Green Energy Not Ready for Prime Time

G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936), a prolific English writer, said, “The whole world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected.”

As our President promised to “double down” on renewable energy, in spite of the bankrupted Solyndra, three more green energy companies, recipients of stimulus dollars, have collapsed.

Evergreen Energy Inc., a developer of alternative fuel products, filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy in a Delaware court on January 23, 2012. Chapter 7 bankruptcy allows the company to liquidate its assets while being protected from creditors. Evergreen Inc. has $25 million in debt and $240 million in assets. Without further financing, the company cannot continue to operate its K-Fuel facility in China. K-Fuel is a process of “refining coal before it is burned to increase energy densities and combustion efficiencies which reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”

Solyndra LLC (solar panel maker) and Beacon Power Corporation (energy storage) filed for bankruptcy last year after receiving government loan guarantees.

Solyndra received $535 million in government loan guarantees and listed in its bankruptcy papers $854.1 million in assets and $867.1 million in debt.

Beacon had $72 million in assets and $47 million debt. Beacon had built a $69 million power plant in New York with U.S. Department of Energy loans.

Ener1 Inc., a manufacturer of lithium-ion batteries for electric cars, filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy in Manhattan claiming heavy competition from Toyota, China, and Korea, and the demise of a major customer, Norway Think Global. Ener1 had received $118.5 million grant from the Department of Energy. The company has $73.9 million in assets and $90.5 million in debt.

Amonix, Inc., a manufacturer of solar panels that received $5.9 billion in stimulus money will cut 200 employees, seven months after opening a factory in Nevada. (Las Vegas Sun)

It appears that producing clean, renewable energy is not such a cheap and affordable proposition after all. In spite of the green movement’s desire to replace “dirty” fossil fuels at all costs, it is not economically feasible to do so at this time.

In addition, the bad news mounts for the progressives who want to send us back to the Stone Age with their global warming fear mongering. The faux “consensus” that global warming is man-made was challenged again by newly released temperature data showing that earth has not warmed in the past 15 years. The temperature readings came from 30,000 measuring stations.

The infamous University of East Anglia Climactic Research Unit and the Met Office confirmed, “The rising trend in world temperatures ended in 1997.” (Daily Mail)

As various scientists compare and contrast diverse methods of climate modeling that take into account the influence of solar flares and the significance of CO2 emissions, it is evident that there were severe shortcomings and misrepresentations in the theories, data, and readings advanced by progressives.

Leading climate scientists believe that the sun will no longer emit high levels of energy as it did in the 20^th century and will deliver a “grand minimum” of output, opening the possibility of colder summers, very cold winters, and much shorter growing seasons for food. (The Mail)

Some scientists, however, are still very confident that “solar activity is insufficient to offset the dominant influence of greenhouse gases.”

“World temperatures may wind up a lot cooler than now for 50 years or more. It will take a long battle to convince some climate scientists that the sun is important. It may well be that the sun is going to demonstrate this on its own, without the need for their help.” (Henrik Svensmark, Director, Center for Sun-Climate Research at Danmark’s National Space Institute)

One can only conclude that the global warming alarm was manufactured based on insufficient or deliberately misrepresented data. The progressives marched on with their agenda to replace traditional fossil fuel energy sources with a non-existent green renewable energy industry, which bankrupted itself in a short time, and the conservatives did nothing to stop them.