Global ‘Stilling’: If you feel the wind is coming to a halt, climate change may be behind it
- September 16, 2022
- Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
- Category: DPN Topics
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Global ‘Stilling’: If you feel the wind is coming to a halt, climate change may be behind it
Subject: Geography
Context:
- Parts of Europe have reported a ‘wind drought’, as wind speed in many places slowed about 15 per cent below the annual average or even more.
- Researchers suspect a global ‘stilling’ is at play — wind speed slacking as global temperatures go up.
Global ‘Stilling’–
- 2021’s summer fall was one of the least windy periods in the United Kingdom in the past 60 years.
- The recent declines in surface winds over Europe renewed concerns about a ‘global terrestrial stilling’ linked with climate change.
- Annual wind speeds dropped by 5-15 per cent in large parts of Europe, central Asia, eastern Asia and North America, a 2010 study published in Nature journal
- The most pronounced effect was seen across Eurasia.
- Global mean annual wind speed decreased significantly at a rate of 2.3 per cent per decade during the first three decades, beginning from 1978.
What does the study say–
- Winckler was the author of a 2021 study that looked into the behaviour of winds by examining where and how much dust settled on earth during the Pliocene era.
- The era from 33 million to 2.58 million years ago had temperatures and carbon dioxide levels similar to what they are today.
- Her models indicate “that the winds [will be] weaker and stiller.”
- By 2100, wind speeds will decrease over most of the western US and the East Coast, but the central US will increase. Several other studies predict similar variability — both regional and seasonal — worldwide.
Conflicting Data–
- In 2019, though, a group of researchers found that after 2010, global average wind speeds had actually increased — from 7 miles per hour to 4 miles per hour.
- However, it also indicated speedier winds over a nine-year period, contrary to last summer in the UK.
- While stilling has occurred in some parts of the world, the report also noted wind is blowing more fiercely — and more often — than ever before. Earlier this year in central New Mexico, for example, wildland firefighters, ranchers, and others described wind events as unprecedented.
- Despite conflicting data, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) forecast slowing winds for the coming decades.
- Average annual wind speeds could drop by up to 10 per cent by 2100, according to IPCC.
Factors responsible for global stilling–
- Along with global warming, another factor behind stilling may be ‘surface roughness’ — an uptick in the number and size of urban buildings that drag on winds.
- The wind has been an overlooked element of climate change studies, which helps explain why the debate over these trends continues.
- It seems likely that the movement of the westerlies towards the poles observed in the modern era will continue with further human-induced warming.
- Westerlies are the prevailing mid-latitude winds that blow from west to east.
Effects on power generation–
- Wind farms produced 18 per cent of the UK’s power in September of 2020, but in September of 2021, that percentage plummeted to only two per cent.
- The UK was forced to restart two non-operational coal plants to make up the energy gap.
- Europe is all in on wind power as an alternative to coal and other fossil fuels.
- About a fourth of the UK’s energy is from offshore wind turbines and the European Union gets about 15 per cent of its electricity from wind.
- Wind farms provide nearly 10 per cent of utility-scale electricity generation in the United States.
- By 2050 the amount of power produced is projected to nearly quadruple.
- But if wind speeds diminish, it could be harder to reach that goal.
Conclusion–
- The recent wind drought is a clear reminder of how variable this form of generation can be.
- It cannot be the sole investment for a reliable future energy grid.