Greetings dear chums, I have been traveling a bit and unlike so many intrepid bloggers I don't find time to give you a hour by hour, or even day by day for that matter of my many pungent observations, although I know that by not doing so I have deprived the world...
But that doesn't mean I don't remain your ever faithful reporter.
In addition to miles and miles of interstate highways I actually saw miles and miles of high tech windmills, some even turning and a hi-voltage transmission line going off into the distance. I was cheered by that. And the fact that wind was about 35 knots may have played a hand in it. Knowing the area I also know that you can have:
Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.
-- "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner," Samuel Taylor Coleridge
I mean I hate to be just so ungreen, but facts be facts. The wind doesn't blow all the times, and I just don't see how you can have a modern society based on energy sources that depend on temperature gradients and air pressure differentials.... And every time I bring this up, someone always starts talking about it working 90% of the time... battery storage.... etc., etc., etc.
One group of us is stupid and I don't think it is me and my group. Especially with Obamie talking about 10 million plug-in electric cars hitting the grid in 5 years. That means we are going to have to overbuild like crazy and we can't afford to overbuild in places that won't provide us a reliable supply of electricity.
The other point is that you can't just transmit electric energy over unlimited distances. Electric cables have resistance and resistance causes power losses.
Yes chums, even Obamie can not repeal Ohm's Law.
