ELSAM (West Denmark Utilities Co) Development Head: "Wind turbines do not reduce CO2 emissions."

[NNadir]

There is no evidence that industrial wind power is likely to have a significant impact on carbon emissions. The European experience is instructive. Denmark, the world’s most wind-intensive nation, with more than 6,000 turbines generating 19% of its electricity, has yet to close a single fossil-fuel plant. It requires 50% more coal-generated electricity to cover wind power’s unpredictability, and pollution and carbon dioxide emissions have risen (by 36% in 2006 alone).

Flemming Nissen, the head of development at West Danish generating company ELSAM (one of Denmark’s largest energy utilities) tells us that “wind turbines do not reduce carbon dioxide emissions.” The German experience is no different. Der Spiegel reports that “Germany’s CO2 emissions haven’t been reduced by even a single gram,” and additional coal- and gas-fired plants have been constructed to ensure reliable delivery.

Indeed, recent academic research shows that wind power may actually increase greenhouse gas emissions in some cases, depending on the carbon-intensity of back-up generation required because of its intermittent character...

...Industrial wind power is not a viable economic alternative to other energy conservation options. Again, the Danish experience is instructive. Its electricity generation costs are the highest in Europe (15¢/kwh compared to Ontario’s current rate of about 6¢). Niels Gram of the Danish Federation of Industries says, “windmills are a mistake and economically make no sense.” Aase Madsen , the Chair of Energy Policy in the Danish Parliament, calls it “a terribly expensive disaster.”

The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported in 2008, on a dollar per MWh basis, the U.S. government subsidizes wind at $23.34 — compared to reliable energy sources: natural gas at 25¢; coal at 44¢; hydro at 67¢; and nuclear at $1.59, leading to what some U.S. commentators call “a huge corporate welfare feeding frenzy...”

...In debates over climate change, and in particular subsidies to renewable energy, there are two kinds of green. First there are some environmental greens who view the problem as so urgent that all measures that may have some impact on greenhouse gas emissions, whatever their cost or their impact on the economy and employment, should be undertaken immediately.

Then there are the fiscal greens, who, being cool to carbon taxes and cap-and-trade systems that make polluters pay, favour massive public subsidies to themselves for renewable energy projects, whatever their relative impact on greenhouse gas emissions. These two groups are motivated by different kinds of green. The only point of convergence between them is their support for massive subsidies to renewable energy (such as wind turbines).

This unholy alliance of these two kinds of greens (doomsdayers and rent seekers) makes for very effective, if opportunistic, politics (as reflected in the Ontario government’s Green Energy Act), just as it makes for lousy public policy: Politicians attempt to pick winners at our expense in a fast-moving technological landscape, instead of creating a socially efficient set of incentives to which we can all respond.

http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2009/04/08/wind-power-is-a-complete-disaster.aspx">Wind power is a complete disaster

Although I have cited this opinion piece, I do not endorse everything said in it.

I, first of all, believe in massive energy subsidies for proved climate change gas free energy systems that are scalable. Let me count them: One. OK, I'm done.

Second of all, despite the perjorative tone, I am a doomsayer. I don't believe in climate change from carbon dioxide emissions since belief is arbitrary. On the contrary, I know climate change is a fact, and I favor the immediate phase out of dangerous fossil fuels.

I do agree however, with the author of this piece that wind power is a disaster, even though I once supported it. All it really generates is complacency and wishful thinking, both of which have increasingly dire consequences.

[ZeitgeistObserver]

1. It was never meant to.

It was meant to cut your dependence on foreign oil. Nothing more.

[Statistical]

8. How does it do that?

Oil is only used in about 10% of electrical generation.

If the goal was simply to cut foreign oil (which nobody has ever claimed it was) you could simply burn 10% more coal, prohibit oil for electrical production and subsidize electric vehicles (powered mostly by coal).

Nobody has ever (until now) made the ridiculous claim that the purpose of wind is to reduce oil consumption.

[kristopher]

13. The OP is horseshit from a utility industry executive...

And post 1 is incorrect but not totally. The key to eliminating ALL fossil fuels is a renewable energy supply, and wind is a very big part of that. The idea post 1 has right is that renewables are the route to energy security, something that nuclear power cannot provide any better than petroleum does.

[Statistical]

14. Energy security is determined by resources vs demand.

Saudi Arabia has very good petroleum energy security (15% of supply and <2% of demand). The United States not so much (5% of supply and 20% of demand).

If Saudi Arabia stopped exporting oil their reserves would last hundreds if not thousands of years. Of course their economy is completely dependent on exporting oil so that is unlikely to happen. US economy isn't dependent on exporting uranium.

The US has a 100 year reserve of Uranium and 5000 year reserve of Thorium. That is just economical reserves at current prices. At $300 per kg (current prices are $60) virtually unlimited amount of Uranium can be extracted from seawater. The "Black Current" off coast of Japan is estimated to circulate roughly 6 million tons of Uranium annually. World wide consumption of uranium with no reprocessing is roughly 70,000 tons.

The nice thing about nuclear is that unlike fossil fuels increasing cost of uranium by 500% only raises cost of electricity by 15%.

[kristopher]

16. Renewables are as good as the sun

And your numbers for nuclear are based on 104 plants now in operation. We have MORE than 6000 coal plants in this country.

[kristopher]

15. WHY the OP is standard entrenched energy industry horseshit:

Aside from the pronuclear agenda of the poster of the OP, the first thing that jumps out is the lie about subsidies in the US:
"The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported in 2008, on a dollar per MWh basis, the U.S. government subsidizes wind at $23.34 — compared to reliable energy sources: natural gas at 25¢; coal at 44¢; hydro at 67¢; and nuclear at $1.59, leading to what some U.S. commentators call “a huge corporate welfare feeding frenzy...”"

Renewable energy has been held down for more than 30 years while fossil fuels AND nuclear have been heavily subsidized. In that time ALL renewables AND energy efficiency AND conservation have had to split 4% (and ethanol got most of that) of the non-carbon subsidies; the other 96% went to nuclear power. And that is only the subsidies that are counted by the GAO. There is a huge amount of financial support for these nonrenewable technologies that is built into the system; support which cost the public but isn't counted as a direct "subsidy".

And of course, fossil fuel subsidies dwarf all of that combined.

So when the author compares just the subsidies from the most recent year to the output TODAY that is a result of 50 years of preferential treatment it is counting all of the output but only using far less than 1% of the subsidy input that it took to get there.

It is, in short, a lie crafted by right wing think tanks to deceive people about renewable energy.

I'm not going to spend the time to track down the particulars of the other claims about wind, but the one that wind doesn't reduce carbon emissions is easy - wind does. It does not require the backup that is claimed.

Doesn’t Wind Power Need Backup Generation? Isn’t More Fossil Fuel Burned with Wind Than Without, Due to Backup Requirements?

In a power system, it is necessary to maintain a continuous balance between production and consumption. System operators deploy controllable generation to follow the change in total demand, not the variation from a single generator or customer load. When wind is added to the system, the variability in the net load becomes the operating target for the system operator. It is not necessary and, indeed, it would be quite costly for grid operators to follow the variation in generation from a single generating plant or customer load.

“Backup” generating plants dedicated to wind plants—or to any other generation plant or load for that matter—are not required, and would actually be a poor and unnecessarily costly use of power-generation resources.

Regarding whether the addition of wind generation results in more combustion of fossil fuels, a wind-generated kilowatthour displaces a kilowatthour that would have been generated by another source—usually one that burns a fossil fuel. The wind-generated kilowatthour therefore avoids the fuel consumption and emissions associated with that fossil-fuel kilowatthour. The incremental reserves (spinning or nonspinning) required by wind’s variability and uncertainty, however, themselves consume fuel and release emissions, so the net savings are somewhat reduced. But what quantity of reserves is required? Numerous studies conducted to date—many of which have been summarized in previous wind-specific special issues of IEEE Power & Energy Magazine—have found that the reserves required by wind are only a small fraction of the aggregate wind generation and vary with the level of wind output. Generally, some of these reserves are spinning and some are nonspinning. The regulating and load-following plants could be forced to operate at a reduced level of efficiency, resulting in increased fuel consumption and increased emissions per unit of output.

A conservative example serves to illustrate the fuel-consumption and emissions impacts stemming from wind’s regulation requirements. Compare three situations: 1) a block of energy is provided by fossil-fueled plants; 2) the same block of energy is provided by wind plants that require no incremental reserves; and 3) the same block of energy is provided by wind plants that do have incremental reserve requirements. It is assumed that the average fleet fossil-fuel efficiency is unchanged between situations one and two. This might not be precisely correct, but a sophisticated operational simulation is required to address this issue quantitatively. In fact, this has been done in several studies, which bear out the general conclusions reached in this simple example.

In situation one, an amount of fuel is burned to produce the block of energy. In situation two, all of that fuel is saved and all of the associated emissions are avoided. In situation three, it is assumed that 3% of the fossil generation is needed to provide reserves, all of these reserves are spinning, and that this generation incurs a 25% efficiency penalty. The corresponding fuel consumption necessary to provide the needed reserves is then 4% of the fuel required to generate the entire block of energy. Hence, the actual fuel and emissions savings percentage in situation three relative to situation one is 96% rather than 100%. The great majority of initially estimated fuel savings does in fact occur, however, and the notion that wind’s variations would actually increase system fuel consumption does not withstand scrutiny.

A study conducted by the United Kingdom Energy Research Center (UKERC) supports this example. UKERC reviewed four studies that directly addressed whether there are greater CO2 emissions from adding wind generation due to increasing operating reserves and operating fossil-fuel plants at a reduced efficiency level. The UKERC determined that the “efficiency penalty” was negligible to 7% for wind penetrations of up to 20%.

Special Master's Presentation by International Electronic and Electrical Engineers

Wind Power Myths Debunked
november/december 2009
IEEE power & energy magazine
Digital Object Identifi er 10.1109/MPE.2009.934268
1540-7977/09/$26.00©2009 IEEE

By Michael Milligan, Kevin Porter, Edgar DeMeo, Paul Denholm, Hannele Holttinen, Brendan Kirby, Nicholas Miller, Andrew Mills, Mark O’Malley, Matthew Schuerger, and Lennart Soder


You can download the entire open access paper with this link: http://www.ieee-pes.org/images/pdf/open-access-milligan.pdf

[Statistical]

19. "The UKERC determined the “efficiency penalty” was 7% for wind penetrations of up 20%"

The study was limited to wind penetration of less than 20%. As the amount of variable power increases you must either
a) increase spinnning reverses
b) increase energy storage

Just because efficiency penalty is 7% at 20% penetration doesn't mean it remains 7% at 40%, 60%, 70%.

Variable power has a cost. The smaller the percentage of powergrid the lower that cost is.

[kristopher]

21. That is false.

You wrote, "The smaller the percentage of powergrid the lower that cost is." You cannot document that statement because it is false. It has been clearly shown that the MORE we install renewable generation the less grid variability there is.

But please, feel free to cite a REAL source (not one of your nukenut blogs) that shows this to be false.

The OP is horseshit and the only people on this forum who endorse that brand of horseshit are the proponents of nuclear power who actually think they are going to convince people that nuclear power is better than renewable energy.

Nuclear power is nothing but "business-as-usual".

[Statistical]

22. How about your source.

The source you provided reference UK Energy Research Council.

Their study was limited to 20% penetration because UK has a goal of 20% wind power. They showed efficiency penalty rises from 0% (negligible) to "only" 7% at 20% penetration.

While the study didn't look at intermittency costs above 20% because it was outside the scope of the study they added following note:

Above 20%, intermittency costs would rise and/or more radical changes might be needed to electricity systems, their control and their markets. The cost implications of this requires further work.

http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/electricalengineering/newsarchive/intermittencyreport

[kristopher]

23. Yawn... That doesn't prove your assertion

I knew you couldn't.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x239961

See post 6 for the pretty pictures.

[teknomanzer]

2. I guess this is what Lovelock was talking about...

When he mentioned Green energy scams. I did not want to accept the death of that sacred cow, but I don't want to get caught being a mindless ideologue. The future looks bleak... I don't want to say there in nothing that can be done but honestly does anyone have any idea how to reverse this. I don't think so. We need to start looking at what to do when the worst comes.

[wtmusic]

4. That's what pisses me off about that prick Lovelock

who will be dead in ten years, while the rest of us are paying the price of his hopelessness and defeatism.

Yes, James Hansen has a very good idea of how to reverse climate change. It's called fee & dividend, and it goes something like this:

1) A carbon tax is placed across the board on all carbon sources when they come out of the ground or enter the country. No exceptions. The tax rate is based on the total amount of atmospheric CO2 the source will generate.

2) The money collected from this tax is split evenly among all citizens, with children getting a 1/2 share. The dividend is paid with a check - no "rebates", no "refunds", no "deductions", so everyone knows where the money is coming from.

People who use more than their "share" of carbon will have to pay more to do so, people who use less will receive a tidy little dividend. It will take a lot of political will to beat down the coal/gas/oil lobby, but it's our only chance.

More:

http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/11/09/fee-and-dividend-better/

[joshcryer]

5. Cue rants about "political reality" and greenwashing with offsets.

[teknomanzer]

10. Interesting...

How exactly is this scheme supposed to work? Oh, I supposed the developing world will simply accept this tax being forced on them by the rest of us. No there won't be any resentment of the fact the the west has had unfettered use of fossil fuels for well over a century. Or do you suppose the developed nations will generously cut back on their use so that the developing nations can catch up?

[wtmusic]

11. Aye, there's the rub.

We would have to lead the way, and take responsibility for putting the planet in the shape it is now. Work for responsible development in other countries.

We are on brand new turf here, and it's obvious we will have to work together. 1% of the pollution you're breathing right now comes from China - the whole idea of CC mitigation being a country-by-country effort leads nowhere.

Odds aren't good, but it's "all we got".

[hunter]

17. If we could somehow ban coal power plants in the United States...

... there's a good possibility we would create an innovative and economically viable electric power infrastructure that would be emulated by other nations.

It would happen much like the spread of wireless phones and TCP/IP packet switching networks. Nobody is trying to duplicate older sorts of telephone networks built with thick bundles of twisted copper pairs. New telephone networks all over the world utilize fiber optic cables, microwaves, and packet switching.

Coal fired power plants ought to be regarded as relics of the 19th and early 20th century, every bit as primitive as old downtown telephone exchanges filled with racks and racks of clicking electromechanical relays switching analog signals through literally tons of copper wire.

[Statistical]

20. The difference is coal is cheap. Insanely cheap. off the charts cheap.

The externalized costs (death, environmental damage, CO2 release) are very high however for the third world without running water, reliable lighting, or convenient access to cooking heat those aren't factors worth consideration.

Dollar for dollar coal provides more electricity than any other form of power.

We should phase out coal in this country and the best way to do that is a carbon tax however it is naive to think third world will do it just because we do.

Americans have massive amount of disposable income and if a small fraction of that is eaten up by carbon tax or higher cost of energy it is an annoyance. Someone living on a tiny fraction of our income (even adjusted for PPP) will have different priorities.

We have know coal was bad for the environment for over a hundred years yet we kept (and still keep) burning it. Why? It is cheap and that cheapness has produced economic value for the US. The economic value of coal over last 100 years is trillions of dollars. You think other countries are going to just ignore that?

Third world will adopt renewable energy when they are cheaper than coal. Simple as that.

[hunter]

24. The world's not pounding on the door demanding 100 amp residential electric service.

They'd be satisfied with an outlet to charge their cell phones and bottled cooking gas, maybe working up from there.

But our industrial oligarchy looks to employ those same people as cheap labor in dirty unsafe factories powered by cheap coal.

Instead of aiming for cheap power, we can aim for a world where coal is seen as worse than worthless, a toxic liability in fact, where the most reasonable thing to do is leave it untouched in the ground.

If we can get ourselves worked up about things like Iran's nuclear program, we ought to be really worked up about further coal development. Coal power plants are a clear and present danger to everyone on the planet.

The world will adopt alternative energy sources when coal is outlawed.

[Statistical]

25. "The world will adopt alternative energy sources when coal is outlawed."

Except nobody has the authority to "outlaw" coal.

The US can ban coal but personally I think that is the wrong aproach. A high and increasing carbon tax would be more flexible.
Steel for example requires coal so likely there would be exceptions to any ban and once you make exceptions then politicis gets involved and more exceptions get in and the "ban" ends up very weak. Simply put at $50 per ton carbon tax "new coal" (i.e new plants needs to be built) becomes more expensive than natural gas, nuclear, or wind. At $120 per ton carbon tax even coal coal becomes more expensive than the alternatives. So just tax carbon. No need to ban anything.

As far as other countries they will need to reach their own decisions. We can try and educate but the best thing we can do is adopt alternative energy to bring the cost down. Third world won't burn coal because they like it they will burn it because it is cheap and if you close the "cheapness" gap the more alternatives will be adopted.

[joshcryer]

28. It also has to be an import/export tax, because that would compel other nations to jump on board...

...too.

[hunter]

29. Maybe we've mined enough iron ore already...

Let's see how far we can coast on the steel we've got.

Take it all down, throw it in electric furnaces, and turn it into railroads and rebar.

[Statistical]

30. That is the beauty of a carbon tax.

By simply taxing carbon you allow the market to move to lower carbon sources.

Rather than have complete ban which won't work you have a system which encourages (because it is now cheaper) companies to move to lower or carbon free sources. A complete ban won't force because it is inflexible. Say we can't recycle enough steel and that leads to steel shortages so Congress will pass exemptions and that opens up politics and lobbying into the system.

Also recycled steel can be just as carbon intensive as new steel. Why? Because it uses a LOT (far more than smelting raw iron) of energy. Not only that the energy is produced via electrical plant so instead of getting 100% of thermal energy you are getting a small fraction (generation and transmission losses).

A carbon tax simply taxes what you want to get rid of. It is complete and covers every source, every method. If recycled steel emits less CO2 then it will be cheaper (because it has less carbon tax) if it doesn't then it won't.

It sadly will likely take decades but eventually we need a carbon tax and eventually we will get one.

Perfect system would be one that starts small and has a clearly defined "ramp" this allows companies to plan.

Something like:
2014: $20 per ton
2016: $30 per ton
2018: $50 per ton
2020: $60 per ton
2022: $80 per ton
....
2030: $150 per ton

[Silent3]

3. Is this a problem of wind power itself, or of a poorly designed system...

...for supplementing wind power's unpredictable output?

[joshcryer]

6. You need something like V2G and solar to supplant wind.

All the wind focused plans make that abundantly clear. Until you have it, and you won't for quite a few decades, you will have this problem.

[madokie]

7. My suspicion is the only time you've supported wind power

was/is when its coming out of your ass. America will not have any new nuclear power plants come on line ever as long before that can happen we're in for a nuclear power plant disaster. As this dustup in Vermont with the nuke plant there shows shit happens and things wear out and when you are in denial about those two important aspects of clean nuclear power, as you like to put it, are ignored big things happen in a big way. Bet on it, as these plants age the possibility of something going wrong goes way way up. If on the other hand the industry was honest and did the required updates and upkeep I could see how some could be around producing power for years to come but, the big BUT, but they aren't honest about the condition of their plants. Nothing is perfect never has been and never will be.

[Statistical]

9. The "dustup in vermont" was media and anti-science activist driven.

If you tried to drink all the tritinated water straight from test wells at the reactor site you would die from hyper-hydration long before you accumulated enough radiation to have any material effect on your health.

Nobody (except anti's trying to put up weak strawmen) has ever claimed nuclear is "perfect". It doesn't need to be perfect it simply needs to be better than the alternatives which it is.

[phantom power]

12. Actually, NNadir used to consider wind power to be comparable to nuclear in externalized cost/erg.

As such, my recollection is he had no real beef with wind power. This was a few years ago.

[kristopher]

18. That must have been before he realized no one bought that bullshit equivalency.

Compering the negative externalities of nuclear to wind is like comparing a beheading to a hangnail.

[Warren Stupidity]

26. The hangnail hurts longer.

Bullshit is tough to deal with sometimes, because the bullshitter has no obligation to engage in honest discourse.

[NNadir]

31. Um, keep whistling in the dark, big boy.

Apparently the whole planet doesn't care what a bunch of malovent malcontent lightweight mystical bloggers think.

This may come as a surprise to non-thinkers, but people can and do change their minds, but in order to do that, one must possess a mind. This is not a good bet among anti-nukes, a bitter uninformed largely scientifically illiterate bunch.

Every time a new nuclear plant is built on this planet, it easily prevents more dangerous fossil fuel waste - the kind anti-nukes couldn't give a rat's ass about - being dumped in the atmosphere than ALL the wind turbines in anti-nukes favorite "Drill, Baby, Drill" nation, Denmark.

Anti-nukes have a lot to say about me even though they don't know anything about me. In fact, from what I can tell, they don't know anything at all but how to consume and curse.

They are all mindless rote dogmatists who are participants in the destruction of the planetary atmosphere through the application of ignorance.

They could not possibly despise me as much as I despise them.

Have a nice evening getting plastered at the poolside contemplating the solar pool light.

[Fledermaus]

27. The article dates to April 2009 made by a blogger

Has any of this enlightened information come up anywhere else? No.

[Dead_Parrot]

32. Well, about 1,409 other places

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=vi8&rls=com.mandriva%3Aen-US%3Aunofficial&q=%22wind+turbines+do+not+reduce+carbon+dioxide+emissions.%22+%2B%22Flemming+Nissen%22&aq=f&aqi=&aql=f&oq=&gs_rfai=

But apart from that, no.

[Fledermaus]

33. They are all from the same orginal blog post by the same guy. Nothing new.

Apparently somebody shopped this guys opinion around.

[kristopher]

34. Wrong Claims About Danish Wind Power

Wrong Claims About Danish Wind Power
Sigurd Lauge Pedersen

It is perfectly legitimate to hate wind power. But it is more convincing if you do your homework first. In his Financial Post Comment 8 April 2009, Michael J. Trebilcock appears to be willing to jeopardise his academic reputation by putting forward a series of wrong claims and false, suspect or irrelevant citations, mainly about wind power in Denmark.

Mr. Trebilcock claims that “Denmark …. has yet to close a single fossil-fuel plant”. There is no citation for this claim. Wise in a sense, for the claim is wrong. Denmark has closed several coal and oil fired plants in the last ten years. Mr. Trebilcock claims that wind power “… requires 50% more coal generated electricity to cover wind power’s unpredictability…”. Wrong again. One megawatt of wind power does not increase conventional power requirements – it saves 0,2-0,4 megawatts of conventional capacity. The high figure is for offshore wind power, the low figure for onshore wind power. This was shown by Diesendorf and Martin as early as 1980 (The Capacity Credit of Wind Power. 3’rd Int. Symp. on Wind Power) but is not very difficult to verify by standard probability theory. Yes, wind power is partly unpredictable. But so is a fossil or nuclear plant. True, they work most of the time. But 5-10% of the time they fail. Hence it is not unpredictability as such that distinguishes wind power from fossil or nuclear plants. It is the level of unpredictability. If Mr. Trebilcock’s argument were valid, any power system would need infinite back up: One coal fired plant can fail, hence needs a backup. This can also fail, hence needs a further backup and so on. Mr. Trebilcock’s argument rests on the unspoken assumption that electricity must be available to consumers always. It cannot be and it never will be.

Mr. Trebilcock claims that CO2 emissions went up by 36% in 2006 as a result of wind power. Again without citation. And of course this does not make sense. If a unit of wind electricity is added to any electricity system with fossil plants, production on a fossil plant will have to be reduced by one unit. The amount of hydro production will not be affected – this is determined by the amount of rainfall. Neither will nuclear production be affected – nuclear plants run full load (whenever they are available) for economic and technical reasons. Hence the claim that wind power increases CO2 is absurd. You can discuss which fossil plant that reduces it’s production, but that one does is simple physics. Mr. Trebilcock quotes “recent academic research” for a claim that wind power increases CO2 emissions. He does not specify which “recent academic research” he is referring to. Wisely in my view, since it does not make any sense at all (cf. above).

Mr. Trebilcock quotes Flemming Nissen from ELSAM power company. Not only is the quote misleading (at best). But Mr. Nissen has not been in ELSAM for years, and the company no longer exists. Mr. Trebilcock quotes Niels Gram of the Federation of Danish Industries. But it is years since he left. Mr. Trebilcock quotes Aase Madsen as Chair of Energy Policy in the Danish Parliament. A position she has not had for a long time.

Mr. Trebilcock quotes “a recent detailed analysis” that for each job created by state-funded wind power, 2.2 jobs are lost. Again, he does not specify the source. And again, I seriously disagree. The number of “wind jobs” in Denmark, around 20,000, recently passed the number of jobs in the bacon industry for which Denmark was long known (source: www.windpower.org).

Mr. Trebilcock claims that Denmark’s electricity generation costs are the highest in Europe. Again without quotation. And again wrong. The 2008 electricity price in Denmark to medium-sized industries is 7.85 eurocents/kWh, which is below the European average of 9 eurocents/kWh. Source: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu. Mr. Trebilcock may confuse electricity prices with electricity taxes. Danish taxes are high, yes, but this has nothing to do with wind power.

Denmark gets around 20% of it’s electricity from wind power. Is this a challenge? Absolutely. But it can be done. On the system operator website: http://www.energinet.dk/Integrationer/ElOest/ElsystemetLigeNu/energinet1.swf you can follow the Danish power production real-time. On the Danish Energy Agency website: www.ens.dk. you can find more information on energy policy in general and wind power in particular.


Sigurd Lauge Pedersen has a M.Sc. in Physics and a Ph.D. in energy planning. He has more than 25 years of experience in the University of Copenhagen, Danish Technical University and Danish Energy Agency.