Q3 earnings call
#131
At an extraordinary cost for that wind generated kilowatt, you are correct. But an apples to apples comparison, not even close to coal or natural gas. The price for wind vs fossil fuel electric generation is more and when you add the necessary fossil fuel backup, which is needed when (gasp) the wind stops blowing or the sun doesn’t shine it’s not even close.
#132
For commercial/large size windmills, it’s well in excess of a decade to break even, sometimes nearly 2 decades. The lifespan is approximately 25 years, at least from what I can find. So it will pay for itself eventually, but it’s no panacea. I think they finally found some way to recycle the used blades finally, other than burying Oh them in the dirt. So there’s that.
#134
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For commercial/large size windmills, it’s well in excess of a decade to break even, sometimes nearly 2 decades. The lifespan is approximately 25 years, at least from what I can find. So it will pay for itself eventually, but it’s no panacea. I think they finally found some way to recycle the used blades finally, other than burying Oh them in the dirt. So there’s that.
heres a link to the editor of the book from which this falsehood originates, explaining how the meme is wrong:
https://homerdixon.com/resource/no-not-say-wind-energy-idiot-power/
Last edited by OOfff; 10-14-2025 at 02:05 PM.
#135
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Joined: Sep 2016
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At an extraordinary cost for that wind generated kilowatt, you are correct. But an apples to apples comparison, not even close to coal or natural gas. The price for wind vs fossil fuel electric generation is more and when you add the necessary fossil fuel backup, which is needed when (gasp) the wind stops blowing or the sun doesn’t shine it’s not even close.
#136
Yawn...
Funny how China is covering their landscape in solar panels though. Yes, famous tree hugging hippies: THE CHINESE. The CCP folded to the environmentalist "Save the Pangolin!" Campaign...

But the way, all for nuclear energy. Split baby split! (As in the atom)
#139
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Are you a green plant or a FOC (friend of China)? Coal is clean if burned correctly. The while plume coming out of stacks is steam…. You could stick your face in that plume and get a steam bath. Wind has not been good and only makes sense is very windy environments or very rural off grid areas. A wind generator doesn’t make enough electricity in its lifespan to overcome the cost of building it. And big solar farms are hit or miss. Where solar would be more reasonable is to mandate (in areas where there’s enough yearly sunlight and cloudless days, no trees etc) that every new home built/condo/apartment building to have mandatory solar panels on the roofs. Then solar makes sense. The combined solar output in those communities augments the KW needed to power those communities.
Fly into Vegas, Phoenix, Cali and scratch your head why there’s not solar on every roof. Big solar farms can be wiped out by 1 freak hail storm. As it’s already happened.
Nothing beats good old fashioned nuclear and fossil fuel use. Augment this power with solar and use wind only where it’s needed. But the rest is a joke.
Fly into Vegas, Phoenix, Cali and scratch your head why there’s not solar on every roof. Big solar farms can be wiped out by 1 freak hail storm. As it’s already happened.
Nothing beats good old fashioned nuclear and fossil fuel use. Augment this power with solar and use wind only where it’s needed. But the rest is a joke.
Nuclear is a great option (as I've been advocating for) but also very expensive to build. While microreactors are coming, they aren't here yet and really are only a good idea in remote areas. Besides that the traditional plant makes sense but those take name and money while not even discussing nimbyism. You're obviously a Navy guy so you've been around nuclear power. There's still drawbacks but the goods outweigh the negatives.
We had solar panels on my house in Florida in the 1980s. California is putting solar farms over aqueducts which provide a double win: no extra land required and the microclimate from the cool water helps keep the cells more efficient.
And no matter how you burn coal, it's not clean, has nasty by products. The entire world has moved on from coal. China has even realized they need to move on from coal.
#140
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Joined: May 2012
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https://hbr.org/2024/02/the-long-ter...-wind-turbines
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