Oh please! That article is a laugh.
Try this unsubstantiated paragraph.
“ In power generation, BNEF estimates that coal is also one of the most inefficient ways to make electricity since 65% of energy is lost in the process of burning the fuel. The energy lost in generating electricity from wind is almost zero.”
So why did we ever burn coal? We must have been stark raving mad.
And this, “ It estimates that melting down old steel and reforming it is five times more energy efficient than making the material from scratch.”
Well, silly us. We should have forever been making new steel out of old stuff (it’s not as if we don’t do this now) just lying around. The first steel would have been made by leaving iron ore out in the 100% efficient sun and watching it.
Do you quote this rubbish in all seriousness?
P.S. Is there a missing word in that article? Subsidies?
It’s only unsubstantiated if you don’t care to do your own research. Since the source of power for a wind turbine is wind, and you’re not burning it, there’s no BTU loss contributing to emissions.
Congressional Research Service:
The National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) took APWG’s analysis a step further, finding that while the average efficiency of U.S. plants was 32% in 2007, the efficiency of the top 10% was five points higher at 37.4%.
University of Calgary:
A typical coal fired electrical plant is around 38% efficient,[[2]so ~1/3 of the initial energy content of the fuel is transformed into a usable form of energy while the rest is lost.
So what? Is the statement,
substantiated? All I asked was,
Answer that. Why are we burning coal? I don’t need a dozen university studies quoted at me when the answer is evident to a five year old … but not, apparently to a ship engineer. Why burn coal? Did you get the question? Why burn coal if it’s the “most inefficient”? Got that?
While you’re at it, tell me why we smelt iron from ore if that’s also stupid.
This is quoting an article posted on this site and all the experts look on proudly as if they’re watching their baby start to crawl. It’s utter rubbish. And you know it. I simply said as much.
You said it was unsubstantiated, so I helped you with that.
Why did/do we burn coal? I thought that was obvious, even as a ship engineer. Because it works, it exists, and it burns. Why did we sail ships before steam engines, why steam before diesel? Why horses before cars? We use the fuel and technology we have while developing better, cleaner, more efficient methods.
Great. So you stand by the article that says, “Wind solar are cheapest power sources in most places”?
I stand by the article that says pretty much the opposite I’ve posted above at #53. In summary, UK’s most “efficient” windfarm makes a handsome profit for its owner but overall it costs more than it makes. That’s really cheap! If it was obliterated today power prices (for the poorest too!) would fall as a result.
We can’t both be right, can we?
Yes I do, because I read the Bloomberg NEF reports and articles that provided the data for that Bloomberg article in question.
And all the while you are referencing an article about a single 15 year old wind farm (one of the first in the UK) in shallow waters and a utility company charging “above market rates” (roughly 300% above the rest of world’s newer wind farms) as evidence that the whole industry is unsustainable.
In the last 15 years the size, scale, and efficiency of the turbines and wind farms have vastly increased, at a rate faster than the per/unit cost, hence the much lower MWh cost for consumers of newer installations.
From that BNEF report:
"On current trends, the LCOE of best-in-class solar and wind projects will be pushing below 20 dollars per megawatt-hour this side of 2030. A decade ago, solar generation costs were well above $300, while onshore wind power hovered above $100 per megawatt-hour. Today the best solar projects in Chile, the Middle-East and China, or wind projects in Brazil, the U.S. and India, can achieve less than $30 per megawatt-hour. And there are plenty of innovations in the pipeline that will drive down costs further.”
No, one of us stuck in the past, one of us is looking to the future.
Great, again! So you read the report that says steel is best made from old steel sorta implying that we have enough of the stuff lying around and if only everyone would drag all that junk to the local steel mill (free of charge, of course), apply a fair bit of (free, again) sunshine and, voila, new steel for a fifth of the price!? That’s why so many old ships just get fed whole into the local steel mills around your place - oh wait, that doesn’t happen - the locals prefer greenery, an occasional supermarket and a strip joint.
I could go on with my sarcasm, but I’d shock your wide -eyed enthusiasm for things that don’t work … without an endless supply of other people’s money.
Hmmmmm. You (deliberately?) missed the bit about that one being the most efficient in the UK. You, of all people, understanding as you do ‘efficiency’ and everything.
And yes, everything new is just so much better and wonderful and sweet and doesn’t scare the unicorns and costs absolutely nothing, or almost nothing so that these wonderful technologies are now approaching the costs we achieved about a century ago with coal-powered stuff which we’ve improved immeasurably since such that even the virtuous Chinese are building them … every week.
Are you concerned you might be left behind them? I am.
I honestly don’t know why you keep talking about steel, this is a topic on Offshore Wind, unless I stumbled into the wrong forum…(no reply required).
That the UK’s most efficient offshore wind farm is old and ranks pretty low amongst the power and efficiency of new wind farms world wide is still not a great argument against new wind tech. If the UK can’t build them in a fiscally responsible fashion even today they are either doing it wrong or they should look into why it is becoming economical in other parts of the world.
15 years ago solar panels were hugely inefficient. And yet R&D continued on, and efficiencies and generation power increased greatly. It continues to do so, as it does with wind. Of course there are and will be subsidies. Much of the worlds modern technology was fostered through government funding. Oil and Gas is subsidized. Development in Offshore Wind will be subsidized. Given the choice I’d prefer todays subsidies go to new developments in wind and solar. If my job on an offshore oil rig is replaced with one on an offshore turbine installation vessel, I’m ok with that. It is a growing industry.
I’ll reply anyway. It’s a topic about the veracity of stupid studies that might be all the proof you need to chuck out everything we know, but not me. Any study that says recycled steel is so much cheaper might also ask are we doing it? If we are doing it (yes we are) why do we need so much iron ore?
We disagree. Great. But you don’t seem to have any arguments against mine other than new stuff is good. I want cost effective everything and you don’t get that with government meddling.
If wind, solar and other silly, unreliable forms of power generation are so good, remove all subsidies, laws, regulations, and other assistance they get and let them stand or fall in free and fair competition with everything else with appropriate requirements to control pollution (and that’s not the gas of all life on earth, CO2). And yes, remove any subsidies etc from all the other forms too.
I would trade jughead and seaeagle for DSD at this point.
“Everybody” wants to get into Offshore Wind/Renewables;
Even the oyster farmers:
Offshore Wind Farms offers protected areas for shells and juvenile fish to grow up without dangers of being scooped up trawlers as bi-catch.
Dutch and Belgian offshore construction companies is saved by the opportunities that arise on the Offshore Wind Industry:
But even small places in Norway sees new opportunities arising to replace the offshore oil & gas industry that has sustained them for years:
I’d trade jughead for the old cantankerous C.Captain. At least he gave me some decent advice about a company one time instead of just being annoying.
C’mon guys. Bid up my price. Am I that much of a bargain? I haven’t tried it yet but I can throw in a personal insult or two like you do if that helps.
Taiwan is fertile ground for new entrants into the offshore wind market:
Aker BP and Aker Solutions to cooperate on floating wind farm:
The generated energy will be used to power oil and gas producing platform on the Norwegian shelf.
Opportunities in the Offshore Wind industry is growing fast and spreading to more disciplines and manufacturing industries:
Scorpio Bulkers is only one of many companies that is jumping on the band wagon:
Dominion Energy East coast project is on track.
Vestas is the world leader in offshore wind turbines: