The commies took up "green" issues as a means of spreading their vitriol. It's not about carbon, or saving the planet. It's about getting range rover driving capitalist pigs to live in caves with the rest of everyone.

If we stopped all this carbon nonsense right now, they'd find some other axe to grind, no doubt.

I worked alongside an IPCC scientist and Dr Sea Acidification from Plimuff Polyversity drinks in my local boozer.What disappointed me was that when I decided to have the global wombling argument with him (after a few pints) he lacked any sort of power of reasoning and finished with "If you had children, then you'd understand why". IPCC chap was also a christian fundamentalist nutter, probably best not to question his scientific integrity.....however, he did leave the IPCC because they weren't taking global warming seriously enough.

Total mad bastards who won't be happy until we're all back in the stone age.

Wind generator not turning, either no wind or too much, NG must use power from nuclear/fossil fuel plant Owner of wind generator still gets paid if too much wind causes stoppage. :confused:

Wind generator turning. NG takes power produced and pays owner. Fossil fuel plant on stand-by, burning coal/oil/gas to produce steam in case wind stops. Carbon emissions saved by wind power = 0. Carbon emissions created by wind power - manufacture of machine, concrete bases, transport and erection - anybody ever worked it out?

Net result - higher bills - we pay twice for the wind generated power. More carbon emissions. :curse:

I hear Carland Cross is to have some new bigger wind turbines delivered, which will nessesitate the widening of the entrance to the field. Level profiles have already been set ready for the digger.
Where's Don Quixote when you need him?.....living in number 10 I reckon.... :lol:

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I noticed they are basically growing them near chiverton roundabout

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Power has always been a mix of sources with different availability/control characteristics. e.g. nuclear for base load as it tends to get left in a fairly constant generating state for periods. Then a bit of coal, and a bit of very responsive gas. Then a spot of very responsive but low capacity pumped storage to fill some gaps. Renewables with unpredictable availability just fit into the mix. You just need to adjust the other sources to get the desired capacity according to demand.

There are a couple of anemometers and a couple of small wind generators along that stretch. Look at what they are doing.

Once, I drove passed and they were (carland) all going like hell and there was no wind, the hilarious thing was that one was pointing in the opposite direction to the others and blowing the wrong way!

No doubt there was an electrical fault, or I was in fact wrong and "The wind was blowing harder higher up" and there was some sort of a vortex (totally natural, of course) going on also.

I'm very pro a solution to this very real energy crisis, spinning wind turbines when there is no wind does not fit in with any of this. If the maths works and adds up to the exercise being worth it, I say cover all the moors everywhere with them. However, I suspect this merely benefits Huhne's dad (or which ever relation runs a factory) and the farmers getting paid to host them.....and of course the subsidy/quango train associated with the whole thing.

A lot of coal then !! The point being you decrease amount of coal by using renewables, but you will always need adjust other components of the energy mix to meet demand at a given point in time.

My point was that this tweaking has been going on before renewables, and will continue to go on with renewables. Indeed more tweaking is probably necessary, but I'm sure controls systems have come on in the last 40 years or so.

I don’t know a great deal about the electrical generation industry and the way in which power strategies are scoped.

I have the impression from what has been said so far that power from wind farms can only be effectively used in conjunction with a hydro power storage scheme – there are a number of these in Scotland and Wales and other hilly areas (usually to the chagrin of the locals). I can’t think of any other available power storage technologies for the moment - maybe somebody out there knows better.

So the wind blows and the power generated is used to pump water into a lake for use as an energy source later. That answers the problem of intermittent generation to a degree, but then the next question along the line is how many (or how many more) storage schemes are needed to do this as there are presumably a limited number of sites available. If the laws of thermodynamics have not been repealed, no pumped storage scheme can generate more energy than had originally been stored by pumping. (Ok, I know a lot of these schemes are located in valleys where the watershed is added to the total).

So where does that leave us?

Hey, maybe we can use the energy from wind generation to heat up the water in the mines….

http://www.theengineer.co.uk/news/vattenfall-and-partners-to-build-uk-norway-interconnector/1007283.article 

The pump storage schemes will be in Norway.

A lot of coal then !! The point being you decrease amount of coal by using renewables, but you will always need adjust other components of the energy mix to meet demand at a given point in time.

So how exactly do you reduce the amount of coal burned by using renewables? When the wind generators are supplying the NG the coal is still being burned to keep the steam available so that they can kick in when the unreliable wind changes.

Looking beyond the screen which the occupants of Westminster have tried to erect it can be seen that in recent months the increased generation needed to cope with the cold snap was provided by increasing not gas, oil or nuclear but by COAL. The proportion rose from 35% to 47% in one week because it is still, despite all the negative bull***, the one source which has the flexibility of capacity to meet changing demand.

The fuel which had no markets 25 years ago is still very much in demand. And if half as much was spent on the development of CCS as on subsidies to landowners and carpetbaggers to erect those useless white follies we may yet be able to utilise our own resources, so gaining a bit of security until the problems with nuclear can be resolved.

OK, have spoken to offspring who informs me that wind turbines are not self starting due to blade/wind dynamics, they have to be motored up to speed, (by the main alternator) and pre-synchonised to grid frequeny. Why they run for long periods of no wind remains a mystery. 😉

This is interesting, as this is clearly not the case in Carland, Delabole or Chivvy cross wind farms.

When they are under power, they appear to be spinning at "the same rate" whereas when they are being driven by the wind, the rates of spin vary hugely. In my estimation, they appear to be turning at different rates, which would suggest there is some sort of inverter at work, unless they are playing hell with the national grid!

My engineer chum explained why they turned them at a given rate (due to motor heating) as they are probably not driven through the same inverter.

What is curious is that when they are clearly being spun by the grid, rather than the wind, the blades are not feathered.

This causes me to believe my "it's all surfers" conspiracy javascript:emoticon(':lol:'):lol:

During our brief conversation "up to speed and waiting for wind" was uttered. 😮

Stolen from Wiki.

"Some models operate at constant speed, but more energy can be collected by variable-speed turbines which use a solid-state power converter to interface to the transmission system."

Interesting. Are they synched up as a group first using a local controller and then and patched into the grid ?

Interesting. Are they synched up as a group first using a local controller and then and patched into the grid ?

Not sure really, if they are motored up via the alternator they are already 'in sync' and locked to grid frequency. I suppose they could operate between grid driven and wind driven with corresponding import/export of power in variable wind conditions.
It was less complicated when I worked at a multi engine diesel station as any engine not puling its weight, (for whatever reason) was auto tripped electrically to prevent engine/switchgear damage.

Suspect new kit is the latest thyristor/inverter magic and, as such, a complete mystery to me. 😉

Interesting. Are they synched up as a group first using a local controller and then and patched into the grid ?

That's an exceedingly valid comment.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/9234715/Wind-farms-can-cause-climate-change-finds-new-study.html  may be of interest to followers of this topic.

Dave

Or, to be balanced:

Telegraph decides to report the research as affecting climate,

whereas

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17871300 

BBC decide to report the same research as showing it only affects local weather.

re the turbines going when no wind and flat spots...there is a How Its Made video on Freeview 38 shwoing them bing made and the engineering is typical heavy duty stuff so its hard to believe the flatspotting theory.
The turbines on the hilltop just outside Halifax sometimes don't make a bit of power on those cold still winter days.

Deep watare heat exchange has been trialled all over but not many solve all the potential problmes.

The bad news for alternative energy is the mega coal strike in Australia that claims to have 200 years of reserves?