Nobody disputes that wind is an intermittent power source. Hatch says that in a typical wind-natural gas hybrid, wind makes up 20% of the generation mix, with natural gas shouldering the other 80%.
If you’re wondering how much less GHG emissions are coming from nuclear power generation than the wind/natural gas duo, Hatch says a lot. In fact, per kilowatt-hour of generation nuclear power emissions are 18.5 grams of GHG, while emissions for wind backed by natural gas are 385 grams of GHGs. That’s 20 times more GHGs for the wind backed by natural gas scenario.
Hatch’s numbers may even be on the conservative side. Because wind comes and goes, backup generating plants have to cycle up and down more often. This stop-and-start cycling burns up more feedstock and increases emissions across the board. Bentek, a Colorado energy analytics firm, found that 1,327 such cycling events happened in Colorado in 2009, which released up to 6.8 million pounds of extra sulfur dioxide (“SO2”), 3.1 million pounds of nitrogen oxide (“NOX”), and 147,000 pounds of carbon dioxide (“CO2”).
h/t Eric A.
It’s a good article and a good study. The only oddity is this in the article:
“It’s puzzling why the Clean Power Plan is drafted this way given the key role that experts say nuclear will need to play in getting us anywhere close to the goal set forth in the Plan itself.”
Well, no it’s not puzzling. The EPA has been an antinuclear organization virtually from its inception. It’s ground water rules for Yucca Mountain were simply ludicrous from any science-based perspective. So the 6 per cent credit limit was simply a way of knocking out nuclear from consideration while the Obama administration can pretend to be even-handed. The Clean Power Plan is not intended to reduce significantly US gaseous emissions from electricity generation. It’s intended as a stick to promote wind and solar, and nothing else. The article’s author of course knows all this, but is too polite to come out and say that the CPP is a fraud.
Where have all the engineers gone, long time passing? Engineering 101. You also can’t replace coal with natural gas in a boiler. Don’t work very efficiently. The boiler tube spacing is different. Oh well, I guess the engineers have gone to greenies or libruls, every one.
I think we have all known that Wind and Solar plants run on subsidies…nothing else.
Hatch et al seriously overstate the case for wind power in three distinct ways:
1 – they assume the nominal 20 year life of the wind generator is real. It isn’t, experience suggests that serious maintenance is required in 4 to 6 years and key component replacement is required in 12 to 15 years in dry areas, 10 – 12 years in high humidity areas with significant wind speed variation.
2 – they assume co-generation via advanced natural gas plants. Most real plants don’t yet use this technology and are much less efficient – particularly on switch-up.
3 – they miss the impact on baseload coal generation. if the wind/gas combination reduces the load for the coal generator below its design range, its efficiency falls significantly – producing an increase in net emissions and system wide cost that can be significantly greater than the totals associated with the wind/gas combos.
Too polite, or too chickenshit? I’ll take Door No. 2.
See Wynne is still touting 42,000 jobs created by her wind and solar program. I think the only consistent wind is the hot air out of her mouth and elsewhere.
Facts don’t “phase” ’em. Pardon the pun……
All true, Paul. It should further be noted that in Vesta’s own specifications manual they claim the only way to achieve design life is at 80 per cent capacity. Operating at nominal significantly reduces life expectancy and increases the maintenance cycles.
That said, Hatch probably made the baseline assumption that the various technologies would perform at their paper-claimed performance specs.
You have a good point about cogen, even more when it is considered that the vast bulk of gas generation cannot be put to cogen operation because of no offtaker for the waste heat.
Speaking of which (sort of), here’s a poll that could go horribly wrong:
“Should protesters be ousted by the court?”
http://vancouver.24hrs.ca/2014/11/02/kinder-morgan-takes-protesters-to-court
I’ll bet they didn’t factor in the emissions of the wind turbines which will inevitably burst into flames when their bearings burn out.
And anyone who knows anything about gases knows that SO2 and NO2 are infinitely worse air pollutants than CO2… So this is great news 🙁
I happen to be traveling to Brampton last weekend. On the route is a lengthy section of county road 124 between Singhampton and Shelburne. On this stretch I counted about 25 wind turbines all of them idle. Lots of Wynne power in that part of the country standing idle.