There are two new reports in the Wall Street Journal about flops in the green energy movement — further illustrations of how much hype there is in it.
The first (Jan. 19) reveals that the vaunted new “amazingly energy efficient,” compact fluorescent light bulbs aren’t so energy efficient after all.
Pushing the hapless consumer to replace incandescent bulbs with CFLs (compact fluorescent lamps) has been the received wisdom among lawmakers for years, and no more so than in California, the ever-green state. California’s utilities alone spent $548 million over the past seven years in CFL subsidies. In fact, California utilities have subsidized over 100 million CFLs since 2006. And on the first of this year, the state started phasing out incandescent bulb sales.
Of course, when I say that the California utilities have been subsidizing the CFLs, I really should say that the aforementioned hapless consumers have been doing so, because all the subsidy money — about $2.70 out of the actual $4.00 cost of the CFL, i.e., more than two thirds of the actual cost — is paid by the consumer in the form of higher utility rates.
Naturally, the rest of the country — and, for that matter, the world — is set to follow California’s lead on CFLs. A federal law effective January 1 of next year will require a 28% step-up in efficiency for incandescent bulbs, and bans them outright by 2014. One consequence of this federal policy — unintended, perhaps, but none the less foreseeable — is that the last US plant making incandescent bulbs has been shut down, and China (which now makes all the CFLs) has seen even more of a jobs expansion, and is able to buy even more of our debt.
The UN is also pushing CFLs to help solve global warming, estimating that about 8% of all greenhouse gas emissions worldwide are caused by lighting. The World Bank has been funding the distribution of CFLs in poorer nations. Last year, for example, Bangladesh gave away five million World Bank funded CFLs in one day.
But now — surprise! — California has discovered that the actual energy savings of switching to CFLs were nowhere near what was originally estimated. Pacific Gas and Electric, which in 2006 set up the biggest subsidy fund for CFLs, found that its actual savings from the CFL program were collectively about 450 million kilowatt hours, which is only about one-fourth of the original estimate.
There are several reasons for the fact the switch to CFLs hasn’t lived up to expectations. First, not as many of the heavily subsidized CFLs were sold as originally estimated. PG & E doesn’t say why, but I will hazard a guess, based on personal experience. Many consumers dislike the light produced by CFLs, which they find dimmer or more artificial in its effect. Also, many complain that lights create static in AM radio reception. In a free market (i.e., one that, among other things, contains no subsidies), it is likely that few consumers would want to switch.
Surprise! — California has discovered that the actual energy savings of switching to compact fluorescent lamps were nowhere near what was originally estimated.
Second, the useful life of the CFLs is less than 70% of original estimates. Amazingly, the estimates were based on tests that didn’t factor in the actual frequency with which consumers turn them on and off. CFLs burn out more quickly the more often they are turned on and off than do the old incandescent bulbs.
Not mentioned in the story is the fact that CFLs contain mercury, and so are supposed to be specially disposed of (which presents an added cost to the consumer in time, money, and energy). The alternative is for the consumer to throw them out in the regular trash, making toxic waste sites out of ordinary trash dumps, with future clean-up costs of God only knows what.
The second Journal story (Jan. 18) reports that Evergreen Solar has closed its Massachusetts plant and laid off all the workers there.
This is deliciously ironic. Evergreen Solar was the darling of Massachusetts. Governor Deval Patrick, devout green and all-around Obama Mini-Me, gave Evergreen a package of $58 million in tax incentives, grants, and other handouts to open a solar panel plant there. In doing so, he simply ignored Evergreen’s lousy track record — a record of losing nearly $700 million bucks in its short life (its IPO was in 2000), despite lavish subsidies from federal and state governments.
Now Evergreen is outsourcing its operations, blaming competition with China, and whining like a bitchslapped baby about China’s subsidies of its solar energy and its lower labor costs. But Evergreen has itself sucked up ludicrously lavish subsidies, and it knew all along about China’s labor rates compared to Massachusetts’.
So Patrick winds up looking like a complete ass, and the taxpayers of Massachusetts wind up eating a massive loss.
But that’s not all. Near the end of last year, the Journal (Dec. 20) revealed still another case of American crony capitalism, of the green sort. It turns out that the wind industry — aptly dubbed “Big Wind” — copped a one-year, $3 billion extension of government support for wind power. It was part of the end-of-2010 tax deal.
Originally, this government subsidy was a feature of the infamous 2008 stimulus bill, under which taxpayers were forced to cover 30% of the costs of wind power projects. The American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) begged for the subsequent bailout, because without it 20,000 wind power jobs would be lost (one-fourth of all such jobs in America). But despite the billions in subsidies, Big Wind is sucking wind; its allure is dropping like a stone. The AWEA’s own figures show a 72% decline in wind turbine installations from 2009, down to the lowest since 2006.
Besides trying to make the 30% subsidy(!) permanent, the AWEA is pushing for a national “renewable energy” mandate that will force utilities to buy a large chunk of the power they sell from renewable sources (mainly solar and wind), irrespective of the fact that the price of renewable energy is sky high. The association has gotten more than half the states to enact such mandates, with higher energy bills for consumers as the result. Not surprisingly, Big Wind is also pushing the EPA to make energy from fossil fuels vastly more costly.
According to the federal government’s own figures, wind and solar take 20 times the subsidy to produce electricity than do coal and natural gas. So you can see why Big Wind keeps blowing smoke up the public’s rear about the fabulous future of renewable energy. You can also see why Big Wind is such a big contributor to the campaign coffers of Democratic politicians. They are the only ones who keep this outrageous boondoggle awash in money.
Meanwhile, the promises of green energy look more and more hollow, every day.
