Pickens Plan I've always been in favor of Wind Farms and Solar Energy. It's too bad more people aren't really pushing for this. The thing is, their isn't as much money in it as their is oil. That is why so many do not want to go this way...greed. Oh, and the environmentalists dont like the look of the Wind Farms....:roll:.
They've been looking at putting some windfarms off the coast of Virginia Beach (way out and not visible from the beach). As windy as it is here today from the Nor'easter....I'd say go for it!! I haven't read the Pickens Plan yet but it's advertised here on TV. Interesting. I know they had wind farms in CA when I visited Palm Springs for a women's retreat once. It certainly is windy in the High Desert in CA during the Santa Ana winds. :lol:
I think if "Environmentalists" were REALLY for the earth, they would put wind turbines on the seashore.... It is ALWAYS windy there! hahahaa!
The mountain we live on is always windy. When we get to build our house up here we are going to be putting in wind and solar energy sources. We are hoping to be able to acutally produce enough energy to make the electric company have to pay us for our output :lol: They have put in a few windmill farms around here. We love to go watch them. I dont' see why we can't run everything off of renewable energy. Hubby and I were talking the other day about making cars that were battery powered, and those batteries were recharged by some form of a wind turbine... not sure how it would look, or how it would all work, but it would be too cool to not have to buy gas, and not be putting polution into the air from a combustion forced engine.
We have wind farms in TX. We actually have the option to use windtricity here in San Antonio. Unfortunately, it is more expensive, so for those of us trying to keep our bills low, it doesn't make much sense.
I think T. Boone Picken's plan is better than doing nothing. In one of my science classes in college I think I remember one drawback to wind turbines is that it chops up birds or something. I could remember wrong. I think wind farms are a great idea though. I don't consider myself an extreme environmentalist. I do care about the environment in some ways.
There are also wind farm on the way to Tracy, CA. It is HUGE! Sometime last year there was talk, mind you only talk , about putting a wind farm out here. Not literally near me but here in the desert. Well, it was shot down and I have never heard anything about it again. I may wrong but I think it had something to do with the desert turtle.:?
WIMom -I've not hear the bird thing. Though, it's kinda funny to think about. We have birds fly into our back windows before but I always figured that was because they saw what looked like more space to fly.
I have to add a little bit of info to this thread. While the whole idea of the wind farms and natural gas sounds great. There are other reasons besides greed from big oil, that it is a bad idea. First is that electricity is not something that can be held in reserve. It has to be used when it is produce (for sure on the large scale we are talking about, because it would take way to much money, space etc to do that it makes it unfeasible) It also is not really econimical for it to be transfered long distances. For example, there are a ton of wind farms along I10 in West Texas. That power is only used in West texas, because they do not have the ability to transfer it to anywhere else. The electric grid in Texas does not connect with any other grid in other states. This is way more them billions of dollars to build infrastructure to help send this power though the state. But that doesnt' account for the fact that the wind doesn't blow 24/7 anywhere on the planet. So you have to have back up power souces, that is where pickens plan uses the Natural gas plants. Natural Gas plants are a good sounding solution as well. But first the price of natural gas is also staying pretty much the same as oil. To get natural gas ( dispite what Pelosi says) you have to drill and and find it just like oil, it is considered a "fossil fuel" just like oil. "Big oil" are the ones who are looking for it as well ( I happen to know a bit about how that works since my sisters ranch has just drilled the two largest producing Natural Gas wells in North America at the moment) We are already starting to import natural gas due to lack of supply in the US. Now on to the energy production from natural gas. (my dad has worked at coal, natural gas, and nuclear fired power plants) Natural gas fired electric plants are very inefficent. They require long start up times, which means that for them to be used they have to be ran 24/7. Coal, oil, and nuclear plants can start up and shut down quickly making them all much better soultions for back up. I had a long like 3 hour discussion with my dad on which of these plants are the best idea. His reccommendation is the nuclear plants, which is what I think it is France is using with great success. I think the eviromentalist are the ones who are standing in the way of us having energy independance, and being more enviromentaly friendly not the oil companies. Here is a link to a Electric coop's article from Nov of 2007 that speaks of the renewable souces and reality in the eletric problems we face. http://www.texas-ec.org/texascooppower/issues_archive/2007/October/system/feature1.aspx Here is a link to part 2 http://www.texas-ec.org/texascooppower/issues_archive/2007/November/system/feature1.aspx One last note. I am all for using everything around to make something work. I don't not think going off with half the information is a good idea it will make electricity so expensive, and unrealiable that we will not be able to use it. My dad has a cabin that doesn't have elec. to it, so he has a wind turbine, and solar panels (neither of which are very reliable) and a huge bank of batteries (which are very expensive, and have to be replaced often) to keep his small fridge running up there. I see the place for them, but not in large scale without having oil, coal, or nuclear as the main source.
I've heard some concerns that they're killing of some wildlife. They're just beginning to realize that bats may be adversely affected (well killed...but that's adverse!) by them. Regardless I tend to think the only two REAL solutions are a) use less energy and b) have people take responsibility for producing more of their own energy.
I am all for this. Sadly, there are cities and towns that are against it. It means less money for them.
It would be awesome to have solar panels on the roof of our house, though our neighborhood won't allow it. I do feel though the positives outweight the negatives when it comes to wind/solar power.
