DIY roof mount wind power? anyone?

[Matt]

Lies, damn lies, and a distinct lack of hot (or cold) air.

How come the tabloids haven't got "PANIC FREAK WEATHER CONDITIONS STRIKE THE UK" on the front page then? Simply these conditions *do* happen, frequently.

About 15 miles away I can observe about two dozen of them right now clustered in one of the highest wind installations in the country - all of them are sat stationery, just as they have been since 6am this morning. I passed another half dozen yesterday again sat doing nothing due to a lack of wind.

The numerous jet trails are just sat in the sky taking about two hours to dissipate. There is no wind, its bloody cold and the volts are dipping. These windmills are not much bloody use today are they?

[meow2222]

You're posing half the story only. Basic capitalist concepts tell us that if the power station were decommissioned and we reached the point where supply were insufficient, electricity prices would rise until investors would return to the market. IRL the moves are slow enough and preditable enough that a major station being decommissioned then another getting rebuilt would be pretty unlikely.

NT

[Roger]

The message from David Hansen contains these words:

They could be and in any event even scientists are not always as impartial as circumstances should demand.

snip

It seems to me that this argument is based on the average output. No wind at all might be almost impossible but what about the presumably near 50% of the time when the output is below average? Sometimes it will be well below average.

[Homer2911]

I'll say yes to wind turbines when Tony Blair, John Prescott and the others agree to have one right next door to their principle residence - sorry, I forgot, Tony Blair prefers to freeload off Cliff Richard and others

[David Hansen]

On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 16:28:02 GMT someone who may be Roger wrote this:-

No, it is based on understanding the performance of wind turbines. There is quite a lot of experience since Delabole opened in November

1991. lists the current position.

Like any other form of generation wind farms can be treated statistically, but that is not as crude as simply an average output.

[Matt]

What I am saying is the price swings are so violent that one year the generation is very profitable, then the market evaporates *completely* because the market was manipulated by certain parties that have less than this countries interests at heart. More than one company just went to the wall (witness British Energy for instance) If scrap prices had been more favourable, and the banks had made the decision to go for stripping the site there is no way the "market forces" would have been able to react in time and build new generation. Witness the same thing happening in California a few years ago. No investment signals were flashing because the market didn't signal anything at all until it was too late. Those who did know what was happening and predicted it ahead of time were sidelined by know it all financiers. Some of the "informed" just took the severance money and retired to the woods up in Oregon and now live a comfortable existence "off grid". The UK market is identical. All the money, from all the tinpot dictators/football chairmen in the world doesn't give you the opportunity to jump the queue at the manufacturers and get what you want years early.

The centralised intelligent planning that went into the UK electricity market up until the late 70's disappeared forever to be replaced by almost total inaction throughout most of the 80's (except Sizewell) due mainly to government restraint and was replaced by the free market, sweet bugger all, head in the sand, couldn't give a shit approach post 1990 with the result that Postman Pat's cat half asleep has more idea of the UK's future power plant requirements than any slick suited inbred merchant banker making critical decisions for the future of the UK ever would.

[David Hansen]

On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 15:40:40 +0000 someone who may be Matt wrote this:-

Who are you accusing of lying? Oxford University? The Meteorological Office?

Have you evaluated the weather records in detail?

And someone else reports wind turbines running happily. That confirms the work in the report.

[David Hansen]

On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 14:25:45 -0000 someone who may be "Andy" wrote this:-

As

indicates there are not too many wind turbines in SE England at the moment.

There aren't a great number of other forms of electricity generation there either. There are a handful of nuclear and coal power stations, plus some gas turbine stations. However, people may have noticed large silver things marching across the countryside like invading martians roped together. These can be used to move electricity from where it is generated to where it is used.

[David Hansen]

On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 17:39:02 +0000 someone who may be Matt wrote this:-

The problem with "basic capitalist concepts", as taught in O Grade economics, is that Adam Smith modelled the market of his time. Small family-owned companies, operating in a local agricultural market. As a result of this there were few barriers to changing product, everyone had much the same market intelligence and the interests of the owners and managers were the same. Markets are rather more complicated today, but party politicians appear unable to grasp this.

Well, there was centralised planning. How intelligent it was is a matter of debate. Two examples.

Scotland ended up with five large power stations (two nuclear, one gas/oil, two coal). There are others but these are all relatively small, apart from the oil fired one that has spent most of its life mothballed. This was the result of unintelligent planning. As well as the expense, it means that the system is less robust than it should be. The exception is the Highlands, which has a large number of small power stations, remotely/automatically controlled and remotely supervised.

The generators of the time were obliged to generate electricity as cheaply as possible, with the result that they built large centralised coal fired power stations that threw a lot of heat away without making any use of it. Had they been obliged to do the best for "UK plc" then they would have built smaller more local power stations, with the heat used for district heating. We would not now be facing a gas shortage if many homes had hot water piped in, instead of burning gas to produce it.

[Steven Briggs]

In message , Matt writes

Agree 100%. The Merchant Wankers who run this country can't see beyond the next quarter's figures. A quick Google hasn't given the me an update on the current situation, but BNFL where looking to sell off their Westinghouse division... the one company with a modern approved reactor design, for sale to the highest bidder (probably be Far Eastern) just as the world moves into the next major phase of Nuclear build. Again the Bankers can see beyond the fast buck now to a potential bonanza 5-10-20 years down the line. Or maybe they've got the nod from Teflon Tone that he hasn't got the balls to order new nuclear.

Maybe a really long, hard winter with rolling blackouts would be the best hope for this country.

[Steven Briggs]

In message , David Hansen writes

25000MW is about 5000-10000 large wind turbines. To displace 5000MW, which is about one large or two medium conventional (or nuclear) plants.

Go figure.

[john.stumbles]

Salter's 'duck'? It was 'evaluated' by the government's research boffins at, er, Harwell who concluded (surprise surprise) that it was a hopeless waste of time & resources and we'd be much better off building more nukes.

I expect we'll end up buying them from the Japanese or Koreans.

[dennis]

The report is obviously wrong then. There are days when the wind speed drops close to zero over large areas of the UK. So you either need to build 20 time the number of wind turbines so that the areas that still have wind can supply all the power or you need gas turbines or similar plant. The alternative is convince the population that they don't need electricity on demand and that sitting in the dark and cold is good for you.

[Andy]

I didn't realise there was another turbine in the SE - when 'mine' was commissioned yesterday it was billed as the first in the SE. Like everything, the definitions are obviously customisable! I therefore have to revise my assessment - the sample size of one represents a 50% outage in SE England. The point I was making was that statistics can 'prove' what ever point to view you happen to have. TBH I have lost track of whether you are for or against wind energy!

Don't get my point wrong, I am neither anti or pro alternative generation, I just don't agree with the one size fits all solution. IMO we should be looking at a range of technologies to ensure the 'lights don't go out'.

Thats a little unfair. Has the discussion now veered away from +/- wind energy to +/- SE England?

How many (currently operational) nuclear stations are there in the whole of England? I think the SE can hold its head high on that one! Probably the same on the fossil fuel front as well for that matter.

Cool. What will they think of next? Actually, don't you think that last remark is just a little patronising?

Regards,

Andy (Ex Hinkley Point B)

[David Hansen]

On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 20:43:06 +0000 someone who may be Steven Briggs wrote this:-

If they were all built tomorrow then the largest turbine rating in use at the moment is 3MW, as at the recently commissioned Kentish Flats

Assuming all were of this size that would be 8333 turbines, or 277 wind farms of that size.

To get that number into perspective the largest 200 cities, towns and districts are

all the wind farms were built onshore then each of those cities, towns and districts would have 1.4 wind farms the size of Kentish Flats. It is more likely that say half the capacity will be offshore and half onshore.

That is a rather simplified analysis, but it certainly isn't "covering the whole of the UK with wind turbines", as some suggest.

5000MW is 20% of electricity generation (from the next sentence which you snipped). It would be delightful if 20% of electricity was generated by wind power, but it is not going to happen tomorrow. There is an aspiration for 20% of electricity by renewable means by 2020, but I doubt if that will all be from wind farms.

that Longannet Power Station is the second largest coal-fired power station in the UK and one of the largest in Europe. It has an installed capacity of four, 600 MW units. In other words 5000MW is about two large conventional plants.

I know that Drax (3960MW) is the largest coal-fired power station in western Europe.

I couldn't rapidly find the largest gas turbine station, but couldn't find one above 1500MW.

says that Sizewell B has an output of 1200MW. In other words 5000MW is about four nuclear plants.

[David Hansen]

On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 23:29:31 GMT someone who may be "dennis@home" wrote this:-

Ah, proof by assertion.

It is the case that wind speeds are close to zero over parts of the land mass of the UK, from time to time. The way to study how large those parts are and how frequently this happens is to study the weather records. The authors of the report say that they have done so. Are you saying they are lying? Are you saying that all the weather recorders are liars? Or are you simply unable/unwilling to accept the report and the evidence it is based on?

[Andrew Gabriel]

A 2MW one was erected a week ago at M4 J11 (Reading). It seems to have caused quite some traffic congestion due to motorists slowing down to admire it. Ironically, there's been virtually no wind since it was finished, and mostly it's been barely managing

1 rev per minute.

[tony sayer]

In article , Andrew Gabriel writes

As is the new farm out near Friday Bridge in Cambs.

Mind you the turbine at the dogs home in Godmanchester every time I go past there its turning. Dorset seem to appear on any mill databases but suppose its privately owned.

Be glad when this bloody fine but cold weather breaks, give me a mild wind anytime:))...

[Roger]

The message from David Hansen contains these words:

"Low wind speed conditions affecting 90% or more of the UK would occur in around one hour every five years during winter;

That is not so much addressing the problem as avoiding it. Firstly even a short lapse would mean that the generating industry would have to provide all its output from other sources. Secondly it is not the area of the UK that is significant but the area that the turbines are built in. And thirdly the more wind generated capacity there is the more chance that the critical value for lack of wind will be well below 90%.

[Steven Briggs]

In message , David Hansen writes

Arklow, Ireland, is built with GE 3.6MW turbines. Total capacity

25MW with 7 turbines. The largest turbines, in prototype testing at the moment, are 5MW (REpower Systems AG, prototype operating in Germany). Many sites may be limited to 2-3-4MW units, hence my estimate of 5000-10000 units for 25000MW. Reasonable?

I was taking the 20% that is the capacity factor of 25000MW of installed turbines, the figure given by National Grid at 20% market penetration. This allows for intermittent operation, periods like now, winter anticyclonic conditions when many sites would not be generating at all.

I was thinking of Drax as the large example.

I stand corrected on the Nuclear front, I looked up Torness (near you), at 1364MWe, assumed this was per reactor, it is in fact total for both. So 4 or 5 typical nuclear plants (current plants have a capacity factor of 75%, new build is expected to be 90%).

So to get to the point I was trying to make, let's take Torness again, an example close to home for you.

1364MWe at 75% capacity value = 1023MWe of useful capacity. To replace this with wind at 20% capacity value, thats 5115 MWe of turbines, or 1023 units of the current biggest (5MWe) turbines in operation.

So lets stick over 1000 turbines, at 450+ feet high, out in the Firth of Forth. How does that look? Expensive too,