Biden Administration stops ANWR development

[SAJ-99]

They will sure have to up their output and be paired to storage so that they are capable of distributing energy when it’s needed on the demand curve before it can become a solution to things like providing baseline energy to Boston or New York, or any other major city, or replacing the Mw of the PNW hydro dams.

Absolutely, and those are being addressed. The entire change has to be incremental, and it will be. Too fast and you disrupt things in ways that you might not think of initially. If we all drove electric vehicles in 5 yrs it would crush economies that are reliant on oil, countries other than the usual suspects in the middle east. Countries like Norway, Nigeria, Sudan, Columbia, Ecuador all heavily reliant on oil.

Change has to happen. I think people on HT would be more supportive of offshore wind and solar than onshore, because most of the latter is in places we enjoy.

 

[BigHornRam]

Absolutely, and those are being addressed. The entire change has to be incremental, and it will be. Too fast and you disrupt things in ways that you might not think of initially. If we all drove electric vehicles in 5 yrs it would crush economies that are reliant on oil, countries other than the usual suspects in the middle east. Countries like Norway, Nigeria, Sudan, Columbia, Ecuador all heavily reliant on oil.

Change has to happen. I think people on HT would be more supportive of offshore wind and solar than onshore, because most of the latter is in places we enjoy.

If we all switched to EV's in 5 years, we wouldn't have the electricity to charge them. They have been yacking about storage for years and nothing has come of it. Right now I'm a skeptic. Show me something works and is in the realm of affordable and I will start to pay attention to the hype.

 

[SAJ-99]

If we all switched to EV's in 5 years, we wouldn't have the electricity to charge them. They have been yacking about storage for years and nothing has come of it. Right now I'm a skeptic. Show me something works and is in the realm of affordable and I will start to pay attention to the hype.

RIGHT NOW? LOL. I'm guessing you have been a skeptic for years and will continue to be a skeptic. While the world changes all around, you remain convinced that nothing will ever change.

 

[Deleted member 28227]

RIGHT NOW? LOL. I'm guessing you have been a skeptic for years and will continue to be a skeptic. While the world changes all around, you remain convinced that nothing will ever change.

Something I've been messing around making during zoom meetings... this is CO

The way it's just energy. Everyone currently moves around using their own little portable energy generator ICE. What were talking about doing is switching everyone to centralized power generation.

To move to all EV cars Colorado needs to figure out how to almost double it's residential power generation.

Pragmatically speaking, I don't see how you do that without building a chit load of NG power plants or nuclear. Absolutely more renewables... but also 1/3 of CO renewables are biomass plants.

 

[Irrelevant]

RIGHT NOW? LOL. I'm guessing you have been a skeptic for years and will continue to be a skeptic. While the world changes all around, you remain convinced that nothing will ever change.

BH can't accept EVs because Tesla makes them. Any thing Tesla, from cars to rocketships are to be doubted.

 

[Irrelevant]

Something I've been messing around making during zoom meetings... this is CO

The way it's just energy. Everyone currently moves around using their own little portable energy generator ICE. What were talking about doing is switching everyone to centralized power generation.

To move to all EV cars Colorado needs to figure out how to almost double it's residential power generation.

Pragmatically speaking, I don't see how you do that without building a chit load of NG power plants or nuclear. Absolutely more renewables... but also 1/3 of CO renewables are biomass plants.


View attachment 173610

I'm not tracking that graphic, can you add notes?

 

[BigHornRam]

RIGHT NOW? LOL. I'm guessing you have been a skeptic for years and will continue to be a skeptic. While the world changes all around, you remain convinced that nothing will ever change.

This is where you post up some cutting edge storage links to convince me I am wrong. If you have any to post. I would be the first to invest in solutions that work and move us forward. Unfortunately there is a lot of snake oil being pitched that doesn't hold up under mild scrutiny.

 

[Deleted member 28227]

I'm not tracking that graphic, can you add notes?

This isn't really for anyone else it's just me mentally laying things out...

Essentially source is the first line.

Oil - Oil -Coal - Mining(lithium-silicon - etc)

Production process

Refinement, NG plant- Coal Plant - turbine

Transmission method

Gasoline - Power lines


In CO residential power is coming from three sources, renewable, coal and NG. Cars which use 17% of the total energy consumed in the state are powered by gasoline/diesel.

So essentially the EV car just means that the 17% of our total power that is produced currently by burning gasoline has to come from other sources.

It's not perfect because there are various efficiencies and costs that we/I can't calculate.

but

It's just resource allocation at the end of the day.

You're just increasing the amount of power you need from the sources that supply residential power.

Cars need a certain amount of energy to move and it has to come from somewhere.

 

[BigHornRam]

BH can't accept EVs because Tesla makes them. Any thing Tesla, from cars to rocketships are to be doubted.

I think the Rivian Company has good potential to succeed, mainly because of it's sound grounded leadership, and the variety of solid businesses that are investing capital in it. Tesla not so much.

 

[Deleted member 28227]

@neffa3 the other thing I worry about is how we restructure our system for EVs as @Wildabeast ? shared there are various subsidies on EVs to drive up demand to get them off the ground.

What is the cost once we drop those? Those subsidies work when not many people have them but when there are EVs everywhere.

Giving people who buy a 100k car subsidies, essentially on fuel?

What is the price to society of those breaks, how much would free public transit in NYC or Chicago cost?

Right now gasoline taxes pay for roads, EV vehicles do the same amount of damage that ICE cars or trucks do... but under current regs they don't pay a cent.

Are we going to include a road maintenance surcharge on residential electricity now?

New taxes go over like a lead balloon, most new roads nationwide are toll roads...

Lots of loose ends is all I'm saying.

 

[SAJ-99]

This is where you post up some cutting edge storage links to convince me I am wrong. If you have any to post. I would be the first to invest in solutions that work and move us forward. Unfortunately there is a lot of snake oil being pitched that doesn't hold up under mild scrutiny.

I am not sure what I need to try to convince you of. Storage is being worked on and it is a problem, but it varies as a problem. Varies by region, varies by type. It seems you keeping thing in absolute terms - like everything needs to be one thing or another. My EV example was just an extreme scenario to make the point. The numbers show that even without storage we could cut carbon impact from electricity transmission by 50% relatively easily. A lot of newer Nat gas plants can become the supplemental provider in off-peak times for renewables. You certainly can't start up and shut down a nuclear plant easily. All this requires an super interconnected grid. That has its own set of problems (see East Coast Blackout in 2003 from software bug).

Current admin is looking to replace old government vehicles with EV. This makes sense because we these vehicles have a pretty well-defined path to fit with the range. Also you don't have to worry about where to recharge. UPS and Fed Ex also looking into doing the same thing. Small steps BHR.

 

[BigHornRam]

@neffa3 the other thing I worry about is how we restructure our system for EVs as @Wildabeast ? shared there are various subsidies on EVs to drive up demand to get them off the ground.

What is the cost once we drop those? Those subsidies work when not many people have them but when there are EVs everywhere.

Giving people who buy a 100k car subsidies, essentially on fuel?

What is the price to society of those breaks, how much would free public transit in NYC or Chicago cost?

Right now gasoline taxes pay for roads, EV vehicles do the same amount of damage that ICE cars or trucks do... but under current regs they don't pay a cent.

Are we going to include a road maintenance surcharge on residential electricity now?

New taxes go over like a lead balloon, most new roads nationwide are toll roads...

Lots of loose ends is all I'm saying.

Complex analysis like this makes hard to do 15 seconds of research before "throwing down", right wllm.

 

[Irrelevant]

@neffa3 the other thing I worry about is how we restructure our system for EVs as @Wildabeast ? shared there are various subsidies on EVs to drive up demand to get them off the ground.

What is the cost once we drop those? Those subsidies work when not many people have them but when there are EVs everywhere.

Giving people who buy a 100k car subsidies, essentially on fuel?

What is the price to society of those breaks, how much would free public transit in NYC or Chicago cost?

Right now gasoline taxes pay for roads, EV vehicles do the same amount of damage that ICE cars or trucks do... but under current regs they don't pay a cent.

Are we going to include a road maintenance surcharge on residential electricity now?

New taxes go over like a lead balloon, most new roads nationwide are toll roads...

Lots of loose ends is all I'm saying.

The WA state gas tax is ~$0.5 a gal. If the typical driver does 15k miles per year and drive a 30 mpg car. They pay ~$250 per year in State gas tax. Registration for EVs is $255 vs traditional vehicles are $30.

edit: Fed gas tax is only $0.184 so it would be incredible cheap to add that to the annual registration.

 

[SAJ-99]

Lots of loose ends is all I'm saying.

Your last two posts were spot on. There are two different problems. the first is an engineering/chemical/logistics type problem. The second is the $money$ problem. Human ingenuity has always found a way around the former. The latter is a little tougher.

 

[Deleted member 28227]

The WA state gas tax is ~$0.5 a gal. If the typical driver does 15k miles per year and drive a 30 mpg car. They pay ~$250 per year in State gas tax. Registration for EVs is $255 vs traditional vehicles are $30.

edit: Fed gas tax is only $0.184 so it would be incredible cheap to add that to the annual registration.

For Colorado registration is the exact same and you get a $2,500 tax credit for buying an EV vehicle.

The last road tax bill that we tried to pass got destroyed by voters...

Your last two posts were spot on. There are two different problems. the first is an engineering/chemical/logistics type problem. The second is the $money$ problem. Human ingenuity has always found a way around the former. The latter is a little tougher.

Both problems can be solved, neither is a reason not to do something.

I would like to see some engineers/economists write an article that walks through gasoline v. EV. In my mind if that EV is being powered by coal shipped on trains from half way across the country you have to add that in... it doesn't matter how it could be powered it matters how is is powered.

From when I push that pedal which is using fuels most efficiently, soup to nuts.

 

[Irrelevant]

For Colorado registration is the exact same and you get a $2,500 tax credit for buying an EV vehicle.

The last road tax bill that we tried to pass got destroyed by voters...

Sure, I get it, it doesn't make sense right now, you have to own the EV for 10 years before the state gets a penny in road maintance. But it's also obvious there is a very simple and easy solution in the future.

 

[BigHornRam]

I am not sure what I need to try to convince you of. Storage is being worked on and it is a problem, but it varies as a problem. Varies by region, varies by type. It seems you keeping thing in absolute terms - like everything needs to be one thing or another. My EV example was just an extreme scenario to make the point. The numbers show that even without storage we could cut carbon impact from electricity transmission by 50% relatively easily. A lot of newer Nat gas plants can become the supplemental provider in off-peak times for renewables. You certainly can't start up and shut down a nuclear plant easily. All this requires an super interconnected grid. That has its own set of problems (see East Coast Blackout in 2003 from software bug).

Current admin is looking to replace old government vehicles with EV. This makes sense because we these vehicles have a pretty well-defined path to fit with the range. Also you don't have to worry about where to recharge. UPS and Fed Ex also looking into doing the same thing. Small steps BHR.

This our current cocktail of electrical generation sources. It takes all these sources to keep the lights and if you want throw EV's into the mix, it's going to take that much more. Want to remove some dams, it's going to take that much more. This isn't rocket science.

U.S. utility-scale electricity generation by source, amount, and share of total in 20191
Energy source Billion kWh Share of total
Total - all sources 4,127
Fossil fuels (total) 2,582 62.6%
Natural Gas 1,586 38.4%
Coal 965
23.4%
Petroleum (total) 18
0.4%
Petroleum liquids 12 0.3%
Petroleum coke 7
0.2%
Other gases 13 0.3%
Nuclear 809 19.6%
Renewables (total) 728 17.6%
Wind 295
7.1%
Hydropower 288 7.0%
Solar 72
1.7%
Photovoltaic 69 1.7%
Solar thermal 3
0.1%
Biomass (total) 58 1.4%
Wood 39 0.9%
Landfill gas 10 0.3%
Municipal solid waste (biogenic) 6
0.1%
Other biomass waste 2
0.1%
Geothermal 15 0.4%
Pumped storage hydropower3 -5 -0.1%
Other sources3 13 0.3%
1 Utility-scale electricity generation is electricity generation from power plants with at least one megawatt (or 1,000 kilowatts) of total electricity generating capacity. Data are for net electricity generation.
2 Small-scale solar photovoltaic systems are electricity generators with less than one megawatt of electricity generating capacity that are usually at or near the location where the electricity is consumed. Most small-scale solar photovoltaic systems are installed on building rooftops.
3 Pumped storage hydroelectricity generation is negative because most pumped storage electricity generation facilities use more electricity than they produce on an annual basis. Most pumped storage systems use fossil fuels or nuclear energy for pumping water to the storage component of the system.

 

[Deleted member 28227]

Sure, I get it, it doesn't make sense right now, you have to own the EV for 10 years before the state gets a penny in road maintaince. But it's also obvious there is a very simple and easy solution in the future.

Practical solution sure... easy?

 

[Irrelevant]

Practical solution sure... easy?

I think so. WA has a love hate relationship with registration fees. Also, the $2,500 credit in WA is mostly just not having to pay sales tax, up to $2,500. Sales tax doesn't go into the transportation fund (at least not all of it). But we are getting way out of my wheelhouse now.

 

[SAJ-99]

This our current cocktail of electrical generation sources. It takes all these sources to keep the lights and if you want throw EV's into the mix, it's going to take that much more. Want to remove some dams, it's going to take that much more. This isn't rocket science.

U.S. utility-scale electricity generation by source, amount, and share of total in 20191
Energy source Billion kWh Share of total
Total - all sources 4,127
Fossil fuels (total) 2,582 62.6%
Natural Gas 1,586 38.4%
Coal 965
23.4%
Petroleum (total) 18
0.4%
Petroleum liquids 12 0.3%
Petroleum coke 7
0.2%
Other gases 13 0.3%
Nuclear 809 19.6%
Renewables (total) 728 17.6%
Wind 295
7.1%
Hydropower 288 7.0%
Solar 72
1.7%
Photovoltaic 69 1.7%
Solar thermal 3
0.1%
Biomass (total) 58 1.4%
Wood 39 0.9%
Landfill gas 10 0.3%
Municipal solid waste (biogenic) 6
0.1%
Other biomass waste 2
0.1%
Geothermal 15 0.4%
Pumped storage hydropower3 -5 -0.1%
Other sources3 13 0.3%
1 Utility-scale electricity generation is electricity generation from power plants with at least one megawatt (or 1,000 kilowatts) of total electricity generating capacity. Data are for net electricity generation.
2 Small-scale solar photovoltaic systems are electricity generators with less than one megawatt of electricity generating capacity that are usually at or near the location where the electricity is consumed. Most small-scale solar photovoltaic systems are installed on building rooftops.
3 Pumped storage hydroelectricity generation is negative because most pumped storage electricity generation facilities use more electricity than they produce on an annual basis. Most pumped storage systems use fossil fuels or nuclear energy for pumping water to the storage component of the system.

BHR, you are bringing me down man. Show some optimism. I am however impressed by your google search of electricity production by source. I feel we are making some progress.
Y
our assumption is that all sources are operating at peak capacity and all energy used to generate electricity is consumed as electricity. The reality is a considerable amount is lost in the conversion process and transmission. Problems, yes, but solvable.