Tax Credits For Hot Air
Lamar Alexander writes in the WSJ that the U.S. Senate is poised to bring back Washington's "most conspicuous, wasteful taxpayer subsidy," the tax credit for "wind production."
(There's a joke about politicians there but it seems too cheap to make.)
Alexander reports that the proposed extension for the wind subsidy would cost taxpayers $10 billion over the next 10 years.
He adds:
...2. The wind subsidy undercuts reliable "baseload" electricity such as nuclear and coal. Let's say it's 3 a.m. in Chicago. The wind is blowing, which it usually does at night when consumers are asleep and don't need as much electricity. Because of the subsidy, wind producers can pay utilities to take their power and still make a profit.But the electricity generated from coal and nuclear plants--which are hard to turn on and off--becomes less economical. As a result, utilities have an incentive to close these "baseload" plants. Negative pricing tied to wind power, along with the low price of natural gas, is causing utilities to close nuclear plants. The Center for Strategic and International Studies says that as many as 25% of our country's 100 nuclear plants might close over the next 10 years.
On April 28, environmental groups, including the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions and Nuclear Matters, announced--they held an event in Washington at the National Press Club-- that they were concerned about losing clean nuclear power, which provides 60% of America's air-pollution-free electricity. And, in a country that consumes 20% of the world's electricity, relying on windmills when nuclear power is available is the energy equivalent of going to war in sailboats when nuclear ships are available.
...3. Wind-power subsidies destroy the environment in the name of saving the environment. The wind turbines that generate power in this country do not resemble the charming, picturesque windmills that dot the Dutch landscape. Instead, they are 20 stories high. Their blinking lights can be seen for miles. Their noise disturbs neighbors. Their transmission lines scar neighborhoods and open spaces.
More details on wind from Ron Bailey at reason:
According to the U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration (EIA), if one includes all the capital, operating, and fuel costs, electricity from wind still costs about 50 percent more than conventional coal and 100 percent more than natural gas. Proponents point out that the costs of turbines are coming down, but the costs for the considerable infrastructure needed to manage wind are still daunting.
For the record, I think those stretches of wind turbines look kinda cool.
I'm guessing that for a lot of the people pushing wind, nuclear plant shutdowns are a feature, not a bug.
Rex Little at May 7, 2014 10:21 PM
Kinda cool except for the piles of dead birds underneath.
Annie at May 8, 2014 5:23 AM
Annie has a great point. Are we serious about protecting endangered species or not? There are a gerzillion regulations allowing that you can be thrown in jail (yes, the regs apply to individuals; see other thread) for so much as doiong something that might annoy or inconvenience a bird of an endangered species. Yet, such a bird being chopped in half by a windmill is fine and dandy. The de facto blanket exemption from the Endangered Species Act that the wind-energy industry enjoys is not only a subsidy; it's an outright effort by the government to ban non-politically-correct forms of energy production, without passing a law to do so. Which IMO is just incredibly sleazy and a total abuse of government power.
Cousin Dave at May 8, 2014 7:14 AM
Cousin Dave is totally correct.
The electric distribution company I worked for was hammered whenever a heron or eagle was killed while perching/nesting on our lines. Eagles would swoop down to gain lift and zapp!
We spent a lot of money (time and material) trying to bird proof certain locations.
Yet windmills are totally cool w/the bird killing. After all, they are GREEN power.
Bob in Texas at May 8, 2014 8:24 AM
My understanding is that when some of California's nuclear plants shut down a year or so ago, carbon emissions went up. Wind and solar will not make up for the lost capacity when nuclear plants shut down, and we can all prepare ourselves for sticker shock once the price of natural gas goes up. Nuclear plants are very, very expensive to build, but once they're on line they are once of the cheapest, most efficient, "greenest" sources of power.
ahw at May 8, 2014 8:27 AM
There are so many problems and misconceptions with power in the US, it is very politically motivated. If it wasn't we would not be discussing wind at all, it is that bad at power generation. But it is the one being pushed.I'll know when they are serious when they bring back talk of hydro-electric as a green energy source. It completely vanished years ago for political reasons.
Some things of not when talking about power generation that are very important but get left out. The main ones are energy storage and energy transportation costs/losses.
Energy transportation loss is, how much energy it takes to get that KW from the power plant to your home. Currently its about .5% per mile. With most US power generated within 15 miles of where it is used. (less than 7% loss)
It doesn't sound like much but it adds up quickly. Power generated 100 miles away has a 40% loss. 200 miles away 60% loss. And yet people are actually suggesting wind farms in the Dakotas or Solar in Arizona powering NYC.
Grid energy is not stored in batteries, it is stored in water. Batteries are very inefficient, water is much less so. How do you store it in water, by using water pumps to push the water up hill to a storage container, when power is needed, the water falls back down turns turbines and you have power. Every time it is pumped or let out there is energy loss.
Now what about hydro electric. It is pretty much banned by the EPA, because it doesn't get the exceptions Cousin Dave was talking about. so any hydro plant will pretty much fail the infinite regulations from the EPA. So even though it is by far the cheapest by far, it has been banned from discussions. because it might disturb a fish.
Joe J at May 8, 2014 8:38 AM
Kinda cool except for the piles of dead birds underneath.
Good point. Fascinatingly (and morbidly) enough, windows and buildings kill far more birds annually -- 60 million or more, some people say; whereas, wind farms kill around 300,000 birds annually.
Wind farms also kill 600,000 bats annually.
But people say it's because there are so many buildings compared to wind turbines. If the number of wind farms increase, the number of bird deaths should increase, too. And for wind to replace coal and fossil fuels, we would have to build a whole hell of a lot of 'em.
Wind turbines are really impressive things, though. They are beautiful.
Jason S. at May 8, 2014 6:47 PM
I think we need to start cranking out a bunch of breeder reactors.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at May 8, 2014 7:49 PM
The Horse Hollow Wind Energy Center in Texas is one of the biggest wind farms in the world. It has 430 windmills, each 300 to 400 feet tall. When the wind blows, which is not quite half the time, it has a capacity of 735.5 megawatts. That's about 90% of the electricity needed to supply a midsize city like Tacoma, Washington on an average day. It covers 47,000 acres of land, about 73 square miles, which is about one and half times the land area of Tacoma, Washington.
Ken R at May 8, 2014 8:02 PM
Leave a comment