Comments stopgreenpath has made

fair enough

Well, now that I've got your attention, I will briefly apologize for my cynical tone (although not for my unwavering commitment to my position), and I will thank you for the transmission article, which is a breath of fresh air (and brought out a lot of people who seem to agree with me).  I have had a particularly rough week watching the completely wasted opportunity of this stimulus package be cheered on by Big Enviros, so I'm not feeling particularly patient with the greenwashers right now.   Unfair of me to paint with such a broad brush, I know, but, like the buildup to the war, the media is part of the problem, when I had really hoped it might be part of the solution long before now.

So, although I have been a little on edge lately, please bear with me, as I have generally been very clear and polite, and unlike the armchair quarterbacks in these conversations, I am at the agency hearings, reviewing the permits, submitting and reviewing comments, on the conference calls and walking the sites where this is all actually happening.  I don't go to Davos to sit in a 5-star hotel room and speculate, I go to Ivanpah to see with my own eyes Bright Source's rendering of the project showing flat, dead, brown dirt as far as the eye can see, and the reality of the dense 4-foot tall creosote forest which is also prime Desert Tortoise habitat.  Don't run spreadsheets on my computer, I read the blatant lies of Sierra Club and NRDC in their 200 page RETI report, claiming that 2 powerlines that aren't even close to breaking ground (one hasn't even started the application process) are "already built" so they can site more Big Energy projects along them and pretend they are much "greener" and much cheaper than they really are, which gives them high rankings on their siting matrix.  So, my position is not theoretical, and I know first hand what is happening, where it's happening and I have a pretty good idea why it's happening.  And many of the people who should be "with us" are actually "against us," and are totally ignorant about what they are killing.  Which is why I'm angry.  It's not fair to vent it on Grist-ers and for that, I apologize.

The way I see it, there is nothing "pragmatic" about dynamiting and bulldozing and "developing" millions of acres of wilderness far far away from any load centers, and running power down long, leaky powerlines, especially when it just re-entrenches Big Energy monopolies and the ostensible goal is to SAVE the planet.  Who starts saving something by killing a bunch of it off as the first move?  So if you truly are pragmatic, and set all the propaganda aside, no doubt you will agree that using the existing grid (with certain upgrades) to balance renewable energy produced right where it is needed is the "pragmatic" solution, at least for the first phase of the Renewable Revolution:

1.  No dead ecosystems vs. millions of acres permanently destroyed (not the "postage stamp in the desert" the greenwashers will have you believe - go look at the applications);

2.  no lost carbon sequestration (the Mojave is as effective as temperate forest - I've linked to that several times);

3.  no eminent domain (thousands of families are in the line of fire for the tens of thousands of miles of unneeded powerlines being sited as we speak);

4.  no incredibly toxic, new GHG spewing powerlines (see the Transmission Lies article, and the SPL EIS which I've linked to several times);

5.  100% of the US' electricity needs can be met on existing rooftops with super-cheap thin film PV at 10% efficiency (I've linked to this at the DOE several times);

6.  90% of the US' electricity needs can be met on existing brownfields within urban load centers with the same super-cheap thin film PV (same DOE study).  Big Energy can own this since they are obsessed with owning generation;

7.  reduced monopolies mean reduced opportunities for pricing and supply manipulations (see Enron, Sempra, Shell, CA gas refiners, to name a few);

8.  much, much, much faster ramp up because permitting is super simple, construction is far less specialized, and financing will super easy if we fund our loan programs like CA's AB 811 (time:  average powerline can take 10 years to permit and build, power plants around 8, PV around 30 days) (financing:  AB 811 is guaranteed repayment, 100% of funds are snapped up within hours of being released, and Big Boondoggle financing is drying up);

9.  ratepayer generation and civic engagement means millions more conscientious people, plus improved property values, while costing non-generating ratepayers less than massive, faraway infrastructure (especially with those built in, guaranteed profit margins, which, unless I'm mistaken, run about 12% for transmission, even when it's not needed) (also, see Craig Rose's article in the Feb 16 issue of the Nation proving that local solar is cheaper, even without ratepayer generators paying for their own systems, which makes it hugely cheaper);

10.  Feed in tariffs mean economic stimulus to the middle classes, increased ramp up and oversizing of rooftop systems, and enormous conservation gains (see Germany, Spain, Japan and 40 other countries) and it's still cheaper than remote infrastructure (already discussed);

11.  rooftop solar is far more reliable and consistent than Big Wind, so although storage solutions may be required once we get to the much smaller "overnight" stage in the paradigm shift, it is far less storage/backup power than Big Wind requires right now - we all know the possibilities for storage since we have cellphones, computers, etc. - it's a question of priorities);

12.  rooftop solar uses no water, while CSP uses millions and millions of gallons a year, even if it's the wasteful, inefficient air-cooled type that drops in production right when we need power the most - the hottest times.  Gotta keep those dirty diesel trucks driving up and down the rows of mirrors rinsing them off to prevent global warming!  When the plants aren't burning gas, that is (I have linked to several actual project applications several times - this is easily verifiable);

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

oh, please

first of all, gar, if you bother to read the permit applications for the CSP plants, like i do, they clearly state that they waste millions of gallons of water every year.  your pie in the sky theories are just that, theories.  my facts are actual, boots on the ground facts.  real power plants listing their real water usage.  i meet with permitting agencies on a regular basis and discuss this stuff.  real people, real projects, real permitting agencies.  i know what i'm talking about and am hardly the one who has to read brochures from Big Energy whores to get my numbers.  speaking of, what are your sources again?

you can cherry pick statistics to try to make it look like these are dainty little water-sippers but you cannot contradict my figures because they are real. sorry if that bugs you so much that you have to belittle my sources and try to tar me with the "you are a coal shill" brush, in a sad ad hominem attack, but, once again, you are wrong.  wrong about me and wrong about CSP. it's crap and wastes water.

local PV will use less water (as in none), and it is still superior to CSP in every way.  no moving parts to constantly break (and they do, just like big wind turbines), no "toxic sludge" waste, no natural gas burned, no "salt cake" waste, plus no dead ecosystem, GHG-spewing transmission lines (another thing you were wrong about), etc.  You are not the only one with a brain, here, Gar, and trying to insult the intelligence and integrity of those of us who have done actual research instead of jacking off with our calculators just discredits you, not me.

Jon, my position has been insanely (inanely?) consistent.  go read through the last 100 posts I've put on this or 25 other blogs and you will see a non-stop adherence to point of use solutions like rooftop solar, storage, conservation, smart meters, passive solar designs, solar thermal (rooftop), geothermal heat exchange, and efficiency.  saving ecosystems and helping out the middle class while doing it is my trip, and I am never diverted.  

in fact, the brownfield study (which is completed, no need for another study) also makes it clear that 100% of US' electricity needs could easily be met with thin film ($1/watt) on existing rooftops right at load centers.  done.  settled.  why do you want another study?  why are you acting like this is some vague, distant future but CSP is somehow relevant?  and why would you believe Gar instead of the NREL?  Gar was wrong about those numbers, too.  20% is either a mistake or a lie.

Of course we need storage, etc. and that is in 75% of my rants on this topic (and is inherent in "point of use solutions" which is the phrase i use in lieu of "rooftop solar" because it is comprehensive) but we need that much more with Big Wind and just as much with Big Solar as we do with rooftop, so double standards are not a useful way to discredit point of use solar, either.

We have to start somewhere, so why the hell would we start by totally decimating and dehydrating millions and millions of acres of carbon-sequestering ecosystem and sharply spiking GHG emissions??  Sorry, that is pure bollocks and anyone who advocates for that position is trying to kill us all for money.  that's not ok with me.  i am constantly baffled that it's ok with almost everyone else on this so-called "environmental" blog.

you will see one post where i suggest that since existing suburbia is already built, rather than abandoning it and all running to the inner cities so we could live like rats piled on top of each other, while suburbia still sits there, why couldn't we plant large organic gardens, tighten up the structures for efficiency and cover them with solar panels to make them net exporters of electricity and maximize their existence?  i never got a sensible response to that, by the way.

i don't believe in waste, and abandoning a suburbia that is already built is just stupid, when it can be converted into a green community.  millions of people (including yours truly) run our businesses from our homes, and drive only a few thousand miles a year, so why couldn't we live wherever the hell we want as long as we are not killing new ecosystems?  i NEVER suggested expanding suburbia, and you know it. just salvaging the parts that were already built from a reverse white-flight phenomenon.

i don't feel any compulsion to march in lock-step with the "ecobabble" of self-proclaimed environmentalists, most of whom are trying to kill off our planet one Solar Farm at a time, about "high density" this and "sprawl" that.  i think for myself, do my research, and bounce ideas off thousands of people.  i'm not always right, but i am absolutely consistent.  i do not believe in killing the wilderness for private profits and energy production since there is a viable, clean, affordable alternative that happens to be superior in every way.  why i get crucified for that here is beyond me.On World heads for 'water bankruptcy', says Davos report posted 10 months ago 31 Responses

Big Transmission is Toxic!

geez, what is wrong with people?  do you REALLY not know that Big Transmission spews HUGE amounts of GHGs into the atmosphere?  if you don't, then are you even qualified to write on this subject?

this, like most articles on this site supporting Big Energy boondoggles, belong in the "greenwash" section.  Big, Remote Industrial Power Plants that kill millions of acres of ecosystems and deplete groundwater, and lengthy, toxic transmission are NOT GREEN, even if they do use a bit of sun or wind as fuel.

local, point of use solutions are cheaper, cleaner, greener and fairer, so why do you keep gabbling about Big Energy saving the planet?  they are just doing what they always do - externalizing 100% of their costs onto ratepayers, taxpayers and the planet, only this time, their PR is "Green."  duh!  

it is embarrassing that so few people are willing to discuss the truth.  are you all hypnotized as soon as someone says "green" "solar" or "renewable?"  snap out of it.  these are more GIVEAWAYS to Big Energy and you should be fighting HARD for loans, grants and feed in tariffs so ratepayer-generators across the country can be the solution.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

what about the feed in tariff legislation?

the feed in tariff law will do more to support "Green Jobs" than any of these other things.  come on, why aren't you talking about it?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

duh, Big Energy runs this country

the NY times ran an article on this topic a week or two ago, because UTILITIES LOBBY HARD AGAINST EFFICIENCY PROGRAMS, and want all the money to go to subsidizing bills, not reducing them:

http://tinyurl.com/8en2rm

one of many money quotes:

"Government aid for weatherization has been modest.

Energy technology research competes for federal aid, said a spokeswoman for the Energy Department. Some states contribute their own money or divert federal money intended to help the poor pay their energy bills.

But utilities that furnish electricity, natural gas and home heating oil have lobbied strongly for programs that provide money to help pay bills.

Although Congress added $250 million to the original $227 million budget for weatherization in the current fiscal year, the number of people receiving weatherization aid is dwarfed by those receiving assistance in paying their energy bills.

"You have six million families a year getting energy assistance, possibly eight million this year, and 150,000 getting weatherization," said Mark Wolfe, executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors' Association, an organization of state officials."

So now you see why I keep harping on Big Energy's "great idea" to recentralize power generation and re-monopolize the grid in a renewable power era.  they are CROOKS who are out to rip all of us off, all the time.  if you really think that the sun doesn't shine in every state of this country, you are beyond help.  for the rest of you - WAKE UP!  Big Solar and Big Wind and Big Transmission are just the "Drill here, Drill now" of the "renewable" energy cabal that doesn't want you earning money by producing power on your own rooftop.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

Brownfields facts

yes, i have posted it a few times, but here it is again:

http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/myths.html

money quote:

Alternatively, PV systems built in the "brownfields"--the estimated 5 million acres of abandoned industrial sites in our nation's cities--could supply 90% of America's current electricity.

These hypothetical cases emphasize that PV is not "area-impaired" in delivering electricity. The critical point is that PV does not have to compete with baseload power. Its strength is in providing electricity when and where energy is most limited and most expensive. It does not simply replace some fraction of generation. Rather, it displaces the right portion of the load, shaving peak demand during periods when energy is most constrained and expensive.

Which is a nice segueway to Gar's objection.  firstly, the sun shines more than 5 hours a day everywhere in the US, all year long.  Some days in some places, there may be very heavy cloud cover, and certainly on winter days, when no A/C is needed, so electric loads are a fraction of what they are in summer, the sun shines for only 8 hours instead of 12.  Fine, so there are overnight loads, but those are a mere fraction of "peak" load, which can be 100% covered by solar, so the actual demand when the sun isn't shining is Phase 2, a storage solution.  MIT insists that within 5 years, they will have a cheap, room temp hydrogen battery that will fuel an average US household during non-PV production hours using one gallon of water.  can't we put a moratorium on killing our wilderness until then?

I am baffled that remote Industrial Wind is being treated as a more reliable source of energy than PV, since wind is terribly erratic and turbines are constantly breaking down, at least in the 1000s of them in the low desert in CA.  their average output is roughly 15% of capacity and peaks at 19% of capacity, but in an unpredictable way, so how on earth is that a more reliable source than PV in the same area with an average of 350+ days of blazing sunshine a year?  I am also baffled that i have not been able to make it clear that Industrial Wind is not a benign technology either, and it still externalizes the vast majority of its costs onto ratepayers, taxpayers and the environment.

since we have a viable option, which, I beg to differ, Gar, will NOT require massive new transmission lines, as point of use solutions actually DECONGEST the grid by using most of the electricity right there, why on earth would we chase after this pie in the sky solution, destroy our ecosystems first, and use up all our funding to do it?  Wind is completely impossible without matching gas backup, unless a huge storage solution is developed, so you can't begrudge storage to PV, when wind needs it even more.  

Big Wind needs to factor in the costs (environmental and financial) of all new roads, backup power, opportunity costs (environmental and financial) and transmission before pricing it, and it starts getting much more expensive than thin film PV at $1/watt, no roads, no transmission, on dead land (no opportunity costs), much less backup power (since it's covering peaker power, many existing peaker plants could be repurposed until storage is perfected).  So, no, my objection is not "down to" transmission, since these power plants are incredibly devastating to ecosystems as well, but i am irritated that transmission is treated as a "separate issue" when people want to talk about emissions, land use, ecosystem harm, eminent domain, and pricing for remote solar and wind.  transmission corridors, per the BLM, run 2 - 5 miles wide.  We are not talking about little wooden poles and skinny wires in rural neighborhoods.  We are not talking about digging up asphalt and putting wires underground.  We are talking about thousands and thousands of miles of new transmission in Orwellian "National Interest Electricity Corridors" that will do one thing, and one thing only - re-entrench monopolies when they are least wanted or needed.  It is terribly naive to imagine that this is being done for the planet or US ratepayers.  This is just "drill here, drill now" for the electricity sector, and the mercenaries are all bellying up to the trough.  That's business as usual, but what the hell are "environmentalists" doing by greenwashing it?

I am also baffled that SDG & E was unaware of all these easy fixes to their GHG emission poisoning and was unable to remedy that factor if it's as easy as you say, Gar.  Perhaps they didn't want to spend several additional millions of dollars on cameras since the line will already cost ratepayers roughly $15 million/mile?  More likely, perhaps its because they knew they would be getting cover from "environmentalists" who would brush those massive poisonous emissions aside in their rush to pave over more desert ecosystems to save the rest of the planet?  Because history is repeating itself.  Utilities are NOT doing things "environmentally sensitively," nor are they required to, nor will they ever.  It is the definition of insanity to even imagine that they will ever, ever change, so let's work with reality.  CEQA, probably the toughest environmental review process in the nation, showed enormous harm, and approved a preferable alternative, in the form of in-basin generation (which has been repeatedly proven to be feasible and viable and affordable).  there must be a serious reason to overrule preferable alternatives, and even though the administrative law judge conducting the hearings (which Sempra repeatedly lied in and got caught) and the one CPUC commissioner familiar with the proceedings, and CEQA all denied approval, they were overruled by the head of CPUC.  why?  because Sempra is Big Energy, and Big Energy is driving all of this.  Not coincidentaly, Sempra was recently fined $350 million FOR MANIPULATING ENERGY SUPPLIES AND PRICING during the 2001 blackouts, just like Enron.  

gee, do you think there is any reason to distrust this process and question whether you have been duped into supporting a process that will benefit mercenaries and greatly harm ratepayers, taxpayers, property owners and the planet?  I'm afraid i have not seen a single good reason why not to build out point of use PV first, and save killing wilderness for a very, very last resort. not one.  my solution will ramp up exponentially faster, just for starters, and if people are paid for their generation, we can plan on a serious consumption drop as well, since FITs have proven to be the most effective conservation policy ever.  if you really believe this is urgent, then my solution is the one to pick.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

construction GHGs, Jon

The GHGs from BUILDING AND MAINTAINING THE POWERLINE will take 12 years to zero out, not from simply processing the steel.  dynamite, bulldozers, water trucks, borers, concrete, steel, helicopters, dump trucks, power tools, herbicides, generators, and all the rest of the enormously destructive CONSTRUCTION PROCESS will emit so many GHGs (many of them far more harmful than C02) that you have to be crazy to pretend they are small, neutral, or harmless.  

you read the EIS, Jon - which was prepared by the CPUC, who are not exactly enviro-nuts, and it was classified a non-mitigatable factor, even with huge "Carbon Offset" purchases.  Sorry, but it is what it is.  Wishing it was "overblown" just to advocate a position you are attached to won't change the facts.

And let's be clear, I am also proposing to generate clean, emissions free energy - in the built environment, where it is needed, so how can you beat that?  You can't.  And why would you want to?  Can't we START with 50% of our energy and work from there?  Do you really think REMOTE solar is going to be able to generate at different times than LOCAL solar?  it's exactly the same.  Wind is a total wild card, so storage is obviously needed before it can become viable, which then puts point of use wind back into the mix.

Like i said in Gar's other post, we are obviously doing renewable energy in phases, and the money follows the policy.  As soon as policy shifts to point of use solutions like demand reduction, generation and storage, the money - and the science, will follow.  The only reason we don't have amazing batteries already is because Big Energy has tried to stunt their development.  They routinely buy up promising technologies and shelve them, they buy off legislators, and they use their monopolies to control access to the grid.

You want cradle to grave analysis?  then include the massive ecosystem destruction, the water waste, the hugely polluting construction process, the backup power required, the gas burned by many CSP plants (which means gaslines, too), the additional powerlines and roads, and I'm sorry, you will really have a hard time convincing us that remote Industrial generation is cleaner or cheaper than point of use PV.  we'll tackle the second 50% later, when tech catches up with policy...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

what about the emissions from the infrastructure?

Gar, your calculations pretend that there are not enormous emissions involved in building and maintaining these power plants (untrue) and that there are not enormous emissions involved in building and maintaining the transmission lines they would require (ditto).  

Just one example - the Sunrise Powerlink EIS found that it would take 12 years of full 100% capacity of 100% renewable power, just to BREAK EVEN on emissions from the LINE ALONE, much less the lost carbon sinks and the lost ecosystems (water, etc.) from the power plants.  and that line's only 100 miles long, and will only last 40 years.

By hedging and selecting certain stats, and pretending all giant power plants always work at optimum capacity (untrue), ANYTHING can present as "Green" or "Renewable" for soundbyte purposes, but with 5 seconds of common sense, you see that destroying functioning ecosystems, which absorb carbon and provide the millions of other global benefits that intact ecosystems provide (most of which we don't even understand - see recent story on the importance of fish poop in maintaining proper ocean pH - did you already know that, and were you actively trying to keep fish poop levels in balance?  of course not, but that is still the truth!), is an incomprehensible "solution" when we have MASSIVE amounts of built environment (on destroyed ecosystem), which is where the power is needed.

I'm sorry, but even if (and it's a big IF) remote power plants are, in practice (not in PR materials about potential), very slightly more efficient, even after transmission losses, that is not a good enough reason to destroy intact ecosystems.  We do not even understand 10% of what we are destroying, so why not do the obviously harmless thing, and cover our brownfields - already destroyed, already in urban centers - with PV and get 90% of our power there, if the thought of ratepayers owning their own generation is so unacceptable?

And Darrell, yes, we have all read the press releases, but the truth is that DWP doesn't need to destroy ecosystems and build massive new transmission since SCE has offered plenty of capacity on their existing transmission.  It was never about geothermal coming to LA, it was about a generation and transmission monopoly that the megalomaniacs at DWP are insisting on, in order to continue holding ratepayers hostage.  If DWP cared about solar, they would have spent that 5 billion dollars their "solar program" will cost on AB 811 loans and feed in tariffs, instead of monopolistic infrastructure.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

wrong - cities can hit 90%

Sorry, Gar, but even the US government does not agree with you about cities and suburbs not being able to generate enough electricity to power themselves:

money quote:  

"A more realistic scenario involves distributing these same PV systems throughout the 50 states. Currently available sites--such as vacant land, parking lots, and rooftops--could be used. The land requirement to produce 800 gigawatts would average out to be about 17 x 17 miles per state. Alternatively, PV systems built in the "brownfields"--the estimated 5 million acres of abandoned industrial sites in our nation's cities--could supply 90% of America's current electricity.

These hypothetical cases emphasize that PV is not "area-impaired" in delivering electricity. The critical point is that PV does not have to compete with baseload power. Its strength is in providing electricity when and where energy is most limited and most expensive. It does not simply replace some fraction of generation. Rather, it displaces the right portion of the load, shaving peak demand during periods when energy is most constrained and expensive."

http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/myths.html

Your whole argument ignores the decongestion and point of use factors that mean that much, much less power will need to even enter the grid if most structures generate a large percentage of their own demand.  No peaks, no valleys.  It also ignores that storage solutions should be top priority for the new administration (see MIT's simple hydrogen storage solution, anticipated within 5 years).  And worst of all, it ignores the total decimation to ecosystems and massive GHG emissions of building out giant, remote power infrastructure far from point of use.  

I seriously can NOT see why anyone who cares even a tiny bit for the planet feels they can get away with advocating the wholesale slaughter of millions and millions of acres of wilderness in order to remonopolize the Big Energy Robber Barons' disastrous externalization of costs onto ratepayers, taxpayers and the planet.  calling such power "green" or "renewable" is worse than a joke because it is built on the back of a large, dead habitat and carbon sink (in the case of the Mojave, at least).  Most of these projects - including Big Transmission - could barely zero out their own GHG emissions over their lifecycles, much less result in net emission reductions.

You talk about the "best wind," but why not address the REALITY of Big Wind, that the vast majority of Industrial Wind plants are unacceptably weak and unreliable?  the average output of the massive (and growing) disastrous Big Wind projects near Palm Springs is only 15%, occasionally increasing to a max of 19% of capacity.  on any given day, even if there is wind, fully 30% of turbines are inoperational.  but because of Big Energy lobbyists and their greenwashing cheerleaders, they keep funding them and building them, while the vast, endless, baking sprawl of the built environment goes without PV, even though it is sunny 8+ hours a day, 350+ days a year there.  Why is that?  Because of propaganda and payoffs, not because Big is Beautiful.  Big is crap from every perspective but the profiteers, who get guaranteed profits whether their project performs or not.

sorry, but it's not NIMBYism that prevents us from embracing these boondoggles, it's concern for the environment and for ratepayers, both of whom are totally ripped off by these Big Energy dead-ends.  point of use solutions need to be the ONLY focus of the first Phase of a renewable energy paradigm.  We need to invest in R & D to make Phase 2 just as clean and green with storage solutions and consumption decreases not with wilderness slaughter and eminent domain.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

another Big Energy Boondoggle

too bad nobody was able to show Obama how the BEST way to prop up property values, rapidly scale renewable energy, reduce GHGs, create local jobs, and build an income stream for the middle class is a nationwide renewable energy loan and feed in tariff program so that ALL OF US could install PV and microwind on our properties and be paid for power we produce and do not consume.

it's cheaper, MUCH better for the environment, democratic, and a GREAT investment for all of us who lost 40% of our nut last year.  not to mention that it's proven to work fantastically (40 nations already out ahead of us on this), and has also proven to be the most effective incentive for energy conservation.

but no.  Big Energy is gonna get millions of acres of functioning ecosystem that is owned by us, and not only be allowed, but be encouraged to permanently destroy it to re-entrench their monopolies.  and the worst part?  WE have to pay for it, not Big Energy!!!  So we are literally, digging our own environmental and economic graves by being forced to pay for monopolistic energy infrastructure that is harmful to us and the planet.

meet the new boss (Big Renewables).  same as the old boss (Big Fossils).  and what's even worse?  it's being greenwashed by sellouts calling themselves "environmentalists."  the planet and ratepayers are still stuck at the bottom of their pyramid scheme, totally exploited for private profits.  disgusting.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

uh, solar panels will do a whole lot more

sorry, but any roof that is "hot" enough to need a "cool roof" should be covered with PV panels.  if they are elevated a bit off the roof surface, they will actually create a shading effect which will cool the roof somewhat, as well as converting a decent amount of the light that hits the panels into electricity rather than heat.  not to mention they will generate masses of clean, green power right where it is used.

keep in mind that 1.7 MILLION acres of carbon-absorbing SW desert is in the permitting cue - so far - for total and permanent destruction to provide (ahem) "renewable energy."  we can hardly waste millions of square meters of flat, baking rooftops right where power is needed, while this eco-terrorism proceeds in our deserts!

cool roads, yes.  cool roofs, no.  we have more than an urban heat island crisis in this country - we have an energy crisis.  all these white roofs and roof gardens are missing the potential of PV.  

sure, we need better policies, like feed in tariffs, to make these projects profitable, so THAT should be the focus of our advocacy, not on re-roofing buildings which then need to pull power (albeit somewhat less power) from a remote wilderness location.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

let's hope it's Waxman

taking the lead.  the other two, god love 'em are CLUELESS, albeit (possibly) well intentioned.  

LADWP has installed, on a per capital basis, less than 5% the rooftop solar that Germany has, despite having more than twice the solar capacity (same capacity as the Mojave, once transmission losses are accounted for).  LA - the land of flat, sprawling, baking burb after baking burb roofs has almost NO rooftop solar.  why?  because DWP is a power-mad megalomaniacal scary organization, hell bent on OWNING 100% of its infrastructure, the planet and ratepayers be damned.  LA has not funded AB 811, to give loans for point of use solutions, repayable through the property tax system, and their big "solar" plan is basically to dynamite all the rock formations and bulldoze all the plants and animals just outside Joshua Tree National Park (including in the Morongo Preserve ACEC) so they can build out giant, remote industrial solar and wind, at ratepayer expense - while still preventing rooftops within the metropolis, other than their own, from getting solar.  visionary?  ummmm.

Boxer's big "environmental" email to us last year was asking if we could please, when we got a chance, if we thought about it, sometimes consider recycling some of our water bottles.  If it's not too much trouble.  WTH?  Does this sound like someone on top of the CRISIS we are facing on this planet, or a supremely superficial greenwasher who is not really interested in the hard policy work that is required right now?  ummmmm.

So, all eyes on Waxman, who has a pair and is not afraid to call upon them when the going gets tough - and it will.  He has shown support for point of use solutions which do not slaughter our open spaces, so that's a start.  He opposed the 2005 Energy Policy Act, and supported all the Section 368 and 1221(a) revision attempts (you know, the ones that made 30% of our nation a "critical energy corridor" for Cheney's cronies, so the Feds could pre-empt local and state siting authority?), so that's good, even though it didn't work....On California lawmakers set to take lead on enviro policy posted 11 months ago 5 Responses

maybe she meant to add...

"...that will not destroy effective carbon sinks, dynamite, bulldoze, poison, dehydrate and pave fragile functioning ecosystems, and re-entrench Big Energy monopolies in an era of ubiquitous sun and wind which is far better sited at point of use" but just ran out of breath because she was jogging?  

after all, the truth is quite a mouthful.  better to go with the disingenuous soundbytes about how "renewable" a power plant, hundreds of miles away, that permanently destroys thousands of acres of highly effective carbon sink, emits TONS of GHGs, slaughters all the wildlife in the region and completely depletes groundwater sources, while often burning natural gas is, eh?  i mean what's not "renewable" about that?  it's genius, alright, but greenwasher-marketing genius, not "clean energy" genius.

truth hurts, folks.  if we don't close the gap between consumption and generation on location, then we will just be continuing to careen down the slippery slope where all the costs of our power consumption are externalized onto ratepayers, taxpayers and especially the planet (both in GHG increases and ecosystem decimation), while Big Energy pockets the profits.  this is the model that made the Fossil Fuel Robber Barons so rich, and Industrial Wind and Solar are trying to do the same thing.

so will we behave like enlightened citizens or like Stockholm Syndrome patients, opening another vein for Big Energy?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

what about the Mojave?

The Mojave, when left intact, has been proven to be as effective a carbon sink as temperate forests, yet many of you would advocate for its wholesale destruction to bolster Industrial Solar and Industrial Wind profits, and to ensure that already built environments (like our load centers) do not get the renewable energy infrastructure we need.  Why?  Why would you advocate killing one GREAT carbon sink, while destabilizing the grid, impoverishing property owners/ratepayers, emitting enormous amounts of GHGs in construction and maintenance of these boondoggles, and missing economic opportunities in the jobs, property values and feed in tariff sectors?

Point of use solutions are the only economically and environmentally viable renewable energy solutions.  we need to STOP killing the Mojave, and allow it to function in the way it was designed to function, and focus on policies that will get panels and windmills onto structures and feeding TRULY clean power into the grid.  40 Nations, including Albania and Algeria are ahead of every state in the US on clean energy policy, even if their solar and wind resources are only 50% what ours are.  why?  because Big Energy is trying to scam us - again - into their greenwashed lies about how much we need to destroy open spaces for energy, and our government is enjoying the cover the "environmentalists" are providing for their big donors...

It's so obvious what they are doing - can we all rise up and refuse to participate in these environmentally devastating pyramid schemes and insist on FITs, efficiency, storage, smart grids and other solutions that will actually HELP the planet?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

jon rynn

SCE is paying $3/watt for rooftop PV, installed, for their bulk installations in CA, so i just added 25% to accommodate the additional locales.  even at $5/watt, CSI is $2.40/watt and the feds give an uncapped 30% tax credit.  10kW X $4 = $40K - $24K CSI = $16K X 70% = $11,200.  i added a few grand for miscellaneous (inverters, administration, declining CSI, etc.).

to my knowledge, nobody has contracted for bulk microwind, since they go from rooftop to 50+ acres/mW, so all the pricing is currently retail, but why wouldn't economies of scale work for this manufacturing and installation process, just like all others?

FITs just need to be in proportion to up-front costs, so that the system owner has incentive to produce more energy than they use, and to install a larger system with a guaranteed buyback...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

jobs and cash and clean energy - for free

Sorry to double - post this, but it is critical that the economies of scale currently available to us get into this discussion NOW, because this is a total win for jobs, economic stimulus, property values, TRULY green energy (that doesn't kill off our open spaces), civic engagement and a free market that breaks us out of the Big Energy Robber Baron model we have suffered under for the past century.

I will use AB 811 "loan" program in CA as a model, where cities and counties can access the property tax system to repay "loans" for efficiency and renewable generation, then point out the, the 3 factors that will make sense of it in a SERIOUS way:

   1.  we need to allow people to oversize their systems.  Big Energy has insisted that we are NOT allowed to build systems that will feed excess power into the grid, and if we accidentally do, we have to give it for free.  this, of course, means NO conservation, and false "demand" for building wilderness-killing, eminent-domain stealing Big Infrastructure (profit center for utilities), rather than clean, green power, generated by the people.

   2.  if we are allowed to generate power, we need to be PAID for it.  we need generous feed in tariffs that reward investing in oversized generation and conservation.  this will obviate the need for more power plants, more power lines, more GHG emissions and ruined lives.  the rate will depend on when we get number 3, below.

   3.  why, since cities and counties have ENORMOUS purchasing power, should they not do an RFP for BULK purchasing/installation of PV and Microwind, and pass the COSTS onto the property owner, rather than loan us the money to go and struggle to pay on our own?  it's like mandating that everyone must buy health insurance but not making it affordable.  

example:  LADWP should be doing an RFP for 100,000 10 kW residential systems and 10,000 50 kW commercial/industrial systems.  They can easily get the price into the $3 - $4/watt range (SCE is paying $3/watt for their bulk installations), and homeowners can get 10 kW systems for about $13,000, repayable at $1,300/year (tax deductible!) for 10 years through their property taxes.  this is less than half the cost if we all have to buy separately.

between total offset of electrical bills, and a modest cash profit from the FIT (in #2), EVERYONE will want to do this.  conservatives are some of the biggest adopters of roooftop solar in Germany, you know.  this is a TOTAL WIN.  and best of all, LADWP will not need to raise rates 1 cent, and will not destroy the Joshua Tree area with it's ill-conceived massive power corridor "Green Path" (snort).

This solution saves wilderness, GREATLY reduces the GHGs that remote power (including Big Solar and Big Wind and Big Transmission) will pour into our environment, it GREATLY stabilizes the grid, makes solar and wind AFFORDABLE for property owners to install and ratepayers to buy, won't force families from their homes, improves property values, saves views and rural communities, and ENGAGES all of us in our sustainable energy future.

the best of environmentalism meets the best of free market economies of scale and reduces the chokeholds of rapacious Big Energy monopolies.  this is a REAL solution, with REAL, current feasibility, that EVERYONE wants.  so, how can we make this work?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

sounds familiar

glad to see someone with a soapbox above the comments section has been invited to post these ideas here.  i have been vehemently advocating this solution for 2 years now, and met with mostly skepticism from the Big Wind/Big Solar "we need it all" baloney the Big Enviros are being paid (via CEERT) to spew.

Colin, the point is not that we need a 100% solution at this exact moment.  The point is, we need a guiding philosophy, and this one is ten thousand times better than recentralizing Big Energy monopolists at a time when Americans finally have a chance to stand on their own two feet and be real participants in the energy free markets, in the conservation solutions, and in our destinies on this planet.  If all the states that can produce 100% of their power at point of use did so FIRST, we can buy some time until the tech catches up with the intention, and fill in the blanks.

We cannot forget that not only do Big Energy Monopolies destroy the American way of life by manipulating supply and pricing, but massive new remote infrastructure directly destroys huge sections of habitat and will force thousands of people from their homes (and ruin the quality of life for millions more).  All to privatize profits and (ahem), "save" the planet?  NO THANKS!

Beyond "community" ownership, we need to see INDIVIDUAL OWNERSHIP, which will bring more prosperity and accountability to the people in this country who want to be REWARDED for doing the right thing.  Current practices of net metering, decoupling, having utilities manage the rooftop solar and conservation programs, and amortizing wasteful infrastructure spending across the grid are massive DISincentives to conservation.

The mechanisms needed for this are generous feed in tariffs (so everyone who produces more clean energy than they use is REWARDED); bulk community level contracts for production and installation of rooftop solar and microwind (which will drop the price in half) and guaranteed financing (as in, through our property tax system) - so that property owners can afford their own systems; stricter building codes (carrot and stick); and a heavy investment in storage, smart grid and point of use generation tech.  

Rates are gonna go up either way.  Do we want to pay for Robber Barons to destroy our wilderness and hijack us, or do we want to pay for self-sufficiency, clean harmless power, more jobs, greater grid reliability and look towards a sustainable future instead of an Orwellian one?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

jon rynn

hi again.  firstly, AB 811 is about accessing the property tax system, which basically "guarantees" and amortizes the loans.  cities can finance the work however they like.  some are doing muni bonds, some are partnering with lenders, some are pulling from their General Funds.  In other words, with both Schwarzenegger and Villaraigosa publicly and privately pleading for Federal "infrastructure" funds, this could be what those funds are used for (and they are loans, not costs, so they come back with interest!)...

the problem with an SF/Berkeley type program is that although it is much cheaper to property owners to install than $8/watt, that is because the city is SUBSIDIZING at substantial ratepayer and taxpayer expense - it still costs $8/watt, the price is just spread over more people.  so every $1,000 saved by a homeowner is assessed at 1 cent across 1,000 ratepayers/taxpayers.  this is an argument often used to object to feed in tariffs and other incentives for rooftop PV, which has the perception of being "too expensive" because the government favors Big Energy with its incentives, so Big wind and Big Solar appear cheaper than they are (just like coal, gas and oil do).  it's a bogus argument in many ways, since we pay for their monopolistic infrastructure, but people are pretty stingy when it comes to paying their neighbor for power rather than Big Energy.  odd.

in start contrast, all the savings in my proposal are real, and they are inherent in bulk purchasing/contracting.  what i'm proposing will NOT raise rates (unlike Big Wind), will NOT raise taxes, and will not kill off 50 acres per mW of power (hello Big Wind again), while recentralizing Big Energy monopolies.  it's regular market functioning with economies of scale, that nails global warming, conservation of habitats/ecosystems, creates huge numbers of local skilled jobs, props up property values, saves open spaces and water, and ENGAGES RATEPAYERS ON A PERSONAL LEVEL, while also rewarding us for doing the right thing (producing more clean power than we use).

i think it's bulletproof, but if you see an objection, please, hit me up.  I won't go into the total myth that Big Wind will be our baseload power, or that it's environmentally sound.  Let's tackle Phases 1 - 3 now, and see how the tech evolves once point of use solutions are the focus of all the R & D...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

We should own the infrastructure ourselves

With the passage of AB 811 in CA, municipalities and counties have access to the property tax assessment mechanism for repayment of loans to property owners for conservation and renewable generation systems they install (rooftop solar, microwind, etc.).  That's good, and anyone who can pay $8/watt over time and is fine with zeroing out their bill and giving the excess to the utility for free is now set to soften the blow of the initial outlay of cash.  So, maybe a few thousand people can put solar panels on their property while RETI marches onwards with its plans to obliterate millions of acres of wilderness, exercise mass eminent domain, and re-centralize our grid for the Big Energy monopolists.

At the same time, big utilities are getting really cheap bids for their own rooftop solar programs (SCE paying between $3 and $4/watt, installed).  I see a perfect opportunity here.  Why doesn't LA, for example, put out an RFP for 100,000 5 KW systems to get a bulk price for installation and materials (both locally sourced), re-sell them to homeowners at cost (say, $4/watt, so $20K less CSI of $10K less Fed tax credit of $6K, so net cost to customer is $4K), finance it through the property tax system, and implement a net metering contract to purchase 100% of net excess for 15 cents/kwh for 10 years?  Even when CSI incentives disappear, $14K is a far cry from $40K, and paid over time, is affordable for most people, since they will be getting checks for excess, plus offsetting their power bills.

ratepayers pay NO additional infrastructure costs, everyone can afford solar on their home and business, no wilderness is killed, 500 MW of in-basin power is generated, lightening the load on the existing grid and requiring no new transmission, and LADWP makes a 100% profit on the peaker power they re-sell for 30 cents/kwH, which can roll over into a program for the next 100,000 homes, until the flat, baking, sprawling metropolis is covered in panels and nearly powering itself.

the only thing standing between this amazing opportunity and reality is the monopolistic mindset of the utilities, and some smart grid infrastructure upgrades which are needed anyway.  slumping property values increase, tens of thousands of skilled jobs are created (over a much longer period than that of scraping and blasting our deserts for faraway power plants and lengthy wasteful powerlines that destroy rural peoples' lives), money is circulating in the local economy, and the city is 100% guaranteed to get their investment back because the property tax system "insures" it.

what do you think?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

decoupling ain't the answer

Gar refers to decoupling as a "perverse incentive" and i couldn't agree more.  Here in CA, you can't win for losing.  Big Energy has managed to manipulate the billing system so that no matter how much you conserve, you still open a vein for them for the privilege of being a customer.  then, the utilities are put in charge of conservation programs, which are an unmitigated FAILURE, and are put in charge of residential and business PV programs, which they actively and passively sabotage.

please, please, please, can we finally admit that Big Energy is not the solution to the energy needs of modern America - that they are the PROBLEM - and start taking local point of use solutions more seriously?  feed in tariffs provide enormous incentives for both generation (including excess generation) and conservation.  why does Big Energy get not only guaranteed power buybacks, but a guaranteed margin on all capacity and transmission, but ratepayers max out at "net metering?"  WHAT A SCAM!  

finally, we get quasi-parity with Big Energy on the modest 30% tax credits for PV installations, but we still are being forced to pay for our homes to be stolen for "new transmission," for the unneeded transmission to be built (at $10 - $15 MILLION PER MILE), for massive, inefficient, centralized Industrial Wind (in the Palm Springs area, less than 16% efficient, despite massive blight, and not counting transmission losses of 7-10%), and Industrial solar which depletes our scarce groundwater beyond belief, then we get to be hijacked by Big Energy on rates.  oh, plus being subject to blackouts every time something 100 miles away happens, having our houses burned down by their lousy powerlines, and having our open spaces blighted forever, many of which are effective carbon sinks.

did i mention that Big Energy has blocked our ability to build PV or microwind systems that produce more energy than we consume, because they don't want us to be net generators?  because that's what happens when you put the foxes in charge of the henhouse.  what are they going to do if the state mandates generous feed in tariffs, incentives for local point of use systems, and smart grids?  leave?  hardly!  they will still make a killing as load storage and balancing entities if they handle their business right, so there is still a healthy income for Big Energy.  problem is, they want ALL the money, and our government is glad to hand it over, even though it's ours.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.  I can't stand to hear any more blabbering about Big Wind, Big Solar, Big Transmission, etc. being the savior of the planet.  these are manifestations of the Robber Baron monopolies that exploit our land, ratepayers and taxpayers and privatize all their profits.  the problem.  not the solution.  time for a REAL change, which means people are paid well for generating more clean energy than they use.  no dead ecosystems, greatly increased conservation, people keep their homes (which are still worth something), local skilled jobs increase - everything is great.  

i can't believe how hard it has been to get people on Grist to agree with that basic principle - that killing open spaces and re-centralizing monopolies are not really the "progressive" or "environmentally sound" ways to manage the new paradigm.  it's like everyone has Stockholm Syndrome and wants their captors to lead them to Solar Nirvana instead of shoving them aside and just going there ourselves for chrissakes.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

how about a 21st century solution?

why do we have some pathetic helpless view of ourselves, so we need Big Energy, Big Government, Big Oil, Big Banks, Big Developers, Big Agra, on an on, to "solve" our "problems?"  

this article, like 90% of the others i see on this subject, is an argument for more dependence, less reliability, more monopolies, less opportunity for ratepayers, more eminent domain, less job creation, more Big Energy pricing and supply manipulation, and less economic stimulus.

clearly, if one spends more than 10 minutes thinking about the Best Way, rather than a bandaid on the Old Crappy Way, we will come to the conclusion that structures should be as close to Net Zero as possible, with some producing more power than they use (and getting PAID for it, via feed in tariffs) and some needing more power than they produce (with them PAYING) for it.

the Big Remote Combustion, Long Transmission, Robber Baron era is OVER.  we need to fight for our rights as taxpayers, ratepayers, land owners, and access holders to public lands and STOP the rape of our open spaces and citizenry to prop up Big Energy profiteering in an era where Sun and Wind are going to be dominant "fuels."

generous feed in tariffs and generous tax credits for point of use generation/conservation/storage will rapidly scale up renewable energy, will reduce demand, will efficiently use existing grid, will provide economic stimulus - both in LOCAL skilled jobs, and in checks going to homeowners - and will keep our desert carbon sinks and wildlife habitats functioning as they are supposed to function.

this whole Big (ahem) "Renewables" interim step is super destructive, super expensive, and will only guarantee that there is no money left for US.  please support local, point of use solutions and incentives, and make sure your legislators know we are opposed to Big Energy monopolists getting yet another massive handout.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

i am one person, ce1907

so, sadly, i do not have a "bill" at this time, although i am trying to educate enough people to build grassroots support for feed in tariff legislation (like they have in 40 GROWN UP countries).  i am having trouble getting traction from elected officials because they are all in the pockets of the Big Energy companies.  even if various bills start out strong, by the time they get to a vote, they are COMPLETELY gutted by Big Energy lobbyists.

as an example, we had a feed in tariff introduced last year that would allow CA residents to oversize PV and microwind systems on their properties and get paid for excess power produced.  the amount of the tariffs paid above retail price would be amortized across the grid, just like when utilities build their power plants and powerlines, only WE would own the systems (we would NOT get to amortize our system costs, of course, since we are peons who don't own the government) and our open spaces would be spared.  WAY cheaper for ratepayers and taxpayers, plus an economic stimulus in terms of skilled local jobs, and actual checks cut to the people doing the right thing.  what's not to love?  well, by the time our Big Energy Aristocracy gutted the bill, they crushed system sizes so ratepayers were NOT ALLOWED TO OVERSIZE their systems even though they were paying for them (hunh?  i thought we wanted renewable energy??  RPS??  etc.??) and were paid puny wholesale rates (which are falsely low due to massive subsidies), rather than the types of rates that every other nation uses - a modest multiple of retail.  at that point, nobody even wanted the bill and it died.  the conclusion?  not "Big Energy is killing the democratic process."  no, it's "we tried feed in tariffs - they just won't work."  insane.

in other words, there is NOBODY LOOKING OUT FOR THE PLANET OR FOR RATEPAYERS AND TAXPAYERS, including Mr. Obama, including Sierra Club, including NRDC, including California.  at least with righties, we know they are proud to kill the planet for money - this is creepier.  Big Solar and Big Wind and Big Geothermal are just new manifestations of Big Coal, Big Gas and Big Oil, with their whole goal being to monopolize supply, suck up taxpayer and ratepayer guarantees and subsidies, prevent us from getting energy independence, and to force a false "urgency" to kill off our public lands to build their private profit centers.  if renewable energy is so urgent, why aren't RAPIDLY SCALABLE solutions like rooftop solar being pursued rather than aggressively stifled?  see the CPUC website which clearly states they don't want rooftop solar to "burden" the grid, even though it decongests the grid.  hmmm.

in an era when wind and sun are the primary fuels being contemplated, there is NO reason to build ANY remote power plants any more, other than Big Energy mercenaries hijacking our democratic process.  it is all about PV and microwind and conservation, at point of use, owned by the people, who should be rewarded for doing the right thing, and who should be encouraged to over-produce and participate in the Green Energy Revolution as more than hijacked ratepayers.  you simply cannot pretend to care about the planet and endorse killing millions more acres of it, totally unnecessarily, for energy production.

we are trying to put together a ballot initiative in CA for 2009 that will create a fair feed in tariff, despite the chokehold Big Energy has on our state and our country.  Germany, Japan, Spain, South Korea, and basically the rest of Europe and Australia all have generous, successful FITs.  as usual, USA is last at the party and our own "environmentalists" are leading the charge to the bottom by investing heavily in super-destructive Big Solar and Big Wind.  

we were told early on not to bother objecting to certain Big Solar projects like those being built by Bright Source, even though they will kill off gorgeous functioning ecosystem, will run mostly on gas, and will deplete desert water supplies in the tens if not hundreds of millions of gallons a year.  you know why?  because Robt. Kennedy, Jr. of NRDC was a big investor.  these are people we thought would be our allies, but they have turned against the environment for personal profit, so now we are down to educating real people one at a time.  they are counting on soundbytes "solar is green" "Pickens is saving America" (that from Carl Pope, head of Sierra Club), and hoping americans are too lazy to learn the truth.  they also provide cover for legislators who want to pretend to be green while doing the bidding of their Big Energy masters.  all this, even though it has been proven that the building and maintaining new transmission lines alone will emit so many GHGs that they can NEVER BE OFFSET no matter how many solar or wind plants are connected, no matter how many carbon offsets are bought, and no matter how many "mitigations" are undertaken.  so they are warming the planet, while killing off the fantastic carbon sink that is the Mojave, while decimating intact ecosystem, shaving off mountaintops, and totally depleting aquifers.  is that what you call "renewable?"

the whole thing is horrifying, but the good news is that every single person we have discussed this with (who is not entrenched in mercenary energy profiteering) has agreed with us, across party lines, so now there are tens of thousands of us, instead of 5 or however many we had 2 years ago.

so, if and when we get a legislator whose hands are clean, and/or if we get a proposition prepared for the referendum process, i will let you know.  in the meantime, please spread the word.  killing our wilderness for money is wrong, especially since there is a totally viable alternative.  it doesn't become right just because you use the sun as an excuse.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

too bad for the environment, then

Hey, i'm all for a smart grid (that is controlled by ratepayers, not utilities), but all this garbage about Giant Power Plants far away from load centers, with long distance powerlines?  Totally wrong - just a blatant giveaway to Big Energy Monopolists.

Obama, they call Chicago the Windy City.  Why on EARTH would you need to IMPORT WIND FROM NORTH DAKOTA?  ever heard of microwind?  on every building in that city and its humongous suburbs?  solar panels?  conservation?  THESE are the programs that will decongest the existing grid, will save our open spaces, will enrich PEOPLE (with Feed In Tariffs) not Big Energy monopolists and will prevent the huge-scale eminent domain and GHG emissions of giant powerlines.

It boils down to this:  do you want to kill our open spaces and use all our taxpayer and ratepayer money to build a gigantic, inefficient, insecure, unreliable centralized power matrix OWNED BY BIG ENERGY, or do you want to save our open spaces and use our taxpayer and ratepayer money to build efficient, clean, reliable point of use solutions that will create a SUSTAINABLE future for America, and will allow democracy to prevail over corporatocracy?

Too bad the choice is not mine, as usual.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

no new grid is needed

if we could get the profiteers out of the way and focus on point of use solutions first.  CA alone has the capacity to be a NET EXPORTER of high-value peaker power from rooftop solar alone.  using existing grid.

why destroy the planet by killing carbon sinks like the Mojave, building massive GHG-emitting infrastructure that makes the grid less reliable and wastes power, destroys our public lands, kills off natural ecosystems and forces people from their homes, when we could just focus on point of use, with excess fed to the grid?

i know, where there is no Big Energy lobbyists, the sensible solutions get ignored.  when Big Enviros, the usual challengers of projects that kill our open spaces are actually heavily INVESTED in the perpetrators (like NRDC's Robt. Kennedy and Bright Source), we are seriously doomed.  because individuals who want to do the right thing and get rewarded, instead get screwed in this corporatocracy.  it's a damned shame.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

Gainesville's feed in tariff

sorry, but the REALLY interesting thing that happened in FLA this week is that Gainesville announced that they, not San Francisco, Austin, Los Angeles, NYC, Chicago, Seattle, Portland, nope, Gainesville, FLA would be the first US city to adopt the wildly successful Feed In Tariff model of renewable energy incentives currently sweeping 40 countries, most notably, Germany, Spain and Japan.  

compensating Joe Homeowner (sorry) generously for clean power generated (and not used) on his home or business will offset fossil fuel use, massive, wasteful infrastructure buildouts, large-scale eminent domain, millions of acres of ecosystem destruction, and re-entrenchment of Big Energy monopolies in a renewable energy era.  it will allow ratepayers/taxpayers to BENEFIT from doing the right thing by producing clean, harmless power on their properties and conserving electricity.

FITs for point of use renewables have proven to be exponentially more effective at creating conservation savings than both net metering and hiking prices, they empower the PEOPLE, they stimulate the economy (systems pay off in ~7 years of 20 year contracts), improve slumping property values, and create thousands of local skilled labor jobs, while feeding high-value "peaker power" to the grid and preventing blackouts, without raising electricity rates noticeably.

the ONLY people opposed to FITs are Big Energy shills and investors, like Bright Source investor, NRDC's Robt. Kennedy, Jr., who has been very outspoken in favor of wilderness-killing Big Solar projects, like the ones he stands to profit from, and has refused to help get FITs to help people like you and me.  the CPUC has constantly railed against allowing people to produce renewable energy themselves.  why?  because it's "base" is the bribe-wielding utilities, not the ratepayers.  strange, eh?

i've said it constantly for 2 years now:  there is NO NEED TO KILL OUR WILDERNESS FOR CLEAN POWER, nor to pathetically tether ourselves to Big Energy any longer.  We need FIT's, smart metering, better storage tech, and increased investment in LOCAL, POINT OF USE RENEWABLES AND CONSERVATION.  let's leave our ecosystems alone, to function as they are designed to function, ok?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

AB 811 for all of California

CA passed AB 811 in 2008, which allows ALL MUNICIPALITIES AND ALL COUNTIES IN CALIFORNIA to access the property tax system for this type of program. as noted, they are usually financed by muni bonds, and the best thing?  the repayment attaches to the property so there is no need to repay the loan out of sales proceeds.  

what might ACTUALLY be the best thing, although i haven't confirmed it, is that the re-payments are tax deductible, as they are part of the property taxes paid.  can anyone confirm?

What is needed is ENORMOUS PRESSURE TO BE PUT ON THESE GOVERNMENTS to drum up the money for these loans.  we are going to be completely overrun with super destructive, wasteful, monopolistic power plants and transmission lines soon if we don't get our power from our own roofs!  would you rather kill off Joshua Tree or get paid for producing your own power?

call your county and city reps today in CA and DEMAND funding for the AB 811 program...

btw, the totally unfair $2,000 federal tax credit cap was lifted for 2009, so we gotta get our systems up and running asap, before another Big Energy hijacking of the wind and solar resources...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

why not PV?

best of both worlds.  much of the light is converted to electricity, there is a "shade" effect which reduces A/C needs 10%, and you get FREE ENERGY as part of the deal!  if you are getting enough sun on your roof that you need a white roof, you are getting enough sun to produce power.  all you need are the right policies, so you get paid for the power you produce, just like Big Energy does.

just read about a corporate solar co in San Diego that will get 29 cents/kwh for all power it produces, plus the un-capped 30% federal tax credit, and RECs, which it can trade or sell, just for installing a 1 MW system (they are killing 8 acres of pristine hillside for it, isn't that "green" of them?).  if you or i tried to install that same system, we would have our system size capped at below our usage, we would have our tax credit capped at $2,000 and we would give our power to SDG & E for FREE.

and people complain that rooftop solar is expensive?  not for Big Solar.  just for people like us, who are being played.  THIS is the other big "cost" scam out there, aside from failure to life-cycle.  all incentives go to Big Energy, not to regular folks trying to do the right thing.  despicable, really.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

thanks for nothing

snore.

what kind of "vision" is this?  

long-term, phased in minor efficiency improvements only for new buildings?  gee, that ought to do...  nothing.  where are the funds and codes for RETROFITTING existing infrastructure - the infrastructure that CURRENTLY EMITS THAT 48% OF GHGS?  oh, right, we can all get more loans and retrofit on our residential and commercial properties that are dropping 20%/year in value?  gee, everyone will run out and to that!

and thanks for the super-expensive boost to natural gas vehicles instead of focusing MUCH more on electric cars and point of use solar generation to charge them.  t. boone also thanks you.  but you already knew that!  meanwhile, we are stuck with a cap of $4,000 for residential solar credits and Big Energy gets an unlimited 30%.  that's genius, because we can obviously afford $30,000 for solar and Big Energy can't.

and thanks for ignoring the PROVEN SUCCESS of the national feed-in tariffs in 40 countries, instead handing over ratepayer and taxpayer land and cash to Big Energy Monopolists to destroy millions of acres of our wilderness for industrial, toxic, water-sucking (gas fired) "solar" plants, deadly, inefficient wind plants and massive, wasteful powerlines.  no doubt the utilities will NOT count power WE produce against that pathetic 15% RPS, either, so they have an excuse to kill our national wilderness.  that's what's happening in CA, the "progressive" state, after all...

yeah, just give them everything we got. i mean, with friends like Big Renewables, who needs global warming?  we can just DIRECTLY kill well over 50 acres for every MW of erratic wind power produced, no need to wait for a slow, agonizing climate change death!  while also denying all of us residents the benefits of our open spaces and our tax and ratepayer dollars to secure TRUE energy independence at point of use.

let's see, Google has a 1.6 MW ROOFTOP system at their HQ that kills NO ecosystems, requires NO new transmission and kills NO animals.  the equivalent in giant industrial wind (killing birds, bats and all ground species) would permanently destroy about 100 acres (including the roads, transmission lines and transmission losses).  1 roof or 100 acres?  hmmmm.  yep, let's give the 100 acres guys the money, because they are Big Energy.  Can't have property owners gettin' all independent!

and it ain't just the MMS that is corrupt at the DOI.  there are dozens of stories of corruption every year.  because it's run by political appointees with a mandate to raid the national coffers for privatized profits for admin cronies, just like every other department in this administration.  it's the sex that bugs them, not the fact that they were cheating us to help Big Oil...

this is not a "compromise."  it's a stinker.  a total Big Energy giveaway that will do nothing to help the taxpayers, ratepayers or the planet and will do a LOT to destroy all 3.  where is dennis kucinich when we need him?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

what about the harm and waste of CSP?

the glaring omissions here are not how GREAT CSP is but rather how destructive and wasteful it is.  check out Black & Veatch's (they are PRO BIG SOLAR) June 25, 2008 assessment for RETI on how many hundreds of billions of gallons of scarce desert groundwater would be wasted to cool and rinse these desert-killers.  want air-cooled?  it'll cost you 15% more/watt for the entire lifecycle of the plant if you build it anywhere HOT (over 21 cents/kWh by their estimate).  want recycled water?  tough, very few desert communities run on centralized waste treatment systems, nowhere near enough to feasibly supply these water hogs.  i only have the doc as a pdf, no link, sorry!  if anyone doubts the veracity, i think i can copy and paste the entire doc here?

if a few golf courses in palm springs can waste enough water to cause aquifer collapse and measurable subsidence, how do you think several big power plants sucking hundreds of billions of gallons a year will help out our desert ecosystems?  If you go with the less-efficient air-cooled plants, which still waste tens of millions of gallons a year apiece on "mirror rinsing," plus lose 7-10% in transmission, you are looking at efficiencies below 25% for MASSIVE ecosystem death, while rooftop PV is running at 18% and rapidly ratcheting up.

even the utility journals have explained how incredibly wasteful and harmful these plants are, requiring enormous multiples of dead ecosystem per watt, compared to PV.  the only free link i know of to that article is in the first sentence of this blog (check out their footnotes, too):

http://tinyurl.com/5ps9nx

and just for fun, why not read about the 350+ foot high, blazing, scorching death rays shooting to the CSP tower in this pro-CSP journalist's little visit:

http://tinyurl.com/3yk5m9

why anyone who is not financially tied up in this dual eco-disaster (economic and ecological) would ever cheerlead for it is beyond me.  rooftop solar, microwind, conservation and other point of use solutions are far and away the best for the planet, ratepayers and taxpayers.  conservation and generation tech, efficiency, storage and smart metering solutions will ramp up like crazy if our resources are not diverted to these giant deadly boondoggles, so let's all push a little harder!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

Big Wind is super inefficient

I have the CEC figures for all those industrial turbines near Palm Springs.  Average output is about 15.5% of rated capacity, much lower than current PV panels for rooftops in the same region, but with the bonus of enormous habitat and species losses, GHG emissions, visual resources destroyed, homes taken and property values sunk, all to support the Big Energy Monopolists.

It's disgusting.  This greenwash MUST STOP.  we need point of use solutions so that every structure can get as close to "net zero" as possible, and many of us can produce excess renewables to feed into the grid.  We need smart metering, good storage solutions and Net Zero building codes, not more annihilation of bird/bat populations and ecosystem destruction.

This is not just about subsidies or no subsidies.  This is about The Big Lie that Big Energy keeps perpetrating on us.  WE DO NOT NEED THEM IN A RENEWABLE ERA!!  When will we get a clue???On Offshore wind power in U.S. poised to take off posted 1 year, 2 months ago 7 Responses

no, we need point of use solutions

what is wrong with people that they are trying to recentralize a resource that is COMPLETELY RIPE for decentralization?  point of use solutions (conservation, storage, generation) are THE ONLY ANSWER to the massive wilderness killoffs and ratepayer/taxpayer hijackings.

I REFUSE TO SPEND ANY MORE OF MY MONEY OR GIVE UP ANY MORE OF MY LAND ON BUILDING BIG ENERGY MONOPOLIES.

start over, man.  you are advocating a disaster.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

greyflcn - wrong again.

sorry if i don't defer to ausra commercials for my info, man.  i prefer facts to propaganda, and your snotty tone makes you look like the amateur you are.

go ahead and look at the EPA's work in this area:

http://tinyurl.com/6duohk

slide 7 has a map showing that 100% of CA's renewable energy needs could be met just from brownfields and superfund sites within 5 miles of existing transmission within the state - this is an EPA doc, not a marketing tool for a Big Energy corporation.  it is being used by all the grownups who are working on siting/permitting and fighting these projects.  in the real world.

there are nearly 4 million acres of these destroyed lands in the US, most of which are in decent solar/wind resource areas and many of which are very close to existing transmission, so i am willing to swallow my objections to centralized monopoly models as a backup to point of use, as long as they are on these poisoned dead places, don't use water, and no new transmission is required.

as you know, i vastly prefer leading with extensive point of use solutions (efficiency, passive solar, geo-heat exchange, PV, thermal, microwind, etc.) and you are welcome to do the research on those yourself, if you are willing to learn how wrong you are.  even if point of use solutions can only immediately reduce overall structural energy usage by 75%, without killing a single acre of wilderness, and we get the storage solutions online, and we get a few larger-scale projects on previously destroyed land, i think we can all agree that this qualifies as "getting serious."  it is FAR more "serious" than cheerleading widespread ecosystem death for corporate profits, my friend.

so, when will you get serious and start admitting that the planet can no longer sustain bulldozing, scraping, dynamiting, paving, dehydrating, burning, poisoning, and the massive species/systems losses inherent in these processes, just to theoretically offset a small amount of carbon emissions?  which will be more than re-offset by any new transmission lines, as i have previously proven to you by other federal government docs...  

in the meantime, there's an administration eagerly hiring folks who will ignore and deny science to promote a Big Energy agenda - maybe you should apply?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

point of use could handle all of Ca's growth

right now.  2 GW are all that's needed for the next 15 years, according to RETI, and that's how much Spain installs in rooftop solar EVERY YEAR, and Germany installs nearly that much.

i am so sick of people acting like we have to do so many drastic things like dynamite all our deserts into oblivion, and drill till we drop, and cover every surface with windmills, and the worst of all - build out some massive new transmission infrastructure.  these are ONLY beneficial to monopolists.  they really, really hurt ratepayers, taxpayers and the environment, so why on earth are people promoting them?

between a serious point of use program, and brownfield/superfund sites near existing transmission, CA could easily cover ALL it's power needs (including growth) from 11-6 daily. storage, smart grids, conservation and other solutions can cover the rest.  let's just do it instead of yammering on and on!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

try contacting legislators...

it DOES NOT WORK!!  i write, call, email and otherwise reach out to my elected reps at the state, local and federal level all the time.  you know what i get?  NOTHING or some grotesquely unrelated form reply.

we need fewer "summits" and more "listening to informed constituents" by legislators.  sorry i'm not some discredited mercenary texas billionaire, but i have a better plan than he does, and my vote is supposed to count with all MY reps, and his is not.  so why do they all issue press releases about his crappy enviro-death hijacking plan, but don't even read my letters?

right.  because they are owned and operated by the mercenaries in Big Energy (among other Bigs), and it's Boxer, Feinstein, Schwarzenegger, Villaraigosa and others just as much as the crackpots in the GOP.  sorry, there just is not a big gap between Big "Renewables" and Big Coal when it comes to anti-competitive devastation of our planet...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

It's people/planet vs. Big Energy...

I've said it before, and I'll say it again.  We are being HAD!!  As much by Big Dems, Big Renewables and Big Enviros, as by Big GOP, Big Coal and Big Oil.

We all know our electrical bills are about to skyrocket.  The Question Is:  Do we want to build clean, planet-friendly point of use infastructure which protects ratepayers from hijacking, taxpayers from massive losses of intact ecosystems and open spaces (plus opportunity costs of their dollars being wasted on more Big Energy subsidies rather than on their own systems), homeowners from eminent domain and the climate from the huge GHG emissions caused by building and maintaining gigantic, centralized power plants and transmission lines - even if the fuel is sun or wind?  OR, do we simply want to replace Big Oil and Big Gas Monopolists with Big Wind and Big Solar Monopolists, no matter how awful that is for us and the planet?

Why not use demand-side solutions NOW, such as efficiency upgrades, feed in tariffs, generous incentives for point of use renewables, and smart metering, since these have proven, repeatedly, to greatly increase thoughtful conservation, to save our fragile ecosystems, to decongest existing grid, and to spread the wealth of the New Renewables Paradigm across all of us who will be paying for it, instead of once again, socializing all the costs onto taxpayers, ratepayers and the environment to enrich a few mercenaries?

If we still need more solutions after we give that a SERIOUS investment of time, money and focus, then we can consider all the more harmful options...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

i hope it's funny

some good points, Gonzo, although to be fair, the Simpsons, South Park and King of the Hill do wander a little into those territories sometimes...  Mark Twain had a sense of humor about Mark Twain, which was the basis of his genius, so all us greenies can just laugh along and STILL know we are superior (wink).

the trailer thing for it looked incredibly trite and boring, which is, pretty much, in an interesting twist, what they are accusing the Goodes of being.  fingers crossed that it's actually funny, and that they aren't relying on mildly insulting stereotyping for the entire comedy line...On From Goode to Bad-ass posted 1 year, 3 months ago 6 Responses

perspective?

how about the "perspective" that Germany installed 1.1 GW of rooftop solar in 2007 and is on track to install 1.8 more GW this year, while spain has installed 2 GW for each of the past few years - ALL WITHOUT DESTROYING HUGE OPEN SPACES, AND WHILE PAYING RATEPAYERS GOOD MONEY FOR EXCESS GENERATION?

the only reason we don't have any solar in this country, which has better solar resources in every state than any spot in Germany, is because we DO NOT HAVE FAIR FEED IN TARIFFS.  there is no reason to kill off huge areas of grasslands, deserts or otherwise, since we have so much sprawling, sunny rooftop surface area in CA BEGGING for panels.

please think hard about how this doesn't make sense for anyone other than PG & E who gets to sell us power that we should be selling them!  we MUST aggressively fight for incentives to use only previously developed land (yes, i know this was "ranchland," which makes it 10% better than pristine ecosystem, but it's still not needed), with the largest focus on POINT OF USE renewables and conservation/smart metering tech.

save our open spaces, our planet, our ratepayers AND our money by advocating for renewable energy which does not destroy...On Ginormous solar plants to be built in California posted 1 year, 3 months ago 15 Responses

but infrastructure cost isn't fixed...

i've enjoyed the discussion, what i can follow (!) but i want to remind people that thousands and thousands and thousands of miles of NEW, GHG-emitting, unneeded transmission lines are being planned for billions and billions of dollars as we speak - that is NOT a "fixed" cost in KenG's model, although it is one we could easily avoid by emphasizing point of use renewables and conservation.

my questions are, especially in a place like CA:

1.  why on earth are utilities in charge of the "conservation" programs for end-users, which have resulted in virtually NO conservation?  sorry to disillusion you, but nearly all the conservation has been achieved in pre-Schwarzenegger eras of forcing efficiency improvements in goods and services delivered in CA.  wouldn't the state or a non-profit be less of a fox guarding the henhouse, regardless of "decoupling," which accounts for all point of use renewables and all conservation as a "loss" on utility books???

2.  similar question - why are utilities in charge of the point of use renewables programs, even after they have proven to be actively obstructing installations?  do you really think that Sempra is "decoupled" to the point where it isn't forcing through gas "peaker plants" at an unprecedented rate, while obstructing rooftop PV through administrative processes?  Utilities, in my mind, need to be "decoupled" from ALL demand-side processes, except as load balancers/grid maintenance/purchasers of our renewable generation at rates set by government.

3.  wouldn't feed in tariffs be a more direct and effective way to accomplish massive grid decongestion, renewable power generation at PEAK hours, and conservation, while engaging PEOPLE directly in the renewable energy paradigm, rather than just as consumers?  this human engagement - with a simple reward/punishment matrix, especially when coupled with smart metering, has proven, time and again, to greatly increase conservation and renewable generation, without killing a single acre of intact ecosystem.

thanks for insights!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

transmission and GHGs

sorry, forgot about the whole "they also cause enormous GHG emission..." here is the conclusion drawn by the BLM as to whether reductions in GHGs from using several remote wind and solar power plants would be enough to offset the GHGs generated by building and maintaining the Sunrise Powerlink Transmission Line, over 40 years of operation (spoiler alert - NOOOOOO!!!):

 "Air Quality. The Air Quality analysis identifies two significant and unmitigable impacts that would
result from construction and operation of the Proposed Project:

1.  Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that would occur as a result of project-related construction
activities and operation, maintenance, and inspection activities. These emissions would be partially offset by the small indirect net decrease in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from power plants during line operation.  Over the life of the Proposed Project, high GHG emissions during the years of construction would be followed by much lower GHG emissions during the years of activity necessary to support transmission line operation. As power plant operation shifts to accommodate the new transmission line and renewable resources replace conventional power plants, indirect GHG reductions are forecasted to occur. But because total construction GHG emissions exceed the GHG reductions achieved due to avoided power plant emissions over 40 years of transmission line operation, the Proposed Project would cause an overall net increase in GHG emissions and a significant climate change impact.  

Also, electrical equipment associated with the new transmission system would result in the potential
escape of sulfur hexafluoride (SF6), a potent GHG, and because the proposed transmission system equipment would cause a net increase in SF6 emissions, this impact would be significant and unavoidable.

2.* Construction emissions would create emissions of ozone precursors, particulate matter, and carbon monoxide, resulting from generation of dust and exhaust emissions of criteria pollutants and toxic air contaminants.

Mitigation measures are proposed to reduce construction and operation emissions, including measures to suppress dust at all work or staging areas and on public roads, use low-emission construction equipment, obtain emissions offsets, offset construction- and operation-phase greenhouse gas emissions with carbon credits, and avoid sulfur hexafluoride emissions. However, the impacts would remain significant."

the whole draft EIR is a good read, and shows the enormous harm that "just" a powerline will cause (another spoiler alert - they decided in favor of local, point of use power generation so far):

http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/environment/info/aspen/sunrise/toc ...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

nighttime power

firstly, power usage is much lower at night for most of the year in all structures - it is "peaker" power which is most expensive, which is being built fastest now, and which Big Solar would (theoretically) provide - solar PV at POU is gonna produce during the same exact hours that CSP produces.  the claims of being "baseload" are based (heh) on (1) unproven "storage" capacity of molten salt or other fluids, and (2) on the NATURAL GAS MOST OF THEM USE.

i am the first one to advocate conservation, storage and smart grid R & D, but as long as we are taking a "first" step, lets have it be one that does not kill off our intact ecosystems.  in the 10 years it takes to get POU everywhere (assuming we can ever get the policies in place), there will be lots of options for load balancing, conservation and storage - it's hardly a static area of research and innovation, and would amp way up if policies were directed towards it.  MIT promised a simple, low-energy hydrogen storage solution within 10 years that would use 1 gallon of water for a home overnight, and a few common, harmless chemicals at room temp.  thousands of others are working on other options.

as wolverine noted, microwind can also produce at night, sometimes more effectively than during the day.

so, let's do what we can do now, and continue researching non-fatal ways to complete the picture as we go along...  there is no turning back once the millions of acres are dead and gone, even if we suddenly realize we screwed up...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

greyflcn - wrong again.

when you have actually been to any of the sites in CA, instead of watching an industry video on YouTube, and you have reviewed all the applications, and you are better informed about what, exactly a transmission corridor comprises, come on back and tell us how it is.

first of all, NONE of the BLM applications I have seen out of the first 125 are for "farmland," so although in your YouTube world, they COULD be, out here in the real world, they aren't. the VAST majority of pending Big Solar and Big Wind applications at the BLM are on PRISTINE INTACT ECOSYSTEM.  which means a perfect, functioning ALIVE habitat with billions of living creatures.  don't believe the "renderings" you see on industry propaganda, since they have already dynamited, bulldozed and killed everything in sight before they snap the photos.  I've been.  In person.  I know.

Oh, and since you obviously have not been attending the BLM hearings, you probably don't know that Big Solar is pushing EXTREMELY hard to be allowed into National Parks, National Forests, ACECs and DWMA's (look it up).  they wanted NO restrictions whatsoever on their land grabs, and wanted to fast-track all the EIS/EIR processes since they are the "good guys," who, not coincidentally, are also Big Energy companies, so they have friends in high places.

secondly, these plants would permanently destroy the millions of acres of ecosystem they would be on and everything around them, plus bring roads and non-native (extremely flammable and toxic) grasses, and CSP plants, most of which are also gas fired (oops!) use billions of gallons of desert groundwater each year for rinsing and/or cooling.  sorry if i equate permanent destruction with "killing."  what would you prefer, "improving?" or some other creepy manifest destiny language of dominance?  it's killing, no matter what you call it.

no doubt you read the utility journals, so you are aware that small scale modular PV is actually FAR, FAR more efficient and uses less than 10% of the surface area as CSP for the same amount of power.  right?  you know that?  you know that it's ideal to site at or near point of use, decongesting the grid and eliminating the need for new transmission.  you know about the scorching, blinding light shooting 350 feet into the air for the CSP "towers," which will zap every bird, bug and bat into oblivion for miles around?  i mean, who needs a global warming catastrophe with "solutions" like these killing everything directly?  and you are still in support?  really?

thirdly, go ahead and research what, exactly the WWECs under 368 will do, how wide they will be, and how destructive they will be.  hint - transmission corridors through federal lands. the fact that you refer to them as having a "footprint" and only "aesthetic" impacts shows your deep ignorance of what's really happening.  it's one thing to armchair pontificate based on limited research about the glories of extremely wasteful, harmful projects.  it's entirely another to actually be out there seeing what's happening, who's masterminding it, what's being totally shoved aside and what's at stake, for ratepayers, taxpayers, open spaces AND GHGs.

you often have good citations and articles you link to, so i don't doubt you can research all of this (why you haven't is another issue), but to dismiss my concerns and insult me without knowing what you are talking about is not a particularly endearing strategy.  i'm fighting for your wilderness, too, even if you don't enjoy it, understand it or respect it.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

thanks rlhughes

for that information on the legislation, which is sitting in Ways and Means (congress) and Finance (senate) - we should all push for it. i don't see any reason to "give" these mercenaries anything in return for renewable energy incentives - it is insane that they are even bullying us into this discussion!

rahreh, it sounds like your heart is in the right place, so i hope you can help me.  i am curious when people equate "Americans" with "Big Oil Drilling in America," since oil is a global commodity, Big Oil is completely free to do as it likes, and the chances of you or i actually buying (or owning - ha!) the oil that comes from our neighborhoods is close to zero.  it will get exported to China, we will buy other oil from the Saudis for high prices, and Big Oil will just get richer off of poisoning our environment and extending their monopolies a few miles and a few decades into the future.  

why do you think that they would suddenly start keeping oil here, when they already export nearly all the oil they extract in the US?  i suspect this is a red herring put out there to confuse people with a bogeyman of "foreign oil terrorists" or similar, because i have never heard mention that 100% of oil drilled in America will now be required to be sold and consumed in America - am i missing something?

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

this is great

i can't imagine why it has taken them so long, but i'm delighted ikea are getting into the groove here and recognizing the enormous value of point of use renewables.  i hope they work with established, high-quality, eco-friendly companies instead of cheapo-polluters like the Chinese. On IKEA invests in cleantech, may soon stock solar panels posted 1 year, 3 months ago 4 Responses

love cities, love options, love grist!

i gotcha, i guess i was chicken-littling like the republican congressman you mention, who, by the way, I am not, based on the article and your 98% comment.  

just to be clear, i live in a city (plus have a teensy cabin in the wilderness), and i love it - i just appreciate that there are other options that don't have to be demonized if they are handled right. we all agree.

i was also blathering a bit too much, because alls i wanted to say was that while we plan better live/work, mixed-use and other hyphenated communities, we could GREATLY improve those we already have.  even the exurbs.  sigh.  coulda been a lot more concise...

good night all.  sorry for the overkill.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

silver lining to suburbs

this is fine for many people, but don't forget that nearly all remote, standalone structures can be built or retrofitted to be either NET ZERO or ENERGY PRODUCING locations, which means that an electric car could be charged from the PV and microwind excess generated at point of use, at least to get to the mass transit stops...  

this would also zero out the problem and provide options for those of use who don't want to live in crowded, cramped, noisy spaces, and those of us who want to have large organic gardens, outdoor play areas for kids, and decentralize our lives and make them more independent from Big Energy, Big Transit and Big Developers rather than re-centralize and re-enslave ourselves.

there is definitely something for everyone, but we need good energy policy to make it happen, which means, in addition to cityscapes and mass transit for city dwellers, feed in tariffs and incentives for those of us living farther from city centers to do the right thing.

finally, don't forget that many, many jobs could be performed from a home office, rather than a commute, and encouraging employment policies that allow/encourage people to work mostly from home will make an enormous difference...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

solar is also an awesome opportunity

I am fully on board with the efficiency/ conservation bandwagon, but what may be even more important about AB 811 is that SOLAR PANELS are financed by it!!!!!!

Finally, a finance mechanism for this very expensive item we ALL should have on our property!  Big Energy gets to amortize all its costs across our grid, gets huge 30% + federal tax credits and guaranteed buybacks, while we have to use our 25% interest credit cards to install at full-retail-price (with teensy $2,000 tax credit), and hand over excess power we generate/save to our utilities FOR FREE!

What a scam!  Time for an aggressive Feed In Tariff NOW!!!!  65 cents for PV, 25 for wind, AB 811 incentives for any sized system, un-cap the CSI rebates for oversized systems, and we got ourselves an RPS WITHOUT KILLING OUR WILDERNESS!!!

I am so sick of Big Energy owning us, hijacking us and bleeding us dry.  Generous Feed in Tariffs now!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

but they are such poisoners!

this is the kind of baloney greenwashing that shows an obsession with CO2 to the detriment of the other 95% of the planetary concerns.  kind of like "let's kill all the deserts off so we can have big, unreliable CSP plants."  there is more than CO2 harming the planet, people.

So, let's not get all warm and greeny over the country that dumps incredibly toxic byproducts in SCHOOLYARDS when they manufacture PV panels, ok?

until all Western nations put Clean and Fair Trade rules into place for every company they are trading with (no poisoning, no sweatshops, etc.), countries like China will continue accelerating the rate of harm to the planet.  

poisoning kids is not acceptable "collateral damage" to making solar panels under any scenario.  I will absolutely boycott these products, and purchase from US or Japanese producers, which recycle their byproducts.  we all should.On China's renewables sector booming, study says posted 1 year, 4 months ago 3 Responses

the next 100 years

I agree that Old Energy (aka ALL Big Centralized Energy) should have subsidies ended and for the next 100 years, and during that time, our tax dollars should work FOR us, instead of against us.  

Big Energy has abused the public trust countless times by destroying our wilderness, polluting our air, poisoning our waterways, ruining our views, taking our homes, and ripping us off - all on our dime, and our land - while MASSIVELY profiting.  OK, our bad for letting them get away with it for so long, but until now we didn't really have a choice.  NOW WE DO - will we take it?

Let's start with a massive push for point of use renewables by offering serious tax credits, subsidies, feed in tariffs and loan programs for every property owner wishing to install PV, solar thermal or microwind on their previously developed property.

In 50 years (a shorter period than Big Energy got subsidized), these breaks should phase out, and we can take a look at where we are, and consider the playing field leveled.  People can choose to re-enslave themselves to Big Centralized Energy if they like, or to maintain the independence they have come to enjoy.  Who knows, Big Energy might even adapt their business model to remain relevant in a distributed-energy future?

What you can't do is feed steroids to one team for 60+ years, refuse the other team access to a gym, then send them to the Olympics to "compete" against each other.  That's not a "free market."  That's a bloodbath.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

no, thank you

i'm not sure it's much compensation to the "people affected by wind and solar farms" that they will also now have a view of a gigantic battery bank in front of the other devastation and blight caused by wind and solar power plants, where they once had sweeping wilderness vistas, clean air, silence, wildlife and gentle cohabitation with the earth.

we want views of solar panels and microwind on our neighbors' roofs, period.  you wanna have a mcmansion crammed full of plasma TVs in a "planned community?"  fine.  figure out how to power it yourself because you can't ruin my life in order to keep grossly over-consuming.  

the idea that endless, unsustainable, overconsumption is a "public good" worthy of dynamiting millions more acres of intact ecosystem is just not appealing as long as we are envisioning the right and wrong way to do this.  let's really go there, and set a goal of all structures being as close to Net Zero as humanly possible.  we can deal with the "excess" needed at that point.

here's a deal, in the meantime, i'll oversize my PV system and sell you power...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

as long as he profits

this guy is a mercenary.  i am so sick of him being referred to as "energy independence" friendly, since  he's just looking to make us all dependent on HIM for energy, instead of anyone else.

all that patriotism and independence talk is just total crap.  he is loyal to one guy, only.  himself.

what's good for america is REAL energy independence from Big Energy Monopolies.  we ain't gonna get it by wasting all our taxpayer money and land on building infrastructure for creeps like Pickens, who will INEVITABLY turn around and hijack us.  you think because the fuel is free we will share the weath?  no chance - nobody's even asking for price caps or any other guarantees that our money will benefit us other than increasing (NOT REPLACING COAL) wind and solar energy output.  seems like a pretty small return on investment when there are much better solutions.

why can't we spend our own tax dollars on building out ubiquitous point of use renewables instead?  feed in tariffs like 40 of those "damn foreign countries" already have?  and save our open spaces for the plants, animals and humans to enjoy?

the problem is not "foreign monopolies."  it is "all monopolies."  please do not be fooled.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

that's not what they are doing, though

if you had been following the terrifying process in our southwestern deserts, you would know that well over a million acres in the Mojave are already in the BLM permitting process, and more are coming online every day...  just for Big Solar, not even counting Big Wind and all the other uses (mining, grazing, military, drilling, etc.).

it is completely disingenuous to act like they will plot this tidy little square of previously farmed land, since at the public hearings, Big Solar was demanding access to National Forests, National Parks, ACECs and other sensitive habitats, and none of the sites I've visted so far have been disturbed land.  That is a greenwashing tactic.  And that doesn't even account for these massive, awful powerlines running everywhere.

this map shows about 2/3 of the current projects in CA right now, since many others have come into view in the past 4 months:

http://www.energy.ca.gov/siting/solar/index.html

I'm off!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

what price for dead ecosystems?

Hi.  I noticed that you appear to have completely dismissed local, point of use renewables and assume basically, that there is no "cost" to the many millions of acres of intact ecosystems which would be permanently destroyed by building out massive wind and CSP "farms."

seems pretty inaccurate, if not disingenuous, after what we've seen from the primary and secondary impacts of lost mangroves, coral reefs, rainforests, old growth, kelp beds, and other ecosystems.  floodings, fires, global warming, lost fish, drastic restoration efforts, dead zones, reduced recreation space, species decimation, etc.

deserts, prairies, none of it is disposable - all of it is serving a crucial environmental function and the cumulative destruction caused by a plan of this magnitude would more than wipe out any price differentials in local, point of use systems IF you stop externalizing all the costs.  the model commonly used is a superfund fine, not a BLM lease...

You must also assume, with the types of Big Renewable monopolies you wish to build, in lieu of energy independence for we ratepayers, that energy prices from these "farms" will skyrocket in coming years, since there will be no options for consumers.  you can use Enron prices during 2001 or Big Oil from 2002 - present as a model for the types of "costs" that monopolies dump onto society...

are you willing to actually attribute real costs to real consequences in this way?  if so, i believe you will find that local solutions owned by US are the only sustainable ones, and therefore, the only affordable ones.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

then we need to own our own

I'm not talking about some Mother Earth separatist "make a solar panel from two pieces of bark and a recycled auto battery" here.  I'm talking about the inherent appeal of ENERGY INDEPENDENCE, which is vastly different than being asked to open another vein to build out Big Energy infrastructure which will inevitably lead to price manipulations and ratepayer ripoffs.

Having been burned by Enron, Big Oil, Sempra and basically every other Big Energy mercenary, I don't want another dime of my money, another acre of my public wilderness or another private home DONATED to the same monopolists in an era when there is NO need for massive remote combustion and lengthy transmission.

Big Solar would have us believe that only the Mojave can provide any power from the sun, but Japan and Germany have CONCLUSIVELY proven that is just another lie to justify using our money to re-entrench monopolies instead of shifting policy towards ubiquitous point of use renewables.

ALL the money and perqs are flowing towards Big Energy instead of towards us.  ALL the Big Enviros are partnered with Big Energy (see CEERT) gabbling about massive solar "farms" and wind "farms" as the solution (conveniently ignoring the stupendous toll these wasteful projects take on the exact planet we are supposed to be preserving).  They have agreed to sell out ratepayers completely, and the environment almost completely, for some un-defined, delusional hope that killing huge intact ecosystems will prevent global warming.  

What is needed is concerted action to make local, point of use renewable power systems affordable, flexible and rewarding for everyone.  I work with heavy right-wingers, working classers, limousine liberals, city and rural dwellers and every single one of them agrees that they want to OWN THEIR OWN SYSTEM and reduce the utilities to a normal, modest part of the energy free markets, instead of Fickle, Selfish Dictators who get to socialize all their costs and privatize all their profits.  What's not to love about getting paid for doing the right thing?  why is that privilege limited to massive corporations?  Is this still a nation of individuals, or are we subjects to the Corporate Aristocracy?

The main problem is that the question is being framed, a la Karl Rove, as "Big Fossil" vs. "Big Renewables" when Big Renewables and Big Fossil are one and the same - see T. Boone Pickens - and the real question here is "Big Energy Monopolists" or "Ratepayer Owners Saving the Planet While Making Money."  Start framing the issue accurately and you will get accurate answers.  Start creating policy which educates people about the options they are not being offered, and you get public outcry that their legislature is merely a puppet of Big Energy, whether it's Big Solar, Big Nukes or any other face of the same monster.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

link to city attorney report

http://www.sandiego.gov/cityattorney/reports/pdf/interim3 ...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

LA has completely bombed on this

The farthest Villaraigosa was willing to go was some tiny modification to existing laws for gigantic commercial buildings, essentially resulting in a press conference and zero actual change.

Not surprising since his commitment to residential solar and wind is less than 5% that of Germany's on a per-capita "systems installed" basis.  4 million ratepayers in 2.5 million sunny, sprawling, overheating residences, and fewer than 1,000 rooftop PV systems in the past 8 years.

He and Schwarzenegger should get awards for the Biggest Greenwashers of Our Time...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

ecosystem losses?

well over a million acres of vital desert ecosystem is currently under siege by Big Solar in the SW USA alone, not to mention the myriad wind, mining, oil, coal and gas destruction in these areas.  this is insane, and is only the very beginning of the Big Energy Gold Rush that is going to kill off a gorgeous, perfect habitat for plants, birds, animals, insects and other living organisms.  have we learned nothing?

we cannot continue to destroy whole ecosystems and call it "sustainable."  land that has not already been harmed by man should be left alone to do what it was intended to do, and new energy, including (especially) renewables, need to be built on previously developed land, preferably at point of use and secondarily on brownfields and superfund sites (there are thousands of them in the US).

please make this crucial distinction.  Big Energy wants to greenwash its horrible, wasteful and devastating power infrastructure by referring to it as "Renewable," even while it depletes groundwater and permanently obliterates wildlife and wilderness (not to mention the terrible effects of its monopolies, eminent domain and expense on humans!).  please, let's not let them get away with it.On Jeffrey Sachs, economist and eco-problem solver, chats about his plans to save the world posted 1 year, 4 months ago 9 Responses

point of use is politically palatable

Thanks for the clarification, Sean.

We are agreed that rates are gonna essentially skyrocket in the next 10 years for any number of reasons.  Mainly because the externalization of the GHG portion of the environmental harm done by Big Coal will no longer be politically palatable.  If the rapid decline in SUV purchases is any indication, rate hikes can steer people into making better choices about conservation and since something like 80% of Americans believe Global Warming is man-made, they are essentially prepared to pay more to stop global death.  What is a real burn, of course, is when we have to pay more to KEEP CONTRIBUTING to global death, as in Big Oil, which is why the RIGHT kind of renewables need to get out in front here...

We are also agreed that current electricity prices are also artificially low, mostly because of the enormous socialization of costs, but as long as we will have to subsidize another form of power to get grid parity, why on earth would we choose another form of Big Energy?  Why can't those huge production credits, RECs, tax breaks, equity returns (which ARE guaranteed for Big Renewables in CA, btw), amortization of costs, and cheap capital flow to you and me instead of people who want to kill our beautiful open spaces?

I guess my point is/was that I think that most people resent Big Energy right now, that sun and wind are ubiquitous, and we have a RARE opportunity to break out of the old paradigm and get REAL energy independence.  You are such a respected voice, I just would like to see local, point of use systems clearly indicated as a VIABLE, POLITICALLY PALATABLE solution to what is constantly framed as Big Energy v. Big Energy.

As long as price hikes are inevitable, who in America (besides T. Boone Pickens) would not want the lion's share of our socialized costs going towards themselves and their neighbors who do the right thing, install systems at their homes and businesses and exercise conservation, especially when it will spare millions of acres of our wilderness?

thanks!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

it's not inevitable

you say things like

"...and are now entering a build-cycle where we must factor much more expensive capital amortization into our power rates. Even if fuel got cheap again, we'd still be facing heavy upward pressure as we built new generation, transmission, and distribution."

and

"On the downside, this slows the rate at which clean energy can come online, since it must compete -- at least in the near term -- with a price that is, essentially, fabricated."

without even mentioning that there is an alternative which would be much faster to scale up, much better for the environment and politically fantastic - assuming a constituency is voters/ratepayers, not lobbyists.  but that's the problem, isn't it?  

These lobbyists have framed the debate, even within this blog, into either "Big Coal" or "Big Renewables" and either way there are massive public/environmental costs all geared towards increased Big Energy monopolies, which are exactly what make it politically unpalatable to raise prices.  

Give people what they want - the price points for personal energy independence - using these same principles of tax breaks, subsidies and amortization of costs across ratepayers and people will go for it much more than saying "you are now going to pay $10 a month more to build someone else's business who will then hijack you and continue raising your rates forever."

As long as we are paying more for "infrastructure," why don't ratepayer-producers get equal consideration as an option in your blog and in our legislation as Big Wind and Big Solar do?  Especially since you seem to agree with me, at least in part?  It would seem the ideal solution to the political, environmental and pricing pressures to give back to the people...  

We don't have a giant lobby and propaganda machine out there and we need more public mention about this as a solution, instead of continuing to frame the issues as massive power plants vs. massive power plants.  this post would have been a perfect place to throw it out there...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

why can't we have the commercial perks?

Bruce, you make a good point, and there are half a dozen of these "leasing" companies up and running already in CA, but the only thing that makes it economically feasible for them is that THEY get huge "commercial producer" tax breaks that you and I, even if we put the exact same system on our homes, would NOT be allowed.

This is, in a word, insane.  Or is it unfair?  Corrupt, even?  Why on earth can't we get the EXACT tax, capital financing, subsidy and socialization of costs that other producers get?  

In Ca at least (which pretends to be sooo progressive on Green Matters), taxpayers and ratepayers either directly or indirectly pay 100% of the costs that utilities and "commercial" producers incur, not to mention guaranteeing their power buybacks, which leads to zero risk, which causes cheap and abundant venture capital to flow to them.  

For one example, the kinds of companies you are referring to get a flat 30% Federal TAX CREDIT for the exact same panels on our roofs as we would install, without caps on size or amount, so why the hell don't we?  They also get PAID for the power produced on our roofs but the best we can do is "net metering" and hand excess to utilities as a GIFT.

We, the people who actually pay all these bills get to choose between crappy, dwindling rebates with severe caps on system size OR incredibly meager "feed in tariffs" which, even when maxed out, will not pay for any size PV system, even in the Mojave, even over the 20 year contract, and even if not a single watt is used by the producer.

All we are asking is to be placed on a level playing field with Big Energy in these days of renewable energy.  We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to achieve PERSONAL energy independence, and are being completely shafted.  

Bill Gates is not likely to take the side of the underdog (us) in this, if his treatment of employees and competitors is any indication.  We need someone who believes in fairness and the power of individuals, not a mercenary monopolist.  Energy industry is already crammed with the latter, including so-called "renewable" industry people.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

aptera's already doing it

obviously they stole this idea from the amazing aptera, which automatically cools your car for you while it's parked in the sun.

support!On Toyota may put solar panels on new Prius to power air conditioning posted 1 year, 4 months ago 14 Responses

much of the mojave is pristine...

...actually.  for those of us who understand that deserts are as critical an ecosystem as oceans, having large sections remain undisturbed is very important.  certainly completely obliterating millions of acres is insanity, hapa, how can you argue with that?  

you know that there are 4 national parks in the Mojave alone, right?  and they are under siege from Big Energy profiteers.  you need to head to some of the BLM hearings so you recognize that the New Boss (Big Solar and Big Wind) is the same as the Old Boss (Big Coal, Big Oil).  these guys are freaking about having to do EIRs, want access to the National Parks, the National Forests, ACECs, DWMAs, you name it. totally rapacious corporatists, not some cool hippie types trying to "do the right thing."

secondly, how much do you know about CSP?  clearly if you understood it, you would not try to separate it from "groundwater" issues, since these power plants use between 35 million gallons (for completely dry cooled) to 800 million gallons (small wet cooled plants) per year per power plant.  is it fair to drag it in now?  where do you think this water is coming from?  is this the highest and best use of scarce desert water resources?  this has to be factored in, and NOT externalized, since it is a DIRECT cost of operations.

i say it again - a mostly untouched ecosystem is far more valuable than a "developed" one, and we need to keep our grubby mitts off.  we have NO idea what kind of snowball effects destroying the deserts will have, but we should know that killing ecosystems has resulted in huge losses of life, property, species, and global climate problems, so why mess with it?  

at least the BLM, which was badly maligned for it, is doing a cumulative impact report on the first million acres of destruction in this region...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

what about pristine ecosystems?

man, this guy has delusions about the central role that pristine ecosystems play in operating this planet.  under this plan, it appears that the entire country would be completely covered with destructive wind farms, scorching/blinding mirrored solar arrays that suck hundreds of billions of gallons of groundwater, and unnatural tree farms.

here's an idea - net zero structures.  let's aggressively pursue building/ retrofit projects which produce more energy than they use or at least a substantial percentage of their own energy use - onsite.  conservation and local, point-of-use systems are FAR superior for the planet, the economy, and for individuals than gigantic, remote, wasteful power plants (including solar and wind) and massive power gridlines.

there are dozens of brownfields and superfund sites in most states - these could be developed for utility-scale projects once renewable baseload generation systems are better developed.

we cannot continue using up the earth as though it is a disposable commodity.  it's not.  these projects create permanent ecosystem and habitat death, like strip-mining.  have we learned nothing from the devastation of the Amazon, the mangroves, the flood plains, the coral and kelp beds, etc.?  why are people gung-ho to destroy millions more acres of wilderness ecosystems, suck billions more gallons of scarce groundwater each year, create tons and tons of highly toxic radioactive waste, and fundamentally alter the landscape of the planet in order to save a (short-term) buck and cost us a fortune later?

this is all about privatizing profits, socializing costs and commodifying nature at unnaturally depressed prices.  that era has to end.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

you've totally misunderstood

the moratorium was NOT intended to "stop renewables" as so many totally uninformed people have been shouting.  the moratorium was intended to provide a clear study basis for the CUMULATIVE IMPACTS of permanently destroying well over a million acres of pristine wilderness all at once, in a small area that is also being aggressively permitted for gas, oil, wind and mining (not to mention all the roads, pipelines and transmission lines which accompany all these projects).

the cumulative impact study was a POSITIVE thing for environmentalists and in no way stopped the process of these initial million acre Desert Death Squads from moving towards their goal of further entrenching Big Energy monopolies, externalizing their costs onto the planet and ratepayers, and gobbling up huge profits and manipulation opportunities, while we all sit here unable to get solar and wind onto our own properties.

if you had been attending any of these hearings, which clearly the writer of the above has not, you  would understand that TRUE environmentalists, including most of the BLM staffers who actually work in these gorgeous ecosystems, know that LOCAL, POINT OF USE RENEWABLES are the only fiscally or environmentally responsible solution to the energy needs of this country.  the 19th Century model of remote generation and transmission is only useful to perpetuate the kinds of price/supply manipulations that Enron and now Big Oil have hurt us with.

if you had been attending the hearings, you also would realize that Big Solar = Big Oil and Big Coal in their mercenary, rapacious tactics.  these are not the "good guys" and it is childish to see the word "solar" and put a halo on anyone nearby.  these guys are not only objecting to EIRs, they are demanding access to State and National Parks, National Forests, ACECs, DWMAs, nature preserves and private property (including homes) in their Gold Rush mentality.  these are guys like T. Boone Pickens, not like John Muir, and they are taking a huge amount of our money, our wilderness, our private property, our water, and our opportunities to participate in the Renewable Economy, in order to enrich themselves, plain and simple.

if you want to fight The Man, then there he is - Big Solar.  you need to get on the feed-in tariff, tax credits, and incentives/subsidies for residential and business-level renewable power, and get off the Big Energy greenwash of Big Solar and Big Wind - they are incredibly destructive, wasteful and unnecessary.On BLM reverses stance on solar-project moratorium posted 1 year, 5 months ago 37 Responses

let's learn from experience, though

we know that by heavily subsidizing energy monopolies, they turn around and bleed us dry.  so a renewable energy model must be built around a new paradigm - aka DECENTRALIZED, preferably point of use, grid-tied generation, not 19th Century massive utility monopolies over faraway power plants and wasteful, unnecessary transmission lines.

we know that by destroying entire ecosystems, we do NOT save money in the long run, and the costs can actually be catastrophic (see rainforests, flood plains, mangroves, coral reefs, etc.).  so we cannot destroy our desert ecosystems in order to maximize profits for Big Energy when there are millions of square miles of developed properties/ rooftops ready, able and willing to be used for power.

we know that if we give ALL the money, incentives, PR, political and financial support to one source (say, utilities) of a material (say, energy), other sources (say, individuals) simply cannot make the numbers work.  the playing field must be LEVELED between Big Energy and Independent Energy.  Tax breaks, cheap capital, access to amortization of all costs across the grid, subsidies, grants and incentives - and hefty fees to destroy taxpayer owned land/generous fees to preserve it.  

Or how about feed-in tariffs that represent actual value to a utility which is no longer allowed to externalize all these costs?  right now, they are such a pittance in CA, that you cannot pay down a residential system in 10 years, even in the Mojave, and even without using a single watt of that power for yourself.  SCE gets your RECs, and gets to count the power against its RPS and does not raise your tariff for the entire term of your 10-20 year contract, no matter how high prices go.  That is outrageous!

don't fall for the fake "renewable" propagandists gabbling about how we NEED to kill the entire desert because of EFFICIENCY or SILICON SHORTAGE or ECONOMICS.  demand policies that stop gaming the system, and we can all be part of the new paradigm.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

point of use isn't counted, though...

at least in CA, the utilities do not count renewable power generated by US at our homes and businesses as "renewable power," but rather as "losses."  oh, and these are the same utilities which are in charge of the PR, the implementation, the inspections and the interconnections for all our grid-tied renewables.  oh, and they are also the only "agencies" in charge of "conservation" programs in CA, which they also write off as, yep "losses" on their books.  

the government does not manage any of the programs which might actually change the way we produce, conserve and pay for/get paid for renewable power on our own properties, and there is a glaring conflict of interest for utilities to run them well.  the only incentive for utilities to implement renewable energy is the insane "giveaway" program known as "net metering," where they get all our excess power for FREE.

the best, fastest, cheapest, fairest and most environmentally sound way to manage this phase of renewable energy is to RAMP UP point of use systems, oversize them in prime resource areas, contract for fair market value for 100% of power, including the extremely valuable "peaker power" produced by US (like Germany, which pays 62 cents/kWh for peaker solar power), and allow utilities to count it against their RPS (since they will be buying it).  no million acres of wilderness obliterated, no homes lost to eminent domain, no hundreds of billions of dollars wasted on power plants/lines which is charged back to ratepayers, a welcome income boost to people who do the right thing, and a large green collar jobs boost to PEOPLE rather than Big Energy, and we have a WINNER.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

why no solar panels on planes?

this is so obvious, that i must be missing something.  shouldn't all planes be covered in thin-film solar material to absorb the massive amounts of light they contact in-flight?  even the aptera (electric car) has a solar sunroof on it which activates an internal A/C while parked in the sun.  seems like, as usual, the airlines are about 10 years behind in their planning and are going for another wasteful, stupid solution - cutting jobs and flights and raising prices - instead of being slightly visionary.  maybe once they get functioning software, they will manage to get 21st century planes?On As fuel prices rise, airline industry profits plummet posted 1 year, 6 months ago 5 Responses

maybe he doesn't want to kill the entire desert?

Naw, I won't give McCain credit for caring about the wilderness, but YOU should!  We do not need thousands of 10,000 acre desert death machines out there, destroying every living thing and sucking all the groundwater, while hijacking ratepayers.  

We only need LOCAL, POINT OF USE SYSTEMS ON PREVIOUSLY DEVELOPED LAND which tie to the grid and feed excess power into it.  if every structure, brownfield and marginal agricultural plot in a prime solar or wind region powered itself and fed excess into the grid, we would not need to kill our planet in order to save it.

Please advocate responsibly, and think a little broader than only C02.  NO wilderness slaughter to try and "help" the planet, please.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

what price for dead ecosystems?

yeah, such a bargain if you want to follow the fossil fuel model of socializing all the costs of your permanent environmental devastation!!  while privatizing all the profits, of course.

These projects permanently obliterate 3500 to 13,000 acres of wilderness EACH, in the "top" solar resource areas.  This is insurmountable, for an environmentalist - they do at least as much damage to habitats/ecosystems (CO2 aside) as COAL, and more than oil drilling.  Many of them use tens of MILLIONS of gallons of scarce desert groundwater each year as well.  Again, insurmountable.

Happily, putting local, point of use solar and wind generation on previously developed land will require NO water, NO destructive transmission, NO habitat losses, NO increased Big Energy chokeholds, NO eminent domain, NO lost viewsheds and natural playgrounds.  Sorry, it's the only thing that makes sense if you care about the planet, instead of care about lining the pockets of utilities.

All our resources need to be diverted to storage, comfortable conservation and local, decentralized GREEN energy instead of this lousy, wasteful, destructive GREENWASHED energy.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

good, so no government land!

Whew!  I guess that means we won't need to kill off the roughly 1 million acres of Taxpayer-Owned Wilderness currently in the BLM permitting process in the Mojave alone!  Since you don't need Guv'ment Cheese, that is.

Yeah, that's the dirty little "Cost" that you people never factor in - TOTAL, PERMANENT ECOSYSTEM DESTRUCTION!  What kind of "environmentalist" advocates killing off that huge amount of wilderness to "save the earth?"  What kind of capitalist EXTERNALIZES huge amounts of their costs then calls it "free markets?"  Right, sounds just like our friends in the fossil fuel world!

As long as your CSP and PV and Wind and Geothermal and Biogas are all sited on previously developed land near existing transmission, I am thrilled with any and all.  Once you start trying to dynamite, bulldoze, deplete the groundwater and otherwise obliterate our precious open spaces, you are just as bad as coal.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

utility-scale solar sucks water, too

Amazing DRX is right - only DISTRIBUTED power makes sense (PV and small wind on garages to fuel cars is a simple, perfect example), and NOT utility-scale solar thermal.  One of the first big solar thermal "concentrating" plants, aside from killing 7,000 acres of pristine wilderness and being powered in large part by natural gas but greenwashing itself as "solar," will suck 35 million gallons of water each year from the scarce groundwater resources of the Mojave (ivanpah, check it out, if you don't believe me).  oh, and will produce toxic sludge and saltcake as byproducts.  Thanks, Brightsource!  You are about as "Green" as coal!

There is nothing sustainable or renewable about killing huge sections of wilderness, and sucking all the groundwater out of the deserts, both of which have devastating ripple effects on other ecosystems!!  Please do not believe the total lies you are being told about massive solar farms - we need ALL OUR RESOURCES to flow into better energy storage, better conservation tech, and better renewable generation ONLY on previously developed land, using ONLY existing transmission corridors.On Electric cars could impact water supplies, says analysis posted 1 year, 8 months ago 18 Responses

the money is being spent - just not on you

Lots of good comments, here.  The bottom line about up-front costs and payback time is simple.  Your tax dollars are being used to build, maintain, and supplement giant, wilderness-killing power plants owned by utilities (solar/wind "farms"), instead of being used to build, maintain and supplement modest, clean, individual-owned power plants which save our wilderness instead of kill it.

We need to INSIST that our legislators (Federal, State and Local) divert that money BACK TO US so we can build a safe, reliable, DECENTRALIZED generation system which does not destroy the environment like the Utility-Scale plants do.

100% buyback programs AT PEAK RATES (that's when we are producing, right?); Berkeley/San Fran style capital loans paid back through property taxes, combined with large subsidies from our government WOULD ONLY PUT US LEVEL WITH UTILITIES, who have been able to buy off our legislators so they can socialize all their costs and privatize all their profits.

Are you a stalinist sucker or do you believe in democracy?  Call, write and email and demand these policies NOW or we will all find ourselves meeting the New Boss (Big "renewable" Energy), same as the old boss (Big Fossil Energy), and losing millions of acres of Federally-owned wilderness in the process...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

surely you are joking...

"We are being urged to compromise -- to put a system in place quickly, even if it is the wrong system. Given that we only have one chance to get this right before it's too late, our top priority must be to make sure that we do not settle prematurely and sign a weak bill into law in the name of doing something about global warming. With momentum for strong action and a friendlier Congress and White House building every day, it's no coincidence that some wish to settle their accounts now."

Uh, Carl?  Who does this sound like?  Sierra Club, perhaps?  Stampeding towards total desert ecosystem annihilation, while frantically greenwashing your trail by calling a bunch of groundwater-sucking, natural gas fired "solar" killing fields "renewable?"

How are the millions of acres you are selling out planning on "renewing" themselves?  How are hundreds of thousands of miles of high-tension buzzing power lines bisecting migration corridors on dwindling Federal wilderness "green" again?

You said it best - We are being urged to compromise -- to put a system in place quickly, even if it is the wrong system.  But it's YOU who is urging us to put the WRONG SYSTEM in place, instead of pushing hard for LOCAL, DECENTRALIZED, RENEWABLE generation only on PREVIOUSLY DEVELOPED LAND.

For shame.  What a difference 37 years makes.  I bet the 25-year old idealist never would have sold out wilderness for utility company profits, and greenwashed the massacre of this country's open spaces.  

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

can't hurt to call

i called my senators and insisted that they keep the renewable energy incentives in the bill, but only insofar as they do not support wilderness-destroying energy projects, and support individuals trying to generate energy on their own previously developed property...On Clean-energy credits likely to be stripped from Senate economic stimulus bill posted 1 year, 10 months ago 6 Responses

torturing animals?

Jason d Scorse, above, links to a very important story about how animals are truly, undeniably and relentlessly tortured when they are being raised for profits.  This is not some sensationalist backlash, it's real footage from a real employee about real torture at a real meat plant.  please look at this, and let's figure out how to drive these sadists out of business, once and for all:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008 ...

be sure to read the comments - very scary to see who we share this planet with..

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

he's running for congress

and is facing a tough fight, so if you want to keep his voice near any microphones at all, you might want to kick him a few bucks:

http://kucinich.us/contribute.html

if whomever gets elected has half a brain (i know, unlikely), they will appoint him as head of like 5 agencies!On Dennis Kucinich drops presidential bid posted 1 year, 10 months ago 10 Responses

this is why rooftop PV makes more sense...

...than it's given credit for.  on top of clean energy which does not kill wilderness, does not waste water, decentralizes power, eliminates "thermal heat island" effects (which results in enormous reduction of power use), and empowers individuals, it also truly engages people in the larger picture and gets them excited about "going green."  

if we would just get beyond the half-assed "net metering" system and insist that utilities pay TOP DOLLAR FOR 100% OF RENEWABLE POWER GENERATED by ratepayers (germany pays roughly 60 cents/watt!), people could actually MAKE MONEY from their rooftops, especially people in sunny, desert areas.  why aren't the good people at Grist pushing much harder for this, rather than the utility-scale killing fields which just impoverish and disengage individuals and enrich utilities by killing OUR open spaces off???

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

timeline disconnect

i suspect that, although intentions may be "good enough," people have some delusions about the timeline for getting these massive, experimental, remote power plants online.  try 8 years, at a minimum, at least in CA, where you at least have to pretend to go through an environmental review.

if the government (and google) truly dedicated themselves to SERIOUSLY getting local, decentralized power online and to R & D into storage and increased efficiency, while using ONLY PREVIOUSLY DEVLOPED LAND for larger-scale projects, we would never, ever need to kill wilderness, because the difference we could make in 8 years would far more than offset these plants, which use enormous swathes of land for very little power.

just because you and i are too ignorant to understand what role desert ecosystems play (and our government prefers not to study it in case they will be forced to stop covering it with military bases), i am certainly not arrogant enough to destroy them!  we didn't understand the role of wetlands until the oceans became poisoned and hurricanes destroyed the gulf - can't we EVER learn from our mistakes?

why not fight for something we can do NOW, TODAY, and try to get our government to help us get all our own wind and solar systems at home?  isn't it high time WE got some benefits from our tax dollars, instead of just the utilities??  they get our public land almost free then bottle the wind and sun and sell it back to us at enormous profits.

time for A NEW PARADIGM - local, decentralized power generation on previously developed land for ALL NEW POWER.  phasing out coal is going to take over 50 years, no matter how hard all of us fight, so there is NO reason to kill more nature now.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

natural gas instead of conservation?

good lord.  all they seem to be doing is INCREASING consumption, using GAS, not residential solar, to do it, and hoping for some non-sustainable sequestration "solution?"  BZZZZ.  next!On Norway aims to be carbon neutral by 2030 posted 1 year, 10 months ago 3 Responses

so, obviously we need to decentralize!

good lord, if i read another hand-wringing "but what can we do?" type statement when Big Power threatens us with blackouts, rising prices, catastrophic whatever, i am going to scream.

solarspike has it exactly right.  if utilities in the US were forced to BUY BACK 100% of power generated by every single person in this country, and if the government offered those massive subsidies, grants and tax breaks to individuals instead of huge corporations, within 10 years this nation would be almost entirely decentralized.

it is sooooo irritating to see reporting (and Sierra Club policies) centering all around maintaining utility chokeholds and the "remote generation and long distance transmission" model of the 19th century.  

game over, guys - you had a good run, but now you are getting phased out in favor of energy independence, even if it is grid-tied.  if you want to work with us, and revolutionize your business model, great.  if not, hasta la vista, baby!

let's lobby a little harder for benefits of our TAX DOLLARS to finally come to US!!!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

stop killing wilderness

hey, wind guys?  all for your projects as long as they are sited SOLELY on previously developed land.  they are TOTALLY unacceptable, however, when wilderness is permanently killed off to make (snort) "green" power.  just not gonna roll with the greenwash, here, even if wind reduces carbon.

you can't directly kill off ecosystems in order to prevent indirectly killing off ecosystems.  you need to focus on previously developed land, and let the wilderness breathe freely, since you and i have NO idea what the disastrous domino-effect of killing hundreds of thousands of acres will be.  the one thing we know for sure, based on other ecosystems like rainforest, coral reef, kelp beds, mangrove forests, and ice caps - no good can come from it, especially since you have alternatives - previously developed land.

thanks for working to SAVE the planet, rather than kill it.  you are either gonna be part of the solution, or part of the problem - the choice is yours...On Clean-tech and wind power both soaring posted 1 year, 10 months ago 11 Responses

economic stimulus for green power

since the government is so eager to "stimulate the economy," why don't they get on the ball and offer some serious and meaningful programs for individuals who want to install residential solar/wind but who can't afford the capital outlay?

San Fran and Berkeley have agreed to FINANCE panels for homes, with a modest payback attached to property taxes (so the cost of the entire system is tax deductible), germany has a 100% buy-back program where utilities have to buy back all the power generated at a very good price (not "net metering").  Feds have had a 35% tax CREDIT on the table for years, but haven't bothered pushing it through.  CA cities like LA squawking at international conferences about how visionary and green they are, are offering much lower rebates than the deep red cities of Florida.

utilities already have massive payback guarantees, tax breaks, and other "stimulus" to get them to make the capital investments in power - even the ones that kill our wilderness - so let's get home-producers on the same footing.  the green economy will be front and center.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

finally, someone gets it!

i have been shouting into a black hole, for the most part, in trying to get some serious distinctions between GREEN ENERGY POLICIES and GREENWASHED B.S. POLICIES.

thank you, ed, and the rest of the 2030 crew for finally addressing TRUE conservation, especially as it relates to building practices.  half-hearted lightbulb programs and $50 coupons for fridges have become symbols of "trying to look like we're trying without actually harming utility bottom lines," whereas your program demands legitimate change.  

thank you also for distinguishing between local, decentralized, sustainable and renewable (rooftop) power and wilderness-killing remote generation and transmission of so-called "renewables" which only benefits utilities.  ok, i think 2050 is way too long to phase out coal, but we can see how our new energy paradigm shifts things, and maybe move that number forward a decade or two (i hope)...

you appear to be one of the few organizations which "gets it," so i wish you tremendous success in getting the message to the people!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

environmentalists as enablers

puh-leeze.  what kind of environmentalist can't say "neither?"  oh, right, you have actually highlighted one of the biggest greenwashing scams being perpetrated by so-called "green" politicians and "environmentalists!"

here's a little tip:  ALL REMOTE GENERATION AND TRANSMISSION ON PREVIOUSLY UNDEVELOPED LAND IS BLACK, NOT GREEN, SO WE ALL NEED TO OPPOSE IT.  PERIOD.

i am, of course, in favor of giving all the "renewable energy" subsidies, tax breaks, low-interest financing and guaranteed power buy-backs - which are currently being traded for bribes from Big Power to our government - to US, AS INDIVIDUAL LOCAL DECENTRALIZED POWER GENERATORS ON OUR HOMES AND BUSINESSES.

trouble is, Sierra Club, NRDC, and several other fake environmentalists seem to think that dynamiting, bulldozing, paving over, developing and poisoning wilderness for utility profits from remote power generation and long-distance transmission is somehow the best way to do things.  kind of like deforesting the amazon, bleaching coral reefs and demolishing old-growth forests is the right way to do things, eh?

time to stop the FAKE ARGUMENTS and get down to WHAT IS BEST.  nobody can deny that paying folks a great price for totally clean and green power they generate is best, so let's just give a flat NO to everything else, including anything that kills wilderness.  NO MORE HALF-STEPPING TO PROFIT BIG POWER.  they had their moment - now it's our turn.On Umbra on nuclear vs. coal posted 1 year, 10 months ago 25 Responses

he's a legislator...

...so i was addressing my comment to him in that capacity, quade00. although, frankly, scalia is not really all that open to being legislated around, so you do make a point!

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

biodiversist's model...

could also be used for residential and commercial PV panels.  Why not have the utility own the panels, inverters, and all the power they generate and offer some sort of rent-offset to the roof owner?  solves the up-front capital problem of market penetration of PV (since the utility will have to build destructive "renewable" power plants otherwise, so they are spending regardless), and keeps the wilderness from suffering, yet again, from man's greedy urban consumption.

local, residential/commercial solar is the answer if you ask the right questions.  one of the pre- questions has to be "how steeply tiered can we make these utility bills so people start conserving and stop wasting?"

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

what cost are you attributing...

to the total destruction of wilderness, greyflcn?  oh, right, nothing.  

that's the exact problem with ALL current economic models - that TRUE COSTS are ignored, then socialized, while consumers of goods pay LESS than what they really cost to produce.  this is true with sweatshop labor produced goods, subsidized agriculture, tariff-penalized goods and with wilderness/resource depleting goods.

It's the exact reason why coal and oil have been "cheap" for all these years.  they are heavily subsidized, the losses of life and habitat are ignored economically, and the costs of global warming are being socialized across the planet, instead of being borne entirely by those who are profiting from the destruction.

The time has come for SUSTAINABILITY.  by attributing a cost of "0" to lost ecosystems, you are perpetuating the model that got us into this mess - it is totally, absolutely unsustainable - a pyramid scheme.  Wilderness is a limited resource.  we need to live within our means instead of constantly depleting everything.  economies of scale fall into perspective once you start attributing real costs to goods and services, and urban retrofits (thanks catman) become far cheaper than any other option.On Tory leader David Cameron lauds "green coal" posted 1 year, 11 months ago 5 Responses

we can still win a lot...

if we get out there and PUSH HARD for residential/commercial URBAN PV/wind subsidies, rather than for environment-destroying, super-expensive, utility-paying "large scale renewables."

the technology, materials, trained installer base, infrastructure and TOTAL GREEN results are all sitting there, waiting for a groundswell.  the big utilities are trying to trick us all into ignoring decentralized, independent energy generation and into supporting total ecosystem obliteration in the form of gigantic solar arrays and wind farms.  why?  because they want to keep all the money flowing to themselves.

meet the new boss.  same as the old boss.  don't get so caught up in climate change and catchphrases that you forget to notice that the forms of "renewables" that are totally available today for homes and businesses are truly green, and the huge, destructive, wasteful power plants and high-voltage lines are not green, even if they (after accounting for irreversible loss of wilderness, fire dangers, etc.) eventually do not emit greenhouse gases.

all renewables are not created equal.  fight for the ones that WE CAN IMPLEMENT without some greedy middleman, and we can win...

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

but it's ok to destroy wilderness for solar??

listen, you are either "with" the planet or you are "against it."  

if you can smugly object to wilderness being destroyed by tar sand production, then you better f**king object to wilderness being destroyed by new remote wind and solar "farms" which are getting the "green housekeeping stamp of approval" from a bunch of "against it" types who pretend to be "with the planet."

examples?  sierra club, nrdc, energy justice, LADWP, Schwazenneger, "solar and clean energy initiative" referendum for 2008, and a bunch of other greenwashing eco-terrorists.  many of the solar arrays being planned use ENORMOUS amounts of water (which they contaminate beyond reuse) in a parched desert area, and use natural gas all night.  is this really what you are signing up for?

ONLY ACCEPT RENEWABLE POWER WHICH IS GENERATED IN PREVIOUSLY DEVELOPED, PREFERABLY URBAN AREAS.  NET-METERED ROOFTOP PV COULD PROVIDE ALMOST ALL OUR POWER NEEDS IN CA, SO WHY ARE UTILITIES INSISTING ON DESTROYING OUR DESERTS TO SELL YOU RESOURCES YOU ALREADY OWN???

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

no, Energy Justice cheerleads for RPS, even remote

i don't see how your disappointment in losing the RPS in the senate bill has anything to do with your cheerleading for "wind and solar" without clarifying that only previously developed areas are the only appropriate sites for this kind of generation/transmission:

http://www.energyjustice.net/rps/

do you really think that all that wind power you are so excited about is coming from mini-turbines on individual homes and businesses?  or is it coming from areas that were fragile wilderness and are now completely destroyed forever?

unless environmental groups get it together and keep the message strong and clear - that we will ONLY SUPPORT LOCAL GENERATION OF RENEWABLES ON PREVIOUSLY DEVELOPED LAND - utilities like LADWP will continue to see the Joshua Tree area as "Fair Game" to blast boulders, bulldoze Joshua Trees, kill off every plant and animal out there, and call it "green power."  that cool with you?

there is more to "green power" than greenhouse gases.  killing off ecosystems has its own very steep costs.  if you aren't part of the solution, then you give cover to mercenaries like LADWP and all the other utilities killing the planet and calling it "saving the planet."  it is WRONG, and i expect more from those who purport to speak for the habitats which cannot speak for themselves.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

my note was a reply to Energy Justice

sorry, it appears the "reply" function doesn't work here.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

the real cost of destroying wilderness

so, why are we so anxious to destroy fragile desert ecosystems for "renewable" energy, then?  who out there can say with any degree of certainty, that MORE wilderness destruction will not harm the planet, and so it is a great idea to keep utilities rolling in dough instead of de-centralizing power generation on a structure-by-structure basis, with NO NEW FOOTPRINT on the wilderness?

please, lobby your elected reps, the Sierra Club, the NRDC and any so-called "green power" advocates who have the audacity to cheerlead for habitat destruction in favor of remote power generation and transmission!!!  this has got to stop, or in 10 years, we will (too late) learn why we shouldn't have "effed up" the deserts.

i swear to god, will we ever get it?On Wild salmon and coral both in trouble, say studies posted 1 year, 11 months ago 1 Response

why can't we pull together like Ron Paul's people?

they have this massive internet-driven grass-roots campaign that a lot of progressives have joined, out of desperation.

where is ours for the true visionary of this election, who is not only against the war in iraq (which is where Paul gets most of his lefty votes), but who has the only even slightly fiscally and environmentally responsible platform?

decentralizing power generation, and decentralizing power (political and corporate) are the cornerstones of democracy.  we have been barreling towards totalitarianism, with bush being the ultimate scary tyrant so far, and we need to reclaim our country.

one man, one vote.  if everyone votes for him, he will win - who will you convince today?On An interview with Dennis Kucinich about his presidential platform on energy and the environment posted 1 year, 11 months ago 34 Responses

please say this to the LADWP!!!!

i couldn't agree more that cities like Los Angeles need a massive retrofit to local residential (and commercial) solar and wind WITHIN THE CITY, and that this will create an enormous moderately-skilled job base for the next 10 years.

so why is LADWP outsourcing all their "renewable" energy, which will outsource all the jobs AND OUTSOURCE ALL THE DESTRUCTION to rural and wilderness areas??

i BEG YOU to contact me so you can make a presentation to the LA City Council so that they will re-think this environmentally and economically destructive policy.  part of the plan can be to lobby Citizen's Energy to subsidize the installation and maintenance of 1 million solar rooftops for low-income people within LA, instead of subsidizing death, increased poverty and environmental destruction via wind farms and solar arrays.

we need a new paradigm, but Sierra Club, NRDC, Citizen's energy, Schwarzenneger, Villaraigosa, LADWP and others are racing to exploit and pillage wilderness, financially destroy rural residents, and deny the urban poor meaningful energy subsidies and jobs, while increasing their chokeholds over ratepayers, and while the McMansions gobble more and more "cheap" power with no incentives to conserve.  the worst is that they have the audacity to call it "Green Path North."

please help:  www.stopgreenpath.com

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.

not NIMBYs

please, stop with the NIMBY propaganda.  90% of the people who object to being yanked forcibly from their homes, or to seeing wilderness or their private property destroyed DERIVE NO BENEFIT AT ALL from the power being generated.  

the NIMBYs are the gluttonous, McMansion jerkoffs in cities like LA who demand unlimited cheap power for their 6,800 square foot houses and their 52 inch TVs and sub-zero fridges, no matter how much habitat is destroyed, or how many rural lives are permanently ruined.

sorry, people need to pay the real cost of their consumption, whether it's greenhouse gases, child sweatshop labor, poisoning farmworkers and watersheds, smog, mining deaths or otherwise.  the fact that these costs are socialized while the benefits are privatized is the problem.

www.stopgreenpath.comOn Innovator patents floating wind turbine posted 1 year, 11 months ago 5 Responses

greenwashing of nrdc and sierra club!

if you think it's bad when a corporation does it, how bad is it when trusted environmentalists do it?  

i'm talking about the toxic tradeoffs sierra club and nrdc are making to support "renewable" energy by permanently destroying hundreds of thousands of acres of wilderness habitat.  sorry, how will that permanent loss ever renew again?

you can't destroy the earth and call it "saving the earth."  you and i know that, so why do they think they can get away with it?  do they really believe that "as long as it's not fossil fuels, it's inherently fantastic?"  please.

remote generation and transmission of power is a relic of the pre-PV past and it is only perpetuated to keep utilities' chokeholds on people and keep their profits rolling in.

stop the greenwashing.  demand aggressive positions on net zero building codes, PV on every roof and industry conservation programs.
On Green products largely guilty of greenwashing, says study posted 1 year, 11 months ago 6 Responses

no remote power

the thing that makes me crazy is that the so-called "environmentalists" (sierra club, nrdc, etc.) are all on the "renewables" bandwagon - - even when the energy is all REMOTELY generated and TRANSMITTED hundreds of miles, both processes destroying hundreds of thousands of acres of previously pristine wilderness.

are they all ok selling out the land to save the sky? selling out the ocean to save the land?  selling out the sky to keep Big Power rich?  come on.  conservation and LOCAL, decentralized renewable energy is the ONLY solution that makes sense.  until every single roof is covered in PV panels and people reduce their energy usage 25%, not one inch of new ground should be plowed over for new power.

the greenest energy is that which you needn't ever produce.