Rhode Island just built America’s first offshore wind farm, which will create clean energy and fight climate change.
@BarackObama
“Also, it will make fresh seagull salsa for local porpoises.”
Rhode Island just built America’s first offshore wind farm, which will create clean energy and fight climate change.
@BarackObama
“Also, it will make fresh seagull salsa for local porpoises.”
Nice that it got built somewhere since the Kennedy’s fought so hard against it being built off Marthas Vineyard
What did all the famous ones say? “Over my dead body!”?
Too soon?
If the government’s and the climate scientist’s (yeah, right) track record is consistent, I guess there will be no more nor’easters.
Turbine Trouble: Ill Wind Blows for German Offshore [Wind] Industry
08/02/2013 / Spiegel.de
“The dedication of the first commercial German wind farm in the North Sea on August 10 is set to be a low-key affair. Chancellor Angela Merkel cancelled her scheduled appearance.”
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Flagship German Offshore Wind Farm Project Humiliated By Technical Faults
Breitbart. | Sept 12, 2014
“Germany’s flagship Bard 1 offshore wind farm has been described as “a faulty total system” as technical problems continue to plague the project, casting major doubts on the feasibility of large scale offshore projects. The wind farm was officially turned on in August last year but was shut down again almost immediately due to technical difficulties that have still not been resolved – and now lawyers are getting involved. The wind farm comprises 80 5MW turbines situated 100 km off the north German coastline. The difficulty facing engineers is how to get the electricity generated back to shore.”
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Guess Why Germany Is Shutting Down Construction of its Offshore Wind Farms
Hotair.com | 7/6/2016
“Germany now has electric rates for consumers that are among the highest in the world. Energy poverty has become a reality for millions of German families,” Myron Ebell, director of the Center for Energy and Environment at the free market Competitive Enterprise Institute, told The Daily Caller News Foundation.
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America’s First Offshore Wind Project Dealt Major Setback After Utilities Bolt
Fox News | January 23, 2015
An ambitious and controversial push to erect America’s first offshore wind farm has been dealt what some call a potentially “fatal” blow after two utility companies pulled out of commitments to buy energy from the lagging operation. The $2.6 billion Cape Wind project, a private operation benefiting from millions in federal subsidies, is attempting to pioneer offshore wind energy in pursuit of an eco-friendly, sustainable energy supply. Wind turbines would be installed off the coast of Massachusetts’ Cape Cod in Nantucket Sound. But Cape Wind is now in limbo after utility companies terminated huge purchase agreements.
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I guess I shouldn’t laugh, I should cry. It’s our money.
Dang, I just finished lunch and now this post is making me hungry again.
Ted Kennedy (who’s been clean and sober for 7 years now!!11!!) was totally against the still not built “Cape wind” project as is/was John Kerry…hmmm, onshore windbags against offshore windfails when they happen to own houses that would have had to look at them….how ironic.
Of course, just because they’ve never been built, since they first came up with the idea like…25 years ago, I can just imagine the billions already spent on something that doesn’t exist.
I wonder if Obama has a hint of a clue just how gigantic the “carbon footprint” of one of these stupid things is? Since he can’t grasp the concept that they’re not only not “free” energy, it’s unlikely they ever even pay for themselves so I guess the whole, they create as much pollution and waste more resources than they save will never sink in either.
I wonder how many nuclear plants could have been built with all the money flushed on “free” electricity….probably enough to actually solve the fake “problem” they claim to want to “fix”. Very similar to Ted’s views on…his view vs “free” energy” and GLOBAL WARMING™!!11!!!
Wasteful Wind Power
American Thinker | 1/26/12
[1] Every wind farm needs backup generators to supply power when the wind fails.
[2] If there is no wind, zero electricity is produced by the turbines and all power comes from the backup generators (mainly coal or gas in my native Australia).
[3] If wind speed exceeds design capacity, the turbines are shut down to prevent damage, and all power comes from the backup generators.
[4] In freezing still air, the wind turbines take electricity from the backup generators to prevent damage from cold. And they draw power to get reconnected.
[5] When the wind blows strongly all over the wind farm, the grid may not be able to cope with the surge in supply so some turbines may be paid to close down, producing no electricity.
[6] And on those rare occasions when a steady wind in the right place produces just the right amount of power to supply the demand at that time, the backup generators produce no useful power but waste fuel to maintain “spinning reserve” and to ramp up and down when the wind fluctuates.
Now we find that wind power probably increases the production of carbon dioxide (not that this matters).
One question.
Why not scrap the wind turbines and produce a steady supply of low cost power from the backup generators?
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[The following were reader comments at http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2838118/posts%5D
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Wind power is not profitable without government intervention.
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No investor or utility would build wind power plants without massive subsidies and mandates. The demand for wind power is almost entirely driven by government control of the energy industry.
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At 30% efficiency, and a conservative 54 year payback not counting maintenance and upkeep, they are a net drain on economies that insist on using them. It is national insanity to subsidize, much less lobby for such ancient technology. In the US it went out in the thirties, and what uninformed idiot would reinvent the wheel by trying to bring it back from where it went, the dustbin of history.
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Govt. intervention does not make it profitable.
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Wind turbines are just yard art for natural gas generators.
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There are now 14,000 wind mills in the USA, that because the subsidy has expired, are abandoned, but new ones are still being built {because they qualify for new tax credits and subsidies}.
YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK.
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At night they are lit up with red lights. Disgusting waste of the beautiful desert.
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There is an engineer named Kent Hawkins who has spent a fair bit of time on this. Here’s a link for what he calls his calculator and to the best of my knowledge, it has never been refuted.
http://www.masterresource.org/2010/11/the-calculator-14-results-part-i/
Here is an overview of the uselessness of wind as a component of the overall grid electrical supply….
You don’t have to read the whole article as here is one small paragraph near the bottom that clearly makes the point….
In November 2009, Kent Hawkins, a Canadian electrical engineer, published a detailed analysis on the frequency with which gas-fired generators must be cycled on and off in order to back up wind power. Hawkins’ findings:
The frequent switching on and off results in more gas consumption than if there were no wind turbines at all. His analysis suggests that it would be more efficient in terms of carbon dioxide emissions to simply run combined-cycle gas turbines on a continuous basis rather than use wind turbines backed up by gas-fired generators that are constantly being turned on and off.
Hawkins concludes that wind power is not an “effective CO2 mitigation” strategy “because of inefficiencies introduced by fast-ramping (inefficient) operation of gas turbines.”