Wind and Solar Renewables Farce Continues

[StuartG]

Here's a bit from last year ...
'Gamesa in £40m Scottish investment'
January 20, 2011 4:04 pm
www.ft.com/cms/s/0/d0f124a6-24ad-11e0-8c0e-00144feab49a.html

this appears to be a year old ...

"American people have gotten wise to the lies spewed by Gamesa's Mike Peck, DEP Chief and former wind lobbyist John Hanger, "Environmental Ed" Rendell, and other wind industry PR people -- lobbyists and politicians -- looking to line their pockets, directly or indirectly, with taxpayer cash. It is time this game STOPS.

The parasitic wind industry is going to have to find another host to suck the life out of. The American people have had enough.

Gamesa - get off Shaffer Mountain - NOW.

shaffermountain.com/

I wonder who they found?

[StuartG]

"Closing Address: Michael Peck, Gamesa
Michael Peck, the architect of the Gamesa project that turned abandoned steel mills into
working windmill factories in the US, has shown how fresh thinking and new partnerships can
create thousands of green jobs. Michael’s efforts to build similar partnerships that contribute to
developing the wind power industry in Ontario point to exciting opportunities in the future.
Michael is also a leader in the national green jobs movement."
www.civicgovernance.ca/files/uploads/2010_Winter_Forum_-_Speakers_07JAN10.pdf

Michael Peck on President Obama’s Visit to Gamesa
(April 6, 2011)
www.bluegreenalliance.org/blog/guest-blog-michael-peck

[StuartG]

there's a message under the picture ...


"The moment their arms spun freely in our air, they were doomed -- for Man has earned his right to hold this planet against all comers, by virtue of occasionally producing someone totally batshit insane."
xkcd.com/556/

[rsmith7]

Meanwhile in the socialist republic of Scotland:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-17548765

"35% of electricity from renewables"
The bullshit keeps piling high...

[marchesarosa]

And the Wind famers are wrapping themselves in the flag! Patriotism really IS the last refuge of the scoundrel!




'British Wind' advert due to appear in the Spectator magazine this week, paid for by RES, SSE and Mainstream Renewable Power.

[rsmith7]

I wonder if the Scottish ministers actually read this:

www.imeche.org/scottish-energy-2020

"During the research for this report, First Minister Alex Salmond announced that the Scottish Government had increased the overall percentage target for energy from renewable sources to 30% by 2020. In light of this report’s analysis, this aspirational target appears to represent an ambition that cannot be justified from an engineering perspective."


Ouch!

[principled]

So good old Salmond thinks you'll be getting 100% ENERGY from renewable sources, not just electricity, mmm, very interesting.
I'm sorry to say this RS but I think that Mr Salmond thinks you'll be rowing or sailing to the fishing grounds, taking the fish to market on the back of a horse and cart, tending your vegetable patch and not consuming anything imported, and either heating your home with peat or keeping your horse in the bedroom to fight off the cold. Cooking will of course be done with electricity, but only when the sun shines or the wind blows.

Mark my words, it will be an idyllic existence and one we'll be chomping at the bit to emulate. I predict a huge population move to the idyllic northerly parts. Are you ready for the influx?
P

[rsmith7]

I'm ready to leave old boy.
What do you make of this from our environmental consultant friends:

www.aquatera.co.uk/OrkneyPowerOutputGraph.asp

A booming industry here in Orkney.

I wonder how they measure the output from renewables...or do they just estimate?
You wouldn't believe the quantity of small 5kW turbines going up at the moment. Twenty plus in the last year on my small Island ( 6 miles by 2 miles )
It's awful.

[principled]

So those super, duper turbines you have up there can produce the same power 6m/s as they do at 14m/s. Well that disproves the Betz limit (max theoretical efficiency) straight away
You need to write to the authors of the site (below} and tell them to get their backsides up to Orkney right away, 'cos they've got a lot of learning to do.
www.wind-power-program.com/turbine_characteristics.htm
P
PS: Of course the discrepancy could be down to the wind created by cow flatulence. Perhaps Aquetera should investigate!
co2insanity.com/2010/11/06/fartgate-cow-farts-measured-incorrectly/

[StuartG]

"to help dairy farmers mitigate greenhouse gas releases"
from cow farts,
I despair, these people are taken seriously, and that's education ....

[marchesarosa]

The Poles have been hit very badly by North German wind farms. Their excess energy surges were being dumped into the Polish grid and by slamming steam turbine output to zero, were causing serious damage and a dramatic rise in fuel consumption.

So, last December, the Poles put in phase inverter switches at the border. In response the Germans have decided to invest in Norway, converting hydro to pump storage. That will retain ownership of the potential energy.

The capital expense means they won't build UK nuclear capacity and it looks like we have to choose between funding those plants out of taxation OR flooding 1% of UK land area and ~5% of Scottish land area for our own pump storage, plus having the planned interconnect to Norway.

Wind energy is seriously bad.

I read this on Bishop Hill, just now. I don't know whether it accurately accounts for the decision of German energy companies to pull out of building nuclear power stations in the UK. If it is true is shows just how stupidly disruptive the dash for wind in Europe actually is.

[principled]

Marchesa

I read this on Bishop Hill, just now. I don't know whether it accurately accounts for the decision of German energy companies to pull out of building nuclear power stations in the UK

The Polish gov. was really concerned about the energy surge as they would end up footing the bill if it brought down their grid system and so put in the inverters. That means that they can't be used as an energy sink for Germany, hence its need to find an alternative.

It has always seemed to me that the only real way wind can work is if it is connected to hydro (and to a lesser extent nuclear) where its fluctuating output can be balanced. From what I have read, there already exists a link through Germany and Denmark to Norway and Sweden (see quote below from www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/8/31/194053/962 ). But with the Germans increasing wind turbines and needing to dump it somewhere, and the Danes wanting up to 50% of their energy from wind, one must assume that the interconnections need to be beefed up (both in terms of the grid and also pumped storage).

The west Danish grid is connected to the Norwegian, Swedish and German grids. The inter connectors were built as export lines of Norwegian and Swedish hydroelectric power to Germany but have found a new use in helping to balance the highly variable wind output from Denmark.

Frankly, I can't see how the RWE and EON decision isn't without some interference from the German gov. Having decided on a non-nuclear policy, I can't see how the German gov. would "allow" either company's energies and funds to be put into building nuclear plants in the UK when we know that there is going to have to be major investment in the German system to cope with wind energy. That's the price we pay for having foreign companies responsible for our core services.

I love this quote from Greenpeace. You'd think they'd know we aren't all thick and at least some of are aware of the huge subsidies going into renewables!

Greenpeace's policy director Doug Parr claimed: "The Government's energy strategy is crumbling. Not even the billions of pounds of taxpayers' money they have offered as incentives to the German and French nuclear industry are enough to make a new generation of power stations economically viable."

From: www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/nuclear-power-plans-damaged-as-the-germans-pull-out-7601148.html

P
PS: Even the EDF/Centrica plans are not set in Concrete as British Gas wants to see the new energy pricing structure before it finally agrees. Meantime, since around 2005 our electrical energy generation has been dropping rapidly and we now have to import the equivalent of 50 million tons of oil to bridge the gap between electricity production and consumption!!!

[StuartG]

P
this piece ...
"The Polish gov. was really concerned about the energy surge as they would end up footing the bill if it brought down their grid system and so put in the inverters. That means that they can't be used as an energy sink for Germany, hence its need to find an alternative."
reminded me straight away of WWII, I wonder why that would be?

p 86/369
E) Effect of wind energy use on the European interconnected power system

"Due to the electric couplings, the high extensive load flows directed from the coast to the load
centres lead even during normal operation to appreciable additional loads of the foreign
neighbouring grids in Poland, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands and Belgium. In the event
of a failure additional load flow transfers to foreign grids occur, thus relieving the German
grid.
An impairment of the neighbouring grids by load flows resulting from the distribution of wind
feed-in throughout Germany must be ruled out because this circumstance increasingly leads to
a lack of understanding on the part of international partners particularly with regard to the
hindrance of trade. One-sided support on neighbouring grids must not occur at the expense of
safe interconnected operation either.
With a high feed-in from wind turbines, conventional power generation units in Germany can
be redispatched and disconnected from the grid so that their contributions are not required for
grid stability. This pertains particularly to the support of frequency (inertia, primary control)
and voltage (short-circuit power, reactive power). It must be investigated to what extent the
operation of the German grid is dependent on parallel operation with UCTE partners when
high amounts are fed-in from regenerative energies and what measures can be used to
eliminate the disadvantages for interconnected operations occurring as a result of this. If this
is not completely possible, it is necessary to clarify with the UCTE partners what can be
tolerated in order not to jeopardise the solidarity principle of European interconnected
operation."
www.uwig.org/Dena-2005_English.pdf

OK,Ja
[sorry, can't help myself]

[StuartG]

Here's a good document I found some time ago, it's written in clearly understandable language, with explanations. He shows the reasons and working. It makes a good reference for any power generation study.

"The windmills required to provide the UK with 20 kWh/d per person are 50 times the entire wind power of Denmark.
Assuming a load factor of 33%, an average power of 20 kWh/d per person requires an installed capacity of 150 GW.
At the end of 2006, Denmark had an installed capacity of 3.1 GW; Germany had 20.6 GW. The world total was 74 GW
(wwindea.org). Incidentally, the load factor of the Danish wind fleet was 22% in 2006, and the average power it
delivered was 3 kWh/d per person."

www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/withouthotair/c4/page_33.shtml

The complete book is 12 Mb ...
"Sustainable Energy — without the hot air"
David JC MacKay
www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/sustainable/book/tex/sewtha.pdf

[rsmith7]

Latest "output" from renewables in Orkney:
www.aquatera.co.uk/OrkneyPowerOutputGraph.asp

This will update automatically so for future reference:

Demand 16MW
Wind Speed 10 MPH
Output 0

I wonder if this has anything to do with my e mail asking them how they measure the output from renewables?
No reply of course.