Recession - What To Do?
By E. Ralph Hostetter
January 8, 2008
Page 2 of 2
DOE points out that "because of the expected near-term retirement of many aging power plants in the existing fleet, growth of the information economy, economic growth and the forecasted growth of electricity demand, America faces a significant need for new power generation." The DOE report concludes: "In summary, the North American world class electric system is facing several serious challenges. Major questions exist about its ability to continue providing citizens and businesses with relatively clean, reliable and affordable energy services. The recent downturn in the economy masks areas of grid congestion in numerous locations across America. These bottlenecks could interfere with regional economic development. Unless substantial amounts of capital are invested over the next several decades in new generation, transmission and distribution facilities, service quality will degrade and costs will go up."
Apparently overlooked in the studies will be the necessity of bringing alternate energy production generation to market. Wind energy, for example, will be developed in the areas where wind corridors exist.
These corridors are not necessarily located conveniently in areas bordering on large population centers. The principal wind corridors with winds in Class 5 are located in the Great Plains area, over elevated regions of North Dakota and the High Plains of northwestern Montana. These sections of the nation are not large population centers and therefore will require fairly long transmission lines to bring the power to larger populated areas. The same will be true of the desert regions of southwest New Mexico, Arizona and Southern California, where the radiant energy of the sun will be collected over many square miles. The population in many of these areas is sparse and the energy will need to be transported to more populated sections of the region.
By upgrading the nation's power transmission grid the nation could save from $25 billion to $180 billion lost annually in power outages.
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E. Ralph Hostetter, a prominent businessman and publisher, also is an award-winning columnist and Vice Chairman of the Free Congress Foundation Board of Directors. He welcomes e-mail comments at eralphhostetter@yahoo.com.
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Note -- The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of GOPUSA. >> Back -- Page 1 2
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