Press Release
London, 6 August: The Global Warming Policy Foundations has warned policy makers that wind energy is an extraordinarily expensive and inefficient way of reducing CO2 emissions. In fact, there is a significant likelihood that annual CO2 emissions could be greater under the Government’s current wind strategy than under an alternative Gas scenario.
Professor Gordon Hughes (University of Edinburgh), on behalf of the GWPF, has also assessed the likely impact of wind power on household energy bills.
In his economic analysis, submitted by the GWPF to the House of Commons Energy and Climate Change Committee, Prof Hughes concludes that meeting the Government’s target for renewable generation would increase households electricity bills by 40-60% by 2020.
The necessary investment for this Wind scenario would amount to about £124 billion. The same electricity demand could be met from 21.5 GW of combined cycle gas plants with a capital cost of £13 billion – the latter option is cheaper by an order of magnitude.
According to Professor Hughes, “the average household electricity bill would increase from £528 per year at 2010 prices to a range from £730 to £840 in 2020 under the Mixed Wind scenario. These figures amount to increases of 38% to 58% in the average household bill relative to the baseline under the Gas scenario. The equivalent ranges for the other scenarios are 29-46% for the More Onshore Wind scenario and 40-62% for the Future Offshore Wind scenario.”
“The key problems with current policies for wind power are simple. They require a huge commitment of investment to a technology that is not very green, in the sense of saving a lot of CO2, but which is certainly very expensive and inflexible. Unless the current Government scales back its commitment to wind power very substantially, its policy will be worse than a mistake, it will be a blunder,” Professor Hughes said.
The GWPF’s submission to the House of Commons Energy and Climate Change public evidence session on the Economics of Wind Power Committee is available here: Gordon Hughes: The Impact of Wind Power On Household Energy Bills.
Professor Gordon Hughes
Dr Gordon Hughes is a Professor of Economics at the University of Edinburgh where he teaches courses in the Economics of Natural Resources and Public Economics. He was a senior adviser on energy and environmental policy at the World Bank until 2001. He has advised governments on the design and implementation of environmental policies and was responsible for some of the World Bank’s most important environmental guidelines. Professor Hughes is the author of the GWPF reports The Myth of Green Jobs and Why is wind power so expensive?
This should be required reading for policymakers and ratepayers. It does a great job of disarming the industry advocates claims of affordability and financial sustainability. Another way of looking at the findings is that the wind lobby is a lot like the nuclear lobby in that they want to distract the public from the total cost picture and rational public choice with distractions of green arguments and selected cost components in isolation. Sounds familiar and so will the eventual cost push to ratepayers when its too late to stop it.
Where is your sense of humour? Didn’t you see the blink I made behind bullshit comment. Of course I know that it’s different in other countries than in Sweden. One thing I don’t like is fundamentalists, and some of you really are that. You should look at your self in the mirror and try to laugh a little, it doesn’t hurt. That I love wind energy is because it’s so beautiful to see the wind mills. That some doesn’t see it my way, well they have their right to their opinion. But even I have my right…
And SanityP, thanks for proving my point, see were all your examples are from. Except the ones on Gotland, they are all very close to were we already have big power lines. For example, Mönsterås is very close to Oskarshamn, the ones in Skåne is very close to Barsebäck and so on… So, once again, thanks, even if it wasn’t your goal.
Unfortunately, Sweden can’t live on power from water energy. We could build more, and make us more self sufficient, but the environmentalists (and also the people living where the dams would be) is stopping that. So, we have to buy coal energy from Denmark and Germany. As I said above, I rather have wind energy produced in Sweden, then to pay extremely high prices for the coal energy.
This reality of how Wind is more expensive, environmentally damaging, inefficient and actually a totally useless form of generation has been around for many many years with thousands of reports and studies to back it up. WHY then, are announcements just starting to be made by Government officials world wide that this is the case…………could it be that this massive SCAM is now in it’s final “development” stages and now all the “scammers” (politicians) are trying to get “ahead of the claims” that will be made that they are “guilty of a criminal conspiracy” bigger than anything ever pulled on modern society?
Circumstances alter cases. If you already have hydro, supplementing it with wind can be a better choice than building other kinds of generation.
Hydro is about the only practical way to store wind power. Sometimes it even makes sense to pump water back up hill. On the other hand: Here’s a link to a great article where someone actually puts pencil to paper. link
In most cases, it would be foolish to rely on wind/hydro as the answer to our energy problems.
A local town just got the bill for replacing a defective gear box – $500,000. After only a few years of operation, they had “saved” less than a tenth that in electricity costs. And they’re not the only ones to discover this problem. Taking down the windmill will cost a huge amount as well.
Doesn’t change the fact that fossil fuels will run out one day and/or that burning them is damaging our environment. When you know you’re in a hole it is wise to stop digging.
However, for the other 90+% of the world that has little or no hydropower, it’s a completely different analysis.
In case you hadn’t noticed, this study was out of the UK.
Martin Lack says
‘Doesn’t change the fact that fossil fuels will run out one day and/or that burning them is damaging our environment. When you know you’re in a hole it is wise to stop digging’
True. We only have enough fossil fuels for a few generations. But a few generations ago the main energy problem was how to shovel out the horse manure from London left behind the coal carts.
A solution will be found, but beware of a snake oil salesman telling you to step up quick to buy the last bottle.
As far as CO2 is concerned, you may believe it is damaging the environment, but the evidence does not seem to support that view
The European record shows that off-shore wind costs in excess of 20-cents (U.S.) per Kwh, at the fence and for the life of the plant. That same record shows central, photovoltaic solar at 40-cents. To both those figures, you can add 8-cents for transmission and distribution fixed costs.
The current U.S. residential electric utility bill averages about 12-cents per Kwh. Of that total, 4-cents is the cost of wholesale electric power at the trading hubs. Do the numbers.
“Drakvag says:
August 6, 2012 at 6:23 am
As a Swede I must say, this article is pure bullshit! 😉
Here in Sweden the costs for wind energy is very low, as most of the wind power plants are built besides, or very close to, where we already have water power plants. So, most of all around costs are already covered by that. It would be very stupid not to build wind energy plants here. Give me a good reason why Sweden should pay a lot of money to other countries for gas, when we can have cheap energy from our own resources? No, I thought so, you couldn’t. So, my bullshit comment was correct.”
You are the BSer mate.
One reason you might not want to use wind power is that it visually and audibl pollutes the environment and is 50% more expensive even in Sweden.
Alan
I will provide a very simple reason why an uncontrollable power generating source is more expensive than its supporters might claim. This applies to ANY uncontrollable power source, not
just wind. As the magnitude of those uncontrollable inputs to the grid grow beyond trivial amounts,
there must exist 100% backup for their power, which comes only from controllable sources. As these uncontrollable sources feed power, it means a conventional plant whose power is being displaced by that uncontrollable power, must produce less power. While proponents of the uncontrollable power technology will point out that fuel is saved, it is also true that power produced by the conventional plants now becomes more expensive, since it has suffered a loss in capacity. This is due to the fact that fuel costs are but part of the costs of operating those displaced plants. In the case of a nuclear plant, barely 10% of its operating costs are from the uranium fuel that it uses. In effect, your operating expenses have almost doubled, but are producing, and selling, the same amount of power. Regardless of the amount of power supplied by uncontrollable sources, it is unlikely that you could ever close down one single controllable power source (conventional plant), since that uncontrollable power can completely disappear. For solar,even if you could guarantee sun every day (perhaps in a desert), that sun only shines and produces appreciable power for 9 or 10 hours or so out of every 24. In non-desert locales, entire days or even weeks can go by without appreciable solar radiation.
Blame Edison and Westinghouse. Both of these made money pushing electricity! No electricity -> no problem. The simplest solution to the use of fossil fuels, and to correct the [supposed] CO2 problem is to use horses and oxen for transportation. All computers should be human powered. Ohhhhhh, that’s right, human’s give off CO2…..
/sarc/
I encountered a pumped storage facility on a bike ride up Guanella Pass out of Georgetown, Colorado. (39°39’19″N 105°42’30″W) It is called the Cabin Creek Generation Station, built in 1964-1967.
Google Earth shows the upper reservoir at 11,235 ft, with the lower reservoir at 9974 ft.
The link to “Do the Math” supplied by commieBob @ur momisugly 7:36 am is a good one to show the scale of the issue.
Big Wind. Politicians and Warmists
Martin Lack says:
“Doesn’t change the fact that fossil fuels will run out one day and/or that burning them is damaging our environment. When you know you’re in a hole it is wise to stop digging.”
Doesn’t it take fossil fuel energy to manufacture and install wind turbines to begin with Martin? In addition, the raw materials extracted from the earth that are needed to make wind turbine components are finite as well, aren’t they?. The rare earth element neodymium immediately comes to mind—and it is quite polluting and destructive to mine them from the Earth. And finally, wind turbines (along with solar panels) leave us with toxic waste that requires disposal at the end of their useful lives. The last I heard, there was no system in place to dispose of that waste—although I could be wrong about that now. Guess we need to stop digging out the raw materials for wind turbines as well, huh?
There never seems to be any end to the number of wind power supporters who are unaware of all
of all of the environmental and other shortcomings that wind turbines suffer from. I just shake my head in dispair whenever I hear from another one.
Dear Dratvag, Congratulation on having a profitable wind industry. I assume of course that this is operating in a free market and that there are no subsidies/mandates for this wind power. So what companies do I buy stock in to get part of these lovely profits? How are the dividends and how have the stock prices done? How much has the cost of electricity dropped as this new “cheap” source entered the market?
On a different note, I once looked at a few numbers from the UK and if one had a few billion pounds laying around and wanted to reduce CO2 emissions, one would get more CO2 reduction by replacing old coal plants with modern coal plants with greater efficiency then spending the money on windmills. But, of course, its not about actually reducing plant food emissions, its about appearances and giving money to the rent seekers. If they were serious, not one more windmill would be built until the coal plants are upgraded to high efficiency coal fired plants.
Drakvag,
How reliable are wind turbines compared to hydro turbines?
Here in Scotland there are some hydro tubines that I understand have been running since they were built in the mid 1920s without any major faults. What percentage of wind turbines have that sort of reliability, or indeed design life?
Reblogged this on The Next Grand Minimum and commented:
CARB has invested in wind power and has made it part of the renewable mandate, thus rate payers will have to accept the increased cost of wind energy, we are a capture audience. The only solution is to get rid of CARB and revoke AB-32. To do they we need an administration change and that if not likely anytime soon, in the mean time CA business become less competitive and will be seeking lower cost business locations.
Here in the US the fact that these windmills are chopping up birds, including raptors, may be our best defense against the expansion of these economic boondogles given the extreme “environmental” indoctrination that has been laid upon the population by the leftist media and educational system.
Drakvag says:
August 6, 2012 at 6:23 am
As a Swede I must say, this article is pure bullshit! 😉
Here in Sweden the costs for wind energy is very low, as most of the wind power plants are built besides, or very close to, where we already have water power plants. So, most of all around costs are already covered by that. It would be very stupid not to build wind energy plants here.
==========
You have a point. With adequate energy storage buffers, the economics of Wind Power become a lot more attractive. The problem is that the only energy storage technology we currently have that is remotely capable of dealing with the eccentricities of wind generated electricity on a large scale is pumped storage. And in its current form, pumped storage probably is not all that great an answer. Energy is lost transmitting electricity to the storage facility even if it is only a short distance. More energy is lost in pumping. After all that work, Water is lost to leakage and evaporation. Yet more energy is lost in generation when the power is eventually needed. And you need a LOT of water — which may not be a problem in Sweden, but is in a lot of places. And not all that much of the world has damable high altitude valleys suitable for pumped storage.
I suspect, but don’t know for sure that the opportunities for pumped storage in Great Britain — which is the region under discussion — are quite limited.
I’d encourage you to spend some time researching actual costs, capacities, problems and benefits of wind power in Sweden. Then write it up. I expect Anthony will post it, and probably the folks at the Oil Drum http://www.theoildrum.com (they aren’t wild about wind power either) would be interested as well.
Among the current darlings of the “clean renewable” crowd we have wind and solar. Both are unreliable in the sense they cannot be made to produce power on demand. Solar is at least reliably unreliable — that is for any given location and date you can calculate the maximum possible output, and know that you will get something less than that. And every day has at least some sunlight. Wind on the other hand is unreliably unreliable, as we can’t even predict a baseline. Wind can go to zero and stay there for days, or get so strong the turbines must be feathered to protect them from damage.
In addition to its “power when the Gods smile” property, wind has the additional problem that the energy density simply isn’t there. If it were, we would still be moving passengers and cargo by sailing ships. We gave that up roughly 150 years ago when fossil fuel efficiency was much lower that we can achieve today. In the same 150 years the wind hasn’t gotten any stronger or steadier.
The best use of solar energy is to grow plants and then eat them. Or feed them to animals and eat the animals. Or grow trees and harvest them for attractive wood so the Gibson company can make nice pretty guitars, which folk-singers can use to protest how capitalism is destroying the world.
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Some of us have been saying this since 2004. Shame it took so long for the scientific and educational establishments in the UK to catch up with reality. It just shows how politicized and out of touch our state-run institutions really are.
Renewable Energy, Our Downfall – an essay….
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/05/25/renewable-energy-–-our-downfall/
P.S. Anthony added the question mark – I was much more certain.
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The Danish Wind Industry has the longest experience record on wind turbines.
Their data shows that CO2 emissions actually increased as a result of leading the charge on using wind power to generate electricity.
But why let facts alter your belief in wind power as an alternative energy. Trust the religion, not the engineering.
Drakvag says: August 6, 2012 at 6:23 am
As a Swede I must say, this article is pure bullshit! 😉
Here in Sweden the costs for wind energy is very low, as most of the wind power plants are built besides, or very close to, where we already have water power plants. So, most or f all around costs are already covered by that. It would be very stupid not to build wind energy plants here.
Do they even account for/ or measure the energy consumption going into the plant, from the grid, to operate the windfarm? Most do not.
yeppers, Wind Energy is so expensive that TXU Energy is giving it away for free from 10:00 PM to 6:00 AM.
Jes don’ know how we can afford it.