Here is Taipowers planned capacity expansion through 2020:
a lot of oil, gas and coal…
T
Very progressive. 
Yup. Progressive Energy policies are just lip service. It’s the job of a nations Energy Department to provide enough power to sustain projected economic growth at the lowest possible price. Guess what’s still the cheapest?
I don’t know if it will be airing here in Taiwan, but Discovery Channel (america) has a new reality series coming out very soon called Coal. How much you want to bet it isn’t to expose it for the filthy earth raping industry that it is?
T
If this stuff interests you check out this series of great articles on China’s energy future and how water is determining the limits.
Some astonishing stuff happening there and at such scale that I believe China will dominate the alternative energy field in the future as they will have the lowest costs and the most experience. By 2020 they are expected to have close to 200 gigawatts of wind power capacity for example. Puts the lie to the arguments that such forms of power are not viable. China is not doing this to be green but because it simply has no choice.
circleofblue.org/waternews/2 … oint-china—confronting-water-scarcity-and-energy-demand-in-the-world’s-largest-country/
Thanks for the kudos Saddletramp, but actually I’m not too hopeful about the wind power project. I may stick up a small unit and see what it does. The whole problem with wind is intermittancy. Yesterday was pretty windy, today there is not even a light breeze. Whatever wind we get tends to be seasonal, mostly in winter, which in Taiwan is when the demand for electricity is relatively low (summer is peak demand season). Taiwan doesn’t really strike me as a great place for wind power. Wind towers take an awful lot of physical space, something that crowded Taiwan lacks. Offshore towers theoretically would solve the lack-of-space problem, but it has to be in shallow water, and typhoons could play havoc with offshore platforms.
Taiwan has pretty good solar potential, but you need roof area, and it’s difficult if your neighbor builds a taller house which throws a shadow across your solar panels. And of course, solar gives you nothing at night - you have to make do with whatever you can store in batteries.
Tidal power is an interesting idea. Taiwan may have some potential there. Off the east coast is a strong, steady current. Taipower has talked about exploiting it, but I don’t know if they’re spending any money to actually make it happen. The technology is only just starting to develop - I did a bit of googling and found this interesting page:
Ocean Current Energy
ocsenergy.anl.gov/guide/current/index.cfm
Geothermal: I’m not sure. My understanding is that you need a fairly active volcanic region. Iceland has had a lot of success with this, not surprising since the country is one big volcano, and very active. We have some impressive hot springs here, but geologically Taiwan is not very volcanic. Yangmingshan is the only actual volcano on Taiwan - the rest of Taiwan’s mountains were created due to faulting. But I’m no expert in this - if the technology can be developed, I’d certainly like to see it happen.
Big electric power consumers like the Taiwan High-Speed Rail need reliable base power, and can’t be dependent on the wind or sunshine. I’d be really surprised if it could ever be run on solar or wind, but I’d be happy to be proven wrong.
cheers,
DB
According to my understanding. Geothermal power is making use of any heat in the ground and doesn’t necessarily need volcanic actions or an volcanic active region. The problem is, that the heat used by that is also difficult to control and some gas from below might come up, where some of them could be harmful.
I was just reading another article at Taiwan EU Watch, stating something like Taiwan has only 10% of its energy supply from nuclear energy. And even at high peaks a 28% surplus. Maybe there is some hope stopping the nuclear plants.
[quote=“方菲力”]According to my understanding. Geothermal power is making use of any heat in the ground and doesn’t necessarily need volcanic actions or an volcanic active region. The problem is, that the heat used by that is also difficult to control and some gas from below might come up, where some of them could be harmful.
[/quote]
I confess to knowing very little about geothermal. I just looked at the Wikipedia page, and found it very informative:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_electricity
After reading all that, I still get the impression that it’s a lot easier to extract the heat if it’s near the surface, as it would be in a volcanic region. But it’s true that anywhere on Earth you’ll hit rock with sufficiently high temperatures to turn water into steam if you drill deep enough. The Wikipedia article seems to suggest that if you’ve got to go too deep, you’ll expend excessive energy on pumping water for the quantity of energy you can extract. But overall, after reading the article, I feel more positive about geothermal. I don’t know if Taiwan has any plan to exploit it - haven’t heard anything about that.
Now if I could just get my hands on drilling equipment…
cheers,
DB
[quote=“saddletramp”][I have to agree with DB that the energy burden has to be spread out between technologies. I also want to point out that he isn’t just talking shit, on a personal level, I know that he has changed lights from T8 to T5 florescent, and LED. He has also purchased, at no worry for reimbursement, several solar panels. He has also been working on getting some DIY wind power equipment. :bravo: :bravo: Most people don’t realize, and I have to admit I didn’t either, that most of the oil consumption goes to providing electricity to your house, and that most of that goes to lighting!! Go green on your lights, and you won’t have to feel guilty about your car! Walk the 2 blocks to 7-11!! Ride your bike!! It all adds up.[/quote]
No argument from me… And for the record, I am a cycle commuter and I prefer to walk to the local supermarket, fruit and veggie market and 7-11 anyway. Only not practical for the weekly Costco runs down in Nantun… Much more than that feel-good shut off the lights for a single-hour once a year, me thinks…