First of all, the notion of a price per MW is atrocious. The only relevant price is that of $/kWh, i.e. per energy output. Prices per capacity can have relevance for intra-industry comparisons (i.e. comparing the cost of one wind farm vs another) but not to compare different technologies. Prices per kWh include the initial investment cost (and the financing cost), the operating cost and the fuel cost. The comparison made appears to focus only on initial investment costs
Second, the comparison of an actual project with an advertisement for a project that does not exist is, similarly, a debatable venture.
Thirdly, presenting offshore wind as a mature technology is also a bit misleading. You can still count on your fingers the number of operating industrial offshore wind farms. PV technology can, conversely, be described as having a 30-year history and it might be more useful to compare recently built PV plants (ther's a number of them) to recently built offshore wind plants.
I won't comment on the Australian project, other than to say that public promotional material made available several years before construction starts is unlikely to provide much useful information.
On the Dutch project, I'll bring up the following tidbits, to enlighten readers:
From our portfolio of existing projects, prices for wind are in the 4-7c/kWh range, for offshore wind in the 7-10c/kWh range, and for solar around 15-20c/kWh. Don't ask me to convert these to USD/MW, because I can't. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
In no sense is offshore windpower mature, and while the long-term prognosis is exceptional, the technology can not truly be considered commercial. Q7 pushes the frontier in both financing and water depth for a large project, but it uses quite conventional turbines.
The first real offshore turbines are still being tested at onshore prototype sites, including REpower 5M (4WTs), Multibrid 5MW (2 WTs, one with a tripod foundation), and the Enercon 6MW (evolved from a number of turbines beginning at 4.5 MW). I've visited all these turbines, but won't climb until next month.
Several other smaller turbines have offshore versions, including one Nordex N90 about a 100 or so meters offshore in Rostock harbor. The German offshore test station is planned to begin construction next year.
REpower has installed one 5M turbine near the Beatrice oil rig at depths around 45 meters, so while this is not a "large commercial" project, it is the state of the art currently. A second 5M was intended to be installed last year, but was pushed back to this summer as the rig was not available. I don't know if the second WT is already installed.
The real state of the art will be floating foundations, as the rest of the world does not look the pool table equivilent of the North Sea. Floating foundations will allow projects to be sited far enough from coasts to obviate conflicting use and visual effects, which in most parts of the world have depths up to 200 meters.
Except in the North Sea, it makes no sense to go offshore until high value onshore wind sites are operational. Onshore remains the focus of any chance we have to meet necessary renewable targets worldwide, but even including the remaining sites in northern Europe. "Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." - Anaïs Nin
First of all, the notion of a price per MW is atrocious. The only relevant price is that of $/kWh, i.e. per energy output. Prices per capacity can have relevance for intra-industry comparisons (i.e. comparing the cost of one wind farm vs another) but not to compare different technologies. Prices per kWh include the initial investment cost (and the financing cost), the operating cost and the fuel cost.
Laurent has chosen USD/installed effective watt as benchmark, which is just installation cost (in $) / output (Wh) * the number of hours in a year (365*24). Perhaps not the measurement I would have chosen, but nothing wrong with it per se as long as you want to compare installation costs. I guess the assumption is that the differences in financing and operating cost is small. Fuel cost is the same, zero.
solar around 15-20c/kWh
Thermal, PV or both? A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!
As far as I know, both thermal and PV are in that price range. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
First of all, the notion of a price per MW is atrocious. The only relevant price is that of $/kWh, i.e. per energy output.
If you read my post carefully you see that I quote only output figures, I just divide them by 365*24.
Why do I do this division and post in installed efficient MW and not USD/kWh "retail price"?
Because I don't have data for financing, maintenance and lifetime of the power plants which is needed to provide the retail price per kWh. Financing being equal we have to guess the relative value of other parameters if we want to get the kWh retail price.
several years before construction starts
My understanding is that the CS500 solar dish model is in production since 2003 at the Umuwa site according to the company document I cited, but it has only 10 dishes (at a price of 207 500 USD per 22kW peak dish, probably first prototypes :).
google map of the Umuwa plant:
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=http%3A%2F%2Fbbs.keyhole.com%2Fubb%2Fdownload.php%3FNumber%3D893511&am p;t=k&om=1&ie=UTF8&ll=-26.473512,132.01476&spn=0.002295,0.003616&z=18
Here is an Oil Drum post with a nice photo of Umuwa dishes:
http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/2583
The 22kW peak dishes at Umuwa have a diameter of 13.7 meter, height of 14.5 meters:
http://www.bcse.org.au/docs/Project%20Profiles/Anangu%20Pitjantjatjara%20Solar%20Station.pdf
I don't know if the dish will be the same or different at the Victoria plant.
Of course all projects carry risk, overestimates are floating around but that's life :).
USD/kWh is not a retail price, it's the price of energy. It can be retail or wholesale. Using USD/MW is like quoting the price of water with respect to the diameter of the pipe - it makes little sense.
Because I don't have data for financing, maintenance and lifetime of the power plants which is needed to provide the retail price per kWh.
Well, my point is precisely that the items you don't have are very relevant and do drive the actual price of electricity for the various technologies. In one case they are included (and even oversized), and in the other they are ignored, or at least unknown. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
Well, my point is precisely that the items you don't have are very relevant and do drive the actual price of electricity for the various technologies. In one case they are included (and even oversized), and in the other they are ignored, or at least unknown.
That's why there's more to the diary than just the first two paragraphs :).
If you look risk and maintenance by small window of the scale of physical parameters in the plant:
http://www.azcommerce.com/doclib/energy/az_solar_electric_roadmap_study_full_report.pdf
page 88-90 it gives 2006 cost per installed effective Watt at 21.7 USD. It notes than if more than 10 MW/year are installed this cost would likely go down to 13 USD.
But the interesting line is their "Non-Fuel Fixed O&M" if you look at the tables you see that CPV are low compared to other solar tech (and projections for the future are even lower).
Amonix technical paper for 2006 has a section on maintenance of their CPV systems for the past years.
