Category: Uncategorized

Uncategorized 13 Mar 2017

Born Lucky: Stars Align Perfectly for PM’s Son with Mammoth Bet on Wind Power Outfit Infigen

via STOP THESE THINGShttps://stopthesethings.com

Life is a lottery. And lottery winners are a mixed bag. Sometimes it’s that battler from Bundaberg who scoops the jackpot, immediately pays off the mortgages of his mates and buys five identical V8 Holden Commodores. On other occasions, the lottery was won at birth. Sometimes the advantage of parentage is immediate and other times […]

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March 12, 2017 at 06:31PM

Uncategorized 13 Mar 2017

‘Combined Heat and Power’ Distributed Generation: Beware of Government Mandates, Subsidies

via Master Resourcehttps://www.masterresource.org

“In cities, piping exhaust steam to closely packed buildings can make sense. But trying to impose CHP in typical American suburbs where there are no industrial uses, or to where buildings are widely spaced, is irrational.”

“Combined Heat and Power has become a political football in the service of government energy planning to cut CO2 emissions. CHP can be used effectively in specific applications where it can be justified economically, but it shouldn’t be forced on Americans by government edict.”

Combined Heat and Power (CHP) is dragged out periodically by anthropogenic global warming (AGW) activists who want to replace central-station electricity with distributed power from wind and solar. Power Magazine recently highlighted this movement in the section, “Global Developments Giving CHP a Much Needed Boost,” with two articles devoted to CHP installations. The UNFCCC COP 21 Paris agreement to cut CO2 emissions, the feature argued, could provide the needed boost to CHP growth.

Typically, promoters of CHP start by saying that CHP improves efficiency–even to the point of 90%. Greenpeace made this claim in its plan, the “Energy [R]evolution” which is riddled with hype and misinformation.

The Basic Fallacy

CHP uses exhaust gasses, or steam from power plants that generate electricity, to provide heat to buildings or industrial processes. This results in more energy being used for work, but it doesn’t dramatically improve efficiency.

The mistake arises when people assign the same value to the heat extracted from exhaust gasses with the electricity produced by the power plant. The exhaust gasses have low heat (i.e., energy) content and therefore less value than the electricity (i.e., energy) produced by the power plant.

A good analogy is one suggested by the former editor of Power Magazine:

An automobile’s engine using gasoline has considerable horsepower and also heats water in the engine’s cooling system. The hot water is then used to heat passengers during the winter. While this takes advantage of the heat in the water, the water doesn’t have the power to drive the automobile. Gasoline has high energy density, while hot water has a low energy density.

Figure Depicting Heat Value and Uses

Obama’s CHP Push

The Obama administration promoted CHP with an executive order. The EPA, under the Obama administration, issued a 22 page report touting the benefits of CHP as a “clean energy solution”. It has also maintained a database (http://bit.ly/2jACeNT) to provide information supporting CHP. For example, CHP qualified for a 10% investment tax credit in 2016.

Historically, there has been a role for CHP in industrial complexes and refineries since the steam, or exhaust heat, could be used to heat buildings or be used in industrial processes. Europe has used exhaust steam to heat residential buildings. Consolidated Edison used CHP to heat buildings in New York City.

In cities, where buildings are closely packed, piping exhaust stem to these buildings can make sense. But trying to impose CHP in areas where there are no industrial uses, or where buildings are widely spaced, such as in typical American suburbs, is irrational.

(Suburbs with free-standing residential buildings are an anathema to city planners and to those promoting CO2 induced climate change, so CHP fits a strategy that promotes mixed use development.)

Europe’s energy efficiency directive (http://bit.ly/2jZQ0FL) requires member states to promote CHP and remove barriers to its deployment. In addition, European countries have used policy tools such as feed-in tariffs to support CHP.

Conclusion

Combined Heat and Power has become a political football in the service of government energy planning to cut CO2 emissions. CHP can be used effectively in specific applications where it can be justified economically, but it shouldn’t be forced on Americans by government edict.

Also see Donn Dears, “Bogus High Efficiency of Combined Heat and Power Plants” (June 22, 2012).

The post ‘Combined Heat and Power’ Distributed Generation: Beware of Government Mandates, Subsidies appeared first on Master Resource.

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March 12, 2017 at 06:03PM

Uncategorized 12 Mar 2017

British Foreign Aid Scandal: “Hundreds of Millions” Wasted on Useless Renewable Projects

via Watts Up With That?http://ift.tt/1Viafi3

Guest essay by Eric Worrall

The Telegraph, a major UK Newspaper, has investigated a scandalous waste of British taxpayer’s money on expensive renewables projects which deliver very little return for the money invested.

Hundreds of millions of British aid ‘wasted’ on overseas climate change projects

Robert Mendick, chief reporter
12 MARCH 2017 • 10:00PM

Serious questions are raised today over hundreds of millions of pounds of British taxpayers’ money being ‘wasted’ on climate change projects such as an Ethiopian wind farm and Kenyan solar power plant.

A Telegraph investigation shows little benefit so far from a £2 billion foreign aid programme to tackle climate change that was established eight years ago.

One scheme, costing £260m of UK taxpayers’ money, has produced only enough renewable electricity to power the equivalent of just 100 British households – about the size of a typical street.

Projects including solar parks in Kenya and Mali, a rubbish-burning power plant in the Maldives and wind farmer project in Ethiopia are all earmarked for funding from the scheme.

The Telegraph investigation raises major concerns over the use of international aid money to fund complex renewable energy schemes in some of the world’s poorest countries.

It will also reignite the row over the Government’s commitment, championed by David Cameron, to ring fence the £12 billion annual foreign aid budget, which is fixed at 0.7 per cent of national income.

Critics have accused the Government of “scandalously wasting” taxpayers’ money on the schemes.

…

The Government defended the funds’ performance.

A spokesman said: “The Climate Investment Fund is helping provide the world’s poorest people with stronger defences to extreme weather which can cause life-threatening crises such as floods, droughts and famine.

…

The experts who forgot that wind energy is intermittent

via Trust, yet verifyhttps://trustyetverify.wordpress.com

A final post in the energy fact check series from SER. Fact check number 4 is titled “Do wind mills run mostly on subsidies?“.

This is the reasoning why subsidies are necessary according to the fact check: since the cost of wind energy is somewhere between €0.074 to €0.098/kWh for onshore wind and €0.133 en €0.157/kWh for offshore wind and on the price on the energy market is around €0.04, therefor subsidies has to be provided to settle the difference.

I have no problem with that.

The fact check starts with the costs of wind energy: cost of the wind mills, installation and maintenance. That is rather brief, but luckily there was a source at the bottom of the page for more information. Unfortunately, no link to it, just a name of a report: Final advice base costs 2014 by ECN (Energy research Centre of the Netherlands). Fortunately that report (Dutch) was easily found on the internet. Strange, why was there no link provided for a source that is readily available online?

According to the report, the cost of wind energy consist of the turbines, installation costs, connection to the grid, maintenance and they even took losses into account, like wake effect, availability, electrical losses, performance (restriction related to its design) and environmental losses (wear & tear) and curtailment.

While there was an impressive list of things that were taken into account in the report, it is only part of the story. In fact, they look at wind energy as if it was a conventional energy source. In other words, they ignored an important characteristic of wind energy: intermittency.

Because of the intermittent character of wind energy, there will be some extra costs that are not accounted for in this calculation.

A first issue that the experts gloss over: because of this intermittency, backup is needed. There is no guarantee that the wind will blow when demand is high or that there will be less wind when demand is low. The morning peak and evening peak in working days in winter are crucial at our latitude. It is entirely possible that there is only little production by wind during these peak moments.

So no matter how many windmills (and even solar panels) are installed, conventional power plants and/or storage systems have to be able to provide the needed electricity in winter for almost 100%. This means that wind mills don’t replace conventional sources, they just add to it. Two systems have to be installed and maintained. That is an extra cost that is the result of the choice for wind energy, but not attributed to wind energy.

The conventional sources that are needed to obtain sufficient capacity during peak demand in winter, will be closed or run idle in summer. These will not economically viable, therefor additional support is needed. This is also a direct result of the characteristics of wind energy, yet no expert is attributing this cost to it.

Even more, the performance of these backup power plants is reduced when a conventional power plant adjusts its load to the intermittent output of the windmills, using more fuel than when they would run at optimal load. This additional inefficiency and corresponding fuel use are also the result of the use of intermittent power sources in a continuous working grid and are not attributed to these intermittent sources.

What about for example production at times it was not needed and other energy providers not be able to adjust to it, yet this output is being counted as useful produced electricity).

So here we have the “experts” in the field of wind energy and they don’t know about or glossed over an important characteristic of wind energy. By the way, they are not the only ones doing so.

Then further in the fact check, it is claimed that wind has social advantages. The example being given is that during production it emits no small particulate as does the burning of coal and this is not accounted for by coal.

Okay, I can perfectly understand that coal power plants emit small particulates and calculating this in the cost, it will make coal more expensive, making it more attractive for wind energy. But first, we are now comparing the advantages of wind energy with the disadvantages of conventional sources, more specifically coal. Second, these disadvantages could be removed. If particulates are the really the issue, I can’t imagine that these could not be filtered out somehow. Or other conventional sources with less/no emissions of particulates could be used (for example gas or nuclear).

The fact check continues by listing other advantages, like the advancing of technological development and innovation, creation of jobs and opportunities for regional development.

True, but that is again only one side of the story. Anyone of these could also be said of conventional sources. They can also advance technological development and innovation, create jobs and provide opportunities for regional development.

What I am missing in this fact check are the advantages of conventional power sources and the disadvantages of wind energy. What they explained is only half of the story. How could policy makers make informed decisions when they are presented with one side of the issue?

In such an unbalanced communication, wind energy appears a no-brainer. While in reality this conclusion could only be drawn because the experts omitted the disadvantages of wind energy and the advantages of conventional sources. The experts are obviously biased. Should’t they give a balanced view in stead of promoting one specific technology?

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March 12, 2017 at 11:31AM