Who would have thunk? Maybe it had something to do with this video of a Vestas wind turbine:
I wonder if it used “Lucas” electronic parts? I owned an Austin Healy Sprite and a Triumph TR6 at one time, and the failure above looks familiar.
Excerpts from an article in the Guardian:
Vestas is to shut down its Isle of Wight factory in the face of collapsing demand from a wind-farming industry hobbled by the recession and red tape.
The group had planned to convert the factory in Newport so it could make blades for the British market, but said this morning that the paralysis gripping the industry meant that orders had ground to a halt. Such low demand could not justify the investment, Ditlev Engel, the chief executive, told the Guardian.
The UK’s only wind turbine manufacturing plant is to close, dealing a humiliating blow to the government’s promise to support low-carbon industries.”
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/apr/28/vestas-wind-turbine-factory-close
See Vestas Wind Power Solutions here
Of course, windmills produce clean emissions free power, they don’t pollute.
Just to be fair, anyone have video or photos of a coal fired power plant exploding or uncontrollably catching fire?
h/t to David Segesta
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The factory making these things in the Isle of Wight was on TV this very week. Pity. Still, they’re ridiculously inefficient anyway. They’ve only become popular because of the grant they’re given.
And cut out jibes on our car electronics – or we’ll start on the fact that the US can’t put together a decent rock band. BritRock rules.
We used to call Joseph Lucas “The Prince of Darkness”.
If you owned a Lucas-eqiped automobile, we used to say, it was guaranteed to fail catastrophically in the middle of the night, far from home, in a driving rainstorm. Oh, and the Skinner’s Union fuel pump too.
I have personal experience; I’ve owned two MGAs, an Austin Healy Sprite, an XKE Coupe (nice one), a Humber Super Snipe (got you with that one I bet) and TWO of the original Sir Alec Issigonis-designed Austin Minis, one RHD and one LHD. I can still balance a triple SU carburetor set-up by ear with a piece of hose.
I once had a bumper sticker that said :
“The Parts That Fall Off Of This Automobile Are Of The FInest British Manufacture.”
At least the British had an excuse; they pride themselves on their brilliant eccentrics (Bletchley Park, RADAR, The Comet) and when they get rich, they retire to The Manor. Hardly a formula for continued manufacturing success (e.g. The Comet; oh, you wanted the wings to stay ON the aeroplane? Right. We’ll get on that straightaway. Spot of tea?)
America, OTOH, created Interchangeable Parts, The Assembly Line, Serial Entrepreneurs, and Deming’s Total Quality Management (TQM); unfortunately, when push came to shove, American management became dominated by accountants (see: GM) who didn’t BELIEVE Deming when he said “quality is free”.
The Japanese DID believe (and revered) the man, and the rest is history.
I wonder who the Chinese will copy?
see now the thing about coal fired power plants is that they CONTAIN the fire and use it to harness energy. I’m just devastated to see the double wammy of energy not being produced from the windmill nor the raging fire spewing from it. Horrible
Ripley Wind Farm in Ontario, Enercon E82 wind turbines
Modern Wind Turbines Generate Dangerously “Dirty” Electricity
By Online Tuesday, April 28, 2009
– Catherine Kleiber, electricalpollution.com
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/10634
Residents of the area around the Ripley Wind Farm in Ontario where Enercon E82 wind turbines are installed feel that the turbines are making them ill. Residents suffer from ringing in the ears, headaches, sleeplessness, dangerously elevated blood pressure (requiring medication), heart palpitations, itching in the ears, eye watering, earaches, and pressure on the chest causing them to fight to breathe. The symptoms disappear when the residents leave the area. Four residents were forced to move out of their homes, the symptoms were so bad. Residents also complain of poor radio, TV and satellite dish reception. There is no radio reception under or near the power lines from the wind turbines because there is too much interference. Local farmers have found that they get headaches driving along near those power lines.
I read the other day that a wind farm was built on the island of St. Helena in the South Atlantic. Unfortunately, it never generated any energy because the site where they were built it is too windy.
A major wind farm project near where I live is on hold. Mostly for economic reasons.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/news/2368926/Wind-farm-no-sure-thing
I’m not against wind power as such. But I am against subsidising it when it is otherwise uneconomic.
Pierre, I know all that.
I also noticed that whenever the media talks about forests, ice sheets, glaciers, volcanoes, asteroids, tsunamis, hurricanes, etc they always use the line ‘roughly the size of Manhattan’.
Examples of use…
‘This year the planet lost an area of ice roughly the size of Manhattan. If the trend continues within ten years sea levels will rise and engulf an area of land roughly the size of Manhattan!’
‘Unless something urgent is done an asteroid roughly the size of Manhattan will hit an area of Mahattan roughly the size of Manhattan!’
If you want to force the creation of new laws nothing works better than scaring the bejesus out of wealthy New Yorkers.
Benjamin P. 12:23:44
A common assumption that we are/will run out of …….. Maybe this will help:- I fully accept that coal and oil are finite resources and that we do eventually need to find other suitable sources of power. However a simple search on the internet (mainly Wikipedia) tells us that proven coal reserves are sufficient for at least 170 years at the present rate of consumption., and oil reserves over 100years. This last figure does not include oil obtainable from shale of which there are huge deposits in Canada. Include that and we have enough proven oil for some 300 years at present consumption rates. Historically, new discoveries of fossil fuels exceeds use. E.g. during two decades recently, known oil reserves increased by 36%. As for uranium for nuclear reactors, there is sufficient for many thousands of years. Considering how far we have come in the last 100 years or so there is every possibility that in a few 100 years from now we will have learned to harness the almost unlimited power from hydrogen (nuclear fusion). Alternative energy sources may be needed in the future but there is clearly no need for a panic reaction.
TG
Electricity is nice to listen to drive your electronics and move things around as well as feed the robots that manufactur things but lots of processes need the high temperatures of FIRE! No wind, tide, nor solar power can give you that amount of energy density. Chemical bonds in hydrocarbons are still the best source of energy for many processes.
I owned an MGB for 15 years, and the saying was that the British drank warm beer because they had Lucas refrigerators.
Wind power’s dirty little secret is ‘capacity value’. This is what utilities must determine in order to fairly pay for the actual electricity used from a wind power plant. If a one megawatt (nameplate capacity) turbine generates power 33% (capacity factor) of the time when the wind is blowing it should produce enough power for 330 homes. However the utility can not necessairly use the power when it is generating power. Capacity values are generally 10% or less. Therefore really only 100 homes are being served. A thousand megawatt wind farm is really a 100 megawatt farm.
Tim F (10:14:54) : Perhaps someone here could pass on their thoughts regarding these turbines. I understand the inefficiencies associated with putting wind farms on the power grid. What if the turbines were to be used to perform electrolysis on water on site?
The problem with storage is that you lose about 1/4 to 1/2 the energy in the conversion to something else and back. Grid connect is in fact the most efficient since you can just turn off a gas turbine somewhere else and that unburnt fuel is a 100% efficient ‘storage’.
I don’t think it would matter at what speed the blades were turning as long as current was generated.
Well, the physics don’t work that way. Energy goes as V cubed, so almost all the wind energy is in the few very high wind speed episodes. To capture that energy efficiently, you need a higher speed airfoil.
It would produce a fairly reliable supply of a scarce and valuable resource. Any thoughts?
Only that there is nothing particularly scarce about energy. We never run out and we can have as much as we want very cheaply forever:
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/there-is-no-energy-shortage/
Sorry, but to actually be fair instead of pretending to be, ~snip~ fails. You want nothing to ever happen with a windmill? LOL!! Right. Everything else can fail and does, but if a windmill goes, SHUT DOWN THE INDUSTRY! LOL! K, quit building bridges, cars, airplanes, dams, nuclear reactors. Hey – there’s a thought. You sound just like the people against nuclear….”Well there can be problems, so stop doing it all together…and just go to wind.” LOL!
Sorry guys….very sorry – but failures happen. I’m not saying wind is the best, but when pointing out these failures which, compared to a nuclear or dam failure….aren’t ~snip~ – don’t be petty and get this thing called PERSPECTIVE. I know it isn’t popular with the greenneads either, but being like them sure doesn’t make you any smarter.
This failure didn’t cause radioactivity or a flood. Not saying don’t build reactors or dams, saying you’re being petty ~snip~. Yeah….it’s ok if dams fail, but a windmill? *gasp!* With all your technical knowledge, all that crap you’re all spewing….you don’t have that much sense!!! LOL!!!!
Wanting perfection from windmills……..or anything for that matter……..BWAHHAAAHAAAHAAAA!!!!! ~snip~.
Like some coal plant hasn’t caught on fire somewhere…right! Lol!!!
Do it all, explore it all, we need or will need it all…we’re addressing a serious problem and you ~snip~ are playing “my team’s better than yours”…..
“”” delecologist28 (10:04:19) :
Wow so this is one negative outcome of the wind energy theroies. Hmmm I’m still in proposition for such a thing. Wind energy has a lot of potential, that systems was probably outdated. “””
Well that’s just the problem; the utility companies can’t charge for potential, and the customers can’t run their electric equipment on potential. We can’t put it into our gas tank in place of stored chemical energy, and we have other options for potential that are not an eyesore and are even cheaper than wind potential.
No you’re backing a losing horse there mate’ and you need a dose of reality.
There was an article by Eric Janszen in Harper’s a while back that made a good point about the motivations behind the push for alternative energies:
Full article here.
CAS (13:45:59) :
I owned an MGB for 15 years, and the saying was that the British drank warm beer because they had Lucas refrigerators.
————–
Aaaah! That explains it all! The first time I was in the UK there was a sign that said “We sell cold beer”. When I got my beer it was warm and flat. Major deception!!!!
Re the efficiency of wind turbines – there are a lot of non-rotating windmills in the video, even though the wind is blowing (as some ARE rotating).
Ironic really that this should occur on the very day that Scotland’s Government is seeking “Views … on the proposals for a strategic centrally co-ordinated plan for adapting to climate change. The proposed aim is to increase the resilience of Scotland’s people and the natural and economic systems on which we depend, to the impacts of climate change.”
I have read a little about this on their website at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2009/04/23145206/0 and shall be formulating my views in due course.
I would strongly recommend that all interested people read the “information” that they present and express their views accordingly.
Anthony, you may consider that this requires a new topic of its own.
@Thomas Gough (13:44:46) :
May as well put it off then is what you are saying?
And hopefully those Saudis are honest about their reserves…
Professor David MacKay’s book “Sustainable Energy – without the hot air” is freely available to download from http://www.withouthotair.com/. It contains useful numbers showing the futility of low energy density ‘sustainable power sources’. It is a veritable gold mine of information.
What I found significant in the video of the burning wind turbine was that only two of the turbines along the whole row were actually working. That appears to be the major problem with wind power – the unreliability factor.
“”” Dan Gibson (10:14:49) :
I have a hard time understanding all the opposition to any new form of energy on this site. All the same things could have been said and probably were said about the horseless carriage (noisy, unreliable, dangerous), the cost of converting from steam and whale oil to petro, the lack of roads to support cars, the lack of gas stations. On and on. New concepts take time, trial and error. Bucks change hands, fortunes are won and lost. It’s just a new face on the same old same old.
Chill. “””
Well Dan, I don’t know where you find the opposition to new forms of energy at this forum. But we don’t include zero point energy or cold fusion, or Dark energy among the list of proven available energy technologies.
As for wind energy; it has been used for eons, to pump water out of wells on farms. One thing about pumping water; it’s a bit like chopping wood for the stove; it really doesn’t matter when you do it, so long as it’s ready when you need it; and that is the idiosyncracy of wind energy; sometimes its in the doldrums; like most of the time for example; which means you have to back it up with some other form of energy that is available when you turn the switch on. In which case, what good is the sometime wind energy.
When somebody comes up with a dependable source of energy; I’m sure you will find it embraced on this forum; like Nuclear for example; even the French can make nuclear work reliably; then there’s petroleum, such as that sitting in a big puddle under the Dakotas waiting for someone to come and put a pipe down into it.
Wind energy is solar energy, so it arrives on earth at about 168 Watts per square meter, so it takes a lot of square metres to collect it. A wind turbine is a form of gas turbine engine that operates with a very low temperature differential between source and sink temperatures; so it has a very low Carnot efficiency. That translates into even more space required to collect more energy. Then wind energy is very subject to wind speed; cut the wind sp0eed in half, and 87.5% of your generating capacity just went down the drain. Not very dependable. Ask teh Europeans who have been trying to make it work; they don’t get even 205 availability.
So tell us what other impractical new forms of energy you would like to waste taxpayer dollars on ?
In the video of the windmill which presumably “went out for a quick smoke”,
In one shot I did a quick count of visible ‘mills and saw:-
4 of the 8 were idle.
3 of the 8 running and
one on fire.
Now, just to be fair, has anyone got a photo showing 8 conventional power plants to equal this….?
Peter Melia
Oddly enough after the oil crisis of 1973/4 I was asked by HMG, the UK gov”t, to assess the possibility of wind, hydroelectric and other alternative sources.
The report was pessimistic, power demand then was lower than today but the basic problems were just the same as today: windmill pollution for one.
In wind we foresaw the problems of these giant windmills and of variable output and the solution suggested was a quite different aerodynamic arrangement which drove a hydraulic motor, so avoiding fast spinning gearboxes, with a hydraulic accumulator in the tower which could store quite a lot of power. The hydraulics were interconnected with other towers to a main generating station which also avoided problems of phase locking with the grid and could supply power on remote demand using an existing telephone command and control system developed by the Central Electricity Generating Board. [CEGB].
A demonstration unit was built and worked quite well but HMG was virtually bankrupt and North Sea gas and oil were beginning to flow so the project was cancelled.
In the same way we looked at the Severn barrage again, a tidal plant first proposed in the 1920’s. Tidal power is intermittent but to some extent you can trade output for time and the tide times are predictable: so with the CEGB’s new gas turbine plant the gaps could be filled. In addition the barrage could carry road and rail links.
To be economic this was a far bigger scheme than the one revived today which is a tiddler, about one tenth the capacity , for fear of upsetting the birdlife on the seashore or some such malarky.
In terms of costs at the time it was barely economic although it offered marginal benefits but again HMG had no money so it was never built.
It just amuses me that all these old ideas are being recycled in the name of Greenery.
Kindest Regards.