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
How any government can invest billions of pounds or dollars in a technology that only works a quarter of the time (if you’re lucky) is beyond me. It does suggest that when it comes to energy and the environment, common sense flies out of the window.
For Britain our only real option is probably nuclear, like it or not. I see it as a short or medium term solution, however. The long term solution is almost certainly fusion, which in principle should be very cheap, reliable and clean. Unfortunately fusion is always at least thirty years in the future, but significant progress is being made. We’ll get there one day.
If, as seems certain now, fortunately, Britain goes for significant nuclear, then it seems that wind power is completely pointless. As Christopher Booker points out, all these thousands of pointless windmills that disfigure our countryside generate less than a single conventional power station. And only when the wind is blowing, of course.
We’ve just had a very hard winter. For much of the time there was high pressure with virtually no wind. Just when we need it the most, wind power delivered the least.
They’re not wind farms, they’re subsidy farms.
The wind my be free but wind power certainly isn’t.
Chris
Vesta being the Roman god of hearth and fire.
E.M.Smith (00:43:19) :
” 3). What is the end to end carbon footprint of a wind turbine?
3) Irrelevant (and somewhat impossible to figure out anyway. It’s mostly an exercise in stating what assumptions you like for where the energy to make the thing came from). You can make it smaller by using farm grown bio-plastics and wind or solar sourced electricity; or larger by using petroleum based chemicals and coal electricity. There is just no point to the exercise.”
What about the massive amount of concrete required for the foundations? As I understand it concrete manufacture is a leading contributor to “greenhouse” gases?
Roger Sowell (19:10:00) :
“DCH, realitycheck: It is just not true, that a gas turbine takes hours to bring up to power. A steam plant that burns gas does require hours. A gas turbine requires roughly half an hour.”
I could be off on timing – that I will agree with.
However, lets be clear here. Suppose the wind stops blowing – you are ok being 1000’s being without power for 30 mins while the gas or coal fired power plant ramps up to meet demand?
I dare say, I believe you hit the nail on the head with this one! Wish more people would realize this.
realitycheck (05:38:58) :
However, lets be clear here. Suppose the wind stops blowing – you are ok being 1000’s being without power for 30 mins while the gas or coal fired power plant ramps up to meet demand?
Let’s be real here.
Base load is required, Gas turbines are required for fast response and CCGT are required for efficiency but slower start.
If a 1GW nuclear station scrams then there MUST be sufficient running warm start to take over the loss -this happened in UK when Sizewell went down followed shortly after by 600MW coal station bringing the grid down over a large area. So there is not much change between running normal stations an running wind turbines in this respect except that if a WT crashes 3MW is taken off line and is easily handled
Interestingly modern WT with electronic connection to the grid can INSTANTLY provide additional power at the correct V and F.
Should the wind suddenly stop you then have to take into account the distributed nature of WT. A 15metres/second wind can provide full output from a turbine. This wind is obviously travelling a meter in 1 second! Assume an abrupt cessation of win at one spot. 1.8km furter on it is still blowing at 15m/s. In 30 minutes this too will cease. So providing you have scattered windfarms greater than 1.8km apart and at different angles to the wind there should be time to get your gas turbines on line.
“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.”
Your specious litany is rather one-sided don’t you think? Top of the list is that conventional capacity is not relieved; windpower is interrmittent and the production disappears in evening. The power is difficult to switch on and off the network when grids are interconnected so that ND power isn’t available to Chicago.
Not to mention enviornmental issues, like here in MN, our southwestern areas most regularly windy are migratory flight paths for birds on their way to/from Canada.
Now, analogous to tons of horse manure, what are the practical, overlooked payoffs?
E.M.Smith (00:25:52) :
Well, if you’re going to pick it apart :)…
Um, I thought Brits drank “room temperature beer” which last time I was there was about 56 F (or about the same as a California Fridge during the repeated energy shortages we had from similar government energy meddling nonsense 😉
Strictly speaking, British beer (or ale) is normally served at cellar temperature. This will vary according to season, but will almost always be considerable colder than room temperature, for obvious reasons. It will start to warm, just like American beer, the second it’s poured. I can’t speak of the exact temperature as I don’t carry a thermometer with me when I visit a pub, plus I haven’t lived in Britain for seven years now.
While this is true at large percentages, for less than about 15-20% you can forgo storage. Simply turning down a gas turbine saves the fuel you would otherwise need, much as is done with gas turbines vs nukes for peaking. Basically, wind becomes your lowest variable cost, but least dispatchable, peaking plant.
Agreed to a degree – but load balancing becomes much more of an issue as one cannot predict when the wind will blow or the sun will shine.
Sorry, but no. There are lots of non-folly energy sources at reasonable prices while fusion has been ‘50 years away’ for each of the last 50 years and is still 50 years away… Now a place like the U.S.A. has many more options than Britain, but there are still plenty of options for every location.
Sorry, but yes. This was not a “short-term view” statement; if we do not start funding nuclear fusion research in a serious fashion *now*, it is always likely to be 30 or 50 years away. My statement was not one of “oil, gas and coal are evil”, just one of common sense about the future. The sooner we can use nuclear fusion to generate power, the sooner we can leave these ridiculous concepts of so-called renewable energy behind. It is folly to turn food into fuel, and to expect to replace a functioning coal/oil/gas/nuclear power generation grid with wind turbines and solar cells. These concepts are all typically short-sighted and narrow-minded knee-jerk reactions to an alleged problem, the burden of proof of which has yet to have been met by its proponents.
So in a way, I agree with you, but would add this: let’s keep what we’ve got going, and rather than spending huge amounts on stuff that almost certainly *cannot* meet even current demand (that’s my “folly” statement from above), use that money to invest in future technologies that can not only meet current and future demand, but also have the added advantage of being “clean”.
We also have to contend with hurricanes (east coast significantly) and tornadoes (east an mid states). How durable are these turbines under such conditions? Even if the chance is low, it’s still a factor to consider.
Well we have to reformulate our old sayings:
Vesta, the company that invented the darkness.
Pumped storage does work, but it is not a panacea for all wind energy problems.
Missouri had a pumped storage facility on the top of Taum Sauk Mountain from the 1960s until 2005. Water was pumped to the top of the mountain during off peak hours and used to generate power on peak. There was a loss of thermal efficiency but brought a cost savings in installed capacity of coal fired plants.
The containment failed disastrously in 2005. The high elevation of the reservoir allowed more energy to be stored per gallon of water. Unfortunately the higher reservoir caused a greater disaster from the failure. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taum_Sauk_pumped_storage_plant
to Climate Heretic (21:27:53) :
“Roger Sowell You need to read the source documentation when you link it, 2008 is a preliminary and renewables are high and also include out of state purchase of renewable power. So lets be real and not use unconfirmed numbers, ok?”
Sir, I do read, and quite well, thank you. The bottom line is more than 7,000 GWH of power were generated by wind, thus reducing the natural gas consumption. The preliminary nature of the numbers is immaterial. Fine tuning in June of 2009 likely will change the numbers by a mere percent or two.
And there is absolutely nothing wrong with one quarter of wind generation being more than another. One week is likely to be more than the next, also. So what? Wind is variable. We knew that going in.
@Squidly: “you are incorrect about the 7,000 GWH .. Northwest imports were 1,026 GWH, Southwest importswere 2,279 GWH, leaving local production at 5,724 GWH. “
Sorry, sir, but I am correct in quoting the official California numbers. And what is your point about California importing power from other states? Do you also have a problem with all the states that import gasoline and diesel fuel from Texas? Do you have a problem with all the states that import food from California? If not, please justify your concern with electric power importation by California. The fact is that several Western states are inter-connected electrically, not the least reason for increased reliability. Other areas of the country also are inter-connected.
As to the triviality of 7,000 GWH, that corresponds to 800 MW of steady power over a year. You have an interesting definition of trivial.
realitycheck (05:38:58) :
”Roger Sowell (19:10:00) :
“DCH, realitycheck: It is just not true, that a gas turbine takes hours to bring up to power. A steam plant that burns gas does require hours. A gas turbine requires roughly half an hour.”
I could be off on timing – that I will agree with.
However, lets be clear here. Suppose the wind stops blowing – you are ok being 1000’s being without power for 30 mins while the gas or coal fired power plant ramps up to meet demand?”
Actually, we have had nobody without power due to the wind not blowing. Our power dispatch guys are good, and know that they must have power plants running at something around 80 percent so they can be ramped up if the wind fails. And the wind is distributed in roughly three areas in California: Altamont Pass, Tehachapi, and near Palm Springs, so complete failure is unlikely.
In general, to the nay-sayers on wind-power: I was under the impression that WUWT was a site in which reality and facts are brought to bear to refute un-substantiated myths and outright falsehoods related to AGW. There has been a plethora of unsubstantiated claims, myths, and falsehoods stated on this thread regarding wind-power. I cannot change a closed mind. I can, however, as I try to do, set forth facts from reliable sources along with some background information.
It would be instructive for the nay-sayers to learn the history of the wind-power industry, exactly when the technology breakthroughs occurred, which allowed the industry to progress from 10 KW systems to 100 KW systems on to 1 MW and 2.5 MW. It was not because 2.5 MW systems were sitting on the shelf 30 years ago, and we just wanted to leave them there for a few decades to ripen like fine wine.
Similarly, it would be instructive for you to keep up with the developments in low-speed wind generation technology, as there is far, far, more wind-power available in that category.
Also, it would be instructive for those who employ such juvenile and inflammatory words as “Bird Beaters” to understand the evolution of wind-generation from trussed towers to monopoles. And I don’t recall anyone complaining about the thousands upon thousands of windmills used for water pumping on farms and ranches over many decades, and the birds that those windmills killed.
Finally, it is instructive that there is a huge research effort, well-funded, in large power storage.
Sowell out for today. Back again around 6 p.m. Pacific time.
Magnus A (10:10:14)
I was wondering why there was a video of this. After all, making a video of a turbine would be ever so ho-hum. Obviously, despite what was said in the video you linked, the destruction wasn’t without warning.
This is British? The announcer doesn’t sound British.
I like the ending: “It’s a reminder that EVEN a man-made machine can be pushed beyond its limits…” Really? Who’da thought? Man-made machine? Is there another kind?
Despite the 12 – 15% availablility of the wind turbines (bird beaters as cleverly described above!) their much bigger problem is their unreliability: Denmark, Germany, and the Scandinavian farms around the North Sea – otherwise and theorectically the world’s absolute BEST area for wind-generated power because of low speed steady winds coming from a clear sea-surface closely surrounded by tens of millions of users – have proven worse than useless.
The random ups and downs, outright failures, and frequency control problems of these wind farms have literally forced them OFF the grid – because these COUNTRY’S connected grids have collapsed several times due to the wind farms’ random failures and unstable production. Sure, the Danish grid isn’t too large – but if it is the only grid you have?
And Germany’s ranks in the top of the worlds’ services.
—
Remember – ALL of these “green” and renewable enrgy sources are a WASTE of effort is more economical, more reliable power is already available – but the enviro’s don’t WANT relibale power.
They must want poor, destitute, unhealthy (dead ?) and economically wasting “natural” (dung-fired ?) fuel sources for a people who can’t feed themselves nor use pesticides properly – because those ARE the only solutions – to an AGW problem that does not exist – that they can come up with.
A single six to ten foot diameter windmill on a farm of 640 acres – complete with dozens of “close-linked” vanes running less than 20 – 30 feet high at 20 rpm – CANNOT kill as many birds as a 300 ft tall tower with three 120 foot radius wings.
Sorry – You’re using a bad example. OK – Cut the subsidies, cut the exaggerations – in a recent issue of Power magazine the wind power group is stupidly claiming to be able to replace 30% of the US’s CURRENT power needs by 2030 with wind – with EVERY one of their “10 proposals for the new administration” merely a different way to demand more taxpayer money.
At an efficiency of 15% – can you see THEIR lie in pretending to be able to locate, build, site, and transmit 210% of today’s ENTIRE power capacity (30% of the need/15 availability factor = .30 x 1/15 = 210% ) in only 20 years?
No – Wind can (maybe) produce 5% of our power needs – and that only rarely. While losing most of that energy in transmission losses across country.
If the enviro’s would let new transmission lines be built in the first palce: it took 13 years of permitting procedures to build ONE 150 mile line across the foothills of the Appalachian Mts in West Virginia and Penn. recently.
Reality talks for itself, Swedish windpower right now:
http://www.vindstat.nu/driftsamfalla.htm
Håkan B (12:18:59) :
Reality talks for itself, Swedish windpower right now:
Send that graph inmediately to repair. There is a PHD physicist , in Boulder, Colorado, who will fix it up in the blink of an eye. Ask for a JH (if they don’ t recognize the initials tell’em he is the guy of those “trains” ya know…)
Anthony.
You started it. We demand a British Sports Car / English electicity thread!
Former 1960 Sprite owner.
Håkan B (12:18:59) :
Reality talks for itself, Swedish windpower right now:
—
Sobering: The daily changes are between 1200 and 4000 – with an “average” of only 2250 or so, compared with a peak ability of 8000.
So, if 8000 “could” be generated “sometimes” but “most of the time” only 2000 can “usually” be generated, doesn’t that show exactly the point amde up above: You have to build 4 to 5 wind turbines to get the power out of one.
Until power storage systems are improved and become economic, it is perhaps helpful to consider wind power like this:
You are pushing a stalled car by yourself, with the driver’s door open and trying to push while steering at the same time. This is difficult. Then two strong guys run up and begin pushing the car from behind, which makes your job of pushing much easier.
Wind energy is a bit like the two guys that run up to help push. When the guys are there to push, your job is much easier, and you can reduce your effort by the amount provided by the two guys. When they leave, the job of pushing falls entirely back upon you.
Similarly, when the wind blows and provides energy, the other generating plants on the grid can throttle back an equivalent amount, saving their fuel.
Wind power was never intended to reduce the need for fossil-fired power plants, at least until power storage becomes economic. That day may never arrive. Wind power is intended to reduce the amount of fossil fuel consumed. It does that job very, very well, because the wind is free energy.
just wondering about the comment on the burning windmill clip re: coal fired stations…
well, they may not burn out of control, but one completely cindered windmill probably represents less than a minute’s worth of coal burn for even a weedy fossil plant. they still burn a lot of fuel after all, just in a more controlled manner. fortunately the windmills typically being a good distance from other buildings (even the 500m mentioned in the comments thread for the netherlands – that’s more than a quarter mile) and having all their combustibles in the high-up part makes them not so risky either. and as we saw, it’s not like they’re burning en masse. just the one out of a bunch was badly made and/or maintained, or suffered some critical parts failure, a bit of freak weather comes along, and whoops there we go. there’s nothing to say other types of generation can’t fail in a similar way, with worse consequences, and indeed at least three nuclear plants have made good cases for not being so flippant about it all…. at least the mills don’t have any radioactive material in them, aren’t too susceptible to operator error (which is what did for Pripyat), and don’t continually burn through a train-load of compressed dead archaeo-plant every few days.
:-/
the blades coming off is a bit worrying, but typically you’re not going to be close enough for it to be an issue anyway. not that you’d *never* be (I’ve stood right beneath one that was within 50m of a major road, in Cumbria), but usually, and it counts as a low overall risk (i’ve been through the visitor centre at Sellafield on that same trip after all… maybe not the safest tourist attraction ever)
Robert A Cook PE (16:02:26)
It’s even worse, theoretically the peak would be 24×715=17160 MWh per 24 hours. And only god knows what it would look like if it was displayed in real time.
So why are we using old technology windmills? There are newer designs you know. Some of them even claim to be bird friendly, city friendly and useful in ranges from light wind to storm forces. The also work vertically or horizontally.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQPQkhDE8eY&feature=related
Just for some examples.. so tell me why exactly are we still putting up huge ugly towers with 70’s technology on them? Why do we have to destroy miles of beautiful scenic landscape and run endless transmission lines when any city could supplement its own power supply locally? The same sad technology is being tried in cities with the same sad problem as the big ones..
sustainable means that it should be mostly local. Current large wind and solar projects are no different then the nasty old coal companies devastating environments to get their product. Can you tell me massive solar and wind projects wont be as environmentally devastating? I thought the idea was to save mother earth?
Fascinating thread. Re wind power, the real question is:
If there were no taxpayer subsidies, would anyone bother with power-grid level wind turbines?
If so, then some of the technologies mentioned seem promising (e.g. the Enercon gearless generator [making Anthony’s brother-in-law’s business obsolete], and the Savonius tube-type). If not, i.e. if there is no chance the free market can see wind turbines competing with existing power generation, then wind power will (and should) be relegated to strictly local installations.
All this taxpayer money going to ‘alternative’ energy is based on one premise: carbon dioxide emissions from fossil-fuel electric generation is bad. Unwittingly, even the climate Realists fall into the trap of agreeing that it is good to reduce our ‘carbon’ output.
This premise is false. There is nothing wrong with CO2, and more of it is better for plants, animals, and people. In order to combat the lemming-like rush to AGW mitigation, we have to convince the people and The Powers That Be that their basic operating assumption is wrong. You can’t do that by agreeing with the premise that we need ‘alternative energy’. Then all you can do is argue about technicalities; you’ve given away the show.
Alternative energy systems are interesting, even exciting, but there is absolutely no need for government to be involved in fostering one technology over another, and good reasons why government should not. As E. M. Smith has pointed out, we have ample supplies of coal, oil, natural gas, and uranium to give us all the cheap, bountiful domestic energy we could possibly use for the next few centuries.
Every US administration since Jimmy Carter has been pushing ‘alternative’ technologies (remember W’s fanciful ‘hydrogen economy’ ambition?), without accomplishing much of anything except enriching companies that couldn’t survive in a free market.
If the US, and ultimately the world, is going to continue growing and prospering, the one essential component is abundant, cheap, and growing supplies of energy. Yet where are the scientists and politicians making this case? Hiding in the bushes, afraid of CO2!
Miscellany:
Beer: The quality of beer is inversely related to how cold it must be kept, i.e. the worse it is, the colder it must be drunk. I keep my beer in the cellar, where it is perhaps 55-60 degrees, and that’s fine for current favorites Harpoon IPA and Sam Adams Cream Stout.
British cars: My brother has a rare Jensen-Healey. As far as I know the electrical systems work well. My Honda on the other hand. . .
/Mr Lynn
Mr Lynn, (05:53:10)
I have a different view. CO2 reduction is a very recent fad, and was not even on the radar when wind-power began to generate electricity.
The motivating factors were the concern for ever-increasing energy costs of petroleum, and by extension, natural gas, and eventually coal. The cost overruns of nuclear power plants fed this concern.
It was patently obvious that renewable energy is absolutely free, thus wind and solar were the subject of experimentation and innovation. Everyone knew that the initial costs would be high, but those would reduce over time with experience and economy of scale. But the cost of energy would forever be zero. At some point in time, as renewable (wind) initial costs declined, and fossil fuel costs increased, a crossing point would be reached at which wind energy would be competitive with, then cheaper than, fossil fuel-based power.
It was deemed a desirable goal by governments, both federal and state, as witness the subsidies and grants provided over many years. The societal benefits from abundant renewable energy include reduced imports of petroleum from nations not aligned with the U.S., among others. Recently, a balance of trade argument is made also.
That point has been reached with wind and solar, in which those renewables can compete economically with many conventional power sources, especially nuclear with its $10,000 or more per kw installed. Additional advances will undoubtedly be achieved, including massive energy storage systems.
Other renewables have been and continue to be under study and innovation, including wave energy, tidal energy, ocean current energy, run-of-the-river energy, small-head hydroelectric energy, bio-gas, bio-mass, and others.
Only recently has the CO2 madness intruded upon the renewable energy field.