The Big Green fiasco

 Power Line:

Around the world, “green” energy is failing with consequences that soon will be catastrophic. From the U.K.: “Ireland freezes power exports to UK as energy costs rocket tenfold.”

Shockingly, if you depend on wind energy you are in trouble when the wind stops blowing.

Ireland has been forced to freeze power exports to the UK to prevent a shortage which could have sparked blackouts as surging energy prices continue to cause chaos across Europe.

A toxic combination of low wind speeds and a severe squeeze on the supply of natural gas sent power costs jumping tenfold on the British mainland on Thursday to as much as £2,300 per megawatt-hour, a new record high.

If my arithmetic is correct, that is around 21 times the average cost of electricity in the U.S. at current exchange rates. The U.S. has the resources to offset a squeeze on natural gas supplies, but the Biden administration is opposed to domestic gas production.

Ireland’s Single Electricity Market Operator had issued an amber warning on Thursday morning, alerting the public to a “general shortfall” of electricity which could result in power cuts.

The cost of energy has been spiralling across Europe, due in part to calm weather which has drastically reduced the availability of renewable power.
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The spiralling prices will prompt further concern among officials who were earlier this week forced to fire up coal-based plants in an effort to cope with tight supplies.

In Spain, day-ahead electricity prices hit a record €152.32 a megawatt-hour according to Bloomberg. In France, the benchmark power price for delivery next year was at a record €99.50.

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Wind and solar energy are just not reliable.  They are both vulnerable to extreme weather.  The Texas deep freeze led to blackouts when wind machines failed in the storm.  There have been pictures of the ruin of several acres of solar panels damaged by a hurricane recently.  The European problem appears to be not even related to extreme weather.  It is just a failure of alternative unreliable energy.

It is also time to remind everyone of the serial failure of the doom and gloom projections of Big Green over the last five-plus decades.  They keep saying we have 10 to 12 years to save the world by adopting their crappy ideas.  But the poles are still not ice-free and New York City is still not underwater as predicted.  We should stop listening to those who have been so wrong for so long.