Nan and the Big Wind Boone-doggle
My syndicated column today looks at Do-Nothing Nancy’s financial interests in pushing T. Boone Pickens’ quixotic Big Wind dreams, as spotlighted here, at #dontgo, and first by Jason Gillman at Michigan Taxes Too Much. More from #dontgo here.
I’ve mentioned Pickens’ backing of Proposition 10 in California. There’s another another eco-boondoggle on the ballot as well. Proposition 7 has been nicknamed the “Big Wind” ballot measure; it would “California utilities to procure half of their power from renewable resources by 2025.”
Related item of snortworthiness: Nancy Pelosi…Washington “outsider.”
***
Pelosi and the Big Win Boone-doggle
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2008
Pelosi and the Big Wind Boone-doggle
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called congressional Republicans who want up-or-down drilling votes “hand maidens of the oil companies.” Let’s call Pelosi what she is: House girl of the Big Wind boondogglers.
Though she seemingly backtracked on labeling drilling a “hoax” this week, Pelosi refuses to consider GOP energy proposals that don’t include massive government subsidies for eco-fantastical alternatives that have never panned out.
Which brings us to Madame Speaker’s 2007 financial disclosure form. Schedule III lists “assets and ‘unearned income’” of between $100,001-$250,000 from Clean Energy Fuels Corp. – Public Common Stock.” Clean Energy Fuels Corp. is a natural gas provider founded by T. Boone Pickens. Yep, that T. Boone Pickens– former oilman-turned-wind power evangelist whose ads touting a national wind campaign are now as ubiquitous as Viagra promos.
Pickens and Pelosi now share the same talking points downplaying the need to drill and open up more access to American oil. Instead, the Pickens pie-in-the-sky plan campaign proposes to completely replace natural gas with wind power in power generation and theoretically free up natural gas for America’s transportation needs.
All well and good in la-la land. But let’s be real about the limitations and costs of wind power. Past and ongoing experience has demonstrated the notorious unreliability of wind and the miserably low operating capacity of wind power facilities here and around the world. Depending on wind requires supplemental fossil fuel plants as back up to be turned on and off to compensate for wind power supply shortfalls– nullifying any reductions in carbon dioxide emissions (which are miniscule, according to the National Academy of Sciences).
Not to mention the thousands of sliced-up birds and other wildlife that have become wind power casualties (a problem that scientists say would be solved by “repowering” old turbines at a cost of untold billions).
Fittingly, the environmental mascot of the Democrat National Convention– the showcase of their alternative energy approach — is an eastern Colorado wind turbine propped up with Democrat carbon credit funds that has never produced any energy because of chronic equipment malfunctions.
But I digress.
Naturally, the Pickens Big Wind plan is proudly endorsed by Do-Nothing Pelosi’s friends at the obstructionist Sierra Club. Through another company, Mesa Power, Pickens has committed upwards of $12 billion in wind farms on the Texas panhandle. CEFC and Mesa Power are separate entities. But what benefits one piece of the Pickens puzzle benefits them all. The wind venture, as Pickens himself acknowledges, depends on permanent federal subsidies.
Pickens is banking on ‘em. And Pelosi’s banking on him.
As reported on #dontgomovement.com, Speaker Pelosi bought between $50,000 and $100,000 of stock in Pickens’ CLNE Corp. in May 2007 on the day of the initial public offering:
“She, and other investors, stand to gain a substantial return on their investment if gasoline prices stay high and municipal, state and even the Federal governments start using natural gas as their primary fuel source. If gasoline prices fall? Alternative fuels and the cost to convert fleets over to them becomes less and less attractive.”
CLNE also happens to be the sponsor of Proposition 10, a ballot initiative in Pelosi’s home state of California to dole out a combined $10 billion in state and federal funds for renewable energy incentives. Namely: Natural gas and wind.
Follow the money. Or, to put it in economist terms as energy analyst Kenneth Medlock III did in an interview with the Dallas Morning News about the Pickens multi-billion wind farm investment: “A lot of what he’s trying to do is add value to a stranded asset…he’s obviously got millions of dollars on the line.”
And so, potentially, does the Democrat Speaker of the House windily wagging her finger at the financial motivations of others.
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But I thought NanP just wanted to save the planet…
you know, like Batman, Superman, or Spiderman do.
Another fine article Michelle.
I wonder, when will we see the PSA with Pickens and Pelosi sitting on a park bench touting renewable energy?
It will probably have turbines spinning in the background while a gentle breeze ruffles Nan’s locks.
I hope they get a cold chill from that breeze too!
It’s a sad time in Washington when a spoiled-brat heiress’s fake energy plan is better than the congressional majority’s energy plan.
Perhaps congressional Democrats should start their own clothing and handbag lines.
The most ethical house in history strikes again. Maybe we should call it the Limbo House. How low can you go? You thought a nine percent approval rating was impressive? Do they really think this air will lift their ratings? PERMANENT subsidies? Ethical illegal redistribution of MY money? OUR money?
More political partying at the expense of we the people.
MM, you have done your research – excellent, excellent article!
Terrific expose of the hypocrisy and greed of Pelosi & Pals.
And like someone said yesterday on another thread, after he reads this article, LGM will be “ticked!”
I reject the idea that wind power can’t work, although I accept that there are obstacles.
Using natural gas to make electricity is inherently dumb. It is a unique fuel, and there are better things to do with it than run gas turbines. Pickens is right in saying this.
And before we start talking about chopping up birds, let’s not suddenly become tree huggers here. You can’t have it both ways. If the spotted owl wasn’t worth saving trees over, the sparrows and hawks of the wind farms aren’t either.
Birds will survive, as a species, with or without wind turbines.
Big wind is worth investing in, if even as an exploration. We all know that it is unreliable, because the wind is unreliable – so we build *backup* natural gas plants that can kick in as needed. During those lulls, yes, we will be using natural gas poorly – but only during those lulls. When the wind is blowing – and it blows a lot in some areas – why wouldn’t we shackle it?
My issue is water rights. There is a lot of talk that Pickens is really going after water rights. My direction to congress would be to grant rights of way for power gneration, but NO mineral or water rights on the land beyond what’s needed to maintain the plants.
We funded the transcontinental railroad with land grants. We funded NASA to get to the moon and beyond. These both took a lot of blood and treasure, but nobody disputes that they gave back far more than they cost in the end.
I believe that large wind and solar installations on land with very little value otherwise falls into the same category. A combination of land grants and private investment make sense.
Just don’t give up the mineral and water rights.
I’m not going to let my contempt for Pelosi – a bottom feeder if ever there was one – get in the way of what I consider to be common sense.
Oh, and I envision one day people decrying “Big Wind” as the bird population decreases from all the “turbine blade” strikes.
Boy would that be a hoot! (of course not for the birds)
An interesting point about wind power is that the oil, gas, coal, or nuclear backups to wind turbines have to be kept running all the time. If the wind ain’t blowing, they have to be able to switch over instantly, so there is little power savings. And there are no batteries which can hold any supplemental power produced by the wind turbines for use later.
Reading about it, the best use for wind turbines would be small ones that could provide extra power for individual homes, much like with solar collectors.
Crook! Thief! Liar! If the mainstream idiots want to become credable again, this is what they should be investigating. Republican or Democrat, liberal or conservative, this type of conflict of interest should always be exposed so the crooks can be exposed and removed.
If it’s done all under the guise of “saving the planet”, then it’s ok. We’re not allowed to criticize it in any way or investigate or else were just “hand maidens of the oil companies.”
The question I have is do you think that the House republicans will have the courage to use this against Pelosi?
Wind ‘farms’ will make the ecological impact of drilling in Alaska and pipelining the oil south look like child’s play.
Consider:
1) Every tower will be connected by wires.
2) Every tower will have a road
3) Entire flocks of birds will be destroyed during their migrations. Weasels and coyotes will be very happy and fat. How efficiently? Dunno, but a typical big tower is 400 feet high with 140 feet radius blades. Chop, chop.
4) Meaningful power distribution will require transmission easements across entire states, probably powered by federal control and laws and taxpayer money. Over mountains, through forests, across rivers, who cares? The transmission losses alone make this idea stupid from its onset.
5) About all those towers, connected to all those towers, connected to all those distribution networks. Well, if you think building a national network of asphalt and concrete roads was expensive, try it with copper.
Contrast that with our usual method: build a coal-fired plant burning Wyoming low surphur coal reasonably close to where you need power. Or a well-scrubbed soft coal plant. (Yes Virginia, they exist and are used). Or rarely, but spoken aloud these days, a nuke plant.
RobM – I don’t care if people want to invest in wind power. I object to the government using my taxes to subsidise it’s development. Government has no business picking and choosing any for profit business to be successful.
BTW – Pickens already has the water rights. He plans to use eminate domain to get the corridor for the transmisssion lines and then use the corridor for the water pipeline.
This made me think of an article I read a while ago. Here it is.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,385182,00.html
I was thinking that if generators like this were placed in the Gulf Stream, that could help coastal towns quite a bit. Granted, they couldn’t power Boston or New York City, but they could help out in places like the Florida Keys.
Windpower is a diversion meant to distract us from pursuing more realistic options such as nuclear, coal liquification and shale oil. Even if it can ever be made economically feasible enironmentalists and NIMBYs will come out against wind power in the end. Consider the case of hydro-electric. If there ever was a clean, reliable, cheap source of electricty this is it. Still, they oppose it because it may endager some obscure species or flood a scenic valley, completely ignoring all the environmental benefits of increased habitat for other species, reduced use of hydrocarbons, flood control and irrigation. Nothing will satisfying them other than creating energy out of thin air and magically delivering to the point of use.
I want to get Federal subsidies to support MY energy plant. I consists to taking all the energy produced by the flapping of pegasus wings, radiated from unicorn horns, and from the forceful stamping of leperchaun feet upon orge heads.
By my calculations, not only will it produce enough power run all of our cars for 5000 years, it will also cause the size of the
my walletpolar ice cap to quadrupleThe US holds 25% of the world’s coal resources and can meet the energy needs of this country for the next 200 years, Coal can also be transfromed to liquid fuel. We are at a time when the use of coal is more than economically feasible and the technology exists to scrub plant exhaust. T. Boone is a corporate raider I view what he says with a turned chhek and my arms akimbo.
You are correct, Guitarplayer. They have their uses. I have written several times about the benefits at seaside towns. The Cape Wind Project is expected to produce 85% of Nantuckets power needs, if Ted Kennedy would stop blocking it.
Atlantic City gets some power from wind, but are being blocked from building more turbines. AC is perfect land to have them, since so much is useless for anything else. Same with parts of northern NJ, which is basically “swamp.”
Wind is good, just not the be all Pickens and Pelosi think it can be. They can be destroyed in a heartbeat by hurricanes and tornadoes, and hail can damage the rotors.
OK. We know the fix is in. How do we apply pressure to Pelosi?
Anyone check to see if Pelosi is wearing wooden shoes? She’s a modern say incarnation of the “Little Dutch Girl”, tiptoeing through the tulip field of Congressional pork.
I would like to see the 30 year environmental reviews of all this just like the approval process for any other project like bridges to no where.
Proposition 7 : procure half of their power from renewable resources by 2025.
Why are they being so stingy? Why not all of their power? Come on California. It’s for the planet.
And why don’t we just mandate that cars get 100 mpg? Oh wait didn’t Obama already talk about that?
We can’t blow our way out of this problem.
Hilarious. She looks more like Catwoman or Poison Ivy.
I remember reading about that. Amazing that environmentalists didn’t come down on him and would probably vote him back in. Now, if he was a republican…
Excellent point! One of the reasons I thought the tidal power generators would be better for the costal areas.
I agree completely with you that wind is a good idea and can help out, but it’s no replacement.
Sounds sorta like “conflict of interest” to me. Getting the Government to develop wind energy while she’s investing in such companies. “Most Ethical Congress”? Yeah right!
I have nothing against wind energy. The wind powered ships across oceans for hundreds of years. But, it isn’t a constant or reliable source, so it needs to be backed up with another source. Plus it won’t power cars. Oil will still be needed.
I am all for wind power. The first project should be hundreds of windmills offshore from Senator Kennedys compound.Let’s get right on that one!
Wind power is NOT “The Answer”, but is part of a mix of answers. There are places where the wind blows enough to make these economical. Let the market drive their placement. Power they produce displaces natural gas…which will save ME heating bill money.
Don’t start in about birds….cars kill millions of them. They fly into buildings too! Those buildings whirl around real fast, don’t they!
And lastly we are Americans, we’ll fix any problems that come up with them. You posted a picture of a windmill with a broken blade. Well what about broke down cars, crashed airplanes, or defunct computers? Everything breaks. We fix broke things and move on. Windmills good…importing oil from the emirs bad!
Any money she makes off of this will be buried in the ground on the eve of the Winter Equinox as a sacrifice to Mother Earth.
I regularly drive through a large wind farm covering over 1,000 acres in NW Iowa. Not only has the installation ruined the ‘pristine’ beauty of the rolling farmland, but the darn things hardly ever work. Two weeks ago almost 1 out of 6 windmills were non-functional. It takes more than 6 months to get one repaired.
The repairs require multiple semi trucks to haul the giant parts and the erection of huge cranes in the corn and soybean fields to do the work. How can any plant that is spread out over several counties ever be efficient to maintain?
HiPwr
What ever is remaining after the botox injections.
Yeah and animal rights groups in California want wind farms banned because birds get killed when they fly into the blades. Hello!!!
Michelle, thank you SO MUCH for covering this. Please tell you friends in talk radio and drudge, if you can, about this issue. I am going to be doing more work on this today and will directly email you info…
It will show up at #dontgo and on my own website. WE NEED TO GET THIS OUT!!!
Bill Collier
The American Communicator
Permanent government subsidies? Geeeeeeeez
Anyone here ever been to Denmark? I have, a few times. Wind turbines everywhere. According to Wiki, they produce about 20% of Denmark’s power.
I’m pretty sure the lights don’t go out when the wind stops blowing. At least they didn’t when I was there.
Just because a scum-sucker like Pelosi is for something doesn’t make it wrong.
Should we gassify coal? Sure. Should we drill wherever oil can be profitably extracted? Of course.
But to not put wind turbines on land that has basically no other uses seems dumb to me.
If Pickens already owns all of these water rights, deny him the right to build a pipeline. Make this a “power only” deal. Or give it to someone other than Pickens, even.
I cannot in good conscience say that I’m willing to grant drilling rights to Exxon in ANWR, but not grant wind turbine rights to someone else on land that is equally worthless.
I don’t hear anyone saying that tax dollars should build the turbines – we’re just talking about access rights, same as ANWR for drilling.
Why not? Just don’t give in on the water and other rights. Wind/Solar only.
Do you have some other idea for what to do with those wastelands?
My take on this is that wind power, proposed in a rational manner, funded privately, and deployed based on ROI, makes sense. My take on Pickens is that he’s a pure capitalist who’s made billions on oil and other business ventures. This is just another opportunity for him. So, OK. If he can get buyers, more power to him. Pelosi is sleazy, left-wing thief politician (ages ago they were called warlords or criminals). One is in it for the money, the other is in it for the power – over people. People should disregard these people all together and keep the pressure up on the Republicans to stay focused on wide-open drilling, coal development, nuclear power generation, plus solar and wind. If we can get the politicians and the enviroNUTS out of the way, it will be amazing to the world how much real Americans can get done. Is there a new “Greatest Generation” out there? This is the best time in history to find out!
What happened to the free market? We the customers need to decide the best form of energy.
Rob
Permanent subsidies are tax dollars!!!!!!!!!!!!
The problem is solar and wind power don’t work all the time so you still need a backup. Great, so we have these vast fields of windmills and solar panels backed up by, you guessed it, a coal power station. Wind and solar can never be 100% of the answer.
Rob
Why is land for wind turbines less valued than AMWR?
Truthfully, I think this makes insider trading look like stealing a piece of penny candy. To let any politician make a profit off decisions they are to make for this country, should be treason or at least a felony. We must demand that this is changed and that the pols don’t make money that way.
Ethical my @**!
“CONFLICT OF INTEREST”, look that up in the dictionary and PELOSI will be pictured next to it!!! Boy, when Ol’ NEWT had the least amount of CONFLICT suspected, he was made to divest himself of the “CONFLICT”… And he was hounded by MSM until he did DIVEST… No double standard here…
And therein lies the caveat. Who decides what other “uses” the land may have? Does the government decide since your home is in the way of their transmission routes that your home really does not serve its purpose well? They have decided this before for much more mundane reasons. What about wetlands, federal forests? I had 110 acres in Nevada and we did use wind power. However, the batteries alone were pretty expensive, even with solar panels we went through lots of batteries. What about their disposal when they are no longer functioning?
While wind power may be a viable option (Though apparently Ted Kennedy and his oil company do not want them in their back yard) the cost and upkeep are just as costly and in many respects, just as detrimental to the environment as other sources currently in use. We were five miles from the power lines and at almost five thousand dollars a pole for running the electrical with anybody else who came along at a later date, free to use them at our expense, it was the only viable option for us. Still, it is definitely not the end-all/fix-all it is made out to be and when “Permanent Subsidies” consisting of illegally redistributed wealth come into the picture … well, I would have to vote “NO!” on that issue.
Indeed.
“Permanent Subsidies” consisting of illegally redistributed wealth come into the picture
Just another way of playing the class envy card.
MOST ETHICAL CONGRESS EVAR!!! FTW!!!
I like that..
I have been told by an electric power engineer (no ties to any oil companies) that there are some problems with wind power. First of all wind is not constant & often during the peak useage times, the wind is the weakest. Second, currently there doesn’t seem to be any way to store the excess wind when it does blow. Third, wind does not blow at 60 cycles per second which is what electricity is, therefore geerators are needed to turn it into 60 cycles & some fuel is requried to run the generators. And finally what about those people who (like Ted Kennedy, are going to say “not in my backyard”) Apologies to any other electric power engineers who may feel I didn’t quite get all the facts straight. Since I know nothing about electricity or generating it I may have inadvertently misunderstood up what I was told. But I attempted to get it straight.
Don’t subsidies anything. Let the free market decide the energy source.
I have studied wind generated power and there are lots of problems with it but, it needs to move forward because it does show promise. I have heard T.B. Pickens say we need to drill here, drill now. He wants this country off of foreign oil, mainly middle east oil. He is, as I am for all the above.
What happened to all those wind turbines in California? are those still functional? (nice scenic shot of them at the end of the movie, ‘Less Than Zero’) I was a little kid when I traveled through there with my dad (early eighties)
Has some very good points.. The salesman at my old job would say, ” The world runs on copper.”
as for one use of clean energy,
there this in Scotland.. using ocean waves for a sourse of engery
but then again, that would mean building on the ocean’s coast and people like Kennedy Jr. wouldn’t want THAT..
The main problem is that wind power has to go right into the grid, and needs backup carbon fired generators. If there was a way to store wind power for later use. It would be a much better technology.
the main part of ‘Picken’s Plan’ is that much of it depends on ‘Rights of Way’, subsidies and eminent domain.
if he’s wants wind turbines then let him raise all the capitol he wants to build it… not in my wallet.. NIMW
not as catchy as NIMBY I guess..
Sadly there is nothing new about what Pelosi is doing. Politicians positioning themselves to make lots of money as they know ahead of the rest of us where/what the government is going and doing is as old as dirt. People who keep voting those kinds of “leaders” into office is the problem. Voters are getting what they deserve.
Anyone remember how Dennis DiConcini of Arizona suddenly bought land for next to nothing in the middle of some Arizona waste land to later find out the Central Arizona Project canal was, surprise surprise, going to run right through the worthless land he bought and suddenly that worthless waste land made him quite a profit?
Has any Congress person come out of office poorer than when they went in?
Good question # 39 FM-
They are ugly -too – the turbines that is…
The adage; Follow the $$$$ always works when ???? the royal (elected) officials…
This is the reason we go to the polls and vote (ISSUES)even if we cannot stomach a L_O_T_E_ vote.
See you all soon…back to Olympic Dressage!!!
I’m still trying to figure out how I’m going to power my SUV with wind?
SUV powered with botox stock.
Narshall & JT
This is what I was trying to say. There are problems with wind power. Not that we shoulnd’t use it but they need to work out the problems first before they push it on all of us. And it isn’t going to run our cars either. But for sure we should not be subsidizing poeple like Pickens & Pelosi who already have millions. Guess that’s how the rich get richer.
Good grief, my typing leaves something to be desired today. Maybe I should turn a light on so I can see the keyboard! Don’t try to conserve electricity when typing. LOL
I have the same problem babbledabble
Looks like the –it really hit the wind turbine..
DemLib Dogma is choking this country’s future.
And the saddest thing is, it looks like these congenital clowns are going to be put back into power this coming November.
Yes, the Despercrats are slowly annihilating the nation; but we citizens (in the aggregate) are allowing them to do so.
God bless Michelle (and Glenn Beck’s pitchforks).
Forgive me for going off topic, but I’m a “newbie” and don’t know how else to pose this question/ request:
Listening to Glenn Beck while shaving… Is the following accurate:
Anyone heard about this from another source? I feel this is vitally important and I think we need to start now. The congress critters won’t allow what happened to Amnesty happen to this bill. Learning from that exprience they’ll hide it better.
I feel squimish posting this, it reads so wimpy-geeky, but after CFR, and the words from both sides of the House after the Amnesty bill’s meltdown, I truely fear our government isn’t above doing something like this. They have a track record.
I take it seriously enough to overcome innate shyness and do what I never do: draw attention to myself to ask for help…
He just mentioned it again, in the 2nd segment. This isn’t a comedy bit.
Now, the other necessary question:
In order to not clutter this thread, how do we talk about it? Is there a place here where we can take this? Something like sitting down in Starbucks at the bookstore?
I am impressed with the brainpower and insight that gathers here. I don’t have much online experience and maybe this isn’t the correct way to do this.
To be honest, how you guys find out the things you do sometimes seems to border on the magical.
Michelle, See-Dubya, others. How do you find this stuff out? Dad, too. He has folders and folders of information, several gigabytes in fact. Senator’s votes, speeches, and all sorts of other stuff. I have no idea where he finds it.
I don’t know where to go from here, can anyone point me in the right direction?
That’s OK vabblefabble.
babbledabble
This is how congress has ALWAYS worked. It’ the structure of the house rules that makes it possible.
Residing in West Texas I have first hand knowledge of how wonderful it is to see hundreds of wind whipping blades spinning in the sun. The area near Abilene Texas has had the hills turned into a giant cuisinart! 200,000 acres of land the Indians called home is being set to accomodate hundreds of turbines that will feed power to…….Dallas! This is NOT the answer to our problems, unless you want the entire plains states to become huge whump, whump, whump generators (yes they do make noise!) for the big cities. What a “Boone”doggle this is.
I’ll accept the wind turbines when NY and other power sucking cities accept a nuclear power station in their states.
It should be a Congressional policy or Federal Law that these Congressmen, who are “public servants,” and their spouses turn their investemnts over to a blind trust just as recent Presidents have done.
It is amazing how many national politicians, who in theory only have their government salaries, soon become millionaires. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.
T. Boone is starting to look like Lyle Landley – the carpetbagger from ‘The Simpsons’ who sold a broken monorail to the town of Springfield and then ran off with the money.
By the way, where did Ross Perot go?
Did you know wind turbines could be hazardous to your health? It’s called Wind Turbine Syndrome. Click below for a Google search:
‘Wind Turbine Syndrome’ Search Results
t boone and san fran nan, what a pair. great article michelle. always follow the money. in the midwest, we brought the world ethanol, that wonderful renewable energy that is 10 – 20% less efficient than gas so your mileage is down, while at the same time creating a shortage of food because the american farmer is switching to corn for ethanol as his primary crop, and who owns the newly minted ethanol manufacturing companies, our politicians and their families. why when ethanol is proven to be a terrible substitute for real gas won’t the politicians abandon it, follow the money.
marcus,
let them reenact the fairness doctrine. If they do then every one of us conservative types should head right on over to daily kos and ask for equal time everytime something is posted. You need to think like an anachronist when you here crud like this.
When the pike’s on the other petard then the libs will reverse course.
Hmmm, why doesn’t Pickens use Pelosi in his TV ads to help validate his real estate scheme?
Great column, Michelle, as always. But —
Bit tired, are we?
old-Texan
AH Texas land isn’t pristine like ANWR Alaska.
Conflict of interest? Who’da thunk it?
Second thought. We could always get some scientist to proclaim that the earth is threatened because, human activity is causing Global Calming and average wind velocities all over the world are plummeting. He should say we need to start making everything aerodynamic or subsurface to “save the planet.”
The Weather Channel will go crazy at the thought of all the specials they can produce.
Nan and the Big Wind Boone-doggle
N.A.T.B.W.B.
Nab All The Big Wind Bucks
Not sure what happened there….
Flyoverman
I wish I could find the link. A news report said wind turbines on a large scale WOULD change the ecowind
system!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Pickens plan is brilliant.
1. Buy range land in the plains.
2. Sell or rent land to wind power company
3. Build natural gas plant for backup
4. Sell natural gas to wind power company as a backup source
5. Sell gas to gas plant to sell to wind power company (Boone has many companies to accompolish this)
6. Laugh your silly ass of all the way to the BANK!!
7. Give a little to the stock holders (San Fran Nan is one!)
Well, Well, Well. Follow the money indeed!
And speaking of wind power…
I’ve been wondering about the following, but have never seen any discussion of it:
If we place massive aggregations of wind farms all over the place, it seems at some point they will have a discernable — and possibly negative — impact on wind patterns and wind strength (?).
This seems to follow from Newton’s most basic principle (ie, “For every action, there is an equal and commensurate re-action”; I’m paraphrasing).
Given this, what is the tipping point?
That is, when does the latest “Life should never have any negative trade-off’s” Libby pipedream/boondoggle start to kick in?
Ane when it does, won’t we be “ravaging the planet” all over again?
Familyman, Interesting and not surprising. I can remember in Science class being told that the very act of measuring anything impacts the result. Example, putting a thermometer into a liquid will change its temperature during the act of measutring.
We need film of the pristine Texas wilderness. With portraits of cuddly little creatures.
Maybe I should stop breathing Flyoverman
Here’s something else to ponder.
How will all those wind turbines fair in tornado alley? We have some real nasty weather here on the plains! By, By wind turbines…….
old texan, remember those slice and dice commercials?
just think that and you got it. lol
Familyman, I think you have hit on something. You could turn on a fan as a wind offset, but then you’d add to your carbon footprint. So to offset the fan running you could plant a tree, but planting a tree would block the wind…….and on and on and on…
Sorry, but your comment was simply inspiring and I could nt resist.
old-texan
Don’t worry. Government subsidies.
What is wrong with having to work a little to get your ticket?
Maybe the Obama campaign should have let them know ahead of time but 6 hours isn’t that much to help out.
This shows the type of people Obama supporters are….the type who are crazy enough about Obama to want to see his acceptance speech but can’t be bothered to carve out 6 hours in their busy life to help their “chosen one”. Real charitable types these democrats are, “snort”
A 40 hour work week isn’t that much. I work 50+ and still have plenty of time for my family, kid’s sports, etc…
Suck it up!
sorry, wrong thread
Flyoverman
My head is spinning. Oh. Maybe thats a good thing?
Has anyone taken a look at Dingy Harry’s involvement in photovoltaic manufacture? We saw a glowing press release here in Nevada where Harry Reid pushed the Big Red Button on a new factory in Las Vegas. I suspect that all these liberal crap weasels are heavily invested in “alternate” power generation. With huge tax payer subsidies of course.
Strap a lib to the back and the wind coming out from their mouth will drive you forward. Only two drawbacks: you can’t stop the wind, and the shrill noise.
Quick, attach a generator to FamilyMan’s head.
First of all, I do not believe this is a case of eminent domain at all. The land, as I read it, is public land. The government isn’t going to take it from any private citizens.
Nor, btw, is it going to sell it. We’re talking about usage rights, at least as I define it. If we want to give Pickens, or anyone else, the right to generate wind power on this land, that’s our right.
And I think it makes sense.
It is *precisely* the same as drilling in ANWR or offshore. Those, too, are public lands that the government can grant drilling and/or mineral rights for – at any terms it chooses, btw.
One of those terms, to Pickens, should be “no water transport rights.” If this is about power, it’s about power.
And, yes, there would have to be backup power generation for when the wind failed. As I say in my first post, that’s what natural gas is best at – filling gaps.
Unlike coal or oil fired plants, gas turbines can be brought on or offline in a matter of minutes. This is one of the reasons so many companies use them as co-generation solutions – they are nearly “instant on,” which is what you’d want for wind supplementation.
This land is our land, but it’s not as if it’s the redwood forest or the grand canyon. It’s desert and badlands.
Why not allow private investors the rights to put wind turbines on it? What, we’re going to ruin the view?
If it works, it works. If it doesn’t, all we’ve lost is “alternative uses” for land that basically has no alternative uses other than mineral rights (water, oil, etc.)
And unlike coal, copper, or other kinds of mining, wind turbines don’t do much to the land. If they work, leave them there and use them; if they don’t, take them down. All that’s left are roads to nowhere and some ghost-town buildings.
I wouldn’t give Pickens rights beyond power generation, for sure. But if he’s willing to fund the turbines (both wind and gas), I’m willing to lend him my (public) badlands to try it.
No different than letting Exxon drill in my “Arctic National Wildlife Reserve,” or Gulf drill off of my coastline.
Why not?
All this time I thought Stretch opposed energy independence because she was a plain-Jane communist. Now I realize, you can take the girl out of the corrupt big city Baltimore Democrat machine, but you can’t take the corrupt Democrat out of the girl…
I got nothing against wind turbine power. Near/North of Bakersfield, TX, around McCamey, the wind turbines are adding an added economic boost to the areas oil production.
But the free market usually does a pretty good job deciding what works and what doesn’t. If wind power can make it on its own, more power to it. If it needs huge subsidies and mandates, and means more expensive electricity, it is a sign it isn’t all it is cracked up to be.
Rob
If you think your land can be used anyway you want, you haven’t had the joy of trying to change your land use of your personal property. Unless you have plenty of lawyers it’s a nightmare.
RobM1981
The land that Pickens owns is land that he bought. 200,000 acres. Most, if not all of the land in the plains states is private land, not government owned land. The land that the turbines now occupy here in the west was pruchased land from private land owners. Nothing was taken as immenent domain as far as I know. And also, have you SEEN the plains? It is something to behold. Yes there are “badlands” as you call them, but there are some truly beautiful places as well. Just standing in the open plains with the huge sky overhead is awesome. Enough of my travel brochure, but this is home to millions of americans, and like Ted Kennedy, we just don’t want to look at the damn things.
RobM1981 said:
They get access to public land and use eminent domain to get access to the private land.
So utility companies have to pay 2 billion for a wind farm and 2 billion for a gas plant, and maintain both…but I’m sure that want effect our utility bills!
What? It seems to be generating electricity constantly right now!
They are also less efficient that steam!!!!!!
He wants us to pay for it!
Yes it its. Oil companies bid for leases (that means they pay the gov $$$). They also pay a rental fee each year. They also pay a royalty on the oil
(that means they pay the gov $$$). They also pay taxes instead of receiving them.
For the reasons above!
Wind power, like Pelosi, is stupid. Yesterday I did about 15 minutes research to determine how much land would be required to produce via solar the 3.2 GW produced by the Palo Verde nuclear power plant in AZ; 35,00+ acres.
It took another 15 minutes to determine that 3.2 GW of wind would require ~76,000 acres. And that is being very generous because I assumed a 100% efficiency using GE’s newest wind turbines that produce nameplate power of 2.5 MW. Physics limits maximum windmill efficiency to 59% and real maximum is far less than that. So, being generous with efficiency and using wind advocate estimates of 60 acres per MW we arrive at the 76,000 acres. In contrast, Palo Verde occupies 4000 acres, most of which is empty space.
Of course, there’s also this little drawback if the wind gets too much
This happened in Denmark, but I can see it happening anywhere.