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Retiring Worn-Out Wind Turbines Could Cost Billions That Nobody Has (energycentral.com)
schwit1 shared this article from Energy Central News:
Estimates put the tear-down cost of a single modern wind turbine, which can rise from 250 to 500 feet above the ground, at $200,000... Which means landowners and counties in Texas could be on the hook for tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars if officials determine non-functional wind turbines need to be removed. Or if that proves to be too costly, as seems likely, some areas of the state could become post-apocalyptic wastelands steepled with teetering and fallen wind turbines, locked in a rigor mortis of obsolescence.
Companies will of course have the option of upgrading those aging wind turbines with new models, a resurrection of sorts. Yet the financial wherewithal to do so may depend on the continuation of federal wind subsidies, which is by no means assured. Wind farm owners say the recycling value of turbines is significant and recovering valuable material like copper and steel will cover most of the cost of decommissioning... Yet extracting valuable materials from the turbines is not as easy as it sounds... "The blades are composite, those are not recyclable, those can't be sold," said Lisa Linowes, executive director of WindAction Group, a nonprofit which studies landowner rights and the impact of the wind energy industry. "The landfills are going to be filled with blades in a matter of no time...."
Unlike Duke Energy, some of the smaller wind farm companies operating in Texas, with fewer financial resources, may be tempted to just walk away when aging turbines no longer spin a profit. Linowes believes such moves may begin occurring even before wind turbines outlive their useful life as manufacturing warranties on the big turbines expire. "At what point does the cost of maintenance tip over to the point it's not worth maintaining a turbine?" she said. "We're in something of an unknown or uncertain territory... It could be a very ugly situation in the next five years when we see turbines need work, and are no longer under warranty and not generating enough electricity to keep running them."
Companies will of course have the option of upgrading those aging wind turbines with new models, a resurrection of sorts. Yet the financial wherewithal to do so may depend on the continuation of federal wind subsidies, which is by no means assured. Wind farm owners say the recycling value of turbines is significant and recovering valuable material like copper and steel will cover most of the cost of decommissioning... Yet extracting valuable materials from the turbines is not as easy as it sounds... "The blades are composite, those are not recyclable, those can't be sold," said Lisa Linowes, executive director of WindAction Group, a nonprofit which studies landowner rights and the impact of the wind energy industry. "The landfills are going to be filled with blades in a matter of no time...."
Unlike Duke Energy, some of the smaller wind farm companies operating in Texas, with fewer financial resources, may be tempted to just walk away when aging turbines no longer spin a profit. Linowes believes such moves may begin occurring even before wind turbines outlive their useful life as manufacturing warranties on the big turbines expire. "At what point does the cost of maintenance tip over to the point it's not worth maintaining a turbine?" she said. "We're in something of an unknown or uncertain territory... It could be a very ugly situation in the next five years when we see turbines need work, and are no longer under warranty and not generating enough electricity to keep running them."
Yeah, but that also means they have as much metal as a small fleet of cars, once you factor in the support post. That's good recycling. :-)
But seriously, nobody in his/her right mind is going to tear down a wind turbine unless global climate change causes the wind to stop. In the worst likely case, when one of these things fails, the owners will temporarily take down the blades, replace the generator portion, and put the blades back up at a much lower labor cost than dismantling it, and at a far lower cost than building a new one from scratch. In the best case, they'll be able to repair it in place.
In other words, this story is pure FUD.
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Does anyone do even a tiny bit of quality assurance on submissions? The person being quoted as saying we're in for an apocalyptic landscape littered with turbine blades is from the WindAction Group. That organization's website claims "Industrial Wind Action Group Corp ("The WindAction Group") was formed to counteract the misleading information promulgated by the wind energy industry and various environmental groups."
In other words, it's probably a fossil fuel front group.
Great job, whoever thought this was a good submission.
Wind power in Texas is often some of the cheapest electricity you can get. It's picking up momentum, and the incentive to keep it going is pretty high. I smell a slant in this article, likely from someone with money to lose from this trend. Say, coal industries.
https://www.chron.com/business...
"50 feet in the air" and "small car" is at least half and order of magnitude too low. Try 80-100 meters, and 10-15 tons. each.
However most wind farms are designed so that each individual turbine could be replaced with a somewhat bigger turbine without interfering with other turbines. If you're rebuilding a farm at EOL, you already have the cranes and expertise on-site, so the per-tower decom cost will go down.
Additionally in the contract phase of the project landowners should and often do demand decommissioning funds to be placed in escrow before any construction begins.
Damn, it's amazing what passes for realistic in the day..
As someone who has worked closely with American Tower, they require a security deposit for guess what purpose? Now, I didn't interact with them with respect to cell phone equipment but everyone else's equipment was covered for removal. Space on a tower isn't cheap and when one goes, if the tower is serviceable (and that is a question on occasion) that space is rented and cleared for the next tenant.
How can you possible say this is B.S.?
We already have huge fields of dead rusting wind turbines in California, and the south of Hawaii. Too expensive to remove so they just sit there, aging....
Given this is ALREADY A PROBLEM...
BECAUSE IT IS B.S.
Those huge fields of dead rusting wind turbines in California, and the south of Hawaii don't exist - or rather they only exist in the propaganda of the more unhinged climate deniers/fossil fuel shills who don't just distort the facts, they simply make stuff up.
I notice that when you repeat this B.S. you never provide links to your "alternative facts".
Note here is a lengthy in-depth discussion of the origins of this lie. It started with a climate denier doing the old distorted facts game - pointing out initially a large number of turbines were installed at the fields in California and Hawaii - but that there many fewer now. But omitting the correct explanation that it was because they were replaced by fewer, much larger, more efficient turbines. And no, the old ones are not just left there, they are removed over time. The actual percentage of non-operating turbines at any given time is about 2%. The fantasy version where there are dead fields (to say nothing of huge dead fields) is the result of climate deniers taking the original BS claim, and extrapolating from it in their imaginations, then posting it as if it was a fact.
I drive through two of the three California fields frequently, watched them go up and evolve, and they are impressive with the huge new towers spinning slowly, but producing far more power than the old ones - which have disappeared. Fields of abandoned turbines are nowhere to be seen. But who should I believe, citation-free climate denier rants or my own lyin' eyes?
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Sometimes not even at a reduced capacity.
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Yep, look at Trump's attitude: I am the best. Everything is Obama's fault. Stop picking on me! Fake news!
A culture of shameless corruption, irresponsibility and outright hypocrisy, truly that is their attitude.
Really, the thing to do is require that these companies have an appropriate sum of money set aside for decommissioning
Most of these turbines are on private land. Decommissioning is their problem, not yours. Despite the idiotic alarmism in TFA, it is none of your concern. It does not affect you in any way.
the way that the nuclear reactor industry is required to.
That is a completely different situation. A leaking reactor doesn't respect property boundaries. That makes it a public concern.
$200,000 (per turbine pull-down) is a completely made up figure by someone who clearly hates wind farms - an anti-wind power NGO. All this rubbish about wind farms won't last 20 years, cherry picking, they scour the planet to find a few badly maintained low quality wind turbines to get that figure, 45 years is more realistic for new wind-farms. And considering the cost of larger replacement turbines a new company would likely pull down the old turbines just to get the rights to the area.
And all of this bullshit about wind needing tax subsidies when the fact is this is not true any more, wind is the cheapest form of power and in the future it'll still be the cheapest form of power even with energy storage added in.
I quote "For example, the copper in the wires used to transmit power from the turbine to the grid will have to be stripped of its plastic insulation, a task which would entail serious labor costs." Now tell me that doesn't sound like utter BS disingenuous facts twisting.
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I had a quick look at WindAction, quoted in the piece, and they are largely against wind power.
"Industrial Wind Action Group Corp ("The WindAction Group") was formed to counteract the misleading information promulgated by the wind energy industry and various environmental groups."
"But like every claim involving the wind industry, there's a darker story."
HHAHHAHHAHHHAHHHHAHHAHAHHAHAAHA. Thanks, i needed a good laugh.
https://www.eia.gov/todayinene...
More recently, the 556 MW Kewaunee Nuclear Power Plant in eastern Wisconsin was shut down in 2013. Kewaunee’s operator, Dominion Power, anticipates nearly $1 billion in total costs using the SAFSTOR method and estimates that work will not be complete until 2073.
That $200,000 is looking pretty good put up against that $1 BILLION plus....and 60 years to complete.
The capacity factor of a wind turbine is about a 1/3rd. The biggest wind turbines are about 2 megawatts. Kewaunee had a lifetime capacity factor of 84% for it's 39 years of service.
To replace Kewaunee's output with wind turbines, you would need 631 of the largest wind turbines available, for a cost of about 2 billion dollars. Since wind turbines last perhaps half as long as nuclear plants, figure $4 billion. That also doesn't count added costs with spreading them out geographically far enough to get reliable generation from them; nor have we touched the tremendous amount of land they need.
At a $200,000 per unit decomissioning cost for wind turbines, the total cost would for scrapping two generations of a 631 unit 'wind farm' would be $250,000,000, less than Kewaunee's billion..... but now you're starting to compare apples to apples.
New nuclear plants are double the output of Kewaunee- while they're admittedly expensive, they have the tremendous benefit of power-on-demand- something that's vital for a stable electrical grid.
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1. Turbines don't "wear out". Only the bearing wear, and they can be replaced.
Right, because you know more about windmill maintenance than the people that have been managing them for decades.
2. The towers don't "go bad" either. They will stand for centuries.
No, they don't, material fatigue is a thing. I don't have data on windmill towers in front of me but I'm quite certain that the metal supports for power lines have a design lifespan of 80 to 90 years. Maybe a windmill tower is quite different in some way but I'd like to see some data on that before I believe you.
3. Wind towers do not create a "wasteland". The surrounding land can continue to be used for grazing, crops, whatever.
Right, surrounding land with rusting towers scattered about. Towers that make good lightning rods and can electrocute cattle or set a crop on fire. Towers that can topple in the wind, which create a hazard to animals, plants, and humans. Towers that will rust and introduce iron into the soil, which can poison the crop, and poison the animals that are too stupid to not lick the metal.
4. Turbines contain plenty of valuable copper, steel, rare earths, etc. We should worry more about someone stealing them than abandoning them.
If you read the article (yep, I know) then you'd know that it takes heavy equipment to cut the thick metal and haul away the pieces. Cutting the pieces smaller on site takes more time and labor and therefore becomes not profitable. I'm guessing that someone could go out with a not much more than a cutting torch and some rope, climb the tower, cut away chunks, and be able to sell that for scrap. The thing is that the fuel for the torch to cut the metal, and for the truck to haul the pieces, costs money. Steel is not all that valuable and so it would take economies of scale to have a chance to make it profitable. People might be able to make a profit on the copper and such with small scale work but that still leaves the steel towers.
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