Whitelee Wind Farm

This week has been the children’s mid-term school break (or as they term it “Staff Development Day” as the teachers are still working). I took the time off work as I had a few days that needed using up before the end of February. I wanted to do something constructive with them so I decided to take them on what I describe as a “Nerdy Day Trip” (in fact there is a whole website dedicated to such excursions). As I was interested in the wind turbines which have recently been installed near our house I took them along to see one of the largest windfarms in the country: Whitelee Wind Farm.

I drove to the visitor centre relying on our trusty sat nav system. As ever Emily, the sat nav lady, decided to take us via the shortest but most convoluted route which seemed to encompass pretty much every roundabout in East Kilbride. Once past there it is a reasonable climb up the hill to the visitor centre car park where we could, if we wanted, charge up the car battery for free. As we don’t have an electric car, we didn’t. The wind farm is some 300m up so I expect the weather can get a bit tasty at times. Given that it is still the beginning of February it was perfectly pleasant for our trip. The visitor centre consists of a reasonably educational exhibition hall with lots of hand-on exhibits which seemed to amuse the kids and a café which we came back to later.

Whitelee has been operating for some 5 years now although judging from some of the works, new turbines are still being added. It currently has in excess of 200 individual turbines and the sight of these across the panorama is quite breath taking. It is spread over a huge area (they quote around 130 km of pathways) so we only walked around a small number of the turbines. Up close they are astonishingly big and the blades, which from a distance look to be meandering around like a child’s toy, move incredibly quickly (one factoid quoted that the blade tips can move at a maximum speed of 240 km/h.) Standing close to them is initially a rather apprehensive experience – not least because for the most part they are eerily quiet. There is the occasional mechanical clank and if standing at just the right angle there is an audible swooshing sound from the blades but for the most part there is just a spooky silence which is strangely at odds with the scale of the beasts.

Aside from the visitor centre one of the great things they have done at Whitelee is to make the grounds accessible for outdoor activities. We just walked around a few km of track but they are actively encouraging cycling including a dedicated mountain bike track and facilities are available for dog walkers and horse riders (although I think I would want to make sure that a horse was not spooked by the turbines before heading out). In many respects they have done what the Forestry Commission has done by freeing up what is in essence an industrial installation for general leisure activities. They even have a ranger on site to look after the wildlife side of things.

I think my three children enjoyed themselves enormously, which I wasn’t quite sure whether they would. In total we spent an hour and a half walking around the turbines which is well beyond the whinge point for a walk in the country. We finished up at the café for lunch and drove back via the M77 through Glasgow which avoided any more roundabouts. I’m quite pleased at how this went – next Nerdy trip will have to be a hydro-electric dam.