The Danish Wind Grid...is 20% Capacity Enough?

The Danish wind grid has a symbiosis of sorts with Norway's and Sweden's abundant hydroelectric capacity.

Much of the fluctuating output of Denmark's wind grid is exported to neighboring countries Norway, Sweden, and Germany. The load factor of Denmark's wind capacity is only 20%. In other words, 5 megawatts of installed wind capacity will generate...one megawatt of actual electrical output. (Compare this to nuclear load factors of around 90% in recent years in the United States).

Can use of wind effectively reduce CO₂ emissions?

"Super G" posted at The Oil Drum:

On average 1 kW of installed wind power costs $1000. Therefore, to get 1 MW return, 5 MW costing $5 million needs to be installed."

Contributors to the comments section (in the middle of The Oil Drum page) posted the cold, hard figures on CO₂ emissions from continental European countries. DOE 2003 figures are used.

Denmark, with its extensive wind network, is far from best in CO₂ minimization.

I've added a few countries to commenter "babble"'s original list:

Per capita Energy CO₂ emission:

• Belgium - 13.66 t of CO2/capita
  
• Denmark - 10.94t of CO2/capita (DOE for 2003)
  
• Finland - 10.41 t of CO2/capita
  
• France 6.80t of CO2 per capita
  
• Germany 10.21t of CO2/capita
  
• Norway - 9.93 t of CO2/capita - electricity is almost all hydroelectric, so CO₂ is probably from transport sector.
  
• Sweden - 6.27t of CO2/capita - almost all electricity is hydro or nuclear
  
• Switzerland - 6.00t of CO2/capita - hydro and nuclear
  
• United Kingdom - 9.53t of CO2/capita
  
• United States - 19.95t of CO2/capita
  

Starvid, who has written interesting articles on the nuclear fuel cycle in Sweden, joined in the discussion at The Oil Drum, and linked to a very interesting set of charts from the International Energy Agency regarding European countries entitled "Evolution of Total Electricity Production by Fuel, 1971-2003."

When you look at the charts below, look at two things: the colors in the chart and whether or not there are overall patterns in year-to-year growth in electricity consumption.

Electricity production and usage is a good proxy for economic growth.


This figure, courtesy of the Edison Electric Institute, shows how closely electric usage is correlated with growth in gross domestic product. This is inclusive of the widespread conservation measures that have been adopted by many factories and other electricity users, such as the use of compact and other fluorescent lighting.

In the charts below, obtained from the International Energy Agency, the various fuels used to generate electricity are color-coded. Here are the colors, and what fuels they correspond with:

• purple - coal
  
• light yellow - nuclear
  
• dark blue - hydroelectric
  
• light blue - oil
  
• green - natural gas
  
• orange - biomass, cogeneration
  
• red - solar and wind
  

(I have converted some of the .pdf's using the free version of Universal Document Converter, which leaves a watermark. For larger pictures, simply click the pictures, or click the links for the original .pdf version).

• Austria
  
• Belgium - increase in nuclear and natural gas use with decrease in coal. Seven operating nuclear facilities. Large amounts of industry in Belgium may explain its relatively high CO₂ emissions. Update: This situation is discussed in a poorly-titled article from Expatica. The reader who has seen the chart knows that Belgium cannot meet its Kyoto targets without nuclear energy. Belgium is even thinking about buying emission rights because of plans to shut down nuclear facilities. What can be more un-green than shutting down emissions-free energy, substituting it with fossil fuels, and then buying the rights to do so? But...guess who's against nuclear energy? Yep, the head-in-the-sand "Greens." (quote marks intentional ;-)
  
  
  
• Denmark - the red is wind generation while purple is coal. No nuclear facilities.
  
  
  
• France - Fifty-nine operational nuclear facilities generate around 78% of France's electricity. France is Europe's largest electricity exporter.
  
  
  
  
• Germany - Note that Germany has an official phaseout policy regarding nuclear power. Despite Germany's policies that favor wind and solar energy, Germany's renewable sector is small compared to Germany's coal generation. Germany committed itself in 1995 to reduce CO2 emissions by 25% compared to 1990 levels by the year 2005. Nuclear from Germany's 17 facilities generates a lot more electricity than the renewable or biofuels sectors, and thus contributes more to CO₂ mitigation, despite the protestations of the "Nein danke!" crowd. Germany's planned phaseout of nuclear generation puts the country in a "bind," if it wants to also reduce CO₂ emissions. "You either phase-out nuclear energy, or you reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but you can’t do both,” says Wolfgang Pfaffenberger, director of the Bremen Energy Insitute.
  
  
  
  
• Finland - wide mixture of fuels. Note the contribution of biofuels to Finland's electricity supply. Four operating nuclear facilities and one under construction.
  
  
  
• Italy - mixture of fossil fuels with minor hydro. Note the closure of Italy's four nuclear facilities in a referendum in 1987. The no-nukes movement at work....supporting fossil fuels as can be seen in the growth in oil and natural gas. Italy is the world's largest net importer of electricity, with most imports coming from France and Switzerland. Italians pay high prices for electricity because of the cost of oil an natural gas imports. As can be seen from the chart, conservation has not been effective in limiting growth in electricity consumption in Italy. Public opinion is changing slowly in Italy. Italy has lost much of its human resource base in nuclear engineering because of the plant closures.
  
  
  
• Netherlands - mainly natural gas and coal. One nuclear unit.
  
  
  
• Norway - dam it, that's hydro! :-) Norway's electricity is almost all from its abundant hydroelectric resources.
  
  
  
• Poland - almost all coal generation
  
  
  
• Spain - mixture of resources. Nine operating nuclear facilities.
  
  
  
  
• Sweden - hydroelectric and nuclear with evident conservation. Ten operating nuclear facilities. Per capita electric consumption is quite high in Sweden - 16,500 kWh/year/person. Despite Sweden's official nuclear phaseout policy (since 1980), public opinion is changing in favor of keeping the ten plants open.
  
  
  
  
• Switzerland - Almost all hydroelectric and nuclear from 5 facilities. Switzerland has had several ballot referendums concerning nuclear power that have resulted in keeping existing facilities but no build of new ones. (The lack of fossil fuel is the probable explanation for Switzerland's low per-capita CO₂ emissions).
  
  
  
• United Kingdom - Note switchover from coal to North Sea natural gas during 1990s. Twenty-three nuclear facilities.
  
  
  

Especially note the low CO₂ emissions from France and Switzerland, which have lots of yellow (nuclear) and dark blue (hydroelectric) on their graphs. Also note that Norway and Sweden's low per capita CO₂ emissions are related to use of hydro, not wind or solar.

When you've finished looking at Europe, here are a few other interesting charts to note. The first four charts concern the large developing countries of China, India, Mexico, and Nigeria that have rapidly growing economies:


Logarithmic growth in coal generation in China corresponding with very rapid industrial growth


Dramatic linear growth in coal use in India


Use of mostly oil and natural gas in Mexico


Use of oil, natural gas, and hydroelectric in Nigeria

The charts below are for the United States, Canada, Japan, and Russia:


Increase in coal consumption in the the United States with little growth in nuclear (except in capacity factor) since the late 1980's. The high per capita CO₂ emissions in the United States, relative to Europe, are probably transportation-related.


Slight increase in coal consumption with abundant hydrolectric resources in Canada

Japan's chart is interesting:

Japan imported a lot of oil during the 1970's. During the 1980's, Japan built nuclear capacity. And, during recent years, Japan has started to burn more coal.

Russia, a well-known natural gas exporter, also uses a great deal of it, and has hardly increased usage of coal. The downturn in Russia's economy during the 1990's is visible in the chart, which only covers the years since the downfall of the Soviet Union:



Bottom line: Even in Denmark, which has the world's largest wind energy program, wind is a supplemental source of energy. There's nothing wrong with it, but it is an unpredictable resource and it's just not baseload. Scandinavia's hydro resources are the baseload that balances Denmark's erratic wind inputs, with nuclear also serving as baseload in Sweden.

You can't have it both ways. The "Greens" can't have neither fossil fuels nor nuclear, unless a country has very abundant hydroelectric resources, as does Norway. The charts show that, if nuclear is not used, fossil fuels are the substitute that accounts for the majority of electric usage. Neither conservation (see Italy's chart) nor non-hydroelectric renewable resources (see the charts for Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands), are sufficient to substitute for both fossil fuels and nuclear.

And, fossil fuels are the source of particulate pollutants, sulfur dioxide, mercury, and other pollutants as well as CO₂.

James Lovelock has probably examined these charts....

coal electricity, nuclear power, energy, Denmark, wind energy