Renewables.

So these so called renewables, such as wind, are going to supply us with our power for the future. just look at the picture below which is the output from one such wind farm at this minute. A paltry 3% of it’s rated capacity. And this is a cold day when power consumption is high.

or even worse the bird mincer array below. Hardly a standard to be proud of. Note that it is minus and therefore is drawing power from the national grid.

When are people going to wake up and realise they are being conned out of their money in allowing this wholesale theft in the name of the green religion?

Even the projected life of these eco crucifixes is in doubt. Supposedly with a life of twenty five years, some have failed in eight and some are actually falling down or catching fire.

Likewise with that other green religion, solar panels. You know, those things that produce bugger all electricity for approximately 50% of the day.

When will people learn.

 

Source.

That’s My WiFi done for then

An extraordinary solar flare - the biggest seen in five years - could interfere with satellite communications and power grids on Earth over the next couple of days, experts have warned.

The effects of the storm are predicted to be moderate and could be felt from around 6pm tonight, lasting for 12 - 24 hours.

 

Just another public service broadcast.

Green Portugal. Bust.

Many should know that Portugal is seeking a rescue package. The reason for the bailout? Strange as it may seem: a green economy that has gotten dark, so much darker... Portugal will be the ONLY country in the World, according to the IMF  that will have a GDP negative growth in 2012. José Sócrates, Environment Minister between 1999 and 2002, and Prime Minister since 2005, is the person behind this tragedy. His green vision has brought Portugal some recognition amongst greenies, but mainly a dark future.
Almost everything imaginable in this Green promise has gone wrong. Murphy's law at its best:

Portugal was the first country with wave power in the world, at Aguçadoura; it broke down only two months later. (Take note those of you advocating it. FE knows how corrosive sea water is) Portugal has one of the biggest solar photovoltaic power stations in the World, at Amareleja, owned by Acciona, a Spanish company. The huge feed-in tariffs being paid for this solar energy is being sent to their neighbours.

Wind power has been a big bet. Big promises included green jobs, but the truth is that they are only a few thousands... The reality is that the more the wind blows, the poorer they get. This is true because wind feed-in tariffs are much higher than energy prices in the spot market.
With such a high share of wind energy, dam construction has started, so that they can be used for energy storage. A double cost, which would not be needed, if wind energy was not so big. But it doesn't stop there: Gas power stations had to be paid for being in standby, raising even more the indirect costs of wind power.

Portugal has boasted that it exported electricity energy for the first time in 2010. The truth is that most of that energy was exported at zero cost, a strange concept with an easy explanation: when wind blows, especially at night, energy consumption is low; the same does occur also in Spain, so they don't need the energy. Spain exports it through France, and gets the excess energy for free. Once again, Portuguese consumers and taxpayers are subsidizing other richer countries.

It isn't any surprise that electricity prices are very high in Portugal. Despite slightly above the European mean value, the low income means that energy is comparably much more expensive in Portugal. And this is only half of the picture, as the KWh energy price accounts for only about 40% of the electricity bill, the rest being taxes and subsidies.

Petrol and Diesel also have very high prices in Portugal, amongst the highest in the World. The reason: multiple taxes and subsidies paid at the  pump. All this has a great impact on the Economy, and is the main reason behind fuel tourism to Spain, where prices are much lower. In fact, they are so much lower, that near the border, people drive 50Km or more just to fill the tank!

Lately, things have got even worse. Sócrates is pushing for electric cars, but nothing in those cars is being made in Portugal. Once again, they are effectively paying for R&D being made somewhere else, without any advantage for the country. Despite being one of the countries with the highest lithium reserves in the World, no value is added in Portugal.

Portugal also has some well proven gas reserves. Despite that, they are not being explored, with tourism fears being invoked. It is viewed that Sócrates wouldn't go this way, as it is not green... And despite potential shale gas reserves being pointed out, no one talks about it in Portugal!

Talk about CO2 compensations sent to other countries, projects involving offshore wind or even more expensive solar energy. The truth is that the green promise has brought them a dark future.

Remember this, our politicians are trying to sell us the same green economy lunacy.

Unsolicited Solar panels

Today I received an unsolicited phone call from a company implying that they were working with  the government. (A quick google search debunked that). Anyway. Would you guess it, they were trying to sell me solar panels for my roof. After painfully listening to the prepared spiel, I asked for some hard economics. And this is what I got.

Cost: Mumbled about not really knowing till my location was inspected by their team of Salesmen Engineers. Even when I gave her rough dimensions of my south facing roof and the fact it was three stories up.

Maintenance: Very upbeat. “Absolutely maintenance free sir”. When I asked about cleaning the panels, and inverter through life costs, the other end of the phone line became very quiet.

Conclusion: I politely asked of her name and the details of the company she worked for. However when I informed her that I’d signed up for the Telephone preference service, and I would be informing Ofcom and Trading standards of their breach of the law, the last thing I heard was the equivalent of a Climate scientist sliding down a red hot hockey stick. A sizzling dial tone.

3TW of Green power?

Here’s a number you need to keep in mind: 3 Terawatts. That’s about how much power They’re using in the USA right now.

If that were used for 100W incandescent bulbs you’d need 30 billion bulbs.

There’s no way renewable energy is going to come close to that.

That would require over 2 billion square meters of 100% efficient solar panels: that’s about the same area as all the land in Rhode Island (real solar panels are about 25% efficient so you’d need to pave Delaware’s land as well). And of course solar panels don’t do too well at night, so you’d need to at least double that area, that brings us to the land area of Hawaii, plus you’d need a way to store around 40 TWh’s which simply doesn’t exist. And all that ignores factors such as clouds, dirt, animals, etc.

So what about wind? The most powerful wind turbine today is ~7 MW, so you’d need around 500,000 of them. They have a rotor diameter of 126m, so they’d have to be at least 65m apart. That means they’d take up 6 billion square meters, about the same as all of Delaware. I can’t imagine it would be good for anything flying. Now this is the peak power, so we’d have to factor in all the time that the wind isn’t blowing hard enough, or when it’s blowing too hard. Again we need a storage system for mind-boggling amounts of energy. Also, has anyone looked at the climatological effects of taking 3TW of convective energy out of the atmosphere?

Both solar and wind suffer from a fatal flaw: They can’t be controlled. Grid operators can’t dial supply up (They can somewhat do down) to meet demand, and when you’re talking about the electric grid either you balance it or it balances itself…usually in some exciting manner.

Hydro’s pretty much tapped out in that country, not to mention ecomentalists flip their shit whenever someone mentions building dams. Same thing with geothermal, unless we want to start drilling in Yellowstone.

Nuclear could do it, but whenever you mention it the ecomentalists set a record in going from zero to stupid.

That leaves fossil fuels. There’s nothing else. Especially when it comes to moving stuff. We have nothing that comes close to the power density of hydrocarbons when it comes to mobile applications, and hydrocarbons are the only energy source that’s suitable for mobile applications. Everything else (e.g. hydrogen and ethanol) are just ways to make electricity mobile.

On the bag of a fag packet.

 

No. This post is not about smoking, although I’m puffing away while I write this.

I’ve just been delving around on the internet, to see if I could see the benefits of fitting a photovoltaic solar panel to my roof. You know saving the planet etc, etc, Bollocks, etc.

And here’s what I’ve come up with:

Initial fitting would be £12,000 for the fitting of the panel, wiring, and installing an inverter. Ok, fine.

Expected overall saving per year is calculated at £839. Calculated for the South of the country. If you live in Scotland, then the figure drops to £716.

Looks jolly good I hear myself think. (All figures calculated for me by The Energy saving trust).

Now for the twist.

The panels are expected to last for 20 years, but at the end of their life will only be capable of delivering 80% performance. (The calculations are based on 100% through life output).

The panel will require cleaning on a regular basis. in my case I’ve based it as every two years due to the Oak trees across the road, and the numerous pigeons we have here for some strange reason.

Now seeing that I have a three story house, H & S decree that work on the roof requires scaffolding in my area.

Lets throw in £200 for that (Most likely double). Therefore after 20 years the cost in total will be £2,000.

Inverters burn out in time. Well the good chaps at MugsRyou, installed a top of the range model that lasts 10 years. So I’ll only need two of those. £1000 a throw.

The upshot of this long rambling story is that it will take me 19.07 years to break even. That’s if the panels deliver that 100% for the whole period and we actually get some sun.

Mind you I expect I’ll have long died from a smoking related disease by then.

Did I mention smoking? Oh dear.

Wind turbines anyone?