Posts from — September 2010

EXTRAORDINARY CLAIMS REQUIRE EXTRAORDINARY PROOF

 —Marcello Truzzi

How can an ancient source of energy, which

• continuously destabilizes the balance between supply and demand,
• is highly variable and unresponsive, and
• provides no capacity value while inimical to demand cycles

effectively replace the capacity of modern machines and their fuels, in the process removing significant amounts of greenhouse gas emissions that are the by-product of the burning of those fuels?

This final post in our four-part series discusses the nature of the scientific method and shows that there are a number of challenges to the claims wind technology can abate meaningful greenhouse gas emissions–challenges that require access to actual wind performance data showing how wind affects thermal behavior throughout the grid.

Any explanation about causation must honestly and transparently account for all variables at play. It should not consist of cherry picked items favorable to a particular agenda while ignoring other, less favorable factors.

Dr. Truzzi (above) also recounted who is obligated to do what in the process of investigating, vetting, and validating explanation:

“In science, the burden of proof falls upon the claimant; and the more extraordinary a claim, the heavier is the burden of proof demanded. The true skeptic takes an agnostic position, one that says the claim is not proved rather than disproved. He asserts that the claimant has not borne the burden of proof and that science must continue to build its cognitive map of reality without incorporating the extraordinary claim as a new “fact.” Since the true skeptic does not assert a claim, he has no burden to prove anything. He just goes on using the established theories of “conventional science” as usual. But if a critic asserts that there is evidence for disproof, that he has a negative hypothesis—saying, for instance, that a seeming [paranormal] result was actually due to an artifact—he is making a claim and therefore also has to bear a burden of proof.”[i]

AWEA’s extraordinary claim is this: That an ancient source of energy, which relentlessly, continuously, destabilizes the balance between supply and demand, is highly variable and unresponsive, and provides no capacity value while inimical to demand cycles, can effectively replace the capacity of modern machines and their fuels, in the process removing significant amounts of greenhouse gas emissions that are the by-product of the burning of those fuels. This claim is particularly egregious given that wind does not even provide modern power performance–only desultory energy. Since energy is the ability to do work and power is the rate work is done, wind technology delivers fluctuating power at a rate appropriate for 1810, not 2010.

The assertion that wind technology is a necessary, let alone sufficient, cause of reductions in the use of fossil fuels and their various emissions cannot withstand even casual scrutiny, for there are, in virtually every case, other much more plausible causes for any CO₂ or fossil fuel reductions—viz, a falling away of demand, substitution of other fuels, improvements in conventional machine efficiencies, even changes in weather conditions. [Read more →]

SCIENCE IS THE DISINTERESTED SEARCH FOR THE OBJECTIVE TRUTH ABOUT THE MATERIAL WORLD.

– Richard Dawkins

This post in our series  looks at how the integration of wind variability affects thermal activity on the grid, favors flexible natural gas generators, and influences economic dispatch and the spot market. It also examines how estimates of carbon emissions are derived and summarizes the limitations of statistically based knowledge. It concludes with a discussion of what Energy Information Administration (EIA) actually says about the causes of carbon emission reductions in the country over the last three years

It is true, as the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) notes, that any wind production must displace some existing generation, but only in terms of electricity–not any of the underlying energy forms transposed into electricity. It is rather due to the stricture that supply match perfectly with demand at all times (and this is another oversimplification of a complicated situation).

Just as the grid must reduce supply in precise increments to keep pace with specific reductions in demand—or increase supply in just the right increments to keep pace with increasing demand, the grid must respond to increased wind penetration, which, to a grid operator, looks much like a reduction in demand. Since wind plants are continuously generating between zero and 100% of their rated capacity in flux, providing who-knows-what for any future time, conventional generation must infill any reduction in wind energy at the precise increment of that reduction and, conversely, it must be withdrawn in increments that match any wind increases.

If wind generation were merely intermittent and unpredictable while producing at a steady rate, it might achieve some of its claims about backing down coal. However, wind’s relentless variability imposes daunting challenges for integration. Clever engineering schemes can mask the problem, but not without imposing increased costs and thermal activity. [Read more →]

FACTS ARE STUBBORN, BUT STATISTICS ARE MORE PLIABLE

—Mark Twain

This section reviews the criticism the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) makes about the Bentek report and the evidence the organization offers purporting to prove how wind reduced substantial greenhouse gas emissions in Texas and Colorado. The section concludes with an examination of what the EIA data really show for those states for 2007 versus 2008—and what the official Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports say about causal factors for any CO₂ reductions.

The Bentek study showed that wind volatility in the sampled regions of Colorado and Texas caused more CO₂ emissions than would have been the case with less wind and more efficient coal plants. Using mostly sub-hourly performance data, Bentek was able to “examine in detail how coal, gas and wind interact and the resulting emissions implications.”

In general, the research team found that wind, typically much more active at night when demand is least, was more entangled with base load coal plants given that more flexible and costly gas plants were dispatched to meet higher daytime demand.

As Robert Bryce reported in his influential Wall Street Journal article, the repeated cycling—ramping up and back—of coal plants, with their higher CO₂ concentrations, created heat rate penalties that produced a greater volume of CO₂ emissions. The coal plants in a wind balancing role were operating more inefficiently, and thus required more fuel, much in the way an automobile does when driven in stop-and-go traffic.

As noted in Part I of this series, Bentek then recommended that better results for carbon emissions offsets could be produced by introducing more responsive natural gas units on the system, in part replacing the coal plants with machines that burned 50% cleaner.

AWEA’s Surface Criticism

AWEA maintains this study must have been seriously flawed, since, as more wind was installed on the systems, EIA data showed that CO₂ and other greenhouse gas emissions declined between 2007 and 2008, and, within both states, coal and natural gas consumption fell as well. Goggin then quotes Frank Prager, who “pointed out the flaws … in the (Bentek) study and reconfirmed that wind … significantly reduced fossil fuel use and emissions….” But as vice president of environmental policy for the energy company, Prager is not a disinterested party. But it’s the evidence that’s important, not his testimonial.

Let’s look at the evidence more closely. [Read more →]

THE LESS ONE KNOWS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE, THE EASIER IT IS TO EXPLAIN

—Leon Brunschvicg

Have truth and consequences arrived for the biggest energy sham of all?

Energy journalist Robert Bryce recently broke the news to mainstream American media. In a hard-hitting article published in the Wall Street Journal, he reported the findings of a Colorado energy research study, which earlier this year concluded that the industrial wind technology it sampled in the regions of Colorado and Texas neither reduced carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions in the production of electricity nor rolled back consumption of fossil fuels.

The raison d’être of the wind industry is to abate significant levels of the greenhouse gas emissions many feel are causing precipitous and adverse warming trends in the earth’s climate. Wind technology is also sold as an alternative source of power to coal-fired plants. Therefore, the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA), the trade organization for a constellation of limited liability wind companies, did not exactly welcome Bryce’s report with arms open.

Instead, AWEA spokesman Michael Goggin penned a stern riposte, which alleged that Bryce and others skeptical about the efficacy of wind technology were “lobbyists” for the fossil fuel industry, spreading lies “to avoid losing market share to wind energy,” and compared Bryce and a range of people and organizations to the groups and pundits from the tobacco industry who once told Congress there was no causal link between cigarettes and cancer.

Goggin also produced evidence and testimonials in ABC fashion that he claimed validated “one of the universally recognized and uncontestable (italics added) benefits of wind energy: that (it) reduces the use of fossil fuels as well as the emissions and other environmental damage associated with producing and using these fuels.” He further boasted that there were “reams of government data and peer-reviewed studies” supporting the effectiveness of his employer’s technology.

Before addressing AWEA’s evidentiary offerings on behalf of wind’s carbon saving/ fossil-fuel slaying potential–a bit of clarifying context. [Read more →]

This three-part series assesses utility-scale wind’s ability to provide reliable power, a necessary qualification for its use in electricity systems. After Part I’s introduction, Part II dealt with power density, where wind fails to meet today’s standards. This final part will look at the extension to power density, that is, capacity (power) value, which takes into account wind’s randomness and intermittency of supply. Again wind fails to qualify as industrial energy.

Electricity capacity is measured in power terms, for example MW. In this connection it is important to note the importance of the distinction that must be made between capacity factor, capacity credit and capacity value. Compared to capacity value, capacity credit and capacity factor are of small importance. Jon Boone has long called attention to this as follows:

“Modern society exists on a foundation built upon productivity that comes from reliable, controllable, interdependent high-powered machine systems. All conventional units that provide electricity must pass rigorous tests of reliability and performance; they must produce their rated capacities, or a desired fraction, as expected whenever asked–or be removed from the grid. Some are like refrigerators, doing heavy-duty long-term work; others are like our toasters or irons, not working all the time but responsive when called upon to do so. This ability to perform as expected on demand is known as a machine’s capacity value. Conventional power generators have a capacity value of 99.999%. Using them for 97% of our electricity, the country achieves high reliability and security at affordable cost. Wind provides no capacity value and can pass no test for reliability; one can never be sure how much energy it will produce for any future time. Generating units that don’t provide capacity value cannot be reasonably compared with those that do.

This is a practical way to think about this concept: You don’t drive your car all the time, with the result that its capacity factor—the percentage of your car’s potential that you actually use–is probably 15-20%, if that. But when you do wish to drive it, the car works virtually all of the time, getting you from pillar to post in line with your own schedule. This is its capacity value. Ditto with your chain saw–or television, or any modern appliance we all take for granted because it works when we want it to work. Appliances that don’t do this are quickly discarded, although this wasn’t the case for much of our history (look at the early days of television or radio or even the automobile). Only in the last hundred years or so have we in the West come to rely on machines with this standard. In fact, it’s the basis of our modernity and it underlies contemporary systems of economic growth and wealth creation.”

In other words, for electrical energy to be useful, we must be able to switch it on and off at the level needed and rely on it being available during the period of use. To accomplish this, capacity (in this context capacity and power are interchangeable terms) must be reliably available on a continuous basis. This is as opposed to wind “activity” as described in Part I, which is available only randomly and in continuously varying amounts over time.

Statistical expectations of this are not meaningful. This cannot be over-emphasized, as electricity is a vital resource for many of our activities and continued well-being. Further, unlike most resources, electricity cannot be stored, and in most applications, in its absence, substitution of some non-electrical power source is not feasible. [Read more →]

Part I of this three-part series set the stage for examining intermittent power sources, especially wind, as viable sources of electricity. Part 2 addresses one of the critical power considerations: power density.

In his  MasterResource series, Vaclav Smil compared the power densities of a range of fuels for electricity production, which demonstrates the inadequacies of renewables. David MacKay also makes a useful contribution to this topic.[i] Table 1 summarizes the results, which take into account entire fuel cycles, transportation and transmission requirements for a range of assumptions.

Note that all renewable energy sources are ten to over a thousand times less effective than those serving our needs today, with wind providing one of the poorest performances of the renewable sources shown, outside of wood. Areas required for renewables are large because of the dispersed, and often remote, nature of their energy supply.

The problem that this presents is that our current electricity infrastructure is based on high power density generation facilities supplying the low power densities of users, and in general, user power density is about ten times higher than most renewable sources, including wind.[ii] [Read more →]

Based on policy pronouncements of governments, the media, and Left environmentalists, one might believe the world is about to enter the renewable energy era. In reality, however, the “new” is about a long gone era that ended before the dawn of the 20^th century. Then the primary fuel was wood. Other renewables, including water and wind, were used because they were available and technologically harnessable for some very localized situations.

However primitive, renewables relating to the sun’s flow was the best our ancestors could do.

Will there be a renaissance of this era? Perhaps there will be, but it will be in a significantly different form and dependent upon a vastly transformed world, in both technological and societal terms, which will not be achievable for many generations. The question is: are we as societies and individuals prepared to make the necessary adjustments to realize the potential opportunities, which we do not currently understand sufficiently, that this may present in the future?

But this series of posts is about wind power specifically, a relic from this earlier period, which is inappropriately named, especially when applied to modern needs. Wind appears to be an electrical power source because it has some ability to generate electricity, which can be expressed as watt-hours, that is, energy. This is a term that we are fairly familiar with because it is the common measure of our use of electricity. But this is not power, which can be expressed as watts. [Read more →]

My post last week evaluated the claim that wind generation can save money for power pool customers.  It was found that the supposed savings could be realized only if the elephant in the room – the above-market feed-in tariff – was ignored.  In other words, consumer payments for electricity from a power pool was half of the story; the real price had to include the consumer-qua-taxpayer funding of the feed-in-tariff (FIT).

And with this two-part scheme, games are played. Wind generators can bid a low price into the pool only to receive a higher FIT, which gives them an incentive to underbid. This might reduce the pool price but not overall cost to Germans for electricity.

Investing in New Generation: What Makes Sense?

If a generation resource is a good investment for its developers then it must return a profit to them.  In a normal electricity market this profit comes from supplying a segment of the demand (peak, intermediate/cycling, baseload) from a plant that is efficient technically and financially.

For existing plants and determinations of electricity costs in the here and now we can figure out the average cost of supplying electricity by calculating the weighted average cost of supply for each time period in the market every day.  If the addition of one generation source raises this weighted average without improving service quality or reliability, then it is not economical and would generally not be chosen in a well-functioning market.

But what about the future?  Electricity suppliers must invest large sums in new generation plants with the expectation that these plants will meet demand at the least cost.  This cannot be known with certainty, and mistakes are made all the time, especially when government policy and rent-seeking drive investment choices.

Transmission network operators – those in charge of the “natural monopoly” part of the power business – try to reduce the risk attendant to future supply by figuring out the least costly way to supply power and energy to their customers in the future, including the wires to transmit the electricity.  They have to take account of a long list of considerations: investment cost, fuel supply, emissions and licensing regulation, proximity to existing load centers and transmission nodes, transmission congestion – you get the idea.

The transmission system operator also has to pay attention to public policy – renewable energy mandates (“portfolio standards”), federal tax incentives (producer tax credits for wind and solar), feed-in tariffs, powerful politicians who do not want their vistas impaired – in a host of ways that directly impact their views of an optimal future generating system.

What Does the Wise Transmission Operator Do?

A wise investor in generation will first figure out what is economic to build? what are the physical constraints on the system? and finally, what limitations will public policy put on otherwise least cost generation choices?

A Case Study of “Germania”[i]

Let us imagine that we have a rather large and wealthy country to play with, one that currently has about 129 GW of installed generation capacity.  Further, we can imagine that this wealthy country, responding to its powerful environmental movement, has decided to

(i) phase out nuclear power;

(ii) limit future coal power-plant operations;

(iii) build a lot (a lot!) of wind generation plants; and

(iv) bring in most of its gas supply from Russia at prices linked directly to refined oil products and crude (i.e., high and volatile). [Read more →]

[Editor Note: This post by Robert Bradley Jr. from January 19th documents a fact that American Wind Energy Association might not want to know. If the American public understands why windpower is and must be government dependent to exist as an industry, and if the public knows about industrial wind's Enron roots, then the same public might just say: 'let's take our energy back'.]

January 7, 1997, some 13 years ago, was one of the worst days in my 16-year career at Enron. Enron had already entered into the solar business (1994) in partnership with Amoco (Solarex), and the U.S. wind industry was on its back. Zond Corporation was struggling, and  rival Kenetech had recently suspended its dividend and was on the way to  bankruptcy. Enron bought Zond on this day and renamed it Enron Wind Company.

Enron Wind would never turn a profit, and it would be sold in May 2002 by the bankrupt parent to GE. (GE and Enron would have other ominous parallels.)

Enron came in at just the right time for a troubled, undeserving industry by

1. Putting a big-name corporation in the U.S. wind industry for the first time;
2. Issuing countless press releases on ‘wonderful’ green wind for the next several years; and
3. Successfully lobbying Texas politicians to enact the most strict renewable mandate in the country in 1999.

Regarding the third point, the Texas mandate created an unholy business-government alliance of sufficient size for the state to increase its renewable mandate in 2005. Texas is the leading wind power state in the country–but hardly by consumer choice. [Read more →]

Germany is a country that has been a leader in many aspects of “clean” energy development during the past decade.  They were among the leaders in establishing pricing mechanisms for wind and solar, phasing out nuclear power and granting incentives to biomass energy producers.  Germany has the highest proportion of wind in its generation mix, now around 20%, but is no longer the absolute installed capacity leader behind the U.S. and China.

With a vast investment in above-market generation resources some in Germany are channeling “Mad Man Muntz” of early US television history – “lose money on every sale but make it up with the volume.”  It did not work for Muntz TV and it will not work for Germany.

A New Fairy Tale, Starring Wind Energy Generators

Lately, a story has gone round with the following general points:

• Assume that the marginal cost of wind is the lowest of all existing generation plant types;
• Assume that power pools in NW Europe accept generator bids based strictly on the marginal energy cost (MEC)
• Assume that wind can be the marginal generation resource during some peak periods
• Assume further that this MEC sets the price on the pool for those time segments (30 minutes) where wind is the marginal producer, and therefore
• Wind, by setting the MEC during some peak demand periods, will reduce the price of energy during such periods and save consumers money.

In other words, even though wind generators are more expensive to build and require above-market prices to sustain, somehow they are able to reduce prices across the power pool.

This would certainly be a neat trick if someone could do it. [Read more →]