BOSTON — New England is decidedly short on coal mines and oil wells, but electricity grid watchers say a recent federal order could help the region finally unlock the power in the energy sources it does have.
A federal order issued last fall is intended to make it easier to construct transmission lines, costly and controversial projects that are notoriously tough to build.
More wires are badly needed in New England to connect customers to the region’s often remote sources of renewable power, which is needed because all six states have committed to using increasing amounts of renewable energy.
To date, the grid managers who plan transmission projects have focused almost exclusively on “reliability” — whether such projects would help keep power flowing when demand is high, such as on a stifling summer day.
But as part of the new FERC order, managers also must plan transmission that helps states meet policy goals, such as increasing renewable power use.
That’s a crucial step to actually getting renewable power generation built, said Seth Kaplan of the Conservation Law Foundation.
“This stuff is not easy,” he said. “We’re going to need the whole portfolio of these solutions.”
On Monday, the Conservation Law Foundation, Americans for a Clean Energy Grid and the New England Clean Energy Council will host a meeting of energy experts and entrepreneurs to discuss the regulatory changes and the importance of expanding transmission.
Massachusetts U.S. Rep. Edward Markey and FERC Commissioner Cheryl LaFleur are keynote speakers and environmentalist Bill McKibben is a panelist at the summit.
The New England states are among 32 nationwide that set at least voluntary goals to increase reliance on renewable energy sources, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.
New Hampshire, for instance, must obtain about 25 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2025.
Massachusetts must get 15 percent of its power from renewable sources by 2020. And another Massachusetts law requires the state to make an 80 percent reduction in total emissions by 2050, compared with 1990 levels.
The requirements create a need for more renewable power, and wind is New England’s most abundant source of it.
A 2010 report done for grid manager ISO New England said the region’s land and ocean winds are plentiful enough to supply nearly a quarter of its power by the end of the decade, if those winds can be tapped.
But the region’s best winds are in some of its most isolated areas, such as off the coasts and in northern Maine. So potential wind farms there can’t reach population centers without miles of high-voltage transmission lines that will cost billions of dollars.
But since the federal order means that building transmission lines isn’t all about reliability anymore, planners and ISO New England will focus more than ever on reaching that renewable power, including devising ways to pay for it, Kaplan said.
“Figuring out how to pay for things can be a very important step in getting it down,” he said.
More renewable power generation could do more than satisfy state mandates. It also has potential to eventually push down New England’s electricity prices, which are high because it has so little of its own fossil fuels.
In 2009, six of the country’s 12 most expensive states for electricity were in New England, including three of the top five, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
More renewable power in New England would mean more generators are relying on fuels that are free, such as sun and wind. With low to zero fuel costs, those generators can enter low bids on the energy market which ISO New England uses to secure power producers for the following day. The low bidders push out costlier options and suppress prices, said ISO New England spokeswoman Marcia Blomberg.
Still, obstacles to more transmission are significant. The billions in costs fall mainly on ratepayers. Also, clearing the way for miles of high voltage transmission wires antagonizes environmentalists and neighbors.
But Bill White of Americans for a Clean Energy Grid said while transmission costs are initially high, the infrastructure lasts decades, brings down costs, and is a good investment it in the long run. He said transmission costs average just 10 percent or less of the total on utility bills nationwide — electricity generation costs makes up the bulk of the bill.
New collaborative planning processes also mandated under the federal order will allow people to help determine which lines are needed, where they’re needed, and how they help states reach their own goals for things such as more renewable energy, White said. He thinks once that’s understood, the projects will find strong support.
“I understand that may sound a bit optimistic,” White said. “That’s OK; we’re optimistic.”
Almost everywhere wind power is introduced into an area, new costly mammoth transmission is needed to handle its erratic sputtering output. An example here in Maine is the Maine Power Reliability Project (MPRP) also known as the $1.5 billion CMP upgrade.
Without such new transmission, the wind industry is essentially dead in the water. So how convenient that the Maine ratepayer gets to pick up the tab for such transmission projects.
Now you might be told that because Maine is only 8% of the New England grid, Maine ratepayers fund “only” 8% of the aforementioned $1.5 billion cost. But what ratepayers are not told is that they will pay 8% of similar wind-required new mammoth transmission projects across the grid. There have been cost estimates for these of up to $30 billion. So multiply Maine’s 8% times $30 billion and then divide by the number of ratepaying households and businesses.
Read more about costly transmission and if you are a concerned ratepayer, sign up with us at:
http://www.windtaskforce.org/page/transmission-lines
This is nothing but a commercial. please get rid of it.
Brad Blake is nothing but a for profit propogandist, he cites this link only to get people to donate money. The site claims that co2 emissions aren’t that dangerous, and that environmentally forms of renewable energy are costly and ineffective. “Contrary to what you might hear from from energy companies and environmentally conscious celebrities, offsets don’t magically make carbon emissions disappear”………..well, you know what Brad, they certainly don’t contribute either.
Click on the link, you will soon be asked to donate. Though the site is opposed to wind energy, it doesn’t offer any other viable alternative, other than fossil fuel. I wager that one wouldn’t have to dig far to find out who is funding this site.
I wonder which it is, Exxon/Mobil or the natural gas industry? I will note, he makes no mention of how dangerous fracking natural gas is to our planet. In some instances, it has caused quakes and have had measureable amounts of chemicals in the ocean water.
What makes him think that you have to destroy the planet in order to turn a buck and generate energy?
Speaking of propaganda, wind power development rides, by necessity, a wave of propaganda and exaggerated benefits. While reducing carbon emissions – or pollution of any kind – is desirable, the methods that we’re asked to endure and pay for, should make sense WITHOUT the elaborate sales pitch.
But, the sales pitch we get, because wind power development in New England lacks enough merit to make a go of it without promises of inflated benefits, threats of horrible consequences if thousands of wind turbines aren’t erected here – and, of course, local mandates to force consumers to buy it.
The average New Englander has no idea that delivering 25% of the New England grid’s electricity from wind turbines would require an almost 3000% increase in the amount of wind power capacity that is currently installed in Maine – and the majority of those wind turbines would be Maine’s burden.
AND, this would not even begin to address the use of transportation fuels or heating oil. Those thousands of wind turbines would intermittently displace, almost exclusively, natural gas, the least polluting – and presently, one of the cheapest – fossil fuels we burn.
Displacing natural gas generated electricity in New England, which emits much less CO2 and virtually no particulates or mercury is unlikely to have any appreciable impact on regional air quality and no measurable impact on global carbon emissions.
Yet, because it is the darling of certain environmental groups and the beneficiary of an effective wind industry lobby, we are being forced to swallow the social, environmental and economic impacts that it leaves in its wake.
Oh, and if it could really significantly lower electricity rates, it wouldn’t require a government mandate (RPS) to force its consumption to the exclusion of cheaper alternatives. The benefit of the “free” wind belongs to the producer, not the consumer.
The Energy Information Administration says they have no empirical data that shows wind energy generation has actually displaced fossil fired power sources or reduced CO2 emissions. All their studies on the subject “are based on theoretical models”.
Ken Salazar, Secretary of the Interior, testified before Congress in November 2011 that they have no evidence that any of the +1 million wells drilled in the USA in the last 60 years using the fracking process has resulted in an incident where a person was harmed or drinking water contaminated. Salazar also acknowledged they have no studies documenting problems caused by fracking.
Preliminary EIA data for 2011 indicates that Maine generated 49.6% of its total power from renewables (excluding wind) which is more than double the next highest New England state (Vermont). Offshore wind projects have been killed in Rhode Island and Connecticut because of high cost and aesthetics. When are the other states going to pick up their fair share of renewable generation and put up with the adverse affects in their own states?
And what does ExxonMobil have to do with electricity generation? Oil fired power generation is a mere pittance in New England and is only used for peaking purposes such as backing up wind turbines when they cut out.
If Brad’s site were receiving money from Exxon Mobil or the natural gas industry, they wouldn’t need to be asking for contributions, would they?
PUC staff: No go for energy firms’ wind deal
http://www.power-eng.com/news/2012/01/1587670991/puc-staff-no-go-for-energy-firms-wind-deal.html
Do you think EUT Rep. Fitts and Hinck ,Du Hoax can do such complex math?
There is currently, and for the foreseeable future, an oversupply of electrical generation in NE. We don’t need to be building more intermittent wind projects far from load centers.
Claiming that wind power will drive down electric rates is nonsense. Wind generators can’ t offer power in they day ahead market because they don’t know if the wind will be blowing. And while the wind may be free to developers it won’t be for us ratepayers, especially when the costs of all this transmission is included.
Were it not for the subsidies, tax breaks, loan guarantees, and mandates politicians have enacted to please global warming alarmists like Bill McKibben, CLF, and the other wind shills, no one would be destroying our mountains to erect these environmentally destructive monuments to stupidity, gullibity, and greed.
Use Less
ya we all know about gullibility……. if Exxon/Mobil doesn’t turn at least a billion dollar profit, our gullibility pays for it’s projected losses.
I hear in central Oregon they are going to attempt to use geo thermal heat to create steam to turn a turbine. Imagine that! An attempt of using what our planet has plenty of and a source that is not going to run out. Oregon is famous for it’s utilization of hydro and tidal power, now tell me, when was the last time there wasn’t a tide? Maine is famous for it’s
tide variables, what is it that creates and transports electricity?….a current!
You do have one thing correct……greed….
“But since the federal order means that building transmission lines isn’t all about reliability anymore, planners and ISO New England will focus more than ever on reaching that renewable power, including devising ways to pay for it, Kaplan said.”That statement is so unbelievable it’s hard to fathom. The feds have decided we don’t need reliable power! Are rate payers foolish enough to pay for billions of dollars of transmission lines snaking hundreds of miles into the backwoods to bring an unreliable trickle of electricity into the grid??? And who’s the guru that predicts twenty four hours in advance when and how much and how strong the wind is going to blow? It’s time to axe our connection to the clean energy grid. If Massachusetts wants to bankrupt its ratepayers, let them. Leave Mainers out of it.
This article is total BS !!! There’s so many holes in it … Lindsay who paid you to right this drivel ?
With out super conductors it’s not even possible to transmit from northern Maine down to Mass… Although if the new transmission lines tie into Hydro Quebec where there is “reliable renewable energy sources” the project isn’t a waste, but if it’s going to tap into wind good luck … The wind hasn’t blown up here in the crown for 4 days :-/
The requirements create a need for more renewable power, and wind is New England’s most abundant source of it.
HYdro is our most abundant source and then the sun shines more than the winds come…I know.
Wind Power Yes?
Have Citizens Pay for a Farce, to Increase Business and residencial electrical rates MORE?
But” first the electric prices will go up , we are told, but then they will go down”?
These are the same people that tell you Pigs , by rotating their tails fly, anda bridge can be bought in Brooklyn for $1.
We should pay for buried cables from Orrington for First Wind et.al,, and to support DE Shaw’s contributions to Obama too?
(So what if it breaks the law of transmission and generator seperation called DEREGULATION legislation in Maine!)
So what, when the only people to pay for it, WILL BE US!
…..and some of Maines’ self serving politicians will laugh as they pocket our cash, and our pockets get wiped clean by this scam.
We should support wind power’s Solnydresque company called First Wind, with more taxpayer dollars?
(Investigative Reporters , where are you?)
Check out the sorded background of Enron’s bastard son, First Wind!
Huh?
—————————————————————–
But Why be bothered with Facts, Darn, those pesky FACTS!
“The current administration and its green energy allies in business and in
Washington appear willing to drive up the price of energy for
American consumers by limiting access to our vast resources. For the
past several years, taxpayer dollars have been spent to fund unproven
green energy pipe dreams, while Americans have been denied the
opportunity to utilize the coal, oil, and natural gas that is
literally under our feet,” said IER President Tom Pyle about the
report.
“This energy report should change the conversation in Washington and
promote policies that reproduce nationwide the energy boom in places
like North Dakota, where unemployment is at now at 3.5 percent (the
lowest in the nation) and domestic production on private lands has
more than tripled in the last five years. The Institute for Energy
Research is proud to release this report, the culmination of months
of research and analysis by IER experts. We have drawn from a broad
array of government, industry, and university data to present hard
facts — not myths — about our energy future. The report presents
a clearer picture than the anti-fracking, anti-drilling, and
anti-exploring ideologues in Washington want the American people to embrace.
Among he report’s findings are:
– When combined with resources from Canada and Mexico, the total recoverable
oil in North America exceeds 1.7 trillion barrels. That’s more than
the entire world has used in 150 years, and sufficient to fuel the
present needs in the United States for the next 250 years.
-In the last 30 years, the United States produced 77 billion barrels of
oil, which was more than 150 percent of the estimated reserves in
1980.
-The total amount of recoverable natural gas in North America is
approximately 4.2 quadrillion (4,244 trillion) cubic feet. That is
enough natural gas in North America to last for the next 175 years at
current rates of consumption.
– There is more recoverable natural gas in North America, Canada, and Mexico
than the combined proved reserves in Russia, Iran, Qatar, Saudi
Arabia, and Turkmenistan.
-North America has more than 497 billion short tons of recoverable coal, or
nearly three times as much as Russia, which has the world’s second
largest reserves. In fact, North America’s recoverable coal
resources are bigger than the five largest non-North American
countries’ reserves combined (Russia, China, Australia, India,
Ukraine.)
-A scarcity of good policies, not a scarcity of energy, is responsible
for U.S. energy insecurity.
watch a video presentation of the report’s central findings, click
here. http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/43016
Attached PDF from:
http://energyforamerica.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Energy-Inventory-FINAL.pdf
But who needs facts. Don’t we all want to support DE Shaw,and the states self-servers to cash in on the WIND LIES, and ignorance of past wind policy?
DO YOU BELIEVE !
(ask your wallet if this Renewable Referendum is approved) allowing more transmission line at tax payer expense.)
MAINE WILL GO BROKE, …..bring in clean fossil fuels(gas) and Hydro please Mr . Lepage.