Hakan, Wind/Solar-Hydro Integration is a big subject at DOE EREN (Peter Goldman)...but otherwise is getting ignored even by agencies like the one I work for. You are right but the contentious politics and costs of building large reservoirs is so high that pumped storage is nothing but a small player in the world of energy lately. With that said, I am working on a potential pumped storage project that is a joint California/Federal endeavor....part of the study is analyzing the ecomomics of pump energy...I hope that alternative energy sources for pump power get a fair consideration.
Kim >>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/15/03 03:53PM >>> Already now it is use of storage dams for hydroelectric power and this could be combined with both wind and solar in the future. Surplus electricity is used to pump water up to the dams. With a large expansion of nuclear, storage dams must be considered also. This to even out low and high peak demands, since nuclear cannot operate on the short time periods and have to run with load in a minimum configuration. Hakan At 04:10 PM 5/15/2003 -0600, you wrote: >Problem with storage. The energy is there but not all the time. >Kirk > >-----Original Message----- >From: Bryan Brah [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >Sent: Thursday, May 15, 2003 12:58 PM >To: biofuel@yahoogroups.com >Subject: RE: [biofuel] Wind Power -- a European Success Story > > >Small-scale wind power utilization is definitely NOT the trend in the US. >Installed capacity here generally consists of 80 - 300 MW farms of hundreds >of 1MW + turbines. There is great popular support for wind in the US as >evidenced by the fact that consumers are willing to pay a premium for >wind-generated electricity. Additionally, many political jurisdictions are >mandating that a percentage of electricity production come from renewable >sources. There is definitely a market for wind power, but the biggest >obstacle to wind development is economic. While turbine designs have >evolved, in order for them to be cost effective over their 20 year >life-span, they still need fairly constant wind blowing at 15 meters per >second. Most of these prime wind resources are located in sparsely >populated areas, where the electrical infrastructure is either far away or >too small to support the added load. This forces developers to build and/or >reinforce transmission lines, which adds expense to the project and makes >wind power more expensive than federally subsidized fossil fuel. We are >almost to the point of price parity, so every penny increase in oil makes >wind more attractive to investors, developers, and consumers. As a finite >commodity, the price of oil can only go up, which means that eventually wind >will be cheaper. When that happens, there will be an explosion of wind >development in the US. It is estimated that with current turbine >technology, all of our (US) electrical needs could be met by the wind >resources in Texas and the Dakotas alone. > > > >-BRAH > > > > > >Biofuel at Journey to Forever: >http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html > >Biofuels list archives: >http://archive.nnytech.net/ > >Please do NOT send Unsubscribe messages to the list address. >To unsubscribe, send an email to: >[EMAIL PROTECTED] > >Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuels list archives: http://archive.nnytech.net/ Please do NOT send Unsubscribe messages to the list address. To unsubscribe, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Get A Free Psychic Reading! Your Online Answer To Life's Important Questions. http://us.click.yahoo.com/aM1XQD/od7FAA/uetFAA/FGYolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuels list archives: http://archive.nnytech.net/ Please do NOT send Unsubscribe messages to the list address. To unsubscribe, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
