The Democrats in the Maine Legislature are actually taking your money to advance their political ideology.

Comment

Comment by arthur qwenk on March 8, 2025 at 4:01pm

The trifecta legislature under Mills makes Maine California East. Very Sad. Why do Mainers vote for their own demise time after time?

Comment by Willem Post on March 8, 2025 at 3:45pm

The Forward Capacity Market (FCM) ensures that the New England power system will have sufficient resources to meet the future demand for electricity.

Forward Capacity Auctions (FCAs) are held annually, three years in advance of the operating period.

Owners of resources compete in the auctions to obtain a commitment to supply capacity in exchange for a market-priced capacity payment.

These payments help support the development of new resources.

These payments also help retain existing resources.

For example,

1) They incentivize investment in technology or practices that help ensure reliable performance.

2) They serve as a stable revenue stream for resources that help meet peak demand, but don’t run often the rest of the year, so-called peaking plants.

Solar and wind cannot RELIABLY provide power to the HV grid during peak hours, when the sun is going down, or when the wind is not blowing.

HIGH COST/kWh OF W/S SYSTEMS FOISTED ONTO A BRAINWASHED PUBLIC 

What is generally not known, the more weather-dependent W/S systems, the less efficient the other, traditional generators, as they inefficiently counteract the increasingly larger ups and downs of W/S output. See URL

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/fuel-and-co2-reduction...

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W/S systems add great cost to the overall delivery of electricity to users; the more W/S systems, the higher the cost/kWh, as proven by the UK and Germany, with the highest electricity rates in Europe, and near-zero, real-growth GDPs
At about 30% W/S, the entire system hits an increasingly thicker concrete wall, operationally and cost wise.

UK and Germany have hit the wall, more and more hours each day.
The cost of electricity delivered to users increased with each additional W/S/B system

.

Base-load nuclear, gas and coal, hydro plants are the only rational way forward, plus the additional CO2 is very beneficial for additional flora and fauna growth and increased crop yields to feed hungry people.

https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/we-are-in-a-co2-famine

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Subsidies shift costs from project Owners to ratepayers, taxpayers, government debt:

1) Federal and state tax credits, up to 50% (Community tax credit of 10 percent - Federal tax credit of 30 percent - State tax credit and other incentives of up to 10%);

2) 5-y Accelerated Depreciation write off of the entire project;

3) Loan interest deduction

.

The subsidies reduce the owning and operating cost of a project by 50%, which means electricity can be sold at 50% less than it costs to produce.

Utilities pay 15 c/kWh, wholesale, after 50% subsidies, for electricity from fixed offshore wind systems

Utilities pay 18 c/kWh, wholesale, after 50% subsidies, for electricity from floating offshore wind

Utilities pay 12 c/kWh, wholesale, after 50% subsidies, for electricity from larger solar systems

.

Excluded costs, at a future 30% W/S annual penetration on the grid, based on UK and German experience: 

- Onshore grid expansion/reinforcement to connect distributed W/S systems, about 2 c/kWh

- A fleet of traditional power plants to quickly counteract W/S variable output, on a less than minute-by-minute basis, 24/7/365, which leads to more Btu/kWh, more CO2/kWh, more cost of about 2 c/kWh

- A fleet of traditional power plants to provide electricity during 1) low-wind periods, 2) high-wind periods, when rotors are locked in place, and 3) low solar periods during mornings, evenings, at night, snow/ice on panels, which leads to more Btu/kWh, more CO2/kWh, more cost of about 2 c/kWh

- Pay W/S system Owners for electricity they could have produced, if not curtailed, about 1 c/kWh

- Importing electricity at high prices, when W/S output is low, 1 c/kWh

- Exporting electricity at low prices, when W/S output is high, 1 c/kWh

- Disassembly on land and at sea, reprocessing and storing at hazardous waste sites, about 2 c/kWh

Some of these values exponentially increase as more W/S systems are added to the grid
.
The economic/financial insanity and environmental damage of it all is off the charts.
No wonder Europe’s near-zero, real-growth economy is in such big do-do

That economy has been tied into knots by inane people.

YOUR tax dollars are building these projects so YOU will have much higher electric bills.

Remove YOUR tax dollars using your vote, and none of these projects would be built, and YOUR electric bills would be lower