On Sat, 23 Oct 2010 12:39:07 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

I wonder how much CO2 "free" power you need generate just of offset the
concrete?

6-12 months worth to recover the lifetime carbon costs, from
building to decommissioning.

See BWEA and the studies Vestas publish. Links provided many times
before.


--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

David Hansen wrote:
On Sat, 23 Oct 2010 12:39:07 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

I wonder how much CO2 "free" power you need generate just of offset the
concrete?

6-12 months worth to recover the lifetime carbon costs, from
building to decommissioning.

See BWEA and the studies Vestas publish. Links provided many times
before.


which are at best economical with the truth.

As with all things wind, the hidden costs that are paid doown the line
both in financial and carbon terms are never mentioned.

John Rumm wrote:
On 25/10/2010 08:05, David Hansen wrote:
On Sat, 23 Oct 2010 12:39:07 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

I wonder how much CO2 "free" power you need generate just of offset the
concrete?

6-12 months worth to recover the lifetime carbon costs, from
building to decommissioning.

That sounds highly dubious. It almost certainly does not include the
infrastructure build out to make the thing accessible and maintainable,
or that required for grid connection. It also ignores conventional power
station the spinning reserve.



Of course it does. The Wind energy association is just PR spin for the
industry.

Every teime ou see a boart or a helicopter trundling offshore to a wind
turbine, its fuel is being burnt.

Every time you see a new CCGT statins spinning up for when teh wind
drops, its fuel is being burnt.

Every time you see a massively overspecced pylon and transmission line
(so that when the wind blows a gale, it CAN take the electricity) being
erected, someone somewhere is burning fuel to make it so


The current way FIT and RO work, these costs are not borne by windpower
companies, and the carbon burn is not quoted in any of their figures.

Fraud, basically.

On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 12:23:14 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

It almost certainly does not include the
infrastructure build out to make the thing accessible and maintainable,

I conclude that you have not even bothered to skim the references.
They are easy to find, but here is a clue
http://www.vestas.com/en/about-vestas/sustainability/wind-turbines-and-the-environment/life-cycle-assessment-%28lca%29.aspx.

Taking the V30 report, as it is for the largest turbine.

If you mean the roads then they are ignored as they are negligible.
However, the travel of the maintenance staff is not negligible, so
is included.

or that required for grid connection.

The cables within the wind farm are included. Those outwith it are
not, neither would they be for any other form of generation.

It also ignores conventional power
station the spinning reserve.

Spinning reserve would still exist even if all wind turbines were
dismantled this afternoon. You are repeating the refuted "wind farms
must have dedicated 100% backup" line.

It is true that fossil fuel fired stations will have their output
varied more often with wind on the system. The amount of increased
emissions this causes are negligible in comparison to the reduction
of emissions having wind causes. A few percent of the savings. It
has all been studied http://www.ukerc.ac.uk/support/Intermittency.



--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

David Hansen wrote:
On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 12:23:14 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

It almost certainly does not include the
infrastructure build out to make the thing accessible and maintainable,

I conclude that you have not even bothered to skim the references.
They are easy to find, but here is a clue
http://www.vestas.com/en/about-vestas/sustainability/wind-turbines-and-the-environment/life-cycle-assessment-%28lca%29.aspx.

Taking the V30 report, as it is for the largest turbine.

If you mean the roads then they are ignored as they are negligible.
However, the travel of the maintenance staff is not negligible, so
is included.

or that required for grid connection.

The cables within the wind farm are included. Those outwith it are
not, neither would they be for any other form of generation.


Indeed, but conventional forms of generation have high *constant*
output, by and large. Only wind and solar are totally unable to operate
in any sort of either base load or dispatchable mode.


Load average on a wind farm is meaningless to compare with load average
on conventional power.

Load average on conventional power means how much of the time its
generating a fixed steady output.

And how much time its down for refuelling or maintenance, or because its
not needed.

Load average on a windfarm is merely the average of a totally randomly
and fast slewing output.

No one else has to build a long distance connector capable of three
times the load average of their power station, just to take what MIGHT
be available. Or not. Ata 30% load average transmission lie shave to nbe
three times teh size of teh actual power genearted,



It also ignores conventional power
station the spinning reserve.

Spinning reserve would still exist even if all wind turbines were
dismantled this afternoon. You are repeating the refuted "wind farms
must have dedicated 100% backup" line.

They do have to have that much,. Not all spinning I grant you, but as I
have repeatedly shown you the calculations for, the fact of having to
operate conventional stations in highly dispatchable mode negates pretty
much all of te carbon gains allegedly made by having them, and i ertain
cases makes the whole exercise carbon positive




It is true that fossil fuel fired stations will have their output
varied more often with wind on the system. The amount of increased
emissions this causes are negligible in comparison to the reduction
of emissions having wind causes.

No, the best estimate was that 50% gains were lost, the worst estimates
have it that windfarms increase fossil fuel consumption overall.


A few percent of the savings. It
has all been studied http://www.ukerc.ac.uk/support/Intermittency.


Those studies only address costs: Nowhere do they address carbon reduction.

More spin and evasion from the wind lobby.

Just look here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...s_per_ capita

and you will see that Germany and Denmark, the most enthusiastic and
wide adopters of windpower, do no better than the UK in terms of per
capita carbon emission.

Nor has it fallen much since the adoption of windpower.

If windpower gains were so great, Denmark with potentially more
windpower capacity than its electrical grid needs, by some margin,
should have shown a 30% reduction in carbon emissions. Assuming like the
UK that 30% of the fuel burn goes to electricity.


The UK is already generating less CO2 per capita than Denmark. Probably
because we have nuclear power. France is very low. Guess what. It has
enough nuclear capacity to generate nearly all its needs that way.
Sweden is very low. It has hydro power. Iceland has geothermal. Both low.


The fact is that massive deployment of windpower has saved little or no
carbon emissions whatsoever wherever its been deployed.

The german and Danish conclusions are that it has saved none whatsoever
- all reductions in CO2 they have made are by other means - better
conventional stations and fuel efficiency measures.


Energy efficiency makes infinitely more difference: Viz the great
difference between the US and the European countries.

In short windpower is not green at all. Its basically a fraud.

On Oct 25, 3:08*pm, The Natural Philosopher
The german and Danish conclusions are that it has saved none whatsoever
- all reductions in CO2 they have made are by other means - better
conventional stations and fuel efficiency measures.

The whole of Europe was stitched up when CO2 reduction targets were
set. All Germany had to do was close/upgrade East German industry.

MBQ

John Rumm wrote:
On 25/10/2010 14:24, David Hansen wrote:


It is true that fossil fuel fired stations will have their output
varied more often with wind on the system. The amount of increased
emissions this causes are negligible in comparison to the reduction
of emissions having wind causes. A few percent of the savings. It
has all been studiedhttp://www.ukerc.ac.uk/support/Intermittency.

The problem there is that its not easy to use genuine low carbon sources
such as nuclear to provide that reserve, and is far better suited to
relying on combined cycle gas stations, running on imported gas in many
cases.



Nuclear can be used, by why use it to back up useless ineffective wind
power?

You might as well go all nuclear. You need the same amount in either case.

On 25/10/2010 19:22, Tim Streater wrote:

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.


You may well be right. Now please suggest what can supply the other 85%
without fossil fuels.

Please remember we'd really like a lot _more_ electricity so we can have
electric cars.(1)

Andy

(1) Tesla preferred to G-Wiz

Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
David Hansen wrote:

On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 12:23:14 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

It also ignores conventional power station the spinning reserve.

Spinning reserve would still exist even if all wind turbines were
dismantled this afternoon. You are repeating the refuted "wind farms
must have dedicated 100% backup" line.

It is true that fossil fuel fired stations will have their output
varied more often with wind on the system. The amount of increased
emissions this causes are negligible in comparison to the reduction
of emissions having wind causes. A few percent of the savings. It
has all been studied http://www.ukerc.ac.uk/support/Intermittency.

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.


it cannot be ignored at all really.

she is basically wrong.

Even now, the official published figures for predicted versyus actual
output show that at least 5% of *total* capacity needs to be on hot
order standby in any given day. Just for wind...

On 25/10/2010 23:21, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
Andy Champ wrote:

On 25/10/2010 19:22, Tim Streater wrote:

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

You may well be right. Now please suggest what can supply the other
85% without fossil fuels.

Well exactly :-)

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

But what do we do when we run out of fossil fuel? What we have left is
the sunlight and the tides.

Dave

Dave wrote:
On 25/10/2010 23:21, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
Andy Champ wrote:

On 25/10/2010 19:22, Tim Streater wrote:

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

You may well be right. Now please suggest what can supply the other
85% without fossil fuels.

Well exactly :-)

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

But what do we do when we run out of fossil fuel? What we have left is
the sunlight and the tides.


well I am not bothered about running out of uranium and other fissile
materials 1000 years down the line, cos by then they MUST have got
fusion working.


Dave

On Oct 25, 11:44*pm, Dave wrote:
On 25/10/2010 23:21, Tim Streater wrote:

In article ,
Andy Champ wrote:

On 25/10/2010 19:22, Tim Streater wrote:

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

You may well be right. Now please suggest what can supply the other
85% without fossil fuels.

Well exactly :-)

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

But what do we do when we run out of fossil fuel?

Nuclear.

On 25/10/2010 23:46, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
Dave wrote:
On 25/10/2010 23:21, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
Andy Champ wrote:

On 25/10/2010 19:22, Tim Streater wrote:

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

You may well be right. Now please suggest what can supply the other
85% without fossil fuels.

Well exactly :-)

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

But what do we do when we run out of fossil fuel? What we have left is
the sunlight and the tides.


well I am not bothered about running out of uranium and other fissile
materials 1000 years down the line, cos by then they MUST have got
fusion working.

Is that how many years of reserve we have left yet?

Dave

On 26 Oct, 15:36, Dave wrote:
On 25/10/2010 23:46, The Natural Philosopher wrote:





Dave wrote:
On 25/10/2010 23:21, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
Andy Champ wrote:

On 25/10/2010 19:22, Tim Streater wrote:

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

You may well be right. Now please suggest what can supply the other
85% without fossil fuels.

Well exactly :-)

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

But what do we do when we run out of fossil fuel? What we have left is
the sunlight and the tides.

well I am not bothered about running out of uranium and other fissile
materials 1000 years down the line, cos by then they MUST have got
fusion working.

Is that how many years of reserve we have left yet?

Dave- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

The actual problem is too many people.

Dave wrote:
On 25/10/2010 23:46, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
Dave wrote:
On 25/10/2010 23:21, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
Andy Champ wrote:

On 25/10/2010 19:22, Tim Streater wrote:

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind
gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

You may well be right. Now please suggest what can supply the other
85% without fossil fuels.

Well exactly :-)

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

But what do we do when we run out of fossil fuel? What we have left is
the sunlight and the tides.


well I am not bothered about running out of uranium and other fissile
materials 1000 years down the line, cos by then they MUST have got
fusion working.

Is that how many years of reserve we have left yet?

Dave

its an educated guess..still its better than coal (200 years) or oil
(150years?) from start to finish, in this country.

Coal production tracks economic advances and rise in global importance
and population and standard of living of the UK, almost exactly.

the issue of fissile materials contains several imponderables:

- how much will the developing world use on future?
- what is the greatest price it will still be economic to extract it at?
- how much is there there, that we don't know about, because its not
been worth finding out?
- ultimately, how much will we be able to generate from reactors as part
of a fast or slow breeder reaction.
- will the global population subside to a more sustainable level?

take the worst case, and it might be 150 years. Take the best and it
might be 1500.

But even 200 years buys us time for the next step. Presumably fusion, or
some deeply obscure bit of quantum physics.

On 26/10/2010 16:20, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

But even 200 years buys us time for the next step. Presumably fusion, or
some deeply obscure bit of quantum physics.




Let's hope it's that and not barbarism.

Probably forever, as the easily accessible resources are used up so even
after a population collapse there would be little chance of a second go.

Andy

Andy Champ wrote:
On 26/10/2010 16:20, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

But even 200 years buys us time for the next step. Presumably fusion, or
some deeply obscure bit of quantum physics.




Let's hope it's that and not barbarism.

It's barbarism right now.



Probably forever, as the easily accessible resources are used up so even
after a population collapse there would be little chance of a second go.

10 acres is probably enough to coppice, and run a steam engine CHP on
for a typical household.
Ok cities are gone, ..Hooray!

Andy

On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 19:22:48 +0100 someone who may be Tim Streater
wrote this:-

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

The figure used to generally be stated as 20% several years ago.

There is no engineering reason why higher amounts of wind cannot be
accommodated according to National Grid, there is however a
financial reason given the current market based system.


--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 23:21:47 +0100 someone who may be Tim Streater
wrote this:-

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

Where will the uranium come from?


--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

On 27 Oct, 06:55, David Hansen
wrote:
On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 23:21:47 +0100 someone who may be Tim Streater
wrote this:-

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

Where will the uranium come from?

--
* David Hansen, Edinburgh
*I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
*http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

This is getting circular. We've covered the point that htere's plenty
od uranium.

On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 17:17:34 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

I don't accept that. Given the places where these things work best -
i.e. high inaccessible ones, the cost of getting a road to them is not
going to be negligible in many cases.

You seem to have swerved from carbon to money.

I am reasonably familiar with many of the large wind farms around
here. They are generally not as remote as you imply, that would
increase the length of the electrical connection. That also means
roads are short. The roads have a limited carbon impact, largely the
one-off of quarrying the chippings. I think the reports are right to
ignore them, the carbon impact is negligible.

The financial cost of building (or adapting as many of the roads to
sites existed in some form anyway) is also negligible. Maintenance
of them is also negligible, in both carbon and money.

The cables within the wind farm are included. Those outwith it are
not, neither would they be for any other form of generation.

Which is a slight of hand, since most other generation is built on
existing sites,

I am reasonably familiar with the electricity system around here.
Torness and Longannet were not built on previous sites, though there
was a power station nearby in the latter case.

and can also source 1GW say from a single plant,

Your point would have some validity if there were large distances of
new cables installed for wind, which were then connected to the rest
of the system at a few points. However, that is not the case. Wind
is usually connected into the 11 or 33 kV systems, where the lines
generally existed long before wind generation. Some large wind farms
are connected at higher voltages.

I was not suggesting it needed 100% reserve. However it
does require a fairly significant amount of reserve,

You claim so, without offering evidence for your assertion. The
results of a couple of hundred studies were summarised by UKERC and
until better evidence is offered I'll stick with them.

and the more wind
you try to introduce into the mix the more is needed.

Are you implying that this is new reserve? If you are then I'll
respond by saying that is not the case. Instead of closing some
existing power stations they can be retained as a reserve.



--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

On Tue, 26 Oct 2010 23:04:23 -0700 (PDT) someone who may be harry
wrote this:-

We've covered the point that htere's plenty
od uranium.

There is indeed plenty of uranium. The question is how much of it is
reasonably accessible. Ideas such as extracting it from seawater are
as close to perpetual motion as makes no difference.

Even just restricting oneself to the reasonably accessible stuff the
estimates of reserves are subject to the same sorts of caution as
apply to estimates of oil reserves.


--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

"David Hansen" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 19:22:48 +0100 someone who may be Tim Streater
wrote this:-

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

The figure used to generally be stated as 20% several years ago.

There is no engineering reason why higher amounts of wind cannot be
accommodated according to National Grid, there is however a
financial reason given the current market based system.

There are good reasons why it can and that involves dropping supply to
customers on none essential supply.
Its dropped as a percentage because the number of such customers has
dropped.
Unless you can majick more of those customers wind energy will have to be
backed up or you will have to disconnect other types of customers at times,
I suggest starting with anyone on a green tariff.

On 27/10/2010 00:01, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Probably forever, as the easily accessible resources are used up so
even after a population collapse there would be little chance of a
second go.

10 acres is probably enough to coppice, and run a steam engine CHP on
for a typical household.
Ok cities are gone, ..Hooray!

That would imply a population reduction of at least 90% and probably
rather more. The redundant peasants aren't going to go without a fight.

David Hansen wrote:
On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 19:22:48 +0100 someone who may be Tim Streater
wrote this:-

My niece alleges that the backup issue can be ignored until wind gets
about 15% or so penetration, which seems not unreasonable.

The figure used to generally be stated as 20% several years ago.

There is no engineering reason why higher amounts of wind cannot be
accommodated according to National Grid, there is however a
financial reason given the current market based system.


typical weaselling.

Yes, it can be accommodated. That is not the point.
Yes, it costs to do it. That is a point, but it is not THE point.

The POINT is, that in so doing, *any carbon emission gains from having
the windmills are almost totally negated*.

Germany and Denmark, despite massive investment in wind, show almost no
overall CO2 reduction as a result, and none that is not consistent with
other measures (efficiency savings and replacing old generation plant)
that could not be ascribed to these measures ALONE.

Why was windpower promoted? As clean carbon free energy.

If it turns out that it is not, (and all the evidence now being collated
is that it makes no difference to CO2 at all) what is the point of
having wind power at all?

I have asked you time and again, to stop avoiding the question: where is
there any study that *conclusively shows that large sale introduction of
wind power has any beneficial effect on CO2 production, whatsoever?*

And you have failed to point out a single one. I have been unable to
find one either.

I have found half a dozen that indicate the in all probability the
impact is low to completely negligible.

And if it means that no less fuel is burnt, it has no advantage in
security of energy supply either.

So the two big pluses for wind power that are alleged by the wind lobby,
turn out to be fraudulent.

David Hansen wrote:
On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 23:21:47 +0100 someone who may be Tim Streater
wrote this:-

A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.

Where will the uranium come from?


same place everything comes from. The universe. The big bang.

David Hansen wrote:
On Tue, 26 Oct 2010 23:04:23 -0700 (PDT) someone who may be harry
wrote this:-

We've covered the point that htere's plenty
od uranium.

There is indeed plenty of uranium. The question is how much of it is
reasonably accessible. Ideas such as extracting it from seawater are
as close to perpetual motion as makes no difference.


Not really. Japan has done it.

There's more uranium around than there is copper to make the bloody
windmills. Or neodymium to make the magnets.

Eve someone as mathematically challenged as you are should be able to
work out that a windmill running at a load factor of 30%, and a
transmissions line connecting it running at a load factor of 30% coupled
to conventional generation as backup , running at 70%, uses 5 times as
much copper and three times as much aluminium as a conventional
generator running at a load factor of 90%.

So called 'green energy' means 4 - times the plant running at an overall
20% load factor (wind and its backup) to do the same job as one nuke
running at 95% load factor.

HUGE waste of scarce precious metals.

Copper aint cheap either. Because its running out.



Even just restricting oneself to the reasonably accessible stuff the
estimates of reserves are subject to the same sorts of caution as
apply to estimates of oil reserves.


...in the 1920s yes.

No one has bothered to prospect for uranium since about 1975. No money
in it. Its cheap as chips at the moment.

The only good thing about windmills is that they have lots of copper, so
once we get around to scrapping them, in 5 years time or so, there will
be plenty of copper in them to make wires to build nuclear power
stations with,.

Then we can sell of the towers themselves to make affordable houses out
of. 'EON Folly'. My Little windmill tower' etc etc. and Grand Designs
can have a competition about who can make the most ridiculous ghastly
overpriced and senseless architectural ego statement out of them.

And get it listed..

David Hansen wrote:
On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 17:17:34 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

I don't accept that. Given the places where these things work best -
i.e. high inaccessible ones, the cost of getting a road to them is not
going to be negligible in many cases.

You seem to have swerved from carbon to money.

I am reasonably familiar with many of the large wind farms around
here. They are generally not as remote as you imply, that would
increase the length of the electrical connection. That also means
roads are short. The roads have a limited carbon impact, largely the
one-off of quarrying the chippings. I think the reports are right to
ignore them, the carbon impact is negligible.

The financial cost of building (or adapting as many of the roads to
sites existed in some form anyway) is also negligible. Maintenance
of them is also negligible, in both carbon and money.

The cables within the wind farm are included. Those outwith it are
not, neither would they be for any other form of generation.
Which is a slight of hand, since most other generation is built on
existing sites,

I am reasonably familiar with the electricity system around here.
Torness and Longannet were not built on previous sites, though there
was a power station nearby in the latter case.

and can also source 1GW say from a single plant,

Your point would have some validity if there were large distances of
new cables installed for wind, which were then connected to the rest
of the system at a few points. However, that is not the case. Wind
is usually connected into the 11 or 33 kV systems, where the lines
generally existed long before wind generation. Some large wind farms
are connected at higher voltages.

I was not suggesting it needed 100% reserve. However it
does require a fairly significant amount of reserve,

You claim so, without offering evidence for your assertion. The
results of a couple of hundred studies were summarised by UKERC and
until better evidence is offered I'll stick with them.

and the more wind
you try to introduce into the mix the more is needed.

Are you implying that this is new reserve? If you are then I'll
respond by saying that is not the case. Instead of closing some
existing power stations they can be retained as a reserve.


That's not what happened in Denmark,. They had to build new reserves.
More efficient CCGT reserves. Because they could not use the big
conventional sets as backup. There is not one whit less conventional
capacity in Denmark than there ever was, and despite he fact that the
installed peak capacity of windpower is greater than their total grid
demand, the whole setup uses just as much fuel as it ever did, DESPITE
the fact that the conventional generation they have built is MORE efficient.

And the *net* contribution of that 110% capacity running at 30% load
factors, is at best 10%. And in some years as little as 6% of the grid.
So the ACTUAL load factor of a massive amount of windpower is between 5
and 9%. Simply because when the wind blows hard, they cant use the power.


And all that efficiency from the new CCGT stations is thrown away having
to back up the wind power.

"The very fact that the wind power system, that has been imposed so
expensively upon the consumers, can not and does not achieve the simple
objectives for which it was built, should be warning the energy
establishment, at all levels, of the considerable gap between aspiration
and reality.€�

(WIND ENERGY - THE CASE OF DENMARK: Center for Politikse Studier
Sept 2009)

Roger Chapman wrote:
On 27/10/2010 00:01, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Probably forever, as the easily accessible resources are used up so
even after a population collapse there would be little chance of a
second go.

10 acres is probably enough to coppice, and run a steam engine CHP on
for a typical household.
Ok cities are gone, ..Hooray!

That would imply a population reduction of at least 90% and probably
rather more. The redundant peasants aren't going to go without a fight.

Fortunately they are as we know, incapable even of that, having been
raised under cradle to grave socialism, when that collapses they will
simply die in front of their sky TV's.

Or eat each other.

John Rumm wrote:
On 27/10/2010 09:57, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Then we can sell of the towers themselves to make affordable houses out
of. 'EON Folly'. My Little windmill tower' etc etc. and Grand Designs
can have a competition about who can make the most ridiculous ghastly
overpriced and senseless architectural ego statement out of them.

At least the windmills of old one could actually turn them into quaint
living accommodation. The modern ones would create a living space with
all the aesthetic charm of a gas main.

exactly. Thats pretty much an apt description of all those 'Grand Designs.

You could pop a little bungalow at the top though.

Or convert the nacelle into a bijoux shag pad.

Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,
The Natural Philosopher wrote:

David Hansen wrote:
On Mon, 25 Oct 2010 23:21:47 +0100 someone who may be Tim Streater
wrote this:-
A nuclear-only solution would seem the most sensible to me.
Where will the uranium come from?
same place everything comes from. The universe. The big bang.

Not the big bang. That only made Helium and IIRC, a bit of Lithium.
Ordinary stars, like our Sun, make elements up to iron and possibly
nickel. Everything heavier than that comes from supanova explosions.


My point was hat ultimately all that lot came from stuff that came from
stuff that...came from the big bag.

I.e. the Universe is not 'sustainable', never was and never will be.

We are all, along with the universe, living on borrowed time.

John Rumm wrote:

On 27/10/2010 22:52, Huge wrote:
On 2010-10-27, Tim wrote:

nickel. Everything heavier than that comes from supanova explosions.

Supernova.

ITYM Supernovae

Umm no, "explosions" is the plural here, also supernovae is deprecated
with supernovas being preferred.

You're welcome.

John Rumm wrote:

On 28/10/2010 21:53, Steve Firth wrote:
John wrote:

On 27/10/2010 22:52, Huge wrote:
On 2010-10-27, Tim wrote:

nickel. Everything heavier than that comes from supanova explosions.

Supernova.

ITYM Supernovae

Umm no, "explosions" is the plural here, also supernovae is deprecated
with supernovas being preferred.

You're welcome.

I did not use explosions...

Yes, I agree, you got it wrong. Never mind, better luck next time.

On Oct 29, 6:57*am, (Steve Firth) wrote:
John Rumm wrote:
On 28/10/2010 21:53, Steve Firth wrote:
John *wrote:

On 27/10/2010 22:52, Huge wrote:
On 2010-10-27, Tim * wrote:

nickel. Everything heavier than that comes from supanova explosions.

Supernova.

ITYM Supernovae

Umm no, "explosions" is the plural here, also supernovae is deprecated
with supernovas being preferred.

You're welcome.

I did not use explosions...

Yes, I agree, you got it wrong. Never mind, better luck next time.

Err, no. Replace "supernova explosions" with "supernovae" and
everything is fine.

You're welcome, no charge.

MBQ

On Wed, 27 Oct 2010 15:52:57 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

The more you build, the further away they are going to have to get (I am
assuming the planners will target the least cost inefficient sites first)

You are assuming that when electricity people plan a wind farm it is
then put up without any further discussion. That isn't the case,
many suitable sites have not had wind farms installed due to
opposition. As the energy crunch happens I expect that the
opposition will diminish.

The financial cost of building (or adapting as many of the roads to
sites existed in some form anyway) is also negligible. Maintenance
of them is also negligible, in both carbon and money.

Have any figures to support your assertions?

I'm happy to rely on the people who did the work for Vestas. Were
these costs high I think they would have included them.

You seem to be suggesting that you can string up 500 wind turbines with
little extra grid extension than would be required for a new nuclear
station.

I don't think I am. What I said was that the connection to the grid
tends to be short, so while it is important to include the cables on
the farm in the calculation, there will be lots of these, the cable
which forms the connection need not be included.

You claim so, without offering evidence for your assertion. The

So you don't need reserve for a wind turbine then? News to me.

Not what I said. Neither did the UKERC report which I referred to.

results of a couple of hundred studies were summarised by UKERC and
until better evidence is offered I'll stick with them.

If you want to discuss what UKERC said, rather than your straw man,
then I may respond.

Since our demand for power is growing, why would we be closing stations?
Perhaps because they are at the end of their useful life? In which case
it does not sound like a sound policy to keep an ageing and probably
inefficient plant going just to back up a wind farm.

See the reply I gave earlier. Backup is provided for all forms of
generation.

These plants may be at the end of their useful lives as generating
stations operating much of the time, but that does not mean they are
at the end of their lives for occasional use. The capital cost of
constructing them should be paid off. Their engineering foibles are
known. Maintenance of them for low running hours should be minimal.
Obviously they can't just be left completely alone, for the cobwebs
to be blown off and them to start when needed, but a gentle system
of maintenance will keep them ready. It is hardly a novel suggestion
that elderly bits of equipment are retained as a reserve, it is done
in all sorts of industries.



--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

On Wed, 27 Oct 2010 16:05:18 +0100 someone who may be John Rumm
wrote this:-

There is no engineering reason why higher amounts of wind cannot be
accommodated according to National Grid, there is however a
financial reason given the current market based system.

Or roughly translated, there is no economically viable way of using it
without artificially distorting the market with subsidies.

Don't take up translation as a business.

20% is a figure that is about a decade old. It was based on what
people felt comfortable forecasting and market conditions of the
time. Since then the price of electricity has gone up. Renewables
have done a little to stabilise the price, but there have not been
enough of them to balance the increase in fossil fuel prices.

The market is now different and I have seen estimates of 30-35%
being the figure under current market conditions. Any more than that
under current market conditions would push the cost of balancing the
system up. I wouldn't favour over-reliance on wind anyway, even if
the financial problems could be resolved.

A note to people who say, look at Denmark and Germany. Remember that
the market is structured differently in Germany, don't assume
experience can be translated directly. There is a note on this in
the UKERC report. The Danes did get very low prices for surplus wind
generated electricity, just as the French do for surplus nuclear
generated electricity. This was a market failure, as saving water in
Norwegian hydro plants is valuable (especially when there is a
shortage of water, as there sometimes is). The Danes didn't sit on
their backsides when they realised this, they now use surplus wind
generated electricity to heat water for district heating.

"Surplus production of electricity from Danish wind turbines is
currently being exported abroad at very low prices, but now Danish
district heating plants are busy installing heating elements, so
that the surplus electricity can be stored as hot district heating
water.

"The Danish District Heating Association, which reports the news in
a press release, expects that more than 20 heating element systems
with a total effect of more than 200 MW will have been installed in
district heating plants by the end of this year.

"Heating elements work in a similar way to giant immersion heaters,
which can automatically heat water when there is surplus production
of electricity from wind turbines. The system regulates itself based
on electricity prices. When the heating elements are switched on,
the district heating plant's own electricity-generating plants are
switched off and do not use fossil fuels such as natural gas."

http://www.denmark.dk/en/servicemenu/news/environment-energy-climate-news/districtheatingplantstostoreelectricityfromwindtur bines.htm



--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54

On Oct 29, 12:21*pm, Tim Streater wrote:
In article
,
*"Man at B&Q" wrote:



On Oct 29, 6:57*am, (Steve Firth) wrote:
John Rumm wrote:
On 28/10/2010 21:53, Steve Firth wrote:
John *wrote:

On 27/10/2010 22:52, Huge wrote:
On 2010-10-27, Tim * wrote:

nickel. Everything heavier than that comes from supanova explosions.

Supernova.

ITYM Supernovae

Umm no, "explosions" is the plural here, also supernovae is deprecated
with supernovas being preferred.

You're welcome.

I did not use explosions...

Yes, I agree, you got it wrong. Never mind, better luck next time.

Err, no. Replace "supernova explosions" with "supernovae" and
everything is fine.

You're welcome, no charge.

I say, d'you mind? I said, originally, "supanova explosions". Ignoring
the typo as trivial, it should be obvious I was using the noun
"supernova" as an adjective, something we do in English all the time.

Yes, you were correct, and I wasn't responding to you.

I was meerly pointing out that it would also be correct to say
"supernovae". No one (excepth the voice in Mr Firth's head) said
"supernovae explosions".

MBQ

David Hansen wrote:

See the reply I gave earlier. Backup is provided for all forms of
generation.

These plants may be at the end of their useful lives as generating
stations operating much of the time, but that does not mean they are
at the end of their lives for occasional use. The capital cost of
constructing them should be paid off. Their engineering foibles are
known. Maintenance of them for low running hours should be minimal.
Obviously they can't just be left completely alone, for the cobwebs
to be blown off and them to start when needed, but a gentle system
of maintenance will keep them ready. It is hardly a novel suggestion
that elderly bits of equipment are retained as a reserve, it is done
in all sorts of industries.


Ad of curse the more they are used, the more fuel they burn, innefficiently.

Which is why windpower hasn't yet demonstarbly reduced CO2 by a single
gramme.

Man at B&Q wrote:

Err, no. Replace "supernova explosions" with "supernovae" and
everything is fine.

Err yes, the OP obviously intended to convey a particular meaning which
your version does not. So you're wrong.

I know from past experience that you're among the most arrogant of the
arrogant ****s posting here, but to start to tell other people that you
know better than they how they meant to convey their message is
startling chutzpah even by your elevated standards.

Man at B&Q wrote:

I was meerly pointing out that it would also be correct to say
"supernovae". No one (excepth the voice in Mr Firth's head) said
"supernovae explosions".

Perhaps you could learn to read?