Serenity54321

As an Independent on this blog, I often have questions arise that no one on either side, Democrat or Republican, can answer. I notice the same human behavior on both sides politically, and really can't figure out why the arguing must be so hostile, and hypocritical.

But serious question to the left on c*****e c****e:

We hear often that c*****e c****e is going to destroy the world, and that Big Oil and large corporations are to blame. This very well may be accurate. However, my question is this: What about our dependence on electricity?

Fully 25% of our electricity comes from coal, another 50% comes from nuclear power plants. While we have worked on both wind and solar technology, neither is far enough along to solve our electricity problem.

What solutions does the left have for this problem in the immediate future? Do you plan to give up your cell phone, computer, and refrigerator?

While the left can attack the right for "no solutions" on health care, the right can attack the left for "no solutions" on c*****e c****e.

I want solutions from both sides, not problems. Please comment.

Patty

We are sitting on the larges formation of natural gas in the world. To start we need to put in an infrastructure of nat gas pipelines along our east/west interstates berm of the road.
We already own the right of way and would not cause problems of eminent domain. It would create a mass amount of employment. It burns at a 50% reductuion of Diesel and could be required that our trucking industry be switched over in the next 10 years. It would eliminate our dependence on foreign oil (which is why Wash would never approve it). It would provide a t***sportation system to bring clean burning nat gas to our electric generation facilities and drop electric generation costs and bring manufacturing jobs home. Costs for the nat gas should be passed on to the big oil corps and they should not be allowed to take those resources that took millions of years to create at strictly the cost of extraction.
For goodness sakes we are flaring it off into the atmosphere up in the Bakken (ND) just to get rid of it since it is so cheap and don't have a way of moving it due to the low temps needed to keep it in liquid form for t***sport.
We are lighting up the sky as seen from space brighter than Chicago with the flaring and completely discredits the Lefts cl;aim that it is all about the environment.

Serenity54321

Yes this would be one option but c*****e c****e advocates are also against natural gas because of fracking. I am wondering what their options are if natural gas is not the way they want to go.

I think it's amazing they can be so vehement about business, forcing expensive laws onto utility companies (which then get passed along to us) but then say virtually nothing about how to solve the worlds dependence on electricity. They attack big oil but have no solution. Does any c*****e c****er have a workable solution if natural gas is not an option?

Patty

I cant answer that as I have never gotten a straight answer from a liberal tree hugger.

Serenity54321

I know Patty I have seen your posts before and you seem reasonable. But that is what I'm trying to get today: a straight answer. I have a feeling they don't have one, and that's ironic because they will be the first ones hollering when their own environmental laws and regulations send the costs of energy so high they can't heat their own homes in the winter.

Patty

:thumbup: :thumbup:
Good luck. Let me know if you get one and I will send up sky rockets to celebrate. :lol:

mcjwelles

The pragmatics of c*****e c****e- whether real or a Left Wing s**m of some kind- is secondary to the implication- that Humankind simply can't "afford" to stop doing what we have always done- even if subsequent generations can't actually survive. "Inconvenience" should not be the reason we can't discuss this matter in calm and non partisan terms.

mkewlkez

As always, trust the government to do nothing...unless it can make them some money.

mcjwelles

Government making money??? Perhaps politicians... But this is more a question of Big Corporations obfuscating the question by making the whole conversation a wild-eyed Chicken Little event- apparently because of the obvious bottom-line issues. They are over invested in a fuel-driven technology that may be k*****g us all- but it would be too 'inconvenient' to afford retooling for an alternative, innovative policy.

So far the alternative energy sources lend themselves better toward small scale t***sition and that SEEMS to favor manufacturing over utilities. I would say that is a failure of imagination mostly. We need to be able to discuss this looming possibility at least.


quote=mkewlkez]As always, trust the government to do nothing...unless it can make them some money.[/quote]

Serenity54321

LA Times just ran an article on this problem yesterday....

U.S. electricity prices may be going up for good
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ALLEN J. SCHABEN / LOS ANGELES TIMES

California has all but phased out coal-generated electricity, and the San Onofre nuclear power plant, shown here, has been decommissioned. Such factors, experts say, will contribute to a rise in electricity prices.
BY RALPH VARTABEDIAN
April 25, 2014, 10:47 p.m.
As temperatures plunged to 16 below zero in Chicago in early January and set record lows across the eastern U.S., electrical system managers implored the public to turn off stoves, dryers and even lights or risk blackouts.

A fifth of all power-generating capacity in a grid serving 60 million people went suddenly offline, as coal piles froze, sensitive electrical equipment went haywire and utility operators had trouble finding enough natural gas to keep power plants running. The wholesale price of electricity skyrocketed to nearly $2 per kilowatt hour, more than 40 times the normal rate. The price hikes cascaded quickly down to consumers. Robert Thompson, who lives in the suburbs of Allentown, Pa., got a $1,250 bill for January.

"I thought, how am I going to pay this?" he recalled. "This was going to put us in the poorhouse."

The bill was reduced to about $750 after Thompson complained, but Susan Martucci, a part-time administrative assistant in Allentown, got no relief on her $654 charge. "It was ridiculous," she said.

The electrical system's duress was a direct result of the polar vortex, the cold air mass that settled over the nation. But it exposed a more fundamental problem. There is a growing fragility in the U.S. electricity system, experts warn, the result of the shutdown of coal-fired plants, reductions in nuclear power, a shift to more expensive renewable energy and natural gas pipeline constraints. The result is likely to be future price shocks. And they may not be temporary.

One recent study predicts the cost of electricity in California alone could jump 47% over the next 16 years, in part because of the state's shift toward more expensive renewable energy.

"We are now in an era of rising electricity prices," said Philip Moeller, a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, who said the steady reduction in generating capacity across the nation means that prices are headed up. "If you take enough supply out of the system, the price is going to increase."

In fact, the price of electricity has already been rising over the last decade, jumping by double digits in many states, even after accounting for inflation. In California, residential electricity prices shot up 30% between 2006 and 2012, adjusted for inflation, according to Energy Department figures. Experts in the state's energy markets project the price could jump an additional 47% over the next 15 years.

The problems confronting the electricity system are the result of a wide range of forces: new federal regulations on toxic emissions, rules on greenhouse gases, state mandates for renewable power, technical problems at nuclear power plants and unpredictable price trends for natural gas. Even cheap hydro power is declining in some areas, particularly California, owing to the long-lasting drought.

"Everywhere you turn, there are proposals and regulations to make prices go higher," said Daniel Kish, senior vice president at the Institute for Energy Research. "The trend line is up, up, up. We are going into uncharted territory."

New emissions rules on mercury, acid gases and other toxics by the Environmental Protection Agency are expected to result in significant losses of the nation's coal-generated power, historically the largest and cheapest source of electricity. Already, two dozen coal generating units across the country are scheduled for decommissioning. When the regulations go into effect next year, 60 gigawatts of capacity — equivalent to the output of 60 nuclear reactors — will be taken out of the system, according to Energy Department estimates.

Moeller, the federal energy commissioner, warns that these rapid changes are eroding the system's ability to handle unexpected upsets, such as the polar vortex, and could result in brownouts or even blackouts in some regions as early as next year. He doesn't argue against the changes, but believes they are being phased in too quickly.

The push to wean California off f****l f**ls for electricity could cause a consumer backlash as the price for doing so becomes increasingly apparent, warns Alex Leupp, an executive with the Northern California Power Agency, a nonprofit that generates low-cost power for 15 agencies across the state. The nonprofit was formed decades ago during a r*******n against the PUC and the high prices that resulted from its regulations.

"If power gets too expensive, there will be a revolt," Leupp said. "If the state pushes too fast on renewables before the technology is viable, it could set back the environmental goals we all believe in at the end of the day."

Artemis

I don't understand how you can say that. The government is not in the energy business, they can only support industries, which Obama has tried to do and of course has been cut down for doing so with Solyndra so China took the ball and ran with it, Solyndra couldn't compete with cheap Chinese solar panels and Solyndra failed along with Obama's efforts.

http://energy.gov/energysaver/articles/installing-and-maintaining-home-solar-electric-system

Patty

Doing the same thing over again when it has failed is by definition insane.
http://dailycaller.com/2012/10/30/as-many-as-fifty-obama-backed-green-energy-companies-bankrupt-or-troubled/

Artemis

My question is why didn't Obama nip it in the bud and tax China a substantial import tax. Having this industry here could have really gotten a movement going forward and employing a lot of people.

mcjwelles

If we do NOT begin Something soon, if we just continue to equivocate the issue, all we will be able to say is that Life's a b***h. Inconvenience is no strategy basis- it will only get more expensive and more inconvenient. This could just be one of the greatest economic stimulus packages to come our way in a long time. I remember scratching my head when Electric Boat Works in Groton CT was defunded- all the lost jobs, etc.- when I was looking at a shop scaled and tooled to do ANYTHING! This is a long awaited opportunity if you can get beyond the "Inconvenience" issues.

Floyd Brown Loc: Milwaukee WI

We can hear solutions from you if you so please.