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The Heartland Institute

It’s a fact that humans are increasing the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. But does it follow, as we’re constantly told, that this increasing of CO2 is poisoning the planet? What if the opposite is actually the case? This week’s guest, CO2 Coalition Executive Director Gregory Wrightstone, is going to explain why it’s not true that more CO2=Bad.

On Episode #139 of The Climate Realism Show, The Heartland Institute’s H. Sterling Burnett, Jim Lakely, and Wrightstone will also cover some of the “Crazy Climate News of the Week.” An op-ed in The New York Times says climate change should make you rethink home ownership. Remember when an iceberg off Antarctica in 2017 was supposed to freak you out? Well, never mind. And the World Economic Forum says you should wash your clothes less to save the planet. They suggest washing jeans once a month and pajamas just once a week. Is there any aspect of our lives that the climate scolds will ignore? Apparently not.

Join us LIVE at 1 p.m. ET so you can leave your questions and comments for the show in the chat.

This show will be archived in WUWT Climate TV, a collection of over six hundred videos, featuring new interviews and analysis, and covering dozens of media sources discussing, debating and analyzing the latest in climate science, climate politics, and energy policy, including topics concerning temperature, sea level, polar bears, ocean acidification, extreme weather, censorship, wild fires, and more.

From CFACT

By David Wojick

Cold kills and America is at great risk of deadly subzero blackouts. Renewables are part of the problem but gas is the biggest part. We now know that the supply system that feeds our gas fired power plants can be unreliable in extreme cold weather.

Switching from coal to gas has made us vulnerable to cold weather blackouts. We need a program to address and cure this vulnerability. Action at both the State and Federal levels will be needed. New coal fired power may be part of the answer.

Vulnerability to extreme cold first hit hard in the catastrophic Texas 2021 blackout. Blackouts caused by Winter Storm Uri were responsible for hundreds of deaths, with estimates ranging from nearly 250 to over 700, as four million people were without power for days in sub-freezing temperatures. Insurance claims due to damages from the prolonged outages reached $10 billion, according to a lawsuit filed by Texas insurance companies.

The crisis began around 1:00 a.m. on February 15th with no solar power available and low wind. Gas-fired generation became progressively dysfunctional due to the cold. Texas had systematically reduced its reliable baseload power from coal. With 69 percent of generation fueled by natural gas or wind, system failures caused a crisis.

Our national vulnerability became clear in PJM’s near blackout during late 2021 Winter Storm Elliot. With little renewables capacity it was the gas supply system that nearly failed. We now know that switching from coal to gas makes America seriously vulnerable to deadly subzero blackouts.

Unfortunately, Elliot was mild compared to prior storms, and it is these extreme cases of cold that should be the focus of those managing our electricity system. For example Elliot caused a Pittsburgh low temperature of minus 5 but the low in a January 1994 storm was minus 23. Philadelphia saw a low of plus 7 while the 1994 storm hit minus 4. As recently as 2015 the worst storm lows were lower than Elliot but we still had lots of coal power.

According to NERC’s December 2023 Long-Term Reliability Assessment PJM had a comfortable looking 30% reliability reserve margin during “normal” weather. Elliot’s cold simply wiped that out. If it had been a lot colder it surely would have been a lot worse. NERC needs to assess this vulnerability not just that for average weather.

But it is the States that are responsible for generator reliability. Every State should now initiate a cold weather Blackout Prevention Program. This means seriously assessing the vulnerability to at least the extreme cold they have seen before. Then taking the necessary steps to prevent deadly blackouts caused by that cold. In most states these will be below zero temperatures, in many states well below.

In particular it is time to put coal back on the table. Coal power’s on-site supply feature makes it immune to cold weather supply disruptions.

We have not built a coal fired power plant for many years so for a start we will need to find the latest technology. China is likely a leader but India is also a good bet. The Indians are great engineers.

Also coal power had been massively over-regulated so a few repeals are called for. I would begin with the mercury emission limits which EPA gleefully admitted they had no scientific basis for. Likewise for the phantom PM2.5 which is not even a specific substance.

We should also gear back up our coal combustion research. DOE’s Fossil Fuel Program has been misdirected onto carbon capture for many years now. Let’s get back to making power.

Small modular nuclear reactors also fit in here. They too do not have fuel supplies that are vulnerable to extreme cold. And of course the gas supply system should be made less vulnerable.

In short there is a lot of work to be done to protect America from deadly blackouts caused by extreme cold. The threat is clear.

Note: Small portions of this article were adapted from my original call for action in Pennsylvania. See “Avoiding Deadly Blackouts: How to Protect Pennsylvanians During Winter Storms” at https://ift.tt/sAJfpdX