It’s not just Wind Turbines that kill wildlife, from the Wall Street Journal:
“A giant solar-power project officially opening this week in the California desert is the first of its kind, and may be among the last, in part because of growing evidence that the technology it uses is killing birds.”
“The $2.2 billion solar farm, which spans over five square miles of federal land southwest of Las Vegas, includes three towers as tall as 40-story buildings. Nearly 350,000 mirrors, each the size of a garage door, reflect sunlight onto boilers atop the towers, creating steam that drives power generators.”
“The owners of the project— NRG Energy Inc., NRG, Google Inc. GOOG and BrightSource Energy Inc., the company that developed the “tower power” solar technology—call the plant a major feat of engineering that can light up about 140,000 homes a year.”
“Ivanpah is among the biggest in a spate of power-plant-sized solar projects that have begun operating in the past two years, spurred in part by a hefty investment tax credit that expires at the end of 2016. Most of them are in California, where state law requires utilities to use renewable sources for a third of the electricity they sell by 2020.”
“Utility-scale solar plants have come under fire for their costs–Ivanpah costs about four times as much as a conventional natural gas-fired plant but will produce far less electricity—and also for the amount of land they require.
That makes for expensive power. Experts have estimated that electricity from giant solar projects will cost at least twice as much as electricity from conventional sources. But neither the utilities that have contracted to buy the power nor state regulators have disclosed what the price will be, only that it will be passed on to electricity customers.”
“The BrightSource system appears to be scorching birds that fly through the intense heat surrounding the towers, which can reach 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
The company, which is based in Oakland, Calif., reported finding dozens of dead birds at the Ivanpah plant over the past several months, while workers were testing the plant before it started operating in December. Some of the dead birds appeared to have singed or burned feathers, according to federal biologists and documents filed with the state Energy Commission.”
“Regulators said they anticipated that some birds would be killed once the Ivanpah plant started operating, but that they didn’t expect so many to die during the plant’s construction and testing. The dead birds included a peregrine falcon, a grebe, two hawks, four nighthawks and a variety of warblers and sparrows. State and federal regulators are overseeing a two-year study of the facility’s effects on birds.”
“The agency also is investigating the deaths of birds, possibly from colliding with structures, found at two other, unrelated solar farms. One of those projects relies on solar panels and the other one uses mirrored troughs. Biologists think some birds may have mistaken the vast shimmering solar arrays at all three installations for a lake and become trapped on the ground after landing.”
Saying things more eloquently than I ever could about this solar plant …
http://joannenova.com.au/2014/02/farewell-knights-of-delingpole-say-it-isnt-so/#comment-1386541
What they need to do is scale this thing down and market it as a carbon free tailgate party turkey cooker. 🙂
It’s $2.2 BILLION bird zapp-o-matic monstrosities like this that should be incontrovertible proof showing CAGW has NOTHING to do with CO2 and saaaaaving the plaaaaanet, but something else very nefarious.
I contacted all the most powerful and influential US Congressmen and Senators about Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTRs) and ONLY Senator Rand Paul and his staff have seriously looked into the matter and remain in contact me.
All the other politicians I contacted just sent auto replies and later sent me e-mails soliciting campaign contributions…. Yeah, right…
The Thorium Age officially starts next year when China flicks the switch on their first LFTR. After that, China will build 100’s of them over the coming decades,……while the US builds $2.2 billion bird zappers…
With the same $2.2 billion spent on this bird zapper, the US could have built their SECOND test LFTR (first one was built in 1965) and would have been well on their way to 100% energy independence at power costing 1/5th that of a bird zappo-matic and 1/2 the cost of natural gas/coal power, with ZERO CO2 emissions and no O3, NH4, N20, SO2, no air/water pollution and no zapped birds, for the next 10,000 years…
The upside is that China’s LFTR rollout will force the US and other Western nations to also implement LFTRs or risk economic suicide, or risk a second and much larger wave of manufacturing move to China to take advantage cheap, unlimited and sustainable power.
Politicians are such clueless scoundrels.
CD (@CD153) says:
February 13, 2014 at 7:36 pm
Could this happen at the site of this solar project?
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Yes.
Hmmm … as a hedge there can be a ‘play’; the economics of natural gas would seem to be subject to swings in market pricing and physical availability/distribution (it must always be flowing in the system), whereas Nuclear does not have this day-to-day volatility or reliance on a pipeline system.
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wws says: February 13, 2014 at 4:11 pm
What a magnificent irony – in terms of wildlife preservation, Oil and Gas development is actually the most environmentally friendly source of large scale energy production available!
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Yep….. and it was Kerosene that saved the whale too…. But you won’t hear Greenpeace acknowledging those kind of facts.
Inre: Thorium reactors in China.
If wikipedia is correct, India is bringing thorium reactors online right now.
India
“India’s government is developing up to 62, mostly thorium reactors, which it expects to be operational by 2025. It is the “only country in the world with a detailed, funded, government-approved plan” to focus on thorium-based nuclear power. The country currently gets under 3% of its electricity from nuclear power, relying for the rest on coal and oil imports. It expects to produce around 25% of its electricity from nuclear power.[15]:144 In 2009 the chairman of the Indian Atomic Energy Commission said that India has a “long-term objective goal of becoming energy-independent based on its vast thorium resources.”[39][40]
In late June 2012, India announced that their “first commercial fast reactor” was near completion making India the most advanced country in thorium research.” We have huge reserves of thorium. The challenge is to develop technology for converting this to fissile material,” stated their former Chairman of India’s Atomic Energy Commission.[41] That vision of using thorium in place of uranium was set out in the 1950s by physicist Homi Bhabha.[42][43] India’s first commercial fast breeder reactor — the 500 MWe Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor (PFBR) — is approaching completion at the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research, Kalpakkam, Tamil Nadu.”
China
At the 2011 annual conference of the Chinese Academy of Sciences it was announced that “China has initiated a research and development project in thorium molten-salt reactor technology.”[35] In addition, Dr. Jiang Mianheng, son of China’s former leader Jiang Zemin, led a thorium delegation in non-disclosure talks at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Tennessee, and by late 2013 China had officially partnered with Oak Ridge to aid China in its own development. The World Nuclear Association notes that the China Academy of Sciences in January 2011 announced its R&D program, “claiming to have the world’s largest national effort on it, hoping to obtain full intellectual property rights on the technology.” According to Martin, “China has made clear its intention to go it alone,” adding that China already has a monopoly over most of the world’s rare earth minerals.[15]:157[19]
In early 2012, it was reported that China, using components produced by the West and Russia, planned to build two prototype thorium molten salt reactors by 2015, and had budgeted the project at $400 million and requiring 400 workers.”[15]:157 China also finalized an agreement with a Canadian nuclear technology company to develop improved CANDU reactors using thorium and uranium as a fuel.[38]
ref: wikipedia, emph added
Comment: thorium is being developed in India. I think this issue is another example of China’s economic and technological power being lionized in the press, when it is probably in worse condition than is reported.
You mean trees (for turpentine) – right? And coal (coal oil)? But whales? What was available before ‘oil’ was struck? Why, these compounds:
Camphene — turpentine and camphor oil without alcohol / not as bright as burning fluid
Burning fluid — combinations of alcohol, turpentine and camphor oil – bright, sweet smelling
Lard oil — low quality, smelly
Coal oil — sooty, smelly, low quality, the original “kerosene”
But whale oil? C’mon …
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From: Henry Ford, Charles Kettering and the fuel of the future –
– a brief except from a long piece:
– – – – – – – –
Ethyl Alcohol Fuel before the Discovery of Petroleum
The history of energy is loaded with inaccuracies and myths. One myth is that Edwin Drake’s first oil well, drilled in Pennsylvania in 1859, arrived in the nick of time to replace a rapidly dwindling supply of whale oil.
Actually, as we will see, a variety of lamp fuels were common in the U.S. and Europe through the 19th and early 20th centuries. These fuels offered the most logical starting point in the search for portable liquid fuels which inventors would use in the internal combustion engine.
Lamp fuels included all kinds of vegetable oils (castor, rapeseed, peanut); animal oils (especially whale oil and tallow from beef or pork,); refined turpentine from pine trees; and alcohols, especially wood alcohol (methanol or methyl alcohol) and grain alcohol (ethanol or ethyl alcohol). The most popular fuel in the U.S. before petroleum was a blend of alcohol and turpentine called “camphene” or simply “burning fluid.”
The”whale oil myth,” appears in many places, most recently in the history of the oil industry, The Prize, which hailed kerosene as “the new light which pushed back the night and extended the working day.”
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Bolding mine.
(A formatting redo)
From: Henry Ford, Charles Kettering and the fuel of the future –
– a brief except from a long piece:
– – – – – – – –
Ethyl Alcohol Fuel before the Discovery of Petroleum
The history of energy is loaded with inaccuracies and myths. One myth is that Edwin Drake’s first oil well, drilled in Pennsylvania in 1859, arrived in the nick of time to replace a rapidly dwindling supply of whale oil.
Actually, as we will see, a variety of lamp fuels were common in the U.S. and Europe through the 19th and early 20th centuries. These fuels offered the most logical starting point in the search for portable liquid fuels which inventors would use in the internal combustion engine.
Lamp fuels included all kinds of vegetable oils (castor, rapeseed, peanut); animal oils (especially whale oil and tallow from beef or pork,); refined turpentine from pine trees; and alcohols, especially wood alcohol (methanol or methyl alcohol) and grain alcohol (ethanol or ethyl alcohol). The most popular fuel in the U.S. before petroleum was a blend of alcohol and turpentine called “camphene” or simply “burning fluid.”
The”whale oil myth,” appears in many places, most recently in the history of the oil industry, The Prize, which hailed kerosene as “the new light which pushed back the night and extended the working day.”
– – – – – – – –
Bolding mine.
Zeke says:
February 13, 2014 at 8:33 pm
Inre: Thorium reactors in China.
If wikipedia is correct, India is bringing thorium reactors online right now.
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China is the only country that will soon be running LFTRs.
Other countries are burning thorium, but these are simply modified Light Water Reactors using solid fuel that still require steam to operate at 70+ atmospheres of pressure, which is inherently dangerous.
LFTRs work at single atmospheric pressure, have one safety mechanism based on gravity (which always works), runs gas powered generators instead of steam so they can even be built in desert areas, produce 200 times less nuclear waste, turns 99% of thorium into energy (while Light Water Reactors–including those burning thorium–turn only 0.5%~1% of solid nuclear fuel into energy before Xenon gas degradation requires reprocessing, LFTRs create their own neutron source (U233) in the process of burning thorium (a really neat trick) so they don’t require any additional U233 once switched on, etc.
In full disclosure, I live about 150 miles away from the Fukushima Nuclear Plant meltdown area, so I’m admittedly biased against LWRs. I realize there are MUCH better LWRs designs now compared to the Fukushima plant, but carrying around a Iodine pill in your shirt pocket for 2 months after the Fukushima accident does tend to make you biased…
LFTRs are simply much more elegant in design and produce the cheapest, safest, cleanest form of nuclear energy available. There just doesn’t seem to be a need for other types of LWRs when there is are only disadvantages in doing so.
The only “disadvantage” of LFTRs is that it is much more difficult to create fissile material to build nuclear bombs, but this is an advantage in my view…
More on the ‘hedge’ against rising natural gas costs and related – Fair use excerpt for discussion purposes and to whet appetites to read the post at the link below:
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Nuclear Energy Less Risky Than Natural Gas
Posted August 4, 2013 by Rod Adams
…
One of the major reasons that nuclear plants are not flying off of the shelves is that rate-regulated utilities do not pay the cost of buying fuel. They have convinced public service commissions that establish their rates that they have no control over variable fuel costs; as a result, the money that they pay for fuel is considered to be a direct “pass through” to customers.
…
Fortunately, there are a few rate-regulated utilities that are run by devoted engineers or service-oriented leaders. They are not dominated by financial specialists who cannot see past their green eyeshades. Those companies (Southern Company, TVA, and SCANA) have accepted the responsibility of providing the best possible service to their customers over the long term.
Each one of them have done the math and run the models, including the cost of fuel, even if they are legally allowed to pass that cost on to their customers. Their analysis has been thoroughly reviewed by regulatory authorities. The companies and their regulators have concluded that their investment will protect customers from the risk of rapidly rising monthly bills during the 60 (or longer) life of the power plants.
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At Ivanpah a bunch of desert turtles had to be relocated at a cost of ~$50,000 per turtle. Apparently there was only one similar plant in quasi-long term operation in Spain. So why didn’t they build any more there?/ha ha
Glennez makes the excellent point that a reasonably well educated and rational person can deduce the wisdom of a project like Ivanpah on the back of a napkin in 15 minutes and know with certainty that it is folly. An engineer friend of mine did some preliminary work on another solar thermal scheme, backed by the DOE, using sterling engines and miles upon miles of high pressure stainless tubing with even poorer capital cost to capacity ratios.
Trying to use any form of diffuse energy as a source for a national grid is a fool’s errand.
The hubris of the progressive bureaucrat politician is boundless. These bastards assume that their bright ideas just need an infusion of money to overcome the ignorance of the common man,
and they cause billions of borrowed tax dollars to be wasted in unproductive efforts, lowering everyone else’s standard of living. When Ivanpah is shut down because it can’t cover it’s operating costs (as other solar thermal plants have preceding it), there will be no consequences for these people, the will continue on to other debacles without remorse and collect their fat pensions.
John Ratcliffe says:
February 13, 2014 at 4:13 pm
Whatever sunlight they collect during the day at Ivanpah, they store up and beam back up at night from the Luxor.
Impressive pictures of the planthere: http://www.flickr.com/photos/brightsourceenergy/sets/72157633434942709/show/. The plant is an ordinary steam plant that will not store heat long into the night. That means that it will be a known rate of change in the power output daily. This should be acommodated without too much trouble since it is in the desert. It is too expensive. $1.6 from the Federal Government is a lot. It is sad for the birds, but the coyotes will get some free meals and learn quickly to come to eat sometime after 3 PM. They have done a nice job of not destroying the natural landscape, so there will be lots of wildlife there. It should be interesting to watch.
SAMURAI says:
February 13, 2014 at 8:14 pm
It’s a different kind of power they want. They can’t actually solve problems and retain power. They can’t give us what we need to be free, or they don’t rule.
Re SKC says: February 13, 2014 at 7:01 pm
and
LamontT says: February 13, 2014 at 7:15 pm
From what I observed several years ago after a wet season, the playa flooding that could be seen from the I-15 freeway was mostly to the east of the freeway. However, the solar arrays west of the freeway are located on what looks like an alluvial fan. Flooding would be in the form of high velocity flows coming out of the mountain canyons to the west. Some examples:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yCnQuILmsM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVBivki-hss
FEMA:
http://www.fema.gov/national-flood-insurance-program/alluvial-fan-flooding
Incidentally, the Mountain Pass rare earth deposits (for solar panels) are in those mountains to the west.
Another example of putting the Mental back in Environmental.
Another successful progressive policy, achieving the exact opposite to what they promised the paying public at 5X the cost.
And sensible people who told them the obvious, are saboteurs .
Democrat-Speak.
Yes Whale oil for lighting
Not a myth but reality
http://www.ramshornstudio.com/early_lighting_6.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whale_oil
http://www.sjvgeology.org/history/whales.html
http://www.wilsonmuseum.org/bulletins/summer2003_2.html
Don’t fall for the myths created by the biofuel websites subsidized with your tax dollars.
Whale oil was expensive and mostly used by the rich because it was clean and brighter.
Dirk Pitt says:
February 13, 2014 at 5:11 pm
I’ve tried (unsuccessfully) to find out what is the installed capacity (in MW) of this plant alone. I would like to compare the cost of a MW to nuclear, coal, nat-gas, or hydro. $2.2B seems extremely steep. For what output?
Anyone having this information?
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There are some here in comment #25.1 by TonyfromOZ
http://joannenova.com.au/2014/02/farewell-knights-of-delingpole-say-it-isnt-so/#comment-1386541
So it costs five times the cost to build, based on theoretical peak output, ignoring dust, mal alignment etc, or 25 times the costs based on average output. It produces power at 5 times the cost of coal, ignoring the cost of a back up generator, which takes it to around ten times the cost. What a bargain!
I don’t get something, and I don’t see anybody commenting on it.
Where in the desert do they get all the water to produce all that steam?
Do they collect the steam, and condense it somehow?
Their idea doesn’t seem as bright as their mirrors, in Mohave-like conditions.
Smoke and mirrors. $1600000000.
The birds a really a non issue, a lot more die flying into bay windows, a lot more. The point is if solar is an economical source of power fine. But it is not. I have no problem with the government giving incentives for 5,10, years to a new promising new power source but solar has be subsidied for way to long It is and most likely will never be economical. If you truly green and want a zero CO2 emitter power source that will last for ever you need to support nuclear. In the mean time coal and gas work quite well as CAGW is totally…. well you know what I was going to say.
Well, I guess the first key question is whether costs will come down to the cost of conventional power if manufacturing scale-up reduces the costs of construction radically or not. The second is whether you can site mirrors in a 3-D configuration to reduce the land required. The third is whether the energy capture technology is at its natural limit or can be improved further also.
Upon those three things, plus maybe a couple of others, will determine whether this technology is already overtaken by events or whether it is still in the Moore’s law phase of technology improvement.