It all started when the Gorran School got the bright idea that a wind turbine would solve all their electrical bills while doing some feel good environmentalism. The BBC was ecstatic when they reported on it back in 2008:
A Cornish primary school could soon be almost completely powered by a single wind turbine.
The turbine should be up and running by the end of March
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Gorran Primary School on the Roseland, has secured more than £50,000 from different agencies to carry out the work on the 15m (49ft) high turbine.
It should be up and running at the end of March at the school made famous by Anne Treneer’s autobiography The Schoolhouse in the Wind.
The head teacher Matthew Oakley says it should save the school £5,000 a year.
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And then, reality came crashing down to Earth:
Wind brings down turbine 02/12/2009 The Newquay Voice
THE eco-dream of a village school turned into a Friday 13th nightmare when high winds destroyed their wind turbine.
Two blades flew off from the 15m tall turbine in Gorran School’s playing field during the bad weather earlier this month. The turbine was part of the school’s £53,000 plan to generate its own electricity,
On the afternoon of Friday, November 13, the school was advised to turn on the brakes to stop the turbine, but the brakes failed, causing two blades to detach in the early hours of Saturday morning.
A concerned parent said: “Thank God it happened when the children were not out on the field. Looking at the size and weight of those rotor blades, I dread to think what would have happened if they had snapped off while they were there.”
…
This is not the first problem Gorran School have experienced with their wind turbine. Only seven months after it was erected in July 2008 it went on the blink. It was repaired by the manufacturers at the time at no cost to the school, and they were reimbursed for the lost generation while the turbine was not working.
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Now today, the company has walked away from the mess according to the Telegraph, and the school has a pile of scrap:
Eco-friendly school left out of pocket after ‘unproven’ wind turbine breaks
An eco-friendly school has been left £55,000 out of pocket after its wind turbine broke – with governors admitting that it was based on “completely unproven technology”.
The company that installed the turbine has gone bust leaving the school with a pile of scrap.
The Gorran School in Cornwall revealed its 15 metre turbine in 2008 which was designed to provide it with free electricity – and sell any surplus power to the National Grid.
The system was seen as a green blueprint for clean, sustainable energy for schools nationwide and received grants from various bodies including the EDF power firm.
But soon after being installed the wind turbine became faulty and after a few months seized up – showering the school’s playing field with debris.
Since then the school has been locked in a battle with suppliers Proven Energy which has now gone into administration leaving the school with little hope of any money being returned – and a pile of scrap in their field.
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Having learned nothing in Gorran, they are still at it, from the BBC on August 19th:
19 August 2011 Last updated at 03:31 ET
Wind energy for Gorran community
The turbines at Gorran may be generating power within a matter of weeks
The small community of Gorran in south Cornwall will soon be generating its own energy and exporting surplus to the national grid.
Work to erect two community wind turbines at a cost of £500,000 is well under way.
Community Power Cornwall, a local co-operative, is behind the project.
The organisation has helped the villagers in Gorran to look at its energy needs and developed a renewable energy scheme.
‘Big symbol’
Villager Ella Westland, from Transition Gorran, said clean energy production and low carbon living were “things many villagers have been working towards for a long time”.
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Yeah ‘Big Symbol’ alright – of FAIL. Just look at all the FAIL in California.
Ok, here is the data on wind turbine deaths;
http://www.wind-works.org/articles/ASummaryofFatalAccidentsinWindEnergy.html
http://www.inquisitr.com/18588/wind-power-causes-more-deaths-than-nuclear-power/
Here is a detailed list;
http://www.caithnesswindfarms.co.uk/accidents.pdf
If this much carnage was going on in our coal fired power plants there would be an immediate cry to SHUT EM DOWN………….
Or to quote John Connolly (Former Governor of Texas circa 1976);
“More people died at Chappaquiddick than died at Three Mile Island”
Cheers, Kevin.
I’ve read various versions of the Chappaquiddick comparison over the years, attributed to all sorts of people, but the Three Mile Island accident occurred in 1979.
Rational Debate:
Thanks. I went to the Caithness site report and the number of protected birds killed is astonishing. If one were setting up a coal fired plant and this number of endangered raptors were killed one could expect riots and draconian legislation!
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“Environmental damage (including bird deaths)
“97 cases of environmental damage have been reported – the majority since 2007. This is perhaps due to a change in legislation or new reporting requirement. All involved damage to the site itself, or reported damage to or death of wildlife. 39 instances reported here include confirmed deaths of protected species of bird. Deaths, however, are known to be far higher. At the Altamont Pass windfarm alone, 2400 protected golden eagles have been killed in 20 years, and about 10,000 protected raptors (Dr Smallwood, 2004). In Germany, 32 protected white tailed eagles were found dead, killed by wind turbines (Brandenburg State records). In Australia, 22 critically endangered Tasmanian eagles were killed by a single windfarm (Woolnorth). Further detailed information can be found at: http://www.iberica2000.org/Es/Articulo.asp?Id=3071 and at: http://www.iberica2000.org/Es/Articulo.asp?Id=1875.”
One good thing, its nice to know that a grid still exists to supply power when the wind doesn’t blow and where the sun don’t shine. I just do not understand the mindset of allowing power to be sold back to “the grid”. Seems akin to shooting one’s foot half way off, and then reloading for more target practice.
To Kevin Kilty;
Ok, I was off by a few years, my bad. Ted Kennedy challenged James Earl Carter for the Democratic nomination for the the presidency of the US in 1979-1980. John Connolly was trying for the the GOP nomination at the same time. He did in fact make the above quoted statement, I remember it distinctly.
I do not remember if it was during a televised debate, or during a TV interview, but He (J. Connolly) did in fact say it. I heard him say it on my TV (back then we only had the TV and the radio for political info, Big Al Gore hadn’t invented the internet yet).
I’m sure that with enough time we could track down exactly who said it and exactly when they said it.
The more important point is that the real purpose of RISK/REWARD analyses is as a useful process whereby persons that are hopefully objective look at the likely benefits occurring from a path of action versus the likely determents from said course of action and weigh each dispassionately.
When done properly this should result in a HIGH QUALITY DECISION PROCESS.
The deployment of wind turbines to solve whatever nebulous problem they are alleged to solve is a textbook example of a POOR QUALITY RISK/REWARD ANALYSIS. It will show up in textbooks for years in the future as an example of HOW TO POORLY SOLVE A NON-EXISTENT PROBLEM.
Cheers, Kevin.
Yeah, but that was the old “Proven Technology” company. The new company says on their website:
“SHARE CERTIFICATES: Completion of money laundering regulations and printing of share certificates before the end of September 2011.”
Looks like an interesting… (searching for a non-libelous word…) “arrangement” they’ve got there!
http://www.communitypowercornwall.coop/
Best,
Frank
Apparently quite a few of that model of ‘Proven’ turbine have been failing. (‘Proven’ is actually the name of the guy that started the company – not any reflection of the product)
Maybe he should have sunk an oil-well instead /sarc
Mixed news of his fortune here…
http://www.clickgreen.org.uk/news/national-news/122527-rescue-deal-close-after-renewable-firm-proven-energy-folds.html
wonder if taxpayers know they are helping BP put up hundreds of turbines:
6 Oct: LA Times Blog: Kansas gets wind farm, BP gets tax credit — just in time
Kansas is to wind as Saudi Arabia is to oil. So it makes sense that energy conglomerate BP recently announced plans to build an $800-million, 262-turbine wind farm in the southern part of the state…
The move comes just in time to take advantage of a stimulus-funded federal tax credit that’s set to expire next year…
BP’s job-creating project — as it has been touted by state officials — will take advantage of an expiring provision that had previously been extended by President Obama’s politically unpopular 2009 stimulus.
The provision offers either a 10-year, 2.2-cent production tax credit for every kilowatt-hour generated, or a onetime 30% investment tax credit paid to companies starting wind projects before 2012 and finishing before 2013 — two deadlines that the BP project exactly meets…
BP will also pay more than $1 million a year for 20 years to the 200 landowners where the turbines will be built, according to a report from The Wichita Eagle, plus another annual $1 million to local governments…
The investment tax credit for new wind projects has been popular too: It has awarded more than $8.4 billion in renewable-energy tax credits since 2009, with roughly $6.7 billion going toward wind projects alone, according to U.S. Treasury award data.
The American Wind Energy Assn. has said that continuing uncertainty about whether the credit will continue beyond 2012 has already led to layoffs in what has been a boom industry: The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service estimated in a Sept. 23 report that nearly 400 U.S. manufacturers produced turbine products in 2010, up from 30 in 2004…
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/nationnow/2011/10/kansas-gets-wind-farm-bp-gets-tax-credit-just-in-time.html
“Ultimately Proven Energy intends to become a fully fledged US-based manufacturer as demand grows.”
http://www.provenenergy.co.uk/proven-media/press-releases/proven-energy-announces-north-american-organization/
Hopefully they can restructure and Obama can give them a few billion dollars./
That Kansas Wind Farm should churn out about 3 GWatt/Hrs/day or 1,000 Gigawatt hrs/Yr. (figuring about 30% of nameplate capacity.)
No Dead Coal Miners. No Coal Trains. No Pollution. No depending on a Depleting, and steadily more expensive resource. Money for the Local Farmers, and Municipalities/Counties.
And, at about $1.90/Watt, installed (before any subsidies,) not a bad price.
Looks pretty good to me.
Rather than paying for the school’s power, these wind projects should pay for the administrators’ pension plan. I’m sure that will put an end to it.
What a missed opportunity! The children should have been taught about the benefits of wind power, by being shown the schools bank statements showing the costs of electricity to power the school. They could have then been shown the costs involved in building the windmill, followed by the zero costs of electricity as the school disconnected from the National Grid. Finally they could review the interest and capital repayments of the initial outlay and ongoing maintenance to see how their investment compares with conventional means of powering the school.
They would then have been able to learn about schooling in VictorIan times by having class sizes of about 70 using chalk and slates and candlelight because the windmill didn’t (note the past tense) have the power to adequately heat more than two or three rooms at once and light them at the same time. On the days when the wind doesn’t blow and the building is too cold to use at all, they could have sent the children out to find and bury the heads and bodies of the decapitated birds littering the playing field.
Welcome to the world of wind power!
I’ve given evidence at wind farm public inquiries about the risks of wind turbines. Turbines should not be built anywhere near where people live, work or play. Of course ‘elf and safety go out of the window when you’re saving the planet!
Rational Debate says:
October 6, 2011 at 5:38 pm
As I recall from discussions/articles/books back in the late seventies or early eighties, for safety on a 25ft dia. turbine, allow 200 yards for potential flying blades. The turbine speed should be aggressively, centrifugally governed, and a steering wind vane should be trippable to turn the turbine normal to the wind. In no case should the turbine be allowed to spin when blades were iced.
These precautions were the norm for homestead wind generators of 3 hp capacity. Most of these 3kW turbines were built with automotive power transmission parts designed for small trucks; massively over-engineered, yet the power of the wind was still to be feared.
Up-to-date statistics about wind turbine failures and accidents are maintained by the Caithness Windfarm Information Forum.
See http://www.caithnesswindfarms.co.uk/page4.htm
£53,000 defenestrated for silencing their conscience… for a while.
Priceless!
I’m waiting for the next headline “Wind turbine parts hit nearby PV solar plant”.
If my sons school was close to water (it is), and I had something to say about energy-supply, (I have not), I would demand that energy was extracted from that water. Even when water is close to only +4 degrees, there is a lot of energy in it. Almost for free. All you need is a pump, a heat exchanger and some tubing. But you must plan for it BEFORE you build the school.
Kum Dollison says:
October 6, 2011 at 10:03 pm
That Kansas Wind Farm should churn out about 3 GWatt/Hrs/day or 1,000 Gigawatt hrs/Yr. (figuring about 30% of nameplate capacity.)
….the inoperative word here being “SHOULD”….whereas coal,oil,natural gas,and nuclear WILL churn out the 75 t0 98% rated capacities,come wind,sun,or especially calm days and winter clouds. And if you think $1.90/KWH is not a bad price,you can only be from Calfinnished.
“etudiant says:
October 6, 2011 at 5:26 pm
Did anyone do any investigation before plunking down the schools cash?
Such as looking at the record of the supplier, apparently nil, based on the article”
Actually “Proven Energy” has quite a good record. It has been supplying small-scale wind turbines for isolated locations without electrical power for many years. This is about the only case where wind power is a reasonable proposition.
However recently they decided to cash in on the “green power” bonanza and to start building larger turbines.
They have now once again proven something that engineers have known for a long time: simply scaling up existing technology rarely works.
There a good idea in the right situation but when you get a car sales man selling you items like this well……
Best I’ve seen though is 100 user licences for 1 user, that was the NHS though.
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Edward Bancroft says:
October 6, 2011 at 5:12 pm
What surprises me is that they are now considering a solar power scheme as a replacement, despite the hard lessons from their mechanically failed wind turbine and its financially failed producer, ‘Proven Energy’.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2045862/Schools-green-dream-blown-away–55-000-wind-turbine-breaks-firm-installed-goes-bust.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
Are we looking at a repeat failure here with the solar scheme? Maybe the only thing that will come out of this is that the school’s pupils will have a better view of the true infeasibility of renewable power, rather than the official line from the educational system.
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A rather expensive education but hopefully a good one.
The kids will probably remember the school and “Eco-friendly” teachers as crazy well meaning spaceshots. Sort of the way my very conservative friend thinks of her 1960’s hippy type parents.
Today kids were going to do one of the most expensive experiments we can think of, we’re going to spend 10 years of our electricity budget on wind power. We are going to put a heavy turbine on top of a large lamp-post that gradually gets thinner at the top, stick propellers to one side of it and expose it to the unpredictable force of the wind, then we will wait for it to pay it’s self off (Bald teacher holds right pinkie to the side of his mouth while maniacally laughing and stroking a white cat), and the turbulence.
Unfortunately Kids, as previous attempts at this experiment have proven disastrous and it should take 15 to 20 years of nonstop electricity production that we sell back to the national grid at an over inflated price that gets passed on to the sucker, cough, cough, I mean tax payer, to receive any benefit, we will have to postpone normal education until such times when lessons become less expensive, So everyone meet back here in the assembly hall on Monday morning at 9:00am 2025.
Dear parents,
It is with great disappointment and sadness that we must inform you that due to the unforeseen circumstances coinciding with the loss of income from our venture with ‘proven technology’ the schools financial situation has taken a considerable loss, we no longer have the funding to restore electrical power for the continued high level of education of our pupils, therefore as a result we have had no choice but to postpone all lessons indefinitely, please feel free to browse through the enclosed brochure of other local schools.
Yours Sincerely.
A.K Gullible
South Eastern school of Pipe Dreams.
1 Laughingstock Road.
Eh, could be worse. They could have invested in Solyndra.
Andrew Harding says: “…The children should have been taught about the benefits of wind power, by being shown the schools bank statements showing the costs of electricity to power the school. They could have then been shown the costs involved in building the windmill, followed by the zero costs of electricity as the school disconnected from the National Grid. Finally they could review the interest and capital repayments of the initial outlay and ongoing maintenance to see how their investment compares with conventional means of powering the school….”
That, of course, would be the last thing that would ever be allowed to happen. In a country where principals hide dead birds to keep children from seeing the reality of Green politics, they certainly won’t let children see the books on their boutique propeller toys. I think England’s gene pool was damaged in WWI by German mustard gas, a mutagenic chemical. That and sending the best and brightest to the Front, where sadistic sociopath Generals churned the mud with pointless, deadly attacks to “maintain an aggressive stance.” Ever read “Now it Can Be Told?”
You may have noticed a reference to “Transition” in the main story. This is an insidious bunch of communist eco-loons trying to subjugate school children and their teachers. They have the same vision of a sustainable future as Mao Tse-Tung. Beware.