Wind Farms

[BlasterBates]

So basically half the time they produce virtually nuffink.

BBC News - Wind farm efficiency queried by John Muir Trust study

The Germans are pushing to have these replace their base load Nuclear, to avoid a "Fukashima" disaster (two employees with sunburnt feet).

Makes sense really.

[Fred Bloggs]

A sensible report about wind power at last. And the response from the industry is just oh so predictable.

[EternalOptimist]

It's actually a good statistic to have. 50%


It means we can get away from the hype (from both sides) and get down to brass tacks.


thats assuming, of course, that everyone buys the 50% figure


pj ?

[pjclarke]

The report is here

Against the figure commonly claimed of an average 30% of capacity, the report found:

Average output from wind was 27.18% of metered capacity in 2009, 21.14% in 2010, and 24.08% between November 2008 and December 2010 inclusive

So a few points below the claimed figure, but the study ran for just over 2 years and ...

Niall Stuart, chief executive of Scottish Renewables, which represents renewable energy companies in Scotland, said the winter of 2009/10 was one of the calmest on record and that it was "no surprise" output figures for the year were below average.

The report was commissioned by the John Muir Trust, a Scottish land conservation group, adamantly anti-wind farm. Nothing wrong with that, but of the various ways of gathering the data and presenting the results they are obviously going to choose the soundbite that best suits their agenda....

Anyhow, I've a friend who works in the industry and I'll ask him for his expert view ....

[EternalOptimist]

30%

its worse than we thought then

[BlasterBates]

You don't really need to put a gloss on it do you really, fact is the wind generators were producing 20% or below for 50% of the time.

Once a week they produce virtually nothing, of course a wind drop could occur at any time and it might just be a few minutes. At the moment there is the equivalent in Hydro available, but if you've no hydro, they're worse than useless because you need a gas turbine running and blowing out CO2, just in case the wind drops.

That is pretty dire.

[EternalOptimist]

You don't really need to put a gloss on it do you really, fact is the wind generators were producing 20% or below for 50% of the time.

That is pretty dire.

If we were living in pre industrial times, the cost in energy to grind your corn is massive. It makes a great amount of sense to build a mill, with a warehouse, and a granary, then wait for the wind to blow.

If you are trading with a ship, the cost in oar labour is massive. It makes a great amount of sense to build a ship with masts and sails, and wait for the wind to blow.

But now we dont live in preindustrial times

When I see pj posting here only when the wind is blowing, travelling to work only when the wind is blowing or eating only when the sun is shining, is the day I will take him and his like seriously

[pjclarke]

Colour me sceptical. If you look at Page 9 you see that the data for 2008 shows an average of over 31%, why they chose November 2008 as a start point is not explained. The study only looked at wind stations metered by the National Grid - about 50%, with a mix of about 80% onshore wind. Towards the end of the survey period major new offshore plant came onstream so the figures are probably unrepresentative of the current and future performance.....

[scooterscot]

And when there's an accidenti?

It not nuclear, instead of sunburn you have decapitation

[pjclarke]

When I see pj posting here only when the wind is blowing, travelling to work only when the wind is blowing or eating only when the sun is shining, is the day I will take him and his like seriously

That really is the stawiest of Straw Men. It is possible now to be carbon neutral by using mainly green energy and offsetting the rest. Did you observe 2 minute silence for the 6 people who died today mining coal?