The purpose of shifting to alternative energy

[GliderGuider]

is of course to decarbonize the atmosphere. That means we need to replace the oil used by cars as well as the coal and gas used for electrical generation. Given that we won’t be able to call on nuclear power to help, how much wind power would it take to do the job?

How about an operating plant of 6,300,000 5 MW wind turbines world-wide?

Here’s how I got that number.

First, I’ll set out my assumptions:

• We may need gas turbines as peaking plants, so I propose to leave 10% of the fossil fuel use intact for that and replace the other 90% of the oil, gas and coal we currently use with electricity from wind.
  
  
• I propose to do it by 2050, giving us a nice generous 40 years to “git ‘er done”.
  
  
• The requirement for primary energy would rise by 1% per year – this is less than half the last 45 year average of 2.5%, but we’ll give up the other 1.5% per year to efficiency improvements and conservation.
  
  
• Since we’re replacing thermal power with wind electricity, we get a 60% improvement in energy converted to work, meaning we only need to replace 40% of the fossil BTUs.
  
  
• We'll do it all with 5 MW turbines that run at an average capacity factor of 23%

The world currently uses 9800 million tonnes of oil equivalent (mtoe) per year of fossil fuels. A 1% growth rate puts the 2050 usage at 14,750 mtoe.

Keeping 10% of that usage intact means we have to replace the work done by 13,275 mtoe.

Applying our 40% conversion factor, we will need to replace about 5300 mtoe.

According to BP’s Statistical Review of World Energy 2010 (the source for all the data here) the conversion factor they use for electricity is 12,000,000 MWh per mtoe. So we will need to be able to generate need 63,600,000,000 MWh of electricity from wind in 2050.

A 5 MW turbine running at 23% capacity produces about 10,000 MWh in a year. In 2050 therefore, we would need to have 6,300,000 5MW turbines running world-wide.

If we installed the same number of them every year, we would need to install 157,500 turbines, or 787.5 GW of capacity every year to reach the required capacity by 2050.

Of course, 40 years is beyond the life cycle of a turbine. Assuming a 20 year life cycle, we need to replace all the 20-year-old turbines at the same time as we’re installing the new ones. So by 2050 we’d be re-installing 5% of the operating plant each year, or 315,000 turbines a year, which we would need to continue forever.

That means installing 1575 GW of new capacity every year. Last year we installed 37.5 GW. We will need to maintain 40 times that installation essentially forever to get the job done.

Given our addiction to fossil fuels, how probable is this scenario? Personally, I have to put on my green glasses to keep the emerald brilliance from blinding me.

[NNadir]

1. There is not enough neodymium on the entire planet to build 315,000 turbines a year.

The entire wind turbine scam is just hype. If it was going to do anything useful, it would have done it years ago, and it hasn't.

The first commercial wind plants came on line in California in the 1970's. Wind is still a trivial form of energy in California, and on the planet as a whole.

Interestingly, neodymium is a prominent fission product.

I discussed some aspects of the neodymium supply on another website where I sometimes write:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/8/29/897137/-Neodymium-Nickelate-High-Temperature-Electrolysis-of-Water-In-Solid-Oxide-Cells.">Neodymium Nickelate High Temperature Electrolysis of Water In Solid Oxide Cells.

[GliderGuider]

4. Regarding neodymium requirements

It seems hard to pin down just how much neodymium is needed for a wind turbine of a given size.

I found a link that indicates a requirement for 0.6 kg of neodymium per kW produced. Given that the author means electricity produced and not capacity, then getting the installation rate I propose in the OP would require an additional 110,000 tonnes of neodymium a year for the next 40 years for the initial build-out. This is on top of the less than 50,000 tonnes that are being produced today. If he means 0.6 kg per MW of capacity, the calculation goes up by a factor of 4, to almost 500,000 tonnes per year.

An article in The Independent contains the prediction that the demand for neodymium will rise to 200,000 tonnes per year in 2014. That's the same order as my back-of-the-envelope calculation above, but is probably predicated on realistic build rates as opposed to my balls-to-the-wall scenario.

The same Independent article says that a wind turbine (size unspecified) requires about 2 tonnes of neodymium. If that's a realistic estimate for a 5MV turbine, then my scenario would required over 600,000 tonnes of neodymium per year, which lines up well with the second estimate (corrected for capacity) in the second paragraph.

Oh yeah, we're going to be replacing all the cars... They'll need neodymium too - maybe 10 kg per vehicle. There are currently 600 million cars int he world, and the projections are for there to be a billion or so in 30 years. For a billion cars we'd need 10 billion kg, or 10 million tonnes of neodymium.

So where does that leave us? Over the next 40 years we would need 24,000,000 tonnes for the wind turbines and 10,000,000 tonnes for the cars. 34 million tonnes of neodymium over 40 years, or 850,000 tonnes per year.

I don't know enough about the economics of neodymium production to be able to tell if a production rate 20 times higher than today's is realistic, but I have my dark suspicions that it's another Technicolor pipe dream.

[NNadir]

8. World neodymium reserves - all of which require solvent extraction to isolate -

are roughly 8 million tons.

Used nuclear fuel, as I pointed out, has only about 600 metric tons in it.

It is of course, possible to make magnets without neodymium, however these magnets are much heavier than neodymium (or samarium) magnets, and would create further torque on the stupid wind turbines, which can't seem to stay up with light magnets.

[joshcryer]

9. There *is* the idea of using wind turbins where the generator is on the ground.

In that event you don't have to have exotic materials, simply a much more strengthened shaft.

But yeah, the argument that neodymium would be used in a future wind turbine build-out is obviously preposterous. But even Jacobson admits that much. ;)

[ishaneferguson]

75. Pr works too

Nd is not the only alloying element for Fe-Rare Earth-Boron. Pr is good too (I was at NRL with Norm Koon).

[joshcryer]

76. Nd is twice as abundant.

[ishaneferguson]

79. This was printed after your post

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/09/science/09seafloor.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=rare%20earth%20minerals&st=cse">Mining The Seafloor for Rare-Earth Minerals, NY Times, 11/9/2010

Scientists have known about rare earths in seabed rocks for decades, seeing them as a curiosity. In 1968, Alan M. Ehrlich, a chemist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, wrote a Ph.D. dissertation titled “Rare Earth Abundances in Manganese Nodules.”

In an interview, he expressed surprise at the interest of the seabed miners, saying the concentrations were too low to power a nodule renaissance.

The would-be miners agree. But they say rising global prices for the more common metals found in the seabed rocks are increasing the allure. Investors, they add, see the presence of the exotic elements as icing on the cake.

“The global activity is tremendous,” said Dr. Hein of geological survey, referring to undersea exploration as well as processing assessments on land.
(loc cit)

.
While the article concedes that the level of rare earths in the nodules is low, the nodules are rich in Ni and Cu, and that makes the recovery of rare earths feasible

[Confusious]

2. Aaaaaaggghhhhhhh

no numbers! no numbers! it makes my brain melt!

only feel good platitudes! They make my brain feel nice!

[joshcryer]

3. Your funging the growth numbers *might* make this defensible, but I can't check the numbers now.

Got to head out. I really really REALLY look forward to the dozens of posts that this thread garners by the end of the day.

[jpak]

5. Ridiculous nonsense

ONLY - wind turbines?

:rofl:

Sorry - we need solar hot water, PV, geothermal, hydro, tidal, wave, efficiency, electric mass transit & wind to de-carbonize the atmosphere.

and a technical point - crustal weathering is the only mechanism that will actually "de-carbonize" anthropogenic CO2 from the atmosphere.

yup

[GliderGuider]

6. Of course we would need all that stuff.

This, however provides us with a quantitative baseline as to the size of the effort required.

Regarding what decarbonizes the atmosphere:

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/CarbonCycle/carbon_cycle4.php


There's a lot more to the carbon cycle than "crustal weathering". The transport mechanisms are important too.

[jpak]

15. Umm...global photosynthesis and respiration are balanced,

It's crustal weathering, bicarbonate formation and burial of carbon that will remove anthropogenic CO2 from the atmosphere.

Renewable energy systems do not remove CO2 - they just displace fossil fuel combustion.

nice try though

[GliderGuider]

16. Who said anything about photosynthesis?

As I said right below in post #7,

"The purpose of shifting to alternative energy is of course to stop emitting CO2 and give natural processes an opportunity to decarbonize the atmosphere." I didn't specify what the "natural processes" were, but a careful look that the image I posted would reveal the main one.

Here's how it happens:

http://www.waterencyclopedia.com/Bi-Ca/Carbon-Dioxide-in-the-Ocean-and-Atmosphere.html

The oceans contain about 50 times more CO2 than the atmosphere and 19 times more than the land biosphere. CO2 moves between the atmosphere and the ocean by molecular diffusion when there is a difference between CO2 gas pressure (pCO2 ) between the atmosphere and oceans. For example, when the atmospheric pCO2 is higher than the surface ocean, CO 2 diffuses across the air-sea boundary into the sea water.

The oceans are able to hold much more carbon than the atmosphere because most of the CO2 that diffuses into the oceans reacts with the water to form carbonic acid and its dissociation products, bicarbonate and carbonate ions . The conversion of CO2 gas into nongaseous forms such as carbonic acid and bicarbonate and carbonate ions effectively reduces the CO2 gas pressure in the water, thereby allowing more diffusion from the atmosphere.

Anthropogenic CO2 Uptake

The constant atmospheric CO2 concentrations in the centuries prior to the Industrial Revolution suggest that the oceans released a small amount of CO2 to the atmosphere to balance the carbon input from rivers. Today, this trend is reversed and the oceans must remove CO2 added to the atmosphere from human activities, known as anthropogenic (humanderived) CO2 .

In the 1980s, the oceans removed an estimated 2.0±0.6 Pg of anthropogenic CO2 each year. Because humans are producing CO2 at an everincreasing rate, the average ocean removal rate increased to 2.4±0.5 Pg of carbon each year in the 1990s.

The uptake of anthropogenic CO2 by the oceans is driven by the difference in gas pressure in the atmosphere and in the oceans and by the air–sea transfer velocity. Because the pCO 2 is increasing in the atmosphere, CO2 moves into the ocean in an attempt to balance the oceanic and atmospheric gas pressures.

The mechanisms that control the speed with which the CO 2 gas can move from the atmosphere to the oceans (air–sea transfer velocity) are not well understood today. Recent technological advances are helping scientists to better understand these mechanisms.

The transfer velocity is related to the surface roughness of the ocean and the wind speed. The difference in pCO2 is related to the amount of carbon that is converted from CO2 gas to other nongaseous carbon species in the sea water, like bicarbonate and carbonate ions. This so-called "buffer capacity" is what allows the oceans to hold so much carbon.

The relative concentrations of CO2 (1%), bicarbonate ion (91%) and carbonate ion (8%) control the acidity (pH) of the oceans. Since CO2 is an acid gas, the uptake of anthropogenic CO2 uses up carbonate ions and lowers the oceanic pH. The carbonate ion concentration of surface sea water will decrease by an estimated 30 percent with a doubling of atmospheric CO 2 from preindustrial levels (280 to 560 ppm). As the carbonate ion concentration decreases, the buffer capacity of the ocean and its ability to take up CO 2 from the atmosphere is reduced.

Over the long term (millennial timescales), the ocean has the potential to take up approximately 85 percent of the anthropogenic CO2 that is released to the atmosphere. As long as atmospheric CO2 concentrations continue to rise, the oceans will continue to take up CO2 . However, this reaction is reversible. If atmospheric CO2 were to decrease in the future, the oceans will start releasing the accumulated anthropogenic CO2 back out into the atmosphere.

The ultimate storage place for anthropogenic CO2 must be reactions that bind the CO2 in a manner that is not easily reversed. Dissolution of calcium carbonate in the oceans, for example, is a long-term storage place for CO2 . As the oceans continue to take up anthropogenic CO2, it will penetrate deeper into the water column, lowering the pH and making the waters more corrosive to calcium carbonate. The problem is that carbonate dissolution typically occurs in the deep ocean, well removed from the anthropogenic CO2 taken up in the surface waters. In portions of the North Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans, however, anthropogenic CO2 may have already penetrated deep enough to influence the dissolution of calcium carbonate in the water column.

Again, the purpose of shifting to alternative energy is of course to stop emitting CO2 and give natural processes an opportunity to decarbonize the atmosphere. Unfortunately, decarbonizing the atmosphere through gaseous diffusion will result in a continuing fall in ocean pH long after we stop emitting carbon.

[NNadir]

17. Um, um, um, really?

"Just balanced?"

"Renewable energy systems displace carbon dioxide?!?!?"

Not much, apparently, since the growth of dangerous natural gas burning practices easily outstrip the growth of so called "renewable energy."

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/solar.renewables/page/trends/table1.html

(Unless, of course, one includes the biofuels fiasco which has been recently reported to increase greenhouse gas emissions: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/1151861">Use of U.S. Croplands for Biofuels Increases Greenhouse Gases Through Emissions from Land-Use Change

If everything's so "balanced" come then 50 years into the grand "reenwables will save us" revolution, the carbon dioxide graph looks like, um, this:



We'll add the inability to interpret a graph to the list of demonstrated mathematical illiteracy in the "renewables will save us" set, along with the fact that the worst of them are highly paid by the dangerous fossil fuel industry to greenwash something called "reality."

http://www.rmi.org/rmi/Amory+B.+Lovins">Famous Anti-nuke Amory Lovins describes his revenue sources:

Mr. Lovins’s other clients have included Accenture, Allstate, AMD, Anglo American, Anheuser-Busch, Bank of America, Baxter, Borg-Warner, BP, HP Bulmer, Carrier, Chevron, Ciba-Geigy, CLSA, ConocoPhillips, Corning, Dow, Equitable, GM, HP, Invensys, Lockheed Martin, Mitsubishi, Monsanto, Motorola, Norsk Hydro, Petrobras, Prudential, Rio Tinto, Royal Dutch/Shell, Shearson Lehman Amex, STMicroelectronics, Sun Oil, Suncor, Texas Instruments, UBS, Unilever, Westinghouse, Xerox, major developers, and over 100 energy utilities. His public-sector clients have included the OECD, the UN, and RFF; the Australian, Canadian, Dutch, German, and Italian governments; 13 states; Congress, and the U.S. Energy and Defense Departments.

[jpak]

19. um..um..um...the NJ molten salt breeder is a fraud

and global photosynthesis and respiration are balanced

as are burial of carbon in marine sediments and volcanic CO2 emissions

you need to read a book

:rofl:

[joshcryer]

23. Please try to contribute something more coherent next time.

Thanks. :hi:

[jpak]

63. The carbon cycle is too difficult for some people to comprehend

yup

[GliderGuider]

7. A more accurate opening line would have been

"The purpose of shifting to alternative energy is of course to stop emitting CO2 and give natural processes an opportunity to decarbonize the atmosphere."

But of course you understood the intent of the line from the beginning, didn't you?

[joshcryer]

10. Yes, so divide by two to meet Jacobson's requirement for 3.8 million wind turbines.

Of course, his 3.8 million wind turbines would've been built by 2030 under his plan, or 190,000 a year.

Now I'm starting to appreciate just how pitiful wind is as a power source.

[joshcryer]

11. Gave the numbers a lot more scrutiny, they're actually *better* than Jacobson's numbers overall.

If you're assuming 90% power by wind, Jacobson assumes 51% power by wind, and comes up with nearly a million more turbines by 2030 (extrapolating out it would be something like 2 or 3 million more turbines).

So basically, you just showed us how utterly daunting 600 Apollo's really are ($100 trillion to solve this problem using a diverse array of energy sources).

Time to become a doomer?

[GliderGuider]

12. There are a number of ways my numbers could have turned out differently from his

Actually, I assume that wind replaces 90% of fossil fuels, leaving the current 12% nuclear+hydro capacity in place. Given the higher efficiency of electrical usage, my scenario would have around 62% of power coming from wind, 15% from natural gas, and 11.5% each from hydro and nuclear. Intermediate comparisons between now an 2050 aren't appropriate, because I assumed a linear build-out, which is absolutely not going to happen. The build-out curve is likely to be some sort of logistical S-curve, which would make the beginning easier to manage but the middle of the period a cast-iron, gold-plated bitch.

Assuming you're referring to the SciAm article, Jacobson and I seem to be in the same ballpark. His thought experiment calls for more diverse power sources, while mine uses just wind to provide the renewable component. Some ways we might differ in our estimate are that we may not be using the same numbers for the relative efficiencies of electricity and fossil fuels, or average turbine capacity factors. Also, he doesn't account for life cycle replacements of the turbines, probably because his timeline ends in 20 years, making life cycle management SEP (Someone Else's Problem).

Don't become a doomer. Become an A&A instead - an Accepter and Adapter.

[GliderGuider]

13. There's one other problem: Gross Capital Formation is too small to support the buildout.

GCF is the amount of the global GDP that's spent on new assets like buildings and machinery. GCF is about 22% of GDP. For the world that means it's around $13.5 trillion per year. I don't think that a proposal to spend 40% of all global capital outlay for the next 40 years on windmills would be looked on that favourably by electors, especially when there is still a functional energy infrastructure whose sunk cost might have to be written off.

[joshcryer]

14. Oh snap! I hadn't considered GCF at all.

Goddamn, that pretty much puts a nail in any sort of reformist non magical technology solution.

[txlibdem]

18. Good thing that there will be NO technology advances between now and 2050

That neatly saves my defeatist, anti-renewable energy meme.

[joshcryer]

24. Yeah, transhumanism / singulatarianism does neatly solve the problem.

But who wants to hold out hope for some magical non-capitalist thing happening?

[txlibdem]

37. What in the world does that have to do with the price of tea in China?

Now I'm totally confused. You're saying that humans will merge with robotics and/or artificial intelligence? And that will solve the problem?

Maybe we're seeing the future from two totally different perspectives. I believe that technology can and should be improved to make being human (the human condition) much better than it is or ever has been.

Consider the following four scenarios for planting crops:

1. A human digs in the dirt with their hands, a stick, or a metal bladed tool, versus
2. A human puts a yoke on a strong animal (horse, oxen) which pulls a metal bladed tool, versus
3. A human uses a fossil fuel burner machine which pulls a metal bladed tool, versus
4. A robotic machine, equipped with artificial vision, radar, infrared and ultraviolet detectors, GPS, and is powered by solar panels, pulls a metal bladed tool, versus
5. A robotic machine, similar to the one in example #4, plants the same crop in a high tech hydroponic system which uses 1/5th the water of field grown crops and grows 3 to 100 times more food per acre (varies by crop).

Which one depicts a future in which humans have the potential to have more freedom to explore what it really means to be human, to expand ones education, to explore the arts, to enjoy living?

[joshcryer]

61. I completely agree with your vision of the future (#5). However, from my POV...

...the planet is in trouble due to the fact that our resources are running dry and that we simply are not building out long term solutions in time. GGs OP shows that a long term solution (one that would last effectively forever), is not very likely to happen.

So we need magic technology, such as replicators or some other thing that can automate the fuck out of shit and build out our energy infrastructure in a very short period of time (relative to our consumption of our fossil resources).

What good is that hydroponic garden (which I strongly advocate) when you don't have the energy for the LED lighting (higher yeilds require 24/7 lighting) or for the robots? :/

[Radical Activist]

20. This makes no sense.

1) We don't have 40 years.

2) There's no reason to assume that level of over-reliance on wind. It's not reliable as a baseload power supply if used alone.

3) Solar will be the most common peak power source.

4) Natural Gas will be used as a compliment to wind to compensate for wind's lack of reliability. It will move up to at least 30% of the power supply, much of which is unused capacity that's already built.

Assuming that we'll ever have more than half of our power supply coming from wind is unrealistic. It makes this exercise pointless.

[joshcryer]

22. The most credible scenarios makes wind the most common power source.

GG just took it a little further. His numbers are actually, for a turbine by turbine basis, less than what Jacobson says will be required (mainly because his growth numbers are hilariously small).

[Radical Activist]

25. We should assume no growth.

Energy efficiency and conservation will be the most significant source of CO2 reduction.

Going from 50% to 90% reliance on wind power is not a "little" further.

[NickB79]

43. "We should assume no growth"

2.5 billion Chinese and Indians striving to emulate a US lifestyle would beg to differ.

[TheWraith]

29. The economic and production numbers are far worse for solar than for wind.

I'm not saying I subscribe to all of GG's numbers, but the fact of the matter is that wind is the only form of "renewable" energy that is both tested and scales well. Hydro is more reliable, but can't be scaled the same way.

If the numbers don't work for wind, they're going to be several times worse for solar. Bank on it.

[Radical Activist]

30. That's why solar makes sense as a peak power supply.

No one said it would be cheap, but don't you think it's worth the initial investment? Besides, everything looks cheaper once we stop subsidizing coal.

[TheWraith]

31. No, it is absolutely not worth the initial investment.

Solar is unreliable too. It doesn't work when it's cloudy or raining. With that in mind, building enough solar to provide peak power would be half a dozen times more expensive than building enough of some other clean form of energy.

[Radical Activist]

32. So what other form of renewable energy

has its highest output on hot summer days when power demand is high and wind speed is low?

[TheWraith]

45. Let me put it this way: a central air conditioning system draws 3500 watts.

A solar system that can produce 3500 watts costs more than $20,000. Now compare that to wind power, which costs about a quarter as much per watt in bulk. Even if you shipped that electricity long distance, say from 300 miles away where it WAS windy, you're still seeing more electricity for vastly less money than you would get with a solar system.

[Terry in Austin]

66. Then we can't assume central air in the scenario, can we?

"Requirements" are negotiable.

All of this is about clinging to a wish to keep BAU when there's no longer enough petroleum to fuel it.

[diane in sf]

33. Solar does work in fog and underclouds, the output drops, but it still generates power

[TheWraith]

46. And in doing so it makes bad economics truly terrible. nt

[diane in sf]

49. Home owners all over the west side of San Francisco are quite happy with the economics of their

solar electricity.

[wtmusic]

21. Conclusion: we must call on nuclear power to help. nt

[GliderGuider]

26. Here's a look at the costs and installation rates for this model.

As a way of clarifying the scale of the task in my own mind, I decided to see what the installation rates and costs were for this model. In this post I present the results of that analysis.

I use the same basic assumptions here as in the OP: the goal is to replace 90% of fossil fuels with wind power, keeping hydro and nuclear contributions intact. It's worth remembering that even though I'm using wind power in this example, the technology doesn't matter - it could include CSP, PV, tidal, hydro in any mix. The important thing is that the model replaces 90% of all fossil fuels (including gasoline, diesel fuel, aviation fuel, natural gas and coal) with electricity. For the purposes of this model, the only difference between the various renewable generating technologies would be capital cost and life cycle. Using one technology like wind is a simplification technique to make the model manageable.

Since the build-out rate is chosen to reach the target by 2050, the logistical differences between various renewable technologies aren't considered, though they would obviously be a factor in real life.

Instead of assuming a simple linear build-out, I approximated a logistical function. The build rate starts where it is today, ramps very rapidly to achieve the majority of the installations in the middle period from 2025 to 2040, then drops off as the capacity requirement approaches saturation. The logistical curve isn't built mathematically, there is no point to that for such a hypothetical exercise. Instead it was constructed by hand in Excel to fit the curve between the known start point (today) and the desired endpoint (32 million MW of wind capacity in 2050).

The first graph shows the growth of cumulative generating capacity over the period of the program (2010 to 2050) plus an additional 10 years beyond that.



The next graph shows the installation of new turbine capacity over time. It peaks in 2033 at a bit under 2 million megawatts of capacity, or 400,000 turbines.



The installation of new capacity isn't the only installation activity, though. As the program goes into its second half, the turbines that were installed 20 years before are coming to the end of their life cycle and need to be replaced. While some of the old materials will be re-used, these replacements count as new construction. The difference is that this activity remains constant even after the goal of 32 million MW has been reached. In fact, it continues in perpetuity. No new capacity is added by these installations, their purpose is simply to maintain the existing generating capacity. At the end of the program 40 years hence there are two end-of-life replacement cycles under way - the one for the new turbines that were installed 20 years before, and the one for the replacement turbines also installed 20 years ago.

The ongoing life cycle replacement requires the installation of 3,200,000 MW of capacity - 640,000 turbines - every year forever (or as long as we use this power source).



When we combine the new installations with the life cycle replacements we get the following curve. It looks much like the life cycle replacement graph, but shifted forward in time, and with the rising portion of the curve considerable steeper.



How much is all this going to cost? The current cost estimates I used are European, from EWEA. They translate to $1.68/watt in US dollars. I factored in an ongoing 1% per year drop in costs that brings the cost down to $1.00/watt by 2060.

The program cost peaks in 2040 at about $4 Trillion annually. The total program cost to 2050 is $100T, with ongoing life cycle replacement costs of about $3T to $3.5T annually after that. These are just the capital cost of turbine manufacture and installation, they don't include changes to the grid required to accommodate variability or to permit the integration of such a high proportion (60%+) of highly variable wind power.



Next I considered how such costs would impact spending in other areas of the global economy. One way to get a feel for this is to consider the costs as a proportion of Gross Capital Formation. This is the proportion of GDP used to produce assets such as machinery. Global GDP is currently around $60T annually, but GCF accounts for only 22% of that (~$13.5T) - the rest is spent on services.

The impact of the program becomes very significant around 2025, rising to the level of a severe impact in 2030, and remaining severe from then on. Since the 25% or more of GCF consumed by this program is not available for other manufacturing investment this is bound to cause a lot of political resistance.



So there is a look at what a wind-only program to replace 90% of our fossil fuels would look like. It's a daunting task from a number of perspectives: material requirements, manufacturing and installation capacity development, and high expenditures required immediately and maintained in perpetuity. As I mentioned above, this thumbnail sketch doesn't include essential grid upgrades, and it also ignores the problems inherent in switching close to a billion cars from gas to electricity. Other issues that are not addressed include aviation and the military, both of which have unique requirements for combustible fuels; the question of how to promote the abandonment of sunk costs in functioning fossil-fuel infrastructure; and the social and political resistance to over 6 million wind turbines dotting the global landscape.

I hope others find this information useful.

[joshcryer]

27. Indeed it was. Thanks for posting.

[joshcryer]

28. I think this is why Jacobson talks about WWII-level industrial production.

But you really show it in numbers and diagrams just how utterly daunting the problem really is.

So OK we spend the next 30 years building out renewables. We'll be lucky if we reach 20% electrical penetration.

[Confusious]

34. My prediction is...

In 10 years, we'll still be talking about how renewables will save us.

[GliderGuider]

42. This model I've been banging on is definitely not achievable

20% renewable electricity might be conceivable over the next 30 or 40 years.

The trouble is, I think a scenario like I've described is what we actually need if we want to stabilize CO2 levels. 20% GHG-free electricity (even if it was all nuclear :evilgrin:)simply won't accomplish that.

I think that CO2 stabilization is a pipe dream until we actually start running out of fossil fuels. And that's not going to happen for a long time yet.

In the meantime, we need to keep the pressure on to increase renewable generation capacity by any means possible. It might be helpful if we got some perspective on the problem, though, and gave some thought to adaptation as well as mitigation.

[XemaSab]

35. Nice graphs

I'd like to point out that the first graph illustrates capacity and not generation and use.

I posit that the generation and use curve is not likely to follow the capacity model due to such factors as siting, distance to end users, and other factors.

Utilities and governments are likely to site wind farms first in windy areas, but then as available windy ridges get developed, more marginal sites will be chosen. The installed capacity of the windmill farm in Dead Air Valley might be the same as up on Mt. Galeforce, but the generation is lower. Furthermore, a wind farm in Timbuktoo would have greater transmission loss than a wind farm 5 miles off the coast of New York City.

In response to these factors, I suspect that the capacity and capacity installation curves would start out steeper and flatten out as there would be an initial rush to develop more accessible spaces followed by a slowdown in the market as ROI drops. This in turn would cascade into the cost estimates. (Wind would not have the same market response to scarcity as, say, oil does, because wind wouldn't be depleted, but I think the cost curves would still fluctuate.)

[GliderGuider]

36. That's a very good observation.

In light of all the factors that I didn't consider, all of which will add to the cost, this exercise - as discouraging as it is - should probably be considered a "best case" scenario.

[txlibdem]

38. The key point is that it CAN be done. Nobody said it would be easy - nothing worth doing is.

Take the capacity factor for wind turbines given by a previous poster, 23%. So in order to get 100% of our power from wind turbines we simply multiply the number of wind turbines by 4.35 to arrive at the actual number of wind turbines we will need. Also factor in that, at any given time, most of those turbines will be channeling their output to some kind of energy storage system so that when power is needed it will be available. That is the only way this could be workable, a reliable source of energy for our homes and industries.

Doable? Absolutely. Cheap or easy? Nope, but neither is sticking with the power sources we have today.

[GliderGuider]

39. What is your domain for the word "can"?

The answer to whether we "can" do it (or how much of it we can do) depends on whether you're speaking technically, logistically, economically or politically.

Even taking the simplest domain, the purely technical possibility, material requirements (like neodymium) and the complexity of universal active grid management make a scenario like this one improbable in the extreme. It may in fact be technically impossible.

Economically and politically (and for this purpose they may be essentially the same thing) I think it would be a complete non-starter. I haven't even addressed the issues of grid upgrades including additional capacity, active management and storage. It's entirely possible they could add another 50% to the cost of the program.

Then there's the issue that XemaSab identified, where all the low-hanging fruit gets picked first. As the program goes on the good spots are already taken and new capacity is increasingly expensive to install as a result. That could add another 50% or more to the estimate. It wouldn't surprise me at all to see the cost of an effective conversion to renewables balloon to $200T or more (in today's dollars) over the next 40 years.

I don't think anybody will be OK with that kind of expenditure, and it would be political suicide for a politician to propose such a thing. We can't get any agreement out of climate change conferences any more, so who in their right mind would propose investing spending 15 years' worth of total global capex to fix a problem they don't think exists?

As far as I'm concerned, "can" is one word that does not apply to this scenario.

[joshcryer]

50. I'm starting to agree with you about whether or not we can.

Highly and utterly improbable. Every post on E&E about renewable or even clean energy is a non-starter. A joke.

[txlibdem]

53. That depends on what the meaning of 'is' is?

Your pessimism is disheartening. Too much negative energy, man. :hippie:

Your argument can be used against doing anything at all. Ever. There are always excuses for not even trying. I prefer to make excuses to KEEP trying.

Look at the Human Genome mapping project. They thought it would take longer and be more expensive than it ended up being. After we made the decision to put our energies into actually DOING it, someone came up with a great idea that did the job faster, better and cheaper. The project succeeded with time to spare and came in under budget. The same thing will happen with a national call to switch to renewable energy.

When President Kennedy told the nation we were going to put a man on the moon a lot of people came up with every excuse under the sun for why it would NEVER work, it would bankrupt the nation, it's too hard, we don't have the resources. Now we can drink Tang whenever we want, use computers and a million other gadgets that would never have existed but for the President making that firm goal to put a man on the moon.

There are a million reasons to just stick with the status quo, keep using coal for our electricity, keep driving fossil fuel powered vehicles, etc., etc. I reject all those reasons. I reject all those excuses.

[GliderGuider]

55. Yes, we have different psychological approaches to this topic.

I am profoundly pessimistic about the probability that any globally significant action will be taken to combat CO2 emissions.

I'm all about realistic expectations based on a keen awareness of the actual situation, and when I see massively unrealistic expectations related to fixing CO2 production, I tend to use the big picture and numbers as an antidote. This applies just as much to nuclear as it does to wind, despite the brush kristopher likes to try and tar me with. My position that we should not take any low-GHG option off the table comes from my desire that we do whatever is possible to address a very urgent and immediate problem.

Ultimately though, my Advaita philosophy colours my response to everything. These days I'm much more about letting the future unfold on its own, letting destiny take care of itself.  I still think about ecological issues, and even population issues, but I have no desire left to change anything.  I find life utterly fascinating just as it is. As a result I see threads like this as play, and I enjoy them hugely as such.

There is a singular lack of shoulds and shouldn'ts in my life. In their place I find a lot of "is" -- as in, "it is what it is, things are as they are, and everything is perfect in its imperfection."  I no longer feel that any outcome can be called better or worse than any other (even those things that are commonly called tragedies), and I certainly have no desire to try and ensure any particular outcome.  That goes as much for my own life as for the state of the world.  I find this to be a much more interesting way to live.

I'm moving toward a position that is 180 degrees out of phase with the basic motivation of our civilization: the driving need to understand, predict and control  Old habits die hard, of course, and understanding still seems to be on my agenda.  The urge to predict has thankfully faded, and the desire to control is gone.  So despite my ongoing interest in ecological issues, I don't think I'm going to be much of spokesman for anything, whether it's wind or nuclear power, or just plain old recycling.

I have no illusions about this position - it's not one most people are going to find palatable, and perhaps not even rational. Humanity has invested our sense of identity in our technological prowess and our ability to change the world. A few Advaita or Zen followers who choose to sit on the sidelines and say, "Wow, would you look at that!" aren't about to change anything. From my perspective adopting a more passive attitude is a good thing. I think that the cause of most problems is solutions, and have chosen as my motto, "Don't just do something, sit there!" A lot more reflection and a lot less action would do us all a lot of good, no matter how high the CO2 goes.

[txlibdem]

57. The reed

"The green reed which bends in the wind is stronger than the mighty oak which breaks in a storm."
— Confucius

As an Asperger's sufferer I don't have the ability to do that. I sometimes wish I could...

[GliderGuider]

58. I get it.

It's much better for someone with Asperger's to keep a positive attitude. I've known doomers with Asperger's and it's not a pretty sight. In fact it's psychologically catastrophic. I'm glad you're working to improve things.

You've just given me another reason to count my blessings. Thanks!

:hi:

[Odin2005]

69. Why do you think I have a positive attitude?

:)

[Odin2005]

68. Heh, this Aspie is full-blown Transhumanist. GO TECHNOLOGY!

[GliderGuider]

70. I'm rooting for gray goo!!!

In Gray Goo, All becomes One...

Once we undergo technological autolysis, we will finally have a chance at butterfly-hood.

[Odin2005]

71. LOL, That post is so pessimist it's full of WIN!

:D

[joshcryer]

72. It already happened.

It's us. :)

[Odin2005]

74. LOL!

:spray: :rofl:

[joshcryer]

73. Not to be a debbie downer here, but GG makes a very good point about resource utilization.

Can we go to full on renewables before the exhaustable resources run out? Will we? Are we?

[kristopher]

40. Only *8%* of people prefer nuclear over renewables - 8 % .

Nuclear power is failing because the reality is that it IS a POOR choice to meet our climate change and energy security needs.

Renewables are surging because the ARE a GOOD choice to meet our climate change and energy security needs.

Nuclear supporters realize they cannot convince an informed public that nuclear is good when it isn't, so they set about trying to tear down support for renewables by creating tripe like the OP.

This is a thread typical of what you can find every day on sites lie freerepublic or those of right wing radio stations.

What does real science tell us? That on a "per dollar" and "per unit of time" basis, renewable energy sources deliver more energy and more carbon reductions than nuclear power does.

Without the problems of nuclear waste, spreading nuclear weapons to every corner of the planet, or the potential high consequences of a failure of nuclear technology.

[GliderGuider]

41. What does that have to do with this thread?

The thread is about the feasibility and scale of installing the renewable infrastructure that is everyone's fondest dream. The only reference I made to nuclear power was about not getting rid of existing infrastructure. A project like this will have enough sunk-cost issues to deal with just in the fossil fuel arena.

Do you have any substantive comments about what I actually wrote?

[kristopher]

44. What you wrote isn't "substantive" enough to merit anything more than a discussion...

...of your goals and intentions.

It is a sloppy, lopsided piece of propaganda designed to create negative feelings for renewable energy in order to enhance the position of nuclear power in the public mind.

This IS substantive comment.

[GliderGuider]

47. Well, I'm not going to fight you over your opinion.

Judging from the language of your posts you seem to be carrying a lot of charge over something or other. Don't let it eat you up, OK?

[Nihil]

48. SPAM spam spam spam ... (n/t)

:eyes:

[joshcryer]

51. Now do nuclear.

Then figure out which one requires more materials.

[joshcryer]

52. And use LFTR in your calculation, it could make things really interesting.

And you'd certainly get more responses from the anti-nukers.

[GliderGuider]

54. Oh what the hell. In for a penny, in for a pound.

I just know I'm going to regret doing this :-(

Let me say at the outset that as far as I can tell, nuclear power is every bit as unlikely to take over from fossil fuels as wind.

However, the cost numbers for nuclear power are at least much better than they were for wind. The following scenario uses the assumptions in the OP for the amount of electrical power needed, and simply replaces the wind turbines with nuclear plants.

We would need to have about 7500 nuclear plants with an average capacity of 1000 MWe operating by 2050. The total overnight cost of the build program would range from $22.5 trillion (assuming a cost of $3,000/KW) to $45 trillion at $6,000/KW.

The life cycle graph is interesting. Because the lifespan of a reactor is 40 years or more, and the build program lasts 40 years, the life cycle replacement program is identical to the build program, prododucing a sine wave of builds on a 40 year period.

The following graphs show the build and life cycle patterns for plant construction and cost, with the following assumptions:

• The overnight cost of plant construction in today's dollars is set at $5,000 per kilowatt. This is at the upper end of the range quoted by the nuclear industry, and is far above actual costs in places like Japan and Korea.
  
• The costs are assumed to be constant, rather than declining over time as with the wind case.
  
• The cost of fuel is not included - this is just for the build program.
  
• Technology is not considered, but is assumed to be similar to today.

This program is easier on the capital budget than the pure wind scenario, even with the maximizing assumptions made about costs. It is to be expected that as experience was gained and construction capacity increased, these costs would fall even further. I would also expect new, more efficient and lower cost technologies to be deployed over time if such a program was undertaken.

On the other hand (and off the top of my head)…

• Nuclear power has a much higher level of perceived risk compared to wind. IMO people are making the wrong risk comparison by comparing it to wind instead of fossil fuels, but that's the reality of the situation.
  
• Nuclear power is a product of an entrenched corporatocracy with strong military ties.
  
• The threat of proliferation and terrorism are real and would need serious scrutiny and safeguards.
  
• The program is dependent on humanity maintaining a high level of technological capability in perpetuity. This is not guaranteed.
  
• Nuclear power is much less granular than wind power: it's impractical to build a 1.5 MW nuclear plant, whereas putting up a single 5MW wind turbine is at least technically feasible.
  
• If we stick with today's technologies fuel availability and spent fuel storage become overwhelming problems very quickly.

In the end it will come down to public sentiment. That alone will delay such a program long enough to make it ineffective as a GHG mitigation strategy.

In the end we won't have wind and we won't have nuclear. What we will have is gobs of coal :-(

[joshcryer]

56. We need magic technology. :(

Glad I spent my youth learning survivalist techniques.

[GliderGuider]

59. No, we need some self-restraint as a species.

But since that is currently in short supply too, I guess I'll go throw another lump of coal in the grate...

[Dead_Parrot]

77. I'm going with Magic Tech, as being more likely.

Occam's razor. :)

[joshcryer]

78. I think we'll get it, but I can't say for sure if it'll be before, during, or after the...

...global resource hit.

[joshcryer]

60. Kick for the mind numbing truth of this.

[4dsc]

62. I see no mention of peaking oil production

I have the utmost respect for many things you have researched and written about over the years but I am afraid you are missing an inportant element here for you plan to become reality. And that missing element of course is oil or should I say the probably decline of oil production on a worldwide basis that will greatly effect the building of these wind plants. Even your own charts clearly point of a time, in the not so distance future, when oil production will be a fraction of what it is today. So I wonder how anyone would think we could possible build the number of wind plants you propose given that fact..

[joshcryer]

64. While absolutely true, the OP was an example of the industrial capacity...

...necessary to simply provide this energy from this source. Much more, much much more would be needed to get the job done. You need a smart grid, you need all electric vehicles (and maybe magical battery technology that doesn't exist yet). The list goes on and on.

[joshcryer]

65. See my post #61 which ties in to this:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=262714&mesg_id=264037

It's almost a given from what the OP writes.

[GliderGuider]

67. You misread the intent of the post.

I'm not proposing any plans.

I think plans that require a massive, rapid shift to renewable energy in order to maintain BAU in the face of the imminent collision of Peak Oil, climate change, ecological collapse and economic meltdown are exercises in self-delusion. It ain't gonna happen.

I'm endlessly fascinated by the psychological ploys that people develop to keep themselves buoyed up in the face of this subliminal realization. That includes the cornucopians' denial of reality and clinging to the world, as well as the doomers' "Dark Night of the Soul", full of despair and self-justifying suffering. There is no need for any of it. Accept what is, accept that change is inevitable and welcome it, no matter what form it takes.

It is possible to awaken from the dream.

[ishaneferguson]

80. Peacenik purpose

The peacenik reasons to go to renewable are:

• To avoid being a "white colonialist" by stealing petroleum, or
  
• To avoid destroying our economy and our dollar by paying cartel prices for oil, while also putting our young people in harm's way to "protect" or "take" the crude oil.