One "problem" (really just something one should keep in mind) with wind turbines is that we can't properly control their energy output. Of course we can limit their output by shutting some down (and from what I've heard, they actually need to do that because they would simply produce too much at times and could fry the the grid), but we can't just increase their output whenever we want, like with traditional fossil fuels (Oh, it's a a really cold day in winter? Just burn some more gas/oil/wood). The way we solve that is by building storage energy plants, where we literally pump water up a hill just to let it flow down (and power more turbines) a few hours later. You just have to keep those inefficiencies and additional costs in mind when talking about wind energy being the future. That said, I'm a huge supporter of wind energy, and I'm glad for every new one I see being built.
It's funny that you should say that because that is exactly what Denmark is doing(When they said they went to the country of wind energy I expected them to be in Denmark ;)) . In Denmark we have a lot of wind turbines but very irregular winds so when we have a lot of wind we sell the power produced to Norway who has a lot of reservoirs, they use it to store the power in potential energy in their reservoirs(like you said) and then they sell it back to us later when we need it at a higher price. It's basically a win-win situation because we get to store the energy and Norway get's to use some of all the reservoirs they had built for hydroelectricity.
Jasper Dar The problem is a bit more complicated than that. Building more infrastructure is always very expensive, and doing so makes the price per watt-hour go up (assuming the people/companies that pay the building costs are they same that run the facilities afterwards), and unforunately, many customers love to say that they care about the environment, but would flinch at the prospect of having to pay few percent more on their energy bill
That or build battery buildings to store energy from the turbines. Build the buildings underground in the city's and under neath the farms so they can store energy in city's and build up energy at the farms.
Offstar1029 You aren't aware of how incredibly dangerous that would be, are you? Also, recycling and building actual batteries that large would negate any positive effect the wind energy might have on the environment...
you should do an episode on water turbines. essentially a wind turbine but underwater. i heard these are more efficient because water currents are more or less in the same spot at all times and only go in a single direction.
And the big plus is the fact that you can modify the amount of energy produced dynamically by letting the water run through the turbines when needed (dams are damn awesome!)
Andy Flow > _big plus is the fact that you can modify the amount of energy produced dynamically_ Not in an tidal plant which might have been what OP was thinking about.
Diana Peña Not really since nuclear materials are radioactive they can go nuclear and explode or go into a meltdown putting tons of radiation into the atmosphere. Not only that nuclear plants create tons of radioactive waste that can't be disposed of it has to be sealed up in massive metal containers filled with water then buried in massive underground cement storage's. And that is bad for the environment because eventually the storage will crack and break and the containers will rust and then that waste will leak out into the ground. Nuclear energy is good because it can produce a ton of clean energy but it's bad because it takes a lot of resources to build a plant and the fact that it creates dangerous waste that we can't get rid of yet.
Offstar1029 No, they can't go nuclear, ever. Nuclear reactor-grade uranium has only 5% U-235, making a nuclear explosion impossible. Weapons-grade uranium has to have at least 90% U-235. Also, the US has been using nuclear power for over 50 years, and we get 20% of our energy from it, and we're still fine.
I live in Wisconsin and wind farms aren't practical because when wind does reach the speed needed to get a lot of power it's for a short amount of time. I prefer Solar because there are plenty of areas with lots of sun and it's more cost effective.
One way to store wind energy is to use water, There are places where this is done. Excess wind energy during the day is used to pump water up a hill to a reservoir. At night, when the wind dies down, the water flows back down and spins a turbine.
Try to remember any pictures you have ever seen of an old clipper sailing ship. Did they have small sails, or "blades"? NO, they had a large number of HUGE sails. You cannot produce the torque necessary to generate electricity with three small blades, or sails. No matter how fast the thing turns, it will never be a realistic generator of electricity. Speed does NOT equal torque. You must have maximum square footage of windmill sails in order to generate electricity effectively. Modern three blade windmills are a con-job.
In the US market, it's very difficult to build a profitable wind farm and nearly impossible without subsidies. Wind farms generate lots of power, but the initial setup cost are tremendous as well. It's easy to forget about maintenance costs as well, there are fairly extreme forces torqueing on them whenever they're generating power. People need to go through an entire wind turbine and every single bolt and weld to make sure there's no cracking or elastication, that's not even the moving parts. The whole turbine is checked at fairly regular intervals (weeks or months) and is an all day procedure. And turbines break or need maintenance replacements fairly often as well. Extensive pre-planning, calculations and measurements are done to ensure that a wind farm will be profitable, time lines to break even are usually around 20 years. Of course many energy sources are subsidized so it's difficult to compare the actual market viability, it's apparent wind farms are usually not viable unless wind conditions are optimal (the wind blows) consistently all the time, and it's near the customers (great for data farms since most people don't want to live where the wind blows ALL the time. While solar is currently much less viable, it has significantly more potential, and even in overcast areas there are benefits to having personal arrays (power outages). At the current rate of progress we'll have viable solar technology in a few decades at the most.
Both are shit. They produce less than 2% of the energy. Wait until we have water power stations, liquid salt reactors and fusion energy, then we'll be able to move full away from fossil fuels. Or will have to when they run out :)
IizUname I would strongly disagree with you. Solar panels are synthesised using chemicals with toxic waste products and solar power's far more polluting than coal or gas power. Wind turbines cause visual and auditory pollution and the light flickering causes suicidal depression and bipolar disorder. So only LFTRs should ever be used, ever.
Thomas Pemberton Optimal wind farm sites are generally not near the source that will use them, a significant amount of the power is lost due to resistance in the power lines, further away the higher the loss. Solar panels can go on anyones roof. The argument about overcast skies is somewhat uninformed as its not so simple. Most of the light filters through the clouds, its just diffuse. Solar panel operate better when cooler, depending on the climates being compared the power loss from cloud cover is compensated for by being in a cooler climate. You can get tables/maps on line that give you a correction factor for the estimated power loss from optimum for your area. Solar panels are not yet efficient enough to operate unsubsidized on the market. They are made in China with extremely low environmental standards. However solar panels exist, we have enough data to project when solar panels WILL be viable in the market and as truly green energy sources. There isn't really a realistic alternative to generating power at home. Most homeowners have an option to put panels with a good enough angle to the sun and area to put enough panels on their home to cover their average power usage. Most states offer tax incentives that make it cost effective. (I'm not in favor of tax incentives, but there are worse things our government spends tax dollars on.) Increased demand for solar panels will increase research will eventually fix the problems with solar panels. If your pessimistic about that, study some of the innovation in history. The fact that environmental activists depopularized nuclear to the point that its almost non-existent in the US, and are NOW trying to shut down carbon usage causes me the utmost frustration at our society. Had we quality modern nuclear reactors (which were almost ready in the 60s) we wouldn't have such a problem with CO2. These so called "environmentalists" are nothing more than fear mongerers that need something to make themselves feel important. If they ACTUALLY wanted to help the environment they would start with themselves, and spread functional environmentalism through their friends and family like sane people instead of clowning around with signs then climbing in their SUV and texting and driving on their China made cellphone. Yes I'm stereotyping a bunch of that, but Al Gore flying around in a private jet, charging a hundred thousand dollars to give his "presentation", doesn't CARE about the environment. I can't setup a nuclear reactor. I CAN put solar panels on my house, turn unused lights off, turn off my heater when I'll be out of my house for a while etc. Everybody adding a couple percent effort to reduce their own energy usage is selfish and will significantly reduce usage. Judging everybody else and screaming for technologies that don't exist in production yet is not environmental. (Sorry, I addressed a lot of the other comments in this reply, most of them weren't directed at you.) Those be my thoughts. :-D
The problem with 'killing' hurricanes is that they have a purpose to balance other parts of the earth cooling system. All too often humans look at small/tiny parts of the overall Earth equation and try to fix that without understanding how it fits into the big picture. The same with huge dams, removing mountains to make concrete or mine other materials, etc. All of the 'little' things we do affect the BIG picture and are cumulative with each other.
Hmm! XxKNightROxX Makes sense! Many things are misunderstood by us humans and we freak out and think it's dangerous... When in reality it can be natural and normal! Kinda silly to think humans should know a little better with all the studies done with closely analyzing storms, quakes, ocean floors, rocks and so forth that temperature changes happen.
XxKNightROxX Nature is not one sentient being, it is an accumulation of effects caused by various things. Climate change is an effect caused by green house gases, mostly co2 and mostly from humans. If the green house gases were not being produced and never had been by humans, earth would be cooling, not warming.
On top of providing energy I think wind farms are incredibly beautiful. Driving through places like Palm Springs, or visiting Copenhagen, where you see lots of wind farms, I can't help but be inspired by their sleek, minimalistic beauty.
I admire your willingness to do actual research on the subject, rather than jumping on a bandwagon of opinion. I learned something too. I've never heard of feathering out a turbine up stream to allow the one downstream to have less turbulent air. It's nice to know, that there is real thought in the layout of turbine farms, based on getting the most out of the wind no matter which direction or how hard it blows.
2:20 The coil of wire spinning does NOT induce a magnetic field. It rotates WITHIN a magnetic field causing current to pass through the coil. The coil is then connected to a slip ring to ensure the correct polarity of voltage for each period.
James Oldfield I'd be interested to see your interpretation of a generator. Could you link me a picture of a generator where the magnet spins and not the wire?
You two are such goobers! I love seeing the passion you guys have for science and how your eyes light up in each video. Thanks for educating while also entertaining me
Ugh I just love German people and Germany, they are so forward thinking and want to help the environment (of course this is a stereotype and can not be said for everyone), there is also the plus that their accents are so adorable!
Unfortunately the conclusion is missing :( Is wind energy now worth it, when taking production of those wind turbines into consideration ? How about the life span, water used to produce and many other factors that have an impact on the question if they are efficient or not.
Initial construction, conventional wins. Life cycle, renewable wins. That's because, once commissioned, conventional requires continuous mining, fracking, and extraction of mineral resources throughout it's service life. Wind and solar don't require much,( other than a little maintenance). Once commissioned, a well sited turbine pays back it's environmental costs in less than a year. They don't require any fuel. A coal or gas fired plant continues to cost, multiplying its initial cost many times over, because of the fuel it needs to run.
As an engineer who has worked on many types of energy harnessing I must say that you are being biased. You do not represent the great negatives that come with them such as the deforestation and road building required to build those parks, destruction of the location's aesthetics, potential damage to the ground which leads to ground water diversion, noise pollution, the CO2 released to making them and the required infrastructure to set them up as well as the high maintenance costs that (in poorer countries such as mine) usually either leads to malfunctions which cause forest fires or they are just abandoned after a few years (at least you talked about the birds even though it is the leased of the issues). I am not saying that there are no good applications but large scale industrial parks should be banned and nobody seems to care because everyone sees the green side but are blind to the negatives. Please try and be objective and research a little, there is no such thing as "only good" so don't show that, you must present the negatives as well even if they ruin the "green perfection" you want to show. Why don't you make an episode on one of the better clean energies available that people actually haven't heard about. These are usually the most environment-friendly and resource efficient but most expensive to build or little researched which is why few pay attention, like the liquid salt solar collector parks, low depth geothermal heat exchangers for homes, large scale plankton cultivation and fuel conversion, direct waste to electricity bio reactor or even better my personal favourite, the thorium fission reactor, all methods of producing energy few people know or care about because they only know the standard clean energy production they are told is "perfect" because a lot of important people have already invested in them and don't want to loose money and look stupid. Or at least talk about the new European fusion reactor currently to be constructed. I am not saying that they don't have any negatives, you should talk about them, but under NO CIRCUMSTANCES are you allowed to NOT BE OBJECTIVE, this is a science show, not an advertisement you should inform and educate people not just saying good stuff, no matter what the subject is, otherwise you loose credibility like you lost with me. This was a subject I have studied for years so I knew what is going on but now I am wondering about other episodes about stuff I did not know as well and whether those weren't objective as well. I am just saying, it is not only rainbows, puppies and unicorns out there, check your data and do some real research, obviously private researchers of companies will be biased, the fact you went to Germany and interviewed them doesn't mean you did a good research, it means you did a good ONE SIDED research, where is the other side..?
You missed one important point. Once these machines be it wind, solar, or concentrated solar are commissioned, there is no further mining, fracking, or continuous extraction of resources for them to produce useful power. I will grant you, that per megawatt hour of capacity, initially, conventional requires far less to build. But it doesn't stop there. It's just the beginning as far as fueling. I won't even mention the water, because this video did that for me.There is one caveat. Renewable energy is intermittent, requiring electrical energy storage, in order to become any more than about 20% of total generating capacity. You can't put up a turbine, or a solar array, and expect 24/7 power, without energy storage. Energy storage is what we need to be investing in right now.
@@aaron___6014 That's the whole beauty of them. They don't affect the ability of the land to support wild flora or fauna, and farmers will often have them on their lands, because they offer a reliable source of income, in case of drought, or a failed crop. They can farm right up to them, so they don't get in the way of agriculture. The cables that carry the power from them do have to be buried deep enough that they don't get plowed up. If I had a farm, I would definitely allocate land for turbines.
@@RichRich1955 I confess: I am a big fan of the big fans. The only thing better is grid scale electrical energy storage to pair them with, so they can contribute their power, without the stability problems due to their intermittency.
Wow, great to hear that 1/3 of our energy could CEOs from wind by 2050. I did a project on renewable energy last year, and it saddened me how little it dents into our energy use. Good to hear that is changing.
rachelle2227 okay thanks, i was wondering which field is involved in wind energy, most say mechanical but i read an article about a civil engineer designed a wind turbine
+Smart Fuq I would guess civil deals with the overall structure while mechanical optimizes the fluid flow and such like the program in the video and by altering the shape of the arms of the turbine.
Fission? No. Fusion? No. In the future? Maybe. Liquid salt reactors look promising. So far breaking even with fusion's not looking too good so that might be a way off if it is even possible :/
Fission is producing a lot of waste that cant be disposed of well so it isnt as great as things like wind energy in that sense. When fusion becomes available then the two will go hand in hand and it will be nearly limitless energy for the globe. Every ounce of science supports our ability to complete fusion, it is just the creation of technology that can withstand these pressures well enough to be cost effective. Once the world's engineers work it out things will get a lot better.
We are still not sure if we are going to be able to make the nuclear fusion produce more than it costs, a lot of money has been invested on it and its future is still very uncertain. So no, it is not cheaper or more effective by far, not even 3 years after your comment. Besides, we still don't know what to do with nuclear waste. Renewable energies are the future, there is a lot of energy in the environment, far more than we need.
Even though nuclear power produces little waste, the waste is dangerous for some time. The more dangerous it is, the less time it lasts. Wind, hydroelectric, and solar theoretically produce less waste that is less dangerous or can be stored easily.
The amount of power from a wind turbine is related directly to three things: 1) the velocity of the wind, 2) the radial area of the blades and 3) the "tip velocity" of the blades, that is, how fast the tip of each blade is going. Based on the above, three major recommendations about wind turbine construction can be made: First, build them were there is a lot of wind (duh!). Second, make sure that the flow of wind is not deflected by structures or by topographical features. Third, make the radial area of the blades as large as possible.
I have a question that you might want to explore. Which is more energy efficient: a physical paper book or an eBook? How much energy does it take to make (grow/cut down tree to make the paper versus writing the program)? How much energy does it take to use? How long does it last? Etc. Essentially, is it better to use old-fashioned books or take to the future of eBooks?
Oh my goodness! Thank you so much for this video! It is amazing the work that goes into new technologies and it is refreshing to see that not all humans want to kill each other off.
You guy's never answered the question. You said to be open minded and that in the future we will have a sustaining source of wind energy. I am sorry but that is a cop-out answer. What about right now? What I got from this video is that wind power is still in development and still needs 25 years or so. What about wind vs other sources of energy? You said that wind energy can compete in today's market. What does that mean? How many turbines do you need to equal one coal nuclear or hydroelectric plant? PLEASE do a follow up video. this is a very interesting topic but I don't think you guys went into much detail.
You're right, but wind and solar are largely perfected now. What we need to be working on is efficient, cost effective grid scale electrical energy storage, to solve the problem of intermittent output.
The real production of energy might not use Water or create CO2, but you need a lot of wind-turbines to get as much energy as a power plant would produce. That means more building of the turbines, more logistics and so on. So in the end they might break even on a short term study. In the long term they will sell at some point, though they will need constant maintenance. Mainetance again means CO2 (cars etc) and water ( making of spare parts etc.)
The problem is, that when a storm apear they have to shut down the wind mills, so that they not become damaged, which means importing some non energy power is necessary to avoid blackout
wind turbines generate low frequency sounds while spinning. this low frequency sounds can affect your health. Heart problems, balance issues, insomnia, etc. This side effect is not known by many and should also be taken into account while installing wind farms. Cool video :) . would like to hear more about this topics.
In their last video they said that wind turbines can help reduce hurricanes by weakening them, but if we were to switch to having a very large percentage of our power needs made from wind turbines, this would mean a LOT of turbines. I am wondering if having THIS many turbines would affect wind patters around the United states in a detrimental way, and I am curious to see if anyone has any input on this thought.
The first thing that popped into my head when y'all said you were going to Germany was that most of Germany's energy needs are bought from outsourced producers. This predominantly happens from countries that utilize nuclear energy, which Germany recently took measures to stop domestically. That's more politics than it is anything else, but I still have to question whether nuclear energy is actually a green solution here. This energy source is potentially less hazardous than fossil fuel sources and meets large-scale energy needs since the economy doesn't seem to accept the nickel and dime approach of wind turbines or solar panels. I'm seriously asking, not trolling.
I'm seeing a lot of comments on it already, but I'd like to see a video on water energy. Not just from dams and such, but maybe the possibility of a tidal turbine? I've heard talk of trying to build one in the Bay of Fundy, with the highest tides in the world it seems like a reasonable option to me...
What about environmental impact? There's no such thing as "Green" energy. Everything impacts the environment, just some less than others. What does interrupting the flow of air around the globe do to the world's weather patterns? Wind turbines essentially slow down wind. This most certainly will impact the movement of air (and the pollution in it), clouds (water), and heat.
Hi, i'm sorry to put you down like this. But you are not asking smart questions, here is another person that the internet made fun of because of this statement "In June 2010, Barton has questioned the wisdom of deficit spending to fund an extensive national wind turbine energy generation grid. He said, "Wind is God’s way of balancing heat. Wind is the way you shift heat from areas where it’s hotter to areas where it’s cooler. That’s what wind is. Wouldn’t it be ironic if in the interest of global warming we mandated massive switches to wind energy, which is a finite resource, which slows the winds down, which causes the temperature to go up? Now, I’m not saying that’s going to happen, Mr. Chairman, but that is definitely something on the massive scale. I mean, it does make some sense. You stop something, you can’t transfer that heat, and the heat goes up. It’s just something to think about."" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Barton Wind is a perfectly infinite renewable resource, the thing that could really f*** up the winds are climate change and global warming caused by Oil, Coal and Gas industry. If we build more green energy and there is a thing called green energy. Then the carbon footprint will become smaller and smaller, green renewable wind turbines produced by other green renewable wind turbines and so on and so forth.
I was wondering that too but as soon as they mentioned buildings I realized that it's likely that whatever effect wind turbines have on global wind speeds and paths, buildings would already be doing that several times over. So all in all, it doesn't look like the effect would be significant.
eldiablooooo Where exactly is the put down? I don't think you even realize what you're typing. Do you have a point because it's not clear? What I said has nothing to do with Joe Barton. What you said has nothing to do with what I said. Rethink what you're trying to say and try again.
JaySee5 Your claim about messing up global wind currents is total bull shit. But if you're right then you should be against planting trees. As they affect wind currents also.
freakman420 You're a moron with no English comprehension ability. I made no claim about messing up global wind currents. Trees grow gradually over many years. They also don't suddenly proliferate in a concentrated area. Nobody plants 100 giant trees in a concentrated area.
Not sure if this is correct in this particular context, but generally when someone´s talking about how where "running out of water", often they really mean "running out of clean, drinkable that water".
1337w0n True, but these techniques require energy. I don't know exactly how much, but it could be more energy than the power plants would produce using said water.
So we are not wasting water so much as we are doing things less efficiently than we could be, in a specific way that requires us to put water through an expensive filtration possess, but the phrase "We're wasting water." rolls off the tongue more easily. Thanks for clearing that up for me.
We have a massive amount of windmills in Iowa. I drive past them every day on my way to work. They always seem to have a crane out working on them. Massive maintenance costs. In the end they are also not actually clean in the end if you are driving around for the sake of doing this maintenance on them. Also what happens when they get old and REALLY start to break down? On top of that the wind does not always blow. All for the sake of having clean energy. When will we think about practical energy sources? Because they really don't seem to be.
Wow, I wished I knew earlier that you guys come to Germany, there might be some viewers who would love to meet you :) And thanks for all the nice words, I wished we all would be so smart here as you said :D I study electrical engineering here in Germany, and I can say, that it is really exciting, but also quite hard :)
Very interesting topic, I also ask if its good to invest in wind since there are more people who oppose using wind as source of energy.... great job in explaining...
I do have to say - that the 'precious water' is not a problem - we have plenty of water, the only problem is being able to transport it over great distances. Furthermore, the water is never wasted - it often would be re-used, or contained inside the poweplant - often the water would be cooled inside of a lake (the water never has contact with the lake - but it is cooled similary to how HeatSinks work in computers).
PeZ Iv Still - not necessarily. The water still evapourates, and rains. We have now, and always had plenty of water - we also have plenty of ways of extracting things like salt from water; but those methods are not used as they use a lot of electricity and money. This is why we should invest in nuclear.
One thing they didn't mention was about how to store that energy. The energy generated on wind farms has to be used on the spot, since you can not store that in other way than in baterries... Other fuels like water, coil, nuclear material, etc can be store, unlike the wind.
I'd love to visit the GE global headquarters. I'm not a scientist by any means but everything that company creates and innovates moves the world forward. Although in our current economy driven by fuels I don't see this taking a strong foothold but the future this is one of the most effective ways I see powering our future. Thank you for the video and keep it up.
very interesting! I'm participating with a European Union project with many other people (we all teenagers) from all over Europe and we're gonna try to convince the European Union people to use wind energy to improve climate etc globally. Really cool to see this :)
You can actually use a bike dynamo to make a windturbine of your own, however it will probably be enough to power your cellphone up in 24hrs. If I'm absolutley wrong, I'm just 15.
illyounotme A guy in Africa did it and got loads of money, he didnt even adjusted it, only cutted some wires and attached it to a power socket... The fame...
You guys are so cool I can't even ^^ I need to quit my job and work in one of those cool places to work with intelligent people, for a change ! Also, the day they make wind turbines completely silent, I'll get one for myself in my yard ^^ takes less room than solar pannels for the same amount of energy.
Can you blokes come to Australia??? We have a government here that just doesn't get it. With plenty of Sun and Wind they still want to dig up more and more coal (especially that horrible brown coal).
IMO the option is to use the energy source which is the most suitable for a certain place eg. geographical location, EIA etc. Even though the latest control technology can be applied for large scale wind turbines (>500 MW), applying them for small wind turbines doesn't make any sense financially, taking into account the avg lifespan of a wind turbine to be 20 years. Thus making decentralized wind energy generation system not a 'plan B'!
Echolocation uses mechanical waves in the air. If mechanical waves are manipulated by changes on the surface of the wind turbine that will increase the drag which lowers the efficiency. Maybe a set of speakers that emit ultrasound which humans cannot hear but which scare bats away? Also ultrasound travels further so if you have a speaker on each wind turbine the collective ultrasound output from the farm will scare away the bats from the general area. On second thought speakers are unnecessary you can attach reeds like a dog whistles to the tips and shaft of the rotor that while turning create the ultrasound and act as an indicator of where the threat is i.e. The moving rotor itself.
That the numbers quoted (homes, kettles) seem to be quoting peak power output. Total energy (kWh in a year, etc not kW) is the more important number to determine the cost/value of the turbines.
Wind has to be used more and more. Everyone brings up how expensive it is but since it costs as much as conventional sources of energy these days there's really no excuse against it.
the guy who never uploads anything "Wind power provided just over 30% of electricity production in Denmark in 2012" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_Denmark razorline The biggest windfarm in Denmark called "Anholt" has 111 x "Siemens SWP 3.6-120" turbines, which produce about 400 MW (and these were built in 2013, so they are not included in the 30%). en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_offshore_wind_farms_in_Denmark The biggest wind farm in the world (as of 2013) is "Alta Wind Energy Centre" in the US. It has way more than 111 units, and creates around 1300 MW. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alta_Wind_Energy_Center So I don't think Denmark has the biggest wind farm in the world, but it's still pretty awesome! LetzPlayMoreGamez I bet (s)he could say the same thing about your danish. (Sorry for any grammatical errors)
Sorry Denmark :) Norway is already 100% Green. Each year we produce from 10.000 - 30.000 GWh more hydroelectric energy than we use our-self, and that's just hydro electric plants we also have wind and solar. But we export that over produce to you guys with your coal fired plants so that you guys can become more green :)
eldiablooooo But then in the winter, when we don't have the hydroelectrical power, we buy power from other countries, don't we? And that is often made by cola and other non-green methods? I'm not very educated on this exact subject, but I find it hard to believe that we're 100% green (would be cool if we were though). Do you have any sources for this (or do I have to go to the googles again :P )?
Um... translation: So who's making actually efficient wind turbines, why are they not being used, and why are we using the ones that suck? Speech to text was high or something.
Is wind energy worth it? The main question is can it reliably take over base load production, a question they didn't touch. The answer is no - wind is variable. It can only ever be supplimental power only!
Well they went most likely for Oktoberfest and decided to get some information for their video while they went there because Germany is the forefront for clean energy and they had the chance to talk to a professional who is working on the technology.
I've seen in some planetary videos where they talk about the extreme traits of our solar system's planets and I remember that one of the extreme traits of Earth is wind. It just lowered down because of mountains, trees, and buildings. What if they color them red, since red is usually a "danger" color for most species? (I'm just guessing here)
I build wind turbine towers for a living...I would like to know the trade off of having our material shipped from over seas on a boat to have it put on a train and eventually end up at our facility...of which we use and insane amount of power to take flat sheets of metal and grind, bend, and weld the plates to make a circle ( tube) that essentially makes up a section of a tower...not too mention the paint ( a petroleum product) that is sprayed on and then baked in large paint booths with...gas heaters....where is the energy costs to make vs produced...I know our facility has a 7 or 10 year warranty for towers we build...and its the estimated life of the tower...I don't see how beneficial it can be considering the energy it takes to build and even erect the towers..
Probably not - there are need really huge farms and we probably have chance to change climate during a manufacturing such farms itself... and hurt and scare thousands of birds, change the paths of migrations and so on.
What is the main difference between a tree in winds path and a wind turbine? If you start thinking this way, we would also need to "make sure" we dont plant trees in paths of main winds... Of course you can see that is not what we think about when deforestating earth ( what if we Open some wind corridors by that?) To my eye this wind blocking has just too little impact as winds can travel not only in atmosphere 50m ahead of earth surface but also way above that. Have you consideret that?
'Revist your assumptions' The most important thing to take away from this video about all of science! Things change quickly :)...although the quicker they change the less patient for change it seems we are.
There is always something that is never mentioned on such ocasions: why the prices for electricity never go down? I do not undermine the fact that this kind of energy source is 'green' - I absolutely support any kind of such solutions. So - could you ask GE guys about the prices? I wonder what they would say... :)
