Shocking destruction of wilderness by Bob Brown windy farm monstrosity !!!
Wind Power Australia – The Musselroe Wind Farm Travesty In Tasmania Posted on 01/18/2012 by TonyfromOz
Why is it that some of the most pristinely beautiful sites are the ones chosen for those new eyesores, Wind Towers. Such is the case for a proposed new Wind Power Plant, euphemistically called ‘Wind Farms’. How I hate that term ‘Wind Farm’, and they use that term to make them sound like they are doing something constructive, associating it with the land somehow. This new Wind Plant, The Musselroe Wind Farm, in Australia, is to be located in Tasmania, that large Island to the South of the Continent.
This new situation has a remarkable symmetry to what happened in Tasmania back in the 1980′s when a new dam was proposed for the Franklin River wilderness on that same Island, and part and parcel with that proposed dam was a Hydro electric plant. Back then however, environmentalists came from everywhere, Tasmania, Mainland Australia, and indeed from the wider World, all to protest against a Dam in a pristine wilderness area. Now however, it seems that something like this Wind Plant is somehow okay.
Back in the 1980′s one of the most vocal protesters, and in fact the leader of the protest was Bob Brown. That same Bob Brown is now an Australian Senator for the Australian Greens Party, representing the State of Tasmania, where this Wind Plant is to be constructed. Part of his agenda, and in fact, his Policy, is the introduction of Renewable Power Plants, so will he be protesting anything like this? In exactly the same manner as the dam on the Franklin that he protested against was a going to be a blot on the pristine Tasmanian landscape, this Wind Plant will also be a highly visible blot on the landscape, in his own home State. Will he be protesting? Will his Greens Party deputy, Senator Milne, also from Tasmania be protesting as well? No. In fact, this time, anybody who is protesting will be labelled by these same environmental advocates as ‘shills’ for ‘Big Oil’. They will be labelled as ‘Deniers’. They will be vilified if they make any protest whatsoever. How times change!
So then, let’s look at this new Musselroe Wind Plant, not from an environmental aspect, but from the absolute core of what this Plant is supposed to do, provide electrical power. First, let’s look at some of the technical details of the towers themselves. Vestas V90-3MW Nacelle - On top of each tower will be the Vestas V90-3 Nacelle. The -3 indicates that this nacelle will be housing a 3 MW generator. This nacelle weighs 70 tonnes, so the structure itself needs to be quite sturdy. Each tower will weigh in the vicinity of 285 Tonnes. The tower will be 105 metres tall, measured to the hub. That’s just a tick over 340 feet. Attached to that hub are the three blades, having a swept diameter of 90 metres, which is around 300 feet. So, from the base of the tower to the top of the rotating blades, that height is now just under 390 feet. There will be 56 of these huge towers in that pristine countryside. So, with 3MW generators, that total power comes in at 168MW.
This sounds like it is in fact quite a large amount of power, but as I have always said, that ‘up front’ Nameplate Capacity is not what should be highlighted. What should be focussed on wholly should be that actual power delivered to consumers in the State of Tasmania, because as with all power plants of any sort, they only supply a relatively local area. That expected power to be delivered for consumption is a theoretical total of 420GigaWattHours (GWH). Again, this sounds like it is a lot of power, and when you, as consumers look at your current electricity bill, you will see that your household consumption is stated there in KWH. (KiloWattHours) That delivered power of 420GWH is in fact 420,000,000KWH, and when stated like that, in comparison to your residential account, it actually does look to be a large amount. What that total power delivered number does tell us is just how efficient a Plant of this nature really is. If those rotating blades on every tower were to rotate 24 hours a day for a whole year, they would generate for consumption 1,472GWH of power. So, knowing the (theoretical) power delivery of 420GWH, we can calculate the Capacity Factor (CF) for this Plant.
That CF comes in at 28.5%.
Now, remember how I said the Plant can generate that huge total if it were to operate for the full 24 hours. Effectively, that 28.5% CF means that this Plant, all of those huge 56 towers will only be supplying their power for just under 7 hours a day. (28.5% of 24 hours) That’s 7 hours of power in every 24, averaged over the full year. The website for the Plant itself says that this Plant will be supplying the power needs for 50,000 homes, and when it is stated like that, it makes it sound like they are supplying an awful lot of power. This plant will not be connected directly to those 50,000 homes, and if it is only supplying power for just under 7 hours a day, then surely it would never supply all the needs for those 50,000 homes anyway. This Wind Plant will be connected to the Tasmanian Power Grid only. That grid supplies power to three sectors, the residential sector which consumes 38% of all power from the grid, The Commerce Sector (37%) and the Industrial Sector. (24%) So, that again shoots down the claim that this Plant WILL meet the electricity needs of those 50,000 homes. So, why do they use this figure when it’s so easy to discount. It’s a clever ploy on behalf of the Company proposing this Plant. They cannot (and never do) state in the proposal that their Plant only has a CF of 28% and will only be supplying power for around those 7 hours a day. If they did that, people would ask some pretty stern questions of them.
So, what they do is, knowing the theoretical total power that the Plant ‘might’ generate, and knowing the total residential consumption for that area, they extrapolate the theoretical total into what an average residence might consume, and from that, they can then say that the Plant can supply the needs for that (X) number of homes, in this case 50,000. This way, it makes the Plant look pretty impressive, instead of pretty average, and they can actually say that they told the truth ‘up front’. The problem with that is that the average person does not know the technical details to work it out. The Plant then states at their website that they will in fact be saving 450,000 tons of Carbon Dioxide emissions each year, again making it sound like this Plant is actually doing something substantial. Again, this is ‘artful’ interpretation.
If they were to construct a coal fired plant of around the same size, then that coal fired plant would emit around that total of 450,000 tons of CO2, so that’s how they come by that number. If they construct this Wind Plant, then they are saving that 450,000 tons of CO2 by NOT constructing an equivalent coal fired plant. It could also be said that because this Wind Plant is supplying that electricity to the grid, then there would be a saving of CO2 emissions from Plants that do supply the grid, in this case Natural gas fired power plants, but again, that is a spurious figure, because, as I have said, this Wind Plant is only supplying power for, on average, 7 hours a day, and those hours are not firm, but can be any time, so, in fact, those same other power plants will still need to be operational to supply power, because they don’t know when this Wind Plant will be running, or just sitting there with the blades not turning due to lack of wind, or even too much wind.
This electrical power data alone is enough to make people think seriously about the efficacy of constructing 56 huge towers in such a pristine area. The average life of a Plant of this nature is (at best) 25 years, while the average life of current coal fired plants is around 50 years, and even that can be extended out. At the end of that 25 years, these now expired Wind Towers will just be huge and totally useless concrete structures.
This Plant will cost around $400 Million. The Company proposing the Plant will need to find finance for that and a large part of that has already been secured, from, of all places, China, the China Light and Power Company, trading in Australia as TRUenergy. Will the Vestas V90-3 Nacelles with the generator complex inside be constructed here in Australia, providing technical jobs for Australians? No. Those nacelles will be imported from the manufacturer, based in Denmark.
The area where this construction is now under way is a known bird life habitat, but the Company says at their website that they will take that into account, and they say at their site: During operation of the wind farm a monitoring program will be undertaken that continues to look at bird use of the area. They will be looking at bird use of the area. Well, that’s a relief. Thank heavens for that. Look, there’s a bird. The area is also culturally significant to the local indigenous aboriginal people and this has also been taken into account when the Company says at their site: The project team continues to consult with the Aboriginal community as construction proceeds, and all construction team members attend a Cultural Awareness training session presented by members of the Aboriginal community as part of their induction to the wind farm site. Well, that too is a relief.
The Plant is situated on the North Eastern tip of Tasmania, and the Plant’s website says that this will take advantage of the ‘Roaring Forties’ that famed Latitude 40 Degrees South where the winds blow so strongly, and in fact the winds utilised to bring that very first fleet of settlers to Australia in 1788.
Read rest of distressing destruction in ref
http://papundits.wordpress.com/2012/01/18/wind-power-australia-the-musselroe-win...
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