JUL 05

An article from the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) outlines how wind power works to reduce overall electricity prices. The study commissioned by EWEA looked at recent data from a number of studies across Europe. "We took 15 studies on the merit order effect from a range of countries, all in Europe, that were published no later than 2005 and summarised their results. They all show that adding more wind can make the power price go down, according to one study as much as 23 Euros (more than $28 at current rates) per MWh." The 'merit order effect' simply refers to more expensive technologies, like gas turbine plants, being used less frequently, as less expensive options are available.

One objection raised by wind energy opponents is that wind power's variability makes it difficult to bring onto the grid. In reality, with weather prediction, the amount of electricity that is likely to be produced by wind farms can be accounted for, and factored into the overall production needed to satisfy grid demand. "As a general rule, additional wind replaces coal during hours of low power demand and gas during hours of high demand, but 'the overall amount the price goes down depends on the power mix in the country, and how much more expensive the fuels are that wind is replacing.'"

With wind overtaking gas for power production in Europe, the economics obviously make sense. Even for people who aren't interested in the carbon emission reductions obtained through increased use of wind, the cost and capacity benefits wind offers will help encourage more use of wind power.

via: Wind Directions (PDF)

Comments (11)

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written by EV, July 05, 2010

The study points out this is only once wind power is in place, due to the lower marginal costs. It would be interesting to see this include the original fixed costs, i.e. cost to build the wind farms and cost to build the other types of plants, instead of relying solely on the marginal costs. The cost to build a power plant must be taken into account, as electric users pay for this as well, not just the marginal costs.

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written by GreenGerbil, July 06, 2010

A nuclear power station will produce base load power 24 hours a day, no atmospheric emissions, no unsightly windmills, no waiting for the wind to blow, no animals getting chopped up, no television interference caused by the rotating blades.

Just saying...

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Nuclear power is not magic...
written by Jimbo, July 06, 2010

...in spite of what its proponents say. No atmospheric emissions? Except for the occasional Chernobyl. Admittedly rare, but it doesn't take more than one to cause a hell of a lot of damage. Unsightly windmills? That's your point of view, but I think windmills look kinda neat. Animals getting chopped up? Meaning bird deaths associated with windmills, I assume? A red herring if ever there was one. The amount of bird deaths associated with windmills in the US in comparison with other forms of human-caused bird deaths is vanishingly small. http://www.awea.org/faq/sagrillo/swbirds.html

How about we talk about the enormous costs associated with disposing of nuclear waste in a safe manner? Or maybe we should talk about the threat of nuclear proliferation caused by nuclear power. Nuclear power plants are all fine and dandy when our allies build them, but we seem to have a problem when countries that don't much like the US build them and refuse to play by our rules.

Nuclear power is not magic. All our problems will not be solved by building more nuclear power plants, and in fact some of the really, really big ones might get worse.

Just saying...

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written by Anspen, July 06, 2010

Nuclear power stations do have significant downtime for maintenance and suffer from reduced production during hot summer due to cooling water issue.

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written by teumesmo, July 06, 2010

Indeed, except a 1GW nuclear plant can cost up to 5 billions USD, and you need the green light from Washington, if I'm not mistaken, and while nuclear fuel costs are low, they can still amount to up to 25% of gross income. Don't get me wrong, I'm a firm advocate of nuclear power, but the price tag, and red tape are far from reasonable, and the fact that nuclear power plants usually receive the lowest priority in the energy market is enough to drive anyone mad. That said, then perhaps any feasible alternative should be strongly considered, and close attention paid to laying an above spec infrastructure in order to reduce future costs.

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Wind power is also cheapest in a California Analysis
written by Carl Hage, July 06, 2010

Note, wind is overtaking gas-fired for *new* power (not installed capacity). But besides the EWEA, last year's report from the California Electric Commission study of the cost of new power CEC-200-2009-017 also shows that wind is the cheapest form of new power.

New nuclear is *only* useful for baseload power 24x7 and according to the CEC, is the most expensive per MWh, except for peaking plants that run only part of the time. [I trust the CEC analysts more than any industry or political organization on these costs.] Nuclear is even more expensive than solar per total MWh even though solar produces during peak daytime prices and nuclear produces all times including off-peak.

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Externalities
written by Rickeagle, July 08, 2010

re:nuclear
What about all those external costs for nuclear energy?
What about the fuel rod disposal?
What about the costs to insure a nuke plant? (carried by the tax payers)

Let's move on to renewables.

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written by teumesmo, July 08, 2010

That's the interesting thing about nuclear power though, like I mentioned before, it has the lowest priority in the energy market. The fuel cost difference between running a nuclear plant at 30% and 90% are negligible, and it's hard to believe wear-and-tear is enough to justify such a loss. Things become even weirder when you take into account that every nuclear power plant is "unique" in design, and that a 1GW nuclear plant is usually estimated to cost 1 billion USD, and usually ends up costing 5 billions. It is very hard to fathom the reasons why it is so, but I'm always reminded that the only reason was added to gasoline, was so that lead producers could have output for their production.

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written by EV, July 09, 2010

teumesmo, part of the increase in nuclear plants is due to all the lawsuits and repeated studies the lawsuits force. Remove those, and the cost comes down. Each one in the US has been unique as the designs were still improving upon prior ones as lessons learned came about. Go to France and you'll see all the plants are nearly identical.

As to lead in gasoline, it has a use as a lubricant. It was not added to create a market for lead producers.

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written by teumesmo, July 09, 2010

Apparently a large portion of the lubrication problem can be solved by simply adding either ethanol or methanol. I'm not saying that tetra-ethyl lead isn't useful, or that say mercury isn't a great electrode, but in the end, it is still a choice. Are you able to say that during the 1920's, they were totally ignorant of lead's toxic properties, and that without lead, motor cars were an impossibility?

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Winds aloft
written by mkass, July 13, 2010

There's more wind at higher altitudes that could be effectively harvested for energy. A Canadian company has a solution for this: http://organicconnectmag.com/w...an-energy/

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