There’s a strong move for wind and solar investment, and people are adamant about it being an absolute need and crisis.
Let’s talk about the science a little bit, and density of electricity generation per area of land occupied for such production.
Wind: 1W/m^2 or 2.6MW/mile^2
Solar panels: 10 W/m^2 or 26MW/mile^2
Natural Gas: 200-2000W/m^2 or 520-5200MW/mile^2
Nuclear: 385W/m^2 or 1GW/mile^2
Coal: 2-5kW/m^2 or 5.2-13GW/mile^2
456,621,004,566.21 Watts (.45 TW) used per day in US.
2,589,988 square meters per square mile.
In an ideal world with no spikes in need and we never grow beyond 2022 electricity usage, how much land space do we need to support the generation of the US’s current electricity needs based on each:
Wind: 175,623 square miles
Solar: 17,562 square miles
Natural gas: 88-878 square miles
Nuclear: 456 square miles
Coal: 35-88 square miles
Disney World is: 43 square miles
Provo Utah is: 44 square miles
Seattle, WA is: 83.7 square miles
New York City is: 302 square miles
Connecticut is: 5,021 square miles
Ohio is: 44,825 square miles
Pennsylvania is: 46,055 square miles
New York State: 54,556 square miles
Florida is: 65,758 square miles
This puts a bit of a visualization to how ridiculous our emphasis is on wind and solar when the reality is there are options which are much better.
Realize these sizes are ideal… you probably need more than twice the sizes I’ve listed due to variance in needs due to season etc. That doesn’t even touch on huge infrastructure needs for power storage on solar/wind…
Hopefully this helps you visualize the reality versus the FUD (fear-uncertainty-doubt) that some people spout.
Also, don’t try and argue the numbers… these are real values averaged across various latitudes and year-round production, and the US consumption is based on the government figures they last published in 2022.
clintel.org
www.dw.com
