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What is important is the cost per kw/hr.
Cost of Wind vs. Fossil Fuels - MEIC
Cost of Wind vs. Fossil Fuels
In Montana, wind energy is cost-competitive with fossil fuels, especially coal. In fact, wind energy is less much less expensive than coal for customers of NorthWestern Energy – the state’s largest utility. The graph below comes from data from the Montana Public Service Commission and it compares the costs of various resources in NorthWestern’s portfolio. The Judith Gap wind facility is about $32.11 per megawatt-hour (or 3.1 cents per kilowatt-hour) while the coal-fired Colstrip Unit 4 is about $64.55 per megawatt-hour or (6.4 cents per kilowatt hour).
Wind power in Montana is less than half the price of coal generated power. So who cares if the wind towers are only putting out a fraction of their rated power, if that fraction is cheaper electricity per kw/hr.
The use of multiple energy sources is required in the renewable energy concept and government subsidy is not required (though important at this stage) as it certainly is with petroleum based and coal.
LOL Cannot answer to the fact the by the kw/hr, wind is now cheaper than any fossil fuel. So you resort to percentage of installed capacity, ignoring the fact that it is the cost per kw/hr that the customer pays. Yes, if it runs at 25% capacity, and that 25% is cheaper than the electricity from the fossil fuel plant running at 90% capacity, then the power from the windmills are a very good deal.
As for the intermittancy, not a problem in the very near future as there are a bunch of very technological savvy people installing and building grid scale storage right now.
My, my, Skull, why don't you just hie your silly ass down to Texas and tell them all about why the wind farms don's work?
Wind Power In Texas: Not Just Hot Air - Law360
Texas’ total wind electricity production — and wind energy share as a percentage of total net generation — is also expected to continue to rise in the coming years, as investment in wind generation nationwide, and particularly in the state, continues to expand.
Indeed, on Nov. 29, 2016, Spanish wind energy giant Gamesa announced that it was awarded a contract to supply 75 additional 2.1 megawatt (MW) turbines to Terna Energy, a Greek renewable energy company, for the development of another wind farm in the lower Texas Panhandle near Fluvanna (for additional capacity totaling 155 MW), the financing for which closed on Dec. 16. Delivery and commissioning are anticipated to be completed by the end of 2017.
The EIA’s report is based on annual wind energy production, but this does not take into account changing wind energy production levels on a daily basis. For example, on Nov. 27, 2016, Texas set a new record for wind power generation.
According to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the electric grid operator for the state of Texas, wind farms that day were providing approximately 15,000 MW of electricity, which accounted for about 45 percent of the total demand for electric power at the time, far exceeding the 9.9 percent annual figure for Texas in 2015.
What are the government subsidies and what happens when they go away?
And why does electricity cost so much more in Germany with their dedication to wind power than in France where almost 80% of their electricity is nuclear?Fig. 1: Gross electricity production by fuel, EU-27
Overview of the electricity production and use in Europe
To 2010.
What are the government subsidies and what happens when they go away?
$5+ trillion a year for fossil fuels.
Global Fossil Fuel Subsidies Still Total More Than $5 Trillion Annually
Global subsidies for all renewable energy are less than $100 billion per year.
So, fossil fuels get subsidized over 50 times more. If subsidies went away, wind power would be much more attractive.
Did you even read the article?What are the government subsidies and what happens when they go away?
$5+ trillion a year for fossil fuels.
Global Fossil Fuel Subsidies Still Total More Than $5 Trillion Annually
Global subsidies for all renewable energy are less than $100 billion per year.
So, fossil fuels get subsidized over 50 times more. If subsidies went away, wind power would be much more attractive.
No they are getting taxed to subsidize the wind installation and that wind power proved to be so unreliable that Germany actually had to build NEW coal fired power stations to make up for their decommissioning of emission free nuclear power plantsSkull, you dumb fuck, not getting taxed for the air pollution created by fossil fuels is an indirect subsidy. Were the coal companies to have to pay for the health problems that their product creates among the population, you would see them go out of business tomorrow. They can kill the rest of us for their profit, and you approve of that.
Elon Musk 
Known to the scientific community as redox (reduction oxidation) batteries, they involve two tanks of liquid — one positively charged and one negatively charged — separated by a membrane which allows electrons to pass between the two tanks but not molecules. In the right setting, they can store prodigious amounts of electricity safely and inexpensively.
you believe this yet you discount a molten salt reactor that actually existed and has been proven to work and that the US is currently working with China to develop.Battery Will Be In German Salt Mine
July 18th, 2017 by Steve Hanley
Flow batteries offer significant advantages over lithium-ion batteries. They have a much longer lifespan, can be fully discharged and recharged many thousand of times without damage, and have no danger of explosion or fire due to overheating. They also tend to be heavy and bulky, which makes them unsuitable for use in automotive applications.
Known to the scientific community as redox (reduction oxidation) batteries, they involve two tanks of liquid — one positively charged and one negatively charged — separated by a membrane which allows electrons to pass between the two tanks but not molecules. In the right setting, they can store prodigious amounts of electricity safely and inexpensively.
German utility company EWE says it is planning to build the world’s largest battery based on flow technology in a pair of salt caves currently used to store natural gas. Taken together, the caves have a volume of 3.5 million cubic feet — enough to store up to 700 megawatt-hours of electricity with an output capacity of 12o megawatts, according to Digital Trends.
To put that into perspective, a battery with that much capacity could meet the electrical energy needs of the city of Berlin for an hour or 75,000 homes for a day. “We need to carry out some more tests and clarify several issues before we can use the storage principle indicated by the University of Jena in underground caverns. However, I expect that we will have an operating cavern battery by about the end of 2023,” says Ralf Riekenberg, head of the project, which has been named brine4power.
World’s Biggest Grid-Scale Battery Will Be In German Salt Mine
As these batteries become more efficient and cheaper, they will replace the coal fire plants around the world. And you will see much more wind and solar. That is clear right now.
Did you even read the article?
They actually call not getting taxed for air pollution or global warming an indirect subsidy
And wind power will never never meet our current demands never mind our greatly increased future demands as we convert from fossil fuels to a totally electric society.
To get our "installed capacity" to equal actual output we would have to at least quadruple the number of wind turbines then factor in the estimated 20 year life span of a turbine (it's probably less) and the unknown cost of the vaporware grid scale batteries and the problems of that like energy losses due to DC to AC conversions and battery degradation and wind power becomes an unsustainable investment black hole.
And why does electricity cost so much more in Germany with their dedication to wind power than in France where almost 80% of their electricity is nuclear?Fig. 1: Gross electricity production by fuel, EU-27
Overview of the electricity production and use in Europe
To 2010.
Did you even read the article?
They actually call not getting taxed for air pollution or global warming an indirect subsidy
And wind power will never never meet our current demands never mind our greatly increased future demands as we convert from fossil fuels to a totally electric society.
To get our "installed capacity" to equal actual output we would have to at least quadruple the number of wind turbines then factor in the estimated 20 year life span of a turbine (it's probably less) and the unknown cost of the vaporware grid scale batteries and the problems of that like energy losses due to DC to AC conversions and battery degradation and wind power becomes an unsustainable investment black hole.
You see it's things like these that wreck your argument and take it from a logical argument to one that is biased.
(It's probably less). What is that based on? Are you bringing up a topic you have experience with or knowledge of, or just making a wild assumption with no evidence to back it up and hoping nobody calls you out on it? Like saying "Coal plants (that probably kill babies) aren't very efficient." I'd better have evidence for my claim.
Can they meet the worlds energy needs? According to studies at Stanford and U of Delaware, yes... The saturation potential, they say, is more than 250 terawatts if we could place an army of 100-meter-tall wind turbines across the entire land and water of planet Earth. Alternatively, if we placed them only on land (minus Antarctica) and along the coastal ocean, there is still some 80 terawatts available. The world uses about 7 terawatts of power currently.
Yes there are energy losses along the way. That is a topic that coal supporters usually shy away from seeing as coal plants in the US tend to be the least efficient source of energy, which is a big reason why they are going away. You can see that worldwide, China, US, Japan....
The issue is with wind energy, you are taking wind and turning a generator with it. With coal, you first have to burn the coal, then use that energy to heat up a water source, then using high pressure steam turn the turbine that powers the generator, then pump millions of gallons of cool water through piping to use as a condenser and turn the steam back into water to use again. It's why Lazard's study (a top asset management firm in US) showed that wind energy unsubsidized vs. unsubsidized was less expensive than coal.
https://www.lazard.com/media/438038/levelized-cost-of-energy-v100.pdf
No one is saying "just shut down every coal, gas, nuclear and other plant in the world in 10 years and make it 100% wind". But shutting down the most polluting, least efficient, and most costly ones that need major rebuilds? Of course if we have the power from wind and other sources to take that over. Why fight to build something inefficient and costly like more coal plants?
Did you even read the article?
They actually call not getting taxed for air pollution or global warming an indirect subsidy
And wind power will never never meet our current demands never mind our greatly increased future demands as we convert from fossil fuels to a totally electric society.
To get our "installed capacity" to equal actual output we would have to at least quadruple the number of wind turbines then factor in the estimated 20 year life span of a turbine (it's probably less) and the unknown cost of the vaporware grid scale batteries and the problems of that like energy losses due to DC to AC conversions and battery degradation and wind power becomes an unsustainable investment black hole.
You see it's things like these that wreck your argument and take it from a logical argument to one that is biased.
(It's probably less). What is that based on? Are you bringing up a topic you have experience with or knowledge of, or just making a wild assumption with no evidence to back it up and hoping nobody calls you out on it? Like saying "Coal plants (that probably kill babies) aren't very efficient." I'd better have evidence for my claim.
Can they meet the worlds energy needs? According to studies at Stanford and U of Delaware, yes... The saturation potential, they say, is more than 250 terawatts if we could place an army of 100-meter-tall wind turbines across the entire land and water of planet Earth. Alternatively, if we placed them only on land (minus Antarctica) and along the coastal ocean, there is still some 80 terawatts available. The world uses about 7 terawatts of power currently.
Yes there are energy losses along the way. That is a topic that coal supporters usually shy away from seeing as coal plants in the US tend to be the least efficient source of energy, which is a big reason why they are going away. You can see that worldwide, China, US, Japan....
The issue is with wind energy, you are taking wind and turning a generator with it. With coal, you first have to burn the coal, then use that energy to heat up a water source, then using high pressure steam turn the turbine that powers the generator, then pump millions of gallons of cool water through piping to use as a condenser and turn the steam back into water to use again. It's why Lazard's study (a top asset management firm in US) showed that wind energy unsubsidized vs. unsubsidized was less expensive than coal.
https://www.lazard.com/media/438038/levelized-cost-of-energy-v100.pdf
No one is saying "just shut down every coal, gas, nuclear and other plant in the world in 10 years and make it 100% wind". But shutting down the most polluting, least efficient, and most costly ones that need major rebuilds? Of course if we have the power from wind and other sources to take that over. Why fight to build something inefficient and costly like more coal plants?
