The Wind Scam in Germany, (and elsewhere), Keeps on Getting Worse….

August 15, 2015 / 1957chev / 1 Comment

Germany’s Wind Power Surges Plunge Their Neighbours Into Darkness

August 15, 2015 by stopthesethings

****

The economics of Germany’s “Energiewende” are so bizarre, that you’d think it had been put together by the GDR’s ‘brains trust’, before the Berlin Wall took its tumble in 1989.

In Germany, around €100 billion has already been burnt on renewable subsidies; currently the green energy levy costs €56 million every day. And, the level of subsidy for wind and solar sees Germans paying €20 billion a year for power that gets sold on the power exchange for around €2 billion.

Squandering €18 billion a year on power – which Germans have in abundance from meaningful sources – has them asking the fair and reasonable question: just how much power are they getting for the €billions that they’ve thrown – and continue to throw at wind and solar?

The answer is: NOT MUCH: Germans Spend 100s of €Billions on their “Energiewende” & Get Only 3% of their Power in Return

But that’s merely to focus on the insane cost to German power consumers and taxpayers – and the meagre returns for their hundreds of €billions in subsidies – of what can only be described as an energy market fiasco.

At a more practical – and to power punters more significant – level chaotic unpredictable surges in wind power output have brought the German grid to the brink of collapse:

Germany’s Wind Power Debacle Escalates: Nation’s Grid on the Brink of Collapse

Unable to build any further transmission capacity of its own – principally because Germans are fed up with having their bucolic homeland turned into an industrial wasteland – not to mention the colossal and wholly unnecessary cost of building a duplicated network simply to take occasional bursts of wind power output – Germany is dumping power into its neighbours’ grids.

The result is that their Czech, Polish, Dutch, Belgian and French neighbours’ grids are being swamped with excess power – whenever the wind picks up in Germany’s North – resulting in grid instability and blackouts.

Germany has – from time to time – been a somewhat boisterous neighbour. With Germany dumping excess wind power on an unscheduled basis – into grids which are simply not designed to take rapid increases in volume – neighbours are fuming again about German arrogance and the cost of accommodating it.

Here’s a couple of takes on yet another aspect of Germany’s wind power disaster.

Germany’s Neighbors Rankled by Its Energiewende
The American Interest
4 August 2015

The German energy mix has been radically changed in recent years, predominantly driven by two forces: a desire to expand renewables’ market share (a task accomplished by generous state subsidies called feed-in tariffs), and an aversion to nuclear power following the 2011 Fukushima disaster. Within Germany these changes have had a number of perhaps unforeseen and certainly unfortunate consequences, including jacked-up power bills for businesses and households and, somewhat bizarrely, an increased reliance on the particularly dirty type of coal called lignite. But the ripple effects of Berlin’s energiewende are expanding past national boundaries, and, as Politico reports, Germany’s neighbors are finding their own grids strained by intermittent solar and wind production:

The country’s move away from nuclear power and increase in production of wind or solar energy has pushed it to the point where its existing power grids can’t always cope. And it’s the Czech Republic, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium and France that have taken the brunt.

“If there is a strong blow of the wind in the North, we get it, we have the blackout,” Martin Povejšil, the Permanent Representative of the Czech Republic to the EU said at a briefing in Brussels recently.

Germany has failed to beef up its energy transmission infrastructure at the same pace as its burgeoning solar and wind industries, that is, and on especially sunny and windy days it relies on the hospitality of its neighbors to distribute those supplies. Poland and the Czech Republic have been forced to pony up $180 million “to protect their systems from German power surges”, while within Germany itself NIMBY-ism is preventing the construction of some key transmission lines.

When examining the costs of boosting renewables, it’s a big mistake to leave out the expense of building out the grids needed to handle production. Germany seems to have made just that error with its energiewende, and central Europe is struggling to cope.
The American Interest

German winds make Central Europe shiver: Junking nuclear power is creating problems for Germany’s neighbors.
Politico
Kalina Oroschakoff
3 August 2015

Germany’s shift to renewable energy has been hailed as an historic policy move — but its neighbors don’t like it.

Germany’s north-south power lines have too limited a capacity to carry all the power that is produced from wind turbines along the North Sea to industrial states like Bavaria or Baden-Württemberg and onto Austria. That means the extra electricity is shunted through the Czech Republic and Poland.

To put an end to the often unexpected power flows from Germany — so-called loop flows — the countries are taking the matter into their own hands. Concerned about the stability of their own grids, additional costs and the ability to export their own power, the Czechs, for example, are installing devices to block the power from 2016 onwards.

Poland is also working on the devices, known as phase shifters, and expects to have some operating this year. To the west, the Netherlands, Belgium and France have also installed phase shifters to deal with the flows.

These separate moves come as Brussels pushes for integration of Europe’s energy markets. The struggle shows how the drive toward more renewables, combined with outdated infrastructure and inconsistent cooperation within the EU, is having unintended consequences.

“In the past, with coal and nuclear power plants, the power system was extremely predictable. Now, with ever more renewable energy coming online, the system isn’t as predictable anymore, which can cause challenges also for the single market debate,” said Joanna Maćkowiak Pandera, a senior associate with German think tank Agora Energiewende.

“We have been telling that to the Germans, ‘Increase your transmission system, or we will shut you off’,” an EU diplomat said at a briefing in Brussels recently.

Power loop flows occur when a country’s power grid infrastructure isn’t sufficient to handle new production, so the electricity is automatically diverted through neighboring countries on its way to its destination in the producing country.

“This also leads to congestion in neighboring systems,” said Georg Zachmann of the Brussels-based Bruegel think tank, adding that to deal with the situation countries can also reduce their own electricity exports to South Germany to make space for the German power. That, however, means that Germany’s energy transition is affecting the export potential of countries like the Czech Republic and France.

Pressure is building on Germany to expand its north-south connection. But the idea has aroused local opposition in Bavaria, with residents unwilling to see their picturesque countryside spoiled by unsightly transmission towers.

“If we want to have a growing share of renewables, we must build the grids,” Walter Boltz, vice chair of the regulators board of the EU’s Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators (ACER), told POLITICO.

The simplest solution, he said, would be for Germany to build up the necessary links. But that will take time. Alternatively, Germany could simply shut down wind power on highly productive days. But the country’s current policy stands in the way.

“It’s an uncomfortable problem and has to do with Germany’s irrational priority dispatch policy under which you cannot shut down renewables,” Boltz said.

Germany’s neighbors aren’t immune from criticism on the issue.

Poland, for instance, could also consume the power it imports from Germany, something it resists to shield its own industry, Boltz said. Further, Poland’s grids needed expansion, he said.

More cooperation

Germany, for its part, has stepped up cooperation with its neighbors to remedy the issue.

Energy Secretary Rainer Baake recently addressed criticism that Germany’s energy transition was an unilateral policy move, Germanmedia reported, saying, “People in this country and also outside of Germany who believe this must be some kind of act of re-nationalization of energy policy […] could not be more wrong.”

In 2014, German transmission operators agreed with the Czechs to regulate cross-border power flows to protect the Czech grid from overloading and reduce the danger of blackouts. A similar agreement was struck between the Polish and German sides.

On a political level in June, Germany signed a pact with 11 “electrical” neighbors, including France, Poland and the Czech Republic, to promote the integration of the respective power markets, counter overcapacity and let the market determine power prices.

Still, Poland’s regulator last year sent a letter to the ACER, asking it to come forward with an opinion on the loop flows from Germany. The response is expected in September.

In 2013, the agency issued an opinion on unscheduled loop flows, concluding that “in most cases these flows are a threat to a secure and efficient functioning of the Internal Electricity Market.”

Energy mix is a national policy

The situation is delicate for the Czech Republic and Poland, which have long insisted that choosing whether power should be generated by solar, wind, coal, nuclear or other ways remains a national issue, not one for Brussels.

So Germany is free to make decisions about how to generate electricity, in this case to shut down its nuclear plants.

Brussels has stepped up efforts to connect the bloc’s energy markets, with the European Commission in a policy paper in February stressing “the interconnection of the electricity markets must be a political priority.”

The Commission released an initial plan in mid-July about how to build a borderless power market that can deal with the rise in renewables. Draft legislation is expected in 2016.

“We haven’t developed the grids,” the EU bloc’s energy chief Miguel Arias Cañete told POLITICO last month, adding that while there has been a lot of investment in renewables, grids aren’t up to standard. That’s also why Brussels is keen on increasing cross-border power interconnections.

It’s making political and financial efforts to finally link up at least 10 percent of the EU’s installed electricity production capacity by 2020.

But it’s a long slog to connect the bloc: EU countries had originally pledged that target in 2002.
Politico

The Wind Scam Proves to be a Huge Waste of Money!

August 13, 2015 / 1957chev / Leave a comment

Germans Spend 100s of €Billions on their “Energiewende” & Get Only 3% of their Power in Return

August 13, 2015 by stopthesethings Leave a Comment

The Germans are rueing the day the bought into the great wind power fraud.

The Germans went into wind power harder and faster than anyone else – and the cost of doing so is catching up with a vengeance. The subsidies have been colossal, the impacts on the electricity market chaotic and – contrary to the environmental purpose of the policy – CO2 emissions are rising fast: if “saving” the planet is – as we are repeatedly told – all about reducing man-made emissions of an odourless, colourless, naturally occurring trace gas, essential for all life on earth – then German energy/environmental policy has manifestly failed (see our post here).

Some 800,000 German homes have been disconnected from the grid – victims of what is euphemistically called “fuel poverty”. In response, Germans have picked up their axes and have headed to their forests in order to improve their sense of energy security – although foresters apparently take the view that this self-help measure is nothing more than blatant timber theft (see our post here).

German manufacturers – and other energy intensive industries – faced with escalating power bills are packing up and heading to the USA – where power prices are 1/3 of Germany’s (see our posts here and hereand here). And the “green” dream of creating thousands of jobs in the wind industry has turned out to be just that: a dream (see our post here).

The ‘gloss’ has well and truly worn off Germany’s wind power ‘Supermodel’ status – as communities fight back against having thousands of these things speared into their backyards – and for all the same reasons communities are fighting back all over the world; those with a head for numbers have called the fraud for what it is; and medicos have called for a complete moratorium on the construction of new wind farms in an effort to protect their patients and quarantine their professional liability:

Germany’s Wind Power ‘Dream’ Becomes a Living Nightmare

German Medicos Demand Moratorium on New Wind Farms

And, on a practical level, those in charge of Germany’s power grid have stepped up calls for an end to the lunacy of trying to absorb a wholly weather dependent generation source into what was never designed to deal with the chaos presented on a daily basis:

Germany’s Wind Power Debacle Escalates: Nation’s Grid on the Brink of Collapse

And the economics are so bizarre, that you’d think its “Energiewende” policy had been put together by the GDR’s ‘brains trust’, before the Berlin Wall took its tumble in 1989.

Squandering €18 billion on power – which Germans have in abundance from meaningful sources – has them asking the fair and reasonable question: just how much power are they getting for the €billions that they’ve thrown – and continue to throw at wind and solar?

The answer is: NOT MUCH.

Germany gets only 3.3% of its energy consumption from wind and solar. Ignore the headlines
Carbon Counter
Robert Wilson
31 July 2015

“Give a man a reputation as an early riser and he can sleep til noon” – Mark Twain.

There is apparently no greater leader on climate change than Germany. Here is some evidence. This country will build almost 11 GW of new coal power plants this decade, and is in the process of licensing new lignite coal mines. It prematurely shut down 8 zero-carbon nuclear power plants in 2011, closed another one this year, and will prematurely close all remaining nuclear power plants by 2022. Germans have reassured themselves by turning from the disturbing vision of the split atom to the nostalgia of coal fires.

But where does Germany’s climate change reputation come from? It certainly does not come from achievements in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This decade Germany’s emissions have been essentially flat, and Germany is on course to come a long way short of meeting its 2020 national targets for emissions reductions.

This planet saving reputation instead comes from what Germany has supposedly achieved with renewables. The German renewables revolution is apparently in full gear. If you want to understand what is happening in the world it is better to ignore adjectives and instead count.

Counting is instructive about the realities of renewables in Germany. According to the most recent data, Germany got only 3.3% of its final energy consumption from wind and solar installation (Eurostat data for 2013 available here and here).

Does that sound like a revolution? Obviously not.

The 3.3% figure above tells us that renewables are in fact marginal to Germany’s energy system. So where does this idea that there is a renewables revolution in Germany come from?

The answer is easy to find by googling and searching social media. This will immediately lead you to the following type of headline:

Germany Just Got 78 Percent Of Its Electricity From Renewable Sources

Another popular variant are headlines about German solar output exceeding 50% of electricity demand. The obvious problem with these headlines is that many people come to the mistaken conclusion that these record highs are somehow representative of what goes on the rest of the time. They are not.

Let’s quantify this. The record high renewables output (which included biomass and hydro, a fact rarely pointed out) occurred on the 25th July. Total wind and solar output was around about 39 GW according toFraunhofer ISE data.

How often does this happen? This is relatively easy to find out. All we need to do is add up all hourly wind and solar output and see how it is distributed throughout the year.

I have done this in the graph below. Hourly output was rounded to the nearest gigawatt. I have then added up the number of hours when total wind and solar output fell under each GW bracket. Each bracket covers the average output over an individual hour, in GW.

In total we have about 40 brackets, starting at 0 GW. Yes, German wind and solar falls to zero gigawatts, rounded to the nearest gigawatt. Resist that temptation to write “German wind and solar now meeting 0.1% of Germany energy needs” headlines.

Mean hourly output of German wind and solar was 9.6 GW in 2014, while the median output was 8 GW. The maximum output was almost 39 GW; four times greater than the average, no matter how you define the average.

Furthermore, total wind and solar output was above 30 GW only 2.1% of the time. It was above 25 GW only 9.6% of the time.

The heavily skewed distribution shown above has clearly lead to heavily skewed perceptions about German renewables.

So each time you see headlines about record high renewables output remember this: average output of combined German wind and solar is roughly one quarter of these record highs, and German wind and solar is still just over 3% of final energy consumption in Germany.
Carbon Counter

Aussies Fighting Back Against the Irresponsible Wind Industry!

August 12, 2015 / 1957chev / Leave a comment

An extract from the Senate Select Committee on Wind Turbines Final Report

Posted on 3:21 pm, August 7, 2015 by Sinclair Davidson

Professor Chapman and his critics

2.19 Professor Simon Chapman AO, Professor of Public Health at the University of Sydney, has been an outspoken critic of those who suffer ill-effects from wind turbines. In both his written and oral submissions, Professor Chapman cited many of his own publications in support for his view that:

…the phenomenon of people claiming to be adversely affected by exposure to wind turbines is best understood as a communicated disease that exhibits many signs of the classic psychosocial and nocebo phenomenon where negative expectations can translate into symptoms of tension and anxiety.

2.20 Several highly qualified and very experienced professionals have challenged this argument. Dr Malcolm Swinbanks, an acoustical engineer based in the United Kingdom, reasoned:

The argument that adverse health reactions are the result of nocebo effects, ie a directly anticipated adverse reaction, completely fails to consider the many cases where communities have initially welcomed the introduction of wind turbines, believing them to represent a clean, benign form of low-cost energy generation. It is only after the wind-turbines are commissioned, that residents start to experience directly the adverse nature of the health problems that they can induce.

2.21 The committee highlights the fact that Professor Chapman is not a qualified, registered nor experienced medical practitioner, psychiatrist, psychologist, acoustician, audiologist, physicist or engineer. Accordingly:

he has not medically assessed a single person suffering adverse health impacts from wind turbines;
his research work has been mainly—and perhaps solely—from an academic perspective without field studies;
his views have been heavily criticised by several independent medical and acoustic experts in the international community; and
many of his assertions do not withstand fact check analyses.

2.22 Professor Chapman has made several claims which are contrary to the evidence gathered by this committee. First, he argues that the majority of Australia’s wind turbines have never received a single complaint. There are various problems with this statement:

wind turbines located significant distances from residents will not generate complaints;
many residents suffering adverse health effects were not aware of any nexus between their health and the impact of wind turbines in order to make a complaint;
just because residents do not lodge a formal complaint does not mean they are not suffering adverse health effects;
data obtained by Professor Chapman from wind farm operators of the numbers of complaints lodged cannot be relied upon; and
the use of non-disclosure clauses and ‘good neighbour agreements’ legally restricts people from making adverse public statements or complaints.

2.23 Second, Professor Chapman has argued that complaints of adverse health effects from wind turbines tend to be limited to Anglophone nations. However, the committee has received written and oral evidence from several sources directly contradicting this view. The German Medical Assembly recently submitted a motion to the executive board of the German Medical Association calling for the German government to provide the necessary funding to research adverse health effects. This would not have happened in the absence of community concern. Moreover, Dr Bruce Rapley has argued that in terms of the limited number—and concentrated nature—of wind farm complaints:

It is the reporting which is largely at fault. The fact is that people are affected by this, and the numbers are in the thousands. I only have to look at the emails that cross my desk from all over the world. I get bombarded from the UK, Ireland, France, Canada, the United States, Australia, Germany. There are tonnes of these things out there but, because the system does not understand the problem, nor does it have a strategy, many of those complaints go unlisted.

2.24 Third, Professor Chapman has queried that if turbines are said to have acute, immediate effects on some people, why were there no such reports until recent years given that wind turbines have operated in different parts of the world for over 25 years. Several submissions to the committee have stated that adverse health effects from wind turbines do not necessarily have an acute immediate effect and can take time to manifest.

2.25 Fourth, Professor Chapman contests that people report symptoms from even micro-turbines. The committee heard evidence that once people are sensitised to low frequency infrasound, they can be affected by a range of noise sources, including large fans used in underground coal mines, coal fired power stations, gas fired power stations and even small wind turbines. As acoustician Dr Bob Thorne told the committee:

Low-frequency noise from large fans is a well-known and well-published issue, and wind turbines are simply large fans on top of a big pole; no more, no less. They have the same sort of physical characteristics; it is just that they have some fairly unique characteristics as well. But annoyance from low-frequency sound especially is very well known.

2.26 Fifth, Professor Chapman contends that there are apparently only two known examples anywhere in the world of wind turbine hosts complaining about the turbines on their land. However, there have been several Australian wind turbine hosts who have made submissions to this inquiry complaining of adverse health effects. Paragraphs 2.11–2.12 (above) noted the example of Mr Clive Gare and his wife from Jamestown. Submitters have also directed attention to the international experience. In Texas in 2014, twenty-three hosts sued two wind farm companies despite the fact that they stood to gain more than $50 million between them in revenue. The committee also makes the point that contractual non-disclosure clauses and ‘good neighbour’ agreements have significantly limited hosts from speaking out. This was a prominent theme of many submissions.

2.27 Sixth, Professor Chapman claims that there has been no case series or even single case studies of so-called wind turbine syndrome published in any reputable medical journal. But Professor Chapman does not define ‘reputable medical journal’ nor does he explain why the category of journals is limited to medical (as distinct, for example, from scientific or acoustic). The committee cannot therefore challenge this assertion. However, the committee does note that a decision to publish—or not to publish—an article in a journal is ultimately a business decision of the publisher: it does not necessarily reflect the quality of the article being submitted, nor an acknowledgment of the existence or otherwise of prevailing circumstances. The committee also notes that there exist considerable published and publicly available reports into adverse health effects from wind turbines.

2.28 The committee also notes that a peer reviewed case series crossover study involving 38 people was published in the form of a book by American paediatrician Dr Nina Pierpont, PhD, MD. Dr Pierpont’s Report for Clinicians and the raw case data was submitted by her to a previous Australian Senate inquiry (2011) to which Dr Pierpont also provided oral testimony. Further, at a workshop conducted by the NHMRC in June 2011, acoustical consultant Dr Geoffrey Leventhall stated that the symptoms of ‘wind turbine syndrome’ (as identified by Dr Pierpont), and what he and other acousticians refer to as ‘noise annoyance’, were the same. Dr Leventhall has also acknowledged Dr Pierpont’s peer reviewed work in identifying susceptibility or risk factors for developing wind turbine syndrome / ‘noise annoyance’. Whilst Dr Leventhall is critical of some aspects of Dr Pierpont’s research, he does state:

Pierpont has made one genuine contribution to the science of environmental noise, by showing that a proportion of those affected have underlying medical conditions, which act to increase their susceptibility.

2.29 Seventh, Professor Chapman claims that no medical practitioner has come forward with a submission to any committee in Australia about having diagnosed disease caused by a wind farm. Again, Professor Chapman fails to define ‘disease’. Nonetheless, both this committee, and inquiries undertaken by two Senate Standing Committees, have received oral and written evidence from medical practitioners contrary to Professor Chapman’s claim.

2.30 Eighth, Professor Chapman claims that there is not a single example of an accredited acoustics, medical or environmental association which has given any credence to direct harmful effects of wind turbines. The committee notes that the semantic distinction between ‘direct’ and ‘indirect’ effects is not helpful. Dr Leventhall and the NHMRC describe stress, anxiety and sleep deprivation as ‘indirect’ effects, but these ailments nonetheless affect residents’ health.

2.31 Finally, Professor Chapman queries why there has never been a complainant that has succeeded in a common-law suit for negligence against a wind farm operator. This statement is simply incorrect. The committee is aware of court judgements against wind farm operators, operators making out of court settlements or withdrawing from proceedings, injunctions or shutdown orders being granted against operators, and properties adjacent to wind turbines being purchased by operators to avoid future conflict. The committee also reiterates its earlier point that contractual non-disclosure clauses have discouraged legal action by victims.

Those Brilliant Aussies, Have Recommended Safeguards Against the Windscam!

August 10, 2015 / 1957chev / Leave a comment

Australian Senate’s Recommendations to Curb the Wind Industry – Driven by Common Sense & Compassion

August 10, 2015 by stopthesethings

****

After almost 6 months, 8 hearings in 4 States and the ACT, dozens of witnesses and almost 500 submissions, the Senate Inquiry into the great wind power fraud has delivered its ‘doorstop’ final report, which runs to some 350 pages – available here: Senate Report

The first 200 pages are filled with facts, clarity, common sense and compassion; the balance, labelled “Labor’s dissenting report”, was written by the wind industry’s parasites and spruikers – including the Clean Energy Council (these days a front for Infigen aka Babcock & Brown); theAustralian Wind Alliance; and Leigh Ewbank from the Enemies of the Earth.

Predictably, Labor’s dissenting report is filled with fantasy, fallacy and fiction – pumping up the ‘wonders’ of wind; completely ignoring the cost of the single greatest subsidy rort in the history of the Commonwealth; and treating the wind industry’s hundreds of unnecessary victims – of incessant turbine generated low-frequency noise and infrasound – with the kind of malice, usually reserved for sworn and bitter foreign enemies.

Labor receives $millions in operational and election funding from Union Super Funds – which its members (both past and present) run as political slush funds – funds which are handled with wanton disregard for the working class mum and dads – who unwittingly end up ‘investing’ their hard earned savings in disasters like Pacific Hydro – a wind power outfit that torched $700 million of mum and dad super savings in a single year:

Pacific Hydro’s Ponzi Scheme Implodes: Wind Power Outfit Loses $700 Million of Mum & Dad Retirement Savings

So, with their snouts wedged deep in the wind industry subsidy trough – and with everything to lose, it’s no surprise that Labor’s dissenting report is full of self-serving lies, omissions and half truths.

Fortunately, however, the majority of Senators on the Committee worked overtime to get the truth out – and made a suite of recommendations based on facts and evidence; and driven by those truly human attributes – common sense and compassion.

STT notes and thanks Coalition Members, Senators Chris Back and Matt Canavan – and Senators, John Madigan, David Leyonhjelm, Bob Day and SA’s Favourite Greek, Nick Xenophon for their tireless efforts throughout: efforts which have done more than any other Parliamentary Inquiry – anywhere on Earth – to expose the insane cost and utter pointlessness of the greatest economic and environmental fraud of all time.

Here’s a succinct little wrap-up on the Senate’s recommendations from Senator David Leyonhjelm.

Wind turbine report vindicates Senate scrutiny
Liberal Democratic Party
Monday August 3, 2015

Liberal Democrat Senator for NSW, David Leyonhjelm has hailed the findings of the Select Committee Inquiry on Wind Turbines as vindication of his motion to establish the inquiry and confirmation that regulation of the wind industry needs to change.

“It is abundantly clear from the evidence of regulators, the community, local councils and wind farm operators that the status quo is untenable,” Senator Leyonhjelm said.

“Only the wind industry and its cheer squad disagree. There are glaring planning and compliance deficiencies plus growing evidence, domestic and international, that infrasound and low frequency sound from wind turbines is having an adverse health impact on some people who live in the vicinity of wind farms. This is not something a responsible government can ignore.”

The report is critical of the work previously undertaken by the National Health and Medical Research Council on wind farm noise emissions, which many have relied upon to declare wind farms have no adverse health effects.

The committee is also concerned about “the lack of rigour” behind the position statement of the Australian Medical Association on wind turbine operations. The inquiry report criticised the AMA for refusing to give evidence before the inquiry, describing their position statement as “irresponsible and harmful”.

The final report, tabled in the Senate today, retains the recommendations of the interim report (which the government has accepted) but expands on these and adds more.

Among them is a requirement for wind farms to comply with national noise standards in order to be eligible for consumer funded Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs), that eligibility for RECs cease after five years to lessen the financial burden on consumers, that state EPAs have jurisdiction over wind farms rather than local councils, that the Clean Energy Regulator be subject to a performance audit by the ANAO, and that the Productivity Commission be required to examine the impact of wind power generation on retail electricity prices.

“Senators involved in this inquiry have been attacked by the Big Wind lobby and those who see it is an assault on all renewable energy. The Labor representative on the Committee, Senator Anne Urquhart, joined this criticism following the interim report.

“However, the report shows there is a problem with the wind industry, not renewables such as solar, hydro, geothermal and biomass. There are potentially just as many jobs in these and nobody living close to them is getting sick. Labor’s enthusiasm for renewables needs to incorporate some compassion for those being hurt.”

Senator David Leyonhjelm

****

A fair call David – but, then again, common sense rarely needs an advocate.

Meanwhile, Committee Chair, Senator John Madigan went on the offensive in his home state of Victoria – where wind industry front man, Labor Premier, Daniel Andrews has adopted an approach to his constituents that would have made his pin-up boy, Generalissimo Stalin, glow with pride.

Senator Madigan warns Premier Andrews: ‘Don’t gamble with the health of Victorians’
Senator John Madigan
Independent Senator for Victoria
July 16, 2015

Independent Senator for Victoria John Madigan has warned Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews the Victorian Government’s unshakeable commitment to wind energy is putting the health of Victorians at risk, while potentially exposing the state to future legal liabilities.

“There is growing evidence living near wind turbines can be detrimental to health,” Senator Madigan said.

“While for a long time this evidence mainly came from the reports of affected individuals, more recently a number of studies have lent scientific weight to their concerns, such as the German and Japanese studies recently reported on,” Senator Madigan said.

“Yet, in the face of this, we have the Premier telling us his government is ‘unashamedly pro-wind power’ and indicating plans to boost investment in the sector.

“Beyond the detrimental health impacts, this could leave the state liable to future claims by those who suffer ill-health as a result. Where there is a reasonably foreseeable risk of harm the law requires us to act prudently to avoid that harm. If we fail to do so we are expected to compensate those impacted. The Andrew’s government is confronted with just this type of situation.”

Senator Madigan said the Premier had been aware of the potential health impacts of wind turbines since at least June 2010 when, as Health Minister, he attended a community cabinet meeting in Bendigo and was handed a file containing approximately twenty statutory declarations made by people living near Waubra wind farm. Each statutory declaration detailed negative health impacts residents attributed to noise from the wind turbines.

Senator Madigan said: “Given the Premier has known about this for some time, it is completely irresponsible for him to be promoting the construction of more wind farms around the state.

“With peoples’ health at risk, the state government should exercise the precautionary principle and delay the approval of any further wind farms until their health impacts are properly understood. This is the only responsible position under the circumstances.”

Senator Madigan said he would write to the Premier to request a moratorium on the development of further wind farms until their health impacts are properly understood.

Senator John Madigan

One Man’s Tale, About the “Renewables Scheme”, and the Ultimate Consequences…

August 9, 2015 / 1957chev / 1 Comment

A Simple Tale About Switching To Renewable Power: Requirements & Consequences.

Guest Blogger / August 9, 2015

Don Bogard,

The tale below is fictional, but every one of its elements and issues has been or will be experienced somewhere in the process of switching electrical power production from fossil fuels to renewable wind and solar. Hopefully this tale will illustrate in a non-technical way some of these complications and potential issues that can and often will arise. My reference to “city” and “government” and “city fathers” are generic and could apply to different entities and scales.

Visualize a medium-size city with two very functional electrical power plants, each producing 500 Mega-watts of electricity, with one fueled by coal and one by natural gas. (About 2/3 of U.S. power is produced from these two sources.) The government decrees that this city must reduce its CO2 emissions. The city fathers decide to retire their coal-fired plant because it generates more CO2 and replace it with 350, General Electric (G.E.) 1.5 Mega-watt wind towers (total rated capacity 525 M-watt). The entire city celebrates over their good fortune in moving into a modern era of green energy. The mood is jovial.

The city planning begins. Each of these G.E. wind towers consists of 116-ft blades atop a 212-ft tower for a total height of 328 feet, and the blades sweep an area just under an acre. Each tower weighs 164 tons and is mounted on 1,000 tons of concrete and steel rebar and must be outfitted with flashing red lights.

City Problem #1. These 350 wind towers are expensive, about $2 million each. Luckily the government will subsidize most of the cost (paid by taxpayers elsewhere).

City Problem #2. Whereas the coal plant occupies fewer than 20 acres, each GE 1.5-megawatt turbine requires a minimum of 32 acres and needs 82 unobstructed acres in order to optimally utilize wind from any direction. This is a total of 28,700 acres, or about 45 square miles of land. That much space is way too expensive to purchase, so the city fathers convince the county and state to fund subsidizes to surrounding farms to host such towers, or decree eminent domain to force their location on unwilling farmers.

City problem #3. The coal plant was located close to town. To service these new wind towers new expensive access roads and power transmission lines must be funded and constructed.

Some grumbling begins, mainly among those whose farms were forced to accept the towers, among coal plant workers who are soon to be fired, and among those long range planners of future city budgets.
The wind towers are finally constructed and tied into the city power grid.

City Problem #4. Before the coal plant is retired, which operated 24/7/365, the city planners realize that the wind does not always blow. Further, even when it does blow, it often does not blow enough, and at these times the wind towers generate less than their rated electrical output. Often some towers will be out for maintenance.
The city fathers decide to keep the coal power plant in operation (after all, it was paid for) and only use it as back-up power for when the wind does not blow.

City Problem #5. It is discovered that when the coal plant must be fired up to replace wind power that has suddenly diminished, it cannot come to power quickly enough to prevent brown-outs (voltage drops), even an occasional black-out (no power). Further, these times of rapid cooling and heating of the boilers are degrading them much faster than when they operated continuously.
Citizen grumbling increases over the power issues they individually are experiencing.

The city fathers decide to build another gas-fired plant to replace the coal plant.
Grumbling increases among city dwellers over the increased taxes and electricity costs required to pay for the second gas plant. For the first time in many years, serious challengers arise in the upcoming city council election.

The second gas plant is constructed. One gas plant operates continuously, and the second plant operates in a near idle mode (but still burning some gas and producing CO2) so that it can be rapidly fired up when the wind dies. Keeping both gas plants operating, even at lower level for one, is more expensive than expected, but now they offer adequate back-up for when the wind-towers generate too little power.
Some city citizens forget that they are now paying sizably higher electricity bills and are happy that their CO2 production is now somewhat lower than originally. But many other citizens grumble and discuss recall elections.

Time passes. The city grows and needs more power. Further, the government gives a new decree to lower CO2 emissions even more. The city fathers decide to construct more wind towers. The reasoning is threefold: a) adequate power would still be available when the wind blew only lightly; b) extra power generated by wind could be sold to the surrounding cities; and c) the city’s gas plants would not have to operate as often, thus lowering CO2 generation. The plan sounded reasonable to city council.

City Problem #6. Large citizen protests erupt. The city mayor and two city council members are recalled. Yet under demands from the government, the new city government barely convinces the annoyed citizens to proceed. Active animosity develops between those who support this rapid move to renewable energy and those who do not.

City Problem #7. With the prospect of large flows of energy among various cities, extra and expensive long-distance transmission lines must be constructed.

The city goes even much more heavily into debt and several hundred extra wind towers are constructed. Counting total power capability from two gas plants and many hundreds of wind towers, the total potential power production is much more than twice what the original power capability was, although the city has only grown by 20%.

City Problem #8. The city is now sharply divided over this issue. The “green” citizens emphasize the good that wind power is doing in reducing CO2 emission and think that good justifies the many extra costs. Financially practical citizens complain that city electricity costs are now much higher than before, that much more open land is being compromised, and that the wind towers are noisy and unsightly, whereas CO2 emissions have only modestly been reduced.
The city fathers argue than the extra wind power produced by the new turbines can be sold to ally some of their costs.

City Problem #9. However, when the wind blows hard and extra wind power is produced, the city fathers discover that surrounding cities, which by now also have converted heavily to wind power, often also have too much wind power and are not in the market for any more. The city cannot sell its unused power, and having no way to store the extra power, must simply “dump” it unused. City fathers also realize that sometimes the wind quits blowing not just over a local region, but over a very widespread one. In these cases most or all of the local cities produce too little total power, and regional brown-outs develop.

The city fathers have a new idea — develop solar energy. Often the Sun shines when the wind does not blow and the wind often blows at night. But the city citizens would never permit a huge central solar power facility, and there is no suitable place to locate such a facility. But, the city fathers learn that the government heavily subsidizes PV-solar equipment for individual homes and businesses. The city fathers again decide to utilize government subsidizes paid for by others elsewhere. The city fathers appeal to the “green” citizens to use some of their funds along with the government subsidies to install PV-solar systems on their roofs. To give further enticements, the city fathers decree that the city electrical power company must purchase at full retail prices all excess solar power than these “green” citizens may produce. Many “green” citizens comply and a few hundred extra M-watts of solar power becomes available.

City Problem #10. However, the city fathers soon discover that when the Sun is brightly shinning, these PV-solar panels feed so much solar power into the grid that sometimes either the gas-fired plants or some wind towers must be curtailed in their power production. This produces further complications in keeping power fed into the local grid precisely in balance with the local and total power demand, as it must be if equipment damages are to be avoided. The city power company strongly complains about the new problems it has been handed.

City Problem #11. Further, the city power company discovers that on sunny days, it is buying so much solar power at retail prices, that it must raise power rates to those customers who do not have PV-solar grids.
Citizen complaints about power costs increase. Some prospective new industries with sizeable power demands decide to locate elsewhere.

Surrounding cities, which have also encouraged rooftop PV systems, find themselves with similar problems.
The city finds itself in a catch-22 situation. Both producing too much power and too little power, both at significantly increased prices, have negative and unintended consequences.

MORAL OF THE TALE. Conversion of electrical power generation from fossil fuels to renewable wind and solar is a process that can readily be both quite expensive and filled with unexpected negative consequences. For governments to rush into such a transfer too quickly or without a fully thought out a plan may be a recipe for higher electricity costs, customer dissatisfaction, social disruption, and ultimate political consequences.

The Insanity of Wind Energy…Just ask Southern Australians. It’s Killing their Economy!

August 9, 2015 / 1957chev / 1 Comment

South Australia’s Unbridled Wind Power Insanity: Wind Power Collapses see Spot Prices Rocket from $70 to $13,800 per MWh

August 9, 2015 by stopthesethings 4 Comments

****

To call what South Australia’s Labor government has ‘gifted’ their constituents an energy ‘policy’, is to flatter it as involving some kind of genuine ‘design’. It’s an economic debacle, pure and simple.

The current mess started under former Premier, Mike Rann – a former spin-doctor, whose relatives all lined up at the wind power subsidy trough from the get-go.

Under its current vapid leader, Jay Weatherill, SA’s Labor government has been talking up a wind powered future for months now – he’s presiding over the worst unemployment in the Nation, at 8.2% and rising fast – and seems to thinks the answer is out there somewhere – ‘blowin’ in the wind’. Its wind power debacle has led to South Australians paying the highest power costs in the Nation – if not (on a purchasing power parity basis) the highest in the world – and, yet, the dimwits that run it wonder why it’s an economic train wreck (see our posts here and here).

A few posts back – always ready to rain on the wind industry’s parade – as well as the gullible and corrupt that cheer it on – we spelt it out in pictures – that even the most intellectually interrupted should be able to grasp:

The Wind Power Fraud (in pictures): Part 1 – the South Australian Wind Farm Fiasco

But that woeful missive merely drew focus on the pathetic performance of SA’s 17 wind farms; and their ‘notional’ installed capacity of 1,477MW – it has the greatest number of turbines per capita of all States – and the highest proportion of its generating capacity in wind power by a country mile.

Now, we’ll take a look at the effect on SA’s power market when wind-watts go completely AWOL, almost every other day. The chaos that wind power brings with it, has created the perfect opportunity for peaking power operators to make out like bandits at power consumers’ expense – simply because it can predictably ‘relied’ on to disappear without warning.

Wind power driven, market chaos clearly has the Australian Energy Market Operator worried; as its ‘Pricing Event Report’ for July shows.

To make clear just what was driving rocketing spot prices, we’ve added pictures, care of Aneroid Energy.

And when we say ‘rocketing’ we mean with all the thrust of Apollo 11. For the year to date, SA’s average spot price for power is $74 per MWh (compared to Victoria’s $35) – the reason for the price difference might just come from the fact that the Victorians have a relatively tiny proportion of their generating capacity in wind power; and the largest coal-fired generators in the country.

Now, with SA’s average of $74 per MWh in mind, consider the number of occasions in July when – as wind power output collapses – the spot price approaches or hits the Market Price Cap. That cap – currently $13,800 per MWh – sets the upper limit of what peaking power generators can extort from the system: for a rundown on how the National Energy Market is designed to work, see this paper: AEMO Fact Sheet National Electricity Market

That’s the ‘design’; here’s the reality.

Pricing Event Reports – July 2015

Electricity Pricing Event Report – Tuesday 28 July 2015 (TI ending 1830 hrs)

Market Outcomes: South Australian spot price reached $1,967.51/MWh for trading interval (TI) ending 1830 hrs.

South Australian FCAS prices (Volume Weighted FCAS Prices) and energy and FCAS prices for the other NEM regions were not affected by this event.

South Australia had an actual Lack of Reserve 1 (LOR1) from 1800 hrs to 2030 hrs (Market Notices 49437 and 49438).

Detailed Analysis: 5-Minute dispatch price reached $10,759.20/MWh for dispatch interval (DI) ending 1820 hrs. The high price can be attributed to rebidding of generation capacity and limited interconnector flows during the evening peak demand period. Wind generation was low during this period in South Australia.

The South Australian demand was 2,233 MW for TI ending 1830 hrs. During the same TI, wind generation in South Australia was at 18 MW.

For DI ending 1820 hrs, a total of 38 MW of generation capacity was rebid from Hallett PS and Northern PS unit 2 from bands priced at or below $590.07/MWh to bands priced above $13,333/MWh. South Australian generation capacity was offered at less than $591/MWh or above $10,759/MWh resulting in a steep supply curve.

Cheaper priced generation were restricted by their ramp rates (Mintaro GT) and FCAS profiles (Torrens Island A units 3 and 4). Generation offers at $10,759.20/MWh had to be cleared from Dry Creek GT unit 3 to meet the demand for the DI.

During the affected DI, the target flow towards South Australia on the Heywood interconnector was constrained to 403 MW by an outage constraint equation V::S_XKHTB1+2_MAXG. This transient stability constraint equation manages the Victoria to South Australia flow for the loss of the largest generation block in South Australia during the outage of both parallel Keith – Tailem Bend 132 kV lines.

The target flow on the Murraylink interconnector was limited to 68 MW towards South Australia by the outage constraint equation, V>X_NWCB6022+6023_T1. This constraint equation limits flow from Victoria to South Australia on Murraylink during the planned outage of the Monash – North West Bend No. 2 132 kV line from 22 July 2015.

The 5-minute price reduced to $104.27/MWh in the subsequent DI to the high priced interval when 673 MW of generation capacity was rebid from higher priced bands to the market floor price of -$1,000/MWh.

The high 30-minute spot price for South Australia was forecast in pre-dispatch schedules prior to TI ending 1130 hrs. The pre-dispatch schedule for TI ending 1830 hrs forecast a spot price of $590.07/MWh. The difference in prices between Pre-dispatch and Dispatch was a result of rebidding of generation capacity within the affected trading interval. The wind generation forecast for pre-dispatch was also marginally higher, which also contributed to the difference in prices.

Electricity Pricing Event Report – Tuesday 28 July 2015

Market Outcomes: South Australian spot price reached $2,390.06/MWh for trading interval (TI) ending 0800 hrs.

South Australian FCAS prices and energy and FCAS prices for the other NEM regions were not affected by this event.

Detailed Analysis: 5-Minute dispatch price reached the Market Price Cap (MPC) of $13,800/MWh in South Australia for dispatch interval (DI) ending 0750 hrs. The high price can be attributed to rebidding of generation capacity resulting in a steep supply curve during the morning peak demand period. Wind generation was low during this period in South Australia.

The South Australian demand was 1,915 MW for TI ending 0800 hrs. During the high priced TI, wind generation in South Australia was at 19 MW.

For DI ending 0750 hrs, AGL shifted a generation capacity of 160 MW from Torrens Island B PS from bands priced at or below $124.99/MWh to bands priced at MPC of $13,800/MWh. South Australian generation capacity was offered at less than $591/MWh or above $12,195/MWh resulting in a steep supply curve.

Cheaper priced generation were restricted by their ramp rates (Hallett PS, Mintaro GT, Quarantine PS unit 4) and fast-start profiles (Dry Creek GT unit 3) which required time to synchronise.

Generation offers at Market Price Cap (MPC) of $13,800/MWh had to be cleared from Torrens Island B PS to meet the demand for the DI.

During the affected DI, the target flow towards South Australia on the Heywood interconnector was constrained to 460 MW by the Victoria to South Australia Heywood upper transfer limit thermal constraint equation, V>S_460. The target flow on the Murraylink interconnector was limited to 61 MW towards South Australia by the outage constraint equation, V>X_NWCB6022+6023_T1. This constraint equation limits flow from Victoria to South Australia on Murraylink during the planned outage of the Monash – North West Bend No. 2 132 kV line from 22 July 2015.

The 5-minute price reduced to $109.32/MWh in the subsequent DI to the high priced interval when South Australia demand reduced by 77 MW. Approximately 101 MW of non-scheduled generation came online. Generation capacity was also rebid from higher price bands to the market floor price of -$1000/MWh which also contributed to reducing the dispatch price.

The high 30-minute spot price for South Australia was not forecast in the pre-dispatch schedules, as it was a result of rebidding of generation capacity within the affected trading interval. The wind generation forecast for pre-dispatch was also marginally higher, which also contributed to the difference in prices between pre-dispatch and Dispatch.

Electricity Pricing Event Report – Monday 27 July 2015

Market Outcomes: South Australian spot price reached $4,449.17/MWh for trading interval (TI) ending 0800 hrs.

South Australian FCAS prices and energy and FCAS prices for the other NEM regions were not affected by this event.

Detailed Analysis: 5-Minute dispatch price reached the Market Price Cap (MPC) of $13,800/MWh and $12,195.07/MWh in South Australia for dispatch intervals (DIs) ending 0755 hrs and 0800 hrs respectively.

The high prices can be attributed to rebidding of generation capacity resulting in a steep supply curve during the morning peak demand period. Wind generation was moderately low during this period in South Australia.

The South Australian demand was 1,896 MW and the temperature in Adelaide was 4.9 °C for TI ending 0800 hrs. During the high priced TI, wind generation in South Australia was at 141 MW.

For DI ending 0755 hrs, AGL shifted a generation capacity of 200 MW from Torrens Island B PS from bands priced at or below $174.99/MWh to bands priced at MPC setting the high price. South Australian generation capacity was offered at less than $591/MWh or above $10,759/MWh resulting in a steep supply curve.

Cheaper priced generation were restricted by their ramp rates (Hallett PS), FCAS profiles (Northern PS unit 2) and fast-start profiles (Dry Creek GT units 2 and 3) which required time to synchronise.

For DI ending 0800 hrs, cheaper priced generation were restricted by fast-start profiles (Dry Creek GT units 2 and 3) which required time to synchronise. Generation offers at $12,195.07/MWh had to be cleared from Hallett PS to meet the demand for the DI.

During the high priced DIs, the target flow on the Heywood interconnector was limited up to 418 MW towards South Australia by the binding transient stability constraint equations, V::S_NIL_MAXG_SECP and V::S_NIL_MAXG_AUTO. The V::S_NIL_MAXG_SECP constraint equation prevents transient instability by limiting flow on the Heywood interconnector from Victoria to South Australia for the loss of the largest generator in South Australia for periods when the South East capacitor is unavailable for switching. The V::S_NIL_MAXG_AUTO constraint equation prevents transient instability by limiting flow on the Heywood interconnector from Victoria to South Australia for the loss of the largest generation block in South Australia.

The target flow on the Murraylink interconnector was limited to 58 MW towards South Australia by the outage constraint equation, V>X_NWCB6022+6023_T1. This constraint equation limits flow from Victoria to South Australia on Murraylink during the planned outage of the Monash – North West Bend No. 2 132 kV line from 22 July 2015.

The 5-minute price reduced to $174.99/MWh in the subsequent DI to the high priced interval when generation capacity from several South Australian generators were shifted to lower priced bands.

Electricity Pricing Event Report – Wednesday 22 July 2015

Market Outcomes: South Australian spot price reached $2,296.07/MWh for trading interval (TI) ending 1830 hrs.

South Australian FCAS prices and energy and FCAS prices for the other NEM regions were not affected by this event.

Detailed Analysis: 5-Minute dispatch price reached $13,481.81/MWh in South Australia for dispatch interval (DI) ending 1810 hrs. The high price can be attributed to a steep supply curve of generation capacity offered during evening peak demand period when wind generation was low in South Australia.

The South Australian demand was 2,100 MW for TI ending 1830 hrs. During the high priced TI, wind generation in South Australia was low at 39 MW.

For DI ending 1805 hrs, Energy Australia shifted a generation capacity of 34 MW from Hallett PS from bands priced at $360.81/MWh to bands priced at $13,481.81/MWh. For DI ending 1810 hrs, AGL rebid a generation capacity of 100 MW from Torrens Island B PS from bands priced at or less $64.99/MWh to bands priced at $13,500/MWh. South Australian generation capacity was offered at less than $591/MWh or above $10,750/MWh resulting in a steep supply curve. Cheaper priced generation was restricted by FCAS profiles (Northern PS unit 2 and Torrens Island PS unit A4) and fast-start units (Mintaro PS and Quarantine PS) which required time to synchronise.

Generation offers at $13,481.81/MWh had to be cleared from Hallett PS to meet the demand for the DI.

The target flow on the Heywood interconnector was limited to 447 MW towards South Australia by the binding transient stability constraint equation, V::S_NIL_MAXG_AUTO. This constraint equation prevents transient instability by limiting flow on the Heywood interconnector from Victoria to South Australia for the loss of the largest generation block in South Australia. The target flow on the Murraylink interconnector was limited to 64 MW towards South Australia by the outage constraint equation, V>X_NWCB6022+6023_T1.

This constraint equation limits flow from Victoria to South Australia on Murraylink during the planned outage of the Monash – North West Bend No. 2 132 kV line from 22 July 2015.

The 5-minute price reduced to $53.42/MWh in the subsequent DI to the high priced interval. South Australia demand reduced by 103 MW when 101 MW of non-scheduled generation came online. Generation capacity was also rebid from higher price bands to the market floor price of -$1000/MWh which also contributed to reducing the dispatch price.

Electricity Pricing Event Report – Sunday 19 July 2015

Market Outcomes: South Australian spot price reached $2,372.11/MWh for trading interval (TI) ending 1830 hrs.

South Australian FCAS prices and energy and FCAS prices for the other NEM regions were not affected by this event.

Detailed Analysis: 5-Minute dispatch price in South Australia reached $13,333.95/MWh for dispatch interval (DI) ending 1830 hrs. The high price can be attributed to a steep supply curve in generation capacity during the evening peak demand period when wind generation was low in South Australia.

The South Australian demand was 2,066 MW for TI ending 1830 hrs. The high evening peak demand was due to the cool weather in Adelaide, with a low temperature of 7.3°C at 1830 hrs. During the high priced TI, wind generation in South Australia was low at 3 MW for TI ending 1830 hrs.

For DI ending 1825 hrs, Alinta Energy rebid 95 MW of Northern PS generation capacity from bands priced at or less than $286.95/MWh to $13,333.95/MWh. South Australian generation capacity was offered at less than $591/MWh or above $10,750/MWh resulting in a steep supply curve for the high priced DI. Cheaper priced generation were restricted by ramp rates (Torrens Island Unit A4), FCAS profiles (Northern PS Unit 2) or required time to synchronise (Hallett PS).

Generation offers at $13,333.95/MWh had to be cleared from Northern PS units to meet the demand for the DI.

The target flow on the Heywood interconnector was limited to 448 MW towards South Australia by the thermal constraint equation, V>S_NIL_HYTX_HYTX. This system normal thermal constraint equation manages post contingent flow on the Heywood 500/275 kV transformers by reducing Heywood interconnector flow when the actual flow exceeds the pre-defined transformer rating. The target flow on the Murraylink interconnector was limited to 64 MW towards South Australia by the outage constraint equation, V>X_NWCB6225+6021_T1. This constraint equation limits flow from Victoria to South Australia on Murraylink during the planned outage of the North West Bend 132 kV circuit breakers from 13 July 2015.

The 5-minute price reduced to $115.77/MWh in the DI subsequent to the high priced interval when demand reduced by 111 MW and 101 MW of non-scheduled generation came online.

The high 30-minute spot price for South Australia was not forecast in the pre-dispatch schedules, as the forecast demand in pre-dispatch was lower.

Electricity Pricing Event Report – Friday 17 July 2015 (TI ending 0000 hrs on 18 July 2015): South Australia

Market Outcomes: South Australian spot price reached $2,256.25/MWh for trading interval (TI) ending 0000 hrs (on Saturday, 18 July 2015).

FCAS prices and energy prices for the other NEM regions were not affected by this event.

Detailed Analysis: 5-Minute dispatch price reached $13,333.95/MWh in South Australia for dispatch interval (DI) ending 2340 hrs on 17 July 2015 during high demand period due to hot water load management (ripple control). Between DIs ending 2325 hrs and 2340 hrs, the South Australian demand increased by 311 MW. This additional load represented an 18% increase in the South Australian demand.

Wind generation in South Australia was approximately 120 MW for TI ending 0000 hrs on 18 July 2015.

At DI ending 2335 hrs, a total of 150 MW of generation capacity from Northern PS was shifted from bands priced at or less than $286.95/MWh to $13,333.95/MWh. The high price for DI ending 2340 hrs was set by Northern PS at $13,333.95/MWh. Cheaper priced generation was available from fast-start units (Hallet and Dry Creek unit 3) which required time to synchronise.

The target flow on the Heywood interconnector was limited to 449 MW towards South Australia by a thermal constraint equation, V>S_NIL_HYTX_HYTX for DI ending 2340 hrs. This system normal constraint equation manages post contingent flow on the Heywood 275/500 kV transformers by reducing the Heywood interconnector flow when the actual flow exceeds the pre-defined transformer rating. The target flow on the Murraylink interconnector was limited to 66 MW towards South Australia by an outage constraint equation, V>X_NWCB6225+6021_T1. This constraint equation manages limits flow from Victoria to South Australia on Murraylink during the planned outage of the North West Bend 132 kV circuit breakers from 13 July 2015.

The 5-minute price reduced to $47.13/MWh for the next interval (DI ending 2345 hrs) when the demand reduced by approximately 122 MW and 102 MW of non-scheduled generation came online. A total of 349 MW of generation capacity was also rebid from higher priced bands to the market floor price of -$1,000/MWh.

The high 30-minute spot price for South Australia was not forecast in the pre-dispatch schedules, as it was a result of a 5-minute load increase that caused a price spike in the 5-minute dispatch prices.

Electricity Pricing Event Summary – Tuesday 7 July 2015*

Market Outcomes: South Australia spot price reached $1,221.54/MWh for trading interval (TI) ending 1900 hrs. South Australia FCAS prices and energy and FCAS prices in other regions were not affected.

Summary:

South Australia 5-Minute dispatch price reached $6,794.04/MWh for dispatch interval (DI) ending 1855 hrs due to a steep supply curve in generation capacity during a period of low wind generation. Planned outages affecting the interconnector flow into South Australia also contributed to the high price.

Low levels of wind generation in South Australia at approximately 60 MW at TI ending 1900 hrs

Rebidding of 20 MW of Hallett PS generation capacity from bands priced at or less than $360.81/MWh to bands priced at $13,481.81/MWh for DI ending 1840 hrs

For DI ending 1855 hrs, South Australian generation capacity was offered at less than $590/MWh or above $10,750/MWh resulting in a steep supply curve

Cheaper priced generation were restricted by a fast-start unit (Dry Creek GT unit 3) which required time to synchronise

The target flow on the Heywood interconnector was limited to 430 MW towards South Australia by a planned outage thermal constraint equation, V>S_APHY2_NIL_HYTX2. This constraint equation manages flow of the Heywood M2 transformer during the outage of APD-HYTS No. 2 500 kV line

The target flow on the Murraylink interconnector was limited to 181 MW towards South Australia by a planned outage constraint equation, S>>RBTX1_RBTX2_WEWT. This constraint equation manages post contingent flow of Waterloo East – Waterloo 132 kV line for the trip of Robertstown No. 2 132/275 kV transformer during the outage of Robertstown No. 1 132/275 kV transformer.

South Australia energy price reduced to $46.14/MWh for DI ending 1900 hrs when:

Demand reduced by 144 MW and 104 MW of non-scheduled generation came online

Generation capacity was rebid from higher price bands to the market floor price of -$1000/MWh which also contributed to reducing the dispatch price.

The high 30-minute spot price for South Australia was not forecast in the pre-dispatch schedules, as the forecast demand in pre-dispatch was lower.

* A summary was prepared as the maximum daily spot price was between $500/MWh and $2,000/MWh

Electricity Pricing Event Report – Friday 03 July 2015

Market Outcomes: South Australian spot price reached $2,296.32/MWh for trading interval (TI) ending 0830 hrs.

South Australian FCAS prices and energy and FCAS prices for the other NEM regions were not affected by this event.

Detailed Analysis: 5-Minute dispatch price reached $13,333.95/MWh in South Australia for dispatch interval (DI) ending 0810 hrs. The high price can be attributed to a steep supply curve of generation capacity offered during morning peak demand period when wind generation was low in South Australia.

The South Australian demand was 1,990 MW for TI ending 0830 hrs. The high morning peak demand was due to the cool weather in Adelaide, with a low temperature of 3.5 °C at 0800 hrs gradually rising to 6.5°C at 0900 hrs at Adelaide Airport. During the high priced TI, wind generation in South Australia was low at 45 MW for TI ending 0830 hrs.

For DI ending 0810 hrs, South Australian generation capacity was offered at less than $590/MWh or above $10,750/MWh resulting in a steep supply curve. Cheaper priced generation were restricted by a fast-start unit (Hallett PS) which required time to synchronise.

Generation offers at $13,333.95/MWh had to be cleared from Northern PS units to meet the demand for the DI.

The target flow on the Heywood interconnector was limited to 444 MW towards South Australia by the binding thermal constraint equation, V>S_NIL_HYTX_HYTX. This system normal thermal constraint equation manages post contingent flow on the Heywood 275/500 kV transformers by reducing Heywood interconnector flow when the actual flow exceeds the pre-defined transformer rating. The target flow on the Murraylink interconnector was limited to 179 MW towards South Australia by a voltage stability constraint equation, V^SML_NSWRB_2. This constraint equation avoids voltage collapse in Victoria for loss of the Darlington Point to Buronga (X5) 220 kV line.

The 5-minute price reduced to $103.93/MWh in the subsequent DI to the high priced interval. South Australia demand reduced by 96 MW when 105 MW of non-scheduled generation came online. Generation capacity was also rebid from higher price bands to the market floor price of -$1000/MWh which also contributed to reducing the dispatch price.

The high 30-minute spot price for South Australia was not forecast in the pre-dispatch schedules, as the forecast demand in pre-dispatch was lower. The wind generation forecast for pre-dispatch was also marginally higher, which also contributed to the difference in prices between pre-dispatch and Dispatch.
AEMO July 2015

****

Next time you’ve got some wind-worshipper or wind industry parasite claiming that wind power lowers power prices, flick them a link to this post and ask them to explain – if they can? – how a wholly weather dependent power generation source lowers power prices when the wind drops to a zephyr?

When wind power output completely disappears – as it does almost every day – spot prices head north at rates slicker than anything set by Australian Formula One Ace, Mark Webber.

A whole shadow industry has been developed around wind power ‘outages’.

****

In the reports above, you’ll see references to the “fast-start unit (Hallett Power Station)”; “fast-start unit (Dry Creek GT)”; “Mintaro GT and “Quarantine PS”. Each of these “fast-start units” use Open Cycle Gas Turbines (OCGTs) – which are little more that jet engines, run on gas or fuel oil (diesel).

The initial capital outlay is low, but their operating costs are exorbitant – depending on the fuel input costs (the gas dispatch price varies with demand, for example) operators need to recoup upwards of $300-400 per MWh before they will even contemplate firing them into action. For a wrap up on “fast-start-peakers” see this paper: Peaker-Case-Histories

As to the insane cost of running them, see this article: OPEN GAS CYCLE TURBINES: Between a rock and a hard place

For peaking power operators, the inevitable and total collapses in wind power output is where the greatest rort of all time begins.

You see, it’s not really about the costs of running OCGTs (or diesel engined generators) is all about what the operator can get away with.

The pattern was set up by the energy market whizzkids from Enron – back in the days when it raped and pillaged the Californian power market, using much the same tactics. Wait for an “outage” – self-generated in Enron’s case – sit back and watch the grid manager panic about widespread blackouts; and then ‘offer’ to solve the problem by delivering power in the nick of time at rates 1000 times the average price: the Enron rort was detailed in the doco “The Smartest Guys in the Room”.

For the purchaser (grid manager), it’s not about how much the vendor ‘needs’ to cover its costs – it’s all about how much the grid manager has ‘got’: some might call it ‘chiselling’; others ‘naked theft’. Hence, the NEM rules that set the upper limit of what can be charged at $13,800 per MWh.

However, there is a serious move to increase the cap to …. be sure you’re seated for this … $80,000 per MWh. See this paper by Dr Jenny Riesz here: Energy-only markets with high renewables: Can they work?

For a ‘wishy-washy’ analysis on the debacle above, note the excuses from wind power fans, Watt-Clarity, here: Why large energy users are concerned about last week’s machinations in South Australia

The ‘alternative’ to increasing the mandatory price cap from its already whopping $13,800 per MWh to a phenomenal $80,000, is to pay baseload generators $millions upfront to hold additional spinning reserve – with plants permanently ready to come online to cover wind power collapses; and, therefore, burning coal and gas around the clock – with what are called “capacity payments”:

Power Punters to Pay Double for Wind Power “FAILS” – REAL Power Generators Paid to Cover Wind Power Fraud

All of this power market insanity is the direct consequence of inevitable but unpredictable wind power output collapses; the criminal scenarios detailed above will only get worse if young Gregory Hunt’s ultimate annual 33,000 LRET were ever met; and would become a complete social and economic disaster if Labor’s 50% renewable target fantasy were ever realised.

One way or another – whether it’s the daily spot price “bonanza” enjoyed by peaking-power-piranhas; or paying millions of dollars in capacity payments to baseload generators, just to keep the grid from collapsing when the wind stops blowing – it’s power punters that pay the ultimate price. And, for South Australians, the only way is up.

Once upon a time, South Australia enjoyed the cheapest power prices in the world; and, with it, an unparalleled burst of economic growth and prosperity:

ETSA: Sir Tom Playford’s Ghost

Today, however, thanks to the most ludicrous power ‘policy’ in the Nation, it’s an economic train wreck. And they wonder why?

Wind Weasels in Scotland, are Being Sent Packing! Way to Go, Scots!!

August 8, 2015 / 1957chev / Leave a comment

Scots Rejoice as Highland Fan Plan Canned & Wind Power Jobs Myth Exposed

August 8, 2015 by stopthesethings

****

The Scots have been set upon by particularly rabid strain of wind weasel:

Got ‘Mercenary Sociopath’ on your CV? Then why not join the Wind Turbine ‘Taliban’

The wind power outfits that have set out to destroy Scotland are peopled by the usual type of bullies and thugs – that are quick to send in the muscle, in efforts to generate ‘community support’ for these things:

Scots Fight-back as Wind Power Outfit Aims to Thump its ‘Community Message’ Home

Faced with a brand of ‘corporate social responsibility’ that would have done the GDR’s Stasi proud, many might have given up and retreated to lick their wounds. But, the Scots are a tenacious bunch, who never say die:

Subsidies Scrapped: Scots Rejoice at Wind Industry’s Demise – Time for a Wee Highland Fling

And now – through their undying efforts to protect the heritage that is the rugged, unspoilt beauty of its majestic Uplands – Highlanders can raise a dram (or three) to celebrate a mighty victory for common sense and Scotland.

£120m Cairngorms wind farm plan blown out
The Scotsman
Alistair Munro
30 July 2015

A CONTROVERSIAL £120 million wind farm proposal has been thrown out by the Scottish Government who admitted that it would scar the Cairngorms National Park.

The 31-turbine Allt Duine development was to be sited within a designated Wild Land area in the Monadhliath mountains near Aviemore.

After a lengthy public inquiry, Deputy First Minister John Swinney has concluded the plan did not represent sustainable development, adding: “The Scottish Government’s policy on wind farms strikes a careful balance between maximising Scotland’s huge green energy potential and protecting some of our most scenic landscape and wild areas.

“We have been clear that wind farms can only be built in the right places and planning policy sets out rigorous steps to ensure wind farms are sited appropriately and sensitively. I have considered the Allt Duine application fully and have refused permission as the proposal would have a significant and unacceptable landscape and visual impacts in the local area, including on the Cairngorms National Park.”

The proposed turbines, which would have stood at 125 metres, would have been visible from nearly 26,000 hectares of the national park, including landmark high points such as popular Munros including Ben Macdui, Cairn Gorm and Braeriach.

The application, by RWE Innogy, was opposed by all statutory consultees, including the government’s own advisers Scottish Natural Heritage, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, Cairngorms National Park Authority and Highland Council.

But RWE Innogy UK has expressed disappointment, claiming it prevents a multi-million pound energy project from going ahead along with the creation of up to 100 jobs. Spokesman Mike Parker said: “We believe that we have designed a wind farm that is appropriate for the area in terms of the location, number and size of the turbines.

“At a time when the industry is under fire from the UK government it is increasingly damaging that this decision has been made. We would like to remain committed to investing in renewable energy projects in Scotland and to doing what we can to invest in the Scottish economy through jobs and community investments.

“However the result on this project has been discouraging. We will now consider the findings further before deciding next steps.”

Chris Townsend, a spokesman for the Save Monadhliath Mountains campaign, welcomed the decision, saying: “This is a victory for common sense, the safeguarding of the wild land in the Monadhliath Mountains and the absolute protection of the Cairngorms National Park. This scheme was the wrong development in the wrong location.”
The Scotsman

****

To our Scottish brothers and sisters, we raise one too, and wish the victors slàinte mhath!

But before we leave this bonnie tale, we can’t help but square up on the drivel in the piece above, that the project would have led to the “creation of up to 100 jobs”. No it wouldn’t.

Once the turbines had been planted, the project would have created less than a handful of full-time jobs, all involving maintenance or repairs.

Hubris and overstatement are, of course, the stock-in-trade for wind weasels, wherever they ply their trade – Scotland – no different.

Here’s a report on yet another wind industry jobs fantasy beat-up, being beaten down by …. you guessed it …. reality.

Tiny fraction of projected jobs bonanza for Scotland’s offshore wind industry becomes a reality
Scotland Herald
Mark Latham
5 July 2015

Only six per cent of the 30,020 jobs projected to be created in Scotland by 2015 through the growth of the offshore wind industry have actually materialised, the Sunday Herald can reveal.

A 2010 report on the future of the sector commissioned by industry body Scottish Renewables forecast that, under the most optimistic scenario, 30,020 full-time equivalent jobs would be in existence by 2015 and that this number would grow to 48,554 by 2020.

But the most recent figures show that in 2013 just 1,842 people were employed in the sector in 2013: a figure that is unlikely to have changed substantially as no offshore wind farms have been built in Scottish waters since then.

Those 1,842 created jobs are however more than twice the number of the study’s worst case scenario projection of 741 jobs by 2015, but far short of the 17,076 estimated under a second “more moderate” development scenario and considerably less than the 5,346 projected under the study’s third scenario of the number of jobs that would be created by 2015 “if Scotland fails to capture the economic benefits of offshore wind development.”

The gap between optimism and reality for Scotland’s offshore wind industry was laid bare last week when the South Korean multinational Samsung Heavy Industries said it would not be going ahead with a planned £100 million offshore wind turbine factory in Methil in Fife, which would have brought 500 jobs to one of Scotland’s most deprived areas.

The project was Scotland’s last remaining hope of creating hundreds of construction jobs in the offshore wind sector, after Spanish wind power firm Gamesa earlier this year dropped plans to build a wind turbine factory and servicing yard for the offshore energy sector in Leith, which would have seen the creation of 800 high-skilled engineering jobs.

In the end the Methil project – which received £6 million from Scottish Enterprise – only led to the creation of 20 research and development jobs following the installation of a 7MW test turbine in the Firth of Forth in 2013, which is now likely to be sold to the Glasgow-based Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult.

If offshore wind finally takes off in Scotland (so far only one offshore wind farm, the 180MW Robin Rigg farm in the Solway Firth, has been installed in Scottish waters) Scottish Renewables believes that more jobs will be created through the operation and maintenance of wind farms than from the construction of turbines or components.

Lindsay Roberts, senior policy manager for offshore wind at the industry body, told the Sunday Herald that the 2010 report’s best case scenario prediction of 30,020 jobs by 2015 was predicated on an assumption that there would be 10GW of installed capacity in Scottish waters by 2020.

“That is clearly now unachievable,” she said. “We appear to be on track to deliver within the lower scenario ranges.”

“The industry across the UK, but particularly in Scotland, is adjusting to a markedly different policy and funding landscape to that envisaged just a few years ago.

“The visibility of a sustainable market throughout the 2020s is the single most important driver of cost reduction in offshore wind. This is partly due to the ability to create a market of sufficient size to drive competition between multiple turbine suppliers and that’s why clarity over the UK Government’s long term support for this sector is so important.”

Roberts disagreed with criticism from the anti-wind farm lobby that Scotland’s deeper waters and more extreme wind conditions make it less suitable for offshore wind farms than England.

“The shallower, more benign, waters found south of the border were a perfect place for a young offshore wind industry to start in the UK but our technology and experience has now developed to a level that makes exploiting more challenging sites around the UK and in Scotland, not just possible, but desirable,” she said.

Linda Holt, spokesperson for the campaign group Scotland Against Spin, said that Samsung’s decision to pull out of the Methil project was “inevitable because Scotland’s offshore wind industry is a dead duck” and that the estimates of 30,020 jobs coming to Scotland by 2015 were “hilarious”.

Holt points to the fact that generous public subsidies have spawned almost 20 wind farms off the coast of England and Wales over the last decade but during that time only one offshore farm has been built in Scottish waters.

“The main reason is that the technical and financial challenges of building and servicing wind farms off the Scottish coast are very much greater than for wind farms in England and Wales. These are located in shallower waters, with less harsh weather and closer to centres of demand for electricity than Scottish ones would be.”
Herald Scotland

Windpushers Lie About the Cost of Producing Wind Energy!

August 7, 2015 / 1957chev / Leave a comment

US Wind Power Spruikers – AWEA – Caught Lying About Wind Power Costs

August 7, 2015 by stopthesethings Leave a Comment

****

The wind industry was built on lies, half-truths and critical omissions – and it prays on misconception, ignorance and downright stupidity.

The standard tactics are to go on the offensive, with well-oiled spin from the wind industry’s “play-book”. However, as time marches on, the myths and lies are being called for what they are.

The result has the wind industry’s spruikers floundering around with nonsensical and nasty attacks: attacks not just against the opinions and the conclusions of those who challenge the fraud; and personal attacks on those that express them – but – most desperately of all – they’ve been reduced to lying about the black-and-white facts upon which those opinions and conclusions are based.

This insidious feature of the wind industry – and the parasites that dine at its table – is no more evident in their efforts to downplay the insane costs of seeking to rely upon a meaningless power source, which was abandoned in the 18^th century, for obvious reasons:

The Wind Power Fraud (in pictures): Part 1 – the South Australian Wind Farm Fiasco

The Wind Power Fraud (in pictures): Part 2 – The Whole Eastern Grid Debacle

Here’s America’s Institute for Energy Research responding to a raft of rubbish pitched up by the American Wind Energy Association – the equivalent of Australia’s Clean Energy Council.

Wind Lobby’s Critique of IER Study Fails on All Fronts
Institute for Energy Research
24 July 2015

IER recently released a first-of-its-kind study on the cost of electricity from the existing generation fleet, titled “The Levelized Cost of Electricity from Existing Generation Resources.” A major takeaway from the study is that the cost of electricity from new wind resources is three times more expensive than electricity from existing nuclear, hydroelectric, and coal power plants. Power from new combined cycle natural gas plants—the lowest-cost new source of electricity—is about twice as expensive as existing coal-fired electricity.

The bottom line: shutting down existing power plants before the end of their economic lives and replacing them with new generation resources will increase electricity rates.

The American Wind Energy Association (AWEA), the lobbying arm of the wind industry, wrote a response to the IER study. AWEA referred to our study as “a new attack piece” against the wind industry, despite the fact that the study was general in nature and reported on all major sources of electricity including natural gas, coal, nuclear, and hydroelectric power. The central theme in AWEA’s argument is that wind energy “is one of the lowest cost sources of electricity, particularly among low- and zero-emission energy sources.”

AWEA may not like our finding that existing nuclear power plants provide electricity at a levelized cost of $29.60 compared to new wind’s Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) of $106.80. But AWEA’s vitriol towards data-driven reports by IER is nothing new—in the past AWEA has reacted withname-calling when IER publishes facts about the wind industry. Below, we go point-by-point through AWEA’s claims and show that our study stands up to AWEA’s scrutiny.

AWEA Claim #1: the “first trick in their paper The Levelized Cost of Electricity from Existing Generation Sources is using obsolete wind cost assumptions.”

This claim is false, unless data that was current until June 2015 is considered “obsolete” for a study released in the same month. Our study was finalized in June 2015—the same month the Energy Information Administration (EIA) came out with new LCOE data for new sources of electricity. We used EIA’s 2014 data, which was the most recent available at the time. Updating to 2015 data does not change the result of the analysis, as the table below shows.

The LCOE 2015 update from EIA reduces the cost of wind by about $7 per megawatt-hour (MWh) from $80.30 to $73.60. Crucially, even that lower estimate (which excludes some categories of the cost of wind) shows that wind electricity is twice as expensive as existing nuclear ($29.60), hydroelectric ($34.20), and coal-fired power ($38.4).

AWEA Claim #2: “[M]arket data indicate the actual average purchase price for wind energy was $25.59/MWh in 2013, or well under $50/MWh if the impact of the Production Tax Credit (PTC) on long-term wind purchase prices is removed.”

This claim is wildly misleading. It may be true that the average price of recent power purchase agreements (PPAs) is only $25/MWh, but that says little about the true cost of wind power. AWEA lobbyists know better than anyone how many subsidies and mandates are built into PPA prices for wind power. Wind is the beneficiary of dozens of subsidies and other government support, yet AWEA only recognizes one of the largest sources—the wind production tax credit (PTC).

The reality is that AWEA’s own made-up numbers actually show that wind is not competitive with existing sources of generation—and calculating the cost of existing sources of generation was the point of our report. Taking AWEA’s figure above ($50/MWh) indicates that building new wind is already an unattractive option relative to existing resources like nuclear power ($29.60). By failing to recognize this simple math, AWEA seems to miss the point of our study.

However, the PTC is not the only subsidy distorting the PPA price for wind power. Wind is the beneficiary of at least five major subsidies:

Federal Production Tax Credit (PTC)
Accelerated depreciation rules
Federal loan guarantees
Renewable Energy Certificates
State and local utility property tax rebates

But don’t take our word for it. These subsidies are well known. In 2010, a White House report written by Larry Summers, Ron Klain, and Carol Browner explained that the subsidies for wind projects are massive. They explained that total government subsidies for the Shepherds Flats wind project totaled $1.2 billion. The total project cost $1.9 billion. When government subsidies cover nearly 60 percent of the value of a project, the sale price loses meaning as a true measure of cost.

And as we highlighted in our report titled The Case Against the Wind Production Tax Credit, which AWEA did not challenge, the Government Accountability Office counted 82 initiatives across nine federal agencies that supported the wind industry. It is disingenuous for AWEA to point to one subsidy and pretend it tells a complete story about the federal support enjoyed by wind power.

Because of the many subsides artificially lowering the PPA price for wind power, PPA prices do not tell an accurate story of the real cost of electricity from wind facilities. EIA estimates of the LCOE of wind power are much more defensible.

EIA notes that “The LCOE values for dispatchable and nondispatchable technologies are listed separately in the tables, because caution should be used when comparing them to one another.” This is because wind is, by its nature, not reliable. The wind doesn’t always blow. In order to make more apples-to-apples comparisons with other sources of generation, we needed to make some adjustments to EIA’s estimates to reflect wind’s unreliability and need for back up when the wind isn’t blowing.

To EIA’s baseline data, we added in the costs imposed by unreliable wind electricity on other resources—we call these “imposed costs.” Because wind is unreliable, it imposes very real and significant costs on other sources of electricity generation and the power grid. With a more complete picture of the cost of wind power, we estimate that the LCOE for wind is $106.80.

AWEA Claim #3: “Imposed Costs are actually ‘sunk costs.’”

False. By definition, sunk costs are already incurred and hence unavoidable. In contrast to sunk costs, the imposed costs we calculate in our study not only apply to existing generation resources but also new resources. The costs are ongoing and avoidable. In fact, the way we calculated imposed costs ties directly to the most relevant comparison of ongoing—not sunk!—costs in the electricity industry: the pairing of new wind facilities with new combined cycle gas plants. On this point, AWEA fails basic economics.

What are the “imposed costs” of wind? Notably, wind is the only intermittent resource in our study. One implication of wind power’s intermittency is that it has a parasitic effect on the rest of the generation fleet, which has to back down its output—which is controllable or “dispatchable”—in lockstep with any increase in wind generation. By displacing the energy from other generation resources without replacing their capacity to the same extent, wind imposes costs on the dispatchable fleet and raises the LCOE for dispatchable resources.

In the chart below, the dark blue areas represent the “cutting in” effect of wind power on the power grid. The gas plant’s output (light blue) represents the non-wind resources on the power grid, which are forced to back down in order to accommodate the unreliable wind output (dark blue). Our estimate of “imposed costs” shows how this parasitic effect increases the LCOE for non-wind resources using natural gas plants as a proxy.

In our calculation of the imposed cost of wind, we used new combined cycle natural gas output as a proxy for the mix of generation wind might displace. Specifically, we applied the fixed costs of new combined cycle gas at two different capacity factors—best case and fleet average—to estimate the effect on each of intermittent wind generation. This is a reasonable and fair choice for the example because: 1) new combined cycle gas is the most common dispatchable technology being built today, and 2) new combined cycle gas units have the lowest fixed cost per MWh of all new dispatchable generation technologies. If wind displaced resources with higher fixed cost, imposed cost would be higher.

Using conservative estimates, we find that the “imposed cost” of wind power on the dispatchable fleet is between $15.87 and $29.94 per MWh. These costs are in no way “sunk.”

AWEA Claim #4: “EIA’s method shows that a MWh of wind energy has an average economic value of $64.60/MWh, much higher than the current cost of wind energy of under $50/MWh, indicating wind energy provides net benefits for consumers.”

False. Just dead wrong. At this point in the “critique,” AWEA’s sleight of hand reaches new levels.

Even if you agree that the EIA estimate above ($64.60/MWh) reflects the real economic value of wind to the power grid, AWEA’s claim that electricity from wind only costs $50/MWh has no basis in reality. As we explained above, AWEA’s estimate ignores the dozens of subsidies that wind receives in addition to the wind production tax credit.

If AWEA had used EIA data to calculate the “net benefits” of wind power, it would have subtracted EIA’s cost estimate of $73.60/MWh from EIA’s “benefit” estimate of $64.60/MWh to come up with negative $9/MWh. The results only get worse when we adjust the EIA estimates to reflect the imposed costs highlighted above. Using our own updated cost estimate of $106.80/MWh for wind and EIA’s “benefit” estimate, we would have to conclude that wind power falls woefully short in a cost-benefit test—net benefits would be negative $42.20/MWh.

Conclusion

Our study on the cost of electricity from the existing generation fleet is a data-driven analysis of the economics of the power grid. AWEA’s characterization of the study as “a new attack piece” against the wind industry is unfounded—unless AWEA perceives reality as an attack on the wind industry. The fact is, shutting down existing power plants before the end of their economic lives is an incredibly expensive thing to do and, as a result, will increase the cost of electricity. That is true whether the replacement technology is wind, natural gas, or any other new resource.

AWEA’s misinformation surrounding IER’s work is nothing new. As with previous critiques of IER reports, AWEA’s rebuttal to “The Levelized Cost of Electricity from Existing Generation Resources” fails to identify any problems with our paper while exposing AWEA’s own flawed analysis.
Institute for Energy Research

Wind Turbines, are Bird Blenders. Killing Birds and Bats, with Impunity!

August 6, 2015 / 1957chev / 1 Comment

Wind Farms: ‘Blending’ ‘Green’ Dreams with Wholesale Avian Slaughter

August 6, 2015 by stopthesethings 1 Comment

***

The rampant slaughter of millions of birds and bats – including rare, endangered and majestic species, like America’s iconic bald and golden eagles – is one of the many ‘inconvenient’ facts that moves the wind industry to lie like fury and – when the corpses can no longer be hidden and the lying fails – to issue court proceedings to literally bury those facts (see our post here).

But – in America, at least – it seemed that the ‘inconvenient’ facts were starting to catch up with a vengeance, with US authorities finally doing their jobs, punishing wind power outfits for what is nothing less than thepointless slaughter of thousands of rare, endangered and, what should be, protected birds:

US Wind Power Outfit Whacked with $2.5 million Fine for Rampant Golden Eagle Slaughter

The avian victims of these things in the US, include its National Icon, the bald eagle which – despite their revered status – get sliced, diced and dumped at the bases of turbines in the same unceremonious manner as other less-loved species (see this article). And also include a mounting pile of golden eagle corpses.

****

Wherever these things operate, majestic raptors cop a merciless belting: 3MW monsters with 50m blades, have outer tips thundering along at over 350km/h – which tend to make short work of an eagle on the hunt for prey:

Bird Carcass Count proves AGL’s Macarthur Wind Farm is an Avian Slaughterhouse

However, in the US, as the corpses and fines mount up, wind power outfits are looking to slip the noose, by … you guessed it … rewriting the rules.

Sorry, Bald Eagles: Wind Farms Are Allowed to Kill You Now
The Corner
Verinique De Rugy
27 June 2015

If you and I kill a bald eagle or disturb its nest, the consequences can be severe. Under the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, the felony killing of a bald eagle is punished by a fine of $250,000 and prison time. The authorities are taking the killing seriously. Well, sort of.

As it turns out, not everyone is equal under the do-not-kill-bald-eagles law. If you happen to be a favored industry like say, a wind farm, you could get a get-out-of-jail-free card after killing up to five bald eagles if you request a permit and the feds grants it. The Associated Press reports:

A California wind farm will become the first in the U.S. to avoid prosecution if eagles are injured or die when they run into the giant turning blades, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Thursday. Under President Barack Obama, wind energy has exploded as a pollution-free energy source that can help reduce the greenhouse gases blamed for global warming. But it is not without opposition from wildlife advocates. The Shiloh IV Wind Project LLC will receive a special permit allowing up to five golden eagles to be accidentally killed, harmed or disturbed over five years. Previously, such a violation could potentially draw criminal charges and discourage private investment in wind farms, which are known for catching birds in their rotors.

Fish and Wildlife Service Director Daniel Ashe said the permit encourages development of renewable energy while requiring the wind company to take steps to protect eagles from turbines and power lines. The move will help California reach its goal of producing one-third of its energy from renewable sources by 2020, he said.

“We can’t solve the problem of eagle mortality at wind farms overnight,” Mr. Ashe said in a statement. The Federal government is being sued over the permits, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. Bald eagles watch out, turns out, you are not that special after all. That’s a lesson some 888,000 bats and 573,000 birds had to learn back in 2012.

The Federal government is being sued over the permits, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. Bald eagles watch out, turns out, you are not that special after all. That’s a lesson some 888,000 bats and 573,000 birds had to learn back in 2012.
The Corner

***

It’s not just raptors that cop a flogging, migratory species are also sliced and diced too – at least you can’t pin the wind industry for being ‘speciest’.

Chaplin, Saskatchewan, is an area with a large salt lake and is also peppered with a number of smaller lakes and wetlands. The brine shrimp that inhabit the salt lakes, attract thousands of migratory birds that turn up to feast on their way North in the summer and South in the winter:see this CBC News report here.

But the weary travellers’ desire to fatten up on their journeys is going to come with a mortal risk, with plans to install 77 giant bird blenders smack in the middle of the lake and wetland complex.

Naturalist opposes wind turbine system in bird sanctuary; 77 wind turbines proposed for bird sanctuary near Chaplin, Sask.
CBC News
29 July 2015

***

A Saskatchewan-based naturalist and author is worried that migratory birds will be killed by wind turbines proposed to be built near Chaplin, Sask. The proposed development site sits approximately three kilometres north of an internationally recognized bird sanctuary at Chaplin Lake. “The Chaplin Lake area is crucial to several species of shore birds, including some endangered species such as the piping plover,” said Trevor Herriot, who’s based in Regina.

Herriot said he’s unconvinced by assertions in an environmental impact study that 77 wind turbines built north of the Chaplin Lake reserve will pose a low risk to the migratory birds passing north through the area. Ontario-based Algonquin Power Company won SaskPower’s request for proposals to develop and build the wind turbine system. Algonquin is a subsidiary of Windlectric Inc. SaskPower estimates the turbine system will generate an additional 175 megawatts of wind power for the province’s power grid. The project is expected to be finished by the end of 2016.

“There are hundreds of thousands of birds who will pass north of that lake every year, and they will go directly through this gauntlet of 77 wind turbines,” Herriot said. He noted that four per cent of the global population of piping plovers nest there. Other well-known shorebirds, like the sanderling, pass through the area at counts of 50,000 or 60,000 each spring, he said.

In a blog post, referring to the “terms of reference for environmental impact statement” drafted by the engineering firm Stantec, Herriot notes the environmental impact statement was paid for by Algonquin. In an interview on CBC Saskatchewan’s the Morning Edition, Brady Pollock, director of environmental assessment for the province, responded to the potential conflict of interest by Algonquin paying Stantec for the environmental study about land it seeks to build wind turbines on.

***

“This is simply the process. The proponent prepares the document and then it undergoes a rigorous and thorough review by government itself. So it really is an independent, arms-length review of information provided by the proponent,” Pollock said.

Pollock said the process is independent, because the government conducts an independent analysis. “It considers all available information, whether it’s info provided directly in the environmental statement [provided by Algonquin] or various literature sources out there, or previous experiences at our own available data on the existing site,” Pollock said. Once the review is complete, analytical findings based on that review will be made available to the public, along with the environmental impact statement, Pollock said.

For his part, Herriot said he’s not opposed to wind turbine systems for generating power. He does, however, disagree with the proposed location for Algonquin’s system. “It’s one of the birdiest spots on the Great Plains and here we are putting a wind turbine there,” he said. “They’re saying there are very few birds that use the area or move through it. I’d like to see how many days of research they did that. And I’d like to see them take that information to a bird scientist at a university who is independent, and see whether it has any rigor or validity,” Herriot said.

CBC News

For a little taste of what so-called “green” power is all about, we’ve put together this little collection of videos:

Eagle carcass counting in Norway

A flock of partridges try to fly through a wind turbine facility in Germany

Then there are the flocks of vultures crossing the Gibraltar strait.

Eagles maimed and killed in California

The fastest in flight – a white-throated needletail – downed in front of bird watchers in the Hebrides, off the coast of Scotland.

A vulture meets with a wind turbine in Lentas, south Crete, Greece.

In this satirical piece – we learn that wind turbines help us to clear the skies of pesky birds

And this review of environmental harm to birds and bats by wind turbines.

Some People Are Very Slow to see the Truth! Wind Energy is USELESS!

August 5, 2015 / 1957chev / Leave a comment

‘Silly’ Sarah Henderson joins ‘Disappointing’ Dan Tehan, as another ‘Green’ in Conservative Clothing

August 5, 2015 by stopthesethings

****

In recent weeks, with the wind industry copping it from all sides, the battle lines have been drawn, with politicians choosing sides. Although, not always the side one might expect. Old guard Labor men – like Gary Johns have rumbled the fraud:

The Wind Industry’s “Fossil-Fuel-Free” Fantasy Scotched

And the PM, Tony Abbott – as a Liberal should be – is no lover of “these things”; and, true to his Conservative roots, is on record as being keen to further R.E.D.U.C.E the staggering LRET subsidy paid to wind power outfits:

Australia’s PM – Tony Abbott – Out to STOP THESE THINGS

Among his team of Liberals and Nationals, there are plenty who get it; and who are quick to call out the greatest economic and environmental fraud of all time – such as Craig Kelly, Keith Pitt, Angus Taylor, Matt Canavan and Chris Back:

STT Champions in Coalition Ranks – Craig Kelly & Keith Pitt – Turn on $46 Billion LRET Debacle

The Wind Industry’s Worst Nightmare – Angus Taylor – says: time to kill the LRET

Senator Matt Canavan: Australia’s RET Policy: “Robin Hood visits Bizarro World”

Chris Back meets Alan Jones & Graham Richardson on Sky News

However, lurking amongst Conservative ranks are a handful of characters, whose recent wailings about the inevitable demise of the wind industry, sound more like the kind of hysterics we’ve come to expect from the lunatics that front up for the Australian Greens.

Separating what comes out of Environment Minister, young Gregory Hunt’s office from the 100% renewable-rantings of Christine Milne or Bill Shorten’s 50% flight of fan-tasy – and their endless tirades about the wonders of wind power – is like trying to pick fly shit out of pepper while wearing boxing gloves:

Australian Wind Industry’s ‘Armageddon’: PM Chops Public Finance for Wind Power

Having a pair of wind industry plants as his advisers, doesn’t help Greg come to grips with the most expensive and pointless policy ever designed. And, barely visible Liberal back-bencher, Dan Tehan suffers from the same lack of common sense and knowledge of basic economics – ‘attributes’ that would qualify him perfectly for Greens pre-selection:

Disappointing Dan: Liberal MP becomes Wind Industry Spruiker

Adding to the list of “Greens” in Conservative clothing is Victorian ‘Liberal’, Sarah Henderson – who in the last few weeks has been out helping to salvage the great wind power fraud with a zeal that would make Christine Milne proud.

****

Greg Hunt, Dan Tehan and Sarah Henderson all seem to believe (and publicly claim) that the cost of the massive subsidies directed to wind power outfits under the LRET is magically picked up by fairies and pixies; and that the policy is a no-cost, family and business friendly vote winner. And these policy lightweights also seem to think that treating the honest, hard-working country people, who have to suffer these things, with high-handed contempt will earn them a badge of “green” honour. Contempt for power consumers of all shades is a given – hell, why not simply follow the Green power model and condemn your constituents to freezing or boiling in the dark:

Victoria’s Wind Rush sees 34,000 Households Chopped from the Power Grid

Casualties of South Australia’s Wind Power Debacle Mount: Thousands Can’t Afford Power

As STT followers are well aware, the mandatory Large-Scale Renewable Energy Target (LRET) and the Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) issued to wind power generators under it amount to a Federal Tax on all Australian power consumers. The value of the REC Tax is then transferred to wind power outfits – like Union Super Fund backed, Pacific Hydro. Under Greg Hunt’s current formula, the REC Tax/Subsidy will add $45 billion to power bills from hereon.

As a direct consequence of the Federal government’s LRET policy, Pac Hydro speared 29 of these things into the heart of the peaceful Victorian coastal community of Cape Bridgewater back in 2008: no LRET, no RECs, no wind farm – pure and simple.

Pac Hydro’s Cape Bridgewater wind farm does not – and will never – comply with the noise conditions of its planning permit. The Victorian government are well aware of that fact but – in a form of malign acquiescence – aid and abet the offender, by doing nothing.

Some time ago, Sonia Trist – one of Pac Hydro’s numerous Cape Bridgewater victims – decided her ability to sleep and be healthy was more important than staying in her beautiful seaside home. Sonia’s decision to vacate it was made for no other reason than to escape the incessant low-frequency noise and infrasound generated by Pac Hydro’s turbines – and the impact that noise has on her ability to sleep, to use and enjoy her (otherwise) perfectly comfortable home.

Here is Sonia talking a while back about the merciless nature of the noise generated by Pac Hydro’s non-compliant wind farm.

****

Now, Sonia has launched into ‘Silly’ Sarah Henderson for running a line that the Clean Energy Finance Corporation – a Green/Labor renewables slush fund – should keep throwing $millions at losers like Pac Hydro – despite her own party’s direction to the contrary.

Subject: CEFC comment on ABC radio national Monday 27/07.

Sarah Henderson, I woke this morning to hear you speaking with Fran Kelly on ABC National Radio.Over the past 6/7 years, living closeby wind turbines, I have learned to listen intently, on hearing mention of renewable energy. In particular wind energy, and matters concerning proposals, commissioning, operations and machinations of this careless industry.

Many people I know listen for any item of news which might bring a ray of hope to our domestic circumstances, living and working as we do, in the all pervasive shadow of the wind industry.

My personal definition of closeby is 620 metres from the kitchen area of my home at Cape Bridgewater.

A very old cypress tree on my fence line, partially shields me, visually, from the revolutions of Pacific Hydro’s number three turbine. Further to the right of the tree I can see five 110m high turbines, each under a kilometre from the kitchen window. 29 wind generators in total, constitute Pacific Hydro’s Cape Bridgewater energy facility. All visible on the approach to my home.

Proximity, and the sanctioning of this proximity, is culpable.

For some reason, known only to themselves and speculated on by others, Pacific Hydro agreed, and negotiated with Steven Cooper, to participate with six residents, of whom I was one, in acoustic testing for a period of eight weeks mid 2014. Pacific Hydro’s acknowledged plan was to ‘restore our lives to those we had had prior to the wind farm.’

Just why this was undergone, only to be reneged upon so brutally by CEO Lane Crockett, at the public presentation of the Cooper Report in PORTLAND in February this year, is beyond words. The company’s reasons can only be suspect.

Now Pacific Hydro’s complaints service has been thoroughly degraded. The 24 hour complaints phone line can ring out when we phone to complain of grotesque noises emanating from the turbines at midnight and the early hours of morning.

Recently we recorded a previously unheard noise from the turbine behind our house. This was sent to Pacific Hydro, only to be asked by them in a brusque, accusatory email, what equipment we had used to capture the noise, alleging falsification.

The family member who resides here with me, has professional photographic and recording equipment and has no need to tamper with the recording process, having been woken by the noise, and not being able to ‘get through’ on the 24 hour complaints service.

I am tired. I did not plan to spend precious years in “the pervasive shadow of this careless wind industry.” It is a nightmare situation, and seems to intensify each time we seek to resolve it.

I simply ask you, why? Why do you want us to cradle this industry, which has already been overfed by subsidies, pampered to our destruction, exposing the wilful emanations of the industry’s influence and power play.

If this industry is so mature, dependable and productive, why does it need to bleed our coffers?

We know the reason and so do you, if you reflect on the process in an informed way.

Wind turbines are not the ‘be all’ of renewables. They can never be, whilst dependent on gas and coal fired back up, intermittent wind, causing health issues of various symptoms, harmful sleep deprivation, anxiety attacks. The effects roll on. The pressure fluctuations in my home last evening caused punchy ear and head aches and breathlessness. Infrasound … well known by the industry for years and years.

Be humanely professional. Let your informed coalition colleagues get on with the job of directing the financing of innovative and reliable renewables. The CEFC was set up for precisely that reason.

In a fragmented world let’s be caring adults. Divisive commentary concerning your Party, to a media saturated in pro-wind propaganda, belatedly destabilising Senator Mathias Cormann’s progress in putting the CEFC back on track, is exceedingly questionable.

It exposes an insensitivity to afflicted residents, struggling to maintain some balance, in conditions knowingly imposed upon them, which suspend and threaten their productivity and lives, in uninhabitable and unsaleable homes.

Loyalty to your electorate and considered respect for your political advocacy, should be paramount.

Why was your position on this matter not discussed within the party at the appropriate time? What is your disruptive agenda?

You have recreated doubt in the minds of people, struggling to understand how they can survive a parliamentary process which permits an out of control industry to control that very process, just when they had taken a breath at the realigning of process by Senator Mathias Cormann and colleagues in the Coalition, regarding the CEFC.

Why?

Sincerely,

Sonia Trist
Corkhill
Cape Bridgewater
Victoria

To give some idea of what Pac Hydro has done to destroy the lives of those – like Sonia – trying to live at Cape Bridgewater, cop an earful of this:

****

The “screech” heard in the video is a “special” feature that was added in 2011 to the “Psychopath’s Symphony” that Pac Hydro has faithfully rendered, whenever the wind is blowing, since 2008 (see our post here). In the result, a law-abiding Australian citizen is driven from her own home.

The offender was only placed in the position to ruin Sonia Trist’s life (andmany other citizens’ lives) by virtue of a perverse Federal government industry subsidy scheme, that has added $billions to power consumers’ bills – lining the pockets of outfits like Pac Hydro – and which has done nothing at all to reduce CO2 emissions in the electricity sector (its stated aim).

In substance, the mandatory LRET/REC scheme is financing outfits like Pac Hydro to take peoples’ homes (some 40, so far) without paying any valuable consideration – or, in simpler terms again, Pac Hydro and other wind power outfits are literally stealing Australian citizens’ homes with Commonwealth government assistance (see our post here). Call us old fashioned, but in STT’s view there’s something very wrong with that picture.

The fact that so-called Conservatives, like Greg Hunt, Dan Tehan and Sarah Henderson have chosen to side with the offenders is nothing short of a disgrace.

	How The Climate Grif… on There is NO Global Warming…
	Bob Bateman on Government-Induced Climaphobia…
	William Hooi on Germany’s Renewable Energy Dis…
	Jessica on Issues for Landowners to Consi…
	Raymond on Poorest Families Left Powerles…

"Mothers Against Wind Turbines™" Phoenix Rising…

Children Deserve Protection!

energy costs

The Wind Scam in Germany, (and elsewhere), Keeps on Getting Worse….

Germany’s Wind Power Surges Plunge Their Neighbours Into Darkness

The Wind Scam Proves to be a Huge Waste of Money!

Germans Spend 100s of €Billions on their “Energiewende” & Get Only 3% of their Power in Return

Aussies Fighting Back Against the Irresponsible Wind Industry!

An extract from the Senate Select Committee on Wind Turbines Final Report

Professor Chapman and his critics

Those Brilliant Aussies, Have Recommended Safeguards Against the Windscam!

Australian Senate’s Recommendations to Curb the Wind Industry – Driven by Common Sense & Compassion

One Man’s Tale, About the “Renewables Scheme”, and the Ultimate Consequences…

A Simple Tale About Switching To Renewable Power: Requirements & Consequences.

The Insanity of Wind Energy…Just ask Southern Australians. It’s Killing their Economy!

South Australia’s Unbridled Wind Power Insanity: Wind Power Collapses see Spot Prices Rocket from $70 to $13,800 per MWh

Wind Weasels in Scotland, are Being Sent Packing! Way to Go, Scots!!

Scots Rejoice as Highland Fan Plan Canned & Wind Power Jobs Myth Exposed

Windpushers Lie About the Cost of Producing Wind Energy!

US Wind Power Spruikers – AWEA – Caught Lying About Wind Power Costs

Wind Turbines, are Bird Blenders. Killing Birds and Bats, with Impunity!

Wind Farms: ‘Blending’ ‘Green’ Dreams with Wholesale Avian Slaughter

Some People Are Very Slow to see the Truth! Wind Energy is USELESS!

‘Silly’ Sarah Henderson joins ‘Disappointing’ Dan Tehan, as another ‘Green’ in Conservative Clothing