Wind Turbines Don't Blow, They Suck

Maybe I should start investing in offshore drilling companies along with wind and solar power. I think my money though is on offshore drilling. Wind or solar, for all the hype, just don't produce much power for all the expense involved.

The other problem is that the environmentalists don't want us to drill for oil, build refineries, build nuclear power plants or use more coal, of which we have a 500 year supply. Once the auto companies start building (coming very soon) plug-in electric hybrid cars (recharge in your own garage using normal house current), most people will never have to buy gas again. Seventy eight percent of all automobiles travel less than 40 miles a day, which is the range of the small batteries in these cars before the gas engine kicks in. Electricity, which is generated mostly by coal, hydroelectric and to a lesser extent nuclear in this country, is currently eight to ten times as cheap as gasoline. It's as if you were still using gas but only paying 50 cents a gallon for it. As soon as we get into the plug-in economy, the price of oil, which is predicated on demand, not availability, will drop like a rock. Then gas will be relatively cheap again.

Not that I'm especially in favor of that. I remember back in 1978 when we had gas rationing. An old girlfriend and I went for a walk in Los Angeles. It was so peaceful. I never before realized just how noisy cars, which is to say, all of them, destroy the quality of urban life. Still, since virtually everything in this country moves by truck, high gas prices drive up the cost of everything else.

I read this morning that food prices in this country went up 5.6% last month. The recent floods in Iowa have destroyed 15 to 20% of our corn and soybean crop. That practically guarantees that food prices will continue to soar. If they rise 5.6% a month for an entire year that's a compounded 92% increase in the cost of food. I guess I'll go back to beans again, with a level teaspoon of baking soda (and small minimally gaseous portions).

The one thing that really depresses me though is how definatly (or helplessly) resistant most people are to getting out of their cars. I had to go get Gabe around 10 p.m. the other night when he locked his keys in my wife's car somewhere out in a lousy part of town where he'd gone to play pool with friends. Even at 10 p.m. The freeways were crowded as always. I guess I should be glad it wasn't bumper-to-bumper gridlock at that time of night.

Last night around midnight I heard some young kids squealing their tires riding in big circles in the parking lot of the shopping center a couple hundred yards down the hill. I guess they can still afford gas (and tires too). The truth is I'm surprised at how much money people have. I guess we're used to living so frugally we don't realize that a lot of people have a lot more money than we do. We hardly ever go anywhere. And spend next to nothing on restaurants or entertainment.

I really like our high definition TV. But it's the TV set itself I like not the programming that's available. I go through the channels trying to find something I want to watch. Then when I do I typically get to watch three to seven minutes when an equal amount of commercials come on (at which point I click it off and go upstairs to my computer). The only exception to the unbelievable amount of commercials are a few late night movies. I've been watching the Clint Eastwood movie “The Outlaw Josie Wales” over about five consecutive nights. I finally got to see the end of it last night.

Regarding subsudies for alternative fuels or energy, I don't think we need them any more. With gas at nearly $5/gallon I'm thinking any alternative fuel that costs more than that to produce isn't economic anyway. Besides, as a libertarian, I hate the idea of the government choosing winners and losers. They invariably choose wrong as when they decided five years ago to make fuel out of corn and now, in part, grain prices have gone up so much people in poor countries can't afford to eat.

I don't know how good wind farms are but I notice when I drive up to San Francisco that most of the wind turbines in the big wind farms out by Altamont aren't even turning. Same thing when I go to Palm Springs. I'm wondering when do they every produce energy. Also even when there is a strong wind blowing only perhaps 75% are spinning. The rest, I presume, are down for maintenance. They rushed windmills into production with government subsidies. The reliability isn't there yet.