Wind turbines as an alternative

[Ohlmann]

Hello.

I belive having an alternative renewable energy source would be good for the game. But it need to be somewhat different ; simply being more expensive and without day cycle would be boring, and having a predictible cycle would mean it's no different from solar.

So I believe the best way to do that would be wind turbins, with somewhat random output (from 50% to 150% nominal power for example), and with a time between wind strength change significantly lower than a night. So that, while unlike with solar panel they wouldn't be 100% predictible, you also would have much shorter outages (and potentially less severe). You could then mix and match accumulator, wind turbines, and solar panel, depending on the risk and ressource cost you can deal with. Since the other energy source would be untouched, one could never use a wind turbine if he fear being unable to deal with low wind situations.

The wind can either be the same for the whole map, or different for suffisantly big area of the map. The former force player to have a non-wind backup plan. The latter allow one to drastically lower the odds of an outage by spreading out his wind turbines.

[Phantasm]

If we get competitive multiplayer or a decent AI we could have enemy plan attacks at worst time based on night and/or low wind conditions. But, it would also be beneficial for the wind to vary even more. Like from 20 % to 400 % or something. Obviously being more on the average than on the extremes.

Calculated risk could add to the gameplay. There could also be efficiency improvements on different energy techs. Focus a lot on single tech and make it better, but face the risks, or make them all average for more safety in mind.

As a little real life statistic.. Typically wind power average over long time is about 22-25 % of nominal (max) output.

[ssilk]

Please refer to this search, too:

https://forums.factorio.com/forum/sea ... bine&fid=6

https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... nd+turbine
https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... wind+power
https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... wind+power
https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... hilit=wind