Egypt Brings New Gas and Wind Plants on Line. [View all]

[NNadir]

This news item is here: Egypt Brings New Natural Gas and Wind Power Plants Online

An excerpt:

New natural gas-fired power plants and wind farms are part of Egypt’s strategy to increase the country’s power generation by at least 50%. It began delivering on that plan in July as it brought three gas-powered plants online in addition to one of the world’s largest wind facilities. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi on July 24 said “Today is a day of hope” as he unveiled the 4,800-MW New Capital plant (Figure 1) near Cairo, in an area that will serve as the country’s new administrative capital...

And of course, the lipstick on the pig, the wind plant:

The Gebel el-Zeit wind farm in the Red Sea province (Figure 2) also was opened on July 24. Officials said the facility has 580 MW of generation capacity and cost $673 million. Egypt wants to produce at least 20% of its energy from renewable sources by 2022 and as much as 40% by 2035. The country currently receives about 3% of its electricity from renewables.

The usual dishonest technique of reporting the dangerous fossil fuel plant - which despite being a dangerous plant is fully capable of running continuusly - and the wind plant in terms of power and not energy operates here.

Around the world, wind turbines typically operate with a capacity utilization of between 30% and 40%, with the higher figure being rather unusual.

One can show, by appeal to the Master Register of Danish Wind turbines that the capacity utilization of all commissioned wind turbines that their capacity utilization is typically in the high twenties for the nation as a whole.

Thus the 580 "MW" wind plant, at 30% capacity utilization will be the equivalent of a 174 MW gas plant, and at 40% - which I personally doubt given where it's located - a 232 MW gas plant. And of course, the wind plant needs the gas plant to be worth anything, since it is generally recognized among all but the most delusional people in the world, that the wind sometimes does not blow.

The lifetime of Danish wind turbines averages less than 18 years, and they're not located among sand dunes as the Egyptian wind plant is:



One does not need a degree in mechanical engineering to have some appreciation of the fact that blowing sand is not good for things with moving parts exposed to the elements.

Egypt's government says it wants to produce 20% of its electricity by so called "renewable energy" with the usual "by such and such a date" statement, "such and such a date" in this case being 2035, 17 years from now. By that time their new wind plant will most likely be sand blasted inoperative junk waiting to be disassembled for metals scavengers who will face the toxicity of the stuff therein and the grease cheerfully, because that's what impoverished people do, suffer for our bourgeois sins.

Egypts new capacity, accounting for the huge difference in capacity utilization between wind and gas plants is on the order of 5%, at least for as long as the wind plant lasts. It is worth noting that the restart of a gas plant because the wind is blowing wastes gas. It's probably more economic to simply run the gas plant full bore without shut down whether the wind is blowing across the sands or not.