------- April1978 RAIN Page 13 I" " \ '., ,( >-,- \ (I,. THE SUN Thus, DOE documents suggest that a far greater return on investments of money and staffing will be realized for solar technologies than for nuclear technologies; but, rather than put funds where they would appear to be most effective, DOE has instead chosen to reduce its support for solar energy tech nologies. For a supposedly populist presidency, the White House is grossly out of touch with the national will, which is clamoring for solar. Only the Congress, which through the "Solar Coalition" of aides and staffers keeps trying to up the solar-windbiomass budgets, seems to understand the serious, popular desire for renewable energy sources all across America. You Can't Throw Dollars at Us! That's the constant, pathetic cry in the halls at DOE-Solar. "We don't have the staff to monitor all the money Congress shovels at us," they say, as if they couldn't staff-up if they really wanted to. Yet this slowpoke, one-step-at-a-time, linear thinking seems dangerously out of place given the president's call for us to view the energy crisis as a "moral equivalent of war." And certainly the nuclear fission and fusion areas havc had billions thrown at them for the last 30 years without such a lack of enthusiasm, lack of staff, or any tendency to return the money! It's high time we got in some new, more enthusiastic (as well as simply technically competent) solar division branch managers to replace the "don't rock the boat by throwing me money" bureaucrats. Funding by Psychological Type: Wind vs. Photovoltaics A specific example of what I, and others watching the energy policy field, am noticing is that, despite the already lower costs of wind energy systems mentioned by Rick KatzMarie McAuliffe enberg of the American Wino Energy Association in a the Feb. '78 Solar Age, the solar photovoltaic branch is getting almost double the funding. A number of experts in both technologies feel this is partly because Paul Maycock, solar cell branch manager, is not only academically competent, but because he also comes to DOE with electronics industry technical and manufacturing know-how and then adds to this solid background a used car salesman's eagerness to sell his wares' L.ou Divone, wind energy branch chief, on thc other hand, is characterized by many of his own grantees as "a conservative MIT scientist who can think only of going from A to B, and B to C, slowly and without innovation." Because of this attitude of scientific detachment, one finds the nation's wind energy program lacking the following "real-world" activities parallel programs emphasizing local, small industry construction of large wind energy conversion systems (LWECS) rather than the expensive, aerospace corporation approach. * strong financial and tech nical advisory support for states and cities needing to develop wind tax credits, wind zoning and wind rights, local siting manuals, consumers' guides, wind energy extension services for site surveys, and public education programs. • a Rocky Flats-type testing program for non-DOE contractor-built large WECS (WTG Energy Systems, Schachle & Sons) to verify manufacturers' claims. thereby increasing utility company confidence in commercially available domestic wind-turbines, and the likelihood of sales. * strong financial and technical support for regional and state wind energy implementation studies focusing on rapid integration of LWECS into electric grids . ..
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NTc4NTAz