Consistant winds?

[Andy Rhody]

There's lots of large wind farms around here in Central Pennsylvania USA but because wind is inconsistant, I always considered them to be just a suppliment to a "base" generating station like a coal plant.

Does anyone know if there are places on this planet where wind blows consistantly and turbines can produce power 24 hours a day?

[Rob Beckers]

Andy, I don't think there are places where the wind always blows such that the turbine output is more-or-less constant. Over water (oceans, sees) the winds are more consistent, and in some areas over or near water there's almost always wind (trade winds for example), but even those sites have considerable variability.

What works better is a coupled grid that spans a large geographical area, so that the wind is always blowing somewhere, and the average production from turbines is more-or-less constant. Utility-scale energy storage is really the holy grail for allowing a very large percentage of power to come from renewables. While there is some of that, it's expensive and quite crude. Find a real (and economical) solution to that one and you're up for the next Nobel price...

-RoB-

[Dave Turpin]

The wind is consistant and powerful up in the jet stream!

A tethered balloon (or perhaps even kite) with wind turbines attached to it floated up at 40,000 feet would produce power consistantly, and would not need to be as large as tower-based turbines (since windspeeds are in the 300-kt range) We just need superconducting wire to make it feasible, otherwise the lines would be too big for the kite to fly or line losses would be too great.

You could place them virtually anywhere, with the only limiting factor being air traffic.

[Andy Rhody]

I was hoping that you would chime in Rob being familiar with the Netherlands and all. I figured if there was constant wind anywhere, it might be there.

What works better is a coupled grid that spans a large geographical area, so that the wind is always blowing somewhere, and the average production from turbines is more-or-less constant. ]

That makes sense maybe like wanting a drink for lunch and saying, "Hey, it's always 5 o'clock somewhere". I had an uncle who was a fighter pilot in the Air Force that use to say that all the time but it's
hard to argue with that. It works!