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U-Know! Forum » Wind farms are shite - more evidence |
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Eduardo 375 posts |
Aug 14, 2007, 08:20
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We'll have to leave out-of-box thinking to smarter individuals than me, I'm afraid, I'm more yer practical type! In the UK, all our coal-burning & nuclear power stations are reaching the end of their useful lives. Many of them are way beyond the time they were designed to operate over. What do you suggest we replace them with, or are you saying that you think we can reduce our energy consumption by 65% over the next 10 years? The point the Guardian article was making was that windpower is detrimental to the landscape, & misleadingly correlated MW with land area. Compare with the open-cast lignite mines in europe, or ask the Radley lake protestors about what didcot is doing to their landscape. Drive past Trawsfynydd in North Wales whilst remembering that hideous eyesore hasn't generated a single watt in over 16 years (without resorting to anti-nuke knee-jerk crap, such as the well-documented exceptionally high levels of cancer in the traws area. Google it if you're really interested...) It could be argued that are visually obtrusive. But they are environmentally benign, & tread lightly on the landscape. So long as they are implimented responsibly, where's the problem?
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PMM 3155 posts |
Aug 14, 2007, 09:49
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Thanks. You certainly know how to make friends and influence people. I have a fucking big windfarm on my doorstep. Good. I'm glad I don't have a fucking big nuclear power station there. Nuclear is a finite, non renewable resource too, by the way. If we used uranium to replace the declining supply of gas and oil, we would se supplies peak and fall into decline in around 50 years according to the figures I've read. Some other points. Gas is needed to do much more than just heat our homes and provide electricity. It also is vital for the production of fertiliser. The more renewable electricity we can produce, asap, means longer before we have to make a choice between heating our homes and feeding people. I'm sure others have responded much more eloquantly than I have, so I'll leave it there.
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Pursued By Trees 1135 posts |
Aug 14, 2007, 12:03
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I accept that these may not be the most land-to-energy efficient of energy sources ... and it's something I know very little about ... so I was wondering if anyone more enlightened could wise me up. I'm under the impression that presently we're paying all kinds of subsidies to a considerable number of farmers to either grow nothing or over-produce oil-seed rape and other surplus crops ... I could well be wrong, but this is the impression I get, maybe this is no longer the case ... maybe it never was? Could biofuel crops not be grown on exisiting farmland which is, in one or other of the above stated manners effectively not efficiently productive? I have no idea if there's enough farmland in such a situation to make any kind of practical contribution to potential biofuel demands or whether these crops yield enough of a viable return to a farmer ... or even whether such crops cause any environmental damage themselves. Is this a totally stupid and ignorant idea? If so why? I honestly know very little about all this but would be interested to learn more.
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moss 2897 posts |
Aug 14, 2007, 12:44
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Biofuels are not the answer - less use of energy is the first port of call. National Express buses have just pulled out of using biofuels because of the controversy that is beginning to wage round them.. More land used for biofuel means less land for wheat and maize grown in America, ask the poor countries of the world what they want, Mexico is already experiencing difficulties with the high price of maize (for tortillas I presume). The link below is probably one of hundreds pointing out the high cost of biofuel not only on the eco system of this world but also to those that can't afford the price of basic food..... http://www.alternet.org/environment/54218/
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Pursued By Trees 1135 posts |
Aug 14, 2007, 13:42
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Thank you! That was a most informative and thought-provoking read. Certainly it's pretty obvious that reducing consumption is going to be the key factor in any move toward a more globally sustainable and fairer system. I can also see the sense of more locally-based food and energy production and distribution systems. I do wonder how it can ever come about when the people with the political/economic power and global reach to inaugurate (or prevent) change on any meaningful scale are the ones profitting so massively from the status quo and even the further expansion of global capital. Certainly it seems to me that change would have to be in stages ... kind of a ramp-down in energy consumption and shift in production rationales and systems ... then again ... we got to where we are now in stages ... some more rapid and momentous than others.
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Lupus 641 posts |
Edited Aug 15, 2007, 14:01
Aug 15, 2007, 11:42
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Energy from windturbines has been much debated here in Norway the last years. The changing of landscapes seems to have been the main topic, but there are other and far worse dangers. On the island Karmøy we have one of the few remaining patches of the northern European heath moors, a landscape that has excisted for 5000 years. Some think it's a good idea to convert this very sensitive eco system into a windturbine park; broad construction roads will be built, bogs will be drained, and the habitat of several species will be destroyed: The Eurasian Eagle Owl (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasian_Eagle-owl), and The White-tailed Sea Eagle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-tailed_Eagle) among others. There are also plans to put up windturbines all along the Norwegian coast; the main north/south trekking corridor of billions of birds from the polar aereas, Greenland, Svalbard and northwestern Russia/Siberia. Clogging up the birds main highway with giant meat grinders is not a good idea! It's a very high price to pay, and for what? A planned windpark on the coast of Møre is estimated to cost 16 milliard Nkr. to build. For this amount 1,5 million heat pumps for private housing can be bought. 1,5 million heat pumps will save 11 TWh a year; over twice (2,5) as much as the windpark is estimated to produce. If windturbines is such great idea, why not put them up where they can't threaten any sensitive eco-system or other "systems" worth protecting: in the cities & suburbs!
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Ascorpius 82 posts |
Aug 15, 2007, 21:57
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I keep telling people but they just don't listen WE ARE ALL DOOMED By the end of the 21st Century human life on earth will not be anything like what we know today. It is time for some other branch of life to take over and a new world to evolve. We've had it I'm afraid. Look at the facts 1 Nuclear power - no 2. wind power - no 3. Oil - no 4. gas no 5 bio fuels - no 6. Trees - no 7. sustainability - no 8. Civilisation - no 9. Peace - no 10. me -no (I'll be well dead by then)
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Lupus 641 posts |
Aug 16, 2007, 07:38
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We'll all be dead when the shit really hits the fan. A little beside the topic perhaps, but since we're in an apocalyptic mood: saw the following in the early eighties, had it on VHS and my sister managed to tape over it (grrr), but found it earlier this summer on Google Video. Brilliant stuff imo. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2023790698427111488
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Eduardo 375 posts |
Aug 16, 2007, 08:31
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There's no excuse for building power stations, of any type, in stupid places. I doubt the moorland you mention will end up as a windfarm though, I suspect it's just a money-grabbing developer trying his luck. I agree the best place for siting them would be urban & ex-industrial sites. Unfortunately they must go where the wind is, ie, coastal & mountainous areas. Heat pumps are not an alternative to power generation though. We need both. They fit better in Norway where you have generally modern, well-insulated housing & plenty of space (low density population). A large part of UK housing is not easily converted, being older, poorly insulated & densely packed. Not to say that they don't have a place here, particularly in new-build where there's little excuse for NOT using them. Also there's a difference between a private company investing in generation (profit-making) & spend to save individuals' fuel costs. I know, it's a shame. But in UK the DTI offer to pay for 50% of the cost of installing ground source heat pumps, to anyone who wants them. I don't know why they don't publicise it more prominently. The energy situation in Norway is entirely different to UK - you don't have a looming energy crisis! Nor do you produce much carbon. Most of Norway's electricity comes from hydro, your hydro resource is probably the best in europe, you have no nuclear & hardly any coal. And it has huge oil & gas reserves. Electricity demand is low & doesn't increase. UK energy comes mainly from coal & nuclear at the moment. The nukes reach the end of their design life in about 2010, coal stations similar. Electricity demand increases every year, & always has. Climate change aside, we're heading towards an energy crisis in the near future. Now that penny has dropped with the govt they have brought nuclear back to the table. Bear in mind that the decommissioning cost for the 20 nuke stations already retired is going to be £56 billion, to be paid for by the tax payer, they must be pretty f'king desparate! Half of that sum would probably pay for a heat-pump system for every house in Britain.
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CraigR 479 posts |
Aug 17, 2007, 14:22
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Can you explain why you cannot remove a wind farm easily?
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