Hurricanes + Offshore Wind Farms

[Pipirr]

Why doesn't it happen? Is it because such plants are inherently too costly to ever turn a profit? Or is it because litigation risks (driven largely by overly zealous environmentalists) make private funding too risky for investors?

I don't know. Although Mr Burns managed to pull it off.

 

[mhaze]

Originally Posted by Ziggurat
Why doesn't it happen? Is it because such plants are inherently too costly to ever turn a profit? Or is it because litigation risks (driven largely by overly zealous environmentalists) make private funding too risky for investors?
​

I don't know. Although Mr Burns managed to pull it off.

Democratic Mayor of New York, Mario Cuomo ordered holes drilled in the Shoreham nuclear plant when it was completed and ready for use.

He destroyed a multi billion dollar facility. A true...progressive.

 

[mhaze]

Originally Posted by Ladewig
International Herald Tribune, April 2007 Quote:
... 108 megawatts an hour ...



??

Derate to 15-30% of the 108 to get actual watt hour/year production.

 

[Wildy]

Derate to 15-30% of the 108 to get actual watt hour/year production.

Evidence?

 

[fsol]

The energy in wind rises as the cube of the wind's velocity; so wind at 35m/s (hurricane force) has 43 times more energy in it than wind at 10m/s (a good stiff wind, enough to invert your umbrella). So in theory the bonanza would be gigantic; 1 day of operation in a hurricane would give you as much energy as 43 really really good days.

Unfortunately the wind force is simply so high that when the wind exceeds about 25m/s it is necessary to feather the blades and lock them down. Typically windmills are designed for survive wind speeds up to 60m/s; something that might happen once every 50 years or so. This is why designs with a few thin, long and narrow blades spinning very quickly are generally adopted. However, there was an incident in Japan in which the blades were snapped off by a wind of 32m/s; it was believed that the blades had been weakened by lightning strikes.

If you don't feather the blades and the braking mechanism fails, this is what happens. Rather spectacular.

It is the rate of change of the winds kinetic energy that goes with the cube of velocity, so power not energy.

 

[fsol]

??

I think it is meant to read megawatts without the "per hour" part. That would make them 3 MW machines.

 

[dahduh]

It is the rate of change of the winds kinetic energy that goes with the cube of velocity, so power not energy.

If you like, if you think of 'wind' as the mass flow per second past a point rather than a block of moving mass.

I would rather take issue with the International Herald Tribunes '108 megawatts an hour', which of course makes no sense at all...

 

[fsol]

If you like, if you think of 'wind' as the mass flow per second past a point rather than a block of moving mass.

The power in the wind is defined as the rate of change of kinetic energy passing at right angles through a given area. For a wind turbine that is the swept area of the turbine. So power available to the turbine is 1/2 * roe * A * U^3 You can start with kinetic energy and derive it yourself in a couple of lines or so.

It really is not the same thing as energy. If you can show that energy of the wind goes with the cube of velocity that would be pretty clever.

I would rather take issue with the International Herald Tribunes '108 megawatts an hour', which of course makes no sense at all...

Most journalists don't know the first thing about "sciencey" things. It is no big surprise and it isn't the first example of weird units I have seen in a newspaper where energy is concerned.

 

[mhaze]

Originally Posted by mhaze
Derate to 15-30% of the 108 to get actual watt hour/year production.
​

Evidence?

Evidence? Wind does not run continous at max rated capacity.

 

[Wildy]

Evidence? Wind does not run continous at max rated capacity.

Well actually I mean that the amount you said to derate by is actually the right amount.

 

[Foolmewunz]

Democratic Mayor of New York, Mario Cuomo ordered holes drilled in the Shoreham nuclear plant when it was completed and ready for use.

He destroyed a multi billion dollar facility. A true...progressive.

Well, he was a Democrat. But he was the governor of the state. The Mayor of New York City has no say on issues concerning Long Island.

And the 6 billion pricetag is not the reality/value of the plant, it's the amount of money pumped into the boondoggle. Between NRC rewrites after 3 Mile Island and Chernobyl, the local cartage and cement contracts by guys named Vinnie and Guido, and the unbelievable length of time that the whole debacle took, the price was inflated over fifty fold what the plant should have cost.

And, Cuomo was a governor, elected by the people who didn't want the plant there. He didn't crusade to pull the plug. The communities in Long Island were against it, as was the majority of the population when polled (I'm pulling that out of my butt, but I'm pretty sure it's accurate). In fact, the State is only footing the bill insofar as they had to take over LILCO, but the debt from Shoreham is being paid back with surcharges on the bills of those same consumers. Who's to argue with the will of the people. They didn't want it, they're willing to pay higher rates (and suffer carbon footprint negatives) for fossil fuel generated electricity, plus they're paying off the debt of Shoreham over thirty years.

Mario had very little to do with it.

 

[mhaze]

I gave a range. The correct number is in that range and dependant on specific site conditions.

 

[mhaze]

Well, he was a Democrat. But he was the governor of the state. The Mayor of New York City has no say on issues concerning Long Island.

And the 6 billion pricetag is not the reality/value of the plant, it's the amount of money pumped into the boondoggle. Between NRC rewrites after 3 Mile Island and Chernobyl, the local cartage and cement contracts by guys named Vinnie and Guido, and the unbelievable length of time that the whole debacle took, the price was inflated over fifty fold what the plant should have cost.

And, Cuomo was a governor, elected by the people who didn't want the plant there. He didn't crusade to pull the plug. The communities in Long Island were against it, as was the majority of the population when polled (I'm pulling that out of my butt, but I'm pretty sure it's accurate). In fact, the State is only footing the bill insofar as they had to take over LILCO, but the debt from Shoreham is being paid back with surcharges on the bills of those same consumers. Who's to argue with the will of the people. They didn't want it, they're willing to pay higher rates (and suffer carbon footprint negatives) for fossil fuel generated electricity, plus they're paying off the debt of Shoreham over thirty years.

Mario had very little to do with it.

Nonsense. Signing the order to perform the action of drilling the holes is exactly what he did.

Governor Mario Cuomo ordered holes drilled in the Shoreham nuclear plant when it was completed and ready for use.
​

Right on his being Gov. at that time.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

... 108 megawatts an hour ...

??

Derate to 15-30% of the 108 to get actual watt hour/year production.

It does not make sense to speak of watts per any unit of time, unless you are referring to a rate at which power production is increasing, which you are not.

Watts, as a unit, already include a per time component.

An ampere (a unit of electrical current) is one coloumb of electricity per second. If we were to compare this to the flow of fluids, speaking of electrical flow in amperes would be like speaking of fluid flow in something like gallons per minute, while the coloumb would be more comparable to a gallon of fluid.

Watts is current (in amperes) multiplied by voltage. Voltage is the force that makes electricity flow. Back to the fluid analogy, this would be comparable to a pressure that we might measure in units such as pounds-per-square-inch. Multiply the rate at which electricity flows (in amperes) by the force which is causing it to flow (in volts) and you have the actual power represented by that flow of electricity — the ability to do real work — in watts.

But power already includes the “per time” component, so it makes no sense to talk about megawatts per hour.

As an added note, watts and horsepower are different units to measure the same thing. Traditionally, we've tended to use horsepower when talking of mechanical power, and watts when talking of electrical power, but the units are interchangeable. One horsepower is equal to approximately 746 watts.

 

[geni]

Please enlighten everybody with the ratio of your alleged subsidies, nuclear vs. renewables in capital cost and or per delivered kilowatt hour. Oh, throw in all those alleged Big Oil subsidies. Let's see some facts.

In the case of the nuclear industry no one is really sure although the insurence industry seems to think it's effectively infinit.

Nuclear Decommissioning Authority estimates cost of decommissioning existing nuclear plants at £70 billion. But that is a pretty rough estimate. With the time scales involved and what are in some cases very long term issues exact cost estimates are tricky.

For oil you would first need to specify which oil.

 

[lomiller]

But power already includes the “per time” component, so it makes no sense to talk about megawatts per hour.

True but electricity is commonly billed in Watt hours (or MWh for large scale) , which of course is different then watts and hour but unless you understand the relation between power and energy it’s easy to make mistakes with the units. It seems to me that's all that was going on here.

 

[mhaze]

It does not make sense to speak of watts per any unit of time, unless you are referring to a rate at which power production is increasing, which you are not.

Watts, as a unit, already include a per time component.

An ampere (a unit of electrical current) is one coloumb of electricity per second. If we were to compare this to the flow of fluids, speaking of electrical flow in amperes would be like speaking of fluid flow in something like gallons per minute, while the coloumb would be more comparable to a gallon of fluid.

Watts is current (in amperes) multiplied by voltage. Voltage is the force that makes electricity flow. Back to the fluid analogy, this would be comparable to a pressure that we might measure in units such as pounds-per-square-inch. Multiply the rate at which electricity flows (in amperes) by the force which is causing it to flow (in volts) and you have the actual power represented by that flow of electricity — the ability to do real work — in watts.

But power already includes the “per time” component, so it makes no sense to talk about megawatts per hour.

As an added note, watts and horsepower are different units to measure the same thing. Traditionally, we've tended to use horsepower when talking of mechanical power, and watts when talking of electrical power, but the units are interchangeable. One horsepower is equal to approximately 746 watts.

Wikipedia beckons.
Capacity factor

Since wind speed is not constant, a wind farm's annual energy production is never as much as the sum of the generator nameplate ratings multiplied by the total hours in a year. The ratio of actual productivity in a year to this theoretical maximum is called the capacity factor. Typical capacity factors are 20-40%, with values at the upper end of the range in particularly favourable sites.[12][13] For example, a 1 megawatt turbine with a capacity factor of 35% will not produce 8,760 megawatt-hours in a year (1x24x365), but only 0.35x24x365 = 3,066 MWh, averaging to 0.35 MW. Online data is available for some locations and the capacity factor can be calculated from the yearly output.[14][15]

 

[Bob Blaylock]

But power already includes the “per time” component, so it makes no sense to talk about megawatts per hour.

True but electricity is commonly billed in Watt hours (or MWh for large scale) , which of course is different then watts and hour but unless you understand the relation between power and energy it’s easy to make mistakes with the units. It seems to me that's all that was going on here.

Watt hours, of course, is watts multiplied — not divided — by hours. That makes sense. Basically, it cancels out the “per hour” component of watts, and gets you back to an absolute quantity of energy rather than a rate at which is is being used.

 

[burrahobbit]

The Dutch project at 272 mill$ for 108MW costs around 40% more per MW than a similar land based wind farm . Offshore wind being more steady would probably provide around 10-15% more power per MW installed making the farm maybe 20-25% more expensive than the land based alternative (Dont bother making the numbers match- Wind farm project costs and generation are so site specific that comparision across projects is tough)

Keep in mind that the current offshore farms are the first generation. Expect to see prices drop as more farms go in. How much did the first Generation of Nuclear reactors cost? The firs generation of TVs?

ALL power is subsidised in some way or another. Coal and Gas are subsidised by the future generations who have to deal with the CO2 and manage without the raw materials. Nuclear likewise. Renewables are subsidised by the present.

 

[mhaze]

No, that's too vague to be useful. That's like saying "All vehicles are dangerous, therefor all drivers should wear helmets". In the real world, we know that perhaps motorcycle drivers should wear helmets.

Looks like not only is wind energy multiple times more expensive even after utilities are forced to buy it, even after governments provide huge tax incentives for it, but it has killed some 50 people:

Here is a rather interesting accident list.

By the way - how many turbines would it take say to get 5% of the energy of the US from wind? A hundred thousand? If we extrapolated the death count from current numbers, what would that be?