Are wind farms an eyesore or do they blow you away?

Wavechange
“Here we go again, choosing information that suits your cause. Why not give consideration to the environmental and human impacts of continued use of fossil fuels?”
But this is exactly what you do!!!!!
I am sorry with all the evidence presented during this discussion you do not seem to comprehend that covering the UK with wind farms will do absolutely nothing to reduce our use of fossil fuels so any further discussion is indeed futile.
Jaz, for me anyway, gave a heartwrenching account of what she and her community (and many more like them) are going through right now, battling immoral wind farm developers and councils who do not care about their residents. For your information, you should check out RSPB who are in cahoots with the wind industry and do little to protect ordinary birds from turbines – Natural England is a government body, following government guidelines. For another view check out http://savetheeaglesinternational.org but of course you will say I am just using websites etc to highlight my particular view. But the point is all you could really reply to Jaz was – it’s not as bad as it may seem – really?
So, I really do think all discussion with you is utterly pointless.

Hi Finsbury Parker
I am a foolish glutten for punishment but can take no more! My brain has gone numb from all that banging on the wall!
After Jaz’s posting you would think Wavechange might have a bit of empathy or understanding but no. Anyway, that gizmo to keep her (I thought she might be a he) laptop happy will be much appreciated as I know for sure Wavechange will be back!!!!

Been watching from those comfy seats since being subjected to some rather vile abuse [thankfully moderated out] for asking for info on this subject.

But after much research [thanks all for the references] here is my tuppenceworth.
In my lifetime I have watched the world human population treble to nearly 8 Billion, I have watched many countries undergo industrialisation and seen the demand for electrical power grow exponentially. It is self evident we cannot keep up with this demand unless we take action.

I have never seriously looked at the aspects of alternative electrical energy generation by the mass harnessing of naturally moving air. My knowledge of windmills is Holland , water pumps, corn grinding and more recently narrow boats.
Nevertheless, like many I had a dream of gently turning windmills dotted around the countryside providing clean energy and helping us reserve our fossil resources for more valuable enterprises than burning them. But I did have reservations such as; How many of these things would it take to power a reasonably sized town, and what do we do on dead days for back up?
For power in remote mountain villages & small communities with a low energy demand, maybe they offer a solution of sorts, but for most other situations they could only offer a top up to existing supplies.
After trawling through reams of material, which seemed to verify my original misgivings, I grew tired and picked up the phone……several meetings and some very heated exchanges later I realised that most of what has been said here about, vested interest, kickbacks, disinformation etc… is true.

Whilst we need to realign our power generation & supply for the future of the planet, instead of doing so, as usual the predatory capitalist community are only looking for short term gain, and to hell with humanities future [they won’t be here, so they don’t care].
So most of the concerned arguments here are directed at how do we in the future supply a power hungry planet?
It does very much seem that for the present we are going to have to continue burning fossil fuels not through choice, but through necessity. Wind harnessing in it’s present form needs to be scaled back and applied only to those areas where it will make a proven viable contribution, we are wasting valuable resources and time on what is a high stakes con game. Nuclear seems to be an obvious solution, but the associated perceived risks and the fear this generates will always mean public opinion will be against it, and no matter how safe we make them, the dreaded X factor means there will always be risks.

One area which we could be working on now is the way we distribute electrical power [thus saving waste] I had mentioned Nikola Tesla in a very early post, anyone familiar with his work will know he had some very interesting theories as to electrical power distribution, of course it would mean massive repercussions across the manufacturing world, and vested interests will fight tooth and nail to prevent this happening.
Another area is local generation [the Mad Max scenario], this is where a variety of local projects are combined to provide electrical power for a certain area, this would also utilise alternative means to provide hot water and [if necessary] heating. Any excess is then sold on to, or traded with nearby communities. So you would have a mixed bag of sustainables with a more traditional emergency back up.

One area under scrutiny is alternatives to the way we wastefully use electricity itself, ie:- most digital devices need no more than a 12 volt supply, yet we build them with transformers and rectifiers, plug them into 240v ac supply and waste all that energy in converting it, at home I have a 12v dc rail to run my devices. The research is aimed at reducing demand by using low power devices and making unnecessary electrical devices obsolete [do you really need an electric sandwich maker or apple corer or 100 types of coffee machine?]

Another is more esoteric and is looking into alternatives for electricity itself, this is ongoing research in what I would term the quantum field and involves sympathetic energies. The rewards for cracking this would be immense and will open up a whole new technological era.

And of course the dreaded elephant in the room, reducing the worlds population!

As others have been pushed into revealing their credentials, and thus their ‘right to comment’  I better do the same.
I do have an electromechanical / electronic engineering background as well as a doctorate in social psychology; Amongst other things I also dabble in technological archaeology. In addition I have input [ideas & design] into military grey technology as well as some quite exciting ‘private tech’ and what is commonly known as restricted research, [and in answer to a previous accusation I have not signed the official secrets act, or am restricted by any government or agency. I am free to say what I please, but most of what I could say would not be believed, so why bother].
One only has to look at the disinformation concerning wingless aircraft since the end of WW2 to see the lengths some will go to, to conceal what they are doing.

I think I have rambled on for long enough.

Dear Hummingbird,

Only the guilty flee where none pursue as far as my reference to ‘Agent Provocateur’.

My old adage of which I have found to be true of academics is, ‘Those that can, do’,….

The task of the Teacher is to impart knowledge to their students in the hope that they can ‘Stand On The Shoulders Of Giants, and further the cause of those Giants who have gone before.

There are very few of these students that will advance the knowledge imparted & take it to the next level, whereas there are those that will just rest on their ‘Laurels’, fortunately, there are enough that will advance the sciences to make the difference.

I myself was born ‘During WW11’, so, what the deuce that has to do with the discussion is anybody’s guess!

Yes, sustainable/renewable sources of the means to generate power are desperately needed, but, Wind Turbines is a blind alley as regards a reliable, constant power source, coupled with a vastly reduced Global population.

Regards,

Finsburyparker.

Dear m
This is incredibly interesting! I am no scientist, just a lay person who has now through necessity done a lot of reading about wind power.
My gut feeling is that wind turbines are totally retro and a definite blind alley, very profitable for some. My feeling has always been that if we are to find a solution to our ever growing demands (and I am totally for energy conservation measures and, dare I say, it population control!) it will come out of the blue through research and development.

From a new Which? Conservation, published today:

Contrary to the impressions from some media coverage, our backing for onshore wind added less than £5 to the average bill last year, while the increase in the wholesale cost of gas added an extra £100 in just 12 months. The only immediate way to address the costs of volatile fossil fuel prices is to reduce energy use; and the key to this is more efficient buildings.

It is about time that those opposed to wind power should wake up to the rising cost of fossil fuels and not blame wind power subsidy for everything.

Here is a response from DECC one year ago to Dr John Etherington’s question
“Has any attempt been made to relate the short term variation of ACTUAL
fuel-use by load-following plant to metered wind power feed-in?”

RE: Empirical measurement of fossil fuel displacement by wind power

“Has any attempt been made to relate the short term variation of ACTUAL
fuel-use by load-following plant to metered wind power feed-in? If so,
can the figures be provided, expressed as tonnes of CO2 actually saved per MWh of wind
generated electricity?

If no such attempt has been made why not, as carbon-fuel displacement is
the only justification for deploying expensive, and covertly subsidised
wind power?”

Here is their answer – In order to determine the relation of the short term variation of actual
fuel-use by load-following plant to metered wind power feed-in, we would
need to know what fuel use would have occurred in the absence of wind
power (i.e. the counterfactual).

This counterfactual (the fuel use in the absence of wind power) depends
on the proportions of nuclear, CCGT or coal investment that are being
displaced by wind power and the effects on their subsequent operation.
Such a counterfactual can only be calculated by modelling a world
without wind power and by subsequently comparing it to the current data
on emissions from the grid. No such analysis has been carried out by
DECC.

So, basically, DECC, are happy to advocate a unproven technology – they haven’t a clue
whether “deploying expensive and covertly subsidised wind power” is actually working and
achieving what it is supposed to be achieving. Neither are they interested it would appear
in finding out this fundamental information. They are therefore happy to continue wasting our
money. It would also be useful to know exactly how much EXTRA fossil fuel is used by the
deployment of wind power as conventional plants cannot run evenly and efficiently when wind
power comes into and out of the equation on a minute to minute basis.

I am not sure if this ‘conversation’is still live. I have only recently discovered it. Of course I am not abble to read all the past comments but I am able to form a view. Obviously the views can be widely different because many have an understanding that is influenced by their hearts rather than their heads. On top of this there is all the distortion caused by those with vested interests in the subject. I get quite disturbed by some of the disinformation that is being promulgated.
For example RenewableUK state that “Every unit of electricity from a wind turbine displaces one from conventional power stations”. They omit the corollary that “Every unit of electricity that fails to be provided by a wind turbine has to be provided by one from conventional power stations”. A very clear demonstration of that fact is provided by record of energy provided by the contributiong fuel types as recorded by the National Grid over the past couple of days. Tuesday 26th Sept was a very windy day as the country was still being battered by the remants of a tropical storm. Wind was the sourse of 7.6GWh of electricity, being 8.6% of the national demand. The follwing day the wind dropped and could only produce 1.7GWh of energy, only 2% of demand. The missing power was provided by Gas (5%), Coal (3.7%), Nuclear (0.25%), Others (5%) and 12% from the Interconnectors with the Continent. The sun shone on both days and demand had dropped by 4.8GWh. All this is a clear demonstration of the physics governing wind turbines that the basic output power is a function of the cube of the wind speed. A drop of only 60% in the wind speed between those two days resulted in turbine output being only 23% of the previous days performance.
I have been encouraged by many of the positive contributions from No2 Wind and Chloe Pink and others and was particularly interested to note that N2W understood the enourmous global potential of Thorium Reactors. I could go on at length about that subject but I fear ant contribution would be Moderated out!
I could make some suggestions for effective use of power from wind and storage of the energy that migh please Wavechange – but I was waiting to see if this Conversation was dead first.

Me, too still here.
Agree, a few more useless wind farms have been approved and a lot of unhappy people abound
because of it in our ever so “democratic” society where the opinion of one person who “likes” wind farms counts against all those who not only don’t like them but also see how useless they are.

I accept that thorium reactors could be an important part of our strategy for power generation in the UK. A lot would need to be done to convince the public that they are different from the much hated nuclear reactors that we are familiar with.

My view is that we must cut down use of fossil fuels. They are needed to produce plastics, pharmaceuticals, chemicals and many other products that are essential to normal daily life. Our own reserves are limited or not readily accessible, so that we are dependent on imports and prices set by other countries.

I also believe that it is worth making use of sources of renewable energy to allow the price to drop when it is plentiful. Some already take advantage of cheap electricity overnight, but what I am suggesting is a continuously variable price.

The unreliability of wind and solar power is a disadvantage and no-one is arguing against this. If we could store energy efficiently, cheaply and in sufficient quantity then that would allow more effective use of our unreliable sources. It would be interesting to hear what Lobro has to say about energy storage.

Let’s keep this a friendly discussion so that our moderators are more interested in joining in than reminding us of the Commenting Guidelines. There is never an excuse for aggression, and aggressive people deserve to be ignored.

Fossil fuel sources increase with the rise in fuel prices. Thorium liquid salt reactors are so efficient and are so safe because they are not high pressure systems, they produce 1% of the waste radio active material compared to present day Nuclear reactors. They also fail safe and all the liquid salts are collected in a protected chamber and solidify.

China, India, the USA are all building Thorium based generators. As usual we are way behind.

Wind power works with battery and water storage but it disrupts National Grid control so much that we will find out when we really need power [ie a very cold winter] and the wind either ceases or varies wildly as it does in winter.

Unfortunately the politicians in this country are more worried about quick fixes which will get them elected in the next general election than long term planning which will benefit the country as a whole and which the opposition might get the credit for. It may be a cynical view but I believe that most if not all politicians are self serving and not altruistic.

badger you say “I believe that most if not all politicians are self serving and not altruistic”. I also think that there are very few technically or scientifically qualified members among them. On top of this, they are informed and advised by partizan researchers who are dependent on grants for their continued activity. However, there might be some hope in the recent formation of an All Party Parliamentary Committee on Thorium. Tim Yeo is a member but wouldn’t it be nice if the energy minister was one also. They list the Weinberg Foundation as their source of references.

The Chair of the Weinberg Foundationis is Lady Worthington (labour). They have a wonderful collection of references to LFTR and molten salt cooled reactors (MSR). Alvin Weinberg was a Director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He was an inventor of the existing pressurised water reactors (PWRs) but didnt like the safety aspects – so he invented and built a thorium reactor that uses a liquid fuel. Unfortunately it is almost impossible to build a bomb from a thorium reactor’s by-products – so Nixon and his cohorts sacked him and scrapped his MSR.

Jazz, you stated that “Wind Farms have a range of known negative impacts,”. Here’s another one a Met man told me the other day. Downwind the turbulent air stirs the boundary layer above the soil. This effect reduces the thermal isolation of the soil and its energy loss. The change is small but the natural environment is changed. It is reported that eventually there is a discernable change in the downwind flora and fauna.

I sympathise with your situation and I don’t want to depress you but in 1841, Charles MacKay, in his Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds repeated a quote that “Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.” This is as true now as it was then. (Sorry if I’m sounding a bit Boris-like).

Jaz, Is that what people have been told? They will get free electricity? Was anything given in writing? I read recently somewhere about this about “free electricity” next to a nuclear power station and it just never happened. What about the competition laws? Who gets free electricity and who doesn’t? People don’t look beyond the end of their noses. I am sorry to hear about your predicament and agree, this is tearing local communities apart.

Sorry Finsbury but I was among those working on fusion research in the late 50’s. Zeta produced some neutrons and the media descended. Someone said “Nuclear Power would be so cheap it would not be worth metering!” and that was it. The next year I was among those that showed that those neutrons did not have a thermonuclear origin! Nevertheless, someday it will be true – and I believe that thorium reactors will come pretty near to the fusion promise – but that is just a feeling and not a fact.

I am sure that we will have break-even fusion demonstrated from either magnetic confinement (ITER) or inertial confinement (laser shock) within the next 10 years, but which ever one wins will lead to enormous reactors when only a few of them will supply the whole country. I think that the small modular thorium reactor will be the result of market demand over the next 50 years but it will need a prototype to be demonstrated first – and the US has shot itself in the foot when it comes to thoriun resources. That is why China and India are likely to get there first. India is sitting on mountains of thorium.

By the way, it is rumoured that the current level of introduction of uranium fuelled reactors will result in uranium shortages in 100 years time whereas thorium, it has been claimed, could last for over 80,000 years. That should give us enough time to solve the compact fusion reactor problem!

Any comparison with fossil fuels seems to me to be used as a justification for wind farms. We know that fossil fuels will be gone at some point so why even mention them? A more meaningful discussion is wind farms v nuclear.
Living near a nuclear power plant, not a problem for me. I would make no sense building one in the centre of a town, in the same way that a (say) chemical plant shouldn’t be built in the centre of a town. But for all those people lauding wind power as the answer to our energy needs, would you rather have an operation in a hospital powered by wind turbines, or a nuclear power plant?

I think you’ll find that a plebiscite would result in abandoning wind farms and possibly even green energy. It’s our our politicians who’ve got their heads up their jacksies and are ruining our country, not the proletariat.