Comparing the land footprint of just the fossil fuel plant to solar and wind energy plants ignores the amount of land fuel extraction requires. A solar or wind farm combines the fuel extraction and the power generation roles into one site. A coal power plant only has the power generation function and doesn't take into account the land required to extract and transport the coal. How much land is required to extract enough coal to power that 750 megawatt plant? I would guess that it's less than 20 square miles, but also significantly greater than a football stadium.

On the DC metro I see ads from some do-gooder dot org complaining that wind farms will kill all the little birdies. Oh well, so much for that form of "renewable energy".

madisonian is pretty much right. Environmentalism gives progressives the power they need to trump individual freedom with the "Tragedy of the Commons" argument."Renewable" anything was never a goal but rather a means until human ingenuity and technology started achieving it. Renewable forests became "ancient forests" that couldn't be touched. Fund scientists with taxpayer money and get the results you want like global warming! Let the energy industry fund research and it's tainted unless it confirms the "independent" taxpayer funded research.
I'm depressing myself, we're doomed!

Steven Hayworth: While I enjoyed watching the recent broadcast of you and Bryce debating a 'green' energy, I urge you to focus on the damage done by big government overstep and market intrusion on the energy issues, which NRO does so well, and stick to observation only on the engineering issues.

Some examples:

No, it is not the case that a single mine in Ky produces more useful energy than all US solar+wind. And no Brycy does not say that in his book "Power Hungry", either. Bryce points out correctly the Cardinal mine in Ky produces 'rocks' the equivalent of 66k bbls of oil equivalent per day. He also states that in 2008 that the equivalent total US wind and solar energy produced a daily ~88k bbls per day equivalent. Seen thus the mine makes less, but even these is misleading and Bryce quickly backs away from it in the book. A couple quick points:
1. The 2011 wind energy daily out put has nearly doubled over 2008. Solar is on track to tripple, putting the energy equivalent at ~170k bbls per day.
2. Two thirds of that coal energy is thrown away, pushed up the stack or into the nearby river as waste heat when it is turned into electricity, leaving the mine w/ 22k bbls per day equivalent of useful energy. This is a hard fact of thermodynamics: the conversion efficiency of a boiler/steam turbine electricity plant is nearly as high today as it will ever be. Wind and photovoltaic solar produce electricity on site, directly.
3. Knock off another ~400 bbls per day for rail transport of Cardinals' 15,000 tons per day of coal to power plants. (~400 miles/gallon/rail-ton).

Bryce is talented at argument and pointing out the hype in the renewable fuels discussion. He's also some how leaped from being an attorney that put some solar panels and his roof to a US energy expert. We kind find a better reference.

Indeed.

The proponents of renewables would blanket the land and sea with solar panels and windmills (and transmission lines). That's the new concept for "saving the environment."

The debate is best understood in terms of energy density. The energy density of wind and solar pales in comparison with the energy density of nuclear and coal powered plants.

The old and tiny Pilgrim nuclear powerplant, for example, generates 680 MW day and night. By comparison, the EPA says that 60-70 windmills over 1500 acres can generate 25MW. What a joke. If something, like wind power, needs subsidy, it's because normal people know better than to invest in it.

Your post reinforces what I have believed for some time and what I think is now more and more apparent: the "environmentalists" aren't interested in the environment at all. They want to weaken and eventually cripple the economy. They are, first and foremost, radical leftists. They will use any excuse to weaken America.

Don't forget those solar panels will need lots of scarce WATER to keep them clean,otherwise,their output declines. Birds will defecate on the panels,dust will built up. Any plants left underneath the panels will die from lack of sunlight.There will be nothing to support the animal life of the desert. It would be more environmentally sound to build more nuclear power plants,and the power delivered would be FAR more reliable and constant. Plus,the solar panels wear out in 20 years.

Sam Hamilton - I would go one step further: What environmentalist actually want is to replace people with plants.

Amen! Green energy is a myth. I am a chemist, and if you think about it, 'fossil fuels' are in fact the ultimate renewable. Lets get away from the term fossil and realize that the earh is reverthing co2 to methane constantly. When we burn it, we are not depleting it, just changing it's form. Carbon dioxide can be reverted to methane, it just takes a little energy like the power in the earth's core. There is no way an energy process like burning which has an efficiency of about 30% will ever be replaced by one (solar/wind) that less than 1% efficient.