Reposted from the MANHATTAN CONTRARIAN
As a state or a country, if you want to have any status in the ranks of the climate virtuous, the key metric is your commitment to get most or all of your energy from “renewables” (mainly wind and solar) by the earliest possible date. Everybody is doing it, and you are nobody if you don’t get in on the bidding. Just a couple of weeks ago (July 14), according to Reuters, the European Commission entered a bid of 40% of final energy consumption from “renewables” by 2030. Back here in the US, the most recent bid from the Biden administration (from April 28) is a goal of 80% of electricity by 2030, which is ambitious on its own, although electricity is a minority of final energy consumption. Congress has yet to consider the Biden administration bid.
Within both the EU and the US, there are national and state champions that are far out-virtuing everybody else. In the EU, it’s Germany. Germany adopted its “Energiewende” way back in 2010 to transition its energy sector to wind and solar. Since then Germany has repeatedly ramped up its renewable energy targets. Most recently, in December 2020, Germany adopted by statute a binding goal of 65% of electricity from renewables by 2030. Here in the US, our champion is California. In California the governing law is the famous SB 100, enacted in 2018, which sets mandatory targets for the electricity sector of 60% from “renewables” by 2030 and 100% by 2045.
As readers here know, the Manhattan Contrarian from time to time has expressed a high degree of skepticism as to whether these mandatory targets are achievable in the real world. Indeed, I have often noted that at somewhere around 40 – 50% of electricity from “renewables,” it becomes impossible as a practical matter to increase the share of electricity from renewables just by adding more renewable capacity. As far as I am aware, no large jurisdiction to date has gotten its percentage of electricity generation from “renewables” up above 50% for any extended period of time. (If a reader can point me to an example, I will be very interested.)
But maybe I’m just a crank. Surely these geniuses in Germany and California must know what they are doing. So let’s check in on the latest news.
Germany
The website No Tricks Zone has a report on July 27 covering electricity output in Germany for the first half of 2021. The No Tricks Zone post is based on data compiled at a German website called Die kalte Sonne.
And the answer is that in the first half of 2020 Germany achieved the level of 50% of its electricity from “renewables.” But in 2021 that level fell back to 43%:
“The share of renewable energies in gross electric power consumption in the first half of 2021 fell from 50% to 43% compared to a year earlier,” Die kalte Sonne reports.
What happened? The wind just didn’t blow as much:
“The production of onshore and offshore wind energy decreased by 20%.” . . . The reason for the steep drop, according to the findings, was due to unfavorable weather conditions. “This year, especially in the first quarter, the wind was particularly still. . . .”
So did solar energy then pick up the slack? Unfortunately, no:
“[T]he sun output was low. . . . Solar energy output . . . rose a modest 2%.”
So how did Germany make up the difference? The answer will not surprise you:
“Coal energy saw a renaissance. Brown coal [lignite] power plants produced 45.8 terawatt-hours of the net power – that is the power mix that comes out of the outlet. That’s a strong increase of 37.6% compared to 2020, when only 33.6 terawatt-hours were produced. The net production by black coal power plants also increased, by 38.9% to 20.4 terawatt-hours after 14.4 terawatt-hours in 2020.”
Basically, Germany has hit the limit of what can be achieved by adding capacity of wind and solar power sources. To get to the higher levels of “renewable” market share that they have committed to, they will need to add large and rapidly-increasing amounts of grid-scale storage. So far, they have barely begun that process.
California
Perhaps you remember the excited headline from the LA Times from April 29: “California just hit 95% renewable energy.” April 29 was just the very day after President Biden had announced his goal of 80% of US electricity from “renewables” by 2030. Now California was already showing the world that they were way ahead and basically all the way to home plate:
Something remarkable happened over the weekend: California hit nearly 95% renewable energy. I’ll say it again: 95% renewables. For all the time we spend talking about how to reach 100% clean power, it sometimes seems like a faraway proposition, whether the timeframe is California’s 2045 target or President Biden’s more aggressive 2035 goal. But on Saturday just before 2:30 p.m., one of the world’s largest economies came within a stone’s throw of getting there.
(Emphasis in the original.). But maybe we shouldn’t get too excited just yet. First, although the author (Sammy Roth) says this was “95% renewable energy,” it turns out as you read further that he is only talking about electricity, which is only about 30% of energy consumption. And for how long did the renewables provide the 95% of electricity consumption?
Saturday’s 94.5% figure — a record, as confirmed to me by the California Independent System Operator — was fleeting, lasting just four seconds.
So what’s the real picture over the course of multiple months or a year? For that you’ll have to ignore the cheerleading reporters at the MSM, and try to find some aggregate statistics. Here are the figures from the California Energy Commission for the full year 2020. The total contribution to electricity supply from “renewables” is claimed to be 33.09%. Oh, but that includes 2.45% from “biomass,” 4.89% from “geothermal,” and 1.39% from “small hydro.” Take those out and you’re left with a big 24.36% from wind and solar. And since electricity is only about 30% of final energy consumption, that means that wind and solar are only contribution around 8% of total energy consumption in California.
Over at the website of California’s Independent System Operator (“CAISO”) they provide a chart for every day’s electricity production that dramatically illustrates the problem. California’s peak electricity demand is around 40 GW, generally occurring around 6 – 8 PM. The large majority of their “renewable” production is from solar. Their current solar capacity, on a sunny mid-summer day like today, provides around 12 GW from about 9 AM to 5 PM — and nothing the rest of the time, including at the time of peak usage. In the winter, the output is more like 8 GW from 10 AM to 4 PM, and nothing the rest of the time. So far, they have almost nothing in the way of grid scale energy storage. In the evening, they ramp up the natural gas plants, and import power from Arizona and Nevada — mostly natural gas, nuclear, and coal. Close to 30% of California’s electricity comes from imports from neighboring states.
Norway produces about 98% hydroelectric power and is a net exporter of electric power.
Practically all of it is sold as “green” certificates to Germany (hardly a kwh is actually sent there, only the certificates). So in the weird world of climate stuff we have a 60% fossil mix with actual hydro power in the outlet.
Norway is in the unusual position of having a small population with gigantic hydroelectric capacity because of its geography. Unfortunately, the biggest emitters of carbon dioxide have huge populations with relatively tiny hydroelectric capacity. So these other countries have to make do with useless intermittent wind and solar energy which can never get beyond a certain percentage of energy requirements.
Britain’s target of net zero carbon (like those of other large economies) is impossible to achieve without a mythical new energy source like Mr. Fusion from Back To The Future. However, the cognitive dissonance of greens means that they cannot see that Britain’s legal requirement to net zero carbon is impossible.
Of course, if greens dropped their objection to fission nuclear energy, it might be theoretically possible to get relatively close to net zero carbon. However, plane travel and shipping would still be a major problem because there is no practical way to power them using electricity.
Undoubtedly, but as jurisdictions go 5.4 millions would be reasonably large. Hydro power is renewable, 98% is a lot more than 50%, we us more than twice as much electric power per capita than say USA and Norwegian geography is not _that_ unique. The author asked for an example of a large jurisdiction producing more than 50% renewable electricity. I gave one. Trying to do it with fans and mirror would be absurd and many states and countries of course don’t have the geography for significant hydro power, but some do.
Even producing all electricity by hydro power doesn’t solve the problem of planes and ships which cannot be powered by electricity. I regard Norway’s population as tiny in global terms; it is less than 0.1% of the world’s population. I don’t think Norway meets the requirements for what the author meant of an example of a large jurisdiction.
22 US states have more than 5.4 million people. Norway is 118 our of 195 in the Wikipedia list of population by country. I would not consider Norway to have a large population.
Apart from China and India most countries has small populations in global terms. In the list of electricity production by country Norway is number 28. India produces from all sources barely 10x the Norwegian hydro production. Only China and USA produce more than India.
Brazil produces 61% by hydro power with a population of 210 million.
I am just pointing out facts as they were asked for. There are many countries that has more than 50% renewables in their production mix. Some of them are large, some of them have significant production.
It will not put planes in the air, ships across oceans or save planets from perceived impending doom but it does help stabilize the grid.
Brazil certainly meets the definition of a large country with more than half of its electricity being renewable. However, it also illustrates the reason why so few countries could do this. After all, how many countries have a resource like the Amazon?
But then again he said jurisdictions, not countries.
Brazil, like USA, India, Britan, Germany and defacto China as most other large countries are unions or federations of much smaller jurisdictions. Making the production of smaller countries relevant, and the the mix of larger federations less so. In this context. As Germany was mentioned in the text, the larges jurisdiction in Germany is Westphalia with 17 million. California I believe has about 30 million. Hardly superpowers by numbers in a global perspective.
There are about 35 countries with more than 50% hydro power in their production mix.
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.ELC.HYRO.ZS?end=2015&most_recent_value_desc=true&start=1960&view=chart
You are trying to mislead, norvejun. The world gets 57% of their electricity from coal and gas. Hydro? Just 16%. If you are suggesting that hydro can expand dramatically then you’re dishonest. Hydro is neary tapped out; most of the places with the potential for impoundments with enough head (elevation difference across the dam), in a place where the dam can be a reasonable size on large rivers have already been exploited.
No, I am answering a very precise question from the author.
“As far as I am aware, no large jurisdiction to date has gotten its percentage of electricity generation from “renewables” up above 50% for any extended period of time. (If a reader can point me to an example, I will be very interested.)”
I have several times pointed out that these facts will do no miracles, and at no time have I said that hydro power can be expanded to do so.
I _do_ think hydro power should be built where it can be done with reasonable impact because it stabilizes the grid and resources should not be wasted. Norway is not the only place where significant hydro power production is viable, and it is silly not to utilize it. It is far from “tapped out”, but it will not nearly cover the worlds need for electricity. Future or present. All that however, is a different story.
Do the Greenie “environmentalists” agree?
You must be kidding.
Every single waterfall is a national treasure they will visit as soon as somebody pays for a charging station for their tesla.
There are very few waterfalls that have both enough height and enough flow to make the cost of a dam and generators economical, and most of them have already been tapped.
They do not, hydro isn’t considered renewable for some reason.
Norvejun,
however, while I agree with you on maximising hydro generation, the greens oppose it with a vengance and makeit very difficult to build. Anything that works they oppose, the same applies to nuclear generation.One of the reasons it is so expensive is the extended time it takes to get approval to build even if that build is the site of an earlier reactor that is at it’s end of life.
Well BC went mad on run of river hydro power (small scale hydro power generation without pondage that feeds into the grid) a couple of decades ago. After years of massive environmental damage to generate expensive and intermittent power, nowadays nary a politician can be heard whispering the sacred mantra “run of river”. We would have been far ahead both environmentally and in generating capacity to have built natural gas power generation.
And even then you get disasters for sheer lack of maintenance… Sayano-Shushenskaya being the perfect example, installed in one the largest rivers in the world.
Ok, that’s 2. Still a far shot from “many”.
but most people aren’t talking hydro when it comes to “Green” crap. It’s all wind and PV. That’s it.
In fact, if memory serves CA is getting rid of a lot of their hydro anyway.
The US alone has at least a dozen cities with a bigger population.
Mountains with adequate precipitation? That’s a lot rarer than you want to believe.
Norway appears to be wonderful place to live possibly because Norway only has 1.6% of the United States population.
I am sure.
The world’s population is estimated to be 7.9 BILLION. Do the math. It ain’t pretty.
Norvejun,
this is a popular misconception that wind and power are equivelant ways to fossil fuel generation. It most certainly is not; grid frequency is the most important parameter which indicates if supply and demand are equal, this requires controlled generation. Wind and solar are uncontrollable. Hydro is quite different and is easily controlled.
Those hydroelectric installations were never installed as “renewables”.
They were installed in recognition that water flowing downhill is capable of producing mighty work forces.
Hydroelectric formed a reliable base of energy generation before fossil fuels became common.
Nowadays, alarmists love hydroelectric electricity because it does what wind and solar are unable to accomplish.
That is, hydroelectric produces consistent reliable high quality electricity that can be used in heavy industry.
Wind and solar are much too unreliable and when they do function, produce poor quality electricity for use in heavy industry.
China is watching us destroy our countries, implementing a concept, that absolutely cannot and will not work, because of physics and facts (physical reality). When will we wake up?
This is a link to an Oxford university study, which at least quantifies conceptually, why it is not possible to get to zero emissions. The Oxford study lists half a dozen specific major loads which would require a scientific miracle/breakthrough to power by electricity.
The green ‘technical’ problems are impossible to solve with current physics. Engineering is limited by the physics of atoms (atomic physics) and by physics and by facts. It does not matter how much money is spent.
The general public, including Democratic supporters, do not understand that breakthroughs, are limited by physics. Spending more money does not change limitations due to physics. This physical facts which make make it physically impossible for the scam to work, have been hidden from us. Facts do not change by wasting more money.
The Oxford university, unfortunately, does not estimate how expensive the electricity will become if money is continually spent on a scam that will not work because of physics and facts.
Will countries destroy their economies for zero benefit?
One of the key issues, which the public is not aware of, is the Green Scam Legislation is trying, to force heating, manufacturing, transportation, and so on ….
Which are currently powered by burning hydrocarbons, to be forced, to be powered by electricity.
That will force the electrical grid to be expanded by a factor of three. Or people will freeze in the winter.
http://www.ukfires.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Absolute-Zero-online.pdf
“The UK electrical grid power supply output would be required to INCREASE by a factor of THREE (with zero emissions) as all heating, manufacturing, and transportation, is going to be powered from electricity”
Cement cannot be made and there is no solution.
There is no solution to how to power ships or airplanes.
There is no solution as to how to construct buildings or what is going to replace plastics.
There is no solution to how to mine and produce the materials which we use to build the green stuff, any stuff that is manufactured, or that is used for construction.
Thank you for the link.
Note that some companies are working on electric-powered airplanes. I doubt that they will be very useful, but at least they can say they did it.
Jim
I have had a look at the plans for electric planes. I regard them as toys with limited range and capacity. Pretty pointless in the real world.
They are a bit better than that. Electric planes with about an hours duration are completely possible and useful as feeders to connect inner city airports (they are very quiet) with larger hubs based up to 100 miles away.
The economics of electric power are quite good for this – its not impossible to recharge on about an hour 20, and this gives quite a high passenger to idle ratio, and maintenance is extremely low.
It’s the trans/intercontinental traffic that is impossible at the current state of play of batteries. Theoretically a lithium air battery might just be able to do it, but we are a very long way away from those. 30 years or more as a crude estimate
How many passengers will fit on that electric plane once you’ve accommodated the batteries? From what I have read it’s only 3 to 5. To get all those passengers from the outlying airports to the hub will take so many planes that there will no longer be room left for the big airliners.
We used to have a commuter airline between Topeka and KC International, about 80 miles. They could take 4 passengers. They made 6 flights per day, three in the morning and three in the afternoon/evening. It was not a feasible route because too many people found it more convenient to make the trip by car. At more than an hour to recharge it would take at least 3 hours round-trip and four hours if you had to recharge at each end. You could never get in six flights per day meaning customers would be inconvenienced from wait times and would find going by car to be far more attractive.
It doesn’t matter how many passengers you can carry if the number of flights is limited. People will drive rather than fly!
Yes, plus the buffer times for passengers at both ends have to be considered: getting to the airport, the battle to get to the gate to wait for departure time, the battle to get of the plane at the destination, etc. None of these are getting shorter or easier.
So…. about 10 years after Fusion, I guess?
like the electric buses?
That idea will never get off the ground, in MY opinion.
I wonder if they are “stimulated” to work on that 😉
I wrote something on this. It is almost doable to go zero carbon but only with the use of massive amounts of nuclear power.
Beyond fossil fuels
Most of the chemical problems of zero fossil can be resolved by e.g. the use of hydrogen as a reducing agent or organic feedstocks for e.g. plastics. Or indeed constriction of sythnetic hyrdocarbons from either organic plant matreal or directly from atmospheric CO2 and water.
The really hard fixes are transport – that is, off grid mechanical energy.
Large objects like ships can be directly nuclear powered. Small vessels can be battery powered for limited range – and that apples to aircraft too – but the overwhelmingly simplest transition is to simply create synthetic hydrocarbon fuel to run your fleet of airliners or miltary vehicles,
The rate at which this happens can be safely left to market forces: As fossil fuels rise in price, at a given point the nuclear/synfuel option simply becomes inevitable.Or a neo-feudalism imposed on a collapsing civiliazation.
The problem is what the South Africans call ‘state capture‘: That is, crony capitalists corrupt government policy to divert public money into their pockets, and not to create solutions in the public interest.
In short what the Green movement has become, a totally corrupt movement designed to milk taxpayers by virtual signalling purveyors of ‘green solutions’
One thought here, though; ships can be powered by wind power! Using sails, as they did for many centuries BEFORE we ‘discovered’ how to use fossil fuels.
The disadvantage is that they can rarely take you precisely where you want to go. As all sailors know!
I noted long ago that discovery of the Americas was latitudinal. The English, Vikings and French blew across the Atlantic to the northern parts. Portuguese and Spaniards to the middle and southern parts.
Of course once you reached shore you could easily follow it south to south America and the Portuguese and Spaniards did just that.
Even animals are somewhat ‘zoned’. Those with branching and palmate horns in the north of America and Eurasia, pronghorn antelope Africa and South America. There is one pronghorn in North America on the Great Plains from Saskatchewan to Mexico. This one must have come from South America when the continents were connected with appearance of Panama isthmus.
I suspect that the setting sun (and the rising sun were) were important directional markers for both sailors and animals.
Many modern ships are electric powered. The propellers are turned by electric power, provided by massive petroleum engine’s
Ditto the ‘diesel’ railway locomotive
Here is an article that totally supports your conclusions. It is such an excellent article that posting it got me suspended from Twitter for seven days. I have no idea why the Twitter Censors got so upset over it except that it is factually accurate and pops their dream balloons of wind and solar ever running the grids.
The “New Energy Economy”: An Exercise in Magical Thinking
March 26, 2019
https://www.manhattan-institute.org/green-energy-revolution-near-impossible
EXCERPT;
…About 60 pounds of batteries are needed to store the energy equivalent to that in one pound of hydrocarbons. Meanwhile, 50–100 pounds of various materials are mined, moved, and processed for one pound of battery produced.[54] Such underlying realities translate into enormous quantities of minerals—such as lithium, copper, nickel, graphite, rare earths, and cobalt—that would need to be extracted from the earth to fabricate batteries for grids and cars.[55] A battery-centric future means a world mining gigatons more materials.[56] And this says nothing about the gigatons of materials needed to fabricate wind turbines and solar arrays, too.[57]
Then there are the hydrocarbons and electricity needed to undertake all the mining activities and to fabricate the batteries themselves. In rough terms, it requires the energy equivalent of about 100 barrels of oil to fabricate a quantity of batteries that can store a single barrel of oil-equivalent energy…
Norway is a beautiful country, full of great people. However, regardless of protestations to the contrary, it’s hydroelectric capacity is unique to its geography – not many other places in the world with sush hydro-friendly geography. And those places that can get hydro power have already probably built out all the hydro power plants that they can. Also, many of those hydro facilities also provide flood-control functions, and have to play off power v flood control.
And I thought that we were all told that we couldn’t count hydro power as “renewable”. Is that no longer the case?
Greenies are completely against building more hydro.
Most of them want to get rid of the existing dams.
Is that just possibly as so few of them are technically-trained, and tend to be governed by their feelings rather than facts?
It’s still renewable, it’s just not green.
Most hydro plants provide flood control. Floods are very common around the world, always has been. It rains quite a lot many places, usually in the mountains. Oregon comes to mind.
And water storage for agric and urban supply.
The Gang Green are against hydro, but they added it in to renewables when their favorites were proving to be unreliable and were stuck at ~10-15% of the total power supply. It was a marriage of opportunity.
Similarly, although now distancing themselves from it after Michael Moores “Planet of the Humans” exposé, biomass was included.
The Navy manages to power some of their bigger ships with electricity. It’s just that it’s electricity from fission, not batteries.
I can just imagine the reaction from greens if it was proposed that container ships would have their own nuclear reactors.
The Russians have a number of nuclear powered ice breakers and a container ship.!
There are 56 thousand large cargo ships in the world. It might be a little impractical to convert them all to nuclear power.
Good point. Can you imagine the crews that would be required to man the nukes and the cost?
The cost is quite reasonable, the number of extra crewman are no more than the number needed to maintain the diesel/electric engines currently.
BS
Norway is one of the largest oil producers in the world. It is the 13th largest. Pop wise it is 120th or something.
Burning oil somewhere else does not change anything for the carbon is bad zealots.
Using hydro for yourself is at best bigotrous.
So no argument, you need to do better
Why exactly do you feel we should not burn oil ?
Norway is a massive fossil fuel producer and exporter, North Sea oil dont hold them up as special!
THey also have massive mountains and a LOT of rain. Yeah, it would be easy to be so virtuous given that mix!
Actually Norway has a average elevation of about 1500ft, Our tallest mountain is 8100ft. Average yearly precipitation is about 55″. It is pretty much the Appalachians, only smaller. USA have 25% of the worlds fresh water in one neat reservoir. All of it came down as rain somewhere.
Our hydro power is not built by virtue, or unique geography. When money is raining from the skies, it is silly not to pick it up.
It’s so easy to hide reality when using statistics.
Average height is utterly meaningless. What matters is whether or not you have either hills or mountains with places where water can be stored.
I don’t know if you are this ignorant, or if you are hoping that the rest of us are. It doesn’t matter how much rain if falling if their is no place to trap and store it. Most of the places where it is economical to build dams in the Appalachians have already been built up.
Rain falling on the plains, even if it is hundreds of inches per year will never be used for hydro, because their is no place to build a dam.
Mountains in the desert will never be used for hydro, because there is no water to capture.
I drove down along the Appalachians a few years back. It was just as described “a land bursting with cascading waterfalls”. Did not se many power plants, although I know there are some. Apart from that it felt almost like home.
Most rain comes from wet ocean air trying to cross mountains, as illustrated on the map on this site:
https://www.currentresults.com/Weather/US/average-annual-state-precipitation.php
It is in no way important for me that you build hydro power, I am just saying it is silly to let money run out in the sea.
So, you compare an average to the tallest eh?
You lose!
CA ” imports from neighboring states “
Search up Path 66 from OR & WA.
Beat me to it.
According to Mark Mills starting at 27 minutes into this video, California not only imports electricity from other states, they steal (through a back door clause) power from lines running through their state:
Come on in! It feels good–all the lemmings are doing it.
The only means for California and for the nation as a whole to reach Biden’s highly ambitious GHG reduction targets is for the federal government to mandate strict energy conservation measures on the entire country, up to and including a program of carbon fuel rationing not unlike the one imposed on Americans during World War II.
Using the authority of his office for managing a declared national emergency — authority already enacted into law by the Congress — Biden has the power to establish a carbon energy rationing program by issuing an executive order formally declaring a national climate emergency. But so far, he has shown no sign he will do so.
Problem for Biden would be which emergency takes precedence, the Climate or the Energy Emergency? Facing a classic Catch 22 Joe’s head would probably just explode.
The environmental law community has known for more than a decade that the Executive Branch already has all the legal authority it needs to unilaterally impose a fossil fuel lockdown on the American economy by combining elements of the Clean Air Act with elements of national security law as it applies to declarations of national emergencies.
Climate activists and the environmental law community never held President Obama to account for not using the full authority of his office in reducing America’s GHG emissions, nor do they now show any sign they will be holding President Biden and his administration to account for not doing all that current law allows the president to do.
In your dreams. The “emergency” would melt away in court very quickly. You extreme libtards think January 6 was an insurrection. If the government tried something like you suggest, there would be a new government very quickly.
Trying to Play Nice: ‘In your dreams. The “emergency” would melt away in court very quickly. You extreme libtards think January 6 was an insurrection. If the government tried something like you suggest, there would be a new government very quickly.’
———————————————————-
The integration of environmental law with national security law as a means of quickly reducing our GHG emissions is a topic which has been under close legal analysis inside the environmental law community since the mid-2000’s.
The legal foundation for imposing a fossil energy lockdown is found in two places: a) the Clean Air Act; and b) in legislation governing how a president can respond to a declared national emergency.
The 2007 SCOTUS decision that carbon dioxide can be regulated as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act, and the SCOTUS decision upholding the 2009 Endangerment Finding, together form the legal basis for employing the Clean Air Act to its maximum possible effectiveness in reducing our GHG emissions.
America’s experience in World War II in rationing gasoline and diesel in support of the war effort — done in the context of a declared national emergency — is the past precedent for imposing a 21st Century program of gasoline and diesel rationing.
Many lawsuits would be brought against the Biden administration if it attempted to impose a fossil energy lockdown. But as long as the lockdown is being applied with equal force throughout the economy — and with equal impact among all affected social, economic, and ethnic groups — then those lawsuits will go nowhere.
The legal foundation for imposing a fossil energy lockdown on America’s economy is solid. The environmental law community knows that it is solid. And yet they still refuse to hold Biden and his people to account for not imposing it.
Declaring a national emergency won’t get crops grown, crops harvested, or crops in the grocery stores. Failure in these areas aren’t subject to *any* laws other than natural law. When people begin starving from Biden closing down fossil fuels there *will* such a hue and cry from the non-elites that an insurrection will be the *least* of the problems the Biden admin would face.
It would be the last straw on the camel’s back leading to secession of the south from the union once again. Do you honestly thin Biden could hold the union together like Lincoln did? Dream on!
——————–
Tim Gorman: “Declaring a national emergency won’t get crops grown, crops harvested, or crops in the grocery stores. Failure in these areas aren’t subject to *any* laws other than natural law. When people begin starving from Biden closing down fossil fuels there *will* be such a hue and cry from the non-elites that an insurrection will be the *least* of the problems the Biden admin would face.”
——————–
Joe Biden made the need to greatly reduce America’s carbon emissions a central theme of his 2020 campaign. He won the election with seven million more votes than his opponent. Everyone who cast a vote for him knew what it was he was proposing.
China and India, and other developing nations around world, are expanding their use of fossil fuels for transportation and for power generation. The argument is being made by climate activists that America’s leadership in quickly reducing our own carbon emissions is essential for convincing other nations, especially China and India, to reverse course and quickly reduce theirs.
The Biden Administration wants a 50% reduction in America’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2030. In addition, America’s power generation sector is to achieve net-zero emissions by 2035, and America must be fully net zero by 2050.
The rapid electrification of America’s entire energy infrastructure is the means by which these emission reduction targets are to be reached — doing so through a massive commitment to wind and solar energy backed by grid-scale energy storage technology and by a greatly expanded power transmission network.
If China and India are to be influenced by America’s climate action leadership, then the Administration’s GHG reduction plan must be fully credible. The plan must be capable of achieving the emission reductions climate activists say are needed. And it is the emission reductions themselves which are important, not simply the amount of money being spent on zero emission energy technology.
Can enough wind turbines, enough solar panels, enough grid-scale batteries, and enough new-build power transmission infrastructure be installed by 2035 to fully replace America’s legacy electricity resources? Can enough electric vehicles be manufactured and sold by 2050 to largely eliminate gasoline and diesel powered transportation? Or is a drastic reduction in America’s use of energy the only means of guaranteeing Biden’s GHG reduction targets can be met?
If the most important goal is to quickly reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions — as opposed to resetting America’s economic, cultural, and social order — then technology innovation alone can’t do it. Building enough wind and solar to replace even half of our fossil electricity resources by 2030 is very nearly impossible. To believe otherwise is to believe in a faith based approach to writing an energy transition plan.
The basic problem Biden’s energy policy advisors must soon address is to decide upon a coordinated mix of three strategic directions: a) build a greatly expanded wind and solar energy infrastructure backed by grid scale energy storage combined with a greatly expanded energy transmission capacity; b) place much greater reliance on energy conservation technology than we do today; and c) impose government-mandated, strictly-enforced energy conservation measures which directly constrain the production and consumption of all fossil fuels.
If President Biden’s highly aggressive GHG reduction schedule is to be seriously pursued, technology innovation will get us only so far. The only reliable means of guaranteeing that Biden’s 2030, 2035, and 2050 targets are actually met is to impose strictly-enforced energy conservation measures on the American public. If we are to achieve Biden’s targets, Americans must be consuming roughly half as much energy per capita in the year 2030 as we do today in the year 2021, and possibly only one-third as much in the year 2050.
So we must ask the question. What do Biden’s voters actually want? Do they want verifiable emission reductions with the goal of making America the acknowledged leader in climate change activism? Or do they only want the well paying middle class jobs the Green New Deal theoretically makes possible?
“Everyone who cast a vote for him knew what it was he was proposing.”
If you really believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.
That has never been the case in ANY election I’ve seen since I was old enough to understand what an election was.
Do you understand that without energy, society would collapse?
You didn’t answer the ‘Reality on the Ground’ question. Even the totalitarians say it’s going to take ’til 2040. Did 75 million voters and ballot box stuffers vote to die of starvation and lack of electric ambulances?
Beta, I have to hope that people as doctrinaire and ig*иorant of reality on the ground are in a small minority. Your miseducation without questioning and without perturbing it with a single thought of your own is truly frightening. Your entire manifesto above is replaceable with a bot from the education camp you attended.
Beta Blocker
You are completely delusional if you think China or India give a damn that we commit economic suicide by an executive action tripling or quadrupling the cost of energy in the US. China and India have made no firm commitments under the Paris Accord, and will continue to electrify their Countries with coal fired power indefinitely.
I don’t care what “legal” basis you and your green communists think that Biden can base an EO on, the practical reality is when this action throws the USA into an instant depression, there will be a revolution.
This is not fighting the the Nazis. Man made climate change it is an propaganda scam that will not be supported by the American public once they feel it in their wallets in a major way.
Climate Change is not a national emergency, because if we went to 0 CO2 tomorrow the effect on future temperature will be negligible on the oder of.1C.
An EO to do what you suggest is in itself a National Security threat and treasonous to intentionally destroy the US economy and leave us economically and militarily vulnerable to China.
Legal? Maybe. Practical? Every politician (excepting the SQUAD) knows that imposing such energy rationing in peacetime will involve massive reductions in the implementing political party’s numbers in government at the next election. All surveys show the American public is not willing to spend much on “Climate.” The French Yellow Vest movement is but pimple on the ass of a gnat compared to what the American public will do in response to serious, unneeded energy rationing by the politicians.
what the American public will do in response to serious, unneeded energy rationing by the politicians.
Which frankly is kinda why I wish they would just do it already.
—————————–
Dave Fair: “Legal? Maybe. Practical? Every politician (excepting the SQUAD) knows that imposing such energy rationing in peacetime will involve massive reductions in the implementing political party’s numbers in government at the next election.”
—————————–
The counter argument is that those who voted for Joe Biden knew exactly what they were voting for and made a conscious decision to support him, including support for his explicitly stated commitment to quickly reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Given that Biden’s vote count in 2020 was 81 million, roughly seven million more votes than his opponent got, it would appear that Biden and the people who actually make the decisions in his administration have a mandate to move smartly forward in delivering a credible GHG reduction plan.
‘Credible’ in that a Biden plan does in fact produce a 50% reduction in America’s GHG emissions by 2030 over a 2005 baseline; it does in fact produce net zero in the electric power sector by 2035, and it does in fact deliver full net zero in all energy sectors by 2050.
—————————–
Dave Fair: “All surveys show the American public is not willing to spend much on “Climate.” The French Yellow Vest movement is but pimple on the ass of a gnat compared to what the American public will do in response to serious, unneeded energy rationing by the politicians.”
—————————–
The only survey which counts is the one collected at the ballot box. So we must ask a perfectly appropriate question here:
Did the voters who cast their ballots for Joe Biden in 2020 want to see America’s GHG emissions greatly reduced, and within a relatively short time frame?
Or was it really the case that they wanted the middle class jobs which are theoretically made possible by massive new spending on a wind and solar energy infrastructure?
Suburban women made up the biggest margin for Biden. Affect them with higher energy costs and a more restricted lifestyle for their kids and that margin will go up in smoke. Enlightened self-interest always wins out in the end.
You’ve made many unsupportable assumptions.
1) You assume that everybody who voted for Biden was voting for Biden, rather than against Trump.
2) You assume that everybody who voted for Biden was fully informed as to what Biden intended to do. Remember Biden ran as a moderate who only wanted to heal the country. He never talked about any of the radical things he has been doing since election.
3) You assume that Biden got 81 million actual, legal votes.
BTW, federal spending has never created any net jobs. Most people know this, though few Democrat voters are smart enough to figure out why.
‘Green jobs’ is an idiotic democrat fantasy.
I don’t want to insult you but I find many of your arguments to be naive. Every survey shows that a near majority of voters who voted for Biden had no real interest in Biden or his policies. They were simply voting against Trump. There is a mountains worth of difference between voting against the evil orange man and supporting the destruction of ones economic way of life.
Have you actually spent any time in China or ever worked with the PRC government. I have. They have nothing but disdain for America. If you think they would ever be influenced by Americas leadership to jump of the economic cliff with us then you truly need to spend a few years in China dealing with their government.
The problem is that those who voted for Joe Biden were not told of what fuel rationing would cause. As stated elsewhere, food resources would soon be limited, transportation would be very limited, and electricity would be rationed.
Politicians and Green New Deal advocates just ignore their responsibility to educate the public on the more serious affects on their lives. This is an ethical lapse of humongous proportion and will result in a massive shift of political power.
I assert that very few individuals voted for Joe Biden. I believe the majority of people voting voted against President Trump. The Deep State, Leftist ideologues (no difference), politicized MSM (still no difference), blue jurisdictions voting machinations and, ultimately, the ChiCom virus undid President Trump. I don’t believe Biden & Crew have any mandate; down-ballot green candidates fared poorly, especially considering the ballot headliners’ clear win.
As you know, Federal Legislation only means what 5 Justices on the USSC says it means. Nothing like an executive order imposing a fossil fuel lockdown has ever been presented to the court. There is a drastic difference between a theoretical climate emergency which has killed no one and the millions of deaths during WW2. You are far more optimistic than I would be that the SC would buy these legal arguments. The question would be whether the SC struck down the order before or afterBiden was voted out of office.
Are you in favor of such extreme actions?
————————
Carlo, Monte: “Are you in favor of such extreme actions?”
————————
The Biden administration owes the nation a credible plan for reaching its emission reduction targets. No such credible plan has been forthcoming.
If Biden’s people deliver an energy transition plan which is fully credible, meaning that it is actually capable of producing the emission reductions they say they want, then I will support that plan, even if it requires a system of fossil fuel rationing to be effective.
Any transition plan Biden’s people deliver must be completely honest in describing the tough choices which have to be made concerning how far innovative technologies can actually take us in decarbonizing the economy, versus the need for imposing highly coercive government-mandated anti carbon measures on the American people.
Once the specter of these severe anti-carbon measures becomes fully evident and becomes fully understood, the American people can then examine the Biden plan in detail and decide at the next presidential election in 2024 if this is what they really want for themselves and for the nation.
Biden can’t even figure out which press person he is supposed to call on without a cheat sheet with pictures.
How much of your paycheck are you willing to sacrifice for the Green Raw Real?
10%?
20%?
40%?
80%?
No plan requiring fossil fuel rationing will be effective at all. Carter tried that by letting fuel prices skyrocket – an effective rationing tool. Biden is doing the same thing today with inflation of fuel prices – a similar rationing plan. It won’t work. It will just contribute to higher inflation and at some point the people will rebel, just as they did with 13% to 18% interest rates.
This is why the people have already rejected the Green New Deal. Only those who are progressive idiot idealogues (like AOC) continue to push the GND. It won’t be any better 10 years from now, 15 years from now, or twenty years from now (2040).
Beta, you should have stopped with your first paragraph. You naively assume that there can ever be a “credible plan” to reach 100% “net-zero” electricity production by 2035 nor economy-wide by 2050. As an electrical engineer that reached high levels in the electric power industry and economic development sector, I tell you it is physically impossible and, especially, economically disastrous to even attempt such folly. Physics, technology and economics do not bend to political whimsy.
The “emergency” would melt away in court very quickly.
You have a lot more faith in courts than I do if you think that.
Beta, what JB is able to do can’t be done. Do you drive a car? Do you eat produce from California or Florida, or even from the outskirts of your city. I’ll leave for homework for you to work out what I’m talking about. Hint: do you understand the term ‘reality on the ground’? This is the the singlemost deficiency in lefty thinking. Detachment from reality, going with your feelings. Better stop the Beta Blockers before it’s too late.
—————————————————-
Gary Pearse: “Beta, what JB is able to do can’t be done. Do you drive a car? Do you eat produce from California or Florida, or even from the outskirts of your city. I’ll leave for homework for you to work out what I’m talking about. Hint: do you understand the term ‘reality on the ground’? This is the the singlemost deficiency in lefty thinking. Detachment from reality, going with your feelings. Better stop the Beta Blockers before it’s too late.”
—————————————————-
Gary, I’ve spent thirty-five years in nuclear construction and operations, in which the bulk of my occupational radiation exposure has come from beta-gamma sources. Hence my internet handle is Beta Blocker.
A fair portion of my career in nuclear has been spent in project planning, work scope evaluation, activity scheduling, and cost estimating. The project planning work we do is expected to be credible in that it can be supported with an accurate analysis of the project’s true scope of work, including a detailed list of project activities carrying defensible estimates of their time and cost.
For those who have followed my commentary here on WUWT and on Climate Etc for the last six or seven years, I am a vociferous critic of the nuclear industry’s lack of management commitment to keeping its capital construction costs under control.
Repeating what I said earlier:
If the most important goal is to quickly reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions — as opposed to resetting America’s economic, cultural, and social order — then technology innovation alone can’t do it. Building enough wind and solar to replace even half of our fossil electricity resources by 2030 is very nearly impossible. To believe otherwise is to believe in a faith based approach to writing an energy transition plan.
If we take the climate activists at their word and assume they are sincere in believing that America must become the pathfinder for decarbonizing an industrial society, then a ‘credible’ Biden energy transition plan is one which does in fact produce a 50% reduction in America’s GHG emissions by 2030 over a 2005 baseline; it does in fact produce net zero in the electric power sector by 2035, and it does in fact deliver full net zero in all energy sectors by 2050.
Any transition plan Biden’s people deliver must be completely honest in describing the tough choices which have to be made concerning how far innovative technologies can actually take us in decarbonizing the American economy.
It is plainly apparent that technology innovation alone cannot produce the GHG reductions climate activists are demanding, on the time schedule they are demanding. If those reductions are to be achieved on the climate activist’s schedule — or even be achieved at all — then Biden and his people have no other choice but to impose highly coercive government-mandated anti carbon measures on the American people, up to and including fossil fuel rationing.
Once the specter of these severe anti-carbon measures becomes fully evident and becomes fully understood, the American people can then examine Biden’s energy transition plan in detail and decide at the next presidential election in 2024 if this is what they really want for themselves and for the nation.
You are correct that insane economy destroying drastic measures of overt tyranny would be required to hope to achieve delusional GND goals that would impoverish millions and have zero discernible affect on the GAT.
Here are a few areas you go astray…
“ If the most important goal is to quickly reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions — as opposed to resetting America’s economic, cultural, and social order — then technology innovation alone can’t do it”
Should be rephrased to reality…
“If the most important goal is to quickly reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions – EVEN WHILE DESTROYING Americas economy, and cultural and social order, and causes a Great Depression that could potentially lead to global war, then inefficient ineffective environmentally destructive wind solar and batteries can’t do it.” FIFY
And this also needs correcting…
“Any transition plan Biden’s people deliver must be completely honest in describing the tough choices which have to be made concerning how far innovative technologies can actually take us in decarbonizing the American economy.”
To…
Any destructive GND Biden’s people attempt to deliver WAS completely DISHONEST in describing the tough economy destroying catastrophic choices necessary to decarbonizing the American economy. FIFY
Let’s be realistic, though:
“Any transition plan Biden’s people deliver must be completely honest…”
That will never happen. Even an actual PLAN isn’t likely, just talking points and feel-good sayings.
“…the American people can then examine Biden’s energy transition plan in detail”
That will also never happen, even assuming such a plan ever were produced. The media wouldn’t provide the detail, and with few exceptions, “the people” are happily misled by those they’ve chosen to follow and never bother to “examine” anything.
Not enough fissile material left in Premier Bai Den’s head to cause an explosion! It would at best be a slow weak implosion; think of an old, tired Whoopie cushion deflating slowly!
On the plus side, many of his “advisors” and the handlers pulling his puppet strings WOULD have exploding heads and hair fire moments! We have to take our comforts where we can!
The only signs from BIden are those form a severly demented senior that urgently needs to get a place in a home.
Only the most naive believe that Joe Biden himself makes the key decisions in his administration. Or any decisions at all, for that matter. However, the people who do make the decisions — people who claim to be deeply concerned about the dangers of climate change — have taken no visible action which would credibly deliver the emission reductions they claim are necessary.
The essence of modern liberalism: a technocracy ruled by a hidden and unaccountable elite.
I agree with your limited statements. Additionally, I assert that they have taken no visible action because they don’t have the power to effectuate such action. The Deep State can thwart action and warp policy, but it cannot force Congress to act. Obama learned the hard way that Executive actions are subject to Congressional and judicial review. That is why the ideological actors are screaming to high heaven over Administration inaction; they can’t act in any meaningful way so they sound off with obvious political blather.
Its like Kamal’s inability to do anything at our borders, so she is off into nation building in Central America. Nobody gives a shit, but the open-borders types use it as an excuse not to act on the borders. It will kill them at the mid-term elections, though. In response? They all put on a happy face and speak in platitudes.
The other problem is distribution. If you look at the major transmission routes, particularly Path 26 and Path 15, there’s no way they can tie in 20GW of additional power. It would require engineering and construction on par with the high speed rail from L.A. to S.F., …. ??? ooops … it would require an army of competent …. oh never mind, not going to happen in CA.
Gov Kate Brown just signed new bills committing Oregon to 100% renewables by 2040. So it won’t matter what grid connections work, there will be no surplus power to sell to California. https://www.oregon.gov/newsroom/Pages/NewsDetail.aspx?newsid=64162 “House Bill 2021, the 100% Clean Energy bill, sets the most aggressive timeline in the country for moving to 100% clean electricity sources, by 2040.”
Isn’t that amazing? When I saw that, I thought, “Hmm, I wonder who will be the first one to pass a bill going for 100% renewables in 2035?” If this keeps up, we will be committed to 100% renewables by…..today. It doesn’t matter what reality is, the virtue signaling is the most important.
They all seem to think these efforts will decrease droughts and wildfires. Oregon’s and California’s combined emissions could go to zero on all fronts and it would have no impact on the climate, even in the most radical climate scenarios.
Hmmm, wildfires in California are caused, in part, by powerlines. Now we’ll have to increase the number of powerlines. I guess that reducing CO2 will cause an increase in wildfires.
“Gov Kate Brown just signed new bills committing Oregon to 100% renewables by 2040. So it won’t matter what grid connections work, there will be no surplus power to sell to California.”
Yes, you can see the trainwreck coming all the way from here.
It will be interesting to see how Governor Kate intends to compel the Federal agency, Bonneville Power Administration, which manages the Pacific NW grid, to follow her dictates. Silly question; she won’t be around beyond the next few years anyway. “Vapor Virtue Signaling.”
BPA covers hydropower, so they are already 100% renewable.
The problem is they are taking out dams to save salmon. Seems long ago somebody should have worked harder at making better fish ladders.
Oregon already shut down nuclear, shutting down coal, and eventually hydro. New legislation effectively prohibits (discourages?) natural gas, so the options are few. It is going to get dark and cold in winter. This isn’t something that can be fixed with windmills and solar panels.Putting all their faith in batteries, while Nevada is fighting over mining lithium.
This should get interesting.
The fact is BPA coordinates the dispatch of all generation resources in its Pacific Northwest operational area. Oregon will always benefit from the prior investments in reliable electric power generation and the development of the bulk power transmission infrastructure in the region. That is, until the renewables craziness and eco-terrorism finally overpowers the hydroelectric and FF system’s ability to load follow.
As a side note, the impairments to the hydro system in supporting unreliables development in the Pacific Northwest will adversely impact its ability to export excess energy to California. Not a good future outlook for CA electric consumers nor industries requiring reliable power (all of them).
They did for 4 seconds, clear path for the other 31,556,948 seconds.
31,622,396 during leap years.
After you achieve that for four seconds, a leap year is just a round error 🙂
Hey, if the Green Blob will accept four seconds as a major success story, so will I. 😁
Another well-delivered Reality Check here at WATTS.
Time for the states around Cali to jack up the prices for electricity, water, gas, oil and gasoline/diesel. Hit where it hurts and keep hitting till the people hang all these leftist scumbags.
Shoot, we here in California actually pay other states’ utilities to take our excess power in the middle of the day.
And then pay for more during the night. Bet if the price going in was quadrupled Cali would drop the greentard stupidity.
I donno, 2hotel9. Hubris is manifest.
Among humans it is as universal as hydrogen in the universe.
A politician’s job is to get elected or re-elected. Our needs or wants don’t even factor into it unless it is a threat their desire. If a politician can win an election through fraud, then they won’t ever have to consider the opinion of the peasants whom they abhor ever again. As has been said, it doesn’t matter who votes, it only matters who counts the vote.
Why do you think Democrats are fighting so hard against having any voting standards?
Vaccine passports and no ID needed to vote 😉
What needs to happen is that California needs to be severed from the grid so that they can’t cover up the colossal failure of “renewables” by importing non-renewable electricity from other states. Ditto for any other state embracing this mass stupidity (I’m looking at you Oregon). This is the only way to show the idiocy of attempting this destruction of real energy infrastructure nationwide.
Then, let the blackouts and the riots begin – and if there is any intelligence among the people, let the voting habits change.
”
What needs to happen is that California needs to be severed from the grid so that they can’t cover up the colossal failure of “renewables” by importing non-renewable electricity from other states.”
Amen!
California politicians are trying to pull the wool over our eyes. You are not fooling us with your virtue signalling.
Oregon is on the regional BPA grid.
(I’m looking at you Oregon).
Ditto for South Australia
grid-scale storage is an impossible pipe dream.
Beyond water-up-a-hill, I agree with you.
And even that is massively impactful on the environment.
When it comes to energy density, nothing beats hydrocarbon fuels, coal, or nuclear fertile or fissile materials.
The ‘greenest’ technologies are in fact rejected by the Greens.
Quite likely Germany will average over 51% (its previous high) over the whole of 2021.
Weather conditions in the first part of 2021 were quite exceptional in Germany: no reason to expect this every year/most years.
Germany is still upping its offshore wind, interconnectors; North/South connections finally making some progress…
Germany is seeing a major boost in residential photovoltaic installations… could see installation of 150,000 residential batteries in 2021Germany could see installation of 150,000 residential batteries in 2021 amid solar PV boom | Clean Energy Wire
Clutching at straws…
Onshore wind down 20.6%,
Photovoltaic up 1.5%,
Biomass down 0.8%,
Offshore wind down 16.2%.
Conventional electricity production from nuclear, coal and gas in the six months, up 19.7%.
Germany’s power consumption overall in the six months rose by 5.5%.
The future….
The future…
Why is Germany so intent on importing more NG from Russia?
Good question. According to Griff, Germany won’t need anything other than wind and solar.
Maybe they will use the Stoke’s method of turning the thermostat really low in the winter and adding blankets…lots of them
Residential batteries? What happened to grid-scale batteries? Oh well, as long as they keep the lights on long enough to take the cover off the diesel generator they might help a little.
Batteries are being depoloyed for an entirely different reason than most people understand
They are not there to hold a conventional grid up for the hours or days that renewable energy fails, but for the seconds and minutes it takes to start up backup fossil generation when a generator goes off line. They provide frequency stability, becaise the grid is designed so that if it drops below its rated frequency too much all the renewables will trip off it anyway.
Precipitating a blackout,
There was one that just caught fire yesterday in Victoria, Australia. Luckily it was during testing and nobody was injured, but it does not bode well for the future.
Crews battle Tesla battery fire at Moorabool, near Geelong
A toxic blaze at the site of Australia’s largest Tesla battery project is set to burn throughout the night.
The fire broke out during testing of a Tesla megapack at the Victorian Big Battery site near Geelong.
A 13-tonne lithium battery was engulfed in flames, which then spread to an adjacent battery bank. More than 150 people from Fire Rescue Victoria and the Country Fire Authority responded to the blaze, which has been contained and will be closely monitored until it burns itself out
I think they are going to have to find something else beside Lithium to power the vehicles.
I see where the Chicoms are working on a new battery based on iron.
We need a battery that doesn’t spontaneously combust.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could invent some easily transported liquid that could be easily burned to produce energy. One that won’t ignite, even if you chuck a lit match into it.
Oh, wait…
A battery based on iron might be useful for static installations, but I suspect it will be too heavy for cars.
Here’s a little info on iron-air batteries:
https://www.motorbiscuit.com/heres-how-iron-air-batteries-1-up-lithium-ion-batteries/
“Weather conditions in the first part of 2021 were quite exceptional in Germany: no reason to expect this every year/most years.”
2 seconds ago you were calling it “climate damage”™, make your mind up.
When it supports the climate change narrative. it’s ‘climate change’ when it is contraindicated its ‘just weather’
“Weather conditions in the first part of 2021 were quite exceptional in Germany: no reason to expect this every year/most years.”
How can you say that, Griff, when you know more CO2 is going into the atmosphere?
Isn’t that your mantra: More CO2 means more severe weather, more frequently? Now, here you are saying next year will probably be better. How can that be with all that CO2 floating around?
I always wait for Griff to establish the idiot greenie lemming position … it’s like, this and no further, that is, until he begins defending his position.
Germany fudges the figures by having a huge surplus of renewable power that it gives away to other countries when the wind blows and the sun shines, and then imports french nuclear power and FrenchSwediush and Spanish hydroelectric power and East European coal power when it doesn’t.
This allowing it to pretend it did it all by itself.
In these days of international grids and interconnectors, no country is alone in its generation policy.
I think this is the first self-aware statement I’ve ever read from you.
Who is going to make these mythical “residential batteries”, how much will they cost, and how many minutes worth of power will they provide?
It really is amazing how griff thinks that just because somebody puts out a press release, that means it’s already happening
Mark,
There’s cookie elves, why not battery elves?
If these people were talking about this in a different set of terminology I would actually agree with them. Decentralized energy production and energy diversification would be great goals to be striving for, right along with load balancing and mitigation of fuel use.
No one WANTS to be burning coal/natural gas, we do it because it makes sense.
But instead it is foolish pie in the sky attempts at energy migration, which has so many issues. So MANY issues.
Most economic and technical problems are in the end bounded by cost/benefit ratios. I.e. the market will decide.
The purpose of Green politics is to ensure that they are not so bounded by guaranteeing profits to particular solutions and raising the total cost to uneconomic.
In a free market there would not be a single renewable energy wind or solar plant in existence.
“ No one WANTS to be burning coal/natural gas, we do it because it makes sense.”
Why not?
What people want, is to be comfortable and be able to get their work done. The means by which these desires are met doesn’t matter.
That’s what Forrest meant when he says people don’t “want” to burn fossil fuels. Fossil fuels just happen to be the cheapest and easiest ways for people to get the things they do want. Fossil fuels are the means to an end, not the end in themselves.
I always learn so much from the comments on WUWT. Today it was Path66 and that Oregon is going 100% renewables by 2035, only 14 years away. The thing is, Oregon gets most of it’s electricity from the dams on the Columbia River; I am in Coos Bay and all of our power comes from there. Does that count as a renewable? And California gets 15% of its electricity from Canada for God’s sake. They are such hippocrites.
Since hydro is reliable, proven, and not easily exploited by the cronies that Michael Moore exposed, no, hydro does not count as renewable.
Has anyone here looked at or evaluated the gravity battery for storing wind/solar, such as this: ARES North America – The Power of Gravity
Don’t tell me.. they’ll be hiring people to push the trucks back uphill as part of the “green new jobs” initiative..
The problem with gravity batteries is capacity.
These plans make batteries look good.
Pumped hydroelectric storage is a gravity battery, and its a darned site cheaper to create a lake full of water up a mountain than haul a comparable lump of solid matter up there.
Pumped hydro is a losers game. There is no way to gain any energy from it. All it does is shift costs by using non peak demand pricing. Not too a bad an idea when you have excess nuclear electricity at night that is too cheap to meter. A horrible idea when you don’t.
Fifty years ago, one-thousand foot high energy storing skyscrapers were being proposed for use in balancing electricity supply with electricity demand in the larger cities.
These skyscrapers would have contained of a series of 1000-foot high shafts in which large blocks of solid steel were being suspended from cables.
The steel blocks would be raised when cheaper power was available to lift them, and then released whenever the energy previously stored needed to be recovered.
All it takes is money.
And stupidity. A lot of stupidity.
There’s a reason why these things never got past the proposal stage.
As soon as someone starts working out how to build one and how much it will cost, they are quickly abandoned.
And lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of steel blocks.
“Socialism works until the government runs out of other peoples’ money to spend.” — Margaret Thatcher
With all the hype from the MSM about renewable energy the only reality check people will understand is when they are forced to do without and it’s too late to do anything about it.
“… repent at leisure.”
Tesla will fix the unreliables-
Crews battle Tesla battery fire at Moorabool, near Geelong – ABC News
Streuth it’s winter now so they’d want to get it right by summer.
Gosh.. I hope grief’s residential batteries are immune to spontaneous combustion..
Oh you mean the EV someone built that had that habit, the solution not to park it in the garage until the issues was fixed.
And now the suffering begins but there is the often sought virtue. To balance out the poverty a few will become richer.
There are no geniuses in Germany, at least not in policy. Especially the Green Party is pushing for ever more crazy targets and the Green candidate (Annalena Baerbock) for chancellorship election in September is politely expressed dumb as a brick.
She declared in television that there are “imps” (German: “Kobold”) in a battery, instead of the element “cobalt” (German: “Kobalt”).
She declared in the same television broadcast, that we can store electrical energy in the grid and that’s “all calculated through”.
And few weeks ago she said also in a TV discussion that “big electrical energy consumers like supermarkets or data centers will become energy producers at night in the future. For example if frozen chickens in supermarkets are only cooled down to -20°C instead of -22°C”
And there is nobody in those TV broadcasting studios telling here, that it’s just ridiculous bullshit she is talking. I bet all the other politicians are not smarter, they are maybe just smarter in not showing their technical ignorance. Nowadays policy in Germany and partly also here in Austria (we already have the Green Party as part of the Government) has reached a level of insanity regarding energy transition which is just unbelievable.
The Dutch Green leader (Yasser Feras, who calls himself Jesse Klaver) demonstrated not once but twice in the Dutch parliament and on camera that he cannot distingish between a million (6 trailing zeros) and a milliard (9 trailing zeros, US: Billion)
He really, really wants to be the next prime minister. God help us all.
Thr Trumph of the Left has been to elevate people ‘educated’ in non STEM subjects to the heart of government and the civil service.
In todays fact free society, ‘caring about’ transsexuals is way more important than being able to calculate the energy density of a storage solution.
In todays education system everybody gets full Marx.
I am SO stealing that one!
I recommend reading Melanie Philllips’ book ” All Must Have Prizes “.
She wrote it in 1997 and was remarkably prescient about the way education was being dumbed down, and how the civil service and non STEM graduates were taking over the reins of influence and power.
Her book got a lot of stick at the time from the establishment, but re-reading it is like watching a car crash unfolding.
Over here across the Atlantic the idiocy is well represented by one Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a member of the US House of Representatives who is as stupid as a brick.
If the brains really cared about our health and prosperity, they would adopt and all in approach. Th e zealots in the government picking winners and losers is a lousy way to run a country IMO.
The brains have been de platformed and cancelled out of government as simply in the way.
We are run by a ‘confederacy of dunces’
And there ain’t no better description of left leaning political parties than that.
They are marching up the hill but soon they will be marching downhill again.
https://youtu.be/YOODoryBT2k
Looking at the UK’s electricity generation figures for 2020 from Gridwatch, the largest contribution of wind and solar added together to the total demand in any one hour was 61.34%. The smallest was 0.38%. If you sort the data in order of this contribution from 0.38 to 61.34, after one month, you get to 4.95%. After two, 8.49%. After three, 15.20%. After four, 22.27%. The government’s plan is to increase the amount of off-shore wind capacity by a factor of four over the next decade (no commitments on on-shore or solar). Assuming we did increase the whole of wind and solar by this huge factor, we would still be short of renewable electricity for four months of the year. (Even increase it by a factor of 20 and we are still short of electricity for one month). Oil and coal are disappearing this decade and nuclear will halve. Electricity demand is likely to double in the next decade as we move to electric cars and probably increase by the same amount in the following decade for heating, etc. We are nowhere near being able to support this demand curve. No one seems to question it.
Which is precisely why I created ‘Gridwatch™’ – to answer the claim that ‘the wind is always blowing somewhere; with the statement ‘yes, but how much, and where’
Because the cost of North Sea wind that is used by London is not just the windmills, but the massive grid extensions needed to move the power TO London, when the wind is blowing, and the backup plant needed to co-operate with it when the wind drops…
The Griffians of this world never include those costs into their models when they claim renewables are as ‘cheap as gas’
The wind is always blowing somewhere The problem is that the people who live in that somewhere also need that power, and they don’t have any to spare.
Thank you Leo for creating Gridwatch, which I am continually recommending to people who are ‘sitting on the fence as regards renewables.
It gives them the real picture about so say renewables/unreliables.
The past month has been particularly interesting in bringing home to them the problems associated with our present direction of travel in energy policy.
It doesn’t matter how many windmills you have, if the wind doesn’t blow for a month we are shafted good and proper.
As for buying electricity from other countries, beggars can’t be choosers. Look at the electricity prices in Texas in the recent cold weather when the windmills were all iced up, they went from 12 cents per kwh up to $9 per kwh.
No worries, griff assures us that “renewables” are perfect and have no downsides and will work wonderfully without any problems whatsoever.
In my business this is called a collosal CLSTRFCK and grounds for immediate dismissal.
How come you even need a certificate of competence for setting mouse traps (this is true in my country) but there are no requirements for a political/government position.
All morons collect at the gubmint level and do incredible damage there.
Stop the madness!!
In my country we have a say’ng that ‘schist’ floats to the top. Especially if you have a Vegan diet.
Every bureaucracy is like a septic tank; the really big chunks float to the top.
Don’t tell Pierre
German Wind Power Consumption Plummets 20% In First Half 2021… Coal Power Consumption Jumps 38%! (notrickszone.com)
Intermittent/renewable. Hilarious. Let them burn candles from both ends.
EIA data shows that in 2019 California used fossil fuels for about 83% of its total energy needs. The electricity sector accounted about 21.1% of its total energy use with the transportation sector being by far the the largest energy use sector accounting for about 39.3% of the states total energy use.
CEC data shows that In 2019 renewable energy was used to supply about 31.7% of the states electricity use with natural gas supplying about 34.2% and imported electricity accounting for about 28% of the states electricity. Non renewable energy accounted for about 68.3% of the states electricity in 2019.
CEC data shows that In year 2020 California used about 2% less electricity than in 2019 due to the pandemic shutdown with the share of natural gas produced electricity increasing to about 36.7% and the share of electricity imports climbing to about 30%. Renewables share increased to about 32.7%. Large hydro use for electricity in 2020 versus 2019 declined by about 46% due to the on going drought.
The amount of the states total energy use from fossil fuels in 2019 was unchanged from year 2006 when the idiotic Global Warming Solutions Act (AB 32) was stupidly passed by the legislature and sign by the incompetent “governor climate alarmism”.
In 2019 EIA data shows that despite California’s mandates and subsidies pushing EV’s the states transportation sector utilized electricity for less than 0.1% of its total transportation energy use with of course oil completely dominating this this largest energy use sector.
In 2019 renewables accounted for just 6.7% of California’s total energy use compared to 83% from fossil fuels. Given the period from 2006 to 2019 along with the state’s clueless government renewable use mandates along with many tens of billions of dollars in renewable subsidies this outcome is ludicrous and reveals the colossal exaggeration of the states renewable energy hype.
Over the last 12 months, Tasmania generated 79.5% of its electricity from hydro, 17.8% from wind, 2.1% from solar, and 0.6% from gas. However they do have a big powercord to Victoria, and some weeks imports represent over 20% of supply.
South Australia generated 19% from solar, 43% wind, with the balance gas. They also have a big powercord to Victoria, and peak imports can be over 20% of demand.
Australia 11% solar, 11% wind, 7% hydro, 62% coal, balance gas.
New Zealand reports 80% renewables, mainly hydro and geothermal, only 5% wind, the balance mainly coal and gas.
It should be noted that South Australia is a minor state, and is propped up up by the other much larger states when it is not windy or sunny. Gas was recently providing 91% of the power for a short period- but around 50% of that capacity (most of which is 45 years old or more) has recently been retired or will be shortly. Our renewables work only because of the kindness of our neighbors. Our regulator regularly asks big consumers to cut consumption. The grid does not have the integrity that it did.
Weathertricity
Statements are one thing, actions are another, and I don’t see any evidence any country is serious about CO2.
All politicians do is spout tokenistic platitudes to soothe the eco-Marxists.
Look at the UK, puts Attenborough in charge of the transition to electric cars.
He isn’t even a scientist, or any sort, He is a nature lover. HIs engineering ability is zero, and he will be dead in a few years.
He is a token figurehead, Greta’s pal.
The moral case for fossil fuels
A sure-to-be-controversial defense of the fossil fuel industry Conventional wisdom says fossil fuels are an unsustainable form of energy that is destroying our planet. But Alex Epstein shows that if we look at the big picture, the much-hated fossil fuel industry is dramatically improving our planet by making it a far safer and richer place.