Costsof renewable power link may not work

[ajl]

I have also been looking at solar power as well recently and agree with Hamloc's math. Without significant subsidies it doesn't work. I also want to get away from more government meddling in the market place.

[tweety]

So what do we do? Wait until fossil fuel becomes very expensive before we do any renewable?

I agree 100%, the math doesn't look so good at today's price of oil especially. Its just too cheap.

Trudeau was supposed to pull all the subsidies away from fossil, hasn't happened.

[oneoff]

Just for the twesties and chocks....

You're sure you know the right thing to do....BUT YOU CAN"T BRING YOURSELF TO DO IT ON YOUR OWN DIME BECAUSE YOU"RE TOO DAMN CHEAP.

If only someone else could be forced to pay for making it cheaper or preferably "free" for your personal use.

What a dilema. And of course how can society ever provide your entitlements to every other customer. That would involve your paying your fair share. Or some of additional public debt that no one (especially those responsible) would ever feel any responsibility for creating

Getting off the grid is so not workable. You'll tie yourself down worse than a dairy or trying to burn coal when you have more than enough to switch around priorities But it might be a good learning lesson and bring some common sense into your lives.


And trying to generate significant solar during the months of December and January is a lot like being able to see to down to the 20 foot dugout ice level when you know there are 200 head of cows and the dugout never was 22 feet deep.


Do you really need to experience what is going to happen through first hand knowledge?

[tweety]

So what do we do in the mean time? Nothing till fossils get scarce and then start building renewable energy sources?

Topic of does it cost more is beat to death. It does.

How about transferring that 34 billion in oil subsidies to become renewable energy subsidies. Does that work for you?

How about putting all the carbon tax into renewable energy. Does that work for you? Or would you rather see it go to Shell and husky? Cuz it aint going away.

[oneoff]

So what do we do in the mean time? Nothing till fossils get scarce and then start building renewable energy sources?

Topic of does it cost more is beat to death. It does.

How about transferring that 34 billion in oil subsidies to become renewable energy subsidies. Does that work for you?

How about putting all the carbon tax into renewable energy. Does that work for you? Or would you rather see it go to Shell and husky? Cuz it aint going away.

If it costs more ...you''ll still be amongst the last to use it. If it has major flaws then all the subsidies still won't provide an alternative. If it makes sense economically it will succeed on its own (in a global market). Now if we make ourselves deliberately uncompetitive and have next to nothing to show for the effort; then thats insanity.

This is the way it works. Recognize the current situation (both its strengths and weaknesses aka. as Present situation) If there are compelling reasons and its necessary to decommission; retrofit or embark on new paths..then realistically examine the alternatives (not based on expectations of perfection) and call it a potential Design project (Plan A). Attempt to account for all known worst case scenarios. If; say; Plan A calls for producing 50% of generating capacity in 20 years; then be damn sure it can be ramped up; scaled and works dependably before committing and investing more than research type efforts...and before altering Present situation significantly.

Still maintain a Plan B in wings for the unforseen setbacks and emergencies and especially before going to point of no return for Present situation

Your assumption that "34 billion" would cure all present deficiencies and problems is just where faulty logic begins. We'd still need our "Present situation" in order to even be able to function with a dependable system which we rightfully expect and depend upon for real life situations.

[tweety]

Never said it would cure anything, just said i'd rather see it go there.

Good enough, do nothing, oil execs need the money.

[Hamloc]

Tweety, you mention 2 things consistently, the finiteness of oil and excessive profits of oil companies.

Both federal and provincial governments want to shutter coal, no effect on oil consumption. Secondly over twice as much C02 emissions come from on road transportation as power generation. As well far more people drive on the roads than work at a coal fired electrical plant so the political fall out is much less. As for oil company profits, in Alberta coal plants are being replaced with natural gas, who sells natural gas? Oil companies. What are solar panels made from? More oil than coal. I would say present policies are hurting our future energy supplies rather than helping them. Just my contrary view!!!Also how many people heat their homes with coal? With natural gas? Which is more widely used? Which do we need to conserve?

[AlbertaFarmer5]

[QUOTE=

Do any Agriville members power their homes year round by solar or wind? Would be interested to hear about farms doing this in a cold climate.

[/QUOTE]

I have a close neighbor and part time farmer entirely off the grid. Solar, wind turbine, wood boiler for heat and hot water, batteries and a back up gasoline generator an propane tank,wood fired tank heaters for stock tanks. All this was done to save the cost of 1/2 mile of powerline. It works, the cost is multiples of what the powerline would have cost. The wind turbine is useless, since it shuts down above a certain wind speed. Someone has to stay home everyday to babysit. They are satisfied with the end result, and will stick with it, but admit it was not cost effective.

A lot of other people out here in the wild west who wanted to go off the grid for various reasons, but eventually and after pouring a lot of money down a black hole gave up.

So it is possible.

[oneoff]

Alberta....if CHP (Combined heat and Power as defined by SaskPower); otherwise known as cogeneration (by others) is considered a part of "green" energy" which may have been hijacked by the "renewable energy movement"; then further examples could be cited..

But that would require an acceptance of that which has always been considered useless; requiring disposal through deliberately combusting flammable products with little intent of gaining any useful purpose therefrom.

The answer to your question is nearly the same as the conclusion of your neighbors experience.

It is certainly possible. For single use purposes it would likely have made multiple times more economic sense to pay for those public utility accesses and the monthly charges whatever they might be.

But if one asks if those hardy souls who do choose to invest their resources; their present and future babysitting time and their planning and construction abilities to utilize wasted and "underutilized" energy sources; we might be astounded by the responses.

Those people might say it was a worthwhile exercise on many fronts. Some aspects worked better than expected; whilst others were disappointing.

The support given by utilities who have only recently noticed these types of energy projects; probably never showed one iota of interest ; and without the subsidies; those utilities still would have nothing to manage in those alternate electrical energy areas.

The electrical and fossil energy utilities are more interested in FRANCHISE; regulatory approvals; safety; audits; their inspections branch and CSA approval of even the trenching that might trap someone's ankles under inches of caved in topsoil.

To the point where staying below the radar; and having fit between and within the statute and regulation lines are the important criteria to know about. Then as long as you don't have too much company (meaning similar minded developers) there is but a little gossip and chatter about what is being done that more likely is in the speculation and pretty shallow thinking arena.

The gems are where those entrepreneurial groundbreakers; have come up with multiple times more energy than they can figure out how to put it to use; and the bottlenecks of energy storage that could/should be tied into public grids .

That's one of the aspects that doesn't seem to have any workable solutions; and no one interested in investigating further.


.

[tweety]

No one posting here needs to worry about it. We will have enough fossil fuels to last. And if it lasts for us, it technically is forever.