Paderborn plateau

The chain of the place

1. 01

   Wind becomes power: The wind turns the rotor, the generator turns it into power; in calm weather the turbines stand still.

2. 02

   Taller and bigger: New turbines carry their hub almost 170 m up and deliver 6 MW: the wind is steadier up there.

3. 03

   Repowering: The oldest turbines from 1995 have 500 kW; today a few large ones replace many small ones.

4. 04

   Feeding in: The array grid collects the power at the substation and lifts it to 110 kV.

5. 05

   Biogas: Biogas farms supply power and heat even when the wind drops.

What is shown – why – for whom

Facilities and areas in the model

• Wind turbines of the plateau

  Every turbine individually: year built, hub height, rotor and removal from the register. Half a year before start-up the tower grows next to the crane.

• Biogas on the farms

  Biogas plants and a wood-fired CHP plant from the register: digesters with gas roofs, a combined heat and power unit next to them. They run almost around the clock, regardless of the wind, and also supply heat for barns and houses.

• Oldest turbine: Eilerberg 1995

  A Nordtank NTK 500 with 500 kW, 50 m hub and 41 m rotor, in operation since August 1995. It is the oldest turbine still running here.

• New generation: Eilerberg 2025

  A turbine with 6.2 MW, 169 m hub and 162 m rotor, in operation since February 2025, about 700 m from the 1995 turbine. It has the rated power of twelve first-generation turbines and harvests steadier wind higher up.

• Umspannwerk Helmern

  110/33 kV: here the array grid of the surrounding turbines collects the power and lifts it into the 110 kV grid. Position from OpenStreetMap, year built not documented.

• Umspannwerk Vierlinden

  Feed-in substation of the wind farms in the west (110 kV). Position from OpenStreetMap, year built not documented.

• Umspannwerke Meerhof und Grüner Weg

  Two feed-in points for the wind farms in the east (110 kV). Position from OpenStreetMap, year built not documented.

Processes in the model

How a wind region can use the model

• Planning and operations

  Every turbine individually with year, hub and rotor, plus the substations: the model shows the stock and how capacity grows over the years – a basis for talks about repowering.

  Para quiénDevelopers, operators, grid connection

• Municipality and region

  What stands here, since when, and what comes next? Time travel shows 1995, 2005, 2015 and 2025 from the same camera – a factual basis for planning and public meetings.

  Para quiénMunicipalities, regional planning, economic development, chambers

• Schools and universities

  How much power does a modern wind turbine generate, what does repowering mean? The five steps from wind to power via taller hubs, repowering and feed-in to biogas fly to each part.

  Para quiénTeachers, pupils, energy engineering students

• Exhibitions and information centres

  Two turbines, thirty years: the 1995 turbine and the 2025 turbine stand 700 m apart. The diagram ‘Additions and closures’ shows how much capacity is added and removed each year.

  Para quiénExhibitions, information centres, technology museums

• Public communication

  Why do the turbines stand still in calm weather, and what is curtailment? The stormy night shows the surplus with yellow rings, the winter evening without wind or sun what still delivers then.

  Para quiénPublic relations, public dialogue, associations

What you can change

What the model gives a wind region

• 01

  Every turbine in its place

  No symbolic turbines: every turbine stands with year built, hub height and rotor from the register, on terrain from Geobasis NRW.

• 02

  Thirty years of growth

  Time travel shows how the turbines have grown taller and bigger since 1995. The history of the place jumps to every year.

• 03

  Wind that moves

  The wind control makes the rotors turn faster and the smoke plumes lie flat; wind power rises, and in a storm it is curtailed.

• 04

  Power now above the field

  Above the plateau’s turbines stands a stack of cubes, one cube 20 MW, the frame the installed capacity – so you see how much is being delivered right now.

• 05

  In the browser and on the big screen

  A browser is enough, and large projections work too. Eleven more places and the map of Germany are part of the same model, designed by an artist and developer.

• 

  Coast near Norden

  Where energy from the North Sea comes ashore, as a walkable model: six direct-current cables under the dike, natural gas from Norway since 1995 and more than 200 wind turbines behind the dike.

• 

  North Sea off Borkum

  The beginning of German offshore wind as a walkable model: twelve test turbines from 2009, a cluster of 284 turbines and about 1,660 MW, substation and converter platforms and the way ashore.

• 

  Rhineland lignite district

  The Rhineland lignite district as a walkable model: from the Garzweiler mine via conveyors, boilers and cooling towers into the 380 kV grid – while wind, sun and batteries grow on the reclaimed land.

• 

  Herdecke

  Three generations of storage at Lake Hengstey as a walkable model: the Koepchenwerk of 1930, the pumped-storage plant of 1989 and batteries since 2017 – the level in the reservoir follows sun, wind and demand.

• 

  Germany 1975–2025

  Fifty years of energy supply on one map: 365 sites, ten grid regions and the power of every hour – from two separate grids in 1975 to wind and sun in 2025.

• 

  Düsseldorf Lausward

  A combined-cycle gas plant on the Rhine as a walkable model: power to the grid, heat via a 58 m storage tank and the district heating line into the media harbour and the city centre.

• 

  Datteln 4

  Germany’s newest hard-coal plant as a walkable model: coal by ship on the Dortmund-Ems Canal, power for the grid and the railway, district heat as far as Recklinghausen.

• 

  Lingen

  The whole nuclear era in one place as a walkable model: the Lingen nuclear plant of 1968, the Emsland nuclear plant until April 2023, interim storage and dismantling – next to them gas, a battery and hydrogen.