Press-Ganged: How the Wind Industry Hijacked the Media to Peddle its Fake News

Myths, half-truths and downright lies are the stock in trade of the subsidy-soaked wind industry: to obtain its ‘social licence’, it’s needed plenty of useful idiots in the press.

Gullible so-called ‘journalists’ ready, willing and able to parrot all the usual fantasies, such as: wind power is ‘free’ and getting cheaper all the time; that wind turbines last for a generation, and run on the smell of an oily rag; and that rural communities are literally falling over themselves in the hope of getting in on some wind farm action.

Here’s Donn Dears detailing some more of the kind of fake news peddled by the wind industry’s trusted spruikers.

A Glimpse at Fake Energy News
Power for USA
Donn Dears
8 December 2017

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) represented the gold standard for truth and accuracy. Unfortunately, it has joined the many publications that have allowed journalistic standards to erode.

Twice over the past three months, the WSJ published articles that were misleading. In early September, it published Wind Power Wins Converts in Rural U.S. In mid-December, it published, by the same reporter, Power Shift Drives a Slide in Prices.

The latest article was actually published twice by the WSJ: First in the Markets Section in late November, under the title Electricity Prices Plummet as Gas, Wind Gain Traction and Demand Stalls, then, again in December, on the front page.

The most recent article made three claims:

• Competitive power markets result in low prices
• Wind and solar are competitive with coal, natural gas combined cycle (NGCC) and nuclear power plants
• Demand for electricity has not grown

Let’s look at each of these subjects.

Claim 1: Competitive power markets result in low prices

The inference is that the markets run by RTO/ISOs result in low consumer prices for electricity based on competition among suppliers.

But, this is misleading.

Obviously, everyone wants to use the lowest cost electricity.

Here are the facts.

The auctions run by the RTO/IISOs use the lowest variable cost when selecting suppliers of electricity, where the lowest variable cost will virtually always be from wind or solar because they have no fuel costs.

In other words, the full cost of generating electricity is excluded from the bid price of winning bids in the auctions conducted by RTO/ISOs.

A market based on a method that excludes full costs will drive all suppliers into bankruptcy except those that have no fuel costs.

The so-called competitive market is a rigged market favoring wind and solar to the exclusion of coal-fired, NGCC and nuclear power plants.

It’s the reason nuclear power plants are being retired before the end of their useful lives. This is explained in the book, Keeping the Lights On at America’s Nuclear Power Plants, published by Hoover Institution Press.

For more on these so-called competitive markets see, The Market for Electricity is Rigged

Claim 2: Wind and solar are competitive with coal, natural gas and nuclear power

All three of the articles written by this reporter cite an analysis by investment bank Lazard claiming that wind and solar are competitive with traditional methods for generating electricity with their levelized costs of electricity (LCOE) lower than for coal, NGCC and nuclear power plants.

A closer look at this claim raises serious questions about the Lazard study.

An important component of the Lazard study is their use of Capacity Factors (CF) based on resource availability.

(Capacity factor represents the amount of electricity a plant actually produces compared with the amount it can theoretically produce based on its nameplate rating.)

In other words, the CFs used in the study were ersatz. The study used a CF of 55% in one instance and 38% in another.

These were higher than any CF used by the Energy Information Administration (EIA) in their determination of LCOEs for the latest land based wind installations prior to 2017.

For more detailed information on the Lazard study see, Misleading Costs for Wind and Solar

The Lazard LCOEs also didn’t appear to take into consideration the intermittency and unreliability of wind and solar. These add substantial costs: For eample, to provide backup power for when the wind stops blowing or the sun stops shining, and to add huge amounts of expensive storage.

For more information on the cost of storage see, Understanding Storage of Electricity, Quantities and Costs

Claim 3: Demand for electricity has not grown

It’s true that demand for electricity has stalled over the past few decades, but this has exacerbated the problems we now confront with grid reliability and costs.

Government actions have encouraged adding wind and solar to the grid, which has contributed to excess supply.

Wind and solar can’t rightfully be considered part of reserves since they are intermittent and can’t be relied on should there be a surge in demand or a failure somewhere on the grid.

It makes no sense to add unreliable excess supply to the grid, unless there is a hidden agenda.

Summary

Media articles, such as those in the WSJ, are misleading their readers about the cost and reliability of wind and solar.

Our system, generally referred to as the grid, used for generating and distributing electricity to consumers is complex, and it’s easy to spin myths about wind and solar without people recognizing the fallacies in the stories.

The media almost always exaggerates the benefits of wind and solar while misleading people about costs and reliability.

Wind and solar are actually causing serious harm to the grid.

For more about this vital subject, see Why are we Destroying the Grid
Power for USA