Wind And Solar Aren’t Nearly Enough: Why Biden Is Suddenly Supporting Fossil Fuels

Wind And Solar Aren’t Nearly Enough: Why Biden Is Suddenly Supporting Fossil Fuels

Authored by Jude Clemente via RealClear Wire,

"Progress towards an energy transition appears to be significantly lagging the optimistic projections and any reduction in government mandates and subsidies could make many investments unprofitable, and at least some elements of the energy transition appear to be driven by irrational exuberance..."

– Michael Lynch, Energy Policy Research Foundation, 2022

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The loud insistence, renewables should displace, not just supplement, fossil fuels and nuclear energy in the power sector has some undeniable problems.  

And much more wind and solar faces the growing obstacle of “high grading,” where the best spots (the low-hanging fruit) get picked first.

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In other words, each incremental build for wind and solar will be in areas that are less windy and less sunny because their best locations are already taken

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Cloudy Germany, for instance, made the major mistake of over-focusing on solar power, which it much later corrected by reducing excessive subsidies.

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As reported by Bloomberg last July, wind power in sweltering Texas was performing at just 8% of its capacity, and frequently much lower than that – as it turns out, the wind almost never blows when it is hot outside. 

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This means, for wind and solar to displace 2,000 megawatts of gas or coal capacity, around 8,000 megawatts of wind and solar are required. 

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But it’s impossible to even calculate that number since wind and solar are naturally intermittent and thus, naturally, unpredictable. 

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Indeed, advocates love to cite capacity, MW, additions for wind and solar, but it’s only ELECTRICITY PRODUCTION, MWh, that counts. 

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As we saw last year, capital costs, $/MW, for wind and solar, and cost for their electricity, c/kWh, and batteries can increase (up 34% in 2022), due to:

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1) increased inflation rates, 2) increased interest rates, 3) supply chain disruptions, which delay projects and increase costs, 4) increased energy prices, such as of oil, gas, coal, electricity, etc., 5) increased materials prices, such as of tungsten, cobalt, lithium, copper, manganese, etc., 6) increased labor rates.

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NOTE: Wind and solar electricity production plants require 8 to 12 times more copper than coal and gas electricity  production plants, if both technologies produce the same MWh/y

Global demand for these raw materials is growing, so it’s a safe bet, costs for wind, solar and batteries will be much higher than currently projected.

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Dysfunctional Germany and California

Germany and California, the world’s two “greenest governments” over the past 20 years, need much more natural gas than they ever said they would. 

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Germany is now looking to build at least eight expensive, liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminals to “get away from low-cost, reliable Russian gas,” 

And the German government admits, closing CO2-free nuclear plants, unfortunately will mean greater reliance on more reliable coal and natural gas, not more wind and solar.

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Germany has had enough of expensive wind and solar, while in-the-basement, senile Biden is hung-ho for them?

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California utilized natural gas to generate over 60% of power during its heat wave late last summer – when smoke from wildfires blocked solar panels from performing. 

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We already know what climate-focused policies bring:

Germany has the highest electricity prices in the world

California’s are the highest in the continental U.S., some 75% above the U.S. average. 

They promised us that it would be much less costly than those evil fossils. 

More Renewable Build-Outs Running into Obstacles

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Grid Expansion/Reinforcement: The renewable build-out is facing another giant obstacle, which is getting the transmission lines built to get their outputs onto the U.S. power grid.

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The very green Rocky Mountain Institute says , we will need to double, or even triple, the size of our transmission grid to make huge amounts of wind and solar viable.  

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Red Tape to Get Connected: Along with their desperately needed, but expensive battery-storage projects, wind and solar power wait in years-long lines to come onto the grid, and then they face huge interconnection fees that they simply can’t afford. More subsidies?

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The interconnection application process takes an incredibly long time, because it is very difficult and expensive to integrate larger percentages of wind and solar onto the gird, as was bitterly experienced by Germany and Denmark (both with the highest HOUSEHOLD electric rates in the EU, with the UK quickly catching up).

All three of these countries foisted most of these costs onto HOUSEHOLD RATEPAYERS, so as not to hurt the competitiveness of their industries.

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The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, FERC, reports , the vast majority of wind and solar projects in the works today will never see the light of day. 

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Getting Projects Built: Even when looking at our two most progressive states for energy policy, the progress made is paltry: “In the California Independent System Operator region, completed projects are only 13% of proposed projects, and in the New York Independent System Operator region, completed projects are only 15% of proposed projects.

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Grassroots Opposition: And then there is the widening NIMBY opposition against the wind and solar build-out, which explains why

JP Morgan’s CEO Jamie Dimon wants the U.S. government to seize private land to install more wind and solar, so JPM can collect bigger bees for providing even more lucrative tax shelters to its thousands of multi-millionaire, yacht/private-plane/golf-club, mansion-owning clients. 

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Land-devouring wind and solar (never call them farms) are every bit as unwanted as the oil and gas pipelines that renewable advocates love to hate. 

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That Renewable Rejection Database is mounting much quicker than the Biden administration apparently realizes. 

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Less Predictable Weather and More Wind and Solar?: if our weather is becoming less and less predictable, as we are often told, how is it that we are setting ourselves up to be increasingly reliant on weather-dependent electricity?

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RE Leaders in Rah-Rah, Double-Speak Mode: I’m truly not understanding that part. We’re heading for a train wreck.

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The in-the-basement, senile Biden offshore wind goal of 30,000 megawatts of fishery, lobster and whale-killing, 850-ft-tall wind turbines by 2030 will prove to be unachievable and astronomically expensive.

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Green California, for instance, has no offshore wind capacity whatsoever, but it’s inanely babbling Governor is claiming, FLOATING wind power will play an integral role in achieving climate goals. 

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The CEO of NextEra, the world’s largest renewable-power generator, calls offshore wind a bad bet.  

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We must be very careful here, and we will likely need all electricity-producing resources, because climate policy and "Electrify Everything" makes electricity even more essential in our economy.

Electricity must be affordable and reliable, 24/7/365, year after year.

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Nobody loves the Biden folks new EPA regulations to force huge amounts of EVs onto the power grid.

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EVs, and heat pumps, and the overarching goal of "Electrify Everything" will surely surge U.S. electricity demand, a sector that has been flat at 4,000 billion kWh during the past 15 years

A service economy requires less kWh/$ of GDP than an industrial power house economy. 

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Ultimately, renewables and electric cars share the same outlook: “growing markets, but nowhere near taking over the market.”

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Physics and higher than expected costs (e.g., only 10 - 15% of Americans, I.e., mostly upper income folks are getting huge subsidies to buy feel-good EVs) will ensure, many of the policies we’re hearing about today will be pulled back and/or drastically watered down, as has happened in Europe, which is embracing fossil, nuclear and big hydro again

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When the rubber hits the road, energy dreams die hard, even in the EU: “Despite climate commitments, the EU is going back to coal.”

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The lavish, wasteful subsidies for wind, solar, batteries, and HPs and EVs are bound to become politically untenable at some point, especially with the federal debt soaring out of control, similar to senile Biden’s open border: “Ford Is Losing $66,446 On Every EV It Sells.”

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Indeed, after promising “no more drilling” during the Biden’s presidential campaign, Biden folks has a new-found love for the fossil fuels that meet 80% of the US and WORLD's energy needs: “Another big Alaska fossil fuel project gets Biden team’s blessing.”

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And just a few weeks ago, Biden folks gave approval to two more giant projects, Texas LNG and Rio Grande LNG,  to export natural gas. LNG EXPORTS INCREASE ENERGY PRICES IN THE US

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Europe has been sleep-walking for several decades, while feasting on plentiful, reliable, low-cost Russian oil, gas and coal.

The recent increases in energy and other prices have been the great reality-check Europe desperately needed for a reality check

Jude Clemente is the Editor at RealClearEnergy. 

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