Bryan,
It looks like an enormous storage problem if you look at any energy system on its own, but if we look at combinations and better usage technologies it might be better. Hydroelectric is already today using pumping of water to storage reservoirs and it is economical. Excess water must either be wasted or pumped and the pumping is the done with energy that otherwise would not be used. For excess capacity wind and solar, it is the same case. We are not talking about efficiency, we are talking about recuperation from waste. Hydrogen produced from this excess capacity is the same thing. On the energy usage side is very large possibilities for the heating/cooling. If you read what we are saying on our site about storage/emission and body system, it is very large savings to be done and reduction of peak demands. It is very much to be done on this side. Solar power does cover peak demands for countries, where offices and industries have large demands during day time. The best system for this is to let users feed it to the grid and make it a part of the peak demand coverage and storage procedures. In this case it could also go towards hydrogen production. Hydroelectric dams would be a renewable resource that can be combined with provider for energy storage. It is no longer necessary to only see it as producer from natural rivers etc. But all of this is large projects for large corporations and those who can afford it is the industrialized countries. I think that it is very important to start diversified biofuel production in all countries and especially the developing ones. It is to extract the solar power in biological form and then refine it as fuels. I have said this many times and it is both affordable and advantageous for developing countries. It is many possibilities and it is possible to do very good energy planning for the future. An energy plan that do not have biofuels as one of the key elements, is not a plan for the people, it is a plan for the corporations. Hakan At 09:20 AM 5/16/2003 -0500, you wrote: >As Hakan has said storage of wind generated electricity will be the >hardest problem to solve if we are to rely on it for our power needs. >Currently electricity generated by wind comprises a small fraction of >total MW's produced, so it can be easily absorbed into the current >system. When wind power represents a significant percentage, there will >be serious problems meeting peak demand. We use more electricity during >the day than at night, but the wind blows... whenever it blows. That is >the biggest single advantage that fossil fuels have over wind; capacity >is scaleable. Need more power, burn more coal. Pumped hydro is one >method to store the energy from wind, (and it doesn't have to be a dam >it can be a closed system with tanks). Unfortunately converting >electricity to mechanical force and back to electricity is not very >efficient. Other options are capacitor banks and batteries, both are >very expensive and add to the overall cost of wind power. Using wind to >split hydrogen is a good idea, but doesn't solve current electricity >needs since most people don't have fuel cells. Furthermore, in order to >make hydrogen from water, you have to have water, which eliminates many >of the areas with the good wind resources. Most of the land in west >Texas and the panhandle is devoid of surface water, and requires deep >wells (sometimes over 300 feet deep) to tap ground water. So the pickle >is that we have all this "free" energy, but it is inconsistent and >inconvenient to integrate into our current infrastructure. Fortunately >we have a long way to go before wind generated electricity comprises >even 10% of our total production. Hopefully this will be enough time >for us to solve the storage problem. > > > >-BRAH > > > >-----Original Message----- >From: Kim Nguyen [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >Sent: Thursday, May 15, 2003 5:59 PM >To: biofuel@yahoogroups.com >Subject: RE: [biofuel] Wind Power -- a European Success Story > > > >Wind has its own unique set of pros and cons like everything else...and >I see it as a vital component to a sustainable and balanced energy >portfolio for the world. Unfortunately, wind's geographic distribution >and intermency make it difficult to integrate into electrical grids >whose cost and stability are based on distances to load centers and >schedulability of the generating resource...neither of which wind is >particularly great at...some say that wind can provide up to 10-20% of a >control area's generating resource without causing load-resource >balancing problems (electrical control areas are "balanced" every two >seconds to maintain 60 hertz, any deviation is typically corrected by >electrical units on Automatic Generating Control, i.e. units that have >the reserve capacity to almost instantaneously increase or decrease >output to keep the system balanced). What geographically remote and >highly concentrated wind is good for is to generate the electricity >needed for the electrolyis of water into hydrogen...if we are moving to >a hydrogen economy, we have to cleanly make hydrogen...making it from >fossil fuels and/or nukes is not the suistainable solution though >probably the most likely one. > >Kim > > > >>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/15/03 03:10PM >>> >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 ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Get A Free Psychic Reading! Your Online Answer To Life's Important Questions. http://us.click.yahoo.com/Lj3uPC/Me7FAA/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. 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