Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
It seems like a particularly vexing problem for wind power because in
general there is a good deal of overlap between people who are sympathetic
to the goals of renewable energy and people who are concerned about
endangered species etc. In other words it can cost the industry potential
allies.

Case in pont: My mom lives in Vermont and composts, recycles, etc. When I
told her I was reading a book about wind power the first thing she said
was, "Do they talk about the BIRDS that get killed?!"

If I ran a wind company the bird question would be near the top of my FAQ.
  

    
Changing topics a bit, It is curious to me why wind and other
renewable QFs had to shut down in order to get the attention of state
lawmakers. These generators are the most valuable on the system, since
their production costs are not linked to today's high gas prices, yet
the utilities have refused to fork over more than $1 billion to these
small companies.

To me, it is the monied interests -- the investor-owned utilities and
big Texas generators -- who pre-occupy lawmakers, while small renewable
generators, efficiency firms and clean distributed generation
companies who are short-changed.

THings keep looking worse -- not better. Perhaps we will have a
revolution of sorts, as people get fed up with both lawmakers and
unregulated fossil suppliers -- and demand community-based energy
systems that focus on clean power.

What do you say?
  

    
        You give a perfect example of misplaced priorities and limited
information.  The avian issue is a much smaller issue than public
outcry believes, fueled primarily by conventional power opponents of
the wind industry.
        Yet there is no outcry against the far greater damage to both avian
populations and the environment in general from burning fossil fuels. 
Just today a report was released showing that acid rain has a much
greater effect on the forests and lakes of the Northeast than
previously suspected.  (BioScience Journal)
        Windpower is a key component of the immediate solution.  It's now up
to the environmental community to help dispel the notion that
windpower's avian problems are serious, while focusing attention to the
real immediate dangers to our environment and our economy from
continued dependence of fossil fuels, a far more serious problem. 

        Peter slipped in above.
  

    
        I'm with you Peter.  The news from the past two weeks is exceedingly
depressing.  I don't see any of the players taking strong strides
towards a sane solution.
        The lack of rational progress indicates that the only real solution
might come if an informed citizenry was roused to action, demanding a
sustainable solar future.
  

    
Email from Kathleen York:

Peter, I'm glad to hear that the bird kill issue is overblown. Birds are
not abstract statistics to us. Even here in town, the skies above my house
are filled with red tail hawks, turkey vultures, kestrels etc..  They are
my neighbors, and I want to protect them. As an organic farmer, I've
learned to cage and use bird scare tape to co-exist happily with the
numerous birds who share my space.

Randy, instead of getting upset with us for not knowing about the bird
issue, can't you see that we are offering our town as a renewable energy
labratory?  We are a town full of artists, writers , videographers etc.
and we plan to promote our town as a blueprint for energy independence.
Then we can tell the world that wind power is safe!  Kathleen York
 
  

    
        Wish i had been clearer in my thoughts, for i never wanted to leave
the impression i was upset with Kathleen or Point Arena.  i continue to
be upset with a portion of the enviromental community after fighting
the issue for fifteen years.  But everyone who knows me  recognizes a
lifetime commitment to visionary environmental policy.
        Windpower would benefit greatly from the commitment of a visionary
town, developing a community energy strategy.  In times of crisis, it's
often creative people who lead the way.  Perhaps the town could
support a small windmill as a start, but should at least begin
monitoring the resource.
        First step would be discovering what meteorological data exists
nearby.
  

    
I sensed this tug-of-way between KAthleen and Randy. Those who worked
in the wind industry, and have lost projects dur to oppostion from
enviros, sometimes have an axe to grind. As a bird watcher myself, I
can appreciate the fears of installing a small wind farm in order to do
good for the environmet, and then feel betrayed if birds starting
dropping.

The truth of the matter is that we do need communities to take their
energy future into their own hands. I think it would be great if Point
Arena moved forward on this, integrating wind, solar and whatever else
might be available -- biomass? 

I'm still not lcear, however, on what scale of a project Kathleen is
considering. A major wind farm? A few small wind turbines? Do you know
that the state will pay up to half of the costs of small wind turbines
and solar PV projects?

Wind power needs to win at the community level. Chances are, a small
wind farm of as many as 10 turbines would have little and probably no
impact on local birds. There have been improvements in design that
greatly reduce chances of mortality. 

Kathleen -- how much power would you want to be generated from the
wind? Who would buy the power? 
  

    
More email from Kathleen:

Randy, Thanks for your reply. I understand the frustration of being a true
believer for a cause few understand. I've been working for years on
woodsmoke pollution.  Woodsmoke is the largest single source of PM 2.5
pollution in the Bay Area. The latest science shows that sooty carbon
emmissions from woodstoves, forest fires, and third world industry have
more of an impact on global warming than fossil fuel emmissions. The dark
soot combines with clouds, and as the clouds become darker they don't
reflect sunlight thus leading to warming.

That's why I am so happy about the success of our Clean Air Project.  We
can buy pellet stoves, pellets, and clean burning firelogs at wholesale
through our co-ops. We look forward to having a great success story with
our wind farm, not to mention our solar, methane and fuel cell plans!
Kathleen
  

    
> the bird issue was used effectively by the pro-fossil fuel guest to 
> say that wind was not a good option

It almost doesn't matter whether it's a real issue.  The entrenched
interests of fossil energy can afford BIG megaphones...as many of them as
they need...to drive home the point that anything you didn't buy from them
is sure to be worse all-around (if not for bird-kill then for some other
trumped up reason) than what you did buy from them.

Concerns about birds killed by windplants will disappear into the woodwork
when they own the windplants.
  

    
        Perish the thought.
  

    
;-)
  

    
Back from southern California. Noticed I was charged an "energy
surcharge" at the hotel I stayed at in San Diego. Guess we may start to
see the same thing up here.

I just learned that a bill that would have made larger distributed
solar systems eligible for net metering (and therefore rendered these
clean sources more cost effective) is being tampered with by utility
lobbyists.

The leadership on energy matters here in California -- as well as the
White House -- is so pathetic. We should be offering low-interest loans
to everybody to install solar, small wind and fuel cell systems,
upgrading the distribution grid. We are still dancing around the
problems, due to the influence of utilities and large fossil power
generators on the political process.

I've decided I am going to write yet another energy book. It will
focsu on how we got to where we are today, why we won't be seeing
answers from the White House (the Texas power generators ) or state
PUCs (private utilities). It is going to up to grassroot activists to
create locally designed energy sytems. It will be up to individuals and
companies installing renewable energy systems.

Let's have a revolution.

The current title: "Revolution in the Air" 

any ideas/comments?
  

    

How much was the energy surcharge!  Did you ask for an explanation?
  

    
The surcharge was only $2.76 -- and I had no trouble paying it, but
this may be what we all will have to get used to in these times of
ever-increasing electric rates...

I'm inserting an article I sent to several newspapers yesterday. THis
is just par for the course in the California Legislature:

State Utilities Still Strangling Solar Power

By Peter Asmus

Solar photovoltaics, tiny semi-conductors that transform the sun’s
light into electric current, are one of the most logical technological
fixes for today’s chronic power supply shortages in California. Yet
state legislation that would greatly expand our reliance upon solar
power was recently compromised with the help of utility lobbyists who
continue their ill-advised and self-serving war on this clean,
renewable energy technology. 
Solar panels can be installed in matters of days or weeks, not the two
or three years it takes to site and build a natural gas plant. If
every single commercial and industrial roof were covered with solar PV,
roughly a third of our peak electricity supply  -- 16,000 MW -- could
be supplied from the sun. Yet state law currently forbids Californian
consumers from selling more than a tenth of single percent – a total of
50 MW -- of electricity they generate on their rooftops and backyards
back to the utilities. Why does sunny California, of all places, limit
our reliance upon solar energy? 
The federal Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy
Laboratory underscored the benefit of installing solar PV. Seven major
outages – including one impacting San Francisco last June -- were
analyzed from the perspective of the quality of the solar resource
during the exact times of power blackouts. Not surprisingly, in all but
one of the outages, conditions for optimal solar electricity
generation were above 90 percent. 
This makes inherent sense. It is typically sunny days that lead to
heat waves that stress our electricity delivery infrastructure. Why not
rely on the same sun that helped create the crisis to solve the power
supply problem? Interestingly, solar conditions were close to perfect
(99 percent) for generating electricity from the sun on June 14th,
2000, the day 100,000 customers in San Francisco lost power. 
One of the prime incentives for California residential consumers to
invest in solar PV systems is current state law that allows them to
sell electricity they can’t consume on-site back to the utility grid at
attractive retail rates. These sales are commonly referred to as “net
metering” because your meter literally runs backwards when you sell
your solar power back to the utility. 
This opportunity to offset one’s ever-increasing utility bill has been
restricted to systems 10 kW in size or less. Language included in AB
29 would have raised eligibility for systems as one hundred times as
large. This would provide incentives for large-scale solar systems on
the rooftops of businesses. Language in the legislation would also
remove the current ridiculous cap on solar net metering sales in the
state. 
In addition, this legislation would have also removed forever yet
another obstacle to widespread reliance upon solar power.
Antiquated rules and regulations designed decades ago under a monopoly
system are still stalling, shrinking and killing installations of
solar PV today. Among the artifacts of the previous monopoly era of
regulation are so-called “standby charges.” The idea behind them was
ostensibly based upon the utilities obligation to serve all customers
connected to its distribution grid. Utilities assess these fees to
private companies developing power plants connected to their grids. The
so-called “standby charges” covered costs associated with the utility
providing the electricity in the advent that the private power plant
tripped off-line for maintenance or other reasons. 
These charges are still being imposed today and can add up to more
than $7,000 annually on a solar system that generates 100 kilowatts of
power. Five proposed installations of solar PV at U.S. Post Offices in
the service territory of Southern California Edison were abandoned
because of these utility charges. 
        The only special interests opposed to the three changes in the state
s solar energy policy – increasing eligibility for net metering to
systems up to 1 MW, removing a cap on solar energy, and removing
standby-charges -- were Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas &
Electric. On April 3rd, new amendments to AB 29 suddenly appeared.
Under the revised bill, the three changes would still go in effect
immediately, but they would be repealed at the end of 2002! At that
point in time, California will go back to limiting our consumption of
solar energy by reinstating a host of archaic rules that have been
entirely discredited by everyone but the utilities crying wolf about
supply shortages. 
        California can solve this energy crisis without increasing air
pollution, without sending our dollars to out-of-state generators, and
without worrying about what natural gas prices are going to do over the
next few years. The answer lies in our very own backyards with solar
energy, a source that consumers have always identified as their
favorite.
        Gov. Davis will no doubt trumpet the changes AB 29 as a sign that he
is encouraging the development of new solar energy sources. Don’t be
fooled by the smoke and mirrors. These last minute changes reflect the
utility hold on the California Legislature. These last-minute
amendments betray not only the public trust, but of our energy future. 

Peter Asmus is author of a new book, Reaping The Wind, and Reinventing
Electric Utilities, both by Island Press. 
  

    
Great job, Peter. I hope you're heard by the right people.
  

    
> I've decided I am going to write yet another energy book. It will
> focsu on how we got to where we are today, why we won't be seeing
> answers from the White House (the Texas power generators ) or state
> PUCs (private utilities). It is going to up to grassroot activists to
> create locally designed energy sytems. It will be up to individuals and
> companies installing renewable energy systems.
>
> any ideas/comments?

We can't altogether substitute technological activism for political
activism, or else they'll legislate against local/renewable solutions,
and the spinmeisters will even make their doing so sound reasonable to
the casual observer.  In my more cynical moments I believe they'd
explicitly ban circumventing the concentration of wealth if they could
get away with it.  So long as we have government in the service of profit,
getting clear of the web of entrenched proprietary interests for any
significant purpose - much less the provision of energy in bulk - is
going to be an uphill fight.  Obstacles which don't currently exist will
suddenly appear if large corporations see their customers beginning to
organize to cut them out of even a small fraction of the picture.

So even though we can't reasonably expect well considered, effective
leadership from most politicians, not when it would run counter to the
interests of corporate power, we must at least demand a decent level
of self-interested followership, that they not impede the efforts of
people to organize their own alternatives, and find a way to make it
stick.  And any effort to develop independent solutions needs to 
include this flank-guarding aspect from the outset.
  

    
Well, what do folks make of the PG&E bankrupcty, the deal announced
today between Davis and Edison on the transmission line purchase, the
cuts in funding for wind, solar and other renewable technoligies by the
Bush administration.

Are we ready for a revolution? Will it be televised?
  

    
This isn't about technology.

This is about ownership and profits, and who wins and loses in the market.
  

    
Peter, for those of us outside of California and not following the
detailed to-and-fro of the crisis, would you mind sharing your view of the
deal's effects on windpower and renewable energy?
  

    
Well, the purchase of the transmission grid of Southern California
Edison could be in the public interest. Owning the electron highways,
however, seems to offer more symbolic value than real solutions to the
power crisis. Think of all of the wind and solar power that could be
installed with $2.8 billion.

The bankrupcty of PG&E could see rates climb even higher than the 40%
increase recently approved by state regulators. Those price jumps will
only convince more consumers to become producers by generating their
own power on-site. The downside is that most folks still choose diesel
over renewable. 

Teh most distrubing news, nonetheless, comes not from Sacto but from
DC. Bush is cutting the exact wrong things -- support for efficiency
and renewables -- and investing in the exact wrong stuff -- "clean
coal." 

I see chaos and rebellion in the near future. Out of this display of
the excesses of old guard capitalism could arise a new movement
embracing local control, community and environmental values, and clean
energy and a hydrogen future.

But I think things will begetting a whole lot worse before they get
better. 
  

    
If the militia types were to clue-in that it isn't government per se
that's the problem, but the cooption of government by powerful private
interests, all of a sudden they'd be in sharp focus and a force to be
reckoned with.

Unfortunatley, I'm afraid they're too confused for that.

The spin doctors have been very busy...
  

    
Civil War II: Militias vs. Wackenhut!

Peter, thanks a lot for your answer.  I agree that the way Bush has so
eagerly co-opted the crisis is one of the worst things about it.
  

    
A> I see chaos and rebellion in the near future. Out of this display of
A> the excesses of old guard capitalism could arise a new movement
B> embracing local control, community and environmental values, and clean
B> energy and a hydrogen future.

Quite possibly to A, but unfortunately probably not to B.

Sure, Greens would be right there, but there aren't enough Greens to
conduct a rebellion, and they tend to do their rebellion in nonthreatening
ways in any case...unless you're a publicist.

But plenty of people on whom that vision of the future falls flat must
surely still be aware that they're being taken to the cleaners en masse,
and building up a resevoir of anger.

This could indeed be a long, hot summer, in more ways than one.
  

    
Yup -- 

I'm an idealist. But who knows, with rate increases of 100%, 34 days
of rolling blackouts (the official estimate), and a continued
leadership vacuum in Sacto and DC, who knows what may happen?

Growing numbers of folks ask me: Why aren't we putting solar panels on
our rooftops? Why aren't we building more wind farms? What about the
hydrogen economy?

Some smart politician out there may be able to capitalize on this.
There is money to be made in clean power (just read my book. Let's make
sure some of the dough goes to the good folks, and not the bad.
  

    
SF Chronicle article about solar power:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2001/04/16/M
N28455.DTL