On 24 Jun 2006 at 20:33, Robert G. Seeberger wrote: > There has been a lot about wind power in the news lately. If this and > similar reports are true, then alternative sources of energy just > might be able to solve many of the problems we face WRT energy.
I don't think so, bluntly. There's a lot of media interest, yes. But wind power is intermittent. That means there needs to be a spinning reserve of "conventional" power stations*, and each turbine produces no more than 25% of the "rated value", for any existing wind farms. (*Ireland, an ideal site for wind farms both onshore and off, has had to stop adding them to their grid because they don't have the spare conventional capacity for dealing with drops in generation) Then there's the cost. Even with current gas prices, it is nearly three times as expensive per MWH, and over twice as expensive as nuclear. France is currently the only country which has embranced nuclear energy wholeheatedly, making 75% of its energy from it, and it's a net exporter which makes a good deal of cash from its efforts. AndrewC Dawn Falcon _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
