It's pure true: The search for a bright side to Storm Ophelia

intriguing facets attached to the swirling petticoats of

Ophelia.

How much extra energy did Ophelia pump into our rapidly growing acreage of wind farms, for example, as she sped across the land?

The volume has to be very considerable, especially now that new technology allows wind farms operate in storms, whereas turbines were previously designed to shut down at very high wind speeds.

One hopes that our energy companies will reflect their Ophelia windfall savings in the next shower of bills they send us, when Ophelia is a diminishing memory, and the colder winter nights increase our consumption of the free energy she bequeathed to us all, in compensation for the damage and hardship she otherwise wreaked upon us.

In a cruel enough world, I suppose that hope is unlikely to be fulfilled. A pragmatic truth there.

It is no less true, is it not, that the acreage of our wind farms has exploded, in the past 10 or 15 years especially.

It is not so long ago that one would stop in one’s tracks to view the very occasional lone turbine mounted atop a local hill or mountain.

They were novelties back then, our ironclad windmills eclipsing ing the equally rare little wind-chargers which

ingenious and inventive folk once mounted near the gables of their homes, to replace the paraffin lamps of yesterday, via batteries in the byre.

Nowadays, as the wind farms spread all around the country, like Japanese knotweed, they usually are crowned by dozens if not scores of turbines hungrily harvesting the energies of all the winds that blow across the parish night and day.

I am well aware that many citizens whose homes are

located close to the wind farms have what appear to be genuine grievances about their operation, especially in relation to noise levels.

In such cases, planning processes apply, and a considerable number of such applications are turned down.

However, the wind farms we now take for granted atop so many of our mountains and high hills have survived that phase, and are now a reality on our horizons.

Their spinning blades reap a rich harvest from barren rocklands upon which even a mountain puck could starve to death in a fortnight.

In some other countries, one can hardly see the land at all for wind farms.

A few years ago, I landed into Bratislava Airport and took a coach to Vienna for the last stretch of my journey.

It was absolutely horrific all along that one-hour journey to see the entire countryside groaning under the weight of the wind farms erected upon it.

There had to be tens of thousands of turbines on every side.

Which brings me to a question. Why are all the turbines I have ever seen across Ireland and Europe always painted in 50 shades of grey?

Is there a more drab colour than grey?

Is there some obscure international convention I know nothing about, which

demands they must all be as wan as a corpse?

Is there any good reason,

especially in a vividly visual land like ours, why they should not be presented to us wearing all the bright colours of the rainbow?

Given the artistic talents of our imaginative visual artists across the land, could they not easily be converted into

incredibly eye catching

optical attractions that might even rival the best elements of high tourism earners, like the Lakes of Killarney and the Cliffs of Moher?

The visual possibilities have to be potentially awesome.

For what it is worth, my own suggestion, off the top of my head, is that the turbines of our wind farms should henceforth, at the very least, be painted in the proudly traditional GAA colours of the counties in which they stand.

We could admire the primrose pride of Roscommon, the deep maroon of Galway crowning one or more of the Twelve Bens, the raw red flame of Cork, the emerald of the likes of Limerick.

And I could go on and on down the list.

If there is no binding convention ordaining the 50 shades of grey on the turbulent turbines, this is perhaps the best novel idea you will encounter this week.

Not blowing my own trumpet, or anything like that!