Newsom, Biden and the radical Progressives are using government policy to kill the California and American economy. They want us to be a Third World country, a national slum.
“Dispatchable power is the capacity of these generation resources to provide reliable electricity when needed. It plays a fundamental role in grid stability by ensuring that fluctuations in demand can be met in real-time, which is critical in maintaining uninterrupted power supply and avoiding outages.
Unfortunately, for those people who want us to rely on solar and wind for all our energy needs, neither of these renewable sources are dispatchable with respect to generation or the ability to meet our needs 24/7. This has to do with the completely intermittent and unreliable power generation supplied by wind. And the fact that solar generation during the day doesn’t meet the peak demand that occurs in the evening hour.”
They do not care if their very unreliable and expensive alternatives to electricity do not bring a prosperous nation—that is why they support crazy, expensive ideas, to deep six our nation. Why be subtle about it?
Green Energy Gluttony: The World is Stuck on Stupid
By Andy Caldwell, Santa Barbara Current, 12/15/24 https://www.sbcurrent.com/p/green-energy-gluttony-the-world-is
According to energy experts, dispatchable generation refers to power sources that can be adjusted on demand by grid operators to match supply with electricity demand. Examples of dispatchable generation include coal-fired plants, natural gas plants, and large hydroelectric plants (all of which have targets on their back) that can quickly ramp up or down depending on the grid’s needs.
Dispatchable power is the capacity of these generation resources to provide reliable electricity when needed. It plays a fundamental role in grid stability by ensuring that fluctuations in demand can be met in real-time, which is critical in maintaining uninterrupted power supply and avoiding outages.
Unfortunately, for those people who want us to rely on solar and wind for all our energy needs, neither of these renewable sources are dispatchable with respect to generation or the ability to meet our needs 24/7. This has to do with the completely intermittent and unreliable power generation supplied by wind. And the fact that solar generation during the day doesn’t meet the peak demand that occurs in the evening hour.
But that is only half of the story.
The L.A. Times recently acknowledged that the increasing oversupply (read: overkill) of solar power in CA has created a situation where energy traders can buy our excess solar power at prices so low they become negative.
What does that mean?
It means that we consumers must pay other states to take the excess energy off our hands lest it overload the grid. Either that, or the solar farms must be shut down completely (they call that “curtailment”), except in those cases when solar farm operators can count on federal subsidies ($54 million in 2023) that pay out handsomely even when the energy is not needed.
Consider the Following:
We used tax breaks, low interest loans, mandates, and incentives of various kinds to get all this solar built and now we are paying other states to take the electricity off our hands at CA rate payer expense. Meanwhile, even more solar is being built. These are a few of the reasons that the CA Public Utility Commission slashed financial incentives for rooftop solar. The L.A. Times reports that the State of New Mexico saved $35 million in 2022, at our expense, by taking CA’s excess solar power. Arizona has a 24-hour trading floor looking to buy cheap or negatively priced solar power from CA; that is how much power and money we are wasting while in our zeal we seek to eliminate dispatchable sources of electricity generation.
Zealots, like local supervisor Das Williams, will tell you that building industrial-scale battery plants can solve this problem. But, as the Times reports, most industrial-sized batteries can only store power for four hours (not even enough to get us through the night). In addition, battery storage effectively doubles the cost of solar.
In Britain, this same phenomenon is occurring with respect to wind power. According to The Telegraph, British bill payers have spent an “absurd” £1bn (equivalent to $1.2 billion U.S.) so far this year to temporarily switch off wind turbines as the grid struggles to cope with their excess power. Sweden’s wind energy sector is also crashing financially.
In Germany, after they closed all their nuclear plants, the wind quit blowing. What to do? According to NPR, at least 20 coal-fired power plants nationwide are being resurrected or extended past their closing dates to ensure Germany has enough energy to get through the winter.
Additionally, as the AP reports, Germany risks “deindustrialization” as high energy costs and government inaction on other chronic problems threaten to send new factories and high-paying jobs elsewhere. For instance, Volkswagen is projected to close three factories and lay off 10,000 workers due to electricity costs, EV mandates, and the inability to compete with Chinese EV imports.
Energy Death Spiral Looms
Unfortunately, here in the echo chamber we call home, our green virtue-signaling leaders believe that we can never have enough solar and wind, making us consumers gluttons for high electricity bills. The real problem, they believe, is the remaining few sources of dispatchable energy, e.g., natural gas, which they are trying to eliminate. The elimination of this vital dispatchable and ubiquitous clean energy source comes by way of prohibiting both production and consumption. Yet, natural gas is one of the only things propping up the green energy facade, while giving consumers an affordable alternative to wind and solar generated electricity. And don’t get me started about CA’s shutdown of oil production that is leading to the closure of our gasoline, diesel, and aviation fuel refineries, which is going to cause a similar energy death spiral with respect to our transportation sector.
