We apologise for the noise being made by the Blackshaw Head turbine at the moment. We are working urgently with our engineer and the turbine manufacturer, Bergey, to diagnose the fault, silence it, and then repair it as soon as possible. We will post updates to this site as and when we have them.
21/01/2021
Update 23/01/2021
Our engineer is due on site on Tuesday 26th January to further diagnose the problem with the inverter. More information to follow as soon as we have it.
Update 25/01/2021
If repair is not possible tomorrow; we aim to swap inverters with the adjacent privately owned turbine of the same make. At that point this other turbine may then make a noise as it freewheels. however this turbine is in a slightly more sheltered position and so the overall noise should reduce.
Our engineer will then return ASAP at suitable weather point to drop the privately owned turbine, which is on a monopole and so can be winched down out of the wind. This will halt any noise from that turbine.
Further repairs and/or modifications to the community turbine will then be investigated by PCP – with focus on installing measures to enable us to rapidly shut down any future turbine noise caused by any future breakdown.
PCP’s priority is to ensure that the turbine is fit for the future; able to be rapidly silenced in case of future technical issues; and that it continues to generate community benefit – estimated at this point to be in the region of £60,000 over the remaining years of the Feed in Tariff.
Update 26/01/21
The engineer visited today and immediate on-site repair of the community turbine inverter was not possible.
So as planned he swapped inverters with the adjacent privately owned turbine of the same make and has taken away the community inverter to his workshop. The swap was successful and the community turbine is no longer freewheeling as a result.
The private turbine will be dropped out of the wind next week by which time we will know more about the repair of the PCP turbine inverter and any noise problem should have been eliminated.
Pennine Community Power 