Bishop Hill points to an essay in the Spectator Matt Ridley: The Beginning Of The End Of Wind which is a summary of the arguments against wind power. He (and I) were not aware of this point:
Putting the things offshore may avoid objections from the neighbours, but (Chancellor, beware!) it makes even less sense, because it costs you and me — the taxpayers — double.
I have it on good authority from a marine engineer that keeping wind turbines upright in the gravel, tides and storms of the North Sea for 25 years is a near hopeless quest, so the repair bill is going to be horrific and the output disappointing. Already the grouting in the foundations of hundreds of turbines off Kent, Denmark and the Dogger Bank has failed, necessitating costly repairs.
…
So even if you accept the most alarming predictions of climate change, those turbines that have ruined your favourite view are doing nothing to help. The shale gas revolution has not only shamed the wind industry by showing how to decarbonise for real, but has blown away its last feeble argument — that diminishing supplies of fossil fuels will cause their prices to rise so high that wind eventually becomes competitive even without a subsidy. Even if oil stays dear, cheap gas is now likely to last many decades.
Though they may not admit it for a while, most ministers have realised that the sums for wind power just don’t add up and never will. The discovery of shale gas near Blackpool has profound implications for the future of British energy supply, which the government has seemed sheepishly reluctant to explore. It has a massive subsidy programme in place for wind farms, which now seem obsolete both as a means of energy production and decarbonisation. It is almost impossible to see what function they serve, other than making a fortune from those who profit from the subsidy scam.
Even in a boom, wind farms would have been unaffordable — with their economic and ecological rationale blown away. In an era of austerity, the policy is doomed, though so many contracts have been signed that the expansion of wind farms may continue, for a while. But the scam has ended. And as we survey the economic and environmental damage, the obvious question is how the delusion was maintained for so long. There has been no mystery about wind’s futility as a source of affordable and abundant electricity — so how did the wind-farm scam fool so many policymakers?
climatereason: “A fundamental cost that is also excluded from the cost of off shore turbines is bringing their power to where it is needed.”
How do you know that? It’s my guess that the engineers that prepared the project cost estimates were well aware of that basic cost and included it.
My experience is that costs of projects that involve new and unique challenges are frequently underestimated not because something is left out, but rather because the construction is more difficult than anticipated and takes longer. So show these costs were left out with something more than an assertion.
See this:
http://social.windenergyupdate.com/operations-maintenance/offshore-wind-corrosion-control-more-guidance-needed?utm_source=WEU%2BE-Brief%2B2102&utm_medium=WEU%2BE-Brief%2B2102&utm_campaign=WEU
The cost of corrosion damage in offshore wind monopile foundations can be crippling, yet industry guidance is falling short. Andrew Williams reports.
The provision of detailed guidance relating to the corrosion control design of monopile foundations for offshore wind turbines is a vital requirement for manufacturers, given the risk of serious financial implications of ‘getting it wrong’.
Independent risk management firm, Det Norske Veritas (DNV), provides much of the corrosion advice currently offered to the industry, but is their most up to date advice adequate to ensure long-term prevention of corrosion damage? If not, how can the industry ensure access to state-of-the-art guidance?
Interesting read…
MSG;
If you haven’t yet, read anything and everything by Bastiat. Here’s a good link:
http://bastiat.org/en/the_law.html#SECTION_G007
Exactly how strong does having it on good authority from a marine engineer make Matt Ridley`s point? I don`t see this as sufficient evidence at all.
We had several interesting days in the UK last weel where there was no wind and no sunshine thereby knocking out the two prime means of renewables.
The only way forward (assuming we don’t see sense with shale gas) is to use the ocean via waves/tidal power.
tonyb
There are less (sometimes no) waves when there is no wind, so that could be a double whammy.
Tides change directions a couple of times a day and therefore switch off power generation. I admit this is more manageable being predictable. If we make use of the Solent then there is potential for fairly continuous power generation?
“The unusual phenomenon of the ‘Double High Water’ in the Solent and Southampton area is well known, but it is not caused by the existence of the two entrances to the Solent or the Isle of Wight as is popularly supposed. However, the two entrances to the Solent do cause other effects to the tide which are not so well known, namely, the ‘Young Flood Stand’ and the short duration of the ebb tide which are both valuable assets to the mariner.”
Ooops make that CDN$0.0485 and $0.022 / kWh…I was the using “Wind” pricing conversion in my calculator (10x all the reliable forms of power generation).
Wonder if anyone will take inventory of the amount of wind and solar capacity lost in the US over the past week as the latest series of major storms crossed the Mississippi and Ohio valleys.
Orkneylad:
Welcome to the club of professionals that no-one wants to hear from until something goes wrong. Just try to get someone to cough up money BEFORE a land use/development project to assess geologic hazards (such as unsuitable substrate for foundation support). They then expect you to be able to retro-fit their construction AFTER it has failed and they finally listen to what you have to say. Result – original cost X 10.
2009 American levelized cost estimate for 2015 http://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/2009/05/12/levelized-cost-of-new-generating-technologies/
2011 estimate for 2016 http://www.eia.gov/oiaf/aeo/electricity_generation.html
Over here, only solar thermal is more expensive than offshore wind.
The sea is a harsh mistress; you can ask anyone who has a boat how much maintenance costs them!
I keep laughing every time they suggest putting wind farms here on the coastline of South Florida. I’ve been through too many hurricanes and tropical storms in the past 25years I’ve lived here and it’s hard enough just keeping a bunker-style concrete-block house in reasonable shape over the years, let alone a 400-ft-high winged generator system!
Simple solution. Get Greenpeace to buy another thousand boats, and have Xena et al lean over and prop the damn things up. Should be fun in a storm.
wws says:
March 5, 2012 at 5:37 am
North Sea? That’s a pretty calm place that never has any really bad storms, right?
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…….no icebergs either
How do you service these ocean wind turbines once they are installed. They will fail and require maintenance just like anything mechanical placed in a violent and corrosive environment does.
I am familiar with offshore platforms that include space in order to service equipment and the producing wells.
A floating vessel with dynamic positioning, a wave motion compensated crane and diving support (for inspection) is like 30 to 40 K per day. Have they anticipated hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual operating cost to maintain these devices?
For an authorative analysis of UK generation costs see:
http://www.iesisenergy.org/lcost/
Summarizing: coal, gas, nuclear and the Severn Barrage (now there’s a surprise) come in at about £60/MWh. onshore wind: £190/MWh, offshore wind £270/MWh.
To quote a Private Eye cover from 1990 (picture of Cecil Parkinson) “Higher prices mean cheaper electricity for everyone”.
“It’s worse than we thought !”
Latitude says:
March 5, 2012 at 8:18 am
windmills in the ocean + icebergs = shave ice.
http://img.ibtimes.com/www/data/images/full/2011/06/04/109108-u-s-president-barack-obama-eats-shave-ice-at-island-snow-near-where-he.jpg
(refreshing on a hot day)
We’re all going to be “eating it” with windmills…
Thank you Mr. President.
Approximately one sixth of UK members of parliament appear to be able to think clearly and rationally on the subject of wind power energy:
http://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=uk%20mps%20wind%20power%20letter%202012&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CEYQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegraph.co.uk%2Fearth%2Fenergy%2Fwindpower%2F9061554%2FFull-letter-from-MPs-to-David-Cameron-on-wind-power-subsidies.html&ei=LO5UT62QM6Pr0gH8sfncDQ&usg=AFQjCNFdM2edYRA5ltxwou5J-p32Cl9-KQ&cad=rja
The other five sixths are science challenged, sociology majors, or career lefties, so the UK has little hope of a sensible energy policy any time soon. The exit of Chris Huhne was a useful start, but the formal final go-ahead has still to be given for the next generation of nuclear reactors, so the UK will shortly be facing a decade of rolling brown outs and black outs.
And the stupid, egotistical, proponents of wind power will just say: “well, it wasn’t supposed to happen like this.”
Advice to potential investors in industry in Britain: “Don’t – there won’t be enough power.”
As a believer in AGW and somewhat who believes we must take the right action, I observe the following. Mitigating and adapting to climate change will require a great sum of money down the line. wasting money today on solutions that are not ready for prime time is worse than pouring C02 into the air. Worse because its sunk cost that can never be recovered. It’s sunk cost that could have gone into nuclear, could have gone into water projects, could have gone into making a society that is more resilient to change rather than less rich and less able to mitigate or adapt in the future. We need to take action, but smart action. the right actions not flailing about.
Renewables seem to be planned by enthusiastic amateurs, not engineers.
It was amusing to read of a huge wind turbine development in southern Germany where they did not plan for connecting it to the grid! They are now trying to install 1000 km of power lines against strong public opposition.
Germany has spent 100 billion Euros on solar panels, and gives 6 billion a year in subsidies, but they only provide about 0.3% of German power requirements. They can’t afford it. The current situation could have been predicted before the first panel was installed, but the idea of cost/benefit analysis never seems to be used for renewables.
There are issues with most ‘green’ solutions :
– Experts point out that if wind power comprises 20% of the grid the variations in output will destabilise the grid causing blackouts or even damaging the infrastructure,
– If 15% of cars were electric it would require hundreds of billions spent on upgrading the grid with new power stations and transmission lines.
– Biodiesel is claimed to produce 4 times as much CO2 as the oil it replaces, and almost a litre of oil is used to produce a litre of biodiesel, plus the destruction of forests and wetlands for palm plantations.
– Ethanol has been proved to require 40% more energy to produce than it creates [a green group said they had disproved this but as is often the case I suspect ‘disproved’ should read as ‘ignored’!], and the watts per square metre using corn is abysmal.
It seems that many decisions are made by people who don’t have a clue, surprising when such vast quantities of money are involved.
LarryD says:
March 5, 2012 at 8:04 am
2009 American levelized cost estimate for 2015 http://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/2009/05/12/levelized-cost-of-new-generating-technologies/
2011 estimate for 2016 http://www.eia.gov/oiaf/aeo/electricity_generation.html
Over here, only solar thermal is more expensive than offshore wind.
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I was looking at the second table (the EIA one) the other day and had trouble interpreting it. It seems to me that it obscures more than it reveals. Firstly, it excludes all subsidies, which in the case of wind are a significant cost. Secondly, it is not clear how the capacity factor relates to the final figure – it seems to have been ignored in reaching the numbers in the last column. Thirdly, the second lot of coal figures are supposedly for ‘clean coal’, which I think means carbon capture technology, which is so far pretty much non-existent.
Can anyone shed any light?
Regarding the reference to the Productivity Commission above, here is the link to their latest report on CO2 abatement costs:
http://www.pc.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/109830/carbon-prices.pdf
There is a table of generation costs for various electricity sources in Australia on page 91 of the report. The costs per MWh (AU$) are:
Coal – $78 – $91
Combined cycle gas – $97
Wind – $115 – $214 (we only have onshore here)
Medium sized (5 megawatt) solar PV – $400 – $473
They regard small domestic PV systems as even more expensive, but do not provide a figure.
“”””” ColinW says:
March 5, 2012 at 4:59 am
Are there any reliable sources to back this up other than “I have it on good authority from a marine engineer…”? “””””
So Colin, who would then back up your “reliable sources” that you propose would back up the author’s Marine Engineer ?
Would Connolleys wikipedia, be an authoritative enough source ? Why would anyone believe ANY opinion other than their own ?
The Spanish Armada came through [the North Sea] totally unscathed. Oh, hang on a min….
It’s hard getting a solid foundation off of mounds of shipwreck.
Bob Dylan may have been wrong [The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind….]
CO2 continues to be the red herring needed by so-called environmentalists to push their anti-human agenda through… energy starvation to cram humans into smaller and smaller spaces and allowing the earth to return to its “normal” condition. Recently, however, environmentalists have been successful in using H2O as their environmental, anti-human, red herring.
Conveniently forgotten is that, as a species, we are capable of implementing rational solutions… if a non-rational agenda does not get in the way.
http://hallofrecord.blogspot.com/2012/03/h2o-continues-to-be-more-important-than.html
Steven Mosher writes:
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As a believer in AGW and somewhat who believes we must take the right action, I observe the following. Mitigating and adapting to climate change will require a great sum of money down the line. wasting money today on solutions that are not ready for prime time is worse than pouring C02 into the air. Worse because its sunk cost that can never be recovered
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And as well, the advocation of an impractical policy raises doubts about AGW that do not have to be there. The failure of wind power will erode the public support for any action. Some could argue that the example of wind showed that such strategies are unworkable and expensive to no end
Steven Mosher says:
March 5, 2012 at 9:00 am
“…cost that could have gone into nuclear, could have gone into water projects,…
We need to take action, but smart action.”
Nuclear or water power is the only current practical source of a replacement to fossil fueled energy that will not cripple our civilization. We need plentiful and cheap power to make things, melt steel, melt glass, and make the world a better place. Electric Arc Furnaces. Safer nuclear is one of the few solutions that will succeed in this endeavor.
Stop the delusion and fund nuclear now. It’s the best we have.