Wind power would be available only 7-30 percent of the time, while solar power is available 51-66 percent of the time.

A report by a foundation studying state energy issues concludes there will be a need for more traditional power plants, even as the state shifts toward more alternative energy projects.
“We think there’s a danger in taking any resource off the table,“ said Bruce Smith, executive director of the Colorado Energy Forum and former director of the Colorado Public Utilities Commission. “I think the study suggests there maybe a role for the government to pursue clean-coal technologies. We have more than a 100-year supply of coal in this country and we should use it.“
The Energy Forum’s seven-member board is a mix of officials from the state’s largest electricity providers and private citizens. Crowley County Commissioner Matt Heimerich is the only member from Southern Colorado, Chieftain.com reported.
Other members include Mac McLennan, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association; Roy Palmer, Xcel Energy; Gary Stone, Aquila; Skip Palmer, Energy Outreach Colorado; Dave Lock, Colorado Association of Utilities; and Paul Fillon, Vail Resorts.
The forum released its report on the state’s ability to attain renewable energy standards in November, following passage of HB1281 this year by the state Legislature. (HB1281, concerning increased renewable energy standards, was signed into law on March 27, 2007 by Colorado Governor Bill Ritter).
The report builds on the forum’s September 2006 report that detailed the electric power generation and transmission needs of the state through 2025. HB1281 requires investor-owned utilities to shift to 20 percent renewable energy sources by 2020, while rural electric cooperatives and municipal utilities serving more than 40,000 customers must reach 10 percent.
While there are some small hydroelectric generation projects in Colorado, the bulk of renewable energy is provided by wind turbines. Under the law, solar electric is required to meet at least 4 percent of the renewable energy for investor-owned utilities.
“The problem is, the wind doesn’t blow all the time and the sun doesn’t shine all the time,“ said Gary Schmitz, chief economist for the Energy Forum. “The purpose of the study was to look at how many of these we will have to build to get that amount of energy.“
The answer is somewhere between 1,700 and 2,000 more wind turbines that produce between 1.5 and 2 megawatts each, or roughly five times current numbers. Solar capacity would have to increase about sixfold from current levels.
Power providers say they can reach those levels without much economic disruption, although requiring larger amounts of renewable energy would begin to strain financial resources, Smith said.
In the report, Schmitz breaks down the capacity to generate power and the actual energy produced. He explained capacity represents the potential to produce electricity over a system, while the actual energy produced depends on actual conditions at the time power is needed--if the wind is blowing, or the sun is shining.
Turns out that on the hottest summer days, when the sun is beating down and people are cranking up their air conditioning, the wind is least likely to be blowing. While solar energy is obviously more available precisely at this peak time, there are far fewer solar projects likely to be built.
Unlike other resources, there is no way to stockpile electricity for the times when you most need it.
“Wind power would be available only 7-30 percent of the time, while solar power is available 51-66 percent of the time,“ Schmitz said.
The relatively low reliability--coal and natural gas have 100 percent availability--means that even though 12.4 percent of the state’s total capacity for projected power needs in 2025 will be met by renewable resources, only a fraction of that--about 10-30 percent--will actually be used.
“That’s only an estimate,“ Schmitz said. “When more are out there, we will be keeping better track and the numbers will be more precise.“
There are hidden costs to conversion to more wind and solar power as well.
“We shouldn’t breathe a sigh of relief because we’ve passed this legislation,“ Smith said. “We need to go forward with all options on the table.“
That includes coal.
“Natural gas, which is more expensive than coal and emits fewer pollutants, is most often used to back up wind and solar projects during their down times. Natural gas plants can be fired up more quickly than coal plants to meet spot power demands as well,“ Schmitz said.
Typically, the price of natural gas has fallen in summer months, allowing utilities to buy it cheaply and store it. With more year-round demand, the price would increase.
Additionally, Colorado would have to pipe more gas in from Mexico and Canada, since its own reserves are not sufficient to meet an increased demand, Smith said.

When Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon made the latest in a string of announcements about British Columbia’s planned hydrogen highway, he billed it as part of a “zero-emission transportation solution.“
While hydrogen vehicles may run cleaner than ones burning fossil fuels, they have a long, long way to go before they become as emission free as the minister asserts they’ll be. And if the goal is cutting our greenhouse gas emissions and our contributions to global warming, say observers, there are many much more cost-effective ways to do that, TheTyee.ca reported.
Take the Dec. 10 announcement, for instance, where Falcon said parties had signed a six-year, $20 million deal for Air Liquide Canada Inc. to provide hydrogen to B.C. Transit. The transportation crown corporation is in the midst of buying 20 hydrogen-powered buses and is planning fueling stations in Langford outside Victoria and in Whistler, where the fleet will be used during the 2010 Winter Olympics.
As sources of hydrogen go, Air Liquide’s is relatively clean. It uses electricity from the Quebec power grid, says company spokesperson, Monica Bhattacharya, to run an electric current through water to separate the molecules into hydrogen and oxygen. Hydro dams supply most of Quebec’s power, and Hydro Quebec’s website says that in 2006 some 94 percent of its electricity therefore came from renewable sources.
Whatever you think of flooding valleys and displacing First Nations folks, compared to Air Liquide’s competitors whose hydrogen production depends on natural gas, coal-fired plants and nuclear fission, as Bhattacharya says, “It’s a clean source of hydrogen.“
The problem is getting it here. Air Liquide’s hydrogen plant is in BŽcancour, Quebec, across the St. Lawrence River from Trois-Rivi�res. It will be shipped to B.C. on trucks, says Bhattacharya.
The drive to Whistler, according to Google maps, is nearly 5,200 kilometers if drivers take the most direct route and pass through the United States. It’s even longer if they stay in Canada.
Asked about greenhouse gas emissions from shipping the hydrogen, Bhattacharya says, “It was definitely a consideration. It’s a temporary measure.“ Some time in the future the company hopes to have hydrogen made in B.C.
B.C. Transit’s manager for the fuel cell project, Bruce Rothwell, says there are only four providers of hydrogen in North America and Air Liquide was the best choice. When asked if it will be shipped using hydrogen-powered trucks, he says, “Unfortunately we don’t have any of those yet. Probably diesel powered trucks.“
However, before entering the contract B.C. Transit did what are called “well-to-wheel“ calculations, Rothwell says, looking at the total greenhouse gas emissions involved in getting either hydrogen buses or standard diesel buses on the road. The hydrogen buses do better.
To power a diesel bus, he says, generates the equivalent of 2,000 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer. Using hydrogen, he says, even when it is shipped across the continent, emits 800 grams per kilometer. About 65 percent of those emissions are from transporting the fuel.
“It’s a 60 percent reduction from diesel,“ he says.
That may be, says the David Suzuki Foundation’s climate change specialist, Ian Bruce, but there are better options. Hybrid diesel-electric buses for instance, reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about 40 percent, according to Translink’s website, and they are much cheaper.
The province and B.C. Transit will spend $89 million for the 20 hydrogen buses. That works out to nearly $4.5 million per bus. Translink recently bought diesel-electric hybrids for $750,000 each, says Bruce. The province could have bought six of the hybrids for the price of one hydrogen bus. It would make more of a difference to buy the larger number of buses and improve the transit system, he says, which would get more people out of their cars.
“Part of our concern regarding hydrogen is the cost effectiveness of hydrogen at reducing greenhouse gas emissions,“ says Bruce. Between the buses, the filling stations and the hydrogen, the province is spending well over $100 million on this one project, and that doesn’t include the large subsidies federal and provincial governments have already paid to research and develop the fuel cell technology. “We could be spending a lot of this money ramping up public transit so it’s high quality, affordable and available.“

The Chevy Equinox, a fuel cell SUV powered by hydrogen.

General Motors is already developing a slew of cars that will run on alternative fuels such as electricity, hydrogen, or green liquids like ethanol. But don’t count on an all-electric car anytime soon from the auto giant.
It’s the one green transportation idea that the company isn’t dedicating a lot of time to, Dave Barthmuss, GM’s group general manager for environment and energy communications, said during a break at the Hollywood Goes Green conference.
GM brought a prototype of its Chevy Volt and the Equinox, a hydrogen-powered SUV, to the conference, News.zdnet.com reported.
Why not go all the way, with a fully electric vehicle? In a word, batteries. Batteries cost a lot, weigh quite a bit, and can’t take a car nearly as far as a combination of gas and electric power, or even a full tank of gas. Battery capacity and endurance are improving, but at an incremental pace. Even bringing down the price and boosting the performance of batteries to manufacture plug-in hybrids and other gas-electric combo cars remains problematic.
“It is the biggest challenge we have with this car. We’re working at the cell level, the pack level,“ said Andrew Farah, vehicle chief engineer of E-flex Systems, the GM group developing the Volt.
The Volt runs on batteries, but it contains a gas motor that recharges the battery after 40 miles. With the gas recharger and a full tank of gas, the car has a range of 640 miles. The batteries also can get recharged by plugging the car into the wall at night. Mileage should be in the triple digit range, or about 100 miles per gallon. People who don’t drive more than 40 miles a day will barely consume gas. Thus, the Volt will outdo many plug-in hybrids on mileage, Farah said.
The goal is to get the car to commercial production by 2010, he said. Ideally, the price will be in the $30,000 range. By contrast, all-electric cars coming to market will have a range of 120 to 250 miles and most will cost between $50,000 and $100,000.
“Currently, GM is testing batteries from A123 Systems, a start-up in Massachusetts, and Compact Power, part of the LG conglomerate. Some recent prototypes just arrived at GM,“ Farah said.
“All-electric and partly electric cars are tough to design as well,“ he said.
“Everyone thinks the battery is an electrochemical problem. Wrong,“ he said. “The whole idea is to integrate it (into the design). You don’t want to have a battery with some wheels.“
In the case of the Volt, one of the design tweaks revolves around putting the battery pack in the floor of the car. It runs between the two front seats and, therefore, doesn’t take up luggage room.
Many others have echoed Farah’s points about the pace of battery science. For instance, Mike Taylor, vice president of finance at Tesla Motors, pointed out that the energy density for lithium-ion batteries doubles about every 10 years while the price drops by more than 70 percent. (He tracked it from 1990 to 2000 and from 1995 to 2005 and found the same thing.) Thus, the technology improves, but it’s not on a torrid Moore’s Law-like pace.
Although the Volt will likely look a lot different when it hits the market, the prototype is kind of cool looking. It’s fairly roomy. The only complaint at the conference came from TV star Larry Hagman, who didn’t like the transparent plastic roof. “You will fry in California,“ Hagman said.
“GM will work on ways to tint it,“ Farah told him.
GM recently kicked off a program called Project Driveway under which 100 consumers will get Equinoxes to drive. The tests, which will take place in California, Washington, Washington D.C., and New York, will largely seek to find how hydrogen cars mix with the average’s person’s driving.
The company also is trying to ensure that the people testing the cars will live near those rare hydrogen filling stations.
In addition, there will be a big push for hybrids and plug-in hybrids, GM executives said. Over the next four years, GM will release 16 hybrids into the market.
Meanwhile, in ethanol, GM will continue to put out flex fuel vehicles that can drive on E85, or a blend of fuel that is 85 percent ethanol. The company has already sold 2.5 million flex fuel cars, and by 2012, roughly half the cars coming out of its factories will be flex fuel cars.