Why Virginia lags on solar

by Ivy Main

Solar energy is one of the fastest-growing industries in the country. Solar PV installations grew 109% in 2011, and the industry now employs over 100,000 Americans. Yet it is almost invisible in Virginia. The installed total in the commonwealth is about 5 megawatts (MW), a pittance compared to the 1,200 MW in California and over 800 in New Jersey. Maryland and North Carolina each have more than ten times as much solar PV as we do.

Part of the reason is our lack of incentives. Unlike many other states in the northeast and mid-Atlantic, Virginia offers no tax credits or rebates on solar systems to supplement the federal tax credit. And our voluntary renewable portfolio standard is so flabby that our utilities will never need solar to meet it.

Virginia also isn’t known for getting out ahead of the curve on energy. Instead of embracing the promise of clean power, the state clings to an old energy model dominated by fossil fuels. Just this year, the General Assembly renewed a subsidy that takes about $45 million every year out of the pockets of taxpayers to support coal mining.

But as a recent article in the New York Times Magazine described, the future has come knocking. With the price of solar energy tumbling, solar now makes economic sense across much of the country. New financing models make it possible to install solar with no upfront capital cost to the customer, who may see immediate savings over grid-delivered “brown” energy.

Among these new models, leases have become especially popular for homeowners and businesses, but only power purchase agreements (PPAs) allow non-profits to take advantage of tax credits. Under a PPA, the solar installer retains ownership of the solar system and uses the tax credits to offset profits, passing along the savings as it sells the power to the nonprofit.

PPAs could permit the solar market in Virginia to blossom in a big way. Colleges and universities, private schools, churches, charities and local governments are now looking at solar systems as a way to meet carbon-reduction targets and reduce energy costs over the long haul.

Unfortunately, this new enthusiasm has run headlong into the immovable force known as Dominion Power. Dominion blocked a PPA at Washington & Lee University last fall, and its threat of legal action has kept other non-profits from moving forward with plans for solar installations.

Dominion is a regulated monopoly in Virginia, a status that gives it the sole right to sell power in its territory, with a few exceptions. One of the exceptions gives sellers of 100% renewable electricity the right to sell to Dominion’s customers if the company itself doesn’t offer that option—which, indisputably, it does not. (Its Green Power Program relies on certificates, not actual green electricity.)

So Dominion’s interpretation of the statute appears to be wrong on its face, but one of the nice things about being a giant monopoly is that you have more lawyers and more money than the people you threaten.

Unable to fund a lawsuit, the solar industry tried last year to get relief from the General Assembly in the form of HB 129, a bill that would have made explicit the right of renewable energy companies to sell power to their customers through PPAs. Delegate Jerry Kilgore (R-Gate City) shepherded the bill through the House, where it passed without a single dissenting vote. Once in the Senate, though, it was “carried over” (effectively, killed) by a Senate committee stacked with Dominion allies like Dick Saslaw (D-Fairfax) and Chairman John Watkins (R-Midlothian).

Quick quiz, but not a toughie: according to the Virginia Public Access Project, www.vpap.org, who is the top donor to the campaign chests of Dick Saslaw and John Watkins?

The failure of HB 129 leaves a lot of would-be solar and wind customers in limbo, keeps Virginia companies from growing and adding jobs, and prevents churches, colleges and universities from benefiting from the federal tax credits that are available to residents of other states where PPAs are common.

It has also given Dominion a black eye with the public and local officials. Critics say the heavy-handed effort to squash small solar companies shows the utility giant has grown overly complacent about its status as the most powerful force in Richmond.

Dominion should back down from its unreasonable opposition to PPAs. It has little to lose by allowing private companies the space to compete and innovate in a market Dominion itself doesn’t serve. And if it won’t back off, then the public needs to remind its legislators who they serve. Hint: it’s not supposed to be Dominion.

From the Brilliant David Roper

About two years ago I created a web page about temperatures in Blacksburg, Roanoke and Richmond: http://www.roperld.com/science/subtropicalva.htm

The conclusions were:
·         Roanoke, Virginia in the Roanoke Valley is well on the way to being a subtropical region.

·         Blacksburg, Virginia is NOT on the verge of being a subtropical region.

·         Richmond, Virginia has been a subtropical region since about 1990.

Today I added the data for 2010 & 2011 and got the following interesting graphs:

The data plotted start at ~1960 as that is when clean-air acts started removing sulfates from the atmosphere, which had been masking (global dimming) global warming. The black lines are linear fits.

The global warming affect on Virginia temperatures is quite evident!

L. David Roper, http://arts.bev.net/RoperLDavid/

How Many Jobs Did GOP Clean Energy Obstruction Just Cost Virginia?

Reposted from the green miles


Congressional Republicans, led by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), have been blocking extension of several key clean energy tax credits, investments that represent a tiny fraction of the subsidies received by the oil, gas & nuclear industries over time. And here in Virginia, officials have dragged their feet on encouraging offshore wind and been accused of letting Dominion Virginia Power slow down the process.

Now the GOP's ideological war is having real consequences and costing Virginia jobs at a critical time for the fragile economic recovery. Wind energy giant Gamesa has announced that if the U.S. and Virginia can't commit to wind energy, it can't commit to the U.S., building key new wind prototypes off Spain & Africa instead:
While still committed to developing a U.S. market, a Gamesa spokeswoman said the slow pace of regulatory actions, uncertainty over the future of tax credits for offshore development and the lack of a federal energy policy all conspired against investment in the prototype.

"Without a mature offshore wind market in the United States, it is extremely difficult to justify the enormous expenditure of capital and utilization of engineering and technical resources that would be needed to build and install a prototype in the U.S.," Gamesa spokesman Susana Sanjuan wrote in an email to The Associated Press. The prototype was to rise in the lower Chesapeake Bay, about three miles off the town of Cape Charles. It had a late 2013 completion date, which would have made it the first wind turbine in offshore U.S. waters.

The prototype was the first publicly announced product to emerge from a partnership between Gamesa and Huntington Ingalls Newport News Shipbuilding. Gamesa also announced that partnership will "wind down" by year's end with the design of a new offshore platform completed.
Just a couple of months ago, Gov. Bob McDonnell had raved about the project. "This wind turbine prototype will bring jobs, jobs and more jobs, and it positions Virginia to be a leader in clean energy technology," said Virginia Secretary of Natural Resources Doug Domenech.

Will Cantor and McDonnell now idly sit by while Virginia gets left in the dust by leaders that are serious about creating jobs and protecting public health with offshore wind?

BASTARDO!

Dominion Power is positioning itself to control how and when wind energy is developed off the Virginia coast, and a fair number of environmentalists, local officials and would-be competitors are nervous about that. Few contest that Dominion, the state's largest electricity utility, is a prime candidate to build and operate the first offshore wind farm in Virginia, given its money, political clout and experience. Critics, though, question its commitment to being a clean-energy pioneer. "Signs suggest that it may be more interested in preventing others from developing" offshore wind "than in doing so itself in a timely manner," Glen Besa, state director of the Sierra Club, said in a letter this week to federal regulators. Dominion told the same regulators at the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management this week that it wants to lease all 112,799 acres of space designated for wind turbines off the coast, an area due east of Virginia Beach, between 23.5 and 36.5 nautical miles from shore. At the same time, the utility is requesting that the government leave out Virginia when considering a giant backbone cable proposed along much of the Atlantic Seaboard. Investors, including Google, the Internet giant, hope to build the billion-dollar cable known as the Atlantic Wind Connection to help carry wind-generated electricity to land for a fee. Presumably, Dominion wants to construct and manage its own delivery lines. Furthermore, advocacy groups note, offshore wind is not listed by Dominion in its 15-year plan for meeting the electricity demands of its customers. These groups worry that if Dominion gains control of wind resources and infrastructure, the utility could keep competitors at bay and bide its time in constructing turbines until market conditions are ripe - perhaps over the next 25 years. Instead, the groups want Virginia and other Atlantic states to fast-track offshore wind farms so they are up and running within five or six years, regardless of the economics, in order to speed the transition from a fossil-fueled economy to one with more emphasis on clean energy sources. To that end, environmental groups last week delivered a 10,000-signature petition to Dominion urging quick wind action. They also plan a demonstration today in which activists are to encircle Dominion's headquarters in Richmond in a human chain. "We have real concerns about Dominion's attempts to monopolize the process," said Beth Kemler, state director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network. "They want to hold all the cards. And if history is any guide, they usually get what they want in Virginia." A wind farm in the Atlantic area approved by the federal government off Virginia Beach is estimated to cost between $1 billion and $3 billion. Almost all Atlantic states north of Virginia are pursuing wind energy as well. But because of differing regulations there, utilities in those states would buy the resulting electricity and let other companies build the farms. North Carolina still is waiting to hear where the federal government wants to designate offshore wind activity. Dominion declined to comment or take questions about its ambitions, but in public statements and published reports, the utility calls offshore wind a tremendous opportunity. "The potential of wind energy blows us away," the company says on its website. Its director of alternative energy programs, Mary Dos-well, has said Dominion is interested in erecting as many as 400 ocean turbines off the Virginia coast, a network capable of generating enough electricity to power 500,000 homes. She has not offered a timeline. The high cost to produce wind energy today, compared with traditional sources such as coal, natural gas and nuclear power, all staples of Dominion's portfolio, is the biggest concern, Doswell has said. "This is a long-term project," she said in a statement posted on the website. "The challenge remains the high cost of building this generation and bringing it to customers." There are no offshore wind farms operating today in the United States. Dozens are up and running in Europe, almost all with substantial government subsidies, and others are being built off China. The U.S. government under President Barack Obama is eager to get moving and has adopted programs such as "Smart from the Start" to hasten permitting requirements, which still can take years to complete. Gov. Bob McDonnell, who has close ties to Dominion and its CEO, Thomas Farrell, a former school roommate, campaigned for offshore wind as a dynamic source of domestic energy and new jobs, especially in maritime-rich Hampton Roads. Conrad Spangler III, McDonnell's appointed director of the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy, supports the idea favored by Dominion that a single entity should develop all designated wind areas off the coast - a position few other states have endorsed. The administration also favors bypassing the Atlantic backbone cable project. In a letter to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which is overseeing offshore wind permitting, Spangler wrote that the lone-developer approach would stretch construction out in phases, cut costs and avoid a "boom, then bust" effect of multiple companies rushing to build their farms as quickly as possible. "Phased development of a single, large lease could ensure a steady market demand for turbines, foundation support structures and array cables," Spangler wrote. Maureen Matsen, McDonnell's senior energy adviser, said the administration is not playing favorites with Dominion but, like the utility, is focused on seeing costs contained and a sober business approach. "We don't see much good in rushing out there just to say we did it first," Matsen said. "We are working to support development of this important resource in a way that will be cost-effective." The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management set a deadline of March 19 for accepting bids from interested offshore-wind developers in Virginia. A spokesperson said this week that a list will be posted soon on its website. At least one other company is known to have applied for offshore leases - Apex Offshore Wind, a start-up enterprise, based in Charlottesville. Apex already is working with shipping giant Maersk Line Ltd. on a project to develop utility-size offshore-wind facilities and is part of another group building a wind farm in Oklahoma, said president Tim Ryan. Ryan said that "it's really bizarre" to be competing with a conglomerate like Dominion for the rights to offshore wind in Virginia. He added, however, that a single-developer idea "makes sense," noting that Apex, too, is asking the government for most, but not all, of the available leases. "We are highly motivated to move as quickly as we can," Ryan said. Environmental groups and some local officials also are edgy over how a new state panel, the Virginia Offshore Wind Development Authority, is doing business. They complain that working documents are not shared with the public and that citizens and industry representatives not on the board of directors are often left in the dark. The authority was created in 2010 and has been meeting to hasten offshore wind since then. Furthermore, activists who attend the meetings say, the deck is stacked in favor of Dominion, which has a seat on the board. "Nothing is passed unless Dominion goes along with it," said Eileen Levandow-ski, Hampton Roads director of the Sierra Club. Bob Matthias, an assistant city manager from Virginia Beach who sits on the board, said he was uncomfortable with how the authority tried to recently push through a letter supporting Dominion's position on the Atlantic Wind Connection project with little debate. He described Dominion's presence on the board as "very aggressive." The Sierra Club complained last month that working conditions at the authority "are untenable," and that board members should be encouraged, not discouraged, to discuss questions and policy options with anyone they choose. The authority was created with the support of "developers, supply chain businesses, utilities, local government and the environmental community," the Sierra Club wrote. "It cannot possibly represent all of these interested parties, as well as the public at large, if it operates under a cloak of secrecy." By Scott Harper, 757-446-2340 , scott.harper@pilotonline.com

U.S. Coal Generation Drops 19 Percent In One Year, Leaving Coal With 36 Percent Share Of Electricity

By Stephen Lacey Power generation from coal is falling quickly. According to new figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, coal made up 36 percent of U.S. electricity in the first quarter of 2012 — down from 44.6 percent in the first quarter of 2011. That stunning drop, which represented almost a 20 percent decline in coal generation over the last year, was primarily due to low natural gas prices. As EIA explains, natural gas generation will climb steadily this year, while coal will see a double-digit drop by the end of 2012: Natural‐gas‐fired generation continues to expand its share of total generation at the expense of coal‐fired generation. During the first quarter of 2012, natural gas accounted for 28.7 percent of total generation compared with 20.7 percent during the same quarter last year. In contrast, coal’s share of total generation declined from 44.6 percent to 36.0 percent over the same period. Prices for natural gas delivered to the electric power industry fell by 7.5 percent in 2011, which contributed to a significant increase in the share of natural‐gas‐fired generation. EIA expects this trend to continue in 2012, with electric power sector coal consumption falling by 14 percent. Natural gas in the electric power sector grows by almost 21 percent in 2012, primarily driven by the increasing relative cost advantages of natural gas over coal for power generation in some regions. EIA also projects that coal production at mines will fall by more than 10 percent this year. However, with prices falling due to an increase in secondary inventories, the agency predicts that domestic consumption may rise by just over 1 percent next year. The U.S. coal industry if facing major headwinds. The current drop in generation is mostly due to competition from natural gas. But there are other factors that will assist in pushing coal out of the electricity mix: An aging fleet of plants, cost-competitive renewables, new clean air regulations, and a strong anti-coal movement are working together to reduce the attractiveness of coal. Since 2010, plant operators have announced 106 retirements of coal facilities — representing 13 percent of the U.S. fleet, according to the Sierra Club. The continued decline in domestic coal generation is good news for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon dioxide emissions from the fossil fuel sector are expected to decline by almost 3 percent this year — continuing the 1.9 percent decrease seen in 2011. Emissions from natural gas will rise by 5.5 percent, while emissions from coal will fall by almost 12 percent.

Dominion's Energy Tyranny: Where's the Outrage from the Tea Party & Ken Cuccinelli?

Reposted from Green Miles

Virginia's 2007 energy re-regulation bill was a terrible idea from the start. It was essentially written by Dominion Virginia Power and rubber-stamped into law by the Virginia General Assembly & Gov. Tim Kaine, who showed no interest in challenging one of Virginia's top sources of money in politics.

Five years later, as Virginia Sierra Club Vice Chair Ivy Main writes in the Washington Post, Virginia taxpayers are seeing huge costs and little benefit:
Yes, the Dominion family owns some wind farms, one just across the state line in West Virginia. But we aren’t getting a single electron of that energy, because Dominion sells it to other states that have much tougher standards for what counts as renewable energy. For us in Virginia, Dominion buys cheap certificates that no one else wants.

That’s a great deal for Dominion. According to the Southern Environmental Law Center, $1.7 million could buy enough of these certificates to satisfy Dominion’s 2010 RPS targets, qualifying the company to collect an extra $76 million over two years from its ratepayers.
Worse yet, Dominion is aggressively using its monopoly power to target any small businesses who try to sell clean energy to customers in Virginia:
The State Corporation Commission recently granted Dominion’s request to impose a “standby” charge of up to $60 per month on customers who install solar projects in the 10- to 20-kilowatt range (about twice the size of an average home’s usage). It’s enough to make these projects uneconomic and destroy the market for them. At a time when Dominion claims we need to build more power to meet demand, it is doing its best to keep small businesses from doing precisely that.

Even worse is its treatment of a Staunton-based solar company called Secure Futures, which has stepped up to the plate to put solar installations on university campuses, using a third-party power purchase agreement to ease financing. This summer, Dominion hit Secure Futures with “cease and desist” letters, claiming it can’t legally sell solar power to Washington and Lee University within Dominion’s exclusive service territory under Virginia law. Dominion, you understand, will not sell solar power to Washington and Lee, but it seems determined to make sure no one else does, either.
Where are Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli & his Tea Party friends as Dominion treads on the rights of small businesses and Virginia energy customers? Shouldn't they be screaming about activist judges and goverment stifling liberty? Or does Tea Party outrage not cover regulations that enrich its polluting benefactors?

Want to tell Dominion to create jobs and clean our air by investing in wind power? Sign the Virginia Sierra Club's petition to Dominion CEO Tom Farrell.

Bob McDonnell's Transportation Plans Serve Developers, Not Commuters

Reposted from The Green Miles

The Coalition for Smarter Growth warns Gov. Bob McDonnell's transportation plans will only add more cars from sprawling new developments to Virginia's existing traffic problems:
The state is borrowing $3 billion in state and federal funds on top of their normal annual spending for transportation, and we'll be paying this back for years. We should be setting smart priorities, but instead, VDOT is:
Reviving the controversial Outer Beltway through historic landscapes at Manassas Battlefield -- the first ten miles of which could cost $250 million to $475 million -- instead of focusing on fixing existing commuter routes in Northern Virginia.
Shifting $200 million in statewide money to a bypass in Charlottesville that won't fix major local traffic problems.
Giving $750 million of our tax dollars to subsidize a private toll road (Route 460) through empty farmland southeast of Richmond.
Meanwhile, when asked to help fund critical Tysons Corner transportation needs, the Examiner reports that "Virginia's Transportation Secretary Sean Connaughton warned Fairfax to look elsewhere for cash."
It's not surprising Bob McDonnell's pandering to developers - he's gotten more than $5 million in campaign cash from developers, real estate & construction, by a wide margin his biggest source of private sector contributions. The Coalition for Smarter Growth has a 10-step transportation agenda for Northern Virginia - really radical stuff, like "Bring our local elected officials back to the table in transportation decision making."

Quake shook nuclear plant beyond threshold

NORTH ANNA, Va., Sept. 8 (UPI) -- The nuclear power plant near the epicenter of the Aug. 23 Virginia earthquake experienced more shaking than it was built to withstand, officials said Thursday.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said the North Anna (Va.) Power Station can handle shaking of as much as 18 percent of the force of gravity. The U.S. Geological Survey measured shaking of 26 percent the force of gravity at the plant on the day of the 5.8-magnitude earthquake, The Washington Post reported Thursday.

Dominion Virginia Power officials said inspections revealed there has been no damage to "safety-related" structures at the plant, despite the data. Nuclear power plants are often built with a large safety margin, according to nuclear experts.

The NRC has not completed its inspection of the facility and has not said when it will give approval for the plant's reactors to restart.

Virginia makes the list with 14th most toxic air - YEAH AMERCIANS FOR PROsPERITY

WASHINGTON (July 20, 2011) -- Residents of Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida live in states with the most toxic air pollution from coal- and oil-fired power plants, according to an analysis by the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The study used publicly-available data in the Environmental Protection Agency’s Toxics Release Inventory (TRI). The analysis, entitled “Toxic Power: How Power Plants Contaminate Our Air and States” was jointly released today by NRDC and Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR).

Among the key findings:

Nearly half of all the toxic air pollution reported from industrial sources in the United States comes from coal- and oil-fired power plants.
Power plants are the single largest industrial source of toxic air pollution in 28 states and the District of Columbia.
“Power plants are the biggest industrial toxic air polluters in our country, putting children and families at risk by dumping deadly and dangerous poisons into the air we breathe," said Dan Lashof, Climate Center Director at NRDC. "Tougher standards are long overdue. Members of Congress who consider blocking toxic pollution safeguards should understand that this literally will cost American children and families their health and lives.”

Despite the health benefits of reducing toxic pollution from power plants, some polluters and members of Congress are seeking to block EPA’s efforts to update public health protections. Last week, two House Committees voted for amendments by Ed Whitfield (R-KY)/Mike Ross (D-AR) and Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) to block for at least a year the EPA’s Mercury and Air Toxics standard. These amendments could move to the House floor as early as this week.

Meanwhile, the chairman of the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee, Fred Upton (R-MI) has vowed to block EPA’s clean air safeguards. One of the nation’s biggest polluters, American Electric Power (AEP) based in Columbus, Ohio has drafted legislation to block the EPA and has argued against EPA’s current efforts.

The states on the "Toxic 20" list (from worst to best) are:

Ohio
Pennsylvania
Florida
Kentucky
Maryland
Indiana
Michigan
West Virginia
Georgia
North Carolina
South Carolina
Alabama
Texas
Virginia
Tennessee
Missouri
Illinois
Wisconsin
New Hampshire
Iowa
The EPA estimates that the reductions of toxic pollution required by the pending “Mercury and Air Toxics” standard would save as many as 17,000 lives every year by 2015 and prevent up to 120,000 cases of childhood asthma symptoms. The safeguards also would avoid more than 12,000 emergency room and hospital visits and prevent 850,000 lost work days every year. These standards are expected to be finalized in November; the agency is taking public comments on its proposal until Aug. 4, 2011.

“Coal pollution is killing Americans,” said Lynn Ringenberg, MD, of Physicians for Social Responsibility. “It is America’s biggest source of toxic air pollution. Air toxics from coal-fired power plants cause cancer, birth defects, and respiratory illness. Just one of those air toxics, mercury, damages the developing brains of fetuses, infants, and small children. It robs our children of healthy neurological development and native intelligence.

“Poisonous power threatens the health of our kids and families. As a pediatrician for over thirty years, I urge us absolutely to support the EPA’s efforts to reduce the health threat from coal.”

The 28 states in which power plants are the leading source of toxic air pollution reported to the TRI are: Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia and Wyoming.

ABOUT THE DATA

The EPA’s Toxic Release inventory, known as the TRI, is a national database of toxic emissions self-reported by industrial sources. This analysis compared TRI emissions from the electric utilities sector to those from other sectors and ranked sources by total emissions by sector. Releases are calculated and self-reported by covered entities. Emissions of key power plant pollutants are reported to the TRI, including mercury, hydrochloric acid, and other hazardous metals.

Top emitting power plants were identified based on toxic emissions reported to TRI. Power plant ownership information was drawn from “Benchmarking Air Emissions of the 100 Largest Electric Power Producers in the United States (2010).” Data on pollution control systems at specific plants was obtained from EPA’s National Electric Energy Data System Database v.4.10 (2010).

For the full methodology, see the analysis “Toxic Power: How Power Plants Contaminate Our Air and States,” which can be found here: http://docs.nrdc.org/air/air_11072001.asp.

Virginia - Where are you?

Our backward thinking, Uranium loving, nuke licking, off shore oil dripping, mountain top raping Governor, O'Dumbell, has continued to ignore the fact that locking arms with the Koch brothers and clinging to unsustainable old technologies will only hurt our state.

Below is a graph of the expansion of solar in the US. 66% growth in a year. now that's a growth industry.

Now here is a graph of the leading states in their solar installs. Need I say more?

Is this a Joke?

http://www.coalcares.org/index.html

Half naked College Students

http://youtu.be/EZj6UBr2KWo

What Energy Sources Do Your Tax Dollars Subsidize?

Republicans squawk about incentives for renewable energy because those are new & need approval, while dirty energy sources locked in their subsidies long ago - like, say, the tens of millions of dollars in tax breaks Virginia gives to dirty coal companies every year.

Why not eliminate all subsidies & put a simple price on carbon pollution? That's what truly terrifies dirty energy companies (and the politicians they fund).

From TheGreenMiles

How Few Jobs Will Wise Co. Coal Plant Create?

Reposted from THE GREEN MILES

Dominion Virginia Power is spending $1.8 billion dollars worth of your electric bills to build a dirty coal-fired power plant in Wise County. How many jobs will that investment of our money deliver? Shockingly few, according to the Virginia Mining Association (PDF):

At the end of July, there were about 1,800 men and women employed in the construction of the 585-megawatt power station. The work force included about 600 people from the local area, accounting for 33.4 percent of total employment. The local area is defined as being within a 50-mile radius of the town of St. Paul, with Wise, Russell and Scott counties accounted for the majority of the local hires. Additionally, the staff that will operate the power station is being formed and trained. After Oct. 4 operations employment will stand at 34 with half of those hires coming from the local area.

Well hey, that's only $106 million of our money per permanent job for local residents. What a bargain!

Meanwhile, a Virginia State Corporation Commission analyst has testified (PDF)that, because the higher rates needed to pay for it, the plant will cost Virginia 1,474 jobs.

Now, apologists for this terrible deal will say, "But The Green Miles! They need every job they can get in Wise County!" By that rationale, why bother actually building the plant? As the Chesapeake Climate Action Network has pointed out, we could pay 75 Wise County residents $100,000 per year and give the county $6 million a year for the next 133 years with the $1.8 billion it will take to build the plant. And in that scenario, we wouldn't have to deal with the 5.4 million tons of carbon dioxide, thousands of tons of other air pollutants & dozens of pounds of mercury the plant will release.

All in all, a terrible deal for Virginia's economy & environment.

'Governor's" Conference on Energy

I just returned from the "Governor's" Conference on Energy and here are some highlights:

#1) Bob McDonnell claims this is the first of these conferences. Not true, people have been attending energy conferences on this weekend in Richmond for years!

#2) Bob McDonnell says Virginia should look at "all the above". But he starts with coal, natural gas, nuclear, off shore oil then wind, solar and biomass. He is proud of the fact that he was in line to be the first Governor to have big oil slide there long pipes in our wet and wind off shore areas. Virginia's off shore oil is extremely limited and very dangerous to extract. He is dead wrong on this and we should fight him on it.

#3) Bob McDonnell thinks the Uranium in southside should be dug up ASAP. Screw the peons who live there.

#4) There were a number of presentations that repeated the call for mandated renewable energy standards. It was repeatedly stressed that the lack of a mandate in Virginia, unlike our neighbor states, is hampering renewable development in the state.

#5) Unlike our neighbors, North Carolina, Maryland and DC, there is no state support for renewable alternative energy. This too is hampering a renewable industry in Virginia.

Bob McDonnell says he wants to make Virginia the Energy capitol of the east. Right now we import more energy than any other state except for California. It seems from his actions that what he wants is to make Virginia the fuel energy capital and and exploit our state's resources to sell to the highest bidder.

Bob McDonnell is a failure as an energy leader and will continue the lax regulation of our environment.

The conference was really a sad couple of days for Virginia.

Sierra Club Flunks McDonnell on Chesapeake Bay

Reposted from The Green Miles

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell ran claiming to be a sensible moderate. But his governance record is clear -- from trying to privatize Virginia ABC stores at a massive loss to taxpayers to ignoring Metro's desperate need for funding, Bob McDonnell puts big business first & the little guy last.

Nowhere does that record become more stark than on environmental issues. McDonnell has made it clear that the agricultural interests like cigarette companies & pork processors that have given him over $1 million come first & the Chesapeake Bay comes last.

Now the Virginia Sierra Club has issued its Chesapeake Bay Report Card, making it clear that when it comes to the Bay, Bob McDonnell has been a total failure:

New Report: Global Warming Threatens Jamestown, Chincoteague, Shenandoah

Human-caused climate change threatens to flood Jamestown, the first permanent European settlement in what became the American colonies and the United States, says a report Wednesday by environmental groups.

Jamestown Island, the site of the original 1607 settlement, is low enough to be inundated by rising seas and tidal waters -- even if the waters do not rise as much by 2100 as scientists predict, according to the report by Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Colorado-based Rocky Mountain Climate Organization. [...]

"Climate change poses the greatest risk our National Parks have ever faced," says Theo Spencer, senior advocate of NRDC's Climate Center. He says Jamestown, along with two other parks, attracts six million visitors each year who spend more than $200 million and support 4,000 Virginia jobs.

The report (PDF) says the other two parks also face grave risks: Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge could lose its beach and Shenandoah National Park could see it brilliant fall colors muted by air pollution and encroaching pine trees.
Previous reports have made similar warning about threats to Virginia's coastal communities & wildlife habitats. And that's on normal days, never mind when a hurricane threatens to bring a storm surge.

Methane Hydrate Risk in our Pursuit of Energy

Here is an excerpt from Oil be Seeing You Blog.

Everyone knows business men are trustworthy. Hell, survey after survey shows that they are more trusted than the family doctor or your local banker or pharmacist or those bleeding-heart scientists writing global warming reports for the IPCC or, God forbid, that wacko environmentalist living down the street who keeps showing up at all those Greenpeace demonstrations. So, of course we can count on business men, these pillars of society, to protect the environment and do the right thing and make decisions in the best interest of "the little people", as Tony Hayward, CEO of BP, so eloquently put it.

And we can trust corporations, like BP, Exxon, Halliburton, Enron and Lehman Brothers, to monitor and police their own operations. If they find something wrong they will make sure it gets fixed, and quickly. So there is no need for us or our governments to hold them accountable. They will hold themselves accountable. After all, isn't BP voluntarily setting aside $20-billion to cover costs and claims resulting from the Gulf oil spill? And don't they have thousands of people on the beaches and on shrimp boats cleaning up the oil spill? Oh wait, they were strong-armed into all of that by President Obama. Well they would have done it anyway, right?

The reality is, in my opinion, that the inordinate faith and trust afforded business and industry leaders and executives is both misplaced and highly irrational in face of the evidence of the collateral damage of their profit-centred decisions and actions over the last several decades. The reality is that, despite the fact that in the beginning people were prone to exclaim, "what a terrible accident", this was no accident. Far from it. The disaster that befell The Deepwater Horizon was the result of very high-risk human decisions in the face of overwhelming evidence that should have caused them to turn back. But don't take my word for it.

For more click here.

Shale gas — the hydrofracking wars

By Dave Cohen

Published Jun 28 2010 by Decline of the Empire,

Josh Fox's film Gasland has stirred up a lot of controversy over the environmental damage caused by shale gas drilling. Shale gas reservoir rock lies many thousands of feet below the surface, with the depth depending on the location. In order to get the gas to flow up to the wellhead, operators drill down to the shale rock layer, and then apply a process called hydraulic fracturing to "open up" the rock. This requires injecting a fracturing fluid into the shale at very high pressure. This fluid is mostly water, but also contains hundreds of nasty chemicals.

Where do the gas, the chemicals, and the contaminated water end up? The best outcome says that all three 1) flow up to the wellhead, where they are captured or produced; or 2) stay trapped in the shale rock many thousands of feet below the surface. This description is over-simplified, but basically correct. The gas industry wants you to believe this story. Josh Fox wants you to believe that these gas or fluids get loose, flowing into the water table or the air, and thus polluting both.

Which story should you believe?

You should believe both of these stories. How many times in the last 40 years have we seen this narrative play out? The answer is too many times to count. Does drilling and hydro-fracking sometimes pollute the environment? Sure it does! Does a bear shit in the woods? On the other hand, shale gas production is perfectly safe most of the time. No one really knows how frequently drilling pollutes the environment in a serious way, which is really the immediate issue at hand.

But we need to step back and look at the Big Picture. Do we need the natural gas? Yes, indeed—see my Betting The House On Shale Gas. Do we want to further pollute the environment? No, of course not—see any story on the BP oil spill. This is the bed we have made, and now we have to sleep in it.

Where are the wind farms, and the solar concentrators, and the whatevers which are supposed to alleviate pressures to produce more & more natural gas? They don't exist! We could re-frame that question. Where are the natural gas vehicle fleets & infrastructure that could alleviate pressures to produce more & more oil? They don't exist! I could go on and on here, and the answer would always be the same: They don't exist!

OK, why don't they exist? Once again, we get into two narratives. The oil & gas industry will tell you that renewable energy is not up to the task of replacing fossil fuels. The environmentalists will tell you the political power of the oil & gas industry prevents us from implementing renewable solutions. I could write a book about this too, but take note: we are still trapped in the same old pointless conflict. People want a sustainably clean environment, but they also want their homes heated (or cooled) and their lights to come on when they flip the switch.

In other words, we want to have our cake and eat it too. How do we break out of this vicious circle? One way we could have escaped would been to have a coherent, universally agreed upon energy policy in place over the last 3 decades after the energy dislocations of the 1970s and early 1980s. That policy could have been amended as circumstances changed. But it was way too much for us to expect such a wise policy in Cowboy America. No can do—we'll just make it up as we go along.

So, we don't break out of this vicious circle. This infantile Fossil Fuels versus The Environment debate has gone on for about 40 years now. This noise will continue well into the future until all the Big Questions have finally been resolved. And that resolution will mean that sometime in the 21st century, we will have exhausted most of our exploitable fossil fuel resources, and we will have trashed the planet.

All because we wanted to have our cake and to eat it too.

OK VA it's your turn