Dylan Ratigan's New Gig - Sustainability

I am on his mailing list which this morning linked to the following article.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/20/business/msnbc-host-left-tv-battles-be...

When Dylan Ratigan was last on daily television, he was often in a bit of a rage. After two highly publicized rants about unseemly ties between corporations and politicians on MSNBC, he left his show in 2012.

Disillusioned, he decided that rather than complain about the state of the world, he would at least try to be part of the solution.

He was especially intrigued by something he had heard over the years from both Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and war veterans: “If you really want to combat conflicts, bring the things that we fight over,” said Mr. Ratigan, 44. “Don’t bring more bullets and boots — bring water, food, shelter, communications, so we can empower women and children who are physically left in the villages.”

I am very encouraged by projects like this. What's missing from the lineup are local sustainable projects that are not so expensive. We have 4 shipping containers on our place. They cost between $1200 and $2700 each. Surely there is a way to outfit one with similar productivity that does not cost $150,000.

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...I moved into solar. It has been enjoyable and it has felt worthwhile. But recently, solar has turned into selling revenue streams. The industry is not focused, IMO, on solving global crises so much as putting out large projects to appease the banksters. I'm not so naive that I don't understand the importance of capital. But big banks have different goals than those of our society. Job creation, clean energy production and education, national security from energy independence etc have no place on the balance sheet. I guess I am getting too old and cynical...

As for Dylan Ratigan, I say right on. I had no idea he was so, well... righteous. That was really some rant !

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mhagle's picture

Cool that you work in solar!

I have not articulated it much, but have felt uneasy about the profit motive screwing with what we need to do to have energy independence, local food, etc.

This is my question about rooftop solar. So a company comes in and puts solar panels on your roof with no money down . . . do you own the panels and make payments until it is paid off? Or does the company own the panels and you pay for solar electricity?

Personally, I would want to own my panels and small wind, and then own a couple of the Tesla Home Batteries - https://www.tesla.com/powerwall - and be truly energy self-sufficient.

But I imagine that utility companies are not going to go gently into that goodnight.

Did you read this essay from last week? http://caucus99percent.com/content/what-media-banks-and-fossil-fuel-comp...

I think it merits more discussion. I don't remember if you commented or not, but if not, I would be interested to hear your views on it.

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

Usually with a no money down lease, you get your rate locked by the lease company. If the utility increases rates, you still pay the rate at time of the lease commitment. The lease has a termination date and you can buy out the lease as well. You get to keep the system after the lease is up. The lease company gets free use of real estate from you and keeps any and all government incentives. It rarely makes sense to lease if you own your home, have no plans to move and can afford to buy.

Being "self sufficient" is nice but honestly, if your local grid is dependable it still makes economic sense to go grid tied and not use batteries. Battery systems are less efficient, more costly and create an undesirable waste stream. That said, the technology is improving. The solar industry has beaten down the cost of modules, inverters and racking and are now focused on power storage. Storage holds the promise of optimizing time of use and distributed generation on a grand scale. This will eliminate the need for costly power transmission, but as I said, we are not quite there yet.

This is just my opinion obviously and I am no longer directly involved with the residential grid tie market. Regardless hope this helps.

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mhagle's picture

Thanks for the info!

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

If it can be encouraged to innovate and invest, and if the consumer demand for alternative energy is strong. It would help to not have monolithic corporations stifle clean energy innovation.

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Beware the bullshit factories.

earthling1's picture

Blueslide, have a question.
How many homes would a billion dollar solar array supply? I ask because I'm working
on an idea . Since you are into solar I thought you might know. Ball park figure would be great.
Basic premise is;
122 million taxpayers in America.
$8 from each, through the same process as the $1 donation for public financing of elections.
This produces a billion dollars per year. A billion dollar solar array or wind farm per year.
This would make the American taxpayers owners of the new energy future, leaving the fossil fuel industry in the dust.
America would be self sufficient without private industry profits sucking revenue from the public.
In the least, private industry would fall all over themselves trying to stay ahead the American people and crank out their own investments.
Just an idea. Thanks ahead of time.
.

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Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

Lol, like what governments are supposed to do in providing public utilities from public money, with the best possible service at the lowest possible cost, while paying decent wages to sufficient employees to provide maintenance and other services?

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

The cheapest prices I hear are approximately $1.2 per watt installed. I am sure there are better out there and a project this size would likely come in cheaper, but let's just use that for now.
$1B = 833 MW installed.
833 MW x 5 sun hours per day (varies by location) = 4.165 GW/hrs day
4,165,000 kwh per day
According to iea.gov avg home consumption in the US is 30 kwh/day
So that system would be enough to offset 138,000 homes.

Someone please check my math !!!

That said, solar does not work that way as you would have a single system. You would have to transport a lot of this power great distances

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earthling1's picture

138,000 is a medium size desert community. Arrays can be located near town. Maybe a billion dollar system is too much for a community and can be scaled to smaller arrays spread around numerous towns, villages, and hamlets.
The whole idea is to frighten the energy giants into thinking they will be cheated out of future profits if they delay investment in renewables.
It does seem clear to me the energy giants want to completely exhaust the global supply of fossil fuels, suck the last bit of profit out of it, before investing one thin dime in sustainable energy.
We need to threaten THEIR wallets for a change.
Your napkin estimates pencil out. We could do this!

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Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.