More BS from the greenies...

[TFOGGER]

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/06/21/worlds-first-247-solar-power-plant-powers-75000-homes-for-3-hours-per-day/



I have to assume that this is a typo:The tower produces 110 megawatts of energy for 12 hours a day according to the company, which works out to roughly 1 million megawatts per year.
Surely they mean 1 million megawatt-hours per year… But, then again, I doubt the EcoWatch “journalist” knows or even cares about the difference between megawatts and megawatt-hours. And there’s a bit of a math problem
110 MW * 12 hr/day * 365 days/yr = 481,800 MWh/yr
481,800 is not roughly 1 million.
This power plant (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crescent_Dunes_Solar_Energy_Project) cost $975,000,000 to build ($8.9 million per MW, ten times the cost of a natural gas fired power plant). Taxpayers are on the hook for 76% of this cost through Federal loan guarantees. The 25-yr wholesale price guarantee of $135/MWh, about 30% higher than the average US retail price (all sectors (https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.cfm?t=epmt_5_6_a)). This is the “good news.”
While the plant has barely started operating, there is some production history (http://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/browser/#/plant/57275).
https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/crescent-dunes2.png?w=720


Soooo... even at full capacity, it will produce less than half of what they claimed, and to date it's never run at more than about 25%...so it cost almost a billion dollars to build a plant that produces around 12.5 percent of the power it was supposed to...


Math is hard for liberals...

[BPTactical]

You think math is hard for liberals?
Try them with truth and facts!
Their heads will explode like a zit on a 14 year old.

[DavieD55]

Meanwhile in leftist kalifonya they're having power shortages and are expecting up to 14 days without power in some places.

[ColoradoTJ]

On a recent trip out to Southern California, I was totally shocked at how many solar projects are being constructed.

I will comment on this after I drop my kids off.

[roberth]

Natural gas and coal are available 24x7. Wind and solar cannot even begin to match that availability nor can they match the low cost of natural gas and coal. Wind and solar need batteries to get to 24x7 coverage, creation and disposal of toxic batteries is something else the left ignores.

Solar is pretty good on the individual home except the for the subsidies paid by the net tax payer directly to the people who get solar. Dump the subsidy and watch all these solar companies go under.

Wind energy was a waste of time and material and skill from the git-go, much less treat as a viable source of energy. Don't bring up the bird kill caused by wind farms, the nature nazis won't hear it.

[DavieD55]

Natural gas and coal are available 24x7. Wind and solar cannot even begin to match that availability nor can they match the low cost of natural gas and coal. Wind and solar need batteries to get to 24x7 coverage, creation and disposal of toxic batteries is something else the left ignores.

Solar is pretty good on the individual home except the for the subsidies paid by the net tax payer directly to the people who get solar. Dump the subsidy and watch all these solar companies go under.

Wind energy was a waste of time and material and skill from the git-go, much less treat as a viable source of energy. Don't bring up the bird kill caused by wind farms, the nature nazis won't hear it.


And the communists are attempting to ban all oil and gas production in colorado with Initiative 78

http://www.journal-advocate.com/sterling-editorials/ci_29981713/denver-post-initiative-78-would-ban-oil-gas.

[TFOGGER]

They also announced the decommissioning of the Diablo Canyon nuke plant, the last remaining nuclear power plant in California (although not until 2025).

[TFOGGER]

Natural gas and coal are available 24x7. Wind and solar cannot even begin to match that availability nor can they match the low cost of natural gas and coal. Wind and solar need batteries to get to 24x7 coverage, creation and disposal of toxic batteries is something else the left ignores.

Solar is pretty good on the individual home except the for the subsidies paid by the net tax payer directly to the people who get solar. Dump the subsidy and watch all these solar companies go under.

Wind energy was a waste of time and material and skill from the git-go, much less treat as a viable source of energy. Don't bring up the bird kill caused by wind farms, the nature nazis won't hear it.

The whole point of this particular project was to store the energy as heat (molten salt) for use during time of demand and limited or no production. Unfortunately, the results have been less than spectacular, and the cost has been astronomical.

[ColoradoTJ]

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/06/21/worlds-first-247-solar-power-plant-powers-75000-homes-for-3-hours-per-day/



Soooo... even at full capacity, it will produce less than half of what they claimed, and to date it's never run at more than about 25%...so it cost almost a billion dollars to build a plant that produces around 12.5 percent of the power it was supposed to...


Math is hard for liberals...


Math is hard for Conservatives as well I guess.

So if anyone actually read the article on this solar project, it is actually pretty cool and cost effective. I will get into that a little later.

https://ecowatch.com/2016/06/20/crescent-dunes-concentrated-solar/

Since the whatsupwiththat.com cherry picked from the article, we should put facts out there. The plant is a 24-7 operating power plant, and very cool to boot. So the original article that says close to 1 million megawatt hours per year....well it would be 963,600 MWH if an outage is never had (that is never happening). Usually a steam turbine requires at least a borescope
inspection every 25, 50, 75K hours and a major inspection (B inspection) every 100K operating hours. A few things go into that calculation (Life factor/hours of operation/start ups).

Now, for the cost:

Personally, I think Solar and Hydro are the best renewable energy sources we have today. I am not a huge fan of wind turbines since they are not very reliable since we all cannot make the wind blow. To be fair, water is not always needed or available either, and a few clouds in the sky can really reduce the output of solar. I see this every day at work, and it is not fun to deal with.

In some of these states that has to import most of their power (CA), they get some really expensive power. I have a few buddies in AZ that sell power to CA for over 650.00 per MWH from various sources. That 135.00 is looking pretty cheap now isn't it? This is not a daily cost, and the real time marketers buy and sell power to get the best deal. Fuel prices are usually locked in on Coal due to long term purchase agreements (let's just say 18.00 per ton of Powder River Basin coal), but Natural gas is traded daily and can vary rather quickly. Right now, NG is trading at a very lucrative price. I can't say how much (I like my job). With all this solar being built, this has been an issue with other units. Companies are backing down units to allow room for the solar. Then a cloud cover comes over and then these units have to ramp up to cover the lost generation. California has over 5000MW of solar. Arizona Power & Light has to deal with 400MW of solar coming on in the morning, and what I have been hearing from friends it has been interesting to say the least.


Here is the ass kicker. With all the new regulations coming in 2017 with coal fired power plants, there are quite a few just moth balling them and building combined cycle plants (whom do you think will absorb that cost?). For the companies that are installing Scrubbers to keep operating (usually 100-150M per unit to scrub), there is an added cost. Combined cycles have a way better heat rate, fuel is cheaper (for now), and in most cases do not need an SCR (scrubber/catalyst for NOx), cost is cheaper to build as well. So what happens when coal plants are not around? Think NG is going to spike up? You bet your ass they will....and whom do you think will pay for this cost?

Get ready Ladies and Gentlemen, 2017-19 should get pretty interesting. For now, I am really glad I live in a Municipal owned utility. The cost difference from just outside the Colorado Springs service area is an eye opener for me (parents live in Canon City, co-workers that live in Pueblo or Monument).

[TFOGGER]

I'm not saying Solar is not the way to go, just that this particular project has yet to produce even a large fraction of what it was designed to(much like many nuke plants), yet the greenies are hailing it as a huge success. Conceptually, this design has considerable merit, but it has not yet realized that potential.

Photovoltaic generation, on the other hand, is a deep dark rabbit hole. Between the ecological impacts and energy required to manufacture the systems make these unworkable on a large scale, and uneconomical for most applications on a smaller scale.

[ColoradoTJ]

I'm not saying Solar is not the way to go, just that this particular project has yet to produce even a large fraction of what it was designed to(much like many nuke plants), yet the greenies are hailing it as a huge success. Conceptually, this design has considerable merit, but it has not yet realized that potential.

Oh I agree with you. When people don't have power...holy hell. Here is another ass kicker. What do you think a person in a low income family pays in CA for electricity per month? 18.00. I totally crapped when I heard that.

Give it time to work out the bugs. The plant I run took a few years to make it all be reliable and cost effective. The website is what I was debating, not you personally.

[Not_A_Llama]

To be entirely fair:
The 480 MWh vs 1 Million MWh figure comes from Ecowatch, not the project
$737mm is DOE loan guarantees if the project fails
Nov-Mar generation is all that's available so far; not really max gen in the solar space
The solar-thermal play does help even out the renewable capacity gap

$135/MWh peak on a PPA... I'm not honestly sure who's getting the deal there. Expectation with solar ramp-up in the next couple decades is for an anti-peak to start forming in certain congested nodes.
As reliance on solar increases, it should be interesting to see a lot of the recent baseload CC Nat Gas generation fall into more of a spinning reserves type role.

[TFOGGER]

Oh I agree with you. When people don't have power...holy hell. Here is another ass kicker. What do you think a person in a low income family pays in CA for electricity per month? 18.00. I totally crapped when I heard that.

Give it time to work out the bugs. The plant I run took a few years to make it all be reliable and cost effective. The website is what I was debating, not you personally.

I welcome informed debate, particularly from someone that has inside knowledge of the subject that can help educate me! [Beer]

[Zundfolge]

You think math is hard for liberals?
Try them with truth and facts!
Their heads will explode like a zit on a 14 year old.

Want to anger a conservative? Lie to them.
Want to anger a liberal? Tell them the truth.

[Great-Kazoo]

Oh I agree with you. When people don't have power...holy hell. Here is another ass kicker. What do you think a person (That works, who subsidizes) a low income family pays in CA for electricity per month? 18.00. I totally crapped when I heard that.

Give it time to work out the bugs. The plant I run took a few years to make it all be reliable and cost effective. The website is what I was debating, not you personally.


CA has so many "safety nets" for everyone. BUT the working / taxed who carry the burden of everyone else.

Their latest "gem" is Registration of wood & pellet stoves. Naturally an additional "fee' added to purchase of said item.

[BPTactical]

Want to anger a conservative? Lie to them.
Want to anger a liberal? Tell them the truth.

Are bumper stickers available?

[Wulf202]

Are bumper stickers available?
PM mazin

[ColoradoTJ]

$135/MWh peak on a PPA... I'm not honestly sure who's getting the deal there. Expectation with solar ramp-up in the next couple decades is for an anti-peak to start forming in certain congested nodes.
As reliance on solar increases, it should be interesting to see a lot of the recent baseload CC Nat Gas generation fall into more of a spinning reserves type role.

This has already happened, or cycling on a daily basis. This all depends if a merchant vs utility and what your portfolio looks like. Most markets, run an economic dispatch to run the cheapest plant at the top, then followed by the next most efficient...and so on. This will for sure be interesting on how the market is changed, better or worse.

[Aloha_Shooter]

Green is the new Red. That's all.

[HoneyBadger]

Oh I agree with you. When people don't have power...holy hell. Here is another ass kicker. What do you think a person in a low income family pays in CA for electricity per month? 18.00. I totally crapped when I heard that.

Give it time to work out the bugs. The plant I run took a few years to make it all be reliable and cost effective. The website is what I was debating, not you personally.
Want to know what a person with a regular income pays?

I live in a 1500 sqft single level brand new house with no A/C and all of the most efficient appliances. Our electric bill is usually $90+ every month. I would consider us to be pretty energy-conscious, mostly because we pay (on average) 2.1x more per KWh here than we did in Colorado Springs and we can't afford to leave the lights on. Of course, I'm too "rich" to get subsidized utilities (read: My basic Air Force income is too much to use the government to force someone else to pay for my financial decisions.)



ETA: Do we have an industry experts on wind power?

I've seen various memes and perused various articles concluding that wind turbines will never pay for their own "carbon footprint" if you consider the hundreds of tons of steel that is required for their production (which must be mined, transported, formed, etc., probably with coal-burning furnaces haha) and other associated costs, like producing, transporting, and installing the actual turbines, along with the regular required maintenance, which is all performed by fossil-fuel burning vehicles, the required infrastructure, etc. Is this remotely accurate?

[ray1970]

Why would you buy a new home with no A/C?

I thought that was pretty standard these days.

Oh, and I'd kill to have a $90 bill. On a slow month it usually runs me around $150 and when the heat or AC are really working it is just north of $250. Sucks in the summer because the water bill is usually around $275 so I'm forking out over $500 a month just for utilities.

I guess when you have an older, less efficient home and like to keep it about 68 degrees year round then that's the price you pay.

[Great-Kazoo]

Why would you buy a new home with no A/C?

I thought that was pretty standard these days.

Oh, and I'd kill to have a $90 bill. On a slow month it usually runs me around $150 and when the heat or AC are really working it is just north of $250. Sucks in the summer because the water bill is usually around $275 so I'm forking out over $500 a month just for utilities.

I guess when you have an older, less efficient home and like to keep it about 68 degrees year round then that's the price you pay.

68* That's a heat wave in this house. AC is set for 76. heat @ 65

[Irving]

Why would you buy a new home with no A/C?

I thought that was pretty standard these days.

Oh, and I'd kill to have a $90 bill. On a slow month it usually runs me around $150 and when the heat or AC are really working it is just north of $250. Sucks in the summer because the water bill is usually around $275 so I'm forking out over $500 a month just for utilities.

I guess when you have an older, less efficient home and like to keep it about 68 degrees year round then that's the price you pay.


Looks like you answered your own question.

My bill for 5/13/16-6/14/16 is $71.25.
That's $45.13 electricity and $26.12 natural gas.

Month before that was $72.75.

[SAnd]

Green is the new Red. That's all.
Not so new.
Watermelons. Green on the outside, Red on the inside. I first heard that at least 45 years ago. Maybe they aren't hiding as much now.

[Not_A_Llama]

I've seen various memes and perused various articles concluding that wind turbines will never pay for their own "carbon footprint" if you consider the hundreds of tons of steel that is required for their production (which must be mined, transported, formed, etc., probably with coal-burning furnaces haha) and other associated costs, like producing, transporting, and installing the actual turbines, along with the regular required maintenance, which is all performed by fossil-fuel burning vehicles, the required infrastructure, etc. Is this remotely accurate?
I think more people are looking at wind as a Renewable Energy play more than a carbon play, given the incentives out there, but there's not really a question that turbines do also have a carbon-offsetting role.

NREL did a harmonization study some time ago, where they looked at lifecycle emissions: http://www.nrel.gov/analysis/sustain_lca_wind.html

Their harmonized lifecycle (all-in) estimates of carbon emissions show 3-45 g CO2e/KWh (0.003-0.045 Metric Tons/MWh). California's cap&trade program assigns a default emissions rate for imported power of 0.428 Tons/MWh. That number's debated enough and still stands, so I'm comfy using it. If you believe that each MWh of wind displaces a MWh of other (mostly fossil fuel) generation, the implication is that each MWh generated of wind displaces something like 0.4 tons of CO2 emission.

On an incremental basis, a 1 MW slice of turbine running at 30% capacity factor for a year will offset something like 1000 tons of CO2 (1 MW*8760 hrs/year*30%*0.40 tons/MWh). You can expect something like 20 years of service from a windfarm. 20,000 tons of CO2 should readily cover the construction of a turbine, even by relatively alarmist standards: ( https://stopthesethings.com/2014/08/16/how-much-co2-gets-emitted-to-build-a-wind-turbine/ )

I've given pretty wide berth for exacerbatory/mitigatory factors, and you do run into a lot of philosophical questions about what should count for CO2 in the manufacturing process, but saving 20k tons leaves a lot of slack to cover manufacture/install/maintain footprint, IMO.


ETA: Sensitivity analysis around the NREL lifecycle figure.. if you take the highest surveyed value of 80g/KWh vs the harmonized mean of 24g/KWh (the number I used), the difference is 56 g/KWh. This leads to 147 fewer tons per year offset, or 3,000 tons/20 years (three kilotons per score?) less than the number I conjured above. 17,000 tons saved vs 20,000 tons probably doesn't change the balance much.

[ColoradoTJ]

Want to know what a person with a regular income pays?

I live in a 1500 sqft single level brand new house with no A/C and all of the most efficient appliances. Our electric bill is usually $90+ every month. I would consider us to be pretty energy-conscious, mostly because we pay (on average) 2.1x more per KWh here than we did in Colorado Springs and we can't afford to leave the lights on. Of course, I'm too "rich" to get subsidized utilities (read: My basic Air Force income is too much to use the government to force someone else to pay for my financial decisions.)



ETA: Do we have an industry experts on wind power?

I've seen various memes and perused various articles concluding that wind turbines will never pay for their own "carbon footprint" if you consider the hundreds of tons of steel that is required for their production (which must be mined, transported, formed, etc., probably with coal-burning furnaces haha) and other associated costs, like producing, transporting, and installing the actual turbines, along with the regular required maintenance, which is all performed by fossil-fuel burning vehicles, the required infrastructure, etc. Is this remotely accurate?


My utility bill for the month was 145.00 for all 4 utilities with a bit more square footage. I have a wife and two girls that love to leave every damn light on in the house, a wife that takes long hot showers and kids that take bath/showers every day due to swimming. Since it has been Africa out lately, my AC has been running non-stop. We have very reasonable rates in Colorado Springs. I had someone bitching about the rates today in fact when I was picking up my welding supplies. It never fails....

Not_a_Llama had a good post on wind generation.

[Gman]

CO2 is plant food. Healthy plants mean healthy cows. Healthy cows mean a healthy me.

[UncleDave]

CO2 is plant food. Healthy plants mean healthy cows. Healthy cows mean a healthy me.

+1,000,000

[Aloha_Shooter]

I'm not saying Solar is not the way to go, just that this particular project has yet to produce even a large fraction of what it was designed to(much like many nuke plants), yet the greenies are hailing it as a huge success. Conceptually, this design has considerable merit, but it has not yet realized that potential.

Photovoltaic generation, on the other hand, is a deep dark rabbit hole. Between the ecological impacts and energy required to manufacture the systems make these unworkable on a large scale, and uneconomical for most applications on a smaller scale.

Well, I am saying solar is not the way to go, not in broad application like envisioned by greenies and Obamabots. If Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are successful in dramatically lowering the cost of launch then solar power satellites become viable and change the equation because they can safely beam the collected power through clouds via continuous wave microwaves (not pulsing like your microwave oven).

Solar is certainly an option and should be used in areas where you can count on low cloud cover (like Nevada, Arizona, much of Colorado, Hawaii, etc.) but it's highly uneconomical in most developed areas of the world. IIRC, BP or BT make a big deal about solar power generation at their London HQ, even to the point of having a board in the lobby providing a running tally on the power generated by their solar panels on the roof. What they don't tell you is how much of that electricity they're burning to run the fancy board or (and thiis is the kicker) that they run light bubls up to the solar panel to keep it illuminated so it can show electricity "production".

I'm all for solar and wind generation where it makes sense -- however, the numbers don't work in most circumstances without a HUGE deus ex machina.

[TFOGGER]

Solar has great potential in the areas where it makes sense, like the big, empty deserts of the world. In the most populated portions, not so much. If someone can solve the demand/production levelling issues, it might , make more sense. The big issue I have is that it doesn't make sense from an economic standpoint, and transmitting power from the areas of production to the areas of greatest consumption is horribly inefficient. Perhaps a decentralized power distribution system using something like Bloom Boxes (http://www.bloomenergy.com/fuel-cell/energy-server/), powered by natural gas would make more sense. Smarter guys than me, please chime in!

[HoneyBadger]

Why would you buy a new home with no A/C?

I thought that was pretty standard these days.

Oh, and I'd kill to have a $90 bill. On a slow month it usually runs me around $150 and when the heat or AC are really working it is just north of $250. Sucks in the summer because the water bill is usually around $275 so I'm forking out over $500 a month just for utilities.

I guess when you have an older, less efficient home and like to keep it about 68 degrees year round then that's the price you pay.

Climate in this area is pretty moderate and it was an extra $12k to get A/C, which I thought was total bullshit (especially for such a tiny house). In the evenings it usually cools down as soon as the sun goes down and we can open up windows and take advantage of a good breeze to cool things down. We have a window A/C unit in our bedroom that we used about a dozen times last August when it was unusually hot and Mrs HB was 38 wks preggo.

Thanks for the input Not_A_Llama.

Holy shit, Ray.

[ray1970]

$12K is definitely too high. When I had mine put in the whole bill was under $4K.

[TRnCO]

I don't know but "green energy" producers such as turbines spread all over kingdom come and huge fields of solar sure ain't very appealing to the eye. Such as huge foot print with wind turbines that for no other reason is why I hate them.
As far as energy use and cost, my wife and I had a new house built almost two years ago and we didn't have AC installed. BUT living at 6800' and out in the country, it seems we are always cooler than places in or around the city, so we also simply open curtains and windows at night and let mother nature cool the place down, and close 'er up tight for the day. Works pretty good. I've never had an electric bill over $100, and that's with two levels of house at 2000' per level.
In the winter I burn wood, so that's my primary way of heating to avoid large electric and propane bills. 500 gallon propane tank gets me through a year, easy.

[HoneyBadger]

$12K is definitely too high. When I had mine put in the whole bill was under $4K.
I'll just drop this link here for you to see the ridiculous prices for glorified apartments in this little farm town:
http://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/Santa-Maria-CA-93458/72554262_zpid/97286_rid/featured_sort/34.938675,-120.44216,34.923739,-120.462352_rect/15_zm/1_fr/

Or how about this gem: 1330sqft with no A/C and very basic appliances and features:
http://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/Santa-Maria-CA-93458/61324866_zpid/97286_rid/featured_sort/34.933521,-120.433856,34.918584,-120.454048_rect/15_zm/1_fr/


Hell, you can barely buy a trailer in a trailer park here for what a modest home would cost in most places.

[Not_A_Llama]

Well, I am saying solar is not the way to go, not in broad application like envisioned by greenies and Obamabots. If Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are successful in dramatically lowering the cost of launch then solar power satellites become viable and change the equation because they can safely beam the collected power through clouds via continuous wave microwaves (not pulsing like your microwave oven).

Solar is certainly an option and should be used in areas where you can count on low cloud cover (like Nevada, Arizona, much of Colorado, Hawaii, etc.) but it's highly uneconomical in most developed areas of the world. IIRC, BP or BT make a big deal about solar power generation at their London HQ, even to the point of having a board in the lobby providing a running tally on the power generated by their solar panels on the roof. What they don't tell you is how much of that electricity they're burning to run the fancy board or (and thiis is the kicker) that they run light bubls up to the solar panel to keep it illuminated so it can show electricity "production".

I'm all for solar and wind generation where it makes sense -- however, the numbers don't work in most circumstances without a HUGE deus ex machina.
A couple perspectives that fill in the narrative.

Of all the renewables, I like solar best. It's not there economically right now, we spend a lot of taxpayer money on the ITC/PTC, and it'll take a lot more investment to develop the technology. It gets philosophical past that, but I personally think it's probably good to have a power resource that you can shove in the middle of nowhere, that produces electricity when you need it most.

Solar doesn't make a lot of sense in places like London. That said, it does make lots of sense in warm, sunny climates. Places that need A/C, which is a very strong driver of electric demand. It ends up being a self-regulating question with placement, predicated on economics. I think we all like that.

Wind is getting to the point that it's almost as cheap as fossil fuel, without subsidies. We did spend quite a bit to get it there, but that's done. Wind doesn't answer the question fully, it makes power when you don't really need it the most, and it does need fossil or other fuel to fill in the gaps. But it's pretty damn cheap, and even our off-peak loads are a real thing. Hell, if consumers had access to better tariffs that gave transparency into the timing of energy prices, you might even see changes to how we use electricity, which I think is a better way to do things. You do get screwy things in places like Texas, where producers are running their turbines, even when they have to pay money (negative pricing) to put their power on the grid. That's the only way they get their production tax credit (PTC) money.

Lots of companies make PR plays to show they're "green", and fossil fuel producers are no exception. If I'm leading a firm like that, though, given the possibility of peak oil and losing the main revenue stream, it makes sense to genuinely become involved; renewables are a hedging strategy.

[Not_A_Llama]

Solar has great potential in the areas where it makes sense, like the big, empty deserts of the world. In the most populated portions, not so much. If someone can solve the demand/production levelling issues, it might , make more sense. The big issue I have is that it doesn't make sense from an economic standpoint, and transmitting power from the areas of production to the areas of greatest consumption is horribly inefficient. Perhaps a decentralized power distribution system using something like Bloom Boxes (http://www.bloomenergy.com/fuel-cell/energy-server/), powered by natural gas would make more sense. Smarter guys than me, please chime in!
To be entirely fair, electric transmission is pretty efficient. I haven't looked at a tag in a while, but a hundred miles on a 345kV doesn't lead to more than a few percent loss.

The corollary, of course, is that nobody like electric generation in their backyard, be it fossil, renewable, or *gasp* nuclear. So really, you need to truck it into your population centers from the sticks, anyway.

I think in the next couple decades, you'll see solar come to be a large component of peak generation. Wind will fill in a big part of offpeak, particularly in winter. You'll need to have something sitting in the back to fill in the troughs. I had hopes that nuclear could be that, but Fukushima has dashed the possibility for maybe a generation. Fortunately, cheap natural gas has impelled a lot of marketplace participants to build very very large CC gas plants that spin up very quickly. They're perfect for that role.

Bloom boxes, Tesla Powerwalls, and rooftop solar are all potential elements of a more resilient/efficient/economical grid, but there's need for a more comprehensive discussion about policy to integrate these new resources onto a grid that is very old and very dumb.

[Wulf202]

Imho going back to pud and getting rid of xcel would be a huge step forward

[erock]

I would like to see solar developer be more responsible for making up kVARs for their projects.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Gman]

The only place where alternatives make sense to me, is in Europe where they use hydro for primary production and wind when available to pump water back to the reservoir to store the energy until it's needed.