My repeated calls for a Demonstration Project of a zero-emissions electrical grid have led to a spirited debate among knowledgeable commenters. While most back my position, some say that a Demonstration Project is really not necessary and would be a waste of effort.
The gist of the argument of those disputing the necessity of a Demonstration Project is that it is so obvious that a zero-emissions grid powered predominantly by wind and solar generation cannot be achieved that the expense and effort of building an actual physical facility cannot be justified. Before the building of a physical demonstration project there would inevitably be an engineering feasibility study, and such a feasibility study would not get through its first day before everybody involved realized that this could never work. All it would take would be a few back-of-the-envelope calculations using basic arithmetic and the whole endeavor would be sunk.
Regular commenter Richard Greene leads the forces arguing against a demonstration project. From a comment by Richard on my August 10 post:
A good demonstration project that included manufacturing and farming is very likely not needed. A real local utility Nut Zero grid engineering plan on paper would have grid engineers laughing hysterically. The money allocated for backup batteries would be nowhere close to paying for the battery GWh capacity needed. Backup natural gas power plants could do the job, but gas backup is not wanted. . . . 100% wind and solar can never work due to compound energy droughts, wind drought and solar droughts (batteries are far too expensive).
Representative of the pro-demonstration project side is a comment from “dm” on the August 13 post. Excerpt:
Because many people doubt paper analyses, lived experience is a necessary teacher. Thus, demonstration projects are NEEDED to prove the folly of “sustainable” electricity grids. Furthermore, the demonstration projects MUST be in regions heavily populated with nut zero enthusiasts, and ALL costs MUST be paid SOLELY by households, businesses, institutions … located within the demonstration areas.
My natural sympathies here would lie with Richard’s side of this debate. How can spending what would likely be billions of dollars of public money be justified when calculations that I have made or verified myself show that the project will never come close to success?
But then we must look at what is happening in large states and countries that are proceeding toward the stated goal of a zero-emissions grid without ever having had a working demonstration project. In some of these cases (Germany, UK) the wasted resources are now into the trillions, not billions. And at some point the whole effort will inevitably be ended with some kind of hard-to-predict catastrophe (long blackouts? multiplication of consumer costs by a factor of ten or more?). By then, many of the working resources that have made the grid function will have been destroyed and will have to be re-created, at a cost of further trillions.
Consider the case of Germany. Germany is a very substantial country (80+ million people, making it twice the size of California and four times the size of New York), with the world’s fourth largest GDP at over $4 trillion annually. Germany was one of the first to start down the road to a zero-emissions grid back in the 1990s, and formally adopted its “Energiewende” fourteen years ago in 2010. Germany has proceeded farther than any other large country in converting its electricity generation to wind and solar.
And yet, as I look around for information on Germany’s progress toward zero-emissions electricity, I can’t find any concern or recognition that this might not be doable in the end. Perhaps that exists in German language sources that I can’t read. But from anything I can find, it looks like Germany is forging ahead in the blind faith that if only they build enough wind turbines and solar panels at some point they will have the zero-emissions electricity that they crave.
Go to the website of the Umweltbundesamt (Federal Environmental Agency) for the latest information. At least on the electricity front, you will not find any indication that there may be problems in achieving the zero-emissions utopian future:
The “Energiewende” – Germany’s transition towards a secure, environmentally friendly, and economically successful energy future – includes a large-scale restructuring of the energy supply system towards the use of renewable energy in all sectors. . . . [T]he switch towards renewables in the electricity sector has been very successful so far. . . . While in the year 2000 renewables accounted for 6.3 percent of electricity demand only, its [sic] share has been growing significantly over the past years, exceeding 10 percent in the year 2005 and 25 per cent in the year 2013. In 2023 renewable energy sources provided 272 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity and account for 51.8 percent of German electricity demand. With wind power being by far the most important energy source in the German electricity mix.
Some 30+ years into this process, and they’re only up to barely over 50% of their electricity from “renewables.” And while they may claim that “wind power [is] by far the most important source in the German electricity mix,” in fact when you get a breakdown you find that wind and solar together provided well less than 50%. According to solar advocates Fraunhofer Institute here, in 2023 “biomass” provided some 42.3 TWh of Germany’s electricity (about 8%), hydro provided 19.5 TWh (about 4%), and “waste non-renewable” (I think that means burning garbage) provided 4.5 TWh (about 1%). That leaves under 40% for wind and solar.
If they keep building solar and wind facilities, and expect batteries to be the backup, has anybody calculated how much battery storage they will need? Not that I can find. Here is a website of a company called Fluence, which is an affiliate of German industrial giant Siemens. They excitedly predict a rapid expansion of grid storage in Germany:
Storage capacity will grow 40-fold to 57 GWh by 2030.
Wow, a 40-fold increase! It may sound like a lot. But Germany’s average electricity demand is about 50 GW, so the 57 GWh of battery storage in 2030 will come to about 1 hour’s worth. Competent calculations of the amount of energy storage needed to back up a predominantly wind/solar grid run in the range of around 500 to 1000 hours.
Here from another website is a chart of the growth of energy storage in Germany up to this year.
Look at that acceleration! But the 10 GWh of storage that they currently have will last no more than about 10 minutes when the wind and sun quit producing on a calm night.
In short, this large and seemingly sophisticated country is completely delusional, with no sane voices anywhere to be heard. A demonstration project that fails spectacularly is the only thing with any hope of saving them.
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Processes required to make wind and solar farms possible:
1) Mining/extracting the raw materials to manufacture solar panels and wind turbines (using fossil fueled equipment)
2) Manufacturing the wind turbines and solar panels (using coal for the solar panels and turbine towers, electricity from fossil fuels and petrochemicals from crude oil for turbine blades)
3) Transporting the finished product to the farm site (using fossil fueled transport)
4) Installing the turbines/solar panels on site (using fossil fueled equipment and cement to anchor
wind turbines in the ground)
Questions:
1) Do the renewable true believers realize that the objects of their theology require fossil fuels to make the solar and wind farms possible?
2) Are their any studies showing that the solar and wind turbine farms save more CO2 emissions during their lifetimes than what was emitted during the processes required to make the solar and wind farms possible?
3) Do the renewables believers realize that wind and solar farms will likely require replacing more often than a new natural gas or coal fired power plant? (Again, consider the emissions involved). Are they planning on replacing wind and solar farms at all when they become inoperative?
4) Do the renewable believers have recycling plans in place to preclude expired solar panel and wind turbine debris from ending up in landfills? Do they realize the toxic waste involved in manufacturing and disposing of the panels and turbines?
5) Do they realize that the sun and the wind are poor, low density energy sources requiring solar and wind farms to use much more land area than traditional nuclear and fossil fuel power plants require?
*********
I could go on, but I think the reader gets the idea. As I’ve said in a previous comment thread, having a brain is one thing. Actually using it is something else altogether.
Solar panels can go on roofs, and be used to build structures over car parks – shade in the Summer, rather than going back to a boiling hot car, and shade when it rains. There is a huge amount of area that can be covered with solar panels, on house roofs and business premises.
They can be covered much more cheaply with sun shade roofs. Rooftop solar is poison to the grid. It is very destabilizing; the more rooftop solar, the greater the cost to keep the grid running.
More rational people in various jurisdictions that have been big on promoting solar, some Australian states and California in the US come readily to mind, have tried to get legislation preventing rooftop solar grid connections to the grid but the religious fanatics control too much political power and the best that has so far been achieved is making the utility’s purchase price very low at peak times and, in some case, charging the rooftop owner for power sent to the grid at peak solar production times.
More is definitely not better unless the more has a local use, not connected to the grid.
And they will continue to produce power less than half the time (night plus cloudy, rain, snow, ice, etc. = no solar power).
Requiring 100% backup to keep the lights, etc. on. Thereby making the grid both less reliable and more expensive.
Was there a point?!
I tend to think a large demonstration is not necessary or feasible.
We already have a failed small one, El Hierro.
A bigger one would never pencil out technically, so politicians would create ‘safety valves’ rather than allow an honest painful failure.
Rather, I think what is needed is a massive grid failure attributable to overpenetration of renewables. Almost got that with ERCOT wind in 2022. Won’t be California, because they import from Bonneville hydro. Won’t be Germany, because they export to and import from Norwegian hydro. Most likely is the UK, with Miliband now hastening the inevitable with two old dispatchable coal stations scheduled to close next couple of years and the new nuclear capacity indefinitely delayed on cost grounds.
The UK government has put off until 2029 its decision on which SMR design to go with for its small modular reactor roll out plan.
This has prompted a decision by Rolls Royce to sell off its SMR subsidiary in order to gain the cash needed for financing other near-term projects with greater near-term profit potential.
In the meantime, the Canadian government is moving forward with the GE Hitachi BWRX-300 design, whose components will be produced in Canada.
If the Canadian government’s financing of the GE-Hitachi design stays in place, the first BWRX-300 could be in commercial operation before the end of 2030. Or possibly a year earlier if the Canadians really put their minds to it.
Rud, I agree with you. It’s a depressing prospect but it seems inevitable.
90 GW of total supply yesterday, of which wind was about 6% and solar 21% (looking at the ERCOT fuel mix web dashboard at 5PM where local high temp was 107 deg F here in Texas.)
If we had had that much dispatchable ‘peaker’ capability available in Feb of 2021 (you got the year wrong) that event would not have been noteworthy.
BTW, ‘Electron paramagnetic resonance proof for the existence of …’ from Prof Hagen of tudelft.nl (Tufts Univ.)
https://pure.tudelft.nl/ws/portalfiles/portal/126823930/1_s2.0_S0360319922022406_main.pdf
If you had enough dispatchable power and zero wind and solar, it would not have been noteworthy at all, and your electricity prices would be lower.
So what will all of their efforts do to reduce the earth’s temperature? Now I get to use a new word … Bupkis!
Because the wind & solar advocates handle the intermittency problem by saying “The wind is always blowing somewhere” and “The sun is always shining somewhere”, a true demonstration project for wind & solar backed by batteries must be continent wide.
Those ‘somewheres’ which are out there somewhere — either near or far — must be specifically identified. The power generation resources located in those near or far ‘somewheres’ must be of sufficient size and availability to supply the demand when closer generation resources fall short. The power transmission infrastructure between ‘here’ and those other ‘somewheres’ somewhere out there must be present and accounted for whenever our call for dispatchable power needed for ‘here’ comes.
Richard Greene is correct. The reason we create engineering plans is to build a paper model of what could eventually become a physical reality, moving forward with our plans only after deciding it is worth the time and the money needed to build whatever it is we want to build.
A paper model of a continent-wide wind & solar powered grid system will be far more revealing in terms of the scope and the importance of its technical details than any smaller-scale demonstration project can possibly be.
But then the question must be asked, will anyone but the renewable energy skeptics care?
The only way the wind & solar juggernaut can be slowed and eventually stopped is for public service commissions all across the nation to demand honest answers to the hard engineering questions.
A set of professionally done paper studies which cover all the necessary bases is the only practical means of answering all the tough engineering questions which must be addressed.
We can only hope that some day in the near-term future, public service commissions will begin demanding those honest answers.
In addition, such studies near a fair and impartial review.
How likely?
Respectfully, I believe folks are forgetting that one can not prove a negative or in this case that something isnt feasible. The green mob will simply say that it wasnt done correctly; no different then when discussing communism/ socialism ie. ‘you didnt do it right, we’ll do it better this time’.
This ^
The left is just not going to listen to reason.
Story Tip
A new nuclear reactor could soon be operating in Switzerland – despite the ban on new nuclear plants
The Paul Scherrer Institute is building a nuclear power test facility in Aargau in collaboration with the startup Copenhagen Atomics. Its designers hope to build it within three years, and to conquer the world from Switzerland
Once again the solution is Trump 2024. Trump will say drill, drill, drill and use the abundant resources we have. Let the Germans and other eco nuts squander their money on unreliable green energy.
In 2023, the US crude oil production reached a record-high 12.9 million b/d in the United States, a 9% (1.0 million b/d) increase from 2022.
What is the world going to do with more oil? The price is not high now. More supply will just lower prices and make the oil industry less profitable.
Chevron Corporation is an American multinational energy corporation predominantly specializing in oil and gas.
Their 2023 net profit margin was only 8.8% i 4Q 2023
The Exxon Mobil profit margin was 10.1% in 4Q 2023.
And 2023 was a good year for the industry
For comparison, the Apple net profit margin for 4Q 2023 was 25%
Lowering the price of oil cripples Russia’s ability to wage war in Ukraine, and that in combination with the actual enforcement of sanctions on Iran dries up funding for terrorism. That is sufficient.
US crude reached record production IN SPITE OF the current administration’s bone-headed energy policies, not because of them. And that record production didn’t satisfy US demand, driving up domestic energy prices and overall inflation.
Biden’s idiocy has done great damage, because his refusals to hold LEGALLY REQUIRED oil and gas exploration leases will likely bake in future shortages (which of course Democrats will blame on non-Democrats).
Under Trump, the US was a net exporter of oil. Under Biden, we were back to buying it elsewhere to make up for inadequate domestic production. Biden’s draining of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in pursuit of temporary gas price reductions to pander for votes also undermined US national security.
We need to get back to pro-energy, pro-prosperity policies. Making energy more expensive and less reliable benefits nobody but the billionaires Democrats are always whining about.
They are the Demonstration Project. We should just sit back and watch them succeed or fail and proceed accordingly. I suggest hiring a reputable accounting firm to keep track of the money spent and received.
Isn’t accounting racist and thus illegal in the west?
Some of the magic the true believers believe might happen could be a mini black hole wherein all the excess generation could be stored. A temporary collapse of same will allow the energy to be made available for the necessary backup generation when there is insufficient wind and solar. See, easy.
It’s right to say its share. Why [sic]?
https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/when-to-use-its-vs-its#:~:text=What%20to%20Know.%20It's%20is%20a%20contraction,%22his%22%20and%20%22her%2C%22%20for%20nouns%20without%20gender.
This whole “share of electricity demand” is another deception. The author caught a piece of it by looking at the details of how much of the “renewables” was actually wind and solar.
But the truth is undoubtedly worse still, because the REAL “contributions” of “renewables” needs to be compared to ALL generation. Since much of renewable “generation” occurs when it is not needed, the comparison of what is generated vs. what is demanded is a deliberate overstatement of the “contribution” of “renewables.”
I’m betting the total dispatchable generation + renewable generation was well in excess of “demand,” and the real “contribution” of wind and solar is the total minus dispatchable non-“renewable” minus the non-wnd/solar renewables (i.e. the portion of renewables that are also dispatchable).
And when that honest approach is taken, the most important energy source is probably still coal.
For Germany in 2023 the annual total CO2 emissions and per cap CO2 emissions had reduced to the level of the early 1950s while the total primary energy consumption and primary energy consumption per cap also fell to around the mid 1960s level (Our World in Data).
Apart from unpredictable electricity generation the function of wind turbines and solar panels is to make electricity less and less affordable forcing reduced use working up through the income levels.
As others have noted Germany for the next decade will be the ‘test bed’ of non-nuclear net-zero’ .
Well the UK is nipping at their heels, at the very least.
Other “western” nations shod just suspend their stupid anti-fossol fuel energy policies and let those two be the test dummies.
(My apologies to test dummies, no offense intended.)
History tells us that when Germany goes Nutty, it does not do so in any small measure.
86% of new generating capacity added last year around the world was solar. It seems the ‘Guest blogger ‘ should brush up a bit
From 2022 to 2023 the share of global electricity from solar went from 4.59% to 5.53% while the overwhelming sources of global electricity generation coal and gas remained steady at around 58% (Our World in Data).
Which is totally useless at night !..
Works far less than half the time. !
Seems the beetroot remains “unaware”.
My home solar system coupled with battery is very useful at night.
According to the Energy Institute ‘Statistical Review of World Energy 2024’
“fossil fuel consumption as a percentage of primary energy in 2023 was 81.5%” and “coal retained its position as the dominant fuel for power generation with fossil fuels overall forming 60% of global electricity generation”
“in 2023 global coal production reached its highest ever level beating the previous high set in 2022”
“In 2023 global oil production reached a record level of over 96m barrels per day” and “consumption of oil exceeded 100m barrels per day for the first time ever”
Great news for coal producers. Solar panels are net coal consumers. China just needs to keep digging it up and converting it to solar panels so western countries can play this silly game of demonising CO2.
The attached image shows the 7m high longwall jacks that are improving the productivity of China’s big coal mines. This is what is enabling the western world’s flirt with insanity.
Underground mining technology is stellar. There is actual, sensible usage of electric vehicles in action.
Whether an actual demonstration project is ever built is not important. The point is that outfits that are pushing the end of fossil fuel and nuclear and the switch to renewables should be made to construct a demonstration project before they can move one step forward. The net zero crowd can lie and fudge figures all they want but being required to build a demonstration project is a different thing. We all know it could never work and they know that also. The lack of a functioning demonstration project should put the whole mess to rest.
Even with the various crash test dummy renewable installations designed to provide all the electricity under ideal conditions people don’t get it because the AGW cabal won’t allow the truth out. The truth would destroy cash cows.
This is not correct. Germany is a leech; relying on neighbouring countries to keep its lights on. Like the UK, the German economy is in decline but Germany has better connection with China so its manufacturing is gradually shifting to China. It is providing intellectual property and bringing in profits for now but that has limited time frame because the next generation of Germans will need to go to China to learn the business. Meanwhile China is in the right place to take on the learning.
If you ask ChatGPT to design an electricity supply system, it will give reasonable numbers.
For example, the task I set it was to design a system based on wind turbines with battery that could supply a 10MW steady demand allowing for a wind drought no longer than 14 days.
It arrived at 29 by 2MW turbine and a 3360MWh battery.
I then asked it to determine how much coal would need to be burnt to make the turbines, the turbine foundations and the battery. It arrived at 297kt. (the battery was by far the biggest cost in coal)
Just burning the coal at a power station would deliver 10MW for 191 years.
I had to calculate the 191 years because I used up my free time getting to that point. But I expect that is would say you could get 191 years of supply from 297kt of coal at 10MW.
That is an astounding result! Can you verify this? Can someone verify this? I’ll try but don’t hold your breath. That implies an EROEI of what? 0.2?
Chat GPT requires payment after a certain number of questions.
This is the final summary it gave after I had framed the question to provide wind turbines, foundations and battery for a 10MW continuous supply allowing for a 14 day wind droundgt.
Clearly the last paragraph is nonsense because it would be much smarter just to burn the coal to make electricity.
I get a different answer for how long the coal would last being burned in a power plant. A 10 MW coal plant running 24 hours a day produces 240,000 kWh of energy per day. The EIA website gives a figure of 1.14 pounds of coal to produce 1 kWh of energy when burned in a power plant. That’s 210,526 pounds of coal per day, or 105.26 tons. 274,000 tons of coal would thus last 274,000/105.26 = 2,603 days, or 7.13 years. I know the mistake you made to arrive at 191 years, because I initially made the same one (and got 191 years).
The wind farm is a bad deal nevertheless.
And unlike the coal power plants that would last at least 60 years with good upkeep, you would be rebuilding the wind turbines and batteries three times as often.
So the amount of coal used would be each 20 years (if you’re lucky and have no weather damage before the operating life is over) would use another 191 years worth of coal.
And so on, and so on…
I saw the mining industry pivot to the Climate Change™ agenda about a decade ago. The reasons are quite obvious when you look at their current advertisements on how they are suppling all the materials needed to build wind turbines, solar panels, batteries and electric motors. Climate Change™ is the gift that keeps giving for the big miners.
The Minerals Council of Australia is now a nest of Greens, all pushing the green agenda.
Germany can only end their self-inflicted economic suicide by making a significant political change. The AfD (Alternative for Deutschland) wants to end support for Ukraine, end the failed energiewende experiment, restart their newer nuclear, reestablish normal trade relations with Russia, and deport illegals. The AfD is growing in popularity at about the same rate that the Green Party is fading so there is hope. Germany has so many political party’s that a three Party coalition is always required for a majority. The AfD has to be one of the coalition partners to begin the healing.
Let’s see what next month’s state elections bring for AfD in the the east. Germany seems to be splitting east to west once again with the east being to home to those who cherish freedom.
I searched the internet for details on the El Hierro island experiment, and was surprised to find that so far only wind and hydro power has been used, with diesel-powered backup.
However, it seems the experiment is ongoing, and the inclusion of solar power is now being considered. Following is an article which analyses the situation.
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/23/16185
“In addition, more renewable generation is needed to reach the aim of 100% renewable energy demand coverage. The total renewable power installed should be around 200% of maximum demand, while energy storage should be in the order of maximum power demand. In particular, the following should be achieved:
Install at least 10 MW of solar photovoltaic.
Install batteries with grid-forming inverters.
Minimize the simultaneous use of turbines and pumps.
Use another inertial provider such as synchronous condensers, or flywheels.
If possible, increase wind farm power.
In particular, for the El Hierro island, it has been verified that with the additional installation of 10 MWp photovoltaic solar power and a battery capacity of 4 MW with 1 h of storage, up to 95% renewable coverage can be achieved, as long as the regulation strategy is modified.”
I personally think that solar power technology can be a sensible mix to mankind’s energy requirements, if it’s used to its maximum capacity on all roof tops. However, in order to maximise the capacity, the houses need to be designed to maximise the amount of sunlight received.
An obvious example is to design a flat, but slightly sloping roof, oriented towards the sun. If the whole roof areas, including, decks, verandahs, garage, carport, garden sheds, and so on, were covered with solar panels, or more esthetically, solar tiles, the amount of electricity produced would very likely be much more than the household uses, especially in sunny areas.
So what? That’s like saying wouldn’t it be great if we had solar panels and inverters collecting the sun’s energy at 100% efficiency. There’s still those pesky rain clouds and starlight and moonlight. Yeah yeah I know the rain that falls from the sky is free so I shouldn’t have to pay for it coming out of my taps and welcome to Gretalogic and anything’s possible. Like Oz towing icebergs from Antarctica to grow orchids around Ayers Rock.
Um, any heavy industry on the island? How about “AI” data centers, requiring (and representing) a constant (and growing) power demand?
You don’t need to cover all your roof.
I have solar system for 3 years, and 4kW of panels are providing 73% of my yearly electricity needs. 3.2MWh solar, rest 1.2MWh I’m taking from grid.
This is done with 24m2 of solar panels. My whole roof is around 200m2.
Looking on statistics I would need around 15kW of panels to be 100% self reliable. This is around 90m2 of panels.
I’m 49 degrees north.
For example household in Bay Area California, with 6kW of panels taking 36m2 of roof could gain 20kWh daily in average during worst month of December. Rest months gain could be up to 28kWh daily.
This enough for one household.
re: “The money allocated for backup batteries would be nowhere close to paying for the battery GWh capacity needed.”
A few years ago, I mentioned that during that month of February in Texas we had had cloudy days *every* day of that month (I kept a weather log back then) … how would we have fared were batteries our ONLY source of energy sans sunlight input (and allowing for the usual intermittent wind?)
I think trying to show people how stupid wind and solar power are (aside from “off grid” use) is a fruitless waste of money (as usual).
Even if such a demonstration was correctly done (isolated from the grid, and hopefully applied to a community that is full Eco-Nazi so as not to make the non-delusional suffer), they would just come back with the same old “but if we did the whole country, the wind would be blowing/Sun would be shining ‘somewhere'” and insist the failure of the demonstration project was about inadequate scope.
IOW, “send more money,” as usual.
So you want an island demonstration project do you? Just dream big-
Australian electrical grid ‘struggling to cope’ with renewable production (msn.com)
A quick glance at https://app.electricitymaps.com/ is all what’s needed to see through the Bundesumweltamt hype concerning the efficiency of the Energiewende in bringing down the CO2 load of electricity: just compare France (no Energiewende, but nuclear) and Germany (Emergiewende, no more nuclear): today 20th August 2024, 13:00 UTC, sunny weather: Germany 216 gCO2/kWh, France 21g
The Royal Society’s ‘Large-Scale Electricity Storage’ report gave a figure of 50 TWhrs (electrical) storage needed to provide reliable power for an 80/20 wind/solar mix supply of 570 TWhrs annually. They calculated that using hydrogen would double the price of electricity over that of the orginal wind/solar mix evn when doubling today’s figures for the capacity factor and electrolysis efficiency.
PS : The NG ESO FES 2024 plans for 2050 show a storage which is 1/200th of the 50 TWhrs the Royal Society say is needed.
Gavin Newsom’s refusal to accept the conclusions of his own staff about “price-gouging” on gasoline in California demonstrates perfectly why some of us believe a demonstration project would not produce the desired outcome. For the genuinely devout evidence is frivolous and trivial.
https://climatechangedispatch.com/calif-energy-czar-tells-senate-no-price-gouging-found-newsom-still-blames-oil-companies/