DIRECTOR'S CORNER By Dustin Buckingham, CCD, BLC, DGC, District 7 Director On a family trip this summer, I had the opportunity to visit the Grand Coulee, Chief Joseph and Libby hydroelectric dams. These massive structures electrify millions of homes and provide a stable electric supply for much of the Northwest. The hydroelectric dams were America’s original clean power generation. The Grand Coulee Dustin Buckingham Dam alone produces 6,809 megawatts of electricity, the equivalent power necessary for 4.2 million households. The dam contains 12 million cubic yards of concrete, enough to put a four foot wide and four inch thick sidewalk around the world twice. Today’s renewables are much less reliable than the old hydroelectric dams. Wind farms and solar fields are intermittent power sources that require nature to cooperate. Solar energy production drops from 40 percent to 60 percent in the winter versus peak production in the summer. Since Ohio is ranked twenty third on the sun index and thirtieth for average wind speed in the United States, neither technology can be used at its optimum production. Wind and solar can play a larger part in our power grid by shaving peak demand and slowing the need for new electric generation. However, you can understand the concern with replacing large amounts of our baseload coal, natural gas and nuclear generation with intermittent power generation from renewables like wind and solar.
electric generation is coming from these two intermittent power sources. EIA also projects new generation capacity will be dominated by solar. My concerns are three-fold. First, the mining and manufacturing process used to make solar panels is not green. The process creates toxic bi-products and currently uses much carbon-based energy in the production of the panels. Second, disposal is problematic because of the lead and cadmium each panel contains. The Electrical Power Research Institute (EPRI) recommends not disposing of solar panels in a regular landfill. Third, China manufactures 80 percent of all solar panels. They also mine and refine 64 percent of the world’s silicon, a key component.
Ohio’s cooperatives continue to work together through Buckeye Power to balance environmental challenges, reliable service and financial prudence for our members as it relates to electric generation.
Buckeye Power has built 23 solar arrays across the state that are rated for 2.1 megawatts of energy. Data shows the solar arrays system peaks at about 1.6 megawatts or enough electricity for 1,295 homes. Members can buy a portion of their power from these fields if they choose. The Places like Texas have already made large capital investments in renewables. According to Governor Greg fields diversify Ohio cooperative’s energy portfolio and Abbott in 2018, Texas led the U.S. in wind generation give the co-ops sound data to make informed decisions and was second for installed solar capacity. Yet, they about future renewable investments. Over the last 20 years, experienced catastrophic results last winter as Texas Buckeye Power has invested over $1 billion in adopting power generation failed to meet demand. According to technologies to clean emissions from our 1800-megawatt the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, this caused 111 deaths, coal-fired electric plants. These plants produce enough bankruptcies and $80 – $130 billion in direct and indirect electricity for 1.1 million homes. economic loss. When Texas needed more power generation, renewables did not produce. According to the United Coal-fired power plants and other electric generation from States Energy Information Administration (EIA), wind carbon-based fuels are under attack across the country constitutes 8.4 percent of our electric generation and solar regardless of emission investments. adds 2.3 percent. EIA charts show that 76 percent of new 8
