Month: June 2024

Atomic Armageddon: Nuclear Power Plan Heralds Demise of Wind & Large-Scale Solar

The overwhelming support for nuclear power among voters, young and old, has wind and solar scammers completely rattled. The move by Australia’s Liberal/National Coalition to back nuclear power ahead of subsidised wind and solar spells doom for the greatest economic and environmental fraud of all time. And the scammers know it.

Not only tapping into voters’ evident and growing support for nuclear power, the Coalition is also riding a wave of seething rage among rural and regional communities being targeted by big wind and big solar with thousands of turbines and millions of panels, that those communities simply do not want. And why would they?

As the team from Jo Nova report below, Dutton’s nuclear move is not only sound economics, it is pure political genius.

On fire! Australian opposition throws down the nuclear gauntlet in the Energy Wars: “No more large scale renewables” 
Jo Nova Blog
Jo Nova
19 June 2024

The Renewable Crash Test Dummy hits a fork in the road!

Finally the Australian opposition is bravely popping the sacred cow of the Energy Wars. The Dummy nation was aiming for the holy grail “low emission” grid that no other nation had tried. The driest continent on Earth, with small hydro, and no extension cords to any nuclear power, were going to build the perfect grid based on the wind and sun alone. It was always doomed to fail, it was just a question of how much money would be burned at the pyre before the Crash Test Dummy crashed.

Because they didn’t do their homework, and the fan-media didn’t ask them to, the Labor Party set themselves up to fail. They left their left flank wide open, and the Opposition is finally launching the missiles that have been there all along in the mist. The ultimate low-emissions generator was always and obviously the unspeakable nuclear power. It’s a fifty year old technology. If anyone actually cared about carbon dioxide, they would have done this instead of the Kyoto scheme in 1997. But it was all a theater of grift and graft for unreliable, fairy energy, or for self-serving players who like trips to ski clubs in Davos, or jobs after politics with the UN or “energy companies”. (Not mentioning any names, Matt Kean).

Australia doesn’t need more “large-scale renewables” says the Opposition party, offering nuclear power instead of renewables technohell
Finally the dirty laundry of renewable power might be hung out to dry in an election. After ten years of rampant renewables growth in Australia, a dawning realization is sweeping the nation that wind and solar are not cheap, and will never be cheap.

It’s hard to believe only two years ago Labor won on promises to bring electricity costs down by $275 dollars a household, only for prices to rise by $750 instead. At the same time, the awful reality of collecting low density energy is all too apparent in regional areas where developers are swarming to cover the land in renewables infrastructure. No one wants industrial plants in their backyard, but when we have to build 10,000 kilometers of high voltage towers, 40 million solar panels, and 2,500 bird killing turbines — its in everyone’s backyard.

Suddenly the real environmentalists are the ones who just want to build seven small nuclear plants on old industrial sites. Save the eagles, spare the whales, and don’t club the koalas, OK? The opposition are promising to build nuclear plants on the old coal sites, give cheap electricity to locals and to block major offshore wind projects and oppose large solar plants too. As they so aptly say, the low hanging fruit on this tree are already done.

This is the Deputy Opposition leader saying what was unthinkable only a year ago:

Nationals leader David Littleproud says Coalition* will find energy alternatives ‘so we don’t have to pursue large-scale renewables’
By Rosie Lewis, The Australian

Nationals leader David Littleproud has said a Coalition government will look at alternative energy sources so it doesn’t have to pursue large-scale renewables such as wind and solar, after suggesting he would axe an offshore wind industry if elected.

Amid a pre-election brawl over climate and energy ­policy, Mr Littleproud said the Coalition would send “strong investment signals” that Australia didn’t need large-scale industrial wind farms onshore or offshore or other big renewable projects.

Mr Littleproud also indicated to The Australian that he was opposed to large-scale solar farms, saying: “We’d like to look for whatever option we can so we don’t have to pursue large-scale renew­ables full stop.

“All the low-hanging fruit for large-scale renewables has been done, we’ve now got to go out beyond that.

He had to clarify that one big wind farm offshore would go ahead, but one that was just approved this week in the Illawarra, would not. The Coalition says the Commonwealth will own the nuclear plants. They’ll build them in the Latrobe Valley in Victoria, the Hunter Valley in NSW, Collie in WA, Port Augusta in South Australia, and the ­southwest Queensland electorate of Maranoa.

According to The Australian Peter Dutton said in April that the “first small modular reactors could be operational by the mid-2030s, following a meeting with British manufacturer Rolls-Royce, which told the ­Coalition it could deliver them at an estimated $3.5bn to $5bn each. Rolls-Royce is contracted by the Australian government to supply the nuclear reactors for the AUKUS submarines.”

Nuclear power is the sleeper policy — even half the Greens agree the government should be talking about it
Last year political number crunchers suddenly realized there is no mass anti nuclear protest movement here, just the ghost of one from forty years ago. Polls came out in May 2023 showing that with virtually no national discussion about it, right out of the starting blocks, fully 56% of Australian voters thought the government should seriously consider small modular reactors (SMRs), and only 12% disagreed. Which is all the more astonishing given that only 24% of Australians even knew about SMRs at the time.

Wait until Australians find out there are 440 nuclear power plants in the world, and that even Armenia has one. And Belarus.

Nuclear power poll Australia, May 2023.
The Australian: commissioned by the Minerals Council of Australia | Insightfully polled 2,400 people, May 2023.

When will we get over the adulation of roof top solar?
Not everything about the Coalition plan is smart, Australia already has a glut of solar power at lunchtime, so promising to put more on roofs in capital cities isn’t going to help. It’s just more electricity we can’t store at a time of day when we don’t need it which non-solar households have to subsidize. The duck curve at noon vandalizes the market for reliable generators, which have to recover costs at breakfast and dinner time anyway. And one cloud can cover a million suburban houses simultaneously. There goes another gigawatt.

If a large solar plant doesn’t make sense in Alice Springs where there is no cheap coal fired power, it certainly doesn’t make sense in Sydney where there is. Most new solar panels in capital cities are a waste of glass, metal and labor that someone has to pay for. They are a pagan shield against the storms, supposedly protecting coral reefs from somewhere in Parramatta.

But we all had cheaper electricity when no one had solar panels.

Thou still shall not question the science
The bottom line, which neither party is saying, is that we need to get the science right before we start pretending to change the weather — not after we blow a trillion dollars making high voltage temples to fend off the evil spirits. Nuclear plants are good, but coal plants are cheaper, and CO2 is a gift from God. The world should pay Australia to burn more of our coal and feed the forests and fields.

Who audits the foreign committee in Geneva? Which scientists are paid to find holes in the IPCC religious sermons about boiling oceans? We’re betting the nation on sacred-cow science.

Once we win the energy war we need to win the science war. Your donations keep me going. Thanks to the readers who help make this work possible.

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*The conservative Coalition is the pairing of the Liberal Party and the Nationals.
Jo Nova Blog

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June 25, 2024 at 02:31AM

Electricity Statism Conference: Kiesling Rides High

“This conference is not about free market reform; it is about centrally planned wholesale markets for electricity, as well as open-ended subsidies for wind, solar, and batteries, all at the expense of thermal generation and free-market order.”

The title says it all: Integrating Science and Law & Economics to Inform Energy Policy in a Decarbonized Future.” And the conference is loaded with electricity statists and ‘clean’ energy activists, all experts (as in expert failure and scientism), with plans to tweak/expand government planning in a failed, failing government system. In political terms, it is Biden’s “all of government” all the way.

The premise of the two-day conference is flawed. “Science” in the title suggests the scientific (physical and social) debate behind Net Zero/forced energy transformation. “Law & Economics” is a discipline that certainly questions the vague idea of “decarbonization.”

This conference is not about free market reform; it is about centrally planned wholesale markets for electricity, as well as open-ended subsidies for wind, solar, and batteries, all at the expense of thermal generation and free-market order.

Assume, don’t debate, climate alarm. Ignore the positives of carbon dioxide (CO2) on plant life and global greening. Accept the status of dilute, intermittent, taxpayer-enabled industrial wind turbines and on-grid solar arrays. Do not question the need for continuing shots of government mandates and subsidies for “energy transformation,” the latest being battery storage.

Who is at the center of this conference, one that is devoid of basic free-market questioning of a politicized market? The answer is Lynne Kiesling, a pretend classical liberal/freedom advocate who really is a technocrat working in a government sandbox. The “queen of power markets” is a woman of system. (For more discussion of our differences, see here and the appendix below.)

The Kiesling problem just starts with her Statist program for electricity (“my synthetic theory of regulation and technological change“) premised on “the grid [as] a common pool resource in which it is literally—literally—impossible to define and enforce property rights.” What?

Beyond a peculiar flawed theory of market failure (inapplicability?), Kiesling has repeatedly engaged in obfuscation against her critics who ask hard questions only to get ignored or, at best, receive evasive and condescending (“I’m-too-busy”) replies. On top of this, she engages in a charm offensive with crony rewards to her allies and defenders.

Unchecked ego will do this. Be original (albeit incorrect) to gain power and prestige via political correctness (sound familiar?). Erect a solid wall without direct debate/concessions to prevent leakage and spiraling deconstruction. And keep going down the interventionist path (an intellectual version of the Mises Interventionist Thesis) to the virtual power plant.

But here we are. Texas was her model for good electricity regulation–until it was not, tragically so. Texas has the most “green” electricity and the most “competition”. But it is wounded and in a spiral of more government intervention to address the problem of prior.

So why not present a real free market alternative, even if in one session of the conference? No, it is “all-of-government” electricity policy, even as practical problems mount.

————————-

Here is the conference pitch, to be held today and tomorrow:

This Symposium, presented by the Paula M. Trienens Institute for Sustainability and Energy and the Institute for Regulatory Law and Economics at the Northwestern Center on Law, Business, and Economics, will provide an opportunity to convene scholars, policy practitioners, and members of industry to explore the science and policy of energy technologies and energy system integration in a decarbonizing electric system. There will be ample collaborative discussion opportunities for all attendees during the active breaks and small group discussion break-outs each day.

The Symposium will feature a virtual Keynote Address by U.S. Congressman Sean Casten (6th District of Illinois) and an in-person Keynote Discussion with Pat Wood, III (CEO, Hunt Energy Network; Former Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Former Chairman of the Public Utility Commission of Texas)….

Symposium Program

————————————-

Tuesday, June 25, 2024
12:15-12:30 Welcome and Opening Remarks
Lynne Kiesling, Director, Institute for Regulatory Law &
Economics; Senior Research Affiliate, Northwestern Center on
Law, Business, and Economics
Hari Osofsky, Dean and Myra and James Bradwell Professor of
Law; Professor of Environmental Law and Culture (Courtesy),
Northwestern Pritzker School of Law

12:30-2:00 Panel: New Technology Breakthroughs: Their Physical and Economic Implications
Moderator: Ted Thomas, Founder, Energize Strategies; Former
Chairman of the Arkansas Public Service Commission
Panelists: Holly Benz, Clinical Associate Professor & Director, Master
of Science in Energy & Sustainability (MSES), Northwestern
University
Meghan Busse, Associate Professor of Strategy, Kellogg
School of Management, Northwestern University
Jana Gerber, President, Microgrid North America,
Schneider Electric
Jeff Lopez, Assistant Professor of Chemical & Biological
Engineering, Northwestern University

3:15-4:15 IRLE 20th Anniversary Panel: Regulatory Decision-Making in a Changing Environment
Moderator: Pat O’Connell, Commissioner, New Mexico Public Service Commission
Rim Baltaduonis, Scientist. SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University; Associate Professor of Economics, Gettysburg College
Lynne Kiesling, Director, Institute for Regulatory Law & Economics; Senior Research Affiliate, Northwestern Center on Law, Business, and Economics
Josh Macey, Assistant Professor of Law, University of Chicago Law School
Carrie Zalewski, Vice President, Transmission and Markets, American Clean Power Association

4:30-5:00 Keynote Address: U.S. Congressman Sean Casten, 6th District of Illinois (virtual)

6:45 Dinner Keynote Conversation
Pat Wood, III, CEO, Hunt Energy Network; Former Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Former Chairman of the Public Utility Commission of Texas
Lynne Kiesling, Director, Institute for Regulatory Law & Economics; Senior Research Affiliate, Northwestern Center on Law, Business, and Economics

Wednesday, June 26, 2024
8:30-9:45 Science, Economics, and Policy Lenses on Transmission Investment
Moderator: Ann McCabe, Commissioner, Illinois Commerce Commission
Panelists: Jacob Mays, Assistant Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Cornell University
Hilary Pearson, VP Policy & External Affairs, LineVision
Jim Rossi, Judge D.L. Lansden Chair in Law, Vanderbilt University Law School
Shashank Sane, EVP Transmission, Invenergy

10:00-10:45 Energy System Resilience Issues Short Presentations (10 minutes each)

  • Winter Reliability
    o Timothy Fitzgerald, Associate Professor, Rawls College of Business, Texas Tech University
  • Energy and AI
    o Kyri Baker, Assistant Professor and Lewis-Worcester Faculty Fellow, Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering, University of Colorado Boulder
  • Energy-Water Nexus
    o David Rankin, Executive Director, Great Lakes Protection Fund
  • Grid Decarbonization/Complex System Dynamics
    o Ermin Wei, Associate Professor, Computer and Electrical Engineering, McCormick School of Engineering, Northwestern University
    10:45-11:15 Small Group Breakout Discussion of Resilience
    1:15-11:45 Report Out/Discussion from Small Groups
    11:45-12:00 Closing Summary

Appendix: Kiesling Issues

In many posts here at MasterResource, I have documented Kiesling’s faux classical liberalism in theory, application, and scholarship. They include:

  • Purposeful obfuscation, evasion, and arrogance toward her free-market critics.
  • Refusal to consider the alternative viewpoint of free-market economists before her on electricity policy reform.
  • Controversial interpretation of Hayek, Coase, etc. for her “synthetic theory of regulation and technological change“.
  • Support for violating basic private property rights of electricity asset owners (mandatory open access).
  • Support of a centrally planned wholesale electricity market (ISOs/RTOs), from which contrived competition emerges at retail.
  • Look-the-other-way treatment of climate activism (climate alarmism and forced energy transformation).
  • Embrace of the next phase of the government takeover of electricity: the “virtual power plant” via wind, solar, batteries, and smart meters in the home or business. [1]

[1] Kiesling endorses Doug Lewin, a paid voice for forced energy transformation in the Texas power market.

The post Electricity Statism Conference: Kiesling Rides High appeared first on Master Resource.

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June 25, 2024 at 01:05AM

Queensland Petition Against Wind Farms in Protected Wilderness Regions

Essay by Eric Worrall

“… There are no words to describe the environmental devastation that these so-called ‘green’ ‘renewable energy’ projects have already wreaked on QLD and will continue to do so …”

Good Afternoon Kilkivan Action Group!

Our wonderful friend from FNQ, Carolyn Emms of Rainforest Reserves Australia, has created a QLD Parliamentary e-Petition calling for a moratorium on all renewable energy projects in QLD.

Please take 30 seconds (seriously, that’s all it takes) to click on the link and sign this very important petition.

Even better, could you please have all your immediate family members sign and then forward it to your extended families and friends.  Post it on Facebook, IG, X – wherever you can spread the word. There are no words to describe the environmental devastation that these so-called ‘green’ ‘renewable energy’ projects have already wreaked on QLD and will continue to do so under the current political landscape here in QLD and across the Nation.

https://www.parliament.qld.gov.au/Work-of-the-Assembly/Petitions/Petition-Details?id=4105

Wishing everyone a wonderful Sunday evening.Warmest (or should I say coldest because it’s bloody freezing in Kilkivan today!) Regards, Katy McCallum Kilkivan Action Group 

The petition is available here. The petition is only open to residents of Queensland, Australia.

It is easy to dismiss the value of petitions – why would a powerful politician care what a bunch of anti-renewable campaigners think?

But this year is different. This year is an election year, and the green politicians who currently run Queensland are clinging to power by their fingernails, because of public anger over multiple policy failures. Even a few thousand votes could tip the balance in the upcoming election.

So this year, more than most years, every gust in the political wind will be closely watched by politicians on all sides. More than ever, this year your voice really does count.

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June 24, 2024 at 11:05PM

A Day in the LIFE of a Climate Journalist

Josh nails it

For context:

We previously covered the pathetic green colonialist’s hit piece here:

Don’t forget to patronize https://cartoonsbyjosh.co.uk/

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June 24, 2024 at 08:01PM