A terrible case of wind !

Applescruffs

Applescruffs

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OK...... let's get this out of the way...........I hate Wind Farms.......if for nothing else then just for the look of the things.

They have completely blighted my 'offshore sailing experience'....that is,

I just don't like the look of 'em.......

I used to sail around the coast lost in isolation....far away from Mans inumanity to Man......at one with nature..etc...

But now......on the East Coast and Thames Estuary the mass of windmills has really has ruined my 'escapist' yearnings.

I have read that that the wind farm off Clacton produces enough electricity to power the aforementioned town and most of the surrounding district......

So.........as I motored past the array on my way back to Maldon last Sunday. in a dead calm, I felt a slight tinge of sorrow as I thought of all those spoiled Sunday lunches that failed to cook.....

Anyway......

I just don't like looking at 'em.

Thoughts??
 
Applescruffs said:
OK...... let's get this out of the way...........I hate Wind Farms.......if for nothing else then just for the look of the things.

They have completely blighted my 'offshore sailing experience'....that is,

I just don't like the look of 'em.......

I used to sail around the coast lost in isolation....far away from Mans inumanity to Man......at one with nature..etc...

But now......on the East Coast and Thames Estuary the mass of windmills has really has ruined my 'escapist' yearnings.

I have read that that the wind farm off Clacton produces enough electricity to power the aforementioned town and most of the surrounding district......

So.........as I motored past the array on my way back to Maldon last Sunday. in a dead calm, I felt a slight tinge of sorrow as I thought of all those spoiled Sunday lunches that failed to cook.....

Anyway......

I just don't like looking at 'em.

Thoughts??
Click to expand...

Fully agree
 
Getting the wind up

Lovely objects d'art.
Sailing past the huge array off the Arklow bank in strong winds I have marvelled at how attractive they look - not generating electricity of course because it is too windy, and then again motoring past in dead calms they are not generating because there is not enough wind..........
At least lots of jobs are created manufacturing them......... abroad :eek:

Robin
Pleiades of Birdham
MXWQ5
 
Interesting point, that...about how often wind turbines are not turning, not producing power, not paying for themselves...

...now, suppose those turbines, elegant or execrable, were based in deep water, where they'd turn in the tide, not the wind...

...so, totally predictable schedules of power-generation could be based on the tide-tables, and they'd turn 23hrs per day...

...plus, they wouldn't be spoiling anyone's view!

I wonder if wind-turbines' high-visibility is the politicians' real reason why wind power has investment-precedence over tide? :rolleyes:
 
centaur1 said:
Don,t like them either and they certainly spoil the view, but ain,t they better than burning more fossil fuel or God forbid, more nuclear. :eek:
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If you didn't need the fossil or nuclear capacity for when the wind doesn't blow, yes.

Like it or not, I'm afraid that nuclear power is the only way we can expect to have a stable power supply for the foreseeable future. Long-term, I expect fusion to take over from fission.
 
The movement against inshore windfarms has been called:

"The greatest outpouring of popular revulsion against Government policy since the Second World War"

At last our leaders seem feeling the draught, still we will be saddled with forking out the subsidy for the next 25 years. I hope the greedy sods that put them up get saddled with the bill for taking them down.
 
better at sea

I think that they are better at sea than on the land

I like to see those sea based jobs they have created

blown new life into Wells

and we have to get our energy from somewhere

I heard a bloke on the radio poo pooing the invention for turning hyrdogen and co2 in petrol - he said that it would never work because you have to put twice as much energy into building the chemeical bonds as you get out when you burn the petrol

not a bad deal if you ask me - and I assume that the technology would get better

imagine if you could have a turbine on your roof or your boat or even on your car that would connect to a briefcase sized device that slowly dripped petrol or even diesel into your tank

Dylan



Dylan
 
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Out of a blue sky...

...does anybody know what process FRACKING refers to? I thought it was what we used to do with beer in the pub after work...

...at least, we always felt totally fracked in the morning.
 
dancrane said:
Interesting point, that...about how often wind turbines are not turning, not producing power, not paying for themselves...

...now, suppose those turbines, elegant or execrable, were based in deep water, where they'd turn in the tide, not the wind...

...so, totally predictable schedules of power-generation could be based on the tide-tables, and they'd turn 23hrs per day...

...plus, they wouldn't be spoiling anyone's view!

I wonder if wind-turbines' high-visibility is the politicians' real reason why wind power has investment-precedence over tide? :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Not enough back handers have been paid.

Anyway when has a government ever done what the people what?
 
centaur1 said:
Don,t like them either and they certainly spoil the view, but ain,t they better than burning more fossil fuel or God forbid, more nuclear. :eek:
Click to expand...

Why "god forbid"?

Coal power emits more radiation to the environment than nuclear power does, and has killed and injured vastly more people over the years.

Pete
 
prv said:
Coal power emits more radiation to the environment than nuclear power does, and has killed and injured vastly more people over the years.

Pete
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Funny, how the government - regardless of left/right inclination over sixty years, seems never to have made the same argument.

They seem to have just settled with public fear over nuclear options after Windscale, etc, and enjoyed the capital which didn't have to be poured into nuclear, because of joe-public's untutored fears.

Saw great plumes of water-vapour rising above the clouds when flying over France recently; a fellow passenger said it was emitting from a nuclear plant. I believe France took the "why not?" approach to nuclear, years ago...so if it wasn't safe, the UK would suffer anyway.

As France is likewise spattered with wind turbines, it's an odd concern for PR, when they're so commited to nuclear.

I still want to see (or at least believe) that tidal movement under the sea is being used to benefit to us. I can't see why it wasn't adopted straight away, as an obvious boon. Is it not obvious?
 
dancrane said:
...does anybody know what process FRACKING refers to?
Click to expand...

Yes.

It turns out that there are a lot of rocks which have gas trapped within them. As in, a lot, way more than was ever in pockets under the North Sea. Makes sense, as rock is generally fairly impermeable stuff, so the number of places where you can drill a small hole and have loads of gas flow out are relatively small compared to the places where gas is there but it's all bound up with the rock.

So what you do, is to drill a hole just like a conventional oil or gas well, but before connecting it up to the nation's cookers you fill it full of water and then use big pumps to pressurise that water. This causes lots of small cracks - fractures, hence the name - throughout the rock around the bottom of the well. Then you suck the water out again, and you find that the gas can flow through your fractures and up the pipe. From then on it's just like any other gas well.

Sadly, a lot of people who don't really know much about the subject, fuelled by some shady youtube videos and the faintly-ominous-sounding geologists' slang name for the process - have been jumping up and down trying to prevent it. With the current net result that we're instead burning dirty coal for electricity and buying the gas for our central heating from Russia.

Pete
 
prv said:
Yes.

It turns out that there are a lot of rocks which have gas trapped within them. As in, a lot, way more than was ever in pockets under the North Sea. Makes sense, as rock is generally fairly impermeable stuff, so the number of places where you can drill a small hole and have loads of gas flow out are relatively small compared to the places where gas is there but it's all bound up with the rock.

So what you do, is to drill a hole just like a conventional oil or gas well, but before connecting it up to the nation's cookers you fill it full of water and then use big pumps to pressurise that water. This causes lots of small cracks - fractures, hence the name - throughout the rock around the bottom of the well. Then you suck the water out again, and you find that the gas can flow through your fractures and up the pipe. From then on it's just like any other gas well.

Sadly, a lot of people who don't really know much about the subject, fuelled by some shady youtube videos and the faintly-ominous-sounding geologists' slang name for the process - have been jumping up and down trying to prevent it. With the current net result that we're instead burning dirty coal for electricity and buying the gas for our central heating from Russia.

Pete
Click to expand...

Very clear, thank you. Why can't 'experts' on the TV explain things so well?

What reason could the shady types have, for disapproving of such a solution?
 
dancrane said:
What reason could the shady types have, for disapproving of such a solution?
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It's new.

Also it's being pursued by oil companies. There are people out there who believe that oil companies are actively evil, bent on harming people and the environment as an end in itself.

Some who are heavily invested (ideologically as much as financially) in wind and solar power see cheap gas (prices have dropped 75% in the US, who are further ahead in the field than us) as a threat to their pet schemes. Part of their concern is valid in that burning gas will create carbon dioxide - but it's still better than burning coal and pumping gas across the width of Europe as we do now.

The only real downside compared to conventional gas extraction is that the fracturing process does have the potential to cause very small earth tremors, as stresses locked in the rocks are relieved by the formation of the cracks. Obviously it can only happen where such stresses already exist, so it only happens occasionally, not as a matter of course. This happens once as the fracturing is performed, it's not an ongoing situation once the gas is being extracted. There has been (as far as I know) one such case in the UK, and the vibrations that were recorded were less than were being generated in Hyde Park at the same time by a Rihanna (whoever she is) pop concert. But obviously "FRACKING causes EARTHQUAKES!!11!" is powerful propaganda.

Pete
 
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I don't like the sound of it

dancrane said:
Very clear, thank you. Why can't 'experts' on the TV explain things so well?

What reason could the shady types have, for disapproving of such a solution?
Click to expand...



In my experience it is best to not rely on one source for information

I personallly would hate the idea of fracking near where I live

(ditto windfarms - although we have HS2 and an incinerator coming as London sweeps ovr us)

our water supplies come from ground water

I have been in parts of America where they have been fracking

the locals don't like it and feel that it has had a massive impact on their lives - particularly on water quality

Dylan
 
Earthquakes sound like a fearsome overblown scare-story...if indeed the tremors are very tiny. Might future, upscale fracking operations be of much bigger proportions, with more serious quakes as a result?

Long-term water pollution would be a nasty problem, if it is a consequence of fracking.
 
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