Re: Wind and Solar Power

<SNIP>
But if they invested all the oil and nuke money on alternative sources
and new generation low-energy technologies, there'd be money to spare.
<SNIP>

Hi

I have not posted to this NG for some time, but feel I must reply to
the above - I am not entirely sure your comment is correct.

Earlier this year, I was talking to a marine accident investigator who
had been asked to do an assessment of the potential implications to
shipping if the supporting tower of an offshore wind turbine were to
sink in the main shipping channel whilst it was being towed out to sea
to be installed off the coast. During his study he was surprised to
discover that the manufacturing cost of a SINGLE supporting mast for a
SINGLE turbine was a million pounds - not a misprint, ONE MILLION QUID
for each and every wind turbine (and that is just for the tower to
fasten it to the seabed - not the other bits). Taking the cost of the
other components into account; blades, the turbine itself, cables to
shore etc., and adding to that the installation and running costs, not
to mention the costs involved in de-commissioning the things and
disposing of the debris at the end of their working life (I assume
they are not just going to be left there to rust and become a shipping
hazard when they reach the end of their life) then you are talking
about an enormous sum of money and, bearing in mind they only work for
a small part of the time when the wind is suitable, they are never,
ever, going to be financially viable. When you count the number of
offshore wind turbines planned then it is hardly money to spare - just
the opposite, a huge drain on the taxpayer.

The high figure of a million pounds is apparently because EACH & EVERY
turbine has to have its tower individually designed to take into
account things like water depth, height of waves, geology of the
seabed under that particular turbine, etc. Get it wrong and
apparently you could get resonance, which literally shakes the turbine
to pieces - which could explain incidents of wind turbines suddenly
collapsing, not to mention the occasional blade falling off.

Regards


KGB

Welcome back, KGB. I wasn't really trying to start something with that
comment. Much of what you say is verified on the Wiki page for Wind
Energy albeit in only a sentence or two. It doesn't bother me if the
masts do cost £1M. You have to compare it to something. Many wind
turbines are not offshore and are apparently cheaper. I don't know of any
offshore installations in Canada for example. Most descriptions of wind
capital costs show it's dropping every year.

I tried looking at nuclear costs and wind costs and I think they are
about equal (as of 2006). Some sites say it's higher and some say it's
lower. Some of the better sites point out it is difficult to compare the
two. However the costs of installing wind energy are clearly falling
anually with increased production and new designs. Nuclear just gets more
and more expensive - well it has all my lifetime. And there's the
inestimable cost of nuclear waste disposal - something of a misnomer as
they still don't know how to get rid of it safely. Wind energy doesn't
pollute during energy production. That's priceless.

I completely disagree with you on your point of economic viability. Wind
produces 35 times more energy than it costs to manufacture and install
the turbines (according to Wiki - I think that's where I saw that stat).
Nuclear costs are never ending - the decommisioning of a nuclear site is
horrendous and the waste must be managed and monitored forever - talk
about your huge drain on the taxpayer! Nothing you criticise about the
cradle to grave life of a wind turbine comes close to the nightmare of a
nuke plant. Some even say the horrendous costs of nuclear we know about
are low because it is secretly co-funded with defence funding.

As for debris in shipping channels, it's a pretty low-tech and easy thing
to collect up large debris from a shallow channel. Things are always
sinking in channels. I would wager you could recover all the off-shore
turbines and masts in the world for less than one investigation/recovery
of a sunken nuclear-powered sub at depth. Maybe not, but you'd never get
the real numbers out of the defence department to prove me wrong!

There is no choice but to go to clean renewable energy production in the
long run. The staus quo is killing us. More nukes is criminal in my
opinion. Fossil fuels will either kill us off or run out.

Finally, when I said 'money to spare' I really believe it is possible.
We're a long way from realising it, I understand. I was talking about all
renewable sources of energy, not just wind, and a corresponding switch to
lower energy consuming devices such as, for example, new light sources
(ones even better than CF), more efficient motors, lower power equipment,
eliminating transmission losses, and all sorts of new smart technologies.
I don't believe we have to give up anything. But we need to do things
differently. And I believe the economy could be booming making it all
happen.

But the giant corporations who sell us the old technologies and pay for
the election costs of our leaders will fight that all the way. And then
there's the NIMBY's who foolishly help them as well.

Johnny-nice-chatting-with-you
.

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