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  • How a 22-year-old student uncovered peak oil fraud

  • Power bills to rise by up to 64% in NSW

     

    They come on top of already significant increases last July.

    The Federal Government’s ETS, twice rejected by the Senate, is behind a big chunk of the latest increases, IPART said.

    Rising network costs have also contributed.

    IPART confirmed Energy Australia bills will rise 60 per cent, adding $754 to a typical household customer’s bill by 2013.

    Integral Energy and Country Energy bills will rise 46 per cent and 64 per cent respectively in the same period, adding $577 and $918 to typical customers’ bills.

    But all the increases will be lower if the ETS is scrapped, IPART said.

    Over the three years to June 2013, if the ETS is not introduced, average prices will increase by a cumulative total of 20 per cent for Integral Energy, 36 per cent for EnergyAustralia, and 42 per cent for Country Energy, IPART said.

    But whatever happens, average prices will increase by seven per cent from July this year for Integral Energy customers, 10 per cent for EnergyAustralia customers and 13 per cent for Country Energy customers.

    The increases will apply to everyone on standard tariffs – said to be about 67 per cent of NSW household customers

  • Ten sites named in 4 Bn UK marine energy project

     

    The devices deployed will include the Pelamis “sea snake”, which uses the undulations of the sea surface to generate power, and the SeaGen tidal machine, which looks like an underwater wind turbine. In total, the machines will be able to produce up to 1.2GW of “green” energy, more than Dungeness B nuclear station in Kent.

    The crown estate, which owns all the UK’s seabed out to 12 nautical miles, said these projects were the world’s first commercial wave and tidal power schemes. It is expected to announce new marine power sites in other parts of the UK later this year.

    Alex Salmond, Scotland’s first minister, said the announcement confirmed his prediction that the Pentland Firth region – where the north-east Atlantic meets the North Sea – would become the “Saudi Arabia” of marine energy.

    The narrow sea channel has some of the most powerful currents and tidal surges in the world, with speeds up to 16 knots or 19mph recorded. The area also experiences some of the biggest waves in the UK.

    Crown estate officials and the developers accepted these often dangerous waters posed significant engineering and safety challenges for the firms involved.

    Salmond said some estimates suggested the waters could release up to 60GW of power – 10 times Scotland’s annual electricity usage. Other studies suggest one-third of the UK’s total electricity needs could be met by tidal power alone.

    “This is a huge milestone on the way to making that dream a reality,” Salmond said. “Today marks a major milestone in the global journey towards a low carbon future, with the commercial-scale deployment of marine renewables set to power our economies and help safeguard the planet for generations to come.”

    The schemes are expected to cost £4bn to install, and will require up to £1bn of extra investment – from public sources – to build new national grid connections, harbours and other infrastructure in Orkney and Caithness.

    The 10 projects, several of which have already had investment from a £22m UK government marine energy fund, are evenly divided between wave and tidal power stations, with each type generating up to 600MW. The projects are being shared by three of the UK’s largest power firms, E.ON, Scottish and Southern Energy (SSE), which already operates the UK’s largest hydro schemes, and Scottish Power Renewables, a heavy investor in windfarms.

    In most cases, the utility companies have formed joint ventures with four of the UK’s leading marine energy firms, covering small areas of sea with up to 200 machines. They use a variety of techniques to capture the energy of the ocean.

    Edinburgh-based company Pelamis Wave Power, whose sea-snake device is now being tested off the coast of Portugal, will have its own 50MW site in the Pentland Firth and share three other sites with SSE and Scottish Power on the west coast of Orkney’s main island. Its new devices will each be 180 metres long and generate 750kW of electricity.

    Also to use wave power is a more powerful version of Aquamarine’s existing Oyster machine, in which a lever hinged at the ocean floor is pushed back and forth. It will be used for a 200MW station with SSE Renewables, and its 200 new 1MW machines are expected to start producing power by 2015.

    OpenHydro, a large underwater turbine resembling a jet engine and bolted to the sea floor, is built by Cantick Head Tidal and will harness the firth’s fierce tides at a 200MW site south of Orkney.

    Another tidal machine, SeaGen, features two underwater propellers attached to a tall column anchored to the seabed. It will be installed by Marine Current Turbines off Orkney and at a 100MW site north-west of John O’Groats. SeaGen is currently on test at the “narrows” leading into Strangford Lough from the Irish Sea.

    The marine announcement follows last month’s confirmation that £75bn will be spent developing a much larger amount of offshore wind power – at least 25GW – at nine sites around the British Isles, including two off Scotland.

    The several government projects are intended to increase the UK’s renewable energy output, in a bid to cut the emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil fuel power stations and to increase the country’s energy security, as North Sea oil and gas declines.

    Orkney islands’ council is now planning to invest more than £20m to upgrade its harbours and port facilities to cope with the huge influx in industrial equipment, ships and workers involved in these projects, which will industrialise large areas of the coastline.

    The islands are widely admired for their tranquillity and scenery but Stephen Hagan, the council’s leader, said he believed most residents were keen to see the investment.

    With other island councils in Scotland facing huge local unrest over plans for major onshore windfarms, he does not expect significant opposition on environmental grounds.

    “I do genuinely think that people in Orkney feel that we have to get the balance right between the long term sustainability of the place and the environment. I think they see the development of marine renewables as a much better option than onshore wind,” he said.

     

  • Australia getting warmer springs and uneven rainfall

    Bureau of Meteorology Director Dr Greg Ayers said the observed changes showed clear evidence of climate change.
    ‘Australia holds one of the best national climate records in the world,’ Dr Ayers said. ‘The Bureau’s been responsible for keeping that record for more than a hundred years and it’s there for anyone and everyone to see, use and analyse.’

    Temperature

    Since 1960 the mean temperature in Australia has increased by about 0.7°C.

    Some areas have experienced a warming of 1.5 to 2°C over the last 50 years. Warming has occurred in all seasons, however the strongest warming has occurred in spring (about 0.9°C) and the weakest in summer (about 0.4°C).

    Rainfall

    While total rainfall in Australia had been relatively stable, the geographic distribution changed significantly over the past 50 years, with rainfall decreasing in southwest and southeast Australia, the major population areas but increasing in northern and central parts of Australia.

    The Bureau of Meteorology expects average temperatures to continue to rise in the country by between 0.6°C and 1.5°C by 2030, with the most dramatic rises in central and north-western Australia.

    Rainfall is also predicted to fall in southern areas of Australia during winter, in southern and eastern areas during spring, and in south-west Western Australia during autumn.

    Useful links
    Full summary report

  • Eye on the Wind: Innovations Designed to “See” and Track Gusts.

     

    One major reliability and operational lifetime enhancing factor is a substantially reduced off-axis turbine loading due to optimised rotor alignment to the prevailing, but continuously changing, direction of the wind encountered by the turbine.

    The company currently employs eight full-time staff and another 35 experts indirectly via OADS, with full-scale production and shipments of the Vindicator expected soon. In September 2009, Catch the Wind announced that it had entered into a manufacturing services agreement with Ottawa, Canada-based BreconRidge Corporation, a fibre-optics specialist and provider of collaborative design and manufacturing services. Under the terms of the agreement, BreconRidge will also provide technical, engineering, design and other professional services related to the manufacture of the Vindicator.

    The fast-track commercialisation efforts also resulted in the successful completion of a full year Vindicator system field-testing programme, conducted as part of different onshore and offshore trial projects in North America.

    In a major onshore project, Catch the Wind and Nebraska Public Power District (NPPD) teamed up for a joint trial at NPPD’s Ainsworth Wind Energy Facility located near Ainsworth, Nebraska. This programme involved evaluating how wind speed and direction forward measurement can optimally align wind turbines with the approaching wind.

    The latter set up involved a Vestas V82-1.65 MW turbine and a beta Vindicator LWS production unit functionality integrated with the turbine’s control system and mounted upon the nacelle cover.

    This particular fixed-speed Active-Stall Vestas model forms part of NPPD’s operating fleet and was originally a former NEG Micon turbine concept. Both fixed speed Classic Stall (fixed blade angle) and Active-Stall (turn-able blade pitch) turbines represent a clear minority compared to more advanced pitch-controlled variable speed turbines now dominating the global wind market.

    Phil Rogers, CTW president and CEO explains, ‘A distinct Vindicator LWS product feature, compared to other LIDAR type devices, is the nacelle mounting and the fact that there are no moving parts, therefore requiring little maintenance. Another unique feature is the forward-looking capability to accurately sense and calculate both wind speed and wind direction up to at least 300 metres upfront the rotor.’

    Eggbeater Shape Stands Out From the Crowd

    The Vindicator LWS ‘Smart turbine control system’ originates from an aerospace product development dedicated to the safety of flight critical applications. Covered by 27 patents, the product’s development track absorbed more than US$70 million in R&D funding. A distinguishing characteristic of the product is the eggbeater-shaped body supplemented by four legs, each with pivotal mounting foot-brackets enabling an uncomplicated nacelle assembly process.

    Explaining the Vindicator LWS working principle, which is that the nature of conventional wind turbine control systems is reactive, Rogers says, ‘With today’s wind turbines, both wind speed and wind direction are usually measured at the nacelle rear with the aid of either a conventional rotating anemometer or a stationary device, plus a separate wind direction sensor.’

    Rogers continues: ‘This common arrangement implies that the wind control system can only start reacting to a wind gust and/or change in wind direction once the actual event has already occurred. In other words, there is no lead time left for adjusting the pitch angle and/or rotor orientation to the continuously changing wind conditions upfront the rotor.’

    In the case of the Vindicator LWS, however, three forward-facing laser beams each reflect off dust particles in the approaching wind, which, in a phenomenon known as the Doppler effect, causes a change in colour. From this sensed colour change, the wind speed and direction are then calculated as a near integral step.

    Finally, the Vindicator LWS commands optimal turbine alignment and blade pitch based on this input. ‘Being able to ‘see’ the approaching wind at 300 metres in front of the rotor translates to 20 seconds lead-time at a wind speed of 35 mph (15.6 m/s)’, says Rogers. ‘This lead-time is, in principle, sufficient for all wind turbines and thus independent of a specific wind turbine, but if necessary can be expanded by further extending the range.’

    Gust Detection and Smart Alignment Boost Yield

    A key finding of the Nebraska trial was that employing a Vindicator on a given wind turbine increases energy yield by 12.3% on average, says Rogers. That positive result in turn can be attributed to both optimized rotor alignment with the oncoming wind, and increased gust detection. He stresses that the increased output was achieved while the Vindicator controlled the turbine for only 56% of the time as specified by the 30-day trial parameters.

    ‘Excluding statistically insufficient measurement data, the Vindicator improved energy output by more than 18%. The system is also insensitive to specific environmental conditions’, adds Rogers, expanding on the positive trial results.

    A Vindicator unit itself is a standard system that can be fitted on all turbine makes and types with an installed cost of about $150,000. ‘This adds about 10% to the current turbine off-factory costs typically in the range of $1.5 million per MW. Based upon incremental cash flows, that in turn translates to a typical two to three year payback period’, says Rogers.

    ‘Our field trial with Nebraska Power above all validated the Vindicator’s built-in capabilities to improve turbine performance through forward wind speed and direction sensing. By increasing energy output by only 10% for a typical 2.5 MW turbine, for example, we are convinced that wind farm operators can expect to generate a present value of future cash flows in excess of $600,000,’ adds Rogers.

    This figure represents an additional $18 million annual revenue for a typical 75 MW wind farm. And as the Vindicator is a standard system, the relative investments costs go down with an increase in wind turbine size, which positively reflects on investment payback period.

    Regarding offshore-related developments, in late 2009 field trial tests of a WindSentinel, a wind resource assessment buoy mounted with the Vindicator LWS, were successfully completed in co-operation with Catch the Wind partner AXYS Technologies Inc. of British Columbia, Canada.

    AXYS Technologies is an established pioneer specialising in the design, manufacture, distribution and maintenance of remote environmental data acquisition, processing and telemetry systems. The marine consultancy has built and tested over 200 meteorological and oceanographic data buoys of various types, activities sometimes expanded by their long-term upkeep.

    The WindSentinel is designed to assist offshore wind farm developers in determining the available wind resource at potential wind farm sites. It is claimed to be the world’s first wind resource assessment buoy capable of accurately measuring wind data at the required hub heights of large conventional offshore wind turbines.

    Historically, wind farm developers have had to construct permanent offshore meteorological towers or ‘met masts’ to collect wind speed and direction data. Catch the Wind estimates that such offshore met masts can cost as much as $10 million to build and erect. Rogers aims to eliminate their future need by offering the floating WindSentinel as a less expensive and therefore more economical and easier to employ a solution instead.

    The field trials were conducted off Race Rocks Island, in the coastal waters of British Columbia. The main goal was to determine if buoy motions affected wind measurement outcomes. The test set-up compared data collected by the Vindicator LWS on a moving WindSentinel buoy to that collected from a second, stationary Vindicator on Race Rocks Island, 750 meters away.

    ‘The buoy worked flawlessly during the trials, with wind speeds that reached more than 80 kilometres per hour (22.2 m/s) and wave heights over four meters,’ says Reo Phillips, manager of AXYS product development.

    AXYS has been granted a license by Catch the Wind to combine and integrate the Vindicator LWS with custom-made AXYS salt/fresh water fixed and floating platforms, and sell the bundled products worldwide. ‘We are very encouraged by the results of these latest field trials’, adds Rogers, ‘and look forward to bringing the WindSentinel to the market, given the industry’s need to better determine the economic viability of offshore wind energy projects before they are developed.’

    Catch the Wind is continuing to conduct further research in collaboration with third parties. These include the Wind Energy Institute of Canada, and Canadian consultancy Helimax Energy, now a group member of Germanischer Lloyd of Germany.

    A preliminary field trial with Helimax involved a Vindicator LWS beta version and a meteorological tower at 85 metres above ground level in Quebec. The trial favourably demonstrated the correlation of wind speed and direction data captured by both measuring systems, Rogers concluded.

    Eize de Vries is wind technology correspondent of Renewable Energy World magazine. e-mail: rew@pennwell.com

     Danes Hail Lidar Breakthrough in Wind

    The world’s largest independent rotor blade manufacturer, LM Glasfiber of Denmark, and two Danish partners are developing a laser-based wind sensing system integrated into a wind turbine’s blades and spinner. They have claimed success for the system in predicting wind direction, gusts and turbulence.

    The three-year research project began in 2009 with financial support from the Danish National Advanced Technology Foundation. The R&D is conducted as a joint venture with sustainable energy research organization Risø DTU and sensor specialist NKT Photonics. Among the main project objectives are that the laser-based solution will significantly improve wind turbine load control during operation, improving overall turbine reliability by acting as an efficiency enhancement and operational lifetime-boosting measure.

    LM Glasfiber has been working for years on multiple projects aimed at improving rotor blade efficiency as a means to raise wind turbine energy yield. A key objective is developing ‘intelligent’ blades that continuously measure the approaching wind and either adapt to these prevailing wind conditions or supply data to the wind turbine control system, says Lars Fuglsang, LM Glasfiber research director. Integrating Lidar technology into the blades themselves is an extension of LM Glasfiber’s previous blade monitoring technology, he adds.

    The partners look to have made rapid progress for their new product development, which has been named ‘wind Lidar’.

    Risø DTU claimed during the first half of January 2010 that it had completed the world’s first successful test on a wind turbine with a laser-based anemometer built into the spinner in order to increase electricity generation.

    Fuglsang adds, ‘Whereas current blade monitoring technologies measure loads on the blades, integrating Lidars into the blade enables us to measure the exact wind conditions to which these blades are exposed. And instead of realizing afterwards what the force upon a blade has been, we will be able to measure wind real-time and either have the blade or the wind turbine react instantly.’

    The combination of Lidar technology integrated into the rotor blades as well as into the spinner is said to further optimize the system’s overall capability to ’see’ the wind well ahead before it hits the blades.

    It is claimed that with the new technology incorporated energy yield may increase up to 5% over the wind turbine’s 20 year lifetime, primarily because it will be possible to use longer blades by maintaining the same wind turbine structural stress level. A 5% yield increase would, for a 4 MW class wind turbine, also result in an annual financial gain in the range of $38,000, depending on fossil energy prices and other variables.

    LM Glasfiber expects a rotor blade prototype with integrated Lidar technology to be available in 2012, potentially allowing the partners to supply LM’s customers with Lidar-enabled intelligent blades by 2014.

  • Diversifying Fuel Supply: Key Players in Biomass

    Siemens‘Alstom is a world leader in delivering biomass co-firing solutions worldwide to contribute to the fight against climate change, in line with its clean power strategy.’ — Patrick Fragman, managing director of Alsom

    Alstom: Engineering, building and turbine supplies

    Alstom has supplied equipment to some of the largest biomass projects in the world, including Drax.

    Alstom is a France-based power engineering giant. In May 2009 the company signed an engineering, procurement and construction contract with Drax Energy for £50 million (US$78 million), to build the processing works for the 1.5 million tonne per year biomass co-firing facility to be constructed at Drax Power Station in North Yorkshire, UK (see details over). The processing works will receive, handle, store and process various biomass materials ready for direct injection into the power station’s existing boilers.

    And, announced at around the same time, the company also confirmed that it is to supply a 1100 MWe steam turbine generator package for the existing Maasvlakte installation near Rotterdam in the Netherlands. This coal-fired facility will also be suitable for co-firing with biomass and, Alstom says, will also benefit from deep water access for fuel suply. Under the terms of the contract, with E.ON Benelux, the plant is due to be commissioned in 2013.

    The company has also previously won the business for a 41 MWe advanced steam turbogenerator for the Dan Cheng Bio Energy Cogeneration Project in Thailand which uses bagass and rice husks.

    Alstom designed, installed and commissioned a dedicated co-firing system on the 640 MWe tangential coal fired boiler at Essent Energy’s Amer Power Station in the Netherlands.