Renewable Energy & Technologies Of The Future

[SVT450R]

Greener Storage for Green Energy http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/11/121129103414.htm

Article on the research and development of new flow battery's to aid in more efficient storage of renewable energy for the grid.

[SVT450R]

Carbon Sponge Could Soak Up Coal Emissions

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130212100602.htm

[Jonger]

Carbon Sponge Could Soak Up Coal Emissions

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130212100602.htm

Sequestration is our biggest hope right now. James Hanson is a big proponent of bio char.

[SVT450R]

Sequestration is our biggest hope right now. James Hanson is a big proponent of bio char.

A positive in the united states atleast is that coal energy  and petroleum energy consumption is on the decline the past 4-5 years.

[blizzard1024]

Just saw this...

While I'm skeptical about the "quality" of the wind on Mt. Tom at all, this project was nixed for an entirely different reason:

FAA determined that a turbine here would disturb air traffic at Bradley and Westover.

 

While I have taken a break from posting a forums lately due to extreme workload at my real job

I had to chime in here. I absolutely HATE wind farms. They are ruining what little is left of the pristine 

"wilderness" in many of the Appalachians around here. They make roads, cut thousands of trees down,

flatten mountaintops and worst of all they DO chop up migrating birds...especially raptors. Given

the Appalachian Mountain chain is a major raptor migratory route this is especially unsettling.

And the "environmentalists" are all for wind energy despite destruction of the local environments

around here.  

[Jonger]

Just saw this...

While I'm skeptical about the "quality" of the wind on Mt. Tom at all, this project was nixed for an entirely different reason:

FAA determined that a turbine here would disturb air traffic at Bradley and Westover.

 

While I have taken a break from posting a forums lately due to extreme workload at my real job

I had to chime in here. I absolutely HATE wind farms. They are ruining what little is left of the pristine 

"wilderness" in many of the Appalachians around here. They make roads, cut thousands of trees down,

flatten mountaintops and worst of all they DO chop up migrating birds...especially raptors. Given

the Appalachian Mountain chain is a major raptor migratory route this is especially unsettling.

And the "environmentalists" are all for wind energy despite destruction of the local environments

around here.  

I wonder what kind of net/cage could enclose future windmills. Pound for pound, wind is the best thing going... Would be a shame to scuttle it over birds.

[PottercountyWXobserver]

 

I can't wait for this to be completed 2019!!

 

 

 

Waa waa hate to look at them waa waa. If that is the worst you can do for a proponet against wind turbines, I think we are doing just fine. The birds will live, only the dumb ones will run into them anyways.  I think wind turbines are actually aethestically pleasing, especially those with a nice paint job of stripes and whatnot. As for csnavy, fusion is the future, it will be our biggest energy producer after 2050. Especially with ITER, the technology is improving.

 

http://www.iter.org/

 

 

 

I hate it when people poo poo the renewable energy sources just because they don't have such a great output in energy than fossil fuels.

The amount of solar energy reaching the atmosphere of the planet is so vast that in one year it is about twice as much as will ever be obtained from all of the Earth's non-renewable resources of coal, oil, natural gas, and mined uranium combined. Something like 170PW reach the Earth's atmosphere which is enough power to generate enough electricity for the whole planet for 8 years in just one day! The potential of solar is incredibly large and promising.

[skierinvermont]

Better get used to wind. There was more MW of wind power installed in the last 5 years than any other kind of power in the U.S. It is economical, renewable, and it is the energy of the future. 

 

Plus air pollution, resource depletion and AGW are all bigger issues than bird populations. I would support not siting them in sensitive areas. 

[SVT450R]

While I have taken a break from posting a forums lately due to extreme workload at my real job

I had to chime in here. I absolutely HATE wind farms. They are ruining what little is left of the pristine 

"wilderness" in many of the Appalachians around here. They make roads, cut thousands of trees down,

flatten mountaintops and worst of all they DO chop up migrating birds...especially raptors. Given

the Appalachian Mountain chain is a major raptor migratory route this is especially unsettling.

And the "environmentalists" are all for wind energy despite destruction of the local environments

around here.  

 Reminds me of this article i came across a few days ago that everything isn't always peachy but in the end it's for the better.

Solar industry grapples with hazardous wastes

http://news.yahoo.com/solar-industry-grapples-hazardous-wastes-184714679.html

[skierinvermont]

Also I have to say I hiked the entire Appalachian trail this summer from Georgia to Maine and I saw many raptors and other birds but no wind farms. They would have made for a pleasant change in scenery. 

 

 

You know what really ruined the wilderness along the way (there isn't any real wilderness.. even the "100 mile wilderness" in Maine is not wilderness).

 

 

1. HAZE (Seriously **** HAZE)

 

2. Logging

 

3. Suburbinization, sprawl and urbanization

 

4. Interstates

 

5. Noise pollution (see #3 and 4)

 

6. Light pollution

 

 

If we keep up we'll be like most of Europe in 50 years. No even remotely "wild" areas. Just small isolated patches of managed nature with limited biodiversity and which cost quite a bit to visit. A solid chunk of hikers were Europeans, mostly Germans, who came to America because Europe doesn't have anything like the AT.

 

EDIT: come to think of it I did see a few small wind farms in Maine. 

[Jonger]

Also I have to say I hiked the entire Appalachian trail this summer from Georgia to Maine and I saw many raptors and other birds but no wind farms. They would have made for a pleasant change in scenery.

You know what really ruined the wilderness along the way (there isn't any real wilderness.. even the "100 mile wilderness" in Maine is not wilderness).

1. HAZE (Seriously **** HAZE)

2. Logging

3. Suburbinization, sprawl and urbanization

4. Interstates

5. Noise pollution (see #3 and 4)

6. Light pollution

If we keep up we'll be like most of Europe in 50 years. No even remotely "wild" areas. Just small isolated patches of managed nature with limited biodiversity and which cost quite a bit to visit. A solid chunk of hikers were Europeans, mostly Germans, who came to America because Europe doesn't have anything like the AT.

EDIT: come to think of it I did see a few small wind farms in Maine.

Thankfully the building boom is over in most of the country, I'm not sure about your location, but I rarely see any new structures built locally.

Germany and much of Europe have a much different settlement pattern.... Very few people live outside towns and villages in Europe... Unlike here, we have tons of people living on dirt roads and 2 lane highways. Europe is much more efficient at populating.

[salbers]

I'm still following the LENR/LANR developments as a potential commercial energy source:

http://www.e-catworld.com/

[FPizz]

Also I have to say I hiked the entire Appalachian trail this summer from Georgia to Maine and I saw many raptors and other birds but no wind farms. They would have made for a pleasant change in scenery.

You know what really ruined the wilderness along the way (there isn't any real wilderness.. even the "100 mile wilderness" in Maine is not wilderness).

1. HAZE (Seriously **** HAZE)

2. Logging

3. Suburbinization, sprawl and urbanization

4. Interstates

5. Noise pollution (see #3 and 4)

6. Light pollution

If we keep up we'll be like most of Europe in 50 years. No even remotely "wild" areas. Just small isolated patches of managed nature with limited biodiversity and which cost quite a bit to visit. A solid chunk of hikers were Europeans, mostly Germans, who came to America because Europe doesn't have anything like the AT.

EDIT: come to think of it I did see a few small wind farms in Maine.

He is right, there are lots of winds farms up and down the chain. Do a search and see for yourself, or maybe hike without looking at the ground.

[SVT450R]

Wind turbines atleast to me is more pleasing to look at then giant cell towers or large electrical  transmission lines and that you know it's for a good cause but thats just me.

[Jonger]

Wind turbines atleast to me is more pleasing to look at then giant cell towers or large electrical  transmission lines and that you know it's for a good cause but thats just me.

 

I don't have any within 50 miles of where I live, but they are awesome if you ask me.

[FloridaJohn]

While I have taken a break from posting a forums lately due to extreme workload at my real job

I had to chime in here. I absolutely HATE wind farms. They are ruining what little is left of the pristine 

"wilderness" in many of the Appalachians around here. They make roads, cut thousands of trees down,

flatten mountaintops and worst of all they DO chop up migrating birds...especially raptors. Given

the Appalachian Mountain chain is a major raptor migratory route this is especially unsettling.

And the "environmentalists" are all for wind energy despite destruction of the local environments

around here.  

If I were to guess, I would say that coal mining has done more environmental damage than all the wind farms combined.

[tamarack]

Also I have to say I hiked the entire Appalachian trail this summer from Georgia to Maine and I saw many raptors and other birds but no wind farms. They would have made for a pleasant change in scenery. 

 

 

You know what really ruined the wilderness along the way (there isn't any real wilderness.. even the "100 mile wilderness" in Maine is not wilderness).

 

 

1. HAZE (Seriously **** HAZE)

 

2. Logging

 

3. Suburbinization, sprawl and urbanization

 

4. Interstates

 

5. Noise pollution (see #3 and 4)

 

6. Light pollution

 

 

If we keep up we'll be like most of Europe in 50 years. No even remotely "wild" areas. Just small isolated patches of managed nature with limited biodiversity and which cost quite a bit to visit. A solid chunk of hikers were Europeans, mostly Germans, who came to America because Europe doesn't have anything like the AT.

 

EDIT: come to think of it I did see a few small wind farms in Maine. 

 

One can see the Kibby turbines froim Crocker and Bigelow, but they are at a distance that makes them look like toys.  Probably can see the Roxbury complex from Elephant, also.

 

Question:  Is "logging" your #2 wilderness-ruiner due to sight of heavy cuts, machinery noise, logging roads, all of the above?  Maine's 100-mile wilderness runs through commercial forest land except for the trail corridor, so is crossed with relative frequency by logging roads.  It's "wilderness" mainly in the sense of trail logistics - no convenient resupply facilities.  There's a professional interest in these questions, as our agency manages the public lands surrounding about 25% of Maine's AT mileage, most actively involved with the trail at Bigelow, and it's always useful to hear from AT users, especially thru-hikers.

[skierinvermont]

He is right, there are lots of winds farms up and down the chain. Do a search and see for yourself, or maybe hike without looking at the ground.

 

Yeah I spent 5 months looking at the ground.

 

I don't doubt there are some small wind farms here and there, possibly some away from the trail where I didn't see them. But nearly every day I would get at least one good 180+ degree view and most days several views where you would be able to see 10, 20+ miles in all directions. And I didn't see any wind farms outside of Maine. Maine had 4 or 5 on distant ridgelines. 

 

The Appalachians have hardly been "ruined" by windfarms. I spent 5 months going over every bump, hill, mountain and viewpoint and didn't see a single one outside of Maine. What has ruined the Appalachians is HAZE, ACID RAIN (several once common tree species killed off), NOISE, LIGHT, and population and road encroachment. 

[PhillipS]

While I have taken a break from posting a forums lately due to extreme workload at my real job

I had to chime in here. I absolutely HATE wind farms. They are ruining what little is left of the pristine

"wilderness" in many of the Appalachians around here. They make roads, cut thousands of trees down,

flatten mountaintops and worst of all they DO chop up migrating birds...especially raptors. Given

the Appalachian Mountain chain is a major raptor migratory route this is especially unsettling.

And the "environmentalists" are all for wind energy despite destruction of the local environments

around here.

Wow! What a steaming pile of misinformation! Let's check your assertions to the facts.

Ruining pristine wilderness - The definition of "pristine" is untouched or unsullied so that by definition rules out cities, towns and agricultural areas. It also rules out all forests other than old-growth forests because second-growth, third growth, and so on, forests are no more pristine than a city park. So how much old-growth forest is left in the Eastern US? Of the 360,432,000 acres of forest in the Eastern US, only 49,000 acres (0.014%) are at least 200 years old. By comparison 347,972,921 acres (96.5%) are less than a century old. [source] Just because some trees are older than you doesn't make them 'pristine wilderness'.

Make roads - true to some extent, but since wind farms in the Eastern US are, as far as I've been able to determine, on private land what is your objection to landowners building roads on their own property? Now, it is likely that the Federal government will open public lands in the East to wind farm development but the first such lease I found reference to in in Wyoming. In any event, the total miles of roads built for wind farms is a small percentage of the taxpayer funded fire roads, logging roads, and mining roads. Wind farms build roads only for installation and maintenance of the turbines, and are an expense wind farms minimize.

Cut thousands of trees down - I don't know where you dreamed this up. Each wind turbine has a small footprint for its base pad and sometimes an ancillary equipment shed. For comparison, the footprint for a wind turbine is much smaller than the footprint for a natural gas drilling and fracking site. Here is a picture of a typical wind farm in a forested area:

Flatten mountaintops - are you serious?! Coal mining is the energy industry engaging in mountaintop removal, not wind farms. If you disagree, then please provide a list of mountaintops that have been removed for wind farms.

Kill birds, including raptors - here you almost have a point. Wind turbines do kill a large number of birds, according to a 2012 article in Nature [source] wind farms kill an estimated 100,000 to 440,000 birds annually in the US. That sounds like a terrible carnage until it is put into context with other anthropogenic causes of avian deaths:

Wind turbines 100,000 to 440,000

Strikes to building glass and lighted buildings 100,000 to 1,000,000,000

Powerline electrocutions and collisions 200,000 to 175,000,000

Communication towers 5,000,000 to 6,800,000

Automobiles 60,000,000 to 80,000,000

Agricultural pesticides 67,000,000 to 90,000,000

Cats, domestic and feral 365,000,000 to 1,000,000,000

Clearly there is a lot of uncertainty in those estimates, but the reality is that cats kill more birds each day than all of the wind farms do in a year. So which makes more sense to be concerned about?

[skierinvermont]

One can see the Kibby turbines froim Crocker and Bigelow, but they are at a distance that makes them look like toys.  Probably can see the Roxbury complex from Elephant, also.

 

Question:  Is "logging" your #2 wilderness-ruiner due to sight of heavy cuts, machinery noise, logging roads, all of the above?  Maine's 100-mile wilderness runs through commercial forest land except for the trail corridor, so is crossed with relative frequency by logging roads.  It's "wilderness" mainly in the sense of trail logistics - no convenient resupply facilities.  There's a professional interest in these questions, as our agency manages the public lands surrounding about 25% of Maine's AT mileage, most actively involved with the trail at Bigelow, and it's always useful to hear from AT users, especially thru-hikers.

 

 

Actually come to think of it acid rain and invasive species would probably be #2 and #3, logging #4. In the south the mountaintops all had half-dead forests which were supposedly killed off by the heavy acid rain/mist/fog that occurs at high elevation. I imagine the north's ecosystems have been severely altered as well but it's not as noticeable as half-dead standing forests. And then seeing a lot of the biodiversity in some areas overrun by invasives I think is a major issue. I'm far from a plant expert but I know a lot of the common invasives and they are just everywhere. 

 

 

Logging was a "wilderness" ruiner in my opinion for several reasons. Machinery noise and walking through heavy cuts were not that big of an issue. You never walk through cuts because of the AT corridor  Occasionally I heard machinery but don't remember if this was in Maine specifically. Machinery, roads, and heavy cuts were noticeable on a hike I did up by Eustis in the late fall of 2011. Crossing roads doesn't bother me too much unless they are causing major erosion or runoff. It's just like "oh there's a road" and then you don't see or think about it again.

 

Just knowing that 99% of what surrounds the trail is not old growth or native forest assemblages bothers me. The patchwork of newer and older forest you often see when looking down from ridges or mountains was a constant reminder of the active logging and that these are not remotely close to native plant or animal assemblages.

 

Also the "100 mile wilderness" isn't even wilderness in the sense of logistics. You can pay to have supplies dropped off at one or two points. You can even pay to be picked up and brought back to a hostel in Monson (thereby "slack-packing" certain sections of the 100 miles which I thought was really missing the point of that section of trail but to each their own I guess). There's also an AT hut a few miles off trail after Chairback Mtn. And then there's the hostel on the lake around mile 70. I think it would be good if some areas were kept more remote and wild so that further encroachment doesn't occur. It didn't bug me that some hikers used these services, but I think it would be good if we had areas that are semi-wild or as wild as possible for people who want to find that in New England. When I did the 100-mile wilderness in 2006 when I was 17, I definitely was looking for a wilderness experience and at that age it definitely was wild. Now it doesn't seem so wild, but I wasn't really expecting or looking for that either.

 

 

I guess none of this really bothered me too much. I didn't really hike the AT for a "wilderness" experience. I hiked it for the trail experience, challenge and scenery (even if the scenery isn't truly wild). If I had hiked it with that intent, it would have bothered me a lot more. I'm pretty used to the fact that eastern forests are logged regularly and we've pretty much obliterated the native forest assemblages. There's probably not much hope of reversing this destruction of wilderness but I am all for protecting the true wilderness we have left (State and National Parks, other untouched areas of the west and Alaska). 

[blizzard1024]

Wow! What a steaming pile of misinformation! Let's check your assertions to the facts.

Ruining pristine wilderness - The definition of "pristine" is untouched or unsullied so that by definition rules out cities, towns and agricultural areas. It also rules out all forests other than old-growth forests because second-growth, third growth, and so on, forests are no more pristine than a city park. So how much old-growth forest is left in the Eastern US? Of the 360,432,000 acres of forest in the Eastern US, only 49,000 acres (0.014%) are at least 200 years old. By comparison 347,972,921 acres (96.5%) are less than a century old. [source] Just because some trees are older than you doesn't make them 'pristine wilderness'.

Make roads - true to some extent, but since wind farms in the Eastern US are, as far as I've been able to determine, on private land what is your objection to landowners building roads on their own property? Now, it is likely that the Federal government will open public lands in the East to wind farm development but the first such lease I found reference to in in Wyoming. In any event, the total miles of roads built for wind farms is a small percentage of the taxpayer funded fire roads, logging roads, and mining roads. Wind farms build roads only for installation and maintenance of the turbines, and are an expense wind farms minimize.

Cut thousands of trees down - I don't know where you dreamed this up. Each wind turbine has a small footprint for its base pad and sometimes an ancillary equipment shed. For comparison, the footprint for a wind turbine is much smaller than the footprint for a natural gas drilling and fracking site. Here is a picture of a typical wind farm in a forested area:

Flatten mountaintops - are you serious?! Coal mining is the energy industry engaging in mountaintop removal, not wind farms. If you disagree, then please provide a list of mountaintops that have been removed for wind farms.

Kill birds, including raptors - here you almost have a point. Wind turbines do kill a large number of birds, according to a 2012 article in Nature [source] wind farms kill an estimated 100,000 to 440,000 birds annually in the US. That sounds like a terrible carnage until it is put into context with other anthropogenic causes of avian deaths:

Wind turbines 100,000 to 440,000

Strikes to building glass and lighted buildings 100,000 to 1,000,000,000

Powerline electrocutions and collisions 200,000 to 175,000,000

Communication towers 5,000,000 to 6,800,000

Automobiles 60,000,000 to 80,000,000

Agricultural pesticides 67,000,000 to 90,000,000

Cats, domestic and feral 365,000,000 to 1,000,000,000

Clearly there is a lot of uncertainty in those estimates, but the reality is that cats kill more birds each day than all of the wind farms do in a year. So which makes more sense to be concerned about?

Its amazing there are any birds left. You are correct. if people just kept their cats inside a huge source of mortality is eliminates. Plus indoor cats have much longer life spans. 

But people just don't care. 

[blizzard1024]

Its amazing there are any birds left. You are correct. if people just kept their cats inside a huge source of mortality is eliminates. Plus indoor cats have much longer life spans. 

But people just don't care. 

Just like people really don't care about ruining the planet with pesticides and pollution and deforestation, draining swamps etc. Plus invasive

species...hemlock wooley adelgid is wiping out pristine hemlock forests, emerald ash borer is decimating ash trees which make up a large

percent of many forests in NY, we already lost most of the gorgeous american elms that lined our streets in cities and towns and the american

chestnut which was a very important tree for wildlife. Sugar Maples are in decline. Out west there is a large scale loss of pines to the extreme.

There isn't going to be much left I fear in 50 years. There are many more pressing environmental problems than just global warming. 

 

But a solid source of energy that does less harm to the environment would be a great start and is very important to the survival of humanity. 

We need energy to maintain our living standard. Are people willing to lower living standards for the above causes, especially if you believe

that AGW is causing some of the above?  I doubt it unfortunately. Humans are short sighted. 

[skierinvermont]

Since wind is approximately as economical as coal and nat gas, it really doesn't require much if any reduction in standard of living (even without factoring the massive economic costs avoided by AGW mitigation) to make modest emission reductions. Large reductions would incur some standard of living reduction, but so does doing nothing. Which is why cost benefit analyses consistently find it is most economical to mitigate AGW. 

[PhillipS]

To expand on a point I made earlier on the comparative footprints of wind energy and natural gas production - according to NREL the typical large wind turbine has a footprint of 0.25 acres.  By comparison, a natural gas drilling and fracking site requires an industrial pad of 5 to 15 acres. [source].  Typically natural gas wells are spaced on 40 acre parcels (16 wells per square mile).  Here is a picture of a natural gas field in the Rockies:

 

 

In my opinion, that wilderness is no longer very pristine.  It's truly ugly in fact.  And keep in mind that each natural gas well requires millions of gallons of fresh water to frack, and in turn generates millions of gallons of contaminated water containing a brew of toxic compounds.  Guess who will be paying for the cleanup and remediation of these thousands of natural gas sites?  We will!  Either the companies will pass the expense to us consumers as higher prices, or the government will reach into the taxpayers pockets to subsidize the cleanup. Either way we pay.  As the writer Robert Heinlein said: TANSTAAFL - there ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

[tamarack]

"The definition of "pristine" is untouched or unsullied so that by definition rules out cities, towns and agricultural areas. It also rules out all forests other than old-growth forests because second-growth, third growth, and so on, forests are no more pristine than a city park."

 

Have to challenge the boldfaced part.  It's certainly correct that true old growth is very scarce.  However, "like a city park" is ludicrously exaggerated.  Maine's forests are just as berift of old growth as elsewhere as most have seen multiple harvests.  However, Maine tops the lower 48 in numbetrs of moose, Canada lynx, fisher, and pine marten, critters not so common in a typical city park (though moose occasionally wander into downtown PWM.)   A challenge:  walk a mle through city parks, then try a similar walk off-trail in northern Maine, maybe on Deboullie Township or at Bigelow.  I suspect the two experiences will be different. 

 

Skier:  Thanks for the comprehensive reply.

[blizzard1024]

To expand on a point I made earlier on the comparative footprints of wind energy and natural gas production - according to NREL the typical large wind turbine has a footprint of 0.25 acres.  By comparison, a natural gas drilling and fracking site requires an industrial pad of 5 to 15 acres. [source].  Typically natural gas wells are spaced on 40 acre parcels (16 wells per square mile).  Here is a picture of a natural gas field in the Rockies:

 

 

In my opinion, that wilderness is no longer very pristine.  It's truly ugly in fact.  And keep in mind that each natural gas well requires millions of gallons of fresh water to frack, and in turn generates millions of gallons of contaminated water containing a brew of toxic compounds.  Guess who will be paying for the cleanup and remediation of these thousands of natural gas sites?  We will!  Either the companies will pass the expense to us consumers as higher prices, or the government will reach into the taxpayers pockets to subsidize the cleanup. Either way we pay.  As the writer Robert Heinlein said: TANSTAAFL - there ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

UGH. I sure hope NY and PA don't become like this someday. just awful. 

[salbers]

The light pollution from North Dakota drilling at night is now visible from space. A real assault on a formerly pristine environment.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/krulwich/2013/01/16/169511949/a-mysterious-patch-of-light-shows-up-in-the-north-dakota-dark

[Jonger]

The light pollution from North Dakota drilling at night is now visible from space. A real assault on a formerly pristine environment.

 

That's gas flaring, the red tape and headaches surrounding a new pipeline makes it more cost effective to just flare off excess gas.

[skierinvermont]

That's gas flaring, the red tape and headaches surrounding a new pipeline makes it more cost effective to just flare off excess gas.

 

 

Source?

 

 

My vague recollection of the oil and gas industry is that it has more to do with it simply not being economical to gather the gas given the quantities produced by each well and the low price globally. Flaring has been a common practice for a long-time in many oil producing countries IIRC. Lack of economics is what the article suggests as well, nothing to do with red tape. So where are you getting this from? Or is this more of an ideologically driven assumption?

[Mallow]

Source?

 

 

My vague recollection of the oil and gas industry is that it has more to do with it simply not being economical to gather the gas given the quantities produced by each well and the low price globally. Flaring has been a common practice for a long-time in many oil producing countries IIRC. Lack of economics is what the article suggests as well, nothing to do with red tape. So where are you getting this from? Or is this more of an ideologically driven assumption?

 

No, you're right.

 

Actually, it's the lack of "red tape" that's allowing the companies to do this. Normally there are restrictions on what percentage of the Natural Gas they can legally flare off. But since ND has had its big oil boom, those restrictions have been "temporarily" laxed to allow most of it to be flared off (supposedly to keep the oil companies profitable, but really just to make things more convenient for them). The problem is that they keep extending these relaxed restrictions, seemingly indefinitely. So, all that NG goes to waste (and pollutes the air with no real benefit except for the convenience of the oil industry).