"Green" policies are destroying this country

Michael Shellenberger, founder of Environmental Progress, said one of the “most misleading ways that renewable salespeople sell their technology” is they claim the electricity produced by wind and solar is cheaper.  

However, the paradox about renewable energy is when deployed at scale, they actually make electricity production more expensive, Shellenberger told CPAC Australia in Sydney on Oct. 1. 

“There are basically two reasons,” he said, “It requires more machines, more backup power generators, more transmission systems, and more people to manage the chaos of an electrical grid with a large amount of unreliable weather-dependent energy.”  

Shellenberger pointed to a prediction by German economist Leon Hirth that the economic value of wind and solar declines significantly as they take up a larger proportion of the electricity grid.  

In a paper for Energy Policy in 2013, Hirth estimated that when wind turbine power generation comprises 30 percent of the grid, its value declines by 40 percent; while solar power’s value declines by 50 percent when it reaches 15 percent.  

“The reason is easy to understand,” Shellenberger noted, “Solar and wind produce too much energy when you don’t need them and not enough energy when you do, and both of those impose costs on the electrical grid.”  

What About the Waste?  

The comments from the environmentalist come as Western countries ramp up their efforts to decarbonise to move towards net zero by 2050, with renewables believed to be the solution as they produce neither greenhouse gases nor polluting emissions.

But Shellenberger, author of “Apocalypse Never: Why Environmental Alarmism Hurts Us All” and “San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities,” argued that renewables were more environmentally damaging than fossil fuels and nuclear energy. 

In the Sunday Business Post today. https://www.businesspost.ie/news/soaring-inflation-puts-vital-new-gas-fired-power-plants-at-risk/

Eirgrid All-Island Generation Capacity Statement 2022-2031 - October 2022

This was published on Thursday.

I am just a dairy farmer and running a small business on the side. Never could get my head around the modern financial and capitalist system where we were all just "policing" and servicing each other but producing nothing. I was reared in a time where you either had to produce some goods or improved their value to make a profit. But now it all seems to be about financial instruments and debt. To survive going forward people will have to get back to basics, reduce or eliminate debt and commitments. I believe lot of small businesses are going to go under when the warehoused debt is called in and consumers cut back spending.

The whole concept of debt is of course ancient. The Jewish and partially Muslim approach was debt forgiveness after i believe 7 years. Modern concepts of debt include a world wide system that has some real intricate complexities attached like a debt that can be bought and sold, speculated on, packaged. With an international marketplace. The value might be variable and/or stated in the contract which is under law. This is the system we are in and every institution is part of it. The problem of setting up a new system is where the hell do you start? Who is going to set up the new system, to what ends and means, what is the hierarchy of decision making etc ? Plus, everyone has a different perspective on things and that varies hugely so no consensus. In a way it was easy after ww2. A kind of ground zero with winners and losers. Not so clear now in a truelly globalized world unless you want to enforce a socialist Utopia. It has been tried many times over.

But ok, lets take debt and debt forgiveness. First off, who forgives what to whom? Let's say we have an overall total debt foregiveness of 50% for everyone. The USA are certainly not going to agree having trillions of debt on their balance sheet. Anyway, debt is but a nr. It depends on who can force the borrower to pay back. That is a matter of power and the willingness to use it. Now, who will give whom the power? Again, the US would like to retain theirs and without the US no global system. Ok, then you say, just rules for the west, or the EU. Then you have competing blocs with different rules.

So, in the end i dont see any global acceptable way forward. Every proposed simple system will keel over by its ramifications. The Mencken quote applies here..

How about debt forgiveness for green tech? Since it depends on reliables supporting it it sets up unfair competition. Standard energy companies will simply walk away cause they will be punished for even existing at all.

We have to go nuclear. Fast. Really fast! It is the only way but politicians have tied themselves on the doom/green train heading for the abyss. We have a short window of opportunity..

Mine won't be one of them.

Question for all you smart people out there: how many hours of sunlight does it take to both light and heat an average house for one day in the wintertime with solar panels?

I say winter time because in summer it gets dark later and you need less heat. Your solar panels are optimal at exactly the wrong time.

The Greens are secretly thrilled by the high energy prices for coal, oil and gas. Finally some real competition! That is to say if we keep on sponsoring 'green' and punishing 'dirty'.

Anyone dare to guess where and how solar panels are made and how green they are? Never mind. The question was retorical..

I just received a flier from the ESB promoting heat pumps... and it went straight onto the paper to be burnt pile. At least I'll get a calorie or two of home heating out of it.

Doomberg's analysis about Germany's situation and the EU. Dont get put off by the chicken image. His team are real energy experts and take a cold look at green policy. He differs on important points w Peter Zeihan while sharing many others

Im following him on Substack but there are several Youtube videos out there where he appears, mainly as a guest..

No doubt, but that pile is going to burn. Its quite remarkable how much heat a stove can get out of a pile of paper and cardboard. Sure beats paying the recycling centre to take it.

Good expose by the BBC panorama team regarding the clear felling of premier forests in Canada to create wood pellets so that a UK power station can claim to be green.😮

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qadWRkPkKus