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R.I.P., Cape Wind (bostonglobe.com)
schwit1 quotes the Boston Globe: What a long, slow death it has been for Massachusetts's first proposed offshore wind farm. But now, its proponents are finally pulling the plug. While others in the energy industry considered the Cape Wind project dead, developer Jim Gordon didn't quit after losing power contracts he needed for financing in early 2015, or after state regulators yanked permission for a power line connection last year.
Another big blow came later in 2016 when Cape Wind foes worked their magic on Beacon Hill. They successfully lobbied lawmakers to prevent Cape Wind from benefitting from a major energy bill, one that requires utilities to buy large amounts of offshore wind. This was exactly the kind of legislation Gordon needed. But he wasn't being allowed at the party...
We're embarking on a new era. Wind turbines are on their way for deeper waters, south of Martha's Vineyard. They won't be Gordon's. But at least he can take some credit, in his defeat, for being a pioneer.
Another big blow came later in 2016 when Cape Wind foes worked their magic on Beacon Hill. They successfully lobbied lawmakers to prevent Cape Wind from benefitting from a major energy bill, one that requires utilities to buy large amounts of offshore wind. This was exactly the kind of legislation Gordon needed. But he wasn't being allowed at the party...
We're embarking on a new era. Wind turbines are on their way for deeper waters, south of Martha's Vineyard. They won't be Gordon's. But at least he can take some credit, in his defeat, for being a pioneer.
Fine. Let's give them a coal-fired plant as an alternative.
...that Jim Gordon was a wind power pioneer in addition to being the commissioner of the Gotham PD
The summary ignores the fact that the anti-wind forces were the super wealthy Dems in Martha's Vineyard who didn't want their views altered.
They're all in favor of renewables as long as someone else (you) has to deal with the negatives while they get all the benefits.
I think wind turbines are beautiful machines.Highly engineered and efficient devices that (mostly) silently turn 24/7 generating power and displacing carbon producing sources contributing to human flourishing. They are a statement that says intelligent creatures live here.
The problem is, you're giving the people the coal fired plant, when it was the politicians that screwed the people in the first place.
It's heartbreaking to watch the deep corruption in politics hold society back while doing direct harm to the citizens with their "wars" on informed personal and consensual choice and their blatant corporate fluffing.
But as long as the voters remain largely poorly educated and gullible, it's going to continue to be corrupt politicians all the way down. Sadly, the people are unable to make the connection between their voting habits and their problems. Not unwilling; unable.
And guess who controls the people's education?
Right.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
When business becomes over intrusive into our lives, who else can you turn to but the government? When business says it's more profitable to lock it's workers into a warehouse with poor ventilation and no fire safety equipment (that costs $$!), who else can you turn to but the government? When business feels they can sell you a product that they know will either kill you or it does nothing at all, and feels it's your problem for buying it, who else can you turn to but government?
Government is what it is because it's been cleaning up Capitalism's messes since we started this country.
The reoccurring cause is the whole NIMBY, because the rich didn't want their view ruined. You all do understand this isn't the view from shore they are complaining about being ruined. In nearly all the cases the wind turbines wouldn't be visible from land.
The view they are talking about being ruined is the view from their fishing boats, sail boats, and yachts 20 miles off shore.
I regularly poo poo on all things tree huggerish, but as an engineer I love wind turbines. There is enough potential wind power just off shore in the US to install 4 times the current power requirements.
Throw in Geo, Solar, and a bunch of base loading produced by coal/natural gas, nuclear, and if Elon can get them to work battery's, and basically we have enough power capacity to fulfill demand for the next several hundred years for all sectors of the economy including transportation, without ever having to import another drop of oil from overseas again.
If you were at risk from dying by being locked in a warehouse you should, through the magic of capitalism, instantaneously acquire another job at another warehouse which, of course, will be totally safe.
So, the only way this would really work is if everyone were required by law to use the product of this company?
Hey, I bet I could make a lot of money making baseball base markers, if everyone in the country were required by law to buy three of them every year!
Slightly more seriously, I don't consider something a good investment if it requires a law making everyone an involuntary customer...
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
And some Kennedys will make people drink their medicine until they drown of it.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
You know, the rich Democrats who had this project shot down repeatedly really care about global warming. I mean, you wouldn't want these ugly towers to ruin their views while they're on their yacht or flying their private plane. It's understandable.
Do you have ESP?
Not sure where you got those numbers for Block Island and Cape Wind because they are not in the Wikipedia page but that page does show the cost of onshore wind to be $24 to $60 MWh ($0.03 to $0.06 per kWh) with offshore wind being about twice as expensive.
(For comparison, coal $100, natural gas $60, nuclear $95, solar PV $58. All of these are minimum costs.)
Costs are dropping rapidly for wind and solar so the original plans are out of date.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
What a pity that there are huge barriers to entry in just about every market in the world (and especially most of the ones that make you a lot of money), that the bankers went to school with the stock market traders and don't like new people, that we keep ending up with Crony Capitalism, instead of the pure as the driven snow Capitalism that so many people think should exist. And family money Really helps people get serious in business.
What the hell are you talking about? The photographs clearly show Franken not touching the reporter. Trying to claim it is a photo of molestation is phenomenally stupid given that we have all seen it.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
There's this thing called "History", you may have heard of it? Read up on things like the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, or perhaps investigate company towns, or just look up workplace abuse.
So if you think having laws to prevent a warehouse full of people from going up in flames actually work, I have a number of recent examples of this not being true, in the USA even.
You get out of Government what you put into it, and frankly, in this country, we stopped putting in about 20 years ago. Listen to yourself, you automatically assume the worst return from it so you don't even bother looking for better from it. Why should we be surprised if inspections don't get performed on businesses if you've cut your tax base to the bone? We could transition from taxes to straight fees and I guarantee you that corporations will complain about them, while simultaneously taking advantage of every subsidy and break to ensure they have a zero burden, just like they currently do. If anyone gets pinched by unfair taxes it's the middle class, who've had to pick up the slack from all the Apple's and Exxon's who avoid their commitments. The amazing thing is all conservatives can chant is LOWER TAXES and not PROSECUTE THE CHEATS.
Corporations SHOULD pay more in taxes, they are a bigger burden on society. They can wipe out the savings of millions overnight, they can send out dangerous products, they need military intervention to protect their supply lines and they drop their used up workers onto the social safety net for everyone else to carry the burden. They destroy the environment, poison our food supplies even as they bring us the products we want.
Also, we live in a nation of 50 individual governments with thousands of governments under them.. some are just gonna be better than others. Maybe they'd improve if people gave a damn and voted on performance rather than who's sleeping with whom and where or if you pray.
Those costs are almost ten years old. Wind is much cheaper now.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Republicans are the ones who dump money onto their precious insiders, as shown with their Cash for Clunkers
You need to put down the crack pipe before you post.
I checked the Senate votes on that Cash for Clunkers bill. There were 4 Republicans that voted for it, and 2 independents, and... wait for it... 54 Democrats. Votes against the bill were 1 Democrat and 35 Republicans.
If the Cash for Clunkers bill was just a bailout for the auto industry, to buy votes in the next election, then we can put all of that on the Democrats. Especially since Obama signed it, and the House had a Democrat majority at the time.
If you can't get that easily verified bit of information correct then how can I trust anything else you said? Can you provide sources for anything you claimed?
Oh, and another thing. I'm pretty sure that ten billion dollars you are talking about for loans to nuclear power also happened under Obama. Watts Barr restarted construction under Bush but it was Obama that approved over fifty billion dollars in loans that allowed for more nuclear power construction. At the same time we had Democrats complaining about no place to put the nuclear waste while it was them that shut down the Yucca Mountain waste disposal site.
This, coming from the poster who stated that Doug Jones was a "known baby killer" is somehow less believable.
Right, I should have put that in quotes. I'm not calling this guy a baby killer, the people polled in Alabama were. I don't know this guy. All I have is a vague recollection of an interview of him where he said some things in support of "women's right to access abortion" or something. Does that mean he's a "baby killer"? I don't know and I don't care.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
You sound like the scam artists that pushed the same crap back a decade ago here in Ontario. It *did* push the cost of electricity though the roof here. The situation here is now so dire that they've mandated by law that they can't cut off power in the winter, for fear of people freezing to death. This, along with what happened in Ontario is gigantic clusterfuck. Nothing more, nothing less and in both cases one would have led to higher energy prices much higher, and in the other case did lead to much higher energy prices. So much so that the government is backtracking because by june of next year it will likely cease to be an actual political party.
Om, nomnomnom...