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+--- Thread: Large scale Puna windfarm? (/showthread.php?tid=8376)
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - DanielP - 01-16-2011
kalama boy,
I was being sarcastic
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - kalama boy - 01-16-2011
Sorry DanielP, I was being a little too serious and missed your sarcasim.
Rob did you read the article in todays Advertiser about ramping up Puna thermal to connect via cable to Oahu?
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - Bullwinkle - 01-17-2011
I have been waiting for the promised commercial availability of fuel cells for the last ten years. They promise to make electricity efficiently without the distribution needs.
Portable fuel cells of the 7kw being about the size of the current home ac systems the will produce electricity, heat and water from hydrocarbons with very little loss (60% of the current energy input in generation schemes is wasted)
Some countries like Japan arent waiting - they are adding little 1k generators onsite at the end users homes - to help with the increasing load, with out increasing distribution costs - and ready for the advent of fuel cells when they arrive
Why the comments.... seems to me with fuel cells coming online soon - we may want to re consider spending on big capital energy projects instead focusing on point of use solar and fuel cell back up or other onsite solutions as the distribution systems becoming the weak links they are
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - peteadams - 01-17-2011
Take a look at Richard Ha's blog at http://hahaha.hamakuasprings.com/. He is leading a consortium called Ku‘oko‘a to purchase HEI, the parent holding company of HECO and the neighbor island power companies. His group's goal is to retire the HECO oil-fired plants and eventually replace them with geothermal. His blog recently put up the report of the Geothermal Working Group created by the legislature last year. With the current closed circuit geothermal technology, relatively small footprint and the essentially endless energy source of lava, geothermal seems to be the best power source option locally. Sending that power to Oahu is another story.
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - TrevorKane - 01-17-2011
@Bullwinkle, the difficulty in moving away from big capital intensive projects is that the people who profit from those projects profit in a big way, so they expend the political effort necessary to see that their projects go forward - often at the expense of any competing projects that do not have deep pockets backing them.
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - Bullwinkle - 01-17-2011
Re: @ B.... agreed ...
waxing philosophical.... that is why self sufficiency a good way to move away from the system... decentralization good for the end user -bad for the corporations inmho
Hawaii being very climate friendly to move towards energy independence, sun, geo, and bio all here as well as no need for fossil fuel heating and cooling.... lord knows we are de centalized enough....
now if they could just get those fuel cells to not overheat and catch fire...... the technology also got a bad rap during the tech stock boom collapse - it was trendy and a looser to own early fuel cell stock......
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - konadave - 01-17-2011
All this talk about sending power to Oahu from the Geo Thermal Plant doesn't make much sense to me at this time. Maybe I am missing something here? The Geo Thermal Plant is not supplying power to the entire island. Why would we want to send power to Oahu while not providing power to the entire island first? It seems to me to make more sense to power the entire island (combo of geo thermal, wind and other renewable sources) before we send power to Oahu. If we are able to create excess energy then I would think it would make sense to send power to other islands. But not before. JMHO
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RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - Rob Tucker - 01-17-2011
No one is going to be laying any cable to Oahu any time soon. Until the production is in place and proven all it is is talk in my opinion. IF there is excess production someday and Oahu wants to buy it - sure. Decades away.
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - Radiopeg - 01-17-2011
quote:Hey that's why we need a sarcasm font. OK so everyone has seen that joke.
Originally posted by kalama boy
Sorry DanielP, I was being a little too serious and missed your sarcasim.
I read something interesting about geothermal power. In Spokane there is a house geothermically heated/cooled. Cost about $40k. He had to dig 4 very deep wells. I wonder if something more small scale for power will ever be workable. I understand the state owns the steam, though. And some of the new vertical wind generators on mag-lev systems are pretty quiet.
I used to visit the California geothermal sites at Lake and Sonoma counties back when it was still hot, literally. All the warnings about scalding steam were kind of scary, but my job required some visits to pretty strange areas.
Life goes on, with you or without you.
RE: Large scale Puna windfarm? - DanielP - 01-17-2011
Radiopeg,
There is a system that is similar to what you describe out there. Not steam for electricity, but a heat exchanger often using ambient groundwater heat to heat and cool with.
Dan