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January 23, 2008
The Wind Power Money Pit
Posted by Dave Blount at January 23, 2008 12:38 PM
The easiest way to tell if something is a wise investment is to see if people put their money in it voluntarily, or if they must be forced to do so by bureaucrats. TCS Daily reports on Britain's push to save the world from the imaginary climate change crisis by building 7,000 wind turbines:
Despite public subsidies to the UK wind industry of over $500 million the government has so far only seen that such a massive investment provided less than half of one percent of the UK's electricity needs. In August 2007, the BBC's Radio 4 Costing the Earth program reported that figures proved that government financial incentives were encouraging wind industry firms to cash-in on massive government subsidies and build wind farms on non-viable sites across the mainland. Even in Europe's windiest country, the winds are just "too variable", with most turbines consistently under-performing. Having analysed figures submitted to the UK electricity watchdog Ofgem on every farm's load factor, Engineering Consultant Jim Oswald explained to the BBC, "It's the power swings that worry us. Over a 20-hour period you can go from almost 100 percent wind output to 20 percent."
The recommended "load factor" to make a wind farm economically viable and efficient is just over 30 percent. However, many of Britain's onshore farms have been running at around 20 percent, with some, in urban areas, dropping as low as 9 percent. Oswald believes that an over-reliance on wind power will result both in major power failures across the UK and an increase in electricity bills of up to 50 percent.
The beauty of the free market is that unlike bureaucratic ideologues, it discerns between what really works and what doesn't. Without subsidies and other incentives, wind power would die the natural death of all inefficient technologies. But thanks to the wind of enviromoonbats and the power of the state, it will be kept alive as a money pit for years to come.
I sure hope Ted Kennedy can't see those from his mansion.
On a tip from Byron.
