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POPSLet's get real about alternative energy The public discussion of energy options tends to be emotional, polarized, mistrustful and destructive. I hope that focusing attention on the numbers may make it possible to develop honest and constructive conversations about energy.
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POPSWill Wind & Solar Become Competitive Soon? The government sponsored campaign for these energies are nothing new: In 1983, Booz, Allen & Hamilton did a study for the Solar Energy Industries Association, American Wind Energy Association, and Renewable Energy Institute. It stated: “The private sector can be expected to develop improved solar and wind technologies which will begin to become competitive and self-supporting on a national level by the end of the decade if assisted by tax credits and augmented by federally sponsored R&D.” In 1990, two energy analysts at the Worldwatch Institute predicted an almost complete displacement of fossil fuels in the electric generation market within a couple decades
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POPSTrojan House: New poster-child of solar failure Yeah, but shouldn’t the first clue of failure have been the very idea of building an 800 square-foot house in Troy, MI that cost $900,000 — that is, $1,125 per square foot? The median price of homes in Troy is about $159,000 and that’s for an 1,800 sq. ft home — about $88 per square foot. Even if the solar system hadn’t malfunctioned, who in their right mind would consider the house a success? I suppose it’s fitting that this tragi-comedy occurred in a place called Troy — the greens are trying to deceive us in adopting their nutty policies and goofy technologies with a Trojan House. Beware of greens bearing grifts.
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POPSWill Americans permit them to get away with this? Why would they advocate reducing emissions to avoid a global warming that is not happening? Why are so many in Congress wedded to this hoax? And will Americans permit them to get away with this? Instead of doing everything possible to encourage energy companies to find and extract the energy reserves the United States requires to function and grow, the White House and Congress is doing everything in its power to restrict energy use.
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POPSWe'll still depend on hydrocarbons Sure, Mr. Obama can double the output from solar and wind. And then double it again. And again. And again. But getting from 76,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day to something close to the 47.4 million barrels of oil equivalent per day needed to keep the U.S. economy running is going to take a long, long time. It would be refreshing if the president or perhaps a few of the Democrats on Capitol Hill would admit that fact.
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POPSWind power is a complete disaster The Ontario Power Authority advises that wind producers will be paid 13.5¢/kwh (more than twice what consumers are currently paying), even without accounting for the additional costs of interconnection, transmission and back-up generation. As the European experience confirms, this will inevitably lead to a dramatic increase in electricity costs with consequent detrimental effects on business and employment. From this perspective, the government’s promise of 55,000 new jobs is a cruel delusion. A recent detailed analysis (focusing mainly on Spain) finds that for every job created by state-funded support of renewables, particularly wind energy, 2.2 jobs are lost. Each wind industry job created cost almost $2-million in subsidies.
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POPSNew Study: Green Jobs Myths Myth: Government mandates are a substitute for free markets. Reality: Companies react more swiftly and efficiently to the demands of their customers and markets, than to cumbersome government mandates. Myth: Imposing technological progress by regulation is desirable. Reality: Some technologies preferred by the green jobs studies are not capable of efficiently reaching the scale necessary to meet today’s demands and could be counterproductive to environmental quality. In this Article, we survey the green jobs literature, analyze its assumptions, and show how the special interest groups promoting the idea of green jobs have embedded dubious assumptions and techniques within their analyses. Before undertaking efforts to restructure and possibly impoverish our society, careful analysis and informed public debate about these assumptions and prescriptions are necessary.
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