Posted on 10/22/2019 8:17:11 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Last week, the lobbying arm of the wind energy industry made an unsurprising, though somewhat embarrassing, announcement. It wants a longer lifeline with federal subsidies. So much for wind being the low-cost energy source of the future.
Less than a year ago, the American Wind Energy Association with great fanfare issued a press statement that, as Bloomberg reported: "America's wind farms are ready to go it alone." Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, a Republican who has strongly supported the wind industry since the days of federal support began in 1992, boasted that the wind industry had finally "matured" and wind farms were "ready to compete."
Never mind.
Big Wind's change of heart was predictable. When this tax giveaway -- which basically requires taxpayers to underwrite 30% of the cost of wind energy production -- was first enacted, the renewable energy lobby promised it would lift itself out of the federal wheelchair and walk on its own within five years. But like clockwork, every five years, they have come back to Congress pleading for an extension -- much like Oliver with his porridge bowl asking, "Please, sir, could I have some more?"
What's especially interesting is why Big Wind thinks it's deserving of "more." The industry execs mentioned the tough competition from natural gas -- which isn't going away. Today, natural gas is by far the most cost-efficient source of electric power generation in most markets. Thanks to the shale revolution, natural gas prices have fallen by about two-thirds. Only with very generous taxpayer assistance on top of local mandates requiring local utilities to buy wind and solar power can green energy compete.
Big Wind said it will lobby for a continued subsidy so wind power will "have parity" with the solar industry subsidies. The solar industry sun gods get even higher subsidies than wind producers. They are actually right. Per unit of electricity, solar gets five times as much as wind power. And wind gets some five times more than coal and natural gas. So now we have a subsidy arms race.
Over the last 30 or so years, the renewable energy industry has received well over $100 billion in federal, state and local handouts. Yet these are still fairly trivial contributors to America's overall energy production -- supplying somewhere between 5% and 10% of the nation's total. The rational solution would, of course, be to eliminate all federal energy subsidies and simply create a level playing field among coal, nuclear, natural gas, solar and wind. But given the current anti-fossil fuel hysteria and the movement to promote green energy at any cost, the idea of creating an economically efficient market for energy is about as likely as hell freezing over -- which isn't going to happen anytime soon because of global warming.
Given the powerful green movement's lobby on Capitol Hill, don't be surprised if the federal aid keeps pouring in. But here again we see the central contradiction of the green energy fad. On the one hand, we here rave reviews of how enormously cost-effective green energy has become in the 21st century. We are told we can require 50%, 60%, even 100% renewable energy over the next decade at no cost to consumers or businesses.
If so, why must the subsidies continue ad infinitum? If $100 billion of taxpayer handouts hasn't worked, what will?
My hunch is that the lifelines Washington keeps tossing to the wind and solar industries have been more curse than blessing. Subsidies can be as addictive as heroin. A cold-turkey cutoff of taxpayer aid would force the renewable industry to adopt strategies and innovations that would make them viable competitors in energy markets.
Necessity really is the mother of invention.
Thanks to Andrew Cuomo New York State residents cannot not participate.
RE: Thanks to Andrew Cuomo New York State residents cannot not participate.
How’s the air and water like in neighboring and FRACKING Pennsylvania? Is it any worse than New York?
CORRECTION: Thanks to Andrew Cuomo, New York State residents cannot participate.
It’s probably better due to the distance away from the People’s Republic of New York City.
According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, U.S. support of wind through the PTC has amounted to at least $1 billion every fiscal year since 2010, including estimates of $4.5 billion in 2018 and $4.7 billion in 2019, or a total of just under $25 billion since 2010.
The credit, however, is already being phased out. After being worth a maximum of 2.3 cents per kWh for farms that broke ground in 2016, the credit value has fallen by 20 percentage points each year, and the PTC is scheduled to elapse entirely at the beginning of 2020. This year is the last year in which wind operators can begin building a new wind farm and receive a tax credit going forward.
Here’s the problem with wind energy there is only big wind there is no little - - wind
contrast this with solar i.e. photovoltaics
I can have one solar panel with an enphase inverter which is an entire solar system! one solar panel !
so I can have 2-100 it doesn’t matter
Furthermore solar panels don’t have any moving parts and are really the answer not wind energy
Note
And NY along with the moonbats here in MA refuse to have new pipelines of NG brought in to help ease our shortages and lower prices.
Furthermore solar panels don’t have any moving parts and are really the answer not wind energy
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Actually, neither are “the answer” AT THIS TIME. When will they be the answer? Maybe 20 - 30 years.....maybe never. It depends upon what technologies emerge in the future.
According to Obama's EPA, Fracking does NOT contaminate ground water.
So... there's your answer.
Additionally, Obama essentially ordered the EPA to claim that Fracking DOES contaminate ground water... yet their research concluded otherwise.
"...requires taxpayers to underwrite 30% of the cost of wind energy production..."
And:
"Per unit of electricity, solar gets five times as much as wind power."
So... solar gets 150% of the cost of energy production in subsidies?
I'm missing something. Hopefully.
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