Originally posted in Western Journal
Which is more environmentally friendly — an energy source that uses one unit of land to produce one unit of electricity, or a source that uses 100 units of land to produce one unit of electricity?
The answer should be obvious.
Nevertheless, “green” energy advocates call for a huge expansion of wind, solar and other renewables that use vast amounts of land to replace traditional power plants that use comparatively small amounts of land.
Vaclav Smil, professor emeritus at the University of Manitoba in Canada, extensively analyzed the power density of alternative sources used to generate electricity. He defined power density as the average flow of electricity generated per square meter of horizontal surface (land or sea area).
Estimating power density is complex. Smil included plant area, storage yards, mining sites, agricultural fields, pipelines and transportation, and other associated land and sea areas in his analysis.
Smil’s work allows us to compare the energy density of electricity sources. If we set a nuclear plant to one unit of land required for one unit of electricity output, then a natural gas-powered plant requires about 0.8 units of land to produce one unit of output. A coal-fired plant uses about 1.4 units of land to deliver one unit of power.
But renewable sources require vastly more land. A standalone solar facility requires about 100 units of land to deliver the same average electricity output as a nuclear plant that uses one unit of land.
A wind facility uses about 35 units of land if only the concrete wind tower pads and service roads are counted, but over 800 units of land for the entire area spanned by a typical wind installation.
Production of electricity from biomass has the poorest energy density, requiring over 1,500 units of land to output one unit of electricity.
As a practical example, compare the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the eastern California desert to the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant near Avila Beach, California.
The Ivanpah facility produces about 793 gigawatt hours per year and covers an area of 3,500 acres. The Diablo Canyon facility generates about 16,165 gigawatt hours per year on a surface area of 750 acres. The nuclear plant delivers more than 20 times the average output on about one-fifth of the land, or 100 times the power density of the solar facility.
To approach even 50 percent renewable electricity using primarily wind and solar systems, the land requirements are gigantic.
“Net-Zero America,” a 2020 study published by Princeton University, calls for wind and solar to supply half of U.S. electricity by 2050, up from about 14 percent today. The study estimated that this expansion would require about 228,000 square miles of new land, not including the additional area needed for transmission lines.
That is larger than the combined area of Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, West Virginia and Wisconsin. This area would be more than 100 times as large as the physical footprint of the coal and natural gas power systems that would be replaced.
Taking land for wind and solar can seriously impact the environment.
Standalone solar systems blanket fields and deserts, blocking sunlight and driving out plants and animals. Since 2000, almost 16 million trees have been cut down in Scotland to make way for wind turbines, a total of more than 1,700 trees felled per day. This environmental devastation will increase the longer net-zero goals are pursued.
Wind and solar require vast amounts of land to generate the electricity required by modern society. Without fears about human-caused climate change, these systems would be considered environmentally damaging.
Net-zero plans for 2050, powered by wind and solar, will encounter obstacles with transmission, zoning, local opposition and just plain space that are probably impossible to overcome.
For more on energy and Net Zero, go to WUWT’s ClimateTV page.
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From today’s WSJ: “The Arizona-based solar panel manufacturer expects to receive as much as $710 million this year–nearly 90% of forecast operating profit–from subsidies the U.S. government rolled out a year ago to encourage domestic renewables production. One analyst estimates the incentives could be worth more than $10 billion for the company over the next decade.”
The poor return of energy with wind and solar systems has always made me think a good analogy – imagine a city building tens of thousands of containers to catch rain water rather than drawing water off of the nearest river or freshwater lake. True, ancient civilizations did build cisterns to catch and hold rainwater, but that was because there was no other source of fresh water nearby,
But imagine the idiocy of having the river right there and still wasting time and money to collect rain water. Which will never be able to supply enough water for the city’s needs.
The only logical uses for wind and solar are like the ancient cisterns – in situations where NOTHING else is available!
And I repeat again: net zero is not needed for CO2 stabilisation in the atmosphere, 20% reduction is sufficient to break even with the sink flux.
And in Australia, at least, upgrading the current coal powered fleet to more efficient standards would probably go well on the way to delivering that reduction.
I’ll raise you one – CO2 stabilization IS COMPLETELY UNNECESSARY.
Ivanpah? 6 Sq miles of mirror pointed at a boiler. A complete failure! Ivanpah is CSP technology that did fail. Ivanpah burns natural gas. 24 hours a day. Ivanpah failed so why use Ivanpah as a comparison.
Diablo Canyon is not 750 acres, Diablo Canyon is not, 500, 400, 300, or 200. Maybe they own that much land but by no means does nuclear power require that much land.
One unit of land, means nothing. If I as a average reader of the news thinks it is dumb, chances are many people think the same.
Solar compared to nuclear power? One does not work so how can you compare the two? Solar does not produce at night, no amount of land units will resolve that.
Wind? Mostly does not work at night hence same problem.
You can not compare what does not work with what does.
Ivanpah is a natural gas plant, the natural gas is pumped with desiel powered pumps.
Man, what a bummer. You’re really stepping on the dream. Such negativity.
Seriously, you aren’t supposed to ask who is that man behind the curtain or point out inconvenient facts such as the emperor is naked. Just go along, be happy.
I have never understood environmentalist who consider man a cancer on the earth and his impact must be minimized, but support wind and solar which are an assault on huge swaths of the earth destroying habitat, birds and bats
I hope Manitoba Hydro is paying attention to Vaclav Smil’s estimates because it plans to greatly increase its investment in wind power to meet future electricity needs for both domestic and export demand. The fact that it currently produces 95% of its power from the dams on the Nelson River near Hudson Bay seems to be lost on its planners; instead, it wants to invest in something less reliable.
Very nice report. Build new fossil fuel and nuclear generators and remove all wind and solar from the grid.
Renewables are cheapest and these are fixed costs folks-
Victorian electricity transmission charges could more than double if Australia’s longest power line proceeds (msn.com)
That’s a different line on the bill and nothing to see there so move along.
I agree, land use is astounding. I was recently at Yulura Resort, associated with Uluru (formerly Ayer’s Rock) in central Australia. Ideal country for solar, possibly no place better anywhere in the world. They have solar installations there and I took the time to go look at one. A huge array 10,000 square metres, was one of 5 they have there. Another of about 4,000 square metres, another at about 3,500 square metres. (rough area measurement from google earth) The others, I can’t say but from google earth these look to be smaller. In total, the 5 sites can, in perfect conditions, supply 30% of the resort’s power needs. The rest is from local diesel generators. So in order to power the whole site, in ideal conditions, they would need not 3 but nearly 4 times the number of panels or 20 such sites. For night use, if they install a battery, you would need to double it again. In less than ideal conditions such as early morning or late afternoon, start adding more and more. To allow for inclement weather you would need to increase everything again and still have the diesel generators to back it all up. I have little objection to the use of solar to top up supplies or for small self contained equipment, but for 100% reliance needed for accommodation, a hospital, water supplies and an airport, I can’t see it to be a practical solution, even in a relatively small and isolated community such as this.
You forgot one elephant in the room…since wind and solar need 100% backup, you can’t “replace” the fossil fuel and/or nuclear power plants, so their footprints must be ADDED TO the wind and solar installations, thereby reducing their power density even further!
If I’m not mistaken, the actual footprint of the power generation portion of Diablo Canyon Units 1 & 2 occupy 12 acres of the 750 acres of their site, thus the land energy density is even more efficient, more than 62 times more. The proposal of replacing Diablo Canyon’s with a solar farm will take more than 130 square miles when all is said and done. At its peak, this solar farm on steroids has the potential on a sunny day, no clouds, of replacing six hours of Diablo Canyon’s output.
12 acres producing 9% of California’s 2022 energy needs 24/7 vs. more than 6,900x the land coverage (more than 34,000 acres, 130 square miles!) producing 9% of California’s 2022 energy needs for 6/7 IF every day is totally sunny.
Somebody in Sacramento has got to learn some basic math before their computer runs out of juice with these ludicrous green boondoggle power schemes.
This analysis was published in 2010.
Not that it detracts from the value of the analysis, it does guarantee the analysis used nameplate power generation number rather than actual, which average 25%-35% of the nameplate figures.
An issue that radically changes the wattage per land area production.
From the analysis: