Wind turbines are neither clean nor green and they provide zero global energy - by Matt Ridley, 2017
“Wind and photovoltaic solar are supplying less than 1 per cent of global energy demand. From the International Energy Agency’s 2016 Key Renewables Trends, we can see that wind provided 0.46 per cent of global energy consumption in 2014, and solar and tide combined provided 0.35 per cent. Remember this is total energy, not just electricity, which is less than a fifth of all final energy, the rest being the solid, gaseous, and liquid fuels that do the heavy lifting for heat, transport and industry”
Link: Wind turbines are neither clean nor green
Problem With Wind Power
by Eric Rosenbloom
Link: Problem With Wind Power
Link: https://stopthesethings.com/
The Hidden Costs of Wind Electricity
A Report from George Taylor and Tom Tanton at the American Tradition Institute called The Hidden Costs of Wind Electricity asserts that the cost of wind power is significantly understated by the EIA’s numbers. In fact, says Taylor, generating electricity from wind costs triple what it does from natural gas.
That’s because the numbers from the EIA and wind boosters fail to take into account a host of infrastructure and transmission costs.
First off the windiest places are more often far away from where electricity is needed most, so the costs of building transmission lines is high. So far many wind projects have been able to patch into existing grid interconnections. But, says Taylor, those opportunities are shrinking, and material expansion of wind would require big power line investments.
Second, the wind doesn’t blow all the time, so power utilities have found that in order to balance out the variable load from wind they have to invest in keeping fossil-fuel-burning plants on standby. When those plants are not running at full capacity they are not as efficient. Most calculations of the cost of wind power do not take into account the costs per kWh of keeping fossil plants on standby or running at reduced loads. But they should, because it is a real cost of adding clean, green, wind power to the grid.
Taylor has crunched the numbers and determined that these elements mean the true cost of wind power is more like double the advertised numbers.
Link: Why It's The End Of The Line For Wind Power
9-Nov 2015 - David Cameron - Speech to the CBI annual conference : Investing in renewables isn't a 'costless exercise'
But there's something else that we need to be very concerned about and perhaps here with lots of businesses large and small is a good moment to mention it. We've got to keep people's bills down.
"Every subsidy for renewable energy if we're not careful ends up on the bill of a small businessman or business woman having to pay more for their energy, so this isn't a costless exercise investing in renewable energy. It does cost and the cost fall mostly onto small businesses and consumers.
"So we have to have a balance here. What do we need to secure green safe clean energy supplies and a proper balance in our electricity generation and what to we need to make sure our businesses are competitive.
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