on August 19, 2019

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WindFail: Minnesota Wind Facilities Could Produce Less Electricity in 2019 Than In 2018

Written by Isaac Orr

in Energy, Environment, Minnesota Economy

This is huge news. I was looking through some data from the Energy Information Administration's website and I stumbled upon this interesting graph which shows that electricity generation from wind in 2019 could be less than it was in 2018 (red line added for emphasis). As you can see, generation from wind power peaked in December of 2017 and has not reached anywhere close to that height in the following months. In fact, wind output was 24 percent lower in December of 2018 than in December of 2017. It is interesting to note that wind generation did increases by about 1.8 percent in...

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on August 18, 2019

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Burning Wood Pollutes More than Coal-Fired Power Plants and Factories in Minnesota, Should We Ban Campfires?

Written by Isaac Orr

in Environment

Most people in Minnesota probably don't realize that our air is incredibly clean. According to Minnesota Pollution Control Agency data, our air meets all federal air quality standards, which are designed to be protective of even the most vulnerable populations such as children and the elderly. In fact, none of the categories of pollutants measured (ozone, fine particulates, lead, nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide, or sulfur dioxide) were even a risk for exceedance. In a nutshell, it means our air is impeccably clean. Despite this fact, many renewable energy groups want to shut down our coal-fired power plants in order to reduce emissions...

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on August 16, 2019

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Secretary of Agriculture Perdue Defends Decision to Renew Mineral Leases

Written by Isaac Orr

in Environment, Mining, Minnesota Economy

Anti-mining activists have been quick to criticize the Trump Administration's decision to renew the mineral leases for the Twin Metals Minnesota project located north of Ely, Minnesota. However, these criticisms are not intellectually honest. After all, it was the Obama administration, in a lame-duck action, who broke decades of protocol by cancelling these mineral leases and sought a 20 year moratorium on mineral exploration. Even Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar stated the renewable should have been handled through the normal process. This is why it was refreshing to see Sonny Perdue, the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, take to the pages of the Star...

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on August 14, 2019

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Wind Turbine Landfill or Mass Grave? We Report, You Decide

Written by Isaac Orr

in Energy, Environment

Last week pictures surfaced of a landfill in Wyoming being filled with something you may not have imagined: wind turbine blades. It turns out that the fiberglass wind turbine blades are not recyclable, and the waste disposal site located near Casper, Wyoming will soon be the final resting place of more than 1,000 decommissioned wind turbine blades and motor housing units. According to the Cowboy State Daily: Each turbine blade will need between 30 and 44.8 cubic yards of landfill space, using a total of 448,000 cubic yards of the 2.6 million yards set aside for construction and demolition material. The components are made...

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on August 09, 2019

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Capitalism is Saving the Planet Part Six: Minnesota Forests Are Flourishing

Written by Isaac Orr

in Environment, Minnesota Economy

Did you know that Minnesota's forests are flourishing? According to research from the U.S. Forest Service, forests account for 17.7 million acres of land in Minnesota out of a total of 54 million acres, meaning forest cover about 35 percent of the state. Furthermore, this number is increasing due in no small part to the fact that 51 percent of forested land in Minnesota is owned by the timber industry. From 2012 to 2017, Minnesota's forested land area increased by 755,000 acres, which equates to an increase of 1.7 percent. During this time, the number of live trees increased by one billion...

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on July 31, 2019

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Minnesota’s Air is Great, Again

Written by Isaac Orr

in Energy, Environment, Minnesota Economy

It seems like we're always being told that we are losing on the environment. Not only that, it seems like we're being told are losing even more today than we were yesterday, but this is blatantly untrue. America in general, and Minnesota specifically, is winning on the environment. One could even argue that Minnesota's air is great, again. Every year the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) releases a study entitled "The Air We Breathe," evaluating the air quality in Minnesota. The 2019 version of this study states shows that Minnesota's air quality meets all federal standards. In fact, emissions of nitrous oxide, sulfur...

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on July 24, 2019

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11 Ways Minnesota Families Are Subsidizing Solar

Written by Isaac Orr

in Climate, Energy, Environment, Minnesota Economy

There is a pervasive fiction that solar is somehow lower cost than other sources of electricity and that this form of energy is competing on a level playing field with sources like coal, nuclear, and natural gas. This notion is a complete fairy tale. Unfortunately, there are a host of renewable energy advocacy groups, some of them who pretend to be conservative, who further this notion and even contend that wind and solar are somehow at a disadvantage relative to more reliable forms of energy due to government intervention. Nothing could be further than the truth. Solar and wind have all...

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on July 22, 2019

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Why Do the Minnesota “Conservative” Energy Forum and Fresh Energy Have the Same Liberal Funders?

Written by Isaac Orr

in Climate, Energy, Environment, Minnesota Economy

The Minnesota Conservative Energy Forum is conservative in the same way that the Democratic Republic of the Congo is both democratic, and a republic. That's why it takes money from leftist environmental groups....

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on July 21, 2019

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What is the ‘Conservative Energy Network’ and Why is it Backed by Leftist Funders?

Written by Isaac Orr

in Climate, Energy, Environment, Minnesota Economy

There is big money behind promoting wind and solar power. After all, the only reasons people build wind turbines and solar panels are because of government subsidies, state-level renewable energy mandates, and government-approved monopoly utility companies, like Xcel Energy, who build them because it allows them to increase their corporate profits. In essence, there would be zero market for wind and solar if the government were not involved, and this fact means that renewable energy companies are willing to spend massive amounts of money to influence public policy. It makes perfect sense, their very existence depends on government policies. Unfortunately, some so-called...

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on July 17, 2019

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Rebuking Renewables: Le Sueur County Places Moratorium on Solar Gardens and Solar Farms

Written by Isaac Orr

in Climate, Energy, Environment

It looks like the Community Solar Gardens aren't very popular with the locals in Le Sueur County. Earlier in July, the Planning and Zone commission voted to enact a moratorium, or temporary suspension, on new solar facilities. The moratorium, which will ban applications for new solar projects for one year, comes at a time when solar facilities are being cited closer to city limits and residential properties. According to KEYC in Mankato: “Separation distances from residential properties is one thing that people are very concerned about. They don’t want to have these panels 50 feet from their house, and by taking this...

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