Wind & solar renewables: pointless

 

Bryan Leyland at The Telegraph UK explains why renewable energy sources (wind and solar) are never going to achieve "net zero".  I missed this column when it appeared a few weeks ago, but it's still current.  And it's still a pipe dream:

Many governments in the Western world have committed to “net zero” emissions of carbon in the near future. The US and UK both say they will deliver by 2050. It's widely believed that wind and solar power can achieve this. This belief has led the US and British governments, among others, to promote and heavily subsidise wind and solar.

These plans have a single, fatal flaw: they are reliant on the pipe-dream that there is some affordable way to store surplus electricity at scale.

In the real world a wind farm’s output often drops below 10 per cent of its rated “capacity” for days at a time. Solar power disappears completely every night and drops by 50 per cent or more during cloudy days. “Capacity” being a largely meaningless figure for a wind or solar plant, about 3000 megawatts (MW) of wind and solar capacity is needed to replace a 1000 MW conventional power station in terms of energy over time: and in fact, as we shall see, the conventional power station or something very like it will still be needed frequently once the wind and solar are online.

The governments of countries with a considerable amount of wind and solar generation have developed an expectation that they can simply continue to build more until net zero is achieved. The reality is that many of them have kept the lights on only by using existing fossil fired stations as backup for periods of low wind and sun. This brings with it a new operating regime where stations that were designed to operate continuously have to follow unpredictable fluctuations in wind and solar power. As a result operating and maintenance costs have increased and many stations have had to be shut down.

In fact it's already common to see efficient combined-cycle gas turbines replaced by open-cycle ones because they can be throttled up and down easily to back up the rapidly changing output of wind and solar farms. But open-cycle gas turbines burn about twice as much gas as combined cycle gas turbines. Switching to high-emissions machinery as part of an effort to reduce emissions is, frankly, madness!

Much more at the link here.  But try sharing any of these facts with a green zealot.  It may be that only after unimaginable damage and suffering resulting from reducing access to energy that the greenies will wake up.  Maybe not even then . . .

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Climate Alarmism vs Real Environmentalism

 

Edward Ring’s column at American Greatness on “Climate Alarmism” offers some facts that might just get through to your climate alarmist friends by making them think about something that motivates them:  guilt.

How Climate Alarmism Killed Real Environmentalism

The environmentalist movement is a political weapon. It unites the most powerful special interests in the world behind an agenda that will further centralize power and wealth, eliminate any hope of financial independence for the vast majority of people, and transition previously free and independent nations into managed, sham democracies that have lost their sovereign agency.

The overwhelming theme of environmentalism today, designed to obscure its true agenda, is the alleged “climate crisis.”

Americans may or may not eventually muster the impertinence to successfully challenge the political power grab masquerading as environmentalism today. But either way, its centerpiece, the “climate crisis,” is responsible for devastating harm both to what was once a legitimate environmentalist movement, as well as to the environment itself.

Policies ostensibly designed to manage the planet’s climate are taking attention and resources away from genuine environmental threats. At the same time, a growing percentage of people are recognizing the fraudulent essence of the “climate crisis” agenda and, as a result, are becoming indifferent to legitimate environmental concerns.

This is a tragedy. 

. . .

Here are just a few of the environmental disasters in progress that nobody talks about either because they’re making too much money pushing the climate change scam, or because they’re thoroughly disgusted with the climate change scam and disregard all environmentalist concerns.

Mr Ring then expands on each of the following bullet point topics:

• Loss of Insect Population
• Aquatic Dead Zones
• Overfishing
• Energy Security in Developing Nations
• The Biofuel Disaster
• Massive Oceanic Garbage Patches
• Population Crash

Mr Ring’s conclusion:

. . . By now, the fraudulent reality of “renewables” that aren’t renewable is well documented, even if that fact receives scant attention in the mainstream press. But this additional fact—that the climate alarmist focus on achieving “net zero” is discrediting environmentalism at large, and taking attention away from other serious environmental threats—is perhaps the saddest chapter in the story of a movement that has lost its way.

Mr Ring’s column is here.

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Updates:Gov. Kasich (RINO) on renewable energy and other bills

art credit: redstate

In an article “Kasich Veto Draws Cheers From Environmental Lobby,” Steve Byas at The New American reports:

Once again, Ohio Governor John Kasich  used his veto power to kill yet another bill favored by conservatives in his state. On Tuesday, he killed a bill that would have made renewable energy benchmarks voluntary, rather than mandatory, for the next two years.

Kasich defended his action, saying, “Ohio workers cannot afford to take a step backward from the economic gains that we have made in recent years, however, and arbitrarily limiting Ohio’s energy generation options amounts to self-inflicted damage to both our state’s near and long-term economic competitiveness.” Of course, how suspending mandatory benchmarks imposed on electric companies would limit the companies’ “energy generation options," as opposed to doing exactly the opposite, Kasich did not explain.

Not surprisingly, the Environmentalist Lobby cheered Kasich, who ran for president this year as a Republican. The Sierra Club, National Wildlife Federation, National Audubon Society, and Ohio Consumers’ Counsel all praised the veto. The “benchmarks,” as they are called, were created by legislation in 2008, requiring electric companies to gradually obtain more energy from “renewable sources,” rather than being allowed simply to make a free market decision to buy the least expensive electricity.

Senator Bill Seitz (R-Cincinatti), however, was not pleased. “It is apparent that Gov. Kasich cares more about appeasing his coastal elite friends in the renewable energy business than he does about the millions of Ohioans who decisively rejected this ideology when they voted for President-elect Trump,” Seitz said in a press release. “We can only hope that President Trump and his amazing cabinet of free market capitalists will save us from this regulatory overreach of Al Gore-style policies that take unnecessary money out of ratepayers’ pockets.”

Seitz said he would move to totally repeal the mandates in the next legislative session.

Kasich made it clear by his veto that he does not trust the free market to sort out which type of energy source is best for Ohio consumers. This veto is a confirmation for many more conservative Republicans that Kasich is simply not a conservative.

Ohio legislators can return to Columbus to override this veto, if they wish. . .

During the Republican presidential contest, Kasich defended the implementation of controversial Common Core standards in his state, and attacked fellow Republican candidates who opposed them — fellow governors Scott Walker of Wisconsin and Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, as well as former Governor Mike Huckabee, and U.S. Senators Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio. At the time, Donald Trump was not mentioned, although Trump also opposed Common Core, seen by conservative opponents as an attempt to nationalize public education.

There have been numerous other deviations from conservative principles by Kasich, including his backing of the expansion of Medicaid in Ohio under ObamaCare. When Kasich was in Congress, he was one of only 42 Republicans who voted for President Bill Clinton’s ban on assault rifles. He also favors granting U.S. citizenship to illegal aliens.

Clearly, Republican primary voters made a good decision to reject John Kasich for the Republican nomination for president.

And another item on the 2017 New Year’s Wish List to Columbus lawmakers: Pass the Ohio Health Care Compact.

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