Comments on: GE to Manufacture Offshore Wind Turbines

By: Mkjon

Mkjon — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 16:46:43 +0000

The switch to expensive renewable energy is all based on the supposition that CO2 makes the air “Dirty”. The fact is that CO2 is an essential ingredient of air. Nothing is greener than CO2. It is the bread of life for food plants and trees and and ultimately food for man.

An increased amount of CO2 in air would greatly increase food plant growth and solve the world food shortage.
Modern greenhouse practice adds CO2 to the air in greenhouses.

By: DWB

DWB — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 16:00:42 +0000

?Boneheaded1, “?DWB, Green energy not practical? That’s gotta be the most ridiculous statement I’ve ever seen on this site.”.

Practical, as I define it ….. I like my electricity to be there at the flip of the switch. “Practically” all the time is not just when the wind is blowing.
Where are the wind turbines not backed up by a coal fired steam plant or other power source? Nuclear and coal energy steam plants spin that turbine at a constant speed, generating 60 cycle AC, while the wind turbine can fluctuate, requiring converters to produce that power, (with converter losses). I may be dense, but if I have 10 MW of wind power that must be backed with a steam plant generating 10MW, where’s the savings? Maybe the savings is when the wind stops blowing, the coal quits burning, the electric goes away and you are in the dark. What’s the payback for that wind turbine?

Here in the US, spending your tax dollars is never justified with real cost benefit analysis. It’s always gee, we need that, I want one of those, I think they are great, we can save with one of them.

“?Make no mistake, coal built this country, but then again, so did cotton and tobacco. Time to move onward and forward.”

It’s been hot this Summer and I’m wearing a 100% cotton T-Shirt since those Rayon shirts make me sweat while I’m outside enjoying my cigar. Some things just are hard for me to change.

By: subramani

subramani — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 22:31:48 +0000

If one man among the BILLION HUMAN BEINGS among us can take initiative to establish an exclusive organization which is 100% non-profit to install wind farms through out the world where ever possible with 100% subsidies from the nations concerned ,the future of this little beautiful planet can be preserved for our future generations.

A century back our forefathers left us this WONDERFUL planet with plenty of pure rivers,oceans,forests and everything to have a peaceful existence.

But what we leave to our children and grand children, THINK IT OVER AS A DAD, AS AN GRANDPA TO YOUR FUTURE GENERATIONS.

By: Lou Gage

Lou Gage — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 03:00:03 +0000

Max, “right” is a concept usually reserved by victors writing histories. I am not sure I agree with your equation of low fuel prices with a subsidy? From who is this subsidy received by the petro industries? Are you referring to an not declared subsidy from society in the form of un or under regulated pollution. It is time that “greens” force themselves to put weak proposal out and let strong technologies survive. Me, I favor a national sales tax at every level and do away with the IRS. The tax code is new technologies worst foe. Just my thoughts. LG

By: Max

Max — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 02:39:50 +0000

LG, I’m afraid Mavis has more the right of it though you do have a point. Manufacturers of fossil fuel using technologies are heavily subsidized, if by nothing else than by artificially low fuel costs, the oil and gas industry receives enough subsidies that gas prices would more than double if full price was paid. Consumers do not make good decisions because the real cost is hidden from them. If these industries had to pay the full cost of their technology the consumer would be able to make wiser choices.

By: Lou Gage

Lou Gage — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 15:45:34 +0000

Mavis, Your comments on “taxing manufactures” to force them to build better engines misses a major point. That is, the consumer will pay with higher cost for more research but the market shows that the consumer, at least, in the USA is sitting on the sideline and those that are buying are still buying BIG. All cost possible including taxes are passed to the consumer. Maybe, it is time for you to rail and vent your anger at consuming people instead of businesses. Just my thoughts. LG

By: mavis

mavis — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 08:33:19 +0000

We need to do things differently, but why not make the ones accountable that are causing the most harmful emissions Like vehicle manufactures that should be building better and cleaner motors, jet transportation and resource scavengers of mining etc. and do we really need to go out to space, imagine all they put into the atmosphere wrecking the ozone layer. everyday ppl will buy whats out there, so industry and new inventions should have strict environmental standards. All government should be enforcing strict guidelines and making sound policies. they should be taxing industry and make them accountable for their low environmental standards, instead of allowing them to get off by buying carbon credits so they can continue on the way they are wreaking havoc around the world.

By: Heru

Heru — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:17:04 +0000

Dear GE,

I think wind power is cheapest and simplest technology on capturing energy among the others.

The better place to ‘harvest’ his kind of energy is along shoreline which faces to open ocean. Indonesia has good place, since a big part of the country faces to Indian Ocean. Maybe GE has a plan to implant this technology in Indonesia, especially in East Nusa Tenggara, since they has relative long period of strong wind.

Best regard,
Heru

By: Papatya

Papatya — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 21:09:43 +0000

Murphy,
There is no such thing as “clean” coal technology.

Have a good day.

By: Sergei from Ukraine

Sergei from Ukraine — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:01:39 +0000

If everybody are concerned on reducing emissions via alternative (wind) energy, at the same time should be concerned why alternative energy equipment and other economic components are so expensive and producers doesn’t want to reduce their profits in favour of cleaning the air. Avoided costs are not accounted in official accounting. There is no emissions taxes, no labels on products about how much emissions are generated while producing them (as incentive for ordinary customers not to buy emission-intensive products). There are a lot of inefficiencies in wind turbine supply chain. There is a huge inefficiency in absence of standardization of certain components of wind turbines. Could you imagine that each car manufacturer will design its car as to use only “exclusive” wheels? Nonsense, but in wind turbines they do this with blades, towers, pitch mechanisms, ets. Wind turbines are utility function first-of-all, therefore, instead of 100 models and sises we should have 20, but more reliable and cheap, thanks to massive production of standardized parts. Making a serial turbine should not ne an art.

Non-profit wind energy associations should have standardization and WT cost reduction as their key task.

By: Murphy

Murphy — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:42:05 +0000

Lets move ahead with clean coal technology in conjunction with green energy. Coal is abundant in this country, and reliable, and we have established coal fired power plants online. Furthermore, Coal can be converted to fuel. If we only took advantage of coal to liquid production to supply our military (airforce), which is the biggest consumer of petroleum; our dependence on foreign oil would be drastically reduced. Clean renuable energy is in our future, but lets utilize our countries abundant coal resource as we re-tool during the decades to come.

By: Boneheaded1

Boneheaded1 — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 14:09:19 +0000

DWB, Green energy not practical? That’s gotta be the most ridiculous statement I’ve ever seen on this site. Green energy isn’t just a good idea, but a necessary one.

Yes, green energy is capital intensive and the energy output vs the dollar input is much lower than fossil fuel plants. But fossil is not sustainable.

You’re right, the wind doesn’t always blow, the sun doesn’t always shine, the waves aren’t always big and the dams aren’t always full. But, you harvest what can be harvested. The goal is to cut down the portion of energy generated by coal. Through conservation and a build out of renewables across the spectrum we can eliminate a large chunk of coal fired power and use natural gas/bio-gas fueled power plants for the times when the renewables need supplementing.

You are almost sounding like the owner of a coal fired plant. Make no mistake, coal built this country, but then again, so did cotton and tobacco. Time to move onward and forward.

By: DWB

DWB — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 14:00:48 +0000

The reality is, the wind doesn’t always blow, but our need for electricity is 24 X 7, 1440 hours a month day in day out. Right now I get 60% of my electricity from coal fired steam plants. If I could replace half of that coal fired steam with wind, what happens when the wind doesn’t blow? It takes days to get a steam plant up to generating capacity and they don’t have wind blowing, steam plant, off switches. If a steam plant has to run when the wind doesn’t blow to backup wind, where’s the green savings? There are none. Green energy is a good idea but not practical.

By: Boneheaded1

Boneheaded1 — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 15:23:02 +0000

If you’re going to have offshore wind, why not do it in tandem with wave power. Where there is wind, there is waves. GE should team up with Pelamis or some other wave generation technology companies. If you’re going to install transmission lines, get the most use you can for the installation cost. If you’re going to have to maintain with ships, again, get double duty. The best way to justify the cost is to share the cost across multiple generation technologies that can work in tandem to increase output.

By: Francisco A Roque

Francisco A Roque — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 13:43:12 +0000

We need not 20% but 100% of the power to be generated by wind power now! The poles are melting… we should not use off all the oil from the ground for that. either to power our cars, big oil should be the ones starting in this alternatives, they can indeed generate jobs and cash.