I mean.... I pay (total) $0.22/kwh now. Having solar panels is a godsend. The politically impossible, even now, (though retroactively correct) answer would be to impose a $0.15 tax on all...
The MOD-1, intended to be the first economically competitive large-scale turbine, produced electricity at the uncompetitive rate of 20 cents per kWh
I mean.... I pay (total) $0.22/kwh now. Having solar panels is a godsend.
The politically impossible, even now, (though retroactively correct) answer would be to impose a $0.15 tax on all coal/oil/gas generated electricity....bet a lot less NIMBY speak up about solar/wind/nuclear when they have to pay double for the alternatives.
I hadn't thought about inflation, but I stand by my point. We probably should be paying 0.80 per kwh, when factoring in societal costs (and to help fund the cleaner infrastructure). But $0.15 per...
I hadn't thought about inflation, but I stand by my point. We probably should be paying 0.80 per kwh, when factoring in societal costs (and to help fund the cleaner infrastructure).
But $0.15 per kwh tax is just as politically impossible today as the inflation-adjusted amount would be.
There's definitely the economic disparity issue to be considered. We have subsidy programs in place already to help poorer households. Have some of that new tax revenue bolster thos programs, expanding it to cover everyone under average income ($50kish per person) to a varying degree.
I generally agree that some kinds of energy need to be expensive to encourage conservation, but it should be a carbon tax. Electricity comes from a variety of sources and making solar or wind...
I generally agree that some kinds of energy need to be expensive to encourage conservation, but it should be a carbon tax. Electricity comes from a variety of sources and making solar or wind power more expensive than they need to be would be going in the wrong direction.
It's all part of the picture. Merely transitioning existing use to green sources isn't going to be sufficient. Reducing use needs to be a big part of the picture. When efficiencies were introduced...
It's all part of the picture. Merely transitioning existing use to green sources isn't going to be sufficient. Reducing use needs to be a big part of the picture.
When efficiencies were introduced to lighting/heating/cooling, some of that energy savings should have translated to a higher rate of electric/gas costs. IE: A new hybrid electric/heat-pump water heater costs <$200 to run annually, even cheaper than existing gas models. Electric rates should rise so that the cheap-to-run model now costs $250 annually, resulting in the older, more inefficient models now cost $400+ to run. It would need to be gradual, with mitigations for the poorer folks, but it should help mitigate the problem of increased efficiencies transitioning to increased usage.
The ultimate answer then becomes: Become a generator of electricity and not just a consumer. Thus further decentralizing the grid.
From the article: [...] [...] [...] [...] [...] [...]
From the article:
NASA's aim [in the 70's and 80's] was to quickly develop large, 1MW+ turbines that could be used for large-scale power generation. It held a series of workshops with wind power experts throughout the 1970s, and funded the rebuilding of Juul's Gedser turbine (which had been sitting in storage) for testing. NASA's first test turbine, the 100 kW MOD-0, was built at at Plum Brook Station near Cleveland in 1975. The MOD-0 was based on the designs of Ulrich Hutter and operated as NASA's testbed for 10 years.
[...]
These turbines largely failed to live up to expectations. The MOD-1, intended to be the first economically competitive large-scale turbine, produced electricity at the uncompetitive rate of 20 cents per kWh, compared to the average electricity price in 1979 of 5 cents per kWh. It operated for just 130 hours before an expensive shaft failure caused it to be mothballed and eventually sold for scrap. Likewise, the MOD-2 turbines exhibited higher-than-anticipated stresses, and stopped operating in 1986 (and were likewise sold for scrap). The MOD-5B was sold to a power utility and operated intermittently until 1996, when it was also sold for scrap. Several other planned MOD turbines were cancelled. None of the NASA designs were successfully commercialized, and GE, Westinghouse, and Boeing all left the wind turbine market (GE would eventually return after acquiring Enron's wind-power division in 2002 following the company's bankruptcy).
[...]
As stated in “The Wind Power Story”
In hindsight, it is more accurate to say that while NASA wasn’t necessarily moving in the wrong direction, they were trying to get there too quickly. As wind turbine technology history demonstrates, you cannot simply upsize from a 100‐kW to a 1‐MW wind turbine and maintain acceptable levels of reliability and performance. Instead, wind researchers—both public and private—would need to build and test successively larger wind turbines over a period of decades—not years—to reach the 1‐MW level in the late 1990s.
[...]
Thanks to these generous incentives, beginning in 1980 California saw a massive investment in wind power. By 1986 96% of the world's wind-generated electricity was being generated in California, and by 1987 California had nearly 17,000 wind turbines producing more than 1.2 GW of electricity. Unlike previous wind turbines (which were typically stood alone or in small groups), these turbines were mostly in large "farms" of many turbines, built by companies like US Wind, Zond, and Seawest.
[...]
But the tide turned for the California wind experiment. The energy crises of 1973 and 1979 gave way to an oil glut in 1986 - oil prices fell from $35 per barrel in 1980 to $10 per barrel in 1986. The Reagan administration was less inclined to spend government funds on wind power development, and the wind power tax credits were increasingly seen as a tax dodge for wealthy investors (Forbes would later call it "The Great Windmill Tax Dodge"). Both federal and California credits were removed or allowed to expire, and turbine installation in the US collapsed[.]
[...]
However, as the US market was declining, the European market was rising, also largely due to government incentive programs. In 1990 Germany passed a Feed-in-Tariff, which required utilities to purchase wind power at favorable rates, which became a popular mechanism in other European countries. Denmark's parliament agreed to develop 100 MW of wind power between 1986 and 1990, and passed its own Feed-in Tariff in 1990. The UK similarly passed a Non-Fossil Fuel Obligation (NFFO) program in 1990, and by 1995 had installed 250 MW of wind power. By 2000, more than 70% of the world’s wind energy was being generated in Europe, mostly in Germany, Denmark, and Spain.
[...]
Wind turbines are thus a good illustration of the complexities and multifaceted nature of economies of scale. There are many simultaneous scale effects at work - learning curve effects, geometric scaling, statistical scaling, fixed cost effects - which often pull in different directions. It's not necessarily obvious, even to experts, which effects will dominate.
I mean.... I pay (total) $0.22/kwh now. Having solar panels is a godsend.
The politically impossible, even now, (though retroactively correct) answer would be to impose a $0.15 tax on all coal/oil/gas generated electricity....bet a lot less NIMBY speak up about solar/wind/nuclear when they have to pay double for the alternatives.
Need to adjust that for inflation. 20 cents in 1979 is about 80 cents now, so still almost 4x what you're paying.
I hadn't thought about inflation, but I stand by my point. We probably should be paying 0.80 per kwh, when factoring in societal costs (and to help fund the cleaner infrastructure).
But $0.15 per kwh tax is just as politically impossible today as the inflation-adjusted amount would be.
There's definitely the economic disparity issue to be considered. We have subsidy programs in place already to help poorer households. Have some of that new tax revenue bolster thos programs, expanding it to cover everyone under average income ($50kish per person) to a varying degree.
I generally agree that some kinds of energy need to be expensive to encourage conservation, but it should be a carbon tax. Electricity comes from a variety of sources and making solar or wind power more expensive than they need to be would be going in the wrong direction.
It's all part of the picture. Merely transitioning existing use to green sources isn't going to be sufficient. Reducing use needs to be a big part of the picture.
When efficiencies were introduced to lighting/heating/cooling, some of that energy savings should have translated to a higher rate of electric/gas costs. IE: A new hybrid electric/heat-pump water heater costs <$200 to run annually, even cheaper than existing gas models. Electric rates should rise so that the cheap-to-run model now costs $250 annually, resulting in the older, more inefficient models now cost $400+ to run. It would need to be gradual, with mitigations for the poorer folks, but it should help mitigate the problem of increased efficiencies transitioning to increased usage.
The ultimate answer then becomes: Become a generator of electricity and not just a consumer. Thus further decentralizing the grid.
From the article:
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