Britains Ministry of Defence is blocking Offshore
Wind Farms, to protect Britain’s long-term security.
When the UK government set out its energy policy in the spring of last year, it was heralded as one of the most ambitious programmes in Europe. The Government pledged to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from 1990 levels by at least 26% in 2020, and by 60% in 2050.
Wind energy is poised to play a small but critical role in the government’s green scheme. Wind power is among the most competitive of all renewable energy sources, and it will help the government to meet near-term goals — most notably, a 10% reliance on renewable energy by 2010. At present, there are only 2.3 gigawatts of installed capacity in Britain. But current Goverment projects in planning, wants to bring that number up to 33 gigawatts by 2020.
Except there is one big problem, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) wont let them build any Wind Farm turbines, that are within any military Radar's line-of-sight.
Given that air-defence radar must, by definition, cover the entire coastline, the rule effectively means that the MoD can block any offshore wind farm.
Their concerns do deserve consideration. Since the massive blades of wind turbines have an enormous radar cross-section that can make it more difficult to see behind them, due to multi-reflections. This has led to fears that a low-flying aircraft or cruise missiles might be able to use the farms as cover for a stealth attack.
More critically, spinning blades interfere with a radar’s Doppler system, creating false contacts and blinding operators to area's above, and out to sea, from the farm.
Ongoing studies by the British MoD, and the US Department of Defense, show that the overall effect depends both on the position of the farm to coastline, and the type of radar used.
But the mission of the MoD is to defend the United Kingdom and its interests.
In the modern world, the threat of climate change is as real as any military or terrorist threat, for with no energy there can be no defense.
So, energy supply is a critical aspect of national security.
The technical issues are real, but hopefully there is every reason to believe that they can be dealt with using technology that either already exists, or can be developed in the near future? It is time for the Ministry of Defense to end its war with wind-power developers, and adopt a more cooperative spirit.
***Thoughts
"And so say all of us, but who's sending over Cruise Missiles?"
(Refrain) To be sung to the tune of Uncle Tom Cobbley and all.
