| Wind Turbine Plans Hinge on Permit
By Laura Nesbitt
Mountain View Telegraph
A wind generating company says it will be ready to start
construction on a wind farm south of Willard in the spring. Managers of the
High Lonesome Wind Ranch LLC were expected to submit an application for a
zoning ordinance for a special use district for the farm.
"We're ready to put our application~ in. We had to pull
together lots of pieces. These are. complex projects," said Amy LeGere,
Foresight Wind Energy regional development manager.
The wind project, is about nine miles south of Willard on
private land on Mesa de los Jumanos and is being developed by High Lonesome
Wind Ranch LLC, a partnership of Foresight Wind, Karbon Zero and Edison Mission
Group.
While other wind companies have constructed
meteorological, or MET, towers to assess available wind in the area, HLWR would
be Torrance County's first wind project, LeGere said.
Construction of the wind energy generation facility may
begin as early as April and would bring about 200 temporary jobs to the area.
The final project would create about 10 permanent high-tech and high-paying
jobs, LeGere said.
"Project financing is in place. ... We're negotiating a
30-year power sale contract with a regional utility," LeGere said. The price of
that power would be fixed or "kicked in," not like the "volatility of fuel
markets," LeGere said.
There would be 40, 2.5-megawatt turbines generating a
total of about 100 megawatts of electricity -enough to supply power to about
30,000 homes. The wind turbines - measuring about 15 to 20 feet in diameter
-would be built on five square miles of private land owned by Goemmer Land
& Livestock Co.
"The 40 turbines will span approximately five miles,"
said Ednen Hindi, Karbon Zero director of projects.
Along with wind assessment studies, HLWR has performed
cultural studies and studied the paths of raptors, bats and small birds in the
area.
"Because modern wind turbines turn slower and are on
steel towers," they are less likely to kill birds, and modem steel towers are
less suitable for building nests than older, lattice towers, LeGere said.
HLWR would build an operations and maintenance building,
and a collection substation on the mesa for the facility, LeGere said.
The project proposal has been presented to Torrance
County Commission, county Planning and Zoning and the Village of Willard by
HLWR, LeGere said.
County Manager Joy Ansley said the county plans to work
with HLWR on applying for industrial revenue bonds.
Because the county has tax exempt status, the bonds are
''a way of giving a tax benefit to a company or a project," LeGere said.
At the Jan. 9 Torrance County Commission meeting, Jimmy
Corliss, who lives close to the wind energy generation facility site, told
commissioners he would like to close about three miles of Corliss Road East, a
road accessing the area.
After the meeting, Corliss said he planned to ask area
residents to sign a petition supporting the closure because trucks from the
wind company are "tearing up the countryside and we're not getting compensated
for it."
Ansley said the matter will not be on the commission
agenda until February.
Albuquerque Journal Saturday January 26,
2008 |
Betting on
Batteries
By Salvatore Salamone
Seeking to boost reliability in the short term and
integrate wind-generated energy in the long term, American Electric Power is
about to deploy several large-scale sodium sulfur batteries on its distribution
grid.
The company has ordered three of the batteries, each
rated at two megawatts, from NGK Insulators of Japan.
Michael G. Morris, AEP's chairman, president and CEO,
said, "These new installations will move us a step closer to the full potential
of advanced energy storage technologies in areas like reliability improvement,
peak-load shaving, and the use of stored energy from renewable sources like
wind to supplement available generation resources."
The use of this type of battery is not that common.
However, AEP has been an early adopter of this technology; its first pilot
program was in 2002. Traditionally, utilities have relied on lead acid
batteries. And some utilities now use batteries based on other technologies
that while promising, are not yet as robust or do not have the storage capacity
of the sodium sulfur batteries.
Why the interest in the batteries? According to Ali
Nourai, strategic technology consultant and battery guru at AEP, the company
selected the batteries for a number of reasons. "We wanted something in the 1
to 10-megawatt range with four to eight hours of energy storage," Nourai said.
"That eliminated many other battery types."
The idea is to use the batteries at specific substations
to delay the need for an upgrade. When the upgrade does take place, AEP will be
able to move the batteries to another location. "Other batteries are three to
five times larger, so they are harder to relocate," Nourai said. That
relocation requirement also eliminated some non-battery technologies. For
instance, some companies rely on a hydroelectric or compressed air technology
to complement a substation's power. Neither can easily be moved.
Beyond the Pilot Stage
This new battery deployment is not a technology
evaluation project. This is an operational deployment, according to Nourai. The
batteries are intended to help AEP support the exponential growth in demand of
distributed generated power hooked up to its grid.
Another consideration for using these batteries is to
support future wind generation efforts. The idea of using batteries to store
energy generated by alternative power generation technologies such as wind and
solar is gaining attention these days. For instance, so-called wind-to-wire
efforts seek to store wind power generated at night when demands are low.
Similar efforts with solar energy projects seek to smooth out day to night
variations in solar generated power.
According to Nourai, wind storage was a consideration
when selecting the batteries. However, he noted there were higher priorities
including improving reliability.
In particular, one of the batteries will be used in West
Virginia where storm-related power outages can be quite common. The batteries
will provide energy storage in the middle of the line to reduce the total
customer outage minutes. For that effort, AEP will add two megawatts of sodium
sulfur battery capacity near Milton, W.Va., to enhance reliability and allow
for continued load growth in that area, according to the company.
AEP will put another two megawatts of battery capacity
near Findlay, Ohio to enhance reliability, provide support for weak
sub-transmission systems, and avoid equipment overload.
Factors like these are being used to cost-justify using
the batteries. For example, it is expected to cost AEP $27 million for the
batteries, the associated work to prepare the three substations, and for
control systems. Some of the cost can be offset by a reduction in customer
outage minutes and by providing additional capacity to postpone substation
upgrades.
The total six megawatts capacity of these batteries is
just the start. "Our near-term goal is to have at least 25 megawatts of sodium
sulfur battery capacity in place by the end of this decade," Morris said. The
company hopes to add another 1,000 megawatts of advanced storage technology in
the next 10 years.
energybizinsider December 26 2007 |
Patty and bill travelled on
Sunday December 23, 2007 from Lubbock to Austin, TX to spend Christmas with
son, daughter, grandchildern and in-laws.
Going south from
Lubbock a gas-fired [no coal piles] electric power generation was observed to
the east.
South of Lubbock there is
agriculture - mostly cotton.
Then the highway descends
into Post, TX and lot of of oil jack pumps are seen with accompanying
smells.
Just to the south and to the west is an OLD wind
turbine farm.
Further to the immediate
south of Snyder, TX are NEW WIND TURBINES NOT SEEN IN DECEMBER
2006!!!
Above photo only captures a
small number of the Turbines seen.
Siemens has a
sign.
South of Synder and to west of Sweetwater, TX are
LOTS MORE wind turbines
which only appeared within the last several
years.
Looks like some in the US are super-concerned about
oil and natural gas depletion.
Southeast of Sweetwater is
Brady, TX where
some have a good
sense of humor.
Grandfather and grandson
are viewing
peak energy video on Sunday December 23,
2007.
|
Because wind generation is immensely erratic and hard to
forecast it is almost impossible to incorporate it into the grid without
compromising reliability. Detailed study of inflow and outflow between
Germany and Scandanavia demonstrates that as much as 84 per cent of west
Denmark’s wind power is exported to Norway (at a loss to Danish consumers
of about £100million) (4).
Currently, the Danish Wind Industry Association (DWIA)
admits: ‘Danish wind power only contributes to adequacy [of supply] with a
capacity value of zero.’ That is, wind’s generating capacity does not
guarantee any of the basic and essential electrical supply.
wind -
Most wind turbines generate electricity from naturally
occurring wind. Solar updraft towers use wind that is artificially produced
inside the chimney by heating it with sunlight.
PNM electric integrated
resource planning July 2, 2007 showed
and
Looks like wind supplies when there is no demand.
Urban Survival
Tuesday April 24, 2007
Wind Power - Overblown
If you think that wind power is the be-all end-all solution to
our power needs, you might want to recalibrate. Seems wind power doesn't have
the much hyped payback that its promoters claim and there's a new sheriff in
town - National Wind Watch which says, among other things:
"Wind speed is unpredictable except in general terms. Even on a
windy day it varies, and therefore so does the output from wind turbines.
On the electric supply grid, wind turbines behave less like a supplier and more
like a user, in that they are outside of the control of the grid dispatchers
who must continuously balance electricity supply and demand."
Not that wind power doesn't have its place. For example, when we
were living on our sailboat in San Francisco a few years back, we had all kinds
of power from our
Southwest
Wind Power marine unit, and not just when going to weather in "hurricane
alley" just inside the Gate.
Our Canadian Bureau Chief Tim B fills us in on other haps:
"Lessee here--install 7300 MW capacity of bird-blenders to get
200 MW useful output? OH, don't ferget ya gotta invest BILLIONS in upgrading
the grid to handle all that ampacity that won't ever be there!
ALBERTA just last week said NO MORE wind power capacity, because
it is so unreliable, and above 20% capacity they risk rolling blackouts if the
wind dies, so they are going to install (surprise!) NG-FIRED plants to handle
peak load!!!
DIRTY SECRET--on the Canucki Prairies in dead of Jan/Feb, when
it gets down to -minus 30C or even -40C, that's when there is NO WIND.
The U.S. wind energy industry installed 2,454
megawatts (MW) of new generating capacity in 2006, an investment of
approximately $4 billion, billing wind as one of the largest sources of new
power generation in the country -- second only to natural gas -- for the second
year in a row.
New wind farms boosted cumulative U.S. installed wind energy
capacity by 27 percent to 11,603 MW, well above the 10,000-MW milestone reached
in August 2006. One megawatt of wind power produces enough electricity to
serve 250 to 300 homes on average each day.
Hassan Masum
January 4,
2007 12:47 PM
Paul
Gipe has been involved with wind energy for 30 years. He has authored
several books in the field, and was instrumental in the successful campaign for
Ontario's 2006 implementation of Advanced Renewable Tariffs to promote
distributed renewable energy supply.
The
gearbox translates the blades' 30- to 60-rpm rotational speed to the 1200 to
1500 rpm necessary to operate a generator. Texas blades appeared to be
turning much slower than 30-60 rpm.
Energy Probe helped crank up
the debate in November when it issued a report that said wind turbines are much
less reliable than expected.
Data collected from three wind farms near Lake Huron during the
summer and fall showed the turbines produced only 22.3 per cent of their
potential capacity for electricity generation. Another problem: The wind often
died in mid-morning when customer demand was gearing up.
Altogether, about 12 off-shore wind projects are under
consideration in the United States.
Texas has proposed 150 megawatt project about seven miles off
of Galveston Island. Texas is uncommon because the wind farm would be built
entirely in state-owned waters, unlike most proposed off-shore deals that are
in federal waters
In Texas, as in many other parts of the country, power
companies are scrambling to build generating stations to meet growing peak
demands, generally driven by air-conditioning for new homes and businesses. But
power plants that run on coal or gas must “be built along with every
megawatt of wind capacity,” said William Bojorquez, director of system
planning at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas.
The reason is that in Texas, and most of the United States, the
hottest days are the least windy. As a result, wind turns out to be a good
way to save fuel, but not a good way to avoid building plants that burn coal. A
wind machine is a bit like a bicycle that a commuter keeps in the garage for
sunny days. It saves gasoline, but the commuter has to own a car anyway.
But neither wind nor solar power can be used to meet surging energy
demands. And,
while wind may be a low-cost resource when it is blowing,
no renewable resources will provide for the large "base load" resources that
Colorado needs the most.
An economic analyst claims he's done the numbers and
wind energy is costing the Victorian Government far more money than any wind
turbines could generate.
In addition
wind is very unreliable, it cuts in and cuts out, so you have
to have backup for it, so the costs are somewhat in excess of that crude
depiction of the premium price you have to pay for wind.
"Oh, well they
just cut in and cut out. Windfarms on average operate for 25 per cent of the
time, but they only operate when the wind is blowing, so when the wind isn't
blowing they're not available. I think it was well publicised in South
Australia a wek or so ago when they had a heatwave of 42 or so degrees and
suddenly none of the windfarms were operating, or only operating at very low
level and one of them caught fire. Wind is not and cannot be reliable. You can
rely on it to be there when you need it only 10 per cent of the time," he says.
Since
1980, the cost of power from wind farms has dropped from 38 cents to 4 to 7
cents per kWh, and it continues to decline. The cost of wind energy is now
on a par with the cost of coal and gas, and it is cheaper than nuclear. As a
result, the industry is in a period of extraordinary growth.
Q What happens when the winds doesn't blow?
The Economics of Wind Energy
In order for wind to generate enough power to replace a typical
power plant it would take up to 300 square miles of wind turbines. That is
the size (and view) of New York City for one replacement wind farm!
The exact efficiency of wind farms is nearly
impossible to pinpoint. The problem is found in the factors that go into the
analysis. The terrain, amount of wind, size of turbines and so on varies from
wind farm to farm. There is no constant, which makes it difficult to nail down
general efficiency ratings. In general, a single wind turbine will convert
about 20 percent of the energy in wind to electricity. The most efficient
production occurs between five and 20 miles an hour of wind speed. This general
20 percent efficiency rating is roughly
seven to five percent more efficient than solar power, but
sunlight is constant whereas wind is not.
Must be located in an area with steady prevailing
winds
The comparison of energy used in manufacture with the
energy produced by a power station is known as the 'energy balance'. It can be
expressed in terms of energy 'pay back' time, i.e. as the time needed to
generate the equivalent amount of energy used in manufacturing the wind turbine
or power station.
The average wind farm in the UK will pay back the energy used
in its manufacture within six to eight months, this compares favourably
with coal or nuclear power stations, which take about six months.
Q Is
above statement true?
We are in the business of providing legal advice to
those in the energy industry, and have been for nearly a century. With this
rich history, we have developed one of the most accomplished wind energy
practices in the U.S. We have
over
twenty lawyers who regularly advise industry participants, including
developers, utilities, governments, lenders, landowners and others, on the
intricacies of wind project development, construction and finance.
Simply put, Andrews Kurth knows wind energy.
Home of
the world's largest wind turbine farm.
The Sweetwater Wind Farm electric generation facility
for Sweetwater Wind Power, LLC, is the first phase of a planned multi-phase
project that
could be as large as 400 megawatts (MW).
Texas is now the largest wind energy producer in the
nation with an
installed
wind generating capacity at 2,370 MW, which is enough power for 600,000
average-sized homes a year. Currently there are about 1,600 hundred wind farms
in West Texas alone, and the numbers continue to increase as development costs
continue to drop and wind turbine technology improves. Moreover, Texas has
approved two offshore wind farms along the Gulf Coast — another national
first. According to a U. S. Department of Energy (DOE) study, the wind-rich
states of Texas, North Dakota and Kansas together could generate enough
electricity with wind energy to furnish the entire nation’s electricity
needs.
Q Do we believe this?
