Plentiful, green energy goes untapped in Florida
Natural resources, including sun, sea and wind, are little used
By Ken Kaye, Sun Sentinel
November 27, 2009
The Sunshine State receives enough rays to power every home from Key West to Pensacola. It sits close to a powerful ocean current, which could generate electricity. And it could draw on the winds to light up homes.
Yet these sources of green energy are largely untapped.
Most residents consider solar energy to be a futuristic or impractical concept. Developing ocean currents as an energy source would require spending billions on engineering special turbines, a price neither government nor business is currently willing to pay.
And wind remains a questionable source of power because it doesn’t blow strongly or consistently enough on Florida’s mainland.
As a result, Florida ranks 23rd in the nation in energy efficiency, according to the nonprofit American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy.
“We buried our head in the sand,” said Camille Coley, executive assistant vice president for research at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton. “We want to continue to live our lives and not make necessary changes.”
It’s not like the state isn’t trying. Gov. Charlie Crist and the Legislature created the Florida Energy & Climate Commission in 2008 to promote and develop alternative energy sources as well as to study how to reduce greenhouse gases. The commission has helped usher through legislation to increase energy efficiency in state-owned buildings and cars and to require all new buildings be more energy efficient by 2019.
Further, the Florida Public Service Commission has recommended utilities generate 20 percent of their power through renewable energy sources within the next 10 to 20 years. The Legislature is considering that plan but unless Florida commits millions more toward the effort, green energy is probably decades away.
“The technology is there,” said Craig Williams, executive director of the Florida Renewable Energy Association, whose home is completely powered by solar energy. “There’s no reason why all Floridians can’t be using it.”
Solar energy
By far the state’s most readily available natural resource, the sun shines in Miami about 70 percent of the time there is available daylight, according to the National Weather Service. Compare that to 58 percent of the time in New York City or 47 percent in Seattle.
Even when it’s cloudy, sun rays penetrate to the ground, said meteorologist Rusty Pfost.
“We get a lot of sun here, so solar energy is definitely something we could do more of,” he said.
To encourage its widespread use, Florida had offered residents a rebate up to $20,000 for using solar panels but funding has run dry.
The state otherwise has applied pressure on utilities to rely more on renewable energy. In October, FPL opened a solar-powered plant in Arcadia with 90,000 solar panels, able to power up to 35,000 homes.
Steven Baillie, owner of Solar Concepts in Boca Raton, said he installed six solar systems on homes this year. He recently placed 26 solar panels on the roof of a Lake Worth home at a cost of about $50,000 before rebates.
Each panel is about 15 square feet and produces 200 to 300 watts of electricity in direct sunlight, enough to power air conditioning, television sets and computers.
Baillie said the system will pay for itself in about four to five years, adding, “It’s a good investment.”
He estimates about 1,000 homes in South Florida have already installed solar panels. Yet, according to the Florida Energy & Climate Commission, the number of homes that use solar energy — and requested a state rebate — is fewer than 200.
The Gulf Stream
Another plentiful but untapped source, this current flows north along the U.S. East coast and is most powerful near South Florida. Turbines, similar those in hydroelectric dams, could be sunk into its deep channel to generate power.
“It has even more potential than sunshine because it’s reliable day to day,” said Jim Lushine, a retired weather service meteorologist, whose job included monitoring ocean currents. “It’s going all the time.”
Obstacles stand in the way, however. The cost would likely be several billion dollars and the turbines would need to be anchored, possibly by platforms similar to oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. That would pose a threat to marine life and coral reefs.
Still, it’s an idea some universities are studying. Florida Atlantic University already has deployed undersea sensors off Dania Beach to measure the current at different depths.
In doing so, the university’s Center for Ocean Energy Technology hopes to determine where the current would be strong enough to run through the turbines and produce the maximum amount of electricity.
With support from the state as well as a $1.2 million federal grant, the center is working with Florida State University and the University of Central Florida and other partners.
Wind
While this is also a potential source of electricity, experts say it doesn’t blow consistently enough on Florida’s mainland to be reliable.
Wind turbines could be anchored offshore; however, they would not be practical around South Florida because of the depth of the ocean and because they might endanger coral reefs and marine sanctuaries, a Florida Public Service Commission study found. The study recommended North Florida as a better possible site.
Currently, there are no wind farms, or numerous turbines clustered together, in Florida. However, FPL is planning a wind farm in St. Lucie County as a means to increase its renewable energy production.
Outside of Florida, NextEra Energy, a subsidiary of FPL Group, is the largest generator of wind energy in North America. It operates more than 8,300 wind turbines at 66 farms in 16 states and two Canadian provinces.
Biomass
This is material derived from vegetative debris, agricultural waste and solid waste plants. In other words, it’s garbage. But it can burned in special plants to produce electricity as well as ethanol.
FPL, the state’s largest utility, says it uses biomass to run plants in Broward, Palm Beach, Volusia and Putnam counties. Progress Energy, another utility, also operates biomass plants in Central Florida.
Biomass likely will be increasingly used as an alternative energy source as it is abundant and relatively easy to harvest, experts said.
Hugh Willoughby, a professor in the Earth and Environment Department of Florida International University, said government, universities and business need to develop alternative energy technologies.
“If they’re used on a wide enough scale, the cost would probably come down,” he said.
Copyright © 2009, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
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