Pressure Harvesting - from ocean depths

[Q-reeus]

The bladed designs that I've seen tend to be in places where either land isn't all that valuable or it's hilly and not useful for farming. They are all over Kauai but they are in hilly areas where it's too steep for houses. You can say they are a visual eyesore but that's subjective I guess.

In the Midwest you see them on farms in areas that are not as useful for farming (along a ditch or whatever). A couple of hours outside of Seattle, near an area where I go rock climbing, there is some farming but there is little water (high desert area) and there is a lot of wind due to the Cascades and there are many bladed designs on the ridges of the hills.

So they are all over and they must be somewhat economical.

There is a big question mark over the true current wind power industry economic viability. Withdraw all the various government subsidies, take fully into account the net cost of initial construction and installation and expanded distribution systems (high tension power lines and substations etc.) and ongoing maintenance (you did for instance read about just the matter of blade leading edge erosion - right?), and is the actual balance red ink or black ink? I have a very strong feeling the current crop of 'renewable energy' enterprises will sooner rather than later prove to be based on very costly dinosaur technologies. Time will tell.

 

[exchemist]

I've read that wind energy is becoming more cost competitive, too.

It is, but in Europe it is encouraged by government-imposed renewables quotas. This seems fair enough, given that the cost of CO2 emissions to us all (flood defences, insurance premia against fire, flood, drought etc) are not costed into fossil fuel usage.

N. Europe benefits from the comparatively shallow North Sea basin, in which offshore wind farms can be planted without enormous cost, and from the fairly strong, prevailing SW winds. These obviously avoid the eyesore problem that restricts their onshore use in some cases.

Wind may be a better bet for maritime countries than continental ones. But then solar will in general be better in a continental climate, due to the much higher amounts of sunshine.

 

[billvon]

There is a big question mark over the true current wind power industry economic viability. Withdraw all the various government subsidies, take fully into account the net cost of initial construction and installation and expanded distribution systems (high tension power lines and substations etc.) and ongoing maintenance (you did for instance read about just the matter of blade leading edge erosion - right?), and is the actual balance red ink or black ink? I have a very strong feeling the current crop of 'renewable energy' enterprises will sooner rather than later prove to be based on very costly dinosaur technologies. Time will tell.

Perhaps - but that's true of a lot of technologies. Here in the US, coal, natural gas, oil and nuclear have large subsidies. Would they be competitive without them? And coal has the cost of acid rain, thousands of deaths a year from particulate pollution and from groundwater pollution. How do you account for that?

One way to do it would be to remove all subsidies for everything, require everyone to meet the same environmental standards, and then let everyone compete. But there's far too much money in the game for that to work.

 

[Q-reeus]

A comprehensive coverage of what goes into building and installing modern jumbo sized wind turbines. It aint a simple undertaking:

Supposedly such behemoths pay for themselves after around half a years use, but I suspect some creative accounting at work there.

 

[exchemist]

A comprehensive coverage of what goes into building and installing modern jumbo sized wind turbines. It aint a simple undertaking:

Supposedly such behemoths pay for themselves after around half a years use, but I suspect some creative accounting at work there.

I think those figures are based on a total cradle-to-grave lifecycle assessment, including decommissioning and cleanup costs, which are substantial for a fossil fuel power station and historically have often been left out of the economics.

Billvon will know far better than I, but figures I've seen for simple economic payback for wind turbines are more like 2-3 years.

So I don't think it is creative accounting so much as accounting on explicitly different bases, which is something any operator or investor will want to do anyway, to get the fullest possible picture.

 

[Q-reeus]

I think those figures are based on a total cradle-to-grave lifecycle assessment, including decommissioning and cleanup costs, which are substantial for a fossil fuel power station and historically have often been left out of the economics.

Billvon will know far better than I, but figures I've seen for simple economic payback for wind turbines are more like 2-3 years.

So I don't think it is creative accounting so much as accounting on explicitly different bases, which is something any operator or investor will want to do anyway, to get the fullest possible picture.

Right. That 6 month figure was admittedly lifted from someone's comment below the article. Wikipedia paints a very rosy picture for wind power with up to date complete life cycle net costs as per opening chart:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source
Surprised to say the least. Of course there will be a big spread depending on location, location, and location.