Sierra Club’s 100% Wind & Solar Power Will Lead World to Grid Collapse

An obsession with chaotically intermittent wind and solar means not only spiralling retail power prices, but guarantees widespread load shedding (aka “demand management”) and blackouts (‘demand mismanagement’), whenever demand peaks and wind and solar output collapses around sunset and calm weather.

The only way of explaining the push for subsidised wind and solar is money. And when we say money, we mean hundreds of billions of dollars of other people’s money.

In Australia, the Greens, Labor Party and their propaganda/marketing wing, GetUp! have received $millions in ‘donations’ from the likes of Danish turbine maker, Vestas; compensating them for their sweat and toil in covering up the troublesome facts above.

In the USA, there are the obvious suspects, such as the American Wind Energy Association. Then there are the not so obvious suspects, such as the Sierra Club.

Once upon a time, the Sierra Club was peopled by sandal wearing tree-huggers, who would die in a ditch to prevent the death of a single furry or feathered critter. These days, however, it’s all about endorsing an utterly pointless power source, abandoned centuries ago for pretty obvious reasons.

This new-found love affair is, of course, all about power, influence and, most of all, Sierra Nevada-sized mountains of money.

And today the Sierra Club knows how to sing for its supper.

Railing against “evil fossil fuels” and making the ludicrous claim that America is well on its way to an all wind and sun powered future, the Sierra Club is just one of those so-called ‘green’ groups that’s worked out that there is serious money to be made running propaganda and other errands for renewable energy rent seekers.

As James Policelli details below, should the dreams of these well-healed eco-lunatics ever be realised, Americans can look forward to some very dark and dismal times, indeed.

In his Dec. 27 letter (“Federal fossil-fuel subsidies hurt renewables, drive up our electric bills”) the Sierra Club’s Jeff Tittel accuses the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission of making a “shameful giveaway” to oil, coal and gas interests to the detriment of all others.

FERC is obligated to assure primarily a reliable electric power grid. Low costs are important, but “cheap” electricity becomes extremely costly when the grid blacks out. And grid collapse is assured under the “100% renewables by 2035” fantasy proposal.

At today’s 8% contribution by wind and solar, damage to grid reliability is hardly noticeable. These unreliable supplies survive by getting a free ride on a grid bridged by fossil and nuclear. They “lean on the wires.”

As that percentage grows, however, grid damage can no longer be ignored and fixing it becomes very costly, both to customers and the generators that have to carry it. Some grid damage could be overcome with massive and very costly battery installations. But that quickly overwhelms any benefits from future cost reductions in wind turbine and solar panel manufacturing.

Cost estimates show that a 24-hour battery backup would cost 10 times as much as a wind farm that it would back up. (Several consecutive cloudy or low-wind days are common).

Sadly, the Sierra Club is no longer the noble organization of John Muir. It has morphed into a group based on extremist ideology, not physical and economic realities. As such, it’s not a credible source of guidance for managing a reliable power grid.

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