Finding Land for US Wind Farms Might Be Easier Than We Thought (msn.com) 81
The Washington Post reports that wind turbines "only take up five percent of the land where they've been built, new research shows."
The rest of the space can be used for other purposes, such as agriculture, according to a study published recently in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Science and Technology. This means developers could fit turbines in places that are often perceived as unsuitable for a wind farm.
The new study highlights that turbines and existing human development, such as agriculture, cannot only share the same area, but also that building wind farms where there are already roads and other infrastructure could help reduce impacts on the land. "Clever siting, use of existing infrastructure, multiple use of landscapes — all these things ... can really contribute to solutions in areas where wind power is acceptable to the local people," said Sarah Jordaan, the study's principal investigator.
Historically, planning studies for wind farms have often assumed that turbines would disturb all the land at the site and leave the area unusable for anything else, said Jordaan, an associate professor in the department of civil engineering at McGill University. The study's findings provide a more accurate accounting of how much land is needed for wind farms, she added.
The new study highlights that turbines and existing human development, such as agriculture, cannot only share the same area, but also that building wind farms where there are already roads and other infrastructure could help reduce impacts on the land. "Clever siting, use of existing infrastructure, multiple use of landscapes — all these things ... can really contribute to solutions in areas where wind power is acceptable to the local people," said Sarah Jordaan, the study's principal investigator.
Historically, planning studies for wind farms have often assumed that turbines would disturb all the land at the site and leave the area unusable for anything else, said Jordaan, an associate professor in the department of civil engineering at McGill University. The study's findings provide a more accurate accounting of how much land is needed for wind farms, she added.
Title are you OK? (Score:2)
Re: Title are you OK? (Score:3)
It's in honor of Start Wars day.
As in, "Uthe the thoughth, Luke!"
Mayth the Fourthhh (Score:1)
Luke to "Father" Darth: "Thattth Impothibull!"
Re: Title are you OK? (Score:2)
Nobody miththpelled anything. It'th how everyone talkth, right?
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Nobody miththpelled anything. It'th how everyone talkth, right?
Well... at least one very recent former President. :-)
A bit late to party... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: A bit late to party... (Score:2)
Same in the USA. This article is raving about how wondrous the discovery was, that you can do exactly what you've been doing, for the last 20 years, right now....
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I suggest we put windmills in baseball stadium on the foul ball posts, they could be used to light the stadiums at night and maybe even cook some hot dogs.
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Nah. Put one right smack in the middle of the field and add a random blocking factor to a home run hit. Add a bit of interest to kind of a boring game.
I'm also in favor of installing some sort of motorized moving backboard to basketball hoops. If you can hit a moving target with that three pointer you actually deserve that extra point.
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I'm sure either the "NIMBY" or environmental group will block it no matter where "nothing" is.
No shit? (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean... isn't this massively astoundingly obvious? To anyone who's seen wind turbines ever?
They're basically a small pole with the interesting bit a very long way up in the air. You can put them on land and use the land. You can put them in the sea and let it be sea. Also the US has an abundance of land.
How on earth did anyone ever thing wind turbines might use up all the land in America?
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Well, you need around 10mx10m and a small access road. That's about it.
Apart from them all needing to be wired as well.
Re:No shit? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:No shit? (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean... isn't this massively astoundingly obvious? To anyone who's seen wind turbines ever?
Yes. You misunderstand the purpose of these studies. Studies like this exist so you can call out politicians who are pandering and ignoring the obvious.
It's like that time Brian Cox was on a panel on climate change with known political piece of shit liar in Australia - Malcolm Roberts, where the piece of shit said there's no evidence that climate change was real, to which Brian Cox replied: "I brought the graph" holding up an a4 print of the data, and sending the entire media into a frenzy about how the piece of shit got intellectually annihilated on a talk show.
Data matters, even when something is "obvious".
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"The government says that wind power takes up no land! Look at how big these things are!
These mills will blow the wheat away! 5%, that is half of your field! You could grow corn for biofuel instead. Not that I put that junk in my truck. No no no, I only use authentic dinosaur juice. Pro life!"
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It is a PMM. you can't just selectively switch off one law of physics with no knock on effects.
When you accept that kinetic energy (non relativistic) is a half mv^2 you will be able to understand why. While you substitute invective for physics, you will remain forever in the dark.
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And yet you literally claimed the opposite repeatedly. Simple, highschool physics, bro.
You have a mass of 1kg. A force of of 1N is applied for 1000 seconds. It's now moving at 1000 m/s. Kinetic energy is 500,000J.
See that up there? It doesn't care where the 1N comes from. That's all there is to it. 500,000J. That's it.
But no, you will instead yell, because hey if the physics and maths isn't in your favour, maybe you can shout it into submission!
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How on earth did anyone ever thing wind turbines might use up all the land in America?
All of the land is already claimed. Of course it will be difficult to start wind farms in such an environment. Many people do not want to sell or to have such things on their property.
MAGAs will rebel (Score:4, Interesting)
According to The Tinted One, windmills cause cancer, insomnia inducing hums, kill whales, reduce real-estate values*, and fly apart under heavy winds with the blades slicing shit up.
Some troll(s) posted bunches of fake videos showing windmills exploding under heavy wind, killing horses etc. The gullible fall for it because it fits their preconceived notions.
* Okay, maybe he has point there, but that's ALL he actually cares about because it affects him him and him.
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Plus rich people hate seeing them. Eww put those on the land where all the poors live!!! Not within sight of my beachfront property!
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Maybe such videos would persuade people who don't actually live in an area where wind turbines are built. But for those who leave near them, they see them every day and would know that the videos are silly.
My father, a Trump supporter, owns land in the Oklahoma panhandle that has a wind turbine on it. He's quite happy with the $8K per year the power company pays him for use of his land. He doesn't care that it's "green" energy, he just sees...greenbacks.
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The most common and most significant factor to be a Trump supporter is the ability to live happily with, indeed thrive off, contradictory positions. If you can't do that, then you get stuck when Trump changes his position, or when two parts of his world view collide with each other. Your father is emblematic of this. Frankly it's a repugnant trait, because it means that most Trump supporters will jettison any values they supposedly hold dear, and will do it with a light heart. They'll follow down into the m
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You forgot the one about how windmills might propel the earth away from it's orbit and cause it to collide with Mars or Jupiter.
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FYI: I'm MAGA.
1) I love wind turbines producing electricity
2) I love huge fields of solar panels producing electricity.
3) I love nuclear, geothermal, hydro, and pretty much anything else that produced electricity relatively cheaply and without dirtying everything up within a hundred miles. IOW, I don't much care for coal, although I wouldn't take a producing plant out of service unless we have more than enough alternate sources to prevent brownouts and blackouts.
MAGA is about returning to prosperity. M
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"I'm MAGA but my version of MAGA means ignoring all the stuff Trump says about race and a dozen other issues, and pretending instead that he has some interest in enabling American families to thrive on a single income, a subject on which he's said not a fucking word ever"
Didn't mommy teach you it's rude to talk with your mouth full, especially when it's an old man's cock in there?
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"I'm MAGA but my version of MAGA means ignoring all the stuff Trump says "
That's right. I ignore pretty much 100% of what he says unless it's a campaign promise. Those are golden, and he will bust his ass to try to keep them. But otherwise, I don't pay any attention to what he says. I only care about what he DOES, as in his policies that brought us ISIS defeated without spilling a drop of US soldier's blood, lowest unemployment in US history, low fuel prices, re-negotiating NAFTA into an agreement f
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...where "Great" is one person being able to provide for a family with one job and one paycheck, like back in the 1960's.
Left out the barefoot and pregnant, stay at home wife.
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"Left out the barefoot and pregnant, stay at home wife."
Absolutely did, because that's not MAGA. MAGA is strictly about prosperity.
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Is not that progressives broke the USA, it's that overseas competition made factory jobs pay much less. US workers have to move up the "skills ladder" to be competitive in the world. With enough education or training, yes, one person CAN support a house, 2 kids, and a car still.
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Is not that progressives broke the USA, it's that overseas competition made factory jobs pay much less. US workers have to move up the "skills ladder" to be competitive in the world. With enough education or training, yes, one person CAN support a house, 2 kids, and a car still.
Actually, its US income taxes sucking the profitability out of US businesses. Been doing it for decades. Researchers have determined that about 22% of the price of all US made goods, on average, are the result of the domestic manufacturer being taxed via the income taxes. If we could repeal those, and switch to the FairTax, a luxury tax on new items for sale at retail and services, we would almost certainly recapture our high-paying manufacturing jobs. More well-to-do citizens could even be expected
I just assume Big Oil will spend money to stopthis (Score:1)
Re: I just assume Big Oil will spend money to stop (Score:3)
Re: I just assume Big Oil will spend money to sto (Score:1)
I think this was over on Reddit. Person was concerned that a piece of property they were buying showed that there have been oil wells on it. Somebody explained to him that in Texas, there wasn't anywhere, that didn't have oil wells on it, at one time...
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>> covered with a grid of a zillion wells
I've seen that too, hundreds of square miles are stippled with wells. Most of the wind farms are in the panhandle though, because it is more windy and there is access to transmission lines that will carry the electricity to population centers.
"the industry will spend $3.4 billion this year on building 470 miles of new transmission lines and upgrading 808 existing miles, according to data from ERCOT. About $11.6 billion worth of transmission projects are in the
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If you think rural Texas is bad, you should look at the oil wells in Los Angeles. Many are disguised and hidden in decorative towers, but you can still see active pumpjacks all around town.
Los Angeles remains the largest urban oil field in the country. Thousands of active oil wells in the greater L.A. area are located amongst a dense population of more than 10 million people. http://www.stand.la/history-of... [stand.la]
Re:I just assume Big Oil will spend money to stopt (Score:4, Interesting)
Petroleum and wind do not compete. Wind power produces electricity. Petroleum produces transportation fuel, lubricants, plastics, and so much else. Sure, there's some petroleum used for electricity but that's tiny outside of Hawaii and Alaska.
The producers of natural gas just love wind power because nothing else can provide backup power to wind like natural gas. There's some exceptions to this, such as hydroelectric dams but there's not a lot of rivers worth damming any more since we've been building hydroelectric dams for something like 100 years now. There's websites built by natural gas producers to support wind power. They don't fear windmills taking their market, they have seen growth because of more windmills being installed.
I doubt that "Big Fossil" fears much of anything right now because with all kinds of trade being held up around the Red Sea and Black Sea from people shooting rockets and artillery, the Panama Canal seeing drought and/or mismanagement, and still a large need for liquid hydrocarbons for planes, trains, and ships, there's not likely to be any shortage of demand any time soon.
Coal might have problems but even they might find a savior in wind power, and solar power too. To refine aluminum, silicon, and likely other materials I'm not thinking up right now, they need coal as part of the process. We might not be using much coal for fuel in the near future but we are likely to still be using coal for all kinds of industry.
What might raise concern, though not exactly fear, is nuclear fission. I don't believe wind power has much to fear from nuclear power since wind power has all kinds of things going its way. Most any other energy source though could see adoption of nuclear fission as a concern.
Some wind turbine terms are arbitrary (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Some wind turbine terms are arbitrary (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I can see at least three non-exclusive paths forward:
- Your BIL says "don't let the door hit you on your way out" (probably what is happening now)
- Your BIL says "here's how much I'd typically make from farming that parcel. Either add that as an annual payment on top of the contract you're offering, or don't let the door hit you on your way out."
- The energy companies will figure out how to compromise once they run out of places to put new turbines, and dual-use becomes the norm.
Re:Some wind turbine terms are arbitrary (Score:5, Interesting)
Be sure to ask for a bond that covers removal and restoration when the equipment is no longer used. The door won't hit them because they will be running too fast.
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There is another option. He could go into the energy business and build his own turbines. Get a business loan to cover the start-up cost. Shouldn't be hard as the return is guaranteed as long as there are no legal issues feeding some megawatts into the grid.
Another option is crowd funding. We have had some of that in Europe, people all buy a small share in a turbine/wind farm and then get a return from it.
One of the great things about renewables is how they democratize energy production in this way. Even a
Personal safety (Score:1, Flamebait)
Would you want to do your work with a multi-ton moving piece of machinery overhead? Infinitesimal chance of being crushed is more than zero chance.
Also, it's much easier to cut hay (i've done this) or I presume work other crops in nice long lines rather than curving around structures. People without farm experiences could talk about riding mowers in the same context.
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I live under the flight path of an airport. Every 90 seconds a piece of multi-ton machinery flies overhead. When I was a small child I did have nightmares about planes falling on me. But as a grown man, no, it doesn't bother me.
I would recommend getting professional help.
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At worst a slide or a door might come off.
Hello from Iowa (Score:1)
In Iowa (part of the US) we're already doing that.
But this article if from the Washington Post. I'm sure they don't care about red states like mine. Do that mean it would be a huge innovation in blue states where farming barely exists?
Re:Hello from Iowa (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think this is a red state versus blue state issue - it's simply speaking to how planners have typically incorporated the land into their plans. I expect the planners have not spent much time in farm country. Or it may just stem from the fact that traditional electricity generation facilities typically does completely tie up the land where it is placed (think hydro dams, coal / nuclear / gas plants).
Washington is a blue state with a lot of farming (although the farming areas are certainly "red"). Whenever I drive through the areas with wind turbines, I see lots of cows grazing underneath - except where the undergrowth just scrub. And when I've attended talks about wind farming (I'm in a STEM department at a university), the ability to also use the land for other things is frequently mentioned as a strong selling point.
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I don't think this is a red state versus blue state issue
It's the Washington Post. We don't have to think. Their bias is strong and well-known.
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We don't have to think.
Well, I think we've identified part of the problem right there.
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We don't have to think.
Well, I think we've identified part of the problem right there.
If you identified anything other than WaPo,, try again.
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Clustering into the turbine shadow usually.
This is not new. same as mineral rights but up. (Score:5, Insightful)
This is where mineral rights came from. You can get a farmer to sell you the rights to the oil and let them still
use the land for cattle or farming. They also do the same thing with radio towers. Radio towers have guy
wires but still leave most of the land usable for farming. Air rights already exist to some extent as well.
Re: This is not new. same as mineral rights but u (Score:3)
I know it is a big deal for oil wells and underground mines caverns to not meet. Even a near miss can be disastrous.
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Wind energy rights are sold separately from mineral rights.
My father owns a piece of land in the Oklahoma panhandle. Years ago, his mineral rights earned him thousands of dollars a year for the oil that was pumped out of the ground. Then Next Era energy came along and paid him to build a wind turbine on the land. He now gets about $8K per year based on the amount of electricity produced by the wind turbine. He then sold the land to a farmer, but kept the mineral rights and the wind rights. Everybody was hap
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Even in states that don't have the concept of mineral or wind rights, it's easy enough for one party to lease
to the other two parties to achieve a similar triple use.
Some agriculture (Score:3)
You need access roads and (underground) power lines. That cuts the land up into smaller parcels that can't be plowed or harvested easily using large farm technology. Although I think a smart wind developer could probably work with a farmer to lay out pylons and roads.
Grazing cattle is reasonably compatible with such structures. I've seen a lot of cattle grazing in and around high voltage transmission line corridors. It shouldn't be too much trouble to teach the cows to duck every time a blade comes around.
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It's easy to teach cows to duck because they're chicken.
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Ours is already cut up into smaller pieces for the road running through long before wind turbines existed.
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It's a thing, farmers use land that has solar panels on it, to raise livestock or grow crops.
https://www.energy.gov/eere/so... [energy.gov].
Personally, I don't think wind turbines are ugly. They're certainly less ugly than the power poles and lines that crisscross the country!
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Coffee does well in the shade. There's also talk of putting solar panels over bodies of water, including the water canals in California to reduce evaporation.
Re: That id why wind is better than solar (Score:2)
How is this not obvious? (Score:2)
It's not the land, it's where the wind is (Score:2)
The the US sure (Score:5, Interesting)
In wind rich Alberta our incompetent nutjob of a Premier has decreed that you can't build a windfarm within 35 kilometres of pristine viewscapes [mylethbridgenow.com].
If you're wondering was a "pristine viewscape" is you're not alone [ctvnews.ca]. But I'm guessing the definition depends on whether you're buddies with the Premier or not.
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Try WILDLAND as a definition of "pristine viewscape". That is ... no people living there no buildings no dams no industry. People do visit ... take only memories, leave only footprints. What is your problem ? Are you a big-city swity swicker ? If your living place is a sewer-pipe then you can't be expected to appreciate a bubbling brook.
Give me a break, it's just a matter of time before this government starts trying to shove open pit coal mining down the public's throats.
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...have they ever stopped?
Can dead birds fertilize farmland? (Score:3)
nuts (Score:2)
Sounds nuts to me. Imagine trying to drive huge agricultural machines like reapers through a field where there is a wind turbine every 1000 feet in any direction.
LOL! Idiots! (Score:1)
I think the author has never seen videos of windmills catching fire and falling apart.
https://www.youtube.com/result... [youtube.com]