Huge wind turbines slow traffic on way to Hermanville

Huge turbine components were moved across the province on Thursday, en route to the new Hermanville wind farm in eastern P.E.I.

Five tower sections for wind turbines that will reach 92 metres tall — some of the tallest in the world — came across Confederation Bridge Thursday afternoon on specialized trucks designed to haul and maneuver the large  components.

The trucks drove around Charlottetown on the bypass, through two roundabouts and then through the lights at the Hillsborough Bridge.

The vehicles carrying the giant components can only move at about 60 km/h, and are wider than an average truck. On some narrow roads traffic had to be slowed or stopped in both directions.

RCMP Sgt Andrew Blackadar said travellers experienced some delays.

"We’ve had lots of police officers involved, a lot of the intersections have been shutdown to allow this equipment to get through. Because as you can appreciate, vehicles that are about 150 feet in length, three of them in a convoy in one case and two in the other — they'd never get through a revolution of lights at one time," he said.

Similar traffic restrictions will be in place over the next month. The convoys will continue every week from now until Oct 1.

The turbines will be put together by a team directed by project manager Carl Brothers.

"These turbines have the same power ratings as the ones at East Point, but they’re 25 per cent larger — there are 116-metre rotors on a 92-metre tower," he said.

"The plan is for all of this electricity from this plant to be used on Prince Edward Island … As it looks now this will be the last major wind development in the next couple of years for sure."