Wind energy

Most of this list names parts and procedures, but its first two entries come from a quieter corner of German. A site that is windhöffig has wind enough to be worth building on, and planners assess its Windhöffigkeit. English has no match, and the word looks like nothing a learner already knows. It borrows an old miners’ adjective, höffig, which described ground that promised a rich yield of ore, and höffig is formed from hoffen, to hope. A windhöffig ridge is therefore, quite literally, a hopeful one, although nobody hears the hope in it any more. The word survives mainly in maps, surveys and permit files, which is where a learner will meet it. The rest of the list is easier to take apart: read each compound from the back, and die Fledermausabschaltung turns out to be a shutdown, and one for bats.