Posted on 12/08/2009 7:47:25 AM PST by PilotDave
One of the projects touted as an example of green energy - supported by the purchase of carbon offsets from the Democratic National Convention - isn't working, according to an online report.
Face the State, a Web site that follows politics in Colorado, reported this week that a wind turbine in Wray has not been able to produce electricity since it was erected in February (2008) because of a faulty converter .
(Excerpt) Read more at rockymountainnews.com ...
How much does a 1000 mw nuke plant and 20 years worth of fuel cost?
Less than the same wattage in windmills, and it’ll be up 24/7 which windmills won’t, and you can put it in parts of the country that don’t get useful wind for windmills, and it will take significantly less space. Nuke plants are better in every possible way.
Only when the wind is not blowing but that doesn't change the fact that a 1.5 mw turbine produces 4-6000 mwh/year.
Nukes are less good in that there is not an infinite supply of fuel, less than one might expect actually, and the spent fuel must be safeguarded from all threats for....how many thousand years? It turns out that people don't like them and will protest their construction. It isn't even clear how much it would cost to build one today.
I drive by those windmills on my way to Purdue games, I wonder how much energy they are producing?
Wind doesn’t really have an infinite supply either, like I’ve already said there’s plenty of places that don’t get windmill useful wind ever, and even in places that do the wind periodically goes away. And as for nukes spent fuel if we weren’t so silly we could get rid of it easily. People don’t like nuke plants because moron hippies can’t hear the word “nuclear” without thinking of “bomb”, they get built in countries that don’t let idiot hippies make decisions. One of the great ironies of the world is that the only country to ever be nuked gets nearly twice as much (by percentage) of its electricity from nuke plants as the country that nuked them.
The world will produce the same amount of wind next year and the year after until the Lord returns. All of our current electrical needs could be provided by capturing a tiny percent of what blows across this country. Study the supply of fissionable material and you'll be surprised at how little there is.
Public opinion counts and people don't like nukes but they love windpower.
From the seven times I’ve driven by them this year:
Zero.
Not really, wind generation fluctuates with the weather, some years are going to be windier than others. And of course too much wind is just as bad for windmills as too little, as each one is speced for a certain range of wind speed. When the wind goes out of phase with your whole farm, like say during bad storms, the farm is doing nothing. Yes eventually the wind will get back in phase with at least part of your wind farm, but that’s cold comfort when your whole city is using battery backup.
Our energy need CANNOT be supplied by wind. Like I’ve told you already, there’s big chunk of this country that DO NOT get windmill usable wind on any consistent level. You’ll never be able to supply Southern Arizona on wind power, we don’t get the wind. Just plain can’t happen.
Ignorant hippies don’t like nukes, but eventually they’ll all die. People that pay attention know wind power is at best a toy, and there’s getting to be more of us every day. Basically right now the only people that actually like wind power are the same smelly hippies that don’t like nukes.
It's still about efficiency, not fuel supply.
First, there is easily enough known fissionable material available to provide safe, efficient nuclear power for hundreds of years, so your point is moot.
Second, wind turbines still COST more to manufacture, install and maintain than they EVER produce in power. Counting taxpayer subsidies, they are a net LOSER.
Theoretically, you're right, capturing the power in the wind would solve all our power problems. In reality, though, we're just not very good at the capturing part.
Public opinion counts and people don't like nukes but they love windpower.
Public opinion cannot change the laws of physics. No matter HOW much the public loves wind power, it's still an expensive, inefficient, land-hungry way to make electricity.
They love it for the same reason so many love Barack Obama: The facts are ignored in favor of hopes and dreams.
People love wind power when they aren’t paying for it.
The Austin city council decided to “go green” and buy wind energy from West Texas and other sources. However, it was expensive, so they couldn’t swing it unless they made it voluntarily for environtally (but not economically) minded people.
A few signed up, but it only took a few months before the Austin utility started to go bust because of the expense of their wind power commitments vs the lack of willing customers.
So, what would any logical thinking person do?
Right.
They tried to make it mandatory for all customers to spread the high cost of wind energy around. Funny how that works.
We may not have a lot of fissionable material, but we’ve got a shitload of coal.
From Monday’s Denver Post:
WINDSOR, Colo.—The Danish wind-turbine maker Vestas Wind Systems A/S plans to halt production at its Windsor blade manufacturing plant in the first part of 2010.
Vestas spokesman Peter Kruse says most, if not all, of the plant’s 500 employees at the plant will be placed on furlough. No layoffs are planned. He says the move is a temporary setback.
Kruse says the first quarter of the year is historically slow, but credit markets are also tight and gas prices are relatively low. He says the company is building up slowly due to a lack of orders.
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_13948809
No orders but old Bill Ritter is optimistic:
Evan Dreyer, a spokesman for Gov. Bill Ritter, who has promoted a “New Energy Economy” for the state, said, “Vestas is fully committed to Colorado for the short term, medium term and the long haul.”
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_13947586
And from today’s Denver Post, Ritter will continue to throw more tax money down the wind energy rat hole:
Vestas Wind Systems is in line to receive about $6 million in state and local incentives at the plants where it plans furloughs or a hiring freeze, according to state and federal reports.
Copenhagen-based Vestas said Monday it would furlough the 500 workers at its Windsor blade factory in the first half of 2010. The company, which also has implemented a hiring freeze at two plants it is finishing in Brighton, has not indicated the length of the furloughs.
Balancing those announcements is the fact that Vestas is still set to invest $1 billion in the state, Colorado economic- development officials say.
“The furloughs for some of their production workers do not affect the support coming from the state,” said Matt Cheroutes, a spokesman for the state Office of Economic Development.
The Windsor factory received about a $4 million incentive package from state and local agencies, according to a U.S. Department of Energy report. The package includes grants, tax rebates and job-training funds.
http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_13955791
I can guarantee you that once all the tax money is spent the $1 billion from Vesta won’t materialize.
Why does it have to be all or nothing and nothing in between is even considered? Nukes can't supply all of our needs either, they have their own limitations.
You’re the one that was saying they can supply all our needs, I was pointing out that you’re wrong. It’s nothing in some places because the climate in those places just isn’t conducive to wind power.
Actually nukes CAN supply all our energy for quite a while.
I had to stop reading right here. I don't think you are speaking from facts but from emotion. The fact is that a 1.5 mw turbine costs $2,500,000 and produces 100,000 mwhr in 20 years. That electricity has a retail value of $13,000,000. Sure in some places a turbine of that size will produce more or less and the cost will be more or less. 2 cents/kwhr for 10 years is from the PTC which represents about a million dollars in subsidy but the numbers I'm quoting are current and your statement is clearly false.
How expensive and why? In this case it sounds like someone was charging a city government a premium for social and political reasons. Electricity is just like any other commodity and people try to get as much as they can for it. Marketing it as Green CAN SOMETIMES earn a premium but usually not.
So with wind you have to run transmission lines long distances and over build by quite a big factor to provide the theoretical and mystical ALL of our power. With nukes you have to.....overbuild and run transmission lines long distances. Since demand fluxuates you have to throttle nukes on and off, which they HATE, thus greatly increasing the cost per kwhr. Same exact problem as trying to provided ALL of our power with wind.
Of course when you run AC over long distances you lose power, and you have to put in substations to juice it back up and those are expensive, and you get more power lines that can be blown down in storms like the one we had yesterday blowing 74 MPH.
With nukes you build power plants over all the place like we already do. Every major city has at least one power plant already, it’s not that tough. Since any other type of power plant can produce hundred of times more energy in the same amount of real estate as a wind farm. And they can keep running during inclement weather. Nobody throttles nuke plants, the just change how much power is going to capacitors for emergency use.
Sorry but no other power plant has the problems of windmills. Windmills are a joke.
It was expensive because it was wind-generated.
Currently, wind-generated electricity is added to the grid as a social service, rather than an economic necessity.
Austin bought the wind credits, thinking everybody was as illogical as the city council, and hoping that they would pony up for the increased rates.
Electricity is only a commodity AFTER it’s added to the grid.
Before that, it’s an economic entity and now, apparently, a political/social one as well.
One power plant per city, how do you refuel...oh....I guess you need transmission lines.
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