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THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Discussions of conventional and alternative energy production technologies.

Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby Ulenspiegel » Fri 31 Jul 2015, 05:29:52

ROCKMAN wrote:U - Perhaps a reduction in the cost of the turbines...but cheaper than onshore turbines at that time? And are you expecting those very expensive support structures to also decrease in costs? I haven't seen any cost estimate for the structures to be built off the east coast of the US. But I'm very familiar with the cost of offshore platform and I'll bet they are greater than the turbines themselves. Likewise maintenance will be significantly more offshore then onshore.

But the bottom line: when will it cost the same to set a wind turbine 10 miles off the coast as setting it 10 miles inland from the coast?


Rockman,

I can only use the German far off-shore wind turbines, which are the worst case scenario, as reference: The turbine contributes to less than 30% of the overall costs, in comparison 80% in case of onshore. Therefore, the highest savings can be expected in the logistic chain, here more industrial production of the stuff, optimized procedures etc. promise >20% cost reduction until 2020. Windpower (esp. offshore) is when we talk about sophistication of production where cars were 1960, i.e. lot room for improvements.

Near off-shore is of course not competitive to onshore wind in costal regions, and will not be in future. Far off-shore may makes sense when you improve the CF significantly, possible in Germany, not really possible in the USA. Personally, I would not build offshore wind in the USA, onshore plus more transmission capacity is very likely much cheaper.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby ROCKMAN » Fri 31 Jul 2015, 09:18:59

U - " The turbine contributes to less than 30% of the overall costs, in comparison 80% in case of onshore. " Thanks. I had not seen any specific breakdowns. Tell me about what local resistance that might pop up with onshore coastline wind farms in your part of the world. As I mentioned above there was virtually no local resistance to that on the Texas coast. Likewise on the desolate plains of west Texas but that should be a surprise given the very low population density out there.

In an odd way I suspect the acceptance of onshore wind farms in Texas is our long history of hydrocarbon development. Not just folks working in the oil patch but no one here really notices drilling rigs, pump jack, refineries, etc. Beyond being used to the sight on energy production infrastructure there's also the obvious connect to economic activity: there are many non-oil patch businesses that wouldn't survive without our industry. There's no physical reason why the offshore wind farms in the NE US couldn't have been built onshore along the coast line. I'll guess the same might be true in your part of the world. But the public here and where you are wouldn't accept it.

I'm sure you're familiar with NIMBY. It also exists in Texas but we tend to be less rigid about it when it comes to economic activity that helps to grow our economy.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby Ulenspiegel » Fri 31 Jul 2015, 13:11:20

Rockman,

onshore wind is concentrated in northern Germany, mainly in the states of Schleswig Holstein, Niedersachsen (Lower Saxony) and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. You find there a very high turbine density and most of the capacity is owned by the local people, usually farmers and their extended families. No chance for NIMBY. :-)

On the political stage we have the funny situation is that there is often simply no opposition against wind power in these states. When it come pro-wind legislation often the opposition votes for it, too.

The NIMBY problem is more prevalent in southern germany and is used by the Bavarian Minister-President for his populistic politics. But I can live with it because he needs in a few years when the last NPPs are switched-off electricity. :-)
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby StarvingLion » Fri 31 Jul 2015, 23:37:38

"onshore wind is concentrated in northern Germany, mainly in the states of Schleswig Holstein, Niedersachsen (Lower Saxony) and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. You find there a very high turbine density and most of the capacity is owned by the local people, usually farmers and their extended families."

"Owned" by Farmers...LOL...since when do farmers ever own anything. Should be called DebtBagHolders instead.

http://www.theenergycollective.com/jess ... renewables

Here is noted internet Energiewende cheerleader, Bas Gresnigt (under a fake name), shedding crocodile tears for another group of German bagholders sucked in by the renewables scam:

"Germany has ~35 pumped storage facilities. Almost all use the 2 reservoir concept. The lower reservoir being a lake too (cheaper).

Almost all were built in the first decade after the Energiewende decisions of 2000 in S-Germany (lot of PV-solar). The ideas Jesse displays in his post played a role in the decisions to build those (Jesse's ideas were used in the hot debate in the nineties by nuclear, etc. to fight the Energiewende ideas).

Part is owned by village communities who did it to become 100% renewable, others by independent investors.
All facilities have to earn their own money. So (pumped) storage facilities earn their money via (automated) buying when whole sale price is low and selling when the price is high.

All pumped storage facilities make losses. Construction of the last one was stopped halfway. At least one is moth-balled, so it couldn't even earn its operations cost which are very low!
Even the Swiss facility makes losses.

There is hope that the situation may improve when the share of wind+solar in electricity production becomes >40% (~2030). Though at that time new competition (cheap batteries, extended grid, power-to-gas/fuel, etc.) may cause continued losses.

I feel sorrow for the idealistic village communities who invested lot of money in their pumped storage facilities."

The same can be said for "I feel sorrow for the idealistic village communities who invested lot of money in their wind turbines"...

Thats the Energiewende...Energy Miracle aka A German Sucker Born Every Minute.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby Ulenspiegel » Sat 01 Aug 2015, 04:53:40

#HerrrlassHirnregnenfürdenunterbelichtetenLöwen
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby ROCKMAN » Sat 01 Aug 2015, 11:29:57

U - Thanks for the details. So is the northern onshore region so saturated with wind farms that they have to move offshore for expansion? Onshore S Texas has huge wind farms whose cost was obviously much less then moving just offshore. Many years ago the state issued offshore wind leases covering the first 10 miles out. Unlike most states the federal govt has no authority of that strip of offshore Texas so it wasn't a obstacle. The lack of Texas offshore wind development was strictly economical: couldn't compete with onshore wind farms less than 30 miles away.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby Ulenspiegel » Sun 02 Aug 2015, 02:39:51

ROCKMAN wrote:U - Thanks for the details. So is the northern onshore region so saturated with wind farms that they have to move offshore for expansion? Onshore S Texas has huge wind farms whose cost was obviously much less then moving just offshore. Many years ago the state issued offshore wind leases covering the first 10 miles out. Unlike most states the federal govt has no authority of that strip of offshore Texas so it wasn't a obstacle. The lack of Texas offshore wind development was strictly economical: couldn't compete with onshore wind farms less than 30 miles away.


Rockman,

the northern states are NOT saturated with windpower, e.g. Lower Saxony will very likely triple its capacity until 2025-2030, however, the high interest of the local population in windpower does it make difficult for professional investors to do larger projects, the largest windfarms in Germany are smaller than the avarage windfarms in the USA.

Offshore windpower is a substitute for institutional investors and has, in clear contrast to the US situation, a much higher CF (>50%) than the onshore turbines (35-40%).
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby StarvingLion » Sun 02 Aug 2015, 18:55:23

You are all completely delusional.

in 2007 Google committed $30 million to its REnewables < Carbon project, devoted to developing renewable energy sources that would generate electricity more cheaply than coal-fired power plants. The project was scrapped in 2011. Here, Google engineers Ross Koningstein & David Fork explain why:

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/renewab ... ate-change

"While a large emissions cut sure sounded good, this scenario still showed substantial use of natural gas in the electricity sector. That’s because today’s renewable energy sources are limited by suitable geography and their own intermittent power production. Wind farms, for example, make economic sense only in parts of the country with strong and steady winds. The study also showed continued fossil fuel use in transportation, agriculture, and construction. Even if our best-case scenario were achievable, we wondered: Would it really be a climate victory?...

Suppose for a moment that it had achieved the most extraordinary success possible, and that we had found cheap renewable energy technologies that could gradually replace all the world’s coal plants—a situation roughly equivalent to the energy innovation study’s best-case scenario. Even if that dream had come to pass, it still wouldn’t have solved climate change. This realization was frankly shocking: Not only had RE<C failed to reach its goal of creating energy cheaper than coal, but that goal had not been ambitious enough to reverse climate change."

Yet "America's Power Plan" remains enthusiastic about the potential of renewable energy. What do you know that Google doesn't?

Within 10 years, the population of Texas will double. Do you really believe windmills are going to save that sorry state from total collapse?

US sucker taxpayers are spending 10's of billions of dollars subsidizing the solar and wind power scams in early adopting states (e.g. 15 GW of subsidized capacity in Texas and 10 GW in California). Your "capitalism" is nothing more than:

CORPORATE WELFARE
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby isgota » Wed 05 Aug 2015, 03:46:32

Then why Google has invested so much in wind & solar power since 2011?

Image

My 2 cents. Those Google engineers are making up excuses.

Their RE<C program was mainly based in technologies that have failed to reach significant scale and cost reductions like EGS or CSP and wind power & solar PV ate their lunch (and now both of them are cheaper than new coal in good locations, just what Google pretended).
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby StarvingLion » Thu 06 Aug 2015, 13:51:02

Look, the German Dolts are "green"...they get to pay higher prices for nothing. The FRAUD that solar and wind lowers electricity costs is true for the corporate welfare pigs who simply transfer the costs onto the idiots who believe the green ideology.

BOTTOMLINE: More renewables = Higher electricity bill for the little people. There is no benefit to the environment whatsoever.

THE THEORY THAT RENEWABLES ARE GETTING CHEAPER IS A COMPLETE FRAUD

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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby ROCKMAN » Tue 10 Nov 2015, 10:41:39

One more reason for folks to be jealous of and/or hate Texas: Texas is generating more wind power than utility companies know what to do with, so they’re handing it out for free.

Over 50 companies in the state offer overnight plans that charge higher fees during the day, but nothing between the hours of 9 p.m. and 6 a.m., according to the New York Times. Texas is the largest generator of wind power in the United States, with about 10% of its generation coming from wind. Since it has its own electricity grid, any energy produced there has to also be used there. Since it produces so much wind power, especially at night, it leaves them with a hefty surplus.

Of course we’d all like to think that they’re giving it away for free out of the goodness of their hearts, but unfortunately that’s not the case. As it turns out, holding onto such a large excess comes with some burdens for the power grid, some of which are costly, so they need to unload. Encouraging consumers to use energy during off peak hours results in lower wholesale prices avoids the need to build more power plants, an expensive task. Omar Siddiqui, director of energy efficiency for the nonprofit group Electricity Power Research Institute calls this “a win-win for consumers and the utility companies."

As we say in Texas: you can be green AND make green. LOL.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby Tanada » Wed 30 Mar 2016, 18:15:05

Pictures and more details at link below quote. Basically China is finding itself learning the same lessons many other countries have learned about renewable power. It often gets generated in inconvenient places far from where it is needed.


HONG KONG—The Chinese government has halted the expansion of wind power in its northern provinces where a large number of turbines are churning out power that's being wasted. The move underscores the challenges facing China as it works to fulfill its clean energy ambitions.

Chinese regulators said the windswept regions of Inner Mongolia, Jilin, Heilongjiang, Gansu, Ningxia and Xinjiang will suspend the approval of new wind projects in 2016, according to a March 17 statement published on the website of China's National Energy Administration. The six regions have installed nearly 71 gigawatts of turbines, more than the rest of China combined. It's at least the fourth time in five years that Beijing has ordered wind operators there to slow down growth.

The decision highlights a growing concern among energy analysts that China's spectacular growth in renewable energy is bumping up against the reality of grid constraints and shrinking electricity demand. Solar panels and wind turbines were virtually nonexistent in China a decade ago, and now the country leads the world in installing both.

Wind power installations, in particular, have exploded over the last five years as part of the country's ambitious push to combat climate change and bring down dangerous levels of air pollution from its massive coal consumption. Already the world's wind energy giant, China installed an additional 33 gigawatts of wind turbines in 2015, more than half of new installations worldwide, as developers rushed to build as many projects as possible to meet a year-end deadline for subsidies.

But too much of that energy is being squandered. In 2015 alone, 33.9 billion kilowatt-hours of wind-powered electricity was wasted, government statistics show—equivalent to the electricity consumed by 3 million American households a year. That was about 15 percent of China's total wind power generation, up from 8 percent a year earlier.

Some of the wind-generated electricity had no place to go because there's no transmission infrastructure to carry the power to population centers. In other cases, developers couldn't compete with coal for contracts to connect to the grid.


http://insideclimatenews.org/news/28032 ... ate-change
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby kublikhan » Wed 30 Mar 2016, 19:12:56

Part of the problem has to do with China's incentive structure. The US wind policy incentivizes for actual results(electricity from wind turbines flowing into the grid). China's incentive structure is for throwing up as many turbines as quickly as possible with little regard to having them actually generate electricity for the grid. There's other issues like Chinese produced turbines are lower quality, China lacks accurate wind data and makes poor placement decisions as a result, etc. Another problem is the breakneck speed China is throwing up the turbines does not give enough time for transmission to be built. Faster is not always better. This article is dated but illustrates the problems:

“China now has 42.3 gigawatts of wind power, and has surpassed the US in terms of total installed capacity.” China now occupies the world’s #1 slot in installed wind capacity, with the U.S. in second place. But here is a little known fact: the U.S. produced 64% more wind energy than China in 2011 with the same amount of turbines. There are a number of important reasons for this, but the main reason is that although China’s renewable energy law mandates that the utility purchases all renewable energy that is generated, the utilities often do not follow that mandate.

First off, the pace of China’s growth in the wind sector is so fast that there will always be some lag in getting those wind farms connected until the sector’s growth slows down.

[China's] Renewable Energy Law also stipulates that the utility must purchase all of the renewable energy generated by power producers (such as wind farms). However, the penalties for non-purchase of renewable energy are either not high enough or not well enforced. Many PPAs are either violated outright or end up with escape clauses, whereby the utility does not have to buy the wind power when it is not in its best financial interest to do so (for instance if electricity demand is low at night, but the wind farms are producing at full power). There is anecdotal evidence that many power purchase agreements (PPAs) in China today have escape clauses.

China’s wind resource is concentrated in the north and west, and wind farms with capacity factors much higher than 30% are rare. In the U.S., wind resource is more evenly dispersed with great resources in the Great Plains and Texas, as well as decent resources on both coasts and in the Northeast. It is more common for individual wind farms to have capacity factors higher than 30%, especially in the Great Plains. Second, wind developers in China often make poor siting decisions due to a lack of wind speed data, leading to a waste of investment. Finally, the quality of turbines produced by many Chinese wind turbine manufacturers (who only have a few years of experience in the sector) has not yet approached the quality of companies with longer history, like GE, Vestas, and Gamesa.

Improvements in China’s legal structure, development patterns, and technology will all lead to a wind sector that generates ample wind energy from all of the wind turbines it is installing. Until then, the U.S. remains the world’s #1 wind energy producer.
U.S. PRODUCES 64% MORE WIND ENERGY THAN CHINA
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby ROCKMAN » Thu 31 Mar 2016, 07:34:54

And Texas represents a big piece of that pie: it has an installed capacity 40% higher than the number two states COMBINED. And the critical factor is touched upon in that link: transmission infrastructure. The state spent $6 BILLION to expand the grid: just like China much of the Texas wind power is located in regions with relatively low electricity demand. And wind power is looking better all the time:

“ On December 20, a low-pressure weather system crossed through the Texas panhandle and created sustained wind speeds of 20 to 30 mph. The burst of wind propelled Texas to surpass its all-time record for wind energy production, with wind providing 45 percent of the state’s total electricity needs — or 13.9 gigawatts of electric power — at its peak. The latest record is news not only because wind provided nearly half of Texas’s electricity needs, but also that it did so for so many hours in a row. The sustained winds brought on by the low-pressure front caused wind energy production to exceed 10 gigawatts for essentially the entirety of December 20. The duration of the record is a big deal because it shows that the rest of the Texas grid can handle a whole lot of wind energy for an extended period of time without suffering instability or brownouts that some predicted. “

And: “Did you know that Texas, a state known for its lucrative oil and gas industry, is actually the largest wind power producer in the country? It now appears that wind farms are cranking out so much excess energy, that utilities are giving this renewable energy source to customers for free. The New York Times reports that thousands of customers in the state are paying zero for their electricity needs between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m., saving $40 or $50 a month during the peak summer season. “TXU’s free overnight plan, which is coupled with slightly higher daytime rates, is one of dozens that have been offered by more than 50 retail electricity companies in Texas over the last three years with a simple goal: for customers to turn down the dials when wholesale prices are highest and turn them back up when prices are lowest.” The newspaper describes, for instance, that Dallas residents are waiting until after 9 p.m. to run the washing machine and dishwasher so it costs them nothing. One resident even unplugs her appliances when she goes to work in the morning then plugs them back in at 9 p.m.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby StarvingLion » Wed 29 Jun 2016, 16:40:33

The landbased wind turbines are obsolete. There is not enough wind near the earths surface. The marginal cost of wind turbines is less than coal but the wind turbines generate very little revenue. It was all A MASSIVE SCAM. The trick is you have to fly the wind harvester on a kite way up in the sky tethered to a generator on land. I don't think even the greatest genius could have ever thought of this brilliant energy device.

The Italians have done it again! They just bankrupted Rockscams Texas and the UK and Germany...Wind Turbine BAGHOLDERS!!! Huge monstrous money losers that they dumped on SUCKERS! to be replace by 100's of thousands of KITES in the skies above....

EROEI of Kitegen: 305
Useless Windmills: 16

Google is buying the technology along with Bill GATES...

The crowning achievement of democracy is the KITE!


Holy chit, how depressing is that.

We'll all be sewing kites for 0.05 cents/hr. People, paradise is NOT possible on this earth.

From Star Trek to Flying Kites...Spock: "Live long and prosper"...Yeah right.

Europe is saved...NOT

When the advancing eastern fossil fueled armies arive, we will be flying kites to power our pea shooters. Start sniffing the glue, this nightmare can't be for real.

http://www.kitegen.com/en/

Eugenio Saraceno says:
June 29, 2016 at 6:54 pm

Some old calculations of mine match with the results reported by Euan even if the calculation logic is a bit different:

Comparision between windmills and KiteGen stem: approximatively the emergy of the two struttuctures is calculated from their weight , assuming they are made of steel. Moreover it is to be considered the concrete foundation, needed only for the windmill
3 MW Kitegen is about 30 tons (mainly steel and plastics) + say 10 tons for supports (micropiles to fix on ground, auxiliary buildings and so on). 3 MW windmill is about 250 tons of steel and 1500-2000 tons of concrete.
One ton of concrete costs 1,76 MWh one ton of steel costs 4,4 MWh. If both materials are produced using petcoke fuel with a 5% overhead due to transport and refination we must consider 4,62 MWh for steel and 1,85 MWh for concrete. Energy intensity of labour is inferred by the per capita energy consumption (3 toe per capita per year in Italy and similar in Europe). 1 toe =11,6 MWh so every maintenance labourer enbeds 35 MWh or 700MWh throughout 20 years. Assuming 8 hours per day of maintenance and operations for both and neglecting the labour energetic cost for construction (by the way windmill construction needs much more labour than a Kitegen):
Emergy windmill
250*4,62+1500*1,85+700=4630 MWh

Emergy kitegen stem
40*4,62+700=885 MWh

Assuming:

* lifetime: 20 years for both
* productivity: 5000 MWh/MW for KiteGen and 2000 MWh/MW for windmill
* nominal power 3MW for both
* availability KiteGen: 95%
* energy needed for plant services KiteGen 5%

Thus:

20 y cumulative kitegen net production= 20*5000*3*0,95*0,95=270750 MWh

Energy Input = 885 MWh

KG EROEI=305

Windmill EROEI =16
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby Tanada » Thu 02 Mar 2017, 06:47:26

Interesting article in the WSJ about the conflict between the rural folks who benefit from the massive wind power subsidy schemes and the politicians who have to agree to put forward those systems. Instead of evaluating the systems based on both local needs and real world costs the subsidies massively distort the power delivery system in favor of wind over other sources.

How the federal government subsidizes wind farms

Wind-farm developers are able to tap one of two federal tax programs for new projects.

The Production Tax Credit, established in 1992, offers wind farms tax credits in proportion to the electricity they generate in their first 10 years of operation.

Wind projects that started construction by Dec. 31, 2016, can obtain credits of 2.3 cents for every kilowatt-hour of power each turbine generates. For farms built after that, the amount of the tax credit drops by 20% each year until it expires at the end of 2019.

There is also the renewable-energy Investment Tax Credit, which is equal to 30% of the value of a project that started construction by Dec. 31, 2016. The credit steps down gradually each year to 12% in 2019, after which it expires.


https://www.wsj.com/articles/wind-farm- ... 1?mod=e2fb
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby Subjectivist » Thu 02 Mar 2017, 12:46:07

I like wind power, but the fact it needs so many subsidies is rather worrying. If it is really price competitive it should have broken through and be popular without subsidies.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby ROCKMAN » Thu 02 Mar 2017, 13:09:19

T - "...the rural folks who benefit from the massive wind power subsidy schemes..." That's very confusing as far as Texas wind power goes. The urban Texas electricity consumers are the primary beneficiaries of rural wind farms. Which is why the state was justified spending $7 BILLION of tax payer's money to upgrade the grid to get rural power to urban areas since the bulk of it came from urban citizens.

"Instead of evaluating the systems based on both local needs and real world costs the subsidies massively distort the power delivery system in favor of wind over other sources." And that's a bad thing? LOL. Isn't that the primary reason for the subs in the first place? Not sure to what degree subs aided Texas in developing world class wind power. But had wind farms not been built we would have added the equivalent capacity with NG and COAL fired plants to meet our growing demand. And that would not have been a good thing, right? LOL.

And let's not forget whatever the short term economics might be the motivation, at least in Texas, is the long term. Such as the folks in Georgetown, Texas, willing to INITIALLY pay above the current market rate to provide financial incentive to the builders of new wind and solar farms. In the long term the plan for the entire town to go 100% alt energy makes economic sense.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby KaiserJeep » Thu 02 Mar 2017, 13:23:14

I have a different view of renewables. Both wind and solar are affordable and can be installed by rural and suburban customers, and now there are batteries like the Tesla Powerwall that can make these credible alternatives to grid power. Renewables need to be distributed, not large central power plants, and most of the power grid materials can eventually be recycled, saving even more energy.

Most people absolutely DON'T need to be locked into a business model where they spend money every month for power. A new home should be NZE (Net Zero Energy) or even NEP (Net Energy Plus) that can also charge your EV.

It makes more sense to go off the grid than to spend money on an extra bedroom, more conditioned space, or a swimming pool. You need to pay that home off as rapidly as possible, then after it's paid for, enhance it as you wish.

Get out of the habit of paying energy companies for something you can gather for zero fuel cost. Pay for the energy upgrade with your mortgage, it's all gravy from there on, and you will be ahead from the first year in terms of cash flow.
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Re: THE Wind Power Thread pt 3 (merged)

Unread postby ROCKMAN » Thu 02 Mar 2017, 14:27:48

KJ - I can see the obvious advantage of individuals going off grid. But it has not and will not happen to a significant degree anytime soon IMHO. Today 15% of Texas electricity comes from the alts daily and up to 40% during catastrophic short term ff sourced outages.

There are 27 million folks in Texas so it would have taken 4 million to individually go off grid to have the same net effect as our commercial wind growth. But would be no help to the grid when we run short of ff power in emergency situations. That growth would not have happened in the same time span as our wind power developed. And how do I know that? According to a big solar advocate, the Solar Energy Industry Association, in Texas the number of homes powered (including those just partially provided) by solar is 136,000. That's 1.5% of our total number of homes. And the % of the state’s total electricity from all solar installations: 0.24%.

Yes, IF there were a massive surge in individually deployed alternative energy. IF, IF, IF. In the meantime Texas has more the 35,000 GWh of installed alt energy capacity.
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