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The Obama administration is about to approve a rule that will ensure the death of golden and bald eagles for the next 30 more years. Hundreds of thousands of birds die each year flying into the deadly turbine blades atop the soaring towers that compose wind farms. The rule will give wind farms thirty year permits for the “non purposeful take of eagles-that is where the take is associated with but not the purpose of, the activity.’’ The take of eagles is also a euphemism for the slaughter of them.

Governments around the world have agreed to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit). That would require an 80 percent reduction in energy sources like coal, oil and natural gas, which emit carbon dioxide into the air. Nations are far from that ambitious path. There are big political and economic challenges. But technologists do see a way — at least for the United States — to achieve that goal. Nowhere is that aspiration clearer than at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. It sits on a hill overlooking Golden, Colo., and suburbs that sprawl all the way to...

Britain could be hit by power cuts next winter because the electricity supply is already “close to its limits”, experts warn. Capacity is so stretched that a cold spell, combined with routine problems at one or more plants, could overwhelm the system and see blackouts in 2014-15, their damning report claims. A major pressure on the National Grid is the forced closure of coal-fired power stations to meet European green directives, the Royal Academy of Engineering says. …

Renewable energy is blamed for jeopardizing Europe’s energy security this winter, a new study has found. EurActiv France reports. The French multinational company Cap Gemini warned in their European Observatory of Energy Markets that energy security in Europe was under threat and that the region could soon be exposed to massive power outages during the winter, due to a lack of production capacity. They blame wind turbines. …

Romney Marsh Wind Farm, Kent/East Sussex * Why do Britons pay much higher electricity prices than before? Because, by government decision, as consumers they have to subsidize low-carbon methods of energy generation, in particular wind farms. There are 4 words that best describe wind turbines for energy production: inefficient, unreliable, very expensive. Wind power is the most costly form of electricity generation. Many British households, no less than 1 in 4, are already suffering from a newly-labelled condition, "fuel poverty", in which energy bills expenditure makes up 10% or more of the household's net income. We've got to the...

Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard has called for development banks with a combined annual lending pot of €130 billion ($170 billion) to end support for fossil fuels in their energy lending policy reviews. “I am particularly keen to see three international financial institutions—the European Investment Bank (EIB), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the World Bank—join with their EU and OECD partners to take a lead role in eliminating public support for fossil fuels,” she said in the foreword to a report on bank lending policies in the Western Balkans, published on 25 June. Although all three banks...

As America's debt rises to unsustainable levels, the U.S. government is losing billions every year on energy tax subsidies that do little to combat climate change. That's according to a tough report released this week by the National Research Council. The non-partisan academic report concluded that current tax policies are a "poor tool" for addressing climate change -- and a costly one. It found energy subsidies in 2011 and 2012 cost $48 billion, with limited results. "Very little if any GHG (greenhouse gas) reductions are achieved at substantial cost with these provisions," the report concluded. The report coincided with a...

President Obama certainly knows how to talk a good game when it comes to energy policy; to the low-information layman, “all of the above” sounds like a superficially excellent plan. Work on green energy development, but keep the traditional fuel production comin’ — it’s the best of both worlds, right? Except that that’s not what the Obama administration has done at all. While the feds have poured billions upon billions of taxpayer dollars into picking economic winners and losers in the clean-energy field, Obama’s EPA/Energy/Interior team have waged a regulatory war on the coal industry and only allowed for relatively...

Details here and here: the short version is that the Senate back in June kicked off opposition to continued ethanol subsidies via a bipartisan amendment: it didn’t pass, but Congress has just let both the ethanol subsidy and a restrictive foreign tariff (on Brazilian sugar-cane ethanol) lapse. Given that the Iowa caucuses will be finished by the time Congress reconvenes – and given that the House of Representatives is currently chock-heavy with people who spit at the very phrase ‘ethanol subsidy’ – getting back either is going to be a problem for the domestic ethanol industry. Mind you, there are...

Via ChrisMartenson.comSo, assuming the Peak Oil camp is on to something, what's the likelihood for a disruption-free transition to another energy source that can replace the energy output we currently enjoy from oil? There's no shortage of promising claims from new laboratory experiments, and there is a lot of optimism in political and entrepreneurial circles that renewable, alternative forms of energy (wind, solar, biofuels, etc) may be able to fill the "energy gap" in time. How realistic are these hopes?Not very, says Robert Rapier, energy specialist and Chief Technology Officer of Merica International.The problem is one of return on...

* 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...

Should energy consumers pay extra taxes to fund government-mandated and subsidized renewable energy technologies? "Absolutely yes," says John Bryson, President Obama's nominee for Commerce Secretary. He made the remark at a meeting of the Commonwealth Club of California in 2009 and went on to extol the virtues of hidden rates in California, a state encumbered with some of the nation's highest electricity and unemployment rates. Bryson, retired CEO of the electric utility Southern California Edison (SCE) and its parent company Edison International, excused the practice, saying, "That's been a part of the regulatory environment for the investor-owned utilities for as...

IN April, Gov. Jerry Brown made headlines by signing into law an ambitious mandate that requires California to obtain one-third of its electricity from renewable energy sources like sunlight and wind by 2020. Twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia now have renewable electricity mandates. President Obama and several members of Congress have supported one at the federal level. Polls routinely show strong support among voters for renewable energy projects — as long as they don’t cost too much. But there’s the rub: while energy sources like sunlight and wind are free and naturally replenished, converting them into large quantities...

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....

This house believes that natural gas will do more than renewables to limit the world's carbon emissions ... For:With no global agreement on cutting carbon emissions, with coal consumption continuing to grow, and with governments around the world cutting subsidies for renewables, the only cost-effective way to limit carbon emissions is with low-cost, low- or no-carbon fuels... Against:"We can't solve a problem by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created it." So said Einstein, and that is particularly applicable in this case. We will not solve the climate problem by burning more fossil fuels...

* Averge household will pay 60 euros more/year for power * Germany top world market for solar, 16% of power green BERLIN, Oct 15 (Reuters) - A surge in Germany's renewable energy capacity this year will lead to a more than 70 percent jump in the levy consumers pay on their electricity bills for green power, according to data from grid operators on Friday. The levy, which consumers pay as a subsidy to producers of wind and photovoltaic and other types of renewable energy, will rise to 3.53 cents per kilowatt hour (kw/h) in 2011 from 2.05 cents, said the...

Alternative Energy: A government report says reliance on electric cars will do little to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and may merely shift our dependence on foreign sources from one set of dictators to another..."If you are using coal-fired power plants, and half the country's electricity comes from coal-powered plants, are you just trading one greenhouse gas emitter for another?" asks Mark Gaffigan, co-author of the GAO report. The report itself notes: "Reductions in CO2 emissions depend on generating electricity used to charge the vehicles from lower-emission sources of energy."

President Barack Obama has praised Spain as a global leader in renewable electricity generation and has lauded its success at creating so-called "green jobs." However, a recent Spanish university study concluded that Spain’s mad rush to meet overly aggressive renewable standards has destroyed jobs and driven up the real cost of electricity, without cutting carbon emissions. Dig a Little Deeper While visiting an Ohio company that provides parts for wind turbines in mid-January, President Obama presented his vision of a nation that is more energy efficient and more reliant on renewable energy. "Think of what’s happening in countries like Spain,...

Many states and the Federal Government are putting a lot of faith in renewable energy sources especially wind and solar as solutions for our energy independence and future cost reduction. However, unlike other energy sources such as natural gas, oil, coal, nuclear, tidal, geothermal and to a large degree hydro, wind and solar are much less reliable and cost effective, requiring heavy subsidization. In fact of the primary energy sources, wind power is the most expensive: Wind = 21.97 cents per kwh Gas and oil = 12.28 cents per kwh Nuclear = 11.06 cents per kwh Hydro = 7.60 cents...

More turbines are in windy New Mexico's future, making many renewable energy advocates cheer. They note wind energy is far cleaner and almost as cheap as electricity from coal-fired power plants. Wind energy companies tout the revenue and jobs generated for cash-strapped rural counties. But a battle is brewing over where wind energy facilities should be built and the first battleground is in rural villages. "Wind power is a clean, inexhaustible domestic resource," said Michael McDiarmid, of the Energy Minerals and Natural Resources Department. "I think it's important for our energy future to have more wind energy." The state ranks...