Has Wind Power Blown It?

Source: Has Wind Power Blown It?

1.  A perfect storm of costs. For many wind farms, each new turbine is now a money pit. The UK’s auction for five gigawatts of new capacity failed because the prices set by the government failed to account for a surge in inflation and costs across the industry, reported The Guardian. For example turbines, which account for about half the total price-tag of a wind farm, cost 40% more today than they did two years ago. Developers in the UK, Norway and the US have even pulled out of gigawatts more of projects that were already green-lit, because they couldn’t see a path to profitability.

2.  NIMBY nirvana. Although researchers have debunked myths that wind turbines decimate bird populations (fossil fuel powerplants are over 30 times as deadly) or depress property prices (they actually go up), opposition to wind farms is increasing, fueled by widespread misinformation reports NPR. People just don’t like change. In May, researchers at the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law found at least 228 local restrictions to renewable energy across 35 US states, plus nine state-level restrictions, that are “so burdensome that they could have the effect of blocking a project.” Nearly 60 of these were enacted just in the last year.

3.  It’s gridlock out there. A wind farm is useless if you can’t get its electricity to homes and businesses, and America’s grid is woefully outdated. Wind farms are often a long (read: expensive) way from existing transmission lines, and there’s a huge backlog to connect them. Earlier this year, the New York Times reported that renewable energy projects can wait four years or more before getting permission to connect to the grid. Over 300 megawatts of wind projects are currently in the interconnection queue, according to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, with fewer than 20% of solar and wind proposals actually making it through.