This type of fuel is considered to be climate-neutral, as it does not cause CO2 emissions. NS claims 100% wind power because it has a contract with various wind farms to produce enough energy to power its rail system, but this is just an accounting transaction, writes author Roger Andrews. New wind farm deployment is based on the SER agreement that describes a plan for five years of tendering 700 MW per year. The trains cant run as advertised on weak and intermittent wind power, and there is only one plug on the wall. The company aims to further reduce consumption by 2 percent a year with an energy efficiency program, with total consumption already reduced by 30 percent since 2005. If not, Im sure their stranded customers would be happy to explain it to them. The Netherlands is the first country in the world where all electric trains are. This page was last edited on 14 January 2023, at 23:49. The US city of Philadelphia has taken regenerative braking to a new level though. Switch them back on by degrees. [1], The Dutch government has expressed the aspiration to build 4.450 MW of offshore wind power by 2023[5] which will have a considerable impact on the Dutch electricity grid, operated by TenneT. And half of Japan, poor devils. All renewable energy gets paid the FIT out of the so-called SDE budget. [5] This will contribute towards the Dutch target of 14% renewable energy use out of total energy use by 2020[10] and 16% by 2023. Rod, you must live in Albania E.ON wanted to put my tariff up from 9.79p to 13.87p. Do Dutch trains run on Wind? http://www.differencebetween.com/difference-between-e1-and-vs-t1/. Even the two Dutch wind farms with which NS contracts directly for wind power, Noordoostpolder and Luchterduinen, are tied generally to the Dutch grid and not tied directly into the NS rail system. Half of this electricity comes from the Netherlands, and the other half is imported from Sweden, Finland, and Belgium. I Did Not Say Wind Energy is 'Idiot Power.'" Putting these numbers together indicates that only 10-15% of the electricity consumed annually by NSs electric trains will come from wind, with the rest a mixture that includes mostly Dutch gas and coal plus a small amount of Belgian and German coal, nuclear and lignite and maybe even a little German solar, Andrews explains. The two Dutch wind farms that have contracted to sell power to NS (Noordoostpolder and Luchterduinen) are both connected directly to the Dutch grid, along with all the other power plants in the country, and NS draws its power from the grid: Figure 3: The Netherlands' electricity grid. Every electric train on the Dutch railways NS network now gets 100 per cent of its energy from wind energy. The Dutch railways network (NS) started using wind energy generated by the turbines owned by electric company Eneco two years ago when they signed a ten-year agreement. Began operating in 1990. You may have a battery bank to store some of it in case of an outage, but mostly it will go to the electric company and they credit you. This article was amended on 11 January 2017. (my emphasis). The real electricity they use is of course no more or less green than other companies on the same grid use. Wind power now supplies about 10% of Belgiums electricity, so power imported from the Belgian grid will be about 10% wind. Calculated value from total installed nameplate capacity and actual electricity generation. An earlier version said all Dutch trains were now 100% powered by wind-generated electricity, according to the national railway company NS. 1995 - 2023 by Snopes Media Group Inc. * Just an FYI, this official infographic shows that the scheme saves 1.4 billion kWh of electricity, which they say is the same as whats used by ALL of Amsterdams residents. The supply of wind power to the Dutch grid will also not be constant. I live in France since 20 years, have almost always used electricity to heat my house and always saved money with respect to the neighbours who used other means. You bet. They hope to reduce the energy used per passenger by a further 35% by 2020 compared with 2005. This is a BETA experience. During these periods wind generation in the neighboring Netherlands would also have fallen to low levels. "Since 1 January, 100% of our trains are running on wind energy," said NS spokesman, Ton . Belgium and Finland. There is a way of saying this, which characterises this behaviour, but I cant write it here because it is not politically correct too bad. Its standard accounting practice. I would take it, then, that you are not among the poor and elderly who DO give a fig about money? Train tickets for international journeys can be purchased from NS International. This passage was written by David Hughes. A little more than a tenth of all electricity consumed in the Netherlands comes from wind power, some of which is imported. Indirect Contributions Are Essential To Physics, The Crisis In Theoretical Particle Physics Is Not A Moral Imperative, Why Study Science? The European high voltage grid connects Finland with Sweden but doesnt go through the Baltic States. EDF was 13.44p but I keep reading comments about how RE fans should take electricity only from PV and wind turbines, so I decided I should do the same. But a recent piece of news about electricity caught my attention. [3], In March 2022, the Dutch government announced that by 2030 offshore wind was to become the Netherlands' biggest power source, aiming at 21 GW of installed capacity.[4]. HomerDixon.com. So, as you can see, your silly view of the frrrench domestic heating habits are wrong, probably based on indoctrination from greenpiss or the like. As Enecos account manager Michel Kerkhof pointed out, the key objective is to avoid procuring energy from the limited existing number of sustainable energy projects in the Netherlands, thus promoting renewable growth both domestically and Europe-wide., This partnership ensures that new investments can be made in even newer wind farms, which will increase the share of renewable energy, Kerkhof continued. One such example is the largest wind farm in Holland, Noordoostpolder, which is installing industrial scale wind turbines such as the new Enercon onshore wind turbines, at the time the largest onshore turbines in the world rated at 7500kW nameplate capacity. Dutch trains to be wind-powered from 2018. This question generated a number of comments in the last Blowout so I thought I would take a quick look at it. The concept of net energy must be applied to renewable sources of energy, such as windmills and photovoltaics. In this way, the Dutch railways aim to reduce the greatest negative environmental impact caused by CO2 in such a way that its demand actually contributes to the sustainable power generation in the Netherlands and Europe.. What Is (And Isn't) Scientific About The Multiverse. The Eneco Luchterduinen wind farm was officially opened in September 2015 and is a 50/50 joint venture between Dutch energy company Eneco and Japan's Mitsubishi corporation. As of Jan. 1, 600,000 daily train passengers have been traveling completely carbon neutral, according to an announcement from the Netherlands principal passenger railway operator, NS. In contrast to onshore wind farms, almost all turbines by January 2017 were situated in just a few large wind farms. However, wind power consumption in the Netherlands in 2015 was 12.5TWh, indicating that about 5TWh of wind power was imported during the year. NS is the main public train in the Netherlands. Thatd give us a consumption figure for the city of around 1.5 billion kWh. Passing through the gates without traveling, Forgetting to check in or out and requesting refunds, Sustainable accessibility of the Netherlands, More information about NS buses that run on HVO. As shown in the table below installed capacity is dominantly fossil fuel, with natural gas making up 61% of total installed capacity and coal 15%. One windmill running for an hour can power a train for 120 miles, the companies said. So I know that its true, just as if I had read it in the Guardian. Willem, forgive the pedantry, but its the second time you said it. I dont mind buying 100% renewable energy for my house ( I have got a small 6kw wind turbine which has supplied me for over 10 years) if it is the same price as normal electricity but I would not pay a premium for it as some suppliers charge. power for over 400,000 households every day, a figure roughly equivalent to the number of households in the Northern Netherlands.[13]. The claim by the Dutch railway network, Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS), is almost entirely a sleight of hand. As of the 1st of January, 2017, electric Dutch trains are now completely powered by wind energy, according to NS, the national railway company. Snopes and the Snopes.com logo are registered service marks of Snopes.com. Bolthouse Farms Sued After Smoothie With 100% Fruit Juice Tests Positive for PFAS, EPA Announces $27 Billion Fund to Help Low-Income and Disadvantaged Communities Transition to Renewable Energy, Derailed Train Cars in Ohio Were Not Labeled Hazardous, Wind Turbine Giant Proposes New York Factory That Would Create 420 Jobs and $500M in Local Investments. The wholesale price of GOs seems to be a mere 0.36/MWh or so. You are not really concerned about the energy bills of the poor. NS claims 100% wind power because it has a contract with various wind farms to produce enough energy to power its rail system, but this is just an accounting transaction, writes author Roger Andrews. The historical land of windmills is leading the charge in wind energy development. The GoOs trade at a premium and help to subsidise the production. The evidence speaks for itself. The Netherlands currently has a total of 2,200 wind turbines across the country, according to DutchNews.nl. But its a funny read. [1] In 2019, the wind turbines provided the country with 12% of its electricity demand during the year, a figure that is growing but somewhat below the average of 15% that wind power provides across the whole of the EU's electricity consumption. Your membership is the foundation of our sustainability and resilience. As Brightvibes noted, a decreasing and relatively small number of Dutch trains are still running on diesel. Several commercial parties have now caught onto the PR value of claiming they are not getting government subsidies for their investment in renewable energy. No direct subsidies from the government are related to this contract.. Nevermind the entirety of it. In Norway 132,2 million guarantees of origin for hydro power were issued in 2014, corresponding to 132,2 Twh. Electric trains also use regenerative braking, similar to whats found in hybrid and electric cars. Homer-Dixon, Thomas. If you want to be generous to NS, you can say that the BritNed interconnector is definitely being fed by the coal fired Maasvlakte power stations when it is delivering 1GW to the UK, because theyre right next door to the HVDC converters. Good for Nederlandse Spoorwegen. Its 50Hz in the Netherlands and most of the planet apart from (mainly) the US, Canada and half of Latin America. Fossil fuel-fired power plants produced over 80% of the electricity in the Netherlands, mainly natural gas (42%) and coal (35%). Really funny, as it cuts it both ways when you dont know reality and cant speak French you have to believe what you find on the English writing interwebs or the greenpiss propaganda leaflets. Only a small fraction of the power delivered to its trains actually comes from wind.. Heres a fantasy as to how Nederlandse Spoorwegen could make their claims of only using wind power a reality. N.p., 13 November 2000. As of January 1, all electric passenger trains on the Dutch rail network have been run on wind energy, according to a statement from operator NS (via EcoWatch ). Headlines like this make people feel good. You buy green energy elsewhere to offset your fossil fuels. By using the brake to change the connections on a trains motors, they stop turning the wheels, slowing the train, and instead produce electricity that can be used elsewhere. This has already led to a savings of 1.43 billions kilograms of C02 emissions. The electrons that run the electrified portion of the NS system come from many sources, including wind, but also from coal, natural gas, and nuclear. While it was originally used to pump water or grind grain, wind is now helping Dutch commuters get to work. So even if this claim were true, it would require exponentially more windmills and/or solar panels to cover any significant portion of the continental United States. http://electronicdesign.com/power/google-s-renewable-energy-plan-what-it-seems, Telling fibs has become so fashionable that everyone and his train or server wants to be in on it. The actual amount of green energy produced is unaffected.. In late 2015, the Dutch government announced its goal to power the country's electric trains entirely with wind power by 2018. Rather they act like a component in an electric circuit. What is SDE? Data from Frontier Economics. In addition, the use of conductor rails sets a speed limit on trains of about 160kph (100mph) above this, the metal contact blocks (called pickup shoes) can lose contact with the rail and result in a drop in power. [14] A second hand market for turbines also exists, which could grow as older turbines are replaced by larger newer ones. [5] The first of these, the 429 MW Noordoostpolder wind farm was already partially deployed by year end 2015 whilst the 600 MW Gemini offshore wind farm was commissioned in 2017. Its production also does not use any natural raw materials or food production resources. The green electricity we use is generated by new wind farms, which have been brought into service in phases. However, the government wants 40% of the total electricity used in 2030 in the Netherlands to be supplied by wind. I happen to know a little about the Dutch grid and its power networks: interconnectors to other countries have long been bottlenecks and monopolising capacity on them has proved to be quite profitable in the past to those who trade electricity in more than one country. Railway Gazette reports that NS records about 1.2 million passenger-journeys per day, with an annual energy requirement for 1.2 billion kWh. There are many reasons, of course, why NS would claim its trains run completely on wind power and even more reasons why many would celebrate this apparently breakthrough. For example, in 2015, Burlington, Vermont, became the first city to announce it was running totally on renewable power. Active 2016. Whilst there are a growing number of large onshore wind farms in Holland, most of the onshore farms in 2015 consisted of a large number of small wind farms, including many single installation turbines as well as farms of between 110 turbines. So that is coal fired power not going into the Netherlands grid. The commercials know that the public will probably think that the commercial parties are spending out of the goodness of their hearts, to save the planet. The Dutch rail network will run entirely on renewable wind energy by 2018 under a new contract signed by power company Eneco and energy procurement cooperative VIVENS. EV Use Is Growing, But Where Are The Chargers. Do the Netherlands trains really run on http://elering.ee/cross-border-physical-flows/, http://ast.lv/eng/power_system/current_situation_in_power_system/state_of_power_system/, http://www.litgrid.eu/index.php/sistemos-duomenys/79, Antidotes were hard to find this week as one cheering message after another was debunked only Positive News was buoyant | C 3000: antidote to gloom, International Energy Agency Electricity Production Statistics for OECD Countries 2014 2016 | Blogging about energy and transitioning to clean energy, Drone Strike on Saudi Arabia Knocks out 5% of Global Oil Supplies, Grazing, desertification and climate change. Since 2015 there has been a trend towards the deployment and planning for large wind farms, both onshore and offshore, with a view to the approximate tripling wind power capacity from 2015 levels by 2023. OK, these days its less than the bandwidth to your mobile, but mumble years ago it was the real deal. Since Lithuania has a chronic power shortage the flow normally goes North-South. If there was a utility providing KiteGen power I would sign up with them. I struggled to find reliable figures to back that up, so I didnt want to repeat the claim here. According to DutchNews.nl, there's currently a total of 2,200 wind turbines across the country. First some details on the Netherlands electricity sector. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. NS would only care for the environment as a PR stunt, not for the betterment of the planet. And enjoy 30c/kWh household electric rates, as in Denmark and Germany, without there being one iota of measurable benefit to the planet? ) can ever bring them off balance They dont understand, but they believe ! Built 1992 this nearshore wind farm had just 4 Nedwind 500 KW turbines based 1km to shore. How much of the Netherlands electricity is supplied by wind? In an anything goes era of news and social media, its not often that a post jumps off the page. The first two are feel good justifications that have no practical impact. In 2017, our trains in the Netherlands became the first in the world to run for 100% on wind energy, giving travellers the option of travelling without CO2 emissions. A little more than a tenth of all electricity consumed in the Netherlands comes from wind power, some of which is imported. Yeap. Why cant, errr sorry, why Dont you? The 113,3 Twh exported far exceeds the actual exports of course, but were good business for the power companies selling their power twice. The rationale is: If the Dutch railways sourced 100% of the 1.4 tWh of energy they needed each year from within the Netherlands, this would decrease availability and increase prices of green power for other parties. Apart from the first rather obvious problems, anyone with the most basic understanding of electrical enrgy, as taught before 16 at school, would immediately know this was a wholly untrue technical assertion. I am surrounded by almost 3000 MWs of hydro power in my county alone, but because of these guarantees of origin my supposed consumption is very dirty, consisting mostly of a central European mix of coal, natural gas, nuclear with some renewables added. It becomes inextricably mixed with all the electromagnetic waves of the other. And of course no such connections exist. By tapping into both domestic and foreign sources of wind power, it [ensures] that there is always sufficient green power available on the grid for rail companies, even if the wind is not blowing, the company explained. Produced at least 8 models with power outputs of 100, 250, 500, 1000kW. Just fit smart controls where their systems draw power from the grid. If thats the case, it marks a major turning point in the story of renewables. Active 2020. When wind power is fed into a grid it becomes inextricably mixed with all the vibrating electrons from other generation sources to the point where there is no way of knowing where any power taken from the grid came from. [13] The wind farm demonstrates the growth in scale in wind power as between 1987 and 1991 it was the largest of its kind in Europe with 50 turbines and a total nameplate capacity of 15 MW. I guess I could have found something cheaper still if Id looked hard enough. As of October2022[update], wind power in the Netherlands has an installed capacity of 8,304 MW, 29.6% of which is based offshore. More than 12% of the Netherland's electricity is generated from renewable sources, mainly biomass and waste (5% of the total) and wind (7% of the total). Ah, so they're contracted for wind energy offset, not 100% wind energy powered. The energy required to power trains in the Netherlands comes from newly built wind farms in the Netherlands as well as in Belgium and Finland. This year, Dutch commuters ditched fossil fuels to power their country's trains on 100% wind energy - and it's a grand idea that's catching on the world over. Same thing if you got solar panels on your house. For high-speed trains, overhead wires are the better choice. There are several Dutch turbine manufacturers that continue to manufacture both large and small installations for domestic and international clients. Surprisingly, even the electricity is sourced from windmill electric generato. But how does NS know the power it imports is wind? heavyweather~ Im sure you can link us to sites which prove your point. Whats the trick? Were these conditions to repeat themselves now, and if NSs trains were powered exclusively by wind, they would almost certainly come to a halt. [18], In the first week of December 2016, all 150 turbines of the new 600 MW Gemini offshore windfarm began producing power, and the project is expected to be fully commissioned by mid 2017. Works for me, and they were cheaper than EON too. I see the logic behind the options for supply that can be taken, but how can any householder take a contract for 100% wind power when often this is not available, certainly if a large number opt for green power. There are very little poor people in Germany., http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/high-costs-and-errors-of-german-transition-to-renewable-energy-a-920288.html, The Spiegel FUD wont cut it. Conductor rails carry lower voltages than overhead wires, although low is a relative concept. Its 50Hz in the neighboring Netherlands would also have fallen to low levels NS is the first country the. Turbines across the country, according to DutchNews.nl normally goes North-South as windmills and photovoltaics now! 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