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Falling Out of Love with Cape Wind

by Dan Haley
1/31/2012

Some time ago a friend of mine (who I've mentioned) turned me on to the energycollective.com, a thoughtful, interesting blog on energy ad climate issues written primarily by subject matter experts (scientists, engineers, etc) in the renewable energy field, mostly from a non-political advocacy perspective. It is a good resource for people who occasionally like to get a sense of what is going on in that market space without all of the political baggage that tends to be loaded onto it in the mainstream media (from both sides).


Of particular note for present purposes is the fact that the blog is underwritten by Siemens AG, an self-described "global powerhouse in electronics and electrical engineering" that, among many other things, will manufacture the turbines for Cape Wind, should that project ever actually break water. So we're hardly talking about a font of green skepticism here. To the contrary.

Anyhow, I recently stumbled on an interesting analysis from March of last year, by Willem Post of the Coalition for Energy Solutions. Titled "Examples of Wind Power to Learn From," the piece uses a series of examples of costly, failed or otherwise deficient wind power projects to illustrate the proposition that with current technology, political promises and rhetoric about such projects too often bear little resemblance to their reality. One of the examples is our very own Cape Wind (the emphasis is mine):
 

Various government entities, eager to show their greenness regarding global warming, passed laws to subsidize renewable power, so-called “green power”, as if there is such a thing. Some governments even passed laws that declare hydropower as non-renewable, but, on reflection of its implications, reversed themselves and passed laws that declare hydropower IS renewable, as recently did Vermont’s legislature.

President Andrew Jackson, Democrat, Populist: “When government subsidizes, the well-connected benefit the most”. The renewables subsidies to the politically-well-connected often result in uneconomic wind power projects, some of which are described in this article.

Vendors, owners, financiers often claim “trade secrets”, whereas in reality they want to obfuscate wind power’s shortcomings, a too-generous subsidy deal, or other insider’s advantage. It would be much better for all involved, if there were public hearings and full disclosure regarding the economics of any project receiving government subsidies, to ensure the people’s funds receive the best return on investment...

EXAMPLE: EXPENSIVE POWER FROM WIND FACILITY IN LONG ISLAND SOUND

Cape Wind Associates, LLC, plans to build and operate a wind facility on the Outer Continental Shelf offshore of Massachusetts. The wind facility would have a rated capacity of 468 MW consisting of 130 turbines @ 3.6 MW each made by Siemens AG, a German company, maximum blade height 440 feet, to be arranged in a grid pattern in 25 square miles of Nantucket Sound in federal waters off Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, and Nantucket Island.

The Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities approved a 15-yr power purchase agreement, PPA, between the utility National Grid and Cape Wind Associates, LLC. National Grid agreed to buy 50% of the wind facility’s power starting at $0.187/kWh in 2013 (base year), escalating at 3.5%/yr which means the 2028 price to the utility will be $0.313/kWh. The project is currently trying to sell the other 50% of its power so financing can proceed; so far no takers, because significant quantities of less expensive power from other renewables is available.

A household using 618 kWh/month will see an average wind power surcharge of about $1.50 on its monthly electric bill over the 15 year life of the contract; if the other 50% of power is sold on the same basis, it may add another $1.50 per month. Tens of thousands of households and businesses will all be chipping in to make the owners of Cape Wind Associates richer.

Power production is estimated at 468 MW x 8,760 hr/yr x CF 0.39 = 1.6 GWh/yr.

The capital cost is estimated at about $2.0 billion, or $4,274/kW. Federal subsidies would be 30% as a grant.

Does any of that sound familiar? How about now? Just one more. I back-link to those prior posts not as a "told you so" (or not entirely anyhow), but rather to underscore the decree to which the above apolitical analysis meshes with precisely the criticism that Cape Wind opponents have been making since it became clear that the project (with the full blessing and cooperation of the state) intends to subsidize itself not only with a 1/3 federal grant, but also by forcing consumers to pay a huge premium on the price of their energy - even though cheaper sources of renewable energy are available.


 

 

A Picture Worth At Least 4997 Words
[Source: Institute for Energy Research]

 

As a practical policy matter this makes zero sense. It is all about politicians "eager," in Mr. Post's words, "to show their greenness regarding global warming," to the exclusion of any and all other considerations. Or as Governor Patrick put it in November 2010, "This project is all about our clean energy future" - emphasis on the all and never you mind about our expensive energy present or all of the businesses these bone-headed decisions are pricing out of expansion in the Commonwealth.

As the energycollective.com post illustrates, this isn't about opposition to renewable energy, or even to government "investment" in developing the technologies that we hope will someday obviate the need for fossil fuels. It is about unnecessary and destructive policy decisions made in blind fealty to the whims of a popular and fashionable movement.

When even some of the people the Patrick Administration and their friends in DC are trying to impress are beginning to recognize the fatal flaws in these projects, it is time for someone to clue in the politicians

 

Comments (1)

I believe you meant to type: theenergycollective.com The link: energycollective.com ...is for a different site. I was just wondering how you felt about the approximately 500 billion dollars of annual subsidies (globally) that we give to the fossil fuel industry?

Dianna Vosburg | 2012-02-07 14:53:59