Once again the arrival of winter has taken all the clever people by surprise. The Canadian Press informs us that “Blasts of frigid Arctic air could send temperatures tumbling in December and herald the arrival of a more ‘traditional Canadian winter,’ a meteorologist for the Weather Network predicts as it releases its seasonal outlook.” And Heatmap Daily emails, with no apparent embarrassment given their own advocacy on the subject (and still no ability to post their newsletters so we can link to them) that “Winter Is Going to Be a Problem” because “Chestnuts may soon be roasting on an open fire, but more homes are being heated by heat pumps. Grid planners and policymakers have to adjust to the possibility that they will soon face peak demand in the winter, especially in cold and dark regions like New England. Their challenge: How to meet the increased demand from decarbonized home heat with decarbonized energy generation.” Yup. If only we’d listened to those bourgeois sticks-in-the-mud who warned about going all-in on alternative energy while waging war on the stuff that works instead of relying on endless rhetoric about how alternatives were fast becoming cheaper and more reliable and anyway winter was history.

Utopianism has painful real-world consequences, some of them even penetrating the political bubble. Thus the Boston Herald reports that:

“The Trump Administration and Gov. Maura Healey continue to spar over the release of Low Income Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) funding and soaring energy costs as the weather gets colder.”

Of course nobody in the Trump Administration or that of Gov. Healey is going to be cold this winter. But they may feel some political heat over having tossed what works for what sounded good.

What with winter actually still being a problem and all, it is also disquieting to read a press release from the Canadian Energy Regulator that says:

“Wind power is set to dominate Canada’s power growth over the next five years, accounting for about 70% of planned renewable capacity additions, according to a new online publication from the Canada Energy Regulator (CER).”

Being ourselves bourgeois sticks-in-the-mud, we note that “dominate Canada’s power growth” does not here mean dominate growth in power generation but merely absorb most of the investment. So money is going to pipe dreams not proven systems.

As when, the Globe & Mail tells us:

“Northland Power Inc., one of Canada’s leading renewable energy operators, shocked investors with a 40-per-cent dividend cut, sending the company’s shares plunging 27 per cent and wiping out virtually all market gains this year…. two offshore wind developments – Baltic Power in Poland and Hai Long in Taiwan – are still sucking up capital. So far, Northland Power has spent $12-billion on them, and another $5-billion in gross capital expenditures are expected.”

But fear not. The Canadian Energy Regulator assures us that:

“Another important trend is the growing number of renewable power projects owned by, or developed in partnership with, Indigenous Peoples.”

So wrong technology right race. And guess which matters more to a mere energy regulator? And it also burbles “Canada remains a world leader in renewable power”.

Phew. Except it immediately adds “generating almost two-thirds of its electricity from renewables with hydro as the dominant source.” So calling both “renewables” in the hope of making wind sound as reliable as Niagara Falls is bad analysis.

Looks like winter is going to be a problem intellectually as well as meteorologically.