Guest essay by Eric Worrall
According to the University of Houston and Houston Advanced Research Centre, more investment in renewable energy will prevent a repeat of the deadly power outages during last year’s ice storm.
Energy experts say renewable energy will be key in making Texas’ electricity more reliable in 2022
To learn more about what’s expected in 2022 for clean energy, Houston Public Media spoke with Gavin Dillingham, Vice President of Research for energy with the Houston Advanced Research Center.
KYRA BUCKLEY | POSTED ON JANUARY 7, 2022, 1:20 PM
Experts watching Houston’s energy industry say the pandemic has accelerated the transition away from fossil fuels and towards renewable energy — and demand is growing worldwide for clean, affordable energy.
It comes as leaders in Texas are working to increase reliability of the electric grid after last February’s deadly winter storm caused widespread outages across the state.
Growth in renewable energy will be key making the grid better able to handle sharp increases in energy demand, like what happened during Winter Storm Uri.
To learn more about what’s expected in 2022 for clean energy, Houston Public Media spoke with Gavin Dillingham, Vice President of Research for energy with the Houston Advanced Research Center (HARC).
…
Read more: https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/in-depth/2022/01/07/416801/in-2022-expect-renewable-energy-to-be-key-in-discussion-around-how-to-make-texas-electricity-more-reliable/
My first reaction was to wonder what they are putting into the drinking water in the University of Houston. Anyone can tell just be looking at the output graph (above) that renewables performed dismally during the ice storm. Solar energy dropped away to almost nothing, and wind turbines froze solid.
I’m not denying winterising wind turbines might have saved a few from freezing, but there are other problems.
New York Times wrote a frantic defence of wind last February, which hilariously claimed that “… Blades of some Texas wind turbines did freeze in place, but wind power is estimated to make up only 7 percent or so of the state’s total capacity this time of year in part because utilities lower their expectations for wind generation in the winter in general. …“.
If utilities do “lower their expectations” for wind power generation in winter, there seems no point chasing more wind.
Solar is also a poor performer because in winter the days are shorter and the angle of the sun is lower, even without the added bonus of winter storm clouds darkening the sky or ice and snow covering the solar panels.
So the question is, how could more investment in renewables possibly improve the situation? No amount of investment can capture renewable energy which does not exist, in a winter environment which appears to be consistently hostile to the harvesting of any form of renewable energy.
Continue to be amazed at how these people avoid the obvious.
Freezing is a non-issue, they can be built to not freeze. We had wind turbines operating at -38C last week here in Alberta.
They cannot be built to turn when there is no wind.
Winter is the time of death. Media fixated term “polar vortex” implies some sort of movement but these events are arctic high pressure systems and except around the edges they are wind desert areas. They can cover huge geographic areas and move slow, the one last february took 9 days to pass over AB in which time our wind rarely exceeded 5%.
9 days!!!
So if Texas has 30GW of wind installed now, they can beggar future generations and destroy the environment by increasing that 10 times to 300GW and they still won’t have enough power next time.
Someone needs to explain a mathematical concept of zero to them (tell them its arabic and so its woke to use a concept invented by a visible minority), as in any number times zero is still zero.
Let me put this simply… When it comes to reliable power in Texas, natural gas is hard to beat, very hard to beat!
Yes and smoking more cigarettes can help with the discomfort of lung cancer. Taking advice from people like this is a first step on the path to oblivion.
Widespread Environmental Destruction due to BBB bill
If Biden’s $4.490-trillion BBB bill becomes law, there would be a vast amount of environmental devastation all over the US, including:
1) On hundreds of miles of pristine, 2,000-ft-high ridge lines, for mounting 500-ft high wind turbines, in New England. The video shows the massive destruction require to install 500-ft high wind turbines on ridge lines in New England. See video
2) On at least 100 square miles of New England meadow land for mounting solar systems, that would produce almost nothing for a few days, after a snow fall, and nothing from about 4 pm in winter, and 5 pm in summer, to about 9 am the next day. The video shows the massive destruction required to install a multi-MW solar system on a wooded area with wetlands. See video
Such destructions would be common-place, and would create huge turmoil among nearby people, all while China, India, etc., continue burning at least 8 billion metric ton of coal, each year, as agreed to during the Glasgow, COP26
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/wind-and-solar-provide-50-percent-of-future-new-england
If all of New England were to disappear, it would not make one bit of difference regarding global warming and climate change.
China consumes about 50% of the world’s coal consumption of about 8 billion metric ton
https://yearbook.enerdata.net/coal-lignite/coal-world-consumption-data.html
I am really surprised to see this headline.
University of Houston said no such thing.
Universities do not make these types of statements. A research group at UH made these statements.
There could be another research group in the next building over saying the opposite.
I always hate hearing “news” headlines: “Harvard says coffee disrupts sleep.” Harvard didn’t say anything. And neither did JAMA.
People who do not know how the world of research works believes Harvard does research and sends out findings. And, we can trust a headline because “Harvard” said it.
Nope. Doesn’t work that way.