Michigan Greenies Begin To Realize They Need Nuclear Power

The Pallisades Nuclear Plant should never have been shut down to begin with, but Michigan's Democrats wanted it shut down as "nukes bad".

The Democrats then realized that if they're going to go to an electric car heavy transportation grid and cut out coal power generation at the same time, their renewable project was not going to be able to cut it and provide reliable power in the face of increasing demand. Do recall that Governor Whitmer was all for shutting it down until she claimed to be against doing so at the last minute when it was too late to prevent the shutdown so she could be on both sides of the fence.

So we get:

The Detroit News: Palisades nuclear plant gets $1.5B federal loan in bid to reopen, a national first

It should never have been shut down in the first place, and Michigan is going  to need more nuclear power generation, not less, if the Democrats persist on getting rid of reliable baseline power and replacing it with  unreliable solar and wind that can't meet the demand.

Abby's Chicago Trip - The Long Wait To Charge Home

Their trip was good and she was much surprised and they had a very nice time.

The return trip however was not quite so delightful.

You see her boyfriend drove her there in a nice new Mustang Mach-E GT.

E is for electric.  Now it is a very nice car, very well appointed with all the bells and whistles, and apparently is both zippy and comfortable.

While electric cars are great for in-town travel, a 241+ mile trip turned into quite the ask of the vehicle. 

It led to a game of find a car charger, wait for charger to be available, wait to charge car, rinse, repeat.

Took them well over 12 hours to get back to their respective places in Ann Arbor for a trip that would take under 3 hours and 45 minutes by gas-powered car, or four and a half hours by train.  Their way there took quite a while as well, but the way back was apparently a lot longer due to both a lack of chargers, and a lack of available chargers not being used by others on their trip home.

So for in-city travel, electric cars seem to be doing very well.  For longer trips, anecdotally, not so much.

Prepare For Greenie-Caused Power Outages In 2032 In Michigan, If Not Before Then

At the same time that the powers-that-be are pushing for electric vehicles that are charged by being plugged into our state electricity grid, those same officials are pushing to eliminate our baseline power generation for that grid, both nuclear and coal, and replace it with far less reliable and more expensive "renewables".

The Detroit Free Press: DTE Energy to move up retirement of its coal-fired Monroe Power Plant by 3 years

Detroit-based DTE Energy Co. announced a clean energy plan Wednesday that includes moving up the retirement of its coal-fired Monroe Power Plant . . .

he Monroe Plant, along with the Belle River Power Plant in St. Clair County, are DTE's last remaining coal-fired plants. The two produce 40% of the overall power the utility provides to its 2.3 million electric customers in southeast Michigan.

DTE also has said it plans to stop burning coal at its Belle River Power Plant, making the Monroe Plant its last remaining coal-fired power plant.

So, DTE will eliminate its reliable baseline that is producing 40% of its power nice and consistently and replace it with solar and wind.

Consumers Energy is apparently going to follow suit, and generate 90% of its power load form renewables.

We're already seeing an increase in electric prices this year from 3-7 pm with a new "time of use" rate to deal with peak demand and because they already can't generate enough electricity to meet the demand.  

Just wait until electric cars start being adopted heavily, whether by government fiat or not, and are plugged into the grid, and the demand go even higher -- just in time for the reliable baseload to disappear in the name of progressive greenie nirvana.

Electric School Bus 2: Electric Boogalo and A Little Democrat Corruption Too

Turns out Electric Buses aren't as reliable nor as cost-effective as they are cracked up to be, shocking, I know.

Washington Free Beacon: Biden Spent $1 Billion To Get Schools Electric Buses. This Michigan District Says Theirs Hardly Work. 

During an April 19 presentation to the Ann Arbor Public Schools Board of Education, the district's environmental sustainability director, Emile Lauzzana, highlighted a number of issues with the district's electric bus fleet. Those buses, Lauzzana said, have "a lot of downtime and performance issues" and aren't "fully on the road," despite the fact that they are "approximately five times more expensive than regular buses." The infrastructure upgrades required to use the buses, meanwhile, were "originally estimated to be only about $50,000" but "ended up being more like $200,000," according to Lauzzana. "I have a number of colleagues in different states who are facing similar challenges," the district official lamented. "For the school bus market, it's been challenging for us."

Note that this is in solid-Blue Ann Arbor.  When even the enviro-nut, quasi-commies of Ann Arbor are complaining about these electric green busses, you know it's bad.

But, no worries, Democrats still made bank on the deal, and that, after all is what matters along with the "green" virtue signalling at the public' expense:

The Biden administration has faced intense criticism from congressional Republicans over its ties to electric bus maker Proterra. Administration officials repeatedly showcased the company while Biden's energy secretary, Jennifer Granholm, held up to $5 million in Proterra stock. Granholm eventually sold her 240,000 Proterra shares in May 2021, with the former Michigan governor earning a cool $1.6 million.

Nice bit of insider trading if you can get it, neh?

Some Outside Home Wiring Repair

We had an "invisible" fence installed last winter for the dogs. Partially due to my surgery talking me off the dog walking roster. It works pretty well at keeping the dogs in the yard.

Unfortunately it was installed by an idiot.

The wires were buried after it thawed this year, but the burying was pretty crappy. The wires coming out of the garage where they were plugged in had been cut and connected with the standard orange non-waterproof connectors and not buried too deep with two of them not buried at all.  On top of that one of the wires had uninsulated wire poking out of the cap.

Either the dogs or other creatures dug near the wires, and the wires would then short out basically whenever it rained or snowed, which was not good. It would then set off a loud alarm in the garage that the loop was broken. Once it dried outside the alarm stopped and it worked again.

So, I decided to take a shot at fixing it.  I used waterproof connectors, covered then in electrical tape and then put silicon tape for more waterproofing on top of the electrical tape and wrapped it around tightly.

Two of the connectors live in a hole in the ground under a rock that keeps them sheltered from dogs or other predators that might like to rip them up.  The other two don't have a rock above them and are just standing up not buried in the dirt, so I need to figure out how best to rebury them.

So far all four repairs are holding up well, without shorting out even through a snowfall here and a major rainstorm since the repair was done.  I will  need to rebury them soon, unlike how the fellow left them, once I'm sure the fix is still holding up.

When Good GFCIs Go Bad

A couple weeks ago after a big storm came through, I found a circuit breaker had popped on the panel.  Reset it and it did not fix the problem - the lights in the guest bathroom, laundry room, hallway, and garage were all non-functional, as were al the plugs on the other side of that wall including the printer, and cable modem. Much fun.

Happily, the fridge, washer, and dryer in the laundry room still worked as did the garage door itself.

Clearly beyond my limited capabilities, I moved the modem via an extension cord to a working plug, and I sought an electrician to further diagnose and fix the issue.

Sadly, finding an electrician willing to work was hard. 

Finally found one and had an appointment set for last Thursday at 9:15 am, about a week after the outage, but it was the earliest I could get someone there.

So last Thursday 9:15 rolled around; then 10:15; then 11:15, and  no call -- no show.  I then called and got voicemail followed by a text message that he would call me right back.

As you might guess, no, no, he did not bother calling back at all.

Nor was there any response to my follow-up text asking if maybe he was too busy to come that day and if we could reschedule.

Then, since he clearly didn't want the work, I started looking for an alternate electrician.  Hard to get people to want to work today I suppose. Got a name from another friend yesterday, called him today, and he came over this afternoon right after finishing another job.

He then started diagnosing it and traced the cause to the GFCI outlet in the garage.  

There were three hot wires connected to the GFCI. One had gotten just loose enough to knock out that part of the circuit while leaving the rest of the circuit on the same breaker, including the Garage door working.  Rather tricky.

So wires got stripped, re-connected, and re-wired, and as a precaution we installed a nice fresh GFCI there as the old one was looking kinda dodgy, and it all works now.

Green Dreams And Brownouts

 This is what happens when the greenies in power think electricity comes from skittles and unicorn farts.

Gov. Whitmer has been on a binge being against coal and nuclear and  focusing on the rather unreliable renewable and with magic thinking expecting solar and wind to eventually cover 100% of the state's energy needs. 

So while eschewing coal and nuclear, refusing to allow the building of coal and nuclear plants and having magic thinking instead of actually heeding reality and "following the science", Michgian is gonna get this:

The Detroit Free Press: With summer heat and storms brewing, some say Michigan is headed for brownouts

The reality is there is currently insufficient power generation to keep up with the projected demand.

Even worse, two coal plants are being shut down, and  the Pallisades nuclear plant is now shut down  taking plenty of clean, reliable power offline right when it is needed the most.  That the nuclear plant provides electricity and needed to stay open to prevent a loss of capacity. 

Gov. Whitmer was all for the shutdown before she was against it.

So, she decided to grandstand and ask it to stay open long after the decision to shut it down was made ,and the shut down was underway in the final stages and she did far too little and too late to keep it open and the closing was assured before she spoke up.  She had 4 years to speak up against the closing and plan for it, and she wholly failed to do so.  Her "attempt" if you can call it that to avert the shutdown seems to be more for show than anything else.

But don't worry, I'm sure Gov. Whitmer and her greenie allies will have all the infrastructure and power generation available for charging all those Electric Vehicles they're pushing.   If you believe that, I  have a nice bridge for sale that's linking the Michigan peninsulae together that's in great shape.

To No One's Surprise, Electric Vehicles Are More Expensive To Operate

The Detroit Free Press: Study compares electric vehicle charge costs vs. gas — and results were surprising

In fact, the results were not surprising to anyone paying attention. 

EVs cost more to use and operate than gas vehicles, and that's not counting the time value of time/money when you're siting somewhere waiting for the EV car to charge.  The study did however take into account the estimated time to find a charging station.  I suspect their numbers would be even worse if they added the cost of the substantial lag caused by waiting for a vehicle to recharge versus filling it with gas and going on your way.

In short, EVs are nice as a second vehicle for in town short jaunts and can fill that role well if you have the cash to cover the higher costs, but you really need a gas- or diesel-fueled vehicles if you plan any seriously long trips.

Still no answer as to where all these electric vehicles will actually go to charge, nor any answer as to the current lack of infrastructure to provide the increased power demanded for them to charge, especially as the Dems and Greens are focused on shutting power plants down rather than building new ones.

I'm puzzled that they haven't come out with diesel-electric hybrids where all the diesel engine does is power a generator to recharge the batteries as needed when the vehicle is on the road.  Possibly too practical and not green enough, or something.

The Biden Admin's Latest Bit Of Cringe, Now With An Ex-Michigan Governor

A cringe-worthy propaganda piece from the Biden administration trying to push the bipartisan infrastructure bill (A bill that sis neither bipartisan anor solely about infrastructure), featuring Michigan's 2nd worse governor in recent history and a Chevy Bolt has gone viral, and it's as bad as you think it would be.

The Detroit Free Press: President Biden surprises GM's Barra by using a Bolt in video gone viral

Very cringe-worthy, and I doubt Granholm's solar panels alone are recharging her Bolt.  You can also hear her stumble on a few of her lines, which is hilarious.  The dialogue does tend to be rather stilted and shows Boomers trying to speak Millennial at times like its a foreign dialect.

Also did you notice that our former Governor Granholm doesn't seem to know how to wear a seatbelt?

Does anyone wear a seatbelt like that when they are actually in a front seat of a vehicle? She'd get a ticket if she was in Michigan wearing a seatbelt like that.

Did you hear where they talk about how excited they are at 2:23 when they talk about electric transit buses?

Well Granholm was certainly excited, all the way to the bank:
Granholm questioned about potential conflict of interest with bus company

Report: Biden Energy Secretary Receives Waiver to Dump Massive Amount of Electric Bus Company Stock

Ethics, after all, are for the little people.

So EVs are supposedly it, even as some places like California and New York City are requesting people not charge their cars due to energy shortages from a lack of production facilities.  

Maybe an Energy Secretary should look into that?

While California Is Undergoing An Electric Power Shortage With No Expected Relief In Sight

Governor Newsom announces that by 2035 only electric cars may be sold as new vehicles in California.

The Detroit News: California moves to end sales of new gas-powered cars

California will halt sales of new gasoline-powered passenger cars and trucks by 2035, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Wednesday, a move he says will cut greenhouse gas emissions by 35% in the nation’s most populous state.

 As there's no simultaneous push to increase reliable electric power generation in the state of California to meet the demand of all these new electric cars, and they can't even keep up with electrical demand as it stands now.

  I think we can have a pretty good idea as to how this is going to end up.

Lots Of Toronto Still Without Power

The ice storm while pretty sure knocked the electric service to Toronto's residents for a loop. Even now, some are still out of power and many people I knew lost power days after the ice storm itself had passed as ice-covered trees kept crashing down taking more power lines with them.

While 80% of those knocked out have their power back on, apparently including my sister-in-law and niece's place, and they're now heading homeward, many are still without.

The Star: Ice storm: 54,000 customers in Toronto still without power

It's a pretty massive job, and about the only way it might go any faster is if Toronto's Mayor Rob Fiord starts sharing his crack with the electrical workers.

West Bloomfield Forks Over $12K In An Electrifying Greendogle

It's free, but it costs $12,000 to install and asphalt and electricity are extra.

West Bloomfield Patch: Township, Library to Share Cost of New Electric Vehicle Charging Station

The West Bloomfield Board of Trustees and the West Bloomfield Library have agreed to share the cost of a new electric vehicle charge station. The station will be the first of its kind in the township, and will be located on the Civic Center campus near township hall and the library.

"We are always looking at ways to become as green as possible," Trustee Howard Rosenberg said. "I think it's critical that the township takes this step, and hopefully it will inspire other places in the township to do the same."

Treasurer Teri Weingarden agreed, "We were the first to have a windmill and I think we need to continue the trend of being a green community. I think it will attract businesses and if we can show this is a success others will want to follow suit."

I somehow doubt that the presence of a charging station by city hall, a pretty far walk from most businesses, is going to attract much in the way of business development. Generally low taxes, and positive business environment will get you a lot farther than a single windmill-powered streetlight and an isolated electric charging station.

The township will have until next year to install the station that's being offered free to the township. The township and the library will split the cost of installing the station - approximately $7,000 to $12,000 total.

The township has yet to report if they've broken even on the windmill, so I'm glad to see they've apparently got the money to burn on this latest SWPL trend.

There's allegedly 200 electric-type vehicles in the township, so it'll take a long time to recoup this expense, assuming that is correct and people stop plugging in at home. Noted in the article, the township will charge 25 cents for 15 charging minutes up to two hours.

The library's share of $6,000 would sure have bought a whole lot of reading and audio-visual materials, and educational programs which is kinda the whole mission of a library after all.

Aside form this misguided flirtation with a township-level Solyndra, I must say the Library really is top rate with lots a great materials, a great learning environment and great staff. So we'll forgive this one misstep.

That is assuming they finally get with it and get some books by Tom Kratman, Larry Correia and Michael Z. Williamson on the shelves and while you're at it, update the John Ringo collection as you're just not keeping up.

You could get all of these authors on the shelves for under $200 and they'd actually be read - considering they've just gone and spend six grand on something the vast majority of their patrons will never use, what's the excuse for not buying that which their patrons will read?

The Obama Inspired Utility Scam

Remember this lady from Detroit?

Well, it turns out that someone was paying attention and figured the denizens of Detroit and southeastern Michigan could be easily scammed with promises of Obama handouts:

The Detroit News: Obama utility bill-paying scam hits Metro Detroit

Metro Detroiters should beware of an online scam that promises President Barack Obama will pay their utility bills.

. . .

Also Wednesday, the state's Public Service Commission, which regulates the state's utility companies, issued a warning for consumers.

Last week, officials with the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department did so as well.

. . .

Under the scam, victims are contacted in person, through fliers, social media and text messages.

Scammers tell consumers Obama can provide credits or apply payments to their water, electric and heating bills in exchange for their Social Security number and a bank routing number.

Once someone provides the information, they receive a bank routing number that will supposedly pay the bills.

No such federal program exists. Customers think they've paid their bills, but they haven't.

Lisa Dilg, a spokeswoman for the Better Business Bureau for Eastern Michigan, said people are still being snookered.

"A lot of people are falling for it," she said. "It's pretty shocking. We're getting several complaints about it every day."

Not to mention they just provided all the information needed for their identity to be stolen.

Its no wonder that the credulous dolts are falling for this scam.

Remember Obama's promise of taxing oil companies and using the money to help people pay their utility bills?

It's a pretty sad turn of events when scammers can use the same magical thinking and economically illiterate approach used by the president to get elected to fleece the same bunch of ignorant fools.

Update: The Detroit Free Press reports that as of July 24, at least 2,300 Michigan residents have been scammed by this scheme.

Tight Supply, Meet Increased Demand.

The Detroit Free Press: DTE lightens electricity load by cycling customers' air conditioning on and off

Reeling from a destructive storm and scorching heat, DTE Energy activated a back-up plan Friday that lessened demand on the system by cycling some customers' air-conditioning on and off amid triple-digit highs of last week's record-setting heat spell. Those customers are among the 280,000 participants in the utility's CoolCurrents program, volunteers who step up from June to October in exchange for a break on power bills. DTE and other Midwest power companies rely on an extended Midwest and Canadian network on which utilities can buy or sell electricity to meet peak demand. But with storm damage and high heat stressing systems in the region, the future supply was in question. DTE decided to take the action to lessen the demand, said spokesman Alejandro Bodipo-Memba. "There was a question about supply on the system," he said. "It can quickly become an issue."

Gee, I wonder what could cause the need for cycling loads and the increasing the cost of power because of increased demand?

Could it be due to the lack of increased supply because of denials for new coal plants, including a new 600 megawatt plant in Michigan not to mention the EPA by regulation choking the construction of new coal plants?

May 21, 2010 (ENS) - The Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment today denied Wolverine Power Supply Cooperative's an air quality permit for a new 600 megawatt coal-fired power plant. The power plant was proposed for Rogers City in northern Michigan on the shore of Lake Huron. The state's decision is based on findings of the Michigan Public Service Commission, which said the company failed to demonstrate the plant was needed to meet future supply needs.

Brilliant forecast there Granholm and dear gentlemen/gentlewomen of the PSC, simply brilliant.