LOCATION/TYPE

NEWS HOME

[ exact phrase in "" • results by date ]

[ Google-powered • results by relevance ]



Archive
RSS

Add NWW headlines to your site (click here)

Get weekly updates

WHAT TO DO
when your community is targeted

RSS

RSS feeds and more

Keep Wind Watch online and independent!

Donate via Paypal

Donate via Stripe

Selected Documents

All Documents

Research Links

Alerts

Press Releases

FAQs

Campaign Material

Photos & Graphics

Videos

Allied Groups

Wind Watch is a registered educational charity, founded in 2005.

News Watch Home

We must look at the evidence on energy 

David Miliband is quoted in The Journal (“Peer wins fight to build wind turbine” September 23) as saying: “Anyone who says they believe in renewable energy, but not about wind farms (sic), needs to be exposed for their hypocrisy.”

Well, much as his Government encourages faith-based policies, I would suggest to the Environment Secretary that the relative merits of renewable energy technologies are not a matter of belief, or ministerial diktat, but of evidence.

Wind power generation, compared to other renewables, is a low value technology, a fact now demonstrated in depth by empirical data from Germany and Denmark.

The evidence shows that the degree to which wind power can replace conventional capacity is very low (German grid operators estimate that 48,000mw of wind will replace only 2,000mw of conventional plant).

Large scale expansion of the grid is required solely to cope with intermittent wind power. “Achieved capacity factors” (actual power produced compared to headline capacity) for onshore wind in the United Kingdom are not promising, with significant regional variations which have important implications for the likely concentration of the UK wind development. The North-East has the lowest average in the country.

Both Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee and the National Audit Office (NAO) have criticised the Government for “poor targeting” of the Renewables Obligation (RO) subsidy system, creating undeserved rewards for onshore wind at the expense of other renewables which are more deserving of support. The NAO has accused the RO system of paying 33% more than is needed to encourage development by onshore wind developers. It is this excess, and nothing else, which is fuelling the present Klondike windrush.

The Government’s recent Energy Review came to the same conclusion. But, such is the urgency of global warming that the Government does not intend doing anything about it until 2009/2010!

The hypocrisy of Mr Miliband and the Government is summed up by their total lack of action to discourage the huge, ongoing expansion in air travel in this country.

Most experts agree that the projected expansion of air travel in the UK will more than wipe out the theoretical saving in carbon emissions from the entire projected onshore wind build in the UK.

DON BROWNLOW, webmaster: www.windbyte.co.uk www.moorsydeactiongroup.org.uk, Norham, Northumberland

icnetwork.co.uk

This article is the work of the source indicated. Any opinions expressed in it are not necessarily those of National Wind Watch.

The copyright of this article resides with the author or publisher indicated. As part of its noncommercial educational effort to present the environmental, social, scientific, and economic issues of large-scale wind power development to a global audience seeking such information, National Wind Watch endeavors to observe “fair use” as provided for in section 107 of U.S. Copyright Law and similar “fair dealing” provisions of the copyright laws of other nations. Send requests to excerpt, general inquiries, and comments via e-mail.

Wind Watch relies entirely
on User Funding
   Donate via Paypal
(via Paypal)
Donate via Stripe
(via Stripe)

Share:

e-mail X FB LI TG TG Share


News Watch Home

Get the Facts
CONTACT DONATE PRIVACY ABOUT SEARCH
© National Wind Watch, Inc.
Use of copyrighted material adheres to Fair Use.
"Wind Watch" is a registered trademark.

 Follow:

Wind Watch on X Wind Watch on Facebook

Wind Watch on Linked In Wind Watch on Mastodon