With all the discussion around offshore oil drilling (following the recent accident in the Gulf of Mexico) I’ve had a renewed curiosity about the effects of wind turbines. People have proposed that we should limit the use of offshore drilling in favor of new energy technologies, and wind turbine farms have been proposed as a good alternative. Frankly, I agree. The risk profile of a wind turbine is insignificant compared to that of an offshore drilling platform.

However, given mankind’s propensity for shortsightedness, I’ve had to ask myself what we’re overlooking in the risk discussion. One long-term effect that I’ve wondered about is whether wind turbines would slow the wind. Clearly they operate by using the wind’s energy, which leads me to assume that the wind would be less energetic/powerful as a result. A quick search of the literature suggests that my assumption is right. Most of the wind turbine work I’ve come across is focused on the technology. But amongst this background noise I found an article Can large wind farms affect local meteorology? by S Baidya Roy, SW Pacala, & RL Walko of Princeton University.

Here is an excerpt from the abstract:

A wind turbine was approximated as a sink of energy and source of turbulence. The wind farm was created by assuming an array of such turbines. Results show that the wind farm significantly slows down the wind at the turbine hub-height level. Additionally, turbulence generated by rotors create eddies that can enhance vertical mixing of momentum, heat, and scalars, usually leading to a warming and drying of
the surface air and reduced surface sensible heat flux.

Does this imply that we shouldn’t use wind turbines? I don’t think so, but it does suggest that we need to keep thinking about what’s next. Wind power may be a great alternative to carbon-based power. But what will be the great successor to wind power? (stealing energy from other planets?) Clearly we can’t leverage the wind without some negative effects. Perhaps it’s an inherently lost battle, because anything that draws power is going to have a systematic effect. But that shouldn’t stop us from working toward a solution.

In most conversations, when I use the Underpants Gnomes reference I get blank stares. It’s truly sad.

So, when I saw that Gartner analyst Lydia Leong makes reference to their master plan in a recent blog post about Sun buying Q-Layer I couldn’t help but feel happy. (Possibly happier than I should have been… I’ll have to think about that.)

Strangely, the gnomes’ master plan inspires me to think about this blog. (See image below if you’re not familiar.) I haven’t had much direction here. I honestly didn’t know what the blog was for, just using it as an outlet for whatever random thoughts I wanted to develop. This has fit into my idea of the blog’s audience just fine, because I assume there is essentially no readership. (Except for my mother, of course, God bless her.)

Well, in the very near future I’m going to change that. I intend to split the current queuefull blog into two parts, one of which will stay behind at this location while the other is moved to my personal website. The point is to allow queuefull blog to focus on technology such as networking, cloud computing, web and the Internet, etc, by giving me a new place to take my personal ravings… er, thoughts.

I also intend to loosen my standards for posting to my personal blog while increasing my standards for writing on queuefull blog. One might consider this a negative thing, considering that my most recent post here was about 3 months ago. But, as part of my 2009 new year’s resolution, I am setting a goal of posting at least one article here each week. Not just a fluff post to meet my quota, but a considered and meaningful article.

The goal is simple: I’d like to make a blog that is useful to a readership. It’s about helping others, establishing community, and (frankly) pushing myself to be more consistent about reaching goals.

We will have to see if I’m successful. My track record suggests failure. But that’s no reason to stop me trying.

In the meantime, if you read this blog and/or would like to read the queuefull blog that I described above, please let me know what kind of articles would be useful or interesting to you. If you would like to write articles about IT technology, in particular about tech infrastructure, please let me know. I’m open to any input; the more we know the better the odds of success.

Until then, ponder this:

Recently I bought a device (via EBay) that logs temperature and humidity. I intend to use it to monitor my wife’s greenhouse when we get it completed, to make sure it’s ready to support her orchids before we move them in. But in the meantime it’s been riding around in my backpack. Here’s what a day in the life of my backpack looks like:

It starts off in my work office, where it stays nice and cool until I go out to meet my wife for dinner. Then I returned to the office and worked late, finally returning home around midnight.

Note the rising humidity in my home office where the logger spend the night, until morning when it rained. It’s nothing remarkable, sure. But it’s amusing. And it tells me I need a dehumidifier.

ACLU Says No Deal on an Unconstitutional FISA Compromise (6/5/2008)

“As news continues to trickle down from Capitol Hill regarding a deal on surveillance legislation, the American Civil Liberties Union once again voiced its fervent opposition to any attempt to undercut the Fourth Amendment or allow the telecommunications companies to gain blanket immunity for illegal spying. Before the Memorial Day recess the ranking member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Senator Christopher Bond (R-MO) floated what he claims is a compromise on surveillance legislation that will allow for sham court proceedings, virtually guaranteeing immunity to telecommunications companies. The ACLU strongly opposes this unconstitutional proposal.”