Category Archives: energy efficiency

LEDs vs. the entire U.S. nuclear fleet (and gas pipeline)

All U.S. nuclear power reactors could be replaced by LED lighting
with a few clever on-off controls.
More evidence Plant Vogtle is a boondoggle good for nothing but

propping up profits for Georgia Power and Southern Company.

Michael Kanellos wrote for Forbes 28 October 2013,

Can LED Bulbs Make Nuclear Plants Obsolete?

One $7 billion nuclear plant like one of Georgia Power’s 1.2 GW
units would add a little over 1 percent of capacity. The bulb
solution would cost $60 billion, and around $36 billion two years
from now, and require only that consumers know how to screw in a
light bulb. Nuclear would cost $105 billion, probably more, and take
decades.

So maybe it’s not

just weather that’s pushing down your demand, Southern Company:
maybe Continue reading →

Southern Company missed earnings: weather and Kemper Coal and nuclear Plant Vogtle



SO CEO Tom Fanning continued to blame slow sales and earnings on mild
weather (air conditioners running less), but the big boondoggle
going bad is Kemper Coal, which has slipped six months from May 2014 to Q4 2014,
and even the Wall Street Journal calls it “possibly the most expensive fossil-fuel power plant ever built in the U.S”.
How bad will SO’s stock tank when SO’s even more expensive
nuclear Plant Vogtle slips even more?

Dividends can’t prop up SO’s share price forever, not when PSCs are revolting against the rate hikes
and guaranteed profit hikes that prop up those dividends.
When will Southern Company and Georgia Power get out front and lead in solar and wind power?
Before or after the public, state public service commissions, and investors make them do it?

Justin Loiseau wrote for DailyFinance 4 November 2013,

Southern Company Earnings: A $5 Billion Blunder? Continue reading →

China $375 billion conservation and pollution investment

Fayen Wong and Ruby Lian wrote for Reuters 30 July 2013,

China to invest $375 billion on energy conservation, pollution: paper,

China plans to invest 2.3 trillion yuan ($375 billion) in energy
saving and emission-reduction projects in the five years through
2015 to clean up its environment, the China Daily newspaper reported
on Wednesday, citing a senior government official.

The plan, which has been approved by the State Council, is on top of
a 1.85 trillion yuan investment in the renewable energy sector,
underscoring the government’s concerns about addressing a key source
of social discontent.

China has set a target of reducing its carbon emissions per unit of
GDP by 40-45 percent by 2020 from the 2005 level, and raising
non-fossil energy consumption to 15 percent of its energy mix, Xie
Zhenhua, deputy director of the National Development and Reform
Commission (NDRC), was quoted as saying.

The article continues about tiered power pricing for energy intensive
industries and carbon trading markets.



Given that most of the world’s increase in energy usage comes from one country,
China,

according to OECD figures,
anything China can do to slow that increase is good.

-jsq

Solar tariff damaging to solar growth in Georgia –GSEA

GSEA PR of yesterday about

Georgia Power’s attempt to tax rooftop solar generators.


Proposed Solar Tariff Unfair and Damaging to Solar Growth in Georgia,



Atlanta, GA — The Georgia Solar Energy Association Chairman Mark Bell said today
that the tariff on solar installations proposed in the Georgia Power rate request now
under consideration by the Public Service Commission is unfair to solar customers.

The tariff, which will add roughly $22 a month to residential solar customers’ bills
beginning in 2014, will have a significant
“chilling effect” on the robust growth
of solar development now under way in
Georgia. Solar investment currently is
providing jobs and new infrastructure throughout the state, including its rural areas
where economic investment is badly needed. Solar energy is making Georgia farms
more cost-effective and productive, and high-demand manufacturing more efficient.

“This proposal penalizes solar at
the exclusion of other energy saving methods,
which Georgia Power supports. Georgia Power has traditionally Continue reading →

Which first to get more solar: fight big money or new technology?

In Georgia we’re still below 1% electric power generation from solar,
and we can get to 20-30% with no new technology whatever.


Georgia Power’s nuke overruns are

already causing a reaction of still more distributed solar.
Yet even that good news gets the usual reaction:
“This is necessary but not sufficient: a breakthrough in energy storage technology is required.”
Which just ain’t so;
distributed rooftop solar alone is plenty to move Georgia way ahead.
That’s why

Edison Electric Institute calls distributed solar
a massively disruptive influence on the utilities’
century-old cozy baseload model.
What’s holding solar back is those same big utilities, who understandably
don’t want to change their long-time cash cow.
But they’re going to change, and pretty quickly.

People unfamiliar with the sunny south (which is most of the world
south of, oh, Germany), still say things like this: Continue reading →

Nuke overruns already causing distributed solar in south Georgia

People are tired of

irresponsible trash government at the state level
colluding with monopoly utilities to hold Georgia back in distributed
solar power, and some of us are doing something about it;
you can, too.


Jigar Shah
wrote for SaportReport 15 September 2013

Solar more viable as Georgia’s new nuclear power plants face overruns,

I am seeing Georgia’s nuclear financial woes starting to prompt a
boon for distributed energy including solar, wind, biomass,
geothermal, low-impact hydro, high efficiency cogeneration, and
other sources of electricity.

Biomass?

Let’s not go back to that carbon-polluting forest-destroying factory-exploding waste of time and resources.
Solar, wind, efficiency, and conservation are the main events, with solar increasingly leading the pack.
And those nuke cost overruns are already driving solar up even faster: Continue reading →

Southern Company missed earnings on Kemper Coal but Plant Vogtle is dominant

The dominant financial consideration
is “what’s going to happen with Georgia”,
meaning with nuclear Plant Vogtle,


said SO CEO Tom Fanning, referring to

the GA PSC CWIP monitoring hearings currently in progress.
Meanwhile, that
$160 million estimate 2 July 2013 of more Kemper Coal cost overruns
by 30 July turned into
$278 million after taxes (AP).

This is on top of

$333 million after taxes in May.
SO earnings fell 52% (WSJ), missing projections, and SO stock dropped 2% yesterday.


Remember GA PSC Tim Echols

already suggested a Plant Vogtle cost overrun cap
similar to the one Mississippi PSC applied to Kemper Coal that caused
SO to have to eat all those costs.
If that happens, SO’s got financial problems.

Has SO seen the solar light yet, as in reliable, dependable, and deployable
on time and on budget?
Nope.
Solar was tacked onto the end of

Tom Fanning’s summary of interesting stuff
in the 31 July 2013 earnings call: Continue reading →

SO’s plan to make the Southeast a net exporter of the energy from solar and wind? –John S. Quarterman @ SO 2013-05-22

SO CEO Tom Fanning didn’t budge from nuclear and coal,
but he did announce a tiger team to get on top of
distributed solar and wind through a smart grid,
headed by SO’s COO,
at the

22 May 2013 Southern Company Stockholder Meeting.


Next question --Tom Fanning

Mr. John S. Quarterman from Lowndes County, Georgia, and he holds
220 shares of Southern Company.

TF: Hello, John. Good to see you again this year.


jsq with SO fade
jsq: Hi. I’ve come to compliment Tom Fanning and Paul Bowers. Last
year, Tom Fanning was so persuasive I ran out and bought $10,000
worth of stock.

TF: Bless you.
[Applause]

However,
apparently because of

SO’s admission a few minutes before in that same meeting
that it was going to have to eat Kemper Coal cost overruns,



SO stock tanked that same day,
causing my stock to stop out,
and Standard & Poor’s downgraded SO the following day
because of Kemper Coal, noting that if the same thing happened
with SO’s nuclear project at Plant Vogtle, S&P’s would probably Continue reading →

Re-evaluate Plant Vogtle and move to wind and solar power –Courtney Hanson @ GA PSC 2013-06-18

Re-evaluate Plant Vogtle, especially its water use,
and move to efficiency, wind, and solar power instead,
said


Courtney Hanson of
Georgia Women’s Action for New Directions (GA WAND)
at

the Georgia Public Service Commission meeting Tuesday 18 June 2013.

She reminded GA PSC Plant Vogtle 3 and 4 are late and over budget, and then:

I want to add my voice to the chorus of folks here who are concerned
about water issues.


We know that Vogtle 3 and 4 will require an additional withdrawal
of as much as 74 million gallons a day from the Savannah River and
most of that water will not be returned.
We know that the central Savannah River
area where Vogtle is located is already
very prone to droughts
and the plant has been close to shutting down several times
due to drought conditions.


Georgia is also already struggling to supply enough water
for our homes, businesses, industries, and farms.

In addition, the Savannah River is Continue reading →

It is not enough to add a little solar and wind on top of fossil and fission fuels –a German @ GA PSC 2013-06-18

A German national residing in Georgia
asked for a serious effort on energy efficiency and conservation
while switching to real renewable energy sources instead of
fossil fuels and nuclear,
at

the Georgia Public Service Commission meeting Tuesday 18 June 2013.

She said increasing fires and floods were part of climate change,
and we need to do something about it.



I always hear this phrase “growing energy demand” as if it’s something,
some matter of fact.
A growing economy means growing energy demand, and that means
consequently growing waste, growing pollution, growing inequity,
and so on.
Any thinking person should notice that we need to find a way out.
For anyone concerned about our future, business as usual is
no longer acceptable.
We need drastic changes in our energy supply.
We need to use less.



Only a month earlier, Tom Fanning, CEO of Georgia Power’s
parent company Southern Company

reemphasized yet again that

To us, growing the economy is how we’re going to make profit.

Yet GA PSC could do something about that antique attitude,
as this speaker pointed out: Continue reading →