Solar Energy Jobs Are Economic Potemkin Villages

It’s one thing to preach the morality of clean energy, which is why we spend three or four times the money to generate electricity using solar and wind power (which, incidentally, must always be backed up by fossil fuels). It’s quite another, however, to try and bend the laws of economics to comport with a progressive vision of the future. 

http://thefederalist.com/2017/05/08/solar-energy-jobs-economic-pote...

To start, despite a huge workforce of almost 400,000 solar workers (about 20 percent of electric power payrolls in 2016), that sector produced an insignificant share, less than 1 percent, of the electric power generated in the United States last year (EIA data here). And that’s a lot of solar workers: about the same as the combined number of employees working at Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Apple, Johnson & Johnson, Microsoft, Pfizer, Ford Motor Company and Procter & Gamble.

In contrast, it took about the same number of natural gas workers (398,235) last year to produce more than one-third of U.S. electric power, or 37 times more electricity than solar’s minuscule share of 0.90 percent. And with only 160,000 coal workers (less than half the number of workers in either solar or gas), that sector produced nearly one-third (almost as much as gas) of U.S. electricity last year.

http://www.aei.org/publication/inconvenient-energy-fact-it-takes-79...

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Comment by Barry @ SaveOurSeaShore on May 9, 2017 at 2:38pm

we would be better off....putting our money into efficiency gains. Heck we could give away high efficiency LED bulbs, fridges, furnaces, appliances....and it still would be cheaper. But this isn't about lowering CO2...this is about MONEY. Warren buffet backed wind and solar through his energy companies...why? THE MONEY! Lowering demand while having no way to raise cost would be terrible for Buffet's energy companies....renewables are a giant fraud to drive the price higher!

solar and wind operate about 30% of capacities and rarely during peak demand....so you can NEVER remove power generation when using renewables

Comment by christian mcginn on May 9, 2017 at 1:46pm

I worked the solar project in Madison.  made and installed the frames for the 13500 panels.  the site engineer told me that the even though the panels are rated at 400 watts a piece.  they actually produce 100 watts due to weather, winter darkness and the rating is max which is never achieved.  I have been out of work since October when the project finished.  Overall the project was inefficient and the cost over runs were huge.  Madison Electric  and all get a federal tax credit..33 percent.  panels made in Taiwan in fine print.....designed in Germany  bold print large capitol letters.....

Comment by Barbara Durkin on May 9, 2017 at 10:40am
The jobs claim, I recall, came about when renewables' high cost was revealed. Invented benefits are rarely realized. Contractors tell me it will be two years before solar projects they build will be connected to the grid in MA. MADE BY JINKO panels are strewn about job sites. By the time China's products, cabling, (inferior), flimsy Junko panels are invited to connect, these solar projects will be Junko. Developers are making millions off citizens' backs. We were never the intended beneficiaries.
Comment by Eskutassis on May 9, 2017 at 10:24am

Economics have never been a strong point of Progressives. So much of their policy is anti profit, anti reality, anti human, anti science, anti environmental, well, just about anti everything. They want to set the progress of humanity back to the stone age. Living on solar is what the cave men had to do. Then they discovered fire and that made their lives a little better. Fire from fossil fuels made us great. Now they want to stifle all that. Progress should NOT be part of their name. They should be called the Regressive Party.

Comment by Barry @ SaveOurSeaShore on May 9, 2017 at 9:28am

who doesn't want to be a solar panel window washer?

 

Maine as Third World Country:

CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power

 

Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.

Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT

******** IF LINKS BELOW DON'T WORK, GOOGLE THEM*********

(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/

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Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law

Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future

"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."

https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/

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