No matter how hard they try, the Germans cannot get the intermittent nature of wind and solar to behave. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/...ower-chaos-should-be-a-warning-to-the-UK.html quote: their actual output will waver between 100 per cent of capacity and zero. In Britain it averages around 25 per cent; in Germany it is lower, just 17 per cent. Taxcutter notes: At Altamont pass one of Americas primo wind sites its 16% of capacity. Quote: it becomes incredibly difficult to maintain a consistent supply of power to the grid, when that wildly fluctuating renewable output has to be balanced by input from conventional power stations. The other is that, to keep that back-up constantly available can require fossil-fuel power plants to run much of the time very inefficiently and expensively Last year, its wind turbines already had 29GW of capacity, equivalent to a quarter of Germanys average electricity demand. But because these turbines are even less efficient than our own, their actual output averaged only 5GW, and most of the rest had to come from grown-up power stations, ready to supply up to 29GW at any time and then switch off as the wind picked up again. so difficult to keep the grid balanced that it is permanently at risk of power failures. Energy-intensive industries are having to install their own generators, or are looking to leave Germany altogether. a mighty battle is now developing in Germany between green fantasists and practical realists. In brief, Germanys renewables drive is turning out to be a disaster. Taxcutter says: Wind and solar make no sense at all unless they are mated to a reliable energy storage scheme such as pumped hydro. Meanwhile, back in the US Hussein Obamas EPA is causing US electric rates to skyrocket. http://bluecrabboulevard.com/2012/09/22/electricity-rates-would-necessarily-skyrocket/ Hope and change.
Unfortunately, there is currently no practical way to store electricity for a power grid. Pumped hydro is simply very inefficient. Much efficiency is lost converting the electricity to raise a water level, then getting the electricity back. The most efficient strategy would obviously be to utilise the mechanical energy from wind turbines directly to lift the water (like the Dutch traditionally did), but this is just not really feasible either. That would mean that each wind turbine must be located on the dam. Or possibly pressurised air pipes could be used to transfer the mechanical energy, but the turbines would still have to be near the dam. Some other methods of storing such vast ammounts of electric power use superconducting coils, or sodium batteries which must be heated to a high temperature before they can be used. But these are only feasible in certain limited situations.
Hmm, this isn't even an article but in the comment section of the paper. It's also done by a poo-for-brains global warming skeptic. He also doesn't even believe that asbestos is a health risk. It's one of these idiots that is either crazy or getting money from corrupt industries to spread their lies. Give me a legitimate source. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2011/oct/13/christopher-booker It gets funny just how stupid (more likely, deceitful) he is: You might want to use valid sources. Your other link is a joke as well. Maybe from someone who isn't a coal industry boot licker. Who do you work for, btw?
When did the Guardian become a valid source? When did mindless ad hominem become a valid rhetorical tactic?
