Oil in "clean green" wind turbines

Of course there has to be some oil for the blade control systems (pitch, yaw, and braking) and the turbine gears, but how much, before it's hard to keep calling it "clean and green"?

In the "Spillage Prevention and Control" section of the Kittitas Valley (Washington) Wind Power Project Application (available here), the expected maximum quantities are described for each of the 1.5-MW turbines planned:

• cooling fluid (glycol & water) for the generator, 50 gallons
• lubricating oil for the gears, 105 gallons
• hydraulic oil for the blade control systems, 85 gallons
• mineral oil to cool the transformer at the base of each turbine, 500 gallons

In addition, the transformers (1 or 2) at the substation connecting the facility to the grid will each contain up to 12,000 gallons of mineral oil. All of these fluids have to be periodically replaced. Several 50-gallon drums of replacement oils, and of waste oils, will be stored at the site.

Planners in Valencia, Spain, admit the likelihood of spills as well as the dripping and flinging off of these and other fluids (see here). Older transformers may also contain PCBs.

Can you say NIMBY?

A story in today's Burlington Free Press ("Winds of controversy blow in Shelburne," by Matt Crawford) describes the wealthy Vermont community of Shelburne's opposition to a small wind turbine that Jon Fishman wants to put up at his home.

'At the heart of the Shelburne discussion is how a 116-foot-high wind tower that resident Jon Fishman wants to build on his secluded Quaker Smith Point property will fit in with the surrounding lakeshore scenery.

'Fishman, the drummer of the defunct rock band Phish, wants to build a 10-kilowatt turbine to provide electricity to his home. He says one big reason he splurged on the 18-acre lot on the Lake Champlain shore is because it's perfectly suited for renewable energy like wind and solar power.

'Shelburne town officials and neighbors have raised flags of concern about Fishman's vision for a turbine.'

One of the troubled citizens is Bruce Lisman, who is building a house about a mile away. Lisman is a director of Vermont's largest utility, Central Vermont Public Service, whose subsidiary Catamount Energy is involved in large wind projects throughout the U.S. and in Europe, including the 27-turbine 48,600-kilowatt project proposed for Glebe Mountain in Londonderry, Vermont.

Residents around Glebe Mountain oppose the installation of the 387-foot-high turbines, each 131-foot blade chopping one and a quarter acres of air, along with the lights and noise, clearing of forest, new roads, concrete foundations, transformers, and power lines required. By the time the developers actually apply for a permit, they will possibly have upgraded their plan to even larger models. The opponents of thus industrializing our ridgelines are derided as NIMBYs, concerned only with keeping their views pristine. Their concern for the wild mountain habitat is mocked as shortsighted because global warming and acid rain do even more damage (though even the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change admits that wind power has little to contribute towards mitigating those problems). Supporters of the project even call the giant industrial assemblies beautiful and question the aesthetic development of its opponents (see, e.g., the earlier post "Wind turbines = Nazi flag"; also see earlier post about the NIMBY charge).

Now Bruce Lisman "is uncomfortable about what a wind turbine on the shores of Lake Champlain would look like" -- a single home-sized turbine with 11-foot blades. Like George Bush's argument that we have to send people to Iraq to be killed so we don't get killed here, Lisman's magical thinking seems to be that we need to build giant power plants on far-away (from him) ridges so he doesn't have to see even one puny turbine anywhere near his back yard.

Ha.

Coke versus Pepsi: It's all in the head

A new study shows there is no difference between the Republican and Democratic parties, only marketing. Studying brain activity scans, the choice between Coke and Pepsi was found to be primarily cultural. As Peter Diamondstone, Liberty Union candidate for Vermont governor, recently remarked on Vermont Public Radio's "Switchboard," the Democrats and Republicans are the good cop/bad cop faces of our single-party corporatist government, which one is which being the "choice" allowed each voter.

They don't like it, but there are other choices, Ralph Nader for one.

The myths of wind power

Promoters of industrial-scale wind power often provide lists of criticisms which they helpfully dispatch as "myths." In fact, the myth making is in their answers to these charges. Here, for example, is the "top 5" list at the Greenpeace-sponsored Yes2Wind web site, all of them well documented valid complaints.

1. Wind turbines spoil the landscape
2. Wind turbines kill lots of birds
3. Tourists hate wind farms
4. Wind turbines are noisy
5. Wind power isn't reliable

Comments:

1. Obviously they spoil the landscape. They are huge man-made erections. Even if you think they are beautiful kinetic sculptures, you don't have the right to fill natural landscapes with them.

2. They kill bats, too. And their noise and vibration drives away animals on the ground, not to mention people and animals in nearby homes and farms. Remember that a viable wind "farm" requires dozens of turbines, each requiring about 50 acres of space, its blades chopping over an acre of air at well over 100 mph. At night they must be lit.

3. Hate may be an extreme word, but tourists sure don't love them. Nobody who makes a long trip to enjoy some unspoiled nature is going to be thrilled to see a wind farm instead. Even if they think it's "cool," they are likely to seek a different vacation spot next time. Several visitor centers at wind plants in the U.K. have already closed for lack of business.

4. The state of Oregon changed their noise regulations because wind power facilities couldn't be built in rural areas. Now the rules say that if it's not a disturbing level of noise in the city then it isn't disturbing in the country, either. Except, of course, it still is.

5. As long as you make sure the sustained wind speed at the nearest wind plant is above 30 mph when you turn on your computer, it will indeed be a good source of energy. If it goes above 60, though, quick, turn it off, because the turbine has to shut down. If it dips below 30, better have the backup power going, because the power generated falls off exponentially.

Cape Wind turbines will be over 400 feet high

Two articles in today's Boston Globe talk about the Cape Wind project proposed for 24 square miles between Cape Cod and Nantucket. They provide different figures for the size of the towers in question, however.

Beth Daley's article about the Army Corps of Engineering report currently being reviewed cites the "246-foot turbines." Eileen McNamara's commentary about the short-lived effort in the joint armed services committee to halt off-shore development until federal guidelines are in place describes "130 turbines, 147 feet tall."

246 feet is in fact only the likely hub height, and 147 feet is apparently a typographical error and should be 417 feet. Though none of this information is on their web site, the Cape Wind proposal involves 3.6-MW turbines from GE, whose rotors sweep a diameter of 341 feet (104 meters), an area of 2.1 acres. With a blade radius of 171 feet, the total height will therefore be 417 feet.

The Arithmetic of Renewable Energy

A recent paper has calculated how much new generating capacity would be required to convert the U.K.'s transport sector -- responsible for a third of the country's energy use -- to hydrogen manufactured from non-carbon fuel sources. Their conclusion is startling: 100,000 wind towers or 100 nuclear plants.

The wind towers if sited off shore would completely encircle the country in a 10-km-deep band. On shore, they would require a land area larger than that of Wales.

Their calculations assume the use of 3-MW turbines and a capacity factor of 50%. In fact, 30% is a generous figure for the capacity factor (it is what the British and American Wind Energy Associations use), and on-shore turbines are typically 1-1.5 MW in size, in rare cases approaching 2 MW. Larger turbines would be intolerable in most locations.

Further, they calculate from a density of 12 MW rated capacity per square kilometer, which is the figure from a pro-wind study prepared for Greenpeace. The giant installation proposed for the western Scottish island of Lewis has a density of 5 MW/km², and the huge facility proposed between Cape Cod and Nantucket island in the U.S. has a density of 6.7 MW/km².

So, roughly, we need to double these authors' conclusions to account for more realistic performance, double them again on shore for more typical turbine size, and double once more for actual installation density: over 800,000 towers, covering fully 80% of the land in the U.K., or 400,000 off-shore towers completely encircling the country in a band 36 km deep.

(The original paper, by Andrew Oswald, Professor of Economics, University of Warwick, and Jim Oswald, Energy Consultant, Coventry, is available as a 20-KB PDF by clicking the title of this post.)

Progressives as Pawns

Cannon Fodder for Kerry's War on Nader
By STEPHEN CONN

"The progressives and peace activists who are helping to stop Ralph Nader and Peter Miguel Camejo don't realize it but they are being used by people who represent the corporate interests, especially the military-industrial complex, of the two major parties," writes Conn.

The two-pronged attack -- to keep Nader off ballots and to attack him as a tool of the Republicans -- was planned during the Democratic convention. The Ballot Project's initial funding came from former Monsanto CEO and genetic-engineering proponent Robert Shapiro. It was started by Democratic insider lawyer William C. Oldaker, whose clients include the Bituminous Coal Association, Delta Air, Corning Glass, Equifax, and Neuralstem Biopharmaceuticals. The effort is being run in Ohio by Ken Starr's firm Kirkland and Ellis, defense attorneys for tobacco giant Brown and Williamson and General Motors. It is being run in Pennsylvania by Republican law firm Reed Smith, a favorite of the banking (29 of the 30 largest), drug (9 of the 10 largest), and advertising industries. They have battled Nader over advertising to children.

Conn points out that not only haven't journalists questioned the motives behind these and other firms committing hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of pro bono work to this effort, they haven't noted the complete silence from civil liberties groups who would normally oppose such activity.

United Progressives for Victory was started by Oldaker to handle the second prong of attack. The organizations use the same office space in Washington, at public relations firm Robert Brandon and Associates. Robert Brandon is a generous supporter of Utah Republican Senator Orrin Hatch, yet progressives unquestioningly sign on to his accusations that Nader is funded by Republicans to divide them. In fact, the Center for Responsive Politics has concluded that no more than 4% of Nader's monetary support comes from Republicans.

Another spokesman for both anti-Nader campaigns is former Monsanto official Toby Moffett, now lobbyist for the Cayman Islands, Turkey, Morocco, defense contractors Raytheon and Northup Grumman, and McDermott International, a Houston oil drilling firm interested in asbestos liability immunity. Moffett was instrumental in getting British company De La Rue the contract to print Iraqi money and passports.

"Anyone who reviews the published client lists (and glowing self-promotion) on the Livingston or The National Groups web sites will discover the anti-Nader crusade by The Ballot Project and United Progressives, designed and orchestrated by the Democrats, is also a very natural extension of both Oldaker's and Moffet's clients' desires to maintain and extend their corporate influence in either a new Kerry or a second Bush administration. ... Hatred of the progressive agenda and persistent public meddling by Ralph Nader in corporate matters also could be said to create a happy coincidence of self-interest between corporate clients with their attorneys' legal wars against Nader in the courts and in the press."

That progressives sit by silently or even sign on to these projects is despicable indeed.