Got Wind?
Unlike some snobs on the East Coast there are some people on the Gulf Coast who think an offshore wind farm is a wonderful thing.
The Gulf Coast is littered with the carcasses of unused oil equipment. Now those structures are being repurposed to build the first offshore wind farm in the United States.
The turbines are bound for an 18-square-mile area roughly 10 miles off the coast of Galveston, Texas, where the first offshore wind farm in the US is under construction.
…a Stanford University study that identified the Louisiana-Texas coastline as one of the best spots in the US for wind power. Average wind speed is exceptionally high, and it blows hardest during the hottest hours of the day, when demand for power is at its peak and electricity prices are highest.
WEST signed a contract to deliver 150 megawatts, which should take roughly 50 windmills. A test turbine is scheduled to be in operation this summer; the rest should be spinning by late 2008. Another 50 or so could follow by 2010 if demand warrants.
Don’t the good news just keep comin’ :)
- Posted in : Environment, In the News, Positive Change, Renewable Energy
- Author :Rt
Comments»
I wonder if they could also be turned into aquaculture rafts of sorts for mussel longlines…. but then I also think of the prime habitat they present for invasives in a newly disturbed area of the ocean. Hmm..oh, has anyone looked into what kind of petroleum products would be greasing all the gears and running back up generators and that sort of thing? I know that some extreme environmentalists point out the fact that there is still oil involved in the production of wind energy.
I think these are structures that are already sitting out there, and the wind turbines are just going to be put on top of them, so its not really newly disturbed ocean floor.
The oil the use to lubricate wind turbines is mineral oil, its biodegradable and for the most part harmless. Compared to your average large boat they have much less oil, and because they are stationary far far less chance of hitting anything (if anything something would have to hit them) and spilling any of this biodegradable oil. Most offshore wind turbines are rated for category 4 hurricanes, so even in bad storms they tend to do alright.
mouseydew,
Some evironmentalists speak without wisdom. There are no perfect solutions. Some complain about the materials used in PV solar panels (making silicon wafers is an exceedingly polluting, power hungry business. Would it be a good idea to stop using PV? Of course not. The object is to minimize the detriments and maximize the benefits - usually stated as the efficiency of a process.
That’s why petroleum is doomed. Not because it is a bad fuel (fuels are not, by nature, either good or bad, we just use them poorly or wisely), but because no one invested the resources to mitigate the detriments of its use. In the case of PVs I believe the environmentalists you spoke of would go nuts if they knew how they are made, but they choose to look at the benefits of the product and ignore its origins. Oil could become much cleaner, but it’s too late. Oil has non environmental flaws that renewable energy sources do not so they will become the “fuel” of choice. Oil will not go away, it still has way too many benefits (the abundance of it is the main thing), gut its role (as a percentage) will be greatly reduced. That said, let me know when you think you have found the perfect energy source, it’s always the way we use it that makes it imperfect.
The sea floor is mostly a desert, huge streches of sand that are all but barren of life (ceratinly not teeming). Sea life has food and shelter requirements just like we do (shelter from predators). In the wild these are provided by rock outcroppings and reefs of which there are few (as a percentage of area). We help these creatures by making “articifical reefs”. We sink large ships, throw in scrap automobiles, we even send down huge numbers of tires chained together. Gasp, you say, isn’t that bad for the environment. Hardly, much research has shown that this increases the local fish population - it is a great habitat for the complete food chain (plants, small fish, and big fish). Do not fear for the sea life with these rigs. I don’t know about “invasives”. We add structures that creatures find useful, we don’t add the creatures.
The Naib,
I believe the platforms are moved.
“…the docks here throb with the sound of tugboats towing oil platforms to and from their anchorages in the Gulf of Mexico. When a drilling site is depleted, the platforms return to port; the docks are littered with rusting steel hulks waiting for their next run.”
I don’t think they even go back to whaere they were originally. It seems new leases have to be purchased for the wind farms to use.
“But first they needed to secure government approval. Their first stop was the state of Louisiana, but the bayou bureaucrats rejected the proposal. “They saw us as competing with oil and natural gas,” Schoeffler recalls.”
and
“Patterson offered to lease WEST the Galveston site for $10,000 a year, an order of magnitude less than the cost of comparable East Coast sites.”
I find this odd since they are not drilling, but money do make the world go ’round. Any time someone makes money other people want a cut of it - usually for doing nothing.
That’s not to say an existing oil rig couldn’t put up a turbine to increase the income from the operation. HAH! These are the people who flare off natural gas instead of sending it thru a boiler and making electricity - or even heating the water they use. Idiots. I guess when you are making money hand-over-fist you don’t worry about the loose change on the floor.
Rt, Mousey knows a thing or two about ocean floors, and marine life, probably more than most…If they are being moved around their must be some plan to anchor them rather permanently or else they will be poor bases of operation for wind farms. I think she was more talking about tunicates and other marine invasive species, but who knows if anything at all can grow in the “dead zone” from the Mississippi. I am going to move this conversation over to the forums to continue it there.
Go Texas! Rigs to renewables is an important program, and it’s great that Texas is taking the lead. Of course, as I discuss in this post - http://carolynelefant1.typepad.com/renewablesoffshore/2007/01/rigs_to_renewab.html#more
there are other reasons for that, including the fact that Texas has control over its offshore lands, in contrast to other states, which must await word from the feds before leasing offshore lands beyond 3 miles out for siting projects.
Texas was my home for (off and on) about 20 years. Strange group - I fit right in :) I didn’t know that about offshore rights
Some think there is irony in that Texas is considered an “oil state”. Little do they know. Texans are as independant as anyone, and more than most. If wind power makes sense they will, by god, have wind power. If wind power is snake oil they will determine that as well.
I thoroughly enjoyed my stays in Texas.
I too lived in Texas for a while, and on another note you might be happy to know Texas is in the top three wind production states in America, they have a fair bit of solar and hydro as well.
A bit of trivia you may not be aware of, Texas has only one natural lake - everything else is dammed (a reservoir), good thing, given the climate. I presume that is where their hydro power comes from. I don’t remember any hydro facilities in the DFW are but that doesn’t mean there weren’t any. I do remember the over-flowing spillways on occational years. Great fun.
More seriously, I take no claim at face value. Every alternative energy source must prove itself - environmentally and economically. This puts me at odds with zealots, but I feel common sense will prevail. You either believe in free market or you don’t. That said - never trust the humans.