TRACKING THE WIND RUSH IN NORTH EAST ENGLAND AND SOUTH EAST SCOTLAND

MOORSYDE ACTION GROUP

Moorsyde Action Group (MAG) was wound up on 12 May 2010. The MAG website has since been closed and much of its information content transferred to this site.

‘SPAIN HALTS RENEWABLE SUBSIDIES TO CURB 31 BILLION OF DEBTS’

Bloomberg Businessweek, 27 January, 2012.

‘Jan. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Spain halted subsidies for renewable energy projects to help curb its budget deficit and rein in power-system borrowings backed by the state that reached 24 billion euros ($31 billion) at the end of 2011.

‘“What is today an energy problem could become a financial problem,” Industry Minister Jose Manuel Soria said in Madrid. The government passed a decree today stopping subsidies for new wind, solar, co-generation or waste incineration plants.

‘The system’s debts were racked up as revenue from state-controlled prices failed to cover the cost of delivering power. Costs have swollen in the past five years because of an increase in regulated payments for the power grid, support for Spanish coal mines and subsidies for renewable energy plants.

‘“It’s clear they have to make major cuts,” said Francisco Salvador, a strategist at FGA/MG Valores in Madrid. “The government has already ruled out a significant increase in prices, so the cuts will fall in many places and the spotlight is on renewables, but not just on renewables.”

[...]’

‘EXCESSIVE GERMAN WIND POWER OUTPUT STRAINS NEIGHBOURS’ GRIDS’

Reuters, 17 January 2012.

* EU neighbours expected to help at times of power tightness
* Costs for green power are accelerating when capital is tight

‘BERLIN, Jan 17 (Reuters) - Germany’s ambitious plan to transform its energy generation in favour of renewable sources is too costly and will place great strains on its neighbours, the chief executive of German utility RWE said on Tuesday.

‘The country’s fast closure of nuclear plants and move to wind and solar was already stressing transmission networks in neighbouring EU countries, Juergen Grossmann said in an address to the annual energy conference of daily newspaper Handelsblatt.

[...]’

‘EUROPEAN SERENGETI’ UNDER THREAT FROM TURBINE PARKS

The region of Extramadura has been described as ‘Europe’s Serengeti’, it shelters five species of eagles, three of vultures, two of storks, a critically important population of great bustards, 80,000 wintering cranes, Iberian Lynxes and many other important and threatened species. Spared from wind farms to date, it is the latest region of Spain to be threatened by wind speculators.

As many as 97 wind farm projects are in the pipeline, totalling 1,700 MW of headline capacity. Given the low winds prevailing in Extremadura, the average load factor could be as low as 15%, i.e. 255 MW. This is less than 50% of what can be produced, reliably, on demand, by a single gas-fired power plant (the gas-fired power stations are anyway being built to back up the huge expansion of wind parks). Bird experts are questioning whether it is worth seriously damaging Europe’s most important bird sanctuary for so little electricity.

Spain is already seeing huge numbers of migratory birds killed by turbines in regions such as Navarra. ¹

EXCESSIVE COSTS

In interviews on January 18th and 19th, José Manuel Soria, Minister of Industry, Energy and Tourism in the new Spanish government declared that there may anyway be no need in his country for more investment in renewable energy, at least for several years. ²

He said on ‘TVE Canal 24h’ that Spain has as much as 100,000 MW of generating capacity, while its peak demand is less than half that figure. This is why his Ministry is wondering, he announced, if Spain must keep adding new subsidised capacity.

The Minister also insisted that Spain must remain competitive in the global market. Its electricity, he said, costs on average more than that of France, one of Spain’s principal competitors, and this is hurting the Spanish economy.

Spain has accumulated a “tariff deficit” of 24 billion euros in subsidising renewables. This deficit is the difference between what electricity has cost to produce in recent years, and what has been charged to consumers. This has added to Spain’s sovereign debt and poor credit rating.

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¹ Gurulur (Navarra).
² ‘Soria duda de la necesidad de instalar más potencia eléctrica con prima’, Europapress, 19 January.
See also:
‘Spanish turnaround on renewable energy?’, WCN, on Wind Watch.

DAILY MAIL POLL

The Daily Mail asks whether we should build more wind turbines - tell them!

WORLD’S LEADING TURBINE MANUFACTURER CUTS ANOTHER 2,300 JOBS

It is reported that Danish turbine manufacturer Vestas is to cut another 2,300 jobs.

Vestas has repeatedly missed profit forecasts in recent years. Its stock lost more than a quarter of its value in Copenhagen trading in the third quarter of 2010 after it reported a larger-than-expected loss and then lost two thirds of its value in 2011. It is now at its lowest level since June 2003.

Last year Vestas announced that it would axe 3,000 jobs, 14% of its global workforce, and shut 4 production plants in Denmark and Sweden. The closures in Denmark represented one third of its domestic workforce.

Questions are now being raised about the future of the company’s CEO and there has been increasing speculation about a possible takeover.

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‘Vestas cuts over 2,000 jobs after profit evaporates’, Reuters, 12 January 2012.

E-PETITION: ‘REDUCE ELECTRICITY BILLS BY REFORMING THE SUBSIDIES FOR WIND FARMS’

This e-petition has overtaken more than 200 other petitions to become by far the most popular petition on the Department of Energy and Climate Change page. It stands a significant chance of reaching the 100,000 signature threshold for parliamentary debate.

Sign it now: E-petition website.

COLLAPSED TURBINE FIRM HAD COLLAPSED

The Swedish manufacturer of the 30.2m turbine that was collapsed for safety reasons at Bogan Farm, near Coldingham, after only two weeks in operation had itself collapsed into bankruptcy in October, 2011. ¹

The bankruptcy of Hannevind surprised many in the wind industry, as the Swedish firm was thought to provide a better quality product than many in the sector.

Simon Maden, of Maden Design, who erected the faulty turbine, stated in the local press that, “It looks like the turbine’s break [sic] mechanisms failed. All parties decided a controlled collapse was the way to go. If we ever found ourselves in the same situation again I wouldn’t do anything differently.

“Things were made more difficult by the fact the turbine manufacturers are no longer in business. We were only alerted to this recently and it meant we couldn’t go to them for any advice. I am satisfied the turbine was installed correctly and properly tested.” ²

PROVEN COLLAPSE

The Hannevind insolvency follows on the failure of Scottish turbine manufacturer Proven Energy, which went into receivership in September 2011 after serious faults occurred in its flagship P35-2 model, forcing the company to suspend sales and warn customers to stop using the 12kW turbine.

Hundreds of customers, such as Defra at Alnwick, have had their turbines shut down for months. Proven has now been sold to the Irish construction group Kingspan who are not assuming any responsibility for previously sold turbines.

As well as problems with the rotor heads there now seems to be a question mark over the towers that the P35-2 turbines are built on. A machine at Snarness, on Shetland, suffered a catastrophic failure of its tower in December last year.

It was reported in October that Scottish wind turbine installer Icon Energy had gone into receivership “as a direct result” of Proven ceasing to trade. ³

INSTABILITY IN SMALL WIND SECTOR

A number of commentators within the wind industry think that the business model for many companies in the small wind sector is not sustainable and that further bankruptcies will occur.

A recent article in Recharge News reported that many smaller turbines have inherent design issues, are not living up to expectations and that, “... action by disappointed small turbine turbine owners may ultimately push many local installers into bankruptcy”. ⁴

According to Ben Cosh, managing director of the installation specialist TGC Renewables, “Fundamentally, wind at low height is quite complex and turbulent, and these turbines need to be based on much more complicated [simulations] than the design engineers are currently using.

‘“They design a turbine in their computer system which looks lovely, then they put it in the real world and it breaks.”

This view is supported by many examples of turbine failure reported in the wind industry press. Recently, 3 Evoco turbines on farms in the Huddersfield area of Yorkshire suffered catastrophic blade failure in one day. ⁵

A 32.4m (112.2 ft) Endurance E-3120 turbine is reported as suffering a catastrophic collapse near Shrewsbury, Shropshire on 19 January, 2012. ⁶

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¹ ‘Hannevind Vindkraft AB’, Bloomberg Businessweek.
² ‘Turbine brought down due to mechanical failure’, Berwick Advertiser, 18 December, 2011.
³ ‘Turbine installer Icon Energy hit by Proven collapse’, BBC News, 14 October 2011.
⁴ ‘Scots bid to keep Proven local as small wind faces sceptics’, Recharge News, 21 September, 2011.
⁵ ‘Wind turbines ripped apart by gale force winds in Hudddersfield’, Huddersfield Daily Examiner, 6 January, 2012.
⁶ ‘More trouble with wind turbines’, Shropshire Star, 20 January, 2012.

TURBINE OUTPUT AGAIN COLLAPSES IN GALES

Wind power has repeatedly been demonstrating its propensity for erratic and unpredictable production as gales have swept across the UK this winter. Unlike previous winters when we have seen a failure to produce any significant amounts of power during periods of peak demand due to lack of wind, we have seen gale force winds causing onshore and offshore turbine parks to trip out of production across the country.

On 3 January, there were periods with a gap between the short term forecast and realised output of up to an astonishing 3,300MW, nearly 85% of total metered wind capacity in the UK.

On 13 December the gap was over 2,000MW.

Less than a week before, on 7 and 8 December there was a gap between short term forecasts and actual production of up to 2,483MW.

TURBINE DAMAGE

As turbine output crashed, reports were starting to filter in of various turbine failures across the country.

In December, these varied from a major fire at a wind park near Ardrossan, the collapse of a 30m turbine with brake failure near Coldingham, in the Borders, and numerous reports of blade damage to farm turbines all over Scotland.

Other failures have been reported in the latest blow, with, for example, 3 Evoco turbines losing blades near Huddersfield.

CURTAILMENT PAYMENTS?

We have yet to hear details of any curtailment payments. In previous high wind episodes, major turbine operators in Scotland have been paid up to twenty times their normal earnings to shut down, even when they might anyway have been forced to shut down by high wind speeds (see below).

BBC ‘PANORAMA’ QUESTIONS WIND COSTS

‘What’s Fuelling Your Energy Bill?’, broadcast on Monday, 7 November, 2011, builds on a number of recent reports by economists, banks, energy experts and learned bodies which question the efficacy and affordability of the Government’s wind-based renewables policy. This is being paid for through massive production subsidies that are concealed in domestic and industrial energy bills.

The programme again exposes the way that, according to Professor Sir David King, Government Chief Scientific Advisor, 2002-2007, Tony Blair signed up to EU carbon targets without understanding the difference between electricity and energy.

This was subsequently exacerbated by unilateral UK targets embodied in the Energy Act, 2008.

According to economists, the UK now bears by far the highest cost burden of all EU countries in meeting carbon targets: around a quarter of the cost across the whole EU.

The programme examines the contribution of renewables subsidies to rising energy bills which are damaging industrial performance and seeing a very rapid rise in the numbers of households in fuel poverty.

‘SCOTTISH GREEN ENERGY PLAN UNREALISTIC, REPORT WARNS’

‘Institution of Mechanical Engineers joins Citigroup in criticising aim to provide all electricity from renewables within nine years’

The Guardian, 3 November 2011.

‘Alex Salmond’s goal of meeting all Scotland’s electricity needs with green sources by 2020 has been attacked for the second time in a week for lacking credibility.

‘In a highly critical report, the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (Imeche) said the first minister’s target was poorly worked out, uncosted and unrealistic.

[...]’

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Institution of Mechanical Engineers (Imeche), ‘Scottish Energy 2020? A target too far?’, November 2011. (Report download page).

FUEL POVERTY AND WIND SUBSIDIES

The head of the Government's Fuel Poverty Advisory Group says the Coalition is underestimating the scale of the problem. Derek Lickorish said: “The situation is dire and the Fuel Poverty Advisory Group is extremely concerned.

“We’re looking at 6.6m households in the UK in fuel poverty by the end of this year compared to 2m in 2004.¹

Meanwhile the government budget to fight fuel poverty has been slashed from around £300m to £110m. The Advisory Group has called for the funding to be reinstated.

WARNINGS ABOUT WIND POWER COSTS

Many experts have been warning government for years about the impacts of green taxes and sky-high renewables subsidies, in particular the Renewables Obligation, on fuel poverty.

Professor Sir David King, former arch-Windy and Government Chief Scientific Advisor, 2002-2007, told BBC Radio 4’s The Investigation in 2008 that the government was placing too much emphasis on wind power to reach targets and that this would mean more people suffering from fuel poverty.

“These are difficult numbers to estimate but numbers around half a million are not at all unrealistic,” he said.

Maria McCaffery, then Chief Executive of British Wind Energy Association, the wind industry trade body, responded with exactly the same argument that we now hear from Energy Secretary Chris Huhne: “The expectation is that it [wind power generation] will in time drive down the basic cost of energy and actually help the fuel poverty situation, that certainly is our expectation.” ³

How this is supposed to happen with a 100% production subsidy on onshore wind power generation (200% on offshore), huge backup and curtailment costs and a minimum of £200 billion in grid engineering costs associated with handling large-scale intermittent generators is not explained by the wind industry or Mr Huhne.

This is not an evidenced argument, it would be better described as blind hope or an article of Green faith.

EXTRA DEATHS

According to figures from the Office for National Statistics There are 27,000 extra deaths in the UK each winter compared to other times of year. Most of these deaths can be ascribed to cold.⁴

The UK figure is one of the highest in Europe, worse than France and Germany, and worse than Norway, Sweden and Finland which have much worse winter weather.

FAILING THE POOR

Nearly £2 billion a year is now being spent on Renewables Obligation subsidies.

This money could drastically reduce fuel poverty and CO2 emissions, as well as kick-starting the economy, if it was spent directly on improving the fuel efficiency of homes and enforcing higher building standards for home insulation and heating.

All experts agree that this is the most cost-effective way of reducing CO2 emissions.

But, it seems that government would rather stand by and see this money, paid from our electricity bills, going into the pockets of multinational energy companies or private wind speculators.

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¹ ‘Government fuel poverty targets likely to be missed’, Channel 4 News, 12 august 2011.
² ‘Poverty fears over wind power’, BBC News , 4 September 2008.
³ Ibid.
⁴ Professor John Hills, ‘Independent review of fuel poverty’. Professor Hills’ interim report was published on 19 October, 2011 and is available from the DECC website.

See also: ‘Energy Policy and Consumer Hardship’, Renewable Energy Foundation, 2011 (Available as a PDF download from the REF website).

‘BRITAIN’S HIGH ENERGY PRICES:
THE FOLLY OF WIND POWER’

Using DECC’s Mott McDonald analysis, Ruth Lea, Economic Adviser to Arbuthnot Banking Group and former Chief Economist at the Institute of Directors, argues that wind power is an expensive “folly”.

We quote from the conclusions of her paper:

Mott MacDonald analysis: conclusions

To sum up, these were Mott MacDonald’s main findings, allowing for carbon costs:

• Gas fired CCGT was expected to be least cost main technology option in the near-term.

• Nuclear power was projected to be least cost option in the longer term, assuming DECC’s central fuel and carbon prices assumptions.

• Excluding carbon costs, coal is the cheapest technology in the near-term and the medium-term, assuming DECC’s central fuel and carbon prices assumptions.

Other things being equal this would suggest that investment should be concentrated in gas and nuclear technologies. (A mix of technologies is preferable for operational reasons.) Both onshore and, especially, offshore wind fared relatively badly in this analysis, even though Mott MacDonald’s analysis for DECC excluded the costs of stand-by generation and transmission reinforcement. There is no economic case for expensive wind-power. It only adds to consumers’ energy bills – both domestically and business.

Even if one accepts the need to cut carbon emissions, not a universal sentiment by any means, it is clear that the dash for wind-power can only be “justified” by Britain’s misguided commitment to the 15% renewables target by 2020 under the EU’s Renewables Directive. It is proving, and will continue to prove, a very costly commitment indeed.

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‘Britain’s high energy prices: the folly of wind power.’ In ‘Perspectives by Ruth Lea’, (PDF download), Arbuthnot Banking Group.
Mott MacDonald, ‘UK electricity generation costs update, June 2010’ (PDF download, from DECC website).

‘WIND FARMS: THE QUESTION IS, WHO WILL PAY?’

BBC News video, 15 August, 2011.

Science correspondent David Shukman talks to economist Professor Dieter Helm, Professor at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of New College, Oxford.

Professor Helm is a special Advisor to the European Commissioner for Energy and a member of the Economics Advisory Group to the UK Secretary of State for Energy & Climate Change.

COUNTRYSIDE PROTECTION UNDER THREAT

The Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) and the National Trust have both warned of the likely effects of the Government’s reform the planning system to benefit business interests.

CPRE say: “The planning system is under attack from the Government’s planning reforms and the protection of precious countryside is going to be seriously weakened.”

The National Trust is equally concerned:

All of us who care about the countryside - as well as the vitality of our towns and cities - need to stand up for what we value. Unless we act now, there will be uproar across the country as local communities discover in the months and years to come that the planning system and its ability to protect the countryside have been undermined by these reforms currently being pushed through.

For decades our planning system has protected much loved places from harmful development. The Government’s reforms turn this on its head, using it as a tool primarily to promote economic growth instead.

We believe in growth – but not at all costs. Planning for people combines long-term growth with other important things like local character and space to breathe, tranquillity and beauty. We need a system that serves all our interests, from commerce to communities.

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CPRE website.
National Trust campaign.

LICENCE TO EXPLOIT?

‘The localism bill now before parliament is a straight developers’ ramp. Drafted by the local government secretary, Eric Pickles, and the business secretary, Vince Cable, it stresses business and "national economic policy" over conservation at every turn. It is the outcome of intense lobbying by the construction industry. Pickles and Cable are mere purveyors of building plots to the capitalist classes. The words development and business occur in the bill 340 times, the word countryside just four.

‘The bill and addendum breach the core principle of planning, that the long-term use of land, the scarcest of resources, should take precedence over an owner's right to profit. That is why there are no bungalows on the white cliffs of Dover and no wind farms on the Chilterns. It is why, when you look out over the Severn valley, you do not see Bristol merged with Gloucester.’ ¹

MP QUERIES GOVERNMENT ‘PRESUMPTION’

Berwick MP Sir Alan Beith is quoted as saying: “Ministers have not made it clear whether their proposed ‘presumption’ in favour of development applies to wind farms. In my view it ought not to and I am raising those issues with ministers.” ²

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¹ Simon Jenkins, ‘This localism bill will sacrifice our countryside to market forces’, The Guardian, 28 July 2011. As well as being a distinguished journalist, Sir Simon Jenkins is Chairman of the National Trust.
² ‘Government urged to save County Durham from too many wind turbines’, The Journal, 7 September, 2011.

‘WIND FARMS PAID £7M TO SWITCH OFF’

UK Press Association on Google News, 11 October, 2011.

‘Wind farms operators have been paid nearly £7 million this year to switch off turbines, the Government has said.

‘Seventeen wind farms across the UK were told to shut down on a total of 37 days, with the farms’ owners compensated for not generating power.

‘So-called “constraint payments” are made when too much electricity floods the Grid, with the network unable to absorb the power generated.

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See below for more on curtailment.

‘U.K. WIND FARMS MAY SHUT WHEN DEMAND IS LOW: NATIONAL GRID’

Reuters, 13 June, 2011.

‘(Reuters) - British wind farms may be shut down about 38 days per year by 2020 to avoid power transmission overload at times of weak demand and high wind speeds, UK energy network operator National Grid said on Monday. Britain is expected to increase wind power capacity seven-fold by 2020 to 26.8 gigawatts (GW), according to National Grid data, which would put additional strain on the transmission network.

[...]’

ONSHORE TURBINES - NORTH SAYS NO!

A poll in The Journal, referencing comments by Energy Minister Chris Huhne (see below), has echoed an exit poll of visitors to the Middleton Burn exhibition in Belford.

According to The Journal, “Some 79 people agreed with Mr Huhne that they [wind turbines] are indeed elegant. But those backing him were somewhat outweighed by the 767 who voted to say they considered turbines to be a blight on the landscape.” ¹

The Middleton Burn exit poll showed that 250 of 267 visitors were against the scheme, only 10 were in favour, while 7 were undecided. ²

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¹ ‘Wind farms poll shows nine in ten reject minister’s backing’, The Journal, 8 October, 2011.
² See ‘93.6% SAY NO!’, Middleton Burn Action Group (MBAG).

‘ENERGY SECRETARY TELLS THE NORTH
WIND TURBINES ARE BEAUTIFUL’

The Journal, 1 October, 2011.

‘ENERGY secretary Chris Huhne has told the North East to learn to love “beautiful” wind turbines and called for hundreds more to be given the go ahead.

‘In comments which will divide opinion Mr Huhne set out his full support for onshore wind turbines during a visit to Newcastle.

‘To an audience of green energy firms and fellow Liberal Democrats [enough said!] he said opponents of wind turbines had to be challenged when claiming wind farms ruin landscapes such as Northumberland’s.

[...]’

COMMENT

Mr Huhne’s views of what is beautiful are at odds with what landscape architects and even the wind industry say. Any wind turbine planning application is largely devoted to a Visual Impact Assessment (VIA) which considers the “visual impacts” of turbines on people and places.

I have yet to hear anyone claim with a straight face that visual impact tables in planning applications demonstrate anything other than the scale of adverse impacts.

Rank hypocrisy

According to official figures produced by DECC, Chris Huhne’s own department, his Eastleigh constituency does not have any large, industrial turbines. In fact, there are none recorded in the whole of Hampshire.

In view of the fact that the North East has already met renewables targets for 2060 (see below) in terms of consented capacity, perhaps Chris Huhne should be lecturing the people of Hampshire on the need for hundreds of ‘beautiful’ 410 ft turbines on the Hampshire Downs.

The suspicion is that his slender majority does not allow for any discussion of the beauty of turbines in Hampshire!

Mr Huhne has been parroting this rather silly comparison with traditional windmills for some time. For entertainment, listen to him making a complete fool of himself on Any Questions, in April, this year: BBC i-Player (question is at approx. 39:30). As is apparent from the audience reaction, the Tories are in danger of losing ground to UKIP on this issue.

FAILING TO DELIVER

Mr Huhne is right about one thing, wind turbines are just like their historic ancestors in producing small amounts of erratic and intermittent power. Which is precisely why they were abandoned in favour of water mills and, subsequently, steam power.

There is an old saying which he should bear in mind: “No one has ever built a windmill if he could build a watermill.” Not unless they were being payed a massive production subsidy for wind power!

Wrecking Britain

This is not the first delusional and damaging policy that Chris Huhne has wholeheartedly pursued. Some of us remember his role in trying to get the UK into the Euro. When wiser heads were urging caution, Mr Huhne was writing that, “The euro is living up to the highest expectations of the economists who advocated it, and Britain is missing out” (Chris Huhne, ‘It’s official: the euro is a success’, The Guardian, 6 June 2002).

He would be well advised to take time out from his endless round of self-promotion in the press and actually study the issues. Very few who have done so share his unbridled enthusiasm for wind turbines as the answer to anything other than as a mechanism for making the rich wealthier at the expense of the poor.

As Professor Sir David King, Government Chief Scientific Advisor from 2002 to 2007, the period when current wind power policy was conceived and rolled out, now says: [Talking of EU targets and fuel poverty] “This is an issue which needs to be revisited and I say this as somebody who feels that we really have to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions very substantially but in my view it is an expensive, and not a very clever route to go for 35 to 40% on wind turbines.” (‘Poverty fears over wind power’, BBC News, 4 September 2008).

BBC ‘FILE ON 4’ - ‘ENERGY PRICES’

“File on 4 has discovered that some companies are so badly damaged by soaring energy prices that they say they may move out of Britain.”

“The latest wave of price rises is expected to mean 6.6 million households wll go into winter officially in fuel poverty.”

BBC File on 4, 10 October, 2011. (Listen again on BBC iPlayer).

Industry and many energy experts are increasingly concerned that Britain’s over-ambitious, unilateral renewables targets and Green taxes will damage British industry and lead to rapidly growing levels of fuel poverty. ¹

Even the BBC has picked up on this. This programme devotes much of its time to examining whether the ‘big 6’ mainly foreign-owned energy conglomerates are guilty of “tacit collusion” in maintaining very high profits and running a market that is opaque even to the regulator.

It does, however, briefly challenge Energy Minister Chris Huhne on his faith position that the UK’s very high green taxes will not damage British industry and lead to the export of jobs. ²

Huhne’s views are strongly disputed by industry. The programme notes that, “In ceramics, a survey of companies found that half expected the impact of one tax alone to exceed their current profits.”

We hear the usual conference soundbites from the Energy Minister, that he is, “...determined to get tough with the big 6 companies”. But he is forced to admit that it is the big 6 who are required to shell out the minimum of £200 billion that is required to invest in new generating capacity (no mention of the equally large sums needed to restructure the grid to deal with wind).

The reality is that however much Chris Huhne talks the talk, the big 6 have government over a barrel when it comes to delivering policy.

We are already seeing this as energy companies threaten to withdraw from vital new nuclear and CCS, and Centrica holds the government to ransome over the vital new gas build. ³

Whatever Chris Huhne’s righteous Green beliefs, it is not wind power that is going to keep the lights on or the elderly and disabled warm this or any other winter.

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¹ There are numerous articles on this page which show this, for example: ‘British jobs gone with the wind’, below.
² programme segment begins at 28:10.
³ See ‘Energy companies want billions for back-up to wind farms’, below.

‘GREEN ENERGY POLICIES “UNCONVINCING”, SAYS LEAKED NO 10 ANALYSIS’

‘PM’s senior policy adviser on energy said DECC claims that rise would be offset by lower consumption was “unconvincing”

Guardian Environment Network, 5 Sep 2011.

‘Downing Street advisers have warned that green energy policies could add £300 to annual household fuel bills, putting them on a collision course with the energy secretary, Chris Huhne.

‘Ben Moxham, David Cameron’s senior policy adviser on energy and environment and a former BP employee, said claims by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) that a 30 per cent rise in fuel bills by 2020 would be offset by lower energy consumption through energy efficiency were “unconvincing”.

[...]’

‘ALEX SALMOND’S GREEN ENERGY REVOLUTION “THREATENS FIRMS WITH BANKRUPTCY”’

‘The costs of Alex Salmond’s green energy revolution are “going through the roof” and threaten to bankrupt companies by doubling energy bills, business leaders have warned the First Minister.’

Telegraph, 29 September, 2011

‘The Scottish Chambers of Commerce (SCC) said electricity is currently about nine times more expensive to generate from wind farms than gas-powered plants.

‘Mike Salter, the SCC chairman, told the organisation’s annual dinner that Government energy experts predict greater reliance on “very expensive” renewables will lead to consumers’ electricity bills doubling.

‘He warned this would hold back the Scottish economy and lead to businesses going under. If this is the consequence, he questioned whether Mr Salmond’s “total commitment” to green energy is “misguided”.

[...]’

THE GREAT CRYSTAL RIG RIP-OFF

CONSUMERS FACE £1.2M BILL FOR 12 HR SHUTDOWN

It is reported that Fred Olsen Renewables,the Norwegian-owned company who own the Crystal Rig turbine array in the Lammermuirs, will receive a £1.2 million payment for turning off their turbines for just 12 hours during the recent high winds.¹

They agreed to cease production for eight hours on Saturday 10 September, 30 minutes on Sunday 11 and four hours on Monday 12.

Turbines are anyway forced to shut down when wind speeds exceed around 60 mph in order to prevent damage.

It has been revealed that not one turbine in Scotland produced any electricity on two separate days – August 30 and September 15 – within the past month.²

National Grid is to pay £2.9m in compensation to the 13 windfarms that were out of operation, costs that will be paid by electricity consumers in their bills. The most recent curtailment incident, between Saturday and Tuesday, accounts for more than half the £4.3m paid out during the 12 months up to June.³

High price at Crystal Rig

The Crystal Rig operators demanded some of the highest curtailment prices yet seen in the industry.

National Grid operates a balancing mechanism to balance the network. “Constraint payments” are made to those who agree to stop feeding energy into the grid. Operators are asked to submit bids for how much power they can pull out of the system and at what price. Often, conventional power stations agree to curtail output for little or no cost.⁴

Fred Olsen offered £999 per MWh for shutting down Crystal Rig II. By contrast, Scottish Power has a standard bid price of £180 per MWh, with Scottish and Southern Electric’s standard bid price thought to be £150 per MWh. Generators would normally receive a wholesale price of £40-50 per MWh plus Renewables Obligation subsidy certificates that were worth £45.37 per MWh at the last auction on 31 August.⁵

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¹ ‘Turbines owner to get £1m windfall’, The Herald, 16 September, 2011.
² Renewable Energy Foundation research - REF website.
³ Ibid.
⁴ Balancing Mechanism website.
⁵ e-ROC Online Auction Services.
See also:
‘Cashback as storms knock wind out of turbine sails’, Evening Times, 14 September, 2011.
‘High winds lead UK to halt turbines for 3rd night’, Reuters, 13 September, 2011
Windbyte article below for previous examples of costly wind curtailment this year.

THE WIND POWER ROLLERCOASTER

Monday 12 September: wind producers in Scotland being paid premium prices to shut down due to the amount of unstable power in the system. Thursday 15 September: all the 3,696MW of metered wind capacity in the UK is producing as little as 24MW, the headline capacity of 8 ordinary 3MW turbines.

Note also the spike at period 23 on 14 September when over 700MW dropped out of the system and then back in within little over an hour, probably caused wind arrays automatically tripping out due to wind speeds exceeding safe operating limits (usually c. 25m/s or 56mph).

The worst of all worlds

This illustrates why National Grid say that we need a huge new build of nuclear and gas-fuelled power stations to provide the power that keeps our lights on.¹

The problem is: gas operators do not want to build gas-fired power stations that will be run inefficiently and damagingly - and with higher CO2 emissions - just to cover a huge capacity of prioritised wind power.²

Wind forecast

The consumer is going to end up paying twice over: massive subsidies and exorbitant ‘curtailment’ payments to wind operators and capital grants and subsidies to gas operators in order to track wind load.

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¹ National Grid’s ‘Seven Year Statements’ and ‘Winter Outlook reports’ on the NG website.
² ‘Energy companies want billions for back up to wind farms’, This is Money, 26 June 2011.

INDUSTRY WARNINGS ON FUTURE OF SMALL TURBINES

‘SCOTS BID TO KEEP PROVEN LOCAL AS SMALL WIND FACES SCEPTICS

REcharge News, 21 September, 2011.

‘As potential buyers begin circling Proven Energy – the newly-bankrupt Scottish maker of small wind turbines – wider questions are being raised about the long-term durability of such machines, and whether installers could face a wave of lawsuits.

[...]

‘Whatever the outcome, some fear the defects uncovered in Proven’s machines could jump-start a rash of bankruptcies and lawsuits within the UK’s small-wind sector, which was given a boost last year by the introduction of a feed-in tariff.

‘It is becoming clear that many turbines rated less than 50kW have inherent design issues and are not living up to expectations, according to Ben Cosh, managing director of the installation specialist TGC Renewables.

‘Proven is “by far” the largest supplier of turbines to that market segment within the UK, Cosh says.

‘“Fundamentally, wind at low height is quite complex and turbulent, and these turbines need to be based on much more complicated [simulations] than the design engineers are currently using,” he says.

‘“They design a turbine in their computer system which looks lovely, then they put it in the real world and it breaks.”

‘Sensing future problems, TGC has shifted its business into PV and mid-sized wind installations requiring turbines in the 50kW-100kW class – a segment dominated by non-UK suppliers like Vermont, US's Northern Power Systems and British Columbia’s Endurance.

‘Cosh says that action by disappointed small turbine turbine owners may ultimately push many local installers into bankruptcy.

‘“It is extremely challenging to get anything sub-50kW to work as a business model,” he says. “I would be amazed if there are long-term business futures for people operating in that sector.”’

-------------------------

‘Wind turbine firm closes as blade hazard is found’, Herald, Scotland, 17 September 2011.

INFLATED CLAIMS AND BREAKDOWNS

Agents and turbine salesmen are making utterly ludicrous and unsubstantiated claims for the output of small turbines. Unsurprisingly, this is leading to some very disappointed customers.

There are a number of examples of planning applications in areas of Northumberland with a low or average wind resource where turbine load factors of over 37% are being forecast. This is, frankly, ludicrous.

Smaller turbines are not as efficient as their large-scale commercial brothers, yet agents are claiming that they will achieve a higher load factor (averaged percentage of headline capacity) than 125m turbines at Aikengall, the highest and windiest turbine site in the Lammermuir Hills! *

No wonder that stories are now getting out of smaller turbines that are producing massively less than promised.

There are also examples in our area (not including ‘Proven’ turbines) of smaller turbines suffering prolonged and repeated electro-mechanical failures, to the great irritation of their owners.

-------------------------

* The highest LF in North East England and South East Scotland is recorded by Ofgem as 35.4%, at Aikengall, in 2009/10; Aikengall has a rolling LF of 32.9%. Recorded output figures and load factors are available from REF’s ‘Renewables Obligation Generators’ database.

‘Eco-friendly school left out of pocket after ‘unproven’ wind turbine breaks’

The Telegraph, 5 October 2011.

‘An eco-friendly school has been left £55,000 out of pocket after its wind turbine broke – with governors admitting that it was based on “completely unproven technology”.

‘The company that installed the turbine has gone bust leaving the school with a pile of scrap.

‘The Gorran School in Cornwall revealed its 15 metre turbine in 2008 which was designed to provide it with free electricity - and sell any surplus power to the National Grid.

‘The system was seen as a green blueprint for clean, sustainable energy for schools nationwide and received grants from various bodies including the EDF power firm.

‘But soon after being installed the wind turbine became faulty and after a few months seized up - showering the school's playing field with debris.

‘Since then the school has been locked in a battle with suppliers Proven Energy which has now gone into administration leaving the school with little hope of any money being returned - and a pile of scrap in their field.

[...]’

THE WIND RUSH REVOLT SPREADS

‘COUNTY COUNCIL SAYS IT IS PUTTING PEOPLE BEFORE PROFITS AS WIND FARM PLANS ARE AXED’

‘It is clear that the people of Cambridgeshire do not want wind farms, and we should be listening to those views.’

Wisbech Standard, 6 September, 2011

‘County councillors today abandoned a £700,000 a year pay day by dropping proposals for wind turbines on any of their 35 farms.

‘Opposition to the plan to build wind farms on county council owned farms was led by Councillor Steve Count of March, the Cabinet member for resources and performance.

‘“We are putting people before profit,” said Cllr Count after a Cabinet meeting which, technically, deferred a decision but in reality ditched proposals for using council owned land for wind turbines.

[...]’

‘CUMBRIA COUNCIL BOSS WANTS GOVERNMENT WINDFARM POLICY RETHINK’

News & Star, 30 June 2011

‘Cumbria has 90 commercial windfarms, with at least another 49 on the way – and the leader of the county council says enough is enough.

‘Councillor Eddie Martin has written to the minister for decentralisation to complain about government plans to allow windfarm applications to be pushed through regardless of local opposition.

‘As well as the 139 windfarms which have already been granted planning permission, there are a further 46 applications awaiting a decision, he said.

‘On behalf of the county council, Mr Martin is calling for the coalition to urgently reconsider its position.

‘In an open letter to Greg Clark MP, he said: “I would not wish, of course, to question the expertise, integrity or professionalism of the planning inspectorate but it remains difficult, nonetheless, to convince local communities and indeed local politicians that public inquiries of windfarm applications are no more than cosmetic exercises, that the government (of any persuasion) is obsessed with EU imposed targets, and that the concept of local democracy appears to be quite meaningless.

‘“In short, and despite the palliative rhetoric and occasional panaceas, central government is simply not listening. And that is profoundly depressing. And fundamentally undemocratic.”

‘Mr Martin points out the “invariably futile” public inquiries are also expensive as the local planning authority has to foot the £60,000 bill.

‘The county council is calling for an end to “over-reliance” on windfarms and a reduction in wind-related targets.

‘It wants investment in other low carbon energy generation to be increased.

‘[...]’

MSP TO MEET MINISTER OVER WINDFARM CONCERNS

West Lothian Herald & Post, 8 September 2011.

‘Lothian MSP Neil Findlay is to call on the Scottish Government to produce a national, co-ordinated, plan for wind farm developments across the country.

‘ During a meeting with Energy Minister Fergus Ewing, the MSP will voice concerns about the current situation in West Lothian, which is seeing a rush of applications from various development companies.

‘The new applications, if approved, are major projects and will see turbines running along the entire southern boundary of West Lothian from Kirknewton through to Shotts.

‘[...]’

‘MP LAUNCHES CAMPAIGN TO FIGHT WIND TURBINES’

Northern Echo, 9 August, 2011.

‘An MP will today launch a campaign aimed at stopping any further wind farms from being built in the region.

‘Sedgefield MP Phil Wilson is taking action after E.ON announced plans that could see England’s biggest wind farm built in his constituency.

‘The energy firm will launch a formal consultation on August 31, with three proposals to be considered – for either 29, 30 or 45 turbines – on a site east of Newton Aycliffe.

[...]

RURAL RUMBLINGS

There are rumblings on all sides: Scottish Borders Council planners have said, in the most direct language yet seen from planners, that enough is enough:

...there are major concerns from various sources confimed during the consultation period of the draft SPG that the potential number of approvals in the Scottish Borders is disproportionate to the capacity of the landscape to absorb such developments and if all these proposals were to materialise they would have an adverse cumulative impact on the Borders landscape and its tourism value. ¹

In Northumberland, where planners have been eager to recommend acceptance of wind proposals which clearly contravene planning guidance, damage residential amenity and have glaringly obvious defects, county councillors are beginning to ask questions about the scale of the wind rush and the way their planners are behaving.

After the ‘Moorsyde’ fiasco, many people think that questions should have been asked about the extent to which local authority planners are in bed with the wind industry.²

-------------------------

¹ Adopted policy: SBC, ‘Supplementary Planning Guidance, Wind Farms’, May, 2011 (3.5, p. 10). SBC website.
² See, ‘The Moorsyde Experience’ and following columns on the Visuals Page.

‘UK RENEWABLES COSTS EXCEED GAS
BY OVER £100BN’

Reuters, 2 September, 2011.

• ‘Renewables costs 10 pct of UK business investments by 2020
• ‘Green job creation misleading as employment impact is short
• ‘Cost of saving one tonne of CO2 will be £270 by 2020

‘LONDON, Sept 2 (Reuters) - The cost of investing in renewable energy in Britain is £105 billion ($170 billion) higher than building the same capacity using gas-fired power plants, an economics professor said in a report published on Friday.

‘The extra investment cost of building power plants such as offshore wind farms is equivalent to nearly 10 percent of overall British business investment in the next 10 years, Gordon Hughes of the University of Edinburgh said in his study ‘The Myth of Green Jobs’.

‘“It is clear that the public and its political representatives have never signed up to the proposition that the UK should sacrifice a minimum of 4-5 percent of GDP annually in order to meet climate change targets,” Hughes said.

[...]’

-------------------------

The report is available as a PDF file download (1.3Mb).

See also:
Verso Economics, ‘Worth The Candle? The Economic Impact of Renewable Energy Policy in Scotland and the UK’, March 2011. Full report costs £36, the executive summary can be downloaded from the Verso Website.
CEPOS, ‘The case for Denmark’, September 2009. (PDF file download).

MILITARY RADAR DEAL OPENS THE WAY FOR MORE TURBINE SCHEMES

A deal done between the Ministry of Defence and the wind industry to buy American radar sets may open the way for a new wave of large-scale turbine parks in Northumberland and the Borders.

Applications such as Middlemoor and Fallago Rig have been dogged by MOD objections due to problems caused to military radars. Moving turbine blades can mimic the signals from aircraft or missiles and could cloak attacks.

The wind industry has now struck a deal to purchase 2 Lockheed Martin TPS-77 3D mobile radars, costing £20 million each. A third, at Trimingham in Norfolk, will be part-funded by DECC, industry and the Crown Estate.

It is reported that the MOD has confirmed that the purchase of a radar set for Brizlee Wood will be announced in the coming weeks, with installation during the next 18 months.¹

This will allow North British Windpower’s 48 turbine Fallago Rig project, on land owned by the Duke of Roxburghe, to be built. It should also unblock other turbine schemes with radar problems in the Borders and Northumberland.

However, it will not only expose the Lammermuirs, which already have huge numbers of operating and consented turbines to yet more applications, but it will will also open up areas that were previously ‘off limits’ due to radar impacts.

The costs of this will, like subsidies and grid strengthening to cope with wind power generation, be passed on to the electricity consumer.

Dr John Constable of the Renewable Energy Foundation said to the Telegraph:

The 27 gigawatts of wind power thought by government to be enabled over the next decade if aviation objections are lifted will cost the electricity consumer approximately £164 billion in subsidy alone over the life time of the wind turbines, around 25 years.

That is a sum nearly five times the annual cost of the entire Ministry of Defence: Army, Navy and RAF combined. Coming at a time of constrained budgets, not least in the MoD, there will be intense and justified questions about the value for money represented by public subsidies on this scale.²

Mark Rowley, who heads the Say No to Fallago campaign, is quoted in the same article as saying:

If even a fraction of the extra schemes are consented, this important gateway to Scotland will become a 21st century Hadrian’s Wall made of 400 foot turbines stretched across some of the finest landscapes in Scotland.

-------------------------

¹ ‘Three new Lockheed Martin radars could unlock 8GW of wind power’, BusinessGreen, 1 September, 2011.
² Telegraph, 28 August, 2011.

‘TIME CALLED ON CLIPPER 10MW PROJECT’

reNews, 19 August, 2011.

‘The troubled Clipper 10MW offshore turbine project Britannia has been kicked into the long grass by US parent company UTC. The decision has forced the Crown Estate to abandon plans to erect a prototype of the machine in the UK [at Blyth].

‘Crown officials confirmed this week that the Britannia deal was off the table and that UTC had repaid the £1.6m plus VAT invested by the estate in the turbine project.

‘A spokesperson said the “aims and objectives of the (Clipper) investment had been achieved” because the offshore turbine market had been “stimulated” as a result.

‘reNews reported doubts about the future of the turbine’s development as long ago as October 2010, when UTC grabbed 100% of Clipper. Company sources reacted angrily at the time to reports of a “crisis meeting”.

‘A second reNews story, in May 2011, revealed that millions of pounds in UK government grant funding for development of the machine had been withdrawn due to Clipper’s failure to meet financial and technical milestones.

‘Companies linked to the Clipper 10MW project included David Brown Gear Systems and Narec. It is unclear how they will be impacted by the decision to ice Britannia.

‘The Crown Estate has been reluctant to provide any information about its tie-up with Clipper, despite a schedule that originally envisioned an operational demonstrator in 2010.

‘It said as recently as May that it was continuing to work with the turbine outfit on an updated programme for the project.

‘Support for Clipper included £5m from One North East to build a blade manufacturing facility at the Neptune Yard on Tyneside. That is expected to be mothballed.*

‘Clipper was also named as a finalist by the UK government in the upcoming NER 300 funding round. The proposal, to deploy a 10MW machine off Blyth in Northumberland, is expected to be withdrawn.

‘Clipper announced its Britannia project in October 2007. At the time established turbine manufacturers questioned the logic of putting so much government backing behind an untried offshore technology.’

-------------------------

* See: One NorthEast press release (PDF file).
The regional press has, at last, published a sanitised version of the story, see: ‘Wind turbine firm Clipper halts North East investment’, The Journal, 24 August, 2011.

‘BRITISH JOBS GONE WITH THE WIND’

Crippling new taxes proposed by Chris Huhne to subsidise green energy could force key employers out of business.

Andrew Gilligan, The Telegraph, 17 July, 2011.

‘[...]

‘The Lynemouth plant is profitable. It is fairly modern, only 35 years old. It is almost at full production. It is the biggest private employer left in the entire county of Northumberland, contributing £100 million to the local economy.

‘Yet it is now at serious risk of closure, the first of dozens of potential victims of what one business spokesman calls Britain’s industrial “suicide”. [Our emphases].

‘Last week, the Energy Secretary, Chris Huhne, announced further massive subsidies for wind farms, nuclear and other forms of low-carbon electricity – all part of Chancellor George Osborne’s ambition to make this the “greenest” country in Europe.

‘There was already going to be a “carbon floor price”, effectively a tax on CO2 emissions, to subsidise wind and other renewables. Now Mr Huhne’s further subsidies will be funded by consumers, through much higher electricity bills.

‘Lynemouth’s problem is that it is probably the UK’s single largest user of electricity. Producing just one ton of aluminium uses more power than the average family does in 15 years.

‘The new wind farm taxes will cost Lynemouth £40 million a year, a third of its entire operating costs, effectively wiping out its annual profits. Last month, John McCabe, a spokesman for the company, said it was examining “how we cope with the huge cost implications of incoming legislation. A number of options are being discussed, one of which is the closure of the plant.”

‘Lynemouth’s 650 workers, and the hundreds of others it supports indirectly, are only the most exposed of the vast number at risk. Britain is still home to huge amounts of energy-intensive heavy industry, employing millions.

‘But Stan Higgins, chief executive of the North East Process Industry Cluster, which represents the region’s chemical and pharmaceutical companies, says current government energy policies are “suicidal” and could end up destroying entire sectors of manufacturing.

‘“Four or five years ago [in pharmaceuticals], energy was the twelfth most expensive element of manufacturing a tablet,” he says. “Now it is second or third.

‘“We are trying to be the first country in Europe to introduce [a carbon floor price], but it’s crazy to do this independently. Our energy costs are six to seven per cent higher than the European average and that’s not sustainable.

‘“Most of our big companies are not UK-owned – they have no allegiance to the UK whatever. They will go where they get the best deal. We can compete with the world, but we just need a level playing field.”

‘Aluminium isn’t even the most energy-intensive manufacture. For the chlorine industry, electricity is up to 70 per cent of its costs. And if British chlorine-making collapses, it takes with it thousands of jobs in other sectors that are wholly dependent on chlorine production. Some people have started talking of a “domino effect”.

‘Jeremy Nicholson, of the Energy Intensive Users Group, says: “Employment in the sectors that are most directly affected by rising green taxes is 225,000.

‘And if you look at the Government’s projections, their CO2 proposals will hit even firms that are less electro-intensive – paper, glass, ceramics – with a further 600,000 jobs. Factories may not close immediately, but investment won’t come here.

‘“The issue for us is the cost of electricity here compared with the rest of the world. Britain has the most ambitious targets for renewable energy growth in Europe and is introducing several measures which will only affect UK users.”

‘The new green taxes will fund several forms of low-carbon electricity, including nuclear. But it is ministers’ attachment to wind farms, increasingly offshore, that is causing industry the greatest pain.

‘“We don’t take issue with the need to decarbonise energy,” says Mr Nicholson. “But, for goodness’ sake, let’s do it cost-effectively. Offshore wind is one of the most expensive ways of reducing our carbon emissions, and one of the least cost-effective ways of generating electricity.”

‘Last week, Mr Huhne scoffed at such claims. But, as is now widely known, wind farms’ biggest problem is that for about three-quarters of the time, the wind does not blow at the right speed to turn the turbines.

‘Electricity cannot be stored – you have to generate it at the moment you need it – and the wind might not oblige when 10 million viewers want to switch the kettle on at the end of Coronation Street. So, at the same time as building new wind farms, you must build new conventional power stations as backup.

‘The Government does not include the costs of building these backup stations in its figures for wind. Nor does it include the cost of the thousands of miles of extra powerlines needed to collect electricity from wind farms, much more widely scattered than conventional power plants.

‘The Renewable Energy Foundation (REF) and The Sunday Telegraph asked Colin Gibson, former power network director at the National Grid, for an estimate that takes into account these production costs.

‘His figures suggest that across its whole life, onshore wind will cost as much as £178 per megawatt hour of electricity generated, three times nuclear (£60). Offshore wind, with its much higher construction cost, is more than four times dearer, at £254 per megawatt hour.

‘Mr Gibson stresses that, though most of his calculations are based on official data, some have to be based on his best judgment, and aren’t definitive. But the broad picture is clear. “If you take the costs of a mixture of on and offshore wind, it is very roughly £140 per megawatt hour higher than a mixture of nuclear and gas turbines,” he says.

‘“Multiply that by the number of megawatt hours we use, and you get a figure in the order of maybe £11 billion a year, which is about £550 per customer per annum [extra] for wind power. That is quite frightening.”

‘Until now, the main controversy about electricity prices has been to do with consumers. Last week, new figures showed that rising bills have driven another 700,000 people into “fuel poverty”. But the impact on manufacturing could deliver a double whammy: not only costing you money, but also costing you your job.

‘John Constable, director of the REF, says: “The emphasis on expensive and uncontrollable renewables such as wind, when there are better and cheaper alternatives that could do the same job, is discrediting the green agenda. We are loading very heavy burdens onto viable industries in order to subsidise immature and costly energy technologies.”

‘“This is a major threat to the UK,” warns Nicholson. “I sometimes think that the Department for Climate Change doesn’t care if we de-industrialise Britain, so long as we meet our climate targets.”’

-------------------------

See the Telegraph website for the full article.

‘CAN AN ENERGY MELT-DOWN BE AVOIDED IN THE UNITED KINGDOM?’

Hugh Sharman, DimWatt.eu, 6 July, 2011.

‘It is said that an alcoholic cannot begin to address his illness before he himself recognizes his addiction and is prepared to take treatment, however difficult and painful.

The challenges described in this paper cannot be fixed as long as they remain unrecognized by the people that we in Europe elect to write and abolish legislation.

Elaborate roadmaps to 2050 and lofty-sounding calls for emission targets in the mid-2020s will be as pointless and useless to future generations as any such “road map” for the nation would have been if written in (say) 1910 or 1934.

Among the chief dangers that the UK faces in 2011 is the critical obsolescence of its electricity infrastructure, its essential bankruptcy and the absolutely unrealistic aspirations of almost all its political class, although not its population, for a new, low-carbon, high-growth, job-creating, tax-paying economy.

The imminent closure of 16 GW of coal, oil and nuclear power plants and the realization that these simply cannot be replaced by the equivalent - or even much greater - wind power capacity, (even if it could be built, which is doubtful) is widely recognized in most senior echelons of the UK’s financial, manufacturing and engineering companies. How soon this general recognition will seep through to those who make decisions but continue to evade this truth, is very much up to the population at large.’

(DimWatt, ‘Can an energy-meltdown be avoided in the United Kingdom?’, Conclusions).

-------------------------

“DimWatt is a campaigning web site dedicated to keeping the lights on affordably, maintaining mobility and the UK’s position as a manufacturing power in a fast-changing world. We hope to bring together utility management personnel, academics, politicians, civil servants, professionals and concerned citizens who are committed to rational discussion and debate on the challenges facing UK's energy infrastructure today.”

‘“OFFSHORE TOO EXPENSIVE FOR UK” SAYS UK ENERGY ADVISOR’

Windpower Monthly, 29 June 2011.

‘UK: Doubt has been cast upon the economic value and affordability of offshore wind in the UK, by top economist and advisor to the British government Professor Dieter Helm.

‘Helm, who is also a professor of New College Oxford, has questioned whether UK consumers will be able to foot the bill for offshore wind energy.

‘He suggested gas generation could be a more affordable low carbon alternative.

‘Helm holds a number of UK and EU roles including special advisor to the European Commissioner for Energy and a member of the Economics Advisory Group to the UK minister for Energy & Climate Change.

‘Speaking at the Economist Energy Summit in London, Helm said: “There is a real doubt whether energy customers can afford the £100 billion UK offshore wind would add to their bills.

‘[...]’

-------------------------

‘Wind farms: The question is, who will pay?’, BBC News video of interview with Professor Dieter Helm.
See previous warnings, below.

‘ENERGY COMPANIES WANT BILLIONS FOR BACK-UP TO WINDFARMS’

This is Money, 26 June 2011.

‘Britain’s richest energy companies want homeowners to subsidise billions of pounds worth of gas-powered stations that will stand idle for most of the time.

‘Talks have taken place between the Government, Centrica, owner of British Gas, and other energy companies on incentives to build the power stations needed as back-ups for the wind farms now being built around the country.

‘It is understood 17 gas-fired plants worth about £10 billion will be needed by 2020.

‘The Energy Department has been warned that without this massive back-up for the new generation of heavily subsidised giant wind farms, the lights could go out when the wind dies down.

‘[...]’

-------------------------

See also:
‘Public must foot bill for carbon cuts, warns Centrica Chief’, The Times, 23 June, 2011.

‘WIND TURBINES PICK UP £2.6M FOR STANDING IDLE’

Sunday Times, 12 June 2011.

‘Wind farm operators were paid £2.6m to keep their turbines idle last month in the latest stealth charge on household power bills.

‘Scottish Power, which last week announced price rises averaging 10% for electricity and 19% for gas, was one of the firms paid to switch off turbines. It received approximately £720,000.

‘National Grid, which operates Britain’s main power and gas transmission networks, admitted it made the payments, which are paid for by the consumer.

‘It blamed lulls in demand during May, an unusually warm month, which meant there were times when energy generated by wind farms was not needed. It said efforts to update the power network had not kept pace with the construction of wind farms.

‘When The Sunday Times first revealed last month that wind farms were being paid to turn off their turbines[¹], the National Grid claimed the £900,000 payments were exceptional. Charles Hendry, the energy minister, also described them as an “anomaly”.

‘Now research carried out by the Renewable Energy Foundation (REF) reveals four energy companies were paid to switch off turbines on 16 occasions in May.[²]

[...]’

-------------------------

¹ See: ‘Turbine parks paid £900,000 to switch off for one night’, below.
² Renewable Energy Foundation website.

FEAST OR FAMINE

Ironically, on the morning that this article was published the 3,042MW of metered wind capacity in the UK was, according to official records,¹ producing as little as 36MW, only 1.05% of headline capacity.

This mirrors the sort of outputs we were seeing at periods of very high national demand last winter.²

-------------------------

¹ Balancing Mechanism website.
² See ‘Failing to deliver, again’ on the Windpower page.

‘U.K. WIND FARMS MAY SHUT WHEN DEMAND LOW: NATIONAL GRID’

Reuters, 13 June 2011.

‘British wind farms may be shut down about 38 days per year by 2020 to avoid power transmission overload at times of weak demand and high wind speeds, UK energy network operator National Grid said on Monday.[*]

[...]’

-------------------------

* National Grid, ‘Operating the Electricity Transmission Networks in 2020’, June 2011 (PDF download).

‘EXASPERATED PLANNERS SHUT WIND FARM DOWN’

Northern Times, 9 June, 2011.

‘The local authority has forced Scottish and Southern Electricity to shut down a Sutherland wind farm after the company breached planning controls by failing to deal with excessive noise from the development.

‘People living close to the Achany wind farm near Rosehall are claiming their lives are being made a misery by the constant noise, and are angry that their complaints are being ignored.

‘In an unprecedented move, Highland Council issued a temporary stop notice on the 23-turbine wind farm at 3pm on Monday.

[...]’

COMMENT

Yet another example of how ETSU-R-97, the noise protocol invented by wind industry acousticians because turbines could not meet the normal industrial noise regulations, fails to protect communities from turbine noise nuisance.

Why haven’t other turbine parks with a history of causing noise problems been closed down?

See the Noise page for examples of the problems and the scandalous story of how our government has ducked and dived in order to allow the wind industry to continue building turbines that will cause noise nuisance.

WAKE FOR THE WILD

Alan Sloman recently organised a ‘wake for the wild’ walk on the Highland shooting estate owned by Sir Jack Hayward, the Bahamas-based multi-millionaire property dealer.

Development company Renewable Energy Systems (RES), well known in the Borders for their 22 turbine Black Hill array near Duns and for a new proposal for 19 much larger turbines at Penmanshiel, near Grantshouse, are seeking to build 33 giant (120m) turbines at Dunmaglass, in the heart of the Monadhliath mountains.

The scheme would be Britain’s highest wind power station and would be visible from the shores of Loch Ness to the heights of the Cairngorms to the east.

The John Muir Trust is a leading objector to the Dunmaglass development, which will result in damage to a large area of relatively unspoiled upland peatland and significant disturbance to rare and protected species, including Golden Eagles.

A radio-tracking project has shown the importance of this area to Golden Eagles. The project website states: “Cullen [young female Golden Eagle] has spent most of her time on Dunmaglass estate, where there has been a recent decision to allow the building of a massive windfarm. This is a very important area for Golden Eagles and there is no doubt that a mistake has been made in this case.”

Alan Sloman said, “This is a chance to enjoy, perhaps for the last time, a wonderful wild place and reflect and celebrate together the glory of the Scottish Wilderness which is now, sadly, destined to be gone forever”.

ACCELERATING LOSS OF WILD LANDSCAPES

A recent report by Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) showed that the proportion of Scotland “without visual influence of built development” fell from 31% to 28% in 2009 alone.

This drop was far more rapid than in previous years.

A spokesman for SNH quoted in the Scotsman blamed the accelerating decline on wind turbines: “The decrease in area unaffected by the visual influence of built development is, in the main, caused by wind turbines,” said a spokesman for SNH. “Wind farms are being built rapidly in relation to other forms of development and they are highly visible due to their locations.” *

The Lammermuir, Moorfoot and Pentland Hills, as well as the Southern Uplands, are all experiencing the same assault by wind speculators. The Cheviot National Park enjoys a higher level of protection, but is gradually being encircled by turbine parks close to its borders.

-------------------------

Alan Sloman’s blog.
RaptorTrack website, ‘Cullen’.
* ‘Paradise lost - Scotland’s vanishing views’, The Scotsman, 22 February 2011.
See also:
John Muir Trust, wild land campaign.
‘Millionaires in wind farm feud’, The Scotsman, 08 May 2005 - ‘Developers use soft, green language when it is really about hard cash’.
Cameron McNeish, ‘The Dunmaglass disaster’, Cameron McNeish website, 29 December, 2010.

‘WIND FARMS: BRITAIN IS “RUNNING OUT OF WIND”

The Telegraph, 29 May 2011.

‘Despite the freak gales that battered parts of the country last week, climate experts are warning that many of Britain’s wind farms may soon run out of puff.

‘According to government figures, 13 of the past 16 months have been calmer than normal - while 2010 was the “stillest” year of the past decade.

‘Meteorologists believe that changes to the Atlantic jet stream could alter the pattern of winds over the next 40 years and leave much of the nation’s growing army of power-generating turbines becalmed.

[...]’

-------------------------

See also: ‘Britain is becoming less windy’, below.

THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME

Recently, local councillors in Northumberland were “inundated by calls from local people” when two 125m turbines went up at the MSD Pharmaceuticals site near Cramlington in Northumberland.¹

It seems that many people still have as little idea of the size of modern turbines as the lady from Wooler who berated critics of turbine proposals in North Northumberland in the press, saying that she was well aware of the size of modern turbines because she had been in Wansbeck hospital and seen their turbine. The Wansbeck turbine, since closed with blade failure, was 33m high!

Many small first generation turbines, such as the Blyth Harbour turbines, are being replaced (‘repowered’) with very much larger models.

The current generation of turbines are commonly 125m (410 ft) high.² The 42.5m turbines at Blyth are to be replaced with six 125m and one 163m turbines.

Enercon’s E-126 onshore turbine, which has already been deployed at several sites in Germany and Belgium (where it is already causing problems with noise, see video on EPAW website), has a height of 198m (649.6 ft). ³

For comparison, the Chatton TV mast in Northumberland is 152.9m high.

The tallest building in the UK at the moment is the 50 storey Canary Wharf tower, in London, at 235m. The BT tower is 188m and the 40 storey Swiss Re building, ‘the Gherkin’, is 180m.

German turbine manufacturers Enercon and REpower are both planning the next generation of turbines which it is thought will be up to 250m in height (820 ft).

NEW VESTAS TURBINE

Vestas have launched their new 187m V164 turbine, aimed, in the first instance, at offshore use.

According to Ditlev Engel, CEO of Vestas, “Its turbine is longer than the Swiss Re building, located in London (180m), and the rotating area of its blade (21,124㎡) is three times as large as Wembley Stadium”. ⁴

UK CONSORTIUM TO BUILD 90M BLADE

It has been announced that, “A UK government-backed consortium of companies, including BP and Rolls-Royce, has launched a project to develop a 90-metre [295 ft] blade.” ⁵

TALLER ONSHORE TURBINES FOR LOW WIND AREAS

General Electric has unveiled plans for onshore turbines with hub heights of at least 130 metres to allow developers to exploit areas with difficult wind conditions. Their 2.75-103 model would have tip height of over 180m.

Spanish wind turbine manufacturer Gamesa has launched the new G128-4.5 MW turbine which will have a tip height of 188m.

These models will join Vestas’ V112 3MW turbine, which is 175m high (130m tower). It has been specifically designed for low wind, onshore sites, 17 are due for construction on a site in Germany in 2012.

-------------------------

¹ Morpeth Herald, 8 October, 2010.
² 125m Aikengall turbine image, Borders page.
³ E-126 construction video.
⁴ ‘Wind Power Turbine as Large as the Size of Three Soccer Fields’, etnews, 6 April, 2011.
⁵ ‘UK to develop 90 metre blade for 10MW turbines’, Windpower Monthly, 17 May 2011.

‘GENTLE FOOTPRINT’ OR JACKBOOT?

“... a huge spatial footprint for a piddling little bit of electricity”

Scottish Natural Heritage’s footprint mapping, above, shows the huge spatial footprint of wind turbine arrays. Note: these are just the site areas not the ‘visual footprint’ of turbine schemes (i.e. the area upon which they have a visual impact), which is massively larger.

As Sir Martin Holdgate, retired chairman of the Renewable Energy Advisory Group, put it: “The trouble with wind farms is that they have a huge spatial footprint for a piddling little bit of electricity.”

In the ‘Moorsyde’ case, we had a 300 acre site for seven 360 ft. turbines that might, erratically and intermittently, produce as little as 18-24% of a headline capacity of 14MW.

By comparison, a small, modern combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) power station has a capacity of 500-600MW and a 50-60% load factor in producing reliable, base load power when it is needed.

Biomass

The Teesport biomass power station, due to open in 2012, is a compact industrial plant with a single 70-90 metre chimney, and occupies a brownfield, industrial site that is only 11.5% of the area of the ‘Moorsyde’ site. It will operate for some 8,000 hours per annum producing 2,400,000MWh of predictable, base load power. The project scoping report notes:

‘As the project will run 24 hours per day, 365 days per annum, it will generate as much renewable electricity as a 1,000MWe offshore wind farm (equivalent to that generated by the London Array wind farm which is one of the largest renewable energy projects in the world)’

The company claims that this plant will save, “ approximately 1.2 million tonnes of CO2 emissions.” The ‘Moorsyde’ developers claimed, using an extravagantly optimistic load factor and making no allowance for reduced output due to noise restrictions or the backup required from conventional power stations, that their project would save 14,650 tonnes. ¹

Wind industry propaganda

The wind industry and its apologists repeatedly suggest that wind turbines are the only “mature” and “proven” technology available. This is not true. Denmark, often cited as the shining example of wind power, actually produces much more energy - and much more reliable energy - from biomass:

“In Denmark, biomass accounts for approximately 70% of renewable-energy consumption, mostly in the form of straw, wood and renewable wastes, while biogas accounts for less. Consumption of biomass for energy production in Denmark more than quadrupled between 1980 and 2005..” (Danish Energy Authority).

Belated Recognition

The EU and our government are belatedly waking up to the relative advantages of biomass energy generation and other renewable technologies as the weaknesses of wind power generation gradually become clearer to the politicians.

-------------------------

¹ MGT Power. ‘Biomass Power Station, Teesport: Final Scoping Report’, April 2008.
² Danish Energy Authority website.

A “TEMPORARY” BLOT ON THE LANDSCAPE?

The wind industry frequently argues that wind turbines are only a temporary blot on the landscape and that they will be removed after “only 25 years”.

Like much else they come out with, this is demonstrably untrue.

Delabole was the first commercial wind farm built in the UK, it opened in 1991. The ten 30m (100ft) turbines installed in 1991 were supposed to have a lifespan of 20 years, after which time local people were told they would be removed and the land returned to its original state.

However, after just 16 years they were replaced with fewer 110m turbines. For “only [another] 25 years”.

This is being seen all over the country, as the planners nod through repowering applications. After all, if the site is already a power station, there is only the question of its size.

In North East England, we have seen the same process at Blyth Harbour: opened in 1993 with nine 42.5m turbines. Planning permission nodded through in 2008 to replace them with six 125m (410 ft) and one 163m (534 ft) turbines.

The only other first generation wind power station in the North East, at Great Eppleton, in County Durham, has also been repowered. Commissioned in 1997, this array of four 72m twin-bladed turbines was shut down in 2005 after only eight years in operation and has now been replaced by four 115m turbines.

NOT ‘TEMPORARY’

The Planning Inspector at the Boxworth appeal poured cold water on the appellant’s argument that the scheme was “temporary”:

The appellant has made much of the reversibility of the project, but to my mind the extent to which this argument is deployed rather undermines its efficacy. If the development was compatible with its landscape setting, there would be no need to protest that the scheme is of a temporary nature. Indeed, Para 109 of DOE Circular 11/95 The Use of Conditions in Planning Permissions states that the reason for granting a temporary permission can never be that the time-limit is necessary because of the effect of the development on the amenities of the area. If it is not possible to overcome the adverse effect on amenity, and if the damage cannot be accepted, then the only course open is to refuse permission. I understand from the appellant however that the reason for the proposed temporary period is the unpredictability of changes to the structure and mix of the power supply industry - circumstances may be entirely different in 25 years time. However, in my view this argument is not compatible with the long-term targets in the Energy Review - for example, to cut emissions by 60% by about 2050. In my opinion the development proposed is substantial in nature, and the appellant acknowledges that the period envisaged is equivalent in human terms to a generation. Although I recognise the 25 year period is the appellant’s suggestion, I nevertheless understand that some of the earlier turbines on established wind farms have been replaced by more recent models. And, in the event of the appeal succeeding, I consider that this would be a more likely future than the closure of the site at the end of the period. (Appeal Decision APP/W0530/A/05/1190473, Para. 26, P.7 )

‘NUCLEAR POWER “CHEAPER OPTION THAN OFFSHORE WIND FARMS”’

The Telegraph, 9 May, 2011.

‘Nuclear power should be favoured over plans to build thousands of offshore wind turbines, the Government's climate advisers have indicated.

‘The Committee on Climate Change said nuclear would be the most cost–effective way of providing low–carbon electricity into the 2020s, and called for about 14 new plants by the end of the next decade.

‘It would mean extending plans to build 12 reactors on seven sites by 2025.

‘The committee also said the “very aggressive pace” of government plans to build offshore wind turbines over the next nine years should be “moderated” because of its expense.

[...]

-------------------------

Committee on Climate Change, ‘Renewable Energy Review’, May 2011. Full report and Executive summary available on the CCC website.
See more views on offshore costs from the renewables press, below.

‘Costs force Spain to cut 2020 offshore projection’

Windpower Monthly, 16 May, 2011.

‘The Spanish government plans to slash Spain's projected 2020 offshore wind capacity to 750MW, a cut of 85 percent on the 5GW targeted five years ago.

[...]’

THINK TANK REPORT SLAMS HUGE COSTS OF INEFFECTIVE RENEWABLES POLICY

A report from the influential Policy Exchange think tank has strongly criticised the efficacy of renewables targets and subsidy mechanisms in decarbonising the UK.

We quote from the Executive Summary:

‘The huge cost of the renewable energy is its biggest problem. It costs far too much to achieve far too little decarbonisation, diverting resources which could be better used elsewhere. The target also damages and distorts the ability of market processes to discover the best approaches to decarbonisation.

‘The government’s 2008 Impact Assessment estimated the costs of the UK’s overall Renewable Energy Strategy for meeting the 2020 target at approximately £66 billion NPV [net present value]. A parliamentary written answer from January 2011 provided the following forecast of spending between 2011 and 2020 on the policies responding to the RET. “The spending is estimated at £32 billion from 2011 to 2020 under the Renewables Obligation; £3.6 billion under small-scale feed-in tariffs; £9.8 billion under the Renewable Heat Incentive; and £8.9 billion under the Renewable Transport Fuels Obligation.” Pöyry Consulting found that the UK bears by far the highest cost burden of all EU countries of the target – around a quarter of the cost across the whole EU. The electricity sector takes the majority of the strain of meeting the RET, with £35.6 billion of the cost between 2011 and 2020 in that sector.

‘However, these enormous costs achieve little. Previous work by Policy Exchange highlighted the cost of the Renewables Obligation at £130 per tonne of CO2 saved, (and the Feed-InTariffs for small-scale renewable generation at £460) compared with a marginal cost of carbon reduction of only around £14 per tonne of CO2 saved under the technology-neutral EU Emissions Trading Scheme.’
(pp.7-8, Executive Summary).

-------------------------

Simon Moore, Edited by Simon Less, ‘2020 Hindsight: Does the renewable energy target help the UK decarbonise?’, Policy Exchange, 2011.
Press:
‘U.K. Urged to Abolish Renewable Goals, Spend Less to Cut CO2’, Bloomberg, 5 May, 2011.

REPORT QUESTIONS WIND POWER’S ABILITY TO DELIVER WHEN MOST NEEDED

‘Analysis of UK Wind Power Generation November 2008 to December 2010’
A Report by Stuart Young, supported by the John Muir Trust.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

PRINCIPAL FINDINGS
in respect of analysis of electricity generation from all the U.K. windfarms which are metered by National Grid, November 2008 to December 2010.

The following five statements are common assertions made by both the wind industry and Government representatives and agencies. This Report examines those assertions.

1. “Wind turbines will generate on average 30% of their rated capacity over a year.”

2. “The wind is always blowing somewhere.”

3. “Periods of widespread low wind are infrequent.”

4. “The probability of very low wind output coinciding with peak electricity demand is slight.”

5. “Pumped storage hydro can fill the generation gap during prolonged low wind periods.”

This analysis uses publicly available data for a 26 month period between November 2008 and December 2010 and the facts in respect of the above assertions are:

1. Average output from wind was 27.18% of metered capacity in 2009, 21.14% in 2010, and 24.08% between November 2008 and December 2010 inclusive.

2. There were 124 separate occasions from November 2008 till December 2010 when total generation from the windfarms metered by National Grid was less than 20MW. (Average capacity over the period was in excess of 1600MW).

3. The average frequency and duration of a low wind event of 20MW or less between November 2008 and December 2010 was once every 6.38 days for a period of 4.93 hours.

4. At each of the four highest peak demands of 2010 wind output was low being respectively 4.72%, 5.51%, 2.59% and 2.51% of capacity at peak demand.

5. The entire pumped storage hydro capacity in the UK can provide up to 2788MW for only 5 hours then it drops to 1060MW, and finally runs out of water after 22 hours.

-------------------------

The full report is available from the John Muir Trust website.

TURBINE PARKS PAID £900,000
TO SWITCH OFF FOR ONE NIGHT

The Renewable Energy Foundation has revealed that substantial ‘constraint’ payments were made to a number of Scottish producers in the first week of April.¹ A constraint occurs when the grid system or a section of the system is unable to absorb all the electricity being generated, and some generators that are contracted to generate are asked to stand down.

The April event occurred because the Scottish grid network could not absorb all the energy being generated, and chose to constrain wind power off the system, paying very high prices to compensate wind generators for the lost income, in some cases as high as 20 times the value of the electricity which would otherwise have been generated. In total approximately £890,000 pounds was paid over a few hours to six operators. These costs will be passed on to the consumer.

The National Grid report which informs REF’s note demonstrates that when there was an excess of power there was a limited range of power stations capable of reducing output on request in early April, and that the costs of paying these generators to reduce their output covered a substantial range. The most economical plant was coal‐fired, which offered to pay the grid £28 per MWh not to run. Some coal‐fired, gas‐fired and hydro generators were willing to reduce output at no cost, but some of these relatively economical offers could not be taken up by NG because the electricity system must always have access sufficient controllable and flexible electricity generation sources to ramp up and down in order to maintain system frequency.

Due to these limited options National Grid was obliged to pay wind farms to reduce output.

The offer prices which the various Scottish operators set for such a reduction ranged from £150 per MWh to £1,000 MWh (wholesale prices are £40-50 per MWh). Fossil‐fuelled power stations routinely pay into the system when asked to reduce output because they still receive their contracted payments, but also make savings on the fuel they have not had to burn.

Conversely, wind farms, when asked to reduce output, forego subsidies worth approximately £50‐£55 per MWh, from the Renewables Obligation Certificates (ROCs) and Levy Exemption Certificates (LECs), so require payment so as not to be out of pocket. However, as seen from the National Grid report and other data in the public domain, wind farm operators that were paid to reduce output on the 5‐6th April set prices significantly in excess of this level.

For example, Farr wind park was paid £800 per MWh to reduce output, nearly 16 times the value of the subsidy foregone.

The following list shows the wind arrays compensated for not generating in the first part of April 2011:

We have seen the future...

Critics of the uncontrolled wind build, including Ofgem and National Grid, have long argued that managing a large wind capacity will lead to these sorts of problems.³

While critics have focused on back up requirements and low average load factors, less attention has been paid to the widespread tendency of wind power generation to deliver maximum output during periods of low demand and its frequently demonstrated failure to deliver during periods of peak demand. At the four highest peak load periods of 2010 wind output delivered 4.72%, 5.51%, 2.59% and 2.51% of capacity.²

-------------------------

¹ REF, ‘High Rewards for Wind Farms Discarding Electricity 5‐6th April 2011’, REF, 1 May 2011.
² Stuart Young Consulting, ‘Analysis of UK Wind Generation’, 6th April, 2011. Available on the JMT website.
³ Earlier reporting on curtailment - see below.
Press reports:
‘Wind farms paid £900,000 to switch off for one night’, The Telegraph, 1 May 2011.
‘Wind farms paid £900,000 to switch off’, Sunday Times, 1 May, 2011 (Paywall protected article).

‘U.K. WIND FARMS MAY SHUT WHEN DEMAND LOW: NATIONAL GRID’

Reuters, 13 June 2011.

‘British wind farms may be shut down about 38 days per year by 2020 to avoid power transmission overload at times of weak demand and high wind speeds, UK energy network operator National Grid said on Monday.

[...]’

‘STUDY SAYS GREEN SECTOR COSTS MORE JOBS THAN IT CREATES’

BBC News, 28 February 2011

‘Government support for the renewable sector in Scotland is costing more jobs than it creates, a report has claimed. *

‘A study by consultants Verso Economics found there was a negative impact from the policy to promote the industry.

‘It said 3.7 jobs were lost for every one created in the UK as a whole and that political leaders needed to engage in “honest debate” about the issue.

‘[...]’

-------------------------

* Verso Economics, ‘Worth The Candle? The Economic Impact of Renewable Energy Policy in Scotland and the UK’, March 2011. Full report costs £36, the executive summary can be downloaded from the Verso Website.

FUELLING THE WIND RUSH

One year’s estimated Renewables Obligation subsidy for a selection of turbine arrays in S E Scotland and N E England:

(Production figures from Ofgem [in REF’s ‘UK Renewable Energy Data, 2002-2010’]. ROC price used is the average of £45.49 from the 28 September 2010 auction [‘e.ROC’ website]. Red LF figures are those below claimed industry average [30%] and assumed regional LF [29%]. The North East continues to have the worst regional load factors in the UK, see DECC tables on the Windpower page).

All RO subsidies are paid from consumer electricity bills. Renewables subsidies already cost well over £1 billion per year and will escalate steeply in the coming years.

Highs and lows

These figures show the extremes of wind production: the most unproductive turbines in the UK, at Blyth Harbour, were rewarded with over £53,000 for producing an insignificant trickle of electricity. The massive 125m turbines at Aikengall on the top of the Lammermuirs were the only machines to achieve what the British Wind Energy Association used to claim was an “average load factor” for modern turbines.

The one consistant factor is the large subsidies paid from consumer tariffs for small amounts of intermittent and unpredictable power from what the wind industry keeps telling us is an “economically competitive”, “mature” and “proven” technology.

By comparison, Torness produced 9,550,000 MWh of cheap, base-load electricity in 2009/10 which was comparable with wind in the carbon burden of its production.

Nuclear production is not subsidised. Torness, with over 500 well paid jobs, also made a major contribution to the local economy. Had it been treated in the same way as onshore wind production, it would have been eligible for £434.42 million in subsidies in 2009/10.

The offshore bonanza

Offshore wind parks get twice the RO subsidy that onshore receives. It is calculated that the Swedish owners of the 100 turbine Thanet array off the Kent coast will receive in the region of £1.2 billion in subsidies during the (optimistic) life of the project. It has been pointed out that the same sum, invested now in a single nuclear power station, could yield a staggering 13 times more electricity, and this would be reliable, base-load output rather than intermittent power that requires fossil-fuelled backup (see below).

As Peter Atherton, head utilities analyst at Citi Investment Research, said to the FT: “It’s a bonanza. Anyone who can get their nose in the trough is trying to.”

‘FICKLE WINDS, INTERMITTENT SUNSHINE START TO STRESS U.S. POWER SYSTEM’

NY Times, April 25, 2011.

‘The growth of U.S. wind power has begun to create operating challenges for nuclear and coal plants that must be ramped up and down as wind speeds vary, panelists at a Massachusetts Institute of Technology energy conference reported last week.

[...]’

‘COUNCIL TO GIVE WIND FARM PLANS SHORT SHRIFT’

This is Staffordshire, 23 April, 2011.

‘Campaigners have welcomed a council’s decision to shun the development of wind farms.

‘Staffordshire County Council has drawn up new policy guidelines, which will effectively mean no large-scale wind farms will be allowed on land owned by the local authority.

‘It comes after a series of community campaigns to try to block wind masts.

[...]

‘The county council set up a policy advisory group last summer to consider exploiting wind power as the most cost-effective green energy. But new energy tariffs mean other technologies, previously considered too expensive, are affordable.

‘Gnosall and Doxey councillor Mark Winnington, cabinet member for the environment, said: “We have looked at wind power and have come to the conclusion that the electorate, as a majority, do not like wind farms.”

‘Deputy council leader Ian Parry, who represents Stone Rural, added: “The intrusion these things have on the landscape is undesirable and unacceptable. Without subsidy, they are not viable.”’

DUTCH REVOLT AGAINST WIND POWER

Holland, the home of the old-fashioned windmill, is experiencing a backlash against modern onshore wind turbines.¹

Increasing numbers of provincial authorities are banning land based turbines. The province of Noord Holland has made it part of the negotiations for a new provincial government that no more onshore turbines are built. Friesland, which used to be at the forefront of wind development, is now relegating them to the borders of the province and may ban them altogether if funds can be found to compensate farmers who are willing to pull them down.

It was reported in february, 2011, that the Netherlands is reducing its targets for renewable energy and slashing the subsidies for offshore wind and solar power. It has also given the green light for the country’s first new nuclear power plants for almost 40 years.²

The reasons for the change are the escalating costs of subsidies, especially for huge offshore schemes, and the growing popular backlash against massive onshore turbines.

Holland is the first country to abandon the EU-wide 20:20 target, a remarkable turnaround for a state that took the Kyoto Agreement seriously and supported EU renewable energy strategies. The €4bn annual subsidy will be slashed to €1.5bn, and future subsidy payments will be channelled away from wind development.

-------------------------

¹ ‘Wind turbines unpopular thanks to environmentalists’, DutchNews.nl, 21 April, 2011.
² ‘Holland’s Radical U-Turn On Climate and Energy Policy’, Translation of article by Michael Gassmann, Financial Times Deutschland, 9 February, 2011.

RENEWABLES INVESTMENT FALLS BY 34% AS SUBSIDIES ARE CUT

‘Clean Energy Investment Fell 34% as Incentives Cut in Europe, BNEF Says.

Bloomberg, 15 April, 2011.

‘New investment in renewable energy dropped to the lowest in two years in the first quarter, weighed down by low natural gas prices in the U.S. and subsidy cuts in Europe, Bloomberg New Energy Finance said.

‘Money flowing into the industry through asset finance, share sales, venture capital and private equity fell more than a third to $31.1 billion in the first three months of the year from a record $47.1 billion in the fourth quarter of 2010, the London-based researcher said today in a statement.

‘Countries including Germany and Spain have announced reductions in the guaranteed prices that they pay for electricity from renewable sources while in the U.K. the government is reviewing the rates. Gas in the U.S. in September fell to its lowest price since 2002 amid a glut in production.

‘[...]’

THE TRUTH ABOUT TARGETS

In North East England, county and regional renewable energy targets are supposed to have been consigned to history, along with the Regional Spatial Strategy framework, ‘W’ maps and the rest of the heavy-handed planning apparatus that was forced on local communities by the last government and their unelected regional commissariat. However, there is little sign that their adherents are inclined to abandon them.

Unsurprisingly, the wind industry has always been eager to use simplistic, outdated and, all too often, plain wrong, ‘evidence’ of unmet renewable energy targets to browbeat planners and bolster their demands for weaker planning controls and speedy, ill-considered consents for ever more and larger turbine arrays.

The way that misleading numbers are used in planning applications was again demonstrated in the Wingates planning meeting on 5 April, when a planning officer again delivered a wildly inaccurate back-of-an-envelope calculation of projected 2020 targets to Councillors.

It is therefore essential to understand the statistics and why a crude measure of installed headline capacity understates how far local planning authorities have already gone towards meeting notional targets for 2020 and beyond.

Local experts have prepared a report using government data which has recently been delivered to Northumberland County Councillors and the planning department.

The results will surprise you!

-------------------------

An updated version (12 April, 2011) of the full powerpoint presentation is available for download here (Large, 3.7Mb, ppt file).

‘CALLS TO PUT THE BRAKES ON WIND TURBINES IN NORTHUMBERLAND’

By David Black, The Journal, 22 February 2011.

‘Calls were made last night for a slowdown in wind farm approvals in Northumberland - amid claims the county is doing far more than its fair share on meeting renewable energy targets.

‘Local environmental campaigners say England’s most northerly county has already approved four times as much wind generation as any other county outside the North East.

‘They claim Northumberland is already meeting renewables targets set for 2060 – and it is now ‘time to take stock’ in terms of how many more massive turbines should be given the green light.

‘A report has been compiled by veteran environmental campaigner and retired business analyst Bill Short of Kirkwhelpington, using statistics from the Department for Energy and Climate Change.

‘Along with Karen Archbold from the pressure group Campaign for Responsible Energy Development in Tynedale – which in 2009 opposed plans for 59 turbines on three sites near Kirkwhelpington – he has now outlined its findings to county councillors.

‘[...]’

-------------------------

Read the full article on the Journal Live website.
Bill Short’s Powerpoint presentation is available as a download.

D.E.C.C. CONFIRMS WIND FAILURE FIGURES

‘Wind farms unreliable, say critics, after lowest energy figures recorded’

‘Onshore wind farms tend to produce less energy in winter when the demand is highest because freezing conditions mean low wind’.

The Times, 1 April, 2011.

‘The average output from Britain’s 275 onshore wind farms fell last year to the lowest level on record, according to official figures that call into question the Government’s decision to rely heavily on turbines for future energy.

‘The Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) said that the amount of electricity generated from 3,000 land-based turbines fell by 7.7 per cent in 2010. However, the decline per turbine was much greater because the overall capacity of onshore wind farms grew by 14 per cent last year. *

‘In its annual Energy Statistics, published yesterday, DECC said: “Ten months of 2010 saw lower wind speeds than the ten-year average.”

‘Wind farms operated at only 21.4 per cent of their maximum potential capacity, compared with 27.4 per cent in 2009. Southern Electric and Scottish Hydro, the leading renewable energy company, recently reported a 20 per cent decline in output from its turbines. The Government is offering generous subsidies to wind energy companies as part of a strategy to produce a quarter of Britain’s electricity by 2020.

‘Opponents of wind farms say that this could lead to power cuts during prolonged periods of low wind. The problem is compounded in winter, when freezing conditions are usually accompanied by low wind but demand for electricity is high.

‘The Renewable Energy Foundation (REF), which lobbies against overreliance on wind energy, said that turbines had a tendency to produce the least energy when they were needed most. It said this had happened last year during the coldest December on record.

‘[...]’

-------------------------

The full article is available on The Times website (subscription needed).
* DECC, Energy Trends, March 2011.
See also: ‘Britain is becoming less windy’, below, and ‘Failing to deliver’, below.

THE WONDER OF WIND

This graph shows the erratic nature of wind power generation and how difficult it is to forecast output.

Short term wind output forecasts can be highly inaccurate, as was seen for a long period in March and as exampled in period 1 on this graph. During period 6 on Monday, 28 March, total UK metered production fell as low as 9MW, the headline capacity of 3 Vestas V90 turbines. This 9MW was all that was being produced from some 1,550 turbines, including over 400 offshore turbines.

As it happens, it is of little moment whether UK wind capacity manages to produce anything when demand is relatively low (peak demand was forecast at 45,749MW for 28 March) and we have reliable fossil-fuelled capacity available. It was a different matter in December 2010 when wind power repeatedly failed to deliver on days when demand was peaking at 60,000MW and National Grid was scrambling to bring hydro, pumped storage, the French interconnector and even seldom used oil-fired capacity online to meet very high demand.

However, this does demonstrate the fact that we cannot rely on wind power to contribute anything and that we will increasingly need a very large thermal capacity (mostly fuelled with imported gas) available in short order for periods when wind fails to deliver or fails to deliver according to the short term forecast. This fossil-fuelled capacity has to be paid for and its operators will have to be compensated if very large wind capacity is prioritised when the wind happens to be blowing or they are forced to inefficiently (and damagingly) ‘cycle’ their plant to cover wind production, raising CO2 emissions in the process.

-------------------------

See below for more on the December 2010 story.

‘HIGH COURT DATE SET FOR “NUISANCE TURBINES” HEARING’

Spalding Guardian, 17 March 2011

‘ALL eyes will be on Deeping St Nicholas this summer when a landmark case on noise created by wind turbines reaches the High Court.

‘A date has finally been set for Jane and Julian Davis to have their say on turbines which they claim have forced them out of their home.

‘Their legal bid, which is thought to be one of the first private nuisance cases brought against a wind farm, will be heard in the High Court from July 4 and has been scheduled to run for ten days.

[...]’

-------------------------

The Davis’ house is “unsaleable” according to a professional valuer and they have had its community charge valuation reduced at Rating Tribunal. For more on this story see our Noise and Property pages.

JOB CREATION AT DECC

While the Government takes the axe to everything from defence to education, it is comforting to know that Cris Huhne, at DECC, is creating jobs:

‘In May 2010 they [DECC] employed 1036 people (full time equivalents). Since May 53 people have left. They now employ 1154 (fte).

‘That means they have employed an extra 118 staff, and replaced the 52 (fte) that have left, making a grand total of 170 extra hirings.

‘I am pleased to report that at Business totals are down by 449, with 500 leaving over the period. At DEFRA totals are down by 539, with leavers amounting to 678. (all fte). The natural wastage rate is running at over 7% per annum at DEFRA and much higher at Business, if all the leavers were voluntary. It shows that there are substantial savings to be had from natural wastage.’

-------------------------

(‘Staff numbers and controlling costs’, John Redwood's blog, 2 March, 2011).

BIG DEAL: PICKING OUR POCKETS
FOR ‘COMMUNITY BENEFIT’

Chris Huhne, Secretary of State for Energy, announced on 16 February that REUK (the trade lobby for the UK wind industry) has agreed on a minimum standard protocol for wind farm community benefits of £1,000 per MW of installed capacity per year.

In response, the Renewable Energy Foundation (REF) has drawn attention to the fact that the “financial benefits” proposed reflect only around 0.5% of the total annual income of the average wind farm.¹ It is also a fact that these proposed ‘benefits’ are substantially below the current going rate advertised by many wind developers.²

An average 2.3 MW turbine receives an income of about £500,000 a year, half of which (around £250,000) is subsidy in the form of the Renewables Obligation drawn from consumer bills.³ (The Renewables Obligation subsidy currently costs UK consumers over £1.4bn).

So, for a typical turbine described above, the community benefit of £2,300 a year will be paid out from an income of about £500,000, or roughly 0.5%.

REF believes that other more generous and less divisive forms of community reparation would be preferable, including direct compensation to affected neighbours (as in Denmark), and reduced council tax to reflect lost amenity.

Dr John Constable, Director of Policy & Research said: “The proposed community benefit is just half of one percent of the large subsidy enhanced income derived from our electricity bills; the wind farm industry is taking our money with one hand and expecting us to be grateful for the small change offered with the other. Many will perceive community benefit of this kind and scale as adding insult to injury, and the plan seems unlikely to be persuasive.”

-------------------------

¹ REF website
² “In consultation with its members, BWEA [ReUK’s previous name] has assumed that the average, annual community fund payment in 2006 equates to £1,500 per MW installed per year.” (British Wind Energy Association, ‘Onshore Wind: Powering Ahead’, March 2006. p.23).

Payments in Scotland have generally been much higher. Highlands Council has Guidelines produced for developers which were adopted by the Council in April 2003:

• The guidance called for community benefit levels – or their equivalent in equity – to rise from the 1996 rate [£1,000/MW p.a.] to at least £4000 - £5000/MW p.a.
  Equity refers to any benefit that enables a community to buy into or take ownership of any part of a commercial development.

Powys County Council decided in 2006 that communities that would be seriously affected by wind farm development should receive payments from developers of £5,000.

³ Assumes an average load factor of 25%, a ROC price of £50/MWh and a wholesale electricity price of £50/MWh.

‘IN CHINA, THE COST OF BRITAIN'S CLEAN, GREEN WIND POWER EXPERIMENT: POLLUTION ON A DISASTROUS SCALE

Daily Mail, 29 January 2011

‘This toxic lake poisons Chinese farmers, their children and their land. It is what's left behind after making the magnets for Britain's latest wind turbines... and, as a special Live investigation reveals, is merely one of a multitude of environmental sins committed in the name of our new green Jerusalem.’

[...]

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‘BRITAIN IS BECOMING LESS WINDY, RAISING DOUBTS OVER GOVERNMENT’S WIND STRATEGY

‘According to Britain’s politicians, covering the landscape with wind farms is still the future. Last month Chris Huhne, the energy secretary, promised a “seismic shift” to wind and other non-carbon forms of generating electricity.

Andrew Gilligan, The Telegraph, 15 January, 2011.

‘In November, Scotland’s first minister, Alex Salmond, spoke of wind’s “massive economic rewards” in a “renewables revolution”. In May, the wind industry trade body, RenewableUK, called the North Sea “the Saudi Arabia of wind”.

‘Yet it can be revealed that as the rhetoric has climbed ever further up the Beaufort scale, the wind itself has moved in precisely the opposite direction. New figures published by The Sunday Telegraph show that 2010 was, by one authoritative measure, the least windy year since 1824.

‘According to other figures from official sources, exclusively compiled for this newspaper, Britain’s wind farms turned less in 2010 than in any previous year since detailed records were kept.

‘The failure of the country’s massive wind industry to generate almost any electricity whatever at the time when it was most needed – during last month’s extreme cold snap – has been widely reported. But that, we can reveal, was just the tip of the turbine-blade in a decades-long trend of declining wind. It is a trend causing an increasing crisis for the industry among those, principally investors, who are more aware of events than British politicians.

‘“For those who staked their future on assumptions made based off of recent weather patterns, there may be some significant flaws in the business plan,” says Todd Crawford, a forecaster at Weather Services International, a consultancy operated by the US's Weather Channel. Moody's, the international credit rating agency, warned that "unusually low levels of wind volumes" were becoming "a key driver of credit risk to investors."

‘According to figures compiled by the Renewable Energy Foundation (REF) for The Sunday Telegraph, UK wind farms generated electricity to just 23.6 per cent of their full capacity between October 2009 and September 2010, based on official data from the electricity regulator, Ofgem. That is lower than in any year since 2002-3, the first year when the figures were collected.

‘Provisional January-to-December data, incorporating the cold snap, also shows that 2010 was the least windy year in Britain since the records began. The data has been compiled using Ofgem figures and statistics for wind power provided to the National Grid, Britain’s electricity transmission network.

[...]’

‘OFFSHORE DEALS TEST BANKS AS WIND DROPS’

Reuters, 27 August, 2010

‘[...]

‘It’s not windy

‘The deals are being launched as it has become clear 2010 has been a bad year for UK wind speeds, perhaps the worse since 1821. Wind speeds clearly have a direct impact on energy MW yields from wind.

‘A recent report from wind consultancy Garrad Hassan said UK wind yields have dropped this year to perhaps a 1 in 15 year event due to stable high pressure. Energy levels from wind dropped 27.8% in the first quarter compared with the average and 18.3% in the second quarter - compared with a 5% drop in the last quarter of 2009 and a 15.7% increase in the third quarter of 2009. The North Atlantic Oscillation index has been measured since 1821 and this correlates with the Garrad Hassan wind index which itself been in existence for 15 years. The NAO index numbers for the 4 months from December 2009 to March 2010 were the most negative since 1821.

‘[...]’

‘Low wind yields

‘Lower than expected wind speeds can be a global phenomenon in the renewables market. In a recent note on FPL Energy American Wind's US$250m of bond debt, rating agency Moody’s referred to the recent “very low wind years” in the US.

‘[...]’

-------------------------

Comment

Even before 2010, European countries were reporting declining year-on-year wind figures: “Generation from Danish wind turbines dropped from 7.0 TWh in 2008 to 6.7 TWh in 2009. This was due to 2009 being a poorer wind year than 2008.” (Energinet, Environmental Report 2010).

‘CUSTOMERS FACE HUGE BILL FOR WIND FARMS THAT DON’T WORK IN THE COLD

Daily Mail, 9 January 2011.

‘The failure of Britain’s wind farms to produce electricity in the extreme cold will cost billions of pounds, create an economic crisis and lead to blackouts, leading industrialists have warned.

‘To cover up the ineffectiveness of wind farms the Government will be forced to build emergency back-up power plants, the cost of which will be paid by industry and consumers.

‘Jeremy Nicholson, director of the Energy Intensive Users Group, which represents major companies employing hundreds of thousands of workers in the steel, glass, pottery, paper and chemical industries, said the failure of wind power had profound implications.

[...]

‘And the cost of the standby generation will be paid for by industry and households through higher bills – which could double by 2020.

‘Industry regulator Ofgem has already calculated that the cost of achieving sustainable energy targets – set by Brussels but backed by the British Government – will amount to £200 billion, which will mean that annual household fuel bills will double to about £2,400 on average within the next ten years.

[...]’

‘LACK OF WIND RAISES FEARS FOR FUTURE OF GREEN ENERGY

The Times, 2 February 2011

‘Britain’s leading renewable energy company has reported a 20 per cent fall in the amount of electricity produced by its wind turbines.

‘The news came as official figures revealed that on December 30, an exceptionally still day, Britain’s 3,000 operational wind turbines produced only 0.04 per cent of the country’s power.

‘The Energy Minister Charles Hendry told The Times that the figures proved the urgency with which other forms of low-carbon generation needed to be developed.

‘[...]’

COMPANY BLAMES LOW WIND FOR £1M OF LOSSES

Reporting their results for the 6 months to 31 December, 2010, Renewable Energy Generation Group (REG), which operates 10 wind power sites, has cited, “Abnormally low wind speeds across the UK” for over £1m of lost EBITDA [Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization].

-------------------------

Press release.

‘LACK OF WIND HITS WIND ENERGY PRODUCTION’

Dutch News, 28 February, 2011.

‘The production of wind energy in the Netherlands fell by 13% last year despite the increase in the number of turbines, the national statistics office CBS said on Monday.

‘[...]’

FAILING TO DELIVER, AGAIN

During the coldest December for 120 years, the UK hit a winter peak load (so far) of nearly 60,000MW. Wind power, yet again, failed to deliver.

The fuel types graph shows the scramble to bring hydro, pumped storage, the French interconnector and even seldom used oil-fired capacity online to meet demand. Wind is not even visible on the graph, providing a mere 61MW at peak from a total UK metered capacity of 2,430MW, only 2.5% of its theoretical capacity.

The forecast out-turn graph shows wind output falling as low as 20MW, less than 0.1% of headline capacity.

This underlines National Grid’s observations on wind power generation during peak demand for the three winters previous to 2010-11:

In terms of generation availability we saw a small contribution from wind generation at the time of the demand peak, underlining the need to discount the technical availability of intermittent generation types.¹

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¹ National Grid, ‘Winter Outlook, 2010-11’, 17. See below.

SOME INCONVENIENT TRUTHS
FROM NATIONAL GRID

National Grid, ‘Winter Consultation Report 2010/11. A review of winter 2009/10 and preliminary outlook for winter 2010/11.’

Downloadable PDF file, see National Grid website.

Selected wind-related excerpts:

Winter Review 2009/10

17. In terms of generation availability we saw a small contribution from wind generation at the time of the demand peak, underlining the need to discount the technical availability of intermittent generation types.

2009/10 Electricity Generation Capacity

140. A more detailed view of the amount of electricity generated by wind is shown in Figure A.30. This data is based on the wind farms that are currently visible to National Grid through operational metering [all in Scotland, the windiest part of the UK]. These wind farms have a total capacity of approximately 1586 MW. The output varied between 3 MW and 1586 MW with an average of 435 MW. This gives an average load factor of 27% over the period. From a security of energy supply perspective the key issue is the uncertainty and variability of output and the average load factor is of limited use. What can be observed from the data below is two periods of low wind output over several days in early November 2009 and early January 2010. Both of these periods were relatively cold for the time of year and coincided with relatively high electricity demands.

141. Figure A.31 highlights that at the times of peak electricity demand over the last three successive winters wind power output has been relatively low compared with average load factors.

142. Table A.9 gives a summary of wind power generation volumes as operationally metered by National Grid for the last four winters. The volume of wind power generation itself is not particularly a key metric for us from a system operation perspective itself, but here it is a useful indicator of the growth in the impact of wind power with its inherent uncertainty and volatility.

145. [...] Wind generation output was only 7% at the time of the winter peak. [...]

146. Note that for wind and hydro generation in table A.10 that the basis of assumed availability is different to that for other fuel types as it is actual load factor at the time of the demand peak and not technical declared availability as in both cases availability of input energy to the generation is a more limiting factor. In turbine availability terms we expect that wind turbine technical availability was in the high ninety percentage level range, but this has very little significance if the wind is not at a speed where they can generate at full output.

Generation Side Risks

254. Recent history has shown that during peak demand, the demand contribution from wind power could be low. If wind power output is discounted to zero over the winter demand peak, available generation reduces by 200 MW (10% of 1.9 GW capacity). Hence in the current environment the impact of no wind is of low materiality for this winter.

THE ALICE IN WONDERLAND WORLD
OF WIND DEVELOPMENT

The wind industry’s trade body includes the following in its list of ‘Top Myths About Wind Energy’:

11. Myth: Wind farms negatively affect tourism
15. Myth: Wind farms are noisy ¹

Meanwhile, in the real world ...

TURBINES V. TOURISM

Wind Prospect Developments recently won planning permission for eighteen 110m turbines at Green Rigg, near Sweethope Lough in Tynedale, Northumberland. They have once more objected to plans for a tourist development nearby.

Sherod Walker had plans for the eco-friendly Waterfalls holiday park and equestrian centre refused by Northumberland County Council earlier this year, his appeal is due to be heard in February.

The project was expected to create 106 temporary jobs and 67 full-time posts. It would have put £2m a year into the local economy and was backed by local organisations, the naturalist David Bellamy and 330 individual supporters.

The county council turned down the plans on the basis of visual impact – the issue upon which Mr Walker is taking the case to appeal.

He has now submitted a second application for a smaller development of three holiday cottages and two stables on land next to his house on the Waterfalls estate.²

Once again he is facing objections from Wind Prospect, whose turbines are only 450 metres from the Waterfalls park boundary.

Again they say that noise from the wind farm, which is not yet fully operational, must be taken into account in considering the new development.

In a letter from their solicitors regarding the first proposal Wind Prospect stated that:

... this is a proposed holiday centre, where patrons would reasonably expect to sit outside to enjoy the relative peace and quiet of the countryside. [...] Noise from the permitted wind energy development will be very likely to provoke complaints, and this will place both the [NCC] Environmental Health Department and the wind farm operator in an impossible position: a complaint about noise could be found to be justified, and construed as a noise nuisance, even though the wind farm was operating lawfully within the constraints of its planning conditions. ³

So, it appears that a wind development company is admitting that:

• wind turbine developments can seriously affect the peace and quiet of the countryside;

• wind turbine developments can cause a noise nuisance within the grounds of a nearby property where noise has been monitored;

• wind turbine developments can harm or restrict tourism;

• complaints about turbine noise may be justified even though the turbine scheme is, “operating lawfully within the constraints of its planning conditions”.

-------------------------

¹ Renewable UK (formerly known as the British Wind Energy Association) ‘Top Myths About Wind Energy’.
² ‘Boss takes on wind farm in new battle’, The Journal, 20 November, 2010.
³ Letter from Hammonds LLP, 11 June 2010, to Northumberland County Council planning department (letter and map linked here).

THE OFFSHORE WIND BUBBLE DEFLATES

‘ORDERS FOR [OFFSHORE] WIND TURBINES TO FALL BY 93%, ENERGY EXPERTS PREDICT’

• [newly installed] Wind power capacity to slump from 1,368Mw to 90Mw in 2013
• Ministers to announce overhaul of energy market this month
The Guardian, 8 November, 2010.

‘Orders for offshore wind turbines in Britain will slump next year, threatening to halt the industry’s recent growth and the expected creation of up to 10,000 “green economy” jobs.

‘Analysts are forecasting a 93% drop in the installation of new offshore windfarms in 2013 compared with the previous year. As orders for cables, foundations and other equipment are typically made two to three years ahead of the project being completed, the slowdown will start to bite among UK suppliers next year.

‘Windfarm developers are worried that the hiatus in the industry will last several years, which could result in large-scale job losses if other related work cannot be found. One said this gap would cause “huge problems” for the supply chain and it would be hard for manufacturers to invest in new facilities in Britain without a steady stream of work.

‘[...]

‘Kintyre wind farm firm goes bust’

BBC News, 26 October, 2010.

‘A wind turbine manufacturer which received £10m from the Scottish government to safeguard jobs in 2009 has gone bust.

‘The Danish company Skykon, which took over the Vestas wind turbine factory in Kintyre last year, has announced it is suspending payments to its creditors.

‘[...]

Industry problems

It seems that, despite government support and huge public subsidies, the wind sector is less than healthy.

In the North East of England, the loss-making Clipper Windpower was recently bailed out by its major shareholder (UTC) in return for agreeing to sell it the remaining shares in the company.

This came after the company was awarded a £4.4 million grant from the Environmental Transformation Fund last year to develop a factory on Tyneside to build its grandiose ‘Britannia’ offshore wind turbine.

Vestas - profits warnings and job losses

Meanwhile, Vestas, the world’s biggest turbine manufacturer and former owners of the Kintyre factory, has announced profits warnings for the second quarter in a row. It says that it will axe 3,000 jobs, 14% of its global workforce, and shut 4 production plants in Denmark and Sweden. The closures in Denmark represent one third of its domestic workforce.

As of 10 December, 2010, Vestas had seen its stock price fall to less than $30 a share from more than $140 in 2008.

US wind bubble deflates

Figures released by the American Wind Energy Association on 29 October show a dramatic drop in new projects during 2010. Installations in the first half of 2010 were down 72% on 2009.

To underline the message, Suzlon, the world’s No. 3 wind energy company, has announced that it is laying off remaining workers at its Pipestone, Minn., blade factory on 29 December. The company has no orders.

A ‘boondoggle’

In some ways it is surprising that the wind industry in the US is in such dire straits when it is the beneficiary of massive federal, state and county subsidies.

The US government has itself calculated that the largest turbine array to be built in the US, at Shepherds Flat, in Oregon, 338 wind turbines on a 30 square mile site, will receive $1.2 billion in subsidies for 35 permanent jobs, a cost per job of $34 million.

The recent US election results are likely to put additional strain on the US wind industry. Wide-ranging climate change legislation is likely to be shelved as a result of deep-seated Republican opposition to carbon pricing and scepticism about renewable energy and wind in particular. The wind industry had already been damaged by the revelation that very large incentive payments were being awarded retrospectively to large foreign companies such as Iberdrola.

Obama has highlighted nuclear energy, as well as electric cars and natural gas, as areas where cross-party support could deliver new clean energy legislation.

-------------------------

See: ‘Obama vows to work with resurgent Republicans on energy policy overhaul’, BusinessGreen, 4 November 2010.

THINK TANK WARNS OF GREEN ENERGY TAX HIKE

Research from think tank Policy Exchange, which has close links to government ministers, warns that UK consumers will pay the equivalent of 4p on the current basic rate of income tax to bankroll government energy and climate change policies by 2020.

The figures reveal that by 2020, the cost of policies like the Renewables Obligation and Feed-in Tariffs (FiTs) - which pay householders to produce power uneconomically through technologies like solar - will hit over £16 billion a year.

That is a tripling in less than a decade, and equivalent to 4p on the current basic rate of income tax, or 2 per cent of total forecast tax revenues in 2020, according to the think tank.

-------------------------

‘WINDY U.K. ENERGY POLICY COSTLY, RISKY’

By Daniel Fineren, Reuters, 14 October, 2010.

‘LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's plan to plant thousands of wind turbines at sea may cost cash-strapped consumers dear, reinforce the UK's risky reliance on gas and hinder deep cuts in carbon emissions.

‘Shamed by its failure to build many relatively competitive onshore wind farms [? Check the maps, Ed.], Britain is poised to pour tens of billions of pounds into the North Sea in a bid to reduce emissions of climate-warming carbon.

‘But offshore wind is one of the most expensive ways to make electricity, even if the multi-billion pound additional cost of building backup gas plants for calm days is ignored.

‘The strategy may only prolong Britain's unhealthy reliance on gas when there is little wind, ensuring the power sector continues to emit carbon unless still unproven carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology can trap it.

‘“Over commitment to subsidized wind power runs a high risk of cementing gas dependency at those times when our need for electricity is greatest, thus increasing the UK's exposure to gas rather than alleviating it,” John Constable, policy director at the Renewable Energy Foundation, said.

‘Keen to make up for Britain's poor renewable energy performance to date, largely because of public opposition to onshore wind, the government is offering big incentives to install turbines ever further out at sea at increasing cost.

‘The government expects offshore wind to make up most of the renewable electricity capacity needed to reach Britain's legally-binding target of getting 15 percent of its energy from renewables by 2020 and some 33 GW of offshore licenses have been offered to prospective developers.

‘Building that many turbines would cost about 99 billion pounds ($158.6 billion), at the UK Energy Research Centre's (UKERC) current estimated capital costs of about 3 billion pounds/GW, for about 15 GW of effective capacity. Grid work is expected to cost another 15 billion.

‘Even at an inflated cost to match Finland’s infamously over-budget nuclear project -- the Olkiluoto EPR -- Britain could build 24-27 GW of effective EPR capacity for the same money.

‘Such a large nuclear contribution could make coal plants redundant and mean less reliance on gas-fired plants which will need ever more imported fuel as Britain’s own gas output declines and need CCS fitted if Britain is to meet its 2050 emissions cut goal.’

[...]

-------------------------

See also: UK Energy Research Centre - ‘Great Expectations: the cost of offshore wind in UK waters – understanding the past and projecting the future’, 27 September 2010.

‘THE THANET WIND FARM WILL MILK US OF BILLIONS’

Christopher Booker, Telegraph, 26 September, 2010

‘In all the publicity given to the opening of “the world's largest wind farm” off the Kent coast last week, by far the most important and shocking aspect of this vast project was completely overlooked. Over the coming years we will be giving the wind farm’s Swedish owners a total of £1.2 billion in subsidies. That same sum, invested now in a single nuclear power station, could yield a staggering 13 times more electricity, with much greater reliability.

‘The first all-too-common mistake in the glowing coverage accorded to the inauguration of this Thanet wind farm by the Climate Change Secretary, Chris Huhne, was to accept unquestioningly the claims of the developer, Vattenfall, about its output. The array of 100 three-megawatt (MW) turbines, each the height of Blackpool Tower, will have, it was said, the “capacity” to produce 300MW of electricity, enough to “power” 200,000 (or even 240,000) homes.

‘This may be true at those rare moments when the wind is blowing at the right speeds. But the wind, of course, is intermittent, and the average output of these turbines will be barely a quarter of that figure. The latest official figures on the website of Mr Huhne’s own department show that last year the average output (or “load factor”) of Britain’s offshore turbines was only 26 per cent of their capacity.

‘Due to its position, the wind farm’s owners will be lucky to get, on average, 75MW from their windmills, a fraction of the output of a proper power station. The total amount of electricity the turbines actually produce will equate to the average electricity usage not of 240,000 homes, but of barely half that number.

‘A far more significant omission from the media reports, however, was any mention of the colossal subsidies this wind farm will earn. Wind energy is subsidised through the system of Renewables Obligation Certificates (ROCs), unwittingly paid for by all of us through our electricity bills. Our electricity supply companies are obliged to buy offfshore wind energy at three times its normal price, so that each megawatt hour of electricity receives a 200 per cent subsidy of £100.

‘This means that the 75MW produced on average by Thanet will receive subsidies of £60 million a year, on top of the £30-40 million cost of the electricity itself. This is guaranteed for the turbines' estimated working life of 20 years, which means that the total subsidy over the next two decades will be some £1.2 billion. Based on the costings of the current French nuclear programme, that would buy 1 gigawatt (1,000MW) of carbon-free nuclear generating capacity, reliably available 24 hours a day – more than 13 times the average output of the wind farm.

‘[...]’

-------------------------

See: UK Energy Research Centre - ‘Great Expectations: the cost of offshore wind in UK waters – understanding the past and projecting the future’, 27 September 2010.

SECURITY OF SUPPLY

In public discussions regarding the costs of the Thanet project, RenewableUK (formerly the British Wind Energy Association, the trade lobby of the wind industry) has suggested that very high subsidies for wind power are justified because of the contribution it can make to security of supply.

However, a sober examination of the available data, and analysis by organizations such as Ofgem [see below] and National Grid, suggests that this is a simplistic analysis, and that government subsidy for wind will deepen and cement the gas exposure of the UK electricity system, particularly at times of peak load.

By distorting the market the presence of large quantities of subsidized wind gives the market no option but to invest in gas generation, and not necessarily the most efficient type of such generators.

Investors will make this choice because the variability of wind, which is difficult to predict, creates a volatile market, and gas generation, which is relatively cheap and flexible, reduces investor exposure to this volatility.

A renewables policy that is over-reliant on wind is in fact a gas policy.

The truth of this is already evident in National Grid’s planned increases in gas capacity.

Ofgem has stated:

“[…] we consider that the net effect on security of supply of displacing fossil fuel generation with (largely) intermittent renewable sources of generation is at best neutral, but not beneficial. There are considerable management issues that arise in electricity generation […] and no evidence to suggest that the availability of wind is more reliable as a fuel source than imported fossil fuels (which in any case will still be required as a back-up source of generation).”
(Ofgem’s response to BERR consultation on the UK Renewable Energy Strategy (Ref 139/08: 2008), 23).

-------------------------

See: National Grid, ‘Seven Year Statement, 2010’ and ‘Winter Outlook, 2010-11’.

‘OFFSHORE DEALS TESTS BANKS AS WIND DROPS’

Reuters, 27 August, 2010

‘LONDON (Project Finance International) - Two projects in the embryonic but fast growing offshore wind sector are currently seeking debt finance. The sponsors, large European utilities, want to transfer construction risk on the deals to the banks to keep the financings off their balance sheets. A further test for the financiers is the fact UK wind speeds have been at 180 year record lows this year - raising concerns about the reliability of wind as an energy source.

‘C-Power - in which RWE (RWEG.DE) and EDF (EDF.PA) are involved - has put together a second 950m euros financing on its 325MW Thornton Bank scheme off Belgium while Centrica (CNA.L), DONG [DONG.UL] and Siemens (SIEGn.DE) are out to banks on their new 270MW £1bn Lincs deal off the UK.

‘Despite the risks, neither scheme has a construction guarantee from the sponsors. And there is plenty of risk on offshore deals. The Fluor (FLR.N) additional revenue claim on its US$1.7bn Greater Gabbard construction contract now stands at US$202m and could rise further. The 500MW UK scheme, being developed by Scottish & Southern Energy (SSE.L) and RWE, had been suffering from faulty monopiles. The scheme is being financed solely on balance sheet. C-Power believes, as an expansion project with an operating first phase, its construction story is already well progressed. However, its first phase was for just 30MW whereas the latest will be for a further 295MW. The Centrica team is offering various financial contingencies to cover its construction risk - up to £180m on the £1bn plus scheme.

‘It’s not windy

‘The deals are being launched as it has become clear 2010 has been a bad year for UK wind speeds, perhaps the worse since 1821. Wind speeds clearly have a direct impact on energy MW yields from wind.

‘A recent report from wind consultancy Garrad Hassan said UK wind yields have dropped this year to perhaps a 1 in 15 year event due to stable high pressure. Energy levels from wind dropped 27.8% in the first quarter compared with the average and 18.3% in the second quarter - compared with a 5% drop in the last quarter of 2009 and a 15.7% increase in the third quarter of 2009. The North Atlantic Oscillation index has been measured since 1821 and this correlates with the Garrad Hassan wind index which itself been in existence for 15 years. The NAO index numbers for the 4 months from December 2009 to March 2010 were the most negative since 1821.

‘Unless something very odd is happening [climate change?] it is fair to assume wind yields will continue to vary quarter by quarter. Debt and equity financiers use probability models - P50 and P90 tests - to make judgments on the wind yields over a period of time so while low wind yields are not good, they can be factored into financial models.

‘The much bigger question, however, is for energy planners. Relying on a variable source of energy creates problems in terms of day-to-day security of power supply, particularly if wind accounts a quarter of the country's power generation by 2030 as planned in the UK. National Grid Company (NG.L) has already started to build up its short term operating reserve (STOR) programme to encourage the building of peaking power plants which can be turned on very quickly, for short periods of time.

‘[...]’

Just over 90% of the income to the scheme is backed by power purchase agreements and renewable obligation certificates (ROCs) with Centrica and DONG. The equity on the deal is around 40%. The EIB and EKF have been approached as potential funders, either by providing direct loans or funding banks, or even the EIB funding an EKF guaranteed portion.

Low wind yields

Lower than expected wind speeds can be a global phenomenon in the renewables market. In a recent note on FPL Energy American Wind's US$250m of bond debt, rating agency Moody’s referred to the recent “very low wind years” in the US. However the bonds kept their rating due the financial structural protections built into the debt. In Europe, rating agency Fitch has downgraded the 350m euros of bonds issued by Breeze Finance twice this year on a portfolio of German and French wind farms to below investment grade due to lower than expected wind yields and some unbudgeted construction costs.’ [Our emphases].

‘MORE THAN HALF OF BRITAIN’S WIND FARMS HAVE BEEN BUILT WHERE THERE IS NOT ENOUGH WIND’

Daily Mail, 17 August, 2010.

‘It’s not exactly rocket science – when building a wind farm, look for a site that is, well, quite windy.

‘But more than half of Britain’s wind farms are operating at less than 25 per cent capacity.

‘In England, the figure rises to 70 per cent of onshore developments, research shows.

‘Experts say that over-generous subsidies mean hundreds of turbines are going up on sites that are simply not breezy enough.

‘[...]’

‘Turbines operating well under capacity are still doing well out of the scheme, but Professor Jefferson, of the London Metropolitan Business School, wants the cash to be reserved for the windiest sites.

‘He said: “There is a political motivation to drive non-fossil fuel energy, which I very much respect, but we need more focus.”

‘He suggests that the full subsidy be restricted to turbines which achieve capacity of 30 per cent or more – managed by just eight of England’s 104 on-shore wind farms last year.

‘Those that fall below 25 per cent should not be eligible for any subsidy. Professor Jefferson said: ‘That would focus the mind to put them in a sensible place.’

‘Britain has 2,906 wind turbines spread over 264 sites. But a further 7,000 are planned for the next 12 years to meet European targets on cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

‘Nick Medic, of Renewable UK [formerly the British Wind Energy Association], which represents the wind industry, said talk of efficiency was ‘unhelpful’.

‘[...]’

DANES COUNT THE COST OF THE WIND RUSH

‘Dong gives up on land-based turbines’

Copenhagen Post, 1 September 2010.

‘‘Mass protests mean the energy firm will look offshore’

‘State-owned energy firm Dong Energy has given up building more wind farms on Danish land, following protests from residents complaining about the noise the turbines make.

‘It had been Dong and the government’s plan that 500 large turbines be built on land over the coming 10 years, as part of a large-scale national energy plan. This plan has hit a serious stumbling block, though, due to many protests, and the firm has now given up building any more wind farms on land.

‘Anders Eldrup, the CEO of Dong Energy, told TV2 News: “It is very difficult to get the public’s acceptance if the turbines are built close to residential buildings, and therefore we are now looking at maritime options.”

‘[...]’

-------------------------

See also: ‘An ill wind blows for Denmark's green energy revolution’, The Telegraph, 12 September, 2010.

‘Wind turbines threatened by nuclear power’

‘New nuclear power stations in Finland and Sweden are poison for the Danish wind industry, but good for electricity prices.’

Jyllands-Posten, Denmark, 19 June 2010.

‘Sweden’s decision to allow the construction of up to 10 new nuclear power stations may result in the electricity price in Denmark collapsing. That will destroy the economy for wind turbines, biogas plant and other forms of sustainable energy, according to Lars Aagaard, a director of Danish Energy.

‘[...]

‘According to General director Luis Echávarri of the OECD Nuclear Energy Authority everyone is banking massively on nuclear energy.

‘Poland and Italy are new nuclear energy states, while Finland, Great Britain, France, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Rumania and Belgium as well as the USA, China, India and now Sweden are developing more’.

‘Governing party proposes to cut funding for wind turbines to support other green energy technology.’

Copenhagen Post, 21 September 2009.

‘The Liberal Party wants to cut state funding for land-based wind turbines in favour of financing biogas, hydrogen and solar cell development. Several parties oppose the idea.

‘Since 2005, the wind turbine industry has received an average of 1.3 billion kroner in subsidies each year.

‘[...]’

‘The government’s ally, the Danish People’s Party, welcomed the proposal, pointing out that the subsidies had cost residents and electric companies billions of kroner.

‘Party group chairman Kristian Thulesen Dahl said consumers had paid huge additional charges on their electric bills for almost three decades, based on an ideological desire to promote the development of wind turbines.

‘When the current energy agreement expires in 2012, we expect a new agreement will be reached where support for onshore wind turbines is phased out.’

‘Now the wind turbines stop, just when it blows most’ (Denmark)

Ingeniøren, 14 September 2009

‘On the 1 October [2009] wind turbine owners risk having to pay to get rid of their power in windy weather. They have therefore developed a system which automatically stops the turbines, they say it is a crying shame to chuck away green power.

‘[...]’

‘Vestas Plunges as Wind-Turbine Maker Cuts Forecasts Blaming Delayed Orders’

Bloomberg, 18 August, 2010

‘Vestas Wind Systems A/S, the world’s largest wind-turbine maker, lost more than a quarter of its value in Copenhagen trading after it reported a larger-than- expected loss and cut forecasts, blaming delayed orders.

‘The stock dropped the most since October 2008 after the Randers, Denmark-based company posted a second-quarter loss of 119 million euros ($153 million), exceeding the average estimate of a 7.3 million-euro loss in a survey of 15 analysts.

‘“Right now it’s just a shock, and Vestas has suffered a serious blow to its credibility,” Teea Reijonen, a London-based analyst with Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc, said today in a telephone interview. “Analysts are going to take a very dim view of margins for 2011 given what’s happened this year.” Reijonen had a “hold” rating on the shares before today.

‘[...]’

GERMAN AND DANISH WIND POWER IN PERSPECTIVE

Denmark and Germany may have a huge installed capacity of onshore wind turbines but the figures should be seen in the context of overall electricity production and consumption.

IBERIAN WIND BUBBLE PUNCTURED

It is reported that Portugal will review its feed-in tariff mechanism following widespread criticism that the subsidies are excessive and are ramping up electricity prices to consumers. ¹

This follows reports in July that the Spanish government is set to trim US$1.5 billion off wind power subsidies.

The Spanish system of funding renewables subsidies, “has created debt of about 16 billion euros for which the government is ultimately liable”. ²

The Wall Street Journal reported that cuts in subsidies will result in the loss of 2/3 of wind power jobs by the end of 2010. ³

-------------------------

¹ ‘Portugal set to cut feed-in tariffs’, Windpower Monthly, 1 August 2010
² ‘Spain Said to Save $1.5 Billion on Wind Power Cuts’, Bloomberg Businessweek, 9 July, 2010.
³ ‘Spain to shed 2/3 of wind power jobs by end 2010’, Wall Street Journal, (On IWA), 18 March, 2010.

THE HIGH COST OF GESTURE POLITICS

In the same week that it was reported that the Olympic Delivery Authority spent almost £1m working up plans for a ‘symbolic’ wind turbine on the Olympic park only to drop the idea when it could not be delivered in time, it has been reported that smaller turbines on top of the Civic Centre in Kirklees have proved to be an expensive fiasco:

‘Kirklees Council’s wind turbine woes deepen’

Huddersfield Daily Examiner, 31 July, 2010.

‘More than FOUR MONTHS after one of the two turbines on top of Civic Centre 3 broke down, it is still out of action.

‘And a Kirklees Council spokesman said there was still no date for a repair.

‘The two turbines on top of the building alongside the ring road have become a familiar sight since they were put up four years ago.

‘But in the middle of March, one of the two 6kw turbines had stopped working and Kirklees Council confirmed it was broken.

‘The council confirmed the electrical generator was faulty and officials were investigating repair costs.

‘Today, a council spokesman said: “No date has been set for the repair of the faulty turbine.”

‘The Examiner revealed last summer that the pair of 27ft-tall turbines on top of the Civic Centre cost far more to run than the amount of money they save the council.

‘The two turbines only generated enough energy to cover a third of their upkeep in 2008.

‘The two turbines brought £2,078 into Kirklees Council coffers, but cost £6,431 to maintain and repair.

‘They cost the council £101,000 to buy and install.’

‘RISING COSTS ARE PUTTING FUTURE OF OFFSHORE WIND UP IN AIR’

Recharge News 12 July, 2010

‘The offshore wind industry faces a disquieting reality: that the cost of building projects has risen dramatically over the past five years - and is likely to continue rising for the foreseeable future, rather than fall as has been predicted.

‘“Let’s face it, if you didn’t have government support through the EIB [European Investment Bank] pouring in, very few of these projects would be going ahead”, says Subocean managing director John Sinclair. In the past, when confronted with offshore wind’s eyebrow-raising price tag, supporters have consistently fallen back on the line that costs will shrink as the industry gains experience and economies of scale.

‘That may yet prove true. But with 1GW now installed in UK waters, and the industry supposedly shifting into a rapid-growth phase in anticipation of Round 3, the notion that offshore wind will naturally become cheaper seems more slippery now than ever.

‘“Sadly, it would seem we have not derived benefits from learning, scale and technological improvement over the last five years,” says Rob Hastings, director of the marine estate at the UK’s Crown Estate. “We have, indeed, gone backwards.”

‘Consider the 60MW North Hoyle project, owned by Germany's RWE, which in 2003 became the first major offshore wind farm commissioned in UK waters. North Hoyle was built at a cost of £1.2m ($1.8m) per mega­watt, according to Hastings.

‘Allowing for price inflation and the current weakness of the pound, it would cost at least £2.6m/MW if built today.

‘Yet even that figure is significantly less than the £3.25m/MW average quoted for most projects currently moving into the water. Moreover, a new report, written by consultant Douglas-Westwood and published by the trade body RenewableUK, concludes that things will get worse before they get better.

‘“It is likely that costs will increase - or at least remain high - during the initial stages of Round 3 projects due to a combination of factors, such as increased project size, distance from shore and water depth,” the report says.

‘With Round 3 projects not set to enter construction until 2014 at the earliest, many industry sources worry that investors will simply lose patience. A financial chill - exacerbated by the recession - has already clouded the prospects for many projects.

‘Making matters worse, the UK has not decided whether to extend the increased Renewables Obligation Certificates (ROCs) [subsidy] banding for offshore wind, set to regress from two to 1.5 ROCs in 2014.

‘[...]’

‘U.K. ENERGY POLICY THREATENS THOUSANDS OF JOBS, CIVITAS SAYS’

Bloomberg Businessweek, 12 July, 2010.

‘Thousands of U.K. manufacturing jobs are threatened by the government’s drive to slash carbon dioxide emissions and boost renewable power, London-based policy analyst Civitas said in a report.

‘Green energy policies have already boosted energy bills to businesses by 21 percent, a figure that could rise to 70 percent by 2020, the group said today. That endangers jobs in industries such as steel, cement, chemicals, paper, ceramics and plastics, according to Jeremy Nicholson, a co-author of the 35-page study.

‘“If we do not see reform of energy and climate legislation a whole swathe of businesses will not be able to operate competitively in the U.K.,” Nicholson said in a telephone interview. “The only question is how long it takes for their closure to result.”

‘[...]’

MORE OFFSHORE PROBLEMS

The wind industry trade press reports that major repairs are required on 181 Siemens turbines at four different UK offshore wind parks. In addition to Dong Energy’s Gunfleet Sands, the affected developments are: Burbo Bank (Dong), Rhyl Flats (RWE NPower) and Lynn and Inner Dowsing (Centrica). Gunfleet Sands was only brought online last month.

The turbines require “extensive work” in order to address problems “relating to corrosion protection of pitch bearings in blades”. This will require the removal of blades using a specialist 7000-ton vessel hired for the task.

Offshore turbine parks have experienced repeated problems with corrosion and blade and gearbox failures, as well as major construction faults. This does not help the costs of offshore wind projects, including very high insurance premiums.

Some major turbine manufacturers, such as Enercon, refuse to get involved with the marine market.

-------------------------

Full story: ‘Wind Power Monthly’, 17 August 2010)
See also:
‘OVG report points to fatuous Crown Estate build estimates’, Press & Journal, Energy, 7 June 2010.
‘Cash crisis is a threat to wind target’, This is Money, 25 July 2010

‘GREEN SETBACK FOR UK AS BRITISH POWER SUPPLIED BY RENEWABLE SOURCES FALLS’

‘Fall of 7.5% in power obtained from wind, hydro and other renewable sources blamed on dry winter with low wind speeds.

The Guardian, 28 June 2010.

‘Britain's renewable energy revolution suffered an abrupt setback this winter when the power supplied from wind, hydro and other "clean" sources fell, despite years of promises and policies to end the nation's dependence on fossil fuels and slash global warming pollution, the Guardian can reveal.

‘The news comes as the government will tomorrow unveil a major report into how it will pay for the hundreds of billions of new spending needed to meet the UK's targets for renewable energy and cutting climate change emissions by setting up a new Green Investment Bank (GIB).

‘[...].

‘The DECC Energy Statistics for the first quarter of 2010 show renewable electricity fell from 6.7% to 6.2% of total supply. Supply from coal power also fell, while nuclear and gas generation increased, bringing the total electricity supply up slightly, by 1.1%, although consumption of electricity fell fractionally. Total energy consumption, including heating, fell by 1.1%.

‘RenewableUK [formerly know as the British Wind Energy Association], the industry lobby group, said the ongoing increase in wind power would reduce problems from relying on hydro schemes as climate change was expected to bring an era of less reliable rainfall.

‘However Sir David King, the government’s former chief scientist and director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at Oxford University, said the figures highlighted the need for new nuclear generators to help cut emissions and keep power supplies reliable. “We can’t rely too heavily on wind because it always requires a gas-fired turbine to be able to be switched on to provide alternative energy,” he said.’ [our emphasis]

-------------------------

See also:
‘Failing to deliver’, Windpower page.
‘Experts warn of power cuts as warm, dry weather creates a blow for wind turbine energy’, The Scotsman, 04 July 2010.

‘FIRMS PAID TO SHUT DOWN WIND FARMS WHEN THE WIND IS BLOWING

By Robert Mendick, The Telegraph, 19 Jun 2010.

‘Britain's biggest wind farm companies are to be paid not to produce electricity when the wind is blowing.

‘Energy firms will receive thousands of pounds a day per wind farm to turn off their turbines because the National Grid cannot use the power they are producing.

‘Critics of wind farms have seized on the revelation as evidence of the unsuitability of turbines to meet the UK's energy needs in the future. They claim that the ‘intermittent’ nature of wind makes such farms unreliable providers of electricity.

‘The National Grid fears that on breezy summer nights, wind farms could actually cause a surge in the electricity supply which is not met by demand from businesses and households.

‘The electricity cannot be stored, so one solution – known as ‘the balancing mechanism’ – is to switch off or reduce the power supplied. ¹

‘The system is already used to reduce supply from coal and gas-fired power stations when there is low demand. But shutting down wind farms is likely to cost the National grid – and ultimately consumers – far more. When wind turbines are turned off, owners are being deprived not only of money for the electricity they would have generated but also lucrative ‘green’ subsidies for that electricity.

‘The first successful test shut down of wind farms took place three weeks ago. Scottish Power received £13,000 for closing down two farms for a little over an hour on 30 May at about five in the morning.

‘Whereas coal and gas power stations often pay the National Grid £15 to £20 per megawatt hour they do not supply, Scottish Power was paid £180 per megawatt hour during the test to switch off its turbines.

‘It raises the prospect of hugely profitable electricity suppliers receiving large sums of money from the National Grid just for switching off wind turbines.

‘Dr Lee Moroney, planning director of the Renewable Energy Foundation, a think tank opposed to the widespread introduction of wind farms, said: “As more and more wind farms come on stream this will become more and more of an issue. Wind power is not controllable and does not provide a solid supply to keep the national grid manageable. Paying multinational companies large sums of money not to supply electricity seems wrong.”

‘Earlier this year, The Sunday Telegraph revealed that electricity customers are paying more than £1 billion a year to subsidise wind farms and other forms of renewable energy.

‘The proceeds of the levy, known as the Renewables Obligation (RO), are divided between the main renewable energy sources, with wind receiving 40 per cent, landfill gas 25 per cent, biomass 20 per cent, hydroelectric 12 per cent and sewage gas 3 per cent.

‘Professor Michael Laughton, emeritus professor of electrical engineering at the University of London, said: “People will find it very hard to understand that an electricity company is getting paid the market rate plus a subsidy for doing nothing. It is essentially a waste of consumers’ money.”

‘[...].’

‘U.K. WIND FARMS MAY SHUT WHEN DEMAND LOW: NATIONAL GRID’

Reuters, 13 June 2011.

‘British wind farms may be shut down about 38 days per year by 2020 to avoid power transmission overload at times of weak demand and high wind speeds, UK energy network operator National Grid said on Monday.

[...]’

‘CURTAILMENT’ IN GERMANY

In 2006 wind turbines were taken off the grid for several hours on about 40 windy days in the effort to dampen instability, “And with respect to this year [2007] we are already talking about a downtime of 15 percent,” said Hermann Albers, vice president of the BWE [German Wind Energy Association ]. ²

Germany’s huge installed wind capacity has not delivered on the forecasts made for it, delivering only 17-18% of installed capacity. It has also caused increasing and serious instability in the electricity supply system.

As in the UK, there are also huge cost implications in strengthening the transmission system to try and cope with intermittent wind power surges:

‘FRANKFURT (Thomson Financial) - German utilities are warning the government of bottlenecks in power transmission grids due to the difficulties of integrating higher shares of wind energy, Handelsblatt reported.

[...]

‘The number of incidents has risen significantly over the past two years, the report said. Vattenfall Europe AG's transmission unit recorded 155 days where the situation was critical on grids last year [2007], and 28 out of 29 days so far this year. ³

Germany is committed to not replacing nuclear stations and it was announced in 2007 that they will have to build 26 new coal- and lignite-fired power stations in order to provide stable, base-load power generation. Lignite, or ‘brown coal’, is even more environmentally damaging than coal.

‘German state agency calls for new power stations.’

‘Demand increases and supply volatility arising from a growing share of erratic production from renewable sources still make new coal and gas-fired power stations necessary, Dena Managing Director Stephan Kohler said during a trade fair.’

[...]

‘Kohler illustrated problems with wind energy, saying 23,000 MW were nominally installed, but high pressure fronts in January curbed wind speeds. On one day, only 113 MW capacity was active.’

‘“This is nothing against renewables, we will just run into problems if we have 45,000 MW of weak load in the system (2020), we’d have to store power (which is technically not yet possible) or look abroad in the European market environment,” he said.’

‘But imports from neighbouring Europe could not solve the problems as it faced wider supply shortfall scenarios itself.’

‘Also, more trade would necessitate more spending on cross-border transmission lines, which faced uncertainty, Kohler said.’ ⁴

The Danes now penalise wind producers through the use of penalty payments when the spot market for electricity dictates that there is no demand for their product:

‘Now the wind turbines stop, just when it blows most’ (Denmark)

Ingeniøren, 14 September 2009

‘On the 1 October [2009] wind turbine owners risk having to pay to get rid of their power in windy weather. They have therefore developed a system which automatically stops the turbines, they say it is a crying shame to chuck away green power.

‘[...]’

‘Too much of a good thing: Growth in wind power makes life difficult for grid managers’ (Oregon)

‘On the afternoon of May 19, in a single chaotic hour, more than a thousand wind turbines in the Columbia River Gorge went from spinning lazily in the breeze to full throttle as a storm rolled east out of Hood River.

‘Suddenly, almost two nuclear plants worth of extra power was sizzling down the lines -- the largest hourly spike in wind power the Northwest has ever experienced.

‘At the Bonneville Power Administration's control room in Vancouver, it was too much of a good thing. More electricity than its customers needed. More than the available power lines could export from the region. And more than the grid could readily absorb by ramping down generation at the region’s network of federal dams.

‘So the edict went out: Feather your turbine blades; slash output.

‘It was an unwelcome instruction for wind farm owners, whose economics depend on generating electricity whenever possible. Yet it’s one likely to go out with increasing frequency.

‘During the last three years, the building boom spawned by green energy mandates in Oregon, Washington and California doubled the generation capacity of wind farms in the region. By 2013, it’s expected to double again.

‘That seems like great news. Plenty of carbon-free energy with no fuel costs. Jobs. Property taxes.

‘In the real world, however, the pace and geographic concentration of wind development, coupled with wild swings in its output, are overwhelming the region’s electrical grid and outstripping its ability to use the power or send it elsewhere. [...]’ ⁵

-------------------------

¹ See Balancing Mechanism website.
² ‘Wind parks: a hot power lines dispute’, Heise Online, 23 June 2006.
³ ‘German utilities warn of power bottlenecks due to wind integration.’ Thomson Financial News, CNBC, 31 January 2008.
⁴ ‘Germany Plans Boom in Coal-Fired Power Plants -- Despite High Emissions.’Spiegel Online, 22 March 2007.
⁵ ‘Too much of a good thing: Growth in wind power makes life difficult for grid managers’The Oregonian, 17 July 2010.
‘German state agency calls for new power stations.’Yahoo, Finance (Reuters), 10 February 2009..
‘Germany's Green-Energy Gap. Germany stumbles in its move to replace coal and nuclear power with offshore wind energy.’IEEE [Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers] Spectrum magazine feature, July 2009.

DON’T MENTION THE PEAT PROBLEM!

‘Greenhouse gas threat from wind farms on peatland goes unchecked’

By Jenny Fyall, The Scotsman, 12 June 2010.

‘Damaging wind farms that unleash carbon dioxide from the soil are being permitted in Scotland because no government body is equipped to advise on the impact of building on peatland, The Scotsman has learned. Peat bog has been described as “Scotland’s rainforest” because it stores huge quantities of the greenhouse gas , which is released into the atmosphere if the peat is disturbed.

However, council planning teams in Scotland have been unable to get advice on the damage individual wind farms will do, because of a lack of anyone with the necessary expertise.

Documents seen by The Scotsman reveal that neither the Scottish Government, the country's environment watchdog the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, nor Scottish Natural Heritage, can provide informed advice on the issue.

Environmental groups have said they think it “extraordinary” that such an important issue has been neglected and there have been calls for a moratorium on wind farms on peatland until the issue is resolved.

Planning officials at Shetland Islands Council tried to get advice on the likely impact on peat of the 150-turbine Viking Wind Farm, which, if built, would be the largest onshore wind farm in Europe.

However, they came up against a brick wall.

A reply from David Liddell, a planning official at the Scottish Government, said: “Sorry, but not aware of a particular source of expertise on the carbon accounting query.”

In what the Shetland Council staff member, Hannah Nelson, then described to colleagues in an e-mail as a “surprising response”, Mr Liddell added: “Given that government (and also government planning) policy is in favour of wind and other renewables, I wouldn’t encourage you to query the carbon benefits of wind farms.”

‘[...].’

Helen McDade, head of policy at the John Muir Trust, said: “I think it’s extraordinary that there is nobody available with the necessary expertise. It seems to be a case of see no evil, hear no evil.”

“How on earth are local councils supposed to know what to do? It’s absolutely urgent that something is done about this.”

She believes wind farms that damage peat bogs have already been granted permission in Scotland.

‘[...].’

‘Uplands inquiry disputes ‘greenness’ of turbines’

Wales Online, 6 April 2010. (Article on a Report prepared for the Welsh Assembly).

‘[...].

‘Both Environment Agency Wales and the Countryside Council for Wales pointed out that turbines have been built without any thought to the effect on carbon storage – and are now allowing carbon that has long been locked away to be released from the land.

‘Forestry Commission Wales confirmed that no assessment had been made of the impact of the Welsh Assembly Government’s policy of using national forest estates for wind turbines on the carbon stored in the uplands.

‘And no-one knew who was responsible. The Forestry Commission indicated that it was the planning authorities, but Environment Minister Jane Davidson suggested that it was the responsibility of the developer.

‘The report expressed concern that no-one accepted overall responsibility and called on the WAG to carry out the assessment, and for soil carbon management to become a central consideration in the current review of TAN8 – the policy that defines areas suitable for wind turbines.

‘It also called for a ban on forestry and wind turbines on deep peat “in order to ensure maximum environmental benefit in future”.

‘CPRW director Peter Ogden called for an immediate moratorium on any further wind schemes proposed in upland areas with deep peat.

[...].’

IN THE FAMILY

NICK CLEGG’S WIFE TAKES JOB WITH SPANISH WIND FARM COMPANY

Daily Mail, 10th June 2010

‘Nick Clegg’s wife has accepted a lucrative job with a major Spanish wind farm firm just weeks after her husband became Deputy Prime Minister.

‘Miriam Clegg is joining the board of Acciona which has been awarded contracts in Britain.

‘The high-flying Spanish-born lawyer has risked conflict of interest accusations by acting as an independent adviser to the firm which is the world’s largest provider of wind farms.

‘[...].’

‘HOW SAMCAM’S SUPER-RICH FATHER IS COINING £3.5M FROM THE TAXPAYER...

Daily Mail, 29 March, 2010.

‘David Cameron’s father-in-law is among rich landowners cashing in on Labour’s green subsidies, with a wind farm generating an estimated £3.5million a year on his country estate.

‘Sir Reginald Sheffield, 63, who is worth at least £20million, splits the profits with the project’s developers.

Around half of the income comes from a government scheme to make power companies use more renewable energy, much of it bought from private generators. It is subsidised by every household, via their electricity bills.

‘Sir Reginald’s eight 400ft turbines were switched on last August at Bagmoor, part of the 3,000-acre Normanby Hall estate near Scunthorpe that has been in his family since the 16th century.

‘He plans a second development at nearby Flixborough Grange, despite fierce opposition from locals.

‘[...].’

THE REAL COST OF GESTURE POLITICS

‘Balmedie wind turbine plans suffer setback

Press & Journal, 24 March, 2010

‘PLANS to instal a wind turbine at a north-east school have received a setback after councillors heard the mast would take more than 100 years to turn a profit.

‘Aberdeenshire Council wanted to erect the structure at Balmedie Primary School.

‘Councillors on the Formartine area committee refused to give the project the go-ahead after hearing it would cost £102,156.54 to instal.

‘[...]’

‘“The estimated annual reduction in electricity costs due to the energy produced by the wind turbine is £1,000.”

‘The report went on to say it would take 100 years to pay for itself without taking into account maintenance or rising energy costs, adding that “the payback period is significantly longer [by at least five times!] than the expected life of the turbine”.’

‘The answer’s not blowing in the wind

Times Online, May 16, 2010

‘For someone keen not only to do their bit for the environment, but to be seen to be doing their bit, there is nothing better than erecting a wind turbine in the garden. The neighbours may be wary, but those spinning blades are clear proof of your green credentials.

‘When it comes to generating electricity, however, they may not be all they’re cracked up to be, as the broadcaster Jonathan Dimbleby has found. The presenter of BBC Radio 4’s Any Questions?, who courted controversy last year by erecting a 50ft turbine in the grounds of his Devon home, revealed last week that its blades were turning rather more slowly than he had hoped.

‘“It’s meant to produce about 11,000kW a year, but it’s not delivering anything like that,” he complained. “I’m afraid we need a very bad summer for it to deliver its potential.”

‘[...]’

OFGEM WARNS, AGAIN, OF THE IMPENDING ENERGY CRISIS

‘Government urged to step in to stop energy cuts

The Times, February 3, 2010

‘Britain’s energy regulator today urged the Government to tear up the existing rules governing the privatised energy market and take greater control to ensure future supply.

‘Ofgem said the country could face power and gas shortages after 2015 because ageing power stations are not being replaced quickly enough.

‘The country needs up to £200 billion of investment in new low-carbon power stations and gas storage, it said, but existing Government incentives are not strong enough to encourage private companies to invest.

‘It proposed five options for Government intervention in the market — all of which would effectively increase government control over the building of new power stations and infrastructure, replacing existing market-based incentives.

‘Its most radical suggestion was to create a centralised energy buyer which would effectively undo the past 12 years of liberalisation, turning back to the early days of privatisation when a central “pool” was responsible for buying energy.

‘Ofgem said the changes were necessary because there was “reasonable doubt” whether Britain’s current energy market will be able to deliver sustainable supplies in the years to come and that the current supply was only “relatively” secure for another five years.

‘The rising costs of gas and electricity meant that eventually growing numbers of households would not be able to afford the gas and electricity they would need, it said.

‘[...]’

THE WIND BUBBLE EXPOSED

‘A report has exposed the true costs of wind generated electricity’
© Sunday Express.

‘£250BN: THE REAL COST OF WIND POWER’

Sunday Express, 15 November,2009.

‘The Government’s renewable energy strategy is in tatters after a report exposing the true costs of generating electricity by wind power.

‘An internal document from the National Grid, seen by the Sunday Express, says wind turbine energy will at times cost over 3,000 per cent more than conventional power.

‘Industry experts say over-reliance on wind power could mean fuel poverty for consumers, as older power plants reach the end of their working lives while Britain’s new generation of nuclear stations is still a long way off completion. Some experts claim the cost of upgrading the nation’s electricity grid – so it is possible to use all the renewable energy – could be £250 billion or 10 times the Government’s estimates.

‘The revelations will make uncomfortable reading for Gordon Brown and his team, who have pinned much of their hopes of meeting carbon emission targets on wind power.

‘Professor Ian Fells, Emeritus Professor of Energy Conversion at Newcastle University, said: “For a long time I have thought that the wind power bubble would burst. I think that’s starting to happen.

‘“Ed Miliband tells people that to oppose wind farms is morally indefensible, but as more people start to realise the reality of what wind power actually offers, that will change.”

‘The National Grid document, ‘Accessing Renewable Energy’, deals with the issue of “balancing the grid” to get the right amount of power from different sources across the UK so that it can maintain a supply to customers.

‘It says wind power could cost “£300 – £800 per mega watt hour (MWH) compared to conventional generation at £23 per MWH”.

‘With generating capacity from wind “increasing rapidly”, the document says the company is presented with “a range of challenges” in managing output. It talks clearly of the “need to curtail wind” because “conventional power is more economic”.

‘A National Grid spokeswoman said the formula for working out the figures was “very complex”. She said no one had actually paid such a high price for wind power and that the figures related to possible costs on the futures market. But an energy industry insider said: “These facts make for interesting, if not worrying reading.

‘“When they have too much power the Grid bids to shut down operators, but you can’t just switch a big power station off and then hope the wind blows. By the same measure, if the wind doesn’t blow you can’t simply start up a power station at the flick of a switch. It will cost.

‘“What they are saying is that wind farms will be producing power which will not be used, and it’s the taxpayer who’ll be footing the bill. It’s a double whammy because consumers are already paying extra on their fuel bills to fund renewable energy.”

‘Under the Renewables Obligation, an incentive scheme to generate more green electricity, six per cent of everyone’s electricity bill is paid to the Government to fund research. This week Lloyds and RBS said they were involved in a loans scheme offering £700million to onshore windfarm firms, which will be matched by the European Investment Bank. The power industry watchdog Ofgem says electricity prices could rise by 60 per cent by 2012, leaving many in fuel poverty.

‘Prof Fells said that while wind turbines provide such a small amount of power – about two per cent of the country’s energy needs – few customers notice the extra on their bills.

‘“Last year subsidies paid out on wind and landfill gas was £1billion. By 2020 that figure will be £30billion. That could subsidise six nuclear power stations. And they operate all the time and don’t rely on what the weather is doing.”

‘The Department of Energy and Climate Change said: “Wind is at the heart of our renewable energy strategy and it will stay there. A more realistic comparison of conventional and wind power would be £23 MWH compared to £30 or £80 MWH.

‘“The figure of £250billion to upgrade the grid is also not a figure we recognise. It’s estimated the cost to deliver our 2020 target is an additional £4.7billion with an additional £15billion needed for offshore grid connections.”’

UK CLIMATE TARGETS ‘UNACHIEVABLE’

Meanwhile it is becoming more and more apparent to even the more gullible that the UK’s self-imposed wind targets are not realistic or affordable, and that they will not be delivered.

Experts and the power industry are becoming more vocal in their condemnation of the Government’s stubborn refusal to face the facts.

A report, ‘Climate Change, Have We Lost the Battle?’, by The Institution of Mechanical Engineers has criticised government climate change targets as “unachievable”. Far from realising a reduction our emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050, the UK is already losing the climate change mitigation battle. The report notes:

The greenhouse gas emission targets set by the Government require a rate of reduction that has never been achieved by even the most progressive nations in the world.

On a global perspective, the UK is one of the better performing nations – China, United States and Germany (with a massive onshore wind capacity) all having economies with higher carbon intensities.

The report does not analyse the reasons for our modest improvement, which many experts say is mainly due to the ‘dash for gas’ during the Thatcher years and the export of much of our heavy industrial base to countries such as China.

Even more recently, the economic downturn has helped reduce emissions.

France has the most decarbonised economy among the large developed nations. The report notes:

This was achieved as it moved towards nuclear power as the predominant source of electricity generation. However, today France is struggling to increase its decarbonisation rates.

For the UK to be on track to achieve the emission reductions required by the Act, it would have to become as carbon efficient as France by about 2015. To put the magnitude of this challenge into perspective, it is equivalent to the UK constructing and putting into service about 30 new nuclear power stations in the next five years, while retiring an equal amount of coal-fired generation! ¹(Our emphasis).

This view is supported by other reports, for example:

... after a decade of pushing windmills and having come perilously close to grid failure in the cold winter of 2008, the UK now has a policy to build a few new nuclear plants. But it faces grave shortages of trained personnel and, as a Johnny-come-lately to new nuclear build, a global shortage of critical component manufacturing capacity.

[...]

The European country which has been most ambitious in its attempt to legislate a top-down emissions policy has been the United Kingdom, with passage of the Climate Change Act in November 2008. Specifically, it requires Britain, by law, to achieve by 2016 a carbon efficiency of its economy equivalent to that of the world-leading major economy, France. That would require, for example, building and putting into operation 30 nuclear power stations in 7 years. Thereafter, assuming a GDP growth of 2% p.a., a year-on-year annual rate of decarbonisation of 5.3% is required to reach the Act’s target; whereas there is no record of any economy having achieved greater than 2.0%, and then only for short spells. In sum, this Act requires the UK to achieve the impossible. ²

-------------------------

¹ The IMECH report may be downloaded here (1.08Mb PDF download).
² Institute for Science, Innovation and Society, University of Oxford (LSE Mackinder Programme for the Study of Long Wave Events), ‘How to get climate policy back on course’. July 2009. PDF download (0.6Mb) available here.

‘E.ON CONDEMNS OVERAMBITIOUS TARGETS FOR GREEN ENERGY’

The Times, October 18, 2009.

‘Government plans to generate 30 per cent of UK electricity from renewable sources by 2020 are doomed to failure, according to the chief executive of one of the world’s biggest utility companies.

‘Wulf Bernotat, chief executive of E.ON, said that British politicians needed to stop misleading the public about what was achievable.

‘He said that British plans to build 33 gigawatts of offshore wind power, up from 0.6 gigawatts at present, was impossible, given the necessary investment and relatively short timeframe. “Politicians need to be more realistic,” he said. “If you just set out these targets without really taking the effort to square it with industry, then you end up with the dilemma of it not being achievable.”

‘E.ON, which reported 2008 revenues of €87 billion (£79 billion), more than any of its peers, plans to spend €10 billion a year globally on new power-generating equipment, including nuclear power plants, wind farms, gas and coal plants. It has invested about £930 million in Britain this year and is a key partner in London Array, a £3 billion project to build the world’s largest offshore wind farm in the Thames Estuary.

‘Mr Bernotat said that there was a bigger mismatch between government targets and what was achievable in Britain than in E.ON’s other key European markets, including its home market. “Germany started earlier and there is a bigger base to build on,” he said. “It’s not a question of willingness. Targets have to be ambitious but the expectation level should be realistic.” E.ON, which employs 88,000 people, has eight million customers in Britain through its UK subsidiary. Its ten coal, gas and oil-fired power stations generate about 10 per cent of the UK’s electricity.

‘A spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: “We must clean up our energy supplies to meet our climate change goals and that will mean a massive expansion of renewable energy. Our target is ambitious but we have a strategy to meet it by 2020.”’.

----------------------------------

See fuller version of interview with Wulf Bernotot: ‘Monday manifesto: UK renewable energy target 'naive' says Wulf Bernotat’, The Times, October 19, 2009.
See below for comment on the Government’s equally exaggerated ‘green jobs’ forecasts.
Germany’s huge, and hugely subsidised, wind capacity has not resulted in any reduction in CO2 emissions according to some reports: ‘Wind Turbines in Europe Do Nothing for Emissions-Reduction Goals’, Spiegel Online; ‘Germany’s renewable myth’, Financial Post.

CLOUD MAKERS

‘The image shows clouds forming in the wakes of the front row of wind turbines of the Horns Rev wind farm off the coast of Denmark. The downstream wind turbines lose 20% or 30% of their power, and sometimes even more, relative to the front row. The spacing of the turbines is 7 diameters.’ (Wind Watch website).

The combined capacity of Horns Rev (80 x 110m turbines) and Horns Rev II (91 x 115m turbines), is 369MW. The combined output of these two enormous schemes will be substantially less than that of a single CCGT gas generating unit.

This is an effect that has not, as far as we know, been factored into consideration of the impacts of coastal turbine arrays on nearby tourist resorts.

No doubt the tourist businesses in Rhyll, Llandudno, Hastings, and in resorts on the Dorset and Norfolk coasts are looking forward to more cloud cover provided by offshore turbines!

‘OFFICIALS COVER UP WIND FARM NOISE REPORT’

The Times, December 13, 2009

‘Civil servants have suppressed warnings that wind turbines can generate noise damaging people’s health for several square miles around.

‘The guidance from consultants indicated that the sound level permitted from spinning blades and gearboxes had been set so high — 43 decibels — that local people could be disturbed whenever the wind blew hard. The noise was also thought likely to disrupt sleep.

‘The report said the best way to protect locals was to cut the maximum permitted noise to 38 decibels, or 33 decibels if the machines created discernible “beating” noises as they spun.

‘It has now emerged that officials removed the warnings from the draft report in 2006 by Hayes McKenzie Partnership (HMP), the consultants. The final version made no mention of them.

‘It means that hundreds of turbines at wind farms in Britain have been allowed to generate much higher levels of noise, sparking protests from people living near them.

[...]

-------------------------

The FOI material behind this story is available on the Den Brook Judicial Review Group (DBJRG) website.
See the Noise Page for more on turbine noise nuisance.

A RELUCTANT ADMISSION

“...due to the intermittency of wind, we will need significantly more generating capacity in the longer term.” (Ed Miliband, DECC Minister). ¹

This is something power engineers have been telling government for many years. Renewable UK (formerly the wind industry lobbying body, the British Wind Energy Association), however, continues to insist on “the myth of intermittency”).

-------------------------

¹ Ed Miliband, Statement to the House on the draft National Policy Statements, 9 November 2009. (See DECC press release).

Simon Hoggert’s sketch in The Guardian, 10 November, concluded:

‘Finally we had the energy secretary, Ed Miliband, explain that after only 12 and a half years delay, the government was going to speed up the planning process for lots more nuclear power stations. It was, we gathered, an emergency. If we didn’t get the power stations, the lights would start going out.

‘He actually came close to admitting that turbines, with their “intermittent wind” (this sounded like a much-loved but elderly dog that lies in front of the fire turning the air in the sitting room foul) were a waste of time and money.

‘But these monstrosities have never been there to provide quantities of clean power. Turbines are the cathedrals of the green religion, huge, vastly expensive and largely useless symbols of faith. However, unlike wind turbines, most cathedrals are beautiful. Except Guildford, of course.’

ONE RULE FOR THE SCOTS ...

In Planning Policy 6, Renewables, the Scottish Executive recommends a separation distance of 2km for large wind farms, which they define as having a headline capacity of 20MW (‘Moorsyde’ had a capacity of 38.5MW when the planning application was submitted):

PAN 45 confirms that development up to 2 km is likely to be a prominent feature in an open landscape. The Scottish Ministers would support this as a separation distance between turbines and the edge of cities, towns and villages so long as policies recognise that this approach is being adopted solely as a mechanism for steering proposals to broad areas of search and, within this distance, proposals will continue to be judged on a case-by-case basis.

The Scottish Minister has recently confirmed that this policy also applies to small hamlets and even individual dwellings:

... SPP6 confirms that, in all instances, proposals should not be permitted if they would have a significant long term detrimental impact on the amenity of people living nearby. This principle applies to houses within and outwith 2km of the proposed development and regardless of whether they are single dwellings or part of a settlement.
(Letter from Jim Mather, Minister for Enterprise, Energy and Tourism, to Stop Highland Windfarms Campaign (SHWC).

When consulted on ‘Moorsyde’, Scottish Borders Council stated:

... this site would not be supported were the proposal to be located in the Scottish borders, primarily by virtue of its landscape character.
(Alistair Lorrimer, Asst. Head of Development Control, SBC. 22 February, 2005. Moorsyde planning file).

Note that there are several homes within 1km of the ‘Moorsyde’ and that all the Berwick appeal proposals would be unacceptable under Scottish guidance.

TURBINES BEFORE PEOPLE

There is no up-to-date guidance on separation distances from housing in England and Wales. In answer to a parliamentary question on separation distances from Sir Alan Beith, the then DTI minister answered:

The issue of windfarms and their proximity to dwellings and roads should be considered at the planning stage of individual developments and will be subject to policies in the local authority's development plan and the national policies set out in Planning Policy statement 22 (PPS22). [PQ No. 2004/872, 27 January 2005].

This is meaningless, because local authorities are not permitted to devise local separation distances that might restrict wind farm development and PPS22 contains only general, and very limited, guidance on separation distances.

Also, when wind proposals are rejected on grounds of protecting residential amenity, decisions are frequently overturned at appeal or by ministerial fiat on the grounds that the decision is not supported by planning guidance and that the outdated ETSU-R-97 noise guidance provides sufficient protection in post-consent planning conditions. In reality, as has been proved at several locations, noise conditions are almost impossible to enforce.

At a recent meeting that representatives of wind action groups in the North East, including MAG, had with Ed Miliband, the DECC Minister, the issue of issuing guidance on separation distances that harmonised with Scotland was repeatedly raised. The Minister rejected the idea of 2km separation in England and Wales out of hand on the grounds that it would make much wind development impossible.

It appears that government targets and the interests of the wind industry are more important than the health and well being of people.

‘ENERGY BILLS COULD RISE 60%, CUSTOMERS WARNED’

The Independent, Friday, 9 October 2009 (Press Association).

‘The energy watchdog today said UK consumers faced potentially steep price rises in their gas and electricity bills as supplies become more volatile.

‘In a review of Britain's energy market, Ofgem said an investment of up to £200 billion is needed to secure supplies and meet environmental targets.

‘It lists four possible scenarios for the future and in one - that of a strong resurgence in global economies along with missed renewable and carbon targets - Ofgem warned prices could surge by more than 60 per cent by 2016 before falling back.

‘[...]

‘The four scenarios include reductions in carbon emissions of between 12 per cent and 43 per cent from 2005 levels.

‘Ofgem said the biggest challenges to Britain's energy supply are the country's growing reliance on a volatile global gas market and its ageing power stations, which are nearing the end of their lives.

‘The regulator also said “significant changes” may have to be made in the way we consume and generate power to manage the “variability associated with increasing reliance on wind power”. [Our emphasis]

‘It said a "massive" investment of between £95 billion and £200 billion in power plants and other infrastructure was necessary “to secure both energy supplies and climate change targets”.

[...]

‘Gary Smith, national officer of the GMB union, said: “This report demonstrates that central planning is essential to ensure that the lights stay on.

‘“How many more red light signals do our politicians have to see before they take action?”

‘Shadow energy secretary Greg Clark said the challenges in the energy sector came about because of Government “dithering”.

‘He said the Tories would take “immediate action” to authorise five gigawatts of capacity in clean coal and publish planning guidance for companies wishing to invest in nuclear power - which he said ministers had held back without good reason.

‘“This is the characteristic over the last 12 years,” Mr Clark said.

‘“There has been no policy, effectively. We are in the situation we are because they have had their head in the sand for 12 years.”

‘Ofgem said current rates of investment would have to be more than doubled to meet the high levels needed.

‘Consumer bills will be pushed up by the level of infrastructure investment and by the increasing cost of carbon - particularly if oil and gas market prices continue to rise as they have been since 2003, or spike sharply.

‘Gas dependence is predicted to increase “dramatically”, especially if environmental measures are not fully successful.

‘The regulator identified the greatest risk as maintaining gas supplies through a severe winter.

‘Ofgem said that while the outlook for this winter is “more comfortable” - with National Grid anticipating high capacity and good gas infrastructure - its analysis suggests that “existing regulatory and market arrangements may well be tested severely over the next two decades”.

‘[...]’

COMMENT

There is a power industry saying: “wind fuels gas”. It is no coincidence that there has been a remarkable growth of gas plants in Spain in parallel with large scale wind development. It is also no coincidence that people like Texan oil and gas man T Boone Pickens have been moving on the wind sector, with an eye to both the huge tax incentives being offered and the potential benefit to their gas interests.

Wind is ‘win, win’ for the gas industry.

THE WIND JOBS DELUSION

Highly publicised claims by Ed Miliband, the Minister for Energy and Climate Change, that offshore wind projects could “create up to 70,000 new jobs” are being exposed at every turn for what they are: political wishful thinking.

Recently, there were press reports on the failure of the London Array to bring promised jobs to Kent. The chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses in Thanet, had said that that dream had faded with the decision to outsource manufacturing and assembly to overseas companies, leaving just a few maintenance and support jobs for local people. ¹

Now we read that the 140 turbine Greater Gabbard project off the Norfolk coast, the biggest offshore project in the world until the London Array is built, is being held up by faulty welding on its Chinese turbine towers. ²

The first of the turbine towers was due to be sunk into the sea bed this year, but sources say the project - hailed as a cornerstone of DECC’s (Department of Energy and Climate Change) green policy - now faces months of delays.

Chinese workers have now been flown in to Holland, where the turbines are being assembled, to remedy the problems.

It is reported that ferrying the 180,000 tonnes of steel tower parts 4,500 miles will have an environmental cost of 27,000 tonnes of CO2.

German engineering firm Siemens is not only supplying the 3.6MW turbines but has also been given the £66 million contract to connect the scheme to the grid.

Dieter Helm (Professor of Energy Policy at the University of Oxford), the CBI and others have long been saying that the excessive costs of wind generated power may have the unintended effect of accelerating the export of what remains of our metallurgical and manufacturing industries to countries such as China and India, where coal is dominant and environmental protection is less rigorous. ³

-------------------------

¹ ‘Wind farm jobs prove to be so much hot air’, Kent Online - Business, 4 September, 2009.
² ‘Broken wind’, The Sun, 18 September 2009.
³ ‘Don’t Blow our £100 Billion on Wind Power’, The Times, July 17, 2009.

POSTSCRIPT

In March, 2010, the Sheringham Shoal offshore scheme started building.

This Norwegian-owned project has seen the usual spin-offs for British jobs: the only major componant being the two 1000 tonne offshore substations. Offshore construction specialist Heerema will fabricate and load out two substation platform topsides from its yard in Hartlepool, County Durham.

‘Turbines

‘The wind turbines selected for the site are Siemens 3.6MW - the latest [Danish] model in the company’s product range. The rotor is a three-blade cantilevered construction, mounted upwind of the tower while the 52m blades are made of fiberglass-reinforced epoxy resin and manufactured in a single operation representing state-of-the-art technology. The turbine is mounted on an 80m-high tapered tubular steel tower with an internal ascent.

‘Foundations

‘These 90 giant monopile structures, as well as the transition pieces which join the turbines to them, are being fabricated by tubular structure specialist, the Sif Group, at their plant in Roermond, the Netherlands, on a sub-contract to the main foundation contractor, MT Højgaard. Once completed, the monopiles will be transported to Kats, Vlissingen, Netherlands for storage before installation. The transition pieces will be transported to Belgium and the Hoboeken plant of offshore foundation pioneer, Smulders for outfitting.

‘Contractor MT Højgaard will use the “Svanen”, its purpose made self-powered heavy-duty floating crane, to drive foundation piles 32-36 metres into the seabed and mount the yellow-painted transition pieces on top, in preparation for the installation of the two substations and 88 wind turbines in 2011.

‘Cables

‘The offshore cables are being produced by global cable experts, Nexans in Norway at their manufacturing plant in Halden, south of Oslo, while the fibre optical elements are being produced in Rognan, in the northern part of Norway. The power and optical cables will be bundled together into one unit.’

‘GERMAN STATE AGENCY CALLS FOR NEW COAL AND GAS POWER STATIONS’

ESSEN, Germany, Feb 10 (Reuters story on Yahoo).

‘Demand increases and supply volatility arising from a growing share of erratic production from renewable sources still make new coal and gas-fired power stations necessary, Dena Managing Director Stephan Kohler said during a trade fair.’

[...]

Kohler illustrated problems with wind energy, saying 23,000 MW were nominally installed, but high pressure fronts in January curbed wind speeds. On one day, only 113 MW capacity [0.5%!] was active.

‘“This is nothing against renewables, we will just run into problems if we have 45,000 MW of weak load in the system (2020), we'd have to store power (which is technically not yet possible) or look abroad in the European market environment,” he said.’

‘But imports from neighbouring Europe could not solve the problems as it faced wider supply shortfall scenarios itself.’

‘Also, more trade would necessitate more spending on cross-border transmission lines, which faced uncertainty, Kohler said.’

(See full article on Yahoo, Finance).

FROM GREEN DREAM TO GRIM REALITY

“Wind turbine Madness: from a dream of environmentally friendly energy to highly subsidised destruction of the countryside.”

At the end of 2007, Germany had 19,460 wind turbines installed with a theoretical capacity of 22,247MW. The UK had 1,951 turbines installed at the end of February 2008. With onshore sites running out and huge swathes of countryside industrialised with giant turbines, Germany has not closed any fossil-fuelled capacity. Indeed, their government announced in 2007 that they were going ahead with 26 new lignite- and coal-fired power stations to add to the numbers of new gas-fired power stations that have been built in recent years. Germany retains its position as the leading greenhouse gas producer in Europe (European Environment Agency figures).

See the Wind Power page for more about the real world experience of wind power in other countries with very large wind capacity.

WIND TURBINES IN EUROPE DO NOTHING FOR EMISSIONS-REDUCTION GOALS

Anselm Waldermann, Spiegel Online

‘Despite Europe's boom in solar and wind energy, CO2 emissions haven't been reduced by even a single gram. Now, even the Green Party is taking a new look at the issue -- as shown in e-mails obtained by SPIEGEL ONLINE.’

‘Germany's renewable energy companies are a tremendous success story. Roughly 15 percent of the country's electricity comes from solar, wind or biomass facilities, almost 250,000 jobs have been created and the net worth of the business is €35 billion per year.’

‘But there's a catch: The climate hasn't in fact profited from these developments. As astonishing as it may sound, the new wind turbines and solar cells haven't prohibited the emission of even a single gram of CO2.’

‘Under current EU law, German wind turbines aren't helping to reduce CO2 emissions. They simply allow Eastern European countries to pollute more.’

‘Even more surprising, the European Union's own climate change policies, touted as the most progressive in the world, are to blame. The EU-wide emissions trading system determines the total amount of CO2 that can be emitted by power companies and industries. And this amount doesn't change -- no matter how many wind turbines are erected.’

‘Experts have known about this situation for some time, but it still isn't widely known to the public. Even Germany's government officials mention it only under their breath. No one wants to discuss the political ramifications’.

‘It's a sensitive subject: Germany is recognized worldwide as a leader in all things related to renewable energy. The environmental energy sector doesn't want this image to be tarnished. Under no circumstances does Berlin want the Renewable Energy Law (EEG) -- which mandates the prices at which energy companies have to buy green power -- to fall into disrepute.’

‘At the same time, big energy companies have an interest in maintaining the status quo. As a result, no one is pushing for change. Everyone involved is remaining silent.’

Not an Instrument against Climate Change

[...]

‘In the worst case scenario, sustainable energy plants might even have a detrimental effect on the climate. As more wind turbines go online, coal plants will be able to reduce their output. This in itself is desirable -- but the problem is that the total number of available CO2 emission certificates remains the same. In other words, there will suddenly be more certificates per kilowatt of coal energy. That means the price per ton of CO2 emitted will fall.’

‘That is exactly what happened in recent trading. A certificate to emit a ton of CO2 cost almost nothing. As a result, there was very little incentive for big energy companies to invest in climate friendly technologies.’

‘On the contrary. Germany was able to sell unused certificates across Europe -- to coal companies in countries like Poland or Slovakia, for example. Thanks to Germany's wind turbines, these companies were then able to emit more greenhouse gases than originally planned. Given the often lower efficiency of Eastern European power plants, this is anything but environmentally beneficial.’

Building Renovations Are Better than Windmills

‘Experts from the Green Party are taking the problem very seriously: “We are in a veritable crisis situation, and that means we must reconsider and alter things we once took for granted,” writes one contributor, adding that it's important to re-examine “whether we have set the right priorities.”’

‘Another expert begins his e-mail with a general clarification: “Dear People, I'm not fundamentally against the EEG. I only emphasize this because Manfred has repeatedly and erroneously described me as an opponent of the EEG.” But here comes the big "but": “When reduction of CO2 emissions is more cheaply achieved through insulating a building than using a wind turbine, that is where we should concentrate our support. When it comes to climate change, everything else is secondary to reducing CO2 emissions”.’

‘Indeed, when it comes to climage change, investments in wind and solar energy are not very efficient. Preventing one ton of CO2 emissions requires a relatively large amount of money. Other measures, especially building renovations, cost much less -- and have the same effect.’

‘The e-mail exchange ends with a conciliatory “What do you think?” But it is quickly followed by a bitter PS: “Do the Greens think that this problem (of climate change) will solve itself if we just screw solar panels onto our rooftops?”’

Environmental Groups Admit to the Problem

‘The German Renewable Energy Federation is clearly not thrilled about the debate. The lobbying group's official line is: “By implementing renewable energy, there will by a reduction in 2008 of 120 million tons of CO2.” When pressed, however, representatives of the federation will admit that this only applies to Germany. But the reality is that the freely traded CO2 certificates can be sold and used abroad.’

‘Likewise, one federation employee openly said that there is “a certain degree of inconsistency” between the EEG and emissions trading.’

‘WINDFARM LOBBY BOWS TO A.S.A.
AND CUTS CO2 SAVING FIGURES’

‘Spinners’ numbers overblown’

The Register, 23 December 2008.

‘The British Wind Energy Association, which promotes the UK windfarm industry, has been forced to halve its figures on carbon-emission reductions by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).’

‘The BWEA had formerly made its calculations on the basis that every kilowatt-hour (or “unit”) of electricity generated by a wind turbine would mean 860 grams of CO2 not emitted by fossil-fuelled power stations. Now, however, it has cut that claim to 430 grams per kWh, following a landmark ASA ruling last year against RWE nPower.’

“The 860 gCO2/kWh figure was hard to validate,” ASA spokesman Matt Wilson told the Reg today. “Following the ruling there was a consensus that the figure be lowered.”

‘Setting a new figure was difficult, however, as judging just how much carbon is saved per kWH of wind energy generated is almost impossible to do with any accuracy. The amount of carbon generated by fossil stations per kWh varies according to the technology used and the age of the facility, and different stations are on line at different times.’

“It was a fiendishly complex process,” said Wilson. “In the end, we're not experts in this area. We can say a figure is misleading, but we can't say what the true value is.”

‘The BWEA has now recalculated its carbon savings figures based on 430 gCO2/kWh, which will effectively mean that the amount of wind turbines required to achieve a given level of carbon savings has doubled. This is an acknowledgement of the fact that some older and dirtier fossil stations - particularly coal ones - have closed, and the increasing prevalence of efficient combined-cycle machinery in the gas sector.’

‘At present, the BWEA still makes no allowance in its calculations for the carbon effects of uncontrolled variability in wind supply, saying t“his is unlikely to become a significant issue until wind generates over 20 per cent of total electricity supply”.’

‘A report written for the Renewable Energy Foundation in the summer said that a substantial wind base would involve more carbon burden than current figures suggest. This was owing to the need for backup gas turbine power during calms - and the fact that irregularly-run turbines would be dirtier than ones run on a predictable schedule.’

‘The BWEA is also sticking to its line that a "normal" 2 megawatt turbine “produces enough electricity each year to meet the needs of 1,000 homes”. This is true [NOT IN OUR AREA, IT ISN'T - THE BWEA ‘ASSUME’ A 30% LOAD FACTOR. Ed.] - provided that those homes are well supplied with gas or heating oil to turn into carbon emissions.’

‘In a post-fossil future where heating, cooking and hot water were all electric - and assuming no rise in domestic energy use overall - such a turbine would actually meet the needs of 214 homes. Provided there was also a backup fossil power station and/or pumped storage hydropower reservoirs, of course.’

‘As of publication, the BWEA still hadn't responded to requests for comment’

THE HIDDEN COSTS OF WIND POWER

Even now, most people are unaware that wind turbines are receiving a massive indirect subsidy that is paid from every consumer’s electricity bills (see the Windpower page for the figures).

Even less well known is the fact that the grid is having to be strengthened at very considerable cost to the consumer in order to handle large amounts of intermittent wind power, much of which will be generated at sites such as Lewis or the Shetlands, far removed from the end user.

National Grid has just [8 October 2008] revealed the latest costings for this work:

‘National Grid to boost transmission investments by £2bn a year’

‘In a presentation to its investors, the transmission system operator said the plan represented an annual spend of £3 billion on the electricity network for mainland Britain. And beyond 2012, the company said “that investment will continue at least at that level for the foreseeable future”.’

‘National Grid said yesterday it has earmarked an extra £2 billion of capital investment in the UK transmission system up to 2012, above and beyond the £16 billion already announced.’ [Our emphasis].

[...]

‘During the investors' day, Mike Anderson, director general of Defra’s Climate Change Group pointed to the “electrification” of the UK’s heat and transport as countering the reduction of energy demand in expected efficiency schemes. ’

‘With an increase in intermittent wind power, Mr Anderson said the UK would require a jump from the current 78GW of power capacity to more than 100GW.’ [Our emphasis].

Reinforcement

‘Getting more renewable energy down from Scotland could involve offshore high-voltage direct current cables running from Loch Ness around Galloway into the Irish Sea and from north-east Aberdeenshire down to Teesside.’

‘The presentation also suggested strategic strengthening of the grid in the Humberside and Lincolnshire areas to enable links to a series of 1.8GW offshore substation platforms to link up Round Three offshore wind projects.’

‘It also noted the developments in nuclear energy regarding transmission arrangements for up to eight new nuclear plants in the application stage of development. A £1 billion investment in the grid would be needed in the South West of England alone to cope with new nuclear plants at Hinkley Point and Oldbury.’

‘Further reinforcements would be needed in Suffolk, Sussex and North-West Wales and Anglesey as two nuclear plants - 3.5GW of capacity - are developed by 2020 and seven plants (10GW) by 2030.’

‘Along with investments in offshore grids for 25GW of wind power, that would see investments of £5 to £9 billion around England and Wales to cope with the new power generation sites. In the short-term, a "connect and manage" approach will attempt to connect up renewable energy projects more quickly than the current system where investment in transmission reinforcements waits until sufficient renewable energy proposals come forward in certain areas.’ [Our emphasis].

[...]

-------------------------

See: ‘National Grid to boost transmission investments by £2bn a year.’ New Energy Focus, 8 October 2008.

‘WIND FUELS GAS’

‘Wind power is clearly not reducing the dependence on imported fuel, contrary to the frequent claims of its proponents. In fact the experience from Germany and Spain shows that it is increasing the dependence of imported natural gas. And that's not energy security.’

Edgar Gärtner, Business Europe, Wall Street Journal. 11 September, 2008.

‘[...]’

‘Wind turbines generate electricity very irregularly, because the wind itself is inconsistent. Therefore wind turbines always need backup power from fossil fuels to keep the electricity grid in balance. Gas turbines are the best way to do this. They are able to respond quickly and push power production when wind generators stop suddenly. They can be turned on and off almost instantly, whereas traditional coal-fired plants need to be maintained in a very inefficient standby mode if they are to respond to large fluctuations in power demand.’

‘A proliferation of windmills, then, can become a windfall for gas sellers. Just look at the cases of Spain and Germany, Europe's leading producers of wind power.’

‘By the end of 2007 Spain had 14,700 megawatts (MW) of installed wind capacity, according to Enagás, which manages the national gas network, producing 8.7% of the country's total power supplies. Most of these wind generators are located in scarcely populated areas, while the power consumption is concentrated in big cities with their many air-conditioned buildings. The peak load of the Spanish power grid is thus in the hot summer months—but this is precisely the time of year when there usually isn't much wind.’

‘For this reason, more and more gas turbines are being installed near consumers in the suburbs of Spain's cities. Only last year, Spanish power providers added 6,400 MW of gas-turbine power capacity, taking the total installed capacity of gas turbines to 21,000 MW. Natural gas has become the main source of electricity generation in Spain, and according to Enagás, 99.8% of the gas used in Spain is imported. Most of this comes via pipeline from Algeria, but the import of liquid natural gas (LNG) by ships will increase.’

‘In Germany, more than 20,000 wind turbines with a total capacity of 21,400 MW are now “embellishing” landscapes. Wind power's share of total electricity generation has risen in line with that of natural gas since 1990. Germany's gas consumption for power generation more than doubled between 1990 and 2007, and now represents 11.7% of the country's total power generation. The country imported 83% of its natural gas supplies.’

‘Today part of the wind power backup in Germany is still done by old coal-fired plants. But the Greens and even parts of the governing Christian and Social Democratic parties are fervently opposed to the construction of new coal plants. So many old power stations will probably be replaced by gas turbines. The green opponents of new coal-fired plants are nowadays the most dependable allies of the big gas companies such as Gazprom, Shell or BP.’

‘[...]’

(Mr. Gärtner is a specialized writer on energy and chemicals issues based in Frankfurt. See: Business Europe, Wall Street Journal for the full story).

COMMENT

The UK will be importing 50% of its gas by 2010, and 80% by 2020. The UK is now in the early stages of intense competition with the major Asian economies for supplies of Liquefied Natural Gas.

Even the originators of the wind policy were beginning to recognise the implications for energy security by the fag end phase of the last government:

• ... due to the intermittency of wind, we will need significantly more generating capacity in the longer term. (Ed Miliband, Statement to the House on the draft National Policy Statements, 9 November 2009. (See DECC press release).

• My Lords, my noble friend makes a valid point. In answer to the question that was asked earlier, wind generation is intermittent and therefore needs—may I use a technical term?—base-load capacity, which means we need to build for coal and gas to back up the wind. That is why it is not the most effective source in terms of energy security of supply, ...
  (Baroness Vadera, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, BERR, House of Lords,23 Jun 2008. Hansard: Column 1219).

Problems ahead

We frequently hear about the 12GW of coal and oil fired capacity that is scheduled to be retired by 2016/2017. We are supposed to be reassured that National Grid is apparently planning for at least 17GW of new combined cycle gas plants. What is not clear is how a market that is scheduled to have some 13GW of intermittent wind capacity with priority access is going to work, or even if it can work without capital grants for gas plant construction and an expensive market mechanism to compensate operators for curtailing output. The unplanned nature of the British system will exacerbate these costs.

Whatever happens, the evidence from other countries is that it will cost the consumer dear.

‘POVERTY FEARS OVER WIND POWER’

Professor King, who served as government chief scientific adviser from 2000 to 2007, told BBC Radio 4’s The Investigation that half a million people could be pushed into fuel poverty by the UK’s drive for wind power. [the programme is sadly no longer available as a download].

‘[...]’

‘The EU needed to renegotiate a more achievable and less expensive target, and he added: “This is an issue which needs to be revisited and I say this as somebody who feels that we really have to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions very substantially but in my view it is an expensive, and not a very clever route to go for 35 to 40% on wind turbines.”’

‘[...]’

(Read the full article: ‘Poverty fears over wind power’, BBC News , 4 September 2008.