Beam me to Planet Gore !
Posted on 09/02/2010 3:20:30 AM PDT by Rashputin
According to The Hill, "Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said Tuesday a nationwide renewable-electricity standard, or RES, is "absolutely" in the mix as he tries to salvage energy legislation this year - possibly in a lame-duck session."
As I have opined in these electronic pages before, Renewable Electricity Standards (RES) are the stuff of "skyrocketing" electricity prices. The effect is quite similar to Cap & Trade but without as much smoke from which to sense danger.
To recap, the RES (sometimes called a Renewable Portfolio Standard ) levels an unfunded mandate on electricity generating utilities (GENCO's). The mandate requires each GENCO to incorporate X% of renewable generation capacity within their portfolio of generating assets. For instance, a 15% RPS (as proposed) would require a GENCO that has 1000 megawatts of conventional generating capacity to include 150 megawatts of renewable generating capacity by some prescribed date certain.
It seems that many people see this sort of mandate as being somewhere between "inert" and "beneficial". One of those people is Sam Brownback (R-Kan)....and therein lies trouble. These mandates are anything but inert and are certainly not beneficial.
Here's the way the game is played:
1. The RES is handed down as law to REGULATORs
2. REGULATORs create specific renewable requirements and standards which are handed down to GENCO's
3. GENCO's engage Developers of "alternative energy resources" to solicit bids and to ascertain project costs, schedules and related particulars
4. The GENCO selects a Developer and a Power Purchase Agreement is settled.
5. The Power Purchase Agreement sets the wholesale kilowatt-hour price of the forecasted energy delivery from the Developers "alternative resource".
6. The GENCO appeals to the governing REGULATOR for a special tariff under which the "alternative" kilowatt-hours may be retailed to consumers at premium (profitable) pricing
7. The REGULATOR grants a special tariff as needed to keep the GENCO financially whole
Note the circular nature of this gambit: the REGULATOR is at the center of the unfunded mandate AND provides the means by which the mandate is ultimately funded. The result is that literally no one with a financial interest in the "deal" is held to any economic standard.
This precise scenario unfolded this summer under the Cape Wind project (the offshore wind farm visible from the Kennedy compound). In that case, the Attorney General of Massachusetts (Martha Coakley) got involved AFTER the Power Purchase Agreement had been established noting that "Neither party had an incentive to bargain for terms that yield cost-effective terms for ratepayers." This intercession was highly unusual. Ultimately the buyer and seller agreed to reduce the kilowatt-hour pricing from $0.207 to $0.187. The final wholesale price, roughly twice the going retail rate, recognizes that fully 30% of the Cape Wind project cost is taxpayer subsidized.
In the end, these RES's are little more than a slick means for fleecing taxpayers and ratepayers (jointly and severally) under the cover of "climate change". To be clear, without the too-widely-accepted notion that "climate change" can be blunted or reversed by earth's human inhabitants, none of these green initiatives would even pass the smell test.
Greencentric idiocy must be fought at every level on the basis of economics. Three reasons:
1. Now more than ever, Americans are coming to grips with the economic realities of "going stupid"
2. Almost nothing greencentric makes any economic sense once brought into the light of day
3. "Climate change" enthusiasts continue to have overwhelming momentum...absent the discussion of their economic folly
Grant Ellis aka "Grant from Comfort" holds a BSEE from the University of Florida and has 30+ years of real-world experience in distributive power generation, power distribution, energy efficiency and project management.
They will be completely desperate. Thrown out RINOS like Murkowski and Bennett could be a problem.
I wrote the expose on Harry Reid that could stop his ability to destroyt the economy in the lame duck session. I am trying my hardest to see that it gets out so we can crush Reid’s ability to govern. Inch by inch.
I was on Rusty Humphries tonight.
Pull the plug on DC until 1/11.
Attach repeal measures for healthcare, clawback of the stimulus, financial reform,etc.to every bill they attempt to pass.
Make each bill a poison pill.
And fillibuster every single bill.
Unless I am mistaken, 4 seats if won by GOP-er's will get seated right away because they are replacements.
2 thru 4 of them would kill his ability to Cloture, all 4 would shut down the old bitties from Maine, and maybe even stop some of the other RINO's.
They are...
Biden's old seat ( DE )
Obama's old seat (IL)
Byrd's Seat ( VA) since he died in office and...
Hillary's Old Seat, (NY) i.e. now Gillibrands
But we gotta save the Squirrels !!!
For the Planet
Get rid of all the children !!!
or so our Green friends tell us.
Skyrocketing prices ... does they even begin to understand how this hurts every single American???
How it hurts you? How it hurts me ???
The democRATS have pretty well admited that they are run by communists now.
If this happens, it is time for the pitch fork crowd to decend on DC.
Right....because that’s been workin’ for us.
What is the backstory to this "squirrel" meme? I've been seeing these references enough to realize some dem must have made a stupid squirrel comment but I missed it. Can ya help a conservative out here?
That guy that took Discovery channel HQ hostage wrote an environut thing that had stuff about saving squirrels.
Did you ever have to evict a bad tenant?
They usually trash the place before you can get them out. They know their time is short, so they will be as spiteful as they can to get even.
Our Congress, knowing their time is short, is planning to act like the bad tenants they really are.
Just like their father, the devil, whose time also is short and is spitefully doing as much damage as he can before the Landlord evicts him.
OK, thanks.
The other factor to consider is the impact of the 2010 elections upon the 2012 elections. If the GOP takes back the House and gains several seats in the Senate in 2010, the Senators up for reelection in 2012 are not going to do anything controversial in a lame duck session. Of the 33 Senate seats up for grabs in 2012, 19 are held by RATs, and of those 19, eight are in states that lean red. Also, both Brown and Snow are up for reelection, and while they are RINOs that cannot be trusted 98.5% of the time, they are not going to do anything in a lame duck session that their voters are going to remember in 2012.
Yeah, for sure. Paraphrasing; “hell haveth no fury like a scorned politician;. However, there may be one mitigating factor a play for Murkoweski. She may have future aspirations for the other senate seat, governor, etc. Those may contain her urge for revenge. Guess we will see...
LMAO
good one!
You may be aware of this, but without saying so, you tangentially denote the fix the Dem's in the Senate are in.
I..E. those up for reelection in 12' will be in a No-mas mood with Reid for lame-duck lunacy because they know their goose will get cooked in 12' as well. Not to get foul here.. I am sorry I couldn't resist.. :-)...
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