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Elements of the New Energy Technology
By Angeliki V. Keil, Lakeville
The answer my friend
is blowing in the wind
The answer is blowing in the wind.
Wind-hydrogen energy is our future, but do you hear about it daily on radio? TV? See it in the paper?
Wind captured by turbines, installed on tall pylons, turns wind energy into electricity. This electricity can be used as is, or it can be used to break down water into oxygen and hydrogen. Hydrogen is a very pure fuel and it can be piped, like gas, to far-away cities and transformed back into electricity. Hydrogen in the form of fuel cells can be used to power cars or generators in areas far from pipelines and electrical networks.
The elements of this new energy technology are quite familiar, with the exception of fuel cells. In the last twenty years wind turbines have improved in efficiency due to the aerospace industry’s know-how. Existing gas pipelines can be converted or imitated to transport hydrogen. Fuel cells are being improved and their cost is dropping just as you are reading this; they can be sold out of existing gas stations. What’s missing? Two things: (1) spreading the good news that petro-oil and coal are easily replaceable right away; and (2) our commitment to invest with gusto in this clean and cheap energy system.
Energy efficiency, turning sunlight into electricity, and tapping the earth’s heat (see Lester Brown’s new book, Eco-Economy) are other methods that can help heat us and cool us while healing global warming; they offer solutions for specific problems and specific locations. But wind-hydrogen is the technology of choice that can replace the present energy uses of oil, gasoline and coal, the main culprits in global warming.
Wind-hydrogen energy creates no global warming gases. It does not pollute the air we breathe. It is vast and abundant all over the globe. It has none of the outrageous dangers of nuclear energy. It makes us independent of foreign oil. It requires no drilling and poisoning of our precious wilderness and farmlands, so there is no need for "sacrifice" areas like the Gulf of Mexico and Louisiana, the Niger delta, the jungles of the Amazon, the Caspian Sea. Wind-hydrogen will empower the cleanup of these areas. Wind farms can coexist with crops and ranching and provide annual royalty checks to farmers. Think of it: no more grimy oil- and coal-fired electricity plants killing the Adirondack lakes and forests with acid rain! No more Chernobyls-in-waiting!
Lester Brown states that "the U.S. Great Plains are the Saudi Arabia of wind power." North Dakota, Kansas and Texas can supply all our electricity needs. Can you believe it? All our electricity needs!
People object to living under giant pylons with thundering turbines, so the issue of how to transport the energy to where it is needed, to the great urban centers, confronted this technology initially. Chicago and the other urban concentrations of the Midwest can have the electricity transported through electrical wires, as it is transported now. But what about the coasts? What about New York City and Los Angeles? It is possible that the coasts will get their electricity from offshore wind farms. This is a method that is being pioneered by the North Europeans, whose countries are densely populated. Cape Wind Associates, a Yarmouth, MA company, plans the first offshore wind electricity generators near Cape Cod. However, a hydrogen pipeline system is probably the way we will solve a lot of wind-energy transmission problems. And hydrogen in the form of fuel cells will power almost silent cars and trucks, as well as generators for homes that are located far away from grids.
During the last twenty years wind energy has gone far beyond the experimental level. The U.S., after a good start in the ‘80s (due to oil price-hikes of the ‘70s), has fallen behind. Currently we get only 0.5% of our electricity from the wind. Lack of leadership and our love affair with oil and oil tycoons have put us in the unenviable position of getting 11% (as environmentalists say) to 20% (as politicians say) of our national energy from nuclear power generation. We could easily replace nuclear with wind energy. And we realize that now, during this time of determined terrorists, millions and millions of us are living within catastrophe-distance of those nuclear plants.
Today the Danes get 15% of their electricity from the wind and export the best turbines the world over. Spain’s industrial state of Navarra, starting from scratch six years ago, now gets 22% of its electricity from wind. What is keeping us from leading in this field? We, the parents and grandparents who wish to insure a future for our children, must take action. We will have to drag our representatives into leading us where we want to go: clean energy and clean politics. We’ve got to drag them out of the oily cesspools of "politicians for hire," and remind them that they are our representatives.
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