
How Windmills as Wide as Jumbo Jets Are Making Clean Energy Mainstream - dankohn1
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/04/23/business/energy-environment/big-windmills.html
======
coryfklein
Selling solar back to the grid has one major problem that, fortunately,
doesn't plague windmill installations: The Duck Curve [1].

The problem is that peak energy usage now occurs _after sunset_. So no matter
how many solar panels you stack on your home, around 6-7 PM the coal, oil, and
gas power plants all have to spin up to their max capacity. Your solar panels
are new less likely to _replace_ a coal power plant, although they do change
how many hours a day it runs.

Unfortunately for the power companies, running a coal power plant for 3 hours
a day costs just about as much as running it for 8 hours a day. This leads to
the power companies naturally feeling rather sour about being forced to credit
residents for the power they supply to the grid during low-demand hours. Their
costs are staying about the same, but now their revenue stream goes down.

In some regions (Utah/Idaho/Colorado is the one I'm aware of) these power
companies are now negotiating with governments for lower and lower solar
credits for these kinds of residents and they're winning because the abundance
of solar power at mid-day is legitimately creating an oversupply, thus making
that energy worth less and less.

I see this causing problems for many of my neighbors, who had solar sales reps
factoring in energy buy-back rates from 2016 into 10-year loans models to pay
for the solar panels. Soon the energy the power companies pay my neighbors is
going to offset their panel loans less and less, which may result in a
reversal of the economics that led to them buying the panels in the first
place.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_curve](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_curve)

~~~
fulafel
When power gets more expensive in the evenings, a lot of
heating/cooling/charging loads may shift in time. Also, hvdc grids let you
transmit over a couple of timezones.

(And wind does not have the problem the first place, obviously)

~~~
ams6110
If possible, but it may only get worse. If EVs become more prevalent, it will
only increase the evening demand as most people will charge when they get home
from work. Sure, maybe with timers you can shift that to midnight or
something, but it's still happening at a time when Solar adds nothing.

You can't just toss out something like HVDC grids as a quick solution. That
kind of infrastructure takes decades to build out.

~~~
fulafel
I'm not sure why you discount charging during the day. Most EVs don't empty
their battery by 6pm and require a full charge at 8am.

~~~
blang
I'm guessing because there is less availability for charging during the day
when you are at work, rather than at night when you are home.

------
nabla9
The interesting question is what effect clean energy has to the usage of
hydrocarbons. Will it bring reduce global demand or just reduce the price of
energy.

The good news is: CO2 emission intensity is going down globally and emissions
per capita in US, China and EU28 are going down.

The bad news are: Emissions per capita are still going up globally, and
hydrocarbon usage and CO2 emissions are breaking records year after year.
[http://folk.uio.no/roberan/img/GCP2017/PNG/s09_FossilFuel_an...](http://folk.uio.no/roberan/img/GCP2017/PNG/s09_FossilFuel_and_Cement_emissions_1990.png)
Economic downturn was the only thing causing temporary decline.

It looks like clean energy reduces the demand in developed countries, thus
reducing the prices of hydrocarbons. It will not reduce the CO2 emissions
globally, it just moves them from the developed world to the developing world.
Maybe it slows down CO2 emission growth rate?

[http://folk.uio.no/roberan/learnmore/more_warning_signs.shtm...](http://folk.uio.no/roberan/learnmore/more_warning_signs.shtml)

\---

EDIT: Just to point out how complex the dynamics between clean energy,
hydrocarbons and policy are, here is nice recent research paper from Acemoglu
and Rafey:

Mirage on the Horizon: Geoengineering and Carbon Taxation Without Commitment
[https://economics.mit.edu/files/14855](https://economics.mit.edu/files/14855)

>Abstract: We show that, in a model without commitment to future policies,
geoengineering breakthroughs can have adverse environmental and welfare
effects because they change the (equilibrium) carbon taxes. In our model,
energy producers emit carbon, which creates a negative environmental
externality, and may decide to switch to cleaner technology. A benevolent
social planner sets carbon taxes without commitment. Higher future carbon
taxes both reduce emissions given technology and encourage energy producers to
switch to cleaner technology. Geoengineering advances, which reduce the
negative environmental effects of the existing stock of carbon, decrease
future carbon taxes and thus discourage private investments in conventional
clean technology. We characterize the conditions under which these advances
diminish—rather than improve—environmental quality and welfare.

~~~
delbel
As a new farmer, this is good news. My target range for CO2 is 1200ppm. This
means our future will be greener!
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkDgYLxp8Sg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkDgYLxp8Sg)

~~~
eropple
You posted a link to a rabbithole of fascist-cheering, bone-stupid
argumentation, and conspiracy theory. Setting aside their fairly obvious
attempts at _political_ astroturfing, the depths to which those people are
lying with regards to AGW to people who lack the scientific literacy to
evaluate the arguments being made is appalling. So are their race-baiting
shithead politics, but this more bluntly--I mean, this is _math_.

I make this post assuming you're not in on it.

------
shaqbert
As the production costs with windpower decrease due to the technological
progress, the question of grid storage and grid interconnection becomes more
pressing.

E.g. in Germany, they frequently have days of negative energy prices, where
producers need to pay to feed energy into the greed because of overproduction
of energy on windy/sunny days [0](in German). Without storage and grid
interconnection, there is only so much renewable energy from intermittent
sources like wind and solar you can handle.

[0]: [https://blog.energybrainpool.com/bereits-103-mal-
in-2017-neg...](https://blog.energybrainpool.com/bereits-103-mal-
in-2017-negative-preise-am-stromspotmarkt/)

~~~
kylegordon
Isn't this where pumped storage and other forms of storage come into play?
Here in Scotland we routinely pump water back up into our lochs in order to
store it for future use.

There's also various news articles reporting on German mines beginning to be
used as pumped storage sites, with a reservoir on the surface, and water
dropping into the mines below when there's sudden demand.

This is a good problem to have, though.

~~~
nmeofthestate
According to Wikipedia we have 15 GWh of pumped storage capacity in Scotland.
Per annum we use 27,000 GWh. So by my calculations we have a pumped storage
battery that lasts about 5 hours.

(NB: I didn't check whether the power output of this battery is enough to
actually meet demand, but wikipedia says it can run at full capacity for 22
hours, so no)

~~~
mattmanser
It can be reused more than once a year. You could use it every day, charge at
night when there's no demand, discharge it during the peak. Really depends on
how fast it can charge and discharge.

~~~
bluGill
Depends more on how variable your supply is. If you have to meet a two week
window with below average wind it isn't enough. If you have to just meet day
to day variation in wind it is probably enough.

Unfortunately two weeks without much wind are common in general weather
patterns. Thus my gut reaction is it isn't enough. However we are now talking
weather where local patterns are the important thing which means each
situation needs to be considered separately.

------
Gravityloss
The title is wrong. One _blade_ is the length of the _wingspan_ of the A380,
80 meters. The _rotor diameter_ is 154 meters.

------
everyone
I like this article. I like that is has nice big pictures and videos, but they
_dont_ do that stupid big 'screenspace' image thing that seems to be popular
in these sorts of articles now.

Also their control centre looks horrible. Wheres all the crap on their desks?
I hope they only just had to tidy it away for the sake of a press photo.

~~~
dmd
The guy on the left appears hard at work looking at an empty Windows desktop.

~~~
loco5niner
Well... at least on one of his 3 screens.

------
dschuetz
I'm sorry, stupid question, but exacly how much power do those big ones
generate? 20 times more than what? This actually most crucial tidbit isn't
even covered in that article, or am I blind?

~~~
boxcardavin
The biggest ones produce over 5 megawatts at peak capacity, I think someone
has built over 10 megawatts but I'm not sure.

5 megawatts is a pretty useless figure for most people to imagine, and I think
imagining it in units of homes-powered isn't great either because we don't
have a sense of the heat or kinetic energy equivalent because our homes are
quiet machines. A 260 horsepower car (think new minivan) at full throttle is
producing about .2 megawatts, so the worlds largest turbines are generating
the same power as 10/.2=20 minivans at full power.

Another way to think of it is in terms of heat. A big stovetop burner will
generate about 3000 watts of heat, so a minivan is like 65 burners at full
blast, and a 10 megawatt turbine is like 3300 burners.

~~~
gascan
But perhaps the most useful might be power-plant-equivalents.

The Stockton Cogeneration Facility near San Fran had a nominal output of 60MW.
Thus, around twelve of these mega-windmills would roughly equal the output of
that coal plant.

~~~
hackerman12345
A large size nuke plant does about 1300 MW nominally (it is initially about
3000 MW thermally but only 35% or so is successfully converted to power for
the grid).

------
indescions_2018
Related story on Bloomberg this morning:

How to Buy a Wind Farm

[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-23/the-
puert...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-23/the-puerto-rico-
family-office-that-bought-a-wind-farm)

------
dmix
Anyone familiar with these "bladeless" wind turbines as an alternative to
large blades?

[http://www.vortexbladeless.com/](http://www.vortexbladeless.com/)

Based on their marketing (far quieter, 40% more energy) it seems like an
interesting option. I know one of the biggest complaints that farmers have is
the noise they cause, so they have to be placed far from houses.

I'm curious to see if it's mostly fluff or has any potential... but I'm not
expert on the subject.

~~~
andbberger
Fluff... dominant factor in potential energy production is area swept out...

------
cesarb
> Lower costs, though, have also made wind power more appealing elsewhere.
> Once mostly concentrated in northern Europe, Mr. Nauen is optimistic that
> new markets will emerge in Asia and the United States.

South America too. In just the last 12 months, installed capacity in Brazil
went from 10.4 GW to 12.5 GW (source: Boletim Mensal de Geração Eólica - ONS).

~~~
adventured
What kind of cost per kwh is Brazil seeing? When the US finally got
consistently below ~$0.10 in the late 1990s, it began to ramp.

[https://i.imgur.com/ehK8jQS.png](https://i.imgur.com/ehK8jQS.png)

~~~
cesarb
According to
[http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/mercado/2017/12/1944853-energia...](http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/mercado/2017/12/1944853-energia-
eolica-e-solar-atingem-patamar-mais-baixo-de-precos-no-brasil.shtml) in the
auctions at the end of 2017 (for new generators to be built) it was around R$
145/MWh for solar and R$ 98/MWh for wind. I don't know where to find the cost
for all currently operating generators.

------
coryfklein
The engaging cinematography on this article really drew me in. Somebody could
write an article about brick laying and if it had the same Nutella-smooth
video I would read the entire thing.

------
cschmidt
I happened to be driving through Indiana this week and saw the biggest wind
farm I'd ever seen. It just went on for ages as we drove. I think it is this
600MW farm: [http://meadowlakewindfarm.com/](http://meadowlakewindfarm.com/)

~~~
adventured
I was pretty amazed to recently read that Iowa is getting ~35-40% of its
electricity from wind energy. They're up over 7,000 MW of capacity (4,000
turbines) now for just three million people.

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that Iowa may have among
the highest wind energy capacity per capita on earth, at 2.2 MW per thousand
people. Denmark, which is perhaps the highest for a nation, is at half that
rate (5,476 MW capacity for 5.7m people).

------
torpfactory
The future of energy is mostly wind, solar, hydro, and nuclear with grid scale
energy storage and long distance HVDC transmission lines. IMHO :)

~~~
konceptz
I’ve always been told that transmission of electricity is hard or inefficient.
What is HVDC and why is it better?

~~~
Robotbeat
High voltage DC. High voltage means it’s more efficient (power dissipation
depends on current, not voltage, so for the same power, higher voltage means
much less dissipation). DC (direct current instead of alternating) makes it
easier to connect disparate grids as you don’t have to worry about phasing.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Also, I recall reading that if you run undersea cables with AC, the sea water
sucks out energy from them.

~~~
gehsty
Can’t tell if trolling or not.

The cables have water barriers so the conductors + insulation remain quite
dry.

~~~
Analemma_
I believe the parent meant that the alternating current creates an electric
field which is then absorbed by the water, leading to energy loss. This
happens to some extent to all AC transmission, but I don't know enough to say
if seawater+AC is a particularly bad combination. It would make sense though,
because it's more conductive.

EDIT: brandmeyer's comment explains it well:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16903431](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16903431)

~~~
TeMPOraL
Yes, that's precisely the thing I was referring to. Wasn't sure about the
correct terminology (not an EE) so I didn't try to make the comment sciency-
souding :).

~~~
gehsty
I work installing these cables and never heard this discussed, maybe at the
voltages / transmission subsea cables work at (220kV, 1000s of amps) makes
this effect negligible?

~~~
rsynnott
Are they AC? My impression was that practically all vaguely modern undersea
cables are high voltage DC.

~~~
gehsty
It depends, when talking about interconnecting cables between countries, yes
the majority are DC, both to minimise transmission losses and also to tie
together grids working at different frequencies....

In terms of km installed I think it will be HVAC just from the sheer number of
offshore windfarms built over the last 10yrs in Europe. These things can be
huge - 60km in length, 220kV ~1500A....

------
reacharavindh
I live here in Jutland, and it is indeed heartening to see those giant wind
mills spread out across the fields. Surprisingly so many can be found inland.

I wish they focus as much on micro grids as much on energy generation.

------
jcun4128
Wow glad I have great internet the footage was great/visual is more direct.

Those turbines appeared to have an upward inclination, curious why that is.
Also interesting that the trailing edge near the hub isn't as sharp as the
tips probably due to slowest rotation.

Good stuff, those things are seriously massive.

I also like that giant wall monitor with all the 'stats'?

------
w_t_payne
Autonomous utility boats will have a significant role to play in monitoring
and supplying the offshore wind industry.

[https://www.asvglobal.com/](https://www.asvglobal.com/)

These little boats can continuously monitor the foundations of offshore wind
turbines for scour, and their larger brethren can quickly deliver supplies in
a wide range of weather conditions -- without putting human engineers at risk.

------
roncohen
As an aside, one of them burned last year:
[http://www.powerengineeringint.com/articles/2017/08/new-
vest...](http://www.powerengineeringint.com/articles/2017/08/new-vestas-
turbine-destroyed-by-fire.html)

By the way, you can walk right up to them. They are very impressive up close.

~~~
jacquesm
That's a 9.5MW unit that burned up. I don't like Vestas, they still use a
gearbox which is a huge amount of extra complexity.

------
macmac
Wind turbines, they are not milling anything. One would have hoped that a
paper like NYT would something as basic as that right.

~~~
shawabawa3
Windmill is a defacto synonym for wind turbines in most english speaking
countries

~~~
macmac
Not in the industry.

~~~
cjarrett
I worked in the industry for three summers, and they were interchangeable
there.

Additionally, they could be 'tur-bans' or 'tur-bines' as well.

------
mack1001
I think storage should be decentralized with towns/cities working to store
locally and forward as required.

------
DoctorOetker
regarding superfluous wind energy: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power-to-
gas#Efficiency](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power-to-gas#Efficiency)

------
eddieschod
Does anyone have a datasheet so we can calculate the Energy ROI?

~~~
alphydan
Here you go:
[https://www.vestas.com/~/media/vestas/about/sustainability/p...](https://www.vestas.com/~/media/vestas/about/sustainability/pdfs/lcav11020mw181215.pdf)

Money-shot on p66. About 8 months for EROEI (Energy returned on energy
invested). I worked on some of these Life Cycle Analyses and can attest that
they were quite rigorous.

------
baybal2
The future of mankind lies with nuclear power. I'm distressed by it not
receiving as much attention as windmills.

~~~
Pxtl
The cost of nuclear power seems to go up while every other zero-emissions
energy source goes down. Even ignoring the fears about accidents and waste, it
seems like nuclear may end up a transitional source.

------
DanCarvajal
Also killing birds and bats though....

~~~
Tharkun
How much wildlife (or human life...) is killed or otherwise threatened by
fossil fuels? I suspect a single oil tanker spill kills more animals than any
wind farm.

~~~
tomcam
Citation?

~~~
loco5niner
No claim was made. No need for a citation.

------
ThomPete
Problem is that these are political markets not market markets. Denmark spent
a lot of money on getting their windmill industry up and running and windmills
still aren't solving the base problem as they aren't reliable for all sorts of
weather.

Furthermore, windmilss don't really scale well, Nuclear on the other hand
which is both safer and more scalable and greener would change that but right
now only the Chinese seems to have realized that.

~~~
swebs
You know Europe is developing a fusion reactor.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEMOnstration_Power_Station](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEMOnstration_Power_Station)

~~~
strictnein
Countries have been "developing" fusion power for decades. It'll arrive
shortly after quantum powered personal computers.

~~~
kuschku
Good that you put "developing" into air quotes.

If I pay one single developer for 50 years to build me all technology Google
has, I still won’t get anywhere.

If you want to actually develop nuclear, you need to increase investment. By a
factor of ten or more.

------
baud147258
I wouldn't call wind turbines exactly clean energy, between the need to have
thermic power plant on stand-by to pick up the slack, since wind is highly
irregular, the metric cube of concrete poured in the ground in the middle of
nowhere to built them, the kilometers of copper to link them back to the
network and the batteries to keep the excess electricity. And it's even worse
when you see a field of turbines where half of them are not turning.

~~~
Milner08
Except, in the grand scheme of things thats very clean. Compared to Gas or
Coal power plants that are much more difficult to build and are also often
located in relatively remote locations. We need some kind of power to pick up
the slack but not necessarily fossil fuel based. There are all sorts of ways
to store energy created at times of high wind for later use, from simple
batteries to things like Dinorwig in Wales. The reason half of them aren't
turning is often because it takes so long to stop a fossil fuel based power
station and the wind turbines would only be generating excess power and
affecting the grid, so they have to stop them. With more investment in storing
energy they can keep them running far longer and decrease the use of fossil
fuels even further.

I'm not saying they are 100% clean, just that realistically nothing ever will
be. We can offset that, and we can work to minimise it. For the moment Wind
turbines are one of the cleanest ways we have.

~~~
baud147258
Thank you for Dinorwig. I did not know about this.

