Green energy and the push to impress all the things have been within the news recently but for all of the mistaken reasons.
As a substitute of the green energy nirvana politicians and green energy advocates have promised, economic and physical reality has begun to set in.
Start with the economic realities.
Wind turbine manufacturers like Siemens and General Electric have reported huge losses for the primary half of this yr, almost $5 billion for the previous and $1 billion for the latter.
Amongst other problems, turbine quality control has suffered, forcing manufacturers akin to Siemens and Vestas to incur costly warranty repairs.
In Europe, offshore wind output has been lower than promised, while operating costs have been much higher than advertised.
Offshore wind developers in Europe and the US are canceling projects because of upper materials and construction costs.
In Massachusetts, Avangrid, the developer of the 1,200 MW Commonwealth Wind project paid $48 million to get out of its existing contract to sell power to ratepayers.
That way, the corporate can rebid the project next yr at a good higher price.
Close by, the developers of the 1,200 MW SouthCoast Wind Project off Martha’s Vineyard pays about $60 million to exit their existing contract.
Rhode Island Energy, the state’s principal electric utility, recently rejected the second Revolution Wind Project since the contract price was too high.
And Ørsted, the Danish government-owned company that’s developing the Southfork Wind and Sunrise Wind projects off Long Island — in addition to the Ocean Wind project off the Recent Jersey coast — last week announced that, without additional subsidies and better contract prices, it’ll should write-off billions of dollars in potential losses.
The result: Though Siemens Energy CEO Christian Bruch insists that “energy transition without wind energy doesn’t work,” 2022 saw 16% less latest wind-power capability than in 2021, in keeping with the American Clean Power Association.
In Recent Jersey, the legislature passed a law in July, which is probably going unconstitutional, to bail out Ørsted.
The laws will award the corporate with several billion dollars of investment tax credits that were speculated to go to consumers.
Back on dry land, opposition to siting land-gobbling wind and solar projects continues to grow.
Local governments in Iowa, Illinois, and Ohio have all rejected or restricted projects.
Rural communities, it seems, are not looking for to host massive turbine farms — nor the high-voltage transmission lines needed to deliver electricity to power-hungry cities.
Then there are electric vehicles.
Ford, which has bet heavily on its electric Lightning pickup and Mustang and received a $9.2 billion government-subsidized loan in January, revealed that it has lost $60,000 for each EV it sold in the primary half of this yr.
Rivian, one other EV company, managed to cut back its losses per EV to around $33,000, a giant improvement over the $67,000 loss per EV in the primary quarter of the yr.
Proterra, a Bay Area-based manufacturer of electrical buses and batteries that had a $10 million loan forgiven by the Biden Administration, just filed for bankruptcy.
Just like the wizard in The Wizard of Oz, alternative energy proponents claim these are only temporary little potholes on the road to economic and climate nirvana — all of which will be crammed with more cash through renegotiated power purchase contracts and more zero-emissions mandates.
Alternative energy madness – and that’s what it’s – has had its biggest impact in California.
But Recent York and Recent Jersey have adopted most of that state’s mandates.
Sales of latest internal combustion vehicles will probably be banned starting in 2035 within the states. All the electricity sold to retail consumers may have to be “zero-emissions.”
Homeowners and constructing owners will probably be forced to exchange gas- and oil-burning space and water heaters with electric heat pumps.
And, gas stoves will probably be regulated out of existence.
Recent York also will soon implement one other California import: a carbon “cap-and-invest” program, which is able to impose a tax on fossil fuels sold by wholesalers and utilities.
The billions of dollars collected annually will provide a green slush fund, allowing the governor and legislators at hand out money to their politically favored cronies, as has so often been the case previously.
Washington State began its “cap-and-invest” program in January of this yr.
Modeled after California’s, Governor Jay Inslee promised this system would have “minimal impact, if any. We’re talking about pennies.”
As a substitute, this system has raised gasoline prices – almost 50 cents per gallon to this point this yr. Washington State now claims the consideration of getting the very best gasoline prices within the nation: In Seattle, for instance, the common price of normal gasoline is over $5 per gallon.
After all, your complete point of this system was to lift gasoline and fossil fuel prices to encourage consumers to change to electric vehicles, mass transit, electric heat pumps, and so forth.
But politics being what it’s, Governor Inslee, together with environmentalists and legislative proponents, now blames greedy oil corporations for the worth increases.
‘We won’t stand for’ corporate greed,” the Governor said at a July 20, 2023, press conference.
Once Recent York’s cap-and-invest program starts, probably next yr, you possibly can expect the same consequence: higher gasoline and diesel prices, higher prices for natural gas and fuel oil used to heat homes and apartment buildings, and countless political demagoguery denouncing all of it.
Because the push toward electric-everything powered by green energy barrels along, proponents also refuse to confront basic physical realities.
Electricity accounts for just one-sixth of all energy use.
The remaining is fossil fuels consumed for transportation, space and water heating, and manufacturing.
Convert all the things to electricity and electricity consumption will increase. Rather a lot.
In keeping with the Recent York Climate Motion Committee’s Final Scoping Plan, Recent York will meet that increased demand by constructing almost 15,000 MW of offshore wind, just like the Southfork Wind and Sunrise Wind projects, and over 40,000 MW of solar panels. (By comparison, the emissions-free Indian Point Nuclear Plant, which former Governor Cuomo forced to shut, had a capability of just over 1,000 MW.)
Since the wind doesn’t at all times blow and the sun doesn’t at all times shine, keeping the lights on would require much more backup resources.
This “reserve margin” – principally, the quantity of generating capability available to step in and meet electric demand – might want to increase from the present 20% to over 100%.
In other words, for each MW of generating capability in 2040, there may have to be an equal amount or more in reserve.
That’s like having to purchase a second automotive and keep it idling on a regular basis in case the primary one won’t start.
The Scoping Plan claims this will probably be achieved by constructing over 20,000 MW of so-called “dispatchable emissions-free generating resources” (DEFRs) and installing over 12,000 MW of battery storage.
Those claims are fantasy.
Start with DEFRs, that are generators that burn pure hydrogen manufactured from surplus wind and solar energy.
They’ve yet to be invented (we repeat – they don’t yet exist). Nor do any large-scale business plants to fabricate green hydrogen exist either.
Hydrogen can’t be transported in existing natural gas pipelines.
A wholly latest infrastructure will have to be built.
Assuming a latest technology will probably be invented by whatever date politicians decree is silly.
That’s not how technology works.
Just ask everyone working on business fusion power, which has been just 30 years off for the last 50 years.
As for battery storage, 12,000 MW will provide at most 48,000 megawatt-hours of actual electricity.
Which will sound like so much but based on the Recent York Independent System Operator’s (NYISO) most up-to-date forecast, on a windless and cold winter evening in 2040, it could keep the lights on for less than one hour.
The materials requirements for batteries are also staggering, which is one reason why replacing existing internal combustion cars and trucks will probably be unimaginable.
Batteries require large quantities of cobalt, much of which is now mined within the Congo using child and slave labor.
In addition they require a lot of graphite, most of which comes from China – the identical with the rare minerals needed for wind turbines and solar panels.
Ultimately, nothing Recent York does may have any measurable impact on world climate since the state’s carbon emissions are minuscule in comparison with the 35 billion metric tons of total global emissions.
So long as China, which accounts for nearly one-third of world energy-related carbon emissions, India, and other developing nations focus policies on economic growth, quite than cutting emissions, Recent York’s efforts may have no environmental value.
Nevertheless, if politicians and environmentalists were serious about zero-emissions goals, they’d abandon the electrification mandates, and abandon reliance on wind, solar, battery storage, DEFRs, green hydrogen, and other unrealistic and unreliable energy sources.
As a substitute, they’d embrace the one existing technology that dare not speak its name: nuclear power.
Unlike wind and solar, nuclear plants run on a regular basis.
Recent, small modular reactors will offer greater safety, lower costs, and simple scalability to fulfill increased electricity demand.
Storing spent fuel is a political issue, not a technological one, for which the perfect solution is to recycle and reuse it, as France has done for the last half-century without incident.
The country can also be developing a everlasting storage site for nuclear waste that may now not be reprocessed.
The economist Herb Stein once quipped that anything that can’t go on eternally, won’t.
That’s true of Recent York’s current alternative energy madness.
It won’t save the world, but it’ll grind down the state’s economy and its residents until the folly is simply too great to disregard.
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Jonathan Lesser is the president of Continental Economics and an adjunct fellow with the Manhattan Institute.
