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| Fig. 1: Egypt, famous for the Great Pyramids, has another wonder with its endless supply of wind. (Source: Wikimedia Commons) |
Egypt is easily recognized for the pyramids (Fig. 1) and the history of the ancient Egyptians but what has been around since the start of ancient Egyptian history is the powerful and relentless wind across the country. Over the past 30 years, the Egyptian Government has complied with many outside organizations to develop an extensive Wind Atlas of the whole country. The Wind Atlas showed many promising regions of Egypt that wind energy would work well. Three areas in particular, the Gulf of Suez, a large region on the Nile bank, and some areas in Sinai showed average wind speeds of up to 10.5 m/sec. [1]
Egypt is already extracting energy from its powerful nature resource. (See Fig. 2.) The country uses a combination of onshore and offshore wind farms. The difference between the two farms is that onshore farms are a system of turbines built on land and offshore farms utilize the large amounts of wind found over bodies of water. Offshore farms are not only found on coastal waterways but also found on fjords and lakes. Both onshore and offshore farms are excellent sources of clean renewable energy. [2] One of the most promising offshore projects is the offshore wind farm planned for El Dabaa station along the Mediterranean Sea. Using a turbine of capacity 1 MW, it is estimated that the station could produce 2,718 MWh per year with a production cost of 2 Euro cent/kWh. [1] Natural gas and coal costs about 5.67 Euro and 6.13 Euro cent/kWh respectively, making wind farms the economical choice and the greener choice. [3]
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| Fig. 2: Picture of an onshore wind farm located in Zaafarana. (Source: Wikimedia Commons) |
Egypt is fortunate enough to possess an abundance of wind. Cultivating their natural resource presents promise but not without some challenges. If Egypt is able to find funding, they could potentially execute their plan of a 20% increase in renewable energy production by 2020. This renewable green energy helps Egypt meet their energy needs while helping the environment by reducing emissions. Repairing the new turbines may present a problem in the future due to the lack of trained people, however it is worth the risk when Egypt has the chance to tap into their unlimited natural resource. [1]
© Sarah Helgeson. The author grants permission to copy, distribute and display this work in unaltered form, with attribution to the author, for noncommercial purposes only. All other rights, including commercial rights, are reserved to the author.
[1] A. S. A. Shata and R. Hanitsch, "Evaluation of Wind Energy Potential and Electricity Generation on the Coast of Mediterranean Sea in Egypt," Renew. Energy 31, 1183 (2006).
[2] R. Kalick, "Off Shore Wind," Physics 240, Stanford University, Fall 2014.
[3] K. Murphy, "Wind vs. Nuclear Energy," Physics 240, Stanford University, Fall 2014.
