Re: Solar power

[Marlyn Jakub <mjakub@physics.otago.ac.nz>]

Dear Frank of Livermore,
I spent several years in Livermore and always enjoyed the beauty of the
windmills. And, as for the noise, the windmills are surely more pleasant and
relaxing for the cattle than the big freeway going through the area!
Finally, one tends to be suspicious about farmers talking to their cattle,
as the animals always appeared contented, as I observed them many times from
the rural roadways.

As for nuclear and fusion dreams, perhaps you could talk to those who have
had to deal with problems in nuclear and tokamak fusion equipment over a
decent part of a lifetime. I did, and the problems certainly were
significant, with much more risk associated with operation than the dangers
from a misbehaving windmill. My two cents worth...as an engineer.
Marlyn Jakub



At 04:38 PM 1/30/98 -0800, Frank from Livermore wrote:

> This is an old thread, but I just picked it up.  Anyone who thinks wind energy
> is environmentally clean hasn't looked carefully into the matter.  I live near
> Livermore, California, southeast of San Francisco.  There are beautiful
> rolling hills surrounding the valley here.  The pass to the east is now
> covered with thousands of wind mills, sometimes generating power.  There are
> many different types of wind mills and propeller shapes.   Most of the time
> these wind mills are not running, because the wind is either too slow or too
> fast, or they are undergoing maintenance.  Building them started several years
> ago, the government offered a tax credit for investing in such things.  If
> your net worth was on the order of a million or more you could buy a share in
> one of these wind mills and write off the cost over several years, and then
> reap the profits.  These wind mills were  better tax write-offs than energy
> producers.  
>
> The beautiful hills around the valley are covered by these steel monsters.
> They are polluting - visually polluting. (Unlike the beautiful wind mills we
> think of in the Netherlands).  They are something that possibly a (few)
> engineers would think are beautiful (I have heard one say so).
>
> Not only are they visually polluting, but they make noise.  The noise can't be
> heard in the valley, but ranchers have complained that their grazing cattle
> are bothered by the noise. 
>  
> One small, safely built, nuclear reactor would be a far better, more reliable
> and less polluting, choice.