I read in a recent New Scientist about Germany decomissioning all their nuclear reactors by 2022 in the wake of the Japan situation. They are going back to power stations, They will produce an extra 300 million tonnes of carbon dioxide between now and 2020.

Bring on the wind farms/magic leccy from the sea machines.

One thing that bothers me about them is the massive powerline being built from beauly to denny to carry all the renewable energy in from offshore and west coast installation. Massive ugly pylons, but if keeps my house from disappearing in to the sea….. If you are a land owner and install one you are laughing (financially).

Germany will still be using nuclear power, they’ll just be buying it from the french.

i don’t know about you, but i call that cheating.

(and yes, producing/buying coal power too, and that’s cheating too)

Neat post, good photos too and, well, you’ve gotta love a decent view. If you are on site, do you get to take your bike along… That place looks like an amazing place to ride out on..

I’m in favour of these things, think we should have more of em, don’t beleive we should subsidize the industry though as at the momant they’re not really productive and should be made to be more productive, but the concepts excellent.
We’re having issues here about a farm on/near/in the sea near the IOW, I think they should be offshore, can’t see any reason why not either, develop something thats compatable with salt water I say.

Hey ho, great views of a beautiful country, enjoy.

I think they should be offshore, can’t see any reason why not either…

cos it’s really expensive.

really, really expensive.

like, really, really, very very expensive.

I did say install them in sections, or the unforrested section of the hill.
I am in favour of them, but looking at those pics there is alot of unforrested hillside that could have been used.

jimster –
We would love to site the turbines away from trees as the wind is less turbulent so you get better yield. Unfortunately our turbine siting experts have to juggle a huge number of constraints within a site. These include, not in order of importance:
Radiolink paths
Certain environmental habitats
Water protection areas
Overhead power lines
Bat paths
Roads/ public rights of way
Houses
Myra (a type of bog in Sweden)
and I’m sure many that I’ve forgotten

Unfortunately these constraints mean that we often have to build in trees.

UK will be buying nuclear electricity from the French too, only it will be generated in the UK in France’s biggest foreign investment project since the war!

So why is it they appear to cut all the trees down to plant these things blah blah blah

I’m guessing you copied and pasted that from the daily mail site? They appear to be planted in a commercial forest anyway, which was planted to be cut down and sold as timber…

where do we put hundreds of wind turbines

Offshore! Where there is much more wind and they can be over twice the output and no NIMBYS or BANANAS (build absolutley nothing anywhere near anything)to complain about them ruining their hare coursing/fox hunting/

OP – are those Vestas? Enercons are more elegant IMO. My friend has a 800Kw Enercon on his farm, have been invited to climb to the top but the service ladder is just metal spike rungs and its straight to the top in a oner…not sure I can do it!

I agree they look graceful in small numbers and I’ve no real objection to them when they’re placed somewhere with great wind stats and little damage to the view. Like in the sea. This makes them expensive to install and maintain though, so the companies don’t like it much – on land is much cheaper and easier. It’s about 3x more expensive to get power from offshore farms.

I think they should be offshore, can’t see any reason why not either…

There are going to be lots and lots offshore in the near future:

http://www.4coffshore.com/offshorewind/

bigjim – yes Vestas.

bikebouy – yes I had my bike with me this time. Riding on site isn’t really an option but there is a big hill behind the hotel that has an epic singletrack descent. I’ve also been to Hemavan bike park.

Wow! Great shots! I’ ve a fantastic view of the scout moor turbines from my house. I love them. I think the skyline looks fantastic! Apparently their numbers are about to double

The pragmatist in me would like to see more use of tidal power. We’re surrounded by wet stuff after all. Althoufh I like the aesthetics of wind turbines, they’re a very expensive interim solution.

They do look nice though.

The real issue is the fact that we’re going to need a post oil economy very quickly, while Germany and Japan are happy to turn their back on nuclear power they’re going to pay a fortune for dwindling fossil fuel energy in future.

I think there is something quite beautiful about wind turbines. Fantastic design aesthetically, imo.

Me too. There seems to be a sort of retro-futurist aesthetic going on, like the spaceships in an old Flash Gordon serial or something. 🙂

Interesting video/article on the BBC the other day about building them out at sea:

How to build a wind farm

cos it’s really expensive.

really, really expensive.

like, really, really, very very expensive

Awhiles, currently pretty much exactly twice the onshore cost. In relation to your comments about the 400MW power station, the offshore standard is about 3.6MW, with up to 10MW in development, so I take your point, but things have moved beyond the 1MW per turbine.

The pragmatist in me would like to see more use of tidal power. We’re surrounded by wet stuff after all.

Yes tidal is the most consistent and predictable renewable energy source in the UK. There has been a lack of investment into wet renewables because wind became the first proven technology and it is a far more attractive investment. Companies like MCT have developed incredibly tidal technology but just can’t get the investment to develop further, hopefully that will change and there are now tidal projects coming through on a commercial scale, same applies for wave power.

Brilliant. Thanks for posting them. Dead Jealous.

One issue with offshore/tidal installations is the unknown/hard to predict damage to the marine ecosystems, wake scouring and the fact that anywhere with large tidal flows has fairly high marine traffic rates.

Awhiles, currently pretty much exactly twice the onshore cost.

like i said, really, really, very very expensive.

In relation to your comments about the 400MW power station, the offshore standard is about 3.6MW, with up to 10MW in development, so I take your point, but things have moved beyond the 1MW per turbine.

so, if i install a 5MW turbine in my garden, (pretend i’ve got a really big garden), will i get a continuous 5MW from it?

or, will i get around 20% of that, once it’s all averaged out over a year?

(and 400MW is small for a power station, it’s more of a backup generator really, something to keep the emergency exit lights on)

Depends where your garden is… I don’t disagree though, it’s very expensive and I wouldn’t imagine would be even considered without all the incentives and grants.

Most of the Round 3 projects (next phase currently being planned) are near enough 1000MW sites.

is that nominal capacity? – or predicted average?

how many sites are planned?

sorry for all the questions, i’m just very interested in the whole ‘energy’ thing…

🙂

Nominal I think* Fairly rubbish map on Crown Estates link below. Round 2 just starting construction now.

http://www.thecrownestate.co.uk/70_interactive_maps_marine

*I’m certainly no expert, also just interested.

so, if i install a 5MW turbine in my garden, (pretend i’ve got a really big garden), will i get a continuous 5MW from it?

Only if it is constantly blowing a wind strong enough to hit max output, which isn’t likely. 3MW is basically the max output of a 3MW turbine. Your long term average output compared to this is the capacity factor of the site, iirc 30% it is roughly the national average, but at the other end of the scale, for places like Orkney, the issue is finding a manufacturer who will guarantee their turbines in the strong wind climate there. Don’t forget that it isn’t just wind farms that have a capacity factor lower than the big number and depending on the type of power station it has a different meaning – i think hydro dams are 40% and coal a bit higher depending on what kind of supply it is providing.

your neighbours might be a bit pissed at a 5MW in your garden anyway!

BloominEk it’s gawn all technikle..

The thing with cost, well it’s all expensive init. So what if it’s expensive, build em’ but don’t subsidise them, make them pay for what they are, if you can’t build em’ nor install them for the cost then don’t build em’

I like the offshore thing myself because it’s efficient in that there is none of this “land stuff” getting in the way, thereby clear air and batter efficiency.

I think they still produce the blades on the IOW, sometime see them on barges coming over the solent, or did, haven’t seen them for a while mind.

There’s one somewhere in Norfolk, near Dereham I think where you can go up in it to a visitors platform but a bit shorter at 160ft. Enough to make me dizzy to say the least.

Personally, i think they’re an utter waste of money, hugely subsidised but in comparison to anything else the best option to roll out en masse to help the government get near green energy targets. The wind turbine industry will never be as lucrative as the gas/oil markets but as an example my old fella lives near Wells Next The Sea where (reputedly) the country’s largest offshore wind farm is being built and nobody on shore is seeing any benefit from it at all.

Don’t we have enough wind in this country without these farms making more?
IGMC

I think there is something quite beautiful about wind turbines. Fantastic design aesthetically, imo

+4

Although I’m sure this is going to turn into another energy argument where people say we should go back to the middle ages and burn wood and live in mud huts.

i think they’re an utter waste of money

not compared to nuclear.

I have mixed feelings about nuclear power. On one hand I find the idea of hulking great grey buildings containing nuclear stuff rather disquieting, however I cannot help but marvel at the technology.

Now if we used Thorium in addition to Uranium we might have an inherently safer industry with larger fuel reserves…

Offshore! Where there is much more wind and they can be over twice the output and no NIMBYS or BANANAS (build absolutley nothing anywhere near anything)to complain about them ruining their hare coursing/fox hunting/

Oh dear, and you were doing really well until that last bit. Who do you work for? Labour central office, Socialist Worker, or just never managed to leave your student union agitprop propagandising behind?
Fox hunting is illegal, and only a very small number of country residents ever took part, because of the cost, and most of those were ancillary, like stableing, grooms, kennel workers, etc, the rich riders were the industrialists with their posh houses in the country and the rich landowners. And as for hare coursing, that’s been illegal for even longer, and the ones enjoying that fine pastime were, and are, more often than not pikeys and Irish travellers, hare coursing is still carried on in Ireland, but with muzzled dogs. It’s a working class sport, like badger baiting and dog fighting, and appeals to the same sort of thuggish mindset.
People hate having them stuck nearby because of the low frequency thump that the blades make, that carries for considerable distances and makes sleep very difficult. Just imagine a nobhead in his Saxon with a huge sub playing grime a short distance away all night. High frequencies don’t travel distances, but low ones do, like the infamous nighttime ‘drone’ that’s driven people nuts for years, that can’t be explained. It’s alright for a townie like elfin to say building turbine farms is what the countryside is for, people like him can’t cope with the countryside because it’s too quiet, they get panicky without background noise. The countryside is for growing food and trees; you know, those big green things that absorb CO2, that we’re destroying in vast numbers in other parts of the world, which is what’s exacerbating the whole climate change situation.