UMPI - please provide project to date minute by minute wind turbine data
I just looked around the UMPI website and almost 11 months after the commissioning of the $2 million project I still am not able to see the type of basic performance data one would expect accompanying such a large investment.
You can read about the commissioning in the 5/15/09 Bangor Daily News at http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/106065.html
At the time, and continuing right up through today, UMPI stated that the turbine would produce 1 million KWH per year: “We are the first university in the state to install a mid-size wind turbine on campus. This $2 million project, installing a 600 kW wind turbine, is expected to produce 1 million kilowatt-hours of electricity per year, create more than $100,000 in annual energy savings and keep an estimated 572 tons of carbon dioxide from being released into the atmosphere each year.” From: http://www.umpi.edu/wind
Also, at the time, and continuing right up through today, UMPI stated that it would share all it has learned including how much electricity has actually been generated: “University officials have promised to be very public about the project, sharing everything they have learned as part of this pioneering venture with others who may want to use this technology.
Part of the University's reason for serving a leadership role in this realm is to fill the classic public university role of being the bold experimenter for projects that can help its community benefit from new knowledge. For this project, that includes providing information about everything from conducting initial wind measurement surveys and feasibility studies to completing contract negotiations and permitting processes to overseeing turbine installation and actual energy generation”. http://www.umpi.edu/wind/project/experiences
I am hoping for a downloadable csv or Excel file that would include basic measures by minute such as wind speed at different heights, turbine status (turning, broken, etc.?), RPM's, electricity, etc. There are about 526,000 minutes in a year, so that number of records fits easily within a csv or Excel 2007 file.
As can be seen below, (or go to http://www.umpi.edu/wind/live and click on "Live Turbine Data") for the first time there are SOME data, but hopefully UMPI will publish the data in a traditional csv or Excel format that would allow data analysis so we could learn from the experience.
It would also be valuable to see all maintenance and other costs related to the project to date.
Finally, the following live data capture provided currently on the site does not include date and time. It should.
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Comment
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Comment by Long Islander on April 16, 2010 at 11:10am
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There is now less than one month to the one year anniversary of the UMPI turbine that was commissioned on 5/15/09. Based on a straight line projection of the 554,767 KWH produced to date, the 1,000,000 KWH expectation appears to be 66% above the first year's projected production.
It also looks as though the turbine is at 11% of capacity, a far cry lower than the numbers the wind industry likes to throw out while it is trying to convince us of the greater good it serves as it blasts the tops of mountains and ridges.
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Comment by Joanne Moore on April 13, 2010 at 9:23pm
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That must be one of the new wind courses being taught...........
How to diddle with the data 101.
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Here it is, today, 4/13/10 at 7:20pm. The KWH = 552,825.
When the first UMPI picture was posted in this blog, it was 4/3/10 and the KWH can be seen as having been 521,404. Thus, in only 10 days, the KWH reported have increased by 31,421. Note that 31,421 is 5.7% of the 552,825 KWH that have been generated in the 332 days the turbine has been spinning since its commissioning. That is quite a surge in KWH in just 10 days:
First 322 days = 521,404 KWH / 322 = 1,619 KWH per day
Next 10 days = 31, 421 KWH / 10 = 3,142 KWH per day
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Comment by Harrison Roper on April 13, 2010 at 6:32pm
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Hello, especially to Long Islander - The Live UMPI turbine data site is working again, as of Tuesday April 13 at 6:00 pm. It shows 552826 kwh, and increase of 4803 since I checked April 9. With no wind at the moment, it shows the usual minus .3 kw power produced. I have seen minus .6 kw reported at times a few days ago when the site was live. The total kwh reported does drop slowly when there is no wind.
The live site was "down" for about four days - no explanation has been given. I am heartened to learn that a number of people have been following this site, and that the followers are disappointed at the paucity of information and the lack of reporting of TIME. When I first asked for output, someone called me to report "kilowatts" and did not seem to understand the concept of "kilowatt hours". Later, we got kilowatt hours, but for no definite period of time! I think there is some learning going on here - at the junior high level.
I went to the site for the Campus Sustainability meeting where our college presidents are going to be presenters, and after the required registration I wrote my disappointment with the live turbine data website; saying that even when it is working, it is incomplete. Thank you, Long Islander, for explaining the voids in the information better than I could.
The sound testing that was done on Stetson I last June included a full page of turbine output data charted on a time sheet - a very jagged line, almost all the time. This showed output for the turbines 1-12 a the south end of Stetson I, spotted every ten minutes. This is the kind of presentation that I fully expected from UMPI. It must be standard software, and Honeywell should know about it and use it. Joanne Moore - the live data are back.
H. Roper 4/13 5:30 pm
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As one con said to another con. "Oops! Busted again."
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Here's a screenshot as of 4/13/10 at 8:25 am.
What a joke of "data reporting".
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Too true, Long Islander. Seems like Maine will lose some great programs and teachers and become nothing more than a voc tech school with sports. What a terrible waste! And who knows how many Maine students will be affected by these decisions. All for the faddish idea of wind energy. Pathetic.
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The $2 million could have paid for a number of teachers for a number of years, no?
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Huh. That's not data, it's a picture. Tells me nothing. I doubt if they will ever have live data - it would reveal the colossal failure of this whole project. Next thing you know the University of Maine system will have to be canceling graduate programs and laying off teachers. Oh, that's right, they already are.
Maine as Third World Country:
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Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT
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(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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