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Atomic Insights

Atomic energy technology, politics, and perceptions from a nuclear energy insider who served as a US nuclear submarine engineer officer

Wind energy

Vermonters say they want industrial wind to go the way of the billboard

January 23, 2016 By Rod Adams 45 Comments

As a native of South Florida, I’ve probably logged at least a million miles driving on its interstate and U.S. highways. Most Americans have probably had at least a small taste of that experience. The contrast between Florida’s highways and those in Vermont is stark; Florida’s are littered with billboards. They often advertise products or […]

Filed Under: Alternative energy, Public meetings, Unreliables, Wind energy

Reliable partnership between natural gas and renewable energy

January 14, 2016 By Rod Adams 27 Comments

Naomi Oreskes is the Professor of the History of Science and Affiliated Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University. She is also the author of the December 16, 2015 opinion piece published in the Guardian titled There is a new form of climate denialism to look out for – so don’t celebrate yet. […]

Filed Under: Alternative energy, Natural Gas, Solar energy, Unreliables, Wind energy

Solar and wind tax credit extensions will put more nuclear plants at risk

December 18, 2015 By Rod Adams 117 Comments

Update: (Posted 4:40 pm December 18) It’s too late. The House and Senate passed the spending bills and went home for the holidays. Sorry to have been too late on this one; the several thousand page bill was just released a couple of days ago. It took a little time to read and understand the […]

Filed Under: Solar energy, Unreliables, Wind energy

Mark Jacobson describes attributes of his incredibly optimistic wind, water, solar energy plans

December 15, 2015 By Rod Adams 48 Comments

During COP16, Dr. Mark Z. Jacobson described attributes of his team’s most recently produced paper. The abstract leads with the following claim about the paper’s content. This study addresses the greatest concern facing the large-scale integration of wind, water, and solar (WWS) into a power grid: the high cost of avoiding load loss caused by […]

Filed Under: Alternative energy, Antinuclear activist, Climate change, Solar energy, Wind energy

Climate scientists skeptical about Mark Z. Jacobson’s 100% renewable energy “plans”

December 14, 2015 By Rod Adams 22 Comments

During COP21, Energy for Humanity‘s Kirsty Gogan moderated a press conference featuring Drs. James Hansen, Tom Wigley, Kerry Emanuel, and Ken Caldeira. The complete event is available on YouTube at [LIVE] Conférence presse de James Hansen à La Galerie by World Efficiency. These experts are the four climate scientists who have spent a part of […]

Filed Under: Climate change, Politics of Nuclear Energy, Solar energy, Wind energy

Democratic Party presidential candidates answer question about climate change and energy plans

October 15, 2015 By Rod Adams 99 Comments

Transcript of the video above. Anderson Cooper: A lot of questions about climate change. I want to go to Don Lemon. Don? Don Lemon: This one is for Martin O’Malley. Governor O’Malley, this one is from Anna Bettis from Tempe Arizona. Anna Bettis: As a young person I am very concerned about climate change and […]

Filed Under: Atomic politics, Climate change, Politics of Nuclear Energy, Solar energy, Wind energy

Why does ERCOT credit wind capacity at less than 9%?

July 22, 2015 By Rod Adams

For a number of years, the planners on the ERCOT (Texas) grid assumed that wind projects would provide less than 9% of their nameplate capacity towards meeting peak demand. That assumed number for “Effective Load-Carrying Capability” (ELCC) was based on the fact that wind production is not dependable and may be inversely correlated with demand, […]

Filed Under: Wind energy

SMRs – lots of noise but DOE budget that’s 1% of annual wind tax credit

March 29, 2015 By Rod Adams

I’ve been spending some time watching, rewatching and clipping interesting excerpts from the Senate Appropriations Energy and Water subcommittee hearings on the FY2016 Department of Energy budget. It’s not everyone’s idea of entertainment, but it’s fascinating to me to watch publicly accessible discussions about how our government makes decisions, sets priorities and spends the money […]

Filed Under: Advanced Atomic Technologies, Atomic politics, New Nuclear, Politics of Nuclear Energy, Small Nuclear Power Plants, Smaller reactors, Unreliables, Wind energy

Australia’s blinkered vision in China’s commitment to reduce global warming

December 3, 2014 By Guest Author

By Robert Parker President, Australian Nuclear Association Two of the most powerful nations on earth have concluded an agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Included in that agreement is reference to nuclear power being used to limit those emissions. Yet in Australia even discussion of nuclear power is taboo. We continue to frame the control […]

Filed Under: Climate change, Energy density, Fossil fuel competition, International nuclear, Solar energy, Unreliables, Wind energy

Atomic Show #228 – Energiewende status

November 26, 2014 By Rod Adams

On November 18, 2014, I participated in a round table discussion hosted by the Global American Business Institute (GABI) and the Korea Institute of Energy Research (KIER). The guest speaker for the round table was Georg Maue, First Secretary for Climate and Energy, Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Washington, DC. The topic […]

Filed Under: Alternative energy, Climate change, Podcast, Solar energy, Unreliables, Wind energy

Northwest wind takes a week-long vacation

November 25, 2014 By Rod Adams

Some Atomic Insights readers don’t like it when I use the term “unreliables” to describe weather dependent power sources like wind and solar energy. They believe that word is demeaning and not entirely accurate, especially in certain system designs where wind turbines are partnered with hydro or pumped storage. Even in that situation, however, the […]

Filed Under: Alternative energy, Unreliables, Wind energy

David MacKay asks his audience to use arithmetic to understand energy challenges

September 9, 2014 By Rod Adams

After posting a couple of videos with Amory Lovins providing his energy mirage, several commenters indicated they would like to hear and see a different point of view. Unlike Amory, David MacKay is a physicist who likes to use real numbers and simple arithmetic to illustrate the scale of the challenge of replacing the power […]

Filed Under: Alternative energy, Energy density, Solar energy, Wind energy

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