7 ms·

Ironic that at the same time a fossil fuel disaster of this scope is occurring, there are folks in Massachusetts still fighting to prevent offshore wind turbine

by alt219 16y ago

Ironic that at the same time a fossil fuel disaster of this scope is occurring, there are folks in Massachusetts still fighting to prevent offshore wind turbines because of concerns over the ecological impact.

eru 16y ago
That's the power of the status quo.
nkh 16y ago
In light of this disaster, I hope we can have a more reasoned debate on the floor of congress than "Drill Baby Drill".
- ams6110 16y ago
  For the next few decades at least, there is no realistic replacement for oil. We need to understand why the safeguards that should have prevented this didn't work, and like with every disaster learn how to do it better the next time.
  - chez17 16y ago
    Actually there are plenty of realistic replacements for oil, the issue is more about lobbying and PR than anything else. IF we as Americans wanted to invest in things other than the military, it wouldn't be that hard to get things moving withing a decade. What if we spent $800 billion a year on implementing solar technology? Obviously that's an overstatement but the point stands. The oil companies have payed hundreds of millions of dollars to lobby congress over the years to keep their dominance in the energy market. I'm not naively suggesting we could go solar tomorrow, but I think it's amazing when people so blindly accept the status quo. This is a willpower issue, not a technological one.
    - Jach 16y ago
      The OP might be referring to the necessity of oil in fabricating all sorts of things, a main focus being plastic and transporting all our Stuff worldwide. But with respect to simple energy, I agree it's a matter of motivation and diversion of funding that keeps us from utilizing solar, wind, etc. energy efficiently.
      - ams6110 16y ago
        I'm not suggesting that we should not pursue nuclear, wind, solar, or other sources of energy. But even building out a nuclear electric generating capacity sufficient to replace our current oil needs would take decades. Wind and solar have theoretical potential but are certainly far from proven on that scale. And not without environmental impact of their own. In the meantime, we need oil. We should understand what went wrong here, and try to prevent it from happening again.
      - sliverstorm 16y ago
        Actually, this reminds me of another reason to stop using oil as energy. We use oil for many things that haven't been replaced yet- plastics, synthetics, and so on. Logically, the best course of action would be to switch energy sources as soon as feasible to preserve as much oil as possible for such fabrication, to give us time to find a replacement for that as well. Or, buy us time to figure out a good way to recycle 100% of plastics.
    - TNO 16y ago
      And why is it that the word nuclear never comes up?
      - Zev 16y ago
        Nimbyism. People want it. Just not near them. Near someone else is fine. The word "nuclear" has too many negative connotations for it to be near them. A perfect example of this is the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant on Long Island in the 70's. LILCO (local power company/monopoly) spent around $6 billion building a nuclear power plant that could generate 820MW of power on the edge of the Long Island Sound. And then decommissioned the plant without so much as generating any commercial electricity. Why? NY Governor Mario Cuomo refused to approve any evacuation plans. Reason for that? To prevent the plant from opening due to public pressure after Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. Result of all this? $6 billion in building costs passed off from LILCO to the public. And instead of generating its own power, Long Island had to lay out a 330MW submarine power cable to obtain extra power from Connecticut after that big blackout a few years back. And a 100MW Gas Turbine plant was built on the site instead. Also after the blackout. Oh. And can't forget about the 50 kilowatts of power generated by the two 100ft wind turbines were built. Really.
      - chez17 16y ago
        I have no idea. I can't stand the attitudes in this country towards nuclear. I'm a vegan, ultra-left, hippy and I think the left has it's head so far up it's ass when it comes to nuclear power. I have no idea why they are so against it as a whole. Again, I think a lot of it has to do with lobbying and the existing power structure so it doesn't get the PR something as horrible and destructive as 'clean coal' gets.
    - davidedicillo 16y ago
      Also with all that money it would be possible to research and developer the nuclear technology that Bill Gates mentioned in his TED talk. http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/ex-microsoft-scientist-crafts-nuclear-reactor-startup-5627/ http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/ex-microsoft-sci...
  - melling 16y ago
    This is the attitude many have had for decades. We had a recent debate about drilling in Alaska and many said "things are different now, and the ecological impact would be small." We don't need to drill in these places. We aren't going to run out of our current sources for decades. In time prices are going to rise and people will be forced to drive smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles, but it is about time.
  - anigbrowl 16y ago
    True, and nor can we can conserve our way out of the problem. I'm not opposed to offshore drilling - we can apply lessons from this tragedy to future projects. but I do think that partial improvements have great potential when considered in aggregate. wind is constantly improving, the energy itself is free, and capital costs are falling to be competitive with those of fossil fuel installations. The same is true of solar. I'm strongly in favor of adding more nuclear power too - both for its large generation capability, and because the US badly needs to recover erstwhile technological and industrial lead in this area. South Korea recently snatched a big contract to build a nuclear station in the Middle East, and it's a depressing fact that the world's only steel plant capable of manufacturing the large single-unit containment chambers for a reactor is in Japan.
    - crocowhile 16y ago
      American have to learn to consume less. Otherwise they are fucked anyway (That goes for oil, food and pretty much everything else). see: http://www.bp.com/liveassets/bp_internet/globalbp/globalbp_uk_english/reports_and_publications/statistical_energy_review_2008/STAGING/local_assets/charts/oil_map_oil_consumption_per_capita_560.gif http://www.bp.com/liveassets/bp_internet/globalbp/globalbp_u...
jacquesm 16y ago
Same here. I used to be a big supporter of the local green party but since they've gone against windmills due to the 'visual pollution' I've turned away from them. They're now effectively causing the deployment of more nuclear power in the mid to long term. Meanwhile the Germans have outdone the rest of the world in both deployment of solar and wind power. Wind power is there now on average 6.5% of all energy produced, in Sachsen-Anhalt (sp?) it is over 40%! The sad thing about this oil spill is that is is a double whammy, not only ecologically is it a disaster of enormous magnitude, it also hits the region that is still recovering from the hurricane disaster only a few years ago.
- boucher 16y ago
  Like every good liberal, I'm not crazy about the idea of nuclear power, but from an objective standpoint it's relatively safe and it's incredibly clean compared to just about every other viable alternative (at least in the short term). Of course, if we had fusion we could easily solve this problem, but that's a good 40 years away.
  - Jach 16y ago
    Just curious, but where did you get the 40 number from?
    - SandB0x 16y ago
      The joke is that it's always 40 or 50 years away. According to the plan for the ITER project at least, the first fusion plant should arrive mid century. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER
  - lisper 16y ago
    > Like every good liberal, I'm not crazy about the idea of nuclear power Pardon me, but I'm a liberal and I support nuclear power.
    - sliverstorm 16y ago
what 16y ago
Are there actually ecological impacts from offshore wind turbines? From what I've read, they rarely hit birds. Bats are another story, but I don't think there are too many bats flying around offshore. On a side note, there's not much potential for wind turbines in most places, the wind just isn't strong enough: http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_wind_national_lo-res.jpg http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_wind_national_lo-res.jpg http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_wind_national_hi-res.jpg http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_wind_national_hi-res.jpg
- jacquesm 16y ago
  If you put up a building with a bunch of windows birds will fly in to them and occasionally get killed, so yes, windmills will kill birds, but: Windmills are portrayed as 'bird slaughterhouses', the reality is that while bird killings do occur they're nowhere near as frequent as the FUD would have you believe. If it were the blades would be dripping blood, and a good place to shop for dinner would be at the foot of a windmill tower. I've had a 5 meter (15') very fast running (600 RPM) mill up for well over a year and not a single dead or injured bird was found near it. Big windmills rotate a lot slower (even if the tip speeds are roughly identical) so are easier to spot as obstacles, the small mills turn so fast the blades are visible only as a blurry disc. As for the side note, that's 30% of the total landmass of the continental united states usable, that's not 'not much potential', that's enormous potential.
  - what 16y ago
    Wikipedia claims an average power consumption of ~12kW per person in the US (but it's marked as needing a citation). Assuming a wind power density rating of good (500W/sq m), you would need to harness all of the energy in a 24sq m area per person. There are >300M people in the US. Plastering turbines over that 30% of the landmass would serve only half the population. (Note: I'm no expert and maybe there is some glaring oversight in my quick calculation.)
    - jacquesm 16y ago
      12kW is not a power consumption but a momentary rate, power consumption per person is rated in KWh per unit of time, or in oil equivalents, about 8 tons of oil per US citizen per year. Also, wind power is not delivered in cross section on a surface parallel to the ground but on one at a right angle to the ground. There are other forms of renewables besides wind, such as hydroelectric dams, geothermal power and solar. A combination of those would be called for anyway. And since it is much cheaper to save a Watt-hour than it is to make one conservation is where it all begins, currently the US uses about double the amount of energy per person compared to the rest of the developed world. I'm fairly sure the US could increase its 7% in renewables to a much more significant fraction without any breakthroughs in technology, say up to 20% or so. That alone would be a major relief. Right now there are iirc about 35GW of installed power in wind turbines in the US, that's about 25,000 turbines. I've been out of the wind energy scene for 5 years now, I was mostly interested in the smaller scale anyway, but there is a surprisingly large amount of energy in wind power and we are using only a very small fraction of it. Keep in mind too that the total energy consumption of a country is used to power lots of different stuff, transportation is going to be the hardest to convert, but anything that runs off the grid is fair game for being powered by renewables, and in all those per-capita energy uses all those different categories are lumped together.
edj 16y ago
It's been approved, so the fight is nearly over. Of course, the not-in-my-backyard types will appeal, but, according to news outlets, will probably lose the appeal.

by alt219 16y ago

eru 16y ago

That's the power of the status quo.

nkh 16y ago

In light of this disaster, I hope we can have a more reasoned debate on the floor of congress than "Drill Baby Drill".

ams6110 16y ago
For the next few decades at least, there is no realistic replacement for oil. We need to understand why the safeguards that should have prevented this didn't work, and like with every disaster learn how to do it better the next time.
- chez17 16y ago
  Actually there are plenty of realistic replacements for oil, the issue is more about lobbying and PR than anything else. IF we as Americans wanted to invest in things other than the military, it wouldn't be that hard to get things moving withing a decade. What if we spent $800 billion a year on implementing solar technology? Obviously that's an overstatement but the point stands. The oil companies have payed hundreds of millions of dollars to lobby congress over the years to keep their dominance in the energy market. I'm not naively suggesting we could go solar tomorrow, but I think it's amazing when people so blindly accept the status quo. This is a willpower issue, not a technological one.
  - Jach 16y ago
    The OP might be referring to the necessity of oil in fabricating all sorts of things, a main focus being plastic and transporting all our Stuff worldwide. But with respect to simple energy, I agree it's a matter of motivation and diversion of funding that keeps us from utilizing solar, wind, etc. energy efficiently.
    - ams6110 16y ago
      I'm not suggesting that we should not pursue nuclear, wind, solar, or other sources of energy. But even building out a nuclear electric generating capacity sufficient to replace our current oil needs would take decades. Wind and solar have theoretical potential but are certainly far from proven on that scale. And not without environmental impact of their own. In the meantime, we need oil. We should understand what went wrong here, and try to prevent it from happening again.
    - sliverstorm 16y ago
      Actually, this reminds me of another reason to stop using oil as energy. We use oil for many things that haven't been replaced yet- plastics, synthetics, and so on. Logically, the best course of action would be to switch energy sources as soon as feasible to preserve as much oil as possible for such fabrication, to give us time to find a replacement for that as well. Or, buy us time to figure out a good way to recycle 100% of plastics.
  - TNO 16y ago
    And why is it that the word nuclear never comes up?
    - Zev 16y ago
      Nimbyism. People want it. Just not near them. Near someone else is fine. The word "nuclear" has too many negative connotations for it to be near them. A perfect example of this is the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant on Long Island in the 70's. LILCO (local power company/monopoly) spent around $6 billion building a nuclear power plant that could generate 820MW of power on the edge of the Long Island Sound. And then decommissioned the plant without so much as generating any commercial electricity. Why? NY Governor Mario Cuomo refused to approve any evacuation plans. Reason for that? To prevent the plant from opening due to public pressure after Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. Result of all this? $6 billion in building costs passed off from LILCO to the public. And instead of generating its own power, Long Island had to lay out a 330MW submarine power cable to obtain extra power from Connecticut after that big blackout a few years back. And a 100MW Gas Turbine plant was built on the site instead. Also after the blackout. Oh. And can't forget about the 50 kilowatts of power generated by the two 100ft wind turbines were built. Really.
    - chez17 16y ago
      I have no idea. I can't stand the attitudes in this country towards nuclear. I'm a vegan, ultra-left, hippy and I think the left has it's head so far up it's ass when it comes to nuclear power. I have no idea why they are so against it as a whole. Again, I think a lot of it has to do with lobbying and the existing power structure so it doesn't get the PR something as horrible and destructive as 'clean coal' gets.
  - davidedicillo 16y ago
    Also with all that money it would be possible to research and developer the nuclear technology that Bill Gates mentioned in his TED talk. http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/ex-microsoft-scientist-crafts-nuclear-reactor-startup-5627/ http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/ex-microsoft-sci...
- melling 16y ago
  This is the attitude many have had for decades. We had a recent debate about drilling in Alaska and many said "things are different now, and the ecological impact would be small." We don't need to drill in these places. We aren't going to run out of our current sources for decades. In time prices are going to rise and people will be forced to drive smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles, but it is about time.
- anigbrowl 16y ago
  True, and nor can we can conserve our way out of the problem. I'm not opposed to offshore drilling - we can apply lessons from this tragedy to future projects. but I do think that partial improvements have great potential when considered in aggregate. wind is constantly improving, the energy itself is free, and capital costs are falling to be competitive with those of fossil fuel installations. The same is true of solar. I'm strongly in favor of adding more nuclear power too - both for its large generation capability, and because the US badly needs to recover erstwhile technological and industrial lead in this area. South Korea recently snatched a big contract to build a nuclear station in the Middle East, and it's a depressing fact that the world's only steel plant capable of manufacturing the large single-unit containment chambers for a reactor is in Japan.
  - crocowhile 16y ago
    American have to learn to consume less. Otherwise they are fucked anyway (That goes for oil, food and pretty much everything else). see: http://www.bp.com/liveassets/bp_internet/globalbp/globalbp_uk_english/reports_and_publications/statistical_energy_review_2008/STAGING/local_assets/charts/oil_map_oil_consumption_per_capita_560.gif http://www.bp.com/liveassets/bp_internet/globalbp/globalbp_u...

jacquesm 16y ago

Same here. I used to be a big supporter of the local green party but since they've gone against windmills due to the 'visual pollution' I've turned away from them. They're now effectively causing the deployment of more nuclear power in the mid to long term. Meanwhile the Germans have outdone the rest of the world in both deployment of solar and wind power. Wind power is there now on average 6.5% of all energy produced, in Sachsen-Anhalt (sp?) it is over 40%! The sad thing about this oil spill is that is is a double whammy, not only ecologically is it a disaster of enormous magnitude, it also hits the region that is still recovering from the hurricane disaster only a few years ago.

boucher 16y ago
Like every good liberal, I'm not crazy about the idea of nuclear power, but from an objective standpoint it's relatively safe and it's incredibly clean compared to just about every other viable alternative (at least in the short term). Of course, if we had fusion we could easily solve this problem, but that's a good 40 years away.
- Jach 16y ago
  Just curious, but where did you get the 40 number from?
  - SandB0x 16y ago
    The joke is that it's always 40 or 50 years away. According to the plan for the ITER project at least, the first fusion plant should arrive mid century. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER
- lisper 16y ago
  > Like every good liberal, I'm not crazy about the idea of nuclear power Pardon me, but I'm a liberal and I support nuclear power.
  - sliverstorm 16y ago

what 16y ago

Are there actually ecological impacts from offshore wind turbines? From what I've read, they rarely hit birds. Bats are another story, but I don't think there are too many bats flying around offshore. On a side note, there's not much potential for wind turbines in most places, the wind just isn't strong enough: http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_wind_national_lo-res.jpg http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_wind_national_lo-res.jpg http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_wind_national_hi-res.jpg http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_wind_national_hi-res.jpg

jacquesm 16y ago
If you put up a building with a bunch of windows birds will fly in to them and occasionally get killed, so yes, windmills will kill birds, but: Windmills are portrayed as 'bird slaughterhouses', the reality is that while bird killings do occur they're nowhere near as frequent as the FUD would have you believe. If it were the blades would be dripping blood, and a good place to shop for dinner would be at the foot of a windmill tower. I've had a 5 meter (15') very fast running (600 RPM) mill up for well over a year and not a single dead or injured bird was found near it. Big windmills rotate a lot slower (even if the tip speeds are roughly identical) so are easier to spot as obstacles, the small mills turn so fast the blades are visible only as a blurry disc. As for the side note, that's 30% of the total landmass of the continental united states usable, that's not 'not much potential', that's enormous potential.
- what 16y ago
  Wikipedia claims an average power consumption of ~12kW per person in the US (but it's marked as needing a citation). Assuming a wind power density rating of good (500W/sq m), you would need to harness all of the energy in a 24sq m area per person. There are >300M people in the US. Plastering turbines over that 30% of the landmass would serve only half the population. (Note: I'm no expert and maybe there is some glaring oversight in my quick calculation.)
  - jacquesm 16y ago
    12kW is not a power consumption but a momentary rate, power consumption per person is rated in KWh per unit of time, or in oil equivalents, about 8 tons of oil per US citizen per year. Also, wind power is not delivered in cross section on a surface parallel to the ground but on one at a right angle to the ground. There are other forms of renewables besides wind, such as hydroelectric dams, geothermal power and solar. A combination of those would be called for anyway. And since it is much cheaper to save a Watt-hour than it is to make one conservation is where it all begins, currently the US uses about double the amount of energy per person compared to the rest of the developed world. I'm fairly sure the US could increase its 7% in renewables to a much more significant fraction without any breakthroughs in technology, say up to 20% or so. That alone would be a major relief. Right now there are iirc about 35GW of installed power in wind turbines in the US, that's about 25,000 turbines. I've been out of the wind energy scene for 5 years now, I was mostly interested in the smaller scale anyway, but there is a surprisingly large amount of energy in wind power and we are using only a very small fraction of it. Keep in mind too that the total energy consumption of a country is used to power lots of different stuff, transportation is going to be the hardest to convert, but anything that runs off the grid is fair game for being powered by renewables, and in all those per-capita energy uses all those different categories are lumped together.

edj 16y ago

It's been approved, so the fight is nearly over. Of course, the not-in-my-backyard types will appeal, but, according to news outlets, will probably lose the appeal.