Wind power works

Offshore wind gets cheaper:

http://renewableenergyworld.com/articles/2016/09/how-dong-energy-bid-off...

Rev Pesky wrote:

It does matter to the extent people want a reliable source of electricity. What I saw, and what you saw, was someone posting what the largest amount of power generated by wind. But the largest amount doesn't matter. What matters is the reliability of the source. That means the most important number is not the largest amount generated, but the smallest. (Actually the large number is important, but for a completely different reason.)

...Now, looking at the output graph for a wind farm what does one see. You see electrical generation that varies from a peak of maybe 45% of capacity to 0% of capacity. Now, how do you get on demand electricity out of that?

The easy answer is that you build fossil fuel electrical generation to backstop the variabble output of the wind generation. But that begs a question, is the cost of the backup fossil fuel generation included in the cost of wind power?

I tried to find a graph of daily output for a wind farm, but those are pretty hard to find. No one really wants to show wind farm generation on a daily basis because it shows clearly what the problem is. However, here's a graph of the monthly output of wind farms in South Australia :

[graph omitted, see Pesky's post above]

You ask why I'm against the use of alternative energy. The answer is I'm not. I am, however, in favour of realistic expectations. The reality is that wind generation cannot produce reliable power.

Pesky, *nothing* can produce reliable power. If you have a million kilowatt nuclear reactor as part of your system, you have to be able to replace it instantly, because nuclear reactors sometimes fail. Ditto coal plants. Renewable energy converters (wind turbines, solar panels) have the merit that they are individually small and if they fail (rare) they are not individually very important to system function. When the wind drops or clouds or night interfere, they go out of service in gradual and predictable ways.

For the moment, wind turbines can be thought of largely as fuel savers. In a civilization and on a planet mortally threatened by climate change, that is not a small thing. The reduction in air pollution is also useful. Wind turbines do have a capacity credit factor but it is small. Fossil fuels are expensive and judging from the low rate of discovery of new reserves the current low price of oil will not endure for a long time. Also, the indirect/external costs of fossil fuels and nuclear power are high; see for example:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_nuclear_power_plants

http://ec.europa.eu/research/energy/pdf/externe_en.pdf

http://www.externe.info/externe_d7/

It's noticeable that government and industry seem to be reluctant to acknowledge the costs of nuclear accidents. Private insurers on the other hand won't touch these risks.

In Bent Sorensen's book "Renewable Energy" (Academic Press, 1979-2011) there is an interesting graph of the production of a group of German wind turbines several hundred kilometers apart (I regret that I can't reproduce it here). Due to the distances, I have somewhat more confidence in it than in your graph for this purpose. Discarding the extreme peaks which involves a loss of around 5% of production, one can see from the area under the curve below the shaved peaks, that a system dependent on current production from such wind turbines alone can supply about 65-70% of total demand.

Wind turbines fit well with solar electricity, since wind turbines produce most of their power in the cooler part of the year, while solar panels produce most generously in the summer. The combination of wind and solar (which also has a capacity credit factor) reduces the peak power required form fossil fuel supplementation or other sources. 

Supplemental fossil fuel generators, typically gas turbines, have a very much lower capital cost per kilowatt of capacity than do wind turbines or solar panels.

The most modern wind turbines, which can reach maximum power at lower wind speeds than older designs, require less supplementation than older types in most areas.

Where nuclear power is not a large factor, renewable energy usually does not require the building of *new* fossil fuel back-up plants.

Current storage technology using hydro, compressed air (usually in conjunction with gas turbines) and pumped hydro, can be useful in some areas. If the cost of electrolysis can be reduced, storage of renewable energy in the form of hydrogen for stationary applications may have a future the storage of peak power.

Flow batteries are promising. Current operational technology is somewhat expensive, but Harvard University has been working for a couple of years with a flow battery using a synthetic organic chemical which may be capable of storing electricity with a cycle efficiency comparable to current designs (75-85%) and a cost which may be as low as 2 cents per kilowatt-hour.

There are very large opportunities in the more efficient use of energy, at lower costs than supply.

In contrast to the anti-wind power propagandists:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/oct/20/onshore-windfarms-mo...

Quote:

New offshore wind farm at 5 Euro cents per kilowatt-hour:

http://www.energymarketprice.com/SitePage.asp?act=NewsDetails&newsId=21431

That's great.