“It’s these subsidies and unfair billing credits–coupled with the intermittent nature of solar energy–that has utilities, utility customers, and taxpayers questioning the expansion of solar power. Until the solar industry can effectively operate in a free market and not burden consumers who cannot or choose not to install rooftop solar, this debate will continue.”
Solar power generation in the U.S. rose nearly 600% from 2000 to 2010 (NREL), and this trend is continuing. Fueled by an array of federal, state and local subsidies along with utility-bill credits, the economics of photovoltaic (PV) energy might seem too good to pass up. This is especially the case with residential or rooftop solar systems.
However, a closer look at industry subsidization, the unique properties of PV, and controversial billing practices for solar users, such as Net Metering, show that solar power is not as great a deal as its supporters would have you believe.…
“Obama’s sloppy use of science was carefully crafted to gain public support for ‘carbon pollution’ as the source of climate change. Using the term 20 times in his speech, he again conflated carbon dioxide, which is essential to plant life on this planet, with anthropogenic emissions (particularly from coal-fired power plants) as the principal cause of climate change. This rhetorical trick should now be obvious to all who were listening closely (or reading the transcript, as I did).”
Robert Peltier, Dr. Peltier, has been many things in his life: professor, marine, policeman, electric utility manager, and scholar/writer. He is honest and a realist, which led him to the free-market side of the energy debate.
Peltier has written a number of posts for MasterResource over the years (see Appendix A). We hope to hear from him in the future if his retirement priorities allow.…
“Put simply, wind farms are causing considerable damage to nature’s balance, for no benefit whatsoever to society. Indeed, no country in the world has reduced its carbon footprint thanks to them…. It is high time to call a moratorium on wind farms, and examine the situation after ditching our blinkers.”
Wind turbines kill birds and bats, we all know that, but the billion-dollar question is: how many? I say “billion” because subsidies to the wind industry run into billions of dollars per year in the United States alone, and chances are the public would not support such expenditures if they found out that these machines were driving iconic, useful or beautiful species into extinction. It is therefore important to find out the extent of the mortality caused by their rotor blades and high tension power lines.…