Update [2006-5-15 6:48:37 by McNerneyforCongress]: Thank you to everyone for making Jerry McNerney's diary the #1 Recommended Diary on Daily Kos! And now Jerome a Paris, the Kossack who originally inspired Jerry to post, is joining in on the comments. Should be a great conversation!
Meanwhile, I have updated the diary to include an extended response from Jerry McNerney regarding avian impacts and hydrogen energy. See his block quote below the "Give Pombo the Boot" button.
Jerry's diary is below the fold.
A.J. Carrillo
Campaign Manager
McNerney for Congress
Jerry McNerney, running in CA-11 against Richard Pombo (and leading Pombo 46% - 42%, according to a Stan Greenberg poll just released) posted the following comment to the Jerome a Paris recommended diary posted earlier today.
As many of you may know, Jerry McNerney is a renewable energy expert with a background in wind energy engineering. On our web site, Jerry has posted a Clean Energy Innovation Plan that is the centerpiece of his vision to transform the 11th Congressional District into the Silicon Valley of renewable energy.
I thought Jerry's response to Jerome was good enough to turn into a diary for Kossacks. If you have comments for Jerry, please post them below. Jerry is at a campaign event right now, but he will be getting back late tonight and will try to respond to your comments.
A.J. Carrillo
Campaign Manager
McNerney for Congress
p.s. the "Replace Pombo with a renewable energy expert..." image at the top of this diary was created by a long-time Kossack and McNerney supporter -- Malacandra (who also designed the cover for Crashing the Gate). Thank you Malacandra!
WIND ENERGY AND THE FUTURE
Thank you, Jerome, for your work here.
I started working as an engineer in wind energy in 1978...
Back then, the technology was crude and we had a very steep learning curve. We suffered just about any kind of failure imaginable. We had new structural engineering problems because the random loads generated fatigue issues never faced before. The low speed aerodynamics were new, often operating in or near stall. Control theory advanced to manage random loads. Attacking these problems was a challenge that we enjoyed.
We dreamed of the day when wind energy would become a part of the accepted utility mix. I remember clearly when the movie "Rain Man" was released and there was a scene in which they passed the Palm Springs wind farms. I was in Massachusetts and there was a gasp in the audience.
We certainly know more now. We know the disadvantages of wind energy, which Jerome has been even handed in describing. Development of the industry over time has seen the problems become manageable. Wind energy displaces fuel from being burned and in many cases has capacity value. With the advent of plug-in hybrid vehicles or other forms of using storage, wind power will have more capacity value.
In the current environment, wind energy is just about the most economic source of new electricity generation and most people find the sight of wind turbines to be pleasing. NREL reports show that there is enough wind resource in the upper Midwest to supply a significant portion of our nation's electricity from wind. However, we lack the infrastructure to take advantage of this resource, and at present, we lack the political leadership to make this happen.
I will give four reasons why we would want to aggressively pursue wind power and all other forms of renewable electric power.
1. First of all, we need to address global warming. There are a few who believe that global warming is fiction, but like those who believe in ID, they are overwhelmed by the evidence. Global warming is real and is starting to have a direct impact on humans. Climate change is accelerating.
2. Wind power does not generate greenhouse gasses.
It is true that little of our electricity is generated by oil, but much of our electricity is generated by natural gas, another commodity we depend upon from foreign countries. Wind and other forms of renewable energy will reduce this dependence. We can also reduce oil usage by moving to plug-in hybrids which use electricity as mentioned above.
3. Wind power and renewable energy in general generate local jobs. (This was already discussed in some detail by Jerome.)
4. Wind power is cost effective and the cost will not increase with the cost of natural resources. The more wind energy a utility uses, the more its customers will be insulated from the cost of oil or natural gas.
Our nation is at serious risk because of the irresponsible and self serving policies of the current leadership in Washington, including energy policy. We need to remove the corrupt leaders and get started to prepare for our future.
Aggressively pursuing wind and other renewable forms of energy while becoming more efficient, especially with our vehicles, will go a long way to developing a sustainable economy so we can pass on a world to the following generations that we can be proud of.
Jerry
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The FEC deadline (for California's June 6th primary) is Wednesday, May 17, and Jerry needs to raise $50,000 by Wednesday to pay for the direct mail and field ops it will take to win.
Jerry is fighting a very tough primary battle in CA-11. If you want to replace Richard Pombo with a renewable energy expert, please CONTRIBUTE to McNerney for Congress now:
http://www.jerrymcnerney.org/...
Please add 11 cents (for our congressional district) so we know the contribution came from the netroots!
Thank you!
A.J. Carrillo
Campaign Manager
McNerney for Congress
Update [2006-5-15 6:48:37 by McNerneyforCongress]: Jerry just wrote an extended response to several of the comments in the diary regarding avian impacts and hydrogen energy. I know a lot of people will be reading this in the morning, so I'm going to post his reponse as part of this diary:
Thanks everyone for your comments. I see there are two major threads: avian impacts, and hydrogen. I will address both of these. I will address smaller threads individually.
Avian mortality is something that was completely unexpected. Most of the people who go into wind energy are committed to protecting our environment. Killing birds to create usable energy is not consistent with protecting the environment and so we agree with the need to find a solution to the problem.
It’s true that Altamont Pass is particularly bad for killing raptors. I have personally seen a freshly killed golden eagle and it is a tragic problem. After many years of research and negotiations between the wind farm owners and environmentalists (it is strange to put these two groups on opposite sides because as I have said, most people in the wind industry are environmentalists) the agreement is that the old wind turbines will be removed and replaced by fewer of the large turbines (each of the new large turbines will replace 10 or more of the old ones). These rotors of the new machines are farther off the ground and the rotors move more slowly. Since the raptors impact the blades in the dive, there should be fewer impacts. If the birds do cross through the rotors, they have more time to get through before being struck. This will help.
The current agreement requires that all the small machines be replaced within 13 years. Moreover, turbines operating in regions of bird kills must curtail operation during the winter season when bird kills are more common. (This is the issue that Pombo tried to skirt. He requested that the turbines on his family’s property be allowed to operate without restriction.) These actions should remediate raptor mortality in the region. There are some who feel these actions are not sufficient, but it is a compromise.
One thing to note is the raptors that get killed are generally juvenile raptors, not mating birds. Consequently, the overall population of raptors in the Altamont Pass region has not been impacted very significantly. At least that’s my understanding.
The real solution to the avian mortality problem is to do the appropriate studies before installing wind projects. If the studies find strong migratory patterns or high levels of raptor activity, then put your wind turbines somewhere else. Most birds do not fly through wind turbines. They see better than we do and can avoid collisions. Nighttime migration may be a problem for birds, but I haven’t seen any definitive studies that confirm this.
Between doing our homework and using larger machines, the raptor mortality will be drastically reduced.
Hydrogen is a difficult proposition for cars. It’s true that the hydrogen for fuel, H2, must be produced using some other energy source, and that producing H2 costs not only the energy that goes into the H2, but additional energy is lost to inefficiency. Depending on the method, less than 50% of the energy used will end up stored as H2. So as several posts indicate, energy must be pretty cheap to be used to produce hydrogen. Hydrogen is difficult to store and energy density is not as good as gasoline.
The idea of putting water in your car and converting it to H2 isn’t practical because you need to have another source of energy for the hydrolysis of water and if you have it on board, you might as well use it to directly power your car because you will be wasting so much energy to inefficiency by converting it to H2.
I haven’t worked out the actual numbers, but if you decide to accept the losses and have a method to store H2, then you can use renewable energy, such as wind to produce the H2 and then burn the H2 or use fuel cells to power your car. In this process, you are losing energy in the hydrolysis. Then there is inefficiency in storing the hydrogen – especially if you have to compress it, then you lose efficiency in converting the H2 to motive power. Personally, I think it is more efficient to use plug-in hybrids with battery storage. It still involves transforming electrical to chemical energy, but is more efficient than remote hydrolysis and H2 storage. However, using stored H2 is technically feasible if the storage issues are addressed.
I realize these are rather simplistic answers to complex questions, but I hope this gives some indication of what makes sense.
Jerry