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Final plea over plans for biggest wind farm in Europe

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Published Date: 16 February 2008
By JOHN ROSS
DEVELOPERS yesterday made a final plea to the Scottish Government to construct the biggest wind farm in Europe in the Western Isles.
Lewis Wind Power (LWP) wants to build 176 turbines in Lewis, but ministers have indicated they are "minded to refuse" the project.

The company was given until 5pm last night to make its case that the project can go ahead without harming the env
ironment. The Scottish Government has not indicated when a final decision will be made on the £500 million project.

Comhairle nan Eilean Siar (Western Isles Council) has backed the scheme, arguing it will create hundreds of jobs during construction as well as millions of pounds in community benefit.

However, the plans have attracted over 10,000 objections and been attacked by conservation bodies including the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. It says the wind farm would destroy a huge area of the North Lewis Peatlands Special Protection Area and go against European habitats directives to protect wildlife.

Officials from LWP, a partnership of British Energy and Amec, met ministers this week to discuss plans ahead of submitting its reply to the government. The company said it hoped the information it was providing would convince ministers the project could deliver in terms of economic impact and the fight against climate change.

A spokesman said yesterday: "We have submitted our response to the government, but cannot discuss the exact contents of the letter."





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1

Biggar Mac,

16/02/2008 00:49:53
Lets hope this plan is kicked into touch. Windfarms should be near the centres of population where the power is needed. The infrastructure needed to bring power from Lewis is too costly.
2

aberdeenshire teuchter,

perth, wa 16/02/2008 01:13:01
#1 Lewis is windy hence the idea of putting a wind farm there. When utilising the earths resources you don't get a easy choice of where to produce oil, mine minerals or get an optimal position to build a wind farm. 99% of the time they're in very remote locations where the capital costs are huge to get them started. Lweis isn't that far away. If the wind farmn shifted to nearer a population centre it would get enough wind to make it feasible.
3

GalacticCannibal,

Murrieta, CA...bye Bush -Cheney..u. evil leaders. 16/02/2008 07:21:00
1
Biggar Mac,

Dude ,
Wind Turbine farms must be erected in places where the wind blows consistently. DUHhhhhh.

GC
4

Greenheatman,

TAIN 16/02/2008 08:00:06
Lewis is not THAT windy - it is about 1% windier than, say, Skye. These turbines will only generate at full plated capacity for just 16% of the year.

The remaining 14% or so is made up with below capacity electricity so the interconnector will lie dormant for 70% to 80% of the time.

Not very good is it?
5

theluckyman,

Glasgow 16/02/2008 08:38:41
#1, you put the tech where the energy source is, then use the electricity where it's needed. Whole point of the National Grid, and the interconnectors to NI and France.

#4, any interconnector is going to be under-utilised - unless it's the DC link from France which is going pretty much full pelt to supply London. Given what you are/were involved in, tell me you've looked at the map of the wave resource available off the Hebrides.

http://www.bwea.com/marine/resource.html from SEA for BERR

6

Unimpressed one,

16/02/2008 08:40:36
"Ofgem is also concerned. “We calculate that renewable energy subsidies will add £60 to consumer bills this year and that will keep rising,” said a spokesman."

Saving the planet, creating jobs? My ar*e!
7

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 08:46:54
I just wish it wasn't the Scottish consumer paying for English consumers to meet their renewable energy targets. When Westminster devolved renewables to Scotland they had the right to set the target, we had the right to determine how we met that target, and with 8% of our electricity from Hydro (requiring no subsidy paid for by the consumer) there has been no need for anyone in Scotland to pay a penny on their electric bills.

To put it bluntly, the Labour-Westminster cartel stitched up the Scots so that we would produce extra renewables to compensate for the failure of the English renewable scheme to deliver the 10% target because it forgot that 7% of the renewables are lost in the transmission network.

If Alex Salmond had an ounce of integrity he would demand back the hundreds of millions that was immorally if not illegally stolen from Scottish consumers!
8

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 08:50:45
It really gets my goat that a Scottish Nationalist Prime minister isn't prepared to fight for Scotland!
9

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 09:00:46
Here are the global temperatures from the most reliable UK authority - the met office (figures relative to 2007):

2000: -0.16C
2001: 0.00C
2002: 0.06C
2003: 0.06C
2004: 0.03C
2005: 0.08C
2006: 0.02C
2007: 0.00C

Where is this global warming? Temperatures in the 21st century (not 2000) have been stable within 0.08C, or to put it another way, they have not risen, if anything they show a small -0.0012°C per year drop this century.

If you want to see the graph look at: http://www.lenzie.org.uk/scam.php

If you still don't believe me go and look at the met office site which shows the same: http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcrut3/diagnostics/global/nh%2Bsh/index.html
10

theluckyman,

Glasgow 16/02/2008 09:05:06
#5 "no demonstrated overwhelming national need AND no alternative site... if the SG were to approve this, there would be appeals to Europe"

Overwhelming national need? No - nuclear. Alternative site? Superb energy resource - wind, wave.

I don't have axes to grind.

I have been on the end of an ill-informed email from the RSPB which included the memorable phrase "So, in summary, the RSPB views climate change as the most serious long-term threat to wildlife in the UK and globally. RSPB's support for renewables has always been predicated on any such development's location being acceptable. The best place to generate power is, of course, where it is needed - not 500 miles away. James Reynolds, Head of Media, RSPB Scotland".

500 miles away? That had me deeply worried for two reasons - the RSPB opposes nuclear, and the Lewis windfarm.

This is a half billion pound project; the Head of Media for the organisation most vocal in its opposition to the scheme is clueless about energy
11

theluckyman,

Glasgow 16/02/2008 09:13:53
#7 Don't get me started on that one - Germany used a system called REFIT which put the onus on the energy companies. Result - 200k jobs. The ROC is arguably necessary because our market is de-regulated. Result - European energy companies buy British. If you ever wondered why our gas prices vary so much...

Similar topic is nuclear; now that new stations have been given the go-ahead in principle, kiss goodbye to cheap electricity for the lifetime of those stations
12

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 09:44:53
TheLuckyman - I really would like to get you started, because I would like to know more! Could you explain your point in more detail.

As for the 200k jobs - if you put supermarket bosses in charge of "rejuvenating the highstreet", why would anyone wonder if the high streets become deserts and all the shoppers are forced to out of town supermarkets?

Similar if you ask those who buy foreign made windmills how to get a UK industry, is it any wonder that there response is to provide more subsidies for those who buy foreign made windmills?
13

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 10:37:14
Rulebutnotrulers, you are talking the kind of sense that should have been listened to around 8 years ago when all this was being planned. Of course local people should benefit from local windpower, particularly in Lewis where many of the jobs are related to tourism which will be severely hit by a massive windfarm.

But then again, whether you believe in the myth of global warming or the reality of limited oil & gas supplies, sooner or later, many of these tourists will stop coming to Lewis and those jobs are at risk anyway! So why not use wind to create local jobs (because the wind lobby association actively blocked any discussion about trying to get any economic benefit from wind!)

If I had been listened to in 2000, we would have a Scottish wind industry, and being Scottish it would be building its windmills in Scotland and there would be thousands of jobs, and thousands of ardent supporters including many people in Lewis.

Instead, we have a sector which is a subsidy junky, unfairly taking money from Scots consumers to pay for the English to meet its target, with next to no jobs, which destroys the jobs that there are in tourism, and whose only effect on most people including those in Lewis is to put up electricity bills.

It is difficult to conceive of a worse way to have implemented windpower. It has maximised anti-wind feeling, it has minimised the number of jobs, it has taken money from the poor Scots consumer and given it to the rich landed gentry (and the English). In fact the only group with any credibility that actively campaigns for wind at a national level are the environmentalists who are the first to object to any windfarm at a local level.

I have no doubt that the policy implementation of renewable energy in Scotland will become a world-wide case study demonstrating the failure of public policy: a country with the best wind resource in Europe managed to so botch its implementation that there were next to no jobs, next to no active public
14

Colin, Glasgow,

16/02/2008 10:57:05
#14 I don't think wind farms can claim ROCs unless they actually generate electricity. These are worth about 4-5p/kWh. This is more than enough to make them profitable. But they do have to generate the electricity in order to make the money.

They are more economically viable than other sources of renewable electricity apart from hydro and biomass (neither of which have much scope for growth in Scotland).
15

Greenheatman,

TAIN 16/02/2008 11:24:33
theluckyman said:
#4, any interconnector is going to be under-utilised - unless it's the DC link from France which is going pretty much full pelt to supply London. Given what you are/were involved in, tell me you've looked at the map of the wave resource available off the Hebrides.

I am still involved with tidal stream which is different from waves! The wave resource is quite good off the Outer Hebrides and over 100kW per metre of wave front is available.

The problem is that, no matter how many intermittent renewables are utilised you will ALWAYS get coincidental nulls when zero electricity is generated. These nulls, obviously, have to be backed up, 100%, with the output from fossil or nuclear thermal power stations.

Let's add wave and tidal stream to the proposed wind turbines' output. Wind does not generate at full capacity for 84% of the year, similarly, wave power does not generate at full capacity for 84% of the year either. This gives a probability of coincident null of 70%. Adding in tidal stream, which can only generate at full capacity for a few hours a day during Springs and almost nothing during Neaps, the probability of it NOT generating at full capacity is 70%.

This means that the probability of full capacity generation at all from all three intermittent resources is 49%.

So the odds of transmitting worthwhile electricity to the mainland down the underutilised interconnector are 50 - 50. Does this fill you with confidence?

16

theluckyman,

Glasgow 16/02/2008 12:13:17
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article3372182.ece worth having a quick look at

#17 Greenheatman perfectly confident. Interconnectors are about energy balances, and 50% isn't bad overall, if that's what you're figures are telling you

#13 Isonomia ok but I'll try to keep it short and pretty much just about wind turbines

1920's - just after the great war there is a lot of fear, including about diminishing coal supplies. Scots biologist comes up with way around the problem
1950's - development of nuclear
1970's oil crises - UK government starts to look at alternative fuel sources
1980's - fuel crises end and so does serious R&D funding everywhere except Denmark, California and to a lesser extent the UK. B0g all in the way of money is put aside from oil revenues.
early90's - Kuwait, end of the cold war, deregulation of UK energy industry etc. No interest in wind apart from Denmark
late90's - The UK government labs are privatised and bought by overseas companies. Vestas start to make turbines that make (a bit) of financial sense. German companies use UK R&D to do the same
2001 - 2008 you know what's been happening in the world
early00's - UK and Germany decide to phase out nuclear due to expense

TBC
17

theluckyman,

Glasgow 16/02/2008 12:32:00
early00's - energy is so cheap in the UK that British Energy goes bust and is effectively renationalised. UK then wonders what to do with BE

UK - Renewable Obligation. Certificate trading, market solution. Favours big companies, because only big investments make sense - otherwise they just buy the ROCertificates from someone else. ROC price is unstable. Government compensates with grants for small investors/generators. Application process is an uncertain nightmare

Germany - Renewable Energy Feed In Tariff. Regulated monopolies are required by law to pay a certain amount per MWh, which reduces over time. Means farmers, householders, communities, companies all start to invest in renewables - they have guaranteed return on investment. That's where 200k jobs comes from. Big energy companies see their profits slip a bit so they start to invest too. Not a great place for speculators to make money though

...so German, French and Spanish companies buy into the UK, where there is speculative money to be made - hardly any regulation. That includes ROCs to an extent, but mainly the price of natural gas. Usual buy low sell high, but that doesn't apply much in their home markets, so all the fluctuations end up in ours.

Wind generation - REFIT puts all the risk onto big companies, but it reduces over time and there is little 'brown trouser' uncertainty. Lots of villages and towns in Germany have their own turbines making them money. RO puts all the risk and uncertainty onto the small companies, so you have to have a REALLY tight community to go for any projects
18

theluckyman,

Glasgow 16/02/2008 12:34:41
Main issue is that we need the energy security... renewables work out about the same cost as nuclear, over the full energy cycle

#19 JohnABZ. Your mum's company is, as I'm sure you've realised, talking out of it's spokesman's rear
19

theluckyman,

Glasgow 16/02/2008 12:51:25
I'm away to watch some football...
20

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 14:22:50
Theluckyman, nuclear really is a disgusting form of energy, yet if oil and gas supplies are depleting as fast as is suggested we really don't have a choice. Likewise wind is far from an ideal form of energy, and it would be just a little easier to accept it if those who propose wind would admit a few home truths.

Wind is intermittent, we need to start building hundreds of pump storage systems to store that wind energy. That means if Lewis got 100s of windmills, the sensible thing would be to build a few pump storage lochs - from my memory of the island I think there are places that could store the energy.

Half the problem is that the wind developers are not being honest with people. And you can't hide the truth forever!!!
21

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 14:27:35
And I should have mentioned these pump storage really do have to be on the island. If you store the electricity on peak days for days of low wind, you can keep a relatively constant supply going through the interconnect. If however you have no pump storage, to delivery the capacity, the interconnect has to be much bigger to cope with the peak output, even though much of the time the electricity flow is well below capacity.
22

Colin, Glasgow,

16/02/2008 14:36:03
Luckyman #18 "early00's - UK and Germany decide to phase out nuclear due to expense"

I disagree with your synopsis here. The UK decided to keep the nuclear option open in the 2003 energy review. True, at the time anything other than gas-fired electricity was expensive, but there was no plan to abandon nuclear power.

And the reason for Germany's phase-out policy was not because of economics - it was purely political. When the Greens finally came into power in 1998 they obstinately pushed through their 20-year-old promise of abandoning nuclear power. But this was for supposedly "environmental" reasons rather than economics.

Ten years later, Germany still uses nuclear power, its plants make 1 million euros profit per day; while its coal industry is subsidised by 2.5 billion euros per year; and renewables are subsidised by 4 billion. The German govt has been warned by Deutsche bank and others that they won't meet CO2 reduction targets if they phase out nuclear power (but do the Greens care?).
http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9595481

The Germans' feed-in tariffs certainly encourage renewables, but they equally subsidise the wrong sort of renewables - such as PV solar - which won't be economic at this latitude.
23

Colin, Glasgow,

16/02/2008 15:19:35
theLuckyman #21 " renewables work out about the same cost as nuclear, over the full energy cycle"

That's a rather sweeping statement and could use some explanation.

"Renewables" covers a multitude of technologies. The only one that has been significantly competitive with nuclear power is hydro electricity. And the majority of good hydro sites have been exploited in developed countries world-wide.

Neither onshore- nor offshore-wind are cost-competitive with new nuclear power (according to the 2006 Energy Review levelised costs, including waste & decommissioning). There is a chance that onshore wind might be competitive by 2020. Wave and tidal certainly aren't competitive, and may never be. Solar is too limited for electricity in Scotland, at least until the technology improves. There are some specific circumstances where certain renewable solutions might be cheaper than certain nuclear solutions. But nothing on a grand scale.
24

theluckyman,

Glasgow 16/02/2008 15:37:01
#23 Isonomia - pumped storage is effective, efficient and unfashionable... great tech, no ROCs. Redox flow batteries and hydrogen are both too expensive for the moment, although there are some interesting developments... For me the biggest thing the REFIT system has done is made turbines and other renewable energy about the communities - it's their investment and profit.

#25 Colin 1M a DAY profit? Blimey. I agree with most of what you say, and yours is a fuller and fairer account on the situation in Germany. I think what a lot of this comes down to is the comparatively cheap energy we've been used to after the dash for gas. What I would say is not to dismiss PV because of latitude - cells optimised for the blue end of the spectrum do reasonably well, probably because of all the clouds... I tend to dismiss them on price, for the moment, at least for more than a few m2

The problem with that review is that it didn't include escalating fuel costs if nuclear starts going global in a big way, and also didn't include carbon emissions from ore and yellowcake production
25

GalacticCannibal,

Murrieta, CA...bye Bush -Cheney..u. evil leaders. 16/02/2008 16:07:10
22
theluckyman,
Glasgow 16/02/2008 12:51:25
I'm away to watch some football...

-----------------------------------------------

Dude Its 8:08 am here. Sun is up.

And I am away to cook a fresh shroom omelet

Yum Yum yummy, yummy.

GC
26

Colin, Glasgow,

16/02/2008 16:17:10
#27 It's not too surprising that the German nuclear plants are making big profits. They are relatively old, and once the capital from building the plant has been paid off the running costs are low. Fuel costs are nowhere near as significant as they are with fossil fuel stations. Only a small proportion of the cost of nuclear electricity is due to fuel; and most of that is the cost of processing the fuel rather than the cost of the raw Uranium. If the price of raw Uranium doubles from the current (relatively high) level it would only add about 7% to the cost of nuclear electricity. In comparison, if the cost of gas doubles, gas-fired electricity increases by 70%.

The CO2 produced from uranium processing is not all that much compared to the energy produced. The Sustainable Development Commission was satisfied with the figure of 16g CO2 per kWh for an average European nuclear plant for the whole nuclear lifecycle (some Swedish plants are lower than 3g). This is similar to the lifecycle emissions of wind or hydro. Coal, by comparison, is about 900g ("clean" coal is 700g; gas is about 400g). The point that the SD commission made is that as we move towards less carbon use in general, this will reduce the indirect emissions from mining, enrichment, etc. Also newer nuclear plants are more efficient with their fuel. So the overall lifecycle emissions are likely to drop further. (The SD commission was still unhappy with nuclear; but not because of the CO2).

There are certain inhibitors that prevent the global use of nuclear power escalating too dramatically - mostly due to the lack of skills and component manufacturing capacity. But if there was a serious push for nuclear, which might look like stretching Uranium supplies, then there are more options. For example using breeder reactors to create more fuel, or using Thorium as well as Uranium.

On a related note, regarding PV solar, I think it is entirely inappropriate to be deploying PV cells anywhere in northern Euro
27

Colin, Glasgow,

16/02/2008 16:19:40
[continued...]
On a related note, regarding PV solar, I think it is entirely inappropriate to be deploying PV cells anywhere in northern Europe when there is a global shortage of supply. They could be generating 2 or 3 times as much electricity in California or Africa. I don't doubt that the technology will improve; and I have high hopes for solar in the future; but I disagree with the way that Germany is subsidising it at the moment. Currently it doesn't make economic sense, nor does it make environmental sense.
28

Greenheatman,

TAIN 16/02/2008 16:37:19
""There is a chance that onshore wind might be competitive by 2020. Wave and tidal certainly aren't competitive, and may never be.........."

Comparing apples and oranges is never a good idea.

Nuclear provides secure base load electricity - renewables as presently configured don't and never will.

Dumping mostly unused electricity onto the grid subject to the randomness of weather is not going to save our planet.

All that guff about 'energy mixes' and balancing loads is just feeble excuses for the inadequacies of real time renewables.

As for pumped storage .....you would need around 400 'Cruachans' refilling every two days to come close to scratching the surface.
29

Colin, Glasgow,

16/02/2008 17:15:15
Greenheatman #31 I agree with what you say, but the fact that wind is intermittent does not mean that it cannot theoretically be economically competitive.

In many ways wind-power is in the same position as nuclear power when it comes to selling electricity. It has to accept the market price, whatever that might be at the time. There is no point in not selling the electricity (in the case of wind there is no saving to be made because there is no fuel to conserve; and in the case of nuclear the fuel is so cheap that it is not worth turning the heat down).

So both wind and nuclear generators sell electricity at the lowest wholesale price. As long as this covers the cost of generating the electricity in the first place they will be competitive. In general nuclear is already competitive (except when the gas price plummets); and it is possible that wind will be in the same position in a decade or so.

However, wind becomes its own worst enemy if there are too many turbines. The price of electricity drops when there is a lot of wind, because there is plenty of supply. Hence if there are a lot of turbines producing a significant proportion of our electricity, the time when they generate most electricity is exactly the time when it is worth the least amount of money.

So the proportion of wind-power will be limited by economics. Which is just as well for the grid really.
30

Greenheatman,

TAIN 16/02/2008 18:46:47
........and if we do go nuclear what would be the point or justification for renewables?
31

Colin, Glasgow,

16/02/2008 20:07:36
#33 You ask what the point of renewables is if we use nuclear power? Well it depends on the type of renewable. The point of hydro is that it already exists and its output is flexible compared to nuclear. In fact a combination of nuclear and hydro is just about ideal - look at Sweden: high energy-usage, low pollution, cheap electricity.

The point of wind is that it can be deployed quickly - it can displace fossil fuel, albeit on a limited scale, sooner than we can build new nuclear stations.

Solar power (for electricity) needs to be improved before it has much point in the UK - but, in the long term, space-based solar is possibly a major competitor to nuclear.

Wave and tidal don't have much point unless they turn out to be very cheap. I suppose the main benefit is that the turbines are more discreet than those of wind.

Geothermal doesn't have much application for electricity in the UK (though ground-source heat pumps are an efficient way to generate low-grade heat).

There is also an argument that says we need diversity of supply. But really we just have to diversify away from using too much imported gas. There isn't a lot of point in using a vast number of different sources to achieve that aim. In order of cost it really means existing hydro, nuclear and then wind.
32

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 21:15:42
Colin, if you were to treat wind as an "optional" power source, it could actually reduce supply intermittency because a stopped windmill can be brought quickly on-line/off-line. So, if say you stopped windmills so that only half the windmills were running at any one time then you would have 100% extra capacitiy to compensate for short-term drops when you get that statistical feature when most windfarms experience a lull. Similarly, you could literally turn off windmills when you have too much capacity.

But of course that is only possible when you have the right pricing structure, and one that always values wind over more stable supplies like hydro is an insentive to destabilise the electricity supply.

Yet another reason why wind was a policy debacle!
33

Isonomia,

Lenzie 16/02/2008 21:16:45
When will we be able to edit posts to correct our smelling?
34

HA,

Beith 17/02/2008 14:25:27
The greatest contribution to C02 in this country is the way in which supermarkets import, distribute, package etc their goods. This is where the family's biggest carbon footprint comes from. If the government was serious about saving the environment we would have a Digging For Victory programme as in WW2 and people would be encouraged to grow food in their gardens, allotments would be encouraged/subsidised in cities. But this is all about the big corporations making huge profits. Remember the Stern report was created by Mr Stern the banker. IT'S ALL ABOUT MONEY. The environment is the excuse. The City runs this government.
35

Colin, Glasgow,

17/02/2008 15:15:42
Insomnia #35, It would be an expensive option to stop wind turbines running when there is wind available. They need to produce all the electricity they can, to be cost-effective. It would be cheaper to run nuclear stations in load-following mode (which sometimes happens in France). But the best option for load following is hydro - any water that is held back is available to be used later; which isn't the case for wind.

 

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