The Folly Of Renewable Policy: From The US, To The UK, To Australia

The US

The United State’s Energy Information Agency (EIA) just released their latest data on renewable subsidies.

The taxpayer bill for this unreliable and totally unwanted energy source (put it to a vote, I dare you) is astronomical.

Broken down, this is what Americans are paying in subsidies per Megawatt-hour:

Also note that the subsidy for solar is about 50% higher than the electricity purchase price paid by most US utilities: “So the solar scammers make money no matter what,” writes Willis Eschenbach for WUWT.

The UK

In official new guidance, the UK government has said that everybody switching to smart appliances –such as heating systems, fridges and car chargers– is key to delivering the country’s ‘Net Zero’ target.

In the face of criticism, ministers have insisted that they are “in no way asking people to ration electricity” in preparation for looming shortages, and that consumers will instead benefit in the form of cheaper bills.

Smart appliances (i.e. those controlled by an app, and so overridable by the energy companies/government) will “enable consumers to shift their electricity usage to times when it is less costly for the energy system,” so reads the pitch.

Past the glossy spiel however and into the print, The Energy Bill, now passed, includes powers for ministers to “mandate that electric heating appliances [etc.] must have smart functionality, prohibiting the sale of non-smart devices in Great Britain” (i.e. digital control of your central heating system–for example–soon won’t be optional).

Craig Mackinlay, MP for South Thanet and head of the Net Zero Scrutiny Group, has tabled an amendment to scrap the entire section on smart appliances from the legislation.

Mackinlay said the government was “admitting a shortage of electricity with its plans to limit supply to households and businesses through smart appliances, peak pricing penalties and reliance on irregular renewables”.

Despite the self-righteous calls of the political class and the ever-desperate antics of extreme environmentalists, CO2-reduction is not the real goal here. It can’t be, else we’d have switched to nuclear long ago and emissions would have already plummeted.

Reneweables are an unworkable disaster and are doomed to fail — and this failure, at least for me, was known from the get.

Cheap and reliable energy is the backbone of western prosperity. But prosperity, it has been decided, cannot be limitless. The life of the average prole was becoming comfortable (at least compared with the struggles of the past). Existence was easy. Too easy. We plebs were starting to thrive, not merely survive, but with that came the increasingly opportunity to pause and think.

I say ‘but’ because a thinking population is harder for the overlords to steer, trickier to control, for sense and logic have the space to prevail. So –as determined by our parasitical masters– a good was in order. Crisis upon crisis upon crisis, in fact. Anything to drive living standards down and, in turn, the opportunity for reflection/introspection down with it.

Australia

Australia now finds itself with more rooftop solar power than coal power. However, consumer uptake of voluntary “demand response” is insufficient to “stabilize” the grid. The upshot is rolling blackouts/brownouts. What the hell is going wrong?

As per MSM spin: energy regulators and retailers are failing to manage Australia’s record integration of rooftop solar power, management they say is the “linchpin” of the ‘green’ energy transition.

As it stands, barely 5% of Australia’s rooftop solar is being managed in a way that could help “stabilize” the grid (aka prevent shortages and so blackouts), and only 3% of peak summer demand could be met by the so-called “demand response”, according to the Australian Energy Market Operator.

Energy companies blame large retailers for the mess, for not incentivizing Australia’s to sign up to the scheme.

They “aren’t partaking in it in a serious way,” said Flow Power’s van der Linden, who added that consumers need incentives to set their dishwashers and other appliances to run when it makes most sense for the grid and their hip pockets. “Why would you participate if there’s no outcome in participating?” he said. “While you’ve got retailers offering dumb, flat rates, it just simply won’t work.”

This again begs the question, what was wrong with cheap and reliable ‘coal’? Talk of “demand response”, aka ‘energy rationing’, was resigned to only extreme circumstances in the days of dispatchable energy, not the daily concern it is today.

Renewables, whether it be directly via the technology or indirectly via woeful management, are not fit for purpose.

Only since the push for wind and solar has it been required that people of developed western nations be enticed/coerced into accepting that their air conditioner will need to stay off on hot days, or that only a single room of the house can be heated during cold winter nights because their pockets (and moreover the grid) can’t handle it. And that’s without mentioning the impact to industry, that of mothballed factory lines etc., such as crucial fertilizer production.

Conclusion

We are driving energy prices higher while simultaneously pushing the grid’s capacity to breaking point — at the cost of lives.

Unless we say the world is cooling, what other explanation can there be for this:

“Forever”

It’s not often I do this, i.e. ask (beg) you for money, but here we are…

Your kind donations are what keep Electroverse going, and I am eternally grateful to all those who contribute. Advertising has also occasionally helped the site, as it is now, but this has been intermittent due to establishment censorship.

I do now, however, have a new–though admittedly unconnected–potential source of income…

Around eight years ago I wrote a short story about my eldest son starting school, called “Forever Little Pirate”. …bear with me here… My wife convinced me to turn the story into a children’s book and self-publish it on Amazon. So that’s what I did.

Electroverse is important to me. I feel I have a duty to combat the destructive mainstream narrative, and EV is my outlet. However, running both the site and the homestead here in Central Portugal consumes the bulk of my day, and I don’t have a tremendous amount of time for other ventures. “Forever” is one small project that I have managed to crowbar in, and I would greatly appreciate your support with it.

The book can be purchased via the link below. And I am hopeful, with your help (and positive review, if you feel it deserves it), that I might be able to work my way up the Amazon ranking and generate a few organic sales.

Thank you reading this far. And regardless if you purchase my book or not, your continued support is what keeps me going.

Best,
Cap