A persistent myth about the challenges of integrating renewable power into the grid is that because solar and wind are intermittent, grid operators need to maintain full generation capacity from "baseload" plants powered by coal and nuclear. Recent real-world data and research shows that not only is this not true, but that baseload capacity is fundamentally incompatible with renewables, and that as renewables provide a greater portion of the grid's power, baseload generation will need to be phased out.
But before we get into the details, some background information is in order.
Types of power plants
"Baseload" power generators are typically large units that operate more or less continuously at 70 to 90 percent of their rated capacity, and do not shut down except for maintenance. These include nuclear, coal, and combined-cycle natural gas plants which capture and recycle the exhaust heat of traditional gas turbines. Coal and nuclear plants can take from one to three days to start up, and take a long time to shut down.
"Load-following" power generators can increase or reduce their output based upon demand, and typically run at 30 to 50 percent of capacity. They are typically traditional gas turbine units, and may be shut down on a daily or weekly basis as needed. Older coal plants, combined-cycle natural gas plants, and some nuclear plants can operate in a load-following mode, but their ability to do so is limited. For example, newer nuclear plants can cut output by as much as 20 percent in an hour, but need as much as eight hours to ramp back up to full capacity.
"Peaking units" typically run for a few hours at a time at low capacity factors when demand reaches unusually high peak levels, like in the middle of a hot summer day. These units are typically simple gas turbines.
The grid today
In the U.S., there are three main grids: one in the east, one in the west, and one in Texas. Some utilities are regulated while others are not, some are publicly owned while others are private, and although they are interconnected within the three main grids, they operate with a certain amount of autonomy. Grid power comes from about 5,800 utility-scale power plants, comprising some 18,000 generating units. A patchwork quilt of agencies with overlapping jurisdictions regulate the grid, including Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the North American Electricity Reliability Corporation (NERC) at the federal level, a range of Regional Transmission Operators (RTO) and Independent System Operators (ISO) at the regional level, and Public Utility Commissions (PUC) at the state level. Ten major RTOs and ISOs serve about two-thirds of consumers in the U.S. and more than half in Canada, with the remainder served by smaller regional operators.
The grid's architecture developed in a fairly ad-hoc way. As the country was built up, more generation capacity was added, and the grid was extended. Technologically speaking, most of the grid is old and "dumb": Power gets generated somewhere, and transmitted somewhere else, but there is very little in the way of sensors, storage buffers, switches, or security mechanisms along the way. It's more like plumbing than an iPhone. This is why it was possible for one overloaded transmission line in Ohio take down much of the grid in Ontario, the Northeast and the Midwest in the blackout of August 14, 2003.
Grid operators have one overriding, fearsome task: They must maintain enough supply from this very complex system, within a narrow range of frequencies and voltages, to meet constantly fluctuating demand at all times. Therefore they tend to be risk-averse, preferring to stick with what they know to be reliable, and avoiding innovation.
Enter renewables
Before the advent of renewables, generating power was a pretty straightforward task: When demand increased, you just added more fuel to an engine. With renewables, the task is reversed: The engines (wind turbines and solar collectors) ramp up and down of their own accord, and grid operators must adjust to accommodate their output.
The growth of renewables in the U.S. has been driven primarily by state Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) requiring a certain percentage of power to be generated from renewables by a certain date. According to an April 2011 MIT report just released this month, 29 states have RPS mandates which typically require 15 to 25 percent renewables by 2015 to 2025. Many of these states mandate that grid operators give the renewably-generated power priority, so when wind generation spikes, for example, they must ramp down other generating units. In other areas of the U.S. and in parts of Europe, operators may instead curtail peak production from renewables to accommodate their baseload generation—for example, forcing a wind farm operator to furl their blades or apply brakes to their turbines.
The baseload fallacy
The notion that renewables cannot provide baseload power is really an artifact of the way the grid and its regulators have evolved. If all generators were able to ramp up and down on demand, and if grid operators were able to predict reliably when and where the sun would be shining and the wind would be blowing, accommodating any amount of power from renewables would be no problem.
A 2010 study called "The Base Load Fallacy" by Australian researcher Dr. Mark Diesendorf, an expert on integrating wind into power grids, fingers the "operational inflexibility of base-load power stations" as the main obstacle to further integration of renewables. "The renewable electricity system could be just as reliable as the dirty, fossil-fuelled system that it replaces," he observes, if demand were more efficient and intelligent, and supply were made up of a wide variety of renewable sources plus a small amount of gas-fired capacity to cover the peaks. The perpetrators of the baseload fallacy, he argues, are mainly the industries who benefit from the status quo: coal, oil and gas companies, the nuclear industry, power generators, and industries who depend on them like aluminum and cement manufacturers.
Claims that renewables could never generate more than a few percent of grid power without taking down the grid have been given the lie by the real-world experience of areas that deliberately adapted their grids.
The best example in the U.S. is Texas. By virtue of having its own grid (technically, an "interconnection"), it is generally outside the purview of federal regulation by FERC. The entire grid is operated by a single ISO, ERCOT, so it has a lot of control over its generation mix and grid planning. Texas decided long ago to pursue its wind potential vigorously, and now has the largest installed wind capacity in the States at over 10 gigawatts (GW).
On March 7, ERCOT used a record 7,599 MW of wind power, constituting 22 percent of the load and representing over 77 percent of its nameplate wind capacity. The previous day it had met 24 percent of the load with wind. Baseload proponents had said that such levels of integration were flatly impossible. But ERCOT had made it possible with the help of a new modeling tool that analyzes real-time conditions every half-hour, giving grid technicians greater ability to match generation with demand and control transmission more discretely. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory has found that if other grid operators adopted similar tools, over one third of U.S. power could be generated from renewables.
All that ERCOT needed to accommodate more wind power was some sensors, a better flow of information, and better modeling tools. As the MIT report notes, the hardware to provide better grid information already exists, but few operators have employed it in their control and dispatch operations. The obstacle is not technology, but "the industry's culture of resistance to new and experimental projects."
That's not a problem for China, however. The MIT report mentions that China is piloting a program that will allow it to monitor the national grid in real-time and control it automatically. The system eventually could allow China's grid to uptake a far greater percentage of renewably-generated power than the antiquated and obsolete U.S. grid can, although the former is still the world's top consumer of coal for power generation.
Another 2010 study by the German Renewable Energies Agency turned conventional baseload logic on its head, finding that due to their relatively inflexible ability to adjust to changing demand, "nuclear power plants are incompatible with renewable energies." To meet forecasted wind production in Germany, conventional baseload operation would be cut in half by 2020, assuming renewable generation continues to enjoy priority dispatch. As renewables gradually replace conventional baseload capacity, only more flexible gas generators that can operate at under 50 percent of their capacity will still have a role to play.
The European example
Europe serves as another model of why good grid planning and management are key to integrating renewables into the grid. If baseload proponents were correct, then we would expect the countries with the highest levels of renewable penetration to have the most trouble in managing their grids, but the reality is quite the opposite.
A comprehensive new report on renewables integration by European consultancy eclareon GmbH surveyed the policies and grid functions of the 27 member states of the European Union, and found that "large quantities [of renewable generation] can be effectively managed on the grid." Countries that planned for adequate grid capacity generally didn't have a problem with accommodating renewables, and unsurprisingly, those are the same countries that have pushed for more renewable generation.
Solar and wind generation as a percentage of electricity consumption in 27 European Union countries in 2010 (first bar) and 2020 (second bar). Grid integration designated by color: green = positive, yellow = neutral, red = negative. Source: RES Integration Final Report, eclareon GmbH.
Countries where the share of renewable power is greatest—Germany, Denmark, Spain, Ireland, and Portugal—offer "positive conditions for grid operations," although some barriers to integration were identified, including the potential for curtailment in Germany, challenges to priority dispatching in Ireland, and strict distribution parameters in Portugal. Identified barriers for grid development in those countries revolve around public policy issues, permitting, regulatory regimes, cost distribution, and the obligation (or lack thereof) of grid operators to beef up their grids to accommodate more renewable power.
Ripe for innovation
The real issues around the integration of renewables into the grid have to do with human arrangements, not technology. As the MIT report concluded, "There is a clear need for a statement on national goals for the electricity sector to streamline the US regulatory structure, which currently is complex and fragmented." We need smart policy, and an intelligent approach to planning the grid of the future that is not simply beholden to the vested interests of the status quo.
This will run directly at odds with the free-market ideologies that have brought us this far. As the EU project THINK observed, “the main shortcomings of the conventional regulatory framework are that grid companies have disincentives to innovate.” A firm regulatory hand, like that in the most renewably-powered countries of Europe, will be necessary to integrate more power from solar and wind onto the grid.
Renewables should be able to meet at least 20 percent of electricity demand without disrupting the grid just about anywhere in the world with good grid planning and management. As geothermal and marine power technologies mature, they will become a much less intermittent, natural substitute for the baseload technologies of the past. A host of other technologies will even out the bumps in renewable generation by adding storage (batteries for distributed storage, and pumped hydro and solar thermal for utility scale); increasing the connections between grids (allowing better transmission between sunny and cloudy, or windy and still areas); and transitioning to on-demand natural gas-fired peaking generators. Over the next decade, the current assumptions about the need for traditional baseload capacity will begin to fade as new storage, interconnection, and smart grid management strategies come into play, and ultimately, a combination of these technologies might raise the limit on renewables to 100 percent.
The attachment to our antiquated architecture of power generation and grid management is simply a failure of imagination and innovation. Those who benefit from its arrangement today hold it up in too-precious reverence, not unlike the those who, one hundred years ago, protested the banning of the ancient Chinese practice of foot-binding depicted in the photo at top. It may be beautiful to them, but to those with modern sensibilities, it's an ugly, even grotesque fetish that should be consigned to the dust bin of history, and one that one hundred years from now will seem unbearably dumb, quaint, and cruel. The problem is not that the feet are too big; it's that the shoes are too small.
Photo: Feet of Chinese woman, bound, compared with tea cup and American woman's shoe, World War 1 era. (otisarchives/Flickr)
A harmonic balancer sounds like a crucial part on a spaceship in some pulpy 1950s sci-fi story, or something you need so you can play music with hobos when you're ridin' the rails. However, it's actually an important part on your engine that helps your crankshaft last as long as possible.As the cylinders in your engine fire, they move up and down, generating torque that's transferred into the crankshaft. As you may already know, the crankshaft is what converts the engine's power into rotational movement, eventually turning the wheels of the car.But consider for a second the forces that are acting on the crankshaft -- they're tremendous. Each time a cylinder fires, a force acts upon the crankshaft, causing it to twist. But this force also causes vibrations in the crankshaft, and at certain frequencies, the shaft can resonate, which makes the vibrations even worse These vibrations from the engine can become too much for the crankshaft to bear, causing it to fail. And when that happens, your car won't run and you'll be facing some expensive repairs.This is where the harmonic balancer comes in. The circular device, made of rubber and metal, is bolted at the front end of the crankshaft to help absorb vibrations. It's usually connected to the crank pulley, which drives accessories like the air conditioner. The rubberinside the pulley is what actually absorbs the vibrations and keeps them at a safe level. In essence, the device is designed to help prevent crankshaft failure. It's also sometimes called a "dampener."However, the rubber material can deteriorate over time. So if your harmonic balancer is going bad, you could get rough engine vibrations, a cracked crankshaft, or even a serpentine belt that gets thrown off its track. Replacing one is excellent preventative maintenance, and that's exactly what we'll talk about next.
Schultzy @ https://www.yourmechanic.com/
Defining art can be tricky! It can be different for every person – what it means to you may mean different to others. For anyone who is involved in this field would know its various areas and how it helps to convey a message, emotion and meaning. Generally smaller and more understated than paintings, these monotypes (some with mixed-media embellishments) nonetheless echo many of the compositional motifs and stylistic devices he used in his canvases, with their subtle, deft mixes of smudges, scribbly lines and veils of color .One can call it a form of indirect communication in which messages are conveyed in a representational manner. To define art is one of the most difficult philosophical challenges because everyone has their own opinion on beauty and these opinions are likely to contradict.
Thanks
PeterGomez
SM @ http://www.exportingart.com
Unique characteristic of electricity is that it cannot be stored. One has to think of grid, power generations, power demand, baseload and peakload terms keeping this characteristic in mind.
Every power generation company would love to be associated with baseload as it ensures Return of Investment (ROI) – this is true for both renewable or traditional sources.
Why baseload and renewables don't mix. Let's do the math: http://energyshouldbe.org/download.html
I am certainly no expert on how electricity grids work, but I do have an objection to this story. The story mentions China's experiment with modernizing a grid, but fails to mention that China has more nuclear power plants under construction that any other country and is planning on putting even more emphasis on nuclear energy and less on wind and solar. http://climateerinvest.blogspot.com/2012/04/china-to-drop-solar-energy-to-focus-on.html
If the grid is a mess, then rebuild it modularly so that which module could have its own power source. Instead of having those large centrally located power plants, have smaller networked plants for each module. The energy source could be a combination of renewable, natural gas and small molten salt reactors. Each module would have automated load balancing as well as the ability to share power other networked modules. By designing the grind in modules you can plan the entire grid once and build it in phases. That is how this internet works.
GOOD comment! and realistic analysis to a most complex and difficult enigma! The reliability of 100% backup, both in trained operators immediately available, and equipment in fully functioning operational standby, COSTLY! Thus, the ongoing need for those base-load units, which do this on a cost efficient basis...
This article includes some very good analysis and offers some novel ways of looking at renewables integration into existing power grids. But there also seems to be quite a bias against existing power sources and towards renewable sources, like wind and solar. For example, the existing baseload power sources like coal and nuclear are taken to task for not being flexible enough to immediately adapt to the availability profiles of wind and solar. I would argue that it is these availability issues with renewables that are the real problem, with the ever-present possibility (that grid managers must anticipate) of both wind and solar sources dropping to nearly zero levels of energy output for hours or even days at a time, due to weather factors beyond human control. This means that each kilowatt of wind/solar energy installed on a grid must be backed to almost a 100% degree, by other fully reliable power sources like on-demand natural gas turbine plants. So we will be able to allow 30% of the grid going to wind/solar, only if we can also afford to back up nearly all of that capacity with a substitute energy source having the availability profile of natural gas turbines. The bottom line is that you cannot depend on wind/solar for even a minimum level of power of a given day - because it MIGHT not be there, and before you can realistically count all of those "nameplate" kilowatts, you must arrange for the added expense of close to 100% backup by the kind of power sources that we can depend on. Not only are wind/solar unsuitable for baseload power, they are also not fully capable of supplying load-following or peak power supplies (because they might not be available when needed). It's actually quite simple, and I sense that the author plays a little bit of a "shell game" with different energy sources, in an attempt to mask the inherent availability problems with wind and solar. Granted, a great deal of this limitation may eventually be overcome by the use of pumped water (or molten salt) heat storage schemes. But (like "clean coal via carbon sequestration") these are still in the process of being developed and they are not yet a reality, by any means. Another hopeful item is a renewable energy source that is in fact suitable for baseload power generation and that would be geothermal energy (wave energy may be another baseload possibility). The problems seem to be that all the best US geothermal locations are out west, while most of the main centers of demand are back east. But I have a feeling that better, deeper drilling technologies might eventually make geothermal sites possible almost anywhere. And no nation on earth has a better head start on drilling lots of deep holes into the ground than the USA, thanks to 140+ years of oil industry operations - with drilling that at some point touched almost every state in the union.
What argument is humanity going to have in 100 500 or 1000 years (if we make it that far) When Venus is a cooler alternative (surface temperature of 400 degrees because of runaway Co2 green house effect) we have burnt all fossil fuel and the only glow is from all the nuclear waste we still do not know what to do with! Try and think of a sustainability in the realms of past your lifetime and your distant relatives looking back and saying how short sighted and greedy the energy giants were in the second millennium. Let's embrace thermodynamics and take advantage of the energy hitting us now not 5 million years ago. Smart grid for the future, nuclear and fossil for no future just present gain for the select few! Adrian Taffinder www.photonutilities.com
This whole issue will become a non issue and is at the heart of the success of our species, we solve it or move into a very poor era. The ONLY reasons we are not already producing EXCESS cheap/co2 free energy for the whole world is due to the oil companies/capitalist/short term-ism that is endemic within our western societies. In one hour the sun provides more energy to our planet than we use in total for a year. Geothermal energy has never been properly tapped, nuclear (via Thorium) is both safe and cheap/plentiful. Many major global issues (water, food, energy, transport) are solved with excess energy - we just move to a Hydrogen distributed economy/transport, using excess daytime energy to create distributive H2 or a derivative. So what is the point of this discussion? We already have numerous 'good' solutions. As humans we are currently inept at finding a way to implement the obvious. So this is the real question - how do we move forward against the current political & economically prevalent power systems that are maintaining the status quo? JP
We already have variation in electrical demand that is accommodated by the load following supply. This same load following supply of electricity can accommodate the variability of renewables. The chances that all renewables will all at once drop to zero is no more likely than all users of electricity simultaneously turning on everything possible. Much of the load variation will be canceled out by the supply variation and likely not have much impact on the load following supply at all.
OneGreen Engineering Waste to Energy Technology www.onegreen.co.za Second Prize Winner in the Gauteng Innovation Competition for Green Energy Technologies Introduction Waste management in general is becoming an increasingly environmental and health risk problem. Environmental legislation and regulations are placing pressure on authorities and industry to improve on existing management processes with a greater focus on recycling with the aim of reducing the footprint of current practices in an ecological and environmentally friendly manner. Industry challenges: The challenge is to convert a cost into revenue and profit by: 1. Diverting of all bio-mass waste to Waste to Energy Plants (The management and handling of biomass waste at landfill sites must be avoided) 2. Reducing landfill site footprints 3. Reducing the production of methane in landfill sites 4. Reducing the bad odours of decomposing biomass. 5. Reducing the cost of transport from collection points to landfill sites by chipping at collection points and transport of chips direct to generation plants. 6. Development and implementing of new green technologies by all industry partners and stake holders including Authorities, promoting a green and sustainable environment. 7. Channelling of resources and investment capital to new green technologies. Municipal solid waste, forestry, agricultural and industrial biomass waste offers a great opportunity for conversion into electricity because it is an untapped resource with consequential negative environmental, economic and social impacts. OneGreen Dry Brayton Cycle Technology OneGreen Engineering has done some extensive research for the last three years developing unique technology that is environmentally friendly and completed verification of all relevant thermodynamic and technology calculations. Verification included universities and independent third party consulting engineers. Combined Turbo Compressor and Turbo Generator units using heat from oxidation of biomass for the generation of electricity using no water, no steam, no water treatment and no gas scrubbing Note: The OneGreen technology is not gasification. ???Exciting??? The OneGreen dry Brayton cycle has the added benefit that it can be integrated with a CSP (Concentrating Solar Power) system allowing seamless migration from sun energy to biomass energy and back, effectively utilizing biomass as a storage battery of energy at night or when it is cloudy. Future Development The development has reached a stage where the building of a pilot plant to demonstrate the technology is in a planning stage together with the North-West University. The co-development with North-West University faculty of Mechanical Engineering is done with a 50% grant from the NRF. The technology is proven in its current application (Waste heat recovery for marine applications) and indicated individual capacity is 0,2 to 2,5 MW per unit allowing total plant capacity up to 20 MW The technology is unique as it uses no water, no gas treatment or scrubbing and no steam. (The working fluid is clean air). Any combustible Biomass Waste can be dried and combustion with full oxidation of all bio-carbons is proven to be the most environmentally friendly practice. The heat of combustion will be integrated into a dry Brayton Cycle with heat exchangers to generate electricity. (No steam, no water and no scrubbing of gasses) All biomass can be chipped at collection points and transferred to the generation plant avoiding handling of the biomass waste at landfill sites. OneGreen technology can convert biomass waste to electricity at an efficiency of 1 ton dry biomass waste per hour produce 1MW hour of electricity. Indicated available resources for this purpose is 1.5 million ton dry biomass for Gauteng This relates to a generating capacity of 170 MW or 1.5 million MW h per annum with potential revenue of R 900 million per annum at R 0.60 per kW h (If above is produced at the feed in tariff of NERSA for biomass to electricity the revenue will be R 1.575 billion per annum at R1.05 per kW h Investment opportunity: The total investment to realize above is in the order of R 5 billion for equipment and infrastructure development. Advantages of the outcome 1. One of the outcomes of this is the price of electricity for the Producer (IPP) can be capped independent from imported power, allowing the IPP open opportunity to increase revenue and keep cost down. 2. The electricity can be integrated into the local supply grid, reducing the local authority reliance on imported electricity and at the same time mitigating the environmental impact and cost of waste management and converting a cost into revenue. 3. The implementation of this technology will create substantial volumes of jobs and commercial opportunities for businesses and local authorities. (1 direct job and 4 indirect jobs per R1 million investments) A limited budget for the co-development of the technology is hampering the progress of the project. To address this problem OneGreen Engineering is looking for investment partners to support the development of the pilot plant to demonstrate the proposed technology in an operational environment. In this regard OneGreen Engineering can offer an investment opportunity to acquire access to the OneGreen Waste to Energy technology. The technology and process have great potential in an environment where waste recycling/use has become very important. The technology can make a valuable contribution in the drive towards a green and sustainable economy unlocking investment and commercial potential of the renewable energy sector. For more information kindly contact: Jan Davel info@onegreen.co.za www.onegreen.co.za 082 579 5865
While I agree that more distributed power is a good thing, I'm a big fan of solar thermal power plants with molten salt heat storage. Solar thermal power plants with molten salt heat storage are being built now. Here's how a CSP plant with 3.5 hours heat storage on typical summer day in Nevada would run. The plant would start saving heat at sunrise. A few hours later, it would start generating electricity and continue storing heat in the salt. By 1pm when the sun peaks, it would be at full rated power, say 1250 MW. It would continue to put out at least it's full rated power, while increasing output and peaking at about 3,000 MW at 5pm, exactly when demand in the grid peaks in the southwest. It would continue putting out steady but declining power until midnight. No fluctuation when clouds pass by. Cloudy periods, which are rare in the southwest can be planned for by the plant manager and utility, from weather forecasts. In the daytime in what the NREL calls Premium Solar Resource areas, there is sunshine all but about 4% of the time. 3.5 hours heat storage means enough to provide 3.5 hours at full rated power, without any input from the sun. The first plant with molten salt heat storage in the U.S. is being built in Arizona. It will have 6 hours heat storage. In the winter there is less solar resource due to the angle of the sun mostly, but demand falls even faster than output in non summer months. Air conditioning is the biggest demand, in the southwest. A plant would run about the same as described ,though at lower output. HVDC tranmission lines would enable solar thermal in this area to feed power into other regions. The above is just one scenario. Another utility company might choose something a little different, like not generating power all the way till midnight, but instead saving the heat to power up earlier in the morning. The plants can also have more hours of heat storage than in my example
There have a been a couple of recent breakthroughs in battery technology, both of which could be game changers for renewables and plug in cars - EVs and PHEVs. DOE-funded battery breakthrough to halve cost, triple range "A new breakthrough from California-based Envia Systems will yield lithium-ion batteries that are less than half the cost of current cells, while also having three times the energy density. And guess who funded it? The Department of Energy. That???s right: Sometimes, when the government invests in innovation, it pays off moon launch-big." "Envia???s announcement said that its packs would deliver cell energy of 400 watt-hours per kilogram at a cost of $150 per kilowatt-hour. Though it doesn???t disclose a cost breakdown, Tesla Motors rates the energy density of its Roadster???s pack at 121 watt-hours per kilogram. Envia said its energy-density performance was verified in testing of prototype cells at the Naval Service Warfare Center???s Crane evaluation division." {read it at Grist} This will mean electric cars that are inexpensive, and have a 300 mile range ----------------- and batteries for the grid The Weekend Wonk: Liquid Metal Batteries TED talk video 15 minutes {watch it at Climate Crocks -3/31/2012}
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I just finished reading "Japan's Tipping Point*" by Mark Pendergras??t which is now available as either a paperback or as an ebook! He won an Abe Fellowship for Journalist??s, (an annual grant given to selected writers who then spend six weeks in Japan); he arrived two months after 3/11 visiting their Eco-Model Cities and interviewe??d many of Japan's Eco "Leaders" both in Government and in the private sector. ===>One thing I learned is that Japan's utilities own their electrical GRID and therefore are the only ones that can "approve" of any forms of energy accessing it! If Japan is to "kick" their Nuclear reactor habit, the Utilities will have to OK that decision, which means a reduction in both Control and Market share for them! snip "I discovered??, however, that the real power in Japan lies with bureaucrat??s who have strong ties to big business. They outlast the politician??s. The Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry (METI) is the most powerful bureaucrac??y, with a large budget at its disposal." ==> Another thing I learned is that Northern Japan has a different form of alternatin??g current than Southern Japan so that Energy cannot be easily shared Nationwide??! This is yet another roadblock to low cost energy that the Utilities promote to protect their market share in Japan! snip "Each of the regional utilities jealously guards its borders, so that there is limited cooperatio??n between them. Transmissi??on lines are not large enough to allow power to flow easily between regions. Worse still, the northeaste??rn half of Japan uses a 50 hertz frequency, while the southwest operates at 60 hertz, making it impossible to share power between them without huge transforme??rs." This to me, is the real "Tipping Point", since without a "up to date" modern (Think SMART) grid, energy cannot flow to where it is needed, when it is needed, at a fair price from where it is generated! Imagine installing new solar panels and the Energy produced is not allowed to be added to the grid because the Utility wants to only sell it's own energy! * http://is.gd/W3Jcuo
Solar (of all flavors) is now less costly and far SAFER than nuclear; here are the links (The hand writing is on the wall): 10 strikes: http://www.greenamerica.org/programs/climate/dirtyenergy/nuclear.cfm Energy Options: http://wp.me/P1YIeo-fi Nuclear Down despite connections: http://is.gd/wGsIWS The End of the Nuclear Renaissance: http://is.gd/61Z8KF Nuclear power plants too expensive for Croatia: http://is.gd/FYyldW Gambling on nuclear power: http://is.gd/4qMpgK The industry is pushing "New Nuclear" but it is like the ice men telling folks to buy new ice boxes instead of the new fangled refrigerators that put the ice men out of business! If people have a real choice and are not made to swallow Nuclear Baloney (NB) by the Industry and or their powerful lobbyists then America and the world will be a much safer place by starting to Shift to Solar (of all flavors) ASAP! Remember America cannot afford a Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster...
#1 Nuclear is not only RISKY to the Planet but also has huge potential problems, so promoting for the use of land based nuclear reactors and or the building of new land based reactors makes no sense at all to me; either financially or safety-wise since Solar (of all flavors) is now about the same or less costly and much faster to build! #2 I think that "dirty" coal can be used in modern plants to generate Energy so it is less damaging to the Planet but it should be phased out as Solar (of all flavors) is installed. I fully expect Germany to development a state of the art coal fired plant that is several magnitudes of order cleaner than what we think of now when we think of Coal and or Gas fired plants. The Japanese are in the process of planning to install mega solar in Argentina (and many believe in Australia) then use the Energy to produce Hydrogen which they will ship to Japan and or sell on the market. This is a great example of planning ahead by not just building more nuclear... #3 We should use oil for transportation until we can develop engines that will run off something cleaner without affecting our food supplies! Heavy trucks require the "power" contained in diesel fuel and all Countries, especially the US depend upon diesel powered trains, farm equipment and trucks to transport food stuffs from A to B... Electric mag-lev types of replacements are not being installed because money is being used elsewhere! #4 Energy from Space will transform our Planet and the sooner we begin the sooner we will stop the global resource race which leads to ever more wasteful wars and possible the end of life as we know it because of nuclear radiation and or pollution!
NRC: Fact Sheet on Nuclear Insurance and Disaster Relief http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/funds-fs.html In short, if there is more that 12 Billion in damages, we are SOL! BTW: This is only a tiny fraction of what it will cost in Fukushima, which is about a Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster! Where would the US Government get the REST, Social Security and or Medicare? This question needs answering ASAP, from both Congress and the Nuclear Industry, then Americans can determine if Nuclear is worth the RISK!
Since water is one of the most precious comodities on the planet, why are we not concidering ways of storing it for consumtion and power generation. Millions of gallons of water are pumped to every home and workplace. Why is this water not turning small turbines in the system to return power to the grid. 1% of the world water is drinkable, more work on increasing this statistic would reap dividends.
There is renewable energy that works in a baseload system. Take a look at Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC). It creates constant power from the constant temperature difference in shallow and deep water. It is a baseload power source, and is emission free. It's a game changer for tropical regions who pay enormously high fossil fuel costs compared to the rest of the world, and have aging, unreliable plants. Plus, every OTEC system produces clean drinking water as a byproduct. So while grids need updating to adjust to mass solar, and wind production, some parts of the world can be saved today with baseload OTEC power. So far the Bahamas is leading the way in OTEC generation, lots more news and info at The On Project. http://www.theonproject.org/?utm_source=smartplanet&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=mscomment
Until viable energy storage methods are developed so renewable sources can generate power when conditions are best, sunny or windy, and use it when the power is needed, to keep the discussion simple lets just say windless nights, they cannot reliably replace the current baseload scheme. I like some of the ideas being floated about using excess power from coastal wind farms to break down sea water into hydrogen, or some form like ammonia, that can be stored and used to power gas turbines when there is no wind. Of course this means you have to build the wind farm with excess capacity to allow for at least modest hydrogen production on days when the plant operates at less than peak because of poor wind conditions. It gets complex to manage, but it can be done if the excess wind power is stored and not used as an excess to expand local development. The same can be said for solar farms. Once a storage method is produced you have to ensure you always have the excess power generation available to store the energy. Even after 40 years of the Department of Energy dumping billions into them, the technology is not quite there. Renewable sources will have their day in the sun as the lead dog, but it is not today. Give it time.
I know a company in TX with a technology to extract hydrogen hydrogen at a fraction of the current cost. But they need capital. Does anyone know a potential investor?
Basic input output model however there are accumulation terms pumped hydroelectric can store energy and release on demand. there is much much more that can be done with the rejected heat than the utilities imagine.
Baseload power is doomed due to increasing regulations and increasing costs, and the subsidizing of competitive renewable energies. The new EPA regulations announced yesterday could either derail or jump-start plans for 15 new coal-fired power plants in 10 states, depending on when they start construction. The loss of coal-fired plants points towards reduced energy output and higher energy prices. This is no surprise. Barack Obama stated that his energy policy would cause energy prices to skyrocket. This is one campaign promise he intends to keep.
Chris, I've read and recommended your articles to others for some time, but this one embarrasses me for you. You ignore several very basic premises. First, it's a simple fact that a mature complex ecology cannot survive transplant from the environment within which it developed and evolved, and a civilization that evolved as western society has, dependent upon exponential growth in supply of ultra compact energy density sources that provide underlying power on demand 24/7/365, simply will not be transplanted to far more costly, intermittent, diffuse sources without vast dislocations, die-offs and other negative lifestyle consequences for most people. Second, you ignore the fact that the USA baseload electric system is 100% dependent on cheap and reliable oil production for the mining and maintenance of its energy sources and ongoing maintenance, and that electricity not used at any significant level is overland transportation - an app that uses about 66% of the total daily energy input in the ecology we live within. Third, you dismiss the financing of a complete overhaul of the entire nation's energy supply as a human problem, not a technical issue, in the face of a globally-collapsing financial system that, right now, is increasingly fed by central bank inflation of fiat money supplies as real economic growth is constrained by a flat oil supply. I live and work off-grid using a 2hp pico hydro power turbine and 2kW of solar PV with a battery-inverter-based "flywheel" that provides a completely modern electrical lifestyle - though the batteries are nearing end-of-life after almost 10 years and will have to be replaced at a cost of some $4000.00 within a year or two. Unfortunately, while I could recharge one, there's no electric alternative to my occasional transportation need, since sites that can produce hydro power are typically rural and today's glorified golfcarts only deliver a 30-40 mile range. While I teach and fully support localism in resource generation, there are thousands of "grids" at work within the USA daily - all of which depend upon a baseload supply of diesel, gasoline, natural gas and coal. To publish Pollyanna Press Releases such as the above, "where our wind powered car will take us the the solar powered Starbucks drive through" (with credit to JH Kunstler for that phrase), using constructs like "smart grid" - which as others have pointed out doesn't exist and, if it does ever come about will mean "sorry, you can't do that right now," is a disservice to your readers and to the truth.
Chris, Like you, I have become fascinated by the results of the quick and heavy switching to renewables in Northern Europe and the claims by their proponents of what is possible on the grid, if all the tech is forward and renewable looking. If the comments to this article are any indication, the fossil fool nabobs of negativity have done their jobs well in blunting any suggestion that baseload will be unnecessary in the future. Surely it's still an experiment in progress with lots of obvious hurdles to be leaped. But just as surely you can't jump the hurdles without first acknowledging that they will be there, like it or not, as fossil fuel outputs diminish inexorably. Visioning is critical and the Germans and other Northern Europeans are doing just that. We're just languishing in the last century here, with understanding that's little more than conventional twittering. Hardly a week goes by without 2 or 3 new possibilities for storage of energy from the peak output of renewables, whether it's portable or stationary battery developments, new and cheaper ways to create and store hydrogen or methane or whatever, yet most all that you get in response to this article is, "You make too many assumptions," "Your vision is progressive twaddle," or "It can't be done." Well, it must be done. The Germans think that they can do it in a less than ideal environment and if they are only half right, half is far better than watching one after another of current fossil fuel and uranium plants go off line because the dirty fuel isn't there or is too expensive. If it takes 2, 3 or 4 times the nameplate numbers of renewables to get the job done, that's all to the better. I'll bet we'll find ways to make very good use of the extra energy when the sun shines like Hell and the wind and waves roll to the max. Intermittent industry can roll with the punch better than no industry. We can adjust, because if we don't we will be in a World of hurt.
In case you haven't been on there lately, http://www.ted.com/talks/donald_sadoway_the_missing_link_to_renewable_energy.html Really promising battery technology!!
"As renewables gradually replace conventional baseload capacity, only more flexible gas generators that can operate at under 50 percent of their capacity will still have a role to play." Flexible gas generators can be replaced with storage. Gas peakers are a very expensive way to fill in the gaps. Gas prices are unlikely to get lower than they are now. Most likely the price of NG will rise. (The futures market thinks so.) Battery prices are falling. At some point we reach the "Hi/Bye" crossover. Then there's this... "(Dr. Alexander MacDonald, Director of the Earth System Research Lab at the) U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) was in Vancouver on Friday for the American Association for the Advancement of Science???s annual convention and mentioned in a talk there that clean, renewable energy (not even including hydroelectric) could cheaply supply 48 states of the continental U.S. with 70% of its electricity demand by 2030. The other 30% would be half from fossil fuels and half from nuclear and hydro. ???NOAA embarked on the renewables project three years ago, collating 16 billion pieces of weather data derived from satellite observations and airplane observations and weather station reports,??? Scott Simpson of the Vancouver Sun writes. ???Then it designed a program to filter the information to remove unlikely venues for wind or solar power arrays ??? such as national parks and urban areas ??? and came up with a map showing robust wind resources in the middle of the continent and decent ones in the northeast Atlantic states, as well as strong solar production areas in the desert southwest.??? But here???s where the NOAA researchers stepped beyond the good to the great, research-wise: they balanced potential power production and electricity demand to determine, how, where, when, and to what extent clean energy could produce the electricity we need. The end result ??? 70% of electricity demand...." http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=clean-energy-could-supply-us-with-7-2012-02 16 billion piece of data. 70% from renewables. Cheaper. And we will almost certainly be able to substitute storage for the 22.5% fossil fuel and nuclear inputs as time goes along. Simple financial considerations are likely to stop us from replacing nuclear and fossil fuel plants once the price of storage falls.
There may be a point at some future date that renewables will become cost-efficient but not now and not with a tanked economy. We need much more of what works- coal, nuclear and natural gas -not of the pie in the sky renewables. Put money into R&D of renewables and other alternative sources but concentrate on what works not what we 'hope' will work. We need a smarter, better managed grid not because of any sources of power generation but to improve delivery efficiencies because the use of power is going up, up, up. Quit using your politics to strangle the economy. China and India are buying most of the coal we produce and are firing up a new, extremely dirty, coal-fired power plant every WEEK!! We have reduced coal-generated emmissions by 85% over the last several decades and the last 15% can be technically solved if we aren't too smug about what is feasible and in what time frame. If we were to adopt the 'European' model each state would have its own regulatory system - their countries are roughly equivalent to our 'state' entities. We need a national energy policy that every politician running for president has promised but not delivered. Current administration wants $10 a gallon gas to 'force' consumers to other choices rather than a more natural, realistic adoption of alternatives that aren't ready for prime time.
1) cost of renewables is much higher than natural gas so major increase would flow through the economy as a huge drag 2) best storage available technology for industrial levels is Vanadium Redux http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110317141418.htm 3) a really smart GRID is an absolute requirement to integrate renewables (except concentrating solar which can be used as base load) 4) reduction of standard generators from near capacity results in such a large increase in production of CO2 and other greenhouse gases that the entire production of renewables thus far has NOT reduced greenhouse gases at all. I can provide citations. Given their higher costs, what is the point without a smart grid? 5) Other than the immediate write-off for tax purposes of drilling costs which only results in a timing change, what specific tax breaks does oil or gas enjoy which other businesses do not? Renewables have HUGE government support and still are a multiple of cost of hydrocarbons. 6) I support huge government support for RESEARCH in renewables but even our current level of support for immediate incorporation is not smart without first changing the GRID which is a nightmare. We will need very smart governmental support for changing the permitting rules like we did for national highways to get it done in 20 years. Checkout the issues of implementation in the national smart grid government strategic document.
I'll go over this again in simple terms for those who missed the point. Right now, we have 3 kinds of generators, base-load, load-following, and peaking. Base-load generators provide only the base load. They cannot increase or decrease their output. So if the load drops below the supplied base-load, you're screwed. If load increases above the base-load, you need another power source. Load-following generators can change their output at a moment's notice to follow the load. My favourite examples are hydro plants. Need more power, drop more water through those turbines. Need less, divert more over the spillway. A large hydro dam can go from 90% capacity to 10% capacity and back again in less than 5 minutes. But it takes them 20 minutes to go from 0% to 10% capacity so you never turn them off. Peaking generators are brought online when the previous two systems are insufficient for the load. Think of a gas turbine. It can go from 0% output to 80% output in under 1 minute. In this system, everything is adjusted based on the load, with out regard to the supply. So let's say we own a building and it requires 20kW just when it's sitting there doing nothing (likely because the lights inside need to be on all the time or some such thing). That's a base-load. We can provide that power using a bunch of nuclear fuel cells. They'll provide the same power, no more and no less, 24/7. Assume our building is in Minnesota. During the winter, the heating system will come on, on average, once every hour and draw 10kW for 15 minutes. But the base-load supply can't supply that. Therefore, we need additional supply. This is where the load-following generator comes in. We get 15kW base-load and between 5kW and 15kW load-following. But see! The requirements for the base-load generator decreased because we added a load-following generator. On very cold days, the heating system will draw a higher load, say 13kW for 5 minutes. So we need to add an additional 3kW above what the load-following generator can provide. This is what the peaking generator is for. Now, let's say we add a wind turbine outside our building and add a bunch of PV panels onto the roof. When the sun is shining and the wind is blowing, we generate 10kW. So on a sunny windy day summer day, we get 10kW from the renewables, and 5kW from our load-following generator. But we need another 5kW. We could get that from the load-following generator, but then we wouldn't have capacity for the 30kW for those still cloudy winter nights when the heater comes on. We could keep a base-load generator but reduce it to 5kW, but it makes more sense to replace the base-load generator with a second 5kW to 15kW load-following generator. So now, on a windy sunny summer day, we get 10kW from the renewables, 5kW from the first load-follower and 5kW from the second load-follower. On a a still cloudy winter night, we get 0kW from the renewables, 15kW from the first load-follower, and 5kW from the second load-follower to fulfill our base-load requirements. When the heating system comes on, the second load follower spins up to 15kW, thus giving us additional 10kW the heater requires. And of course, we still have that peaking generator for that extra 3kW needed for those really cold cloudy nights. So as we increase renewable energy sources, we also need to increase load-following and in some cases, peaking generator capacity, to compensate for the renewable energy's unevenness or "unreliability". (Chris suggested other ways we might do that, but everyone seems to be taking that the wrong way, so we'll just leave it out for now.) But as we increase load-following capacity, we subsequently need to decrease base-load capacity to compensate. The increased minimum load-following capacity replaces the previous base-load capacity. And this kind of system of using more load-following generators instead of base-load generators, is even more reliable and more adaptable than the current system. And if Chris had left it at that, the column would be 1/3 the length and everyone would have wondered what the big deal was about. I think the real thrust of the article isn't about the technical problems of bringing in renewables because, that's actually the "easy" part. The real thrust of the article is about the human issues in trying to do it. If you sell nukes, you want the country to buy base-load generators because that's what you sell. If you're a utility, you want to stick with what you know, and that's base-load generators. And if you're Ontario Power Generating, you're building new nukes to increase base-load capacity, but wondering why because you also have a history of having too much base-load capacity twice a year. And there's the rub.
Dear Mr. Nelder: The world is currently using ~16TW of energy, expected to double to 32TW in 20 years. NO AMOUNT OF RENEWABLE SOURCES CAN ACCOMPLISH THIS ELECTRIFICATION DEMAND. The only chance we have to manage this need is with 'lifter's' Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTR's).... I'm afraid your optimism is misguided!!!!
This wasn't reported in English as far as I could find, but nuclear "minicenters" being developed in Argentina could potentially keep nuclear as an option on the grid http://www.bbc.co.uk/mundo/noticias/2012/03/120308_argentina_minireactor_nuclear_vs.shtml (view with Chrome browser for a translation if needed)
Germay's plan to create many thousands of 'Green Jobs' is unfolding as we see them planning to add to renewables: battery storage, pumped storage, solar thermal and smart grids. It sounds very expensive. Maybe this is why the UK will follow the lead of an American expert, who gave evidence only yesterday, to the Committee on Senate Finance Subcommittee on Energy, Natural Resources and Infrastructure: http://lftrsuk.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/millions-of-green-jobs-lets-dig-ditches.html
If only ... there were storage for the wind power generated at night, when the wind mostly blows, and when the coal and nuclear plants sell spinning reserve power cheap into low demand. If only ... there were no resistive loss in the power transmission lines, so the sun from California could power New York, and the fantasy of the widespread smart grid could become reality. If only ... new transmission lines to connect distant sorces didn't cost $2 million a mile -- if you get past the environmental litigation and local shakedowns that stall any new construction. If only ... like Joshua, President Obama could command the sun not to set. Bullfeathers, indeed. Renewable portfolio standards and feed-in tariffs are artificial pressures trying to achieve an outcome not grounded in reality. When the water problems of natural gas production are frankly acknowledged, that baseload fantasy will die too. Ignoring the real limitations of wind, solar, and gas might have crippling results to the economy. Which raises the possibility that the renewable baseload argument is a bad faith attempt to shut down the coal and nuclear plants, recklessly or deliberately sabotaging the national economy. Not just technical ignorance, but worse. Wind should be used for grinding and pumping things, in high-torque applications where variability does not matter. Solar, presently a midget compared to wind, seems destined for niche markets because night happens every day, and sometimes it snows when you need power.
The discussion comments have touched on much of the magical thinking in Mr. Nelder's arguments. His article is so preposterous that I now suspect the veracity of his previous posts on the false industry estimates of natural gas reserves.
Solar thermal and heat storage "Profit Maximization Energy storage allows the plant operator to maximize profits. During periods of low hourly power prices, the operator can forgo generation and dump heat into storage; and at times of high prices, the plant can run at full capacity even without sun. Peak Shaving Solar generating capacity with heat storage can make other capacity in the market unnecessary. With heat storage the solar plant is able to 'shave' the peak load. Reducing Intermittence The ability of thermal solar plants to use heat energy storage to keep electric output constant: (1) reduces the cost associated with uncertainty surrounding power production; and (2) relieves concerns regarding electrical interconnection fees, regulation service charges, and transmission tariffs. Increasing Plant Utilization Solar plants equipped with heat storage have the ability to increase overall annual generation levels by 'spreading out' solar radiation to better match plant capacity." http://www.nrel.gov/csp/troughnet/pdfs/owens_storage_value.pdf
First Large Scale 24/7 Solar Power Plant to be Constructed in U.S May 22, 2011 The Obama administration provided a loan guarantee of $737 million to SolarReserve on Thursday to construct the first large-scale solar power plant that stores energy and provides electricity 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The solar power project will be constructed in Nevada. (Note that BrightSource Energy is at a similar stage in the development of a larger solar thermal power plant in the Mojave Desert, receiving a DOE loan guarantee of $1.37 billion in February 2010 and $168 million from Google this April.) This solar technology is a genuine alternative to baseload coal, nuclear or natural gas burning electricity generation facilities, Kevin Smith, SolarReserves chief executive, said in a statement Source: Clean Technica ---------------------------------------------------------------- Solar Power at Night Developed by Torresol at Plant in Southern Spain Torresol Energy SA began operating the worlds first solar-thermal tower with heat storage, allowing it to sustain generating power through the night near Seville in southern Spain. The 19.9-megawatt Gemasolar plant will produce power 24 hours a day during the sunnier parts of the year by stockpiling heat in molten salt to power turbines after sundown, can generate temperatures of up to 900 degrees centigrade (1,652 degrees Fahrenheit) in the receptor mounted on a central tower while its salt-based storage system will exceed 500 degrees; produces hotter steam than rival installations, making it more efficient, the company said. Torresol plans to commission two more plants with 50 megawatts of capacity each in the southern region of Andalucia later this year. Those plants will use rows of parabolic mirrors to focus the suns energy on pipes of oil rather than a central tower. {from Bloomberg}
Some solar thermal farms already have the ability to store heat (in molten salts and the like) overnight and run 24x7. The main reason why that technology hasn't become more commonplace is because financiers are less familiar with it than they should be, and are risk-averse. Again, it's a human problem, not a technological one.
@solar_teacher, I'm not sure what you're objecting to. Yes, we live in a complex world with many difficult interdependencies, but all I have done here is to review research and data from the real world showing that renewables can achieve significant penetration into grid power supply, and that there is no technical obstacle to doing so. How does that qualify as a "Pollyanna Press Release?" The smart(er) grid does exist in places like Germany and Texas and Denmark and China, albeit at a fairly nascent stage. It is not a pipe dream. The global smart grid market was $23 billion in 2011, and is expected to be over $80 billion by 2016. I did not say that we'll run our entire society on renewables alone, as you imply. I did say that renewably generated electricity can grow substantially from where it is today, and might, in the distant future, rely almost entirely on renewables. You seem to have confused my discussion of grid power with some much bigger notions on energy transition for society as a whole, which I have written about previously.
Joe, I was aware of the technology, but hadn't seen the TED talk, which goes beyond batteries to the nature of learning and invention. Super Inspirational! Thanks! And yeah, anyone thinking of off grid could use a coffee table or two in the shed.
Thanks for the tip, Wallace Bob. I'll have a look at that paper.
Again, thanks Marie for expanding upon the idea with a good real-world example. This is obviously a complex and multi-faceted topic, as the comment thread here shows. You honed in on the point that I was actually making, which is that technology isn't really the issue here. The claim that there is some fundamental technological reason why renewables can't make up a much larger part of the grid power supply, and that baseload power cannot be replaced to some extent by renewables, is simply wrong. Getting renewables up to 100% would be an incredible feat and would probably take the better part of a century, as someone else noted. But that's a story for another day. I did not say that reconfiguring the human side of the grid (policy, regulation, siting and permitting, cost allocation, dispatching requirements, etc.) would be easy, or quick, or cheap, particularly in the U.S. There are a lot of thorny issues there. But it's important to understand that these are human, not technological, issues.
...by throttling demand to match supply. That's the "smart" part that they're trying to peddle. Theoretically workable, but inevitably not popular with a society that has grown up with power on demand, and rightly views places in the world where power regularly is throttled as "backwards".
The most recent large nation to go down this road was Spain. Spain started toward a green economy around 2005/2006. Before the great global recession hit they were already deep in a recession by mid 2007. Draconian regulations put on carbon emissions shuttered factories for businesses that were very clean by all other EU standards. The number of green jobs created by green industries has been far below the rosy numbers projected. http://motorcitytimes.com/mct/2010/06/according-to-spanish-government-its-green-energy-initiative-is-responsible-for-spains-economic-distress/ While much of Europe is starting to pull out of the recession Spain is right there with Greece dragging link an anchor on the entire European economy. Please do not blow smoke at me about the magic of green jobs. It has proven to be an illusion for every nation that has tried it.
" that I now suspect the veracity of his previous posts on the false industry estimates of natural gas reserves." You're just now catching on? I read Chris Nelder for laughs. Like watching a dog trying to lick all the peanut butter out of the jar, even though his tounge can't quite reach the end. The shale gas revolution is going to steamroll coal, nukes and renewables (especially renewables) for the next 5 years minimum. Maybe 10.
Investors look at the bottom line on solar and do not like what they see. It is that simple. The cost is so high that in many cases it cannot be ignored that the designed life expectancy of a solar plant using molten salt storage might be 30 years and the ROI is 25. That is a long time to wait to get your money back. There is also a long line of alternative energy projects that have grossly under estimated the startup costs and over estimated actual output. To make a bad pun, many investors have been burned by solar. Artificially driving up the cost of fossil fuels, an admitted goal of the Obama administration (think cap and tax and now higher user taxes and strict regulations) is not the answer if you want the US economy to ever recover. You cannot make the ROI of something look better by hurting the American people. Like it or not the technology your promote is not yet ready for prime time. It???s close, but then again many experts, as yourself, have been saying it is ready for the big time for 30 years.
I am far more afraid of the unregulated pollution being pumped from hundreds if not thousands of coal power plants being used in China and India than I am of CO2 from the 6 or 8 much cleaner burning US coal plants being shutdown because of the global warming zealots in the EPA. Our grandchildren will be suffering the long term effects of the toxic poisons from those plants in China and India long before the seas rise from the alleged warming of the planet from CO2.
The cost of fossil fuels on the market is too low. As a result, taxing fossil fuel use is a correction to the market to move the price toward its true cost. It is unlikely the taxes will ever be high enough to get up to the true cost. What is the cost of destroying the planet for all future generations? This is not just about a few polar bears dying, this is about billions of people dying. I recommend the book "Storms of Our Grandchildren" by James Hansen for an honest assessment of the dangers of global warming.