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Page added on January 21, 2012
$1 Billion More Pumping Into U.S. Wind
Dire predictions abound for U.S. wind power development if a federal production tax credit dies as scheduled at the end of this year, but projects already in the works appear to retain solid investment appeal. Sempra Energy sure seems to think so. The sprawling California energy company said it is jumping in with BP on a couple of big wind projects – one in Kansas and one in Pennsylvania – and the companies said they’ll invest more than a $1 billion in the plants.
Sempra said its Sempra U.S. Gas & Power business was taking a one-half equity stake in the 419-megawatt (MW) capacity Flat Ridge 2 plant BP is building 43 miles southwest of Wichita in south-central Kansas, and the 144-MW Mehoopany plant that’s going in 20 miles northwest of Scranton, Pa. A couple of months ago we reported that BP had struck a $750 million deal with GE for 350 wind turbines for the two plants. Now it looks like Sempra will share in that cost and the additional cost of building out the plants.
Dire predictions abound for U.S. wind power development if a federal production tax credit dies as scheduled at the end of this year, but projects already in the works appear to retain solid investment appeal. Sempra Energy sure seems to think so. The sprawling California energy company said it is jumping in with BP on a couple of big wind projects – one in Kansas and one in Pennsylvania – and the companies said they’ll invest more than a $1 billion in the plants.
Sempra said its Sempra U.S. Gas & Power business was taking a one-half equity stake in the 419-megawatt (MW) capacity Flat Ridge 2 plant BP is building 43 miles southwest of Wichita in south-central Kansas, and the 144-MW Mehoopany plant that’s going in 20 miles northwest of Scranton, Pa. A couple of months ago we reported that BP had struck a $750 million deal with GE for 350 wind turbines for the two plants. Now it looks like Sempra will share in that cost and the additional cost of building out the plants.
Sempra Energy consists of San Diego Gas & Electric (one of California’s three giant utilities), as well as Southern California Gas, Sempra International and the U.S. Gas & Power unit. The company’s wind deal with BP fits with a trend in the energy sector, which has also seen Warren Buffett’s MidAmerican Energy Holdings buy into a couple of big solar-power projects.
“Through strategic partnerships with world-class companies like BP, Sempra U.S. Gas & Power continues to grow a highly successful wind business while extending its position as a leading solar energy developer,” said Jeffrey W. Martin, president and CEO of Sempra U.S. Gas & Power. “This is an exciting time for our company. Over the next 12 months we expect to more than double the size of our operating wind and solar generation portfolios, resulting in significantly improved recurring cash flows from long-term contracted assets.”
BP’s Wind Energy division will operate the wind farms when they go into service, the companies said.
6 Comments on "$1 Billion More Pumping Into U.S. Wind"
BillT on Sun, 22nd Jan 2012 2:44 am
Wind farms can only last as long as oil lasts. Ditto for PV solar. All of the renewables depend on oil to exist.
$1,000,000,000.00 is a drop in the bucket in BP investments…and costs. The Gulf leak cost BP $40,000,000,000.00 already, and this is just the beginning of catastrophic costs because of where we are trying to get energy.
cephalotus on Sun, 22nd Jan 2012 11:53 am
Wind farms and PV power plants can generate their own (synthetic) fuel out of water and CO2 if that would be needed some day.
http://www.audi-balanced-mobility.de
The EROEI for wind farms is between 20:1 to 80:1, so turning (some) electricity to fuels at 60% efficiency is no problem.
BillT on Sun, 22nd Jan 2012 1:09 pm
Wow! you really are dreaming or drinking some wicked ‘cool aid’ cephalotus. Wind is nowhere near even 60% efficient. Maybe 20% in optimum conditions, and the whole wind system depends on oil to exist. When oil is gone, so is wind.
cephalotus on Sun, 22nd Jan 2012 1:36 pm
Turning electricity from wind to methane via hydrolsysis of water and the sabatier process has an efficiency of around 60% for plants > 50MW.
The efficiency from wind to electricity is not so relevant as long as there is enough wind left to “harvest”.
You may need some oil/fossil fuels for building wind parks, but you can use wind parks to make methane and with methane everything else can be made easily.
I showed you a link to AUDI, the German carmaker, which builds a small 6,5MW facility that will do exactly this: Transform electricity from wind to methane to drive cars with it.
You need some energy to make wind power plants, but it is not really much. The EROEI is quite good and much, much, much better than the EROEI of tar sands in Alberta for example.
I will provide a actual analysis for the wind EROEI, but is is in German:
http://www.enercon.de/p/downloads/Windblatt_04_11_de_web.pdf
see page 10
So why are you people still spreading this FUD about renewable energies that can’t substitute oil directly? Of course they can (they don’t have to do this for the next 20-30 years btw), you need to look at current technology not at the technology level of 1990.
BillT on Mon, 23rd Jan 2012 2:39 pm
cephalotus, You are dreaming. Where does the metals come from except mines? Mines require oil powered equipment to move millions of tons of ore out of the tunnels or out of holes in the ground,to refineries where it is crushed, again in metal machines, and heated to maybe 2,000 F. (Manganese steel) Then poured into sand molds and when cool, machined to the tolerances needed for whatever part is required. ALL of these steps requires energy that cannot come from air or PV solar or any other ‘renewable’ in a concentration that will make a wind fan possible. We have not even gotten into transportation and assembly, maintenance or replacement. You are dreaming if you think your world is not going to change drastically in a downward direction.
BillT on Mon, 23rd Jan 2012 2:45 pm
BTW: “…You need some energy to make wind power plants, but it is not really much…” is a pile of BS as high as one of your windmills. EROEI, total from mines to replacement, is a negative number…and certainly not a beneficially positive one.
All of these companies that claim to be efficient are just propaganda to sell wind mills. Let them power ALL of the requirements from mining to replacement with windmills and see how quickly it fails. Easy to make claims when there is still millions of barrels of oil in the process. They are not making additional energy, they are just changing one form for another, often at a loss.