Spiritofireland.org - suggests energy independence in five years and much more

[Geckko]

This is simply opportunistic spruiking of someone's "millionaire idea".

The economics of wind farms just don't cut it. Add in the additional massive capital expense of the proposed storage systems and it becomes economic lunacy.

Any concept of "X independence", as in "food independence", "energy independence" is the same type of economic lunacy.

You must give them credit for the marketing hype for the grand plan though. Just look at the number of people it has taken in here alone.

It doesn't bear to think to much about this though, because I end up crying yet again at the waste and price I would have to pay for such a folly in higher electricity bills and direct and indirect public subsidies, tax breaksm, soft loans and general slush.

[Carryon]

This is simply opportunistic spruiking of someone's "millionaire idea".

The economics of wind farms just don't cut it. Add in the additional massive capital expense of the proposed storage systems and it becomes economic lunacy.

Any concept of "X independence", as in "food independence", "energy independence" is the same type of economic lunacy.

You must give them credit for the marketing hype for the grand plan though. Just look at the number of people it has taken in here alone.

It doesn't bear to think to much about this though, because I end up crying yet again at the waste and price I would have to pay for such a folly in higher electricity bills and direct and indirect public subsidies, tax breaksm, soft loans and general slush.

That was quick with the cost benefit analysis. Can you provide us with the construction cost figures you used?

[An Gilladaker]

Windfarms with Pumped Storage. Hardly a new idea.

Dead right I have been working on a DIY nuclear plant to run my house it keeps fecking over heating and the radiation is a nuisance think i will try a stove run on election posters

[Vega1447]

That was quick with the cost benefit analysis. Can you provide us with the construction cost figures you used?

I'm sure he can't but more importantly the promoters of this scheme have produced none either.


Lotsa €Billions thrown round on PK prog - and PK asked no hard questions.

I hope to Xrist that opposition ask the right questions if Govt do run with this...

Though I suspect that it is a ball of smoke...

[EoinMn]

My point is we already have windfarms in Ireland. And we already have a small amount of pumped storage. Building more pumped storage is a good idea as it will allow us to make better use of our wind energy. But AFAIK the government is already committed to growing our windfarms, but instead of storage, will incentivise electricity users to use more power off-peak. This is cheaper and faster than building pumped storage.

BTW, I remember Enda Kenny saying recently he was excited by pumped storage. Although he seemed to be under the impression that it was a method of generating new electricity, rather than storage. The clue is in the name Enda!

[droghedasouth]

This was discussed a few weeks ago - I ressurected that thread this morning after hearing them on the radio.

What makes this idea worthwhile is that you can get a reasonably big difference in level, up to 500 feet, very close to the sea.

This project makes serious sense from an engineering point of view and should be done immediately.

And it is even good politically to the peripheral regions who got next to nothing out of the Bertie Boom but are being screwed in the Cowen Bust.

[sparkey321]

The website is a joke. It looks nice, has plenty of fluff but no substance.

What volume of water storage would be required to power peak demand of this country for say 12 hours (an absolute minimum requirement) ? Anyone ?

Lets put it this way Ardnacrusha uses 400 cubic meters of water a second or 24,000 cubic meters a minute or 1,440,000 an hour or 17,280,000 cubic meters in 12 hours.

Ardnacrusha generates approx 86 MW

Moneypoint generates 915MW. So used ardnacrusha as a model you would need the equivalent of 10.64 ardnacrushas (for the sake of calculations lets use 10.)

So now we need 170,280,000 meters cubed of water just to replace moneypoint.

That's a reservoir 557 meters wide by 557 meters long by 557 meters high and that's just to replace moneypoint.

The ESB total fossil fuel generating capacity is over 3 times that.

Now imagine the amount of power required to not only replace all these fossil fuel generating plants but also to refill these reservoirs.

Until I see some real figures its a pipe dream, its vapour ware.

[droghedasouth]

My point is we already have windfarms in Ireland. And we already have a small amount of pumped storage. Building more pumped storage is a good idea as it will allow us to make better use of our wind energy. But AFAIK the government is already committed to growing our windfarms, but instead of storage, will incentivise electricity users to use more power off-peak. This is cheaper and faster than building pumped storage.

BTW, I remember Enda Kenny saying recently he was excited by pumped storage. Although he seemed to be under the impression that it was a method of generating new electricity, rather than storage. The clue is in the name Enda!

There is only so much you can do to get users to use off-peak electricity.
ESB have been doing it for decades.

So pumped storage is the answer.

And because of the fact that we have mountains all around our west coast, we are in a very good position to do this economically. Especially as we can build the reservoirs where the wind is and so dont need massive power lines to cope with the high power at the peaks.

[Vega1447]

This was discussed a few weeks ago - I ressurected that thread this morning after hearing them on the radio.

What makes this idea worthwhile is that you can get a reasonably big difference in level, up to 500 feet, very close to the sea.

This project makes serious sense from an engineering point of view and should be done immediately.

And it is even good politically to the peripheral regions who got next to nothing out of the Bertie Boom but are being screwed in the Cowen Bust.

A little bit premature to say it

makes serious sense from an engineering point of view

Before sinking (say) 10-20Billion into it I'd suggest some analysis.

The two lead guys are a TCD nano-tech academic researcher and a (afaik) unknown electrical engineer.

[Vega1447]

The website is a joke. It looks nice, has plenty of fluff but no substance.

What volume of water storage would be required to power peak demand of this country for say 12 hours (an absolute minimum requirement) ? Anyone ?

Lets put it this way Ardnacrusha uses 400 cubic meters of water a second or 24,000 cubic meters a minute or 1,440,000 an hour or 17,280,000 cubic meters in 12 hours.

Ardnacrusha generates approx 86 MW

Moneypoint generates 915MW. So used ardnacrusha as a model you would need the equivalent of 10.64 ardnacrushas (for the sake of calculations lets use 10.)

So now we need 170,280,000 meters cubed of water just to replace moneypoint.

That's a reservoir 557 meters wide by 557 meters long by 557 meters high and that's just to replace moneypoint.

The ESB total fossil fuel generating capacity is over 3 times that.

Now imagine the amount of power required to not only replace all these fossil fuel generating plants but also to refill these reservoirs.

Until I see some real figures its a pipe dream, its vapour ware.

Their "big idea" is to dam a valley that opens to the sea and use that as the resevoir - a clever idea but theers a bit more too it than that.

I agree it is prob a ball of smoke but the present Govt are desperate enough to blow a few hundred million on the Great Wall of Kerry.

Tom Parlon was salivating on PK show when asked his opinion...