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New Mexico the Most Coal-Heavy State To Pledge 100 Percent Carbon-Free Energy By 2045 (arstechnica.com)
New Mexico's state House of Representatives passed the "Energy Transition Act" on Tuesday, where it's expected to be signed quickly by Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham. The bill "commits the state to getting 100 percent of its energy from carbon-free sources by 2045," reports Ars Technica. From the report: The bill includes interim goals mandating that 50 percent of the state's energy mix be renewable by 2030 and 80 percent of the energy mix be renewable by 2040. The state currently buys no nuclear power, which is not renewable but qualifies as a zero-carbon energy source. The bill passed yesterday does not require that 100 percent of the state's energy be renewable by 2045; it just specifies that no electricity come from a carbon-emitting source.
New Mexico is unique among these states because it is a relatively coal-heavy state, generating 1.5 gigawatts of coal-fired electricity as of November 2018. Last month, the state's Public Service Company of New Mexico had slated its 847MW San Juan coal plant for shut down by 2022, but a New York hedge fund called Acme Equities swooped in with an offer to buy the 46-year-old plant. According to Power Magazine, Acme intends to retrofit the plant with carbon capture and sequestration technology. If the deal goes through, Acme would use the captured carbon in enhanced oil recovery, where carbon is forced into older or weak oil wells to improve the pressure of the well and extract more oil. But with the passage of this bill, Acme's offer may not stand. New Mexico In Depth writes that the bill puts "$30 million toward the clean-up of the [San Juan] coal-fired power plant and the mine that supplies it and $40 million toward economic diversification efforts in that corner of the state and support for affected power plant employees and miners."
New Mexico is unique among these states because it is a relatively coal-heavy state, generating 1.5 gigawatts of coal-fired electricity as of November 2018. Last month, the state's Public Service Company of New Mexico had slated its 847MW San Juan coal plant for shut down by 2022, but a New York hedge fund called Acme Equities swooped in with an offer to buy the 46-year-old plant. According to Power Magazine, Acme intends to retrofit the plant with carbon capture and sequestration technology. If the deal goes through, Acme would use the captured carbon in enhanced oil recovery, where carbon is forced into older or weak oil wells to improve the pressure of the well and extract more oil. But with the passage of this bill, Acme's offer may not stand. New Mexico In Depth writes that the bill puts "$30 million toward the clean-up of the [San Juan] coal-fired power plant and the mine that supplies it and $40 million toward economic diversification efforts in that corner of the state and support for affected power plant employees and miners."
Good for you, and good for your children, and theirs, and theirs-theirs. Coal ash makes good land fill.
The summary states $40 million has been allowed to help coal workers and other residents of the norther corner of the state - but will that really be enough to help them Native American communities that suffer from coal plant shutdowns? (html links for text don't seem to be working, check out https://www.abqjournal.com/121... for details).
It sure seems like the offer to buy the plat and retrofit it with scrubbers and recapturing technology was a win-win that should have been lauded as a green solution that also helped the residents of that part of the state.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
New Mexico is already a shithole state. Their new pledge will skyrocket the cost of electricity, then you'll see people burning wood or coal to heat their homes and cook their food instead. So New Mexico will still be a shithole state, but now it won't have air conditioning and even worse air quality.
I do not belong to the church of the lowercase 'i'
Whats the new cost of energy going to be day and night?
When the sun is down and the wind speed changes?
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
"suffer from coal plant shutdowns", is that like "doing their part to save the planet"?
New Mexico, the state with the most worthless real estate that could be running solar. You know, for the benefit of Native Americans. And the rest of us.
... and we think this is somehow a wonderful thing. *SMH*
mnem
"Clean Coal" is, and always has been, a fucking lie.
https://justoneminute.typepad....
“A committed, lifelong Green pounds the table for nuclear power. People familiar with the baseload problem and the unreliable nature of wind and solar won’t find the plot surprising, but the detailed studies of California’s seasonal use and generation from wind and solar were new to me.”
Sorry, you don't know what you're talking about. There is local battery storage capacity in every powerwall sufficient for an entire household for the evening and various other means - geothermal, wind, gravity storage, etc.
All of these things are thousands of times more worth investing in than coal pollution, says the market, and we have the solutions right now. All we have to do is throw some money at it, like you advocate continuing to waste on coal.
You're a moron.
Very sad to hear that you don't understand history.
There is a difference between understanding history and living in the past. The universe is not in stasis, the decisions made 100 years ago are not some kind of absolute truth to worship as dogma.
Bill got caught lying 12-25 times repeatedly stating "Blood plasma is sterile" and then later that "The Chinese Govt does not directly censor Chinese citizens" and other absolute bullshit head-in-ass retard-level lies. You're not trustworthy.
You are not a source of information that anyone should or even could trust, knowing your dishonest history. Sorry. That's what accountability means when you get caught lying repeatedly, over and over, even after directly corrected.
You understand that the rez is not bound by state laws, right?
they heat their homes 3 weeks out of the year. I don't think you've ever lived in the American Southwest.
And RTFS, all they have to do it have no carbon emissions. There are Zero emission gas plants. That's half the reason coal is dead. Gas is cheaper and cleaner. Clean coal doesn't work because coal is dirty as F.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
So 100% Nuclear? Sounds good to me.
Haven't they heard sunlight is free and New Mexico has a lot of sunlight.
Natural Gas does not have an OPEC, so prices can fall disastrously low, ie, cheaper than coal electricity. In the early days, oil would sometimes become absurdly cheap. The Texas Railroad Commission regulated oil prices in the USA. Russia and Iran have been pushing for such an organization in Natural Gas.
New Mexico is right next to Texas, the Great Plains, and has good solar. New Mexico could join Texas' big wind powered grid, and throw on some solar. So, getting a good amount of renewable power is not prohibitively expensive. Now, going COMPLETELY renewable, will be expensive.
Unfortunately for your STUPID HEAD IN ASS RETARDATION PROBLEM, coal is going out of business due to market forces anyway.
Coal is a complete waste of money, and then you have to pay to mitigate the pollution and the carbon. Spending on battery infrastructure reduces the cost baseline. Coal infrastructure also requires investment and replacement.
You're a fucking moron.
Let me ease your suffering with a poem:
Coal is cheap. Natural gas is cheaper still.
Batteries are expensive.
Drill baby drill.
A theme in pretty much everything Huxley "contributes" here is EXTREME SIMPLICITY. If we do xyz simple thing, then 123 intractable problems will disappear instantly. That kind of insane libertarian type bullshit, with more filler.
Do not feed the troll.
You're a moron Huxley.
Unfortunately for your STUPID HEAD IN ASS RETARDATION PROBLEM, coal is going out of business due to market forces anyway! www.nbc4i.com/news/u-s-world/coal-mines-closing-at-a-faster-rate-under-pres-trump-than-obama/1690261093
Coal is a complete waste of money, and then you have to pay to mitigate the pollution and the carbon. Spending on battery infrastructure reduces the cost baseline. Coal infrastructure also requires investment and replacement.
You're a fucking moron, but at least you're not a traitor, right? RIGHT? (Cue rope)
In actual-reality America the vast, vast mass of toxic fly ash sits unused in huge piles alongside rivers and other waterways, and has contaminated the groundwater of all 48 lower states. https://www.grandforksherald.com/business/energy-and-mining/4583002-report-unsafe-levels-coal-ash-contamination-found-north-dakota
Please stop. They dont want to hear how they are (no so) slowly killing themselves and their children. Dont reason with them using facts. Cause... muh coalz!
I love those who argue for solar. Solar panels are incredibly toxic to make and have horrible efficiency. They never pay off the emissions a d toxic chemicals required to make them, let alone anything beyond that, before needing to be replaced
In actual-reality America the vast, vast mass of toxic fly ash sits unused in huge piles alongside rivers and other waterways, and has contaminated the groundwater of all 48 lower states. https://www.grandforksherald.c...
Well that comes down to regulations and enforcement of those regulations however when it comes to climate change https://www.carbonbrief.org/ma... paints an interesting picture. Instead of complaining about the converted western countries who are clearly closing plants to their own economic detriment to appease the climate change brigade. Why don't those same people go protest in countries who are building more coal fired plants and tell them what they are doing is bad for the planet. And note:- those countries have far fewer regulations and even less enforcement than the EU and US and other western nations. Just wait till that catches up with the planet.
Your'e all thinking it, I just said it for you
Coal ash in our groundwater is from decades of our self-exposure to low-level contamination that we produced, not other countries. Stop obfuscating about climate change, that's an entirely separate series of concerns from ash in water.
Two, perhaps 3 nuclear power plants should be able to replace their coal fired plants. Coal and oil are going to be too valuable as feedstocks for chemical processes to just burn the stuff.
I'm interested in this idea that Acme was going to fit CCS tech. I thought it had never been commercialised?
Two, perhaps 3 nuclear power plants should be able to replace their coal fired plants.
I'm in no way anti-nuclear and its not as if NM is a stranger to uh nukes, but its got vast amounts of empty space and vast amounts of sunshine. Its pretty much the ideal place for solar.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Since when is heating silicon toxic?
Oh the bullshit "it uses antimony"/
News flash, it's not required for the basic function, just improves efficiency a bit.
Plus even if panels are 1% efficient, who cares? It's sunlight, still better than plant to coal to generator efficiency!
"Empty space" is a myth, and solar farms require a massive investment in resources, produce an equal amount of waste, all for a pittance of unreliable energy. A sensible environmentally-conscious person would strive to use the most resource-efficient sources with the least impact on the natural world, and everything else is vastly inferior to nuclear energy in this regard.
2010 called, they want their lies back. Your statement hasn't been true for a little over 15 years.... But keep clinging onto whatever ignorance you have left.
I'll bite.
How much lower lifetime CO2 emission than coal of natural gas must a generation source emit to qualify as low carbon?
Don't suck coal cock in public, man, it's demeaning of you. Coal didn't lift you out of poverty, industrialisation did. Coal is pre-stone-age technology: Burn stuff for light and heat.
What do you do when your coal plant has a fault, runs out of either water or coal, or the power grid fails or the conversion to HV fails? That's right:intermittent power from coal.
You DO know we had things called "black outs" before, when we used coal plants, right?
And there needs to be a move to non coal. You're real hot on government intervention to support "winners" you like but trot out "government should not pick winners" when you no longer get personal benefit (either financially or ideologically) from it. Hypocrite.
What's the cost of energy now with blackout from power stations like coal or nuclear going offline for maintenance or due to failures of safety?
PS the answer to your idiotic question is around everywhere. You don't care to look because you just want to snide that it will be a problem, and having the answer won't do that for you. So you ignore reality. As the other AC says, you're a moron 24/7, every day of the year, plus leap years and seconds.
I'll bite, how much fuel does the solar panel use?
And how do you get this "no carbon" uranium out of the ground? Ask the seven dwarves to dig it out and carry it to you?
Well their goal is zero carbon, so it's more a question of how much can they capture. If they capture 1kg of CO2 somewhere they can then emit 1kg of CO2 somewhere else and it's net zero.
Obviously the more CO2 they emit generating electricity the more they need to capture elsewhere. So it makes sense to pick low emission technology for generation because then it's easier to get to net zero.
Nuclear can be fairly low, but only in the absolute best case for fuelling it and dealing with the waste. In practice it's not great, and spending the money to get it down to that best case doesn't make sense given the alternatives.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
I used to live in New Mexico. Lovely place, but not terribly wealthy, which makes me wonder when I see legislation like this. If you read it, much of the legislation is about handing out money to various parties: incentives, but also reparations to plants and workers that will have to close. Bet: these handouts will be exploited to suck on the public teat.
That aside, here's the core message:
"...'renewable energy resource' means electric or useful thermal energy:
So it's the usual greenie idiocy: spend other people's money on a pipe dream. Solar, of course, would be great in the high desert - except for the minor little problem that the sun doesn't shine at night. None of the named technologies can possibly produce enough power 24/7, except possibly razing and burning the forests.
They could take a lesson from parts of Australia or Germany that have already made the same damned mistake: They wind up giving their solar power away, when they have too much of it. At night, or when it's cloudy, they have to import power, sometimes at outrageous prices.
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
And solar panels only have to be 8ft off the ground for cattle to be 100% safe to graze under them and that means THEY'RE vastly empty space. Try not being a dumbass, you only prove how dumb the idea of anti-renewables is when the only proponents you hear are fucking idiots like you.
Yeah, germany is giving away their daytime (peak spot price) electricity.... FFS. Why do you think that France exports net MWh but Germany exports net REVENUES???? Because nukes produce at night all their daytime amount and the price and demand are low at night, so they have to give it away for reals. Meanwhile Germany's solar produces at peak when prices are at peak and so is demand, so they can either use it themselves or export it for premium prices.
Germany only net import MWh because it makes no sense for them to do otherwise when France will pay top whack for their excess and increasing that excess won't be used but WILL in that case have to be dumped, like France's nuclear power excess.
What a fucking hypocritical lying asshole you anti-renewable shills are. You're proclaiming either that Germany don't overproduce (net import MWhs, at least at SOME time) and now you're proclaiming that Germany DO overproduce (having to dump MWhs at least SOME of the time).
When your position was ALSO a meaninglessly vague waffle about how coal made you come out of poverty when that was, if anything, only one small factor out of hundreds.
So you need to reduce that 50% by whatever reduction base cost of solar has. Why do pro coal shills and anti-renewable morons all have zero math skills but an overwhelming DK belief they can demonstrate skill at it???
You didn't even try to nibble. What is the amount of CO2 produced by fueling a solar panel. Wow, miss school, did you? Reading not working for ya? Or was it that you had a script like any callcenter operative and had to just ignore what was asked and continue with your script?
And you also didn't explain how the uranium gets out. How many tons of ground need to be broken (and how, remember, you claim no CO2 from solar fuelling is equalled by nukes, making, ooh, zero CO2 from mining the Uranium, refining the ore, transporting the ore, getting rid of the waste....).
Especially a uranium mine? No? Then pretending that the averagemerkin co2 footprint is relevant is kinda stupid. Not that anything better would be expected from a nuke shill idiot who didn't even attempt to answer the question posed. Either of them, indeed.
And here I though I was replying to a response to my initial post (in which I did not bring up solar by the way).
The point I was making, and the point I originally made, was that nuclear is low carbon. Heck, the link I provided (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse-gas_emissions_of_energy_sources#2014_IPCC,_Global_warming_potential_of_selected_electricity_sources) shows it is indeed close to the lowest carbon source of energy, and that solar produces 4 times as much CO2 on average, when lifetime emissions are taken into account.
And yes, I also consider solar to be low carbon too if you are asking.
And of course the average American CO2 output is kinda relevant since the US produces about a sixth of global CO2 emissions!
YOU brought up how low CO2 production must be to be low carbon to someone who said that nuclear wasn't really an option for NM because it's not that low. So whinging about what you were posting about not being what I was posting about and somehow making that my problem is really hypocritical of you, though this is required of nuke fluffers, like christian apologists, because there is no rational argument they can afford to take, since any consistent paradigm will kill their pre-arranged conclusions.
Why does nuclear not fit NM's stance?
Because nuclear power needs fuel.
Solar panels don't.
As to your other fatuous post, I'll append my repy to that one here:
Which link answers the question of how much fuel a solar panel uses up? None you supplied. Where is the link that says how you get zero CO2 uranium out? Oh, by the way, that section in the IPCC report was written by a uranium mine owner. If they were honest, it would not be necessary to have laws against misreporting leaks or dumping. Nor does that link support anything you've JAQed off about. You JAQed off "how much lower should a thing be to be low carbon!?!?!?!" when the poster said that nukes produce CO2 over its lifetime. You JAQed off "if an average merkin uses...QED" to a question of either how much fuel does a solar panel use or how you get Uranium out. And your link answered none of the posts you have spammed moronic idiocy and a prerendered script at.
So you included a link. Irrelevant. I can include a link too:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link
Do I now get to claim you will be wrong to not admit your failure and point to "I have given you a link!"? Because that's all you did. Provide an irrelevant link and then rebut "But I gave you a link!!!!".
Nuke shills only show how vacant and unreal nuclear is when they are as dumb as you, and when all we hear is your meaningless bleating DK whinges and assertions of Holy Doctrinal Faith.
Solar uses no fuel. So it has zero CO2 emissions. If you whinge that building them requires CO2, first, nope, only if we use Carbon fuels, secondly, so do buildings like homes. Are you going to complain that homes should not be built??? Then stop whining about building anything, retard.
YOU brought up how low CO2 production must be to be low carbon to someone who said that nuclear wasn't really an option for NM because it's not that low.
Now we are getting somewhere. For the bit in bold, I disagree. Nuclear IS that low. It is very low indeed, close to the lowest CO2 generating source out there. SO your claim is demonstrably false, as per IPCC data (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse-gas_emissions_of_energy_sources#2014_IPCC,_Global_warming_potential_of_selected_electricity_sources).
If you are claiming otherwise, then show us the data / information.
I plan to be a millionaire by then (having won the lottery at some point between now and 2045).
Delusion, thy name is nuke shill.
YOU proclaimed Germany dumps electricity. Now you backpedal and proclaim they are exporting but in January they import. They aren't going to dump if they are underproducing, are they, moron.
If Germany overrpoduces and sells it, then they aren't dumping it. During summer france's nukes, like the USA's nukes, have to shut down and produce nothing, so they buy from Germany. This is not dumping, asshat.
And Germany still produces lots of renewable energy in January, fuckwit, because wind is renewable too, retard. As is biomass. Fucking moron can't keep more than one think in their head at a time, it's otherwise filled up with "HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE".
"Dunno where you get the idea that Germany makes money doing this"
From their reports. Public record. Or do you believe them when they say they produce X power in January, but not on how much they get paid for power?
And they dont pay 30c/kWh. Euros, fuckwit. Please explain why the price went down from 2016 to 2018, when they have cut even more coal and increased renewable production.
Moreover, what is your average monthly bill? Germany, with an average of two people per home, is around 967 euros. Do you spend less than that? No, you spend a lot more.
And there's a reason why they pay what they DO for electricity. Same as you pay around $2.50 for a loaf while in Somalia they pay the equivalent of 16c. How much do you pay for bread? $0.16 like a Somali? No? I guess that your bread production is inefficient and you should adopt Somalia's processes, yes?
When you factor in battery costs, and renewable maintenance (replacing those old wind turbines and solar cells that require massive reliable power to fabricate), the power will be very expensive. Germany and other countries/states have shown, those with the highest percent of renewables have the highest power costs.
So, the title should be, New Mexico pledges to have 100% unreliable expensive electricity by 2050.
As a way to "win" against an AC by just posting more than 10 items of bullshit to be countered that the AC is allowed to post a rebuttal to.
I asked how much fuel does a solar panel use. And solar panels use no fuel. So its generation is zero carbon use.
So simple you know you have to dance around everything to pretend you are not an ignorant paid up shill who is lying their arse off.
The bit in bold? The bit you posted about in response to someone NOT MENTIONING HOW LOW SOMETHING HAS TO BE, which proves your current deviant whinge about "But I didn't mention solar!!" is self serving irrelevant crap.
Solar uses no fuel.
So it is zero emissions.
What was NM's aim: to go zero emissions by 2045. Even if you wanted to include buildings for power, if they're built by 2045, they don't emit any more.
Solar panels are incredibly toxic to make
Bullshit.
and have horrible efficiency
They have the HIGHEST efficiency in converting sunlight - the primary source of energy for all electricity generation that isn't nuclear, tidal or geothermal (with the latter two being negligible contributors to anything on Earth at the moment) - compared to any other pathway through which sunlight ever became electricity, be it wind, oil, gas or coal.
They never pay off the emissions
They do, in a year or so.
a d toxic chemicals required to make them
That's not even a thing for them.
let alone anything beyond that, before needing to be replaced
They last 25 years or more without any problems.
Ezekiel 23:20
Since there is always a demand for coal *somewhere*, miners will likely find buyers in adjacent states and send their coal trains on slightly longer paths to their destination. The net amount of pollution remains relatively static in this case.
Ultimately, the only real solution IMHO is to develop alternative energy sources that are economically cheaper than coal, making mining unnecessary in any part of the world.
New Mexico will just unplug California.
Have gnu, will travel.
They have lots of empty space for building antenna arrays. They should look at space based solar power.
"$40 million toward economic diversification efforts in that corner of the state and support for affected power plant employees and miners."
That's going to be awfully short for helping the displaced.
"Forget the engineers." -Carly Fiorina, briber of MIT Technology Review.
and have horrible efficiency
They have the HIGHEST efficiency in converting sunlight - the primary source of energy for all electricity generation that isn't nuclear, tidal or geothermal (with the latter two being negligible contributors to anything on Earth at the moment) - compared to any other pathway through which sunlight ever became electricity, be it wind, oil, gas or coal.
They never pay off the emissions
They do, in a year or so.
a d toxic chemicals required to make them
That's not even a thing for them.
The problem with solar is similar to the problem for most energy sources and that is low energy density. Solar at large scale requires lots of land. And while some PV cells are made with toxic materials, others are made with much less environmental impact. The problem is they are also lower efficiencies. Solar is great for small amounts of power which are far from generation sources. Its just not a useful energy source for large scale grid applications. Also, your definition of generation capacity used by solar advocates is what we call "nameplate capacity". Its the max amount of power produced per unit time at ideal conditions (when the sun is shining). But in reality, you only get about 10% of that from solar. So even if you ignore the generation problem, to install enough solar to supply a significant amount of grid load you are using absurd amounts of land. As in more land than food production currently uses. Solar is nice and makes folks feel good but it does nothing to dent our CO2 production. Without nuclear, nothing does. Its the only source that has high enough energy density to replace the bulk of fossil fuels.
"Those that start by burning books, will end by burning men."
Nuclear power plants are not getting built because the cost/benefits are not there -- otherwise you'd see more than just the Georgia plant going up that is 3x what they projected to build it for.
I'm not an expert, but I do believe that MOST of the products of oil are put to use right now except for Benzene, which we have too much of but is put in gas as a good way to get rid of it (and we tolerate this, apparently). I don't think those plastics, or fertilizers are going to need the gasoline products -- so, those by-products are just going to get more expensive as the use for the gasoline fuel goes down (and, not an expert, but that's probably the most expensive and profit-making part). Thus, I'm betting gasoline will get cheaper as electric cars get more numerous, and Jet Fuel (kerosene) will get cheaper but plastics and such more expensive as now they are the principle profit source.
Anyway, solar and wind are just going to become more and more economical and we will probably solve the storage issue. Right now there's a solar panel that produces hydrogen -- you could have both on a rooftop and the hydrogen is used as a way to store energy when the wind and sun aren't producing any.
If we acted like our lives depended on it - we could really get carbon neutral in 20 years -- if we had the can-do attitude that took us to the moon or the Manhattan project that is.
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
There is more than one type of solar, you know. In the case of New Mexico, there is no reason not to use thermal solar. In this case, the "panels" could be nothing more than polished sheets of aluminum that all focus the sunlight on a central point.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
The problem with solar is similar to the problem for most energy sources and that is low energy density. Solar at large scale requires lots of land.
I take it you've never driven through New Mexico. The problem with New Mexico is that it is a lot of empty land, that rarely has cloud cover.
And while some PV cells are made with toxic materials, others are made with much less environmental impact. The problem is they are also lower efficiencies.
So? Don't use PV. Thermal solar is much cheaper at grid scale and has the capacity to inherently store energy (through underground liquified salts).
Solar is great for small amounts of power which are far from generation sources. Its just not a useful energy source for large scale grid applications.
My local power company would like to see your analysis, since they've been working on different numbers and quietly building out large PV farms. Considering that thermal solar is even cheaper than PV, my thinking is that they're telling everybody else that it isn't worthwhile to invest in home solar while they build out their own infrastructure.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
Do you enjoy giving people cancer? WHO DO YOU WORK FOR?!?!?!
Solar is great for small amounts of power which are far from generation sources. Its just not a useful energy source for large scale grid applications.
My local power company would like to see your analysis, since they've been working on different numbers and quietly building out large PV farms. Considering that thermal solar is even cheaper than PV, my thinking is that they're telling everybody else that it isn't worthwhile to invest in home solar while they build out their own infrastructure.
Your local power company doesn't do this type of analysis. They build/buy what their regulators tell them to. Those regulators don't do analysis either, they answer to elected officials. Those elected officials don't do the analysis either unless their opposition does it, in which case they do it too but twist the numbers to say what they want. Ironically, the only folks to do these types of analysis work for banks which bet on these power companies and energy traders that bet on the price of energy in highly localized markets. They love solar but not for the reason you do. They love it because it makes the price of energy very volatile. That's good for them and bad for the rest of us. Of course, to do this type of analysis, all you need to know are the raw inputs to each type of energy source and then see what it would take to replace a good chunk of a major grid with new supply. At that point, the result of the analysis will come screaming out at you, either yes it scales (nuclear and fossil fuels) or no it doesn't (everything else).
"Those that start by burning books, will end by burning men."
The problem with solar is similar to the problem for most energy sources and that is low energy density. Solar at large scale requires lots of land.
Fortunately we have lots of spaces that we don't know what better thing to do with them.
And while some PV cells are made with toxic materials, others are made with much less environmental impact.
Yes, CdTe panels contain cadmium. Yet they are mostly an American curiosity, courtesy of First Solar, and conventional crystalline silicone panel, which contain no toxic materials, constitute 95% of the current market. So I wouldn't worry about toxicity.
The problem is they are also lower efficiencies.
Efficiency is not a problem if you have space to waste, unless you're talking about cost efficiency. But we've already achieved grid parity in many places. So that should not be an issue anymore.
Solar is nice and makes folks feel good but it does nothing to dent our CO2 production.
It did almost nothing perhaps in Germany for the simple reason that the increase in renewable generation in Germany was only somewhat higher than the closures of nuclear power plants that were possible because of the renewable generation increase. But that is an outlier, and if you're claiming that a generator that has CO2 intensity of 50 g CO2/kWh (and *still* quickly declining) saves nothing over a coal plant with 1000 g CO2/kWh emitted, then I don't understand where is your extra 950 g CO2/kWh coming from.
Without nuclear, nothing does
Great. It would be awesome and I'd absolutely love it, if it weren't for the fact that the price for new nuclear generation is somewhere around 14 cents per kWh - which is around triple the price of new solar in Germany.
Ezekiel 23:20
Are you having issues? Your claim is also a nonsequitur and unfounded by anything outside your own internal monologue. Got any evidence?
Making you an arsehole making snide assertions and demanding that people either waste time with you or let you think that you've made a case against solar.
But with all your wining about solar backup, why haven't you whined about nuckear backup or coal backup generation? Is it because you don't have a point,only a complaint?
Unlike nuclear. Because it DOES demand fuel. Unlike solar. Just cannot bring yourself to admit it, though. Solar is zero emissions generation, nuclear isn't.
Where do you pull your unemployment checks from? Or are you still at school?
Or are you imagining things again?
We need to quit emitting CO2.
What is not needed is to force our nation to use just wind/solar, which from a national security POV, that is a disaster in the making.
Nuclear fission (replaced by fusion in the future), Geo-thermal combined with wind, solar on rooftops, and storage, would be the best idea going.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
America desperately needs to clean up it's act.
For far too long America has pumped out way more than any other comparable country. Per person you are practically the worst in the world.
You can still see, so light still gets under it. And plants are green to reflect sunlight at the peak intensity of the sun, indicating that they can't handle full sunlight. Else they would not be green, moron.
The FACT is that running a nuke plant is not zero carbon, running wind or solar IS. Pretending that solar panel building has to happen AFTER BUILDING is lying your arse off. If all the solar panels are built before 2045, then how much building CO2 is emitted after 2045?
NONE, YOU FUCKING SHILL.
You also ignore nukes need building, need a lot more concrete which produces CO2 when it cures, and decommissioning requires YET MORE buildings with LOTS more concrete (and reinforcement, steel, requiring CO2 to mine and refine), all of which you "forget" to include, as the nuke plant owner who wrote the report in the IPCC did.
It's simple to claim there are problems, but only simplistic people cannot solve them. Green New Deal solves CO2 problems. What problem does it introduce and why can't you solve them?
Power loss is reduced proportionally with insulation (double the insulation, half the power loss), so if you lose it in 6 hours, you double the insulation and you can keep it for 12.
What YOU are reading are anti-renewable blogrolls that cherry pick, for example what you may be being told is that power output will last 6 hours if pulled out at the rated rate, but that is to make it as cost efficient as possible, so a bigger reservoir has a faster draw, and the lying shills telling you just handed you the cherry picked bit of all of them drawing in 6 hours their stores. If they don't extract the heat, then it will last longer.
Either that or YOU are the lying asshole that is eliding the facts to make a lie out of a partial truth.
Because this time it is for hating the lefties, your only aim in life. Look at it as job creation, fuckwit, but one that isn't possible to game like the tax cuts. If you don't produce (requiring workers) the solar panels, you don't get the subsidies.
Are you against job creation now??? Why do you hate job creators so much?!?!?!?
Oh, I get it, it's nothing to do with jobs, it's about how this is a lefty thing. And you're rabid with hate over the left, which is anyone not agreeing with your authority figures...
The only math where America's 15.56 is smaller than China's 7.45
You people are hilarious.
You didn't just learn WindBourne math. You didn't even read your own link like him, or even look at the pretty pictures to see The US is bright red.
You must in fact just be WindBourne himself.