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IronLionZion
IronLionZion's Journal
IronLionZion's Journal
July 7, 2019
I knew it. Republicans talk about supporting coal miners but they always value money over everything else. Coal just can't compete as renewables get cheaper.
New Solar + Battery Price Crushes Fossil Fuels, Buries Nuclear
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2019/07/01/new-solar--battery-price-crushes-fossil-fuels-buries-nuclear/#64e34b1c5971
Conservative Indiana Chooses Renewables Over Gas As It Retires Coal Early
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2019/07/02/mike-pences-indiana-chooses-renewables-over-gas-as-it-retires-coal-early/?fbclid=IwAR1K0aFhfkjN9faPjmOI8oUABioGs5Q4-hjyJ8hZFck6paAAWNXNvpo1jYQ#5760152543b4
Los Angeles just announced the largest and cheapest solar+storage project in the world, but that's the golden land of dreamers and subsidies. About 1,800 miles to the right, conservative Indianawith no renewable-portfolio standardis making similar choices.
Renewables are so cheap, said Mike Hooper, the senior vice president of the Northern Indiana Service Company (NIPSCO), that the utility can close its coal plants early and return $4 billion to its customers over the next 30 years.
"It ends up being a really big number, somewhere in the neighborhood of $4 billion for our customers, and clearly a lot of that comes from the fact that theres hundreds of millions of dollars in fuel every year from a marginal standpoint that you're not spending, that the customer gets the advantage of through the check they write us every month."
NIPSCO, which delivers power to the northern third of Indiana, issued a request for proposals in 2018 to transform its energy system away from coal. The company had issued a similar RFP in 2016, but the results it got this time were markedly different.
"We kind of made an assumption that as the results came back it would be very much similar to 2016, particularly where we sit in the world, that natural-gas generation would be the most cost-effective option," Hooper said. "And as we ran this RFP and got our results back, we were surprised to see that windespecially early wind in service in 2020 and 2021and then solar, on a levelized-cost-of-energy-basis, were significantly less expensive than new gas-fired generation."
Los Angeles just announced the largest and cheapest solar+storage project in the world, but that's the golden land of dreamers and subsidies. About 1,800 miles to the right, conservative Indianawith no renewable-portfolio standardis making similar choices.
Renewables are so cheap, said Mike Hooper, the senior vice president of the Northern Indiana Service Company (NIPSCO), that the utility can close its coal plants early and return $4 billion to its customers over the next 30 years.
"It ends up being a really big number, somewhere in the neighborhood of $4 billion for our customers, and clearly a lot of that comes from the fact that theres hundreds of millions of dollars in fuel every year from a marginal standpoint that you're not spending, that the customer gets the advantage of through the check they write us every month."
NIPSCO, which delivers power to the northern third of Indiana, issued a request for proposals in 2018 to transform its energy system away from coal. The company had issued a similar RFP in 2016, but the results it got this time were markedly different.
"We kind of made an assumption that as the results came back it would be very much similar to 2016, particularly where we sit in the world, that natural-gas generation would be the most cost-effective option," Hooper said. "And as we ran this RFP and got our results back, we were surprised to see that windespecially early wind in service in 2020 and 2021and then solar, on a levelized-cost-of-energy-basis, were significantly less expensive than new gas-fired generation."
I knew it. Republicans talk about supporting coal miners but they always value money over everything else. Coal just can't compete as renewables get cheaper.
New Solar + Battery Price Crushes Fossil Fuels, Buries Nuclear
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2019/07/01/new-solar--battery-price-crushes-fossil-fuels-buries-nuclear/#64e34b1c5971
July 6, 2019
Good long read about the generational differences based on experiences. We're seeing a lot of this right here on DU. I was very young during Reagan but I saw Clinton and Obama try in vain to work with Republicans just to be obstructed and sabotaged relentlessly. Fox News and RW hate radio have convinced many folks that America is more conservative than it actually is.
Haunted by the Reagan era, Past defeats still scare older Democratic leaders
Haunted by the Reagan era
Past defeats still scare older Democratic leaders but not the younger generation
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2019/07/05/feature/haunted-by-the-reagan-era/?utm_term=.550fae2b6893&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1
Newly elected Democrats in the House of Representatives spent June 27 with the sinking feeling that it was happening again: Their party was going to cave to President Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on a viscerally emotional issue. Just after a searing photo circulated of a father and his young daughter who had drowned in each others arms while fleeing for the sanctuary of U.S. shores, Democrats in Congress let a GOP-drafted spending bill go through that did nothing to address conditions for detained immigrant children abandoning a House version that would have ordered improvements. House leaders blamed Senate Democrats for capitulating; Senate Democrats attacked the House for poor negotiating.
The new insurgent class of Democrats put the fight in sharp moral terms. A vote for Mitch McConnells border bill is a vote to keep kids in cages and terrorize immigrant communities, said Rep. Ilhan Omar (Minn.). If you see the Senate bill as an option, then you dont believe in basic human rights, declared Rep. Rashida Tlaib (Mich.). Hell no. Thats an abdication of power, said Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.).
Frustration with the refusal to stand up for principle is boiling over among younger Democrats. On issue after issue impeachment, Medicare-for-all, a $15 minimum wage, free public college, a Green New Deal the answer from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and other Democratic leaders is consistent: Now is not the time; the country isnt ready. Push too fast or too far, and therell be a backlash.
For newer members of the partys caucus, the older generations fear of a backlash is befuddling. Leadership is driven by fear. They seem to be unable to lead, said Corbin Trent, a spokesman for Ocasio-Cortez and and a co-founder of Justice Democrats, the insurgent political organization that powered her rise, while also backing Omar and Tlaib. Im not sure what caused it.
The answer, in short: the Gipper.
Past defeats still scare older Democratic leaders but not the younger generation
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2019/07/05/feature/haunted-by-the-reagan-era/?utm_term=.550fae2b6893&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1
Newly elected Democrats in the House of Representatives spent June 27 with the sinking feeling that it was happening again: Their party was going to cave to President Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on a viscerally emotional issue. Just after a searing photo circulated of a father and his young daughter who had drowned in each others arms while fleeing for the sanctuary of U.S. shores, Democrats in Congress let a GOP-drafted spending bill go through that did nothing to address conditions for detained immigrant children abandoning a House version that would have ordered improvements. House leaders blamed Senate Democrats for capitulating; Senate Democrats attacked the House for poor negotiating.
The new insurgent class of Democrats put the fight in sharp moral terms. A vote for Mitch McConnells border bill is a vote to keep kids in cages and terrorize immigrant communities, said Rep. Ilhan Omar (Minn.). If you see the Senate bill as an option, then you dont believe in basic human rights, declared Rep. Rashida Tlaib (Mich.). Hell no. Thats an abdication of power, said Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.).
Frustration with the refusal to stand up for principle is boiling over among younger Democrats. On issue after issue impeachment, Medicare-for-all, a $15 minimum wage, free public college, a Green New Deal the answer from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and other Democratic leaders is consistent: Now is not the time; the country isnt ready. Push too fast or too far, and therell be a backlash.
For newer members of the partys caucus, the older generations fear of a backlash is befuddling. Leadership is driven by fear. They seem to be unable to lead, said Corbin Trent, a spokesman for Ocasio-Cortez and and a co-founder of Justice Democrats, the insurgent political organization that powered her rise, while also backing Omar and Tlaib. Im not sure what caused it.
The answer, in short: the Gipper.
Good long read about the generational differences based on experiences. We're seeing a lot of this right here on DU. I was very young during Reagan but I saw Clinton and Obama try in vain to work with Republicans just to be obstructed and sabotaged relentlessly. Fox News and RW hate radio have convinced many folks that America is more conservative than it actually is.
July 1, 2019
It's a very interesting article if you read the whole thing. Lots of pictures too.
Sikh drivers are transforming U.S. trucking. Take a ride along the Punjabi American highway
https://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-col1-sikh-truckers-20190627-htmlstory.html?fbclid=IwAR0Aq56RY7_0VUTNbiaWOY9a6dMOvkW9qIccT6xyibTYmE5i3MzvEWC5kkY
The building is small, single-story, built of corrugated metal sheets. There are seats for 20. The only advertising is spray-painted on concrete roadblocks in English and Punjabi. Next door is a diner and gas station; the county jail is across the road.
Palwinder Singh orders creamy black lentils, chicken curry and roti, finishing it off with chai and cardamom rice pudding. After 13 hours on and off the road in his semi truck, he leans back in a booth as a Bollywood music video plays on TV.
This is like home, says Pal, the name he uses on the road (said like Paul).
There are 3.5 million truckers in the United States. California has 138,000, the second-most after Texas. Nearly half of those in California are immigrants, most from Mexico or Central America. But as drivers age toward retirement the average American trucker is 55 and a shortage grows, Sikh immigrants and their kids are increasingly taking up the job.
Estimates of the number of Sikh truckers vary. In California alone, tens of thousands of truckers trace their heritage to India. The state is home to half of the Sikhs in the U.S. members of a monotheistic faith with origins in 15th century India whose followers are best recognized by the uncut hair and turbans many men wear. At Sikh temples in Sacramento, Fresno, Bakersfield and Riverside, the majority of worshipers are truck drivers and their families.
Over the last decade, Indian Americans have launched trucking schools, truck companies, truck washes, trucker temples and no-frills Indian restaurants modeled after truck stops back home, where Sikhs from the state of Punjab dominate the industry.
The building is small, single-story, built of corrugated metal sheets. There are seats for 20. The only advertising is spray-painted on concrete roadblocks in English and Punjabi. Next door is a diner and gas station; the county jail is across the road.
Palwinder Singh orders creamy black lentils, chicken curry and roti, finishing it off with chai and cardamom rice pudding. After 13 hours on and off the road in his semi truck, he leans back in a booth as a Bollywood music video plays on TV.
This is like home, says Pal, the name he uses on the road (said like Paul).
There are 3.5 million truckers in the United States. California has 138,000, the second-most after Texas. Nearly half of those in California are immigrants, most from Mexico or Central America. But as drivers age toward retirement the average American trucker is 55 and a shortage grows, Sikh immigrants and their kids are increasingly taking up the job.
Estimates of the number of Sikh truckers vary. In California alone, tens of thousands of truckers trace their heritage to India. The state is home to half of the Sikhs in the U.S. members of a monotheistic faith with origins in 15th century India whose followers are best recognized by the uncut hair and turbans many men wear. At Sikh temples in Sacramento, Fresno, Bakersfield and Riverside, the majority of worshipers are truck drivers and their families.
Over the last decade, Indian Americans have launched trucking schools, truck companies, truck washes, trucker temples and no-frills Indian restaurants modeled after truck stops back home, where Sikhs from the state of Punjab dominate the industry.
It's a very interesting article if you read the whole thing. Lots of pictures too.
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