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Italy Proposes Phasing Out Coal Power Plants By 2025 (reuters.com)
Italy is the next country to phase out coal. According to Reuters, the country has set its sights on phasing out coal power plants by 2025. From the report: Italy's biggest utility Enel has said it will not invest in new coal-fired power plants. The new energy strategy, still under discussion, aims to reach the goal of 27 percent of gross overall energy consumption from renewable sources by 2030, the document showed. The strategy, which should be approved by the government at the beginning of November, is also looking to speed up the introduction of vehicles powered by alternative fuels. It aims to raise the number of electric charging stations to 19,000 by 2020.
If solar and wind are as cheap without subsidies as recent stories claim, why do countries need to set targets like this? If renewables are really that cheap, shouldn't the free markets phase out coal power without government regulation? Countries setting targets like this and regulating the sources of energy seems to suggest that the claims made about renewables are false. Why else would the government need to intervene?
Italy just can't do anything. They even couldn't fight effectively in WWII since the Grand Council of Fascism voted to limit the power of Benito Mussolini. Allied forces landed in Italy on Sept 3, and on before Sept 8 a secret armistice was signed and then announced on Sept 8. Italy only lasted five days.
We should definitely criticize them for not fighting harder in support of the Nazis. ~
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Italy is weak, and couldn't even take on the British navy in the Mediterranean. Don't see how that contradict's the GP's argument.
So where is the other 73% of their power coming from. Nuclear and natural gas? :Seems like a big amount for those.
Also the article was basically just the summary. No sources or content whatsoever.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
Unless Italy plans on building nuclear power plants they are not going to get rid of coal. I suppose with enough natural gas and importation of neighboring nations' coal and nuclear power they might be able to kick out their domestic coal in less than 10 years. They already pay a high price for their electricity, it's only going to get more expensive as they'll need to rely on expensive unreliable energy like wind and solar, expensive imported natural gas, and imported electricity.
What's even more laughable is the plan to use more electric cars. Maybe with "smart" timed chargers people can alleviate some of the issues with unreliable wind power at night but that's not likely to be enough, especially in the short time they've given themselves for the transition.
Has no one learned from Germany? Germany's heavy reliance on unreliable energy means having to export the excess electricity at a low price (sometimes at a loss) when the wind blows, only to have to import at a high price (often from France's nuclear reactors) when the wind calms. Germany's CO2 output reductions are more likely from the reduced demand than from the use of unreliable energy. I suspect the reduced demand was at least in part from the increased prices the ratepayers saw.
France has to be loving this. They have two neighbors in need of energy because they both abandoned nuclear and coal. France has a lot of nuclear power, and is building more. While France is splitting atoms we see that Germany has failed on the claim to abandon coal. Maybe they burn some wood chips with the coal to claim it's "green" but they are burning something in those coal plants. Maybe they are burning cash.
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Good night, Lucia.
If they decide to go up in smoke, coal plants will not even be peanuts in comparison.
So the panic over climate change is starting. Wonder how long before they realize it's about overpopulation.
Why can't they just say that they'll do it, do it, and then all the people in the business of making power generation won't have spent 10 years trying to get a coal power plant built then find in 2025 that they'll just have to shut it down and swallow the cost?
while blind-as-a-bat has to lie to get their partisanship seeming sensible. Not that I consider mdsolar to be as unbalanced in their partisanship as blindfromwanking is, but you have your own agenda and bias and partisanship: you hate people who "talk too much" like a hippie eco warrior.
8 years away is a long time, given the current trend. A yearly 20% price reduction on solar electricity will drop the price with 83% over 8 years. Right now, electricity from a new solar farm or a new coal power plant costs roughly the same. It won't take many years before the price for electricity from a new solar farm will be lower than the price for electricity from an already-build and paid off coal power plant.
So the 'global warming' nutcases are going to turn the entire developed world into a third world country, because 'climate change'. Bloody idiots.
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It means the politicians want another round of campaign cash from coal lobby.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
You know, the people who ensure that the country runs. And since it needs an electrical grid system, it runs the electrical grid system. What do you think all your whining about regulation and interference by government in private business means if government has no role and does nothing in regards to things like private business planning and actions?
The GP is obviously yourself, and his (your) post has already been both downvoted and ridiculed. No need to embarrass yourself further, poor idiot.
'nuff said
Italy just can't do anything.
... except having the healthiest people on the planet ( https://www.weforum.org/agenda... ), the highest number of UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the world ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ), giving birth to those who invented the radio, the telephone and even the first microprocessor ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ), having had some of the biggest scientists in history (Galileo, Volta, Fermi), and, quite surprisingly, having one of the richest population on the planet in terms of median net worth per adult, far higher than the US ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ).
Except all of that, they can do nothing.
P.S.: Italians chose to leave the war after they toppled Mussolini. It was actually an extremely cunning move: while formally defeated, they basically avoided paying war damages, and they preserved their gorgeous architecture and artistic heritage from allied carpet-bombing. So now they have probably the three most beautiful cities in the world: Florence, Rome and Venice. Just look at how ugly Berlin is instead.
I mean all that coal is going to stay in the ground and pollute out ground water and give people cancer. I like the current system where we extract this dangerous substance and burn it so it can't harm people.
Italy wouldn't care about its own, just the policymakers.
"Forget the engineers." -Carly Fiorina, briber of MIT Technology Review.
Too late