Accelerate the World's Transition to Sustainable Energy - to fight Anthropogenic Climate Change, page-521

First 521 Last

Share
Profile

Follow
Penny Pincher

1,646 Posts.

202

10/07/21

22:21

Post #: 54420117
Share

Originally posted by Tulipbulbous: ↑

Rare earths aren't so rare... there are plenty of companies/countries to mine deposits. it is just the market is still relatively small, as soon as they go online they tend to cannibalise the market price and hurt there bottom line, There is more than enough deposits outside of China as reserves (30% of current reserves) for the next 30 years at projected growth.... the price might have to double to make it attractive to mine. Magnets are 100% recyclable and science in the element make-up is shifting all the time. The increase in element cost is not a major factor in the cost of car production or wind turbines.... just availablity. The Chinese a playing a good game, by keeping prices relatively low.... The Saudi's of the Rare Earth oil.

"A wind turbine study using German data showed that these costs can be 1-2 Eurocents per kilowatt hour (kWh) produced, on average."

The cost of the magnets is a factor, but the cost of lifetime maintenance/ area fees/ regulation etc is where the money goes. More humans are involved with this type of power per Megawatt than a coal fired power station.

Expand

That is a fascinating report. The reduction in repair costs for the newer and larger turbines is quite amazing:

Given that this study appeared to be from 2002 or thereabouts, I did a quick search for more recent research. I came across this 2021 study:

New Tendencies in Wind Energy Operation and Maintenance

It looks at research papers on Wind O&M costs. I found the following chart, which tracks the number of publications on wind power O&M costs vs wind power LCOE and O&M costs... quite fascinating:

Basically, there has been a rapid increase in research on wind power over the last 20 years (unsurprisingly), and it has led to continued decrease in O&M costs since 2002 (i.e. the article you quoted above).

... and as research continues, wind power continues to get cheaper year by year.... accelerating the transition to sustainable energy.
Upvote

Reply