Windmill nonsense.. Tilting at Wind mills

[Andy Hall]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 09:08:14 +0100, David Hansen wrote (in article ):

Do you have the results of the poll for the Wrekin site?

Does it leave any out that don't produce convenient results?

[Andy Hall]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 09:11:30 +0100, David Hansen wrote (in article ):

Prejudice is an emotionally loaded word which rather suggests that you feel a need to defend the industrial deployment of your technology.

That just shows an ugly industrial windmill in front of a field being ploughed and a landscape with low rolling hills. Subtract the industrial windmill and it would look great

[Andy Hall]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 06:27:54 +0100, David Hansen wrote (in article ):

I didn't say that planning authorities are building wind farms. However looking at

that due diligence is not being done.

Now add in this

a picture of nothing short of coercion emerges.

This whole area is not the sweetness and light that you seem to see through your rose tinted spectacles.

You think that these industrial windmills are attractive?

[Andy Hall]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 09:38:17 +0100, David Hansen wrote (in article ):

It appears that yours is completely closed to anything that exposes the unacceptable aspects of industrial windmills.

Weak point.

The point is very clear. If one contributory report to a set of source reports is called into question (and you said that it is), then automatically the others should be as well. You can't have it both ways.

I notice also that the commissioners of the SDC can hardly be described as a representative cross section of the energy industry.

[Fitz]

Honestly - no. Is it expensive? Is it anywhere near comparable to decomisioning a nuclear power station? I thought that the recent programme on one of the BBC digital channels about Dounreay was very interesting. When the government closed it the community was appalled at the thought of losing their major local employer. As it turned out they didn't need to worry because the decomissioning is providing more employment than the plant did when it was running. And it's expected to take years to sort out. Some of the wleders who built the thing are now dismantling it again.

Well I'm a lot more relaxed now about radioactivity than I used to be, but even so it still needs to be treated carefully and with respect.

Perssonally I think that Whitehaven is the biggest argument against nuclear. Look what sellafield has doen to the locals! ;-)

[The Natural Philosopher]

No, but the most dangerous mining is underground, and south Africa and Australia have plenty of deep mines also.

Check your facts.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Well as long as MORE is coming from the uranium once processsed, than goes into the processsing, its still a net loss of CO2 innit?

Do you peer into your electric socket and say 'now little electron, where did YOU get your shove from..was it a nasty gas powered station or a shiny Nuclear one, or just a windmill?'

[The Natural Philosopher]

Not any more. I wonder if you really are as thick as you come across, or just trolling.

[The Natural Philosopher]

So?

Oh fer gawds sake. If it takes one gallon of oil to make enough uranium to save burning 400 gallons of oil to make electricity for electric trains..

Its easy enough to use electricity to SYNTHESISE hydrocarbon fuels, if its cheap enough energy.

The argument is as specious as saying '10% of energy will be met by windmills'

Not on a calm day it won't..

[The Natural Philosopher]

Although uranium is very very low grade ore, and even when refined you stll need to separate U235 and U238..a few kilos will ruin a powerstation for several years IIRC.

So actually not that much compared with coal.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Oh good. You had better ban God then for making the Earth a nuclear reactor that has produced far more radiation and radioactive materials than man ever has.

I am SO glad to hear that its just as dangerous to have these a couple of hundred miles underground as in your local Tescos parking lot.

[David Hansen]

On 11 Jul 2006 02:18:16 -0700 someone who may be "Fitz" wrote this:-

The background is that slag heaps were essentially created for coal that could not be sold at the time, because it was too small to fit traditional grates. That doesn't apply to coal used in power stations, as one look at a merry go round coal train will confirm.

Provided they are looked after properly there is no particular need to do anything with the heaps, indeed some are now preserved as a monument to past industries. If they are not looked after properly then they can become dangerous, which is what happened at Aberfan.

Sometimes tips are removed for various reasons, not just coal ones. Compared to the effort involved in cleaning up after nuclear the cost and time involved is minimal. A year or two and the tip is gone and the land ready for further use. That is not the case with nuclear, as the hulks of former submarines in the basin at Rosyth demonstrate. One of the hulks has been there for at least fifteen years, surrounded by radiation monitors. Then there is Windscale, which will undoubtedly take at least two centuries to clean up even if work on creating any more mess there was stopped tomorrow.

It needs to be understood and controlled properly. Some people panic too much when the "R-word" is mentioned. However, that does not mean one can believe some of the "reassurance" the nuclear lobby puts out on the subject.

[The Natural Philosopher]

I would say rebuilding new Orleans is CONSIDERABLY more expensive than decommissioning ALL the nuclear power stations in the world.

I thought that the recent

YOu have to see the nuclear industry in the light of history.

When Britain first embarked on a nuclear program, it had just fought and nearly lost a war where its aces to oil was threatened, and only its natural coal mines had kept it going. And it faced a potential threat from the SovBloc too. Well it thought it did anyway.

Coal supplies were getting harder to extract, there was a MAJOR pollution problem from coal fired heating..and a major political problem from nationalised unionised coal and power industries, which were felt to be infiltrated with pro soviet agitators.

Nuclear power represented a far smaller amount of pollutant, and a chance to both join the nuclear club to at least book a table at the UN security council, and the ability to stockpile enough fuel for many many wars..and wit fast breeders, to make weapons grade plutonium too.

With people dying from lung cancer and chronic bronchitis from coal pollution, acid rain devastating the continent, and rivers devoid of fish, nuclear didn't seem a bad price to pay...and IMHO it wasn't.

What happened in the 70's was a knee jerk reaction against nuclear,m that coincide with the development of North Sea Oil and natural gas.

It was politically easier to avoid the nuclear issue, trash the coal industry, and simply burn the oil. This is no longer a viable option.

Nuclear is eminently suitable for baseband power generation. There is a strong case for making up to around 60% of all power generation nuclear.

The issue of fuel rod reprocessing versus simply dumping the hot rods deep down somewhere, and concreting them in, is worthy of debate, I accept. As is building power stations with eventual decomissioning in mind, which the originals never were.

But as the lesser of many evils, nuclear has to be considered seriously.

The global damage from global warming potentially far exceeds all the nuclear accidents that ever were and probably ever will be.

[David Hansen]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 11:12:05 +0100 someone who may be The Natural Philosopher wrote this:-

Nobody has proposed dumping the hot rods deep down somewhere, and concreting them in, so your "debate" would be a rather false one.

However, there is a debate to be had about reprocessing versus above ground dry storage. In my view the latter is highly desirable for the fuel remaining as nuclear power stations are eliminated.

That then just leaves the question of what to do with the mightmare at Windscale.

[David Hansen]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 10:54:10 +0100 someone who may be The Natural Philosopher wrote this:-

Oxford University studied the weather records going back to the

1970s in considerable detail. Their conclusion was that there has never been a period of even one hour where the whole of the UK has experienced wind speeds too low or two high to operate wind turbines. That study ignored offshore wind. Thus, while the output of wind farms dispersed around the UK will always be variable it will never be zero.

Over the time periods that matter in the UK electricity system, 1-2 hours ahead and a few days ahead weather forecasting is already accurate enough for wind generated electricity to be integrated with other sources very well. At less than one hour small variations are mopped up by the same balancing services that deal with other variations in supply and demand.

[David Hansen]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 10:50:49 +0100 someone who may be The Natural Philosopher wrote this:-

Nice try. However, I know rather a lot about electrical systems.

Electrons [1], don't come from anywhere. Rather they are waggled backwards and forwards, over surprisingly small distances.

[1] which don't really exist but are rather something of an artificial construction.

[David Hansen]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 10:51:22 +0100 someone who may be The Natural Philosopher wrote this:-

Excellent, personal abuse. Usually the resort of those with no better arguments.

[David Hansen]

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 09:55:33 +0100 someone who may be Andy Hall wrote this:-

Yawn. My mind is completely open, to good arguments. Bluff and bluster, on the other hand, does not impress me. For instance I have changed my mind on nuclear generated electricity, after listening to the arguments of all sides. The anti-lobby have by far the most convincing set of arguments.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Probably less than me however.

I note with interest that whereas I said 'where did you get your SHOVE from' YOU changed it to say 'don't COME from anywhere.'

In order presumably to appear smart, when in fact I was well ahead of you all the time.

So ending up actually looking both deceitful AND stupid.

Your not a member of the Nu Laber party are you?

[The Natural Philosopher]

No, a standard response to someone who is trying to appear smart, but is actually appearing dumber buy the minute.

I have no objection to being beaten down by superior logic, or better factual data. I do object to people who use specious logic and are economical with the facts to win arguments however. And actually deliberate changing of what one has said in order to make an utterly specious point, simply to attack my credibility, really is a step beyond the pale..