Wind Turbines ,Good Or Bad....?

[SollyOlly]

 Methuselah ha ha, yes, spot on! "it be witchcraft"...!! 

I guess there'll always be progressives, and always naysayers. Sometimes the 'truth' lies somewhere in-between...

Funnily enough, when I were a lad back in London in the old days, we not only had a coal fire (no central heating, it was bloomin' cold having to light the fire first up!) but we also had kerosene lamps - massive fire risk that wouldn't be allowed these days, but the lamps provided heat as well as light! No need these days, in the times of no winter of course...

[In Absence of True Seasons]

 SollyOlly yes. No doubt when the first ingenious individuals amongst steppe-dwelling nomadic hunter gatherers invented the wheel which enabled horse-drawn chariots to be utilised, there would've been many naysayers going "Erm, doesn't this disrupt our peaceful way of life where we walk everywhere currently!? What's he doing rushing and rolling around like that at high speeds!? Those wheels are so ugly and fast and disturb my peace!" or something similar...

Tale as old as time for human mentality haha

Edited February 20 by In Absence of True Seasons

[Methuselah]

@SollyOlly: I grew up with nothing but one coal fire, and my bedroom was freezing; especially in 1963. And the filth in the air was something to behold. I'm glad I haven't experienced green-brown fog since the 1960s.

Up in Scotland (1988-2010) it was cold, but at least the fog was clean and white.

[WYorksWeather]

What always strikes me about these sort of debates is that people often make the perfect the enemy of the good. Are wind turbines a perfect solution that can can replace all our current energy needs whilst generating zero CO2 emissions over the entire life cycle? No, of course not, that's just not realistic. We'll need a multitude of energy solutions, and manufacturing emissions will probably need to be solved by as-yet unknown technology or else offset by other methods (afforestation, direct CO2 capture). And we'll also need ways of storing energy, whether through batteries or by using geography to our advantage e.g. hydroelectric power storage.

But when you compare the environmental impact to the continued use of fossil fuels, it's a definite improvement.

[Derecho]

On 18/10/2021 at 13:37, Derecho said:

Far better then being put to the mercy of geopolitical actions of the likes of Putin and in the long run, far better for the UK. 

Didn't realise I wrote this comment back before the Ukraine war started but it has unfortunately aged very well. We need more renewables! and the Ukraine war highlights it... the less we rely on the likes of Russia the better as it weakens their hand. It's a shame Trump will serve to strengthen it from next year.

Edited February 23 by Derecho