Wind turbines around airports

[GyvAir]

I had been hoping someone from the other side of the story would weigh in here, to give some added perspective. Which points in particular are being misrepresented?

[Troubleshot]

I had been hoping someone from the other side of the story would weigh in here, to give some added perspective. Which points in particular are being misrepresented?

Points that are off here about Wind Turbines:

- They Interfere with VOR signals - FALSE - Numerous studies are completed and verified by the federal government in regards to Nav Aids for aircraft, Music radio stations, Birds, Bats, Noise. These studies are in depth, seen them with my own eyes signed off by Transport Canada (including the aviation lights installed on the tops of the turbines) You may have an author or NIMBY'er try and sway facts but there have been many studies on this, to many parks out there to allow it to continue (or be true). If you surround a VOR station with Turbines yes it would interfere but I can see the government allow it.

-500+ feet tall - FALSE - unless you are privy to a new technology I am un aware of, 500 feet would be about 200 feet taller than anything on the market to date. The tallest wind turbines will be commonly be off shore. The tallest turbine I have seen is 328 feet (100m). Most common is 80-90 meters hub height.

-It costs of slightly less than 500 grand in capital outlay and O&M which is expected to produce about $4,500 in power per year. - WAAAY FALSE- I run a 33 Mega-Watt farm and my O&M budget is about $500K but the park pulls in about
$1.6 Million/ year...give or take. $500K to run a 50 kW turbine would mean jail time for someone and is simply not true.

[Cat Driver]

Make it simple for us to understand Troubleshot, what is the cost per KW hour for turbines?

What is the cost per KW hour for the public power provider?

[Beefitarian]

After managing a Wind Turbine park for almost the last 2 years...

Bird killer.

[single_swine_herder]

I'd welcome expanding my knowledge on this, as my basic information comes from social conversations with one of the Electrical Engineers of a major power company in Texas with whom I'm acquainted. They deal with the dreaded coal-fired plants, the even more dreadful nuclear plant, gas turbine generation facilities, and windmills because of the political ramifications of not being seen to do so with respect to the EPA. Heavy subsidies are provided for installation and coverage of wind farm operating losses in exchange for reduction of output from the coal and natural gas fired plants.

This info came from the service provider, SaskPower when announcing plans to construct a 100 ft wind turbine in Shaunavon:

SaskPower will cover the capital cost of the project, including purchase, installation and maintenance costs for the first five years. The budget for the turbine is between $380,000 and $385,000, and the maintenance costs have been estimated at about $4,000 year.
The town of Shaunavon would be responsible for covering the maintenance costs after that, which would add up to about $130,000 over the next 25 years.

When unveiling the project, SaskPower said the turbines could generate between $4,500 and $10,000 worth of electricity a year.

[Troubleshot]

Should also talk about Shadow Flicker video posted. This can be eliminated with a simple software add-on to the turbine, you simply have to put in the parameters in which shadow flicker can occur...date, time, wind direction, sun sensitive photo cells... turbine will stop spinning if all criteria are met, and start back up when environmental conditions do not cause flicker. Wind park owners MUST deal with shadow flicker claims, and can be solved in a day or two.

Most of the time though people just want money from the park owner and would live with the shadow flicker (surprise). Most issues with residents that live around wind farms are residents that are sour that their neighbour is making money by leasing his land to the park owners and they are jealous.

[Troubleshot]

I'd welcome expanding my knowledge on this, as my basic information comes from social conversations with one of the Electrical Engineers of a major power company in Texas with whom I'm acquainted. They deal with the dreaded coal-fired plants, the even more dreadful nuclear plant, gas turbine generation facilities, and windmills because of the political ramifications of not being seen to do so with respect to the EPA. Heavy subsidies are provided for installation and coverage of wind farm operating losses in exchange for reduction of output from the coal and natural gas fired plants.

This info came from the service provider, SaskPower when announcing plans to construct a 100 ft wind turbine in Shaunavon:

SaskPower will cover the capital cost of the project, including purchase, installation and maintenance costs for the first five years. The budget for the turbine is between $380,000 and $385,000, and the maintenance costs have been estimated at about $4,000 year.
The town of Shaunavon would be responsible for covering the maintenance costs after that, which would add up to about $130,000 over the next 25 years.

When unveiling the project, SaskPower said the turbines could generate between $4,500 and $10,000 worth of electricity a year.

I guess I can read between the lines on this project. We call them COMFIT parks, which are really not a money maker. The numbers don't add up anyway. $4000/yr to maintain a 50 KW turbine is flat out wrong ... I have 15, 2100KW turbines that cost about $1800/yr to maintain (barring any big component failures).

There is more than meets the eye to this little project, I am sure SaskPower did it for some reason (appear green?) but I can tell you the small towns that get involved in these type of projects always lose in the end.

[Troubleshot]

After managing a Wind Turbine park for almost the last 2 years...

Bird killer.

haha ... funny thing is 12 years as an AME I cleaned more bird guts off planes than environmental people have ever found on my wind turbine site.

[Beefitarian]

Personally I think if a bird can't dodge one of those things maybe it needed to be culled. Come to think of it I probably think up that goes for pilots too.

[single_swine_herder]

I guess I can read between the lines on this project. We call them COMFIT parks, which are really not a money maker. The numbers don't add up anyway. $4000/yr to maintain a 50 KW turbine is flat out wrong ... I have 15, 2100KW turbines that cost about $1800/yr to maintain (barring any big component failures).

There is more than meets the eye to this little project, I am sure SaskPower did it for some reason (appear green?) but I can tell you the small towns that get involved in these type of projects always lose in the end.

Thanks Troubleshot. I guess that I didn't grossly err in interpreting that story.

The heavy government subsidy to make the concept viable troubles me though.

Good to have your professional expertise available on here.

[Troubleshot]

Make it simple for us to understand Troubleshot, what is the cost per KW hour for turbines?

What is the cost per KW hour for the public power provider?

Kinda hard to lay it our that way Cat but here is how larger wind farm projects are are put together.

1.) local Power company puts out a "request for power" RFP, They state how much they want (45 mega-watts)
2.) several companies submit bids to build parks in various areas in the province
3.) Local utility selects company "B" and award RFP
4.) Company "B" selects a Turbine manufacture (that's me)
5.) Turbine Manufacture offers a warranty and operations package with the sale of the turbines (mine is for 10 years)
6.) We build them, and maintain them and run all aspects of the operation. Company "B" pays us a fee per turbine
7.) Company "B" receives all revenues from power generation.

I am not sure to be honest what Company "B" makes per KW but I can tell you my park produces about 150 million KwH per year. and I am pretty sure most companies get about 10 cents /Kw, so about $15 million in revenues/ year. My Park cost $65 Million to build.

[Cat Driver]

Thanks for answering.

I flew in Holland for four years and Holland has hundreds and hundreds of wind turbines, obviously they must be worth while or there would be less not more of them.

[azimuthaviation]

The numbers don't add up anyway. $4000/yr to maintain a 50 KW turbine is flat out wrong ... I have 15, 2100KW turbines that cost about $1800/yr to maintain (barring any big component failures).

Some math is not adding up. You said before you make north of 100 000 a year, plus company truck, benefits, etc etc. (>100k + company truck + benefits)/15 ≠ "about $1800"

[Troubleshot]

The numbers don't add up anyway. $4000/yr to maintain a 50 KW turbine is flat out wrong ... I have 15, 2100KW turbines that cost about $1800/yr to maintain (barring any big component failures).

Some math is not adding up. You said before you make north of 100 000 a year, plus company truck, benefits, etc etc. (>100k + company truck + benefits)/15 ≠ "about $1800"

well, you are missing the $70000/Turbine ($1.12Million) the owners pay my company (yearly) to run and maintain the site. plus a $130K management fee on top of that. ...Plus I have 4 techs, not just me. We are held by a contract to have the turbines ready to make power 97% of the time based on SCADA data, below 97% we pay liquidated damages (cash) to the owners.

The $1800 for maintenance is what I budget per turbine. (grease, filters, oil, etc...)

[azimuthaviation]

1250000/15 is almost 85000 a year per turbine in fixed operating costs. I think thats what they mean by maintenance.

[Beefitarian]

The 15 are particular units that cost that much, the farm might have other turbines that have different costs.

[Troubleshot]

1250000/15 is almost 85000 a year per turbine in fixed operating costs. I think thats what they mean by maintenance.

Ok am I missing something here? Are you talking about my park? Because the one I was talking about was the 50 kW single turbine.

I have 15 turbines and a substation. My turbine is a 300 foot 2.2MW turbine, my park can power about 12000 homes. The 50 Kw can offset power costs slightly but that is about it. The small 50 KW machines do not require operations budgets because there are no operations to run. The small installations should be a "plug and play" operation, with minor maintenance impact. They tie directly into the grid and have software to operate itself.

To put in perspective, just one of my turbines can put out more power in 10 days than one 50 Kw turbine can put out in one year.

azimuthaviation, the cost per turbine is still $70000/year for O&M, the $130K fee is because I manage the "Balance of Plant" work too, that is the substation yard, road maintenance, snow removal, etc...normally the owners would do that with their own employee but in this case I do it. That fee is separate from fixed operating cost in regards to the turbines.

The point I am trying to make is that this little venture with single 50 Kw turbine stinks and someone is gonna lose on this deal, my guess is won't be SaskPower...looking at the numbers SaskPower released, about $4000/year in maintenance cost and the turbine can produce any where from $4500-$10000 in power.... hmmm, so if they have a crappy wind year (they will) that means the town will either go in the hole or make a $1000 bucks. I guarantee that this small turbine will not produce $10000/year, it would have to be running at rated capacity all the time...not gonna happen.

[Tailwind W10]

-500+ feet tall - FALSE - unless you are privy to a new technology I am un aware of, 500 feet would be about 200 feet taller than anything on the market to date. The tallest wind turbines will be commonly be off shore. The tallest turbine I have seen is 328 feet (100m). Most common is 80-90 meters hub height.

Troubleshot, thanks for the insider information you're supplying here. Please forgive me for picking nits; an 80m hub height assuming a 70m blade length puts the top of the blade arc at 492 ft. Does this not count when speaking of a windmills height?

Gerry

[Troubleshot]

-500+ feet tall - FALSE - unless you are privy to a new technology I am un aware of, 500 feet would be about 200 feet taller than anything on the market to date. The tallest wind turbines will be commonly be off shore. The tallest turbine I have seen is 328 feet (100m). Most common is 80-90 meters hub height.

Troubleshot, thanks for the insider information you're supplying here. Please forgive me for picking nits; an 80m hub height assuming a 70m blade length puts the top of the blade arc at 492 ft. Does this not count when speaking of a windmills height?

Gerry

Hi Gerry, you are correct. I was speaking in general wind industry terms where "hub height" is the common measurement. I should have been more clear. With one blade pointing straight up my towers are 122m tall (400 feet) each blade is approx, 44meters in length, make a rotor diameter of 88 meters. However, I am sure there are taller buildings around airports than a standard height wind turbine but I am not a pilot so I cannot say for sure. A couple of hotels at the end of Pearson's runways come to mind but I have no idea how tall they are. Worth noting that 100meter towers are almost always used in off shore applications.

Capture.JPG (29.56 KiB) Viewed 3056 times

someone posted a story where a wind turbine park was encroaching on an airport in Chatham-Kent I believe, and Transport Canada has ordered them to be removed. My "Beef" was with the context in how so posters believe these turbines are just thrown up anywhere without any studies. The site in Chatham-Kent is an interesting one seeing how Transport Canada is usually involved in the approval process. Someone F'ed up big time here.

[The Mole]

Grosse mountains wind turbine tosses snowballs at children. I guess a little ice shedding isn't a problem in a wind farm. But on ski hill it makes for a hazard to the general public.

[photofly]

With one blade pointing straight up my towers are 122m tall (400 feet) each blade is approx, 44meters in length, make a rotor diameter of 88 meters. However, I am sure there are taller buildings around airports than a standard height wind turbine but I am not a pilot so I cannot say for sure. A couple of hotels at the end of Pearson's runways come to mind but I have no idea how tall they are.

A quick look at the Toronto VTA reveals that all the nearby obstacles are much lower than that: the following are heights above ground level for all the (marked) obstructions within 3nm of the centre of Pearson: 125, 150, 110, 148, 130, 148, 149, 94, 115, 136

At approximately 4nm distance there are two higher obstructions, at 401 and 417 feet agl.

A 122m obstruction could be one of your turbines, or it could be a 35-40 storey building. They're both about the same kind of hazard to aviation. There are no 35 storey buildings that close to Pearson airport.

[The Raven]

Does anyone have a link to the regulations as far as height of obstacle vs distance from the airport?

[Troubleshot]

Grosse mountains wind turbine tosses snowballs at children. I guess a little ice shedding isn't a problem in a wind farm. But on ski hill it makes for a hazard to the general public.

Must be an older model I would say. My turbines software can detect ice/snow on the blades and it shuts itself down before it builds up enough to shed at high speed. Looks at wind speed Vs. Power output, OAT and vibe sensors, if the wind speed is high, power output low, and the OAT is in a certain range it will look for small vibes in the blades. Once sensed it will shut down. Just like an aircraft wing icing up, you can have high TAS but almost zero lift. Same goes for turbine blades. Throws a fault and my techs go check it out.

[Troubleshot]

With one blade pointing straight up my towers are 122m tall (400 feet) each blade is approx, 44meters in length, make a rotor diameter of 88 meters. However, I am sure there are taller buildings around airports than a standard height wind turbine but I am not a pilot so I cannot say for sure. A couple of hotels at the end of Pearson's runways come to mind but I have no idea how tall they are.

A quick look at the Toronto VTA reveals that all the nearby obstacles are much lower than that: the following are heights above ground level for all the (marked) obstructions within 3nm of the centre of Pearson: 125, 150, 110, 148, 130, 148, 149, 94, 115, 136

At approximately 4nm distance there are two higher obstructions, at 401 and 417 feet agl.

A 122m obstruction could be one of your turbines, or it could be a 35-40 storey building. They're both about the same kind of hazard to aviation. There are no 35 storey buildings that close to Pearson airport.

I knew someone would answer that, thanks. I really had no clue.

[The Mole]

Grosse mountains wind turbine tosses snowballs at children. I guess a little ice shedding isn't a problem in a wind farm. But on ski hill it makes for a hazard to the general public.

Must be an older model I would say. My turbines software can detect ice/snow on the blades and it shuts itself down before it builds up enough to shed at high speed. Looks at wind speed Vs. Power output, OAT and vibe sensors, if the wind speed is high, power output low, and the OAT is in a certain range it will look for small vibes in the blades. Once sensed it will shut down. Just like an aircraft wing icing up, you can have high TAS but almost zero lift. Same goes for turbine blades. Throws a fault and my techs go check it out.

How big of slush ball does it take to wipe out a 5year old on a chair lift. Low or high speed ice shedding, over a ski hill would be a concern.... There turbine doesn't turn very often, and seems designed as a ride/attraction. They charge people to go up it. http://www.grousemountain.com/eye-of-the-wind.