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Wind turbines and solar panels are an increasingly common sight. But why? What are the benefits of renewable energies-and how do they improve our health, environment, and economy?

This page explores the many positive impacts of clean energy, including the benefits of wind, solar, geothermal, hydroelectric, and biomass. For more information on their negative impacts-including effective solutions to avoid, minimize, or mitigate-see our page on The Environmental Impacts of Renewable Energy Technologies.

Less global warming

Human activity is overloading our atmosphere with carbon dioxide and other global warming emissions. These gases act like a blanket, trapping heat. The result is a web of significant and harmful impacts, from stronger, more frequent storms, to drought, sea level rise, and extinction.

In the United States, about 29 percent of global warming emissions come from our electricity sector. Most of those emissions come from fossil fuels like coal and natural gas [ 1, 2].

What is CO2e?

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the most prevalent greenhouse gas, but other air pollutants-such as methane-also cause global warming. Different energy sources produce different amounts of these pollutants. To make comparisons easier, we use a carbon dioxide equivalent, or CO2e-the amount of carbon dioxide required to produce an equivalent amount of warming.

In contrast, most renewable energy sources produce little to no global warming emissions. Even when including "life cycle" emissions of clean energy (ie, the emissions from each stage of a technology's life-manufacturing, installation, operation, decommissioning), the global warming emissions associated with renewable energy are minimal [ 3].

The comparison becomes clear when you look at the numbers. Burning natural gas for electricity releases between 0.6 and 2 pounds of carbon dioxide equivalent per kilowatt-hour (CO2E/kWh); coal emits between 1.4 and 3.6 pounds of CO2E/kWh. Wind, on the other hand, is responsible for only 0.02 to 0.04 pounds of CO2E/kWh on a life-cycle basis; solar 0.07 to 0.2; geothermal 0.1 to 0.2; and hydroelectric between 0.1 and 0.5.

Renewable electricity generation from biomass can have a wide range of global warming emissions depending on the resource and whether or not it is sustainably sourced and harvested.

Increasing the supply of renewable energy would allow us to replace carbon-intensive energy sources and significantly reduce US global warming emissions.

For example, a 2009 UCS analysis found that a 25 percent by 2025 national renewable electricity standard would lower power plant CO2 emissions 277 million metric tons annually by 2025-the equivalent of the annual output from 70 typical (600 MW) new coal plants [ 4].

In addition, a ground-breaking study by the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) explored the feasibility of generating 80 percent of the country's electricity from renewable sources by 2050. They found that renewable energy could help reduce the electricity sector's emissions by approximately 81 percent [ 5].

Improved public health

The air and water pollution emitted by coal and natural gas plants is linked with breathing problems, neurological damage, heart attacks, cancer, premature death, and a host of other serious problems. The pollution affects everyone: one Harvard University study estimated the life cycle costs and public health effects of coal to be an estimated $74.6 billion every year. That's equivalent to 4.36 cents per kilowatt-hour of electricity produced-about one-third of the average electricity rate for a typical US home [ 6].

Most of these negative health impacts come from air and water pollution that clean energy technologies simply don't produce. Wind, solar, and hydroelectric systems generate electricity with no associated air pollution emissions. Geothermal and biomass systems emit some air pollutants, though total air emissions are generally much lower than those of coal- and natural gas-fired power plants.

In addition, wind and solar energy require essentially no water to operate and thus do not pollute water resources or strain supplies by competing with agriculture, drinking water, or other important water needs. In contrast, fossil fuels can have a significant impact on water resources: both coal mining and natural gas drilling can pollute sources of drinking water, and all thermal power plants, including those powered by coal, gas, and oil, withdraw and consume water for cooling.

Biomass and geothermal power plants, like coal- and natural gas-fired power plants, may require water for cooling. Hydroelectric power plants can disrupt river ecosystems both upstream and downstream from the dam. However, NREL's 80-percent-by-2050 renewable energy study, which included biomass and geothermal, found that total water consumption and withdrawal would decrease significantly in a future with high renewables [ 7].

Inexhaustible energy

Strong winds, sunny skies, abundant plant matter, heat from the earth, and fast-moving water can each provide a vast and constantly replenished supply of energy. A relatively small fraction of US electricity currently comes from these sources, but that could change: studies have repeatedly shown that renewable energy can provide a significant share of future electricity needs, even after accounting for potential constraints [ 9].

In fact, a major government-sponsored study found that clean energy could contribute somewhere between three and 80 times its 2013 levels, depending on assumptions [8]. And the previously mentioned NREL study found that renewable energy could comfortably provide up to 80 percent of US electricity by 2050.

Jobs and other economic benefits

Compared with fossil fuel technologies, which are typically mechanized and capital intensive, the renewable energy industry is more labor intensive. Solar panels need humans to install them; wind farms need technicians for maintenance.

This means that, on average, more jobs are created for each unit of electricity generated from renewable sources than from fossil fuels.

Renewable energy already supports thousands of jobs in the United States. In 2016, the wind energy industry directly employed over 100,000 full-time-equivalent employees in a variety of capacities, including manufacturing, project development, construction and turbine installation, operations and maintenance, transportation and logistics, and financial, legal, and consulting services [ 10]. More than 500 factories in the United States manufacture parts for wind turbines, and wind power project installations in 2016 alone represented $13.0 billion in investments [ 11].

Other renewable energy technologies employ even more workers. In 2016, the solar industry employed more than 260,000 people, including jobs in solar installation, manufacturing, and sales, a 25% increase over 2015 [ 12]. The hydroelectric power industry employed approximately 66,000 people in 2017 [ 13]; the geothermal industry employed 5,800 people [ 14].

Increased support for renewable energy could create even more jobs. The 2009 Union of Concerned Scientists study of a 25-percent-by-2025 renewable energy standard found that such a policy would create more than three times as many jobs (more than 200,000) as producing an equivalent amount of electricity from fossil fuels [ 15].

In contrast, the entire coal industry employed 160,000 people in 2016 [ 26].

In addition to the jobs directly created in the renewable energy industry, growth in clean energy can create positive economic "ripple" effects. For example, industries in the renewable energy supply chain will benefit, and unrelated local businesses will benefit from increased household and business incomes [ 16].
Listen to energy expert Paula Garcia talk about renewable energy progress in the US on the Got Science? Podcast:
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Local governments also benefit from clean energy, most often in the form of property and income taxes and other payments from renewable energy project owners. Owners of the land on which wind projects are built often receive lease payments ranging from $3,000 to $6,000 per megawatt of installed capacity, as well as payments for power line easements and road rights-of-way. They may also earn royalties based on the project's annual revenues. Farmers and rural landowners can generate new sources of supplemental income by producing feedstocks for biomass power facilities.

UCS analysis found that a 25-by-2025 national renewable electricity standard would stimulate $263.4 billion in new capital investment for renewable energy technologies, $13.5 billion in new landowner income from? biomass production and/or wind land lease payments, and $11.5 billion in new property tax revenue for local communities [ 17].

Stable energy prices

Renewable energy is providing affordable electricity across the country right now, and can help stabilize energy prices in the future.

Although renewable facilities require upfront investments to build, they can then operate at very low cost (for most clean energy technologies, the "fuel" is free). As a result, renewable energy prices can be very stable over time.

Moreover, the costs of renewable energy technologies have declined steadily, and are projected to drop even more. For example, the average price to install solar dropped more than 70 percent between 2010 and 2017 [ 20]. The cost of generating electricity from wind dropped 66 percent between 2009 and 2016 [ 21]. Costs will likely decline even further as markets mature and companies increasingly take advantage of economies of scale.

In contrast, fossil fuel prices can vary dramatically and are prone to substantial price swings. For example, there was a rapid increase in US coal prices due to rising global demand before 2008, then a rapid fall after 2008 when global demands declined [ 23]. Likewise, natural gas prices have fluctuated greatly since 2000 [ 25].

Using more renewable energy can lower the prices of and demand for natural gas and coal by increasing competition and diversifying our energy supplies. And an increased reliance on renewable energy can help protect consumers when fossil fuel prices spike.

Reliability and resilience

Wind and solar are less prone to large-scale failure because they are distributed and modular. Distributed systems are spread out over a large geographical area, so a severe weather event in one location will not cut off power to an entire region. Modular systems are composed of numerous individual wind turbines or solar arrays. Even if some of the equipment in the system is damaged, the rest can typically continue to operate.

For example, Hurricane Sandy damaged fossil fuel-dominated electric generation and distribution systems in New York and New Jersey and left millions of people without power. In contrast, renewable energy projects in the Northeast weathered Hurricane Sandy with minimal damage or disruption [ 25].

Water scarcity is another risk for non-renewable power plants. Coal, nuclear, and many natural gas plants depend on having sufficient water for cooling, which means that severe droughts and heat waves can put electricity generation at risk. Wind and solar photovoltaic systems do not require water to generate electricity and can operate reliably in conditions that may otherwise require closing a fossil fuel-powered plant. (For more information, see How it Works: Water for Electricity.)

The risk of disruptive events will also increase in the future as droughts, heat waves, more intense storms, and increasingly severe wildfires become more frequent due to global warming-increasing the need for resilient, clean technologies.
Learn more: References:
[1] Environmental Protection Agency. 2017. Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks: 1990-2015.

[2] Energy Information Agency (EIA). 2017. How much of the U.S. carbon dioxide emissions are associated with electricity generation?

[3] Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). 2011. IPCC Special Report on Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation. Prepared by Working Group III of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [O. Edenhofer, R. Pichs-Madruga, Y. Sokona, K. Seyboth, P. Matschoss, S. Kadner, T. Zwickel, P. Eickemeier, G. Hansen, S. Schlömer, C. von Stechow (eds)]. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA, 1075 pp. (Chapter 9).

[4] Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS). 2009. Clean Power Green Jobs.

[5] National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). 2012. Renewable Electricity Futures Study. Volume 1, pg. 210.

[6] Epstein, P.R.,J. J. Buonocore, K. Eckerle, M. Hendryx, B. M. Stout III, R. Heinberg, R. W. Clapp, B. May, N. L. Reinhart, M. M. Ahern, S. K. Doshi, and L. Glustrom. 2011. Full cost accounting for the life cycle of coal in "Ecological Economics Reviews." Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 1219: 73-98.

[7] Renewable Electricity Futures Study. 2012.

[8] NREL. 2016. Estimating Renewable Energy Economic Potential in the United States: Methodology and Initial Results.

[9] Renewable Electricity Futures Study. 2012.

IPCC Special Report on Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation. Prepared by Working Group III of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 2011.

UCS. 2009. Climate 2030: A national blueprint for a clean energy economy.

[10] American Wind Energy Association (AWEA). 2017. AWEA U.S. Wind Industry Annual Market Report: Year Ending 2016. Washington, D.C.: American Wind Energy Association.

[11] Wiser, Ryan, and Mark Bolinger. 2017. 2016 Wind Technologies Market Report. U.S. Department of Energy.

[12] The Solar Foundation. 2017. National Solar Jobs Census 2016.

[13] Navigant Consulting. 2009. Job Creation Opportunities in Hydropower.

[14] Geothermal Energy Association. 2010. Green Jobs through Geothermal Energy.

[15] UCS. 2009. Clean Power Green Jobs.

[16] Environmental Protection Agency. 2010. Assessing the Multiple Benefits of Clean Energy: A Resource for States. Chapter 5.

[17] UCS. 2009. Clean Power Green Jobs.

[18] Deyette, J., and B. Freese. 2010. Burning coal, burning cash: Ranking the states that import the most coal. Cambridge, MA: Union of Concerned Scientists.

[20] SEIA. 2017. Solar Market Insight Report 2017 Q2.

[21] AWEA. 2017. AWEA U.S. Wind Industry Annual Market Report: Year Ending 2016. Washington, D.C.: American Wind Energy Association.

[22] UCS. 2009. Clean Power Green Jobs.

[23] UCS. 2011. A Risky Proposition: The financial hazards of new investments in coal plants.

[24] EIA. 2013. U.S. Natural Gas Wellhead Price.

[25] Unger, David J. 2012. Are renewables stormproof? Hurricane Sandy tests solar, wind. The Christian Science Monitor. November 19.

[26] Department of Energy. 2017 U.S. Energy and Employment Report

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Wind turbines and solar panels are an increasingly common sight. But why? What are the benefits of renewable energies-and how do they improve our health, environment, and economy? This page explores the many positive impacts of clean energy, including the benefits of wind, solar, geothermal, hydroelectric, and biomass.

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Read about the benefits of renewable energy and the different types of renewable energy.

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Tells pros and cons of  hydropower Its Wikipedia URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_power_network

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The pumping station and hydraulic accumulator at Bristol Docks

A hydraulic power network is a system of interconnected pipes carrying pressurized liquid used to transmit mechanical power from a power source, like a pump, to hydraulic equipment like lifts or motors. The system is analogous to an electrical grid transmitting power from a generating station to end-users. Only a few hydraulic power transmission networks are still in use; modern hydraulic equipment has a pump built into the machine. In the late 19th century, a hydraulic network might have been used in a factory, with a central steam engine or water turbine driving a pump and a system of high-pressure pipes transmitting power to various machines.

The idea of a public hydraulic power network was suggested by Joseph Bramah in a patent obtained in 1812. William Armstrong began installing systems in England from the 1840s, using low-pressure water, but a breakthrough occurred in 1850 with the introduction of the hydraulic accumulator, which allowed much higher pressures to be used. The first public network, supplying many companies, was constructed in Kingston upon Hull, England. The Hull Hydraulic Power Company began operation in 1877, with Edward B. Ellington as its engineer. Ellington was involved in most of the British networks, and some further afield. Public networks were constructed in Britain at London, Liverpool, Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow. There were similar networks in Antwerp, Melbourne, Sydney, Buenos Aires and Geneva. All of the public networks had ceased to operate by the mid-1970s, but Bristol Harbour still has an operational system, with an accumulator situated outside the main pumphouse, enabling its operation to be easily visualised.

Joseph Bramah, an inventor and locksmith living in London, registered a patent at the London Patent Office on 29 April 1812, which was principally about a provision of a public water supply network, but included a secondary concept for the provision of a high-pressure water main, which would enable workshops to operate machinery. The high-pressure water would be applied "to a variety of other useful purposes, to which the same has never before been so applied". Major components of the system were a ring main, into which a number of pumping stations would pump the water, with pressure being regulated by several air vessels or loaded pistons. Pressure relief valves would protect the system, which he believed could deliver water at a pressure of "a great plurality of atmospheres", and in concept, this was how later hydraulic power systems worked.

In Newcastle upon Tyne, a solicitor called William Armstrong, who had been experimenting with water-powered machines, was working for a firm of solicitors who were appointed to act on behalf of the Whittle Dene Water Company. The water company had been set up to supply Newcastle with drinking water, and Armstrong was appointed secretary at the first meeting of shareholders. Soon afterwards, he wrote to Newcastle Town Council, suggesting that the cranes on the quay should be converted to hydraulic power. He was required to carry out the work at his own expense, but would be rewarded if the conversion was a success. It was, and he set up the Newcastle Cranage Company, which received an order for the conversion of the other four cranes. Further work followed, with the engineer from Liverpool Docks visiting Newcastle and being impressed by a demonstration of the crane's versatility, given by the crane driver John Thorburn, known locally as "Hydraulic Jack".

While the Newcastle system ran on water from the public water supply, the crane installed by Armstrong at Burntisland was not located where such an option was possible, and so he built a 180-foot (55 m) tower, with a water tank at the top, which was filled by a 6 hp (4.5 kW) steam engine. At Elswick in Glasgow, charges by the Corporation Water Department for the water used persuaded the owners that the use of a steam-powered crane would be cheaper. Bramah's concept of "loaded pistons" was introduced in 1850, when the first hydraulic accumulator was installed as part of a scheme for cranes for the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway. A scheme for cranes at Paddington the following year specified an accumulator with a 10-inch (250 mm) piston and a stroke of 15 feet (4.6 m), which enabled pressures of 600 pounds per square inch (41 bar) to be achieved. Compared to the 80 psi (5.5 bar) of the Newcastle scheme, this increased pressure significantly reduced the volumes of water used. Cranes were not the only application, with hydraulic operation of the dock gates at Swansea reducing the operating time from 15 to two minutes, and the number of men required to operate them from twelve to four. Each of these schemes was for a single customer, and the application of hydraulic power more generally required a new model.

Machell Street hydraulic pumping station in Hull, showing the water settling tank on the roof

Kingston upon Hull

The first practical installation which supplied hydraulic power to the public was in Kingston upon Hull, in England. The Hull Hydraulic Power Company began operation in 1876. They had 2.5 miles (4.0 km) of pipes, which were up to 6 inches (150 mm) in diameter, and ran along the west bank of the River Hull from Sculcoates bridge to its junction with the Humber. The pumping station was near the north end of the pipeline, on Machell Street, near the disused Scott Street bascule bridge, which was powered hydraulically. There was an accumulator at Machell Street, and another one much nearer the Humber, on the corner of Grimsby Lane. Special provision was made where the pressure main passed under the entrance to Queens Dock. By 1895, pumps rated at 250 hp (190 kW) pumped some 500,000 imperial gallons (2,300 m ³) of water into the system each week, and 58 machines were connected to it. The working pressure was 700 psi (48 bar), and the water was used to operate cranes, dock gates, and a variety of other machinery connected with ships and shipbuilding. The Hull system lasted until the 1940s, when the systematic bombing of the city during the Second World War led to the destruction of much of the infrastructure, and the company was wound up in 1947, when Mr F J Haswell, who had been the manager and engineer since 1904, retired.

Independent hydraulic power networks were also installed at Hull's docks - both the Albert Dock (1869), and Alexandra Dock (1885) installed hydraulic generating stations and accumulators.

The best-known public hydraulic network was the citywide network of the London Hydraulic Power Company. This was formed in 1882, as the General Hydraulic Power Company, with Ellington as the consulting engineer. By the following year another enterprise, the Wharves and Warehouses Steam Power and Hydraulic Pressure Company, had begun to operate, with 7 miles (11 km) of pressure mains on both sides of the River Thames. These supplied cranes, dock gates, and other heavy machinery. Under the terms of an Act of Parliament obtained in 1884, the two companies amalgamated to become the London Hydraulic Power Company. Initially supplying 17.75 million gallons (80.7 megalitres) of high-pressure water each day, this had risen to 1,650 million gallons (7,500 megalitres) by 1927, when the company was powering around 8,000 machines from the supply. They maintained 184 miles (296 km) of mains at 700 psi (48 bar), which covered an area reaching Pentonville in the north, Limehouse in the east, Nine Elms and Bermondsey in the south and Earls Court and Notting Hill in the west.

The preserved pumping equipment in Wapping pumping station, which was owned by the London Hydraulic Power Company

Five pumping stations kept the mains pressurised, assisted by accumulators. The original station was at Falcon Wharf, Bankside, but this was replaced by four stations at Wapping, Rotherhithe, Grosvenor Road in Pimlico and City Road in Clerkenwell. A fifth station at East India Docks was originally operated by the Port of London Authority, but was taken over and connected to the system. The stations used steam engines until 1953, when Grosvenor Road station was converted to use electric motors, and following the success of this project, the other four were also converted. The electric motors allowed much smaller accumulators to be used, since they were then only controlling the pressure and flow, rather than storing power. While the network supplied lifts, cranes and dockgates, it also powered the cabaret platform at the Savoy Hotel, and from 1937, the 720-tonne three-section central floor at the Earls Court Exhibition Centre, which could be raised or lowered relative to the main floor to convert between a swimming pool and an exhibition hall. The London system contracted during the Second World War, due to the destruction of customers' machinery and premises. Following the hostilities, large areas of London were reconstructed, and the re-routing of pressure mains was much more difficult than the provision of an electric supply, so that by 1954 the number of machines had fallen to 4,286. The company was wound up in 1977.

A system began operating in Liverpool in 1888. It was an offshoot of the London-based General Hydraulic Power Company, and was authorised by acts of Parliament obtained in 1884 and 1887. By 1890, some 16 miles (26 km) of mains had been installed, supplied by a pumping station at Athol Street, on the bank of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal. Although water was originally taken from the canal, cleaner water supplied by Liverpool Corporation was in use by 1890, removing the need for a filtration plant. At this time two pumpsets were in use, and a third was being installed. Pressure was maintained by two accumulators, each with an 18-inch (460 mm) diameter piston with a stroke of 20 feet (6.1 m). The Practical Engineer quoted the pressure as 75 pounds per square inch (5.2 bar), but this is unlikely to be correct by comparison with other systems. A second pumping station at Grafton Street was operational by 1909. The system ceased operation in 1971.

Manchester & Glasgow

The final two public systems in Britain were in Manchester, commissioned in 1894, and Glasgow, commissioned the following year. Both were equipped by Ellington's company, and used the higher pressure of 1,120 psi (77 bar). This was maintained by six sets of triple-expansion steam engines, rated at 200 hp (150 kW) each. Two accumulators with pistons of 18-inch (460 mm) diameter, a stroke of 23 feet (7.0 m), and loaded with 127 tonnes were installed. In Manchester, the hydraulic station was built on the east side of Gloucester Street, by Manchester Oxford Road railway station. It was later supplemented by stations at Water Street and Pott Street, the latter now under the car parks of the Central Retail Park. At its peak in the 1930s, the system consisted on 35 miles (56 km) of pipes, which were connected to 2,400 machines, most of which were used for baling cotton. The system was shut down in 1972. In Glasgow, the pumping station was at the junction of High Street and Rottenrow. By 1899, it was supplying power to 348 machines, and another 39 were in the process of being completed. The pipes were 7 inches (180 mm) in diameter, and there were around 30 miles (48 km) of them by 1909, when 202,141 imperial gallons (918.95 m ³) of high pressure water were supplied to customers. The system was shut down in 1964.

All of the British systems were designed to provide power for intermittent processes, such as the operation of dock gates or cranes. The system installed at Antwerp was somewhat different, in that its primary purpose was the production of electricity for lighting. It was commissioned in 1894, and used pumping engines producing a total of 1,000 hp (750 kW) to supply water at 750 psi (52 bar). Ellington, writing in 1895, stated that he found it difficult to see that this was an economical use of hydraulic power, although tests conducted at his works at Chester in October 1894 showed that efficiencies of 59 per cent could be achieved using a Pelton wheel directly coupled to a dynamo.

Two major systems were built in Australia. The first was in Melbourne, where the Melbourne Hydraulic Power Company began operating in July 1889. The company was authorised by an Act of the Victorian Parliament passed in December 1887, and construction of the system began, with Coates & Co. acting as consulting engineers, and George Swinburne working as engineering manager. The steam pumping plant was supplied by Abbot & Co. from England. Expansion was rapid, with around 70 machines, mainly hydraulic lifts, connected to the system by the end of 1889, and a third steam engine had to be installed in mid-1890, which more than doubled the capacity of the system. A fourth pumping engine was added in 1891, by which time there were 100 customers connected to the mains. The mains were a mixture of 4-inch (100 mm) and 6-inch (150 mm) pipes. The water was extracted from the Yarra River until 1893, after which it was drawn from the Public Works Department's supply. There were some 16 miles (26 km) of mains by 1897. A second pumping station was added in 1901, and in 1902, 102 million gallons (454 megalitres) of pressurised water were used by customers.

In January 1891, a system in Sydney came on-line, having been authorised by act of Parliament in 1888. George Swinburne was again the engineer, and the system was supplying power to around 200 machines by 1894, which included 149 lifts and 20 dock cranes. The operating company was the Sydney and Suburbs Hydraulic Power Company, later shortened to the Sydney Hydraulic Power Company. Pressure mains were either of 4-inch (100 mm) or 6-inch (150 mm) diameter, and at its peak, there were around 50 miles (80 km) of mains, covering an area between Pyrmont, Woolloomooloo, and Broadway. In 1919, most of the 2369 lifts in the metropolitan area were hydraulically operated. The pumping station, together with two accumulators, was situated in the Darling Harbour district, and the original steam engines were replaced by three electric motors driving centrifugal pumps in 1952. The scheme remained in private ownership until its demise in 1975, and the pumping station has since been re-used as a tavern.

Ellington's system in Buenos Aires was designed to operate a sewage pumping scheme in the city.

Due to increased demand, a new pumping plant was installed, which started operation in 1886. The pumps were driven by Jonval turbines using the water power of the river Rhône. This structure was called Usine des Forces Motrices and was one of the largest structures for generation and distribution of power at the time of construction. By 1897 a total of 18 turbines had been installed, with a combined rating of 3.3MW.

Many turbines were used for driving generators for electric lighting. In 1887 an electricity generation plant was built next to the powerhouse, which generated 110 V DC with a maximum power of 800 hp (600 kW) and an AC network with a maximum power of 600 hp (450 kW). The generators were driven by a water turbine supplied from the hydraulic power network. The hydraulic power network was not in competition with the electric power supply, but was seen as a supplement to it, and continued to supply power to many customer until the economic crisis of the 1930s, when the demand for pressurized water as an energy source declined. The last water engine was decommissioned in 1958.

In order to avoid excessive pressure build-up in the hydraulic power network, a release valve was fitted beside the main hall of the powerhouse. A tall water fountain, the Jet d'Eau, was ejected by the device whenever it was activated. This typically happened at the end of the day when the factories switched off their machines, making it hard to control the pressure in the system, and to adjust the supply of pressurized water to match the actual demand. The tall fountain was visible from a great distance and became a landmark in the city. When an engineering solution was found which made the fountain redundant, there was an outcry, and in 1891 it was moved to its current location in the lake, where it operated solely as a tourist attraction, although the water to create it still came from the hydraulic network.

The Oamaru Borough Water Race was designed by Donald McLeod (b.1835). It opened in 1880 after 3 years of construction. With water sourced from the Waitaki River, the race stretched nearly 50km and comprised an intake structure, a stilling pond, 19 aqueducts and six tunnels. The spare horsepower generated water motors, water engines and turbines in the town of Oamaru for decades and operated for 103 years. Much of the race and its components can still be seen today.

The external hydraulic accumulator at Bristol Harbour

Bristol Harbour still has a working system, the pumping machinery of which was supplied by Fullerton, Hodgart and Barclay of Paisley, Scotland in 1907. The engine house is a grade II* listed building, constructed in 1887, fully commissioned by 1888, with a tower at one end to house the hydraulic accumulator. A second accumulator was fitted outside the building (dated 1954) which enables the operation of the system to be more easily visualised.

A number of artefacts, including the buildings used as pumping stations, have survived the demise of public hydraulic power networks. In Hull, the Machell Street pumping station has been reused as a workshop. The building still supports the sectional cast-iron roof tank used to allow the silt-laden water of the River Hull to settle, and is marked by a Blue plaque, to commemorate its importance. In London, Bermondsey pumping station, built in 1902, is in use as an engineering works, but retains its chimney and accumulator tower, while the station at Wapping is virtually complete, retaining all of its equipment, which is still in working order. The building is grade II* listed because of its completeness.

In Manchester, the Water Street pumping station, built in Baroque style between 1907 and 1909, was used as workshops for the City College, but has formed part of the People's History Museum since 1994. One of the pumping sets has been moved to the Museum of Science and Industry, where it has been restored to working order and forms part of a larger display about hydraulic power. The pumps were made by the Manchester firm of Galloways.

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Field, Corinne (16 August 2004). "Pump Up The Volume - Manchester Hydraulic Heritage". Culture 24.

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Tissot, Tatiana (23 November 2017). "The story of Geneva's Jet d'Eau". House of Switzerland.

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Hull system

London system

Ellington, E. B. (1888), "The Distribution of Hydraulic Power in London. (Includes Plates and Appendices)", Minutes of the Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers, Institution of Civil Engineers, 94 (1888): 1-31, doi:10.1680/imotp.1888.20879

"The London Hydraulic Power Company" (PDF), The Engineer, 75: 43-48, 51, 54, 20 January 1893

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A hydraulic power network is a system of interconnected pipes carrying pressurized liquid used to transmit mechanical power from a power source, like a pump, to hydraulic equipment like lifts or motors. The system is analogous to an electrical grid transmitting power from a generating station to end-users.

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Tells pros and cons of Windpower Its Wikipedia URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power

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Wind power or wind energy is mostly the use of wind turbines to generate electricity. Wind power is a popular, sustainable, renewable energy source that has a much smaller impact on the environment than burning fossil fuels. Historically, wind power has been used in sails, windmills and windpumps but today it is mostly used to generate electricity. Wind farms consist of many individual wind turbines, which are connected to the electric power transmission network. New onshore (on-land) wind farms are cheaper than new coal or gas plants, but expansion of wind power is being hindered by fossil fuel subsidies. Onshore wind farms have a greater visual impact on the landscape than some other power stations. Small onshore wind farms can feed some energy into the grid or provide power to isolated off-grid locations. Offshore wind farms deliver more energy per installed capacity with less fluctuations and have less visual impact. Although there is less offshore wind power at present and construction and maintenance costs are higher, it is expanding. Offshore wind power currently has a share of about 10% of new installations.

Wind power is variable renewable energy, so power-management techniques are used to match supply and demand, such as: wind hybrid power systems, hydroelectric power or other dispatchable power sources, excess capacity, geographically distributed turbines, exporting and importing power to neighboring areas, or grid storage. As the proportion of wind power in a region increases the grid may need to be upgraded. Weather forecasting allows the electric-power network to be readied for the predictable variations in production that occur.

In 2021, wind supplied over 1800 TWh of electricity, which was over 6% of world electricity and about 2% of world energy. With about 100 GW added during 2021, mostly in China and the United States, global installed wind power capacity exceeded 800 GW. To help meet the Paris Agreement goals to limit climate change, analysts say it should expand much faster - by over 1% of electricity generation per year.

Regions in the higher northern and southern latitudes have the highest potential for wind power. Installed capacity has reached 650 GW in 2019. In most regions, wind power generation is higher in the winter when PV output is low. For this reason, combinations of wind and solar power are recommended.

Wind energy

Wind energy is the kinetic energy of air in motion, also called wind. Total wind energy flowing through an imaginary surface with area A during the time t is:

[18]

where ρ is the density of air; v is the wind speed; Avt is the volume of air passing through A (which is considered perpendicular to the direction of the wind); Avtρ is therefore the mass m passing through A. ρv ² is the kinetic energy of the moving air per unit volume.

Power is energy per unit time, so the wind power incident on A (e.g. equal to the rotor area of a wind turbine) is:

[18]

Wind power in an open air stream is thus proportional to the third power of the wind speed; the available power increases eightfold when the wind speed doubles.

Wind is the movement of air across the surface of the Earth, driven by areas of high and low pressure. The global wind kinetic energy averaged approximately 1.50 MJ/m ² over the period from 1979 to 2010, 1.31 MJ/m ² in the Northern Hemisphere with 1.70 MJ/m ² in the Southern Hemisphere. The atmosphere acts as a thermal engine, absorbing heat at higher temperatures, releasing heat at lower temperatures. The process is responsible for the production of wind kinetic energy at a rate of 2.46 W/m ² thus sustaining the circulation of the atmosphere against friction.

Through wind resource assessment it is possible to estimate wind power potential globally, by country or region, or for a specific site. The Global Wind Atlas provided by the Technical University of Denmark in partnership with the World Bank provides a global assessment of wind power potential. Unlike 'static' wind resource atlases which average estimates of wind speed and power density across multiple years, tools such as Renewables.ninja provide time-varying simulations of wind speed and power output from different wind turbine models at an hourly resolution. More detailed, site-specific assessments of wind resource potential can be obtained from specialist commercial providers, and many of the larger wind developers have in-house modeling capabilities.

The total amount of economically extractable power available from the wind is considerably more than present human power use from all sources. The strength of wind varies, and an average value for a given location does not alone indicate the amount of energy a wind turbine could produce there.

To assess prospective wind power sites a probability distribution function is often fit to the observed wind speed data. Different locations will have different wind speed distributions. The Weibull model closely mirrors the actual distribution of hourly/ten-minute wind speeds at many locations. The Weibull factor is often close to 2 and therefore a Rayleigh distribution can be used as a less accurate, but simpler model.

A wind farm is a group of wind turbines in the same location. A large wind farm may consist of several hundred individual wind turbines distributed over an extended area. The land between the turbines may be used for agricultural or other purposes. For example, Gansu Wind Farm, the largest wind farm in the world, has several thousand turbines. A wind farm may also be located offshore. Almost all large wind turbines have the same design - a horizontal axis wind turbine having an upwind rotor with 3 blades, attached to a nacelle on top of a tall tubular tower.

In a wind farm, individual turbines are interconnected with a medium voltage (often 34.5 kV) power collection system and communications network. In general, a distance of 7D (7 times the rotor diameter of the wind turbine) is set between each turbine in a fully developed wind farm. At a substation, this medium-voltage electric current is increased in voltage with a transformer for connection to the high voltage electric power transmission system.

Generator characteristics and stability

Induction generators are not used in current turbines. Instead, most turbines use variable speed generators combined with either a partial or full-scale power converter between the turbine generator and the collector system, which generally have more desirable properties for grid interconnection and have low voltage ride through-capabilities. Modern turbines use either doubly fed electric machines with partial-scale converters or squirrel-cage induction generators or synchronous generators (both permanently and electrically excited) with full-scale converters. Black start is possible and is being further developed for places (such as Iowa) which generate most of their electricity from wind.

Transmission systems operators will supply a wind farm developer with a grid code to specify the requirements for interconnection to the transmission grid. This will include the power factor, the constancy of frequency, and the dynamic behaviour of the wind farm turbines during a system fault.

Offshore wind power

Offshore wind power is wind farms in large bodies of water, usually the sea. These installations can utilize the more frequent and powerful winds that are available in these locations and have less visual impact on the landscape than land-based projects. However, the construction and maintenance costs are considerably higher.

Siemens and Vestas are the leading turbine suppliers for offshore wind power. Ørsted, Vattenfall, and E.ON are the leading offshore operators. As of November 2021, the Hornsea Wind Farm in the United Kingdom is the largest offshore wind farm in the world at 1,218 MW.

Collection and transmission network

In a wind farm, individual turbines are interconnected with a medium voltage (usually 34.5 kV) power collection system and communications network. At a substation, this medium-voltage electric current is increased in voltage with a transformer for connection to the high voltage electric power transmission system. A transmission line is required to bring the generated power to (often remote) markets. For an offshore station, this may require a submarine cable. Construction of a new high voltage line may be too costly for the wind resource alone, but wind sites may take advantage of lines already installed for conventional fuel generation.

Wind power resources are not always located near to high population density. As transmission lines become longer the losses associated with power transmission increase, as modes of losses at lower lengths are exacerbated and new modes of losses are no longer negligible as the length is increased, making it harder to transport large loads over large distances.

One of the biggest current challenges to wind power grid integration in some countries is the necessity of developing new transmission lines to carry power from wind farms, usually in remote lowly populated areas due to availability of wind, to high load locations, usually on the coasts where population density is higher. Any existing transmission lines in remote locations may not have been designed for the transport of large amounts of energy. In particular geographic regions, peak wind speeds may not coincide with peak demand for electrical power, whether offshore or onshore. A possible future option may be to interconnect widely dispersed geographic areas with an HVDC super grid.

Wind power capacity and production

Growth trends

In 2020, wind supplied almost 1600 TWh of electricity, which was over 5% of worldwide electrical generation and about 2% of energy consumption. With over 100 GW added during 2020, mostly in China, global installed wind power capacity reached more than 730 GW. But to help meet Paris Agreement goals to limit climate change analysts say it should expand much faster - by over 1% of electricity generation per year. Expansion of wind power is being hindered by fossil fuel subsidies.

The actual amount of electric power that wind can generate is calculated by multiplying the nameplate capacity by the capacity factor, which varies according to equipment and location. Estimates of the capacity factors for wind installations are in the range of 35% to 44%.

Capacity factor

Since wind speed is not constant, a wind farm's annual energy production is never as much as the sum of the generator nameplate ratings multiplied by the total hours in a year. The ratio of actual productivity in a year to this theoretical maximum is called the capacity factor. Online data is available for some locations, and the capacity factor can be calculated from the yearly output.

Unlike fueled generating plants, the capacity factor is affected by several parameters, including the variability of the wind at the site and the size of the generator relative to the turbine's swept area. A small generator would be cheaper and achieve a higher capacity factor but would produce less electric power (and thus less profit) in high winds. Conversely, a large generator would cost more but generate little extra power and, depending on the type, may stall out at low wind speed. Thus an optimum capacity factor of around 40-50% would be aimed for.

Penetration

Wind energy penetration is the fraction of energy produced by wind compared with the total generation. Wind power's share of worldwide electricity usage in 2021 was almost 7%, up from 3.5% in 2015.

There is no generally accepted maximum level of wind penetration. The limit for a particular grid will depend on the existing generating plants, pricing mechanisms, capacity for energy storage, demand management, and other factors. An interconnected electric power grid will already include reserve generating and transmission capacity to allow for equipment failures. This reserve capacity can also serve to compensate for the varying power generation produced by wind stations. Studies have indicated that 20% of the total annual electrical energy consumption may be incorporated with minimal difficulty. These studies have been for locations with geographically dispersed wind farms, some degree of dispatchable energy or hydropower with storage capacity, demand management, and interconnected to a large grid area enabling the export of electric power when needed. Beyond the 20% level, there are few technical limits, but the economic implications become more significant. Electrical utilities continue to study the effects of large-scale penetration of wind generation on system stability.

A wind energy penetration figure can be specified for different duration of time but is often quoted annually. To obtain 100% from wind annually requires substantial long-term storage or substantial interconnection to other systems that may already have substantial storage. On a monthly, weekly, daily, or hourly basis-or less-wind might supply as much as or more than 100% of current use, with the rest stored, exported or curtailed. The seasonal industry might then take advantage of high wind and low usage times such as at night when wind output can exceed normal demand. Such industry might include the production of silicon, aluminum, steel, or natural gas, and hydrogen, and using future long-term storage to facilitate 100% energy from variable renewable energy. Homes can also be programmed to accept extra electric power on demand, for example by remotely turning up water heater thermostats.

Variability

Wind power is variable, and during low wind periods, it may need to be replaced by other power sources. Transmission networks presently cope with outages of other generation plants and daily changes in electrical demand, but the variability of intermittent power sources such as wind power is more frequent than those of conventional power generation plants which, when scheduled to be operating, may be able to deliver their nameplate capacity around 95% of the time.

Electric power generated from wind power can be highly variable at several different timescales: hourly, daily, or seasonally. Annual variation also exists but is not as significant. Because instantaneous electrical generation and consumption must remain in balance to maintain grid stability, this variability can present substantial challenges to incorporating large amounts of wind power into a grid system. Intermittency and the non- dispatchable nature of wind energy production can raise costs for regulation, incremental operating reserve, and (at high penetration levels) could require an increase in the already existing energy demand management, load shedding, storage solutions, or system interconnection with HVDC cables.

Fluctuations in load and allowance for the failure of large fossil-fuel generating units require operating reserve capacity, which can be increased to compensate for the variability of wind generation.

Utility-scale batteries are often used to balance hourly and shorter timescale variation, but car batteries may gain ground from the mid-2020s. Wind power advocates argue that periods of low wind can be dealt with by simply restarting existing power stations that have been held in readiness, or interlinking with HVDC.

The combination of diversifying variable renewables by type and location, forecasting their variation, and integrating them with dispatchable renewables, flexible fueled generators, and demand response can create a power system that has the potential to meet power supply needs reliably. Integrating ever-higher levels of renewables is being successfully demonstrated in the real world:

In 2009, eight American and three European authorities, writing in the leading electrical engineers' professional journal, didn't find "a credible and firm technical limit to the amount of wind energy that can be accommodated by electric power grids". In fact, not one of more than 200 international studies, nor official studies for the eastern and western U.S. regions, nor the International Energy Agency, has found major costs or technical barriers to reliably integrating up to 30% variable renewable supplies into the grid, and in some studies much more.

Solar power tends to be complementary to wind. On daily to weekly timescales, high-pressure areas tend to bring clear skies and low surface winds, whereas low-pressure areas tend to be windier and cloudier. On seasonal timescales, solar energy peaks in summer, whereas in many areas wind energy is lower in summer and higher in winter. Thus the seasonal variation of wind and solar power tend to cancel each other somewhat. Wind hybrid power systems are becoming more popular.

Predictability

Wind power forecasting methods are used, but the predictability of any particular wind farm is low for short-term operation. For any particular generator, there is an 80% chance that wind output will change less than 10% in an hour and a 40% chance that it will change 10% or more in 5 hours.

In summer 2021 wind power in the United Kingdom fell due to the lowest winds in seventy years - smoothing peaks by producing hydrogen may help in future when wind has a larger share of generation.

While the output from a single turbine can vary greatly and rapidly as local wind speeds vary, as more turbines are connected over larger and larger areas the average power output becomes less variable and more predictable. Weather forecasting permits the electric-power network to be readied for the predictable variations in production that occur.

It is thought that the most reliable low-carbon electricity systems will include a large share of wind power.

Energy storage

Typically, conventional hydroelectricity complements wind power very well. When the wind is blowing strongly, nearby hydroelectric stations can temporarily hold back their water. When the wind drops they can, provided they have the generation capacity, rapidly increase production to compensate. This gives a very even overall power supply and virtually no loss of energy and uses no more water.

Alternatively, where a suitable head of water is not available, pumped-storage hydroelectricity or other forms of grid energy storage such as compressed air energy storage and thermal energy storage can store energy developed by high-wind periods and release it when needed. The type of storage needed depends on the wind penetration level - low penetration requires daily storage, and high penetration requires both short- and long-term storage - as long as a month or more. Stored energy increases the economic value of wind energy since it can be shifted to displace higher-cost generation during peak demand periods. The potential revenue from this arbitrage can offset the cost and losses of storage. Although pumped-storage power systems are only about 75% efficient, and have high installation costs, their low running costs and ability to reduce the required electrical base-load can save both fuel and total electrical generation costs.

Fuel savings and energy payback

According to the American Wind Energy Association, production of wind power in the United States in 2015 avoided consumption of 280 million cubic metres (73 billion US gallons) of water and reduced CO ₂ emissions by 132 million metric tons, while providing US$7.3 bn in public health savings.

The energy needed to build a wind farm divided into the total output over its life, Energy Return on Energy Invested, of wind power varies but averages about 20-25. Thus, the energy payback time is typically around a year.

Onshore wind is an inexpensive source of electric power, cheaper than coal plants and new gas plants. According to BusinessGreen, wind turbines reached grid parity (the point at which the cost of wind power matches traditional sources) in some areas of Europe in the mid-2000s, and in the US around the same time. Falling prices continue to drive the Levelized cost down and it has been suggested that it has reached general grid parity in Europe in 2010, and will reach the same point in the US around 2016 due to an expected reduction in capital costs of about 12%. In 2021 the CEO of Siemens Gamesa warned that increased demand for low-cost wind turbines combined with high input costs and high costs of steel result in increased pressure on the manufacturers and decreasing profit margins.

Northern Eurasia, Canada, some parts of the United States, and Patagonia in Argentina are the best areas for onshore wind: whereas in other parts of the world solar power, or a combination of wind and solar, tend to be cheaper.

Electric power cost and trends

Wind power is capital intensive but has no fuel costs. The price of wind power is therefore much more stable than the volatile prices of fossil fuel sources. However, the estimated average cost per unit of electric power must incorporate the cost of construction of the turbine and transmission facilities, borrowed funds, return to investors (including the cost of risk), estimated annual production, and other components, averaged over the projected useful life of the equipment, which may be more than 20 years. Energy cost estimates are highly dependent on these assumptions so published cost figures can differ substantially.

The cost has decreased as wind turbine technology has improved. There are now longer and lighter wind turbine blades, improvements in turbine performance, and increased power generation efficiency. Also, wind project capital expenditure costs and maintenance costs have continued to decline.

In 2021 a Lazard study of unsubsidized electricity said that wind power levelized cost of electricity continues to fall but more slowly than before. The study estimated new wind-generated electricity cost from $26 to $50/MWh, compared to new gas power from $45 to $74/MWh. The median cost of fully deprecated existing coal power was $42/MWh, nuclear $29/MWh and gas $24/MWh. The study estimated offshore wind at around $83/MWh. Compound annual growth rate was 4% per year from 2016 to 2021, compared to 10% per year from 2009 to 2021.

Incentives and community benefits

Turbine prices have fallen significantly in recent years due to tougher competitive conditions such as the increased use of energy auctions, and the elimination of subsidies in many markets. As of 2021 subsidies are still often given to offshore wind. But they are generally no longer necessary for onshore wind in countries with even a very low carbon price such as China, provided there are no competing fossil fuel subsidies.

Secondary market forces provide incentives for businesses to use wind-generated power, even if there is a premium price for the electricity. For example, socially responsible manufacturers pay utility companies a premium that goes to subsidize and build new wind power infrastructure. Companies use wind-generated power, and in return, they can claim that they are undertaking strong "green" efforts. Wind projects provide local taxes, or payments in place of taxes and strengthen the economy of rural communities by providing income to farmers with wind turbines on their land.

The wind energy sector can produce jobs during the construction and operating phase. Jobs include the manufacturing of the wind mills, and the construction process which includes transporting, installing, and then maintaining these wind mills. An estimated 1.25 million people were employed in wind power in 2020.

Small-scale wind power

Small-scale wind power is the name given to wind generation systems with the capacity to produce up to 50 kW of electrical power. Isolated communities, that may otherwise rely on diesel generators, may use wind turbines as an alternative. Individuals may purchase these systems to reduce or eliminate their dependence on grid electric power for economic reasons, or to reduce their carbon footprint. Wind turbines have been used for household electric power generation in conjunction with battery storage over many decades in remote areas.

Examples of small-scale wind power projects in an urban setting can be found in New York City, where, since 2009, several building projects have capped their roofs with Gorlov-type helical wind turbines. Although the energy they generate is small compared to the buildings' overall consumption, they help to reinforce the building's 'green' credentials in ways that "showing people your high-tech boiler" cannot, with some of the projects also receiving the direct support of the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority.

Off-grid system users can either adapt to intermittent power or use batteries, photovoltaic, or diesel systems to supplement the wind turbine. Equipment such as parking meters, traffic warning signs, street lighting, or wireless Internet gateways may be powered by a small wind turbine, possibly combined with a photovoltaic system, that charges a small battery replacing the need for a connection to the power grid.

Distributed generation from renewable resources is increasing as a consequence of the increased awareness of climate change. The electronic interfaces required to connect renewable generation units with the utility system can include additional functions, such as active filtering to enhance the power quality.

Impact on environment and landscape

The environmental impact of wind power is minor compared to that of fossil fuels. According to the IPCC, in assessments of the life-cycle greenhouse-gas emissions of energy sources, wind turbines have a median value of 12 and 11 ( gCO ₂ eq/ kWh) for offshore and onshore turbines, respectively. Wind turbines have some of the lowest global warming potential per unit of electricity generated.

Onshore (on-land) wind farms can have a significant visual impact and impact on the landscape. Due to a very low surface power density and spacing requirements, wind farms typically need to be spread over more land than other power stations. Their network of turbines, access roads, transmission lines, and substations can result in "energy sprawl"; although land between the turbines and roads can still be used for agriculture. They also need to be built away from urban areas, which can lead to "industrialization of the countryside". Some wind farms are opposed for potentially spoiling protected scenic areas, archaeological landscapes and heritage sites. A report by the Mountaineering Council of Scotland concluded that wind farms harmed tourism in areas known for natural landscapes and panoramic views.

Habitat loss and fragmentation are the greatest potential impacts on wildlife of onshore wind farms. But the worldwide ecological impact is minimal. Thousands of birds and bats, including rare species, have been killed by wind turbine blades, though wind turbines are responsible for far fewer bird deaths than fossil-fueled power stations. This can be mitigated with proper wildlife monitoring.

Many wind turbine blades are made of fiberglass and some only had a lifetime of 10 to 20 years. Previously, there was no market for recycling these old blades, and they were commonly disposed of in landfills. Because blades are hollow, they take up a large volume compared to their mass. Since 2019, some landfill operators have begun requiring blades to be crushed before being landfilled. Blades manufactured in the 2020s are more likely to be designed to be completely recyclable.

Wind turbines also generate noise. At a distance of 300 metres (980 ft) this may be around 45 dB, which is slightly louder than a refrigerator. At 1.5 km (1 mi) distance they become inaudible. There are anecdotal reports of negative health effects on people who live very close to wind turbines. Peer-reviewed research has generally not supported these claims.

Central government

Nuclear power and fossil fuels are subsidized by many governments, and wind power and other forms of renewable energy are also often subsidized. It has been suggested that a subsidy shift would help to level the playing field and support growing energy sectors, namely solar power, wind power, and biofuels. History shows that no energy sector was developed without subsidies.

Following the 2011 Japanese nuclear accidents, Germany's federal government is working on a new plan for increasing energy efficiency and renewable energy commercialization, with a particular focus on offshore wind farms. Under the plan, large wind turbines will be erected far away from the coastlines, where the wind blows more consistently than it does on land, and where the enormous turbines won't bother the inhabitants. The plan aims to decrease Germany's dependence on energy derived from coal and nuclear power plants.

Public opinion

Surveys of public attitudes across Europe and in many other countries show strong public support for wind power. In 2008, surveys found about 80% of EU citizens supported wind power.

Bakker et al. (2012) found in their study that residents who did not want turbines built near them suffered significantly more stress than those who "benefited economically from wind turbines".

Although wind power is a popular form of energy generation, onshore or near offshore wind farms are sometimes opposed for their impact on the landscape (especially scenic areas, heritage areas and archaeological landscapes), as well as noise, and impact on tourism.

In a 2007 survey of wind power in Canada, 89% of respondents said that using renewable energy sources like wind or solar power was positive for Canada because these sources were better for the environment. Only 4 percent considered using renewable sources as negative since they could be unreliable and expensive. Another 2007 survey concluded that wind power was the alternative energy source most likely to gain public support for future development in Canada, with only 16% opposed to this type of energy. By contrast, 3 out of 4 Canadians opposed nuclear power developments.

A 2010 Harris Poll found strong support for wind power in Germany, other European countries, and the United States.

Public support in the United States has decreased from 75% in 2020 to 62% in 2021, with the Democrat Party supporting the use of wind energy twice as much as the Republican Party. President Biden has signed an executive order to begin building large scale wind farms.

Many wind power companies work with local communities to reduce environmental and other concerns associated with particular wind farms. In other cases there is direct community ownership of wind farm projects. Appropriate government consultation, planning and approval procedures also help to minimize environmental risks. Some may still object to wind farms but many say their concerns should be weighed against the need to address the threats posed by air pollution, climate change and the opinions of the broader community.

In the US, wind power projects are reported to boost local tax bases, helping to pay for schools, roads, and hospitals, and to revitalize the economies of rural communities by providing steady income to farmers and other landowners.

In the UK, both the National Trust and the Campaign to Protect Rural England have expressed concerns about the effects on the rural landscape caused by inappropriately sited wind turbines and wind farms.

Some wind farms have become tourist attractions. The Whitelee Wind Farm Visitor Centre has an exhibition room, a learning hub, a café with a viewing deck and also a shop. It is run by the Glasgow Science Centre.

In Denmark, a loss-of-value scheme gives people the right to claim compensation for loss of value of their property if it is caused by proximity to a wind turbine. The loss must be at least 1% of the property's value.

Despite this general support for the concept of wind power in the public at large, local opposition often exists and has delayed or aborted a number of projects. As well as concerns about the landscape, there are concerns that some installations can produce excessive sound and vibration levels leading to a decrease in property values. Potential broadcast-reception solutions include predictive interference modeling as a component of site selection. A study of 50,000 home sales near wind turbines found no statistical evidence that prices were affected.

While aesthetic issues are subjective and some find wind farms pleasant and optimistic, or symbols of energy independence and local prosperity, protest groups are often formed to attempt to block some wind power stations for various reasons.

Some opposition to wind farms is dismissed as NIMBYism, but research carried out in 2009 found that there is little evidence to support the belief that residents only object to wind farms because of a "Not in my Back Yard" attitude.

Geopolitics

Turbine design

Wind turbines are devices that convert the wind's kinetic energy into electrical power. The result of over a millennium of windmill development and modern engineering, today's wind turbines are manufactured in a wide range of horizontal axis and vertical axis types. The smallest turbines are used for applications such as battery charging for auxiliary power. Slightly larger turbines can be used for making small contributions to a domestic power supply while selling unused power back to the utility supplier via the electrical grid. Arrays of large turbines, known as wind farms, have become an increasingly important source of renewable energy and are used in many countries as part of a strategy to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels.

Wind turbine design is the process of defining the form and specifications of a wind turbine to extract energy from the wind. A wind turbine installation consists of the necessary systems needed to capture the wind's energy, point the turbine into the wind, convert mechanical rotation into electrical power, and other systems to start, stop, and control the turbine.

In 1919 the German physicist Albert Betz showed that for a hypothetical ideal wind-energy extraction machine, the fundamental laws of conservation of mass and energy allowed no more than 16/27 (59%) of the kinetic energy of the wind to be captured. This Betz limit can be approached in modern turbine designs, which may reach 70 to 80% of the theoretical Betz limit.

The aerodynamics of a wind turbine are not straightforward. The airflow at the blades is not the same as the airflow far away from the turbine. The very nature of how energy is extracted from the air also causes air to be deflected by the turbine. This affects the objects or other turbines downstream, which is known as Wake effect. Also, the aerodynamics of a wind turbine at the rotor surface exhibit phenomena that are rarely seen in other aerodynamic fields. The shape and dimensions of the blades of the wind turbine are determined by the aerodynamic performance required to efficiently extract energy from the wind, and by the strength required to resist the forces on the blade.

In addition to the aerodynamic design of the blades, the design of a complete wind power system must also address the design of the installation's rotor hub, nacelle, tower structure, generator, controls, and foundation.

Wind power has been used as long as humans have put sails into the wind. King Hammurabi's Codex (reign 1792 - 1750 BC) already mentioned windmills for generating mechanical energy. Wind-powered machines used to grind grain and pump water, the windmill and wind pump, were developed in what is now Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan by the 9th century. Wind power was widely available and not confined to the banks of fast-flowing streams, or later, requiring sources of fuel. Wind-powered pumps drained the polders of the Netherlands, and in arid regions such as the American mid-west or the Australian outback, wind pumps provided water for livestock and steam engines.

The first windmill used for the production of electric power was built in Scotland in July 1887 by Prof James Blyth of Anderson's College, Glasgow (the precursor of Strathclyde University). Blyth's 10 metres (33 ft) high cloth-sailed wind turbine was installed in the garden of his holiday cottage at Marykirk in Kincardineshire, and was used to charge accumulators developed by the Frenchman Camille Alphonse Faure, to power the lighting in the cottage, thus making it the first house in the world to have its electric power supplied by wind power. Blyth offered the surplus electric power to the people of Marykirk for lighting the main street, however, they turned down the offer as they thought electric power was "the work of the devil." Although he later built a wind turbine to supply emergency power to the local Lunatic Asylum, Infirmary, and Dispensary of Montrose, the invention never really caught on as the technology was not considered to be economically viable.

Across the Atlantic, in Cleveland, Ohio, a larger and heavily engineered machine was designed and constructed in the winter of 1887-1888 by Charles F. Brush. This was built by his engineering company at his home and operated from 1886 until 1900. The Brush wind turbine had a rotor 17 metres (56 ft) in diameter and was mounted on an 18 metres (59 ft) tower. Although large by today's standards, the machine was only rated at 12 kW. The connected dynamo was used either to charge a bank of batteries or to operate up to 100 incandescent light bulbs, three arc lamps, and various motors in Brush's laboratory.

With the development of electric power, wind power found new applications in lighting buildings remote from centrally generated power. Throughout the 20th century parallel paths developed small wind stations suitable for farms or residences. The 1973 oil crisis triggered the investigation in Denmark and the United States that led to larger utility-scale wind generators that could be connected to electric power grids for remote use of power. By 2008, the U.S. installed capacity had reached 25.4 gigawatts, and by 2012 the installed capacity was 60 gigawatts. Today, wind-powered generators operate in every size range between tiny stations for battery charging at isolated residences, up to gigawatt-sized offshore wind farms that provide electric power to national electrical networks.

References

External links

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Wind power or wind energy is mostly the use of wind turbines to generate electricity. Wind power is a popular, sustainable, renewable energy source that has a much smaller impact on the environment than burning fossil fuels. Historically, wind power has been used in sails, windmills and windpumps but today it is mostly used to generate electricity.

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Unlike fossil fuels, it doesn't release greenhouse gases into the atmosphere which are harmful for the environment. They also help us less use fossils for fuel, once again lessening the amount of greenhouse gases being released into the atmosphere.

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Tells pros and cons of Biofuel Its Wikipedia URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biofuel

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A biofuel is a fuel that is produced through contemporary processes from biomass, rather than a fuel produced by the very slow geological processes involved in the formation of fossil fuels, such as oil. Since biomass technically can be used as a fuel directly (e.g. wood logs), some people use the terms biomass and biofuel interchangeably. More often than not, however, the word biomass simply denotes the biological raw material the fuel is made of, or some form of thermally/chemically altered solid end product, like torrefied pellets or briquettes.

The word biofuel is usually reserved for liquid or gaseous fuels, used for transportation. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) follows this naming practice. Drop-in biofuels are functionally equivalent to petroleum fuels and fully compatible with the existing petroleum infrastructure. They require no engine modification of the vehicle.

Biofuels can be produced from plants (i.e. energy crops), or from agricultural, commercial, domestic, and/or industrial wastes (if the waste has a biological origin). Renewable biofuels generally involve contemporary carbon fixation, such as those that occur in plants or microalgae through the process of photosynthesis. If the biomass used in the production of biofuel can regrow quickly, the fuel is generally considered to be a form of renewable energy. The greenhouse gas mitigation potential of biofuel varies considerably, from emission levels comparable to fossil fuels in some scenarios to negative emissions in others.

The two most common types of biofuel are bioethanol and biodiesel.

Bioethanol is an alcohol made by fermentation, mostly from carbohydrates produced in sugar or starch crops such as corn, sugarcane, or sweet sorghum. Cellulosic biomass, derived from non-food sources, such as trees and grasses, is also being developed as a feedstock for ethanol production. Ethanol can be used as a fuel for vehicles in its pure form (E100), but it is usually used as a gasoline additive to increase octane and improve vehicle emissions. Bioethanol is widely used in the United States and in Brazil.

Biodiesel is produced from oils or fats using transesterification and is the most common biofuel in Europe. It can be used as a fuel for vehicles in its pure form (B100), but it is usually used as a diesel additive to reduce levels of particulates, carbon monoxide, and hydrocarbons from diesel-powered vehicles.

In 2019, worldwide biofuel production reached 161 billion liters (43 billion gallons US), up 6% from 2018, and biofuels provided 3% of the world's fuels for road transport. The International Energy Agency want biofuels to meet more than a quarter of world demand for transportation fuels by 2050, in order to reduce dependency on petroleum. However, the production and consumption of biofuels are not on track to meet the IEA's sustainable development scenario. From 2020 to 2030 global biofuel output has to increase by 10% each year to reach IEA's goal. Only 3% growth annually is expected the next 5 years.

First-generation biofuels are fuels made from food crops grown on arable land. The crop's sugar, starch, or oil content is converted into biodiesel or ethanol, using transesterification, or yeast fermentation.

Second-generation biofuels are fuels made from lignocellulosic or woody biomass, or agricultural residues/waste. The feedstock used to make the fuels either grow on arable land but are byproducts of the main crop, or they are grown on marginal land. Second-generation feedstocks include straw, bagasse, perennial grasses, jatropha, waste vegetable oil, municipal solid waste and so forth.

Algae can be produced in ponds or tanks on land, and out at sea. Algal fuels have high yields, can be grown with minimal impact on fresh water resources, can be produced using saline water and wastewater, have a high ignition point, and are biodegradable and relatively harmless to the environment if spilled. Production requires large amounts of energy and fertilizer, the produced fuel degrades faster than other biofuels, and it does not flow well in cold temperatures. By 2017, due to economic considerations, most efforts to produce fuel from algae have been abandoned or changed to other applications.

This class of biofuels includes electrofuels and solar fuels. Electrofuels are made by storing electrical energy in the chemical bonds of liquids and gases. The primary targets are butanol, biodiesel, and hydrogen, but include other alcohols and carbon-containing gases such as methane and butane. A solar fuel is a synthetic chemical fuel produced from solar energy. Light is converted to chemical energy, typically by reducing protons to hydrogen, or carbon dioxide to organic compounds.

The following fuels can be produced using first, second, third or fourth-generation biofuel production procedures. Most of these can be produced using two or three of the different biofuel generation procedures.

Biogas is methane produced by the process of anaerobic digestion of organic material by anaerobes. It can be produced either from biodegradable waste materials or by the use of energy crops fed into anaerobic digesters to supplement gas yields. The solid byproduct, digestate, can be used as a biofuel or a fertilizer.

Biogas can be recovered from mechanical biological treatment waste processing systems. Landfill gas, a less clean form of biogas, is produced in landfills through naturally occurring anaerobic digestion. If it escapes into the atmosphere, it is a potential[clarification needed ] greenhouse gas.

Farmers can produce biogas from manure from their cattle by using anaerobic digesters.

Syngas, a mixture of carbon monoxide, hydrogen and other hydrocarbons, is produced by partial combustion of biomass, that is, combustion with an amount of oxygen that is not sufficient to convert the biomass completely to carbon dioxide and water. Before partial combustion, the biomass is dried, and sometimes pyrolysed. The resulting gas mixture, syngas, is more efficient than direct combustion of the original biofuel; more of the energy contained in the fuel is extracted.

Syngas may be burned directly in internal combustion engines, turbines or high-temperature fuel cells. The wood gas generator, a wood-fueled gasification reactor, can be connected to an internal combustion engine.

Syngas can be used to produce methanol, DME and hydrogen, or converted via the Fischer-Tropsch process to produce a diesel substitute, or a mixture of alcohols that can be blended into gasoline. Gasification normally relies on temperatures greater than 700 °C.

Lower-temperature gasification is desirable when co-producing biochar, but results in syngas polluted with tar.

Biologically produced alcohols, most commonly ethanol, and less commonly propanol and butanol, are produced by the action of microorganisms and enzymes through the fermentation of sugars or starches (easiest), or cellulose (which is more difficult). Biobutanol (also called biogasoline) is often claimed to provide a direct replacement for gasoline, because it can be used directly in a gasoline engine.

Ethanol fuel is the most common biofuel worldwide, particularly in Brazil. Alcohol fuels are produced by fermentation of sugars derived from wheat, corn, sugar beets, sugar cane, molasses and any sugar or starch from which alcoholic beverages such as whiskey, can be made (such as potato and fruit waste, etc.). The ethanol production methods used are enzyme digestion (to release sugars from stored starches), fermentation of the sugars, distillation and drying. The distillation process requires significant energy input for heat (sometimes unsustainable natural gas fossil fuel, but cellulosic biomass such as bagasse, the waste left after sugar cane is pressed to extract its juice, is the most common fuel in Brazil, while pellets, wood chips and also waste heat are more common in Europe) Waste steam fuels ethanol factory - where waste heat from the factories also is used in the district heating grid.

Ethanol can be used in petrol engines as a replacement for gasoline; it can be mixed with gasoline to any percentage. Most existing car petrol engines can run on blends of up to 15% bioethanol with petroleum/gasoline. Ethanol has a smaller energy density than that of gasoline; this means it takes more fuel (volume and mass) to produce the same amount of work. An advantage of ethanol () is that it has a higher octane rating than ethanol-free gasoline available at roadside gas stations, which allows an increase of an engine's compression ratio for increased thermal efficiency. In high-altitude (thin air) locations, some states mandate a mix of gasoline and ethanol as a winter oxidizer to reduce atmospheric pollution emissions.

Ethanol is also used to fuel bioethanol fireplaces. As they do not require a chimney and are "flueless", bioethanol fires are extremely useful[citation needed ] for newly built homes and apartments without a flue. The downsides to these fireplaces is that their heat output is slightly less than electric heat or gas fires, and precautions must be taken to avoid carbon monoxide poisoning.

Corn-to-ethanol and other food stocks has led to the development of cellulosic ethanol. According to a joint research agenda conducted through the US Department of Energy, the fossil energy ratios ( FER) for cellulosic ethanol, corn ethanol, and gasoline are 10.3, 1.36, and 0.81, respectively.[clarification needed ]

Ethanol has roughly one-third lower energy content per unit of volume compared to gasoline. This is partly counteracted by the better efficiency when using ethanol (in a long-term test of more than 2.1 million km, the BEST project found FFV vehicles to be 1-26% more energy efficient than petrol cars, but the volumetric consumption increases by approximately 30%, so more fuel stops are required).

Methanol is currently produced from natural gas, a non-renewable fossil fuel. In the future it is hoped to be produced from biomass as biomethanol. This is technically feasible, but the production is currently being postponed for concerns that the economic viability is still pending. The methanol economy is an alternative to the hydrogen economy, to be contrasted with today's hydrogen production from natural gas.

Butanol () is formed by ABE fermentation (acetone, butanol, ethanol) and experimental modifications of the process show potentially high net energy gains with butanol as the only liquid product. Butanol will produce more energy than ethanol because of its lower oxygen content and allegedly can be burned "straight" in existing gasoline engines (without modification to the engine or car), and is less corrosive and less water-soluble than ethanol, and could be distributed via existing infrastructures. DuPont and BP are working together to help develop butanol.[citation needed ] Escherichia coli strains have also been successfully engineered to produce butanol by modifying their amino acid metabolism. One drawback to butanol production in E. coli remains the high cost of nutrient rich media, however, recent work has demonstrated E. coli can produce butanol with minimal nutritional supplementation.

Biodiesel is the most common biofuel in Europe. It is produced from oils or fats using transesterification and is a liquid similar in composition to fossil/mineral diesel. Chemically, it consists mostly of fatty acid methyl (or ethyl) esters ( FAMEs). Feedstocks for biodiesel include animal fats, vegetable oils, soy, rapeseed, jatropha, mahua, mustard, flax, sunflower, palm oil, hemp, field pennycress, Pongamia pinnata and algae. Pure biodiesel (B100, also known as "neat" biodiesel) currently reduces emissions with up to 60% compared to diesel Second generation B100. As of 2020, researchers at Australia's CSIRO have been studying safflower oil as an engine lubricant, and researchers at Montana State University's Advanced Fuel Centre in the US have been studying the oil's performance in a large diesel engine, with results described as a "game-changer".

Biodiesel can be used in any diesel engine when mixed with mineral diesel. It can also be used in its pure form (B100) in diesel engines, but some maintenance and performance problems may then occur during wintertime utilization, since the fuel becomes somewhat more viscous at lower temperatures, depending on the feedstock used.

In some countries, manufacturers cover their diesel engines under warranty for B100 use, although Volkswagen of Germany, for example, asks drivers to check by telephone with the VW environmental services department before switching to B100. In most cases, biodiesel is compatible with diesel engines from 1994 onwards, which use ' Viton' (by DuPont) synthetic rubber in their mechanical fuel injection systems. Note however, that no vehicles are certified for using pure biodiesel before 2014, as there was no emission control protocol available for biodiesel before this date.

Electronically controlled ' common rail' and ' Unit Injector' type systems from the late 1990s onwards may only use biodiesel blended with conventional diesel fuel. These engines have finely metered and atomized multiple-stage injection systems that are very sensitive to the viscosity of the fuel. Many current-generation diesel engines are made so that they can run on B100 without altering the engine itself, although this depends on the fuel rail design. Since biodiesel is an effective solvent and cleans residues deposited by mineral diesel, engine filters may need to be replaced more often, as the biofuel dissolves old deposits in the fuel tank and pipes. It also effectively cleans the engine combustion chamber of carbon deposits, helping to maintain efficiency. In many European countries, a 5% biodiesel blend is widely used and is available at thousands of gas stations. Biodiesel is also an oxygenated fuel, meaning it contains a reduced amount of carbon and higher hydrogen and oxygen content than fossil diesel. This improves the combustion of biodiesel and reduces the particulate emissions from unburnt carbon. However, using pure biodiesel may increase NO x-emissions

Biodiesel is also safe to handle and transport because it is non-toxic and biodegradable, and has a high flash point of about 300 °F (148 °C) compared to petroleum diesel fuel, which has a flash point of 125 °F (52 °C).

In the US, more than 80% of commercial trucks and city buses run on diesel. The emerging US biodiesel market is estimated to have grown 200% from 2004 to 2005. "By the end of 2006 biodiesel production was estimated to increase fourfold [from 2004] to more than" 1 billion US gallons (3,800,000 m ³).

In France, biodiesel is incorporated at a rate of 8% in the fuel used by all French diesel vehicles. Avril Group produces under the brand Diester, a fifth of 11 million tons of biodiesel consumed annually by the European Union. It is the leading European producer of biodiesel.

Green diesel is produced through hydrocracking biological oil feedstocks, such as vegetable oils and animal fats. Hydrocracking is a refinery method that uses elevated temperatures and pressure in the presence of a catalyst to break down larger molecules, such as those found in vegetable oils, into shorter hydrocarbon chains used in diesel engines. It may also be called renewable diesel, hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO fuel) or hydrogen-derived renewable diesel. Unlike biodiesel, green diesel has exactly the same chemical properties as petroleum-based diesel. It does not require new engines, pipelines or infrastructure to distribute and use, but has not been produced at a cost that is competitive with petroleum. Gasoline versions are also being developed. Green diesel is being developed in Louisiana and Singapore by ConocoPhillips, Neste Oil, Valero, Dynamic Fuels, and Honeywell UOP as well as Preem in Gothenburg, Sweden, creating what is known as Evolution Diesel.

Straight unmodified edible vegetable oil is generally not used as fuel, but lower-quality oil has been used for this purpose. Used vegetable oil is increasingly being processed into biodiesel, or (more rarely) cleaned of water and particulates and then used as a fuel.

As with 100% biodiesel (B100), to ensure the fuel injectors atomize the vegetable oil in the correct pattern for efficient combustion, vegetable oil fuel must be heated to reduce its viscosity to that of diesel, either by electric coils or heat exchangers. This is easier in warm or temperate climates. MAN B&W Diesel, Wärtsilä, and Deutz AG, as well as a number of smaller companies, such as Elsbett, offer engines that are compatible with straight vegetable oil, without the need for after-market modifications.

Vegetable oil can also be used in many older diesel engines that do not use common rail or unit injection electronic diesel injection systems. Due to the design of the combustion chambers in indirect injection engines, these are the best engines for use with vegetable oil. This system allows the relatively larger oil molecules more time to burn. Some older engines, especially Mercedes, are driven experimentally by enthusiasts without any conversion. A handful of drivers have experienced limited success with earlier pre-"Pumpe Duse" VW TDI engines and other similar engines with direct injection. Several companies, such as Elsbett or Wolf, have developed professional conversion kits and successfully installed hundreds of them over the last decades.

Oils and fats can be hydrogenated to give a diesel substitute. The resulting product is a straight-chain hydrocarbon with a high cetane number, low in aromatics and sulfur and does not contain oxygen. Hydrogenated oils can be blended with diesel in all proportions. They have several advantages over biodiesel, including good performance at low temperatures, no storage stability problems and no susceptibility to microbial attack.

Bioethers (also referred to as fuel ethers or oxygenated fuels) are cost-effective compounds that act as octane rating enhancers."Bioethers are produced by the reaction of reactive iso-olefins, such as iso-butylene, with bioethanol." Bioethers are created from wheat or sugar beets. They also enhance engine performance, while significantly reducing engine wear and toxic exhaust emissions. Although bioethers are likely to replace petroethers in the UK, it is highly unlikely they will become a fuel in and of itself due to the low energy density. By greatly reducing the amount of ground-level ozone emissions, they contribute to air quality.

When it comes to transportation fuel there are six ether additives: dimethyl ether (DME), diethyl ether (DEE), methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE), ethyl tert-butyl ether (ETBE), tert-amyl methyl ether (TAME), and tert-amyl ethyl ether (TAEE).

The European Fuel Oxygenates Association (EFOA) identifies methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE) and ethyl tert-butyl ether (ETBE) as the most commonly used ethers in fuel to replace lead. Ethers were introduced in Europe in the 1970s to replace the highly toxic compound. Although Europeans still use bioether additives, the US no longer has an oxygenate requirement therefore bioethers are no longer used as the main fuel additive.

A biofuel project is said to be carbon-neutral if the CO ² absorbed by the crop compensate for the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions related to the project (CO ² is the most important of the greenhouse gases, and there is 27% carbon in CO ²). This includes any emissions caused by direct or indirect land use change. Many first generation biofuel projects are not carbon neutral given this definition. Some have even higher emissions than some fossil based alternatives.

It is the total amount of absorption and emissions that together determines if the GHG life cycle cost of a biofuel project is positive, neutral or negative. If emissions during production, processing, transport and combustion are higher than what is absorbed, both above and below ground during crop growth, the GHG life cycle cost is positive. Likewise, if total absorption is higher than total emissions, the life cycle cost is negative.

Whitaker et al. argue that a miscanthus crop with a yield of 10 tonnes per hectare per year sequesters so much carbon that the crop more than compensates for both farm operations emissions and transport emissions. (The emissions originating from combustion are fully absorbed by next seasons' above-ground plant growth.) The top chart on the right displays two CO ² negative miscanthus production pathways, and two CO ² positive poplar production pathways, represented in gram CO ²-equivalents per megajoule. The bars are sequential and move up and down as atmospheric CO ² is estimated to increase and decrease. The grey/blue bars represent agriculture, processing and transport related emissions, the green bars represents soil carbon change, and the yellow diamonds represent total final emissions.

Successful sequestration is dependent on planting sites, as the best soils for sequestration are those that are currently low in carbon. The varied results displayed in the graph highlights this fact. For the UK, successful sequestration is expected for arable land over most of England and Wales, with unsuccessful sequestration expected in parts of Scotland, due to already carbon rich soils (existing woodland) plus lower yields. Soils already rich in carbon includes peatland and mature forest. Grassland can also be carbon rich, however Milner et al. argue that the most successful carbon sequestration in the UK takes place below improved grasslands. The bottom chart displays the estimated yield necessary to achieve CO ² negativity for different levels of existing soil carbon saturation. The higher the yield, the more likely CO ₂ negativity becomes.

All burning of carbon-based fuel lead to carbon-based emissions (e.g carbon dioxide, airborne carbon particulates, carbon monoxide, and atmospheric alcohols from ethanol). It does not matter if the carbon originated from fossil fuels or biofuels. In general, substance or energy is considered pollution when released into the environment at a rate faster than the environment can disperse, dilute, decompose, recycle, or store it in some harmless form. Based on this definition, both fossil fuels and some biofuels are polluting the environment. For instance, in 2018, the European parliament voted to phase out the use of palm oil in transport fuels by 2030. The reason for the policy change was a 2015 study funded by the European Commission which found that palm oil and soybean oil had the highest indirect greenhouse gas emissions due to deforestation and drainage of peatlands.

In 2009 a Swedish study of the giant brown haze that periodically covers large areas in South Asia determined that two thirds of it had been principally produced by residential cooking and agricultural burning, and one third by fossil-fuel burning. The use of wood biomass as an industrial fuel has been shown to produce fewer particulates and other pollutants than the burning seen in wildfires or open field fires.

To calculate land use requirements for different kinds of power production, it is essential to know the relevant area-specific power densities. Smil estimates that the average area-specific power densities for biofuels, wind, hydro and solar power production are 0.30 W/m ², 1 W/m ², 3 W/m ² and 5 W/m ², respectively (power in the form of heat for biofuels, and electricity for wind, hydro and solar). The average human power consumption on ice-free land is 0.125 W/m ² (heat and electricity combined), although rising to 20 W/m ² in urban and industrial areas. The reason for the low area-specific power density for biofuels is a combination of low yields and only partial utilization of the plant when making liquid fuels (for instance, ethanol is typically made from sugarcane's sugar content or corn's starch content, while biodiesel is often made from rapeseed and soybean's oil content).

Smil estimates the following densities:

Combusting solid biomass is more energy efficient than combusting biofuel (liquids), as the whole plant is utilized. For instance, corn plantations producing solid biomass for combustion generate more than double the amount of power per square metre compared to corn plantations producing for ethanol, when the yield is the same: 10 t/ha generates 0.60 W/m ² and 0.26 W/m ² respectively. Oven dry biomass in general have a calorific content of roughly 18 GJ/t, and every t/ha of dry biomass yield increases a plantation's power production by 0.06 W/m ².

As mentioned above, Smil estimates that the world average for wind, hydro and solar power production is 1 W/m ², 3 W/m ² and 5 W/m ² respectively. In order to match these power densities, plantation yields must reach 17 t/ha, 50 t/ha and 83 t/ha for wind, hydro and solar respectively. This seems achievable for tropical plantations - Smil estimate that large scale plantations with eucalyptus, acacia, leucaena, pinus and dalbergia in tropical and subtropical regions yield 20-25 t/ha, equivalent to 1.20-1.50 W/m ². It also seems achievable for elephant grasses, e.g. miscanthus (10-40 t/ha, or 0.6-2.4 W/m ²), and napier (15-80 t/ha, or 0.9-4.8 W/m ²), but unlikely for forest and many other types of biomass crops - Smil's estimate for natural temperate mixed forests is 1.5-2 dry tonnes per hectare (2-2,5 m ³, equivalent to 0.1 W/m ²), ranging from 0.9 m3 in Greece to 6 m ³ in France).

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A biofuel is a fuel that is produced through contemporary processes from biomass, rather than a fuel produced by the very slow geological processes involved in the formation of fossil fuels, such as oil. Since biomass technically can be used as a fuel directly (e.g.

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Tells pros and cons of Solar Fuel Its Wikipedia URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_fuel

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A solar fuel is a synthetic chemical fuel produced directly/indirectly from solar energy sunlight/solar heat through photochemical/photobiological (i.e., artificial photosynthesis, experimental as of 2013), thermochemical (i.e., through the use of solar heat supplied by concentrated solar thermal energy to drive a chemical reaction), and electrochemical reaction.

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- Coal
- Fuels (like oil)
- Natural Gasses

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Tells pros and cons of Geothermal power Its Wikipedia URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_power

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this article says how the wind turbines spin with the wind and turn that energy into electricity.

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Wind is a form of solar energy caused by a combination of three concurrent events:

1. The sun unevenly heating the atmosphere

2. Irregularities of the earth's surface

3. The rotation of the earth.

Wind flow patterns and speeds vary greatly across the United States and are modified by bodies of water, vegetation, and differences in terrain. Humans use this wind flow, or motion energy, for many purposes: sailing, flying a kite, and even generating electricity.

The terms "wind energy" and "wind power" both describe the process by which the wind is used to generate mechanical power or electricity. This mechanical power can be used for specific tasks (such as grinding grain or pumping water) or a generator can convert this mechanical power into electricity.

A wind turbine turns wind energy into electricity using the aerodynamic force from the rotor blades, which work like an airplane wing or helicopter rotor blade. When wind flows across the blade, the air pressure on one side of the blade decreases. The difference in air pressure across the two sides of the blade creates both lift and drag. The force of the lift is stronger than the drag and this causes the rotor to spin. The rotor connects to the generator, either directly (if it's a direct drive turbine) or through a shaft and a series of gears (a gearbox) that speed up the rotation and allow for a physically smaller generator. This translation of aerodynamic force to rotation of a generator creates electricity.

Types of Wind Turbines

The majority of wind turbines fall into two basic types:

When wind turbines of any size are installed on the "customer" side of the electric meter, or are installed at or near the place where the energy they produce will be used, they're called "distributed wind.

Many turbines used in distributed applications are small wind turbines. Single small wind turbines-below 100 kilowatts-are typically used for residential, agricultural, and small commercial and industrial applications.

Small turbines can be used in hybrid energy systems with other distributed energy resources, such as microgrids powered by diesel generators, batteries, and photovoltaics.

These systems are called hybrid wind systems and are typically used in remote, off-grid locations( where a connection to the utility grid is not available) and are becoming more common in grid-connected applications for resiliency.

Learn more about distributed wind from the Distributed Wind Animation or read about what the Wind Energy Technologies Office is doing to support the deployment of distributed wind systems for homes, businesses, farms, and community wind projects.

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Learn the basics of how wind turbines operate to produce clean power from an abundant, renewable resource-the wind.

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The reason we need to switch over to renewable sources is because the ones that we

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Since the energy plants (dams, windmills, solar panels) need to be set up, this means there are more open jobs for people

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Air Quality
This article is part of our "CleanTechnica Answer Box" collection. In this collection of articles, we respond to dozens of common anti-cleantech myths.
Renewable energy is already cheaper than other energy options in most of the world, but it comes with other economic and societal benefits as well. Because of the number of countries investing in renewable energy, the complexity of their national economies and their energy infrastructure details, it isn't possible to cover everything in one online article. The subject would be better addressed in a book. So, this article is intended only to be a snapshot of some key high-level points.

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs

The first point is that there are a huge number of people employed in renewable energy jobs globally. There are almost 10 million of them around the world. Slightly over 3 million are employed in solar power. Large hydropower employs about 1.5 million people, and 1.2 million are in wind power employment. Advanced energy - which includes solar, wind, energy efficiency, energy storage and EVs - contributed $1.4 trillion to the global economy in 2016. (The US portion of this amount was $200 billion.)

In the US, President Trump has jabbered on about the importance of coal jobs, but they actually aren't all that significant when put in context. According to a Washington Post article, the US coal industry employs about 76,000 workers, which is less than many industries. For example, used car dealerships have a total of about 138,000 workers, casinos employ about 99,000 people, as do travel agencies. Museums, radio stations, and breweries and wineries all have more workers than coal does.

Shockingly, the Washington Post article leaves out renewable energy jobs. In fact, over 260,000 Americans are employed by the solar power industry, and that total blows away the number of coal jobs - it's well over three times more! Imagine if strong solar power industries were stimulated in West Virginia and Ohio.

Easily beating coal again is the wind power industry, with over 100,000 jobs. Also, NREL published an article in 2017 stating that wind power technician was the fastest growing job in the country. Funny how Trump doesn't mention that, and actually has a history of complaining about wind power and suing to try to block wind farms.

Another high-demand cleantech job is solar PV installer. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median pay for PV installers is about $39,000/yr. For the wind power service tech job, it is $52,000. Would you rather work outdoors in unpolluted air or in a coal mine breathing coal dust which may cause you to die prematurely?

Maybe President Trump should try coal mining. Nah, he's too busy bashing wind power.

What was that ... He might have noticed how dismal coal's future looks and how bright it is for wind power. "To achieve 20% wind power by 2030, the U.S. Department of Energy estimates that the United States will require more than 100,000 additional wind turbines, creating more than 500,000 new jobs." potentially 500,000 new wind power jobs?

So, if that estimate is accurate, there would be over 600,000 jobs in wind power just in the US. That figure might sound kind of nuts, but it has been referenced here as well. "According to the Wind Vision Report, wind has the potential to support more than 600,000 jobs in manufacturing, installation, maintenance, and supporting services by 2050."

At the state level, the numbers look promising too, Texas alone may have 31,500 wind power jobs by 2020, Colorado could have 22,000, and Iowa about 17,000.

Another benefit is that wind turbines can be installed Here's another The Union of Concerned Scientists made a great point in one its This means that, on average, more jobs are created for each unit of electricity generated from renewable sources than from fossil fuels." That is true even when wind and solar power are in rural areas at existing farms to provide much-needed income to local people. fascinating example: "The report looked at the 23 largest wind farms in Illinois, finding that they will add almost $6 billion to local economies over their lifetimes and have resulted in the creation of more than 19,000 jobs during the construction periods. The projects will also support 814 permanent jobs in the state." recent articles on renewable energy: "Compared with fossil fuel technologies, which are typically mechanized and capital-intensive, the renewable energy industry is more labor intensive. Solar panels need humans to install them; wind farms need technicians for maintenance. cheaper for the customer.

An NREL document backed up this insight as well. "There are two main reasons why renewable energy technologies offer an economic advantage: (1) they are labor intensive, so they generally create more jobs per dollar invested than conventional electricity generation technologies, and (2) they use primarily indigenous resources, so most of the energy dollars can be kept at home."

So, renewable energy can generate better jobs and more of them.

Human Welfare

Another economic benefit - which doesn't seem to get enough attention - is that renewable energy is scalable in areas where there is very little or no electricity. For example, there are over one billion people who don't have access to electricity. Getting home solar power systems gives them access to something that can change their lives for the better. "Even in the poorest countries, solar's flexibility is making it desirable. In Bangladesh, more than 3.5m solar home systems have been installed in rural villages." (We covered that inspiring story in 2014: The Solar Energy Revolution Everyone's Ignoring ... Is In Bangladesh.)

How do you begin to quantify the value of giving electricity access to millions of people who did not have it? To put it simply, this benefit must be massive. Not having access to electricity puts many Africans in the position of having to buy kerosene, the economic effects of which can be far-reaching. "When added to cell phone charging, fuels for lighting and cooking, energy can consume up to 50% of household incomes in sub-Saharan Africa. As long as families are dependent on non-renewable energy sources, they cannot lift themselves out of poverty." (Kerosene usage also results in a huge number of severe or even deadly burns every year in Africa.)

We who live in countries with stable and ubiquitous electricity may not think about it much because we probably have always had it, but solar power in very poor areas with no electricity can be transformative.

Similarly, reducing the use of coal and eventually eliminating it would save hundreds of billions of dollars of dollars a year in various societal costs. "The impacts found are damages due to climate change; public health damages from NOx, SO2, PM2.5, and mercury emissions; fatalities of members of the public due to rail accidents during coal transport; the public health burden in Appalachia associated with coal mining; government subsidies; and lost value of abandoned mine lands."

Coal's impact in China is even greater. In a single year, about 670,000 premature deaths have been linked to coal emissions, but the true number might have actually been even larger than that. "The health cost [of the study] is only based on the premature death figures due to the limitations of our research data. It could be way higher if we also include medical costs for other chronic illnesses." According to the same Fortune article, 157 million people in China live in areas with harmful air pollution levels.

If coal impacts cost hundreds of billions each year in the US, how much are they in China, where the number of premature deaths and respiratory illnesses is much greater?

Economic Stimulation

Of course, renewable energy contributes more economically than only jobs and pollution reduction. An IRENA report includes a reference to how stimulating renewable energy investment can be. "Doubling the share of renewables in the global energy mix by 2030 would increase global GDP by up to 1.1% or USD 1.3 trillion. The report shows that such a transition increases global GDP in 2030 between 0.6% and 1.1%, or between around USD 700 billion and USD 1.3 trillion compared to business as usual."

Another key, and very striking, benefit is how renewable energy investment can impact trade. "For fossil fuel importers, the switch to a greater share of renewables has potentially favourable trade implications. Reducin g fuel imports can improve trade balance and improve GDP. The EU33 improves its net exports by USD 15 billion when the renewables share is doubled and by USD 21 billion in the higher electrification case."

According to an analysis conducted by the Union of Concerned Scientists, implementing a national 25% by 2025 renewable electric standard would result in the following benefits: "$263.4 billion in new capital investment for RE technologies, $13.5 billion in new landowner income from biomass production and/or wind land lease payments, and $11.5 billion in new property tax revenue for local communities [ ]."

A single program created by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was very stimulating to the US Wind power has contributed greatly to the US economy in "Since 2005, American wind power has attracted more than $100 billion in new investment. At the current rate, the wind industry is investing between $10 billion and $20 billion per year in the U.S. economy."Another key point is the national economy (at a critical time). "NREL's analysis estimates that up to 75,000 direct and indirect jobs and up to $44 billion in total economic output were supported by the design, manufacturing, construction, and installation of solar photovoltaic (PV) and wind projects funded by the 1603 Treasury grant program. In addition, the study estimates that the operation and maintenance of these solar and wind facilities will continue to sustain up to $1.8 billion per year in economic output over the lifetime of the facilities (20-30 years)." just in the last dozen years or so.
amount of manufacturing that takes place here in America. "Now, more than 50% of a U.S.-installed turbine's value is produced in America, a twelve-fold increase from just a few years ago. Some turbine manufacturers plan to make 100% of their components in America, and the trend is expected to continue."

Currently, wind power contributes about $20 billion a year in value to the US economy, and it has been projected that amount will rise to $24 billion by 2020.

Wind power is more stable than fossil fuels in this regard. "Because the electricity from wind farms is sold at a fixed price over a long period of time (e.g. 20+ years) and its fuel is free, wind energy mitigates the price uncertainty that fuel costs add to traditional sources of energy." The Solar Foundation also released a report containing an astonishing figure - "the U.S. solar industry added $154 billion in economic output in 2016."

Researchers at UC Berkeley studied the climate and health benefits of solar and wind power in the US and came up with equally huge benefits. "The climate benefit estimates ranged from $5 billion to $106 billion, with an additional $30 billion to $113 billion in air quality and public health benefits. And that's just the estimated economic benefits of the averted 3,000 to 12,000 premature deaths-it doesn't count things like sub-lethal medic al issues and lost productivity, much less the personal benefits to individual lives." On the low end, the combined values are $35 billion in benefits. At the top, it has the number at $219 billion.

Most of this information so far has been US-centric so let's look at some other countries. China is a world leader in renewable energy in part due to it's over-reliance upon coal and other fossil fuels. The result has been very harmful and even deadly air pollution problems. It has been reported that China will invest $361 billion by 2020 to combat this very serious problem.

"In the development scenario, the quantitative analysis implies that the added value brought about by wind and solar PV power industry, directly and directly, is about 5.0 times in 2030 more than that in 2015," a China's forward-looking investments in renewable energy have already Germany is also a renewable energy world leader and its transition from fossil fuels to clean energy has had study of renewable energy economic benefits in China estimated. "During 2016-2030, about 8674 billion RMB (1300 billion dollars) and 6949 billion RMB (1042 billion dollars) added value could be generated respectively by wind power industry and solar PV power industry, accounting for about 0.58% and 0.47% of GDP."
paid off economically. "China is a case in point. Having pursued an aggressive industrial policy early on, it has emerged as a major exporter of renewable energy. It exported over USD 10 billion in solar panels and cells, almost 80 times the value it exported only ten years earlier (UNEP, 2013). As countries develop their individual renewable energy sectors, localising different activities in the value chain can redirect investments. These are channelled into the local economy and would otherwise have been spent on importing fossil fuels or renewable energy goods and services." some clear economic benefits. "By 2020, they calculate, the renewable energy industry could contribute as much as 37 billion euros annually to GDP and the total number of jobs will be 120,000 higher than would be the case in the absence of the Energiewende."

A PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC) study generated some key figures about such benefits as well. "The study finds that climate policy measures will create a total of 430,000 new jobs by 2020, mainly in the construction and metal production sectors, and increase GDP by 1 per cent in 2020. Due to increased energy efficiency and an overall decline in energy demand, Germany will also save €3,5 bn in fuel imports. The authors argue that, despite the high initial investments of €125 bn, long-term savings of €274 bn, e.g. through reduced energy consumption, will result in a net economic gain of €149 bn. Private households will save about €25 bn in energy bills. While the energy sector faces a net burden of €10 bn, industry, transport, agriculture, as well as the trade and services sectors can expect a total gain of €84 bn."

By embracing renewable energy Germany has developed its technological capacity and increased its exports. "Germany has been one of the biggest exporters of technology and equipment for use in exploiting renewable energy sources. The value of exports just recently totalled around 10 billion euros." 42 BMUB estimates that these exports will increase to €47-69 billion by 2030."

Energy Efficiency

Adding new, more efficient energy technology can reduce waste in India has seen other benefits to renewable energy, too, Logan says. Right now, the country loses about 30 percent of the energy it generates, because of transmission line losses. By having decentralized solar power and wind, they've cut these losses and seen big savings in energy and money."As mentioned before with the Bangladesh example, in rural India, renewable energy has the ability to current systems. "
bring electricity to remote places where people have not had access, or not enough of it. To reach such places, large power plants just can't make financial sense unless heavily subsidized, whereas distributed, small-scale renewables can service people and save them money today. "Solar DC microgrids are also starting to have an impact in Indian villages that have never had grid-provided electricity. Our largest installation to date involves 71 villages in the western state of Rajasthan, where we have been working with the utility company Jodhpur Vidyut Vitran Nigam to electrify some 4,000 homes for the Ministry of Power."

So renewable energy is not only about the environment, it has the ability to changes lives for the better and it contributes economic benefits.

Climate Change

It has been established that climate change can intensify weather, including causing severe events like hurricanes, cyclones, tornadoes, and wildfires. "Human-induced climate change has already increased the number and strength of some of these extreme events."

Hurricane Harvey alone had estimated costs of $125 billion. Estimates for the costs of Hurricane Maria range from $95 billion to $102 billion. In fact, 2017 was a record-breaking year for the United States. Sixteen distinct severe weather events cost a total of $306 billion. The previous record of $214 billion was set in 2005.

California experienced the most costly wildfires in its history in 2017 - the total cost has been reported to be $9 billion dollars. One contributing factor to the fires was a particular type of wind which has been linked to climate change. "According to a 2015 study, thanks to warmer and drier summers driven by global climate change, the downslope winds that led to the current situation are going to become more frequent and are likely to cause fires across even bigger areas in California in the future."

While these severe weather event costs are huge, they unsurprisingly are small compared with the collective ones. "The share of national GDP at risk from climate change exceeds $1.5 trillion in the 301 major cities around the world. Including the impact of human pandemics - which are likely to become more severe as the planet warms - the figure increases to nearly $2.2 trillion in economic output at risk through 2025." These figures are from an article on the Harvard Business Review site, not from an environmental activist source. These people are about business - they aren't environmentalists.

One billion people might be forced to leave their homes by the impacts of climate change. What will that cost? Do we know how to make such estimates?

Another way that climate change can impact human health is through the spread of infectious diseases. "Climate change destroys habitats and stresses animal populations such as the bats of West Africa, forcing them to hunt for food nearer to humans. Humans, likewise pressed by climate impacts, encroach more closely on animal habitats. While we cannot know that climate change was the cause of the specific interaction between bats and humans that is believed to have launched the Ebola outbreak in Guinea, we will see more of these interactions in the future, and more epidemics as a result."

The Zika virus outbreak was also noted to possibly have had a connection. "The spread of Zika, just as with Ebola, has sent a strong signal to the international community that there is a need for increased attention to the linkages between environment and health," said UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner.

The costs of the 2014-2016 Ebola outbreak in Africa were huge. "Aside from the devastating health effects, the Ebola epidemic also had a pronounced socio-economic im pact in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. According to 2014 projections from the World Bank3, an estimated $2.2 billion was lost in 2015 in the gross domestic product (GDP)4 of the three countries. The disease resulted in lower investment and a substantial loss in private sector growth, declining agricultural production that led to concerns about food security, and a decrease in cross-border trade as restrictions on movement, goods, and services increased." (Over 10,000 people also lost their lives.)

The costs of the Zika outbreak range from $7 billion to $18 billion.

Climate change was not the only factor in causing these outbreaks, so only a portion of these total costs would be attributable to it. However, these are chilling examples of climate change's impact on human health and the burdensome costs that go with it. Renewable energy replaces fossil fuels, thereby reducing emissions that cause climate change. Increasing renewable energy allows to decrease the costs described, and that is obviously very economically beneficial.

In fact, continuing to use fossil fuels will only worsen climate change impacts and their costs. Renewable energy is clearly the solution to many global problems. How could anyone argue against potentially raising millions of people out of energy and/or financial poverty with a clean, inexhaustible form of electricity?
Images: solar power plant in Germany by * CC BY-SA 3.0; wind farm by Steve Braund * CC BY-NC-SA 2.0; Indian solar by Vinaykumar8687 * CC BY-SA 4.0; Hurricane Harvey aftermath by SC National Guard; Ebola virus graphic, CDC

Tags: China, CleanTechnica Answer Box, Germany, India, solar energy jobs, solar installers, Solar Jobs, usa, Wind Energy Jobs, wind turbine jobs, wind turbine technicians

About the Author

Jake Richardson Hello, I have been writing online for some time, and enjoy the outdoors. If you like, you can follow me on Google Plus.

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Renewable Energy Has More Economic Benefits Than You Know

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Renewable energy is already cheaper than other energy options in most of the world, but it comes with other economic and societal benefits as well. Because of the number of countries investing in renewable energy, the complexity of their national economies and their energy infrastructure details, it isn't possible to cover everything in one online article.