April 22, 2023

Another Non-reassuring Report On New York's Energy Future

April 22, 2023/ Francis Menton

As stated in my previous post of April 19, two separate Reports addressing the question of New York’s net zero electricity future have recently been brought to my attention.
These two Reports are distinct from the so-called Scoping Plan, issued by the state’s Climate Action Council. The Scoping Plan is supposed to be the official word on how we are to achieve “net zero” electricity by some time in the 2030s.
Unfortunately, this Scoping Plan is not a feasibility study, or anything close to that, and despite enormous length — 700+ pages between text and appendices — really comes down to no more than a direction to the low status people to figure out how to achieve the decarbonization mandates set by their superiors.
My subject today will be the other Report, titled “Initial Report on the New York Power Grid Study.”

April 19, 2023

New York Goes Full Central Planning For The Electricity Sector

April 19, 2023/ Francis Menton

Here in New York State, we have an electricity system that, as of this moment, is functioning just fine. Granted, we pay more for the electricity than we should — probably in the range of 50% or more extra — mainly because we have banned the exploitation of our own abundant natural gas resources from the Marcellus and Utica shale formations in the upstate areas. And granted also that we just in 2020 and 2021 closed the two big nuclear reactors at Indian Point, about 40 miles north of New York City, which had supplied more than 25% of the City’s power.
It is not news that our existing, functional electricity system grievously offends the sensibilities of environmental activists, particularly due to its high reliance on natural gas to generate the power.
No feasibility study or demonstration project for us! The only option is Full Speed Ahead, without a clue as to whether this will work or not.
We will go Full Central Planning. Has that ever proved to be a problem anywhere in the past? Not that anyone here seems to recognize.

April 16, 2023

April 16, 2023/ Francis Menton

Returning from Washington after the court hearing on Friday, I took the Amtrak train to Penn Station, and then the subway a few stops down to my home in Greenwich Village. It being the tail end of the rush hour, the subway was relatively crowded.
A few moments after getting on the subway train, something struck me: every single person in my field of vision was staring at a smartphone screen.

April 14, 2023

April 14, 2023/ Francis Menton

This morning the DC Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington held oral argument in the case of the Concerned Household Electricity Consumers Council v. EPA.
That’s the case where a hardy band of citizen petitioners (CHECC) challenges the 2009 finding of EPA that CO2 and other “greenhouse gases” constitute a “danger” to human health and welfare by reason of their potential to warm the atmosphere.
That finding, known as the Endangerment Finding or EF, is the underlying basis for the all-of-government regulatory assault on the fossil fuel industry and the energy economy currently being conducted by the Biden Administration.

Slightly less than all of the argument was devoted to an issue that we lawyers call “standing.”

April 11, 2023

April 11, 2023/ Francis Menton

My previous post discussed a few aspects of the just-issued Tesla Report with the title “Sustainable Energy for All of Earth.” Today, I’ll poke around at a couple more.
If you were to try to read this Report (not recommended) you will quickly find your head spinning in a sea of numbers the significance of which is completely unclear.
Was that last number expressed in kilowatts, megawatts, gigawatts, terawatts or petawatts? Is it big or small? Reasonable or completely absurd? It’s quite difficult to tell without some context.
So let me try to provide some of that.

April 09, 2023

April 09, 2023/ Francis Menton

One of the core subjects of this site for several years has been doing reality checks on the schemes of Net Zero central planners. Is there any chance that these zero carbon economy schemes might work? Or are they just dreams that ignore obvious physical obstacles in a religious zeal to reach an imagined future utopia?
My prior writings on this subject are summarized in my December 2022 Report “The Energy Storage Conundrum,” and in my recent posts (here and here) on the work of Bill Ponton regarding the UK.
On April 5 Tesla dropped into the debate a big Report of their own, with the title “Sustainable Energy for All of Earth.” Tesla reaches the exact opposite conclusion from me and the people I have cited in my writings on this subject.
Could that be?