First the promise, perhaps a bit overrated:
The article goes on to say:
The borough already has one publicly-owned turbine — a 33ft Air Dolphin turbine at a location off Taylors Lane, Oldbury, near the civic amenities site in Shidas Lane.
Through monitoring the performance of the turbine it was hoped the council would be able to find out how practical it would be to harness wind power on a large scale in the borough
Here is what it looks like:
Interestingly, right below the picture on this sale page for the wind turbine, they say this:
With the average price for 1kWh of electricity in the UK at around 11 pence, this wind turbine is predicted to save its owner just £55 to £154 per year giving a pay back period of 45 to 125 years!
I kid you not, that’s actually what they say. In tips and notes, UK blogger Derek Sorensen calls our attention to this FOI request regarding the production of the very same wind turbine on Taylors Lane, Oldbury.
Source: http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/wind_turbine#incoming-163689
Roy Mccauley
Sandwell Borough Council
31 March 2011
Thank you for your enquiry about the Taylor’s Lane wind turbine in
Oldbury. The answers to your questions are as follows:
1) Could you please tell me the total cost spent on purchase and
installation of the 33ft Air Dolphin turbine at a location off Taylor’s
Lane, Oldbury?
£5,000 (plus VAT) was the total cost of the Taylor’s Lane micro wind
turbine in Oldbury, including foundations, tower and connections.
2) Could you also tell me how much has been spent on the turbine since?
Nothing has needed to be spent since it was installed.
3) How much electricity has been generated by the turbine and how much has
been spent monitoring the performance of the turbine – e.g. cost of
setting up a computer/software etc.
No money has been spent monitoring the performance of the micro wind
turbine at Taylor’s Lane.
However, the council paid £750 for 3 years of monitoring an identical
micro wind turbine at Bleakhouse Primary School in Oldbury. We chose to
monitor just one of the turbines to minimise costs. We wanted to track
performance, establish whether predicted wind speeds in Sandwell were
accurate and use the technology and readings for educational purposes in
schools.
For the 12 months between May 2009 and April 2010, the Bleakhouse Primary
School micro wind turbine generated 209 kWh of electricity.
If you are dissatisfied with the handling of your request, you have the
right to ask for an internal review. Internal review requests should be
submitted within two months of the date of receipt of the response to your
request, and should be addressed to:
Freedom of Information Unit
Oldbury Council House
Freeth Street
Oldbury
West Midlands
B69 3DE
Email – [1][Sandwell Borough Council request email]
If you are not content with the outcome of an internal review, you have
the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a
decision. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF
Please remember to quote your reference number above in any future
communications.
Roy McCauley
Sustainable & Economic Regeneration Unit
======================================================
Dereke writes:
Sandwell Borough Council paid £5,000 a pop to install several wind turbines in their area, and then paid another £750 to have the output of just one of them monitored.
The monitored turbine, which was installed on a primary school, generated 209kWh of electricity in the twelve months it was being monitored. That’s about 20 quid’s worth. So each turbine will have to run for 250 years without breaking down or requiring maintainance, just to break even.
Such a deal. Since the FOI request was granted on March 31st, and the Express and Star News story was February 24th, do you think the Sandwell council may have had time to consider these massive energy production figures for their toy £5000 toy turbine?
Okay, when all else fails, do the research. It seems like Iowa generates about 52 Million Megawatt Hrs (According to EIA.)
It looks like they’re producing 10.7 Million Megawatt Hrs of Wind, which would be about 20.6%.
http://www.state.ia.us/government/com/util/energy/wind_generation.html
Actually, hstad, there’s quite a bit more capacity going up in Iowa, and the surrounding states. Their only hang-up, right now, is getting permission for the generation lines. They seem to be getting about 33.3% of “nameplate.”
Their plan seems to be to “Export” about half of their 50% that’s derived from Wind.
BTW, as they add “Cellulosic” production, and the attendant electricity generation, to their corn ethanol plants I wouldn’t be surprised to see another 500 or 600 baseload Megawatts from that.
On P4 of Semplice’s offer [found & linked by Berényi Péter 05:53am], they guess / hope / predict (with not financial penalty if they’re over-optimistic), that the turbine has a “Total potential annual energy production of around 1400 kWh per annum.” [Two, cumulative, fudge factors!]
If the turbine has actually only produced 209 kWh, then there should be a case for mis-selling & a full refund.
Latimer Alder says:
April 27, 2011 at 7:23 am
@nonegatives
I am fine with putting small systems on schools for education reasons.
I’m struggling to imagine what such ‘education reasons’ might be. And why such reasons (if they exist at all) couldn’t be satisfied for a darned sight less than £5K by other means.
‘Look children.. the wind is (or as it maybe – isn’t) blowing’
Ten seconds of learning per kiddiewink. Expensive stuff.
“Today kiddiewinks, we’re putting on our hats, getting our whips, and going down to the Green Temple of Doom. There, we shall find out what’s inside a seagull.”
That’ll take more than 10 seconds.
“Headteacher Stuart McLeod was even forced to come into school early to clear up the bodies before his young pupils spotted them.”
O, the horror, if his young pupils should learn that Green energy isn’t the clean, planet-saving, wildlife friendly boon it’s been hyped as. Clean up the bodies, Stuart! Hide the truth!
And if the 10-10 people show up, have a mop handy.
Latimer Alder says:
“Examples please of exactly how the physical presence of such a turbine (don’t forget it is a simple machine designed for domestic use only) on a school site helps in each of these.”
Modern teaching employs a lot of physical teaching aids and out-of-classroom work in preference to “mere” book-learning.
“5 grand may be only a drop in the ocean to a ‘public servant’ but its a very very wasteful way to spend my taxes and generating twetny quid’s worth of electricity.”
The council spent that £5000 not primarily to generate electricity, but primarily to generate data. It was a very cheap way of doing it. Alternative methods – such as contracting out an independent feasibility study – would typically have cost in the order of £50,000 and up. And I repeat, unless the turbine was out of order for most of the year (which is admittedly possible, but if so they’d be sueing the manufacturer for a £5000 refund), that figure of 209kWh (still worth nearly £100 to the council) cannot be correct; a more credible figure is 2090kWh.
Latimer Alder says:
“… ”
… a lot of irrelevancies that show you don’t understand the tender process that councils are legally obliged to follow, nor how expensive that process is for large projects; and furthermore that you either ignored or failed to grasp what I said in the previous comment.
Kum Dollison says:
April 27, 2011 at 1:24 pm
See my previous comment. Those figures are projections using a 33.3% capacity factor. EIA has the numbers for 2009 at about 52MMWhrs total and 7.4MMWhrs wind or about 24% capacity factor and 14% of total, which is actually better than I thought it would be.
Smokey says:
“If windmills are so efficient, we should eliminate the subsidies. But that would, of course, eliminate the windmill industry.”
I never claimed that they were efficient (although in point of fact the efficiency of a wind turbine can be close to 100% – which has almost no bearing on their suitability as power generators), only that they can be profitable for their operators (whether private individuals, private companies, or public bodies). This is a fact, whether you like it or not, or whether or not you think it would be the case in some hypothetical alternative universe in which their were no taxes, subsidies or regulatory burdens. And if they are profitable, it is not irrational for councils to consider installing them. The questions of subsidies are decided on national or supranational levels; local authorities have no power to change them, and blaming them for taking advantage of them is foolish. They have to budget the way things currently are, not how they might be under some different political regime; if they fail to do so, wantonly or negligently, individual councillors can be prosecuted and fined.
@paul birch
‘Modern teaching employs a lot of physical teaching aids and out-of-classroom work in preference to “mere” book-learning’
I’m very pleased to hear it. My old primary school in the early 60s and grammar school in the late 60s/early 70s did also. As did trhe school where my granfather was headmaster in the 40s/50s in one of the most deprived parts of South Wales.
Now, are you going to actually give some eeal examples as requested of how having a windmill on site would help?
You must be a local governemt officer since you think that £5K (plus VAT) plus the salary of sustainability officer was a good deal. Did you not see that a device specifically designed to do exactly the job that Sandwell council wanted done is available commercially for 200 quid? With monitoring software…just plug it into a PC.
We have 5 large turbines within 7 miles of where I live, they are situated at Rainworth near mansfield Nottinghamshire UK, it is rare to see all 5 spinning at the same time, can someone explain.
Gary Hladik says:
“Um, Paul, on the WUWT site is an ad for assorted weather equipment, including this wind logger … “designed to meet the needs of people considering the purchase of a wind turbine”, advertised for $315. No doubt the council has access to similar equipment locally. Call me crazy, but wouldn’t such a unit have given pretty much the same answer as the much more expensive “wind logger” actually installed?”
I doubt if it would make much difference to the overall cost, which at such a small scale is dominated by the installation and monitoring costs, not the simple hardware price. Also, a wind logger (which was probably included in their monitoring setup at the school) doesn’t by itself tell you how a real turbine will react to that wind. No doubt if the council had spent a bit longer hunting for the best buy and cycling them through committee they could have shaved a few thousand off the headline price – at the cost of another few thousand in councillors’ and officers’ time!
Kum Dollinson:
Wind turbines operate when the wind is sufficiently strong but not too strong. Hence, there are significant periods when they do not operate because the wind is not in the appropriate range of wind speeds.
To date no country has managed to operate its wind turbines for more than 30% of a year, but at April 27, 2011 at 1:24 pm you assert;
“Okay, when all else fails, do the research. It seems like Iowa generates about 52 Million Megawatt Hrs (According to EIA.)
It looks like they’re producing 10.7 Million Megawatt Hrs of Wind, which would be about 20.6%.”
OK. That suggests
(a) the turbines are providing all – or almost all – of Iowa’s electricity at times
or
(b) the turbines are operating for significantly more than 30% of the time.
Either of these performances by Iowa’s wind turbines is an amazing achievement: all countries with large numbers of wind turbines would be interested to know how it was achieved.
Importantly, the wind power was an extravagant, expensive waste whatever the proportion of Iowa’s electricity was supplied by the wind turbines.
The wind power displaced thermal power stations from the grid, but the power stations continued to operate – and, therefore, to burn their fuel and to make their emissions – while waiting for the wind turbines to stop providing electricity when the wind changed. That fuel would have provided electricity if the wind turbines were absent.
Thermal power stations take days to start from cold so cannot be shut down while waiting for the wind to change. Therefore, they have to operate at reduced output or on standby while waiting for the wind to change.
Thermal power stations usually operate at optimum efficiency. If a power station is required to provide less electricity then its efficiency reduces so it provides less electricity but consumes MORE fuel (this is like trying to drive a car at 10 mph in fifth gear: it can be done but it uses a lot of fuel). And a power station operates at optimum efficiency when on standby, so it then uses similar fuel to that needed for it to efficiently provide electricity (although it provides no electricity when on standby).
In other words, the only effects of the wind turbines are to increase the fuel consumption and the emissions of the power stations which provide the electricity when the wind turbines don’t. And those power stations would have provided the electricity if the wind turbines had not. Also, it should be noted that the increased emissions from power generation are caused by the wind turbines although those increased emissions are from the power stations.
So, the wind turbines provided no useful power but provided significant additional cost to the power generation and additional emissions from the power generation. This is true wherever wind turbines are used to provide electricity to a grid supply.
Richard
Latimer Alder says:
” ‘Modern teaching employs a lot of physical teaching aids and out-of-classroom work in preference to “mere” book-learning’
I’m very pleased to hear it. My old primary school in the early 60s and grammar school in the late 60s/early 70s did also.”
Not the way they do now. Their budgets for this sort of thing are enormously larger than they used to be (even after the latest “cuts”) — and there are numerous grants on offer from all sorts of organisation too. That £5m figure wasn’t just plucked out of the air.
“Now, are you going to actually give some eeal examples as requested of how having a windmill on site would help?”
I already have done.
“You must be a local governemt officer since you think that £5K (plus VAT) plus the salary of sustainability officer was a good deal. Did you not see that a device specifically designed to do exactly the job that Sandwell council wanted done is available commercially for 200 quid? With monitoring software…just plug it into a PC.”
No, but I am a local town councillor, so I know how much it costs to get these things done in reality. £5K +£750 for monitoring is a very good deal. And I repeat, local authorities do not pay VAT.
Paul Birch says (April 27, 2011 at 3:17 pm): “I doubt if it would make much difference to the overall cost, which at such a small scale is dominated by the installation and monitoring costs, not the simple hardware price.”
Um, Paul, you don’t think it would be a lot cheaper to install an off-the-shelf logger than a wind turbine? Even assuming it costs the same to monitor? BTW, note from the FOI response that the council was willing to give up data to save the relatively small cost of monitoring a second turbine, when according to your argument, it wouldn’t be worthwhile. WUWT?
“Also, a wind logger (which was probably included in their monitoring setup at the school) doesn’t by itself tell you how a real turbine will react to that wind.”
Not directly, but it will predict the turbine’s expected performance, given its advertised specifications. Judging by the turbine’s dismal output, a wind logger alone would have settled the issue (unless of course the council bought defective turbines, in which case it should get a refund). Note that the council could have passed a two-step plan (phase 1: check wind; phase 2: install test turbines only if phase 1 successful) with the same (apparently arduous) bureaucratic effort, and saved a bundle.
Paul Birch says (April 27, 2011 at 3:35 pm): “No, but I am a local town councillor, so I know how much it costs to get these things done in reality. £5K +£750 for monitoring is a very good deal. And I repeat, local authorities do not pay VAT.”
I just looked back at the FoI response. According to Roy Mccauley of the Sandwell Borough Council, the cost of one wind turbine (Taylor’s Lane) was £5,ooo “plus VAT”.
WUWT?
Forget the savings! The wind turbine released co2 in its manufacture!!! How long before it is re-couped? Then let’s add the cost, maintenance, VAT etc. What a SCAM.
I haven’t seen any articles, complaints on blogs, etc about Iowa Utility Rates increasing as the proportion of Wind goes up.
I did see, the other day, where Australian Thermal Coal is exploding in price. IIRC it’s up about 30% in the last couple of months to a price of around $130/Ton at the port of Brisbane.
>Dollson
the Iowa rates are on the rise: http://www.alliantenergy.com/Newsroom/IntheNews/UtilityRateCases/IowaElectricRates/index.htm
The wind turbines were the golden-haired child of the previous governor.
Interest at 10% on £5,500 (incl VAT) plus £250 P.A.for monitoring equals £3.80 kWh, thats only 3455% more expensive, a cheap price for saving the planet.
Kum Dollison, Using the very source you quoted, 3.7 GW of installed capacity at 19 per cent capacity factor is less than 6 TWH, not the 10.7 you claimed (3.7 GW x 0.19 x 8760 hours/year).
Of course Iowa rates haven’t gone up significantly. Wind is still a trivial part of its electric energy supply, something very different from installed capacity.
Your note on Australian thermal coal prices is irrelevant. It’s being driven up by demand from China and India. Such demand is NOT applicable in either Western Europe or the USA. Coal is not a unified global commodity price the way oil is, particularly not thermal coal.
And they should have lots of opposition to transmission line construction. Wind on the system means chronically underloaded lines, as you have to build them to take the full capacity but on average will deliver only a small fraction of that. And what you wind advocates never factor in is the additional T&D cost of wind compared to high capacity factor sources.
Paul Birch, pretty it up however you like. The fact remains you spent taxpayer money on a useless scheme that has no useful output. It serves only to collect government subsidies and, as noted by others earlier, add to the fuel cost and burn of the fossil fleet. Do try to learn what “hot standby” means. Read Richard Courtney’s post again. You clearly didn’t understand it. Your savings have simply been someone else’s much great expenses.
And what do you mean by “close to 100% efficiency”? Utter nonsense. First there are the thermal losses from the blades. Then the real killer. All the energy has to be transmitted through a mechanical gearbox. Huge losses, on the order of 30-50%. And you have to convert the mechanical rotation into electric current. More heat losses.
In terms of basic physics, your statement is meaningless. You should also be aware of the detailed specifications provided by manufacturers such as Vesta. They specify that the designed 20 year life span is only achieved by a capacity factor of 70% or less. It’s in their technical spec’s. Engineers know this stuff; you obviously don’t.
And remember, you spent all this money on a 1 kW machine. Big deal. You powered about two to three rooms. Do you plan to power an entire school by spending 20 to 30 times that amount? The typical person in an industrial civilization consumes between 5-7 MWh per year, and this little toy makes about 1.5-2 MWh per year and I’m being unreasonably optimistic here. Given the poor performance of the micros compared with the 1-2.5 MW machines, it’s probably much less.
Jimbo, on a per installed kW basis, a large wind turbine uses approximately four times the concrete and six times the steel of a nuclear plant. Because of the scaling factors, the ratios for micro-turbines are worse. For a coal-fired plant the disadvantage for wind in construction material inputs is roughly the same except for less concrete and more steel than a nuclear plant. The difference between the coal and nuclear is largely the coal plant’s fuel handling system and the nuclear plant’s concrete containment structure. Given a maximum 20 year operating life, at an optimistic capacity factor of 20%, the carbon dioxide inputs for wind are probably never recovered. Given the very high degradation rates for offshore wind, they never will be. In the case of a nuclear plant, its carbon cost of construction, like its energy input, is recovered in about two years of nominal operation.
Various audits have been made into Czech science. Of course, much of it sucks due to the socialist habits and a complete lack of competition and people try to pretend otherwise. But even among the sucking places, only one place got the very worst failing grade it could. 🙂
http://www.ceskapozice.cz/en/news/society/czech-science-won%E2%80%99t-succeed-grades-alone
Guess which one! It was the Wind Energy Department of the Institute of Atmospheric Physics. 🙂
Iowa Residential Rates seem to be going up about $8.00/mo, on average. They give “adding additional renewable energy” as being 20% of that. That means Wind Power has added about $1.,60/Mo to the average residential bill.
I guess they’re figuring 33.3% because of their experience, to date. EIA said 14% for 2009; I’m sticking with 20% for 2010.
Don’t kid yourself about coal. We export about 4% of our production, and we import some Australian Thermal Coal. The more China is willing to pay, the more Philadelphia will, eventually, pay. Those train tracks out of Wy run East AND West.
@paul birch
Thanks for (perhaps unwittingly) confirming all my thoughts about the many inadequacies of UK local government. Woolly thinking, empire building and profligacy with our money obviously remain as entrenched as ever.
Some of you guys are just making up numbers. This wind farm at Altamont Pass has the smallest, oldest, least efficient wind turbines just about anywhere on Earth, and they’re still putting out 20%, and they’ve been running for thirty years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altamont_Pass_Wind_Farm
It seems very likely that those Iowans know what they’re doing when they state 33%. And, if those old 100 kw turbines at Altamont Pass can still be going strong after 30 Years, I have a hard time seeing how the New ones won’t.