BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Richard H
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 11:08 PM

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 11:35 AM

Heat pumps are great.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,noddy
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 08:56 AM

what is wrong with heat pumps.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Metchosin
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 01:12 AM

Then again, maybe I could qualify for a federal government grant....hmmmm.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Metchosin
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 01:05 AM

No problem with codes?..hmmm... You probably don't live in western Canada then. No form of gas, can be hooked up to a house or any stove modified here, except by a qualified gas fitter. If there ever was a fire, even unrelated to the gas, the the unqualified work would also render the house insurance null and void.

On to next questions....Do you know how much the digester would have cost if you had had to construct and pay for it yourself? Do you know if they are available commercially? I'm pretty handy with wood and wire, but except for the shovelling sh*t part, this is probably beyond my ken as a DIY project.

I'd love to have a windmill here, but when I looked into the feasability, the cost of the tower, to get the rotors above tree height and the rest of the ancillory equipment was about 5-6 thousand dollars US. Even if we could come up with the funds, we'd be dead before we could recoup the cost.

We used to be off the grid, in an area that had little or no regulations and you could do pretty much as you wished, but things have changed in the last 30 years. Despite regulations, I'm blissfully thankful that I no longer have to haul my water in buckets from the well, ....which makes me wonder...remind me....why am I now considering the feasability of hauling buckets of sh*t?

I think perhaps I should just stick to my 12V LED lighting projects.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Richard H
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 11:55 PM

Metchosin,
No problems with codes. Au contraire, the Ministry of Health sees methane digesters as a preferred option for persons who traditionally let pig effluent run into gullies or put raw manure on their fields.

The technology is really simple - in an anaerobic container (no oxygen), bacteria will break down organic matter like manure and produce methane which is insoluble in water.

Mine consists of a big round tank with a gas-holder (an inverted tank) on top. The gas-holder can move up and down depending on the amount of gas trapped inside.

When we had the cows, we used a pump but nowadays my daughter or wife walk around and collect a bucket or two of horse manure every day or so, add water to form a slurry and pour it into the digester. Maybe 10 minutes a day

That is all we've done since 1984. A PVC pipeline takes the gas to the house. Any ordinary gas-stove will work on methane with slight modification. No hi-tech gas plumbing involved.

Sometimes we rotate the gas-holder for fun but it doesn't seem necessary. The digester stays full: as you add manure, the digested effluent flows into a storage tank.

CarolC, the Chinese run buses on methane from digesters. They have big bags on top. The equipment for compression is similar to what they use for diving tanks, I am told.

My digester was built as a development project with funds from USAID and technical expertise from a German agency. So got it free.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Blissfully Ignorant
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 11:36 PM

Well, Augie, if it actually IS in your back yard, that's a different question. Obviously some consideration should be given to where the turbines are put. The ones in question reaare twenty nine years old, i think the technology has improved a lot since then, as the winfarms i have visited have been extremely quiet, even right up close. My best to you as well!

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,petr
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 02:21 PM

in fact this technology is used around the world, there are NGOs
helping people make and set up methane digesters.
the gas is usually not kept under high compression.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 02:03 PM

I don't know anything about methane compression (although I may do some looking into what that involves), but it seems like a really great technology someone could invent/produce would be a mobile methane compressor that could be put on a tanker truck. A fleet of tanker trucks with compressors could go around to farms that have methane digesters, collect and compress what they have, transport it to a facility that stores it, and then sells it to customers.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Metchosin
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 01:56 PM

I have, in the past, given the output of our twa beasties to an organic farm, in exchange for produce. The idea of constructing a methane generator here is intriguing, especially after seeing the documentary "Sweet as a Nut", many years ago.

However, I would expect that the regulations of the municipality, where I live, would prohibit it, unless it was done by someone who was licensed as a gas fitter. This might prove a very expensive undertaking.   

RichardH, have any problems arisen regarding local code requirements, regarding your digestor? How much time and labour is required to keep it up and running?

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,petr
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 01:50 PM

read a book (from the 70's) on renewable energy and one story was about a south african pig farmer who looked at the costs of hauling away the pig manure- decided to build a methane digester and ended up generating enough to run all the power on his farm (with a lot of excess gas still going to waste)
He devised simple easy to build digesters using two oil drums (one inside the other, when the amount of gas increased the drum on top would rise up, and excess gas could escape - as well as smaller ones using large innertubes.
As there was a United Nations summit on renewable energy coming up (sometime in the early 60's) he tried to present a paper to the UN
and was told (6months ahead of the summit) there is no time for his paper. In the end it was presented but not much done, even though it was a cheap easy solution for much of the third worlds energy problems

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Tam the Bam (Nutter)
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 01:37 PM

I live quite near a windfarm, and I like them, these people that don't what would they rather have a bloody big nuclear power plant or a factory. I also live quite near a nuclear power plant Hunterson which is on the Clyde, I tell I would rather have the windfarm that power station any day, at least with a wind farm if it breaks down your not in danger of being killed, or a very small danger.
So these NIMBYS should all crawl back to wherever they come from and just get used to them, because this is the way forward and if you don't like then tough, just move.
And leave the rest of us in peace.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Richard H
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 01:31 PM

CarolC,
Intensive livestock operations, or rather those where the manure is easily collectible, (I'm not too keen on feed-lots) can certainly generate a lot of methane. All the stats are available i.e. so many cows/pigs/whatevers produce so much manure per day which gives so much gas.

We had the manure from 63 cows fuelling two digesters and used a lot of gas for hot water, cooking etc. and still had more to spare.

Methane digesters, however, aren't primarily targeting gas. You have a lot of manure to get rid of. Putting it through a digester gets rid of the offensive smell, flies etc. and the end product is excellent feertiliser. I used to sell it at US50 cents a gallon which wasn't bad considering what we were getting for milk.

The methane gas is a bonus. It's easy to run a pipe from the digester to your home or a village. Compressing it for transport is more complicated.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 12:48 PM

Richard H, do you think that large livestock operations have the potential to provide a significant source of methane for public consumption? Seems like farmers would welcome an additional source of income that wouldn't significantly add to their overhead.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Chris Green
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 11:21 AM

Given that we're an island, isn't wave power the most obvious solution? I know someone's already made this point, but I'm genuinely confused as to why wind power seems to be being pushed instead.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Pied Piper
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 08:46 AM

Wake up folks; if we don't sort this we're going to go extinct.
We can't afford Augie's aesthetic self-indulgence.
PP

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 08:09 AM

"...complaining about windfarms based solely on their cosmetic apppearance."

That rather implies that complaining about them because of the way they look would be unreasonable. I think it would be perfectly reasonable. But in fact they look rather good, generally.

Taking account of how they look in particular places is fair enough. There are some places where any kind of construction would be wrong. Those are the kind of places which wouldn't be in anyone's backyard.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Roger the Skiffler
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 03:56 AM

Considering that before the machine age every village would have had a watermill or a large brick built "sails" windmill: they would never have got through the planning process today: too noisy, too dangerous, spoils the view etc. If we are serious about renewable energy we have to forgo the "visual impact" argument, unfortunately. I'd rather see a windfarm than a mobile phone mast!

RtS

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 01:14 AM

Hey, Dave the Gnome! What an idea! Is it really as crazy as it seems????? Pity---
Guest Richard H. has really given us something to consider. So a load of horse-shit is nothing to be sneezed at after all. I'm gonnae get me twa horses!

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Richard H
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 11:51 PM

I built a methane digester in 1984 when I was in dairying and have produced all my cooking gas from it ever since. We had plans to use the gas for lighting, freezer and fridge but never bothered.

What amazes me is that for the past few years the manure from just two horses put in the digester provides all our gas needs.

If I could only get me a politician or two...

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Augie
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 09:37 PM

Hi there. NIMBY here. We have a few of the damn things in my neck of the woods and aesthetically, I hate the bastards. They are just huge(350-380 ft. high) and so, so very out of scale to everything in the farmlands surrounding them (average barn building=60 ft high, average mature hardwood tree=60 to 80 ft high) that from 5 or ten miles away they don't look so bad but to have one actually in your own back yard they are,to my eyes, a monstrosity. If we've got to have them, then let's put them in urban areas. Hell, it's ugly there already. Maybe we could run some on the Mall in DC. With the abundance of strong winds emanating from nearby they should function very well.

In our state there are six such projects. 3 met with little or no NIMBY opposition ,and three with strident opposition, to the extent that one of these was eventually abandoned prior to construction.

With respect to noise, they are supposed to run at no more than 50 decibels,but that is measured at a distance of 1000 ft., which means up close, they aren't something you would want to try to sleep thru (or play acoustically under).If all are operational they should provide a whopping 0.14% of our state's yearly energy needs.

Beauty is in the eye... so they say. I find them, like cell phone towers and gravel pits, to be an abomination upon the face of the earth. Then again, I aint much to look at either and yet my wife hasn't complained too much in 29 years. I suspect in both cases it's all a matter of how much ugliness one is willing to tolerate.

My best to you, BI

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,petr
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 09:18 PM

well one objection I heard to the windfarm,,
was the constant and repetitive whoosh sound they make
but Id take that than smog anyday.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Blissfully Ignorant
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 07:23 PM

I agree wave-power is part of the way forward, but what i was whinging about in the initial post was people complaining about windfarms based solely on their cosmetic apppearance. Where are these people? Do they exist? They're being uncharacteristically quiet...come on, NIMBYs, scared or somethink?

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 06:17 PM

It isn't that growing plants offset CO2 increase, it's that they don't contribute to it. In growing they take up CO2, and in burning they give it back to the atmosphere. It's a convenient way of using solar energy.

Burning fossil fuel means putting back into the atmosphere the CO2 that was safely stashed away over millions of years. Not a very good idea, because that is an awful lot of CO2.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,petr
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 05:59 PM

in one study an economist (in a recent nyorker) calculated one hidden cost of oil (that of military action and spending in the mideast-) adds up to a hidden tax of 10to 20cents per gallon.

of course oil, along with wind and hydropower are all solar energy anyway - (oil being stored solar energy from the past, wind being a result of solar heating, and also the water cycle of evaporation/rainfall etc. also due to solar energy)

I remember a university geography class on the subject of solar energy that hits the earth at any given time: 30% percent is reflected back into space, another large part goes into latent heat(ie. heating the ground etc) and a large part into water evaporation.
I asked the professor how much actually goes to sustain life on earth, and the answer was astounding: negligible - less than 1% OF THE TOTAL SUNS ENERGY.

www.hubbertspeak.com has an interesting calculation comparing the
amount of solar energy to hit the earth in 24hours being equal to the known or estimated oil reserves of the Earth (all the oil thats ever been used and has yet to be used).

To say that there is no future in wind for instance is ridiculous,
25% of Denmarks energy comes from offshore windfarms. Not Insignificant.

Last spring I was in the Czech Republic, and everywhere you look there were rapeseed (canola) fields. BioFuel is becoming a large factor. I fact theres a team from BC driving an old diesel van across Europe to Vladivostok, running purely on waste cooking grease and methanol.

Alexander Graham Bell suggested that we start using alcohol when petroleum becomes too expensive, you can make alcohol from any plant
- the growth of which should offset co2 increase.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: LilyFestre
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 03:56 PM

Hmmm...I don't know much about all this except that in the state of Pennsylvania, if you have a windmill on your property that is supplying your electricity for you, the electric company has to PAY YOU for any surplus that the windmills have created and you have not used.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 02:24 PM

What's it go to do with energy? We absolutely need windfarms - where will the wind come from if we don't have them. Everyone knows that wind is made by trees waving their arms. With all the deforestation going on there are just not enough trees to produce wind for us so we need to have huge fans generating more.

What? What have I said? Am I missing something?

Cheers

DtG

(Great believer in kinetic energy btw. Have a huge ring orbiting the world in the opposite direction to the rotation. Connect it by towers with huge wheels on all round the equator. Bingo! Biggest dynamo in history...)

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 01:27 PM

it is all coming, solar power, solar heating to reduce other forms of energy use, wind power, tide power, cleverer ways to use hydro-electric sources, more effecient batteries....and, probably 'some' nuclear power, though I hate to see it. Even cheap solar stoves that work much like a magnifying glass for cooking in places where the trees are almost gone.

We must do these things in order to cope with the future and survive in any comfortable manner. If Global Warming IS, in fact, a reality for the next few decades or centuries, we need to plan now. If an ice age comes, we need to be ready...etc...

The other thing that needs to be considered is that we need to control (preferably reduce) the population in order to make better use of what energy we CAN produce, and to facilitate living in reduced areas if either ice age or serious warming happen.....

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Metchosin
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 01:02 PM

well one thing for certain, its highly unlikely that those who advocate for alternative energy will, like the proponents of nuclear power generation, still be trying to come up with, yet one more foolproof way, of trying to deal with their nasty byproduct.

Oh dear, another failed fast breeder tidal turbine! Now what are we going to do with all that water?

"Do you want my job?"

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: CarolC
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 11:31 AM

The other (aside from bird destruction) major drawbacks to wind power are a) relatively high initial cost and b)high maintenance.

When figuring out cost ratios between oil and wind (or other alternative energy sources), one needs to factor in the hidden costs as well as the obvious ones. With oil, the taxpayers (at least with the way it's set up in the US) pay huge hidden costs. The US taxpayers pay massive sums of money in the form of government subsidies to the oil industry, as well as the costs of the wars that we have to conduct in order to secure the supplies of oil that we rely on in other parts of the world. Plus the hidden costs arising from polution... health care costs, cleanup costs, etc. When we take all of the hidden costs into consideration, I bet oil is a lot more expensive than wind.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Pied Piper
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 11:12 AM

And we still have to dispose of the Plutonium.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Pied Piper
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 11:11 AM

Sorry johnInKansas your energy payback time is a myth.
Solar Energy Payback Time
PP

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 11:02 AM

Since we've got a fair-sized fusion plant going alread, the most snesible thing is to arrange things so that we make use of the ample power it supplies. I refer to the Sun of coiurse. And the Moon for tidal power. More than enough if we organise ourselves sensibly.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Skipy
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 10:45 AM

How long does it take for a turbine to 'pay back' the electricity used to manufacture it?

The comparison of energy used in manufacture with the energy produced by a power station is known as the 'energy balance'. It can be expressed in terms of energy 'pay back' time, i.e. as the time needed to generate the equivalent amount of energy used in manufacturing the wind turbine or power station.

The average wind farm in the UK will pay back the energy used in its manufacture within three to five months, and over its lifetime a wind turbine will produce over 30 times more energy than was used in its manufacture. This is quicker than coal or nuclear power stations, which take about six months. When the energy used to supply the fuel for nuclear and coal power plants is included, the energy balance for those conventional source is even poorer still.

This year the Department for Trade and Industry (DTI) calculated that onshore wind farms recover around 80 times the input energy required.

Just a ditty Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Midchuck
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 10:30 AM

There are two, and only two, long-term solutions to the environment/energy problem.

One is nuclear fusion power - not fission. What happens in the Sun, and in a hydrogen bomb. You squeeze hydrogen hard enough and it turns into helium and gives off a lot of energy.

The trouble is, the technology doesn't exist yet. It'll take a good deal of money to get to where it works, and no one wants to spend money without a short-term return. And most people think of fission when you mention nuclear power at all. There are very sound objections to fission power, but the public is too stupid to understand that there are two very different forms of nuclear power.

The second is getting population growth under control. This is happening in the developed countries. I don't see how it's going to happen in the undeveloped ones except through the mediums of starvation and disease, and I can't wish for that. Also, most of the established churches fight any effective population control measures, so we'd have to eliminate organized religion to make any progress.

So we're probably f***ed, in the long run.

Peter.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Dave Masterson
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 08:31 AM

Noddy says,
"it is all about choice. so give them a choice. What do you want next to you a wind farm or a nuclear power station?"

If they have their way on Romney Marsh we'll have both!

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 08:31 AM

"current manufacturing methods are just that, and they are based on relatively low levels of production.

Longterm I'd anticipate a combination methods, including wind turbines and improved efficiency, plus especially tidal power.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Dave Masterson
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 08:27 AM

I agree with Boab – surely hydro-power is the way forward. The good news in the UK is that an experimental wave turbine was commissioned in the Bristol Channel last year. It will be interesting to see the results of that. The UK has so many tidal inlets the prospects should be good, although I believe one 'expert' has discounted the Thames estuary as being the wrong sort of tidal flow. I dunno, I'm a simple soul, the tide comes in – power, the tide goes out again – more power. It's obviously not as simple as that.
Solar power is another good prospect. Deputy PM John Prescott has recently stated that all new houses should have solar power fitted as standard (Ooh look, there goes a pig flying by!). In Greece you'd be hard pushed to see a house that doesn't have solar panels on the roof. I know it's much sunnier than the UK, but there are solar panels on the market that work perfectly well in our environment. Of course this would not solve the demands of industry but it has to be better that the present situation.

Mind you, if we could only harness the power of all the hot air expounded on Mudcat then all our problems would be over….

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 07:41 AM

With current manufacturing methods, and currently achieved efficiencies, it requires more total energy to make a solar electric cell than the cell is likely to produce by conversion of sunlight during its usable lifetime. The manufacturing process is not, of course, completely free from producing "industrial wastes." The energy required for manufacture usually comes from conventional sources.

There are places where solar electric power makes some sense. This is usually where there are unusually high transportation costs for conventional fuels, sometimes where there are very high "local" taxes on fuels, or where no conventional energy sources are accessible.

A couple of "venture companies" have recently claimed to have found processes for producing more efficient cells, or producing cells with "typical" efficiencies more cheaply, so there appears to be continual progress; but the fact that there's no pollution at the point of use doesn't mean that it's a polution free process. It just means someone else carries off your garbage.

John

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Pied Piper
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 07:15 AM

A slight digression; there are approximately 1500 tons of Plutonium on the earth today, most made for the fission bombs of the cold war.
As it takes only 2Kg or so to make a bomb this is a real threat to the future.
The only really practical and the safest way to dispose of it is to burn it in Nuclear Power stations.
I'm not generally in favour of Nuclear power but needs must when the devil vomits in your kettle.
In the UK on average 300 Watts/square meter of energy reaches the ground from the Sun. Solar cells are about 15% efficient at the moment but this may rise to around 20%.
That's 45W for on average 12 hours a day, which is 500Wh a day (half a unit). Multiply by your average usable roof area, say 5 square meters, gives you about 2.5 units a day = 2.5x90= 225 units a quarter.
Of cause it would cost an arm and a leg, but prices are falling and the Government could give grants.

PP

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 07:08 AM

I was talking to Alan Bell at Sidmouth, and he told me that someone has written an extra verse to his song Windmills, about wind turbines. He wasn't sure how he felt about them   

The thing about wind turbines, as opposed to windmills, is that they get put up in greater numbers in windy places, and in wilder places than windmills were.

But I still think they can be pretty beautiful. And I'd have thought that it ought to be possible to design them so they wouldn't be any more dangerous to birds than windmill sails.

In days gone by when the world was much younger
We harnessed the wind for to work for mankind
Seamen built tall ships to sail on the ocean.
Landsmen built wheels the corn for to grind

Around and around and around went the big sails
Turning the shaft in the great wooden wheels.
Creaking and groaning, the millstone kept turning
Grinding to flour the corn from the fields...


For the rest of Alan Bell's song (without any wind turbine verse), here is the link to it in the DT - Windmills

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,noddy
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 05:55 AM

it is all about choice. so give them a choice. What do you want next to you a wind farm or a nuclear power station?

Give time to think cos it is a hard choice !

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Fibula Mattock
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 05:51 AM

I like 'em, and I'd be happy to have one in my back yard, if I had a back yard. Much prettier than a power station, even if not as efficient.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 05:00 AM

I'd settle for one in my back yard.

eric

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 04:46 AM

Precisely put, Metchosin!

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Metchosin
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 04:40 AM

well if you don't like looking at them or listening to them, you can put them underwater. The power of the moon is much more predictable and constant than the wind.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 03:36 AM

I'm in similar mind to Akenaton on this one. Wind power generates clean energy. I don't tend to sympathise with those who say "not in my backyard". Windfarms CAN supply a small proportion of the power required by Scotland, both for industry and domestic use. But in order to have a truly significant effect on the grid, Scotland---or any other country---would literally have to be covered in windmills!
Just listen for the anti-windmill propaganda from the fossil fuel lobby;there is NONE! They know full well that wind power will never be a threat to their muck -producing industry. Solar power is in the same category. Good for boiling the odd kettle or even shower or dishwashing ---but industry?---Not a hope! There is one clean power generator which terrifies the oil/coal/nuke mob, and that is Hydro-power. Not only the power generated by dams, although there is very significant power from just that source. The real inexhaustible and dependable source of power lies in the oceans. There is power inherent in the waves, in the tides and in the ocean currents. Comparison of the relative efficiencies of wind [gaseous] -driven machines and water [liquid]-driven ones is simple, and you don't need an engineering degree to understand that water, volume for volume and velocity for velocity, has many magnitudes more mechanical power than air. The power potential in global waters--rivers and oceans-- is practically limitless. Governments have been challenged more than once by people [and companies involved in research] who have designed generators for oceanic application, to pit any form of power generation against their design. I know of at least one administration who took up the challenge [avoiding publicity in the matter----] . For some strange reason, the whole discussion faded into oblivion. It's my guess that they got quite a fright when they realised the implications for their oil industry. It's so damned easy to put inventions "on the shelf". Money talks---and pollution still pays.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Ebbie
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 03:04 AM

The biggest wind farms I saw last winter was in the Palm Desert California area. I was told that the windfarms provide ALL of the electricity the community uses. And that when they don't need all of the output, they stop individual banks of windmills so that they don't all run at once. It was also interesting to see that they have different- height mills.(I'm not clear on why that is.) I wss told that some of the mills are now "3rd generation". The couple of people I talked with about it seemed very pleased with themselves and their community.

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: Blissfully Ignorant
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 01:55 AM

I believe the major drawbacks of windfarms are greed and incompetence. Both of which, surely, can be overcome? Or maybe not...sometimes i curse myself for having faith in humanity :0)!

Subject: RE: BS: NIMBYs and Windfarms
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 27 Oct 04 - 01:39 AM

The other (aside from bird destruction) major drawbacks to wind power are a) relatively high initial cost and b)high maintenance. I suspect that alternative energy won't happen on a meaningful scale until fossil fuels become to expensive to compete.