Representative of what?

On Monday, Richard Black wrote about an Ipsos-Mori poll conducted on behalf of Renewables UK:

Earlier this month, Ipsos-Mori asked a representative sample of just over 1,000 adults to what extent they favoured wind power.

Sixty-six per cent were either "strongly in favour of" or "tended to favour" the technology, against just 8% who were opposed.

Pretty strong support, wouldn't you say?

However, thanks to a twitterer who goes by the name of "The Debunker No 2 BS" it has now been revealed that the poll might have been, well, less straightforward than might have been expected. The clue is in the technical details of the report, where we find that:

Questions were asked online of 1,009 adults aged between 16 and 64 across Great Britain.

Whatever happened to the over-65s? Do they have no opinions on windfarms? Perhaps someone with more experience of these kinds of polls can tell me whether this exclusion of older people is normal in these kinds of surveys. Either way, Richard Black has reported the poll as being representative of British people rather than those of working age.

Quelle surprise.

When do windfarms work?

Updated on Mar 14, 2012 by Bishop Hill

Readers here are familiar with the idea that wind turbines do not generate electricity when the wind doesn't blow and it is also now widely understood that they have to be switched off when the wind blows too hard as well, either because the grid can't take the surges or because it's dangerous to have the turbine spin too fast.

The latest news from the USA is that some windfarms may now have to be switched off at night.

Night operation of the windmills in the North Allegheny Windpower Project has been halted following discovery of a dead Indiana bat under one of the turbines, an official with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Monday.

Click to read more ...

A letter from the Conservative leader

This is a letter from Scottish Conservative Party leader Ruth Davidson to a windfarm campaigner. It was posted on the Facebook page of the Stop St Andrews University Windfarm group.

Thank you for contacting me about the issue of windfarms.

There is no doubt that renewable energy is a potentially highly beneficial  energy source. However it should not be pushed upon the people of Scotland  at any cost. Although attaining clean, renewable energy sources should  always remain a priority for Scotland, current strategies excessively burden communities, outweighing any possible benefits. In particular, many  people feel that their communities are coming under attack as wind farm  developers submit increasing numbers of speculative applications for  industrial wind farms. The current Government’s obsession with wind energy  over all other energy sources and the lack of any coherent strategy to  ensure that wind farms are put in appropriate locations, is unacceptable.

The continuing lack of any proper guidance to local authorities from  Government on the siting of wind farms is the root cause of much of the  anger and frustration felt in communities across Scotland. The cumulative  impact of more and more wind farms is becoming almost unbearable for an  increasing number of people. It is for this reason that we have called on  the Scottish Government to consider a moratorium on further development  until the public’s concerns have been addressed.

We should not forget that nuclear power currently provides a large  proportion of our electricity needs, yet Alex Salmond has, thus far,  failed to include nuclear power in its energy strategy. Nuclear power  provides thousands of jobs, which guarantees Scotland’s retention of  engineering talent. Despite what the SNP Government might say about the  safety of nuclear power, the fact remains that Scotland is one of the  world’s safest nuclear power providers. While the wind may not blow,  nuclear provides a reliable and secure energy supply.

The Scottish Government has set an ambitious target of sourcing 100% of  our electricity needs from renewable sources by 2020, and while that  target is questionable in itself, it is even more unlikely to be achieved  when the SNP government places greater emphasis on wind power at the  expense of other sources of renewable energy. By focusing on wind energy, which is highly unreliable, the Scottish Government is failing to plan to  provide Scotland with a secure energy supply.

Thank you for taking the time to contact me and for making me aware of  your position.

Yours sincerely,

Ruth Davidson MSP

The suggestion that renewables are good but windfarms are bad seems rather odd in the Scottish context, since there are few other forms of renewables on the table at the moment. I don't know whether this represents the beginning of the Tories backing away from greenery or just standard political two-facedness.

Chronic wind

The latest GWPF report - on the subject of wind energy - is published today. It makes pretty grim reading.

In his report, Professor Gordon Hughes (Edinburgh University) finds that

* Meeting the UK Government's target for renewable generation in 2020 will require total wind capacity of 36 GW backed up by 13 GW of open cycle gas plants plus large complementary investments in transmission capacity at a cost of about £120 billion.

* The same electricity demand could be met from 21.5 GW of combined cycle gas plants with a cost of £13 billion, i.e. an order of magnitude cheaper than the wind scenario.

* Under the most favourable assumptions for wind power, the Government's wind policy will reduce emissions of CO2 at an average cost of £270 per metric ton (at 2009 prices) which means that meeting the UK's renewable energy target would cost a staggering £78 billion per year in 2020.

Read the whole thing.

Matt Ridley on wind

Matt Ridley's essay in the Spectator is a nice summary of the arguments against wind power. I wasn't aware of this point:

I have it on good authority from a marine engineer that keeping wind turbines upright in the gravel, tides and storms of the North Sea for 25 years is a near hopeless quest, so the repair bill is going to be horrific and the output disappointing. Already the grouting in the foundations of hundreds of turbines off Kent, Denmark and the Dogger Bank has failed, necessitating costly repairs.

Booker in the Telegraph is ploughing a similiar furrow.

Windfarm

I came across this woodcut by artist Paul Bloomer and thought it told a story. Thanks to Paul for sending a high-res version.

Conservative Home against wind subsidies

I think this could be significant. In the latest of its pieces on how to build a majority at the next election, Conservative Home, the biggest website for the Tory grassroots, has come out against subsidies for windfarms.

Breaking with the cross-party consensus on climate change would put Cameron on the side of families and manufacturers. Perhaps free from the obsession with change-the-world environmentalism we could also be freed up as a party to focus on a more practical, local environmentalism. Conservatives should, of course, be conservationists but our focus should be on cleaner rivers, planting trees and protecting habitats of outstanding beauty. Yes, we should invest in clean technologies that will help the global environment but we shouldn't be spending money on imported and immature windfarm technologies.

Tory windfarm revolt

According to the Telegraph, around a hundred Tory MPs have demanded that subsidies to onshore windfarms be dramatically reduced.

A total of 101 Tory MPs have written to the Prime Minister demanding that the £400 million-a-year subsidies paid to the “inefficient” onshore wind turbine industry are “dramatically cut”.

The backbenchers, joined by some MPs from other parties, have also called on Mr Cameron to tighten up planning laws so local people have a better chance of stopping new farms being developed and protecting the countryside.

H/T Jiminy Cricket.

Ofgem's maths

The Telegraph is reporting that the UK's energy "regulator", Ofgem, has authorised capital expenditure of £7.6bn to allow windfarms in Scotland to be connected to the electricity grid (H/T Lord Beaverbrook).

Ofgem said on Monday it had fast-tracked proposals for infrastructure spending by energy companies ScottishPower and SSE and expected to make a final decision in April, following a consultation.

The investment will be paid for through energy bills and is likely to add 35p to a typical household bill each year from 2013 to 2021.

Eight years, 35p per year, and say 30 million households. By my reckoning the cost to consumers over eight years is £84 million, (£10.5m per annum).

8 × 0.35 × 30 million = 84 million

So who is paying the difference between the £7600m spend and the £84m recouped from consumers?

Or have they got their maths wrong and they mean that the cost per household per year will be £32?

7600 ÷ (30 × 8)  =  32

I guessing they have got this wrong by a factor of 100.

Glyndebourne's turbine

The opera house at Glyndebourne has installed a new wind turbine, a story covered in gratuitous detail by the Guardian.

"That is just so beautiful," sighed Brenda Sherrard, as Sir David Attenborough and Verity Cannings, deputy head girl at Ringmer community college, wrestled with the green ribbon wrapped around the 44-metre mast of the first wind turbine to power a major UK arts institution.

I was struck by this quote from the aforementioned deputy head girl at the local college.

I don't get how anyone can object to it. In a few years' time they won't even notice it. In another few years, if we don't do something about climate change, this view won't be here anyway because we'll all be under water.

It would be inappropriate, I think, to criticise Ms Cannings, who is, after all, rather young. But what do her extraordinary ideas tell us about the education system in this country? And should we be concerned that the Guardian reports this nonsense?

A wind-up

Thanks to a reader for alerting me to a new report from the Netherlands Institute for International Relations, ‘Clingendael’. The institute has a new programme looking at what it calls "the issue of the growing mismatch between long-term energy needs, climate change visions and short-term market developments".

The report covers the question of just how much conventional power capacity is required to back up wind farm installations. Here are some excerpts from the conclusions:

Wind power has a low capacity credit (in NW Europe). This means that wind power does not significantly replace other generating capacity; alternative power sources need to be in place, together with new installed wind capacity for at least 80% of installed wind capacity, to ensure that there is sufficient back-up to meet market demand at times of reduced wind power supply. Most of this will have to come from conventional power plants. If hydro capacity from Norway  is available, this back-up capacity could be reduced to approximately 70%.

The effectiveness of wind power to reduce CO2 emissions is directly related to the level of CO2 prices. In today’s energy market with low CO2 prices, new installed wind power tends primarily  to replace gas-fired power, resulting in limited CO2 reduction, and thus becomes an expensive and less effective way of reducing CO2 emissions.

Government surveillance of windfarm protestor

In an eerie echo of the use of anti-terrorist police to investigate Climategate, the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change has apparently authorised the use of surveillance to delve into the background of a windfarm protestor.

The victim, George Watson, is going to sue.

Appalling, if true.

H/T Ben Pile

Update on Jan 10, 2012 by Bishop Hill

A correction. RIPA is not strictly "antiterrorism law", as I originally characterised it above. It applies to criminal and terrorism activities. I've changed the headline and text accordingly.

The cost of wind

The action today is all on the question of wind farms. This has been prompted by the publication of a report by the thinktank Civitas, which is strongly critical of the UK's wild expenditure in this area and cites some Dutch research to back its case up.

The Telegraph reports:

A study in the Netherlands found that turning back-up gas power stations on and off to cover spells when there is little wind actually produces more carbon than a steady supply of energy from an efficient modern gas station.

The Civitas report has prompted a response from Leo Hickman in the Guardian. Lots of comments coming in saying that it's not true and that wind saves fuel for energy companies. It looks as though this will be quite a thread.

In among all the shouting though, you have to wonder - if wind saves fuel for energy companies, why do we need a "renewables obligation" to make them adopt this technology?

Shukman on windfarms

Ocean Powerhouse was a BBC show about offshore windfarms broadcast a couple of days ago. It can be seen here if you can get the iPlayer. It's a strange show, focusing mainly on the assembly process for a wind turbine, with lots of "corblimeying" over the size of everything and the technical challenges involved. The music makes it feel like a corporate puff-piece and there were indeed several opportunities for the various companies involved to sell their wares. However, a measure of balance was achieved: in the shape of a short interview with Dieter Helm, who said that the whole idea of offshore wind is a bit stupid, particularly in the current economic climate, and by the summing up, in which narrator David Shukman left it as an open question as to whether there is actually a future for offshore wind.

Click to read more ...

Windy days

Bit windy here at the moment. I wonder how the windfarms are getting on?

Click to read more ...