Following is LaVerne Thraen’s response to an Omaha World Herald letter to the editor, “Watch wind Turbines on Hot August days,” by Rodger K. Nunley, published July 31, 2008 in “Midlands voices.”
The facts in Nunley’s opinion are correct. His organization of the facts and the lack of facts on end use efficiency paints a gloomy future of more coal and more nuclear. He fails to explain that our energy future is a national security issue. The options he describes do not give us national security and they are the most expensive, polluting way to deliver electrical service.
When looking for energy security, I look to the Department of Defense. In 2003, the D.O.D. sponsored a little known report titled “Winning the Oil End Game Innovation for Profits, Jobs and Security” which contends it only costs 180 billon over 10 years and in 25 years we will be oil free and carbon free (on line at www.oilendgame.com). There will be an actual reduction in carbon year after year using switch grass and crop wastes for cellulosic ethanol as our bio fuel.
The reason T. Boone Pickens is excited about freeing up natural gas for transportation is that we can triple the efficiency of our cars by making them out of lightweight composite materials. At this higher efficiency, hydrogen from recycled natural gas becomes a viable business model.
When it comes to our electrical service, the author’s data about reliability show none of his options were a hundred percent reliable. End-use efficiency: new windows, doors, and insulation will a hundred percent of the time keep us warm and cool.
For every 10 kilowatts of coal we save at our homes and businesses, we will save 100 kilowatts of coal at the power plant. End-use efficiency can reduce everybody’s electrical use by two thirds. This dwarfs all of the efficiencies described in the article and costs less while improving all of our lives, not just the lives of large corporations and utilities.
New building and retrofits of old buildings average three percent a year. So a simple state law that says all new and retrofitted buildings need to be zero emission buildings would mean that in 25 years we would have 75% of our buildings converted over.
A feebate program on the state level would place a fee on non-efficient refrigerators and a rebate on super efficient refrigerators allowing Sunfrost refrigerators manufacturing the worlds most energy efficient domestic refrigerators and freezers in Arcata, CA. to be affordable for all. www.sunfrost.com.
The cheapest way of using energy is by not using energy. Not through conservation which means to do without but through end-use efficiency which means to do more with less. The U.S. is already the leader in these technologies. Midwest Renewable Energy Fair the largest renewable energy fair in the world comfortably snuggled in Custer, WI. www.the-mrea.org. Southwest Windpower in Flagstaff, AZ. manufactures the most advanced small-scale wind turbine on earth www.windenergy.com, and Powerfilm Inc. manufactures the worlds most lightweight and flexible solar panels located in Ames, IA. www.powerfilmsolar.com
We have a choice for our future: continuing to feed an inefficient system or to make every end user so efficient that we could use solar and wind (passive and active) where we need it. Using it at our homes and businesses would create a decentralized energy system that would provide much more reliability in the delivery of electrical service, and would be cheapest and cleanest.
P.S. The refinement of fuel and the repair and maintenance for nuclear power plants releases more carbon in the atmosphere than end-use efficiency and renewables. It’s an urban myth that nuclear is carbon free.