Wind Turbines for Thee, but Not for Me

NIMBY, NIMBY, NIMBY – this example from New York of all wonderfully liberal places:

Naples, N.Y. — The Town Board Monday unanimously rejected a proposed wind-turbine project in the town, determining the gigantic power-generating machines would have a negative effect on the environment. The board also agreed it wants to impose a six-month moratorium on wind turbines, though that decision requires a public hearing and final board vote.

“Most people did not want wind turbines,” Town Supervisor Margaret Dunn said Tuesday.

Come, come now people.  The Messiah has decreed that you will have electricity if the wind blows or the sun shines.  Why in the world would good New Yorkers not want wind turbines?

Last month, hundreds of residents in this Yates County town of 1,000, bordering Naples, turned out largely to voice their opposition to turbines in an emotionally charged gathering. Most of the 116 residents who spoke at the meeting were against the machines, said Dunn.

When the board convened Monday, it determined the 17 proposed turbines would have a negative impact due to noise, light flicker and positioning on steep slopes. Dunn said the board was particularly disturbed because the original proposal stated the turbines would not be sited on slopes exceeding 15 percent, yet the environmental study showed some were slated to be built on such slopes.

Resident Vince Johnson, who lives on Italy Hill Turnpike near a targeted turbine site, said he was worried about storm-water runoff from turbines — as well as noise and possible effect on spring-fed wells

Water runoff?  Slopes?  Noise?  Wells?  Hey – who wouldn’t want to have 20 story turbines booming away.  But they are very very very very green!

So should local cities be able to throw roadblocks in the way of energy independence and Algore worship?

Democrats Number 1 Priority

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Wind Power Blows

clipped from www.energytribune.com Wind has been the cornerstone of almost all environmentalist and social engineering proclamations for more than three decades and has accelerated to a crescendo the last few years in both the United States and the European Union. But Europe, getting a head start, has had to cope with the reality borne by experience and it is a pretty ugly picture. Independent reports have consistently revealed an industry plagued by high construction and maintenance costs, highly volatile reliability and a voracious appetite for taxpayer subsidies. In the journal Energy Policy gas turbine expert Jim Oswald and his co-authors, came up with a series of damning conclusions: not only is wind power far more expensive and unreliable than previously thought, it cannot avoid using high levels of natural gas, which not only it will increase costs but in turn will mean far less of a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions than has been claimed.

Energy Nonsense

In an April 4 Newsweek guest editorial, Secretary of Energy Steven Chu also proved that — his Nobel Prize notwithstanding — common sense and rudimentary knowledge are lacking. First he did not offer one sentence on securing the 87 percent of energy supplies that the US needs other than to discuss “advanced biofuels.”

Not to be outdone in slogan-style exaggeration, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar chimed in…Salazar, the Wall Street Journal reported, “raised eyebrows when he said offshore wind farms could replace 3,000 coal-fired plants.” Never mind that the US only has 600 of them. He also claimed that offshore wind in the Atlantic could deliver 1,000 gigawatts of capacity – approximately equal to the entire electric generation capacity of the US…Salazar’s statement should raise a lot more than eyebrows.

clipped from www.energytribune.com The Obama Administration seems to be unmoved by the fact that according to almost all estimates, by the year 2030, while the world energy demand will increase by 50 percent, oil, gas and coal will still account for 87 percent of world energy. The EPA of course does not offer solutions to the 87 percent problem and defers to Congress to do so. Surely Congress will find the right solution from a position of knowledge as demonstrated by the honorable Nancy Pelosi who on NBC’s Meet the Press said “I believe in natural gas as a clean, cheap alternative to fossil fuels,” and lest one thought she misspoke, she went on to say in the same interview that natural gas “is cheap, abundant and clean compared to fossil fuels.” Let me make two predictions which for most who understand energy may generate chuckles for the dearth of daring: By the end of Obama’s first term, oil consumption in the US will rise and the imported portion of that consumption will increase.

Brown and Obama – VisionQuest

I ran across a great review of Gordon Brown and The Holy Messiah’s visions for the future by Janet Daley in the UK Telegraph:

Mr Obama – who gives the impression of being considerably out of his depth in the economic maelstrom – talks of an “opportunity” to “reorganise our priorities”. He gave a major speech last week in which he actually seemed to suggest that the present crisis had been caused by America’s failure to develop a universal health care system and to attend to the impending environmental disaster of global warming (“we made the wrong choices”), and that by focusing on these matters a way can be found out of the country’s economic problems.

Is he quite mad? Does he really believe that the banking crisis and the recession were some kind of divine retribution for the absence of universal health care, and excessive carbon emissions? Or is he suggesting that a practical solution lies in spending money on health care and the development of alternative energy sources?

Its a power grab and everyone knows it who is actually paying attention.  Here’s Mr. Brown’s vision for the future:

In Gordon Brown’s fantasy, this is an “opportunity” to exercise control over the whole world. Not just stricter regulation by national governments of their own economic institutions, but a wondrous new level of international regulation by supranational functionaries – to be appointed by whom? A World Government agency accountable to no electorate and with no democratic mandate from the populations over whom it will wield such power? Trotskyists used to say that Stalinist Russia had failed to achieve Utopia because it had embraced “socialism in one country” rather than going for “world revolution”. Now, we are being told that Labour’s market-led social justice programme failed because it opted for “regulation in one country” instead of understanding the need for “world regulation”.

Maybe being an ex-Marxist is a bit like being a lapsed Catholic: you never quite get rid of the old thought patterns.

In the more overheated renditions of the Brown theme, there is talk of a “global vision for fairness”, in which the very poverty that is being visited upon all the developed economies will somehow make it possible to redistribute wealth to the developing world.

And these wonderful visions of destroying rich countries in order to make everybody equally poor have been voted into office by a bunc h of idiots who somehow think they will get everything for “free”.  Free health care, free mortgages, car tires automatically inflated to the right pressure, free food, and all done by taking the money from the six evil rich people who control all the wealth.

Horse Pellets and Hockey Sticks.  We get what we deserve.

Your future power generator

New Zealand’s Biofuel Requirements To Be Axed

Gerry Brownlee says there is no way to prove imported biofuels are sustainably produced and he says the government’s view is that using the current arrangement could cause more environmental harm.

Brownlee sees a future for locally produced biofuel but says importing it to create a problem is not what the government wants to do.

Biofuel requirements to be axed (0:45)

http://tvnz.co.nz/view/video_popup_windows_skin/2416055

clipped from tvnz.co.nz Mandatory biofuel requirements are to be axed by the government. The Energy Minister says legislation passed in September forcing oil companies to use proportional levels of biofuel in their products will be repealed. The Biofuel bill was been passed into law in September with the then-government aiming to increase the amount of biofuel such as dairy and beef by-products to power motor vehicles. The bill passed with a 20 vote majority and meant biofuels would have to make up 0.5% of oil companies’ sales this year. Related Air NZ first to trial biofuel Kiwi company to make algae biofuel Biofuel bill becomes law Biofuels: an acceptable alternative? � watch FACTBOX – Biofuels, NZ and abroad

90,000 Renewable Energy Colorado Jobs?

The Colorado Governor is touting research (paid for by…The Governor of Colorado) about hwo specatularly wonderful renewable energy is and how its provising food for 90,000 families and:

Gov. Bill Ritter made the startling claim this week that “the renewable energy industry is creating directly or indirectly 90,000 jobs” in Colorado – in other words, 20,000 more than the estimated employment associated with the booming oil and gas industry.

Let’s put the figure of 90,000 jobs in perspective. It’s nearly twice the number of cops, firefighters, security guards and prison guards in Colorado – combined. It’s more than the combined total of every teacher in K-12 schools together with every lawyer and paralegal. Ninety thousand is twice the waiters and waitresses in this state, twice the number of fast-food workers, and only 10,000 or so less than the total for all major health-care occupations (see the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the occupational employment totals).

Here’s another reality check: After the legislature increased the renewable energy standard for utilities last year from 10 percent to 20 percent for 2020, the League of Conservation Voters – not known for soft-pedaling the impact of green energy – told its members that the measure would create a grand total of 4,100 jobs.

Well, how do you get to a figure that there are more renewable energy jobs than teachers, firemen and policemen?

The report admits that the energy efficiency business is “much more nebulous and difficult to define” than renewables, but that doesn’t stop it from trying. For openers, its definition includes “partial segments of large industries such as vehicles [those considered energy efficient], buildings, lighting, appliances, etc.” And don’t sneer at that “etc.” because it covers a lot of ground, too, including “insulation sales” and the recycling industry.

Never mind that people have been blowing insulation into walls for decades: That activity has now been drafted into the New Energy Economy, where it can be displayed by politicians as a trophy of their economic leadership.

Of course, this will be touted as an example of the wonderful leadership provided by the Dummycrats in Colorado who are working to ensure that every single person either works for the government or is dependant on it.

Democrats To Commuters – Ride a Bike for 20 Bucks

yes – here’s the solution to our energy problems. Giving 20 dollar per month per employee tax deductions to businesses.

Of course, they are frantically working to make sure that we can’t drill for oil precisely where we KNOW it is – because that might actually make sense apparently.

But your legs might be worth a double sawbuck to your employers. Not to you of course – the tax benefit will go to your employer.

Just one other question – are we now going to have bike tax police to monitor the tax returns of business who claim this deduction to verify that the employees are truly humping themselves into the office? When will the first bike tax deduction scofflaw be hauled before the authorities? Lots of employment benefits here.

clipped from www.humanevents.com Section 827 of the bill defines the “Transportation Fringe Benefit to Bicycle Commuters.” It says: “The term ‘qualified bicycle commuting reimbursement’ means, with respect to any calendar year, any employer reimbursement during the 15-month period beginning with the first day of such calendar year for reasonable expenses incurred by the employee during such calendar year for the purchase of a bicycle and bicycle improvements, repair and storage, if such bicycle is regularly used for travel between the employee’s residence and place of employment.” Bottom line: Employers could count as a deductible business expense a tax-free $20 monthly reimbursement to workers who bike to work.

They are Both Economic Nincompoops

Basic economics people – trade is a win/win – now if only somebody would tell the two major party Presidential candidates:

McCain and Obama talk constantly about how much they will “invest” — with money taken from the taxpayers, of course — to achieve energy independence. “[W]e can provide loan guarantees and venture capital to those with the best plans to develop and sell biofuels on a commercial market,” Obama said.

What makes Obama think he’s qualified to pick the “best plans”? It’s the robust competition of the free market that reveals what’s best. Obama’s program would preempt the only good method we have for learning which form of energy is best.

And John McCain seems to be no better:

McCain promises a $300-million prize to whoever develops a battery for an electric car. But the free market already provides plenty of incentive to invent a better battery. As George Mason University economist Donald Boudreaux writes, “Anyone who develops such a device will earn profits dwarfing $300 million simply by selling it on the market. There’s absolutely no need for any such taxpayer-funded prize“.

Central energy planning and government-funded prizes are economic idiocy.