Image of offshore wind farms. Baltic Sea Wikimedia | Mariusz Paździora
We are trying to collect dilute erratic energy, spread over hundreds of square kilometers in windy, salty, and wet conditions with machines that spin at 330km/hour. What could possibly go wrong?
From: “Offshore wind fiasco” at GWPF — The original story in Danish.
Ørsted must repair up to 2,000 wind turbine blades because the leading edge of the blades have become worn down after just a few years at sea.
The wind turbine owner will not disclose the bill, but says that the financial significance is “small”.
The cost of repair is so small they need to keep it a secret.
But it can’t be cheap. For the most repairs, the blades need to be brought down, shipped and fixed on land. Repairing them at sea is a rare feat.
This must be the infamous leading edge erosion.
The Offwhore Wind Industry website discussed this type of damage in 2015:
Large rotors lead to large yields, but also to lots of annoyance – at least as far as the coating is concerned. After only a few years, the protective layer that is supposed to prevent erosion is already worn out. Materials that really last for 20 years are still being worked on.
The ever larger rotor blades have led to increasing rotation speeds of the blade tips. Offshore, speeds of up to 90 m/s are now reached. This is around 330 km/h. At these speeds, raindrops and hailstones hit the coating like bullets and remove the erosion protection like a pressure washer. After that, the rain washes away the rest of the coating layers and in the worst case exposes the blade structure. The tips and the leading edges of the blades are most affected.
Because the aerodynamics also get ruined along with the protective coating, the repair costs are accompanied by a loss in yield for the operator. Various studies estimate these losses to be between 4 and 10 %. If delamination sets in, this can quickly rise to 20 %.
It would already be an improvement if the erosion protection lasted six to seven years on the blade tips….
Apparently the protective coatings need a protective coating.
There is a steep loss of power as the leading edge erodes.
Significant blade erosion could cause up to a 5% power loss each year, according to Blade Dynamics sales and marketing manager Theo Botha.
The lifespan of a wind turbine offshore is supposed to be 25 years. Back in 2012 land-based wind farms in the UK were found to show signs of wearing out in just 12 years.
For onshore wind, the monthly ‘load factor’ of turbines – a measure of how much electricity they generate as a percentage of how much they could produce if on at full power all the time – dropped from a high of 24 per cent in the first year after construction, to just 11 per cent after 15 years.
For offshore wind –examined only in Denmark where it has been used for longer – it declined even more dramatically from over 40 per cent at the start, to just 15 per cent after ten years.
The bigger wind farms were less efficient than the small.
There is a five year guarantee on the rotor blades.
This, and other failure types, were expected from the beginning, but I’m sure it was a “surprise” to the green energy promoters.
441
Not a failure. Merely a routine maintenance, that ratepayers will gladly pay for.
381
As we all now know by now, the shrewd elite ancient Dutch windmill operators figured out that after they had used their windmills to make flour and pump water, they could secretively then use them to power printing presses to print money out of thin air. That is where the saying, “to print money out of thin air” comes from.
There will be more than enough money spare to repair the windmills here.
181
Friendly fire and fat thumb ES sorry
50
That’s ok robert, because it gives me the opportunity to also add that the ancient entrepreneurial elite Dutch windmill operators who first printed money out of thin air with the windmills, on the sly a bit, were the first to come up with the saying “money spinner”.
So the danger of not having enough money to make ongoing repairs of any kind whatsoever is very remote. For example, mice getting into the bearings. In fact, it should be well to anticipate the power of contemporary windmills/turbines greatly exceeds the money printing capacity of the ones once used by those early Dutch windmill elites.
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And if that fails, they also invented the tulip mania or the modern equivalent, Bitcoins. Money out of nothing.
30
Absolutely correct that all of the issues were foreseen; not just foreseeable.
While “early” failures are acceptable in a mass production environment; they are unacceptable in structural Engineering. Catastrophic failures can result from blade erosion leading to blade delamination; the separation of structural layers and the disintegration of the blade. If one blade is shed, the whole structure is unlikely to be able to support the enormous rotating imbalance forces resulting in tower failure or a separation between the main turbine shaft and the tower structure. i.e. things fall down and go splash! Usually with an oil slick to mark the spot.
Such catastrophic failures would, outside of the renewable energy sector, result in the all the Engineers and constructors being required to “show their work” so that the source of the problem can be identified. Meanwhile, there’s a stop of construction and limited operation of similar, constructed product until the issue has been identified and remedied. Costs are nominally borne by respective insurers.
Outside of the renewable energy sector, premature, systemic wear and consequential loss of service would require the manufacturer to set things right at manufacturer’s cost. “Consumer” protection. If the blades are only guaranteed for 5 years, then such is essentially the service life of the whole device because; especially in offshore service; replacements repairs are probably not commercially viable. Keep in mind that guarantees are typically only for manufacturing defects and that the manufacturer is “protected” by statements to the effect of the user being responsible for ensuring the suitability of the product for the purpose.
Maintenance and repairs of offshore wind turbines is horrendously expensive. Moreso than the construction. Especially in regions where the maintenance seasons are short and often interrupted by high winds. i.e. Prime regions for wind-driven generators. Regions such as the North Sea which are shallow and therefore “ideal” for erecting wind turbines, are also prone to heavy fog making the structure navigation hazards and disrupting work schedules for maintenance. And then; under certain conditions; wind farms make their own fog; perhaps from the moisture in the air that might otherwise fall as rain on nearby coastal plains. Quite pretty but worse than useless.
Access to offshore wind turbines is hazardous. Lifting heavy components for assembly is especially dangerous and very, very expensive; lifting has to be done by e.g. special cranes that are floated into place; which then lower supports to the sea bed for stability. Such multi-billion dollar vessels are not common; you can count their number on the fingers of one hand. The “alternative” is to use heavy-lift helicopters — helicopters that burn between 200 and 500 litres of fuel per hour. But then, the special floating cranes also burn fuel, sitting idle in the water, waiting for the winds to calm enough for safe working at heights.
While the lobbyists like to promote build and forget for wind and solar; the real-world picture is quite different. Harvesting from diffuse sources makes no sense when other proven sources are at hand.
It’s like getting farmers to abandon fertile, lush fields in favour of arid deserts and rocky ranges.
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Can we speed up the destructive process by any chance? I would love to see these monstrosities fall in the drink. The only problem is our dimwitted politicians will probably demand the consumer pay for the repair.
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I am reminded of a story my father used to tell, of Henry Ford on the release of the Model A. (1925?); which, Dad said, was a very good car.
A woman asked him how was it possible to make this car and sell it at such a low price?
“Madam”, he replied, “if I could get sole rights to the spare parts I would give the cars away!”
30
What we need to do is strip out the generators, add a heavy braking system,connect them from the grid and add lights to make them pretty at night.
Just like a few units in Ontario.
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You can make them reliable by re-powering 😉
30
For instance, I always enjoy video of subsidy farms on fire. Hilarious.
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A good site for large blade issues (helicopters) is here:
http://www.helicoptermaintenancemagazine.com/article/rotor-blade-preventive-maintenance
Remember helicopters are used a few hours per day and these windmills are 24×7 and not easy to work on!
No wonder they fail regularly….
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I just looked up the overhaul recommendation for fixed wing props. 2000 hours between overhaul. I can tell you that you inspect the prop before every flight. The equivalent document for fixed wing props!
https://www.faa.gov/documentLibrary/media/Advisory_Circular/AC_20-37e.pdf
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A lot more money in overhauling these than in fixing gel coat crazing in sailplanes I’d bet
40
How do I purchase a shareholding in the repair contractor’s company?
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I would like to purchase shareholding in the financial entities involved in lending/financing the windmills/repairers. The big money is in the debt the windmills create.
For example, some people say there is money in weapon sales during a war, however, i have heard it said the really big money is in the debt the war creates. The money made out of weapons sales is trifling in comparison…The big money and power is in the debt….The money being made out of the debt in the climate war must be in the trillions
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There’s only money if you have buyers.
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Flying through one shower of heavy rain in the wooden propped Ultra Light class of aircraft generally will cost a new prop and much heart bleed at the cost as rapid leading edge erosion destroys the prop’s efficiency, sometimes within a couple of minutes flying in heavy rain. Take off distances are considerably extended to the point of being exciting, cruise speeds drop off quite dramatically and the consequent fuel consumption goes up according to how much leading edge erosion from the rain drops has occurred.
The composite Ultra light aircraft propellers which are very similar in build techniques as the rotor blades on the turbines, plus some wood props on these small aircraft often have a thin sheet of steel lining the extreme leading edge of the prop to slow down this erosion effect.
Metal props atre too heavy for the ultralight class aircraft and can also have some serious and exciting resonances interactions in some revolution bands with some engines used in UL’s so it is either composite props , expensive, or wooden props, reasonably cheap and quite efficient when carved to the correct profiles.
The whole propeller erosion problem was known maybe a century ago from WW1 on.
But, hey this is renewable energy where a whole bunch of wet behind the ears university trained engineers are busy before their computer monitors re-inventing the wheel , er ! propeller all over again.
And the renewable energy scammers figure they can keep on convincing the politicals to continue milking the tax paying suckers until they really start to bleed and scream at which point the scammers sell the whole, near end of efficient life, wind farm off to some superannuation fund run by some financial expert who would’nt know which end of a spanner to shove up where.
Some years ago one of the biggest onshore SW Victorian wind farms located some distance inland in SW Vic, soon after it was opened with the usual lying fan fare about wind suddenly had a real problem on their hands.
The blades they were supplied with, where from I don’t know, proved to be built of a type of composite material that turned out to be very badly affected by the salt in the air and by erosion from the airborne sea salt from the ociean not that far away.
The whole very costly problem was kept under very tight cover as all of mutitude of blades on that multi turbine farm had to be removed and replaced with blades designed for the near ocean conditions and constructed with the correct composite plastics and etc so as to be able to keep operating in that environment.
I’m thinking that the endless flow of Other Peoples Money into the coffers of the renewable energy industry is now beginning to bring on a Enron type of hubris where they are beginning to believe they are untouchable politically and have become so important financially and to the politicians who backed them that nobody can do without them .
Which of course leads to an outrunning of their technical expertise as they keep on scaling up the older technologies to ever greater sizes but without doing the research to verify the problems that will occur with the increasing sizes of the turbines particularly as the turbines move into eever more extreme environments.
Worlwide it seems that the hey day of renewable energy might wellbe over as government subsidies to renwable energy are trimmed in Europe as they run out of money and in some states of the USA, in China where a high percentage of newly built wind farms are not even connected to the local grid as the relevant grid authorities get further and further behind in constructing the wide spread power collecting systems from the turbines and extending the vital power systen into the western back blocks of China.
Investment in solar and wind is in free fall over the last few months in many European nations.
New requirements and demands to meet the non despatchability problem from the intermittent wind and solar are being implememted by governments [ UK ]
. In short, the renewable energy suppliers are going to be forced into guanranteeing a certain level of power when required by the grid authorities.
Fauilure to meet that despatchability of power to the licensed level if and when required will lead to very heavy fines to cover the need for altranative fast start gas and diesel generators and eventually a withdrawal of licensed goverment approval to operate.
In the North sea the immense amoiunts of shipping passing though the northn sea is beginning tobe constrained by wind farms extending further and furhther into the sea lanes as well as the North Sea habitat for ocean life is being disrupted.
Despite not hearing about t , the shipping consortiums are beginning tobe very vocal indeed about the intrusion of wind farms into shipping lanes .
The oceanic branch of the environmental movement are beginning to really scream about the dislocation and species replacement from disturbing the North Sea bed plus the infra sound effects of the turbines on sea life.
The small boat North Sea fisheries which has a lot of political and financial heft is beginning to erupt as its fisheries are virtually eliminated by the huge areas and complex underwater constructions particularly the poor burial of the high voltage power lines from the off shore fiwind farms to shore.
One recent major Germnan North sea windfarm has had to pay a large all weather boat to stay in one position above a couple of hundreds of high voltage power line that lifted up out of its burial in the strench in the sea bed and could possibly snag fishery gear or even a passing ship apparently .
All this until the calm of another season stil la few months away can lead to the reburial of the cable.
That or the very large off shore wind farm stops generating .
Another major German North sea wind farm was completed but then could’t begin operating for ayear or more until a HV power cable was buried from wind farm to shore to bring the power onto land.
The problem!
Somebody didn’t do their homework.
The cable was p;rogrammed to be laid right through the WW2 dumping grounds of the RAAF and USAF bomber commands where bombs and ordinance which was not dropped or failed to be dropped and often was armed as well was dumped in that North Sea patch before the aircraft went on to land in England.
So multi millions of Euro s had to spent clearing a bomb proof corridor through this North Sea ordinance dumping ground until the cable to the shore could be safely laid. And then it still wasn’t exactly a safe situation for any cable repair crews.
———————
To paraphase Churchill as the battles of WW2 began to turn the Allies way.
It is not the beginning of the end.
But it is the end of the beginning for renewable energy.
——————–
Of course nobody foresaw, nobody predicted, nobody imagined the fantastically quick and dramatic demise of ENRON in 2001 either.
And the renewable energy industry in many ways tracks the spectacular rise of ENRON and its claim that it was going to the most powerful and most innovative and most important financial organisation on earth that would control much of the global commerce and financial system..
And at every level today’s Renewable Energy industry like ENRON, believies it will forever have almost unlimited access to as much money and power it will ever need to ensure its ongoing politacal and social power over all the citizens of the nations it holds its energy sway over.
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Very interesting ROM. But please use spell-checker next time?
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Wind wake turbulence…see photo at top of article I penned a few years ago.
http://dailybail.com/home/why-wind-power-wont-work.html?currentPage=3
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More technical details here:
http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/75/1/012033/pdf
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Similar effect by/on aircraft.
https://www.aopa.org/training-and-safety/air-safety-institute/accident-analysis/featured-accidents/wake-turbulence-rips-aircraft-apart
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Incredible read, thanks for that.
20
Many thousands of wind farms at sea,
Are not all they’re cracked up to be,
Needing costly repairs,
As the leading edge wears,
On each blade and each tower has three.
520
Forget Paris: Global Fossil Fuel Consumption To Rise By 20% By 2040, BP Energy Outlook
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Ah, part of that will be because the wind farm rotors are all made from oil (fibreglass using epoxy resins) and lots of repairs/replacements are needed?
Gee, not free energy after all …
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It is my understanding that these big turbine blades are carbon fibre as fibre glass is not strong enough for the centrifugal force for these diameters.
What they harden the tips and leading edges with I have no clue, but whatever it is it ain’t good enough.
50
Even carbon fibre uses resins … made from oil.
If you search this blog, you may find a post, maybe early last year, about recycling these dreaded things. Rotors couldn’t be recycled because of their construction materials and there were hundreds of tons of these things. They all had to go into landfill.
Good hunting.
40
The designers of these things need to take lessons from aircraft history and design. The blades could be made using late 1950 ties technology using a titanium honey-comb with titanium skin with leading edges and tips hard chromed. They would last the life of the wind turbine and would be lighter.
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Don’t encourage them Wayne. We don’t want to see design improvements that could mean more appallingly inefficient and environmentally destructive eco-crucifixes!
10
thank god (and poseidon ) we are going to get rid of these things sooner than expected.
The cost of repair is still governed by contracts that will bankrupt most suppliers. This means that ,
as onshore build is almost impossible in the UK, the power of refusal being restored to the localities after the last election, the current offshore projects are now kaput and rape of our sublime seascape is ending. On a side note, our National Trust, of which I am still (just) a member have been defeated in the attempt to stop fracking on their (my?) land, in defiance of long standing UK law. Perhaps my country might now survive the coming solar minimum.
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I gave up my membership of the NT, the RSPB and the RHS because of their waste of money on “climate change” propaganda and their support of renewable energy such as wind power.
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Same here Phillip,
I have given up on most of my charities. All the environmental ones were cancelled the moment that they mentioned Climate Change.
St V de P is still there so far.
51
Looks like a job for the Spin Doctors
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The question I have is what caused it? Why are the leading edges of blades failing faster than those on similar units on land? Wind carried spume of froth? Salt is pretty abrasive stuff after all and I am assuming it is the culprit but what is the actual physical mechanism for salt to impact the blades?
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I doubt the salt content plays any role in the blade damage.
Offshore turbines are typically the largest yet made with the highest tip speed. The blades have higher exposure to water and, in the Danish location, sleet is likely at certain times. Once water can penetrate a surface it can do considerable harm with expansion if it freezes.
Surface cracking is the inevitable consequence of the high fluctuating stresses in the blades with time as well as high speed impacts. So pathways for water ingress is assured over time.
There is also the occasional bird strike and maybe flying bugs.
Salt will play a significant role in the stress corrosion cracking of the towers. We will see the consequence of that in a few years. Highly stressed offshore structures have a relatively low reliable life.
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Perhaps salt crystallisation in minute irregularities in the surface causing cracks to develop.
Once salt water is deposited on a blade it will quickly evaporate leaving a small salt deposit to act as a nucleus for further crystal activity. There’s probably a zone of perfect action between the outer part of the blade where it’s moving too fast for saltwater to settle and the inner part where it’s moving slowly enough to stay moist most of the time.
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“There is also the occasional bird strike and maybe flying bugs. ”
I think you have underrated the significant impact “bird strike” can have on wind turbine blades. Unless we are talking about ducks which have softer bills.
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They are essentially creating a reef habitat on the sly. ! 🙂
70
Helped along with some strategicly placed exothermic activity…tiimmbbberrrrr….
10
The possible damage caused by flying pigs should also be considered.
90
Has anyone seen Dumbo the elephant lately ?
70
As an engineer, I look at the photo above and feel sick.
It’s an engineering nightmare designed??? By Idiots.
Unbelievable engineering and an Environmental Tragedy.
KK
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But KK, this is leading edge technology. And the blades are renewable.
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Sort of reminds me of a Japanese accountant speaking “English” who said “this is very bad rotation but dangerous”.
After a while his colleagues (not me) worked it out, he meant it was a vicious circle.
Spoken during a hectic end of financial year accounting period.
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That reminds me of the old idea of using solar wind sails to propel spacecraft. It’s still taken seriously even today. Sometimes I wonder if the proponents are either outstandingly stupid or just con artists. Either way it’s a total waste of time and money. Why don’t they just stick thermocouples into the sun, link them up and have a long flexible cord to the spacecraft? It makes just as much sense.
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Solar wind sails would be excellent for long duration missions out to the Oort Cloud or Kuiper Belt. You boost into a basic trajectory and use the sail to build the velocity you need to get data back in reasonable time. Also allows a bigger payload. Not for manned missions, I would say.
Light Sail 2 is due to launch this year and attempt to do a transorbital insertion. I can’t stand Bill Nye, but this activity he’s associated with prevents him from being a total loser.
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Unmanned perhaps but even that has issues. By the time it got to say Pluto it would be flying past it so fast it wouldn’t have enough time to explore the environs. Forget about trying to slow it down as that would require so much energy it defeats the purpose of using solar sails. It would also put so much stress on the vehicle it would collapse. Of course one could jettison small exploratory vehicles as it flew past but that would also require too much energy and g forces. The only alternative is to start slowing it down about the half way point. The trouble is by the time it speeds up and slows down, it still will take a very long time to get to the required destination. I’m afraid we have to make some major advances in physics before we can travel really quickly in space, manned or unmanned, to be of any real use. Something that can accelerate and decelerate a vehicle extremely quick, like in minutes not months, without the impact of horrendous g forces. At the moment it’s not even theoretical. Perhaps inertia negation (as distinct from damper) would work. We just need to invent it.
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I watched a few Bill Nye videos about the Light sail. I have one important question. How is it steered?
30
There’s a lot of free energy available in each CME. Wait until there’s one going your way, then deploy the sail. Gotta work 🙂
50
EH
Frequently by the sound of it
30
KK:
Turbine blades are built using a knowledge base from fibreglass boat construction. The thin outer layer is about 30 microns thick (a human hair is about 90 microns diameter). The basis for boat gelcoats is resisance to exposure (sunlight, water) and glossy for sales success. A thicker layer would not be any more impact resistant. A tougher layer might not look as glossy and probably wouldn’t have as good resistance to sunlight.
The thing that builders should have done is checking on the experience with off shore powerboat racers. These travel much faster than ordinary boats and face more damage at their high speeds. In fact the boats usually have a life of one season of 6-7 races due to the stresses they encounter.
I doubt that the North Sea sunlight is strong enough to effect turbine blades; far more likely is impact (salt crystals maybe but water droplets certainly). Once there is some cracking in the gelcoat water can get in and weaken the adhesion between the gelcoat and the laminate and rapidly accelerate damage.
171
This recently discovered damage to the working parts of renewable energy generating gadgets, is entirely predictable because of the precipitate rush into this and other immature technologies, with little or no time allotted to working out all the bugs.
Just goes to show what disasters can be inflicted on humanity when bog ignorant amateurs are allowed to meddle in areas of which they know exactly nothing.
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G3.
I just found this:
That’s pretty fine sand paper. 🙂
40
A mate of mine, over 30 years ago supplemented his boat building business with the repair of fiberglass yachts, with osmosis damage. This is delamination of the fiberglass matrix caused by water.
They would sand blast up to 10mm of the degraded hull away until they got down to sound structure, then spray shopped glass & resin from a “chopper gun” to rebuild to the original thickness.
Painted with the best urethane paint of the day, this gave longer life than the original mould built hulls.
Materials & building techniques have improved dramatically with time, but hitting a piece of flotsam can cause enough damage to give a start to the process.
This is such good news it makes me think that maybe there is a divine being looking over us. after all.
110
When you take a wrong turning
no end to the spin you need to
keep on going but eventually
you run out of energy.
https://www.google.com.au/search?tbm=isch&sa=1&ei=iZSQWtbEL4HM8wW-nKfgDQ&q=wrong+turn+signs+images&oq=wrong+turn+signs+images&gs_l=psy-ab.12…13790.16029.0.18448.7.7.0.0.0.0.197.1328.0j7.7.0….0…1c.1.64.psy-ab..0.0.0….0.NqbcLYSdsjU#imgrc=zymcrQUTtaXiMM:
40
Is that now the official collective noun, or just a Freudian slip?
Either way, it works for me.
140
Maybe the designers have an approach to maths like this?
“In case You Forgot For A Minute That The Left Is Completely Insane”
“Student investigated after allegedly saying a maths symbol looked like a gun”
https://realclimatescience.com/2018/02/in-case-you-forgot-for-a-minute-that-the-left-is-completely-insane/
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We know they are insane……thats why they would promote people like Marx ( who was paid by the Elite in the 1800s to create his unworkable anti-human manifesto…)
Everywhere you look, the Left is dropping all pretence and showing its true colours now.
The best antidote, is teaching Kids and 20 somethings of today about Communism and Leftism.
Living within leftism is like living in a house whereby every member is abused…it becomes normalized, but people cant quite work out without na external reference *why* its wrong.
Our young people risk the same ongoing abuse of their minds, their souls and their futures – unless we teach them the Left is one big long PTSD-inflicting episode, and that the Left must be resisted and stopped cold. Its only becasue there is no cold hard comparison to the evils of the Left that they run riot.
We need to be the voices insode our kids heads who tell them “Hey, this Left wing nonsense is not OK”….and this its Ok to question what they are told, and its OK to be booted from Uni if they professors are all card carrying Communists, and that most of the Left is divisve – rascism, feminism, poverty alleviation, climate chnage…..these are all wedge politics the Left uses along with its abusive Godless mouth and heart, to divide families, divide communities, corrode sociery.
I stamp on it my house, it gets discussed and rightly shot down with logic.
My 12 year old is learning about Communism and why its so bad, what divisive politics are, so she knows……
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Indeed the world is becoming more and more insane. So what happens if someone draws an actual gun? I know a person with a fake gun can be expected to be met with force but a drawing? Do the thought police arrest or even shoot a person who dares draw a gun? Meanwhile the real criminals are not touched, including some politicians, mostly from the left. Wonders never cease.
72
A high point of hysteria was reached a few years ago when a plane was turned back to Sydney after a vomit bag was found in the toilet with the word BOB written on it which is clearly a bomb on board warning message.
50
Yes but that still was a bag of something so I can understand the hysteria. A more appropriate example would be if they found a child drawing a picture of a gun in a scrap book, and the crew went into hysteria forcing the plane to turn back. Clearly we are all living in a more dangerous world than ever before causing us to be hypersensitive but the irony is we are letting go others who are actually causing real harm but we are desensitised to it because they keep doing it so often. Here I mean the likes of the far left who are whining and casuing much havoc and alarm through fake media reports and outrageous innuendoes. Yet they suffer no consequences for doing so when they are proven to be false, and the appropriate authorities can’t be bothered or pretend it’s not important and let it go. The only ones who understand this is all wrong are those who have responsibilities as well as rights, and the rest believe they have only rights but no responsibilities, which in the end means they can do almost anything they like and in their mind get away with it, and in almost every case do get away with it. The longer this keeps happening the more desensitised we become leaving us wide open and totally unprepared when disaster hits. That’s when a dictatorship steps in and rules. History repeats.
70
Have we got this bass ackwards.
We (collectively, and especially in the U.S.) freak out at the mere thought of gun violence, and guns in general, and yell and scream ‘Gun Control Now’.
And then, in the very next breath, we laud and go into raptures over one of the biggest box office successes of recent times, Black Panther, which features 163 instances of gun violence.
Am I missing something here?
Tony.
280
‘Am I missing something here?’
No you got that right, our cousin is truly weird.
Before the American revolution Britain used it as a dumping ground for convicts, so in fear of an imminent invasion the forefathers allowed everyone to carry arms.
Big mistake and non retractable.
83
Yes what you are missing is there is a great polairsation of the people. Much civil unrest the likes we’ve never seen is very likely coming when the polarisation is too much to bear, and someone goes too far.
30
Tony
Have a look at this
“Illegal Weapons and Gun Laws”
https://rosebyanyothernameblog.wordpress.com/2018/02/15/illegal-weapons-and-gun-laws/
20
I look at the Israelis….if they followed the Australian gun model, they would all be dead by now.
There is, in my humble opinion, nothing wrong with people having easy access to firearms, as long as mentally unstable ( via prescription drugs or mental illness ) are prohibitted from holding guns like martin bryant, or the kids on anti- depressants.
I dont think ive ever heard of an NRA memver committing mass murder, as its normal law abiding people who arent the problem and neither are guns, cars and trucks and knives kill way more people…they arent the whiplash focus of the hysterical thuggish left though…why us that?
72
AH! But the Israelis both male and female have a mandatory two years I think, service in the israeli military so they learn to handle weapons of every lethality.
They also , unlike the americans and other western nations, have even when fighting like cats amongst themselves, a culture and a morality that says despite all this disension amongst ourselves, we are all Israelis and we must act collectively otherwise we are all dead meat in this Middle eastern world centre of hate and fear.
The Americans and increasingly seen here in Australia due to our failure to be able to culturally and socially integrate the huge numbers of immigrants from diverse cultures that the government in its usual abject level of disdain for the Australian voters and tax payers and iwhat they want and abject stupidity in its terar jerking concern for refugees are allowing into australia at a rate where we can no longer absorb them into our culture
“Refugees” who from what I see passing through Horsham are doing very nicely indeed financially especially compared to so many pensioners and ex servicemen who served , fought for and worked all their lives for this Australia.
America is culturally divided by a very significant cultural divides and numbers of identifiable culturally seperated sectors which unlike the far more culturally cohesive Israelis with a gun / guns in every house, ready for immediate use, provide a deep reservoir of hatred to draw on and use against other groups within the USA.
50
OS
Don’t forget Switzerland
20
I disagree….if america had been divided for that long, which people could argue for the last 200 years with slavery etc and the north south divide, americans ( and for that matter australians ) have a tendency to pull back from the brink when it looks like it might go off the rails.
What is different this time is professional left wing agitation groups who happily forment trouble to create instability with the express aim of impkementing gun control.
Had Helkary won, they would have brougt in gun control very quickly so the left could destroy america. Australia is half way there and we have a population and compliant left wing pollies like John Howard happy to run with the left wing agitprop.
The framers of the US Constitution had seen in europe what happens when a govt or ruler can monster the people, so made sure the pooulation could defend itself from abuse of power, either internal or external. China, Germany, Turkey – all these had internal populations killed by the own govts as it turns out, and as a historic fact, all implemented gun control before hand.
The mechanism / excuse may vary, but the aim is always the same it seems, which is implementing socialism via the barrel if a gun…..
31
My respons 9.2.1.1.3 is to ROM
Cheers,
OS
Yes good point about Switzerland
20
When we reach the tipping point, where more than half of the population don’t have any semblance of independent thought at all, we will have reached the end-state, where the philosophers and students will be seen as abhorrent, and a dire threat to The Ordered Society.
I recommend buying pitchfork futures.
100
Yes you have the broad picture correct. It’s just a matter of time before it all explodes. Then comes the dictatorship, which much of the population will love to see, takes over in the pretense of peace and order only to find out in the long run they just handed over their lives to a tyrant.
60
Free speech rally in Melbourne today on the steps
of the State Library. Good, (young) speakers from Tax Payers
Alliance, Libertarian Society and Oz Freedom of Speech Movement.
Up to sixty attendees, some casual listeners and strangely, in
the RMIT student heartland, no hecklers.
60
One would hope that RMIT students would be more pragmatic than most, so its encouraging no hecklers.
Its funny…people, even normally gobby and smart-mouthed students, know stuff isnt right and the respect for those speakers reflects it.
Interesting, isnt it?
Things arent going to end well…..
41
I was in IGA the other day, and to my surprise in the toy section was three toy gun types. The black cowboy and indian type that I used when growing up; a red cap gun, the type now banned in the US; and a yellow water pistol.
I nearly took a photo of it with my phone, but thought that would be too weird.
20
I just got this in an email. Which might also help explain the problem with the turbines (/s)
“Stronger storms mean new ‘category six’ scale may be needed
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/feb/22/category-six-storms-cyclones?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GU+Today+AUS+v1+-+AUS+morning+mail+callout&utm_term=265254&subid=12211115&CMP=ema_632
110
What would the world do without The Guardian and than Mann?
132
Sink faster?
90
Yea right! No extremely powerful hurricanes ever occurred before the Saffir-Simpson scale was invented. [sarc]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Category_5_Atlantic_hurricanes
100
Saw that in our local Fairfax rag and on the local (Newcastle) TV weather report too. The idiot weather man there couldn’t wait to announce that there would be bigger scarier cyclones coming.
Perhaps if the BOM stopped naming every half-baked rain depression as a cyclone when it clearly isn’t, and routinely calling Cat 3 storms Cat 5, we wouldn’t need a Cat 6.
Likewise if they didn’t paint their weather maps scarlet at 20 degrees they wouldn’t need a new purple category to describe a normal hot summer temp in central Oz.
And they can stop fudging the definition of a heatwave too!
End of rant. Thank you.
262
IIRC Didn’t they do that with the UV warning scale?
62
True or False?
‘The proportion of intense tropical cyclones versus weaker ones has increased both regionally and globally by 25% to 30% per degree Celsius of global warming over the past four to five decades.
‘As the seas warm, the ocean has more energy available to be converted to tropical cyclone wind. So with increasing sea surface temperatures we can expect to see higher tropical cyclone wind speeds. This has been the case as the wind speeds of the most intense tropical cyclones have been increasing in all ocean basins.’
The Conversation 2015
30
Who to believe?
50
For the lurkers, cyclone activity is way down.
http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/graphs/storms/tropical/haig-2014-fig-4-australian-cyclones-1500-years.gif
This should be ringing alarm bells.
On the question of intensity, I have seen nothing to convince me that hurricanes and cyclones have become more intense.
In regards to windfarms, as we enter a global cooling phase the storms and severe winds will increase in midlatitudes. No due diligence on this possible eventuality.
132
You are right el gordo. On this side (west) of the continent we have had an improved number of cyclones this season, though short-lived and weaker, giving us enormous amounts of rain. Broome has broken January and February recods and even annual this early in the season with in excess of 1.5 metres of rain. Surrounding areas have been similarly affected.
The last few years have been below average in cyclone number and above average in rainfall.
80
I doubt they have even named a cyclone on the east coast, there certainly hasn’t been a warning issued. Our dam is at 15% and we have been pumping water from the Burdekin since Nov at a daily cost of $35,000/day.
Pity Qld doesn’t have any of that free wind power. /sarc
81
Southern Hemisphere Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) was at a near record low last year. And while the Eastern Pacific ACE was near average and the Atlantic Basin ACE was labeled “Hyperactive”, the over all lack of activity in the southern hemisphere was the primary factor that drove the Global ACE down about 20% below average.
But as we have seen, the only storms that matter much to the alarmists are those that form and strike land. And when there is a lack of storms in the present they spend their time making up scary scenarios about what will happen in the future.
71
El gordo proclaimed: 🙂
What a surprise! Solar activity is also down with Spotless Days:
Today (feb 24 2018): Blank Sun.
Current Stretch: 6 days
2018 total: 24 days (44%)
2017 total: 104 days (28%)
2016 total: 32 days (9%)
2015 total: 0 days (0%)
Cyclone Gita was wound up by one sunspot as seen here which spat out a pair of flares as a double banger (last seen sept 8 2014).
See also the Sun and Storms from Ben Davidson for the link.
40
there has been a shift in patterns – a climate shift of sorts over the last 30 or so years wherein the tracking of TCs has changed. I recall many cyclones would travel inland onto the continent and then curve out into the north Tasman. No longer.
20
A pattern change is more likely to be Solar induced. Storm energy seems to determine how far they track latitudinally before turning towards the poles, but I can’t prove that. Yet.
20
If you told Darwinites that their is a cyclone coming even stronger than Tracy they would leave town.
And then there is C Leonta:
Townsville was a small town then.
50
“… by 25% to 30% per degree Celsius of global warming over the past four to five decades.”
So during the past “4 or 5” decades, was there 1, 2, 3,… degrees of warming?
If not some real number, the statement is meaningless.
Also, as stated, that is a compounding – the 8th wonder of the world.
71
el Gordo I’m not buying that we see stronger storms yet.
1. Our coverage and technology has increased during the years since we finally go full satellite coverage of all global surface where tropical cyclones form in the late 60’s.
2. NOAA is developing new formulas for measuring the intensity of storms and I suspect they are inflating the wind speed values.
An example of why I am skeptical is that these new remote sensing techniques combined with the data from hurricane hunter aircraft are not matching up with direct observations once the storms reach where buoy and land based station data can be monitored and it has happened more the once.
The latest example was Irma. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Irma
I happened to be home and for hours monitored all of the buoy and surface stations in real time in the path of Irma and at the same time monitored the news. When it hit Cudjoe Key NOAA had it as a CAT IV with 130 mph winds, but I couldn’t even find a buoy or station that recorded 115 mph sustained for 1 minute (CAT IV is 130 to 156 mph) . At the time it came ashore on the Florida mainland near Naples, FL NOAA had it at as a Category III with 115 mph winds but I could find not a single buoy or station which had 1 minute sustained winds reaching even 110 mph which is the high end of CAT II. What I was seeing from the live coverage of the effects on the television matched up with what the buoy and surface station data were.
Thus I suspect that the complicated formula they’re using to get their numbers through their remote sensing is significantly inflating the wind speed values. I’m just a truck driver and no expert but it seems to me that at least one weather buoy or surface station in the storms path should have shown wind speeds that corroborated the NOAA statements of the Category of the storm and not a single one did!
61
I did something similar when NOAA declared the warmest May ever for our area. Personal experience said it was one of the coldest. I checked data from many area weather stations which supported my feeling. This was a number of years ago and my memory is a little dim but I have never trusted NOAA data since. More people should do their own search for data and not blindly accept what is pushed on us by biased organizations and media. I doubt it would keep them honest but it might limit the magnitude of the lies.
30
Fixing the impeller blades on offshore turbines will be an expensive exercise to be sure. And we all know how long ‘repairs’ last – maybe onother 10 years if they are lucky.
The public and governments will be asking questions about all this (like who pays) and building more of these silly and futile machines may be curtailed.
Regards GeoffW
120
I doubt that in 10 years or so they will still be building them. Once the next financial crisis hits they won’t have the money to keep them running let alone repair or build them.
150
The government subsidies around the world are being pulled, so their demise is imminent.
The real question now is who is going to pay to get these contraptions removed when the company goes bankrupt?
30
The public haven’t even noticed yet, let alone started asking questions. Maybe when their power bills have quadrupled yet again, and their jobs in energy-intensive industries have gone, their household appliances are stuffed by constant brown-outs and fluctuating electricity supplies, when their own kindred are stranded on a hospital operating theatre table in the dark with no electricity – maybe then they may notice and maybe ask a question or two.
The governments know, but don’t want questions asked.
130
I notice the manufacturers have a 5 year warrentyon the blades no flies on them. I get better life from my lawn mower blades!
I wonder if they’ve considered hardwoods? Say like oak or ironbark. Maybe not so silly if you think about it.
GeoffW
30
I reckon ironbark…its basically organic concrete….i built a garden wall out if it….heavy as…
20
Rotol made propellor blades for late Merlins and Griffons from treated wood known as hydulignum and Jablo. The process is detailed towards the end of this link
https://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?126514-Hydulignum-props
20
I guess they can drive their electric cars out to the wind farm and use electric power to remove the blades then load them in the back of the electric car and take it for repair too easy .
151
With a trailer covered in solar panels, registration plate DAYLIT
90
Take an antique technology to generate weak, diffuse, intermittent power then give it massive maintenance and access problems while creating hazards to navigation and wildlife. If nobody’s buying, launch one of the whirlygigs into space (or say you did).
Kids out of the kitchen. Without delay. Now, please. Out!
180
Don’t worry. It will all come to an end once the Western governments realise they are on the verge of bankruptcy, if not already, and they pump up taxes to the point of killing the Western economy. Then both they and businesses all go broke and reality bites while the global warming hoax is forgotten.
150
..or they create a war as a diversion….
40
But even 5% of sfa is still sfa.
40
These “surface coatings” that are being washed into the oceans.
What are they?
How TOXIC and a massive form of POLLUTION are they ?
202
I can see an ecocatastrophe of even greater proportions than supermarket plastic bags.
110
There is no catastrophe regarding supermarket plastic bags. It’s all hype and photo opportunism from third world countries after a flood event washes the garbage out of town.
So an ecocatasrophe greater than nothing, is probably still nothing. Life loves oil as much as the industrial world does.
41
and there’s oxybenzone from spf 50 + human sunscreens. Well, that’s a surface coating 🙂
Oxybenzone in even minute quantities in the water is fatal to filter feeders (corals, barnacles, oysters, mussels, and other shell fish).
Has allegedly been found in human mother’s milk but carcinogenicity and toxicity is unknown. I understand, but could be wrong, that it has not been tested on this life form at any stage of its life cycle. Has also been alleged to decompose under exposure to UV-B but into what I don’t know. Useful stuff.
90
Oxybenzone
Wiki has a bit on it – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxybenzone
This site has a large accumulation of data – it should open in the toxicity section
https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/oxybenzone#section=Non-Human-Toxicity-Excerpts
10
Uhuh! Fibre glass coatings coated with something else etc etc — wouldn’t happen to be ” PLASTIC ” , would it. and definitely NOT the UK’s other national Flag ( t’esco bag ) … but THAT’s alright to lose bits o’ plastic in the wind in the Sea…. Just like the Plastic Tags and beacons/ flags used in tagging creatures, etc och I could go on..
100
But wont it be just so easy – doing the repair work!!!!!!
The repair work might just cost more than the original erection cost.
80
So then, let’s compare the wind turbine process to the coal fired power process.
The wind blows the blades around, and the blades in turn drive the generator through a CSD. (Constant Speed Device, a glorified gearbox)
The boiler boils water to steam to drive a turbine which drives the generator.
An early part of the wind process, the blades have a problem with wear that leads to a lowering of power generation by as much as 20% after just a few years.
Hazelwood had a problem with the early part of its process, the boilers themselves. which lead to a lowering of power generation by only 13% ….. and that was after 53 YEARS.
The generators were so clapped out (/sarc) that one of them was onsold overseas and will still be used to generate power at another plant.
53 years, and still doing better than the most recent wind power technology.
I’m beginning to think that perhaps modern coal fired technology may be better than modern wind power technology. (please Tony, don’t forget the /sarc)
Tony.
360
Good comparison – clear and succinct. Unfortunately most people in politics, especially of the left, will get the 4th word in your opening sentence and their powers of deduction, logic and understanding drop to that of a rock.
120
That picture looks like a good fishing spot, an artificial reef the trawlers can’t wreck.
Could you put one in Bowling Green Bay please?
61
Pity we can’t ask some Neandertalers about cooling the climate urgently. Investigations of crater lake sediments where these humans had a long history indicate transitions from forest to steppe, steppe to forest, warm to cool and cool to warm…sometimes in the space of a decade. No evidence of whirlygigs, government subsidies or special taxes.
How on earth did those Neandertalers do it? It’s a question you’re bound to ask yourself as you boat out to a busted wind-turbine with your special whirlygig-reaching crane.
80
Neanderthals adapted, but because they were so spread out there may have been a genetic bottleneck.
40
Ah the old bottle neck theorem its handy to fill in the blanks
40
Strange about those Neanderthals and a cooling climate
when you consider that Neanderthal Barney Rubble Stone Economy,
chip, chip, chip, flake, flake, flake…all those limestone atoms
released into the atmosphere. And yet it cooled.
40
Well there is always US coal to fall back on.
Europeans rip Trump on climate change, import record amounts of U.S. coal
71
23 Feb: Reuters: Coral reefs at risk of dissolving as oceans get more acidic: study
by Alister Doyle
Coral reefs could start to dissolve before 2100 as man-made climate change drives acidification of the oceans, scientists said on Thursday.
Acidification will threaten sediments that are building blocks for reefs. Corals already face risks from ocean temperatures, pollution and overfishing.
“Coral reefs will transition to net dissolving before end of century,” the Australian-led team of scientists wrote in the U.S. journal Science. “Net dissolving” means reefs would lose more material than they gain from the growth of corals…
Coral animals will be able to keep growing and replenish reefs long after sandy sediments start to dissolve, lead author Bradley Eyre, of Southern Cross University, told Reuters.
“This probably reflects the corals’ ability to modify their environment and partially adapt to ocean acidification whereas the dissolution of sands is a geo-chemical process that cannot adapt,” he wrote in an e-mail.
The report said it was “unknown if the whole reef will erode once the sediments become net dissolving” and whether reefs “will experience catastrophic destruction” or merely a slow erosion.
Some reef sediments were already starting to dissolve, such as at Kaneohe Bay in Hawaii, where other pollutants were contributing…
Most studies show that acidification will be overwhelmingly bad for ocean life, also threatening creatures such as oysters, lobsters and crabs. Another study on Thursday, however, found that it might help the growth of some plants.
“An increase of carbon dioxide in the ocean theoretically could stimulate higher growth of kelp and seaweeds,” Kasper Hancke, a biologist at the Norwegian Institute for Water Research, wrote in a statement.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-environment-corals/coral-reefs-at-risk-of-dissolving-as-oceans-get-more-acidic-study-idUSKCN1G62LS
23 Feb: ScienceNordic: Will climate change affect Norwegian kelp forests in a positive way?
http://sciencenordic.com/will-climate-change-affect-norwegian-kelp-forests-positive-way
MSM loves the Aussie study:
Scientific American: Corals Are Dissolving Away
Highly Cited
Phys.org: Acid oceans will dissolve coral reef sands within decades
Science Mag: Coral reefs will transition to net dissolving before end of century
The Age: World’s coral reefs face new peril from beneath within decades
SBS: Coral reefs may dissolve in acidic oceans
Conversation, Australia: Our acid oceans will dissolve coral reef sands within decades
21
It wont be long before we get some wise academic tell us that the acidic sea water will dissolve silica.
Some of these academics need to be well and truly buffered.
91
G’day Pat,
Did you notice the non-appearance of any Ph numbers?
Cheers,
Dave B
61
That would be pH numbers.
40
I can’t remember my phone number at the moment.
20
Alister Doyle is a master baiter. The article mentions a team making the study. Ooh: kinky and naughty.
By the end of “the century” eh? Yeah, right. He carefully didn’t say which century leaving readers to assume this century when it’s more likely to be so far in the future the sun will be in its death throes. Before then, those reefs could be either sub-ducted or pushed up into mountains. We won’t be around to see it.
There are no pH figures, and no mention of the oceans being a buffered solution. It will never happen. It didn’t happen when CO2 was at 1000 ppm, so why should it happen at a mere 400ppm? A non-existant problem; worse than click-bait. Climate pornography.
61
The theory of the Brontosaurus(Apatosaurus) by AnnElk
20
This is just so unscientific. The PH scale goes from 1 to 14 with a neutral solution being 7. Below 7 is acidic and above 7 is alkaline.
A pH of 8 is less alkaline than a PH of 14. A PH of 6 is less acidic than a PH of 1. The sea has a PH of above 7 ie alkaline. As it approaches 7 it becomes less alkaline not more acidic. Yet these clowns writing this stuff get away it. It is not ignorance that is driving this. It is deliberate misinformation.
60
And how will anything dissolve in an ocean that can never become acidic? Even the worst case scenarios of the most rabid alarmists predict only a closer approach to neutral (or a less corrosive condition.) There is no such thing as ocean acidification, only a lessening of alkalinity.
30
There are three sorts of people in this world.
This time I don’t mean Single People, Married People and Parents.
Instead, when it comes to electrical power generation, there’s:
Homo Stupida Stupidus. Wind Power, Solar and Diesel
Homo sapiens sapiens: hydro, geothermal, natural gas, coal and high pressure nuclear.
Homo superior and China: LFTR nuclear.
Makes you think.
61
Also small thorium based reactors for home use have been proposed for some time now. But will the big ones produce weapons grade material? If not then it won’t replace existing nuclear plants except in countries that don’t have nuclear weapons – ideal for Australia.
40
I don’t think the LFTR produces weapons grade material. That was the main reason the US stayed with the High Pressure Water Uranium Reactors. In case of a nuclear war, the civilian reactors could be called upon to produce Plutonium. At least that’s what I think I remember from way back then.
You’re right about the LFTR being ideal for Aus. It is for NZ, too. The only problem I can see is retraining all those who have the “Ooh! Nuclear! Radiation! Too Scary!” knee jerk reaction. They should be taken on a guided tour of Chernobyl as it is now. It’s reverted to the wild without any two-headed wolves or eight-legged calves. No triffids, either.
Watched the video? It’s really interesting!
Terrestrial Energy is either trying to or actually is playing in the LFTR or MSR space.
50
You are right. Although LFTR does produce Plutonium it’s the wrong type and is not suitable for making nuclear weapons.
40
I’ve seen a hint of a LFTR-powered car. That could be exciting. No need to refuel for at least a century. Home use? Maybe. Who needs a MegaWatt in their basement? 🙂
Maybe one per neighbourhood. That would be nice.
30
I just watched the video. I began to like LFTR some years ago but never thought it was that good. If all of it is true, and I’m not suggesting any of it isn’t true, then LFTR is actually a no brainier for Australia, and a much better option than all other forms of energy sources, including coal and gas. For starters the cost of electricity to the consumer and commerce would plummet, and the byproducts would generate a 100 billion dollar export industry and pay our national debt in very little time. Of course our politicians are too dumb to understand it let alone agree to such a solution. Also the energy companies would be dead against it as they would lose out to all the huge profits they are effectively robbing from us now. The only way we will end up getting such reactors is after the crash and burn scenario plays out and China builds them here. I can’t see it any other way. I am a realist.
20
Glad you liked it. Sorensen, the presenter, is a nuclear engineer, I think. I’ll have to chase that rabbit down and check.
Trouble with NZ is we have anti-nuclear legislation in place. I’m going to have to see if a campaign to remove it to enable the LFTR could get going.
20
As the video explain, there is bad nuclear energy and there is good nuclear energy. I like the example of the car. There are bad (eg, unsafe) cars and there are good (eg, safe) cars. Just because there are bad cars we don’t ban all of them. Anyway, I don’t see us going nuclear of any form soon. As I said it will only happen when forced to by another nation. Come to think of it here’s a possible but unlikely unexpected outcome. If China does build them in their own country in great numbers, perhaps ALP+Greens will decide to follow them since they like communism so much. One thing is for sure. As long as the Libs have people like Turnbull there is almost no chance of doing it no matter what China does, mainly because the Libs are gutless and clueless (as well as the Senate).
20
Sorensen makes the claim on the video that China is building—not planning to build—50 reactors, with the implication that they are all LFTRs.
Your Libs, from what you say, are about as Clue-batted as our Greens.
10
as for solar –
17 Feb: Morning Bulletin Rockhampton: BREAKING: Fire crews tackle solar panel fire on Cap Coast
by Leighton Smith
A neighbour reported solar panels were “billowing black smoke”…
“It was lucky that the owner was able to isolate the power,” (Queensland Fire and Emergency Services spokesperson) said.
“All we had to do was apply water to cool the panels down and wait for an electrical contractor and Ergon to arrive.”
It was subsequently confirmed that the electrical contractor had now isolated the solar panels from the rest of the electrical system…
5 Feb: Gladstone Observer: VIDEO: Solar panel catches fire on Gladstone rooftop
by Andrew Thorpe and Matt Taylor
FIREFIGHTERS have extinguished a fire on the roof of a two-storey Telina home after a solar panel ignited earlier this afternoon…
Venus St was briefly closed off by police as firefighters and Ergon Energy crews worked to disconnect power from the damaged solar panel.
QFES station officer Graham Smith said they were now waiting for a solar-qualified electrician to come out to the property and inspect the panel…
Mr Smith said an isolator switch inside the solar panel appeared to have been the cause of the blaze.
“(Solar panel fires are) not a common problem, but there has been instances of some installations that have recalls associated with the DC current isolator switches, and it appears that the fire has started in one of these,” he said.
“If (members of the public) have a solar installation, particularly an older one, legislation now requires that they have an isolator – however there is a recall on some of the DC isolators and that information is available on the Electrical Safety Office’s website…
some of the ongoing problems facing firefighters:
29 Jan: FireEngineering: Ventilating Attic Fires With Solar Panels
by Brian D Butler
Solar panels cannot realistically be deenergized during fire operations unless correctly powered down and all panels completely covered with appropriate canvas or 100 percent light-blocking tarps. Firefighters are going to have to CAREFULLY deal with their presence and focus on isolation over deenergizing. PV solar panels are always live and can easily electrocute a complacent firefighter using a hand tool and roof ladder in their vicinity.
The primary concerns for the presence of panels during attic fires vary from electrocution, roof ventilation and the weight of the panels contributing to collapse. An array of panels weighting 150 lbs each, and carrying voltage between 500-1000 volts DC current are dangers the IC must consider. Another concern is overhaul. The electrical components (solar PV conduits and wiring) may extend into the attic space. When shutting off the breaker to secure the buildings power prior to opening up, hooks are being extended into an area that is potentially energized…
If panels are starting to burn, the acrid smoke is deadly and contains additional hazardous material. Wear an SCBA when solar panels are present! (Usually, I am against SCBA’s on the roof, but not for solar panels)
The presence of 20 PV solar panels on a lightweight truss roof with fire in the attic or cockloft will be adding 3000 lbs to the roof, plus the weight of the firemen. There could be several inches of snow covering an array of solar panels on the roof at a top floor fire in a SFD with unsuspecting firemen below unaware of this additional weight.
IMPORTANT: Heavy solar panels sliding off the roof can kill firefighters below. Safety officers must address the potential for runaway panels at large fires, and keep those areas clear…
Approximately 7% of solar panels are installed incorrectly…
All firefighters should attend a course on solar panels to become familiar with them. The technology is always changing and the dangers are always going to be there for the duration of their careers.
http://community.fireengineering.com/profiles/blog/show?id=1219672%3ABlogPost%3A644298
http://community.fireengineering.com/profiles/blog/show?id=1219672%3ABlogPost%3A644298
40
The Fire Service should just smash them. They can be replaced by the property owner’s fire insurance. Premiums of course will soar, but that’s just too bad.
40
Similar issue with batteries at home. In fact some insurance companies will refuse to insure the home if they don’t have the batteries installed appropriately in a shed away from the home. The last time I looked several months ago they were formulating new guidelines. So much for renewables being cheaper. As is virtually in all other issues, the renewables cult have it completely back to front and up-side-down.
31
If you are going to do it , spend the money and go micro invertors, the AC plumbing is much simpler
10
At 330 kph I wonder if the turbines can experience over torque like a helicopter…..need someone good at maths
30
Precessional forces on wind turbine bearings and structures during very rapid wind shifts such as squally front with rapid wind changes passing though can cause very serious damage to the wind turbine blade carrying bearings;
From; Wind farm management blog;
TECHNOLOGY OPERATIONS
May 5, 2017 No Comments
Bearing reliability
Top 4 bearing failure modes in wind turbine gearboxes
30
And when anon each falls beneath the sea,
no Ozymandias bears witness-‘look on me.’
10
I have seen helicopter blades create a low pressing area in their wake causing the following blade to speed up. The gear box then over rotates potentially causing damage. Probably part of the reason the bearings break.
10
o/t no apology. what a pompous twit is Probyn and theirABC?
24 Feb: ABC: Andrew Probyn: Donald Trump’s choppy temperament navigated well by patient, firm Malcolm Turnbull
Not only has Mr Turnbull successfully charted US President Donald Trump’s temperament — notoriously choppier than the South China Sea — but he’s helped steer an old alliance closer towards full health.
In doing so, he has made headway in ensuring the insularity threatened by Mr Trump’s America doesn’t see the United States drift from its security and economic responsibilities in the Asia-Pacific…
Turnbull gently educating Trump
Australia and the US have a long history of camaraderie: on the battlefield, the world stage — even the silver screen. They have shared language, values and democratic outlook.
He’s judged — not without some risk — Mr Trump has needed an ally and would be urged by others not to offend one of America’s staunchest friends.
He’s sought to gently educate Mr Trump about America’s strategic importance to its ally Australia and its Asia-Pacific neighbourhood, of its role as foil to China.
Regional prosperity and security demands a muscular America — not an insular one.
But there is an abiding sense that an Australian Prime Minister’s work watching over Mr Trump will never be done.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-02-24/donald-trump-temperament-navigated-by-malcolm-turnbull-analysis/9481468
when will ABC management pull their staff into line. they are insane with hatred of the US President.
70
Its hard to differentiate the comedy (Planet America) from the pseudo news, but yes they do have a staunch hatred.
50
Trump has no friends in Canberra or the Australian press. It is they who need to be urged not to offend.
Trump has done nothing, nor threatened to do anything to offend Australia. Our trade deal has not seen American factories relocate here nor are we bulging on the US militarily. Any units they have here are for their own benefit, not our defence.
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David Littleproud is a climate change sceptic, we are saved.
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…but wait, there is more …. Nationals MP George Christensen urging his party to split from the Coalition and ‘consider our options’ in wake of Joyce saga.
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23 Feb: KingstonWhigStandard: Loyalist Township halts work on Amherst Island energy project
By Elliot Ferguson
The company building a wind energy project on Amherst Island (Ontario) has been issued a stop-work order by Loyalist Township.
The order was issued last weekend and was confirmed again in a letter from the township to Windlectric Inc. on Thursday.
Heavy construction vehicles had caused significant damage to haul routes, including deep ruts on South Shore Road, Lower Forty Foot Road and sections of Front Road.
“The ruts from the previous night’s heavy traffic had in fact not been smoothed out by the Windlectric grading crew, and the road surface was a continuous series of deep ruts, which had frozen hard,” township chief administrative officer Robert Maddocks wrote in a letter to Windelectic on Thursday. “These ruts were several inches deep and would be very difficult, if not completely impossible, for a smaller car to pass without significant damage, and potentially a serious safety issue if someone hit them at normal speeds.”…
In a response to the municipal action, Homer Lensink, vice-president of development for Windlectric’s parent company Algonquin Power, said the company “respectfully but strongly disagrees with this instruction.”
“The Road Use Agreement and the Operations Plan only allow the Municipal Engineer to stop work in the event of immediate danger to life and health, and public safety. This is clearly not the case today,” he wrote in a letter on Feb. 17.
Lensink wrote that the company has repaired roads damaged by the construction vehicles and the township’s stop-work order came just before forecast heavy rain and unseasonably mild temperatures.
“As you know, we are at a critical stage of the construction progress and any delays to the project construction have a cascading effect,” he wrote.
“Windlectric objects to the stopping work order days in advance of a forecasted rain event whose impact cannot be predicted nor quantified.
“Stopping this work days in advance of an unknown rain event’s impact is completely arbitrary, directly impacting the project schedule,” he added.
Maddocks’ reply Thursday accused the company of being more interested in the project’s construction schedule rather than its impact on the island’s roads…READ ON
http://www.thewhig.com/2018/02/23/loyalist-township-halts-work-on-amherst-island-energy-project
6 Feb: GlobalNews: Amherst Island residents say wind turbine construction has led to road closures, ferry delays
By Nikki Jhutti
Windlectric Inc., a subsidiary of Algonquin Power, is in the process of constructing 26 wind turbines.
Local resident Janet Grace says it’s been chaos since November and the construction has led to poor road conditions, road closures and ferry delays.
“Terrible roads, terrible shape of roads, road closures when there shouldn’t be road closures, noise, lights on from all hours of the morning,” said Grace. “And there’s no road really that won’t be affected by all this construction.”
Grace says it’s hard for residents to plan their days especially when it comes to the Amherst Island Ferry.
She says not only are ferries overloaded but in some cases, roads are so congested with construction vehicles that residents aren’t able to make the ferry in time.
Grace adds the company isn’t honouring agreements that were put in place when the deal was inked…
Loyalist Township Mayor Bill Lowry says he’s exhausted and frustrated that promises that were made to the municipality have been broken…
“How long do we have to take this, how long does the island have to take this? It’s been far too long, we’ve been three months of being out of compliance,” said Lowry…
Lowry says he will continue to put the pressure on IESO and if he has to, he’ll take his complaints to Premier Kathleen Wynne…
https://globalnews.ca/news/4010067/amherst-island-residents-say-wind-turbine-construction-has-led-to-road-closures-ferry-delays/
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This is really good news for all electricity consumers in the UK, which has more offshore wind power than the rest of the world combined (well it used to, I’m not sure if it still does). That just shows how ignorant politicians in the UK are.
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Not just the politicians but also the voters who put them in government in the first place. We all get the government we elect and deserve. Solution for Australians – do not vote for either major party and vote for AC. If enough do it then we can have a hung election and one of them will be forced to comply with the policies of AC. Who knows it might even be ALP given Turnbull’s stubborn arrogance! That would shock us all but I don’t care as long as AC holds them to account (unlike the Nats who abandoned most of their principles and have given into the phony Libs – which is why I will never vote for them again).
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23 Feb: SanDiegoUnionTribune: Stanford professor withdraws lawsuit over renewable energy paper
By Rob Nikolewski
The Stanford professor who sued energy researchers who disputed his paper claiming the U.S. could switch to 100 percent renewable energy sources by 2050 has withdrawn his lawsuit.
“After weighing the pros and cons, I find that I have no more reason to fight this battle,” Mark Z. Jacobson said in a 28-page statement (LINK) linked to a message from his Twitter account Thursday afternoon…
In his statement Thursday, Jacobson defended filing the suit, saying Clack and the co-authors “knowingly and/or recklessly published false statements of fact.”…
Clack referred comments to his lawyers, who filed a motion Tuesday calling on the court to throw the case out.
“We note that Dr. Jacobson saw the light and made the tactical decision to dismiss” the lawsuit, Drew Marrocco and Clinton Vince said in a statement. “No doubt Dr. Jacobson based his decision on the high probability that his lawsuit would be dismissed.”
One of the 21 co-authors of the Clack paper is David Victor, a professor of international relations and co-director of the Laboratory on International Law and Regulation at UC San Diego.
Victor was not named in the lawsuit but on Friday morning said he actually wanted to see Jacobson bring his case before a judge.
“I think the scientific community needed a very clear signal from the legal system that this kind of behavior is totally inappropriate,” Victor said. “This is not how you resolve scientific disputes.”…
Ken Caldiera of the Carnegie Institution for Science, who was one of co-authors of the Clack paper, tweeted to Jacobson:
“What about offering to reimburse legal expenses you have caused people to incur? Your lawsuit has caused real injury, costing people money and wasting their time.”
Jacobson responded:
“Ken, you still don’t get it. It is YOU and your 20 coauthors who recklessly published false facts in three areas and refused to correct them. You have no-one to blame but yourself. Take responsibility and stop blaming others for your own actions.”
http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/business/energy-green/sd-sdfi-jacobson-withdraws-20180222-story.html
thought WUWT would have the story. more details:
23 Feb: WUWT: Anthony Watts: Citing Mann’s legal case against Steyn, Jacobsen throws in the towel on defamation case
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/02/23/citing-manns-legal-case-against-steyn-jacobsen-throws-in-the-towel-on-defamation-case/
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VIDEO: 2mins12secs: 23 Feb: ClimateScepticism: “We knocked out the Paris Climate Accord”
by Paul Matthews
Donald Trump has been speaking out about the Paris climate agreement again, at a conservative conference…
“We knocked out the Paris Climate Accord, would’ve been a disaster … would’ve been a disaster for our country” (applause and cheers, shouts of ‘USA, USA’).
“China, their agreement didn’t kick in until 2030.”
“They called India a developing nation, they called China a developing nation but the United States, we’re developed, we can pay.”
The attacks began immediately of course. Supposedly award-winning journalist Timothy Cama claimed that the Paris agreement didn’t distinguish between developed and developing countries. In fact it mentions developing countries 43 times, (“recognizing that peaking will take longer for developing country Parties” etc).
https://cliscep.com/2018/02/23/we-knocked-out-the-paris-climate-accord/
23 Feb: CompetitiveEnterpriseInstitute: Myron Ebell: President Trump in Cpac Speech Says Deregulation Is as Important as Tax Cuts and the Paris Climate Treaty Is a Disaster
President Donald J. Trump in his speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference today spent seven minutes discussing his deregulatory agenda, ending the war on energy, getting out of the Paris climate treaty, the harmful effects of Paris, and the positive effects his policies are having on property owners and workers. Notably, he said that in his opinion getting rid of job-killing regulations had just as big an impact on the economy as the tax cuts. The president spoke for more than an hour, and one of the longest interruptions for applause was when he said Paris would have been a disaster…
Trump: We’ve ended the war on American energy. We were in war. And we’ve ended the war on beautiful, clean coal. (Applause.) One of our great natural resources. And very important for our defense — coal — very important for our defense. Because we have it. We don’t have to send it through pipes. We don’t have to get it from foreign countries. We have more than anybody. And they wanted to end it. And our miners have been mistreated and they’re not being mistreated anymore. We’re doing tremendous business. (Applause.)…
I was in Vietnam, and the Prime Minister and the President of Vietnam were there. And we have a massive deficit with them, like we do with everybody else because these Presidents have just let it go to hell…
So I said, we have too big of a deficit with Vietnam; I’m not happy. He said, “Well, but we’re going to…” — I said, “Buy coal. Buy coal.” They use a lot of coal. Buy coal. And he said, “You know, we have bought coal from West Virginia and other places, and it’s the finest coal we have ever used.” It’s interesting. And West Virginia now is doing great. You look at what’s happening in West Virginia. You look at what’s happening in Pennsylvania. You look at what’s happening in Ohio. (Applause.) And you look at what’s happening in Wyoming. You look at what’s happening all over. It’s like a — it’s like a different world.
And remember this: Virtually, as soon as I got into office, we approved the Keystone XL pipeline and the Dakota Access pipeline, which would never have been approved. (Applause.) And we announced our withdrawal from the totally disastrous, job-killing, wealth-knocking-out — you know, it knocked out our wealth, or it would have. They basically wanted to take our wealth away. They didn’t want us to use our wealth power. We knocked out the Paris Climate Accord. Would have been a disaster. (Applause.) Would have been a disaster for our country…
AUDIENCE: USA! USA! USA!
THE PRESIDENT: You know, basically, it said, you have a lot of oil and gas that we found — you know, technology has been amazing — and we found things that we never knew. But we have massive — just about the top in the world — we have massive energy reserves. We have coal. We have so much. And basically, they were saying, don’t use it, you can’t use it.
So what it does is it makes us uncompetitive with other countries. It’s not going to happen. I told them, it’s not going to happen. And, you know, China, their agreement didn’t kick in until 2030. Right? Our agreement kicks in immediately. Russia, they’re allowed to go back into the 1990s, which was not a clean environmental time.
Other countries, big countries — India and others — we had to pay, because they considered them a growing country. They were a growing country. I said, “What are we?” Are we allowed to grow too? Okay? (Laughter.) Now, are we allowed to grow? (Applause.) They called India a “developing nation.” They called China a “developing nation.” But the United States, we’re developed — we can pay.
So, folks, if you don’t mind — I’ll tell you what — it’s amazing how many people understood the Paris Accord, because it sounds so good. It’s like some of the environmental regulations that I cut — they have the most beautiful titles. And sometimes I’d say, “Look, I’m just going to close my eyes and sign this because, you know what, I’m going to get killed on this one.” And I get so much thanks. The country knows what I’m doing. We couldn’t build. We couldn’t farm. If you had a puddle on your land, they called it a lake for the purposes of environmentals. (Applause.) I mean, it’s crazy. It’s crazy.
And I’d sign certain bills and I’d have farmers behind me and I’d have house builders, home builders behind me. And these are tough people, strong people. They fought hard. They’ve worked all their lives, hard. And they’d be — half of them would be crying because we gave them their property back. We gave them the right to earn a living. They couldn’t do it. They couldn’t do what they had to do. We gave them their property back. We gave them their dignity back. (Applause.)…
Companies are pouring back into this country. They’re pouring back. Not like — I mean, when did you hear about car companies coming back into Michigan and coming to Ohio and expanding? (Applause.) When did you hear — you never heard that. You hear they’re leaving. I’ve been talking about it for 20 years.
https://cei.org/blog/president-trump-cpac-speech-says-deregulation-important-tax-cuts-and-paris-climate-treaty
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23 Feb: WindPowerMonthly: Spain to pay compensation to renewables investors
by Richard Weyndling
SPAIN: In a second international ruling against retroactive cuts in renewables support introduced by the Spanish government in 2013, a Swedish arbitration panel has awarded a Luxembourg-based investment firm €53 million compensation.
First published on Ends Europe
The ruling by the arbitration institute of the Stockholm chamber of commerce, disclosed this week by the Spanish photovoltaic producers association ANPIER, follows a €128 million award against the Spanish government by the World Bank’s ICSID arbitration panel in May 2017.
***The arbitration cases pending against Spain could lead to costs to the Spanish electricity system of €7.66 billion, according to ANPIER’s legal expert Juan Castrogil.
The Spanish government won a previous ruling in 2016 before the Stockholm panel but, according to ANPIER, that case referred exclusively to smaller cuts in renewables support introduced by a previous administration in 2010…
The Spanish energy ministry “is making a detailed analysis of the ruling and will decide what to do in consequence,” a spokesman said.
“Many EU member states have been the object of arbitration decisions in recent years and the European Commission is currently looking into the issue of competence to rule in these matters.
“The Spanish supreme and constitutional courts have upheld the legality of the electricity reform with regard to renewables,” he added…
https://www.windpowermonthly.com/article/1457902/spain-pay-compensation-renewables-investors
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Is there any information on windfarm service life, claimed vs actual? we must have a few reach end of life by know. Would also be interesting to know what happens to them, replaced, recycled, left to rot.
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Yarpos
Check out StopTheseThings. You can do an internal search for many other relevant posts, but here are a couple to whet your appetite:
https://stopthesethings.com/2014/05/28/wind-turbines-lucky-to-last-10-years/
https://stopthesethings.com/2017/07/15/wind-turbine-blades-a-toxic-legacy-for-centuries-to-come-so-much-for-saving-the-planet/
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OT but speaking of wind power I see that SA’s power demand has just started to exceed their generation. (Nem watch) Will someone please cut the interconnector.
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Lookee here: http://reneweconomy.com.au/nem-watch/
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The infamous battery has kicked in contributing a massive 30MW.
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Thats a lot of AA cells…..
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It is very interesting that the blade manufacturers only give a 5 year guarantee on their blades and that for land based use – they must know something they are not passing on to the users.
Another thing regarding the cost of repairs/replacement. While they say it is ‘small’ that ‘small’ is relative to the amount they are raking in in subsidies from the taxpayers. I read somewhere (can’t remember where) that it couls run into billions of euro when all the costs are added up.
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It’s a safe bet that they expect increased subsidies to cover their losses.
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Odd that a system that is supposed to have a 25 year life, only has a 5 year warranty on a critical , non optional component. Bit like saying your car has 7 year warranty!! but the engine only has an 18 month warranty. Thats OK isnt it?
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I wonder what the inevitable exposure to salt spray during a high wind can do. Salt water can eat almost anything metal.
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Roy,
As bad as salt spray might be, it could not possibly be as bad as that nasty gas that does everything bad – CO2.
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Oh! I get it. It’s the CO2 that’s eroding the leading edges of those blades. It serves them right then, huh?
I guess we better do as they say and outlaw CO2 then.
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I’m fairly neutral on wind power, it has it’s place but will never replace (petro)chemical power. Today we drive engines that need an oil change every 20,000 km and can achieve 500,000 if well maintained. 100 years ago an engine required a total rebuild every 10,000 km.
I don’t know how old those turbines are but 20 years ago we could only anodize aluminium to make the first few micrometres very hard then paint it with an anti abrasive epoxy, but salt crystals are very hard and very abrasive. Today we can spray a ceramic compound onto a surface like paint them bake it to create a surface as resistant the tiles on a space shuttle.
Technology moves on relentlessly.
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neil, the blades are made of fibreglass so there is no way they could have any compound baked on the surface.
If they were aluminium it would be a totally different ball game with the price per blade rocketing. You must realise these are made as cheap as possible and sold as high as possible – it’s all part of the scam.
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…often in the wrong direction, and with ever increasing cost.
..Meanwhile, Nature is even more relentless and persistent !…
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This story makes me think of the story of the Wankel Rotory Engine. When the invention was first announced, pretty much every automotive manufacturer bought the rights to manufacture it. At the time it was assumed that this type of engine would replace the piston engine entirely in a very short time. As it turned out, there were numerous problems with the new type of engine and, to my knowledge, only two manufacturers persevered with the design long enough to produce a reasonable product. These were the Mazda RX series of sports cars and the Norton range of motorcycles. The Norton racing bikes were successful partly due to the difficulty in calculating the equivalent capacity to a piston engine due to the rotory working on an entirely different principle. In the end, the rotory engine was abandoned by almost everyone as the piston engine is just far more practical.
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True, ….abandoned by the motor industry mainly due to the existing investment in piston engine manufacturing and design, and critically also the difficulty of emmissions control with the rotary.
However , far from abandoned by the military where the high power to weight advantage is ideal for Drone aircraft , field generators, pumps, etc.
Mazda have also continued to develop the designs for future possible use such as range extender generators on EVs (The Japanes Mazda 2 was equiped with such a generator !)
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Even without the erosion problem they are not energy sustainable:
Renewables are an egregious mistake responding to misinformed subsidy. It is not simply a matter of increased cost. The energy consumed to design, manufacture, install, maintain and administer renewables exceeds the energy they produce in their lifetime. Without the energy provided by other sources, renewables could not exist. They can only exist now because fossil fuels are still used to power industry, heat our homes, power nearly all vehicles, power farming, etc.
Now this!
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As if the cobalt cliff isn’t bad enough with lithium battery technology for their BIG BATTERIES to make this stuff despatchable now it seems the plant food doomsdayers are facing the neodymium magnet cliff. You choose bozos. The windmills or the EVs.
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Travelling about a bit I can’t remember where now but I came across a wind turbine blade on the ground (actually on temp props) obviously under leading edge and tip repair as you could see upon close inspection. They’re big suckers at 40M long when you see them up close like that and obviously creating those Green jobs we were promised.
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An interesting comment post back in 2014–
Hmmm… I didn’t know you don’t want a blocked tip hole with a hefty lightening strike and blow me down with this-
because that’s exactly where all the ones I’ve seen are sited.
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Good set of posts. Thanks Observa.
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The wind turbine engineer in your link states that they were never designed for vertical shear loads. Well, what do these designers think occurs underneath a thunderstorm cell? Not only extreme downdraughts but hail and lightning. As well as this high downward force in frontal thunderstorms the wind veers 180 degrees the other way in an instant when the in flowing air is overtaken by the speed and movement of the storm. It is the reason the blades fail and the gearboxes fail with damaged bearings. No level of design can overcome this force.
Of course the placing on ridge tops and near cliffs is equally stupid. Good link
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http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/photos-show-renewable-energy-took-a-beating-in-puerto-rico/article/2644268
AND THIS IS WHAT IT LOOK LIKES WHEN YOU GET THAT WEATHER.
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