Roxbury: RoxWind reaches commercial operation
Deep roots in the community because of John Richardson? Did he live in Roxbury? I thought it was Brunswick or somewhere in that area.
Excerpts:
Greenbacker Renewable Energy Company LLC (“GREC” or “Greenbacker”), a leading owner and operator of sustainable infrastructure and energy efficiency projects, announced today that RoxWind, a 15.3-MWdc wind farm, entered commercial operation on November 30. When it was acquired in 2020, the to-be-constructed project in Roxbury was Greenbacker’s first asset in Maine, a state with a history of strong support for renewables. Since then, the company has acquired four other assets and steadily built out its pipeline of renewable energy projects there, with RoxWind being its first in the state to reach the commercial operation milestone.
Each of RoxWind’s turbines can produce over 3.8 MW of wind power and has a rotor diameter of 137 meters—roughly the length of 10 full-sized school buses placed end to end.
RoxWind also has deep roots in the community. John G. Richardson, Jr., the 97th Speaker of Maine’s House of Representatives, was an invaluable proponent of the project who passed away before the construction was completed. His memory was honored in June 2021 during a community blade signing and commemoration event organized by Greenbacker and its development partners.
The full article is here:
https://www.evwind.es/2022/01/05/greenbackers-15-3-mwdc-roxwind-ass...
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Comment
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Comment by Willem Post on January 8, 2022 at 7:35am
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MAKE NEW ENGLAND GREAT AGAIN
THIS SIMILAR TO DEFORESTATION OF THE 1800s, but nothing grows back for at least 25 years!!!
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WIND AND SOLAR TO PROVIDE 30 PERCENT OF NEW ENGLAND ELECTRICITY CONSUMPTION BY 2050
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/wind-and-solar-provide...
Energy systems analysts of Denmark, Ireland, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, etc., have known for decades, if you have a significant percentage of (wind + solar) on your grid, you better have available:
- An adequate capacity, MW, of other power plants to counteract any variations of (W+S), 24/7/365
- High-capacity, MW, connections to nearby grids
- An adequate capacity of energy storage, such as:
1) Pumped hydro storage
2) Hydro plants with reservoir storage
3) Grid-scale battery systems
The more presence of variable (W+S) on the NE grid, the more the other generators have to vary their outputs, which causes these other generators to be less efficient (more wear and tear, more Btu/kWh, more CO2/kWh).
Owners in European countries with much wind and solar on the grids get compensated for their losses.
Those compensations are charged to the general public, not to the Owners of wind and solar systems, as part of the political (subsidy + cost shifting) regimen, to make wind and solar appear price-competitive versus fossil fuels.
RE folks often advocate:
1) Electricity must be 100% renewable, or zero carbon, or carbon-neutral by 2050
2) Getting rid of the remaining nuclear plants
3) Getting rid of natural gas, coal, and oil plants
4) More biomass burning
About This Article
This article has four parts and an Appendix
Part 1 provides an introduction to miscellaneous energy topics, and consumption of world energy quantities
Part 2 provides an introduction to existing NE grid conditions
Part 3 provides an introduction to daily NE grid load shaping, to deal with heat pumps and EVs in 2030
Part 4 provides the future NE grid conditions with 20% wind and 10% solar in 2050
The Appendix shows various energy topics, such as:
- Turnkey Capital Costs of Grid-scale Battery Systems
- Grid-scale Battery System Operating Cost in New England
- Energy Losses of Battery Systems
- “All-in” Electricity Cost of Wind and Solar in New England
“All-in” Electricity Cost of Wind and Solar in New England
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/high-costs-of-wind-sol...
http://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/cost-shifting-is-the-na...
Pro RE folks point to the “price paid to owner” as the cost of wind and solar, purposely ignoring the other cost categories. The all-in cost of wind and solar, c/kWh, includes:
1) Above-market-price paid to Owners
2) Subsidies paid to Owners
3) Owner return on invested capital at about 9%/y
4) Grid extension/augmentation
5) Grid support services
6) Future battery systems
Comments on table 5
- Vermont legacy Standard Offer solar systems had greater subsidies paid to owner, than newer systems
- Wind prices paid to owner did not have the drastic reductions as solar prices.
- Vermont utilities are paid about 3.5 c/kWh for various costs they incur regarding net-metered solar systems
- "Added to rate base" is the cost wind and solar are added to the utility rate base, used to set electric rates.
- “Total cost”, including subsidies to owner and grid support, is the cost at which wind/solar are added to the utility rate base
- “NE utility cost” is the annual average cost of purchased electricity, about 6 c/kWh, plus NE grid operator charges, about 1.6 c/kWh
for a total of 7.6 c/kWh.
- “Grid support costs” would increase with increased use of battery systems to counteract the variability and intermittency of increased build-outs of wind and solar systems.
NOTES:
1) NE wholesale grid price averaged about 5 c/kWh, starting in 2009, due to low-cost CCGT and nuclear plants providing at least 65% of all electricity loaded onto the NE grid, in 2019.
https://www.iso-ne.com/about/key-stats/resource-mix/
https://nepool.com/uploads/NPC_20200305_Composite4.pdf
2) There are Owning costs, and Operating and Maintenance costs, of the NE gridISO-NE charges these costs to utilities at about 1.6 c/kWh. The ISO-NE charges include:
Regional network services, RNS, based on the utility peak demand occurring during a monthForward capacity market, FCM, based on the utility peak demand occurring during a year.
Table 5/VT & NE sources
Paid to
Subsidy
Grid
GMP
Added
ISO-NE
Total
NE
Times
paid to
support
to rate
RNS+
utility
owner
towner
cost
adder
base
FCM
cost
cost
c/kWh
c/kWh
c/kWh
c/kWh
c/kWh
c/kWh
c/kWh
c/kWh
Solar, rooftop, net-metered, new
17.4
5.2
2.1
3.5
20.9
1.6
29.8
7.6
3.92
Solar, rooftop, net-metered, legacy
18.2
5.4
2.1
3.5
21.7
1.6
30.8
7.6
4.05
Solar, standard offer, combo
11.0
6.74
2.1
11.0
1.6
21.44
7.6
2.82
Solar, standard offer, legacy
21.7
10.5
2.1
21.7
1.6
35.9
7.6
4.72
Wind, ridge line, new
9.0
4.1
2.4
9.0
1.6
17.1
7.6
2.25
Wind, offshore, new
12.1
5.4
2.8
12.1
1.6
21.9
7.6
2.88
Sample calculation; NE utility cost = 6, Purchased + 1.6, (RNS + FCM) = 7.6 c/kWh
Sample calculation; added to utility base = 17.4 + 3.5 = 20.9 c/kWh
Sample calculation; total cost = 17.4 + 5.2 + 2.1 + 3.5 + 1.6 = 29.8 c/kWh
Excludes costs for very expensive battery systems
Excludes costs for very expensive floating, offshore wind systems
Excludes cost for dealing with shortfalls during multi-day wind/solar lulls. See URL
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/wind-and-solar-provide...
“Added to rate base” is for recent 20-y electricity supply contracts awarded by competitive bidding in NE.
“Added to rate base” would be much higher without subsidies and cost shifting.
Areas with better wind and solar conditions, and lower construction costs/MW have lower c/MWh, than NE
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Blade signing ceremony? The photo in the article brings tears to my eyes. What a disgrace. The name "Greenbacks" Renewable Energy really fits. Taxpayer greenbacks being used to destroy Maine's mountains.
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Comment by Art Brigades on January 5, 2022 at 10:58pm
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Rent seeking project flipping pursuers of public funny munny.
Maine as Third World Country:
CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power
Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.
Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT
******** IF LINKS BELOW DON'T WORK, GOOGLE THEM*********
(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/
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Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law
Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future
"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."
https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/
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