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197 comments on Why wind power works in Denmark

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totoneila on August 31, 2006 - 7:14pm

Hello Cry Wolf,

Thxs for this post. It has many good ideas. My suggestion is that wind power could also be harnessed to pump seawater behind seaside dams built along the mountainous seashore. Not sure of the environmental effects, but it might be a good way to store energy in areas where there is insufficient freshwater runoff to justify a hydrodam.

Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?

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alistairC on September 1, 2006 - 3:17am

Logically this could be combined with tide power -- no sense in wasting the periodic height differential you get on the sea shore.

However, tide power is intermittent, though predictable... so the pumped-storage aspect would need to be big enough to mask the tidal variation, otherwise you're creating another imbalance problem.

Paradoxical.

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And1 on September 1, 2006 - 5:34am

Hello all.
The integration of wind power is high on the agenda in Europe. Here you can find the Wind energy industry views. They indicate that in the European grid some 20 % wind can be integrated "without problems" in the EU. Industry wiewpoints, but better than speculation.

http://www.ewea.org/index.php?id=60&no_cache=1&tx_ttnews[tt_news]=43&tx_ttnews[backPid]=1&cHash=f7f7678089

At the bottom links to the main reports
http://www.ewea.org/fileadmin/ewea_documents/documents/publications/grid/051215_Grid_report.pdf

A lot of talk- but also useful technical info.

Regards And1 from Denmark :-)

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AlanfromBigEasy on September 1, 2006 - 9:55am

One poster at the HydroVision conference was from the Bath Pumped Storage Plant. A rework had increased the cycle efficiency from just under 80% to just over 80%, and they were proud of the result.

http://www.dom.com/about/stations/hydro/bath.jsp

Pumped air is limited to ~60% efficiency due to adiabatic heating/coolling.

Wind & hydro are a VERY good match. Hydro can be dam (run-of-river not so good) or pumped storage (ideal).

New Zealand can accept "at least" 35% wind energy because they are half hydro. Once they get close to 35%, they will study the issue more.

An interesting note. Hydro is twice as variable as wind on an annual basis (per speaker at HydroVision). "Wind droughts" are rare.

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Starvid on September 1, 2006 - 10:02am

But water can be saved behind the dams in the vast reserves from year to year. Wind can't.

Except in the form of reduced water consumption in the dams, of course.

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Euan Mearns on September 1, 2006 - 10:16am

Thanks Alan.

New Zealand can accept "at least" 35% wind energy because they are half hydro. Once they get close to 35%, they will study the issue more.

Does that mean that with a wind-hydro balancing system that you can install up to 70% of your hydro capacity as wind?

Note your point about droughts - its just that here in Scotland we've never had any direct experience of drought. Though in Norway, lesser snow falls in recent winters have left many magazines half empty - skiing across those in winter can be interesting with massive tangles of ice blocks along the shores.

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tomgraywind on September 8, 2006 - 10:59pm

Does that mean that with a wind-hydro balancing system that you can install up to 70% of your hydro capacity as wind?

Sounds plausible to me. You would also need good transmission linking the whole system.

Regards,
Thomas O. Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
www.ifnotwind.org

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tomgraywind on September 8, 2006 - 10:55pm

It's an interesting idea, but as my other posts here indicate, storage is not something that is currently needed for wind generation to provide a steadily increasing share of our electricity production. There are other options, such as linking more utility systems with more transmission, that are usually less expensive to implement.

Regards,
Thomas O. Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
www.ifnotwind.org

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