U.S. wind power installation slows

[phantom power]

If I were an unkind or sarcastic man, I might ask whether this means that somewhere accountants are putting stakes through the heart of new wind projects.

But no! That's not who I am!

New installments of U.S. wind energy in the second quarter of this year fell by more than half from the first quarter as the recession helped cut contracts for new turbines, an industry group said.

New installations totaled about 1,210 megawatts in the second quarter compared with about 2,790 MW in the previous one, the American Wind Energy Association said on Tuesday.

"The recession is a force that is having an effect on the industry, as it is on most other industries," said a spokeswoman.

http://www.reuters.com/article/internal_ReutersNewsRoom_BehindTheScenes_MOLT/idUSTRE56R5TA20090728

[vincna]

1. The recession is a big problem

I manage about 1,000 MW of combustion turbine capacity and our sales are in the toilet. Combination of the recession plus cool weather in the northeast.

[phantom power]

2. The current economy is truly an equal-opportunity energy buildout barrier.

Our overall energy consumption actually declined last year. Reduces the business case for installing new capacity of any kind.

[Systematic Chaos]

3. My own theory:

So far, there has been a serious deficiency in the "Massive Turbine Splody Effect". Americans are a violent culture who love spending money on watching things and people go **BOOM**.

So, if they really want 800 lb. turbine blades -- I mean this great wind idea -- to fly, then they just need to design them to put on a jolly good show at the end of their life cycle, or any random time up to 27 years before that.

I'm sure it'll soar, irrespective of who it kills along the way.

[vincna]

4. You lost me

They don't spin very fast.

[phantom power]

5. There have been cases where the governors failed.

Definitely made for some interesting youtube.

[Systematic Chaos]

6. In what respect, Charlie?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbMO7ufATBc&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1OlHEvPRT8&feature=related

And these are just the ones caught on film.

There are other examples of ones just sitting there, still intact but on fire, and all kinds of other wonderful stuff.

But you're right -- this is perfectly safe and a paragon of energy efficiency. What am I thinking?

[kristopher]

7. As usual you aren't.

http://www.rsc.org/publishing/journals/EE/article.asp?doi=b809990c

Energy Environ. Sci., 2009, 2, 148 - 173, DOI: 10.1039/b809990c
Review of solutions to global warming, air pollution, and energy security

Mark Z. Jacobson

This paper reviews and ranks major proposed energy-related solutions to global warming, air pollution mortality, and energy security while considering other impacts of the proposed solutions, such as on water supply, land use, wildlife, resource availability, thermal pollution, water chemical pollution, nuclear proliferation, and undernutrition.

Nine electric power sources and two liquid fuel options are considered. The electricity sources include solar-photovoltaics (PV), concentrated solar power (CSP), wind, geothermal, hydroelectric, wave, tidal, nuclear, and coal with carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology. The liquid fuel options include corn-ethanol (E85) and cellulosic-E85. To place the electric and liquid fuel sources on an equal footing, we examine their comparative abilities to address the problems mentioned by powering new-technology vehicles, including battery-electric vehicles (BEVs), hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (HFCVs), and flex-fuel vehicles run on E85.

Twelve combinations of energy source-vehicle type are considered. Upon ranking and weighting each combination with respect to each of 11 impact categories, four clear divisions of ranking, or tiers, emerge.

Tier 1 (highest-ranked) includes wind-BEVs and wind-HFCVs.
Tier 2 includes CSP-BEVs, geothermal-BEVs, PV-BEVs, tidal-BEVs, and wave-BEVs.
Tier 3 includes hydro-BEVs, nuclear-BEVs, and CCS-BEVs.
Tier 4 includes corn- and cellulosic-E85.

Wind-BEVs ranked first in seven out of 11 categories, including the two most important, mortality and climate damage reduction. Although HFCVs are much less efficient than BEVs, wind-HFCVs are still very clean and were ranked second among all combinations.

Tier 2 options provide significant benefits and are recommended.

Tier 3 options are less desirable. However, hydroelectricity, which was ranked ahead of coal-CCS and nuclear with respect to climate and health, is an excellent load balancer, thus recommended.

The Tier 4 combinations (cellulosic- and corn-E85) were ranked lowest overall and with respect to climate, air pollution, land use, wildlife damage, and chemical waste. Cellulosic-E85 ranked lower than corn-E85 overall, primarily due to its potentially larger land footprint based on new data and its higher upstream air pollution emissions than corn-E85.

Whereas cellulosic-E85 may cause the greatest average human mortality, nuclear-BEVs cause the greatest upper-limit mortality risk due to the expansion of plutonium separation and uranium enrichment in nuclear energy facilities worldwide. Wind-BEVs and CSP-BEVs cause the least mortality.

The footprint area of wind-BEVs is 2–6 orders of magnitude less than that of any other option. Because of their low footprint and pollution, wind-BEVs cause the least wildlife loss.

The largest consumer of water is corn-E85. The smallest are wind-, tidal-, and wave-BEVs.

The US could theoretically replace all 2007 onroad vehicles with BEVs powered by 73000–144000 5 MW wind turbines, less than the 300000 airplanes the US produced during World War II, reducing US CO2 by 32.5–32.7% and nearly eliminating 15000/yr vehicle-related air pollution deaths in 2020.

In sum, use of wind, CSP, geothermal, tidal, PV, wave, and hydro to provide electricity for BEVs and HFCVs and, by extension, electricity for the residential, industrial, and commercial sectors, will result in the most benefit among the options considered. The combination of these technologies should be advanced as a solution to global warming, air pollution, and energy security. Coal-CCS and nuclear offer less benefit thus represent an opportunity cost loss, and the biofuel options provide no certain benefit and the greatest negative impacts.