There are proposals to build a 150-turbine wind farm in the mountains near Caledon that would generate 300MW of electricity. The Caledon Wind Farm would be on 15 farms and cover about 3700ha between Bot River and Caledon. Episan (Pty) Ltd, trading as Caledon Wind, plans to establish the wind farm on land it would lease from private landowners in the Theewaterskloof municipal area.
Each turbine would be 80 metres from the ground to the hub and have a 40m turbine blade. Other infrastructure would include tower foundations, underground cables, powerlines to the electricity networks and an internal access road. The project would be registered with the United Nations Framework Convention for Climate Change as part of the clean development mechanism programme.
The areas selected for the project have been identified as prime spots for wind generation. The EIA consultants held public meetings about the project on Monday and yesterday. The information document the consultants supplied said 90% of South Africa´s electricity was generated in Mpumalanga, from which 70% of the electricity used by the Western Cape was imported. The long distances the power had to travel along transmission lines led to energy losses that added between 6% and 8% to the cost of electricity and 25% to the cost of electricity delivery.
Building a wind farm in the Western Cape would reduce energy loss and climate changing greenhouse emissions. If the project was approved, the first phase of 50MW would take about a year to build, and the remaining 250MW a further 3 years. The wind farm´s lifespan would be at least 20 years.
Environmentalist Liz McDaid welcomed the plan, but said the company would need to ensure the public was well informed about the benefits of wind energy or it would meet opposition. “Renewable energy is a great idea and the benefits are clear. It creates less carbon emissions or nuclear waste and there will be an increase in jobs. But 150 turbines are a big project, and it would be in the interests of the applicants and the government to ensure there was intense public consultation, not just with the landowners, but with the public, so people understand the benefits.
“It will shock many people to see a massive row of wind turbines, and if they have not done the public participation properly, the project may be delayed.”
Source: Cape Times, 13 January 2010.
The liveeco team
