I Look at the Floor and See It Needs Sweeping

On Monday President Obama attended an event at a new solar power plant in Florida. While there, he announced an allocation of over 3 billion dollars of the bailout money that will go towards smart grid initiatives. This money will supposedly be match by private investment of over 4 billion.

I'm actually not all that upset about the smart grid stuff. A lot of that money will be used for things that are pretty cool. There is one thing about it that bugs me though. The P.R. spin. They make it sound like this investment will revolutionize the grid and solve all our problems. It won't even get close. If you look at the numbers in this PDF (Link), you'll notice that there's a lot of money going to smart meters. Outside of that, there's a not a lot of solid information about what's going to be done with the money. You can say you're going to install a new system that's going to save power all you want to, but in the end, it might not work out. It also only awards money to 100 different utilities. That's a fraction of the total marketplace.

It's a good start, but if the industry can invest 4 billion of its own money in this, then why does the government have to hand out 3 billion of our tax dollars?

The other thing that bothers me is the so called "green" aspect. The technology they're talking about this money making available can help save power, yes, but if you really want to cut carbon emissions the easiest and cheapest way is nuclear. If the government would ease the permitting process and help move applications for new nuclear facilities towards construction, this country could be well on its way to being over 50% nuclear by 2030. We're already 25% nuclear and that just with the plants that we have. A new plant hasn't been constructed since the 70's.

I also want to talk about the solar plant that was the centerpiece of the announcement. It's rated for a max production of 25 megawatts (per hour). All the people that think solar and wind are the answers are wrong. At times, the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine and what are you going to do then? The other problem is the investment versus return. That solar plant is reported to have cost of $150 million to build. All for 25 megawatts. A mid-size factory of some sort can burn through twice that in an hour. Solar and wind are never going to be capable of supporting the base load on a grid. They may be great for peaking, but who's to say that the sun's going to be shining on a cold winter morning when a system peaks?

Nuclear has to be part of the equation and it's just not something you hear anyone talking about in the current administration.

Have a good Thursday.

--Paul