World's Largest Wind Farm Gets Green Light 388
cliffski writes "According to the BBC website the UK govt has just given the go ahead to two large offshore wind-farm projects.
Between them the schemes would produce enough renewable electricity to power about one million households.
The larger London Array project covers 144 sq miles (232 sq km) between Margate in Kent and Clacton, Essex and will be the world's biggest when it is completed. The £1.5bn scheme will have 341 turbines rising from the sea about 12 miles (20km) off the Kent and Essex coasts, as well as five offshore substations and four meteorological masts"
Re:144 mi^2 !=232 km^2 (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Such specific numbers, blah. (Score:4, Informative)
How about a MW output.
1.3GW according to the Register article.
Re:Such specific numbers, blah. (Score:3, Informative)
This should mean that the new media mesurement of 1Hp (House power) is equal to 1.33KW peak power....
Re:What about our fine feathered friends? (Score:5, Informative)
Mans activity contributes to a vast number of bird deaths every year:
In December of 2002, the report "Effects of Wind Turbines on Birds and Bats in Northeast Wisconsin" was released. The study was completed by Robert Howe and Amy Wolf of the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, and William Evans. Their study covered a two-year period between 1999 and 2001, in the area surrounding the 31 turbines operating in Kewaunee County by Madison Gas & Electric (MG&E) and Wisconsin Public Service (WPS) Corporation.
The report found that over the study period, 25 bird carcasses were found at the sites. The report states that "the resulting mortality rate of 1.29 birds/tower/year is close to the nationwide estimate of 2.19 birds/tower.16- The report further states, "While bird collisions do occur (with commercial wind turbines) the impacts on global populations appear to be relatively minor, especially in comparison with other human-related causes of mortality such as communications towers, collisions with buildings, and vehicles collisions."
Re:Such specific numbers, blah. (Score:5, Informative)
> be compared to other forms of electric generation.
According to the Register, it's 1.3GW
> Or is that one million homes in the middle of summer when
> whole power grids collapse from the strain?
You are confusing US power requirements with UK. Vast majority of UK homes don't have A/C so you don't see that massive summer energy consumption spike, in fact quite the reverse, with fewer houses needing heat and daylight from 6am-10pm (give or take) the electricity requirements in the UK typically drop during the summer.
Um. (Score:2, Informative)
Doh.
144 mi^2 != 103.5 mi^2 (Score:3, Informative)
The larger London Array project covers 90 sq miles (232 sq km) between Margate in Kent and Clacton, Essex.
The second wind farm, called the Thanet scheme, will cover 13.5 sq miles (35 sq km) off the north Kent coast.
I'd call it 103.5 sq miles (267 sq km).
Wind power NOT significantly harmful to birds (Score:3, Informative)
Rather birds tend to fly into ordinary power lines and die. Climate change and pollution are also big threats to birds as other wildlife too, and their effect is often global.
Furthermore, bird enthusiasts even in America are supporting wind power, here is a link to a statement from the Audubon Society:
http://personals.salon.com/blog/1976/post_32241.h
It's one of the perpetual myths against wind power that surface every time the public discusses about it, I was sure it'd pop up here on slashdot...
Now just waiting about the "will the turbines ever recoup their construction energy cost?" (They will in a few months.)
Re:The question nobody's asked. (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.eoearth.org/article/Energy_return_on_i
Re:The question nobody's asked. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:The question nobody's asked. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:What about our fine feathered friends? (Score:3, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power [wikipedia.org]
"An estimated 1% to 3% of energy from the Sun that hits the earth is converted into wind energy. This is about 50 to 100 times more energy than is converted into biomass by all the plants on Earth through photosynthesis." This gives you an idea of the scale.
Re:What about our fine feathered friends? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Such specific numbers, blah. (Score:1, Informative)
I presume you are being deliberately over the top!
You might want to have a look at some of the research done into straw bale construction, a traditional building form in Arizona. It has excellent thermal properties and can dramatically cut the requirement for a/c. (The downside is that it only really works for single storey buildings) Stone can also be very effective and many traditional houses in Southern France (where it also gets hot) can remain cool in summer without air conditioning. Add in other traditional measures such as shutters and awnings and more modern devices such as glass which rejects some of the light spectrum, smaller windows on the southern faces, and passive air conditioning and you can reduce electric a/c requirements quite considerably.
Some of these techniques are more expensive than the typical postwar US house construction which were used when energy was cheap, but as energy costs increase they will pay back the investment. The problem is that people don't want to pay the extra few percent on the home cost unless it is explained in detail. As you say - it can be an education problem.
Re:Such specific numbers, blah. (Score:4, Informative)