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First US Offshore Wind Power Park In Delaware
Posted by
kdawson
on Tue Jun 24, 2008 01:53 PM
from the doesn't-get-much-greener dept.
from the doesn't-get-much-greener dept.
Dekortage writes "Offshore wind power company Bluewater Wind has announced an agreement to build America's first offshore wind turbine park off the coast of Delaware. 'Each turbine [will sit on] a pole about 250 feet above the waterline... the units are to be constructed to withstand hurricane-force winds. From the shore, the park will be visible only on clear winter days, and the turbines will be nearly invisible during summer months when Rehoboth Beach fills with vacationers. Each blade on the three-blade rotor is to be 150 feet long.' The wind farm will power 50,000 homes in Delaware, using about half of its capacity."
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The conspiracy continues... (Score:5, Funny)
The wind farm will power 50,000 homes in Delaware
Lies. There are no homes in Delaware. Ask yourself, do you know anyone from Delaware?
I thought not.
Delaware is a plot between the banking industry and the DuPonts to get a few free Senators. Don't believe the lies.
Don't forget... (Score:5, Funny)
According to TFA there are also tourists.
But that only begs the question...who would go to Delaware for a vacation?
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Re:Don't forget... (Score:5, Funny)
That alone makes Delaware worth a vist, if only to check out the brewery and then drink oneself into oblivion... to avoid having to face the reality that you did, indeed, got to Delaware for a vacation.
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Re:Don't forget... (Score:5, Funny)
You all suck. I'm from Delaware and I'm the coolest guy you know.
I:
-have Real Genius AND Aliens memorized word for word ....and am alive to type about it.
-speak 23 languages, 3 of which are actually used on this planet
-actually have a job
-changed my underwear recently
-am voting for the Cylons this upcoming election
and
-fought Chuck Norris
Beat that.
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Easy.... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Don't forget... (Score:5, Funny)
But that only begs the question...who would go to Delaware for a vacation?
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Re:Don't forget... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: The DelMarVa coast - It's warm enough, breezy enough, and wet enough to approximate a beach in summer. With cheap oil, it's a cheap automotive vacation. It attracts everyone east of Appalachia, south of Pennsylvania, and north of Richmond. Somehow it never became an icon - but it is the most popular vacation destination for several million people.
The only inhabitants that aren't supported by the corporate technicalities or the vacation industry are farmers.
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Re:Don't forget... (Score:5, Funny)
> I was stationed at Dover AFB from 1971-1973 [...] I owned a motorcycle and a new 1869 Mustang.
After 102+ years, I don't think your horse was even alive, let alone "new".
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Re:Don't forget... (Score:5, Funny)
Never before or since I was there have I ever been so bored, and I owned a motorcycle and a new 1869 Mustang.
That's your problem ... the Mustangs were a lot more fun once they started making them out of metal and putting gasoline engines into them!
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Well, I've been to Delaware... (Score:3, Funny)
And I agree with everything you said.
Re:Well, I've been to Delaware... (Score:5, Informative)
Sorry for the hijack, but I'm going to attempt to insert some of the backstory here. See, I've lived in Delaware for the last 4 years (I'll gladly accept your pity)
Getting this deal done was a seemingly never ending political nightmare. Delmarva, the recently deregulated power company has fought against it tooth and nail. They seemed to have been under the impression that signing a 25 year power deal at a fixed price was a bad idea because you know, the price of oil might go down in the future...
Our governor was initially pushing a "clean coal" plant and against this deal. Blue Water Wind finally got the deal done due, in a large part, to netroots action pressuring the state legislature to force a deal down Delmarva's throat if they didn't start to negotiate in good faith. Delaware doesn't have ANY power generation, and buys all of it's power from other states. Delmarva wanted to continue to do this in spite of the rediculous congestion on our power infrastructure.
Tommywonk [blogspot.com] has been doing a fantastic job covering this issue, and if anyone wants anymore information I'd suggest they head there. (Surprisingly he doesn't have an update about the deal being inked yet)
Anyway, a warning to green power advocates, if this case is any indication, expect the entrenched interests to fight you every step of the way.
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Re:The conspiracy continues... (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:The conspiracy continues... (Score:5, Funny)
Haha, that just goes to show that Americans get an unfairly bad rap for being bad at geography. It turns out you Canadians know far less about American geography than we know about everyone else's geography!
Man, what a bunch of losers. I'm so going to mock you losers when I travel up to the oceanfront property I just bought in Alberta. I'm pretty sure my property is close to your national capital in Toronto too, so maybe I'll just have to go complain to your President about all the jokes. You'll be sorry you ever made fun of us!
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Re:The conspiracy continues... (Score:4, Funny)
Everyone knows the main purpose of Delaware is actually to mark the credit card junk mail you can throw out without looking at it.
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Re:The conspiracy continues... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:The conspiracy continues... (Score:5, Funny)
It's worse than that.
I had a bartender in Olean, New York confiscate my driver's license because, and I quote, "This is a fake, there is no such state as Delaware".
I went over the bar to get it back, the cops got called, it was getting pretty ugly until the cop got there (the cop told the bartender he was a retard).
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Ocean view (Score:5, Interesting)
My family usually makes a trip every year to Bethany Beach, which is just a bit south of Rehoboth Beach. While I understand that it's better for most tourists if the turbines are not visible, it'd be cool if we could make it into a real-life science "field trip" for the kids sometime in the future.
Are there any plans for something like a small boat trip to see them up close? Maybe they could build a museum?
Re:Ocean view (Score:5, Interesting)
If you ever have the chance, go to Tarifa, Spain. It's one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.
The beaches are nice and wide with fine sand. It makes for a perfect place to ride wind powered boards and of course kite surfing in the ocean.
All of this wind also makes for the perfect location for windfarms. The area around Tarifa is spotted with the turbines. Honestly that was my favorite view was to stand on the beach and watch all of turbines happily spinning up on the mountains producing nice clean energy.
If I had faster internet I'd find you some links for pics.
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Re:Ocean view (Score:5, Insightful)
That's just stupid. They're _windmills_. It would be a massive waste of money to guard them in particular over and above normal coast guard duties. The effort required to inflict any damage of real consequence is massively prohibitive. And trust me, industrial espionage? Not a problem here.
Yep, they're novel to see if you haven't before. But they're truly just really big steel towers with 3 giant blades at the top. They're building lots in Ontario these days, and there is nothing keeping anybody from getting reasonably close to them whatsoever...there's no point.
I do find it weird that they'd be building these out in the Ocean so that people can't see them. They're not unsightly, and the increased initial cost and access costs for maintenance seems counter productive. Ah well. It's a step in the right direction anyways.
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Re:Ocean view (Score:4, Insightful)
People keep saying this, but I have to ask: how close do you have to stand to hear a modern wind turbine? Because I've stood at the fence of the Palm Springs wind farm (because my girlfriend insisted on taking photos of "the pretty windmills", so much for them being an eyesore too) and I couldn't hear a thing. And I wouldn't expect to hear much either, since they rotate about once every 3 seconds and have 3 blades. I don't hear very well in th 1Hz range.
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Re:Ocean view (Score:5, Informative)
A lot of wealthy and powerful people have bought homes in places that look out over the ocean, and they want to see the ocean, not a bunch of wind turbines or oil rigs or boat people. These people will say anything do stop the project, so if the area gets money from tourism, they say that tourists will stop coming. I agree with you, I don't see anything wrong with it. While I like looking at mountains or the ocean, if I was going to buy a home because of the view it would be a view of the Chicago skyline.
Also, the web site and the submission didn't mention why it would only be visible in winter. I thought that it would be visible in summer and not the winter, if anything. Does anybody understand why?
In the summer the humidity is higher and the air holds more water which reduces visibility. In the winter there is less humidity and visibility improves. It isn't stated in the summary, but it is implied that they are referring to clear, sunny days (which probably occur less often during the winter, but do still occur occasionally).
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Cool; Now to expand to the great lakes (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Cool; Now to expand to the great lakes (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Cool; Now to expand to the great lakes (Score:5, Informative)
Better visibility in the winter. All the water vapor freezes out of the air, basically.
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Re:Cool; Now to expand to the great lakes (Score:5, Informative)
The winds are much, much, much, much more constant and also stronger off shore than on.
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Re:Cool; Now to expand to the great lakes (Score:5, Informative)
I can't imagine that they're going to build wind turbines that can rotate into the wind. A vertical axis wind turbine wouldn't have that problem.
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Re:Cool; Now to expand to the great lakes (Score:5, Informative)
There is a motorized & computer-controlled 360 Degree bearing surface where the generator housing nacelle attaches to the vertical supporting column. The computers on-board each generator keep their own weather sensors for wind speed and direction as well as for power demands of the cluster of wind generators and they calculate how best to pitch their blades and what direction to point or if they need to feather their pitch because of an incoming storm, etc...
General Electric has a detailed drawing of one of their models here: http://www.gepower.com/prod_serv/products/wind_turbines/en/36mw/index.htm [gepower.com]
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Ah, good. (Score:4, Insightful)
I was afraid that the US would be losing out on the fundamentals of actually deploying such alternative energy setups. While I don't suspect wind power will be the answer to anything much more than maybe 5% of the world's power needs, we WILL need the engineering and technical know-how. Either we can get in on this stuff early and have our people (And by our people I am well aware some may be from other countries, bust most will stay in the US) gain the expertise and be home-grown, and thus, ultimately contribute to our society, culture or economy, or we would have to rely on experts from other countries almost exclusively, and end up being at the mercy of foreign nationals.
This would be an ideal opportunity to track the total cost of installation and management vs. the total cost for an equivalent 'traditional' power plant.
Feasible? (Score:4, Interesting)
Technical Details (Score:5, Informative)
Technical data here [udel.edu]...
Bluewater Wind agrees to build a 150 turbine, 450MW wind project 12-13 miles off of Rehoboth Beach. Delmarva Power agrees to buy up to 300MW at any one time. The cost to Delmarva ratepayers for energy and capacity will be 10.56 cents/kWh in 2007 dollars. Delmarva is also purchasing Renewable Energy Credits (RECs) associated with its energy purchases.
So evidently these are 150 x 3MW turbines. Generally turbines of this class have a blade space diameter of 100m.
It is interesting to note that while Delaware has no nuclear reactors, it is across the river from the Salem [nrc.gov] dual 1.1 MWe PWRs and the co-located Hope Creek [nrc.gov] 1.0 MWe BWR in New Jersey, for a total of 3.2 MWe of nuclear in the neighborhood.
The two big questions.... (Score:5, Interesting)
They're not answered anywhere on the company's website or in the article...
The answers to these questions are important when determining whether this project is worthy of support or not:
Who is paying to build the windfarm?
Who gets to keep the profit from the windfarm?
For the windfarm they wanted to build around here, the answers were "me" (through tax dollars), and "not me" (as in some private corporation got to keep the profit, even though they didn't pay for the initial investment). Luckily a sufficient number of people were able to see that they were getting screwed through the veil of "environmental responsibility" in order to get the project canceled.
Re:The two big questions.... (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:The two big questions.... (Score:5, Insightful)
"By your logic, we shouldn't get tax cuts for hybrid cars, or tax cuts and government rebates on solar cells in our homes, because in the end our tax dollars are paying for it..."
Don't know about the OP's logic, but by my logic you are absolutely correct. Why should you get to hold a fricken gun to my head (courtesy of the IRS) to pay for your Prius? If you want to buyt a Prius, or install solar cells on your roof, fine - and more power to you. But when you use the government to steal money from others to pay for it, well it is time for you to STFU and pay for the real costs of your toys.
You know the way everyone is supposed to pay for the real costs of using oil etc. - or does such blatant hypocrisy just not register?
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Re:The two big questions.... (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason to offer rebates to prius buyers is simple. The market doesn't charge other car buyers for the pollution and other real or perceived negative effects of their choice vehicle. These negative effects are shared amongst the populace at large; the costs savings and benefits of a more polluting vehicle are enjoyed by one person alone yet everybody ends up somewhat worse off (by living with poorer air quality etc). So the government is taking a look at prius buyers and saying "Hey, your vehicle choice doesn't result is as many negatives so here is a credit."
Without such credits and rebates their would be no financial incentive not to pollute and generally create a mess of the environment as the market is unable to capture and charge you for these costs.
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Not secure against NIMBY attacks! (Score:4, Funny)
This was a huge political battle... (Score:5, Informative)
I actually live in Delaware, and for those fools who aren't in the know, Delaware has some of the lowest property taxes in the area, good rail transit, and good gun laws.
Now, the windmill battle in Delaware was an EPIC battle. On one side, you had the utility that wanted to build a gas turbine, and on the other side, you had the windmill people.
The backdrop is that the utility already doubled rates because of rising fuel prices, and the state was already importing a great deal of energy at spot (read high) prices. To work around this, the state needed its own generation.
Now, the utility wanted to build a new gas turbine facility, because the capital costs were pretty cheap and they had enterprise experience with both operating and constructing them. The windmill people wanted a windmill farm, and, they probably would have lost on merits of costs, because the windmills are nearly twice as expensive as a cheap gas turbine station. However, I think what's happened is that, between everyone being so spooked by the perpetually rising fuel costs, and, a newly enacted state sustainability law, they more or less had to build the wind mill.
It will be cool if it works, but I'm cynically betting on rolling blackouts on calm, hot summer days.
Re:This was a huge political battle... (Score:5, Informative)
i'll take your bet.
Electricity is a grid of multiple sources, kept in tight balance at several geographic levels. The output of all of them fluctuate constantly, as does use.
When there's not enough wind, it'll come from somewhere else. The concept is to build a diverse portfolio of sources so that we're not as affected by situations in any one.
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Re:This was a huge political battle... (Score:5, Informative)
That is sort of odd, considering that gas turbines and wind power fill two separate niches.
Wind power provides good support to base-load power, while gas turbines can fill demands during "peak" periods.
Also, there are fairly extensive atmospheric/climatic studies performed before sites are selected for wind farms. Given the height of the turbines, it's probably a pretty safe bet that there'll be some wind virtually all the time.
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They changed the state motto (Score:4, Funny)
From "Small Wonder" to "Don't Blink". But for the hundreds of State Troopers on I-95 making up the State's entire budget, you could drive through Delaware in about 6 minutes.
Politics of Wind Power (Score:5, Insightful)
USA needs to be going full bore with wind power. So what if it only contributes a fraction of the power we need. Any additional source of power is good and worth it if the energy return is positive. Off-shore wind power strikes me as a great alternative to the concerns regarding land-based wind power. Concerns such as overcoming NIMBY resistance, ugly-ling up the landscape, discouraging tourism, etc.
So, what's the deal with the politiking? When you face a problem, you attack that problem on all flanks, which for this problem means investing in all forms of safe, eco-friendly energy. Sometimes that means legislating enticing incentives and direct funding by the government for solutions which cannot immediately generate profits, but would over time if initially invested.
F the politics.
Obligatory wind map... (Score:5, Informative)
It's interesting to note that most of the wind maps agree that offshore is the best place to stick a wind turbine. If you've ever stood by the ocean, there's always a stiff sea breeze coming from the ocean onto the land.
Re:1.6 billion for 50,000 homes? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:1.6 billion for 50,000 homes? (Score:5, Insightful)
You have an excellent point...
However, electricity has tripled in the last 20 years from 5.3 to 16~ish cents. Assuming in the next 20 years, it does the same... then 1,280 would be roughly $430 adjusted for inflation- which will be a huge bargain.
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Re:1.6 billion for 50,000 homes? (Score:5, Informative)
Furthermore, this is only half the capacity. In theory they can sell their surplus to other utility companies.
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Re:1.6 billion for 50,000 homes? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Dela-Where?? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Why make them hard to see? (Score:5, Insightful)
For some reason people like to endlessly bitch that windmills are "eyesores", as if this in and of itself is reason not to use them. They don't look unsightly to me.
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Re:Here it comes... (Score:4, Insightful)
The wind farm will be several miles out from the beach, so on a non-hazy day you will be able to make out a few toothpicks sticking up out of the water. Big deal, there are more ugly planes (with annoying banners!) and boats that go by all the time that look much bigger.
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Re:Environmental Impact (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Nuclear power? (Score:5, Interesting)
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