That said, solar and wind prices in the US are falling fairly rapidly, solar quite rapidly. It’s not clear that we need any heroic aid to mature these technologies.

Probably where we need to concentrate our money is on transmission, grid improvement and overall efficiency.

And make sure that storage research/development has all the money that needs. Storage is the missing part for completing the new grid puzzle.

That’s what I believe in doing.

Now you’re going to drag out that old, worn out highly-bogus Republican Solyndra stuff?

How about something fresh like Travelgate? Or maybe how Ike had a mistress?
Did you know that Grant drank a lot?

Yes, towers cost money. So do dams, feedstock, and turbines.

Take a look at what is happening. Over the last ten years wind has grown from a 0.03% share to 3.5% share of our generation. Most of that growth has been in the last five years.

During those ten years hydro has grown from 6.9% to 7.6%.

The people making the decision of what to build can do math.

http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/aj07_jamc.pdf

You are misunderstanding output/realized capacity and you don’t even have that number correct. Median output capacity is just over 40% and best site capacity exceeds 50%. Better siting and improved technology keeps pushing output higher.

http://en.openei.org/apps/TCDB/

Water does not flow 24/365 in all locations. I’ve lived close to large dams in both the east and west and there are times at which there is not enough water behind the dam to let it run.

In order to harvest energy from falling water it is necessary to build infrastructure of some sort – dams or feedstock – and install turbines. That costs money. When the math is done hydro is not cheap enough. If it were then we would see a lot more hydro coming on line. A lot of existing dams would be converted to generation. And realize, the dams are already built.

What do you believe in? Magic?

Right. And the Earth is flat. That orange thing gliding across the sky each day is Apollo in his golden chariot. And Fox News can be counted on to deliver facts….

This is simply incorrect. The median LCOE price for onshore wind is currently $0.05/kWh. The lowest price is $0.04/kWh. That number does not include subsidies. The price of wind is expected to drop to $0.04/kWh median and $0.03/kWh over the next 20 years.

The current median LCOE price of hydro is $0.04/kWh and the lowest price is $0.02/kWh. The expected price of new hydro is around $0.06/kWh.

The price of unsubsidized PV solar is expected to drop below $0.10/kWh this decade.

http://en.openei.org/apps/TCDB/

Hydrogen is not a source of energy, it is a way to store energy. And it’s not likely to be our least expensive way to store.