Fields of red lights southeast of Wichita

[FloridaMan]

Last time I flew into Wichita from Florida I noticed huge fields of red lights at night. The lights were flashing synchronously; I didn't notice anything really conspicuous during the day. Were they windmill fields? Oil fields? 

[Hank]

There's one I noticed near P40 that is windmills. Is nothing marked on the sectional?

[Marauder]

Probably windmills. They will be on the sectional:

 

 

 

 

 

[Dale Logsdon]

They are windmills for generating electricity. They are sprouting up all over western Oklahoma and Kansas.The wind blows all the time out here.

[wishboneash]

Windmills. We have the same lights at the Altamont Pass near Livermore, CA.

[firefly201]

Elk River Wind Farm, 100 wind turbines, 7000 acres. 45mi East of Wichita, South of Beaumont,KS

[NotarPilot]

Green jobs! Yippee!

[Dave Marten]

The obstruction lights are sync' by design. Just imagine if that many lights were all firing off independently. Would be one heck of a headache generator.

[StinkBug]

I've noticed the same thing while driving down I-10 west of Palm Springs. All the windmills lighting up mostly in sequence. It's kinda freaky looking on the ground even. 

[XXX]

Damn, I haven't encountered windmills until last week when we flew from Dayton to Cumberland. There must be tens of thousands of them in WV alone and a large percentage aren't windmilling. How much did that cost us taxpayers? Who pocketed the $$? They can't be cheap to produce and certainly not cheap to install or maintain. 

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[Yetti]

Shhhh pays part of my salary

[Mooneymite]

Those windmills generate huge tax credits.....and some electricity if the wind blows.

[Kale McManus]

They are terrible just let the gas and flow through the pipeline 

[Nokomis449]

If you look behind the curtain, you'll find a slew of gas generators that fire up to pick up the slack when the wind dies down or the wind turbine is "off line" (broke).  Each windmill costs 3-4 million dollars to construct, plus the cost of land/lease and infrastructure.  Can they ever pay for themselves?  

http://www.windpowerengineering.com/policy/environmental/8-6-mw-natural-gas-powered-generator-plays-well-wind/

http://www.windustry.org/how_much_do_wind_turbines_cost

I've flown over them a few times on long trips and the first 500 or so are really neat to see, but then it becomes just miles and miles of blight.  Hopefully they're green enough to justify/recoup the cost.

 

[XXX]

Looks like the taxpayer has taken another one right up the keister.

[XXX]

2 hours ago, Chupacabra said:

 Who pocketed the $$?

Well I found the answer...

large foreign companies continue to reap most of the taxpayer-funded benefits for wind.

As stated in this Newsweek article.

http://www.newsweek.com/whats-true-cost-wind-power-321480

[mooneyspeed]

Huge farm up the valley north of PSP


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[cliffy]

In answer to the OPs question-

All wind farms flash in synchronous at  night. This is the only synchronous wide area pattern in the book right now.

It sure cuts down on scud running though!!!!

On the other hand, try finding anything abut the financials of wind farms. How to invest and what the profitability is is information not published.  You won't find it anywhere. I've been searching for years. Someone is keeping it quiet.