Legalectric

I must admit, I get so tired of over and over and over and over harping on the basic bottom line, that we DON’T NEED MORE TRANSMISSION. But oh well… here we go again. Just filed Reply Comments on the Biennial Transmission Report:

Once more with feeling:

2021 Biennial Transmission Report

Remember “Think Globally, Act Locally” — the bumper sticker and the practice?

Now we’ve got the wind industry winding people up to do just the opposite!  This is a study released recently, looking to power the world on Midwest wind:

Global Potential for Wind Generated Electricity

They’re assuming land turbines at 2.5 MW which is nearly twice the size of typical land turbines.  They’re also saying that this could be done with turbines running even at a 20% capacity factor, which I do think makes sense.  But that makes sense when it’s near load, doesn’t make any sense when long transmission lines, with lots of transmission losses.  So powering the world by this limited geographic area does not make sense.