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Memes - Abandon all hope - Ye who enter....


swordfish

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33 minutes ago, swordfish said:

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https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/wind-idiot-power/

The meme selectively paraphrases language from an article written by an economist. The actual quote is below. You can see how the meme intentionally misrepresents the author's point: 

"The concept of net energy must be applied to renewable sources of energy, such as windmills and photovoltaics. A two-megawatt windmill contains 260 tonnes of steel requiring 170 tonnes of coking coal and 300 tonnes of iron ore, all mined, transported and produced by hydrocarbons. The question is: how long must a windmill generate energy before it creates more energy than it took to build it? At a good wind site, the energy payback day could be in three years or less; in a poor location, energy payback may be never. That is, a windmill could spin until it falls apart and never generate as much energy as was invested in building it."

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3 minutes ago, Wabash82 said:

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/wind-idiot-power/

The meme selectively paraphrases language from an article written by an economist. The actual quote is below. You can see how the meme intentionally misrepresents the author's point: 

"The concept of net energy must be applied to renewable sources of energy, such as windmills and photovoltaics. A two-megawatt windmill contains 260 tonnes of steel requiring 170 tonnes of coking coal and 300 tonnes of iron ore, all mined, transported and produced by hydrocarbons. The question is: how long must a windmill generate energy before it creates more energy than it took to build it? At a good wind site, the energy payback day could be in three years or less; in a poor location, energy payback may be never. That is, a windmill could spin until it falls apart and never generate as much energy as was invested in building it."

I'll be honest, I would be very skeptical that there's that much steel in the windmill, I would assume there would be a much greater use of composites and alloys. 

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5 minutes ago, Impartial_Observer said:

I'll be honest, I would be very skeptical that there's that much steel in the windmill, I would assume there would be a much greater use of composites and alloys. 

I think the snopes page indicated that the original article that this meme was taken from was published sometime prior to 2008, so maybe he was refering to an "old school" windmill.

I'll ask my friend Quixote to investigate. 

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Just now, TrojanDad said:

Wasn't it Warren Buffet that stated that building them only makes sense with tax credits?  Also, on average wind facilities operate at approx 30% of capacity and must be backed up by natural gas?  Has that changed much over the past couple of years?

 

This is one of those areas where relevant technologies are changing all the time, so the economics are changing all the time as well. Just as an example, the meme (which dates to atound 2008) talks about a 2 MW windmill, but 3 MWs are the current standard, with 4 MW rapidly replacing it. That's a two-fold increase in energy output per windmill over about 10 years. 

The fact that the wind is not always blowing at the "right" time (to coincide with demand) is like the "sun don't shine at night" problem for solar. But there is lots of good research going on now with energy capture technologies, so these are hardly insurmountable problems. Wind and solar are currently as cheap or cheaper forms of energy (without subsidies) compared to fossil fuels in many areas of the country. As the energy storage technologies mature, they will slowly take over from fossil fuels in most areas.  Just as the new fracking technologies allowed the US to produce natural gas and oil that was formerly too costly to attempt to extract, pushing coal as a power source closer and closer to extinction in this country, the technologies will come, probably in our lifetimes still, for solar and wind to do the same to natural gas and oil. 

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BTW - It was just a meme........But here goes....

https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2017/05/09/costbenefit-of-wind-energy-must-be-publicized/

Wind turbines produce energy only about 40 percent of the time and must be backed up by “firm” generation sources such as gas or coal, which blows electricity costs skyward. OTPC already charges a 7 percent “Renewable Resource Adjustment” on North Dakota electric bills to cover the cost of renewable generation. Other utilities charges various Renewable Energy Surcharges, bury the extra cost of renewables by raising rates across the board or implement a rate fee that is a combination of both.

In Germany, with the largest combined wind and solar capacity in Europe, affixes a renewable energy surcharge on residential bills of almost 24 percent of household electricity price. The surcharge has risen tenfold since implementation and has been partially responsible for a hike in German residential electric bills of 68 percent since 1998, according to https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/what-german-households-pay-power.

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But what do you do about the NIMBY syndrome towards wind farms at the county level?  Tippecanoe, Hamilton, and to an extent Clinton have all told wind power companies to basically take a hike and don't come back.  And those are the counties I am aware of.   I'm sure there are more.

 

 

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55 minutes ago, swordfish said:

BTW - It was just a meme........But here goes....

https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2017/05/09/costbenefit-of-wind-energy-must-be-publicized/

Wind turbines produce energy only about 40 percent of the time and must be backed up by “firm” generation sources such as gas or coal, which blows electricity costs skyward. OTPC already charges a 7 percent “Renewable Resource Adjustment” on North Dakota electric bills to cover the cost of renewable generation. Other utilities charges various Renewable Energy Surcharges, bury the extra cost of renewables by raising rates across the board or implement a rate fee that is a combination of both.

In Germany, with the largest combined wind and solar capacity in Europe, affixes a renewable energy surcharge on residential bills of almost 24 percent of household electricity price. The surcharge has risen tenfold since implementation and has been partially responsible for a hike in German residential electric bills of 68 percent since 1998, according to https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/what-german-households-pay-power.

U.S. residential electricity costs have gone up by 64% since 2000. http://www.in2013dollars.com/Electricity/price-inflation

So it sounds like we've paid just about as much as the Germans over approximately the same period, but have fallen far behind them in adopting the next gen technology. Not good. 

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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

But what do you do about the NIMBY syndrome towards wind farms at the county level?  Tippecanoe, Hamilton, and to an extent Clinton have all told wind power companies to basically take a hike and don't come back.  And those are the counties I am aware of.   I'm sure there are more.

 

 

Citation needed.

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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

But what do you do about the NIMBY syndrome towards wind farms at the county level?  Tippecanoe, Hamilton, and to an extent Clinton have all told wind power companies to basically take a hike and don't come back.  And those are the counties I am aware of.   I'm sure there are more.

 

 

Don't know about the others, but Tippecanoe is tied to population density as well as as the growing size of the structures.  BC tends to have just a bit over 21 people per square acre while TC has over 350 per square mile.  Hamilton is denser than that.  The density also makes it more likely to encroach/impact on folks that aren't involved than in a place BC.  Tippecanoe County will still allow for private turbines, just not industrial.

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15 hours ago, foxbat said:

Don't know about the others, but Tippecanoe is tied to population density as well as as the growing size of the structures.  BC tends to have just a bit over 21 people per square acre while TC has over 350 per square mile.  Hamilton is denser than that.  The density also makes it more likely to encroach/impact on folks that aren't involved than in a place BC.  Tippecanoe County will still allow for private turbines, just not industrial.

So it makes sense, in regards to fighting global warming, to compel counties with population densities under a certain threshold to allow the construction of industrial wind farms?

 

16 hours ago, gonzoron said:

Citation needed.

*yawn* Didn't you and I have a similar discussion about this in a different thread not to long ago?  You trotted out statistics about wind speed averages.

 

 

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48 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

So it makes sense, in regards to fighting global warming, to compel counties with population densities under a certain threshold to allow the construction of industrial wind farms?

 

*yawn* Didn't you and I have a similar discussion about this in a different thread not to long ago?  You trotted out statistics about wind speed averages.

 

 

No, what it means is that there isn't specifically a "one-size-fits-all" approach to the implementation.  Part of the argument tied to population density, by the way, is a very libertarian ideal of minimized impact against non-participants.  That's harder to pull off in higher population density areas.  Also, part of the issues, at least in Tippecanoe County, that were discussed are tied to the size of the turbines.  Earlier consideration was based on turbines that had smaller footprints, but the current turbines have increased in height 50-100% since the original ordinances were devised.  That pretty much wipes out setbacks and impact originally looked at by the county.  Progress in the area may well end up seeing turbines that have smaller footprints and better efficiency that may have less impact in higher-density areas which would allow for a revisiting of the general ordinance. 

Incidentally, the CityBus terminal in Lafayette has had three turbines in use since 2011.  They are smaller footprint than the ones you see in Benton County; roughly 60% of the size, and are part of the cities efforts to produce cleaner energy use in transportation including some of the city's natural gas buses.

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30 minutes ago, foxbat said:

No, what it means is that there isn't specifically a "one-size-fits-all" approach to the implementation.  Part of the argument tied to population density, by the way, is a very libertarian ideal of minimized impact against non-participants. 

So NIMBYism.

Where are the peer reviewed studies showing that wind turbines cause property or personal damage to non-participants on a regular basis?

 

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20 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

So NIMBYism.

Where are the peer reviewed studies showing that wind turbines cause property or personal damage to non-participants on a regular basis?

 

No, not NIMBYism.

Don't know about peer reviewed studies, I merely reported what the point was stated by the folks making their decisions.  Not sure that you need a peer reviewed study in many cases.  If I put up an observation tower in my backyard blocking the sunlight in my neighbors backyard pool area and encroaching on his privacy, I'm not sure that there would be a need for a peer review study in him taking me to court.  Of course, if you want to go with peer review studies, one of the other reasons cited by the council/commission was not enough info based on potential negative impacts at this time to leap headlong into unrestricted implementation.  Their current actions are to get ahead of things more so than to say no completely.

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24 minutes ago, foxbat said:

No, not NIMBYism.

Don't know about peer reviewed studies, I merely reported what the point was stated by the folks making their decisions.  Not sure that you need a peer reviewed study in many cases.  If I put up an observation tower in my backyard blocking the sunlight in my neighbors backyard pool area and encroaching on his privacy, I'm not sure that there would be a need for a peer review study in him taking me to court.  Of course, if you want to go with peer review studies, one of the other reasons cited by the council/commission was not enough info based on potential negative impacts at this time to leap headlong into unrestricted implementation.  Their current actions are to get ahead of things more so than to say no completely.

Why not NIMBYism?  It's obvious a number of non-participants are saying "Not In My Backyard because of X, Y, Z, etc."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NIMBY

Quote

NIMBY (an acronym for the phrase "Not In My Back Yard"),[1][2] or Nimby,[3] is a characterization of opposition by residents to a proposed development in their local area. It often carries the connotation that such residents are only opposing the development because it is close to them, and that they would tolerate or support it if it were built farther away. The residents are often called Nimbys, and their viewpoint is called Nimbyism.

So if my neighbor builds a new swimming pool and when the sun shines the glare off the water shines into my upstairs windows, unnecessarily heating up my rumpus room to uncomfortable levels, I can take him to court?

 

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4 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Why not NIMBYism?  It's obvious a number of non-participants are saying "Not In My Backyard because of X, Y, Z, etc."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NIMBY

So if my neighbor builds a new swimming pool and when the sun shines the glare off the water shines into my upstairs windows, unnecessarily heating up my rumpus room to uncomfortable levels, I can take him to court?

 

Might well be able to take him to court.  Depending on your lawyer, you may prevail too.

Yes, I'm well aware of what NIMBYism means.  You also probably understand that they idea of NIMBYism often has degrees of unreasonableness attached to it when objection is made.  It's not a general term, it often has context. 

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3 minutes ago, foxbat said:

Might well be able to take him to court.  Depending on your lawyer, you may prevail too.

Yes, I'm well aware of what NIMBYism means.  You also probably understand that they idea of NIMBYism often has degrees of unreasonableness attached to it when objection is made.  It's not a general term, it often has context. 

So the opposition to wind turbines in Tippecanoe county is not NIMBYism because the opposition has a zero degree of unreasonableness attached to it?

I thought you were a proponent of clean energy systems?

 

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