Your point about my comparison of 10GW of average power against 75 GW peak is a fair one, I just did not get around to drawing the comparison better - a better comparison is either the one you suggest, or to compare peak wind power production with peak, and since wind power tracks rather well in the UK with power consumption at peak in the winter it is around 2.5 times more than in June, as against an increase on power consumption of just under 4 times, from 20GW to 75GW - so we might say that the 33GW nameplate will produce around 5-15GW of actual output, or around a quarter to a fifth of total output, similar to the figure you give.

The running costs you mention are pretty low in both cases, and in the absence of whole life-cycle costs for wind-turbines perhaps somewhat moot, as more problems with maintenance such as faulty gear-boxes than have been anticipated and costed for in the figures you give could greatly increase that.

However, the real problem is that the costs are only even vaguely reasonable for on-shore - for off-shore they are astronomic.

There are actually no proposals to build 33 GW of on-shore wind power, and even could that vast number of windmills somehow be sited on land, you certainly would not be able to increase it to provide for running even the present electric output of society, let alone run a society which ran substantially without fossil fuels.

In contrast a similar power output at around the same cost would be produced by around 7 modern reactors on perhaps 4 sites in a double configuration, and the expertise in so doing could be used to series build enough reactors to provide for most of our electricity power at minimum estimates - the French already do so.

So is substantial on-shore wind really worth the bother in this country?

The real option we are being presented with in this country is in any case the vastly expensive off-shore one.

I actually have no objection to wind turbines being built where appropriate, but it is so far from a total solution or even a major economic contribution that it should attract very little of our attention - at the moment it is only a distraction from solutions which could really help - conservation initially followed by a large nuclear build and the installation of air heat pumps.

So we are not really talking about aesthetics as the primary concern, or at least I am not - if wind turbines really could contribute in a major economic way, as may be the case on the American plains, then we should pay the ecological price of building them, but for the marginal contribution they might make in the UK we would be far better off getting focussed on real solutions.

Hmmm, you seem to have convinced yourself that I am totally opposed to wind turbines, which is not the case.

Concerns for the environmental impact of windmills are widespread, and not confined to fringe blogs, as you seek to suggest.

The information on possible concerns about windmills tracking favoured bird migration routes comes from California, and refers I believe to the Great Heron.

I did not in any case represent this as a show-stopper, but it does seem to be a valid concern, and I find your dismissal of all environmental concerns as Nimbyism over-drawn, and in any case it is very right that people should be concerned by impacts on their own lives, and it is incorrect to imply that they should instead automatically bow to some assumed 'greater good'

Particularly when that good is maybe not so good after all.

And even more so when there are other solutions possible - why should they not prefer the alternative, if they so choose?

The contribution of on-shore wind in the UK will be ultimately trivial, as there are not enough suitable sites, and off-shore is horrendously expensive.

Wind power should help a lot in some areas of China, India, and perhaps the US if costs can be controlled, but certainly in the UK unless costs of off-shore decreases vastly, which hardly seems likely at least for wind turbines, will be basically irrelevant to CO2 reduction in any substantial sense.

Hi E-P,

Commercial thermal storage is another possible solution. This allowed Credit Suisse to reduce peak demand at its New York headquarters by 900 kW and to lower its electrical consumption by over 2 million kWh (its chillers operate more efficiently at cooler night time temperatures).

See: http://www.nyserda.org/Press_Releases/2006/PressRelease20063101.asp

Upgrade the lighting and cooling systems in the tens of millions of square feet of commercial and office space and you could power just about every vehicle in North America.

One more example: When I worked for the Ontario Ministry of Energy our offices occupied floors 8 through 12 of the Suncor Building (56 Wellesley St. West). The building was built in 1972 and the original lighting system consisted of a two-tube 1 x 4 ft. F40T12 fluorescent fixture every 25 square feet. With a conventional magnetic core ballast power consumption came to slightly less than 4 watts per square foot, fairly typical for an office building of its day.

In the late 1980s the lighting system was upgraded to F32T8 and electronic ballasts. The existing fixtures were reused, but instead of two tubes they installed just one, fitted with a high performance reflector. The fixture casing and lenses were washed to remove years of dirt built-up and grime (remember, back in those years people actually smoked at their desks) and a single ballast drove two fixtures in a master/slave arrangement. Power consumption dropped to less than 1.2 watts per sq. ft., for a 70 per cent savings. There was no noticeable drop in light levels; these T-8 fluorescents and electronic ballasts produce roughly 40 per cent more light per watt (a combination of better phosphors, more efficient ballast design and high frequency operation) and simply cleaning the fixtures (dirt absorbs light) and installing a reflector (improved optics so less light is trapped inside the fixture) did the rest. In addition to the demand savings -- about 630 kW as I recall -- the load on the a/c system was cut substantially, saving even more money.

The really big savings? As mentioned, this building is nearly 40 years old and the building transformer and a/c system were sized to accommodate typical office loads of that day (e.g., some desk lamps, a couple pencil sharpeners and a few Selectrics). By the mid-80s every desk had a power hungry PC, plus there were now dozens of servers, photocopiers and laser printers on every floor. With plug loads and corresponding heat loads growing almost daily, the buildings owners were faced with two very expensive and disruptive upgrades: installing a larger main transformer and adding additional cooling capacity. This lighting upgrade greatly reduced the stress on both systems and the building owners were able to defer these costly upgrades for several more years.

Cheers,
Paul

Again, I can understand that people will find wind turbines ugly.

But do they find nuclear cooling towers, or coal chimneys beautiful? I don't believe that.

Let's face it: We're not really talking about aesthetics, we're talking about NIMBYism. And I say, people should have the right to decide what power stations are in their area. Of course if they say, "but everything is ugly! We'll have nothing!" then I'd say, "fine, so you'll have no electricity, then."

The things have to be in someone's backyard. So, which would you rather look at? Or would you rather be without power entirely? That's the choice I'd offer people.

This has to be one of the dumbest statements to be posted on TOD in recent memory.

Well before Stonehenge and the Megalith builders were here, the brits started to slash and burn. You could say that the forests and swamps of post ice-age britain and doggerland were somewhat ephemeral and the impact of man is in fact a more natural state over the last 8k.

Is it beautiful? I think so, unatural or not. I grew up surrounded by 'satanic mills'- a bus ride away from the Yorkshire Dales and would never miss a chance to get out.

I would not mind wind mills if they were effective. Where I now live I can see the Wind Farm Arrays of Morayshire and a small cluster not 3 miles away. They are always in use, but then North East Scotland is an ideal site and do not harm the general amenity of the landscape to all users. Here, they work.

The photo up top of wind turbines so close to where people live in an urban environment is frankly ghastly. But looking at the houses suggests that they are not middle class and thereby not capable of organising or militating against the emplacement of such beasts in their midst.

Whichever way you shake a stick at it, power generation is industry and large and generally pretty ugly.

The objections from the 'greens' are pretty stale now. They object to just about everything. (Including wind when it impacts on their own constituents)

So why not do ugly and reliable? (Nukes)

Rather than ugly and unreliable? (Wind)

Lovelock is one of the few (IMO) that still makes sense. Regarding energy and what it will take he seems less than a mad old fool and more of a supreme rationalist. Facing the final sunsets of his life, he has no axe to grind and time to think. It is ironic that the father of the Gaia Hypothesis should become the devil of the greens.

But that says more about the greens than it says of Lovelock...

Sure, where wind works, then ok. Same for solar, hydro, geothermal, tidal, wave, whatever.

Moray and Aberdeenshire have good prospects, but thousands of turbines in the Central Belt of Scotland (where most of the population and commerce are) or in the Manchester - Leeds conurbation , or the West Midlands, or the Home counties is frankly stupid, unreliable and ugly.

A few nukes would resolve the issue. Where mini-power projects cannot reliably work, nukes would help to keep the lights on.

And yes, the best place for wind is offshore. But tide is reliable.

Anyway, we will need anything and everything we can get.

Shame we are running out of actual money, water, grains and hydrocarbons.

These perpetual pro-anti arguments do nothing other than kick the required action way into the long grass.

Some , I suspect, rather like it that way.

May be old Lovelock is right:
As the song goes:
Enjoy yaself - it later dan you tink.

Strange argument. It's not beautiful, it's artifical;you only think it's beautiful. Might as well pave it over. To describle it as centuries of rape is demented. People need to eat. For food you need farms, unless the population lives on Wild Boar, a la Asterix the Gaul and chums. That means cutting down trees. Get used to it. The turbines would be much better of at sea where there is a lot more wind. Better still build a few nuclear power stations.