If you flip a coin, it comes up heads half the time. But if you give Donald Trump a chance, he can be wrong about energy every single time.
“It’s so expensive,” Trump said. “And honestly, it’s not working so good. I know a lot about solar. I love solar. But the payback is what, 18 years? Oh great, let me do it. Eighteen years.”
Donald Trump knows a lot about solar. Apparently like he knows about Russia not invading the Ukraine.
In fact, the cost of solar has declined 70 percent since 2008, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association, and the return on investment for a homeowner in California, say, is nine years. In New Jersey, it is seven years.
Solar can be installed in small, incremental units that pay back in a handful of years. A coal power plant requires more than a billion dollar investment, needs extensive supporting architecture, and has a payback period of at least 20 years.
But Trump didn’t stop with being wrong about solar. He also talked about wind, where he also found plenty of things to be wrong about.
“The wind kills all your birds. All your birds, killed. You know, the environmentalists never talk about that,” Trump said.
Just to be sure, let’s peek out the window … yup, birds still there. Trump’s statement not only exaggerates the death of birds from windmills, it also belittles the amount of study and discussion that’s been centered on this issue.
In fact, environmentalists often talk about wind turbine’s impact on birds, but many believe the relatively small number of bird deaths is worth transitioning to a clean energy economy.
Wind turbines kill far fewer birds than do tall buildings, though it seems unlikely that Trump will mention this fact.