Wind Turbines the TRUTH

[Brian Carragher]

I honestly despair of people who have the audacity to put beauty before safety.

 

Here is a simple choice a nuke station on your door step or a wind farm out at sea.

 

I would spoil a scenic view at the drop of a hat rather than bless my grand children and their children with a potential terrorist target, and a pile of nuke waste to dispose of.

 

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Well said Ken you reflect my thoughts entirely

 

 

I am far more suspicious of the anti wind farm lobby, even more so than those who have a vested interest in building them. You really do hear so much rubbish coming from the antis, such as how they won't work in a light wind. Last week, it seemed almost a still day, yet it was sufficient to keep the ones near me turning merrily. I'm also quite sure that even if the power generated cannot be stored, the technology to do it must be only just round the corner. After all, in an extremely primitive way you could do it now. Just it to power a winch to haul a bloody great big rock into the air and then generate power later on as it drops to the floor again. Probably not the most efficient way to do it, but I'm sure there must be an exceedingly clever equivalent.

As for harming birds, they would have to be spinning at the rate of an aircraft propeller to do that, by which time they would have taken off into orbit. I find it very difficult to imagine that any bird capable either of plucking its prey out of the air, or else flying in synch like a flock of starlings, can't avoid a comparitively slow moving propeller the size of several barn doors.

It has been stated that the off-shore wind farms will be located well out to sea. I can't see how they would spoil anybody's view any more than one of the many oil tankers that you see passing by.

 

 

Top marks Peter and I'm sure your thoughts are echoed by the silent majority who I'm convinced support wind power

[kleinboet]

I wonder if the government is going to be so keen when they cost it out and find that the power will be cheaper - and they can't tack on any "green" taxes!

[Ken Davison South Wales]

This business about storing electrical power is just another old red herring, once a nuke station is powered up and running you don't shut it down over night, any more than a coal fired one, power is used or lost, but as has been stated give it a few more years and we will be able to find a way around that problem, unlike tons of nuke waste which no one wants and that includes the far east.

 

We have had a bloody good go at screwing everything up over the last hundred years or so, it's about time we started trying just as hard to put things right.

 

This isn't about the likes of me, I have one boot well and truely in the grave but it is about our kids future, we may not succeed but at least let us pop our clogs knowing that we tried to pave the way.

[five bellies]

To be honist I dont find the ones Off shore at Hern Bay that offensive, And if any thing the fishing has improved in that area, Ive got to balance that against not living there though! One for the floor How about every building from this piont on being equiped with a small wind turbine where Practical and solar panals By law,

[deanbmw]

in florida their powered buy RUBBISH, if you dont put your bins out TWICE a week you get a $35 fine.....strange we havent picked up on that one as our councils want to charge us for the pleasure of collecting 5 different bins once a fortnite.

Edited December 9, 2007 by deanbmw

[five bellies]

in florida their powered buy RUBBISH, if you dont put your bins out TWICE a week you get a $35 fine.....strange we havent picked up on that one as our councils want to charge us for the pleasure of collecting 5 different bins once a fortnite.

 

 

Lewisham Council in london Rubbish incinerator fuels a power station I believe thy sell the power back to the national grid.

[Guest Brumagem Phil]

Brian........nobody here has been anti wind power.

 

What I in particular am against is the idea of all our great vistas being wrecked by these things. Wind turbines are not the only source of alternative power (although reading this thread you'd think so). Its also far from perfect as we know the wind doesn't always blow.

 

I'm sure we could make better use of the power of our rivers for example, solar has been mentioned here too, as has the endless supply which tidal power could produce.......after all we do have in the severn estuary the second largest tides on the planet.

 

Nobody has really mentioned conservation which is the other angle.........look at all the new homes they are building now. Just the usual loft insulation and double glazing with some additional insulation..........we can surely do better than that!!

 

Peter.....I'm no expert on the bird issue, but have read it can be a serious problem if they are located on migratory routes, as the birds don't adapt to such changes well. It would be wrong to simply dismiss such issues out of hand, or presume that all progress is good.

 

I don't buy the terror issue of nuclear either.........nuclear has been with us for 50 years now and its never been an issue. Bringing it up now is just the usual bring terrorists into the argument somewhere routine.

 

Having said all that, the fact our government is looking at such issues is certainly a good thing........I just think they are too focussed on wind power, at the expense of other alternatives.

[Clifftop]

trouble is they only work 64% of the time so we need reall power generation using nuclear and ask anyone living near dungerness and they welcome them ,without the generators the place would be as remote as it was in the past.

its far easier to place nuclear plants than it is any other forms of power ,they can live anywhere unlike all the rest.

i would have no problem living near a nuke plant but a hoofing great noisy propeller spoiling the countryside is not so nice.

they cannot work in light breeze and cannot work in a large wind and its britain after all not france where they have the mistral.

solar heating is so so ,solar power (as in electric) useless and not cost efficiant ,the wind is up to the gods all that is certain is that we definately wont run out of uranium

 

 

Chesters, i live just a couple of Ks from our windfarm, ( 55 towers )the only time you can hear them is if you stand directly underneath one.If you stand in the middle of the wind farm area there is virtually no noise to hear from them.

Nuclear power is not cheap to set up and run either.

[ColinW]

I can see wind turbines almost every time I fish in the sea, because we've had them here for a while. They don't bother me in the least. I've yet to hear a remotely convincing argument against their use. My own point of view is that we should use the oil up as fast as we can to make this country rich before it runs out, not let the Chinese use it all! There is a finite amount of carbon fuel, it WILL all be burnt, we may as well be the ones to benefit.

[Ken Davison South Wales]

Nobody has really mentioned conservation which is the other angle.........look at all the new homes they are building now. Just the usual loft insulation and double glazing with some additional insulation..........we can surely do better than that!!

 

I did pick up on that having just constructed a new building with the benefits of additional insulation, however the goal post on construction of new buildings have been raised insulation wise. In my book they could be pushed higher and reduce heating requirements even further. Buildings should be positioned in such a way that the roofs where ever possible have a south facing element to take a solar panel for water heating.

 

We also need to look at domestic production of hydrogen for vehicle power, a lot of research has been done in this field but again I feel it is being stifled by those with vested interest in oil.

 

i would have no problem living near a nuke plant but a hoofing great noisy propeller spoiling the countryside is not so nice.

 

Here is a good example of someone who has never been close up to wind turbines running them down because of the untrue negative nonsense which is spread around. The large units are very quiet it is the small roof ones which do produce an element of noise. Recently when talking to someone about my intentions he said "That is alright because the small units are quieter" I did not destroy the myth in this case.

 

For those who think I introduced the terrorist attack element on nuke stations just for the sake of it, again totally untrue. It comes very high on the agenda relating to safety and security, not only the structure its' self but the safe containment of the by-products. It is a major problem.

 

Reliability of nuke stations is another myth, because of the high danger levels involved in running these units if one of a type develops a fault all of that type automatically have to be shut down, this info has been known for some time. So the more you build on the same design the bigger the problem.

 

Another strange thing applying to vista minded people. I used to live in Salisbury and in the middle of the city was a building over the Avon generating power. Shut it down was the cry from the lovers of unspoilt UK, so shut down it was. Strangely though the building still remained, all that went was the turbines. The building was then LISTED so redevelopment became a problem and we now have a restaurant over looking the mill pool where all of these vista minded people can sit and enjoy themselves hopefully reflecting upon their stupidity.

 

It is the same with the tidal issue, yes things will be different, but nature adjusts to these changes given time, once again I highlight Chew and Blagdon as shining examples of where conservationist kicked up a lot of dust at the time of construction causing untold problems and costing additional money and today they have the bloody nerve to hold them up as shining examples of their achievements which is the biggest load of rubbish ever spouted.

 

There are issues with the Bristol Channel barrage BUT for years now before anyone was taking any notice of its potenial and design; work was going on to ensure these problems were addressed and that is over a period of nearly three decades.

 

The so called greenies are not so green as they like to think they are in most aspects, however they are very green when it comes to design and planning.

Edited December 10, 2007 by Ken Davison South Wales