In the early 1900’s American architect and urban planner Daniel H. Burnham said, “Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men's blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans. Aim high in hope and work. Remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will not die.”
What’s your Energy Plan? Don’t have one? If you don’t have one why should your local, state or national government have one? Don’t have an energy plan? Why should your electric utility have one? I’ll bet you have an emergency plan for bailing out of your house if it catches on fire. I’ll bet you have a planned route to get to work. Most of us these days have a retirement plan. You probably have some plan for dinner tonight. You have a plan to educate yourself and your children. You may have a plan for what to wear to the office tomorrow. A plan. Hmm.
How would you like it if your local state or national government planned your dinner for you, or your route to work, or your wardrobe? Those of you standing in bread lines after the recent round of employment cut backs may think government planned dinners are a great idea. But let’s take it a step farther. How would you like it if your local government decided that all the people in your neighborhood had to do without electricity every Wednesday? It’s just one day a week for Pete’s sake, what’s the big deal?
Right now stop reading this and walk through your house. Don’t take paper and pen with you but just walk into each room and notice what uses electricity. I have gas heat so I’m all set you might think. Me too, but unless you have a gas powered fan or pump or a gas powered ignition switch, Wednesday means long underwear and winter parka day for both of us.
Ten years ago I did an energy audit for a guy that wanted to really cut his electric bill. My cursory investigation of his billing history showed a very low bill even in subzero high mountain valley January. I was intrigued. How was I going to help this guy save energy, he wasn’t using any. I pulled into the drive-way on the appointed day and as I pulled out my blower door and other equipment this quiet retired school teacher came out of the house wearing a winter parka, gloves with the fingers cut out, a wool watch cap pulled down over his ears, wool pants, insulated boots and a friendly smile. I discovered during my home owner’s interview that he was not dressed for the outdoors. He was dressed the way he always dressed in the winter – inside. He kept thermostats in back rooms at 40 degrees and his main living area thermostats were set at 50 degrees. His other energy saving tips included pulling every other light bulb out of any double bulb fixtures and replacing all remaining bulbs (except one reading lamp) with 25 watt incandescent bulbs. He thought those compact fluorescents were a little pricey. Every drape and curtain that wasn’t in full sun was closed tight. In a perfectly normal American home, I felt like I was creeping through a medieval mountian top monastery instead of a split level ranch house 50 yards off the highway.
Is this what is in store for everyone? Is this what Randy Udall meant when he said, “the challenge in president-elect Obama’s energy plan will be to maintain prosperity”? “We have to be very smart about what kind of investments we make in a new energy supply”. (Dawson, Crested Butte News, November 21, 2008)
Dean Kamen is very smart. The inventor of the Segway and expensive medical equipment, Kamen rules a three acre island off the coast of Connecticut that proclaimed energy independence. He has a plan. It includes the elimination of all incandescent lighting and the installation of wind and solar power.
Samso, Denmark is an island community that’s 40 square miles and a two hour boat ride from the main land. After ten years of community and government collaboration they are closing in on their goal, 100% energy independence. They have a plan. A summary of their plan includes a section on implementation appropriately titled, project design and planning. Their plan included every citizen, and every agency on the island.
“No man is an island, no man is an island…..he’s a peninsula” – Jefferson Airplane
Could your community make an energy plan? Sure it could. But, let’s not make the same mistake we did in the 70’s with our energy planning. OK gas prices are going down and Jim Carter lost the election – problem solved.
Recent headlines blarred, “World Publics Strongly Favor Requiring More Wind and Solar Energy, More Efficiency, Even If It Increases Costs. Most Think It Will Save Money in the Long Run". While some may have cheered the recent findings of the World Public Opinion.org survey I was not impressed. As you read the details of their findings you discover that most people think their government or utility companies should solve the problem.
This problem will never be solved as long as people think the solution is up to someone else.
The solution to meet the growing demands for electricity is not a problem to solve; it’s an ethic to be lived. It should be as much a part of our national ethos as “family values”. In fact it should be a family value. Can you make a difference in all of this? Of course you can. And, you don’t have to freeze in the dark to do it …. at least not yet. Let’s make better choices and better plans about using energy before it comes to that.
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has". - Margaret Mead
Showing posts with label All power requirements. Show all posts
Showing posts with label All power requirements. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Monday, October 20, 2008
Consumerism and Energy Conservation
I had quite a surprise this morning. Actually it was more like an epiphany, really.
For over fifteen years I have struggled with energy conservation in the electric utility industry. I’m a trained energy auditor and was a certified Home Energy Rating System technician. I visited with electric customers to answer the question, “Why is my energy bill so damned high and what can I do about it?”
I did detailed inventories and spit out detailed reports showing the source of the culprits contributing to high energy bills. I offered suggestions for how these customers could save money. Most of the time, I got a polite thank you. Sometimes I got a reference to another customer wanting to know, “Why is my energy bill so damned high and what can I do about it?” But, only a few cases out of hundreds brought any action on the customer’s part. One customer really loves me. He saved over three hundred dollars on propane the first month after he actually performed the measures I recommended, but, that was the exception.
Generally, customers just kept on doing what they had done before, yelling at family members to “turn off those lights” and “close the damned door – what were you – born in a barn”, and; they kept sending their money to the utility companies.
My epiphany was the result of reading a recent report by a group called ECOALIGN. Their mission is to” .. align corporate and consumer behavior with the future of energy and environment via innovative marketing and communications strategies”.
The report titled Project Energy Code, told me exactly why I couldn’t get any traction with most customers to implement the energy conservation measures I recommended. Maybe this explains why you haven’t taken action either.
The “problem” is a combination of three issues, visibility, ambivalence, and trust, as explained in the report prepared by Pippa Chenevix Trench. Here is my take on what they are getting at.
Visibility- Many of us won’t implement energy saving actions because even if we do, no one will know. Appraisers won’t increase the home’s value. Neighbors won’t make encouraging comments and no one will really be able to tell that we’re going green and saving the planet. It’s hard to brag about something you didn’t use –like energy.
Ambivalence- My dictionary defines Ambivalence as the “existence of mutually conflicting feelings or thoughts such as love or hate about some person (maybe energy auditors), object (like set back thermostats) or idea (like energy conservation). Some people might be thinking, “what’s the use, the planets going down the tubes anyway, why bother”. Or maybe they’re faced with the conflicting choice of paying for a great vacation versus installing more attic insulation. If you read the report you might conclude that the problem could even be deeper and more subtle than that. It could be anthropological.
Trust – This one really got me. Although I had a good working relationship with many customers, I was working for the utility. This fact alone made people wonder why I was recommending actions that would cut the profits from my employer. I talked about how we cared about energy conservation as well as the need to reduce the company’s cost to buy power. The report referenced a piece of research from Arizona that showed that when customers got energy saving ideas from a government agency, 17% of the recipients took energy saving actions. While 0% of recipients that got the same advice from a utility took any action. I guess I should be glad I got as many positive results as I did.
Yet, to save the planet, really save customers money and reduce the growing demand for electricity, we are all going to have to get a lot more successful at selling energy conservation.
I hope you will take the time to read the report yourself. It’s free. I didn’t even have to register or give away any personal information. Reading this report showed me that customer choices are complicated and go way beyond the typical environmentalist accusations that we are all just thoughtless consumers. EcoAlign concludes that our “consumption [is] not out of mindless greed but in response to a complex web of culture and belonging” influences. Wow, if I’d only known.
The Project Energy Code concludes with the call to arms for more research into human behavior as it applies to energy conservation. They say, “there are three areas for future research that stems from the hypotheses described in this essay”:
1. Understanding better how energy consumption and environmental issues are “bundled” within the broader context of people’s day to day lives.
2. Understanding the ways in which information surrounding energy use and decisions over consumer practices flows within and between households and social networks.
3. Identifying ways in which energy efficient behavior can be made more visible and the impacts of different media in communicating this information.
I’ll be thinking a lot about this report and its importance to saving money and the planet at the same time. In the mean time, I hope someone gets working on those three additional areas of research. If the experts are right, energy conservation is still the best bang for the buck and “negawatts” are still worth bragging about to your neighbors.
© 2008 Mark R. Daily
For over fifteen years I have struggled with energy conservation in the electric utility industry. I’m a trained energy auditor and was a certified Home Energy Rating System technician. I visited with electric customers to answer the question, “Why is my energy bill so damned high and what can I do about it?”
I did detailed inventories and spit out detailed reports showing the source of the culprits contributing to high energy bills. I offered suggestions for how these customers could save money. Most of the time, I got a polite thank you. Sometimes I got a reference to another customer wanting to know, “Why is my energy bill so damned high and what can I do about it?” But, only a few cases out of hundreds brought any action on the customer’s part. One customer really loves me. He saved over three hundred dollars on propane the first month after he actually performed the measures I recommended, but, that was the exception.
Generally, customers just kept on doing what they had done before, yelling at family members to “turn off those lights” and “close the damned door – what were you – born in a barn”, and; they kept sending their money to the utility companies.
My epiphany was the result of reading a recent report by a group called ECOALIGN. Their mission is to” .. align corporate and consumer behavior with the future of energy and environment via innovative marketing and communications strategies”.
The report titled Project Energy Code, told me exactly why I couldn’t get any traction with most customers to implement the energy conservation measures I recommended. Maybe this explains why you haven’t taken action either.
The “problem” is a combination of three issues, visibility, ambivalence, and trust, as explained in the report prepared by Pippa Chenevix Trench. Here is my take on what they are getting at.
Visibility- Many of us won’t implement energy saving actions because even if we do, no one will know. Appraisers won’t increase the home’s value. Neighbors won’t make encouraging comments and no one will really be able to tell that we’re going green and saving the planet. It’s hard to brag about something you didn’t use –like energy.
Ambivalence- My dictionary defines Ambivalence as the “existence of mutually conflicting feelings or thoughts such as love or hate about some person (maybe energy auditors), object (like set back thermostats) or idea (like energy conservation). Some people might be thinking, “what’s the use, the planets going down the tubes anyway, why bother”. Or maybe they’re faced with the conflicting choice of paying for a great vacation versus installing more attic insulation. If you read the report you might conclude that the problem could even be deeper and more subtle than that. It could be anthropological.
Trust – This one really got me. Although I had a good working relationship with many customers, I was working for the utility. This fact alone made people wonder why I was recommending actions that would cut the profits from my employer. I talked about how we cared about energy conservation as well as the need to reduce the company’s cost to buy power. The report referenced a piece of research from Arizona that showed that when customers got energy saving ideas from a government agency, 17% of the recipients took energy saving actions. While 0% of recipients that got the same advice from a utility took any action. I guess I should be glad I got as many positive results as I did.
Yet, to save the planet, really save customers money and reduce the growing demand for electricity, we are all going to have to get a lot more successful at selling energy conservation.
I hope you will take the time to read the report yourself. It’s free. I didn’t even have to register or give away any personal information. Reading this report showed me that customer choices are complicated and go way beyond the typical environmentalist accusations that we are all just thoughtless consumers. EcoAlign concludes that our “consumption [is] not out of mindless greed but in response to a complex web of culture and belonging” influences. Wow, if I’d only known.
The Project Energy Code concludes with the call to arms for more research into human behavior as it applies to energy conservation. They say, “there are three areas for future research that stems from the hypotheses described in this essay”:
1. Understanding better how energy consumption and environmental issues are “bundled” within the broader context of people’s day to day lives.
2. Understanding the ways in which information surrounding energy use and decisions over consumer practices flows within and between households and social networks.
3. Identifying ways in which energy efficient behavior can be made more visible and the impacts of different media in communicating this information.
I’ll be thinking a lot about this report and its importance to saving money and the planet at the same time. In the mean time, I hope someone gets working on those three additional areas of research. If the experts are right, energy conservation is still the best bang for the buck and “negawatts” are still worth bragging about to your neighbors.
© 2008 Mark R. Daily
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Take Action to Support Distributed Renewable Energy Generation
So, you want to install a solar photovoltaic system on your roof and join those taking action to reverse climate change. You want to be part of the solution to the growing gap between energy demand and new power plant construction by installing distributed alternate energy generation. You’ve consulted your Special 30th Anniversary Edition of the Real Goods Solar Living Source Book, trimmed your home’s energy demand as much as you can without freezing in the dark and you are ready to order your equipment.
Wait! Have you contacted your local utility?
Almost every utility in the nation has some type of policy or regulation that could impact your ability to generate your own power from your own alternate energy system. Utility policies are a function of State regulations and individual utility company choices. Before you dump that list of PV parts into your checkout basket, contact your utility to make sure you can do what you want to do without being surprised by extra fees, technical restrictions or a hostile utility engineer that doesn’t get what you are trying to do.
The Network for New Energy Choices grades States on net-metering and interconnection laws and gives them an “A” through “F” score on how well they assist consumers with installing alternate energy distributed generation systems. The grades are based on a comparison with recommended regulations featured in the model regulations from the Interstate Renewable Energy Council.
Here are the results from the Network for New Energy Choices report.
Net Metering Grades
A IREC Model , New Jersey, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Maryland, California.
B Oregon, Delaware, Iowa, Nevada, Connecticut, Ohio, New Mexico.
C Arkansas, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Hawaii, Maine, Louisiana, Virginia, North Dakota, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Montana, Vermont, Missouri.
D Washington, New York, Texas, Kentucky, Michigan, Wyoming, Oklahoma, Indiana, West Virginia.
F Utah, D.C., Georgia, North Carolina, Wisconsin.
Interconnection Grades
A IREC Model.
B New Jersey, Arizona.
C California, Ohio, Texas, New York, Colorado, Oregon* , Massachusetts, Georgia, New Mexico* , Vermont, Minnesota.
D Rhode Island, Wisconsin, West Virginia, Arkansas, New Hampshire, Virginia, Iowa, Maryland*, Montana, Michigan, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Connecticut.
F North Carolina, D.C., Wyoming, Louisiana, Delaware, Hawaii, Utah, Washington, Missouri.
The Network for New Energy Choices offers these definitions to explain the difference between interconnection and net-metering and their report offers more details showing what makes a good regulation.
Interconnection – the technical rules for customers to “plug in” to the grid.
Net Metering – the billing arrangement by which customers realize savings from their systems, here 1-kWh generated by the customer has the exact same value as 1-kWh consumed by the customer.
States scoring an A or B are obviously trying to allow distributed alternate energy generators to start-up in their states. States scoring a C are pretending that they care about distributed alternate energy generators. And, States scoring a D or F obviously aren’t interested in having distributed alternative energy play any roll in meeting their electricity demands. The interesting thing is that states scoring A’s are finding spin-off results that improve their economies, reduce costs for customers, and reap financial benefits for their utilities. States scoring D’s and F’s are telling manufacturing industries, businesses and citizens to forget about making any money in the new economy where green businesses are growing new jobs and creating new business opportunities.
The killer in all of this is that a comparison of the top ten states by non-farm employees working in the manufacturing industry are in many cases, the same states that score the lowest on net-metering and interconnection support.
Rank. State – Net-metering Grade/ Interconnection Grade
1. Indiana - D/D
2. Wisconsin - F/D
3. Arkansas - C/D
4. Iowa - B/D
5. Mississippi- no grade/no grade
6. Alabama – no grade/no grade
7. Michigan - D/D
8. Ohio - B/C
9. Tennesse- no grade/no grade
10.Kentucky- D/no grade
So, the states potentially best equipped to make and supply distributed generation equipment and reap the corresponding economic benefits are shooting themselves in the foot when it comes to alternate energy development.
If you live in a State scoring anything less than a B, it’s time to take action. In less time than it took to read this, you can email your state representatives. Tell them you support distributed alternate energy and you think it’s time that they woke up and supported it too. Tell them you’re tired of being a C student- or worse, and you want to get A’s the next time the Network for New Energy Choices scores your State.
To find more details about your utility or your State and how they treat distributed alternate energy generation, visit the Database of State Incentives for Renewables & efficiency (DSIRE) web site and see how they stack up.
Wait! Have you contacted your local utility?
Almost every utility in the nation has some type of policy or regulation that could impact your ability to generate your own power from your own alternate energy system. Utility policies are a function of State regulations and individual utility company choices. Before you dump that list of PV parts into your checkout basket, contact your utility to make sure you can do what you want to do without being surprised by extra fees, technical restrictions or a hostile utility engineer that doesn’t get what you are trying to do.
The Network for New Energy Choices grades States on net-metering and interconnection laws and gives them an “A” through “F” score on how well they assist consumers with installing alternate energy distributed generation systems. The grades are based on a comparison with recommended regulations featured in the model regulations from the Interstate Renewable Energy Council.
Here are the results from the Network for New Energy Choices report.
Net Metering Grades
A IREC Model , New Jersey, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Maryland, California.
B Oregon, Delaware, Iowa, Nevada, Connecticut, Ohio, New Mexico.
C Arkansas, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Hawaii, Maine, Louisiana, Virginia, North Dakota, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Montana, Vermont, Missouri.
D Washington, New York, Texas, Kentucky, Michigan, Wyoming, Oklahoma, Indiana, West Virginia.
F Utah, D.C., Georgia, North Carolina, Wisconsin.
Interconnection Grades
A IREC Model.
B New Jersey, Arizona.
C California, Ohio, Texas, New York, Colorado, Oregon* , Massachusetts, Georgia, New Mexico* , Vermont, Minnesota.
D Rhode Island, Wisconsin, West Virginia, Arkansas, New Hampshire, Virginia, Iowa, Maryland*, Montana, Michigan, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Connecticut.
F North Carolina, D.C., Wyoming, Louisiana, Delaware, Hawaii, Utah, Washington, Missouri.
The Network for New Energy Choices offers these definitions to explain the difference between interconnection and net-metering and their report offers more details showing what makes a good regulation.
Interconnection – the technical rules for customers to “plug in” to the grid.
Net Metering – the billing arrangement by which customers realize savings from their systems, here 1-kWh generated by the customer has the exact same value as 1-kWh consumed by the customer.
States scoring an A or B are obviously trying to allow distributed alternate energy generators to start-up in their states. States scoring a C are pretending that they care about distributed alternate energy generators. And, States scoring a D or F obviously aren’t interested in having distributed alternative energy play any roll in meeting their electricity demands. The interesting thing is that states scoring A’s are finding spin-off results that improve their economies, reduce costs for customers, and reap financial benefits for their utilities. States scoring D’s and F’s are telling manufacturing industries, businesses and citizens to forget about making any money in the new economy where green businesses are growing new jobs and creating new business opportunities.
The killer in all of this is that a comparison of the top ten states by non-farm employees working in the manufacturing industry are in many cases, the same states that score the lowest on net-metering and interconnection support.
Rank. State – Net-metering Grade/ Interconnection Grade
1. Indiana - D/D
2. Wisconsin - F/D
3. Arkansas - C/D
4. Iowa - B/D
5. Mississippi- no grade/no grade
6. Alabama – no grade/no grade
7. Michigan - D/D
8. Ohio - B/C
9. Tennesse- no grade/no grade
10.Kentucky- D/no grade
So, the states potentially best equipped to make and supply distributed generation equipment and reap the corresponding economic benefits are shooting themselves in the foot when it comes to alternate energy development.
If you live in a State scoring anything less than a B, it’s time to take action. In less time than it took to read this, you can email your state representatives. Tell them you support distributed alternate energy and you think it’s time that they woke up and supported it too. Tell them you’re tired of being a C student- or worse, and you want to get A’s the next time the Network for New Energy Choices scores your State.
To find more details about your utility or your State and how they treat distributed alternate energy generation, visit the Database of State Incentives for Renewables & efficiency (DSIRE) web site and see how they stack up.
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
What will you do when your area runs out of electricity? - Preparing for Future Electricity Demands
Ignoring the title question is like an ostrich hiding its head in the sand when attacked by wild dogs. Guess which part of the anatomy gets bitten first? So it could be with us, if we all ignore the facts when it comes to getting electricity to our homes and businesses.
Electricity users throughout the United States and Canada are being ostriches unless they actively ask their elected Representatives to deal with the question, “how can we power the future without destroying the planet or making electricity a luxury few can afford”.
“Summer peak demand in the U.S. is forecast to increase over 135,000 MW or 17.7 percent in the next ten years with committed resources projected to increase 77,000 MW or 8.4 percent
(including uncommitted resources, 123,000 MW or 12.7 percent).” Source: NERC 2007 Long-Term Reliability Assessment
No matter which study or forecast you review, the answer comes out the same. We will not have enough electric power to meet our needs in as little as two years, if our current (pun intended) behavior doesn’t change. It the NERC assessment is correct we will have 5 percent less electricity than we need when 2018 arrives in less than ten years.
Don’t be an ostrich, take action. If you are a member of a rural electric cooperative your supplier belongs to the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. They created a website that makes it easy for anyone to contact their elected representatives. I did it in about five minutes and you can do it too.
Go to https://www.ourenergy.coop and after reading that page, scroll down to the line that says "Contact your electric officials and begin the dialogue now". When you click the arrow at the end of this line, you will be asked to fill out your name and address to email your US Senators and US House of Representatives with the following message:
Our country faces a crisis as electricity use increases faster than available supply. I believe that by unleashing American ingenuity we can solve this problem. What are you doing to speed the development of new technology which will allow me to have the electric power I need while meeting our national climate policy goals? I look forward to your answer and will share it with my friends and neighbors. Thank you.
Then click “Send Message”, that’s it. You don’t even have to know who your representatives are. By filling in your name and address your message will automatically be sent to the correct representatives and you will get a brief confirming message listing which representatives were emailed on your behalf. It’s easy.
Let me know who it went and what you think about it.
© Mark Daily, 2008
Electricity users throughout the United States and Canada are being ostriches unless they actively ask their elected Representatives to deal with the question, “how can we power the future without destroying the planet or making electricity a luxury few can afford”.
“Summer peak demand in the U.S. is forecast to increase over 135,000 MW or 17.7 percent in the next ten years with committed resources projected to increase 77,000 MW or 8.4 percent
(including uncommitted resources, 123,000 MW or 12.7 percent).” Source: NERC 2007 Long-Term Reliability Assessment
No matter which study or forecast you review, the answer comes out the same. We will not have enough electric power to meet our needs in as little as two years, if our current (pun intended) behavior doesn’t change. It the NERC assessment is correct we will have 5 percent less electricity than we need when 2018 arrives in less than ten years.
Don’t be an ostrich, take action. If you are a member of a rural electric cooperative your supplier belongs to the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. They created a website that makes it easy for anyone to contact their elected representatives. I did it in about five minutes and you can do it too.
Go to https://www.ourenergy.coop and after reading that page, scroll down to the line that says "Contact your electric officials and begin the dialogue now". When you click the arrow at the end of this line, you will be asked to fill out your name and address to email your US Senators and US House of Representatives with the following message:
Our country faces a crisis as electricity use increases faster than available supply. I believe that by unleashing American ingenuity we can solve this problem. What are you doing to speed the development of new technology which will allow me to have the electric power I need while meeting our national climate policy goals? I look forward to your answer and will share it with my friends and neighbors. Thank you.
Then click “Send Message”, that’s it. You don’t even have to know who your representatives are. By filling in your name and address your message will automatically be sent to the correct representatives and you will get a brief confirming message listing which representatives were emailed on your behalf. It’s easy.
Let me know who it went and what you think about it.
© Mark Daily, 2008
Monday, August 11, 2008
Clear Skies is a Lie
I can’t figure out why the public isn’t outraged over the obvious disregard for human health that comes with provisions of President Bushes’ Clear Skies Act. This is just one in a long list of legislation proposed by the Bush administration that does the exact opposite of its title. The Clear Skies Act makes our skies less clear by so many measurable standards that the title could only have been selected by a room full of comedians. Clear Skies? I don’t think so.
According the National Resource Defense Counsel, “The Clear Skies legislation sets new targets for emissions of sulfur dioxide, mercury, and nitrogen oxides from U.S. power plants. But these targets are weaker than those that would be put in place if the Bush administration simply implemented and enforced the existing law! Compared to current law, the Clear Skies plan would allow three times more toxic mercury emissions, 50 percent more sulfur emissions, and hundreds of thousands more tons of smog-forming nitrogen oxides. It would also delay cleaning up this pollution by up to a decade compared to current law and force residents of heavily-polluted areas to wait years longer for clean air compared to the existing Clean Air Act.”
Zachary Roth writing for the Columbia Journalism Review put it this way, “It’s not just that the Clear Skies reduction targets are “little different” from what would be achieved by simply enforcing the Clean Air Act. It’s that Clear Skies, despite its name, would actually lead to more pollution than the existing Clean Air Act, because current law calls for further reductions over time.
In other words, either Clear Skies or strict enforcement of the Clean Air Act would make the air cleaner than it is today. But enforcing current law will achieve greater reductions than would Clear Skies”.
According to Energy Central Ken Silverstien “In February, a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. ruled that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had violated the Clean Air Act by refusing to make mercury reductions mandatory. Instead, the Bush administration had proposed a voluntary cap-and-trade system that it says would have reduced mercury emissions by 70 percent by 2018.”
Yet cap and trade means that those that can trade, create hot zones of mercury pollution that may exceed responsible mercury pollution standards.
The NRDC says that “Mercury can cause serious neurological and developmental damage, including birth defects, subtle losses of sensory or cognitive ability, and delays in developmental milestones such as walking and talking. Power plants are responsible for 34 percent of all mercury emissions, which settle into our waters, where they accumulate in fish. In 41 states, officials warn against eating fish from mercury-contaminated lakes and rivers.”
Are people really so busy that they can’t rally enough vocal opposition to this blatant attempt to court irresponsible industries? Are we so strapped financially that we can’t keep our air clean enough to avoid health problems?
If this is all about money why aren’t the taxpayers outraged at the expense of treating air pollution related illnesses and diseases. It has to be less expensive to prevent the pollution than it is to treat all of the health problems associated with dirty air. Yet, people remain focused on complaints about the high cost of electricity without realizing that they are going to have to pay more money for health problems than they would for prevention programs.
I just don’t get it. Can someone out there explain it to me?
According the National Resource Defense Counsel, “The Clear Skies legislation sets new targets for emissions of sulfur dioxide, mercury, and nitrogen oxides from U.S. power plants. But these targets are weaker than those that would be put in place if the Bush administration simply implemented and enforced the existing law! Compared to current law, the Clear Skies plan would allow three times more toxic mercury emissions, 50 percent more sulfur emissions, and hundreds of thousands more tons of smog-forming nitrogen oxides. It would also delay cleaning up this pollution by up to a decade compared to current law and force residents of heavily-polluted areas to wait years longer for clean air compared to the existing Clean Air Act.”
Zachary Roth writing for the Columbia Journalism Review put it this way, “It’s not just that the Clear Skies reduction targets are “little different” from what would be achieved by simply enforcing the Clean Air Act. It’s that Clear Skies, despite its name, would actually lead to more pollution than the existing Clean Air Act, because current law calls for further reductions over time.
In other words, either Clear Skies or strict enforcement of the Clean Air Act would make the air cleaner than it is today. But enforcing current law will achieve greater reductions than would Clear Skies”.
According to Energy Central Ken Silverstien “In February, a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. ruled that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had violated the Clean Air Act by refusing to make mercury reductions mandatory. Instead, the Bush administration had proposed a voluntary cap-and-trade system that it says would have reduced mercury emissions by 70 percent by 2018.”
Yet cap and trade means that those that can trade, create hot zones of mercury pollution that may exceed responsible mercury pollution standards.
The NRDC says that “Mercury can cause serious neurological and developmental damage, including birth defects, subtle losses of sensory or cognitive ability, and delays in developmental milestones such as walking and talking. Power plants are responsible for 34 percent of all mercury emissions, which settle into our waters, where they accumulate in fish. In 41 states, officials warn against eating fish from mercury-contaminated lakes and rivers.”
Are people really so busy that they can’t rally enough vocal opposition to this blatant attempt to court irresponsible industries? Are we so strapped financially that we can’t keep our air clean enough to avoid health problems?
If this is all about money why aren’t the taxpayers outraged at the expense of treating air pollution related illnesses and diseases. It has to be less expensive to prevent the pollution than it is to treat all of the health problems associated with dirty air. Yet, people remain focused on complaints about the high cost of electricity without realizing that they are going to have to pay more money for health problems than they would for prevention programs.
I just don’t get it. Can someone out there explain it to me?
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Alternate Energy Advocates need to Get Real
Electricity is today, by almost any standard, a requirement for modern life.
A nation-wide system of unrelated companies makes electricity, a product that cannot be seen, stored or stockpiled and gets it delivered to every corner of the nation through a series of wires connected by thousands of different companies, 24 hours a day for 365 days a year.
This product reaches the customer at the exact moment that the customer wants it- even when the customer doesn’t know they want it. If too much electricity is delivered, things start melting. If too little electricity is delivered, things start melting. This is not like gas for your car. There is no gauge showing a low tank so you can head to the filling station. This is a product that most homeowners only think about when it isn’t there or when the price goes up.
The back bone of the electric power generation system consists of thousands of power plants spread across the country. Most are located strategically near urban load centers or sources of fuel. Usually, sources of fuel, like coal or wind or hydro power, are nowhere near urban load centers.
Base-load fossil fuel is stockpiled allowing power plants to schedule power production to meet anticipated loads. When power plant schedulers get it right, nobody notices. When they get it wrong, rolling brown-outs or black-outs inspire months of government investigation and reams of customer hate mail focused on those utilities that left them in the dark or melted their ice cream. Wholesale power suppliers pay various contract penalties for being short on generation delivery if they under produce or waste electricity and ratepayer’s money if they produce more than is needed.
Because of the ability to schedule these base-load fossil fuel systems, they are called “dispatch-able”. Schedulers dispatch power at varying levels targeted every thirty minutes to meet your electricity demands. They do it based on formulas that consider historic loads, predicted weather conditions and anticipated load growth. Wind and solar energy are not “dispatch-able”.
Based load power plants have an excellent track record of meeting the nation’s needs. As a whole, they achieve an astounding 80% production output that combines with back-up power generation and regional inter-connections to provide electricity at your house almost 100 percent of the time.
Renewable power production facilities have a track record of 25% output. As renewables become more plentiful and spread over wider geographic areas, this “production” factor will improve. Increased reliability through diversity has long been a goal of renewable energy advocates. The Rocky Mountain Institute is one group supporting this concept. Their recent research in the July 2008 issue of their Solution Journal describes how that might come about.
Utilities, have historically appeared to drag their feet about including wind and solar power into their generation portfolio. This is not because they dislike clean power, but because they feel like a 25 % production track record does not meet the needs of their customers. From their perspective, every kilowatt of wind or solar power generation must be backed up with equal base load generation to cover the 75% of the time renewable resources fail to deliver power. In a business dedicated to reliable power at the least cost, the expense of supporting renewable energy means building redundant base-load coverage.
Until customers get “real” about alternate energy expectations there will always be conflict between customer expectations and utility’s ability to deliver.
A nation-wide system of unrelated companies makes electricity, a product that cannot be seen, stored or stockpiled and gets it delivered to every corner of the nation through a series of wires connected by thousands of different companies, 24 hours a day for 365 days a year.
This product reaches the customer at the exact moment that the customer wants it- even when the customer doesn’t know they want it. If too much electricity is delivered, things start melting. If too little electricity is delivered, things start melting. This is not like gas for your car. There is no gauge showing a low tank so you can head to the filling station. This is a product that most homeowners only think about when it isn’t there or when the price goes up.
The back bone of the electric power generation system consists of thousands of power plants spread across the country. Most are located strategically near urban load centers or sources of fuel. Usually, sources of fuel, like coal or wind or hydro power, are nowhere near urban load centers.
Base-load fossil fuel is stockpiled allowing power plants to schedule power production to meet anticipated loads. When power plant schedulers get it right, nobody notices. When they get it wrong, rolling brown-outs or black-outs inspire months of government investigation and reams of customer hate mail focused on those utilities that left them in the dark or melted their ice cream. Wholesale power suppliers pay various contract penalties for being short on generation delivery if they under produce or waste electricity and ratepayer’s money if they produce more than is needed.
Because of the ability to schedule these base-load fossil fuel systems, they are called “dispatch-able”. Schedulers dispatch power at varying levels targeted every thirty minutes to meet your electricity demands. They do it based on formulas that consider historic loads, predicted weather conditions and anticipated load growth. Wind and solar energy are not “dispatch-able”.
Based load power plants have an excellent track record of meeting the nation’s needs. As a whole, they achieve an astounding 80% production output that combines with back-up power generation and regional inter-connections to provide electricity at your house almost 100 percent of the time.
Renewable power production facilities have a track record of 25% output. As renewables become more plentiful and spread over wider geographic areas, this “production” factor will improve. Increased reliability through diversity has long been a goal of renewable energy advocates. The Rocky Mountain Institute is one group supporting this concept. Their recent research in the July 2008 issue of their Solution Journal describes how that might come about.
Utilities, have historically appeared to drag their feet about including wind and solar power into their generation portfolio. This is not because they dislike clean power, but because they feel like a 25 % production track record does not meet the needs of their customers. From their perspective, every kilowatt of wind or solar power generation must be backed up with equal base load generation to cover the 75% of the time renewable resources fail to deliver power. In a business dedicated to reliable power at the least cost, the expense of supporting renewable energy means building redundant base-load coverage.
Until customers get “real” about alternate energy expectations there will always be conflict between customer expectations and utility’s ability to deliver.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Why Environmentalists think Electric Utility Executives are a pain.
Environmentalists view utility executives as part of the cause of global climate change and resource pollution rather than as the defenders of low cost reliable energy that electric utility executives view themselves being. This disconnect between executive’s self image and the environmental community image has several sources. One is the media attention focused on electric utility problems and mistakes. Enron leaps into mind as does the California billing crisis. Unfortunately every mistake from Three Mile Island to Florida’s recent blackout feeds an impression that electric utility executives make important decisions without including the public in their decision making. These media reports have been long on fearful emotions and short on engineering details. It comes down to the idea that people tend to fear what they don’t understand and utility executives have not been at all successful at improving the public’s understanding of the utility business.
The other source of this distrust goes back many years.
In an address to the National Association of Science Writers in New York on September 16, 1954, US Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Lewis L. Strauss was talking about nuclear power and said, "It is not too much to expect that our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter; will know of great periodic regional famines in the world only as matters of history; will travel effortlessly over the seas and under them and through the air with a minimum of danger and at great speeds, and will experience a lifespan far longer than ours, as disease yields and man comes to understand what causes him to age. This is the forecast of an age of peace." (N.Y. Times, August 7, 1955)
Now that the future has arrived we all feel cheated since few of these predictions have materialized. The promise of electricity “too cheap to meter” hits especially hard as rate increases nation-wide reminder us of the failure to reach this dream. So, we have to blame someone and who better to blame than people we don’t really understand, electric utility executives.
And of course, electric utility executives encourage a certain amount of persecution simply by the way they conduct business. If they manage an investor owned utility, their allegiance is to stockholders and investors whose primary interest is the biggest return on their investment. If they lead a municipal or member cooperative electric utility, their allegiance is to their diverse constituents. Some constituents believe we must explore alternate energy resources, demand side management and energy conservation while other constituents simply want the cheapest way to keep beer cold and light bulbs working.
While the environmental community buys the whole global climate change scenario, utility executives generally remain skeptical about the role of power generation in climate change.
Al Gore included this quote in his book about the subject that seems to apply here.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” Upton Sinclair
Utility Executive are well educated and experienced. They have seen a lot of history and simply don’t buy the premise that mankind is powerful enough to alter the planet’s climate. A common agreement about facts remains a barrier of distrust between utility executives and the environmental community. Many “green” concepts and the load reduction possibilities of energy conservation are also viewed skeptically by utility executives because in their experience customers don’t use these programs, even when they are well advertised and free.
To add to these differences in world view, they tend to over-estimate load growth because it takes so long to get new generation and transmission facilities in place. They feel the only way they can avoid the rolling blackouts of the Northeast several years ago or more recent sustained power outages in southern Florida is to have lots of facilities approved and ready to go.
The rewards for succeeding with energy conservation and demand side management are not equal to the penalties imposed for poor power reliability.
Utility executives refuse to talk about anything but base-load coal generation because when real numbers are compared, they do not see how renewable energy or energy conservation can meet the demands for electricity based on today’s energy use growth trends. Yet, if they stand up and say these things, environmentalists respond with personal attacks and polarizing comments. This only increases the resolve of utility executives to push for business as usual. It forces them to retreat into protective policies that lack transparency.
Balancing the diverse needs and desires of electric utility customers is not for the faint of heart. Yet, from the looks of things today, it is clear that utilities must do a better job of explaining a boring but necessary business to a busy and misinformed public. "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology." - Carl Sagan
And, this lack of knowledge will continue to haunt utility executives for many years. Their refusal to discuss facts about alternatives because they think it is a waste of time, money and effort will continue to be the primary reason that environmentalists think electric utility executives are a pain in the… you know what.
The other source of this distrust goes back many years.
In an address to the National Association of Science Writers in New York on September 16, 1954, US Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Lewis L. Strauss was talking about nuclear power and said, "It is not too much to expect that our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter; will know of great periodic regional famines in the world only as matters of history; will travel effortlessly over the seas and under them and through the air with a minimum of danger and at great speeds, and will experience a lifespan far longer than ours, as disease yields and man comes to understand what causes him to age. This is the forecast of an age of peace." (N.Y. Times, August 7, 1955)
Now that the future has arrived we all feel cheated since few of these predictions have materialized. The promise of electricity “too cheap to meter” hits especially hard as rate increases nation-wide reminder us of the failure to reach this dream. So, we have to blame someone and who better to blame than people we don’t really understand, electric utility executives.
And of course, electric utility executives encourage a certain amount of persecution simply by the way they conduct business. If they manage an investor owned utility, their allegiance is to stockholders and investors whose primary interest is the biggest return on their investment. If they lead a municipal or member cooperative electric utility, their allegiance is to their diverse constituents. Some constituents believe we must explore alternate energy resources, demand side management and energy conservation while other constituents simply want the cheapest way to keep beer cold and light bulbs working.
While the environmental community buys the whole global climate change scenario, utility executives generally remain skeptical about the role of power generation in climate change.
Al Gore included this quote in his book about the subject that seems to apply here.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” Upton Sinclair
Utility Executive are well educated and experienced. They have seen a lot of history and simply don’t buy the premise that mankind is powerful enough to alter the planet’s climate. A common agreement about facts remains a barrier of distrust between utility executives and the environmental community. Many “green” concepts and the load reduction possibilities of energy conservation are also viewed skeptically by utility executives because in their experience customers don’t use these programs, even when they are well advertised and free.
To add to these differences in world view, they tend to over-estimate load growth because it takes so long to get new generation and transmission facilities in place. They feel the only way they can avoid the rolling blackouts of the Northeast several years ago or more recent sustained power outages in southern Florida is to have lots of facilities approved and ready to go.
The rewards for succeeding with energy conservation and demand side management are not equal to the penalties imposed for poor power reliability.
Utility executives refuse to talk about anything but base-load coal generation because when real numbers are compared, they do not see how renewable energy or energy conservation can meet the demands for electricity based on today’s energy use growth trends. Yet, if they stand up and say these things, environmentalists respond with personal attacks and polarizing comments. This only increases the resolve of utility executives to push for business as usual. It forces them to retreat into protective policies that lack transparency.
Balancing the diverse needs and desires of electric utility customers is not for the faint of heart. Yet, from the looks of things today, it is clear that utilities must do a better job of explaining a boring but necessary business to a busy and misinformed public. "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology." - Carl Sagan
And, this lack of knowledge will continue to haunt utility executives for many years. Their refusal to discuss facts about alternatives because they think it is a waste of time, money and effort will continue to be the primary reason that environmentalists think electric utility executives are a pain in the… you know what.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Why Utility Executives Hate Renewable Energy Portfolio Standards
Did you ever wonder why Renewable Energy provides less than ten percent of this nation’s electric energy? What the heck is an RPS and why should you take action to support them? And, finally if RPS’s are such a good idea, why do many utility executives hate them?
Defining Renewable Portfolio Standards
Renewable Portfolio Standards are not exactly on everyone’s mind these days. A Google search of RPS is just as likely to turn up sites about Rock – Paper – Scissors. Some insist that RPS is a game, but for states moving ahead with renewable energy industries, Renewable Portfolio Standards, sometimes called Renewable Electricity Standards, can be just the extra push that renewables need to become a big player in the electric energy generation game.
“A renewable portfolio standard is a state policy that requires electricity providers to obtain a minimum percentage of their power from renewable energy resources by a certain date. Currently there are 24 states plus the District of Columbia that have RPS policies in place. Together these states account for more than half of the electricity sales in the United States.
Four other states, Illinois, Missouri, Virginia, and Vermont, have nonbinding goals for adoption of renewable energy instead of an RPS.
Three states, Missouri, Virginia, and Vermont, have set voluntary goals for adopting renewable energy instead of portfolio standards with binding targets.”
Source: Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy
Today renewable energy makes up less than 10% of the generation mix anywhere in the nation. And, 8% of that is from conventional large hydroelectric dam facilities. Wind generation even with its recent strong growth amounts to less than 1% of the generation mix and solar comes in at 0.04% of the generation resource in 2005.
Non-renewable resources mostly fossil fuel related, still account for 89.9% of the electricity generated in the USA.
Utility Executives Hate Renewable Portfolio Standards
So, why do some utility executives appose Renewable Portfolio Standards? It’s simple. No one likes it when someone else tells them what to do, especially when that someone else is outside the industry and expertise of that industry. Utility executives feel that the public is ill-informed about the true costs of electric energy generation. Utility executives with electrical engineering background especially feel that the public has arrived at their “pro-renewable” stance based on incomplete or faulty information. “If you knew what I know….,” you can hear them saying.
Frankly, I think that these executives are right. You don’t have to review too many of my previous blogs to find examples of misguided renewable cheerleaders getting carried away with a few acts or ignoring the facts all together. One mission of this blog is to correct that lack of information. The Union of Concerned Scientists must feel the same way because their FAQ does a pretty nice job of answering those happy hour questions about renewable energy.
Despite gains made in renewable energy production and in spite of the fact that the “fuel” for wind and solar energy is free, the fact still remains that all renewable energy resources cost more to get into the grid than non-renewable energy.
The Bottom Line for Renewable Energy
So, here is the real reason utility executives hate RPS. It raises rates and these guys have never ever gotten one phone call from any of their consumers yelling at them for having rates that were too low. Oh no my friends. I know from personal experience being the main person fielding angry customer complaints that I never, ever in fifteen years of dealing with angry customers – had a customer angry with me because rates were too low; quite the opposite in fact. And, since utility executives are trying to deliver electricity at the best rates possible, no one wants to be forced into RPS regulations mandating higher rates. Or, worse yet mandating rate freezes while requiring RPS targets, similar to what the retail deregulation experience did in many states.
A recent study by American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy of the financial impacts of RPS adoption shows that over all energy costs would go down but the cost savings do not happen right away and this study shows that electricity rates by themselves go up as a result of RPS implementation.
Renewable Energy Management
Renewable Energy tends to be a small scale disbursed generation resource. This requires more coordination for dispatching electricity to the load or demand centers that need the juice. Having a host of renewable energy resource generators to coordinate instead of one huge coal fired power plant gives utility executives nightmares. While there can be positive aspects to a more widely distributed generation resource, there is also the real possibility that making the system more complicated will lead to more system failures, brown-outs and black outs from mistakes made in the dispatch process.
What Can You Do to help Push Renewable Energy Electricity Generation and RPS forward?
So, how do we get around this opposition and get state legislators to adopt renewable portfolio standards?
There are three things that you must do to save the world.
First, know what you are talking about. Get the facts. Find out what alternate energy can really do. Parroting phrases like, “the State of Nevada has enough solar energy to power the entire US economy” is counter-productive. This may be a true statement, but unless you support extensive transmission line construction, no one cares what happens in Nevada.
Second, become a vocal, but polite voice advocating renewable energy development through the adoption of Renewable Energy or Renewable Electricity Portfolio Standards. Write to state and national elected officials and your utility executives and tell them that you support higher rates as long as those increases go toward the addition of renewable energy resources in their generation portfolios.
Finally the absolute most important thing that you can do to help renewable energy become a bigger percentage of the electricity generation mix is stop using electricity stupidly. This is more than just turning the lights off. Residential lighting in the US accounts for only about five percent of the entire electric energy demand. So even if you use headlamps all the time you haven’t done much to reduce energy use. Energy conservation means doing the same work smarter, by buying the most energy efficient appliances; hunting down and eliminating phantom electric loads in your house; making sure your home has the best insulation levels and high quality windows possible. Utility executives are not generating electricity because it’s a lot of fun. They are generating electricity because you are asking for it. Read some previous postings to find out more about energy conservation.
My next Blog will explain why utility executives think environmentalists are a pain in the ass.
©Mark Richard Daily
Defining Renewable Portfolio Standards
Renewable Portfolio Standards are not exactly on everyone’s mind these days. A Google search of RPS is just as likely to turn up sites about Rock – Paper – Scissors. Some insist that RPS is a game, but for states moving ahead with renewable energy industries, Renewable Portfolio Standards, sometimes called Renewable Electricity Standards, can be just the extra push that renewables need to become a big player in the electric energy generation game.
“A renewable portfolio standard is a state policy that requires electricity providers to obtain a minimum percentage of their power from renewable energy resources by a certain date. Currently there are 24 states plus the District of Columbia that have RPS policies in place. Together these states account for more than half of the electricity sales in the United States.
Four other states, Illinois, Missouri, Virginia, and Vermont, have nonbinding goals for adoption of renewable energy instead of an RPS.
Three states, Missouri, Virginia, and Vermont, have set voluntary goals for adopting renewable energy instead of portfolio standards with binding targets.”
Source: Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy
Today renewable energy makes up less than 10% of the generation mix anywhere in the nation. And, 8% of that is from conventional large hydroelectric dam facilities. Wind generation even with its recent strong growth amounts to less than 1% of the generation mix and solar comes in at 0.04% of the generation resource in 2005.
Non-renewable resources mostly fossil fuel related, still account for 89.9% of the electricity generated in the USA.
Utility Executives Hate Renewable Portfolio Standards
So, why do some utility executives appose Renewable Portfolio Standards? It’s simple. No one likes it when someone else tells them what to do, especially when that someone else is outside the industry and expertise of that industry. Utility executives feel that the public is ill-informed about the true costs of electric energy generation. Utility executives with electrical engineering background especially feel that the public has arrived at their “pro-renewable” stance based on incomplete or faulty information. “If you knew what I know….,” you can hear them saying.
Frankly, I think that these executives are right. You don’t have to review too many of my previous blogs to find examples of misguided renewable cheerleaders getting carried away with a few acts or ignoring the facts all together. One mission of this blog is to correct that lack of information. The Union of Concerned Scientists must feel the same way because their FAQ does a pretty nice job of answering those happy hour questions about renewable energy.
Despite gains made in renewable energy production and in spite of the fact that the “fuel” for wind and solar energy is free, the fact still remains that all renewable energy resources cost more to get into the grid than non-renewable energy.
The Bottom Line for Renewable Energy
So, here is the real reason utility executives hate RPS. It raises rates and these guys have never ever gotten one phone call from any of their consumers yelling at them for having rates that were too low. Oh no my friends. I know from personal experience being the main person fielding angry customer complaints that I never, ever in fifteen years of dealing with angry customers – had a customer angry with me because rates were too low; quite the opposite in fact. And, since utility executives are trying to deliver electricity at the best rates possible, no one wants to be forced into RPS regulations mandating higher rates. Or, worse yet mandating rate freezes while requiring RPS targets, similar to what the retail deregulation experience did in many states.
A recent study by American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy of the financial impacts of RPS adoption shows that over all energy costs would go down but the cost savings do not happen right away and this study shows that electricity rates by themselves go up as a result of RPS implementation.
Renewable Energy Management
Renewable Energy tends to be a small scale disbursed generation resource. This requires more coordination for dispatching electricity to the load or demand centers that need the juice. Having a host of renewable energy resource generators to coordinate instead of one huge coal fired power plant gives utility executives nightmares. While there can be positive aspects to a more widely distributed generation resource, there is also the real possibility that making the system more complicated will lead to more system failures, brown-outs and black outs from mistakes made in the dispatch process.
What Can You Do to help Push Renewable Energy Electricity Generation and RPS forward?
So, how do we get around this opposition and get state legislators to adopt renewable portfolio standards?
There are three things that you must do to save the world.
First, know what you are talking about. Get the facts. Find out what alternate energy can really do. Parroting phrases like, “the State of Nevada has enough solar energy to power the entire US economy” is counter-productive. This may be a true statement, but unless you support extensive transmission line construction, no one cares what happens in Nevada.
Second, become a vocal, but polite voice advocating renewable energy development through the adoption of Renewable Energy or Renewable Electricity Portfolio Standards. Write to state and national elected officials and your utility executives and tell them that you support higher rates as long as those increases go toward the addition of renewable energy resources in their generation portfolios.
Finally the absolute most important thing that you can do to help renewable energy become a bigger percentage of the electricity generation mix is stop using electricity stupidly. This is more than just turning the lights off. Residential lighting in the US accounts for only about five percent of the entire electric energy demand. So even if you use headlamps all the time you haven’t done much to reduce energy use. Energy conservation means doing the same work smarter, by buying the most energy efficient appliances; hunting down and eliminating phantom electric loads in your house; making sure your home has the best insulation levels and high quality windows possible. Utility executives are not generating electricity because it’s a lot of fun. They are generating electricity because you are asking for it. Read some previous postings to find out more about energy conservation.
My next Blog will explain why utility executives think environmentalists are a pain in the ass.
©Mark Richard Daily
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
The Death of the Electric Utility Industry- Part Two
So, here is the scenario for the demise of central station electricity power grids. Many of the key elements are already visible. First you have climbing electric rates. Today, no one is predicting a decrease in electric rates. In fact no one is predicting stabilization of electric rates in the near future.
Next as central station power production rates climb, costs for alternative power systems keep going down. Innovations in wind turbine design, solar photo-voltaic output and other alternate electricity systems continue to drive down the costs of delivering power to your house from these choices. And, the majority of these systems are designed to work right at your house. No more buried cable or over head power lines for residential development. Bye Bye wires companies. No more distribution meters on homes for local distribution companies, adios distribution companies.
Of course this isn’t going to happen tomorrow, but the trends are there. Today the driving expense for wholesale power costs are power plants and transmission grids. These two features of the electric utility industry are also the most damaging to the environment. Witness the reduction in the number of proposed coal fired power plants as investors and consumer re-evaluate their roles in a climate change environment. Take away the residential load and what happens? Poof, now all that’s left is business and industrial loads.
Here too the trend is moving to disbursed generation facilities. Part of this movement is to improve reliability and part is a direct response to increasing rates and the lack of control that businesses feel over electric utility rate increases. The Y2K scare drove many industries to set up back up power systems that were under their control, just in case. So, many facilities have already done some of the planning to be grid free.
What can you do about all of this. Get informed. Find out how solar and wind might work at your house. Use existing tools to calculate what it would take for you to get off the grid. Even if you choose not to make the plunge, like me, you will at least understand your energy appetite and be able to have some control over your own climate change emissions. Here are some sites to get you started with your quest.
For innovations in wind energy see- http://www.getsmartenergy.com/
For help sizing your photovoltaic system see- http://www.realgoodssolar.com/
For help reducing your home energy use see- http://www.epa.gov/cleanenergy/energy-and-you/reduce.html
I like electric utilities, really I do. I’m not ready to do this stuff by myself. I want a team of lineman ready to help get the lights back on after a storm. I want an office of skilled engineers designing a safe and reliable system to keep my home running. What I don’t want is an industry wide arrogance about individual energy choices that assumes central station power generation is the only economical way to go. That may be true today, but tomorrow will be here sooner than many utility executives can imagine.
Next as central station power production rates climb, costs for alternative power systems keep going down. Innovations in wind turbine design, solar photo-voltaic output and other alternate electricity systems continue to drive down the costs of delivering power to your house from these choices. And, the majority of these systems are designed to work right at your house. No more buried cable or over head power lines for residential development. Bye Bye wires companies. No more distribution meters on homes for local distribution companies, adios distribution companies.
Of course this isn’t going to happen tomorrow, but the trends are there. Today the driving expense for wholesale power costs are power plants and transmission grids. These two features of the electric utility industry are also the most damaging to the environment. Witness the reduction in the number of proposed coal fired power plants as investors and consumer re-evaluate their roles in a climate change environment. Take away the residential load and what happens? Poof, now all that’s left is business and industrial loads.
Here too the trend is moving to disbursed generation facilities. Part of this movement is to improve reliability and part is a direct response to increasing rates and the lack of control that businesses feel over electric utility rate increases. The Y2K scare drove many industries to set up back up power systems that were under their control, just in case. So, many facilities have already done some of the planning to be grid free.
What can you do about all of this. Get informed. Find out how solar and wind might work at your house. Use existing tools to calculate what it would take for you to get off the grid. Even if you choose not to make the plunge, like me, you will at least understand your energy appetite and be able to have some control over your own climate change emissions. Here are some sites to get you started with your quest.
For innovations in wind energy see- http://www.getsmartenergy.com/
For help sizing your photovoltaic system see- http://www.realgoodssolar.com/
For help reducing your home energy use see- http://www.epa.gov/cleanenergy/energy-and-you/reduce.html
I like electric utilities, really I do. I’m not ready to do this stuff by myself. I want a team of lineman ready to help get the lights back on after a storm. I want an office of skilled engineers designing a safe and reliable system to keep my home running. What I don’t want is an industry wide arrogance about individual energy choices that assumes central station power generation is the only economical way to go. That may be true today, but tomorrow will be here sooner than many utility executives can imagine.
Monday, November 26, 2007
The Death of the Electric Utility Industry
"The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated"- Mark Twain.
Like Mark Twain, the US electric utility industry will no doubt be surprised by my predictions that their death is coming soon. This is no apocalyptic prediction and certainly no veiled monkey wrench threat; so, DHS don’t get your knickers in a knot.
What I am talking about is the age old cyclical nature of technology and the natural evolution of things from disbursed to central and back to disbursed again. I am sure entropy is at work in this, or chaos theory or at least a corollary version of my mother’s plea to, “put all your toys in one box”. But, I knew that keeping my toys spread out through the house was more efficient. I could get them quicker and if one broke I didn’t have to go all the way back to the toy box to get a new one.
Hang with me just a little longer this is really cool stuff and what you are about to learn will help you for the rest of your life.
The popular press and media hype about renewable energy versus that bad old kind of energy made from coal and hydrocarbon fuels leads many people to believe that if those greedy bastards at the electric utility company would just use wind and solar instead of coal, our electric bills would drop with green house gas emissions. Then Al Gore could retire and quit using all that jet fuel to travel around the world telling everyone about global climate change.
It must be a fossil fuel baron’s conspiracy keeping the world from clean air and cheap power right? After all the sun shines everywhere and that damned spring wind makes everyone insane part of the year and Wyoming residents crazy all year long. You just have to watch our vice president for awhile to see the proof of that, but I digress.
If you want to call yourself an American, or an Environmentalist or an Industrialist or a true blue techie, you have to know the history of electricity generation. I’m not going to launch into the details of the knock down drag out contest between the Alternating Current philosophies of Thomas Edison and the Direct Current philosophies of Nikola Tesla, but read those links and find out what the limitations where of each system because that same argument is coming back to haunt the electric utility industry.
It’s no secret that distributed distribution (e.g. home light plants and individual municipal electric generation) systems generally went the way of the dinosaur. Efficiencies for power production and air quality have long been assumed to be best with a central location for power production. Why else do you think all of those investor owned, cooperative and municipal utilities got together to power the industrial world from central power plants? Check it out yourself. If you live in or near a city that existed before the 1940’s, I’ll bet you that they had their own, light plant or power plant. When large central station transmission lines came to the neighborhood most of these municipalities dropped their power generation facilities and started buying the bulk of their electricity from a wholesale power supplier. Doing this reduced their costs and their headaches. It also made the air in your city cleaner.
Yet as construction costs, electricity demand, and environmental concerns grow, it will be these big central power suppliers that will disappear like an extinct reptile. No- wait; I like electric utilities, really. Without them we would have all been in the dark and powerless. Yet today, their desperate fight for survival is due to the fact that the big money and the big expense, is still in central station electricity generation. And, it’s the “big expense” part of the equation that spells the death knell for electric power generation as we know it.
Of course the electric utilities argue that alternate energy is not capable of powering our society. They are right and they will continue to be right for another 15 to 50 years or until society changes and that is where it gets interesting. Society is changing and the change is accelerating in a way that will make distributed power generation king again, dethroning King Coal and its entire kingdom. Remember, “The stone age did not end because we ran out of stones and the Oil (fossil fuel) Age will not end because we ran out of Oil (fossil fuels). – Don Huberts, Shell Hydrogen.
My next Blog entry will begin to explain how I think this is going to happen.
Like Mark Twain, the US electric utility industry will no doubt be surprised by my predictions that their death is coming soon. This is no apocalyptic prediction and certainly no veiled monkey wrench threat; so, DHS don’t get your knickers in a knot.
What I am talking about is the age old cyclical nature of technology and the natural evolution of things from disbursed to central and back to disbursed again. I am sure entropy is at work in this, or chaos theory or at least a corollary version of my mother’s plea to, “put all your toys in one box”. But, I knew that keeping my toys spread out through the house was more efficient. I could get them quicker and if one broke I didn’t have to go all the way back to the toy box to get a new one.
Hang with me just a little longer this is really cool stuff and what you are about to learn will help you for the rest of your life.
The popular press and media hype about renewable energy versus that bad old kind of energy made from coal and hydrocarbon fuels leads many people to believe that if those greedy bastards at the electric utility company would just use wind and solar instead of coal, our electric bills would drop with green house gas emissions. Then Al Gore could retire and quit using all that jet fuel to travel around the world telling everyone about global climate change.
It must be a fossil fuel baron’s conspiracy keeping the world from clean air and cheap power right? After all the sun shines everywhere and that damned spring wind makes everyone insane part of the year and Wyoming residents crazy all year long. You just have to watch our vice president for awhile to see the proof of that, but I digress.
If you want to call yourself an American, or an Environmentalist or an Industrialist or a true blue techie, you have to know the history of electricity generation. I’m not going to launch into the details of the knock down drag out contest between the Alternating Current philosophies of Thomas Edison and the Direct Current philosophies of Nikola Tesla, but read those links and find out what the limitations where of each system because that same argument is coming back to haunt the electric utility industry.
It’s no secret that distributed distribution (e.g. home light plants and individual municipal electric generation) systems generally went the way of the dinosaur. Efficiencies for power production and air quality have long been assumed to be best with a central location for power production. Why else do you think all of those investor owned, cooperative and municipal utilities got together to power the industrial world from central power plants? Check it out yourself. If you live in or near a city that existed before the 1940’s, I’ll bet you that they had their own, light plant or power plant. When large central station transmission lines came to the neighborhood most of these municipalities dropped their power generation facilities and started buying the bulk of their electricity from a wholesale power supplier. Doing this reduced their costs and their headaches. It also made the air in your city cleaner.
Yet as construction costs, electricity demand, and environmental concerns grow, it will be these big central power suppliers that will disappear like an extinct reptile. No- wait; I like electric utilities, really. Without them we would have all been in the dark and powerless. Yet today, their desperate fight for survival is due to the fact that the big money and the big expense, is still in central station electricity generation. And, it’s the “big expense” part of the equation that spells the death knell for electric power generation as we know it.
Of course the electric utilities argue that alternate energy is not capable of powering our society. They are right and they will continue to be right for another 15 to 50 years or until society changes and that is where it gets interesting. Society is changing and the change is accelerating in a way that will make distributed power generation king again, dethroning King Coal and its entire kingdom. Remember, “The stone age did not end because we ran out of stones and the Oil (fossil fuel) Age will not end because we ran out of Oil (fossil fuels). – Don Huberts, Shell Hydrogen.
My next Blog entry will begin to explain how I think this is going to happen.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Air Permit Denial Threatens to Cost Consumers
Like the old Chinese curse, " may you live in interesting times", recent events could be on track for a perfect storm for electric utility generation, with electricity consumers caught in the middle and footing the bill as usual.
The convergence of recent US Supreme Court decisions, pending State and Federal government climate change legislation and citizen discussions about global warming put consumers at risk for a deluge of electric rate increases. Add a cold winter, or higher transportation and maintenance costs and the writing is on the wall. For those consumers that believe that current electricity rates are too low and do not reflect the external costs of air pollution created during electricity generation, the recent decision to deny power plant air quality permits in Kansas is a good decision. For those consumers struggling on fixed incomes or tight budgets, the decision may mean electric rates will continue to climb. That could be bad for everyone.
The Background
Tri-State G&T proposed the joint construction of the largest coal-fired power plant in the United States, to be built at the cost of $3.6 billion. The power plant with its two 700-megawatt generators was to be built and financed by several utilities including, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, Sunflower Electric Association, Golden Spread Electric Cooperative, Inc, and Midwest Energy.All four companies are member owned, non-profit cooperative corporations. The first three companies are wholesale power suppliers. Sunflower, organized in 1957, serves six rural electric distribution cooperatives in 34 western Kansas counties. Tri-State, started in 1952, is owned by and serves 44 electric cooperatives across portions of Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico and Wyoming. Golden Spread Electric Cooperative was founded in 1984 and serves 16 distribution cooperatives in Oklahoma and Texas. Midwest Energy serves customers in central and western Kansas.
The new power plants are planned as an expansion to existing power generation facilities owned by Sunflower on their 10,000-acre, 360-megawatt Holcomb Station site. This is located approximately four miles south of Holcomb, Kansas.
The original plan was for Golden Spread, Sunflower, Tri-State and other investors to jointly own the first new 700-megawatt unit. Construction of the first unit was planned to begin in 2007 and be operational in 2012. Golden Spread planed to own 400 megawatts of the unit’s output for supply to its member systems. Sunflower expected to provide up to 150 megawatts to its member systems, and Midwest Energy was in for 75 megawatts. Tri-State planned to own the second 700-megawatt unit, to supply power to its member systems. This unit was projected to be online in 2013, but recent proposals before the denial show Tri-State postponing construction and tying the construction schedule to future load growth.
The Denial
According to an October 18, 2007 Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE), press release concern over carbon dioxide production was the key factor in permit denial. Bolstered by the recent US Supreme Court decision (Massachusetts v. EPA), KHDE Secretary Roderick L. Bremby, stated, "I believe it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing".
Massachusetts v. EPA defined carbon dioxide ( CO2) as an air quality pollutant that should be regulated by the EPA. The 66 page Supreme Court Opinion refers to specific scientific studies and reports documenting the existing and predicted negative impacts from global climate change and ties these changes directly to human activity; specifically the accelerated production of green house gases. Carbon dioxide heads the list of these green house gas emissions.
The EPA defines coal fired electricity generation as the single largest source of CO2 emissions in the USA. Coal fired electricity generation exceeds CO2 emissions from the entire transportation sector.
This permit denial is the first such denial in the nation."We are disappointed with the Secretary's arbitrary and capricious action," said Earl Watkins, Sunflower's president and chief executive officer. Those disappointed with the denial point out the neither the EPA or the State of Kansas include CO2 as a regulated air pollutant. Project partners felt that they had met all environmental and regulatory requirements with their proposal.
This action also changes Sunflower's plans to invest in and advance algae technology that would use carbon dioxide from the power plants. Attempting to address carbon emissions, the project partners completed initial testing for an innovative algae reactor that would use a portion of the carbon dioxide emissions from Holcomb Station to produce biofuels, including ethanol and biodiesel. Funds that would have been earned from the power plant expansion project were expected to be used to finance Sunflower's investment in the commercial algae reactor.
The Next Step
Tri-State's general counsel Ken Reif reported to the G&T's employees, "Naturally we are all disappointed in this action and we are in the process of evaluating our options with Sunflower and our board."
Sunflower’s President and CEO Watkins said, "Politics aside, the 1.5 million cooperative customers still need reliable, low- cost power. We will endeavor to fulfill that mission in the appropriate way, but those customers will be harmed and the economy damaged by the Secretary's decision. Sunflower expects to pursue legal and legislative remedies to this denial."
Talk about Denial
Wholesale power utilities still do not get it. They continue to promote misleading statements regarding global warming or climate change and insist that decisions are being made based on emotion and "politics" rather than science. If it wasn’t for "politics", utilities and consumers would have been paying higher generation rates for decades to account for externalities - pollution etc., caused by fossil fuel electricity generation. Some argue that as soon as electricity becomes expensive enough to be worth saving, energy conservation will finally kick in and become a serious part of demand side management, instead of the token savings that it is inmost homes today.
In any case the Kansas Department of Health and Environment took one of the first steps toward new thinking and new energy solutions. In these interesting times it will be very interesting to see the impact that this permit decision has on other coal fired power plant construction plans across the nation. It will be even be more interesting to see how utilities meet the growing national demand for electricity with limited generation resources and a growing demand for climate change action.
© 2007Mark Daily
The convergence of recent US Supreme Court decisions, pending State and Federal government climate change legislation and citizen discussions about global warming put consumers at risk for a deluge of electric rate increases. Add a cold winter, or higher transportation and maintenance costs and the writing is on the wall. For those consumers that believe that current electricity rates are too low and do not reflect the external costs of air pollution created during electricity generation, the recent decision to deny power plant air quality permits in Kansas is a good decision. For those consumers struggling on fixed incomes or tight budgets, the decision may mean electric rates will continue to climb. That could be bad for everyone.
The Background
Tri-State G&T proposed the joint construction of the largest coal-fired power plant in the United States, to be built at the cost of $3.6 billion. The power plant with its two 700-megawatt generators was to be built and financed by several utilities including, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, Sunflower Electric Association, Golden Spread Electric Cooperative, Inc, and Midwest Energy.All four companies are member owned, non-profit cooperative corporations. The first three companies are wholesale power suppliers. Sunflower, organized in 1957, serves six rural electric distribution cooperatives in 34 western Kansas counties. Tri-State, started in 1952, is owned by and serves 44 electric cooperatives across portions of Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico and Wyoming. Golden Spread Electric Cooperative was founded in 1984 and serves 16 distribution cooperatives in Oklahoma and Texas. Midwest Energy serves customers in central and western Kansas.
The new power plants are planned as an expansion to existing power generation facilities owned by Sunflower on their 10,000-acre, 360-megawatt Holcomb Station site. This is located approximately four miles south of Holcomb, Kansas.
The original plan was for Golden Spread, Sunflower, Tri-State and other investors to jointly own the first new 700-megawatt unit. Construction of the first unit was planned to begin in 2007 and be operational in 2012. Golden Spread planed to own 400 megawatts of the unit’s output for supply to its member systems. Sunflower expected to provide up to 150 megawatts to its member systems, and Midwest Energy was in for 75 megawatts. Tri-State planned to own the second 700-megawatt unit, to supply power to its member systems. This unit was projected to be online in 2013, but recent proposals before the denial show Tri-State postponing construction and tying the construction schedule to future load growth.
The Denial
According to an October 18, 2007 Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE), press release concern over carbon dioxide production was the key factor in permit denial. Bolstered by the recent US Supreme Court decision (Massachusetts v. EPA), KHDE Secretary Roderick L. Bremby, stated, "I believe it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing".
Massachusetts v. EPA defined carbon dioxide ( CO2) as an air quality pollutant that should be regulated by the EPA. The 66 page Supreme Court Opinion refers to specific scientific studies and reports documenting the existing and predicted negative impacts from global climate change and ties these changes directly to human activity; specifically the accelerated production of green house gases. Carbon dioxide heads the list of these green house gas emissions.
The EPA defines coal fired electricity generation as the single largest source of CO2 emissions in the USA. Coal fired electricity generation exceeds CO2 emissions from the entire transportation sector.
This permit denial is the first such denial in the nation."We are disappointed with the Secretary's arbitrary and capricious action," said Earl Watkins, Sunflower's president and chief executive officer. Those disappointed with the denial point out the neither the EPA or the State of Kansas include CO2 as a regulated air pollutant. Project partners felt that they had met all environmental and regulatory requirements with their proposal.
This action also changes Sunflower's plans to invest in and advance algae technology that would use carbon dioxide from the power plants. Attempting to address carbon emissions, the project partners completed initial testing for an innovative algae reactor that would use a portion of the carbon dioxide emissions from Holcomb Station to produce biofuels, including ethanol and biodiesel. Funds that would have been earned from the power plant expansion project were expected to be used to finance Sunflower's investment in the commercial algae reactor.
The Next Step
Tri-State's general counsel Ken Reif reported to the G&T's employees, "Naturally we are all disappointed in this action and we are in the process of evaluating our options with Sunflower and our board."
Sunflower’s President and CEO Watkins said, "Politics aside, the 1.5 million cooperative customers still need reliable, low- cost power. We will endeavor to fulfill that mission in the appropriate way, but those customers will be harmed and the economy damaged by the Secretary's decision. Sunflower expects to pursue legal and legislative remedies to this denial."
Talk about Denial
Wholesale power utilities still do not get it. They continue to promote misleading statements regarding global warming or climate change and insist that decisions are being made based on emotion and "politics" rather than science. If it wasn’t for "politics", utilities and consumers would have been paying higher generation rates for decades to account for externalities - pollution etc., caused by fossil fuel electricity generation. Some argue that as soon as electricity becomes expensive enough to be worth saving, energy conservation will finally kick in and become a serious part of demand side management, instead of the token savings that it is inmost homes today.
In any case the Kansas Department of Health and Environment took one of the first steps toward new thinking and new energy solutions. In these interesting times it will be very interesting to see the impact that this permit decision has on other coal fired power plant construction plans across the nation. It will be even be more interesting to see how utilities meet the growing national demand for electricity with limited generation resources and a growing demand for climate change action.
© 2007Mark Daily
Monday, August 13, 2007
Wind Energy Could Be Mainstream Generation Resource Soon
With over 11,000 megawatts of wind energy on line in the USA and 2,000 of it coming on line in 2006 alone, wind stands to be a major contributor to renewable energy generation.
One of the obstacles to the adoption of wind generation as a major electric energy generation source in the Untied States has been the contention by some in the Utility industry that wind energy must be covered by duplicate dispatchable fixed output generation facilities. This argument has been used to down play the importance and usefulness of wind energy to the growing renewable energy moment. The argument goes like this.
Since the wind can stop blowing at any time, coal or other conventional generation resources must be built simultaneously with wind production facilities, just in case the wind stops blowing. While it maybe true that wind is not as reliable as conventional generation, according to a Utility Wind Integration Group ( UWIG) report entitled, " Utility Wind Generation State of the Art", studies confirm that wind generation can stand alone as a generation source without the requirement for fossil fuel back up.
The anti wind sentiment also dampened the enthusiasm of utility planners to the acceptance of combined cycle gasification technologies and other advance clean coal and clean fossil fuel technologies because they argued that the extra expense of these unproven technologies was not justified if wind generators could kick in any time the wind was blowing hard enough to cover the demand.
While some of you may see a pattern here ( read conspiracy) I think that utilities justifiably and sincerely are concerned about the impact that wind generators might have on a stable energy grid. Restarting a coal fired plant (50% or more of the USA’s generation fuel) is no easy task. Neither is balancing load requirements with available electricity generation facilities. While some may retort that this is not rocket science, I think its pretty close. Keep in mind that terribly expensive things happen to utilities when there is not enough power available to cover the demand from millions of independent homes and businesses. Every kilowatt hour sent to your house or business comes from a system that plans ahead for your equipment to come on even when you haven’t told anyone that you have the equipment.
Utilities have developed suffisticated computer models that use weather forecasts, seasonal business cycle histories and historic residential demand data for the average home in their service area. They are prepared to turn on, ramp up and stoke up generation facilities or turn off, ramp down or slow down every generator in the USA every thirty minutes to an hour, 24 hours a day 365 days per year. Just to keep us in cold beer and toast. Well, I guess it is more than just cold beer and toast.
The UWIG report acknowledges that Wind Generators are a different type of generator but assure planners that wind generation can fit into the existing electricity generation system nationwide, with the proper planning, design and integration.
Electric energy dispatchers rely heavily on weather forecaster’s temperature predictions for scheduling their power delivery. The UWIG report says that weather forecasters are 80% effect at predicting wind speeds and durations. This additional weather data can go a long way towards making wind generators as reliable, predicable and dispatch able as fossil fuel generators.
Recent policy approvals for amendments to the National Energy Policy Act of 2005 lend new support for renewable energy initiatives. This could be the perfect storm that renewable energy needs to get a little help out there. The coal, nuclear and oil industries have subsidies and federal support that has been in place for decades. Now is the time to lend that same support to renewable energy by supporting Renewable Electricity Standards.
Over twenty states including,California, New Mexico, Minnesota, Oregon, and Colorado – have or are implementing Renewable Portfolio Standards of 20 percent or more. Now is the time to take it nation wide.
Have you contacted your legislators to show support for Renewable Energy Standards? I'd like to hear from you one way or the other about this. What are your thoughts on the subject?
© Mark Daily 2007
One of the obstacles to the adoption of wind generation as a major electric energy generation source in the Untied States has been the contention by some in the Utility industry that wind energy must be covered by duplicate dispatchable fixed output generation facilities. This argument has been used to down play the importance and usefulness of wind energy to the growing renewable energy moment. The argument goes like this.
Since the wind can stop blowing at any time, coal or other conventional generation resources must be built simultaneously with wind production facilities, just in case the wind stops blowing. While it maybe true that wind is not as reliable as conventional generation, according to a Utility Wind Integration Group ( UWIG) report entitled, " Utility Wind Generation State of the Art", studies confirm that wind generation can stand alone as a generation source without the requirement for fossil fuel back up.
The anti wind sentiment also dampened the enthusiasm of utility planners to the acceptance of combined cycle gasification technologies and other advance clean coal and clean fossil fuel technologies because they argued that the extra expense of these unproven technologies was not justified if wind generators could kick in any time the wind was blowing hard enough to cover the demand.
While some of you may see a pattern here ( read conspiracy) I think that utilities justifiably and sincerely are concerned about the impact that wind generators might have on a stable energy grid. Restarting a coal fired plant (50% or more of the USA’s generation fuel) is no easy task. Neither is balancing load requirements with available electricity generation facilities. While some may retort that this is not rocket science, I think its pretty close. Keep in mind that terribly expensive things happen to utilities when there is not enough power available to cover the demand from millions of independent homes and businesses. Every kilowatt hour sent to your house or business comes from a system that plans ahead for your equipment to come on even when you haven’t told anyone that you have the equipment.
Utilities have developed suffisticated computer models that use weather forecasts, seasonal business cycle histories and historic residential demand data for the average home in their service area. They are prepared to turn on, ramp up and stoke up generation facilities or turn off, ramp down or slow down every generator in the USA every thirty minutes to an hour, 24 hours a day 365 days per year. Just to keep us in cold beer and toast. Well, I guess it is more than just cold beer and toast.
The UWIG report acknowledges that Wind Generators are a different type of generator but assure planners that wind generation can fit into the existing electricity generation system nationwide, with the proper planning, design and integration.
Electric energy dispatchers rely heavily on weather forecaster’s temperature predictions for scheduling their power delivery. The UWIG report says that weather forecasters are 80% effect at predicting wind speeds and durations. This additional weather data can go a long way towards making wind generators as reliable, predicable and dispatch able as fossil fuel generators.
Recent policy approvals for amendments to the National Energy Policy Act of 2005 lend new support for renewable energy initiatives. This could be the perfect storm that renewable energy needs to get a little help out there. The coal, nuclear and oil industries have subsidies and federal support that has been in place for decades. Now is the time to lend that same support to renewable energy by supporting Renewable Electricity Standards.
Over twenty states including,California, New Mexico, Minnesota, Oregon, and Colorado – have or are implementing Renewable Portfolio Standards of 20 percent or more. Now is the time to take it nation wide.
Have you contacted your legislators to show support for Renewable Energy Standards? I'd like to hear from you one way or the other about this. What are your thoughts on the subject?
© Mark Daily 2007
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Electricity Generation Requires a New Way to Talk and Listen
We could save the Universe if we just learned how to talk to each other. In 2002 Adam Kahane wrote a wonderful article called "Changing the World by Changing How We Talk and Listen". Mr. Kahane lays out a compelling argument for why so many of our most complicated world problems never get solved. Not only do they never get solved, but some problems never seem to change. The vitriolic arguments use the same words and phrases over and over again until all sides are red in the face with frustration. While his article draws from his experience mediating factions during the Guatamala’s peace vision, his principles apply well to any area of conflict. He clearly shows why frustration grows and how to resolve it.
Today frustration is growing in the great debate about how to power our modern society. And, this debate is now officially mainstream as of last night. Last night I saw a REMAX Real Estate television commercial with a sharp looking couple cheerfully telling their wonderful REMAX real estate agent that they wanted a home powered by solar and wind energy and maybe even bio- gases. Then the mythical wife wrinkles her nose as pictures of dairy cows swirl by while she says, "Well, maybe not methane gas".
Living technicolor proof that what Carl Sagan said long ago is true now more than ever. "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology."
One solution may be to follow Adam Kahane’s prescription for talking and listening. He claims that there are "four distinct conversational modes". Every discussion, whether it focuses on how to stop the genocide of pregnant women stacked like cord wood in a mass grave or how to create electric energy reliability without green house gases, must go through each of these four distinct conversational modes. These modes are "Downloading, Debating, Reflective Dialogue and Generative Dialogue". No long term solutions to any serious problems have ever occurred without the stake holders or effected players getting together and working through all four of these modes in order. You can’t skip any of the steps and you can’t change the order of the progression without destroying trust. And trust, is the foundation of any problem’s solution. It can only be obtained if each mode is played out in order.
Today the electric industry, environmental groups, and your average electricity customer are stuck somewhere between Downloading and Debating. Downloading occurs when stakeholders repeat facts about their solution over and over again. They list the reasons their special solution is the only answer to the problem and they repeatedly dismiss anyone else’s solution as unrealistic. In our current debate, this is why utility executives fight tooth and toe nail against renewable portfolio standards and why environmental groups continually deride, coal, nuclear and large hydro power projects. Downloading keeps everyone stuck in a constant shouting match about potential solutions while one side accuses the other side of not understanding the real problem and not have the sense or vision to propose a real world solution. While we must go through this part of the discussion, Downloading offers nothing new. All sides get stuck in their own self confidence believing they have the solution while belittling other solutions. We don’t need more facts about fuels. We need to go beyond downloading facts to come up with a radical new solution. This is not an argument to wait until technology saves us with a magic energy pill. It is a plea for us to get the objective facts on the table and move to the next step.
Downloading "facts" as both sides see it, sets up the second mode of communication - Debating. Here we see more of what "is" but offer no new solutions to the problem. We talk about more coal or add the concept of clean coal. We talk about more solar and add Concentrating Solar Power. We throw acronyms around like CSP and IGCC. The discussion logjams into talking heads and dueling experts with the consumer shaking their heads in disgust as they head for the fridge for another cold beer. Debating fosters winners and losers, without getting to the real understanding of other solutions or the role of all solutions in solving the problem. This won’t happen until debating ends and understanding begins to dawn on all of the players.
This is where Reflective dialogue comes into play. It’s the light bulb going on when the person realizes," Oh yeah, I see now that a photovoltaic system will not meet my energy needs if I continue to demand this level of power". Or, it’s the utility executive that really begins to see that some of his customers are bailing from central station grids, changing their life styles to allow small scale wind and solar systems to meet their energy needs. Its making realistic assessments about the role of energy conservation. Its getting into each other’s heads and gaining empathy for the real world situation that the other person is coming from. Reflective Dialogue will not produce the answers to the puzzle, but it will set up the trust and understanding that is vital to getting to what Steven Covey calls the "Third Alternative". That is the solution that makes everyone pretty happy without making anyone feel terribly mad. It makes all stake holders winners because through Reflective dialogue they finally understand why that crazy SOB thinks the way that they think. It begins to give validity to multiple solutions and sets the foundation for the next mode of dialogue, Generative Dialogue.
According to Kahane, Generative Dialogue produces a "deeper unity of purpose". The big light bulb finally gets lit in each and every stake holder and every one realizes that the only way to stop the atrocities of war or save the world from energy related side effects , or power civilization without destroying it, is to come together and work together on that "Third Alternative" . The alternative that makes every stake holder look like a hero to their constituents. It’s the solution that allows everyone to go home with their heads held high taking rightful credit for solving the problem without sacrificing their sense of what is right.
This is where we as a nation and a world need to go when it comes to deciding our energy future. When history is written describing how this generation met the challenges of our time and produced a workable and healthy energy solution to power the future, the record will show that we went through each of these "four distinct conversational modes".
We must keep this conversation going until we can all collectively make it through all four modes. As the Guatemalans found during their peace initiative, the stakes are way too high to do anything else. Does this mean that all we have to do is go through the four steps and like the addict finishing the twelve step rehabilitation program all problems are solved? Of course not. There will be good days and bad days. There will still be debates and downloading, setbacks and discouragement. Clearly, the methods being used to solve the problem today are not working. Its time to try something different. "Insanity is repeating the same behavior and expecting a different result," said Werner Erhart.
It is time to stop the insanity.
Today frustration is growing in the great debate about how to power our modern society. And, this debate is now officially mainstream as of last night. Last night I saw a REMAX Real Estate television commercial with a sharp looking couple cheerfully telling their wonderful REMAX real estate agent that they wanted a home powered by solar and wind energy and maybe even bio- gases. Then the mythical wife wrinkles her nose as pictures of dairy cows swirl by while she says, "Well, maybe not methane gas".
Living technicolor proof that what Carl Sagan said long ago is true now more than ever. "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology."
One solution may be to follow Adam Kahane’s prescription for talking and listening. He claims that there are "four distinct conversational modes". Every discussion, whether it focuses on how to stop the genocide of pregnant women stacked like cord wood in a mass grave or how to create electric energy reliability without green house gases, must go through each of these four distinct conversational modes. These modes are "Downloading, Debating, Reflective Dialogue and Generative Dialogue". No long term solutions to any serious problems have ever occurred without the stake holders or effected players getting together and working through all four of these modes in order. You can’t skip any of the steps and you can’t change the order of the progression without destroying trust. And trust, is the foundation of any problem’s solution. It can only be obtained if each mode is played out in order.
Today the electric industry, environmental groups, and your average electricity customer are stuck somewhere between Downloading and Debating. Downloading occurs when stakeholders repeat facts about their solution over and over again. They list the reasons their special solution is the only answer to the problem and they repeatedly dismiss anyone else’s solution as unrealistic. In our current debate, this is why utility executives fight tooth and toe nail against renewable portfolio standards and why environmental groups continually deride, coal, nuclear and large hydro power projects. Downloading keeps everyone stuck in a constant shouting match about potential solutions while one side accuses the other side of not understanding the real problem and not have the sense or vision to propose a real world solution. While we must go through this part of the discussion, Downloading offers nothing new. All sides get stuck in their own self confidence believing they have the solution while belittling other solutions. We don’t need more facts about fuels. We need to go beyond downloading facts to come up with a radical new solution. This is not an argument to wait until technology saves us with a magic energy pill. It is a plea for us to get the objective facts on the table and move to the next step.
Downloading "facts" as both sides see it, sets up the second mode of communication - Debating. Here we see more of what "is" but offer no new solutions to the problem. We talk about more coal or add the concept of clean coal. We talk about more solar and add Concentrating Solar Power. We throw acronyms around like CSP and IGCC. The discussion logjams into talking heads and dueling experts with the consumer shaking their heads in disgust as they head for the fridge for another cold beer. Debating fosters winners and losers, without getting to the real understanding of other solutions or the role of all solutions in solving the problem. This won’t happen until debating ends and understanding begins to dawn on all of the players.
This is where Reflective dialogue comes into play. It’s the light bulb going on when the person realizes," Oh yeah, I see now that a photovoltaic system will not meet my energy needs if I continue to demand this level of power". Or, it’s the utility executive that really begins to see that some of his customers are bailing from central station grids, changing their life styles to allow small scale wind and solar systems to meet their energy needs. Its making realistic assessments about the role of energy conservation. Its getting into each other’s heads and gaining empathy for the real world situation that the other person is coming from. Reflective Dialogue will not produce the answers to the puzzle, but it will set up the trust and understanding that is vital to getting to what Steven Covey calls the "Third Alternative". That is the solution that makes everyone pretty happy without making anyone feel terribly mad. It makes all stake holders winners because through Reflective dialogue they finally understand why that crazy SOB thinks the way that they think. It begins to give validity to multiple solutions and sets the foundation for the next mode of dialogue, Generative Dialogue.
According to Kahane, Generative Dialogue produces a "deeper unity of purpose". The big light bulb finally gets lit in each and every stake holder and every one realizes that the only way to stop the atrocities of war or save the world from energy related side effects , or power civilization without destroying it, is to come together and work together on that "Third Alternative" . The alternative that makes every stake holder look like a hero to their constituents. It’s the solution that allows everyone to go home with their heads held high taking rightful credit for solving the problem without sacrificing their sense of what is right.
This is where we as a nation and a world need to go when it comes to deciding our energy future. When history is written describing how this generation met the challenges of our time and produced a workable and healthy energy solution to power the future, the record will show that we went through each of these "four distinct conversational modes".
We must keep this conversation going until we can all collectively make it through all four modes. As the Guatemalans found during their peace initiative, the stakes are way too high to do anything else. Does this mean that all we have to do is go through the four steps and like the addict finishing the twelve step rehabilitation program all problems are solved? Of course not. There will be good days and bad days. There will still be debates and downloading, setbacks and discouragement. Clearly, the methods being used to solve the problem today are not working. Its time to try something different. "Insanity is repeating the same behavior and expecting a different result," said Werner Erhart.
It is time to stop the insanity.
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