Barclays Closes US Carbon Desk In Latest Cap And Trade Setback

Is there nothing that Obama can’t do?

When the companies that supply motor fuel close the books on 2011, they will pay about $6.8 million in penalties to the Treasury because they failed to mix a special type of biofuel into their gasoline and diesel as required by law.
But there was none to be had. Outside a handful of laboratories and workshops, the ingredient, cellulosic biofuel, does not exist.
In 2012, the oil companies expect to pay even higher penalties for failing to blend in the fuel, which is made from wood chips or the inedible parts of plants like corncobs. Refiners were required to blend 6.6 million gallons into gasoline and diesel in 2011 and face a quota of 8.65 million gallons this year.
“It belies logic,” Charles T. Drevna, the president of the National Petrochemicals and Refiners Association, said of the 2011 quota. And raising the quota for 2012 when there is no production makes even less sense, he said.

Daily Mail;

Europe’s focus on wind power is crippling British energy users with additional costs as it is not a cost-effective way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, a report has found.
The EU has directed governments to generate 15 per cent of energy from renewable sources by 2020, leading many to focus on wind.
But wind power is unreliable and requires back-up gas power stations to maintain a consistent electricity supply, the Civitas think-tank study found.
It means energy users pay twice – once for the ‘window-dressing’ of renewables and again for fossil fuels the energy sector continues to rely on.

h/t Maz2

The Worst Product Flops of 2011;

3. Volt
Company: General Motors
GM (GM) was originally so excited about the Volt that the company had announced in January it was speeding up its roll-out by six months. But by November the excitement had fizzled out. Larry Nitz, GM’s executive director for vehicle electrification told Reuters, “It’s naive to think that the world is going to switch tomorrow to EVs [electric vehicles].” Indeed, sales for the vehicle have been consistently low. Only 125 models were sold in July 2011. This was after GM spokeswoman Michelle Bunker was quoted as saying that the Volt was “virtually sold out” due to its popularity — a statement later shown to be misguided. Adding insult to injury, Chevy Volts are under investigation for fires involving the cars’ lithium-ion batteries. For concerned Volt owners, GM has offered free loaner cars.

Related!

SDA gets results!

The city of Saskatoon is no longer giving the landfill wind turbine project a green light after the sole bid on the project exceeded the estimated budget by nearly $2 million.
The bid received was $6.35 million – the city had set the budget at $4.4 million.
City manager Jeff Jorgenson says the project is no longer considered to be a good financial investment.

Now is the time at SDA that they were warned!
AJC.com;

The failed Range Fuels wood-to-ethanol factory in southeastern Georgia that sucked up $65 million in federal and state tax dollars was sold Tuesday for pennies on the dollar to another bio-fuel maker with equally grand plans to transform the alternative energy world.

From the archives of Steven Den Beste;

One of the biggest advantages of coal and oil is that they are high-energy, but also extremely concentrated. A relatively small capital investment in a single area can harvest a great deal of useful end-product. A big open-pit coal mine can justify hundreds of millions of dollars spent on big shovels and huge dump trucks, because the shovel can dig more than a ton of coal on each bite, and each dump truck can carry several tons of coal out of the mine. The coal can be carried by rail point-to-point from the mine to a big power plant to be burned, or to a nearby harbor where it will be loaded on barges or ocean-going bulk carriers. All of this can be done big because huge amounts of coal come from one place, and go to a small number of destinations. Since petroleum is liquid, it is even easier to transport via pipelines or ships.
Coal would be a lot less valuable if it was found as a layer one centimeter thick spread over an area the size of the states of Iowa and Nebraska; the collection process would defeat the purpose. How difficult would it be to gather it all? How much equipment would be needed? Would it make sense economically to buy it all, given that each piece of equipment could only collect a relatively small amount of coal? Unfortunately, it wouldn’t.
But that’s exactly what the situation is when you’re talking about any kind of biomass as a source of fuel; it grows on the ground, and though you may get a lot of it, it’s spread over an immense area and you can’t do anything until you pick it all up first and collect it.

Of course, if one is only interested in harvesting tax dollars…

…when work is completed on the Nordsee Ost wind farm, some 30 kilometers (19 miles) north of the island of Helgoland in the North Sea, the sea air will be filled with a strong smell of fumes: diesel fumes.
The reason is as simple as it is surprising. The wind farm operator, German utility RWE, has to keep the sensitive equipment — the drives, hubs and rotor blades — in constant motion, and for now that requires diesel-powered generators.

How many solar panels does it take to make a solar panel?

Idaho Power plans to cut off electricity on Tuesday to plant in Pocatello, Idaho, that makes material for solar energy, because the factory owes $1.9 million in unpaid utility bills. The dispute is with Honolulu-based Hoku Scientific, Inc., which is backed by Chinese financing and enjoys federal and state incentives…

h/t Maz2

It’s always darkest before the lights go completely out…

With at least seven solar-panel manufacturers filing for bankruptcy or insolvency in the last several months and six of the 10 largest publicly traded companies making solar components reporting losses in the third quarter, public-market investors are punishing the solar sector, sending shares down nearly 57% this year.
Although winners are expected to emerge eventually…

The things you’ll never see at the CBC;

Gevo, a prominent advanced-biofuels company that has received millions in U.S. government funding to develop fuels made from cellulosic sources such as grass and wood chips, is finding that it can’t use these materials if it hopes to survive. Instead, it’s going to use corn, a common source for conventional biofuels. What’s more, most of the product from its first facility will be used for chemicals rather than fuel.

Via

That the rise of the oceans began to slow and the re-election coffers began to fill…

Meant to create jobs and cut reliance on foreign oil, Obama’s green-technology program was infused with politics at every level, The Washington Post found in an analysis of thousands of memos, company records and internal ­e-mails. Political considerations were raised repeatedly by company investors, Energy Department bureaucrats and White House officials.
The records, some previously unreported, show that when warned that financial disaster might lie ahead, the administration remained steadfast in its support for Solyndra.
The documents reviewed by The Post, which began examining the clean-technology program a year ago, provide a detailed look inside the day-to-day workings of the upper levels of the Obama administration. They also give an unprecedented glimpse into high-level maneuvering by politically connected clean-technology investors.

h/t

Not just synonyms anymore! – “Six men jailed following €300million tax evasion on carbon permits”

Via Climate Depot

It’s the physics, stupid – BP quits solar power industry
Update! Sometimes they quits the industry, and sometimes the industry quits them.

Hey, Who’s Up For Another $2.1 Billion In Stimulus Money Lost on Yet Another Bankrupt Solar Company?

And it’s a German company.

Things you’ll never see at the CBC;

Since 2007, Geneva-based Oak Foundation, set up by British billionaire Alan Parker, has divided almost $2.6 million among six groups for campaigns against the “tarsands.”
While Oak did not respond to QMI Agency’s interview request, the foundation’s database of grants shows Greenpeace Canada has swallowed more than $860,000 “to create financial and political uncertainty” about the oilsands.
Tides Canada took money to stop “new infrastructure development” like pipelines, while Forest Ethics accepted cash to stop the Northern Gateway and for “creating a perception of economic risk” around the oilsands.
West Coast Environmental Law, Environmental Defence Canada, and the World Wildlife Fund Canada received Oak’s anti-oilsands money, too.

And then, there’s the British government…
Related – “Impressive! He’s found a way for a president to vote ‘present.’”

SDA gets results! Congress suspends light bulb ban. Update: More details here.

Via Tim Blair;

EU carbon prices fell to their lowest ever level on Wednesday as the euro currency and equities slid on renewed fears over the bloc’s debt crisis and oil prices tanked after producers promised to maintain high output. […]
“I still don’t see any bottom to this market,” said one carbon trader, who said any positive sentiment from this weekend’s landmark U.N. climate summit in Durban was purely psychological as it brought no increase in demand for permits.

Update: Looks like a false alarm. Content at the WCO link has been updated, click for further details.
Original post below:
Looks like somebody can’t handle the truth. This just went up at Wind Concerns Ontario;

Due to a threat of legal action, this site will no longer be updated. For more info, please contact: wco-board@googlegroups.com .

And then some;

A Los Angeles firm has quietly assembled a Trojan horse electric car designed to carry the Chinese military-industrial complex deep into America’s auto market. Detroit should be afraid, very afraid. And anyone in the U.S. unemployment line — along with American taxpayers, who are subsidizing this sham — should be outraged.

More at Death By China. (h/t Brian)

Your “safe, renewable power” Quote of the Week;

“All staff vacate wind farms when wind speeds exceed 55mph and therefore no one was present on site at the time of this incident.”

Related: “When Europe is fighting just to stay afloat, and tea party style balanced budget amendments are being imposed on every country in the eurozone, emptying government coffers to raise the price of energy is not exactly an attractive proposal.”