Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of wind power

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Advantages: Wind produces no emissions once the necessary equipment is manufactured and installed. As a replacement for fossil fuel combustion in the average U.S. utility generator, running a wind turbine can prevent the release of carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and mercury. Wind power appears considerably more energy?efficient than conventional power sources. Wind farms also use less water than do traditional generating plants. Wind turbine technology can be used on many scales, from a single tower for local use to fields of thousands for utilities to supply large regions. Small?scale turbine development can help make local areas more self?sufficient. Currently, start?up costs of wind farms generally are higher than those of fossil?fuel?driven plants, but wind farms incur fewer expenses once up and running.

Disadvantages: We have no control over when wind will occur; it is an intermittent resource. This poses little problem if wind is one of several sources contributing to a utility's power generation. Moreover, several available technologies can help address the problem. For example, batteries or hydrogen fuel can store energy generated by wind and release it later when needed. Some areas are windier than others. Global wind patterns combine with local topography–mountains, hills, water bodies, forests, cities–to create local wind patterns. Good wind resources are not always near population centers. Thus transmission networks would need to be greatly expanded. Moreover, when wind farms are proposed near population centers, local residents sometimes oppose them. Many people object to wind farms for aesthetic reasons. Wind turbines also pose a minor threat to birds, which can be killed when they fly into the rotating blades. Studies estimate that the number of birds killed this way is far less than the millions already being killed annually by other human causes. The key for protecting birds seems to be selecting sites for wind farms that are not in the midst of prime habitat.