Free Republic

Snips from excerpt website: Japanese solar company Sanyo plans to lay off about 140 employees in California, or about 40 percent of its manufacturing workforce in the United States, as it shifts its strategy in order to compete with large rivals, particularly those from China. The company, which is part of Panasonic, is buiding a large factory in Malaysia that will make wafers and turn them into solar cells and then panels. Panasonic plans to invest 45 billion yen (about $580 million) in the new factory. A fellow manufacturer in Japan, Sumco, announced Friday it would get out of the...

Despite history – and current events involving alternative energy companies – many Americans buy into the notion that for good things to happen, the government needs to be involved, even in charge. How many Solyndras is too many?

Electric car enthusiasts – those who want someone else to subsidize their extravagances and then pretend that the electricity they use isn’t created with fossil fuel anyway – may at first find something to cheer about in this news from England. There are now more charging stations than electric vehicles on the road, reports the MailOnline. . . . But we need to read a bit more in that Mail story. The reason there are more electric charging stations than electric cars isn’t because there are so many stations. It’s because there are so few electric cars.

It’s another day, and another round of layoffs by a recipient of millions of dollars under the Obama Administration’s renewable energy initiatives, administered by the mismanaged Department of Energy. This time the Recovery Act largesse – taken out of the hide of taxpayers – went to A123 Systems, Inc. The Massachusetts-based energy storage company was given $249.1 million to help launch two battery-manufacturing plants in Michigan. A123 also received grants and tax credits from the state that could total more than $135 million. In a separate federal grant as a subcontractor for another grantee, A123 received nearly $30 million...

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Livestock farmers are demanding a change in the nation's ethanol policy, claiming current rules could lead to spikes in meat prices and even shortages at supermarkets if corn growers have a bad year. The amount of corn consumed by the ethanol industry combined with continued demand from overseas has cattle and hog farmers worried that if corn production drops due to drought or another natural disaster, the cost of feed could skyrocket, leaving them little choice but to reduce the size of their herds. A smaller supply could, in turn, mean higher meat prices and...

* China eyeing "vastly superior" scale, Immelt warns * "I worry a little bit about us," Immelt says of U.S.* GE "all-in" on solar, sees potential $20 bln business By Scott MaloneNov 3 (Reuters) - General Electric Co's Jeff Immelt worries the United States may lose ground to China in the renewable energy sector because it is not prepared to invest in solar, wind and other technologies on the same scale.But the chief executive of the largest U.S. conglomerate said his company remains undaunted and will continue to work in the sector despite the recent bankruptcy of solar panel maker...

“Energy independence.”Doesn’t that sound like a great idea? Unfortunately, in the era of Barack Obama the goal of enabling the United States to meet its own energy needs has been subverted by some very destructive politics. First, the term “energy independence” has been confused with the term “green energy.” While some people use the two expressions synonymously, the Obama Administration has gradually phased-out references to “energy independence” and moved towards “green energy” references exclusively. This language shift from the Obama Administration raises some important questions: are we no longer seeking to become “energy independent?” And if we are still seeking...

A recent study, released on 11 October, “Biofuel Markets and Technologies” released by Pike Research states that the global biofuel market will double within the next decade to $183.3 billion from its current level of $82.7 billion, with ethanol production accounting for $78 billion of future worldwide biofuel production, while predicting that biodiesel production will reach $25.5 billion. Perhaps not surprisingly, Pike Research predicts that the US will become the world’s leading biofuel producer, accounting for 71 percent of alternative fuel by 2021. Colorado-based Pike Research on its website defines itself as “a market research and consulting firm that provides...

For those looking for world changing technology in cold fusion or its more ambiguous moniker, LENR, I invite them to return to 2008 to examine a cutting edge company with a grand plan. The had a test plant on the Texas coast, foreign partnerships and agreements, land cleared for a new plant, scientific minds at work and the figures to prove it. The company (a few founder/investors in LaJolla, Ca.) sold stock and the price went to about $1.50 a share. An office was opened in Scottsdale, Arizona (if you've been to LaJolla Scottsdale looks shabby by comparison). The company...

Forty-one years ago on Sesame Street, Kermit the frog sang a plaintive song, “It’s not easy being green.” In a gesture of solidarity, perhaps he should fax the lyrics to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose government is suddenly discovering the costs of weaning itself off nuclear energy. In the wake of Fukushima, German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced on 30 May that Germany, the world's fourth-largest economy and Europe's biggest, would become the first industrialized nation to shut down all of its 17 nuclear power plants (NPPs) between 2015 and 2022, an extraordinary commitment, given that Germany’s 17 NPPS Germany produce...

Our ever-campaigning president heads off to a fundraiser held by a politically connected businessman whose company took a $100 million stimulus tax credit. Solyndra didn't stop pay-for-play the "Chicago Way."

China, arguably the world’s most influential and dynamic economy, is beginning to eye renewable as a partial solution to its voracious and growing energy needs. If Beijing determines that biofuels represent the future, expect to see the current modest western investment field to change dramatically. As yet, China’s involvement is modest. According to a PetroChina company official, the firm intends to increase its production of biofuels by 2015 to 1.1 million tons and import and additional 470,000 tons. PetroChina, a traditional hydrocarbon company, is clearly thinking outside the box to increase its alternative energy portfolio. According to PetroChina's Petrochemical Research...

The domestic alternative energy policy in the US seems to rotate on semantics and adding words to other words to make it look like something is going on. However, the truth of the matter is, energy policy is as defunct as ever and on most fronts the US is lagging far behind. Mostly it is a disregard of what the economist Herman Daly has pointed out about the macro-view of the macro-economic system. His idea is that the ecological system is closed and finite, not infinite created by God for our own personal use, which needs to be included into...

Tripling America's Fuel ProductionMost alternatives to oil are pipe dreams. This one is not. The United States currently produces 8 percent of the world’s liquid fuel but uses 25 percent, making up the difference by importing 5 billion barrels of oil annually. With prices currently near $100 per barrel, this dependency will cost us $500 billion this year, an amount equal to the nation’s entire trade deficit. Furthermore, at a time when Congress is seeking to keep taxes light in order to boost job creation, our dependency will impose a tax on our economy equal to 20 percent of what...

Alternative energy (or renewable energy) is a new manufacturing industry paradigm that is in its infancy. However, the discussion is not new, and it looks as if the United States has positioned itself to be behind history on what can be a very promising industry for a stumbling economy. After the oil shortages in the 70’s, government officials began discussing energy policy as a matter of national security, but this misses the point of a globally competitive economic world. It was too early then to begin thinking that China could out-invest the United States in order to produce an alternative...

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a column for The Week in which I questioned the notion of electric cars being a green option. My arguments got swift rebuttals from backers of electric cars, but a new study produced in partnership between the British government and the car industry shows just how correct I was. Not only do electric vehicles produce just as much carbon in their overall cycle as internal-combustion engines, the need to replace the batteries actually makes the less green than current technology (via Jeff Dunetz): ELECTRIC cars could produce higher emissions over their lifetimes than...

Energy Policy: The former governor of energy-rich Alaska calls the administration's bluff: End tax breaks for all forms of energy, she says, and let the free market pick winners and losers. End the ethanol pandering too. She isn't running, or riding, for president, at least not yet. But at a stop on her One Nation bus tour, Sarah Palin offered a winning idea for an economy strapped for energy and jobs and saddled with unsustainable debt. "I think all our energy subsidies need to be re-looked at today and eliminated," Palin told Scott Conroy of Real Clear Politics during a...

For two centuries the American economy has been driven by ever cheaper energy, from the steam engine to modern coal and nuclear electric power, and of course petroleum-based transportation. As costs of production and transport declined, incomes rose. Now environmentalists seek to reverse the process. They propose to raise the cost of our cheapest and most important energy source, coal. Subsidies for production of wind and solar energy already in place induce investment in much higher cost solar and wind power energy. Since the most efficient locations for solar and wind energy do not coincide with concentrations of population and...

President Obama’s plan to have the government employ a fleet of vehicles that uses alternative fuels, such as ethanol, may actually end up increasing the use of gasoline, rather than decreasing it. Last year, 55% of fleet vehicles capable of running on E85 – a blend of 15% gasoline and 85% ethanol – were given waivers for conventional gas, because E85 was no where to be found. That makes sense however, as E85 is only carried in about 1% of filling stations nationwide. “If you don’t have the infrastructure, it’s going to be tough to use the fuel in these...

There is a piece of doggerel which goes: They said it couldn’t be done. So I went right to it -- that thing they said Couldn’t be done. And I couldn’t do it. And that is the way it has been with presidents since the 1973 oil crisis. All of them -- from Richard Nixon to Barack Obama, who has just joined the club -- have wrung their hands and exhorted Americans to use less oil in general and less foreign oil in particular. Nixon had his commerce secretary, Peter G. Peterson (he of enormous wealth these days), promise far...

Despite some rather daunting technical difficulties, many people including President Obama, are pushing hard to have "alternative energy" take a bigger role in our nation's energy production. In fact, Obama plans to reduce our oil imports by 1/3 and using alternative energy as the main replacement. Alternative energy may be expensive and in it's infancy, but surely the enlightened hand (and pocketbook) of the federal government can transform these technologies into a mature, reliable, and pollution free power source? Obama, and the Democratic party have made that claim part of their party platform. In fact, they say alternative energy will...

In a speech yesterday, President Obama laid out the preposterous goal of reducing our oil imports by 1/3 before 2025. Even while he was making the goal, he acknowledged that many presidents had made the claim before, but none have ever delivered. However, even he seems dubious about achieving his goal. He said "when you look at the long-term trends, there are going to be more ups in gas prices than downs in gas prices.” This came after an admission that even present prices were hurting our economy. That's probably why he gave himself such a long deadline. It's easy...

Various Democratic politicians and sundry environmentalists have promised us that alternative energy and "green industry" can revive our economy. In June of last year, President Obama said, "the transition to clean energy has the potential to grow our economy and create millions of jobs." Kentucky Rep Ben Chandler says the ACES clean energy bill, "is not just about our environment, but it is about the future — the future of our economy, the future of our jobs." The "Center of American Progress" claims, "a new Green Recovery program that spends $100 billion over two years would create 2 million new...

Power: A study of renewable energy in Scotland shows that for every job created in the alternative energy sector, almost four jobs are lost in the rest of the economy. We've seen this movie before. Not only has the sun set on the British Empire, but the promise of wind apparently is deserting it as well. A new study called "Worth The Candle?" by the consulting firm Verso Economics confirms the experience of Spain and other countries: The creation of "green" jobs destroys other jobs through the diversion of resources and the denial of abundant sources of fossil fuel energy....

Two German inventors have created an electric vehicle that recharges the battery through a wind turbine carried in the car. To test the vehicle, the duo recently completed a 3,100-mile trek across Australia.

Times of international turmoil are great moments for domestic governments to make important announcements they don’t want to be noticed. Especially if the announcement involves a sudden reversal in policy that could seriously embarrass the government. So Friday afternoon was an ideal time for Ontario’s Liberal government to take a big chunk of its alternative energy program and chuck it overboard. .. After years of touting wind projects as a critical piece of the alternative energy puzzle, the government let slip — very quietly — that offshore wind projects are no longer part of the game plan. Turns out there...

According to research from the Chicago Board of Trade, futures markets for corn in March spiked 3.6 percent, or 24.25 cents per bushel. Currently the price of this commodity is hovering around $6.98. The core futures markets of corn, wheat, and soybeans, have jumped 97 percent, 107 percent, and 56 percent respectively. The outlook for international food and grain supplies are looking more uncertain after the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) reported its expectations that corn supply would decrease to lowest level in 15 years, the Wall Street Journal reported. The supply of corn has been depleted for a...

As was discussed on the February 2nd edition of Pratt on Texas, the ERCOT (Electric Reliability Council of Texas) rolling blackouts across the state could have been prevented with better planning and policy. Electrical engineer, Ross Aten, joined Robert Pratt to talk about how too many coal and natural gas power plants within ERCOT were taken offline for maintenance. Ross also explained that if you, ‘ran the numbers’, the only way ERCOT could have met peak winter demand usage is if wind energy across the state was producing at significant totals. However, because of the ice storm and lack of...

The prospects for solar and wind companies have declined significantly in the last few years.  Those who have been unfortunate enough to invest in solar and wind enterprises have, on the whole, experienced mediocre returns even as the overall market has risen 50% since its low of March 2009.  Over the last twelve months, one popular global alternative energy index fund has declined in price from $25 to $20.50.  Over the past two years, it has produced a return of zero. There are several reasons for the declining prospects of alternative energy companies.  Competition has become fierce, supply has...

In last months of his successful campaign, Gov.-elect John Kasich — in a statement that almost all politicians would deem risky due to fear of inflaming the Big Green lobby — told the Dayton Daily News that he would seriously consider a repeal of Ohio’s Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard. These mandates for utilities to generate minimum percentages of their power generation from expensive renewable sources drive up electricity rates for everyone. Paul Chesser has a piece in the Cincinnati Enquirer that encourages Kasich, now that he’s won, to push for the AEPS repeal and its associated job destruction and Big...

ROME (Reuters) – Italy Tuesday seized Mafia-linked assets worth $1.9 billion -- the biggest mob haul ever -- in an operation revealing that the crime group was trying to "go green" by laundering money through alternative energy companies. Investigators said the assets included more than 40 companies, hundreds of parcels of land, buildings, factories, bank accounts, stocks, fast cars and luxury yachts. Most of the seized assets were located in Sicily, home of the Cosa Nostra, and in southern Calabria, home of its sister crime organization, the 'Ndrangheta. At the center of the investigation was Sicilian businessman Vito Nicastri, 54,...

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has set an ambitious plan that requires a third of the state's electricity to come from renewable sources by 2020. But a fight over where to build large clean-energy projects is slowing the green revolution. Credit: Alyson Hurt, NPR One of these battlegrounds is Panoche Valley, ringed by rolling, scrub-covered hills. Located in California's rural San Benito County, the area was used mostly for cattle grazing, and it has escaped the notice of many Californians. Until now.

Advocates of a smooth transition away from petroleum may be surprised by the consequences of huge swings in the cost of oil. I first proposed a "head-fake" in the price of oil in 2008. My thesis was that the oil exporting nations had become so dependent on revenues from oil that even as prices plummeted in global recession, they would have no choice financially and politically to pumping every barrel they could. This would increase supply even as demand fell, causing prices to crash. This dynamic would drive prices down to lows which are widely considered "impossible" in an era...

Instead of an oil spill commission staffed with experts, as promised in his Oval Office address, the president has announced a panel with membership that reads like a Who's Who of radical environmentalism. Former Senator Graham of Florida, for example, has consistently pushed for a ban on oil drilling, and Frances Beinecke of the National Resources Defense Council has argued for the global warming agenda -- including linking "global poverty" to global warming, an argument used at the Copenhagen conference to support reparations to be paid to nations such as Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe for our supposed global crimes. In fact,...

Obama is using the oil spill in the Gulf as an emotional lever to push his cap and trade policy. The spill is a disaster, but exploiting it is truly despicable. It is made far worse when the alternative energies solutions don’t work. Increased costs will damage the economy and negatively impact the people he claims to represent. We’re in this predicament because of exploitation by politicians and environmental groups who deliberately ignore scientific evidence and corruption in climate science. Options were dramatically reduced by campaigns of fear against nuclear power creating legislation so that it now takes up to...

The editors of Investor’s Business Daily write: Environment: Our growing addiction to alternative energy was killing aquatic life in the Gulf long before the Deepwater Horizon spill. Abandoning oil will kill more and also release more carbon dioxide into the air. President Obama sees the oil spill as a chance to make the planet a greener place by weaning us off fossil fuels and pushing us toward alternative energy. The earth and the Gulf of Mexico have indeed been getting greener lately, thanks to agricultural runoff due to a mandated surge in biofuels such as ethanol. Before the first gallon...

You may never have never heard of Patricia Woertz, or Archer Daniels Midland. Woertz is the CEO of ADM, America’s 27th largest company, and it’s the largest company headed by a female in the US. The reason you ought to care is that Woertz and ADM have the power to make your life more expensive – much more expensive. And they have been aggressively exercising that power for over 30 years. ADM is the largest primary food processor in the country – it turns corn and soybeans (among other products) into a host of consumer products: corn flakes, cornstarch, corn...

Environment: Our growing addiction to alternative energy was killing aquatic life in the Gulf long before the Deepwater Horizon spill. Abandoning oil will kill more and also release more carbon dioxide into the air. President Obama sees the oil spill as a chance to make the planet a greener place by weaning us off fossil fuels and pushing us toward alternative energy. The earth and the Gulf of Mexico have indeed been getting greener lately, thanks to agricultural runoff due to a mandated surge in biofuels such as ethanol. Before the first gallon gushed from Deepwater Horizon, there existed an...

FREMONT (CBS 5 / AP) - President Barack Obama tours Solyndra, Inc. in Fremont Wednesday, a solar panel manufacturing facility, with Executive Vice President, Operations and Engineering Ben Bierman (R) and Chief Executive Officer Chris Gronet. President Barack Obama pointed to the Gulf oil spill disaster as another reason for Americans to move toward alternative energy resources during a visit to a solar energy plant in Fremont Wednesday. Speaking at the Solyndra plant, the President hailed the company advances in photovoltaic cell technology. Solyndra is building a new factory that will produce solar panels, using federal stimulus funds. ... At...

Opponents of land-based wind farms have a new ally in the form of MIT. Researchers there say that, far from mitigating global warming, land-based wind turbines actually increase the temperature around them.With the US Department of Energy expecting wind power to account for a fifth of the US’s electricity supply by 2030, the team used a climate model to analyze the effects of millions of wind turbines on the climate. Such a massive deployment could indeed make a difference, they found - though not necessarily a welcome one. Ron Prinn, TEPCO Professor of Atmospheric Science, and principal research scientist Chien...

Future Fuels: Our secretary of energy pushes bio-refineries and windmills to oil executives at an energy conference as the administration announces a three-year offshore drilling ban. This is a policy for economic suicide. They don't qualify as an official group of victims, but carbon-Americans, as they have been called, did not have much to cheer about last week, when Energy Secretary Steven Chu addressed CERAWeek 2010, a premier industry conference hosted by IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates. With an economy struggling to regain sound footing, Chu advocated a starvation diet devoid of additional fossil fuels that are to remain under...

A fight brewing over the allocation of costs for transmission lines to connect wind and solar power plants to end users is the latest sign that fossil-fuel electricity producers are stepping up the fight against renewable energy sources. A coalition of 10 big utilities this week announced it would oppose provisions in Senate bill 1462 that gives the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission authority to broadly allocate costs for long-distance transmission lines linking power sources to power users. The industry coalition maintains that only those who benefit from the new lines should be obliged to pay for them. Or, putting it...

Energy: When even Chuck Schumer is upset with the White House, you know something’s amiss. In this case, it’s news that efforts to boost wind power with taxpayer stimulus dollars are filling foreign coffers and creating foreign jobs. According to the …

Energy: When even Chuck Schumer is upset with the White House, you know something's amiss. In this case, it's news that efforts to boost wind power with taxpayer stimulus dollars are filling foreign coffers and creating foreign jobs. According to the Investigative Reporting Workshop at American University, nearly $2 billion in money from the American Recovery and Investment Act has been spent on wind power. The goal was to further energy independence while creating American jobs. It has done neither. Of the money spent, according to the report, nearly 80% has gone to foreign manufacturers of wind turbines. "In all...

The battery, which has powered our lives for generations, may soon be consigned to the dustbin of history. British scientists say they have created a plastic that can store and release electricity, revolutionising the way we use phones, drive cars - and even wear clothes. It means the cases of mobiles and iPods could soon double up as their power source - leading to gadgets as thin as credit cards.

This is a video of a panel discussion at the Herzliya Conference in Israel which informed that the US can be oil energy independent in 10 years. Really fascinating.

Wind turbines placed in cities across Minnesota to generate power aren't working because of the cold temperatures. The Minnesota Municipal Power Association bought 11 turbines for $300,000 each from a company in Palm Springs, Calif.

Energy: The government says wind power could supply the eastern half of the U.S. with a fifth of its electricity by 2024. Just don't try building wind farms where someone might see them. A claim is contained in a new study released by the Energy Department's National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and technically it might be true. But we've heard these overblown predictions before, and experience around the world with heavily subsidized alternative energy has not worked out well. The area in question, called the Eastern Interconnection, is a grid extending roughly from the western borders of the Plains states through...

January 13, 2010, 4:00 a.m. Earth-Shattering NewsAnother energy “alternative” hits the wall. By William Tucker Geothermal energy, the effort to tap the earth’s “renewable� internal heat, is often touted as the most promising potential source for clean, green energy — only this week, the White House was bragging about its investments in geothermal generation. Team Obama may not have noticed, but geotherm has had a rough few months. First off, Al Gore went on The Tonight Show in November, telling Conan O’Brien and his nighttime audience: People think about geothermal energy — when they think about it at all...

AMBOY, Calif. — Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation in Congress on Monday to protect a million acres of the Mojave Desert in California by scuttling some 13 big solar plants and wind farms planned for the region. But before the bill to create two new Mojave national monuments has even had its first hearing, the California Democrat has largely achieved her aim. Regardless of the legislation’s fate, her opposition means that few if any power plants are likely to be built in the monument area, a complication in California’s effort to achieve its aggressive goals for renewable energy. Developers of...