Green power, alternate energy resources - all the good buzz words. Here's an article on wind farm performance in Britain that is not very encouraging. Basically, even the newer wind farms are operating at less than 20% of rated capacity and that's not good enough by a long shot.
The key performance index is "base load" - modern society has a certain minimum consistent demand for power so that whenever someone flips the switch at their home or business, the power comes on. None of the green technologies are reliable enough to meet base load requirements because the wind stops, the sun goes down, etc. Continued R & D into alternate technologies is a good idea to develop supplemental energy resources, but environmentalists and politicians who try to make us believe that we can make the shift now across the board to new green energy resources now are kidding themselves and guaranteeing cold and dark nights for the rest of us in the future.
www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7069938.ece
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