By Steve Goreham
Originally published in Communities Digital News.
The global energy outlook has changed radically in just six years. President Obama was elected in 2008 by voters who believed we were running out of oil and gas, that climate change needed to be halted, and that renewables were the energy source of the near future. But an unexpected transformation of energy markets and politics may instead make 2014 the year of peak renewables.
In December of 2007, former Vice President Al Gore shared the Nobel Peace Prize for work on man-made climate change, leading an international crusade to halt global warming. In June, 2008 after securing a majority of primary delegates, candidate Barack Obama stated, “…this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal…” Climate activists looked to the 2009 Copenhagen Climate Conference as the next major step to control greenhouse gas emissions.
The price of crude oil hit $145 per barrel in June, 2008. The International Energy Agency and other organizations declared that we were at peak oil, forecasting a decline in global production. Many claimed that the world was running out of hydrocarbon energy.
Driven by the twin demons of global warming and peak oil, world governments clamored to support renewables. Twenty years of subsidies, tax-breaks, feed-in tariffs, and mandates resulted in an explosion of renewable energy installations. The Renewable Energy Index (RENIXX) of the world’s 30 top renewable energy companies soared to over 1,800.
Tens of thousands of wind turbine towers were installed, totaling more than 200,000 windmills worldwide by the end of 2012. Germany led the world with more than one million rooftop solar installations. Forty percent of the US corn crop was converted to ethanol vehicle fuel.
But at the same time, an unexpected energy revolution was underway. Using good old Yankee ingenuity, the US oil and gas industry discovered how to produce oil and natural gas from shale. With hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, vast quantities of hydrocarbon resources became available from shale fields in Texas, North Dakota, and Pennsylvania.
From 2008 to 2013, US petroleum production soared 50 percent. US natural gas production rose 34 percent from a 2005 low. Russia, China, Ukraine, Turkey, and more than ten nations in Europe began issuing permits for hydraulic fracturing. The dragon of peak oil and gas was slain.
In 2009, the ideology of Climatism, the belief that humans were causing dangerous global warming, came under serious attack. In November, emails were released from top climate scientists at the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom, an incident christened Climategate. The communications showed bias, manipulation of data, avoidance of freedom of information requests, and efforts to subvert the peer-review process, all to further the cause of man-made climate change.
One month later, the Copenhagen Climate Conference failed to agree on a successor climate treaty to the Kyoto Protocol. Failures at United Nations conferences at Cancun (2010), Durban (2011), Doha (2012), and Warsaw (2013) followed. Canada, Japan, Russia, and the United States announced that they would not participate in an extension of the Kyoto Protocol.
Major climate legislation faltered across the world. Cap and trade failed in Congress in 2009, with growing opposition from the Republican Party. The price of carbon permits in the European Emissions Trading System crashed in April 2013 when the European Union voted not to support the permit price. Australia elected Prime Minister Tony Abbott in the fall of 2013 on a platform of scrapping the nation’s carbon tax.
Europeans discovered that subsidy support for renewables was unsustainable. Subsidy obligations soared in Germany to over $140 billion and in Spain to over $34 billion by 2013. Renewable subsidies produced the world’s highest electricity rates in Denmark and Germany. Electricity and natural gas prices in Europe rose to double those of the United States.
Worried about bloated budgets, declining industrial competitiveness, and citizen backlash, European nations have been retreating from green energy for the last four years. Spain slashed solar subsidies in 2009 and photovoltaic sales fell 80 percent in a single year. Germany cut subsidies in 2011 and 2012 and the number of jobs in the German solar industry dropped by 50 percent. Renewable subsidy cuts in the Czech Republic, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, and the United Kingdom added to the cascade. The RENIXX Renewable Energy Index fell below 200 in 2012, down 90 percent from the 2008 peak.
Once a climate change leader, Germany turned to coal after the 2012 decision to close nuclear power plants. Coal now provides more than 50 percent of Germany’s electricity and 23 new coal-fired power plants are planned. Global energy from coal has grown by 4.4 percent per year over the last ten years.
Spending on renewables is in decline. From a record $318 billion in 2011, world renewable energy spending fell to $280 billion in 2012 and then fell again to $254 billion in 2013, according to Bloomberg. The biggest drop occurred in Europe, where investment plummeted 41 percent last year. The 2013 expiration of the US Production Tax Credit for wind energy will continue the downward momentum.
Today, wind and solar provide less than one percent of global energy. While these sources will continue to grow, it’s likely they will deliver only a tiny amount of the world’s energy for decades to come. Renewable energy output may have peaked, at least as a percentage of global energy production.
Steve Goreham is Executive Director of the Climate Science Coalition of America and author of the book The Mad, Mad, Mad World of Climatism: Mankind and Climate Change Mania.
Errata; Changing 3rd sentence to: “Are you ‘presuming’ stability by, perhaps, the simple lack of an observed ‘collapse’ attributed to any reasons connected to stability?”
Roger Sowell,
Thanks for a well thought out response.
I think the problem is just what the article says:
“…the ideology of Climatism, the belief that humans were causing dangerous global warming…”
If there was a crisis, or even if the rise in CO2 caused any measurable global warming, then maybe there would be a reason to change over to windmills. But as we know, Planet Earth has been telling us very clearly, and for a long time now, that the “carbon” scare is nonsense.
That being the case, the original rationale for windmills is not there. It turns out that the power we have been getting from fossil fuels is just fine, with no real downside. [Greenies, relax. I know that a comment like that launches an emotional reaction in you. But if you’re going to argue that there is global harm from burning coal, you will have to provide verifiable evidence. Otherwise I will remind you that since CO2 does not cause any measurable harm, it should be considered “harmless”.]
We should be using the most efficient power source — not an extremely inefficient source like windmills.
Does that make sense?
Roger has stooped to ad hominem attack and a complete refusal to address detailed, sourced comments from me and others … a sure mark that he is unable to substantiate his positions (which are exceeding short on documentation and sources) nor able to defend against the claims I and otherz have made.
Ridicule and denigration are the marks of someone who is unable to intelligently discuss and support their positions Roger.
It makes you look juvenile and ignorant in your response:
“futile arguments”
“low-information commenters”
“religious-style belief”
“bleating sheep”
“religious-style”
Then, you make broad, specious statements, mostly devoid of ANY sources or supporting proof – claiming them as fact – that are anything but, as I have repeatedly shown. A single example is your statements about the Mass/RI Offshore wind lease – that YOU brought up:
I posted the details of the wind lease you noted …. that the winner of that lease, Deep Wind, will someday install appx 200 turbines with 1,000 MW name plate capacity. In the entire 165,000 acre lease area they will only install 1,000 MW – not the 3,400 MW claimed available. And theirs was the BEST of 8 bidders.
I also noted your claim about “MIT storage” being installed were ridiculous – 100% completely unsupported by the facts. The MIT storage spheres operate at depths of 400-750 meters, 1200 to 2,300 feet. The waters across the entire lease area are from 90 to 130 FEET, 30 to 40 meters. Not only WON’T the MIT spheres work in this shallow water, they would stick OUT of the water in many areas.
You lecture about engineering, and looking at facts … yet despite all your self proclaimed expertise, in your rush to denigrate others you show you are literally clueless about your own claims. I understand the engineering very well. And I actually researched the real facts Roger, including reading the MIT paper on the sphere technology. I went and obtained the Nautical charts along with copies of the leases and maps of lease areas.
Clearly you did NONE of this simple basic research – you read an MIT April 2013 press release which says:
This was not even their work. They basically stole it from graduate student Gregory Fennel’s Master’s thesis dated May 2011. Slocum was the Thesis Supervisor – who certified Fennel’s highly detailed thesis paper.
This “sphere storage” is in no way proven – its a mere pipe dream idea at present – nothing more. Yet you have it providing the solution to wind power intermittency problems – despite that even the appear notes it can at best provide “several” hours of back up despite its huge costs. And that is assuming it actually works.
Just like you ignored the depth issue in the lease area (a lack of necessary depth) … so too did you completely ignore the fact that any wind turbine installed in an area where the MIT sphere storage would work (1200-2300 feet deep) would require a floating platform … and that I showed there a total of TWO deep water floating platforms (in 45-100 meter depths only) in the WORLD … 0.1% of all off shore wind is on a floating platform.
So neither the sphere or any other storage technology exists today at all, And floating deep water turbine platforms are all but non-existent as well. A floating platform for the massive 5 MW turbines Deep Wind plans for the MA/RI lease area is a huge technological challenge.
So much for your “proven storage technology” and your claims the Mass/RI leases were some massive savior.
Then there is your denigrating juvenile and completely unsourced attack on my comments regarding Germany’s actual emissions experience.
You posted a link to an NREL “study” that attempted to model different scenarios in Iowa. I posted a link to the Bloomberg story with direct quotes from officials in Germany’s Environmental Ministry – those responsible for energy in Germany, and their shift to solar.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-28/merkel-s-green-shift-backfires-as-german-pollution-jumps.html
And 2012 saw similar increases according to the Environmental Administrator:
http://www.focus.de/wissen/klima/erfuellung-der-klimaziele-gefaehrdet-co2-emissionen-in-deutschland-steigen-wieder_aid_923133.html
Hard quotes and facts … not a “study”.
Same thing with my levelized construction costs data. I presented data directly from the US Energy Information Agency. I included a direct link to the documents from them. I aslo provided a seprate link to an earlier WUWT article than looked at Maryland offshore wind which confirmed the EIA costs numbers.
Roger blathers about some alleged California “CEC” numbers yet never posts a link to the data. All too typical.
I hate people who refuse to engage and support their claims. I hate people like that even more, who denigrate and demean anyone who disagrees with them, and who ignore documented research and facts when they don’t conform to their position or world view.
I do detailed research on my positions and claims. I support everything with documented sources and references so people can confirm for themselves. I expect those like Roger to at least make a minimal effort to support their claims. And to engage in the discussion when rebutted – and support their claims.
ERCOT Wind Power Mar. 6, 2014, as of 19:10 pm CST
Spent all day below 2000 MW,
500 MW below projections
Low point of the day at 300 MW @ur momisugly 14:00
Projected to rise from 3000 to 6000 MW from 20:00 to 00:00.
http://www.ercot.com/content/cdr/html/CURRENT_DAYCOP_HSL.html?uniquenessFactor=1393994301992
I found the ERCOT Wind Integration Report Archive:
http://www.ercot.com/gridinfo/generation/windintegration/index.html
Here is the Wind Integration Report for January 29, 2014.
Most of the report is just one day. But at the bottom of the PDF, they have a chart of the past week, Total Load and Wind (rescaled) so that what can be seen is how the peak wind and peak load do and do not match.
I chose this date because it was the second day of state wide freezing weather and high demand. January 24 was a day of freezing rain in Houston making the “flyways” on the freeways skating rinks until noon.
Houston TranStar Traffic Map at 10:43am. Note all the closures as well as the red slow and stopped traffic.
The peak loads this week were 55,000 MW about 10 am 1/24 with wind at a relative low about 1,900 MW, and 10am 1/29 with load at 56,100 MW and wind at about 3,000 MW (rising from 1,000 MW at midnight to 8,600 MW at 23:59). ERCOT has about 11,000 MW of installed wind capacity in Feb. 2014.
WSJ: March 10, 2014, A6. Pacific Draws Green-Energy Rush (paywalled)
On offshore wind, wave energy. Coos Bay.
Principle Power, 6MW, floating turbines.
“could have five massive turbines spinning by the summer of 2017” “needs to raise capital — as much as $200 million, those familiar with the project estimate–and submit a business plan.” [In that order??]
Ocean Power Technologies Inc. buoy wave generators. $6 million prototype. Initial buoy in 2015, nine more by 2017. No estimate on power.
M3 Wave LLC, pressure driven device on the ocean floor, “as soon as August” ‘Its basically a giant bladder inside a box, pressure goes through a pipe and spins a turbine.’ [on the ocean floor… maintenance $$] $200K to deploy. No estimate of power.
Resolute Marine Energy. rows of panels that rock with the waves. [I want to see the EIS on that]. No estimate of cost or power. “would allow prospective customers to view the technology as a ‘sales tool.'”
US Tax Dollars “At Work”
PROJECT SELECTIONS FOR MARINE AND HYDROKINETIC ENERGY TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT (PDF 6 pgs, catalog of grants for about 30 projects)
http://www.eere.energy.gov/pdfs/project_selections_mhk_release.pdf
Still have not found any estimate of power for the cost. Water depth 10-40 m. The power output is a function of wave height, orientation, and choosing the distance between bladders at 1/2 the predominant wave length.
Geospatial Analysis of Technical and Economic Suitability for Renewable Ocean Energy Development on Washington’s Outer Coast
US DOE PNNL-22554 June 2013
http://www.msp.wa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/PNNL_EnergySuitability_Final-Report.pdf
Quite superficial qualitative scoring of various proposals. No cost information.
@ur momisugly dbstealey, re March 6 at 3:15 pm,
“. . .the “carbon” scare is nonsense.”
I completely agree.
“That being the case, the original rationale for windmills is not there.”
Wide use of commercial-scale windturbines and electric power from them came about after the Arab oil embargo of the early 1970s when the price of oil increased many-fold. For a time, the price of natural gas also increased along with oil. Also at that time, a fairly good percentage (around 20 percent) of electric power was generated by burning fuel oil. Those oil-burning plants were uneconomic with the higher price of oil and were shut down. The oil-burning power plants were replaced almost on a one-for-one basis (MW for MW) by nuclear power plants. At the same time, wind energy was advanced as a way to generate electricity and not be at the mercy of foreign countries that could arbitrarily increase the price of oil. The US government funded research and development of several wind turbine systems, and provided subsidies in various forms to nurse the new industry.
see e.g. http://www.iowaenergycenter.org/wind-energy-manual/history-of-wind-energy/
It has only been recently, to my knowledge, that wind power advocates have added “carbon-free energy” to the list of reasons to support wind power. I know it was never mentioned in the 1970s. The original impetus was to keep the cost of electricity down as it was feared that natural gas would run out, with its price climbing to exorbitant levels. President Jimmy Carter actually told the nation that we were running out of natural gas. He was wrong, of course.
” It turns out that the power we have been getting from fossil fuels is just fine, with no real downside. “
I agree. In fact, research and development in gas turbine technology and combined cycle systems now allows a combined cycle gas turbine power plant to achieve 60 percent thermal efficiency and very low cooling water consumption at reasonable capital cost.
“We should be using the most efficient power source — not an extremely inefficient source like windmills.
Does that make sense?”
Here, I disagree. Efficiency should be only a small part of the decision process. The proper criteria for choosing a power generation method should be lowest cost to the consumer, safety, and reliability. In fact, those three criteria are mandated by law in most states, definitely so in California. Lowest cost is moderated by the need to allow a reasonable return on investment for the utility. California actually has a fourth criterion, low impact on the environment which means low CO2 emissions in that context.
It turns out that wind energy now plays a role in keeping natural gas prices down, as the power from windturbines reduces the demand for natural gas in power plants. As more offshore windturbines are brought on-line, the decrease in natural gas demand will coincide with peak power periods since the offshore wind typically blows strongest in the late afternoons. As a long-time sailor, I can attest to that fact.
[]
Re wind energy forcing nuclear power plants to shut down because they cannot compete economically, this from the Chicago Tribune newspaper:
“Shutting down nuclear generators would have been unthinkable less than a decade ago. They were once the most profitable form of generated power. But since then, cheap natural gas and a boom in wind power have driven down electricity prices, eroding nuclear power’s profits. (emphasis added)
. . . As . . . fossil fuel costs came down substantially from those peaks five years ago, nuclear has lost a lot of its cost advantage when you consider the amount of capital investment it requires.
The Tribune analyzed hourly power prices that Exelon’s reactors in Illinois received over six years and determined the plants haven’t made enough money to cover operating and ongoing capital costs since 2008.”
source: http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-exelon-closing-nuclear-plants-0308-biz-20140309,0,7718140.story
That’s dead wrong: The wind-political-academic industry is destroying gas-fired power plants by their daily/hourly start-restart cycles as the wind turbines create power momentarily, then trip off again only a few minutes later. These rapid, uncontrollable heat-up/cooldown rates across burners, 2 and 3 inch thick compressor cylinders, compressor and turbine blades, and turbine shafts is breaking the units. Fatigue cracks propagate BECAUSE of these wind-required rapid startup and subsequent shutdowns. Rapid gain and loss of wind power KILLS the turbines that otherwise would last for 5-7-9 years. Start them, run them, keep them at power? No fatigue. No failures.
Run them at off-peak power “just in case”? Your enviro’s penalize the companies BECAUSE they are not running at efficient levels, and so have more pollutants released and much, much lower efficiencies.
Now, they are getting 18 months to 2 years and inspections show the exhaust and compressor sections are cracking and shedding metal around the turbine bearings and exhaust shields.
Mr. Sowell. Mister Sowell! MISTER SOWELL!!
(dousing Sowell with a bucket of cold water) —
Sowell! SNAP OUT OF IT. {no response — keeps right on with his anti-nuclear — pro windmill arguing}
Is it really possible that you simply CAN-not comprehend what all the fine scientists (no, I’m not including myself there) have been trying to tell you for DAYS above? Can you not “hear” ANYTHING they are saying to you?
Just FYI (just in case you can “hear” me):
Do you realize how pitiful you now appear? Ay yai yai, Mr. Sowell. I’m not being sarcastic here. If you literally cannot take in the information you’re being presented with, then, I’m SO SORRY. I don’t think you are another D. C–tt-on, pushing weird stuff mainly to get attention. I think you are terribly in earnest and deeply worried about nuclear power. And that is too bad.
At this point, scientists such as Stephen Rasey and _Jim and davidmhoffer and A. Scott and Ric Werme and R. A. Cook are, almost certainly, correcting your errors only to prevent you from misleading others.
I would say, “Get help,” but you likely do not think you need any. Sigh. I WILL (I have already), even though you will scorn it, pray for you. THAT is real.
With sincere sympathy,
Janice
@ur momisugly RACookPE1978 at March 10, 2014 at 6:33 pm
You cannot be serious with your statements above. (and where are the WUWT-police, demanding supporting “evidence” or links to back up the naked assertions? but, I digress…)
You wrote: “ That’s dead wrong: The wind-political-academic industry is destroying gas-fired power plants by their daily/hourly start-restart cycles as the wind turbines create power momentarily, then trip off again only a few minutes later. These rapid, uncontrollable heat-up/cooldown rates across burners, 2 and 3 inch thick compressor cylinders, compressor and turbine blades, and turbine shafts is breaking the units. Fatigue cracks propagate BECAUSE of these wind-required rapid startup and subsequent shutdowns. Rapid gain and loss of wind power KILLS the turbines that otherwise would last for 5-7-9 years. Start them, run them, keep them at power? No fatigue. No failures.”
I suppose you have real-world evidence of this? Or are you making stuff up? The fact is that wind energy is not much different than the ever-changing loads on utility grids. Or, do you suggest that the entire grid is so fragile that, using California as an example, a one percent reduction in grid input due to a few wind turbines ceasing to generate will cause power plants to cycle? That is beyond belief.
Now, you might have a point if there was just ONE giant wind turbine, on a very small grid where the wind output was a substantial fraction of the total grid energy. Can you produce such evidence?
Dear Janice Moore: thank you SO MUCH for your (fake) heartfelt concern. Perhaps you enjoy seeing the poor and elderly paying outrageous amounts for their electric bills, knowing that there are far more economic ways to produce that electricity? Do you also enjoy seeing businesses and industry close shop and move to other areas because of the high cost of nuclear-based electricity?
You clearly think I am wrong on all this. Perhaps you also think my clients over more than 40 years were wrong in retaining my services and listening to my advice, too. (actually, my former and current clients get quite a kick out of reading the exchanges on WUWT and some other sites where such as you cast aspersions. Quite entertaining for them, and for me! So, a big thank you from all of us… but I digress again)
Without honking my own horn too much, I am proud to say that my feeble efforts played a small but crucial role in stopping the proposed nuclear power plant expansion at the South Texas Nuclear Project near Victoria, in South Texas. That was a decision taken by sober men and women, who had their eyes opened to the shenanigans trying to be put past them by the pro-nuclear group.
Perhaps your heroes (named by you above) should step in and persuade the stakeholders of the error of their ways. You will have to merely accomplish the following: 1) show that the proposed two new reactors can be built on-time and at less than $10 billion, 2) show that the drought being experienced in Texas will not be made worse by the nuclear plant consuming and evaporating the river water. The river that flows past their towns and farms and cannot be touched by the citizens for any use whatsoever, not drinking, not watering livestock, not any use. Mind you, this is South Texas, where natural gas is plentiful and new natural gas power plants provide power for a fraction of the cost of a nuclear power plant. Go ahead, and good luck with that.
My best to you, please keep the entertainment coming!
Oh, just one more thing, Janice Moore. That South Texas Nuclear Plant is very near to some of the best off-shore wind in the entire Gulf of Mexico – from about Houston on south to Brownsville. The nuclear plant, and its proposed expansion (if it is ever built) will have to try to compete with the power produced by off-shore wind. The nuclear proponents down there all are keenly aware of this and wanted no part of the proposed expansion. You see, they actually want a power plant that makes a profit, not one that loses millions of dollars each and every month.
Perhaps you and your much-adored cadre of competents (see above for your list) can show the stakeholders the error of their ways.
Good luck with that, too.
All my best to you.
Actually, I mis-wrote that part above. The city’s planners and officials are keenly aware of the future of off-shore wind energy, and they decided not to invest in the proposed nuclear plant expansion. The nuclear proponents of course wanted the project to proceed.
Mea culpa.
Dear Mr. Sowell,
I DID joke around in the beginning. I’m sorry that that made my concern come off as “fake” to you. Please know that my concern is genuine. I have a bad habit of teasing people some of whom I should just leave alone. I believe, now, that you are full of genuine fear about nuclear power and that you sincerely believe wholeheartedly in wind power.
You are, apparently, quite complacent and at peace with yourself. That is, however much I am convinced that your positions are mistaken, a good thing. Given what I believe to be true of you, I don’t want you to be miserable. From now on I’ll just try to accord you all the dignity and respect you deserve, for I really believe that you cannot help your rudeness and your dismissive disregard toward the scientists above. I will try to feel for you the compassion you very much need. I now realize that I have been, to some degree, transferring my frustration about a person (or persons) in my own life (or that of a good friend) whose conversational style is similar to yours. That was wrong of me.
No, I can’t admire you as I do those listed above and as I do many others on WUWT. I am glad that that does not trouble you. It really shouldn’t, you know. What Janice thinks of you is pretty unimportant in the scheme of things.
With prayers and hoping you can find peace,
Janice
1. Yes, I have specific and credible (eyewitness evidence, personal evidence that I have witnessed and repaired, and multiple (hundreds of) unit records of such cracks and fatigue failures) as “evidence” of these cracks, failures, and unit degradation. That you are not cleared to view such evidence does not trouble me. I “know” me and my witnesses and their data, and I have more trust in these accounts than in ANY so-called “scientific pal-reviewed” prejudiced papers paid for by the government-paid-laboratories and universities.
As a doubting Thomas once said, “I have put my fingers in the holes, and I have put my hand through the cracks and touched the metal and the blades, and I have stood inside the turbines and seen daylight through the holes and cracks and fatigue points, and thus I know.” Now, whether “you” believe or not is irrelevant to the truth of the issue. “I” don’t really care whether you chose to believe these events or not. Your belief does not change their veracity, and the propaganda of the self-serving and self-paying tax-assisted wind energy groups addressed to self-serving politicians is irrelevant to the accuracy of my statements.
I know these events to be true because I have seen them, felt them, and fixed them.
2. A cold front blowing through north Texas at 45 miles per hour will generate a good bit of power for 6-10 hours. THEN IT IS GONE. 20 hours later, there is NO energy being produced from wind, because the back side of a cold front is a persistent high-pressure system of clear skies and low winds for 4-5 days. Then, after 4-5 days, clouds return, some mild winds return, and the next cold front might come through again in 6-8 days. or maybe not.
Show me, worldwide by actual producing records, 10 regional wind generation systems that have generated even 80% of real, nameplate power at 80% service factor for any period of 12 months straight the past twenty years.
Show me 20 wind power systems that generate real-world power without subsidies or tariff or tax-incentives or slave-labor rate setups. if wind power worked, it would work.
Rather, wind power is an expensive game politicians and their cohorts deliberately play at the expense of real lives.
This Chinese paper is close to on point
On gas turbine damage from grids out of joint
But I have seen only the abstract so far
And don’t know if wind or what else was sub-par:
http://gasturbinespower.asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/article.aspx?articleid=1789540
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
Hmmmmn.
So, all this very expensive and very harmful 11,000 MW of mythical wind energy produced only 1,000
MW of actual energy only hours BEFORE the cold front, then produced an unplanned and uncontrollable 8,000 MW of wind energy just BEFORE the actual cold weather arrived over a rapidly rising and unplanned 18-24 hour period, then produced only 3,000 MW (and decreasing!) of unplanned and unreliable energy in the very cold days right AFTER the cold front had come through – thus forcing the actual power plants to re-re-recycle their turbines and condensers and boilers and reactors BACK to full production to save the lives of Texans forced to pay billions of dollars in extra fees for the power that had to ALREADY as a emergency backup for the mythical wind energy anyway, but couldn’t be used … Right?
“… or what else was sub-par.” (Keith DeHavelle)
… So read it and see just how hard the wind blew,
It’s a relevant piece, whether goyim or Jew.
#(;))
@ur momisugly RACookePE
Yes, gas turbines require repairs.
Yes. Wind energy is intermittent.
But, if a grid is so fragile, explain to us all how California manages a huge load increase (equivalent to wind ceasing to blow), and that load change is 5 to 6 MW over 90 to 120 minutes? That occurs every morning, some days a greater load change than 6 MW.
Quit trying to BS another engineer.
One could simply look at the load curve at http://www.casio.com and select “Supply and Demand”.
From what you and others write, a grid has never EVER had to deal with load variations, until those diabolical wind turbines started up. You could not be more wrong.
@ur momisugly Mr. DeHavelle — Uh, that was an attempt by me at a little “inside” joke, based on your kindly (and wittily) correcting my mistake about a week ago about “goyi” (I thought the commenter who used it meant “goyim” and you informed me that it was most likely: “good old yankee ingenuity.”). Perhaps, your silence is due to your never having read my comment at 12:48am… ? Well, just in case, I wrote this explanation to prevent any possible misunderstanding.
Cute poem.
Janice
Hello, Janice! I got it, and smiled
And I saw how your ping-back was styled
As I follow along
All this wind-dance and song
I’m amazed rather more than beguiled.
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
Was there ever a poster like Keith DeHavelle
Who posted in rhyme (and who did it quite well)?
I am glad that you smiled and I hope you can see
that your poems add zest at Watts Up — with esprit.
@*@*@*@*@*@*@*@*@*@*@*Janice Moore
[See and esprit?
Janice’s Rhyming is getting desperate. Mod]
@RACookPE1978 at 9:51 pm
Well I would not have put it quite that way, but….
11,000 MW of nameplate wind turbine installed,
might deliver 9,000 MW when you need it,
or only 1,000 MW when you need all you can get.
ERCOT Wind Power can go from 9,000 MW to 2,000 MW in 12 hours (as in 1/23-1/24), just as your demands reach a peak.
The wind power can peak as the front passes Western Texas, but demand peaks as the front reaches Eastern Texas (Dallas, Houston)
See Jan 1/22/14 – 1/29/14 at the bottom of this pdf.
http://www.ercot.com/content/gridinfo/generation/windintegration/2014/01/ERCOT%20Wind%20Integration%20Report%2001-29-14.PDF
One other point should be made about the ERCOT plots. They are only end of hour average power. I’m looking for plots that show variations in supply an a shorter time period.
To Roger Sowell’s point at 3/12 8:42 am, the load itself might drop 16 MW in 5 hrs (1/25) or grow 23 MW in 18 hrs. So there is plenty of load changes that on-demand sources must meet. The point is that wind power supply can make the problem worse at least as often as better.