Beam me to Planet Gore !
Posted on 11/01/2011 9:33:42 AM PDT by jpl
At Last: Britain Pulls Plug On Green Energy Boondoggle
The Government Giveth and the Government Taketh Away
–-Famous green proverb
Ministers have been accused of destroying 25,000 jobs and “bankrupting a whole industry”, after the Government unveiled plans to slash subsidies for green energy. Hundreds of solar companies are likely to go bust by Christmas after the Department for Energy and Climate Change confirmed it is looking to halve subsidies for new panels. –Rowena Mason, The Daily Telegraph, 1 November 2011
The row over solar subsidies is the latest manifestation of a long and fierce battle within the government between Chris Huhne’s DECC and George Osborne’s Treasury over the role of green growth in the UK’s economic recovery, made especially pointed by soaring home energy bills. “We may be out of touch with the solar lobby, but we are not out of touch with energy bills,” Barker told parliament on Monday. –Damian Carrington, The Guardian, 31 October 2011
At a time when household savers are struggling to get a 0.5 per cent return on an instant access saving account, some of these renewable energy subsidies – paid in the form of generous payments for the electricity produced, so called feed-in tariffs (FITs) – are guaranteeing annual returns of 10 per cent. It’s one of the biggest wealth transfers – from millions of ordinary hard-working tax payers to a few hundred of the hugely wealthy – in British history. It’s staggeringly unfair and, in the growing opinion of many, totally pointless. –Benny Peiser, Daily Mail, 9 June 2011
The right hon. Lady says that we are out of touch. We may be out of touch with the solar lobby, but we are not out of touch with energy bill payers. She says that they are groaning under a £175 increase, but she wants to put that up. If we did not act now, consumers would face massive increases in energy bills. –-Gregory Barker, Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change, House of Commons, 31 October 2011
Silicon Valley’s green geek scenario, which we can date at around 2005-2009 is now gurgling down the WC pan of history. Its elitist and totally unreal notions of extreme high priced electric cars for Nice People Saving the Planet, and designer Low Energy homes for the same Nice People, and nobody else, has gone down the tube. –Andrew McKillop, The Global Warming Policy Foundation, 31 October 2011
Beacon Power Corp filed for bankruptcy on Sunday, just a year after the energy storage company received a $43 million loan guarantee from a controversial Department of Energy program. The bankruptcy comes about two months after Solyndra — a solar panel maker with a $535 million loan guarantee — also filed for Chapter 11, creating a political embarrassment for the administration of President Barack Obama, which has championed the loans as a way to create “green energy” jobs. –Reuters, 31 October 2011
Here’s the kicker: Market-driven energy choices are cutting more tons of CO2 in the U.S. than have been cut by wind and solar—even with their billions of dollars in subsidies. Natural gas-fired electricity generation has grown from 15.8 percent of America’s power generation in 2000 to 24.1 percent in the most recent 12-month tally from the Energy Information Administration. That 8.3 percent increase is enough to cut 120 million metric tons of CO2 per year compared to coal. Over the same span, wind- and solar-generated power grew to 2.75 percent of total power generation. That would cut CO2 by 108 million metric tons per year compared to coal power. So over the past decade, hugely subsidized wind and solar have done less to cut CO2 emissions than market-driven natural gas production. –-David Kreutzer, The Foundry, 25 October 2011
In Britain, once in the vanguard of action on climate change, the government is scaling back its green energy investment… Nobody expects a UN climate deal in Durban this year — nor next year, nor the year after. But meanwhile the coal keeps burning. Global production is set to rise by 35 percent in the coming decade, according to industry analysts. The cheapest, most abundant and dirtiest of all the fossil fuels is extending its grip on the world’s energy supply system. And nowhere more so than just up the coast from Durban. –Fred Pearce, The Guardian, 31 October 2011
We have to put shale in the context of other energy sources in order to convey a comparative analysis of the environmental impact. People forget the environmental costs of coal mining or oil exploration; nuclear also has its own risks. Natural gas is a form of energy that falls into the low risk category. Can the green lobby win the shale debate over environmental objections? I don’t think it can. Ten or 20 years ago it could have won when governments were willing to burn billions, but the economic climate has changed, we’re facing the biggest crisis in decades. No government in the world would give up this opportunity, not even the British government, which is very green indeed. –Benny Peiser, Natural Gas Europe, 25 October 2011
Solar ping.
The bottom line is that solar energy is not particularly good for providing “grid” energy, that we are used to. Instead, its best application is in “marginal” energy, which can be very important in its own right, but has very different rules.
I like to cite the example of air conditioning on a hot day in the desert southwest. Typically a home has an air conditioner, which almost has to be powered by grid electricity because of its energy needs. But homes often have attics, where temperatures can hit 150F on a 115F day. This hot attic space sends lots of IR radiation down into the home, which makes the load on the air conditioner very heavy.
But, if you have a simple, solar powered fan to evacuate the hot attic air, it can drop the internal temperature from 150F to maybe 120F, still hotter than the outdoor temperature. But this slashes the load on the main air conditioning. As such, this solar power marginal application becomes extremely efficient, if indirectly.
Another example is that of water heaters, that even in summer need to raise water temperature to 125F or so, from a typical city water temperature of maybe 78F. By first running city water up to a roof in summer, to let it pre-warm in a passive solar tank, before going back down to the water heater, its temperature may be raised to 110F, which takes a LOT less energy to warm to 125F than from 78F.
Again, a very efficient use of solar energy.
I have nothing against subsidies and tax breaks for green companies as long as it makes sense.
But to make half billion dollar loans to companies who are going belly up, or car companies in other countries is insane.
Some day we may need some sort of alternative power , and it makes sense to help that power get developed, what makes no sense is to cut down on drilling and developing new oil fields, and put coal companies, and electric companies out of business before the other power is ready.
This is what the Ice Cream eating Muslim Vacationer is doing and it is wrong.It is hurting America, killing jobs and destroying our economy.
I agree, but all the available evidence appears to show that it just doesn't make sense.
If there is an instance where the "Green Jobs" philosophy is working, I'm not aware of it. It failed dismally in Spain, it has failed dismally in the U.K., and it is clearly failing dismally here in the U.S.
That’s what I have here. I have a whole stack of water buckets. They absorb the heat when it’s hot and cool off in the evening. Makes a big difference with the bills.
Failure does not mean it cannot work.
Edison failed hunbdreds of times before getting his light bulb to work.
Now they are outlawed LOL.
Anyway I can see helping to make it work, What is stupid is trying to force it to work.
To stop using the energy we have because we want to force an energy we dont have to work, is beyond stupid.
What good is a clean environment if no one has a job, cannot afford to keep warm, and is living in the dark.
Sh*t N. Korea already has that. Is that what Obama wants for us? It would appear to be so.
That’s an oxymoron right there. If that “green energy” made sense, then it wouldn’t need tax breaks and other subsidies. They need them precisely because it does not make sense.
BRAVO!!!
There.
Fixed it for them.
How does that work? Where are you putting the buckets?
“Green Energy” does serve a purpose,
and that purpose is to simultaneously bankrupt the country,
and deny the people the use of viable energy sources.
Ever wonder why Gang Green doesn’t support developing their “Green Dream” WHILE we use our present energy sources?
Works on the same principle that insulation does in walls. It’s passive cooling. So long as the buckets are colder than the ambient temp, they will continue to absorb heat.
For best results put it in the hottest areas of the house. I have a room, so I have them stacked by one of my walls.
Water is 2 to 4x as efficient as the next closest building material, which is wood. This is due to specific heat capacity. This means that they take longer to warm up, but this is what you want in hot climates. You don’t even have to worry about replacing the buckets, just make sure you’ve got enough room for some thermal expansion and you’re good to go.
Out of curiosity, how often do you have to refill the buckets?
Not if you keep a lid on to keep evaporation in.
Fill them and forget. The water won’t boil because even during the hottest days (say 100F or higher, that’s still only 40-45 degrees C. Well under boiling. The 75 degree water takes quite a bit of heat to get up to 100 degrees, and will radiate that back when the temperature drops.
I used to keep my old apartment heated that way in winter when I lived up north for the same reasons. Fill up the bathtub with water as hot as you can get it and let the heat from the water radiate throughout the apartment. But that is a bit more involved, because you have to do it every day. I wouldn’t want to use it with the buckets because they would shatter in the cold.
Your energy source to heat the water was lower cost than the energy source used for the furnace/heater system?
Heat was controlled by the building owner and all the joys that this entails.
If you’re in a stick house with a standard roof,
watering the roof will dramatically cut your cooling bills.
Evaporating water off your roof removes a lot of heat BTUs so that your AC won’t have to.
Oh sure. Now that the money is gone.
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