UPDATE: Western Solar Zones to Streamline Development on Public Lands

Steve Leone, Associate Editor, RenewableEnergyWorld.com
October 15, 2012 | 98 Comments

Update: Interior Secretary Ken Salazar officially announced last week that the Department of the Interior has designated 285,000 acres of public land for solar development on pre-sited zones in the Western states of Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah, as RenewableEnergyWorld.com reported in July.

From our July report:

The Wild West days of American solar development are nearing their sunset with the release and likely adoption of federal guidelines that more clearly define where large-scale projects can be sited.

The document, released by the Department of the Interior and the Department of Energy, is the culmination of two years of dialogue between regulators, environmentalists, industry advocates and the public at large. On Tuesday, the DOI unveiled the much-awaited Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS), which sets a vision for development on public lands in six Western states — Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah.

The Interior has approved 17 zones for utility-scale solar energy projects on about 285,000 acres of public land with combined resources of nearly 32,000 megawatts (MW). It also sets up a process to allow development of what the DOI calls “well-sited projects” on 19 million acres outside those zones. PEIS estimates that the zones and the variance areas will eventually lead to about 23,700 MW of development.

The PEIS has focused on identifying locations on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lands best suited to large-scale solar. To be included, the zones had to have excellent solar resources, good transmission potential and minimal environmental, cultural or historical conflict.

Renewable energy development — especially solar — has turned some prized development areas into battlegrounds over conservation and habitat protection. That’s caused an uneasy divide between solar companies pushing cleaner technologies and environmental groups aiming to shelter sensitive areas. The guidelines would streamline much of the development process, and it would cut into both the time and litigation that has beset some of the larger Western projects. In fact, it would exclude 78 million acres of public land from solar development.

The document also outlines a process for the industry and the public to propose new or expanded zones. According to the DOI, efforts already underway include California’s Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan and the West Chocolate Mountains Renewable Energy Evaluation, Arizona’s Restoration Energy Design Project, and other local planning efforts in Nevada and Colorado.

Following Tuesday’s release, there will be a 30-day protest period. After that, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar can move to adopt the document.

The 17 zones are broken down below by state, the name of the zone and the potential resource:

Arizona
Brenda: 372 MW
Gillespie: 291 MW

California
Imperial East: 635 MW
Riverside East: 16,434 MW

Colorado
Antonito Southeast: 1,079 MW
De Tilla Gulch: 118 MW
Fourmile East: 320 MW
Los Mogotes East: 294 MW

Nevada
Amargosa Valley: 942 MW
Dry Lake: 635 MW
Dry Lake Valley North: 2,785 MW
Gold Point: 511 MW
Millers: 1,837 MW

New Mexico
Afton: 3,329 MW

Utah
Escalante Valley: 726 MW
Milford Flats South: 695 MW
Wah Wah Valley: 653 MW

98 Comments

Dr. A. Cannara
October 28, 2012

Dave, you've finally gone off Desperation Cliff, eh?

You really think serious attention to facts is "b*#/s?*^."? Well, then, when you next go to the doctor for help, argue with him/her, and ignore his/her advice -- after all, you're a much better judge of science & fact than he/she ever could be, eh Dave?
;]

Dr. A. Cannara
October 27, 2012

Yes, Dave, even the Lewis Group at Cal Tech. explained years ago that a 200km square of desert solar could do the US a big favor.

However, why bother? Why waste the land & continual transmission loss, and why create single points of failure for the grid?

Human struct5ures have long been explained by folks, like Lawrence Berkeley Labs, to cover >2% of all earth's land. We need no new land for solar PV/hot-water -- and that latter is a problem for remote solar 'farms'.

This is exactly why new solar projects are local, like the "million solar homes" initiative in Calif., the community-college solar initiatives, the county government solar initiatives, and even individual city initiatives, like Palo Alto's.

There's no need for any 'farms' -- solar or wind.

Given the good progress on storage & EVs, we even have the opportunity to make the grid more robust via local solar plus EV storage, but we also benefit via EV's inertial storage, which amounts to ~15% of energy input over typical driving cycles, just due to regenerative braking.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 26, 2012

Dave, the interesting thing is that the "nuclear field" has never been a narrow technology, as are coal/gas/oil/wind. etc.

It was simply subject to sad political and industrial biases over the last 50+ years, so what we have, and what some folks criticize, is just one narrow form patented in 1946.

JFK and now others around the world knew far better what to do: http://tinyurl.com/6xgpkfa

And then, unfortunately, we elected an administration admittedly ignorant of science in general: http://tinyurl.com/73p7ler

So, others around the world will now lead us with our own inventions.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 24, 2012

Dave, actually, rather than being "too critical of the renewable energy fields", the concern has been with facts. We only advance and make good chioices for our descendents if we strive to uncover all relevant facts.

Some 'renewables' or 'green' folks are simply too often less concerned with facts and complete costs than they are with personal profit or comfort.

Gerry Wootton
October 23, 2012

Sorry for the rant. How about starting by taking less - possibly leave a bit for all the other creatures on the planet? I support renewable energy because it's better than the grimy alternatives. Or, if everything has a price, let's price right: every mountain should cost 1000 $/cubic yard - you break it you pay for it. Every brook, 100 $/ft. Landfill, 2000 $/cubic yard. Mercury and heavy metal air pollution, 5000 $/pound. Buffalo pasture, 50,000 $/acre. Currently, these things are 'free' and in many cases subsidized by the tax payer: why give it away when you can pay them to take it? We are well and truly all bozos on this bus. Especially when we take the position that we won't even pay for fresh air to breath.
In fairness, we should give the natives back at least all the land we agreed they could have. Then create viable nature preserves to replace the token refuges. Scrap 10,000 golf courses return them to the wild. Eat less and leave more forage for the rest. Stop beating wilderness to death for fun and then go back and replace the divots. All things we won't do. Best we can manage is to minimize our footprint and at least play nice with the nature. All a species needs is enough habitat to survive - endangered species lists are just a bad appolgy for taking too much. Amazingly, we think that burying our garbage is doing good.
A common theme I find related to environmental impact is lack of data, mainly because we're too cheap to pay for it, and when there is a decent result, we ignore it. It's rare to find studies that do continuous observation. And few that are repeated. Because we're cheap or lazy or don't want to know. Utilities don't study raptor kills by power lines because that would be evidence of a federal offense. Point studies indicate between 1 and 6 per pylon in habitat. Annual # - don't know. Mitigation by guess work. Just a side effect of binary thinking when it's never black and white.

Gerry Wootton
October 23, 2012

Thanks bob. I would never the cost of human activity - we are clearly top predator. It's only a matter of relative magnitude of depradation. Since we are a) greedy b) lazy, c) rarely man up and c) never put back, the best we may do is tally up the options and, hopefully, choose one that's best for everyone and everything. Simply saying an activity is bad because it has a cost is pointless - what doesn't? We have a saying 'if you can't measure it, you can't control it'. My corollary is that 'if you don't measure it, you won't control it'. There is no substitute for good quality measurement. A sense of proportion doesn't hurt either. It's human nature to have none: we're more afraid of a moslem than the millions of french fries we'll eat even though the latter has several million times better chance of knocking us off. Some of the simplest things we could do for the planet include birth control and energy conservation and yet, we're quite cosy with the population growth and energy demand always increasing. Let's face it, even renewable energy is mostly an excuse to keep taking more pieces of the pie - a bit smaller piece perhaps but it's not baking a pie. 'Drill baby drill' is just an example of a fat kid with his dirty hand in the cookie jar and not overly concerned if he breaks it.
This article was about a land use - that's always important. In the relative scheme of things, this is a flyspec. The area is less than 1% of all of the highly disturbed and polluted abandonded land in the same region. Resource extraction companies always leave behind their mess. We're led to believe that they're dealing with it responsibly and cleaning up after themselves - the reality is they've left behind so much destruction that even the huge super-build fund can't even tally it all up let alone deal with it. Every spill, leaking pit and toxic dump was prefaced by a promise that nothing could go wrong. If we're lucky there's a half-assed cleanup. And yet, we still buy in.

Bob Wallace
October 22, 2012

Gerald - you might want to consider if you're being jerked around by a troll. If you look back you'll see that when someone asks him for documentation for his claims he doesn't bring it. If someone documents one of his claims to be false he dances on to another.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 22, 2012

Gerald, there's a 'reproducible', 'peer-reviewed' result for ya. How come you never discovered what the State of Calif. has been concerned with changing re bird deaths from windmills? It's not exactly your lame 'highly speculative conclusions'? Oops. Tell you what, the Koch Bothers are in need of some more fudged data -- write 'em. ;]

Dr. A. Cannara
October 22, 2012

Thanks for the Altamont info Bob. We've long been advocating for it here. So now Gerald, etc. should see that indeed that windmills kill migratory birds" and after the expenditure of much fossil energy, newer ones will "kill fewer".

Neither is 0.

Add in the roads & transmission systems originally built and now being removed again via fossil fuel, and we have another deduction to EROI? Wonder if the hundreds of tons of concrete laid per windmill will also be removed & recycled via fossil fuels?

The problem is that no matter how ardent wind aficionados are, they're in a losing battle with facts, just as are the climate deniers.

Unfortunately, such failures to assess reality hurt us all and our descendents.

Gerry Wootton
October 22, 2012

'I'm an engineer and statistician. Your 'peer-reviewed' fetish sounds like a climate denier's, and your conf. interval BS is just silly.' That's just silly. Data has to have a degree of repeatability and reproducibility to be useful for decision making.

'You can find it for yourself -- remember Google?' I have, in fact several peer reviewed studies which I have read carefully: none of them provide anything better than highly speculative conclusions. Where studies have been repeated, the repeatability is poor - in some cases the researchers themselves raise that point. I would gladly like to see something with decent statistical confidence and preferably reproducible results. Expecting to see good science denies nothing except alchemy, witchcraft and astrology.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 22, 2012

Gerald, I'm an engineer and statistician. Your "peer-reviewed" fetish sounds like a climate denier's, and your conf. interval BS is just silly..

You can find it for yourself -- remember Google?
;]

Gerry Wootton
October 22, 2012

'Geraold, the eagles and other raptors, bats, etc. have been oft counted in Calif. wind farms,' Kindly point me at any peer reviewed scientific studies that have a CI within +/-20%.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 22, 2012

Geraold, the eagles and other raptors, bats, etc. have been oft counted in Calif. wind farms, as have the broken blades littering the ground and the dead windmills, unmaintained while otrhers nearby spin.

The wind 'farm' biz hhas been a subsidized scam here in Caklif. for a few decades. Remember? No cleanup bonds.

There's a reason Golden Eagles are mentioned -- they're endangered, so whether it'[s 11 or 116, it's serious.

Again, what does 'green' or "environmentalist" mean to each of us?

Dr. A. Cannara
October 22, 2012

Solar 'farms' in Nevada or elsewhere, for grid connection, benefit no one but the few gaining FIT incomes from subsidies paid by the rest of us.

It's truly amazing how some who consider themselves 'green' don't seem to get basic science, engineering or environmental issues, yet must have their way.

Any 'farm' consumes land and wastes power in transmission/ conversion.

This is exactly why local solar generation, which also provides local hot water, is becoming the logical deployment.

Wind/solar 'farms' serve no long-term purpose, especially when the subsidies fade.

Gerry Wootton
October 22, 2012

@bob 'I'd like to store it away for future use.'. I wouldn't! The statistical confidence intervals for data in the few published studies are so wide and the data littered with proxies - it's hard to put any confidence in the numbers (to me, any number with more than +/-20% CI isn't a safe guess). I find data on golden eagles killed by power line and road accident more compelling, data on bald eagles drowned in fish nets a little less so; data on raptors killed at airports seems pretty good (and how many killed by relocation attempts). Once again, off topic.

Bob Wallace
October 22, 2012

Gerald - a link to the "67, ~1/3rd transmission lines".

I'd like to store it away for future use.

Gerry Wootton
October 22, 2012

Can we focus on land use rather than turbine eagle interaction?
If you're going to talk eagles at least get the facts straight - 116 golden's per year is unsupported by data (it started at 115 but 116 sounds more credible). The official number is 67 of which ~1/3 are killed by power lines; however, this is a statistical estimator based on statistics with a huge uncertainty putting the lower confidence interval into negative numbers i.e. there is a probability that wind turbines create eagles. Dr A says you should come and count the dead eagles - indeed you should, it would be a first. Camp out for a year and keep watching. Here's an idea, buy a few hundred surveillance cameras and take pictures over the web. Meanwhiile, the nesting population in the vicinity of wind farms is - surprise - stable but less than the estimated kills leading to the introduction of the unsubstantiated theory of eagle imports.

Let's get back to land use - this land set aside for solar development is less than that set aside for future urban sprawl around Phoenix but a bit more than that for urban sprawl near Las Vegas; way less than land set aside for waste ponds at future oil and gas drilling sites in the same area; ~twice the area of abandoned uranium mines awaiting reclamation,less than 5% of the public land occupied by unreclaimed land left behind by fossil fuel extraction; the total area of closed landfill sites in the US, etc. Perhaps we should see what percentage of solar lands overlap with man-made wasteland. Or, let's consider that each American consumes 3.46 tons of coal per year including ~270 lbs of imported coal (and the political stability of central America). Also, why is conservation such a non-starter (isn't fiberglass insulation an American invention)?

Bob Wallace
October 21, 2012

This was published on December 6, 2010...

"Thousands of decades-old wind turbines in Altamont Pass will be replaced with new ones that produce more power and kill fewer migratory birds under the terms of a legal settlement announced Monday.

California Attorney General Jerry Brown said he brokered an agreement between environmental groups, wind developer NextEra Energy Resources and the state after a long running legal battle.

"This landmark settlement mandates the replacement of outmoded wind turbines with newer models that are more efficient, generate more power and are less harmful to eagles, falcons and other birds," Brown said in a statement.

Under terms of the settlement, 2,400 turbines on the hills of the Altamont Pass operated by NextEra will be replaced in the next four years or shut down completely by Nov. 1, 2015."

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2010/12/06/wind-turbines-to-be-upgraded-in-altamont-pass/

" The company is also removing 6.5 miles of overhead electrical lines and eight miles of roads to allow the land to return to its natural state. The project is also creating union construction jobs. So far, 135 people have been hired for the upgrade. "

Bob Wallace
October 21, 2012

Here's what Audubon has to say about eagles and Altamont Pass wind turbines...

"Every year, an estimated 75 to 110 Golden Eagles are killed by the wind turbines in the Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area (APWRA).

....

Golden Gate Audubon is committed to reducing the levels of bird mortality at Altamont Pass to the greatest degree possible. In early 2004, Golden Gate Audubon joined the Center for Biological Diversity and Californians for Renewable Energy in a formal appeal to the Alameda County Board of Supervisors challenging the renewal of permits for 18 of Altamont's 20 wind farms in Alameda County. The permits were reissued without requirements to decrease the bird mortality caused by the turbines and without environmental analysis under the California Environmental Quality Act. Golden Gate Audubon requested an environmental review of the permitting and urged the county to mandate that the wind industry reduce bird mortality. We subsequently sued the county and wind companies in order to force a reduction in avian mortality at APWRA.

Reducing the kill entirely may not be possible, as long as the wind turbines continue to operate at Altamont. But we believe that significant progress can be made. The CEC estimates that wind operators could reduce bird deaths by as much as 50 percent within three years–the goal stated in our settlement agreement–and by up to 85 percent within six years–all without reducing energy output significantly at APWRA. These reductions could be achieved by removing turbines that are the most deadly to birds and shutting down the turbines during four winter months when winds are the least productive for wind energy, combined with some additional measures."

http://www.goldengateaudubon.org/conservation/birds-at-risk/avian-mortality-at-altamont-pass/

Dr. A. Cannara
October 21, 2012

Dave says about things he disagrees with: "I haven't seen that". So, Dave do some honest reading, some Googling, call the Audubon Society. In other words man up.

And we get: "I can't comprehend what is wrong with petitioning for solar energy PV CSP etc. in the deserts of all of Nevada" -- so
here you go, suppose we said you'll have to pay 10% of your income to you brother in law and you'll never see it again? Like that idea? That's what you're supporting for remote solar/wind.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 20, 2012

C'mon Dave, only $5, not gumption for a Romney bet?

Come on over and you can count the dead eagles, etc. under our Calif. windmills.
;]

Dr. A. Cannara
October 18, 2012

BobW, your #67. Folks have already mentioned present hydro & rotational storage, which are mature and have specific applications.

Sounds like you want everything handed to you before you do any research to correct your misinformation.

Well, that's not our job. But, you can certainly find plenty of info on all the various up & coming storage possibilities, especially for electrical storage. Just Google some terms like electrical storage, chemical storage, nano-tech storage, etc.

EVs, in fact, provide ~15% inertial storage, if they have regenerative braking. So everything that males EVs longer range, lighter, etc., advances local and central storage too. This will be less & less of a problem each year from today.

As for windmills threatening species, Google up some terms you can spell, like bird and bat deaths from windmills, or even crop losses due to windmills, or... There's a nice one from 2005.

You can do it Bob, you can do it!

Dr. A. Cannara
October 18, 2012

Nadia, I sure hope so! Not much sand left.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 18, 2012

Well, well, NovaDoug actually had the gumption to call my cell! Of course, his level of discussion is to leave a message starting with 'hello dipsh__' So there we go, high-level thinking, eh Nova? I see we finally have a reference to the Jacobson papers being paraded out. Too bad his work has been discredited even in professional journals. And, since he's only 2 miles from this keyboard, he & I have had interesting discussions about his fudging of the numbers he uses as well. As a Civil Engineer, he doesn't seem to have what it takes to make electrical/power-engineering statements. But, he's definitely selling wind! One of his students, whom I met, served us well as a soldier and was honest enough at a meeting at Stanford to admit that his work under Jacobsion had not included all costs. So, there we go -- old (yes, you sound old) Nova leaving playground insult msgs , while insulting normal human honesty with fudged figures just because he likes windmills more than facts. Go figure. As the yield figures for wind bear out, the total doesn't even match the power derived for a single plant operating with <1/100 the land and less mined/processed resources, with lower embedded carbon. So, c'mon Nova, tell us why you're so in love with windmills. Maybe have your name stenciled on each nice white tower, so later your descendents can see them sitting idle and know who didn't care about energy facts, species, or even scenery?

Penelope Gray
October 18, 2012

Can any of you sand box squabblers agree that we all share a common concern for the planet?

Gerry Wootton
October 18, 2012

Perhaps a better storyline would be 'proposed solar lands could interfere with Phoenix area residential development'.

Gerry Wootton
October 18, 2012

So what to do with moderately disturbed wilderness areas? The only way humans can have no impact is to stay out. Even then human development and activity up to thousands of miles away have an impact. One of the big issues seems to be personal preference. A nature hugger / solar detractor posted a picture of themselves at the end of a trail they made by trampling desert micro-fauna into oblivion. Another detractor complains a wind farm was impeding his hobby of killing wild animals by creating a defacto wildlife preserve. Another complains that a solar farm is providing a rich habitat for some predatory species. Citizens protested a native reservation's plan to create a solar farm, describing it as a get-rich quick scheme, while a neighboring coal power plant, notorious for its clouds of fly ash, was able to expand it's operation without protest. A homeowner was forced to remove solar panels because of visual impact / real estate values while one block away billboard signs went in unopposed - apparently beauty IS in the eye of the beholder. A frequent complainer about wind projects lives on a desert acreage and commutes to town in a truck.

There's many things you can do with 1000 acres of arid wilderness:
1 ATV trails (beat the hell out of it for fun)
2 half a dozen golf courses (picture verdant green desert ecology)
3 open pit mine for coal or uranium ore.
4 an ash pit
5 a tailings dump
6 a holding pond for fracking fluid or brine
7 a new truck route
8 a new runway for an airport
9 homes for 2200 Arizonans
10 a nuclear waste dump
11 a big-box plaza
12 a low-rise commercial park
13 a section of a transmission line importing power from 1000 miles away
14 part of a pipeline moving petrol bound for China.
So many better choices! Proposed land area for solar is smaller than Phoenix sprawl over the next 20 years.

Bob Wallace
October 18, 2012

Dave - you are right. The disappearing snow packs are going to change the flow patterns in some of our rivers. We may have to build more high elevation storage so that our rivers and water systems can be fed on a regular basis rather than become only seasonal streams.

We certainly may lose some late summer/fall generation ability. There is already a late dry season fall-off in the West. It might get worse.

On the other hand, we're going to have more rain overall. Hotter air holds more moisture. The atmospheric warming we've experienced so far has boosted atmospheric moisture about 4%. That's likely what led to Snowmagddon and Nashville's 500 year flood. Some of our hydro-generation resources are going to increase.

We do need to do something in this next election. We need to keep Romney away from the presidential pen and to return Congress to people who live in the 21st, not 10th Century. We've tasted the Dark Ages and disdain for knowledge. It's not where we want to live.

Bob Wallace
October 18, 2012

Peter - yes. Pumped storage is clearly one option. We built about 20GW to move late night nuclear to daytime demand. But it does come with a cost. We could convert hundreds of the existing 80,000 dams to pump-up storage or we could build "closed-loop" in which both the upper and lower reservoirs are made on dry land and filled up from rainy season water. Germany is building closed loop storage in abandoned mines.

More likely are emerging battery technologies. Most likely cheaper, certainly easier to site, quicker to install, and able to be placed close to point of use which reduces transmission issues.

My request in #67 was to get Alex to admit that it would be unreasonably expensive to use stored solar for non-sunny hours when there are cheaper renewable energy sources. Storing 10 cent solar at even 2 cents can't compete with 5 cent wind. Or 5 cent wind stored for 2 cents.

(To be truthful, I suspect Alex is not at all what he claims to be. He seems to be a pro-nuclear individual with a very limited energy knowledge base.)

Peter Bradshaw
October 18, 2012

BoBW Comment 67 "give us a route to storing solar to make it extend past the Sun's hours."

Pumped storage systems have been added to many nuclear power plants to handle peak demands, storing excess energy at other times, since nuclear plants want to run at a constant power level. The same facility can be used to solve the inverse problem with solar power. Most such facilities are in river systems where winter rains generate hydro power from the same equipment, helping fill the winter dip in solar power. Cost is low.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

"BoBW wind "50.6% (best technology and siting)." -- so you can take the "best" as your overall estimate in comparison with anything else? Really?"

No, Alex. I gave you the median and the maximum realized capacity.

And I gave you the Archer and Jacobson paper so that you could get a better feel for how much of the time the wind actually blows.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

"Est. over 160,000 [MWHrs] for year"

Read more carefully. Right at the top of the column it says "Net US wind generation (thousand MWhs)"

160,000,000 MWhs.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

BoBW wind "50.6% (best technology and siting)." -- so you can take the "best" as your overall estimate in comparison with anything else? Really?

When real weather history over a year is considered; when losses are considered; when missed opportunity power due to wind speeds out of range are considered; your 50% is not what a utility exec or engineer would depend upon.

But, even so, say 50%, that till makes wind inefficient in relation solar PV, nuclear, hydro, etc.

Seems like you've been brainwashed by Vestas, etc., even as their business fortunes force them into layoffs.

Your 50% estimate is also becoming laughable to the Chinese...
http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/wind/a-less-mighty-wind
www.nytimes.com/2011/01/21/us/21tttransmission.html?_r=1&hpw

Hmmm, how do we move a few thousand tons of concrete & steel per MW that's getting becalmed?

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Alex, give us a route to storing solar to make it extend past the Sun's hours. A route cheaper than wind direct from the turbine (currently 5 cents and dropping).

And give me a link to the bird death study you are referencing.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

By the way, BobW, on #83, 2012 wind power "Est. over 160,000 [MWHrs] for year" equals 0.018GWe which is less than 1/50 of one power reactor on 50 acres.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

BobW, nice of you to check AAAS, but that's a position not the research result published by scientists investigating wind effects.

However, it's irrelevant, since wind, as you fail to honestly recognize, can never meet the efficiency of power per acre, low loss, high reliability and resource economy of local solar.

You say you're environmentally concerned, but you reject the basic facts about wind power's inefficiency and inherent land consumption relative to local solar. And your position only gets worse as solar PV technology improves.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Alex, at your suggestion I checked with the AAAS to see what their position is on wind. Here it is...

"concerns have been raised about the impacts of large wind farms on migrating birds and on global climate patterns. The data show, however, that the relative risk to birds compared with buildings or vehicles is very small, representing less than a tenth of a percent of human-caused bird mortalities.6 Meanwhile, a study on the impact of large wind farms on wind circulation showed that the energy extracted from the atmosphere by wind turbines worldwide has a nearly negligible effect on climate compared to the many other factors affecting it, such as solar radiation and greenhouse gases.7"

They also had this to say about wind generation...

" Recent technological developments for wind power include refinements to the electrical generators, aerodynamic improvements to the turbine blades, use of more advanced light-weight materials, and improvements to control software that deals with fluctuations in wind speed and direction. These improvements make the turbines quieter, more efficient and reliable, and able to extract more energy from wind. In all, technological improvements have been estimated to increase wind energy generation by up to 61 percent and reduce the cost of turbines by as much as 36 percent by 2030.8"

http://www.aaas.org/spp/cstc/briefs/renewables/index.shtml#wind

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

"No one's talking about building new fossil fuel plants instead of windmills."

Natural gas is a fossil fuel.

"Glad you caught yourself with your incorrect figur4e on local solar, "

No, I had no need to catch myself. I've been in conversation with the EIA about how it might be possible to measure installed end-user solar. So far all they have been able to offer is avoided generation.

Net US wind generation (thousand MWhs)

2005 17,811
2006 26,589
2007 34,450
2008 55,363
209 73,886
2010 94,652
2011 119,747
2012 first six months 83,868. Est. over 160,000 for year.

Yep, that shows us that wind is falling out of favor.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Alex. I am so tired of your ignorance.

Wind is not "1/3 the time". Output capacity is 43.65% (median) and 50.6% (best technology and siting).

http://en.openei.org/apps/TCDB/

Output capacity is not a measure of how much of the time the wind blows, the wind blows well more than half the time at good sites.

http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/aj07_jamc.pdf

Here are two worker deaths at Indian Point nuclear plant in 2010.
http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Diver-Dies-at-Indian-Point-Nuclear-Power-Plant-95810259.html

Recently a worker fell over a railing in a nuclear plant and died. I'm not going to look that up for you. You've become a jerk.

Now, Alex, tell us how local solar is superior from 4pm to 9am.

And please don't tell us that you don't know that new nuclear is too expensive to consider. My opinion of your knowledge base it already in the basement.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

BobW, are you just trying to find something to say that's right?

The intertie improvement is great. So what?

Tying in 1000 windmills to make some power 1/3 the time is better than a 100-acre nuke doing that 24/7? Better than local solar needing no intertie, making ~0 loss and having no single point of failure? (that's engineering talk, Bob)

By the way, fossil fuel use indeed kills workers, etc. So does wind. How many nuke worker deaths this year? Last? Last decade?...

Right, 0.

I gave Gerald some links via a comment, if they check & approve the links, you'll see what professional researchers find for the various power sources and injuries.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Alex, you don't act like an engineer.

You act like someone so biased that they cherry-pick data and distort facts in an attempt to push a personal belief.

BTW, people fall off roofs while installing solar. People get killed building and operating nuclear plants. Bad stuff happens.

And you might want to get on top of the new HVDC line being developed to connect Wyoming wind to the Pacific Intertie and Intermountain Intertie along with the new HVDC transmission underway to take Oklahoma and Kansas wind to Tennessee and Alabama. And the new MidWest HVDC transmission.

Now, Alex, tell us how local solar is superior from 4pm to 9am.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

Glad you caught yourself with your incorrect figur4e on local solar, Bob! But then we still have...

"Since end-users provide the real estate and capital for solar I suspect the utilities to build little large scale solar but to build cheaper wind generation and swap wind for end-user solar."

Neither is necessary, which is also why wind is becoming disfavored. Storage for EVs etc., is necessary and as important as any effort. This will not promote wind, because of wind's losses, land costs, etc. It will, however, promote both EVs and local solar.

What you forget is that windmills, as designed now, are very inefficient, and not able to improve significantly, while solar PV has at least another doubling of efficiency and yield per sq meter. It's already far better than wind 'farms' and this will simply be another factor in making windmills irrelevant.

Now about those wind decommissioning bonds & costs...
;]

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

Got it, Gerald!

It's always interesting to look at the facts when folks are hawking some magic 'green' power. Here's some overall energy/health background... http://tinyurl.com/42wvr9l
http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/03/deaths-per-twh-by-energy-source.html
www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2012/06/10/energys-deathprint-a-price-always-paid/

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

Busy boy there, BobW -- #52 "you're acting like a child."

No one's talking about building new fossil fuel plants instead of windmills.

Local solar kills you birds/ bats... Windmills kill those and people too -- we lost 2 workers just this past year. ever see how windmills are maintain, Bob?

Look up dome of the publications, like last year's AAAS Science piece on bird/bat deaths and their costs to our grain-belt farmers.

Looks like this problem for wind has indeed brought the inner "child" out, Bob.
;]

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

BobW, thanks for the homework, but we're not talking expensive HVDC links from wind 'farms'. Glad you admit to the perennial loss though. That's a step for you.
;]
You need to add the lost-opportunity cost as well though -- remember the operating wind-speed window? Unlike solar, windmills load the grid when wind ain't right. Oops.

Now, in Calif., we have to deal with things like adding new 'farm' power to existing lines, which is expensive and lossy, if corners are cut, as you mention. And we have to deal with proposed new 'farms' needing all new transmission, plus beefing up of everything past the new interconnect.

Just so you won't be tempted to waste time further, I'm an Electrical Engineer, with a few degrees & decades in the subject.

You make no case for wind. But you do show why local solar is superior, which is one reason we have our "million solar homes" initiative here, and why counties & school districts are ramping up local solar on their structures.

Wind never was meaningful, except to the few who want subsidy from the many, and it will never be meaningful, except to descendents who have more than just or '80s junk to clean up...
http://webecoist.com/2009/05/04/10-abandoned-renewable-energy-plants/

But, windmills have indeed provided fun moments...
http://tinyurl.com/bl9vlc7
;]

Gerry Wootton
October 17, 2012

Sorry DrA - I was responding to those who want to see the individually provable bodies. Black lung plus employment history possibly meets that criteria of certainty at a sample size 1 level although I'm sure some wouldn't be convinced if you placed the actual organ in their hand. I'm aware of the larger overall impact but those numbers were established by epidemiological research of doctors and other 'untrustworthy eggheads' as someone most elegantly expressed it.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

"Since local solar has no land consumption and over twice the power density of wind, would you call wind an "emerging technology", BobW, or a meaningless technology?"

I would call wind a maturing technology. And solar almost to that point.

Again, I think the grid will be fed by both wind and solar. I think most solar will be rooftop/parking lot/local double use land.

I think wind will probably be a larger contributator than solar on the future grid simply because the wind blows more hours of the day than the Sun shines. Storage comes at a cost.

In 2007 we got 0.8% of our electricity from wind and 0.01% from solar. During the first half of 2012 we got 3.5% from wind and 0.09% from solar.

Based on that I would say that both are coming on strong. I expect solar installation to soar and possibly pass wind in the short run. Financially solar works so well at the end-user level that I expect a lot more money to be invested there.

Since end-users provide the real estate and capital for solar I suspect the utilities to build little large scale solar but to build cheaper wind generation and swap wind for end-user solar.

Once end-user solar scrapes off most of the need for expensive gas peaker plants then utilities are going to have little motivation for installing solar.

As natural gas prices rise, as we burn our way through the present supply glut, I expect wind installation to take off.

--

BTW, that 0.09% solar does not include rooftop/end-user solar. The EIA does not track non-utility scale solar, so solar is clearly contributing more than the number indicates.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Alex - here's your transmission homework. Just copy it over when you need to turn in your work. (No, don't. See below.)

HVDC has an approximate 1.5% DC->AC->DC conversion loss and looses 3% per 1,000 km. Over a very long run of 1,200 miles that's a 7.5% loss. A more typical run is something like Nebraska to Chicago, 600 miles, 4.5% loss.

Most transmission loss in the grid is at the neighborhood level. As we smarten our grid those losses will fall.

You may have been distracted by the fact that some wind farms install transmission lines capable of handling only 90% of peak output power. That just makes good financial sense. The wind does not often blow at "100%" and when it does there's going to be a lot of input from a lot of wind farms so the price of power is going to be down. The extra wire cost would not be recovered in a short enough time to make financial sense.

--

Be sure to paraphrase my words. You teacher might do a web search and find that you didn't do your own work.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Alex, you're acting like a child. Here, I'll do your work for you....

"Fossil-fueled facilities are 17 times more dangerous to birds on a per GWh basis than wind power. Wind turbines may have killed about 7000 birds, but fossil-fueled stations killed 14.5 million and nuclear 327,000."

http://www.nukefree.org/news/avianmortalityfromwindpower,fossil-fuel,andnuclearelectricity

"For Audubon, wind power is a good news, bad news story. The good news is that many new wind-power projects are being proposed across the country. For example, not long ago I flew over South Dakota and saw hundreds of wind turbines dotting the landscape. The state of Texas recently announced its intention to become the country's wind-power capital.

The bad news is that wind turbines sometimes kill a lot of birds. Some early wind projects like Altamont in California are notorious for killing many raptors, including golden eagles. Modern wind turbines are much safer for birds than their predecessors, but if they are located in the wrong places, they can still be hazardous and can fragment critical habitat. In cases where the birds affected are already in trouble, such as sage grouse in windy parts of the plains states, the turbines could push them closer to extinction.

On balance, Audubon strongly supports wind power as a clean alternative energy source that reduces the threat of global warming. Location, however, is important."

http://policy.audubon.org/audubon-statement-wind-power

Those old Altamont Pass bird killing-turbines are almost totally gone. They are being replaced with bird-safer much higher, and slower spinning turbines.

----

Lifetime greenhouse gas emissions gCO2/kWh

Wind 2.5 MW offshore 9

Wind 1.5 MW onshore 10

Solar PV Polycrystaline silicon 32

Nuclear various reactor types 66

Nuclear is 6.6x onshore wind.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparisons_of_life-cycle_greenhouse-gas_emissions

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

Since local solar has no land consumption and over twice the power density of wind, would you call wind an "emerging technology", BobW, or a meaningless technology?

The market seems to be making the latter assessment, despite your boosting.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Gerald - you want to compare sales of a mature technology vs. an emerging technology? That makes no sense.

BTW, people will have a full sized pickup (and SUV) PHEV option in the next few months.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

And here's BobW, speaking and from profound ignorance:

"I work for no one. I have never received a penny for anything that I've written. If you are actually a Ph.D. working at Cal Tech, you embarrass your institution."

So Bob, if someone provides a link to a report, it means that person works for that institution?

Now we can see how you are so easily misinformed.

And, recall I gave my phone number for you or anyone to call. why not man up & call and ask me directly?

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

Gerald, good points again, but you're too generous. Actual EPA coal-power deaths are >12,000/year, not including mining, processing, transport, etc. That's just the ordinary citizens dying. China reports it in a different way -- percent of GDP for coal combustion health costs. And remember, it takes 2000 tons of coal to make just one 400-ton top-line windmill tower. then there's the limestone kilning... The wind folks just aren't honest engineers or scientists, but some are good at scamming for subsidies. ;]

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

And Bob, you can try to fib about costs like CO2 & species, but to do that you'll first need to study up on professional, unbiased literature, say as found in publications like AAAS Proceedings, Nature, IEEE, etc. Just because you like windmills doesn't mean you get to mislead others.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

Anon! Haven't heard from you in so lone! " I suspect you are being baited, and homework is not at all the issue here"

Are you taking Bob's bait?

When do we listen to you re " so many factual mistakes"? When you man up and use a realish name?

Gerry Wootton
October 17, 2012

@bob - nice try but GM sales of IC V6's & V8's grew by way more than 16K units in the same time period. Sadly, a lot of people would prefer to drive to work in a pickup truck. Even more sadly, the government would prefer to put their employees in gas guzzlers. Of the 60,000 purchased and a larger number leased, 46 were EVs and <200 PHVs - awsome stat. Basically, a few billion simoleons out the door. Now, what important servant of the public would be seen driving a Volt? We can only hope that EVs will do to IC what the Model T did to horse power, I'm just not holding my breath. But I wouldn't use that as an excuse to not ramp the heck out of energy conservation and renewable generation and mothball the man killers as ridiculous and criminal as that may seem.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Henry introduced the Model T in 1908. Two years later he had sold 12,000. The Chevy Volt sold 16,348 in the last year.

Range anxiety with the Volt would only occur if you failed to stop at the gas station.

The solar charging station makes no sense. At least very little sense. Grid charging with a wind and solar fed grid makes the most sense. EVs and wind turbines are great partners.

Gerry Wootton
October 17, 2012

@bob 'Renewables can very much get us off of foreign oil' - that's a nice hypothetical position. Some flack invented 'range anxiety' and put a fork in it. Compare the sales growth in EVs and PHVs relative to vehicles with V8 engines. The electric commuter car and electric transit vehicles have a certain je ne sais quois but in reality, nous savons jacques. The former is not so hot and the latter is in decline. The majority of public transit boffins just love the smell of diesel in the morning. We can only imagine it would be otherwise. Even if it could happen, there is no coupling between electricity demand and generation unless you imagine the mythical ubiquitous solar charging station. So enough with your greenwashing ... just joking ... but watch out, some zealous reader here would like to punish this 'rediculous and criminal' behaviour!

ANONYMOUS
October 17, 2012

Bob -- It is almost impossible to believe anyone familiar with this web site could make so many factual mistakes as "DrAlexC." Most of the misleading numbers throughout his comments above are familiar and oft-repeated throughout the devices of the fossil fuel industry misinformation campaign that has been in full force for decades. I suspect you are being baited, and homework is not at all the issue here.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Alex - you should gather some facts before you spout off.

Lifetime CO2 footprint for nuclear is higher than for wind. Considerably higher.

Bird/bat kills for wind are insignificant.

You transmission losses are overstated. As are your conversion losses.

Are you going to ask me to do your research for you or are you capable of doing your own homework?

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

Bob, good to hear you're not profiting from the wind scam. So now, maybe you'll be open to rewriting this sentence more honestly:

" Now, thanks to subsidies helping build an industry, wind-electricity's median price is $0.05/kWh. That's a 6x drop in 30 years. It has made wind our least expensive way to bring new generation to the grid"

The cost of wind juice remains higher than nuclear and much higher than local solar, especially when real cocts are accounted for, such as:

a) Embedded CO2 burden, which is twice that of even a large nuclear plant.

b) Costs to species, such as midwestern birds & bats, where a full build-out of projected windmills will cause more cost in crop losses than the value of the intermittent power generated.

c) Inescapable transmission & conversion power loss of ~10% -- more if the opportunity cost of missed light & strong winds are added.

And many more, especially when one honestly notes 700 tons of mined resources must be processed via fossil fuel just to install 1 peak MW of output (1/3MW avg.).

Remember how wind power comes about?

2nd-order solar.

Oh yeah, forgot d) De-commissioning cost. Oops, never in the EROI.
;]

Gerry Wootton
October 17, 2012

@peter-bradshaw - stop guessing and just look at the data - you have it by use (residential, commercial, industrial, transportation), by state, by power district, yearly, monthly, daily also in terms of generation by source, by hourly electricity pricing markets, by utility sales, etc. You can learn a lot: like California and New York State are thrifty electricity users while Wyoming and Kentucky are pigs; Alabama and North Dakota have really poor residential standards; there is a strong positive correlation between thrifty energy use and GDP, the states with the highest per capita industrial use have the lowest per capita GDP, there is no evidence that 'cheap' electricity produces economic prosperity; that the average American household uses 2.5X the amount of electricity that the average German does, new renewable energy is a flyspec in the American power industry, hydro is in decline, etc, etc. As far as jobs go, there is data for that too. If Americans were to bring their energy consumption in line with Germany, every coal fired generator could be taken off-line. If the American grid were to have state of the art performance, half of the NG generators could be mothballed.
Both sides of the coin are tarnished - on the one hand, profligate waste of energy; on the other, prolific use of 50+ year old production and distribution technology.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

"there's no question that renewables aren't going to 'wean us off of foreign oil'' - what does foreign oil have to do with electricity production except in some very remote locations? "

Renewables can very much get us off of foreign oil. And off domestic oil.

Right now we have the technology to do our personal driving with 80% less oil than we now use.

We could move half of our air travel to electrified rapid rail, get there just as fast and in a lot more comfort.

We could move a very large percentage of our truck shipping to electrified rail and move between rail and door with battery powered trucks.

And 100% of the electricity could come from renewable sources.

(It looks like we're getting close to creating the fuel for our long distance air travel with algae. That's renewable as well.)

Gerry Wootton
October 17, 2012

@nadianichols - ~1200 Americans per year die, cease to exist, perish, shift of this mortal coil due to black lung disease. I wonder where they got it. Please, continue to fight tooth and nail to protect their right to die. Above all else, don't let this tradition be eradicated by greenwashing.

Gerry Wootton
October 17, 2012

@nadianichols - and yet your perfectly happy with millions of acres being drilled, frac'ed, dug up and polluted - because that's the current plan but you don't find it 'ridiculous and criminal'. They killed the water quality and most of the fish in my lake with their emissions - not that you care as long as they don't put up any solar panels anywhere. 'It's amazing how few realize that when the sun doesn't shine, energy isn't produced.' Thanks for the insult - amazingly our off-grid systems continue to work flawlessly day and night - you'd have to be pretty clueless to not be able to figure out how that works. 'Do the cost/benefit analysis, which doesn't require a physcis degree, and there's no question that renewables aren't going to 'wean us off of foreign oil'' - what does foreign oil have to do with electricity production except in some very remote locations? Managed the cost benefit analysis without a 'physcis' degree - the IRR is actually as good or better than many other energy generation possibilities. But then, you could simply rely on the empirical method i.e. a lot of companies in the business of making money lining up to take a shot at solar farming. One would have to imagine that large corporations make multi-million dollar investments without qualified bean counters to run the numbers - if they didn't that would be, in fact, criminal.

@DrAlexC - good one! Somehow Appalachia ended up in Texas. Holy cow - apple maps has got it wrong again!

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

nadian - Got my hand up in the air. I've been off the grid for over 20 years and you're not speaking facts.

It's very clear to me that we could run our world 100% from renewables and we need 0% nuclear. Besides, thorium reactors are a hypotheses. No one has ever built a thorium reactor which produced marketable electricity. Perhaps it will happen ten years from now, but until it happens what you suggest equates with running turbines with unicorn farts.

--

BTW, the price of panels is now very inexpensive. Not the $12/watt of a couple of decades ago. There's no reason to cramp your lifestyle with only half a kW any longer.

Bob Wallace
October 17, 2012

Alex. I work for no one. I have never received a penny for anything that I've written.

If you are actually a Ph.D. working at Cal Tech, you embarrass your institution.

You have now morphed your argument on wind. No longer is it the 2% of the wind farm that wind turbines use but now you're on to other ranchers not happy with transmission lines.

As for "subsidized for so long, without good results" about 30 years back electricity from wind was around $0.30/kWh. Now, thanks to subsidies helping build an industry, wind-electricity's median price is $0.05/kWh. That's a 6x drop in 30 years. It has made wind our least expensive way to bring new generation to the grid.

Try honesty, Alex. A little truthiness could be a good thing.

Penelope Gray
October 17, 2012

Anonymous, I was raised that two wrongs don't make a right. It's not just oil extraction, look at the archaic mining laws that still apply to our public lands. They're a travesty as well and should be abolished. Okay, all of you who live off grid, raise your hand. You are the few who truly understand renewable energy...and its limitations. It's amazing how few realize that when the sun doesn't shine, energy isn't produced. When the wind doesn't blow (or blows too hard), ditto. I've lived off grid for almost 30 years on 500 watts of solar (out of necessity) and I will say this about renewables; very few Americans will EVER unless forced reduce their energy footprint to the point that renewables will make any difference whatsoever in powering our little planet. In Maine, our mountains and ridgelines are being dynamited and destroyed, sacrificed (that's the only word for it) to industrial wind power, which has a huge ecological footprint and produces negligible power. Do the cost/benefit analysis, which doesn't require a physcis degree, and there's no question that renewables aren't going to "wean us off of foreign oil". I would gladly host a small thorium reactor in my back yard, but would fight, and am fighting, industrial wind tooth and nail. I care too much about this planet to destroy it in the name of "green religion" and the mindless frenzy to erect monstrous blinking icons that would dominate our landscape: nothing more than hugely expensive and very destructive visual symbols of "what we should be doing!". Science based energy solutions, not political and corporate cronyism, is the only answer to an ever-expanding and insatiably hungry human population.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 17, 2012

Gerald, Bob & maybe Anon are wind salesmen? (assuming Anon is male).

This is priceless: "...let's not go to silly-land. The footprint of a wind turbine is the area that is used for the tower footing. It is less than 2% of the area of the wind farm, leaving 98% of the land for original use"

Right, like forest in Appalachia?
www.keepersoftheblueridge.com/environmental-impact.html?mid=538

The Texas facts aren't quite so good either, since the transmission towers, rights of way, maintenance roads, etc. are what ranchers don't like being forced down their throats by Texas courts -- big government was supposed to be a problem for Texans?

So now we know we've at least 2 wind salesmen here, whose science & engineering truthiness are to be taken seriously?

No wonder Vestas & others are laying off folks -- the business has been hyped & subsidized for so long, without good results that the curtain is falling away. Build that vacation cottage right under a 5MW Siemens windmill, boys.
;]

ANONYMOUS
October 17, 2012

So where do the 50,000,000 acres of fossil-fuel development now on USA onshore public lands belong? In your back yard? Please do volunteer your yard for a drill rig and everything else that goes with it.

Penelope Gray
October 17, 2012

Ridiculous and criminal. Proof positive that the average American has been "greenwashed" into believing we have to destroy the last of our great spaces in order to save the planet. Solar belongs on rooftops, NOT on my wild lands. Never forget, those public lands the government is industrializing belong to WE THE PEOPLE, not $$$$ubsidy seeking corporations.

Gerry Wootton
October 16, 2012

'The point is that more than 90% of power in the US goes to non-residential uses' ... duh, realy? According to EIA data, residential use is ~38% of the total (in greeniefornia, that drops to 34%).

Gerry Wootton
October 16, 2012

Texas farmers give up ~3% of usable land to wind turbines and increase their cash yield per acre by 300%. Silly blighters.

Gerry Wootton
October 16, 2012

The only way you can avoid using up land is to die now and get cremated - any other option is going to have an impact on land use. There are many easy ways to reduce your energy footprint which in turn reduces your effective land use, your effective GHG production,etc. There are many ways that utilities could do the same - the efficiency of the distribution system is less than stellar; for consumers, this essentially amplifies their impact. The system needs to input a lot more than 1 kWh in order to deliver 1 kWh to the end user; it also needs to input much more than 1 cuft of NG to get 1 cuft to the user with emissions of GHG that exceed the impact of the CO2 produced by end user burn. Why do they do it? Cheap is cheap and we all want cheap. On average, a coal fired plant will over 30 years consume 10 times as much area in open pit mines as it uses for facilities and ash pits.
Consider percapita residential consumption; if an average American lives to be 80, they mess up a 4 acre patch of land on a steady diet of coal power. Or 0.08 acres of land with solar panels. Can you spell r-e-n-e-w-a-b-l-e? Good, now go put on your 'America's energy' T-Shirt and find a flag to wave. What's really depressing is that some American states consume 6600 kWh per capita in residential use while others as little 2200 kWh (and, no, there is no correlation between degree days and consumption). The USA leads OECD countries in residential electricity consumption beating the Germans by a comfortable 150% (A German's solar footprint would be only 0.032 acres). Surprisingly, a people that can get all worked up about solar panels in the desert but not subdivisions of new houses with no insulation.

Bob Wallace
October 16, 2012

Alex, come on, let's not go to silly-land.

The footprint of a wind turbine is the area that is used for the tower footing. It is less than 2% of the area of the wind farm, leaving 98% of the land for original use - grazing, farming or wild life. In general turbines use existing farm roads and/or let their roadways grow back for grazing. Transmission lines generally go underground.

Bird kill and crop damage are not real problems.

The financial footprint includes lease payments to land owners and it is a very good source of income for them and for small town America. Wind is bringing life back to dying towns via good jobs and tax revenue.

You are correct, localized solar has no issues with roads, transmission lines, bird deaths, etc. That's why most of us support distributed solar. But we also know that it would be too expensive to run our grid from solar alone. Wind is a great partner for solar as it extends the number of hours that the grid can be fed directly rather than via storage.

Oh, and take your personal attacks and stick them. I work for no one.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 16, 2012

Bob --"Those of us who see the big picture" -- well, that's special, Bob. So you're a windmill sales guy?

Sure, Caltech folks don't know much do they?
;]
"we have far more very windy land than we will ever use for turbine footprints" -- pretty funny, since "footprint" is what, Bob? The diameter of the tower? Maybe the swept area of the blades times 360 degrees? Maybe that and the diameter of the 1000-cubic yard concrete foundation? Or maybe, the "footprint" includes the roads and transmission via needed per windmill? Or, maybe it includes the 700 tons of resource materials that must be processed via fossil fuels in order to get just 1MW peak wind power installed? Even a nuclear plant has 1/2 the embedded CO2 burden windmills have.

Does the financial "footprint" include the crop losses due to bird & bat deaths? Or maybe to the noise & visual pollution? And so on.

So, since local solar has none of those, plus it avoids the financial opportunity costs of transmission losses, why wind? Is it how you get some subsidized $, Bob?
;]

Bob Wallace
October 16, 2012

Alex, the vertical axis turbine study is flawed. All it says is that you can pack verticals closer together. That's a worthless fact. All turbines take only the space of their footprints and we have far more very windy land than we will ever use for turbine footprints.

Nuclear is priced off the table. Forget about it.

Bob Wallace
October 16, 2012

Alex - this is completely untrue - "The land/species waste are also a concern, but folks just interested in juice don't care."

Those of us who see the big picture understand that if we don't get off fossil fuels we will waste all the land and species.

Again, I agree that solar is best done on rooftops, in most cases. There may be arguments for some large solar farms. Consider the fact that we have a HVDC transmission line running from Utah to SoCal which was built to bring coal power to the coast. Now that we are moving away from coal we are freeing up that transmission. It might make sense to put some large solar arrays along that route and extend SoCal's solar day by an hour or so so.

Wind, again, it's not "rooftop power".

Dr. A. Cannara
October 16, 2012

BobW, yes, wind makes no sense, unless you're on a remote farm or island. Even the present, horizontal prop-generators are the least efficient choice. For example...
http://cleantechnica.com/2011/07/14/caltech-vertical-axis-wind-turbines-boost-wind-farm-power-efficiency-10x/
http://media.caltech.edu/press_releases/13430
www.flickr.com/photos/carbonfreeenergy/3957479225/

Dr. A. Cannara
October 16, 2012

Gerald, the "boo birds" are simply applying common sense. As Caltech long ago explained, we could run the US on a solar 'farm' 200km on a side, in the Southwest.

But, that would waste power in transmission, in locked-in inefficiency of the current PV devices, and create a naive dependency on limited transmission paths.

The land/species waste are also a concern, but folks just interested in juice don't care. And, we don't need to care about them anyway, since local solar PV/hot-water is more than adequate for peak daytime needs.

LBL long ago explained how >2% of earth's land is covered by human structure -- far more than needed to meet peak daytime demands with even present 20% efficient PV.

So wind/wave/solar 'farms' are completely unnecessary. If anyone wants to see the comparison of areas needed to be consumed for various power sources, look at p37 here...
www.thoriumenergyalliance.com/downloads/TEAC3%20presentations/TEAC3_Cannara_Alex.pdf

It becomes obvious why local solar and nuclear are the wise choices.

Bob Wallace
October 16, 2012

Alex - I agree on installing most solar on rooftops/over parking lots. But neighborhood wind doesn't make sense. People tend to not live in the windiest places and people don't want to live right under large turbines.

As for the Pacific Intertie, yes, it is a single run that could be disrupted, but that is only a temporary condition. The new HVDC line underway in Wyoming will tie together the Pacific and Intermountain Interties which will create a loop and provide two north/south routes for power. And a lot of excellent Wyoming wind will power the west coast.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 16, 2012

Jeff -- appreciate your comments. One thing about local solar is that it's indeed business/industrial to some extent. The present Calif. "million solar homes" initiative aims at delivering 10% of the state's peak daytime load via many small systems.

Small, local systems make for a more robust grid. We don't need large, remote solar/wind 'farms' because they lose considerable power in transmission and those transmission connections become points of failure. For example, the Pacific Intertie from Wash. to S. Calif. is a single point of failure that can bring down half the state.

Having millions of small systems connected locally makes a far more efficient, robust system, especially as EVs continue to roll out. Even NYC was surveyed and found to be able to meet about 1/2 its peak daytime summer loads via rooftop solar -- and NYC has lost of people & machinery per roof!

For reference, here's Calif (~36GWe capacity)...
www.caiso.com/outlook/SystemStatus.html

And here's local PV on a church: http://tinyurl.com/3znad4b

Gerry Wootton
October 16, 2012

Before the boo birds start flapping too hard about the 'waste of land', consider that in the same year they were offering up 59,000,000 offshore acres for oil and gas drilling. Currently, they have about 26,000,000 offshore acres and 21,000,000 acres in the lower 48 leased and pending oil and gas development. In the lower 48 that amounts to ~7,000 approved projects on public and indian land (nice one America: still calling them 'indians' and still taking the land). And still, there are some intellectual giants that think that 285,000 acres for solar development is just too much. If you have an interest in wildlife consider 77,000,000 acres in Alaska handed out by doubleyah; more recently, 36,000,0000 acres in the Chukchi Sea and 32,000,000 in the Beaufort proposed to be put on the block. The history of solar development in the southwest is that only about 40% of the land used is actually disturbed with much of it being left to preserve watersheds, habitats and viewsheds. But lets assume that every acre of the 285,000 were used, that would be <0.1% of the onshore area devoted to fossil fuel production; <20% of the total acreage of mountains removed to date in Kentucky, Tennesee, Virgina and West Virginia alone (not to mention 725 miles of mountain streams backfilled). One reason they do it is that it takes a lot less labor to do it than other methods - a job killer and an environment killer. But, we're okay with that.

ANONYMOUS
October 16, 2012

Those commenting on the trivial amount of public land designated for "solar zones" are probability blissfully unaware that the natural gas industry alone will obliterate several hundred thousand acres of lands across the USA this year and each year for so long as that industry continues to drill. The land scarification includes that for well pads, roads, water and natural gas pipeline alignments, electrical transmission swaths, compressor stations, storage tanks, waste disposal pits, etc. As a contemporary example, the land-surface obliteration devoted to creating natural gas well pads alone easily exceeds 300,000 acres per year - year after year - in the USA during the modern shale gas boom. Using contemporary "restoration" techniques, these lands possibly could be transformed into something like their pre-drilling condition in about one century. Those concerned about land-surface impacts should devote their energies to heading off the potential devastation of multi-millions of acres of land by the fossil fuel industry before our descendants spit on our graves for having allowed that industry to trash our land, waters, and atmosphere for more than a century - and counting.

Jeff Kelly
October 16, 2012

The point is that more than 90% of power in the US goes to non-residential uses. I certainly support rooftop solar - I don't consider it a waste of money. It's just that it is very hard to piece together several gigawatts from thousands of little rooftop systems. The big projects have a role. And in deference to Dr Alex, I am a supporter of nuclear power. Our refusal to reprocess nuclear fuel in this country is brainless.

Peter Bradshaw
October 16, 2012

Comment # 9: "Over 90% of all electricity is consumed in 3-phase form". I suspect that percentage is high, since just about all houses in the US operate on a single phase, but solar panels on three streets in my neighborhood, with equal sizes on the three, would generate three phase power anyway. And with enough rooftops so handled, local inequalities would soon balance out. And commercial/industrial rooftop and parking space areas could certainly be converted via three-phase converters. No problem.

Dr. A. Cannara
October 15, 2012

What a waste, since local solar DG would ruin 0 acres and not lose ~10% of its juice in transmission/conversion.

Solar/wind 'farms' are burps from the past of engineering & environmental ignorance. But, they can make $ from rate/tax payers.
;]

ANONYMOUS
October 15, 2012

Wow! 285,000 acres! That is a colossal 0.6 (zero-point-six) percent of the 50,000,000 (fifty million) acres of USA onshore public lands already under lease by the fossil fuel industry!!! But hey -- THOSE guys know how to take care of our public lands.

Bob Wallace
October 15, 2012

"designated 285,000 acres of public land for solar development on pre-sited zones"

"would exclude 78 million acres of public land from solar development"

285,000/78,000,000 = 0.4%

Failure to stop extreme climate change will screw up 100% of all our land.

Jeff Kelly
October 15, 2012

I believe our descendants will be much upset about the MTR holocaust in Appalachia, as well as the pervasive groundwater contamination resulting from fracking. They will say: "Geez, they knew better, they had scientists and regulations, but in the frenzied greed of the day they didn't bother to enforce them."

Rooftop solar has advantages of being local and robust in terms of power support; I am particularly supportive in the "Big Box" commercial rooftop solar model being advanced by Project Amp. But the big desert utility projects are also necessary in order to get the sheer gigawatts that are necessary to make a difference in carbon reduction. I have seen the various claims about many gigawatts of "potential" solar generation available on rooftops in SoCal; this is mainly theoretical based on rooftops observable from space. But when you get down to ground level, people are funny about their property, you know. Americans aren't Germans, and the vast majority of the population is not interested in being a plant operator.

Solar leasing, through its imperfect business model, has managed to dramatically increase the amount of rooftop solar installed, but just today the Rooftop Purists are attacking solar leasing on this website because it is greedy capitalism, blah blah, blah. This is really just a social manifesto that is holding back vital RE development. We don't need big utility companies and power lines; why, those steel mills can power themselves with rooftop solar arrays. The Purists suck at math. Over 90% of all electricity is consumed in 3-phase form; please try to understand what that statement means. I will accept a small, contiguous area of desert land being solarized to help free us from fossil fuel. This latest winnowing of federal land for solar projects should help the process along, but the Rooftop Purists still aren't satisfied.

Dr. A. Cannara
July 29, 2012

"arracking each other"?

The discussion is about what makes sense. Our descendents are watching us.

Each power source has plusses and minusses.

Your "biogas" power, for instance, is fine where its generation is unavoidable, as in digesters. It's not a source to be cultivated otherwise because of the inefficiency of the thermal cycle and the need to add energy consumption to do the various separations mentioned.

So, as a member of the Palo Alto Green Energy group, which is planning a digester for waste & sewage, biogas is a necessary source, because methane must be burned, even if not used for power. Biogas is not something to be souught out as a source of energy. It's something to be avoided, if possible, and burned, if not.

JIM HETZER
July 29, 2012

I suggest that we stop attacking each others' position and focus on how to generate an alternative energy approach that has a positive impact on the environment. Anaerobic digesters offer an opportunity to utilize animal waste, human waste, and biomass to produce natural gas. The biogas is 60% methane and 40% carbon dioxide. Upon separation, the methane can be used to generate electricity or used directly as a heat source. The CO2 can be used to produce more biomass for processing, or for production of food.

The remaining mass from the digesters can be reduced by about 97% by using thermal oxidizers to extract the energy available that can not be digested, and the resulting residue is biologically inactive and non-toxic to the environment.

Someone is going to make money on any approach that is taken. That is free enterprise. We need to take the long view on how to meet the demand for energy in the best way for our grandchildren and for the earth.

Rev. Jim Hetzer (formerly an energy worker in industrial automation)

Jen Aitchison
July 27, 2012

Thank you Twigger, you have summed it up perfectly.

Dr. A. Cannara
July 26, 2012

Good points Bill & Twigger. This is why we have the Calif. "million solar homes" initiative, and a raft of no-down-payment installers, and municipalities getting wise...
http://paloaltoonline.com/news/show_story.php?id=24561
www.cityofpaloalto.org/news/displaynews.asp?NewsID=1877?id=223
www.environmentcalifornia.org/sites/environment/files/reports/California%27s%20Solar%20Cities%202012%20-%20Final.pdf?utm_source=041+April+30+General+Newsletter&utm_campaign=General+March&utm_medium=email
www.sccgov.org/sites/opa/nr/Pages/Santa-Clara-County-Celebrates-Completion-of-New-Solar-Installation-Project.aspx

PS, "anonymous" got desperate on another thread and revealed something about being ex-CIA, to bolster an argument. But do we really think an ex-CIA guy would reveal being "ex-CIA"? Maybe a janitor, or IT tech?

Michael Connor
July 26, 2012

The utility companies are just beginning to salivate about selling energy they get for free to all the suckers out there in suburbia. It's mindboggling how ignorant the average electricity consumer is. The utilities are just going to keep ripping them off. Only now they will be belly laughing so hard they will barely be able to make it to the bank.

Smarten up people. Put the solar panels on your own roof, or somewhere in the local community. Take control. Cut out the middle man. Distributed generation is the way to go. Be your own utility. Get your energy delivered directly to you from your own personal nuclear fusion reactor, the sun. Don't let utility companies "own the sun"

william mcdonald
July 26, 2012

Heh anonymous- at least he has the courage to use his name.

And in case you haven't noticed, these solar and wind farms are going up on mostly unspoiled land ruining it, in human lifetime terms, for many generations. They have to scrape the ground bare, compress it, and treat it with chemicals- don't believe me- go look at the now decommissioned solar farm near Barstow, California- not a blade of grass- I know, I have photographed it, let me know if you want the pictures.

Or perhaps like BrightSource Ivanpah, they use a kinder and gentler "mowing the vegetation" approach, chopping the plants down to about 18 " high, again I have been there and photographed this, but the kicker being all, and I mean ALL animals have been removed, leaving a sterile, uninviting habitat for anything but the solar heliostatic mirrors.

There are a lot of people who feel that our solution is apply the method used successfully in Germany, rooftop solar with a robust feed in tariff, instead of destroying our wildlands, are all those people shills for the fossil fuel industry as well?

Next time before you start calling someone a troll, I suggest you look in the mirror first.

Bill McDonald
Southern California

ANONYMOUS
July 26, 2012

DrAlexC,

I am sure our descendants will be particularly bothered with solar farms given the beauty of the strip mining, tar sands, fracking, brownfields, nuclear waste sites and other earth-loving activity going on...

Google "solar panel attachment" and see that it can simply be removed without trace, unlike any other form of energy. Why don't you go and troll on some coal-lover site somewhere instead.

Dr. A. Cannara
July 25, 2012

What a waste, of land, species, power & subsidy. Well, the subsidies are "green".
;]
With >2% of earth's land covered with human structures, there's no need for any solar/wind/wave 'farms'. That;s why these wasteful projects will be laughed at by our descendents, right before they spit on our graves for trashing the land with them.

The Calif. "million solar homes" initiative, the Santa Clara County administration's local solar (DG), the local school district's DG, the local municipal utilities' DG,... all make this kind of land-hungry, power-wasting project absurd scams that waste transmission power forever, while forcing new transmission corridors & resources simply to allow a small group to profit from the rest of us.

Some sane projects...
http://paloaltoonline.com/news/show_story.php?id=24561
www.cityofpaloalto.org/news/displaynews.asp?NewsID=1877?id=223
www.environmentcalifornia.org/sites/environment/files/reports/California%27s%20Solar%20Cities%202012%20-%20Final.pdf?utm_source=041+April+30+General+Newsletter&utm_campaign=General+March&utm_medium=email
www.sccgov.org/sites/opa/nr/Pages/Santa-Clara-County-Celebrates-Completion-of-New-Solar-Installation-Project.aspx

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Steve Leone

Steve Leone has been a journalist for more than 15 years and has worked for news organizations in Rhode Island, Maine, New Hampshire, Virginia and California.