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#Post#: 544--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: December 13, 2013, 9:50 pm
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Fossil fuelers are handicapped by hydrocarbon tunnel vision. But
most people no longer see things their way. Moreover, since more
and more people are making a LIVING off of RENEWABLE ENERGY and
less and less people are making a living from fossil fuels, the
dirty energy will get pushed out.
Fossil Fuels should have been pushed out in the 1980s. This time
they will be. 8)
Here's some more reaiity based community information fossil
fuelers refuse to acknowledge.
HTML http://www.pic4ever.com/images/301.gif
Major Shipyard Now building MORE Renewable Energy machines than
ships!
Imagine how quickly we could transition if the over 400 OIL
TANKERS the Oil Industry builds EACH YEAR, were NOT BUILT and
WIND TURBINES were built instead! That's a LOT of wind turbines
and tidal or ocean current turbines! [img width=30
height=30]
HTML http://www.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/3-141113185701.png[/img]
Oil Tanker costs:
DWT= DEAD WEIGHT TONNAGE CAPACITY
LR2 (Large Range 2), Suezmax class,120,000–200,000 DWT, $60.7M
VLCC (Very Large Crude Carrier), VLCC class, 200,000–320,000
DWT, $120M
ULCC (Ultra Large Crude Carrier), Ultra Large Crude Carrier
class, 320,000–550,000 DWT, $120M PLUS
Now suppose you wanted to build 100 of those pigs at an average
price of $100M or so (they're cheaper by the dozen!).
$100,000,000 X 100 = $10B
How many wind turbines can we buy with that $10B INSTEAD OF
TANKER PIGS?
Here's a nice wind turbine outfit that is ALREADY kicking fossil
fuel ass! Maybe we can do business with them. [img width=30
height=40]
HTML http://www.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/3-141113185047.png[/img]<br
/>
As of 2011, Vestas wind turbines generate enough electricity to
provide for 21 million people. In January 2011, Vestas won the
$1.5m (£940,000) Zayed Future Energy Prize in Abu Dhabi. [img
width=40
height=40]
HTML http://www.clker.com/cliparts/c/8/f/8/11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png[/img]<br
/>;D
HTML http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vestas
[embed=640,380]
HTML http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Rjzsjqmqws#[/embed]
Nice video! Too bad they didn't have to turbines spearing oil
tankers as they surfaced!
HTML http://www.pic4ever.com/images/128fs318181.gif
;D
Using the information at the link below, you can get a bunch of
the top of the line Vestas 8MW (formerly the 7M just two years
ago but has been tweaked up) for around $8M if we order more
than 300 MW worth of turbines (Yes, those are cheaper by the
dozen TOO!
HTML http://www.freesmileys.org/emoticons/emoticon-animal-042.gif).
That means we can buy about ONE THOUSAND turbines for the price
of 100 oil pig tankers. [img width=40
height=40]
HTML http://www.clker.com/cliparts/c/8/f/8/11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png[/img]<br
/>
Those 1,000 turbines will generate 8 GW of power near
continuously because they will be placed offshore, to MKing's
chagrin. ;D But don't worry, they have maintenance and some
slack wind periods from time to time so you fossil fuelers can
claim they are "discontinuous, unreliable and no good for
baseload".
HTML http://www.pic4ever.com/images/ugly004.gif
HTML http://emp.lbl.gov/sites/all/files/lbnl-5119e-ppt.pdf
But let's not stop there. The fossil fuel industry has enough
capital to build 400 tankers in a single year so they
technically have enough capital to build 4000 wind turbines
producing 32 GW EACH YEAR. :o Consider, for a moment, what
adding 32GW of renewable energy would DO to the energy picture
of this planet. [img width=80
height=70]
HTML http://us.123rf.com/400wm/400/400/yayayoy/yayayoy1106/yayayoy110600019/9735563-smiling-sun-showing-thumb-up.jpg[/img]<br
/>
Now consider that world governments have even more capital.
Consider that adding ten times that much (320 GW each year) from
various renewable energy technologies is feasible simply because
there are several large wind turbine and ocean current and tide
turbine manufacturers just as capable as Vestas of pumping out
4,000 8MW turbines a year (GE can make even more than Vestas).
And then there is solar PV and power towers and geothermal along
with all sorts of energy storage technologies that, unlike oil
tankers, don't spill their guts into the oceans on a regular
basis and will provide 24/7 smooth power access to customers,
regardless of what the nasty, negative, naysayers among us that
will mendaciously claim otherwise as long as their portfolio has
dirty energy stocks in them.
HTML http://www.freesmileys.org/smileys/smiley-scared002.gif
Within a couple of decades we could stop burning fossil fuels
completely as long as we stuck to the current 18TW annual human
civilization energy demand.
HTML http://www.pic4ever.com/images/balloons.gif
No more strip mining for coal or drilling for oil or fracking
for oil and gas messing up our biosphere.
Consider what having 34% LESS ocean traffic and NO oil tankers
or oil rigs would do for the health of the oceans.
Dear readers, always remember to remind the fossil fuelers a
little item they ALWAYS seem to forget. And that is, that they
DO NOT have an ESTABLISHED industry and a "going concern proven
business model" as they claim because
A) They are massively subsidized
B) They are CONSTANTLY replacing equipment that lasts, at most,
a couple of decades. At any moment they can decide to buy the
renewable energy machines instead of fossil fuel transport and
drilling equipment on the same schedule of replacement that they
use to replace oil rigs, tankers, etc. BUT THEY REFUSE TO DO SO.
HTML http://www.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/3-311013201314.png
Can you say, Mens Rea? >:(
At any rate, the shipyards are catching on that building
Renewable Energy Machines provides more and better jobs than
building polluting tanker pigs. GOOD!
Harland & Wolff Heavy Industries is a Northern Irish heavy
industrial company, specialising in shipbuilding and offshore
construction, located in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
The shipyard has built many ships; among the more famous are the
White Star trio RMS Olympic, RMS Titanic and Britannic, the
Royal Navy's HMS Belfast, Royal Mail Line's Andes, Shaw Savill's
Southern Cross and P&O's SS Canberra. The company's official
history, Shipbuilders to the World, was published in 1986.
As of 2011, the expanding offshore wind power industry has taken
centre stage and 75% of the company's work is based on offshore
renewable energy.
HTML http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harland_and_Wolff
... the United Kingdom planned to build 7,500 new offshore wind
turbines between 2008 and 2020, creating great demand for heavy
assembly work.
Unlike land-based wind turbines, where assembly occurs on site,
offshore wind turbines have part of their assembly done in a
shipyard, and then construction barges transport the tower
sections, rotors, and nacelles to the site for final erection
and assembly. As a result of this, in late 2007, the 'Goliath'
gantry crane was re-commissioned, having been moth-balled in
2003 due to the lack of heavy-lifting work at the yard.
In June 2008, assembly work at the Belfast yard was underway on
60 Vestas V90-3MW wind turbines for the Robin Rigg Wind Farm.[6]
This was the second offshore wind farm assembled by the company
for Vestas having completed the logistics for the Barrow
Offshore Wind Farm in 2006. In August 2011 Harland and Wolff
completed the logistics for the Ormonde Wind Farm which
consisted of 30 REpower 5MW turbines.
In March 2008, the construction of the world's first commercial
tidal stream turbine, for Marine Current Turbines, was completed
at the Belfast yard. The installation of the 1.2MW SeaGen Tidal
System was begun in Strangford Lough in April 2008.[7]
In July 2010, Harland & Wolff secured a contract to make a
prototype tidal energy turbine for Scotrenewables Ltd.[8]
Manufacture of the SR250 device was completed in May 2011 and
has been undergoing testing in Orkney since.
As of April 2012, the booming offshore wind power industry has
taken centre stage. Harland & Wolff are currently working on
three innovative meteorological mast foundations for the Dogger
Bank and Firth of Forth offshore wind farms, as well as putting
the finishing touches to two Siemens substations for the Gwynt y
Môr offshore wind farm. Seventy-five per cent of the company's
work is based on offshore renewable energy.
Harland & Wolff is one of many UK and international companies
profiting from the emergence of UK wind- and marine-generated
electricity, which is attracting significant inward investment.
[img width=45
height=100]
HTML http://www.clker.com/cliparts/c/6/7/1/12065737551968208283energie_positive_Wind_Turbine_Green.svg.hi.png[/img]http://www.4smileys.com/smileys/seasons-smileys/storm.gifhttp://www.freesmileys.org/emoticons/emoticon-object-062.gif
HTML http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harland_and_Wolff
#Post#: 550--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: December 14, 2013, 12:12 am
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[font=arial black]Wind energy becoming cheaper than natural gas
:o[/font]
By John Upton
In the blustery Midwest, wind energy is now coming in even
cheaper than natural gas. From Greentech Media:
“In the Midwest, we’re now seeing power agreements being signed
with wind farms at as low as $25 per megawatt-hour,” said
Stephen Byrd, Morgan Stanley’s Head of North
American Equity Research for Power & Utilities and Clean Energy,
at the Columbia Energy Symposium in late November. “Compare that
to the variable cost of a gas plant at $30 per megawatt-hour. …”
Byrd acknowledged that wind does receive a subsidy in the form
of a production tax credit for ten years at $22 per
megawatt-hour after tax. “But even without that subsidy, some of
these wind projects have a lower all-in cost than gas,” Byrd
said.
And the gas industry certainly gets plenty of its own subsidies.
>:(
Wind is also breathing down the neck of the coal industry in the
region: ;D
Wind is even going head-to-head with Powder River Basin coal.
“In the Midwest, those wind plants are, many times of the day,
competing against efficient nuclear plants and efficient PRB
coal plants,” Byrd said.
Oh yeah, nuclear. As we reported earlier this year, wind is
threatening nuclear too.
HTML http://www.pic4ever.com/images/47b20s0.gif
While wind and solar farms can be expensive to build, Byrd
points out that the fuel for them is free, giving them an edge
in the country’s competitive electricity markets.
HTML http://www.pic4ever.com/images/19.gif<br
/>
HTML http://www.pic4ever.com/images/128fs318181.gif
HTML http://www.desismileys.com/smileys/desismileys_0293.gif
Source
Midwest Wind Cost-Competitive with Gas and Coal, Greentech Media
John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets,
posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes
reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants:
johnupton@gmail.com.
HTML http://grist.org/news/wind-energy-becoming-cheaper-than-natural-gas/
HTML http://grist.org/news/wind-energy-becoming-cheaper-than-natural-gas/
#Post#: 559--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: December 16, 2013, 5:00 pm
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With a wind PTC expiration potentially days away, expect more
deals like this one to get projects qualified under the gun.
[img WIDTH=640
HEIGHT=380]
HTML http://csmres.co.uk/cs.public.upd/article-images/Wind_turbine_smiley_shutterstock_28691215.gif[/img]
James Montgomery, Associate Editor, RenewableEnergyWorld.com
December 16, 2013
New Hampshire, USA -- We're just days away from the end of
calendar 2013, which means a number of annual rituals: holiday
parties, lists of top-everything-whatever -- and angst over the
expiring production tax credit (PTC) that has been key to the
U.S. wind industry's growth. ??? >:(
Last year's PTC was ultimately extended at the 11th hour, and
its language tweaked this spring changing the requirements that
a power plant must be online to requiring that a plant be "under
construction" either through physical work being done or the
developer having incurred 5 percent of the total cost. With the
PTC's expiration looming one again, look for some last-minute
announcements as wind developers try to get some projects nailed
down.
And now we have Exhibit A: [img width=45
height=100]
HTML http://www.clker.com/cliparts/c/6/7/1/12065737551968208283energie_positive_Wind_Turbine_Green.svg.hi.png[/img]MidAmerican<br
/>has ordered 1 GW of turbines from Siemens AG for its five
planned new wind farms in Iowa scheduled to come online in 2015,
spanning sizes of 44 MW up to 500 MW, adding to the roughly 2.3
GW the company already operates in the state. The blades will be
built in Siemens' Fort Madison, Iowa plant and the nacelles and
hubs will be assembled in Hutchinson, Kansas. With these turbine
investments, those projects officially qualify for the PTC as it
currently exists, according to Adam Wright, VP of wind
generation at MidAmerican.
About half of that collective 1 GW of new Iowa wind capacity is
expected to be installed by the end of 2014, with the "civil
work" completed for the remaining 500 MW, which will add
turbines and come into service in 2015, Wright explained. But in
a surprise, he also revealed that the 44-MW Vienna II expansion
originally slated to be completed in the fall of 2014 has
already begun commercial operations -- it came online on
December 4, to take advantage of the current PTC's bonus
depreciation. [img width=40
height=40]
HTML http://www.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/3-051113192052.png[/img]<br
/>
HTML http://www.websmileys.com/sm/violent/sterb029.gif
MidAmerican and Siemens will broadcast all this news live at 1
pm Central Time today; watch it here or on AWEA's home page.
Iowa is one of the leading U.S. state adopters of wind energy,
getting nearly a quarter of its total power generation from wind
in 2012. It ranked third in the nation for MW installed (5.1 GW)
and number of wind turbines (3,200). The Iowa Wind Energy
Association projects 10 GW of installed capacity in the state by
2017, with a statewide potential of 570 GW.
HTML http://www.pic4ever.com/images/looksmiley.gif
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2013/12/midamerican-siemens-secure-1-gw-turbine-pact-for-iowa-wind-farms?cmpid=rss
#Post#: 580--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: December 18, 2013, 5:35 pm
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UK Approves 450 Million Pound Offshore Wind Port Project Plan
Alex Morales, Bloomberg
December 18, 2013
LONDON -- The U.K. approved a 450-million pound ($736 million)
project to build manufacturing and port facilities for the
offshore wind industry in northeast England, expanding the
country’s drive to develop the technology. ;D
Able U.K. Ltd. was given the go-ahead for the project after
satisfying a government request for more detail on how it will
accommodate for seabirds and a railway line affected by the
plan, the Department of Transport said today in an e-mailed
statement. Parliament must now consider compulsory purchase
powers to acquire some of the land needed, it said.
Britain has more installed offshore wind power than the rest of
the world combined, and ministers have identified the technology
as key to U.K. efforts to slash carbon and boost renewables.
Deployment of 10 gigawatts, almost triple current installations,
is possible by 2020 ;D, according to the government, which has
shied away from setting an official goal.
The approval is “testament to a continuing sense of long- term
confidence in the offshore wind sector, which is at the very
heart of our green energy future,” Maf Smith, deputy chief
executive officer of the RenewableUK lobby group said in a
statement. “Offshore wind, and the supply chain it is building,
could create tens of thousands of green-collar jobs to coastline
communities in areas where they’re needed most.”
The project on the banks of the Humber River in northeast
England includes about 1,300 meters (4,300 feet) of deep-water
docks and 906 acres (367 hectares) of land for offices and
factories, according to its website. Able says the project may
create 4,000 jobs.
Timeline
It’s designed to be used by offshore wind project developers
that need to deploy large components such as foundations and
wind turbine towers and nacelles to their sites at sea. The
intention is for the first dock to be available for use in 2016.
“It provides the opportunity, not available at any other U.K.
location, to create a critical mass of activity,” Able Executive
Chairman Peter Stephenson said today in a statement. “The Humber
is ideally placed in close proximity to the world’s largest
proposed offshore wind farms.”
Able Marine Energy Park on Dec. 9 signed a memorandum of
understanding with Strabag SE’s Stuttgart, Germany-based
offshore wind unit identifying it as the company’s preferred
location to build a factory for the mass production of
foundations for offshore wind turbines, with the potential to
create up to 500 jobs.
Copyright 2013 Bloomberg
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2013/12/uk-approves-450-million-pound-offshore-wind-port-project-plan
Agelbert NOTE: The above is more evidence of the lack of
foresight of a certain energy expert that moved from the UK to
Canada BECAUSE the UK was running out of "cheap" fossil fuels
AND
Renewable Energy could "NEVER" fill the gap because
1) It is TOO EXPENSIVE AND HAS TOO LOW AN EROI.
HTML http://www.u.arizona.edu/~patricia/cute-collection/smileys/lying-smiley.gif
2) It can't provide baseload power due to "intermittence". [img
width=160
height=095]
HTML http://www.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/3-241013183046.jpeg[/img]
3) Forced lessening of total energy use will impair the economy
drastically because GDP ALWAYS tracks total energy use!
4) Renewable Energy cannot be deployed quick enough to avoid a
collapse.
HTML http://www.freesmileys.org/smileys/smiley-scared003.gif
WELL, both "1)" and "2)" have been proven FALSE.
As to "3)" we have already proved that is false in the last 13
years.
HOW DID WE DO THAT? According to Amory Lovins of the RMI, US GDP
is 25% higher than in the year 2000 and we use MUCH LESS TOTAL
ENERGY!
BUT, ya never know... Item "4)" may still happen,,, 8)
I say that IF IT DOES HAPPEN, it will have NOTHING to do with
energy and be solely climate catastrophe caused. :P
#Post#: 616--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: December 25, 2013, 2:11 pm
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6 Reasons Why Nuke Fan Is Dead Wrong About Wind Energy
American Wind Energy Association | December 7, 2013 11:45 am
By Michael Goggin
The Energy Collective blog recently carried a column,
Limitations of Unreliable Energy Sources, aka ‘Renewables,’ by
Rod Adams, a longtime nuclear power advocate and critic of
competing energy sources. In his column, Adams repeats a number
of false statements about wind power.
nukewind
When corrected, his claims actually highlight a number of ways
in which wind energy’s efficiency is superior to that of other
energy sources.
Wind energy significantly reduces carbon emissions and does not
noticeably reduce the efficiency of fossil-fired power plants on
the utility system.
Recent analysis of the impact of wind on the efficiency of
fossil-fired power plants found that with renewable energy
supplying 33 percent of the electricity, wind produces 99.8
percent of the expected fuel use and carbon dioxide (CO2)
emissions savings after accounting for all cycling impacts, or
savings of 1,190 pounds of CO2 per megawatt hour (MWh) of wind.
This analysis is based on real-world hourly emissions data for
all fossil-fired power plants in the Western U.S, and puts to
rest the fossil fuel industry myth that wind energy’s emissions
savings are lower than expected.
Transmission pays for itself through economic and reliability
benefits.
Numerous studies show that grid upgrades more than pay for
themselves through the reliability and economic benefits they
provide to consumers. The claim that a significant amount of
wind energy is lost in transmission to consumers is false, as
almost all line losses occur on low-voltage distribution lines,
and thus apply to all energy sources evenly (page 30).
Wind energy has a lower integration cost than large conventional
power plants.
Every wind integration study has found that there is more than
enough flexibility on the power system today to accommodate very
high levels of wind energy. In contrast, the need for reserves
to accommodate the sudden failure of conventional power plants
is far larger and many times more costly than for wind (see
calculations in footnotes 6 and 7). Adding wind energy to the
grid does not cause any need for new power plant capacity, and
actually significantly reduces the total need for power plants.
Wind energy curtailment has only occurred due to localized
transmission constraints (that are being eliminated), and never
because the amount of wind output exceeded total demand on the
power system.
Even the curtailment caused by localized transmission congestion
is being eliminated as long-needed grid upgrades catch up with
wind energy’s rapid growth, with curtailment cut in half from
2011 to 2012. (see page 44) Further declines are occurring in
2013, with curtailment on the ERCOT (Electric Reliability
Council of Texas) system now approaching zero.
Onsite energy use is far higher at conventional power plants, on
the order of 7 to 15 percent of power plant energy production.
In contrast, the figure for wind plants is typically far less
than 1 percent. A comprehensive literature review of all
peer-reviewed studies on the lifecycle carbon emissions impacts
of all energy sources demonstrates that wind’s impact is a
fraction of all conventional energy sources, and is also much
lower than most other renewable energy sources.
Energy storage is not needed for wind energy.
The U.S. has added 60 gigawatts (GW) of wind, and Europe even
more, with zero need to add energy storage. As explained above,
there is plenty of flexibility on the existing power system.
Interestingly, nearly all of the 22 GW of pumped hydro energy
storage in the U.S. was added to help accommodate the
inflexibility and additional reserve needs imposed by large
nuclear power plants.
Finally, it seems strange to talk about the efficiency of
different energy sources without discussing the fact that most
fossil and nuclear power plants immediately waste 2/3 of the
energy in their fuel as waste heat at the power plant, while
most modern wind turbines capture around 50 percent of the
energy available in their fuel. The U.S. Department of Energy’s
data on the average efficiency of different types of power
plants is here:
•Coal: 32.7 percent efficiency
•Gas: 41.9 percent efficiency
•Nuclear: 32.6 percent efficiency
HTML http://ecowatch.com/2013/12/07/nuke-fan-dead-wrong-wind-energy/
#Post#: 618--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: December 25, 2013, 4:02 pm
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Siemens to Supply Turbines for $2.6 Billion :o Cape Wind
Project
Ehren Goossens, Bloomberg
December 24, 2013 | 2 Comments
NEW YORK CITY -- Siemens AG, Europe’s biggest engineering
company, agreed to supply turbines to the $2.6 billion Cape Wind
project, the first offshore wind farm planned in the U.S.
Siemens will install 130 of its 3.6-megawatt turbines at the
facility that’s now seeking finance for construction in
Massachusetts waters, the Munich-based company said today in a
statement. Financial details of the agreement weren’t disclosed.
[img width=320
height=220]
HTML http://www.energy.siemens.com/hq/pool/hq/power-generation/wind-power/SWT-36-107-nacelle.jpg[/img][img<br
/>width=320
height=220]
HTML http://www.worldoil.com/uploadedimages/Issues/Articles/Apr-2011/0411-Gas-Kennedy-Fig-06.jpg[/img]
[img width=640
height=600]
HTML http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/wp-content/uploads/wind-turbines-on-cargo-ship.jpg[/img]
The deal along with a proposal from Siemens to take a $100
million equity stake in the project raises the chances that the
project will move forward. Residents including the family of
former President John F. Kennedy have sued to stop the project,
??? >:( saying it will spoil a uniquely beautiful area.
“Siemens will most likely be an investor in the project,” Randy
Zwirn, chief executive officer of SiemensEnergy Inc., said in an
interview.
Siemens, the largest supplier of offshore wind turbines, said
the deal is subject to final negotiations. Its 3.6 megawatt
turbine is the most installed offshore turbine in the world, Jim
Gordon, founder and owner of Boston-based Energy Management
Inc., the parent of Cape Wind, said in an interview.
“Because it’s the first offshore wind farm in America, it was
very important for us to pick the workhorse of the offshore wind
industry,” Gordon said.
Siemens said last week that Cape Wind is likely to qualify for a
tax credit that expires at the end of this year. It has faced
delays due to lawsuits opposing it.
Legal Outlook
“The process was careful and deliberate, and we fully expect our
permit will be upheld,” Gordon said. “We fully anticipate the
legal decision our way simply because this has been one of the
most comprehensively reviewed energy projects in decades in the
United States. They’ve been using these avenues as a delaying
factor.”
The Interior Department has said about 1,000 gigawatts of
potential wind energy exists off the U.S. Atlantic coast, though
no projects have been completed. Several, including the Block
Island project are moving forward as well.
The U.S. awarded a lease to Cape Wind Associates LLC in 2010 for
an area 5 miles (8 kilometers) off mainland Cape Cod. It’s
spread over 25 square miles known as Horseshoe Shoal and would
generate on average enough electricity to power 200,000 homes,
according to the Energy Department.
“This is really the first offshore wind project of any
significance anywhere in the U.S.,” Zwirn said. “As the leading
supplier of offshore wind turbines in the world, we obviously
have an interest to see that market potential to be developed.”
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. unit MidAmerican Energy
Holdings Co. awarded Siemens, whose largest business is energy,
on Dec. 16 with a more than $1 billion contract, the largest
ever, for 448 turbines for wind farms in Iowa.
Copyright 2013 Bloomberg
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2013/12/siemens-to-supply-turbines-for-2-6-billion-cape-wind-project?cmpid=WNL-Friday-December27-2013
#Post#: 629--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: December 27, 2013, 5:24 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
Subsea Cables Bring Offshore Wind Power to the People
Cables are increasingly recognized as a crucial aspect of wind
farm construction and operation. Here, we offer a glimpse of a
Norwegian subsea cable manufacturing facility and review the
challenges of this evolving market.
Tildy Bayar, Contributing Editor
December 19, 2013
LONDON -- It might be surprising to learn that Norway’s tallest
building is Nexans’ 120-metre extrusion tower at the company’s
submarine high-voltage direct current (HVDC) cable factory in
Halden. Nexans makes subsea cables that connect offshore wind
farms to the grid, transports them around the world and installs
them underwater so that the cables can bring clean power from
offshore wind farms to onshore substations and from there to our
homes.
Several different types of cable are used in offshore wind
projects. Low (up to 1 kV) and medium-voltage loop cables
transmit the electricity produced in the turbine’s generator to
the transformer, usually located at the tower’s base. Then array
cables connect the turbines on a wind farm to each other and
export cables carry their power to the grid. Finally,
underground and overhead line (OHL) cables that make it all work
on land.
[img width=640
height=380]
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/assets/images/story/2013/12/3/body-0-1386110300950.png[/img]
Offshore wind export and inter array cable types. Credit:
Nexans.
On a recent tour of the factory, sponsored by Nexans, guides
explained that the high tower at the Nexans factory houses the
vertical extrusion machinery that begins the cable-making
process. From “clean rooms” at the top of the tower, superclean
polyethylene and cross-linkable, super-smooth “semicon” are fed
through a closed system of huge tubes back down to an extruder
at ground level, where the conductive material and insulation
are spit out simultaneously from multiple extruders that feed
into a single head. The tower can produce 15 km of cable in one
week before the workers have to stop the process to change the
enormous receiving baskets.
The height of the tower is important because all of the heat
must be removed from the materials before they enter the tube.
Curing and cooling takes place in a dry atmosphere of
pressurized nitrogen in the building before the materials are
fed from the tower to various stations in other buildings
through “cable ways” which are little wheeled tracks running
across and between buildings.
Using copper, aluminum, lead and wire, the materials are formed
into cable lengths weighing up to 400-500 kg. At the end of the
process the lengths are combined using proprietary joints to
make 60-70 km cables.
After several more processes involving insulation and
strengthening of the cables, they are tested for resilience and
torsion. As a wind turbine’s nacelle rotates, the cables are
severely twisted, so they must be extremely resistant to both
torque and vibration. The torsion tests on cables simulate 20
years of use in a wind installation. Nexans said the exact test
applied to a given cable depends on the customer’s
specifications.
A Challenging Market
The wind industry’s move to deeper waters is challenging,
according to Nexans, because transport vessels can only hold so
much cable. Nexans’ flagship transport and laying boat, the
Skagerrak, holds 50 tons of cable on its built-in turntable. The
Skagerrak can accommodate 65 workers and has travelled all over
the world. Not many vessels can hold its capacity, according to
the company, and there are just one or two others in the world
including the Giulio Verne, belonging to Nexans’ main competitor
Prysmian.
[img width=640
height=380]
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/assets/images/story/2013/12/3/body-0-1386110282754.jpg[/img]
The Nexans "Capject" can dig trenches in soft or hard sediments,
according to the comany, and is able to operate in depths of up
to 1,000 meters. Credit: Nexans.
With wind farms moving further offshore, said Vincent Dessale,
chief operating officer of the submarine high voltage business
line, Nexans’ customers are seeking increasingly higher
transmission capacity, which means producing larger and longer
cables. The Halden plant ran into problems in 2012, with an
invoice delay in submarine cables leading to a drop in Nexans
stock and an eventual restructuring of the business. The company
has learned some lessons, it said, including that “feeding in
more machines and manpower to match market demand is not
sufficient” and that “coping with growing complexity and
increasing timeline uncertainty requires highly structured
organization, robust processes and the right mindset,” said
Dessale.
Another challenge is that cables are becoming increasingly
important in risk management. “One of the key differences
between offshore and onshore wind farms, at the concept and
design phase is the need to consider cable failure when
designing the electrical architecture,” said David McNaught,
senior engineer at consultancy Frazer-Nash. “If a submarine
cable fails in service the consequences for the operability and
profitability of the wind farm could be dire; especially if
there are delays in securing a suitable repair vessel or if
weather conditions are severe, likely during the winter months.
“It is essential that the electrical cable systems of wind farms
have high reliability – that the system has the ability to
withstand unforeseen circumstances,” McNaught continued. Cable
risk is a relatively new aspect of wind project financial
analyses, he said, but it is increasingly being considered – to
the point where new guidelines from GL Renewables Certification,
published in January, include on-site and power export cables.
To address this growing concern, Nexans said it has scaled up
risk analysis at the tendering stage and the company is working
to develop and implement risk mitigation before beginning
production.
Another challenge is transport for larger and longer cables. The
current Skagerrak, the third in its line and 130 km, was built
in 1993; the Skagerrak 4, which is expected to be complete in
2014, will be 140 km.
[img width=640
height=380]
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/assets/images/story/2013/12/3/feature-1-1386110300950.jpg[/img]
Coils of cable at the base of the Nexans' 120-meter extrusion
tower at the company's submarine high voltage direct-current
(HVDC) cable factory in Halden, Norway. Credit: Nexans.
The market is growing in complexity, too, said Dirk Steinbrink,
executive vice president for high voltage and underwater cables.
The project scope of Nexans’ work has expanded to offer not just
cables but turnkey interconnection solutions, he said.
On the Northwind project, which is expected to be completed
before the end of 2013, Nexans is contracted to supply cables to
connect the Belwind 2 offshore wind farm to Northwind, and
Northwind to the shore. The project’s scope includes cable
design, testing, supply, jointing termination work and on-site
testing (called cable witnessing). The company said that it
would use the largest cable ever manufactured at the project
site, a 1-meter wide, 30-kg behemoth.
Offshore wind farm developers must also consider the social
impact of the installation process. “The acceptance level from
people living [near a site] is quite low,” ??? >:( Steinbrink
said. “They like green energy but don’t want to see us doing the
work. So we do micro-tunneling, especially in places with
tourism.” [img width=40
height=40]
HTML http://www.clker.com/cliparts/c/8/f/8/11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png[/img]<br
/> ;D
Frédéric Michelland, senior executive vice president for high
voltage and underwater cables, North and South America, does not
expect the market for wind turbine cables to evolve dramatically
over time. Today, he said, Nexans covers 80 percent of the
European market, while “tomorrow that will move to North America
and China – but we expect our market to remain largely
European.” In Europe there are “still plenty of projects where
most of the action will take place,” he said.
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2013/12/subsea-cables-bring-offshore-wind-power-to-the-people
#Post#: 634--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: December 28, 2013, 4:22 pm
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HTML http://www.freesmileys.org/emoticons/emoticon-object-106.gifHow<br
/>Wind Met[size=36pt] All of Denmark’s Electricity Needs for 90
Hours[img width=45
height=100]
HTML http://www.clker.com/cliparts/c/6/7/1/12065737551968208283energie_positive_Wind_Turbine_Green.svg.hi.png[/img]http://www.pic4ever.com/images/balloons.gif[/size]
American Wind Energy Association | December 13, 2013 4:09 pm
By Bentham Paulos
Renewable electricity records are being broken every day. In
early October, Germany hit a 59 percent renewable peak, Colorado
utility Xcel Energy peaked at 60 percent wind at the beginning
of the year and Spain got its top power supply from wind for
three months leading into 2013.
But that’s chump change compared with Denmark. According to data
from Energinet, the national grid operator, wind power has
produced 30 percent of gross power consumption to date in 2013.
This includes more than 90 hours where wind produced more than
all of Denmark’s electricity needs, peaking at 122 percent on
Oct. 28, at 2 a.m.
And Denmark has plans to get to 50 percent more wind by 2020,
creating even bigger hourly peaks. Energinet predicts the
country may hit as many as 1,000 hours per year of power
surplus.
To champions of renewables, this is validation that a clean
energy future is possible and that the transition is already
underway. These regions also give insight into what is to come
in the U.S., and what needs to change to keep a reliable and
affordable power system as clean energy grows.
Postcards from the future
As part of America’s Power Plan, we have developed a series of
“postcards from the future,” describing places like Denmark that
are already grappling with a high-renewables future.
Studies and real-world experience are underscoring that there
are many tactics available to deal with the variability of wind
and solar, and that these tactics are largely substitutes for
each other.
While energy storage comes to mind first for many people, the
truth is that the grid has functioned just fine with very little
storage. Power system operators have to deal with variability
all the time, with or without renewables. Demand fluctuates with
the weather, time of day, social activities, and industrial
operations. And supply varies unexpectedly too, such as when a
power plant breaks down. The fluctuations of wind and solar,
especially at moderate levels, are just one more variable—one
that may or may not add to overall variability, depending on the
system and timing.
Power system engineers use a whole suite of tools to match
supply and demand, both minute-to-minute and over longer time
frames. The most obvious example is a dispatchable power plant,
like a gas turbine. But they also benefit from bigger balancing
areas (trading power with neighbors), more transmission
connections to reduce congestion, faster-acting fossil power
plants, direct load control and demand response, targeted energy
efficiency, and curtailment of wind and solar plants.
Hydro power and even fossil fuels are the traditional forms of
energy storage, but many more are emerging, such as using power
to heat district heating systems, compressed air, batteries and
flywheels, and charging electric cars during the renewable peak.
It is increasingly common to treat wind power as a controllable
generator, rather than just letting it go full out. System
operators in New York, Texas and the Midwest direct wind farm
owners to submit five-minute forecasts of output, and ramp up
and down if necessary to meet system demands, just like
conventional generators. The Midwest ISO enforces this with a
“dispatchable intermittent tariff.”
Making it work: Easy Solutions First
So how can Denmark be 122 percent wind-powered? Where does the
extra power go?
Denmark is part of an integrated regional grid with the
Scandinavian countries and parts of Germany. They have a
constant trade with utilities in the region, especially hydro
plants in Norway.
As renewables grow and as Denmark attempts to phase out fossil
fuels altogether by 2050, the country is aggressively adopting
smart grid technologies, leading Europe in research and
demonstration projects on a per-capita basis. The island of
Bornholm will be a test bed, with extensive smart grid and
renewable energy deployment. Demand response is beginning to
grow, though in a different form than in the U.S. Denmark also
has big goals for electric cars, and has exempted them from the
180 percent sales tax applied to gas and diesel vehicles.
But conventional solutions will be the first solution through
better grid links between countries. As Germany’s Agora
Energiewende has put it in its 12 Insights report, “Grids are
cheaper than storage facilities.” More grid connections allow
surplus power to be shipped off rather than curtailed or stored.
Larger balancing areas reduce the variability of wind and solar
across a wider geographic area. Agora thinks storage will only
be necessary when renewables constitute 70 percent of total
supply.
As in the U.S., European regulators are grappling with policies
to integrate large amounts of renewables. While technical issues
remain, they are not really new, only of a larger scale. Most of
the integration tools are known; they just need to be bigger and
more capable to deal with bigger variations.
Less known are the policy issues. How big should control areas
be? How much should be invested in transmission lines, and who
should pay for them? What is the relative value of energy
payments, versus capacity payments or ancillary services? Most
of all, how should we pay for the services we need to keep the
lights on?
In America’s Power Plan, Mike Hogan of the Regulatory Assistance
Project calls for aligning power markets with clean energy
goals, giving proper incentives for market flexibility.
With 2020 just around the corner, it will be instructive to see
how Denmark deals with getting half its electricity from the
wind. What will the country do with a 200 percent wind day? ;)
;D
Bentham Paulos is the project manager for America’s Power Plan.
Author’s note: A number of system operators have put their
real-time data online and in iPhone apps, so you can track
hourly progress on renewables.
Energinet (Denmark): Real time map and historical data
National Grid’s NETA (England): Data sources
California ISO: Daily demand graph and iPhone app
ISO New England: Guest dashboard
Midwest ISO: Contour pricing map
Visit EcoWatch’s RENEWABLES page for more related news on this
topic.
HTML http://ecowatch.com/2013/12/13/wind-denmark-electricity-needs/
#Post#: 678--------------------------------------------------
Re: Wind Power
By: AGelbert Date: January 9, 2014, 2:01 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
Wind Energy Helps Ward Off Power Outages
Michael Goggin, AWEA
January 08, 2014 | 6 Comments
Over the last 48 hours, wind energy played a critical role in
keeping homeowners warm as grid operators across the Eastern and
Central U.S. worked overtime to keep up with record-breaking
winter demand.
Most importantly, wind energy provided massive quantities of
extremely valuable electricity when grid operators needed it
most to meet demand from electric heaters and furnace fans. In
several cases, wind energy’s output provided the critical
difference that allowed grid operators to keep supply and demand
in balance and the lights on. Wind energy also helped by
offsetting natural gas consumption at gas-fired power plants,
keeping natural gas prices in check by making more natural gas
available for building heat.
The last two days serve as a powerful reminder that wind energy
plays a critical role in diversifying our energy mix, improving
energy reliability and reducing energy costs for homes and
businesses. Diversity inherently makes the power system more
reliable by protecting against the unexpected failures that
afflict all energy sources from time to time.
While wind energy output does change with the wind speed, such
changes occur far more slowly than the unexpected outages that
frequently occur at large conventional power plants. Moreover,
changes in wind energy output are predictable using weather
forecasting, while conventional power plant failures are not,
making them far more difficult and costly for grid operators to
accommodate.
Diversifying our energy mix with wind energy also protects
consumers from energy price fluctuations. By providing consumers
with more choice, wind energy reduces the price of both
electricity and fossil fuels and hedges against price
volatility, both during times of crisis and over the
longer-term.
As the winter storm moved from west to east over the last two
days, wind energy repeatedly proved its reliability and value:
As the cold and high winds first rolled into the Upper Midwest,
the MISO grid operator saw very high wind energy output of
around 8,000 MW, enough to supply 6 million average homes under
typical conditions.
Then in Texas, the more than 2,000 MW of wind output on Monday
morning was the critical difference keeping heaters running as
the grid operator struggled with numerous outages at
conventional power plants. More than 13,000 MW of conventional
power plants were down for maintenance, while another 2,000 MW
of conventional power plants experienced unplanned outages,
forcing the grid operator to resort to emergency procedures. In
a similar incident two years ago, wind energy earned accolades
from the grid operator for helping to keep the lights on as
dozens of conventional power plants failed in another cold snap.
More cold air reached the East Coast Monday evening. The grid
operator for the Mid-Atlantic and Great Lakes states, PJM, saw
very high wind energy output when it needed it most. Wind output
was above 3,000 MW when the grid operator faced extreme
challenges due to the unexpected failure of numerous
fossil-fired power plants as well as two large nuclear power
plants in Pennsylvania and Illinois.
Finally, on Tuesday afternoon, very high electricity prices and
natural gas prices across New England are being reduced by high
wind output across the region’s wind plants.
Wind energy diversifies our energy mix, providing consumers with
more reliable and lower cost electricity during both extreme
weather and normal conditions.
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2014/01/wind-energy-helps-ward-off-power-outages
Agelbert Comment on the comments: ;D
January 9, 2014
Thank you Brian Ross and Jeff Green for providing truth and
logical discourse to the comments.
When the tsunami hit the East coast of Japan, wind turbines
directly in its path did not fail and continued to provide
electricity vitally needed after the disaster. They were the
unsung heroes of that tsunami. But not ONE SINGLE newspaper
article was written in the USA about these marvels of renewable
energy technology.
Also, anyone with absolutely any knowledge about how
transmission lines are affected by high winds and loads from
freezing rain and/or branches falling on them knows that wind,
particularly in the winter, is a huge challenge to grid
stability. Centralized power plants WEAKEN the grid by reducing
redundancy along the transmission lines that DON'T fail.
Multiple redundant power sources like wind turbines are
providing a high amount of power exactly when the wind is
highest and transmission lines are most subject to outage by
wind damage.
Wind turbines are further proof that distributed renewable
energy is the only viable future for energy on this planet has.
But, of course, the defenders of centralized power utilities
will continue to fight it with hyperbole, exaggerations and
mendacity while they are silent as tombs about the massive
subsidies all these dirty energy providers are sucking out of us
in order to remain "competitive". LOL!
I live in Vermont and Green Mountain Power is extremely pleased
with wind turbine performance during the recent high winds and
freezing rain providing power to thousands of homes with space
heaters, not furnaces, for heat.
Yes, New Englanders mostly heat with furnaces but those furnaces
require electricity to maintain the combustion spark AND a
yearly inspection running over $150 along with skyrocketing
heating oil costs. People are pretty tired of that game.
I switched to electric heat and have saved thousands of dollars
in heating costs in the last 8 years. For those that use wood
pellet stoves, no outside electricity is needed but those still
pollute the air MORE than wind turbine electricity heat. We do
not need to keep destroying forests to heat our homes! If you
can make the pellets from biofuels then go for it as long as you
don't contribute to destroying old growth forests; that's just
wrong because it hampers biosphere diversity and a livable biome
for thousands of species.
Here's my latest blog right here at Renewable Energy World
picturing a viable energy future:
HTML http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2014/01/a-g-gelbert-outrageously-positive-renewable-energy-growth-prediction<br
/>
HTML http://thehalloffame.wikidot.com/agelbert
#Post#: 685--------------------------------------------------
Earth Wind Map showcases real-time data on global wind condition
s!
By: AGelbert Date: January 11, 2014, 7:20 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
Interactive Global wind pattern real-time data :o on global wind
conditions in the form of snaking neon lines.
HTML http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/1000hPa/orthographic=-39.01,24.31,333
HTML http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/1000hPa/orthographic=-39.01,24.31,333
[img width=640
height=380]
HTML http://cdn3.sbnation.com/entry_photo_images/9573485/earth-wind2_large_verge_medium_landscape.jpg[/img]
See wind patterns any place on the planet. Use your mouse to
move the planet and zoom in or out. [img width=80
height=70]
HTML http://us.123rf.com/400wm/400/400/yayayoy/yayayoy1106/yayayoy110600019/9735563-smiling-sun-showing-thumb-up.jpg[/img]<br
/>[quote]
This mesmerizing Earth Wind Map showcases real-time data on
global wind conditions in the form of snaking neon lines.
Breezes are represented by thin strands of green lines, strong
winds with long streaks of yellow, while the most violent
currents are shown in red.
The Earth Wind Map gathers weather data from the Global Forecast
System at the National Center for Environmental Prediction, a
NOAA initiative. The script then translates the data into a user
friendly interactive animation.
Interactive maps seem to be one of the best ways of bringing
environmental data to the general public – in the past we’ve
also featured Google’s high-res global deforestation map, and a
map showing major U.S. fires in the last 11 years. This
fascinating new tool goes above and beyond by providing specific
data on the position, date and conditions of wind measurements.
The map is not exactly real-time, but it comes pretty close: the
data is updated every three hours and it can be set to show wind
conditions on any day in recent history.[/quote]
HTML http://inhabitat.com/beautiful-animated-map-of-earth-shows-real-time-global-wind-patterns/
HTML http://inhabitat.com/beautiful-animated-map-of-earth-shows-real-time-global-wind-patterns/
HTML http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/1000hPa/orthographic=-39.01,24.31,333
HTML http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/1000hPa/orthographic=-39.01,24.31,333
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