Like I say, the people that know wind energy first hand are its biggest boosters. Case in point, rock ribbed conservative Sam Brownback, Governor of Kansas, writes in the Witchita Eagle:
The moment is approaching when our nation must decide how it’s going to power the future. The
importance of renewable energy to the nation becomes clear as Congress turns its attention to energy policy this fall, as we examine the importance of true energy independence and security more closely, and as we continue our work on rebuilding the economy and job creation.Experience has taught us that investment in the renewable-energy economy is creating jobs across all employment sectors, including construction, engineering, operations, technology and professional services, in both rural and urban communities. Greater use of renewable energy also will allow the country to prolong its current power-generation resources while developing new generation technologies to ensure a secure and homegrown supply of energy.
We, as a nation, have been waiting for the moment when a true balance between environmental concerns, economic benefits and energy needs is in view. I believe that moment has arrived.
At the national level, we’ve moved toward this balance by deploying powerful tools, such as tax incentives to support investment in renewable-energy projects and grants to encourage innovation in clean-coal technologies. The wind industry has utilized a production tax credit, which has helped the industry see steady growth this decade. I support the continued use of those tools as a way to spur investment in our communities and create sorely needed jobs.
In Kansas and the lower Midwest, our local utilities have designed and are constructing an electric transmission system that ensures greater reliability for our residents, offers access to competitively priced power, and dramatically increases our ability to move renewable energy across the country.
Other private companies are working to develop renewable-energy highways — dedicated transmission lines — that can transport thousands of megawatts of renewable energy from the Midwest to population centers in the East, thereby providing access to clean, reliable and affordable energy for millions of customers.
The Grain Belt Express Clean Line, which will deliver 3,500 megawatts of low-cost, renewable energy from western Kansas to southeastern Missouri and points farther east, is a great example of such a project.
A combination of events in Kansas has driven the cost of wind energy to historic lows. We have 1,100 megawatts of operational wind and are on track to more than double that number by the end of 2012.
Wind energy makes a compelling economic case with new installed wind prices dropping from around 6 cents per kilowatt-hour to 3 cents per kilowatt-hour or lower, while turbine technology increases capacity factors to about 50 percent or more. We’ve increased transmission capacity, constructing more than 1,000 new miles of high-voltage electric transmission.
The price of Kansas wind is now competitive with the traditional sources of energy, and you can get guaranteed rates for the next 20 years.
Kansans have a proud history of meeting the needs of the world. We export wheat to feed the hungry and machines that can fly to make the world a smaller place. The time has come for us to export clean, reliable and affordable wind energy to the nation.
This comment brought to you by wind power…
The HVDC (high voltage direct current) lines mentioned in this article are the key to the large-scale success of wind energy. Conventional HVAC (high-voltage alternating current) lines start to lose efficiency over distances larger than about 1,000 miles. The HVDC systems are more efficient over long distances, but they’re completely wrong for distribution of power. Think of them as rather like the backbone of the Internet — a super-efficient way for getting something from Point A to Point B, but not right for getting it into your house.
Thermal power plants — coal, oil, nuclear, and natural gas — are highly reliable because they provide full power 24/7/365 (except for the rare shutdown). Wind and solar are lousy in this regard: they go up, they go down, it’s a real roller coaster ride, which makes life hell for grid operators who have unreliable inputs but are legally required to provide reliable outputs. With a continental backbone of HVDC lines, it would be much easier to combine all those fluctuating inputs into a single stable average.
The problem is, such a backbone would be quite expensive — easily a hundred billion bucks for a continental-scale backbone. No single grid operator can economically justify setting up a single leg of such a backbone; it makes sense only when tackled as a single project. I had always though that such an operation would require a Federal government initiative. However, the Grain Belt Express Line (what a corny name!) suggests a different path. Once that line has been set up, it makes sense for nearby grids to connect to it. From that point on, network effects set in and, the more legs there are to the backbone, the more cost-effective it becomes to hook up to it.
The construction of a large enough HVDC power backbone is, IMO, the single most important step in making wind energy successful on a large scale.