Are any of you guilty of nimbyism - objecting to solar farms?

Volver No argument with you, in principle, but in times of urgency we need to concentrate time money and effort on those forms of alternative energy that can provide large quantities of energy. Currently the best for this are wind and water. Once we are virtually emission free, then we can explore the smaller scale low volume sources.

Katie59

“Why are you so reluctant to tell us the source of your information, Katie59?. This is sheep husbandry nonsense. where are you getting it from?”

Family are in farming and this is how they look after sheep, and what all should be doing and mostly are

The part of Northamptonshire where I live is a big sheep-farming area, and most of the fields have sheep on them 365 days a year!

Katie59

“Why are you so reluctant to tell us the source of your information, Katie59?. This is sheep husbandry nonsense. where are you getting it from?”

Family are in farming and this is how they look after sheep, and what all should be doing and mostly are

OK, Katie59. I give in. All the farmers in Weardale are doing it wrong...

M0nica

Chestnut i do look at telegraph poles and think them ugly, ditto pylons at times.

But since, neither I, nor any other poster on this thread, has a problem with solar farms, beyond, on occasion, their siting, which applies to telegraph poles, pylons and any other human-made prominent feature in the landscape, it is not really an issue.

I didn't mean posters on this thread, but rather people in general, who complain that wind turbines or solar panels are ugly, but have been looking at pylons and telegraph poles for many years and have accepted them as a necessary blight on our landscape.

“Why are you so reluctant to tell us the source of your information, Katie59?. This is sheep husbandry nonsense. where are you getting it from?”

Family are in farming and this is how they look after sheep, and what all should be doing and mostly are

M0nica its such short termism that has got us where we are. The attitude that everything else is just not good enough so we better stick with what we’ve got. We need it all, barrages, solar, wind, geothermal, everything. We need to keep some fossil fuel capacity in the background. But nothing will ever convince me that nuclear is the future. It’s not useful to compare it with coal because we don’t use coal any more. We used coal when we didn’t know how damaging it was, and now we do, we’ve stopped using it. We can’t sail ahead and use nuclear saying well at least its better than coal, when we are just storing up a disaster for the future.

There is, whether you are worried about it or not, a danger from the very existence of nuclear power stations. Chernobyl, Fukoshima, Three Mile Island. Maybe Zaporizhzhia next? But that is only one aspect. The by-products of nuclear fission are radioactive for 10s of thousands of years. We don’t know how to deal with them. Currently, the idea is to hide them in a deep hole and hope that future generations think of a way of sorting it. Taking this route just so that current politicians get to say they have solved the energy crisis is not the right thing to do. And I include all politicians, British, French, whatever.

I wonder what kind of scientist you are karmalady? Physicist, chemist, biologist? You know that that these mini-reactors of Rolls Royce’s are as big as a football pitch? “Mini” is all relative. When I hear people say that nuclear is the clean green fuel of the future it makes me so angry, because people who say that don’t know what they are talking about, sorry. (Just for info, the kind of scientist I am is one that got their PhD from studying photovoltaics and alternative energy sources.)

As a scientist and living close enough to a nuclear power station, bring it on. Nuclear power is very much the future of clean green energy. The more investment the better and great news that rolls royce will be manufacturing the mini nuclear power plants for all over the uk

Solar is also a way forward but not those awful massive solar panel fields which should be used for food production. I am glad to see that solar tiles have now been developed and will be the next stage in going solar in the uk, every building could have them and they will not look ugly. They just need light and not sun.

There is hope for self sustaining energy in the uk

Volver Neither hydro, geothermal or sun can fill the gap between variations in wind power in this country. None can play a significant role other than in the margins.

Ennergy from the sea, tidal lagoons, or in sea generators can. Nuclear is going to have to play a significant part until we have fusion. It might not be what we want, but when you compare the damage that theoretically be done by a nuclear incident - and no major incident has done so yet with the damage coal has done over the centuries, and is still doing and the many millions of people whose death has been hastened or directly caused by the coal industry from pit face to domestic hearth, it is the preferable option.

I have spent most of my life living near nuclear facilities of various kinds and it has never caused me a moment's worry. I am aware of the potential dangers, in the same way I am aware of the danger of a large metiorite strike, but I am also aware of the probabilities. Coal killed my grandmother and caused her a lifetime of ill health - her and millions more in this country alone.

Katie59

MaizieD

sheep are always rotationally grazed, moved onto fresh pasture every 3 or 4 weeks to prevent parasite build up.

I really think not, Katie59. Sheep around my area (and there are a lot of sheep around my area) stay on the same fields for months at a time. Where are you getting your information from?

That’s what they should do, it’s good practice, sheep can be very unproductive if left on the same land.

Why are you so reluctant to tell us the source of your information, Katie59?. This is sheep husbandry nonsense. where are you getting it from?

Sorry, just noticed you didn't mention specific sources. But I think you were talking about solar and wind.

Katie59

M0nica

Just noticed that wind power currently accounts for only 1% of our current power consumption. That is the problem with wind, one day it is all over you like a rash, the next day it avoids you like the plague.

All those hundreds of wind turbines, offshore and on, currently producing next to no power at all.

A cold calm day in January there will be hardly any renewable power, so we do need nuclear and fossil fuel available, even if we only use it when neeeded in the future.

Please read my post from around 5pm yesterday and remember that there are more sources of renewable energy than those 2 you mention.

We will probably have to keep some fossil fuel capacity for emergencies. But nuclear must be phased out, we certainly don't need to invest in any more. By-products from a nuclear industry will make dealing with carbon look like a walk in the park.

MaizieD

^sheep are always rotationally grazed, moved onto fresh pasture every 3 or 4 weeks to prevent parasite build up.^

I really think not, Katie59. Sheep around my area (and there are a lot of sheep around my area) stay on the same fields for months at a time. Where are you getting your information from?

That’s what they should do, it’s good practice, sheep can be very unproductive if left on the same land.

M0nica

Just noticed that wind power currently accounts for only 1% of our current power consumption. That is the problem with wind, one day it is all over you like a rash, the next day it avoids you like the plague.

All those hundreds of wind turbines, offshore and on, currently producing next to no power at all.

A cold calm day in January there will be hardly any renewable power, so we do need nuclear and fossil fuel available, even if we only use it when neeeded in the future.

Chestnut i do look at telegraph poles and think them ugly, ditto pylons at times.

But since, neither I, nor any other poster on this thread, has a problem with solar farms, beyond, on occasion, their siting, which applies to telegraph poles, pylons and any other human-made prominent feature in the landscape, it is not really an issue.

MaizieD

^sheep are always rotationally grazed, moved onto fresh pasture every 3 or 4 weeks to prevent parasite build up.^

I really think not, Katie59. Sheep around my area (and there are a lot of sheep around my area) stay on the same fields for months at a time. Where are you getting your information from?

Same here, MaizieD. The field behind us is grazed almost all the time. It might occasionally be empty for a few days, but never more than a week.

sheep are always rotationally grazed, moved onto fresh pasture every 3 or 4 weeks to prevent parasite build up.

I really think not, Katie59. Sheep around my area (and there are a lot of sheep around my area) stay on the same fields for months at a time. Where are you getting your information from?

We have two solar farms near us. Both have crops planted in the field and the farmers seem to have no problems at ploughing, planting or harvest. One feeds directly into the National Grid and the other provides all the electricity for the major hospital that stands next to it. I have no problem with solar panels or wind farms and much prefer them to polluting coal/gas fired/ nuclear power stations.

We do quite well for hydro in Scotland. Even now, in the middle of a drought.

Some friends in Germany have a house heated by geothermal, you don't need a volcano.

But I definitely agree about the sea.

But volver, we have very few rivers/mountains etc to provide significant hydro power, which is why we already have so little. The same with geothermal power. Fine for Iceland set over the mid Atlantic ridge and an active earthquake and volcano zone, but much less useful for us.

What we have is the sea, we should be powering ahead (sorry about the pun) to build the tidal lagoons that can provide so much power 24/7 - and their power generation will be unaffected by droughts, as hydro power is.

The other technology, a long time coming but the first prototype commercial unit is finally running, is power directly from the movement of the water in the sea and there are quite a number of sites round the country where tidal currents tidal currents are strong enough to provide reliable power.

Both these power sources are reliable, and unaffected by weather and seasons.

Many thanks, MOnica. I'd forgotten about the Rance barrier. The French are more clear-sighted that we ever seem to be. Where there's a will.....

An area near me is a proposed site for a new wind farm ( we already have some in the vicinity) but the size of the proposed turbines is huge, 820ft to go on top of a mountain and they are proposing 26 of them to bring that into focus ,the Shard in London is 1016 ft , normal turbines in an adjacent area are 475ft. So obviously the people are objecting to them because it is going to be a blot to the semi rural mountain but this objection is purely on the actual size . The company have been unable to answer many questions about noise and how safe they would be at that height in high winds put to them by our local MP. The group have mentioned that one site in that was recently turned down in Scotland the turbines were 620ft high. I am in favour of them in principle, but the sheer scale of these does put me off.

Chestnut

volver

So how much energy do solar panels provide during Nov-Jan

Loads. Its light they need, not sunshine. Also if I remember correctly they are also more efficient at lower temperatures. But don't quote me on that!

Well there's not much light during Nov-Jan either, short daylight hours and often very overcast and extremely dull. If there's no wind then the wind turbines will stop turning. I'm just not convinced that renewables can provide reliable energy for 68 million people. I wish I was.

Geothermal never stops, because the earth is warm.

The tide rises and falls with alarming regularity.

Water keeps flowing through barrages and down mountains.

Wind and solar aren't the only renewables we need to think about.

winterwhite power prices have gone up, which must make it more competitive, but I believe, more than anything that there is an environmental imperative to fund these huge schemes that can provide so much of our power and have such enormous life spans . The 120 years mentioned in the paperwork, is probably a conservative figure.

The plan initially was to start work on the tidal lagoon in Swansea Bay and the consortium still have up this site with its promise of construction starting in 2020 www.tidallagoonpower.com/projects/swansea-bay/

Unfortunately in 2018, the UK government got cold feet and withdrew funding theswitch.co.uk/energy/producers/swansea-tidal-power-lagoon

The Swansea lagoon was to be one of several along the coast that could, with the Severn Barrage (if it was resurrected), provide 20-30% of the power we currently use, and of course, it is operational 24/7.

There is a tidal lagoon power station in Brittany - The Rances Barrage. That has been operational for almost 60 years - and wil probably be operational for another 60 years at least.

I had thought of that, it's been very still here for some weeks, windows open every day and rarely any breeze going through the house at all.

Just noticed that wind power currently accounts for only 1% of our current power consumption. That is the problem with wind, one day it is all over you like a rash, the next day it avoids you like the plague.

All those hundreds of wind turbines, offshore and on, currently producing next to no power at all.