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The Forum > Article Comments > Windpower and Sydney to Hobart: reaching the limits > Comments

Windpower and Sydney to Hobart: reaching the limits : Comments

By Graham Young, published 4/1/2019

The race combines disdain for cost with leading edge technology so has to be at one of the pinnacles of windpower.

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I think the telling analogy is that when small yachts are caught in a storm they advised to take down sail and motor to a safe harbour. That seems to confirm that wind power is merely adventitious but heat engines are reliable. Nobody is saying that batteries can replace the backup engine in a sailboat.

By my reckoning electricity sector emissions declined just 2% between 2001 and mid 2018 despite billions ($20bn ?) in subsidies. Most electricity came from thermal plant just like the engine in the sailboat.
Posted by Taswegian, Friday, 4 January 2019 11:25:24 AM
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Some well made points.

It is also worth noting that even the most advanced racing yachts can't gain any speed whatever, if there is no wind.

Maybe the rules could be changed to allow them to use battery power in a calm! Such a rule change of course would lead to the installation of money-no-object batteries. Maybe they could be made in SA assisted by green subsidies.
Posted by Bren, Friday, 4 January 2019 12:39:50 PM
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A clever way to scotch the wild claims of windmill makers and users who rabbit on about a wonderful future for wind power.
Posted by ttbn, Friday, 4 January 2019 12:58:02 PM
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>I think the same is also likely to be true for wind turbines. Physics and budgets are not infinitely elastic.
A quite illogical conclusion to an otherwise logical article.

Unlike racing yachts, which are up against hard physical limits and designed to make maximum use of the wind at virtually any cost, wind turbine improvements generally aren't improvements in performance efficiency. Instead they make:
• Improvements in size (bigger wind turbines generate more electricity)
• Improvements in cost (cheaper wind turbines are more cost effective for the same output)

There is no reason to suppose those two factors won't continue.

It's even possible there could be bigger improvements in wind turbine design, as those we have in commercial operation are all based on a Danish design. Vertical axis wind turbines are theoretically more efficient, though not as cost effective. But that could change if more work is done on developing them.

It's solar power, not wind, that's revolutionising Australia's electricity industry. But wind power still has a significant role to play, and there's plenty of scope for it to get cheaper.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Taswegian,
What's the significance of using 2001 as a basis for your reckoning? The peak was around 2007.
Posted by Aidan, Friday, 4 January 2019 2:45:06 PM
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It is not only windmills that have to get bigger to produce more power. The racing yachts are much bigger today than the cruising yachts that started in 46. They are also totally different.

Those early yachts were designed to be safe sea kindly boats. In really nasty conditions you could go below, batten down the hatches & the boat would lie ahull safely, & look after the crew.

Todays boats are so much faster as sea kindly hull shapes are no longer used. Todays racing boasts need their large crew to look after them, they are unsafe left to their own devices in really rough weather.

The hull shape has forsaken safety for speed, as have the rigs become better at extracting every bit of power from the wind, at the cost of safety. These rigs do fall over much more often due to this.

A bit like windmills really. They can produce more, but for how long is doubtful subject.
Posted by Hasbeen, Friday, 4 January 2019 3:10:10 PM
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Aiden 2001 was the start of the RET or MRET as it was called and the beginning of the STC and LGC subsidies. I'm fairly sure its architects thought it would force emissions to rapidly plummet now they want the subsidies extended to 2030. That's all the while saying they are cheaper than alternatives. A convenient form of the sectoral emissions figures is the lower bar chart in
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/dec/13/australias-carbon-emissions-highest-on-record-data-shows
Posted by Taswegian, Friday, 4 January 2019 3:47:55 PM
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When I become Commodore of the Sydney to Hobart, later this year, I'll bring in:

- sails but also windmills and solar cells driving in-water propellers

- spectator cruise boats with banks of oars for bankers, financial planners and bankers-best-mate Malcolm Turnbull rowing: with bank-charge-ripped-off members of the public "prompting" them with whips

and, of course

- coal fired steam engines for our new submarines

Poida
Posted by plantagenet, Friday, 4 January 2019 4:24:35 PM
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Thanks for a well-researched article, Graham, nonetheless one which seems based on the economic parameters of return on investment.

Competitive ocean sailing is a challenge which is generally only enjoyed by those able to afford it.
I well remember a comment by a enthusiastic sailing acquaintance who described his ocean-going adventures as being "like standing under a cold shower tearing up fifty dollar notes."

Our enjoyment of the Sydney to Hobart race is enhanced by smartness in technological and performance thinking, allowing worthwhile development to be acclaimed, but only on the basis of what can be achieved during the challenge to nature's impressive range of conditions.

It is a challenge available only to those with the economic, mental, and physical resources to cope with it.
Posted by Ponder, Saturday, 5 January 2019 10:37:28 AM
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Profound post Ponder

Poida
Posted by plantagenet, Saturday, 5 January 2019 11:41:27 AM
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Trimarans with carbon fibre hulls and composite masts can reach reaching speeds twice that of the wind. And speeds in excess of forty knots possible, especially if fitted with curved lift legs (blades) that physically lift hull completely out of the water.

As you Say Graham single hulled yachts have been around for centuries. All that now remains is just how fast the fastest ever wind powered craft can traverse the distance using just wind or wind and solar.

And wise as improvement in a world where fossil fuel is a one time only, finite resource.

For mine travelling on top of often mountainous waves and battered by the vagaries of weather. Trying to get there ASAP, just to prove to
his or that very marginal improvement in some outdated technology is just plain daft!

If we are to traverse the oceans, why not at speeds in excess of fifty knots and in stable armchair comfort. That is nuclear-powered submersibles. Given the inherent stability, utilising walk away safe MSR thorium.

The crew completely protected by the radiation limiting water jacket and a concrete box that would contain a shipping container sized 40 MW reactor aft. And consequently exposed to fewer rads than that emanating from a bunch of bananas.

40 MW enough to power a submersible fast ferry, linking rapid rail links from here to most of Asia.

Moreover, given water protects one from most radiation, the very reason that nuclear powered and nuclear-armed subs are the ultimate deterrent against a preemptive strike by hostiles. And the reason we ought to have a dozen or so.

As our ultimate, last resort, defence.
Alan B.
Posted by Alan B., Saturday, 5 January 2019 11:58:13 AM
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"... steam engines for our new submarines"

Don't knock the steam submarine, they were fast boats, even though they had a few problems.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_K-class_submarine
Posted by Is Mise, Saturday, 5 January 2019 12:38:33 PM
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True Is Mise

Just bring back the self destroying K class would be super. I particularly liked http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_K-class_submarine#Service

"A dive from [a K class sub's] steam-powered surface operation normally required 30 minutes"

All one need do is bring back 10 km/hr hot air balloons to give K class captains fair warning of an anti-sub bomber approach.

Though I think the simple expedient of using Nuclear Reactors as water boilers, rather than coal furnaces, would more than suit Oz's new subs.

Cheers

Pete
Posted by plantagenet, Saturday, 5 January 2019 1:15:35 PM
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Pete, Steam power is second only to nuclear power. And given MSR thorium and the passive safety of the design, much-much safer than current solid fueled reactors.

Given operating temps of 700 C+, more than able to get a head of steam, very rapidly, some of which would go directly to steam-powered venturis that would turn the craft into a virtual jet-propelled U boat able to outrun any surface vessel or current torpedo technology.

There'd be an inboard turbine making electricity for all the other functions including endless oxygen replenishment. Also, a deionisation dialysis desalination plant that would supply potable water for crew, steam turbine and venturi drive.

It would not carry torpedoes but a couple of dozen mini subs of modern design and stronger than steel acrylic. Also powered with an inboard steam venturi system and each mini-sub armed with around a dozen underwater capable armour piercing rockets.

And able to attack sub-hunting aircraft or other subs at will! And in that case, directed at torpedo tubes. Then drive system.

The main armament would be an (under watertight hatch) inboard electric rail gun, able to send laser guided target seeking delta winged smart bombs over the horizon.

And therefore, one of the most formidable weapons platform and delivery system ever devised. Able to go under any ice in straight line trajectory so as to attack from a most unexpected quarter. Emergency propulsion would come from a retractable forward leg. And powered by hydrogen consuming ceramic fuel cells.

This created during electrolysis oxygen replenishment, compressed to liquify it and store month's worth of emergency power/propulsion. CO2 removed via fractional distillation and ejected as dry ice.

Mini acrylic subs would enable operators to eyeball prospective targets as well a adjust flight of weapons to counter evasive action.

If the full range of weaponry deployed, single sub able to cripple 100 opponents. Imagine then what 12 might do. And without putting the entire crew in harm's way!
Alan B.
Posted by Alan B., Saturday, 5 January 2019 3:59:06 PM
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Dear Grahamy,

Sorry mate but you have lost me. I'm really struggle making the links you are. To tool up and build one of the latest generation of windturbines from scratch would literally be millions of dollars worth. The moulds alone for those enormous blades would be prohibitive.

However economies of scale has meant the cost of cradle to the grave of windfarms generation of electricity is now cheaper than coal fired generation and continuing to plummet.

That is were the efficiency calculations have to be made. Sure new coal fired generation efficiency is improving though the cost of the plants have not. But because the fuel has quite dramatic fluctuations in price often these gains are lost to increases in price.

On the other hand the fuel for wind turbines is indeed free. Gains in turbine design translate directly into reduce cost. These gains far outstrip those in coal technology and will do so well into the future.

If I were an investor I know which one I would be backing.

Anyway I don't think the Sydney to Hobart race is much of an example.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Saturday, 5 January 2019 4:44:29 PM
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Given most of the blades of wind powered turbines are made in China and made of steel! The steel made using metalugical coal and smelted using mostly coal fired power supplemented with some nuclear power.

China has, I'm informed a 30% annual wages inflation? And the cost of recovering and transporting the iron ore and both thermal and metalugical coal never ever gets cheaper.

So the idea that either wind tuurbines which have to turn for around thirty years just to offset the carbon used in their creation, able to get cheaper and cheaper, is simply ludicrous and absurd postering by an idealogical driven cohort, for who no other energy source other than the least reliable and most expensive will ever fly.

Given their stated aim is to reduce our energy consumption! Their only solution!

Now,I've seen solar powered RC air conditioners that run on fuel supplied free by the sun and atronomically expensive.

If the priveleged well off green movement want the nation's grannies, the poor and downtrodden, to use less electricity thsan they do now?

The only ones their obtuse asinine energy objective actually effects, then they should man up and buy a couple each, for around 40% of Australia's households.

You know all those folk now living below the poverty line Including Grandma and Granddad.

Or an armful of Nembutal to get them gone and no longer a burden on the bottom line or the energy grid. And would have to include most single mums also a burden on our alleged social saftey net.

Alternatively, read a book, by Investigative, prize winning Journalist and science writer Richard Martin, namely, Thorium, Super Fuel, subtitled, green energy.
Alan B.
Posted by Alan B., Sunday, 6 January 2019 10:13:04 AM
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Dear Alan B,

What is with the diatribe? Look I get that you think your reactors are the bees knees and are the answer to all our problems but it doesn't mean you get to go on an ignorant rant without getting pulled up.

To blade construction;

“The majority of current commercialized wind turbine blades are made from fiber-reinforced polymers (FRPs), which are composites consisting of a polymer matrix and fibers. The long fibers provide longitudinal stiffness and strength, and the matrix provides fracture toughness, delamination strength, out-of-plane strength, and stiffness. Material indices based on maximizing power efficiency, and having high fracture toughness, fatigue resistance, and thermal stability, have been shown to be highest for glass and carbon fiber reinforced plastics (GFRPs and CFRPs).
Wikipedia

So not steel as you asserted. I wager it would be the concrete footings with the highest carbon cost, far more than composite blades.

Now you might have different up to date information that you might want to share with the rest of us stating otherwise, if so I invite you to do so.

You wrote;

“So the idea that either wind tuurbines (sic) which have to turn for around thirty years just to offset the carbon used in their creation, able to get cheaper and cheaper, is simply ludicrous and absurd postering (sic) by an idealogical (sic) driven cohort, for who no other energy source other than the least reliable and most expensive will ever fly.”

Absolute rot.

Here is a link to a University of Texas study showing wind to be the second lowest behind nuclear for total carbon footprint for energy produced.
http://energy.utexas.edu/news/nuclear-and-wind-power-estimated-have-lowest-levelized-co2-emissions

Wind turbines are not without their issues but relative carbon footprint isn't one of them.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Sunday, 6 January 2019 1:24:36 PM
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Garbage Steely, as usual.

If wind is now cheaper, there will be no complaint if all subsidies are removed, & preferential treatment is discontinued, as of this moment.

Of course the wind industry will be profitable enough without those subsidies to supply backup power plants to guarantee their supply of power when it's windy or calm.

You could try pulling the other one old boy, it yodels.
Posted by Hasbeen, Sunday, 6 January 2019 2:17:18 PM
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Hi Alan B [re your Saturday, 5 January 2019 3:59:06 PM comment]

Your constant Lithium then Molten Salt Reactor (MSR) suggestions enjoy all the elements of a delayed, overbudget, financial, then nuclear, disasters for Australia.

If Australia developed a Molten Salt Reactor (MSR) for submarine this would oddly avoid the cheaper, more logical and vastly less dangerous option of using tried and tested French, UK or US submarine reactor technology.

Instead you advocate that Australia live dangerously and reinvent reactor technology long discarded by countries who know better.

Instead Australia should blow 200,000,000,000 dollars developing what the real experts (US and Russia) discarded decades ago due to MSW reactor's appalling safety and inefficiency records.

As Australia will need to massively increase its nuclear reactor experience base and need for coastal naval facilities, the, dangerous, renewed, Molten Salt Reactor type be developed, by the Lucas Heights workforce:

in and around SYDNEY HARBOUR.

Molten Salt Reactor were most notably developed in the 1960s-70s for the Russian Alpha/Alfa nuclear submarines http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfa-class_submarine#Propulsion the BM-40A MSR reactor:

The worlds most developed MSR reactos for submarines:

"...turned out to be much more demanding in maintenance than older [PWRs]. The issue was that the lead/bismuth eutectic solution solidifies at 125 °C. If it ever hardened, it would be impossible to restart the reactor, since the fuel assemblies would be frozen in the solidified coolant.

Thus, whenever the reactor shut down, the liquid coolant had to be heated externally with superheated steam."

While the Molten Salt Reactors were "able to work for many years without stopping, they were not specifically designed for such treatment and any serious reactor maintenance became impossible."

This led to a number of failures, including coolant leaks and one reactor broken down and frozen while at sea. However, constantly running the reactors proved better than relying on the coastal facilities. Four vessels were decommissioned due to freezing of the coolant."

Alan B. your suggestions enjoy all the elements of a 30 year financial, then nuclear disasters for Australia.

Cheers

Pete
Posted by plantagenet, Sunday, 6 January 2019 3:01:54 PM
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Dear Hasbeen,

Good to see you are still kicking old cock.

So no evidence, no links and no idea. Pretty standard fare from you.

I reckon stand you in front of the largest windfarm with the hot air you put out and our energy worries will be over.

Anyway what subsidies are you talking about? If you are referring to LGCs then they will be basically worthless by 2020 as new renewable energy projects come on line. Most of the current contracts have zero subsidy expectations in them anyway as many state governments are handing in their LGCs.

For instance the subsidy free windfarms of the ACT government actually returned a dividend to residents in 2017.
http://reneweconomy.com.au/subsidy-free-wind-farms-returned-money-act-consumers-2017/

That is the future mate. Not that you will get on board of course. However how about having a crack and attempt one link to support your normal bombast for your next post.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Sunday, 6 January 2019 4:01:36 PM
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I think the point that GY was trying to make is that with wind generation efficiency and cost the world is beginning to approach the limits where any further advances will yield diminishing improvements. Their life span hasn't improved much past 20yrs either.

What hasn't changed is the reliance on the wind and sun for renewable power generation which are both notoriously unreliable.
Posted by Shadow Minister, Wednesday, 9 January 2019 10:05:55 AM
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Shadow,
Of course that's the point GY's trying to make. But it's a point based on flawed comparisons and ill thought out suppositions rather than on facts and logic.
Posted by Aidan, Wednesday, 9 January 2019 4:51:43 PM
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Are folks supposed to ignore the fact that solar and wind only generate electricity cheaply when the sun shines or the wind blows enough? Vast times in between costs and emissions are created from burning backup fossil-fuels or there is the immense cost (and emissions in production) of sufficient storage to make renewables fully dispatchable.

Do renewablistas really expect the rest of us to suspend our disbelief while they make outlandish claims? Sadly, they're getting through to our youth via bending science education towards ideology and making the likelihood of reaching any sense on energy matters in Oz a generational problem.
Posted by Luciferase, Wednesday, 9 January 2019 8:40:36 PM
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Solar is increasingly becoming successful due to:

- plunging wholesale and retail costs of solar cells and Batteries

- Batteries in the home (contributing between sunlight hours)

- large City central computer coordinated batteries pooling the power of many homes with solar And home batteries.

Also of increasing benefit are massed Batteries at large Windpower and solar collection facilities 10s kms from cities and towns.

Particularly look at advances in Adelaide and broader South Australia.

As banks won't lend for new coal fired power stations, government run taxpayer money funded coal power construction will waste like the NBN.
Posted by plantagenet, Wednesday, 9 January 2019 9:52:31 PM
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Aidan,

Being an engineer, GY's suppositions and comparisons are very valid. Perhaps you would care to back up your sweeping statements.
Posted by Shadow Minister, Thursday, 10 January 2019 7:34:09 AM
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SR,

The claim that wind power is now cheaper than coal is complete baloney given the vast subsidies required to installers.

If it were true countries like Germany and China would not be building coal fired generation in preference to wind power.
Posted by Shadow Minister, Thursday, 10 January 2019 7:47:32 AM
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Shadow,
> Perhaps you would care to back up your sweeping statements.
I refer you to my first comment on this thread.

> The claim that wind power is now cheaper than coal is complete
> baloney given the vast subsidies required to installers.
Exactly what subsidies are you referring to?

> If it were true countries like Germany and China would not be
> building coal fired generation in preference to wind power.
That assumes their construction of coal fired power stations is for economic rather than political reasons.
Posted by Aidan, Thursday, 10 January 2019 10:13:46 AM
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Aidan,

Actually with wind turbines you are beginning to run into physical limits. Already the biggest turbines generate 9MW (theoretically) but are 200m high (60 stories) with 167m diameter blades. (The energy that can extracted from the moving air is proportional to the surface area covered by the rotors)

A lot of research has gone into the blade and generator efficiencies, but the problem is that to increase the size of the wind turbines to say 400m high would generate 4x the power, but require 8x the materials.

I have no doubt that further efficiencies will be gained, but the dramatic drop in cost/kW of generation is not going to be duplicated in the future decades.
Posted by Shadow Minister, Thursday, 10 January 2019 12:15:55 PM
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I found it useful for me.
Posted by amir ali, Thursday, 10 January 2019 1:08:45 PM
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There's no validity in the efficiency argument.

If 100% renewables was the only economically viable game in town every nation/state would have little choice but to opt in to remain competitive. That isn't the case now, and is unlikely to become so as all technologies have equal capacity for efficiency improvements.

It would be a pointlessly stupid moratorium for all nations to agree on a considerably higher cost carbon free source than is available. It would also be a moratorium unlikely to be respected, given human nature to get an edge.

None of this stops dreamers from dreaming, of course. Ideologues will soon be in charge of the asylum and we seem destined to re-fail the German experiment.
Posted by Luciferase, Thursday, 10 January 2019 4:47:44 PM
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