On 18/10/2010 17:33, Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Mon, 18 Oct 2010 12:39:32 +0100, John Rumm wrote:

True HEP generation requires a georgraphy and rainfall predisposed to it
that we don't really have much off.

But we do have an awful lot of water reservoirs obstenishly for
drinking water but most if not all let down water all the time to
keep the rivers below them flowing. One could harness this let down
for power generation.

It probably wouldn't be a great deal at any single reservior, maybe a
few MW, but not far from here there are a series of reserviors all
letting down one to the other. It starts to add up and apart from
maintenace and faults it would be 24/7 power.

Not only more expensive, but more importantly not able to generate in
sufficient quantity.

No one single renewable energy soure stands a chance of supplying all
the enregy demanded but that is *not* a reason not to use renewables.

Cost effectivness is. None of the renewables can match the generating
cost of conventional or nuclear power and, if you do a whole life study,
when nuclear still wins out on cost, wind farms generate a lot more CO2
per MWh than nuclear.

Colin Bignell