{"id":188,"date":"2013-01-18T08:40:07","date_gmt":"2013-01-18T13:40:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2013\/01\/solar-pieces-of-a-puzzle-dr-michael-g-noll.html"},"modified":"2013-01-18T08:40:07","modified_gmt":"2013-01-18T13:40:07","slug":"solar-pieces-of-a-puzzle-dr-michael-g-noll","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2013\/01\/solar-pieces-of-a-puzzle-dr-michael-g-noll.html","title":{"rendered":"Solar: Pieces of a Puzzle —Dr. Michael G. Noll"},"content":{"rendered":"

\nOp-ed in the VDT today, responding to\n\na response<\/a>\nto\n\nmy op-ed.<\/a> -jsq\n<\/p>\n

\n

\n\n<\/a>\nIf the attempt of\n\na guest column from Jan 13<\/a> was to shine light on solar power,\nit left everyone in the dark.\nNeither mockery nor close mindedness will assist us in finding real answers\nif we want to solve\n\nthe energy puzzle of the 21st century.<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\n\nIn July 2012, the Financial Times interviewed Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of GE.<\/a>\nGE knows perhaps more about the world of energy business than any other company.\nImmelt stated that\n<\/p>\n

\n“on a cost basis it is impossible to justfy investing in nuclar power for the future.”\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nPeople who sitll claim that solar is more expensive\nthan nuclear are not paying attention.\nIf solar is viable as far north as\n\nNew Jersey<\/a>, it certainly is in Georgia.\nIf countries like\n\nGermany<\/a> can excel in solar energy production,\nso can we.\nCompanies like Walmart, Costco, Apple, and\n\nGoogle<\/a>\nare havily investing in solar because it works.\n<\/p>\n

\nIt should also be noted that the nuclear plant on\n\nCrystal River has been idle since 2009.<\/a>\nAs\n\nthe Tampa Bay Times reported last December,<\/a>\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n

\n
\n“the crippled Crystal River nuclear plant is now America’s headache.\nThe bill to fix it and pay for replacement power may top $5 billion.”\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nA similar fiasco awaits Georgia Power’s Vogtle Plant,\nwith\n\ncost overruns and delays.<\/a>\nThat headache, too, will cost billions, and\n\nwe, the ratepayers, get to pay for these boondoggles.<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\nLastly, a comment on\n\nwater consumption.<\/a>\nThe idea that water used for the cooling of nuclear power plants\n\n“is not lost … but returned to the environment”<\/a>\nis absurd.\nThat’s like saying that wood burned in your fireplace is not lost\nbut returned to your storage bin.\nThe\n\ntwo towers at Vogtle use more than 43 million gallons of water daily.<\/a>\nThat is an enormous amount, and it is indeed lost.\nIt is lost to the farmer who needs to irrigate his fields,\nand it is lost to the flora and fauna of our ecosystems.\n<\/p>\n

\nIn the end only a conmbination of\n\nenergy conservation and efficiency<\/a> measures\nwith\n\nclean forms of renewable energy<\/a> like\n\nsolar and wind<\/a>\nwill make a difference.\nNatural gas, too,\nhas its advantages, but\n\nfossil fuels are by nature finite,<\/a>\nand the process of\n\nfracking shows many dangerous pitfalls.<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\n\n\nDr. Michael G. Noll<\/a><\/strong>\nis president of\n\nWiregrass Activists for Clean Energy.<\/a>\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n-jsq\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Op-ed in the VDT today, responding to a response to my op-ed. -jsq If the attempt of a guest column from Jan 13 was to shine light on solar power, it left everyone in the dark. Neither mockery nor close mindedness will assist us in finding real answers if we want to solve the energy […]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[97,202,14,264,265,16,203,8,18,558,104,21,22,32,23,24,53,133,700,55,36],"tags":[8736,8750,701,8704,8754,8755,8706,8751,308,704,8701,8708,8781,639,705,8702,12,7,703,562,33,8737,8711,8712,8715,8713,466,702,8714,8725,6,8742,626,8796,8727,8716],"class_list":["post-188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism","category-agriculture","category-economy","category-energy-conservation","category-energy-efficiency","category-environment","category-florida","category-georgia","category-georgia-power","category-germany","category-nuclear","category-planning","category-politics","category-pollution","category-renewable-energy","category-solar","category-sustainability","category-vdt","category-wace","category-water","category-wind","tag-activism","tag-agriculture","tag-crystal-river","tag-economy","tag-energy-conservation","tag-energy-efficiency","tag-environment","tag-florida","tag-fracking","tag-ge","tag-georgia","tag-georgia-power","tag-germany","tag-google","tag-immelt","tag-lake","tag-lowndes-area-knowledge-exchange","tag-lowndes-county","tag-michael-noll","tag-natural-gas","tag-new-jersey","tag-nuclear","tag-planning","tag-politics","tag-pollution","tag-renewable-energy","tag-river","tag-savannah","tag-solar","tag-sustainability","tag-valdosta","tag-vdt","tag-vogtle","tag-wace","tag-water","tag-wind"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-32","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}