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Big Wind's Big Bucks Bandwagon

8/12/2020

1 Comment

 
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How obviously greedy does a wind turbine company have to be before a supposedly "clean energy" website poops all over their poorly written blog post?  That's what I wondered when I came across this "article" on CleanTechnica.  CleanTechnica is pretty famous in certain circles for its misinformed pandering to an arrogant bunch of sycophantic loyalists who post incessant, incorrect "facts" and argue with people in the "article" comments. 

So, I went looking for the source, although CleanTechnica conveniently "forgot" to link to its source material, it was easy enough to find.

It looks like this guy is the "president of sales" so of course he's interested in selling more product, in this case wind turbines.  I hope he's better at selling wind turbines and he is at selling ideas, because this one is dead on arrival.  Even CleanTechnica couldn't stomach it.

Chris's main problem seems to be that there's not enough transmission from the remote areas where his customers would put his wind turbines.  This is cramping Chris's profits (and probably his bonus).  So now Chris is an expert on electric transmission and has all the good ideas that nobody has ever tried before.  And he deploys it using the most trite of propaganda devices. 

The Bandwagon propaganda device attempts to persuade the target that everyone else thinks the same way as the propagandist.  Use of inclusive words and ideas, such as "everyone", "we", "our", or "most Americans" are a way the propagandist draws the reader in to think that if they don't agree with "everyone" and conform, they're missing the bandwagon and will be left out or become unpopular.  It replaces individual thought with group think.  And there's nothing more dangerous to personal liberty than mob rule.
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Find the use of bandwagon in this short quote:
Every week you open your browser, scan the headlines, and see something to the effect of, “fossil fuels are out and clean energy is in”. The recent court decision upholding the shutdown of the Dakota Access Pipeline and Dominion and Duke’s decision to abandon their Atlantic Coast pipeline project indicate a changing tide in how consumers and utilities view our energy future.

Most Americans want clean energy. People want electric vehicles and a cleaner environment. But, our policies on building the infrastructure to deliver this clean energy future have not caught up to public sentiment.

In June, the leading renewable energy trade associations made a goal to reach 50% renewable energy by 2030. Meanwhile, if elected, Joe Biden will push for a carbon-free power sector by 2035. Goals aside, the fact remains we need more transmission to move cheap wind and solar from more rural areas to load centers if we want to reach ambitious clean energy goals. We need a new wave of electron pipelines.

Not me.  Chris doesn't speak for me.  He probably doesn't speak for you either.  You know who he speaks for?  Vestas and himself.  But yet he has imposed his personal and business views on "most Americans", "you" (the reader), "consumers", "utilities", "people", "public sentiment", "we, we, we" (all the way home!) for the express purpose of convincing someone that his ideas have merit.

Let's look at some of these ideas:
The Plains & Eastern transmission project exemplifies this problem. In 2009, Clean Line Energy Partners announced plans for a transmission line that would carry 4,000 MW of clean power from Oklahoma to load centers in the southeast and Mid-Atlantic. Years of navigating state and local regulations and gathering, then losing, federal support ensued.

By 2019, Clean Line had divested most of their transmission projects, including the Plains & Eastern Clean Line project, selling them off with the hopes someone else could overcome the endless regulatory and political battles associated with interstate transmission lines.
It NEVER had the support of its desired government customer, Tennessee Valley Authority.  It had hopes and dreams and a MOU that TVA would consider the project.  Ultimately, when TVA considered it, TVA decided Clean Line wasn't economic or needed for serving its customers.  Meanwhile, Clean Line could not find any other customers.  If TVA wasn't buying or was dragging its feet, Clean Line was free to go sell service to other eager customers.  Except there weren't any.  There were no utilities interested in buying service on a "clean line" from Oklahoma.  This is what ultimately killed the Plains & Eastern.  Get your facts straight, Chris!

And here's the inconvenient truth Chris misses -- it's not lack of transmission connections that is preventing utilities in other states from buying remote wind.  Even when the transmission connection can be made, customers fail to materialize, as the lesson of Plains & Eastern demonstrates.  Why?  Because states want to develop their own renewables because development of new renewables bring economic development to the state.  Why send your energy dollars to Oklahoma when you can create new industry and new jobs in your own backyard?  Offshore wind is coming!  Onshore wind profiteers like Chris are nearly hysterical over it.

It's simply not true that if new transmission is built utilities will voluntarily elect to use it.  Building new transmission is an attempt to FORCE utilities in other states to purchase imported power.  The industry keeps bellowing (without support) that remote wind from the Midwest is "cheaper" than building renewables near coastal load.  But how cheap is it really when the cost of the generation is combined with the cost of hundreds of billions of dollars of new transmission?  Not so cheap anymore... and it provides no economic benefits to the importing states.  The only way to make imported generation "cheaper" is to allocate the cost of building new transmission for export  onto captive electric consumers who may not benefit, instead of the current requirement that the generator must pay its own costs to connect to the existing system.  This idea cannot work because it upends the long-held principle that beneficiary pays for utility costs.

Of course Chris has ideas because he can solve any problem!  Let's make "coordinated transmission working groups" to change the siting dynamic, "transmission NIMBYism" and community involvement.  You mean Interstate Transmission Line Sighting Compacts?  Yeah, that hasn't worked in 15 years.  Why?  Because no state wants to subject itself to mob rule of other states.  Just because Chris has suddenly found the interstate compact idea doesn't mean it can suddenly work.  It won't work. 

Next idea...
In addition to state input, there should be back-stop federal authority when transmission projects reach an impasse. The 2005 Federal Power Act attempted to give FERC this authority, but the rule framework was convoluted and limited in scope, leading to several court challenges. Through a clearer and more definitive act of Congress, FERC can serve as the final decision-maker when a transmission project cannot garner all permits from state and local authorities, or the permitting process is delayed beyond a year.
If the majority of a transmission line’s route has received proper permits, but a small portion has been denied or delayed by regulatory challenges, a transmission developer should be able to bring the case before FERC for final adjudication.

To address the aesthetic concerns of high voltage transmission lines, policy-makers can consider tax incentives or direct pay reimbursements for companies that bury their power lines near residences and towns or work with communities to design more aesthetically-pleasing structures.
To aid in the clean energy future, these incentives should only be available to power lines that predominately transfer renewable energy. This would allow transmission developers to accommodate the very real concerns of citizens and not break the bank.

Again, you're 15 years too late for this party, Chris.  Backstop siting authority didn't work because it was plain usurpation of state authority.  And Chris has made it even dumber with his plan for FERC to sit as some state transmission permitting court of appeals.  FERC has no such authority to overrule state permitting decisions.  Various iterations of FERC and special interests have been begging Congress to give FERC siting and permitting authority over electric transmission for years, but it's never even gotten close to happening.  It's unlikely to happen now, when Congress is at its most dysfunctional.  States do not want to give up their authority to the federal government.  End of story.

Chris also needs to learn that there is no such thing as a "power line that predominately transfers renewable energy."  Power lines are open access... electrons from all generators get mixed up and there's no way to separate them.  A transmission line cannot prevent "dirty" generators from using its line.

So who is all this propaganda directed at?  Your elected representatives.  If your elected representatives don't hear from you, they may believe Chris's lie that "most Americans" want huge increases in their electric bills to pay for new transmission lines in their own backyard that they'll have to fight in Washington, D.C. before people who have never set foot in their communities.  Make sure your elected representative hears the truth from you today!
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A Transmission Line In Every Back Yard:  The Democratic Vision For Overbuilding Electric Transmission

7/11/2020

1 Comment

 
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Our federal government is completely dysfunctional.  The two houses of Congress don't agree on anything and neither one is willing to give an inch.  As a result, nothing gets done except through Executive Order.

The Democrat-controlled House of Representatives is wasting its time creating, on paper, their own utopian vision of how our country should be, even though the legislation they produce is about as useful as a screen door on a submarine.  It's completely pointless, except as a roadmap for how things *could* be if the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress and the Presidency.  Their little committees have been hard at work, and their "House Select Committee on the CLIMATE CRISIS" (all caps because they're shouting, I guess) has just released a "report" entitled "Solving the Climate Crisis, The Congressional Action Plan for a Clean Energy Economy and a Healthy, Resilient and Just America."

Really?  The very small section on electric transmission that I read seemed more like a plan for an unjust, poor, and dark America.  I'm not quite sure how they crammed so much bad into just 6 pages.  Reads more like a renewable energy company lobbyist's wish list than a just and effective plan for electric transmission.  See for yourself -- and you only need read pages 51 - 57 of the report.

First, this section is premised on things that just aren't true.  It states that the cost of wind and solar have fallen dramatically, but they fail to mention how much federal production tax and investment tax credits have subsidized the cost of renewable energy.  What does it really cost without taxpayer handouts?  Not so cheap anymore, is it?  Nevertheless, these swamp creatures think we need to build some sort of "National Supergrid" (Macrogrid, anyone?) to act like the world's largest Energizer battery, to suck up renewable generation and deposit it thousands of miles away, just like magic.  Very expensive magic.  We'd get along just fine if we built renewables near load, and all loads have their own unique sources of renewable energy.  There is no place without renewable energy resources.

First thing the Democrats want to do is "modernize" the National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors (NIETCs) that were part of the Energy Policy Act of 2005.  These corridors, dreamed up by energy industry lobbyists as a "fix" for the poor maintenance and operation of the existing grid that caused a major blackout, were not designed for renewable energy transmission lines.  As if there even is such a thing... because the electric grid is a un-sortable mix of both "clean" and "dirty" electrons.  Once a transmission line is connected to the existing grid, it is "open access" to all generators who want to use it.  There is no such thing as a "clean" line.  And speaking of Clean Line...
To meet its climate goals, the country needs to build cross-state High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) transmission lines to significantly ramp up renewable electricity generation. The five HVDC transmission lines Clean Line Energy Partners unsuccessfully tried to develop to deliver renewable energy across the country are high-profile examples of these challenges.
This ridiculous report then had the audacity to footnote that with a reference to Russell Gold's hero-worship fantasy story about a failed energy idea (the whole book!).  The "challenge" that killed Clean Line Energy Partners had nothing to do with planning, permitting, or siting.  Clean Line Energy Partners could not find any customers to pay for service on its lines.  No customers, no revenue, no transmission line.  It's as simple as that (there, I saved you from reading a really awful book).

The report admits that NIETCs have been a miserable failure due to two separate federal court opinions that completely neutralized their use, hence the new brainfart to "modernize" them.  NIETCs, as currently written, task the U.S. Dept. of Energy with designating corridors for new transmission to connect areas rich in energy generation with areas of high population.  One of the corridors so designated once upon a time covered a long swath of the Mid-Atlantic and was designed to connect the Ohio Valley coal generation plants with the east coast cities.  Once a corridor is designated, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is anointed with "backstop siting authority" for a transmission line proposed for the corridor, in the event a state does not have authority to issue a permit for a new line in a corridor.  Except states do have authority to site and permit, and the court decided that a state's denial was the end of the road.  FERC could not preempt state authority in the event of a denial.

Changes to NIETCs include taking DOE out of the loop and allowing FERC to designate corridors that it will then have permitting and siting authority within.  This does away with any "checks and balances" that exist within the current split authority system.  In addition, FERC can only designate corridors that coincide with transmission projects proposed by energy companies.  This way, energy companies drive the entire NIETC program and may use it to ram through their transmission wish lists.  The Democrats think it works best like this.
... requiring DOE to designate broad areas as corridors before project proponents have developed specific, narrow proposals can strain relationships with landowners and communities. Allowing project proponents to apply for corridor designation after having laid the groundwork with landowners and communities may be better.
In what universe?  Project proponents are horrible at "laying the groundwork" with landowners and communities.  Nothing foments entrenched opposition to new transmission like an energy company telling them that they "need" a new transmission line through their home.  Instead, project proponents want to wield the authority of the federal government to designate corridors as a sledge hammer to beat down developing opposition.  This can't end well.

The NIETCs also have a new goal.  It's not just about transmission in general anymore... "the goals of the National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors program are to help achieve national climate goals, including enhancing the development, supply, or delivery of onshore and offshore renewable energy."

The new NIETCs are also about usurping the authority of states to site and permit electric transmission.
Consistent with requirements under NEPA, Congress should amend the Federal Power Act to clarify that FERC may exercise backstop siting authority for an interstate electric transmission facility within a National Interest Electric Transmission Corridor if one or more states have approved the project, but one or more states have denied the proposed project or have withheld approval for more than two years.
Under the new rules, if even one state approves a multi-state transmission project, then FERC may step in and take control of the siting and permitting process.  Other states crossed by the project would have no say in it and their authority would be preempted by FERC.  In this way, the Democrats want transmission siting and permitting to be a federal process, which removes the current state authority to site and permit.

Why would any state give up its transmission siting and permitting authority?  The new NIETCs are nothing more than heavy handed preemption of current state authority to allow project proponents to run roughshod over any state that resists their proposal.

Just in case the crushing new authority scenario doesn't work for you, the Democrats also want to create a new federal slush fund using your tax dollars so DOE can  bribe state, local, and tribal authorities to approve new transmission lines.  DOE could provide "economic development incentives" to entities that agree to approve the new transmission line within two years.  A host of federal acronym agencies will "offer" their expertise to review the transmission application for the local governments, and help to pay for the review.  It won't cost you a thing... except your soul.  Seriously though, this is merely a way to bribe your local government to throw you under the bus in exchange for cash for them.  The landowner doesn't benefit from these bribes, but local governments will be encouraged to sacrifice landowners in exchange for cash.  The biggest insult may be that this is YOUR cash the federal government is bribing your local government with!  The government doesn't have any money of its own... all its money comes from your pocket!

In keeping with the new federal theme, Democrats want FERC to develop a "National Policy on Transmission."  This "policy" is intended to "guide the decision-making of government officials at all levels as well as reviewing courts, the private sector, advocacy groups, and the general public."

As if the general public is going to be "guided" by some rent-seeking corporate transmission policy.  Not sure who the "advocacy groups" are supposed to be, but let's assume it's the big green NGOs whose private financiers have their own agenda to control your life.  The real scary one here, though, is the idea that some corporate lobbyist's self-serving "policy" is supposed to drive the judiciary.  The courts are our safety net against an overbearing and unjust government.  The courts guide the policymakers to keep their policies within the law and the limits of the Constitution, not the other way around.  The Democrats have lost all sense of democracy in their eagerness to "guide" the courts.  Our government is split into three branches for a reason just like this!

What do the Democrats think is in "the public interest?"
Congress should establish a National Transmission Policy to provide guidance to state and local officials and reviewing courts to clarify that it is in the public interest to expand transmission to facilitate a decarbonized electricity supply and enable greenhouse gas emissions. The policy statement should also encourage broad allocation of costs. Congress should amend Section 111(d) of PURPA to require consideration of the national benefits outlined in the National Policy on Transmission in any proceeding to review an application to site bulk electric transmission system facilities.

First, let's get the comedy out of the way...  Democrats want to "enable greenhouse gas emissions."  Well, gosh, fellas, then let's start mining more coal!  *can't even produce a report without serious typos*

Now, let's think about how this mandate of federal considerations conflicts with existing state laws.  Each state with transmission permitting and siting authority is doing so in accordance with their own state laws.  It is up to the states to decide if they want to make federal policy part of their transmission application considerations.  This idea doesn't work.

And, hey, look what they tossed in this section... The policy statement should also encourage broad allocation of costs.  This idea is sprinkled liberally (haha) throughout the report.  Democrats want to spread the cost of new transmission over a broader pool of captive electric ratepayers.  Currently, transmission is paid for by its beneficiaries.  Benefits are pretty concrete, such as lower costs, needed reliability, or state public policy requirements (and within this subset, only the citizens of a state are responsible for its public policy transmission cost -- a state cannot shift the cost of its public policy requirements onto citizens of another state).

But what's the real reason for broader cost allocation?  It's because building all this new transmission is going to be astronomically expensive!  If they left current cost allocation practices in place, people would notice a huge increase in their electric bills.  They would notice how much all this new transmission costs.  However, if they can spread it around to more people by inventing new "benefits" for everyone, then it's less likely to be noticed.

Once the Democrats have diluted the costs by spreading them among more consumers, they also plan to increase the costs by allocating the cost of connecting new generators to consumers.  Currently, FERC's policy assigns not only the cost of interconnecting the generator to the system, but also the costs of upgrades needed in the regional network caused by the interconnection, to the new generator.  It's been this way for a long time.  When someone builds a new electric generator, it's a commercial enterprise to sell electricity for a profit.  It's up to the generator to pay its cost to connect to the system, and also for any upgrades to the system it causes to be necessary.  It would be like building a new widget factory -- the factory pays for its costs to build the factory and any private driveways it needs to connect to the public road system.  If the factory has so much traffic that the public road needs to be widened, the factory would have to pay for that, too.  The public shouldn't have to pay for a private corporation's burden on their road system when the corporation is making money by having that connection.  The same is true of electric generators.  But now the Democrats want the public to pay for grid upgrades made necessary by new generators making a profit selling electricity.  The current policy ensures that new generators are sited in the most economic places, instead of willy-nilly all over the place.  If a generator has to consider the cost of upgrades it may make necessary, perhaps it would site its new generator in a different spot near existing strong connections to minimize its upgrade costs.  The Democrats want to do away with this important safeguard so that new generators can be built anywhere without any economic considerations because consumers are paying the cost of the upgrades.  This is bad policy and will result in higher electricity costs.

The Democrats also want government incentives to increase the capacity of existing transmission lines.  This isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's just bad execution.  The Democrats' idea is based on a fallacy... "Over the last few years, the costs caused by transmission congestion have been increasing."  This isn't universally true.  In fact, in the PJM Interconnection region, congestion costs have been decreasing over the past few years.  In addition, the Democrats want to create a "shared savings" incentive whereby the transmission owner keeps a share of the "savings" created by increasing the capacity of existing lines.  Sounds reasonable, until you realize that their share is based on the projected savings, not the actual savings.  So, a transmission owner could tell you its project would save ten hundred bajillion dollars and then charge you its share of that amount.  There will be no measurement to verify that consumers actually saved a dime.  Why not just write these fellas a blank check from the Electric Consumer Savings and Loan?

Another bad Democratic idea is mandating interregional planning of new transmission lines.  Currently, each interconnection region plans transmission that serves needs within its own region.  That's what they're supposed to do.  FERC has also tried to get them to plan for joint projects that bring benefits to more than one region, but it hasn't worked in practice.  Why?  Because nobody needs interregional transmission lines, and nobody wants to pay for them.  Interregional transmission lines don't benefit both regions equally.  One region's consumers receive the energy (benefits!) while one region's consumers receive nothing (exporting energy is only a benefit to energy corporations, not consumers).

The Democrats' plan is so bad that they want regional grid planners to develop plans that "proactively plan transmission lines in anticipation of renewable energy development."  It's not about building transmission lines that are needed, it's about building transmission lines that are not currently needed with the hope that someday they will be needed.  What the everliving spit would we do that for?  Transmission is not only incredibly expensive, it also takes private property using eminent domain and violates the sanctity of people's homes.  Why would we do that for transmission that's not even needed?  Sounds like some Congressional Committee got a little too big for their britches, doesn't it?

But wait, they're not done yet!
Congress should provide financial support for priority HVDC transmission lines, such as through an ITC. Congress should provide an option for direct pay for the tax credit.
Democrats want to use taxpayer funds to pay money to transmission developers for building new lines.  Wait... who thought this was a good idea?  The current tax credits for renewable energy generators are costing taxpayers billions.  Is there some money fountain spewing in Washington, D.C., that we don't know about?  In addition, all of the long-distance HVDC transmission lines that have been proposed to date have been merchant transmission projects.  That means that all the risk of building them goes to their owners and investors.  A transmission project with a mandated public revenue stream cannot be a merchant transmission project because that would shift risk from the project to the ones who pay that revenue stream (taxpayers).  This idea just doesn't work.

The Democrats also want to create a national RTO/ISO to manage its new "national grid."  We already pay billions of dollars in our electric bills to support our regional RTO/ISOs.  This would add a whole new layer of costs to consumer electric bills.

What does this all add up to?  YOU CAN'T AFFORD IT!

And if you think you will somehow benefit from this federal effort to usurp state authority, you'll be thinking differently when these clowns propose a new transmission line across your property and your only venue to be heard is in Washington, D.C. 

If this is the Democrats' plan for electric transmission if we elect them to office in November, I won't be voting for them.  Think hard before you vote.  The electric bill and back yard you save just might be your own.
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The Truth About The Macrogrid Initiative

7/7/2020

8 Comments

 
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Renewable energy companies, transmission builders, and Bill Gates have come together to brainwash the American public into thinking that they need a "macrogrid."  And, of course, the mainstream media is only too eager to assist by publishing thoughtless propaganda designed to guide your thinking towards their goal.  Here's one of the first examples, from the Los Angeles Times.

Renewable energy has been using your tax dollars for years to build infrastructure that provides small amounts of intermittent energy.  Because they are financially rewarded with your money for building, they've built more than the people can use in certain areas, like the Midwest.  They have gobbled up a lot of the available transmission capacity to export their product to cities, where people expect all the benefits of energy without any of the sacrifice that goes along with creating it.  In order to keep building renewable energy generators in places where there is no need for the electricity, these piggish profiteers want to build a whole bunch of new transmission.  They presume if they can get their energy to populated areas, consumers will be forced to buy it.  Absolutely not true.  The populated areas are also busy building their own renewable infrastructure so they can create both renewable energy and economic development in their own cities, states, and regions.  We don't need new transmission to switch to renewable energy.  Even if we overbuild transmission, it doesn't mean distribution utilities in New Jersey will choose to buy wind energy generated in Iowa.

Let's take a look at the one-sided propaganda these racketeers are spreading.

1.  A macrogrid can save consumers billions of dollars per year.

THE TRUTH:   The "studies" that supposedly proved all these savings are skewed.  The biggest problem?  All renewables studied were terrestrial sources.  Offshore wind wasn't part of the study, although offshore wind provides the best source of wind power and is conveniently located near the largest population centers -- both coasts and the Great Lakes.  When offshore wind is removed from the equation, the best sources of wind become the Midwest, and the best sources of solar are the south and southwest.  But is it cost effective to build a gigantic new grid to move this generation to the population centers?  No, they already have a better source closer at hand.  I also don't trust the magic math taking place here that prices this new grid.  It's going to take a lot longer, and cost a lot more, than a bunch of scientists think it will.  None of these guys know the first thing about utility ratemaking.  And what are these scientists comparing their new utopia to in order to produce a "savings"?   The most expensive sources of energy they can find shipped the longest distance they can imagine on the most congested transmission lines they can find?  That's how magic math happens... change the variables until you arrive at the desired answer.  If we don't build a macrogrid and force people to use energy produced thousands of miles away, how much will energy prices actually rise?  But it's not really about the price of energy, it's about "climate change" and changing how we produce energy.  Telling the people that it's going to save them money on their power bill is a dirty lie.

2.  We can power our country with 100% renewable energy.

THE TRUTH:  Not feasible with today's technology.  Just the other day, the Midwest ISO ran into an issue with not having enough supply on a hot day.  This is a region that has built a lot of wind turbines.  But those turbines weren't producing when the region needed it most on a hot day.  Here's a graph showing the generation sources for MISO's power on a hot, summer afternoon.
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Without coal, gas and nukes, the power would have gone out. 

MISO was also importing more than 5,700MW of power from neighboring PJM Interconnection, the grid authority for a number of eastern states.  MISO was importing an astonishing 39% more power than scheduled from PJM in order to serve its load.  Here's a graph of the generation sources operating in PJM at that time.
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Again, coal, gas and nukes.  Without them, a good two thirds of the country would have blacked out yesterday afternoon.

These graphs show the cheapest resources available being dispatched in real time.  If renewables were cheap and available, MISO and PJM would have been using them.  The resources necessary to run everything on clean "renewable" energy do not exist.

However, some "studies" and "reports" have suggested a massive build out of new industrial wind and solar under the pretense that we can have enough renewables to meet load.  How much wind and solar does it look like we're going to need to meet peak load on a hot day?  This report calls for 62,626 square miles of new wind and solar installations.  For comparison, that's an area just a little bigger than the state of Georgia, and just a bit smaller than the state of Wisconsin.  Imagine the entire state of Georgia covered end to end, side to side, with industrial wind turbines and solar panels.  How much do you think that would cost?  And if the government keeps giving them tax credit handouts with our tax dollars, how much additional cost would that add?

The capacity factors for renewable energy are surprisingly low because they cannot store fuel on site to run when called.  When they produce energy, it's a happy accident, not on purpose.  Because renewable generators can only be counted on to produce energy a very small percentage of the time, you'd need to overbuild them by perhaps factor of 10.  Example:  If you need a generator with a dependable capacity of 100MW, you'd need 10 wind farms with a nameplate capacity of 100 MW each.  Even then, you're taking your chances that those resources would produce the power you need when you need it. 

Wind and solar are poor choices for a 100% carbon-free power source.

3.  Renewable energy provides jobs and we need jobs to restore our economy after Coronavirus.

THE TRUTH:  Are we supposed to spend money building stuff we don't need in order to create jobs?  That's absurd.  We build stuff we need, and jobs happen.  Why would we spend a bunch of money creating make work jobs building stuff we don't need?  The renewable energy industry isn't at any greater risk than any other industry in the wake of Coronavirus.  In fact, they seem to be getting additional help other industries aren't.  Because Coronavirus put a short pause on the renewable energy industry, the federal government has extended the amount of time they have to claim the fading production tax credit.  What other industries are getting taxpayer handouts for making things?  Are restaurants getting tax credits for each meal they sell?  Of course not.  Renewable energy, however, is getting a tax handout for each unit of power they generate for 10 years after being put in service.  Remember, that money they're earning comes directly from your pocket because the government does not have its own source of income.  All its income comes from you!

We've been subsidizing industrial wind and solar for decades.  At first, perhaps it needed a leg up to compete with conventional generation, but over time it developed an appetite for government handouts and now doesn't want to exist without them.  In fact, the renewable energy industry has asked the federal government to convert the tax credits it currently earns into straight up cash payments.  A tax credit is just that... a credit for the recipient's tax burden.  Because many renewable energy companies pay little taxes, they have been converting the credits they earn into cash by selling them to other corporations that can use them to reduce their tax liability.  But just like those companies that will convert your long-term legal settlement payments into instant cash, they only give you a portion of the value of the settlement (or tax credit) in exchange for some cash now.  Renewable energy companies don't want to lose the full value of tax credits they earn but can't use, so they want the government instead to just give them cash they can use.  Pretty bold, isn't it?

And then the industry speaks out of the other side of its mouth about how mature its industry is, how cheap the power they generate is, and how mainstream it's become.  They claim they are competitive with conventional generation.  If that is true, why do they still need a handout to stay in business?

Renewable energy companies have opportunely seized upon the Coronavirus crisis to pretend they can solve the economic crisis.  Never let a good crisis go to waste!

Renewable energy is back in business, and they're building things.  We don't need to give them more money to create new jobs... we need to concentrate on other industries that haven't fully re-opened in order to restore jobs.  We don't need to spend our money building out an existing industry.

4.  We need to "modernize" our grid.

THE TRUTH:  Our grid is adequate for its purpose.  Old lines and equipment are constantly re-built and upgraded.  Transmission operators and reliability organizations make sure the grid stays reliable.  They order fixes, re-builds, and new lines as needed.  Interestingly enough, this call to build a new "macrogrid" doesn't even contemplate fixing the existing lines, it just wants to build a new system to work in conjunction with the existing one.  If the existing one fails, it's going to take the new "macrogrid" down with it.  The macrogrid is about building new transmission to ship energy further from its point of generation.  It's got nothing to do with the existing grid.

And a couple more things about that crazy LA Times article...

It starts out talking about a newly built power line in operation.  It mentions that there was opposition to the project because it would "saddle energy consumers with unnecessary costs, degrade sensitive wildlife habitat and interrupt a series of gorgeous landscapes."  And then the Times points out that it was built anyhow.  Logic leap!  Just because the project was built doesn't mean it obviated all those concerns.  It merely means that those concerns were run over in the process of approving it.  Unnecessary costs and degradation of habitat and landscapes happened anyway.  Building it didn't make them disappear.

The article tells you that building billions of dollars of new transmission will make you less likely to catch Corona.  So will wearing a mask, and that's only going to cost you a buck.

Landowner concerns about eminent domain and sacrifice for the benefit of people far, far away are glossed over and minimized with the idea that if they don't accept it, we're all doomed.  The idea that we have to sacrifice something and may only choose which sacrifice to make is overblown.  We can have it all if we choose to build renewables near load.  It's as simple as that!

On the subject of Clean Line Energy Partners... that company failed because it had no customers.  It wasn't the fault of landowners or regulation.  Those things merely slowed the projects, they didn't kill them.  CLEP failed because there were no places "where the energy is needed."  If nobody needs imported "clean" power, why would we spend billions building new transmission?

The article points out that California, a huge importer of power, has plans for 100% clean electricity by 2045.  But what happened when California recently debated the issue of installing wind offshore?  The fishing industry, the U.S. Navy, and coastal residents got their shorts in a wad, claiming that offshore wind would hurt them.  Where does California plan to get its renewable energy if it doesn't make it in state?  Why, it plans to put those hurtful burdens on other states to produce it and export it to California.  The politically disconnected are ground zero.  This is the epitome of environmental injustice!  If you want renewable energy, you must sacrifice.  You!  Not someone else!  Only when these states are forced to make their own sacrifices will all the impossible clean energy goals begin to wane.

One more thing... this "macrogrid" has been proposed in one form or another ever since I've been doing the transmission thing... a dozen years now.   Except it's only recently been about "clean energy."  It used to be about moving coal-fired resources around the country "cheaply."  It's just been re-packaged to fit today's narrative.  It's not about "clean energy."  It's about building a whole bunch of transmission in order to make billions of dollars of profit at consumer expense.

And about the House Democrat's newly released climate plan?  Ahh... that's another blog post soon to come!  Keep checking back!
8 Comments

Not In Microsoft Bill's Yard

6/17/2020

5 Comments

 
NIMBY!

Super-rich Microsoft tycoon Bill Gates is funding a new initiative to brain wash the American people into believing they need a "national" transmission system.

Don't fall for it!

Of course, none of these new transmission lines would be in Bill's yard, they would be in yours!  He thinks you need a nationwide, high-voltage direct current (HVDC) network optimized for the nation's best wind and solar resources.
Thanks to generous support from Breakthrough Energy, an organization founded by Bill Gates that is working to expand clean energy investment and innovation, the Macro Grid Initiative will undertake wide-ranging educational efforts in support of transmission expansion to connect areas with low-cost renewable resources to centers of high electric demand. This can be accomplished by connecting grid regions like MISO, PJM and SPP.
Take a look at this propaganda group's maps of "America’s centers of high renewable resources".  What's missing?  Offshore wind.  Offshore wind doesn't exist in this group's scenario.  Why not?  Because offshore wind doesn't require a "national transmission system."  In fact, it requires very little new terrestrial transmission at all.  Now guess who's paying for this little brainwashing expedition, and who might benefit if they can succeed in making America dumber, and completely upend the way we plan and build transmission and generation in this country.

And how do they plan to do that?
The Macro Grid Initiative seeks to build public and policymaker support for a new policy and regulatory environment that recognizes the substantial nationwide benefits of new regional and interregional transmission. Priority areas include:

An expanded nationwide and eastern grid with a focus on the regions of MISO, PJM and SPP.

The next round of regional and interregional transmission planning.

A fully planned and integrated nationwide transmission system.

A new Federal Energy Regulatory Commission transmission planning rule.

Achieving the Macro Grid vision will require new policies at the federal, regional and state levels that recognize the substantial nationwide benefits of an interregionally connected transmission network.

New policies at the state and federal level?  Like usurping state jurisdiction to site and permit new transmission and planning the grid on a national level so that uncooperative states are run over in the process and affected landowners are left with nowhere to turn?  How else would they:
...reduce barriers to development...

...overcome the barriers to siting long-line transmission facilities...

...upgrade our nation's aging and creaky transmission network...

...connect all this clean energy to our homes...

...expand regional and interregional transmission...

... build a strong national power grid...
Barriers?  They mean you.  They mean hundreds of thousands of landowners whose private property will be condemned using eminent domain in order to place an unwanted transmission line on private property and generate a huge profit to the owner of the new transmission line.  Affected landowners will get nothing, not even one electron from the transmission line.  HVDC is an unbroken line from beginning to end and requires outrageously expensive substations to convert it from DC to AC in order to connect with our existing transmission system.  It's an electric highway on your property that you cannot use.  Landowner payments are merely compensation for the market value of the land taken.  They are an attempt to make landowners whole, not to realize any sort of profit.

Creaking?  I've honestly never heard a transmission line creak.  It whines, it hums, it crackles.  It doesn't creak.  Replacing existing lines to upgrade conductors and equipment happens when needed because our system must remain reliable at all times.  This is so much crap. Bill's NIMBY initiative is about building NEW lines, not upgrading existing ones.

Instead of connecting centralized electric generation to our homes, people are increasingly installing their own electric generation on their homes.  Corporations are installing on-site renewables on their stores, offices, and factories.  We don't need to "connect" anything, just generate our own clean energy!

And this one.  It deserves to be quoted in its entirety.
Michael Skelly, Founder, Clean Line Energy Partners; Senior Advisor, Lazard:
"Building out our grid brings jobs, efficient markets, and cheaper and cleaner power. No individual or company can do this alone. But together with a broad public and policy maker consensus I have no doubt it can and will be done. I'm excited to see ACORE and ACEG's Macro Grid Initiative take on this important effort."

YOU FAILED, Michael Skelly!  You proposed building the same kind of "national" grid a decade ago, and you failed miserably after wasting $200M of investor's money.  (Bill Gates beware!)  A national grid isn't feasible.  It's not what the people want.

Why not?  Because they want to build renewable generation for clean energy in their own homes, neighborhoods, states and regions.  They don't want to create a hole in their own economy where they stop creating local energy and economic development and begin to send their energy dollars to other regions.  For example, let's look at New Jersey.

Yesterday, NJ Governor Phil Murphy announced plans to build a new port in Salem County to support the development of offshore wind farms off the Jersey Shore.  Officials say the New Jersey Wind Port will create 1,500 permanent jobs, generate $500 million in annual economic activity, and help the state reach its goal of gradually relying more on so-called clean energy.

Does Governor Murphy want to pay for an outrageously expensive "national grid" so he can import energy from other regions and cancel his port project?  My suspicions point to "no."

Likewise other eastern states, who plan to jumpstart their own economies by creating a robust offshore wind industry.

Nobody wants an exorbitantly expensive "national grid."  And if you need an example of how such an initiative will fail, maybe you can ask Michael Skelly?

Take your propaganda and shove it, ACORE.  Quit pretending you represent consumer interests, ACEG.  Everyone knows where you get your funding, and it's not from consumers.

And while we're at it, next time your crappy Microsoft PC gets infested with viruses and quits working, toss it in the dumpster and buy a MAC.  It might cost more upfront, but you won't have to buy a new computer every couple years.  Unlike his proposed "national grid" your boycott of Microsoft products will end up in Microsoft Bill's Yard.
5 Comments

Invenergy Decides Not to Compete With Itself in Missouri

6/14/2020

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Invenergy has pulled the plug on a wind farm in southwest Missouri that it has been planning for the past three years.
“Invenergy has decided to change course in Barry County,” said Meredith Jeffrey, manager of renewable development for Invenergy, in a statement to The Times.
That's it.  Oh, there's also some speculation about interference with air traffic and wildlife, but when has Invenergy ever cancelled its money-making plans because they caused community impacts?

Now that Invenergy is going hammer and tongs on its Grain Belt Express transmission line to ship wind energy from "better places farther west with fewer people that are better suited", it has bagged its plan to build wind in Missouri.  After all, why compete with itself and let Missourians partake of wind energy produced in their own state?  Isn't it better for Missouri communities to pay Invenergy a bunch of money to create wind energy elsewhere and import it to Missouri?  That idea has worked so well for goods manufactured in China, hasn't it?  Things are so cheap!  But a lot of local jobs dried up and the imports can't be depended upon.

Sorry, City of Monett, you're going to have to buy service on the Grain Belt Express if you want wind energy.  You can't have locally produced power.
As an electric service provider, the City of Monett is interested in renewable energy and expanding our resource mix that already includes wind, gas and coal resources. The city may have an interest in procuring a local source of wind energy, but we have to balance that with concerns for the operation and future expansion of our airport and electric generator’s potential impact on our airport tenants and users.
Well, isn't that hypocritical... the city and county officials want wind energy, but they don't exactly want it in their own backyard.
“The thing about this area is we’ve got the wind, but the demographics and geography just are not conducive for wind towers,” Schad said. “We’ve got too many small concentrations of homes and two airports. It’s not so good when you look at the details.”
Well, guess what?  None of the communities on the GBE route are conducive for transmission lines.  They've got too many concentrations of homes and airports.  But nobody seems to care about that when eminent domain has been granted.  And speaking of eminent domain, here's a whopper....
As power producers and not as a utility, the company’s activities did not fall under oversight by the Missouri Public Service Commission.
When Invenergy is a "power producer" it's not a utility.  But when it wants to build transmission to make its power production available at a different location,  it is magically a utility with eminent domain authority.

I'm not fooled.  A HVDC transmission line with no available connections except at an end point converter station acts more like a generator than a transmission line.  It injects large amounts of power to the grid at a fixed location.  It's not an open-access highway that will provide fixed-rate service for all customers who request it.  It will only provide service for customers who offer to pay the most.  That's not a public utility.

It remains to be seen if Invenergy will pack up its bindle and leave Missouri altogether when it finds out that Missourians want nothing to do with its GBE project either.  Landowners have been resisting this company for more than a decade.  They're not likely to cave in now.
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Never Let A Good Crisis Go To Waste

6/13/2020

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Industrial "renewable" energy builders, transmission companies, and their big, green NGO sycophants aren't about to let the Corona Crisis go to waste.  They've come up with a new "plan" to "rewire the U.S. for economic recovery."  That's right, we need to build new energy generation and transmission in order to recover from the Corona Crisis.  Only putting money in their pockets will get us on the road to recovery!

Smells like greed to me.

$1.7 trillion in "investment" could  reduce U.S. GHG by  27%.  Just 27%.  And guess who gets to pay for it all?  You do!

Seems like these greedmeisters are having a hard time building this stuff because the people not only don't want to pay for it, they don't want it on or near their property, either.  Therefore, in order to force this amazing Corona Crisis recovery, they've come up with a "plan" to change federal laws to force it on us.  Never let a good crisis go to waste!
Today’s grid operator and state regulatory approaches to transmission planning and generation interconnection are not up to the task of delivering a low-carbon grid at speed and scale.
Therefore, let's do away with state siting and permitting authority and allow FERC to do it for everyone.  After all, look how swell that's worked out for gas pipelines...
While 544 GW of renewable generation lies in wait to interconnect to high-voltage transmission systems – nearly half of the capacity needed to meet a 90 percent clean energy standard – these projects face unreasonably high barriers due to conventional interconnection rules. Rather than investing in transmission planning that would more efficiently serve society’s economic and policy goals, today’s rules typically require every new generation resource to separately pay grid upgrade costs to interconnect their power plant the system, when there would be far greater societal benefit to view transmission planning and upgrades with a more holistic regional perspective. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) should exercise its authority and expand its capacity to require regional transmission expansion and simplified interconnection rules that support the realities of society’s policy goals and a 90 percent by 2035 clean energy standard.
What's wrong with generation owners paying their cost to connect their for-profit enterprises to the existing electric highway system?  It's not like everyone pays for a driveway to some isolated commercial farm operation in order to give the owner a free way to get his products to market.  Renewable energy is no different... it should pay its own way to market.  That's why these rules exist in the first place.  If you site generation near transmission, your costs may be less, but you'd need to pay for any upgrades to the system caused by your commercial generation enterprise.  If you want to make money selling electric generation, you need to pay your own way to get it there.  But these folks want to build new, highly profitable generation way out in the middle of nowhere, and that's pretty expensive.  It makes the cost of their generation more expensive than others, and it cuts into their profits.  Instead, they want YOU to pay for their interconnection so they can make more money on the generation they build.
Transmission networks can be planned in advance to accommodate a sensible mix of very low-cost renewable resources, creating net benefits for customers, and Congress should reform FERC’s electric transmission authority to support the changing electricity system in a cost-effective manner. To begin, cost-allocation should be driven by analysis of the benefits and balanced by a consideration of the negative factors beyond direct cost (e.g., land-use impact, landscape degradation, habitat disruption). Congress could give FERC a clearer mandate to enforce and expand Order 1000 (FERC’s regional transmission planning order), by requiring timely plans, accounting for public policy in planning, and allocating regional costs to beneficiaries where regions fall short.
This is a whole bunch of regal words for giving FERC transmission siting and permitting authority and taking it away from states.  And that talk of benefits?  What benefits? 
Benefits should include quantifiable environmental, resilience, and public policy benefits, in addition to direct economic benefits. The basic idea is to codify the lax suggestions of FERC Order 1000. The Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) Multi-Value Projects methodology is a model to consider building upon.
No, it's not.  MISO's method tosses a bunch of junk in the "benefits" mix in order to pretend that "environmental benefits" save people money.  They don't.  They cost people money because they require the building of a bunch of unneeded, costly infrastructure that people pay for.  These "benefits" are not quantifiable.  They're not real.  They force everyone in the region to pay for the "environmental" laws of individual states.  The benefits are not distributed equally, but the costs sure are.

Their idea is to build a whole bunch of new transmission at your expense so that industrial renewable companies can build new generators in places where it's not currently economic to build.
...adopting a more comprehensive, proactive regional planning approach in the rest of the country could reduce interconnection queue waiting times and improve the risk for developers...
There ya go... reduce risk (and cost) for renewable generation developers by shifting risk and cost to captive electric ratepayers.
Congress could also push FERC to act on cost-allocation for new multi-state transmission lines. Though these lines do not feature prominently in the 2035 Report, their benefits are clear from other modeling exercises. For example, FERC should encourage high voltage inter-regional transmission to access least-cost (and clean) resources, by requiring regional Order 1000 Planning Authorities to develop compatible models (incorporating state energy resource plans) and pursue interregional transmission where benefits exceed costs. Alternatively, Congress could vest DOE with authority to plan large interregional lines, reducing complexity of coordinating planning between regions. A more holistic cost benefit analysis of this nature can also help address the most common reason many important transmission lines have failed: disagreements between states over how to fairly allocate costs. For multistate lines, FERC could require states denying a regionally beneficial line to demonstrate certain criteria are met to justify denial, similar to the rate design structure used in the Public Utility Regulatory Policy Act.
In other words, let's force states to use imported energy on new transmission lines and make it impossible for them to deny new projects.  Why is that?  Because states are developing local renewables that keep energy dollars working in their own state and create local economic development.  Should renewable generation and transmission developers be able to force a state to buy their product using the force of the federal government?

These shysters also want Congress to create a federal clean energy standard.  Currently, states set their own clean energy policy, and it works just fine.  It just doesn't allow the greedy developers to force states to buy their products.

So, with all that in mind, here's how these guys want to reform energy policy:
U.S. Congress Affirm FERC’s authority for transmission cost allocation and planning for public policy impacts to the grid, including regions outside of ISOs/RTOs. Give particular attention to the federal clean energy standard, or in its absence state and utility clean electricity goals. Make clear the intention to reduce interconnection queue times and require beneficiary customers to pay their fair share.

U.S. Congress
Provide states with matching funds to pay for interstate transmission lines with demonstrable reliability, cost, and renewable integration benefits. Consider vesting DOE with authority to plan for and site interregional transmission lines to streamline development of the nation’s most crucial and beneficial long-distance transmission projects.

FERC
Exercise authority to require regional transmission expansion and simplified interconnection rules that support the realities of society’s policy goals and a 90% by 2035 clean energy standard.

FERC
Require regional Planning Authorities to develop compatible models (incorporating state energy resource plans) and pursue transmission where benefits exceed costs. Require states denying a regionally beneficial line to demonstrate certain criteria are met to justify denial.

FERC
Require regional transmission planning bodies created under FERC Order 1000 to propose to FERC multi-value transmission projects, accounting for state and federal clean energy policies, with Federal authority to promulgate a cost allocation methodology where regions fail to act.

They also want to "extend federal clean energy investment and production tax credits and conversion to more liquid incentives, and extend these incentives to battery storage."  In other words, forget the tax credits, these fellas now want cold, hard cash for generating energy that nobody wants.
Wait... I thought this was about recovering from the Corona Crisis?  This isn't about Corona at all.  It's a renewable energy and transmission lobbyist's wish list to make a whole bunch of money.  Never let a good crisis go to waste!

Be careful in the voting booth this November if you don't want electricity to become a luxury that you can no longer afford.
0 Comments

Inside The Fake News Sausage Factory

4/20/2020

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Maybe there's a whole bunch of of unsold books moldering in Russell Gold's basement?  What other reason would there be to create fake news plugging a book you wrote that was published last year?  That seems to be what happened last week on Twitter.
Picture
See that article he quoted in the original post.  Here it is.
It's not a very long article, around 250 words.  Probably takes all of a minute to read, if that.  But it looks like Russell didn't bother to read the article before tweeting.  He tries to blame the closure of the "wind turbine factory" on Arkansas' Congressional Delegation (who, BTW, seem to be busy with real stuff and couldn't be bothered to play the fake news game with Russell or the reporter from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette).

Here's what the article said about why the "factory" is closing.
The decision to close the site wasn’t a result of the coronavirus pandemic, the company said. Rather, the industry is moving toward wind turbine blades larger than the 44- and 62-meter blades made at the Little Rock facility in order to bring down the cost of renewable energy, according to the spokesman.
The factory is closing because it cannot manufacture blades large enough for new wind farms.  It has nothing to do with elected officials, and it has absolutely nothing to do with the failure of the Plains & Eastern Clean Line.

But Russell said the closure was "the consequences of political decisions."  And some reporter with little to do tried to gin up a fake news story using Russell's made up "news" about the factory closure, instead of actually asking the people at the factory (or reading their own dang story on the closure, for goodness sake!).  To add absurdity to insanity, Michael Skelly was reached for comment.
In an interview Friday, Skelly said the wind farms would have required 3,500 to 4,000 blades. The Little Rock factory would have had plenty of business, he added.

Opposition from the state's two Republican U.S. senators, John Boozman of Rogers and Tom Cotton of Dardanelle, played a major part in derailing the effort, Skelly said.

"They tried to pass a law in the United States Senate that would kill the project," Skelly said. "That does have a chilling effect on a project and on customers for a project, more specifically."

Except, according to the factory (and a prior news story) the Little Rock factory could not have made blades big enough to supply the fabled wind farms of the Plains & Eastern Clean Line.  The factory would not have had any business even if the project had been successful and would likely be closing anyhow.

And except that the legislation introduced by Boozman and Cotton was not successful and played no part in derailing Skelly's transmission project.  The project failed because there were no customers.  It's as simple as that.  It wasn't wanted or needed.  It was a stupid idea that wasted hundreds of millions of dollars of investor cash.  Plains & Eastern had no customers before Boozman and Cotton introduced legislation, and they still had no customers afterwards.  There's no proof that the legislation had any role in driving away customers.  I'm pretty sure they could have escaped any contract if the legislation had been enacted, but it never even got close, not really.

Skelly is still making excuses for why he failed.  It's always someone else's fault.  Might as well be, since he wasted someone else's money on it.

This is one guilt trip that has no passengers.  Nobody cares anymore.  Good luck selling any moldy leftover books!
0 Comments

The Biggest Transmission Lies Renewable Energy Tells Itself

4/11/2020

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Renewable energy writers are also suffering from Covid Ennui, if this transmission wish list is any indication.  The article profiles seven possible transmission projects "for renewables" and posits that if any of them are built it could "unlock a renewable energy bounty." 

Unlikely, and here's why.  The article is based on a foundation of stale lies the renewable energy industry continues to peddle.
  • ... big U.S. transmission projects seeking to carry wind and solar power from where it’s most cost-effectively generated to where it’s needed the most.
Where it's needed the most?  Where is that, exactly?  Who "needs" renewable energy the most?  And why is this renewable energy not generated near "need"?  It's no longer true (if it ever was) that most renewable energy is generated far from load.  The places "where it's needed most" all seem to be dense population centers on both coasts.  And guess what?  These places on the east coast are going gung-ho on building offshore wind and transmission to connect it.  This generation can be built within 12 miles of the cities "where it's needed most," although most of them are proposing to put it at least 30 miles offshore so they don't have to look at the generators.  The biggest battle seems to be connecting it at the shoreline.  Does it even make sense to avoid that battle in favor of new transmission from the west, thousands of miles long?  No, it does not.  New transmission to ship renewable generation to the east coast no longer makes sense, and furthermore, the ones "who need it most" aren't buying it.  Giant transmission lines from the Midwest are pretty much dead.

But, but, but...
  • The case for new multistate transmission lines has never been clearer. A growing number of states and utilities have set 100-percent-clean-energy goals, albeit with no obvious path to generating all that power close to home. The gap is growing between the transmission network’s capacity and the need to link wind farms in the Great Plains and Intermountain West, solar farms in the Southwest and hydropower resources in eastern Canada to other regions hungry for carbon-free energy.  
Some states that have set renewable energy targets actually have no idea where their "clean" energy is going to come from?  Isn't that a rather naive notion?  These states are not setting targets and then sitting back to wait for the energy industry to find ways to deliver it to them.  It is the energy industry that is eagerly proposing that these states get their renewable energy targets met with new generators in other regions and new long-distance transmission lines.  The states actually do have plans to make their goals happen, and they don't rely on passive sloth while the energy industry finds ways to meet the goals.  The energy industry is eager to provide these states with renewables from other regions using new transmission lines because that's how the industry makes money.  The industry figures if they can only make these states captive consumers of renewables from other regions that they can reap huge profits.  That's the only "need" and it's actually just greed.  There is no "need" to link wind farms in the Great Plains to "regions hungry for carbon-free energy."  These hungry regions actually aren't that hungry.  They brought their own lunch to the picnic.  The "hungry" regions want to develop their own renewables and the economic boost that comes from them, not send all their energy dollars to some other region.  They may be hungry, but they're not starving.
  • Transmission projects can be derailed at many points in their decade-long timeframes from conception to completion. Failure to gain regulatory approval from every state they cross, public opposition from environmental groups and communities worried about their negative impacts, or the refusal of any landowner along their path to cooperate are ever-present risks and have led to several high-profile project failures.
Wait a minute here... you actually think that one objecting landowner can derail an entire transmission project?  You make it seem like new transmission easements are voluntary on the part of landowners.  Are you truly unaware that transmission developers have proposed using eminent domain to acquire easements for multi-region projects that benefit other regions?  I'm not sure who you think believes this lie.  Also the idea that environmental groups oppose transmission "for renewables" is ludicrous.  Environmental groups love new transmission "for renewables".  They only oppose transmission for energy sources they don't like.  It's about the energy sources, not the transmission.

The real reason big transmission "for renewables" has failed is because these purportedly "hungry" regions don't want to buy the generation.  Transmission for renewables doesn't have customers.  Utilities have not signed up for service on new merchant transmission proposals.  This is the reason Clean Line failed.  It had no customers.  And even though they sold off their projects, the projects will still fail because they have no customers (looking at you, Grain Belt Express).

And then the article purports that there are at least 7 projects still "moving ahead."  My take on this list is that maybe only 3 of these 7 projects have any chance of actually happening.  The viable ones?  They're buried on existing rights of way.... SOO Green, The New England Clean Power Link, and the Champlain Hudson Power Express.  But buried projects are more expensive, and that may price them out of the game when a hungry region can build its own renewables at a competitive price.

What is renewable, "clean" energy worth to the hungry, anyhow?  Do they only want to be "clean" when they can foist the cost of their cleanliness onto other regions?  Is there a price point where a hungry region decides to just be dirty instead?  Instead you've got energy companies competing to be the cheapest option, and they're cutting costs by building cheaper generation in other regions and using eminent domain to acquire easements for new overhead transmission.  It's not that this energy is any cheaper, it's just that someone else is paying its true cost.  Overhead transmission on new rights of way is the hardest transmission to build because it receives the most opposition.  Opposition is costly in both time and money.  Transmission with opposition can linger for years before being cancelled, and the longer it lingers, the more likely it will be cancelled.  Successfully building transmission after decades of opposition is a myth from a history book.  It's not going to happen in this decade.

When is the renewable energy industry going to quit fighting to build what they want, and start building what the customers want?  Maybe right after they quit lying to themselves.  Hungry regions want to build their own renewables.  The only long-distance transmission that's viable is buried on existing rights of way.  Renewables need to be priced at their true cost.
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Gimme cash!  I need to buy straws!

3/26/2020

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Who's missing the good old days of individually wrapped, single-use plastic drinking straws being handed out at restaurants now?  Would you really put your lips on a restaurant cup handed through the drive-in window right now?  But... straws are destroying the planet!  We must outlaw straws!  Seems like we've replaced the climate crisis with the COVID crisis.  A real-time threat instead of a dire prediction.  And maybe all the climate change hysteria has been shoved to the back of the rack right now in favor of dealing with the actual threat we're all living with.

Except all the "clean energy now" folks are still trying to push their agenda while holed up in their urban paradise.  Everyone has probably heard something related to an effort to include financial incentives for wind and solar in federal economic relief packages.  That's kind of like worrying about your single-use plastic straw destroying the planet when a pandemic is killing thousands.

Depending on your political persuasion, you may think the attempt to shove environmental wish lists into federal relief packages isn't happening.  But it is.

Here's a "wish list" for the American Wind Energy Association.  AWEA sent a letter to Congress urging them to provide "relief" to the renewable energy sector.  As if they're not part of the corporate world already included in relief packages?  For some reason they need special, additional relief.

While this whole economic crisis was winding up, so was my anxiety over how we'd ever pay for it all.  Maybe we need to cut some pork.  The billions of taxpayer dollars handed out each year to big wind and big solar in the form of renewable energy tax credits seems like a good place to start.  After all, this industry has claimed that it is competitive in energy markets without any subsidy.  Isn't it about time to make them put OUR money where their mouth is?

Perhaps the most disturbing "want" by AWEA is "the ability to receive direct payments for or refundability of our tax credits would keep our current pipeline of projects moving forward."  In other words, big wind doesn't even want tax credits anymore because their ability to monitize them by selling them to other corporations has been hit hard by the economy.  Instead, big wind and solar corporations simply want the cash.  Instead of a credit on the taxes they may pay, they want the government to just hand them cash because they're unlikely to pay enough taxes to cover the credits they're earning.

How come I'm not allowed to sell my own tax credits to other taxpayers?  Oh, that we all could receive a payment from the government instead of credits to our tax burden!  Forget all those write-offs I'm allowed on my tax return, just give me cash instead!    Except I never get more write-offs than I can use.  Big wind does.  Maybe we shouldn't lose sight of that fact.  It's not a mere tax credit, it's a source of income.

So, maybe big wind's wish list didn't make it into the most recent economic relief package.  There will be more relief to come, and that's where they're focusing right now.  As more relief comes, it's going to start to look more like corporate Christmas and less like actual relief for the American people who need it.

Keep your eyes on this one.  Greed knows no bounds.

Meanwhile, use a straw, folks.  Go ahead, live large!  I must admit I've been stockpiling them and carrying them around for more than a year.  Have you ever seen how they "wash" bar glasses?  Even before COVID-19 I wasn't a fan of sharing germs on poorly washed, reusable restaurant ware.  And now I've got nowhere to use my stockpile of straws because I'm certainly not eating any food prepared by someone else.  No straws needed!

Yes, this too shall pass, and eventually I can enjoy a meal out again.  I have straws at the ready.  But will I ever look at the "climate crisis" as a real, imminent threat again?  Probably not.  The dangers of climate change have paled in comparison to the present threat.  And that presents a problem to the renewable energy industry, whose power to scare or shame people into submission has paled as well.

Perceptions have changed.  The money buffet may just be closed forever.
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Making America Dumber, One Reader At A Time

2/26/2020

1 Comment

 
This Letter to the Editor popped up in my news feed.  Not even sure why I bothered to read it.  It was probably the same emotion that makes people look at train wrecks.  The letter is a train wreck.

"We have the technical foundation to power the US by electricity right now" screamed the headline.

Huh?  *scratches head*  We've been powering the US with electricity for more than a century.  This is news?

It begins like this:
There has been a spate of gas and oil company ads heralding their fight against global warming. They produce ever-greater greenhouse gas emissions and want credit for doing it more cleanly.

They claim natural gas is a bridge fuel while building new pipelines soon to lie uselessly in the ground. They could use their assets, tax subsidies and ratepayers’ money to electrify every home, business and vehicle very quickly.
What?  Oil and gas companies have ratepayers?  Maybe gas companies, but those ratepayers wouldn't be paying the cost to electrify vehicles (homes and businesses have already been electrified over the past century).  What is this guy going on about?  It makes no sense...

Oh, here we go...
Many believe the wind does not blow all the time. In fact, there are many, many places throughout the world where it does blow and blow strongly all the time. The Oklahoma panhandle produces thousands of megawatts. Vast quantities of constant strong wind off the New England coast are being developed now. Giant turbines driven by 120 feet blades produce constant electric power from wind which costs nothing. Direct current transmission lines deliver power efficiently over long distances. We have the technical know how and the construction capacity to power the United States by electricity now.
News flash... the wind, in fact, does not blow all the time, especially on land.  Who wonders if this writer has ever even been to the Oklahoma panhandle?  Where did he get such a ridiculous idea?  Wind does not produce "constant electric power."  In fact, it's quite intermittent and requires back up generation to smooth out the peaks and valleys of its variability.  Probably gas plants, which need gas lines.  Wind costs nothing?  Of course it costs something to generate wind power, even if the fuel is free.  The infrastructure has an enormous cost compared to the small amount of energy produced.  As well, turning uncluttered paradise and prime farm land into industrial power plants creates a huge cost to the environment and farming operations.

Oh, wait... there it is... direct current transmission lines!  They're so wonderful, right?  Private highways cutting a scar across states that get no benefit in order to ship "clean" energy thousands of miles away where it can power the computer used to write this drivel.

So, what are we supposed to do?
Skeptical, add solar and new pocket nuclear stations to the mix. Why squander billions of tax and customer dollars on new gas infrastructures while electrification is happening? Will these fossil fuel giants delay so long as to cause great climate damage while building useless stranded assets?
Build industrial solar and new nukes (just so long as you don't build them in the backyard of this writer).  Don't build any more gas infrastructure, just power everything with electricity.  Where does electricity come from?  Predominately from gas these days.

This guy's suggestions are about as useful as a screen door on a submarine.  Logic leap, anyone?

How did this poor guy get so confused?
Please read Wall Street Journal reporter’s, Russell Gold’s, book, Superpower, One Man’s Quest to Transform American Energy.
Ah, so there's the source of the problem.  Making America dumber, one reader at a time.
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    About the Author

    Keryn Newman blogs here at StopPATH WV about energy issues, transmission policy, misguided regulation, our greedy energy companies and their corporate spin.
    In 2008, AEP & Allegheny Energy's PATH joint venture used their transmission line routing etch-a-sketch to draw a 765kV line across the street from her house. Oooops! And the rest is history.

    About
    StopPATH Blog

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