Was Carter right?Solar power, fuel efficiency weren't pushed enough?

[Algorem]

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/news/112826731353380.xml&coll=2

Was Jimmy Carter right?
Some suggest solar power and fuel efficiency weren't pushed enough

Sunday, October 02, 2005

Washington- President Bush is telling Americans to go easy on energy, use carpools and "curtail nonessential travel" - an unusual moment for an administration that used to say it could meet growing energy demand by expanding supply, not consuming less.

But this is not a Jimmy Carter, turn-down-the-thermostat, late-1970s moment.

Carter wore a cardigan when asking Americans to bear a little discomfort in a time of severe oil price increases. Last Monday, Bush rode in a motorcade - two limousines, three utility vans, six SUVs and a medical truck - to the climate-controlled Department of Energy, where he appeared in a suit and tie behind a podium.

Symbols aside, the former oilman who occupies the White House today shares a problem that plagued Carter, a former peanut farmer and naval nuclear engineer: How to solve an energy crunch in a nation utterly dependent on fossil fuel?...

[billbuckhead]

1. But solar power would have cut Enrons profits

History will be very unkind to th Raygun Revolution.

[NNadir]

2. Carter was dead on right about conservation.

His nuclear policies were uninspired and of dubious environmental value, and were completely ignored by the rest of the world. In particular his reliance on once-through fuel strategies was wasteful and dangerous. In his defense, the risks and rewards of nuclear energy were far less understood than they are today.

His syn fuels program was a program for coal utilization, and the environmental costs of coal are prohibitive - something that is much better understood today than it was then. That said, some of the basic science conducted under this program will be of considerable value to the energy future. The program centered on the use of syn gas and happily syn gas is available from sources other than coal. Unfortunately this future will rest with countries like China and Japan that have a scientific talent base.

Solar power is still largely a pipe dream. That said, it was a noble effort. The fact that the technology would be a complete commercial failure was not understood then, and it was certainly worth a shot in those times.

[Coastie for Truth]

7. Overlooking "niche" markets

You posted

Solar power is still largely a pipe dream. That said, it was a noble effort. The fact that the technology would be a complete commercial failure was not understood then, and it was certainly worth a shot in those times.

and while we normally agree on most things, you are overlooking the niche markets-- biggest market is for off the grid service in remote areas. Specifically, if you have a regulatory scheme that madnates service to 100% of the residences (not commercial, but residential) in a state, a photovoltaic power pack (pv cells, batteries, electronics) is the product line of choice.

Also, peak power on a hot, sunny, August afternoon.

Trickle chargers (used a PV charger in the Lake Ontario snowbelt - even on snow shower and snow flurry days -- never had a problem.

Again, trickle chargers for those ubiquitous rechargeable batteries (especially packs with AA's, AAA's, C's, and D's)- I have several of these (here in earthquake country with who knows how many portable radios, 5 watt ham radios, etc.)
<>

Emergency household power - again, it may require a photovoltaic power pack (pv cells, batteries, electronics) - I also have several of these (here in earthquake country)--
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AND MY SHARES IN PHOTVOLTAICS COMPANIES HAVE GONE UP 800% SINCE 9/11

:toast: :beer: :toast: 800% in four years!

[NNadir]

10. You are correct. There are niches.

However the solar PV game is not the industrial power production scheme that Mr. Carter envisioned, nor will it be such an industry in the lifetimes of any one now living.

I am not in the business of offering stock advice, but I note that in the 1990's many internet stocks, things like Pets.com went up thousands of percent in a matter of a few years.

Solar power has always been sexy. It has always been cool.

The price of oil and the new energy awareness that it brings, like a 1970's redux certainly will make solar energy illusions more attractive, just as they were 30 years ago. This will last as long as it takes to demand delivery on the promise.

Believe it or not, I would very much enjoy it if the success of the solar industry forced me to stuff it. I don't worry too much though about having to eat my words though, although the broad implications of energy on agriculture does make me wonder if I will be able to eat my food.

[Turbineguy]

3. One thing about Carter

There is no doubt he understood the nature of the problem.

For Bush, it is merely "folks are complaining about gas prices".

[Coastie for Truth]

4. Carter was 1000% Right

"IF" we had pushed CAFE up to 38-40 mpg (the trend line that Ronald "It's Morning In America" Regan took us off of)

"IF" we had continued the Carter solar energy program (the program that Ronald "It's Morning In America" Regan cut back)

"IF" the "Big Three" had continued work on electric cars and hybrids (instead of lobbying Congress, suing the State of California over the Zero Emission Vehicle mandate, filing frivolous and vexatious law suits against EV entrepreneurs, and passing the torch to Japan)

"IF" --- "IF" --- "IF"

we wouldn't have 150,000 of our fellow Americans spilling American blood in a war for foreign oil in Iraq.

we wouldn't have killed 1900 Americans (and uncounted Iraqis) in a war for foreign oil in Iraq.


we wouldn't be propping up autocrats like the Saudi Royals (see House of Bush, House of Saud: The Secret Relationship Between the World's Two Most Powerful Dynasties by Craig Unger.)

What might have been--- "IF" --- "IF" --- "IF"

[Democrats_win]

8. I'm with you. If they had done these things we'd be in good shape. nt

[Lindacooks]

11. Boy, are you ever right.

President Carter had us starting down the right path, then that fucktard Reagan came in and dismantled everything. This is ALL Reagan's fault, and Bush I, and Bush II.

[gizmo1979]

5. Yes he was

and boy are we paying the price for laughing at him!Our huge SUV'S look pretty fuelish now.I know I drank the coolaid.They labeled anyone conservation minded a tree hugger.And like liberal it became a dirty word.

[skids]

6. WRT solar, Research was underfunded, and commercialization underfinanced.

Solar PV wasn't where technology was at in the 70's. It was a little too raw to be pushed to market in the form it was.

However Solar heat was practically stone age technology at the time, but did not get adequately commericalized. Even today the price for solar hot water panels is far too large compared to their practical cost when compared to other mass-manufactured products with similar materials. If demand goes up (and that will depend on whether the public can get over their fascination with solar PV and see that solar heat is the better value at the moment) hopefully a major manufacturing effort will develop that will bring costs down. Fortunately even with the overpricing, solar heat panels pay for themselves pretty quickly.

As to photovoltaics -- how hard could it have possibly been for a research scientist to discover that the solar cells in normal panels can take more than one sun worth of light as long as they are cooled, and for a product engineer to notice that that would have reduced the cost of solar PV dramatically. It's 35 years later and only next year will products that do this be hitting medium-scale production. Somewhere between the chemistry lab and the assembly line some critical thinking was not done. One could argue the reason is that research -- and by this I don't mean lab research but industrial logistics research -- was not adequately funded.

Of course, just throwing government money at the problem might not have fixed it, because Americans have this nasty habit of grabbing for government dollars without giving a second thought as to whether they are providing any value in return. Remember the whole $90 bolt and thousand dollar toilet seat pentagon thing? That's a shining example of what our fine upstanding American businessmen deliver when they see the government cow lactating. The product only works as well as it has to to keep the nipple flowing. They don't care that they are ripping off the public, because as far as they are concerned, their tax dollars were stolen from them. They just don't get it. They think they are just retrieving stolen property and any trick they can come up with to do so is fair.

[Lisa]

12. there are a lot of parallels between alternate energy and computers ...

It took decades for research into computer technology to start paying off ... even some people in the industry didn't see the potential, until the late 1960s.

As you say, more R&D and commercialization could have put us considerably ahead of where we are now, for things like solar (and wind, and geothermal).

[grannylib]

9. Thank you , thank you, thank you! Been saying it for years. If we had

listened to and heeded Carter's words back then, we might not be over the oil barrel the way we are now. But the auto companies are in bed with Big Oil and have been for years, and they fought long and hard to destroy Amtrak and to make sure that the money would flow as long as there was any oil to flow (or not flow, as the case may be).
If there had been any work at all done on alternative energy in a serious fashion 30 years ago, think of the technology that we could be using now...but the auto/oil industries wants to wring every last cent out of every drop of oil they can find.
Makes me just sick when I think back on the ridicule that was heaped on Carter for his efforts (if he were doing that today, I can just hear the response from the Reich Wing: "Why does he hate America???")
And the arrogance of assuming that we, Americans, are ENTITLED to use/overuse/misuse so much more than our share of the world's resources, should be a source of shame. But of course, one can only feel shame if one has a conscience and some sense of justice, so we won't be seeing any from the reThugs any time soon.

[JohnWxy]

13. U. S. WIND POWER POTENTIAL 3 X CURRENT TOTAL ELECTRICITY PRODUCTION

The potential for wind power in the U.S. is 3 times the current total electrical power now generated in the U.S. with NO GREENHOUSE GASES!! AND WIND POWER IS COMPETITIVE WITH COAL AND NATURAL GAS RIGHT NOW. (Solar power is still a long way from being economical) . THIS IS THE BEST KEPT SECRET IN THE U.S. TODAY (but not Europe).

THREE TIMES THE CURRENT TOTAL PRODUCTION OF ELECTRICITY -and if financed the same way utilities finance coal and gas fired plants Wind farms would be 40% cheaper to build than they are now. THIS WOULD MAKE WIND POWER CHEAPER BY FAR THAN COAL AND NATURAL GAS - AT PRESENT PRICES - IN A FEW MONTHS NATURAL GAS WILL BE 20% HIGHER THAN IT IS RIGHT NOW AND IT WILL KEEP GOING UP WITH THE OIL SHORTAGE AND CONTINUOUSLY GROWING DEMAND. AT THIS RATE IN A COUPLE OF YEARS ( certainly by 2010) WIND POWER WILL COST ABOUT HALF WHAT NATURAL GAS WILL COST. Keep in mind as more windmills are produced and installed the cost of each windmill will go down rapidly – since we do not have many in place now. And of course, this comes with ZERO GREEN HOUSE GASES.

BUT THAT’S NOT ALL. At night when the power demand is lower the windmills can generate electricity to run ELECTROLYSIS PLANTS WHICH WILL PRODUCE HYDROGEN GAS (for fuel cell cars). Now, the one big practical problem with Fuel cell cars (aside from figuring out how to carry enough hydrogen safely around in them for decent range) is that there is no cheap plentiful supply of Hydrogen gas. Wind farms would end that problem. The hydrogen gas would be produced as a bonus to the cheap electrical production.

From BusinessWeek on-line magazine (July 2005):

"But now, with natural gas rising to more than $7 per million BTUs and eastern coal up to $60 per ton, average U.S. electricity prices, by state, now range from 5 cents to 16 cents per kilowatt hour (kwh). In some states, that's a 25% jump since 1995. At the same time, technological improvements and economies of scale have significantly lowered the costs of alternatives. Wind-power costs have declined to as little as 3 cents to 5 cents per kwh, making wind cost competitive. That's one reason why GE's wind business has soared from $500 million in 2002 to a predicted $2 billion this year."

Wind Power would also provide greater security from terrorist attacks as it is not concentrated in one large plant. This also would help increase the security of the traditional power plants - IF WE INCREASED WIND POWER PRODUCTION TO 10 % OF OUR TOTAL OUTPUT . THis is because the terrorists would be much less likely to hit a coal or nuclear plant if they new we could just transfer the power from windmills installed widely over the U.S.

The area of the greatest wind power potential is the Great Plains states from the Dokotas down to Texas. Installing windmills also allows for dual use of the land. Farmers can still farm, cows can still graze while the windmills are slowly turning.

LIke I said, this is the best kept secret in the U.S. But right next door, Canada is embarking on an ambitiuous program to develop wind power themselves. Probably, one day soon they will be selling electical power to us!!

[phantom power]

14. If we can afford the buffer storage required to even the production.

[dazzlerazzle]

15. solar energy

when it comes to solar energy i believe you have to think big...we have thousands of miles of desert basically doing nothing where huge solar panels could be constructed and supply of electricity probably unbelievable, but a idea of this proportion takes real leadership... no one is enthusiastic about more nuclear power plants, but lining the desert with solar panels would be a much greater venture than going back to the moon!!

[rodeodance]

16. silly question-of course he was right.

[Chalco]

17. Well, duh...and more duh!

Carter threatened the bejeesus out of those people. So much so they made sure he didn't get re-elected and in my opinion pulled a coup much like the coup in 2000.

[RedCloud]

18. Yeah. But they want us to pay and pay and pay and pay....

I have heard mention that there are some wind machines designed for houses that kind make each home energy self-sufficient. This would naturally be great news to all except those who want to profit from it. I also think this is why so many homes are energy inefficient made of out of materials that quickly lose their ability to hold the temperatures. (higher bills)