Saving Teignmouth and Holcombe Beaches

Saving Teignmouth and Holcombe Beaches and maybe more of the GB coastline.

What is proposed here is to reduce the effect of sea storms on our coast - not tsunamis where the vertical end wave dynamic is astronomical and almost unopposable. 

There are three options here that will protect the beaches and preserve some of the natural wave action that they have on those beaches

1. A submarine breakwater made from concrete interlocking tetrapods
2. Changing the sea bed parallel to the beaches through intermittent  GPS focussed dredging and the production of a sand bar and deep water gulley distal seaward to this.
3. Using underwater concrete to form revetments to absorb foul weather pounding

I think the concrete that is proposed to cover the beach would be better used to produce concrete tetrapods for a submarine breakwater running parallel to the beach. If the tetrapods are arranged in an intermittent manner in short lengths  like this - _ - _ - _ - , it will reduce the power of the seas without abolishing altogether the waves that the beach enjoys and of course protect the beach and the cliff or bluff behind. The gaps will ensure that the marine life will quickly return. Quite often the tetrapods are used to reinforce existing breakwaters, coming well above the low water line and spoiling the view. I propose that their use here is kept well below  this so there is no disruption of the view - it implies of course that there is adequate depth for this.

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Changing the sea bed is easily possible with the ability of dredgers to hover  precisely through GPS and contour the sea bed parallel to the beach front forming a deep water runnel that will accommodate wave action and simultaneously use the sea bed removed to form a bar or soft breakwater on the beach side of the runnel. Again, marine life will quickly return afterwards.

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Slanted revetments can be made from UWC (or underwater concrete), again parallel to the beach front but arranged to allow partial transit of wave action. They can be designed to throw wave action laterally as well and thus direct thrust where or not it is needed to protect the beach head.

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All of these methods will preserve the aesthetic nature of the beach water front as well as the sands. 

Tetrapods can be moved and thus their action can be altered to where best their action is needed. The technology for these in standard breakwaters is well known and it would probably be the quickest and cheapest to install. Gaps, as mentioned can be made large and marked for landing small craft or the RNLI. That these are made onshore and can be added to or adjusted makes them attractive.Their shape offers interlocking and stability and a large footprint spread on the seabed.

The effect of seas will build some sea bed up and around the pods and tend to reinforce their effect. 

The beach and adjoining coastal seabed can be modelled on existing or new soundings and photographic data and used with historic weather information to generate what is likely to be a best outcome. 

Success here might offer a formulae or algorithm for other threatened coastal features.

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Could Wind Turbines Be A Catastrophe In The Making?

Christopher Booker is a journalist in the UK for the Sunday Telegraph through which he shows a sceptical attitude to global warming and wind turbines. There is little scepticism about climate change - it is definite. Scepticism would be thrown aside if it could be shown that it and possibly global warming are actually being contributed to by wind turbines.

The changes we see here might be the unintended consequences of their action as it coincides with the massive installation of them across the world but in the UK and Europe in particular.

Locally speaking, farmers in California actually choose to be in  the lee of wind farms to  avoid damaging night-time frosts. Friction or air tumbling might be the cause of this warming effect..

From a global viewpoint however, the Lorenz effect should be considered, given it contends that a butterfly’s flapping in the Amazon can disturb critical weather systems such as to cause a tsunami in Hawaii. How much more then the trillions of cubic kilometres of post turbine air that are is persistently rising into the brittle fabric of the atmosphere. Those massive volumes, being of low density and warmer air, are able to hold more water as vapour and rise and carry with them many thousands of tonnes of water which, perhaps, we are seeing descend in the North of the UK or anywhere else for that matter.

Also, not to diminish the effects of carbon dioxide with which it interacts very unfavourably, water vapour is the most important greenhouse ‘gas’.It's levels must rise with the rise in sea levels that are predicted and will aggravate in time the effects outlined above and contribute to global warming.
It is said that modelling of the weather is difficult. Forget modelling here.Turbines are everywhere.
What needs to be done now is getting measurements and sampling from what exists to determine what truth is in that which I have outlined.

I think, with a sizeable fraction of a trillion pounds spent on wind turbines already in the UK, it would be a good time to take stock before the rest of the planned installations here go ahead.

Time to take stock over wind turbine installations

The present situation with wind turbines needs assessment. Their installation by the many thousands across the world and the thousands in the UK in particular as a result of Ed Milliband signing us up to the dictates of the EU when he was energy secretary in the last Labour Government would imply that they are controversially rationale or that the industry producing them could do no better by way of design etc.
Worrying factors are:
- They all produce electricity which cannot be stored.
- The carbon footprint for their manufacture, installation and upkeep is not known or is not revealed.
- Their power contribution and the cost of their contribution from installation to the present and prospectively individually and collectively is not known or is not revealed.
-They don't work all the time and when they do it is at the behest of the weather and their potential contribution to the grid needs is unreliable.
- They need backup from other sources to cope with this unreliability from other grid sources of power.
- The conventional back-up sources are being run down or are not unequivocally known to cope.
- Their presence in the UK is mostly in the hands of foreign investment.
- Their is little or no contribution to their manufacture by the UK.
- Contractual arrangements mean owners of wind turbines are paid to shut them down to prevent grid over load so reflecting poor distribution of their output.
- It is almost certain that the increasing size of turbine size will conflict with the changing wind patterns as the slot of wind spectrum to start and stop them narrow.
- They all produce electricity which cannot be stored.
- Materials for their manufacture are increasingly in short supply and that their costs will rise.
- Their presence spoils a spectrum of naturally beautiful landscapes.

Some further understanding of the WASPHEAD

The silo as depicted appear to be floating just under the surface. I apologise for this illusion but it was really difficult to demonstrate the water flow beneath the Wasphead without doing that. The silos go to the sea bed but are deeply scalloped to allow flow throughout the footprint of the whole 'island'.
Of course the two lower diagrams in Fig. 8 show cut off sections and the plan view of the circulation of water beneath the 'island'.

The normal running of the hydroelectric generating unit is through the overspill or overflow from the top of the water-head in the silos thus keeping in hand that water-head potential when wind, tide wave and solar are inadequate to the grid's needs.
This allows tide and overspill from the central hydro-electric generating unit and from any overfill of the silos themselves which is not being diverted to this generating unit, to contribute to the tidal effect on the marginal tidal/wave generators.

In the vimeo there is some detailing of the flow of rainwater into the marginal silo

The whole of the 'islands' margin will be contained by these particular silos and the pump action of the tide and waves on the drum turbine in the base of the silos will contribute to the total water-head driving the central generation turbine and of course be separate from the section of silo above it containing the fresh water.

A diagram of the action of the drum turbine is shown in Fig. 9 below.

Some detail as to how the rotary and vertical reciprocation action of the drum pumps water through a cam mechanism is shown below.

Wasphead in action

             This show the Wasphead island complex in the full range of its capacities.

The silos at the margins of the island are dual purpose. The lower half houses a large partially submerged drum turbine - that is it's a drum with turbine blades on it's perimeter. It is located on a central spindle such that it can rotate in the tide and simultaneously lift and sink from the action of the waves. Both the rotating and lifting actions activate pumps which deliver sea water to the  adjacent silos inwards of this marginal silo. This thus contributes to the general water head and thus to action of the central hydro-electric generator.
It is worth mentioning that the used water or overspill from the central generator is higher than the sea level and thus contributes to the tidal effect on the drum turbine.
The top half of this marginal silo is storage for fresh water or at least potable water draining from over the slats of photo electric cells. All this silo storage is interconnected and can be drained or pumped to shore or to awaiting tankers for delivery to shore.

Resistance in the USA over powerhouse emissions.

On the news this morning, in the UK, President Obama is cited as upping substantially the restrictions on powerhouse emissions. Almost immediately a responder from of one of the coal mining states said that Obama's proposals would be opposed. The responders said that affected states would ignore the legislation and the devil take the hindmost.
Australia in many areas is the opposite situation where the government is ignoring, failing to support and generally running down renewable energy schemes despite hue and cry from the informed body of opinion there and as well, a sizeable proportion of the opposition.

What happens when the wind stops?

In the news in the UK this week concern were voiced as to how the grid will cope with the needs of a severe and prolonged winter or even just period of heightened cold. The margins of safety has been reduced from 15% or so five years ago to 5% now. There has been preparation by the energy distribution boards of lists of major users who will be paid, that is if they agree, to cut their production in order to keep the lights going.
This is, of course, due to the closing of coal powered stations and the failure to renew the ageing nuclear power plants.
They are also determining that standby generators will be available to help out.
The folly here is that the costs ultimately will not just be that these are higher for all but the effect will almost certainly be a costly increase in CO2. The generators, the partial factory closures  the re-opening or extending the use of the retired coal plant will ensure this.