Pylon of the Month

 

August's pylon comes from France and was sent by a fan of the blog. who tells me it is to be found near Gargilesse Dampierre. A bit of research tells me that Gargilesse Dampierre is officially one of the most beautiful villages in France so that promotes this pylon to near the top of my 'must visit' list especially as it is also quite close to the Eguzon dam and associated 72 MW hydroelectric plant. The email with the picture asked about the weights attached to the transmission lines, but I had to admit that I hadn't seen anything like them before. Are they an alternative to Stockbridge dampers to reduce unwanted wind-induced oscillations? Answers on a postcard, please.

 

Pylons are in the news a lot here in the UK at the moment. I've written before about how the move to more renewable energy generation means that lots of new pylon lines are needed, but whilst everyone can agree on that in principle, it all gets a bit heated once the routes are decided. ‘There’ll be no countryside left’: Opposition to pylons puts UK carbon targets at risk was the rather over the top headline of a recent article in the Guardian, but there is definitely work to be done if we are to persuade people to see pylons as beautiful. The Dutch designer, Jhon Van Veelen has thoughts about this that are worth considering and his 2023 pamphlet, Designing the Power Grid: The high-voltage overhead grid as a landscape design task makes fascinating reading. Below is a page from the pamphlet, with the thoughts of Bas Haring which I really must follow up for a future post.

 

That's all for now. September, the start of a new academic year, is always a busy time but I'm hoping to find time for a post so come back then for more pylon action.