Shetland windfarm - Viking Energy

[crofter]

[sarcasm]Yeah, just look at how often they've had to rebuild the Burradale turbines!!11![/sarcasm]

 

 

Is that 11 times? Do you know how many gearboxes they have gone through?

 

We operate in a challenging environment and there are always things that need atten­tion. It’s hard to imagine how much better these machines would do without the breakdowns but we get on pretty well anyway.

[PressedCurdsOfMilk]

^^^^ArrabiaTerra, sorry to disappoint you by not presenting a flawless argument and thank you for the sarcasm tags, they're very amusing. Speaking of a flawless argument why don't you tell us what Viking Energy say about the methods of the ST poll as relayed by their representative Allan Wishart in the BBc speakeasy debate. I heard him utterly dismiss and discredit the results of such a poll.

 

The ST poll, however, was not relevant to the point I was making, so stop implying that I am a liar. And What do you mean "there never has been" a majority against, now you seem to be lying. There are many example over the past few year, look back in this debate, I gave you examples before and a very good example above... perhaps you need to read it again.

 

I was referring to the public meeting 5 years ago attended by local open minded, interested, intelligent people who will be most affected by a giant windfarm... before the publicity machine, the lobbyists and the divided community (on this issue) was established.

 

The point I was making was that the views that really matter are the views of people who will have to live right next the windfarm. Those are the people you dismiss as NIMBY's... you know, members of the community who have every right to be concerned. I also think that expert views are important like, SNH, RSPB, Amenity Trust, John Muir Trust etc. are highly significant. Repondents of a national YouGov poll are quite a different matter.

 

As for Trump, I'm not prepared to use labels as you do, but I'm not a supporter... it seems a bit rich complaining about a windfarm spoiling the coastline when you're building a golf course on coastal sand dune (is it SSSI?)?

 

As for subsidies, I just happen to agree that they have promoted a rush of development that is inappropriate and environmentally damaging. Speed of development, drive of developers for profits, political drive and bias, cost to consumer, pressure on sensitive/ protected areas, pressure on and disregard of individuals and communities etc.

 

I'm just proportioning my belief to the evidence.

 

I think I'll quote myself now... If developers/supporters don't like the truth, they ignore it then, it seems, go to incredible lengths to get the answer they want... at considerable expense.

[PJ of Hildisvik]

@AT.........YAWN

[ArabiaTerra]

[sarcasm]Yeah, just look at how often they've had to rebuild the Burradale turbines!!11![/sarcasm]

 

 

Is that 11 times? Do you know how many gearboxes they have gone through?

 

We operate in a challenging environment and there are always things that need atten­tion. It’s hard to imagine how much better these machines would do without the breakdowns but we get on pretty well anyway.

And yet, they have still managed an overall efficiency of >50%* over the full ten years of operation, and managed to pay back their initial funding years earlier than planned.

 

Sounds like a success story to me.

 

*The most efficient windfarm in the world!

[paulb]

so there turbines were designed at least 12-15 years ago. they have improved the designs since then. but note that the blades have not fallen off or burst into flames. the gears will fail like any other machine it wears out.

[Para Handy]

those are smal domestic turbines. lots of them were not built to cope with very strong winds maily cheap ones. the ones that viking will build will be designed to cope with our wind speeds. its ike saying all houses are unsafe because a garden shed blew down in glasgow.

 

sorry but I would not trust viking to make a sand castle never mind the involment of councillors who are all in it to fill there own back accounts

[sarcasm]Yeah, just look at how often they've had to rebuild the Burradale turbines!!11![/sarcasm]

 

 

To bad ArabiaTerra

I would love to see the Burradale turbines fall down and the bits blowing up.

I have no time for windmill huggers either

I would kick them all up the backside with my carbon-footprint all the way to the moon if I could.

 

[ArabiaTerra]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-17061075

 

That takes care of storing the output from Viking.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17014808

 

And, turbine blades made of batteries?

[NewMagnie]

To bad ArabiaTerra

I would love to see the Burradale turbines fall down and the bits blowing up.

I have no time for windmill huggers either

I would kick them all up the backside with my carbon-footprint all the way to the moon if I could.

 

 

Well of course you would Para - because you can sort out the upcoming energy crisis by simply roaring at it.

 

Maybe they should chopper you out to the Brent where you can persuade the wells to produce another hundred years of oil by bellowing down the well head about how sh!te the council are.

[MuckleJoannie]

A planning determination on the Viking Energy wind farm project is still some months away.

 

http://www.shetnews.co.uk/news/3408-viking-decision-still-some-time-away.html

[Para Handy]

A breathtaking sight awaits those who travel to the southernmost tip of Hawaii’s stunningly beautiful Big Island, though it’s not in any guidebook. On a 100-acre site, where cattle wander past broken ‘Keep Out’ signs, stand the rusting skeletons of scores of wind turbines.

 

So Shetland will have someone to twin with then!

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2116877/Is-future-Britains-wind-rush.html

[ArabiaTerra]

^^^^ In the 1970's and early 80's in the US, oil prices were high and the US was actively trying to reduce it's dependence on foreign oil. The Saudi's didn't like this as they saw it as a direct threat to their biggest market. So they opened up the taps and flooded the world with cheap oil. This wiped out the wind industry in the US.

 

Today, high oil prices and the threat of climate change are driving the global shift away from fossil fuels, so why don't the Saudi's simply open the taps again and crush the embryonic renewables sector before it gets itself established?

 

Because they can't. They are already running at full capacity. And the oil price continues to climb. Despite continuing record investment in exploration, enhanced recovery methods and unconventional oil sources like the Alberta tar sands, oil companies are struggling to keep up with increasing demand.

 

This is peak oil. It is here. The 2007 oil price spike was the first manifestation of this, and we'll see another spike as soon as the world economy starts to pick up again.

 

The option for oil producers to stop the growth of renewables is gone. The global subsidies paid to fossil fuel producers are coming under increasing attack all over the world and if they are substantially removed then the price of fossil fuel derived energy will climb to a point that renewables will be cheaper. The current subsidies paid for renewable energy are simply an attempt to level the playing field against subsidised fossil fuel energy. They won't be going away anytime soon.

 

What we will see is steadily increasing energy prices until we are paying the true cost of the energy we use at the point of purchase instead of through the increased taxes which subsidise the fossil fuel producers.

 

The subsidies paid to windfarms in the US in the 70's and 80's were a tactical move by the US Gov to reduce their dependence on foreign oil. The tactic failed because there was sufficient slack in the system to allow the oil producers to flood the market, and the market won.

 

This slack no longer exists.

 

In fact the market is running the other way. Once renewables are built, then the energy they produce is free*. Fossil fuel prices, on the other hand, will continue to rise as the cheaper, easier to extract stuff, is used up.

 

What happened in Hawaii 30 years ago will not happen here. It's a different world now.

 

 

*Apart from maintenance and running costs.

[Dratsy]

you keep harping on about subsidies payed out for oil and gas but if this were the case then surely a savy politician would cut the fuel duty and the subsidy then they would be the hero and the oil companies would be the evil bogey men you seem to think, when fuel prices remained high.

[shetlandpeat]

^ as simple as that!

 

You could face the wrath of the Peoples Front of Shetland if they took away the duties. There would be no monies for Independence....stuck with the folk south for a wee while longer.

[Dratsy]

as ever pete WTF r u on about

[ArabiaTerra]

you keep harping on about subsidies payed out for oil and gas but if this were the case then surely a savy politician would cut the fuel duty and the subsidy then they would be the hero and the oil companies would be the evil bogey men you seem to think, when fuel prices remained high.

$409 billion dollars in 2010:

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/damian-carrington-blog/2011/nov/09/iea-energy-outlook-carbon-climate-change