From the “fire and ice” department, Craig Kelly writes on Facebook
The entire rationale for wind turbines is to stop global warming by reducing the amount of CO2 being returned to the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels.
In the attached picture, recently taken in Sweden, freezing cold weather has caused the rotor blades of a wind turbine to ice up bringing the blades to a complete stop.
To fix the “problem” a helicopter is employed (burning aviation fuel) to spray hot water (which is heated in the frigid temperatures using a truck equipped with a 260 kW oil burner) on the blades of the turbine to de-ice them.
The aviation fuel, the diesel for the truck, and the oil burned to heat the water, could produce more electricity (at the right time to meet demand) than the unfrozen wind turbine could ever produce. (Before it freezes up again).
The attached picture is a metaphor of the complete insanity of the climate change debate.
In decades to come this one photo alone with sum up an era of stupidity, when rational thought, logic and commonsense was abandoned and immense wealth and resources needlessly sacrificed.
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Worth repeating here this one.
Electricity Costs: The folly of wind-power
by Ruth Lea
January 2012
© Civitas 2012
Civitas is a registered charity (no. 1085494) and a company limited by guarantee, registered in England and Wales (no. 04023541)
email: info@civitas.org.uk
Or even better: at this link
Mis-posted this below. Wonderful reference. Thank you.
Yes, indeed, Berenyi Peter! Sorry I did not acknowledge your kindness above. THANK YOU to you (and also, again, to Markx, lee, commieBob, Climate Heretic, and daveburton for the links to the Lea articles) for that link.
And here is the link (again) to Alan Robertson and ferdberple re: bearing failure: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/01/23/saturday-silliness-wind-turbine-photo-of-the-year/comment-page-1/#comment-2127755
The first rule of enerconics is that if something doesn’t make financial sense it very likely doesn’t make energy sense. So, despite all the blatant lies from the wind industry, it is very likely that putting up wind means there is a net increase in energy usage compared to more cost effective options like coal and gas.
The reason is simple:
ALL ENERGY IS FREE – what costs/absorbs energy is the means to harvest it – and that means costs more for wind than e.g. coal.
Wonderful reference. Thank you.
Green energy schemes aren’t about saving CO2 but making money at taxpayer expense.
@ur momisugly LarryFine, 1.26 am: Green energy schemes aren’t about saving CO2 but making money at taxpayer expense. it is more like TAKING money at the taxpayers expense
@tobias smit America’s almost got a handle on that.
The irony of using one of the least efficient forms of vehicle to defrost wind turbines. Perhaps we will develop solar powered helicopters one day…
Lawrence
After you – for being a passenger in one of those.
Never liked them when going out to the ESV in the North Sea.
And Solar Powered – in Sweden or the UK especially – reeks of implausibility.
Auto
@ur momisugly Janice Moore
I must assume from your aggressive comments – January 23, 2016 at 6:17 pm
( “Windmill hu$ters like 1save can try divert attention from their sc@ur momisuglym” ) &
( “until there is a MASSIVE advance in bearing tech, windmills will NEVER have a positive ROI”)
You are either drunk, stupid or ignorant possibly a combination ?? but you are definitely ignorant of the engineering facts.
Over the last 20yrs there have been MASSIVE advances in bearing technology but they have had little bearing on ROI (see what I did there !!), whereas advances in electronics allowing change to direct drive thus reducing fail points has.
I could wax lyrical about the superb engineering & technology that goes into a wind powered generator, but that doesn’t make it an appropriate technology. ( If you want to plough a field do you choose a Rolls Royce or a John Deer ? )
I found it strange YOU accuse me of being a “Windmill hu$ter” as I’ve been an active member of Anglesey Against Wind Turbines http://aawt.org.uk/index.htm for the last 7 yrs & have on numerous occasions presented evidence AGAINST their deployment.
Many years ago when I entered engineering, I was told “if you don’t know the facts, keep your mouth shut & learn them”….. it’s been excellent advice.
New Hypothesis !!! Ice Age returning. Arctic Cold sweeting down over Quebec these the last number of years, does not allow the Low Pressure Systems north as far as before. Therefore Montreal is no longer in the Snow Belt. The Low Pressure now take a 90 degree right over the Eastern USA. Just look at Boston last year and New York this year. Thus Proves my Hypothesis.
Wait a few days, it will be snowing in Montreal.
If for no other reason than you said this.
Gaia hates being told what to do!
“1saveenergys
January 24, 2016 at 3:16 am
Over the last 20yrs there have been MASSIVE advances in bearing technology…”
Yeah, like what? Go on, enlighten us ignorant people. I am all ears to this new MASSIVE advance in bearing technology. Bear in mind I am a trained engineer who worked to tolerances of +/- 2 microns.
I’m with Patrick MJD as the bearing journals for windmill gear boxes are machined like the ones in the gear boxes for the really BIG Caterpillar machines. I know because Dial Machine here in Rockford Illinois machines both. I actually saw bearings for both but was too busy to closely examine them. They were not very different or even busy I would have learned about them.
Here in Rockford we produce magnetic levitation bearings. They are too costly and unreliable to be used for intermittent machinery. For really small stuff they are battery powered and just too darned expensive to get much use.
“John H. Harmon
January 25, 2016 at 5:37 pm”
The only application of magnetic bearings (They don’t work on the horizontal plane, so will never work in a wind turbine) that I know of as an experiment was in a flywheel device on trams to store braking energy and then use that energy stored in the flywheel to power the traction motors. I understand it was binned, partly because of cost, but also an already well established technology was available; regenerative braking. While it works differently, it returns power to the supply lines while “braking” (Using the traction motors as generators creating a “drag” or braking effect) and thus, effectively, saving energy.
1saveenergys
@Janice” Moore ” should say” Less ” up until now she/he has posted 18 comments on this thread (to say so much and know nothing ? not normal!
This, from someone who cannot tell whether ” Janice ” is male or female name ?? Strange !!
Oh, it is ON now, buddy!
What a lot of energy wasted by so many people raving about this particular photo. I wonder how many of you who commented here have actually bothered to read the Swedish article which is the source of the photo? Do you know what the photo actually shows? Ah, you don’t understand Swedish? Well, if you really cared, you could use Google Translate, couldn’t you?
The article is about a guy who claims to have invented a genius idea – and the photo shows an experiment of his. The original article explains that the turbines have an electric heating foil on the rotor blades to prevent ice growth. Mikael Lindmark from Blaiken Vind is quoted as saying that this technique generally works well but that ice which lowers production forms even so. Therefore, the 30 new turbines which are to be installed in the park in April have received a dual anti-icing system – both a laminated electrically heated foil on the rotor blades and the hot air circulating inside the leaves.
Both methods are already in use in many turbines, but Mikael Lindmark says he has not yet seen them combined in commercial operation.
“Anyone who builds wind turbines in cold climates have to deal with icing problems, and my assessment is that the loss of production is around ten percent on the turbines whichh have a de-icing system,” said Mikael Lindmark, CEO of Blaiken Wind.
For some reason, this information was not included in the IceAgeNow article or the many other climate-sceptic sites who seem to be up in arms over this particular photo – because they don’t have a tradition of checking their sources.
On a personal note: I lived in Copenhagen four years with my family, we lived less than 500 metres from a huge wind turbine. I never saw ice on it in that period, and have never heard about it being a serious problem.
Apart from that – why is this so different from worrying about that driving coal supplies to a coal-fired power plant also becomes problematic in cold and snowy weather? – when snow falls as it does in the USA at the moment, for instance…
Mike,
You’re missing the big picture: windmills are über-stupid. They should not be publicly funded. No one in their right mind would prefer windmills over fossil fuels or nuclear if they were paying the bills.
The problem is that the so-called “green” lobby is just a cover for the hard Left. If you ignore what they say and watch what they do instead, it all becomes crystal clear.
Mik Aidt says:
********Apart from that – why is this so different from worrying about that driving coal supplies to a coal-fired power plant also becomes problematic in cold and snowy weather? – when snow falls as it does in the USA at the moment, for instance…
********
That’s what coal storage piles are for. Recover from the local storage pile during nasty snowstorms, etc. Deliveries can resume when conditions improve.
Mik Aidt
Appreciate your input.
One minor point, if I may?
No icing in four years on a huge wind turbine in Copenhagen.
I’m sure you are right; Urban Heat Islands do get everywhere, don’t they?
Auto – tongue only a bit in cheek.
Copenhagen is a port – but in an area of ‘shallow’ [so easier cooled] water.
Mik AIdt: lots of variables but wind industry studies say icing can cause a 20% reduction in production – when the cost of running the de-icing system is included. Older wind turbines must be shut down for de-icing, some newer ones with vibration and flexible leading edges can de-ice while spinning. Some of the latest ones have the ability to run in high winds by adjusting the blade pitch even while de-icing. However, it all reduces the generating capacity. Figures vary dramatically from article to article so there really is no way to know except to look at name plate capacity versus production.
Here is an old but interesting study, including painting of blades with black ice shedding material:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165232X10000108
Worth repeating here this one.
Electricity Costs: The folly of windpower
by Ruth Lea
January 2012
© Civitas 2012
Civitas is a registered charity (no. 1085494) and a company limited by guarantee, registered in England and Wales (no. 04023541)
email: info@civitas.org.uk
Or even better: this link
Scrap the wind turbines and scrap the solar farms, solar arrays, utility-scale solar power stations (heating towers with heliostats), etc. Lets do it since that is what is being advocated. Forget “climate change” and “Global Warming”. Let’s go back to the 1960s, before there were regs on leaded gasoline, and have a merry old party producing energy the old fashioned way, completely with fossil fuels. Lets get drunk and have a party with the oil, lets swim in it, have coal-burning parties, lets go back to coal-fired steam locomotives–lets do all these things UNTIL IT ALL RUNS OUT (yeah, I know there’s an abundance of coal but you can’t put coal in your gas tank like bio-diesel or propane, right?). Then we can all go back to the stone age and make fires scrapping to pieces of flint together so we can cook and boil water. Sounds like a great plan.
• “Scrap the wind turbines and scrap the solar farms, solar arrays, utility-scale solar power stations (heating towers with heliostats),”
Agreed, not fit for purpose of running a grid.
Some merit for a few stand alone projects – Water pumping & Desalination
• “but you can’t put coal in your gas tank like bio-diesel or propane, right?).”
Wrong !!
have you never heard of Coal liquefaction or coal gasification ??
Reliance on ‘unreliables’ is the quickest way to take us back to primitive times.
However we do need to be less profligate.
The most foolish thing about your comment is the total fantasy that oil or gas etc. will run out ALL AT ONCE as though it is some big bucket under there and you are certain we are approaching the bottom. Nothing could be further from the truth.
1) NOBODY actually knows how much is down there, 2) Oil exploration thus far has only scratched a very TINY percentage of earth’s God given bounty, 3) Technology keeps coming to the rescue to both find more oil and also find new ways to get such as fracking.
Please reconcile the fact that there were people just like you saying exactly the same things about “peak oil” doom ~50 years ago for exactly the SAME reasons and they were just as wrong then as you are now.
I also find it odd that some people will point to a global temperature trend as evidence of climate doom but then are forced to ignore the trend of ever increasing oil production in order to proclaim FF energy doom.
There have been predictions saying oil is going to run out in twenty years going all the back to the 1800s.
And there are oil fields which are being recharged from below as fast as the oil is drawn out of them.
The reservoirs that allow oil to be extracted are only a sort of catchment…places where the right geologic conditions exist to trap and hold oil in a strata that is sufficiently permeable to allow for efficient extraction.
And even after tertiary recovery techniques have needed and a formation is considered tapped out, about half of the original oil remains. Future technology may well allow recovery of all of the oil, and if this is the case it doubles the amount available in one fell swoop.
Also, recharge rates for many fields is such that wells that were capped decades ago can now be reopened and production resume.
The amount of oil ever drawn from the Earth is tiny on a geologic scale, about the volume of a single large mountain. The equivalent, volume and proportion-wise, of a bacteria taken off the surface of a cur ball.
The world, solar system, galaxy, and entire universe are awash in energy on a scale so titanic we can barely conceive it, just like we can barely conceive of the actual volume of the Earth beneath our own feet.
We should get our energy from where it is cheapest to get, period. Anything else is economic death by a thousand cuts.
Sorry about the typos, need coffee.
Have ended,
Cue ball.
T. Madigan the Well-educated, Economic-Illiterate.
As others have pointed out, fossil fuels will gradually run out. As long as you allow the free market to work, futures traders and fossil fuel producers and their competitors in the power-generation market will be very aware of how much is plausibly left at any given time and the price will reflect that.
As the resource diminishes, the price will go up. Alternatives which were too costly to research and or produce before will be able to get market share… gradually.
Also! Take heart!! HUMAN INGENUITY IS! Not all that long ago, people were worried about the telecommunications industry: COPPER IS RUNNING OUT. If you had been around, you (on behalf of the string-and-can hu$tlers who fooled you) would have run over to the local paper and screamed, here, print this!!!:
And then…. along came…… silicon….. .
*********************************************************
Suggestion: add to your fine education these 3 courses: Econ 101 (Macroeconomics), Econ 102 (Microeconomics), and Econ 102 (Applied Economics). You will sleep better at night — and vote for candidates who understand how scarcity and technology and free markets work. AND YOU WILL BE HAPPIER!
Dear T. Madigan,
Please forgive the overly harsh “economic illiterate” name-calling above. There is no excuse. I’ve just had to deal with one-too-many unthinking liberals this past week… I guess. Anyway! Please forgive me. I, for my part, am definitely “astronomy-illiterate.”
Hoping you learn some science (and economic 🙂 ) facts at WUWT (and elsewhere),
Janice
Correction: “…..Then we can all go back to the Stone Age and make fires scraping two pieces of flint together so we can cook and boil water. Sounds like a great plan.”
Further to my point, Einstein’s famous quote, that you shamelessly used to describe the de-icing of wind turbines in the opening photo, rather than describe it as being necessary in a few instances (compared to their world-wide deployment in all different types of climates) for continued use in cold weather (whose total energy output over their useful life times far outstrips the energy needed to de-ice them a few times), more so epitomizes the ongoing folly of continued reliance on and consumption of NON-RENEWABLE fossil fuels!
I see you are mad again !!
calm down
😉
Are you really that stupid or are you just practicing to be a liberal politician ??
Well then shouldn’t they be using whale oil to de-ice them or at least use palm oil from farms in Indonesia that displaced rain forest habitat for orangutans? Both are renewable resources correct?
Maybe that’s why they are allowed to kill so many endangered birds ?… Chicken fat for re-greasing the ball bearings !
Hypocrites, you’d think they would have at least devised a way to use a large kite to lift the water up to the blades?
There are heat absorbing colors, why not flat black. I would like to know if this could reduce the number of birds killed buy these things. All I have seen are painted light colors or even white and not black. Why is that?
Or coat the blades with this stuff – http://www.neverwet.com/ or PTFE etc.
Why bother? Don’t throw away money or risk lives, just let it melt naturally. It’s not like it produces any significant power…..
And how did the grid respond when the turbine(s) shut down?
Anyone who votes for Donald Trump or any of the other imbeciles running on the Republican ticket should have their heads examined. In short, if any of these fools actually wins next November, the American people and the rest of the world is thoroughly screwed.
I suspect you are related to Illinois Speaker of the House Mike Madigan ( Speaker for 40 years). We have no budget but figured a way to spend more money than we raise. Now THAT is talent. A Government that cannot pass a budget to designate on what it’s money is to be spent is spending more than it raises.
A State that is totally broke cannot allow “fracking” in Southern Illinois to provide taxes and jobs when “fracking” was common there in the 1950s.
Wells drilled in the 50s are now surrounded by corn or beans within 30 feet even though mud pits and dump points for produced water (mixed with oil, of course) covered more than an acre.
Watermelons lie. It is what they do. We now actually know that each doubling of C)2 will raise air temps .14 to .55 degrees C. We know the period 1926 to 1945 was warmer than the last 20 years, yet, the watermelons tell us the oceans will boil without windmills.
Even Trump sees through the CO2 scam.
If coal and hydrocarbons really were bad only nuclear would replace them for grid-supply purposes in the near term.. Watermelons oppose nuclear in the “developed” world but aid Iran in building reactors. Wow!
I hope your car breaks down on way to vote .
Anyone who votes for Donald Trump or any of the other imbeciles running on the Republican ticket should have their heads examined. In short, if any of these fools actually wins next November, the American people and the rest of the world are thoroughly screwed.
Any fool who voted for Obama should have his head examined.
I recall people saying exactly the same thing about Reagan as they’re saying about Trump at this point in the campaign.
But maybe the polls are all lying, and Bernie Sanders is the guy everyone wants, LOLOL!!
Pretty scary when you think about it !! Half the liberals want an elitist who will probably be in jail next year for incompetence and other crimes, while the other half wants a socialist willing to raise the the debt by another TRILLION dollars !!! NUTS !!
See my reply to @Tucci78, above: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/01/23/saturday-silliness-wind-turbine-photo-of-the-year/comment-page-1/#comment-2128286
Hmmmmmm…Too lazy to retype it or too stupid to copy it ?? Hmmmm, choices, choices !!
One whole helluva lot more than one trillion, Marcus. A trillion is the new billion…chump change for gubnamint big spenders. Hell, we are already at close to 19 trillion, IIRC.
Bernie wants free everything, for everyone, forever…and send the bill to the fat cats.
Just do not run the numbers, nooo, do not do that.
You mean it’s possible to even more “thoroughly screwed” than we’ve been by Obama?
I admit, I never thought we’d could have a less honest, more selfish, more despicable President than Hillary’s husband. If Hillary or Bernie win, I’ll need to set a new low standard for that high office.
Lets agree to disagree; thanks.
I think it is the widespread and systematically articulated irrational concepts used in the climate change debate that the pic illustrates. It is not insanity. Insanity could not create the comprehensive complex ‘mimicking of science’** that led to the absurd in the pic. It is an academic philosophically irrational world view, it is not insanity. The antidote is merely scientific and philosophical systems based on objectively verified reasoning.
** ‘mimicking of science’ is the essence of the concept of pseudo-science
John
The debacle comes from politicians who see some shyster’s pitch and say “hey, that looks good, let’s build 20,000 of ‘em.” A rational investor would build one and run it for 10 years first, then make decisions.
@pochas94 . . . and probably sell it as a carnival ride. Elevator. Ferris wheel seats hanging from blades. One of a kind . . .fast . . . exciting
Well at its either paid for by the government, which is perfectly understandable as they want to just count how many watts they produce. Or its paid for government-subsidized private enterprise and the private enterprise is just trying to earn mark up on expenses. Or its paid for by private enterprise, likely soon to be out of business. . . .which is probably the most outstanding attribute of the private enterprise system.
@ur momisugly commieBob
January 23, 2016 at 4:32 pm
Electric deicing for aircraft propellers It’s technically doable. I leave the economics to you as an exercise.
I know there are lots of reasons it’s safe but seeing a helicopter that close to a windmill scares the willies out of me.
I was sorta hoping that the blade would break free and twat that squirrel…
@RACookPE1978: see my reply to Trump lover above (@Tucci78): http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/01/23/saturday-silliness-wind-turbine-photo-of-the-year/comment-page-1/#comment-2128286
Hmmmmmm…Too lazy to retype it or too stupid to copy it ?? Hmmmm, choices, choices !!
[??? Let each other writer decide how he/she/it decides to write and repeat answers. The more difficult somebody makes an answer become visible, the less likely it is to be read by anybody. .mod]
Marcus slinks away mumbling to himself !!!
Well I thought it was funny….which really doesn’t help much !! D’oh !!
If you want to have a reasoned discussion, stop with the ad-hominems, you will end up talking to yourself. Neither, I don’t have the time and no matter what I say, it will be a waste of whatever time I’ve invested in my reply.
Hilariously, T. Madigan postures:
Oh, my. Our host having asked us to forego “reasoned discussion” with T. Madigan anent this “Liberal” fascist’s political malignancy ’cause it would sizzle him like any other grease spot on a barbecue, how should we address this and other toxic spew therefrom?
By the bye, buchen, how do you differentiate your socialism from national socialism from the socialism being implemented by the National Socialist Democrat American Party (NSDAP)?
The candidate teetering at the top of the NSDAP presidential polling – the lady who’s wearing orange so often now, we might suppose, in order to get used to what she’ll likely be wearing every day after she enters the federal prison system – couldn’t seem to answer that question.
Yes, and I respected his request until someone else decided to start it up again. Don’t worry host (and moderator), I’m done.
C’mon guys… T.Madigan was involved in a pie fight upthread and our gracious host asked everyone to knock it off, (which TM did.) Leave the troll alone.
No, he didn’t ” knock it off “, he repeated his comment by directing people to his comment upthread !!
Check the time stamps, Marcus…
Alan, I cannot read the time stamp on his forehead from here !
Great picture, indeed! And great metaphore also! On the other hand, I want to remember an important fact: Northern European winters are getting warmer and warmer at a rate higher than global average. An important role, in this case, seems to have been played by the offshore wind farms and by the stirring effect. Here are some information on that: http://www.ocean-climate-law.com/12/arch/12.html.
So, we are all going to somehow die of less frigid winters?
I worked out the global weighted average capacity factors for the different technologies. These I calculated form the data at the EIA website (average 2008-12). They are as follows:
Nuclear 78.2%
Coal 56.2%
All Fossil Fuels 46.3%
Hydro 42.2%
Natural Gas 33.4%
Petroleum 28.5%
Wind 22.3%
Solar,Tide&Wave 11.3%
These are lower than I had expected. One of the main criticisms you hear of wind (apart from wind not blowing when you need it) is that the capacity factor is unacceptably low. However, looking at the figures for wind you can see that it is globally comparing with levels of 28-42% for other technologies except for coal and nuclear. Given that Ireland, US, Canada, Aus&NZ, Africa, S. America, parts of Europe get capacity factors 27-30% means it is a bit more comparable than I had thought on a CF basis. The global average is brought down to low 20’s mainly by Europe and Germany would be the main culprit with a large installed capacity. As I said earlier, their love of wind is unusual as it isn’t a great resource there with annual capacity factors as low as 14.5% recently.
I don’t get why people say here it is a great scam being foisted on us. Wind is popular with the public and polls have shown this (except for those directly affected by proposed wind farms). In Ireland for over 20% of electricity generated from wind it costs us an extra E5.69 per month (incl sales tax and only part of the remainder goes to wind). Wind is producing real energy, increasing energy security, popular with the public and a modest individual extra cost. What’s the great scam here that so many here see? I know many here don’t like it but, be honest, can you really claim it is all a great scam?
Ummmmm…you forgot to include burning cow dung for the impoverished people of the world !! You know, that stuff that kills 100’s of thousands per year !!
Also the biggest installers of wind today are China and India. China installed nearly half the new global capacity last year. They now have 18% of total global wind capacity and India has 7% compared with 22% for USA and 43% for Europe. The environmental movement isn’t very strong in either country. Also they have quite poor national average capacity factors of 18%. So claims here that wind is just being pushed by Western enviro-nuts doesn’t stack up. Why would China and India be developing it so much if they didn’t see it as beneficial to their economies? (I know remote un-electrified rural areas are part of what attracts them to it).
Hoplite,
Totally different situation. China and India are providing electricity where there was none, like the U.S. Tennesseee Valley rural elctrification project did in the 1930’s. In many cases it’s the fastest to install, and it keep employment up. That’s especially important in China, where the government’s hold on things is always a little shaky.
How long does it take to build a dam? Or a nuke? Or even a conventional power plant? Your comment leaves out those things, which are also being built.
In the West, though, windmills are presumed to replace much cheaper fossil fuel sources, while despoiling the countryside, killing raptors by the millions, and making a few cronies rich.
But you aren’t one of the cronies, are you? Why would you ever approve of windmills??
dbstealey, Well said, BUT China and India have stated they will at least triple their coal energy production in the next 15 years…and I don’t blame them !! How many more people have to die in third world countries from lack of affordable energy before liberals admit that it is the only viable option available to that area ?? All Human life depends on keeping your ass warm !
DB,
As I said part of the reason is remote rural electrification. But that doesn’t explain China installing almost half the new installed capacity in 2014. It is estimated that only around 25% of China’s installed wind capacity is not grid connected. So the facts don’t support your assertion.
I know China are also installing Nuke, Coal etc. How does that argue against the point I was making?
‘windmills are presumed to replace much cheaper fossil fuel sources, while despoiling the countryside, killing raptors by the millions, and making a few cronies rich.’
No, as I said, they don’t replace anything. They are IN ADDITION to the fossil fuel sources and have to be. Despoiling the countryside is your aesthetic opinion. Others like the look of them. I’d like to see a reliable (as in properly scientific with real data and unbiased methodology) report on raptor strikes by wind turbines. Making a few rich? Terrible stuff indeed!! Disgraceful I say that anyone would get rich from commercial endeavours. All us posters here on WUWT are down at heel communists and will have no truck with people making money and bettering themselves over their neighbours and comrades! Down with that sort of thing I say.
I’m sure you’ll agree with me DB that no one in oil, gas, nuclear or coal ever made any money and enriched themselves. The wind industry shouldn’t expect to be any different. Absolutely no one in the value chain of wind should be allowed to make a profit at the expense of others!
Bottom line is: wind works and produces real electrical energy that people use every day; the ADDITIONAL costs of wind are modest on a notional scale; the public generally are very enthusiastic about it; almost no one claims that wind reduces the cost of electricity. I guess that is democracy in action.
Oh – and forgot to say that I don’t receive any money from the renewable industry or have any shares or financial interest in it. Did a little research work in it a few years back but that is it. I don’t receive money from the Koch brothers either for my global warming skepticism (or anybody else) and never have done!
Nice to see you using the same tactics as the warmunists 😉
‘National’ not ‘notional’ in the previous post.
“Hoplite
January 24, 2016 at 12:42 pm
Also the biggest installers of wind today are China and India. China installed nearly half the new global capacity last year.”
I think the right word is “say”. They say anything to appease alarmists. Can you provide documentary evidence that this actually was the case? Because if this were true it would be plastered all over the ABC, SMH and SBS here in Australia, the BBC in the UK, the CBC in Canada. *crickets chirping*
They say there is a plastic patch the size of Texas in the middle of the Pacific. If satellites can resolve a door sized object floating in the sea, why can they not resolve an object the size of Texas?
If satellites can resolve images of huge run off in to the sea, why can they not resolve this rubbish patch?
They say ocean heat, as a result of CAGW, is hiding in the deep oceans, where it cannot be found nor measured.
I say it’s all BS!
@Patrick – China’s wind installations
http://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2015/05/12/chinas-revolution-in-wind-energy-infographic/#3c5853142cb5
http://www.reuters.com/article/china-power-windpower-idUSL4N0VM3XJ20150212
You can google others yourself. Check out http://www.eia.gov. The figures are too specific so I don’t think the ‘Chinese are telling fibs’ will explain away all of this.
“Hoplite
January 25, 2016 at 1:49 am”
Cannot see anything in those articles that demonstrates China installed, in 2014, nearly half new global capacity (Your words) wind power. Nothing! Again, I call BS on your claim!
“Hoplite
January 25, 2016 at 1:49 am
You can google others yourself.”
You made the claim. You back it up with real information. I am not going to waste my electrons googling a pile of BS.
and again:
What a pleasant person you are indeed! (You do know you are now behaving exactly like the CAGW true believers that you decry here so much?
BS? Back it up with real information? If I do will you apologise for your churlish and ignorant behaviour? I doubt it very much.
Not for your benefit (as you don’t deserve it) but for others reading this here’s the data to back up my ‘claim’:
New capacity Installed in 2014
http://s19.postimg.org/g1bd9xbab/World_Wind_Installed_Capacity_2014.jpg
Accumulated installed capacity at Dec 2014:
http://s19.postimg.org/77p26kdpf/World_Wind_Accumulated_Capacity_Dec2014.jpg
Read all about it here:
http://www.gwec.net/global-figures/graphs/
As of Jan 2016 the UK has ~ 13.6 GW wind capacity from ~6,600 industrial turbines
http://www.renewableuk.com/en/renewable-energy/wind-energy/uk-wind-energy-database/
At the moment we have high winds across the entire UK
http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/overlay=temp/orthographic=1.19,49.32,671
the wind contribution is only 5.6GW ; 41% of its capacity & that’s on a good day (for wind)
http://nationalgrid.stephenmorley.org/
Also go down that page to see Averages –
Annual wind contribution to UK demand is just 8,1% • capacity factor ~ 19.4%.
We’ve paid £billions for less energy security …
…& no one is going to jail !!! ( I speak as a moderate)
How exactly is UK now less secure? Please be specific.
How exactly is UK now less secure? Please be specific.
The idiots in charge believed the ‘green’ snake oil salesmen instead of the power engineers,
“green energy is the way forward” “100,000s of green jobs” “enough renewable energy resources around Britain to power Europe”…..
so they brought in far reaching “green” legislation to enable it to happen which has closed / is closing all coal powered generating, shut all British coal mines, so we now have to import all our coal.
A few conventional power stations are being converted to co-fired biomass (utter madness) 95% is imported.
Green energy has pushed up energy costs so many companies have moved abroad
Larger numbers of CCGT units are running inefficiently as spinning reserve to absorb the volatility of wind & solar,…. we import Gas from Norway, Nigeria, Qatar.
Because our glorious leaders believed that ‘green energy’ was more effective than it really is, we are closing conventional power stations at a greater rate than we are replacing so margins of reserve are down to ~3%.
Fortunately it’s an El’nino winter & Tata has just closed several steelworks so no blackouts this year.
A cold 2016-17 winter will be a different story.
CCGT plants run very efficiently at part loads. Your information is well out of date. Gas technology pairs extremely well with wind and wind is very lucky it developed alongside it (wind really couldn’t have paired with coal or nuclear). Wind can’t be blamed for the decision to not invest in thermal plant technology. Per capita, Ireland has a lot more wind than Britain and it has surplus thermal capacity. The problem in Britain is your market structure which hasn’t incentivised generating (thermal) development (this has been known about for years and it isn’t like you haven’t collectively seen it coming). That is the fault of your politicians (ultimately the electorate) not the wind industry.
I note that the blowhard Patrick MJD has slunk away and said nothing after I met his challenge to support my ‘BS’. Am I surprised he has behaved thus?
@ur momisugly Hoplite January 26, 2016 at 7:23 am
CCGT plants run very efficiently at part loads. Your information is well out of date”
Shadowing a widely fluctuating grid can knock 12-15% off the efficiency curve of a CCGT.
You may like to peruse these-
General overview
http://www.power-eng.com/articles/print/volume-119/issue-9/features/improving-the-flexibility-and-efficiency-of-gas-turbine-based-distributed-power-plants.html
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/222520914_Comparative_analysis_on_the_part_load_performance_of_combined_cycle_plants_considering_design_performance_and_power_control_strategy
http://www.wartsila.com/energy/learning-center/technical-comparisons/combustion-engine-vs-gas-turbine-part-load-efficiency-and-flexibility
All of that was taken into my calculation table further up this thread showing reduced fuel consumption.
Windmills bring out the worst in me. Whenever I see a wind farm, I just itch to get my hands on a bazooka.
Funny thing is, a thick piece of rope wrapped around the turbine would have the same affect !! They are unstable and destined to explode given enough time !! ( too much Carbon emissions from a bazooka also )
Marcus, I LIKE carbon emissions. I also like your idea. Rope I can get my hands on. I might yet get to watch a windmill burning. I hear too that there’s a lot of copper to be had and wily thieves are taking advantage. Oh, to be young again.
I bet the plants ( those funny green things that environmentalists forgot about ) like it better than you !!
That would be criminal activity. Lets leave that to the alarmists.
Anthony – please check for a post I just submitted on global average capacity factors for electricity generation technologies. What’s happened to it?
[Reply: Please give us more than 5 minutes. ~mod]
Sorry – see it there now.
Patience little worm !