Letter-writers to your newspaper appear to have strangely divergent ideas about the amount of electricity generated by wind power. First we have Mark Cullen (April 21) telling us that it contributes less than 1% of the total. The very next day Michael Pidgeon assured us that wind generation makes up 15% of our electricity generation.
Neither of these is correct. Data supplied by the EU Eurostat show that in 2007, 2008 and 2009 wind supplied 7.1%, 8.5% and 11.3%, respectively. Not a very impressive performance, considering that wind generators make up about a quarter of the country’s total generating capacity.
All this means, of course, that wind generators need costly back-up for when the wind doesn’t blow. And how is such back-up to be fuelled? At present by fossil fuels. Something’s wrong here, surely; I understood that we’re trying to reduce our use of fossil fuels, but it seems that wind power perpetuates their use. The answer is to go for nuclear power, which is reliable, tested, safe and economical. But first we must get rid of the ludicrous legislative ban on the production of electricity by nuclear power.
