The Vogtle $913 million cost overrun by itself could have paid for
approximately 1,000 megawatts of natural gas generation; 450 megawatts
of wind power; and 330 megawatts of solar power.
That’s not 20 gigawatts.
But the population of Germany is about 81 million,
while the population of Georgia is about 9.8 million people,
so the Georgia equivalent of 20 gigawatts would be about 2.4 gigawatts.
The federal government has guaranteed about $8.3 billion in loans
related to Plant Vogtle.
That $8.3 billion would pay for about 3 gigawatts of solar power.
That
big dish at Plant Vogtle?
That’s not just a nuclear containment vessel,
it’s a solar prevention wall.
Preventing jobs, energy independence, and profit through solar power in Georgia.
Plant Vogtle is why Georgia is not a leader in solar power today.
German solar power plants produced a world record 22 gigawatts of electricity per hour—equal to 20 nuclear power stations at full capacity—through the midday hours on Friday and Saturday, the head of a renewable energy think tank said….
Norbert Allnoch, director of the Institute of the Renewable Energy Industry (IWR) in Muenster, said the 22 gigawatts of solar power per hour fed into the national grid on Saturday met nearly 50 percent of the nation's midday electricity needs….
The record-breaking amount of solar power shows one of the world's leading industrial nations was able to meet a third of its electricity needs on a work day, Friday, and nearly half on Saturday when factories and offices were closed.
Berlin is at more than 52 degrees north latitude. Even southern German city Munich is at 48 degrees north. That's a thousand miles north of where we sit here in south Georgia at 31 degrees north.
Germany has sun like Alaska, while Georgia has sun like the south of Spain.
"Never before anywhere has a country produced as much photovoltaic electricity," Allnoch told Reuters. "Germany came close to the 20 gigawatt (GW) mark a few times in recent weeks. But this was the first time we made it over."
In a statement, Wal-Mart representative Maggie Sans wrote, “Previously, we expressed our concerns about ALEC’s decision to weigh in on issues that stray from its core mission ‘to advance the Jeffersonian principles of free markets…We feel that the divide between these activities and our purpose as a business has become too wide. To that end, we are suspending our membership in ALEC.”
Wal-Mart claimed that ALEC was no longer as interested in Jeffersonian free market principles as they were other partisan political issues. Two of those unnamed political issues are most certainly voter ID and stand your ground laws.
When even Wal-Mart complains that ALEC isn’t “free market” enough, Wal-Mart, which
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FYI: The Strickland Mill in Remerton is being threatened with demolition. Remerton City Council will meet to discuss this situation on Monday, June 4th at 5:30pm during their work session, and on Monday, June 11th at 5:30pm to vote on the matter. The public is invited to both of these meetings to express opinions on the possible demolition of the Mill. As you all are aware, this mill complex dates to 1899 and is one of the few surviving textile mills in our region. This is an important community landmark and was very influential to the development of Valdosta, not to mention integral to Remerton's existence.
Remember the Southern Company brags about “Our competitive generation business”. The important word there is “our”, as in the Southern Company and its subsidiary Georgia Power gets to compete, and you don’t. Unless you’re big enough.
Some retail competition has been present in Georgia since 1973 with the passage of the Georgia Territorial Electric Service Act. This Act enables customers with manufacturing or commercial loads of 900 kW or greater a one time choice in their electric supplier. It also provides eligible customers the opportunity to transfer from one electric supplier to another provided all parties agree.
Because of that law, you can’t you put up solar panels on your own land and sell your power to somebody somewhere else. And you can’t get a company like SolarCity or Lower Rates for Customers to put up solar panels on your property and sell you the power ( or can you?). Unless you’re generating at least 900 KW; then maybe you can get selected businesses to switch to your power once. Except you probably still won’t qualify, because
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I think of Georgia Power more as like IBM when minicomputers came out. IBM built bigger mainframes. The Internet started to spread, and IBM pushed its own proprietary SNA network. (Remember SNA? I didn’t think so.) Then PCs came out, and IBM layoffs started….
Everybody except for Georgia is jumping on the wind and solar bandwagon, but Georgia Power is side-lined in a nuclear jam like a horse-buggy manufacturer at the dawning of the Ford assembly line.
The white area on that map is for states that have no standards or goals for renewable energy.
Remember Georgia Power is the biggest part of its parent, The Southern Company, and the nuclear units at Plant Vogtle (operating and planned) are actually owned by another offshoot of The Southern Company. According to Southern Company’s webpage, Megawatts and Markets,
Southern Company regulated regional electric utilities serve a 120,000-square-mile territory in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi. Our competitive generation business extends to markets in six southeastern states.
It’s interesting how similar the Southern Company’s markets are to the states in that white southeast no-renewable-energy-portfolio area!
Nuclear is our only emissionless technology, said Southern Company (SO) CEO Thomas A. Fanning. That would indicate that solar and wind have emissions. I assume he just mis-spoke in his otherwise masterful responses (often not answers) to shareholder questions.
Slides and sound for CEO Fanning’s main presentation are available on SO’s website. He indicated SO is unmatched in a combination of financial aspects, including dividends that have steadily increased year after year, and especially investment stability. He neglected to mention that much of those dividends are made possible by Georgia Power’s guaranteed profit margins. He did find time to oppose big government regulation, which is ironic, since Southern Company is a big beneficiary of Georgia’s numerous regulations benefitting Georgia Power. He also bragged about the Georgia legislature passing the “Energy Rate Increases to Finance Nuclear Power Plant Construction”.
Market study advisory panel forming up! Chairman Roy Copeland asked whether “Industrial” in VLCIA’s name is positive or negative for PR? Executive Director Andrea Schruijer made sure to announce a date change for a board meeting a month in advance. All that and much more!
Here are videos of the entire 17 April 2012 regular meeting of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA). Here’s the agenda.
VLCIA Executive Director Andrea Schruijer said they had shown contractor Market Street Services the area so they could go back and start working up data for a market study. In May an advisory panel of 10-13 individuals plus focus groups will meet with Market Street.
I’ll answer: as long as VLCIA includes as “industry” boondoggles like a health-threatening biomass plant and a job-destroying private prison, why yes, “industrial” reflects negatively on VLCIA. But a mere name change through a D.B.A. won’t fix that problem. Only a change in behavior will fix that problem. Changes such as doing some due diligence so they know when a private prison company is playing them along by saying they’re the primary site. Changes such as weighing the community’s health when considering potential jobs. And especially changes such as listening to people outside the VLCIA and Chamber bubble when others do useful and important research. The community can be an asset for VLCIA, providing research and contacts VLCIA either does not have the resources to do or might not think of to do, if VLCIA will listen to the community.
Videos Regular Meeting, Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA), Norman Bennett, Tom Call, Roy Copeland chairman, Mary Gooding, Jerry Jennett, Tom Davis CPA, Allan Ricketts Project Manager, S. Meghan Duke Public Relations & Marketing Manager, Lu Williams Operations Manager, Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 17 April 2012. Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).
Progress Energy announced Tuesday that it is hiking the estimated
cost of its proposed Levy County nuclear plant and pushing the
plant’s completion date back to 2024.
Progress Energy also said it plans to ask Florida regulators to
increase customers’ bills to upgrade Progress’ damaged Crystal River
nuclear plant.
Progress said in a press release that the new cost of the plant
could be as high as $24 billion. The previous estimate was about $2
billion less. The plant was originally slated to go online in 2016,
but that deadline continues to get pushed back.
Meanwhile, by
John Hanger’s estimates,
an extra $1 billion would buy about 450 MW of wind power or about 330
MW of solar power.
So that $2 billion expected cost rise would buy about
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The Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber of Commerce’s annual “economic summit” of invited participants has a report for 2012 called “Lowndes County by the Numbers” that compares our local area with fourteen other places. Curiously none of those places is known for Internet access speed or solar energy. I wonder what comparisons with places like Thomasville or LaGrange or Chattanooga or Lafayette or Bowling Green, Kentucky (all of which have fast community-wide Internet access) would have shown?
It looks like the peer communities may have been chosen for proximity to military bases. That’s fair, but what about medical facilities, regional universities, or agriculture?
Establishing a plan for economic success and growth requires an unbiased knowledge of a community’s endowments and economic indicators. While community endowments are the unique characteristics that arise from location and geography and therefore are not likely to change, economic indicators such as demographics and labor market structure can be cultivated and enhanced in ways to improve the economic growth and prosperity of a community. Progress toward achieving these desired outcomes can only be assessed by comparing oneself to peer and aspirant communities. This report identifies the peer and aspirant communities for Lowndes County and compares economic indicators that measure the strengths and opportunities for this community.
Why is economic growth listed before prosperity? Is growth a goal in itself? If so, why? Population growth without more jobs just results in
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The Vogtle $913 million cost overrun by itself could have paid for approximately 1,000 megawatts of natural gas generation; 450 megawatts of wind power; and 330 megawatts of solar power.
That
big dish at Plant Vogtle?
That’s not just a nuclear containment vessel,
it’s a solar prevention wall.
Preventing jobs, energy independence, and profit through solar power in Georgia.
