Community debunks misleading meme about wind turbines: 'Where is the common sense?'

A picture is worth a thousand words, but images can be deceiving.

On "r/conspiracy_commons," a photograph of a helicopter spraying water on a wind turbine initially confused some users, but there was an easy explanation.

The photo was captured at the Uljabuouda facility in Sweden's Arjeplog municipality during the winter of 2014, per Reuters.

The outlet cited an article by NyTeknik, which explained why a helicopter was spraying concentrated hot water on the blades — a new protocol at the time to hasten de-icing. This method is typically used on older turbine models, as modern ones have built-in de-icing functions. 

NyTeknik said that the cost of de-icing was equivalent to two days' worth of electricity production. When forecasts predict weather cold enough to stop the turbines from functioning, that de-icing expense is accounted for. 

Wind turbines are an efficient and clean energy source, capable of powering the average American home for a month after just 46 minutes of operation, according to the U.S. Wind Turbine Database. 

Wind is an abundant and essentially inexhaustible source of power, generating energy without producing planet-warming gases and other harmful pollutants, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Wind energy is also cost-effective and creates jobs in nearby communities. 

Since the photo first emerged, it has recirculated repeatedly alongside falsehoods and disinformation, as recently seen on Reddit. 

In the iteration shared to r/conspiracy_commons, a misleading caption read: "Don't mind us, we're just burning 300 gallons of jet fuel to de-ice this clean energy wind turbine."

Users in the comments pushed back, asserting that manual de-icing was not a typical occurrence and that the meme was one of many conspiracy theories targeting clean energy.

Do you think your city has good air quality? Definitely 🥰 Somewhat 😮‍💨 Depends on the time of year 😷 Not at all 🤢 Click your choice to see results and speak your mind.

"I don't know what's happening here, but I can say this is not the norm," one person wrote, adding that they lived near a wind farm and observed wind turbines working even in the harshest winter weather.

"This 'copter is spraying hot water on a turbine in Sweden a number of years ago," another response began. 

"The fact you have to go back that far is telling. … More relevant points are that [wind turbines] can still produce a joule with less net CO2 than, say, a fossil power plant, and that cars and oil became dominant despite once depending on horses for their infrastructure," they added.

"Where is the common sense? This is a outlier obviously," a third noted.

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