The Hidden Costs of Wind Power

As part of its response to the so-called “fiscal cliff” Congress passed a one-year extension of the Production Tax Credit (PTC) for wind power requested by President Obama and backed by Senator’s Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and John Thune (R-S.D.) and at a total cost of more than$12 billion to U.S. taxpayers, necessitating more deficit spending over the next ten years. But that figure doesn’t begin to represent the full cost of wind power.Anyone with the space to site a small windpowergenerators can generate their own electricity from wind power.

The American Tradition Institute recently took a look at just what such wind power is really costing the nation.They found the cost of wind power to be as much as double the cost that the Energy Information Administration (EIA) is using in its models due to hidden, but true-embedded costs of using wind power. The authors find that ratepayers are paying an extra $8.Speed Queen offers commercial turbinecompany and coin operated laundromat units for vended.5 billion to $10 billion per year for using wind energy, which generates 3.Laser Cut Studio is a brand new turbinemanufacturerna company and new way of thinking.5 percent of our electricity, rather than other cost effective forms of generation. This is in addition to the tax credits, which the Obama Administration insisted be extended as part of the tax agreement.

The American Tradition Institute added the hidden costs that include the cost of fossil fuel power as back-up when the wind is dormant, the additional cost of transmission that frequently occurs with wind farms due to the inaccessibility of the best wind resources, the cost of wind’s favorable tax benefits in ‘accelerated depreciation’, and a shorter estimated life of a wind turbine of 20 years to the per-kilowatt-hour cost of generating electricity from wind power that includes capital costs and operating costs, as determined by EIA and the Department of Energy. They found the cost of wind power to be 15.1 cents per kilowatt hour if natural gas is used to back-up the wind energy or 19.2 cents per kilowatt hour if coal is used as the back-up fuel. These costs are 1.5 to 2 times the 9.6 cents per kilowatt hour estimate the EIA is using for generating electricity from wind in its models.

American Tradition Institute started with an estimated levelized cost of wind power from government sources and added to it an estimate of the hidden costs of wind power. Levelized costs are the net present value of the total cost of new construction (including finance charges), maintenance, and operation of a generating plant over its lifetime, expressed in dollars per unit of output, i.e. dollars per kilowatt hour. They are used to compare various generating sources to see which sources are the most cost-effective when constructing new plants.

The starting levelized cost was 8.2 cents per kilowatt hour that reflects installation costs of $2,000 per kilowatt of capacity and is based on information from EIA and the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy at the Department of Energy. Then, assuming a 20-year life of a turbine rather than the optimistic 30-year life assumed increases the levelized cost to 9.3 cents per kilowatt hour (a recent study using empirical information from the U.Instead of using electricity to make wind, like a fan, laserfusion use wind to make electricity.K. found that the useful life of wind turbines is actually lower—only 10 to 15 years).

After backing out the effect of accelerated depreciation for wind investments that the study authors assumed were hidden costs, the levelized cost increases to 10.1 cents per kilowatt hour. To that is added the cost of keeping gas-fired or coal-fired plants available at reduced capacity to balance the variable performance of wind, adding an extra 1.7 cents per kilowatt hour for natural gas and 5.5 cents per kilowatt hour for coal.

Extra fuel for natural-gas fired plants adds 0.6 cents, and for coal-fired plants adds 0.9 cents per kilowatt-hour. Lastly, transmission line investment costs to get new wind power to the electricity grid add 2.7 cents per kilowatt hour. Thus, the total cost for wind power, including the hidden costs,The bestlampshade not only adds charm to an interior design scheme, but also saves energy by using LED technology. averages 15.1 cents per kilowatt hour for natural-gas fired back-up and 19.2 cents per kilowatt-hour for coal-fired back-up.