Comments on: Greenwashing and Whining

By: Richard Mercer

Richard Mercer — Wed, 13 May 2009 02:27:24 +0000

Canada also has huge wind potential in the Hudson Bay region.
The arguments against wind are the same in the U.S.
We have 1% or so wind energy and they’re arguing against wind because of it’s intermittency. I try to point out that it’s a little early to be too concerned about that, since Spain seems to manage with 12% wind energy and Denmark with 20%.
Then they tell you wind can’t amount to enough power.
Point out that America’s wind power increased by 8.3 GW last year, the equivalent of 2.5 nuclear reactors built in one year. This includes a 30% capacity factor for wind. And to really embarrass those who blame China, note that they increased their wind energy by over 6 GW last year.

This article explains why storage is not the only tool for integrating renewables into the grid.
Storage: The Best Renewable Energy Integration Strategy?
http://www.altenergystocks.com/archives/2009/05/storage_the_best_renewable_energy_integration_strategy_1.html

This is a stock website but has some worthwhile articles.
Like this one on solar thermal vs. coal.
http://www.altenergystocks.com/archives/2009/04/why_csp_should_not_try_to_be_coal.html
Not something that Canada can use, but makes the case that the dispatchable power from CSP with heat storage is in many ways better than base load power.

There’s was also an interesting article recently, about the economics of wind energy and feed in tarrifs in Europe. It shows how wind energy lowers consumer electricity bills.

http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2009/5/1/174635/6513

“studies in Germany, Denmark and Spain prove that the net cost of feed-in tariffs in these countries is actually negative, i.e. an apparent fixed cost imposed on consumers ends up reducing their bills!”

“as noted in my text, wind is already cost-competitive with other technologies; it is its high fixed cost, lower marginal cost which makes it require a feed-in tariff, not its lack of competitivity. But there is no subsidy per se: as I note, the overall effect of the feed-in tariff is to lower the price paid by the rate payers who are bearing that tariff.”

By: Richard

Richard — Tue, 05 May 2009 23:08:04 +0000

Hey JimBobby… You’re a smart man!

It’s exactly as you say; we have many simple and ingenious engineering solutions to the intermittent nature of renewables. It just makes me laugh when deniers try to throw all manner of insurmountable problems in the way, as if they’ve thought of something deep and profound that has escaped all the researchers with PhDs.

By: JimBobby

JimBobby — Tue, 05 May 2009 13:04:53 +0000

Whooee! I hear this all the time — “storing electricity generated by turbines remains an abstract concept”. Usually, it is preceded by “the sun doesn’t always shine and the wind doesn’t always blow.”

Storing energy is hardly an abstract concept. Hydro=electric is generally produced by reservoirs and dams. When we use wind and solar, we can keep the water in the reservoir and store it for later use. We can also use excess wind and solar to pump water uphill and use that energy when the sun ain’t shining or the wind ain’t blowing.

In the US southwest, they’re using solar to pump compressed air into large tanks. At night, the compressed air is bled off through a turbine.

Province to province arrangements have been proposed whereby wind and solar from Ontario is traded to Quebec for clean James Bay hydro. Again, water kept above the dam is stored energy. Alberta and BC could be doing something similar, as you mentioned.

As far as what “remains an abstract concept,” CCS is far more abstract and unproven than centuries old water power. Also abstract is the disposal and long term storage of nuclear waste. Sometimes, the old, tried and true, proven methods are superior to unproven, money-pit, whizbang techno-dreamland “solutions.”