Alternative Energy: US data show wind energy works and is cost-effective -- by Robert H. Owen Jr.

Occasionally a misinformed reader asserts wind turbines produce insignificant electrical output. That's simply untrue.

MGE reports the energy produced by its wind turbines annually. According to reports, its Rosiere Wind Farm in Kewaunee County produced 19,513,000 kilowatt hours in 2011 and 20,279,000 in 2012, the former at an operating cost of 2.11 cents per kilowatt hour.

MGE reported that its Top-of-Iowa Wind Farm produced 80,592,300 kilowatt  hours in 2011 and 74,147,900 in 2012, the former at an operating cost of 1.48 cents per kilowatt  hour.

MGE also reports the energy it buys from two Iowa and one Wisconsin wind farms owned by others. It reported total wind energy purchases of 275,932,000 kilowatt hours in 2011 and 290,540,000 in 2012 at a net cost of about 6 cents per kilowatt hour.

By contrast, MGE's inefficient Blount Street Plant, which burns natural gas, produced only 47,689,100 kilowatt hours at an operating cost of about 14 cents per kilowatt hour in 2012.

Modern wind turbines are being widely adopted in other states in the Midwest because they are productive and cost-effective.

Read more: Data show wind energy works and is cost-effective -- Robert H. Owen Jr. : Ws

Energy Prices: Plateau Oil meets 125m Chinese cars - by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

Oil is not supposed to ratchet defiantly upwards in a downturn, which is what we have with the Euro zone facing a year of contraction in 2012, and much of the Latin bloc sliding into full depression. Japan‘s economy shrank in the fourth quarter.

Asia’s emerging powers of Asia - the key force driving the commodity boom of the last decade - are in various stages of “soft-landings” after hitting the monetary brakes last year to check property bubbles and curb inflation. China’s manufacturing has been bouncing along near contraction levels through the winter. So what happens when it recovers?

The issue is not whether Iran has the military kit to close the Straits of Hormuz and cut off 18pc of global oil shipments for more than a few days (probably not), but whether an Israeli/US attack on the regime’s nuclear facilities would later set off an uncontrollable chain of events in the Middle East.

The West has the disquieting experience of watching crude soar even as we languish in stagnation. This never used to happen. If we faltered, energy costs would fall too, acting as a stabilizer. This harsh new reality is going to become uncomfortable when the emerging world enters a new cycle of growth, leaving us behind. Rising utility costs have already raised the numbers of householdsfrom Britain in poverty from a fifth to a quarter.


For more: Plateau Oil meets 125m Chinese cars - Telegraph

Petroleum Industry: Venezuela risks shooting itself in the foot causing more problems for the oil industry

There are more problems on the horizon for the oil industry and its coming of all places from Venezuela.

One of Venezuela’s major problems has been that Mr Chávez’s has been pillaging the state oil firm PDVSA. It is now run loyal supporters of the regime, starved of investment and income used for social spending of the Government, cutting its output from 3.3m barrels per day (b/d) in 1998 to around 2.25m b/d today, according to industry estimates. Of that, some 1m b/d is sold at subsidized prices at home or to regional allies, like Cuba, Suriname and others, leaving just 1.25m b/d for full-price exports.

If this keeps going on Venezuela will not be able to pay his countries debts and causing the bond markets to fear for the solvency of the world’s eighth-largest oil producer.

EU-Digest