Wind power was Spain's top source of electricity in 2013

[bananas]

Source: Guardian

Remarkable new figures from Spain's grid operator have revealed that greenhouse gas emissions from the country's power sector are likely to have fallen 23.1% last year, as power generation from wind farms and hydroelectric plants soared.

Red Eléctrica de España (REE) released a preliminary report on the country's power system late last month, revealing that for "the first time ever, (wind power) contributed most to the annual electricity demand coverage". According to the figures, wind turbines met 21.1% of electricity demand on the Spanish peninsular, narrowly beating the region's fleet of nuclear reactors, which provided 21% of power.

In total, wind farms are estimated to have generated 53,926 gigawatt hours of electricity, up 12% on 2012, while high levels of rainfall meant hydroelectric power output was 16% higher than the historical average, climbing to 32,205GWh.

<snip>

In contrast, the preliminary figures show that power output from combined cycle gas plants fell 34.2% year-on-year, coal-fired plants saw generation fall 27.3%, and nuclear power output fell 8.3%.

<snip>

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jan/06/wind-power-spain-electricity-2013

---

[Fred Sanders]

1. 60 Minutes Hit Piece On Solar was not a mistake, the oil and gas barons are not stupid.

[jpak]

2. K&R

[Loge23]

3. Wind turbines dot the landscape in Spain

I was fortunate to travel this past summer in Spain. I observed literally hundreds of wind turbines on a rail trip across Spain, all of which were situated in wide open valleys between San Sebastian and Barcelona. They looked great really - not at all obtrusive.
Meanwhile, the Neanderthals in the US are buying up networks to spread anti-clean energy propaganda.

[PeoViejo]

4. A bit Quixotic, don't you think?

..attacking Windmills...

[BlueToTheBone]

14. Is that Dali?

[PeoViejo]

31. I don't know.

I thought it was appropriate, though.

[Ash_F]

36. Love that piece /nt

[yeoman6987]

34. BIRDS

They are killing the bird by the millions. There HAS to be something else that we can use to reduce our dependency on oil. It is a tragedy to see all the killing in the name of human beings having some electricity.

[awoke_in_2003]

5. Next on Fox news-

"Spain is windier tha we are"

[grahamhgreen]

6. WooooHooo HOOO! Wind rules, nuclear is for fools:)

[SHRED]

11. PV rules

Corporate wind farms are for fools.

http://www.anzaborrego.net/Travel/AnzaBorrego/post/Fiftteen-Thousand-Acres-of-fiberglass-and-steel-in-Ocotillo-

[BlueToTheBone]

16. The Sun and The Wind

are brothers and sisters.

[seabeckind]

7. Paired with HSR

it's a winner.

Unfortunately not enough profit for our culture.

[SHRED]

8. Where's the rooftop PV?

I'm not a fan of these blights on the landscape and here in the USA where much of this is privatized to a large degree it means more centralized corporate power production. You go to them and pay the ransom.

[kristopher]

15. We need utility and small scale wind, solar, geothermal, tidal, hydro biomass, and biofuels

Wind is probably the most important.

Or would you rather have nuclear and fossil fuels?

[SHRED]

17. So favoring decentralized...

...rooftop PV over centralized corporate wind farms is now in league with the Koch Bros? It's frustrating getting these accusations here.

[kristopher]

28. You mean prettying up antiwind advocacy with claims of being for solar?

Go look. Every expert you'll find when you research (and I invite you to please research it) will confirm that we MUST have wind if we are going to move away from the fossil/nuclear centralized system.

Onshore wind is about $0.04/kWh - that is the least expensive power on the market. It also produces power in a complimentary manner to solar.
When solar is at its best, wind tends to be at its worst.
When wind is at its best, solar tends to be at its worst.

So, do you want to keep using nuclear and coal?

There are no two ways about it, whether you like it or not, that is the choice you are faced with: centralized thermal or ALL renewables. Just saying bullshit isn't going to change that.

[solarhydrocan]

37. They have lots of PV parks

Like Olmedilla Photovoltaic Park



and Puertollano

...Many solar photovoltaic power stations have been built in Spain.[12] As of November 2010, the largest photovoltaic (PV) power plants in Spain are the Olmedilla Photovoltaic Park (60 MW), Puertollano Photovoltaic Park (47.6 MW), Planta Solar La Magascona & La Magasquila (34.5 MW), Arnedo Solar Plant (34 MW) and Planta Solar Dulcinea (31.8 MW)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Spain

[blackspade]

9. But we can't do that here in 'Merka'

It's all a socialist plot to have us worship the sun instead of holy fossil fuels!

Joking aside, I think this is awesome, something that the US should lead on, not follow.

[SHRED]

10. Oh they are here

And they are corporatized and centralized. Yuck.

http://www.anzaborrego.net/Travel/AnzaBorrego/post/Fiftteen-Thousand-Acres-of-fiberglass-and-steel-in-Ocotillo-

[blackspade]

12. I'll take that over this:

[SHRED]

19. false choice

[blackspade]

27. In what way?

Please describe how the environmental damage of wind farms is worse than coal mining in general and mountaintop removal specifically.

If it is a false choice as you say, what is the choice? No coal, natural gas, wind farms, solar farms, hydro, oil drilling, nuclear?
All forms of energy generation have environmental impacts.
The trick is selecting the ones that do the least amount of damage and are sustainable. Of the ones listed, there are only three that are sustainable (wind, solar, and hydro). But damage occurs with all three.

So you tell me what is the choice?

[yeoman6987]

35. Distruction of the envirnoment

The wind farms have turned into bird killers. Need something else.

[blackspade]

38. And the alternative is what?

Solar and Hydro won't cut it.

[solarhydrocan]

39. Solar seems to be working in Germany beyond expectations

Germany @~50N latitude, known for sunshine

Germany is the world's top photovoltaics (PV) installer, with a solar PV capacity of 35.526 gigawatts (GW) at the end of November 2013.[2] The German new solar PV installations increased by about 7.6 GW in 2012, and solar PV provided 18 TWh (billion kilowatt-hours) of electricity in 2011, about 3% of total electricity.[3] Some market analysts expect this could reach 25 percent by 2050.[4] Germany has a goal of producing 35% of electricity from renewable sources by 2020 and 100% by 2050...

Increases in installed solar PV power capacity and generation in recent years is shown in the table below.[22][23] The solar PV power in Germany has been increasing exponentially for the last 20 years, with a doubling time of 1.5 years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Germany


Solarpark Neuhardenberg

[blackspade]

41. From the snippit you provided: 3% in 2011

25% by 2050. The other 97-75%?

[solarhydrocan]

42. also from the snippit:

The solar PV power in Germany has been increasing exponentially for the last 20 years, with a doubling time of 1.5 years

and: Germany has a goal of producing 35% of electricity from renewable sources by 2020 and 100% by 2050

Probably somewhere in between but when something doubles every 1 1/2 years...well that will really get huge in a few years. Also they are not blowing trillions in the Mideast invading and conquering foreign lands and building drones like the US.

[blackspade]

43. Yet the 2050 number is still only 25% solar

The other 75% has to come from somewhere.
What are the other choices?

[LanternWaste]

40. it is likely that they will have minimal impacts." The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds

"If wind farms are located away from major migration routes and important feeding, breeding and roosting areas of those bird species known or suspected to be at risk, it is likely that they will have minimal impacts." The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds

http://www.rspb.org.uk/ourwork/policy/windfarms/index.aspx

[yeoman6987]

44. Doesn't sound good enough

Minimum impact? So we will have hundreds of birds dying instead of thousands. Sounds like good old human race being selfish once again. Would we accept a few hundred dogs getting killed for the good of humans. Why get all worked up over the animals being tested in various facilities. It must stop somewhere. Wind farms are killers to the living!

[kristopher]

13. The Koch brothers thank you for your efforts...

They are one of the prime funders of anti wind astroturf organizations.

[SHRED]

18. Bullshit

[kristopher]

20. Bullshit yourself.

They are the originators of the anti wind movement in the US. They spend hugely promoting exactly the message you are sharing. There are two fundamental facts you have wrong:
You can't build a renewable system without wind.
Wind doesn't have to be the corporate critter you are making it out to be. The technology lends itself to community ownership very well. As the system built on renewables changes, local ownership will easily outstrip large corporations because the power will be used locally and the community can keep the money instead of spending it on fuel.

[SHRED]

21. You said they would thank me

That's the bullshit.

Koch brothers do not favor rooftop PV.

[kristopher]

23. They love anyone who advocates a system without wind.

They cut their teeth ginning up the anti wind movement in Cape Cod. Hell, they ARE the antiwind movement. They know damned well that without wind, solar is just a bit player.

Cost-minimized combinations of wind power, solar power and electrochemical storage, powering the grid up to 99.9% of the time

Abstract
We model many combinations of renewable electricity sources (inland wind, offshore wind, and photovoltaics) with electrochemical storage (batteries and fuel cells), incorporated into a large grid system (72 GW). The purpose is twofold: 1) although a single renewable generator at one site produces intermittent power, we seek combinations of diverse renewables at diverse sites, with storage, that are not intermittent and satisfy need a given fraction of hours. And 2) we seek minimal cost, calculating true cost of electricity without subsidiesand with inclusion of external costs. Our model evaluated over 28 billion combinations of renewables and storage, each tested over 35,040 h (four years) of load and weather data. We find that the least cost solutions yield seemingly-excessive generation capacity—at times, almost three times the electricity needed to meet electrical load. This is because diverse renewable generation and the excess capacity together meet electric load with less storage, lowering total system cost. At 2030 technology costs and with excess electricity displacing natural gas, we find that the electric system can be powered 90%–99.9% of hours entirely on renewable electricity, at costs comparable to today's—but only if we optimize the mix of generation and storage technologies.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378775312014759

[SHRED]

22. name one. ..

... corporate centralized power producer that favors rooftop PV because there are many who love these wind farms.

[kristopher]

25. It's the antiwind meme that they love and promote.

[SHRED]

26. Can we get beyond the centralized model?

Or am I dreaming? Will we forever be at the mercy of an energy bill that keeps climbing?

[kristopher]

30. Yes we can.

The early roll out is large scale, but as the norm becomes based on renewables community and individual ownership starts to increase. More than 50% of Germany's renewable generation is not corporately controlled; but it didn't start out that way.

I'll find the number and update this post.

?w=470

You'll want to read the post:
3 Reasons Germans are Going Renewable 'At All Costs'
John Farrell
October 23, 2013

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2013/10/3-reasons-germans-are-going-renewable-at-all-costs

As penetration increases, so too will the percentage of local ownership.

[ProgressSaves]

24. I hope I live to see MTR sites turned into wind/solar farms.

Coal is one thing that still chains us to the 19th and 20th Centuries.

[blackspade]

29. Add oil and natural gas to that list!

[Enthusiast]

32. K&R! This is encouraging.................nt

[tanyev]

33. Added bonus, Donald Trump has removed Spain from his list of vacation destinations.