Category: Reveal

This was a tough contest, as seen by the number of correct responses. Let Paul and I know if it was too tough.

St. Paul Island is one of 4 volcanic islands in the middle of the Bering Sea. The island itself has a land area of 100 square km. There is a small community there with a harbour and the largest crab processing plant in the world (Trident). Highly automated for efficient snow crab production, the operation can butcher, cook, freeze and box more than 500,000 pounds of opilio per day.

There is one church on the island, Sts. Peter and Paul Church, a Russian Orthodox church built in 1907.

Found the island in the ocean:

• Graham Hedley

After the hint:

• Paul Voestermans
• Walter_V_R
• Martin de Bock
• hhgygy

The Ashegoda Wind Farm is located near Ashegoda in the Tigray region of northeast Ethiopia. The 120 MW wind farm supplies electricity to more than 3 million Ethiopians. The powerful wind resource allows the Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation (EEPCo), the national electric company, to produce each kWh at low cost (0,06 €/kWh).

A total of 84 wind turbines make up the wind farm.

This truly ends the renewable energy series of contests.

Before the hint:

• Garfield
• Martin de Bock
• Lighthouse
• Paul Voestermans
• Phil Ower
• Graham Hedley

After the hint:

• Walter_V_R

The Xiluodo Dam is a major power producer in Sichuan. With an annual output of approximately 55 terawatt/hours, it ranks as the 3rd largest producing power generation plant on the planet. Just this plant produces more power than such entire countries as Greece, Denmark, and Peru. This one site produces enough renewable power that if it was a country, it would be the 17th largest generator in the world.

Built in 2005, the dam also provides vital flood control for the region.

Those who flowed through the Xiluodo before the hint were:

• Lighthouse
• Paul Voestermans
• Walter_V_R
• hhgygy
• Martin de Bock
• Graham Hedley
• Garfield
• Phil Ower
• Andreas Meister
• Nancy Barbato
• Yusef Yakub Hoca Fendi
• Hans1789

And after the hint:

• David Kozina

Congratulations to Garfield with a perfect score this renewable energy series!

Located on the northern coast of Spain in the Basque country, this ingenious power plant leverages the motion of the waves against a breakwater to generate power. The breaking waves push a series of columns of air. The moving air drives 16 generators.

Those who found it before the hint:

• hhgygy
• Eloy Cano
• Paul Voestermans
• Walter_V_R
• Lighthouse
• krenek
• Martin de Bock
• Garfield
• Andreas Meister
• David Kozina
• Phil Ower

And after the hint:

• Robin
• Chris Nason
• Jeather

By the way, I made a mistake in the hint — the 70,000 homes number comes from the previous contest (Steven’s Croft). Mutriku generates about 300KW, or enough to power about 250 homes. To be fair, I’m sure the “Basque” part of the hint was way more useful to people that needed it than the output number could have. I fixed it on Thursday, but, if that threw you off and kept you from entering the right place, comment here and we’ll consider giving you the point.

Steven’s Croft is a biomass plant — the largest one in the UK. It runs completely on wood, most of which it receives as by-products from the mill next door.

This little video has more info (excuse the sound):

Those who found this site were:

• Paul Voestermans
• Martin de Bock
• Garfield
• Phil Ower
• Walter_V_R
• Eloy Cano
• Lighthouse
• hhgygy
• Andreas Meister
• Luciano P.
• Root007-1
• Nancy Barbato

Passive house architecture is a set of standards and methodologies for creating extremely energy-efficient spaces. Passive house uses technologies like superinsulation, dynamic heat-exchange units, low energy-loss windows, and intelligent air-exchange to minimize heat loss from the structure, allowing the tenants to leverage passive heat sources like body heat to keep warm, even in cold-weather climates like that found in Scandinavia.

In Växjö, they have taken this even further — Portvakten Söder is two, 8-story apartment complexes with 64 apartments between them. They have no traditional heating system. The heat produced by the residents, body heat, lamps, ovens, toasters, coffee makers, etc, is kept in the complex. Exhaust air is “mined” for heat which is redistributed throughout the buildings. A small allowance is made for unoccupied apartments, a battery that generates heat is built into each apartment which comes on only when the sensors in the air-handlers determine that the unit is not producing its fair share.

Those who moved in and save a bunch on their heating costs included:

• Paul Voestermans
• Martin de Bock
• Garfield
• Phil Ower
• Luís Filipe Miguel
• hhgygy
• Walter_V_R
• Teemu Pukki
• Hans1789
• MuThDdDe

And after the hint:

• Andreas Meister
• Lighthouse

Cerro Prieto sits on top of a large geothermal field associated with the Cerro Prieto volcano. The whole thing sits on the southern end of the San Andreas fault system.

The power station is the largest (in size) geothermal complex in the world, producing about 850MW of electricity.

The verified users who found it were:

• Walter_V_R
• Martin de Bock
• Phil Ower
• hhgygy
• Paul Voestermans
• Luciano P.
• Andreas Meister
• Lighthouse
• Hans1789
• MuThDdDe
• John Gospel IV
• Garfield
• René De La Carte
• Nancy Barbato

And after the hint:

• Rob de Wolff

Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) refers to electricity generation by reflection and concentration of sunlight on a target, either a trough or a tower, heating that target and using that heat to run generators (boil water -> steam, etc).

The Ouarzazate Power Station has 3 CSP nodes, Noor I and Noor II are “trough” CSPs and Noor III, the image in the contest, is the world’s second tower CSP with storage (the first being Crescent Dunes in Nevada, USA). The sunlight heats a molten salt tank at the top, which stores the energy through the non-sunlight hours.

The sustained power generation from this site is about 150MW.

Those who got lit by these mirrors before the hint were:

• Garfield
• Paul Voestermans
• Martin de Bock
• Lighthouse
• Walter_V_R
• Phil Ower
• hhgygy
• Glenmorren
• Gillian B
• Rob de Wolff
• Chris Nason
• Andreas Meister
• Yusef Yakub Hoca Fendi
• Luís Filipe Miguel
• Nancy Barbato
• MC Solaar
• John Gospel IV
• Teemu Pukki
• MiranDese-12
• krenek
• Luciano P.
• pizzaro_12
• Riel L
• J.V. Conyers

And after the hint:

• VliegendeHollander999
• Elrober
• Robin
• David Kozina
• MuThDdDe
• Root007-1
• Wista

We started off this series of 10 with a location where wind turbine blades are stored – the Santa Teresa Blade Facility.

Diamond WTG Engineering & Services, Inc. provides wind farm owners with parts and services. The blades are constructed in Mexico and moved across the border to many locations like this one.

• Glenmorren
• Martin de Bock
• Paul Voestermans
• Garfield
• hhgygy
• Phil Ower
• Lighthouse
• LegoGame
• Walter Schirra
• BurningSoul
• Fernando Antonio
• Борис Карлофф
• René De La Carte
• Hans1789
• WENDY COBURN
• JimCricket1981
• Walter_V_R

The municipal flagpole in the small desert community of Calipatria, California was, at the time of build, the tallest flagpole in the world. The base of the flagpole sits 184 feet (56 M) below sea level, and the ball at the top sits at exactly sea level.

By Perdelsky (talk) – Link

By Perdelsky (talk) – Link

The “Good Neigborliness” on the plaque is a reference to one Harry Momita. Harry was the town pharmacist in 1957. He and his wife Helen had lived in the Japanese internment camps during World War II, but Harry was a dedicated patriot, proud of his inherited home.

On a trip to visit their son in Los Angeles, the Momitas were in a horrible car crash. Helen was killed instantly, and Harry was critically wounded. The community drew together — they kept the pharmacy open with the help of a pharmacist from the next town over, they collected donations towards paying for Helen’s funeral and Harry’s medical care. When Harry was released and returned home, he was so touched by the graciousness of the town, that he decided he would work to create something that would make the town stand out.

The town’s elevation had long involved jokes about creating a building or something that would top out at sea level, but Harry took this idea seriously. He began to collect donations to build the flagpole, he got an architect and engineer to donate their time, he got a steel pipe company to agree to do the job for cost. Harry’s story and his quest started to make national and international news.

In May of 1958, the television program “This Is Your Life” featured him (the previous week’s guest was Kirk Douglas). They spotlighted this immigrant with a tragic past, still staunchly patriotic. They talked about his and Helen’s time in the detention camps. They also talked about his desire to build this monument to “Good Neighborliness”. Through the program, he won a car and several other prizes, including $1000 in cash — the last bit of cash he needed to start construction.

Those who found it — all before the hint:

• Walter_V_R
• hhgygy
• Garfield
• Eloy Cano
• Lighthouse
• Phil Ower
• Paul Voestermans
• Martin de Bock
• Jean Noyau

Congratulations to the series winners, with perfect scores, hhgygy, Garfield, Lighthouse, and Jean Noyau.