‘Symbolic’ Wind Turbines Generating More P.R. Than Power
by Tom StewardNow that most of twelve California wind turbines retrofitted for Minnesota winters are finally operational, several cities have acknowledged to the Freedom Foundation of Minnesota that the $5 million project may be more suited for generating PR—both good and bad—than producing significant quantities of power.
The wind power project involves utilities in eleven cities scattered across the state from the metro area to East Grand Forks in a consortium called the Minnesota Municipal Power Agency (MMPA). Each of the eleven member cities received one turbine, and the twelfth was given to the MMPA owned and operated Faribault Energy Park in Faribault. It was supposed to be a step toward meeting the state renewable energy mandate that requires 25 percent of Minnesota’s power be from renewable energy sources by 2025.
It turns out, however, the twelve wind derricks will produce power for perhaps several hundred homes, hardly making a dent in the MMPA’s 57,000 household and business customers.
“They’re basically for public relations, educational purposes. They’re just not feasible for any significant amount of electrical generation,” said Dan Voss, Municipal Utilities Director for the City of Anoka.
The idea of a green energy public relations campaign is acknowledged up front in what’s called the Hometown WindPower project’s criteria for the turbine site selection on member city North St. Paul’s website. The document states the turbine must have “prominent visibility from major roads” and serve to “show each community’s commitment to clean renewable energy.”
The turbines succeeded in attracting publicity from the start, drawing national attention for all the wrong reasons, when the frigid Minnesota temperatures shut down the turbines before they ever got going.
“The original purpose was to help meet our 25 per cent requirement,” said Wally Wysopal, City Manager of North St. Paul. “The other objective is to get people to understand this is going to be a tough objective to hit and these are symbols of that. And I think you can see they’re not easy to get going sometimes.”
At $417,000 per wind turbine, it’s an expensive campaign fueled by federally subsidized Clean Renewable Energy Bonds (CREBS). The revenue or cost savings from the renewable energy are utilized to pay off the bonds over an average of 15 years.
“The CREBS bonds made it reasonable. It is subsidized, it is available, and we took that opportunity,” Wysopal added. “Otherwise, we would not have done it.”
In 2007, MMPA envisioned installing 300 foot tall turbines that would generate as much as 1.5 megawatts of electricity, providing a greater portion of the cities’ daily energy use. But last fall MMPA began installing turbines less than half that height at 115 feet and with about one-tenth of the capacity at 160 kilowatts.
The estimates of how much power will be produced varies: North St. Paul’s website estimates that 110 homes will receive power when the turbines operate at full power; Anoka’s estimate is at 35-40 homes. At least one city utilities director hopes the controversy focuses attention on the danger of over-relying on wind power to meet the state’s renewable energy mandate.
“One fifth of the arable land would have to be taken up by wind turbines to meet the mandate,” Dan Voss said. “It’s just not a good policy and it’s not sustainable and unfortunately, there’s no interest in it until the lights go out.”
Check here for coverage of another controversial wind power project in Minnesota.
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169 Comments
Everyone in the energy industry knows that wind turbines are a joke.
The only way they are feasible, is because of government tax breaks and federal subsidies. when government picks up the shortfall for every failed business model, you know WE are in big trouble. Wind is nothing more than a hoax, perpetrated by GE.
There just isn't that much energy in wind, much less enough that can be efficiently captured.
drill baby drill…wind, solar and all the renewable electric sources won't solve our problems, only create new problems.
It would have been done a long time ago if it was effective. Trying something that doesn't work time and time again doesn't change the outcome.
Starting up a new business venture and looking for some investors. All we need is a Tractor trailer (flatbed) a 25,000 gallon tank full of diesel fuel and a long term storage site. In ten years we will be the only outfit within hundreds of miles that can haul all these windmills and solar panels to the land fill.
Our tax dollars "Blowing in the wind"
Turbines simply aren't efficient enough to provide even a fraction of the power we've been told they would. Turbines either need to become far more efficient or we need to accept that there will have to be other power sources.
All of these turbines were bought used. The one in Anoka hasn't spun one revolution as of yet. Also, I understand that there is concern that the ice that will build up on the blades during winter , might come flying off and hit passing cars or people. I guess ice build up on things up here in Minny didn't cross the minds of any of our city or state engineers. When these things wouldn't operate this winter, the California company they were purchased from said …" they were not asked or consulted about cold weather operation" …….Priceless!! Can't make this stuff up folks!
I have been screaming this for years it seems like. There is NO way we can build enough wind turbines and solar panels to replace our electricity that is generated by coal. We HAVE to use fossil fuels or nuclear. Period. But oh no, pie-in-the-sky, rose-colored-glasses, environuts dreamily insist on wind and solar. Give me a f*****ing break.
Seems like all that these wind turbines were good for were generating a lot of BS and hot air, and like any government project, a lot of red ink.
I've only seen the one in Chaska spin once in 7 months. I pass by it twice a day. What a waste.
It is ALL symbolism, something Obama is long on. Does not need to be good, just look and sound good. This is the fallacy behind the entire GREEN movement. There will never be a "Green job" industry.
"The turbines succeeded in attracting publicity from the start, drawing national attention for all the wrong reasons, when the frigid Minnesota temperatures shut down the turbines before they ever got going"
So…… some Al Franken voters who depended on the energy from the windmills to power their homes sat in the dark and froze?
Finally, some good news for a change.
the same wind turbines none of the NIMBY's want? Those turbines? Can't have them in 'Mahtha's Vineyard, blocks our view' so said Senators Kennedy and Kerry.
Seems the greenies don't like wind turbines OR solar panels. Basically, they don't want ANY power in the US.
Except in their little communities we suspect…
The same GE that employs Olby?
Yep. For sure. One and the same. General Electric.
Well at least they are generating power. There was a program in southern California a few years ago that was making news by putting in solar panels on schools. I happened to know a man involved in the project. For one thing, despite the media attention, none of them were actually hooked up! (They didn't get hooked up until a year after the hoopla.) Then to make things even more interesting, the panels weren't maintained. (That is they need to be cleaned off occasionally to.. ya know… get any sunlight!) The end result was a big PR stunt with essentially -no- new energy production. Got to love PR…..
When was the last time anyone ever saw a coal fired power plant do this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nSB1SdVHqQ
One shuttle load of Helium 3 would power all of the US for 1 year. The only abundant resource for Helium 3 is the moon yet the POTUS just scrapped our plans for the return to the moon. I saw that the cost to retrieve Helium 3 from the moon would be equivalent to 7 dollar a barrel oil.
A few years back, there was a wind power company that wanted to build a windfarm offshore at Martha's Vineyard. The Kennedy clan shot that idea down right quick. Said it would disturb the seagulls, and ruin the asthetics.
See Cpae Wind project in Mass…. regulations take any project to work !! 5yrs no and counting to get windmills started….and still freaking stuck in Governemtn CRAP !!!
State and Local Permitting completed in 2009.
Federal Permitting through April, 2010.
Once it gets underway, construction will take two years.
http://www.capewind.org/
also see FREEDOM TOWER!!! This is such a slap to America….
GE is the NEW Halliburton.
The only difference is that GE has it filthy grubbing hands in many more markets including the media, Health Care, Energy……Strange that those are all the same big issues for Oblamer.
I hope that cold north wind blows straight into AlGore's bank account.
I can't wait to see his phony ponzi scheme crumble and put him out in the streets.
You might be on to something.
We need to make GE into what the left did to Halliburton.
In Texas the "Wind Farm" the wind over blew and burned up transmissions, new ones had to be installed, (they must be shut down when the wind is blowing TOO hard).
Five years.
Cost of wind turbine – $417,000 +
Cost of billboard – $50,000 + $300 to $3,000 @ month.
Wasn't T. Boone Pickens pushing this?
We will be able to buy H3 from the Chinese, they know that space exploration will drive their energy solutions. They actually have a mission.
IMO the Orion space oddessy was a waste of money. But now they will just use that money some even loonier green projects including solar and wind. So its a lose, lose I guess.
it's the cape wind farm – see my post – it's taken years just to get things going and still years until they can build … everyone should bring this up when talking about government getting involved… The president does NOT know how to create jobs .. all his life he has lived off the backs of the worker… grants / government jobs ..etc
he only knows government … I don't think we will make it 3 more years!!!!
slick willy got more of a charge from monica's wind-mill.
Wind makes things cooler, thats science, and these wind turbines are slowing wind down which normally/naturally cools the earth. This could be a contributing factor to global warming, oh my
NASA is being transformed to a hack global warming research center which makes soo much sense. You are right about the Chinese thanks to the super computers Bill Clinton allowed them to purchase from the US they are well on their way to sending maned spacecraft to the moon,.
The US has a helium reserve, in Amarillo, Texas.
Yes, in a big way in 2008.
Unreliable, inefficient, uneconomic recycled failures from the Jimmy Carter era and earlier generations. Send them back to Jurassic Park. We have a 200 year supply of coal, 100 year supply of NG and infinite supplies of NUQULAR. Let's get serious.
I've driven past the pinwheel in North St. Paul, MN for several months and I've never seen it operating. It's right in the middle of an office park with buildings on each side. I'd never want to live anywhere near that monstrosity. Supposed to be operating in November 09, but that remains to be seen.
So what's his angle? If these things clearly cannot provide sufficient energy, why was he pushing it so hard?
I know you said you don't shop at Wal Mt CL, but for anyone who does, look for lightbulbs
made by anyone other than GE, even at Home Depot GE products gobble up 85% of
the shelf space.
Subsidies can be very profitable.
Boone was smart.
If you are interested, look up "Pickens Plan".
Essentially, he was playing it for the tax breaks and the subsidies.
So why isn't anyone investigating him for malfeasance? He was trying to scam us out of a pantload of money and not a peep. Sarah Palin gets Oscar swag and it's all over the effin news…..
I did not know that. Do they have any old fashioned good lightbulbs in there, or just the new enviro-wacko ones that don't shed enough light that you can't find your ass to scratch it?
Thank you algore
thx for the giggle, my daughter who grew up in Txz lives in Minnesota. She can't believe how
thoroughly the mid-westerners are invested in symbolism.
On the contrary.
I didn't say anything about malfeasance. There is nothing wrong with following the law, and using the tax code to your advantage. I do it every day.
Oh I dont know, install a few in both houses.
Senators and congressional reps spew enough hot air to power DC I bet.
Snip … "…They’re just not feasible for any significant amount of electrical generation,”
I could say the same about progressives if you replaced "electical" with "economic" but then I guess that's the point of the article isnt it.
They are all over here, the break down rate is phenominal, the cost to repair even more so.
About 1 of 3 is always down for maintenance
The GREEN MOVEMENT has been CO-OPTED by the LEFTISTS, MARXISTS,AND SOCIALISTS………IT'S NO LONGER ABOUT MOTHER EARTH……..IT'S ABOUT POWER AND CORRUPTION.
It doesn't matter how much carbon based fuel that you burn……YOU CAN BUY CARBON CRDITS THAT WILL REDISTRIBUTE THE WEALTH THROUGH SOCIAL JUSTICE……AFTER AL GORE AND HIS ILK SKIM A PERCENTAGE OFF THE TOP.
It doesn't matter that you decide and build wind frams……..YOU CAN'T TURN THEM ON…….BECAUSE THE BATS AND MIGRATORY BIRDS WOULD BE DESTROYED.
It doesn't matter that you decide and try to build solar energy farms…….YOU CAN'T BUILD THEM…….BECAUSE THE BEAUTIFUL DESERT WOULD BE DESTROYED.
It doesn't matter that you decide and try to build nuclear power plants………..YOU CAN'T BUILD THEM…..THEY MIGHT HAVE A PROBLEM AND DESTORY THE ENVIRONMENT.
BOTTOM LINE………….THE GREEN MOVEMENT IS OUT TO DESTROY THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AS WE KNOW IT.
In 2008 Pelosi and her hubby invested substantial money in T. Boone Pickens’ Clean Energy Fuels Corp.
It always helps to have friends in high places.
Buy locally from the "mom and pop" type hardware stores…My local Raks has lots of them…
I have to disagree with you there pard, Pickens is nothing more than a smart version of Al Gore.
Which brings me back to my earlier question. Why isn't anyone looking into this whole scam?
if we can get enough of them and just do it right, they'll work for us
I wouldn't do that…
The less DC is powered the better…I wanted to dance naked in the moonlight while the snowstorms shut down that den of iniquity…
It's always a good deal when you use someone else's money and everybody wants in. For the government; It's like walking into a bar and yelling, 'the drinks are on me'. Everyone will have one in each hand and 3 backed up.
Which brings me back to my earlier point – "It always helps to have friends in high places."
You think Barry is going to tell Eric to look into the Nancy/T. Boone slow dance, music provided by G.E.?
If Alwhore negotiated the deal, no wonder the "small" detail about ice wasn't asked. You bet this is priceless info! Even a child knows the wheels of a toy won't turn if left outside and frozen.
Symbolic’ Wind Turbines Generating More P.R. Than Power by Tom Steward: Thanks, Tom! Great article!
This is more scary stuff, isn't it? I just heard yesterday that in France in creation of green jobs are losing two jobs for every person they hire to be green! Again, this is more of an economic scam to bust the economy and create what the Bible calls in the end days, a "cashless society" in a New World Order" government, led by Lucifer, the first messiah!
This is evil stuff folks! If you think not, I want to hear from you next year at this time when you've had a chance to see just how evil this plan really is! Folks; It's all about power and control!
I believe it was shut down several years ago, I could be wrong though. May be there is still a storage
facility there, but production side was shut down. One of those Democrat paybacks for Amarillo area
always voting Republican, possibly during Clinton era. It was claimed the Govt could import cheaper
than producing. It was the only helium enrichment facility in the US, I think. Around here there was much
discussion that we shouldn't become dependent to foreign suppliers for this important commodity.
I live about 70 mi from Amarillo.
Boys,
Like the song says:
"The road goes on forever, and the party never ends"……….
"IT'S NO LONGER ABOUT MOTHER EARTH……..IT'S ABOUT POWER AND CORRUPTION."
Really?
Thats all it ever was about. Nothing more, nothing less.
Been listening to that for decades…every time a Prog resurrects statist liberalism…
Your best bet…hook up one sized for a single home to your house…
When it doesn't work, it won't interfere with the rest of us getting our power from that little baby nuke power station in the neighborhood…
Wow. Wonder how many critters that killed. Send this video to Peta!!
Sarah-
We got lot's more in great used condition where these came from! And we're in a selling mood….!!
yes, although he shelved his project when oil prices went back down last year. He was lobbying
Congress for financing guarantees above the normal tax breaks they usually give to entities who
install these big wind-farms. You know our boy Boone is 'special'. There was also a certain pub-
licity factor for Boone, he would like to run for National office, well not actually run, he'd like to be
'crowned'. He's too important to 'run'. Before the wind turbine deal he was buying up land in Rob-
erts County Tx , in the Panhandle, planning to sell the water (Oglalla Aquifer a finite source w/ neg-
laible recharge) to SanAntonio. The whole Panhandle, South Plains area was up in arms, kind of
open season on Pickens, if you will.
yeah, I figured….
I'll bet that is 5 years of 100% uptime and no mechanical failure. Seems totally ridiculous.
Nuclear is looking better and better. Even the FRENCH have figured that out. Do we want to be trailing the French in anything??? Hell NO!
You need a better business model: take them to the scrap yard and sell them for weight. That will offset your shipping costs.
Landfill hell, wonder how much copper wire is in those turbines. The wet-backs will be climbing
them trying to steal the copper. Almost weekly we hear of someone in our general area who goes
out to start a center pivot irrigation system only to find the 1/4 or 1/2 mile of copper wire that runs
on top of the water pipe has been stripped off during the previous night. One absentee landlord
who maintains a tiny one bedroom house on his farm, drove up to find 3 or 4 men in his farmyard,
burning the insulation off of a large bundle of wire. They completely ignored him, he sat on his
porch swing & watched until they finished & left. Darn old fool, it's a wonder they didn't kill him.
Several years ago in the North Carolina High Country, three wind turbines were erected on our highest peak. The turbines turned, but the noise was so excruciatingly loud that no one could get any sleep in the surrounding neighborhoods. They were stopped and shipped off into oblivion-more taxpayer waste!
Au contraire – Storing energy in those amounts can be done simply and efficiently. I know how.
The hilarious unintentional side-effect of this "green" power source is that it's a major killer of local bird populations.
How anyone thought the wind could be harnessed to be as effective as fossil fuel or nuclear power sources is beyond me. Now, this new algae-based biofuel they're talking about shows promise.
Yep, shut off when the wind blows too hard and supplemented by a gas generator when the wind isn't blowing hard enough.
seems like I read about 35 or 40mph they automatically shut down, hell 35 is just a refreshing
breeze here on the High Plains of Txz..
It's all about the tax breaks; just another way to screw the taxpayer out of money, BUT make them "feel good" about it…The only CONSTANT source of alternative clean energy I know about is nuclear power…but what do I know?I don't work as a green energy PR exec…
Helium yes but Helium3 is not abundant on earth.The earth is also running out of helium if you did not know. Helium is so light that it actually escapes the earths gravitational pull. This is a major issue for things like MRI's which use liquid helium to cool their superconductors. The Texas reserve is still there but it will run out
“One fifth of the arable land would have to be taken up by wind turbines to meet the mandate,” Dan Voss said.
This is something I don't understand. (If someone can explain it, I'd appreciate it) The physical footprint of a wind turbine is really quite small. The blades are high enough off of the ground that they can't hit anything. So how do they take up huge amounts of land? Wouldn't the area underneath them still be useful for farming? (Except, obviously, for the actual base.) I see farms under power lines, except for the actual footprint of the towers, so how is this any different?
Wind would only transfer heat, not actually cool anything. But there is a point to be made. Turbines take megawatts of energy out of the atmosphere. Although I don't think we (humans) would be capable of taking enough energy out of the atmosphere to make any difference, how long until someone starts screaming that we are harming the environment by building turbines.
I thought it was funny when he announced that he was giving up on the idea.
I heard that on Limbaugh's show.
I didn't hear it anywhere else.
We have received several mailings lately, addressed to 'landowner' from companies claiming to be
interested in leasing large tracts of land for installation of windfarms. We had a neighbor who went.
He was all excited to lease his land to them, until he did the math. Probably wouldn't pay the real
estate taxes. I'm curious how long this shyster scam will continue to run, after the AGW Hoax was
revealed, one would think any company planning investments in windfarms would take a wait & see
pause. It may be that until the tax incentives & federal subsidies are stopped, this little farce will con-
tinue, full steam ahead. Guess that's one more thing we need to contact our congressman about.
Those subsidies need to be eliminated. Think of all the industries that have grown up around the
algore global warming hoax. Windfarms receiving billions in subsidies/ tax breaks, ethanol plants
ditto, probably solar, geothermal, battery research for autos, my head hurts, you think of some more.
How many folks will be out of work if these subsidies/ tax breaks stop abruptly? Sorry we can't afford
this stuff any longer, it was born of a hoax anyway. Pretty damn big hoax. I vote for a perp walk for algore.
Enviros already do that – saying they harm wildlife, especially birds.
“The CREBS bonds made it reasonable. It is subsidized, it is available, and we took that opportunity.”
Let me translate; Subsidize from the liberal prospective equals FREE MONEY. Subsidize from the conservative prospective equals more taxes because conservatives know there is no such thing as free money and know that the money government spends was first stolen from a productive tax payer (conservative). This is why liberals love boondoggles like wind energy and vote in favor of higher taxes……because they don't pay for it.
Grew up back east but I went to college in Kansas. Sebelius country. I know just what she means. The limousine libs on either coast have nothing on these people.
It is noteworthy that Hamas; color of choice is greeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeen.
If these people wanted something that was "symbolic" of wind energy why didn't they buy some of those little hand held pin-wheel toys that kids love and which probably cost a couple bucks apiece compared to these $417K unsightly useless symbols of progressivism? Our tax dollars at work.
NEWAR
Transmission lines would probably be buried. Should be simple enough to do so deep enough to not impact farming. Also, with reasonable planning, the road footprint could be minimized – and with the transmission lines buried along the road, that decreases footprint even more. A single road could service a whole line of turbines, all laid out in a straight line.
I looked into an alternate energy source for my very, very small woodworking shop. The common factor was the storage batteries. The cost is very high, then add on the additional expense of maintenance and replacement. Then the inverter to convert the energy back to a usable, clean, sine wave, AC signal, which goes up with the amount of watts needed. Now add on the energy collector, Wind turbine or solar panels and the maintenance needed to keep everything working in top form. With all that said, if you believe this crap is ready for prime time you must be a salesman for GE. It may work for my small shop and I'm still shopping, but I am an electronic nut and like to play. Until someone solves the low output, poor storage, and high conversion cost it ain't ready.
The same GE that delivers millions in campaign donations to Obamao. But I'm sure that Obie's cancelling the missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic and a market suddenly opening for GE in Russia was pure coincidence. No?
Why don't we see if we can capture some of the hot air coming out of Washington DC. Should power the US long enough for Bozo to run the country into the ground.
straight line, well no………..that would be several straight lines, covering about 650 acres of
land, at a minimum. For efficiency of maintenance personnel the turbines need to be concen-
trated, less driving time, equal more working time, equal less personnel, equal less net loss.
Buried trans lines lose certain % power/ foot. Not recommended for long runs. Farming under
turbines would be OK until a breakdown caused the crop to be destroyed by the big cranes &
machinery required for repair. A minimum of 5 acres of crop would be destroyed with any major
repair.
What about wind turbines in tornado country? Those blades are lethal weapons.
Just another in a long list of bad ideas the goverment shouldn't be involed in.
If you want wind and solar power then let the land owners do want they want with their land.
Enough with the goverment telling us what we can and can not do on our own land.
Hamas,….member of the Green Cartel…???????…. don't think so,….
just another one of the hooos….there Ashrak.
thx Lew01,…………I've been curious about the small turbines,…………sounds like another job to me,
think I'll pass at this time. Guess one would need to be a tinkerer with time & know-how to keep
it going.
A fool and his money are soon separated……….
'….where appropriate'…..and just where is that??????
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