Shivering and Sweltering in the Dark

First, let me differ in defining environmentalists from greeners in my book. Environmentalists are the people for a cleaner earth and have my thanks and respect.

http://ransrants.blogspot.com/2010/04/convenient-truth.html

Greeners are the scammers that are riding that movement for their own ends and enrichment. Greeners sue any and every energy project to prevent, delay or make it more expensive. Recently they have sued California trying to prevent a solar generator in the Mojave Desert, not to mention a power line to San Diego to carry power.

I also do not lump coal, oil, and nuclear together. Oil power plants are almost gone; 95% of them have been converted to natural gas for economic reasons. Coal vs. nuclear I have covered in a blog:

http://ransrants.blogspot.com/2010/04/unconsidered-consequences.html

The latest generation of nuclear reactors are even safer but not considered by many including the US.

http://ransrants.blogspot.com/2011/01/thorium-reactors-and-sputternik-moments.html

Wind power is a scam. Spain went for it big and a Spanish economist pointed out it cost 2.2 jobs for every green job created, and the green jobs were government subsidized so are going away as Spain downsizes their budget.

The Danes went big for wind power and now have the highest-cost power in Europe. The secret though is that when becalmed, there is an undersea cable bringing Norse hydroelectric power.

The UK has built an extensive net of wind machines originally thought to produce and average of 27% of their max capacity. Experience has been much less than this figure, with an average of 9 months out of 26 being less than 10%.

A study projected the wind machines to replace the 2400 MW nuclear generator outside of Dallas-Fort Worth would cover 20% of Texas and still would have left them shivering or sweltering the dark when Texas is becalmed in mid-Summer or Winter.

In other words, not only is wind expensive, it must be duplicated in capacity by some other reliable source, thus making it even more and absurdly expensive. The reason most want to build wind machines is the $23 per kilowatt US government subsidy (plus often additional from the state). There is no government subsidy for maintaining and operating them, so many machines become abandoned after breaking. California and Hawaii have this problem.

T Boone Pickens wanting to build a few billion dollars of these machines adds new meaning to "Boonedoggle" (sic).

The future holds promise for alternative power should thin-film solar become cheap enough to go on peoples' roof. It's not there yet. I read an article yesterday that would bring it down to 15-cents per KWh, but coal now comes in at 8-cents per KWh. The real idea behind Cap-and-Trade was to raise the price of coal to make solar competitive, not to mention allowing someone to enhance revenues equal to everyone's current power bill.

Other alternatives exist, but I doubt one is moving civilization backwards. Power is civilization. I am not opposed to alternative power; I am opposed to shivering and sweltering in the dark

Thorium Reactors and "Sputternik Moments"

The People’s Republic of China has initiated a research and development project in thorium molten-salt reactor technology. A thorium-fueled MSR is best run with uranium-233 fuel, which inevitably contains impurities (uranium-232 and its decay products) that preclude its use in nuclear weapons. Currently there is no US effort to develop a thorium MSR.

The LFTR (TMSR) was first developed by Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers between 1950 and 1975. During the last decade by The Reactor Physics Group of the University of Grenoble has renewed TMSR research. This step is highly rational for the Chinese to take. China appears to have a large thorium reserve, much of it now in the form of rare earth mining tailings. LFTRs as so efficient that they could supply China with all the energy it needs for a period of time that could stretch out for millions of years. LFTRs can be factory built and rapidly deployed in Very large numbers. A large scale LFTR program would enable China to replaced fossil fuel energy sources with nuclear power by 2050, if LFTR development had a 20 year gestation period.

There has been a grass-roots effort underway for over five years to change this. Will the US accept the challenge or allow the Chinese to dominate advanced nuclear technology too? Using a technology invented in the US 40 years ago no less! Here is a true "sputnik moment" but it seems we are destined to tilt at windmills.

http://www.itheo.org/

http://www.thoriumenergyalliance.com/

I find the "sputnik moment" reference amusing. Forty years ago, we walked on the moon; today, we are just walking. We have one more shuttle mission we can't seem to get off the ground and rely on the Russians to lift our astronauts into space. The Russians said, "No problem." and increased the price from $20 million to $50 million. Seems more like a "sputteringnik moment."

BP 1; EPA 0; Greenies 0.

"Government scientists studying the BP disaster are reporting the best possible outcome: Microbes are consuming the oil in the Gulf without depleting the oxygen in the water and creating "dead zones" where fish cannot survive." REF

EPA failed to test dispersants in the 20 years since Exxon Valdez, so restricted BP's usage by 75% because it "might" hurt something. Unknown to EPA, apparently, the Brits had tested it and approved unlimited usage outside of 10 miles of coast. After EPA restriction, the oil came ashore.

Is EPA more responsible for the damage ashore than BP?

Greenies opposed any use of dispersant because they wanted all the oil to come to the surface so it could be seen. Instead of minimizing damage to the environment, they apparently wanted to maximize it to make points. With friends like them, the environment doesn't need enemies.

The plumes of underwater oil thought so horrific turn out to be so diluted one could swim through a plume without realizing it. Seems it takes mass spectrometry or other sophisticated chemical analysis to detect the oil in the plumes. Most just failed to mention this little fact. Wonder why?

These criticisms in no way should be interpreted as exonerating BP of the shoddy engineering practices in their attempt to save money. They blew it and we all will pay for it--including BP--but not including the EPA and greenies. I just wanted to assure EPA and greenies got their full and just credit. They did so much.