The American Spectator : Comparing Apples and Orangutans

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The Energy Spectator

Comparing Apples and Orangutans

By John Droz, Jr. on 5.14.10 @ 6:07AM

The mistaken "equivalency" between renewables and conventional power sources.

One of the most important energy matters to understand is that popular "renewable" electrical energy sources are not even remotely equivalent to our conventional energy sources.

Of course lobbyists don't want consumers and politicians to think about that fact, so they go to great lengths to disguise it. Everything they propagate is based on an "equivalency" between "renewables" and conventional power sources that does not exist in the real world.

Even generally objective sources like the Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration (EIA) seriously err when they show such things as levelized cost charts that have wind energy and nuclear power in contiguous columns.

The first problem encountered here is the term "renewables." This is bantered about as if it were: 1) a scientific definition, and 2) a homogeneous group of energy sources. This is lobbyist sleight of hand, as neither is true. It isn't my purpose here to go into the details of this charade but suffice it to say that the definition is very subjective, and there are extraordinary differences between various "renewables." (See here and here.)

After you've grasped those details, the heavy lifting begins. The trick here is to get our heads around the fundamental difference between something like wind energy and nuclear power.

I'm just a physicist and not a professional communicator, so wordology doesn't come naturally to me. However, what I have learned is that most people have a better chance of understanding complex matters when an analogy is used. Let's try that here.

My suggested comparison is to look at two types of transportation (a parallel energy sector), using concepts we are all familiar with.

Let's say that we have a business that repeatedly needs to get 50,000 pounds of goods from New York City to Denver, in two days, and cost is quite important. (In the electricity business this translates to satisfying a demand [load], through dispatchable energy, reliably and economically.)

So who do we subcontract this job to? A good option is to put this merchandise on an 18-wheeler and send it on its way. Will it always get there 100% of the time without fail? No, flukes do happen. However, if this experiment were repeated 100 times, the truck would arrive well over 90% of the time, on schedule and within budget. This is equivalent to using a conventional energy source, like nuclear power.

Now let's say greenologists are introduced into the equation, and they arbitrarily add a new requirement that no fossil fuel can be used. Oops. Our options are now severely restricted.

The parallel choice to using wind energy is to send the merchandise with golf carts (battery powered so no fossil fuel will be consumed during transport). The question is: how many golf carts will it take to dependably replicate the performance of one Mack truck?

Let's say a golf cart can carry 500 pounds (two golfers with sticks). To transport 50,000 pounds that would work out to 100 golf carts.

This is essentially the message that the lobbyists want you to buy: that approximately 100 golf carts (wind turbines) will do the job of one 18-wheeler (conventional source: e.g. a coal facility). They want you to blink and move on. Do not look behind the curtain! But wait! Can the golf carts get really there in two days? Of course not. The lobbyists answer is to add more vehicles: use 1,000 carts!

Does this "solution" really solve anything? No, but it further confuses politicians not used to critical thinking. What it also does is to insure more profit for the cart industry -- which is the only concern of the lobbyists.

What if the load is a hundred 500 pound pianos? Even though (on paper) a golf cart can carry 500 pounds, can a golf cart transport a piano across country? The lobbyists' answer: disassemble the load and use more carts. (Yes, they are slick.)

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About the Author

John Droz, Jr. is a physicist and environmental advocate.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (34) | Leave a comment

SC Mike| 5.14.10 @ 8:00AM

Mr. Droz’s point is somewhat like expectations for a second marriage, the triumph of hope over experience.

We do have years of experience with so-called “conventional” sources, some of which are carbon-based (oil and coal), others are not (geothermal and hydro). What most folks seem to overlook is that we’ve adopted these sources -- they’ve become conventional -- because they pass the tests of reliability and reasonable cost. Nuclear and coal plants generate oodles of power where electric needs are high, hydroelectric dams work where there’s oodles of water, natural gas turbines can be put almost anywhere, and petroleum fuels our mobile needs.

Enter the politicians and we get things like corn-based ethanol, a lousy idea for lots of reasons, but it won’t die. It exists solely due to tax preferences and mandates, yet the facts that it destroys engines and pollutes more are overlooked. Its use as fuel for our mobile needs has never been subject to the same level of scrutiny, i.e., testing, that petroleum products have been.

Wind and solar technologies are used more widely, but to date are driven primarily by mandates, tax preferences, and subsidies. They work best where “conventional” energy sources are not readily available simply because they are expensive, producing power at a total cost significantly higher. In fact, we learn more of the costs as deployment continues. Windmills, the bat / bird Cuisinarts, take up a lot of real estate and produce a low-frequency sound that drives most folks mad. The turbines don’t seen to last as long as originally expected. Solar panels vary in complexity and cost and take up a lot of space. Electric cars make sense if one’s motoring needs don’t range far from home and as long as one’s not bothered by the inefficiency of hauling around a large heavy battery and ignores for now the future costs associated with recycling all those batteries.

Sadly there’s no sign that this madness will end soon.

John Droz jr.| 5.14.10 @ 12:50PM

SC Mike:

Agreed.

The madness will end when citizens insist on Sounc Scientific Solutions for our technical challanges.

In my view we need an Energy FDA.

Mel Torme| 5.14.10 @ 7:26PM

No, Mr. Droz, we DON'T need another government agency to screw up the screwed-up solutions to made-up (think global-warming hoax) problems. Are you just plain insane? Your left-wing knee-jerk answer to SC Mike's comment just shows us how even the supposed good guys can ruin our country.

All it takes for the right energy production methods to be used is to let the free market work. We don't get to see a free market very often in this country anymore. In fact, sometimes you've got to go to China to observe a real free market (not in all things, but in small business, we can learn from them).

Do you think in a free market, a company will just decide to build out an energy plant of any kind that has not been proven to work? Why would they? Most companies don't like going bankrupt. That is, in a free market with no bailouts, they don't like going bankrupt. The shareholders or owners just don't take too kindly to that.

Let the people do their own thing, and you will see prosperity and freedom. This goes for any industry.

Frickin' closet Commies! I'm trying to read this site without having to write in all the time with corrections. Damn, this is wasting a lot of my time.

John Droz jr.| 5.14.10 @ 7:54PM

Mel:

It is a nice idealized belief that free markets will be a cure all, and (in general) I support free markets.

Unfortunately, we live in the real world, and free markets have their limitations and liabilities.

I am ordinarily against government agencies, but just consider where we would be with pharmeceutical products if there was no FDA.

Any drug company could make essentially any claim. We should just assume that "informed" citizens could sort these out?

We have a similar situation with energy: any company IS making any claim, and no one is holding them accountable.

I just made a suggestion. If you have a better one, please provide it.

Mel Torme| 5.14.10 @ 9:11PM

If you are writing about companies making false claims during their business deals, the solution lies with a court of law. That is obvious. Companies don't like to be sued either. Governments however, can't be sued, for the most part. When they do stupid things or lie to the public, all the public can do is bend over some more and take it.

Do you know what ASME standards are about? Do you know that these standards originated way more than 100 years ago; at that time the worry was exploding pressure vessels (any type of boiler or storage tank, etc.) Do you know that the problem was solved back then without any government's help? Why? Good question. It was because engineers don't want to be responsible for designing things that kill people (accidentally, that is!). So, the standards were developed by the mech. engineers with the know-how using mechanics, and the solution was pretty damn good, as you don't hear about boilers or tanks just exploding, except when people violate the standards.

Ever hear of the USPA (skydiving association)? They are not a government agency. Skydiving was dangerous in the past, but the actual practice of jumping out of a plane with a main and a reserve chute is pretty damn safe now (it's the airplane ride up that may be questionable, BTW). Does a jumper or a drop zone operation have to listen to the USPA? Good question. No, they don't. Why do they, in that case? Good question. It is because they don't want to die. (oooh, good answer!)

Ever heard of Underwriter's Laboratories? Maybe you have at least seen a sticker on a light fixture or power cord saying "UL". That "U" stands for "Underwriter's" and that "L" stands for "Laboratory", OK? So, these guys made standards for electrical products way back. Why do companies comply with those standards? They really don't want people to die from their products.

Who in the Sam Hill pays for these dang organizations, huh? They can't all be volunteers. No, they aren't all, but an industry can support a standards group easily, and they will if it will help make their products or services safer for the public. You can get a lamp that's not UL approved (go to China), and you can jump out of any old air airplane with no USPA rules, and you can make your own boiler out of riveted tin cans for all I care. It is up to you - that is freedom, my friend.

That last sentence comes to the gist of it. Left-wingers and others who keep thinking the government is the answer to all their problems have a basic misunderstanding of people. They think people are stupid. (Admit it, you must think that.) People will form associations and do the right thing if the government gets out of the way. People only ACT stupidly when there is a government incentive to do so, and there are plenty of those.

Stupid is as stupid does, as some moron once said.

Mel Torme| 5.15.10 @ 11:45AM

Well, I guess my suggestions of freedom, free enterprise, free markets, and non-stupid Americans doing non-stupid things when let alone does not impress you. If you were an engineer, I would be very disappointed in you, Mr. Droz. However, I see you are a physicist, so I can't say too much here.

BTW, I didn't know you were the writer of the article until this morning when I refreshed the page. I do appreciate it when the writers bother to read the comments, even when the commenter gets a bit pissed in having to correct these serious misunderstandings of economic common sense (not the gist of your analogy of the golf cars vs. trucking, but your sick sheeplike belief in government as the answer to your problems.)

Curly Smith| 5.14.10 @ 8:21AM

While I agree that renewables are game of charades, the correct transportation comparison is a conventional 18-wheeler and a bio-diesel powered 18-wheeler. Although the ultimate in renewable transpiration is a "Prairie schooner"; heck, you could probably attract taxpayer funding by replacing the oxen with sails... Save the World with a Wind Schooner!

John Droz jr.| 5.14.10 @ 12:45PM

Curly:

Yes, a prairie schooner with sails would be another analogy.

In the example I restricted the business owners choices to existing types of available transportation — which is the situation we have with electrical energy.

Indiana Alex| 5.14.10 @ 9:37AM

In the evil, profit driven, business world, we are constantly looking to employ new technology, for the goal of improving productivity, and or saving money.

Never would a new technoloy be adopted by any sort of a smart company without a true Proof Of Concept.

It has to be tested and verified before a single dollar is spent.

Yet the government lays out tens to hundreds of billions of dollars with no idea whether the concept will even work in the long run, regardless of cost/benefits.

Yeah, these are the people we want deciding which health care proceedures are worth while and which aren't.

owyheewine| 5.14.10 @ 10:24AM

The analogy is good, but misses the key question of scale. Current energy usage in this country is something like 300 quadrillion BTUs a day. That is the equivalent of at least 15 million windmills.
I recently read that one fairly large Kentucky coal mine produces as much energy as all of the windmills and solar cells currently in operation.
Renewables may have a small role in our energy future, but the scale is so small that even if we repeal the laws of physics and find a way to store produced energy economically for the times that wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine, they can never be anything more than a supplementry part of our energy future.

John Droz jr.| 5.14.10 @ 11:30AM

Owyheewine:

Yes, scale is an issue. The whole point though is that wind energy is NOT just a more dilute, more inefficient, more inexpensive source of electrical power. It is much more that than.

No number of golf carts can replace the reliability, and cost of a single Mack truck in this example. Not 100, not 1000, not 10,000, not a million.

The difference is much more than scale. It's like comparng a rowboat to a lawnmower, or a tree to a bicycle, or apples to orangutans.

John Droz jr.| 5.14.10 @ 11:32AM

Sorry, a typo. I meant to say "more expensive..."

DatsunMark| 5.14.10 @ 3:48PM

Mr. Droz jr,
I liked your article. There is (1) efficient transfer of energy that is taking place with renewables: the transfer of my grandchildren's wealth and human effort to the green lobby and politicans.

owyheewine| 5.14.10 @ 4:51PM

We actually agree. In fact the effects are additive if not multiplicative. Of course both points are lost on lawyer politicians, bureaucrats and almost all journalists.

roadmaster| 5.15.10 @ 11:17AM

Good article and some good responses. Having been in and around trucking most of my life, I've watched the equipment evolve to become much more efficient over the years, UNTIL gubmint stuck it's nose in and enforced unrealistic emission requirements which actually REDUCE fuel efficiency and longevity of big truck engines.
Ten years ago, it wasn't unusual for a Mack or a Freightliner to average 7 mpg (20+ years ago, if you got 5 mpg, you were ecstatic) and last for 1 million miles or more, without a major overhaul. Since regulations compelling manufacturers to build their engines with recirculating exhaust gas systems and other expensive add ons, diesel engines burn hotter, use more fuel and wear out faster.
I've been out of the biz for the last few years because I was sick of being looked upon as a captive source of revenue for cities, states and Feds and endlessly demonized, simply for being.
We used to joke in the truck stops about mounting sails and solar panels on our trucks to placate the tree huggers, who work endlessly to destroy the very system which brings them EVERYTHING!
I once hauled an electric truck designed to service airplanes to a show in Vegas and had a long and interesting discussion with the developer. He was interested in using my Peterbilt as a testbed, to try new electric technologies to boost my fuel efficiency. He had some very interesting ideas about wheel mounted generators/brakes, but the killer for me was the extra weight - 3000 pounds or more for motor, batteries, extra wiring and such. That would reduce my capacity to around 45K which meant less revenue. I was barely able to haul 48K at the time and lost out on many loads of 50K.
Energy sources and systems would naturally balance out, IF the free market were allowed to work. Putting unnecessary restraints on any one area causes a ripple effect, therefore, the steadily increasing rates to get stuff from point A to point B. I see big trucks going up and down the road every day and wonder just how much longer they can run on little profits and burgeoning regulation.
Remember, if you got IT, a truck brought IT!!!

John Droz jr.| 5.15.10 @ 5:18PM

Thank you for sharing.

Indeed the government has screwed up MANY things. However, that indisputable fact does not mean that it is impossible for the government to do something right.

In my view, the main reason for the government screwups in the technology areas (e.g. energy) is that we citizens have allowed lobbyists for self-serving interests to dominate policy decisions.

My view is that if independent scientists were the main basis for policy decisions, that there would be fewer errors.

Ryan| 5.14.10 @ 10:41AM

Something else not addressed - the production of the renewable technology devices - particularly batteries and solar cells - is both highly toxic and materials have to be transported all over the place for manufacture and assembly.

John Droz jr.| 5.14.10 @ 11:34AM

Ryan:

That's true. Also there are special materials used that only come from places like China. We are then moving our oil dependence (Canada) to other materials dependence (China).

Sounds like a well thought out plan.

Ken (Old Texican)| 5.14.10 @ 11:45AM

Mr. Droz,
Thank you. Analogies (parables?) have always been a proven reliable means of transporting a concept or idea.

I literally want to tear at my hair with the energy myths being bought by so many Americans.

Teflon93| 5.14.10 @ 12:36PM

Milton Friedman once was an advisor to the Chilean government. He was taken to a job site where Chileans were hard at work with shovels. He asked where the earth-moving equipment was. The response of his hosts was that they didn't use it---using such equipment would cost jobs.

Friedman puzzled over this a moment, then asked, "So why don't you give them spoons then?"

John Droz jr.| 5.14.10 @ 12:42PM

Excellent parallel!

Nick| 5.14.10 @ 3:35PM

I don't get it.

Why is there a picture of Joy Behar next to this article?

Dan McKay| 5.14.10 @ 5:40PM

A man starts a bus company with a hundred buses and several different routes. He becomes successful because he has dependable buses and customers available to travel the routes he has selected. The government sees his success and mandates that 20% of his fleet be of a poor quality bus, jalopies. These jalopies never make a trip without breaking down.His customers get very disturbed with these unreliable buses and the owner knows that this will ruin him, so he designates a new route for these jalopies. A route no one ever travels. No customers on these routes; no customer complaints.
Another man works daily routing electricity to customers.The government mandates a jalopy generator be used for 20% of his business. Knowing how unreliable this jalopy generator is, will this man find the unused route, sending this electricity through so many miles of power lines it eventually disappears.

Marc Jeric| 5.14.10 @ 7:00PM

The success this giant scam of green or renewable energy enjoys today is the result of teachers unions teaching - self esteem, feeling good.
1) Ethylene production increases our petroleum imports: tilling machines, fertilizer produced from petroleum, spreading fertilizers and pesticides, harvesting machines, truck transport, chemical factories using heat and electricity to produce ethylene, distribution by trucks...Energy equation is totally negative. Same goes for diesel production from whatever - algae, grass...
2) Wind power: unreliable, expensive, mass cuisinars of birds (birds do not see the blades);
3) Battery-operated cars; one just has to plug it overnight (and the electricity comes from where?);
4) Hydrogen operated cars; electrolysis of water to produce hydrogen consumes more electricity than hydrogen is worth;
5) Solar power (this comes from the sun's hydrogen bomb reaction); unreliable, dispersed, costly mirrors that need daily cleaning, covering huge areas in perpetual shade thus killing everything under them; killers of birds that fly into their concentrated rays; like wind, about 4 times more expensive (when available) than coal or nuclear or gas or oil;
6) Geothermal; necessarily small, produce huge amounts of arsenic and radioactive Selenium and Cesium;
7) Tidal power plants; huge areas necessary, prohibitively expensive maintenance, subject to weather extremes, rare areas where practicable.
Etc., etc. I worked 40 years in the design of power plants - coal-fired, oil-fired, gas-fired, nuclear, hydro, solar, geothermal, wind. None of these "renewable" or "green" energies is new; some of them like windmills are older than Don Quijote.

John Droz jr.| 5.15.10 @ 6:32AM

Marc:

Very good that you made the "self-esteem" connection. See http://tinyurl.com/34nn3g8 and http://tinyurl.com/344xtdr.

Linda | 5.17.10 @ 7:13AM

America relies on perception and not truth. Please continue to keep educating us about the truth.

Bob R Geologist| 5.15.10 @ 4:09AM

The thing that burns my tail as a scientist is that these Green dreamer's continue to support their politically inspired POLICY that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are a danger to life on earth and must be drastically curtained. This is the biggest lie against nature ever, bigger even than creationism. They ignore the fact that greenhouse gases are our only protection from a sun that is barely adequate to protect us from icing up again and again which has happened numerous times in the past. We are in an intergalcial at this moment of geological time, the fifth in the last 1.75 million years. Dr. Jones, head of the climate unit at E. Anglia U, in the UK, a kingpin of climate research, admitted publicly, that there had been no warming of the world climate during the past 15 years! Yet our Gov't continues to push Cap and Trade that will probably complete the collapse of our economy for no good scientific reason whatever.

John Droz jr.| 5.15.10 @ 6:37AM

Bob:

Indeed.

Hopefully you checked out the link at the end of the article http://EnergyPresentation.Info.

I also have a free periodic energy newsletter that you may be interested in. If so email me at "aaprjohn@northnet.org".

Larry| 5.15.10 @ 11:30AM

Mr. Droz, an excellent article. And your power point is also excellent. You are a better communicator than you give yourself credit for. I wish there were more scientists/engineers like you who would speak out on these issues, because there is a lot of nonsense being spewed out there on the subject of renewable energy in the political world.

John Droz jr.| 5.15.10 @ 5:24PM

Larry:

Thank you for your support. I have dedicated thousands of hours of my life towards educating citizens about energy and environmental issues.

Among the downsides is the fact that my golf game has gone to hell.

Email me at "aaprjohn@northnet" if you'd like to get my free, periodic energy newsletter.

Curtis| 5.16.10 @ 1:13PM

We can dither on power plants all we want, the absolute truth is that our power transportation system (The lines themselves) are in bad condition, and in some cases are nearing obsolescence.

To stick to the authors analogy, we're arguing over whether to run semis or golfcarts over dirt trails and two lane roads.

We can't fully utilize our energy assets until we build the lines capable of interlinking our electrical system so that shortages in one place can be fed by the over capacities in another.

First fix the transmission lines, then we can argue over effective power generation.

Though I must say, I believe the author is right about the hidden costs of 'renewable' energy, both monetary, and environmentally. The power itself may be 'clean' but how many exotic materials are used in the manufacture of solar panels? How much fuel are you going to burn servicing a hundred wind turbines interspersed over a thousand isolated acres? How many miles worth of service roads are you going to have to bulldoze through pristine land to access your turbines in order to run service and maintenance?

The current placement policies don't work, even the environmentalists know this as they NIMBY out most placement attempts. (IE Pelosi fighting the Mojave projects.) We like to smirk at the yuppies fighting the wind turbines off Marthas' Vineyard ("NNNOOO, Not my beautiful view! Can't you place those things near poor people!?) But the truth is putting wind turbines in the stormy north Atlantic is not a bright idea, you're going to wind up with a lot of wrecked turbines after each storm.

You could place them in shallower water, behind a storm break, but yet again you are moving dirt and tinkering with the environment to make things work. Not exactly 'nature freindly'.

Bob R Geologist| 5.24.10 @ 2:15AM

John Droz, I don[t think you took my Geological comments seriously, engineers are inclined to do that. I might add that I have been reading lots of climate science since I read the Kyoto Protocols. Those Greenies that concocted that AGW hypothesis are guilty of knowing nothing about past climates--that CO2 has been as high as 20 X our present 390ppm without burning up the Earth. As long as we have ice at our poles the earth is in glacial mode. We are in our 5th interglacial epoch of the Pleistocene that began only 1.75 million yrs ago, a mere moment of geol.
time. CO2 never has initiated warming. There have been 5 known major extinctions of life, 3 due go ice ages, a meteor strike, and a huge basalt extrusion in Siberia poisoned the atmosphere. I am convinced from the geological evidence that we are a few deg C below an ideal climate and much more likely to freeze than burn. Nobody can predict climate or micromanage it. Climate is a geologic process, global in scope and beyond man's meager resources. As long as the mantle (a few miles below Earth's crust) remains hot and more or less plastic, plate tectonics will continue to alter our geography at about the speed of grass growing. Environmentalists must learn that the earth is always changing without any help from mankind or eventually we'll all die broke from some stupid idea like cap & trade.