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wrote:
Looking at physical facts, rather than sales rhetoric, and techno-jumbo talk - "Gigawatts of "installed capacity" etc. the uk govt. can be seen to be up a gum tree with this "renewable energy" stuff. No doubt THEY are quite happy up their gum tree with their friends installing this junk, but, if the public ever discovered the reality of this bad joke, they would not be pleased. As indeed I am not.
Not only happy as they and their friends coin it - by using tons more cheap pollutant energy to advance to their % goal, but happy that the "Greenies" are off their backs while they get bizzy putting in Nuclear stations. And happy that they get a pat on the back for looking so useful in the cause of "slowing Global warming".
Please read "Wind info" just below carefully, since, allthough it has been
said to contain "irrelevance", I promise that there is none !!
Wind Info" ("TAD" = Turbine-Alternator Device)
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Data from public meeting at Llandeilo, uk July 2005
regarding proposed "Windfarm"
Cost of farm -------------- 160M Euro
Annual return from energy supplied ------- 220k Euro
which is less than 0.15 % p.a. ?!
This is not energy production, it is energy "laundering".
Meanwhile swea.co.uk will have us believe that they provide a return
of 200 to 300% p.a. !?!
Why invest in anything else ! ? I think this was how HBOS (RBoS
?) was sunk by American estate agents ?
The Good news
It is quite possible to get several Whole percent of cost returned
annually - from a Sensible design of Turbine-ALTERNATOR Device.
I stress "Alternator", to highlight the fact, to which, you may
notice, reference is never made in talk of "windfarms".
A fat lot of use is a Turbine without an Alternator ! hence I call
the complete thing a "TAD"
The Simple Facts
There are three or four simple ( but not to find ! ) reasons which account
very well - for the disparity in these figures i.e. C 5% (from
a sensible design) cf a fraction of 1 % from current "technology".
Look away now if you think it will be easy to find them !
I shall list them, and then point to just two.
A) Economy of Size
B) Mode of operation
C) Betz limit
D) The bigger the "TAD" the less able it is to face a veering wind,
and the bigger problem from "Wind shear", i.e. windspeed changes with
height.
A) Economy of Size
TADs have an unusual "Economy of Size",
The cost of facing a given area of weather, is necklace-shaped
function of (log) SIZE of the TADs deployed.
This is because the two components (T and A) have Opposite
"Economy of Size".
Viz.
One T to replace 4 of half the diameter will require 8 times the
quantity of materials (of any one of the 4) to make. The cost of 1/4
as many turbines of twice the diameter, is therefore DOUBLE that of
the 4 times as many which they replace.
Meanwhile
The one A of 4 times the thro'put, costs only about twice as much as
any one of the 4 which it replaces, in my experience. The Alternator
bill is therefore HALVED by doubling the diameter of the TADs. (and
making 1/4 as many)
Lowest farm-cost ocurrs around sizes where the Ts costs about the
same as the As.
For a very effective design of turbine, this
appears to happen at around One metre diameter (Not 40-odd !!)
Just below this size and the required ratio of the coupling geabox
becomes 1:1 !
B) Mode of operation
There are two possible modes.
Constant rps and Constant Pitch
Current (80m high) "technology" runs at constant revs. which
progessively wastes the higher winds, causing the power taken from the
wind to be more or
less "pro-rata" with windspeed - despite what "BWEA", etc. would
apparently like to believe.
On the other hand, the power taken from the wind, by a TAD running
with Constant Pitch-angle, and at a speed which varies to suit the
wind, ( instead of changing the
angle of the "blades" (wings)) is very much Cubicly related to windspeed.
About 3780 of the TADs pictured herewith face the same area of
weather as one 40m diameterr "1 MW turbine", supply 380 kW from
11m/s wind (Actual result - which was also indicated by design
"numerical model") and 1.8 MWatt from 19 m/s wind ( indicated by the
same model) .
Totat weight is about 1/5 that of the (1000 tonne ?!) block of
concrete ALONE to which the monster is bolted !!
This translates to several Whole percent of cost returned p.a. in
very many sites
The TADs hang one below another, for instance
within the volume of a "power- pylon".
A low-voltage line would need to be added to the the pylons. As you
can see, they also go perfectly in a "Tadfrey" atop the house.
Growth rate
If half of the energy supplied by a system returning, for instance,
5% p.a. of its cost, is used to extend the system, then it will double
in size, value, and output, with the passing of each 100/2.5 x
logn(double, 2), or about 28 years.
Substituting even as much as 1% for the 5, we can see that there is
no possibility of growth without continuous INPUT from elsewhere but
the wind. I.e it is not a net energy supply At All !! Well, yes,
it supplies energy, but this has a POSitive "carbon footprint" - as
indeed some associated websites openly admit.
Need I say, Wind and solar are supposed to have a NEGative
"footprint", i.e. avoid the use of oil that would otherwise have been
used. i.e lead to the use of LESS fossil fuel, not "just a little bit
more".
Vital parameters of the TAD in the available .jpg
Inlet dia 65cm
Outlet 92 cm
Measured Output +/- 15%
100watts 11m/s
200w 14m/s - and the arithmetic which forecast these
Actual results, suggests 500watts at 19m/s
Weight of TAD alone about 35kg (no more)
Approx Cost of materials to make each:
Alternator (converted 1100watt 3-ph motor) 200 Euro
Turbine 200 Euro
If you do the sums, you will see that this is 40 ? times the
%p.a.of cost returned by current "windfarms" in equivalent locations
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