Offshore windfarm

The largest offshore wind farm in the world began generating yesterday. It's called the Walney Extension and is 12 miles off the Cumbrian coast. It can generate enough electricity to power 600,000 homes.
I think it's marvellous.

I'm all in favour. Don't find them particularly intrusive (quite attractive in some landscapes) and think the clean enetgy option is the future.
Same goes for solar and tidal systems.

I got my first sight of it yesterday. It looks very busy out to sea, what with the wind farms and the all the ships queuing to get into harbour! My 4yo GS loved it.

I don't really have any issues with wind farms although it would be nice to keep some areas where you can enjoy the views without modern encumbrances.

I think they look very elegant and as long as they are producing power (sometimes they seem to be switched off and aren't moving even though there is wind.) can't see what the problem is with them.

There was once a report on the radio that they can even take the sails out of hurricanes, and building huge wind farms in the Gulf of Mexico would reduce the devastation in the Southern US States.

Sue, I agree about having some places where you don't see them. The Cairngorms National Park does not allow windmills, though you can see some from the outer edges. A rural-dwelling relative of mine thinks we will all have some sort of windmill at some point in the near future.

Minimoon that is, indeed, marvellous

I'm all in favour too.

I don't know why some people have a problem with renewable energy, it it because there are people with vested interests in keeping energy prices high?

I know some people don't like the look of them, but pylons are hardly attractive and we have just had to get used to the sight of them.

I was just about to say that about pylons too, I love cheese. I think they are much better than the alternatives, such as fracking.

DH played a major part in the construction of the new Walney windfarm, He did all the calculations to make sure that everything to be towed out to site was properly loaded on the barges and then lifted and placed in position safely.

He had the webcams of the yard showing on his pc at home to keep an eye on things, not to mention standing on a cold windy dockside watching.

Love them!!!
As someone who lived off grid for 20 years with 2 wind generators and solar panels and had every modern convenience, and has solar panels on our motohome you can imagine how strongly I feel about alternative energy.
What is not mentioned is the fact that fish stocks are building up massively within these wind farms.
Now we have to put money into tidal power, we are an island with 2 tides a day!!!

Caledonail I can imagine we all might have mini-windmills at some point in the future - those of us in gusty Scotland, at any rate!

I think solar panels should be mandatory in all new-builds, too.

I agree about the mandatory solar panels. There were quite a few new ones in this area recently, but some people who are tenants have suggested that many of the solar panels are not actually functional. I'm not sure whether that's because of connection problems but I hope it gets fixed. We've also had word that small hydro electric schemes are making a comeback and that - too - is very appropriate for Scotland's resources.

SueDonim
I've been banging on about this for years. Plus tanks built in the foundations of houses to collect waste water to be used in toilets.

Totally agree. We should be embracing all forms of renewable energy, water saving, solar panels on roofs, etc..
Why don't we do more? It's a puzzle to me.

henetha
Simples: energy companies have too much power.
That wasn't a play on words

I don't know why we can't harness more wave power. Hydro-electricity is a good way forward - why on earth the government turned down the Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon project I do not know.

Very often we see wind turbines sitting idle - is that by design or just lack of wind?

I think that every new house should have solar panels as a matter of course, too.

I don't have a problem with wind farms either but here in France they are unpopular. Local people are always demonstrating and complaining about them.

Jalima
Sometimes the grid can't store anymore electricity.
We sometimes had to turn them off as it would have boiled our very expensive batteries.

I'm conflicted about wind turbines. They provide necessary energy but they use quite a lot of energy in their construction and they do spoil the view... We have a lot in our area as it's very hilly but one place there aren't any is the Wear Valley (a lot of the moorland is Arab owned and I suspect that they don't particularly want them). The view across the valley to the moors is lovely without any turbines..

I was very sad about the Swansea Bay scheme being turned down. It seemed like such a good idea and not as obtrusive as turbines. Did the locals like it?

(For some obscure reason I rather like pylons)

P.S It's not uncommon to see a few motionless turbines when all the rest are whirling away...

Wind turbines have down time, breakdown, have to be maintained. The National Grid have to take all renewable energy before they take hydrocarbon generated power.

The biggest problem with wind is that it is unreliable, In the sense that some days it can supply nearly 25% of our energy, on other days, including those long sunny bitterly cold days we get in winter, it will produce only 2 or 3%. It can also be fitful depending on the speed of sudden gusts or sudden lulls.

Conventional power plants are not designed to be switched on and off like a fan heater as a result they have to be kept ticking over so that they can come on as soon as wind power drops. That means burning gas to keep them ready while not producing energy. That is the other side of wind power. The gas burnt to cope with its unreliability.

I wonder also just how cost-effective wind turbines are and how reliable.

I do think that wave, tidal, hydro power could be a better way forward to manage our energy needs in the future.

Off shore wind farms are very expensive, the cost per unit is reflected in our electricity bills in the name of being carbon free. Their main drawback is that an equal amount of other power ( coal, gas, nuclear etc) has also to be built to use when there is no wind or in fact too much wind

Solar power in the UK also has the same problem so we are paying twice, it would be interesting to know just how much these renewable schemes really cost the UK.

When fossil fuels do run out and they will, future generations will have to use much less energy, their lives will be very different.

The simple answer is nuclear power.

Yes. Perfect. Clean nuclear energy.

Well, it will be once we learn how to deal with 50 years of past hazardous waste and come up with a brand new ultra-safe scheme for the future.