Here's how they do it here, Peli: There's a Chrysler plant about two miles away got shuttered by the first stimulus. I ride past it several times a week on the way to the gym. I don't know how many thousand jobs lost. Sold for a song to the U of DE for a technology park, then leased for a token to an outfit called Bloom Energy, who promised they could make electricity out of methane from trash. Turns out it doesn't pay to make methane from recycled trash; so no one does. Bloom uses natural gas. Which we basically have none of in this state. Still, our house got two trash cans instead of one, and two trash trucks, and so we pay double for trash pickup. State tasked the electric company with paying Bloom. Condition of re-upping their monopoly. I dunno, I don't think they produce much if anything there yet, six years later. But we still pay for it. A surcharge with a great sounding name on our bill. Brag how they created a hundred or so jobs. Nowhere near what the auto plant employed. Vast parking lot full of union auto workers, used to be. Now, you can't see a single car from the road. There's your green energy jobs. But at least that's better than the Saturn plant couple miles from where I work, which employed 3500, now shuttered after the whole criminal Fisker stupidity. Cripes, that place is a whole series of swindles. Last swindle made a hundred million for a Chinese billionaire named Li in a matter of two weeks. Sure, recovery.gov claimed they created 5,000 jobs. Biden made a speech at the site bragging all about it. It's a ghost town.
So, yeah, money does not grow on trees, these things don't pay for themselves, politicians are great at swindling and conniving. That's what they do. They get rich at it. Power corrupts.
Oh, and ... Both trucks still take both trash can contents separately to the same dump and dump them together.
Read an article about the windmills off Block Island just this morning. Similar swindle. They originally wanted to set these windmills off Martha's Island or some such, but the millionaires went to court, not wanting the ugly things obstructing their expensive view, so, they're off Block Island. Lawmakers required the utility to pay 24 cents a kwh for any power the windmills produce. National average for juice is 10 cents. Average in New England is 17 cents. Yes, they promised the people these windmills would make their rates go down. How's that work out at a higher price? Worse yet, it's a 20 year contract, so the rate the utility pays for wind juice automatically goes up every year. Twenty years from now it will cost 50 cents a kwh. On top of the tax breaks you taunt us as being conservative.
But at least nobody gave away tax money, did they, Peli? So, what the hell, it must be a free lunch. Right?
Wrong. There is no free lunch. A truth which you yoiurself tacitly admit when you say you believe the feds should invest in wind energy. If it did not cost there would be no investment.
I don't see where we ever get anywhere with these discussions, though, Peli. I can give you facts and history, past and present, and you will just come back with something so off the wall that it makes me want to ask what color is the moon on your planet. Endless straw men, irrelevancies about who else we subsidize, cherry picked facts. I prolly sound the same to you. Why?
Cause we are coming from opposite poles. You're a statist. I'm a humanist.
The statist believes government is smarter and more capable and more benevolent than people. The statist believes in people of, by, and for the government.
The humanist believes that what we have seen over all the millennia remains true: government is stupider, more corrupt, and more inept than people. The humanist believes in government of, by, and for the people.
Which of these two describes the American experiment in Liberty?
My bottom line is always this: Nothing I propose begins with taking your money nor ends with telling you how to live. That's my definition of liberty. Everything you propose does. Cause liberty is for brainwashed right wing reactionary tea bagger nut jobs. Innit? Worst of all, you think anyone who resents you taking their money and pushing them around, if they get angry, they are not civil.
If you want to pay more tilting at windmills, do it. I'm not stopping you. If I don't, don't make me. Stop it.
Now I gotta stop editing this and go smoke on the porch. Thanks for listening.
"I drink a great deal. I sleep a little, and I smoke cigar after cigar. That is why I am in two-hundred-percent form." -- Winston Churchill "LET'S GO FRANCIS" Peter
I'll reply to everyone's post one at a time as to not get anything mixed up. I have read them all and will reply to each of your concerns. I have no intention of being uncivil nor do I sense any incivility from any posts. I apologize if any of my posts have seemed uncivil as I have a terrible habit of being a smarta$$. I'm about to fire up something tasty and kick off the holiday weekend myself.
Depends where your getting your "facts". I can find articles all over the Internet to back up any argument.
I'm all for change when change makes sense, but throwing billions into something to only get 4.44% ( I have yet to find anything claiming that figure) does not make sense. If it's so grand why isn't all the the green peace billionaires funding it?
I believe in climate change, there is a book that proves it, it's called the Almanac. Climate has changed well before man started using fossil fuels and coal. I do agree we should stride to use cleaner energy, and we have cleaned it up. Advancements should be made thru the private sector and if they fail they fail. You brag how many jobs where created due to green energy, why don't you try going to coal country and tell the folks who are now unemployed about how great of a job the government is doing.
I am getting my facts from academic papers, federal administrative reports, or the well-cited wikipedia. These are not articles. Articles can be written by anyone and say anything they want.
I feel we as a nation have a responsibility to lead the world in changing our energy creation and consumption. We need to move from non-renewables to more renewable sources. We need to be independent of other countries when it comes to energy. The economy of my local area is heavily dependent on fossil fuels. There are over 40,000 natural gas wells in the basin in which I live and our economy sucks. I'm not seeing any raises in my wage as an effect. The 4.44% number, which I believe is from 2014, is a direct quote from the wikipedia entry on US wind energy. I posted the 2015 numbers in an earlier post directly from the US Energy Information Administration stating wind energy at 4.7% of total electrical energy generated in the US. What rich folks do with their money isn't any of my business, but I would be willing to bet there are plenty of them that support a move to more renewable energy sources.
I too believe in climate change. The nature of climate is that is always changing. Climate is an observation of weather patterns over time. 88,000 jobs related to wind energy at the beginning of this year is nothing to balk at.
Just like ethanol. Government keeps pounding it and pounding it.. I've yet to have a vehicle that loses less then 5mpg burning 10% ethanol apposed to regular gas. So say your car gets 35mpg on regular and 30mpg on ethanol, your actually burning 5% more regular gas to go the same distance using ethanol. Not to mention the diesel to work the ground, plant the crop, fertilize and spray the crop, water the crop (in some cases), harvest the crop and haul it to town then haul it to the ethanol plant.. You do all this to burn 5% more fossil fuel to go the same distance in your car. That is just the affects on the environment. Then add in the consumer's cost of having to buy more fuel to go the same distance, fuel additives to TRY to help the damage ethanol does to an engine fuel system, and in small engines case actually be able to run on it, then repair costs due to the harm it causes to fuel system.. Makes a lot of sense doesn't it?
I'm not a proponent of ethanol. While I see the merits of having an energy source that we can grow year after year, I have to agree with you that it isn't worth pursuing. Crude oil on the other hand doesn't "grow on trees". We give the farmers enough money to grow corn to feed livestock anyways, but that's an argument for another time.
I agree 110% @pelirrojo. We have no business sending our boys and I guess girls over to liberate other countries while we have plenty of our own problems, especially countries that history has proven do not want to be liberated . To be honest I don't believe we should be fighting any wars until the powers that be figure out war is ugly and if you must fight, fight to win. Also do not go into battle without providing our military the tools they need to achieve victory. Both sides guilty.
I had no intention of discussing military spending or our military action throughout the world, despite bringing it up. Really only using it as an indicator of how little money we actually "spend" on energy and climate/conservation. I am happy to see that we agree. See I'm not such a bad guy after all and neither are you
How exactly can one dislike their government supporting the establishment of sustainable and renewable energy sources?
And American manufacturing... "As of April 2009, over 100 companies are producing components for wind turbines, employing thousands of workers in the manufacture of parts as varied as towers, composite blades, bearings and gears. Many existing companies in traditional manufacturing states have retooled to enter the wind industry. Their manufacturing facilities are spread across 40 states, employing workers from the Southeast to the Steel Belt, to the Great Plains and on to the Pacific Northwest."
"American wind power supported a record 88,000 jobs at the start of 2016."
"Recent U.S. policy has generally been to provide an inflation-adjusted federal production tax credit (PTC) of $15 per MW·h (in 1995 dollars) generated for the first ten years of operation for wind energy sold. As of 2015, the credit was $23 per MW·h. Renewable portfolio standards mandating a certain percentage of electricity sales come from renewable energy sources, which are in place in about half of the states, also have boosted the development of the wind industry.
Each time Congress has allowed the production tax credit to expire, wind power development has slowed as investors wait for the credit to be restored. Each year it is renewed development has expanded. The tax credit expired at the end of 2012, bringing wind power development activity to a near halt. A short term, one year policy was enacted at the beginning of 2013 which provides a tax credit to projects under construction by the end of 2013 and completed before the end of 2014. The PTC was first introduced in 1992. When it was allowed to expire, development dropped 93%, 73%, and 77% the following year."
Actually if you read your post you make a perfect argument against wind energy. First off is the renewable energy % mandate. If wind energy is so efficient and reliable why would there have to be a mandate? Answer, that is code for cost to benifit is horrible, but it's our agenda so we will force it on you. "Each year congress has allowed the production tax credit to expire, wind power development has slowed as investors wait for credit to be restored. Each year it is renewed development has expanded". If such a viable source of energy why could this be? Could it mean the investors know without government wind energy would not exist? Warren Buffet who is no right winger by any stretch of the imagination seems to believe so.
Depends where your getting your "facts". I can find articles all over the Internet to back up any argument.
I'm all for change when change makes sense, but throwing billions into something to only get 4.44% ( I have yet to find anything claiming that figure) does not make sense. If it's so grand why isn't all the the green peace billionaires funding it?
I believe in climate change, there is a book that proves it, it's called the Almanac. Climate has changed well before man started using fossil fuels and coal. I do agree we should stride to use cleaner energy, and we have cleaned it up. Advancements should be made thru the private sector and if they fail they fail. You brag how many jobs where created due to green energy, why don't you try going to coal country and tell the folks who are now unemployed about how great of a job the government is doing.
I am getting my facts from academic papers, federal administrative reports, or the well-cited wikipedia. These are not articles. Articles can be written by anyone and say anything they want.
I feel we as a nation have a responsibility to lead the world in changing our energy creation and consumption. We need to move from non-renewables to more renewable sources. We need to be independent of other countries when it comes to energy. The economy of my local area is heavily dependent on fossil fuels. There are over 40,000 natural gas wells in the basin in which I live and our economy sucks. I'm not seeing any raises in my wage as an effect. The 4.44% number, which I believe is from 2014, is a direct quote from the wikipedia entry on US wind energy. I posted the 2015 numbers in an earlier post directly from the US Energy Information Administration stating wind energy at 4.7% of total electrical energy generated in the US. What rich folks do with their money isn't any of my business, but I would be willing to bet there are plenty of them that support a move to more renewable energy sources.
I too believe in climate change. The nature of climate is that is always changing. Climate is an observation of weather patterns over time. 88,000 jobs related to wind energy at the beginning of this year is nothing to balk at.
We have just as much responsibility to lead the world in renewable power as we do in policing it.
Not against renewable energy if it makes sense and is developed in the private sector. We have all the energy resources we need to not be dependant on other countries, why not utilize them until technology comes about in renewable energy? Why force feed massive waste, that benifits foreign intities by the way?
Like it or not, the biggest push for renewable energy is for environmental issues not self reliance. There maybe 88,000 new jobs due to wind power, but how many millions of jobs have been ran out of the country with help from federal regulations from the EPA? Sure there is other factors such as taxes and labor cost that contributed, but regulations played a big part of why we have moved from a producing nation to a consuming nation.
There once was a time when people seen a problem and fixed it, came up with an idea and made it reality.. That is what made this country as strong as it is. Common people that made things happen, did not look to government to solve everything.
Here's how they do it here, Peli: There's a Chrysler plant about two miles away got shuttered by the first stimulus. I ride past it several times a week on the way to the gym. I don't know how many thousand jobs lost. Sold for a song to the U of DE for a technology park, then leased for a token to an outfit called Bloom Energy, who promised they could make electricity out of methane from trash. Turns out it doesn't pay to make methane from recycled trash; so no one does. Bloom uses natural gas. Which we basically have none of in this state. Still, our house got two trash cans instead of one, and two trash trucks, and so we pay double for trash pickup. State tasked the electric company with paying Bloom. Condition of re-upping their monopoly. I dunno, I don't think they produce much if anything there yet, six years later. But we still pay for it. A surcharge with a great sounding name on our bill. Brag how they created a hundred or so jobs. Nowhere near what the auto plant employed. Vast parking lot full of union auto workers, used to be. Now, you can't see a single car from the road. There's your green energy jobs. But at least that's better than the Saturn plant couple miles from where I work, which employed 3500, now shuttered after the whole criminal Fisker stupidity. Cripes, that place is a whole series of swindles. Last swindle made a hundred million for a Chinese billionaire named Li in a matter of two weeks. Sure, recovery.gov claimed they created 5,000 jobs. Biden made a speech at the site bragging all about it. It's a ghost town.
So, yeah, money does not grow on trees, these things don't pay for themselves, politicians are great at swindling and conniving. That's what they do. They get rich at it. Power corrupts.
Oh, and ... Both trucks still take both trash can contents separately to the same dump and dump them together.
Read an article about the windmills off Block Island just this morning. Similar swindle. They originally wanted to set these windmills off Martha's Island or some such, but the millionaires went to court, not wanting the ugly things obstructing their expensive view, so, they're off Block Island. Lawmakers required the utility to pay 24 cents a kwh for any power the windmills produce. National average for juice is 10 cents. Average in New England is 17 cents. Yes, they promised the people these windmills would make their rates go down. How's that work out at a higher price? Worse yet, it's a 20 year contract, so the rate the utility pays for wind juice automatically goes up every year. Twenty years from now it will cost 50 cents a kwh. On top of the tax breaks you taunt us as being conservative.
But at least nobody gave away tax money, did they, Peli? So, what the hell, it must be a free lunch. Right?
Wrong. There is no free lunch. A truth which you yoiurself tacitly admit when you say you believe the feds should invest in wind energy. If it did not cost there would be no investment.
I don't see where we ever get anywhere with these discussions, though, Peli. I can give you facts and history, past and present, and you will just come back with something so off the wall that it makes me want to ask what color is the moon on your planet. Endless straw men, irrelevancies about who else we subsidize, cherry picked facts. I prolly sound the same to you. Why?
Cause we are coming from opposite poles. You're a statist. I'm a humanist.
The statist believes government is smarter and more capable and more benevolent than people. The statist believes in people of, by, and for the government.
The humanist believes that what we have seen over all the millennia remains true: government is stupider, more corrupt, and more inept than people. The humanist believes in government of, by, and for the people.
Which of these two describes the American experiment in Liberty?
My bottom line is always this: Nothing I propose begins with taking your money nor ends with telling you how to live. That's my definition of liberty. Everything you propose does. Cause liberty is for brainwashed right wing reactionary tea bagger nut jobs. Innit? Worst of all, you think anyone who resents you taking their money and pushing them around, if they get angry, they are not civil.
If you want to pay more tilting at windmills, do it. I'm not stopping you. If I don't, don't make me. Stop it.
Now I gotta stop editing this and go smoke on the porch. Thanks for listening.
I always love reading your posts on these things Web honestly. I think my southern/southwestern upbringing makes some of the colloquialisms difficult to comprehend, but I always have a pretty good understanding of what you're getting at.
To be honest, Chrysler makes a bad product. I can say that because I drive a jeep haha. At least parts are cheap and readily available. Lord know's you'll need 'em. I haven't seen a Saturn worth it's weight in coal since the 90's.
You are in fact correct that we sit in completely different realms when it comes to thoughts on government. The relationships between large private sector industries and the federal government are likely ones neither of us will ever know or understand. I wish there were more transparency when it comes to that, as I'm sure you do too. These Panama papers released recently sort of got me excited that we may be making some headway in that department; offshore accounts, tax havens, etc... I take it that you are not a big whig in some corporation and darn sure ain't either.
I think we can agree that there's too much fishy funding going on in D.C. these days. Too many industries in the pockets of politicians and they wind up directing the legislature that gets pushed rather than the voters/citizens that got them in office. I think a lot of this has to do with voters only being given a few options and hey this guy's a little better than this other one. Money talks as they say.
That being said, unfortunately we live and operate in the political environment that we have allowed to be created. We as citizens are responsible for our state of affairs. We vote based on what we hear/see/read on cnn/fox/msnbc/whatever and we don't bother to do the research for ourselves. George Carlin has a really good piece on that that I may post after this.
I am not a statist. I do, however, wish that we could view things from a national standpoint. We have to observe the political environment that we are responsible for creating. It is our money and we have a say in what it is used for and how much of it we give. We have to unite to see our money used for things that will better not only our country but the world as a whole. We can voice our opinions. I write my representative/senator regularly. I'm not afraid of being outnumbered. I'm probably one of 15 registered Democrats in my county(joking there may be 50 of us). I smile and nod at work because I need my paycheck, but I do stand loud and proud here and elsewhere.
Wind energy I feel is a reasonable investment in the future of our country and of our world. It is currently employing many Americans and will continue to do so. It provides for our needs and it is solely by Americans for Americans. In that aspect I do feel like it is something that our government should be in support of.
Most of all, I just wish @kswildcat would keep his eyes on the road while captaining that big rig
How exactly can one dislike their government supporting the establishment of sustainable and renewable energy sources?
And American manufacturing... "As of April 2009, over 100 companies are producing components for wind turbines, employing thousands of workers in the manufacture of parts as varied as towers, composite blades, bearings and gears. Many existing companies in traditional manufacturing states have retooled to enter the wind industry. Their manufacturing facilities are spread across 40 states, employing workers from the Southeast to the Steel Belt, to the Great Plains and on to the Pacific Northwest."
"American wind power supported a record 88,000 jobs at the start of 2016."
"Recent U.S. policy has generally been to provide an inflation-adjusted federal production tax credit (PTC) of $15 per MW·h (in 1995 dollars) generated for the first ten years of operation for wind energy sold. As of 2015, the credit was $23 per MW·h. Renewable portfolio standards mandating a certain percentage of electricity sales come from renewable energy sources, which are in place in about half of the states, also have boosted the development of the wind industry.
Each time Congress has allowed the production tax credit to expire, wind power development has slowed as investors wait for the credit to be restored. Each year it is renewed development has expanded. The tax credit expired at the end of 2012, bringing wind power development activity to a near halt. A short term, one year policy was enacted at the beginning of 2013 which provides a tax credit to projects under construction by the end of 2013 and completed before the end of 2014. The PTC was first introduced in 1992. When it was allowed to expire, development dropped 93%, 73%, and 77% the following year."
Actually if you read your post you make a perfect argument against wind energy. First off is the renewable energy % mandate. If wind energy is so efficient and reliable why would there have to be a mandate? Answer, that is code for cost to benifit is horrible, but it's our agenda so we will force it on you. "Each year congress has allowed the production tax credit to expire, wind power development has slowed as investors wait for credit to be restored. Each year it is renewed development has expanded". If such a viable source of energy why could this be? Could it mean the investors know without government wind energy would not exist? Warren Buffet who is no right winger by any stretch of the imagination seems to believe so.
Name a major industry that hasn't benefited from gov't tax breaks or subsidies. Please.
That's kind of impossible as it seems government cannot keep from sticking it's nose into everything thinking they can fix it or make it reality by throwing money at it. I'm sure every industry has lobbyists with a bunch of politicians In their pocket just waiting for the return on their investment via Joe blow taxpayer.
Precisely my argument. Why is it that a windmill is such a big deal when you're putting taxpayer money in your tank every time you're at a truck stop? Gas/Diesel ain't cheap just for schnits and giggles
Does wind power feed you, clothe you? Fossil fuels sure does. Everything you touch fossil fuels made available to you and oil subsidy has made more affordable to you. Any subsidy oil receives we get benifits from. There is a huge difference.
Also every gallon of fuel I put in this truck is taxed. I assure you the amount of Joe the taxpayers money that goes in my tank is far less then the taxes on fuel that goes in my tank, and those taxes are not going to the highways, if they were our highways wouldn't be tire, shock, ball joint, springs and tie rod eating chit roads.
Sometimes it seems like the liberal's favorite argument is "so's your old man"... that is, when they're not marshalling their vast army of straw men.
Just because Lincoln was the first president to suspend habeus corpus does not make it right for either Bush or Obama to do so.
in the same way...
Just because the corn lobby can get an ethanol subsidy does not make it right for the green lobby to get a subsidy for wind.
Dad used to say "One wrong doesn't right another."
It's the whole principle of subsidy, that's what sucks donkey dongs. The statist says subsidize. The humanist says let people vote with their pockets. If people want gasahol they'll buy it. If people want wind energy, let them buy it. The statist says you have to buy it. As soon as you hand the decision over to government, what you get is kickbacks, payoffs, bought votes, graft, coercion, thralldom, extortion, corruption, ineptness, lies, inefficiency, and unscrupulous double dealing failures .... which never ever ever go away ... anything fails, they just throw more money at it. Hell, we still have the mohair subsidy. That's a century old. Needed wool to make uniforms for WWI soldiers, so subsidized goats to replace wool. A hundred years ago. World War effin One, fer cryin out loud. No one buys mohair except ... all of us.
Governments discover or invent crises so that they can mis-apply the wrong solutions in order to enrich their cronies and enhance their power. This is what they do. Always have done. I'm not theorizing this fact. I didn't come up with it. This is not what I asked for. It's not my ideal. I didn't hear this fact from right wind talk radio blowhards, bible beaters, trumpkins, tea baggers or reactionaries. It's not any kinda hateful ism other than plain old realism. Pull your head out of the theoretical sand and take a look all around you. That's just what happens. This is the recorded experience of all the millennia. Power corrupts. The first thing power corrupts is good intentions.
If you believe in windmills, buy one. I won't stop you. I don't. Don't make me.
That seems such a simple proposition, to me, that I fail to see why you don''t get it. Let me repeat it:
If you believe in windmills, buy yourself one. I won't stop you. I don't. Don't make me.
The humanist says leave as much as we can up to the individual. The statist says leave as much as we can up to the state... then keeps on extending what we can. You claim you are not a statist. Who then do you say we should leave it up to?
“It has been a source of great pain to me to have met with so many among [my] opponents who had not the liberality to distinguish between political and social opposition; who transferred at once to the person, the hatred they bore to his political opinions.” —Thomas Jefferson (1808)
Precisely my argument. Why is it that a windmill is such a big deal when you're putting taxpayer money in your tank every time you're at a truck stop? Gas/Diesel ain't cheap just for schnits and giggles
That argument is so bs. There are other power sources that can and do provide power if wind energy isn't available. Name one single source of power that can take place of oil providing our basic needs? Take away oil subsidy and tell me how well stocked your grocery, and other goods stores are. Tell me how many people would starve to death. Tell me your quality of living would not drastically change.. Now tell me how your basic needs will not be provided and quality of living will drastically change without wind power and compare them. Do you at all see a difference, or is wind energy subsidy the exact same as oil subsidy to you?
They could probably get better results by stopping the government subsidies and letting the private businesses handle it themselves. The businesses would go by the market not some pipe dream. They would not waste their own money on research as easily as government does. Most of our electricity comes from coal, or fired, turbines now doesn't it? That's what we're geared for and they have made progress in cleaner coal. We can evolve into different "environmentally safe" means but not until it's affordable, more affordable than what we have now. Windmills, solar all that will evolve of it's own market volition not government mandates.
So there was this awesome thing a while back called the industrial revolution. Fossil fuels provided this great source of energy to accomplish many things.
One day that source of energy will dry up. That is a fact that no one can argue against.
Would you rather be left with fledgling energy sources or would you rather already have those sources established and productive?
I view it as preparation for the inevitable. Trying to secure a future for my descendants if I ever get around to getting laid.
I want the people that I vote for and the money that I give to go to that cause.
And your oh so right, if it wasn't for federal government subsidizing all those industries during the industrial revolution we would still be riding horse and buggy and plowing fields with ox powered 1 bottom plows.
Can you believe those silly people that believe all that was done through inventors and investors? Hahaha those fools, nothing gets done without government. Do we thank Tesla for electricity, Ford for the car? Heck no, thanks to government backing we have those things.
I retract all my previous comments. Let's give a finger to evil oil.
Now I may have a problem with bridges, tunnels and highline wires, but hey those are just small problems.
We all know the sun is always shining, and think of the weight savings electric motor vs diesel engine. Also I have 53' trailer to haul the batteries to power it. I betcha I can haul a entire pallet of goods and be 80,000lbs or less with this rig.
How long before we all reach the point that California has already arrived at, when one can accurately state that "if it isn't prohibited, it's mandatory"?
WARNING: The above post may contain thoughts or ideas known to the State of Caliphornia to cause seething rage, confusion, distemper, nausea, perspiration, sphincter release, or cranial implosion to persons who implicitly trust only one news source, or find themselves at either the left or right political extreme. Proceed at your own risk.
"If you do not read the newspapers you're uninformed. If you do read the newspapers, you're misinformed." -- Mark Twain
How long before we all reach the point that California has already arrived at, when one can accurately state that "if it isn't prohibited, it's mandatory"?
What time is it now?
O'er the la-and of the regulated, And the home of the circumspect
Play Ball!
“It has been a source of great pain to me to have met with so many among [my] opponents who had not the liberality to distinguish between political and social opposition; who transferred at once to the person, the hatred they bore to his political opinions.” —Thomas Jefferson (1808)
Fossil fuels and electricity are 2 different things, but still energy. Point I guess I was trying to make was that the right people working on these things in a free enterprise type way would get faster and better results as opposed to government involvement and rules. Just keep us safe and collect the taxes.
Basic thesis of "The 3000 Year Leap" was that man had used the same implements for ages until the USA was up and running. Hand tools, farm animals for power had been used forever, but in just couple hundred years this country advanced civilization 3000 years. People free of government intervention, chasing their dreams, learning and sharing information. Turn people loose and give them a goal to achieve, it will happen.
Solar is the way to go, even with Elon Musks crazy "Power Wall" he talked about in 2015, Power Wall Fact Check. Which would take 100,000 Square KM's to power the US right now. That is a crap load of land. But realistically, it's only 1% and some change, of the US's total land. 1% of the land in a desert environment to power the entire US? Sounds like a damned good deal no matter how many billions it costs. And managing that much space would open up a crap ton of jobs, from construction, to maintenance to security. Would be a big boon to the country if you ask me.
Between installing, maintaining, then firing up separate generators for night time and the sky high energy cost of making these things, on top of the immense amount lost AS HEAT min the grid, not to mention the crew it would take to keep 1000,000 square kliks clean of dust... if solar were the way to go, then we'd already be going there.
All my childhood, nuke fusion was the way to go. Unfortunately, turns out it's a problem to which the answer is perpetually five years away.
You ever notice how every electric answer to global warming begins with creating heat?
“It has been a source of great pain to me to have met with so many among [my] opponents who had not the liberality to distinguish between political and social opposition; who transferred at once to the person, the hatred they bore to his political opinions.” —Thomas Jefferson (1808)
Comments
-- Winston Churchill
"LET'S GO FRANCIS" Peter
I feel we as a nation have a responsibility to lead the world in changing our energy creation and consumption. We need to move from non-renewables to more renewable sources. We need to be independent of other countries when it comes to energy. The economy of my local area is heavily dependent on fossil fuels. There are over 40,000 natural gas wells in the basin in which I live and our economy sucks. I'm not seeing any raises in my wage as an effect. The 4.44% number, which I believe is from 2014, is a direct quote from the wikipedia entry on US wind energy. I posted the 2015 numbers in an earlier post directly from the US Energy Information Administration stating wind energy at 4.7% of total electrical energy generated in the US. What rich folks do with their money isn't any of my business, but I would be willing to bet there are plenty of them that support a move to more renewable energy sources.
I too believe in climate change. The nature of climate is that is always changing. Climate is an observation of weather patterns over time. 88,000 jobs related to wind energy at the beginning of this year is nothing to balk at.
First off is the renewable energy % mandate. If wind energy is so efficient and reliable why would there have to be a mandate? Answer, that is code for cost to benifit is horrible, but it's our agenda so we will force it on you.
"Each year congress has allowed the production tax credit to expire, wind power development has slowed as investors wait for credit to be restored. Each year it is renewed development has expanded". If such a viable source of energy why could this be? Could it mean the investors know without government wind energy would not exist? Warren Buffet who is no right winger by any stretch of the imagination seems to believe so.
Not against renewable energy if it makes sense and is developed in the private sector. We have all the energy resources we need to not be dependant on other countries, why not utilize them until technology comes about in renewable energy? Why force feed massive waste, that benifits foreign intities by the way?
Like it or not, the biggest push for renewable energy is for environmental issues not self reliance. There maybe 88,000 new jobs due to wind power, but how many millions of jobs have been ran out of the country with help from federal regulations from the EPA? Sure there is other factors such as taxes and labor cost that contributed, but regulations played a big part of why we have moved from a producing nation to a consuming nation.
There once was a time when people seen a problem and fixed it, came up with an idea and made it reality.. That is what made this country as strong as it is. Common people that made things happen, did not look to government to solve everything.
To be honest, Chrysler makes a bad product. I can say that because I drive a jeep haha. At least parts are cheap and readily available. Lord know's you'll need 'em. I haven't seen a Saturn worth it's weight in coal since the 90's.
You are in fact correct that we sit in completely different realms when it comes to thoughts on government. The relationships between large private sector industries and the federal government are likely ones neither of us will ever know or understand. I wish there were more transparency when it comes to that, as I'm sure you do too. These Panama papers released recently sort of got me excited that we may be making some headway in that department; offshore accounts, tax havens, etc... I take it that you are not a big whig in some corporation and darn sure ain't either.
I think we can agree that there's too much fishy funding going on in D.C. these days. Too many industries in the pockets of politicians and they wind up directing the legislature that gets pushed rather than the voters/citizens that got them in office. I think a lot of this has to do with voters only being given a few options and hey this guy's a little better than this other one. Money talks as they say.
That being said, unfortunately we live and operate in the political environment that we have allowed to be created. We as citizens are responsible for our state of affairs. We vote based on what we hear/see/read on cnn/fox/msnbc/whatever and we don't bother to do the research for ourselves. George Carlin has a really good piece on that that I may post after this.
I am not a statist. I do, however, wish that we could view things from a national standpoint. We have to observe the political environment that we are responsible for creating. It is our money and we have a say in what it is used for and how much of it we give. We have to unite to see our money used for things that will better not only our country but the world as a whole. We can voice our opinions. I write my representative/senator regularly. I'm not afraid of being outnumbered. I'm probably one of 15 registered Democrats in my county(joking there may be 50 of us). I smile and nod at work because I need my paycheck, but I do stand loud and proud here and elsewhere.
Wind energy I feel is a reasonable investment in the future of our country and of our world. It is currently employing many Americans and will continue to do so. It provides for our needs and it is solely by Americans for Americans. In that aspect I do feel like it is something that our government should be in support of.
Most of all, I just wish @kswildcat would keep his eyes on the road while captaining that big rig
This Warren Buffet? http://www.wsj.com/articles/buffett-puts-wind-in-berkshires-sails-1414084146
And yes that's an article, from a well known "right leaning" source.
I'm parked by the way..lol
Also every gallon of fuel I put in this truck is taxed. I assure you the amount of Joe the taxpayers money that goes in my tank is far less then the taxes on fuel that goes in my tank, and those taxes are not going to the highways, if they were our highways wouldn't be tire, shock, ball joint, springs and tie rod eating chit roads.
Just because Lincoln was the first president to suspend habeus corpus does not make it right for either Bush or Obama to do so.
in the same way...
Just because the corn lobby can get an ethanol subsidy does not make it right for the green lobby to get a subsidy for wind.
Dad used to say "One wrong doesn't right another."
It's the whole principle of subsidy, that's what sucks donkey dongs. The statist says subsidize. The humanist says let people vote with their pockets. If people want gasahol they'll buy it. If people want wind energy, let them buy it. The statist says you have to buy it. As soon as you hand the decision over to government, what you get is kickbacks, payoffs, bought votes, graft, coercion, thralldom, extortion, corruption, ineptness, lies, inefficiency, and unscrupulous double dealing failures .... which never ever ever go away ... anything fails, they just throw more money at it. Hell, we still have the mohair subsidy. That's a century old. Needed wool to make uniforms for WWI soldiers, so subsidized goats to replace wool. A hundred years ago. World War effin One, fer cryin out loud. No one buys mohair except ... all of us.
Governments discover or invent crises so that they can mis-apply the wrong solutions in order to enrich their cronies and enhance their power. This is what they do. Always have done. I'm not theorizing this fact. I didn't come up with it. This is not what I asked for. It's not my ideal. I didn't hear this fact from right wind talk radio blowhards, bible beaters, trumpkins, tea baggers or reactionaries. It's not any kinda hateful ism other than plain old realism. Pull your head out of the theoretical sand and take a look all around you. That's just what happens. This is the recorded experience of all the millennia. Power corrupts. The first thing power corrupts is good intentions.
If you believe in windmills, buy one. I won't stop you. I don't. Don't make me.
That seems such a simple proposition, to me, that I fail to see why you don''t get it. Let me repeat it:
If you believe in windmills, buy yourself one. I won't stop you. I don't. Don't make me.
The humanist says leave as much as we can up to the individual. The statist says leave as much as we can up to the state... then keeps on extending what we can. You claim you are not a statist. Who then do you say we should leave it up to?
At any given time the urge to sing "In The Jungle" is just a whim away... A whim away... A whim away...
One day that source of energy will dry up. That is a fact that no one can argue against.
Would you rather be left with fledgling energy sources or would you rather already have those sources established and productive?
I view it as preparation for the inevitable. Trying to secure a future for my descendants if I ever get around to getting laid.
I want the people that I vote for and the money that I give to go to that cause.
And your oh so right, if it wasn't for federal government subsidizing all those industries during the industrial revolution we would still be riding horse and buggy and plowing fields with ox powered 1 bottom plows.
Can you believe those silly people that believe all that was done through inventors and investors? Hahaha those fools, nothing gets done without government. Do we thank Tesla for electricity, Ford for the car? Heck no, thanks to government backing we have those things.
Now I may have a problem with bridges, tunnels and highline wires, but hey those are just small problems.
We all know the sun is always shining, and think of the weight savings electric motor vs diesel engine. Also I have 53' trailer to haul the batteries to power it. I betcha I can haul a entire pallet of goods and be 80,000lbs or less with this rig.
"If you do not read the newspapers you're uninformed. If you do read the newspapers, you're misinformed." -- Mark Twain
O'er the la-and of the regulated,
And the home of the circumspect
Play Ball!
Basic thesis of "The 3000 Year Leap" was that man had used the same implements for ages until the USA was up and running. Hand tools, farm animals for power had been used forever, but in just couple hundred years this country advanced civilization 3000 years. People free of government intervention, chasing their dreams, learning and sharing information. Turn people loose and give them a goal to achieve, it will happen.
Between installing, maintaining, then firing up separate generators for night time and the sky high energy cost of making these things, on top of the immense amount lost AS HEAT min the grid, not to mention the crew it would take to keep 1000,000 square kliks clean of dust... if solar were the way to go, then we'd already be going there.
All my childhood, nuke fusion was the way to go. Unfortunately, turns out it's a problem to which the answer is perpetually five years away.
You ever notice how every electric answer to global warming begins with creating heat?