Wind turbines – love 'em or hate 'em?

Where are the exaggeratesd solar PV claims? My panels produced 5% more than on the quote in the first year. The same goes for all the people I know that have installed them.

Where are the exaggeratesd solar PV claims?

On the literature of nearly every solar PV manufacturer we’ve looked at over the last year or so as validated by our laboratories and technical staff.

The cynic in me would say that it is nice of them to give you a slightly low quote so your first year proves to you that it was worthwhile.

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molgrips – Member

no backhander – in two hours it will use 120w not 120wh

Are you trolling?!

confused after a night shift actually – I know what I tried to say but it ain’t what I said

molgrips – Member

(discussing tidal)

Well it’s not really always on is it? It’s always going to generate a huge amount in a 6hr period or whatever it is, but it’s only for two 6hr periods a day, and those periods don’t always line up with demand.

actually you can generate for much more than half the day – and conveniently tide times vary greatly around our shores – the advantage of being an island.

Well… it looks like a discussion on wind farms has inadvertently started a group ride to go and have a closer look for ourselves. Wonder if we can get a research grant?

Hope you don’t mind us all crashing your gig harry? I knew as soon as i mentioned fish and chips and a pint that peoples receptors would be awakened. Nice food in that place too 😀

actually you can generate for much more than half the day – and conveniently tide times vary greatly around our shores

Certainly what this guy believes…

http://www.royalsoced.org.uk/enquiries/energy/evidence/Greenheat_Systems_Ltd.pdf

Well they give me a job. 🙂

I’m managing the turbine supply agreements for two wind farms totaling 85.4MW capacity in Sweden. In fact I’m just back from site – cold and snowy.

I took this photo yesterday – made me smile.

Oh and here’s the view from the nacelle of a turbine in Ireland, taken January this year.

Which lab would that be Too Tall? Because PV panels are some of the most tested things on the planet and German labs that test for the magazines come up with the same figures claimed by reputable manufacturers such as Solar World. In fact you’l usually find it’s the other way around, the manufactureres simply publish the results published by the magazines.

TooTall – Member

On the literature of nearly every solar PV manufacturer we’ve looked at over the last year or so as validated by our laboratories and technical staff.

The cynic in me would say that it is nice of them to give you a slightly low quote so your first year proves to you that it was worthwhile.

So they’re both exagerrated and underexaggerated?

I was going to reply but now I am convinced backhander is just on the troll…surely…

Edukator – are you talking about domestic solar PV alone? I’m looking more at flexible and lightweight panels.

Also, the performance away from the standard 25 deg C is of far more interest ie at higher and lower temperatures and higher and lower incidences of sunlight. Those quoted figures have not always been so useful in ‘real world’ situations where their performance has been found to be less than useful.

Northwind – over as in manufacturers data, under as in a quote from an installer of a complete system.

The cynic in me would say that it is nice of them to give you a slightly low quote so your first year proves to you that it was worthwhile.

before you said

All manufacturers over-egg their product – solar PV is particularly bad for that as well.

the cynic in me would say your statements are mutually exclusive and you may not be the best source of information on this issue

Go on then TooTall, find an exaggerated figure on the world wide web and link it. So performance tails off as the panels get hot, so what? That’s allowed for in predicted performance.

The figures Solar World publish are very useful in the real world. Along with latitude, the orientation of the panels and the sunshine record the figures given allow a remarkably accurate prdiction of the annual production of the panels. Of course I’m talking about the panels used in domestic PV, which are the very same ones used in bigger installations. The bigger installations simply use more panels.

I am not a big fan of photovoltaic – too much embedded energy and too little generation. A small part of the answer but not a large part.

I like the mirror fields that concentrate the energy then use it for more conventional generation

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6616651.stm

Too much embedded energy. How so, TJ? I’ve already linked stuff to show that the latest panels produce the energy needed to make them in a couple of years in southern europe and can be reasoanbaly expected to be producing for 25 years with over 80% of the initial production at the end of the period. That’s in the same ball park as wind turbine carbon pay back periods.

Edukator – its just a viewpoint. They have their place but its not a major component of the solution IMO. Worth persevering with and who knows – perhapos the efficeincy can be increased – after all look at LEDs 🙂

My parents have had photovoltaics installed on their house (In glasgow) It will be interesting to see how well they perform but as it cost £9000 and their electricity bills were only a few hundred a year they will be hard pushed to pay back anything.

Hats off to your parents for investing in the future, TJ. As an old guy on DWTV said, “it’s the young people that would like to do it but it’s the old people that have the money to do it, I’m investing in my grandchildrens’ future”.

I agree that the financial return period in Scotland with the rate they’ll be paid for production is going to be close to the life of the panels. From an energy point of view though, they should produce enough to justify the manufacture of the panels within about four years. Nice to know they care.

STW wind turbine ride? 🙄

OK…

I’ve got to sort a few things out with Mr Starship first as this started out as a “fancy a ride but can’t be arsed driving too far” sort of deal. If there are many we will need to meet somewhere with sufficient parking (not the little car park in Holcombe as was the original plan) and we may as well aim to finish in the pub or chippy.

I shall post something. HtN started out this way too

“Shall we organise a race?”
“yeah”

5 events, £25,ooo and numerous sleepless nights later…

One problem with them is their impact on migrating birds.
They are very prominent here in the South West of Spain and are in direct line of the European Migration. Because the are on the top of mountain ranges they are having an impact on bird numbers, especially large and sometimes rare Raptors. Unfortunately there is a bit of a cover up going on too, where the authorities will quietly collect the dead birds and dispose of them early in the morning, largely out of sight. These deaths are unreported so the size of the impact cannot be clearly known.

Just to play Devil’s Advocate… What effect is the reduction in polution from fossil fuel buring powerstations having on wild bird numbers?

They closed the coal fired station near us 20 odd years ago and a forest has grown on land that was once poisoned.

I love them! but i do work for a company that invests and builds wind turbines.

People need to face facts that we need to do something about where our energy comes from and modern day turbines are efficient and do not meet the stereotypes that plagued the industry years ago

oh and the migrating birds thing tends to only be with badly placed turbines, commonly with farms that were built in the early days. It is much more strict now and RSPB amongst others are always consulted.

ive spent the afternoon on site watching the blades and rotor hub being constructed and hoisted into place. absolutely fascinating to watch and it was massive. 125m to the tip of the blade. which is pretty big for an inland turbine. they can be seen from the m1 just south of leicester.

Harry. Sit back and relax dude. I’ll take over organisational duties if you like.

Got to know Rammy pretty well of late. We’ll liaise on route choice. Leave the rest to me. Seeing as this seems to be all my fault

Seems I’m riding out round Roddlesworth tomorrow. About these chips and beer?

And on a total thread hijack,

Do you have any routes in a shareable format?

Its a week tomorrow cougar. You don’t get out of it that easy 😀

Have you ever ridden up the rake? Its a hell of a start to any ride. If we get up to the tower without anyone having a coronary we’ll be doing well

I’ve just been informed its a 25% incline. Its thoroughly unpleasant anyway

Ooh, Binners, will there be any Hora Hurting™?

I may be tempted to come all the way up, if so…

Harry. Sit back and relax dude. I’ll take over organisational duties if you like.

Nowt to it. We just need a meeting point and we’re away.

Its a week tomorrow cougar. You don’t get out of it that easy

Ah. Ok. That’s a whole different kettle of whelks. Cool.

Have you ever ridden up the rake? Its a hell of a start to any ride. If we get up to the tower without anyone having a coronary we’ll be doing well

I don’t even know what the Rake is. I should also point out that I’m a) a noob, b) a pune and c) deeply out of practice. If you’re happy to be gentle or give me a map and meet me at the end, that’ll be groovy.

We’re sorted then. I’ll have a word with the lanlord of Grants this week. See if we can all park up there seeing as we’ll be eating and drinking there later. We can be civilised and have frothy coffee’s before we set off (and walk!) up the rake

Fred – if you get on the trainline.com now you’ll get yourself a cheap ticket up to gods country. You know you want too 🙂

We can hold Hora hostage him and give him the full Guantanamo experience

Cougar. I can assure you most will be walking up it. I bloody will for a start! Masochistic roadies do a race up there every year

Its got a bit of a reputation. I doubt any of us will be posting faster times than these guys:

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest/348440/wiggins-enters-rake-hill-climb.html

Of course I’m talking about the panels used in domestic PV

As I said – I am only looking at them in the sidelines – lightweight, robust and flexible are my current interest, which are only just being embedded into buildings (but have other uses). I won’t link if you don’t mind as we have further trials running over the summer both here and abroad.

Where are the exaggeratesd solar PV claims? My panels produced 5% more than on the quote in the first year. The same goes for all the people I know that have installed them

Ah, but we’re in the UK, and companies here like to quote figures for what you get from them if you live where you do, which isn’t. You can go on all you like about how well they work for you, but it will still be irrelevant for me, let alone TJ.

As for windmills, no matter how efficient they might be nowadays, you can’t get away from the fact that the wind doesn’t always blow, and that we have nowhere near (and never will have) the amount of storage capacity to cope with the times when it doesn’t if we were relying on wind for even 25% of our electricity needs. Far better than wasting money on them to spend it on research into far more useful things like undersea tidal generation – or save it for rolling such technologies out when they are more mature. With the bonus of not spoiling the environment we’re ostensibly trying to save.

i am sorely tempted but the day after I need to do Snowdon or I would be with you
Cougar all STW rides are more competitive for the lantern rouge [ last rider] than for first.

Any chance a relative newby to the area could come gate crash this ride too? I like the idea of being competitive for last rather than first place and you chaps don’t seem all bad either!

looks like the more the merrier at the moment fella 😀