Wind power key to UK's desperate renewable energy bid Good news and bad news. This week's government strategy document-cum-consultation on renewable energy, and on how the UK proposes to meet its EU obligation to derive 15 per cent of its energy from renewable sources by 2020, shows clear signs of practicality and joined-up thinking. But making it to the magic 15 requires several …
SPain in 2007 produced 10% of its electricity through windpower.
It's taken them about 10 years to do this.
Funny how a bunch of dodgy foreigners can actually get this done, while Britain dithers......pathetic really.
The nay-sayers can be safely ignored - they are demonstratedly wrong - Britain can easily have 15% of its power produced by wind within 12 years.
On top of that, a bit of tidal power, and some other renewables should in fact make 20% a perfectly feasible target.
In any case - by 2020 only Richard Branson will still be able to afford petrol for his cars, for the rest of us, filling-up at the petrol station will be but a memory by 2020, nothing the nay-sayers say can change that.
Shove convicts and chavs on a bike (dynamo fitted, I don't mean let the buggers steal it and hide somewhere). You could also pay the unemployed to do it. Not for the grid, but could supply power for prisons or something not even vaguely critical (free battery recharging?).
Remove personal TVs / PS2s from convicts quarters, and give them a couple communal TVs.
I bet they get a cooked breakfast too (although I'm happy to stand corrected). Cereal or toast is good enough. One cooked meal a day is more than what some people get.
And, force companies/universities to turn lights and unused IT equipment off over night (and in pre-response to all those who are about to shout 'We have to leave XYZ running' I did say unused).
And they say that cutting back on UK consumption can't be done. They're just not thinking.
Where does the UK get most of it's energy from at the moment -the scottish sector of the north sea.
Where does the UK plan on getting the majority of it's renewable and future energy from - Scotland
Who wants to bugger off and leave you guys in a lurch paying £200 a barrel for oil rolling around pissing themselves laughing in their own oil rich country. -we do.
Not the best though plan by team labour.
Now bugger off all you scrounging sods (you can keep Paw Broon) who've been saying Scotland's been living off England for the last 300 years. Time you dug out your candles.
"SPain in 2007 produced 10% of its electricity through windpower."
That's 10% of its electricity. Spain has a low reliance on fossil fuels at only 56.8% (http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Europe/Spain-ENERGY-AND-POWER.html) so 10% of electricity is about 4.3% of total energy.
"It's taken them about 10 years to do this."
So another 25 years to get to 15% of total energy then ...
That's hardly within the 2020 timescale and they've got a 10-year head start.
Spain if memory serves me correctly has a far lower usage of power then England and as most was new build it was rather easy to obtain such figures.
Relying on wind power in Scotland isn't wise.
Plus you can't rely on the weather to behave (a bit like the Scots, who I'm sure would be most amused by turning off the power to England once they succeed.)
However soon(50 to 100 odd years) we'll be getting 70% from renewable sources as our nuclear stations will be too old to run, gas and oil shall all be bought up by the States and China, all we'll be left with is a few windmills, coal powered stations and very little electricity.
If we'd invested in power diversity 30 years ago we'd be fine (nuclear/wind/hydro/wave) but we've dillydalleyed so long that we're shafted no matter what we do.
Spains hardly a good example.
So they have reached 15% of energy usage,
They have 2/3 of the UK population in a country that is much warmer than the uk (so use MUCH less energy) they also have twice the land area of the UK so have far more places to build turbines.
It's a bit far off being as easy for us.
Although Scotland already gets around 20% of it's energy from renewable sources so might be a little easier for us up here to meet that target.
Where is the hydro tidal barrier plans?
MOD can't detect anything with rader because they can't afford it. Never mind wind power, and it anything is going to fly low enough to not be detected amongst a wind farm, good luck to 'em.
I think the document is just scaremongering. If the will was there it would be done, but this govt like commitees and spending money on itself so we think it has done something. Which we don't
Case in point. The earth quake that hit san francisco and flattened the two story highway. 3 weeks of building and it was back up.
In the UK we can't build a new road surface with new barriers in the middle in less than 60 weeks.
I like to think the 2020 target will not be reached and we will fail and look stupid to Europe who already think that. But the govt then can blame the govt now and it will be all okay then....
The microgen-specific section leaves open the prospect of a FIT for this sector of the market, i.e. where it is most effective (making people buy solar panels etc.). There is no reason why this can't work alongside ROCs for larger projects. Of course, as to whether it will actually go ahead is another matter!
Interesting report on power in the Economist last week, showing the big advances in efficiency for both wind and solar power over the last few years.
Add some DC infrastructure (rather than AC) and intelligent appliance metering and its not so crazy to think we couldnt hit 20% and upwards for renewables.
I look forward to the end of the noisy combustion engine and our over dependence on oil.
How did Spain achieve 10% of their electric power through wind?
Well possibly because it has only two-thirds the population of the UK and twice the land area leading to a population density just one third of that of the UK. The population density of Spain is closer to that of Scotland than England.Quite simply there isn't as much land, especially thinly populated land in England as there is in Spain. In consequence, many more places to put wind farms cheaply with fewer local objections.
The population density of England in 2002 was 371 people per sq km, in Spain 81 per sq km, so manage to lose 78% of England's population and you might find a few more places to install wind turbines. Just whether the Scots will be happy to have their mountains covered in turbines to meet England's power needs is going to be interesting. Well perhaps if England built a lot more nuclear power stations they might take notice.
nb. does nuclear count as "renewable" in this commitment? I know it's not renewable in the technical sense, but as a low CO2 emission power system does it count? Also why don't power savings count - for many countries (especialy heavily populated ones), investing in power saving could reduce CO2 emissions far more cheaply than renewables. Saving 100GWh is surely better than generating 100GWh from renewables.
Here is analysis of the impact on the UK balance of payments, if we do not invest in renewables, based on a recent BERR report and current energy price trends.
http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/4188
The Uk would b spending $200,000,000,000 a year on importing energy by 2013 - 5 years from now. This would treble our balance of payments deficit and represent 10% of UK GDP.
I think that these are numbers that get noticed even by economists. This country is going into energetic and economic meltdown.
Always comments about electric cars and recharging at home. What about those of us who don't have a drive-way to park the car on and therefore no easy access to plug a car into the house ??
We need more nuclear power-stations. Why don't we build them off-shore, in under-sea chambers - no NIMBY problem and plenty of cooling. :-p
For every Mw of windpower you have you also require a back up.....now i might be being pedantic but if i was an energy firm i wouldn't build a power station to sit on standby and not get paid for doing that.
The power of the sea and hydro offer far more in he way of a stable supply but they cost vast amounts to build but IMO we have to do it.
As for all the politicians i would like to see a windmill put up in the Thames outside parliament just to show their determination to push through these policies.This would save huge amounts of tax payers money if their figures are to be believed.
After all what possible excuse could they give for not doing it ???
xx If your radar doesn't work in the presence of windmills,
xx that's not a problem with the windmills.
I'm not sure there are many ways that a regular array of metal poles (windmills) can be made to not interfere with radar -- tis simple physics.
Perhaps they should instead mandate that each windmill has radar mounted on it -- that way you wouldn't be trying to look at radar reflections through a bloody great metal grid; you'd be on the grid looking out.
To "breakfast"
Clearly you have little clue about defence theory, or radar theory for that matter. Within defence there are a variety of radars in use. You have radars on aircraft, for detecting other aircraft. By virtue of altitude these would see little affect from wind turbines. This is the case for both air-search radars on aircraft like AWACS, and also targetting radars on fast jets. You also have airborne radars involved in ground search or terrain following. These can be affected, but shouldn't be much of a concern. Terrain following radar has been largely replaced and is only relevant for very low level flying anyway, which is out of favour in a lot of war scenarios. Ground search aircraft like JSTARS should be able to filter out returns from wind turbines. This is because, whilst they have fast returns, the blips don't appear to move (and yes, radar is good for detecting both speed and position).
There are radars for airfield surveillance, but these are all about helping aircraft out that are close to your airfields (ie air traffic control) - again the problems here are minimal. Also Surface to Air missile radars shouldn't be affected since they are actually quite short range.
Now the problem is air-defence radars. These are mobile ground based radars that are used to constantly monitor the airspace around the UK (and elsewhere like the Falklands). These use lots of clever technologies to track moving objects, even at very low altitude, for up to 100s of miles (and yes, that does involve beating the curvature of the earth). You can argue that these radars are outdated, simply because the threat axis has moved, but we do have people who don't like us within reasonable air-range of the UK - so getting rid of this technology completely would be downright stupid. What large wind-farms allow you to do is run in to the range of the wind-farm at low altitude, using the messed up returns from the blades like a jammer. Other people building windfarms is an irrelevance, since they won't build them within the 200-300 miles of UK land that would be needed to actually interfere with our radar sites.
It's a concern - but there are plenty of other much bigger concerns to deal with when considering wind power which could well mean that any massive offshore facilities remain a pipe dream.
>Why don't windfarms have solar panels embedded in the blades?
Nice thought, but solar panels would add weight to the blades, and the heavier the blade, the more wind energy you lose trying to make them move.
Also, it's very unlikely that the solar cells would be exposed to the sun in the most efficient way when the wind isn't blowing, you'd get a lot more benefit from sticking the same area of solar cells on someone's south-facing roof.
I do like the Scottish idea though - it's nice to think that even after the oil runs out, we'll still have a stranglehold on energy provision for the sassenachs ;-)
INteresting argument - Spain has less people, less power, and less money (and less wind) - but somehow they can get off their arses long enough to build enough windmills to produce 10% of their electricity.
Now, what could Britain achieve, with its huge wealth and enormous distance of wonderfully wind-prone coastline?
Maybe a bit more whining and moaning in lieu of action, I suppose?
As for "weather is unreliable" - please provide evidence for when the wind has ever failed to blow on the british isles......these muppets seem to not grasp the whole idea of distributed power generation....
"They have 2/3 of the UK population in a country that is much warmer than the uk (so use MUCH less energy) they also have twice the land area of the UK so have far more places to build turbines."
And we are much warmer than Sweden, who (despite being at least as well of as us in the UK, as well as colder and darker), have half the CO2 output per capita we in the UK do.
So, if your point has merit, you've just proven that we're wasteful.
Since the east coast is gradually collapsing into the sea that would seem a prime spot killing two birds with one large lump of concrete and rather than NIMBY's we'd have WITBY's there.
They're right about Scotland, it would be stupid to leave England energy dependent on a country that may become independent and who's population has often been hostile. But then we are on our second dumb jock PM in a row, so that's distinctly possible...
Every time this kind of subject comes up some stupid jock starts blathering about us English stealing their oil/ wind/hydro power, I wonder whose money it was that developed the oil fields in `their´territory? Somehow I don't think it was a Scottish purse that was opened for the funds anymore than it was existing Scottish knowhow that was used to open up the North Sea. Any time the jocks have something we want it's unequivocally theirs but when they need investment over the border or other resources from us it's their `right´.Get a grip why don't you we are all on the same planet and have to live together, the human race got where it is by evolving to cooperate!
As far as renewables are concerned (for the UK not the jocks) govuk should stop sodding around and immediately put money into nuclear research AND development and maybe even offer prizes to innovative researchers if they come up with anything novel and new. Forget biofuels, the country is not big enough to grow sufficient biofuel crops to sustain any appreciable levels of use. Tidal is of limited use and extremely expensive to develop and maintain. Offshore wnid is a good bet and the idiots moaning about radar need to buy up a few soon to be redundant oil platforms and stick some radar on those outside the curtain of windmills. The other thing that never seems to get mentioned is LARGEscale energy storage, there is a fair amount of private and DTI backed research going on in Britain and one of the best developers is dare I say it in Scotland. Stop leaving the lights on in the streets all night start saving the wasted energy and tell the Europeans that until they come up with schemes that make sense in allowing for geographical variation we wont play their stupid games.
I crunched the numbers, as I recall tidal was ok, but stuck with environmental problems, hydro didn't work (3 gorges damn in China shows it could never work), wind could contribute, but a bit, not a major chunk, solar, not really workable, algae I did yesterday and I'm quite upbeat on that, it can contribute a bit too.
I still basically believe we have to do nuclear, but doing wind turbines is at least a good step. The arguments against it, are basically nonsense, 'it looks ugly' (subjective & transient), 'bird chopper' (false).... etc.
I think this is the first time I've ever agreed with a choice of Brown & Co, but then to undo the good work, they made it legal to discriminate against men (erm I mean descriminate FOR women) on the same day, followed by undoing the Lord decision that people can't be prosecuted SOLELY on evidence from secret witnesses (they didn't say you couldn't use them just that there has to be some other evidence too, not just secret witnesses).
It's like one step forward, two steps back with this lot. Still makes Robin Cook a better leader, no steps forward, no steps back....
I tried to start a company to make wind turbines in the '980s and was told it would never work. Now the Government wants to use millions of them all over the country.
As for microgeneration, unless you have a wind turbine with a 6 meter diameter rotor you are waisting your time. Likewise with solar cells you would need at least 40 sq m area to generate any useful power, i.e. something that has a pay back period in years not decades.
I also think the estimated rise in power bills is off by at least an order of magnitude.
Unless nuclear power stations are built fast there will be power shortages in the UK by 2020 if not before, all the green energy supplies not withstanding.
I know the green lobby would love the country to revert to the dark ages but to do that would require the population to be reduced to that level as well, maybe the greens should be the ones to volunteer to drop dead first then those remaining can get on with their lives in peace.
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Everywhere has to be like Spain, but more so. So (A) make the world warmer - you got it - more CO2. And (B) reduce the population density - you got it - reduce the population.
Why can't I have both the Flame icon and the Skull'n'bones icon? I don't see why I should I have to post twice.
First off,two fingers to ALL EEC requirements. Remeber how bothered the French were by our threat to take them to the European Court for continuing to ban our Beef! (Sorry, OT) Build more Nuclear stations, its aboput all we can do with the present finnancial climate (NO pun intended!) . And as far as radar goes, there is some pretty good OTHR (Over The Horizon Radar which works in the HF band.)about these days (Northrop have one with a scanning range in excess of 1000 miles.) Looks like we have to go it alone again, Gary
Funny thing I've noticed amidst all the yap yap yap moan groan grumble bitch complain about climate change, environmental degradation, and other modern eco-ills: no one ever points the finger at the real cause: over population.
Indeed, when I read of the rise in yob-crime, loss of civility, and the institution of a police state in England, the thought that invariably comes to mind is rats in an overcrowded cage fighting ferociously with one another for survival.
Sooner or later, some new disease will arise that in the course of a few weeks or months will kill off 99+ percent of the earth's human population, thereby spelling the end of civilization. If you don't believe me, find a good graph of the (estimated) global population going back, say, 1000 years and look at the ever-accelerating population spike that started around 1850. Any animal species that proliferates so much so quickly ends up getting whacked by Ma Nature with a devastating plague of some sort.
Need a specific prediction? How about a hybrid of Ebola, Marburg virus, and hanta virus that is contagious via contact with unbroken skin as well as coughing and sneezing, and survives dry conditions on handrails and doorknobs for weeks on end?
What is the IT connection of this comment? There is no IT connection to this comment unless someone smarter than me can figure one out.
>>>We could build 2 additional nuclear power stations for a small fraction of the cost and neatly cover the entire energy gap.<<<
Absolute rubbish. Current nuclear technology is highly cost-ineffective, even before you factor in the costs of waste storage, disposal, decommissioning and risk which together make it completely prohibitive.
>>>We'd also not disrupt the estinated 40-50% of bird migration paths which currently pass over the UK which heavier investment of wind farms would cause, with major knockon effects to biodiversity in the UK, the costs of which will also be substantial.<<<
Funny how all these pro-nuke anti-renewable loonies are SUDDENLY SO CONCERNED ABOUT THE POOR, POOR birds!?!?!?
Who gives a flying fuck if a few birds fly into a spinning windmill blade?
>>>Spain's deployed wind farms in a few highly suitable areas. This dosn't mean that they can deploy a lot more for low costs, and they're also having problems with having suddenly chopped off bird populations..<<<
The British Wind Power survey found Britain has a vast choice of higly-suitable areas.
Your concern about the bird populations is based on a wild fantasy - this objection to wind farms has no valid basis in fact, except in Denmark where they nailed a bunch of rare sea eagles. Bad luck.
I mean, its one thing to expect hard workin`, disabled and old folk to do the eco-right thing....but why the hell can we not get da lags to go totally green.
They want leccy for their t.v.? Give em a bike and a dynamo!
I think a spell growing their own food would be a hugely beneficial thing for them all.
Hmmm come to think of it why not involve the Unemployed in `food collectives`. As a part of their benefit they work the land and get a food hamper in return.
Not by force you understand......only if they want to!
It`d at least help out with some of the costs we`r all gonna pay in future!
Nuclear - How much uranium do we in Britain have access to ?
Oil - I thought we decided against using this stuff for power.
Wind power - Between the cost and the NIMBYs, not going very far.
Solar - In Britain ? Yeah right !
Hydro - Not enough land to drown to guarantee supplies.
Coal - See Oil.
It seems to me that our only recourse is to revert to a low energy consumption economy. The millions of private cars clogging the roads and burning oil while transporting 1 person each can go for a start. Central heating is a bad idea too. We live in one of the earths temperate zones, why do we need 70 degrees in the house ? Needless transportation of goods is out too. Why does food have to travel from one end of the country to another and back just to get sold. Why have masses of useless packaging for retail goods. Why buy a new tv every few years, because of the next big thing, when you could separate the screen from the decoding hardware, and just upgrade the set top box.
Consumers have as much a part to play in this as governments and businesses. Get your consumption down, and the rest will follow. Example - I bought a new fridge freezer from an online (and high street) retailer. A + rating and it has saved me several pounds a week from day 1. Not only that, but when they delivered it, they took the packaging away with them, I never even saw it. So why use cardboard packaging at all ? Why not use proper reusable crates that go straight back to the manufacturer. When a store or warehouse gets a delivery of products, the lorry doesn't go away empty, it is full of packaging for reuse.
Convenience is the enemy of economy. Laziness is the result of convenience.
On a slightly related tangent, did anybody hear that stupid cow representing the public sector workers pay demands. "Inflation is not caused by the public sector, it is caused by the private sector putting prices up". Does she know where the funds to pay the public sector come from ? And what the private sector has to do when taxes are raised ? Idiot.
Something I missed in my earlier comment was about solar power. Most people seem automatically to think of photovoltaic for solar, if instead you start thinking about solar concentrators and the available technology connected with them you will get a lot further. One of the main and expensive reasons for power use in a modern home is heating water, why make the electricity to heat the water when you can do it direct? One of the countries with some of the best technology in this area is Canada, not the sunniest or warmest place on the planet but they offer tax breaks on solar water heating installations. Also it is possible to use thermal differential engines such as Sterlings to generate electricity as a by product. I don't think the people that look at the alternatives for our energy requirements know how to use Google.
Are you SERIOUSLY suggesting that if Scotland actually controlled England's power supply they would cut it off?
It'sinteresting that you have a strange paranoia about Scotland but have no problem with the rest of the European countries and dodgy places worldwide that "England"/Britain relies on in one way or another..From fuel to food.
WHEN were Scotland ever "hostile" to England in such a way that would lead you to conclude the above? Because some of them like to see England's team lose at football..? As far as I can see, it is increasingly the English hating the Scottish and they have become very vocal with their anti-Scottishness since Gordon Brown became Prime Minister.
I'm sure that in the whole of the UK they can come up with some decent (boring, out of the way) places to put windfarms/turbines.
I don't think it's fair at all that they should all be put in Scotland to fuel the entire UK. I don't care how much more efficient it is. For one thing, wind turbines do to a certain extent spoil the landscape. Yes, they are needed so we will have to put up with it but it is not fair to lump it all on one country while everyone else just reaps the benefits, especially since Scotland is specifically known for it's scenery.
Personally, even though we need to figure the above out, wind power and other renewables are still the way to go. I don't understand how anyone could possibly argue in favor of something like nuclear, that is for one thing, extremely dangerous. People are saying that there's not enough time and we will need to use nuclear until there are enough renewable sources built. Great! But are you forgetting that you can't just use nuclear short term? Even when you're done with it it's still a big, dangerous problem.
I am big on animal rights etc but not to the extent where I think that a couple of birds who have the entire sky to fly in, but decide to fly straight towards turbine blades (which make a noise) are more important than the survival of mankind.
I think Darwin would agree.
Anyone complaining about the birds should be ignored imo. If they want a cause they should go and complain about the destruction of the rainforests. A true travesty.
"Indeed, when I read of the rise in yob-crime, loss of civility, and the institution of a police state in England, the thought that invariably comes to mind is rats in an overcrowded cage fighting ferociously with one another for survival."
And when I read of someone blaming environmental degradation on over-population rather than over-consumption and exploitation, the thought that invariably comes to mind is nihilistic loners viewing the world through a screen and scared of a freindly chat and co-operation with their neighbours.
Funny that.
Improving efficiency and using more renewables is all very well, but a 15% improvement per lifetime is woefully less effective than a 100% saving by not being born in the first place.
China dodged the starvation and economic meltdown bullet by implementing the "one baby" tax.
Population is the elephant in the room nobody wants to talk about.
The hypocrisy of the human race is sickening sometimes. We cull other species without a second thought when their populations outgrow the available resources; we "put to sleep" pets *we* think are suffering. Yet the one species we can actually communicate with, and who can make conscious decisions as to when they want to die, and can (through choice) control birth rates - is the one we turn a blind eye too.
Nuclear is dangerous? Could you kindly list all the accidents with nuclear reactors and their fuel (not counting nuclear bombs being dropped on Japan, that was no accident) and the amount of casualties as a result of that?
Then do the same for, say, every other type of fuel.
Yup, nuclear sure is dangerous in comparison.
gizmo23 - because you'll not get a lot of electricity from any blade that does not face South and the amount generated is so minuscule compared to the cost that this is an exercise in futility !!
As for the Scots, just cut their sticky fingers from London's well-provisioned purse and tell them to go spin on their windmills !!
"For every Mw of windpower you have you also require a back up"
Why? Maybe some industries close down on non-windy days. It's not unusual, building sites, schools, etc shut down under some weather conditions.
Once the cost of carbon is added onto energy pricing you're going to see some basic assumptions change (which is the point).
You're absolutely correct about population, however over-population isn't a problem we europeans have to worry about - our birth-rate has declined sufficiently that we *would* have NO net population growth, if only we didn't have hordes of 3rd-world immigrants flooding into europe.
If you are seriously concerned about over-population (which is a huge part of the problem), then target your criticism at the countries that are the cause of this problem: In the middle-east, India, Africa and South America.
Depopulating countries like Yemen, Brazil and India should be the UN's number 1 concern.
But I guess nobody *really* wants to go there, do they....so we'll ignore that and worry about other things instead...
The only thing that is efficient about wind power is the rate at which money disappears into the pockets of politicians and shareholders of wind generating companies.
The statistics regarding the efficiency of the generators themselves and the subsequent need for backup, leads to no other possible conclusion.
With a little bit of research, it must be possible to build enough tidal power generators around our coast, where we have some of the highest tides in the world, to give us ample power for ever. I can think of at least four different types of system that would exploit the power of the tide, a couple of which are running now, that could be used without polluting the visual environment, and which are 100% reliable.
France derives over 75% of its electricity from nuclear energy. This is due to a long-standing policy based on energy security.
France is the world's largest net exporter of electricity due to its very low cost of generation, and gains over EUR 3 billion per year from this.
China are building lots of pebble reactors, which are efficient and safe.
>kill off 99+ percent of the earth's human population, thereby
>spelling the end of civilization.
'Beginning' surely?
@The Scottish AC
>"WHEN were Scotland ever "hostile" to England in such a way
>that would lead you to conclude the above?"
Try living there only put on an English accent and swap all your Scottish flags for English ones, and see how chummy it is.
Besides, I didn't say "cut off", if England were dependent on one supplier for energy that one supplier would be pretty dumb not to put the price up.
English money invested in national infrastructure in Scotland is just stupid, having spent the money building all this stuff we'll be paying someone else for the use of it come devolution. No, it's time to sort out Englands energy infrastructure for the impending reality of Scottish independence.
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