 it s not easy being green  the following are excepts from an article from the cato institute that originally appeared at forbescom by by jerry taylor and peter van doren on march 29 2011 for the full article click on the following story link  the green energy economy reconsidered  green energy such as wind solar and biomass presently constitute only 36 of fuel used to generate electricity in the us the cost of converting to the new green energy is estimated to be in the trillions let s assume however that we could afford that first green energy is diffuse and it takes a tremendous amount of land and material to harness even a little bit of energy second it is extremely costly onshore wind the least expensive of these green energies will be 80 more expensive than combined cycle gasfired electricity third it is unreliable the wind doesn t always blow and the sun doesn t always shine when the energy is needed fourth it is scarce while wind and sunlight are obviously not scarce the real estate where those energies are reliably continuous and in economic proximity to ratepayers is scarce finally once the electricity is produced by the sun or wind it cannot be stored because battery technology is not currently up to the task hence we must immediately use it or lose it  if green energy is so inevitable and such a great investment why do we need to subsidize it if and when renewable energy makes economic sense profithungry investors will build all that we need for us without government needing to lift a finger but if it doesn t make economic sense all of the subsidies in the world won t change that fact  161  not easy being green  