“While solar and wind receive huge subsidies, the end user pays for the party.”
“The dream of a solar and wind grid is collapsing very quickly as they are only profitable in a low penetration context.”
The following LinkedIN discussion is notable for its insight and reader reaction–and timely with summer concerns about grid reliability, given the wind/solar penetration at the expense of reliables.
Oscar L. Martin teed things off with this post:
Early adopters of solar and wind such as Texas or California are starting to see alarming signs of saturation even when the total energy production of intermittent sources barely reaches 24% of the total in those areas. Basically the dream of solar and wind is collapsing very quickly as they are only profitable in a low penetration context.…
Continue ReadingEd. Note: This post draws upon yesterday’s post, The Liberating Theory of Resourceship.
“[Darren] Woods’ comments indicate that ExxonMobil is very close to developing the technologies that will keep the United States the world leader in hydraulic fracturing and enable the U.S. to remain the world’s largest crude oil and natural gas producer for decades.” (Ed Ireland, below)
Peak Oil and Peak Gas beliefs never really die. They just go underground. Remember The Oil Drum website (2005–2013)? This central meeting place of the resource neo-Malthusians went kaput in the face of the oil and gas hydraulic fractionation boom. Such has been, is, and will be the case in a high-energy world not paralyzed by government intervention.
Rise and Fall
A Reuter’s story in mid-2013, “The Oil Drum Website Set to Close as Peak Oil Fears Vanish,” recounted the cycle of interest and decline.…
Continue ReadingEd. Note: The subtle, insightful concept of resourceship is back in the news given ExxonMobil’s new-generation hydraulic fractionation technology, discussed tomorrow. The expanding hydrocarbon age, still young, is overwhelming political attempts to disrupt it at the expense of consumers, taxpayers, and liberty.
… Continue Reading“If resources are not fixed but created, then the nature of the scarcity problem changes dramatically. For the technological means involved in the use of resources determines their creation and therefore the extent of their scarcity. The nature of the scarcity is not outside the process (that is natural), but a condition of it.”
– Tom DeGregori (1987). “Resources Are Not; They Become: An Institutional Theory.” Journal of Economic Issues, p. 1258.
“Those in the mineral-resource world think in terms of proved, probable, and speculative quantities. Should another category be added–resourceship–that would make such supply open-ended?