Wind from the woods

[woodlander]

I wonder what forum members feel about this

http://www.power-technology.com/features/feature127084/

[jillybean]

well Im against it. My Woods are windy enough.

[happybonzo]

If wind farms actually worked it would be wonderful. Regretably, there is no chance that we, the UK, will ever be able to generate enough energy by renewables.

The financial costs of building wind farms will never be recovered from the energy generated. It is only the subsidies that are available that makes companies invest in them

No one wants to come out with it but the future will be nuclear

[Toby Allen]

Will you be pushing for a reactor to be built in your garden then?

[rogerspianocat]

Of course nuclear power hasn't ever got a penny of subsidy, nor ever will!

The future needs renewables and nuclear - whatever works, is safe and low carbon (not coal, gas, palm oil, etc.). The future also needs us to reduce demand, but don't see us being up to that challenge.

[Henrietta]

Nuclear power stations have been hugely subsidised by governments, and even though the government says it won't subsidise the new ones it is going ahead with, they will do so all the same. The building of them is very expensive and very polluting, considering the massive amount of concrete used.

Nobody said that wind power would solve the energy crisis, but it could help much more than it is, largely because of all the NIMBY's. I would have no objection to living near a wind farm, but every objection to living by a nuclear power station.

No where near enough effort has been put into renewables, no doubt for political reasons.

[treebloke]

It is a pity they put the turbines in such beautiful places.

[Sussexboy]

Each wind turbine is manufactured in any other country but the UK and transported here. Each new site has to have access roads built, across some of the most beautiful and fragile parts of our countryside. Each mast has approximately 1000 tonnes of concrete to anchor it to the earth. This concrete is buried in the ground and will stay there forever as there is no compulsion on the developer to remove it after the end of life of the installation. All that concrete is transported by road across these new access roads. All the hardware is then transported across these roads and erected. To erect the masts more concrete pads are needed for the huge cranes to stand on.

The average efficiency of a turbine in the UK is about 23% of rated capacity. Add on all the conventional power stations that are on standby for when the wind drops, or blows too hard, and we see an increase in fossil fuel use and subsequent CO2 emissions from these sites with no associated power generation. Current available figures suggest that during its lifetime one 3MW turbine will “save” 6,356 tonnes of carbon and “cost” somewhere between 27,213 and 40,773 tonnes of carbon.

So they are about as green as coal.

They are certainly a marvel of engineering, and for that I can appreciate them. However they are ugly, not the future of mainstream electricity generation, and they will always be an add on. Better technology is needed to increase the return on the carbon investment placed on them.

All the time that renewables rely on huge subsidies then it will be a brave developer that takes them on, as subsidies have a habit of disappearing as the political landscape changes.