Wind power: for or against the wind?

[Woodcutter]

[..] In my opinion what particularly disturbs is that "foreigners" come to exploit the potential of THEIR region without compensation (or almost) for the locals so there are false arguments to prevent the success of the projects. It's very Franco-French behavior.

It seemed to me, however, that there was a tax on this activity, interesting enough for the municipalities?

[bojourvous5094]

Quebec would be Saudi Arabia for wind energy, a real wind field. This analogy is not wrong. Great winds beat the lands of the Far North of Quebec. Environment Canada researchers have shown that the entire coast of Quebec is very windy. The winds are 6,5 to 9 meters per second. The wind potential is therefore considerable.

There are prejudices about wind energy. However, the wind is more constant than water. Wind energy can be stored by coupling it with hydro power. And the costs of wind power production have joined those of hydroelectricity.

Environmentalists advocate the construction of wind farms. Others denounce the negative effects on birds. Research also indicates that these effects are minimal.

Louis-Gilles Francoeur
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SOURCE:
Radio-Canada: you can listen to the interview….
http://radio-canada.ca/radio/indicatifp ... 514.shtml#

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*** The problems that arise in Quebec, the power of gusts of wind can go up to around 160 km ... which creates extreme pressure on the mechanics of the wind turbine ...
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Negative effects on birds. :

1) Large office towers are more deadly than all wind turbines ……
2) In the USA, 14,000 times more birds killed by cars ... than the electricity network ... especially the high voltage lines which are struck by birds ...
In Germany, for 15,000 wind turbines have listed 39 dead birds… for a year…

[Christophe]

It seemed to me, however, that there was a tax on this activity, interesting enough for the municipalities?

For the municipalities YES (although it is quite light it seems to me) but for the natives no ... it is rarely the municipalities which block the projects (except the municipalities which do not benefit from this tax but which are nonetheless hampered by "noise" and vision)

[bojourvous5094]

Crees think big

A budget of $ 3 billion, the construction of 1100 wind turbines, a production of 1650 megawatts, these are some of the figures that emerge from the project that the Crees want to set in motion in the Far North of Quebec.

The project promoters then want to sell their energy to the Americans and Quebecers.

However, according to what the daily newspaper The Gazette reports on Wednesday, this vast project could well meet with opposition from the Government of Quebec due, precisely, to its desire to do without Hydro-Quebec for distribution.

Hydro-Québec, reminds the Minister of Natural Resources, is the only authorized buyer of the energy produced in Quebec. A producer must therefore necessarily sell all of his production to Hydro-Québec, which will then sell it on the market.

Cree Grand Chief Matthew Mukash, recently declared that the future of energy development in the Far North lies in the exploitation of wind energy.
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SOURCE:
http://www.radio-canada.ca/nouvelles/so ... ojet.shtml

[Philippe Schutt]

I see that Quebec has the same monopoly brakes as France, at least for electricity ... if you want to do without it, you can only produce for yourself.

[bojourvous5094]

I see that Quebec has the same monopoly brakes as France, at least for electricity ... if you want to do without it, you can only produce for yourself.

[Quote]

Electricity in Quebec

I think I have to explain our hydro situation.
Quebec nationalized electricity, because American companies exploited us ... This is one of the major turning points in Quebec. But, with globalization, private companies are trying to infiltrate by all means into our “hydroelectric gem”…

1) They started with mini-dams and sell electricity to Société Hydro-Québec.

2) The idea of ​​the great Cree chief, Matthew Mukash, to sell electricity seems good, but it opens the back door to the intrusion of multinationals in our production. It is preferable for the Crees to associate with Hydro-Québec to develop and sell electricity, in order to keep control over our resource. The danger is real.
In the wind energy sector, HYDRO has left the field open to private development. I started to look at WHO is involved in these contracts ……… We end up immediately with gas and oil companies with Canadian content, but they belong as by HASARD, to American interests…

3) When I looked at the pipeline map, it leads right into the center of the United States as usual… All of Alberta's oil production goes directly to the USA…. If the interest is shown by the same companies for our wind energy, we can already see the road, it is the same as the pipeline… We can easily see the American ramifications to appropriate all the resources available around them….
What I found :
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Cartier wind energy
will become the largest producer of wind energy in Quebec.
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Assets related to energy projects
wind turbines are the indirect property of TransCanada Corporation (62%) and Innergex II, Income Fund (38%).
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These projects represent a private investment of more than 1,1 billion
$ and will be commissioned over a period from 2006 to 2012.
These projects will represent a total annual production of 2,3 terawatt hours (TWh), the energy needed to power nearly 150 Quebec homes.
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TransCanada Corporation Profile

TransCanada is a leader in the energy sector in North America, specializing in natural gas and energy services. TransCanada's network represents nearly 41 kilometers of pipelines, which
transport most of Alberta's natural gas to markets
Canadian and American. In addition to its participation in Cartier energy
wind turbine, TransCanada owns, controls or builds nearly 5 MW of
electrical capacity, the equivalent of the consumption of approximately 5,1 million households.


Profile of Innergex II, Income Fund

Innergex II Income Fund ("Innergex II"), is a privately held open-ended trust, which was established in 2001 to build, own and operate hydroelectric plants and wind farms in North America. In addition to being a partner of Cartier wind energy, Innergex II owns, operates and develops nearly 300 MW of hydroelectric projects. Innergex II has entered into a cooperation agreement with Innergex Energy, Income Fund, ("Fund"), a public open-ended trust created in July 2003 and traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange (IEF.UN), pursuant to which all project developed by Innergex. It is offered to the Fund before being offered to any other party. The Fund indirectly owns nine hydroelectric plants in Quebec, Ontario and the State of Idaho in the United States.
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It supplies natural gas to several American cities as well as regional distributors such as Consumer Gas in Ontario and Gaz Métro in Quebec. Since 1996, TransCanada has also become a significant producer of electricity with a current capacity of 4700 megawatts.

This monopoly, or almost, in the transport of natural gas ………___________

This process was started around 1999 with the arrival of a new president, Douglas Baldwin, a former senior executive of Imperial Oil Company, whose mission consisted in rectifying the financial situation of the company, in better refocusing its activities and clearly determining its growth niches.
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Thanks to its significant liquidity, TransCanada Corporation can consolidate its position in various pipeline projects (it has just increased its respective interests in the Portland and Foothill pipelines) in addition to continuing its expansion in electricity production (purchase in 2003 d '' a participation in the Bruce Power nuclear power plant, recent launch of construction of a power plant in New Brunswick, announced project of a power plant in Trois-Rivières) and to consider the construction of a regasification facility for natural gas imported into the State of Maine and that of a pipeline to transport natural gas from the Mackenzie Delta.

For more complete information on the company (data and financial ratios provided by Stock Guide), visit the website of the Internet class Pro-Placement (www.proplacement.qc.ca)
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cchiasson@proplacement.qc.ca
SOURCE: http://www.ledevoir.com/2003/12/09/42492.html?296

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TRANSCANADA PIPELINES
transports and markets natural gas. The company owns and operates a pipeline system from Alberta to Quebec and has interests in other pipeline systems in Canada, the United States and internationally. Its subsidiary Western Gas Marketing buys and sells natural gas from Western Canada.SOURCE: http://investdb.theglobeandmail.com/inv ... _id=167637

[vtajmb]

The beautiful mayor of our small village of Sancerre gathered those who wanted to talk about the wind turbines project which should decorate the top of the hills which overhang our super valley ... The "traveling salesman" of the company which pilot this project made a idyllic presentation, sweeping a back of the sleeve the objections of those who were doing the primary wind turbine, or rather who would see them a little further, but not with us, please ...

And then there were also some questions which raised the debate, because they rather tinet requests for information on the risks of nuisances of this field (ten ten mini Eiffel towers of 130 m high!) ...
- night light pollution: we are a few km further from the Belleville sur Loire power plant, which is brightly lit at night. According to the company that runs the project, only lights at the four corners of the field of wind turbines rather oriented towards the sky will be necessary for aviation safety
- visual pollution ; the hills that surround our small valley are about the same height as the wind turbines. Won't wind turbines stain this little gem of nature? On a mountain 1000 m high, wind turbines are more modest, since they represent only 1/8 of the height of the relief ...

- noise pollution; the emerging noise (perceptible) for the closest residents (750 m) would be, according to the company, negligible (<5 decibels). It is probably true. But what about the infrasound that Scandinavians living near wind turbines have been talking about? They are said to be vectors of hearing and also neurological disorders for humans and cattle. Of course the representative of the company refutes these fears ...

- efficiency; by the company's own admission, the 10 to 12 wind turbines would only produce 24 megawatts. The Belleville power plant produces with its two 2700 megawatt reactors. It would therefore take 100 to 120 wind fields of 10 to 12 pieces each to replace said power plant. But it is true that I would be very annoyed if I were entrusted, confined in a vitrified coating, the storage of nuclear waste that I consume, directly or indirectly.

Our wind sales representative insisted, before the meeting ends in a counterproductive hubbub, that tourism will be increased by the curious who come to see the wind turbines, that one day the wind turbines may be imposed on us, that the landscape evolves permanently under the action (or the omission) of man (but is this a reason to spoil an exceptional site?), that there are already outrages committed in the environment (but is it a reason to add a layer?), that the dismantling is budgeted on a blocked account unlike nuclear power plants ...

The main thing is there. If the field of wind turbines is built, I will feel shit to have been the passive accomplice of a big attack on the beauty of a site of any beauty. If the project fails, I will blame myself for having hampered the production of clean energy by default ... What do you think?

[freddau]

There is a wind turbine field near my home in Teterchen in Lorraine.

At the visual level: it doesn't bother me more than that

At the hearing level: at 50 m you hardly expect them and you have to be at the feet of the masts almost to hear something, big wooff on the other hand for the ultrasounds, must see with the cillage which is just below the wind turbines .

they were dimensioned to resist up to winds of 185 km / h and during the storm of the century (Lothar) which fell on France and Germany in 2000 or 2001, most of the wind turbines resisted .

[frl]

Our friend from Quebec bojourvous5094 is moved by the origin of investors interested in wind turbines (and from there, the destination of the electricity produced).

The only answer I see is what are Quebec investors waiting for to do their job?

Should we prevent the construction of wind turbines because the origin of the funds is not Quebec (or even Hydro)?
You have to think a little wider than the (beautiful) province. I know that in Canada nothing is simple between Francophones and Anglophones. So obviously foreigners arriving with their dollars ...

Private funds can provide a decentralized solution. If building a nuclear power plant cannot be everyone's business, a wind turbine is everyone's business. In the Netherlands, some farmers simply have the wind turbine in the farmyard! (I think they have a power of a few hundred KW). But it is a country where the only relief consists of wind turbines!

The major interest of the wind turbine is that if it interferes, we dismantle it and reassemble it further. Nothing remains, the process is completely reversible unlike many other sources of energy (even hydro).

[vtajmb]

thank you Freddau;

I agree with almost all your answers (resistance, displacement, acoustic discomfort ... even if it does not answer the question infrasound and auditory and neurological disturbances. The emerging noise does not seem to be a problem indeed.

the only point that bothers me is the aesthetic aspect; in fact, if you have an acce relief, killed, the wind turbines do not spoil the look, they do not present the landscape. On a bleak Beauceronne plain or otherwise, it breaks with a monotony linked to platitude. On hills the height of wind turbines, which is more magnificent, the photo-montages of the wind turbine company give me a little (a lot!)

but can I be messed up? am i mistaken?