Editor's Note Presented on October 20th during the 2006 Electric Market Forecasting Conference sponsored by EPIS, Inc. this addresses, in part, the issue of whether emissions are reduced with the addition of industrial wind energy. This is a large pdf file (8.55MB) and is available via the weblink below.

The Update to the 2005 electric plan frames issues within the statutory directive provided by the legislature in 30 V.S.A. §202, which requires that the electric plan ensure, . . . to the greatest extent practicable, that Vermont can meet its energy service needs in a manner that is adequate, reliable, secure, and sustainable; that assures affordability and encourages the state’s economic vitality, the efficient use of energy resources and cost effective demand side management; and that is environmentally sound.

Rick Webb's presentation on October 17 at the Energy Virginia conference provides a thought provoking analysis of the costs and benefits of industrial wind energy.

Recent demonstrations have targeted the four lower Snake River dams as unimportant and obsolete. This argument casually discards the fact that the dams generate enough electricity to energize a city the size of Seattle. At a time when concerns about climate change dominate headlines, our dams are emission and fuel free. Electric energy generated by the federal dams greatly reduces our dependence on imported oil and natural gas. Dams truly are our region’s home grown renewable energy resource.

There are those who believe that conservation and wind turbines could replace the energy generated bythese dams. While wind is a growing and valuable regional industry, our region’s wind farms depend upon the certainty of hydropower to “firm’ the load – which means provide energy when the wind isn't blowing. In other words, without hydro's reliability, our region's wind industry would be a whisper instead of a gust. meansprovide energywhenthe wind isn’tblowing. Inother words,without hydro’s reliability, our region’s wind industrywould be a whisper instead ofa gust. What would be the alternative to hydro to back up wind?Coalor naturalgas thermal generationplants would have to be built, adding emissions to our air and furthering concerns about globalwarming.

This report provides an assessment of the status of renewable energy resource information and products for the United States. This work was completed for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) under Contract No. DE-AC3699-GO10337.

This is the pdf version with charts of Sen. Inhofe's speech. The full text version of the speech is available via the link below.

All actions and statements by Sierra Club entities with regard to energy policy and facilities shall be in furtherance of and consistent with this policy. Additional guidance can be found in the Energy and Economics Policy, the Energy Facility Siting Policy, and the One-Club Policy, as well as in various energy guidelines and advisories. This policy takes precedence over any earlier energy policies, guidelines, advisories or positions. It does not change jurisdictions for establishing positions as set forth in the Policy on Policies.

Q. Please state your name and position.

A. My name is Charles Simmons and I have been retained to provide assistance to Highland Citizens in regard to the application of Highland New Wind Development, LLC to construct a wind generation facility in Highland County.

Editor's Note:This testimony provides an excellent description of how a grid works- particularly the role of 'economic dispatch' and 'spinning reserves'. It also addresses the methodology for estimating emissions savings and numerous other topics of interest.

...the wind industry and other wind energy advocates have, for years, greatly overstated the energy and environmental benefits of wind energy and understated the true environmental, ecological, economic, scenic, and property value costs. They have misled the public, media and government officials – and created a “popular wisdom” about wind energy and promoted the creation of faulty government policies, tax breaks and subsidies that will take years to correct. This brief paper deals with only two of the areas where the industry and its supporters use half-truths and false or misleading information.

It is broadly accepted that wind turbines do not emit CO2 at the point of generation. However, in common with all types of power station, it is emitted during their construction and, through damage directly inflicted on the construction site, over a much longer period. The total debt will vary from site to site but will comprise some or all of the following;

• Emissions arising from fabrication (steel smelting, forging of turbine columns, the manufacture of blades and the electrical and mechanical components);
• Emissions arising from construction (transportation of components, quarrying, building foundations, access tracks and hard standings, commissioning);
• The indirect loss of CO2 uptake (fixation) by plants originally on the surface of the site but obliterated by construction activity including the destruction of active bog plants on wet sites and deforestation;
• Emissions due to the indirect, long-term liberation of CO2 from carbon stored in peat due to drying and oxidation processes caused by construction of the site.

It is important to recognise that peat is a major store of carbon accumulated from dead plant remains over many millennia. It is held in perpetuity because the bog’s wetness and acid conditions prevent the access of oxygen and inhibit the growth of bacteria which would otherwise rot the vegetation. Draining peat for construction reverses both these long-term processes: the soil is exposed to the air, the carbon is converted to CO2 and released slowly to the atmosphere.

Several papers from the wind industry in Denmark and the UK have addressed the first two points with estimates of payback time ranging from about six to 30 months.

However, the industry rarely, if ever, considers the last two. This is a fundamental omission as their contribution to the overall CO2 debt, in particular the last, can be far greater than all the others put together. This paper outlines a procedure for quantifying it.

The guide has been prepared to enable anyone with access to the Environmental Statement (ES) that forms part of a Planning Application (PA) for a wind farm to estimate its CO2 debt. (If some of the requisite information proves to be unavailable, this ought to provide grounds for postponing consideration of the application and the commissioning of further assessment.)

The results of the calculations described should be submitted to planning authorities or Public Inquiries as part of the arguments used in assessing the merits and demerits of an application.