Nestled away in Northern Ireland’s sprawling Antrim Hills, a wind turbine towers over a beef farm. Its sweeping blades generate all the energy the farm needs, and send excess electricity back to the power grid, where it is zipped across the country.
The turbine belongs to a local farmer, John Watt. It was inspired, he says, by his father, who hooked a water wheel up to a generator to produce energy for the farm back in the 1950s. “He always wanted a wind turbine. He thought it would be a great thing, because we lived up on a very naturally windy area, to produce your own electricity,” Watt said.
That dream, finally, is a reality.