Remember; we should view bio fuels as the back-up for wind and solar energy, not as the primary source.

Keep in mind, as you read the older post below, that biofuels, particularly cellulosic ethanol and butanol are best used as the back-up, rather than the primary source of electrical energy for small communities. This is especially true in sunny areas and windy areas where an abundance of those ever-renewable resources is available. The less we depend on actual feed grains for fuel, the less deleterious influence it has on grain prices.

This plan is essentially a 5-legged structure; 1. Wind as primary power, 2. Solar as Peak Power, 3. Biofuel and 4. Grid as backup, and 5. Biomass gasification to fuel the biofuel production process and if there is a surplus, supplemental electricity generators.

As for Solar and Wind Power as primary sources, there is no longer any question these unlimited and infinitely renewable energy resources will prove to be the two pillars of our eventual national and personal energy independence.

Wind has inherent doldrum issues, while solar collection is limited to daylight hours. The best use of these is to produce a marketable surplus during peak periods, with systems all designed to produce sufficient energy under AVERAGE conditions. With the help of state and federal regulation, small communities should get the benefit of selling their surplus to the grid, and receiving it back during those rare times when the local loop is not producing enough energy for it's own needs.

Whatever trade-off this might require, it is really a win-win-win situation. Even the utility companies benefit, from the opportunity to sell energy produced at no real expense, just whatever price they can negotiate with those communities. And the communities get the benefit of a market for their surplus energy AND a 5th layer of back-up, represented by the "the grid" that they normally are feeding their surplus into.

The idea is, if enough communities nationwide adopt this form of community energy production, they can literally replace, with their growing surplus, a lot of future coal plants, especially in places like Kansas. The benefits this kind of program would offer to small-town USA are incalculable. When they realize they can lower their rates for their own residents, and local taxes in the process, they will all be ready to start building their own local loop systems.

The Local Loop, as far as Kansas and most of the midwest goes, is a three-part process, with Wind Energy as the primary source, Solar Energy as the peak source, and Biofuels as the back-up source.

Here's a map of Kansas, showing the high-wind areas.

These numbers have been revised recently, there's much more wind power available than they previously have disclosed to the public.

Here's an excerpt taken from a recent Wichita Eagle article about wind power.

"Kansas is now No. 2 for wind potential, according to data released Friday by the Department of Energy.

The new study vaulted Kansas and Texas — the new No. 1 — past former wind-potential leader North Dakota, which fell all the way to No. 6 on the new list.

Montana, Nebraska and South Dakota round out the new top five.

The numbers show that Kansas has the potential to generate 3.6 million gigawatt hours of electricity from wind — roughly equivalent to 10 times the power consumed by the state of California in a year.

Kansas' wind potential was upgraded from earlier estimates of 1 million gigawatt hours."

There is no longer any doubt Kansas communities can harvest this natural resource, as I describe in the Local Loop process below. And that is why it is the primary resource on this list.

But let's not forget the abundant sunshine available in Kansas, too.

THE FIGURES ABOVE INDICATE THE AVERAGE (OVER THE COURSE OF THE YEAR) AMOUNT OF INSOLATION (FULL SUN HOURS) FOR THESE ZONES.

In this plan, solar does it's best work right at the same time it is most required. By using Solar energy as the peak-energy booster supplement, air conditioning and heating peak demands are completely offset.

Using deep-cycle batteries, even night-time heating can be accomplished with stored solar power, via low-wattage floor-heating systems.

Even those batteries are unnecessary when the third leg of the energy loop is added.

By locally producing biofuels for use in generators that serve as the low-wind, night-time back-up system home heating is available at any hour. And when the wind blows at night, the back-up systems and battery storage would remain available, but unused, so biofuels would not be required as a primary or peak source, only as the backup system.

The excess fuel resulting from an extended windy spell and/or bright sunlight periods could potentially be sold to the open market, after first providing greener transportation fuel to schools, city and county vehicles.

As I state later in the blog, this loop gets it's fourth leg from local waste, turning sewage and sweepings and biomass into methane gas to heat the biofuel refining process. By creating this energy with local resources, the loop is closed and self-perpetuating, and that loop opens only on occasion, to re-purchase power back from the grid whenever the local loop is short.

Multiply this plan by the number of communities under 10,000 in Kansas, and across the country, and the total energy production potential is simply astounding.