Wind Option Hot Topic Webinar April 8 and 9
On Thursday, April 8, 2010, five presenters from URS gave a well balanced description of the U.S. wind industry. Since they represented different parts of the country, listeners were able to receive a glimpse of the unique issues in different areas.
Dilip Khatri led off with an overview. Currently the U.S. has two percent of its power generation supplied by wind energy. The sector has been growing by eight to ten percent a year. Kharti said the average cost of wind power is $0.07/kWh but it can be as low as $0.03/kWh in areas such as Texas. The U.S. government underwrites a portion of this with a $0.02/kWh tax credit. As to technology, attendees learned that wind turbines reach their peak efficiency with wind speeds of 17-20 mph. They can be effective with wind speeds as low as 5 mph. Wind turbines have been growing taller and the swept rotor area has been increasing. Wind turbines as large as 10 MW are under development.
Jack Wilcox gave an excellent description of the challenges of developing wind farms in the Northeast, an area where demand is great but restrictions are many. Noise, visual impact, and avian and bat concerns were cited as the big three concerns. Next Wilcox presented a specific siting example. He led viewers through maps showing agricultural uses, topographical features, slope analysis, wet lands, structures, etc. Each one eliminates more sites on which turbines could be placed. When he had finished all understood the difficulties of building wind farms in the Northeast.
Richard Podolsky explained the avian/bat issues. He stressed that if bird or bat issues are insufficiently addressed it can result in significant delays, turbine layout changes or in extreme cases, cancellation of some or all of a wind project. The major laws are the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, Endangered Species Act, and the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act. In answer to a question Podolsky reported only 2-3 birds/turbine/year are killed by wind farms. This compares well to those killed in collision with tall buildings and is astonishingly better than feral cats that can kill 2-3 birds a day. One to three years of pre-construction sampling and one to two years of post-construction sampling typically are required at a site.
Joe Kuebler discussed siting and environmental studies in Texas. Texas has more wind power installed than any other state. Its good wind resources and favorable regulations make it by far the leader. Kuebler explained major environmental permitting issues include Phase 1 ESA, FAA Lighting and Marking, US ACOE Jurisdictional Water Permitting, archeology/cultural resources, USFWS Biological Resources and avian/bat studies. A typical permitting time frame is three to six months. This includes site work, studies and agency approval.
Dennis Dudzik described Owner’s Engineer Issues. He sees these as Interconnection & Power Purchase Agreement; Land Acquisition & Development Rights; Plan of Development; Plans, Specifications and Bid Packages; Collection System, Substation and Transmission; Mitigation Monitoring and Construction Management. Based in Sacramento Dudzik also discussed some the challenges of the strict California regulations.
Continuing on April 9--
Gerald (Gerry) Sheblé, PhD, MBA, Executive Advisor and Senior Director US R&D at Quanta Technology, LLC, shed some light on the financial aspects of wind power. The uncertainty of wind generation is not clearly understood at this time. The generation output is a function of wind energy at a given instant of time. The variability can be rather large and thus leads to a requirement for other generation, storage or demand response to maintain system balance. It is the combination of resources that determines the total value of wind generation.
Jeff Kopp, P.E., Development Engineer at Burns & McDonnell, examined the issues associated with bringing large amounts of wind energy online and the problems that can result. There is a lack of transmission, output is intermittent, and there is a mismatch between production and load profiles. Wind is weakest during the day when the load is the greatest. Solutions include energy storage and investment in transmission. With large power pools there is reduced impact of wind variability.
Len Januzik, U.S. Power Delivery Manager at AMEC, came to the following conclusions based on the wind penetration study results for Southwestern Public Service (SPS):
The Bios, Abstracts and Photo can be viewed as follows:
BIOS, ABSTRACTS AND PHOTO - APRIL 8-9-2010.htm
The individual slides can be viewed through our Power Plant Air Quality Decisions in the ENERGY AND WATER DECISION TREE as follows:
ENERGY AND WATER DECISION TREE/Joe Kuebler - URS - part 1 04-08-10.pdf
ENERGY AND WATER DECISION TREE/Joe Kuebler - URS - part 2 - 04-08-10.pdf
ENERGY AND WATER DECISION TREE/Joe Kuebler - URS - part 3 04-08-10.pdf
ENERGY AND WATER DECISION TREE/Gerald Sheble - Quanta 04-09-10.pdf
ENERGY AND WATER DECISION TREE/Jeff Kopp - Burns & McDonnell - 04-09-10.pdf
ENERGY AND WATER DECISION TREE/Len Januzik - AMEC - April 9, 2010.pdf