Question

Could someone please tell me what is meant when people say that wind energy can be expensive or more expensive than fossil fuels?

Answer 1

Wind energy is not available at all times, so one still has to build conventional power plants to supply power. Both have to be paid for.

Wind is available in selected areas, and due to geography, these areas are not where cities are built. Thus, long transmission lines have to be build and maintained. This adds greatly to power cost.

Answer 2

We can find that there are three topics that may generate high costs, which can make inefficient use of large-scale wind energy:
- The purchase and set-up of wind turbines can be expensive
- Wind turbines require certain constant speeds to be productive
- Wind farms can't sustain constant power due to daily and seasonal variance in wind