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Originally Posted by leifus  I've been looking on the internet for a while now, but still can't find the answers to these questions, so maybe you could help? 
1 how many wind turbines would it take to replace one nuclear power station in terms of energy generation?
2 how much land space do wind turbines take up in the UK compared to nuclear power stations? |
I'm not surprised you can't find simple answers to these questions because they are of the 'how long is a piece of string ?' type - but you can find info to do your own calculations based on your own choice of 'how big' - for current nuclear output -
British Energy - Nuclear output. Of course the claims for putative newgeration power stations are at higher levels of efficiency. There's a useful categorisation of wind turbine yields by size of turbine/location at:
Two Terawatts average power output: the UK offshore wind resource | Claverton Group
However wind and nuclear power generation modules are not easily comparable. Even on a simplistic 'how much land' comparison there are numerous points where direct comparison is not possible. A few obvious non comparables are (a) Wind power generation can be constructed off shore, nuclear can't (b) Wind power generation can be integrated with other land uses, nuclear can't (c) Wind power generation can be constructed close to, and even within urban centres, nuclear can't (d) Wind power generation does not require permanent large scale transport access - road and rail - nuclear does. (e) Wind power generation does not produce waste needing extensive areas for commitment to storage - nuclear does.
There's one other aspect which so far has received little attention, but although permanent employment on wind farms is limited, it is potentially important to small rural communities. Nuclear power generation will always be a centralised operation with employment concentrated in a very few areas. The upland areas of Britain desperately need new employment forms if they are to have any economic future other than tourism - Wind power generation offers precisely the small to medium scale projects that can reinvigorate declining communities.
CM