Posted on 08/16/2008 5:57:34 PM PDT by aussiemom
[ROBERT M. SYKES is Professor emeritus Civil and environmental engineering Ohio State University Mount Vernon]
I was disappointed to see that the very large negative effects on both Ohio's economy and environment were not discussed in the July 27 article "Wind power likely to blow in," on the wind-power projects in Champaign County.
The first issue is the high cost of wind power, which is about 2.5 to three times the cost of coal-generated power. Large wind-power projects exist only because of large government subsidies. Otherwise, wind power would be restricted to a few applications where the physical isolation of the electricity demand precludes extending the transmission network to the site.
The other major issue is the intermittency of wind power. Even on the best of sites, wind turbines generate usable power less than 30 percent of the time, and the experience of E.ON Netz Co. of Germany, which operates a large number of turbines, is that long-term availability for large sets of turbines is closer to 4 percent.
This suggests that the installed capacity of 300 megawatts in Champaign County will, in fact, produce as little as 12 megawatts of power on an annual average basis. The suggested license fee of $15,000 per year per landowner is more likely to be only $600 per year.
Intermittency means that wind turbines require backup from conventional power, meaning nuclear, coal, oil, gas or hydroelectric. In general, the engineering studies conducted by both the German company and by the UK's Royal Academy of Engineering indicate that 1 watt of wind-power generation requires 1 watt of conventional generation as backup.
T. Boone Pickens' claim that wind power will reduce the need for natural gas in electricity generation is spectacularly wrong. Wind power intermittency means that the backup unit must be very quick-responding, and this requires natural-gas-fueled turbines. So wind power means more natural gas will be needed for electricity generation, and since gas turbines are not as thermodynamically efficient as coal-fired power plants, more fuel will be required.
So, we will require two complete power generation systems: wind power and conventional, when we only need one, conventional. At present, wind turbines are few in number, and they get a hidden subsidy from our conventional plants' excess capacity.
As electricity demand increases, this excess capacity will slowly drain away, and the full negative impact will become apparent. E.ON Netz also notes that intermittency of wind-power supply reduces the stability of electricity-transmission networks, leading to more frequent power blackouts. The blackout of a few years ago was because of network failures as power plants were taken off line to protect them.
All in all, wind power will substantially increase our power costs and increase the frequency of power blackouts. What absolute madness.
Why does no one ask the flim-flam man (Pickens) about this?
Good post!
Those who have such, please post away! I want to be educated...
Since when do facts matter?
Pumped storage is the best, and with proper design it can be quickly brought on line and throttled.
However, there are few sites suitable for pumped storage and there are environmental concerns (of course!) that make permitting difficult.
Virginia Power has a successful pumped storage facility in Bath County http://www.dom.com/about/stations/hydro/bath.jsp
Totally impracticable with the scale of 20% wind energy, however.
And pumped storage can’t cope with extended periods of calm.
Jack
Day-um ... sorta runs that idea right through the blender, doesn’t it T-Boone?
Concur.
Article is a good summary of today’s “windy” problems. Except in DC.
Both wind and solar are intermittent and have a storage / battery / capacitors problems. Wind, in addition has a distribution problem. Solar might eventually be used locally on small scale when technology is cheap enough, while wind is not.
Both are not applicable in large parts of the landscape and thus are not “universal”. Nuclear is universal and is more clean and cheaper to maintain.
Wind and to certain degree solar, on a large scale, are just “green scams” by people like Al Gore to get rich at the expense of taxpayers and ratepayers who will wind up (pun intended) subsidizing these scams because they will be imposed on them by some state and local governments, touting “green clean cheap energy”. It’s been done in 1970s already, and the only people who benefited from these “projects” were the ones who sold them as the solution to our energy problems.
All in all, wind power will substantially increase our power costs and increase the frequency of power blackouts. What absolute madness.
...and soooooo one must ask who it is that is spearheading the madness and what chance there is to put it to rest before we have a country filled with these soon to be outmoded skeletons that we may consider too expensive to remove.
...and another thing, one should consider the considerable sum put into wind power plus the subsidies and realize it might go towards nuclear applications that someone besides the various labs around the country should be spearheading.
This country has allowed its energy development, direction, and resources to be totally sidetracked and moved onto paths leading nowhere but expense with very little income to show for the expense.
As if they are searching for the energy perpetual motion machine that will give free energy at zero expense and be clean enough to please the most radical of clean air nazis. I can say with much confidence, that such does not exist
We should not allow those who are not in the energy business to dictate the conditions of energy exploration, discovery, development, production, or distribution. The evidence of allowing such is already clearly hindering energy policy.
“and soooooo one must ask who it is that is spearheading the madness”
Yep, you always have to follow the money. Who is making money from wind power ?????
Yet way too many otherwise conservative freepers turn misty eyed, their brains turn to mush and they support these utopian boondoggles.
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