What is even more bizarre to me, is that:
1. Wind turbines look really slick in my opinion
2. These people don't complain about power transmission pylons, which are uglier to look at!
1. Wind turbines look really slick in my opinion
2. These people don't complain about power transmission pylons, which are uglier to look at!
Again iirc(!), line operators get a guaranteed return of 8%, while land-owners get a low one-time payment.
And maybe the crisis will finally push this, but my guess is, this will take plenty more years until finally being built fully.
They are expensive, but I also don't hate it. If we can reduce the impact of infrastructure on people, we should do it.
Some people complain that birds will fly into them, as if climate change won’t kill 1000x as many birds as turbines ever will.
They're a visible symbol of non-progress, we had windmills for centuries and it's literally one of the most low-tech ways to produce power.
Though I would argue that current wind is extremely new, in the advanced manufacturing methods for such massive structures, in the design of blades and placement on wind farms. And for flaring offshore wind, the engineering is truly impressive. Thinking that modern wind turbines are centuries old tech is like thinking that nuclear power is centuries old tech because it boils water to generate mechanical force.
But again, "new" is not the desirable property, it's only a means to other better attributes.
Exactly. Since watching Macross Plus when I was young, wind turbines instill a deep nostalgia in me. Though Yoko Kanno’s soundtrack is likely partly to blame. :)
The pylons, no one complains because they’re used to them. No kid will grow up complaining about turbines.
Perhaps your memory of turbine perception is dominated by some examples that weren't quite as big as you might have thought? It's really difficult to judge the size of those things (they are all "much bigger than a house") if you don't deliberately focus on rpm (this little trick only works in reasonably high wind conditions of course)
Our ability to manufacture has so outpaced our ability to construct that nuclear doesn't really fit modern economies very well.
Yes, we should invest in both SMRs and advanced storage, not because we are assuming feasibility, but because we can't know their feasibility without trying them.
> Storage companies have a far better track record of delivering on their promises than the nuclear industry does
I disagree, and anyway I'm not saying "invest in SMRs instead of storage" but rather in addition to because it increases our odds of finding a viable solution and moreover a diverse grid is a robust grid (different energy sources are likely to have different failure modes, such that we have a fallback in case one source experiences a catastrophic failure).
https://www.powermag.com/researchers-say-smrs-will-produce-m...
Lovely. Would take loooooots of windmills instead.