What's Missing From Consumers Energy's Announcement?

The Detroit News: Consumers Energy plan calls for more than doubling capacity by 2040

Consumers Energy says it will more than double its system capacity by 2040 by using an “all-of-the-above” mix of natural gas, solar, wind, pumped and battery storage as part of a long-term supply proposal.  

Energy matters.  America's economy, businesses, and consumers all depend on available, reliable, and (relatively) inexpensive energy.

And we as a country have been deliberately negligent in maintaining that available, reliable, and (relatively) inexpensive energy - whether going for the Greenies with their no building of power plants whether coal or nuclear at all, to the Green New Deal with its demand of having unreliable solar and wind to replace reliable baseline power.

That Consumers is announcing they will double production capacity is welcome news, especially as all coal plants in Michigan have been set to close by 2032 and we're down to two nuclear plants from five and energy demand has not decreased.

In short, there's not going to be much in the way of reliable baseline production aside from some natural gas plants.  

Certainly that will be badly needed, as there's been scant increase in reliable production capacity. But notice that nuclear is missing from the  “all-of-the-above” mix.

Nuclear provides excellent baseline power and is reliable and yes, safe, and verily non-polluting and not even making those greenhouse gases the Greenies fret about, so long as you don't put communists in charge of it. 

A pity Consumers isn't leading the way with the new SMR reactors or even the large safe reactor designs. 

When Government GEVeth, Government Can TakEV Away

GM, Ford and Stellantis all jumped on the EV bandwagon in compliance with President Biden's edict to shift to electric vehicles.  The edict came with the carrot of many government subsidies for doing so, including $7,500 direct to each consumer.

The problems that then ensued is that the infrastructure for such vehicles is still not in place even after billions spent by the Biden Administration to force such to be created - only to have it bogged down in  Democrat-created red tape that basically spent the funds to create jobs for Democrat functionaries with little actual results to show for it. Even Democrat cheerleader and mouthpiece John Stewart was appalled. Nor are the vehicles themselves suitable to fully replace ICE vehicles on a one-for-one basis.

But the market for electric vehicles was pretty much created and expanded by these edicts and subsidies.  Now that President Trump's administration has ended the taxpayer give-aways and drunken spending on electric cars, economic reality has set in.

The current limits on electric cars still make them a niche vehicle that are only good for certain conditions - and not for the Democrat-Greenie-demanded total replacement of internal combustion engine vehicles.

The results are that the manufacturers that went all-in and complied with the Biden Administration's edict and promise of government subsidies while ignoring economics and the actual current use case for electric vehicles are now realizing reality:

The Detroit News: Stellantis writes down $26.5 billion from EV investments

Yahoo Finance: What Ford Motor (F)'s $19.5 Billion EV Reset and Hybrid Pivot Means For Shareholders

 GM Authority:  GM Writing Down Another $6 Billion For Cutting Back On EV Investments

 Jumping on the Biden EV bandwagon cost the automakers over $58 Billion dollars so far and the losses continue to pile up.

Again, EVs do have some niche uses and appeal, but to expect based on government edict and the promise of tax breaks and subsidies alone that they would replace ICE cars and especially work trucks was foolhardy in the extreme. 

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?

So Texas, How's The Preview Of The Green New Deal Working Out For You?

So it turns out windmills don't handle icing conditions very well. Solar doesn't do well when covered in snow or in overcast conditions either.

MSN :   Texas electric grid operator says frozen wind turbines are hampering state's power output: report

About half of Texas' wind power generation capacity has been put on ice amid the state's historic winter storm, according to a report.

Oops. Add to that a sudden demand for natural gas for heating instead of electricity generation and there's not enough capacity to provide power.

It's definitely a cautionary tale of over-reliance on unreliable sources of energy such as solar and wind.    It's another cautionary tale of the failure to maintain and build an energy infrastructure able to keep up with the demand and have enough at the margins to handle an emergency. 

Pushing for the Green New Deal and not building reliable nuclear power and clean coal plants instead of expensive and unreliable wind and solar are going to end up putting us all in the dark and cold.