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Old Posted Dec 3, 2010, 12:05 AM
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Doady Doady is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jamesfury View Post
The Wind power is one of the best Non-Conventional resource of energy which needs a lot of research harness to produce power.The following are the advantages and disadvantages of Wind power.
Advantages:
1)The wind is free and with modern technology it can be captured efficiently.
2) Once the wind turbine is built the energy it produces does not cause green house gases or other pollutants.
3)Remote areas that are not connected to the electricity power grid can use wind turbines to produce their own supply.
Disadvantages:
1)The strength of the wind is not constant and it varies from zero to storm force. This means that wind turbines do not produce the same amount of electricity all the time. There will be times when they produce no electricity at all.
2)Wind turbines are noisy. Each one can generate the same level of noise as a family car travelling at 70 mph.

Water damage
I don't that is complete. I just finish doing a paper on wind power in Denmark. Here's what I think are the complete list of advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages
1. No greenhouse gas emissions or other pollutants, obviously. No radiation, unlike fossil fuels and nuclear.
2. No water consumption: fossil fuel and nuclear power plants waste water and the water they draw is subsidized (i.e. free). This is a big issue in the Great Lakes where the water levels have been dropping thanks mostly to all the coal plants on the US side (US = the Saudi Arabia of Coal). Plus, water vapour is a greenhouse gas as well...
3. Cheap production of electricity and low electricity prices offsets most of the subsidies consumers have to pay.

Disadvantages.
1. Bird collisions and loss of habitat for certain bird species (esp. offshore wind).
2. Large amounts of decentralized, small-scale generators destabilizes the grid and so large-scale plants would still need to be in operation.
3. Variation in electricity production not matching variation in electricity consumption results in excess electricity, which causes a whole bunch of economic and technical problems.
4. NIMBYism: wind turbines aren't just noisy, and they're also very visible in the landscape.
5. Corrosion and other damage due to salt (offshore wind in the oceans).
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