Go with the wind

Re: “Krabi coal plant up in the air”, (Business, April 24).

Most countries in Europe have shut down coal plants. They even scrap new ones in the pipeline. They now rely on cleaner sources of energy such as natural gas and renewables. Within 10 years there will be no coal plants and nuclear plants, especially in Germany and the Netherlands.

Despite minimal sun hours compared to Thailand, many public and private buildings use solar cells. In short, people like to have renewable energy.

I was involved in a wind farm in the North Sea, 100km north of Bremen Germany, which features 80 windmills (80 x 5MW = 400MW) for four years. Now several wind farms within the coastline of the Netherlands are under construction with a total output of 3000MW.

The Thai government wants to build a coal-fired power plant with capacity of 800MW: Don’t do that.

We still cannot control the pollution that results from burning coal. If the coal plant is built in Krabi, there will be many logistics problems with the transport of coal to that southern province.

Engineering, project management, construction, installation, operation and maintenance of wind farms offshore are fully under control regarding costs and risks at this moment. And with no pollution.

Thailand wants to be more independent regarding energy and minimise the power output from neighbouring countries. Just build a wind farm in the sea with 100 or more wind mills. Capacity of 8MW each. In opting for renewables, Thailand can be an example for the other Asian countries.

PETER JOHANNES VAN DIJK