Report takes Wind out of the Sales of Large Turbine Projects
This just in sports fans ... Denmark is the country with the highest density of wind turbines per capita. No, that's not the news, but this is: Danish energy consulting Incoteco just filed a report that concludes that, based on Denmark's extensive wind power experience to date, the UK's plans to achieve a significant portion of power in 2020 from wind sources are way, way out of whack. Actually, if the report is correct, any country (or country for that matter) that wants to use wind to boost its capacity should think twice, if not thrice, about the economics of doing so. The two key findings are: - The observed power generation output of wind turbines and turbine farms is disturbingly out of sync with the rated output of turbines, both peak capacity and average. Denmark has found they've got to install a whole lot more turbines to reach the power gen levels they had planned on. That's more money, more land, more moving parts, and more maintenance.
- Double trouble. The inherently unreliable nature of wind, combined with the inherently relentless requirement for energy to be available always, adds up to this ... I'll let the report speak for itself here: "Each kW of wind energy will require a kW of firm, conventional capacity to be built." If this is fully or nearly fully true, one might wonder what the point of the wind turbines is. Investors, including public investors, won't pay for back-up coal/gas/nuclear plants only to have them idle part time. No way. No freaking way. Nada.
posted by Andy Bochman at 11:50 AM
 
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