Local Stories by Local People
updated: Oct 09, 2012, 7:35 PM

A big decision Tuesday night on an energy project that would be the largest solar energy project in Santa Barbara county.

Comments in order of when they were received | (reverse order)

COMMENT 329813	2012-10-09 07:45 PM
And how much in taxpayer funded subsidies will it take? NO SUBSIDIES FOR SOLAR, NO SUBSIDIES FOR OIL!!! From Calwatchdog(Your Eyes on Government) July 17, 2012 By Dave Roberts Two new studies are predicting economic devastation in California as the myriad regulations and costs resulting from AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, take effect in the next eight years. The hit to state residents will total $35 billion in 2020 — exceeding California’s combined revenue from sales taxes, corporation taxes, insurance taxes, estate taxes, liquor taxes, tobacco taxes and vehicle fees, according to a study by Andrew Chang & Company for the California Manufacturers & Technology Association. The average family will pay an extra $2,500 by 2020 due to increased energy prices.
COMMENT 329824	2012-10-09 08:06 PM
Are you saying California is the land of overspending and flawed government programs? I'm shocked! How can I be out of money when I still have checks?
COMMENT 329836	2012-10-09 08:29 PM
@813 Surprise, surprise. "Calwatchdog" is funded by the world's largest producer of petrochemicals--Koch Industries.
COMMENT 329882P	2012-10-10 07:49 AM
AB 32 stipulates the following timeline:[4] By Jan 1, 2009 ARB adopts plan indicating how emission reductions will be achieved from significant sources of GHGs via regulations, market mechanisms and other actions During 2009 ARB staff drafts rule language to implement its plan and holds a series of public workshop on each measure (including market mechanisms) By Jan 1, 2010 Early action measures take effect During 2010 ARB conducts series of rulemakings, after workshops and public hearings, to adopt GHG regulations including rules governing market mechanisms By Jan 1, 2011 ARB completes major rulemakings for reducing GHGs including market mechanisms. ARB may revise the rules and adopt new ones after 1/1/2011 in furtherance of the 2020 cap By Jan 1, 2012 GHG rules and market mechanisms adopted by ARB take effect and are legally enforceable December 31, 2020 Deadline for achieving 2020 GHG emissions cap. According to ARB, AB 32 is "generating jobs, promoting a growing, clean-energy economy and a healthy environment for California at the same time." AB 32 supports efficiency-driven job growth California gets more clean energy venture capital investment than all states combined Green technologies produce new jobs faster Venture capital investment produces thousands of new jobs Green jobs are growing faster than any other industry California leads the nation in clean technology California’s economic powerhouses support AB 32[9] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Warming_Solutions _Act_of_2006
COMMENT 329887P	2012-10-10 07:57 AM
“Since 2006, AB32 has spurred more than $9 billion in investment in clean energy, helping spawn 12,000 businesses and thousands of new patents. According to the Wall Street Journal, California is home to seven of the top 10 clean-tech businesses in the United States and, according to the New York Times, five of the top 10 cities for clean-tech jobs are in California. As a result, Silicon Valley Leadership Group members Sunpower, Applied Materials, Serious Materials and Solaria are creating jobs in R&D, design, production, sales and installation. In fact, clean tech is one of the leading bright spots in our economy.”
COMMENT 329890	2012-10-10 08:06 AM
Our energy problems are fuel for transportation problems which currently and now well into the future will be supplied by oil. Solar should be a personal users and not a public, heavily subsidized token gesture response to far more limited domestic utility needs. Until you can run a car/truck on solar, these projects remain political vanity projects of limited and questionable value. Basically a waste of money and a diversion from the real energy needs this country faces.
COMMENT 329898	2012-10-10 08:17 AM
Does anyone know if the solar project they built on the hill above the jail is meeting the targets projected in the report used to justify it? Now that we have a working solar field it would be good to evaluate how it is doing before we dump a bunch of money into another one. But maybe the new solar field will be paid for by grants from the feds? That makes it like free money, right?
COMMENT 329910P	2012-10-10 08:41 AM
Don’t mess with success. Net metering has delivered proven benefits to California: supported 25,000 solar jobs, driven $10 billion of private investment in the state’s clean energy industry, given thousands of homeowners, schools, water districts, industrial users, and cities control over their electricity bills, and installed 2 natural gas plants worth of valuable peak solar power generation that our utilities WON’T have to build and our ratepayers won’t have to fund. http://votesolar.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Protect-NEM-Fact-Sheet.pdf
COMMENT 329912P	2012-10-10 08:47 AM
Vanity project ???? 15% Return on Solar Investments Attracts Buffett, KKR and Google http://investorplace.com/2012/03/solar-investment-buffett-berkshire-google/
COMMENT 329965	2012-10-10 10:43 AM
I'm all for the benefits of solar, but my concern is that the subsidies that they are providing are very costly and our state doesn't appear to have much extra money at this point. Maybe they are hiding funds until after the election for the new taxes like they did for the state parks. Those new solar installations in the desert are subsidized to cost 2x what natural gas or other existing power plants do per kilowatt hour. If we were flush with cash, that would be great. Does anyone here think that we are rolling in dough? But I guess if you are the one being subsidized, you are very happy.
COMMENT 329996	2012-10-10 11:46 AM
Don't forget we subsidise oil to the tune of billions! every year.
COMMENT 330000P	2012-10-10 11:51 AM
Solar doesn't contribute to global warming, I believe, an imperative reason to switch as for as many hours of daylight we have -- overnight storage is in the invention works. Here we are on the coast, with rising oceans and the examples of some islands in the world already drowned and abandoned, We'd better get panels up on roofs pronto by hook or by crook. We are such an impatient country, balky on developing wind and power, giving up on electric cars after about six decades, ditto for space. Even penicillin took about 80 years. The discovery of germs was centuries ago and some parts of the world still don't believe in them. Patience! Even in cloudy Oregon, a solar panel gave us three months of hot water for free; that was before solar electricity. How much better the amount of energy available by panels on everything would be down here in sunny CA. I think solar energy is subsidized in many European countries. Our Armed Forces, not an impulsive outfit I would say, uses solar extensively and is at the cutting edge of portable solar invention. Solar cooking and electricity is often free in countries where deforestation is occurring or has occurred because all the trees are burned for fuel.
COMMENT 330026P	2012-10-10 01:09 PM
where is the proposed facility in No SB CO?
COMMENT 330083	2012-10-10 04:13 PM
Does anyone have the exact facts on how much money has gone to Green Energy in the last 5-10 years? I think Mitt mentioned it in the debate and his facts were not refuted. Seemed like many years worth at minimum. Also, If these panels are such hot stuff....and there's limitless Mojave Dessert for sale....where's the private sector!? Would'nt most rational people want that kind of return on their money when banks are giving so little nowadays?
COMMENT 330085	2012-10-10 04:14 PM
Thank you for the time line. The state cap and trade requirements go into effect January 1, 2013. Keep in mind California already has the cleanest, greenest emissions requirements and air quality so this is purely a symbolic gesture on our part to show the rest of the world how they should behave. We will not be able to show much measurable benefit but we do get psychic virtue points being a model for world to follow. There is some concern about "leakage" in that all the businesses driven from California due to these draconian but symbolic regulations will impose on Jan 1, 2013 will move to other more polluting friendly near-by states thereby defeating California's well-intended gestures will driving our state economy further into the hole. Luckily, pot smoke is exempt. Party on.
COMMENT 330089	2012-10-10 04:18 PM
Mojave Dessert, 083? That sounds pretty delicious. Is it spicy?
COMMENT 330136	2012-10-10 05:56 PM
Local college spent $1 million to put in solar and is paying it off at $100,000 per year for the next 10 years. Then after 10 years they finally start saving money on electricity. If the system is still working in 10 years and after annual maintenance costs to keep it working efficiently. But look ma, no carbon. Except for what it took to manufacture, transport, install and maintain it.
COMMENT 330154	2012-10-10 06:24 PM
Comments like yours are tremendously unhelpful, 890. I understand what you're getting at, but the implication of what you're saying is that we should basically sit on our hands and do nothing until we've run out of fossil fuels and wind up nuking ourselves to death while we fight for what's left. Petroleum is a finite resource; the sooner we start working on infrastructure and resources to move us away from petroleum and to something more sustainable, the better. You have to learn to crawl before you can learn how to walk, after all.
COMMENT 330194	2012-10-10 07:50 PM
Wow 154, when you put it like that, the only alternative is nuking ourselves to death, it explains where you are coming from. Be sure to see the movie "spOILed", okay?
COMMENT 330199	2012-10-10 07:56 PM
If one accepts that human activity contributes to Global Warming (I don't), then solar, wind, and tidal energy all potentially contribute to "the problem", Consider a fact regarding solar panels. Sunlight that would be reflected back into space is instead absorbed by the panels, thereby increasing the energy (heat) of the planet. It's a shame that these sorts of politically correct projects seem to be able to bypass the Environmental Impact review that everything else is subjected to. The Lompoc wind farm project is a potential disaster. Has anyone else recently seen the enormous wind farm at Pacheco Pass on I580 in the Bay Area? 80% (my casual estimate) of the units are out of commission, with no maintenance activity in evidence. Should we really be withdrawing energy from the atmosphere anyway? Done in any substantive way, won't that affect weather patterns? Ditto with tidal energy. Ought we be withdrawing energy from the oceans?
COMMENT 330261	2012-10-11 08:28 AM
Report today that ice packs in the Antarctic are growing, which is naturally blamed on "global warming" too. Plus there is no *evidence* (which differs from media hysteria) as a prior poster reported that islands like the Maldives or San Blas are getting submerged by rising sea levels. A news story about a San Blas Island village getting flooded was due to seasonal high-winds that temporarily cause water to overflow some of the canals. And marine biologists in the Maldives are finding the coral reef islands are actually growing in height, instead of sinking into the allegedly rising ocean. What is with this anthro-centric hair-shirt environmentalists want to don? World population has increased dramatically in the past few generations. The planet will have to accommodate this sheer increase in numbers which will dislocate its resources. So what are environmentalists going to do about that root cause?
COMMENT 330357	2012-10-11 11:14 AM
I can't find any information that even remotely supports your claims about the Maldives or San Blas, 890. Can you provide information? I spent about an hour and a half on Google earlier and couldn't find anything. :)
COMMENT 330445	2012-10-11 02:55 PM
Try visiting the Maldives and talking to the university marine biologist on loan from an Australian university, who has lived in Mahe for the past 17 years. I had no problems finding the San Blas story. Keep trying.
COMMENT 330465	2012-10-11 03:57 PM
No thanks. You can't even be bothered to try and provide me with any facts outside of anecdotal evidence and some thinly veiled "I'm smarter than you" stuff. I can say all sorts of things but if you asked me to prove them I'd at least give you a publication or something more concrete other than telling me to take a plane halfway around the world.

25% of comments on this page were made by Edhat Community Members.