Why do some of those huge windmills in the desert turn while some are stopped.?
Answer:
There are always a few down for maintenance. Things that move, break.
Any which are not turning may be out of order with mechanical problems. Such problems can be so severe that the machines are uneconomical to repair.
They will often stop them from turning as to conduct maintenance and to rest them (yes machines need rest too!)
If the windmills are used as an alternative source of energy, then some windmills could have gathered more wind to convert to energy to store for future use and some windmills did not gather any.
"Every wind turbine is designed for a limited range of wind speeds. Too much, and the machine could destroy itself." The machines are set to automatically turn off if the wind in their area is not in the wind speed range they need.
An excellent question. Well - since there are technical challenges with storing electricity, some of the windmills are may be stopped when there isn't much demand for electricity, as the few that are turning are enough to cover the demand.
There are also several finer variables involved in when to decide to turn them on - modern wind turbines take power to get them started, they are not freely spinning. The gears inside that convert the spinning of the turbine into energy also resist the spinning that is needed. There is a lot of decision making involved in determining when to "turn on" the turbine, since it takes energy to run the windmill, so they will want the wind to be fast enough to pay off, but not to fast to damage the windmill, if the wind is too strong, they can damage the turbine by either spinning to fast or breaking the blades. If this is the case they lock the turbine down to prevent it from spinning, although this is more commonly for strong winds and storms.
Then there are the maintenance issues that other answerers mentioned.
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