energy costs

“Renewable” Energy Scam….Providing Unaffordable, Unreliable Energy….No Thanks!

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Wind Power – It’s ONLY an ‘Alternative’, if You’re Prepared to Freeze or Boil in the Dark

June 12, 2015 by

kilgore

Commentary: I love the smell of fossil fuels in the morning
Elko Daily Free Press
Chuck Muth
29 May 2015

When it comes to energy, windmills are useless when there’s no wind, solar is useless when there’s no sun, and hydro is useless when there’s no water – a condition Nevadans were recently warned about again thanks to the ongoing drought.

Indeed, the ONLY dependable sources of cheap energy remain oil, natural gas and coal. Yet all we hear are Chicken Little environmentalists screaming about global warming – oh, excuse me, “climate change” – while tax-addicted politicians in Washington are floating energy tax hike trial balloons.

Make no mistake; the cost of energy in Nevada will surely skyrocket if Congress tries to reform our insane tax code on the back of the fossil fuel industry.

Frankly, I’m tired of enviro-kooks constantly bad-mouthing affordable, dependable energy – especially as we approach the 100-degree+ dog days of Nevada’s summer.

Can you imagine sleeping at night if there was no affordable electricity to power our air conditioners and swamp coolers?

Or tourists taking horse-drawn carriages to and from Vegas or Reno instead of a petro-fueled planes, trains and automobiles?

Indeed, as the publisher of Alex Epstein’s new book, “The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels,” points out on the jacket cover, fossil fuels such as oil, gas and coal “don’t take a naturally safe climate and make it dangerous; they take a naturally dangerous climate and make it ever safer.”

Especially the desert.

Those of us in Nevada know how sky-high the ol’ electric bill can go thanks to the scorching summer heat. But can you imagine how high those bills would be if all of us were forced to pay the higher costs for solar power?

Not to mention the fact that solar can’t provide any of us with enough electricity to recharge an iPhone at night when the sun don’t shine, let alone an air conditioner!

“The only way for solar and wind to be truly useful, reliable sources of energy would be to combine them with some form of extremely inexpensive mass-storage system,” Epstein writes. “No such mass storage system exists … (w)hich is why, in the entire world there is not one real or proposed independent, freestanding solar or wind power plant.”

For that reason, Epstein argues that wind and solar are not so much power sources as power “parasites that require a host.”

The cost of abundant, on-demand energy that makes the Nevada desert not only habitable for human beings, but desirable is high enough already. The last thing Nevadans need are higher taxes on the very fossil fuels that make life here so livable and driving to Nevada from California in the summer so bearable.

Thank goodness for fossil fuels. Because life in the desert would be h-e-double-hockey-sticks without them. Literally.

And as for raising taxes on affordable energy, Congress should just chill.
Elko Daily Free Press

summer-heat2

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STT gets its share of snippy Tweets (ignored) and comments (binned) from the dwindling band of intellectual pygmies who seem permanently wedded to the delusion that wind power is a real alternative to conventional power generation sources.

These infantile “attacks” usually kick-off with a rant that STT MUST be backed by BIG COAL or BIG OIL or BIG GAS etc – and then launch into the fantasy that our stance on the great wind power fraud is all about ‘protecting’ any or all of the former from the ‘threat’ posed by wind power – which – on the infant’s world view – will DESTROY not only fossil fuel generators, but all those who have the temerity to point out the several teensy, weensy flaws in their “analysis”.

Where their limited intellectual equipment lets them down, is on the ‘little’ things: you know, like how meaningful power is generated (on-demand) and used (in an instant); and economics, and the like.

Then there’s their failure to make even the most basic connection between the materials and resources that go into a wind turbine: like hundreds of tonnes of plastics, reinforced concrete, aluminium and steel – which all require mountains of ‘dirty’ COAL and GAS and OIL.

Far from being any kind of ‘threat’, the great wind power fraud opens up huge opportunities for fossil fuel producers, simply because wind power will never ‘displace’, let alone ‘replace’ conventional generation sources, now or ever:

Why Coal Miners, Oil and Gas Producers Simply Love Wind Power

Truth be told, STT couldn’t care less where power comes from: as long as it’s available around-the-clock, rain, hail or shine; and it’s cheap enough for every household and business to be able to use and benefit from, then the rest is ideology.

However, for the sake of argument, STT concedes the Chicken Little’s case and accepts that CO2 emissions may cause “global warming” – these days known as “climate change” (whatever that means?). But we don’t concede that wind power has made – or is even capable of making – one jot of difference to CO2 emissions in the electricity sector; principally because it is NOT – and will never be – an ‘alternative’ to conventional generation systems, which are always and everywhere available on demand (see our post here and here).

STT doesn’t bear an onus: if you think you’ve got an REAL alternative to coal, gas, nuclear or hydro, then we’ll be happy to spruik its wares.

Until then – stop pretending that wind power is an ‘alternative’ to all but permanent stone-age darkness – plug in, turn on and enjoy the cheap, dependable power delivered to your door on a daily basis, by a range of on-demand sources, like coal and gas.

plug LifeSupportSlider

Germany Realizing the Truth, About the Wind Scam!

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Germany’s Wind Power ‘Dream’ Becomes a Living Nightmare

June 11, 2015 by

claudia schiffer

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The wind industry, its parasites and spruikers, around the globe, hail Germany as THE wind power ‘Super Model’. Trouble is, in Germany – as elsewhere – the ‘gloss’ has well-and-truly worn off – and the ‘Model’ is looking more than just a little worse for wear.

The Germans went into wind power harder and faster than anyone else – and the cost of doing so is catching up with a vengeance. The subsidies have been colossal, the impacts on the electricity market chaotic and – contrary to the environmental purpose of the policy – CO2 emissions are rising fast: if “saving” the planet is – as we are repeatedly told – all about reducing man-made emissions of an odourless, colourless, naturally occurring trace gas, essential for all life on earth – then German energy/environmental policy has manifestly failed (see our post here).

Some 800,000 German homes have been disconnected from the grid – victims of what is euphemistically called “fuel poverty”. In response, Germans have picked up their axes and have headed to their forests in order to improve their sense of energy security – although foresters apparently take the view that this self-help measure is nothing more than blatant timber theft (see our post here).

German manufacturers – and other energy intensive industries – faced with escalating power bills are packing up and heading to the USA – where power prices are 1/3 of Germany’s (see our posts here and hereand here). And the “green” dream of creating thousands of jobs in the wind industry has to turned out to be just that: a dream (see our post here).

In response to mounting health complaints, German Medicos have called for an outright halt to wind farm construction, in order to protect their fellow citizens; and to stave off medical malpractice suits:

German Medicos Demand Moratorium on New Wind Farms

Now, apart from unnecessary wind farm harm, Germans are fast waking up the unassailable fact that wind power is not only insanely expensive, it’s utterly meaningless as a power source.

Here’s a couple of recent pieces from Deutschland, that detail the scale of the disaster and the German’s brewing hostility to it.

The Madness Of Germany’s Energy Socialism
GWPF
Wolfram Weimer, Handelblatt
1 May 15

Germany’s energy revolution is getting more and more absurd. After nuclear power and gas, coal power is about to be phased out. The madness is reaching new proportions.

Thirty years ago, he would have certainly been honored as “Master Architect of Socialism” or “Chief Activist of Socialist Labour” – east of the Elbe. Sigmar Gabriel is doing everything possible to re-establish a comprehensive planned economy in Germany: the green energy transition pushes the gates to energy-socialism far open.

His latest coup: the German coal mining industry should be subjected to a national climate change regime and should submit to bureaucratic CO2-tonnes planning and arbitrary special levies. The German economy, the coal-states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Brandenburg, and the unions are up in arms. Verdi boss Frank Bsirske sees up to 100,000 jobs at risk and calls for mass demonstrations. The unfortunate RWE CEO Peter Terium warns desperately: “The levy would mean the immediate end for much of lignite mines and coal-fired plants.” And the Christian Democrat’s Armin Laschet warns:” With its special tax on coal the Minister of Economy purges the last subsidy-free, economic and import-independent domestic energy source from the German electricity market.”

In fact, the new coal plan is just another step in the great socialist power master plan that Sigmar Gabriel is rolling out all over Germany. Already a whole republic of Green electricity councils establishes determined plan-prices, solar and wind comrades produce arbitrary amounts of power, the population pays compulsory levies, supply and demand are suspended and party politics determine plan fulfillment figures. In this eco-socialism, everybody who produces electricity from renewable sources receives a nationally defined “energy feed-in tariff” (the very word sounds like it comes from East Berlin) according to plan specifications. This has as much to do with free market prices for electricity as Stasi boss Erich Mielke had to do with the freedom to travel – nothing.

What was once launched as a – well-intentioned – green energy revolution has now mutated into a giant VEB [i.e. East German state company]. In Gabriel’s system electricity production is no longer determined by demand – as is usual in a market economy. It is not demand that determines supply – but the subsidy billions. Produced is only what wind and solar power and feed-in tariffs expensively allow, not what the public and the economy need – cheap energy. In Gabriel’s national energy system there is an ideological distinction between “good” (green) and “evil” (traditional) energy. Therefore, even profitable and clean gas power plants are switched off – as just happened to Europe’s most modern gas-fired power plant in Irsching. Instead, new subsidy-fed projects are connected to the grid without the necessary network capacity and without the necessary storage technology. For these intermittent power plants, coal power plants have to be kept running as backups, which in turn emit a lot more CO2, which now are also extra-taxed. It all feels like socialist self-perpetuating: this energy revolution cannot be stopped.

Environmental Destruction

The eco-guaranteed prices already lead to all sorts of classic features of a planned economy all of which are well known from the Soviet bloc economies: unprofitable excess capacity, for example. Meanwhile, 1.4 million photovoltaic panels have been installed in the rather shady Germany.

No other country in the world has built up such a tremendous and wholly unprofitable contingent. With around 25,000 wind turbines as well as thousands of biogas plants we are world leader. Like in the five-year plans of the socialist German Democratic Republic, quotas, objectives, and targets are prescribed by central ministries.

The new eco-planned economy devours vast billions in subsidies, not less than 22 billion euros total EEG feed-in tariff per year – and yet electricity from renewable sources, even after more than ten years of continuous subsidies, is more expensive than that from coal, oil, nuclear energy and gas. Rather than terminate the subsidy socialism, however, a parasitic mix of funding application experts, investors, plant manufacturers and subsidy distributers continues to drive the industry forward.

They have created an eco-industrial complex, which performs perfect lobbying in Berlin, but which also ruins the country with windmills and fleeces it with collective money, because on top of that the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (Credit Bank for Rebuilding) grants the green lobby subsidised loans to ensure that the planned economy is also financially rounded.

The wrong-headed system is so expensive that only a very rich country like Germany can afford this large-scale experiment. Around 100 billion euros have already been burnt by this subsidy socialism. Currently the green energy levy costs 56 million euros every day. The expanding eco-socialism has turned energy providers to state combines of the Federal Grid Agency. Because this agency determines which prices may be charged for electricity transmission, it allows subsidies and authorised returns on investments. Because the industrial electricity prices are the second highest in Europe, energy-intensive businesses are gradually saying good-bye to Gabriel’s energy-socialism.

The fact that the colossal construction of wind turbines and solar installations also causes dramatic landscape blight is the sad irony of this green story. A journey through Gabriel-Germany is now like a green tunnel of horror, a roller-coaster ride through vast tracks of destroyed nature, a subsidy-grave filled with turbines and panels.

That’s why – rather than chasing coal off the market too – the green command and control economy needs to be reformed fundamentally. It has set in motion the biggest rip-off subsidy of recent history and has damaged the environment, it burdens the economy and forces all consumers to suffer from rising electricity prices. The worst distortions of the market have to be balanced by more and more new regulations. In this way, one government intervention justifies the next. Germany’s ‘real existing socialism’ has been history since 1989, thank God. The energy-existing Gabriel-socialism, however, is on the rise.
Translation Phillip Mueller
Wirtschaftswoche, 24 April 2015

German wind farm

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Part of what’s got Germans up in arms is what the wind industry has done to their beloved towns and country-side (for a pictorial taste of the aesthetic destruction – see this article).

And the Germans are not taking what the wind industry has dished up, lying down: they’re getting angrier and more organised by the day.

Germany’s Anti-Wind Energy Elements Morph Into A Massive Network Of Protest Groups… Call Wind Energy “A Lie”
NoTricksZone
4 June 2015

Resistance to the junk green energy is growing in Germany.

Last month a print edition of Germany’s Braunschweiger Nachrichtenfeatured a commentary by the head of a German wind protest organization, Dr. Thomas Carl Stiller. The title: “Madness With Wind Turbines”

Braunschweiger-Zeitung1

Hat-tip K.E. Puls, European Institute for Climate and Energy (EIKE).

In the commentary Stiller says that Germany’s once highly ballyhooed Energiewende (transition to renewable energies) “cannot and will not function“, and what was once only a few single protesters voicing opposition to wind parks, is now an entire nationwide umbrella organization of protest groups against the “subsidy-robbing empire” of wind energy industry.

Stiller describes a technology whose produced energy cannot be stored and which depends on random, unpredictable winds. The technology is so inefficient that builders are now forced to erect 800-foot tall monster size machines in a desperate effort to extract real power. He also writes that “wind energy has done nothing to combat climate change”.

“Despite increased wind energy installation, CO2 emissions in Germany have risen. […] Climate protection and reliable power supply by wind turbines installed on the land is thus a lie.”

Stiller also writes that the maximum output of a wind turbine “is far below its rated capacity” and that the German citizenry is paying 20 billion euros annually for a “misconception“. To illustrate the folly of wind energy, Stiller writes that Germans are paying 20 billion euros a year for a commodity that gets sold on the power exchange for only around 2 billion euros.

What’s encouraging is that Stiller writes:

“German citizens are waking up to this insanity”. He comments that “wind energy would not be able to supply the country even if the entire country were covered with wind turbines”.

Stiller also calls for more research for the health impacts that wind turbines are having and that the energy source has got to be for the good of the public and not profit a few opportunists. He adds:

“Us organized citizens are demanding independent feasibility studies and calling for more transparency during the planning process and that man and nature be put back in the focus.”

NoTricksZone

divine

The Left Uses “Climate Change”, as their “New Religion”!

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Why The Left Needs Climate Change

Try this out as a thought experiment: what would happen if, tomorrow morning, we had definitive proof that catastrophic climate change was impossible, wasn’t happening, and would never happen. Would Al Gore breathe a big sigh of relief and say—“Well good; now we can go back to worrying about smoking, or bad inner city schools, or other persistent, immediate problems.”

Of course not. The general reaction from environmentalists and the left would be a combination of outrage and despair. The need to believe in oneself as part of the agency of human salvation runs deep for leftists and environmentalists who have made their obsessions a secular religion. And humanity doesn’t need salvation if there is no sin in the first place. Hence human must be sinners—somehow—in need of redemption from the left.

I got to thinking about this when reading a short passage from an old book by Canadian philosopher George Grant, Philosophy in the Mass Age:

“During the excitement over Sputnik, it was suggested that the Americans were deeply depressed by Russian success. I thought this was a wrong interpretation. Rather, there was a great sigh of relief from the American elites, for now there was an immediate practical objective to be achieved, a new frontier to be conquered—outer space.”

This tracks closely with Kenneth Minogue’s diagnosis of liberalism in his classic The Liberal Mind.  Minogue compared liberals to medieval dragon hunters, who sought after dragons to slay even after it was clear they didn’t exist. The liberal, like the dragon hunter, “needed his dragons. He could only live by fighting for causes—the people, the poor, the exploited, the colonially oppressed, the underprivileged and the underdeveloped. As an ageing warrior, he grew breathless in pursuit of smaller and smaller dragons—for the big dragons were now harder to come by.”

Hence on college campuses today the liberal mind is relentlessly hunting after “microaggressions,” which is pretty pathetic as dragons of injustice go. Environmentalists are still after the fire-breathing dragon of climate change, now that previous dragons like the population bomb have disappeared into the medieval mists—so much so that even the New York Times recently declared the population bomb to have been completely wrongheaded.

Or perhaps a better metaphor for true-believing environmentalism is drug addiction: the addictive need for another rush of euphoria, followed by the crash or pains of withdrawal, and the diminishing returns of the next fix. For there’s always a next fix for environmentalists: fracking, bee colony collapse disorder, de-forestation, drought, floods, plastic bags . . . the list is endless.

The political scientist Anthony Downs diagnosed this aspect of environmentalism in a famous 1972 essay in The Public Interest entitled “Up and Down with Ecology—The Issue-Attention Cycle.”  In analyzing the then fairly new public enthusiasm over environmentalism (though it tended to go by the term “ecology” back then), Downs laid out a five-step cycle for most public policy issues. A group of experts and interest groups begin promoting a problem or crisis, which is soon followed by the alarmed discovery of the problem by the news media and broader political class. This second stage typically includes a large amount of euphoric enthusiasm—you might call this the dopamine stage—as activists conceive the issue in terms of global salvation and redemption.

But then reality starts to intrude. The third stage is the hinge. As Downs explains, there comes “a gradually spreading realization that the cost of ‘solving’ the problem is very high indeed.” This is where we have been since the Kyoto process proposed completely implausible near-term reductions in fossil fuel energy—a fanatical monomania the climate campaign has been unable to shake.

“The previous stage,” Downs continued, “becomes almost imperceptibly transformed into the fourth stage: a gradual decline in the intensity of public interest in the problem.” Despite the relentless media and activist drumbeat and millions of dollars in paid advertising, public concern for climate change has been steadily waning for the last several years.

“In the final [post-problem] stage,” Downs concluded, “an issue that has been replaced at the center of public concern moves into a prolonged limbo—a twilight realm of lesser attention or spasmodic recurrences of interest.”

Activist liberal elites always need a Grand Cause to satisfy their messianic needs, or for the political equivalent of a dopamine rush. For such people, the only thing worse that catastrophic climate change is the catastrophe of not having a catastrophe to obsess over—and use as an excuse to extend political control over people and resources, which is the one-side-fits-all answer for every new crisis that starts through the issue-attention cycle.

Downs did think that the issue-attention cycle would be longer for environmental issues that other kinds of issues like civil rights and crime, for a variety of reasons.  So environmental junkies should chill. They’ll find new ways to get their fix. They always do.

The Windweasels Scream in Agony, When Subsidy Tap is Shut Off!!!

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Doomed UK Wind Power Outfits Reduced to Idle Legal Threats

June 10, 2015 by

brat

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The Guardian (both in its home territory, the UK and in its doppelganger Australian version) is the ecofacists’ megaphone – and is duly lapped up with relish by the intellectual pygmies of the hard-‘green’-left or – as James Delingpole aptly dubbed them; “greentards”.

Both here and in the UK, The Guardian has been the preferred platform for the wind industry, its parasites and paid spruikers to run an endless stream of drivel propounding the magical properties of giant fans – you know, the usual twaddle about wind power being a serious alternative to conventional generation – despite the fact it can only be delivered at crazy, random intervals (see our post here); powering millions of homes around the clock for “free” (see our posts here and here); never harming so much as a bird’s feather (see our post here); and providing such a soothing and peaceful environment for humans that they – like our feathered friends – can’t help but flock towards the nearest wind farm to set up homes and raise their families (see our posts here and here).

No, The Guardian will never be among those accused of helping to bring the great wind power fraud to its inevitable end.

In the UK, The Guardian was caught out pumping clearly misleading and deceptive advertising, for yet another wind power fraud, profiteer – Dale Vince and his wind power outfit, the lamely tagged, “Ecotricity” – dropping all pretence of objective journalism in its quest to profit from spruiking wind industry propaganda:

The Guardian Caught Out Pumping Dale Vince’s Bogus Wind Power Propaganda

Now, The Guardian has stepped in again, in an effort to forestall the inevitable demise of the wind industry, in the face of David Cameron’s clear-as-crystal election pledge to bring the great wind power fraud to and end (see our posts here and here).

UK renewable energy industry warns of legal action over subsidies
The Guardian
Adam Vaughan
2 June 2015

Closing scheme a year earlier than due would amount to ‘wilful destruction’ by the government, climate secretary told

The UK renewable energy industry has warned the government’s new climate secretary that she will face a legal challenge if she oversees the “wilful destruction” of the industry by retrospectively curtailing subsidies.

Later this week, the Department of Energy and Climate Change will announce that the existing subsidy scheme for onshore wind power will be closed a year earlier than it was due to, according to a source close to the process.

Such a move would be a major blow to the industry and go further than the Conservative party had pledged in its manifesto. It had said that it would “end any new public subsidy” in a bid to “halt the spread of onshore windfarms”.

But writing in the Guardian on Monday, a lawyer for the trade body RenewableUK called on Amber Rudd to reconsider – or face legal challenges.

“Minister, please talk to us before you act. We recognise the pressures on you. There are solutions which need not damage confidence in the UK or in your government as one for all of us and not just for a few dangerous, ill-informed and visibly rabid party members,” wrote Marcus Trinick QC, a barrister for law firm Partner Eversheds LLP.

“Please be aware of the dangers of [EU] state aid discrimination and look at what is happening in international energy arbitration across Europe. In such a position we could not afford not to fight, especially if action is taken to interfere retrospectively,” he added.

If the Renewable Obligation (RO) subsidy scheme closes in April 2016 rather than April 2017, as is now expected, onshore windfarms will have to bid for public subsidy under a new subsidy regime known as Contracts for Difference (CfD).

But it is not yet clear if they will even be eligible for the CfD scheme, and Bloomberg Energy Finance has estimated that if onshore wind was not eligible then less than half the capacity of projects in advanced stages of planning would get subsidies.

Maf Smith, deputy chief executive of RenewableUK, vowed to fight the move which he said would appear to contradict the Tory pledge that cuts would only be to new, not existing, subsidies.

“The industry will fight against any attempts to bring in drastic and unfair changes utilising the full range of options open, including legal means if appropriate,” he said.

Ian Marchant, chairman of Infinis Energy Plc and former chief executive of Big Six energy company SSE, warned that closing the subsidy scheme early for onshore wind would have wider ramifications: “If the RO is terminated early without reasonable grace periods in place, not a single energy or large scale infrastructure project in the UK will be safe going forward.”

Dr Rob Gross, an energy expert at Imperial College, said that it was not fair to suggest the RO was hugely over-rewarding onshore wind with too much public subsidy.

“I think this is mainly about the manifesto commitment and being seen to do something to curtail the development of onshore wind. It’s primarily a politically-motivated change,” he told the Guardian.

Rudd said in statement that: “We promised people clean, affordable and secure energy supplies and that’s what I’m going to deliver. We’ll focus support on renewables when they’re starting up – getting a good deal for billpayers is the top priority.” A Decc spokeswoman added: “It’s premature to talk about retrospective changes [to subsidy regimes].”

The government has already laid out the other part of its crackdown on onshore windfarms, using the Queen’s speech to announce that the energy bill will give local communities an effective veto over new ones. Onshore wind is considered by most authorities to be the cheapest form of renewable power in the UK.
The Guardian

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The one thing the wind industry will never be pinned for is “consistency”.

Where The Guardian – parroting on behalf of its benefactors – chirps about “wind power being the cheapest form of renewable power available in the UK”, there are plenty from the wind industry’s more deluded fringes that run the claim that wind power is (now) actually cheaper than coal-fired power – see this piece of twaddle from ruin-economy, for example.

Way back in 1984, Christopher Flavin, the President emeritus of the Worldwatch Institute, ran a pitch that in a few years’ time wind energy would not need to be subsidised.

Over 30 years later, and the wind industry the world over still keeps talking itself into circles: one minute it’s ready to take on conventional generators head-to-head; the next it’s wailing about the need to keep the subsidy gravy train running just that little bit longer. The guff from The Guardian entirely true to that insipid form.

In Australia, the wind industry spin-cycle is just the same.

Here, the wind industry, its parasites and spruikers – like The Climate Speculator’s, Tristan Edis (see our post here) – keep telling us, over and over again, how cheap wind power is by comparison with conventional power sources – a story pitched up in order to counter the recent challenge to the Large-Scale Renewable Energy Target and its insane cost to power consumers.

The wind industry’s standard pitch is, however, found to be tinged with a teeny, weeny little internal inconsistency.

Having boasted about the wonders of their product – and its ability to “compete” with the big boys – in the very next breath, these subsidy leeches start wailing – like crazed little brats – at the prospect of there being so much as the slightest interference with a stream of subsidies, so massive that their scale makes Croesus look like a penny-pinching pauper.

Either wind power is economically viable, or it isn’t? If the former, then there’s no need for mandated subsidies and/or massive penalties, at all.

Call us a tad cynical, but STT thinks it all boils down to the quality of the “product” on offer. Break down the terms on which wind power is “supplied”, and the “deal” reduces to this:

  • we (“the wind power generator”) will supply and you (“the hopeful punter at the end of the line”) will take every single watt we produce, whenever that might be;
  • except that this will occur less than 30% of the time; and, no, we can’t tell you when that might be – although it will probably be in the middle of the night when you don’t need it;
  • around 70% of the time – when the wind stops blowing altogether – we won’t be supplying anything at all;
  • in which event, it’s a case of “tough luck” sucker, you’re on your own, but you can try your luck with dreaded coal or gas-fired generators, they’re burning mountains of coal and gas anyway to cover our little daily output “hiccups” – so they’ll probably help you keep your home and business running; and
  • the price for the pleasure of our chaotic, unpredictable power “supply” will be fixed for 25 years at 4 times the price charged by those “evil” fossil fuel generators.

It’s little wonder that – in the absence of fines and penalties that force retailers to sign up to take wind power (see our post here) and/or massive subsidies (see our post here) – no retailer would ever bother to purchase wind power on the standard “irresistible” terms above.

There is NO market for electricity that cannot be delivered on demand – wind power has NO commercial value for that very obvious reason. The “demand” that exists is nothing more than legislated policy artifice – in the absence of mandated fines, penalties and/or endless subsidies the wind industry would have never got going at all.

Any policy that is unsustainable will either fail under its own steam; or its creators will eventually be forced to scrap it. Endless streams of massive subsidies for a meaningless power source fits the “unsustainable” tag to a T.

The wind industry has been telling the world it’s almost ready to stand on its own two feet for over 30 years (see our post here). Now, in Britain, David Cameron, Amber Rudd & Co will give it the chance to do so. We wish it the best of luck.

wind turbine Screggah-wind-turbine-Padraig-McNulty-5-460x345

Windweasels Never Have Any Qualms About Harming People….

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Wind Power Outfit Ordered to Remove its Turbines from Stolen Land

June 5, 2015 by

highwayman lg

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The goons that people the wind industry are low – to be sure. This is an industry devoid of any moral compass or human empathy, and always quick to ride roughshod over the living:

The Wind Industry’s Latest “Killing Fields”: Africans Just “Dying” to “Save the Planet”

Farmer’s Fiery Suicide Attempt Follows Land Theft by Wind Power Outfit

And the dead:

Wind Power Outfits – Thugs and Bullies the World Over

The Wind Industry Knows No Shame: Turbines to Desecrate the Unknown Graves of Thousands of Australian Soldiers in France

A few posts back, we ran a story in which these boys were shown to have outdone themselves, as a bunch of mean-spirited, violent, racist thugs – that would have given the Mississippi Klansmen of old, a solid run for their money. Instead of burning crosses or blowing up Baptist Churchesfull of African American worshippers, these wind industry red-necks deliberatey destroyed a black family’s desert holiday home, simply because their property stood in the way of their plans to wallow in thePTC subsidy cesspool.

Black American Family Sues Wind Power Outfit for Wantonly Bulldozing their Home

In Kenya and India, wind power outfits have simply helped themselves to land owned by local farmers. In the former case, the riot provoked by the wind power outfit’s blatant land theft ended with a young Kenyan farmer being shot to death; in the latter, the farmer made a statement of desperation by trying to incinerate himself on the steps of the local police station.

In only the latest wind industry outrage – once again in India – the thugs involved have been ordered to remove their fans from tribal land. Although, this time it seems that the authorities went after the miscreants not so much due to their willingness to help themselves to other peoples’ land, but because they were just a bit too shy about stumping up with their revenue commitments.

The story has been plodding along for a couple of years now, at the centre of which is none other than Indian fan maker, Suzlon – aka Senvion (of CERES fame), aka Suzlon REPower (responsible for the Cape Bridgewater disaster).

Suzlon is not only responsible for the worst designed and built turbine ever, the S88 (see our posts here and here), for years now, it’s been the meanness and muscle that stole tribal land and then bullied and bribed its way to cover up the theft:

Suzlon – sets new benchmark for managing “community outrage”

Now, here’s the latest on Suzlon’s skulduggery.

Windmill firms told to remove towers
The Hindu
K.A. Shaji
28 May 2015

The controversy over installing windmills by usurping tribal land at Attappady about a decade ago took a new turn on Tuesday with the Sholayur grama panchayat directing owners of 23 wind power units located in its jurisdiction to stop generating power and remove the towers with immediate effect.

The move is in response to the Accountant General (AG)’s query why no tax was collected from the controversial units, which continue to feed the generated power to the grid of the Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB).

No tax paid

Panchayat secretary Nithin Kailas told The Hindu that all the windmill towers had been installed without permission from the local body. No tax was paid to the government since they were set up. As per rules, each wind power generating unit had to pay Rs.70,000 as annual tax. As each unit occupied 120 sq m, they would have to pay land tax too.

Tribal land encroachment by the wind power companies was one of the key campaign issues of the ruling United Democratic Front (UDF) in the last Assembly elections, but the dispute over the alienation of 85.21 acres of tribal land remains unresolved.

Though four years have elapsed since the then Palakkad District Collector K.V. Mohankumar discovered the role of some government officials in fabricating documents and a committee headed by the Chief Secretary recommended reclamation of the land and disciplinary action against the officials, the UDF government has not taken any steps to restore the land to the tribespeople.

The AG’s order has now prompted the local body to take action. According to official documents accessed by The Hindu , the 85.21 acres of land was part of the 374.48 acres that Sarjan Realities Ltd., a subsidiary of Suzlon, had acquired at Attappady where Suzlon Energy had installed 31 windmills.

The windmills were later sold to some film personalities and entrepreneurs. Among the 31 windmills, those coming under the Sholayur panchayat are now facing action.

Following protests by the UDF in the wake of the findings of the Chief Secretary, the then Electricity Minister A.K. Balan had admitted that the windmill companies had encroached on tribal and forestland at Kottathara, Sholayur, and Agali villages.

The Integrated Tribal Development Project Officer of Attappady also submitted reports confirming the encroachment. The Collector suggested a comprehensive inquiry.

No action by UDF

“Top UDF leaders reached Nallasinka in Attappady in July 2010 to lead an agitation demanding reclamation of the tribal land. They later led a delegation of tribesmen to Delhi and met Congress president Sonia Gandhi and vice president Rahul Gandhi for their intervention,” says M. Sukumaran, convener, Attappady Samrakshana Samithi. But nothing happened even after the UDF came to power.

Though the government had suspended four government officials and three officials of the Attappady Hill Area Development Society in connection with the case, all of them returned to service later, he said.
The Hindu

india wind farm

Windpushers in Panic Mode, as Subsidies are Being Slashed!

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SNP will fight Tories over lifting wind farm subsidies, energy spokesman indicates

Fergus Ewing says scrapping subsidies would be ‘irrational’ in comments that could undermine Tory manifesto promise to ‘halt’ spread of onshore wind farms

The energy sector has launched the UK’s first wind turbine apprenticeship scheme. Photo: PA

By , Political Correspondent

 04 Jun 2015

 The Scottish National Party will fight David Cameron’s attempts to scrap onshore wind farm subsidies, the party’s energy spokesman has indicated.

Fergus Ewing MSP, who holds the brief in the Scottish Parliament, said removing such subsidies was “irrational” and could cost taxpayers up to £3 billion.

While subsidies remain a reserved matter with the UK Government, the SNP have demanded a veto over the policy in Scotland.

It emerged last week that UK ministers will consult with the Scottish Government over lifting the subsidy, raising the prospect of English consumers having to pay for new wind farms in Scotland.

The Conservatives pledged to “halt the spread of onshore wind farms” in their election manifesto, explaining they had failed to “win public support”.

However the majority of onshore wind farm projects awaiting planning permission – 1,642 out of 2,836 turbines – are in Scotland.

Nicola Sturgeon has demanded a veto on David Cameron’s plans

Mr Ewing, Scottish Minister for Business, Energy and Tourism, indicated that the SNP would oppose the proposals in a new consultation which was launched at the Queen’s Speech last week.

He warned on BBC Radio Four’s Today programme that there was a “headlong rush by the UK government to make apparent policy statements regarding scrapping new subsidies for onshore wind without a proper engagement either with ourselves or with the industry”.

“It’s our view that it is irrational to reduce or even scrap on shore wind subsidies when in fact … onshore wind is clearly still the most cost-effective large-scale way of deploying renewable technology in the UK. Economically, therefore, why would you want to bring that to a premature halt?”

Quoting figures from Scottish Power, Mr Ewing added: “If you prematurely bring onshore wind to a halt you will end up costing UK consumers an extra £2-3bn and you will end up having to deploy more expensive technologies.”

He said bodies like Scottish Renewables and UK Energy had said privately they are “very, very concerned” about the plans and the warned the move could prove “costly, irrational, and even expose the taxpayer to the risk of judicial review”.

While Mr Ewing fell short of pledging the SNP will block the proposals outright, his comments will disappoint Conservative voters.

The Tory manifesto read: “Onshore wind farms often fail to win public support, however, and are unable by themselves to provide the firm capacity that a stable energy system requires. As a result, we will end any new public subsidy for them and change the law so that local people have the final say on wind farm applications.”

Inefficient, Unreliable, Wind Turbines, the Parasite of the Energy Grid.

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Wind Power Subsidies: A Bottomless Money Pit

June 3, 2015 by

money pit

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Way back in 1984, Christopher Flavin, the President emeritus of the Worldwatch Institute, ran a pitch that in a few years’ time wind energy would not need to be subsidised.

Over 30 years later, and the wind industry the world over still keeps talking itself into circles: one minute it’s ready to take on conventional generators head-to-head; the next it’s wailing about the need to keep the subsidy gravy train running just that little bit longer.

In Australia, the wind industry spin-cycle is just the same.

Here, the wind industry, its parasites and spruikers – like The Climate Speculator’s, Tristan Edis (see our post here) – keep telling us in one breath how cheap wind power is by comparison with conventional power sources – a story pitched up in order to counter the recent challenge to the Large-Scale Renewable Energy Target and its insane cost to power consumers. Some of the wind industry’s more deluded champions have tripped off to fantasy land, peddling the claim that wind power is (now) actually cheaper than coal-fired power – see this piece of twaddle from ruin-economy, for example.

The pitch is found to be tinged with internal inconsistency, because, in the very next breath, these clowns start wailing – like Tristan has – about it being “totally unacceptable that the Renewable Energy Target should be reduced”. Either wind power is economically viable, or it isn’t? If the former, then there’s no need for mandated subsidies and/or massive penalties, at all.

leeches1

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In the US, the wind industry exhibits the same blood-sucking tendency of a long-starved jungle leech: once it’s latched on, it ain’t ever letting go. But, as any host grappling with a voracious parasite knows, there’s only so much life in the leech’s targeted victim.

Which begs the question: for all that’s stolen, does the parasite offer ANYTHING in return?

One effort to unscramble that little poser has been made by the Institute for Energy Research.

Oil and Gas Growth Outpaces Wind and Solar 9-Fold
Institute for Energy Research
14 May 2015

President Obama has bragged that during his time in office “wind and solar electricity production has doubled” and should play a major role in the future energy mix of the country.

So, let’s examine how much wind and solar have contributed to U.S. energy growth and how that growth compares to the growth in oil and natural gas production during the same time period.

Examining data on energy production from the Energy Information Administration (EIA), it turns out that oil and natural gas productionincreased more than 9 times faster than wind and solar production.

Since 2007, wind production grew by 452 percent and solar production grew by 462 percent.[1]

These percentage increases are impressive, but that’s because they produced a relatively small amount of energy in 2007 and still produce a small fraction of the energy that the U.S. economy needs.

When compared with the energy produced by oil and natural gas during the same time period, wind and solar energy production clearly have a long way to go to demonstrate their relevance in the energy industry as the chart below shows.

Increase-in-Energy-Production-Since-2007-Oil-and-Natural-Gas-vs.-Wind-and-Solar

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According to EIA data, since 2007, wind and solar production increased by 1.74 quadrillion BTUs. Over the same time period, natural gas and oil production increased by 15.98 quadrillion BTUs—a factor of 9 difference.

Not only is the amount of energy produced by natural gas and oil increasing much faster than wind and solar energy, but the increase in solar and wind energy is due to massive government subsidies and state mandates.

According to EIA, in fiscal year 2013—just one year, wind and solar received $11.26 billion in federal subsidies compared with $2.35 billion for oil and gas—almost 5 times more.

In fiscal year 2010, EIA reports that wind and solar received $6.54 billion compared to $2.92 billion for oil and natural gas, which means that wind and solar received more than double the subsidies of the oil and gas industry.[2]

When compared on a unit of production basis to produce electricity, the federal subsidy for solar in fiscal year 2013 cost $231 per megawatt hour, while the federal wind subsidy cost $35 per megawatt hour.

These federal subsidies for wind and solar compare to federal oil and gas subsidies for electricity production of just $0.67 per megawatt hour. So, on a unit of production basis for electricity generation, solar subsidies are 345 times more than oil and gas subsidies and wind subsidies are 52 times more.[3]

Further, more than half the states have Renewable Portfolio Standards that require renewable power be used to generate electricity within the state by specific dates. Government compulsion to buy renewable generation sources obviously has also spurred the growth of solar and wind power.

The boom in oil and natural gas production in the United States has been mainly due to technology—hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling. The environmental lobby claims that this growth in natural gas and oil production was only possible because of large amounts of government backing. However, this is not true.

The Breakthrough Institute produced a report highlighting the government’s role in developing hydraulic fracturing and the expansion of the natural gas industry into shale formations.

Alex Trembath, a researcher who worked on that report, estimated that the U.S. Department of Energy invested only $137 million in research and development for the natural gas sector over a 30-year span.[4]

The purpose of the program was “to assess the resource base, in terms of volume, distribution, and character and to introduce more sophisticated logging and completion technology to an industry made up mostly of small, independent producers. The goal was to substantially increase production from these basins at a time when increased national supply was critically important.”[5]

Lately much of the focus in the energy discussion has been centered on the growth and development of renewables while less notice has been given to the truly impressive growth of the United States in oil production.

Between 2008 and 2014, the United States increased oil production by 3.7 million barrels per day, bringing total U.S. oil production to 8.7 million barrels per day.  The increase alone equates to more oil than the total production of Canada, Iraq, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria, or Brazil—to name just a few of the world’s oil producing countries.

Put another way, this increase in U.S. oil production is equivalent to the total production of six and a half Ecuador’s—an OPEC member country.[6]

In fact, the increase in U.S. oil production since 2008 is greater than the oil production of every OPEC country except Saudi Arabia.

U.S.-Increase-in-Oil-Production-2008-2014-vs.-Select-Country-Oil-Production-in-2014

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As the President sets out to enact his energy plan, it is essential for policy makers, taxpayers, and industry leaders to recognize the limitations of the green revolution and to simultaneously acknowledge the magnitude of the oil and gas renaissance taking place in the country.

Understanding this relationship will lead to lower energy costs for consumers and greater economic growth nationwide. Recognizing the relative effect future policies will have on our energy security, economy and international relations is critical for America to realize fully its new found status as a world power in energy production.

References

[1] Energy Information Administration,http://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/monthly/pdf/sec1_5.pdf

[2] Energy Information Administration, Direct Federal Financial Interventions and Subsidies in Energy in Fiscal Year 2013, March 12, 2015, http://www.eia.gov/analysis/requests/subsidy/

[3] Institute for Energy Research, EIA Report: Subsidies Continue to Roll In For Wind and Solar, March 18, 2015,http://instituteforenergyresearch.org/analysis/eia-subsidy-report-solar-subsidies-increase-389-percent/

[4] Yahoo, Decades of federal dollars helped fuel gas boom, September 23, 2012, http://news.yahoo.com/decades-federal-dollars-helped-fuel-141648115.html

[5] Resources for the Future, A Retrospective Review of Shale Gas Development in the United States, April 2013,http://www.rff.org/RFF/documents/RFF-DP-13-12.pdf

[6] Energy Information Administration, International Energy Statistics, http://www.eia.gov/cfapps/ipdbproject/iedindex3.cfm?tid=5&pid=57&aid=1&cid=regions&syid=2010&eyid=2014&unit=TBPD

Institute for Energy Research 

turbine fintona 4jpg

Shut Off the Subsidy Tap….and the Windweasels Scurry!

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Brits’ Wind Power Nightmare to End Soon: Tories Set to Take the Axe to Subsidies

June 2, 2015 by s

chop-wood-axe-downgrade

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Contrasting with the delusions that continue to grip Australian’s political betters in Canberra (see our post here), sensible governments are rapidly retreating from the brink of energy market madness.

The Americans are pulling the plug on Federal and State based subsidies for wind power outfits. Its ‘wind power’ states have cut their state based subsidies to wind power outfits (or are well on the path of doing so); and Republicans are out to prevent the extension of the Federal government’s PTC wind power subsidy:

Texans Move to Slam Wind Power Subsidies

2015: the Wind Industry’s ‘Annus Horribilis’; or Time to Sink the Boots In

US Republicans Line Up to Can Subsidies for Wind Power

And David Cameron’s Tories strode to power on the back of a manifesto pledge to slam the door on wind power outfits eager to carpet Britain in 10s of thousands of giant fans, in terms that couldn’t be clearer:

“I want to make it clear that if there is a Conservative Government in place we will remove all subsidy for on-shore wind and local people should have a greater say.  Frankly I think we have got enough on-shore wind and we have enough to be going on with, almost 10 per cent of our electricity needs, and I think we should give local people a say if they want to block these sorts of projects.  The only way to stop more on-shore wind is to vote Conservative there is no other party with this policy. We are saying very clearly we would remove the subsidy and give local people the power to say yes or no. This would end the growth of on-shore wind and if that’s what you care about you must vote Conservative.”

Now, Cameron’s Tories are sharpening their axes ready to bring the lunacy to an end even faster than Brits could have dreamed of, even a month ago.

Wind farm subsidies facing the axe
The Telegraph
Emily Godsen
31 May 2015

Generous taxpayer subsidies will be cut off earlier than expected, effectively preventing thousands of turbines from being built, under plans being considered by Amber Rudd, the energy secretary

amberrudd

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Subsidies that have fuelled the spread of onshore wind farms are to be dramatically curtailed, under Government plans to be unveiled within days.

The Telegraph has learnt that a generous subsidy scheme will be shut down earlier than expected, effectively preventing thousands of turbines from getting built, under plans being considered by Amber Rudd, the new energy secretary.

The proposals, which could be announced as soon as this week, will set out for the first time how the Conservatives will implement their manifesto pledge to end any new public subsidy for onshore wind farms – amid concerns that turbines are unpopular with local communities.

Under current policy, any big onshore wind turbines built before the end of March 2017 would automatically be able to qualify for generous payments through a scheme called the Renewables Obligation (RO), which is funded through green levies on consumer energy bills.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change has now confirmed it plans to “reform” the RO scheme. It is understood to be looking at ending the free-for-all by shutting the scheme down early – effectively preventing thousands of turbines getting built. The action follows similar moves taken to curb subsidies for solar farms last year.

After the RO shuts, the only possible subsidies for wind farms will be through a new scheme that is less generous and also much more strictly rationed, with ministers deciding how many projects – if any – are awarded subsidy contracts, enabling them to block further onshore wind if desired.

As well as big wind farms, subsidies for small individual wind turbines such as those popular with farmers – funded through a separate scheme called the Feed in Tariff – are expected to be limited under the plans.

A spokesman for the DECC said: “We are driving forward plans to end new public subsidy for onshore wind farms.

“We will shortly be publishing our plans to reform the Renewables Obligation and Feed in Tariff scheme to implement this commitment. With the cost of supplying onshore wind falling, government subsidy is no longer appropriate.

“We have supported new technologies when they’ve been a good deal for the consumer – providing start-up funding and certainty about future payments to help them become competitive. However, those subsidies won’t continue when costs come down – that’s not value for money for billpayers in the long run.”

Ms Rudd said: “We promised people clean, affordable and secure energy supplies and that’s what I’m going to deliver. We’ll focus support on renewables when they’re starting up – getting a good deal for billpayers is the top priority.”

Government plans to tackle climate change and hit EU renewable energy targets envisage that between 11 and 13 gigawatts (GW) of onshore wind power is needed by 2020.

More than 9.5 GW of projects – about 5,500 turbines – have either already been built or are under construction in the UK. At least 5.2 GW more wind farms – almost 3,000 more turbines – have already been granted planning permission.

Even if not all of these are built there would still be enough to hit the top end of Government plans.

On top of that, there are close to 3,000 more big new turbines with a combined capacity of more than 7GW seeking planning permission.

The DECC spokesman said: “Looking at what has already had planning permission, there is enough onshore wind to contribute what’s needed to reach the ambition set out in the Coalition Government’s renewables roadmap that 30 per cent of our electricity should come from renewables by 2020.”

Many of the projects that already have planning permission would have been expecting to secure subsidies under the RO scheme and it is not clear whether they will still be able to if the scheme shuts early. Ministers may consider offering a ‘grace period’, enabling some of those that already have permission to still get built while blocking off subsidies for those that do not.

One of the biggest factors determining the impact of the proposed changes will be whether or not they apply in Scotland, where the majority of proposed turbines are due to be built.

The Government said last week that it would “consult with the devolved administrations on changes to subsidy regimes for onshore wind farms”.

Nicola Sturgeon, the SNP Scottish First Minister, wants more onshore wind farms and has already demanded a veto on the Tory plans – raising the prospect that subsidies could continue to be paid to new projects in Scotland.

However the Conservatives will be under pressure from their own backbenches to ensure the subsidies are scrapped across the UK.

The Government also announced in the Queen’s Speech last week that it would bring forward legislation to give local communities “the final say” by ensuring large wind farm projects are decided at local rather than national level.

Ms Rudd said: “We need to make decisions on energy more democratic and give our communities a direct say into new onshore wind farms where they live. In future, I want planning decisions on onshore wind farms to be made by local people – not by politicians in Westminster.”

However those in the green energy industry had been most concerned about the pledge to end subsidies, amid uncertainty over the detail of the plans.

Critics of the Conservative pledge, including Tim Yeo, the former Tory head of the energy committee, and Ed Davey, the former Lib Dem energy secretary, have argued that it will actually push up bills as ministers instead offer subsidies to more offshore wind farms that are even more expensive.
The Telegraph

What’s spelt out above is just the accelerated passage of the inevitable.

Britain’s insane wind power policy has been accompanied with all the usual stuff: an unstable grid, with increased risk of widespread blackouts; subsidy-soaked, institutional corruption; spiralling power costs;splattered birds and bats; and divided and angry rural communities.

In those circumstances, David Cameron had little choice but to promise to end the madness. By answering the brewing rage among rural constituents about the adverse impacts of thousands of giant fans on home, hearth and health, he headed off an attack from the UKIP – which had run a solid pro-community stance against the wind power fraud.

And, by decoupling from the Lib-Dem’s deluded love of giant fans (an outfit peopled with wind industry shills like Ed Davey), Cameron dragged in votes from those hundreds of thousands of households and businesses being belted by escalating power bills (see our post here).

And the Conservatives have also seized on a report into the health complaints of those subjected to incessant turbine generated low-frequency noise and infrasound; promising to add adverse health effects as a basis to refuse planning approval, with local communities to have the final say, in any event (see this article from the Daily Mail).

Any policy that is unsustainable will either fail under its own steam; or its creators will eventually be forced to scrap it. Endless streams of massive subsidies for a meaningless power source fits the “unsustainable” tag to a T.

The wind industry has been telling the world it’s almost ready to stand on its own two feet for over 30 years (see our post here). Now, in Britain, David Cameron, Amber Rudd & Co will give it the chance to do so. We wish it the best of luck.

subsidies

Corrupt Ontario Liberals are Accused of Lying, Covering Up Evidence, and Erasing e-mails…..Again!

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Trillium accuses Liberals of destroying wind farm lawsuit documents

RICHARD BLACKWELL

The Globe and Mail

Published Monday, Jun. 01 2015

An offshore wind farm developer that is in the midst of a lawsuit against the province of Ontario is now accusing the Liberal government of destroying documents related to its case.

In a notice of motion filed with the Ontario Superior Court, Trillium Power Wind Corp. says: “It has become apparent … that documents have been destroyed and records of communications have been wiped clean or deleted from computers, or assigned a code name to render their retrieval impossible.

Trillium spent years and millions of dollars developing plans for an offshore wind farm in Lake Ontario near Kingston, but it had the rug pulled out from under it in February, 2011, when the province said it would not consider any offshore development until more scientific studies were done. The decision came the same day Trillium was to sign a large financing deal.

Trillium sued the government – initially for $2.25-billion in damages – but most of the grounds for the suit were thrown out of court.

However, in 2013 the Ontario Court of Appeal said the company could go ahead with one specific allegation, that the government’s decision amounted to “malfeasance in public office.”

As the revised suit – which reduced the claim for damages to $500-million – wound through the discovery process, Trillium found that some government documents it expected to see were not handed over.

Now the company has filed a notice of motion asking that its claim be amended to include the allegation of “spoliation,” or the “deliberate destruction or elimination of incriminating evidence.” None of these allegations, or the claims in the broader suit, have been proven in court.

Ontario’s Liberal government has been hit with accusations that staff members under former premier Dalton McGuinty deleted documents related to the cancellation of two gas-fired power plants. Police are investigating the destruction of e-mails and other records.

The Trillium court filing alleges that the destruction and concealment of documents related to its case were done “concurrently with, and by the same persons” in the office of Mr. McGuinty and the cabinet office who deleted files in the gas plant case.

Jennifer Beaudry, a spokeswoman for Ontario Energy Minister Bob Chiarelli, said it is inappropriate for the minister to comment on the Trillium allegations because the case is before the courts.

However, she said, “we take our record-keeping obligations very seriously. We’re committed to being open, accountable and transparent.” The government has implemented “significant record-keeping reforms” including mandatory staff training and new legislation that implements recommendations of the Privacy Commissioner, she said.

Trillium’s lawyer Morris Cooper said his client’s claim is that “the energy brief was destroyed” pretty much in its entirety when the gas plant files were erased. “All of the communications from the cabinet office and the office of the premier are gone. And there are e-mails confirming an intention to purge, and e-mails confirming an instruction to alter the offshore file to a codeword,” he said.

Among Trillium’s evidence for the destruction of documents, its court filing says, is that some of the communications the company had with the government are “nowhere to be found in the [government’s] documentary productions.”

Trillium also said that the government has not produced any documents regarding internal discussions in the premier’s office or the cabinet about cancelling offshore wind projects, even though it has said that decision was a “core policy decision” of the government.

The provincial government has denied any wrongdoing. A trial in the case is not likely before late in the summer, at the earliest.