Jump to content

Shetland windfarm - Viking Energy


trout
 Share

Recommended Posts

^^ Blimey Shetlandpeat - where have you been? London hasn't had smog for yonks! Granted, there may be air pollution but no way is it "smog" (as was the case in many an industrial city decades ago).

 

One could also argue that it is selfish for those residents of large, power-hungry cities to inflict wind turbines on non-townies!

 

Personally, I reckon there is an argument that the actions of the SIC/Trust/Viking Energy have put years on the lives of Shetlanders through the sheer stress of it all. :wink:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is smog in London but not they type that hung around in the 50s.

 

Anyone who has ever landed at Heathrow would have noticed it if it was a hot fine day.

 

 

The City of London has been found to be one of the most polluted places in Europe after monitoring equipment recorded dangerous levels of minute particles for the 36th time this year. Under EU rules, Britain is allowed no more than 35 "bad air" days in the whole year, and now faces court cases and unlimited fines by Europe.

 

The breaching of the EU levels after just six months will embarrass the government, which was sent a final warning only three weeks ago from the European commission to improve air quality. Many other places in central London are close to the limit and can be expected to break the law within weeks.

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jun/25/london-air-pollution-europe

 

Fifty-thousand people a year may be dying prematurely because of air pollution, a influential committee of MPs has reported after a six-month investigation.

 

According to the environment audit committee, minute sooty particles, emitted largely from the burning of diesel and other fuels and inhaled deeply into the lungs, shortens lives by seven to eight months. In pollution hotspots like areas of central London and other cities, the particles could be cutting vulnerable people's lives short by as much as nine years.

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/22/air-pollution-deaths

 

 

I guess we don't want to be in the EU, should then at least we stick together as a nation.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What Are the allternatives to this windfarm? Where ser the Jobs it will creat come from, where are the money it will bring in to the economy come from?

 

Last winter Langeled pipeline who delivers a big% of the uk gas supply did have some failings and the pipeline was closes down for about 2 weeks time, luckely the pipeline have a one month capasity of gas in it so the uk was not effected. But if the pipeline was closed down for a longer period of time durring the winters, prices would skyrock and pepole would freeze. And gues what group of of pepole who will suffer the moste. Yes the weak, the poor, and the elderley.

 

So we need windfarms to becoume more energy indipendent, can we afford the risk of a terrorist atack on a pipeline at sea thath we can't propurly defend, or sky high prices from abroad.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

^^ Just how many jobs is Viking proposing to create, not many last I heard.

 

And sorry to be selfish, but gas usage in Shetland is very low, and for most a secondary or auxiliary energy source, so unless you're suggesting that the Sullom power station would not have adequate supplies to run, and Gremista couldn't cope with the load, Shetland is not likely to be affected much by a gas shortage.

 

A gas shortage on the UK mainland is far more of an argument for alternative energy sources near to the consumers most liked to be affected, than for a windfarm in Shetland IMHO.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thath is correct thath shetland is blessed with all of this natural resources, but shouldent Shetland take atvantadge of it? And building windfarms just where the need are, is a good idea but not practical. Would we for exampel have a water resovour in the town center or oilfilds in the town park? No we wouldent we would build it where the national resources are avaibel or where the land/sea alowes you to build it.

And there will be jobs created from this, it might not be many jobs but it will be high skilled jobs and jobs thath will last.

I am not saying windfarms are the solution to the chalanges we are having in front of us, but it a vital part of it. And with all the wind there is in the uk and around the uk coast we can creat a new future for Britain, we can be energy exporters to France, holand etc. Insted of a hostadge to Norway and other countrys who know provide us whith energy.

 

Sorry for beeing of topic when it comes to Shetland and the windfarm but we need to see the big picture.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The thought is on a nation working together to solve a nations problem. Don't matter who is to blame who does what who uses what.

As mentioned, we are talking about an area high in a natural energy source wanting to keep it for themselves yet has been over reliant on cash from the oil industry. It is about the short sightedness of it all.

You guys charge enough to visit the islands, there are the odd couple who do a good deal with that. Shetland attracts enough from the nation and the EU.

My tweets say Viking has some news to be released. Now you say you cannot build because of land slippage! Desperately pushing the boat out. But yup, Sullom Oil terminal does produce a romantic glow with its flares and the fish cages attract other wildlife.

Off shore or on, windfarms are the future.

I am amazed at your comment that no jobs will be created for local folk. Any argument to keep the argument going. As well as local jobs there will be national employment opportunities.

Renewable power technologies will alway come on leaps and bounds, but as with past history, we log and let other nations become the experts and let them train others. The success of the Marine College shows that if you have a natural resource you cam become world leaders. Seems your denying future folk cos you think your yard is better than theirs.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Quote :- problem. I can only remember one significant landslide before 2000, and that was man-made.

 

Depends how old you are, I can remember a fairly significant landslide at Maywick, Bigton back in the sixties, am sure some of the readers on this forum would be able to give more details.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The jobs created directly by the windfarm will be operations staff, maintenance staff and management, probably around 50 staff working in shifts. VE have stated that they will pay for peat conservation measures around the windfarm and possibly across wider areas of Shetland, so I guess that will employ a few people too.

 

Indirectly, the windfarm has the potential to create many more jobs via the interconnector which will allow the development of other wind and more importantly, marine sources of power, principally tidal which will be much more labour intensive. To do minor maintenance on an onshore wind turbine, you just need a couple of technicians and a van. To do the same work on a tidal turbine would require a couple of divers and support crew plus a couple of boats with crews, probably 8-10 people minimum. I imagine wave and offshore wind would be just as labour intensive.

 

Quote :- problem. I can only remember one significant landslide before 2000, and that was man-made.

 

Depends how old you are, I can remember a fairly significant landslide at Maywick, Bigton back in the sixties, am sure some of the readers on this forum would be able to give more details.

I was born in '69, so I don't remember that one. But that's one in the 50's (thanks, GR), one in the 60's, I don't remember anything significant in the 70's, 80's or 90's and now we've had two major slips and a number of minor ones in the last 10 years and there has definitely been an increase in the number and ferocity of cloudbursts in recent years. This is in line with the predictions of climate scientists, and it's only going to get worse as the world warms and the atmosphere picks up more moisture so I think we should resign ourselves to these landslides becoming increasingly common.

 

Whether or not we build the windfarm.

 

Climate change doesn't happen instantly. Scientists believe there is a lag of around 30 years between the CO2 level reaching a certain number and the full effects of that rise being felt. This means that what we are seeing now is the effects of a CO2 level of around 330 ppm, which was reached at the end of the seventies. The current level is around 390 ppm.

 

Things are going to get a lot worse before they get better. The one thing we do still have control over is what the final peak level of CO2 will be. To keep this as low as possible, we have to get off fossil fuels as quickly as possible, but even if we went to zero emissions worldwide tomorrow, the climate wouldn't stabilise for another 30 years or so. (And that's assuming we don't trip any of the natural CO2 sinks into a catastrophic release.)

 

The seabirds are disappearing, the phytoplankton have dropped 40% since 1950 and continue to drop at 1% a year, the oceans are becoming increasingly acidic and we simply can't afford to produce all the oil that has already been discovered, let alone develop more and the peat is sliding off the hills. That means the tourism, the fishing and fish farming and the oil industry all have very uncertain futures. For Shetland, what else is left? We need this windfarm and the other renewable developments that it will bring. That's the bottom line.

 

And now, some bad news.... (only kidding) :wink:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

probably .... possibly .... I guess that

 

.... has the potential....

 

AT, is this compilation of speculation and conjecture not exactly the type of thing you lambast when it comes from other posters. No references for any of this?

 

To do the same work on a tidal turbine would require a couple of divers and support crew plus a couple of boats with crews,

And then followed by this^? Many of the offshore installations being experimented with deliberately don't require divers, they are accessible from topside to reduce maintenance costs.

 

probably ... I imagine wave and offshore wind would be just as labour intensive.

And then more speculation!

 

 

:wink:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't remember anything significant in the 70's, 80's or 90's and now we've had two major slips and a number of minor ones in the last 10 years and there has definitely been an increase in the number and ferocity of cloudbursts in recent years.

 

Just because you do not remember any does not mean that there were none. When was that slip above the road to the ferry at toft for example? Late 80's or early 90's maybe?

 

Is there any evidence for more ferocious rain, or does it just seem that way because we have forgotten past flood events. eg Noah.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just because you do not remember any does not mean that there were none. When was that slip above the road to the ferry at toft for example? Late 80's or early 90's maybe?

 

Is there any evidence for more ferocious rain, or does it just seem that way because we have forgotten past flood events. eg Noah.

At Toft? I assume you mean the one on the left hand side as you head towards the ferry, not the collapse I referred to earlier from above the Firth camp.

 

I thought this one was from the early 2000's but I could be wrong.

 

Njugle, I'm only aware of one tidal prototype currently operating which can raise itself out of the water. This is the one they are testing in Strandford Lough (spelling?) in Northern Ireland and this unit is only designed for relatively shallow water. The 1MW unit that's being deployed in the Pentland Firth has no such mechanism or topside access and so will require divers or a crane barge to do any maintenance work on it.

 

I've seen conceptual drawings of tidal turbines for deeper water which can be retracted from the water for maintenance, but these exist as nothing more than drawings at present.

 

probably ... I imagine wave and offshore wind would be just as labour intensive.

And then more speculation!

Can you think of any way that offshore wind and wave power maintenance could be less labour intensive than two guys in a van? At the very least you will need a boat and crew to get your two men to the machine to work on it.

 

As for the rest, you want references:

 

Heavier rain

 

Phytoplankton

 

Ocean Acidification

 

Climate time lag

 

The reason the planet takes several decades to respond to increased CO2 is the thermal inertia of the oceans. Consider a saucepan of water placed on a gas stove. Although the flame has a temperature measured in hundreds of degrees C, the water takes a few minutes to reach boiling point. This simple analogy explains climate lag. The mass of the oceans is around 500 times that of the atmosphere. The time that it takes to warm up is measured in decades. Because of the difficulty in quantifying the rate at which the warm upper layers of the ocean mix with the cooler deeper waters, there is significant variation in estimates of climate lag. A paper by James Hansen and others [iii] estimates the time required for 60% of global warming to take place in response to increased emissions to be in the range of 25 to 50 years. The mid-point of this is 37.5 which I have rounded to 40 years.

 

Edit: I forgot this one:

 

Sea bird decline

 

Edit 2: Got the right link for the sea bird report

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I never found time to get back to this yesterday, but, a few more to be going on with.

 

A bit further up than the previous pic, as Frakkafield July 1915.

 

http://photos.shetland-museum.org.uk/image.php?i=52203&r=2&t=4&x=1

 

http://photos.shetland-museum.org.uk/image.php?i=52204&r=2&t=4&x=1

 

I think I mentioned on a thread on here before, but in the 1920's there was significant a slippage somewhere in the same area as the 2003 ones, the herring boats at sea met the moory coloured water and floating faels from it off Sumburgh Head circa 10 miles away.

 

I think I'd be right in saying the same cloudburst washed away several sections of a gravel peat road on the west side of the Ward of Scousburgh, which had been there since well in to the previous century without notable damage, and continued to be there without further notable damage right up until it was upgraded and tarred around 1962. It was such a notable event, with channels cut feet deep in to where the road had been, that "da dae da hill rod ran" remained a topic that was recounted often by those who were alive and old enough to witness it, until their dying day.

 

Date unknown, but it had to be between the late 30's to 50's, there was a slippage at the north end of Levenwick, some of it came down at the back of a house that's still there, and came in the window. The adults who were living there then are long gone, but all their children are still alive and would be able to verify date and details.

 

Autumn '79, several metres, from memory at least 2-3 bus lengths, of road vanished up to about 3/4 of its width, down the slope at the Red Burn in the Bigton Hill, where the road goes through a dip at an old disused quarry.

 

These just cover a very small area, ie. from Channerwick and south, and Dale, and even then its only what I have personal knowledge of/heard about from reliable sources. I'm sure local knowledge would pull up similar for other areas.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1st impressions:

 

23 turbines have been removed including all the turbines in the NE sector of the farm along with 9 in the NW sector near Scatsta, one in the SW sector and 6 in the SE sector.

 

The roads associated with the removed turbines are gone, and the number of quarries has been reduced from 23 possible to 12.

 

The number of stream crossings has been reduced from 97 to 79 (including 2 existing crossings).

 

The number of turbines is down by 15% while the total area affected during the construction phase is down by 26%.

 

Disturbance Footprint

 

All the changes described above lead to a greatly reduced footprint for the proposed wind farm. Compared with the 2009 proposals, the area which may be disturbed during construction activities is reduced from about 314 hectares to about 232 hectares (1.24 percent of the planning application area). This is the worst case, including the whole of the possible borrow pit “areas of searchâ€, and the actual final disturbance figure would be less.

 

This figure includes an allowance for construction activities to over-run the actual working area, when for example lorries turn outside the construction zone.

 

After construction is complete, the area which would be permanently affected amounts to about 104 hectares (0.56 per cent of the planning application area).

 

The wind farm has therefore reduced in size by about 15% in terms of the number of turbines, but by about 26% in terms of the area of land affected during the construction process.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • admin changed the title to Shetland windfarm - Viking Energy

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...