Iowa Wind Power

[BCClone]

You and I and everyone else are paying a fortune in taxes for those windmills.

Over $100 billion has already been spent on renewables subsidies.

Renewable energy resources—primarily wind and solar—have received subsidies through the tax code since 1979, most of which have occurred in the last decade. Through 2018, these subsidies amounted to more than $100 billion. This amount is far in excess of federal assistance received by other electricity sources. And for perspective, this exceeds the combined 2020 budgets for the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Energy, the Department of the Interior, and the Environmental Protection Agency.

I was looking at solar panels for a livestock facility. I am with a cooperative. Solar panels were cheaper long term than a windmill. The cooperative would pay me what their cost was to buy electricity for any over production (seemed fair). Their cost was 2.3 cents per killowatt about 6 year ago. If I was with Alliant, I would have received 9-10 cents payment since the government mandated them to have so much green energy. The manager told me that windmills were running around 8-9 cents for production costs, but government incentives cut that down to about 5-6 and the mandate forced them to put them up anyhow. This is why electric bills have been ratcheting up yearly.

 

[motorcy90]

Wind turbines 'only lasting for half as long as previously thought' as study shows they show signs of wearing out after just 12 years

A study of almost 3,000 turbines in Britain – the largest of its kind – sheds doubt on manufacturers claims that they generate clean energy for up to 25 years, which is used by the Government to calculate subsidies.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Really? This is a British article, but lines up with what someone I know who works on them for MidAmerican says. More like 12 years, not the 25 manufactures claim. Claims by those selling these are going up, but from what I have heard, not happening in reality. Nuclear to stabilize everything would be great though.

if you live in the Des Moines area the DMACC turbine is about 30 years old now.

 

[flycy]

Laws need to be written to force companies to have an escrow fund to tear them down when they go bankrupt, otherwise no permit to build a windmill. North Dakota has done this, Iowa hasn't?

....and the DMACC turbine is 9 years old according to their website. Its also just a 100KW teaching/research unit.

Ankeny Wind Turbine

www.dmacc.edu

 

[VeloClone]

Laws need to be written to force companies to have an escrow fund to tear them down when they go bankrupt, otherwise no permit to build a windmill. North Dakota has done this, Iowa hasn't?

This is common for mining operations as well - an escrow is required for end of life mine closing and clean up operations.

 

[Stewo]

MidAmerican expects to have 100% of its electric customers on wind energy within 5 years.

 

[motorcy90]

Laws need to be written to force companies to have an escrow fund to tear them down when they go bankrupt, otherwise no permit to build a windmill. North Dakota has done this, Iowa hasn't?

....and the DMACC turbine is 9 years old according to their website. Its also just a 100KW teaching/research unit.

Ankeny Wind Turbine

www.dmacc.edu

it was installed 9 years ago yes.. but it was purchased used out of California. and they had to de-rate it for use because they didn't have anywhere to actually handle the full power output of it, the president and board wanted it out front where it's at now vs where the program leads wanted it out back to the north (and where all the industrial programs are located) on the high side of the campus. the city also set a height limit on it due to the proximity to the Ankeny Airport so a full scale tower couldn't be installed either unfortunately.

 

[barometriclow]

Laws need to be written to force companies to have an escrow fund to tear them down when they go bankrupt, otherwise no permit to build a windmill. North Dakota has done this, Iowa hasn't?

....and the DMACC turbine is 9 years old according to their website. Its also just a 100KW teaching/research unit.

Ankeny Wind Turbine

www.dmacc.edu

You are in Iowa. Don't hold your breath for legislation that protects the little guy.

Some counties require the contracts to specify that the power company be responsible for decommissioning the tower but it is not going to help if the power company goes broke. Only two companies are regulated utilities - Midamerican and Alliant and they control about 60% of towers. The rest are independents.

Read that decommissioning costs about $200K.

A smart landowner would insist on a bond or dedicated fund be setup to handle decommissioning.

Blades have yet to be recyclable. Hence the stockpiles in Newton and a small one at the Elsworth exit.

 

[Sigmapolis]

Wasn't aware the state generated 42% from wind. Highest in nation. My guess would have been 5 to 10%

MidAmerican Energy takes 46 wind turbines offline after blades fall in rural Iowa

The Des Moines-based subsidiary of Warren Buffett-owned Berkshire Hathaway says it will inspect the wind turbines for safety.

www.desmoinesregister.com

States don't really produce their own electricity for themselves (with a few exceptions). Nobody really knows where the exact electron in the light bulb came from, after all. They are part of broader, interconnected networks.

Most of Iowa is part of MISO, which covers a roughly triangular area from Manitoba over to Indiana and down to eastern Texas and Louisiana. Spread Iowa's concentration of wind throughout the system, which is a fairer way of looking at it, and you end up with more like 10% of regional generation from wind.

Lots of wind coming from the Great Plains in the northwest of that triangle heading down to the population centers on the Great Lakes (though not Chicago, which is in another system) and along the Mississippi River. Your guess of "about 10%" was pretty much on if you look at it in a more realistic fashion.

 

[agrabes]

I understand why you would be concerned about the windmills being decommissioned after their 20-30 year lifespan. Nobody wants to be stuck with a big tower that's dilapidated and a potential danger.

But think about it for a minute. These windmills are supplying grid power. They are utility scale and the utilities in Iowa rely on them to be able to power the state. This is not some fly by night or mom and pop company that owns these things. The only way they are going away is if the power demand in our state or our country decreases. In other words, they will not go way. If they reach the end of their useful life, they will be refurbished or replaced. We need the power they provide. The windmills are expensive, but compared to the billion dollar plus price tag of a natural gas generator or the likely multi-billion dollar cost of a nuclear plant... wind is here to stay. You should not be afraid of the windmills being abandoned. If you want to be afraid of something, be afraid of more windmills being placed - it's more likely. MidAmerican has already made commitments to have 100% of their electric generation supplied by wind and there are plans in the works to develop additional high voltage lines to carry wind power generated in Iowa out of state.

*EDIT* Regarding the use of the wind power in Iowa vs. MISO - that's both right and wrong. It's a little simplistic to say that Iowa has X amount of wind generation vs. Y amount of electric load and calculate a percent of capacity filled by wind. That's not accurate, because like you say the generation capacity of (most of) Iowa is distributed throughout the MISO system. But it's not accurate to say that Iowa's wind generation capacity is evenly distributed throughout the entire MISO footprint. Especially MISO South, which is pretty much independent and not directly interconnected with MISO North. To know how much of Iowa's wind generation is actually used in state, you'd need to actually have MISO's data on how power is dispatched. It's something less than Generation/Load, but something more than Iowa Wind Generation/MISO Load.

 

[cyinne]

Nothing in the farmer's contract that the company is responsible to remove them when they are no longer functional?

At least in my county (Sac) there is an escrow account established for removal of decommissioned units. The company is responsible for removal of unit and everything up to 5 feet below grade.

 

[CloneJD]

The pipeline and windmills have kept my property taxes a bit more reasonable. A bit unsightly but property owners get some nice checks.

 

[BCClone]

The pipeline and windmills have kept my property taxes a bit more reasonable. A bit unsightly but property owners get some nice checks.

It really screws the ground up. I didn’t realize how bad it was

 

[Cyclonepride]

I'd really love to see an honest, unbiased assessment of all the various potential forms of energy, and their costs without subsidies. If someone knows where to find that, I'd appreciate it.

 

[NWICY]

You are in Iowa. Don't hold your breath for legislation that protects the little guy.

Some counties require the contracts to specify that the power company be responsible for decommissioning the tower but it is not going to help if the power company goes broke. Only two companies are regulated utilities - Midamerican and Alliant and they control about 60% of towers. The rest are independents.

Read that decommissioning costs about $200K.

A smart landowner would insist on a bond or dedicated fund be setup to handle decommissioning.

Blades have yet to be recyclable. Hence the stockpiles in Newton and a small one at the Elsworth exit.

South of Fort Dodge.

 

[Sigmapolis]

*EDIT* Regarding the use of the wind power in Iowa vs. MISO - that's both right and wrong. It's a little simplistic to say that Iowa has X amount of wind generation vs. Y amount of electric load and calculate a percent of capacity filled by wind. That's not accurate, because like you say the generation capacity of (most of) Iowa is distributed throughout the MISO system. But it's not accurate to say that Iowa's wind generation capacity is evenly distributed throughout the entire MISO footprint. Especially MISO South, which is pretty much independent and not directly interconnected with MISO North. To know how much of Iowa's wind generation is actually used in state, you'd need to actually have MISO's data on how power is dispatched. It's something less than Generation/Load, but something more than Iowa Wind Generation/MISO Load.

This is all true, but of the two extremes, Iowa's wind generation over MISO load is the more accurate way to look at it. I suppose you could do MISO-N load, taking out the portion from AR, LA, MS, and TX, and still end up with a fair comparison, given there is limited (though still some) transmission between the two.

The only way you could do it "properly" is if MISO was going to give you that powerflow data on a really micro level, which I am not even sure they would have (not an electrical engineer here, I understand this more from the market side) but, even if they did, I doubt they are sharing it with anybody.

The 40% number is more misleading than the 10%, at least. That 40% implies that Iowa is starting to rely on wind and increasingly on wind alone, which is not quite the reality of it. There will be times when Iowa is exporting a ton of wind on a cold and long night with the wind howling, but there are still times when the state is going to be very dependent on coal, gas, and nuclear imports in other Midwestern states or imports from the same in SPP to the west along our borders.

We have made some good progress on renewables, but we are still a long ways away from not needing the coal and gas plants in Illinois and Missouri around to keep the lights for peak load on in Des Moines and Ames.

 

[Sigmapolis]

I'd really love to see an honest, unbiased assessment of all the various potential forms of energy, and their costs without subsidies. If someone knows where to find that, I'd appreciate it.

I think the problem with that is it is not quite that simple.

It comes down to two things...

(1.) Defining "costs" is harder than you might think. You might say it is just the straight expenditures to build and operate a generating asset, but it is not that simple. How do you account for transmission costs spread throughout an interconnected system? Two wind farms that cost the same to build could cost radically amounts depending on their location. How do you account for externalities? I sometimes roll my eyes at claims of the fossil fuel industry receiving "trillions in subsidies," only because that is a misuse of the word "subsidy," though. What they mean is the social cost of carbon dioxide not having any price on it for them, which is a "subsidy" in a sense but not really a comparable one to the wind and solar PTC/ITC.

(2.) Different power types (to keep this conversation to electricity alone) have different strengths and weaknesses that do not lend themselves easily to giving you one number about costs. They can complement and supplement one another in complex ways. Wind, for instance, works well at night and during the winter when solar is weakest. Solar works best during the summer and the daytime. While both are becoming cheaper, both are intermittent, which then leads to the need for firming power from something dispatchable like gas, hydro, or large-scale battery storage. Just saying "this is lowest cost, so build that" is not really an accurate picture of resource planning. You have to account for all of these interactions.

Think of it like building a football or basketball roster. You need a complex mix of talents to play different roles to field a balanced and winning team. And one that you need to be constantly adjusting as the recruiting landscape and preferred game strategies evolve season-to-season or even within a single season. Recruiting a team of nothing but WRs or PGs will eventually end in disaster.

 

[flycy]

I think the problem with that is it is not quite that simple.

It comes down to two things...

(1.) Defining "costs" is harder than you might think. You might say it is just the straight expenditures to build and operate a generating asset, but it is not that simple. How do you account for transmission costs spread throughout an interconnected system? Two wind farms that cost the same to build could cost radically amounts depending on their location. How do you account for externalities? I sometimes roll my eyes at claims of the fossil fuel industry receiving "trillions in subsidies," only because that is a misuse of the word "subsidy," though. What they mean is the social cost of carbon dioxide not having any price on it for them, which is a "subsidy" in a sense but not really a comparable one to the wind and solar PTC/ITC.

(2.) Different power types (to keep this conversation to electricity alone) have different strengths and weaknesses that do not lend themselves easily to giving you one number about costs. They can complement and supplement one another in complex ways. Wind, for instance, works well at night and during the winter when solar is weakest. Solar works best during the summer and the daytime. While both are becoming cheaper, both are intermittent, which then leads to the need for firming power from something dispatchable like gas, hydro, or large-scale battery storage. Just saying "this is lowest cost, so build that" is not really an accurate picture of resource planning. You have to account for all of these interactions.

Think of it like building a football or basketball roster. You need a complex mix of talents to play different roles to field a balanced and winning team. And one that you need to be constantly adjusting as the recruiting landscape and preferred game strategies evolve season-to-season or even within a single season. Recruiting a team of nothing but WRs or PGs will eventually end in disaster.

Excellent post touching on the complexities of integrating renewables into the system. Natural gas generators have made Wind/Solar possible at all. They are quick to respond to fill in the gaps in a way steam plants cannot. California, for example, has to pay other states to take their unneeded solar energy at times, and experiences rolling brown/black outs during high demand low production times. Germany is experiencing the same problems and high costs. Wind energy causes other forms of energy to be more expensive by forcing them to adjust output due to the imbalances of renewables. There is also a higher than expected environmental cost in the death of birds, particularly large birds of prey, bats and insects.

 

[AuH2O]

I'd really love to see an honest, unbiased assessment of all the various potential forms of energy, and their costs without subsidies. If someone knows where to find that, I'd appreciate it.

If you look up the EIAs levelized cost of energy there are some good studies. They show costs with and without subsidies and separate dispatchable vs non-dispatchable sources.

The thing people typically find surprising is the high cost of nuclear, which is due to massive CapEx. I also think things are moving more toward micro grids rather than a nationwide smart grid. Technologies that scale down better are probably going to do better in the future.

 

[DurangoCy]

You and I and everyone else are paying a fortune in taxes for those windmills.

Over $100 billion has already been spent on renewables subsidies.

Renewable energy resources—primarily wind and solar—have received subsidies through the tax code since 1979, most of which have occurred in the last decade. Through 2018, these subsidies amounted to more than $100 billion. This amount is far in excess of federal assistance received by other electricity sources. And for perspective, this exceeds the combined 2020 budgets for the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Energy, the Department of the Interior, and the Environmental Protection Agency.

Why compare a 40 year period of subsidies to a 1 year budget item? What type of perspective is that?
100 billion/40 years is 2.5 billion/year, which wouldn't equal the market capitalization of the 500th largest company in the US. In the same article, they state 80billion over an 8 year period, so using that number, it's the US Government buying the 420th largest company on the S&P each year, which is the Discovery Channel, not a big deal for all of the us with a 17 trillion GDP.

Also, those are also pretty minor departments:
Homeland Security - 50 billion/year
Energy - 32.5 billion/year
Interior - 12 billon/year
EPA - 9 billion/year

Compared to:
Defense - 721.5 billion/year
SSA - 950 billion/year
Medicare - 625 billion/year
Medicaid - 409 billion/year
Interest Payments - 375 billion/year

Put another way, if the US Government were equivalent to a $100k a year worker, we would be subsidizing renewables to the tune of $285/year. At the same time, we would be spending spend about $20,000 on guns, ammo, and a moat each and every year.

 

[nfrine]

Back in the day, I used to work with a number of big utilities. All of them said that without subsidies, wind power was a no-go as a good business decision. The subsidies and public perception were the only reason they were choosing to build wind power production. Several that were already in the wind power business wished they could have the opportunity to revisit their decision.