Obstacles Have Been Piling Up For Wind Power

See Wind Power Hopes for Sea Change: Since Germany Started Planning Investments More Than a Decade Ago, Obstacles Have Been Piling Up. From the WSJ. Excerpts:

"Offshore wind holds enormous potential for plentiful, environmentally friendly energy because the open sea is almost always windy. But ever since Germany started planning investments in the sector—around the start of the century—obstacles have piled up, including a lack of component suppliers and the absence of equipment needed to link turbines to the national power grid. Even the ships needed for construction out in open water were unavailable.

As a result, early offshore-wind projects blew through budgets and schedules because developers had to invest billions of dollars in ports, special barges and power connections."

"Meerwind, which counts 80 massive Siemens turbines, is expected to start delivering electricity late this year—about a year behind schedule.

Building Meerwind proved daunting, despite its relatively shallow waters. Engineers had to anchor foundations for turbines, transformers and converter stations more than 130 feet beneath the surface, which proved far more difficult than expected. 

Another problem was wiring the system to move gigawatts from the sea to consumers on land. This requires offshore converter stations the size of factories, which Siemens builds at a price of around €1 billion each."

""Long-term subsidy programs need to be in place to cover this gap," said Magnus Dale, senior analyst at consultancy IHS Energy in Paris."

"Michael Hannibal, head of Siemens's wind-power division, said the offshore industry aims to cut costs by around 40% by 2020. This would still be around 35% higher than onshore wind today—and 2.7 times more expensive than coal and gas—but more reductions are expected to follow. To achieve this, Siemens is looking to develop bigger and more efficient wind turbines."