[Alpha]

At present the tallest wind turbine of the world, is the Fuhrländer windturbine at Laasow in Brandenburg, Germany. It has a 90 metre rotor mounted on a 160 metre tall lattice tower ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuhrl%C3%A4nder_Wind_Turbine_Laasow ). Further wind turbines of this size are planned ( or perhaps already built) at Kirchhundem and at Penzin, also in Germany.

How tall will wind turbines in future be? Can we expect 300m+ wind turbines?

[tackledspoon]

I love turbines and I'd love to see pictures of these. There is something of a grassroots movement for wind power over here in the states, but I'm not sure how successful it's been.
I read an article in Wired last month about some offshore turbines going up on old oil drilling platforms out in the gulf, but I don't remember if they provided height statistics. Regardless of height, it was a pretty massive project.

[HomeInMyShoes]

At some point, mankind will decide to build one gigantic wind turbine to power the planet, which will generate enough force to push the Earth through the solar system towards the sun, causing the seas to boil and evaporate and everyone to get a tan like those thirty-year-olds that look like they are sixty.

Wouldn't there be a theoretical point at which power generated versus cost to build just makes it silly to build them any larger? Then again, we're building 1800 foot skyscrapers when it's economically more efficient to build a couple of 900 footers. There's no accounting for human folly [see first paragraph for likely outcome.]

[Alpha]

Wind turbines cannot be compared with radio towers or skyscrapers as they have a large rotable structure, which causes additional structural stress.

[olga]

I just visited a industry (http://www.enercon.nu/) that makes windtowers this morning. It was pretty amazing. I can't post any pics from inside the factory, but lets just say you feel pretty small standing next to those things. Here's a pic from outside:

http://img177.imageshack.us/img177/3608/kockumsxo4.jpg

[BTinSF]

I love turbines and I'd love to see pictures of these. There is something of a grassroots movement for wind power over here in the states, but I'm not sure how successful it's been.
I read an article in Wired last month about some offshore turbines going up on old oil drilling platforms out in the gulf, but I don't remember if they provided height statistics. Regardless of height, it was a pretty massive project.

I don't know anything about especially large wind turbines, but large ones don't necessarily offer any advantage over numerous small ones and many people find the sight of them objectionable. Anyway, to try to answer your question about "how successful it's been", the answer is very and getting more so:

BREEZY TALK
The Texas Wind Powers A Big Energy Gamble
Shell, Others, Pile In Despite Regulatory Risk; Poke Arnold's 'Rib Eye'
By JEFFREY BALL
March 13, 2007; Page A1

SILVERTON, Texas -- Deep in the heart of Texas, multinational giants are gambling on a new supply of energy. The prize isn't oil. It's wind.

In this pancake-flat country, where the wind blows so relentlessly that the sagebrush and mesquite are permanently bent, Royal Dutch Shell Group, BP PLC and a wind-development company owned by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. are racing to lease vast expanses of ranchland. In a bet on wind power's long-term viability, they're planning to erect what would be some of the biggest wind farms in the world, with thousands of wind turbines costing some $2 million apiece.

But generating power from wind isn't profitable without government tax breaks, which in the past have been offered and taken away. The big proposed projects in Texas, like those elsewhere in the country, are dependent on regulators approving transmission lines to connect remote and windy regions to major power markets. If the new lines aren't built, the projects are doomed. Such uncertainty has dashed hopes for fossil-fuel alternatives before, creating a boom-and-bust cycle not unlike the one that typifies the oil industry itself.

Energy companies investing in wind power are expecting governments to toughen rules relating to traditional energy sources, part of long-term efforts to reduce global-warming emissions and reliance on Middle East oil. As a result, they're hoping renewable energy will become a profitable niche, not merely one that allows them to burnish their green credentials.

Few places exemplify the gamble as vividly as Briscoe County, a 900-square-mile patch of ranchland in the Texas Panhandle with more cows than people. It's one of the windiest spots in Texas, which already cranks out more wind power than any other state. Texas regulators won't decide for months whether to authorize a new line to connect this isolated county to Texas's network of high-voltage power lines. But in Austin, the state capital, energy companies are lobbying hard, and on the ground they're scrambling to lock up acreage. What happens here is being watched closely in other states trying to promote wind development, such as California, Colorado, Kansas and New Mexico.

It's "a land rush," says Mark Wilby, a petroleum engineer who once developed natural-gas power plants for Enron Corp., and now develops wind projects for Shell. In Shell's storefront office in the largely abandoned courthouse square of Silverton, the county seat, Mr. Wilby pulls out a color map showing how the Texas wind blows. The windiest areas are in red, and Briscoe County is bloody. Shell hopes to build an approximately 120-square-mile wind farm here, which would be several times larger than any in the world today.

Local landowners who grew up cursing the wind can't believe their new luck. The county's windiest stretch is a curving ridgeline where the flat terrain of the Texas high plains ends and suddenly drops as much as 1,000 feet into the rocky, rugged Tule Canyon and onto the lower plains. The topography causes the wind to accelerate as it approaches the edge. The land at that edge was once good only for grazing cows, but now residents liken the ridgeline to a good steak, calling it "the rib eye."

Poke Arnold's land includes a piece of it, and the rancher has hired a lawyer to negotiate with energy companies. "They started getting in a dog fight," he says, "and the leases started going up tremendously."

Wind power accounted for 0.5% of global electricity production in 2004, the most recent data available, according to the International Energy Agency. Although that contribution is expected to grow fast in coming years, by 2030 wind is projected to account for only 3.4% of the total. If governments adopted more-aggressive policies to promote renewable energy, the IEA predicts, wind's share of total energy in 2030 could rise to 4.8%.

The wind doesn't always blow, and when it does, the amount of land required to catch meaningful amounts of it is vast. Shell's planned wind farm here would cover an area about five times the size of Manhattan, yet it would crank out, on average, only about as much electricity as a single coal-fired power plant. Even with subsidies, the return from wind projects tends to be lower than that from oil and gas.

But the risks are lower, too. Putting up antennae to measure wind speed is vastly cheaper than drilling a well to look for oil. Turbine manufacturers often will essentially guarantee that their machines will produce a certain amount of power.

Moreover, unlike most other green-energy options, wind power doesn't require any technological breakthroughs. The soaring pinwheel turbines that turn wind into electricity are manufactured by a growing cadre of mainstream companies, including General Electric Co. and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd., and are getting more reliable and efficient.

So far, wind power has taken off in states with favorable regulatory environments, in particular those with rules requiring utilities to generate a certain percentage of their electricity from renewable sources. Capital spending on new wind projects in the U.S. rose to $3.65 billion last year, up from $3.19 billion in 2005 and just $420 million in 2004, according to a study being prepared for the Department of Energy by its Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Steve Westwell, head of the alternative-energy unit at BP, expects governments to toughen rules governing energy production, especially those relating to emissions of carbon dioxide, a gas linked to global warming. That will boost viability of alternative sources such as wind. "In the future, there will probably be a very different discussion of the economics of these technologies," he says. BP has announced plans to start building five wind farms in the U.S. this year.

Exxon Mobil Corp., the biggest publicly traded oil company in the world, remains unconvinced. Exxon is bankrolling research on clean-energy technologies, but says renewable energy isn't yet viable on a large enough scale. In addition, the company says, it doesn't want to get into a business that depends on subsidies.

"People are still going to need a hell of a lot of oil and gas" in the future, "and that's what we're good at," says Rex Tillerson, Exxon's chairman and chief executive. "I prefer to stay with what we know."

Texas, the heart of the oil patch, shows how far wind energy has come and how far it has to go. One of the state's first big wind-energy projects began producing electricity in 1995, three years after a federal tax break came into effect. Under that provision, the company that owns a wind project can reduce its tax bill by 1.9 cents for every kilowatt-hour of electricity that the project produces during its first 10 years of operation. That's often the bump that makes a project viable.

Congress has authorized the credit only for short bursts. Wind development tends to screech to a halt when the credit is about to expire and ramp up when it's renewed.

The early Texas wind project has a generating capacity of 35 megawatts, a tiny fraction of a coal-fired power plant. Because of the wind's unpredictability, the Texas project produces on average only about one-third of its capacity, a typical rate. It produces enough power for about 7,800 households.

Even with the federal tax credit, wind development didn't really pick up until after 1999, when Texas passed a requirement that utilities buy a certain amount of renewable power. And even then, it took off only in a part of the state served by a grid fueled mostly with natural gas, where power prices are relatively high.

Surrounding the tiny town of Fluvanna, on the western edge of the grid, is the Brazos wind project, which sprawls across 30 square miles. Brazos is the second-biggest working wind farm in Shell's portfolio. It sells its power to TXU Corp., the Dallas-based utility that's under pressure to curb emissions from coal plants. Last month, a private-equity group agreed to buy TXU for $32 billion, and promised to more than double the utility's wind investments to get environmentalists' backing for the buyout.

On a recent afternoon, a computer in Brazos's office showed that the project's 160 towering white turbines were generating just 5.5 megawatts, a fraction of their 160-megawatt capacity. Tom Schroeder, the site's supervisor, said a weather front was approaching, calming the air. The wind had been "screaming" that morning," said Mr. Schroeder, whose last job was on an oil rig off Nigeria. And "it's going to be probably screaming tonight."

In Texas, some of the strongest wind is in the Panhandle, which lies to the north of Brazos. But the Panhandle has few high-voltage lines and it sits in a multistate power grid that commands relatively low power prices because it gets much of its power from coal, a cheap fuel.

State officials are talking seriously about building new power lines to expand wind production. If one were built to Briscoe County, this massive wind resource would be unlocked.

Eddie Rhoderick, a rancher and farmer in Briscoe County, used to hate the wind. When it whips in after a heavy rain, it "sandblasts the cotton plants," he says. But a few months ago, he leased 1,900 acres to Shell. He won't divulge the terms of the deal. "Shell bought me a root canal," he said one recent morning as he headed to the dentist.

Shell rolled into Briscoe last summer as the talk of new transmission lines heated up in Austin. So did Horizon Wind Energy, a Houston company that Goldman Sachs bought in 2005 and has now put up for sale.

Wind developers in the U.S. have typically offered landowners one-time signing payments of about $3 an acre and annual royalties totaling 3% of revenue. Within months in Briscoe, energy companies were offering signing payments of between $50 and $80 an acre and royalty payments of about 6% annually, according to Mr. Arnold and several other local landowners. If the Briscoe project is built, a local rancher could expect to collect some $80,000 a year for each "section" of land, a parcel equal to 640 acres.

Laquetta Schott , the local manager of a title company, has leased about 1,900 acres to Shell. Though Ms. Schott won't discuss the terms of her contract, she says wind deals are offering signing bonuses that "could be more profitable than oil and gas."

In December, BP bought a wind-development company that had been scouting in Briscoe. But skyrocketing prices persuaded BP to retreat to a county farther south. "With Shell and Horizon bidding up the properties to what we think may be unsustainable levels, we have stepped away," says Robert Lukefahr, head of BP's North American alternative-energy business.

Horizon hopes to build a wind project in Briscoe County with a capacity of about 600 megawatts, says Michael Skelly, Horizon's chief development officer. That would make the Horizon project one of the biggest in the world. It would still be less than one-third the size of the 2,000-megawatt project that Shell's Mr. Wilby says his company hopes to build.

More than a dozen companies that want power lines in various parts of the state have submitted proposals to the Texas Public Utility Commission, the state agency that oversees electricity issues. Shell's proposal calls for a 290-mile line to Briscoe that it estimates would cost $480 million. Ultimately, that cost would likely be paid by Texas customers. The state is scheduled to signal its intentions in July.

The companies won't disclose how much they've spent so far on preparatory work such as land leases. Their spending is a tiny fraction of what they would ultimately invest if the power lines were approved.

Meanwhile, Mr. Arnold, the Briscoe County rancher, is relishing the battle for his land. He hasn't signed a lease with any of his suitors. "They think there's big bucks in this, or they wouldn't be playing," Mr. Arnold says. "Them folks don't play for cheese and crackers."

http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/images/P1-AH366A_Windr_20070311194028.gif

http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/images/P1-AH365_Windru_20070311214029.gif

Write to Jeffrey Ball at jeffrey.ball@wsj.com3

URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117347331863532510.html

[KevinFromTexas]

There's already a good bit in West Texas, a few that are as tall as 250 feet. And I saw one near Houston, (the Brazos area the article spoke of).

[PuyoPiyo]

I think this picture of Fuhrländer Wind Turbine is what you look for. It might not look so exciting, but that is the Fuhrländer Wind Turbine.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v500/Ufozacky2k/12798.jpg

I found it through the google.

[Xelebes]

I know we have windfarms in the Pincher Creek Valley - I think with over 1,000 wind turbines. Not sure - they don't build them fantastically tall like they do off of Denmark.

[staff]

Windmills in Öresund between Copenhagen and Malmö.
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/180/399152781_b341c934ba_b.jpg

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/81/233801908_04fbb3c4ec_o.jpg

[bosmausasky]

I have always wondered why the wind turbines cannot be placed closer together. It seems there is alot of space in between each turbine.

Also Highways would be a great place for wind turbines, wonder why nobody puts turbines on highways. I assume the state, local, and federal governments would be able to make a couple bucks off the deal. In addition nobody would bitch about it looking bad because the highway already looks bad.

[Spotila]

the turbines in the ocean are excellent! You guys have got it down up there. I think that makes sense.

[Trantor]

this thread asks for my pictures of the 75 140 meter tall wind turbines in Osório, southern Brazil.

unfortunatelly, the pics are on SSC (in a thread there) and SSC seems to be offiline right now for me, so tomorrow I will edit this post and post the pics)

[anecdoto]

In Netherlands they are decided to experiment this issue.The result is not too favourable, i think.

The limits are exceeded in space and time
only an structural theory can stop the growth
genetic engeenering doesn't know borders
http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/7758/flowerpower01ss8.jpg

http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/556/flowerpower02dj5.jpg

we make money not art (http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/archives/008720.php)

Bright (http://www.bright.nl/bosjes-en-bergen-windmolens-sieren-landschap)

I prefer the "traditional" arrangement :(

[Trantor]

Wind Powerplant Park at Osório, southern Brazil.

75 generators
each wind turbine is 140 meters tall

150 MW


these close up pics are NOT mine. The panoramic pics were taken by me.

this one sums perfectly the size of the wind generators... look the size of the car, the trees, and the wind generators towering above them!
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b91/latinohunk/six/osorio1.jpg

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b91/latinohunk/six/osorio.jpg

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b91/latinohunk/six/osorio2.jpg

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b91/latinohunk/six/osorio3.jpg

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b91/latinohunk/six/osorio4.jpg

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b91/latinohunk/six/osorio6.jpg



NOW, MY PICS
http://img467.imageshack.us/img467/9787/1535323iy0.jpg

http://img442.imageshack.us/img442/8664/1535328am9.jpg

http://img263.imageshack.us/img263/9665/1535331hm4.jpg

http://img234.imageshack.us/img234/2711/1535332ds5.jpg

http://img506.imageshack.us/img506/8260/1535333ar5.jpg

http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/853/1535345jg1.jpg

http://img68.imageshack.us/img68/8423/1535363me5.jpg

http://img65.imageshack.us/img65/8373/panoramicaosoriolq6.jpg

http://img267.imageshack.us/img267/549/1535385xg2.jpg

[fountainhead]

^^^ Amazing pictures. They give a sense of hope!

[aVegetable]

They are mighty structures, but wind energy requires such massive government subsidies it can only ever be useful as a "green" political ploy. Their implementation in the UK is purely to inflate the German economy, which exclusively supplies the turbines.

from http://www.countryguardian.net/ROC%20Etherington%202006%201.htm


A big wind turbine earns £400,000 p.a. of which half is ‘subsidy’, paid by all consumers

Many wind turbines are of 2.0 MW or greater capacity and about 120 m in height. Because of limitation by wind speed, a 2.0 MW machine produces a quarter or a little more of its rated capacity, i.e. 0.5 MW on average.

Over one year it generates 0.5 x 24 x 365 = 4,380 MWh, and at the renewables price of £90/MWh, the gross earning is £394, 200 p.a.

About half of this income is from the consumer-sourced subsidy, without which the machine would be close to bankruptcy.

Big earnings, big ‘footprint’ but not much electricity or CO2-saving

One might assume that as the wind generators are so substantially rewarded, they produce a lot of electricity but this is not so. At the moment DTI figures show that wind provides less than 0.5% of UK electricity.

If the 2.0 MW wind turbines, wind-limited as above, were to replace the output of a large, 2000 MW conventional power station it would require at least 3000 turbines spread over 750 km2 of countryside. Some footprint!

Incidentally the replaced power station could not be closed as its electricity is still required to fill the gaps when the wind turbines are not fully generating.

The main reason given by government for installing wind power is that it will save carbon dioxide (CO2) emission and consequently reduce the rate of Global warming‚

Government's own prediction for CO2 saving by renewable electricity (mainly wind) in 2010 is just 9.2 million tonne CO2, which is less than four ten-thousandths (0.0004) of global man-made CO2 emission.

[Trantor]

^come on, even Brazil can build wind powerplants like the ones I showed above!

Not only that, but this very same wind power park is being expanded... more 25 turbines, to total 100 and 200 MW.

^^^ Amazing pictures. They give a sense of hope!

Hope?? In what sense?

[aVegetable]

^ This is not a question of capability, it is a question of false economy.

Following a discussion with a friend, it has been pointed out to me that the carbon footprint of a wind farm is equal to or higher than that of a nuclear power station over the course of both their lifecycles - inclusive of complete nuclear decommissioning. It begs the question: what is the point?

[Trantor]

I really do not think the carbon footprint of a windfarm or nuclear power station changes much during their lifes. Their carbon footprint only happens when they are built.

And a nuclear power station can have a nuclear meltdown, which is much worse than any carbon footprint all windfarms in the world can generate.

[wong21fr]

^ This is not a question of capability, it is a question of false economy.

Following a discussion with a friend, it has been pointed out to me that the carbon footprint of a wind farm is equal to or higher than that of a nuclear power station over the course of both their lifecycles - inclusive of complete nuclear decommissioning. It begs the question: what is the point?

I find that a highly dubious assertion. How can the carbon footprint of the windfarm be so large and what are the factors for both forms of generation?

[aVegetable]

I really do not think the carbon footprint of a windfarm or nuclear power station changes much during their lifes. Their carbon footprint only happens when they are built.

And a nuclear power station can have a nuclear meltdown, which is much worse than any carbon footprint all windfarms in the world can generate.

nearly all the [wind farm] emissions occur during the manufacturing and construction phases...These account for 98% of the total life cycle CO2 emissions.
[nuclear] Decommissioning accounts for 35% of the lifetime CO2 emissions
(source follows below)

The UK has already been through this electricity generation sham at the "forefront" of "green technology". This is a topic I have found interesting.

For a windfarm to be built and then "pulled down" to be comparable with nuclear decomissioning and the massive associated carbon footprint is absurd, don't you think?

source: http://www.parliament.uk/documents/upload/postpn268.pdf

UK Government
October 2006
CARBON FOOTPRINT OF
ELECTRICITY GENERATION

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u163/sublimino/carbonfootprints.jpg

Sorry to paste so much:

Wind
Electricity generated from wind energy has one of the
lowest carbon footprints. As with other low carbon
technologies, nearly all the emissions occur during the
manufacturing and construction phases, arising from the
production of steel for the tower, concrete for the
foundations and epoxy/fibreglass for the rotor blades.10
These account for 98% of the total life cycle CO2
emissions. Emissions generated during operation of wind
turbines arise from routine maintenance inspection trips.
This includes use of lubricants and transport. Onshore
wind turbines are accessed by vehicle, while offshore
turbines are maintained using boats and helicopters. The
manufacturing process for both onshore and offshore
wind plant is very similar, so life cycle assessment shows
that there is little difference between the carbon footprint
of onshore (4.64gCO2eq/kWh) versus offshore
(5.25gCO2eq/kWh) wind generation (Fig 2).11 The
footprint of an offshore turbine is marginally greater
because it requires larger foundations.
Nuclear
Nuclear power generation has a relatively small carbon
footprint (~5gCO2eq/kWh) (Fig 2). Since there is no
combustion, (heat is generated by fission of uranium or
plutonium), operational CO2 emissions account for <1%
of the total. Most emissions occur during uranium mining,
enrichment and fuel fabrication. Decommissioning
accounts for 35% of the lifetime CO2 emissions, and
includes emissions arising from dismantling the nuclear
plant and the construction and maintenance of waste
storage facilities.12 The most energy intensive phase of
the nuclear cycle is uranium extraction, which accounts
for 40% of the total CO2 emissions. Some commentators
have suggested that if global nuclear generation capacity
increases, higher grade uranium ore deposits would be
depleted, requiring use of lower grade ores. This has
raised concerns that the carbon footprint of nuclear
generation may increase in the future (see Issues)

And for those worried about nuclear meltdowns, how many times do you think these have ever occurred? How many people do you think have died? Can you compare that to the amount of people who have died working in other electricity generation methods like coal mining? There is no comparison.


source: http://www.ecolo.org/lovelock/lovelock-wind-power.html

Dr James Lovelock:

Dr Lovelock has been a lifelong environmentalist and member of the green movement. He says the more "pragmatic" nations, such as France, Finland, Sweden, Japan and China, are embracing nuclear power as they believe it is the most viable and safe source of energy for the future.

So why are we scared of it? "I think the reason is just simple politics," he declares. "Our Government is persuaded that there are so many people in Britain who are frightened off nuclear energy by fiction, mainly films. Bad fiction written by good writers. It continues to pervade and give the impression it is the most evil thing.

"I would take high-level waste if they would let me have it. I would have it just over there," he says, pointing to the hedge visible from his sitting room window.

"We could use it for home heating. They could put in a concrete pit and it would stay hot. What a waste not to use it. People have got in mind great big glowing slag heaps. It's all nonsense."

He dismisses Chernobyl as a "nasty accident that killed 45 people" saying it was not comparable to the amount of people who die in an air crash or in an industrial accident such as Bhopal in India, which killed 3,500 people and maimed countless others.

He believes that if we are concerned about health risks we should consider how many people are dying as a result of climate change. He estimates that last summer's heatwave in Europe killed upwards of 20,000 people.

"The area around Chernobyl has been invaded by wildlife and allowed to flourish as it has been left alone. It doesn't mind the radiation in the least," he says.

"We have lived under a lot of absolute nonsense for years and years about radiation. You can't live without breathing oxygen, but it's also the most ubiquitous carcinogen of the lot. Just breathing daily is equivalent to quite a hefty radiation dose."

Apologies for the length of this post, but to stay on topic future wind turbines should be used to supplement the enerygy requirements of small scale projects in suitable (windy) locations. Large wind turbines will be a legacy of a naive "green" generation.

[Captain Carpetburn]

The size of wind turbines will also be limited by the size of the generators they are attached to - I think the biggest ones in use just now are 5MW.


I have always wondered why the wind turbines cannot be placed closer together. It seems there is alot of space in between each turbine.

Also Highways would be a great place for wind turbines, wonder why nobody puts turbines on highways. I assume the state, local, and federal governments would be able to make a couple bucks off the deal. In addition nobody would bitch about it looking bad because the highway already looks bad.

Wind turbines create turbulence so you cant have them too close thats one reason they arent usually tightly packed - I am sure there are others.

You don't tend to see wind turbines on highways as highways usually avoid going over the tops of hills - i.e they stick to low ground and turbines are usually sited on the top of hills - where its windier.

I agree though it could look quite cool - and if you look at the visions for sustainable cities in china they have windturbines on the sides of roads - and scattered everywhere really.

[wong21fr]

Interesting report, aVegetable, the studies I've seen have shown that nuclear energy has a higher footprint than wind, though not by that much. I'm also guessing that this report uses shaft mining for uranium extraction rather than pit mining. If so, there would be a large increase to the carbon footprint.

I still believe that both sources have their uses, wind in more decentralized locations and nuclear for urban areas.

[aVegetable]

Interesting report, aVegetable, the studies I've seen have shown that nuclear energy has a higher footprint than wind, though not by that much. I'm also guessing that this report uses shaft mining for uranium extraction rather than pit mining. If so, there would be a large increase to the carbon footprint.

I still believe that both sources have their uses, wind in more decentralized locations and nuclear for urban areas.

This a UK government report; I believe (althought I have no proof) that in this situation a proportionately weighted average of all techniques would be used. Otherwise the report would be purposefully favouring nuclear engergy over wind by glazing over this topic. However, the report mentions it briefly:
"The most energy intensive phase of the nuclear cycle is uranium extraction, which accounts for 40% of the total CO2 emissions."

The margins are slight:
onshore wind farm (4.64gCO2eq/kWh)
offshore wind farm (5.25gCO2eq/kWh)
nuclear power station (~5gCO2eq/kWh)

The crucial factor is the spread of the data - the graph shows that the least environmentally damaging technology available is nuclear, although less effectively built stations have a similar footprint to offshore windfarms.

I agree both technologies have their uses, but as energy requirements worldwide outpace resources (in terms of fuel and space) surely only the safe application of nuclear fission (or fusion) will fill the breach.

Or possibly the moon. I wonder what this "inexhaustible, clean, pollution-free" energy source's carbon footprint is estimated at:

source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6533169.stm

Data collected from the Apollo Moon landings have indicated that large deposits of an extremely rare gas called helium 3 are trapped in the lunar soil.

Scientists believe that this helium 3 could be used to create a new source of almost inexhaustible, clean, pollution-free energy on Earth.

One of them is Dr Harrison Schmitt, a member of the 1972 Apollo 17 mission and the only trained geologist ever to walk on the Moon.

"A metric ton of helium 3 would supply about one-sixth of the energy needs today of the British Isles," he claims.

Plans are already afoot in the US and Russia to strip-mine lunar helium 3 and transport it the 240,000 miles (385,000km) back to Earth.

[KevinFromTexas]

A Lubbock billionaire is proposing building the world's largest wind farm in the Texas Panhandle.

Here's the article on it. Oddly enough, he's an oil tycoon!
http://www.statesman.com/business/content/business/stories/other/06/14/14wind.html

And another sort of related article. This one is about Applied Materials, Inc., which is the world's largest chip maker. They're putting solar panels on their chip factory in Austin and it will be the largest collection of solar panels in the city.
http://www.statesman.com/business/content/business/stories/technology/06/14/14applied.html

[DanJ]

A Lubbock billionaire

:haha: That's just a really amusing statement to me.

Cool articles though, intersting to see the change from oil to wind.