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US Becomes Top Wind Producer; Solar Next
SpuriousLogic sends along a SciAm piece that begins, "The United States overtook Germany as the biggest producer of wind power last year, new figures showed, and will likely take the lead in solar power this year, analysts said on Monday. Even before an expected 'Obama bounce' from a new President who has vowed to boost clean energy, US wind power capacity surged 50 percent last year to 25 gigwatts — enough to power more than five million homes."
Well, locations where these 'wind farms' are both out of eye sight and ear shot (as they can be quite loud) are rather rare.
But good news, because with the current economic crisis, there are fewer homeowners to do the NIMBY.
I think there was a story last year, where some rich community in Florida managed to get a off-shore wind farm denied because the towers would just be visible on the horizon...
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
He's totally wrong. the 'energy pay-back time' or EPBT of big windmills ranges from 6 months to a year.
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
The helix towers are also less efficient. And,
the higher up you go the more wind there is.
Finally, I like the standard windmills. I think they are a beautiful monument to human ingenuity.
They're also a massive repair bill waiting to happen off the florida coast.
The helix ones don't have to be as efficient, they can be clustered in phalanxes and placed ANYWHERE.. this means they can be included on skyscrapers, placed on the sides of interstates, put in your back yard, on your roof, etc.
(not sure how well they'd do in water, but, if you'll allow me to make an arse out of you and me, i'll assume their resilience in turbulent winds would make them fairly resilient in water with minor modifications)
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
it is not, really, combined with this technology
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
I'm from Melboure Australia, some say it's the 2nd largest Greek city. :)
Here's shame: We were the last "friend" the neo-cons had in the international climate "debate".
We have just had a week of ~40deg celisus, three days in a row at 43deg+. Footpaths slabs pop out of the ground due to expansion, rail lines buckle and damage points. Our coastline is a shallow straight in the "roaring fourties" of the southern ocean, it has tremendously powerfull tides and huge swells.
Last weekend everyone was hoping the bushfires and heat would not cut off a major power line from the coal mines to the city, another major line was out because a sub-station exploded in the heat. No air-con literally kills people (as it has also done in Greek heat waves).
Our electricity is centralised and more or less all coal with gas/hydro backup, (same with most of Australia). Where we have the most hydro capacity it's screwed because of the "permenant drought" (accelerating shift in rainfall patterns for last 50yrs). But coal? The stuff everywhere, we even sold "coals to Newcastle" in the Thatcher era. The disinformation in this country over the last decade is only rivalled by that of the US. To overcome the water shortage we are now contemplating building another coal plant to power the humungous desal plant we are building on the coast of said roaring fourties.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
I know that wind-powered energy generation is growing in the U.S. because I see it every day (in season; see below). I don't know if they're manufactured near here or just shipping in via our port, but those gi-normous wind turbine blades are a common sight on the freeways of Houston, traveling up I-45 headed for who knows where. There's a small cottage industry in escort vehicles. I've seen every manner of tiny, broken-down car, truck, and minivan festooned with flags and feeler poles, in packs, leading and following each individual blade as it makes its way through town. You don't realize it until you're driving right next to one, but those blades are *HUGE*; I'd estimate as long as 4 or 5 tractor-trailer rigs. I'm sure someone will pop up with an accurate number. Whatever the correct size, it's just amazing to watch something that long and odd-looking moving through midday traffic, dwarfing everything around it. Up until a few months ago (I assume winter brings a slowdown to construction), I'd see at least one every day. Sometimes I'd see three at a time. I expect for the freeways to be lousy with 'em again as soon as the weather gets warm.
I've stood at the base of the three-blade type in North Dakota and Michigan. They were almost silent, with only a slight whoosh as each blade passed overhead. Are other designs louder? There were no mounds of cuisinarted birds, either, no dead birds at all.
That's because dakrats and other carrion eaters drag them away ;)
I've heard is that some efficiency improvements dramatically decreased the bird kills - the older, smaller, faster, and louder turbines killed far more birds than the bigger slower(quieter) turbines of today - though those edges still end up moving pretty quick, birds evolved to at least try to dodge falcons and such are plenty fast enough to avoid them. A lot easier than they avoid our nice clear windows, at least...
The latest though, is that they kill more Bats than birds - Personally, while I don't want bats too close to me due to the whole rabies problem, I do love the little mosquitoe eaters a little further away.
Still, put the turbines up high enough and you should avoid the bats - I don't imagine that skeeters fly that high, after all, there's no prey at that altitude, and why would bats be up there if their food isn't?
I don't read AC A human right
Somehow, I doubt seriously we'd need 1000% of our current electrical generation capacity to replace oil alone....
We use oil for some stuff like lubrication that, assuming we insist on using nuclear power to provide it, wouldn't be too efficient. ;)
I haven't seen an estimate either on how many kwh a year it'd take if we went to 100% EVs. Don't feel like building one at the moment either - though .3kwh a mile is one figure I've seen. You'd have to get trucks and trains as well.
http://www.bts.gov/publications/national_transportation_statistics/2004/html/table_01_32.html
3 Trillion highway miles a year - 900 Billion kwh required - a Gigawatt plant can be expected to produce ~7.8 Billion kwh a year.
We have just over a hundred reactors now, to supply 20% of our power. Call it 500 to supply all of our electricity, and another 100-200 to provide the power for vehicles. 700 reactors in total, for relatively carbon-free transportation and electricity. Utilize cogeneration and we'd be able to eliminate a lot of heating bills as well. Reactors by the ocean could use the ocean for cooling and desalinate water while they're at it.
We'd burn through our uranium reserves pretty quickly doing it that way with traditional reactors, but using breeders and such we'd be good for thousands of years before we'd need to start filtering the stuff from ocean water or switching to Thorium. Still, I'd definitely use wind/solar where it makes sense.
It's also suspected that with increased use of nuclear fuel and the depletion of fuel coming from weapons stockpiles that a price spike would result in more exploration ala oil and find lots more of the stuff.
I don't read AC A human right