Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
12.9 FUTURE
As stated earlier, predictions about the future are risky; however, here they are:
1. At some point in time there will be a distributed wind market, very similar to the farm
implement business today. A farmer, rancher, or agribusiness owner will go to the bank
and obtain a loan for a wind turbine (size range from 25 to 1,000 kW). He will expect a
payback of 5-7 years, and it will make money for him for the next 15 years. The nice thing
about money from wind-generated energy, value of energy displaced (retail rates) and the
avoided cost for electricity, is that it will not fluctuate like other agriculture commodities.
2. Major transmission lines will be built from the windy plains areas in the United States to
load centers. Within 10 years, wind power will compete with fuel adjustment cost without
production tax credits, primarily due to value received for the reduction of carbon dioxide
emissions.
3. There will be trading in carbon dioxide in the United States, much as there is now trad-
ing in NOX and SOX. At that point in time, wind energy becomes the cheapest source
of electricity. Why is Shell Oil now buying wind farms? In my opinion, it is the same as
European countries buying forests in South America to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.
A wind farm, La Venta II (83 MW), in Oaxaca, Mexico, displaces 205,380 tons/year of
carbon dioxide, and the CO
2
credit for the first 7 years goes to the Spanish Carbon Fund,
which helped finance the project. The value of wind energy would increase by $0.0.03-04/
kWh if the avoided CO
2
is worth $30/ton.
4. Cooperative wind plants, from one to ten units, will become common. Because of the
economies of scale, groups of farmers will form cooperatives to buy larger-sized wind
turbines.
As stated in
Chapter 2
, the world faces a tremendous energy problem, and a number of people have
sounded the warning and suggested solutions [19, 20]. The first priority is conservation and energy effi-
ciency, and the second is the increased use of renewable energy. Wind has now become part of national
energy policies, which is reflected in the large growth rate in wind capacity across the world.
LINKS
European Wind Energy Association,
www.ewea.org/index.php?id201
. Economics of wind energy.
National Renewable Energy Lab,
www.nrel.gov/analysis
.
Energy analysis.
National Renewable Energy Lab,
www.nrel.gov/wind/coe.html
.
Baseline cost of energy.
NREL Photographic Information eXchange, also known as PIX,
www.nrel.gov/data/pix/
.
Lots of great pho-
tos on the Internet of wind turbines and wind projects: small systems, grid connect, village power,
hybrid systems, and wind farms.
Power Technologies Energy Data Book, 4th ed.,
www.nrel.gov/analysis/power_databook
.
Subsidies,
www.awea.org/pubs/factsheets/Subsidy.pdf
U.S. DOE, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, planning, budgeting, and analysis:
REFERENCES
1.
R. J. Brown and R. R. Yanuck. 1980.
Life cycle costing, a practical guide for energy managers
. Atlanta,
Georgia: Fairmont Press.
2.
J. M. Cohen et al. 1989. A methodology for computing wind turbine cost of electricity using utility
economic assumptions. NREL/TP-257-3628. Paper presented at Proceedings, Windpower '89. CD.
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