CHALLENGES TO NEW ENERGY

The challenges are real but so is the big money funding the scientists who are meeting the challenges as fast as a fluff piece like this can describe them.

Interesting that this author considers natural gas/LNG to be "clean" energy. NewEnergyNews does not.

Clean energy solutions still face obstacles
Keiko Morris, August 23, 2007 (Newsday)

WHO
Matthew Cordaro, utility expert & acting dean/College of Management, Long Island University (C.W. Post campus); Ashok Gupta, chief energy economist, Natural Resources Defense Council & member, NY Gov. Eliot Spitzer's Renewable Energy Task Force; other unnamed energy experts

New Energy.

WHAT
Fossil-fuel is the most cost-effective energy for power plant electricity presently but a future in which alternatives are a significant part of the mix is foreseeable.

WHEN
Alternatives are expected to emerge following further research discovers ways to improve efficiency and lower costs.

WHERE
Placing alternative energies in the U.S. market is especially challenging because Americans expect nothing less than perfection of delivery.

WHY
- Cleaner alternative energies still lack immediate viability in terms of cost and reliability but are cleaner and renewable. The complete mix of resources will provide a combination with which utilities can manage risk by having a portfolio of energy options.
- Short term alternatives include renovating existing power plants to burn natural gas in a combined cycle so as to make use of the heat as well as the electricity generated.
- A quick run-down of current alternatives for Long Island, NY:
1. Efficiency programs such as LIPA's Home Performance with ENERGY STAR can mean 30 to 40 percent in savings…
2. Combined cycle plants reduce cost and emissions by including natural gas with denser, dirtier fossil fuels.

Getting more cost-competitive all the time. (click to enlarge)

3. Solar energy will improve in cost but in places like Long Island where there is ample sun on big rooftops, it can already make sense.
4. Wind energy is expected to be cost effective as soon as turbine manufacturing capacity ramps up to meet demand.
5. Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) terminals may make natural gas more competitive but there is controversy over placement of the potentially dangerously explosive facilities.
6. Wave-tide-current energies are still in the testing stages but represent enornmous potential.

QUOTES
- Cordaro: "What it comes down to is what's cost effective and what's reliable, especially in this country when we've come to expect almost perfect reliability…"
- Gupta: "You manage your risk so you don't have to depend on any one source or cost…"
- Gupta: "[Solar energy] makes a lot of sense on Long Island, where there is so much sun and so many rooftops…A $30,000 system on a $1 million house is not a lot of money, and you can finance it like you would your roof. You pay for it over time."