Off The Net For Awhile -- Going Biking -- April 21, 2016; Wind Generation Growth Slowed In 2015 As Wind Speeds Declined -- Was This Predicted By The Warmists? Enquiring Minds Want To Know; I Guess This Is Why It's Called "Unreliable" Energy

Bill Walton: It's All About The Bike.

But I don’t think I’ve talked to someone who loves to ride a bicycle as much as Bill Walton.

“I love to ride all day,” Walton told me on a recent afternoon, in a telephone interview. “My dream is to do 100 miles a day. Get up, have breakfast, get going, ride all day, stop for lunch, ride, come home, take a swim, take a Jacuzzi, have a hot shower, have dinner, go to bed, get up and do it again, day after day.”

You see what I mean.

 And now this:

But before we go, a couple of Bakken economy stories.

First, from The Williston Herald:

Mercy Medical Center (MMC) formally announced on Tuesday that it is joining to a regional healthcare system and will unite with nine healthcare facilities in central and western North Dakota.

CHI Mercy Medical Center in Williston, CHI St. Joseph’s Health in Dickinson, CHI Carrington Health in Carrington, CHI Mercy Hospital in Devil’s Lake and CHI St. Alexius Health in Bismarck, Garrison, Turtle Lake, Minot, Mandan, and Washburn will be united under one name, CHI St. Alexius Health.

Largest biker bar to re-open -- in time for next summer's Sturgis rally:

A popular Sturgis bar that burned down after last year’s 75th anniversary of the town’s rally will be rebuilt and moved after a major expansion is planned.

The new location will be a 600-acre site five miles from the original bar at the former Broken Spoke campground near the base of Bear Butte.

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Wind Slows

Updates

April 25, 2016: same story reported in utilitydive.com.

• U.S. wind energy generation rose to 191 TWh in 2015, accounting for 4.7% of the country’s electricity. That was an increase on the 4.4% wind contributed to U.S. power in 2014 but, due to weaker winds, it was only a 5.1% increase on 2014’s total TWh, the smallest increase in wind’s output since 1999.
• Weather patterns in the Western U.S. caused lower wind speeds and decreased wind production in the first half of 2015, though the same weather patterns caused the stronger winds in the central U.S. that were the basis for major wind output growth in that region.
• U.S. wind’s cumulative installed capacity reached 73 GW in 2015. New wind capacity grew by 8.1 GW, a 12.9% gain, and wind led all resources in new installed capacity for the year, accounting for 41% of new U.S. megawatts. Wind was second only to hydropower in TWh of generation from renewable sources.

Original Post

 

Wind speeds slowing down? Was this predicted by the warmists? There seems to be absolutely no correlation between wind capacity growth and wind energy generation growth -- every time you look more closely at intermittent energy you find another reason not to like it.....just staying....

Link here.

Wow, capacity increased significantly last year (see below) while actual generation slowed considerably. Interesting, huh? That would be like drilling more oil wells and coming up with less oil, I suppose.

EPA Chief admits: ‘I’m not disagreeing’ states with climate regs have ‘triple’ the electric rate. Link here.

Pointing out the high costs of electricity in states that have implemented climate regulations similar to EPA’s proposed Clean Power Plan, Senator Bill Cassidy tells EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, “states that emit the most carbon have the lowest energy costs [while those] that emit the least have the highest — in some cases triple…” Administrator McCarthy responds, “I guess I’m not disagreeing with your– the facts that you’ve outlined them just there.”

SENATOR CASSIDY: “In a previous conversation we’ve had, I’ve made the point that if the Clean Power Plant [sic] rule raises energy costs, that will put our economy at a economic disadvantage relative to countries overseas which frankly will continue to pollute or emit carbon. Now, we wanted to test this hypothesis, so we took all the states in the United States, and we looked at those which have the easiest compliance with the Clean Power Plant [sic] rule, i.e. they currently emit the less [sic], and those states that are going to have the hardest time, they emit the most. And, turns out there is kind of an inverse correlation with electricity costs. So, if you look at RGGI states for example, the Northeast, they have electricity costs that are three times higher than that for a state like Montana.”

ADMINISTRATOR MCCARTHY: “Mmmhmm (affirmative).”

SENATOR CASSIDY: “Now, I think I remember you saying, ‘No, it’s possible to lower emissions without raising the costs’, but I’ll just say it, baseline, these states which have the lowest emissions of carbon already have triple the cost of their electricity.”