Tesla

[Tim]

It's hard to see what you don't want to. Drive anywhere west of I-35 and Texas is nothing but windmills. Most of those turbine blades went right up from the Port of Houston, where you live. There has been a constant stream of blades for twenty years.

Every part comes from China, so the Port of Houston is the entry point.

https://www.energybot.com/blog/biggest-wind-farms-in-texas.html

There are windfarms but in clusters. If you look, the population centers are Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and Austin. Total wind and solar is about 20 %.
Not going to drive 12 hrs to El Paso or 8 hours to Lubbock to tour the wind farms. Take away those four cities and what is left. I have seen some driving a trip through New Mexico to Colorado. You did say west of I-35, not in San Antonio or Dallas. The vast majority of Texans never drive west of I-35.

[StarTrekDoc]

Here

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_p...exas's%20power.

Per wiki -- 17% wind power to Texas total. So not insignificant.

[Tim]

Here

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_p...exas's%20power.

Per wiki -- 17% wind power to Texas total. So not insignificant.

Dated 11 years ago. I saw something from ERCOT that showed 20% of solar and wind combined at 20 %. That may have been the actual provided when we got warnings. I would be interested if there is an updated map. No growth in 11 years? Surprised. Texas is very friend to new businesses, they actually have a fund and it gets used. I still don't see significant growth, I do see tons of offers for retail.

[A nony mous]

Every part comes from China, so the Port of Houston is the entry point.

Is xenophobia your #1 response to being shown intentionally misinformed? The fact that you don’t drive to West Texas often is your excuse for not believing in renewables? Is this a joke? Regardless of if you go see the windmills, if you have eyes and have been on I45 since 2000, you’ve seen blades by the truckload. BTW, those blades were probably manufactured by GE.

3 of the top 4 manufacturers of wind generators are in the west, and those 3 account for more production than the 6 Chinese firms on the list.
https://blog.bizvibe.com/blog/energy...acturers-world

For those who care, here is a current map of wind in the US.

https://eerscmap.usgs.gov/uswtdb/viewer/#3.91/32.12/-103.58

[StarTrekDoc]

Dated 11 years ago. I saw something from ERCOT that showed 20% of solar and wind combined at 20 %. That may have been the actual provided when we got warnings. I would be interested if there is an updated map. No growth in 11 years? Surprised. Texas is very friend to new businesses, they actually have a fund and it gets used. I still don't see significant growth, I do see tons of offers for retail.

Lots of growth; take a look at the Wiki link in the same post;

Here's Bloomberg: up to 50% of grid can come from wind for texas -

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-07-20/how-wind-energy-powers-the-texas-grid

--another example of a system that overly relies on a single source that can be subject to variations; there needs to be redundant sources overlapping for sound energy plan.


- A nony mous - thanks for the wind heatmap -- impressive that texas has so much.

[Kamban]

From a 2020 report Texas produces 67% from natural gas and coal and 20% wind and 18% nuclear.

When driving from Dallas to OK city about 7-8 years ago I saw a ton of windmills. I bet that number is significantly more now.

Not sayings that windmills don't have its issues ( birds getting killed, noise of blades whirling and disposal of giant blades) but they can be solved and are being addressed. Texas is in an unique place to harvest a lot of power from wind and solar, having being blessed with both in spades. But it needs to free itself from the shackles of the petroleum industry and its lobbyists.

[Tim]

From a 2020 report Texas produces 67% from natural gas and coal and 20% wind and 18% nuclear.

When driving from Dallas to OK city about 7-8 years ago I saw a ton of windmills. I bet that number is significantly more now.

Not sayings that windmills don't have its issues ( birds getting killed, noise of blades whirling and disposal of giant blades) but they can be solved and are being addressed. Texas is in an unique place to harvest a lot of power from wind and solar, having
being blessed with both in spades. But it needs to free itself from the shackles of the petroleum industry and its lobbyists.

Agree with the 20% and potential.
Natural resources exist where they naturally occur. They should be used.
What I don’t see in the current discussion is balance or equilibrium. Source/Capacity/Storage/Use
Single source won’t work. The environment leans towards renewables, but there are limitations. Give society enough rope and it can hang itself.
How much is too much? (all sources considered).
You have been very reasonable in your considerations of multiple sources. How much should Texas rely on wind power or solar or petroleum? It is going to be different for every place to my way of thinking. Of course, I could be wrong. Reliable utility is all I ask.

[Kamban]

Agree with the 20% and potential.
Natural resources exist where they naturally occur. They should be used.
What I don’t see in the current discussion is balance or equilibrium. Source/Capacity/Storage/Use
Single source won’t work. The environment leans towards renewables, but there are limitations. Give society enough rope and it can hang itself.
How much is too much? (all sources considered).
You have been very reasonable in your considerations of multiple sources. How much should Texas rely on wind power or solar or petroleum? It is going to be different for every place to my way of thinking. Of course, I could be wrong. Reliable utility is all I ask.

I am not a Greta or Koch. Extreme views and digging in the heels leads to stalemate.

We should use natural resources sensibly. Not all are 100% safe, as I had pointed out with the wind situation. And not all produce energy 24/7. And finally use them in appropriate situations. Just because there are tons of tree huggers in Vermont does not mean we put a solar farm or wind power turbines there. Concentrate on solar in the South and wind in Midwest and mid South.

Gradually increase those numbers while cutting back oil and coal and natural gas energy sources. Consider newer nuclear power energy but first solve the NIMBY problem of disposal of nuclear waste. I am not a fan of long term storing of nuclear waste at the production site hoping a solution is found in 30 years. That is kicking the ball down the road like we are doing with out national debt. Also we can be hit with surprises as we saw recently in Europe where they had to cut production because they could not cool the reactors and that is because the rivers were running out of water.

Explore new sources of carbon neutral energy. Tides. Off shore wind. Space solar. And I recently read about boring pipes deep into earth , about 20-30 km where the temp is 400+ degrees F and the energy sources is infinite. The Russians dug 12 miles ( deepest man made hole) and it took 20 years. With new microwave vaporizing technology we can do it in weeks. But dong a prototype and large scale are 2 different things and that is where VC money comes in.

https://app.podscribe.ai/episode/83582841

Develop storage and distribution solutions. Battery pack. Pushing water up a dam when energy is abundant and using it to generate energy at nights. That is what we need more graduates in the STEM field and would encourage subsidizing educations costs there.

Finally we need petroleum. If not for energy, it is the various products we make from it - from chemicals to drugs to plastics and so on. Maybe slowly reduce its usage in energy sector to 10-20%.

[StarTrekDoc]

Kamban - for Sec of Dept of Energy -

[Nysoz]

https://electrek.co/2022/08/25/us-renewables-first-half-2022/

Renewables provided more than 25% of electrical generation in the United States during the first half of 2022, according to new data from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).

[Kamban]

Residential Solar Clients

The California Solar Mandate is already in effect for residential solar clients in single-family homes and multi-family housing three stories or less. Although residential new construction projects must have solar panels, existing homes are not usually required unless they are undergoing extensive updates. In the future, new homes will be required to have wiring that enables an easy transition from gas appliances and heating to all-electric and to be “solar-ready” to easily add solar storage capacity.

The mandate for high-rise residential projects is expected to take effect on January 1, 2023, allowing some time for planning.
In addition, the total capacity of the solar panel system can be reduced when adding solar battery storage or other energy-efficiency measures to the home. If your clients add solar storage capacity, they may qualify for rebates through the Self-Generation Incentive Program (SGIP). The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) has already authorized more than $1 billion in funding through 2024 for this popular energy storage incentive program.

Opponents have criticized that the solar mandate will increase new home prices for Californians because of the upfront cost of solar panels, making home ownership unaffordable to some. However, projections from the CEC indicate otherwise, because of the reduction in energy bills with PG&E, SCE, or the local utility provider.

StarTrekDoc and others in CA - Looks like this bill is in effect since Jan of 2022. Are new subdivisions now having solar panels in all their new homes?.

I am not a fan of broad mandates, but I feel that sometimes bills and laws need both carrots and sticks to have a meaningful impact. And sometimes those sticks turn into carrots years down the line.

[StarTrekDoc]

Yes newly approved have to have some. Previously approved are grandfathered in. Personally think it's a money grab opportunity for builders now they can upsell a base 2.5kw system for tons of extra dollars like any other upgrade.

Overall good for the grid and ability to maintain existing infrastructure without major upgrades needed.

[burritos]

https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2022-08-23/wyoming-clean-energy-california

Now just divert some water with that powerline to Cali and we're good! Ok sorry about that. Didn't mean to trigger the non cali folks.

[burritos]

Yes newly approved have to have some. Previously approved are grandfathered in. Personally think it's a money grab opportunity for builders now they can upsell a base 2.5kw system for tons of extra dollars like any other upgrade.

Overall good for the grid and ability to maintain existing infrastructure without major upgrades needed.

People are happy to throw in 20-30k of upgrades with fixtures/tile if amortized over 30 years. I feel that with the upcoming generation of home buyers(millennials and gen z) who are "climate change" conscious, a solar upgrade wouldn't be a big ask. And possibly if built out in bulk at a development, savings could be harvested. .

[Kamban]

For Tim

The EIA grid monitor shows the sources of electricity operating at any given time, revealing the intricate dance between renewables and fossil fuels. In Texas, for example, wind and natural gas provide most of the electricity, and the relationship between those two resources is intriguing. On days when the wind is strong, Texas’s 28 gigawatts of wind generating capacity can harness the resource, and the use of natural gas is correspondingly low. On March 7-8, for example, wind supplied the vast majority of electricity in Texas.

When the wind subsides, natural gas fills in the gap, as seen on March 10. On March 11 and 12, the outputs of wind and natural gas are perfectly out of phase, with gas scaling up and down to complement wind. All told, wind supplies 17.6% of electricity use in Texas, and the state is the nation’s leader in wind energy generation.