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Sky-well curtailment
Got back from the 794-mile Green New Deal road trip.
At times I was driving in EF-0 and EF-1 tornado-strength wind, depending on direction.
As I departed the back portal of Jacksboro, Texas, I was driving right through the path of the recent tornado which destroyed 90-homes there. None of the local wind turbines appeared affected at all, despite some 'news'.
Installed wind turbine power has dramatically increased since my last trip out West. 'Drilling shallow wells' into the sky for atmos-electrons.
From Jack County, Texas, out to Big Spring, Texas the number of wind turbines cannot be counted now due to the proliferation.
One thing that did stick out though, was that in all locations, entire strings of turbines were idled, as winds ripped by at 15-25-mph, plus gusts.
Evidently, there's so much power being generated, and with Texas' grid cut off from the rest of the nation, there's not enough load, compared to supply.
Grid-scale batteries will be able to mitigate some of the loss, but right now, it's a terrible loss.
I witnessed no compliance with speed limits except 18-wheelers. There was no apparent law enforcement.
SUVs and full-sized pickups dominated traffic, moving in excess of 80-mph, out in the Trans-Pecos on I-20, in horrific wind.
The BEV I drove averaged 126-mpg at 70-mph. It's first 'tank' was canned-sunlight. I was near the world's largest PV farm, west of Odessa, Texas.
Most efforts to increase CAFE standards have been shot down in Congress since the Oil Crisis of October, 1973.
With heavier cars, and larger frontal areas, when we lost the 55-MPH National Speed Limit in the 1990s, we devolved to a 16-mpg actual American Fleet average, only 3-mpg better than 1973, pre- crisis.
It's what the people want.
Darkly fascinating.
It would be interesting to know how many 1,000-km range M-B EQXX's could have been powered by those idled turbines.
Better $ 4/gallon gas and wars, than renewables and energy independence I suppose.
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