Renewables go from boom to bust in the wind capital of Canada

[OnlinePoker]

In Pincher Creek, Alta., wind is king, roaring down the eastern Rockies, delivering power for generations, so much so the municipal district made a windmill part of its corporate logo.

Not anymore.

District Reeve Rick Lemire said the windmill image, which sits alongside other Alberta icons on the logo — a wild rose, wheat, a pumpjack and cattle will soon be erased.

"It's not us anymore," Lemire said in an interview.

There are few places where the wind blows as hard and as often as it does in Pincher Creek, Alta., where clusters of windmills tower over farmland, with mountains in the distance.

But in a few short years, new rules and changing attitudes have delivered a sharp pivot away from wind projects.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/pincher-creek-windmills-renewables-1.7645988

[NNadir]

1. One wonders why these news items can never be correct as to basic scientific units.

This statement is illiterate:

The district has more than 255 turbines producing nearly 511 megawatts of energy, says a third-party report commissioned last year by the town and district.

The "megawatt" (sic) is not a unit of energy; it is a unit of power, represented, almost always, dishonestly, since it is really a statement of peak power which is almost never obtained with so called "renewable energy."

The unit of energy is the Joule, not the Watt.

It is telling that 255 turbines spread across the landscape cannot reliably produce as much power as a thermal plant - the only sustainable case being a nuclear plant - can reliably produce in a relatively small building.

We're in deep shit because our media can't understand even the basics. I used to joke that one can't get a degree in journalism if one has passed a science course with a grade of C or better. I'm not sure it's a joke.