Beam me to Planet Gore !
Posted on 08/17/2008 10:30:05 PM PDT by ricks_place
In this year's great energy debate, Democrats describe a future when the U.S. finally embraces the anything-but-carbon avant-garde. It turns out, however, that when wind and solar power do start to come on line, they face a familiar obstacle: environmentalists and many Democrats.
To wit, the greens are blocking the very transmission network needed for renewable electricity to move throughout the economy. The best sites for wind and solar energy happen to be in the sticks -- in the desert Southwest where sunlight is most intense for longest, or the plains where the wind blows most often. To exploit this energy, utilities need to build transmission lines to connect their electricity to the places where consumers actually live. In addition to other technical problems, the transmission gap is a big reason wind only provides two-thirds of 1% of electricity generated in the U.S., and solar one-tenth of 1%.
Only last week, Duke Energy and American Electric Power announced a $1 billion joint venture to build a mere 240 miles of transmission line in Indiana necessary to accommodate new wind farms. Yet the utilities don't expect to be able to complete the lines for six long years -- until 2014, at the earliest, because of the time necessary to obtain regulatory approval and rights-of-way, plus the obligatory lawsuits.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
There.
I fixed it.
The Greens haven’t had nearly enough bad press, but that’s starting to change.
This article, for one, helps.
The Greens are The Reds of today and the sooner people catch on to them the better.
the greens are blocking the very transmission network needed for renewable electricity to move throughout the economy. The best sites for wind and solar energy happen to be in the sticks -- in the desert Southwest where sunlight is most intense for longest, or the plains where the wind blows most often. To exploit this energy, utilities need to build transmission lines to connect their electricity to the places where consumers actually live. In addition to other technical problems, the transmission gap is a big reason wind only provides two-thirds of 1% of electricity generated in the U.S., and solar one-tenth of 1%....let's not forget that the Kennedys fought tooth and nail against wind farms near The Compound. Oh, and that "renewable" sources can't possibly provide what we need.
Some person has told me that when a wind generator is working, a powered turbine must ALSO be running on standby mode in case something happens to the wind power.
In other words, despite the 'free' energy from wind, we're still running another generator on standby; there's virtually no fuel savings.
I was assured this is federal law.
Anybody know anything about this?
I was assured this is federal law.
No, it is NOT federal law, it is simply a basic fact. Due to the transitory nature of, and unreliability of wind/solar/ "alternate" energy sources (the very BEST anyone has produced with a wind turbine is 30% online, for ONE year ), every utility that uses any and all of the above MUST, by virtue of basic economic laws, build 1 MW of "conventional" power in order to build 1 MW of "alternative" power, so that WHILE the "alternative" power is OFFLINE, the "conventional" power is online and there for the PAYING customers.
"Alternative" energy is exactly that: the alternative to actually HAVING energy.
There’s really nothing surprising here. The Greens aren’t about “alternatives”...they’re about non-alternatives.
That is, they only call for replacements that are completely infeasible. The degree to which a new technology is impractical and makes everyday life more difficult and expensive is the degree to which they support it.
The degree to which something does not require the masses to make back-breaking sacrifices and reductions in lifestyle is the degree to which they turn on it.
Hence the fight against nuclear (it’s not about any accidents that could hypothetically happen down the road, it’s because it works). Also the fight against any practical implementation of wind power.
The “organic” movement works the same way...bacteria-infested crops with inferior yields that feed fewer people for triple the cost are a good thing, because they support less life. Opposition to “development” in and of itself works the same way. Everyone should be shoved into a UN-approved urban mega-high-rises with all progress banned.
It’s not new...Ayn Rand’s book “Return of the Primitive: The Anti-Industrial Revolution” has a bunch of essays about this. She’d recognized it in the 60s and 70s. (It’s also called “The New Left: The Anti-Industrial Revolution)
There is a large cost involved & the greenies want us all to ignore that cost; until massive investments are made in solar and wind generation.
Now let me get this straight. It’s okay to wait six years while the wiring for a wind farm is set up, but it’s not okay to wait a few years for offshore drilling rigs to find new oil?
They want you to wear a burlap bag while you live in your mud and straw yurt heated with cow dung.
I will go kicking and screaming against their reality, thank you very much, but onto a real world story.
A Green Engineer I know lamented that they are worried the Green Power movement would get a black eye. I guess recently the wind picked up spiked the grid and a Utility had to blow a safety valve to take a steam unit off line and they were p!$$&d. Other worries abound, but not for here....
You heard it here 1st, IMHO the battery system in the Chevy Volt or something like it will be needed to dampen the irregularities of the green power generating systems. In that regard, the solutions will come from the private sector, not from some bone-head like Nancy Pelosi.
Bingo! Give that man a cigar. The “Greenies”, also more commonly known as socialists, are not interested in solutions but only issues. By raising “awareness” to these issues they stand with their hand out for donations and government grants to perform more “studies” to inform us of even more results from “studies”. True, they are socialists but also scam artists who create fear in the unwashed masses to advance their goal of obtaining power over those same masses. Essentailly, they are the “robber barons” of our time. Enriching themselves at the expense of the masses while also entrenching their power over those they are enriching themselves.
The absolute worst thing you can do for a “greeie” is to provide a proven solution to their issue. That automatically makes you the next enemy of the people. I know from first hand experience.
Not federal law and not actually running.
but a utility company needs to have available power to provide for their customers and wind is less reliable than most sources. Typically, having access to Natural Gas Turbines direct coupled to generators provides very quick start time for power. Those units are relatively cheap to build (compared to other power plants) but rather expensive for fuel price versus electricity generated. They are often used to meet peak power demands for the same reason.
Fires happen all up and down the west coast due to green lawsuits. How many spotted owls lose their homes because of fires? Nobody cares. Bulldozers cut fire lines and kill the salemander, but the greens don't stop that. Let a Forest Service team try to clear the ungrowth and their is a lawsuit. Someone should mention that lawsuits are how the RATS govern America!!
With sufficiently widely-distributed wind generators this problem is substantially reduced. BUT... we had a problem on the southern border of this state last month when an excess of wind (and poorly-managed wind generators) led to too much power being fed into the grid, resulting in the need for some dams to quickly dump water, threatening the fish (salmon).
There was an article posted about a week ago concerning this.
Seems a windmill farm on the coast of Britain has caused a 10% increase in natural gas usage at the power station.
Apparently having to fire up cold boilers when the wind died caused the increase.
Now let me get this straight. It's okay to wait six years while the wiring for a wind farm is set up, but it's not okay to wait a few years for offshore drilling rigs to find new oil?[virtual tickertape parade down the canyon of heroes for Berosus]
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