Too much of a good thing?

Wind power is one of the most exciting, and costly, sources of alternative energy available to Canadians. Currently, we have an installed capacity of 1,855 megawatts, the 11th highest in the world.

But for all the excitement over wind power, sometimes it can go wrong, and we’re not talking about errant birds being turned into feathery paste.

For a particularly spectacular example of wind power’s worst case scenario, we leave Canada for a short trip into the high winds of Denmark, land of exotic pastries and heavy metal drummers. There, we find a wind turbine explosion that looks more like a Hollywood special effect than a power generating catastrophe.

Often circulated with the kind of breathless subject line (“OMG!1! windmill 4 REAL!!”) that’s liable to end up in the “junk” folder, the video shows a windmill located near the Danish city of Århus being destroyed during high winds. The winds rotate the blades at dicing speed, causing one of the rotor blades to break off, eventually shearing the tower in half — all a result of getting more of the windmill’s energy source than its structure could handle.

If any doubt remained over the truth of the fantastic shot, the inimitable urban legends website Snopes recently confirmed the video, linking the collapse to the collapse of two Vestas wind turbines first reported by the Copenhagen Post. According to the Post, which first ran the story in February, the cause of the collapse was likely related to faulty maintenance on the 20-year-old windmill.

Good news, considering that Canada is already poised to add another 800 MW of wind power in 2008. After all, it’s hard (though not impossible) to get more than enough of a good thing.