David. WHAT IS YOUR OPINION ON WIND TURBINES BEHAVING BADLY?
Posted by Lizabeth on Thursday, 11 January 2007 23:20:41
Blyth offshore wind turbine generators.
In July 2006 I updated my personal website at www.wind-farm.co.uk with a full year details for 2005 of the Load Factors relating to the operational wind farms in the North East of England. The resulting figures were compiled from the OFGEM website monthly record of ROCs accredited.
This was done to see whether the wind power generating stations were in fact doing what had been predicted.in terms of annual carbon dioxide emission savings and annual energy output in combating climate change.
The situation is somewhat worse than that identified by Ian Fells on the' You and Yours' programme 05/01/2007. Here I refer only to Blyth offshore. In addition to turbine WTG1 not operating for at least seven months in 2006, it did not operate for eight months in 2005
The second turbine WTG2 has not recorded a single ROC since their introduction in 2002.(OFGEM explanation for this was either the WTG was not working or the electricity was going abroad and suggested I contact the operator). I received no reply.
I have copied below the Blyth offshore case study from DTI website
The UK's first offshore wind farm, commissioned in December 2000, is situated off the Northumberland coast. It has a capacity of 4 megawatts, two 91-metre-high turbines and a predicted annual energy output of 10,500 megawatt hours. It is predicted that the reductions in annual emissions will be 9,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide, 100 tonnes of sulphur dioxide, and 30 tonnes of oxides of nitrogen (NOx). It is predicted that 5,800 people or 2,400 households will be supplied from this wind farm.
In order to ensure that there would be no detrimental effects to the environment, an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) was prepared and submitted with various consent applications.
Site surveys were carried out to confirm the seabed conditions. Boreholes were drilled at the proposed locations of both turbines. This confirmed that there were different ground conditions at each location, even though the turbines are only 200 metres apart, and this information was provided to the engineers to aid in the design of the foundations.
The turbine manufacturer took responsibility for the design of the tower and foundation, with the installation contractor taking responsibility for the manufacture and installation of piles, access platforms and the wind turbines. The turbine contractor was responsible for the commissioning of the wind farm.
The total project cost was approximately £4 million. The project has an NFFO4 contract to purchase electricity generated by the first 2-megawatt turbine, and the electricity generated by the second 2-megawatt turbine is sold via tradable green labels. The project has received the support of the European Commission Thermie Programme.
If they are not working as predicted is there any point in leaving them standing?
DTI, Climate change, Blyth offshore turbines