Glyndebourne abandons show after wind turbine fails to keep lights on

Telegraph

01-07-2025

Power cuts compelled Glyndebourne to abandon a performance as the opera house's wind turbine offered little back-up in the still summer air.
The production of Handel's Saul on Saturday was plagued by power outages before organisers pulled the plug on the whole show.
Organisers said the production had been hit by six blackouts while the audience was present, each requiring a 15-minute pause to restart the stage technology.
A spokesman for Glyndebourne told The Telegraph: 'Three of the power cuts happened during the long interval, which meant we were able to minimise the impact. However, the continued instability of power after the interval made it impractical to continue.
'Our teams, on and off stage, are working at their peak. Repeated stops and restarts become untenable and even unsafe, and compromise the performance we are able to deliver.'
The performance of Saul was abandoned minutes before the final curtain.
'As we left, I gazed up at Glyndebourne's solitary but enormous wind turbine, magnificently motionless in the still and balmy evening air,' an attendee told Slipped Disc, a classical music publication.
Glyndebourne was dependent on electricity from the grid at the time, as its turbine was not meeting the needs of demand and its short-term back-up generators were unable to cope with the length of the disruption.
The spokesman said: 'Glyndebourne's wind turbine generates electricity equivalent to almost 100 per cent of our annual usage. While in the windier winter months it generates an excess to our needs, daily supply does not meet demand at the height of summer.
'We aspire to be energy self-sufficient in the future and are already reviewing the investments and infrastructure needed to make this possible. This is now a heightened priority. We are now working to increase our resilience in this area.'
'Wind power can never provide for all our wants'
Technical difficulties also delayed the final scene of Le nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro) at Glyndebourne on Sunday evening. The organisers said Sunday's problem was still under investigation.
The country house's 230ft Enercon wind turbine, on a hill overlooking the opera house in the heart of the South Downs National Park, was launched by Sir David Attenborough in January 2012.
'Wind power can never provide for all our wants but every bit of power generated by wind must be welcomed,' he said at the time, adding: 'Even if we only generate a fraction of what our country needs in this way, then we must.'
Between 2012 and 2023, the turbine is said to have generated the equivalent of 102 per cent of electricity used by the company in the same period, resulting in a 50 per cent cut in carbon emissions.
Prof Tony Parker, a retired engineer, led protests against the wind turbine before its installation, claiming the 900KW unit would be one of the most inefficient in the country, only generating power 17 per cent of the time.