Posted on 05/02/2012 1:24:58 PM PDT by neverdem
Large wind farms in certain areas in the United States appear to affect local land surface temperatures, according to a paper published April 30 in the journal Nature Climate Change.
The study, led by Liming Zhou, an atmospheric scientist at the State University of New York- (SUNY) Albany, provides insights about the possible effects of wind farms...
The results could be important for developing efficient adaptation and management strategies to ensure long-term sustainability of wind power.
"This study indicates that land surface temperatures have warmed in the vicinity of large wind farms in west-central Texas, especially at night," says Anjuli Bamzai, program director in the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences, which funded the research.
"The observations and analyses are for a relatively short period, but raise important issues that deserve attention as we move toward an era of rapid growth in wind farms in our quest for alternate energy sources."
Considerable research has linked the carbon dioxide produced by burning fossil fuels with rising global temperatures.
Consequently, many nations are moving toward cleaner sources of renewable energy such as wind turbines. Generating wind power creates no emissions, uses no water and is likely "green."
"We need to better understand the system with observations, and better describe and model the complex processes involved, to predict how wind farms may affect future weather and climate," said Zhou.
There have been a growing number of studies of wind farm effects on weather and climate, primarily using numerical models due to the lack of observations over wind farms.
As numerical models are computationally intensive and have uncertainties in simulating regional and local weather and climate, said Zhou, remote sensing is likely the most efficient and effective way to study wind farm effects over larger spatial and longer temporal scales.
(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...
I'm surprised that Nature Climate Change decided to accept it.
So Wind Farms = GLOBAL WARMING!!!! Who would have thunk that?
That's because there is grant money to be had proving that warming caused by wind farms actually cools the planet.
Related thread (not duplicate) from Monday.
(Texas)Wind farms may have warming effect - research
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2878026/posts
Work is being done and equipment is not 100% efficient. There should be no surprise that there is some warming in the area.
Because it is a non-problem and the alarmists will have no problem showing that these wind farms are just small "heat islands" that are dwarfed by even modest sized cities. Even if you are worried about Global Warming this is a gnat on an elephant kind of problem
Kinda goes back to the idea of “For every action, there’s a reaction”.....huh. I’m surprised they didn’t think of this.
so now the windmillers can chop up the spotted owls and bats, and cook them too
Dinner...and a show!
Funny
Now some Obama Cronies can get multi-billion-dollar grants to mitigate GW from Windmills.
Actually I believe this “Global Warming” theory more than the others by Al Gore.
If cars can cause AGW by their exhaust, then why not AGW because windmills are slowing the airflow across the surface of the earth, slowing the dissipation of heat?
Of course it is all hype and scam to tax and return us to the stone age. Humans can’t do to the atmosphere what one huge volcano can do.
"Our results show a significant warming trend of up to 0.72 °C per decade."
Now, I'm still going to laugh at this... we're talking about 2 degrees on average in a decade. And there's just no possible way: the same bogus research that gives us AGW has to be at work here, too.
The only thing that wind farms do is perhaps stir up the air that's already present. Maybe the metal in the towers absorbs heat energy from the sun and reflects it into the air slightly, but that's gotta be it. But it's the same sun that shines on the entire area -- some of it simply hits the tower and doesn't hit the ground. And given the sparcity (is that a word?) of wind farms anyway, the total possible impact is negligible at best.
It's kind like the crazy ideas we hear sometimes about jetliner contrails causing greenhouse effects: it's stupid. But yeah - somebody got a grant to write that nonsense.
The windmills are coming; the windmills are coming!
Seriously, though, I suspect all that thrashing around of propeller blades disturbs the night-time temperature inversion effect near the ground, especially in low humidity environments. The pointy headed Gummn’t PhD welfare pimps know that, but why let details get in the way of a nice fat study grant.
.... maybe if we build these huge fans behind the windmills, we can get the air moving again and cool things back down < /sarcasm>
I would think the blades ain't turnin' unless the air is ALREADY moving enough to disturb this inversion layer.
That'll cool them off, and generate more wind, to boot!
This problem in Texas should be handled in 2 steps:
Sounds like a plot from Big Climate if you aske me. Anything to kill energy.
Take THAT James Cameron, a self proclaimed warmist.
When he talks about the hubris of Titanic’s designers and operators, he never considers the hubris of warmists. He’s just as blind as Captain Smith.
Farmers in the 40s, 50s, and 60s were using powered propellers to keep crops from freezing.
One Google search would have answered their questions.
I wonder how much the govt paid for this “study”?
Here's my theory: the fans are slowing down the breeze, which would otherwise cool things off, sort of like driving around in your pickup with the windows up.
Since it's hot as hell there anyway, why not build more windmills--enough to generate heat enough to boil water and spin turbines.
Think about it: if too much of a good thing is bad, then maybe too much of a bad thing is really good. I should remember this next time my wife....
Instead of the typical east moving gulf rains they have been mostly north moving. Weird.
Not if you live near the wind farms. And there are numerous other effects that slowing the wind will have on the atmospheric climate. Warming the area under the slowed winds is just the first observation. This study illustrates just how absolutely clueless the AGW crowd is.
Nah.Use the wind power to generate a freezer which would create ice cubes or blocks which would then be placed in front of said windmills and would thus generate cooler air and in turn would thus cool the surrounding climate. Any wind power residue would hence be set forth for the private usage of over taxed sweating peasants at a higher fee whose cost would maintain the running of said windmills under the guise of saving the planet at whatever the cost would be. Mother Nature thanks you. Whoever and wherever she may be.
In West-Central Texas, a significant part of the time is spent with the air temperature hotter than the ground temp.
Have you ever felt 100°F wind?
I believe it is because of the huge concrete footprint they have to install for these over sized POS!
They slow the wind. Energy is transferred from the wind to the blades. The turbulence is caused by the method they use to slow the wind. But slowing the wind caused the heat rise. They just did not quantify the observation correctly.
How ironic, the very thing they would tout to help against global warming probably contributes to it. Don Quixote has nothing on these enviro-clowns.
Friction. Who couldn't have thunk it. Wind turns the prop. Prop turns the generator. wind kenetic energy is transformed to rotational kenetic energy, heat, and electricity. The heat goes back to the atmosphere. Where was the environmental impact study? Broomed by the lunatics at EPA I bet.
Friction. Who couldn't have thunk it. Wind turns the prop. Prop turns the generator. wind kenetic energy is transformed to rotational kenetic energy, heat, and electricity. The heat goes back to the atmosphere. Where was the environmental impact study? Broomed by the lunatics at EPA I bet.
In either case, just another example of how government subsidized efforts are seldom thought through.
A second thought - would creating new hot spots on the Texas plains create more tornadoes?
An invisible menace for solar cells
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Wow, that's a big number! Cooling winds slowing at night has a possible effect, but I would expect it to be barely measurable. Then again, what does "0.72C per decade " mean???
Wind Turbines
Chevy Volt
Mercury Lightbulbs
Solandra (& 20 simular Co.)
I think the progressives have taught us a very expensive lesson about the new green economy and socialism.
Wind gennies work by slowing down the wind. Less wind, due to the energy extracted to turn the things. Less wind, = warmer, esp at night?
What do you want the result to be? I could write a 'numerical model' to give any result you desire.
The entire Global Warming scam is based on biased 'Numerical Models.'
I want empirical measurements.
This is just another PhD candidate looking for a published paper for some creds.
Anyone with a hand held calculator can figure out that wind farms are BS based on empirical economic reality. Too expensive and too unreliable.
Thanks for the ping!
So whats a good Libral to do?!!!
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