Op-Ed: Yes, coal and natural gas remain much cheaper than wind and solar

[rangerrebew]

Op-Ed: Yes, coal and natural gas remain much cheaper than wind and solar
Opinion by James Taylor | The Heartland Institute • 19h

Renewable power advocates often claim wind and solar are less expensive energy sources than coal, natural gas and nuclear power. Such a claim begs the question of why the heavily subsidized Ivanpah solar power facility is going out of business, following a long line of other renewable energy project bankruptcies. Also, why would most of the world continue to build coal power plants if it is more expensive than wind and solar? The answer is wind and solar are expensive, financial losers. A recent peer-reviewed analysis proves that point.
 
A recent study, published in the peer-reviewed journal Energy, reports on the full-system levelized cost of electricity generation. The term “full-system” is key. Many entities have assessed what it costs utilities to purchase or produce electricity from existing sources and deliver it to customers. These cost assessments, however, ignore the intermittency of wind and solar and how intermittency adds substantial costs to the entire electric grid. The cost assessments also fail to account for how wind and solar projects cannot be built just anywhere and often require new, long, expensive, and inefficient transformation lines to deliver power from the generation locations to consumers. This also adds substantial costs to the overall electric grid.

The peer-reviewed Energy study analyzes these factors and presents an apples-to-apples cost comparison on the full-system cost of wind, solar, coal, natural gas and nuclear power. The verdict is devastating to wind and solar power and explains why most of the world prefers to build coal and natural gas power plants.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/op-ed-yes-coal-and-natural-gas-remain-much-cheaper-than-wind-and-solar/ar-AA1A9Pmq?ocid=widgetonlockscreen&cvid=4660ae7ac2da4cc5a438c91f5f56102a&ei=100

[Fishrrman]

Coal should be the go-to fuel for power plants.

Natural gas should be directed towards home heating/cooking and towards industrial applications (power generation, not so much).

[Bigun]

Coal Thorium should be the go-to fuel for power plants.

Natural gas should be directed towards home heating/cooking and towards industrial applications (power generation, not so much).

  (As corrected.)

[DefiantMassRINO]

America needs an all-of-the-above energy portfolio for national security, economic security, and competitive advantage in the Global marketplace.

All of it ... thorium, traditional nuclear, natural gas, coal, oil, geo-thermal, hydro, wind, solar, energy storage, tidal - combined with a more robust, integrated, efficient near-real-time smart grid will improve the efficiency and reduce the cost of a next generation electric future.

The mistake of the Biden Boondoggle was to replace less expensive, more reliable sources of electricity with more expensive, less reliable renewables ... instead of just integrating renewables into a diversified, modernized energy grid.

Oil, natural gas, and coal are outputs of natural processes that have gone on for hundreds of millions or years.

At one time in the Earth's history, before micro-organisms used photosynthesis to oxygenate our atmosphere, our atmospehere was comprised of carbon dioxide and sulfure dioxide.  Ironically, at that time, O₂ was a pollutant.  Life evolved and adapted to a change to an oxygenated atmosphere.

[IsailedawayfromFR]

Coal should be the go-to fuel for power plants.

Natural gas should be directed towards home heating/cooking and towards industrial applications (power generation, not so much).

If one is interested in security of supply to lessen possibility of disruptions, nothing beats hydro(the water is already stored and ready to generate), Coal(where a mountain of coal can be be piled right next to the plant to use) and nuclear(all you need is access to plentiful cooling water when the fuel half life is in the million of years).

Natural gas cannot be readily stored near most plants but be transported to a plant normally by pipeline.  Those lines can freeze up as we saw in the recent Texas winter freeze.  It is still far, far better than any renewable like wind or solar.

Coal and natural gas are virtually limitless and have hundreds of years of resource availability to tap into.

[DefiantMassRINO]

Hydro supply can be compromised during drought.  That's why all-of-the-above energy supply policy is most secure.

If one is interested in security of supply to lessen possibility of disruptions, nothing beats hydro(the water is already stored and ready to generate), Coal(where a mountain of coal can be be piled right next to the plant to use) and nuclear(all you need is access to plentiful cooling water when the fuel half life is in the million of years).

Natural gas cannot be readily stored near most plants but be transported to a plant normally by pipeline.  Those lines can freeze up as we saw in the recent Texas winter freeze.  It is still far, far better than any renewable like wind or solar.

Coal and natural gas are virtually limitless and have hundreds of years of resource availability to tap into.

[IsailedawayfromFR]

Hydro supply can be compromised during drought.  That's why all-of-the-above energy supply policy is most secure.

Hydro indeed is limited to specific situations, as is tidal power or geothermal power, all of which are almost inexhaustible.

And all of the above, including nuclear, hydrocarbons and renewables, are appropriate.  That is, as long as the price to pay, either in $ or whatever, is not too large.  E.G. - do we need to kill millions of birds and insects, and utterly compromise land by installing fashionable solar panels and/or windmills?

[Bigun]

Hydro indeed is limited to specific situations, as is tidal power or geothermal power, all of which are almost inexhaustible.

And all of the above, including nuclear, hydrocarbons and renewables, are appropriate.  That is, as long as the price to pay, either in $ or whatever, is not too large.  E.G. - do we need to kill millions of birds and insects, and utterly compromise land by installing fashionable solar panels and/or windmills?

IMHO only technologies that can stand on their own merits should be considered.

[DefiantMassRINO]

Economies of scale need to be coomparable and competitive among all methods selected to provide the lowest price reliable energy supply possible.

[IsailedawayfromFR]

Economies of scale need to be coomparable and competitive among all methods selected to provide the lowest price reliable energy supply possible.