A few days ago I wrote an article mentioning solar power and the war that will occur between proponents of solar, wind and other renewable energies and the fossil fuel electric generating industry. Today the New York Times has an article describing a wind farm in upstate New York whose power is not being used because there is “not enough room on the power grid” to handle its electric power.

This article is complete balderdash except for the part that indicates that electricity companies haven't invested enough in their infrastructure to carry the needed loads when electricity demand is high. However, on mild weather days like today, coal plants shouldn't be given first priority to sell to the public, with wind operating as “peaker plants”. It should be the other way around. There is already enough power being generated on the lines because the electric utility companies don’t want to shut down one of their power plants — the ones that are generating electricity by casting their pollution over all of us on the East Coast — and allow a wind generating station to steal their market. I previously stated that there was going to be a war regarding these energy resources and I'll repeat what I said here:

There are a host of solar energy companies who are coming out with newer and more technologically advanced products every day. And one company even claims that they have reached parity with coal fired generating plants, although huge volume production is some time down the road. But when it comes, solar panels may come off the assembly lines like newspapers from a printing press. When that happens, what happens to the fossil fuel industry and all the coal fired plants that will be useless?

Are we destined for a full scale war or will the nation happily embrace the promise of solar power. Al Gore says we can get off fossil fuels for electric power generation, if we apply ourselves, in ten years. Or are we in for the battle of our lives? I am reminded of a similar battle, with a sadder human element, one that is part of American history. In the American South we had huge plantation owners who in the aggregate owned perhaps several million slaves, which in the capitalist system that was in existence then were considered “assets”. The sudden relegation of these “assets” to a zero value on the balance sheet promised to ruin plantation owners, destroy banks who had lent money on these assets, and create financial armageddon in the Southern States. And the battle was joined.

Likewise, we have thousands of fossil fuel and nuclear plants which — if solar panels can be produced on machines at thousands of feet per minute and printed like newspapers — will be rendered into valueless assets and heaping junk piles. These fossil fuel plants are poisoning the planet and all living creatures living on the planet. We are all slaves to the pollution machines that encircle the globe. And the vested interests in these behemoths don’t want the value of their assets reduced to zero, and will fight to keep them. Solar power (and wind, wave and other renewables) have the power to set us free from the deleterious effects of pollution from coal, oil and other limited resources. But we’ve got one hell of a fight to make it happen.

The New York legislature needs to meet immediately to remedy the situation in New York by forcing one or more electric generating coal plants to shut down to make way for the non polluting wind energy that is available. Renewable energy must be given first priority to the power infrastructure, and the most polluting plants last. The profits of one of their electric companies must make way for non polluting energy and the health of our citizens.

The first salvo in the war I described that will occur has now been fired. Which side are you on?