Skip to main content
search
Tag

wind turbines

Jul 01
Love0

Wind Power Wind Bags

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant No Comments
Politics exert major forces on energy policies and fortunately, few oppose energy efficiency.  Therefore, I strongly suggest our industry build high walls around energy efficiency and not let controversial things like climate change and even in some cases, renewable energy, into our sandbox.  Case in point: this recent opinion piece by a guy from the Heartland Institute regarding wind power and corresponding rebuttal letters published in The Wall Street Journal. You may recall that about a year ago, I wrote about a scandal contrived by Peter Gleick, outspoken global warming PhD guy, where he impersonated insiders from the Heartland Institute,…
Read More
Sep 07
Love0

Soothsayer: Analyze This

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Renewable Energy, Sustainability No Comments
How many times have you read "we can create 40 million jobs and reduce our energy consumption by 90% if only we did x, y, and z."  Lester in this article says by 2035 we can double our fuel economy.  Well I should hope so!  Lester is actually one guy that is conservative in his estimates/goals.  David Goldstein in the same article says we can decrease our energy consumption by 88% by 2050.  Now where does he or any other egghead come up with these numbers? I had to laugh out loud regarding the results of an energy efficiency potential…
Read More
Aug 10
Love0

Get a Grip

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government, Renewable Energy, Sustainability One Comment
As you may have heard, this year China powered past (cheesy pun warning) the United States in total energy consumption.  Apparently, back in 2007, they surpassed the US in carbon emissions.  This makes sense as almost 70% of China’s electricity is derived from coal as compared to just under 50% in the United States.  In the U.S., nuclear and natural gas make up most of the other 50%, roughly split evenly with renewable energy rounding out the 100%. In recent years, or especially since President Obama moved into the White House, there have been multiple verbose incomprehensible cap and trade…
Read More
Jul 13
Love0

The Nebulous Green Job

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant, Government, LEED, Renewable Energy, Stimulus, Sustainability One Comment
“Green jobs” have been all the buzz for quite some time, probably before Barack Obama was elected president, but I don’t know for sure.  What the heck is a green job anyway?  Some real answers include those like we have at Michaels Engineering with 20+ engineers working full time on real energy-saving projects.  Another example is the guy who operates the humongous crane that helps erect humongous wind turbines. But politicians and academic eggheads aren’t talking about jobs like we have at Michaels, although they probably do agree the crane driver has a green job, but it goes far beyond…
Read More
Apr 20
Love0

Wind Energy and the Utility Business Model

By Energy Rant, Government, Renewable Energy, Sustainability, Utility Stuff One Comment
The masses want power on demand without interruption or failure.  They want it at a practically negligible cost and more so every year, they want it without emissions or other unpleasant byproducts. In the upper Midwest, energy without emissions means wind energy.  Wind energy sounds great.  It’s “free”.  No emissions.  But it comes with a load of drawbacks compared to conventional sources of coal, nuclear, and natural gas. First, utilities can’t count on it for peak load generation.  I searched a while for this and found nothing but the bottom line is there is no guarantee there will be any…
Read More
Oct 13
Love1

Renewable NIMBY

By Energy Rant, Renewable Energy 2 Comments
"There should be a place for these -- someplace that isn't going to impact families quite so much."  This was a quote regarding wind turbines from a woman in the Wall Street Journal article Renewable Energy, Meet the New Nimby. I laughed out loud for a while when I read this California has a mandate for 33% renewable energy consumption by 2020.  New York: 25% by 2013.  Oregon: 25% by 2025.  These states and similar ones have meager interim targets and/or have meager portfolios today.  Some serious ramp up is required. However, it seems people claim to want it but…
Read More

All things energy. That’s our jam.

We talk a lot about energy – from the serious to the satirical.

All things energy. That’s our jam.

We talk a lot about energy – from the serious to the satirical.

Subscribe for Expert Insights
Close Menu