From xxxxxx <[email protected]>
Subject Wind Turbines Can Handle the Cold Just Fine. Just Look at Iowa.
Date February 20, 2021 3:45 AM
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[Some Republicans want you to think wind turbines caused the Texas
blackout. Here’s why they’re wrong.] [[link removed]]

WIND TURBINES CAN HANDLE THE COLD JUST FINE. JUST LOOK AT IOWA.  
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Lili Pike
February 19, 2021
Vox
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_ Some Republicans want you to think wind turbines caused the Texas
blackout. Here’s why they’re wrong. _

Wind turbines near Halifax, Nova Scotia, K Ali CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

 

As the energy crisis in Texas deepened this week, leaving millions
without power, heat, and even running water, conservative
commentators
[[link removed]] and
politicians persistently peddled a myth that wind turbines are to
blame.

“It seems pretty clear that a reckless reliance on windmills is the
cause of this disaster,” Tucker Carlson said Monday
[[link removed]] on
Fox News. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott also used wind power as a scapegoat
for the crisis when he appeared on Fox
[[link removed]] Tuesday
night, but he later walked back his comments.

Let’s get the facts straight. Every type
[[link removed]] of
power plant — whether powered by coal, natural gas, nuclear, solar,
or wind sources — in Texas was impacted by the ice and freezing
temperatures that arrived with Winter Storm Uri over the weekend. But
it was natural gas — the state’s top source of electricity —
that failed most significantly
[[link removed]] as
wellheads and power plants froze over. Wind turbines, meanwhile, were
responsible for 13 percent
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the total lost electricity output, according to the Electric
Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the state’s nonprofit grid
operator.

But there is nothing innate about wind power — or natural gas —
that caused these power plants to fail. It’s merely a matter of
preparation, Hui Hu, a professor of aerospace engineering at Iowa
State University who studies wind turbines, told Vox.

Places reliant on wind energy that are no strangers to cold and ice
— from Sweden to Iowa — are proof that the freezing of turbines
in Texas was not inevitable. The difference: Unlike in Texas, those
turbines were weatherized to operate in the cold.

Does this mean that, as wind power contributes a greater and greater
share of electricity in states like Texas, all wind turbines have to
be storm-proofed to avoid a future mass blackout like this week’s?
This is ultimately a risk calculation that lawmakers and scientists
will have to make going forward, but the scale of the damage from this
blackout suggests the upfront investment would be worthwhile.

So, how exactly do cold veterans like Iowa keep their turbines
turning, and what can we learn from them?

Why only some ice is problematic for wind turbines

To understand how to winterize wind turbines, we first need to take a
slightly deeper dive into why ice caused some turbines to fail in
Texas.

The answer has to do with the specific intersection of temperature and
humidity. At Iowa State, Hu and his research team pinpointed these
factors through a decade of research to figure out why some ice
impacts wind turbines and what can be done to stop it.

Hu oversees experiments at what he proudly tells Vox is the largest
wind tunnel at any US university. Originally set up to test de-icing
methods for airplanes, Hu’s lab converted the tunnel to blow icy
wind at wind turbine blades when Iowa started to go big on wind power
a decade ago. These experiments have given us a lot of information
about how to keep wind turbines moving in the winter.

The researchers identified one kind of ice — wet “glaze” ice —
that is particularly of concern. This ice creates a cottage
cheese-like texture on turbine blades, which slows down airflow. In a
field experiment, researchers found
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during a 30-hour period when blades iced over, power production
dropped by up to 80 percent.

Even worse, this ice can cause turbines to become severely unbalanced
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potentially even breaking under the stress. So if turbines aren’t
winterized, operators will shut them down before they reach that
point, Hu explained.

It was exactly this wet ice that formed on turbine blades in Texas
when Arctic air met Gulf humidity
[[link removed]],
Hu said. Meanwhile, in Iowa, the temperatures are usually so low and
the air so dry that smooth “rime” ice forms over turbine blades,
which doesn’t affect the turbines as much. You can see the
difference in the photo from one of Hu’s team’s experiments below.

The difference between dry “rime” ice and wet “glaze” ice —
the latter is what impacted Texas’s turbines.

 Iowa State University
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Low temperatures alone can also cause some turbine components to
malfunction without proper protective technologies. But Hu pointed out
that the higher density of cold air actually boosts wind power
generation in the winter.

How some of the coldest regions keep their turbines turning

So, how do wind farms respond to these different types of ice, to keep
their turbines from shutting down as they did in Texas?

In wetter places like Scandinavia and Scotland, some turbines are
filled with hot air while others have a special coating to prevent ice
from forming. These winter-ready turbines cost about 5 percent more
than regular turbines, and the heating process uses up some of their
energy output, Stefan Skarp, who oversees wind power for Swedish
utility Skellefteå Kraft, told Bloomberg News
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Hu’s team is working on more energy-efficient technologies that
could be cheaper.

Because Iowa is blessed with drier ice, wind farms there haven’t had
to invest in such elaborate measures while reaching the highest share
of wind electricity generation in the country: 42 percent in 2019.

Midwestern utility company MidAmerican Energy Company has shown that
wind energy is highly reliable, even in harsh Iowa conditions. In
2020, 80 percent of the utility’s electricity was generated by
renewable energy — the majority of which comes from its 3,300 wind
turbines, said Geoff Greenwood, a spokesperson for MidAmerican Energy.

“This year it’s been cold, but our wind fleet continues to
generate clean energy for our customers,” he said. All that’s
needed is a few extra measures in the turbine design to make sure
certain components don’t freeze up.

Some Iowa wind operators use flashier action movie techniques to keep
their turbines going. Helicopters and drones swoop over turbines
dropping hot water or de-icing chemicals. But this is typically just a
one-off measure if bad ice hits, Hu said.

Should Texas winterize all of its turbines?

Given that winterizing turbines costs more, should Texas wind
developers take a cue from Sweden and pay that price upfront to help
avoid future disasters?

HELP IN TEXAS FOR THOSE AFFECTED BY WINTER STORM URI

* Find a warming shelter [[link removed]] with this
state map
* And a list of food banks
[[link removed]], searchable by zip code
* Conserve power
[[link removed]] (if
you have it) with this Austin American-Statesman guide
* Find Austin-area restaurants offering free meals
[[link removed]] (also
via the American-Statesman)
* Host someone in need through Airbnb’s OpenHomes program
[[link removed]]

WHERE TO DONATE

* Help feed Texans via these Eater Austin
[[link removed]] and Eater
Dallas
[[link removed]] guides
* Donate to Kids’ Meals
[[link removed]], which provides meals to
Houston-area children experiencing food insecurity
* Volunteer with or donate to Crowdsource Rescue
[[link removed]],
which works to get vulnerable residents to safety and delivers
supplies

Find more ways to contribute here
[[link removed]], here
[[link removed]], and here
[[link removed]*Pg7lnrGM1YXV1YfuLnAFDw].

Jesse Jenkins, an assistant professor of energy systems engineering at
Princeton University, argued in a New York Times op-ed
[[link removed]] on
Wednesday that electricity systems need to be ready for future risks.
“Preparing for extreme events is like buying [a] home or health
insurance: it costs you every year and you hope you’ll never use it.
But when a crisis strikes, paying the premiums can look like the
perfect decision in hindsight.”

After this crisis comes to an end, “Texans will have to determine
just how much insurance is worth taking out,” he added.

This doesn’t just apply to one type of power generation. “Because
wind is the new kid on the block, it’s getting a lot of
attention,” said Kerri Johannsen, energy program director at the
Iowa Environmental Council. But all grids have to consider whether
their systems can weather the extremes brought by climate change.

Oversight is increasing to ensure grids are up to the challenge. The
Texas Tribune reported
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the North American Electric Reliability Corporation is working on
establishing mandatory requirements for power plants to prepare for
winter extremes. Even though Texas operates its own grid, it would
also be subject to these rules.

Texas has ignored previous guidance. In 2011, after a storm caused a
severe blackout, ERCOT developed winterization guidelines, but
they weren’t enforced
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Now, facing the consequences, Gov. Abbott has called for
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winterization measures to be required and for the state legislature to
fund the necessary upgrades.

As the old saying goes, “You should never let a crisis go to
waste.” After all the havoc that the grid failures have wreaked this
week, it's critical that these calls for action don’t just fade away
as they did after 2011. Texans should know wind itself isn’t the
problem; it’s a question of how much insurance state leaders are
willing to purchase to prevent another disaster of this magnitude.

Lili writes about climate and energy issues for Vox. Previously, she
worked for Inside Climate News and China Dialogue where she covered
Chinese climate policy.

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