According to the Daily Telegraph, Dec 21, The British Wind Energy Association, (BWEA ) the wind farm industry lobby group, has been “forced to admit that the environmental benefit of wind power in reducing carbon emissions is only half as big as it had previously claimed”. This is because it used a carbon emission figure […]
Read MoreNew Titanic Disaster Discovery Points Way To Solving Global Warming And Fossil Fuel Shortages
Jodrell Bank radio telescope discovers faint radio echoes of last broadcasts from doomed ocean liner Titanic. World learns of hitherto unknown triumph of economic thinking with striking lessons for how to deal with global warming and predicted energy shortages! (Also see http://tx1.fcomet.com/~claverto/cms/professor-lowed-notes-similarity-between-birkenhead-disaster-and-complex-systems-such-as-politics-globalisasion-and-economics-the-banking-crisis-perhaps.html) By: Brendan “Lunchtime” O’Toady * Images courtesy Wikipedia. It is well […]
Read MoreNew fusion approach at Lawrence Livermore – "artificial star"
“Scientists plan to ignite tiny man-made star. It is science’s star experiment: an attempt to create an artificial sun on earth — and provide an answer to the world’s impending energy shortage”……..
….drools the headline of Telegraph Science Correspondent, Richard Gray’s article article – 27 Dec 2008
A cynic would say this is part of the ongoing “distraction robbery” being carried out by the energy and motor industry – “don’t worry – we’ll sort out the energy problem (we’ve got various wheezes up our sleeves – fusion, fuel cells, hydrogen just around the corner) meantime keep shelling out on far more of the stuff than you would need if the governments and / or us, the energy utilities funded the already existing and far more cost effective energy conservation schemes, or invested in already available and proven renewable energy schemes such as wind energy along with further grid interconnections, and more high efficiency local CHP/DH schemes.
Read MoreBlackouts could hit Britain by 2015, says National Grid chief
Reported in The Daily Telegraph by Jon Swaine 22 Dec 2008, Steve Holliday, National Grid chief executive, said that Britain faces a severe shortage in power generation due to crumbling coal and nuclear plants being taken out of service and that the Government needs to cause the investment of Pounds 100 billion in new power plant.
This is the legacy of the deluded economic “thinking” of the Thatcher era which instituted the not widely admired market for electricity which was supposed to use market signals of supply and demand to cause an optimal delivery of the cheapest sources of power.
Read More100% carbon reduction possible with wind power, vehicle to grid and interconnection.
Review of solutions to global warming, air pollution, and energy security
Mark Z. Jacobson is Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Director of the Atmosphere/Energy Program at Stanford University. and has amongst his qualifications a B.S. in Civil Engineering and a B.A. in Economics.
With Jacobson’s credentials, and the fact that this is a peer reviewed journal, the paper has to be taken seriously. He indicates that wind powered battery electric vehicles not only offer the most reduction in CO2 compared to other options, but is also better than the other options when other environmental impacts are considered. CCS is a poor option, and corn to ethanol or cellulosic ethanol are very bad indeed.
He notes, that as does Claverton, that the intermittency effects can be dealt with using a combination of geographic dispersal, demand management, storage, use of vehicle to grid, and weather forecasting.
Danish Wind Power and Electricity Export in 2007
By Paul Frederik-Bach, ex Director Danish Western Power Grid.
Denmark is considered to be a frontrunner in the use of wind power. In 2007 the generation of wind energy in west Denmark was 5.6 TWh or 26 % of the electricity consumption.
In east Denmark 1.6 TWh wind energy was generated, which is 11 % of the electricity consumption.
The normal interpretation is that 20
Read MoreOptimal central power station back up for wind – what is Claverton view?
The old power-station retention concept does require a lot of maintenance work to keep them open.
Long start up times are also an issue particularly if the turbine and the whole of the steam system is cold.
In comparison the engine based local CHP option can operate happily with minimal maintenance and with remote unmanned start up and operation.
The benefits from wind are clear they replace fossil fuel but are not effective as replacement capacity unless linked to a sufficiently large area of the world to ensure some wind all the time.
Read MoreThe NASA Climate Scientist James Hansen – urgent warning
The NASA Climate Scientist James Hansen and an international team of researchers have very recently completed a paper for the Open Atmospheric Science Journal, concerning an in-depth analysis of Climate history at the Earth’s Polar regions, relating it to today’s warming conditions.
Published on 7th November 2008, the peer-reviewed research paper shows, by careful calculations on proxy data for the very distant past, that we should expect high Climate Sensitivity, the warming signal of the Earth in response to Greenhouse Gas accumulation above ground.
The team looked at the relative changes in Carbon Dioxide concentrations in the Earth’s atmosphere and showed that the rate of change showed strong negative “radiative forcing” clearly associated with the formation of the polar ice caps, and used that as a basis for calculating the Climate Sensitivity.
Read MoreNews Flash – HVDC European super grid meeting in London
A meeting of French government representatives and energy and financial experts occurred on Oct 30th in London at which a plan for the construction of an HVDC link to bring power from renewables sites in North Africa to Europe was discussed. It was not clear exactly what the French plans and motives were, although it […]
Read MoreWhat is Microgeneration? And what is the most cost effective in terms of CO2 reduction
© Jeremy Harrison:
The UK Government definition of Microgeneration[1] applies to a rather surprising mix of heat and power generating technologies with a thermal output below 45kWt or an electrical output of 50kWe. It covers electrical generation from wind, solar photovoltaics (PV) and hydro, and heat generation from biomass, solar thermal and heat pumps as well as micro CHP which produces heat and power from renewable or fossil fuels. It is not just another term for small scale renewables, but comprises a portfolio of low carbon technologies.
There has been a tendency amongst advocates[2] and sceptics[3] alike to lump all Microgeneration technologies together, either as “all good” or “all bad”. This is particularly unhelpful when attempting to understand the potential contribution Microgeneration can make to UK energy strategy and it is important that we understand the particular characteristics and potential role of each technology.
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