Hi Uko
Don't see you often here, so welcome!
Uko Zylstra wrote:
>
> Meanwhile, world wind power use has multiplied nearly fourfold over the
> last five years, a growth rate matched only by the computer industry. In the
> United States, the American Wind Energy Association projects a staggering 60
> percent growth in wind-generating capacity this year.
Already NIMBY protests as these large, nosiy, and obtrusive structures are beginning. Wind power is not as environmentally benign as people would like to think.
>
> Wind power was once confined to California, but during the last three
> years, wind farms coming online in Minnesota, Iowa, Texas, Colorado,
> Wyoming, Oregon, and Pennsylvania have boosted U.S. capacity by half from
> 1,680 megawatts to 2,550 megawatts. The 1,500 or more megawatts to be added
> this year will be located in a dozen states. A 300-megawatt wind farm under
> construction on the Oregon/Washington border is currently the world's
> largest.
Windpower was not "once confined to California" It has been used in many parts of the world for millenia. Wind farms have been generating power for decades in several countries.The US is not the centre of the world.
>
> But this is only the beginning. The Bonneville Power Administration (BPA)
> indicated in February that it wanted to buy 1,000 megawatts of
> wind-generating capacity and requested proposals. Much to its surprise, it
> received enough to build 2,600 megawatts of capacity in five states, with
> the potential of expanding these sites to over 4,000 megawatts. BPA, which
> may accept most of these proposals, expects to have at least one site online
> by the end of this year.
> A 3,000-megawatt wind farm in the early planning stages in South Dakota,
> near the Iowa border, is 10 times the size of the Oregon/Washington wind
> farm. Named Rolling Thunder, this project, initiated by Dehlsen Associates
> and drawing on the leadership of Jim Dehlsen, a wind energy pioneer in
> California, is designed to feed power to the midwestern region around
> Chicago. This proposed project is not only large by wind power standards, it
> is one of the largest energy projects of any kind in the world today.
> Advances in wind turbine technology, drawing heavily from the aerospace
> industry, have lowered the cost of wind power from 38 cents per kilowatt
> hour in the early 1980s to 3 to 6 cents today depending on the wind site.
> Wind, now competitive with fossil fuels, is already cheaper in some
> locations than oil or gas-fired power. With major corporations, such as ABB,
> Shell International, and Enron plowing resources into this field, further
> cost cuts are in prospect.
> Wind is a vast, worldwide source of energy. The U.S. Great Plains are the
> Saudi Arabia of wind power. Three wind-rich U.S. states-North Dakota,
> Kansas, and Texas-have enough harnessable wind to meet national electricity
> needs. China can double its existing generating capacity from wind alone.
> Densely populated Western Europe can supply all of its electricity needs
> from offshore wind power.
> Today Denmark, the world leader in wind turbine technology and manufacture,
> is getting 15 percent of its electricity from wind power. For
> Schleswig-Holstein, the northernmost state of Germany, it is 19 percent and,
> for some parts of the state, 75 percent. Spain's industrial state of
> Navarra, starting from scratch six years ago, now gets 24 percent of its
> electricity from wind.
>
What was is the actual power demand of Navvare, Denmark, Scheswig-Holstein, and Norway. New Zealand generates 10% of its power from geothermal sources and the Philipplines 25%, but this does not mean that geothermal will be the big energy source of the future.
> As wind generating costs fall and as concern about climate change
> escalates, more and more countries are climbing onto the wind energy
> bandwagon. In December, France announced it will develop 5,000 megawatts of
> wind power by 2010. Also in December, Argentina announced a plan to develop
> 3,000 megawatts of wind power in Patagonia by 2010. In April, the United
> Kingdom accepted offshore bids for 1,500 megawatts of wind power. In May, a
> report from Beijing indicated that China plans to develop some 2,500
> megawatts of wind power by 2005.
Sounds impressive but:
IAEA figures show a 2% increase in nuclear electric output in 2000, to 2447.5 billion kWh
worldwide. With six new reactors coming on line and one closing down, total nuclear capacity
increased to 351 327 MWe, from 438 reactors. (http://www.uic.com.au/wns0511.htm). These are the sort of figures that actually matter in the big picture Of course is this from the IAEA and therefore tainted!
>
> The growth in wind power is consistently outrunning earlier estimates. The
> European Wind Energy Association, which in 1996 had set a target of 40,000
> megawatts for Europe in 2010, recently upped it to 60,000 megawatts.
> The Bush plan to add 393,000 megawatts of electricity nationwide by 2020
> could be satisfied from wind alone.
How? This figure 6 X that postulated for Europe, and would require more than 100 power stations of the size of that mentioned being planned South Dakota.
> Money spent on wind-generated
> electricity tends to remain in the community, providing income, jobs, and
> tax revenue, bolstering local economies. One large advanced design wind
> turbine, occupying a quarter acre of land, can easily yield a farmer or
> rancher $2,000 in royalties per year while providing the community with
> $100,000 of electricity. U.S. farmers and ranchers, who own most of the wind
> rights in the country, are now joining environmentalists to lobby for
> development of this abundant alternative to fossil fuel.
>
Farmers own the wind? Bizzare!
> Once we get cheap electricity from wind, we can use it to electrolyze
> water, producing hydrogen. Hydrogen is the fuel of choice for the new,
> highly efficient, fuel cell engine that every major automobile manufacturer
> is now working on. Daimler Chrysler plans to be on the market with fuel
> cell-powered cars in 2003. Ford, Toyota, and Honda will probably not be far
> behind. William Ford, Chairman of Ford Motor Company, says he expects to
> preside over the demise of the internal combustion engine.
> Surplus wind power can be stored as hydrogen and used in fuel cells or gas
> turbines to generate electricity, leveling supply when winds are variable.
> Wind, once seen as a cornerstone of the new energy economy, may turn out to
> be its foundation. The wind meteorologist who analyzes wind regimes and
> identifies the best sites for wind farms will play a role in the new energy
> economy comparable to that of the petroleum geologist in the old energy
> economy.
> With the advancing technologies for harnessing wind and powering motor
> vehicles with hydrogen, we can now see a future where farmers and ranchers
> can supply not only much of the country's electricity, but much of the
> hydrogen to fuel its fleet of automobiles as well. For the first time, the
> United States has the technology and resources to divorce itself from Middle
> Eastern oil.
All sounds like wishful thinking!
>
> In addition to neglecting the potential of wind, the Bush energy strategy
> pays only lip service to climate stabilization. This is a high-risk
> strategy. With business as usual, the International Panel on Climate Change
> recently projected a global temperature rise during this century of up to 6
> degrees Celsius (10 degrees Fahrenheit). If this rise occurs, the rest of
> the world may hold the United States, the leading CO2 emitter, responsible.
The source does not mention that this is the high end of the prediction. The most likely figure is much lower.
>
> What the United States needs now is an energy plan for this century, one
> that takes into account not only recent technological advances in wind
> power, fuel cells, and hydrogen generators, but also the need to stabilize
> climate. Perhaps Congress will bring the energy plan into the twenty-first
> century and restore U.S. leadership in the fast-changing world energy
> economy.
Don't get me wrong. I am all for wind power, but it is not free of economic or environmental cost, nor is it likely to make a significant dent in base load generating capacity.
Jon
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