All posts by dickstormprobizblog and dickstormenergyelectricity.org
Registered Professional Engineer in NC. Specialized as a Coal power generation engineer. Began career in 1962. Worked as electrician at SPS Technologies, Utility Engineer at Mobil Oil Corp, at Babcock & Wilcox as a Results Engineer, Riley Stoker as Senior Field Service Engineer, Carolina Power and Light Company as a Principal Engineer and later, Operations Superintendent of Roxboro Generating Plant, head of Technical Services Department of Flame Refractories and then founded Storm Technologies in 1992. Served as a contributing Editor to POWER Magazine and Instructor of Power Generation Short Courses at Storm Technologies and Williamson College of the Trades. My largest current concern is the inadequate understanding of the general public on the importance of energy to humankind and western civilization. My goal for this Blog is to share my knowledge and experiences regarding Energy and Electricity Generation. Specifically, I will endeavor to provide posts of some reasons why and how reasonable cost energy and electricity lead to Economic Prosperity and at the same time, protect our environment & support clean air and clean water.
In parts 1 and 2 of this Green Energy Series, the Green Energy Crisis and which people and organizations caused it. (part 1 here and part 2 here) The purpose of this post is to attempt to explain the impossibility of replacing conventional forms of Primary energy with wind and solar.
America consumes right at 100 Quadrillion Btus of energy each year. This has been fairly constant for decades. My previous posts here and here have explained this. Broken down to a per capita basis this is about 315 million Btus per year, per person/year. This is as compiled by the EIA and each BTU of energy is based on the thermodynamic equivalent of the following. From BP stats here:
1 British Thermal Unit (BTU) = 778 foot pounds of energy
3412.6 BTUs = 1 kWh of electricity
1 Barrell of oil = 42 gallons
1 Barrell of oil=. 5.8 million BTUs
2,545 BTUs = 1 Horsepower
The book, “Clean Energy Crisis” by Donn Dears is an outstanding reference and short read. I will use Mr. Dear’s books, data and calculations for much of this post.
What are the sources of America’s Primary energy now? The two charts that show this best are the Statista Bar chart and the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory Sankey Digram. Both are copied below:
Electrify Everything? Really, Think Again?
The government, MSM, Entertainment, Woke corporations (and there are a lot of them), public school education, the WEF, Environmental Extremists and many politically active organizations have waged a Demonization of conventional fuels since about 1970(13). My take on this history of environmental extremism is covered in part 2 of this series.
Electrifying everything, of course, (such as transportation EV’s) will require much more electricity generation. That is, if we are to continue to live our high quality of living and freedom of travel.
Sustaining our current life-styles and economy will require an average of about 315 million Btus/person/year.
This math is a fact and it is provided by the EIA. Please note the Statista and Sankey Diagrams above which show the Total Primary Energy Flows for 2021. The key word is Primary Energy. Electricity is Secondary Energy. Note that about 37% of the total Primary Energy was used to generate electricity. Of that total, less than 5% of the total Primary Energy used to generate electricity was provided from solar and wind. Let’s go to Mr. Dears book, Clean Energy Crisis and take a look at what it would take to replace fossil fuels. It is my understanding that Mr. Dears book calculations are projected from normal electricity growth, not including “Total Electrification of Transportation” and NOT to provide for Industrial Reshoring of industries lost to China over the last 20 years, especially primary metals industries such as steel, aluminum and copper. Primary metals production is particularly energy intensive.
These numbers below are the number of units of each form of carbon free generation that it would take to provide the electricity demand expected in 2050. Keep in mind, future predictions of any kind are always done with uncertainty.
Wind Turbines- 995,141 units of 2.5 MW each
PV-Solar Panels- 139,964 MW per year, every year till 2050
Nuclear- 851 new nuclear units comparable to Southern Company’s Plant Vogtle in Georgia. This is building 31 new nuclear units every year, till 2050 (The Plant Vogtle Nuclear Power Plant expansion of just two units has been in progress of construction since 2009)
The combined design, manufacturing, construction and commissioning of replacements for the existing installed capacity of coal, gas and nuclear plants would take over a hundred years to build, in my opinion. I recommend reading and referring to Mr. Dears book to form your own opinion. Below is a paragraph from chapter 8 of “Clean Energy Crisis”, page 59:
“Transition Reality”
“1. It is impossible for the United States to achieve Net-Zero carbon by 2050
2. CO2 is not an existential threat to mankind”
If these two conclusions are correct, and there’s considerable evidence that they are, the entire clean energy transition is a dangerous delusion.
Europe is learning the importance of energy security as it struggles to find sources of fossil fuels.”
I agree with the conclusions of Donn Dears.
We Did a Great Job of Energy Education of the U.S. Public 1950-1970. This is The Best Solution of “How to Fix Public & Political Demonization of Carbon” Educate the Public!
This post was started a couple months ago and I thought;
“What is a positive approach to correct the indoctrination?”
The solution to the problem (Self Sabotaging America’s Energy Infrastructure) is Energy Education of the public. Those of us folks who were born before 1950 remember the Public Utilities energy education programs from the 1950’s through the 1970’s “Living Better Electrically”. One example is the Sunday night TV program of the 1960’s, the “General Electric Theatre” which showcased Ronald Reagan as a spokesperson for G-E, to introduce new electrical appliances that were making a Mother’s work easier and living better electrically a reality for all Americans(4). Reddy Kilowatt was the mascot for the programs by the Investor owned Utilities. Living better electrically was shown on TV, electric bill inserts, newspapers and perhaps more importantly, in public schools. Local electric Utilities had regular programs in High Schools to teach not only Home Economics and how to cook using electric stoves, for the girls, but also “How Electricity is Generated” for the boys. I know, today that sounds wrong and politically incorrect, but back when we referred to Boys and Girls. People also had a better understanding of where our electricity came from. In fact, I was one of them that as a 16 year old (in 1959), I became enamored with coal power generation. A true fact. And I was just an average student, but I knew how electricity was generated as a teen.
In my view, this is what America needs again. Improved energy education for all ages to teach the importance of energy and the various sources of primary energy that can meet our needs.
This is a tall order. Better energy education of the public has been an idea I have had for at least two decades. When living in N.C. I did paid weekly “Energy Fact Minutes” on the radio with my old friend Matt Smith and also placed full page paid advertisements in the local Stanly News and Press newspaper.
Since then, I have written to the leaders of several Utility companies, including Lynn Good CEO of Duke Energy and the CEO of our Electric cooperative, A. Berl Davis (Palmetto Electric) to suggest such energy education programs to be reinstated. The letters and message were ignored and in fact, not answered. Those Utilities and Coop’s are Politically Correct and at least partially “Woke”…. they are Promoting the myth of green energy instead of educating the public on the true facts of energy and electricity generation.
A review of the history of how energy replaced muscle power in both the U.S. during the 20th Century and China in the 21st would be instructive for anyone who doubts the importance of conventional energy. I wrote three blog posts on the history of energy and electricity and the growth of economic prosperity, here, here and here. Also, a course presented to USCB-OLLI Program on the history of Energy and Electricity is here.
If Not the Electric Utilities, Then Who Will Educate the Public?
A good question. Mr. Tom Moser of the retired, NASA Right Stuff Climate Team is shown on a presentation by the Heartland Institute in February. At the end of his presentation, (at about the 15 minutes mark) he addresses this issue with regard to educating the public and changing public policy on the current path of Net-Zero Carbon. The number he used was 50 million dollars. A good start, but it will take much more to reverse the demonization of carbon in the public’s minds.
Summary and Conclusions
There are many reasons why the transition to wind, solar and nuclear by 2050 is unreasonable, impractical and essentially, impossible. Some reasons are simply the laws of Physics which have been explained in easy to understand terms by Donn Dears, Vaclav Smil and others. Some of the reasons are Supply-Chain related.
America invented commercial nuclear power generation and once had a strong U.S. based manufacturing infrastructure. I know this for a fact because I was employed by B&W when nuclear power was expected to grow so fast and so efficiently , “It would be too Cheap to Meter”. Now the massive manufacturing facilities of Combustion Engineering in Chattanooga, TN and many more facilities ( like Textiles and Furniture manufacturing in U.S.) are mostly gone. Also, included in the supply chain concerns & limitations is training of the workforce. Those of us old enough to remember President Kennedy’s inspirational “We Choose the Moon” speech of 1960 where he stated we “will land on the moon within ten years” remember the extremely successful upgrading of public education in math and science and the large number of excellent engineers that were trained 1960-1970. In my view, “Electrifying Everything” at least everything possible, will take a larger commitment than the space program of the 1960’s and we cannot electrify everything nor can we replace fossil fuels with wind and solar. The fundamental Physics of energy and electricity need to be taught to all students and adults. Like the Edison Electric Institute and Electric Utilities did in the 1960’s with the “Live Better Electrically” program and Federal and State governments did to inspire excellence in public STEM education, 1960-1970.
So, where do we start? As I see it, we need to educate the public on energy and how it is produced and used. A model of public education on energy was accomplished between 1950 and 1970. Let’s take a look at what we once did in energy awareness for the public. The B&W ad is from a nationally distributed business magazine in 1954.
Just for the record, I practice what I preach and have done my best to spread the word to my friends, neighbors and the communities where I have lived for decades. In the past three years I have presented several courses at USCB-OLLI in Beaufort County, SC, given presentations in Public Schools and civic clubs. Most of my presentations are available in pdf on LinkedIn or on my blog. If I can assist or share any info to others interested in educating the public on the facts of the importance of conventional energy, let me know, I will help as best as I can.
Thank you for reading. This blog is my small contribution to spreading the true facts on the importance of conventional forms of energy.
Yours truly,
Dick Storm, June 23, 2023
References and Further Information
Tom Moser video, (198,298 views Mar 21, 2023) Join former NASA engineer and program director for the space station Tom Moser for a presentation that sheds light on the science behind climate change. Drawing on his impressive credentials, including serving as Acting Associate Administrator for Spaceflight in Washington, D.C., Director of the Space Station Program, Deputy Manager of the Space Shuttle Orbiter, and Chief Engineer at the Johnson Space Center, Moser highlights the correlation between global temperatures and solar irradiance. He also delves into the disparity between real-world data and often reported climate models, which are used as the basis for governmental public policy, and how these models consistently overestimate temperature trends versus the real-world data. Moser exposes the propaganda in the climate science field and breaks down why media claims are often misleading. This informative presentation is not to be missed by anyone interested in gaining a better understanding of climate science. The Fifteenth International Conference on Climate Change (ICCC) featured more than 50 speakers who are top scientists in their fields and policy experts from around the world. Each edition of these conferences attracts scientists, legislators, environmentalists, and more all discussing their views on climate science, the idea that there is a crisis, efforts to educate the public, views on the state of discourse, and more. Visit these sites for more great climate information from The Heartland Institute: PLAYLIST FOR THE WHOLE 2023 HEARTLAND INSTITUTE CLIMATE CONFERENCE: • 2023 Climate Conf…
Here is a summary of the people & organizations That have led to the destructive Climate Policies our country is now enduring. The “Climate Policies” are against the best interests of America and are not about saving the planet or protecting the environment. There is no planned transition to renewables(25, 60) and our country will be weakened by the path to Net Zero. The worrisome bottom line is, that no one person or organization is accountable and it will be hard to fix.
The path to correcting the absurd Climate Policies is to improve the energy and environmental science education of the public and elected officials.
It is a very daunting challenge to reverse about 50 years of public indoctrination on the demonization of coal, oil, gas & nuclear.
Dr. Judith Curry recently wrote on her Blog,“How the Disinformation Industrial Complex is Destroying Trust in Science”.(14) In my view, the only science that climate policies are based on is, Political Science.
We should try our best to correct the miseducation/indoctrination/scaring of the public. Somebody should! Here is my shot at identifying the problem. I am reminded of a quote attributed to Ben Franklin, “Identifying the Problem is the First Step in Correcting It” A future post will outline my thoughts on “How to Correct the Indoctrination and Mis-education (on Energy) of the public. Hint, it is a huge challenge that will need billions of dollars in communications funds.
Conventional energy built America and it continues to provide the fuel for our high quality of life, provides transportation, washes our dishes, cleans our clothes, produces and cooks our food, creates products from Industry, powers our National defense, powers our computers, servers and Smart Phones, energizes our economy and more…. Why would thinking people destroy the energy that we depend on? I wrote on the beginnings of the “War on Carbon” in 2021. This is a followup to that post which is here.
Please read on, I will try to explain how the demonization of carbon came to be and it is not naïveté, it is intentional. In fact, it is not hyperbole to say it is evil.(53) If you read all the way through I will connect the dots of the how and who of the movement against conventional forms of energy. The politicians and activist organizations are NOT Stupid as I and many others have once thought. They are very well organized & lavishly funded with billions of dollars. However, they do not care about the future of America and if they have any motive at all, it is that they are against the best interests of the U.S.A. The activists listed below do not appear to be very well educated in science and engineering to include; Physics, Chemistry, Thermodynamics, Electricity or Energy. Please check the references and then you decide.
The Political Science trained incumbent politicians do have access to the best engineering and science minds in America, (if they wanted it) yet they have very effectively set the U.S. on a path of destruction. Why? Because the advice they seek from “Experts” (if they seek any advice?) are from extremists, many of which are employed as Bureaucrats or within NGO organizations with people embedded in government. They appear to be not very savvy on energy and engineering.
In the interest of brevity of this post, at the end, I have included many references for you to refer, let me suggest you start with # 51 to read and judge for yourself.
The references support my conclusions that the elected officials have used energy and environmental advice from extreme activists that know little about energy. Worse yet, they are not interested in the continued strength of the Free Western World.
Environmental Extremists are In Charge
Today the people in charge of energy policy have risen from their College graduations through paths of training and experience in Political Science, Law or Environmental Activism, progression of elected offices or University Teaching. None that I am aware have had any significant power generation technical, business experience or training as power engineers. My previous Blog in the January post listed numerous Climate and Energy Influencers. These influencers of energy policy have no background in energy production or power generation. So, the energy and electricity generation policies that have been forced onto the American citizens and (now struggling) productive industries are not well thought out. The so called “Transition to Renewables” is not a planned process as a group of experienced electric utility planning engineers would methodically produce. That is, if it was even possible to replace fossil fuels and nuclear with solar and wind.
The so called “Climate Policies” are simply a wrongheaded fast track approach to Decarbonize Bulk Power Generation, Transportation and Industry. In essence, “Electrify Everything” and do so without knowing the consequence of sabotaging America’s Energy & Electricity Generation Infrastructure.
Here are some of the key persons responsible for the current “Green New Deal” or so-called “Inflation Reduction Act”, which codifies the green policies.
John Kerry– Special Envoy for Climate . Background: Politician and trained in Political Science. A “Green” Ideologue that has spent his entire career as a politician. His recent speech to the WEF attacked Farmers and food production. Although he travels in luxury via Jet fuel guzzling private jets, he advocates reducing the quality of life of the rest of us, including the amount and type of food that we eat and the fuel used to cook it.
Gina McCarthy, Past EPA Administrator in Obama Administration and past Chief Executive Officer at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) This lady presided over the most effective times of the war on coal by the EPA since 1970. Her employment, like many other top EPA officials cycled back and forth between anti coal NGO’s and government(51,52). Two references are here and here:
Michael Regan–EPA Administrator Past employment head of N.C. Dept of Environmental Quality and was a past employee of the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).
Joe Goffman A high level EPA official, I am not sure of his present title. Here is a newspaper op-ed by West Virginia Senator Shelly Moore Capito, in WVA “Intelligencer” Newspaper, July 2022.
Deb Haaland Secretary of Dept of Interior: Past experiences as Gov. of New Mexico. Has advocated policies to reduce access to American energy reserves.
The people and a short resume of each Biden Administration Cabinet member is listed below in references 53-62 thanks to the Capital Research Center’s Robert Stilson. The Congressional representatives that have come to positions of high influence are listed in an article in E& E News, here.
Barrack Obama ramped up the war on carbon during his two terms in office. His appointment of Gina McCarthy as EPA Chief was devastating to coal plants. Weaponization of government agencies by using a revolving door for employment of environmental extremists is documented in a report to Congress here.
Al Gore. His background is well known. His scare mongering claims of the movie “Inconvenient Truth” and other activities have been debunked by real scientists but the MSM loves him and his scare tactics, aided by “Woke” Entertainment and the Mainstream Media have out-shouted true science.
President Joe Biden has continued and expanded the war on carbon that Clinton & Obama started. He has unashamedly accelerated the decline of America, including the weakening of the U.S. military in the name of “Climate Change”. Even absurdly(107) pushing to electrify the Military.
Senator Ed Markey has served in Congress since 1976. Clearly a career politician and green ideologue.(109)
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez along with Senator Ed Markey, Cori Bush and others, has become very influential in creating energy policy in Washington. I am not saying they have sinister or evil intentions, it is just the fact that they do not understand energy and electricity generation. They obtain technical advice from activist organizations and people that also either do not understand the science of power generation or they have other agenda(s) that is/are being promoted, such as the U.N. Agenda 21, U.N.-IPCC and World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset”.(120)
Congressional Representatives Cori Bush and Jamaal Bowman. Power players for Green New Deal Policies.
Michael Bloomberg Also well known as a successful businessman and past Mayor of NYC. Perhaps good intentions, but his lavish funding of NGO’s to Demonize coal, oil and gas are in fact, un-American. He has given over 174 million to the Sierra Club for their “Beyond Coal” campaign.
Tom Steyer Another successful businessman and huge funder of propaganda to demonize conventional forms of energy. Steyer has given over 100 million to environmental activists.
Jeff Bezos of Amazon fame. Highly successful businessman and another person that should know better, but like Steyer and Bloomberg has given over 100 million dollars to Environmental Activist NGO’s to fight conventional fuels.
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse A talented politician that is effective in accusing the opposing side of doing what his party has honed to perfection. Here is a review of his new book, “The Scheme”.
Senator Joe ManchinWhenhe was Governor of West Virginia I met him to discuss trade education in the WVA Community Colleges. A very personable guy. Well, one would think a Patriotic folksy and nice guy like Joe Manchin would put America and the state of West Virginia first. Right? No, he voted for the radical “Green New Deal”. If you review the references of funding of environmental activist organizations, it may help explain why.
Antonio Guterres, Socialist Leader, now United Nations Secretary General and he favors “One World Government” The UN-IPCC is a path toward such a body. I have written on the uselessness of the U.N. on an earlier blog post. Here. Also, on the views of the past President of the Czech Republic in his book, “Blue Planet in Green Shackles, Which is Endangered? Climate or Freedom?”, here.
World Economic Forum Leader, Klaus Schwab The WEF has been pretty much aligned with the U.N. and leftist causes to move toward World Totalitarianism. (120) WEF is an advocate for degrowth of population, deindustrialization and reduced food production. As mentioned above, John Kerry gave a speech on reducing agriculture(112) and the WEF published positions on Degrowth and Limiting the Use of Private Vehicles. (111, 112, 113)
WEF Member Bill Gates I suspect he has good intentions and yes, he has a lot of money to influence others. Here is an article published in the Guardian on some of his views on climate.(110)
Greta Thunberg She has not been trained in Atmospheric Science or any technical field, yet she is given speaking slots at the United Nations, WEF, TV and has been on the cover of Internationally distributed magazines.(115) Yes, she is very influential and absolutely hard to understand when real Scientists such as Dr’s. Judith Curry, Richard Linden, Roy Spencer, Pat Michaels, and many more…are ignored and not given the world stage to present the facts to the public, yet teenagers with little engineering or science training are posted on the cover of Internationally distributed magazines and hailed as heroes of the planet.
The previous post from January outlines some more information on people & organizations involved in influencing U.S. and world Climate Policy.
Deep Pockets
The enormous funding of the NGO’s which include “abortion” (which is aligned with environmental activist groups such as the Sierra Club and NRDC) (116, 117, 118) have a large impact on voter influence. The NGO’s are Tax exempt and have Billions of dollars in reserves to use. Some of the funds are reported to be provided by Dark money and some is provided by U.S. Taxpayer dollars, such as Planned Parenthood which is very much aligned with the policies of the Internationally connected environmental activists. (116, 117,118, 119, 120, 1F)
Global Influencers
The United Nations and the World Economic Forum are two key organizations responsible for current paths to one world government, discussed as decarbonization & environmental policies. Several books are listed below and I have written previous posts on the UN-IPCC and WEF policies and activities. Some NGO’s are global and are aligned with the WEF and the U.N. Such as: The Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club, Greenpeace and others.
I will attempt to be brief in connecting the dots from the early beginnings of the environmental movement.
The Beginnings of the Climate Extremists Movement
The start of the modern environmental action is (usually) credited to the book, “Silent Spring” by Rachel Carson in 1962. This book focused on the harmful affects of DDT insecticide and although there were abuses, the banning of DDT caused many millions of deaths in Developing countries from Malaria that could have been prevented by careful use of DDT for mosquito control. Then, following Silent Spring was Dr. Paul Erhlich’s 1968 book, “Population Bomb” where he outlined the decline of humanity due to over-population. The Sierra Club and Ehrlich had some interaction and the Sierra Club is mentioned in the book, Population Bomb. Following Erhich was the “Club of Rome” publication “Limits to Growth” was published in 1972. As stated in the sub title, “A Report to the Club of Rome on the Predicament of Mankind”.
Much of the story of Radical Environmentalism, Pseudo-Scientists and the Fatal Cult of Anti-Humanism is captured in Robert Zubrin’s book, “Merchants of Despair”.(53) Also connected with the environmental and population growth concerns has been the “Reproductive Rights”movement and “Planned Parenthood” founded by Margaret Sanger. The Sierra Club and Planned Parenthood have been somewhat aligned in their concerns for reducing population growth and protecting the environment, calling it the connection of “Reproductive Rights and Environmental Justice”.
Dirty Open Secrets
Two dirty little secrets of the environmental movements are: 1. they are a movement of socialism and 2. they favor Deindustrialization and Degrowth of the population. (at least, degrowth and depopulation of the western world and poor countries) The roots of these are provided in the books listed above. A more recent video of a Climate Activist explaining her feelings was shown on a video of the European Union meeting in May of this year. This link is to the ESG investing post on LinkedIn. The post by Joseph Castillo is copied below:
“Anuna De Wever Van Der Heyden is a 22-year-old Belgian climate activist. She delivered this speech at the Beyond Growth conference in the European Parliament on May 19th. Here is a link to a post-conference panel discussing the EU adoption of degrowth policies: https://lnkd.in/g68-PJ4d.
Van Der Heyden has not explicitly identified as a Marxist, but her views on economics and social justice are consistent with Marxist principles. She calls for the EU to adopt “degrowth economies,” policies that reduce GDP, consumption, and production to protect the environment. Not explicitly mentioned are policies that would slow or reverse population growth. These views are shared by many Marxists who believe that capitalism is inherently unsustainable and exploitative.
She has also called for “decolonization,” a process by which colonized areas achieve independence from the colonizing countries. For example, the American Revolution decolonized the present-day US from the British, India gained independence from the UK in 1947, and South Africa declared itself a republic and left the British Commonwealth of Nations in 1961. Obviously, the Brits are the problem.”
Ms. Van Der Heyden, in my opinion, represents the true beliefs of the typical Climate Activists. It is not about Climate, it is about control of the population and in fact, limiting the growth of population on the planet. Getting back to the writings and stated beliefs of the Club of Rome, Margaret Sanger and Paul Ehrlich.
The United Nations IPCC and the World Economic Forum have added their influence to the so called “Climate Activism”. The movement has grown worldwide and spread through the G7 countries. Oddly, few news articles mention the fact that China and Russia are not part of the decarbonization and in fact, China is growing in economic power by being the worlds largest manufacturing country. Powering that manufacturing is over 50% of the total coal burned in the world. Let’s get back to the path the U.S. is taking to self sabotage our electric reliability.
Self Sabotaging America’s Energy Infrastructure
America has no energy policy and is currently embarked on policies that will self sabotage electricity reliability, reduce availability of gasoline, Diesel, gas and propane, increase costs, increase food costs and reduce food availability to the people of America and to Developing countries.
The current Climate Policies will Deindustrialize America, lower our standard of living and infringe on our freedom. This is called Net Zero Carbon by 2050 and the decarbonization path currently sought, using wind and solar power to replace fossil fuels is absolutely wrong for our country.
My background is having worked as a nuts and bolts practical power engineer. My work experiences involved design, startup, operations, maintenance, performance tuning and designing steam generator and fuel burning equipment, including NOx reduction systems and efficiency enhancements for large coal fueled Utility steam generators. The picture below is the demolition of the L.V. Sutton, Unit #3, a 420 MW coal unit. This is typical of what we see today. This one is a bit nostalgic to me, because I was the lead startup engineer of this unit when it was commissioned in June 1972. Sure it was old, but it was capable of running at least ten more years until more Dispatchable or base load coal or nuclear units could be constructed.
Demolition, 2016 of Sutton Unit #3, 420 MW Coal Plant started up in June 1972, I was the lead startup engineer for Riley Stoker, the Steam Generator Manufacturer when this plant went commercial
Therefore, my experience base is Bulk Power Generation aka “Bulk Power Supply” (BPS). My observations from this viewpoint of working in the energy and electric power generation industry for over 50 years is that I saw and continue to read about the NGO Extremists, working in concert with the U.S.- EPA to formulate ever more stringent Regulations. U.S. regulations and Public Indoctrination have forced over 102 GW of coal and nuclear plants to shut down since 2011. The problem is exacerbated by RTO’s (Regional Transmission Operators) creating cut throat competition by forcing renewables onto the Grid (and consequent lowered capacity factors of reliable coal generation). This is created by Federal Policies that provide investment and production tax credits to solar and wind generation owners. Here is an excerpt of the July 2022 Reliability report from NERC (North American Electric Reliability Corp.) This is from page 25 of the July 2022, NERC “Bulk Power Supply Assessment” report.(3)
The shut down (2011-2021) of 102 GW (98.7 coal + 3.9 GW nuclear) of Reliable, affordable, Dispatchable and Abundant Bulk Power supply, without replacing these plants with like capacity of Dispatchable Bulk Power Supply generation assets is a serious problem for the U.S. This is what I refer to as self sabotaging our electric reliability right before our eyes. I have done some research to try to find the reason why the U.S. has such an absurd policy of mindless, Decarbonization by shutting down reliable coal plants (nuclear too) without replacing their needed generation capacity. The descriptions of Primary and Secondary Energy have been written on my previous Blog posts. There is no energy policy for an orderly transition to reduced carbon energy such as nuclear.
Federal Energy Commissioner Mark Christie testified to Congress this month on the fragility of our Bulk Power Supply for the future. (60)
The Public’s perceptions of coal, oil and gas have been poisoned with indoctrination by the United Nations, the U.S. government, the World Economic Forum, Environmental Extremist NGO’s, the Entertainment Industry, Main Stream media and “Woke” corporations. As someone posted comments attributed to Professor Michael Kelly on LinkedIn, “Where are the engineers?”
Summary
Not only the U.S. but the entire western world’s energy situation is in dire straights. In my view the future energy problems will exceed the difficulties of the 1973 and 1978 oil embargoes. These problems are being brought on by misguided politicians, NGO’s, “Woke” corporations, Entertainment and the MSM. Fixing it will be difficult. The purpose of this post is to try to connect the dots of how we have come to this energy mess.
Unless the Net Zero Carbon path is changed, America, the western world and poor countries of the world will have to reduce our quality of life. Our economic output will decline and so will America’s influence in the world. America’s influence in the world will decline and China’s will rise. I don’t have anything against the people of China, but the past history of the CCP does not read like a happy fairy tale. I personally prefer living by the freedoms provided in our Constitutional Republic .
There is no planned or organized energy transition to renewables. Period. It is Impossible without totally disrupting our economy, life-styles and quality of life.
Conclusions
Below are five groups of references for further reading to support my conclusions. These are in five categories:
Climate Science references from respected and credentialed Physicists and Atmospheric Scientists that challenge Anthropogenic Global Warming or Climate Change.
Energy, Minerals and Electricity Supply concerns for the future
Energy correlation with Economic output & Quality of Life
Climate Policies are about one world government and control of the citizens of the world, not protection of the environment. Books, News articles and reports documenting the fact that Climate Policies are Polic corruption of science and not about protection of the environment, clean air and clean water.
Energy Policymakers, Environmental Extremist and Activist NGO’s
As an example, here is a comment by Dr. Patrick Moore on the U.N.-IPCC report. Dr. Moore is one of many credentialed scientists that dispute Anthropogenic Climate Change. So do the scientists at the IPCC, but that is not what is reported by the Main Stream Media.
You do not have to believe me, kindly read the references which follow. They are all open sourced.
Yours very truly,
Dick Storm, Flag Day, June 14, 2023
References for further reading and research (Five categories):
Climate Science Books, websites, reports and information by Credentialed Physicists and Atmospheric Scientists:
53. Book: “Merchants of Despair” by Robert Zubrin, on Radical Environmentalists, CriminalPseudo-Scientists and the Fatal Cult of Antihumanism: Published 2012 by Encounter Books and again in 2016 by the Heartland Institute
103. Sheldon Whitehouse’s new book where he will claim the opposition party does what he and his party have done very effectively, for decades: “The Scheme, where He accuses Republicans of using Dark Money”, when in fact, the Democrats do it much more: https://thenewpress.com/books/scheme
The purpose of this post is to show a few of the warnings that Congress has been unresponsive and the Executive Branch and EPA either clueless or Intentionally Causing the coming energy crisis. Paul Harvey’s classic radio commentary of 1964 comes to mind, “If I Were the Devil”.
Typical Coal Plant Demolition. This one in NSW Australia, but we in the U.S. have performed similar demolition of important power generation stations capable of generating reliable, affordable & Dispatchable power 24/7 during all weather conditions. It is heartbreaking for those of us who understand energy and electricity generation. But, it is cheered by about 50% of the world’s population because those who do not understand the importance of conventional forms of energy have been indoctrinated on the demonization of fossil fuels.
Introduction
Many of us who have been closely associated with energy production and electricity generation have known the day of reckoning is coming. In this post I will lift up some past posts, presentations and published articles to show the foolishness of the “Green New Deal” which has been codified in the so called, “Inflation Reduction Act” or IRA.
Below are two of the slides I presented to the ASME Annual Meeting in 2011. Yes, I have been an advocate for Common Sense Energy Policies for a long time.
The year 2011 was during the Obama Administration and the “War on Coal” was being escalated by the EPA and Activist NGO’s such as the Sierra Club, Natural Resources Defense Council, Environmental Defense Fund, Wild Earth Guardians and many more environmental extremist organizations. Shale gas was coming onto the market at ever increasing volume and low prices. Thus, as much coal generation was replaced with natural gas fuel, the consumers and industry had no concerns for the future. But, those of us associated with the power industry knew the crisis was coming.
Let me point out the graph on the second slide above, this correlates Coal use and GDP 1970-2010. Yes, Life was very good for us and our country’s electricity was generated by about 50% coal power generation. Blackouts were very rare. Brownouts were very rare. Let’s fast forward to the claimed great success of the carbon hating Bureaucrats and their allies in the NGO’s. I will show a screen print from the Sierra Club website below. They continue to be very proud of their accomplishments in the war on coal, which really is a war on the consumer.
This is from the Sierra Club web site. Note above they are literally bragging about shutting down 372 coal plants with 158 plants to go. Not only shut down, but completely demolished. Both the environmental activists and the U.S. Government top officials have a goal of shutting down all coal plants by 2030.
Let me direct your attention to the slide below. This is also a screenshot of the Sierra Club web site. Notice that not only do they want to shut down coal plants, they also want to kill natural gas production and pipelines. Not clearly shown today, but in their’s and other activist goals has been the opposition to nuclear power.
At the end of this post I will provide many references for further reading on the war on coal-natural gas and nuclear. This is serious folks. These people and their organizations do not understand energy and appear to have no concern for the harm they are causing to the citizens of the U.S.A.
Part 2 of this post will be a summary of how these Un-American Climate Policies have come to be and to list some of the policies, organizations and people that have contributed to the Clean Energy Crisis that our country and the Free Western World is facing.
Closing
The coalescence of environmental activists, government officials (both elected and Bureaucrats), the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, the Main Stream Media, Entertainment, Woke Businesses & Industries and leftist activist organizations have put our country on a path of weakness and decline. It must be stopped. But before it will be reversed there will be many industries, businesses and citizens who will be harmed. It did not have to happen this way. (2) Kindly read the references listed below for support of my conclusions.
History has shown that countries rise, fall and rise again. The economic decline of the U.S. should not be hastened by self destructive and unnecessary environmental restrictions.
The true facts on the importance of conventional forms of energy are well described in many books. Especially the books by Donn Dears(19) and Vaclav Smil(95) these provide excellent insight into the importance of conventional forms of energy. Mr. Dears provides a very enlightened summary in about 100 pages.
Yours very truly and on this Memorial Day, We should pause and remember those who fought and died to secure our freedom. May God Bless America,
Dick Storm presentation to the American Coal Council, 2008 on “Perceptions of Coal” This is not posted online that I know of. I can send a copy upon request.
Long story shortened, the only way I know to stop the destructive policies is through an intensive energy education program of the general public. The ad below was typical of many in business and industrial trade magazines of the 1950’s and 60’s. It represents the culture of those times.
Introduction
Parts 1 through 4 of this series are my attempt to explain where we are on energy policy and how we got here. Here below are my additional thoughts on “How to Fix” Americans perceptions of the importance of energy in our lives.
Energy Education: The Best Solution of How to Fix Public & Political Demonization of Carbon
This post was started a couple months ago and after I was thinking about “What is a positive approach to correct the indoctrination?” The solution to the problem (Self Sabotaging Madness) is Energy Education of the public. Those of us folks who were born before 1950 remember the Public Utilities energy education programs from the 1950’s through the 1970’s “Living Better Electrically”. One example is the Sunday night TV program, “General Electric Theatre” showcased by none other than future President, Ronald Reagan as a spokesperson for G-E, to showcase new electrical appliances that were making a Mother’s work easier and living better electrically a reality for all Americans(4). Reddy Kilowatt was the mascot for the programs by the Investor owned Utilities. Living better electrically was shown on TV, electric bill inserts, newspapers and perhaps more importantly, in public schools. Local electric Utilities had regular programs in High Schools to teach not only Home Economics and how to cook using electric stoves, for the girls, but also “How Electricity is Generated” for the boys. I know, today that sounds wrong and politically incorrect, but back when we referred to Boys and Girls. People also had a better understanding of where our electricity came from. In fact, I was one of them that as a 16 year old (in 1959), I became enamored with coal power generation. A true fact. And I was not exactly a standout scholar, but I knew how electricity was generated as a teen. Here is a reminder of the correlation of GDP and coal consumption 1970-2010. (148)
In my view, this is what America needs again. Improved energy education for all ages to teach the importance of energy and the various sources of Primary energy that can meet our needs.
This is a tall order. Better energy education of the public has been an idea I have had for at least two decades. When living in N.C. I did weekly “Energy Fact Minutes” on the radio with my old friend Matt Smith and also placed full page advertisements in the local Stanly News and Press newspaper. I have written to the CEO’s of several Utility companies, including Lynn Good of Duke Energy and the CEO of our Electric cooperative (Palmetto Electric) to suggest such energy education programs to be reinstated. The letters and message were ignored and in fact, not answered. Those Utilities and Coop’s are what I consider “Woke”…. and they are Promoting the myth of green energy instead of educating the public on the true facts of energy and electricity generation. Speaking of misinformation and “Wokeness” below is a screen shot from the NextEra Energy web site. A plan for Net Zero, really? Electrify everything? This and other once fine Utility companies have gone “Woke” and are promoting solar and wind power when they fully know it is not possible to replace the 100 Quadrillion BTUs that America needs every year. Why? Two reasons: 1. Follow the money through government subsidies and 2. Avoid the wrath of punishment of well funded (Billions of $) environmental extremist groups. Below is a screen print of the NextEra Energy website as an example.
I do a lot of complaining regarding the government, NGO’s, Woke Industries and public education, so it seems reasonable that I should at least offer a positive suggestion of a solution. A suggestion “How to Correct” the 50 year indoctrination and demonization of the fuels we depend on, Improve energy education.
An informed and energy savvy public will be capable of making the best choices of candidates when voting in the 2024 election. The best hope for America, is that informed and energy savvy candidates will change the destructive Net Zero Policies forced on industry and the citizens.
Did you ever wonder how the misconceptions of energy started? Well, stick with me and read on.
What Went Wrong With the Living Better Electrically Programs of the 1950’s-1970’s? Why was Energy Education Stopped?
The public energy education programs went pretty well up to about the mid 1970’s. The Arab Oil Embargoes(5,6) of 1973 and 1978 created financial stress on electric utilities (and everybody else too!). I was working on the startup of the Roxboro Unit #3 a 720 MW coal plant for CP&L back then (I joined CP&L in Jan. 1973) and I remember it clearly. In 1973 the Roxboro plant expansion was for two 720 MW coal units to be completed in 1973 and the second one 1974. I was the senior startup engineer for the two units. Shortly after unit #3 began commercial operation in June 1973, the first oil embargo took place. Raising investment capital by selling stock to investors became a challenge and CP&L like many other utilities during that time had to cut back spending. Those of us that were adults in 1973 remember some electric utilities actually selling power plants to the state or other drastic measures. The period 1973-1978 was very tough on investor owned utilities.(149,150) These spending cut backs included CP&L shutting down construction on Unit #4 and then reducing operational & maintenance expenses. The first budget items to be cut (not only CP&L but most Utilities) were tree trimming near power lines, then painting and any maintenance that could be deferred. A crucial budget cut which has had long term consequences was halting the Public Energy Education programs. Yes, the “Living Better Electrically” public education programs were slashed from the budget. Not only at CP&L but pretty much industry wide. CP&L has since been absorbed by Duke Energy. This was a mistake that is easy to see from my vantage point, because I lived through it and it impacted me personally.
What is to come with the consequences of Net Zero Carbon, if we continue this dangerous path, will be in my view, worse than 1973-1978
So, what replaced the “Living Better Electrically” PR programs? Sadly, the void of public energy education was filled with biased anti-fossil fuels and anti nuclear propaganda by Environmental activists. Piling on was population growth organizations such as Margaret Sanger’s Planned Parenthood which became affiliated with the Sierra Club(151). Many of the environmental and anti population growth organizations coalesced after the first “Earth Day” in 1970. The (then) recently published books by Rachel Carson, “Silent Spring”, Paul Ehrlich’s “Population Bomb” and the Club of Rome’s, “Limits to Growth” all became popular with the Leftists and NGO’s. These, in my life experiences are the roots of the current war on carbon. More will be provided later. I gave a presentation to the American Coal Council in 2008 on the “Perceptions of Coal”(15). In this presentation I used one graphic to attempt to show the decline of energy education and the enormous rise of funding resources for environmental extremism. This is shown below:
The point of the graphic was to show how the progression of the perceptions of coal power by the public from the time line of 1950 to 2008. In the 1950’s, 1960’s and 1970’s “Living Better Electrically” was the theme promoted by the MSM and in public schools. Also, the funding for TV, magazines and newspaper advertising was generous by such Fortune 500 companies as General Electric, Westinghouse, Allis-Chalmers, Babcock and Wilcox, Combustion Engineering and many more. One of my favorites by B&W is shown below.
Then, as the Environmental Activism started in the late 1960’s, the funding for advertising (Indoctrination) changed from those who were creating the products to live better electrically….to those who objected to the use of fossil fuels and nuclear. The Sierra Club, NRDC, EDF and many other NGO’s became more and more well funded. Today collectively they have billions of tax sheltered funds to use for public indoctrination and election campaigns of candidates that favor the path of “Woke” Climate Policy. They have used the funding to demonize conventional forms of energy and they have been very successful. However, they may not understand the harm they are causing to our country? Even successful but energy ignorant Billionaires fund the NGO’s to indoctrinate the public and influence elections(16,17). It is a war on consumers energy costs but the left uses carbon as a scare tactic. This war on consumers is described by Hayden Ludwig in the article by Capital Research Center.
Here is a recent post by the Sierra Club, in essence, bragging about how their war on coal has gone so well. Their goal is to kill all coal plants in America by 2030.
Coal plants are being retired and demolished without replacement of new reliable capacity which makes the promoters of renewable power very happy. Not only extremists that hate coal, but also some Utilities and Private sector companies that are investing in “Green Energy” as the expression goes….”Follow the Money”. Below is from a screen print of a portion of NextEra Energy’s website. I consider this un-American and an example of a “Woke” corporation.
Meanwhile, as we fast forward to 2023 the new government and main stream media Mantra is “Electrify Everything” Missing in today’s woke advertising and PR programs by the proponents of electrify everything is a basic understanding of how electricity is generated and the details of how reliable, affordable and Dispatchable generation is accomplished. This gets back to the general public’s (and government Bureaucrats) mis-understanding the differences between Primary and Secondary energy.Also, “Nameplate Capacity” and actual “Capacity Factor” of Bulk Power Generation Resources. Just for the record, I have done my best to educate the public with energy and electricity courses at USCB-OLLI and presentations to public schools, Colleges and Civic Clubs. We need more of us experienced and energy savvy engineers to do this!
Getting Back to Basics: Electricity is Secondary Energy and must be Generated from Primary Energy
When I meet intelligent and successful people who have a great general understanding of business and industry but have not worked in the energy or power generation business, they are often stunned when I explain the facts of where our electric power is generated and the fuels used to power our economy and high quality of life. They usually say in essence: “I can’t believe that there is not a planned transition from fossil fuels to renewables?” A student of one of the courses I taught at USCB-OLLI stated, “You mean electricity has to be generated from coal, gas and nuclear power to charge my Tesla?” The misconception of Primary Energy and Secondary Energy is one of the largest causes of misunderstanding by the general public. Partly because of the general public’s lack of interest in educating themselves and partly because of indoctrination by the well funded Environmental Extremist NGO’s, government, the entertainment industry (ex. Disney), Public Schools and by public Education/Indoctrination,
America Has Some of the Cleanest Air in the World
Environmental Progress in Cleaning the Air
We all want clean air and clean water. And, in 1970 some attention to cleaning discharges to the air and water of the United States was badly needed. Sulfur Oxide and Oxides of Nitrogen were causing Acid Rain, particulate emissions were unacceptable and heavy metals were a valid concern for public health. Thus, the EPA began in 1970 and did a very good job of cleaning the air and water after 1970. The great job is shown on the chart below.
The air in the U.S. is truly amongst the cleanest of all industrialized countries. The great progress in cleaning the air is a fact as shown on the EPA chart above. So, why is the EPA continuing to force more and more coal plants to shut down? In my view, it is not about clean air, it is about following the environmental extremist NGO’s policies of Degrowth, Deindustrialization, One World Government and Socialism policies of the U.N. , the WEF (World Economic Forum) and the world’s “Greens”.
Sadly, these influential people and organizations have done a very thorough job of scaring and indoctrinating over 50% of the people in America and also other Free Western World countries.
The Growth of Worldwide Environmental Extremism
In the foregoing paragraphs I have tried to show the path of public education on energy matters (Public Energy Education was Good up till 1973) and the growth of environmental extremism and indoctrination from the late 1960’s through present day. There are some green organizations that are Global and these have infiltrated the leadership of the United Nations. Some of the environmental activists have coalesced with Socialists and organizations concerned with population growth. All together, the International Green movement has become comprised of followers of stopping population growth, abortion, environmental extremists, anti-nuclear power activists and socialists. Together these organizations have gained wealth and influence over much of the free western world. Alarmingly, many of the 192 nations that are members of the U.N. are aligned with the so called “Climate Policies” of the U.N. except for China & Russia. In fact, most of the BRICS nations which comprise about 40% of the world population are aligned with UN Climate Policies which are, in my opinion, slanted toward weakening America and strengthening China. Read the PA Pundits essay on the CFACT Blog here.
The Climate Policies are Not About Environmental Concerns. They are about Control of Our Lives, So, Why is America Self Sabotaging Our Reliable Electric Power Supply?
This post is to attempt to show the coalescence of various activist groups that have been growing in influence since the 1970’s. Basically, since the 1973 Oil Embargo. Those of us that were adults then remember the disruptions to our life styles and the economic pain which was inflicted on us by having our energy supply disrupted. Friends, the 1973 and 1978 oil embargoes were a problem but the electricity shortages that America is faced with in the future will be worse unless we turn away from the destructive path of Net Zero Carbon which is focused on use of renewable wind and solar to replace fossil fuels. It is impossible to do so by 2050. Not without severe disruptions of our economy and our lives.
America Does Not Have an Energy Policy to Transition to Carbon Free Energy
The Climate Policies and the Paris Agreement have little to do with protection of the environment. However, if clean energy sources are desired, then nuclear power is the one source of carbon free energy that can significantly reduce emissions with reliable, affordable and base load capacity.
I invite you to refer to my other Blog posts and the references listed below for further reading and information that will support my conclusions.
Yours very truly,
Dick Storm, August 8, 2023
Here are References for further reading and research, More will be posted in the Appendices for the “Green Energy Crisis” series in the next week.
Video of 22 year old Belgian Climate Activist to European Union: Anuna De Wever Van Der Heyden is a 22-year-old Belgian climate activist. She delivered this speech at the Beyond Growth conference in the European Parliament on May 19th. Here is a link to a post-conference panel discussing the EU adoption of degrowth policies: https://lnkd.in/g68-PJ4d
Dick Storm presentation to the “American Coal Council” 2008, “Perceptions of Coal”
Each citizen needs about 315 million Btus of energy to sustain our freedom of travel and way of life
Introduction
Yesterday I was a guest speaker at the “Money Talks Club” gathering in Sun City. I presented my views of Net Zero Carbon and was impressed with the interest and understanding of energy and electricity generation by the group. A fine gathering of American Patriots and I was honored to be their guest. At the same time of my talk, Santee-Cooper published their final 2023 IRP which shows the planned shut down of the 1,150 MW Winyah coal plant and plans to replace the generation largely with solar panels. Based on my experience yesterday, I thought it would be timely to attempt to explain in as short a post as possible, the importance of energy to our lives and where this primary energy can be sourced. Hint, it is not from wind and solar.
I have lived the American Dream and wish the same for my grandchildren to do so. I also pray that the U.S. politicians will wakeup and understand the energy sources to keep America strong, productive and free.
As shown above, the majority of the energy we depend on each day is sourced from traditional forms of primary energy. To me, sustainable living means that we Americans can continue to live our good lives as we have been. Doing so requires that reasonable cost, abundant forms of energy are an absolute pre-requisite. Replacing the traditional forms of energy with wind and solar is simply not possible. Attempting to do so by, shutting down, “Killing the supply chain”, demolishing and abolishing reliable forms of primary energy as shown above, is self sabotaging our quality of life. It is engineering fiction to believe that wind, solar and batteries can replace the Primary Energy sources that have served us so well for my entire life-time and I have been Blessed with many good years.
The most descriptive and simplified chart to show the forms of energy we depend on and how that energy is used, is the LLNL energy flow chart. The 2021 version is shown below.
Americans have used right at 100 Quadrillion Btus of Primary energy for over 20 years. The chart from 2021 shows a total of 97.3 Quads because 2021 was after the Covid lockdowns and reduced freedom of travel and reduced industrial production as well as other factors. The fact remains that Americans still used within +/- 3% of the decades long energy consumption, about the same amount of total Primary Energy, 100 Quads.
Electricity is Secondary Energy
The understanding of Primary and Secondary Energy should be clarified. When the government or MSM promotes “Electrify Everything” they are suggesting that electricity always will be available from some unlimited and magical source to power their EV’s, trucks, cooking, HVAC, industrial production, etc. The inference is that pollution free electricity can be provided by wind and solar to replace fossil fuels by simply spending billions of taxpayer dollars in incentives and installing millions of acres of wind farms and solar panels. My point here is to remind readers that Electricity is Secondary Energy. It must be generated using Primary energy! Batteries and hydrogen are also forms of Secondary Energy.
Let’s go back to the LLNL energy flow chart above. Note that wind and solar provided less than 5% of the total Primary energy in 2021. This is after over 30 years of incentives to force renewable wind and solar onto the Grid. Most of the other 95% Primary Energy was provided by conventional forms of energy.
How Can We Electrify Everything Without Increasing Generation From Traditional Forms of Energy?
The short answer is, we can’t. I have written other posts to explain. Donn Dears and Vaclav Smil together have written over 50 books to try to explain the importance of energy and the most likely sources for the future. I highly recommend their books to help understand the Importance of Energy and the differences between Primary and Secondary Energy..
Here is a list of the most common sources of carbon-free energy. Please refer to the LLNL Energy Flow chart above and then you decide how to replace or reduce fossil fuels by substituting those that are socially acceptable today:
Summary
I wanted to keep this post short and concise. For more details on the importance of energy in our lives, I suggest referring to other posts on my Blog and Donn Dears and Vaclav Smil’s books listed below.
The most important point of this post is to attempt to explain how keeping your quality of life depends on abundant, reasonable cost and reliable Primary Energy. Electrifying transportation and nearly everything else you use and doing so with wind and solar alone will be impossible in the near term.
This is an update on my comments to the IRP development for my local Regional Utility, Santee-Cooper. The last draft IRP has been published for comment and the figure below shows the expected load growth up to 2042. This Figure is from page 28 of the IRP presentation updated in April 2023. Shockingly, there is serious planning to shut down all coal plants by 2034 without having a Balanced Portfolio of replacement Bulk Power Supply that is Dispatchable, affordable and of reliable supply. Some energy news/issues authors, when discussing energy policy, speak metaphorically of “Falling off the Cliff” The illustration of projected load growth for Santee-Cooper is an example of planning to “Fall off the Cliff” by (NOT) Balancing Bulk Power Supply & load Demand. (The graph reminds me of the old saying, “Failing to Plan is a Plan for Failure”. How? By not providing adequate new generation capacity as older, reliable, dependable and Dispatchable coal units are retired. This is typical all across the U.S. and the western free world(6,10,14,15,15,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,27)
I had hoped that the more conservative, level headed General Assembly of S.C. would have better sense than to follow the “Woke policy” of the U.S. government and other states. There is still time to wake up to reality. (5,8)
The slide below is from my ENERUM presentation, August 2022. Data and chart are from the July 2022 NERC Report.(10) This shows 102 GW of Dispatchable & Reliable coal and nuclear plants shut down since 2011. This is shown to illustrate the fact that Santee-Cooper seems to be following the same destructive path as other utilities in the U.S.
Can a Great 80+ Year Record of Reliability and Affordability be Sustained While Retiring Coal Plants? Is S.C. Self Sabotaging our Great Record of Reasonable Cost, Reliable Bulk Power Supply? Why? Can the Legislature Stop the Madness?
It is my understanding, that the management of Santee-Cooper has been directed to formulate a plan to achieve Net Zero Carbon by 2050. Anyone that knows me, knows that I do not agree with this plan and my posts on this blog and my public presentations have clearly shown my analysis of the madness of Net Zero Carbon & the War on Coal. I have written letters to Santee-Cooper, the Governor, Congressional representatives and my S.C. Senator. Most of these have been made public. Myself and others that have knowledge of energy and electricity generation know that the path to Net Zero carbon is not possible by 2050.(4,5,6,7,8)Not without severe disruption of our way of life, our economy, industrial output, controlling inflation and national security. It is important for our state to generate electricity reliably, with high quality frequency and voltage control, from Dispatchable generators to meet customer Demand and do this 24/7 affordably under all weather conditions…..This has been done by Santee-Cooper for almost 90 years. Thanks to the reliability of coal, nuclear, natural gas generation and hydro-electric. Why would the Legislature force this fine Utility to sabotage its great record? The chart below is from the 2020 IRP. This lists the Dispatchable, Reliable, Affordable generating assets that have created and continue to provide a great record. In essence, the apparent path of the IRP update is to replace 61% of the reliable coal generation with “Intermittent” solar and wind generation.
Path to Jeopardizing S.C. Bulk Power Affordability, Reliability and Dispatchability
The S.C. Legislature has directed Santee-Cooper through “Act 90” to meet a net zero carbon goal by 2050.
The slide above is copied from the Santee-Cooper IRP presentation. My understanding is, that this is the direction ordered by the legislature. A plan to achieve Net Zero Carbon by 2050.
There is active planning to not only shut down the 1,150 MW Winyah coal plant in 2028 but also to shut down the 2,350 MW Cross Coal plant about five years later so that in 2034 all coal plants will be shut down. This is shown on the slides below. Shutting down all coal plants by 2034, in my opinion, will jeopardize the very favorable record of reasonable cost, reliable and Dispatchable electricity Bulk Power Supply that has become associated with Santee-Cooper’s great reputation. Even more importantly, South Carolina’s excellent record of attracting and keeping a thriving industrial base within this region. Electricity intensive industries such as aluminum and steel manufacturers/Recyclers have thrived here as manufacturers in other states have ended operations and ceded U.S. manufactured steel and aluminum capacity to China.
Let me digress and quote Vaclav Smil’s statement on decarbonization. From Professor Smil’s book, “How the World Really Works” This applies to S.C. Too!
“The real wrench in the works: we are a fossil-fueled civilization whose technical and scientific advances, quality of life, and prosperity rest on the combustion of huge quantities of fossil carbon, and we cannot simply walk away from this critical determinant of our fortunes in a few decades, never mind years. Complete decarbonization of the global economy by 2050 is now conceivable only at the cost of unthinkable global economic retreat, or as a result of extraordinarily rapid transformations relying on near-miraculous technical advances.” Smil continues….
But who is going, willingly, to engineer decarbonization while we are still lacking any convincing, practical, affordable global strategy and technical means to pursue the latter? What will actually happen? The gap between wishful thinking and reality is vast, but in a democratic society no contest of ideas and proposals can proceed in rational ways without all sides sharing at least a modicum of relevant information about the real world, rather than trotting out their biases and advancing claims disconnected from physical possibilities.”
I have written other posts on this Blog to express my thoughts on competition with China and the importance for America to reshore U.S. manufacturing. This my friends, is in our backyard, our neighborhood, our state. This is a fact as stated above10). Premature retirements of reliable coal plants has been occurring at an alarming rate all across the U.S. Do we have to follow the same foolish self sabotaging policies of NY, Hawaii, Germany, the UK and Texas? I hope not. (12,13,14,15,)
Future Bulk Power Generation Capacity, The Apparent Plan to Self Sabotage Reliable Bulk Power Supply
Expected Outcome of Adding Over 4,250 MW of Non Dispatchable, Intermittent Bulk Power Supply
If all of the coal plants are retired and the portfolio shown above is used. Her are my predictions, based on the experiences of Hawaii, California, Texas, Germany, Denmark and the UK.
California is thought by some in government to be a model for the U.S. with regard to renewable energy policy. I do not agree. Here is a recent post by the CEO of the Electric Power Research Institute on how the California electric load (as reported by CAISO) has morphed from a “Duck Curve to a Canyon Curve”. Here is a screenshot of Dr. Mansoor’s post:
The “Canyon” curve represents high renewable generation during the peak sunshine of the day where California has bragging rights to sourcing almost all of their electricity from solar collectors. This is great until folks come home from work, mom starts dinner in her totally electric home and Dad plugs in his EV for charging. By early evening, electricity demand skyrockets out of the Canyon and must, for the sake of reliability, be generated to meet demand from Dispatchable sources.
Battery storage is not Bulk Power Supply. Batteries store electricity they do not generate electricity. Batteries are capable, depending on the size of the installation, of providing minutes or hours of backup. The largest battery storage in the U.S. is the Vistra Energy, Moss Landing facility in CA. The CAISO load for April 27 is expected to be about 30,000 MW. Note the largest battery storage facility in the world, Moss Landing, is 1600 MW which is about 5% of the Demand and only capable of providing minutes or hours of stored electricity.
Here is another post from another energy expert on LinkedIn. This graphic shows the electric generation through the day which includes battery storage.
The Moss Landing Storage facility is rated at 400/1600 MW and is capable of storing excess renewable generation for hours so that it can be used as the sun sets and kick in as the “Canyon Curve” and CA power supply and Demand Curves above become reality of demand. Emphasis should be on “Hours” it is not capable of backup during a days long cold severe winter storm, such as NC and SC experienced over Christmas week, 2022. Another example is the 150 MW Battery storage designed for Queensland, Australia and an artists depiction below. This is from an essay reviewing the NY electricity future written on the Blog, Watts Up With That.
Battery storage such as shown above is very costly. For example, the 150 MW facility above is projected to cost $250/kWh. Therefore for 12 hours of storage for 450 MW, the cost would be about $1.35 Billion dollars. Keep in mind, this is for 12 hours storage of only 450 MW of power. Winter storms such as the Christmas 2022 storm lasted longer than 12 hours and even very conservative, steeped in energy expertise Duke Energy, also with a great reputation for reliable electric service, had rolling Blackouts. Ditto for TVA(18,19,20,21,22,23).
When the sun is not shining and the wind not blowing, then the generation must be purchased from neighboring Utilities or generated with Dispatchable natural gas generation. The plan shown above includes 4,316 MW of natural gas generation. This combined with the 322 MW of Summer Unit #1 nuclear power totals 4,638 MW. The wind generators, though intermittent, could generate another 400 MW to total 5,038 MW. The projections of up to 9,000 MW Demand in 2050 (according to Santee-Cooper projections) then will require additional Dispatchable generation which is likely to be natural gas CT’s or Combined Cycle facilities. Think for example of the uncertain growth of Electric Vehicles. If much of transportation is “Electrified”, then the high range projections of about 9,000 MW peaks can be expected in 2050 or before. So, why would we kill the coal plants that have served South Carolinians so well?
This reminds me of my experiences working for CP&L in the 1970’s when the manager of Fossil Plant Engineering pointed to an oil fueled CT and proclaimed to me, then a young engineer, “That young man is a monument to poor planning”. Yes, as CP&L (That was before CP&L merged with Florida Progress and was later absorbed by Duke Energy). I see history repeating here as so much faith in renewables today is somewhat like the high expectations of nuclear being “Too Cheap to Meter” beliefs of the 1970’s. However, nuclear power eventually delivered. Wind and solar are not capable of replacing coal, nuclear and gas fueled Bulk Power Generation. In the 1970’s the Bulk Power Supply gaps were made up with quickly installed, oil fueled CT’s. Today, thanks to reliable, affordable natural gas, the backup generation, when solar and wind cannot deliver, is gas fueled CT’s or Combined Cycle plants. This is doable and satisfactory… providing that pipelines are of adequate capacity and natural gas remains affordable and Federal Regulations on drilling, Hydraulic Fracturing, pipelines and fuel supply infra-structure is expanded as needed, when it is needed. The Federal Government is wrong on their war on carbon and the natural gas resources just may not be as abundant in 2040 or 2050 as they are now. Because, the Federal Government currently highly regulates exploration, drilling, production and transport of any fossil fuels. The uncertainty of future primary energy supply is why a Balanced Generation Portfolio is important. A Balanced Energy Portfolio will include nuclear, coal, gas and renewables.
Have the Importance of Reserves Been Forgotten?
Santee-Cooper is a Regional Utility. In other states, such as PA, OH, WVA, NJ & DE many utilities the size of Santee-Cooper have joined RTO’s (Regional Transmission Operators) such as the PJM Interconnection. In the Midwest it is MISO (Midwestern Independent System Operator) With RTO’s, the electricity generation is shared across state lines and with different utilities with separation of the ownership of the generating plants and the transmission and distribution of the Bulk Power. This has eliminated accountability for individual utilities such as Philadelphia Electric, Potomac Electric Power Company, Public Service of NJ, PP&L and others to plan for Reserve Generation capacity. Therefore, there is no accountability for lack of reserves. I presented examples in my ENERUM talk slides(6) . There is some talk of Santee-Cooper joining a similar RTO with the Southeast Electric Exchange. In my strong opinion and based on the references listed below and my experiences, Santee-Cooper should plan for their own (Our own) reserves. Reserve generation from others states was depended on Christmas week 2022 by TVA and Duke Energy. Two fine utilities, also with great records from the past. But, the reserves from neighboring states were not available due to Demand exceeding supply. Reserves of 15-20% have always been important for reliability and to keep generation costs reasonable by not requiring the startup of backup power generation using high cost fuels such as Diesel or spot market gas. Donn Dears has written several books on this. Here is a graph from the book, “Clean Energy Crisis”, on the Reserve generation that was planned in 2018. However, Texas Blackouts in 2021 killed over 200 people. The ERCOT planners in 2018 had performed due diligence as Santee-Cooper is doing now with well respected consulting services to perform computer analyses of planned reserve margins. Do we need to learn the hard way as Texans did in 2021?
Facts to be Consider regarding Electricity and South Carolina’s High Quality of Life
The experiences of other states and other countries should be considered. I cited the examples of California, Texas and Hawaii above. Much analysis has been put into the planning by some very smart engineers and planners. However, computer modeling of the “Future” weather, fuel prices, EV use, population growth, industrial growth and other uncertainties, will likely create a need for other sources than wind and solar renewables. Just as Texas learned in 2021 after performing similar planning.
Primary Energy and Secondary Energy
Each S.C. resident on average uses about 300 million Btus per year in Primary Energy. If the trend to “Electrify Everything” continues, then more of the energy use currently provided at reasonble prices for transportation and our high quality of life, will be substituted for by (Secondary Energy) electricity or hydrogen. Such as more EV’s as the government is forcing us to use. Therefore, the growth of electricity demand may be much greater than expected. Thus, my title which relates to potential 9,000 MW Demand in 2050.
Over 50% of South Carolina’s electricity has been provided by nuclear power for decades. SC is rated as #3 in the nation in nuclear power generation. Nuclear power has served SC citizens and industry well. Safe, affordable, Base load capable at 90+% capacity factor and proven. However, the great record and importance of nuclear is not discussed by politicians or even utilities. For example, Palmetto Electric promotes the use of “Green Power” when in fact, it is a small contributor to the total portfolio of power generation. Here is an example of “Green indoctrination” by a bill insert that misleadingly leads citizens to believe that most of their power is from renewables:
The reality of our future electricity generation is that nuclear is the most important and least carbon intensive fuel for electricity generation. The plan to expand the Summer nuclear plant with two additional units was a very good idea. However, it was not to be because of poor management, limited trained talent and failure by Bankruptcy of Westinghouse, the primary contractor. The planned new Pee Dee coal plant near Florence was also a good idea and provided for natural growth of generating capacity to meet Demand. Pee Dee, (600 MW coal plant) in my understanding, was killed because of outside influence of Environmental Extremists. Had the Summer Units 2 & 3 and the 600 MW Pee Dee Clean Coal Plant been built as planned, then together these three units would have provided 2,800 MW of Base Load plus reliable, affordable and clean, Dispatchable Bulk Power. Including some reserve generation capacity.
Is the Great State of South Carolina going to sabotage our future just because other countries and states are doing so? I hope not.
Conclusions
The“War on Carbon” is based on politics and corrupted science. It is about Socialism and not about protecting the environment. The South Carolina Legislature seems to be just as gullible of the green myth as the current Federal government leaders.
The UN-IPCC is also Politically Driven and Not based on protection of the environment or to provide for the best interests of the people of the world. The Paris Climate Agreement is not in the best interests of America, the free western world or even for protection of the environment. It is politically motivated.
The path to Net Zero Carbon is steadily weakening our country. It will eventually destroy America’s productive capacity, lower our standard of living and place national security at risk. It will hasten the decline of America and the Rise of China.
America requires 100 Quadrillion BTUs of energy each year to sustain our quality of life. This is about 300 million BTUs per person, per year. Currently, after decades of subsidies, wind and solar provide about 5% of the total PRIMARY energy we use. Wind and solar cannot replace the other 95% of energy we need.
A Balanced Portfolio of Generating Capacity as is currently installed at Santee-Cooper generating plants, is the best path forward to sustain our high quality of life and economic prosperity. Reserve generation from dynamic generators is needed. Battery backup does not provide the same system voltage and frequency control as spinning reserve generator rotors do.
Electric generation planning in the 1970’s and 1980’s was better than today. There is no Energy Policy in America, there is only a decarbonization plan(4,5,6,7), there is no well thought out plan to replace the reliable and dispatchable generating capacity that is being shut down across the country. As during the 1970’s when nuclear units were late coming into service, the quickest available generating capacity was to install gas turbines. This is likely here in SC if the coal plants are retired before Dispatchable or Base Load replacement generation is installed.
Recommendations
Initiate a comprehensive Energy and Electricity Education program to provide 1. public education on energy, 2. Public School education on energy and electricity generation and 3. Public Technical/Trade School education to prepare youth for the construction workforce. Energy Education is recommendation #1 of the path forward. Public education is needed to reverse the myth that wind and solar can replace coal, gas and nuclear power generation. This is priority #1 because so many people are “Green Energy” indoctrinated.
Plan and continue to provide adequate Operations and maintenance funds for repairs and component replacements of the boilers, pumps, turbines and all of the equipment installed at the Cross Coal Plant. Keep the full 2,350 MW capacity so that it can be used until replacement generation is built and proven.
Construct the 600 MW Pee Dee Coal plant that the components were purchased for in 2009.
Plan and begin construction on at least 2,000 MW of nuclear capacity. (as was planned for the Summer Units 2 & 3). Please re-read recommendation #1 above.
Plan and construct at least 1,750 MW of combined cycle gas plants
The coal, nuclear and gas plants 2,3 & 4 could replace the existing Cross coal plant capacity, thus continuing a “Balanced Generation Portfolio”
Summary
South Carolina can be an example of applied Common Sense Energy policies that can be a model for the U.S.A. and for the world. The current reasonable cost electricity in SC is amongst the lowest cost in the nation. Over 50% is generated from 4 nuclear plants with seven units. Four of these 7 nuclear units started up in the 1970’s. These four units operating licenses will expire in the 2030’s. They may be extended for another 20 or 30 years by the NRC but, plans should be made to construct new nuclear units for replacement of carbon free, Dispatchable, reasonable cost electricity.
Every time I present a course on energy and electricity generation the comments come back, “You did not discuss Climate Change and Decarbonization”. My response is, I am not an atmospheric scientist. I am an experienced power engineer. My beef with the current path toward Net Zero Carbon is, there is not an organized plan to replace the vitally important electric generation that has kept our country strong. If the politicians were really serious about reducing carbon dioxide emissions and “Sustaining” our high quality of living, then nuclear plants would be on a fast track to construction. After the Summer 2 & 3 failure, SC politicians are rightfully concerned about the financial risks. Plant Vogtle in GA is an example of a major budget overrun. Last cost estimate that I saw shows that Vogtle will cost $34 Billion and the original planned cost was less than half the ultimate cost. Also, it took ten years to just get one of the units running.
In my opinion and research, I feel the war on carbon is a plan initiated by the U.N. (including competitors/enemies of the U.S.A.) and Socialists that have an agenda other than clean power generation. If we wish to “Sustain our high quality of life“, then we need a reasonable cost, abundant and reliable electricity supply. Nuclear is the most accepted approach to achieving that goal. Three examples of applying a Balanced Energy Portfolio with a high percentage of nuclear are S.C. (1970-2030), Sweden and Finland. For research into why I believe the “War on Carbon” is political, not environmentally driven, I have included dozens of references below. My concern for Santee-Cooper and for America is to keep our Bulk Power Supply safe, secure, reliable and affordable. Also, sourced from a U.S. Supply-Chain.
The Supply-Chain of all of the future generation equipment, in an ideal scenario, would be from U.S. sources. Including manufacturing and construction talent. The workforce education is a weakness that I believe had part in the $9 Billion dollar Summer 2 & 3 construction debacle. We should learn from the past 50 years of electric generating history. The successes and the failures.
Arshad Mansoor, CEO of EPRI (Electric Power Research Institute) LinkedIn post, April 25, 2023 on the CAISO System. EPRI Post on the CAISO “Duck Curve changed to Canyon Curve” of Electric Load: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/activity-7056612841755181056-SCPK?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
In My opinion and research, the Path to Net Zero Carbon is Based on Corrupted Science and Political Ploys to Promote Socialism and One World Government, Not to Save the Planet or to Improve the Environment. Therefore, to substantiate this claim the following references are provided:
I live in Hilton Head, SC and our local electricity provider is Palmetto Electric Cooperative. Palmetto Electric obtains most, if not all of their Bulk Power from the SC Public Service Authority, known as Santee-Cooper. Santee-Cooper has a long history of providing reliable, reasonable cost power to the low country of SC. However, due to political pressure, they like most other utilities are working toward Net Zero Carbon by 2050. I disagree with this path and have written a couple letters to share my opinion and experiences. Here below is my latest letter concerning the creation of the next Integrated Resource Plan. The figure below shows Santee-Cooper load growth projections and the loss of the coal capacity from the Winyah Generating Station in 2028. It is this loss of Dispatchable capacity in 2028 that prompted my letter:
Dear Friends at Santee-Cooper,
Thank you for the opportunity to follow your development of the IRP. I would like to submit my additional comments below:
Santee-Cooper has a long history of providing reliable power to your service territory. During most of the preceding 89 years, the affordability, Dispatchability and reliability of coal fuel has been largely responsible for the reasonable cost rates and the attraction of industry. Especially energy intensive industries such as Nucor Steel and Century Aluminum. The 322 MW of nuclear power provided by Santee-Cooper’s ownership portion of the Summer #1 nuclear plant has also helped maintain favorable rates and reliability.
I have many years of experience in power generation using most common fuels. Most as a senior engineer. Based on my experience and including travels world-wide, I strongly favor a Balanced Generation Portfolio of coal, nuclear, gas, hydro and up to about 15% renewables.
Santee-Cooper once had a good plan, about 15 years ago when you purchased the components for the 600 MW Pee Dee Clean Coal plant and the 45% ownership portion of units 2 & 3 Summer nuclear plant. The Summer nuclear plant units 2 & 3 seem to be history now. Pee Dee as I understand it is also history. However, the major equipment for the 600 MW Pee Dee coal plant, as I understand it, are still owned by Santee-Cooper.
I strongly believe that the 600MW Pee Dee Coal plant should be built along with plans for additional units.
America is headed for an Energy Crisis and we already have had Blackouts in TN, CA, TX and NC during severe weather during peak Demand periods. As recently in NC and TN as Christmas week, 2022.
With the shutdown of the Winyah coal plant, continued electricity Demand increases and emphasis on intermittent renewable power to replace the coal generating capacity, South Carolina is at risk of Blackouts in our future at worse and escalating electricity generation costs at best if we do not keep and maintain the coal generation capacity.
I understand that the goal of Net Zero Carbon is the goal, due to pressure from the S.C. Legislature. In my strong opinion, Net Zero Carbon is wrong and in fact, it will be impossible to achieve by 2040 or even 2050 by depending on wind and solar. I have written to Senator Tom Davis to ask that he initiate legislative action to keep fossil fuels viable beyond 2050. At least until electricity storage technologies catch up.
It is my hope that the Santee-Cooper staff will evaluate all options and including in the evaluation, consider the experiences of Hawaii, California, Texas, the UK, Germany and the entire European Union. I cite the example of Hawaii. Hawaii of course, is a true “Energy Island” and has no Grid connection as SC does. Hawaii has implemented Net Zero Carbon policies and included the premature shut down of the Barber’s Point coal plant, 180 MW unit. As a result of the renewable policies Hawaii now has the highest cost electricity ($0.45/kWh) of any U.S. state. Why? Because the intermittent wind and solar needs to be backed up with conventional fuels. With no coal or gas option, that leaves Diesel fuel as the Dispatchable alternate fuel. The highest cost primary energy available.
Three more examples are the UK.( $0.48/kWh), Denmark ($0.54/kWh) And Germany ($0.53/kWh) . Here are links to the electricity costs in Germany, Denmark and the UK. https://www.globalpetrolprices.com/electricity_prices/ A print out of the Global Electricity prices is attached at the end of this letter.
The more renewables that are installed, the higher the cost of electricity. The low cost that is often quoted is for installation cost by “Nameplate” rating. $/kWh capacity. However, when the backup power fuel is considered, as has been experienced in Hawaii, the cost to the consumer is much higher.
I have written on my Blog many reasons why a Balanced Generation Portfolio is needed. My Blog is here:
Global electricity prices are attached below as an appendix:
Note the highest Global cost electricity cost (please see last page) is in the UK, Germany and Denmark. All of which have made huge commitments to Renewable wind and solar power to replace coal and nuclear. So far, SC is lower than the average cost of the 50 U.S. states. Let’s keep the costs affordable and service reliable. Thank you.
Public Misinformation Example
The bill insert below suggests that Hilton Head Island electricity is provided by “Green Power” when in fact most of the power supply results from coal, gas and nuclear generation. In fact, the great state of SC has over 55% of our electricity provided by nuclear power but it is rarely discussed by the MSM or even the electricity providers.
Here are some additional References and Reading materials for Backup to the reasoning behind my letter above:
Sierra Club Beyond Coal Website. This organization has created a lot of harm to the U.S.A.and they are funded with Billions$$$: https://coal.sierraclub.org
Since the Oil Embargoes of the 1970 and 1980’s the public has been indoctrinated by extremists. Part of the indoctrination was well meaning to force government action on cleaning the air and water of our great country. This goal, has been largely accomplished. However, the extremists have grown in influence to seek more than clean air and clean water, they have morphed into promoters of Socialism and one world government. My previous posts on my Blog have described my thoughts on the demonization of carbon and the war on coal, and how they came to be. This post was primarily written to show my attempt through a two part course on energy and electricity generation to provide an energy information course for the general public. The course was provided as part of the USCB-OLLI program and entitled, “Understanding Net Zero Carbon”. It is posted on LinkedIn. Part 1 and Part 2. Then, as I thought about the misguided indoctrination of the public, I thought it would be helpful to provide some insight as to how such absurd energy policies came to be. Therefore, at the end of this post is a summary of some of how this public indoctrination into “Electrifying Everything with Wind and Solar” evolved. It began as misguided public indoctrination. Now it is the “Green New Deal” passed into law and codified into government policy as part of the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act”. The green policy is based on the premis that, “Everything can be Electrified”. Really? The illustration below shows the traditional sources of 95% of our primary energy. A large part of the public’s misunderstanding about energy is NOT knowing the difference between Primary and Secondary Energy. Many Energy providers do not help with clearing up the public’s confusion. I will provide an example later.
Net Zero Carbon by 2050 and Sustaining Our High Quality of Living is Impossible
The short course I presented at OLLI is my attempt to explain the facts of: “Primary & “Secondary” Energy, Energy Density, Dispatchable Generation, Electricity Storage, Electricity Demand Cycles and production cost increases with increased percentages of wind and solar. The main point: If reduced carbon intensity is really sought after, then the only known and proven source of reliable 24/7 carbon-free Bulk electricity generation is to build many new nuclear plants. The current path of reaching Net-Zero carbon by 2050 using only wind and solar is impossible.
Donn Dears published the book(19), “Clean Energy Crisis” just a couple months ago. In about 100 pages Mr. Dears explains the futility and impossibility of achieving Net Zero carbon by 2050. One excerpt from chapter 8, “Impossibility of Net-Zero Carbon”, expresses the number of new nuclear power plants needed to achieve Net Zero Carbon by 2050: “The total number of new nuclear plants needed to achieve net-zero carbon by 2050 is 881. This requires building thirty-one new nuclear plants, comparable in size to existing units, every year between 2022 and 2050. This in spite of the fact that the United States hasn’t been able to build one new nuclear plant over the last ten years.” Check the latest news update for Georgia Power’s Vogtle Units 3 & 4, the only major 1,100 MW+ new nuclear units under construction in the U.S. at this writing. The loss of nuclear component manufacturing facilities and obtaining a trained workforce of engineers, welders, machine tool operators, electricians and instrument technicians is a topic for another day. Suffice it to say here, The U.S. does not have the facilities and talent to build the components needed to build 31 new nuclear plants each year. Plant Vogtle is struggling to build two.
The current policies of decarbonization favor (and incentivised with tax dollars) wind and solar generation. Getting back to Mr. Dears “Clean Energy Crisis”, he has calculated that by 2050 almost a million wind turbines would need to be installed. To be exact, he calculated 995,141 wind turbines of 2.5 MW each. To achieve this number 35,540 must be installed each year. If they were 5 MW each, it would take 17,770 installations per year. The maximum actually installed in one year to date is 5,680. At this rate it will take 175 years to install the needed wind turbines. An important point I made in my course is that wind and solar are forms of “Intermittent Power Generation” and must be backed up by other forms of Dispatchable generation, such as gas turbines, coal plants or Diesel generators.
Replacement of conventional generation with solar is just as impossible. According to Mr. Dears, “It would take 3,918,996 MW of capacity. The most ever installed in one year is 21,500 MW. Therefore, it would take 182 years to complete”. Like wind power, solar power is intermittent power good for about 6 hours each sunny day. Therefore, energy storage by not yet invented batteries or other storage devices will need to be installed for backup.
Mr. Dears (and mine) Conclusions of the Net-Zero Carbon Transition:
It is impossible for the United States to achieve net-zero carbon by 2050.
CO2 is not a threat to mankind.
Energy Reality
The EIA chart of nuclear generated electricity for the state of S.C. is shown below. Over 54% of S.C. electricity was generated from four nuclear stations within the state in 2022. These plants are very reliable, robust and safe. Most are also very old. Two, Oconee and Robinson began operations in the 1970’s. I know that for a fact, because I was working for Babcock & Wilcox in Barberton, Ohio in 1966 when the Reactors and Steam Generators for Oconee were being manufactured. These outstandingly successful units may receive new operating licenses for another 30 years, but the fact remains, some day new generation will be required to replace the aging units.
I personally had believed that NuScale Nuclear’s “Small Modular Reactors” (SMR’s) would be a large part of future replacements for aging coal and nuclear plants. However, the recent cost escalations do not look very encouraging, based on Donn Dears cost analysis of NuScale’s SMR. (275)
Over 200 slides are included in my course to show the reality of all forms of Primary and Secondary Energy. Energy used by America is used for more than generating electricity. In fact, about 37% of total primary energy is used for generating electricity. The other 63% is for Industrial production, Transportation, residential and commercial, cooking, heating, lighting, entertainment and cooling.
The course includes information on all forms of energy and how it is used to power our lives. I invite you to take a look at it, if you are interested, part 1 and part 2.(2,3)
Confusing the Public
I live in Hilton Head, South Carolina and soon the Heritage Golf Tournament will take place. This is a huge event that draws tens of thousands of Golf fans to this island. The normal peak electric power demand on Hilton Head is between 150 and 250 MW’s and it is provided by Palmetto Electric Co-Op which distributes electricity generated by Santee-Cooper, a state run electric utility. Santee-Cooper has about 5,300 MW of installed capacity and most of this is coal, natural gas and nuclear generation. Santee-Cooper is interconnected with the Duke and Dominion nuclear plants as well as other generation from the Grid. Overall, over 50% of S.C. electricity has been from nuclear power. (Santee-Cooper owns 322 MW of Summer nuclear plant operated by Dominion Energy) Santee-Cooper advertizes that they have about 400 MW (Nameplate) of solar power capacity either owned or under contract. So at first glance the claim of 100% green power to power the island may seem plausible, especially if Palmetto Electric defined nuclear power (they don’t) as being “Green”. Nuclear is the largest form of carbon-free electricity generation in the world. The point not explained regarding solar and wind is that “Nameplate Capacity” is not the same as delivered Dispatchable power. The actual electricity produced in the state through the year 2022 to SC is shown above. 54% nuclear & about 5% solar.
The bill insert from Palmetto Electric Coop, the HHI electricity supplier is copied below. This infers that the island of Hilton Head is powered by wind, solar and landfill gas. If you check the website scgreenpower.com it shows that most of the green power is from the 29 MW landfill gas units that Santee-Cooper operates. Not solar and ironically, they mention nothing about the importance of carbon free nuclear generation?
The misinformation and resulting misconceptions are nationwide as shown below. The headline refers to installed “CAPACITY” not actual generation. My Part 2, OLLI course(2,3) , slides # 16-20 show the recent actual generation for the U.S. electric Grid by fuels. (about 80% conventional generation)(157)
The actual delivered wind and solar generated electricity cost when metered and billed to the consumer is typically a higher cost/kWh than electricity generated from conventional generation. This is partly because the intermittent solar or wind power needs to be backed up with natural gas, Diesel or other Dispatchable generating capacity. So, the installed cost of solar is only the cost to install solar collectors or wind turbines. In the real world, the cost to the consumer includes the cost of the installation and fuel for backup generation. Another factor regarding intermittent wind and solar is that maintenance costs tend to be very high. Especially for offshore wind turbines. The chart below is from European experiences. The case study of Hawaii Electric which has shut down their one highly successful, clean and reliable coal plant is shown on slide # 48 of part 2 of the OLLI course. Now, dependent on wind, solar and other renewables Hawaii has the highest cost electricity in the U.S.A.. (53, 223 & 224) Mostly because the backup power when the wind isn’t blowing or sun not shining must be made up by Diesel Fuel burned in Internal Combustion engines, gas turbines or oil fueled steam boilers. Diesel fuel in the middle of the Pacific ocean is the most expensive form of primary energy. Diesel fuel is also one of the highest cost forms of primary energy anywhere, second to hydrogen in $/BTU.
Weaponization of the EPA
The Biden Administration is hell-bent on killing coal power generation(29) in America. The latest EPA Rules may in fact kill over a third of the remaining U.S. Coal generation capacity. Many of the power generation facilities that have been depended on as recently as last December 2022, (even now) will likely be shut down in the next year or two. This despite the fact that electricity shortages are expected. We already have had Rolling Blackouts in 2022 due, in part to too many reliable coal and nuclear power plants being shut down without replacing them in kind. Check slide #81 of OLLI course, part 2. This shows the over 102,000 MW of coal generation shut down since 2011. This is from data in the NERC report.(4)
In addition to the concerns of solar and wind being intermittent generation, there is the concern of Grid voltage and frequency stability with increasing generation provided through inverters. (20) The “Spinning Reserve” of thousands of tons of generator rotors from conventional power plants add Grid Stability of voltage and frequency as new power demand is added. Solar and wind power provided through inverters does not provide this dynamic reserve stability.
“Roosters of the Apocalypse” How Junk Science of Global Warming Nearly Bankrupted the Western World(1)
The Heartland Institute published the short book, “Roosters of the Apocalypse” in 2012. Basically it is a story of how “in the spring of 1856, the Xhosa tribe in today’s South Africa destroyed it’s own economy. According to the book, the Xhosa killed an estimated half-million of their own cattle (which they ordinarily treated with great care and respect), ceased planting crops and destroyed their grain stores. By the end of 1857 between thirty and fifty thousand of them had had starved to death. A third of the population. The British herded survivors of the once powerful tribe into labor camps, and white settlers took much of their land.(1)
The Xhosa had acted on the prophecy of a 15 year old girl who promised that if they destroyed all they had and purified themselves of “witchcraft” (including evil inclinations and selfishness), the world before the white invaders came would be restored: The British oppressors would flee, and the Xhosa ancestors would return, bringing with them an even greater abundance of cattle and grain.”
I found a copy of this book which I had purchased in 2012 amongst some other old books. I paged through it and thought “gee whiz, this is very relevant to the absurd actions and Regulations our government is now forcing on us”. The EPA and most of the rest of the U.S. government (Nearly all government Bureaucracies) have been weaponzied.(5) An OpEd opinion writer to the “Wall Street Journal” has written at least one letter with the truthful title: “America is Self Sabotaging the Electric Grid”. Then considering the story of the young girl advising the Xhosa tribe we could say, this is much like the message of Greta Thunberg and non-energy savvy politicians. In current times we have an inexperienced and thoroughly green indoctrinated Greta Thunberg (and along with many energy ignorant politicians) addressing the World Economic Forum as if she (and they) is/are well credentialed Atmospheric Scientist(s) and Greta appears on the cover of Internationally circulated magazines and is Time Magazine’s person of the year in 2019. Greta’s message, “Stop using fossil fuels”.(270) The fossil fuels that power 80%+ of all that we depend on to achieve the high standard of living we have come to enjoy.
Are the free people of the western world as gullible as the people of the Xhosa tribe? It sure looks that way to me. The Net-Zero Carbon Path may be impossible and wrong-headed, but our government sure is hell-bent on following it no matter what the consequences.
How, Why or Who is Responsible for the Absurd Energy Policies and Demonization of Carbon?
The perpetrators of the war on carbon and all conventional fuels for that matter are numerous. In my opinion, it began with the United Nations Agenda 21 and that (later the formation of the UN-IPCC) I believe is the root cause of why and how the “Green” policies have been started in the U.S. and EU. Demonizing conventional forms of energy (carbon and nuclear) and strangling of the Free World’s Energy supplies. I started digging to try to discern how such ludicrous policies could become embraced by most of the leaders of the free western world, some who are otherwise reasonable people believed to be of above average intelligence.
The intent of the following is to show the progression of the U.N. Agenda 21 from the inception in 1992 and how it morphed into being a policy to promote “One World Government” and control over all of the citizens of the Free World and to do this through environmental regulations. Why did the UN choose the environmental route to promote socialism? Because, in my opinion, everyone wants clean water and clean air, so it was a means for the leaders of the U.N. and Socialists to appeal to the free world’s citizens, even if it meant using scare tactics(6). If it sounds like a conspiracy, well please read on. I have provided many references at the end for your further reading and research. I said the scare tactics are aimed at the citizens of the Free Western World. You would think that the Main Stream Media would notice and report that the war on carbon does not apply to China and Russia. These two countries have the most to gain as the OECD countries become weaker.
The largest influencers of U.S. energy policy has been environmental extremist organizations.(250, 251, 252, 253,254, 255)Not engineers or energy savvy organizations. Not even electric Utilities.
The Beginning of Agenda 21 1992-Rio De Janeiro -Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)
This conference produced three documents: The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (an international treaty), the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (an international treaty), and U.N. Agenda 21, (not a treaty, but a “soft law” or suggestion)
President George H.W. Bush along with 178 other countries signed the agreement, along with 178 other countries. But he refused to sign the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity because it required transfer of technology without recognition of property rights.
The treaties and the Agenda 21 (soft law) were not ratified by the U.S. Congress. However, parts of it have been incorporated into other laws passed because all members of Congress do not read all of the words that are in Bills. (7)
Nancy Pelosi in 1992 introduced a bill to follow the 1992 Rio Earth Summit to conform to U.N. Agenda 21, its local sustainable community practices, and to follow international law.
The administration of the next President, Bill Clinton initiated the “War on Carbon”. (10) Many prominent members of the Democrat Party have hated coal for a long time, and I have yet to find a reason for their angst against the treasure of energy that America is Blessed with? Clinton’s administration started with appointing environmental activist zealot Carol Browner to the EPA. Between her and some clever and devious lawyers on staff at the EPA they ramped up the Rules on “New Source Review”. This is the point that extreme policies came to my attention. At that point in my life (early 1990’s) I was working as a boiler engineer/consultant and was directly involved in upgrading and improving older coal plants to improve efficiency, reliability, fuel flexibility, reduced NOx emissions and capacity. I learned the hard way that the word “Upgrade” was a trigger word to the EPA. It triggered NSR. Even if it improved efficiency and reduced emissions. The word upgrade in a technical report we wrote or a proposal triggered NSR “New Source Review”(8,9). The concept by the EPA was to eliminate coal plants gradually by forcing an environmental review of an older plant as if it was a new plant being constructed at that time. Because the older coal plants were built before the newer Regulations, NSR was a death sentence to any coal plant faced with NSR. Here are some links to NSR lawsuits. That was the beginning of the war on coal, based on my observations, then the U.S. had a pretty good run of enjoying some of the lowest cost electricity in the world for the next two decades.
Summary and Conclusions
It will not be possible to reach net-Zero Carbon by 2050. It may be possible to help the Chinese Economy and Influence in the world to surpass America’s by restricting, regulating and taxing America’s vast energy resources. Thus, weakening America as the WSJ OpEd title stated, “America is Self Sabotaging Our Electric Grid”. It is not only the electric grid. Remember there is a difference between “Primary and Secondary” energy. Electricity currently utilizes about 37% of America’s “Primary Energy. If everything is electrified (not possible) then the Grid will need much more than the 37 Quadrillion BTUs used currently to generate our electricity. Note the LLNL chart below of total PRIMARY Energy use in the U.S.
My hope is that the American people (and our elected officials) who are not involved in energy or electricity production, will wake up and study the fundamentals of energy and electricity generation. (that was the intent of my OLLI course) I have written to many elected officials. I have had little if any interest by these officials to do anything. Why? I think it is because the environmental extremist organizations have literally Billions of dollars of funding to use in election campaigns against any politician that stands up for Common sense Energy Policies. Check Capital Research Center’s “Influence Watch” website to see some of the enormous resources of funds that the Sierra Club, Environmental Defense Fund, NRDC and others have. Besides being enormously well funded, these are Tax sheltered. Also, the 2012 book, “The New Leviathan”(158) which outlines the funds of extremist non-profit organizations in Appendix X, page 245: $9,310,833,507. That was 2012 and at that time the average annual revenues were $6,454,568. Being 501(c)3 non-profits, they have even greater funding today,(15,16,162) thanks to American Billionaires and some Dark Money. Many of the non-profit leaders have participated in a Revolving Door of high government positions with the EPA and other agencies of the U.S. government. (254)
Also, I have written on my Blog on Influencers of Energy and Environmental Policy. America has not had an energy policy since the presidency of Jimmy Carter. His National Energy Act as older folks will recall, was following Oil Embargoes of the 1970’s and 1980’s.
A couple final thoughts on “Electrify Everything”…..
Itshould be obvious that Energy Independence is a prerequisite for National Security.
Everything cannot be electrified. For example, Plastics, Steel, Cement and Fertilizer. Yes, energy and food production are inextricably linked also.(182)
The bottom line is. America does not have an Energy Policy(159) for an orderly transition to Net-Zero Carbon. My message to my fellow citizens is this: Please wake up(59) and go study the true facts on energy and electricity. If you only check two references, the two I suggest are Vaclav Smil’s book, “How the World Really Works” and take a look at the Finnish GTK presentation, entitled, “Time to Wake up”. (59)
Yours very truly,
Dick Storm, March 18, 2023
When you have some free time, kindly read or at least peruse through the additional resources listed below. Learn about the details of our energy mess and then educate your friends and neighbors to the true facts. Especially your friends that are involved in education. Thank you.
References and Factual Information for Further Reading
Roosters of the Apocalypse by Rael Jean Isaac, published by the Heartland institute, 2012
“The Climate Change Hoax Argument” by C. Paul Smith, 2021
U.N. Agenda 21 by Dr. Ileana Johnson Paugh, ISBN: 978-0615716473
The Right Stuff Climate Team Reports and Videos. Outstanding applications of Science and Common Sense by retired NASA highly credentialed experts: https://www.therightclimatestuff.com
TED Talk Nuclear Power Is Our Best Hope to Ditch Fossil Fuels | Isabelle Boemeke on the need for more nuclear power. I do not agree with her bashing fossil fuels, but her promotion of nuclearis correct and well done with class and a little humor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESAaz9v4mSU
It is well documented that China is the world’s largest manufacturer of just about everything. This manufacturing might requires a lot of energy and electricity generation to power it. I first became concerned about the loss of American manufacturing (and jobs) with NAFTA in the 1990’s when my state of North Carolina lost most of the furniture and textile manufacturing. Then, after China entered the WTO (about 2001), the loss of American aluminum (and other industries) became very personal with me. I had worked as a Field Service engineer/Consultant on coal and oil power generation all around the world for ALCOA for 35 years (1977-2012). ALCOA during the 1980’s was the world’s largest alumina and aluminum manufacturer. After China was admitted to the WTO (World Trade Organization) the CCP promptly ramped up their aluminum production from insignificant production in the year 2000 to over 50% of world capacity by 2012. They produced aluminum at very low cost and then sold aluminum ingot (some would say, Dumped) on the London Metal Exchange. The figure below is from a Dick Storm presentation in 2016. The production data is from the International Aluminum Association and the WSJ. My Blog post in Feb. 2021 outlined some of my personal experiences in working for the power plant which powered the massive ALCOA Rockdale Smelting Works in Rockdale, TX.
At about this time, Alcoa was reducing capacity & shutting down refining and smelting capacity. (including the Rockdale Works). I gave a presentation to the (PA) Delaware County Bar Association in 2016 wherin I used my experiences of working with ALCOA to make my point on the importance of reasonable cost, abundant and reliable energy to create jobs and economic prosperity. Local manufacturing and providing high paying jobs ultimately leads to improving Real-Estate markets. Perhaps this is abtract, but that is how I saw it from 1990- 2016.
Then in 2020 I wrote on my Blog regarding the Rise of China and my concerns for American competitiveness. The Blog in 2020 combined my personal experiences of working several decades for ALCOA plus two OLLI courses given at USCB. One course on the “Rise of China” was presented by retired U.S. Army General Craig Whelden and the other on the “Rise, Fall and Rise again of Nations” of the world, presented by Retired Navy Intelligence Officer, Captain Greg Blackburn. So, after thinking about my personal past experiences and then combining the information provided in the OLLI courses, I thought it would be timely to update the energy and electricity generation capacities of China as compared to the U.S.A. I chose to focus on the extreme increase of aluminum production in China (at the expense of U.S. production) because huge amounts of electricity are needed to produce aluminum. Aluminum, of the commonly used metals, requires the greatest amount of electricity to produce. Aluminum smelting requires about 5 kWh per pound of smelted aluminum ingot from alumina powder. Note on the chart below, the growth in electricity generation capacity of China since 2010. This growth was used to increase manufacturing capacity including aluminum production, as noted above.
Most of the electricity generation is from coal as shown on the EIA chart above.
Comparing China’s fuel use for electricity production (above) to the U.S.A. (below). This is an overview of energy and electricity generation capacity in the U.S.A. in 2021 with natural gas being the largest fuel source.
U.S. Has Shut Down Over 102,000 MW of Coal Plants Since 2010
The U.S. has aggressively shut down hundreds of coal power plants and replaced most of the lost generating capacity with natural gas fuel. This was possible as a result of the “Shale Gas Revolution” which produced enormous amounts of natural gas after the perfection of Directional Drilling and Hydraulic Fracturing which became commercial about 2010. The two graphs of fuels used for U.S. electric power production are shown below.
China Uses More Than 50% of the World’s Coal Fuel
Comparing China’s coal consumption to the world, we have the graph below. In actuality, China consumes more than 50% of the world’s coal production. This chart is provided by the IEA.
You may say, “So What?” Well, China, Russia and the United Nations are all in agreement that the U.S. and the rest of the western world, the Free World, should stop using Fossil Fuels. Meanwhile, Russia and China are profiting and expanding their influence by using the very fuels that the U.N. and the MSM, WEF and others have decided are harmful for the planet. I will just leave it there for you to decide the U.N. and Environmental Extremists motives for Demonizing Carbon use by the Western World. The top sixteen “Influencers” are identified on my Blog of January 4th. A good friend commented that I forgot to list Al Gore as one of the primary influencers, so perhaps the number should be 17 for top ranked individuals and organizational influencers. No matter the number, they have harmed America’s competitiveness and productive manufacturing capacity.
World CO2 Emissions by Country
Carbon Footprint by Country
According to the European Union‘s Joint Research Centre, total global CO2 emissions increased from 34.1 GT in 2010 to 37.9 GT—an all-time high—in 2019. The COVID-19 pandemic and its related restrictions on travel and transportation triggered a decrease to 35.962 GT in 2020, but emissions are expected to resume increasing once 2021 totals become available. China is the largest emitter of CO2 in the world, with 11680 Mt (11.680 GT) of carbon dioxide emissions in 2020. This is just over 32% of the world’s total 2020 emissions. The United States released the second-highest amount of carbon emissions at 4.535 GT, or roughly 12.6% of the total global emissions.
Top 10 CO2-emitting countries in the world (Total CO2 in Mt) – EU JRC 2020
Total emissions, however, fall short of telling the full story. For example, sharp-eyed observers may notice that the top three emitters are also three of the most populous countries on Earth that also have the largest manufacturing capacity. So it stands to reason that their emissions would be higher than that of countries with a fraction as many residents and less manufacturing.
China’s Planned Future Electricity Generation
To China’s credit, unlike the U.S. they have a rational path forward to transition toward a reduced carbon energy future. However, until the 150 new nuclear plants are completed and increased renewables are installed, China is forging ahead with plenty of conventional generation capacity. As you can see from the aforementioned information, China currently has 2,390 GW of electric generating capacity and the U.S. about 1,200 GW.
China’s Most Recent Announcement of A Major Power Plant Expansion, A 16 GW Wind-Solar and Coal Plant
This was reported in this month’s (Jan. 2023) edition of POWER Magazine: China talks a good game on being “Green” and promoting renewables. The facts are that China’s leaders clearly believe in “A Balanced Generation Portfolio”. Not a bad approach for any country. Let’s get back to China’s latest Press Release:
“A massive, multibillion-dollar renewable and fossil-fuel energy project is underway in China. The installation, being built by China Three Gorges (CTG), includes wind, solar, energy storage and coal-fired power generation.
Ground was broken for the first pilot of the Kubuqi Base project in Dalate Banner, Ordos, Inner Mongolia on Dec. 28, 2022, according to Chinese media. Kubuqi represents an investment of 80 billion yuan ($11.6 billion). Reports said the installation will eventually have 8 GW of solar power capacity, along with 4 GW of wind power, and 4 GW of coal-fired generation, in addition to energy storage.
“The Kubuqi Base project is the world’s largest wind [and] photovoltaic base project developed and constructed in … desert areas,” CTG said in a statement. The company said it wants to build “the Three Gorges on the Great Wall,” which is apparently a reference to CTG’s major 22.5-GW hydropower project on the Yangtze River, the world’s largest hydro installation and largest power plant of any kind by power generation capacity.”
The capacity of 16,000 MW’s is huge. However, to put it into Reality and perspective, China currently has about 2,390 GW’s of installed electricity generation capacity.
In February 2022, China had 2,390 GW of installed capacity. This is comprised of 17% Hydroelectric, 14 % Wind, 14% Solar and 5% Natural Gas and 2% nuclear, Coal Power generates over 2/3 of China’s electricity. Keeping in mind that Nameplate capacity is not the same as actual generation through the year. China plans to install over 3,000 GW of total generation capacity by 2025. The U.S. by comparison is about 1,200 GW.
The total electricity generation (for China) by fuel from 1990 to 2020 is shown below. This is from the IEA statistics:
Coal is widely used in China for generating electricity, despite the country’s rapid growth of renewable energy in recent years.
According to China’s National Bureau of Statistics, coal accounted for 56% of the country’s total energy consumption in 2021. The ratio signifies a continuous decline from more than 70% in the mid-2000s. Nevertheless, the absolute level of China’s coal use has continued to rise.
Two important metals are steel and aluminum. The best data available shows that China produces more than 50% of both the steel and aluminum needed by the people of the world. This production requires large amounts of primary energy, which for China means, mostly coal fuel.
Conclusions:
China’s carbon dioxide emissions are the largest in the world, about 33% of the world total in 2022.
China has a Rational Energy Policy to increase conventional generation as they move toward reduced carbon production of electricity, including 150 planned new nuclear power plants. China is not sacrificing manufacturing capacity or competitiveness like the U.S. and the rest of the Free World.
China is likely to remain the world’s largest manufacturer of aluminum and steel for the foreseeable future.
American leaders seem to be tone death on the importance of energy to keep America strong.
I thought the summary above would be useful for anyone interested is comparing the energy policies of the U.S. to those in China. In addition to the information provided above, some additional references are provided below for further reading and research.
Yours very truly,
Dick Storm, January 18, 2023
References and links for additional reading and research
The impossibility of achieving Net Zero Carbon by 2050
This is a follow up to my last post: “Influencers of American Energy Policy” The purpose of the January 4th post was to outline “who” influenced the current American Energy Policy and how the “War on Carbon” advanced to reckless, un-American government policies to reach the unobtainable goal of Net Zero Carbon by 2050. A decarbonization path removing 80%+ of the conventional energy we depend on without an engineered transition plan to replace either the conventional electric power generation capacity or the fuels for transportation, cooking, heating, industrial production, commercial enterprises and our high HDI (Human Development Index). If carbon free power is to be achieved and our economy and quality of life is to be sustatained, then a major investment in nuclear is needed. As it stands now, there is No government Energy Policy, only a Decarbonization and anti-nuclear policy, thanks to the heavy influence of Environmental Extremists. Since 2010 over 102,000 MW of reliable coal and nuclear generation capacity has been shut down. It has not been replaced with new HELE coal plants nor with no startups yet of any new nuclear plants. The shutdowns are equivalent to more than 40 power plants the size of the Robert Moses Hydroelectric plant at Niagara Falls. And the MSM reports that the reason for Blackouts was unseasonable cold and too much electricity use for heat-pumps and electric heating. What caused Rolling Blackouts over Christmas week? My answer is because there was too much reliable coal generation shut down and retired, without replacing that capacity in new plants! It is not that I alone am concerned, see July NERC Reliability report which also warned of diminishing reserve capacity. Also, compounding the problem of minimum maintenance on the existing coal fleet. Why? Because Utility executives expect the coal plants to be required to be shut down anyway, such as the (another energy incompetent lawyer making public policy) NC Governor Roy Cooper’s Clean Power Plan.
Replacing 100% of reliable coal and nuclear capacity with wind and solar is not possible.
This post is intented to show the diffficulty and in fact, the impossibility of achieving the stated end result of Net Zero Carbon by 2050. Growth of fossil fuel use 2020 to 2021 is shown here by Petro-Physicist Andy May. The people of the world continue to demand conventional energy. Also, worldwide coal consumption was at an all time high in 2022 as reported by the IEA. Conventional energy growth is also forecasted by the and the EIA with projections of 50% increased energy Demand by 2050.
I personally gave a presentation to the August 4th ENERUM Conference in Columbus, Ohio where I cautioned the audience on the inability of wind and solar to replace the generation from prematurely retiring of coal plants based on my own obervations and experience in the industry.
The principal reference that I have used below is from Mr. Donn Dears latest book, “Clean Energy Crisis”. Donn Dears has written numerous books and on his Blog “Power for the U.S.A.” on the topics of Energy, Environmental Regulations, The Looming Electricity Generation Crisis, Net Zero Carbon, Electric Vehicles and the facts on carbon dioxide’s impact on the planet. At the end of this post I have included over 100 references for further reading that support both Mr. Dears and my belief (also many other climate scientists and power engineers agree) that America truly does have a Clean Energy Crisis and that America has a (to borrow a WSJ headline) self-sabotaged Electric Grid. This is being done by the people and organizations written about in my January 4th Blog post. The WSJ also has chronicled some of the failures of green energy.
In “Clean Energy Crisis” much of the reasearch and facts previously described by Mr. dears and documented in his books and his excellent Blog, “Power for the U.S.A. These facts and information are condensed and summarized in a little over 100 pages. Here are some of the facts and thoughts from from “Clean Energy Crisis”.
What it Will it Take To Achieve Net Zero Carbon Bulk Electric Power Generation by 2050
For an energy engineer or anyone trained and experienced in energy and electric power generation, it is absurd to believe that renewables can replace fossil fuels. For example, here is what Dears suggests as a generation portfolio in 2050 that has no natural gas or coal power generation. It will take……..
Wind– 995,141 Wind Turbines of 2.5 MW each
Solar 3,918,996 MW (this is 139,964 MW each year)
Nuclear 881 new nuclear power plants, which is 31 per year for every year from 2022-2050
For anyone involved in electricity generation the numbers shown above for Wind, Solar and Nuclear will instantly appear unachievable due to the intermittancy & the low energy density of wind and solar. The land area required for solar and wind will be immense. Doug Houseman, Principal Consultant at 1898 Consulting Division of Burns & McDonnell has provided his insight here on a LinkedIn post.
Nuclear, the most energy dense fuel, is the most proven provider of reliable, affordable Base load Bulk Power electricity generation. Nuclear power generation, in fact, has provided about 20% of America’s electricity for decades. For my state of SC over 50% of the total electricity is generated by four nuclear power plants. However, the building of 31 new plants nationwide, every year from 2022 till 2050 is simply not possible with the current workforce, manufacturing capacity, Federal regulations and numerous supply chain limitations. For those not familiar with primary energy and electricity production/generation a short overview is provided below. There is a lot of catching up to do to install reliable new power plants to replace the over 102,000 MW that has been shut down. Also, a lot of new power plants to produce the needed new power generation required for EV charging, hydrogen production and population growth. By 2050 the U.S. Population may exceed 438 million citizens. If everything is “Electrified” as some suggest, the electrification will not be from wind and solar. It is impossible for the Green New Deal to work.
What Fuels are used for the Currently Installed Bulk Electricity Generating Capacity Now? Here is What Powers America Now:
Electricity generation uses about 37% of the Primary Energy (see LLNL chart below) used by the U.S. Therefore, if much more expansion of EV use for transportation, home heating, cooking and other current uses of primary energy are transitioned from natural gas, gasoline, Diesel, Jet Fuel, etc, to being powered by electriciity, (are you ready to board electric or hydrogen powered airliners?) then the electric generation capacity will will need to be drastically increased. Also, by 2050 the U.S. population is projected to be up to about 438 million. The new citizens will want and should have high quality lives as we enjoy now. Like Donn Dears, I am interested in the future of America for our grandchildren and for future generations of Americans, which according the the Census Statistitions, will be more citizens in 2050.
1,143,757 MW of Installed Generation by Fuel in U.S.-2021: From EIA website. Note the numbers below express “Nameplate Capacity” This is not the same as actual generation, that will be discussed further down in the post.
Electricity Generation by Fuels, Now
The data above shows installed capacity in 2021 by “Nameplate” rating. The actual electricity generation for the Grid is accomplished by the most affordable fuels that are available at a given time. Those of us that have worked in the electric power industry know this as “Economic Dispatch” That means the lowest cost generation is selected to run at the highest possible capacity so that electric power production can be accomplished for the lowest overall cost to the consumers. Fuel alone constitutes about 90% of the production cost for a gas turbine combined cycle plant. So, if fuel costs double, so does the production cost of electricity.
Note: For the peak load which is highlighted, this is 80% Dispatchable Bulk Power provided by Natural Gas, Coal and Nuclear. Total electricity generation on Dec. 21st at the peak was 627,323 MW. Of that total, 221,648 MW was from gas, 132,423 MW was from coal and 92,397 MW was from nuclear power. Over 80% generation from conventional fuels.
Wind and Solar at peak shown above were 7% of the total generation mix. Not a forecast or guess. Just fact.
Wind and solar groups actively undermine grid reliability
This is excerpted from the “American Experiment.org” in Minnesota. This is regarding XCEL Energy’s plans to shut down the 2,238 MW Sherburne County Coal Plant in 2024. The below is quoted from the “American Experiment”.
“Adding new power plant capacity is fraught with challenges, especially if that power plant is supposed to be reliable.
For example, in Minnesota, Xcel Energy announced it would shut down all three units at the massive 2,238 MW Sherburne County (Sherco) generating station beginning next year for Sherco 2 (680 MW), Sherco 1 in 2026 (680 MW), and Sherco 3 (876 MW) by 2030.
Xcel’s original plan was to replace the retiring coal units with an 800 MW combined-cycle natural gas plant to maintain reliability, but the company caved to wind and solar special interest groups who, wrongly, argued the plant was not necessary for reliability.
Instead of building more reliable natural gas capacity, these groups, consisting of Fresh Energy, the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, the Clean Grid Alliance, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and the Minnesota Citizens Utility Board, argued the company should instead pursue wind, solar, battery storage, and limiting people’s access to electricity through LMRs, which seek to solve the problem of renewable unreliability by reducing electricity demand instead of providing adequate reliable power.
It was a textbook example of how these groups are willing to sacrifice reliability for more renewables.”
As outlined in my January 4th Blog post, what is stated by the “American Experiment” is typical across the U.S.A. The results of the shutdowns of reliable coal plants should not be unexpected……
Rolling Blackouts, Christmas Week, 2022 Tennessee and North Carolina
Yes, Christmas brought Rolling Blackouts to two well respected and well run Utilities, Duke Energy and TVA. Why? In my view, it was forced by environmental extremists that have influenced the Clean Power Plan in NC and the National Net-Zero Carbon Policy of the government to incentivize more wind and solar and the shutting down of reliable coal plants by TVA. Here is the testimony of a representative of a large Industrial customer of Duke Energy and his OpEd in a local NC Newspaper:
N.C. Utilities Commission Testimony of Bradford Muller of Charlotte Pipe and Foundry:
The PRIMARY AND SECONDARY ENERGY that We Depend On:
Electricity and Hydrogen are forms of Secondary Energy. Primary energy must be used to create them. Forms of primary energy are natural gas, coal, nuclear, hydro, wood (Biomass), MSW Municipal Solid waste, wind and solar. I showed the U.S. Grid generation during Christmas week 2022 above. This was for electricity generation and on the chart are the forms of primary energy used to generate the electricty that was needed (called Demand). The chart below shows America’s use of just short of 100 Quadrillion BTUs of energy during the entire year 2021. This includes energy flows for all forms of energy from source to end use. I think it is the best graphic to show the energy needs of the U.S. in one illustration. Energy is expressed in British Thermal Units (Btus) and all forms are converted to Btus for comparison. For example, wind & solar power of 1 kWh is equivalent to 3,412.6 Btus. Thus, all forms of energy are depicted on the chart, including renewables in their BTU equivalence.
The title of this post is, “The Impossibility of Achieving Net Zero Carbon by 2050”. One way to visualize the impossibility of replacing conventional primary energy with wind and solar is to study the LLNL energy flow chart above. Note that after decades of subsidies (since Jimmy Carter’s National Energy Policy Act of 1978) for solar and wind, less than 5% of our total primary energy was produced by wind and solar for the entire year. Also note the U.S. Grid chart of actual generation by fuel for Christmas week, 7% of the total electricity generation was from wind or solar at the peak load point that I referenced.
Conclusions
It will be impossible to sustain the American economy and our life styles without about 0.8 million Btus per person per day. This aggregates to about 100 Quadrillion Btus of annual primary energy use total. It is important to specify Primary Energy. Those who promote electrifying everything or using hydrogen for transportation are performing a disservice by promising mythical power that must be produced by a form of Primary energy. Electricity and hydrogen do not occur naturally in nature, they must be produced using primary energy.
Replacing the approx 80% of our primary energy now provided by Fossil Fuels with wind and solar is not possible today and without immediate and extreme technological advances it will not be possible by 2050.
Nuclear energy as a primary fuel, could provide a huge portion of (secondary energy) electricity and hydrogen. However, building 31+ nuclear plants/year is simply not possible. Why? because of manufacturing supply chain limitations plus a lack of a trained workforce of engineers & craftsmen. The workforce and supply chain will need to be rebuilt, literally starting at Middle School training, as many of the workforce that built the existing nuclear fleet are retired or in other forms of work.
The Perpetrators of the misguided “Demonization of the Fuels we depend on, deserves most of the blame. However, the cause of the decline in energy independence and electric reliability is spread widely as outlined in my January 4th post. Regional Transmission Operators and cut throat pricing exaserbated by subsidized renewables contributes to the problem. Meredith Angwin, an energy expert has outlined other problems of Grid Reliability. Here is a LinkedIn post on her book, “Shorting the Grid”.
There is no transition plan for “Decarbonization”. Only ever increasing regulations to force the shut down of reliable coal plants with no viable replacements. Over 102,000 MW of reliable coal and nuclear plants have been shut down since 2010. These have been (at least some thought capacity was replaced) replaced in “Nameplate” capacity with natural gas, wind and solar. The Rolling Blackouts over Christmas week are the result of shutting too much reliable coal and nuclear generation down over the last few years. A true transition plan would include replacing existing older designs with new HELE ( High Efficiency Low Emission) coal plants. A major (600 MW or larger) new coal plant has not been build in the U.S. since 2013.
Summary
The people that truly understand energy and electricity know that replacing fossil fuels and nuclear with wind and solar is impossible by 2050, if ever. The problem as I see it, is that energy engineers and others trained and experienced in energy and electricity production are in a small minority of the U.S. and the world’s population. I estimate in the U.S. less than 3% of the total population understands energy and electricity generation. However, the majority of the U.S. and world citizens have been scared into believing carbon and nuclear energy is evil. How? By one very effective disinformation campaign by the MSM, WEF, the United Nations, wealthy Billionaires and government agencies. The policies of Environmental Extremism are about power over the people, not about saving the planet.
Some who read this post will disagree with me. That is expected because of the very effective work of the aforementioned organizations to demonize carbon and nuclear. This has been anticipated and below there are more than 100 reference links to support my conclusions, Most of these have not been reported fairly in the MSM so the original links are shown on this blog so that any one who disagrees is welcome to form your own opinion by reading and studying the references provided. Thank you for your attention to this important topic.
Yours truly,
Dick Storm, January 10, 2023
Suggested for further reading and reference. Many of the references are related to Climate Science, sea level rise and Anthropogenic Global Warming. However, the focus is on keeping America Energized!
Dick Storm presentations at ENERUM, August 2022, Columbus, Ohio. These presentations are posted on the WESCOM website, Link to Dick Storm ENERUM Presentations and Podcast Oct. 2022: https://linktr.ee/wescominc
Professor Vaclav Smil quote: (Smil is a prolific author on energy issues and lives in Canada)I absolutely hate the word sustainability because there is no such thing. Sustainability cannot be defined. Sustainable for what? Over next year? Over 10 years? Over a millennium? On a local basis, on a planetary basis? I mean, there are so many time and space dimensions to it you cannot define what is sustainable. If somebody is boasting what they are doing is sustainable, it’s a total laugh. There is no sustainable thing.
Dick Storm's Thoughts on Energy, Education, Economic Prosperity & Environmental Blog 
