The Environment

I feel informed. I didn't realize the bird problem was that bad, and since Trump tends to exaggerate I thought he was doing just that. Especially since he's shown himself to be pro oil/coal.

I heard several years ago about a big balloon type thing with a fan in it that they were testing (maybe one of you has mentioned it already). We need to be doing everything we can to promote energy that requires less oil.

 
ColoNoCoHusker said:
Solar vs wind is difficult. I think the solution ultimately has to include widespread residential & distributed green energy rather than relying almost entirely on massive farms. I have 2 residential wind turbines installed by a Boulder company and they produce more energy refund than my neighbors' full roof solar installs. Part of the reason is my turbines are going 8-18 hours per day, 330+ days per year. They are always at optimal position and the install cost was close to half that of full roof solar. We routinely get winds between 55-80 mph and microbursts up to 120 mph. Not every location is so blessed.

The design is a vertical cylinder similar to the one on right below.

cylindrical-wind-turbine.jpg


As far as wildlife, it can be much better but all the numbers I have seen are lower than referenced above. Definitely less compared to wildlife impact of other infrastructure. I know NREL tracks this info as part of their testing and I asked a friend that's an engineer at the Boulder test farm (http://www.nrel.gov/nwtc/) if he can share the data. If he is able to provide it, I will post it.
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You are correct that it's not always easy to compare wind and solar. Some places the wind blows hard enough and often enough that wind generation makes sense. Determining whether wind even makes sense can be challenging. But almost everywhere that's not in the Arctic/Antarctic gets some sun and can be evaluated for PV.

FYI, I'm glad you are having success with a vertical axis wind turbine, but they can't compete with the horizontal axis ones (except in a few niche applications perhaps). The vertical is losing at least half the exposed area to the wind as compared to the horizontal one.

 
Abandoning fossil fuels at this point is not feasible since green energy is not a consistent power producer. The research needs to be put into storage because you need to have the capacity for high demand periods. It has been nice to see coal firing power plants make strides to be more efficient and produce less pollution in the air. There have also been great efficiency improvements in things we take for granted every day...hvac, insulation, motors, lighting, controls. These efficiency gains have reduced the load on coal firing plants and have even curtailed the need to build more power plants.

 
It's mostly not feasible at this point because we haven't made it feasible. Sweden is on its way to abandoning fossil fuels, and currently receives more than 70% of its energy from nuclear and renewables.

It also doesn't help that the fossil fuel lobby fights against development of green technology.

What can't America do? In 1902 we didn't have powered flight. Less than 75 years later we had landed men on the Moon. We can do just about anything if we want to, and if people aren't working against it.

 
Another interesting tidbit I found out about those bladeless turbines is that that site had pictures of them in water. I don't know about the practical implications of expanding them into, say, the ocean, and how that would affect the ecosystem, but that seems pretty innovative.

Jaws, I know very little about coal. I've always thought the term "clean coal" seemed to be an oxymoron used by pro-coal folks. Is that not actually the case? Isn't natural gas supposed to be cheaper and more efficient that coal as well?

 
dudeguyy said:
Another interesting tidbit I found out about those bladeless turbines is that that site had pictures of them in water. I don't know about the practical implications of expanding them into, say, the ocean, and how that would affect the ecosystem, but that seems pretty innovative.

Jaws, I know very little about coal. I've always thought the term "clean coal" seemed to be an oxymoron used by pro-coal folks. Is that not actually the case? Isn't natural gas supposed to be cheaper and more efficient that coal as well?
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I don't see how they'd work in water since they're based on generating power from the vibration frequency, which would be dampened in water.

Natural gas is cheaper and more efficient (and easier to use for peaker plants) than coal, but there is some debate if it's any "cleaner" than coal. Coal plants are going away because natural gas prices are so cheap, and PV and wind are starting to have an impact as well (although much as than NG).

 
Oade said:
ColoNoCoHusker said:
Solar vs wind is difficult. I think the solution ultimately has to include widespread residential & distributed green energy rather than relying almost entirely on massive farms. I have 2 residential wind turbines installed by a Boulder company and they produce more energy refund than my neighbors' full roof solar installs. Part of the reason is my turbines are going 8-18 hours per day, 330+ days per year. They are always at optimal position and the install cost was close to half that of full roof solar. We routinely get winds between 55-80 mph and microbursts up to 120 mph. Not every location is so blessed.

The design is a vertical cylinder similar to the one on right below.

cylindrical-wind-turbine.jpg


As far as wildlife, it can be much better but all the numbers I have seen are lower than referenced above. Definitely less compared to wildlife impact of other infrastructure. I know NREL tracks this info as part of their testing and I asked a friend that's an engineer at the Boulder test farm (http://www.nrel.gov/nwtc/) if he can share the data. If he is able to provide it, I will post it.
Click to expand...
I agree that residential and local use are essential to long-term success.... Can you imagine a small solar panel on the top of every city street-light pole in the US? Just add it to the design of any new poles, it would be a game changer.

The newer UV and IR panels are awesome, plus I've also heard of some that can work off of water & air-humidity in addition to UV and IR. Which would mean energy could be produced at respectable levels during prolonged cloud-cover and during a rain storms.
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I am not finding the article atm but an EE wrote an interesting article couple years ago on the impact of getting traffic & street lights off the electrical grid. It was like 8% decrease overall. It's not necessarily practical but the opportunity is there to make substantial difference in small increments...

RedDenver said:
ColoNoCoHusker said:
Solar vs wind is difficult. I think the solution ultimately has to include widespread residential & distributed green energy rather than relying almost entirely on massive farms. I have 2 residential wind turbines installed by a Boulder company and they produce more energy refund than my neighbors' full roof solar installs. Part of the reason is my turbines are going 8-18 hours per day, 330+ days per year. They are always at optimal position and the install cost was close to half that of full roof solar. We routinely get winds between 55-80 mph and microbursts up to 120 mph. Not every location is so blessed.

The design is a vertical cylinder similar to the one on right below.

cylindrical-wind-turbine.jpg


As far as wildlife, it can be much better but all the numbers I have seen are lower than referenced above. Definitely less compared to wildlife impact of other infrastructure. I know NREL tracks this info as part of their testing and I asked a friend that's an engineer at the Boulder test farm (http://www.nrel.gov/nwtc/) if he can share the data. If he is able to provide it, I will post it.
Click to expand...
You are correct that it's not always easy to compare wind and solar. Some places the wind blows hard enough and often enough that wind generation makes sense. Determining whether wind even makes sense can be challenging. But almost everywhere that's not in the Arctic/Antarctic gets some sun and can be evaluated for PV.

FYI, I'm glad you are having success with a vertical axis wind turbine, but they can't compete with the horizontal axis ones (except in a few niche applications perhaps). The vertical is losing at least half the exposed area to the wind as compared to the horizontal one.
Click to expand...
If you are comparing horizontal vs vertical axis turbines, it really does depend upon application and factors such as location. The blade length of the horizontal axis turbine contributes a lot to its efficiency. For wind farms and large applications, nothing comes close to the long bladed horizontal design.

For small scale and/or residential, the vertical axis type is the most common due to a variety of factors. On a small scale, a short blade horizontal axis turbine is very temperamental, especially with turbulent winds. In my case there were also county ordinance & zoning issues that came into play. I'm on several acres with multiple zoning. My house is on 2 acre parcel zoned residential surrounded by many acres zoned ag/com. The codes and ordinances are very different depending on the zoning. A horizontal axis wind turbine on the residential parcel could not be higher than the base of my house's roofline. Factor in location of trees/outbuildings/etc and it becomes a problem.

 
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knapplc said:
It's mostly not feasible at this point because we haven't made it feasible. Sweden is on its way to abandoning fossil fuels, and currently receives more than 70% of its energy from nuclear and renewables.

It also doesn't help that the fossil fuel lobby fights against development of green technology.

What can't America do? In 1902 we didn't have powered flight. Less than 75 years later we had landed men on the Moon. We can do just about anything if we want to, and if people aren't working against it.
Click to expand...
I have to agree with bnilhome that it's not yet feasible to move entirely to renewables. Mostly because it's not economical to store the generated power for night, cloudy days, low wind, and other supply interruptions. There's a lot of research in that direction, and if the US put real effort into it (like the Apollo program), we could likely get there in a decade. But it's not there yet.

 
ColoNoCoHusker said:
For small scale and/or residential, the vertical axis type is the most common due to a variety of factors. On a small scale, a short blade horizontal axis turbine is very temperamental, especially with turbulent winds. In my case there were also county ordinance & zoning issues that came into play. I'm on several acres with multiple zoning. My house is on 2 acre parcel zoned residential surrounded by many acres zoned ag/com. The codes and ordinances are very different depending on the zoning. A horizontal axis wind turbine on the residential parcel could not be higher than the base of the roofline. Factor in location of trees/outbuildings/etc and it becomes a problem.
Click to expand...
There was a study done a few years ago into whether small vertical or horizontal axis wind turbines were more efficient, and it turned out that horizontal was more efficient both in power generation and cost. It was done in Amsterdam, I think. I'll see if I can find that study later.

Edit: I can't find the original study, but here's a summary of small-scale wind turbine test cases conducted in the UK a few years back: http://bergey.com/technical/warwick-trials-of-building-mounted-wind-turbines

 
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RedDenver said:
ColoNoCoHusker said:
For small scale and/or residential, the vertical axis type is the most common due to a variety of factors. On a small scale, a short blade horizontal axis turbine is very temperamental, especially with turbulent winds. In my case there were also county ordinance & zoning issues that came into play. I'm on several acres with multiple zoning. My house is on 2 acre parcel zoned residential surrounded by many acres zoned ag/com. The codes and ordinances are very different depending on the zoning. A horizontal axis wind turbine on the residential parcel could not be higher than the base of the roofline. Factor in location of trees/outbuildings/etc and it becomes a problem.
Click to expand...
There was a study done a few years ago into whether small vertical or horizontal axis wind turbines were more efficient, and it turned out that horizontal was more efficient both in power generation and cost. It was done in Amsterdam, I think. I'll see if I can find that study later.
Click to expand...
You are ignoring the installation factors. Height from ground and blade length are the primary components of the horizontal axis design creating the increase in efficiency. In most residential zoning building codes in this country, that design is not allowed. If you cannot install it, efficiency doesn't matter.

 
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dudeguyy said:
Jaws, I know very little about coal. I've always thought the term "clean coal" seemed to be an oxymoron used by pro-coal folks. Is that not actually the case?
Click to expand...
I am talking about overall power plant efficiencies. They have also been installing scrubbers on the exhaust to reduce waste from entering into the atmosphere.

knapplc said:
It's mostly not feasible at this point because we haven't made it feasible. Sweden is on its way to abandoning fossil fuels, and currently receives more than 70% of its energy from nuclear and renewables.

It also doesn't help that the fossil fuel lobby fights against development of green technology.

What can't America do? In 1902 we didn't have powered flight. Less than 75 years later we had landed men on the Moon. We can do just about anything if we want to, and if people aren't working against it.
Click to expand...
I agree with you in principle but it isn't that easy. I am sure that most people won't volunteer their backyard for a nuclear power plant.

Are you talking about energy companies trying to stop the federal government from funding research into green technologies?

I think power storage (think Telsa) research should be #1 on our list if we want renewable energy to really work.

 
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