How Wind And Solar Power Are Polluting The Commons

This is superb.

How Wind And Solar Power Are Polluting The Commons - Seeking Alpha:

I have no quarrel with those who argue that green-electrons are more valuable than conventional electrons because of reduced CO2 emissions. I do believe, however, that the price premium paid for green electrons must be offset by the fully loaded cost of providing standby generating and storage for times when the weather is uncooperative and the green electrons are not available.
Every industry in the world is expected to pay the costs of abating the pollution it creates. Why should renewable power producers be treated differently as they pollute a critical commons?
Over the last year it's become increasingly clear that something has to give and companies and individuals who sell or operate renewable power generating systems will be compelled to accept responsibility for their unavoidable intermittency. Some will choose to sacrifice their curtailment priorities. Others will contract with standby capacity providers. The third, and in my opinion the most interesting, class will incorporate enough energy storage in their project specifications to firm their power delivery commitments.
At this point it's not entirely clear what the minimum required level of capacity firming will be, although I tend to believe a minimum of 15 minutes will be required to leave enough time for a reasonable ramp of standby systems.

Read the entire article at Seeking Alpha:

Graphic noted in the comments to the article

The comments to the article are also informative, although not many seem to grasp a very notable graph which shows energy use - and rejection.  Natural gas is informative there - where in electricity generation it might be 55% rejected and in home heating only 10%.

I noted in a recent post on the collapse of A123 that Johnson Controls had purchased it primarily for the manufacturing capability - in terms of this article the facilities industry is in need of technology to stabilize the power supply precisely because of the grid pollution this article notes