On January 16th, 2017 China’s National Energy Administration (NEA) officially released its solar photovoltaic (PV) installation figures for the entire year 2016, Asia Europe Clean Energy (Solar) Advisory Co. Ltd. (AECEA) reports.
Accordingly, by the end of 2016 the total grid-connected solar PV installations reached 77.42 GW – up 34.24 GW YoY.
China’s National Energy Administration (NEA) has released PV installation figures for 2016, reporting that a stunning 34.2 GW of solar was connected to the grid over the full year.
This is substantially more than analysts had predicted. Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) had earlier estimated that 26-27 GW of new solar would be installed, however BNEF Head of Solar Analysis Jenny Chase notes that there was likely a rush by developers spurred by the nation’s system of annual province-level quotas.
“We think what they have been doing is building so that they are first in line for the 2017 quota,” Chase told pv magazine. She notes that the 34 GW figure may also include a significant portion of PV installed in 2015 and only connected to the grid in 2016.
If this 34 GW figure is accurate that would mean that, for the calendar year 2016, China connected more solar power to their grid than the cumulative amount any single country had installed up to the end of 2015, with the exception of Germany!
According to the report, solar industry employment jumped by over 73,000 jobs or 25% in 2016. Of the 1.9 million workers in electric power generation and fuels, 800,000 employees contribute to the production of low-carbon electricity, including renewable energy, nuclear energy and low emission natural gas.
“This report verifies the dynamic role that our energy technologies and infrastructure play in a 21st century economy,” said DOE Senior Advisor on Industrial and Economic Policy David Foster.
“Whether producing natural gas or solar power at increasingly lower prices or reducing our consumption of energy through smart grids and fuel efficient vehicles, energy innovation is proving itself as the important driver of economic growth in America, producing 14% of the new jobs in 2016.”
We need over 300 GW installed per year because everybody knows that a gigawatt a day keeps ole King Coal away.
We are at 64 GW installed per year now and estimated to be 100 GW by 2020. It will have risen by 10 times in 10 years.
An underestimate, I suspect. The growth rate has been about 40% per year. If we’re at 64 GW in 2016, we will probably be at 125 GW per year by 2018.
The End of the Energiewende?
“The prominent German economist Heiner Flassbeck has challenged fundamental assumptions of the Energiewende at his blog site makroskop.eu. According to Flassbeck, the former Director of Macroeconomics and Development at the UNCTAD in Geneva and a former State Secretary of Finance, a recent period of extremely low solar and wind power generation shows that Germany will never be able to rely on renewable energy, regardless of how much new capacity will be built.
– This winter could go down in history as the event that proved the German energy transition to be unsubstantiated and incapable of becoming a success story.
Electricity from wind and solar generation has been catastrophically low for several weeks. December brought new declines. A persistent winter high-pressure system with dense fog throughout Central Europe has been sufficient to unmask the fairy tale of a successful energy transition, even for me as a lay person. This is a setback, because many people had placed high hopes in the Energiewende. I likewise never expected to see large-scale solar arrays and wind turbines, including those offshore, motionless for days on end. The data compiled by Agora Energiewende on the individual types of electricity generation have recorded the appalling results for sun and wind at the beginning of December and from the 12th to 14th: Of power demand totaling 69.0 gigawatts (GW) at 3 pm on the 12th, for instance, just 0.7 GW was provided by solar energy, 1.0 by onshore wind power and 0.4 offshore. At noontime on the 14th of December, 70 GW were consumed, with 4 GW solar, 1 GW onshore and somewhat over 0.3 offshore wind. The Agora graphs make apparent that such wide-ranging doldrums may persist for several days. You do not need to be a technician, an energy expert, or a scientist to perceive the underlying futility of this basic situation.”
Shortly after that graph ends the wind came up and provided about one third the power generated for several days. Since none of the other sources of power can run the grid alone, why is the bar set so high for solar and wind, when there is not even enough installed to peak at 100 percent, let alone power the country?
The heavily biased articles about wind and solar not working when the system has not even been set up so they can function and there are not enough installed to provide even 50 percent at peak power. Conventional power is overbuilt by more than two times. One can see that even at peak they provide only about 1/3 of the power. Once the power systems have been designed for renewables and there are enough installed, a few days of low wind will not mean much.
Also note that they were exporting power throughout December. https://www.energy-charts.de/power.htm
Use the “all sources” button to get a true picture of what exists now.
sufficient to unmask the fairy tale of a successful energy transition, even for me as a lay person
“Even for me as a lay person?” What a clear statement that he’s not competent in the field of energy analysis!
In fact, anybody who’s experienced in grid management and planning for renewables knows that a 5 day period of relatively low output is something that needs to be planned for. And…it’s no big deal. As mentioned above, there are a wide range of solutions, including overbuilding, Demand Side Management, long distance transmission, low cost seasonal storage, etc.
I’m a firm advocate of using as much renewable energy as possible, but I refuse to get all giddy and religious about it, like people jonesing on going to Heaven.
A due consideration of practical problems and some common sense are ALWAYS appropriate tools when discussing major changes in policy and technology.
Sometimes we take our enthusiasm to extremes that provide anti renewable folks with plenty of ammunition to make renewables look BAD to people who are only marginally interested in environmental issues.
Joe Sixpack and his wife Susy Sixpack don’t know much about renewables, and don’t care to learn, and the only point they are seriously concerned about TODAY is whether their electric bill will go up or down NOW when renewables are added to THEIR grid.
It’s ok to talk about renewable electricity being cheaper than coal or gas or nukes in a forum such as this one, where virtually the entire audience is savvy to the real score. Such statements are true in context, but context is absolutely critical to understanding what is meant.
Sure a big new wind farm can generate electricity for less than a new coal plant. But the fact remains that for NOW , the coal plant is still ABSOLUTELY necessary and it will continue to be necessary for quite some time.
Cheap storage for times when the wind doesn’t blow, and the sun doesn’t penetrate the clouds DOES NOT EXIST, for all intents and purposes, except on paper and in our minds. Talking as if it does, it does, in a forum where Joe and Suzy are apt to look in once in a while is a MAJOR mistake.
Saying that renewable energy can carry the fossil fuel load NOW is an equally serious mistake because renewables CAN’T carry the load,except in a very few places, because not enough wind and solar farms have been built , and won’t be, for another decade or longer. And even then, we will still be COMPELLED to maintain a substantial portion of our old sunk investment in fossil fuel generating plants, or build some new nukes, because we don’t have any technology YET that is economical enough to scale it up adequately to do the storage job.
Pumped storage would work, but there aren’t too many sites that are physically suitable where pumped storage can be built, and hardly any sites at all that are both physically and politically workable.
Now it might be possible to overbuild to the extent necessary, and deploy super duper batteries on the grand scale, and build hvdc transmission lines all over the place, like highways. I hope we can overbuild to that extent, and that super duper batteries get so cheap everybody can afford one that will run his home for a week. I’m all for building the long distance transmission lines too.
But REALITY has a way of butting into plans drawn up on such grand scale. Times are already hard for over half of the people here in the USA, and we’re one of the wealthiest countries in the world, per capita, excluding the oil patch countries and a very few small countries.
The public may go along, and the public may not.
Every body I know is more interested in having plenty to eat, and a decent place to live, etc, this week, than in what may or may not happen a decade or two or three down the road.
It’s FINE to get giddy here in this forum. It’s fun. Hardly anybody from the other side ever drops in here, and when they do, they hardly ever stick around for more than a day or two.
But we need to be careful in other forums, because if we say some of the things we say here, THERE, we will be making fools of ourselves, because there are PLENTY of anti renewable folks out there who will use our words to make us look like idiots to Joe and Suzy.
And like it or lump it, Joe and Suzy are the ultimate decision makers, when it comes to whether it’s POLICY to subsidize and otherwise encourage the growth of the renewable energy industries.
It is NOT good to paint a bright and sunny picture of renewable energy in the mind of a typical man on the street by talking about things that are not yet possible and things that don’t yet exist.
When he finds out there ain’t no Santa Claus, HERE AND NOW, he’s going to be pissed.
I’m sure everybody here is acquainted with the law of diminishing returns. The return on building the last ten or twenty percent of renewables, and or storage enough to get by without that last ten or twenty percent will probably be two or three times the cost of keeping enough of the best and newest fossil fuel plants on standby so as to keep the lights on a few days a year.
The savings thus realized can be directed to projects that generate more REAL benefits than the REAL expenses ( pollution primarily) incurred by burning fossil fuels a few days a year.
Somewhere down the road, a good long way down the road, we might actually be able to go one hundred percent renewable.
I’m apparently the only regular in this forum who REALLY understands the mind of the common people of this country, because I’m apparently the only one that grew up among them, and still RESPECTS them, and still LIVES among them, day in and day out. It bears mentioning that I also spent ten or fifteen years, in total, in professional jobs, living in an apartment or house in the university district of a fair sized city, spending almost all my time with young professional adults or graduate students. So I’ve been there and done that too.
I know where of I speak, when it comes to getting this kind of people on board with renewable energy.
Right now I am totally whipped because I’m an old fart, and I’ve been getting up firewood off and on all day. But a little food and a nap will put me right again, and I’ll come back and post some stuff that WORKS when you are talking to working people.Stuff that turns them ON, without turning them OFF.
Hi Old Farmer Mac,
Nobody is saying that moving to 100% renewable can be done overnight, only that a gradual transition to more renewable power is possible.
If we just enforce pollution regulations in the Clean Air Act, most coal fired power plants would no longer be profitable and would shut down. It is already the case that in many places wind and solar are cheaper than new coal or natural gas power plants so the fossil fuel plants will gradually be shut down and more and more wind and solar facilities will be built as they become cheaper over time. At some point even already built natural gas power plants will be too expensive to use as back up and building excess wind and solar capacity will be the cheaper solution. This is likely to be true in less than 35 years.
Hi Dennis,
“Nobody is saying that moving to 100% renewable can be done overnight, only that a gradual transition to more renewable power is possible.”
Of course nobody here is saying that, and nobody who is knowledgeable is saying it elsewhere.
I am NOT disagreeing with you at all about what you say in your second paragraph, but allow me to pull out one or two lines of it.
” It is already the case that in many places wind and solar are cheaper than new coal or natural gas power plants. ”
I’m fairly sure you read enough political news, and listen to enough political debates to understand just how easy it is to use that statement, out of context, to make renewable energy look bad, and there are LOTS of people out there who WANT to. A lot of them get paid to do so.
All they have to do to make you look like a liar or a fool is to ask one simple question. ” Which country is it that gets all it’s electricity from wind and solar, having done away with coal and gas ?”
The rhetorical answer is that there isn’t any such country, of course, because it’s just not POSSIBLE ( for now,between us ) to do away with our RELIABLE coal and gas fired electricity. And we still have to pay for the plants, and run them only part time, instead of full time, making it harder to recover the investment and turn a profit.That means we will have to pay more, for less juice from our existing coal and gas plants.
Believe me, Joe Sixpack will take you for the fool anyplace outside a technically sophisticated forum if you say things like that, without adding the qualifiers,. Believe me, I spend some time in non technical political forums.
Somebody once upon a time famously said that nobody ever went broke over estimating the ignorance or stupidity of the public.
If you wish, I will hunt up a few links and post them to illustrate what I’m trying to get across.
Just yesterday somebody talked about using cheap storage that DOES NOT EXIST. How much hay do you think a skillful Koch brothers PR guy can make out of that remark, by taking it out of context?
There’s at least one way to make it harder to twist words in favor of renewables into pretzels, and that’s to compose comments and lead articles including the needed qualifiers.
It’s better to acknowledge right up front what the problems are, and that it will take a while to solve them.
People are sick and tired of being SOLD STUFF these days. They don’t want to hear it anymore. Most of what I see on the net in favor of renewable energy consists of sound bites as one sided as automobile advertisements.
Hey Mac, I found the following PDF, produced by the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems, earlier this morning while doing some research for info to put in a comment to an article at one of my local newspaper web sites. It’s really current, having been last updated January 9, 2017 and contains tons of info and analysis at over 80 pages:
I read your links, and will be making use of the data in them.
I appreciate the link, but my point remains, and that point is this. Germany for now, and for a long time to come, will NECESSARILY have to burn some coal and gas to back up wind and solar power, and making statements that say otherwise, in forums populated by the general public, is a FOOLISH thing to do.
The anti renewable guys jump on that sort of statement like a duck on a june bug, and make renewables advocates look like idiots and charlatans.
THE ATTENTION SPAN OF THE PUBLIC IS PATHETICALLY SHORT.
Joe and Suzy aren’t focused on the details, and aren’t going to spend more than a minute or two making up their minds.
They aren’t going to read Nick G’s technically correct responses, even if he posts them in such a forum. They will look at a chart such as the one Javier posted a few days back, showing that consumers pay more for electricity in Germany than in the USA, and BOOM, touchdown for the opposition, GAME OVER , as far as what Joe and Suzy think.
I find it incomprehensible that the regulars here in this forum don’t seem to be able to grasp such an obvious and simple truth.
THERE ARE WAYS to support renewables that WORK , ways to be literally honest, without any weasel like cherry picking such as using the words “not yet needed” to cover up for making earlier utterly stupid remarks in favor of renewables.
Focus your remarks in favor of renewables on what renewables do for us NOW, in terms of the day to day lives of people, especially working people, and you will have far greater success.
Renewables now, TODAY, not twenty or thirty years from now, mean your utility has to buy LESS coal and gas, meaning as the price of coal and gas inevitably eventually go up, your electriticy will go up LESS.
Renewables mean local investments, local tax collections, local jobs.
Renewables mean greater local control.
Renewables mean that the chance of your country having to go to war are less, and the chances of being harmed by an embargo on energy exports by a country that is a historical or potential enemy are less.
Renewables mean cleaner air, and better public health , and lower health care costs.
NOW. TODAY.
Don’t bullshit Joe and Suzy by telling them something that is essentially a lie, if you leave out the qualifier, YET or for now and for some time to come.
You are sticking your chin out for a roundhouse knock out by the opposition.
MY point, expressed differently, is that the issue is one that is fought with sound bites, and that the attention span of the public is measured in seconds.
Nobody is going to come back and read Nick’s half lame explanations after the fact, except in an enthusiasts’ forum such as this one.
Germany for now, and for a long time to come, will NECESSARILY have to burn some coal and gas to back up wind and solar power
Nobody has disagreed with that! Let me say that again:
No one has disagreed with that.
Nick’s half lame explanations after the fact
Read my other comment, that I just posted.
Hi Old Farmer Mac,
I would point to power purchase agreements (PPA) signed in places like Iowa and Arizona for very low prices to back up the fact that there are places where renewable energy is very inexpensive.
Fossil fuel prices are likely to increase in the future which will make fossil fuel powered electricity more expensive and the cost of wind and solar will continue to fall so that non-fossil fuel powered electricity will fall in price over time.
Just because no nation uses 100% renewable power now, does not mean it is not possible. Peak fossil fuels will change the energy mix over the next 35 years as the relative prices of different types of energy changes.
It will be a simple choice, expensive fossil fuel energy or cheaper wind and solar, my guess is that people will choose the cheaper option.
Pardon my language Dennis,
But dagnabit it I ‘ m talking about winning and losing the debate WITH THE PUBLIC, not with the very minor fraction of the public that is technically sophisticated enough to really understand the issue, and interested enough to spend at least a few evenings reading up on the subject.
Remember Javier posting a graph a few days back showing that German consumers pay more for electricity than Yankees?,
While you are saying renewable electricity is as cheap, you cannot post a graph showing that it is cheaper in any country that has gone heavily for wind and solar power.
And Joe and Suzy aren’t much interested in spending any more time than it takes to look at Javier’s graph ,and to see that you haven’t posted one showing contrary results.
We live in a world where we are stressed out, tired, worried, suspicious, even paranoid. And we are VERY prone to making snap judgements.
You can make Javier look bad in this forum, because your reply to me is technically accurate, but YOU FAILED to mention that in order to use wind and solar power, we must also pay for fossil fuel power as well.
In the public arena, at most websites, or at a political rally, Javier would win hands down.
I hope everybody sees what I am trying to get at.
Here’s another example. I mentioned special lube a while back talking about disruption and buying parts on the internet. That lube is made especially for particular applications requiring that formula, and nothing else. Put the wrong stuff in a machine, and you can ruin it in a matter of minutes. ,
My little lap doggie HB jumped on it to make a nasty remark implying I’m a child molester, and worse, that I molest children who are close relatives.
Now I am perfectly sure that although hardly anybody except HB is replying to my comments about Clinton, they are provoking a LOT of thought.
The moral is that it pays to be cautious about what you say, because it is VERY easy, especially for people on the other side to twist your words into pretzels, if they have had plenty of practice .
This is all I am trying to get across, but it’s important, in other forums.
It doesn’t matter here, because the audience is knowledgeable and sticks around and thus is capable of separating the facts from the propaganda.
in order to use wind and solar power, we must also pay for fossil fuel power as well.
Not really. That cheap underground storage does exist, right now. It’s in use. Of course, it hasn’t been built up yet for grid backup because it hasn’t been needed. The engineering exists right now. Just not the scale.
Also, Demand Side Management works well, and has been in use for decades. When 25% of the grid’s output goes to power EVs, it won’t be hard to use dynamic price sensitive EV charging to buffer a great deal of grid variation. EVs and dynamic charging are here right now – they just haven’t been scaled up yet.
It’s not really necessary to keep coal plants around just because they’re not amortized yet – the same is true for coal mining companies that are going bankrupt. They couldn’t compete with natural gas, so they went bankrupt. That’s the way it works – if something can’t compete, it goes under. And, keeping coal plants for use as peaker plants is a good idea for a while, but not that long: they cost a significant amount to keep in operation, and eventually they’ll need major investments to keep running, like a transmission in a car. Cheap NG, H2 or NH3 peaker plants will likely make more sense.
Heck, Mac, I’m not sure what you’re worrying about – we’re writing for this forum, not others.
I understand your concern: messaging, PR, management of perceptions are all very important. But…it’s more important to get your basic facts right first, then we can worry about our public persuasion skills.
High Nick,
It’s my OPINION that I have my factual ducks in a hell of a lot straighter row than you do, most of the time.
You just stuck your foot in your mouth, saying we DON’T have to pay for fossil fuel generation to use renewables because it ‘s not necessary YET.
Well, HELP ME get my facts straight, so I won’t make the mistake again, and excluding some tiny little country such as Norway, TELL me WHICH COUNTRY IT IS that is using wind and solar power TODAY without fossil fuel back up.
Not NEXT year, or twenty years down the road.
TODAY.
To the best of my knowledge, there ISN’T any such country.
YET is a weasel word in this context.
I’m dead sure there won’t BE any country larger than a postage stamp than won’t HAVE to use fossil fuel to back up renewable electricity for at least another decade and probably for closer to two decades.
My whole POINT is about talking to the public, and you post a condescending remark indicating I need to get MY facts straight?
I suggest you need to work on your reading comprehension skills, and maybe get down off your high horse once in a while. 😉
Mac,
Here’s a general thought: if you avoid letting things get personal, you’ll be a lot happier, and the discussion will be a lot more informative. I think there have been very few people on this forum attacking you personally, or attacking rural or southern folk in general. Even when that does happen (or it seems like it’s happening), you should probably ignore it, or try to respond quietly to figure out exactly what they’re saying and why they’re saying it. In any case…the time you spend defending yourself and your neighbors is…energy spent in the wrong direction.
Specifically: I wasn’t attacking you with this comment. I was simply saying that we should argue about the facts first, and come to general agreement on them first, before we spend a lot of time arguing about perceptions. It wasn’t meant AT ALL to disrespect you.
—————————————————–
Okay, back to our program, already in progress:
saying we DON’T have to pay for fossil fuel generation to use renewables because it ‘s not necessary YET.
I’m not sure exactly what you mean, but I’m pretty sure that’s not what *I* meant.
What I meant was that large scale energy storage for *seasonal* backup (e.g., underground H2 storage) isn’t needed yet, because traditional tactics (use of other sources like coal, NG, nuclear), forecasting, DSM, etc is entirely adequate.
So….nobody has underground storage of H2 or NH3, because…it’s not needed yet. That’s all.
“I’m dead sure there won’t BE any country larger than a postage stamp than won’t HAVE to use fossil fuel to back up renewable electricity for at least another decade and probably for closer to two decades. ”
I’m dead sure you’re wrong and I’ve probably already got more money on that bet than you have on the other side of the bet.
We don’t “HAVE to” use fossil fuels for electricity generaion as of right this minute. It’s a choice made because we have a lot of fully depreciated coal & NG plants, and coal and NG are still quite cheap. The moment the price signals cross — and they’re crossing as we speak — they get replaced.
Seriously, MidAmerican Energy is already targeting 100% renewables. They expect to be at 85% from already-contracted construction. They’ll figure out how to deal with the last 15% next; they’ll probably put up some more wind farms, a few solar farms, and buy some batteries.
They’re keeping customer rates the same, by the way.
They’ll be well set up.
OldMacDonald,
Your little lap doggie seems to be a rottweiler on top of you with it’s jaws locked around your neck and hungry. You might want to pet your little doggie nicely on the top of the head. While you still can.
I thought you just didn’t have a sense of humor, but now I realize you didn’t get the joke. That “child molester” crap is all in your mind. I never said that or implied. Go back and reread the comment.
And my last thought for now, HRC is history. I could care less about all the crap you write about her and I don’t even read it. What I don’t understand is why you care who the Democratd vote for? You state your an Independent and write like a Republican, so again. Why do you care? Oh, please do us all a favor and keep it under 140 characters.
01/06/2017 AT 12:00 AM
“and a quart of special lube”
For your 13 year old nephew, right ? It must be pretty special, you mentioned it twice.
That’s your comment, copied.
When you make a remark of this nature, it’s pretty much up to the target of it to decide what is meant. I leave it to the reader to make up his own mind.
This remark made in the company of men just about anywhere MEN congregate is provocative enough that either the maker, or the target, will shortly be in need of medical attention, depending on who is the tougher guy.
I’ve been to the hospital on three or four occasions needing medical attention, but then so did the other guy. He needed MORE in every case.
It’s been a while for me, but I’m as the song goes , as good once as I ever was,because I get out and get some REAL exercise almost every single day. I expect it would be about as easy to make you pee your pants and whimper an apology by just by shaking hands with you , and BEARING DOWN, as it is to make a fool out of you debating politics.
As you said someplace else, don’t take it personally, I’m just saying. 😉
You see, except that you never see, I grew up in a place and at a time when a man could never show his face again in public if he didn’t kick your ass, or at least get hurt trying, for making such a remark.
You are safe enough on your porch, of course, because this is the internet, rather than a bar.
You have played into right into my hands, but you’re too stupid to know when to shut up and quit digging your hole deeper than ever.
The more you insult me, the more likely it is that readers will consider my arguments, which is what the game is all about, for me.
This one remark is enough to make it clear to any perceptive person who reads it that you have it in for me , personally, and in context, this indicates you have nothing with which to refute my arguments, except nasty insults.
Thanks again. 😉
You’re finally right about ONE thing, HRC is history now.
I have done more in the last year to save the country from Trumpster types that you will ever do in your entire LIFE, because I have convinced at least a few Democrats, here and there, to work for a candidate NEXT time that is not at high risk of losing due to a smelly personal and professional record going back for decades.
So what are you saying ? The “special lube” is for you big guy ? I tried to give you an opportunity to save face. But I guess that went right over your head too. I think you would be better off not sharing your personal life on an energy blog. Maybe a little more time on a dating websites might help. Good luck.
I didn’t bring up your need for lube, you did(twice). I suggest you google shop “special lube” and see what “pops up”. Don’t blame your problems on me.
Now let’s hear your Trump alternative facts
I know most people don’t spend any time studying any topic, and therefore have foolish and stupid ideas. But who cares?
So what if the majority of ignorant Americans think that solar and wind can’t provide cheap electricity, when in fact they actually can? The ignorant lose out, the smart get richer. The best sort of capitalism.
The fact that most people are ignorant is, fundamentally, how I make money in the investment markets. I know more than they do, so I make money off of them.
There are, admittedly issues where the only way to solve the problem is through coordinated public action, i.e. campaigning and government. On those issues, it’s important to campaign to people in the right way.
Energy is simply not one of them. Renewable energy is winning. Even direct government subsidies won’t be able to prop up fossil fuels much longer. Attempts to ban, fine, or tax electric cars or solar panels are *super* unpopular.
At this point, with renewable energy, I figure it’s time to simply make a lot of money by making the right moves, and watch people who don’t make the right moves get poorer and poorer. Eventually they’ll admit that you made the right moves, and then you can be gracious about it.
There’s very little purpose now in trying to convince anyone except your friends, though I will explain what’s going on to anyone who asks, and I routinely tell people that it would be a big financial mistake to buy a new gasoline car now.
It’s unfortunate that China is beating the pants of the US when it comes to renewable energy, but it’s actually too late to reverse that (waaaay too late, we should have acted in 1980 and our last chance was 2000). It’s time to relax, watch the New Chinese Century unfold, and do our best to personally profit.
Hi Dennis, a late Happy New Year!
I still don’t quite understand those power purchase agreements that offer 2-3 cents/kwh for wind/solar
Using relatively reliable EIA data and making assumptions about reasonable rate of return, I still don’t see wind/solar being cheaper than gas in the US. In China, solar is still more expensive than coal. These are the two largest economies in the world, one high income, one middle income.
The EIA data is for national average. But their state by state cost estimates do not show that much difference from the national average.
One possibility is that for some reason, those solar investors do not need to demand normal rate of return. Say, if they only need to have depreciation covered, that would of course the price a lot. Subsidy is another matter. But basically one really needs to know (1) detailed terms of power purchase agreement; (2) actual investment cost of wind/solar (some time ago, I also read reports about very cheap solar power in UAE but the actual investment cost turned out to be high); (3) on the ground capacity utilization rates (not theoretical, hypothetical projections) to have real sense about how exactly those agreements work
About 100% renewable energy, before we can talk about that, we need to have 100% renewable electric power first. I think last month Euan Mearns’s website had several posts about difficulties in having 100% renewable electricity in some Pacific islands
Hi MacBoris
“Joe Sixpack and his wife Susy Sixpack don’t know much about renewables, and don’t care to learn”
“But we need to be careful in other forums, because if we say some of the things we say here, THERE, we will be making fools of ourselves, because there are PLENTY of anti renewable folks out there who will use our words to make us look like idiots to Joe and Suzy.”
So if I understand this correctly, I need to careful because a couple of drunks who are to lazy to educate themselves might think PeakOilBarrel posters are fools.
Only in the back woods of Virginia could this make any sense
Hi HB,
Up until now, I have refrained from getting dirty the way you have, making a pervert joke, and repeating it.
But from here on out, until either one or the other of or both of us get kicked out of the forum,I’m going to just use some ordinary every day backwoods language.
Your “couple of drunks” number somewhere up around a couple of hundred million, and there would be more, but that’s a very rough estimate of the number of people of voting age.
Maybe five to ten percent of the people in this country actually know enough about renewable energy to understand the pros and cons.
You’re too stupid to even comprehend you’re stupid.
You’re so stupid that you cannot comprehend that the VAST MAJORITY of the people in this country don’t put an hour a YEAR into the study of renewable energy.
You’re so stupid you would need an hour to find your own ass with both hands, and my middle finger is in your face.
But please keep it coming, because it will remind me to post more stuff about how arrogance,stupidity and machine politics cost the Democratic Party the White House for the next four years.
You will never get it, but there ARE some people in this forum who do, and there are more who WILL, and next time they will be better motivated to make sure the D’s run a candidate without a mile long baggage train and polling numbers that were the worst in party history from the beginning.
Idiots like you always blame anything that goes wrong on somebody else.
Adults understand that they cannot control what other people think and believe, or how they will vote, but that they DO HAVE the power to change the way THEY do things, so as to get better results.
Hopefully next time around the D’s will have sense enough to nominate a candidate with sense enough to campaign at least a few days on the traditional home turf of the Democratic Party.
I intend to remind them, from time to time, and I’m counting on YOU to remind me. 😉
“Sometimes we take our enthusiasm to extremes that provide anti renewable folks with plenty of ammunition to make renewables look BAD to people who are only marginally interested in environmental issues. ”
For the German Energiewende all the physical basics have been discussed in depth around 2010, see the 400 page report of the expert group for environment of the German parliament.
In the last 6 years at least three different large studies/simulations covered the issues of a 100% RE scenario in Germany, in a national and EU context. (Fraunhofer)
WTF is Flassbeck and Javier not able to argue with correct data and come with non issues? Stupid propaganda.
BTW: The current political program is only for 90% RE until 2050, the 10% fossil allow a cheap solution for a period of 10 days without sun and wind. 🙂
It’s funny how people go all Soviet 5 Year Plan when they start talking about renewables. All this talk about what WE NEED.
The reason renewables are winning in the market is that they are popular, cheap, agile (extremely fast to implement on large and small scales) and they cost zero at the margin. The lsat point means they stay online as long as prices stay at or above zero.
Furthermore, the fact that renewables are intermittent may be unpleasant for the five year plan, but it actually helps renewables by disrupting the traditional utility business model, which relies on inflexible cheap power supplies.
Cheap storage already exists. It really doesn’t cost much to put in 5 days of storage for Germany. Actually, someone should figure out how much storage capacity the hydro dams *already have*.
“The prominent German economist Heiner Flassbeck ”
Then why does he has have problems to understand the issue? It has been described in depth many years ago:
It is clear from weather data that Germany has on avaerage 15 days without sun and wind per year (“Dunkelflaute”) and 8 of these days can occur sequently.
This means we have to provide around 60 GW non-wind and non-PVcapacity and have to store 15*1.7 TWh energy. There are some possible solutions – published for years.
Javier works with a strawman again.
Theoretical solutions as they have not been implemented. Right now unless you are willing to shut down a major part of the electrical supply for several days, you have to be able to completely substitute renewable production by other sources. And it is very expensive to have that capacity all the time when it is needed only ~15 days per year. That is possibly one of the factors why countries with a lot of renewables have a more expensive electricity.
Theoretical solutions as they have not been implemented
Of course – they’re not needed yet.
it is very expensive to have that capacity all the time when it is needed only
No. It can be very cheap. Again, very cheap Demand Side Management is widely used right now; cheap underground storage is widely used right now, and cheap peaker generators are widely used right now.
countries with a lot of renewables have a more expensive electricity.
No, they tend to have higher priced residential electricity. Those prices include a lot of things besides the actual current cost of power generation.
Look at actual generation costs; look at industrial whole sale prices; include the value of domestic production (for instance, Germany could import cheaper Moroccan power, but do you blame them for not doing so??).
Cheap underground storage of electricity does not even EXIST except maybe in comic books.
Fossil fuels, namely gas is stored underground, in quite a few places, but the number of suitable places is extremely limited, in relation to the number of places that are needed to store gas that can be produced during off peak seasons and saved for times of high demand, typically saving up in warmer months and drawing down in colder months.
A relatively tiny amount of oil is stored underground, but most of it so stored is in strategic reserves, to the best of my knowledge, and not used to balance seasonal demand surges.
Such statements make renewable energy advocates look like fools in the hands of skillful Koch brothers type operatives.
Now my ENTIRE argument in making all these comments is ABOUT winning the debate in terms of public opinion. It’s NOT about the technical details.
The fight will be won or lost by whoever comes up with the best sound bites, as far as short term to medium term support of renewables is concerned, when dealing with the man on the street.
Cheap underground storage of electricity does not even EXIST except maybe in comic books.
Storage of electricity in general doesn’t exist. Pumped storage means storage of water. Batteries means storage of chemical energy.
Now, cheap underground storage of hydrogen exists. Cheap storage of CH4 and NH3 exist.
Fossil fuels, namely gas is stored underground, in quite a few places, but the number of suitable places is extremely limited
What makes you think that?? I’m really puzzled: that’s exactly what’s done in massive quantities with natural gas (CH4).
And, why define CH4 as fossil fuel? It can be synthesized just like H2. It’s a bit more expensive, but it’s more convenient in some ways, which is why Germany is focusing on it for the short term.
A relatively tiny amount of oil is stored underground
720M barrels isn’t tiny. It would be enough to power the grid for about 6 weeks, if we desired. That kind of storage is what this whole discussion is about.
Again, there are a lot of ways to synthesize molecules that can store energy: H2, CH4, NH3, synthetic diesel, etc., etc.
Some are easier, more convenient and or cheaper, but they’d all work. And there are very cheap ways to store them. Heck, the liquids could be stored pretty cheaply in aboveground tanks, if desired. That’s not the best solution, but it would work. Just compare the cost per kWh-equivalent of big metal tanks vs batteries or pumped storage: there’s no comparison.
The bottom line: this whole thing is silly. Javier’s objection is a theoretical idea about a problem that might arise in the relatively far future, and it’s entirely unrealistic.
Now…if you can figure out a way to answer Javier’s claim in a nice sound bite, that would be very, very nice.
I agree: it’s a very good idea to figure out how to answer stuff like that.
It doesn’t matter Javier. Renewables are trashing the oil industry by sucking all the profits out of it.
Cranky old engineers like you can grumble all they want, but it’s a rearguard action.
The idea that there is no technical solution to intermittency is about as curmudgeonly as it gets. And you get your cost estimates for solar from where the sun don’t shine.
It would have been interesting if the guy in the link below were around to give his perspective. As the chief architect of The Renewable Energy Sources Act of 2000 and strident proponent of the Energiewende he surely would have had something to say. There must have been a huge sigh of relief when he died suddenly from a “heart failure” back in October 2010! He was a major annoyance and impediment to the interest of some very wealthy and powerful vested interests, a wild duck or loose canon depending on your perspective! I admired his indefatigable, can do, attitude.
Thanks Islandboy, I found a longer more thorough talk by Dr. Scheer to be highly informative. He was a brilliant man.
In 2007 he said he had no doubt that the electric powered car would be the only real choice. The electric power must be produced by renewables. Even the hydrogen powered car produces problems in cities by producing too much humidity.
He also states that the real working time of an ICE engine is about 4000 hours while the electric motor can have a working time of up to 100,000 hours.
I have spent hours watching his videos and would like to point out that, rather than saying that he is supporting conspiracy theories about resistance from legacy industries involved in the extraction and consumption of FF, I would say he is putting forward ideas that are really just common sense.
It is difficult to imagine how the legacy fuel extraction and electricity generation industries could create monopoly industries with renewables in the way that they exercise control over mineral rights and electricity grids with central generating plants. It is similar to how the internet and digital technology have disrupted the content creation, publication and distribution businesses. Legacy industries do not “get it” or they do not have a place in the new paradigm, so they obstruct it as much as they can. It’s plain common sense and he used to say it all the time.
Confirmed: 2016 the Warmest Year in History of Global Recordkeeping
WASHINGTON (AP) — Earth sizzled to a third-straight record hot year in 2016, government scientists said Wednesday. They mostly blame man-made global warming with help from a natural El Nino, which has since disappeared.
Measuring global temperatures in slightly different ways, NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that last year passed 2015 as the hottest year on record.
NOAA calculated that the average 2016 global temperature was 58.69 degrees (14.84 degrees Celsius) — beating the previous year by 0.07 degrees (0.04 Celsius).
NASA’s figures, which include more of the Arctic, are higher at 0.22 degrees (0.12 Celsius) warmer than 2015. The Arctic “was enormously warm, like totally off the charts compared to everything else,” said Gavin Schmidt, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies in New York, where the space agency monitors global temperatures.
Records go back to 1880. This is the fifth time in a dozen years that the globe has set a new annual heat record. Records have been set in 2016, 2015, 2014, 2010 and 2005.
The World Meteorological Organization and other international weather monitoring groups agreed that 2016 was a record, with the international weather agency chief Petteri Taalas saying “temperatures only tell part of the story” of extreme warming.
These damned, alarmist, money grubbing, scientists, trying to justify taking away our freedom to live as we like! Haven’t they got the memo? President Obama is out come Friday and the new administration knows better than to listen to silly alarmists. In the face of all the threats to eliminate their funding from the president elect and the GOP, they must be either extremely brave or extremely desperate to hang on to the billions of dollars of profits they have been making from their activities!
Wait! Hold on! That’s another set of guys! Cue Javier……….
edit: Note to Gavin Schmidt, your pink slip is in the mail. Hope you have another job lined up!
Obviously a commie plot to destroy capitalism, create a one world government, and worst of all, raise taxes!
Worldwide climate has always been in constant state of change, and always will be. The only question then is why almost the entire political left thinks we need to go back into the Stone Ages in response, and deprave ourselves of all the things that make modern life comfortable.
You have to admit also that it just can’t be coincidental how the people showing the biggest concern over climate change are the same people desiring to crash the American free market capitalist economy in order to make way for a Big Government central planned economy. Because if that’s just coincidence, it’s a remarkable one isn’t it?
Well, of course, none of that is true.
The real question is: is this from Fox News, talk radio, or online sources like Breitbart or Drudge?
Just what is the source of this misinformation?
I inform myself through many sources of information from both sides of politics. Which includes Fox, Drudge, Newsmax, Huff Post, Daily Kos, Infowars, Facebook, and such.
Lol infowars and Facebook! Please share with us your analysis of the pizzagate scandal. Pure comedy gold. Both sides of politics? There’s only two? Oh boy, ‘Merika’s got problems.
Survey: Fox Was Dominant News Source for Trump Voters
Fox News Channel was the main source of news for 40% of the voters who put Donald Trump into the White House, while Hillary Clinton’s supporters got their news from a number of outlets, with none of those getting more than 20%.
The full Trump voter breakdown was FNC, 40%; CNN, 8%; Facebook, 7%; NBC, 6%; Local TV, 5%; ABC, 3%; CBS, 3%; and local radio, 3%.
The full Clinton voter breakdown was CNN, 18%; MSNBC, 9%; Facebook, 8%; local TV news, 8%; NPR, 7%; ABC, 6%; The New York Times, 5%; CBS, 5%; NBC, 4%; local newspapers, 4%; and FNC, 3%.
Facebook was the 3rd most popular news outlet for both groups of voters.
All brought to you with the kind sponsorship of Koch Industries in association with Exxon Mobil!
What I really enjoyed about The Oil Drum was the wealth and variety of actual expertise in the predominant participants and the Fireside Chats they would lead in explaining the details of an aspect of their specialty. The seminars by Heading Out on the technical details of how underground coal-mining is done comes to mind.
But like TOD, respect for actual expertise has taken a major hit, compliments of Twitter, FB, 24-hour news, and the shared narcissistic Lake-Wobegon belief that we are “above-average” in our knowledge of any subject of the day.
Even in the sciences business want jack-of-all trades scientists. Specialists are getting rare in some areas.
It’s possible to be a bit of a jack-of-all-trades expert in multiple areas (if you’re really smart), and it can actually be more productive than hyperspecialists (who can miss things which are right under their noses because the key was from the specialty next door).
What’s unproductive is people who think they know a lot about a specialty and are actually utterly *totally* wrong.
HVACMan — this is why Dennis & Ron need to ban Javier.
I would like to have a place where there is some expertise, and Javier’s constant lies and cherrypicking is deeply unhelpful.
My areas of expertise are a little random and mostly have to do with investing. If Javier has any expertise in anything, he has not shown it in the last two years.
It really doesn’t matter what you think, the biophysical reality of the Planet has the last say.
(when you realize this, you will probably be screaming in a fetal position)
Most folks figure out there’s a problem on the horizon once it starts kicking them in the face. Crisis cults serve up illusions of recovered grandeur and empowerment during times of collapse, anxiety and disempowerment. Trump promises a magical return to a mythologized past. Make America great again. Indeed. I suggest Trump hasn’t gone for many strolls through Walmarts. He flies private jet from gated community to gated community. Other than the odd WWE appearance he hadn’t spent much time pressing the flesh with the average American. Anybody who wants to run for President should first be required to take a Grey Hound bus milk run from coast to coast.
Earth was created to sustain mankind. I don’t spend any of my time worrying about nonsense. More people would be better off doing the same.
Earth was created to sustain mankind.
SUSTAIN?!
LOL! LOL! Bwahahahahahah!!!! ROFLMAO!!!
This is one of those ‘the earth is 5000 years old’ types.
#Adam&Eve#PizzaGate#JesusFreak
It is a little scary when one says that God comes first in life and they say they listen to God, then do what they are told.
Do they hear voices or do they just make it up in their heads?
Fishin’
You might have asked that question without really expecting a serious answer, maybe even believing it to be so ridiculous as to not need an answer. However, since I have near nothing to contribute here on the scientific front, and have gained so much from the contributions of the rest of you, I’ll offer my thoughts on one subject that, sad to say, I wasted so much of the first 50 years of my life.
I was raised by a set of parents whose hard work, sincerity, and love of what they thought was “right” is unquestioned in my mind. Fine folks, could be trusted with your paycheck or anything else. Also, they were not well-educated, though reasonably intelligent, and were raised as they raised me and my siblings. Raised in a fundamentalist, poor-folk Holiness church in north Alabama. Yep, I was raised a holy-roller, and followed their teachings as best I could till it finally didn’t work anymore, at about 50 years of age. Then I decided to try to educate myself on the subject of religion as best I could, an now here I am, an atheist thru and thru. Holy-roller to atheist, now that’s what I call progress!
Sorry to be so wordy, but that background is necessary to let you know where I’m coming from. Now, to your question:
I’ve known, and still know people who are as honest and sincere as anybody anywhere, who sometimes say “the Lord told me to …….”. I believe it’s as simple as them having a thought run through their mind, especially when they are in a contemplative mood, and then honestly attributing that thought to the voice of their Lord. I don’t believe the vast majority of them actually hear voices as those people who we understand to be mentally ill do. Do I believe any holy spirit actually speaks to them? NO. NEVER. When I was a part of the church, I was as sincere and honest as any, respected as such by those who knew me, and never tried to fake anything resembling spiritual connections. If it wasn’t real, I didn’t see any need for it. I believed then, as I do now, that anything real can speak for itself, and will bear questioning. Guess that was why it finally all came unglued for me.
So, I think lots of religious people really think they follow the “voice” of their god, or his “spirit”. Probably the majority of the time it’s harmless. Well maybe not completely harmless. My family and most of the friends I had no longer have anything to do with me, since they believe I’m on my way to hell, with no chance of changing course. I realize that’s not consistent with most Christian teachings, but, as I said, I was raised in a more backwoods church than most. And they’ve got bible, chapter and verse to support their view, same as everybody else does.
Now, having said all that, I believe that some folks, get a bit too much power over others, and maybe get to hearing voices a bit too easily. Such as, “god told me to raise 6 millions dollars to build…..” Hellfire, you teach that you want to go to heaven, this looks like a guaranteed shortcut, why don’t you take it?
Ah, I’d better not get started preaching. I see we now have a new prez, and I think I’ll go outside and see if it’s getting great yet.
Later all
Stanley, what part of North Alabama are you from. I lived about half my life in Huntsville but I was born and raised on a cotton farm in Hazel Green. That is about 15 miles north of Huntsville and about 3 miles south of the Tennessee border.
I too was raised in a fundamentalist family, but not quite Holy Rollers. My dad was a deacon in the Primitive Baptist Church. I was never baptized. Even as a teenager I had my doubts. But I did not become an atheist until my early 20s.
Actually I am only an atheist as far as the biblical god is concerned. I am rather agnostic, or leaning toward a believer as far as “something else” is concerned.
But I have battled religion all my adult life. It is bullshit from top to bottom.
But… I will leave it there.
Thanks for sharing Stanley, as good of an explanation as any I have heard. You are right about the ostracism, if you are not part of the pack then they shut the doors. At least quite a number of them. The holier than thou act wears very thin once you find out what they really are like.
Ron,
I was raised in the Big Cove community, just a few miles south of Huntsville, and have family and friends in the Hazel Green area also.
I learned from here that you were living in Huntsville just before you moved south, but didn’t mention it to you because I knew you had plenty on your plate at the time, and as I was unknown to anyone here, didn’t feel it appropriate to try and contact you at the time.
As a matter of fact, now that I’m thinking about it, my Dad bought about 5 acres, and built the house I was raised in, from a Mr. Wilburn Patterson, about 1951 or’52. Pretty sure Dad paid it off, so I guess I don’t have to dodge you on that account. My sister and her family live there now, so take it up with her if it’s not paid and there’s any connection. LOL
Since I was raised as a holy-roller, and the kind with the narrowest, strictest view I’ve encountered anywhere, I have a hard time trying to back up far enough to realize that lots of believers don’t necessarily associate “God” with the vengeful, murderous one that I always feared would send me to an everlasting, burning hell. However, I’m at least bright enough to understand that I don’t have all the answers, hell I don’t even have any answers really, but if someone tells me they have the answers, they had better be ready for some pretty stiff questions. I’ve found that most Christians are a bit like I was for a long time, and never even read their own book close enough to see the contradictions in it. And that includes lots of their preachers as well.
Anyway, thanks again for the time and work you’ve put into this blog, as it’s given me lots of reading material, written by folks with lots of useful knowledge.
And thanks to Dennis Coyne for adding his part to keep it going.
Later
Stan
Hmmm,
I kind of thought that we are graciously allowed to live here for our brief time, and that with luck, we may sustain ourselves with hard work and some correct decisions.
regarding the statement: “Earth was created to sustain mankind. I don’t spend any of my time worrying about nonsense. More people would be better off doing the same.”
Talk about entitlements!!!!!
My Dad used to say that if things are a little bit better for you having lived, then your life has been a success. He didn’t ever mention we could take all we want and that it was our right to do so; and “damn the hindmost.” I must of missed that talk.
Who raised you, Peggy, wolves?
That crack about wolves was very undeserved.
Hi Gonefishing,
I agree, wolves are very good stewards of the environment relative to humans.
A truly extreme understatement if I ever heard one. Just about everything alive is a far better steward of the natural world than humans, In fact, overall humans are a major destructive force in nature, THE major destructive force now.
Wolves have a workable niche in the environment as well as preserve riverine ecology as shown by the Yellowstone studies.
Humans probably were a positive influence at one time, but that extra brain growth sent them on a delusional and destructive journey that has not ended yet.
It’s been a long arms race between ourselves and between nature and ourselves. Nature is the loser so far, but nature bats last.
Well, we shouldn’t be so hard on humans.
Wolves, and other similar wild creatures, aren’t stewards at all. They don’t worry about conserving deer populations for the next year or generation: they just eat what they need. Their existence may generally be beneficial for an ecosystem, but that’s not the same thing: given an opportunity to go into overshoot by the right circumstances, they’ll go for it.
Humans may not be great about stewardship, but we’re better than most creatures. For example, a report just came out that was discussed in the last non-oil thread that found that bio-diversity has increased recently by 10% in developed countries. That’s not as good as we need, but it’s a lot better than wolves would do.
It’s appropriate to have higher expectations for humans, but let’s keep some perspective.
Nick, thanks for a good example of lack of self-realization which leads to lack of responsibility and then lack of action.
I do hold humans to a higher standard, we should know better. Otherwise I would just say the human race is doing what it was designed to do, has no real control over itself and is really just part of the natural order.
Of course that is partially true, but we left the natural order behind and are impressing an imagined world on top of one that already existed. Our intelligence gives us self-realization and we should apply it.
The only thing that wolves need protection from is us. In fact much of the world needs protection from us.
Would like to see that report about an increase in biodiversity.
good example of lack of self-realization which leads to lack of responsibility and then lack of action.
No. My point is exactly the same as yours: humans have the ability to choose to be stewards, whereas wolves do not.
And, of course, we need to make that choice, as individuals and as a society.
If we think that humans are worse than other species than we come up with the kind of unrealistic ideas that make environmentalists look suicidal and self hating.
Countries like the US are now choosing to support improved biodiversity, despite high population density:
“Latin America, home to many low-income countries, has borne the brunt of animal loss, with “a dramatic decline” of 83 percent cited in the report. The opposite was found in countries where income is high�those nations show a 10 percent increase in biodiversity.”
I like wolves but I wouldn’t let them raise my kids.
I’ve used the measure of are you creating topsoil, or are you reducing it.
It seems to work most of the time.
Hi Jason T,
Fossil fuels are limited and will become much more expensive in the future.
Moving to non-fossil fuel energy is the logical solution to that problem.
It has nothing to do with socialism or big government, this is basic neoclassical economics and a free market that properly regulates pollution (so we don’t get more pollution than people want) is likely to be the most efficient way to address the future scarcity of energy as fossil fuel depletes.
A true free market capitalist economy is a bit of a myth because it has never existed under industrial capitalism. Governments, rather than markets, have always determined the fortunes of corporations, through preferential contracting, tax breaks and direct subsidies.
Hi Survivalist,
Some markets are “freer” than others in the sense that some nations impose more government regulation than others.
If you mean that the perfectly competitive market modelled by Walrasian Economic Theory rarely exists in practice, I would agree.
I believe monopoly power should be regulated, negative externalities should be capped or taxed, and positive externalities should be subsidized. The devil is in the details.
The only question then is why almost the entire political left thinks we need to go back into the Stone Ages in response, and deprave ourselves of all the things that make modern life comfortable.
Not really!? It’s usually conservative morons who believe that crap! On the one hand you have conservatives who are borderline authoritarian fascists with little regard for the environment and human rights who yak about bringing back coal mining jobs or worse! I guess they must like black lung, mercury poisoning and air and water pollution.
On the other hand you have progressives who embrace environmental protection and humanistic ideals and who tend to be highly educated in science, and medicine and are building systems such as AI based distributed clean energy girds that are the basis for the 4th industrial revolution.
Stone Age my ass! Free market capitalism? Yeah, that’s a hoot and a half! As they say: ‘Not all conservatives are stupid but all stupid people are conservative.’
Hey J.T. bet you don’t have the begining of a clue what these people are talking about because you’re the one still living in a cave…
Davos 2017 – Artificial Intelligence https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1Uc2DL9P9k
“I did not mean that Conservatives are generally stupid; I meant, that stupid persons are generally Conservative. I believe that to be so obvious and undeniable a fact that I hardly think any honourable Gentleman will question it.” ~ John Stuart Mill, in a Parliamentary debate with the Conservative MP, John Pakington, May 31, 1866.
Conservatives literally can’t (CAN’T) believe in climate change. It goes against their core belief that the free market is the answer to everything. In order to fight climate change, the free market has to be set aside in some areas.
To them, it’s like believing in Christianity minus Jesus. They can’t.
“and depravedeprive ourselves of all the things that make modern life comfortable.”
de·prave dəˈprāv/ verb: deprave; 3rd person present: depraves; past tense: depraved; past participle: depraved; gerund or present participle: depraving
meaning – make (someone) immoral or wicked.
de·prive dəˈprīv/ verb: deprive; 3rd person present: deprives; past tense: deprived; past participle: deprived; gerund or present participle: depriving
meaning – deny (a person or place) the possession or use of something.
2016 was the warmest year since humans began keeping records, by a wide margin. Global average temperatures were extremely hot in the first few months of the year, pushed up by a large El Nino event. Global surface temperatures dropped in the second half of 2016, yet still show a continuation of global warming. The global warming “pause”, which Berkeley Earth had always stressed was not statistically significant, now appears clearly to have been a temporary fluctuation.
It is only logical that if the world is warming, and very few people deny that, temperatures should be higher, not lower.
It is only logical that temperature records are broken by a bigger margin during strong El Niño years, as it took place in 1998.
So what is the problem? The world has been warming since about 1650 when the Little Ice Age was at its bottom, and more noticeably since 1815. This has been tremendously positive both for the world and humans. The hypothesis that more global warming is going to be so negative as to become dangerous has no support by evidence. 2016 was also the record year for wheat crop.
The hypothesis that global warming should accelerate due to the increase in CO2 has not proven correct, and since 2003 to 2014 the warming rate has been smaller, not higher. Obviously including and ending in El Niño warming will bias the results, but it is clear that after the El Niño, temperatures are going down to where they were before. The rumor that the hiatus has died is premature. Two or three more years of data are needed.
Wehappyfew likes to talk about whole system warming. He should be aware that an El Niño is actually a huge loss of heat from the ocean to the space. We just register it as the heat flows through, but the world has now less heat than it had prior to El Niño. Part of that heat is now flowing through the Arctic showing unusually high temperatures there while displacing polar air towards lower latitudes cooling them. Unless there is more warming in the next years, the situation could very well be a return to the hiatus to the dismay of alarmists [they should be happy when there is less warming, but they are strange people].
They call him “Both-way Javier”
1. No global warming
2. If it was global warming, it would be beneficial
LOL at the primitive nature of Javier’s arguments.
Not to say that ours are that much more impressive with respect to moving to renewable energy sources.
1. Global warming caused by fossil fuels
2. Even if it wasn’t the case, fossil fuels are finite and non-renewable
ha ha Javier
Global warming is a fact, Webby. Why don’t you try to demonstrate that it has been detrimental? I would like to see you do that.
Climate wise the world is in a much better situation than in pre-industrial times.
Javier,
Detriment is a policy question not a scientific one. As you know little about biology and the theory of opportunistic natural selection, you evidently don’t realize that something detrimental to one species may be beneficial to another.
Take that back, maybe it is a science to a member of the sponge species such as yourself.
Ha you are the one that doesn’t know anything about biology.
That some species or populations lose and some win is the default situation and a pre-requisite to evolution. Only people that don’t understand biology defend that every species should stay the same.
And a warmer world is a more productive world. I know this notion escapes you, but the latitudinal diversity gradient was a concept well established since 19th century biology. As global warming is taking place at high latitudes more than at low latitudes and almost nothing in the tropics, ecosystems in higher latitudes increase the energy flow, being capable of sustaining both more individuals and more species. Global warming favors an increase in biodiversity and wild populations. No wonder it is so damn hard to prove the damage of global warming. More species are doing better than worse when the human factor is eliminated through conservation efforts.
“Wildlife will bounce back if we allow it to – this report shows that”, says Frans Schepers, Managing Director of Rewilding Europe who initiated and commissioned this study. “With continued and strong legal protection, active boosting of existing wildlife populations and reintroductions to bring back lost species, combined with an increasing tolerance towards wildlife, more species will surely follow.”
The wildlife comeback is not limited to the species presented in this study; there are many more that are showing similar patterns of recovery.
Amazing book. Anybody with an interest in conservation, and/or European fauna, should take a look at these 37 success stories and rejoice that well directed efforts have such wonderful payoff. It is magnificently illustrated too.
Javier claims to understand biology but won’t divulge his credentials on the topic. He can’t show us that he has done any research on the topic.
So all that we can infer is that he knows very little about biology, energy, or climate.
+1 to that.
Javier seems to have problems following simple conversations. He doesn’t seem to bright to me.
You guys are such losers, coming after me with ad hominem attacks. It is the recourse of those left without arguments.
You don’t realize those attacks tell a lot more about you than about me. You come out as losers.
Its very easy to take on a persona of Javier, as he simply regurgitates all the talking points from others that came before him.
Oh look at Javier up on the cross lol maybe you need a safe space eh snowflake?
Javier, you do not seem adverse to ad hominem attacks and downright slander and insults. Even to people who aren’t posting here. Perhaps if you don’t like ad hominem attacks then you should stop engaging in them. Simultaneously playing the victim card while being rude and insulting to others is a sign of a personality disorder.
Playing the victim card is the last recourse of those who’s arguments have failed. If ad hominem attacks make someone a loser then you are by your own definition a loser. Later snowflake.
Survivalist,
You are a joke. You immediately throw personal attacks against anybody who dares post here against the climate doom cult.
Funny that you try to justify your behavior with that of others.
If ad hominem attacks make someone a loser, as you say they do, then you are by your own definition a loser.
“Funny that you try to justify your behavior with that of others.” ~ Javier
I have not posted any comments on the topic of trying to justify my behaviour.
Hi WHT,
I’m sorry I referred to you as pompous stuffed shirt in the past, and you have my apology for doing so. I can now better understand why you are impatient and don’t waste time trying to be nicer to nincom poops.
I find it really strange that a professional biologist would dismiss the concerns of hundreds and thousands of scientists in other fields, from a to z, who are gravely concerned about global warming.
I haven’t ever even HEARD of another biologist who so casually dismisses the precautionary principle.
Has anybody else??
I am pretty sure you are just as curious as I am as to the motivations of such people, especially when they themselves do not stand to gain anything in comparison to say a Rex Tillerson, from opposing the consensus. Are they just victims of the Koch propaganda machine, having swallowed the machines narrative hook, line and sinker?
“I haven’t ever even HEARD of another biologist who so casually dismisses the precautionary principle.”
Perhaps Dr. Frankenstein?
Michael Crichton?
I’d like to thank y’all for making fun of Javier. It’s really the only appropriate way to respond to his insane, dishonest trolling if the mods won’t ban him.
So, Javier, yes, some species survive, some don’t.
If you’re rooting for humans to go extinect and for octopuses to rule the earth, then maybe your attitude makes sense.
Otherwise, you’re just being unscientific.
“Unless there is more warming in the next years, the situation could very well be a return to the hiatus to the dismay of alarmists [they should be happy when there is less warming, but they are strange people]. ”
Hi Javier,
This is where you really lose me. I think the scientists are trying to get it right. I will concede that it is just my opinion, as you are entitled to yours.
You were, however, spot on about the unusually high temperatures in the arctic.
I said alarmists, not scientists. Different words. I understand you mistake them as alarmist scientists get a disproportionate amount of attention.
Hi Javier,
I assumed you meant scientists because they are the ones who’s opinions are most important on this topic, as they are conducting the research and are most familiar with the data. It is true that some scientists may be considered more on the “alarmist” side within the community, just as someone like Judith Curry leans towards the alternate view. However, the overall consensus points in one direction, and it is doubtful, though not impossible, that all these different researchers, in the various fields of climate science (glaciology, atmospheric science, etc.) can all be drawing the wrong conclusions, as you imply. You should concede that.
AS for what “alarmists” think, well that’s not really important. You should stop ranting about it as it makes you look deranged. And you can’t afford to take any more hits to your credibility. That being said, I actually enjoy your debates against the consensus view, I have learned a lot.
Chilyb,
Scientists are as prone to group thinking and fashion thinking as anybody else. Let’s examine the consensus:
1. The world is warming.
I would say there is near total consensus about that between scientists.
2. The warming is due to CO2
I would say there is a near total consensus that anthropogenic CO2 is at least partially responsible for the warming between scientists.
3. The warming is bad and it is going to become catastrophic
Here is when things get questionable. The IPCC really stretches to try to find damage done by warming, while trying its best to ignore every possible benefit. The business as usual scenarios are anything but possible. Time has demonstrated two things, the first is that warm and wet is a lot better than cold and dry. The second is that while we follow the worst emission scenarios since the late 80’s, we observe the best warming scenarios (not considering last El Niño). Scientists are not at all convinced that we have got this part right, and while the ones that don’t see catastrophic outcomes in our mid-term future quietly publish their research, the ones that do think a catastrophic outcome is possible in just a few years get celebrity status and are prominently displayed and interviewed by the mass media.
And then we get to:
4. We have methods to reduce CO2
This is simply laughable. The disconnect between the official discourse and the reality is absolute. Five serious future energy analysis for 2040-50 all coincide in that the world is going to use more fossil fuels, not less.
5. The reduction in CO2 emissions will have a significant effect on global warming
This one is directly fantasy and nobody really believes that. Even if all the Paris accords are implemented (and they won’t), and we believe the IPCC models, according to them that would reduce global warming by 0.17°C by 2100, which would be equivalent to delay global warming by 4 years.
As you can see the consensus is not such when it comes to effects and solutions.
Hi Javier,
The best scientists are not prone to group think, they follow the evidence. In your field, do you just follow the crowd? There may be some scientists that do, but not very many good scientists are followers.
A major problem in climate science is poor estimates of available fossil fuels. The reality is that any scenario higher than RCP4.5 is unlikely due to peak fossil fuels.
There is a basic tension between mainstream climate science (where ECS is likely to be between 2.7 and 3.3 C) and a belief in peak fossil fuels.
If we assume that ECS is near the mean estimate by the IPCC (3 C) and that the concept of peak fossil fuels is also correct in the near term (peak by 2030+/-5 years for total fossil fuel output in millions of tonnes of oil equivalent), then catastrophic global warming is not likely.
You might want to look at this list of feedbacks, though incomplete, before you are so certain about the role of fossil fuels in global warming.
I know you think you have a handle on aerosols, but the actual effects are much larger. Scientists believe the cooling from sulfates and other reflective aerosols overwhelms the warming effect of black carbon and other absorbing aerosols over the planet. Models estimate that aerosols have had a cooling effect that has counteracted about half of the warming caused by the build-up of greenhouse gases since the 1880s. However, unlike many greenhouse gases, aerosols are not distributed evenly around the planet, so their impacts are most strongly felt on a regional scale.
Despite considerable advances in recent decades, estimating the direct climate impacts of aerosols remains an immature science. Of the 25 climate models considered by the Fourth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), only a handful considered the direct effects of aerosol types other than sulfates.
I agree the effects of aerosols are poorly understood. For that reason we do not know the magnitude of the effect from reduced aerosols, it might be large as you suspect or it might be relatively small.
Note that IPPC AR5 used newer models (CMIP5) , many of which considered both direct and indirect affects of aerosols.
Nonetheless much more research is needed and both clouds and their interaction with aerosols is a major area of uncertainty in climate science which I am well aware of.
DC or GF – what do you think about this?
Ancient CO2 estimates worry climatologists:
“The upshot of these findings strongly suggests that the Earth’s climate sensitivity to atmospheric CO2 (the amount of global climatic warming for a doubling of pre-industrial CO2 concentration) may be greater than previously thought; around 4° rather than the currently accepted 3°C.”
The methodology appears sound. Since CO2 is only one dependent factor among dozens of natural feedbacks, the tendency of the system to keep moving in the direction it started (due to building feedbacks) means CO2 and other radiative forcings can have an outsized response to their individual changes.
The biggest factors are solar insolation differentials involving the characteristics of the various phases and phase change energies of water. Since they are self-feeding and related to CO2, I don’t have a problem accepting the higher sensitivity as long as one accepts that CO2 is just the initiator of other forcings.
One must also accept that the recognized forcings we are dealing with right now are small compared to other forcings that normally shift climate.
That said, we are in a relatively warm portion of the glacial cycle and thus easily tipped toward further warming by a swarm of smaller induced forcings. There is a larger radiative forcing that is coming into play currently.
So 4 to 6C could be an endpoint in global warming.
Once I find the actual research paper I may be able to give a more definitive statement.
Hi George,
Over many millennia the Earth System sensitivity is likely to be at least 3.5 C, but if it is assumed that eventually anthropogenic carbon emissions stop (by 2065+/-5 years), then atmospheric CO2 falls to 420 ppm by 3000 CE and to 408 ppm by 10,000 CE. This would correspond to about 1.9 C above pre-industrial. The other issue is that the response of global temperature to increasing natural log of CO2 may be non-linear. So it is possible that the climate sensitivity for an increase in atmospheric CO2 from 500 to 1000 ppm is 4 C, but and increase from 275 to 550 ppm is 3 C.
It is unlikely that there are enough recoverable fossil fuels to result in atmospheric CO2 much above 550 ppm, if we remain on a pathway close to 1000 Pg of total carbon emissions (all sources including land use change) Allen et al 2009 suggests we are likely to remain close to the 2 C limit. In a 1080 Pg C emissions scenario, CO2 peaks at 507 ppm in 2080 and falls to 437 ppm by 2500 CE. This scenario uses the GISS Model E-H (CMIP3) emulation from MAGICC 6.3 and the median Carbon model emulated by MAGICC 6.3.
What about historical sensitivity vis-a-vis unprecedented human-impact variables like deforestation, desertification, urbanization, and monoculture? Are these included in the models? Even if the world was warmer and contained more atmospheric C02 in the far past, it certainly didn’t have those variables, which may suggest differences, compared with the past, in how things play out.
Hi Javier,
If we assume a 60 year natural cycle due to a combination of ocean effects such as the NAO and ENSO and solar variability, that could certainly be consistent with warming associated with increased greenhouse gases since 1850, in earlier times, when emissions were lower, the temperature signal from natural variability was more dominant.
It would seem you expect relatively little warming (or no warming) on average from 2001 to about 2030. It is certainly possible this will be the case, if the pattern from 1850 to 2016 continues. The chart below shows the centered 25 year average of the BEST land ocean data where an approximately 60 year cycle is evident. We will have to see what happens tp global land ocean temperature over the next 10 to 15 years.
Even if that hypothesis is correct, the increased temperatures will continue over the next 30 or 35 years (from 2030 to 2060) unless green house gas emissions are reduced.
If we ignore the el Nino years of 2015 and 2016 and consider the trend from 2001 to 2014, it is 3 times smaller in slope than the trend from 1971-2000 (0.5 C per century for 2001-2014 and 1.6 C per century from 1971-2000).
However the linear trend from 1976-2014 is 1.76 C per century, so the hypothesis of a 60 year cycle may be incorrect. (I also considered 1971-2014 and the linear trend is 1.74 C/century.)
Chart for BEST LO data from 1976-2014 is below.
Dennis,
Even if that hypothesis is correct, the increased temperatures will continue over the next 30 or 35 years (from 2030 to 2060) unless green house gas emissions are reduced.
If that is the case you will agree with me that the general rate of warming is lower than has been assumed, and that makes warming not that dangerous at all. Instead of continuous warming we are dealing with periods of warming and periods of no warming.
And warming will not continue forever even if CO2 emissions were to grow forever, and we both know that fossil fuel usage is going to reach a limit some time during the next decades. The history of the planet has see all sort of drastic things, and warming/cooling periods always stop and reverse. Global warming is never going to get dangerous while we are at the Quaternary Ice Age.
au contraire
(you really need to educate yourself- just a suggestion)
As the Earth moved out of ice ages over the past million years, the global temperature rose a total of 4 to 7 degrees Celsius over about 5,000 years. In the past century alone, the temperature has climbed 0.7 degrees Celsius, roughly ten times faster than the average rate of ice-age-recovery warming.
Models predict that Earth will warm between 2 and 6 degrees Celsius in the next century. When global warming has happened at various times in the past two million years, it has taken the planet about 5,000 years to warm 5 degrees. The predicted rate of warming for the next century is at least 20 times faster. This rate of change is extremely unusual.
Comparing rates of change at different temporal scales produces meaningless comparisons. There are several degrees difference between night and day too.
If you want to know what an abrupt climate change is, you should look into Dansgaard-Oeschger events, where several degrees warming were concentrated in just a few decades.
It doesn’t matter what models predict because they are wrong, unable to predict 20-30 years ahead, much less 85.
Hi Javier,
We don’t know that the models are wrong. They reproduce past temperature fairly well, some models do better than others and no model is perfect. As to the future, we will have to wait and see what occurs. Many of the poor predictions of the future will be due to an assumption that fossil fuels are far more abundant than is likely, so scenarios such as RCP6 or RCP8.5 are likely to be far from the mark, RCP4.5 is possible if there is a very slow decline of fossil fuels and a very slow increase in non-fossil fuel energy, but even that scenario is likely to be too pessimistic.
Hi Dennis,
We do know the models are wrong. As per IPCC (AR4):
“For the next two decades, a warming of about 0.2°C per decade is projected for a range of SRES emission scenarios. Even if the concentrations of all greenhouse gases and aerosols had been kept constant at year 2000 levels, a further warming of about 0.1°C per decade would be expected.
Since IPCC’s first report in 1990, assessed projections have suggested global average temperature increases between about 0.15°C and 0.3°C per decade for 1990 to 2005. This can now be compared with observed values of about 0.2°C per decade, strengthening confidence in near-term projections.
Model experiments show that even if all radiative forcing agents were held constant at year 2000 levels, a further warming trend would occur in the next two decades at a rate of about 0.1°C per decade, due mainly to the slow response of the oceans. About twice as much warming (0.2°C per decade) would be expected if emissions are within the range of the SRES scenarios. Best-estimate projections from models indicate that decadal average warming over each inhabited continent by 2030 is insensitive to the choice among SRES scenarios and is very likely to be at least twice as large as the corresponding model-estimated natural variability during the 20th century.”
We are supposed to be warming at 0.2°C/decade, and we haven’t. The only warming we have seen has been from an El Niño. Looking forward to 2030 it might be closer to zero than 0.2.
Table 3.3 p. 248, the trend from 1979 to 2005 was 0.17 C per decade.
If we look at 1988 to 2016 the trend has been 0.19 C per decade, so the prediction has been good so far.
Dennis,
You and I have a different concept of what constitutes a prediction.
AR4 was published 2007 with analysis up to 2005. Anything previous is not a prediction. In their prediction they talk about the next two decades after 2000. They predicted an acceleration of warming. Instead we got a hiatus.
Hi Javier,
The trend from 1979 to 2005 has continued through 2016, we will have to wait until 2025 to see if that proves correct. Also the range of predictions depends on the scenario for emissions, emissions from 2005 to 2016 were lower than most of the SRES scenarios, if a fair comparison is made of what the median model would predict given actual emissions, the predictions were pretty good for 2006 to 2016.
Maybe it is you who does not realize that a prediction based on data analyzed through 2005 would indeed cover 2006 to 2016, my chart shows the trend of 0.19 per decade from 1988 to 2016 (27 years), which is more than the 1979 to 2005 (also 27 years)trend of 0.17 per decade. So the warming trend has increased (when an appropriate length of time is used) fairly close to what was predicted despite carbon emissions that were lower than expected.
warming averaged for 2011 to 2030 compared to 1980 to 1999 is between +0.64°C and +0.69°C, with a range of only 0.05°C
So from 1990 to 2020 about 0.64 C of warming was predicted, or about 0.21 C per decade where the rate of warming from 1988 to 2016 was 0.19, a slight overestimate, but given the relatively low emissions from 2009 to 2016, this is nor surprising.
Javier,
In short, if one expects perfection, one could claim the models are “wrong”. Climate science is far more complicated than your field, where experiments are straightforward.
The models are “right” within the uncertainty of the models, using the executive summary as a basis for evaluation is a mistake in my opinion.
If that is the case you will agree with me that the general rate of warming is lower than has been assumed, and that makes warming not that dangerous at all.
No Javier, that isn’t how things work at all! Here ya go, a little chaos math that even a PhD in molecular biology should be able to understand…
Is our climate headed for a mathematical tipping point? – Victor J. Donnay
Let’s Begin…
Scientists have warned that as CO2 levels in the atmosphere rise an increase in Earth’s temperature by even two degrees could lead to catastrophic effects across the world. But how can such a tiny, measurable change in one factor lead to huge, unpredictable changes elsewhere? Victor J. Donnay uses billiards to illustrate tipping points, chaotic motion and their implications on climate change.
Javier has a PhD?
From where Bob Jones?
Evangelical Scientists Refute Gravity With New ‘Intelligent Falling’ Theory
Proponents of Intelligent Falling assert that the different theories used by secular physicists to explain gravity are not internally consistent. Even critics of Intelligent Falling admit that Einstein’s ideas about gravity are mathematically irreconcilable with quantum mechanics. This fact, Intelligent Falling proponents say, proves that gravity is a theory in crisis.
“Let’s take a look at the evidence,” said ECFR senior fellow Gregory Lunsden.”In Matthew 15:14, Jesus says, ‘And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.’ He says nothing about some gravity making them fall—just that they will fall. Then, in Job 5:7, we read, ‘But mankind is born to trouble, as surely as sparks fly upwards.’ If gravity is pulling everything down, why do the sparks fly upwards with great surety? This clearly indicates that a conscious intelligence governs all falling.”
Hi Duncan,
Javier does indeed have a PhD and several peer reviewed publications. Though he is not an expert in climate science, his field is biology (either cell or micro, I forget which and it is not my field so there may not be an important distinction.)
Javier’s PhD does prove that many institutions have extremely low standards for granting PhDs. If he really has one, that is.
He certainly does not understand biology in general. If he got a PhD in biology, it was either a very long time ago, or from an incompetent institution. Certain incompetent institutions will grant PhDs to people who have overspecialized training, who have only studied one tiny corner of the field and do not actually really understand basics of the field like ecology, evolution and biological history. He might be one of those.
The climate on Earth is bounded. Just take a look at the past 540 million years.
And we are in the midst of the Quaternary Ice Age, one of the 10% coldest periods of Earth. That’s why there is ice in both poles when normally they have been ice free for most of the past 540 million years.
Chaos plays a small role in the past climate of the Earth. It is all cycles. From the 150 million year Ice Age cycle all the way down to the 60 year oceanic cycle that produces the hiatus.
Javier’s a lying cherry-picker. He has abandoned all scientific integrity in favor of dishonesty. He is not a scientist, regardless of whether he used to be one.
Yes, the Earth’s biology has a feedback effect which lowers global temperature… eventually.
At the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum.
This is the graph Javier should have been reading, from the same wikipedia page which he got his cherrypickin’ graph from.
I don’t know why the lying troll Javier can embed images and I can’t, so here’s a link.
Dennis, you need to ban Javier. You really need to ban him. He’s useless and disruptive to the forum; he contributes precisely nothing useful and throws shit around constantly. He has turned global warming denial into an article of faith, part of his religion, and is immune to all rational thought. He needs to go.
Hi Javier,
If my estimates of economically recoverable fossil fuels (assuming high fossil fuel prices and very little substitution by other forms of energy) is correct we would see no more than about 1500 Pg of carbon emissions from 1750 to 2500 CE (all sources including cement production and land use change) due to fossil fuel depletion.
It is fairly likely that as fossil fuels become scarcer and more expensive that other forms of energy will substitute for fossil fuel (nuclear, wind, solar, and hydro power) so that carbon emissions might be limited to 1000 Pg of carbon (1750-2500) which Allen at al 2009 found would result in 2 C of warming or less (from 1850-1900 mean global temperature) which is roughly 1.7 C above the 1951-1980 global mean temperature.
Using a simple model with a sinusoidal “natural variation” of 78 years (cosine function worked best) and the natural log of atmospheric CO2, a multivariate linear regression from 1850 to 2015 gives an R squared of about 89% and a TCR for a doubling of CO2 of 2.45 C (2.3 to 2.6 C 95% confidence interval). I also used a Bern type model to match the median MAGICC 6 carbon model to a 1080 Pg carbon emission scenario to estimate future carbon emissions to see what this very simple model would predict for future temperature. This is shown in the chart below.
There are many problems with this Cstad “model” (C for carbon, stad for stadium wave hypothesis). It does not account for future ocean warming, future albedo change as ice sheets melt, and carbon emissions from melting permafrost. It is not clear how large the effects from these processes will be or how quickly they will occur, the CMIP3 median model suggests about 0.3 C of warming due to ocean warming and albedo effects from less snow cover and sea ice. Falling CO2 might offset some of albedo effect from ice sheet melting and the emissions from permafrost melt so we might remain about 1.5 C above pre industrial Holocene temperature based on research by Hansen of mid-Pliocene. High uncertainty so this is quite speculative.
what about methane emissions? is that included in the carbon emissions?
Hi Ezrydermike,
No carbon emissions are from CDIAC and MAGICC6 emissions scenarios for CO2, the MAGICC6 models include methane my very simple model considers atmospheric CO2 in parts per million and takes the natural log for the linear regression.
Congratulations Dennis, on producing the first model with more realistic emission predictions.
In my opinion no significant rise in temperatures from 0.6 until 2030 and lower climate sensitivity, so temperatures should stabilize around +1° in your graph.
This is certainly an improvement. Albedo effect is likely to be from very small to negligible. NASA has been measuring global albedo from satellites between 2000 and 2011 and reports no change in albedo trend despite significant sea ice melt in the period.
The empirical data suggests a TCR of at least 1.9C, and the models that agree well with the empirical data have an ECS of at least 2.5 C, my carbon model (based on median carbon model from MAGICC 6) suggests about 420 ppm of CO2 in 2500, this suggests a temperature of 1.5 C in 2500 above pre-industrial Holocene temperatures. With ice sheet and permafrost changes it may be higher.
Dennis, ban the troll. Please. I caught him lying and cherrypicking AGAIN, up above.
Just ban the loser troll.
Using GISS Model EH (median MAGICC 6 CMIP3 model) and the median carbon model of 9 carbon models used by MAGICC 6,along with a 1080 Pg Carbon emission scenario (all sources from Global Carbon Budget), temperature rises to about 1.9 C above the 1951-1980 mean by 2500.
Hi Javier,
Is anyone supposed to take those charts seriously? Maybe if the arrows followed the black lines rather than the highest and lowest points they would be a little believable. As they are they would be dismissed by any intelligent observer.
I am referring to your 1/19/2017, 6:21 PM comment. Link below
Obviously the reduction in temperature rise during the 1950’s into the 60’s was due to high levels of pollution from aerosols causing a decrease in insolation. That is well documented.
The leveling out of temperature rise in the late 1800’s is curious, since it goes against some historical temperature effects of the time. There was extreme coal pollution due to inefficient burning and cutting and burning of large swaths of forests during that period, to the point where large areas were completely denuded of trees. So maybe that had something to do with the temperature running flatter. Heavy industry was making regions dark during the day from pollution.
Although I see the 25 year average has done a lot of smoothing of the temperature record.
NASA Goddard record below with 5 year average.
“Obviously the reduction in temperature rise during the 1950’s into the 60’s was due to high levels of pollution from aerosols causing a decrease in insolation. That is well documented.”
That’s an assumption. The aerosol cooling factor is less known that the climate sensitivity. Essentially it was chosen to match the observed cooling to support the hypothesis. New lower estimates are now being produced.
in the late 1800’s … There was extreme coal pollution due to inefficient burning and cutting and burning of large swaths of forests during that period, to the point where large areas were completely denuded of trees.
Funny how you function within a narrative to explain things. I guess you have no experience in the scientific method where you have to look at empirical evidence and not logical evidence to support your hypothesis. In the late 1800’s industrialization affected a very small part of the planet. Most of the world was still not industrialized until after WWII. The cause-effect that you describe is just impossible and you should know it.
” Essentially it was chosen to match the observed cooling to support the hypothesis. ”
More conspiracies from Javier. Always a conspiracy theory.
Your claims are not supported by evidence.
“It is only logical that if the world is warming, and very few people deny that, temperatures should be higher, not lower.” ~ Javier
Thanks for the update doc. Where would we be without you?
Actually our friend Javier is right- he just left out a few biophysical realities.
Earth has gotten gradually colder for the last 4000 years, and with the quiet Sun, we should have actually accelerated the decrease.
Normal between Ice Age events.
Instead, temperatures have increased, as we have carbonized the atmosphere.
Where is his hockey stick?
With the tails on Co2, this is at least a 10,000 year delay, possibly much longer.
(maybe changed from Ice Age to a new global climate reality)
And add to that enough natural self-reinforcing feedbacks that extra CO2 from us is not needed to continue the warming of the planet.
At this point the only thing that could induce even a small glaciation would be a shutdown of the AMOC. Even so, the increasing insolation in the northern hemisphere and the natural feedbacks would probably reverse or stall any glaciation forming in northern Europe.
The constantly increasing area of exposed ocean in the Arctic not only allows great absorbance of visible light energy but open water absorbs longwave infrared much better than ice. This allows the Arctic Ocean to become a heat trap. Once the Arctic region is warm, it is difficult to start any kind of glaciation in the north, in fact just the reverse is occurring now.
The constantly increasing area of exposed ocean in the Arctic not only allows great absorbance of visible light energy but open water absorbs longwave infrared much better than ice. This allows the Arctic Ocean to become a heat trap.
You got it all backwards. Less Arctic sea ice means more heat is lost to space from the sea by radiation, and more atmospheric humidity that increases snow. The albedo effect is very small, as atmospheric albedo dominates, and sea ice is maximum when solar radiation is zero (six months).
Also we are at a 23,000 year minimum in Northern insolation, The increase in Northern insolation is at this time negligible. the decrease in obliquity is a much stronger force.
You are also right in that the cooling started about 5000 years ago when the Neoglacial period started in most places.
But you got the Sun part wrong. No quiet Sun. We are close to the peak in the 1000 year solar activity cycle, the millennial high. Previous peaks of this cycle have been:
1100 AD: Medieval Warm Period
100 AD: Roman Warm Period
Temperatures have increased as solar activity has increased since the Little Ice Age. CO2 is a late comer to the warming party and wants to take all the credit.
We are just entering a centennial low in solar activity and not a pronounced one since we are so close to the millennial high. Still enough to stop global warming in its tracks until it ends around 2030.
Once the millennial high is past, next century, global warming will very likely stop, and the planet will be in a prolonged warm period like during the Roman Warm Period, for several centuries.
Solar activity has corresponded quite well with climate for thousands of years and still does. Prolonged periods of below average solar activity, like 1790-1830 (Dalton Minimum), 1870-1920, or 2000-, correspond to periods without warming. The mid-centennial lows (1860, 1960) also correspond to periods of little warming.
Original figure from:
Tan, Baolin. “Multi-timescale solar cycles and the possible implications.” Astrophysics and Space Science 332.1 (2011): 65-72.
“But you got the Sun part wrong. No quiet Sun.”
Fail again, I’m afraid.
If you’re looking toward the sun to help explain this decade’s record global heat on Earth, look again. Solar activity has been below average for more than a decade, and the pattern appears set to continue, according to several top solar researchers. Solar Cycle 24, the one that will wrap up in the late 2010s, was the least active in more than a century. We now have outlooks for Cycle 25, the one that will prevail during the 2020s, and they’re calling for a cycle only about as strong as–and perhaps even less active than–Cycle 24.
Weak solar cycles tend to produce fewer solar storms, those dramatic bursts of magnetized material from the sun that generate spectacular auroral displays and play havoc with satellite-based systems and power grids on Earth. However, solar storms that do emerge during weak cycles can be among the most potent, notes Scott McIntosh (National Center for Atmospheric Research). Just as a catastrophic hurricane can occur in an otherwise quiet season, a quiet solar cycle can still cause devastating space weather, McIntosh told me. “If you look at the record of extreme events from the sun, they most often occur in weak cycles, and they almost always occur in the deep, descending part of the cycle,” he said.
Solar activity has been below average for more than a decade
That’s clearly not the case. Cycle 24 is the first one to be below average in several decades. Solar activity has been at or above average for the entire second half of the 20th century until the second decade of the 21st.
Hi Javier,
Using changes in Total solar irradiance (TSI) improves models with other factors such as the natural log of atmospheric CO2, but by itself a “solar”model does not explain global temperature changes from 1850 to 2015 very well.
TSI data is based on sunspots from 1850 to 2002 and on satellite data from 2003 to 2015.
The temperature data from BEST. Model in chart below.
Thanks for the update doc. Where would we be without you?
A lot of people here think that being an skeptic means rejecting that the world is warming and keep throwing at me evidence that it does. They need reminding that the issue is not the warming, but the catastrophic warming. No evidence for that.
A lot of people here think that being an skeptic means rejecting that the world is warming and keep throwing at me evidence that it does.
The problem with your argument is that you are not a legitimate skeptic, in the scientific sense. You are an equal opportunity science denier! Anything that does not support your ideology or agenda, whatever that may be!
What Skepticism Reveals about Science
A skeptic’s journey for truth in science
By Michael Shermer on July 1, 2009
Climate scientists prove anthropogenic global warming from the environmental sciences, planetary geology, geophysics, glaciology, meteorology, chemistry, biology, ecology, among other disciplines…
…Once an inferential or historical science is well established through the accumulation of positive evidence, however, it is just as sound as a laboratory or experimental science.
You, want to deny all the converging lines of scientific evidence of anthropogenic climate change from hundreds if not thousands of individual scientists, working independently in dozens of different scientific disciplines, in universities, government labs, in independent labs connected to corporations, in almost two hundred independent countries, who claim unequivocally that anthropogenic climate change is caused mostly by burning carbon based fuels and that it is a seriously problem!
BTW…
Definition Skeptic:
skep·tic
ˈskeptik/Submit
noun
1.
a person inclined to question or doubt all accepted opinions.
synonyms: cynic, doubter; More
2.
PHILOSOPHY
an ancient or modern philosopher who denies the possibility of knowledge, or even rational belief, in some sphere.
Nope, I have defended publicly that anthropogenic global warming has been taking place.
I do believe that CO2 has caused warming and I say so. I just defend climate sensitivity is at the low end of the accepted range.
I thought that my position was clear by now.
Global warming? Yes
Anthropogenic warming? Yes
Dangerous? No
You obviuously have your own definition of what constitutes dangerous climate change!
So let’s start with the IPCC’s definition: I know the IPCC are all alarmists… but
1.2.2 What is dangerous interference with the climate system?
Defining what is dangerous interference with the climate system is a complex task that can only be partially supported by science, as it inherently involves normative judgements. There are different approaches to defining danger, and an interpretation of Article 2 is likely to rely on scientific, ethical, cultural, political and/or legal judgements. As such, the agreement(s) reached among the Parties in terms of what may constitute unacceptable impacts on the climate system, food production, ecosystems or sustainable economic development will represent a synthesis of these different perspectives.
Over the past two decades several expert groups have sought to define levels of climate change that could be tolerable or intolerable, or which could be characterized by different levels of risk. In the late 1980s, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO)/International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU)/UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Advisory Group on Greenhouse Gases (AGGG) identified two main temperature indicators or thresholds with different levels of risk (Rijsberman and Swart, 1990). Based on the available knowledge at the time a 2ºC increase was determined to be ‘an upper limit beyond which the risks of grave damage to ecosystems, and of non-linear responses, are expected to increase rapidly’. This early work also identified the rate of change to be of importance to determining the level of risk, a conclusion that has subsequently been confirmed qualitatively (IPCC, 2007b, Chapters 4 and 19). More recently, others in the scientific community have reached conclusions that point in a similar direction ‘that global warming of more than 1°C, relative to 2000, will constitute “dangerous” climate change as judged from likely effects on sea level and extermination of species’ (Hansen et al., 2006). Probabilistic assessments have also been made that demonstrate how scientific uncertainties, different normative judgments on acceptable risks to different systems (Mastrandrea and Schneider, 2004) and/or interference with the climate system (Harvey, 2007) affect the levels of change or interference set as goals for policy (IPCC, 2007b, Chapter 19). From an economic perspective, the Stern Review (Stern, 2006) found that in order to minimise the most harmful consequences of climate change, concentrations would need to be stabilized below 550 ppm CO2-eq. The Review further argues that any delay in reducing emissions would be ‘would be costly and dangerous’. This latter conclusion is at variance with the conclusions drawn from earlier economic analyses which support a slow ‘ramp up’ of climate policy action (Nordhaus, 2006) and, it has been argued, is a consequence of the approach taken by the Stern Review to intergenerational equity (Dasgupta, 2006).
Global climate change has already had observable effects on the environment. Glaciers have shrunk, ice on rivers and lakes is breaking up earlier, plant and animal ranges have shifted and trees are flowering sooner.
Effects that scientists had predicted in the past would result from global climate change are now occurring: loss of sea ice, accelerated sea level rise and longer, more intense heat waves.
Taken as a whole, the range of published evidence indicates that the net damage costs of climate change are likely to be significant and to increase over time.
– Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Scientists have high confidence that global temperatures will continue to rise for decades to come, largely due to greenhouse gases produced by human activities. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which includes more than 1,300 scientists from the United States and other countries, forecasts a temperature rise of 2.5 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit over the next century.
According to the IPCC, the extent of climate change effects on individual regions will vary over time and with the ability of different societal and environmental systems to mitigate or adapt to change.
The IPCC predicts that increases in global mean temperature of less than 1.8 to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit (1 to 3 degrees Celsius) above 1990 levels will produce beneficial impacts in some regions and harmful ones in others. Net annual costs will increase over time as global temperatures increase.
“Taken as a whole,” the IPCC states, “the range of published evidence indicates that the net damage costs of climate change are likely to be significant and to increase over time.”
Global warming is already having significant and costly effects on our communities, our health, and our climate.
Unless we take immediate action to reduce global warming emissions, these impacts will continue to intensify, grow ever more costly and damaging, and increasingly affect the entire planet — including you, your community, and your family.
Yeah, I know, the Union of Concerned Scientists are all ‘Alarmists’!
And then we have the evidence that global warming has been beneficial for 170 years.
Let’s see, opinion versus evidence, what should I trust?
Most people assume that global warming is going to continue indefinitely. That is not going to be the case. Fossil fuels are a lot more limited than most people think. In a few decades we are very likely to use less fossil fuels. And present global warming has a natural underlying cause that started it after the Little Ice Age. Multi-centennial global warming or cooling trends are common in paleo climatology. These trends always end and reverse.
Javier obviously does not believe in heeding the precautionary principle.
He would have a very hard time getting a job as a lab technician handling dangerous chemicals or living organisms. If the lab manager were to be aware of his comments here, he couldn’t even get an interview, doctorate or not.
Hi Javier,
You seem to think either the AMO or solar variability or perhaps both are mostly responsible for global warming rather than atmospheric CO2 since 1850.
I have shown before how a model using AMO or solar perform (not very well in either case) when we assume the contribution of atmospheric CO2 is negligible (as you seem to assume).
So let’s try AMO and total solar irradiance (TSI) together in an “AMOTSI model”. Again, not very good on a regression from 1856 to 2010 with an R squared of 71% (compare with a CO2 only model with an R squared of 81%). Chart below shows AMOTSI Model and BEST LO data. Note the very poor match of model with data from 2000-2016.
Hi Javier,
The “C Model” which uses the natural log of atmospheric CO2 vs BEST LO data from 1856-2010 for the regression, R squared 81%. A better match especially after 2000.
Yet I am right and Tamino is wrong. No Arctic melting since 2007. It will eventually be a problem for those who live out of the Arctic melting scare.
“There hasn’t been any melting in the Arctic since 2007” ~ Javier
“Javier has also resorted to another denier favorite: computing a “trend” based on a time span that’s way to short. Way too short. Ten years, from 2007 to 2016. And, in classic fashion, he omits to estimate any uncertainty with that “trend.”
Let’s do the math for him.
Using September average sea ice extent from NSIDC, and using only the data from 2007 through 2016, the estimated trend by linear regression is +18 thousand km^2 per year. Upward!!! But, the “margin of error” (95% confidence interval) for that figure is somewhere between +142 thousand km^2/yr and -105 thousand km^2/yr. Downward”
“Modeled and with large uncertainties. You can believe on that if you want.” ~ Javier (on PIOMASS)
From PIOMASS data
Model Validation and Uncertainty
“PIOMAS has been extensively validated through comparisons with observations from US-Navy submarines, oceanographic moorings, and satellites. In addition model runs were performed in which model parameters and assimilation procedures were altered. From these validation studies we arrive at conservative estimates of the uncertainty in the trend of ± 1.0 103 km3/decade. The uncertainty of the monthly averaged ice volume anomaly is estimated as ±0.75 103 km3. Total volume uncertainties are larger than those for the anomaly because model biases are removed when calculating the anomalies. The uncertainty for October total ice volume is estimated to be ±1.35 103 km3 . Comparison of winter total volumes with other volume estimates need to account for the fact that the PIOMAS domain currently does not extend southward far enough to cover all areas that can have winter time ice cover. Areas in the Sea of Okhotsk and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence are partially excluded from the domain. Details on model validation can be found in Schweiger et al. 2011 and (here). Additional information on PIOMAS can be found (here)
A comprehensive library of sea ice thickness data for model validation has been compiled and is available (here)”
Yet the Arctic hasn’t been melting since 2007, despite going through how many of the top warmest years? Four? Five?
Try to deny that. Try to predict when the Arctic will start melting again. Join the growing list of failed predictions on Arctic sea ice.
Javier, has it ever occurred to you that you sound exactly like those who deny that global oil production is going to peak any time soon or in the case of the abiotic oil crowd, at all? Check this:
Yet the Arctic hasn’t been melt global oil production hasn’t started declining since 2007, despite going throughdeclining or flat production from several former leading oil producers for how many of the top warmest years? FourEight? FiveNine?
Try to deny that. Try to predict when the Arcticglobal oil production will start melt declining, without ever exceeding current levels again. Join the growing list of failed predictions on Arctic sea icePeak Oil.
Sound familiar? It should. It is exactly the sort of statement that is made by people who do not believe that Peak Oil is ever going to happen or who for their own selfish reasons, don’t want people to do anything in terms of transitioning away from the use of petroleum products.
Your claim is exactly the sort of statement that is made by people who do not believe that Peak Oilglobal warming is ever going to happening or who for their own selfish reasons, don’t want people to do anything in terms of transitioning away from the use of petroleum productsfossil fuels.
See what I did there? You sir, do not have much credibility with me. You seem to be carrying a line that would find favor with the guys pictured below, some guys who have spent a considerable amount of money, albeit a tiny fraction of their net worth, estimated to be somewhere between US$80 billion and $100 billion (Bloomberg), depending on who you ask and company values at the time of asking, on getting politicians of their choice (Mitch McConnel) elected to public office. Here’s an excerpt from the linked Bloomberg piece:
The political network overseen by the Koch’s aims to raise almost $1 billion in the run up to the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The fundraising goal of $889 million was announced on Jan. 26 at a Koch-organized summit of 450 wealthy donors and small-government activists in Palm Springs, California.
The brothers are the 5th- and 6th-richest people in the world.
Charles G. Koch is on record as having founded the “Insitute for Energy Research” and provided considerable funding for the “Heartland Institute” and the “American Legislative Exchange Council”. For more on their activities see:
You can say one thing about the Koch brothers: They don’t let the facts get in their way.
Of course I’m talking about Charles G. and David H. Koch (above), the billionaire owners of Koch Industries, the oil, coal and natural gas conglomerate that’s been dubbed the “kingpin of climate science denial.”
Last summer, Richard Muller, a Berkeley physicist long skeptical of climate science, went off script and announced that his three-year, Koch-funded investigation verified that global warming is indeed real, is primarily caused by human activity, and is even worse than the climate science community thought.
Did Muller’s conclusions prod the Kochs to reconsider their hardline position against wind, solar and other renewable energy—our best bet, besides energy efficiency, to combat global warming? Hardly. The Kochs’ minions merely stepped up their ongoing disinformation campaign to scuttle renewable energy on economic grounds.
It is my considered opinion that anyone denying that global warming is happening and is being caused by human activity, is either a purveyor of Koch funded propaganda or a victim of it. Why should I think otherwise when I believe in the principle of “cui bono”? From Forbes:
Charles Koch’s dad, Fred, started the family business in 1940 and improved a method of refining heavy oil into gasoline. Charles took over as chairman and CEO of the oil and gas business after his father’s death in 1967 and expanded the firm into Koch Industries, a $100 billion (sales) conglomerate that includes chemicals manufacturing, pipelines and commodities trading.
Koch’s philanthropic activities have focused on research, policy, and educational projects intended to advance free-market views. He has underwritten scholarships and financed the research of economists such as James Buchanan and Friedrich Hayek. He has also “supported efforts to inspire at-risk young people to consider entrepreneurship, to teach American students the principles of limited government, and to connect recent graduates with market-oriented organizations, in an effort to launch their careers in public policy.”
Bold mine. Can you say oligarch? Need I say more?
Was driving up the 880 highway last Saturday, and as I approached the big white gleaming Tesla headquarters/ factory in Fremont, CA, I came upon a tractor trailer hauling a shipment of new cars.
They were very good looking little cars that caught our eye-
‘What are those cars’ my pretty wife asked?
“I don’t recognize ’em…they look good though!”
As we overtook the truck she proclaimed “those are Chevy Volts!”
Shiny and cool. Plug it in, and cruise 200+ miles.
Volts? 200+ miles? Maybe Bolts!
Damn GM nomenclature 🙂
PS Volts get 50+ electric miles and no range anxiety. Just sayin’…
Either way, they are highly advanced mass produced electric vehicles. Not the amateur electric conversions of the past. Ironic that a diesel tractor had had to pull them, but that will change eventually.
Agreed. It’s all good!
Oops- my mistake. Meant to say Bolt, of course.
This article from 2009 questions the use and longevity of the internal combustion piston engine. Things have changed some since then, but we still have a lot of ICE piston engines.
I like to look at old-time steam locomotives. One thing I have observed is that essentially every component of an 1850 coal-fired steam locomotive is still present in a modern internal-combustion car (highly refined, of course, but still there).
The German V-8 steam locomotive (The V19.1001) had the drive pistons outboard on the wheels in a V formation, directly connected via a flexible coupling. This not only smoothed out the drive pulsing (greater traction) but eliminated the long oscillating drive shafts and counterweights. The engine could reach speed over 100 mph and had greater efficiency than standard configurations.
Boomer II says that he is pessimistic, along with many others. So, assume you turned 20 in Sep 1961, with your life in front of you, and turned 40 in Sep 1981.
Aug 1961 – Berlin Wall goes up
Oct 1962 – Cuban missile crisis
Nov 1963 – JFK assassinated
Jul 1965 – LBJ sends 125,000 ground troops to Vietnam, doubles the draft
Aug 1965 – Watts riots in Los Angeles burn thousands of places down
Apr 1968 – MLK assassinated, major riots
Jun 1968 – Peace presidential candidate RFK assassinated
Aug 1968 – Democrat convention in Chicago disrupted by major riots
May 1970 – National Guard shoots and kills students at Kent State
Jun 1972 – Watergate starts
Oct 1973 – Mideast embargos oil to US
Aug 1974 – Nixon resigns
Apr 1974 – Saigon falls, US loses Vietnam War
Nov 1976 – US elects peanut farmer president
Nov 1979 – Iran humiliates US, taking all diplomats hostage
Jun 1981 – Federal Reserve raises the Federal Funds rate to 20% to combat inflation
Recessions
Apr 1960 – Feb 1961
Dec 1969 – Nov 1970
Nov 1973 – Nov 1975
Jan 1980 – Jul 1980
Jul 1981 – Nov 1982
So, imagine yourself there in 1981 on your 40th birthday. Are you optimistic or pessimistic? I was optimistic – Reagan had been elected. The list above is just the “highlights.” If you are pessimistic now, I think that you need a safe space.
Look, the only thing on the line was your life back then, that and total annihilation of life on earth when the nuke missiles flew. But there was girls, cool cars, drive-in movies, TV, college, jobs. I don’t remember giving a shit except that the natural areas were getting wrecked and the pollution was horrible. But we had peace, love and bad music too.
So now it’s our life on the line, the nukes could still fly and destroy all life on earth, civilization can collapse and the natural areas are still getting wrecked. Same old same old with a few added twists.
Remember, Limits to Growth came out way back then. We knew things would get screwed.
Now we have peace, love, bad music, cool cars, TV, computers, smartphones and less pollution (at least here). Oh, yeah, remote everything. Things have improved. You can’t get killed more than once, same skin in the game.
Well, the news was done better back then and there was less of it, that is one big downside now.
Well put!
1967 was the last year I thought homo sapiens were marginally heading in a positive direction.
(a glimmer of hope while I was in Paris in 1989)
Hi Clueless,
I was convinced Reagan would cause WW3 with his evil empire rhetoric and was very pessimistic in 1981, I was wrong then, hopefully I will be wrong now.
Are you also optimistic now that Trump will soon be president? Trump seems far less qualified than Reagan, who at least had been governor of California, but you may think differently.
Trump is fairly predictable, just think good ole boy business network and you can fairly well say what he will do or at least try to do. Maybe his ways will put off some of those empire expanding dreams of China and Russia, who knows. Maybe his plans will work or he will send us down the tubes to a depression. Who cares?
All I know is we are not moving in a strong way to correct or mitigate major environmental predicaments so we will get blind-sided. Doesn’t matter who is president if we are not going to deal with the big problems. The best I could hope from the Democrats was to do something, but something is not enough. So in the long run, it doesn’t matter.
Maybe states, towns, cities, other countries and private business will keep doing things to improve the environment and mitigate some of the predicaments.
Even if we stopped putting out CO2 and all the pollution related to fossil fuels really quickly, what do we do about the fact we are eating up the world ecological resources far faster than they can replenish and killing off much of it? How long can that go on? Ten years? Twenty? Thirty?
406 ppm Co2 today.
Toxic World – over 2500 toxic sites identified worldwide The global health impact from toxic pollutants such as heavy metals, radionuclides, and
pesticides is much greater than previously thought. Today, well over 100 million people
are likely at risk. The vast majority of these people live in low- and middle-income
countries. This is a public health issue as salient as tuberculosis, malaria and HIV/AIDS,and one that should also receive considerable attention and resources.
Toxic pollution causes immense harm to humans, especially children. Health impacts
include physical and mental disabilities, organ dysfunction, neurological disorders,
cancers and death. These pollutants exacerbate other health concerns by weakening
the body’s immune system, rendering it more susceptible to disease. An initial exposure to toxic pollution can be the undocumented cause of later illnesses, such as respiratory infections, tuberculosis, gastrointestinal disorders, and maternal health problems. In addition, while most toxic pollution is localized, some pollutants, such as mercury, are transboundary and end up in food chains in distant oceans and countries.
While Sir Ronnie The Lessor was not the brightest porch light on the block, he did have some political experience, and his “B” actor career made him a good politician.
(He perfected the Electronic Nuremberg Rally).
Donald seems like a train wreck, but that might be a good thing, as it will be over quickly.
Sir Ronnie and the Thugs had 8 years to form and create the casino we are now living in.
I’m optimistic for myself but most everybody else is totally screwed. I don’t know what to call that. I’ll be fine, but you’re all f*cked. Ya can’t stop what’s comin’.
And some of us even voted to do it to ourselves, MacBoris. Don’t get me wrong or anything. I’m just saying, you know.
It was bad at times in the 1960s. 1968, in particular, was especially bad.
I was a young adult then.
There were several differences between then and now:
1. We believed that protesting would accomplish something. And we did get out of Vietnam, though perhaps it had nothing to do with our protests.
2. We had race riots, but we assumed that things would get better and rise out of the urban ashes.
3. Economically things looked good. We had recessions, but we knew they were temporary. I particularly remember assuming every college graduate would have a job. It was just a matter of picking which one and whether you wanted to have a job. Now jobs aren’t a given for many people.
4. Families could still have a comfortable life with just one working adult.
5. We were worried about nuclear war, but we didn’t talk about irreversible environmental factors doing us in. We also didn’t worry about oil running out.
Back then there were concerns, but we also thought we could control the outcomes.
But now the only people who seem to be talking about a glorious future for the world are either “back to the 1950s” types, or technological utopians.
There have been massive changes in world economics before, like the Industrial Revolution. Life changed and it didn’t go back to what it was.
I think the global economy is leaving the Industrial Revolution and the Fossil Fuel ages. We could come out of both ahead, but change is so stressful to many cultures that they react negatively rather than positively.
Perhaps we are due for another world war, though I hope not.
I haven’t lived through anything as dark as the Depression and WWII, but during my life, I have never been less optimistic that the world will pull itself together and do what is necessary to provide the highest quality of life for the most people.
’68 was the year my medal holding WW2 vet Dad packed up his family and moved to Canada. 🙂
Seriously, he proclaimed the US was on its way to becoming a Police State.
He was a very smart and kind man.
None of us alive today have lived through anything as dark as World War I.
However, the current geopolitical and economic trends are very similar to the situtation in the 1900 – 1914 period.
Perversely, Trump might actually be a break from the trends which led to WWI. We can hope.
OFM, are you channelling this guy? (the late Joe Bageant)
Poor, White and Pissed: A Guide to the White Trash Planet for Urban Liberals
Highly recommended! Deer Hunting With Jesus is the best book on Class in ‘Merika ever!
I’ve read a little of his stuff. He definitely gets it, but you can get it without taking it seriously, as I do. There are some overtones in his work that I don’t especially like, in the little bit I have read.
Generally speaking, I think his style is overblown, and he makes just a little too MUCH fun of working class people, as if he longs to be accepted by the elite, and ENVIES the elite, subtly or maybe not so subtly implying that he too looks down on the working class.
This sort of stuff is not the stuff of fun and games for me. I don’t know if he ‘s for real, or just out making a buck.
I could do something similar, making fun of the urban liberal set, but I wouldn’t REALLY believe in what I would write, it would just be a piece of work.
Maybe he IS part of the elite now.
I’m still working on what MY style will be. This is a handy place to practice, since the discussion is generally about things I’m passionate about. I get some feed back, and I learn quite a lot as well.
He would be good at firing up a working class crowd, if somebody in it didn’t actually READ his stuff closely, and decide to run him out of town, or at least off the soapbox, for making too much fun of them.
The few lines of his stuff I have read about political activism are in my opinion unrealistic and indicative that he doesn’t understand the realities of politics very well, or alternately, he does, and is just writing what he thinks will get an audience and a following.
Maybe I ought to read his book, there might be some stuff in it that I have overlooked, or never thought about.
He’s dead you know Mac, Joe is.
Sure would have loved to read what he would have had to say about the election of Donald Trump.
Mac,
I’m surprised you haven’t read Joe Bageant’s books. If you do, I think you’ll find that you’ve mis-guessed him by a bunch. I think he had a good handle on the political and social situation in this country from way back. The latest post on John Michael Greer’s blog is very much in agreement with one of Bageants central themes throughout his writings, that being the class bigotry that’s so much a part of things, even though it’s not called out as such very often.
As far as I’ve read, Joe certainly never joined the elite, or even tried to. He did do some union organizing if I remember correctly, and always stayed true to his roots, so I think your comment about him just writing for a paycheck is probably just an uninformed guess.
Anyway, I think you’d probably enjoy his writing.
Stan
Thanks Stanley,
I ‘m always glad to change my mind, when somebody points out I’m wrong, and points the way to enlightenment.
I will read his books.
But I didn’t go looking for his stuff in the past because I recognized him as a man who at least WRITES very much like I think, and I haven’t ever spent much time on reading people who agree with me, except if they are real experts, in which case I might learn something.
Maybe Joe knows some stuff I don’t. I’ll check him out.
You’re right, I was guessing, reading between the lines of a very limited amount of his stuff, and I never take anybody at face value in the literary world.
I can’t remember the author’s name, but I recently ran across a book titled The Redneck Manifesto, at Goodwill, where you can find gold for two bucks in hardcover sometimes.
It’s a superb book, a laugh a minute, and the author has some real insight into working class life. If you wish, I will post his name and the catalog number. If you like Bageant, you will like this guy, guaranteed.
I read professors of biology, because I can learn LOTS of things about biology from them, but otherwise it would be mostly pointless , because I’m already on the same page as they are, in terms of the environment. Ditto politics, mostly.
Mac,
Thanks for the mention of the Redneck book. I just ordered it, used, from Amazon. I’d heard of it but never found it in the thrift stores, so decided to order it used. Most of my reading comes from such places and I’m often surprised by what I find there, just have to do a lot of looking to get thru all the useless stuff.
The link is to a site with lots of Bageant’s essays, so you can get a good idea of his thoughts.
Another Alabama redneck (yep, I’m one of those, or I guess I oughta say “one uh them”) whose writing is very much to my liking is Rick Bragg. His family history writing is enjoyable to me, probably because it’s so very much a reminder of the time and place I grew up, even though my own folks were way more religious than most of his were. He doesn’t get into the political or social causes much, so reading him is just lots of pleasure.
Thanks again,
Stanley
Joe lived on $850 a month by choice.
While a redneck by birth, he explored the 60’s culture in SF, and had a interesting
peer group.
As stated Deer Hunting With Jesus is one of the best works on class in ‘Merika I have read.
DC
I agree.
Stan
as if he longs to be accepted by the elite, and ENVIES the elite
An important thing to keep in mind: book readers and intellectuals are not the “elite”. The 1% (or the tenth of 1%) are the elite.
There has been a long-term propaganda campaign intended to divide the middle class from the working class, which aims working class anger at the middle class. This campaign labels the middle class as the “elite”. This is classic scapegoating and diversion.
The working class and the middle class are both being victimized by the true elite, of which Trump is a perfect representative. This means the true elite can continue it’s business, cutting it’s taxes and preserving it’s profits, while the middle and working classes both decline.
Democratic party policies are (mostly) far better for the working class, but the Fox/Murdoch/Trump media machine convinced working class voters otherwise.
Hi Nick,
Well said.
But I read for nuance, and to me the longing for acceptance in what is PERCEIVED to be the elite is THERE in his work, judging by the small amount I have read.
I’m going to read his books, and I may well change my mind.
There is substantial truth in the argument that the REAL elite are the one percenters.
BUT- pardon me for being blunt- You just don’t get it , if you don’t understand that the elite in the minds of working people, poor people, consists not only of the one percent, but also of the professional classes, the doctors, lawyers, dentists, engineers, midlevel and up government employees, the owners of apartments and rental houses, people who have money enough to take advantage of them, by using them as servants, yard workers, etc.
You may disagree, but the poor and the working classes generally believe that the folks I mention in the above paragraph ARE justifiably thought of as PART of the elite, because those kinds benefit to a far greater extent from elitist policies and practices than they do.
And it’s not just the one percenters that have lead them to believe this is true.
About the bitterest words I have ever heard come from the mouth of one of my neighbors, a very poor man who has never accepted charity other than a donation from his church, which he has repaid many times, were spoken by this man about our “local ” dentist, meaning the only one within about ten miles. (There are dozens a little farther away, within twenty miles. )
This is a man who so seldom complains about anything that it’s hard for me to remember the last time ( previous to his remarks about the dentist being so terribly expensive) I heard him complain about anything at all, and I see him on a regular basis.
He lives on about six hundred dollars a month, after paying his electricity bill.
The dentist charged him a full months net income, after paying for his electricity, for taking out two teeth, which took the dentist about an hour. My honest opinion is that after paying his assistant, insurance , office expenses,etc, he netted well over four hundred bucks for that hour, and to anybody who wants an emergency appointment with him or ANY dentist within a couple of hundred miles, in a hurry, GOOD FUCKING LUCK is all I can say.
I had a dental infection recently, and finally found somebody who would take me as the result of a cancellation, after a week. Fortunately my doctor gets it, and slipped me in and provided me with prescriptions for an antibiotic and a pain reliever that was powerful enough to work.
I have paid this particular dentist over five thousand dollars cash on the spot over the last five or six years. He charges me MORE in cash than he charges for the EXACT same procedures when paid for by insurance.
Should I look at him as a friend, or a predator?
If you can’t see that to that man, that a dentist, or lawyer, or reasonably successful owner of a small business is justifiably viewed as his enemy, a predator taking advantage of him, well, you’re not nearly as smart as I think you are. I have painted an extreme example of course, so as to make the point as vividly as possible.
Now as a purely practical matter, my friends and neighbors understand that the one percent are NOT on their side, but they don’t DEAL with the one percent. They deal with the people I mention above.
There is no NEED for the one percent to bullshit them into believing who their enemies are.
Tell me, what is your opinion when it comes to describing the Democratic Party, as it exists NOW, as a Republican Lite party??
those kinds benefit to a far greater extent from elitist policies and practices than they do.
No, they really don’t. Middle class and professional incomes have been stagnating. Some professions are being wiped out: realtors, travel agents, journalists. Most of the rest have seen wages that have been stagnating. Most of the increase in income and wealth in the last 40 years has gone to the 1%. Not to the middle class of professionals, small land owners and small employers (of whom you’re a part on the basis of economics, even if you don’t identify that way).
That stagnation is why middle class and working people are struggling so much. It’s fair to say that working class people are being hit *even harder*, but basically they’re both in the same boat.
When Trump blames stagnation on immigrants and trade deals, he’s lying and scapegoating.
And, when Fox news tells it’s viewers that it’s urban elites that are causing their problems, it’s lying and scapegoating. Doctors and dentists don’t control the Repub party and it’s policies, billionaires do. The Tea Party didn’t come up with it’s ideas, Koch controlled think tanks and media sources came up with them. Conservative strategists like William F. Buckley (an oil money heir) came up with ideas, channeled them through media and politicians, and a few years later they were coming out of the mouths of “grass roots” people. Like Javier, sad to say, who often repeats talking points, probably with no idea of where they originally came from.
So……
Yes, of course the Dem party is Repub-lite. The successful “conservative” propaganda strategy of the last 40 years has pushed the Dems to the right. Dems HAD to go the right in order to not lose every election. The Dems looked very carefully, very calculatingly at the electorate, and shifted in it’s direction. That’s why Clinton, Obama and Hilary had so many conservative, FF aiding, bankster-helping policies: they were forced to by pressure from the right.
Why did Obama go with a Republican health plan, with fees and taxes and high priced policies? Because the Repubs successfully killed a more generous Hillary plan (under Bill Clinton).
I said those kinds benefit to a far greater extent from elitist policies and practices than they do.
You said
No, they really don’t.
I say you are one hundred percent consistent in supporting and defending the Democratic Party, which is AMPLE evidence that you will say and pretend to believe anything at all, consistent with supporting and defending the D party.
You aren’t stupid, no indeed.
Now let’s fucking talk about who owns the world these days from people like Soros to people like Trump. To the best of my knowledge, anybody that wants to, and has some money to invest, can buy Microsoft, or General Motors or any other stock , or bond , or commercial instrument sold in marketplaces.
MY dentist , the same sob who charged my impoverished neighbor doesn’t KNOW what I think of him, other than that I think it’s low life to charge me more for the same procedure,paid for on the spot, than he charges insurance companies.
He has at least TWO VERY LATE MODEL luxury automobiles,and he has told me , when I asked , what he does with his money, except what he spends on cars, vacations, etc, and he very cheerfully told me it’s in the stock market, and that he has done VERY WELL.
I know quite a few people like him, well enough to engage them in a conversation, if I run into them someplace, such as in line voting, or leaving their car to be serviced, or in the line of business.
They all benefit to a substantial extent from globalization, to a FAR FAR greater extent that poor people and working class people who don’t make much, by comparison. They spend only a minor percentage of their day to day income on such items as groceries, clothing, housing, medical care, compared to poor and working class people, and the either spend the rest on high on the hog living, or they invest it.
Poor people and working class people who can just get buy don’t HAVE money in the stock market.
Nick, you are making a FOOL of yourself, do realize that?
you say
Middle class and professional incomes have been stagnating. Some professions are being wiped out: realtors, travel agents, journalists. Most of the rest have seen wages that have been stagnating. Most of the increase in income and wealth in the last 40 years has gone to the 1%. Not to the middle class of professionals, small land owners and small employers (of whom you’re a part on the basis of economics, even if you don’t identify that way).
I won’t dispute anything in this paragraph, because it’s more or less true, and I don’t want to quibble about the details.
BUT I SAID the people you are crying about BENEFIT MORE from globalization.
The corollary is that when things turn sour, they SUFFER LESS from globalization. EITHER WAY, they are better off.
You say
That stagnation is why middle class and working people are struggling so much. It’s fair to say that working class people are being hit *even harder*, but basically they’re both in the same boat.
No they are NOT IN THE SAME FUCKING BOAT. The vast majority of people you refer to as the middle class EAT WELL, HAVE ACCESS TO QUALITY MEDICAL CARE, HAVE AT LEAST A FEW BUCKS IN THE BANK AND IN RETIREMENT SAVINGS OF SOME SORT, THEY LIVE IN NICER NEIGHBORHOODS, etc etc.
Driving the commuter car an extra year or two, and vacationing domestically, rather than internationally , is NOT suffering.
Now working like a dog, for peanuts , if you have any work, and getting there and back in a car that might make it, and might not, and letting your teeth rot, because you can’t afford to fix them, is suffering.
Whatever else you are, you aren’t very good at this sort of propaganda, although anybody who WANTS to believe it , will gladly do so.
When you say
When Trump blames stagnation on immigrants and trade deals, he’s lying and scapegoating.
For once I will agree with you. But it takes a goddamned fool, pardon me for being EXCESSIVELY blunt , to fail to understand that people in this country, CITIZENS of this country, who have next to nothing in the way of education or salable skills are suffering a LOT due to immigration.
I KNOW, I live among such people. I have immigrant neighbors who will very gladly work TWICE as hard as some of my ANGLO neighbors will work at the same job, and of course employers always take the cheapest route, overall. The immigrants are fine people, in and of themselves, and some of my close kin will be intermarrying with them soon. Some of them already have kids, on a common law basis.
But the fact that they ARE here means that the glut of cheap labor IS FAR WORSE. When a man has a choice of two or three jobs, he has a shot at getting paid better, and treated better. When there are five or six or twenty people applying for ONE job, it won’t pay shit, and it won’t have benefits.
You aren’t stupid, and you are rather well informed, and there is no way in hell you DON’T know what I have said is true.
Stagnation is real, and it has many causes, and I will say that immigration is not a major or serious factor in the big picture, when it comes to stagnation.
But when it comes to the problems experienced by poor and working class people, it IS a MAJOR problem for THEM, depending on the kind of work they do, etc. The janitor at the local elementary school will never lose his job to ANYBODY, so long as he does it reasonably well. Nor will a cop, or nurse or teacher, etc. An engineer might lose his job to an immigrant, but we don’t have millions of engineers coming into the country.
You say
And, when Fox news tells it’s viewers that it’s urban elites that are causing their problems, it’s lying and scapegoating. Doctors and dentists don’t control the Repub party and it’s policies, billionaires do. The Tea Party didn’t come up with it’s ideas, Koch controlled think tanks and media sources came up with them. Conservative strategists like William F. Buckley (an oil money heir) came up with ideas, channeled them through media and politicians, and a few years later they were coming out of the mouths of “grass roots” people. Like Javier, sad to say, who often repeats talking points, probably with no idea of where they originally came from.
True to a substantial extent.
I will point out that you FAILED to point out that the D party is also controlled by billionaires, with maybe a few ordinarily rich people, with say only a hundred million, thrown into the mix.
So……
You say
Yes, of course the Dem party is Repub-lite. The successful “conservative” propaganda strategy of the last 40 years has pushed the Dems to the right. Dems HAD to go the right in order to not lose every election. The Dems looked very carefully, very calculatingly at the electorate, and shifted in it’s direction. That’s why Clinton, Obama and Hilary had so many conservative, FF aiding, bankster-helping policies: they were forced to by pressure from the right.
There’s an element of truth in what you say at this point, but I can make a MUCH better case that one , the country itself for the most part did not WANT the D party ramming cultural changes down it’s throat, and that the COUNTRY, especially smaller towns and rural and southern areas, etc, shifted right as much or more for this reason than for any OTHER reason.
And I can make a BETTER case that the D party sold out in part, and was simply CO OPTED by the elite, meaning the folks with a LOT more money than they need to live well.
The women at the DNC wore Prada.
You say
Why did Obama go with a Republican health plan, with fees and taxes and high priced policies? Because the Repubs successfully killed a more generous Hillary plan (under Bill Clinton).
The ACA was not a REPUBLICAN PARTY plan, the R party fought it tooth and nail, and won the election in some part by promising to repeal it.
It did next to nothing to reduce the cost of health care , although cynics like you will insist that when you get a subsidy for something the cost of it has been reduced. NO , the price of it to the customer has been reduced but the cost remains the same or goes up, everything else held equal, because part of the cost is shifted to the tax payer.
I have said many times that the PRIMARY goal of the ACA, providing low cost insurance to people unable to afford it otherwise is admirable.
But the execution was awful, because all it really does is shift the costs around, without reducing the overhead associated with insurance companies, lawyers, etc, while shoving the bill into the face of a demographic that is dominated by R type voters, which pissed them off NO END. It motivated the hell out of them to go anti D this last election.
The D’s are Republican Lite sure enough, I’m glad you are man enough to admit at least this much.
Now the question from here on out, is who will control the D party?
For what it’s worth, my opinion is that if the D party searches it’s soul, and turns in the direction Sanders is trying to take it, it will return to power. Otherwise, the R’s will continue to dominate for some time, maybe as much as eight to twelve years, depending on how the cards fall, before the country gets sick enough of the status quo to be to throw the bums out.
If the D party doesn’t reverse course, and give up being Republican Lite, it won’t really matter very much WHICH party is in control anyway.
I await the day you say anything at all that is not either solid support or an apology for the current day D party, and thus prove to me that you AREN’T either a true believer or else a hypocrite.
MY non partisan credentials are OBVIOUS. I have openly and consistently said that the D’s are right on some major issues.
There’s another point I forgot to make previously, at least in this thread.
It’s obviously true in my opinion that it is highly detrimental to the public interest, and actually DANGEROUS , REALLY dangerous, for so much wealth to be concentrated into the hands of the elite of the elite, meaning maybe anybody with a hundred million on up, or maybe five hundred million, the cut off amount is not important to my point.
But as far as people’s day to day lives go, the ultra rich have more of every sort of luxury than merely well do to people such as successful small businessmen, doctors, lawyers, professional athletes, senior civil servants, etc.
But they don’t actually live any better, NOT REALLY, because you can eat only so much, and fly only so often, and throw only so many million dollar parties. The part of the citizenry I refer to as the elite lives QUITE WELL, for the most part, although some people fall out of that category when the economy turns sour.
All the billionaires in the world probably don’t consume as much jet fuel in their private jets as people in the USA burn just flying to athletic events and on vacations, etc. Per capita American consumption is not all that big a deal, but there are so MANY of us that DO fly……
And the far greater percentage of what the super rich do spend on frivolous living is spent paying working class people from peasants who harvest coffee to finish carpenters to carpet weavers to gardeners to security gaurds to provide the goods and services they consume, so their PERSONAL consumption hardly matters at all, in terms of depriving less fortunate people of the actual physical resources they consume.
They are mostly only dangerous to us because they have so much POWER to control our lives by way of controlling the media and government and to the extent they have monopoly powers in some industries.
Hardly any of them can be expected to refrain from doing whatever pleases them, and what pleases them is to add even more the fortunes they have already, and to have even more power.
There are some exceptions though, such as Bill Gates, who has donated by the tens of millions to good causes, and has promised the bulk of his fortune to good causes.
“The ACA was not a REPUBLICAN PARTY plan, the R party fought it tooth and nail, and won the election in some part by promising to repeal it.”
Wrong MacHealthcare”Special”ist, it’s straight out of the Heritage House Republican play book back more than 20 years ago when Hillary was fighting for single payer(back when you and Bernie were smoke’in J’s in the parking lot, oh you probably don’t remember).
The ACA mandates health care plans for children must have dental care. Because the children have better teeth their entire life. Which saves MONEY in the long run and a better quality of life. The ACA offers free health coverage(Medicaid) for the poor, but Republican governors refused to accept it.
You and your friends don’t want to be helped. You would rather put your trust in a conman and this time I’m not talking about your skydaddy.
Hi HB,
You are constantly proving that you are the biggest fool in this forum, with the possible exception of Javier.
Anybody who knows shit from apple butter knows the R party did everything it could prevent the passage of the ACA .
You are prone to telling such bald faced lies that not even a twelve year old would listen to you very long.
Incidentally, since you refer to me as boris Email server, etc, I will add this additional remark.
Back when the story was about Clinton’s ridiculous half assed home brew email server providing a security hole you could drive a truck thru for the Russians,and anybody else, all of your sort of Clinton fans assured us hacking was no problem at all, that it was all just R party propaganda, lol.
Now since Clinton lost, it’s all serious as hell, since you blame her losing on the emails being hacked, and all at once hacking the Clinton gang is a great sin.
You like it both ways, don’t you??
Well, the USA, and the Russians, and virtually all of the great powers have habitually and historically made a practice of this sort of monkey business.
Only a fool would believe the Russians aren’t actively involved in such affairs, although there is a very real possibility that the emails were leaked by a D party insider. So I’m not excusing the Russians, but neither am I ACCUSING them.
If your heroine had not been so foolish, maybe her dirty little secret server wouldn’t have been the most probable route into D party emails far and wide.
And if the R party didn’t have the same problems, maybe because it’s because the R’s were smart enough to use better email systems, lol.
The R party certainly has plenty of enemies that would gladly have released any dirty R emails they could get their hands on, but if they failed to get any………. Maybe it’s because in this case, the R’s were more competent, and less careless about their security.
Just saying, ya know. 😉
Hi Mac,
The ACA is essentially the same plan passed by the Republican governor of Massachusetts, they call it Romneycare in Massachusetts.
It is a Republican Healthcare plan from before the republican move so far right that Reagan would be considered a RINO by today’s average Republican.
Heck, it hits -50F just about every year in the mountains to the north of me and that is way farther south than Fairbanks. It’s called winter weather.
Where I am now, it’s in the thirties (F) and the snow is gone (not much anyway). The thin ice that covered most of the lake is melting off, spring in the middle of winter, yippee. The migratory birds are loving it here this year, even have a flock of Brants. No mergansers yet but if this keeps up I expect them here soon. Then the eagles follow.
It’s summer in Antarctica. har
The sun is shining on the southern Atlantic and southern Pacific for probably 18 hours each day now. Heats up those bodies of water. Satellite images of the sun’s reflection from the oceans on clear days covers a circle about 1000 miles wide from the east side of the reflection to the west side, 24 time zones. 1000 miles tall, covers about 15 degrees latitude. 15×66=990 nautical miles.
That is the size of the sun’s reflection off the surface of the ocean on a clear day.
Fairbanks is not in the Antarctic region, much further north where it is winter. Turn your GPS the other way so you don’t get lost again.
I’ve been working in shirt sleeves the last few days, at a couple thousand feet elevation in Virginia. It’s scary how warm it is, from a farmers point of view.
The bugs we would like to see mostly wiped out over the winter will get in a good strong start, because too many will survive. This means more damage, and more spraying, and modern pesticides are VERY expensive.
And if it stays abnormally warm, the fruit trees will come out of dormancy too early, and then we are at very high risk of losing the crop to frost. You can replant corn, or soybeans, but you eat all your usual expenses with very little or NO income in the orchard biz if frost gets ya.
But I’m out of the orchard biz, except for a hobby size little corner, and going into grass fed beef. There’s not much potential for profit in grass fed beef, but the risks are minor, and there’s a LOT less work involved. It will still be more than enough work to keep me as busy as I want to be.
No, but it is weather for EV driving (with the window down and in gym shoes!)
“In November 2007, while Georgia suffered from one of the worst droughts in several decades, Perdue, along with lawmakers and local ministers, prayed for rain on the steps of the state Capitol. This came shortly after Alabama Governor Bob Riley issued a proclamation declaring a week in July as “Days of Prayer for Rain” to “humbly ask for His blessings and to hold us steady in times of difficulty.” The Atlanta Freethought Society opposed the rain prayer saying in a statement, “The governor can pray when he wants to. What he can’t do is lead prayers in the name of the people of Georgia.””
Anybody know of any electric powered boats they’d recommend? I’d like to look at inboard engines. Battery weight seems perhaps less problematic if I’m hauling goods over water. I often move several 100 pounds of kit solo just rowing my canoe along the shore. It’d take all week to haul it on land the distance I can row in a day, terrain dependant. Any recreational fishing electric boats have a good reputation?
Yeah there’s lots out there.
For starters you can check out this old home built speedboat that was featured on EVTV back in 2012. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9a1Br7XEpCU
I ‘ve never seen an inboard electric boat, nor one intended to go fast, but there are lots of small electric outboards on the market, and the larger ones will move a good sized jon boat right along, faster than you can paddle a canoe. You could rig up a couple of them in tandem and haul a ton or more of freight five miles in still water in an hour and a half.
I have one , and it’s never given me any trouble, but I can’t recommend any particular makes. All the fishermen I know who use them use lead acid batteries, but you might be able to buy something better nowadays.
Any body who knows about small boats knows they are real fuel suckers, if you want to go faster than a slow walk. Outboards run HARD all the time, if you are making any speed, ditto inboards as far as that goes.
It would take one hell of a battery to keep a twenty horsepower outboard at or near full output for an hour- one about as big as the one in a Chevy Volt.
A typical car has three or four times as much horsepower at full throttle max rpm as it needs to maintain a typical highway cruising speed, so when you cruise, you just barely touch the old gas pedal, and you go a long way on a gallon.
In a boat, you have to ” put the hammer down”, or “pedal to the metal”, in trucking slang, and put something heavy on it to keep it there, figuratively speaking, or you go slow- REALLY slow.
Small boats are the worst fuel hogs in the transportation world , if you go fast in them, to the best of my knowledge.
Interview with Dr George Mobus on The Permaculture Podcast
Last 8 min he presents his collapse theory, the closest he gets to making predictions.
“We’ve tried to do [fake news with] liberals. It just has never worked, it never takes off. You’ll get debunked within the first two comments and then the whole thing just kind of fizzles out.”
I consistently said Trump would be worse, and he’s making me out to be a good fortune teller.
The way I remember it, you trashed HRC for 15 paragraphs and than a one liner that said “Trump would be worse”.
Clinton needed trashing, because she was the WRONG candidate. Her flip flopping record, her arrogance, her elitist attitudes, and her disregard for the rules everybody else is expected to follow, combined with her walking the walk with the one percenters, and taking a one percenter’s share for herself in cash for a few speeches, and her failure to understand that the election was not about who uses which bathroom, but rather about who buys groceries and who uses food stamps………
I could go on, lap doggie, but I didn’t trash her, she trashed herself. I laid it on the line, with the intention of getting as many readers as possible to understand that Trump might beat her, and he did.
My ultimate goal was and is to get the D’s to nominate GOOD candidates, rather than ones that come INTO the race with half or more of the country already disliking and distrusting them.
There’s hardly any chance AT ALL that even ONE member of this forum voted for Trump because of what I said about Clinton.
But I’m reasonably sure I have gotten some members to thinking about whether it’s a good idea to run such a candidate as Clinton NEXT time. Maybe a lot of members…….
I didn’t NEED to say much about Trump, other than that he would be worse.
Just about every body here was on THAT job.
It was WELL TAKEN CARE OF.
Proof again, 5 paragraphs hate Clinton and one line “Trump is worse”
You did your job, and reminded me, and I posted some of the reasons why Clinton lost again. 😉
Here’s some more stuff for Clinton diehards to think about, assuming they are ABLE to think, and willing to do so.
The fact that Sanders could come out of nowhere, with hardly a dime to his name, and no organization, and no big money donors, and capture the hearts and souls of enough young people who are the future of the D party to put a real scare into the Clinton camp, is AMPLE evidence that a very large part of the D party BASE had little use for Clinton.
Now that’s damning evidence that she was the wrong candidate for the times.
And her dirty tricks team didn’t help her much either, in terms of public opinion.
Remind me again, later, and I will post some links about her homies manipulating the nominating process in her favor, and having to give up their party positions as a result.
Lol paragraph 5! Gotta love those farmer posts 😉
Hi Survivalist,
I’m glad you’re reading them, regardless of what you think, either way.
It’s likely that reading them will cause you to think a little more often, and more deeply, in the future, regardless of whatever conclusions you reach.
That’s always good.
I’m not sure you believe there WAS a dirty tricks team, or that there was NOT.
I can post links proving it, if you wish.
Yes please post the links. I’m interested. I like your posts.
Google Debbie Wasserman , Cheryl Mills, campaign tricks,etc. and read the links that are posted for liberal leaning sites.
You were duped by 20 years of relentless Republican propaganda. They recognized her as presidential material in the early 90s and brainwashed you into writing your nonsense posts.
It’s funny how so many Americans brag about being pragmatic and down to earth without having any clue about the basic things that affect their lives.
Media illiteracy is rampant in this country. Nobody seems to be able to see what is happening to themselves.
“There are two ways by which the spirit of a culture may be shriveled. In the first—the Orwellian—culture becomes a prison. In the second—the Huxleyan—culture becomes a burlesque. No one needs to be reminded that our world is now marred by many prison-cultures…. it makes little difference if our wardens are inspired by right- or left-wing ideologies. The gates of the prison are equally impenetrable, surveillance equally rigorous, icon-worship pervasive…. Big Brother does not watch us, by his choice. We watch him, by ours…. When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience, and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility.”
— Professor Neil Postman
SMART man, Professor Neil Postman.
I have read and reread both Orwell and Huxley, but not in recent years.
One of the smartest things any individual can do is break the tv habit and spend the time formerly spent staring at the idiot box with books. I last watched television on a regular basis over forty years ago, and I didn’t watch it much before that. In recent years I have spent maybe ten hours annually watching tv, for example at a Kentucky Derby party.
Anybody who can read reasonably well can finish a serious book a week on average if he gives up television. It fifty years, that’s fifty times fifty books, which is probably about two thousand four hundred and ninety plus more than the average person reads once he leaves school.
I estimate that I have read over four thousand, but I read faster than most people, and got seriously started when I got to the eighth grade, and got access thereby to the portion of the school library reserved for older kids. Plus I took a LOT of extended vacations in the woods over the years, and spent most of my vacation time reading, sometimes for weeks at a time.
The more I learn, the more I realize just how little I actually know.
Hi alimbiquated,
I dare you to go to the archives of the New York Times, or the Washington Post, and read the Cattle Gate story from start to finish.
Then we will talk about it.
We can also talk about how many of her CLOSE business associates wound up in jail, if you like. You can read all about it in the archives of the same papers.
( I read them on a daily basis, back then, real time.Sometimes I went a long way out of my way to get a paper if the boxes near where I lived were sold out. You could get both papers at convenience stores on I 95 any place north of Richmond, and I lived in those days near I 95 north of the city, or IN the city, mostly where I could get them from boxes and book stores. But there was no local delivery of either paper. )
We can talk about her astounding arrogance and stupidity, considering she wanted to be president, in installing a secret email system. You can pretend that having that email system was nothing, something to pooh pooh away, but if a mainstream Republican candidate had gotten caught with the same setup, same job, etc, you would be screaming bloody murder. Go ahead and deny it, and any body OTHER than hard core Clinton partisan will have a VERY hard time not laughing in your face.
And for what it is worth, I have noted more than ONCE in my comments here that it DID NOT even matter if she was as I have described her, or if it was all a smear by the ” Vast right wing conspiracy”. What MATTERED is that enough of the voting PUBLIC shared my opinion of her that she was an extremely high risk candidate. Elections are won in the middle in this country. A hell of a lot of independents had a low opinion of her, and were leery of voting for her. Some of them stayed home, and at least a few of them went for Trump.
It was a COLOSSAL mistake on the part of the Democratic Party to run her for that reason alone. She brought the baggage into the race with her, in the minds of the voters who voted against her, whether it was real or imagined baggage.
Trump is WORSE , no question, in terms of his questionable past, but he’s new to the political arena, and he ran as an outsider, and he didn’t have to deal with the burden of a lifetime of publicity focused on his shenanigans.
If you are SMART, you don’t take an unnecessary chance with such a candidate , when there are plenty of other suitable potential nominees.
But there was a LITTLE problem with that, since Clinton used her years in and near the seats of power to gain an octopus like grip on the party machinery, and thus scared off every other potential serious candidate except Sanders.
Now if you think the millions of well educated and generally reliable D voters who went whole heart for Sanders were taken in by right wing propaganda, then you’re telling me the best and the brightest young Democrats, the future of the D party …….. well then just what ARE you telling me?
That all those young professional adults are IDIOTS, nearly all of them reliable D voters, that in spite of their status and education, they fell for the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy? Most of the ones I talked to were too young to remember hearing about stuff such as Cattle Gate and White Water real time. They got what they know from reading history.
And while hard core Clinton supporters insist that she didn’t do any of the stuff mentioned, or that if she maybe did, she and Bill never got convicted, and so we are somehow logically supposed to not hold any of it against them.
But ya know what? If you get an UNDENIABLE reputation for hanging around with questionable characters, and doing business with them, and they wind up in hot water, the SMELL of it STICKS , and LASTS, in the minds of anybody paying attention.
I can name half a dozen local businessmen in my community who have never been convicted of any thing, or even CHARGED. But they have habitually done business with people who HAVE been convicted, and for that reason local people who know their history tend to steer clear of them,and take their business elsewhere.
Do you see that voters might just do the same thing, and take their vote elsewhere?
There’s NO QUESTION the R wing has done all it could, over the years, to make Clinton look bad. But you can’t criticize a person for something like the Cattle Gate scheme, or the EMAIL s, unless they DO those things. Clinton DID them. She has had no choice except to own up to doing them.
But if any ONE thing cost her the election, it’s that the people of the three Rust Belt states that put Trump over the top took a long hard look at her, and ENOUGH of them decided she’s a phony , talking some working class talk, once in a while, but walking the one percenter walk nearly all the time.
It didn’t help at all that she displayed her customary arrogance and condension for common people, and for all intents and purposes extended her middle finger to tens of millions of people by calling them”deplorable” and in her arrogance concluded that the reliable D voters in those three states would remain on the Democratic plantation, like good little kids, rather than going on the political warpath and extending her an emphatic and unmistakable middle finger message about not even showing up to talk to them while promoting the globalization that has had a huge part to do with their economic problems.
I’m out to encourage D voters to think long and hard before they nominate another candidate with so many problems coming INTO the race.
A few at least will think about what I have been saying.
I will say that I did my damnedest and poured as much effort as I could into helping Bernie win the nomination. When Clinton secured the nomination, my first statement was “We just lost the election”. She would have been an OK President, but she has ALWAYS been an APPALLINGLY bad CAMPAIGNER.
She won *two elections in her life*, one of which was a re-election, and both of which had ridiculously joke candidates, in a state which votes overwhelmingly Democratic. She was outperformed by not only Schumer, but also Gillibrand. She’s just plain bad at campaigns and should never have run for elected office.
The real problem is that our “democracy” is horrendously broken.
The two-party-system throws up as our choice (a) Trump and some other con men, (b) a bunch of incompetent, deranged ideologues and religious extremists, (c) an incompetent campaigner with no political sense who epitomizes conventionalism and “business as usual”, and (d) an 80-year-old who’s running because he sees no other way to change the political converstion.
Then the 80-year-old loses in the primary because he’s more popular among Independents than among Democrats, and the “business as usual” candidate gets the most votes but loses because of the undemocratic and deranged Electoral College.
We need to change the electoral system to get rid of the two-party-system. It’s caused by Duverger’s Law, so we need to scrap first-past-the-post. We need proportional representation. Or approval voting. Or something else which actually allows third parties to exist. (Frankly, I would have preferred Gary Johnson over Trump and I don’t like Gary Johnson at all. Jill Stein would have been a better President than Trump or Clinton. But third party, y’know.)
And we need to abolish the Electoral College, like, yesterday. The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is the most promising approach right now.
Oh, and we need to actually have hand-counted paper ballots. And election day needs to be a holiday. And we need truly independent redistrictring. And the voter suppression must STOP. The Carter Center, which observes international elections to determine whether they are free and fair, refuses to observe US elections because they don’t meet basic international standards. Isn’t that sad?
Aside from the cost of batteries, aren’t EVs cheaper to build because they have fewer parts?
Hi Boomer
You can bet your last dime that except for the battery an electric car is cheaper to build, and more reliable to boot , than a comparable conventional car, same size, features, etc.
And a whole lot of people who know a whole lot about the battery biz are convinced that the price of batteries will come down far enough to make electric cars competitive in terms of the actual purchase price within five to ten years.
Nobody really knows yet how long the electric car batteries already on the road will last, but so far they seem to be holding up pretty well.
But I would think long and hard about buying a used electric car, expecting to keep it ten or fifteen years. They’re low volume machines, so far, and you might have to pay an arm and a leg for a replacement battery, because any time the volume is low, the price is high, in the auto biz.
You might not even be able to get a new battery that will fit in the car, and that is compatible with the electronics of the car. Manufacturers cut off production of replacement parts as soon as they think they can get away with doing so.
I’ve said that if the US fails to move forward on renewable energy, China will likely fill in the void.
How many times does it have to be drummed into liberals’ empty heads that the affordable care act is not very well liked, read hated, by the voting populace in the United States and that is the number one reason why the Democrats lost the presidency?
Ten, twenty, thirty, a hundred, a thousand, a million?
People are fed up with the Democrats!
Donald Trump is a liberal New York Democrat, not a stupid Republican the likes of John McCain or Paul Ryan or Sarah Palin. The list goes on and numbers into the millions.
Alfred E. Newman could have won the Republican nomination and won. Well, he probably did win the Republican nomination, he was just disguised as Donald Trump. Charles Manson could have opposed Hitlery and won.
Get a freaking ka-loo!
How many times does it have to be drummed into liberals’ empty heads that the affordable care act is not very well liked, read hated, by the voting populace in the United States and that is the number one reason why the Democrats lost the presidency?
With a new Congress and a new president intent on repealing Obamacare, more voters than ever are calling for fixing it rather than throwing it out completely. Most expect major changes in the trouble-plagued national health care law in the near future, though.
R Walter wrote: People are fed up with the Democrats!
That is the highest pile of bullshit I have heard in a long time.
(CNN)More Americans voted for Hillary Clinton than any other losing presidential candidate in US history.
The Democrat outpaced President-elect Donald Trump by almost 2.9 million votes, with 65,844,954 (48.2%) to his 62,979,879 (46.1%), according to revised and certified final election results from all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Hi Ron,
RW is our resident court jester / comedian and the words of a court jester are not to be interpreted literally.
If you can point out any particular business, or industry, or class of people, or damned near any subject at all discussed here that he does not routinely make fun of in roughly the same fashion as his seven thirty three am comment, please do so.
It’s true that Clinton won the popular vote, but the fact that Trump is headed to the WH is fairly good evidence that a very large number of people don’t care at all for the ACA, considering how close the vote was.
Speaking as a life long observer of the American political scheme, I believe that a huge number of Clinton votes were actually votes AGAINST Trump, and that likewise a huge number of Trump votes were actually votes against Clinton. Most objective political observers seem to agree with me on this point.
This means it’s harder than usual to pin down what the voters wanted most, in terms of government policy.
I personally know a few long term R voters who voted for Clinton, but I don’t personally know a long term D who voted for Trump.
It’s a fact that I know some republican type folks who are tickled pink with getting highly subsidized coverage via the ACA, because they don’t make peanuts on their jobs, or else are unemployed and living however they can.
I agree with the goal of the ACA, but the implementation of it was a political mistake of the first order, because putting the cost of it on individuals who aren’t covered by group plans, and forcing them to pay for it, REALLY pissed them off, and most of them are inclined to vote R ANYWAY.
The implementation of it resulted in a huge backlash that helped put Trump in the WH.
Just about everybody I have talked to who is in favor of the ACA is INSULATED against the possibility of having to actually pay for it out of their own pocket, so they can be in favor without it costing them anything. There are exceptions, but not very many, among those who pay for the subsidy. I have talked to a few people who are ok with it, because they have friends or relatives who are in real need of the subsidy.
One of them is paying near the very top price, but his sweet pea is still in college, making peanuts working, and what he pays, she saves, so he’s ok, they’re getting married within a month of her graduation.
With the popular vote being as close as it was, it’s not a very good measure of public opinion concerning the ACA.
But you are right, most people NOW seem to be in favor of an overhaul, rather than outright repeal and a return to the previous status quo.
I’m in favor of an overhaul myself, but I fear it will result in something that doesn’t work any better, if it works as well, given that Trump is prez elect, and that the R’s control congress.
OldManFarmer,
Your ignorance of the Affordable Care Act is robust, verifiable, full of right wing talking points and shows disregard for intelligence.
The Affordable Care Act offers individuals without coverage and who make less than 138% of Federal poverty level free Medicaid coverage if the individual state accepts it for free the first 3 years from the federal government. Than after 3 years the state pays only 10%. Most right wing Republican governors have refused to pay the 10% cost for it’s poorest citizens and let them go without any coverage.
For those individuals who make between 138% to 400% of the Federal poverty level. The Federal government helps the individual pay for coverage so that the coverage costs no more than 10%(less if your on the lower end of the scale) of their income. In the state of California, that means an individual gets help until their income reaches over $47,000 per year. Families of 4 get additional assistance with incomes up to $97,200.
“But O Care puts a HEAVY burden on the very sort of people who are most likely, statistically, to be REPUBLICANS.”
This maybe your most insulting comment of your current rant. The ACA has an additional income tax of 1 to 2 percent on the wealthy who’s incomes are in the top 1%.
Oldman, you continue to cry and ask for help for the working person, but your partisan ways don’t even see it when it’s offered to you. Your Republican leadership is selling you BS to get their top 1% a tax cut at your expense.
Let’s also keep in mind, “Joe Sixpack and his wife Susy Sixpack don’t know much and don’t care to learn”
Now let’s see. A local guy working for himself is making say eighty grand, and paying taxes on that eighty.
If I’m not mistaken, ten percent of eighty thousand is EIGHT THOUSAND bucks.
That’s about the figure I have been using, or more. I have mostly used a smaller figure.
The forum members who are making mid five to high five figure incomes or more can decide for themselves if having to spend an extra couple of thousand, and UP on top of their other tax obligations, etc, would be a burden on them, or not.
Now you may believe that most of the people who are self employed, or own small businesses and run them, etc, are Democrats.
I DON’T.
Other folks mileage may vary.
And even if the actual amount of money is in dispute, it pisses the hell out of one hell of a lot of people because they are FORCED to buy something that most other working people get for whole lot less, as a fringe benefit on the job, or as medicare if they are older.
The guy who is on a state or federal payroll, or a company payroll at a place with a good group plan, making the same amount of money, in effect is allowed to keep a LOT more of his money.
And the people who are self employed tend to be TOTALLY pissed when they think about it.
They feel DISCRIMINATED against, ya see?
And they tend to vote R, and when enough people vote R, you get Republicans in control of Washington.
Now it’s true that Clinton won the popular vote, but anybody able THINK and willing to take a look at the BIG picture can go looking for the data showing how many local and state level offices are held by Republicans, nation wide, and how big the R party’s margins are in congress, etc.
It’s perfectly reasonable to argue that the country as a whole really does favor R type government over D type government, or else those figures would be reversed, for the most part.
And after looking at that data, that hypothetical thinking person may conclude as I have that Clinton won the popular vote because maybe one voter out of every hundred was even more disturbed by the thought of a Trump presidency that a Clinton presidency , and voted FOR Clinton in order to vote AGAINST Trump.
The flip side is that maybe somewhat fewer than one person out of a hundred voted FOR Trump , not because they wanted Trump, but rather because THEY would rather have Trump than Clinton. So their vote for TRUMP was in essence a vote AGAINST Clinton.
My extended replies are for anybody else who cares to read them.
I wouldn’t spend even ten seconds on you one on one, except for the middle finger.
About my one nineteen three twenty nine comment.
I should have pointed out that I have never said the PRIMARY GOAL intended in passing the ACA is not a desirable goal. I support a single payer health care system myself, paid for with tax money. The goal is admirable, but the implementation has been a disaster.
The point I have been making is that the ACA was poorly conceived, and resulted in an enormous backlash against the D party as a result.
I haven’t thought to post this particular cynical possible secondary goal until now, but a cynic, or a Republican, lol, could easily conclude that a secondary goal was to poke a sharp stick in the eye, or maybe up the backside, of the people to whom the bill was sent. That would be entirely consistent with the assumption that most of the people who pay more tend to vote R , and with the assumption that most of the people who pay less are apt to vote D.
Good day OFM,
Sometimes I get confused between a court jester and a fool. Is there a good way to tell the difference?
Hi Hickory,
It’s a court jesters JOB to play the fool.
This enables him to SAY THINGS, in the presence of kings and queens and assembled powerful noble men, some of whom who may be as powerful as the king or queen , ABOUT THINGS, that nobody present else wants to bring up FIRST.
Every body can look around, and see what everybody else is thinking, to some extent, see which way the wind is blowing, in a manner of speaking, and anybody who wishes to do so can slip a gold coin to the jester and put him up to making fun, carefully, of a rival, or dropping hints that the rival is engaged in some underhanded trick , etc.
His primary loyalty is supposed to be to the king or queen.
IF he’s really good at what he does, you cannot distinguish him from a fool, except by noting that sometimes the jester says things indicating that he has a nuanced understanding , an in depth understanding , of some of the things discussed at court. This understanding might well be over the heads of some of the people present, because the jester is either smarter than they are, or because he has more information, or both.
Every once in a while RW says something that in my opinion indicates that he is NOT a fool, although he might or might not believe some things that are accepted as givens in this forum.
After reading him carefully for a LONG time, I still am never QUITE SURE PRECISELY what he actually believes.
IMO, he doesn’t believe wind and solar power can scale up far enough to shoulder the load carried by fossil fuels, but that doesn’t mean he IS a fool, or even a (gasp!) Republican.
I believe he believes that the R and D political parties are bought and paid for.
Nobody at all has ever dropped a hint that they think Ron Patterson is any other kind of man than a proud, self proclaimed big D Democrat, and Ron not only shares RW’s opinion ( my guess) of renewable energy, ,Ron actually ridicules the idea that we can replace fossil fuels with renewables.
The thing to do is to read RW for laughs and an occasional new insight.
Don’t take anything he says literally. He may be pulling your leg, playing the fool, while maintaining a perfectly straight face.
I don’t know what wikipedia says about court jesters.
What I have posted is a very short summary of what I have read about them in various history books and well respected historical novels, years ago.
My opinion is that he posts mostly to entertain himself. He certainly entertains me!
Good analysis OFM, thanks. I think RW is an expert at his word/mindcraft- he certainly gets my goat.
RW is a character. I have always liked characters, they are at a minimum interesting and can at a maximum be quite balmy (which can be quite fun).
Yes, complete, utter bullshit is what it all is and was. Bullshit nonpareil! Hillary’s campaign was about the same, but probably exceeded my complete and utter bullshit.
In the parlance of our times: You see, Hillary, this is what you get when you call people ‘deplorables’.
Besides, the popular vote doesn’t count, only the votes counted by the electoral college count, sorry. That is how a constitutional republic works. You have to grin and bear it.
I do get people’s goats every once in a while. Now and then, I find those goats to be terribly underfed, malnourished, and in need of great care to bring the poor goats back to a healthy state. Quit mistreating your goat then I won’t have to get the scraggly mistreated soul and give it the care it badly needs.
I am Non-Partisan, meaning I sympathize with any plight, if you are liberal, you have my sympathy, if you are conservative, I feel sorry for you even more.
When you are Non-Partisan, you even sympathize with socialists. God forbid that such a creature would exist that would sympathize with those evil wicked socialists.
The Non-Partisan League’s motto was ‘The Goat that can’t be Got’. You just can’t get my goat. Calmer than you are.
Socialists in my home state referred to those who sympathized with them but not join as ‘non-partisans’.
In the beginning, it was the Republican-NPL, later to become the Democrat-NPL.
Mother Bloor, Ella Reeve Bloor, socialist, communist.
Where the Progressive Movement had its beginnings.
Its OK, I calmly give you my goat.
I’ll keep the women, the solar panels, the chickens, and the other goat. And the apricot orchard.
You can come over for dinner.
Just keep yer durn goats outta my trees!
.
We don’t have to “grin and bear it”. When power is stolen using undemocratic means — whether it’s the Supreme Court ordering a stop to the vote counting in Florida in 2000 — or whether it’s the undemocratic Electoral College —
Well, I think Jefferson said it best:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
“— That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
“— That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. ”
When the candidate with fewer votes takes power and there are 5.4 million person rallies against him immediately, the consent of the governed does not exist.
It’s time to alter or abolish the current form of government.
Obama has been a fair to good prez, in my opinion,except that he came up REALLY short in not prosecuting the banksters.
But that’s understandable, because you don’t have to be a cynic to believe that both parties are wholly owned and operated subsidiaries of BIG MONEY, and as Willie Sutton ( ?) replied when asked why he robbed banks, “That’s where the money is”.
Reality and objectivity require that you consider the state of national and world affairs in judging the record of a president, and most of us in this forum seem to agree that times are tough and dangerous, and getting worse.
There are many many more things, many times more things, that a prez has no control of whatsoever, than there are things he can control or at least influence.
RW’s arguably dead on about the ACA being a political disaster for the D party. I always said this would prove to be the case, short term, but that it would be good for the D party LONG term.
I’m all for a single payer health care system, with the power to giterdone, modeled after the ones used in other fully developed Western countries.
But O Care puts a HEAVY burden on the very sort of people who are most likely, statistically, to be REPUBLICANS. I know some who would have literally attacked anybody who said anything in favor of it in a bar, when they found out that they were going to have to pay as much as seven or eight thousand dollars for something they didn’t want.
Some of those guys are just barely keeping their heads above water,in terms of staying in business, as a small contractor, or farmer, or mechanic or itinerant construction guy, as I was in my nuke days. You can make good money one year and be broke the next, or covered up with consumer debt raising a family.
None of the ones I know personally had an extra five or six thousand laying around getting mold on it.
And then on top of that , the D’s were STUPID enough, or cynical enough, or whatever, to pretend that that seven or eight thousand IS NOT A TAX.
Well, some judge or another seems to have backed them up on that, but if you ask the next thousand people you meet on the street what a tax is, about nine hundred and fifty of them, probably, will say that it’s money you have to pay to the government, and in the minds of the people who got their asses burnt big time having to pay for ACA, it ABSOLUTELY IS a tax, because the government told them to just send it directly to an insurance company, rather than to the treasury.
And not only that, it’s a tax ( to them) preferentially and deliberately levied on THEM, as opposed to on people in general, and especially NOT on Democrats, who tend to work for government in particular, and other businesses and industries where they are likely to have excellent group plans. The small businessmen who took it up the backside are not all Republicans, but Republicans dominate in that category.
The R’s used the ACA to mop up politically and there is little doubt in MY mind that the very large majority of the people who say they are in favor of it aren’t using it, and aren’t paying for it. If they were, they would be singing an altogether different tune.
On several occasions I pointed out that there is such a thing as overreaching, politically, and that there is such a thing as political backlash, and that if the D’s continued to use the courts and congress to force changes in culture and society that most or at least a VERY large portion of the people of this country DO NOT WANT, etc, that there COULD BE A POWERFUL ENOUGH BACKLASH to put the R’s in power, with the result of THAT being , well, I hate to sound too much like a smart alec, but I was RIGHT.
Hey , it takes a nincompoop to conclude that the man on the street who is opposed to renewable energy is opposed to it because he is a big fan of fossil fuels. He’s opposed because he sees that the D’s are in favor,if he happens to even give the subject a minute’s thought, and that’s all it takes.
It’s true that the Koch brothers types use that prejudice to reinforce their cultural prejudices, so they will vote R, but the prejudice comes first, and the reinforcement second.
Two or three of my reddest redneck acquaintances own some solar panels, and are very fond of talking about landing some work on a wind farm construction job,etc, if any get built nearby. But they voted for Trump.
The usual responses to my comments along this line consisted of remarks to the effect that I’m a trumpster WORM TONGUE, and that conservatives always use the slow change meme to justify the status quo.
They persist in coming to this conclusion although nearly everything I have to say in favor of actual POLICIES lines up perfectly with the all around D party consensus. Ah well, one must be a bit naive to expect partisan thinkers to recognize bad news for what it is, rather than just dismissing the messenger as a Worm Tongue working for the opposition.
( I envy the shit out of anybody who has not yet read Tolkien, because they still have that awesome treat in front of them, instead of behind. )
The liberal establishment arguably pushed too hard, too fast, and it’s obvious enough that Trump is our prez elect.
People who are able to step back far enough from the trees to recognize that they are looking at a forest may not AGREE with me, but they will at least give some thought to what I have been saying.
And thought is always good.
Critical thinking leads to constructive change.
Well, it’s not a tax — you pay a tax to the government…
…it’s a PRIVATE tax, where a private company gets to force money out of you and give you nothing in return.
This is pretty much universally hated. It used to be called “tax farming”.
Romney (R) designed “Obamacare”. Obama was a complete idiot to copy it.
“The authors say that this is upending the rules of procurement, and that future efforts will focus on building a system based on low-cost renewables, supplemented by flexible capacity from gas, demand response, batteries and other sources. This in turn will force a fundamental re-organization of power grids, particularly as renewables reach high penetration levels.
“We are reaching the point in the story where power system regulation will have to be fundamentally rethought. Simply layering on a capacity market is the wrong response: creating guaranteed demand for obsolete technologies has never ended well.” – BNEF
This does not mean that it will be easy for the solar industry along the way. In addition to pricing struggles, BNEF is predicting a new phase of slower deployment of wind and solar in China. This is due to the nation’s struggle to integrate large amounts of renewables on its grid, along with other macroeconomic issues.
However, BNEF is also predicting a big increases in deployment along with falling costs for batteries and smart grid equipment, and for more than one million electric vehicles to be sold.”
Mr. Perry, who once called for the elimination of the Energy Department, will begin the confirmation process Thursday with a hearing before the Senate Energy Committee. If approved by the Senate, he will take over from a secretary, Ernest J. Moniz, who was chairman of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology physics department and directed the linear accelerator at M.I.T.’s Laboratory for Nuclear Science. Before Mr. Moniz, the job belonged to Steven Chu, a physicist who won a Nobel Prize.
Rick Perry: energy czar?
Kafka would be blushing!
WASHINGTON — When President-elect Donald J. Trump offered Rick Perry the job of energy secretary five weeks ago, Mr. Perry gladly accepted, believing he was taking on a role as a global ambassador for the American oil and gas industry that he had long championed in his home state.
In the days after, Mr. Perry, the former Texas governor, discovered that he would be no such thing — that in fact, if confirmed by the Senate, he would become the steward of a vast national security complex he knew almost nothing about, caring for the most fearsome weapons on the planet, the United States’ nuclear arsenal.
Hi Duncan,
I was going to post this Perry link myself, but you beat me to it.
It’s appalling that Perry , given his extensive government experience, didn’t know the energy department is responsible for nuclear weapons,etc, but I suspect that a great many people assume that there is a separate office for that purpose and that the energy dept deals mostly with fossil fuels, etc.
If I didn’t know myself, and had to guess on a multiple choice test, I would guess that the Defense Dept is in charge of nuclear weapon programs and facilities in terms of being the overseer.
Perry can LEARN the job, if he is smart enough ( ?) to listen to his staff. My personal take is that he was selected for reasons having to do with political debts, and pushing for changes in the regulations that would help out Trump’s friends.
There is at least a theoretical possibility that Perry will be an honest and competent cabinet secretary, but I suspect this guy with the Post has nailed it.
It’s pretty much a given that the R’s are going to write laws favoring the rich as often as they can get away with it, whereas the D’s tend to throw the common people a piece of bread once in a while.
And if you’re really hungry, hurting for income, a piece of bread, meaning food stamps, unemployment insurance , free lunches at school for your kids, etc, can make all the difference in the world.
But if you take a look at who financed the Clinton campaign, it’s pretty obvious that as things stand right now, the D’s are in one vest pocket of the rich, and the R’s are in the opposite one.
HRC voted for:
Iraq War
Patriot Act
Keystone Pipeline
Called TPP “Golden Standard” of Trade Deals
Voted to bail out her bankster contributors to the tune of 12 trillion dollars, covering their bad bets
On the Board of Wall Mart
Was instrumental in her husbands administration that impoverished many of the poor, mostly children, instigated drug laws that incarcerated many, mostly black and Latino, and repealed Glass Steagall, which helped create the casino conditions of our current predicament.
While not into reformist politics, I do vote fro strategic reasons occasionally.
One can see the quandary of voting for HRC for someone even marginally left leaning.
From the perspective of someone on the Left, reformist politics is amusing, and brings opportunity.
I haven’t been too impressed with Perry’s level of intelligence (even with the urban glasses). His boss ain’t too swift either.
UCI researchers map oceanic troughs below ice sheets in West Antarctica
Channels give warm ocean water access to their undersides, speeding glacier retreat Millan said the study’s most important findings were the gigantic submarine valleys under the Crosson and Dotson ice shelves. The channels start 1,200 meters below the masses of ice and slope up to points 500 meters beneath Crosson and 750 meters beneath Dotson.
More Javier “misrepresentation” of the facts… including another arrow on a chart!
“If that is the case you will agree with me that the general rate of warming is lower than has been assumed, and that makes warming not that dangerous at all. Instead of continuous warming we are dealing with periods of warming and periods of no warming.”
At the bottom, see a portion of that chart, with Javier’s blue arrow, plus the actual trends calculated for the designated periods.
Not content to admit the plain fact that the hiatus in surface warming is over, and has been replaced by another period of accelerated warming (common during positive PDO phases), Javier wants us to think the blue arrow is sufficient to extend the hiatus by sheer horizontal willpower.
But the trend over Javier’s blue-arrow-hiatus is actually larger than the previous period labelled “accelerated warming”, even though the fake blue-arrow hiatus starts on an El Nino!
Of course, it ends on an El Nino, too, but those don’t count when they occur on the right-hand side of a trend calculation, right?
….
Preview of the next chart …. how are the trends in temperature and Ocean Heat Content changing over the recent decades? Is there really a slow down, or is there acceleration? … Stay tuned …
Lol oh Javier you’re pure comedy gold. You should have be on The Colbert Report.
The present hiatus period is too short. North Atlantic ocean temperatures are still falling, and therefore AMO is falling too. The hiatus hasn’t ended. It was just masked by a very strong El Niño. Its likely comeback is going to be a very serious problems for alarmists like you, that rather see the planet warming to blame CO2 than not warming due to natural causes.
Hi Javier,
The not detrended AMO aka the North Atlantic Sea Surface temperature (NASST) is shown in chart below.
I plotted the AMO data from 1979 to 2016 to compare with your heat content chart (which is not very relevant as it is global ocean heat content which applies here.)
Global ocean temp below 0 to 2000 meters depth.
I don’t see what is the point you are trying to make, Dennis.
Detrended AMO index stopped increasing in 2007. It is not expected to continue increasing until it goes through a negative phase. If the hiatus is linked to AMO and PDO as it looks very likely it is very hard to defend that it has ended just because of a very strong El Niño.
Hi Javier,
You are taking one dataset to make your claim, other analyses show the data from my chart in my comment from 1/20/2017 at 11:26 AM.
Using annual AMO data (unsmoothed) and taking 5 year centered moving average there has been very little change in AMO since 2007 based on data from NOAA Earth System Research Lab.
In any case the AMO does not do a great job explaining temperature diffirences by itself, one needs to consider other factors.
You seem to favor solar and/or amo as a major explanation for warming since 1850, using a regression on 1856 to 2010 data for TSI (centered 11 year moving average) and AMO (unsmoothed) we get the following “AMOTSI model”. This model does fairly well from 1880 to 2000, but does not predict global temperatures very well after 2000.
R squared from 1856 to 2010 is 71%, where the C only (natural log of CO2) has an R squared of 81% for the 1856-2010 period.
I did not say CO2 plays no role.
From paleoclimatic studies it is clear that solar activity has a bigger role than currently assumed, and that role appears not to be mediated by TSI changes. There are literally hundreds of paleoclimatic studies that support a principal role for solar variability on climate change. We are just looking at a tiny window of 35 years of modern instrumentation, with about 100 more years of crude instrumental records.
If solar has a bigger role, and CO2 a smaller role, it turns out we got it all wrong. That is a very real possibility that is supported by quite a lot of the evidence.
When we come to our senses regarding CO2 warming being over-hyped, we will see that a lot of the papers were already indicating so, but a strong selection was done for the most alarmistic ones.
More lying. Dennis, why haven’t you banned this lying, dishonest cherrypicker? He keeps shitting over the comment sections.
Javier,
C Model (natural log of atmospheric CO2 in ppm vs BEST LO Temp) below.
Three years is all it is going to take to expose Tamino’s foolishness. By then he will have run out of excuses for why temperatures are still the same as in the early 2000’s
There is a little known way that the long-term variations in the global temperature can be compensated for. NASA JPL first identified this via measurements of Length-Of-Day. After removing this factor, the AGW trend is more clear. Can do that with the CSALT model. http://contextearth.com/2016/07/24/lod-revisited-for-csalt/
Geophysics rules!
Hi Javier,
I will let Wood for Trees draw the trend line which as a slope of about 1.3 C per century.
Obviously, because it has an El Niño at the end. But we know El Niño is not a part of global warming, don’t we?
Hi Javier,
A proper analysis includes all the data and for climate should include a period of at least 25 years. El Ninos and la Ninas are part of the temperature record. We can go back to 1997 and we get the chart below, though the interval is less than 21 years so still not a very good indicator of the trend (but better than 17 years), it includes the last strong el Nino in 1997/1998. Still about 0.124 C per decade for Hadcrut4 which is biased low because is does not cover the Arctic well, a better Global temperature data set is Berkeley Earth Land Ocean data which has a 0.164 C per decade linear trend on monthly data from Jan 1997 to Dec 2016.
No significant change in trend.
Satellites say otherwise.
That’s gotta be your stupidest chart yet.
If anybody is wondering about the future of the Democratic Party, about the direction it’s headed, about who will be leading it, a few years, or maybe even a few months down the road, they might give some thought to this quote I just copied from THE HILL site.
The far left and the far right are covering this, but the msm aren’t touching it, according to my google search.
It could be that it just isn’t news enough to bother with , considering Obama leaving and Trump coming in.
Or a cynic could conclude that maybe the msm don’t particularly care to say much about D party domestic cat fights. But in that case, outfits such as Fox ought to be covering this…….. except maybe Fox managment believes that doing so would help the D party. In that case Fox would ignore this takeover of the California D party.
As final vote totals trickled in, Sanders backers claimed to have elected more than 650 delegates out of 1,120 available seats chosen at this month’s caucuses. Those delegates will choose the next state Democratic Party chairman, along with other party officials.
Sanders supporters say they hope to change the very nature of the Democratic Party.”
It seems sort of obvious to me that there are one hell of a lot of big D Democrats who are pissed as hell about the current day party status quo, and determined to do something about it.
Just about every body seems to assume that as California goes, so goes the D party, before very long.
These excerpt below is from Theobserverdotcom. I don’t know this site, but knowing how the party establishment ran things during the primary season, I’m willing to believe these charges unless I see proof otherwise.
“n Carson, California’s Assembly District 64 in Los Angeles County, the Democratic Party officials, led by Assemblyman Mike Gipson, called the police on Sanders’ supporters, trying to kick them out to prevent them from voting in the delegate elections, while bussing in and providing breakfast to their own supporters. This, of course, resulted in no Sanders progressives winning. “The volunteers for the Mike Gipson slate, the staff at the Carson Center were completely on their side, because they paid for the facility so anything they said went, and it was sad to see that. We tried sticking up for our rights and we talked to the security guard multiple times to try to stand our ground,” said Bernie Sanders delegate Tyler Morrison in an interview. In delegate elections, electioneering rules don’t apply, so delegate candidates and their supporters can openly campaign, but the Democratic Party aggressively constrained Sanders’ supporters from doing so. “I would be cool with it if it was fair and square and they won, but it really kind of brings the beast out in the person, because we were really cheated and it was really wrong,” said Tiffanie Smith, who lost a delegate election in AD 64 running as a Sanders Progressive.
In San Diego’s Assembly District 76, ballot counting is a public procedure required for oversight and verification, but the Democratic Party refused to disclose the results, claiming the convener would conduct the tallies himself in private.
Similar events have occurred in other states across the country where Sanders progressives are making viable pushes to unseat leaders of the Democratic Party. As Sanders progressives are organizing around the enthusiasm built during Sanders’ campaign to gain ground around the country, the Democratic establishment will continue to push back, even to the point of circumventing or violating their own rules to prevent relinquishing their political power to progressives.”
Whatcha think , HB?
Can you get your head around it?
Nah, that’s a rhetorical question.
You know in your little doggie heart that all those pissed of Democrats who showed up to kick the party establishment OUT are cretins who swallowed the R party propaganda about HRC whole.
The country as a whole was utterly sick and tired of business as usual politics, which explains why Trump was able to hijack the R party nomination, despite the party doing everything it could to push him out, and why Sanders was able to make a good enough showing to put the fear of god into the Clinton camp, despite his late start, lack of an organization, lack of big money donors, and lack of a fair playing field, which was denied to him by the party establishment, which was the defacto personal property of one HRC.
Trump was smart enough to run on CHANGE. Clinton made the mistake of running a business as usual campaign when all the signs indicated that what the country wanted worse than anything else was an end to the usual business as usual politics practiced by both parties.
Oh for crying out loud. When are people going to wake up to the fact that we are all in the same boat and had better start paddling together rather than in opposite directions. Government seems to need generated enemies, both internally and externally to stay in power and make big business operate. I don’t think it has to be that way.
Well, I guess we shall see how a rabble rouser government operates led by a guy with not enough sense to not poke the wasp nest.
If we don’t find common ground soon and work from there, we are just wasting time and making heat. In order to do that, we have to stop the propaganda machine that has been used to game the government and the Constitution.
Choose your world and try to make it so, or just keep being a Moaning Myrtle.
Obama ran on change too. A bit more of a hopeful angle though. Or maybe it was just denial. Trump ran on angry change. From hope/denial to anger. Sounds like the five steps of grief. Next comes bargaining. Trump promised a great deal too. Trumps got anger and bargaining covered in one go. Then comes depression (what a coincidence! The economy does look bleak). And finally acceptance. That could be exciting. Once one accepts what’s coming the restraint on ones impulses often diminishes. Terminally ill bachelors make the best wingmen. They just don’t give a f*ck anymore.
Speaking of steps. The American Political scene, and I use that term lightly, is a sewer pipe. Increased social schisms and political fragmentation are all just par for the collapse. So are opportunists looking to capitalize on it.
Step 1. Individuals and groups evolved a bias to maximize fitness by maximizing power, which requires over-reproduction and/or over-consumption of natural resources (overshoot), whenever systemic constraints allow it. Differential power generation and accumulation result in a hierarchical group structure.
Step 2. Energy is always limited, and overshoot eventually leads to decreasing power available to some members of the group, with lower-ranking members suffering first.
Step 3. Diminishing power availability creates divisive subgroups within the original group. Low-rank members will form subgroups and coalitions to demand a greater share of power from higher-ranking individuals, who will resist by forming their own coalitions to maintain power.
Step 4. Violent social strife eventually occurs among subgroups who demand a greater share of the remaining power.
Step 5. The weakest subgroups (high or low rank) are either forced to disperse to a new territory, are killed, enslaved, or imprisoned.
Unified Sea Ice Thickness Climate Data Record Sea ice thickness is, perhaps, the most important climate state variable that is currently poorly observed, poorly documented, and poorly archived. We as a community can do much better and a unified sea ice thickness data set is an important step forward. This new archive will be a valuable baseline and a continuously growing resource for ongoing work by many groups in understanding, predicting, and adapting to changes in the polar regions.
While ice extent is well measured by satellite, monitoring ice thickness has been and remains a challenge. However the amount of ice draft and satellite data available in the last few years from both polar regions has increased markedly, providing a large and growing resource. Existing observations of ice thickness span a variety of methods, accuracies, and temporal and spatial scales and are archived in a variety of different locations and in different formats. Each has its own strengths in terms of sampling or accuracy. The uncertainties are documented to various levels of detail for the different data sources but the documentation in general is spread throughout the literature.
This new data set is a concerted effort to collect as many observations as possible in one place, with consistent formats, and with clear and abundant documentation.
Not exactly a bunch of lefties looking to trash capitalism.
If we start building large space station habitats to orbit the earth and moving people up there, we only have to move 83 million people a year into space to stabilize the population on earth. It will provide a large amount of jobs for machines and robots as well as make money for the one percent.
Also all those large orbiting cities will shade earth somewhat and slow global warming.
Climate change is increasing food production, not curtailing it. Check the data. The warmest year with the most atmospheric CO2 saw a world record wheat crop.
No substance to the claim that climate change could cut crop yields by more than 25%.
Climate change is increasing food production, not curtailing it. Check the data. The warmest year with the most atmospheric CO2 saw a world record wheat crop.
No, you check the data! You’re a despicable baldfaced liar!
In the past, I’ve posted plenty of links to peer reviewed scientific papers ranging from topics such as the specifics of wheat plant physiology which show significant decreases in the nutritional levels due to increase of CO2.
to the negative effects of increases of actual temperature in global bread and other major grain baskets. Not to mention the impacts of increases in the unpredictability of droughts and flooding!
We are all well aware that facts do not matter to you. Your are an ideologue and a professional obfuscator of the worst kind!
For those that are interested in critical thinking:
Of course our knowledge has increased greatly since this talk was given.
There are some serious and disturbing trends in agriculture. Since 1960 the hectares/capita (global) have fallen from 0.45 to about 0.2. That is a combination of both irrigated and rainfed cropland.
The amount of cropland stopped increasing about 1990 and has held fairly steady since then. We appear to have hit a plateau in cropland area at near 1.5 billion hectares.
Rainfed cropland has stayed about the same (-0.2%) 1961 to 2009. The increase was all in irrigated cultivated land at 117% in that time period.
Water quality is falling and a number of aquifers are being utilized beyond their capacity to fill (levels dropping). Eight countries have exceeded their irrigation potential and twenty countries including China are at least at 75% of their irrigation potential.
Hidden within the statistics is the slash and burn poor quality farmland. The farmland is often abandoned after a few years due to poor soil quality, yet the number of acres does not fall since more forest and jungle is slashed and burned to create new cropland. If the old abandoned acreage is not capable of being brought back into production, then the agricultural process in those areas is just a way to destroy forest and jungle area, a wrecking machine.
Information above from FAO United Nations.
As an example of irrigation withdrawal effects on an aquifer here is the water level changes and storage in the high plains aquifer https://ne.water.usgs.gov/ogw/hpwlms/files/HPAq_WLC_pd_2013_SIR_2014_5218_pubs_brief.pdf
Irrigated cropland has much higher yields than rainfed cropland, so part of the increase in crop production has been due to increases in irrigation.
As we are reaching limits to food production it makes the world food supply vulnerable to changes in rainfall and rainfall patterns as well as temperature changes and weather variability. To think we can keep producing food at a higher rate through technology may be an incorrect assumption. There is also the problem of increasing pollution and contamination with which we must deal.
The decrease in cropland is due in great measure to the huge increase in crop production per acre. We produce a lot more food from less farmland.
But any excuse is good for you to run around Chicken Little.
Childish name calling does fit your image.
Javier , drop the last sentence and your comment would have more weight.
In the past, I’ve posted plenty of links to peer reviewed scientific papers ranging from topics such as the specifics of wheat plant physiology which show significant decreases in the nutritional levels due to increase of CO2.
I won’t call you a liar because you actually believe that bullshit. You are a great consumer of it. We have gone from 270 ppm to 400 ppm in CO2 and no discernible decrease in nutrition levels has been seen. In fact quite the opposite, our nutrition is much better than it has never been. You are simply a fool for believing that for going from 400 to 450 or 500 ppm plants are going to suddenly become less nutritious.
Again you are promising ugly outcomes in the future yet unable to prove any damage to crops from the increase from 270 to 400 ppm CO2 and 170 years global warming. You are a merchant of fear.
You claim increase in wheat yields when the opposite is true.
What can you tell us about plant physiology that supports your position?
The stimulatory effect of e[CO2] on plant growth is dependent on adequate nutrient supply. For example, N concentrations in plant tissues generally decrease under e[CO2], which in leaves is commonly related to a decrease in Rubisco concentration and activity, and therefore linked to photosynthetic downward acclimation. This effect is also of direct concern for food production where decreased N and protein content can have negative effects on product quality (e.g. grain protein). Plant nutrient metabolism appears to adjust to a new physiological equilibrium under e[CO2] which limits the extent to which nutrient application can ameliorate the situation. What the control points are for an adjustment of plant N metabolism is unclear. Rubisco metabolism in leaves, N assimilation, N translocation or N uptake are all potential key steps that may be inhibited or downregulated under e[CO2]. To achieve the best possible growth response whilst maintaining product quality, it is important to understand plant nutrient metabolism under e[CO2].
Do you deny that this is an issue?
Yeah, there is research underway to genetically select and modify wheat, rice, soy and maize strains to produce higher nutrient quality under heat and increased CO2 stress. Do you seriously believe that will solve the coming food crisis for a planet with supposedly 9 billion plus inhabitants?
Would you care to have a serious discussion about plant phisiology and how increase in CO2 impacts it ?
How about how the fact that even small increases in temperature negatively impact crop yields in geographic areas that are already close to the edge of the optimum crop growing temperature ranges. Especially in the tropics in Asia, Africa and South America?
Care to discuss how increases in the frequency of floods and droughts brought about by climate change affect the long term planning for agriculture production in those very same areas?
And the list of things which you deliberately choose to ignore would fill quite a few books!
Do you deny that this is an issue?
I don’t need to. It is the one proposing it who has to demonstrate that it is an issue. Decades and centuries of crop production under increasing CO2 levels indicates it is not.
increased CO2 stress
There is no such thing. Plants get CO2 starvation at around 150 ppm. Otherwise the more the CO2 the better for them all the way to at least 1000 ppm
Especially in the tropics in Asia, Africa and South America?
Global warming affects less the tropics. Crops originated in tropical areas are little affected. Crops in higher latitudes benefit a lot from global warming. Some of the highest grain production regions in the world are in regions that are very sensitive to cold, like Russia.
Figure 9.6 from IPCC AR4. Global warming by latitude.
Otherwise the more the CO2 the better for them all the way to at least 1000 ppm
Absolutely NOT true!
Where do you get your information?
Plant quality impaired by increased carbon dioxide levels
The study examines various types of ecosystems, including crops, grasslands and forests, and involves large-scale field experiments conducted in eight countries on four continents.
“The findings of the study are unequivocal. The nitrogen content in the crops is reduced in atmospheres with raised carbon dioxide levels in all three ecosystem types. Furthermore, we can see that this negative effect exists regardless of whether or not the plants’ growth increases, and even if fertiliser is added.
This is unexpected and new,” says Johan Uddling, senior lecturer at the Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences at the University of Gothenburg.
Significance of food quality, biodiversity and productivity
When carbon dioxide levels in the air increase, crops in future will have a reduced nitrogen content, and therefore reduced protein levels. The study found this for both wheat and rice, the two most important crops globally. The study also reveals that the strength of the effect varies in different species of grassland, which may impact on the species composition of these ecosystems.
“For all types of ecosystem the results show that high carbon dioxide levels can impede plants’ ability to absorb nitrogen, and that this negative effect is partly why raised carbon dioxide has a marginal or non-existent effect on growth in many ecosystems,” says Johan Uddling. Accepted “truths” do not hold
This is your big problem that it is endangering humankind. Come on.
Coskun, D., Britto, D. T., & Kronzucker, H. J. (2016). Nutrient constraints on terrestrial carbon fixation: The role of nitrogen. Journal of Plant Physiology, 203, 95-109. http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~britto/publications/N-C.pdf
Again you are promising ugly outcomes in the future yet unable to prove any damage to crops from the increase from 270 to 400 ppm CO2 and 170 years global warming. You are a merchant of fear.
And you are a merchant of doubt who cherry picks data to obfuscate the truth!
Plant quality impaired by increased carbon dioxide levels
The study examines various types of ecosystems, including crops, grasslands and forests, and involves large-scale field experiments conducted in eight countries on four continents. “The findings of the study are unequivocal. The nitrogen content in the crops is reduced in atmospheres with raised carbon dioxide levels in all three ecosystem types. Furthermore, we can see that this negative effect exists regardless of whether or not the plants’ growth increases, and even if fertiliser is added. This is unexpected and new,” says Johan Uddling, senior lecturer at the Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences at the University of Gothenburg.
Of course most everyone is neglecting the finding that increased CO2 reduces plant transpiration, causing further global warming irrespective of CO2 being a GHG. That is a global occurrence.
And how does a reduction in plant transpiration cause global warming?
Reduction in the atmospheric vertical energy transport mechanism.
That’s probably taken care by the increase in humidity from global warming.
No. You are the one spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt.
One only has to go to a good review to read an overview of the status in the field.
“In this review, we have discussed the effects of eCO2 and N limitation on photosynthesis, respiration, N transport and assimilation, C and N accumulation, and growth and yield in a variety of plant systems and ecosystems.
it is clear that eCO2 increases the NPP (net primary production) of most C3 plants particularly strongly when N supply is adequate,
In agricultural and silvicultural systems, where N is routinely supplemented, there may be potential for greenhouse-gas mitigation, as the growth and yield of crop species tend to respond well to eCO2, especially so in the case of legumes. Clearly, the intelligent management of soil resources will be required, such as the coordinated application of N at specific stages of plant development, and increases in the N-use efficiency of cropping systems”
Coskun, D., Britto, D. T., & Kronzucker, H. J. (2016). Nutrient constraints on terrestrial carbon fixation: The role of nitrogen. Journal of Plant Physiology, 203, 95-109. http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~britto/publications/N-C.pdf
See. No problem.
But Fred doesn’t lower nitrogen in plants cause lower chlorophyll production, small leaves and lower food production? Doesn’t it also cause lower reproductive rates and cause insect reduction, thus shifting and hampering the food chain?
Once bird populations fall, insect population will rise, causing greater use of pesticides which stresses bird populations even further.
Lower nitrogen levels in plants slow bacterial breakdown of dead plants and animals, thus slowing the availability of compounds for plant growth.
Except that 170 years of global warming and rising CO2 levels have not even hinted that it is a real problem.
Alarmists have a great collection of future problems, that surprise, surprise, never materialize.
You don’t even know what is going on now. So how can you claim knowledge over 170 years?
Hi Javier,
The warming at the global level is occurring at unprecedented rates (DO events were local North Atlantic events, not Global in nature), most of the warming from the 1850-1900 mean (when global temperatures were quite low) simply returned Global temperatures to the 11,000 BP to 1750 CE mean temperature (about o.2 C above the 1951-1980 Global mean temperature). From the 1850-1900 global mean temperature to the centered 20 year moving average in 1970, global land ocean temperatures only rose by about 0.55 C, or about 0.58 C per century over the 1875-1970 period.
In the following 36 years (1971-2006) the 20 year centered moving global average temperature increased by 0.87 C or at a rate of 2.4 C per century. The concern is that crops may not be able to withstand continued warming at this rate, you claim that we do not know that warming will continue at this rate because the models are far from perfect. That is correct, the models may either underestimate or overestimate future warming, we do not know.
The difference is that you assume without proof that everything will be ok. This strikes many as overly optimistic, and implies you know the future rate of warming better than most climate experts.
Your estimate of very low climate sensitivity (1.65 C per doubling of atmospheric CO2) does not match empirical data and median CMIP3 models suggest ECS of 2.5 to 2.7 C, while data suggests a TCR of 1.8 to 2 C.
It is correct that the median CMIP3 ECS and carbon emissions limited to 1000 Pg of C (all sources of CO2 from 1750-2500 CE) might keep us under 2 C above 1951-1980 mean temperatures, but again many believe keeping emissions below 1300 Pg C will be difficult or perhaps impossible. I think it will be difficult, but not impossible.
A more realistic view in my opinion is that we should be careful because the future rate of warming is uncertain and the effects of that future warming (whatever its extent)are also uncertain.
Dennis,
“Your estimate of very low climate sensitivity (1.65 C per doubling of atmospheric CO2) does not match empirical data”
My estimate of very low climate sensitivity is not my estimate of climate sensitivity, but that of:
Aldrin M, Holden M, Guttorp P, Skeie RB, Myhre G, Berntsen TK (2012) Bayesian estimation of climate sensitivity based on a simple climate model fitted to observations of hemispheric temperatures and global ocean heat content. Environmetrics 23:253-271
Annan, J.D., Hargreaves, J.C., 2006. Using multiple observationally-based constraints to estimate climate sensitivity. Geophys. Res. Lett. 33, L06704.
Annan, J.D., Hargreaves, J.C., 2013. A new global reconstruction of temperature changes at the Last Glacial maximum. Clim. Past 9 (1), 367-376.
Annan, J and Hargreaves, J., 2015. A perspective on model-data surface temperature comparison at the Last Glacial Maximum. Quaternary Science Reviews 107 1-10
Lewis N (2013) An objective Bayesian improved approach for applying optimal fingerprint techniques to estimate climate sensitivity. J. Climate, 26, 7414-7429.
Lewis N (2016) Implications of recent multimodel attribution studies for climate sensitivity. Climate Dynamics, 46(5), 1387-1396
Lewis N, Curry JA (2015) The implications for climate sensitivity of AR5 forcing and heat uptake estimates. Clim. Dyn. 45, 3, 1009-1023
Masters T (2014) Observational estimate of climate sensitivity from changes in the rate of ocean heat uptake and comparison to CMIP5 models. Clim Dyn 42:2173-2181 DOI 101007/s00382-013-1770-4
Otto A, Otto FEL, Boucher O, Church J, Hegerl G, Forster PM, Gillett NP, Gregory J, Johnson GC, Knutti R, Lewis N, Lohmann U, Marotzke J, Myhre G, Shindell D, Stevens B, Allen MR (2013) Energy budget constraints on climate response. Nature Geosci 6:415–416
Ring MJ, Lindner D, Cross EF, Schlesinger ME (2012) Causes of the global warming observed since the 19th century. Atmos Clim Sci 2:401–415
Skeie RB, Berntsen T, Aldrin M, Holden M, Myhre G (2014) A lower and more constrained estimate of climate sensitivity using updated observations and detailed radiative forcing time series. Earth Syst Dynam 5:139–175
They all defend a lower than 2.5 ECS, and as low as 1.5, so it does match empirical data.
Crops do not have to withstand continued warming at this rate, since warming rate has fallen significantly for the 2001-2014 period, and may continue to be subdued if we discount the effect of El Niño.
And you have to consider that most of the warming has taken place in the winter, making winters milder, which has a positive effect on most crops. And prolonging the growing season at high latitudes, which is a very positive development.
Climate change is clearly not harming our food production, while weather might have a very negative effect on local or regional crops, like it always has had.
As it is usually said for climate:
Top ten years for global grain production are the last 10 years. Hard to demonstrate any damage to our crops from climate change.
Will it continue in the future? It will certainly stop increasing some year in the future, but so will global warming. The idea that global warming will stop our food increase is just an idea.
Hi Javier,
Not many of those papers defend 1.65 C, there are many papers which defend higher ECS and the experts at the IPCC which review all the peer reviewed literature from an expert perspective suggest a range of 1.5 to 4.5 C for ECS with a TCR of 1.8 to 2.2 C.
Using empirical data and simple linear models it is easy to show that the data supports a TCR of 1.9 C (1.7-2.0 C for 95% confidence interval). Using the land temperature data which might reflect ECS better, a linear model suggest an ECS of 2.9C with a 95% confidence interval of 2.6 to 3.2C.
These models use TSI, AMO, ENSO, Aerosols, and the natural log of atmospheric CO2 as independent variables and BEST Land Ocean or Land only data as the dependent variable in multiple linear regressions.
This independent analysis supports the mean estimates of the IPCC for TCR and ECS.
The median CMIP3 model has an ECS of 2.5 C and models with ECS lower than this do not match the empirical temperature data as well as models with ECS in the range of 2.7 to 2.9 C over the 1870-2015 period.
The lowest mean estimate was 1.7, using very simple models.
Another issue is the nonlinearity of the climate system. The principal equation that utilizes the climate feedback parameter (generally the inverse of ECS, depending on usage) is a linear relationship, with higher order terms neglected on the basis that the temperature response from feedback interactions is small.[74] This can still give rise to an asymmetric probability distribution due to uncertainties in observed climate forcing and the feedback responses.[75, 76] This linear assumption may underestimate the risk of high warming.[77] When the top-of-atmosphere energy imbalance is relatively small, such as in the first half of the 20th century, a linear relationship between radiative forcing and temperature change is an acceptable approximation. As the radiative forcing increases, this linear relationship may no longer hold and second or higher order terms become necessary. The asymmetry seen in most estimates for ECS probability distributions (the long right-hand tails) may be partially explained by this nonlinearity.[77] The use of uniform priors also gives rise to the skewed distributions seen in the pdfs for ECS, more so than with normal or noninformative priors.
Dennis said
“Using empirical data and simple linear models it is easy to show that the data supports a TCR of 1.9 C (1.7-2.0 C for 95% confidence interval). Using the land temperature data which might reflect ECS better, a linear model suggest an ECS of 2.9C with a 95% confidence interval of 2.6 to 3.2C.”
I agree that this is right on track, down to 2.9C being a better estimate than 3C for ECS. This last year may push it a bit closer to 3C, but I will have to double check on that.
That’s over 37 years of a consistent track record.
Denialists claim the numbers are being fudged to maintain this agreement. Yet, looking at the data, there is a significant amount of “noise” due to the ENSO signal, which somehow remains there with all this “fudging”. It is impossible to fudge the data while keeping this variation in place. The fingerprints of fudging data would be apparent as the ENSO signal disappears
Hi Dennis,
“Not many of those papers defend 1.65 C”
Average of 1.79 not including Lewis & Curry 2014.
Hi Javier,
If we select all the papers with the lowest estimates, then it is not surprising that the mean is relatively low.
A problem with the Aldrin et al 2012 and Skeie et al 2014 is that they estimate a climate sensitivity parameter which ignores the future warming of the ocean due to increased greenhouse gases. Their “climate sensitivity” is really a transient climate response, so it is nor surprising they have a low estimate, similar to my estimate of the transient climate response based on a simple multivariate linear regression.
So you can call it an equilibrium climate sensitivity that has been estimated, but you would be wrong. A name like “short term climate sensitivity” might be appropriate, bit the equilibrium climate sensitivity is the amount of warming of land and oceans in response to a doubling of atmospheric CO2 after the ocean has approached an equilibrium temperature in response to the increased radiative forcing du to higher levels of greenhouse gases.
The physics suggests it will take roughly 250 to 500 years for the ocean to approach this equilibrium level of warming.
The Aldrin and Skeie papers ignore this part of the ECS which accounts for their low estimates. Typically this ocean warming adds another 1 C to the ECS on top of the TCR, so your 1.8 C “ECS” (which is really TCR) should be about 2.8 C for actual ECS, which is not an unreasonable estimate.
Hi Javier,
Gavin Schmidt covered estimates of climate sensitivity at the link below:
And then there are the recent papers examining the transient constraint. The most thorough is Aldrin et al (2012). The transient constraint has been looked at before of course, but efforts have been severely hampered by the uncertainty associated with historical forcings – particularly aerosols, though other terms are also important (see here for an older discussion of this). Aldrin et al produce a number of (explicitly Bayesian) estimates, their ‘main’ one with a range of 1.2ºC to 3.5ºC (mean 2.0ºC) which assumes exactly zero indirect aerosol effects, and possibly a more realistic sensitivity test including a small Aerosol Indirect Effect of 1.2-4.8ºC (mean 2.5ºC). They also demonstrate that there are important dependencies on the ocean heat uptake estimates as well as to the aerosol forcings. One nice thing that added was an application of their methodology to three CMIP3 GCM results, showing that their estimates 3.1, 3.6 and 3.3ºC were reasonably close to the true model sensitivities of 2.7, 3.4 and 4.1ºC.
On other papers he said:
There are two recent papers on paleo constraints: the already mentioned PALAEOSENS (2012) paper which gives a good survey of existing estimates from paleo-climate and the hierarchy of different definitions of sensitivity. Their survey gives a range for the fast-feedback CS of 2.2-4.8ºC. Another new paper, taking a more explicitly Bayesian approach, from Hargreaves et al. suggests a mean 2.3°C and a 90% range of 0.5–4.0°C (with minor variations dependent on methodology). This can be compared to an earlier estimate from Köhler et al. (2010) who gave a range of 1.4-5.2ºC, with a mean value near 2.4ºC.
Note that the “fast feed back” sensitivity is different from the ECS (also called the Charney Sensitivity) which waits for the upper 700 meters of ocean to approach an equilibrium temperature (possibly 100 years after greenhouse gases stabilize).
The “Charney sensitivity” will be larger (by about 0.5 to 0.7 C) than the fast feedback sensitivity, which is larger than the transient climate response.
So rather than just apples and oranges, we would need to add bananas for the various flavors of climate sensitivity.
Hi Javier,
A good paper to consider is Marvel et al 2015, discussed at Real Climate at link below:
The paper used the GISS Model E2-R model (CMIP5) with a TCR of 1.4 C and an ECS of 2.3 C.
Based on empirical data, the paper estimates TCR is 1.6 C (using ERF) and ECS is 3 C (again using ERF). So just another recent paper with a different result for ECS, with a possible explanation for the lower estimates.
But Fred doesn’t lower nitrogen in plants cause lower chlorophyll production, small leaves and lower food production? Doesn’t it also cause lower reproductive rates and cause insect reduction, thus shifting and hampering the food chain?
There is most certainly a direct correlation between lower nitrogen levels and a reduction in chlorophyll production. Though I’m not sure it automatically follows that this will also reduce insect populations, at least in the near term. For one thing, a warming climate tends to favor the survival many insects that are considered agricultural pests.
As to how that will affect bird populations?! Yikes!
Oh, man, I think you are now starting to really increase the dimensions of the state space of the system. You are asking for apriori knowledge about the future behavior of a multi-dimensional computational state space system.
That’s Javier’s domain, I honestly haven’t anything more to offer than a hunch or two.
Maybe you can ask Javier to make you a graph of rising bird populations…
We can at least start with the N2 and photosynthesis part… um, yes, light levels do play a role in this discussion as do CO2 levels 😉
Here’s a paper that addresses a part of how Nitrogen can improve the rapid response of photosynthesis to changing irradiance in rice (Oryza sativa L.) plants
Jiali Sun, Miao Ye, Shaobing Peng & Yong Li
Abstract To identify the effect of nitrogen (N) nutrition on the dynamic photosynthesis of rice plants, a pot experiment was conducted under two N conditions. The leaf N and chlorophyll levels, as well as steady–state photosynthesis, were significantly increased under high N. After the transition from saturating to low light levels, decreases in the induction state (IS%) of leaf photosynthesis (A) and stomatal conductance (gs) were more severe under low than under high N supply. After the transition from low to flecked irradiance, the times to 90% of maximum A (T90%A) were significantly longer under low than under high N supply. Under flecked irradiance, the maximum A under saturating light (Amax–fleck) and the steady–state A under low light (Amin–fleck) were both lower than those under uniform irradiance (Asat and Ainitial). Under high N supply, Amax–fleck was 14.12% lower than Asat, while it was 22.80% lower under low N supply. The higher IS%, shorter T90%A, and the lower depression of Amax–fleck from Asat under high N supply led to a less carbon loss compared with under a low N supply. Therefore, we concluded that N can improve the rapid response of photosynthesis to changing irradiance.
Maybe if there were fewer damn birds there would be fewer conservatives complaining about how windmills are killing more birds than all the glass skyscrapers and pussy cats put together… I’m pretty sure the White House put out an alternate fact based bulletin on that!
Cheers!
From your link:
The land, biodiversity, oceans, forests, and other forms of natural capital are being depleted at unprecedented rates. Unless we change how we grow our food and manage our natural capital, food security—especially for the world’s poorest—will be at risk.
Already, volatile food prices—and the price spikes that can result—are the new normal. When faced with high food prices, many poor families cope by pulling their children out of school and eating cheaper, less nutritious food. This can have severe life-long effects on the social, physical, and mental well-being of millions of young people. Malnutrition contributes to infant, child, and maternal illness; decreased learning capacity; lower productivity, and higher mortality. One-third of all child deaths globally are attributed to under-nutrition.
Of course malnutrition is one reason fertility rates are falling in the undeveloped world. And things will get worse. Also: (Bold Mine)
A new study has examined the potentially disastrous implications that a combination of global warming and air pollution could have on crop yields by the year 2050. The research is one of the first projects to take into account a combination of the two dangers, and highlights the humanitarian crisis that could arise should the threat not be tackled head-on.
The study, carried out by researchers from MIT, the University of Hong Kong and Colorado State University, focuses on four major crops that represent over half the calories consumed by the global population – rice, wheat, corn, and soy. It estimates that global crop yields will drop by around 10 percent by the year 2050 due to global warming, however the damaging effects of air pollution may be harder to quantify due to the difficulty in differentiating it from other damaging phenomenon.
For example, an estimated 46 percent of damage to soy crops previously believed to have been caused by global warming was reportedly actually due to air pollution. However, whilst the two phenomenon damage the crops in their own right, they are also inextricably linked. The rising temperatures caused by global warming is itself the catalyst that leads to an increase in the creation of plant-damaging ozone.
But Dennis and Nick, not to worry, all this malnutrition is already causing a dramatic drop in the fertility rate, especially in the undeveloped world.
To me the biggest concern regarding food security is the enormous dependence of food production, transformation, and distribution, of oil. That is really our Achilles heel. Should we experience a reduction in oil supplies usually accompanied by a spike in food prices, we are going to be immediately in a very bad situation.
A spike in oil prices usually means a spike in food prices, with very nasty consequences.
To me the biggest concern regarding food security is the enormous dependence of food production, transformation, and distribution, of oil. That is really our Achilles heel.
I could not agree more. An increase in oil prices accompanied by a decrease in oil production is going to play havoc with food production. And of course all that will be accompanied by an increase in fertilizer prices.
When oil production starts to fall, it is going to get bad, really bad. And all those so called renewables will be of very little help.
I too couldn’t agree more with you two on this (Javier and Ron). I hope all who plan to live beyond 2030 are ready to spend a lot personal labor time in the field. Good land (class I/II farmland) is the precious thing, and water of course.
Might be a good time to get good with goat recipes.
Hi Ron,
I believe fertilizer price depends more on the price of natural gas than oil, see
Eventually natural gas prices will rise, but probably 5 to 10 years after the rise in oil prices (which will start in earnest in 2018.
Probably the use of oil for personal transportation will decrease as oil prices rise and the cost of batteries falls, leaving plenty of oil for the farm.
Lower fertility is mostly occurring because of decreased poverty rather than the reverse. The poorest nations on the planet tend to have the highest total fertility ratios, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa.
Greater access to modern birth control and education are the solutions to the population problem.
Hi Dennis. The nitrates in fertilizer are made from natural gas feed stock. But the phosphorous and potassium parts of fertilizer both must be mined and processed, so liquid fuel undoubtedly makes up a significant portion of their direct and indirect costs. So as oil prices increase, so will fertilizer prices. However…
Phosphorus is just as important to agriculture as water. But a lack of availability and accessibility of phosphorus is an emerging problem that threatens our capacity to feed the global population. Like nitrogen and potassium, it is a nutrient that plants take up from the soil and it is crucial to soil fertility and crop growth.
“Unless something is done, the scarcity of phosphorus will cause problems of a global dimension. As early as 2035 it is calculated that the demand for phosphorus map outpace the supply,” says Dana Cordell, who presented her thesis at the Department of Thematic Studies — Water and Environmental Studies, Linköping University, Sweden on the implications of phosphorus scarcity on global food security.
Phosphorus is extracted from phosphate rock, a non-renewable resource that is used almost exclusively in agriculture. Two thirds of the world’s resources are in China, Morocco, and Western Sahara.
As phosphorus becomes more scarce its price will skyrocket. So look for fertilizer prices to even outpace rising oil prices.
Hi Ron,
Any references on oil prices and fertilizer prices?
Most of what I have found suggests natural gas prices are a key, in many cases natural gas price moves with oil price so there may be a tie there.
Paper below finds that high oil prices do lead to high fertilizer prices as you have said.
Like oil, the world’s economy is totally dependent on phosphate rock. But our dependence on the latter differs: while oil can theoretically be replaced with solar, wind or biomass energy, there is no substitute for phosphorus in crop growth and hence food production. A scarcity of phosphate rock is therefore likely to threaten the world’s ability to produce food in the future if concerted efforts are not soon taken by policy makers, scientists, industry and the global community. While the critical point in time for phosphorus scarcity is highly uncertain and contested, all agree that demand for phosphorus is growing, and remaining phosphate rock is becoming increasingly scarce and expensive.
I don’ have the link handy but some years ago, the king(?) of Morroco, or whoever was running the country at that time, raised the price of phosphate ore four hundred percent, and nobody said a word.
They just paid the new asking price.
But it’s possible to recapture a good bit of the phosphorus we flush down toilets, and the nitrogen too, by recycling sewage onto farm land.
The art and science of crop management will advance so that we can use a great deal less, to get fairly close to the same yields, most likely. The necessary techniques are known , but implementation won’t come about until the price of phosphate fertilizer rises sharply, because the techniques are expensive.
Doing this on the grand scale is going to be expensive as hell, but it won’t be as big a problem as the alternative, doing without.
Hi Old Farmer Mac,
I imagine in the future there could be sewage recycling plants that converts human and farm animal waste into fertilizer, but I agree this will only happen when critical elements (N-P-K) become scarce.
How Donald Trump Kingmaker-Billionaires Robert and Rebekah Mercer Have Poured Millions Into Climate Science Denial
By Graham Readfearn • Thursday, January 12, 2017 – 10:34
This reply is in reply to your own above comment, but you already know all this stuff, so it’s for anybody else who cares to read it.
The papers you refer to are professionally produced, and must be taken seriously.
But as everybody knows who knows anything at all, the numbers are estimates, and they could be far wide of mark either way, at any given time.
The odds of them being off on the low side, meaning a lot less than twenty five percent loss of production , are not important in the context of my remarks in this comment. That would be great, but I want to talk about how we might collectively deal with declining food production.
I walk and talk professionally in this one field in particular.
The loss of production could easily be a lot worse that twenty five percent, or it could be somewhat less, because we don’t know precisely how fast the climate will warm, and worse, we don’t have more than a general idea how much growing conditions will change in any given geographical area.
The ” worse” potential scares the crap out of me when I allow myself to think about it. People who are well informed often remind those who are less knowledgeable that averages aren’t all that relevant to understanding the EFFECTS of warming on agriculture.
Some places, including some of the best agricultural land of the world , are going to be hotter and drier by a substantial margin ON AVERAGE, compared to the rest of the world. A few places with great potential given more rain might get that rain, etc, but there aren’t many such places.
It’s true as some people point out that growing conditions will actually improve in some parts of the world, on average, particularly in places rather far to the north. But that’s not where the people are, and the people that are going to be in one hell of a fix for food live in countries that don’t own land in the northern climes anyway. Farming in such places in any case will be a crapshoot of the first order, which is something I will address in another comment later on.
It will be horrible when food production in places where people just barely have enough to eat NOW declines gradually, on the human suffering level, but there is some hope that the rest of the world will be able to help out enough to prevent outright famines, and maybe keep the lid on the pressure cooker at least to the extent that no hot wars are fought over access to food, at least for some period of time.
But I wouldn’t bet my farm on the rest of the world being willing to foot the bill, and there’s a very real possibility that the rest of the world WON’T HAVE food enough on hand to giterdone anyway.
There’s some hope gradual declines can be managed locally and regionally,for some years, on a country by country basis, by diverting resources from other endeavors to providing more food production.
It really is possible to grow a great deal of food at a very small scale , meaning the individual family scale, if it is NECESSARY to do so. A country in dire need that goes on a wartime kind of economic footing to produce food the same way munitions and soldiers are produced during wartime will be able to cope to some extent. Resources that are wasted now CAN be put to good use.
Add a little poop and pee, and a few thousand square feet of ground, even if the soil is pathetically depleted, can be extraordinarily productive, using just a LITTLE water, and just a few dollars worth of drip line tubing, etc.
But this sort of coping depends on the availability off food declining gradually, because it will ( very likely ) only be implemented with production declining gradually, as the people in dire need start doing anything they can to eat.
It takes a long time to establish family minifarms or little local community farms of this nature. People have to become convinced of the need, laws and regulations and customs have to change, diets have to change, and there is a STEEP learning curve to be mastered. The people involved, meaning most people, will have to devote a substantial amount of time to the job, time that is now devoted to other work or leisure, and they will have to get by with less other stuff, but they would be able to produce enough this way to substantially reduce the odds of outright famines.
It’s hard to estimate how long it would take to really exploit the potential for alternative production of this sort, but my guess is that it would take at least five to ten years from the time a really serious effort is made to get started.
Now HERE is the REALLY scary part. Consider that people who habitually drive drunk get away with it , ninety five per cent plus of the time, but they do have the occasional fender bender, maybe once or twice in four or five years. Sooner or later they have a SERIOUS accident, maybe this week, maybe five or ten years down the road, if they haven’t been jailed to keep them off the road.
Food production, and the problems associated with it, tend to vary in a fashion comparable to the accidents suffered by drunk drivers. There will be local and regional shortfalls, which will cause more or less pain and stress, locally and regionally, but they will be survivable, just as fender benders are survivable. And just as drunk drivers don’t take their fender benders seriously enough to give up either the keys or the alcohol, the people in such places probably aren’t going to change their ways, because the next two or three years , most likely, production will be up again, and they will continue to do as they usually do, ignoring the problem.
Sooner or later, a weather disaster will hit, and the odds of such a disaster happening grow a little higher every year as the climate heats up. A really wet spring season can delay planting for a few weeks , and this in and of itself can and does result in yields falling off ten percent or more.
If a drought hits after a wet late spring delays planting, production could easily fall off fifty percent or more, regionally. Regionally could mean an area as large as the Yankee bread basket, or half of India.
There are other substantial risks involved as well. A long spell of unusually damp weather can and does sometimes result in major outbreaks of pests and diseases, and while the drought problem vastly outweighs the flood problem, floods will be a problem too.
It’s a foregone conclusion that in places where it is possible to grow more food by putting more land to the plow, it will be done, and the ecosystem services provided by wild or semiwild lands will be lost in proportion to the amount lost, in some cases. In other cases, ecosystem support to agriculture will be lost altogether. Bats eat awesome numbers of insects where they are found, ditto many species of birds. If too much habitat critical to any given species of insect eating bird is lost, the population of that bird will crash, maybe all the way to ZERO over large areas. The species might even go extinct. Some will, there’s hardly any question about that. Predatory insects and wild pollinator insect species ( mostly various bees but there are others ) WILL crash due to habitat loss.
The depletion of fossil fuels, everything else held equal, will result in the price of synthetic fertilizers going thru the roof, sooner or later, and there is essentially no chance at all that production can be maintained on the grand scale, or over large regions, without these fertilizers, at least not for the next thirty or forty years. After that……. maybe. Miracles on the technology front are possible, and to be hoped for, but not to be counted on.
What all these factors combined boil down to, in a nutshell, is that it’s a foregone conclusion that plain old bad luck guarantees that various large regions will experience potentially catastrophic losses of production, without warning , in a fashion that can only be predicted in a general way.
I can say these sudden regional crashes ARE BAKED IN, but not how frequent they will be, nor where they will occur, nor how often. All I can say is that they will be more frequent than they have been in the past, for a lot more reasons than I have mentioned here today.
It’s rather unlikely that food production will crash dramatically in any one year on a global basis, so it’s unlikely that there will be massive unrest, riots, forced mass migrations of hungry people, etc in more than a few places any given year, at least in the earlier years of really troublesome warming.
Bottom line, regional crisis level food shortages, shortages at the famine level, are going to hit without warning. People are going to starve, slowly, or not so slowly, by the tens of millions, and once that happens, the other Horsemen, War, Pestilience, Death, will run wild.
How it will all play out is an open question, but one good thing about being an old fart is that I will most likely be gone before the shit is well and truly in the fan.
The consequences could range all the way up to flat out nuclear war, although I think the odds of nuclear war between the really big and powerful countries such as China, the USA, and Russia are very low. The odds of a nuclear war between say India and Pakistan……….. who can say?
In the past, biological warfare has mostly been a rather impractical and iffy undertaking, and not often successfully DELIBERATELY implemented. But it’s an indisputable fact that when we Euro types landed on the east coast of North America and established colonies, we mostly didn’t HAVE to bother ( sarcasm intended using this word bother) with genocidal warfare in order to play that old Darwinian game so beloved of Mother Nature.The contagious diseases we brought with us killed most of the local people here ahead of us. We rolled over the rest like a tsunami.
Sky Daddy alone knows what may be possible in the near future in terms of biological warfare. I have talked about these possibilities, not for attribution, with a few microbiologists and other specialists who know a lot about the various technologies involved, and my conclusion is that most of the people in the field, or related fields, believe there is a very real possibility, that within another decade or two, even relatively poor and backward countries will be able to invent and manufacture biological weapons that could wipe out just about everybody in places where they are deliberately released. Whether such hypothetical diseases could be contained by quarantine is questionable to say the least.
And if a new killer disease comparable to the flu ( but possibly far deadlier and far more contagious) that swept the world during WWI is created, who is to say the creators won’t already have a vaccine ready prior to releasing it? A vaccine reserved for the use of their own people?
It’s a damned good thing most of the real individual troublemakers in this old world are underachievers lacking in imagination, because they could cause a hundred times more trouble than they are causing so far, except for the areas where actual fighting is going on.
I won’t say anymore than that anybody who knows his shit when it comes to agriculture could potentially cause more problems, all by himself, than an an entire division of soldiers set loose to plunder a helpless country. I wouldn’t say this much, except that some of the trouble makers DO have brains and initiative, and know about the possibilities already. The ones who know enough to act also know enough to know that they might harm their own cause more than the enemies, and thus they so far have refrained from acting in this respect. They might not hold back,in the event they come to believe their cause is lost, and decide to take as many of their enemies with them as they can.
We live in interesting times, and although they are flat instead of round, all of us here have crystal balls, and if we live long enough, we can watch it all come to pass.
Hi Old Farmer Mac,
How much warming (in degrees Celsius) is “really troublesome” for a farmer?
Since 1960 temperature has risen at the rate of 2.62 C/century in Virginia or 1.44 C from 1960 to 2015 (data from Berkeley Earth), is that a “troublesome” amount of warming so far? Does the oft cited 2 C of warming seem a catastrophic level of warming? The Northern hemisphere land temperature has risen on average about 1.5C from the 1850-1900 mean and about 1 C from the 1951-1980 mean (10 year centered average in June 2008). Has farming in Virginia become more difficult (lower yields etc) due to the 1.4 C temperature increase since 1960?
I know very little about farming. Grow some stuff in my backyard garden, which is the extent of what I know about growing food.
I no longer have access to professional journals, which is a great disadvantage to me, in answering you more specifically. Hopefully within the next year or so, I will have my personal ducks in a straighter row, and get up to Blacksburg, and enroll in a course or two as a special grad student, which will give me access again, and an opportunity to talk extensively with specialists, etc.
That’s part of the plan, anyway, and necessary to doing a good job on my book- which I will hopefully finish someday.
As you know, since you are quite obviously skilled in statistics, separating the signals from the noise can be hard, unless you have a large long term data set. I don’t. I don’t know if it is possible to say with certainty that farmers in this state have yet suffered much in the way of ill effects from climate change over the last couple of generations.
But I can say anecdotally that we have clearly suffered in the orchard business, which is the specialty I know best, from EITHER a long run of bad luck, which has gotten worse, as the years have passed, or ELSE we have suffered , and are suffering , from climate change.
The average temperature in the sense of it being a couple of degrees warmer on any particular day of the year, doesn’t make much difference at all , on an ANNUAL basis. Corn grows about as well at eighty as it does at eighty two.
(Sorry I have never gotten into metrics, except in lab work, where everything is metric. I can do the calculations, and it’s easier in metric of course. But I just don’t THINK in metric. I can do fractions in my head, as needed in my day to day life.I use the decimal inch for precision measure in the shop, and all the people I normally talk to on a day to day basis use the old system. I don’t LIKE metrics on a day to day basis. It’s a damned sight easier to read halves quarters eighths sixteenths, etc, on a tape, and you CANNOT read a subdivided millimeter without a powerful magnifying glass, etc.It’s likewise true that I can’t see a onehunredtwentyeighth inch division on a rule for sure, not anymore, lol, and I can’t see a one thousandth division at all. But I have micrometers and vernier calipers marked in inches, and they cost a lot a long time ago. I use a pad or calculator and convert the readings to metric if NECESSARY. Every single stick of lumber, sheet of plywood, board, brick, block, angle iron, channel iron, I beam, etc, that I own or run into on the job has been standardized and manufactured on the old system. A typical American trades guy will necessarily have to be competent in Imperial measure a lot longer than I will live. But the younger guys might as well get used to metrics, because sooner or later, all NEW manufactured standardized materials dimensions, etc, will be metric. )
Now old anti metric fogey ranting aside, I hate to sound like Javier, but a little warming is not NECESSARILY a problem for farmers. A glass of wine is not necessarily a problem, it can be good for you right? But a bottle of wine, or too much warming IS a problem.
The problem that kicks your butt up into your abdominal cavity as the average temperature rises is that the higher temperatures are never just a degree, or two, warmer , every day, day after day. The length of the growing season changes, and you gain a few days ,on average, which can be and mostly is GOOD.
But as usual, the devil is in the details.
One thing has actually happened HERE is that we have been getting more days that are a LOT warmer than just a degree or two, during the winter months, and especially during the later part of the winter season. Farmers don’t think in terms of officially designated seasons,lol. Spring to us is when things turn green, rather than a subdivision on a calender. So the trees wake up, too soon, and bloom, and then you get a killing frost at about the same calendar date as usual. You can replant corn, but you can’t make an apple tree bloom twice. We are suffering a lot more frost damage than we used to. Warming or luck? I can’t say for sure, but if the trend continues, it’s climate warming up.
And we have been getting hit with hail noticeably more often as the years have passed. Bad weather luck, or climate change, who can say?
When I was a kid, there was ONE place in the entire neighborhood you could get a fig. My maternal grandfather built his house in a very well sheltered spot, with hills on either side to block the wind, and he planted figs tight against the south facing masonry wall. Behind that wall there is a full basement, where in the temperature has never fallen to freezing. His figs prospered. Nobody else had such a good spot, and so nobody else had figs, locally. Figs right off the tree are one of nature’s most sublime gifts, and they are easily propagated from cuttings, and the roots send up shoots all over the place, which can be transplanted. So a number of people tried raising them, no luck.
Fig trees are perfectly common place around here NOW. We still need to select a sheltered spot, but it doesn’t have to be all that good a spot anymore.Any a south facing wall that is sheltered from the worst winter winds is satisfactory.
There’s an important Christmas tree industry in this area, but it’s pretty much the accepted wisdom that you don’t try it at less than about two twenty two to twenty four hundred feet elevation, or they won’t grow. People used to plant some at somewhat lower elevations, and they seemed to do ok.
We aren’t getting as many really cold ( meaning zero to ten F ) days and nights as we used too, and this means that many species of insects over winter in greater numbers than formerly , and insect populations explode in exponential fashion, as a rule, every year. This is perfectly NORMAL. Insect populations always crash in the winter and explode thru the spring and summer.
That swift kick in the butt comes in again when there are enough surviving insects to get the insect ball rolling earlier than usual. The peak number of bugs chewing on your crops can be ten times or even more than ten times as high as usual, if they get a good early start.Sometimes the bugs get in a whole extra GENERATION, and there can be a thousand times as many as usual. This can mean you have to put on a couple more applications of insecticides, which is a VERY expensive job, and unfortunately the insecticides may kill some beneficial insects as well. Plus there are larger implications for the environment, but that’s off topic for the moment.
My end of the state is a long way from the coast, and we have never had much in the way of problems with hurricane winds. We have had fewer problems state wide with such winds in recent years, compared to decades back.
But locally we have traditionally expected that autumn hurricanes would bring us some good heavy rains, over a period of days, which helped keep up the water table, stream flows,and soil moisture.
We haven’t been getting these autumn rains as often as we used to.
So- Taken all around, I think it’s probable that bad weather luck is a less likely explanation that that our climate has changed for the worse, in terms of farming.
Now to be clear, the weather is STILL well suited to farming, but we adjusted our operations to the average weather we used to have, when we were having it, and now we seem to be paying a price, because it’s not easy to adjust your operations to changing conditions, especially when you don’t know what changes you need to make, because you don’t know what conditions will prevail a decade down the road.
The country has gone nuts for wine, and a lot of people have put in grapes just to the south, in North Carolina. They haven’t done as well as expected. The weather has turned out to be a little too hot and humid, on average, although the varieties were generally selected based on the recommendations of professional researchers.
Farmers here in the USA will be able to adapt successfully to changing climate, in terms of gradual changes in average temperatures. The most southerly located apple orchards will fail, but the flip side is that citrus growers will be able to move north some distance if they want to, rather that being forced to.
Guys and girls who grow field crops can switch varieties, or even switch to new crops, as the climate warms up, as far as the average temperature is concerned.
But if the average amount of rain that falls in any given part of the country changes significantly, especially if the changes occur at the most disadvantageous times,farmers in that part of the country may find themselves up the proverbial creek without the proverbial paddle.
From what I read, most modelers expect we will have a LOT more problems with droughts than with floods, but a flood can still wipe out farmers by the thousands, and a long spell of extremely wet weather in the spring, or during the harvest season , can result in yields falling off by fifty percent or more , sometimes, over distances well into the hundreds of miles.
You can grow a decent crop of corn with forty inches of rain, if it falls mostly when you need it. If you can’t irrigate, which is an EXPENSIVE undertaking, and your average rain drops to thirty five inches……….. you may have to give up corn, and try hay and cows, or wheat, because while you could still grow corn, you wouldn’t be be able to compete with a guy who gets the additional five inches, everything else equal.
It’s been raining and snowing in the western mountains that are the source of the water that enables California to WORK, economically. If the rains continue to fall, copiously, we will continue to have domestically sourced fresh winter veggies.
But
The drought there is by no means OVER, it’s just off the front pages for the moment. If the recent trend towards less rain there continues a few more years, we won’t be eating much California produce.
It’s the possibility of more frequent wide scale long term droughts that scares me more than any other single factor.
I don’t know enough about farming in other parts of the world where the people are very heavily dependent on a single crop say rice for instance, to say that a couple more degrees warming will help or hinder production, in any given locality. But it’s well known that every major crop grows well only within some fairly hard and sharp temperature limits, at both the high and low extremes.
If people are growing rice, for example , in places that are already at or near the upper limit for rice to do well, another degree or two of warming could mean their yields will fall off enough to mean they go hungry.
In places where a given crop might continue to do well, in and of itself, due to warmer temperatures, blights or fungus infections or insect problems that were formerly manageable and tolerable could get so bad that crops would fail on a far more frequent basis that formerly.
I need to get back into the academic environment in order to learn the specifics when it comes to given crops and given areas, on a national or world wide basis.
Old Farmer, with the large changes in crop genetics and methods of production over the last few decades, wouldn’t the extra production per acre mask the signal of crop reduction by warming except in severe cases?
Sure. We don’t see the crop reduction by warming, but it is still there masked, and some time in the future it will rise to become a very serious problem for humankind.
You don’t realize how similar and repetitive these stories sound and they have an incredibly long record of failure. But doomsters are never put off by failure. They just move forward the date.
HI Javier
I have posted before, in your defense, that there IS a non zero chance that you are right about enough warming happening to be a major problem.
But that chance is probably one in million, lol.
Now as far as KNOWING what will happen if the climate warms up to a given extent in any given area, we KNOW from experience that there will be proportionally MORE extremely hot days is that area.
And we KNOW VERY WELL what the effects of such hot days are on crops in the field. Depending on what the calender date may be, they are neutral to disastrous nearly all the time, statistically.
You make a greater fool of yourself day after day.
Oldfarmermac
Perhaps you are the one making a fool of yourself by talking without checking the facts.
Our agriculture is not being affected by climate change perhaps because the number of very hot days is not increasing. Contrary to expectations and contrary to your beliefs.
Not in the US
And not in Australia.
So no damage to our agriculture from global warming. Sorry, that’s the evidence.
You might believe otherwise if you want.
Backatcha Javier,
I have said that it is unlikely that the case can be proven EITHER way, that warming ( meaning in the last few decades, I should have said, but failed to specify ) has EITHER helped or hindered in the production of food, on a world wide basis.
Most agricultural scientists ( and working farmers who have read up on longer term climate trends, going back a few hundred years,) will agree that we are in a better position now, in terms of climate, than during the Little Ice Age. I personally don’t know of any who would disagree with this statement.
I SAID was that you are making a fool out of yourself if ( or when ) you insist that continued warming will not result in an excessive number of days that are too hot for crops to thrive.
And additionally I also said you are making a fool out of yourself when you say agricultural scientists and practicing farmers don’t know what the effects are of extremely hot days that fall during the growing season on crops in the field. We DO know.
Even guys who work as laborers on farms know. They’ve seen it.
If the AVERAGE temperature continues to increase, the number of excessively hot days will increase too, in the professional opinion of virtually everybody in the fields of agriculture, statistics, climate, etc.
And it’s a given among professionals in my field we should take the precautionary principle seriously.
As a matter of fact, it’s pretty much SOP to take the precautionary principle as seriously as personal heart attack in ANY field of science involving the environment, public health, or other such broad issues.
You might have heard about that old bit of homely wisdom than says a stitch in time saves nine.
And you might have some knowledge in respect to taking proactive measures in respect to reducing or eliminating future problems.
Most people understand that fixing a leaky roof now is a lot cheaper than replacing an entire rotted out house a decade or two down the road. Most people understand the importance of proactive precautionary measures, especially if the potential problem is even a hundredth as serious as continued forced warming.
You leave me with no other choice, considering your reckless attitude in this respect except to conclude that you are a dangerous quack.
Many kinds of problems can be minimized if proper precautionary measures are proactively taken. Without proactive measures, they can and often do get ENTIRELY out of hand over a period of years, so that possible corrective measures are either prohibitively costly, or non existent.
I have resisted actually saying so until the last few days. But I should have said so sooner. You’re a dangerous quack.
You’re the ONE kid marching in step to the factual music, in your opinion.
Virtually everybody else believes you’re the kid out of step.
I will look into the statistical evidence pretty soon concerning the number of hot days that fall during the critical parts of the growing seasons.
IF there’s any way to cherry pick it, I’m fairly sure you have found it.
Hi GF,
I was just fixing to come back and add something to what I posted in response to Dennis’s question.
These things get to be sort of involved, and separating the various causes and effects can be tricky.
OK- First off, it IS true that as a GENERAL PROPOSITION, more CO2 means greater productivity in most species of plants.
And it is true that SOME warming will improve the productivity of some cultivated plants in some parts of the geographic range over which they are cultivated.
Now without doing some fairly sophisticated, extensive, time consuming and expensive gathering of data , and crunching it, it would be hard to say for sure, either way, that there has been, or has NOT been, a very slight increase in the average yields of food crops.
Your speculative question is DEAD ON.
We KNOW , without ANY question at all, that the farmers of the world ARE using more pesticides, more fertilizer, more herbicides, more of every thing, more irrigation,and of course substantially more productive cultivars ( cultivated varieties) every year, as the years pass.
It’s also rather likely that the total acreage of the major crops has been creeping up over the last few years, although I’m not sure of this point.
So – everything else held equal, we should EXPECT record production year after year. Of course everything is never equal, with the weather being the biggest variable from one year to the next. A major drought or late wet spring, etc, can put a huge dent in production across the entire American mid western bread basket, by way of example . That would be most enough to prevent a record being set world wide for corn or wheat.
Javier doesn’t really have a leg to stand on in terms of asserting that warming is responsible for record crop production. On the other hand……. can I prove some minor portion of the better yields is not the result of warming?
No, I cannot.
But I know that if my neighbors who are growing corn or soybeans go back to the tech they were using just eight or years ago, their yields would fall off five to ten percent!
It’s just not possible to make a good case for warming increasing food production, globally. There’s a correlation, but correlations do not prove causation, and we all know that.
Now another thing that agricultural scientists and working farmers alike know without a SHADOW of a doubt, is that it takes only a few unusually hot days to really cut into crop yields.
What happens is that higher temperatures lead to increased transpiration, so long as soil water is plentiful, but as soon as the plant starts getting to be a little water stressed, it shuts off some pores, which saves water, but it also slows down CO2 intake. CO2 is of course the carbon input source. Hydrogen is ultimately sourced from water, and nitrogen from the air, indirectly, via microbes that can source it from the air.
When the weather gets too hot, our little green food factories slow down to a crawl. As I pointed out in my above comment , there are HARD and fairly SHARPLY defined limits to the temperature range at which any given crop does well. Any colder, or any hotter, and yields start to decline dramatically.
Just about any working farmer will tell you a five or ten extremely hot days, relative to normal highs at his location, mean he’s going to be in the hole, running in the red for the year, if they fall during the wrong part of the season for the crops he grows.
If you can irrigate, you can usually compensate for the heat, up to a certain limit, but irrigation is an expensive proposition, and most farmers don’t have the equipment needed. And even the ones who do have the equipment are apt to run short of water.
A lot of farmers in California have the equipment, but they have never the less stood by and watched helplessly as their almond orchards died for lack of water over the last couple of years.
It’s common knowledge in the industry and among people who are well informed concerning environmental issues that we are looking at a fossil water crisis that might be WORSE than the fossil fuel depletion crisis that must sooner or later arrive, unless we manage the transition to renewable energy, because we will run out of fossil water QUICKER.
Either way, whichever comes first, we’re collectively in for some extremely rough involuntary sex.
I cannot prove that the climate has heated up enough, SO FAR, that total crop yields have suffered due to warming. Javier cannot prove yields have increased due to warming.
What I KNOW, as a farmer, professionally trained, is that if the climate continues to warm , yields WILL decline, and we know how about hot it must get , in order for this to happen, at any given location.
And if the climate modelers are even in the ballpark , it ‘s going to get a LOT hotter than working farmers would like. A LOT hotter. Hot enough to fuck things up ROYALLY.
“The simulations reproduced a strong reduction in past crop yields induced by high temperatures, thereby confirming that they capture one main mechanism for future projections. Importantly, the scientists find that increased irrigation can reduce the negative effects of global warming on crops—but this is possible only in regions where sufficient water is available. Eventually, limiting global warming is needed to keep crop losses in check.”
Thanks Old Farmer, very informative response. The kind I would like to see more of on this site.
I wouldn’t concern myself with Javier too much, his hole is dug and he doesn’t know enough to stop digging.
Backatcha GF,
You’re welcome,and thanks for reading my comments.
I likewise would like to see more comments posted by specialists in various fields.
It would be great if we had more people like Fernando, who’s hands on oil engineer. We don’t have any regulars who are health care professionals, or professional military guys, or materials scientists of the sort who work on cutting edge new materials , or a serious historian, or ……..
Now if a correlation is STRONG ENOUGH, then causation is probable, or certain, and there is a VERY strong correlation between high temperatures and water stress in geographically and climatically temperate farming .
If it gets a good bit hotter than usual, then you can safely bet crops in the field are going to be water stressed , and between the heat and the water stress, the result is that yields drop off DRAMATICALLY.
The data in such documents as this one is all the proof anybody other than a Javier will ever need to understand that if the climate continues to warm up, we are going to be in one hell of a fix.
This is HARD DATA. It’s not modeling.It’s not theoretical.
Hard data.
OFM,
“Javier doesn’t really have a leg to stand on in terms of asserting that warming is responsible for record crop production.”
Warming surely did not harm crop production, did it? If you think so let’s see your leg.
“If you think so let’s see your leg.”
Cheeky.
How about the 2010 Russian heatwave that saw grain yields decline and exports banned.
What about it?
Any evidence that global warming was implicated? Since the world is warming, there should be by now a global effect.
One of the worst heat waves in Europe took place in 1540. Was it global warming?
Right, because we can see in the West Russian record how heat waves have been getting more frequent.
Wait a second, actually the evidence disproves it.
Climate disruptions to agriculture have increased. Many regions will experience declines in crop and livestock production from increased stress due to weeds, diseases, insect pests, and other climate change induced stresses.
More doom predictions, while the evidence says otherwise.
Cold can easily be a lot more devastating to crops than heat. A late frost is one of the greatest dangers in agriculture.
“Cold can easily be a lot more devastating to crops than heat”.
I’ve lost a year’s production three or four times to frost, raising apples and peaches, and suffered lesser losses a couple of dozen times.
In every case, the trees broke dormancy way too early, because we had unseasonably warm late winter weather.
Not once did I ever lose a crop due to having typical late winter weather followed by a normal spring season with a killer frost arriving after our usual last hard frost date.
Farmers who grow field crops can replant. It’s expensive, and it results in significant lost production, but that’s something we can do something about.
Unless a farmer is one of the lucky minority with irrigation equipment, and an ample supply of water, there’s virtually NOTHING we can do about killer heat.
And unusually hot weather usually arrives in combination with dry weather, especially in the temperate zone where we grow most of the grain that’s the foundation of our food supply.
Any experienced temperate zone grain or fruit or vegetable farmer will tell you he has lost more production to hot weather than he has lost to cold weather, probably by a factor of at least three or four to one.
Javier might conceivably have heard that correlation is not evidence of causation but if so, he has forgotten all about hearing it.
Nearly 80% of the nitrogen found in human tissues originated from the Haber-Bosch process in which artificial ammonia is produced.
Malthus died in 1834.
Haber-Bosch process successfully developed for industrial scale in 1910.
Due to its dramatic impact on the human ability to grow food, the Haber process served as the “detonator of the population explosion”, enabling the global population to increase from 1.6 billion in 1900 to today’s 7 billion. Nearly 80% of the nitrogen found in human tissues originated from the Haber-Bosch process
The green revolution in the late 1960s
After the Second World War, increased deployment of technologies including pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers as well as new breeds of high yield crops greatly increased global food production.
Chances now are that global energy production will slow and is soon likely to start to decline.
Isn’t nature wonderful? It makes creatures who can evolve technology to produce needed nutrients much faster than the rest of the natural order.
There is a huge supply of nitrogen all around us. There are also many phosphorus containing rocks, just need a new process to access it.
Huge amounts of energy are all around us, just have to be willing to implement the new technologies and not get stuck in the bad old days.
Looks like the new regime is going to gut the clean energy program. In return workers get an extra 10 cents an hour raise within seven years! Whooopeee!!!
Well, not really because there will be more workers to spread it around, so it might only be 7 cents an hour.
.
Someone over at Real Climate posted a link to this talk:
I think it thickens the plot a bit. Especially near the end of the talk when he gets to geoengineering.
If humans manage to continue on this path it is the end of the ‘Natural’ world as we have known it. E.O. Wilson’s vision of ‘Half-Earth. Our Planet’s Fight for Life’ is doomed! The conservative right wing religious meme of ‘Man’ dominating the earth will have come to pass! Viva La Anthropocene! Good bye Whales, and Orangutans it was nice knowing ya… Hey, we need to cut down every last stretch of Borneo rain forest so we can grow Palm Oil for the junk food industry. It is God’s will!
The new Government Website makes much more sense once you watch that talk! So does Javier’s “See, No Problem!” Attitude.
Humans living in shopping malls, driving ICE Pickups with bibles on their dashboards, rifles in their gun racks terraforming our entire planet like the cyanobacteria did 3.8 billion years ago.
Cheers and Good Luck!
The neo-liberal attempt to geo-engineer the climate system is just another technological and economic trap similar to the problems they are supposedly trying to solve.
First, just to reduce and eventually eliminate the production of GHG’s means a highly energetic and initially expensive campaign to re-engineer the technology of civilization.
Geo-engineering just adds one more level of gigantic complexity and energy to achieve an unknowable result. Unknowable because it does not solve the problem, merely covers it up and tries to put the problem back in a box, actually a worldwide set of boxes yet undefined. All this with incomplete knowledge or recognition of the natural processes it is playing with.
Also geo-engineering can have the rubber band effect. After reducing or eliminating carbon output, then covering up the problem with reflective clouds, what happens when something interrupts the cover-up? A sudden doubling of heat gain occurs causing weather chaos. Let alone the totally unknown effect on the monsoon system while the process is running.
The fantastic size and complexity of carbon capture and storage planet wide is almost beyond belief. The cost would be tremendous, if it ever did become fully implemented and the security of the storage is unknown over time.
Yes, the whole idea of the “market” knowing better and making the best decisions is a huge fantasy.
Hi Gonefishing,
When most economists suggest a market economy with minimal government interference results in the most efficient allocation of scarce resources (which is true only in the case of a perfectly competitive market with no negative or positive externalities, a case which does not exist in reality), they implicitly assume that monopolies are regulated and that government regulation of negative externalities (pollution) and support for positive externalities (public transportation or road infrastructure) will occur.
You are absolutely correct that our incomplete understanding of the natural world makes the task of regulating positive and negative externalities appropriately almost impossible.
We do the best we can with current scientific understanding while continuing to increase our level of knowledge.
fyi
10 Investigative Reporting Outlets to Follow
Here are some new organizations, as well as a few established ones, that are working to uncover the truth.
I’m guessing, but I think that if you loaded the battery from one into the back of an old Model A pickup truck with a four banger and replaced the engine with an electric motor with the same amount of horsepower, it would go at least five or six hundred miles, and maybe as far as eight hundred miles, but of course it wouldn’t go over about forty or so. But about forty is as fast as anybody with good sense wanted to go, considering the brakes, suspension, tires , etc, back then.
It would be interesting to see how far a chevy bolt would go at 40 mph max.
Heat off, AC off, headights off, steady highway cruising, my guess is three hundred twenty five to three hundred fifty miles by actual road test before she falls back to limp off the road mode.
It’s amazing how much slowing down increases fuel efficiency. Aero drag is MURDER, and it increases exponentially.
GLOBAL ENERGY NEWS | Tue Jan 17, 2017 | 4:13pm IST
In latest move, China halts over 100 coal power projects
China’s energy regulator has ordered 11 provinces to stop more than 100 coal-fired power projects, with a combined installed capacity of more than 100 gigawatts, its latest dramatic step to curb the use of fossil fuels in the world’s top energy market.
In a document issued on Jan. 14, financial media group Caixin reported, the National Energy Administration (NEA) suspended the coal projects, some of which were already under construction.
The projects worth some 430 billion yuan ($62 billion) were to have been spread across provinces and autonomous regions including Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Gansu, Ningxia, Qinghai, Shaanxi and other northwestern areas
Putting the power projects on hold is a major step towards the government’s effort to produce power from renewable sources such as solar and wind, and wean the country off coal, which accounts for the majority of the nation’s power supply…
…To put it in perspective, some 130 GW of additional solar and wind power will be installed by 2020, equal to France’s total renewable power generation capacity, said Frank Yu, principal consultant at Wood Mackenzie.
“This shows the government is keeping its promise in curbing supplies of coal power,” Yu said.
While Trump wants YUUUGE coal mining and generation increases to make America Great Again, China just says,’that’s pretty stupid!’, Let’s just keep investing in Clean energy instead.
I couldn’t agree more with just about every line of this article.
Next time around, remember that while you can’t control who the opposition is, you have some control of what they run on, depending on WHO your candidate is.
There’s no NEED to hand the opposition a suitcase of grenades to lob back at you.
And while individuals cannot exert much control over which candidate gets the actual nomination, they can collectively work on making sure the one who gets it is the most likely one to win.
The only line I disagree with is the one about the” coastal elites” getting it. I sure as hell didn’t notice the coastal elites saying very much in favor of the rest of the country.
The VAST majority of what was said was condescending, sniffy nose in the air, to say the least. Most of it was outright insults, the sort virtually guaranteed to provoke the targeted audience into either staying home or voting for TRUMP.
Most of what was said HERE was the same sort of stuff.
But it didn’t matter much HERE, because the audience is small, and hardly anybody here, other than yours truly, is a horny handed son of the soil, so to speak.
I am now DONE talking about HRC’s shortcomings, except for a passing reference, unless somebody REMINDS me again to point out WHY Trump is now our president.
White House climate change webpage disappears after Trump’s inauguration
“The only line I disagree with is the one about the” coastal elites” getting it. I sure as hell didn’t notice the coastal elites saying very much in favor of the rest of the country.”
MacBackwoods, you have got it ass backwards about who gets it. You have been conned.
Repeat a lie often enough, and it will be believed by people who don’t hear the other side of the story. I will reply every time you tell it.
You’re a cynical, sniveling, bald faced liar of a little partisan porch dog, and everybody knows it. It’s understandable that hardly anybody will post a comment acknowledging my argument. People don’t usually like to admit they were wrong.
I spent the last few months making the case that Clinton was a very high risk candidate, due to her record and baggage train. I started well before she had the nomination locked up, supporting Sanders because he did not HAVE the baggage train, or the negatives, and because he better represents the traditional Democratic Party.
Clinton lost.
I was as right as the day is long.
My point all along, once Sanders conceded, has been to wake up D voters about running the WRONG candidate, so that hopefully they will run a BETTER candidate next time, one who has more brains, better polling numbers, less baggage, etc.
Thanks for helping me keep the attention of the audience focused on my arguments.
Your wanna be empress lost, CHUMP. She lost because she was arrogant, stupid, overbearing, and condescending, and because she talked only a little working class talk, at long intervals, and in the wrong places. She lost because she had a baggage train a mile long, and because half the country had near zero use for her even before the real campaign even got started.
She essentially extended her middle finger to the people of the three big Rust Belt states that put Trump in the WH, not even paying them the courtesy of a visit.
That’s the single COLOSSAL mistake that put Trump in the White House, her being so arrogant as to assume traditional D voting working people would vote for here even as she walked the one percenters walk with the bankers who paid her millions without even blushing, without even trying to conceal the millions.
Well, those working class voters extended that middle finger right back.
Trump’s the result.
And every body in this forum knows it’s true, even you.
Of course nobody is willing to come out and actually say so NOW, since they have failed to acknowledge my point previously, when it could have made a difference, back when Sanders was still in the race for the nomination.
Hardly anybody likes to admit he has been wrong on such an important point, so I don’t expect comments acknowledging I was RIGHT.
And I ‘m sure at least SOME of the D’s in this forum have mostly already made up their minds that they will not support another candidate with Clinton’s shortcomings in future elections, during the primary season. They’ll vote for candidates more likely to win the actual election in the primaries.
Likewise, at least some of the middle of the roaders who vote in primaries in states with open primaries will be thinking about how their choice will fare in the actual election.
I have made my point.
I will repeat it, any time you remind me.
“My point all along, once Sanders conceded, has been to wake up D voters about running the WRONG candidate, so that hopefully they will run a BETTER candidate next time, one who has more brains, better polling numbers, less baggage, etc.”
So there it is, you admit for the almost 5 months prior to the election you trashed HRC and at the same time claiming to want the Democrats to win(only in Republicanland does this make sense). Also claiming that your an Independent who was supporting a life long Independent Sanders.
I stand by my case your a backwoods Republican who enjoyed damaging the Democrat party. Who has swallowed the Republican hate Clinton smear tactics for the last 25 years.
Just admit it, your a Republican Trump supporter because sooner or later you will slip up again and admit it.
Hi Huntingtonbeach,
There was this new color discovered recently, a mixture of black and white, it is called gray. I have heard there are many shades besides black or white. You should check it out. 🙂
HB, you’re such a stupid little lap doggie that you obviously don’t even understand that it’s sop to trash the candidate you DON’T want in order to improve the odds of your own candidate winning.
This is sop, D party and R party both, during the primaries.
Clinton set her dogs on the Sanders camp. Her dogs scared every body else out of even RUNNING.
The Sanders camp played nice, too nice. If he had really gone after Clinton, he would have forced the D voters to face up to her dead fish stink, the stink that trailed her all the way back to Arkansas. He could have won the election, if he had gotten the nomination.
I was not an OFFICIAL part of the Sanders camp , and thus free to say what I pleased, and what in my judgement would help Sanders win the nomination.
And I most certainly did keep on badmouthing Clinton even afterward, warning that her liabilities might cost the D’s the election, and I was RIGHT.
Since then big D Democrats by the thousands, and by the millions, are coming around to admitting, quietly, to themselves that I was right about the risks of running a candidate with Clinton’s flaws.
There’s an excellent chance that the Sanders camp will be running the D party by 2020.
Hopefully the D party as a whole will have better sense next time around. I did everything I could to make sure D voters would be thinking about these things.
Hey, I’m just one little guy blogging, without even having my own site, just like you say you are only one little guy making out like a bandit in the oil biz, and that it doesn’t matter, because you’re just one little guy.
” Just admit it, your a Republican Trump supporter because sooner or later you will slip up again and admit it.”
Any body who is mathematically literate is welcome to debate Clinton’s personal ethical record with me, any old time.
We can start with Cattle Gate, which lies all the way back to the good old days in Arkansas.
From there we can go on to a detailed discussion of her close business associates who spent substantial amounts of time in jail.
The odds of doing as well as Clinton did, even for the best of the best of professional commodities traders, were astronomically high to one against.
Her broker would have been jailed in just about any other state, but given that Clinton’s husband happened to be the guv, and one of her best buddies the head of the biggest company in the state, and supposedly by her own statements giving her advice about her trading ……..
I am not surprised that while I have posted this challenge numerous times, in a number of forums where in most of the audience is mathematically literate, nobody has ever come forward to debate her side.
I propose as the ground rules be that we use the archives of the New York Times and the Washington Post as our sources of admissible data.
To the best of my knowledge, nobody ever referred to either of these two papers as republican mouthpieces back in those days.
“MacBackwoods, you have got it ass backwards about who gets it. You have been conned.”
Yep. I fell of the turnip wagon and landed in this forum in about the same fashion as Alice wound up down the rabbit hole. I imagined the WHOLE THING. Musta got hold of some uncommonly good dope or something.
I sure am glad I have HB to keep me straight. What would I ever do without him?
Climate Change Information Has Been Deleted From the White House Website
The incoming administration has removed any references to climate change, replacing it with a promise to “take advantage” of fossil fuels “on federal lands.”
The official White House website used to feature a lengthy information page related to climate change and energy policy. But as of noon today, that page, and all references to climate change or global warming, have been scrubbed from the White House website, Motherboard reports. In its place is a short statement on the incoming President’s “America First Energy Plan.”
Obama’s Climate Action Plan was a centerpiece of the President’s climate change policy. Through actions like requiring auto manufacturers to increase fuel efficiency, mandating cleaner power plants, and investing in renewable energy initiatives, the plan sought to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and reduce the effects of climate change.
The White House website contained a lengthy page explaining the details and effects of the plan. Since the website has been handed over to the Trump Administration, that page has been completely removed, and is only accessible via the Internet Archives.
In its place is a short description of the Trump Administration’s “America First Energy Plan,” which has the goal of “eliminating harmful and unnecessary policies such as the Climate Action Plan.” The page claims that the new energy plan would “[increase] wages by more than $30 billion over the next 7 years.”
The plan also states the goal of “[taking] advantage of the estimated $50 trillion in untapped shale, oil, and natural gas reserves, especially those on federal lands that the American people own.” This seems to suggest the incoming administration would turn over public lands, including national parks, to private companies for drilling.
Trump has previously promised to cut funding for NASA to study climate change, and many researchers are worried that critical government data may disappear. If they’re right, Obama’s Climate Action Plan page may be the first in a long line of climate information to disappear from government websites.
In its place is a short description of the Trump Administration’s “America First Energy Plan,” which has the goal of “eliminating harmful and unnecessary policies such as the Climate Action Plan.” The page claims that the new energy plan would “[increase] wages by more than $30 billion over the next 7 years.”
The plan also states the goal of “[taking] advantage of the estimated $50 trillion in untapped shale, oil, and natural gas reserves, especially those on federal lands that the American people own.”
Really?! And I have this great deal on a bridge in Brooklyn in case anyone is interested! I’ll even sign the deed over to you at no extra charge…
But, GRRRREAT! We’re now officially ruled by a narcissistic tweeting twit who is owned lock stock and barrel by the global cabal of fossil fuel interests!
I tawt I taw a putty tat!
.
.
A Corporate Coup d’état
Finally they eliminated the middle man.
Really?! And I have this great deal on a bridge in Brooklyn in case anyone is interested! I’ll even sign the deed over to you at no extra charge…
It just occurred to me that the anti-climate public might be just the folks to pitch fossil fuel stocks and beach front property to.
If you have reason to believe climate change will affect the future and you have stocks and property you want to unload as a result, it might be useful to tell potential buyers that they have nothing to fear and then sell to them and get your money out while you can.
NASA Data Shows the Rate of Global Warming is Accelerating — 2016 is Third Consecutive Hottest Year on Record
Solid science no doubt. It will be disproved next year, but who cares.
Your repetitive predictions have failed in the past Javier. Why should we care what a purveyor of failed predictions has to say?
“Apparently the rate of fall for RSS is the fastest for a 3 month period since measurements begun. If a strong la Niña develops during the summer, it will be difficult that 2016 is a temperature record year. All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time. ” ~ Javier
Javier thought that the 2015 record would not be broken for some time. He also mixes up his datasets. 2015 wasn’t the hottest year in the RSS TLT v3 dataset although it was in the TTTv4 dataset. I guess if Javier keeps predicting “next year won’t be so bad” then perhaps one day he will be right.
Hey Survivalist, Have you read my 01/21/2017 at 8:37 am post? I am often more interested in a persons motivations for saying or doing something than what it is that they actually say or do. I get more interested in their motivations as they become more and more persistent, the question changes from what? to why? Why would someone with so much less skin in the game, be so firmly on the side of those with so much (billions) to loose?
Yes I read that post. I like it.
It seems to me that some sock puppets are for convincing those that don’t know better that global warming is not occurring. Other sock puppets are for convincing those that are smart enough to know global warming is occurring that it is not a problem. The sock puppet army has multiple fronts. One front is deny and another front is miiimize the concern. Anybody with a concern is labeled by Javier as an alarmist. Javier’s communication techniques are not those of a scientist. They are the communication techniques of a PR firm that wished to define all questions and concerns as overreactions. Javier has an agenda. His dialogue makes that clear. And it is not the agenda of truth through scientific evidence.
“If a strong la Niña develops during the summer, it will be difficult that 2016 is a temperature record year.”
No prediction there. It says If. La Niña didn’t develop so the condition didn’t happen.
“All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time. ” ~ Javier
If w get a record next year, on a La Nina, we know we are totally screwed (even if we get our mild El Nino in the Fall).
But agree, lets hope we don’t get one more record smasher–
Even if we are in the top 5, things are accelerating.
Every heat pulse sent up to the Arctic melts more ice. Each square meter of open ocean absorbs up to 300 watts of solar energy greater than ice. The steady reduction in ice concentration leads to an amplification of heating.
Every heat pulse sent up to the Arctic melts more ice.
Hmm no when temperatures are below freezing. There is no melting in the Arctic during the winter.
What an ignorance of such basic things.
Despite all the Arctic warming this winter, Arctic sea ice is keeping up quite well. All that heat is going out to space. Together with the El Niño, the planet has been losing an unusual amount of heat in 2015-17. If the Arctic warming ends by the spring we might see a lot of sea ice this summer.
You have very little concept of reality or science. Even if something is below freezing and it’s temperature is raised, it will be that much easier to melt in the warm season. Did you pass the fourth grade?
Here, I will make it simple for you.
Temperature of ice is at 23.5F. Another equal mass of ice is at 27.5F. Which mass will reach 28F first given equal heating later?
Now do you understand? Comprende? What happens in the winter counts too. Si? Heat content changes.
Arctic ice concentration and volume has been falling rapidly for many years. Stop with the lying.
Gone Fishing said about Javier:
“You have very little concept of reality or science. Even if something is below freezing and it’s temperature is raised, it will be that much easier to melt in the warm season. Did you pass the fourth grade?”
Javier has made so many of these baffling statements as to make his credibility essentially zero.
He only has a talent for recycling talking points that on the surface sound reasonable, but that’s only because he says them with such conviction.
“Even if something is below freezing and it’s temperature is raised, it will be that much easier to melt in the warm season.”
Don’t be silly. For that you need temperatures to remain elevated above average all the way to the melting season. If in the meantime they go back to average, as it is quite likely, everything cools down there.
This place is populated by climatic fourth graders that believe they know something about it.
Look, the situation is like last year. Elevated temperatures above average during the cold season, but average or even slightly below average during the melting season, resulting in more ice, not less.
That Arctic heat is going out to space because it has no other place to go. Lost to the planetary system. A cooler planet than otherwise. Negative feedback. That heat should actually be in mid latitudes where we are getting polar air that is causing cold waves instead. A cold winter like alarmists would like to see every year that is causing increased demand for fossil fuels and high energy prices in many places.
“For that you need temperatures to remain elevated above average all the way to the melting season. If in the meantime they go back to average, as it is quite likely, everything cools down there.”
That is one big IF when heat inputs and are higher than average and longwave radiation is blocked.
Building imaginary scenarios. You are good for a laugh though.
Look Javier, your shtick is getting awful tiresome here.
As usual, when Javier makes a very confident statement that gives the appearance of being objectively based on measurable facts…
” All that heat is going out to space. Together with the El Niño, the planet has been losing an unusual amount of heat in 2015-17”
… it is actually complete and utter bullshyt. Made up. Not based on reality as measured by science. Wrong. Contrary to the published data.
OHC at the end of 2014/beginning of 2015 = 21.12 * 10^22J
OHC at the end of 2015/beginning of 2016 = 22.27 * 10^22J
That is an INCREASE of 1.15 * 10^22J for 2015. Not a decrease.
OHC lost energy during the 2016 El Nino. The change in OHC was -0.71 *10^22J.
So the net change over the two El Nino years of 2015 and 2016 was an INCREASE of 0.43 * 10^22J.
Most of the decrease was concentrated in one quarter at the height of the El Nino – AprMayJun of 2016 – losing 3.03 * 10^22J while temps zoomed up to 1.35C. Most of that loss was regained in the 4th quarter with a gain of 2.41 *10^22J.
This recent gain occurred when global surface temperatures were at all time highs for non-El-Nino months. So even though temps are very high, we are still gaining energy while at 0.8 to 0.9C GISS temps. This means we cannot count on a return to the “Pause”. We are gaining heat at an extraordinary rate, and only temperatures higher than about 1.1C above the 1951-1981 baseline will be sufficient to balance the energy retained by GHGs today.
The Arctic is one place where GHG have increased much faster than average. Water vapor is the strongest GHG, and the Arctic used to be a desert with essentially zero water vapor for most of the year. This allowed heat to escape efficiently, and allowed the heat of ice formation to escape.
Now we have more open water – even in the fall and winter – adding more water vapor, in addition to the increased transport from the south due to the wavier jetstream (see Francis)…
“The Arctic is becoming warmer and wetter as revealed by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder
…In response to sea ice loss, evaporation rates (i.e., moisture flux) increased between August and October by 1.5 × 10−3 g m−2 s−1 (3.8 W m−2 latent heat flux energy), increasing the water vapor feedback and cloud cover…”
Today we have essentially the entire Arctic Ocean covered with ice, but it is very thin, mostly first year ice, and it did not thicken at the usual rate due to the abnormally high temperatures. This coming melting season will be a record. The final autumn low in extent may or may not be a record, but during the important part of the melting season – May to July, when the albedo feedback is strongest – the Arctic waters will gain even more heat than last year, leading to an even weaker re-freeze… even more water vapor… even higher winter temps… you get the idea.
The Non-Science based wishful thinking of Javier will continue to be proven wrong.
… it is actually complete and utter bullshyt. Made up. Not based on reality as measured by science. Wrong. Contrary to the published data.
Wehappyfew, you are actually one of those people that think that he knows something when in reality your knowledge is negative. You have a hole that you don’t even know is there. You measure the planetary energy budget balance at the top of the atmosphere, not in the oceans.
El Niño and La Niña are not only intervals when heat within the system is distributed around the planet, but also periods which see a net loss of heat by the Earth (El Niño) and a net gain of heat (La Niña). Over the long-term these intervals balance out to zero.
“Tropical variations in emitted outgoing longwave (LW) radiation are found to closely track changes in the El Niño- Southern Oscillation (ENSO). During positive ENSO phase (El Niño), outgoing LW radiation increases, and decreases during the negative ENSO phase (La Niña).”
Loeb, Norman G., et al. “Advances in understanding top-of-atmosphere radiation variability from satellite observations.” Surveys in geophysics 33.3-4 (2012): 359-385.
As measured by CERES satellites the planet loses a lot of energy during Los Niños, as I have said. The planet has been losing an unusual amount of heat in 2015-17. And you are the one that is posting bullshyt, while attacking me for posting the reality as measured by science and in agreement with published data.
Now try to demonstrate that the planet doesn’t lose energy during El Niño… if you can.
As usual, after Javier gets caught in yet another blatant lie, he tries to find some graph in his denier playbook to “support” his wildly non-science pontifications.
Also standard operating procedure for Javier, he uses obsolete incomplete AND irrelevant data to “support” his claim.
What’s the claim?
El Nino conditions in 2015 and 2016 caused the planet to lose energy.
The data to “support” this claim… ends in 2010!
Plus the chart Javier posted is of net Long Wave flux (LW), not total flux (which includes both Short Wave and Long Wave fluxes measured by CERES). The paper Javier linked to, but apparently didn’t read very carefully, DOES show a chart of the net TOTAL flux, but that chart still doesn’t tell us anything about 2015 and 2016 data, since it also ends in 2010!
….
What do the actual up-to-date data say about Javier’s claim?
The data say his claim is WRONG (for 2015). See chart below.
The data say his claim is CORRECT for 2016. See OHC data in my previous post… the Earth lost a lot of heat in the first half of 2016… due to the super-El-Nino. Due to the high correlation between OHC and CERES TOA Net flux as shown in the chart, we can be very confident that the CERES data for 2016 will confirm the ARGO data and show that the TOA Net flux was negative for 2016.
For the 2 year period from the beginning of 2015 to the beginning of 2017? Javier’s claim is WRONG. The net change in heat energy for the Earth is POSITIVE for the two years, as shown by the ARGO OHC data.
After failing so profoundly to find even a shred of up-to-date data to support his claims, Javier goes on to challenge me to “show that the planet doesn’t lose energy during El Niño… if you can.”
OK, done.
The Earth gained energy during the 2015 mild El Nino conditions, as shown by both CERES and ARGO data (see chart below)…
…AND it lost energy during the 2016 super El Nino.
The total net change for the two years was a GAIN of 0.43 * 10^22 Joules.
The lesson to be gained from the net energy imbalance data?
It takes very high temps… 1.35C GISS… for the Earth to lose energy at the current level of radiative forcing. At lower temps… 0.87C for 2015, and 0.88C for the last quarter of 2016… the Earth still gains heat. Both the CERES satellite data and the ARGO data confirm this heat gain.
A second lesson?
Never take a Javier-Claim at face value. If it is presented without data, you can be certain that it is made up, false, unsupported – a lie.
If Javier present data to “support” his claim, you can be sure the data is incomplete, not up-to-date, or irrelevant to the claim, as amply demonstrated here.
“…With over 90% of Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI) being stored in the ocean, the most accurate way to determine it is to measure increases in ocean temperatures (along with increases in land temperatures, decreases in ice mass, and increases in atmospheric temperature and moisture)…”
…owing to improved sampling by the Argo array over time (Fig.1), the correlation between year-to-year rates of 0–1,800m ocean heat uptake and the latest release of CERES EEI is a much-improved 0.78. This striking agreement between two completely independent measures of EEI variability bolsters confidence in both of these complementary climate observation systems…”
The Non-Science based wishful thinking of Javier will continue to be proven wrong.
Xavier doesn’t give a rodent’s rear end about scientific fact or whether or not he will be proven wrong. His only goal is to sell doubt and obfuscate the truth.
Besides being a science denier he has now come out openly in favor of coal over solar and wind and he keeps talking about the economic dangers of changing as quickly as possible to a clean energy economy!
While he often claims that he doesn’t care about US politics because he doesn’t live here, he fits right in with the new Fossil Fuel Fascists who are actually a global cabal of ultra right wing authoritarians who are fighting alternative energy and human rights all over the world.
Emboldened by the Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s US election win, these right-wing populists are hoping to capitalize on rising resentment against the establishment and alarm over immigration to shake up the political landscape on the continent.
French presidential hopeful Marine Le Pen will lead a European gathering of right-wing populist parties in Germany on Saturday in a show of strength ahead of crucial elections across the region this year.
The congress in the western city of Koblenz will also feature Geert Wilders of the Dutch far-right Freedom Party, Frauke Petry of the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) and Matteo Salvini of Italy’s xenophobic Northern League.
Billed as a “European counter-summit”, the event is being held just a day after the inauguration of Trump, who himself rode to power on a wave of discontent with the status quo.
In announcing the meeting on Twitter, Wilders used the hashtag “WeWillMakeOurCountriesGreatAgain”, a play on Trump’s election-winning slogan “Make America Great Again”.
“The aim is to talk about freedom for Europe and for Europeans. Let us break free from the EU’s straitjacket and from globalization,” Ludovic de Danne, an advisor to Le Pen, told AFP.
It is with these people that Xavier is ideologically aligned.
As usual this reply is for any body else who may read it. For HB personally , five or ten seconds to extend the middle finger would be it.
Hi HB,
Thanks for the reminder. Later this evening I will post some articles about Clinton’s good buddies having to resign positions, etc, due to playing dirty tricks during the nomination process.
The sort of comment you make in virtually every case is exactly the kind of comment that provokes middle of the road voters to either stay home, or vote for the opposition,in this case , the R opposition.
I don’t see much in the way of comments from others supporting what I have said, all along, but except for YOU, it’s almost everybody else seems to be thinking about what I have been saying, and staying quiet.
There aren’t any shy people in the habit of posting here. If the run of them were thinking I’m the idiot, the dupe, the sucker, they would be saying so, loud and clear. Lots of them.
They’re thinking, and if they could think of anything substantial with which to refute my observations, they would post their thoughts.
The near silence tells me that their mental mills are grinding slow and fine.
And given that ALMOST every body here is capable of some basic rational thinking, they
one,
realize that you cannot control the opposition, but
two, you DO have control, collectively, about what YOUR team does or does not do, and
three, that if the D team had done things differently, there would have been a Democrat sworn in today.
Blaming your side’s losses on other people is just about as childish as it gets.
ADULTS take responsibility for their own actions and mistakes, although they are naturally reluctant to admit them publicly, or to say thank you to the people who point them out.
HB is obviously too stupid to ever accept that as a person ( as opposed to a person wearing the hat of a writer sitting a long way from the trees, so as to have a good view of the forest ) I want a D in the White House.
There are millions of committed Democrats in this country who have long had and still have LITTLE use for Clinton, which has a GREAT DEAL to do with why Obama came out of nowhere and won the nomination eight years ago, and a GREAT DEAL to do with why so many millions of committed Democrats went for Sanders, this past year, and SOMETHING to do with why Trump is our president NOW.
There is always a possibility that anybody may be a fake or a fraud, a Worm Tongue working for the enemy.
There are only two logically viable conclusions concerning my motives. I’m either a Worm Tongue, a secret Republican, or I’m who I say I am, an individual trying to point out to D voters what went WRONG, WHY Clinton lost, in terms of things WITHIN THE CONTROL of the Democratic Party, so that they hopefully won’t make the same mistakes next time around. Or the one after that.
Try to remember, my Little Lap Doggie,
You are in control of YOUR OWN decisions and actions.
You cannot control the opposition.
Blaming the opposition for whipping your ass, my little lap doggie, is tantamount to admitting incompetence on your own part.
HB has long been reduced to personal insults. When he says I’m deluded, he sounds just like an old time backwoods preacher warning his congregation not to listen to a scientist trying to explain that the world is NOT flat, and that we WEREN’T created as toys by an all powerful entity amusing himself.
The gospel according to HB basically boils down to something along these lines.
Steer clear of OFM, don’t listen to anything he has to say, because he’s a demon ( Republican) sent by the DEVIL ( the right wing collectively, Trump in particular) to steal your soul. Listen to him, and you will be CAST OUT, you will no longer be a member in good standing of the Democratic Party ( meaning the Clinton camp IS the D party, nobody else matters ) .
You will be hated and reviled, and unwelcome in clean households by all truly righteous and right thinking people- meaning the Clinton camp of course.
It’s LONG been said that the bearers of bad news are apt to get shot for their troubles.
It’s not all that different for the bearers of facts and data that are useful in UNDERSTANDING WHY THE NEWS IS BAD- when such facts and data point to mistakes on the part of the recipients.
I’m not here trying to win a Mr Congeniality award. It’s unlikely I will never meet another member of this forum face to face.
Sticks and stones break bones, but I have a leathery old hide, and words run right off of it.
I like HB and OFM. I wish they could be best friends.
“I listened as they called my President a Muslim.
I listened as they called him and his family a pack of monkeys.
I listened as they said he wasn’t born here.
I watched as they blocked every single path to progress that they could.
I saw the pictures of him as Hitler.
I watched them shut down the government and hurt the entire nation twice.
I watched them turn their backs on every opportunity to open worthwhile
dialog.
I watched them say that they would not even listen to any choice for Supreme
Court no matter who the nominee was.
I listened as they openly said that they will oppose him at every turn.
I watched as they did just that.
I listened.
I watched.
I paid attention.
Now, I’m being called on to be tolerant.
To move forward.
To denounce protesters.
To “Get over it.”
To accept this…
I will not.
I will do my part to make sure this great American mistake becomes the
embarrassing footnote of our history that it deserves to be.
I will do this as quickly as possible every chance I get.
I will do my part to limit the damage that this man can do to my country.
I will watch his every move and point out every single mistake and misdeed
in a loud and proud voice.
I will let you know in a loud voice every time this man backs away from a
promise he made to them.
Them. The people who voted for him.
The ones who sold their souls and prayed for him to win.
I will do this so that they never forget.
And they will hear me.
They will see it in my eyes when I look at them.
They will hear it in my voice when I talk to them.
They will know that I know who they are.
They will know that I know what they are.
Do not call for my tolerance. I’ve tolerated all I can.
Now it’s their turn to tolerate ridicule.
Be aware, make no mistake about it, every single thing that goes wrong in
our country from this day forward is now Trump’s fault just as much as they
thought it was Obama’s.
I find it unreasonable for them to expect from me what they were entirely
unwilling to give.”
Author unknown.
Thanks for the warning!
It is doubtful that the unknown author believes his own lyin’ words, though.
You can’t tolerate ridicule, which makes you an ‘intolerant’. Hardly a liberal by any means. You want to dish it out but you won’t take it anymore. Your name must be Howard Beale!
Has Jon Stewart left America and gone to Canada yet?
Where is he now? Still in America? Amy Schumer in Spain yet? Barbara Streisand, where did she go? Whoopi Goldberg still here? Miley Cyrus said so too. How about it, have they flown the coop or not?
Are they going to stay here in the new and improved fascist state of the US of A?
Worthless words from members of the phony baloney left who just can’t stop crying.
Empty promises from left wing nuts once more.
Has Jon Stewart left America and gone to Canada yet?
God you are such a right wing nut case. Jon Stewart never said he was moving to Canada. But you insinuated that he did. That makes you a liar. Also, none of those other folks said anything about leaving the US if Trump got elected. More lies.
The former “Daily Show” host told People magazine last year that if Donald Trump won the presidency, he’d be “getting in a rocket and going to another planet, because clearly this planet’s gone bonkers.
My advice to Jon is to go to Canada, for his own good. Another planet might be better, I can agree, but Canada is much closer and the Canadians are more open minded than most murkans these days.
Forget America, Canada is a better place to be.
Count me in, Americans have gone bonkers.
The former “Daily Show” host told People magazine last year that if Donald Trump won the presidency, he’d be “getting in a rocket and going to another planet, because clearly this planet’s gone bonkers.
Oh goddammit Walter, Bill Maher said Trump’s daddy was an orangutan. Trump sued him and produced his birth certificate showing that his daddy was not an orangutan. To which Bill Maher replied: “Does that idiot not know a joke when he sees one”? Or something to that effect.
To which I reply to your assertion that Jon Stuart said he would go to another planet… (not Canada)… if Trump were elected.
To which I reply: Are you such a fucking idiot that you do not realize a joke when you see one? Any goddamn fool would have known Bill Maher was not serious when he said Trump’s daddy was an orangutan. Likewise any goddamn fool would have known Jon Stuart was joking when he said he would go to another planet if Trump was elected.
There is a substantial core of truth in your post. I wonder who actually wrote it. It’s well enough done that it has some tell tale hallmarks indicating it’s the work of a real professional.
Rants from foot soldiers usually contain some self contradictory ideas, examples, facts, etc. This one is entirely internally consistent.
From here on out , the more you post about the faults and crimes of the R party in general, and Trump in particular, the higher my opinion of you will rise, and the more I will post on other subjects.
But you can rest assured I will be posting any juicy Trump links I run across FIRST, before somebody else posts them.
Trump is our COMMON enemy, even though you may not yet have come to this realization.
As Churchill famously said, he would at least favorably mention the Devil himself in Parliament, if he were to come out against Hitler.;-)
I can work WITH you from here on out. I was working FOR you , in respect to the LONG TERM, all along.
Hi Survivalist,
I am not free to name him, but I have an old friend from the TOD days who an one time maintained two or three different personnas at that site, so as to play them like puppets in order to make his points.
If I didn’t have HB to spar with, I would need to INVENT HB.
I didn’t and don’t want to call the run of the forum members idiots to their face, especially a few of the more important regular contributors. I can best get the hard core Clinton partisans among them to THINKING about my arguments by avoiding a direct confrontation with them, you see?
Hard core Clintonistas have an intellectual blind spot when it comes to Clinton. They allowed their loyalty to blind them to the possibility that she was the WRONG candidate, and that she was at high risk of losing.
Running somebody distrusted and disliked and even reviled by close to half, or maybe even more than half of the electorate is a mistake from the word GO.
When your team is out on the athletic field, playing for the ultimate prize, the White House, the Super Bowl of politics, you don’t necessarily want the coach to put YOUR favorite quarterback out there, if he’s not what he used to be, if he’s apt to get sacked and intercepted too easily. You want to be thinking about whether it’s best to be playing the backup who is maybe in FAR BETTER shape, who hasn’t recently had his ass kicked in eight or ten tough games.
Clinton has suffered a thorough ass kicking that she brought mostly on herself, the speeches, the flip flops, the emails, the shady business deals, the former partners in jail, etc.That ass kicking goes ALL THE WAY back to Arkansas , like it or not.
Somebody accused me of being the dupe, the sucker, the victim of the R wing propaganda a couple of days ago, and I offered to discuss Cattle Gate with him, here in this forum, where most of the audience is mathematically literate. He won’t, nor will anybody else.
Neither he nor any other D partisan has EVER come forward in this forum to discuss this scandal with me, because it is utterly and absolutely obvious what the result MUST be, if the audience knows some basic math. This audience knows basic math.
Clinton herself was one of the most potent tools in Trump’s toolbox, in terms of winning the election. She was arguably the D party’s biggest liability, in terms of losing.
Think about it.
All the things I am in favor of, the traditional D party is in favor of, and the D party as it exists today is ok with me on things issues such as civil rights, etc, although I will quibble about some of the details in that area.
What I am NOT in favor of is the BUSINESS AS USUAL REPUBLICAN form and style of government. I am OPPOSED to most of what the R party STANDS for, although I believe in some of the things it PRETENDS to stand for.
In recent times, the D party has morphed into a REPUBLICAN LITE party that goes along with most of what the R party stands for economically, although it pays some lip service to the interests of the working class and poor people.
Yes, it passed the ACA act, but it was written in such a way that it could not have been DELIBERATELY better designed to poke a sharp partisan stick up the backside of the people who pay for it, and the large majority of them appear to be R type voters.
The primary goal was and is admirable, but the EFFECT on the elections held since then makes it look a hell of a lot like a Pyrrhic victory to me. YMMV. Other folks mileage may vary.
Personally I believe that if the bill for the ACA had been sent to the Treasury, which is the proper place for government bills, the ACA would not have played much of a role in motivating the R voters. It might even have been a net plus for the D’s that way.
Anybody who does not agree that the current day D party is best described as Republican Lite, on economic policy, EITHER lacks a deep enough understanding of our political landscape to actually KNOW, or ELSE cynically maintains otherwise due to reasons of partisan and tribal loyalty.
To me, it’s perfectly obvious from the walk she walks, in recent years, and a SUBSTANTIAL portion of the talk she talks, that HRC’s real loyalties lie more with the one percenters, when you get right down to brass tacks. Yes, she USED to do a hell of a lot for ordinary people, but in recent times, she has pretty much taken them for granted.
YES_ I DO NOT LIKE HER !
That should be obvious enough for a six year old.
But MOSTLY I have been trying to get it across is that it’s STUPID to run a candidate that is at high risk of losing because she ( or he ) comes into the race pulling a mile long baggage train,.
What MATTERED, in terms of WINNING, is what the electorate BELIEVED. It’s as obvious as the noon day sun that a hell of a lot of people BELIEVE she is ethically and morally unfit to be president..I ‘m one of them.
I hammer away at these points for various reasons.
I want to piss off and irritate Clinton partisans, because doing so provokes them into posting comments that I can use to prove my points.
And I ENJOY poking sharp sticks up the backside of people who have called me the dupe, the idiot, or Worm Tongue, etc.
I was RIGHT about the RISK. ( I believed she would win, and said so, except on days I got worried Trump would pull off the upset. ) Clinton managed to snatch a defeat from the jaws of what should have been a cakewalk victory, considering that the R party, AGAINST the wishes of the R PARTY ESTABLISHMENT, ran the worst and most reviled candidate in THAT party’s history.
She was such a piss poor candidate, and such a piss poor campaigner, that she actually managed to lose to a candidate the opposition party establishment wanted about as much as you want a dose of the clap. ( a colloquial term for gonorrhea )
Any D voters who read my comments will hopefully think MORE about who they support in the primaries, and support the candidate they believe will be best positioned to win the actual ELECTION, NEXT time around.
I would have shortened this rant up, except I promised HB to post something, and this is it.
It’s time to move on now, and I will, except when somebody accuses me of being the fool, lol.
Hey, has anybody considered the possibility that HB WANTS me to post this stuff?
Oh what twisted webs we weave, sometimes. 😉
This guy is fun!
“How pathetic of Anthony Watts to resort the the perennial climate denier game “hide the incline” with the predictable climate denier tactic “show such a short time span there’s no context.”
Time for some reflection, some armchair analysis, some more musings, and to poke some fun at politicians, they deserve it, they are always asking for it, all of them, they have it coming to them in spades. Politicians really know how to squawk, I tell ya.
After listening to our glorious leader speak the Inaugural Address yesterday at high noon, it sent goose steps up my spine.
Although, it was very, very good, magnificent, tremendous. You have to have a very good feeling about the new president duly sworn into the Office of the Presidency.
You have to accentuate the positive, even if there isn’t any, and attenuate the negative. The nattering nabobs of negativism will accentuate the negative for sure, though, have that one covered.
I mean, come on, have a heart, make sure you say a prayer for the new Preznit. He needs all the help he can get and God’s won’t be enough, yours is needed so much more than God’s it is imperative that you do. Goldman Sachs will help Donald do God’s Work, they’ve been doing it for so long, they don’t need God’s help at all!
Did you hear the reverent words spoken by those representing God at the inauguration?
Those words that are ignored the most, especially by the newly, duly elected el presidente, the words that compel the human spirit to believe that there is more than mere mortals to the existence of the whole enchilada.
America is very fortunate to have a president who abides by reverent words.
Aren’t there a set of rules handed down by God to Moses when he was up there on Mount Sinai? Or was it from Mt. Si in the Cascades? A much better place to be handing down some rules to abide by.
15 commandments, five were removed when Moses dropped the third tablet of commandments and they broke apart, according to Mel Brooks, so there are only ten, five were destroyed before anybody could read them, didn’t need them at all, I suppose. Unknown knowns, but there is one commandment in the remaining ten that says you shouldn’t commit adultery. Says it pretty darn plain and clear. Thou shalt not commit adultery. What part isn’t understood?
The members of the clergy conveniently forgot about those 15 commandments, five of which are a mystery to them, but the other ten should be rote. Oh well.
Let’s examine some more of those commandments, can’t remember what they are, but some come to mind.
Like these:
Don’t steal. check
Don’t kill. check
Don’t lie. check
Don’t covet. check. Translates to don’t cheat too. That means coveting your neighbor’s wife, which is very hard to do if you are Donald Trump. Bill got a deferred action on that one, the fury of hell awaits Bill, nothing like the scorn of a woman, though. Hillary will tell you all about it.
Who in the hell wants to abide by things like the Ten Commandments and other such nonsense? Nobody here on earth, that’s for damn sure.
I’ll see them all in hell. har
RW- you proved it- the jester is a fool, a grand one. I want my goat back.
“Don’t covet. check. Translates to don’t cheat too. That means coveting your neighbor’s wife”
Rightwing Walter, you can have her back. Come and pick her up. Like an unleashed dog she keeps returning for a treat and her bottom rubbed. She keeps saying something about business not getting done at home.
Har
HB is so insufferably stupid he wouldn’t know a pole cat from a pussy cat.
Or alternatively,maybe he’s just such a little pussy he gets his jollies making such remarks from his mommy’s safe porch on the internet.
Which is it HB? Stupidity, or malice?
I think maybe it’s a combination of both.
You’ll be ok as long as you stay on your porch, but it would be best that you not venture out into the world where you might forget and make such a remark in the physical presence of a man.
Oh get a sense of humor
When you talk about other people, depending on who they are, I could care less. When you insult me, or RW, I reserve the right to take offense as I please, although RW is a big boy and can look after himself. He might not be back for a day or two, so I took it on myself to return the insult on his behalf, before this thread goes dead.
Call me stupid, that’s ok, deluded, that’s ok too, but there’s a line we should not cross in getting personal.
You don’t apparently don’t realize that.
Slate has a news feed /blog on the first hundred days of Trumpster land.
It’s a handy place , they will be gathering up the worst dirt all in one spot.
The World Bank in association with the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) has made some renewable energy resource maps available under it’s Renewable Energy Resource Mapping Initiative
The international financial institution is offering the free, web-based resource in collaboration with the International Solar Alliance
The platform — which data provider SolarGis designed to help policymakers, investors and prospective developers identify new locations in which solar projects can be built — allows users to zoom in on high-resolution regional and global maps, with a spatial resolution of 1 kilometer….[snip]
The database is built on roughly 22 years of satellite data, verified with ground-based measurement data where possible. Data in some developing countries cannot be validated due to a lack of ground-based measurement equipment. However, the World Bank plans to set up solar measurement stations in about 20 countries over the next four years to address this issue.
This is interesting and should be of particular interest to underdeveloped or developing countries that have limited ground based data. It is the first global solar resource map I have been able to access with resolution down to 1 km. One just has to zoom in on a particular location and click on it to get their estimates of solar resources for that location. Nice!
So what is going on in eastern China, a huge drop in solar insolation? Is it the pollution?
I can only guess but, based on their description of how the data was collected it is quite possible that pollution could cause those readings. In February 2015 there was a big fire at the landfill in Kingston, Jamaica. I remember looking at Google maps satellite images for the areas around the fire for months after the fire and they were quite hazy to say the least. It was obvious that the images were captured while the fire was burning.
You can read up on their methodology at http://solargis.com/support/knowledge-base/methodology/solar-radiation-modeling/ and from my reading it would appear that they cover all the bases so, the horrendous pollution in China would be a factor. If the stories one hears about poor visibility are anything to go by, it has to be a factor.
Probably a combination of pollution and the long rainy season.
You need to remember that Google satellite images often don’t update for weeks/months/years.
NAOM
That’s the weird part. The images don’t update for months but, they just happened to have updated the region around the fire during the three weeks or so that the fire was burning. We had dark hazy images of the area around the fire for about six months! I know this because I have a little Wikipedia project that involved me using the satellite images to try and spot large rooftop PV installations.
The picture below shows the landfill in relation to a large warehouse in the lower of the two images. The line in the image is exactly 1 mile. Can you spot the PV on the rooftops in the upper image? Hint: there are two installations.
Fair enough, but did the dark, hazy image update during that 6 months?
One of the installations stands out but the second!!!! Nope!
NAOM
I’m not really being fair since even using the clear satellite image it is very difficult to detect the faint grid of the PV modules on the southeasterly facing sections of the roof of the large warehouse. In late June of 2015, when I started the Wikipedia page Solar power in Jamaica, I was made aware of the largest PV installation in Kingston through this page on the web site of that installation’s inverter manufacturer, found by looking at their publicly available sites for the island.
The first data for that project showed production starting some time in May so as a result, I would have been looking for that big installation to appear on the roof of one or more of the company’s buildings and I remember being frustrated by the dark hazy images at the time.
I was also looking for the installation in the upper left of the picture below since it was mentioned on that company’s web site as a project they had started. I did detect the installation in the lower right corner of the picture below, since it ‘s very high contrast allowed it to be visible despite the haziness. A friend of mine had also told me about the one you were able to spot since he had actually done some work on that roof.
So, I was looking for these installations and not been able to find them because the hazy images probably predated them. I kept checking to see when they would replace the hazy images in the hope that updated images would reveal what I was looking for. IIRC it took longer than six months.
One last remark on the Google maps updating process is that it seems very inconsistent. In one case back in August, while I was on my way to an annual agriculture show, I detoured for half an hour or so to visit the site of the newly built 20 MW Content Solar Farm, less than five miles from the show ground. A friend of mine was working at the site and giving me directions but, I had Google Maps on my phone showing me exactly where I was on the map so Google should have been aware of my trip to a location in the middle of nowhere. When I got home I labeled the location on Google maps and lo and behold, within a few days the image had changed from an open field to a solar farm!
On the other hand, the image below clearly shows a new highway under construction, connecting the north of the island to the south. That section of the island consists or limestone with a layer of soil (mostly bauxite) so, the limestone underlay of the road is in stark contrast to the surrounding greenery. I first drove the entire length of the highway back in May of 2015 so the road has been complete since May but, the images date from long before construction was complete.
My most recent trip along the highway was back in December so I tried the trick, this time using Google Maps Navigation, ignoring the guidance and following the highway, just to let the system know that there’s a road there (a phone traveling at speeds of up to 65 mph has got to be on some sort of road) . It’s been a month now and Google Maps satellite images are still not showing the parts of the highway that go through undeveloped areas as complete or in some cases not at all.
Cant figure out what their basis for updating images is.
That article states impacts to those crops in accordance with global average temps of plus 5. It seems to me that much of those crops are grown in the northern hemisphere and that the northern hemisphere is warming faster than the global average.
I would very much like the opinion of OLD FARMER MAC on this video and I particular the Seneca cliff image shown at 46 minutes and 30 seconds into the video.
So sorry Survivalist,
It won’t play for me. I’m using an old computer right now that got the automatic TEN new programming, and I can’t figure out how to fix it. I want to watch it too.
But I’m a computer klutz, so that’s to be expected.
Next time I can get a kid to come by, hopefully he will show me what I’m doing wrong.
Alternatively they could decline by -20% and actually increase like they have been doing for 170 years of global warming. they are just guessing because they have no clue.
Yes Javier, that’s it. They’re just guessing. Just throwing darts in the dark. Not a clue what they are up to. Are you delusional?
Speaking of having no clue, how’s your track record for predictions going?
“All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time.” ~ Javier
Not very well I see. You were just guessing because you had no clue. Amazing how you think you know what is going to happen in the future, except that you never get it right.
This is Javier’s latest prediction:
“For 2017 and 2018 the annual global average temperature will not be significantly (≥ 0.1°C) above the average for 2001-2016. For September 2017 and September 2018, Arctic sea ice extent as defined and measured by the Danish Meteorological Institute and OSISAF, will not be lower than for September 2007.”
Javier appears to have switched tactics from predicting no more warming to predicting no significant warming, or as others might call it, just a little bit of warming.
Cite correctly. I said if there was a strong La Niña in the summer of 2016. There wasn’t one. La Niña cannot be predicted.
If ifs and buts were candy and nuts.
“All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time.” ~ Javier
Cite correctly. I said if there was a strong La Niña in the summer of 2016. There wasn’t one. La Niña cannot be predicted.
“
ENSO (El Nino + La Nina) can in fact be predicted. It’s a standing wave oscillator that has a somewhat erratic cycle related to the periodic cycling of the earth’s angular rotation rate.
If you can predict it, I am sure you can publish it. Actually you could make millions if you are the only person that can predict ENSO.
” Actually you could make millions if you are the only person that can predict ENSO.”
How can I make millions if I already placed the physical model for ENSO into the public domain?
I’ve finally figured it out.
Javier is Baghdad Bob.
Hi Javier
They sure as fuck are NOT guessing about the effect of the average temperature in growing areas rising by four or five degrees, because when this happens, the inevitable exceptionally hot days will be hot enough to result in production crashes up to a HUNDRED percent.
I KNOW. I have a degree in the field and a lifetime of practical experience to back it up, and I have seen crops wither and die with my own eyes, several times, due to a string of extremely hot days, in relation to local norms and calender dates.
Now of course there is some reason to hope that we can adapt, by using varieties of wheat for instance that are suited to hotter climates ( currently grown at the southern boundaries of the wheat growing regions) in more northerly areas, and at higher elevations, and that we can develop new varieties that are more tolerant of hot spells, etc.
But as a practical matter, we can’t count on great success in making these adaptations, and there isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that we can just up and move food production from Western Europe to Siberia, or from the American bread basket up into Canada.
The Russians and the Canadians would have a few choice things to say about such ideas, and while I have never yet researched Siberian soils, most of the land in Canada that is well suited to farming is already being farmed. The part that’s good but not being farmed already is pretty much in the hands of various peoples and governments up that way that take a VERY dim view of any except the most minor of changes.
I suppose you might have heard of the Canadian Shield.
It recalls the 2010 Russian heat wave that saw Russian grain production drop by 40% and resulted in Russia banning grain exports.
BUT BUT! Increased CO2 and heat are supposed to increase wheat yeild. Maybe the Ruskies are still trying Lysenkoism and expect that exposing wheat plants to increases in CO2 and heat will produce hardier plants…
This is an interesting study on the 2010 Russian grain export ban secondary to the heat wave that reduced harvest.
And how do we link weather events to climate change?
The prediction is that we should see an increase in heat waves frequency and intensity as global warming takes place.
The statistics show we don’t see such increase.
January 13, 2017 — All charges have been dropped against Vanessa Gray, Stone Stewart and Sarah Scanlon who shut down Enbridge’s Line 9 pipeline on December 21, 2015 on Anishnaabe territory just outside of Aamjiwnaang and Sarnia.
They were charged with mischief endangering lives and mischief over $5000. as their lawyers explained, these exaggerated charges were a scare tactic used to intimidate them and future water defenders from engaging in direct action. however, the court could present no evidence to convict them on these charges.
“The only way Enbridge can prove these cases is by admitting that their pipelines are subject to rupture.”
A guy up in Alberta named Wiebo Ludwig. He would seal off wells with poured concrete mixed with shotgun shells to dissuade the use of jackhammers to remove the concrete. There are some very creative saboteurs in this world. They laid spike belts, blew up propane tanks, cut power lines, fired shots at well operators and truck drivers, and once even plowed up a big snow berm to block a road and posted signage saying the berm was rigged with explosives. Just a few folks cost the industry millions. RCMP had a task force but they were useless to stop it. Rural areas were hard to police back then. UAV’s could today get video evidence but back then it was the county mounty. Good at handing out speeding tickets. Not exactly cut out for counterinsurgency with vandals.
As well some natives up in Canada who were dissatisfied with land claims issues once had a campaign called ‘if justice fails stop the rails’. The activists stated that a simple piece of copper wire, for example 8 feet of uninsulated stranded 3AWG ground wire (wiring for main service panels in a house, or science experiments) can stop thousands of tonnes of train traffic. The wire, laid across the tracks will mimic a blockage and trigger the electronic sensors telling the trains to stop. Covering the wire between the tracks will make it more difficult to detect. They would wrap the wire around one rail then bury it across to the other rail and wrap that rail too. It was difficult to detect and required inspectors to clear lines.
It’s amazing what a smal group of creative and motivated people can do.
“A review of the Fifth Assessment of the IPCC suggests that while positive and negative projections of impacts on crop yields counterbalance each other at global level until about 2030, the balance after that becomes increasingly negative”
Amazing how they know what is going to happen in the futurE.
In science if the predictions from your hypothesis fail so spectacularly, it means that you are wrong. This failure to recognize this problem and your insistence that you are still right clearly shows that your professional work is bad.
No prediction. A possibility conditional to a strong La Niña in the summer of 2016, that never materialized.
This study says the onset of the “Little Ice Age” was initiated by multiple volcanic eruptions over a 50 year period then perpetuated by a sea ice-ocean feedback. Makes the most sense so far. One would expect some global effects from a regional change that large and long.
The models showed sustained cooling from volcanoes would have sent some of the expanding Arctic sea ice down along the eastern coast of Greenland until it eventually melted in the North Atlantic. Since sea ice contains almost no salt, when it melted the surface water became less dense, preventing it from mixing with deeper North Atlantic water. This weakened heat transport back to the Arctic and creating a self-sustaining feedback system on the sea ice long after the effects of the volcanic aerosols subsided, he said.
It doesn’t make any sense at all, because volcanic eruptions only have an effect for a few years. We know that both from proxy records and from the Pinatubo and El Chichón eruptions during instrumental era. They are claiming an effect for which there is no experience and no evidence. Of course they base it on a model.
Oh, sorry Javier, too complex for you, has more than one variable.
Javier, I can no more disprove that crop yields on a world wide basis have IMPROVED as the result of warming than you can prove the contrary.
But it’s utterly obvious that you either don’t know doo doo from apple butter about the effects of unusually hot weather on crop production, or else you pretend otherwise, in saying we don’t know what will happen if average temperatures continue to increase.
And even the greenest apprentice mechanic knows that if you hit something once or twice with a hammer, the effects of the blows might be minor and of short duration.
But get with it with the hammer, and pound on it for a while, and it is apt to have a hell of an effect.
From wikipedia
In a 2012 paper, Miller et al. link the Little Ice Age to an “unusual 50-year-long episode with four large sulfur-rich explosive eruptions, each with global sulfate loading >60 Tg” and notes that “large changes in solar irradiance are not required.”[6]
Throughout the Little Ice Age, the world experienced heightened volcanic activity.[74] When a volcano erupts, its ash reaches high into the atmosphere and can spread to cover the whole earth. The ash cloud blocks out some of the incoming solar radiation, leading to worldwide cooling that can last up to two years after an eruption. Also emitted by eruptions is sulfur, in the form of sulfur dioxide gas. When it reaches the stratosphere, it turns into sulfuric acid particles, which reflect the sun’s rays, further reducing the amount of radiation reaching Earth’s surface.
A recent study found that an especially massive tropical volcanic eruption in 1257, possibly of the now-extinct Mount Samalas near Mount Rinjani, both in Lombok, Indonesia, followed by three smaller eruptions in 1268, 1275, and 1284 did not allow the climate to recover. This may have caused the initial cooling, and the 1452–53 eruption of Kuwae in Vanuatu triggered a second pulse of cooling.[6][14] The cold summers can be maintained by sea-ice/ocean feedbacks long after volcanic aerosols are removed.
Other volcanoes that erupted during the era and may have contributed to the cooling include Billy Mitchell (ca. 1580), Huaynaputina (1600), Mount Parker (1641), Long Island (Papua New Guinea) (ca. 1660), and Laki (1783).[20] The 1815 eruption of Tambora, also in Indonesia, blanketed the atmosphere with ash; the following year, 1816, came to be known as the Year Without a Summer, when frost and snow were reported in June and July in both New England and Northern Europe.
Ocean circulation[edit]
Thermohaline circulation or Oceanic conveyor belt illustrated
Another possibility is that there was a slowing of thermohaline circulation.[39][68][75][76] The circulation could have been interrupted by the introduction of a large amount of fresh water into the North Atlantic, possibly caused by a period of warming before the Little Ice Age known as the Medieval Warm Period.[30][77][78] There is some concern that a shutdown of thermohaline circulation could happen again as a result of the present warming period.[79][80]
Decreased human populations[edit]
Welcome to the climate wars, OFM.
We know the hypothesis that the LIA was due mainly to enhanced volcanic activity to be false because two very well established facts that contradict it.
1. We know the effect of volcanic eruptions on temperatures to be short lived. Temperature proxies reflect very well a few years of cooling after the eruption (blue bars), followed by a rebound in temperatures (orange bars). They don’t affect the general trend. This short-lived effect agrees well with modern instrument measurements after El Chichón and Pinatubo eruptions. So the “did not allow the climate to recover” part is not sustained by evidence.
Sources in the figure. You can see some of the eruptions you talk about there. Second argument in next post.
And,
2. We know thanks to sulphate in ice cores that the deglaciation and Holocene Climate Optimum (HCO), up to 7500 years ago had a lot more volcanic activity than the Little Ice Age (LIA). So it turns out that the warmest period in the Holocene, the HCO, had a lot more volcanic activity than the coldest, the LIA. Clearly the hypothesis that volcanic activity drove the LIA is bogus.
No problem. Most hypothesis are wrong.
There is often disagreement in science about how to interpret evidence. If you look at glaciers or peat bogs it is very evident that the Little Ice Age was a global event. It is also well demonstrated that the LIA was also colder at the tropical Indo-Pacific Warm Pool. Those that defend that the LIA affected only the Northern Hemisphere are clearly wrong.
I think the problem comes because almost 95% of the paleoclimatological evidence about the climate of the past comes from the Northen Hemisphere. This is a sampling problem as for centuries geologists and climatologists have been from the Northern Hemisphere, and it is always cheaper to get records without having to travel much.
In the late 90’s and early 00’s there was an attempt by a group of prominent climatologists to erase the Medieval Warm Period and to make the LIA a regional event so the only global climate change in thousands of years was current warming. But apparently it has failed and both MWP and LIA are now quite established, and confirmed by numerous articles, like the one you link.
8 minutes after 4 in the morning in Spain. You’re up early. The last time I was awake at 4am I was on my way to bed.
this is a full time gig.
Let’s look at some 30 year trends in temperature and Ocean Heat Content…
The graph below shows the same temperature data and regression fit of CO2 to temperature as the previous graphs I have posted. Similar to Dennis’ model, the regression is a fit of temperature to the logarithm of CO2 lagged by ten years to account for the heat capacity of the mixed layer of the ocean (roughly 100 meters). Except Dennis does not fit to lagged CO2.
Then 30 year trends are calculated for each year from 1975 up to 2016, so the left-most blue square is the 30 year trend for temperature from 1946 to 1975. The last blue square on the right is the trend from 1987 to 2016.
The red diamonds are the same 30 year trends calculated for the CO2 regression model. It is the “predicted” temperature based on CO2 levels lagged by ten years. It essentially represents something similar to a simplified hybrid ECS/TCS of 2.8C per doubling of CO2.
Finally, the 30 year trends in Ocean Heat Content (OHC) are in green. There aren’t enough OHC data at the beginning, so the green circles don’t start until 1979. The units for the trend in OHC are 10^22 Joules/ quarter, so multiply the number by four to get the rate of annual incremental heat added to the oceans.
What I found interesting and thought provoking is the fairly good ANTI-correlation in the temperature (dark blue squares) and OHC trends (green circles). When temperature trends are going up quickly from the 70’s up to 1991, the OHC trends are flat to declining. When the acceleration in the temperature trend slows down, rising much more slowly from 1991 to 2003, the OHC starts rising slowly (with some waviness). Then the last part has temperature trends declining slightly from 2003 to the present, while OHC trends accelerate vigorously.
It’s like the heat either goes into the ocean, or it goes into driving up surface temps.
From this we could derive a prediction:
If temperature trends start accelerating significantly, then the current rapid acceleration in the OHC trend should slow down, level off or even decline.
OR, conversely, if the temperature trends stay level (low or zero acceleration), the OHC will continue their acceleration.
Either way I predict the blue squares will stay pretty close to the red diamonds, as they always have up to now. Javier predicts the blue squares will decline back to zero (temps stay near 0.6C for for several decades, producing a sharp decline in the 30 year trend rate).
……
Please note that the current plateau in temperature trends – near zero increase since 1991 – means temperatures are rising steadily, but not going up faster and faster like the OHC is right now.
The 30 year trend is analogous to a smoothed derivative of temperature or OHC – it represents the RATE of change, not the absolute difference in temperature from the beginning to the end of the period.
…..
You should look at actual rate of warming to see that anthropogenic global warming has failed to produce a higher rate of global warming as it should.
Doesn’t seem to be much of a hiatus since the 70’s.
How about some regressions on that?
NAOM
More than one variable again, beyond Javier’s comprehension. Half of the warming has been blocked by aerosols. Yet still the global surface temperature rise rate has increased. The rate of temperature increase has doubled in the last fifty years.
The problem is that natural global warming and man-made global warming don’t look very different. Shouldn’t they?
Interesting they all meet around 2015. I wonder what bearing ENSO has on this given that it can throw out huge amounts of heat.
NAOM
ENSO is an oscillator. A long-term trend, like 30 years, washes out the short term variation of ENSO cycles (which average about 3 to 4 years in length).
The read and blue lines have to stay close to each other, that’s how the regression math works. The green line is scaled to fit, so it coincides near 2015 purely by coincidence 😉
Another way to look at the data is 30 year averages. The trend calculation in the previous chart is like a derivative – it tends to accentuate the noise. The averages chart below is the opposite, the 30 year average filters out the short term noise, so it show how the long term change in temperature follows CO2.
There are long term variations still remaining. Natural variability does exist. Solar output has changed – the early 1900’s were low compared to the 1940’s to 1960’s. Volcanic aerosols were higher for several decades from 1880 to 1920, and much lower from 1930 to 1960.
When the annual increases in CO2 were small, natural variability could easily overpower the CO2 warming rate. Since 1970, not so much, especially when looking at 30 year averages that filter out the short term noise.
This is interesting, though not really new:
Facts, beliefs, and identity: The seeds of science skepticism
‘”We find that people will take a flight from facts to protect all kinds of belief including their religious belief, their political beliefs, and even simple personal beliefs such as whether they are good at choosing a web browser,” says Troy Campbell (University of Oregon).’
‘Dan Kahan (Yale University) agrees, finding in their research that “the deposition is to construe evidence in identity-congruent rather than truth-congruent ways, a state of disorientation that is pretty symmetric across the political spectrum.’
‘Merely talking about “evidence” or “data” does not typically change a skeptic’s mind about a particular topic, whether it is climate change, genetically modified organisms, or vaccines. People use science and fact to support their particular opinion and will downplay what they don’t agree with.’
Ya suppose philosophers, playwrights, novelists, and poets, and even old farmers might have known this for as far back as maybe forty thousand years or so ago? 😉
I have said a hundred times that people believe what they want to believe, and what they want to believe is based on their cultural and tribal loyalties as much or more than any other factor. 😉
It was unnecessary for me to figure it out for myself. I read all about it well before I got out of high school.
I bet you did too.
It looks as if Fox News thinks Trump in church is more important than a million women going way out of their way to protest his very existence. This is to be expected, of course. Fox is for all practical purposes a wholly owned subsidiary of the R party, when it comes to political news.
But Fox does run some fairly good coverage from time to time concerning renewable energy, or environmental issues, in the business section.
I wonder if that coverage will be gradually removed, to be replaced by cheerleading for the fossil fuel BAU establishment. It seem’s likeliest to me it will be cut back but not eliminated, because a lot of people would go elsewhere looking for it, and once they’ve gone looking, Fox is at risk of losing them.
It looks like Trump has forbidden the National Park Service to post pictures of HIS crowd, compared to Obama’s crowd. This is both laughable and as serious as chest pains if you have heart trouble, as a warning of things to come.
It looks like Trump has forbidden the National Park Service to post pictures of HIS crowd, compared to Obama’s crowd. This is both laughable and as serious as chest pains if you have heart trouble, as a warning of things to come.
Yeah, next he will command the tides not to rise at his Miami resort.
Given that just about everyone nowadays has a smartphone with video capabilities, internet access and a twitter account, fortunately we don’t need to depend on the National Park Service to post pictures for us… Trump may be POTUS but for starters there are millions of women all over the world protesting him today. Trump does not control the internet and he has the women of the world pissed at him, no pun intended…
And any body with brains enough to wipe his backside knows that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.
If I ever find my self in the cross hairs of more than maybe two women simultaneously, I’m headed up the holler into the deep woods, and crawling under a big rock, and I’m not about to come out again until I’m about forty pounds lighter, I can find a rock abutting a spring branch. 😉
You mean Jon Stewart was only joking? damn!
What is written is merely for the purpose of raising tolerance and awareness.
A world foreign to those who feign to be liberal. They are far from it, not even close.
Bigots are of any stripe. There is intolerance everywhere you go these days. Especially those so-called modern day liberals, they’re totally unaware of how intolerant they’ve all become..
I have thousands of goats, goat roping is a skill few know. Will Rogers was the greatest goat roper who ever lived. He was a goat roping fool himself. He got lots of goats.
But, hey, I understand, everybody knows we’re here on a ship of fools.
Have a good Sunday in Pleasant Valley.
When a ‘jester’ is determined to not be at all funny, people ignore them. Consider it done.
We have talked about this possibility before. I still haven’t found out if we can detect space weather events on near by stars, so as to have a better idea how often these big solar storms might actually occur.
And I haven’t yet run across any good info as to how likely it would be that such a storm would fry the electronics in a modern automobile, etc, nor what the minimum specs would be for a Faraday cage adequate to prevent it.
I’m certain that unless things change damned fast from here on out that a major event could knock out the grid for a VERY long time. The knock on consequences could be so bad we could never get the grid up again, and here’s WHY.
I have not heard that the utilities are stocking up on transformers and other extremely scarce long lead time spare parts or that they are doing much in the way of preparing to shut down the grid,and disconnect it into as many discreet parts as possible, on very short notice, so as to keep induced current surges from running wild thru irreplaceable switches, breakers, computers, etc.
Getting into a safe shutdown mode will have to be an automated process, because it would take thousands of times more hands on skilled workers to giterdone in a day or less than are available. That means that making a fast move to safe mode possible requires spending megabucks starting yesterday. THAT means a safe shutdown is probably not in the cards.
If I am technically way off base in any part of my analysis, somebody PLEASE point out where I’m wrong, and I will sleep a little better, and thankya truly. 😉
Being called a chicken little doesn’t bother me at all. I ‘m called a LOT worse just about every day of my life.
The large transformers than are used by the thousands, and scattered all over the place, are built to last more or less indefinitely, and are kept in service more or less indefinitely, maybe for forty years or more.
Since they are so well built, it’s rather unusual for one of them to fail, meaning that the electric utility industry needs to keep only a VERY few spares on hand.
Now although these things are used by the thousands, but the market for new ones is VERY limited, because they so seldom fail, and thus the only real need for new ones is for EXPANSION of the grid.
THAT means that there are very few companies that build new ones, and that they are built mostly on a one at a time basis. You can’t mass produce these things, they’re built to specs, CUSTOM ORDERED.
The lead time to get a big new one is from at least a YEAR on up.
With the grid down, and hell on earth bloody reality even within the confines of gated subdivisions in rich communities, it might not be POSSIBLE to build new ones at all.
And waiting for years for delivery ………….
A really big solar storm could literally wipe us out. It wouldn’t be just the end of life as we know it, but the literal end of the lives of ninety five percent of the people who read this comment.
I could live for a few years without electricity,or gasoline or diesel fuel, or just about anything else not already on the place, but the odds are high I would be murdered within a matter of weeks by starving people willing to do anything whatsoever to put some food in their belly.
But if the cards were to fall in my favor, I might be able to fort up,with mutual help from a few old friends who might manage to get here, and we might manage to hold out until the roving mobs either starve or die of exposure or kill each other. That could take anywhere from a few months to a few years.
We would have to eat mostly horse chow and cow chow concentrates , but it’s actually pretty decent food, if you can choke it down, and it keeps indefinitely if you keep it dry. You can haul home enough in a pickup truck in one trip to last an individual a year.
Anybody in the USA who is ever in a position such that he is worried about access to food for the next year, and has a few bucks and access to a truck could put his hands on a ton in a matter of hours, if he lives where there are farms or pleasure horses. But he would have to act VERY quickly indeed. In store stocks would sell out in an hour once the public is aware the shit is in the fan. Store owners would just close their gates to anybody except personal friends and maybe a couple of long term customers, knowing their next delivery might be delayed……… days? weeks? months?
Anybody who buys a truck load of feed concentrate can sell his load a few weeks later to a horse owner or farmer for just a little less than he paid for it, in the event it’s not needed.
I really don’t have more than a foggy idea how likely it is that a killer solar storm will hit any given year, except that the odds are high enough that it’s prudent to have a plan in mind, in the event one does hit. My plan is about as bare bones as it can get, just stock up on non perishable food as fast as humanly possible, and hope to ride it out with a few old friends.
I have always practiced keeping non perishable stuff on hand in substantial quantities, because it’s cheaper to buy in quantity anyway, and more convenient. A drum of diesel or ton of fertilizer is apt to cost more next year , and a thousand bucks in the bank won’t draw enough interest to pay for the gas to make two or three trips to town to buy in smaller quantities over the coming year.
It helps that my potential fellow doomsteaders are all LITERATE rednecks who believe we have a GOD GIVEN (mild sarcasm intended ) right to own weapons, etc, and that we are proficient in their use, and that a couple of us (not I) are old soldiers who survived serving in Vietnam and Iraq where bullets were actually flying, rather than in rear echelons.
Any links to sites where real astronomers and scientists hang out and there is an on going discussion of this topic will be greatly appreciated.
If the annual odds of such a catastrophe are one in ten thousand or less, the issue is entirely negligible as far as I’m concerned personally. If they’re one in a thousand, that’s ample justification for the thought I have given this matter.
And if they’re one in hundred, or worse, I ought to be proactively doing a few things to prepare.
Having a couple of tons of salt on hand would make it possible to salt down a lot of beef on the hoof that would otherwise be impossible to care for, and to guard from other folks ready to kill for a full belly. Salt’s dirt cheap, and it will keep forever, if kept dry.
The silver lining in this storm cloud is that any of us who survive, if the storm hits, can quit worrying about cutting back on fossil fuels. That problem will take care of itself for a couple of generations at the very least.
First of all , a Carrington-like event would not have the energy density to wreck small electronics that was not connected to the power grid. It could harm the power grid. We do have some warning due to a satellite placed between us and the sun, however I doubt if the operators will take the chance of shutting down the grid or will react fast enough. Can breakers act fast enough?
This is a real advertisement for distributed power systems. The new map singled out the northern edge of the Midwest—especially Minnesota and Wisconsin—as vulnerable to geoelectric storms for two reasons. First, the shape of Earth’s magnetic field causes space weather to have bigger impacts at higher latitudes. When clouds of ejected material and energy from the sun hit Earth’s donut-shaped magnetic field, some of it is deflected, but the rest is shunted toward the ground near the magnetic poles. This material interacts with Earth’s magnetic field, creating auroras and the electrical surges that flow through the planet’s surface. The closer to the poles a power grid is, the more likely it is to experience problems during geoelectric storms. Using historical data from a network of geomagnetic observation stations, the researchers were able to calculate the statistical likelihood of how strong storms could get in a given region.
But that’s not the only factor at play: Some areas of Earth’s crust are more conductive than others. Over the last few years, the National Science Foundation has sponsored a “magnetotelluric” survey of large swaths of the United States…
The thing about saying a Carrington like event will not destroy free standing electronic equipment is that it’s true, but we don’t actually KNOW, so far as I know, if CME’s ten times bigger, or even a thousand times bigger, are possible.
Nor do we have any real idea how often such an event might happen.
So far as I can tell, from just casual reading, we would know about such a big one if it had happened maybe as far back as we have tree ring data, etc. It would be detectable in any preserved wood still around, but maybe not in petrified wood.
Am I right about this speculation?
OFM,
Science has taken a look at this as at anything else we can think of.
Usoskin, I. G., & Kovaltsov, G. A. (2012). Occurrence of extreme solar particle events: assessment from historical proxy data. The Astrophysical Journal, 757(1), 92.
“The probability of occurrence of extreme solar particle events (SPEs) with proton fluence (>30MeV) F30 ≥ 1010 cm−2 is evaluated based on data on the cosmogenic isotopes 14C and 10Be in terrestrial archives covering centennial–millennial timescales. Four potential candidates with F30 = (1–1.5) × 1010 cm−2 and no events with F30 > 2 × 1010 cm−2 are identified since 1400 AD in the annually resolved 10Be data. A strong SPE related to the Carrington flare of 1859 AD is not supported by the data. For the last 11,400 years, 19 SPE candidates with F30 = (1–3) × 1010 cm−2 are found and clearly no event with F30 > 5 × 1010 cm−2 (50 times the SPE of 1956 February 23) has occurred. These values serve as observational upper limits on the strength of SPEs on the timescale of tens of millennia. Two events, ca. 780 and 1460 AD, appear in different data series making them strong candidates for extreme SPEs. We build a distribution of the occurrence probability of extreme SPEs, providing a new strict observational constraint. Practical limits can be set as F30 ≈ 1, 2–3, and 5×1010 cm−2 for occurrence probabilities ≈10−2, 10−3, and 10−4 yr−1, respectively. Because of the uncertainties, our results should be interpreted as a conservative upper limit on the SPE occurrence near Earth. The mean solar energetic particle (SEP) flux is evaluated as ≈40 (cm2 s)−1, in agreement with estimates from lunar rocks. On average, extreme SPEs contribute about 10% to the total SEP fluence.”
In practical terms it means that we get (as a planet) a strong particle event about every 200-500 years on average. There are no known 50x Carrington events. However the study does not detect the Carrington event in the proxies, so it appears it was a weak one.
Although there’s no way to know if tomorrow is the day, with some luck our technological civilization will be over by the time the next one hits.
“There are no known 50x Carrington events. ”
My point is that so far as I have yet found out, we really haven’t got a clue as to whether 50x Carrington events are possible, or how often they might be expected to occur.
The most we can say for sure is that we don’t think there has been one within the past x years, or else we would have found indications of it.
I’m not at all sure about how many years are represented by X, but about a thousand to two thousand years may be in the ballpark.
I seek enlightenment.
Remember the tsunami that made us a present of the biggest and baddest nuclear accident so far ?
If we had known more for sure about the odds of such a tsunami occurring , maybe that plant would have been at a higher elevation, or never built at all.
Since this thread is about dead and Dennis will probably be posting a new one…… here are some quotes worth a smile or a thought.
The totally convinced and the totally stupid have too much in common for the resemblance to be accidental. Robert Anton Wilson
I tried to edit my 12:42 and didn’t get back in time. Here’s the rest.
I’m hoping some of the brighter bulbs here will have something to say about sure ways of separating the totally convinced from the totally stupid.
Another
We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid. Benjamin Franklin
I agree with old Ben, within the ( omitted ) context of the quote, but it’s just not true as a generality.
Countless people are born into and trapped in lives where they really don’t have much if ANYTHING AT ALL in the way of opportunity to learn very much. I know many such people myself.
(Fortunately none of them are youngsters these days, they’re all older people. The kids nowadays know there’s a big world out there, and that r they have a good to excellent shot at doing as well or BETTER someplace else.)
Their minds are as good as anybody’s, but they’re like computers without adequate and accurate data. You can’t crunch it if you don’t have it, and if you haven’t got it, you are very likely to come to the ACCURATE conclusion that it’s beyond your reach.
They mostly make the best decisions they can be expected to make, given their circumstances, and the data they have to work with. It’s easy to believe you can do better, if you have role models who HAVE done better. If you don’t…..
Making fun of them is a BIG mistake, politically. It reinforces their already strong tendency to stick with what they know. Sticking with what you know, when you have NOTHING to fall back on but your position in the community in which you live is a very wise decision, if you want to be reasonably sure you will continue to live, and that you will be around to support the people who supported YOU when you needed it, as a child, or an adult in a bind.
People in this situation are most often either young and rebellious, or desperate, in order to make the leap and pack up and leave.
In recent times, the ones that have packed up and left in countries like the USA have generally survived, and a lot have thrived.
But in other places they may be at greater risk of perishing than surviving, never mind thriving. . and it seems to me that they usually understand that this is so…..if they even come to realize that packing up and leaving is even POSSIBLE.
Blaming such people for the circumstances they were born to, and the decisions they make within the context of their lives, is as utterly stupid as blaming a black man for being born black.
It’s really sad that so many people who are well enough informed to understand this perfectly obvious fact continue to look down on such people, and make fun of them, for various reasons….. none of them reasons to be proud of.
And it’s not only stupid, it’s sort of hypocritical in terms of the tolerance the liberal establishment preaches on a daily basis.
Even worse, it’s a major major political risk, because it leads to political backlash.
Can any of you nose in the air sniffy talking types spell T R U M P?
Hmmm, resonance can cause structural failures in materials.
Here’s another. Voltaire is a writer of stature comparable to that of Franklin as a poltician and scientist, but quotes taken context sure can make you look silly.
To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. Voltaire
I guess if even if Trump has never accomplished any thing else worth mentioning, he has proved that Voltair. is sort of dated, in this one respect, lol.
This one is one to keep in mind, when making decisions about one’s personal life, and one’s political allies and enemies.
The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.
Thomas Szasz
This one ought to be hanging on the wall in every office, every business, home, and bar.
It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong. Thomas Sowell
Incidentally all these are copied from BrainyQuotes.
Let me tell you something about full moons: kids don’t care about full moons. They’ll play in a full moon, no worries at all. They only get scared of magic or werewolves from stupid adults and their stupid adult stories. Neil deGrasse Tyson
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/stupid_2.html
Solid gold, and a perfectly VIABLE explanation for our status quo predicament.
The wise are instructed by reason, average minds by experience, the stupid by necessity and the brute by instinct. Marcus Tullius Cicero
Memo to White House: Calling voters stupid is not a winning strategy. Karl Rove
Both parties fail to heed this memo at grave risk, both short and medium term.
It can mean losing short term, and it can mean losing two or four years down the road.
The stupid things you do, you regret… if you have any sense, and if you don’t regret them, maybe you’re stupid. Katharine Hepburn
It’s time to get out of this easy chair, and outside, and get a little exercise.
The PV Market Alliance (PVMA) estimates global photovoltaic installations at 75 GW in 2016 and possibly a stable market in 2017.
After 50 GW of PV installations in 2015, this represents a 50% YoY growth, with now a total capacity installed globally crossing the 300 GW mark, PVMA notes.
China installed a world record of 34 GW; Japanese market decreased
China, leading the PV market since 2013, installed in 2016 an absolute world record of 34 GW, representing an increase of 126% YoY and 45% of total global deployment. Given China’s total installed capacity of 77 GW, PVMA estimates that China will have exceeded the 100 GW mark by the end of 2017, if not even earlier.
Japan has installed about 8.6 GW of PV in 2016, down 10.8 GW in 2015. 2017 might show a further decrease, says PVMA, but the market is expected to reach 7.5 to 8.5 GW, due to current project pipelines.
300 GW of solar PV installed worldwide must be preventing a fair amount of carbon emissions! Add to that almost 500 GW of wind power (see graph below plus an estimated 60GW for 2016) and it would seem that global renewable energy production is growing quite nicely!
Japan’s Renewable Energy Institute has published data on renewable energy’s contribution to the nation’s energy mix, using data from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). The METI data shows solar PV rising to 4.3% of electricity production over the course of 2016, a dramatic increase from 2015, when PV represented only 2.7% of production.
The effect was particularly noticeable in the last two quarters, when PV represented 5.0% and 6.0% of electricity generation, respectively.
Together, all renewable energy sources together represented 14.2% of production during 2016, but hydroelectric power is the majority of this. Japan has limited deployment of biomass, wind and geothermal, which makes up the final few percent.
This is after having an installed base of 3,618 MW of PV at the beginning of 2011, the year of the Fukishima incident and ending up with 33,300 MW at the beginning of 2016. According to the story I linked to in the post above this one, Japan added 8,600 MW in 2016 for a total 41,900 MW. If their installations continue as planned, Japan should end up second in terms of installed capacity globally. Only China will have more. Somebody should tell President Trump, the US is currently fourth in this race and if he wants the US to start winning again he’d better get out of the way of the people who want the US to stay firmly in this race!
Somebody should tell President Trump, the US is currently fourth in this race and if he wants the US to start winning again he’d better get out of the way of the people who want the US to stay firmly in this race!
Trump is owned by fossil fuel interests! Hopefully he will be impeached the sooner the better! He also wants to get out of the TPP! China must laughing all the way to the bank!
New Wyoming bill forbids utilities from using renewables
Republican legislators recently introduced a bill that would essentially ban large-scale renewable energy in the state by 2019.
Brilliant move by the coal lobby of Wyoming! Though I think it is tantamount to a declaration of war and it is a war they will lose. Republicans are much stupider than I ever thought possible and I already thought they were pretty darn stupid!
Yeah I saw that but, I didn’t want to steal the anti-renewables crowd’s thunder. Now you’ve gone and spoiled it for them by posting it before they spotted it! 😉
The Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project received key approvals for the initial phase of construction this week, with an ultimate aim of helping California meet renewables targets by 2030. BLM and FWS said the first 500 turbines would create negligible environmental impacts, and would be a net-positive for an eagle species in the area which had threatened the proposal.
“We can develop our nation’s wind resources in a way that conserves our extraordinary wildlife resources,” FWS Mountain-Prairie Regional Director Noreen Walsh said in a statement. Once final mitigation measures are approved, the service will issue an Eagle Take Permit for PCW.
BLM explained in its statement that under federal regulations, compensatory mitigation is not required for bald eagles. “However, any golden eagle taken must be compensated for to ensure golden eagle populations remain stable,” the agency said.
The project is located about half on privately-owned land and half on land administered by the federal government. According to PCW, the 1,500 MW of renewable energy generated from the project’s initial phase “will reduce America’s carbon emissions by millions of tons per year.”
The project is estimated to bring up to 1,200 jobs to Wyoming at peak construction, and more than 100 permanent positions to run the wind farm. The first phase of the project is estimated to generate almost $200 million in property-tax revenue during construction.
Timing of the project had been in doubt as Wyoming considered raising its tax on wind production, but the state nixed that proposal in the fall. However, lawmakers have introduced a measure that seeks to limit instate wind energy usage as a way to ensure more traditional generation resources like coal remain afloat in the power mix. The Cowboy State is heavily dependent on the coal industry for revenue, producing roughly 40% of the U.S.’ coal. As natural gas prices and the falling cost of renewables squeeze coal, Wyoming lawmakers are scrambling for ways to keep the industry financially stable.
Grab your popcorn folks! This one promises to be a doozy!
Isn’t most of the coal from Wyoming burned outside of the state? Wouldn’t that limit any effect Wyoming itself has on the coal industry? Sort of like bringing a pea-shooter to a gun battle.
Currently, yes, but the state government along with the University of Wyoming has an exciting Carbon Engineering Initiative that aims to use Wyoming’s incredible coal reserves to produce value-added products within the state. Beyond that many stakeholders are working hard to increase international exports of Wyoming coal along with investigating the feasibility of constructing a coal refinery.
I agree that our upcoming high tech materials will need carbon, so why are they in such a hurry to burn it up and reduce their long term resource income?
The rest are energetic pipe dreams. Government must increase coal subsidies and ignore all it’s external costs to keep the market stable or growing.
Some of our greatest welfare recipients.
But, along with timber and cattle and mining, the government feeding trough is a part of Wyoming life (one of my favorite states).
(although it is only 16th Nationally)
Red States generally live off Federal Aid:
1 Mississippi 62.08 11 1
2 New Mexico 55.45 2 8
3 Alabama 53.00 5 9
4 Louisiana 51.29 39 2
5 Tennessee 50.07 20 3
6 Montana 49.51 12 6
7 South Dakota 49.34 19 4
8 Kentucky 47.37 10 12
9 West Virginia 46.64 7 16
10 Missouri 45.07 30 5
They better enjoy the high life for the short term they will get it.
Currently, yes, but the state government along with the University of Wyoming has an exciting Carbon Engineering Initiative that aims to use Wyoming’s incredible coal reserves to produce value-added products within the state.
Right!
Your Republican Governor is a dishonest moron of the highest order! he wants the people of Wyoming to go back to the stone age and live in caves. Coal is uneconomic and it is downright stupid!
At nearly every turn Mead has raised a fist of defiance in the face of reality, be it with the economy, the environment, the federal government or his apparent conviction that the “Wyoming way” means rejecting science that doesn’t conform to a 19th-century world view.
Just a few weeks ago the governor vowed to again “double down” on Wyoming’s commitment to coal even as three of the biggest coal companies in the state sit in bankruptcy or teeter on the brink of it. Even as some of those companies appear poised to walk away from their liberally granted “self-bonding” requirements, which were supposed to pay for clean-up of the public lands they’ve soiled.
The inability of those companies to fulfill their promises means federal taxpayers are likely to get stuck covering a tab that could reach hundreds of millions of dollars or more.
As Tea Party Wyomingites still curse the Obama administration for completing the Bush-Cheney bailout of Wall Street banks and the auto industry, caused by a Great Recession that began on Bush’s watch, perhaps they might explain how the bonding fiasco does not equate to a taxpayer-subsidized bailout of big coal?
I don’t live in Wyoming, Fred. Although I’ve been there many times and could drive to Gillette, the coal capital of Wyoming, within a few hours if I wanted to.
I’m guessing you’ve never been to this region? Your attitude comes across as a stereotypical coastal liberal who will do anything to avoid “flyover country,” yet somehow feels justified in belittling the people who live there.
yet somehow feels justified in belittling the people who live there.
I didn’t belittle the people, it is the government of Wyoming that is the problem and that is who I’m speaking out against!
I just have a profound dislike of fascism which people who are pushing coal and other fossil fuels seem to love.
I also don’t like Orwellian double speak and alternative facts.
BTW, I’m a citizen of planet earth and have no idea who or what a coastal liberal is. As someone who has lived in countries other than the US, I have seen first hand the results of populist nationalism. It sucks big time!
Thanks to the current administration the US has officially been demoted from being a full democracy!
The U.S. has been demoted from a full democracy to a flawed democracy for the first time, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).
Every year, the firm’s Democracy Index provides a snapshot of global democracy by scoring countries on five categories: electoral process and pluralism; civil liberties; the functioning of government; political participation; and political culture. Nations are then classified under four types of governments: full democracy, flawed democracy, hybrid regime and authoritarian regime.
We are losing time with backwards thinking by pushing a 19th century industrial coal based economy while the rest of the world is embarking on a 21st century clean energy revolution.
The US is well on its way to becoming a third world country in all metrics.
On the Weather Depends the Harvest, and on the Harvest Depends Everything
European grain yield stagnation related to climate change, says Stanford scholar
“in 2010 and 2012, high nighttime temperatures affected corn yields across the U.S. Corn Belt, and premature budding due to a warm winter caused $220 million in losses of Michigan cherries in 2012.”
It’s critical that people actually understand reality, as it is laid out in this article.
But the Steinbeck qoute at the end perhaps says more about us, and about the future, than the entire article except that last paragraph.
Half a century ago, John Steinbeck wrote in East of Eden: “And it never failed that during the dry years the people forgot about the rich years, and during the wet years they lost all memory of the dry years. It was always that way.” We now have an opportunity to prove him wrong, to remember even in wet years that the lessons learned in dry years can stay with us.
People that live close to the land have long memories.
I fear that those who get their livings doing things that would be mostly incomprehensible to their great grandparents, and their groceries in supermarkets, and live in houses where everything but the food is magically taken care of, have short memories.
Short memories imply relative ignorance, in respect to many aspects of the physical world, and therefore a tendency to take unnecessary chances.
We already had the discussion in the last thread about how these numbers represent weather, not climate. In other words, using them to push a personal climate change fanaticism is disingenuous.
The other thing to keep in mind about the Arctic is all the “in-filling” the meteorologists have to perform to the weather data there. Because there are few human settlements up in the far north, there are few observation stations there. Even among the stations that do exist, getting the data out to the wider world can be problematic due to the lack of telecommunications infrastructure or other logistical challenges. Consequently, scientists have to do a lot of “massaging” of actual data in order to get any semblance of understanding of the parts of the Arctic where they have no concrete data. Therefore, any “index” that claims to represent the current state of the entire Arctic should be looked at with, at the bare minimum, a critical set of eyes.
Trigger Warning
And yet a 19-station index along the Arctic Ocean observed only 5 below normal days in 2016. No infilling. Just measurements of temperature. That’s a lot of warm weather. 360 out of 365 days worth.
“We already had the discussion in the last thread about how these numbers represent weather, not climate. In other words, using them to push a personal climate change fanaticism is disingenuous.” ~ Steven Haner
FYI
Premise: (noun) previous statement or proposition from which another is inferred or follows as a conclusion.
Conclusion: (noun) a proposition that is reached from given premises. https://youtu.be/OpNoCmNtP5c
“Even among the stations that do exist, getting the data out to the wider world can be problematic due to the lack of telecommunications infrastructure or other logistical challenges. Consequently, scientists have to do a lot of “massaging” of actual data in order to get any semblance of understanding of the parts of the Arctic where they have no concrete data.” ~ Steven Haner
Thanks for the heads up Steve. Where would we be without you and your inside scoop on the details of Arctic telecommunication logistics? Pure comedy gold.
For all interested parties, I suggest you peruse the following page for the facts before it too, is removed:
No need to speculate about the measurements, how they are made, collected and adjusted. The facts are all there.
You can always go to the European Environment Agency. In Europe even the right wing fascists do not dispute the science behind anthropogenic climate change.
Another fun, “fact filled” post, brought to you with the kind sponsorship of the Happy Billionaires!
“The Party told you to reject all evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
~George Orwell, 1984
Tamino is a foolish blogger that believes he can remove the effect of El Niño on global average temperatures. Already the fall in global average temperatures since March 2016 has proven him wrong.
Thanks Bob.
“You guys are such losers, coming after me with ad hominem attacks. It is the recourse of those left without arguments.
You don’t realize those attacks tell a lot more about you than about me. You come out as losers.” ~ Javier
I don’t intend to be personally disrespectful to you, either.
So as a PERSONAL matter, I apologize. We’re all big boys and girls here, and we all know it’s hot in the kitchen, so it’s perfectly acceptable to sling a little mud concerning the validity of anybody’s beliefs and opinions.
In terms of debating the specific question, I will continue to believe you are shooting off your own toes, another one every time you try to refute my point.
I don’t CARE what you believe, personally, or if I convince other forum members I am right, and you are wrong, in terms of winning or losing this particular round.
MY INTENTION , MY OVERALL goal, is ONE to provoke any reader of my comments to think about the issues from an ADDITIONAL, DIFFERENT perspective, thereby widening the range of conclusions he MIGHT reach in deciding his future courses of action. Reading my stuff might also help him prove his own arguments, even if they are contrary to my mine.
TWO, to provoke replies that enable me to spot blind spots in my own thinking, and get rid of them, or correct my reasoning, as necessary. The more replies to the contrary I get, the better.
I don’t mind admitting it when I’m wrong. But later on, when I publish for real, I want to be as sure as possible that I am RIGHT. So……. Thank you , Nick, for helping me get my ducks in a row, factually.
And while a less intelligent person might not appreciate this fact, I am sure YOU do. We are basically in the same book, and mostly in the same chapter, and often enough on the same page.
So it pays to remember what Ronnie Raygun had to say about such a scenario.
If somebody agrees with you eighty percent of the time, he’s your friend.
Domestic squabbles aside, I salute you as a friend and ally, in terms of the BIG PICTURE.
Now back to a little domestic cat fight’n, as far as the SPECIFIC argument above, concerning how we present the case for renewables is concerned, I simply cannot conclude anything except that you are utterly incapable of understanding what I am talking about, or ………….
I have often remarked that you are remarkably consistent, so consistent in sticking to your messages, in fact, that I strongly suspect you are a professionally trained PR guy. Such people NEVER admit they are wrong, and they NEVER admit the opposition has a VALID point.
So ……. I conclude you DO get my point. I conclude that you ARE highly intelligent. And I conclude you simply do not wish to acknowledge I have a valid point.
Anybody that has been paying any attention at all for the last forty or fifty years HAS to understand that the people of this country are mostly lead around by the nose via sound bite coverage of the issues, rather than by reading and listening to accurate and in depth reporting of the issues, and making up their own minds after serious thought.
Given this reality, I am convinced I have made my case, in respect to the way we COLLECTIVELY PRESENT the case for renewable energy, and that you have stuck your foot in your mouth, and are trying to avoid acknowledging you lost this point.
I conclude you simply do not wish to acknowledge I have a valid point.
Mac, I’ve agreed that perception and messaging are important. Let me say it again:
I agree that getting the right sound bites are important. Heck, I believe that’s why Trump won the election: Fox News et al have succeeded in spreading vast amount of misinformation and toxic, unrealistic anger/fear over the years. I’ve been saying that for years on TOD and POB: the technical issues about energy and climate are all solvable: it’s the politics and messaging that need fixing.
I was trying to say that we need to come to agreement on the technical issues before we move to messaging…
Now….on the technical issue – I’m just as baffled as you. Javier’s point was dead wrong. The fact is that *seasonal* energy storage just isn’t needed yet, and that the tech and engineering to solve that problem, when it’s needed, are all there. It’s just not a big scary predicament, as his argument would suggest.
So, I’m baffled as to why I’m not able to communicate that to you. Perhaps you can figure out the correct way to say it…
Sure , Nick, just DON’T SAY IT if it isn’t TRUE, and then go back and weasel by adding the qualifier or caveat ” not needed yet” .
It is as obvious as the noonday sun that WE MUST HAVE FOSSIL FUEL BACKUP POWER NOW, TODAY, NOW ,TONIGHT , in order to make use of wind and solar power within the context of an electrical grid.
Saying we don’t need it is sticking our collective chin out for a knock out round house blow, in the public arena, because these days we win or lose such debates in the public arena using sound bites.
It’s FINE, it’s GREAT to talk about new solar farms, or new wind farms, generating electricity cheaper than new or even old gas or coal fired plants, so long as you tell it like it is, and like it is involves acknowledging that we MUST KEEP MOST , maybe even nearly all, of our existing fossil fuel fired plants ready to run, for quite some time yet.
If you (rhetorical ) cannot understand why a man on the street thinks you are talking bullshit, when you ignore this sun at high noon obvious fact, and the anti renewable faction points it out, making you ( rhetorical) look just as phony and slimy as the coal junkies look to US ( renewable’s advocates ) when WE point out they fail to acknowledge the externalized costs of burning coal when arguing that coal is cheap……….
It’s just not intellectually honest to go around saying an electric car costs only x dollars, when the actual fucking price of the car is X plus Y dollars, Y being however much the purchaser can get in the form of a tax rebate.
Pardon my french sir, but the goddamned cost of the car is equal to whatever the MANUFACTURER GETS FOR IT.
And anybody who happens to be even REMOTELY even handed in his judgement of this argument will agree with me. The fact that one guy can get a new electric car for say five thousand less than another guy who for some reason cannot get the five grand tax break simply means in non partisan terms that one guy is the beneficiary of successful special interest lobbying, in THIS case the lobbyist’s being those working for the electric car industry, environmental organizations, etc.
The car does NOT cost less , although the actual purchaser pays less. The difference is paid by guys like me, and maybe guys like you, if you haven’t bought one yourself, and collected the subsidy.
You are prone to saying things that make you look utterly foolish when the opposition is at bat in the court of public opinion.
This forum is not the court of public opinion. The audience is too small, and we are a self selected group with a substantial body of knowledge at our disposal, and HERE , in this forum, we know what you mean, even if what you actually SAY is demonstrably misleading when and if it is overheard by a typical man or woman on the street, because the typical man spends about as much time in a YEAR thinking about such topics as the regulars here spend on them in a single DAY.
None of what I have said should be interpreted as an indication I am opposed to subsidizing the electric car industry. I AM in favor of these subsidies, although I believe they should be arranged in a more equitable fashion so that lower income people can benefit from them as well.
I just try to tell it like it IS.
Tens of millions of people are opposed to these subsidies, and if THEY read your remarks in respect to the cost of buying subsidized electric car……………… well THEIR opinion of YOUR motives and honesty parallels your opinion of the motives and honesty of the Koch brothers defending their coal mines, when they avoid mentioning the externalized costs of using coal.
Am I making it OBVIOUS enough YET?
No, you’re not remembering things right.
1st, Javier claimed that a 100% renewable grid wasn’t possible. Ever. I refuted that. I never said that fossil fuels were not needed on the grid right now. It wasn’t part of the discussion.
I have never argued about the net cost of EVs, after tax credits. I have always talked about the manufacturer’s cost *without* tax credits. I HAVE stressed that operating costs are important, and that EVs like the Leaf have a Total Cost of Operation that is about as low as cars get (again, excluding the tax credit). I also have at times pointed out that at least 90% of new car buyers can take advantage of the tax credit by leasing, and that EVs like the Leaf have a crazy low TCO with the tax credit, but those were never main points. I’ve always taken pains to exclude the tax credit for cost discussions.
You have noticed that I’m careful what I say, and try to be somewhat consistent. For some reason that sometimes strikes you as a possible negative. I don’t know why – it’s because I think what we’re doing here is meaningful, so I try to get things right.
Since there is no slot to reply upthread, I will just copy HB here.
He has oh so GRACIOUSLY offered ME an opportunity to SAVE FACE? HAR HAR HAR
So what are you saying ? The “special lube” is for you big guy ? I tried to give you an opportunity to save face. But I guess that went right over your head too. I think you would be better off not sharing your personal life on an energy blog. Maybe a little more time on a dating websites might help. Good luck.
I didn’t bring up your need for lube, you did(twice). I suggest you google shop “special lube” and see what “pops up”. Don’t blame your problems on me.
Now let’s hear your Trump alternative facts
xxxx
You haven’t even a stub of a leg to stand on, but it’s obvious you are too stupid to ever understand that you are so stupid you can’t comprehend your own stupidity.
Yep, the lube I mentioned is for me. I have machinery that requires that sort of thing.Tradesmen and jobbers refer to them as specialty products, specialty lubricants, specialty paints, specialty fasteners, specialty this that and the other, because the market for them is limited, and you generally have to order them, as they are not sold in sufficient quantity to stock them in local stores.
I know what the other kind is, and who uses it. I have never had any need for that kind. I stick to women, and they are always nicely lubricated after I use my well educated hands and tongue on them for an hour or so. Old farmers generally do it in a leisurely fashion.
One piece of my machinery would probably fit up your backside, using the other kind of lubricant, but it would cause you quite a bit of pain. I wouldn’t abuse it that way, however, for fear I would catch a social disease, and I don’t owe you any favors, and thus wouldn’t want to give you any pleasures.
I can get as dirty as you like, and if you want a personal face to face confrontation, we can sign up for the tough guy fights.
They have them as preliminaries to the regular fights in lots of places. Perfectly legal, no problems with the law. I’m a Scots Irish southern mountain guy. We’re FAMOUS for being touchy, and for fighting just for the fun of it, the way guys in other places play a little basketball. It’s old hat to me.
We’re all big boys and girls on the net, and slinging a little mud is ok as long as it’s aimed at political and economic opinions, etc.
But if you want to play the entirely personal game, I can play it better than you , and will. Call me stupid, that’s no problem. Imply that I am a pervert or whatever, and I will reply in kind until one or both of us are banned.
Ron and Dennis are patient guys, but they will eventually get rid of us.
I forgot to thank H B for helping me keep attention focused on my arguments.
Oldfarmermac says:
01/21/2017 AT 10:29 AM
Hi Survivalist,
I am not free to name him, but I have an old friend from the TOD days who an one time maintained two or three different personnas at that site, so as to play them like puppets in order to make his points.
If I didn’t have HB to spar with, I would need to INVENT HB.
XXXXX
Your post above makes it pretty clear that your only using myself as an excuse to continue your hate rants toward HRC. Which you regularly posted prior to the election and makes no sense it you truly didn’t want Trump to win. No one believes your current story that you were just trying to help the Democrats prior to the election. Mac, you were part of the conduit of the hate Hillary campaign. There is no if’s, and’s or but’s about it. It’s time for you to own up to your actions.
I think Hillary is a horrible human being. She’s a blood thirsty warmonger who campaigned on a promise of an act of war with Russia (Syria no-fly zone). She’s a damned fool.
Alternative view:
“Actually, in retrospect, I’ve started to think I’m pleased about Trump and I’m pleased about Brexit because it gives us a kick up the arse and we needed it because we weren’t going to change anything. Just imagine if Hillary Clinton had won and we’d been business as usual, the whole structure she’d inherited, the whole Clinton family myth. I don’t know that’s a future I would particularly want. It just seems that was grinding slowly to a halt, whereas now, with Trump, there’s a chance of a proper crash, and a chance to really rethink.”
Oldfarmermac says:
01/23/2017 AT 10:32 AM
Hi HB,
You are constantly proving that you are the biggest fool in this forum, with the possible exception of Javier.
Anybody who knows shit from apple butter knows the R party did everything it could prevent the passage of the ACA .
XXXX
Is the ACA the GOP health care plan from 1993?
If there’s one thing conservatives might hate more than Obamacare, it’s hearing that Obamacare springs from Republican ideas. The Heritage Foundation, the granddaddy of the right-wing think tanks, fumed when President Barack Obama said it was the source of the concept of the health insurance marketplaces where people could shop for the best deal. (We rated Obama’s claim Mostly True.)
Squaring off with Sean Hannity on his Fox News Channel show, Democratic public relations consultant Ellen Qualls could barely get these words out:
Time out!
Is the Affordable Care Act really the same as “the Republican plan in the early ’90s?”
Short answer — sort of. There was a Republican bill in the Senate that looked a whole lot like Obamacare, but it wasn’t the only GOP bill on Capitol Hill, it never came to a vote and from what we can tell, plenty of conservative Republicans didn’t like it.
Republican Sen. John Chafee of Rhode Island was the point man. The bill he introduced, Health Equity and Access Reform Today, (yes, that spells HEART) had a list of 20 co-sponsors that was a who’s who of Republican leadership. There was Minority Leader Bob Dole, R- Kan., Sens. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and many others. There also were two Democratic co-sponsors.
Among other features, the Chafee bill included:
An individual mandate;
Creation of purchasing pools;
Standardized benefits;
Vouchers for the poor to buy insurance;
A ban on denying coverage based on a pre-existing condition.
You’ve still got your head so far up your backside it would take a winch to extract it.
Sure there have been proposals made by Republicans in the past, such as the ones you mention, that include features similar to the ACA.
I suppose you are too poorly informed to know that Chafee is usually referred to by the R establishment as a RINO, or used to be, anyway. Look it up.
THAT BILL WAS NEVER PASSED.
The ACA was passed, and the R’s did everything they could to PREVENT it from being passed, and only an idiot who has NO CONCEPTION of how stupid he looks by claiming other wise would make such a claim.
You’re at least proving one thing. You are good enough at telling bald faced lies that even a six year old can see thru that Trump might offer you a job in his propaganda department.
Now here’s a little excerpt from a piece written by UGO BARDI, who is a well known scientist, environmentalist, and writer with a deep understanding of modern day culture. Anybody that wishes can read the whole piece at Resilience.ORG.
“Defeats are supposed to teach people how to do better; in theory. In practice, it often happens that defeats teach people how to become masters in blame-shifting. With some exceptions, this seems to have been the main result of the recent defeat of the Democrats in the 2016 presidential election, where we saw a truly spasmodic search for culprits: Putin, the Russian hackers, the Fake News, the Rednecks, the FBI, Exxon, the aliens from Betelgeuse, and more. Everything except admitting one’s mistakes.”
People who can think accept their mistakes, and change their ways, so as not to make the same mistakes a second time.
Every body knows why the D’s lost the election. Clinton came into the race with a baggage train a mile long. She was condescending and arrogant, and only her hard core trusted her, and even her hard core was suspicious of her.
She displayed an appalling lack of judgement in creating her secret home brew email system,and when it was found out, all the little Clinton lap doggies insisted hacking was no issue. She displayed an appalling lack of sense in openly taking millions of dollars in speaking fees from banksters, considering she was running for president, right along.
When she lost, all her lap doggies reversed course on the hacking question, and started baying about the Russians costing their princess the election. It’s nice having it both ways, but believing it both ways requires a certain minimum level of stupidity.
She displayed an even MORE ridiculuous lack of sensitivity to the mood of the public, and to the needs and fears of the REAL core of the D party, by rubbing the noses of working class people in the dirt, using words such as deplorable, and not even bothering to show up for a campaign event in the states that put Trump over the top.
She was even too full of herself to understand that black and brown people, and gays and lesbians and sex changers and everybody else, except her elitist supporters in English suits and Italian shoes and Prada live, in the words of a very famous bald headed D pit bull, “live in the economy” meaning they have to go to work every day, rather than live on investments or inheritances.
She was a dangerously high risk candidate from the word go, and the biggest reason she got the nomination is that she played the old time machine politician game, using her position as Bill’s First Lady, etc, to gain an octopus like grip on the D party machinery.
You can continue to deny it, but other than prominent D leaders who are as a matter of necessity forced to blame her loss on the R’s, the fake news, the FBI, the Russians, etc, you are alone, except for other little Clinton lap doggies.
There are now enough big D Democrats who have either known it all along, or else who have realized the truth of what I have been saying that they are mounting an assault on the D party establishment that may well result in their kicking the hard core Clinton partisans OUT, to a sufficient degree that they ( they are usually referred to as BERNIECRATS or something along that line ) become the party bosses.
I have posted several links already pointing out this rebellion inside the party on the part of D’s who never wanted Clinton as their candidate in the first place. I will post more, here and there , all along, every time you tell another lie about me.
The bald headed D pit bull is James Carville. He’s one of the meanest and most effective D guys ever, when it comes to ripping R’s to shreds with his tongue. When he says something critical of a Democrat, you can bet your virgin daughters honor that it NEEDS SAYING. He’s about as inside an insider as exists, the sort of guy who could get Bill Clinton on the phone just about anytime at all, a go to man that Bill called when there was a problem calling for his talents.
He was an IMPORTANT MAN in the Clinton administration.
I will say it again. The only people, other than Clinton lap doggie true believers, blaming Clinton’s loss on OTHER people are public D figures compelled to pretend they believe it, because they are part of the Clinton machine, and although Clinton is history, the machine still exists, and they still want to maintain their positions as movers and shakers inside the D party AS IT EXISTS AT THIS TIME. Clinton lost, but her machine still exists, and still controls the D party, but maybe not for much longer.
The Berniecrats are mounting an assault that might succeed. THEY may be in control of most of the key D party positions and offices before too much longer.
HB might eventually get it, one of these days, maybe a couple of years down the road, but if he does, he will NEVER admit it in this forum.
This is for Javier.
“All eight papers dealing with extreme heat events in this year’s Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society’s attribution report show a clear climate change signal that made them more likely, more hot or both. In fact, of the 22 studies scientists have submitted to the annual review over the past four years, only one didn’t find that climate change increased the odds or severity of extreme heat.”
I copied this from the Climate Central site. Took about two minutes to find it.
Sometimes some of the consequences of changing averages lag the average. The number of extremely hot days may actually be increasing at a slower rate than global average temperatures are increasing. I haven’t yet looked very far into this possibility.
If so, the number of extremely hot days occuring any given year will sooner or later accelerate and catch up.
If so, the number of extremely hot days occuring any given year will sooner or later accelerate and catch up.
Back to the predictions that are not taking place. Why if global warming is more than a century old we have to wait for the predictions to take place in the future instead of taking place right now?
Do you think the EPA is lying when they show their heat wave index?
That figure shows the annual values of the U.S. Heat Wave Index from 1895 to 2015. These data cover the contiguous 48 states. Interpretation: An index value of 0.2 (for example) could mean that 20 percent of the country experienced one heat wave, 10 percent of the country experienced two heat waves, or some other combination of frequency and area resulted in this value.
Here is a very informative graph with the hot daily highs and hot daily lows versus US percent land area during June, July and August.
That graph shows the percentage of the land area of the contiguous 48 states with unusually hot daily high and low temperatures during the months of June, July, and August. The thin lines represent individual years, while the thick lines show a nine-year weighted average. Red lines represent daily highs, while orange lines represent daily lows. The term “unusual” in this case is based on the long-term average conditions at each location.
Hi OFM, thanks for posting those links. I’m interested in them too. It seems to me that if climate change is a problem it is for various reasons. It’s impact on agriculture is my biggest concern. Note- having a concern makes one an alarmist to some. It’s a feeble attempt to cast an intelligent discussion as a debate between extremists vs a moderate. A moderate who doesn’t believe in the precautionary principle. Any-who, I feel that modern civilization is based on the assumption of a lot of continued rice, corn, soyabean and wheat production. I appreciate your Ag background and experience and your input to the food security climate change discussion. Thanks again for those links. Prof David Battisti has some good lectures on YouTube if you care to view them.
Precisely OFM,
EPA figure shows that it is the hot lows that are increasing, not the hot highs. Hot highs are similar to the 1930’s, when CO2 was much lower.
So how can anybody predict a disaster for agriculture when heat waves and hot highs are not increasing? Based on what? No wonder agriculture is doing so well. What we have seen is a reduction in crop frost losses as the growing season has lengthened and temperatures have raised.
Javier is not only unacquainted with the precautionary principle, he’s also badly vision impaired, as far as I can tell.
He can’t even see the heavy red line from the sixties on up, lol.
He sounds exactly like either a Republican or Democratic party mouth piece denying obvious facts and saying something might be ( and is, in this particular case ) or might not be true to divert the audience’s attention from the issue.
Sure the “hot lows” are increasing. So are the highs for the day, and according to what I hear inside my profession, they tend to be increasing at the times of the year they cause the most problems for farmers.
I am not yet doing detailed research on this this particular aspect of climate and farming, but I suppose I can find a chart or graph to support my case every time Javier can find one to support his. Later on is plenty soon in this respect, because I can use newer data when I ‘m ready for it.
Incidentally temperatures don’t need to go to the century mark to cause some real problems. The problems can and do start at much lower highs for the day, depending on the calender date, the crop, and the geographical area under consideration.
Any thing in a chart that contradicts Javier’s arguments is always an outlier data so far as he is concerned. But if it works better for him, an outlier is evidence .
I’m sure he can repost the graph with his own trend line perfectly flat by going back thru the thirties at the peak. Outliers don’t exist for him, unless they support his case.
As RW would say, HAR HAR.
One of the characteristics of the temperature rise is the increasing warm nights. That is indicative of a shift in the lower end of the temperature distribution and shape of the distribution.
Droughts go hand in hand with temperature rise and high temperature peaks. Desert regions are predicted to expand as the earth warms. Droughts will become more intense with warming.
According to Javier-Logic, we are just now getting back to the ideal growing conditions of the 1930’s Dust Bowl. Yields should skyrocket! 😉
Nope, the growing conditions in the 1930’s were clearly much worse. Non-CO2 global warming then produced a much greater increase of hot days in the US and lots of forest fires, unlike present global warming.
Javier is not only unacquainted with the precautionary principle
The precautionary principle clearly states that your actions should not cause more harm that the bad you are trying to prevent.
Was putting all Americans of Japanese origin in concentration camps during second world war a good example of the precautionary principle?
If the dangers of global warming are imaginary, how far should we go to de-carbonize the economy for a negligible effect on temperatures? The estimated cost of the Paris accords is one trillion dollars that according to IPCC models will prevent 0.017°C of warming or the equivalent delay of 4 years in global warming by 2100.
I don’t think you can invoke the precautionary principle under these conditions.
Hi Javier,
Do you expect that fossil fuels will deplete?
If the answer is yes, won’t we need some substitute for the energy provided by fossil fuels?
It would seem a combination of better energy efficiency and a ramp up of non-fossil fuel energy will be needed in the future whether climate change is a problem or not.
Does it not seem prudent to prepare for a future where fossil fuels may become scarce?
I would note that in most cases you have suggested that my projections for future fossil fuel availability are far too optimistic (you believe there will be less available than my “medium” fossil fuel scenario, and that perhaps my low scenario is also too high).
In fact, your belief that climate change is unlikely to be a problem may in part be explained by a lack of economically recoverable fossil fuels along with a low estimate (less than 2 C) for climate sensitivity.
I think it is possible that climate change might not be a problem if my low scenario proves correct, non-fossil fuel energy is ramped up quickly, and ECS is around 2.5 to 3 C.
I am far less certain that any of these assumptions will prove correct than you seem to be. There is much that is unknown and just as an engineer would build a bridge 2 or 3 times stronger than his best estimate of needed strength just to be safe, it would be better to err on the side of caution in the face of uncertain levels of future global warming.
Dennis,
Do you expect that fossil fuels will deplete?
I believe Peak Oil is already taking place and 2015 could very well be the year of highest oil production.
But while I think we are pretty much doomed to collapse starting in just a couple of decades, I believe we are going to enjoy a very nice climate while we collapse. And I define collapse as entering a downward trend in population, economy, and complexity, interrupted by periods of stabilization (pauses or hiatuses in collapse if you like).
In a very few years we all are going to stop worrying about the climate and start worrying about more pressing issues. Perhaps we will have time before to see that the CO2 hypothesis is incorrect and its future dangers have been greatly exaggerated.
Not all Japanese Americans were placed in camps. Many Japanese Americans served in the US Army.
No, putting most Americans of Japanese origin in concentration camps during second world war is not a good example of the precautionary principle. It’s a good example of risk assessment (and risk management). Perhaps you didn’t know there’s a difference.
Precautionary principle is for the avoidance of risks that are impossible to assess. Risk assessment is the process that is used to quantitatively or qualitatively estimate and characterize risk.
“The precautionary principle demands precautionary measures whenever unknown risks prove impossible to assess”
I’m rather sure you don’t know what the precautionary principle is. I’m also rather sure that not knowing what it is won’t stop you from thinking that you do and talking about it nonstop like you’re a leading world expert on it.
“The precautionary principle clearly states that your actions should not cause more harm that the bad you are trying to prevent.”
In this case, as in every case, we have to estimate the odds of the potential harm coming to pass , the costs of the harm if it does come to pass, and the costs of the potential precautionary measures, and do the usual cost benefit analysis.
This has been done many many times, and unless you assume that the odds of major climate problems happening are low to negligible, the result is that it’s a no brainer to implement proactive preventative measures NOW.
The Trumpsters and the Koch brothers and their ilk assume the risks of climate trouble are low to negligible, as you do.
The very large majority of professionals in the fields of public health, climate, physics, agriculture, etc, estimate that the odds of climate troubles resulting from the continuing bau use of fossil fuels are high to extremely high.
And they estimate that the MAGNITUDE of these problems will be CATASTROPHIC, if we continue on our current path.
You’re entitled to your own opinion, and free to express it, but I for one will not let you get away with misleading any newcomers or lurkers who visit this forum.
The example of the internment of the Japanese people is relevant , after some fashion, but not very relevant. It might be used to prove that sometimes precautions are taken that later proved to be unnecessary.
I lock up my shop. I have found out thousands of times that nobody attempted to steal my tools the previous night. Does that prove I ought to leave my shop unlocked??
As for your link, I long ago concluded that Lomborg ( spelling? ) went the route of paid mouthpiece for the business as usual establishment, and I rate his credibility as about equal to your own- meaning close to zero. So does just about every body else, except fossil fuel industry mouthpieces, meaning Lomborg. I presume that hardly anybody has ever even heard of YOU, by comparison to Lomborg.
It’s very easy to cherry pick and exaggerate the worst case estimates of the cost of preventative measures, in respect to future climate problems, while totally ignoring the secondary benefits of taking such measures NOW, while we are still able.
Whatever measures we take will on the average improve public health outcomes, and reduce the risk of war between countries, both economic and literal. Any measures we take now will have the happy effect of speeding up progress in various fields ranging from A to Z all the way along the economic alphabet.
And such efforts will have the very happy effect of EXTENDING the life of our one time gift of nature finite depleting endowment of fossil fuels.
It’s easy to deliberately overlook the undeniable fact that natural gas depletes just like oil, and that we will be wishing ten years down the road we had used that one time gift of cheap gas more wisely, because it’s not always going to be cheap.
Virtually every body in this forum knows that conventional natural gas production is in terminal decline. I don’t pretend to know how long the CHEAP part of the tight gas endowment will last, but I am dead sure it won’t last FOREVER, and I’m of the opinion it won’t last much longer than a decade , if it lasts even that long.
Outfits like the one you quoted pull numbers out of the air, as it suits them. Outfits like the CDC and Greenpeace cite their sources.
Folks interested in knowing what sort of outfit prageru is can google the term, and they can see for themselves. I guarantee they will NOT be impressed.
You’re running neck and neck with my little lap doggie HB when it comes to winning the forum’s dunce hat award.
Keep it up. I’m accumulating useful working notes engaging in this little pissing match. It’s wet and muddy and not very pleasant outside. I’m inside enjoying a nice warm fire and an Irish coffee. This sort of thing is both work and recreation to me. I’ve got all night, and if I fall asleep, there’s tomorrow. 😉
As my dear departed blunt spoken country woman Mom used to say, I can tear up anything you are likely to post ” like a chicken on a dry cow turd”.
Are you having any fun yet?
Bring it on, I’m used to working in manure up to a foot deep, and keep knee high rubber boots handy in case of need. If it gets even deeper, I have taller ones that reach up to my armpits, that I can use if necessary, although they were designed for fishing rather than working cows.
I find the Japanese internment issue fascinating. Ethics are a big part of responding to risk assessments, and operationalizing the precautionary principle when risk assessments can’t be made. Perhaps you might like this article that examines the military necessity of Japanese internment from the perspective of the Canadian experience.
Forget it OFM, the US government is now controlled by Javier’s ‘FFF’ Friends.
That would be ‘Fossil Fuel Fascists’, in case you are wondering! The only thing they are interested in, is ‘Alternative Facts’!
I’ll see if I can find the link to a talk on how global warming affects the optimum range of temperature for most of the world’s crops. As you are well aware there may be a slight improvement for crops currently being grown in cooler climes.
However since it is highly likely that the temperature range for most of South Asia, Africa and South America will be skewed towards a few days of too hot weather during the already at the high end limit of temperature range, only a fucking imbecile would argue that the world has nothing to worry about.
I have nothing to do with US politics. That’s your problem, not mine.
it is highly likely that the temperature range for most of South Asia, Africa and South America will be skewed towards a few days of too hot weather during the already at the high end limit of temperature range
I already showed you that global warming has taken place mainly in the Northern Hemisphere. Antarctica has been cooling, and the Southern Hemisphere and Tropics have experimented reduced global warming. It is curious that there is so much mythology between alarmists when the knowledge is there. Perhaps because it does not support alarmism.
There is always something to worry, Fred. There were people that went to live into self-made nuclear refuges during the nuclear war scare. Where you one of them? It is not insane to worry, but it is to make your life turn around your worries, because more often than not they turn out to be unjustified.
Figure from IPCC AR4 figure 9.6.1
Hi Fred,
I’m afraid you’re right about the triple F faction being in control of our government, but as you and a few million other scientifically literate guys and gals have said before, and sooner than I, you can’t fool Mother Nature, and facts are stubborn things.
I wish I had thought of the FFF moniker first!
The rest of the world will continue to gather the relevant data, and publish it.
The rest of the world will continue to invest in going renewable as fast as possible, and not only for reasons doing with climate.
One of my primary goals is to convince as many renewable advocates as possible to place a LOT more emphasis on the many benefits associated with going renewable, and relatively less emphasis on the climate problem, especially here in the land o’ the free ( more or less ) and home o’ the brave.
My reasoning is based on a thorough ( though non professional ) study of human nature, and in particular the way we make up our minds about issues such as renewables and global climate change.
Here’s the way I see it.
Those of us who are technically literate DON’T need to be sold over and over, the way the sellers of automobiles, beer, and soft drinks continually sell and resell their products. We understand.
And those who don’t really understand, in purely technical terms, but do understand that scientists in general are morally upright people, and that science as a whole has provided us with our current day pleasant, easy, relatively disease free, long lives are smart enough that they only need be reminded of the climate problem from time to time. So long as the D or liberalish leaning political wing is on board, they will be on board no matter what, because they will vote their tribal loyalties, in precisely the same fashion as the Trumpster types will vote THEIR tribal loyalties.
So far as I am concerned, this interpretation of the political landscape is as obvious as the sun at noon on a clear day.
So- as I see it, what we are doing as environmental advocates in general, and renewable advocates in particular, when we focus so heavily on climate, IS GOOD, but it’s NOT optimal.
We need to get the message across to the middle of the road people, and to the people on the other side who are willing to listen to it. Quite a few of them are on board already, although they still vote the other way. They can be won over, gradually.
And changing the emphasis will not hurt at all, in respect to the people who are ALREADY on board and voting the environmental ticket.
I hang around an hour or so at our little local ” country club happy hour” and have a beer at least a couple of afternoons a week with from four to eight good old country boys, the sort who love their guns, and their women, and their country, and their oversized trucks too, although they have almost entirely given up the oversized trucks for smaller ones, being retired now. Six out of the eight are hard core R types. About three of them believe in Trump. They’re the dumbest , as you can easily guess. Two are hard core D’s, believe it or not. They are not at all scarce even in this backwoods. I’m number nine, and the only real outlier, speaking for both sides, and pissing off both sides.
(We meet in the sunshine right across the creek from my place,at my neighbor’s shop and barn, on nice days, under the equipment shed on hot days, and in the shop on cold days. We get our beer in bulk of course. These guys are as regular as the ones on any tv show where in the characters hang out in a bar. Even MORE regular! )
Four or five years ago, or a little longer, they were all laughing at “lecterk” automobiles, but now they’re talking every day about that there ‘Mer’kun gen’yis Musk ‘n how he’s showed them fancy pants Huns ‘n ‘talyins his taillights racing their cars that cost three ‘n four times as much. And how Guv’mint Motors is gonna be the first big ol time car kumpne to put ah lecterk car that kin really giterdone in driveways and fuck them A rabs, and their camels too.
They even get it about oil coming out of holes in the ground, and that since it doesn’t RAIN oil……………..
We can win these people over, and there are literally tens of millions of them out there.
Enough to make the difference at election time.
And their favorable opinions of wind and solar power and electric cars will be gradually diffusing , eating away, like water on soft stone at the prejudices of the hard core Trumpster types who haven’t got a clue when it comes to physical realities such as resource depletion.
We need to be talking A LOT MORE about local control, local jobs, needing fewer troops overseas, about OWNING our own electrical generation systems, the way we own our own homes, and our own cars.
Any and every good salesman, any and every good general, and and every good advertising man, will tell you to find out where the soft spots are in the quarry’s armor, and what his hot spots are.
If you are smart, you hammer away at the soft spots in the armor, and play the hot spots like a violin, and you make your sale, you win your war, you win your bonus for coming up with an ad campaign that WORKS.
You win elections.
The Trumpsters and their allies the FFF don’t HAVE any GOOD counterarguments against the strategies I advocate.
They have their Javier’s . They have their equivalent of the HB type that accuses anybody who disagrees with the prevailing orthodoxy a Worm Tongue, a lying member of the opposition, but that’s about it.
We aren’t going to win in a month, or six months, but we WILL win, in the long term, so long as we stay after it.
Any comments pro or con are extremely welcome, as always. I’m always ready to change my mind if shown enough relevant facts…….. enough to outweigh the ones I know already and have judged to represent the “preponderance of the evidence”.
And I’m always eager to hear any new argument either pro or con concerning any environmental issue.
You must know your enemy if you wish to overcome him.
Badmouthing his allies won’t win them over.
Putting the facts on our side out there in such a fashion that the enemy foot soldier can consider them and think about them without losing face WORKS.
Don’t rant and rave about industries polluting the environment. Get right down to the nitty gritty part of the mind where you can hit a home run, without your quarry even REALIZING you have just flipped him from Trumpster to environmentalist.
Don’t even mention politics. Get him on your side by pointing out that he has to pay an extra ten or twenty a month for his water because somebody upstream is dumping piss and shit in it, and sawdust, and dirt, and paint thinner and motor oil and stuff coming out of pipes with the other end in factories, and THAT AIN’T RIGHT.
Plant the seed right, and environmentally friendly memes will grow in his head like crabgrass in hot wet weather.
And so far as crops and temperature ranges are concerned, we are already growing a lot of crops in a lot of places where we are bumping up against the high end of the desirable temperature ranges in the USA, for sure.
My neighbors just fifteen or twenty miles to the south, with comparable soils, don’t even TRY to grow cabbage, at only five to eight hundred feet lower elevations. It just won’t grow worth a damn.
I don’t grow it myself, some of my neighbors do, and it works for them, because they get started at the earliest possible date, and cabbage transplants stand up well to frost.
Folks no more than three or four miles to the north, but at somewhat higher elevations, grow cabbage under optimum conditions, and they can grow it and sell it for as little as anybody else anywhere in the USA, and still make a profit.
Sure we can shift the acreage devoted to cabbage farther north, and to higher elevations, as a theoretical matter, because cabbage is a minor crop, in relation to the big picture.
There are REASONS why you don’t hear much about corn in Alabama, or wheat, lol.
At the southern end, and at the lower elevations at which they are grown, corn and wheat production is ALREADY limited to the point of growers just BARELY being competitive with growers farther north and or at somewhat higher elevations. Another degree or so, even less, of warming, and they will either be out of corn and wheat, or they will have to get a higher price to stay in.
Now while it’s theoretically possible to for grain growers to just pack up and move a maybe a hundred miles north every generation, or maybe oftener, there are some PRACTICAL problems to be considered………
I know what I’m talking about, I’ve been on working farms at least three months out of the year just about every year of my life.
I have a degree in the field, and close to enough credits in biology or closely related fields to get a degree in biology, although they are not distributed properly, and most of them are dated.
Javier hasn’t proved his case, and he never will, because for one reason or another, he has made up his mind that he knows more than just about every body else in the forum combined, not to mention the rest of the world’s technically literate people.
Every once in a while, you will run across such a person, for example a doctor who is convinced aids is not caused by the aids virus. He might be a competent doc when it comes to prescribing for the flu, or the treatment of diabetes. Such a doctor is not generally shilling for somebody selling quack aids cures, except maybe to get more patients into his own office.
There is at least a possibility that Javier is not a shill working for the TripleF crowd. I will give him that, it IS possible that he is serious.
But it’s a SLIM possibility. A slim one indeed.
Oldfarmermac,
By your own statements you are an old man. Old enough to have lived to see the end of many scares that turned out to be nothing. I wish that you live long enough to see the passing of the global warming scare. There is a good chance that the turning negative of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, and the centennial solar minimum we have just started make the trick and give us 10-20 more years of pause. The scare would not survive to that, so you just stay put for a couple more decades and you will see how bad you are at calculating odds.
Yes, I have seen some scares flare up and die away. I have also lived long enough to know that some scares are based on reality, and that they WILL manifest themselves as disasters, sooner or later.
The best analogy is that of the sailor , who will tell you that you can never win the battle with the sea. You can only fight the sea to a draw, one time at a time, every time you set sail.
You’re DONE, you’re gone, the first time you lose.
Some scares turn out to be real , and we have lived thru the results of them already, such as the threat of WWII. Lots and lots of people pooh poohed that threat thru the mid thirties, or even a little later.
Lots of people have pooh poohed the threat to our environment concerning the importation of invasive plants and insects for reasons having to do with their making some money, or with ignorance, or unreasoned hostility to environmental regulations because their political enemies are in favor of such regulations.
We are living with the consequences NOW here in the USA, and lots of other people in other countries are suffering likewise. I suppose you know what happened to our chestnut trees, and about fire ants, and various invasive snakes taking over the Everglades, even if you do live in Spain.
A favorite personal story, one I have repeated often, concerns an older relative who bought a brand new car after he retired. Ten going on twenty years later it was still the proverbial grandmother’s car, never been anywhere except church and the supermarket, hardly ever even been wet except to wash it.
He got in the habit of parking in under a big old tree next to his car shed, and sitting in it, and washing it there, and leaving it there. Every body tried to tell him the tree was rotten, and would fall on the car someday, but like a lot of old people, he was set in his ways, and kept leaving the car under the tree, and sure enough the wind got up a little, and a big rotten limb fell on it, and ruined it.
You can disregard the precautionary principle, that’s your privilege, at the personal level.
I refuse to do so, as either a person, or as a technically literate citizen.
There’s this little PROBLEM with your arguments, which can be largely summed up as the hysteresis problem. Results or consequences always lag behind causes.
Sometimes the lag is measured in milliseconds, sometimes in minutes or hours, sometimes in weeks and months, sometimes decades. The lag might even best be measured in centuries.
Sometimes the causes have to reach or attain a certain level , measured in mass, or energy, or accumulate in some fashion to a certain level, such as the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, to RESULT in significant consequences.
I was still a YOUNG man when I realized the truth of these observations, and I have never found any reason to change my mind concerning them. I didn’t have to figure it out for myself, these things were routinely discussed in class.
They’re basically entirely consistent with the orthodoxy prevailing TODAY in the historical field, and likewise prevailing in the general field of biology, meaning all the branches of the life sciences as a whole.
They were orthodox when I was an undergrad ag student, they’re still orthodox TODAY.
Some people like to get sort of sniffy and condescending when talking to farmers, but the reality of agriculture is that it’s basically the application of biological knowledge and principles to the job of producing food and fiber.
I took all my the lower level ag science courses, and some right thru graduation, in the biology department, in the same classroom at the same hour as the biology majors. Same text books, same lab exercises. My transcript only varies from a biology majors in that a given biology course is indicated as for example Intro to Botany as Intro to Agricultural Botany.
The lag in respect to climate changes brought about by rising greenhouse gas concentrations is best measured in decades, and there is EVERY reason to expect the consequences to grow in magnitude over time.
I’m not a climatologist, nor a physicist , nor a physician. Good sense dictates that I rely on the consensus professional judgement of people in these fields, rather than allowing my ego to convince me I know more than they do.
I know my field, and I will do what I can to make sure people who are NOT professionally knowledgeable concerning agriculture understand at least the abc’s of the field correctly.
Doing something about the consequences of warming later will probably prove to be impossible even from a technical viewpoint, because any technology that might work will almost for dead sure cost WAY more than we will be able or willing to pay.
The prudent thing to do is to take proactive preventative measures NOW, while we can afford to do so.
Besides, it’s happily true that these measures , taken as a whole, will actually improve our lives short term, on average.
I’m neither a hick nor a hayseed. I didn’t fall off the turnip wagon and land in this forum by accident, despite what my good little lap doggie HB says about me.
I know a hell of a lot more about this sort of thing than you do, doctorate or not, unless for some reason of your own you are telling it the way you do, deliberately telling lies.
I can think of only two reasons you might do that. One, you’re simply wrong, but serious. That’s rare, but not unheard of among professional people. TWO , you have an agenda having to do with promoting the status quo.
That seems to be about a thousand times more likely, in my estimation.
Nothing I have said however , should be taken to indicate that I disagree with everything you say.
I do for instance agree that you that you have a very powerful argument, in saying that some of the attention and resources currently devoted to the warming issue could be better spent on preservation efforts on the ground, for instance by setting aside more land for nature refuges.
You are most likely right about the Little Ice Age being a real world wide event. I have heard it strenuously argued by some people, some reputed scientists among them, that it didn’t even happen , that it wasn’t real.
Not old enough to remember this.
However we do have the evidence.
Hi Javier,
The AMO has not turned negative yet, but perhaps there will eventually be a hiatus, a more likely scenario is that the rate of warming may slow a bit for a 30 to 36 year period and then accelerate. As natural variability is expected, this would prove nothing should it occur.
It is clear that though you claim the AMO has turned negative, the data says otherwise.
The AMO shows a peak in 5 and 10 year smoothing. But whether it has already peaked or not, it is very clear that the AMO has stopped growing.
It did the same in the 1940’s when the previous hiatus started.
And we know the North Atlantic 0-700 m waters are cooling.
Everything suggests a period of decreasing AMO detrended index is very likely in the next 1-2 decades. Based on past evidence, it is going to be very hard that the world warms with a negative AMO.
Paraphrasing the blog,
The Reported Death of the Pause Has Been Greatly Exaggerated
Come now–
He is Baghdad Bob!
Fred, you really know what you are talking about.
“Fascists believe that liberal democracy is obsolete, and they regard the complete mobilization of society under a totalitarian one-party state as necessary to prepare a nation for armed conflict and to respond effectively to economic difficulties.”
That describes Republicans in the US completely. I think that they do not riot in the streets, do not kill those that disagree with them, do not burn down the cities, do not send death threats to those that disagree with them, but do go to Church and work, etc., is for the sole purpose of fooling everyone. But, we all know that they are just waiting to show that they are fascists at the right time when no one suspects it.
Hi Fred,
I ENJOY poking holes in everything Javier has to say.
Unfortunately you’re right about the government, but as an old friend of mine, a very hard core Democrat, remarked back when Reagan won , we’ll probably live over it. The Trumpsters turn in charge will only SEEM like a century.
I ENJOY poking holes in everything Javier has to say.
Are you having any fun yet?
You use far too many words to say little. No fun at all.
Javier reminds me of that Etp fanatic Futilitist.
I just ran across this outfit for the first time, and don’t know how creditable they are, but this link seems to be factual and well balanced at first glance.
Scroll down to the charts on voters opinions on renewable energy and you may be in for a surprise.
The most relevant ones start at page ten or eleven.
The nutshell takeaway is that according to this survey, the VAST majority of ALL of the people of the country want more emphasis on renewable energy rather than less, and that surprise ( ? ) this appears to be true of the majority of Trump voters as well, although the percentage of D voters in favor is higher.
Folks into slicing their political data up according to age groups, etc, will find some interesting charts in this link.
“But the overwhelming analysis emanating from Brockapalooza was essentially a haute couture Berniecrat gripe: The Democratic Party has been writing off way too much of the electorate by assuming it doesn’t need ― or can’t win ― the votes of working-class people.”
““How many bankers went to jail?” Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), the sole senator to endorse Sanders in the Democratic primary, asked the crowd on Saturday morning in reference to the 2008 financial crisis. “None,” he concluded. ”
“There were real disagreements about the right course of action. But speaker after speaker said the party’s reliance on demographic trends had made it complacent on matters of economic justice. This had cost Democrats not just the presidency, but governorships and hundreds of state legislature seats across the country.”
“The Democratic coalition lives in the economy, all right?” former Bill Clinton campaign manager James Carville told reporters. “The idea that somehow it’s only white working-class people that live in an economy … blacks, Hispanics, unmarried women, gay people ― they’re like everybody else.”
Any of you so-called liberals out there in freaking outer space with Joh Stewart on some other planet catch a glimpse of video recorded and broadcast of leftists dressed in black smashing windows and busting heads during the protests in Washington, DC?
Those liberals are some peaceful folks, compassionate, tolerant, always do the right thing, always lend a helping hand, always looking for ways to improve. Anybody can sympathize with that.
Interesting perspective– the Right (unconsciously) has embraced no growth before “liberals”
The standard liberal answer would be to follow our Silicon Valley leaders and new Wall Street friends and double-down on innovation and growth, open the last corners of the world to ever-more trade, and invest in the so-called knowledge economy—messages that fit easily with the other liberal message of inclusion and increased freedoms for the previously dispossessed and marginalized others. Regular readers of Resilience of course realize that this economic program has a strong mythical element. Yes, I would remind us all, but without any joy, economic growth has been the strangely elastic glue (the subject of this series) that has held the body politic together—or sufficiently apart. But economic growth was never simply about innovation or freedom; it was about using energy to turn more and more natural resources into more and more usable products under very specific historical conditions; it was not to be sustained without breaching ecological limits. The price of continued economic growth will be an overheated planet, ecosystems spinning out of control, more war, famine, waves of forced migration initiated by political instability, a further narrowing of our trust horizons leading to tribalism and nationalism, the election of populist right-wing demagogues. . .
Like others, I have elsewhere suggested that Trump is a symptom of the end of growth. I have long assumed that the end of growth would create exactly the sort of dangerous neo-populism and probably violent economic nationalism that Trump represents. But what is left of the hopeful liberal in me had also held out the possibility that, at the same time, the end of growth would have also spawned a vigorous and vibrant post-growth communitarianism–that educated, structurally and system-minded liberals, at the least, would join a post-growth movement founded on values of earth care, people care, and fair share. But as of yet, such values remain secluded in a small and powerless subculture. Liberal America is as lost as Trump with its unarticulated hopes for the rise of a cosmopolitan global middle-class, eight billion strong–a view that belies all reason and all math. Because growth had become magnanimous, or so we could reasonably believe, liberals have narrowed their horizons to growth and only growth as the foundational value. It had not occurred to me that the hard, boorish, and belligerent right would be the first to plant its flag in the end of growth. But it has–whether it is aware of it or not.
To put this another way, yet to emerge is a widespread post-growth political movement grounded in universalism (rather than nationalism), in cosmopolitanism (rather than tribalism), in empathy (rather than pugilism), in sharing what is left (rather than competing over it). Perhaps I was hoping for too much—for the impossible transplanting of a kind of altruism and generosity that, ultimately, may be the result only of growth and expansion, into conditions of contraction. But the possibility that a whole-planet populism is not simply a contradiction in terms—however slight it may be—will keep me going for another round.
I give those DC guys a C-
European Black Bloc are way more brave
Hand to hand with the pigs and lighting then on fire A+ https://youtu.be/CoyF09kJHNQ
Having been CS Gassed on Three Continents, I agree.
The folks who have managed to over throw any existing orthodoxy are always utterly intolerant of any opposition to their new found status as the rulers of the roost, politically, economically, or culturally.
And if part of that new ruling orthodoxy consists of preaching tolerance, it is always understood to mean tolerance of friends and allies, but none for the OLD rulers of the roost.
And when they LOSE, the current rulers always throw the rule book they have always sworn by (publicly, at least ) out the window, and resort to as much violence as they can get away with.
So it’s to be expected that there has been and will be some more violence involved in protesting the Trumpsters taking over.
They won’t be in power forever, hopefully not for more than the next four years.
When it’s their turn to be kicked off the highest perch in the chicken house, they will turn violent too.
But the R’s have reason to be complacent, in respect to the mid term elections. The D’s have a LOT more seats at risk in the Senate, and a lot more seats are currently presumed to be safe for the R party.
It would be good if Sky Daddy , or some nice snake , would send us a wake up brick upside our collective head in the form of a natural disaster unprecedented in recent centuries, one that would clearly indicate that forced climate change is a GRAVE ( pun intended ) issue sure enough.
And while He OR IT is at it, it would also be VERY helpful if somebody would take an obsolete fighter up, loaded with anti armor rockets, and sink a couple of super tankers at exactly the right spot to create the maximum disruption in international energy markets. ( Supertankers might not sink as the result of such an attack, but they sure as hell would burn down to the water line. )
Yes, I fully understand that such events would result in a lot of people getting killed, and a lot more hurt, and some real economic grief. They might even lead all the way up to WWIII.
But on the other hand, WWIII would be an extremely unlikely consequence, and if we DON’T wake up, collectively, and get our shit together, we are going to be up shit creek in more ways than one.
We’re going to experience a substantial taste of Hell on Earth as the result of runaway climate , and as the result of fossil fuel depletion as well.
Sometimes, you literally DO have to smack a kid to get his attention. The ones that refuse to listen are quick to learn that when Mommy and Daddy won’t do anything but talk, they can continue to do as they please, except maybe for losing tv privileges or something of equally trivial importance to them.
And while it sounds harsh indeed to actually say it, sometimes adults likewise have to be slapped, HARD , figuratively speaking, to bring them to their senses, and get them to act.
I’ve been to the funeral of a young woman who died as the result of her husband, who loved her dearly, crashing their car while driving drunk. She paid with her life, and a couple of other people who were badly hurt paid dearly indeed.
He walked away from the accident, but he hasn’t had a drop to drink since. He learned the hard way.
Unfortunately naked apes mostly refuse to learn any way except the hard way.
“When it’s their turn to be kicked off the highest perch in the chicken house, they will turn violent too.”
Not one chance in a billion.
Hi Clueless,
I suppose what you are saying is that there’s not one chance in a million that the R/ Trumpster/ FFF WILL EVER be kicked out ? FFF=fossil fuel fascists
I’m afraid I must agree that they’re perfectly safe , in the very short term, but I’m enough of an optimist to believe they WILL get their butts kicked out of the WH and halls of congress sooner or later, maybe even as soon as the next four to six years.
It does look bad for the very short term, with the R’s holding most of the safe seats in the upcoming mid term elections, and the D’s having a lot at risk.
The repugs will put this train wreck into the ditch– the only question is when.
The Dims would of also.
Whoever “won” this election is going to be the Bag Holder.
Weather is not going to do it. Katrina and Superstorm Sandy didn’t.
Old Farmer, I think we have plenty to act on now with the foxes being in the henhouse. They will set up so many distractions that nothing will get done if the focus is on the foxes.
ENOUGH Katrina’s and Sandy’s will do it.
The historical record includes storms as bad or worse, within the last century or so, and most people are aware of these earlier storms. The money damages were trivial back then, compared to today, because now the coasts are heavily developed.
I personally believe the odds of such storms are higher now than ever before, but it’s just not possible to make A GOOD TIGHT CASE that these last two are the result of global warming. BUT if we get some more soon that are equally destructive, physically, over as large an area, the case will be made, and eventually the man on the street WILL get it.
“and eventually the man on the street WILL get it.”
So what then? What will change when more people conclude that global warming is real and a threat?
Coal as the new way to meet CO2 targets in a cost-effective way.
The Australian: Turnbull backs cleaner coal for hitting renewable target
Australia should be a world leader in demonstrating that carbon emissions can be lowered by replacing ageing electricity generators with new and emerging technologies to produce cleaner coal, Malcolm Turnbull has declared.
The Prime Minister also hit back at Tony Abbott days after he called on Mr Turnbull to dump the renewable energy target, saying renewables had a “role” to play in reaching the government’s carbon reduction target of up to 28 per cent by 2030.
As revealed in The Australian yesterday, research commissioned by the Turnbull government has estimated the country’s emissions would be cut by up to 27 per cent if coal-based power generation ran on “ultra-super-critical-technology” used in other parts of the world.
Carried out by the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science, the research showed emissions would be reduced even further — by up to 34 per cent — if the technology now in development was adopted across Australia.
Mr Turnbull acknowledged coal would be part of the world’s energy mix “for a very, very long time” as he attacked the Labor state of South Australia, which generates 40 per cent of its energy through wind, for having the “most expensive and the least reliable electricity” in the country.
“We are the biggest coal exporter in the world. If anybody, if any country has a vested interest in demonstrating that clean coal and cleaner coal with new technologies can make a big contribution to our energy mix and at the same time reduce our emissions in net terms — it’s us,” Mr Turnbull said.
“Our approach, and my approach, to energy is absolutely pragmatic and practical … Renewables have a role. Fossil fuels have a role. Every type of energy — storage, all of it — has an important role to play.”
Mr Turnbull said it was “wrong” to be ideological about the nation’s energy mix after Mr Abbott wrote in The Weekend Australian that the government should urgently scrap the mandatory RET, insisting the focus should be on what is most affordable.
The Minerals Council of Australia said the Department of Industry’s projections showing new coal generation technologies could reduce emissions “sharply” were consistent with emissions savings being achieved around the world.
“With high efficiency low emissions (HELE) coal technologies as clean as gas plants, countries accounting for nearly half of global CO2 emissions are deploying these technologies to meet their emissions targets under the 2015 Paris Agreement,” the council’s chief executive Brendan Pearson said.
“These HELE plants deliver secure, affordable energy while lowering CO2 emissions by as much as 50 per cent compared with existing plants. As the adoption of carbon capture and storage technologies increases, these emissions savings will increase to 90 per cent.”
Resources Minister Matt Canavan said Asian countries were not only reducing carbon emissions by installing supercritical coal-fired power but they were doing so “at a cost cheaper than many other emissions reducing options”.
“When reducing the carbon emissions of our power stations we should seek to do so at the lowest cost,” he told The Australian.
Replacing sub-critical technology with super-critical technology saves CO2 at a cost of between US$15 to US$25 a tonne in Southeast Asia, according to the World Coal Association.
The Greens are not happy about it, but it appears to be the fastest, most cost-effective way of reducing CO2 emissions while keeping the lights on. Existing coal plants can be upgraded at a much lower cost than being substituted by intermittent renewable generation.
Hi Javier,
The price of “clean coal” is not cheaper than wind and solar.
An analysis from 2011 would be very out of date in 2017 as the price of wind and solar has plummeted since 2011. Find a more recent analysis that shows that new coal fired power plants will be cheaper than wind and solar.
The investment in new coal power plants will become a stranded investment in short order. Natural Gas or nuclear would be a better form of backup for wind and solar than coal.
Coal will peak and decline and electricity from coal fired power plants will be very expensive in the future, a very bad investment relative to the investment in wind, solar, or nuclear power.
The only clean coal pilot plant I know of got shut down. The sequestered power production plant down south is hugely expensive.
The price of “clean coal” is not cheaper than wind and solar.
The Prime Minister of Australia seems to think it is for them. Australia has a lot of cheap coal which might be a factor. One has to consider that they provide base-load capacity, so they do not directly compete with renewables.
The world efficiency record for a coal plant is held by Denmark, and both Germany and Japan are building HELE (high-efficiency low-emissions) coal plants. It is clear that they compete with nuclear generation and in that they are simply a question of choice between gas and clean coal depending on conditions. Many Asian countries are also going that way.
Coal provided 37% of he world electricity in 1980 and provided 39% in 2014, so it is growing as fast or faster than our energy needs. It is not being substituted except in some countries, but countered by a faster expansion in others.
For electricity generation, the expansion of coal, gas, and renewables is compensating the relative reduction of oil, nuclear and hydroelectric. That is the reality.
The Greens are not happy about it, but it appears to be the fastest, most cost-effective way of reducing CO2 emissions while keeping the lights on. Existing coal plants can be upgraded at a much lower cost than being substituted by intermittent renewable generation.
LOL!! You are so full of shit and you know it too! But with that statement you have eliminated any and all doubt about your agenda and ideology. You have finally shown your true colors! You and your little Fossil Fuel Fascists friends are forgetting that you do not get a free pass on externalities, they have costs. You also do not get free use of the commons as a waste sink you will have to pay your fair share. You do not get to make up your own alternative facts! Coal is dirty and it is uneconomic without subsidies and tax breaks!
You are ideologically blinded.
This is the reality. And it is only electricity, which is only a part of our total energy.
From 6,108 TWh to 14,806 TWh, we have more than doubled our dependency from fossil fuels in the past 25 years only in electricity generation.
We have doubled the dose of fossil fuels in just electricity. Peak oil today would have much worse consequences than in 1990. You are completely blind due to ideology to the fact that the energy transition is simply not taking place. We are just covering part of our growth with a little bit of renewables on the side. Renewables are not going to save us from Peak oil. Due to its irreplaceable role in transportation Peak oil will be also peak energy, with all the consequences.
To be able to withstand Peak oil we should have to be able to boost our cheap energy capacity many fold in just a couple of decades, to be able to manufacture liquid fuels at a loss of energy without wrecking the economy. The only path available to us was nuclear, but we didn’t take it. Now it is not doable.
To keep entertained until Peak oil arrives, while increasing renewables, we distract ourselves with an issue completely blown out of proportion. The climate apocalyse. You have bought into that narrative due to your ideological blindness. Evidence shows we have a very moderate climate compared to just a hundred years ago. A lesson in how to make a good thing look scary without any solid evidence for it.
Team Koch surely must be getting increasingly agitated by stuff I am posting below:
The amount of electricity generated using solar panels stands to expand as much as sixfold by 2030 as the cost of production falls below competing natural gas and coal-fired plants, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency.
Solar plants using photovoltaic technology could account for 8 percent to 13 percent of global electricity produced in 2030, compared with 1.2 percent at the end of last year, the Abu Dhabi-based industry group said in a report Wednesday. The average cost of electricity from a photovoltaic system is forecast to plunge as much as 59 percent by 2025, making solar the cheapest form of power generation “in an increasing number of cases,” it said.
Does anybody here really think that after growing one hundredfold over the past ten years, PV is only going to grow sixfold over the next thirteen?
“It’s usually the ‘experts’ and ‘insiders’ who dismiss Disruptive Opportunities” – Tony Seba.
You sir, are a classic “insider” and one with an agenda that is becoming more clear everyday to boot!
Perhaps you are correct or perhaps not.
Energy consumption projections by six agencies and organizations:
The BP Energy Outlook 2016
The Exxon 2017 Outlook for Energy
The EIA International Energy Outlook 2016
The IEA 2016 World Energy Outlook
The MIT 2015 Energy and Climate Outlook
The IEEJ Asia/World Energy Outlook 2015
All agree quite well in projecting an average of 16% (15-18) of total energy coming from new renewables by 2040.
It is a nice increase from now that it is like 5%, but can hardly be sold as an energy transition. Specially since all six reports predict an average increase of 27% (19-33) in fossil fuel consumption, and 77% (74-79) of our energy still coming from fossil fuels in 2040.
So I would say the experts don’t see things the way you see them. But still you could be right. I just doubt it.
“It’s usually the ‘experts’ and ‘insiders’ who dismiss Disruptive Opportunities” – Tony Seba.
Either you have never watched any of Seba’s video presentation or read his book “Clean Disruption” or you simply don’t think any of his projections are remotely possible. In March of 2015, I put together a little spreadsheet that started from current shares of generation, with current growth rates for solar and wind and reduced the growth rate by a fixed percentage every year to yield a logistic (S shaped) growth curve.
Below is an earlier EIA projection followed by a run of my spreadsheet that has wind and solar approaching 70% of global electricity production in 25 years. This would allow other sources like hydro, geothermal, biomass, tidal, nuclear and FF to have a share of 30% between them. For all I know, solar PV growth could accelerate rather than decline sometime in the next 25 years, making my projection look conservative.
Of the six agencies and organizations: you listed, two are FF business that are very unlikely to put out forecasts foretelling their demise any time soon. The EIA and IEA have been notoriously conservative (read wrong) with their wind and solar projections and I have never seen anything citing or even mentioning the other two. All six forecasts you list, have been done by people who are probably totally incapable of imagining a scenario in which the energy landscape is disrupted, changing significantly from what persists now.
At any rate, I’m not at all surprised to see you parroting a line that would find favor with Team Koch.
“a run of my spreadsheet that has wind and solar approaching 70% of global electricity production in 25 years”
Quite a prediction. EIA has the entire renewable electricity production, including hydro, at 30% in 2040.
With such a discrepancy we should see who is wrong in just 3-5 years. Since your model starts in 2015 you will probably know with the data for 2017.
I am not really predicting anything in the sense that I am saying that any particular course of events is going to happen. What I have done is examine recent trends and project them into the future with the growth declining at a certain percentage each year rather than accelerating or remaining steady. What actually happens depends on how the rate of growth changes. Since I cannot predict what will happen to the growth rate, it would be presumptuous of me to say I am predicting anything.
What I am saying is that, on the basis of current trends, the projections of the EIA are questionable in the extreme, unless they can point out why the rate of growth is going to fall so precipitously. Is it increases in cost? – No. Is it resource limitations? – Unlikely. Is it politics? – Maybe. I would like to understand why they think renewable growth rates will be so low?
It is important to realize that science is about universal truths, which means that you should get a consistent picture in a comprehensive analysis. The idea of a hiatus was indeed inconsistent with other indicators, such as the global sea level which continued to rise unabated (Watson et al, 2015). And there was no reason to think that changes in the cryosphere and precipitation had ceased either.
More than 70% of earth’s area is oceans, and sea surface temperatures (SSTs) carry a large weight in the global mean surface temperature estimates. Karl et al. (2015) reported a cold bias in recent SSTs due to changing observing network. This bias gave the false appearance of a slow-down in the warming of the oceans, and by taking into account artifacts from a change in the observing network, Karl et al found a more pronounced warming in the recent decade. Hausfather et al. (2017) studied these more closely, and their findings confirmed the NOAA analysis.
“It is important to realize that science is about universal truths…”
I don’t understand what he means by this. Can someone name a “universal truth” that the natural sciences concern themselves with?
which means that you should get a consistent picture in a comprehensive analysis.
So, if data is coming in consistently in one direction, and a anomaly shows up on another data point, one should examine that thoroughly.
(that is what this post was about)
Things are contingent on causal events.
Hi Synapsid,
Laws of nature such as conservation of mass and energy and other physical laws, I imagine.
Synapsid,
“Can someone name a “universal truth” that the natural sciences concern themselves with?”
OK, but first you define what you mean by ‘universal’ and ‘truth’. BTW Biblical Truth doesn’t count and by universal I presume you include the set of all possible universes?
DougL,
“universal truth”–not my words; they’re in the quote. They’re what I don’t understand.
Duncan Idaho, DC,
Thanks, but I still don’t understand what Rasmus meant.
To say that things are contingent on causal events, for instance, just doesn’t line up in my head. I could re-phrase it as “If something can happen, it will.”
What stops me is “truths”, I guess. That makes no more sense to me than “scientific proof”. There is no such thing. We can’t even prove that the Sun will come up tomorrow, though we can make such a strong case for it that it would be perverse not to accept it.
I guess that I’d say that “universal truths” in a statement about what the natural sciences are concerned with is what is called a category mistake. It doesn’t belong in the discussion.
There was no pause
Scientific opinions differ.
Notice how Fyfe et al., 2016, include NOAA-Karl (Karl et al., 2015) corrections to SST and yet they defend the hiatus is real.
“Here is a figure that was originally in the Fyfe et al. paper but was removed during the review process. It shows various linear trends (and error bars, 10-90% ranges) for the HadCRUT4.4 and Karl et al. datasets: http://www.met.reading.ac.uk/~ed/fyfe_extra.png
For example, the trend ranges for 1972-2001 and 2001-2014 are significantly different from eachother, especially for HadCRUT4.4. This is the basis for the statistically significant statement in the text. The error ranges account for the serial correlation, following Santer et al (2000). If you want more details then ask John Fyfe who did the calculations.” ~ Ed Hawkins https://www.climate-lab-book.ac.uk/2016/slowdown-discussion/#comment-2589
“Firstly, climate scientists agree that global warming has not ‘stopped’ – global surface temperatures and ocean heat content have continued to increase, sea levels are still rising, and the planet is retaining ~0.5 days of the sun’s incoming energy per year.” ~ Ed Hawkins
Which has little to do with the scientific debate on the so-called hiatus between 2003-2014 that most temperature databases show to be real.
The funny thing is that the debate is moot. El Niño has caused a blip in temperature records 2015-2016. The blip is now over and we are likely to see a continuation of the hiatus, slowdown, pause or whatever you call it or whether you believe it existed or not.
The planet has lost a huge amount of heat to space due to El Niño and winter Arctic warming. As there is no La Niña, the AMO has peaked, and we have entered a centennial solar minimum, that heat is not going to be easy to replace. Energetics and climate cycles favor a continuation of the hiatus for 1-2 decades more.
I suppose it is going to be a huge embarrassment for those defending in 2017 that the hiatus, pause or slowdown never existed. Talk about denying the evidence.
This is a measurement of the energy flux at the top of the atmosphere (TOA) by CERES satellites showing the amount of energy lost by the planet during the period studied, compared with El Niño Southern Oscillation index (MEI). Look what happened during the normal Los Niños of the period. Now imagine the amount of heat lost during the monster El Niño of 2015-16. That amount of heat dwarfs the effect of greenhouse gases, but on the long term it averages out.
Don’t count on much warming for the next years, and without a La Niña there is no recharging of the lost heat. The reported death of the Pause has been greatly exaggerated.
Australian population, about 24 million
About 50 000 people employed in the coal industry – This is a very tiny fraction of the population indeed, although there might be two or three times that many whose jobs depend indirectly on the coal industry. Thats still peanuts, in terms of the Australian economy.
Renewable energy is generating 11 time as many jobs in Australia as coal for every petajoule of energy
According to the Minerals Council of Australia, between
2014 and 2018 the coal industry expects to pay more than
$10bn in tax to the federal government.25 If that figure is
correct, and the coal industry contributes around $2.5bn
in federal taxes annually, it accounts for a mere 0.63% of
the government’s annual revenues of $398bn.26
Against the modest revenue being collected from the coal
industry, close to $1bn is being paid out to the industry
in the form of fuel tax credits. Since 2008-9, the amount
being claimed by the coal industry has risen by a massive
46%.27 Today, coal mining claims more in fuel tax credits
than any other industry – more than agriculture, forestry
and fishing combined; more than road and rail freight put
together.28 An industry worth 2% of GDP is receiving 15%
of the fuel tax credits.
Meanwhile, both the carbon tax and minerals resource
rent tax (MRRT) have been abolished after fierce lobbying
by mining companies. Now the coal industry is pushing
to have the company tax cut by a third to 20% in order to
improve their international competitiveness.30 Under the
circumstances, the net contribution to federal government
revenue from the coal industry shows little sign of
increasing any time soon.
At the state level, governments are also relying less on the coal industry to fund
government services. Most Australian states get no significant revenue from coal. With
the abolition of the carbon tax and the MRRT, there is even less prospect that non-coal
producing states will share in any significant benefit. The state governments that do
benefit from coal are Queensland and New South Wales, and to a much lesser extent
Victoria (which has no black coal or coal export industry). Yet, even in Queensland and
New South Wales coal’s contribution has crashed in spite of rising production volumes.
In 2009 the Queensland government received 8.2% of its
income from coal royalties.31 Six years later that figure has
been cut by more than half to just 3.4%.32 33 Coal royalties
once provided the state with over $3bn in annual revenue
out of a total of $37bn. Today, they generate around
$1.68bn out of a much larger revenue base of $50bn.
Because higher royalties apply in Queensland when coal
is over $100 per tonne the collapse in coal prices has
magnified the decline in revenues.34
In New South Wales coal royalties are now nearly 37%
less significant a funding source for the state government
than they were in 2009, having fallen from 2.6% of revenue
to 1.65%.35
Just as federal taxes paid by the coal industry are
substantially offset by fuel tax credit claims, the coal
royalties paid to state governments are eroded by billions
of dollars in taxpayer funding in recent years for coal
industry infrastructure. It might be billed as “multi-user
infrastructure” but in practice, most of the port, rail and
road funding is almost exclusively for use by the coal
industry.3
Coal exports are now a
minor contributor to the nation’s
economy, providing 2% of GDP, less
than 1.5% of tax revenue, and less
than 1% of jobs.37 Other industries now
account for over 88% of exports too.38
These excerpts are from this Green Peace publication.
Most of us here are adults , and know about how much credence we should give to the huffing and puffing of politicians who as often as not , regardless of their party, tucked into a vest pocket of an industry such as the coal industry,peeking out like one of Paris Hiltons little doggies peeking out of her purse.
A global study of health indicators spanning
40 years and 41 countries found that there are
large, hidden health costs associated with coal
consumption (Gohlke et al 2011). In Australia,
it is estimated that the adverse impacts from
pollutants produced from coal-fired electricity
generation costs A$2.6 billion annually
(ATSE 2009). In Europe, the health cost of
air pollution from coal-fired power stations is
43 billion Euros (A$61 billion) a year. There are
18,200 premature deaths, about 8,500 new
cases of chronic bronchitis, and over four
million lost working days each year due
mainly to respiratory and cardiac disease in
Europe (HEAL 2013). US economists have
estimated the health impacts of coal-fired
power stations in the US to be between one
and six times its value added (Parkinson 2014).
The hidden costs of coal
In Australia, it is estimated that the adverse impacts
from pollutants produced from coal-fired electricity
generation costs A$2.6 billion annually.
I think maybe I have posted enough, considering it is reply to Javier’s posting what amounts to a paid advertisement for the coal industry.
I’m not religious about doing away with coal. I acknowledge that we will need to burn quite a bit of coal for some time to come, because it’s going to take quite some time to build up enough renewables capacity, and some sort of storage capacity, whether battery, pumped storage, hydrogen gas storage, etc, and up the efficiency with which we use electricity IN ORDER to quit burning coal to generate electricity . And even after that, we will probably need to keep on using SOME coal for some additional period of time to manufacture steel, etc.
I also acknowledge and publicize the fact that the faster we build up our renewables industries, and the faster we increase the our energy efficiency, the faster we will be ABLE to cut back on coal, and the better off we will be , collectively.
And for what it’s worth, my personal opinion is that we owe it to the people who make their living in the industry to do whatever it takes to ensure that they can continue to live decently, by way of direct subsidy, or paying them to move out of coal towns, or whatever it takes.
We can’t do this for ALL the people who work in industry, because we don’t have the capacity to do it, but to the extent we regulate coal out of the economic picture, we owe it to the workers in the industry to REALLY help them. Coal is about the only major industry that has really and truly been in the dead center of the crosshairs of regulators writing and enforcing regulations that make it less and less profitable to be in the coal biz. We can afford to help the relatively small number of people who are coal workers.
And yes, I know and understand that cheap natural gas has been the primary reason for the price of coal for domestic use crashing, with wind and solar power playing a lesser role, and the economic doldrums playing a role as well.
( And yes, it’s obvious that Trump is not planning on downsizing the coal industry ! )
It’s obvious that coal mining is a profit making enterprise and has an oversized negative impact on Australia plus the world in general. About $38 billion dollars export a year and about 6 billion internally. For Australia though, it is a loser, even including pay to workers and personal income taxes. The 2.5 billion in medical costs let alone the pain, suffering, job loss and death make coal a negative for Australia.
Then add in the climate change problem, a loser for the world. Maybe we should add in all those Asians getting sick from using that coal also.
The faster renewables, efficiency and life style changes can eliminate coal, the better.
As an added bonus, a lot of fuel will not be needed and a lot of trucks, trains and machinery will not be worn out or need replacement.
BTW, it looks like the number of employees in the coal industry took a downturn lately to 40,000. Australian Bureau of Statistics give it at 37,800 in 2014.
even after that, we will probably need to keep on using SOME coal for some additional period of time to manufacture steel, etc.
Coal is convenient and cheap for reducing iron ore (and providing a little carbon), but once renewables (or nuclear) are large enough to produce large surpluses of very cheap power 80% of the time, then hydrogen will become very cheap. Hydrogen works very nicely to reduce any kind of oxide, including iron ore. So, coal won’t be needed for much once grid alternatives are in place.
It will be a LONG time before we have enough wind and solar power to manufacture free hydrogen on the grand scale.
But I believe there is an excellent possibility that day will come.
It’s an interesting question.
Even now there are significant amounts of time when whole sale power prices go to zero, due to low night time demand combined with high generation from wind and nuclear. Those periods will only expand, and increase the % of time that very cheap power is available.
So, the question is: what capacity factor would be needed for electrolysis capex to make producing H2 profitable in this way? I believe about 4% of industrial H2 production is from electrolysis right now, but I don’t have the operational details.
Your predictions vary from ‘2016 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time’ to ‘annual global average temperature will not be significantly (≥ 0.1°C) above the average for 2001-2016’. You’re all over the road. Pick a lane.
“but temperatures are dropping very fast. We might have a below average late summer and autumn, and that would make it very difficult to have a record year.” ~ Javier June 21, 2016
Anyone interested in a good laugh can read Javier’s guest post over at WUWT
“It is very likely that Arctic sea ice might not significantly melt or even grow during the next few decades” ~ Javier (comment- “very likely that….. might not significantly…. or even” lol you need an editor dude. Are you sure you’re published? In a science journal right?)
You are the one alarmed by climate change and talking about models, accelerations and predictions.
Do you think September of 2017 will have less Arctic sea ice than September of 2007? Or do you think we will have a 10th year of no melting in the Arctic? Despite all those record warm years.
Javier is, as usual, lying again. Yes, there has been Arctic melting since 2007, and he’s just lying.
It’s interesting to speculate about the possibility that some old battery tech considered obsolete today might make a comeback in the future. Nickel iron batteries for instance are very large and bulky and heavy, but they last just about forever.
And there are PLENTY of places some pretty big ones could be installed with the expectation they will be there indefinitely, such as in attached carports where ventilation could be easily managed.
Iron will stay dirt cheap, and nickel is not all that expensive, considering that such a battery will likely outlast original owner, and maybe his kids too.
And if wind and solar power get to be cheap enough, round trip efficiency won’t matter much, no matter what battery tech is used.
Appliances in the future will be routinely built with computer chips to turn them on and off when the home owner can use intermittent electricity most efficiently, thereby reducing the load on his batteries. Homeowners WILL have batteries a generation down the road, just as they got hooked up to the grid , and the phone company, and most recently to the internet.
The only really BIG electrical load that must be taken care of at night and during bad weather days is the hvac load, and it’s easy as pie to prune the crap out that load with added insulation and by adding thermal mass.
So the batteries won’t really have to carry a large load except maybe when making breakfast and dinner.
Let’s be realistic.
We’re going to have AMPLE fossil fuel or nuke or hydro sourced juice to back up wind and solar power for a LONG time to come, probably at least a couple of decades, here in the USA. The people will insist on having it, and they will gladly pay for it, after experiencing just one or two blackouts due to a lack of it. And the blackouts WILL come, because it’s damned unlikely that we will build out wind and solar power fast enough to prevent them, WITHOUT that fossil fuel backup ready to roll.
The temptation to use any existing renewable electricity infrastructure to the max virtually guarantees the blackouts will come, barring adequate fossil fuel backup. A few blackout are to be expected, because the savings on fuel purchases will be too tempting to pass them up, and the savings from scrapping some legacy fossil fuel capacity , a LITTLE TOO MUCH legacy capacity, will likewise be so tempting that going a little too far down this road is almost a dead certainty.
Lead-acid batteries maintain some advantages over lithium ion, including cost and cycle life. But on whole, they are taking a backseat to a new generation of batteries. Tesla’s Gigafactory, for instance, will produce 35 GWh/year of lithium-ion battery cells, for use in home storage systems, utility battery arrays and electric vehicles.
Gridtential’s work could potentially wrest a bit of that momentum, however. The company says its “Silicon Joule” technology replaces the lead grid a traditional lead-acid battery with a plated silicon wafer similar to a solar cell. According to the company, the result is performance levels that match or exceed lithium-ion battery performance in some deep cycling applications, while also offering cost, safety and recycling advantages.
“Lead-acid batteries are the most cost-effective, safest form of energy storage — and they’re more recyclable than an aluminum can,” Hal Hawk, president and CEO of Crown Battery Manufacturing, said in a statement issued by Gridtential.The company’s new technology could add five times the power density to a traditional battery, he said.
We have gone nowhere in battery technology after the Japanese commercialized Lithium-ion in the early 1990’s.
It has been a while.
fyi
AMERICAN EXPERIENCE
Rachel Carson
01/24/17
Rachel Carson is an intimate portrait of the woman whose groundbreaking books revolutionized our relationship to the natural world. When Silent Spring was published in September 1962 it became an instant bestseller and would go on to spark dramatic changes in the way the government regulated pesticides.
I read it shortly after it was published. Back then, I realized just how dangerous pesticides could be , POTENTIALLY, but I wasn’t at all that worried about the picture painted by Carson. It seemed grotesquely over done.
I changed my mind about how dangerous pesticides could be, not because of the inherent properties of any given pesticide, but rather because I realized that the farmers of the world could not be expected to use them wisely, without being FORCED to do so, and that the various governments of the world, including our own, could not be counted on to force the manufacturers, sellers, and users to exercise the necessary precautionary measures, right up to banning the worst ones as necessary.
I have always changed my mind when the facts warrant doing so, and will continue to do so.
We NEED pesticides. We can no more get along without them, given the cards in our hands TODAY, than we could get along without tractors and trucks to grow and haul food. Nature doesn’t do redeals, we HAVE to play the cards in our hand.
Rachel Carson deserves a statue, or at least a bust, on the campus of every agricultural college, but I’m not holding my breath waiting for them to be put there.
And we need to keep on getting rid of the most dangerous and harmful pesticides we use, replacing them with newer ones that are safer and less harmful, and working on technologies and techniques that enable us to use less and less , per unit of food produced.
When I retired, I was using less than half as many kilos per unit of production as my Dad did when I was a kid. The really nasty ones I routinely used back then have all long been banned here in the USA.
There’s a theoretical possibility that some day we can invent or discover pesticides that cause little harm to the environment, and maybe even farm on the industrial scale without any pesticides, but that day is one hell of a long way off.
A little kid alive today might live to see it, but none of the regulars here will live that long.
Apparently using natural predators works well, allowing reduction of pesticide use and increase in production.
Yup I can still remember Rachel Carson. I remember the banning of DDT after all the hearings that could find no evidence of any harm it caused yet our wonderful federal gov’t banned it anyway and destroyed many jobs. I know that millions of humans have contracted malaria and died of it in the years following. Yet there’s still way more birds to go around, as seen with all the droppings on my windshields despite all the pesticides and chemicals still in use. Yup looking back the DDT ban wound up being one of the key events that allowed fringe leftist movements to dictate federal gov’t policy for all these years.
Navypop, you are so wrong it isn’t funny.
DDT prevented birds from forming eggshells and the osprey was about to go extinct. This is not controversial; it is established fact. The osprey has since recovered.
DDT is a *persistent organic toxin* which means that it bioaccumulates. (Good pesticides *break down* into harmless chemicals *quickly*. DDT lasts for decades.) Top predators end up with a large dose of it. It prevents birds from forming proper eggshells.
Yes, the hearings demonstrated evidence of this harm. You clearly don’t remember them properly.
Rachel Carson was very specific in describing this harm; it was amply demonstrated; and the elimination of DDT has allowed birds to recover.
I hope you were simply extremely ignorant. I hate liars.
“The idea is that for those who lack a cognitive ability to grasp complexities of our world, strict-right wing ideologies may be more appealing”
You sir, are the one who’s so wrong it isn’t even funny. All of these supposed “truths” about DDT you’ve thrown out have been completely and utterly debunked and proved as myth. A simple google search will turn up hundreds of references revealing the actual truths. Here, let me get you started with the research.
In congressional testimony, Charles Wurster, a biologist for the Environmental Defense Fund (and someone whose sympathies, therefore, were clearly with the anti-DDT coalition), likewise noted the general abundance of birds during the DDT years—referring specifically to “increasing numbers of pheasants, quail, doves, turkeys and other game species.” Similarly, the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary Association of Pennsylvania noted dramatic increases in most kinds of hawks; national forest studies from Wisconsin and Michigan reported a nearly sevenfold increase in nesting osprey productivity from 1965 to 1970; and the herring gull population reportedly grew from 2,000 pairs in 1941 to 35,000 pairs in 1971. Some birds, such as blackbirds and redwings, multiplied so rapidly that they became “pests.”
Experiments on caged birds repeatedly found that exposure to DDT—at levels that were hundreds of times greater than those which birds in the wild might encounter—did not lead to significant thinning of their egg shells. A slight degree of eggshell thinning was observed among some birds that had been exposed to mega-doses of DDT, but that thinning was much less pronounced than what had been found in many natural habitats around the world where DDT had not been used. Nor was there any solid evidence that the eggshell thinning among the DDT control group was in fact due to the pesticide. Eggshell thinning can result from such variables as high levels of oil, lead, or mercury in a bird’s environment; or from phosphorus deficiency, calcium deficiency, dehydration, temperature extremes, decreased light, and stress.
Other studies have shown no correlation whatsoever between DDT exposure and eggshell thickness in pelican populations. Moreover, it was found that red-tailed hawks and golden eagles during the DDT era produced eggs whose shells were thicker than those of the eggs that these bird species had produced before the creation and use of DDT.
Just as empirical evidence discredits the notion that DDT led to a decline in bird populations, so do the facts contradict claims that the pesticide is harmful to humans and other animals.
Today, it is widely acknowledged that Carson overstated the dangers of DDT, according to a diverse array of groups including the conservative think tanks such as American Enterprise Institute and civil rights groups like the Congress of Racial Equality. It is widely acknowledged that a reduction in DDT use has led to a dramatic rise in malaria cases — over 214 million new cases of malaria occurred in 2015, according to the World Health Organization.
“DDT can be used safely and in limited quantities in and around homes to repel mosquitoes and save lives, but many governments ban or severely limit its use because of Carson-generated alarmism,” Logomasini continued. “Meanwhile, people continue to get sick from diseases like Malaria, Dengue, and now the Zika virus. An estimated half a million people—mostly children–die every year from malaria alone.”
The Environmental Protection Agency even admitted “DDT is not a carcinogenic hazard to man … The use of DDT under the regulations involved here does not have a deleterious effect on freshwater fish, estuarine organisms, wild birds or other wildlife.”
Even Carson’s claims that DDT use harms birds, the original justification for banning DDT, have been thoroughly debunked.
Almost a half billion people contract malaria each year. Over a million of them die. DDT is the most effective weapon against malaria. But it was banned. Was that decision based on faulty research?
To this day, news organizations cite their DDT hoax as if it was true. But it wasn’t — the pesticide caused none of the problems laid at its feet, including the infamous thinning of bird shells alleged by the 1962 book Silent Spring. This was known at the time, as reputable scientific research knocked down the anti-DDT allegations … only to be overridden by political considerations.
Dr. Robert Zubrin, author of a recent book on junk science, succinctly summed up the DDT saga in a National Review article, calling for the return of the much-maligned, highly effective pesticide
Banning DDT marked the start of the left bringing it’s population control eugenics agenda to our country. They disguised it as environmentalism, just like they still do today with climate change.
“The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.” ~ Winston Churchill
Well folks, now that the foxes are busy with taking charge of the hen house, Team Fox Koch is busy spreading their ideas!
I would not be surprised if it were discovered that the Koch brothers are interested in DDT. Did their father have anything to do with DDT?
You are full of shit!
Out wingnut friends really have a hard on for Carson.
They are trying to rewrite history, with their fairyland delusions.
Sounds to me like they do not understand basic biology and ecosystems. Also that they did not read or understand the book.
It’s a complex subject and the changes affected powerful pesticide manufacturing. Both factors lead to dilution of the knowledge chain with time.
George, you need some serious meds, bro! You are a real sicko!
May I suggest something to help soothe your twisted pathetic little mind…
PSYCHEDELICS
Oh, give me a button of wild peyote
To munch in my den at night,
That I may set my id afloat
In the country of queer delight.
So ho! it’s off to the land of dreams
With never a stop or stay,
Where psychiatrists meet with fairy queens
To sing a roundelay.
Give me a flagon of mescaline
To wash o’er my mundane mind,
That I may feel like a schizophrene
Of the catatonic kind.
So hey! let in the visions of light
To banish banality,
Then will I surely catch a sight
Of the Real Reality.
Give me a chalice of lysergic
To quaff when day is done,
That I may get a perceptual kick
From my diencephalon.
So ho! let all resistance down
For a transcendental glance
Past the superego’s frosty frown
At the cosmic underpants.
Give me a pinch of psilocybin
To sprinkle in my beer,
That my psychopathic next-of-kin
May not seem quite so queer.
So hey! it’s off for the visions bizarre,
Past the ego boundary,
For a snort at the psychedelic bar
Of the new Psychiatry.
F. W. HANLEY, M.D.
Hey, if non of the above suits your fancy, then, since it is so harmless anyway, why don’t you go ahead and quaff a chalice of DDT instead. Let us know how that works out for ya!
Cheers!
the anti science left gets grubered again! i mean really how much more proof do you guys need to see DDT is very helpful but banned bcuz politics.
read the comments….”I read years ago an account by the daughter of a DDT salesman in rural Ohio back in the 1950s. At each farm visited, the salesman would drink a tablespoon of DDT to show farmers the pesticide was not dangerous to humans.”
Just about every old fart in the USA USED to know half a dozen guys who habitually smoked a pack or two a day, guys who departed this old vale of tears a decade or two earlier on average that guys who never smoked.
DDT is a deadly poison, depending on the species exposed to it. And it sticks around just about forever in the environment, messing things up that are better left undisturbed.
I know it’s not going to make any friends for me when I say this, but the folks who drew a line in the sand in respect to transporting Canadian heavy oil, tar sands oil, thru the USA by pipeline made a major mistake, politically, in that their opposition in my opinion pushed the hot buttons of a lot more people to voter R than it did hot buttons among people who tend to vote D.
The mistake was compounded by the fact that it was perceived by the Canadians as a slap in the face. That sort of mistake can fester and poison relations for years or even decades depending on who might hold some particular political office in Canada.
I understand that the people who so vigorously opposed the pipeline did so mostly for what they thought was an EXCELLENT reason, namely that it would at least temporarily reduce the production of tar sands oil, with high hopes that it would cripple production of that nasty stuff permanently.
And it’s altogether possible that the opponents of the pipeline roused up enough D voters to win a few elections here and there for the D party. I don’t know.So maybe they achieved that goal.
The biggest tactical mistake they made was to continuously emphasize the possibility of a pipeline failure resulting in a major oil spill. Nobody can deny that such spill could happen, or that there have been plenty of spills before proving their case. So focusing on that possibility worked, at least it worked to motivate D ‘s afraid of virtually everything that moves, sarcasm intended.
It backfired badly however when R inclined voters heard it over and over, because the pipeline advocates had the relevant facts on their side.
One the country is literally crisscrossed with old pipelines, built to yesteryear’s far less rigorous standards, and spills aren’t all that common in spite of there being many thousands of miles of old lines.
Two, the new line would be built to the latest and most rigorous standards, and equipped with pumping stations so designed that they would shut down pretty quick in the event of a major leak. Bottom line, anybody listening to the pipeline advocates with an open mind most likely concluded that the new line would be quite safe enough , in terms of the big picture.
Then the opponents made another mistake, emphasizing that most of the profits would accrue to oil companies, with little of the money going to American workers. That sort of argument doesn’t sit too well with most Americans, not even ultra reliable D voters such as union members and teachers, who are apt to have some of their pension money in oil stocks.
What I’m trying to get at is that the D’s need to think more about the needs, desires, and fears of the common people of this country, in terms of formulating policy, if they want to win elections.
Preventing the construction of the Keystone didn’t do result in our country, or the world, cutting back on oil enough to matter, if there was any reduction in the use of oil AT ALL due to preventing it being built.
The pipeline advocates had this high card in their hand too, they knew the public in general would understand that oil is fungible , and it will find it’s way to the customer who wants it.Blocking drilling in one particular spot, or blocking one particular pipeline, won’t stop people from burning as much oil as they please, they just get it from a different producer via a different delivery path, if necessary.
It’s said that nobody has ever went broke overestimating the gullibility of the public, but it is certainly possible to lose close elections by overestimating the ignorance of ordinary working people, and their ability to understand such clear cut arguments as the ones pro and con in respect to the Keystone.
If the D’s want to win, they MUST HAVE leaders with the common touch, leaders who can understand how to win the votes of the people who put Trump in the White House.
Anyone who has their pension money in oil stocks needs to get it out. NOW. It’ll be worthless in 10 years. Tillerson already cashed out, making sure he sold his Exxon Stock even though he wasn’t supposed to be able to sell it for 10 years.”
It’s quite possible to lose elections by underestimating the ignorance of ordinary working people. Which is what happened, actually. Having the “common touch” is largely about being able to communicate and sympathize with the deeply ignorant.
The pipeline was a weird and not entirely useful place for environmentalists to take a stand, but there was a very sound reason for Dakota Access Pipeline to be stopped. It was going to run north of Bismarck. Bismarck complained because of the threat to their municipal water supply. So it was rerouted to run right under the water supply of the local Native Americans, who absolutely rejected it but were overruled.
Does that sound legal to you? Because it isn’t. It’s a treaty violation. Running it north of Bismarck *was* legal.
Trump and his oligarch buddies are running a pump and dump scam on the American economy. I’m gonna ride the scam and cash out at the top. Dow Jones to 23,000. Oil to 140/barrel. Then get liquid before the next big crash. The next crash is the last crash. Ain’t no recovery after that. The next economy after that is agrarian, with a bit of post industrial scavenger economy on the side.
I will take your word for the local opposition, it was well founded.
My larger point in making my 12:58 comment, which I intended to come back and add a few minutes later, is that the D’s miscalculated in picking this particular battle.
There are battles you can win, and battles you might win, at very high costs to your own side, and battles best avoided, so as to use your troops and war materials in OTHER battles that are easier to win at lower costs.
My opinion is that simply opposing the Keystone pipeline was ok, but drawing a line in the sand and making such a HUGE issue out of it was a serious mistake.
The D’s dawdling and avoiding making a decision on the pipeline was one of the hottest of hot button issues for a lot of R leaning and R voters. They were totally convinced of course that it would eventually be a denial, and just saw it all as a farce to help Clinton or who ever got the D nomination among the “tree huggers and whale lover” set.
Construction guys who work in big unions know the D’s are the ones who put the money up for the really big jobs, and help them keep on making maybe double or triple ( I KNOW, I have been in heavy construction both union an non union ) what they would make in an open shop environment.
So as a rule, they’re reliable D voters. But the Keystone issue, and the regulatory pressure on the coal industry , etc, well……….
That sort of thing can leave construction and trades guys wondering if a D politician is REALLY their friend . Throw in support for globalization, and you have found yourself a formula for losing the votes of the working class people who are the REAL core of the D party.
Such people don’t have to actually work in heavy construction or industries that might be or have been offshored.
There are a lot of people in the little city nearest me who USED to be hard core Democrats, a minority of the voters, to be sure, but still a lot of them. A bunch of them lost their jobs, or went broke running businesses of their own , when the textile and furniture industries were mostly offshored.
A few years ago , they were more prone to blame this FIRST HAND personal loss on the R’s, but last year……….. They were far more prone to blame it on the D’s, because they saw Clinton as the champion of the offshoring movement.
A good many of them voted for Trump for this reason alone. Some others simply stayed home. If the D’s had run a candidate not burdened with that globalist baggage, or with the secret speech at a quarter of a million a pop to the banksters, etc, they would have voted D.
This is the sort of thing I’m talking about when I say the D’s need to run somebody with the common touch.
Bill had it. So did Reagan. Obama had it too, but maybe not quite to the same extent.But he still WON. Any D nominee with a little charisma, a decent reputation with the overall electorate, and a message that rallied the working class would in my estimation have whipped Trump’s ass by at least ten points and won the WH as easily as falling off a log.
I forgot to post this link up thread for my little buddy HB.
Carville is one of the big D Democrats who has said that Clinton and the D’s lost because they made too many mistakes.
Big D Democrats don’t come a whole lot bigger than Carville, except for Presidents and Congressional committee chairmen and maybe senators with a lot of seniority, etc.
“An updated NOAA sea-level rise report just released recommends a revised worst-case sea-level rise rise scenario of 2.5 metres by 2100, 5.5 metres by 2150 and 9.7 metres by 2200. It says sea level science has “advanced significantly over the last few years, especially (for) land-based ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica under global warming”, and hence the “correspondingly larger range of possible 21st century rise in sea level than previously thought”. It points to “continued and growing evidence that both Antarctica and Greenland are losing mass at an accelerated rate”, which “strengthens an argument for considering worst-case scenarios in coastal risk management.”
Georgia Tech couldn’t stand the smell—
Judith is a intellectual embarrassment.
She’s cashed out and started blatantly accepting checks from the people who were sponsoring her dishonesty all along.
Good for her.
“Additionally, in its recent transition from the Dyas/Frye test to the Daubert test for the admissibility of scientific evidence, this Court has embraced the view that generally accepted scientific viewpoints are not always more reliable than the minority opinion. In order for minority views to flourish and develop into arguments that will aid finders of fact, they must be protected from efforts that seek to silence and force them out of the marketplace of ideas.”
Couldn’t be more correct.
“With 168 published peer-reviewed articles and two major textbooks she has nothing more to demonstrate in Academic science. Her climate studies private company is doing good and she has requested emeritus status at Georgia Tech. She will continue to do great whatever she pursues. Her contributions to climate science will only grow with time.” ~ Javier, on Judith Curry.
A question for anyone knowledgable: the Antarctic sea ice extent is about to hit a minimum which is going to be below 2 million square kilometres (probably close to a record but I don’y know for sure). When they give the numbers does the sea ice include ice shelves or just free floating ice, and in either case how would they account for the big chunk of Larsen C that is about to break away?
Sea ice is frozen ocean water that forms and melts in the ocean. Sea ice is typically just a few metres thick. Ice shelves float in the ocean but originate on land as glaciers. When Larsen C goes they will subtract (about) 50,000 km^2 off the total ice shelf area.
From what I understand sea ice is ice with the sea under it. Glaciers are grounded on land, even if the land is below sea level. Sea ice is not glaciers.
No, ice shelves and any ice that comes from glaciers is not considered sea ice.
Changing climate has stalled Australian wheat yields: study
Statistically, the chance of observing the decline in yield potential over 50 weather stations and 26 years through random variability is less than one in 100 billion.
But just like climate change affects agriculture on land it does the same to ocean based agriculture and whether or not the anti science types would like to deny it, ocean acidification is also a problem that we know will continue to get worse if we continue on our current fossil fuel burning path.
But hey jelly fish are edible, though not quite as tasty as tuna…
I am going to try those kelp crunch energy bars from the Maine coast. Rather eat weeds than jellyfish (yuck).
Hi Dennis, I replied your message above. But somehow it’s now showing up:
Hi Dennis, a late Happy New Year!
I still don’t quite understand those power purchase agreements that offer 2-3 cents/kwh for wind/solar
Using relatively reliable EIA data and making assumptions about reasonable rate of return, I still don’t see wind/solar being cheaper than gas in the US. In China, solar is still more expensive than coal. These are the two largest economies in the world, one high income, one middle income.
The EIA data is for national average. But their state by state cost estimates do not show that much difference from the national average.
One possibility is that for some reason, those solar investors do not need to demand normal rate of return. Say, if they only need to have depreciation covered, that would of course the price a lot. Subsidy is another matter. But basically one really needs to know (1) detailed terms of power purchase agreement; (2) actual investment cost of wind/solar (some time ago, I also read reports about very cheap solar power in UAE but the actual investment cost turned out to be high); (3) on the ground capacity utilization rates (not theoretical, hypothetical projections) to have real sense about how exactly those agreements work
About 100% renewable energy, before we can talk about that, we need to have 100% renewable electric power first. I think last month Euan Mearns’s website had several posts about difficulties in having 100% renewable electricity in some Pacific islands
EIA projections are known to be absolute utter garbage for solar and wind. EIA *data* is accurate but is typically two years old.
Yes, utility-scale solar and onshore wind are cheaper than NG for electricity production in most of the US, as of now (not 2 years ago). Please note that most of the world has substantially more expensive NG than the US does.
Yes, utility-scale solar is cheaper than new coal in China, too.
Second point, which might be where you went wrong: estimates on rate of return for solar depend quite heavily on lifetime of the panels. The warranties are now about 25 years. The actual lifetimes appear to be in excess of 40 years. Investors with a long time horizon will use the 40 year lifetime.
I am not talking about projections, I am talking about actual cost estimates of US generating capacity. I do not think anyone can seriously claim EIA’s is not among the most authoritative regarding actual current cost estimates.
About China’s construction cost, it’s safe to say I know better
About China’s construction cost, it’s safe to say I know better
Love to hear your thoughts on how accurate the part about China is.
Fred, thanks.
In China, coal power costs about 4000 Chinese Yuan/kw to build and solar PV still costs about 7000-8000 Chinese Yuan/kw to build. Of course, coal power plants consume coal but PV has much lower capacity utilization rates.
Regarding Gonefishing’s points about wind power’s rising capacity utilization, I don’t see it in the data (BP or EIA). Some individual sites may be, but that may not be representative. In China, effective capacity utilization rates for wind is less than 20% and for solar is about 10%
I do know that if there had not been central government intervention, the local authorities would have rushed to build coal power plants. China used to build near 100 GW of coal plants every year and is still building dozens of them every year now. So, instead of building 2GW of coal plants per week, now the pace is down to about 1GW per week. Progress, a sort of.
China used to build near 100 GW of coal plants every year and is still building dozens of them every year now. So, instead of building 2GW of coal plants per week, now the pace is down to about 1GW per week. Progress, a sort of.
Thanks Political Economist, appreciate the response and your perspective. So we are at least moving forward, sort of 😉
Cheers!
Hi Nathanael,
I’m personally all for building things to last for generations, for centuries even, and have invested extra money in some of my own projects to extend their lifespan to “indefinite” or permanent status, even though I won’t be around to benefit.
But not many people will invest money in anything other than real estate based on the life expectancy of it.
It’s all about returning the principal amount to the lender within a workable time frame.
Thirty years is about the longest time frame that can realistically be considered for loaning money. Even at thirty years, the first five years payments are almost entirely interest.
This is why you seldom hear of a forty year mortgage. They exist, but I have no personal knowledge of an example.
Any debt scheduled to run past thirty years is basically partially a gift to the borrower in that the expectation of the lender getting his money back is slim to none.Inflation typically means the last few years payments are worth only a rather minor fraction of their worth at the time the loan was made.
Now if a solar installation is built as a PERMANENT part of a house , or permanent installation on the grounds, in such a way that nobody is ever likely to remove it, it’s easy to make a case for including it in a purchase money loan. Furnaces or heat pumps are included , although there is no real expectation that either a furnace nor a heat pump will last thirty years.
Replacing some individual panels, or the lot of them, with new ones somewhere along the way is not that big a deal.
Bottom line, my opinion is that the industry should put a lot of emphasis on selling customers to integrate new installations as part of the new house construction process. Then there need be nothing that looks out of place, or that is harder to work on than the rest of the house.
Apparently the increasing utilization factor of wind turbines while holding cost of the turbine the same has dropped the power cost dramatically in less than a decade. Solar has a similar story of increasing efficiency with quickly reducing costs allowing a solar farm to now produce electricity in the 2 cents/ kilowatt range over 40 years (including O&M).
Some areas have very good wind and or solar potential, leading to very low prices in those areas, along with the technological advances.
China installed 17.4 gigawatts of wind power in 2016. The represented a fall by 16.8 gigawatts from the wind power installation in 2015.
However, China’s solar power installation surged from 15.3 gigawatts in 2015 to 34.8 gigawatts in 2016
Some people think the Chinese have gotten way too far ahead building wind farms and way to far behind in building long distance transmission lines, and are thus more or less compelled to back off on the wind somewhat until they can catch up on the transmission lines.
Our own Fred Maygar could have written this piece.
It’s right down his favorite alley, er, I mean no speed limit FREEWAY.
It’s about the turmoil in the Australian domestic electricity market, and change happening and the old boss dogs no more able to stop it that a man in a swamp can keep the mosquitoes from biting. For every one he can squish, a dozen home in on the smell of blood ( figurative blood) .
“The problem for the minister is that the nature of the energy sector has changed from a centralized, top-down, slowly changing system dominated by big businesses, governments and large investments to a chaotic, decentralized, diverse and rapidly changing jungle.
Even if state governments could be brought into line, local governments, the private sector, households and community groups will pursue their agendas. Competitive democracy is at work.”
Things are not always as political partisans paint them.
Georgia is a red state, and we all know that R type people not only don’t like renewable energy, they DETEST it. We’ve heard it from some of our D true believers, and they’re NEVER wrong about anything, right HB?
This is why the wind energy industry in Texas consists only of a few old timey windmills pumping water for the cows , because Texans are mostly Republicans. 😉
Them there Texans have obviously got plenty of open space, and plenty of wind, and some nice big cities that could use the juice, but being as they’re REPUBLICANS, they would just rather do without. Stupid stupid stupid!
North Carolina is another red state where the solar power industry is growing fast.
OFM-
I had a few gigs (movie industry) in Atlanta this summer and Fall, and really liked it.
(and I’m from SF and the Bay).
We need to be more open to experience.
Daily CO2
January 24, 2017: 407.69 ppm
January 24, 2016: 403.45 ppm
What, still increasing at over 3 ppm per year and El Nino long over? How can that be? Only two decades to a doubling now, maybe less. Arctic will be mostly free of summer ice by then. Natural feedbacks cranking up, should be interesting.
We better really get those EV’s on the road and install a lot more renewable energy by then. Need to anyway, oil will be depleting.
The temperature effects of the late El Nino receded months ago, but the hydrological effects (drought) take longer to rebound. It’s the accelerated oxidation and reduced CO2 uptake due to drought in the tropics that bumps up the CO2 during and after El Nino. The drought conditions are apparently continuing.
After the 97-98 El Nino, we saw a rapid reversal to strong La Nina, but CO2 kept going up until it plateaued from April 99 (368.45ppm) until May 2000 (368.71ppm).
This time, we are heading back to neutral or weak El Nino for 2017 after a very weak La Nina that has already fizzled out. There may not be any drought relief in sight until the next real La Nina.
There is a chance of a more robust El Niño in the Fall, is starting to become part of the discussion among the forecasters.
Which will be realty interesting.
However, we are still behind the “Spring Barrier”, which makes forecasting much more challenging.
Accelerated oxidation and drought in the tropics has been going on for a long time, initiating well before the latest El Nino. There has been increased growth in higher latitudes due to warming to help balance that effect. I think one needs to look to the ocean for changes in CO2, as it warms it absorbs less CO2 and has a much vaster area than the jungles and forests of the tropics.
If the drought in the tropics could cause a 30 percent rate increase in atmospheric CO2 increase then they are actually outputting much more since the ocean sink and land sinks would take up at least half. That is a lot of CO2 and a lot of forest oxidation.
NASA just announced that any published research funded by the space agency will now be available at no cost, launching a new public web portal that anybody can access.
The free online archive comes in response to a new NASA policy, which requires that any NASA-funded research articles in peer-reviewed journals be publicly accessible within one year of publication.
Due to the narrowing width of replies, my comment above is hard to read and the chart almost illegible, so I am reposting it here:
As usual, after Javier gets caught in yet another blatant lie, he tries to find some graph in his denier playbook to “support” his wildly non-science pontifications.
Also standard operating procedure for Javier, he uses obsolete incomplete AND irrelevant data to “support” his claim.
What’s the claim?
El Nino conditions in 2015 and 2016 caused the planet to lose energy.
The data to “support” this claim… ends in 2010!
Plus the chart Javier posted is of net Long Wave flux (LW), not total flux (which includes both Short Wave and Long Wave fluxes measured by CERES). The paper Javier linked to, but apparently didn’t read very carefully, DOES show a chart of the net TOTAL flux, but that chart still doesn’t tell us anything about 2015 and 2016 data, since it also ends in 2010!
….
What do the actual up-to-date data say about Javier’s claim?
The data say his claim is WRONG (for 2015). See chart below.
The data say his claim is CORRECT for 2016. See OHC data in my previous post… the Earth lost a lot of heat in the first half of 2016… due to the super-El-Nino. Due to the high correlation between OHC and CERES TOA Net flux as shown in the chart, we can be very confident that the CERES data for 2016 will confirm the ARGO data and show that the TOA Net flux was negative for 2016.
For the 2 year period from the beginning of 2015 to the beginning of 2017? Javier’s claim is WRONG. The net change in heat energy for the Earth is POSITIVE for the two years, as shown by the ARGO OHC data.
After failing so profoundly to find even a shred of up-to-date data to support his claims, Javier goes on to challenge me to “show that the planet doesn’t lose energy during El Niño… if you can.”
OK, done.
The Earth gained energy during the 2015 mild El Nino conditions, as shown by both CERES and ARGO data (see chart below)…
…AND it lost energy during the 2016 super El Nino.
The total net change for the two years was a GAIN of 0.43 * 10^22 Joules.
The lesson to be gained from the net energy imbalance data?
It takes very high temps… 1.35C GISS… for the Earth to lose energy at the current level of radiative forcing. At lower temps… 0.87C for 2015, and 0.88C for the last quarter of 2016… the Earth still gains heat. Both the CERES satellite data and the ARGO data confirm this heat gain.
A second lesson?
Never take a Javier-Claim at face value. If it is presented without data, you can be certain that it is made up, false, unsupported – a lie.
If Javier present data to “support” his claim, you can be sure the data is incomplete, not up-to-date, or irrelevant to the claim, as amply demonstrated here.
“…With over 90% of Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI) being stored in the ocean, the most accurate way to determine it is to measure increases in ocean temperatures (along with increases in land temperatures, decreases in ice mass, and increases in atmospheric temperature and moisture)…”
…owing to improved sampling by the Argo array over time (Fig.1), the correlation between year-to-year rates of 0–1,800m ocean heat uptake and the latest release of CERES EEI is a much-improved 0.78. This striking agreement between two completely independent measures of EEI variability bolsters confidence in both of these complementary climate observation systems…”
wehappyfew,
Thanks for taking the trouble of responding to Javier’s ongoing lies, misrepresentations and (deliberate) distortions. It’s pretty obvious most of us find his subterfuge anything other than disconcerting noise but there are, I suppose, bound to be a few lurkers who mistake him for an honest broker in the assessment of scientific data. So, simply ignoring him may not be an ideal solution.
I came to the conclusion that Javier is like static noise on a radio station, irrelevant and meaningless. Merely clouds the communication if you pay attention to it. I stopped taking him seriously, he has nothing of value to add to anything, waste of time trying to chase down all his claims. He no longer provides references since then it is too easy to refute.
So turn on the squelch and let’s talk to each other in the clear.
Your data range is well below the ocean thermocline so is missing much of the imbalance. The actual mixed layer only goes down to 450 meters and the main thermocline exists between 90 and 125 meters depth. So to go to 1800 meters averages in a lot of little changing temperatures of water not involved in the radiational heating and cooling process.
“So to go to 1800 meters averages in a lot of little changing temperatures of water not involved in the radiational heating and cooling process.”
Good point. If memory serves, ocean waters warmer than 10°C which dominates the surface rarely extend much below 500 meters.
However, I must say, static noise is not irrelevant and meaningless because it can, and often does, mask meaningful signals (useful information). In my field, seismic, digital signal processing offered a major resolution and image clarity improvement of over previous analog methods making it possible to strip off and separate the unwanted noise. So, maybe we should digitize and strip off Javier. 🙂
Sure, adding in mass that is not involved in the process can allow any result to be generated. Might as well add in the temperature of the first 1800 meters of earth to the land surface temperature results.
Five by five on the noise problem. Reducing bandwidth will increase Q.
No, Wehappyfew,
You are the one trying to confound the issues to accuse me of lying when what I have said is supported by the best data available.
You try to change the discussion to the energy imbalance when it is something that cannot be measured with any precision and therefore it is estimated by different procedures that give different results.
The issue is much simpler. During El Niño situations the amount of heat that radiates to space from the planet increases, while during La Niña situations is the opposite. And the way you measure that is by measuring Outgoing Longwave Radiation OLR from satellites. And it is measured with AIRS and CERES instruments.
It is really funny that you would accuse the graph as denier data, because Norman Loeb is CERES Principal Investigator at NASA Langley Research Center.
“Tropical variations in emitted outgoing longwave (LW) radiation are found to closely track changes in the El Niño- Southern Oscillation (ENSO). During positive ENSO phase (El Niño), outgoing LW radiation increases, and decreases during the negative ENSO phase (La Niña). The coldest year during the last decade occurred in 2008, during which strong La Niña conditions persisted throughout most of the year. Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) observations show that the lower temperatures extended throughout much of the troposphere for several months, resulting in a reduction in outgoing LW radiation and an increase in net incoming radiation.”
Is that clear enough for you? El Niño means an increase in OLR i.e. heat lost to space.
Both AIRS and CERES show very close agreement in their measures:
“The extremely close agreement of OLR anomaly time series derived from observations by two different instruments implies high stability of both sets of results. Anomalies of global mean, and especially tropical mean, OLR are shown to be strongly correlated with an El Niño Index. These correlations explain that the recent global and tropical mean decreases in OLR over the time period studied are primarily the result of a transition from an El Niño condition at the beginning of the data record to La Niña conditions toward the end of the data period.”
This are the best measurements on the issue that science can provide, and they agree that El Niño conditions produce an increase of radiation to space and therefore and increase of heat lost to space as I have said
You have been caught not knowing this and are trying to confound the issue, while attacking me. That the CERES data for the 2015-16 El Niño has not been published yet does not change anything. The conclusion is solid and supported by several articles and the best group in the world in measuring OLR.
Ignore what Javier is saying.
Much more interesting is to follow my geophysical modeling of ENSO
This behavior has probably been going on for thousands of years and it really is a zero-sum contribution to global temperature.
I posted the chart showing CERES data for 2015. You ignored it because it disproved your lie.
Then you post more charts that DON’T SHOW 2015 or 2016 data. Again proving you cannot ever post up-to-date or relevant data.
I agree the CERES data will show a net energy loss for 2016. Super Los Ninos do that. Since the resumption of neutral ENSO conditions in late 2016, OHC has resumed its relentless increase. And CERES data will confirm that.
“Soon there will be demonstrations that dwarf in size the humongous outpouring the world witnessed last Saturday. Hundreds of thousands of citizens became millions. Millions will become tens of millions. The big lie of Trump’s phony investigation of voter fraud will give way to the big truths that set us free. Many who did not vote before will vote next time. Most who supported Sanders in primaries and Trump in November will not support Trump again. Many who believed Trump’s false promise of reform reject the dirty swamp of crony capitalism and conflicts of interest that corrupt Washington under Trump today.”
But this one sentence is apparently intended to be read as meaning a lot of Sanders supporters voted for Trump.
I’m sure at least a handful of people who hate HRC’s insides and supported Sanders for that reason only went on to vote for Trump. I’ve read an account or two posted by such people on the net.
But I talked with a LOT of Sanders fans, and I have never yet met one personally or engaged one on the net at a site devoted to Sanders fans, who would vote for Trump even if the D party were to run OLD SCRATCH himself, or Atilla the Hun , at the top of the D ticket.
I think maybe this guy is trying to deflect some of the blame for Clinton losing onto Trump supporters.
There’s a good chance that later on he will be all kissy kissy with Sanders fans, because there’s a very good possibility they will control the party, or at least a whole lot of key positions in the party, within the near future.
Barring really good luck, I don’t see the R party and the Trumpsters losing the congressional mid terms, because the R’s hold most of the safe seats by a mile. Local elections and state elections don’t correlate very will with national elections in the off years, and voters aren’t too apt to blame their county and city governments for Trumpster issues.
But in 2020, it’s my opinion that the D’s have a FINE, an EXCELLENT shot at regaining the White House and picking up a lot of seats in both the House and the Senate, maybe even enough to capture control.
Trump and his homies are setting all time records fast, when it comes to pissing off just about everybody except his fellow one percenters and the unfortunately less well informed ( AKA know as ignorant ) part of the working class that has little or no appreciation of the BIG PICTURE.
Too bad we don’t have a democracy.
When I look at the state of the world right now, I see an arc bending towards something that dwarfs any parochial concerns about particular presidential elections or political arrangements between human nations, and which should put those events into deep perspective. I see a grand planetary shift that has not been seen for millions of years. I see that half the world’s wildlife has gone, and half the world’s forests, and half the world’s topsoil. I see that we have perhaps two generations of food left before we wear out the rest of that topsoil. I see 10 billion people needing to be fed. I see the highest concentration of carbon in the atmosphere since humans evolved. I see coming waves of political and cultural turmoil resulting from all of this, which makes me fear for my children, and sometimes for myself.
Hi Duncan,
Whoever wrote it has a way with words.
I don’t have any children, at least not any who know who Daddy really is, and I don’t fear for myself, because I am old already.
The author gets it, in spades.
But he or she is probably wrong about having two more generations of food left.
The optimists will of course point out the the pessimists have been wrong in the past, but in the past there were fewer people and more remaining resources. The rate of consumption of resources grows faster year after year, even as the remaining endowment shrinks like a stone.
Agriculture is my profession, and my personal estimate is that it’s rather unlikely we will make it another two generations without some parts of the world suffering a very hard crash, in terms of food production.
Whether the more fortunate citizens in other places and other countries will be willing and able , if willing, to give up a substantial part of their own food supply to prevent forced migrations, famine , war, death from exposure and disease and local violence on the grand scale is a tough question.
We Yankees can feed a billion MORE people than we do already, IF we are willing to give up red meat and eat bread,beans, and a little chicken, maybe.
I’m not placing any bets on our being willing to do so.
The only real hope for avoiding a very hard crash is to pray to our favorite snake or sky daddy or sky mommy or waterfall or mountain that the birth rate continues to drop like a stone in water, to the point that the population peaks and starts declining a hell of a lot sooner than anybody expects it to.
The one somewhat comforting thought considering this scenario is that people living in larger,more powerful , well developed and well educated countries with a substantial remaining endowment of natural resources have a very good shot at pulling thru without suffering a catastrophic crash, so long as they don’t get entangled in too many hot fights.
DON’T get caught in Egypt!
Egypt has nothing to export except desperate people, and not even a quarter of the decent land that is needed to sustainably support the CURRENT population, never mind twice as many.
There are many other countries in as bad or worse circumstances already.
Technological miracles on the ag front might help, if they come about, but not they won’t solve the problem. We know about what the theoretical limits are, when it comes to producing food, and about what inputs are necessary.
The inputs won’t be available in even remotely adequately sufficient quantities.
I’ve been living on 20 acres, horses, llamas, donkey, two mules, chickens, a mature orchard of various trees, and I grew (I’m now living in Mexico) a significant portion of my food.
But even with the fertilizer inputs from the animals (which need exterior inputs), I didn’t come close to self sufficiency, and I had year around growing conditions (Sonoma Valley).
Veggies are easy, eggs not a problem, but calories and oils and fats, more challenging.
I had olives, and a community olive press, and one could get dairy (I didn’t go there).
Potatoes seem the easiest available calories, without getting into grain production, which opens another door entirely.
Anyway, it is much more challenging than the uninitiated ever realize.
What part of Mexico, if I may ask?
NAOM
“I don’t have any children, at least not any who know who Daddy really is”
Deadbeat Dad
Unfortunately for you not much good said about you, disrespectful is your middle name, laziness is your game
Babies don’t need fathers, but mothers do. Someone who is taking care of a baby needs to be taken care of.
I totally disagree about babies not needing fathers. They DO. Kids grow up healthier and better adjusted in two parent homes.
And while it IS possible I might be a father without knowing it, the odds are very high that I am not.
I had three or four long term girl friend/ lovers, and a couple of wives, over about a forty year period, but I know for sure I never fathered any children with any of them.
I had a few casual encounters, as did most young men and women back in those days, and these days as well, but they were few and far between, and I took the usual precautions. So did the women. I never was the sort of guy that lots of women found attractive, but those who did tended to stick around, and I was always faithful to them, for lack of opportunity if for no better reason. Amazingly enough, they were all physically attractive themselves.
Any one of those relationships might have lasted a lifetime if a kid happened. At times there was a mutual decision made that we would like to have one or more, but it never happened.
With some luck and good management, we could probably collectively ( world wide ) grow enough food, even considering the resource depletion problem, and maybe even the climate problem as well, IF we were willing to make the necessary sacrifices.
But I just don’t think the odds are at all good that most of the countries at the greatest risk of a catastrophic economic, ecological and agricultural crash are going to make the necessary sacrifices over the next decade or two in order to ensure their survival more or less whole thirty or forty years down the road.
The last thing starving subsistence farmers eat is next years seed.
A lot of countries and a lot of people are going to be doing what they MUST to survive the near term, without giving the long term any thought at all.
It’s unfortunate, but naked apes aren’t very good at long term thinking and ACTING , on either the individual or collective basis.
The next time you are at a hospital, look around at the doctors and nurses. Most of the ones middle aged or older are seriously overweight, despite the fact that they are health care professionals.
To put it mildly, I’m not an optimist.
Tilting at Windmills, Spain’s disastrous attempt to replace fossil fuels with Solar PV, Part 2
We are still paying that disaster in our energy bills. The backlash has been so harsh that there is now a big tax on solar energy for self consumption if you also use grid energy. It is almost not worth it to install PVs in Spain. Clearly they are being actively discouraged. A lot of people that invested in Solar due to huge subsidies lost money when subsidies were slashed and have a demand against the Spanish government at the EU.
This is one of the reasons I am quite skeptical of renewables saving the day. They haven’t worked very well in Spain. Still we get about 1/3 of our electricity from renewables on good months.
In retrospect, with the benefit of hindsight, it’s now obvious that some countries went overboard on subsidizing solar power and wind power, and promised too much to early investors.
Mistakes WILL be made, in any sort of business or government program.
But the subsidies have in the end basically resulted in doing what they were intended to do, which was to speed up the growth of the renewable energy industries, so that the cost of renewable energy would come down as the result of better technology and the economies of scale.
In the long run,Spain will be much better off for having spent the money on getting the wind and solar industries up and running strong.
Suppose the people of the country had spent the money on cable television, or wine? The money would be gone, just the same, and they would have nothing to show for it except memories.
The solar panels and wind farms are still there, and because they are there, new ones that produce twice or three times as much electricity per euro invested are available for new installations.
As best as I can remember , Spain has next to nothing in the way of domestically sourced fossil fuel. This means every ton of coal, and every barrel of oil, and every cubic meter of gas used means more money leaves the country, and the long term price trend of all three will be up, rather than down.
Personally I believe that both solar power and wind power generate a high enough return measured as EROEI to make a strong case for believing that we really can transition away from fossil fuels and still enjoy the fruits of industrial civilization.
It won’t be easy, and even if we get with it and stay with it, we might not succeed anyway. Lots of things will have to go right, and there are countless things that can go wrong. If too many go wrong……..
At different times I have read quite a lot of articles arguing that wind and solar power simply aren’t efficient enough to ever shoulder the load currently borne by fossil fuels, and at one time I found them convincing.
But in recent years I have changed my mind.
It’s not just that the costs of building and deploying renewable energy infrastructure has fallen dramatically, especially over the last ten to fifteen years.
It’s also that we are improving the efficiency with which we use energy at a steady if slow pace, and we have barely scratched the surface when it comes to how much bigger bang we can get out of a dollar’s worth of electricity.
There’s every reason to believe that we can get by just fine with a quarter or even less of the energy we use per capita in countries such as the USA, using only well proven existing technology, if we are willing to make the necessary changes in our life styles.
Anybody who makes an honest and unbiased effort to investigate the possibility of using so little energy and still living well is just about sure to come to the same conclusion.
The anti renewables faction has a way of overlooking some of the most dramatic benefits of going renewable and adopting truly healthy lifestyles . These benefits in and of themselves are more than adequate to justify the ENTIRE cost of adopting a very low energy lifestyle.
It’s so mindblowing that most people can’t get their heads around the well demonstrated fact that if they would only eat right and get enough exercise and give up tobacco that they can cut their risk of suffering from cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity, etc by two thirds or more.
The savings in health care costs alone, if we do the right thing, will be more than enough to convert our homes to zero net energy status and to pay for our per capita share of the cost of building out wind and solar farms on the grand scale.
We’re sort of STUCK right now with our existing sunk infrastructure investment in suburbia and all the trappings associated with suburbia, but that can change over the next generation or two, and it WILL change.
A twenty five mile round trip to town back when my maternal grandfather was a boy was a can’t see to can’t see proposition. Now if you REALLY think about it, WHY should anybody, excepting a few specialists, NEED to travel farther than that on a regular basis?
Work, shopping, medical care, and all the other day to day things we do day after day can gradually be reorganized so that we can work and shop and go to the doctor and out to have a good time within a few minutes of home, maybe not for everybody, but for just about everybody, for sure.
Such changes will be very hard indeed on people who make their living in businesses and industries involving a lot of travel. The coming of the automobile and the tractor played hell with the livelihood of the people who raised horses and mules. The birth of the coal industry put woodcutters out of work. Big box stores have put most of the smaller independent stores that sell items such as hardware, paint, and groceries out of business.
When and if energy gets to be too expensive to travel very much, we will just quit doing very much travelling. When the time comes when we can’t afford our food precooked in boxes and pouches, we can go back to cooking, and save by far the larger part of the money we spend on groceries. One truck load of potatoes in bags is enough to make at least ten truckloads of potato chips, which come wrapped in at least fifty times as much throw away packaging. And when potatoes go to the store in bags, the bags can go back to the farm, and be reused indefinitely, until they are worn out.
When I was a kid, we were still making our own wooden boxes, felling the trees and milling the lumber right on the farm. Other than nails, gasoline, and spare parts, we bought only nails to make boxes, since we already had every thing else needed on hand. Some of the boxes we made in the fifties are still in use. They were typically used from four or five times up to ten or even more times in a given year, because they were used in turn for peaches, potatoes,apples, sweet corn, tomatoes, and anything else grown and sold on the home farm. We delivered to local stores, and picked up the empties next time around, a few days or weeks later, and loaned the boxes to customers who came from farther away for full truckloads.
I feel that solar is of great use to me personally. I just don’t think it’s sufficient to keep the economy going. Soccer moms driving around in mini vans looking at show homes, so to speak, accounts for a lot of economic activity. When that activity ceases a lot of jobs go with it. I use solar to recharge my 12V batteries when the power is down. Usual due to a tree falling on the line somewhere. As it stands right now when the power goes out you soon hear a helicopter fly by within the hour, if it’s after a big wind storm, to assess the damage. Then the repairmen in trucks get dispatched. It’s usually back on in 3 hours or so. In the future that 3 hours could be 3 days, then 3 weeks. Yeah, I got a use for solar panels. But they ain’t gonna run the world. And they ain’t gonna feed 7 billion people.
Solar and wind power sure as hell are not going to support today’s energy hog economy, and for now all they can really accomplish, in terms of the big picture, on a real time basis, is to help us cut back substantially on the use of fossil fuels used to generate electricity.
We’re getting five percent plus of our electricity in the USA from wind and solar power, and the two industries together have just within the last four or five years grown big enough to REALLY start growing, in terms of capacity added on an annual basis.
Trump or no, my opinion, which I base on reading the industry news at left right and middle of the road web sites, is that within about five years we will be getting TEN percent plus of our electricity from wind and solar.
I can remember hearing a lot of people saying such and so a new technology would never take off and replace an older technology.
My grand parents could remember seeing their first automobile, and their first tractor. Mom and Dad, who is still with me, can remember when electricity made it into this FORMER backwoods community. I have witnessed the coming of cheap air travel, organ transplants, the internet, the wide scale adoption of computers and the rise of highly automated manufacturing processes personally.
When we shut down the orchards, I was getting things done in a couple of hours that took couple of days when I was a kid.
Unless the economy collapses sooner, there will come a time when we can generate enough electricity with wind and solar farms to run AN industrial civilization, although it’s not likely we will have the amount of energy available per capita that we have now.
But we don’t really need more than about a quarter to a third as much as we use today to still live quite well, by gradually changing the way we live.
And we have only two basic choices. ONE is to start cutting back before too much longer, and keep on cutting back until there is nothing left that could honestly be described as an industrial civilization, because fossil fuels DO deplete.
The other is to go proactive and generate as much renewable energy as we possibly can, and make the best possible use of it.
Dozens of trades and industries have come and gone since we made the transition from wood as fuel and animals as the source of motive power.
I can’t say how many new ones will arrive over the next couple of generations, but I can say with confidence that some that are dependent on using a lot of energy providing non essential goods and services will GO.
In my opinion, air travel on the grand scale will be one of them.
People who can’t get their heads outside the box of the present day economy seem to think that there’s something intrinsically NECESSARY about millions of people travelling long distances on a daily basis , day in and day out, but IT JUST AIN’T SO.
The people who work in air travel, and in jobs related to tourism dependent on air travel, will have to find new work. It may not pay as well, but they will find something, and barring the economy actually collapsing, they won’t starve or die of exposure.
Ditto the people who work in a large number of other trades and industries that are dependent on cheap energy and the customer having disposable income.
It’ll be rough as the proverbial cob ( Cobs were reputedly used in earlier times as toilet paper in rural outhouses, but I have my doubts. Grass and leaves are preferable by a mile, and free. About the only thing a damned old corn cob is good for is kindling.) but the experience will be survivable.
Just how well we will be able to live on renewable energy is an open question, but there are MANY MANY scientists, engineers, and economists who believe it is possible to live well without fossil fuels.
>> within about five years we will be getting TEN percent plus of our electricity from wind and solar. <<
At current growth rates, wind will be 14% and solar will be 7% in five years time. We will be getting TWENTY percent plus of our electricity from wind and solar.
The same story from two sources:
NEA: China added 34.24 GW of solar PV capacity in 2016
China claims 34.2 GW of PV installations in 2016
If this 34 GW figure is accurate that would mean that, for the calendar year 2016, China connected more solar power to their grid than the cumulative amount any single country had installed up to the end of 2015, with the exception of Germany!
U.S. DOE National Energy Employment Analysis: Solar industry employment jumped by over 73,000 jobs in 2016
We need over 300 GW installed per year because everybody knows that a gigawatt a day keeps ole King Coal away.
We are at 64 GW installed per year now and estimated to be 100 GW by 2020. It will have risen by 10 times in 10 years.
An underestimate, I suspect. The growth rate has been about 40% per year. If we’re at 64 GW in 2016, we will probably be at 125 GW per year by 2018.
The End of the Energiewende?
“The prominent German economist Heiner Flassbeck has challenged fundamental assumptions of the Energiewende at his blog site makroskop.eu. According to Flassbeck, the former Director of Macroeconomics and Development at the UNCTAD in Geneva and a former State Secretary of Finance, a recent period of extremely low solar and wind power generation shows that Germany will never be able to rely on renewable energy, regardless of how much new capacity will be built.
– This winter could go down in history as the event that proved the German energy transition to be unsubstantiated and incapable of becoming a success story.
Electricity from wind and solar generation has been catastrophically low for several weeks. December brought new declines. A persistent winter high-pressure system with dense fog throughout Central Europe has been sufficient to unmask the fairy tale of a successful energy transition, even for me as a lay person. This is a setback, because many people had placed high hopes in the Energiewende. I likewise never expected to see large-scale solar arrays and wind turbines, including those offshore, motionless for days on end. The data compiled by Agora Energiewende on the individual types of electricity generation have recorded the appalling results for sun and wind at the beginning of December and from the 12th to 14th: Of power demand totaling 69.0 gigawatts (GW) at 3 pm on the 12th, for instance, just 0.7 GW was provided by solar energy, 1.0 by onshore wind power and 0.4 offshore. At noontime on the 14th of December, 70 GW were consumed, with 4 GW solar, 1 GW onshore and somewhat over 0.3 offshore wind. The Agora graphs make apparent that such wide-ranging doldrums may persist for several days. You do not need to be a technician, an energy expert, or a scientist to perceive the underlying futility of this basic situation.”
http://energypost.eu/end-energiewende/
Use coal and Nat gas more in the winter. Simple
Shortly after that graph ends the wind came up and provided about one third the power generated for several days. Since none of the other sources of power can run the grid alone, why is the bar set so high for solar and wind, when there is not even enough installed to peak at 100 percent, let alone power the country?
The heavily biased articles about wind and solar not working when the system has not even been set up so they can function and there are not enough installed to provide even 50 percent at peak power. Conventional power is overbuilt by more than two times. One can see that even at peak they provide only about 1/3 of the power. Once the power systems have been designed for renewables and there are enough installed, a few days of low wind will not mean much.
Also note that they were exporting power throughout December.
https://www.energy-charts.de/power.htm
Use the “all sources” button to get a true picture of what exists now.
sufficient to unmask the fairy tale of a successful energy transition, even for me as a lay person
“Even for me as a lay person?” What a clear statement that he’s not competent in the field of energy analysis!
In fact, anybody who’s experienced in grid management and planning for renewables knows that a 5 day period of relatively low output is something that needs to be planned for. And…it’s no big deal. As mentioned above, there are a wide range of solutions, including overbuilding, Demand Side Management, long distance transmission, low cost seasonal storage, etc.
I’m a firm advocate of using as much renewable energy as possible, but I refuse to get all giddy and religious about it, like people jonesing on going to Heaven.
A due consideration of practical problems and some common sense are ALWAYS appropriate tools when discussing major changes in policy and technology.
Sometimes we take our enthusiasm to extremes that provide anti renewable folks with plenty of ammunition to make renewables look BAD to people who are only marginally interested in environmental issues.
Joe Sixpack and his wife Susy Sixpack don’t know much about renewables, and don’t care to learn, and the only point they are seriously concerned about TODAY is whether their electric bill will go up or down NOW when renewables are added to THEIR grid.
It’s ok to talk about renewable electricity being cheaper than coal or gas or nukes in a forum such as this one, where virtually the entire audience is savvy to the real score. Such statements are true in context, but context is absolutely critical to understanding what is meant.
Sure a big new wind farm can generate electricity for less than a new coal plant. But the fact remains that for NOW , the coal plant is still ABSOLUTELY necessary and it will continue to be necessary for quite some time.
Cheap storage for times when the wind doesn’t blow, and the sun doesn’t penetrate the clouds DOES NOT EXIST, for all intents and purposes, except on paper and in our minds. Talking as if it does, it does, in a forum where Joe and Suzy are apt to look in once in a while is a MAJOR mistake.
Saying that renewable energy can carry the fossil fuel load NOW is an equally serious mistake because renewables CAN’T carry the load,except in a very few places, because not enough wind and solar farms have been built , and won’t be, for another decade or longer. And even then, we will still be COMPELLED to maintain a substantial portion of our old sunk investment in fossil fuel generating plants, or build some new nukes, because we don’t have any technology YET that is economical enough to scale it up adequately to do the storage job.
Pumped storage would work, but there aren’t too many sites that are physically suitable where pumped storage can be built, and hardly any sites at all that are both physically and politically workable.
Now it might be possible to overbuild to the extent necessary, and deploy super duper batteries on the grand scale, and build hvdc transmission lines all over the place, like highways. I hope we can overbuild to that extent, and that super duper batteries get so cheap everybody can afford one that will run his home for a week. I’m all for building the long distance transmission lines too.
But REALITY has a way of butting into plans drawn up on such grand scale. Times are already hard for over half of the people here in the USA, and we’re one of the wealthiest countries in the world, per capita, excluding the oil patch countries and a very few small countries.
The public may go along, and the public may not.
Every body I know is more interested in having plenty to eat, and a decent place to live, etc, this week, than in what may or may not happen a decade or two or three down the road.
It’s FINE to get giddy here in this forum. It’s fun. Hardly anybody from the other side ever drops in here, and when they do, they hardly ever stick around for more than a day or two.
But we need to be careful in other forums, because if we say some of the things we say here, THERE, we will be making fools of ourselves, because there are PLENTY of anti renewable folks out there who will use our words to make us look like idiots to Joe and Suzy.
And like it or lump it, Joe and Suzy are the ultimate decision makers, when it comes to whether it’s POLICY to subsidize and otherwise encourage the growth of the renewable energy industries.
It is NOT good to paint a bright and sunny picture of renewable energy in the mind of a typical man on the street by talking about things that are not yet possible and things that don’t yet exist.
When he finds out there ain’t no Santa Claus, HERE AND NOW, he’s going to be pissed.
I’m sure everybody here is acquainted with the law of diminishing returns. The return on building the last ten or twenty percent of renewables, and or storage enough to get by without that last ten or twenty percent will probably be two or three times the cost of keeping enough of the best and newest fossil fuel plants on standby so as to keep the lights on a few days a year.
The savings thus realized can be directed to projects that generate more REAL benefits than the REAL expenses ( pollution primarily) incurred by burning fossil fuels a few days a year.
Somewhere down the road, a good long way down the road, we might actually be able to go one hundred percent renewable.
I’m apparently the only regular in this forum who REALLY understands the mind of the common people of this country, because I’m apparently the only one that grew up among them, and still RESPECTS them, and still LIVES among them, day in and day out. It bears mentioning that I also spent ten or fifteen years, in total, in professional jobs, living in an apartment or house in the university district of a fair sized city, spending almost all my time with young professional adults or graduate students. So I’ve been there and done that too.
I know where of I speak, when it comes to getting this kind of people on board with renewable energy.
Right now I am totally whipped because I’m an old fart, and I’ve been getting up firewood off and on all day. But a little food and a nap will put me right again, and I’ll come back and post some stuff that WORKS when you are talking to working people.Stuff that turns them ON, without turning them OFF.
Hi Old Farmer Mac,
Nobody is saying that moving to 100% renewable can be done overnight, only that a gradual transition to more renewable power is possible.
If we just enforce pollution regulations in the Clean Air Act, most coal fired power plants would no longer be profitable and would shut down. It is already the case that in many places wind and solar are cheaper than new coal or natural gas power plants so the fossil fuel plants will gradually be shut down and more and more wind and solar facilities will be built as they become cheaper over time. At some point even already built natural gas power plants will be too expensive to use as back up and building excess wind and solar capacity will be the cheaper solution. This is likely to be true in less than 35 years.
Hi Dennis,
“Nobody is saying that moving to 100% renewable can be done overnight, only that a gradual transition to more renewable power is possible.”
Of course nobody here is saying that, and nobody who is knowledgeable is saying it elsewhere.
I am NOT disagreeing with you at all about what you say in your second paragraph, but allow me to pull out one or two lines of it.
” It is already the case that in many places wind and solar are cheaper than new coal or natural gas power plants. ”
I’m fairly sure you read enough political news, and listen to enough political debates to understand just how easy it is to use that statement, out of context, to make renewable energy look bad, and there are LOTS of people out there who WANT to. A lot of them get paid to do so.
All they have to do to make you look like a liar or a fool is to ask one simple question. ” Which country is it that gets all it’s electricity from wind and solar, having done away with coal and gas ?”
The rhetorical answer is that there isn’t any such country, of course, because it’s just not POSSIBLE ( for now,between us ) to do away with our RELIABLE coal and gas fired electricity. And we still have to pay for the plants, and run them only part time, instead of full time, making it harder to recover the investment and turn a profit.That means we will have to pay more, for less juice from our existing coal and gas plants.
Believe me, Joe Sixpack will take you for the fool anyplace outside a technically sophisticated forum if you say things like that, without adding the qualifiers,. Believe me, I spend some time in non technical political forums.
Somebody once upon a time famously said that nobody ever went broke over estimating the ignorance or stupidity of the public.
If you wish, I will hunt up a few links and post them to illustrate what I’m trying to get across.
Just yesterday somebody talked about using cheap storage that DOES NOT EXIST. How much hay do you think a skillful Koch brothers PR guy can make out of that remark, by taking it out of context?
There’s at least one way to make it harder to twist words in favor of renewables into pretzels, and that’s to compose comments and lead articles including the needed qualifiers.
It’s better to acknowledge right up front what the problems are, and that it will take a while to solve them.
People are sick and tired of being SOLD STUFF these days. They don’t want to hear it anymore. Most of what I see on the net in favor of renewable energy consists of sound bites as one sided as automobile advertisements.
Hey Mac, I found the following PDF, produced by the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems, earlier this morning while doing some research for info to put in a comment to an article at one of my local newspaper web sites. It’s really current, having been last updated January 9, 2017 and contains tons of info and analysis at over 80 pages:
Recent Facts about Photovoltaics in Germany
Hope you find it useful!
Thanks Island Boy,
I read your links, and will be making use of the data in them.
I appreciate the link, but my point remains, and that point is this. Germany for now, and for a long time to come, will NECESSARILY have to burn some coal and gas to back up wind and solar power, and making statements that say otherwise, in forums populated by the general public, is a FOOLISH thing to do.
The anti renewable guys jump on that sort of statement like a duck on a june bug, and make renewables advocates look like idiots and charlatans.
THE ATTENTION SPAN OF THE PUBLIC IS PATHETICALLY SHORT.
Joe and Suzy aren’t focused on the details, and aren’t going to spend more than a minute or two making up their minds.
They aren’t going to read Nick G’s technically correct responses, even if he posts them in such a forum. They will look at a chart such as the one Javier posted a few days back, showing that consumers pay more for electricity in Germany than in the USA, and BOOM, touchdown for the opposition, GAME OVER , as far as what Joe and Suzy think.
I find it incomprehensible that the regulars here in this forum don’t seem to be able to grasp such an obvious and simple truth.
THERE ARE WAYS to support renewables that WORK , ways to be literally honest, without any weasel like cherry picking such as using the words “not yet needed” to cover up for making earlier utterly stupid remarks in favor of renewables.
Focus your remarks in favor of renewables on what renewables do for us NOW, in terms of the day to day lives of people, especially working people, and you will have far greater success.
Renewables now, TODAY, not twenty or thirty years from now, mean your utility has to buy LESS coal and gas, meaning as the price of coal and gas inevitably eventually go up, your electriticy will go up LESS.
Renewables mean local investments, local tax collections, local jobs.
Renewables mean greater local control.
Renewables mean that the chance of your country having to go to war are less, and the chances of being harmed by an embargo on energy exports by a country that is a historical or potential enemy are less.
Renewables mean cleaner air, and better public health , and lower health care costs.
NOW. TODAY.
Don’t bullshit Joe and Suzy by telling them something that is essentially a lie, if you leave out the qualifier, YET or for now and for some time to come.
You are sticking your chin out for a roundhouse knock out by the opposition.
MY point, expressed differently, is that the issue is one that is fought with sound bites, and that the attention span of the public is measured in seconds.
Nobody is going to come back and read Nick’s half lame explanations after the fact, except in an enthusiasts’ forum such as this one.
Germany for now, and for a long time to come, will NECESSARILY have to burn some coal and gas to back up wind and solar power
Nobody has disagreed with that! Let me say that again:
No one has disagreed with that.
Nick’s half lame explanations after the fact
Read my other comment, that I just posted.
Hi Old Farmer Mac,
I would point to power purchase agreements (PPA) signed in places like Iowa and Arizona for very low prices to back up the fact that there are places where renewable energy is very inexpensive.
Wind averages about 2 cents per kW-hr http://www.aweablog.org/new-report-highlights-bright-low-cost-wind-future/
and solar is about 5 cents per kW-hr on average and 3 cents per kW-hr in the best areas (US Southwest).
https://emp.lbl.gov/publications/utility-scale-solar-2015-empirical?utm_source=newsletter29&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Constant%20Contact
Fossil fuel prices are likely to increase in the future which will make fossil fuel powered electricity more expensive and the cost of wind and solar will continue to fall so that non-fossil fuel powered electricity will fall in price over time.
Just because no nation uses 100% renewable power now, does not mean it is not possible. Peak fossil fuels will change the energy mix over the next 35 years as the relative prices of different types of energy changes.
It will be a simple choice, expensive fossil fuel energy or cheaper wind and solar, my guess is that people will choose the cheaper option.
Pardon my language Dennis,
But dagnabit it I ‘ m talking about winning and losing the debate WITH THE PUBLIC, not with the very minor fraction of the public that is technically sophisticated enough to really understand the issue, and interested enough to spend at least a few evenings reading up on the subject.
Remember Javier posting a graph a few days back showing that German consumers pay more for electricity than Yankees?,
While you are saying renewable electricity is as cheap, you cannot post a graph showing that it is cheaper in any country that has gone heavily for wind and solar power.
And Joe and Suzy aren’t much interested in spending any more time than it takes to look at Javier’s graph ,and to see that you haven’t posted one showing contrary results.
We live in a world where we are stressed out, tired, worried, suspicious, even paranoid. And we are VERY prone to making snap judgements.
You can make Javier look bad in this forum, because your reply to me is technically accurate, but YOU FAILED to mention that in order to use wind and solar power, we must also pay for fossil fuel power as well.
In the public arena, at most websites, or at a political rally, Javier would win hands down.
I hope everybody sees what I am trying to get at.
Here’s another example. I mentioned special lube a while back talking about disruption and buying parts on the internet. That lube is made especially for particular applications requiring that formula, and nothing else. Put the wrong stuff in a machine, and you can ruin it in a matter of minutes. ,
My little lap doggie HB jumped on it to make a nasty remark implying I’m a child molester, and worse, that I molest children who are close relatives.
Now I am perfectly sure that although hardly anybody except HB is replying to my comments about Clinton, they are provoking a LOT of thought.
The moral is that it pays to be cautious about what you say, because it is VERY easy, especially for people on the other side to twist your words into pretzels, if they have had plenty of practice .
This is all I am trying to get across, but it’s important, in other forums.
It doesn’t matter here, because the audience is knowledgeable and sticks around and thus is capable of separating the facts from the propaganda.
in order to use wind and solar power, we must also pay for fossil fuel power as well.
Not really. That cheap underground storage does exist, right now. It’s in use. Of course, it hasn’t been built up yet for grid backup because it hasn’t been needed. The engineering exists right now. Just not the scale.
Also, Demand Side Management works well, and has been in use for decades. When 25% of the grid’s output goes to power EVs, it won’t be hard to use dynamic price sensitive EV charging to buffer a great deal of grid variation. EVs and dynamic charging are here right now – they just haven’t been scaled up yet.
It’s not really necessary to keep coal plants around just because they’re not amortized yet – the same is true for coal mining companies that are going bankrupt. They couldn’t compete with natural gas, so they went bankrupt. That’s the way it works – if something can’t compete, it goes under. And, keeping coal plants for use as peaker plants is a good idea for a while, but not that long: they cost a significant amount to keep in operation, and eventually they’ll need major investments to keep running, like a transmission in a car. Cheap NG, H2 or NH3 peaker plants will likely make more sense.
Heck, Mac, I’m not sure what you’re worrying about – we’re writing for this forum, not others.
I understand your concern: messaging, PR, management of perceptions are all very important. But…it’s more important to get your basic facts right first, then we can worry about our public persuasion skills.
High Nick,
It’s my OPINION that I have my factual ducks in a hell of a lot straighter row than you do, most of the time.
You just stuck your foot in your mouth, saying we DON’T have to pay for fossil fuel generation to use renewables because it ‘s not necessary YET.
Well, HELP ME get my facts straight, so I won’t make the mistake again, and excluding some tiny little country such as Norway, TELL me WHICH COUNTRY IT IS that is using wind and solar power TODAY without fossil fuel back up.
Not NEXT year, or twenty years down the road.
TODAY.
To the best of my knowledge, there ISN’T any such country.
YET is a weasel word in this context.
I’m dead sure there won’t BE any country larger than a postage stamp than won’t HAVE to use fossil fuel to back up renewable electricity for at least another decade and probably for closer to two decades.
My whole POINT is about talking to the public, and you post a condescending remark indicating I need to get MY facts straight?
I suggest you need to work on your reading comprehension skills, and maybe get down off your high horse once in a while. 😉
Mac,
Here’s a general thought: if you avoid letting things get personal, you’ll be a lot happier, and the discussion will be a lot more informative. I think there have been very few people on this forum attacking you personally, or attacking rural or southern folk in general. Even when that does happen (or it seems like it’s happening), you should probably ignore it, or try to respond quietly to figure out exactly what they’re saying and why they’re saying it. In any case…the time you spend defending yourself and your neighbors is…energy spent in the wrong direction.
Specifically: I wasn’t attacking you with this comment. I was simply saying that we should argue about the facts first, and come to general agreement on them first, before we spend a lot of time arguing about perceptions. It wasn’t meant AT ALL to disrespect you.
—————————————————–
Okay, back to our program, already in progress:
saying we DON’T have to pay for fossil fuel generation to use renewables because it ‘s not necessary YET.
I’m not sure exactly what you mean, but I’m pretty sure that’s not what *I* meant.
What I meant was that large scale energy storage for *seasonal* backup (e.g., underground H2 storage) isn’t needed yet, because traditional tactics (use of other sources like coal, NG, nuclear), forecasting, DSM, etc is entirely adequate.
So….nobody has underground storage of H2 or NH3, because…it’s not needed yet. That’s all.
“I’m dead sure there won’t BE any country larger than a postage stamp than won’t HAVE to use fossil fuel to back up renewable electricity for at least another decade and probably for closer to two decades. ”
I’m dead sure you’re wrong and I’ve probably already got more money on that bet than you have on the other side of the bet.
We don’t “HAVE to” use fossil fuels for electricity generaion as of right this minute. It’s a choice made because we have a lot of fully depreciated coal & NG plants, and coal and NG are still quite cheap. The moment the price signals cross — and they’re crossing as we speak — they get replaced.
Seriously, MidAmerican Energy is already targeting 100% renewables. They expect to be at 85% from already-contracted construction. They’ll figure out how to deal with the last 15% next; they’ll probably put up some more wind farms, a few solar farms, and buy some batteries.
They’re keeping customer rates the same, by the way.
They’ll be well set up.
OldMacDonald,
Your little lap doggie seems to be a rottweiler on top of you with it’s jaws locked around your neck and hungry. You might want to pet your little doggie nicely on the top of the head. While you still can.
I thought you just didn’t have a sense of humor, but now I realize you didn’t get the joke. That “child molester” crap is all in your mind. I never said that or implied. Go back and reread the comment.
And my last thought for now, HRC is history. I could care less about all the crap you write about her and I don’t even read it. What I don’t understand is why you care who the Democratd vote for? You state your an Independent and write like a Republican, so again. Why do you care? Oh, please do us all a favor and keep it under 140 characters.
01/06/2017 AT 12:00 AM
“and a quart of special lube”
For your 13 year old nephew, right ? It must be pretty special, you mentioned it twice.
That’s your comment, copied.
When you make a remark of this nature, it’s pretty much up to the target of it to decide what is meant. I leave it to the reader to make up his own mind.
This remark made in the company of men just about anywhere MEN congregate is provocative enough that either the maker, or the target, will shortly be in need of medical attention, depending on who is the tougher guy.
I’ve been to the hospital on three or four occasions needing medical attention, but then so did the other guy. He needed MORE in every case.
It’s been a while for me, but I’m as the song goes , as good once as I ever was,because I get out and get some REAL exercise almost every single day. I expect it would be about as easy to make you pee your pants and whimper an apology by just by shaking hands with you , and BEARING DOWN, as it is to make a fool out of you debating politics.
As you said someplace else, don’t take it personally, I’m just saying. 😉
You see, except that you never see, I grew up in a place and at a time when a man could never show his face again in public if he didn’t kick your ass, or at least get hurt trying, for making such a remark.
You are safe enough on your porch, of course, because this is the internet, rather than a bar.
You have played into right into my hands, but you’re too stupid to know when to shut up and quit digging your hole deeper than ever.
The more you insult me, the more likely it is that readers will consider my arguments, which is what the game is all about, for me.
This one remark is enough to make it clear to any perceptive person who reads it that you have it in for me , personally, and in context, this indicates you have nothing with which to refute my arguments, except nasty insults.
Thanks again. 😉
You’re finally right about ONE thing, HRC is history now.
I have done more in the last year to save the country from Trumpster types that you will ever do in your entire LIFE, because I have convinced at least a few Democrats, here and there, to work for a candidate NEXT time that is not at high risk of losing due to a smelly personal and professional record going back for decades.
So what are you saying ? The “special lube” is for you big guy ? I tried to give you an opportunity to save face. But I guess that went right over your head too. I think you would be better off not sharing your personal life on an energy blog. Maybe a little more time on a dating websites might help. Good luck.
I didn’t bring up your need for lube, you did(twice). I suggest you google shop “special lube” and see what “pops up”. Don’t blame your problems on me.
Now let’s hear your Trump alternative facts
I know most people don’t spend any time studying any topic, and therefore have foolish and stupid ideas. But who cares?
So what if the majority of ignorant Americans think that solar and wind can’t provide cheap electricity, when in fact they actually can? The ignorant lose out, the smart get richer. The best sort of capitalism.
The fact that most people are ignorant is, fundamentally, how I make money in the investment markets. I know more than they do, so I make money off of them.
There are, admittedly issues where the only way to solve the problem is through coordinated public action, i.e. campaigning and government. On those issues, it’s important to campaign to people in the right way.
Energy is simply not one of them. Renewable energy is winning. Even direct government subsidies won’t be able to prop up fossil fuels much longer. Attempts to ban, fine, or tax electric cars or solar panels are *super* unpopular.
At this point, with renewable energy, I figure it’s time to simply make a lot of money by making the right moves, and watch people who don’t make the right moves get poorer and poorer. Eventually they’ll admit that you made the right moves, and then you can be gracious about it.
There’s very little purpose now in trying to convince anyone except your friends, though I will explain what’s going on to anyone who asks, and I routinely tell people that it would be a big financial mistake to buy a new gasoline car now.
It’s unfortunate that China is beating the pants of the US when it comes to renewable energy, but it’s actually too late to reverse that (waaaay too late, we should have acted in 1980 and our last chance was 2000). It’s time to relax, watch the New Chinese Century unfold, and do our best to personally profit.
Hi Dennis, a late Happy New Year!
I still don’t quite understand those power purchase agreements that offer 2-3 cents/kwh for wind/solar
Using relatively reliable EIA data and making assumptions about reasonable rate of return, I still don’t see wind/solar being cheaper than gas in the US. In China, solar is still more expensive than coal. These are the two largest economies in the world, one high income, one middle income.
The EIA data is for national average. But their state by state cost estimates do not show that much difference from the national average.
One possibility is that for some reason, those solar investors do not need to demand normal rate of return. Say, if they only need to have depreciation covered, that would of course the price a lot. Subsidy is another matter. But basically one really needs to know (1) detailed terms of power purchase agreement; (2) actual investment cost of wind/solar (some time ago, I also read reports about very cheap solar power in UAE but the actual investment cost turned out to be high); (3) on the ground capacity utilization rates (not theoretical, hypothetical projections) to have real sense about how exactly those agreements work
About 100% renewable energy, before we can talk about that, we need to have 100% renewable electric power first. I think last month Euan Mearns’s website had several posts about difficulties in having 100% renewable electricity in some Pacific islands
Hi MacBoris
“Joe Sixpack and his wife Susy Sixpack don’t know much about renewables, and don’t care to learn”
“But we need to be careful in other forums, because if we say some of the things we say here, THERE, we will be making fools of ourselves, because there are PLENTY of anti renewable folks out there who will use our words to make us look like idiots to Joe and Suzy.”
So if I understand this correctly, I need to careful because a couple of drunks who are to lazy to educate themselves might think PeakOilBarrel posters are fools.
Only in the back woods of Virginia could this make any sense
Hi HB,
Up until now, I have refrained from getting dirty the way you have, making a pervert joke, and repeating it.
But from here on out, until either one or the other of or both of us get kicked out of the forum,I’m going to just use some ordinary every day backwoods language.
Your “couple of drunks” number somewhere up around a couple of hundred million, and there would be more, but that’s a very rough estimate of the number of people of voting age.
Maybe five to ten percent of the people in this country actually know enough about renewable energy to understand the pros and cons.
You’re too stupid to even comprehend you’re stupid.
You’re so stupid that you cannot comprehend that the VAST MAJORITY of the people in this country don’t put an hour a YEAR into the study of renewable energy.
You’re so stupid you would need an hour to find your own ass with both hands, and my middle finger is in your face.
But please keep it coming, because it will remind me to post more stuff about how arrogance,stupidity and machine politics cost the Democratic Party the White House for the next four years.
You will never get it, but there ARE some people in this forum who do, and there are more who WILL, and next time they will be better motivated to make sure the D’s run a candidate without a mile long baggage train and polling numbers that were the worst in party history from the beginning.
Idiots like you always blame anything that goes wrong on somebody else.
Adults understand that they cannot control what other people think and believe, or how they will vote, but that they DO HAVE the power to change the way THEY do things, so as to get better results.
Hopefully next time around the D’s will have sense enough to nominate a candidate with sense enough to campaign at least a few days on the traditional home turf of the Democratic Party.
I intend to remind them, from time to time, and I’m counting on YOU to remind me. 😉
“Sometimes we take our enthusiasm to extremes that provide anti renewable folks with plenty of ammunition to make renewables look BAD to people who are only marginally interested in environmental issues. ”
For the German Energiewende all the physical basics have been discussed in depth around 2010, see the 400 page report of the expert group for environment of the German parliament.
In the last 6 years at least three different large studies/simulations covered the issues of a 100% RE scenario in Germany, in a national and EU context. (Fraunhofer)
WTF is Flassbeck and Javier not able to argue with correct data and come with non issues? Stupid propaganda.
BTW: The current political program is only for 90% RE until 2050, the 10% fossil allow a cheap solution for a period of 10 days without sun and wind. 🙂
It’s funny how people go all Soviet 5 Year Plan when they start talking about renewables. All this talk about what WE NEED.
The reason renewables are winning in the market is that they are popular, cheap, agile (extremely fast to implement on large and small scales) and they cost zero at the margin. The lsat point means they stay online as long as prices stay at or above zero.
Furthermore, the fact that renewables are intermittent may be unpleasant for the five year plan, but it actually helps renewables by disrupting the traditional utility business model, which relies on inflexible cheap power supplies.
Cheap storage already exists. It really doesn’t cost much to put in 5 days of storage for Germany. Actually, someone should figure out how much storage capacity the hydro dams *already have*.
“The prominent German economist Heiner Flassbeck ”
Then why does he has have problems to understand the issue? It has been described in depth many years ago:
It is clear from weather data that Germany has on avaerage 15 days without sun and wind per year (“Dunkelflaute”) and 8 of these days can occur sequently.
This means we have to provide around 60 GW non-wind and non-PVcapacity and have to store 15*1.7 TWh energy. There are some possible solutions – published for years.
Javier works with a strawman again.
Theoretical solutions as they have not been implemented. Right now unless you are willing to shut down a major part of the electrical supply for several days, you have to be able to completely substitute renewable production by other sources. And it is very expensive to have that capacity all the time when it is needed only ~15 days per year. That is possibly one of the factors why countries with a lot of renewables have a more expensive electricity.
Theoretical solutions as they have not been implemented
Of course – they’re not needed yet.
it is very expensive to have that capacity all the time when it is needed only
No. It can be very cheap. Again, very cheap Demand Side Management is widely used right now; cheap underground storage is widely used right now, and cheap peaker generators are widely used right now.
countries with a lot of renewables have a more expensive electricity.
No, they tend to have higher priced residential electricity. Those prices include a lot of things besides the actual current cost of power generation.
Look at actual generation costs; look at industrial whole sale prices; include the value of domestic production (for instance, Germany could import cheaper Moroccan power, but do you blame them for not doing so??).
Cheap underground storage of electricity does not even EXIST except maybe in comic books.
Fossil fuels, namely gas is stored underground, in quite a few places, but the number of suitable places is extremely limited, in relation to the number of places that are needed to store gas that can be produced during off peak seasons and saved for times of high demand, typically saving up in warmer months and drawing down in colder months.
A relatively tiny amount of oil is stored underground, but most of it so stored is in strategic reserves, to the best of my knowledge, and not used to balance seasonal demand surges.
Such statements make renewable energy advocates look like fools in the hands of skillful Koch brothers type operatives.
Now my ENTIRE argument in making all these comments is ABOUT winning the debate in terms of public opinion. It’s NOT about the technical details.
The fight will be won or lost by whoever comes up with the best sound bites, as far as short term to medium term support of renewables is concerned, when dealing with the man on the street.
Cheap underground storage of electricity does not even EXIST except maybe in comic books.
Storage of electricity in general doesn’t exist. Pumped storage means storage of water. Batteries means storage of chemical energy.
Now, cheap underground storage of hydrogen exists. Cheap storage of CH4 and NH3 exist.
Fossil fuels, namely gas is stored underground, in quite a few places, but the number of suitable places is extremely limited
What makes you think that?? I’m really puzzled: that’s exactly what’s done in massive quantities with natural gas (CH4).
And, why define CH4 as fossil fuel? It can be synthesized just like H2. It’s a bit more expensive, but it’s more convenient in some ways, which is why Germany is focusing on it for the short term.
A relatively tiny amount of oil is stored underground
720M barrels isn’t tiny. It would be enough to power the grid for about 6 weeks, if we desired. That kind of storage is what this whole discussion is about.
Again, there are a lot of ways to synthesize molecules that can store energy: H2, CH4, NH3, synthetic diesel, etc., etc.
Some are easier, more convenient and or cheaper, but they’d all work. And there are very cheap ways to store them. Heck, the liquids could be stored pretty cheaply in aboveground tanks, if desired. That’s not the best solution, but it would work. Just compare the cost per kWh-equivalent of big metal tanks vs batteries or pumped storage: there’s no comparison.
The bottom line: this whole thing is silly. Javier’s objection is a theoretical idea about a problem that might arise in the relatively far future, and it’s entirely unrealistic.
Now…if you can figure out a way to answer Javier’s claim in a nice sound bite, that would be very, very nice.
I agree: it’s a very good idea to figure out how to answer stuff like that.
It doesn’t matter Javier. Renewables are trashing the oil industry by sucking all the profits out of it.
Cranky old engineers like you can grumble all they want, but it’s a rearguard action.
The idea that there is no technical solution to intermittency is about as curmudgeonly as it gets. And you get your cost estimates for solar from where the sun don’t shine.
It would have been interesting if the guy in the link below were around to give his perspective. As the chief architect of The Renewable Energy Sources Act of 2000 and strident proponent of the Energiewende he surely would have had something to say. There must have been a huge sigh of relief when he died suddenly from a “heart failure” back in October 2010! He was a major annoyance and impediment to the interest of some very wealthy and powerful vested interests, a wild duck or loose canon depending on your perspective! I admired his indefatigable, can do, attitude.
Can Renewable Energy Power The World? Hermann Scheer (Youtube video)
Thanks Islandboy, I found a longer more thorough talk by Dr. Scheer to be highly informative. He was a brilliant man.
In 2007 he said he had no doubt that the electric powered car would be the only real choice. The electric power must be produced by renewables. Even the hydrogen powered car produces problems in cities by producing too much humidity.
He also states that the real working time of an ICE engine is about 4000 hours while the electric motor can have a working time of up to 100,000 hours.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_z7cdDYP_zg&t=2951s
I have spent hours watching his videos and would like to point out that, rather than saying that he is supporting conspiracy theories about resistance from legacy industries involved in the extraction and consumption of FF, I would say he is putting forward ideas that are really just common sense.
It is difficult to imagine how the legacy fuel extraction and electricity generation industries could create monopoly industries with renewables in the way that they exercise control over mineral rights and electricity grids with central generating plants. It is similar to how the internet and digital technology have disrupted the content creation, publication and distribution businesses. Legacy industries do not “get it” or they do not have a place in the new paradigm, so they obstruct it as much as they can. It’s plain common sense and he used to say it all the time.
Confirmed: 2016 the Warmest Year in History of Global Recordkeeping
https://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/confirmed-2016-the-warmest-year-in-history-of-global-recordkeeping
Yup, AP is running that story and it popped up on the “latest news” section on the web site of one off the local papers:
For third-straight time, Earth sets hottest year record
These damned, alarmist, money grubbing, scientists, trying to justify taking away our freedom to live as we like! Haven’t they got the memo? President Obama is out come Friday and the new administration knows better than to listen to silly alarmists. In the face of all the threats to eliminate their funding from the president elect and the GOP, they must be either extremely brave or extremely desperate to hang on to the billions of dollars of profits they have been making from their activities!
Wait! Hold on! That’s another set of guys! Cue Javier……….
edit: Note to Gavin Schmidt, your pink slip is in the mail. Hope you have another job lined up!
Obviously a commie plot to destroy capitalism, create a one world government, and worst of all, raise taxes!
Worldwide climate has always been in constant state of change, and always will be. The only question then is why almost the entire political left thinks we need to go back into the Stone Ages in response, and deprave ourselves of all the things that make modern life comfortable.
You have to admit also that it just can’t be coincidental how the people showing the biggest concern over climate change are the same people desiring to crash the American free market capitalist economy in order to make way for a Big Government central planned economy. Because if that’s just coincidence, it’s a remarkable one isn’t it?
Well, of course, none of that is true.
The real question is: is this from Fox News, talk radio, or online sources like Breitbart or Drudge?
Just what is the source of this misinformation?
I inform myself through many sources of information from both sides of politics. Which includes Fox, Drudge, Newsmax, Huff Post, Daily Kos, Infowars, Facebook, and such.
Lol infowars and Facebook! Please share with us your analysis of the pizzagate scandal. Pure comedy gold. Both sides of politics? There’s only two? Oh boy, ‘Merika’s got problems.
Survey: Fox Was Dominant News Source for Trump Voters
http://www.multichannel.com/news/content/survey-fox-was-dominant-news-source-trump-voters/410261
Fox News Channel was the main source of news for 40% of the voters who put Donald Trump into the White House, while Hillary Clinton’s supporters got their news from a number of outlets, with none of those getting more than 20%.
The full Trump voter breakdown was FNC, 40%; CNN, 8%; Facebook, 7%; NBC, 6%; Local TV, 5%; ABC, 3%; CBS, 3%; and local radio, 3%.
The full Clinton voter breakdown was CNN, 18%; MSNBC, 9%; Facebook, 8%; local TV news, 8%; NPR, 7%; ABC, 6%; The New York Times, 5%; CBS, 5%; NBC, 4%; local newspapers, 4%; and FNC, 3%.
Facebook was the 3rd most popular news outlet for both groups of voters.
All brought to you with the kind sponsorship of Koch Industries in association with Exxon Mobil!
An interesting book will be released soon –
“The Death of Expertise”.
https://www.amazon.com/Death-Expertise-Campaign-Established-Knowledge/dp/0190469412
What I really enjoyed about The Oil Drum was the wealth and variety of actual expertise in the predominant participants and the Fireside Chats they would lead in explaining the details of an aspect of their specialty. The seminars by Heading Out on the technical details of how underground coal-mining is done comes to mind.
But like TOD, respect for actual expertise has taken a major hit, compliments of Twitter, FB, 24-hour news, and the shared narcissistic Lake-Wobegon belief that we are “above-average” in our knowledge of any subject of the day.
Even in the sciences business want jack-of-all trades scientists. Specialists are getting rare in some areas.
It’s possible to be a bit of a jack-of-all-trades expert in multiple areas (if you’re really smart), and it can actually be more productive than hyperspecialists (who can miss things which are right under their noses because the key was from the specialty next door).
What’s unproductive is people who think they know a lot about a specialty and are actually utterly *totally* wrong.
HVACMan — this is why Dennis & Ron need to ban Javier.
I would like to have a place where there is some expertise, and Javier’s constant lies and cherrypicking is deeply unhelpful.
My areas of expertise are a little random and mostly have to do with investing. If Javier has any expertise in anything, he has not shown it in the last two years.
It really doesn’t matter what you think, the biophysical reality of the Planet has the last say.
(when you realize this, you will probably be screaming in a fetal position)
Most folks figure out there’s a problem on the horizon once it starts kicking them in the face. Crisis cults serve up illusions of recovered grandeur and empowerment during times of collapse, anxiety and disempowerment. Trump promises a magical return to a mythologized past. Make America great again. Indeed. I suggest Trump hasn’t gone for many strolls through Walmarts. He flies private jet from gated community to gated community. Other than the odd WWE appearance he hadn’t spent much time pressing the flesh with the average American. Anybody who wants to run for President should first be required to take a Grey Hound bus milk run from coast to coast.
Earth was created to sustain mankind. I don’t spend any of my time worrying about nonsense. More people would be better off doing the same.
Earth was created to sustain mankind.
SUSTAIN?!
LOL! LOL! Bwahahahahahah!!!! ROFLMAO!!!
This is one of those ‘the earth is 5000 years old’ types.
#Adam&Eve#PizzaGate#JesusFreak
It is a little scary when one says that God comes first in life and they say they listen to God, then do what they are told.
Do they hear voices or do they just make it up in their heads?
Fishin’
You might have asked that question without really expecting a serious answer, maybe even believing it to be so ridiculous as to not need an answer. However, since I have near nothing to contribute here on the scientific front, and have gained so much from the contributions of the rest of you, I’ll offer my thoughts on one subject that, sad to say, I wasted so much of the first 50 years of my life.
I was raised by a set of parents whose hard work, sincerity, and love of what they thought was “right” is unquestioned in my mind. Fine folks, could be trusted with your paycheck or anything else. Also, they were not well-educated, though reasonably intelligent, and were raised as they raised me and my siblings. Raised in a fundamentalist, poor-folk Holiness church in north Alabama. Yep, I was raised a holy-roller, and followed their teachings as best I could till it finally didn’t work anymore, at about 50 years of age. Then I decided to try to educate myself on the subject of religion as best I could, an now here I am, an atheist thru and thru. Holy-roller to atheist, now that’s what I call progress!
Sorry to be so wordy, but that background is necessary to let you know where I’m coming from. Now, to your question:
I’ve known, and still know people who are as honest and sincere as anybody anywhere, who sometimes say “the Lord told me to …….”. I believe it’s as simple as them having a thought run through their mind, especially when they are in a contemplative mood, and then honestly attributing that thought to the voice of their Lord. I don’t believe the vast majority of them actually hear voices as those people who we understand to be mentally ill do. Do I believe any holy spirit actually speaks to them? NO. NEVER. When I was a part of the church, I was as sincere and honest as any, respected as such by those who knew me, and never tried to fake anything resembling spiritual connections. If it wasn’t real, I didn’t see any need for it. I believed then, as I do now, that anything real can speak for itself, and will bear questioning. Guess that was why it finally all came unglued for me.
So, I think lots of religious people really think they follow the “voice” of their god, or his “spirit”. Probably the majority of the time it’s harmless. Well maybe not completely harmless. My family and most of the friends I had no longer have anything to do with me, since they believe I’m on my way to hell, with no chance of changing course. I realize that’s not consistent with most Christian teachings, but, as I said, I was raised in a more backwoods church than most. And they’ve got bible, chapter and verse to support their view, same as everybody else does.
Now, having said all that, I believe that some folks, get a bit too much power over others, and maybe get to hearing voices a bit too easily. Such as, “god told me to raise 6 millions dollars to build…..” Hellfire, you teach that you want to go to heaven, this looks like a guaranteed shortcut, why don’t you take it?
Ah, I’d better not get started preaching. I see we now have a new prez, and I think I’ll go outside and see if it’s getting great yet.
Later all
Stanley, what part of North Alabama are you from. I lived about half my life in Huntsville but I was born and raised on a cotton farm in Hazel Green. That is about 15 miles north of Huntsville and about 3 miles south of the Tennessee border.
I too was raised in a fundamentalist family, but not quite Holy Rollers. My dad was a deacon in the Primitive Baptist Church. I was never baptized. Even as a teenager I had my doubts. But I did not become an atheist until my early 20s.
Actually I am only an atheist as far as the biblical god is concerned. I am rather agnostic, or leaning toward a believer as far as “something else” is concerned.
But I have battled religion all my adult life. It is bullshit from top to bottom.
But… I will leave it there.
Thanks for sharing Stanley, as good of an explanation as any I have heard. You are right about the ostracism, if you are not part of the pack then they shut the doors. At least quite a number of them. The holier than thou act wears very thin once you find out what they really are like.
Ron,
I was raised in the Big Cove community, just a few miles south of Huntsville, and have family and friends in the Hazel Green area also.
I learned from here that you were living in Huntsville just before you moved south, but didn’t mention it to you because I knew you had plenty on your plate at the time, and as I was unknown to anyone here, didn’t feel it appropriate to try and contact you at the time.
As a matter of fact, now that I’m thinking about it, my Dad bought about 5 acres, and built the house I was raised in, from a Mr. Wilburn Patterson, about 1951 or’52. Pretty sure Dad paid it off, so I guess I don’t have to dodge you on that account. My sister and her family live there now, so take it up with her if it’s not paid and there’s any connection. LOL
Since I was raised as a holy-roller, and the kind with the narrowest, strictest view I’ve encountered anywhere, I have a hard time trying to back up far enough to realize that lots of believers don’t necessarily associate “God” with the vengeful, murderous one that I always feared would send me to an everlasting, burning hell. However, I’m at least bright enough to understand that I don’t have all the answers, hell I don’t even have any answers really, but if someone tells me they have the answers, they had better be ready for some pretty stiff questions. I’ve found that most Christians are a bit like I was for a long time, and never even read their own book close enough to see the contradictions in it. And that includes lots of their preachers as well.
Anyway, thanks again for the time and work you’ve put into this blog, as it’s given me lots of reading material, written by folks with lots of useful knowledge.
And thanks to Dennis Coyne for adding his part to keep it going.
Later
Stan
Hmmm,
I kind of thought that we are graciously allowed to live here for our brief time, and that with luck, we may sustain ourselves with hard work and some correct decisions.
regarding the statement: “Earth was created to sustain mankind. I don’t spend any of my time worrying about nonsense. More people would be better off doing the same.”
Talk about entitlements!!!!!
My Dad used to say that if things are a little bit better for you having lived, then your life has been a success. He didn’t ever mention we could take all we want and that it was our right to do so; and “damn the hindmost.” I must of missed that talk.
Who raised you, Peggy, wolves?
That crack about wolves was very undeserved.
Hi Gonefishing,
I agree, wolves are very good stewards of the environment relative to humans.
A truly extreme understatement if I ever heard one. Just about everything alive is a far better steward of the natural world than humans, In fact, overall humans are a major destructive force in nature, THE major destructive force now.
Wolves have a workable niche in the environment as well as preserve riverine ecology as shown by the Yellowstone studies.
Humans probably were a positive influence at one time, but that extra brain growth sent them on a delusional and destructive journey that has not ended yet.
It’s been a long arms race between ourselves and between nature and ourselves. Nature is the loser so far, but nature bats last.
Well, we shouldn’t be so hard on humans.
Wolves, and other similar wild creatures, aren’t stewards at all. They don’t worry about conserving deer populations for the next year or generation: they just eat what they need. Their existence may generally be beneficial for an ecosystem, but that’s not the same thing: given an opportunity to go into overshoot by the right circumstances, they’ll go for it.
Humans may not be great about stewardship, but we’re better than most creatures. For example, a report just came out that was discussed in the last non-oil thread that found that bio-diversity has increased recently by 10% in developed countries. That’s not as good as we need, but it’s a lot better than wolves would do.
It’s appropriate to have higher expectations for humans, but let’s keep some perspective.
Nick, thanks for a good example of lack of self-realization which leads to lack of responsibility and then lack of action.
I do hold humans to a higher standard, we should know better. Otherwise I would just say the human race is doing what it was designed to do, has no real control over itself and is really just part of the natural order.
Of course that is partially true, but we left the natural order behind and are impressing an imagined world on top of one that already existed. Our intelligence gives us self-realization and we should apply it.
The only thing that wolves need protection from is us. In fact much of the world needs protection from us.
Would like to see that report about an increase in biodiversity.
good example of lack of self-realization which leads to lack of responsibility and then lack of action.
No. My point is exactly the same as yours: humans have the ability to choose to be stewards, whereas wolves do not.
And, of course, we need to make that choice, as individuals and as a society.
If we think that humans are worse than other species than we come up with the kind of unrealistic ideas that make environmentalists look suicidal and self hating.
Countries like the US are now choosing to support improved biodiversity, despite high population density:
“Latin America, home to many low-income countries, has borne the brunt of animal loss, with “a dramatic decline” of 83 percent cited in the report. The opposite was found in countries where income is high�those nations show a 10 percent increase in biodiversity.”
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/09/1409030-animals-wildlife-wwf-decline-science-world/
I like wolves but I wouldn’t let them raise my kids.
I’ve used the measure of are you creating topsoil, or are you reducing it.
It seems to work most of the time.
Hi Jason T,
Fossil fuels are limited and will become much more expensive in the future.
Moving to non-fossil fuel energy is the logical solution to that problem.
It has nothing to do with socialism or big government, this is basic neoclassical economics and a free market that properly regulates pollution (so we don’t get more pollution than people want) is likely to be the most efficient way to address the future scarcity of energy as fossil fuel depletes.
See http://peakoilbarrel.com/the-energy-transition/
NASA has a nice link on it too.
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-noaa-data-show-2016-warmest-year-on-record-globally
A true free market capitalist economy is a bit of a myth because it has never existed under industrial capitalism. Governments, rather than markets, have always determined the fortunes of corporations, through preferential contracting, tax breaks and direct subsidies.
Hi Survivalist,
Some markets are “freer” than others in the sense that some nations impose more government regulation than others.
If you mean that the perfectly competitive market modelled by Walrasian Economic Theory rarely exists in practice, I would agree.
I believe monopoly power should be regulated, negative externalities should be capped or taxed, and positive externalities should be subsidized. The devil is in the details.
The only question then is why almost the entire political left thinks we need to go back into the Stone Ages in response, and deprave ourselves of all the things that make modern life comfortable.
Not really!? It’s usually conservative morons who believe that crap! On the one hand you have conservatives who are borderline authoritarian fascists with little regard for the environment and human rights who yak about bringing back coal mining jobs or worse! I guess they must like black lung, mercury poisoning and air and water pollution.
On the other hand you have progressives who embrace environmental protection and humanistic ideals and who tend to be highly educated in science, and medicine and are building systems such as AI based distributed clean energy girds that are the basis for the 4th industrial revolution.
Stone Age my ass! Free market capitalism? Yeah, that’s a hoot and a half! As they say: ‘Not all conservatives are stupid but all stupid people are conservative.’
Hey J.T. bet you don’t have the begining of a clue what these people are talking about because you’re the one still living in a cave…
Davos 2017 – Artificial Intelligence
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1Uc2DL9P9k
“I did not mean that Conservatives are generally stupid; I meant, that stupid persons are generally Conservative. I believe that to be so obvious and undeniable a fact that I hardly think any honourable Gentleman will question it.” ~ John Stuart Mill, in a Parliamentary debate with the Conservative MP, John Pakington, May 31, 1866.
Conservatives literally can’t (CAN’T) believe in climate change. It goes against their core belief that the free market is the answer to everything. In order to fight climate change, the free market has to be set aside in some areas.
To them, it’s like believing in Christianity minus Jesus. They can’t.
“and
depravedeprive ourselves of all the things that make modern life comfortable.”de·prave dəˈprāv/ verb: deprave; 3rd person present: depraves; past tense: depraved; past participle: depraved; gerund or present participle: depraving
meaning – make (someone) immoral or wicked.
de·prive dəˈprīv/ verb: deprive; 3rd person present: deprives; past tense: deprived; past participle: deprived; gerund or present participle: depriving
meaning – deny (a person or place) the possession or use of something.
The view from Berkeley Earth at link below
http://berkeleyearth.org/global-warming-2016/
From press release:
2016 was the warmest year since humans began keeping records, by a wide margin. Global average temperatures were extremely hot in the first few months of the year, pushed up by a large El Nino event. Global surface temperatures dropped in the second half of 2016, yet still show a continuation of global warming. The global warming “pause”, which Berkeley Earth had always stressed was not statistically significant, now appears clearly to have been a temporary fluctuation.
http://berkeleyearth.org/a-second-half-dip-but-2016-hottest-on-record/
Warmest year in history of glabal recordkeeping for the third year in a row!
“There will be consequences”
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2017/01/18/global-temperature-the-big-3/
It is only logical that if the world is warming, and very few people deny that, temperatures should be higher, not lower.
It is only logical that temperature records are broken by a bigger margin during strong El Niño years, as it took place in 1998.
So what is the problem? The world has been warming since about 1650 when the Little Ice Age was at its bottom, and more noticeably since 1815. This has been tremendously positive both for the world and humans. The hypothesis that more global warming is going to be so negative as to become dangerous has no support by evidence. 2016 was also the record year for wheat crop.
The hypothesis that global warming should accelerate due to the increase in CO2 has not proven correct, and since 2003 to 2014 the warming rate has been smaller, not higher. Obviously including and ending in El Niño warming will bias the results, but it is clear that after the El Niño, temperatures are going down to where they were before. The rumor that the hiatus has died is premature. Two or three more years of data are needed.
Wehappyfew likes to talk about whole system warming. He should be aware that an El Niño is actually a huge loss of heat from the ocean to the space. We just register it as the heat flows through, but the world has now less heat than it had prior to El Niño. Part of that heat is now flowing through the Arctic showing unusually high temperatures there while displacing polar air towards lower latitudes cooling them. Unless there is more warming in the next years, the situation could very well be a return to the hiatus to the dismay of alarmists [they should be happy when there is less warming, but they are strange people].
They call him “Both-way Javier”
1. No global warming
2. If it was global warming, it would be beneficial
LOL at the primitive nature of Javier’s arguments.
Not to say that ours are that much more impressive with respect to moving to renewable energy sources.
1. Global warming caused by fossil fuels
2. Even if it wasn’t the case, fossil fuels are finite and non-renewable
ha ha Javier
Global warming is a fact, Webby. Why don’t you try to demonstrate that it has been detrimental? I would like to see you do that.
Climate wise the world is in a much better situation than in pre-industrial times.
Javier,
Detriment is a policy question not a scientific one. As you know little about biology and the theory of opportunistic natural selection, you evidently don’t realize that something detrimental to one species may be beneficial to another.
Take that back, maybe it is a science to a member of the sponge species such as yourself.
Ha you are the one that doesn’t know anything about biology.
That some species or populations lose and some win is the default situation and a pre-requisite to evolution. Only people that don’t understand biology defend that every species should stay the same.
And a warmer world is a more productive world. I know this notion escapes you, but the latitudinal diversity gradient was a concept well established since 19th century biology. As global warming is taking place at high latitudes more than at low latitudes and almost nothing in the tropics, ecosystems in higher latitudes increase the energy flow, being capable of sustaining both more individuals and more species. Global warming favors an increase in biodiversity and wild populations. No wonder it is so damn hard to prove the damage of global warming. More species are doing better than worse when the human factor is eliminated through conservation efforts.
https://www.rewildingeurope.com/news/wildlife-comeback-in-europe-study-released/
“Wildlife will bounce back if we allow it to – this report shows that”, says Frans Schepers, Managing Director of Rewilding Europe who initiated and commissioned this study. “With continued and strong legal protection, active boosting of existing wildlife populations and reintroductions to bring back lost species, combined with an increasing tolerance towards wildlife, more species will surely follow.”
The wildlife comeback is not limited to the species presented in this study; there are many more that are showing similar patterns of recovery.
Amazing book. Anybody with an interest in conservation, and/or European fauna, should take a look at these 37 success stories and rejoice that well directed efforts have such wonderful payoff. It is magnificently illustrated too.
http://bigfiles.birdlife.cz/ebcc/WildlifeComeback_in_Europe-the_recovery_of_selected_mammal_and_bird_species.pdf
Javier claims to understand biology but won’t divulge his credentials on the topic. He can’t show us that he has done any research on the topic.
So all that we can infer is that he knows very little about biology, energy, or climate.
+1 to that.
Javier seems to have problems following simple conversations. He doesn’t seem to bright to me.
You guys are such losers, coming after me with ad hominem attacks. It is the recourse of those left without arguments.
You don’t realize those attacks tell a lot more about you than about me. You come out as losers.
Its very easy to take on a persona of Javier, as he simply regurgitates all the talking points from others that came before him.
Oh look at Javier up on the cross lol maybe you need a safe space eh snowflake?
Javier, you do not seem adverse to ad hominem attacks and downright slander and insults. Even to people who aren’t posting here. Perhaps if you don’t like ad hominem attacks then you should stop engaging in them. Simultaneously playing the victim card while being rude and insulting to others is a sign of a personality disorder.
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-jan-8-2017/#comment-591762
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-january-1-2017/#comment-591001
Playing the victim card is the last recourse of those who’s arguments have failed. If ad hominem attacks make someone a loser then you are by your own definition a loser. Later snowflake.
Survivalist,
You are a joke. You immediately throw personal attacks against anybody who dares post here against the climate doom cult.
Funny that you try to justify your behavior with that of others.
If ad hominem attacks make someone a loser, as you say they do, then you are by your own definition a loser.
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-jan-8-2017/#comment-591762
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-january-1-2017/#comment-591001
“Funny that you try to justify your behavior with that of others.” ~ Javier
I have not posted any comments on the topic of trying to justify my behaviour.
Hi WHT,
I’m sorry I referred to you as pompous stuffed shirt in the past, and you have my apology for doing so. I can now better understand why you are impatient and don’t waste time trying to be nicer to nincom poops.
I find it really strange that a professional biologist would dismiss the concerns of hundreds and thousands of scientists in other fields, from a to z, who are gravely concerned about global warming.
I haven’t ever even HEARD of another biologist who so casually dismisses the precautionary principle.
Has anybody else??
I am pretty sure you are just as curious as I am as to the motivations of such people, especially when they themselves do not stand to gain anything in comparison to say a Rex Tillerson, from opposing the consensus. Are they just victims of the Koch propaganda machine, having swallowed the machines narrative hook, line and sinker?
“I haven’t ever even HEARD of another biologist who so casually dismisses the precautionary principle.”
Perhaps Dr. Frankenstein?
Michael Crichton?
I’d like to thank y’all for making fun of Javier. It’s really the only appropriate way to respond to his insane, dishonest trolling if the mods won’t ban him.
So, Javier, yes, some species survive, some don’t.
If you’re rooting for humans to go extinect and for octopuses to rule the earth, then maybe your attitude makes sense.
Otherwise, you’re just being unscientific.
“Unless there is more warming in the next years, the situation could very well be a return to the hiatus to the dismay of alarmists [they should be happy when there is less warming, but they are strange people]. ”
Hi Javier,
This is where you really lose me. I think the scientists are trying to get it right. I will concede that it is just my opinion, as you are entitled to yours.
You were, however, spot on about the unusually high temperatures in the arctic.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
Chilyb,
I said alarmists, not scientists. Different words. I understand you mistake them as alarmist scientists get a disproportionate amount of attention.
Hi Javier,
I assumed you meant scientists because they are the ones who’s opinions are most important on this topic, as they are conducting the research and are most familiar with the data. It is true that some scientists may be considered more on the “alarmist” side within the community, just as someone like Judith Curry leans towards the alternate view. However, the overall consensus points in one direction, and it is doubtful, though not impossible, that all these different researchers, in the various fields of climate science (glaciology, atmospheric science, etc.) can all be drawing the wrong conclusions, as you imply. You should concede that.
AS for what “alarmists” think, well that’s not really important. You should stop ranting about it as it makes you look deranged. And you can’t afford to take any more hits to your credibility. That being said, I actually enjoy your debates against the consensus view, I have learned a lot.
Chilyb,
Scientists are as prone to group thinking and fashion thinking as anybody else. Let’s examine the consensus:
1. The world is warming.
I would say there is near total consensus about that between scientists.
2. The warming is due to CO2
I would say there is a near total consensus that anthropogenic CO2 is at least partially responsible for the warming between scientists.
3. The warming is bad and it is going to become catastrophic
Here is when things get questionable. The IPCC really stretches to try to find damage done by warming, while trying its best to ignore every possible benefit. The business as usual scenarios are anything but possible. Time has demonstrated two things, the first is that warm and wet is a lot better than cold and dry. The second is that while we follow the worst emission scenarios since the late 80’s, we observe the best warming scenarios (not considering last El Niño). Scientists are not at all convinced that we have got this part right, and while the ones that don’t see catastrophic outcomes in our mid-term future quietly publish their research, the ones that do think a catastrophic outcome is possible in just a few years get celebrity status and are prominently displayed and interviewed by the mass media.
And then we get to:
4. We have methods to reduce CO2
This is simply laughable. The disconnect between the official discourse and the reality is absolute. Five serious future energy analysis for 2040-50 all coincide in that the world is going to use more fossil fuels, not less.
5. The reduction in CO2 emissions will have a significant effect on global warming
This one is directly fantasy and nobody really believes that. Even if all the Paris accords are implemented (and they won’t), and we believe the IPCC models, according to them that would reduce global warming by 0.17°C by 2100, which would be equivalent to delay global warming by 4 years.
As you can see the consensus is not such when it comes to effects and solutions.
Hi Javier,
The best scientists are not prone to group think, they follow the evidence. In your field, do you just follow the crowd? There may be some scientists that do, but not very many good scientists are followers.
A major problem in climate science is poor estimates of available fossil fuels. The reality is that any scenario higher than RCP4.5 is unlikely due to peak fossil fuels.
There is a basic tension between mainstream climate science (where ECS is likely to be between 2.7 and 3.3 C) and a belief in peak fossil fuels.
If we assume that ECS is near the mean estimate by the IPCC (3 C) and that the concept of peak fossil fuels is also correct in the near term (peak by 2030+/-5 years for total fossil fuel output in millions of tonnes of oil equivalent), then catastrophic global warming is not likely.
You might want to look at this list of feedbacks, though incomplete, before you are so certain about the role of fossil fuels in global warming.
http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php?topic=540.0
I know you think you have a handle on aerosols, but the actual effects are much larger.
Scientists believe the cooling from sulfates and other reflective aerosols overwhelms the warming effect of black carbon and other absorbing aerosols over the planet. Models estimate that aerosols have had a cooling effect that has counteracted about half of the warming caused by the build-up of greenhouse gases since the 1880s. However, unlike many greenhouse gases, aerosols are not distributed evenly around the planet, so their impacts are most strongly felt on a regional scale.
Despite considerable advances in recent decades, estimating the direct climate impacts of aerosols remains an immature science. Of the 25 climate models considered by the Fourth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), only a handful considered the direct effects of aerosol types other than sulfates.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/Aerosols/page3.php
Once those aerosols drop from reduced use of fossil fuels, the cooling effect disappears pushing other feedbacks faster as temperature rises quickly.
Hi Gone fishing,
I agree the effects of aerosols are poorly understood. For that reason we do not know the magnitude of the effect from reduced aerosols, it might be large as you suspect or it might be relatively small.
Note that IPPC AR5 used newer models (CMIP5) , many of which considered both direct and indirect affects of aerosols.
Nonetheless much more research is needed and both clouds and their interaction with aerosols is a major area of uncertainty in climate science which I am well aware of.
DC or GF – what do you think about this?
Ancient CO2 estimates worry climatologists:
“The upshot of these findings strongly suggests that the Earth’s climate sensitivity to atmospheric CO2 (the amount of global climatic warming for a doubling of pre-industrial CO2 concentration) may be greater than previously thought; around 4° rather than the currently accepted 3°C.”
https://earth-pages.co.uk/2017/01/20/ancient-co2-estimates-worry-climatologists/
The methodology appears sound. Since CO2 is only one dependent factor among dozens of natural feedbacks, the tendency of the system to keep moving in the direction it started (due to building feedbacks) means CO2 and other radiative forcings can have an outsized response to their individual changes.
The biggest factors are solar insolation differentials involving the characteristics of the various phases and phase change energies of water. Since they are self-feeding and related to CO2, I don’t have a problem accepting the higher sensitivity as long as one accepts that CO2 is just the initiator of other forcings.
One must also accept that the recognized forcings we are dealing with right now are small compared to other forcings that normally shift climate.
That said, we are in a relatively warm portion of the glacial cycle and thus easily tipped toward further warming by a swarm of smaller induced forcings. There is a larger radiative forcing that is coming into play currently.
So 4 to 6C could be an endpoint in global warming.
Once I find the actual research paper I may be able to give a more definitive statement.
Hi George,
Over many millennia the Earth System sensitivity is likely to be at least 3.5 C, but if it is assumed that eventually anthropogenic carbon emissions stop (by 2065+/-5 years), then atmospheric CO2 falls to 420 ppm by 3000 CE and to 408 ppm by 10,000 CE. This would correspond to about 1.9 C above pre-industrial. The other issue is that the response of global temperature to increasing natural log of CO2 may be non-linear. So it is possible that the climate sensitivity for an increase in atmospheric CO2 from 500 to 1000 ppm is 4 C, but and increase from 275 to 550 ppm is 3 C.
It is unlikely that there are enough recoverable fossil fuels to result in atmospheric CO2 much above 550 ppm, if we remain on a pathway close to 1000 Pg of total carbon emissions (all sources including land use change) Allen et al 2009 suggests we are likely to remain close to the 2 C limit. In a 1080 Pg C emissions scenario, CO2 peaks at 507 ppm in 2080 and falls to 437 ppm by 2500 CE. This scenario uses the GISS Model E-H (CMIP3) emulation from MAGICC 6.3 and the median Carbon model emulated by MAGICC 6.3.
What about historical sensitivity vis-a-vis unprecedented human-impact variables like deforestation, desertification, urbanization, and monoculture? Are these included in the models? Even if the world was warmer and contained more atmospheric C02 in the far past, it certainly didn’t have those variables, which may suggest differences, compared with the past, in how things play out.
Hi Javier,
If we assume a 60 year natural cycle due to a combination of ocean effects such as the NAO and ENSO and solar variability, that could certainly be consistent with warming associated with increased greenhouse gases since 1850, in earlier times, when emissions were lower, the temperature signal from natural variability was more dominant.
It would seem you expect relatively little warming (or no warming) on average from 2001 to about 2030. It is certainly possible this will be the case, if the pattern from 1850 to 2016 continues. The chart below shows the centered 25 year average of the BEST land ocean data where an approximately 60 year cycle is evident. We will have to see what happens tp global land ocean temperature over the next 10 to 15 years.
Even if that hypothesis is correct, the increased temperatures will continue over the next 30 or 35 years (from 2030 to 2060) unless green house gas emissions are reduced.
If we ignore the el Nino years of 2015 and 2016 and consider the trend from 2001 to 2014, it is 3 times smaller in slope than the trend from 1971-2000 (0.5 C per century for 2001-2014 and 1.6 C per century from 1971-2000).
However the linear trend from 1976-2014 is 1.76 C per century, so the hypothesis of a 60 year cycle may be incorrect. (I also considered 1971-2014 and the linear trend is 1.74 C/century.)
Chart for BEST LO data from 1976-2014 is below.
Dennis,
If that is the case you will agree with me that the general rate of warming is lower than has been assumed, and that makes warming not that dangerous at all. Instead of continuous warming we are dealing with periods of warming and periods of no warming.
And warming will not continue forever even if CO2 emissions were to grow forever, and we both know that fossil fuel usage is going to reach a limit some time during the next decades. The history of the planet has see all sort of drastic things, and warming/cooling periods always stop and reverse. Global warming is never going to get dangerous while we are at the Quaternary Ice Age.
au contraire
(you really need to educate yourself- just a suggestion)
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/GlobalWarming/page3.php
As the Earth moved out of ice ages over the past million years, the global temperature rose a total of 4 to 7 degrees Celsius over about 5,000 years. In the past century alone, the temperature has climbed 0.7 degrees Celsius, roughly ten times faster than the average rate of ice-age-recovery warming.
Models predict that Earth will warm between 2 and 6 degrees Celsius in the next century. When global warming has happened at various times in the past two million years, it has taken the planet about 5,000 years to warm 5 degrees. The predicted rate of warming for the next century is at least 20 times faster. This rate of change is extremely unusual.
Comparing rates of change at different temporal scales produces meaningless comparisons. There are several degrees difference between night and day too.
If you want to know what an abrupt climate change is, you should look into Dansgaard-Oeschger events, where several degrees warming were concentrated in just a few decades.
It doesn’t matter what models predict because they are wrong, unable to predict 20-30 years ahead, much less 85.
Hi Javier,
We don’t know that the models are wrong. They reproduce past temperature fairly well, some models do better than others and no model is perfect. As to the future, we will have to wait and see what occurs. Many of the poor predictions of the future will be due to an assumption that fossil fuels are far more abundant than is likely, so scenarios such as RCP6 or RCP8.5 are likely to be far from the mark, RCP4.5 is possible if there is a very slow decline of fossil fuels and a very slow increase in non-fossil fuel energy, but even that scenario is likely to be too pessimistic.
Hi Dennis,
We do know the models are wrong. As per IPCC (AR4):
“For the next two decades, a warming of about 0.2°C per decade is projected for a range of SRES emission scenarios. Even if the concentrations of all greenhouse gases and aerosols had been kept constant at year 2000 levels, a further warming of about 0.1°C per decade would be expected.
Since IPCC’s first report in 1990, assessed projections have suggested global average temperature increases between about 0.15°C and 0.3°C per decade for 1990 to 2005. This can now be compared with observed values of about 0.2°C per decade, strengthening confidence in near-term projections.
Model experiments show that even if all radiative forcing agents were held constant at year 2000 levels, a further warming trend would occur in the next two decades at a rate of about 0.1°C per decade, due mainly to the slow response of the oceans. About twice as much warming (0.2°C per decade) would be expected if emissions are within the range of the SRES scenarios. Best-estimate projections from models indicate that decadal average warming over each inhabited continent by 2030 is insensitive to the choice among SRES scenarios and is very likely to be at least twice as large as the corresponding model-estimated natural variability during the 20th century.”
We are supposed to be warming at 0.2°C/decade, and we haven’t. The only warming we have seen has been from an El Niño. Looking forward to 2030 it might be closer to zero than 0.2.
Hi Javier,
If you look at estimates from AR4 (link below)
https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-chapter3.pdf
Table 3.3 p. 248, the trend from 1979 to 2005 was 0.17 C per decade.
If we look at 1988 to 2016 the trend has been 0.19 C per decade, so the prediction has been good so far.
Dennis,
You and I have a different concept of what constitutes a prediction.
AR4 was published 2007 with analysis up to 2005. Anything previous is not a prediction. In their prediction they talk about the next two decades after 2000. They predicted an acceleration of warming. Instead we got a hiatus.
Hi Javier,
The trend from 1979 to 2005 has continued through 2016, we will have to wait until 2025 to see if that proves correct. Also the range of predictions depends on the scenario for emissions, emissions from 2005 to 2016 were lower than most of the SRES scenarios, if a fair comparison is made of what the median model would predict given actual emissions, the predictions were pretty good for 2006 to 2016.
Maybe it is you who does not realize that a prediction based on data analyzed through 2005 would indeed cover 2006 to 2016, my chart shows the trend of 0.19 per decade from 1988 to 2016 (27 years), which is more than the 1979 to 2005 (also 27 years)trend of 0.17 per decade. So the warming trend has increased (when an appropriate length of time is used) fairly close to what was predicted despite carbon emissions that were lower than expected.
See also
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch10s10-es-1-mean-temperature.html
warming averaged for 2011 to 2030 compared to 1980 to 1999 is between +0.64°C and +0.69°C, with a range of only 0.05°C
So from 1990 to 2020 about 0.64 C of warming was predicted, or about 0.21 C per decade where the rate of warming from 1988 to 2016 was 0.19, a slight overestimate, but given the relatively low emissions from 2009 to 2016, this is nor surprising.
Javier,
In short, if one expects perfection, one could claim the models are “wrong”. Climate science is far more complicated than your field, where experiments are straightforward.
The models are “right” within the uncertainty of the models, using the executive summary as a basis for evaluation is a mistake in my opinion.
If that is the case you will agree with me that the general rate of warming is lower than has been assumed, and that makes warming not that dangerous at all.
No Javier, that isn’t how things work at all! Here ya go, a little chaos math that even a PhD in molecular biology should be able to understand…
http://ed.ted.com/lessons/is-our-climate-headed-for-mathematical-chaos-victor-j-donnay
Is our climate headed for a mathematical tipping point? – Victor J. Donnay
Let’s Begin…
Scientists have warned that as CO2 levels in the atmosphere rise an increase in Earth’s temperature by even two degrees could lead to catastrophic effects across the world. But how can such a tiny, measurable change in one factor lead to huge, unpredictable changes elsewhere? Victor J. Donnay uses billiards to illustrate tipping points, chaotic motion and their implications on climate change.
Javier has a PhD?
From where Bob Jones?
Evangelical Scientists Refute Gravity With New ‘Intelligent Falling’ Theory
http://www.theonion.com/article/evangelical-scientists-refute-gravity-with-new-int-1778
Proponents of Intelligent Falling assert that the different theories used by secular physicists to explain gravity are not internally consistent. Even critics of Intelligent Falling admit that Einstein’s ideas about gravity are mathematically irreconcilable with quantum mechanics. This fact, Intelligent Falling proponents say, proves that gravity is a theory in crisis.
“Let’s take a look at the evidence,” said ECFR senior fellow Gregory Lunsden.”In Matthew 15:14, Jesus says, ‘And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.’ He says nothing about some gravity making them fall—just that they will fall. Then, in Job 5:7, we read, ‘But mankind is born to trouble, as surely as sparks fly upwards.’ If gravity is pulling everything down, why do the sparks fly upwards with great surety? This clearly indicates that a conscious intelligence governs all falling.”
Hi Duncan,
Javier does indeed have a PhD and several peer reviewed publications. Though he is not an expert in climate science, his field is biology (either cell or micro, I forget which and it is not my field so there may not be an important distinction.)
Javier’s PhD does prove that many institutions have extremely low standards for granting PhDs. If he really has one, that is.
He certainly does not understand biology in general. If he got a PhD in biology, it was either a very long time ago, or from an incompetent institution. Certain incompetent institutions will grant PhDs to people who have overspecialized training, who have only studied one tiny corner of the field and do not actually really understand basics of the field like ecology, evolution and biological history. He might be one of those.
The climate on Earth is bounded. Just take a look at the past 540 million years.
And we are in the midst of the Quaternary Ice Age, one of the 10% coldest periods of Earth. That’s why there is ice in both poles when normally they have been ice free for most of the past 540 million years.
Chaos plays a small role in the past climate of the Earth. It is all cycles. From the 150 million year Ice Age cycle all the way down to the 60 year oceanic cycle that produces the hiatus.
Javier’s a lying cherry-picker. He has abandoned all scientific integrity in favor of dishonesty. He is not a scientist, regardless of whether he used to be one.
Yes, the Earth’s biology has a feedback effect which lowers global temperature… eventually.
At the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum.
This is the graph Javier should have been reading, from the same wikipedia page which he got his cherrypickin’ graph from.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f5/All_palaeotemps.png
I don’t know why the lying troll Javier can embed images and I can’t, so here’s a link.
Dennis, you need to ban Javier. You really need to ban him. He’s useless and disruptive to the forum; he contributes precisely nothing useful and throws shit around constantly. He has turned global warming denial into an article of faith, part of his religion, and is immune to all rational thought. He needs to go.
Hi Javier,
If my estimates of economically recoverable fossil fuels (assuming high fossil fuel prices and very little substitution by other forms of energy) is correct we would see no more than about 1500 Pg of carbon emissions from 1750 to 2500 CE (all sources including cement production and land use change) due to fossil fuel depletion.
It is fairly likely that as fossil fuels become scarcer and more expensive that other forms of energy will substitute for fossil fuel (nuclear, wind, solar, and hydro power) so that carbon emissions might be limited to 1000 Pg of carbon (1750-2500) which Allen at al 2009 found would result in 2 C of warming or less (from 1850-1900 mean global temperature) which is roughly 1.7 C above the 1951-1980 global mean temperature.
Using a simple model with a sinusoidal “natural variation” of 78 years (cosine function worked best) and the natural log of atmospheric CO2, a multivariate linear regression from 1850 to 2015 gives an R squared of about 89% and a TCR for a doubling of CO2 of 2.45 C (2.3 to 2.6 C 95% confidence interval). I also used a Bern type model to match the median MAGICC 6 carbon model to a 1080 Pg carbon emission scenario to estimate future carbon emissions to see what this very simple model would predict for future temperature. This is shown in the chart below.
There are many problems with this Cstad “model” (C for carbon, stad for stadium wave hypothesis). It does not account for future ocean warming, future albedo change as ice sheets melt, and carbon emissions from melting permafrost. It is not clear how large the effects from these processes will be or how quickly they will occur, the CMIP3 median model suggests about 0.3 C of warming due to ocean warming and albedo effects from less snow cover and sea ice. Falling CO2 might offset some of albedo effect from ice sheet melting and the emissions from permafrost melt so we might remain about 1.5 C above pre industrial Holocene temperature based on research by Hansen of mid-Pliocene. High uncertainty so this is quite speculative.
what about methane emissions? is that included in the carbon emissions?
Hi Ezrydermike,
No carbon emissions are from CDIAC and MAGICC6 emissions scenarios for CO2, the MAGICC6 models include methane my very simple model considers atmospheric CO2 in parts per million and takes the natural log for the linear regression.
http://www.globalcarbonproject.org/carbonbudget/
http://www.magicc.org/
http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/co2/
Link to spreadsheet below
https://www.dropbox.com/s/95ms4lzt30zuv2q/cstad.xlsx?dl=0
Congratulations Dennis, on producing the first model with more realistic emission predictions.
In my opinion no significant rise in temperatures from 0.6 until 2030 and lower climate sensitivity, so temperatures should stabilize around +1° in your graph.
This is certainly an improvement. Albedo effect is likely to be from very small to negligible. NASA has been measuring global albedo from satellites between 2000 and 2011 and reports no change in albedo trend despite significant sea ice melt in the period.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=84499
Hi Javier,
The empirical data suggests a TCR of at least 1.9C, and the models that agree well with the empirical data have an ECS of at least 2.5 C, my carbon model (based on median carbon model from MAGICC 6) suggests about 420 ppm of CO2 in 2500, this suggests a temperature of 1.5 C in 2500 above pre-industrial Holocene temperatures. With ice sheet and permafrost changes it may be higher.
Dennis, ban the troll. Please. I caught him lying and cherrypicking AGAIN, up above.
Just ban the loser troll.
Using GISS Model EH (median MAGICC 6 CMIP3 model) and the median carbon model of 9 carbon models used by MAGICC 6,along with a 1080 Pg Carbon emission scenario (all sources from Global Carbon Budget), temperature rises to about 1.9 C above the 1951-1980 mean by 2500.
Hi Javier,
Is anyone supposed to take those charts seriously? Maybe if the arrows followed the black lines rather than the highest and lowest points they would be a little believable. As they are they would be dismissed by any intelligent observer.
I am referring to your 1/19/2017, 6:21 PM comment. Link below
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-jan-18-2017/#comment-592960
Obviously the reduction in temperature rise during the 1950’s into the 60’s was due to high levels of pollution from aerosols causing a decrease in insolation. That is well documented.
The leveling out of temperature rise in the late 1800’s is curious, since it goes against some historical temperature effects of the time. There was extreme coal pollution due to inefficient burning and cutting and burning of large swaths of forests during that period, to the point where large areas were completely denuded of trees. So maybe that had something to do with the temperature running flatter. Heavy industry was making regions dark during the day from pollution.
Although I see the 25 year average has done a lot of smoothing of the temperature record.
NASA Goddard record below with 5 year average.
That’s an assumption. The aerosol cooling factor is less known that the climate sensitivity. Essentially it was chosen to match the observed cooling to support the hypothesis. New lower estimates are now being produced.
Stevens, Bjorn. “Rethinking the lower bound on aerosol radiative forcing.” Journal of Climate 28.12 (2015): 4794-4819.
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00656.1
Funny how you function within a narrative to explain things. I guess you have no experience in the scientific method where you have to look at empirical evidence and not logical evidence to support your hypothesis. In the late 1800’s industrialization affected a very small part of the planet. Most of the world was still not industrialized until after WWII. The cause-effect that you describe is just impossible and you should know it.
” Essentially it was chosen to match the observed cooling to support the hypothesis. ”
More conspiracies from Javier. Always a conspiracy theory.
Your claims are not supported by evidence.
“It is only logical that if the world is warming, and very few people deny that, temperatures should be higher, not lower.” ~ Javier
Thanks for the update doc. Where would we be without you?
Actually our friend Javier is right- he just left out a few biophysical realities.
Earth has gotten gradually colder for the last 4000 years, and with the quiet Sun, we should have actually accelerated the decrease.
Normal between Ice Age events.
Instead, temperatures have increased, as we have carbonized the atmosphere.
Where is his hockey stick?
With the tails on Co2, this is at least a 10,000 year delay, possibly much longer.
(maybe changed from Ice Age to a new global climate reality)
And add to that enough natural self-reinforcing feedbacks that extra CO2 from us is not needed to continue the warming of the planet.
At this point the only thing that could induce even a small glaciation would be a shutdown of the AMOC. Even so, the increasing insolation in the northern hemisphere and the natural feedbacks would probably reverse or stall any glaciation forming in northern Europe.
The constantly increasing area of exposed ocean in the Arctic not only allows great absorbance of visible light energy but open water absorbs longwave infrared much better than ice. This allows the Arctic Ocean to become a heat trap. Once the Arctic region is warm, it is difficult to start any kind of glaciation in the north, in fact just the reverse is occurring now.
You got it all backwards. Less Arctic sea ice means more heat is lost to space from the sea by radiation, and more atmospheric humidity that increases snow. The albedo effect is very small, as atmospheric albedo dominates, and sea ice is maximum when solar radiation is zero (six months).
Also we are at a 23,000 year minimum in Northern insolation, The increase in Northern insolation is at this time negligible. the decrease in obliquity is a much stronger force.
You are also right in that the cooling started about 5000 years ago when the Neoglacial period started in most places.
But you got the Sun part wrong. No quiet Sun. We are close to the peak in the 1000 year solar activity cycle, the millennial high. Previous peaks of this cycle have been:
1100 AD: Medieval Warm Period
100 AD: Roman Warm Period
Temperatures have increased as solar activity has increased since the Little Ice Age. CO2 is a late comer to the warming party and wants to take all the credit.
We are just entering a centennial low in solar activity and not a pronounced one since we are so close to the millennial high. Still enough to stop global warming in its tracks until it ends around 2030.
Once the millennial high is past, next century, global warming will very likely stop, and the planet will be in a prolonged warm period like during the Roman Warm Period, for several centuries.
Solar activity has corresponded quite well with climate for thousands of years and still does. Prolonged periods of below average solar activity, like 1790-1830 (Dalton Minimum), 1870-1920, or 2000-, correspond to periods without warming. The mid-centennial lows (1860, 1960) also correspond to periods of little warming.
Original figure from:
Tan, Baolin. “Multi-timescale solar cycles and the possible implications.” Astrophysics and Space Science 332.1 (2011): 65-72.
“But you got the Sun part wrong. No quiet Sun.”
Fail again, I’m afraid.
If you’re looking toward the sun to help explain this decade’s record global heat on Earth, look again. Solar activity has been below average for more than a decade, and the pattern appears set to continue, according to several top solar researchers. Solar Cycle 24, the one that will wrap up in the late 2010s, was the least active in more than a century. We now have outlooks for Cycle 25, the one that will prevail during the 2020s, and they’re calling for a cycle only about as strong as–and perhaps even less active than–Cycle 24.
Weak solar cycles tend to produce fewer solar storms, those dramatic bursts of magnetized material from the sun that generate spectacular auroral displays and play havoc with satellite-based systems and power grids on Earth. However, solar storms that do emerge during weak cycles can be among the most potent, notes Scott McIntosh (National Center for Atmospheric Research). Just as a catastrophic hurricane can occur in an otherwise quiet season, a quiet solar cycle can still cause devastating space weather, McIntosh told me. “If you look at the record of extreme events from the sun, they most often occur in weak cycles, and they almost always occur in the deep, descending part of the cycle,” he said.
https://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/as-earth-warms-up-the-sun-is-remarkably-quiet
That’s clearly not the case. Cycle 24 is the first one to be below average in several decades. Solar activity has been at or above average for the entire second half of the 20th century until the second decade of the 21st.
Hi Javier,
Using changes in Total solar irradiance (TSI) improves models with other factors such as the natural log of atmospheric CO2, but by itself a “solar”model does not explain global temperature changes from 1850 to 2015 very well.
TSI data is based on sunspots from 1850 to 2002 and on satellite data from 2003 to 2015.
http://lasp.colorado.edu/home/sorce/data/tsi-data/#historical_TSI
The temperature data from BEST. Model in chart below.
A lot of people here think that being an skeptic means rejecting that the world is warming and keep throwing at me evidence that it does. They need reminding that the issue is not the warming, but the catastrophic warming. No evidence for that.
A lot of people here think that being an skeptic means rejecting that the world is warming and keep throwing at me evidence that it does.
The problem with your argument is that you are not a legitimate skeptic, in the scientific sense. You are an equal opportunity science denier! Anything that does not support your ideology or agenda, whatever that may be!
What Skepticism Reveals about Science
A skeptic’s journey for truth in science
By Michael Shermer on July 1, 2009
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-skepticism-reveals/
Climate scientists prove anthropogenic global warming from the environmental sciences, planetary geology, geophysics, glaciology, meteorology, chemistry, biology, ecology, among other disciplines…
…Once an inferential or historical science is well established through the accumulation of positive evidence, however, it is just as sound as a laboratory or experimental science.
You, want to deny all the converging lines of scientific evidence of anthropogenic climate change from hundreds if not thousands of individual scientists, working independently in dozens of different scientific disciplines, in universities, government labs, in independent labs connected to corporations, in almost two hundred independent countries, who claim unequivocally that anthropogenic climate change is caused mostly by burning carbon based fuels and that it is a seriously problem!
BTW…
Definition Skeptic:
skep·tic
ˈskeptik/Submit
noun
1.
a person inclined to question or doubt all accepted opinions.
synonyms: cynic, doubter; More
2.
PHILOSOPHY
an ancient or modern philosopher who denies the possibility of knowledge, or even rational belief, in some sphere.
Nope, I have defended publicly that anthropogenic global warming has been taking place.
I do believe that CO2 has caused warming and I say so. I just defend climate sensitivity is at the low end of the accepted range.
I thought that my position was clear by now.
Global warming? Yes
Anthropogenic warming? Yes
Dangerous? No
You obviuously have your own definition of what constitutes dangerous climate change!
So let’s start with the IPCC’s definition: I know the IPCC are all alarmists… but
1.2.2 What is dangerous interference with the climate system?
Defining what is dangerous interference with the climate system is a complex task that can only be partially supported by science, as it inherently involves normative judgements. There are different approaches to defining danger, and an interpretation of Article 2 is likely to rely on scientific, ethical, cultural, political and/or legal judgements. As such, the agreement(s) reached among the Parties in terms of what may constitute unacceptable impacts on the climate system, food production, ecosystems or sustainable economic development will represent a synthesis of these different perspectives.
Over the past two decades several expert groups have sought to define levels of climate change that could be tolerable or intolerable, or which could be characterized by different levels of risk. In the late 1980s, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO)/International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU)/UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Advisory Group on Greenhouse Gases (AGGG) identified two main temperature indicators or thresholds with different levels of risk (Rijsberman and Swart, 1990). Based on the available knowledge at the time a 2ºC increase was determined to be ‘an upper limit beyond which the risks of grave damage to ecosystems, and of non-linear responses, are expected to increase rapidly’. This early work also identified the rate of change to be of importance to determining the level of risk, a conclusion that has subsequently been confirmed qualitatively (IPCC, 2007b, Chapters 4 and 19). More recently, others in the scientific community have reached conclusions that point in a similar direction ‘that global warming of more than 1°C, relative to 2000, will constitute “dangerous” climate change as judged from likely effects on sea level and extermination of species’ (Hansen et al., 2006). Probabilistic assessments have also been made that demonstrate how scientific uncertainties, different normative judgments on acceptable risks to different systems (Mastrandrea and Schneider, 2004) and/or interference with the climate system (Harvey, 2007) affect the levels of change or interference set as goals for policy (IPCC, 2007b, Chapter 19). From an economic perspective, the Stern Review (Stern, 2006) found that in order to minimise the most harmful consequences of climate change, concentrations would need to be stabilized below 550 ppm CO2-eq. The Review further argues that any delay in reducing emissions would be ‘would be costly and dangerous’. This latter conclusion is at variance with the conclusions drawn from earlier economic analyses which support a slow ‘ramp up’ of climate policy action (Nordhaus, 2006) and, it has been argued, is a consequence of the approach taken by the Stern Review to intergenerational equity (Dasgupta, 2006).
NASA seems to concur with the IPCCs assesment: More Alarmists, I know!
http://climate.nasa.gov/effects/
Global climate change has already had observable effects on the environment. Glaciers have shrunk, ice on rivers and lakes is breaking up earlier, plant and animal ranges have shifted and trees are flowering sooner.
Effects that scientists had predicted in the past would result from global climate change are now occurring: loss of sea ice, accelerated sea level rise and longer, more intense heat waves.
Taken as a whole, the range of published evidence indicates that the net damage costs of climate change are likely to be significant and to increase over time.
– Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Scientists have high confidence that global temperatures will continue to rise for decades to come, largely due to greenhouse gases produced by human activities. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which includes more than 1,300 scientists from the United States and other countries, forecasts a temperature rise of 2.5 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit over the next century.
According to the IPCC, the extent of climate change effects on individual regions will vary over time and with the ability of different societal and environmental systems to mitigate or adapt to change.
The IPCC predicts that increases in global mean temperature of less than 1.8 to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit (1 to 3 degrees Celsius) above 1990 levels will produce beneficial impacts in some regions and harmful ones in others. Net annual costs will increase over time as global temperatures increase.
“Taken as a whole,” the IPCC states, “the range of published evidence indicates that the net damage costs of climate change are likely to be significant and to increase over time.”
Then we have the Union of Concerned Scientists:
http://www.ucsusa.org/our-work/global-warming/science-and-impacts/global-warming-impacts#.WIJPuRsrKM8
Global warming is already having significant and costly effects on our communities, our health, and our climate.
Unless we take immediate action to reduce global warming emissions, these impacts will continue to intensify, grow ever more costly and damaging, and increasingly affect the entire planet — including you, your community, and your family.
Yeah, I know, the Union of Concerned Scientists are all ‘Alarmists’!
And then we have the evidence that global warming has been beneficial for 170 years.
Let’s see, opinion versus evidence, what should I trust?
Most people assume that global warming is going to continue indefinitely. That is not going to be the case. Fossil fuels are a lot more limited than most people think. In a few decades we are very likely to use less fossil fuels. And present global warming has a natural underlying cause that started it after the Little Ice Age. Multi-centennial global warming or cooling trends are common in paleo climatology. These trends always end and reverse.
Javier obviously does not believe in heeding the precautionary principle.
He would have a very hard time getting a job as a lab technician handling dangerous chemicals or living organisms. If the lab manager were to be aware of his comments here, he couldn’t even get an interview, doctorate or not.
Hi Javier,
You seem to think either the AMO or solar variability or perhaps both are mostly responsible for global warming rather than atmospheric CO2 since 1850.
I have shown before how a model using AMO or solar perform (not very well in either case) when we assume the contribution of atmospheric CO2 is negligible (as you seem to assume).
So let’s try AMO and total solar irradiance (TSI) together in an “AMOTSI model”. Again, not very good on a regression from 1856 to 2010 with an R squared of 71% (compare with a CO2 only model with an R squared of 81%). Chart below shows AMOTSI Model and BEST LO data. Note the very poor match of model with data from 2000-2016.
Hi Javier,
The “C Model” which uses the natural log of atmospheric CO2 vs BEST LO data from 1856-2010 for the regression, R squared 81%. A better match especially after 2000.
Gotta love Javier’s linear trend lines.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2016/10/18/extreme-cherry-ice/
Yet I am right and Tamino is wrong. No Arctic melting since 2007. It will eventually be a problem for those who live out of the Arctic melting scare.
“There hasn’t been any melting in the Arctic since 2007” ~ Javier
“Javier has also resorted to another denier favorite: computing a “trend” based on a time span that’s way to short. Way too short. Ten years, from 2007 to 2016. And, in classic fashion, he omits to estimate any uncertainty with that “trend.”
Let’s do the math for him.
Using September average sea ice extent from NSIDC, and using only the data from 2007 through 2016, the estimated trend by linear regression is +18 thousand km^2 per year. Upward!!! But, the “margin of error” (95% confidence interval) for that figure is somewhere between +142 thousand km^2/yr and -105 thousand km^2/yr. Downward”
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2016/10/18/extreme-cherry-ice/
“Modeled and with large uncertainties. You can believe on that if you want.” ~ Javier (on PIOMASS)
From PIOMASS data
Model Validation and Uncertainty
“PIOMAS has been extensively validated through comparisons with observations from US-Navy submarines, oceanographic moorings, and satellites. In addition model runs were performed in which model parameters and assimilation procedures were altered. From these validation studies we arrive at conservative estimates of the uncertainty in the trend of ± 1.0 103 km3/decade. The uncertainty of the monthly averaged ice volume anomaly is estimated as ±0.75 103 km3. Total volume uncertainties are larger than those for the anomaly because model biases are removed when calculating the anomalies. The uncertainty for October total ice volume is estimated to be ±1.35 103 km3 . Comparison of winter total volumes with other volume estimates need to account for the fact that the PIOMAS domain currently does not extend southward far enough to cover all areas that can have winter time ice cover. Areas in the Sea of Okhotsk and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence are partially excluded from the domain. Details on model validation can be found in Schweiger et al. 2011 and (here). Additional information on PIOMAS can be found (here)
A comprehensive library of sea ice thickness data for model validation has been compiled and is available (here)”
http://psc.apl.uw.edu/research/projects/arctic-sea-ice-volume-anomaly/
https://youtu.be/9NP0L1PG9ag
Yet the Arctic hasn’t been melting since 2007, despite going through how many of the top warmest years? Four? Five?
Try to deny that. Try to predict when the Arctic will start melting again. Join the growing list of failed predictions on Arctic sea ice.
Javier, has it ever occurred to you that you sound exactly like those who deny that global oil production is going to peak any time soon or in the case of the abiotic oil crowd, at all? Check this:
Yet
the Arctic hasn’t been meltglobal oil production hasn’t started declining since 2007, despitegoing throughdeclining or flat production from several former leading oil producers for how manyof the top warmestyears?FourEight?FiveNine?Try to deny that. Try to predict when
the Arcticglobal oil production will start melt declining, without ever exceeding current levels again. Join the growing list of failed predictions onArctic sea icePeak Oil.Sound familiar? It should. It is exactly the sort of statement that is made by people who do not believe that Peak Oil is ever going to happen or who for their own selfish reasons, don’t want people to do anything in terms of transitioning away from the use of petroleum products.
Your claim is exactly the sort of statement that is made by people who do not believe that
Peak Oilglobal warming isever going tohappening or who for their own selfish reasons, don’t want people to do anything in terms of transitioning away from the use ofpetroleum productsfossil fuels.See what I did there? You sir, do not have much credibility with me. You seem to be carrying a line that would find favor with the guys pictured below, some guys who have spent a considerable amount of money, albeit a tiny fraction of their net worth, estimated to be somewhere between US$80 billion and $100 billion (Bloomberg), depending on who you ask and company values at the time of asking, on getting politicians of their choice (Mitch McConnel) elected to public office. Here’s an excerpt from the linked Bloomberg piece:
Charles G. Koch is on record as having founded the “Insitute for Energy Research” and provided considerable funding for the “Heartland Institute” and the “American Legislative Exchange Council”. For more on their activities see:
Koch Brothers Fund Bogus Studies to Kill Renewable Energy
It is my considered opinion that anyone denying that global warming is happening and is being caused by human activity, is either a purveyor of Koch funded propaganda or a victim of it. Why should I think otherwise when I believe in the principle of “cui bono”? From Forbes:
From Wikipedia:
Bold mine. Can you say oligarch? Need I say more?
Was driving up the 880 highway last Saturday, and as I approached the big white gleaming Tesla headquarters/ factory in Fremont, CA, I came upon a tractor trailer hauling a shipment of new cars.
They were very good looking little cars that caught our eye-
‘What are those cars’ my pretty wife asked?
“I don’t recognize ’em…they look good though!”
As we overtook the truck she proclaimed “those are Chevy Volts!”
Shiny and cool. Plug it in, and cruise 200+ miles.
Volts? 200+ miles? Maybe Bolts!
Damn GM nomenclature 🙂
PS Volts get 50+ electric miles and no range anxiety. Just sayin’…
Either way, they are highly advanced mass produced electric vehicles. Not the amateur electric conversions of the past. Ironic that a diesel tractor had had to pull them, but that will change eventually.
Agreed. It’s all good!
Oops- my mistake. Meant to say Bolt, of course.
This article from 2009 questions the use and longevity of the internal combustion piston engine. Things have changed some since then, but we still have a lot of ICE piston engines.
Why are we still using the internal combustion engine?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/columnists/jamesmay/5368889/Why-are-we-still-using-the-internal-combustion-engine.html
I like to look at old-time steam locomotives. One thing I have observed is that essentially every component of an 1850 coal-fired steam locomotive is still present in a modern internal-combustion car (highly refined, of course, but still there).
The German V-8 steam locomotive (The V19.1001) had the drive pistons outboard on the wheels in a V formation, directly connected via a flexible coupling. This not only smoothed out the drive pulsing (greater traction) but eliminated the long oscillating drive shafts and counterweights. The engine could reach speed over 100 mph and had greater efficiency than standard configurations.
http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/LOCOLOCO/steamotor/steamotor.htm
http://schneider-mayenfisch.com/drg_lokomotiven_19_1001.htm
Boomer II says that he is pessimistic, along with many others. So, assume you turned 20 in Sep 1961, with your life in front of you, and turned 40 in Sep 1981.
Aug 1961 – Berlin Wall goes up
Oct 1962 – Cuban missile crisis
Nov 1963 – JFK assassinated
Jul 1965 – LBJ sends 125,000 ground troops to Vietnam, doubles the draft
Aug 1965 – Watts riots in Los Angeles burn thousands of places down
Apr 1968 – MLK assassinated, major riots
Jun 1968 – Peace presidential candidate RFK assassinated
Aug 1968 – Democrat convention in Chicago disrupted by major riots
May 1970 – National Guard shoots and kills students at Kent State
Jun 1972 – Watergate starts
Oct 1973 – Mideast embargos oil to US
Aug 1974 – Nixon resigns
Apr 1974 – Saigon falls, US loses Vietnam War
Nov 1976 – US elects peanut farmer president
Nov 1979 – Iran humiliates US, taking all diplomats hostage
Jun 1981 – Federal Reserve raises the Federal Funds rate to 20% to combat inflation
Recessions
Apr 1960 – Feb 1961
Dec 1969 – Nov 1970
Nov 1973 – Nov 1975
Jan 1980 – Jul 1980
Jul 1981 – Nov 1982
So, imagine yourself there in 1981 on your 40th birthday. Are you optimistic or pessimistic? I was optimistic – Reagan had been elected. The list above is just the “highlights.” If you are pessimistic now, I think that you need a safe space.
Look, the only thing on the line was your life back then, that and total annihilation of life on earth when the nuke missiles flew. But there was girls, cool cars, drive-in movies, TV, college, jobs. I don’t remember giving a shit except that the natural areas were getting wrecked and the pollution was horrible. But we had peace, love and bad music too.
So now it’s our life on the line, the nukes could still fly and destroy all life on earth, civilization can collapse and the natural areas are still getting wrecked. Same old same old with a few added twists.
Remember, Limits to Growth came out way back then. We knew things would get screwed.
Now we have peace, love, bad music, cool cars, TV, computers, smartphones and less pollution (at least here). Oh, yeah, remote everything. Things have improved. You can’t get killed more than once, same skin in the game.
Well, the news was done better back then and there was less of it, that is one big downside now.
Well put!
1967 was the last year I thought homo sapiens were marginally heading in a positive direction.
(a glimmer of hope while I was in Paris in 1989)
Hi Clueless,
I was convinced Reagan would cause WW3 with his evil empire rhetoric and was very pessimistic in 1981, I was wrong then, hopefully I will be wrong now.
Are you also optimistic now that Trump will soon be president? Trump seems far less qualified than Reagan, who at least had been governor of California, but you may think differently.
Trump is fairly predictable, just think good ole boy business network and you can fairly well say what he will do or at least try to do. Maybe his ways will put off some of those empire expanding dreams of China and Russia, who knows. Maybe his plans will work or he will send us down the tubes to a depression. Who cares?
All I know is we are not moving in a strong way to correct or mitigate major environmental predicaments so we will get blind-sided. Doesn’t matter who is president if we are not going to deal with the big problems. The best I could hope from the Democrats was to do something, but something is not enough. So in the long run, it doesn’t matter.
Maybe states, towns, cities, other countries and private business will keep doing things to improve the environment and mitigate some of the predicaments.
Even if we stopped putting out CO2 and all the pollution related to fossil fuels really quickly, what do we do about the fact we are eating up the world ecological resources far faster than they can replenish and killing off much of it? How long can that go on? Ten years? Twenty? Thirty?
406 ppm Co2 today.
Toxic World – over 2500 toxic sites identified worldwide
The global health impact from toxic pollutants such as heavy metals, radionuclides, and
pesticides is much greater than previously thought. Today, well over 100 million people
are likely at risk. The vast majority of these people live in low- and middle-income
countries. This is a public health issue as salient as tuberculosis, malaria and HIV/AIDS,and one that should also receive considerable attention and resources.
Toxic pollution causes immense harm to humans, especially children. Health impacts
include physical and mental disabilities, organ dysfunction, neurological disorders,
cancers and death. These pollutants exacerbate other health concerns by weakening
the body’s immune system, rendering it more susceptible to disease. An initial exposure to toxic pollution can be the undocumented cause of later illnesses, such as respiratory infections, tuberculosis, gastrointestinal disorders, and maternal health problems. In addition, while most toxic pollution is localized, some pollutants, such as mercury, are transboundary and end up in food chains in distant oceans and countries.
While Sir Ronnie The Lessor was not the brightest porch light on the block, he did have some political experience, and his “B” actor career made him a good politician.
(He perfected the Electronic Nuremberg Rally).
Donald seems like a train wreck, but that might be a good thing, as it will be over quickly.
Sir Ronnie and the Thugs had 8 years to form and create the casino we are now living in.
I’m optimistic for myself but most everybody else is totally screwed. I don’t know what to call that. I’ll be fine, but you’re all f*cked. Ya can’t stop what’s comin’.
And some of us even voted to do it to ourselves, MacBoris. Don’t get me wrong or anything. I’m just saying, you know.
It was bad at times in the 1960s. 1968, in particular, was especially bad.
I was a young adult then.
There were several differences between then and now:
1. We believed that protesting would accomplish something. And we did get out of Vietnam, though perhaps it had nothing to do with our protests.
2. We had race riots, but we assumed that things would get better and rise out of the urban ashes.
3. Economically things looked good. We had recessions, but we knew they were temporary. I particularly remember assuming every college graduate would have a job. It was just a matter of picking which one and whether you wanted to have a job. Now jobs aren’t a given for many people.
4. Families could still have a comfortable life with just one working adult.
5. We were worried about nuclear war, but we didn’t talk about irreversible environmental factors doing us in. We also didn’t worry about oil running out.
Back then there were concerns, but we also thought we could control the outcomes.
But now the only people who seem to be talking about a glorious future for the world are either “back to the 1950s” types, or technological utopians.
There have been massive changes in world economics before, like the Industrial Revolution. Life changed and it didn’t go back to what it was.
I think the global economy is leaving the Industrial Revolution and the Fossil Fuel ages. We could come out of both ahead, but change is so stressful to many cultures that they react negatively rather than positively.
Perhaps we are due for another world war, though I hope not.
I haven’t lived through anything as dark as the Depression and WWII, but during my life, I have never been less optimistic that the world will pull itself together and do what is necessary to provide the highest quality of life for the most people.
’68 was the year my medal holding WW2 vet Dad packed up his family and moved to Canada. 🙂
Seriously, he proclaimed the US was on its way to becoming a Police State.
He was a very smart and kind man.
None of us alive today have lived through anything as dark as World War I.
However, the current geopolitical and economic trends are very similar to the situtation in the 1900 – 1914 period.
Perversely, Trump might actually be a break from the trends which led to WWI. We can hope.
OFM, are you channelling this guy? (the late Joe Bageant)
Poor, White and Pissed: A Guide to the White Trash Planet for Urban Liberals
http://joebageant.net/?p=674
Highly recommended!
Deer Hunting With Jesus is the best book on Class in ‘Merika ever!
I’ve read a little of his stuff. He definitely gets it, but you can get it without taking it seriously, as I do. There are some overtones in his work that I don’t especially like, in the little bit I have read.
Generally speaking, I think his style is overblown, and he makes just a little too MUCH fun of working class people, as if he longs to be accepted by the elite, and ENVIES the elite, subtly or maybe not so subtly implying that he too looks down on the working class.
This sort of stuff is not the stuff of fun and games for me. I don’t know if he ‘s for real, or just out making a buck.
I could do something similar, making fun of the urban liberal set, but I wouldn’t REALLY believe in what I would write, it would just be a piece of work.
Maybe he IS part of the elite now.
I’m still working on what MY style will be. This is a handy place to practice, since the discussion is generally about things I’m passionate about. I get some feed back, and I learn quite a lot as well.
He would be good at firing up a working class crowd, if somebody in it didn’t actually READ his stuff closely, and decide to run him out of town, or at least off the soapbox, for making too much fun of them.
The few lines of his stuff I have read about political activism are in my opinion unrealistic and indicative that he doesn’t understand the realities of politics very well, or alternately, he does, and is just writing what he thinks will get an audience and a following.
Maybe I ought to read his book, there might be some stuff in it that I have overlooked, or never thought about.
He’s dead you know Mac, Joe is.
Sure would have loved to read what he would have had to say about the election of Donald Trump.
Mac,
I’m surprised you haven’t read Joe Bageant’s books. If you do, I think you’ll find that you’ve mis-guessed him by a bunch. I think he had a good handle on the political and social situation in this country from way back. The latest post on John Michael Greer’s blog is very much in agreement with one of Bageants central themes throughout his writings, that being the class bigotry that’s so much a part of things, even though it’s not called out as such very often.
As far as I’ve read, Joe certainly never joined the elite, or even tried to. He did do some union organizing if I remember correctly, and always stayed true to his roots, so I think your comment about him just writing for a paycheck is probably just an uninformed guess.
Anyway, I think you’d probably enjoy his writing.
Stan
Thanks Stanley,
I ‘m always glad to change my mind, when somebody points out I’m wrong, and points the way to enlightenment.
I will read his books.
But I didn’t go looking for his stuff in the past because I recognized him as a man who at least WRITES very much like I think, and I haven’t ever spent much time on reading people who agree with me, except if they are real experts, in which case I might learn something.
Maybe Joe knows some stuff I don’t. I’ll check him out.
You’re right, I was guessing, reading between the lines of a very limited amount of his stuff, and I never take anybody at face value in the literary world.
I can’t remember the author’s name, but I recently ran across a book titled The Redneck Manifesto, at Goodwill, where you can find gold for two bucks in hardcover sometimes.
It’s a superb book, a laugh a minute, and the author has some real insight into working class life. If you wish, I will post his name and the catalog number. If you like Bageant, you will like this guy, guaranteed.
I read professors of biology, because I can learn LOTS of things about biology from them, but otherwise it would be mostly pointless , because I’m already on the same page as they are, in terms of the environment. Ditto politics, mostly.
Mac,
Thanks for the mention of the Redneck book. I just ordered it, used, from Amazon. I’d heard of it but never found it in the thrift stores, so decided to order it used. Most of my reading comes from such places and I’m often surprised by what I find there, just have to do a lot of looking to get thru all the useless stuff.
http://bageant.typepad.com/
The link is to a site with lots of Bageant’s essays, so you can get a good idea of his thoughts.
Another Alabama redneck (yep, I’m one of those, or I guess I oughta say “one uh them”) whose writing is very much to my liking is Rick Bragg. His family history writing is enjoyable to me, probably because it’s so very much a reminder of the time and place I grew up, even though my own folks were way more religious than most of his were. He doesn’t get into the political or social causes much, so reading him is just lots of pleasure.
Thanks again,
Stanley
Joe lived on $850 a month by choice.
While a redneck by birth, he explored the 60’s culture in SF, and had a interesting
peer group.
As stated Deer Hunting With Jesus is one of the best works on class in ‘Merika I have read.
DC
I agree.
Stan
as if he longs to be accepted by the elite, and ENVIES the elite
An important thing to keep in mind: book readers and intellectuals are not the “elite”. The 1% (or the tenth of 1%) are the elite.
There has been a long-term propaganda campaign intended to divide the middle class from the working class, which aims working class anger at the middle class. This campaign labels the middle class as the “elite”. This is classic scapegoating and diversion.
The working class and the middle class are both being victimized by the true elite, of which Trump is a perfect representative. This means the true elite can continue it’s business, cutting it’s taxes and preserving it’s profits, while the middle and working classes both decline.
Democratic party policies are (mostly) far better for the working class, but the Fox/Murdoch/Trump media machine convinced working class voters otherwise.
Hi Nick,
Well said.
But I read for nuance, and to me the longing for acceptance in what is PERCEIVED to be the elite is THERE in his work, judging by the small amount I have read.
I’m going to read his books, and I may well change my mind.
There is substantial truth in the argument that the REAL elite are the one percenters.
BUT- pardon me for being blunt- You just don’t get it , if you don’t understand that the elite in the minds of working people, poor people, consists not only of the one percent, but also of the professional classes, the doctors, lawyers, dentists, engineers, midlevel and up government employees, the owners of apartments and rental houses, people who have money enough to take advantage of them, by using them as servants, yard workers, etc.
You may disagree, but the poor and the working classes generally believe that the folks I mention in the above paragraph ARE justifiably thought of as PART of the elite, because those kinds benefit to a far greater extent from elitist policies and practices than they do.
And it’s not just the one percenters that have lead them to believe this is true.
About the bitterest words I have ever heard come from the mouth of one of my neighbors, a very poor man who has never accepted charity other than a donation from his church, which he has repaid many times, were spoken by this man about our “local ” dentist, meaning the only one within about ten miles. (There are dozens a little farther away, within twenty miles. )
This is a man who so seldom complains about anything that it’s hard for me to remember the last time ( previous to his remarks about the dentist being so terribly expensive) I heard him complain about anything at all, and I see him on a regular basis.
He lives on about six hundred dollars a month, after paying his electricity bill.
The dentist charged him a full months net income, after paying for his electricity, for taking out two teeth, which took the dentist about an hour. My honest opinion is that after paying his assistant, insurance , office expenses,etc, he netted well over four hundred bucks for that hour, and to anybody who wants an emergency appointment with him or ANY dentist within a couple of hundred miles, in a hurry, GOOD FUCKING LUCK is all I can say.
I had a dental infection recently, and finally found somebody who would take me as the result of a cancellation, after a week. Fortunately my doctor gets it, and slipped me in and provided me with prescriptions for an antibiotic and a pain reliever that was powerful enough to work.
I have paid this particular dentist over five thousand dollars cash on the spot over the last five or six years. He charges me MORE in cash than he charges for the EXACT same procedures when paid for by insurance.
Should I look at him as a friend, or a predator?
If you can’t see that to that man, that a dentist, or lawyer, or reasonably successful owner of a small business is justifiably viewed as his enemy, a predator taking advantage of him, well, you’re not nearly as smart as I think you are. I have painted an extreme example of course, so as to make the point as vividly as possible.
Now as a purely practical matter, my friends and neighbors understand that the one percent are NOT on their side, but they don’t DEAL with the one percent. They deal with the people I mention above.
There is no NEED for the one percent to bullshit them into believing who their enemies are.
Tell me, what is your opinion when it comes to describing the Democratic Party, as it exists NOW, as a Republican Lite party??
those kinds benefit to a far greater extent from elitist policies and practices than they do.
No, they really don’t. Middle class and professional incomes have been stagnating. Some professions are being wiped out: realtors, travel agents, journalists. Most of the rest have seen wages that have been stagnating. Most of the increase in income and wealth in the last 40 years has gone to the 1%. Not to the middle class of professionals, small land owners and small employers (of whom you’re a part on the basis of economics, even if you don’t identify that way).
That stagnation is why middle class and working people are struggling so much. It’s fair to say that working class people are being hit *even harder*, but basically they’re both in the same boat.
When Trump blames stagnation on immigrants and trade deals, he’s lying and scapegoating.
And, when Fox news tells it’s viewers that it’s urban elites that are causing their problems, it’s lying and scapegoating. Doctors and dentists don’t control the Repub party and it’s policies, billionaires do. The Tea Party didn’t come up with it’s ideas, Koch controlled think tanks and media sources came up with them. Conservative strategists like William F. Buckley (an oil money heir) came up with ideas, channeled them through media and politicians, and a few years later they were coming out of the mouths of “grass roots” people. Like Javier, sad to say, who often repeats talking points, probably with no idea of where they originally came from.
So……
Yes, of course the Dem party is Repub-lite. The successful “conservative” propaganda strategy of the last 40 years has pushed the Dems to the right. Dems HAD to go the right in order to not lose every election. The Dems looked very carefully, very calculatingly at the electorate, and shifted in it’s direction. That’s why Clinton, Obama and Hilary had so many conservative, FF aiding, bankster-helping policies: they were forced to by pressure from the right.
Why did Obama go with a Republican health plan, with fees and taxes and high priced policies? Because the Repubs successfully killed a more generous Hillary plan (under Bill Clinton).
I said those kinds benefit to a far greater extent from elitist policies and practices than they do.
You said
No, they really don’t.
I say you are one hundred percent consistent in supporting and defending the Democratic Party, which is AMPLE evidence that you will say and pretend to believe anything at all, consistent with supporting and defending the D party.
You aren’t stupid, no indeed.
Now let’s fucking talk about who owns the world these days from people like Soros to people like Trump. To the best of my knowledge, anybody that wants to, and has some money to invest, can buy Microsoft, or General Motors or any other stock , or bond , or commercial instrument sold in marketplaces.
MY dentist , the same sob who charged my impoverished neighbor doesn’t KNOW what I think of him, other than that I think it’s low life to charge me more for the same procedure,paid for on the spot, than he charges insurance companies.
He has at least TWO VERY LATE MODEL luxury automobiles,and he has told me , when I asked , what he does with his money, except what he spends on cars, vacations, etc, and he very cheerfully told me it’s in the stock market, and that he has done VERY WELL.
I know quite a few people like him, well enough to engage them in a conversation, if I run into them someplace, such as in line voting, or leaving their car to be serviced, or in the line of business.
They all benefit to a substantial extent from globalization, to a FAR FAR greater extent that poor people and working class people who don’t make much, by comparison. They spend only a minor percentage of their day to day income on such items as groceries, clothing, housing, medical care, compared to poor and working class people, and the either spend the rest on high on the hog living, or they invest it.
Poor people and working class people who can just get buy don’t HAVE money in the stock market.
Nick, you are making a FOOL of yourself, do realize that?
you say
Middle class and professional incomes have been stagnating. Some professions are being wiped out: realtors, travel agents, journalists. Most of the rest have seen wages that have been stagnating. Most of the increase in income and wealth in the last 40 years has gone to the 1%. Not to the middle class of professionals, small land owners and small employers (of whom you’re a part on the basis of economics, even if you don’t identify that way).
I won’t dispute anything in this paragraph, because it’s more or less true, and I don’t want to quibble about the details.
BUT I SAID the people you are crying about BENEFIT MORE from globalization.
The corollary is that when things turn sour, they SUFFER LESS from globalization. EITHER WAY, they are better off.
You say
That stagnation is why middle class and working people are struggling so much. It’s fair to say that working class people are being hit *even harder*, but basically they’re both in the same boat.
No they are NOT IN THE SAME FUCKING BOAT. The vast majority of people you refer to as the middle class EAT WELL, HAVE ACCESS TO QUALITY MEDICAL CARE, HAVE AT LEAST A FEW BUCKS IN THE BANK AND IN RETIREMENT SAVINGS OF SOME SORT, THEY LIVE IN NICER NEIGHBORHOODS, etc etc.
Driving the commuter car an extra year or two, and vacationing domestically, rather than internationally , is NOT suffering.
Now working like a dog, for peanuts , if you have any work, and getting there and back in a car that might make it, and might not, and letting your teeth rot, because you can’t afford to fix them, is suffering.
Whatever else you are, you aren’t very good at this sort of propaganda, although anybody who WANTS to believe it , will gladly do so.
When you say
When Trump blames stagnation on immigrants and trade deals, he’s lying and scapegoating.
For once I will agree with you. But it takes a goddamned fool, pardon me for being EXCESSIVELY blunt , to fail to understand that people in this country, CITIZENS of this country, who have next to nothing in the way of education or salable skills are suffering a LOT due to immigration.
I KNOW, I live among such people. I have immigrant neighbors who will very gladly work TWICE as hard as some of my ANGLO neighbors will work at the same job, and of course employers always take the cheapest route, overall. The immigrants are fine people, in and of themselves, and some of my close kin will be intermarrying with them soon. Some of them already have kids, on a common law basis.
But the fact that they ARE here means that the glut of cheap labor IS FAR WORSE. When a man has a choice of two or three jobs, he has a shot at getting paid better, and treated better. When there are five or six or twenty people applying for ONE job, it won’t pay shit, and it won’t have benefits.
You aren’t stupid, and you are rather well informed, and there is no way in hell you DON’T know what I have said is true.
Stagnation is real, and it has many causes, and I will say that immigration is not a major or serious factor in the big picture, when it comes to stagnation.
But when it comes to the problems experienced by poor and working class people, it IS a MAJOR problem for THEM, depending on the kind of work they do, etc. The janitor at the local elementary school will never lose his job to ANYBODY, so long as he does it reasonably well. Nor will a cop, or nurse or teacher, etc. An engineer might lose his job to an immigrant, but we don’t have millions of engineers coming into the country.
You say
And, when Fox news tells it’s viewers that it’s urban elites that are causing their problems, it’s lying and scapegoating. Doctors and dentists don’t control the Repub party and it’s policies, billionaires do. The Tea Party didn’t come up with it’s ideas, Koch controlled think tanks and media sources came up with them. Conservative strategists like William F. Buckley (an oil money heir) came up with ideas, channeled them through media and politicians, and a few years later they were coming out of the mouths of “grass roots” people. Like Javier, sad to say, who often repeats talking points, probably with no idea of where they originally came from.
True to a substantial extent.
I will point out that you FAILED to point out that the D party is also controlled by billionaires, with maybe a few ordinarily rich people, with say only a hundred million, thrown into the mix.
So……
You say
Yes, of course the Dem party is Repub-lite. The successful “conservative” propaganda strategy of the last 40 years has pushed the Dems to the right. Dems HAD to go the right in order to not lose every election. The Dems looked very carefully, very calculatingly at the electorate, and shifted in it’s direction. That’s why Clinton, Obama and Hilary had so many conservative, FF aiding, bankster-helping policies: they were forced to by pressure from the right.
There’s an element of truth in what you say at this point, but I can make a MUCH better case that one , the country itself for the most part did not WANT the D party ramming cultural changes down it’s throat, and that the COUNTRY, especially smaller towns and rural and southern areas, etc, shifted right as much or more for this reason than for any OTHER reason.
And I can make a BETTER case that the D party sold out in part, and was simply CO OPTED by the elite, meaning the folks with a LOT more money than they need to live well.
The women at the DNC wore Prada.
You say
Why did Obama go with a Republican health plan, with fees and taxes and high priced policies? Because the Repubs successfully killed a more generous Hillary plan (under Bill Clinton).
The ACA was not a REPUBLICAN PARTY plan, the R party fought it tooth and nail, and won the election in some part by promising to repeal it.
It did next to nothing to reduce the cost of health care , although cynics like you will insist that when you get a subsidy for something the cost of it has been reduced. NO , the price of it to the customer has been reduced but the cost remains the same or goes up, everything else held equal, because part of the cost is shifted to the tax payer.
I have said many times that the PRIMARY goal of the ACA, providing low cost insurance to people unable to afford it otherwise is admirable.
But the execution was awful, because all it really does is shift the costs around, without reducing the overhead associated with insurance companies, lawyers, etc, while shoving the bill into the face of a demographic that is dominated by R type voters, which pissed them off NO END. It motivated the hell out of them to go anti D this last election.
The D’s are Republican Lite sure enough, I’m glad you are man enough to admit at least this much.
Now the question from here on out, is who will control the D party?
For what it’s worth, my opinion is that if the D party searches it’s soul, and turns in the direction Sanders is trying to take it, it will return to power. Otherwise, the R’s will continue to dominate for some time, maybe as much as eight to twelve years, depending on how the cards fall, before the country gets sick enough of the status quo to be to throw the bums out.
If the D party doesn’t reverse course, and give up being Republican Lite, it won’t really matter very much WHICH party is in control anyway.
I await the day you say anything at all that is not either solid support or an apology for the current day D party, and thus prove to me that you AREN’T either a true believer or else a hypocrite.
MY non partisan credentials are OBVIOUS. I have openly and consistently said that the D’s are right on some major issues.
There’s another point I forgot to make previously, at least in this thread.
It’s obviously true in my opinion that it is highly detrimental to the public interest, and actually DANGEROUS , REALLY dangerous, for so much wealth to be concentrated into the hands of the elite of the elite, meaning maybe anybody with a hundred million on up, or maybe five hundred million, the cut off amount is not important to my point.
But as far as people’s day to day lives go, the ultra rich have more of every sort of luxury than merely well do to people such as successful small businessmen, doctors, lawyers, professional athletes, senior civil servants, etc.
But they don’t actually live any better, NOT REALLY, because you can eat only so much, and fly only so often, and throw only so many million dollar parties. The part of the citizenry I refer to as the elite lives QUITE WELL, for the most part, although some people fall out of that category when the economy turns sour.
All the billionaires in the world probably don’t consume as much jet fuel in their private jets as people in the USA burn just flying to athletic events and on vacations, etc. Per capita American consumption is not all that big a deal, but there are so MANY of us that DO fly……
And the far greater percentage of what the super rich do spend on frivolous living is spent paying working class people from peasants who harvest coffee to finish carpenters to carpet weavers to gardeners to security gaurds to provide the goods and services they consume, so their PERSONAL consumption hardly matters at all, in terms of depriving less fortunate people of the actual physical resources they consume.
They are mostly only dangerous to us because they have so much POWER to control our lives by way of controlling the media and government and to the extent they have monopoly powers in some industries.
Hardly any of them can be expected to refrain from doing whatever pleases them, and what pleases them is to add even more the fortunes they have already, and to have even more power.
There are some exceptions though, such as Bill Gates, who has donated by the tens of millions to good causes, and has promised the bulk of his fortune to good causes.
“The ACA was not a REPUBLICAN PARTY plan, the R party fought it tooth and nail, and won the election in some part by promising to repeal it.”
Wrong MacHealthcare”Special”ist, it’s straight out of the Heritage House Republican play book back more than 20 years ago when Hillary was fighting for single payer(back when you and Bernie were smoke’in J’s in the parking lot, oh you probably don’t remember).
The ACA mandates health care plans for children must have dental care. Because the children have better teeth their entire life. Which saves MONEY in the long run and a better quality of life. The ACA offers free health coverage(Medicaid) for the poor, but Republican governors refused to accept it.
You and your friends don’t want to be helped. You would rather put your trust in a conman and this time I’m not talking about your skydaddy.
Hi HB,
You are constantly proving that you are the biggest fool in this forum, with the possible exception of Javier.
Anybody who knows shit from apple butter knows the R party did everything it could prevent the passage of the ACA .
You are prone to telling such bald faced lies that not even a twelve year old would listen to you very long.
Incidentally, since you refer to me as boris Email server, etc, I will add this additional remark.
Back when the story was about Clinton’s ridiculous half assed home brew email server providing a security hole you could drive a truck thru for the Russians,and anybody else, all of your sort of Clinton fans assured us hacking was no problem at all, that it was all just R party propaganda, lol.
Now since Clinton lost, it’s all serious as hell, since you blame her losing on the emails being hacked, and all at once hacking the Clinton gang is a great sin.
You like it both ways, don’t you??
Well, the USA, and the Russians, and virtually all of the great powers have habitually and historically made a practice of this sort of monkey business.
Only a fool would believe the Russians aren’t actively involved in such affairs, although there is a very real possibility that the emails were leaked by a D party insider. So I’m not excusing the Russians, but neither am I ACCUSING them.
If your heroine had not been so foolish, maybe her dirty little secret server wouldn’t have been the most probable route into D party emails far and wide.
And if the R party didn’t have the same problems, maybe because it’s because the R’s were smart enough to use better email systems, lol.
The R party certainly has plenty of enemies that would gladly have released any dirty R emails they could get their hands on, but if they failed to get any………. Maybe it’s because in this case, the R’s were more competent, and less careless about their security.
Just saying, ya know. 😉
Hi Mac,
The ACA is essentially the same plan passed by the Republican governor of Massachusetts, they call it Romneycare in Massachusetts.
It is a Republican Healthcare plan from before the republican move so far right that Reagan would be considered a RINO by today’s average Republican.
It’s -42°F right now in Fairbanks way up north.
http://www.accuweather.com/en/us/fairbanks-ak/99701/weather-forecast/346836
Not exactly weather for water skiing.
Heck, it hits -50F just about every year in the mountains to the north of me and that is way farther south than Fairbanks. It’s called winter weather.
Where I am now, it’s in the thirties (F) and the snow is gone (not much anyway). The thin ice that covered most of the lake is melting off, spring in the middle of winter, yippee. The migratory birds are loving it here this year, even have a flock of Brants. No mergansers yet but if this keeps up I expect them here soon. Then the eagles follow.
It’s summer in Antarctica. har
The sun is shining on the southern Atlantic and southern Pacific for probably 18 hours each day now. Heats up those bodies of water. Satellite images of the sun’s reflection from the oceans on clear days covers a circle about 1000 miles wide from the east side of the reflection to the west side, 24 time zones. 1000 miles tall, covers about 15 degrees latitude. 15×66=990 nautical miles.
That is the size of the sun’s reflection off the surface of the ocean on a clear day.
Fairbanks is not in the Antarctic region, much further north where it is winter. Turn your GPS the other way so you don’t get lost again.
I’ve been working in shirt sleeves the last few days, at a couple thousand feet elevation in Virginia. It’s scary how warm it is, from a farmers point of view.
The bugs we would like to see mostly wiped out over the winter will get in a good strong start, because too many will survive. This means more damage, and more spraying, and modern pesticides are VERY expensive.
And if it stays abnormally warm, the fruit trees will come out of dormancy too early, and then we are at very high risk of losing the crop to frost. You can replant corn, or soybeans, but you eat all your usual expenses with very little or NO income in the orchard biz if frost gets ya.
But I’m out of the orchard biz, except for a hobby size little corner, and going into grass fed beef. There’s not much potential for profit in grass fed beef, but the risks are minor, and there’s a LOT less work involved. It will still be more than enough work to keep me as busy as I want to be.
No, but it is weather for EV driving (with the window down and in gym shoes!)
Driving a Chevy Volt in -47F weather in Fairbanks
http://gm-volt.com/forum/showthread.php?273874-Mileage-at-47F
Dang those Volts are robust vehicles, as are their northern drivers;)
Things are getting interesting:
https://boingboing.net/2017/01/12/98-of-bitcoin-trading-volume.html
Trump to name ex-Georgia Gov. Perdue as agriculture secretary: Fox News
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-perdue-idUSKBN153048?feedType=RSS&feedName=politicsNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Reuters%2FPoliticsNews+%28Reuters+Politics+News%29
“In November 2007, while Georgia suffered from one of the worst droughts in several decades, Perdue, along with lawmakers and local ministers, prayed for rain on the steps of the state Capitol. This came shortly after Alabama Governor Bob Riley issued a proclamation declaring a week in July as “Days of Prayer for Rain” to “humbly ask for His blessings and to hold us steady in times of difficulty.” The Atlanta Freethought Society opposed the rain prayer saying in a statement, “The governor can pray when he wants to. What he can’t do is lead prayers in the name of the people of Georgia.””
Anybody know of any electric powered boats they’d recommend? I’d like to look at inboard engines. Battery weight seems perhaps less problematic if I’m hauling goods over water. I often move several 100 pounds of kit solo just rowing my canoe along the shore. It’d take all week to haul it on land the distance I can row in a day, terrain dependant. Any recreational fishing electric boats have a good reputation?
Yeah there’s lots out there.
For starters you can check out this old home built speedboat that was featured on EVTV back in 2012.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9a1Br7XEpCU
Or go the slow river boat cruise on the Thames…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx6uk8bLXas
There’s lots more where that came from. Big commercial riverboats. Combo sailboats… you name it.
Go-Float.com has electric boats.
These are super cool electric sleds:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cjDhvejedA8
Duffy Electric Boats
http://www.duffyofnewportbeach.com/sales.html
Used
http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/search/boo?query=duffy
I ‘ve never seen an inboard electric boat, nor one intended to go fast, but there are lots of small electric outboards on the market, and the larger ones will move a good sized jon boat right along, faster than you can paddle a canoe. You could rig up a couple of them in tandem and haul a ton or more of freight five miles in still water in an hour and a half.
I have one , and it’s never given me any trouble, but I can’t recommend any particular makes. All the fishermen I know who use them use lead acid batteries, but you might be able to buy something better nowadays.
Yair . . .
These folks make a very nice 20hp outboard.
http://www.torqeedo.com/en/products/inboards
Cheers.
Any body who knows about small boats knows they are real fuel suckers, if you want to go faster than a slow walk. Outboards run HARD all the time, if you are making any speed, ditto inboards as far as that goes.
It would take one hell of a battery to keep a twenty horsepower outboard at or near full output for an hour- one about as big as the one in a Chevy Volt.
A typical car has three or four times as much horsepower at full throttle max rpm as it needs to maintain a typical highway cruising speed, so when you cruise, you just barely touch the old gas pedal, and you go a long way on a gallon.
In a boat, you have to ” put the hammer down”, or “pedal to the metal”, in trucking slang, and put something heavy on it to keep it there, figuratively speaking, or you go slow- REALLY slow.
Small boats are the worst fuel hogs in the transportation world , if you go fast in them, to the best of my knowledge.
Interview with Dr George Mobus on The Permaculture Podcast
Last 8 min he presents his collapse theory, the closest he gets to making predictions.
http://www.thepermaculturepodcast.com/2014/georgemobus/
“We’ve tried to do [fake news with] liberals. It just has never worked, it never takes off. You’ll get debunked within the first two comments and then the whole thing just kind of fizzles out.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/12/07/why-conservatives-might-be-more-likely-to-fall-for-fake-news/?utm_term=.6ea045d2fecd
I wonder why that is?
http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/16/politics/tom-price-bill-aiding-company/index.html
So much for draining the swamp.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/01/betsy-devos-confirmation-hearing-bernie-sanders-al-franken-real-bad
I consistently said Trump would be worse, and he’s making me out to be a good fortune teller.
The way I remember it, you trashed HRC for 15 paragraphs and than a one liner that said “Trump would be worse”.
Clinton needed trashing, because she was the WRONG candidate. Her flip flopping record, her arrogance, her elitist attitudes, and her disregard for the rules everybody else is expected to follow, combined with her walking the walk with the one percenters, and taking a one percenter’s share for herself in cash for a few speeches, and her failure to understand that the election was not about who uses which bathroom, but rather about who buys groceries and who uses food stamps………
I could go on, lap doggie, but I didn’t trash her, she trashed herself. I laid it on the line, with the intention of getting as many readers as possible to understand that Trump might beat her, and he did.
My ultimate goal was and is to get the D’s to nominate GOOD candidates, rather than ones that come INTO the race with half or more of the country already disliking and distrusting them.
There’s hardly any chance AT ALL that even ONE member of this forum voted for Trump because of what I said about Clinton.
But I’m reasonably sure I have gotten some members to thinking about whether it’s a good idea to run such a candidate as Clinton NEXT time. Maybe a lot of members…….
I didn’t NEED to say much about Trump, other than that he would be worse.
Just about every body here was on THAT job.
It was WELL TAKEN CARE OF.
Proof again, 5 paragraphs hate Clinton and one line “Trump is worse”
You did your job, and reminded me, and I posted some of the reasons why Clinton lost again. 😉
Here’s some more stuff for Clinton diehards to think about, assuming they are ABLE to think, and willing to do so.
The fact that Sanders could come out of nowhere, with hardly a dime to his name, and no organization, and no big money donors, and capture the hearts and souls of enough young people who are the future of the D party to put a real scare into the Clinton camp, is AMPLE evidence that a very large part of the D party BASE had little use for Clinton.
Now that’s damning evidence that she was the wrong candidate for the times.
And her dirty tricks team didn’t help her much either, in terms of public opinion.
Remind me again, later, and I will post some links about her homies manipulating the nominating process in her favor, and having to give up their party positions as a result.
Lol paragraph 5! Gotta love those farmer posts 😉
Hi Survivalist,
I’m glad you’re reading them, regardless of what you think, either way.
It’s likely that reading them will cause you to think a little more often, and more deeply, in the future, regardless of whatever conclusions you reach.
That’s always good.
I’m not sure you believe there WAS a dirty tricks team, or that there was NOT.
I can post links proving it, if you wish.
Yes please post the links. I’m interested. I like your posts.
Google Debbie Wasserman , Cheryl Mills, campaign tricks,etc. and read the links that are posted for liberal leaning sites.
You were duped by 20 years of relentless Republican propaganda. They recognized her as presidential material in the early 90s and brainwashed you into writing your nonsense posts.
It’s funny how so many Americans brag about being pragmatic and down to earth without having any clue about the basic things that affect their lives.
Media illiteracy is rampant in this country. Nobody seems to be able to see what is happening to themselves.
“There are two ways by which the spirit of a culture may be shriveled. In the first—the Orwellian—culture becomes a prison. In the second—the Huxleyan—culture becomes a burlesque. No one needs to be reminded that our world is now marred by many prison-cultures…. it makes little difference if our wardens are inspired by right- or left-wing ideologies. The gates of the prison are equally impenetrable, surveillance equally rigorous, icon-worship pervasive…. Big Brother does not watch us, by his choice. We watch him, by ours…. When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience, and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility.”
— Professor Neil Postman
SMART man, Professor Neil Postman.
I have read and reread both Orwell and Huxley, but not in recent years.
One of the smartest things any individual can do is break the tv habit and spend the time formerly spent staring at the idiot box with books. I last watched television on a regular basis over forty years ago, and I didn’t watch it much before that. In recent years I have spent maybe ten hours annually watching tv, for example at a Kentucky Derby party.
Anybody who can read reasonably well can finish a serious book a week on average if he gives up television. It fifty years, that’s fifty times fifty books, which is probably about two thousand four hundred and ninety plus more than the average person reads once he leaves school.
I estimate that I have read over four thousand, but I read faster than most people, and got seriously started when I got to the eighth grade, and got access thereby to the portion of the school library reserved for older kids. Plus I took a LOT of extended vacations in the woods over the years, and spent most of my vacation time reading, sometimes for weeks at a time.
The more I learn, the more I realize just how little I actually know.
Hi alimbiquated,
I dare you to go to the archives of the New York Times, or the Washington Post, and read the Cattle Gate story from start to finish.
Then we will talk about it.
We can also talk about how many of her CLOSE business associates wound up in jail, if you like. You can read all about it in the archives of the same papers.
( I read them on a daily basis, back then, real time.Sometimes I went a long way out of my way to get a paper if the boxes near where I lived were sold out. You could get both papers at convenience stores on I 95 any place north of Richmond, and I lived in those days near I 95 north of the city, or IN the city, mostly where I could get them from boxes and book stores. But there was no local delivery of either paper. )
We can talk about her astounding arrogance and stupidity, considering she wanted to be president, in installing a secret email system. You can pretend that having that email system was nothing, something to pooh pooh away, but if a mainstream Republican candidate had gotten caught with the same setup, same job, etc, you would be screaming bloody murder. Go ahead and deny it, and any body OTHER than hard core Clinton partisan will have a VERY hard time not laughing in your face.
And for what it is worth, I have noted more than ONCE in my comments here that it DID NOT even matter if she was as I have described her, or if it was all a smear by the ” Vast right wing conspiracy”. What MATTERED is that enough of the voting PUBLIC shared my opinion of her that she was an extremely high risk candidate. Elections are won in the middle in this country. A hell of a lot of independents had a low opinion of her, and were leery of voting for her. Some of them stayed home, and at least a few of them went for Trump.
It was a COLOSSAL mistake on the part of the Democratic Party to run her for that reason alone. She brought the baggage into the race with her, in the minds of the voters who voted against her, whether it was real or imagined baggage.
Trump is WORSE , no question, in terms of his questionable past, but he’s new to the political arena, and he ran as an outsider, and he didn’t have to deal with the burden of a lifetime of publicity focused on his shenanigans.
If you are SMART, you don’t take an unnecessary chance with such a candidate , when there are plenty of other suitable potential nominees.
But there was a LITTLE problem with that, since Clinton used her years in and near the seats of power to gain an octopus like grip on the party machinery, and thus scared off every other potential serious candidate except Sanders.
Now if you think the millions of well educated and generally reliable D voters who went whole heart for Sanders were taken in by right wing propaganda, then you’re telling me the best and the brightest young Democrats, the future of the D party …….. well then just what ARE you telling me?
That all those young professional adults are IDIOTS, nearly all of them reliable D voters, that in spite of their status and education, they fell for the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy? Most of the ones I talked to were too young to remember hearing about stuff such as Cattle Gate and White Water real time. They got what they know from reading history.
And while hard core Clinton supporters insist that she didn’t do any of the stuff mentioned, or that if she maybe did, she and Bill never got convicted, and so we are somehow logically supposed to not hold any of it against them.
But ya know what? If you get an UNDENIABLE reputation for hanging around with questionable characters, and doing business with them, and they wind up in hot water, the SMELL of it STICKS , and LASTS, in the minds of anybody paying attention.
I can name half a dozen local businessmen in my community who have never been convicted of any thing, or even CHARGED. But they have habitually done business with people who HAVE been convicted, and for that reason local people who know their history tend to steer clear of them,and take their business elsewhere.
Do you see that voters might just do the same thing, and take their vote elsewhere?
There’s NO QUESTION the R wing has done all it could, over the years, to make Clinton look bad. But you can’t criticize a person for something like the Cattle Gate scheme, or the EMAIL s, unless they DO those things. Clinton DID them. She has had no choice except to own up to doing them.
But if any ONE thing cost her the election, it’s that the people of the three Rust Belt states that put Trump over the top took a long hard look at her, and ENOUGH of them decided she’s a phony , talking some working class talk, once in a while, but walking the one percenter walk nearly all the time.
It didn’t help at all that she displayed her customary arrogance and condension for common people, and for all intents and purposes extended her middle finger to tens of millions of people by calling them”deplorable” and in her arrogance concluded that the reliable D voters in those three states would remain on the Democratic plantation, like good little kids, rather than going on the political warpath and extending her an emphatic and unmistakable middle finger message about not even showing up to talk to them while promoting the globalization that has had a huge part to do with their economic problems.
I’m out to encourage D voters to think long and hard before they nominate another candidate with so many problems coming INTO the race.
A few at least will think about what I have been saying.
I will say that I did my damnedest and poured as much effort as I could into helping Bernie win the nomination. When Clinton secured the nomination, my first statement was “We just lost the election”. She would have been an OK President, but she has ALWAYS been an APPALLINGLY bad CAMPAIGNER.
She won *two elections in her life*, one of which was a re-election, and both of which had ridiculously joke candidates, in a state which votes overwhelmingly Democratic. She was outperformed by not only Schumer, but also Gillibrand. She’s just plain bad at campaigns and should never have run for elected office.
Of the Republicans, I think Trump was actually the Least Worst option. The others were all even more terrifying:
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v38/n15/eliot-weinberger/they-could-have-picked
The real problem is that our “democracy” is horrendously broken.
The two-party-system throws up as our choice (a) Trump and some other con men, (b) a bunch of incompetent, deranged ideologues and religious extremists, (c) an incompetent campaigner with no political sense who epitomizes conventionalism and “business as usual”, and (d) an 80-year-old who’s running because he sees no other way to change the political converstion.
Then the 80-year-old loses in the primary because he’s more popular among Independents than among Democrats, and the “business as usual” candidate gets the most votes but loses because of the undemocratic and deranged Electoral College.
We need to change the electoral system to get rid of the two-party-system. It’s caused by Duverger’s Law, so we need to scrap first-past-the-post. We need proportional representation. Or approval voting. Or something else which actually allows third parties to exist. (Frankly, I would have preferred Gary Johnson over Trump and I don’t like Gary Johnson at all. Jill Stein would have been a better President than Trump or Clinton. But third party, y’know.)
And we need to abolish the Electoral College, like, yesterday. The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is the most promising approach right now.
Oh, and we need to actually have hand-counted paper ballots. And election day needs to be a holiday. And we need truly independent redistrictring. And the voter suppression must STOP. The Carter Center, which observes international elections to determine whether they are free and fair, refuses to observe US elections because they don’t meet basic international standards. Isn’t that sad?
Aside from the cost of batteries, aren’t EVs cheaper to build because they have fewer parts?
Hi Boomer
You can bet your last dime that except for the battery an electric car is cheaper to build, and more reliable to boot , than a comparable conventional car, same size, features, etc.
And a whole lot of people who know a whole lot about the battery biz are convinced that the price of batteries will come down far enough to make electric cars competitive in terms of the actual purchase price within five to ten years.
Nobody really knows yet how long the electric car batteries already on the road will last, but so far they seem to be holding up pretty well.
But I would think long and hard about buying a used electric car, expecting to keep it ten or fifteen years. They’re low volume machines, so far, and you might have to pay an arm and a leg for a replacement battery, because any time the volume is low, the price is high, in the auto biz.
You might not even be able to get a new battery that will fit in the car, and that is compatible with the electronics of the car. Manufacturers cut off production of replacement parts as soon as they think they can get away with doing so.
I’ve said that if the US fails to move forward on renewable energy, China will likely fill in the void.
And I think the US economy could suffer.
Along those lines, here’s this article.
Chinese billionaire Jack Ma says the US wasted trillions on warfare instead of investing in infrastructure
How many times does it have to be drummed into liberals’ empty heads that the affordable care act is not very well liked, read hated, by the voting populace in the United States and that is the number one reason why the Democrats lost the presidency?
Ten, twenty, thirty, a hundred, a thousand, a million?
People are fed up with the Democrats!
Donald Trump is a liberal New York Democrat, not a stupid Republican the likes of John McCain or Paul Ryan or Sarah Palin. The list goes on and numbers into the millions.
Alfred E. Newman could have won the Republican nomination and won. Well, he probably did win the Republican nomination, he was just disguised as Donald Trump. Charles Manson could have opposed Hitlery and won.
Get a freaking ka-loo!
How many times does it have to be drummed into liberals’ empty heads that the affordable care act is not very well liked, read hated, by the voting populace in the United States and that is the number one reason why the Democrats lost the presidency?
Total absolute bullshit:
Most Voters Now Favor Piece-by-Piece Fix of Obamacare
Tuesday, January 10, 2017
With a new Congress and a new president intent on repealing Obamacare, more voters than ever are calling for fixing it rather than throwing it out completely. Most expect major changes in the trouble-plagued national health care law in the near future, though.
R Walter wrote: People are fed up with the Democrats!
That is the highest pile of bullshit I have heard in a long time.
It’s official: Clinton swamps Trump in popular vote
(CNN)More Americans voted for Hillary Clinton than any other losing presidential candidate in US history.
The Democrat outpaced President-elect Donald Trump by almost 2.9 million votes, with 65,844,954 (48.2%) to his 62,979,879 (46.1%), according to revised and certified final election results from all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Hi Ron,
RW is our resident court jester / comedian and the words of a court jester are not to be interpreted literally.
If you can point out any particular business, or industry, or class of people, or damned near any subject at all discussed here that he does not routinely make fun of in roughly the same fashion as his seven thirty three am comment, please do so.
It’s true that Clinton won the popular vote, but the fact that Trump is headed to the WH is fairly good evidence that a very large number of people don’t care at all for the ACA, considering how close the vote was.
Speaking as a life long observer of the American political scheme, I believe that a huge number of Clinton votes were actually votes AGAINST Trump, and that likewise a huge number of Trump votes were actually votes against Clinton. Most objective political observers seem to agree with me on this point.
This means it’s harder than usual to pin down what the voters wanted most, in terms of government policy.
I personally know a few long term R voters who voted for Clinton, but I don’t personally know a long term D who voted for Trump.
It’s a fact that I know some republican type folks who are tickled pink with getting highly subsidized coverage via the ACA, because they don’t make peanuts on their jobs, or else are unemployed and living however they can.
I agree with the goal of the ACA, but the implementation of it was a political mistake of the first order, because putting the cost of it on individuals who aren’t covered by group plans, and forcing them to pay for it, REALLY pissed them off, and most of them are inclined to vote R ANYWAY.
The implementation of it resulted in a huge backlash that helped put Trump in the WH.
Just about everybody I have talked to who is in favor of the ACA is INSULATED against the possibility of having to actually pay for it out of their own pocket, so they can be in favor without it costing them anything. There are exceptions, but not very many, among those who pay for the subsidy. I have talked to a few people who are ok with it, because they have friends or relatives who are in real need of the subsidy.
One of them is paying near the very top price, but his sweet pea is still in college, making peanuts working, and what he pays, she saves, so he’s ok, they’re getting married within a month of her graduation.
With the popular vote being as close as it was, it’s not a very good measure of public opinion concerning the ACA.
But you are right, most people NOW seem to be in favor of an overhaul, rather than outright repeal and a return to the previous status quo.
I’m in favor of an overhaul myself, but I fear it will result in something that doesn’t work any better, if it works as well, given that Trump is prez elect, and that the R’s control congress.
OldManFarmer,
Your ignorance of the Affordable Care Act is robust, verifiable, full of right wing talking points and shows disregard for intelligence.
The Affordable Care Act offers individuals without coverage and who make less than 138% of Federal poverty level free Medicaid coverage if the individual state accepts it for free the first 3 years from the federal government. Than after 3 years the state pays only 10%. Most right wing Republican governors have refused to pay the 10% cost for it’s poorest citizens and let them go without any coverage.
For those individuals who make between 138% to 400% of the Federal poverty level. The Federal government helps the individual pay for coverage so that the coverage costs no more than 10%(less if your on the lower end of the scale) of their income. In the state of California, that means an individual gets help until their income reaches over $47,000 per year. Families of 4 get additional assistance with incomes up to $97,200.
“But O Care puts a HEAVY burden on the very sort of people who are most likely, statistically, to be REPUBLICANS.”
This maybe your most insulting comment of your current rant. The ACA has an additional income tax of 1 to 2 percent on the wealthy who’s incomes are in the top 1%.
Oldman, you continue to cry and ask for help for the working person, but your partisan ways don’t even see it when it’s offered to you. Your Republican leadership is selling you BS to get their top 1% a tax cut at your expense.
Let’s also keep in mind, “Joe Sixpack and his wife Susy Sixpack don’t know much and don’t care to learn”
Now let’s see. A local guy working for himself is making say eighty grand, and paying taxes on that eighty.
If I’m not mistaken, ten percent of eighty thousand is EIGHT THOUSAND bucks.
That’s about the figure I have been using, or more. I have mostly used a smaller figure.
The forum members who are making mid five to high five figure incomes or more can decide for themselves if having to spend an extra couple of thousand, and UP on top of their other tax obligations, etc, would be a burden on them, or not.
Now you may believe that most of the people who are self employed, or own small businesses and run them, etc, are Democrats.
I DON’T.
Other folks mileage may vary.
And even if the actual amount of money is in dispute, it pisses the hell out of one hell of a lot of people because they are FORCED to buy something that most other working people get for whole lot less, as a fringe benefit on the job, or as medicare if they are older.
The guy who is on a state or federal payroll, or a company payroll at a place with a good group plan, making the same amount of money, in effect is allowed to keep a LOT more of his money.
And the people who are self employed tend to be TOTALLY pissed when they think about it.
They feel DISCRIMINATED against, ya see?
And they tend to vote R, and when enough people vote R, you get Republicans in control of Washington.
Now it’s true that Clinton won the popular vote, but anybody able THINK and willing to take a look at the BIG picture can go looking for the data showing how many local and state level offices are held by Republicans, nation wide, and how big the R party’s margins are in congress, etc.
It’s perfectly reasonable to argue that the country as a whole really does favor R type government over D type government, or else those figures would be reversed, for the most part.
And after looking at that data, that hypothetical thinking person may conclude as I have that Clinton won the popular vote because maybe one voter out of every hundred was even more disturbed by the thought of a Trump presidency that a Clinton presidency , and voted FOR Clinton in order to vote AGAINST Trump.
The flip side is that maybe somewhat fewer than one person out of a hundred voted FOR Trump , not because they wanted Trump, but rather because THEY would rather have Trump than Clinton. So their vote for TRUMP was in essence a vote AGAINST Clinton.
My extended replies are for anybody else who cares to read them.
I wouldn’t spend even ten seconds on you one on one, except for the middle finger.
About my one nineteen three twenty nine comment.
I should have pointed out that I have never said the PRIMARY GOAL intended in passing the ACA is not a desirable goal. I support a single payer health care system myself, paid for with tax money. The goal is admirable, but the implementation has been a disaster.
The point I have been making is that the ACA was poorly conceived, and resulted in an enormous backlash against the D party as a result.
I haven’t thought to post this particular cynical possible secondary goal until now, but a cynic, or a Republican, lol, could easily conclude that a secondary goal was to poke a sharp stick in the eye, or maybe up the backside, of the people to whom the bill was sent. That would be entirely consistent with the assumption that most of the people who pay more tend to vote R , and with the assumption that most of the people who pay less are apt to vote D.
Good day OFM,
Sometimes I get confused between a court jester and a fool. Is there a good way to tell the difference?
Hi Hickory,
It’s a court jesters JOB to play the fool.
This enables him to SAY THINGS, in the presence of kings and queens and assembled powerful noble men, some of whom who may be as powerful as the king or queen , ABOUT THINGS, that nobody present else wants to bring up FIRST.
Every body can look around, and see what everybody else is thinking, to some extent, see which way the wind is blowing, in a manner of speaking, and anybody who wishes to do so can slip a gold coin to the jester and put him up to making fun, carefully, of a rival, or dropping hints that the rival is engaged in some underhanded trick , etc.
His primary loyalty is supposed to be to the king or queen.
IF he’s really good at what he does, you cannot distinguish him from a fool, except by noting that sometimes the jester says things indicating that he has a nuanced understanding , an in depth understanding , of some of the things discussed at court. This understanding might well be over the heads of some of the people present, because the jester is either smarter than they are, or because he has more information, or both.
Every once in a while RW says something that in my opinion indicates that he is NOT a fool, although he might or might not believe some things that are accepted as givens in this forum.
After reading him carefully for a LONG time, I still am never QUITE SURE PRECISELY what he actually believes.
IMO, he doesn’t believe wind and solar power can scale up far enough to shoulder the load carried by fossil fuels, but that doesn’t mean he IS a fool, or even a (gasp!) Republican.
I believe he believes that the R and D political parties are bought and paid for.
Nobody at all has ever dropped a hint that they think Ron Patterson is any other kind of man than a proud, self proclaimed big D Democrat, and Ron not only shares RW’s opinion ( my guess) of renewable energy, ,Ron actually ridicules the idea that we can replace fossil fuels with renewables.
The thing to do is to read RW for laughs and an occasional new insight.
Don’t take anything he says literally. He may be pulling your leg, playing the fool, while maintaining a perfectly straight face.
I don’t know what wikipedia says about court jesters.
What I have posted is a very short summary of what I have read about them in various history books and well respected historical novels, years ago.
My opinion is that he posts mostly to entertain himself. He certainly entertains me!
Good analysis OFM, thanks. I think RW is an expert at his word/mindcraft- he certainly gets my goat.
RW is a character. I have always liked characters, they are at a minimum interesting and can at a maximum be quite balmy (which can be quite fun).
Yes, complete, utter bullshit is what it all is and was. Bullshit nonpareil! Hillary’s campaign was about the same, but probably exceeded my complete and utter bullshit.
In the parlance of our times: You see, Hillary, this is what you get when you call people ‘deplorables’.
Besides, the popular vote doesn’t count, only the votes counted by the electoral college count, sorry. That is how a constitutional republic works. You have to grin and bear it.
I do get people’s goats every once in a while. Now and then, I find those goats to be terribly underfed, malnourished, and in need of great care to bring the poor goats back to a healthy state. Quit mistreating your goat then I won’t have to get the scraggly mistreated soul and give it the care it badly needs.
I am Non-Partisan, meaning I sympathize with any plight, if you are liberal, you have my sympathy, if you are conservative, I feel sorry for you even more.
When you are Non-Partisan, you even sympathize with socialists. God forbid that such a creature would exist that would sympathize with those evil wicked socialists.
The Non-Partisan League’s motto was ‘The Goat that can’t be Got’. You just can’t get my goat. Calmer than you are.
Socialists in my home state referred to those who sympathized with them but not join as ‘non-partisans’.
In the beginning, it was the Republican-NPL, later to become the Democrat-NPL.
Mother Bloor, Ella Reeve Bloor, socialist, communist.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ella-Reeve-Bloor
Where the Progressive Movement had its beginnings.
Its OK, I calmly give you my goat.
I’ll keep the women, the solar panels, the chickens, and the other goat. And the apricot orchard.
You can come over for dinner.
Just keep yer durn goats outta my trees!
.
We don’t have to “grin and bear it”. When power is stolen using undemocratic means — whether it’s the Supreme Court ordering a stop to the vote counting in Florida in 2000 — or whether it’s the undemocratic Electoral College —
Well, I think Jefferson said it best:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
“— That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
“— That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. ”
When the candidate with fewer votes takes power and there are 5.4 million person rallies against him immediately, the consent of the governed does not exist.
It’s time to alter or abolish the current form of government.
Obama has been a fair to good prez, in my opinion,except that he came up REALLY short in not prosecuting the banksters.
But that’s understandable, because you don’t have to be a cynic to believe that both parties are wholly owned and operated subsidiaries of BIG MONEY, and as Willie Sutton ( ?) replied when asked why he robbed banks, “That’s where the money is”.
Reality and objectivity require that you consider the state of national and world affairs in judging the record of a president, and most of us in this forum seem to agree that times are tough and dangerous, and getting worse.
There are many many more things, many times more things, that a prez has no control of whatsoever, than there are things he can control or at least influence.
RW’s arguably dead on about the ACA being a political disaster for the D party. I always said this would prove to be the case, short term, but that it would be good for the D party LONG term.
I’m all for a single payer health care system, with the power to giterdone, modeled after the ones used in other fully developed Western countries.
But O Care puts a HEAVY burden on the very sort of people who are most likely, statistically, to be REPUBLICANS. I know some who would have literally attacked anybody who said anything in favor of it in a bar, when they found out that they were going to have to pay as much as seven or eight thousand dollars for something they didn’t want.
Some of those guys are just barely keeping their heads above water,in terms of staying in business, as a small contractor, or farmer, or mechanic or itinerant construction guy, as I was in my nuke days. You can make good money one year and be broke the next, or covered up with consumer debt raising a family.
None of the ones I know personally had an extra five or six thousand laying around getting mold on it.
And then on top of that , the D’s were STUPID enough, or cynical enough, or whatever, to pretend that that seven or eight thousand IS NOT A TAX.
Well, some judge or another seems to have backed them up on that, but if you ask the next thousand people you meet on the street what a tax is, about nine hundred and fifty of them, probably, will say that it’s money you have to pay to the government, and in the minds of the people who got their asses burnt big time having to pay for ACA, it ABSOLUTELY IS a tax, because the government told them to just send it directly to an insurance company, rather than to the treasury.
And not only that, it’s a tax ( to them) preferentially and deliberately levied on THEM, as opposed to on people in general, and especially NOT on Democrats, who tend to work for government in particular, and other businesses and industries where they are likely to have excellent group plans. The small businessmen who took it up the backside are not all Republicans, but Republicans dominate in that category.
The R’s used the ACA to mop up politically and there is little doubt in MY mind that the very large majority of the people who say they are in favor of it aren’t using it, and aren’t paying for it. If they were, they would be singing an altogether different tune.
On several occasions I pointed out that there is such a thing as overreaching, politically, and that there is such a thing as political backlash, and that if the D’s continued to use the courts and congress to force changes in culture and society that most or at least a VERY large portion of the people of this country DO NOT WANT, etc, that there COULD BE A POWERFUL ENOUGH BACKLASH to put the R’s in power, with the result of THAT being , well, I hate to sound too much like a smart alec, but I was RIGHT.
Hey , it takes a nincompoop to conclude that the man on the street who is opposed to renewable energy is opposed to it because he is a big fan of fossil fuels. He’s opposed because he sees that the D’s are in favor,if he happens to even give the subject a minute’s thought, and that’s all it takes.
It’s true that the Koch brothers types use that prejudice to reinforce their cultural prejudices, so they will vote R, but the prejudice comes first, and the reinforcement second.
Two or three of my reddest redneck acquaintances own some solar panels, and are very fond of talking about landing some work on a wind farm construction job,etc, if any get built nearby. But they voted for Trump.
The usual responses to my comments along this line consisted of remarks to the effect that I’m a trumpster WORM TONGUE, and that conservatives always use the slow change meme to justify the status quo.
They persist in coming to this conclusion although nearly everything I have to say in favor of actual POLICIES lines up perfectly with the all around D party consensus. Ah well, one must be a bit naive to expect partisan thinkers to recognize bad news for what it is, rather than just dismissing the messenger as a Worm Tongue working for the opposition.
( I envy the shit out of anybody who has not yet read Tolkien, because they still have that awesome treat in front of them, instead of behind. )
The liberal establishment arguably pushed too hard, too fast, and it’s obvious enough that Trump is our prez elect.
People who are able to step back far enough from the trees to recognize that they are looking at a forest may not AGREE with me, but they will at least give some thought to what I have been saying.
And thought is always good.
Critical thinking leads to constructive change.
Well, it’s not a tax — you pay a tax to the government…
…it’s a PRIVATE tax, where a private company gets to force money out of you and give you nothing in return.
This is pretty much universally hated. It used to be called “tax farming”.
Romney (R) designed “Obamacare”. Obama was a complete idiot to copy it.
BNEF predicts “revolution” in the power sector due to low-cost renewable energy
“The authors say that this is upending the rules of procurement, and that future efforts will focus on building a system based on low-cost renewables, supplemented by flexible capacity from gas, demand response, batteries and other sources. This in turn will force a fundamental re-organization of power grids, particularly as renewables reach high penetration levels.
This does not mean that it will be easy for the solar industry along the way. In addition to pricing struggles, BNEF is predicting a new phase of slower deployment of wind and solar in China. This is due to the nation’s struggle to integrate large amounts of renewables on its grid, along with other macroeconomic issues.
However, BNEF is also predicting a big increases in deployment along with falling costs for batteries and smart grid equipment, and for more than one million electric vehicles to be sold.”
Mr. Perry, who once called for the elimination of the Energy Department, will begin the confirmation process Thursday with a hearing before the Senate Energy Committee. If approved by the Senate, he will take over from a secretary, Ernest J. Moniz, who was chairman of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology physics department and directed the linear accelerator at M.I.T.’s Laboratory for Nuclear Science. Before Mr. Moniz, the job belonged to Steven Chu, a physicist who won a Nobel Prize.
Rick Perry: energy czar?
Kafka would be blushing!
Hi Duncan,
I was going to post this Perry link myself, but you beat me to it.
It’s appalling that Perry , given his extensive government experience, didn’t know the energy department is responsible for nuclear weapons,etc, but I suspect that a great many people assume that there is a separate office for that purpose and that the energy dept deals mostly with fossil fuels, etc.
If I didn’t know myself, and had to guess on a multiple choice test, I would guess that the Defense Dept is in charge of nuclear weapon programs and facilities in terms of being the overseer.
Perry can LEARN the job, if he is smart enough ( ?) to listen to his staff. My personal take is that he was selected for reasons having to do with political debts, and pushing for changes in the regulations that would help out Trump’s friends.
Here’s one that’s worse.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/01/19/how-republican-style-health-care-reform-quickly-becomes-a-tax-cut-for-the-richest-of-the-rich/
There is at least a theoretical possibility that Perry will be an honest and competent cabinet secretary, but I suspect this guy with the Post has nailed it.
It’s pretty much a given that the R’s are going to write laws favoring the rich as often as they can get away with it, whereas the D’s tend to throw the common people a piece of bread once in a while.
And if you’re really hungry, hurting for income, a piece of bread, meaning food stamps, unemployment insurance , free lunches at school for your kids, etc, can make all the difference in the world.
But if you take a look at who financed the Clinton campaign, it’s pretty obvious that as things stand right now, the D’s are in one vest pocket of the rich, and the R’s are in the opposite one.
HRC voted for:
Iraq War
Patriot Act
Keystone Pipeline
Called TPP “Golden Standard” of Trade Deals
Voted to bail out her bankster contributors to the tune of 12 trillion dollars, covering their bad bets
On the Board of Wall Mart
Was instrumental in her husbands administration that impoverished many of the poor, mostly children, instigated drug laws that incarcerated many, mostly black and Latino, and repealed Glass Steagall, which helped create the casino conditions of our current predicament.
While not into reformist politics, I do vote fro strategic reasons occasionally.
One can see the quandary of voting for HRC for someone even marginally left leaning.
From the perspective of someone on the Left, reformist politics is amusing, and brings opportunity.
I haven’t been too impressed with Perry’s level of intelligence (even with the urban glasses). His boss ain’t too swift either.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-cabinet-ethics_us_5880e8e4e4b0e3a7356770c1
This piece speaks for itself.
UCI researchers map oceanic troughs below ice sheets in West Antarctica
Channels give warm ocean water access to their undersides, speeding glacier retreat
Millan said the study’s most important findings were the gigantic submarine valleys under the Crosson and Dotson ice shelves. The channels start 1,200 meters below the masses of ice and slope up to points 500 meters beneath Crosson and 750 meters beneath Dotson.
https://news.uci.edu/research/uci-researchers-map-oceanic-troughs-below-ice-sheets-in-west-antarctica/
More Javier “misrepresentation” of the facts… including another arrow on a chart!
“If that is the case you will agree with me that the general rate of warming is lower than has been assumed, and that makes warming not that dangerous at all. Instead of continuous warming we are dealing with periods of warming and periods of no warming.”
At the bottom, see a portion of that chart, with Javier’s blue arrow, plus the actual trends calculated for the designated periods.
Not content to admit the plain fact that the hiatus in surface warming is over, and has been replaced by another period of accelerated warming (common during positive PDO phases), Javier wants us to think the blue arrow is sufficient to extend the hiatus by sheer horizontal willpower.
But the trend over Javier’s blue-arrow-hiatus is actually larger than the previous period labelled “accelerated warming”, even though the fake blue-arrow hiatus starts on an El Nino!
Of course, it ends on an El Nino, too, but those don’t count when they occur on the right-hand side of a trend calculation, right?
….
Preview of the next chart …. how are the trends in temperature and Ocean Heat Content changing over the recent decades? Is there really a slow down, or is there acceleration? … Stay tuned …
Lol oh Javier you’re pure comedy gold. You should have be on The Colbert Report.
The present hiatus period is too short. North Atlantic ocean temperatures are still falling, and therefore AMO is falling too. The hiatus hasn’t ended. It was just masked by a very strong El Niño. Its likely comeback is going to be a very serious problems for alarmists like you, that rather see the planet warming to blame CO2 than not warming due to natural causes.
Hi Javier,
The not detrended AMO aka the North Atlantic Sea Surface temperature (NASST) is shown in chart below.
Hi Javier,
From
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/timeseries/AMO/
I plotted the AMO data from 1979 to 2016 to compare with your heat content chart (which is not very relevant as it is global ocean heat content which applies here.)
Global ocean temp below 0 to 2000 meters depth.
I don’t see what is the point you are trying to make, Dennis.
Detrended AMO index stopped increasing in 2007. It is not expected to continue increasing until it goes through a negative phase. If the hiatus is linked to AMO and PDO as it looks very likely it is very hard to defend that it has ended just because of a very strong El Niño.
Hi Javier,
You are taking one dataset to make your claim, other analyses show the data from my chart in my comment from 1/20/2017 at 11:26 AM.
Using annual AMO data (unsmoothed) and taking 5 year centered moving average there has been very little change in AMO since 2007 based on data from NOAA Earth System Research Lab.
In any case the AMO does not do a great job explaining temperature diffirences by itself, one needs to consider other factors.
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/timeseries/AMO/
Hi Javier,
You seem to favor solar and/or amo as a major explanation for warming since 1850, using a regression on 1856 to 2010 data for TSI (centered 11 year moving average) and AMO (unsmoothed) we get the following “AMOTSI model”. This model does fairly well from 1880 to 2000, but does not predict global temperatures very well after 2000.
R squared from 1856 to 2010 is 71%, where the C only (natural log of CO2) has an R squared of 81% for the 1856-2010 period.
I did not say CO2 plays no role.
From paleoclimatic studies it is clear that solar activity has a bigger role than currently assumed, and that role appears not to be mediated by TSI changes. There are literally hundreds of paleoclimatic studies that support a principal role for solar variability on climate change. We are just looking at a tiny window of 35 years of modern instrumentation, with about 100 more years of crude instrumental records.
If solar has a bigger role, and CO2 a smaller role, it turns out we got it all wrong. That is a very real possibility that is supported by quite a lot of the evidence.
When we come to our senses regarding CO2 warming being over-hyped, we will see that a lot of the papers were already indicating so, but a strong selection was done for the most alarmistic ones.
More lying. Dennis, why haven’t you banned this lying, dishonest cherrypicker? He keeps shitting over the comment sections.
Javier,
C Model (natural log of atmospheric CO2 in ppm vs BEST LO Temp) below.
The ongoing comedy routine of David Whitehouse
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2017/01/19/the-pause-that-never-happened/
Three years is all it is going to take to expose Tamino’s foolishness. By then he will have run out of excuses for why temperatures are still the same as in the early 2000’s
There is a little known way that the long-term variations in the global temperature can be compensated for. NASA JPL first identified this via measurements of Length-Of-Day. After removing this factor, the AGW trend is more clear. Can do that with the CSALT model. http://contextearth.com/2016/07/24/lod-revisited-for-csalt/
Geophysics rules!
Hi Javier,
I will let Wood for Trees draw the trend line which as a slope of about 1.3 C per century.
Obviously, because it has an El Niño at the end. But we know El Niño is not a part of global warming, don’t we?
Hi Javier,
A proper analysis includes all the data and for climate should include a period of at least 25 years. El Ninos and la Ninas are part of the temperature record. We can go back to 1997 and we get the chart below, though the interval is less than 21 years so still not a very good indicator of the trend (but better than 17 years), it includes the last strong el Nino in 1997/1998. Still about 0.124 C per decade for Hadcrut4 which is biased low because is does not cover the Arctic well, a better Global temperature data set is Berkeley Earth Land Ocean data which has a 0.164 C per decade linear trend on monthly data from Jan 1997 to Dec 2016.
No significant change in trend.
Satellites say otherwise.
That’s gotta be your stupidest chart yet.
If anybody is wondering about the future of the Democratic Party, about the direction it’s headed, about who will be leading it, a few years, or maybe even a few months down the road, they might give some thought to this quote I just copied from THE HILL site.
The far left and the far right are covering this, but the msm aren’t touching it, according to my google search.
It could be that it just isn’t news enough to bother with , considering Obama leaving and Trump coming in.
Or a cynic could conclude that maybe the msm don’t particularly care to say much about D party domestic cat fights. But in that case, outfits such as Fox ought to be covering this…….. except maybe Fox managment believes that doing so would help the D party. In that case Fox would ignore this takeover of the California D party.
xxxx
Sanders backers take over California Democratic Party
© Getty Images
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) turned out en masse at ordinarily sleepy party caucuses earlier this month, electing a slate of delegates who could be poised to take over the largest Democratic Party organization outside of Washington, D.C.
As final vote totals trickled in, Sanders backers claimed to have elected more than 650 delegates out of 1,120 available seats chosen at this month’s caucuses. Those delegates will choose the next state Democratic Party chairman, along with other party officials.
Sanders supporters say they hope to change the very nature of the Democratic Party.”
It seems sort of obvious to me that there are one hell of a lot of big D Democrats who are pissed as hell about the current day party status quo, and determined to do something about it.
Just about every body seems to assume that as California goes, so goes the D party, before very long.
More details here
http://ivn.us/2017/01/16/revolution-within-berniecrats-take-california-democratic-party/
These excerpt below is from Theobserverdotcom. I don’t know this site, but knowing how the party establishment ran things during the primary season, I’m willing to believe these charges unless I see proof otherwise.
“n Carson, California’s Assembly District 64 in Los Angeles County, the Democratic Party officials, led by Assemblyman Mike Gipson, called the police on Sanders’ supporters, trying to kick them out to prevent them from voting in the delegate elections, while bussing in and providing breakfast to their own supporters. This, of course, resulted in no Sanders progressives winning. “The volunteers for the Mike Gipson slate, the staff at the Carson Center were completely on their side, because they paid for the facility so anything they said went, and it was sad to see that. We tried sticking up for our rights and we talked to the security guard multiple times to try to stand our ground,” said Bernie Sanders delegate Tyler Morrison in an interview. In delegate elections, electioneering rules don’t apply, so delegate candidates and their supporters can openly campaign, but the Democratic Party aggressively constrained Sanders’ supporters from doing so. “I would be cool with it if it was fair and square and they won, but it really kind of brings the beast out in the person, because we were really cheated and it was really wrong,” said Tiffanie Smith, who lost a delegate election in AD 64 running as a Sanders Progressive.
In San Diego’s Assembly District 76, ballot counting is a public procedure required for oversight and verification, but the Democratic Party refused to disclose the results, claiming the convener would conduct the tallies himself in private.
Similar events have occurred in other states across the country where Sanders progressives are making viable pushes to unseat leaders of the Democratic Party. As Sanders progressives are organizing around the enthusiasm built during Sanders’ campaign to gain ground around the country, the Democratic establishment will continue to push back, even to the point of circumventing or violating their own rules to prevent relinquishing their political power to progressives.”
Whatcha think , HB?
Can you get your head around it?
Nah, that’s a rhetorical question.
You know in your little doggie heart that all those pissed of Democrats who showed up to kick the party establishment OUT are cretins who swallowed the R party propaganda about HRC whole.
The country as a whole was utterly sick and tired of business as usual politics, which explains why Trump was able to hijack the R party nomination, despite the party doing everything it could to push him out, and why Sanders was able to make a good enough showing to put the fear of god into the Clinton camp, despite his late start, lack of an organization, lack of big money donors, and lack of a fair playing field, which was denied to him by the party establishment, which was the defacto personal property of one HRC.
Trump was smart enough to run on CHANGE. Clinton made the mistake of running a business as usual campaign when all the signs indicated that what the country wanted worse than anything else was an end to the usual business as usual politics practiced by both parties.
Oh for crying out loud. When are people going to wake up to the fact that we are all in the same boat and had better start paddling together rather than in opposite directions. Government seems to need generated enemies, both internally and externally to stay in power and make big business operate. I don’t think it has to be that way.
Well, I guess we shall see how a rabble rouser government operates led by a guy with not enough sense to not poke the wasp nest.
If we don’t find common ground soon and work from there, we are just wasting time and making heat. In order to do that, we have to stop the propaganda machine that has been used to game the government and the Constitution.
Choose your world and try to make it so, or just keep being a Moaning Myrtle.
Obama ran on change too. A bit more of a hopeful angle though. Or maybe it was just denial. Trump ran on angry change. From hope/denial to anger. Sounds like the five steps of grief. Next comes bargaining. Trump promised a great deal too. Trumps got anger and bargaining covered in one go. Then comes depression (what a coincidence! The economy does look bleak). And finally acceptance. That could be exciting. Once one accepts what’s coming the restraint on ones impulses often diminishes. Terminally ill bachelors make the best wingmen. They just don’t give a f*ck anymore.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kübler-Ross_model
Speaking of steps. The American Political scene, and I use that term lightly, is a sewer pipe. Increased social schisms and political fragmentation are all just par for the collapse. So are opportunists looking to capitalize on it.
Step 1. Individuals and groups evolved a bias to maximize fitness by maximizing power, which requires over-reproduction and/or over-consumption of natural resources (overshoot), whenever systemic constraints allow it. Differential power generation and accumulation result in a hierarchical group structure.
Step 2. Energy is always limited, and overshoot eventually leads to decreasing power available to some members of the group, with lower-ranking members suffering first.
Step 3. Diminishing power availability creates divisive subgroups within the original group. Low-rank members will form subgroups and coalitions to demand a greater share of power from higher-ranking individuals, who will resist by forming their own coalitions to maintain power.
Step 4. Violent social strife eventually occurs among subgroups who demand a greater share of the remaining power.
Step 5. The weakest subgroups (high or low rank) are either forced to disperse to a new territory, are killed, enslaved, or imprisoned.
Step 6. Go back to step 1.
http://www.dieoff.org
Unified Sea Ice Thickness Climate Data Record
Sea ice thickness is, perhaps, the most important climate state variable that is currently poorly observed, poorly documented, and poorly archived. We as a community can do much better and a unified sea ice thickness data set is an important step forward. This new archive will be a valuable baseline and a continuously growing resource for ongoing work by many groups in understanding, predicting, and adapting to changes in the polar regions.
While ice extent is well measured by satellite, monitoring ice thickness has been and remains a challenge. However the amount of ice draft and satellite data available in the last few years from both polar regions has increased markedly, providing a large and growing resource. Existing observations of ice thickness span a variety of methods, accuracies, and temporal and spatial scales and are archived in a variety of different locations and in different formats. Each has its own strengths in terms of sampling or accuracy. The uncertainties are documented to various levels of detail for the different data sources but the documentation in general is spread throughout the literature.
This new data set is a concerted effort to collect as many observations as possible in one place, with consistent formats, and with clear and abundant documentation.
http://psc.apl.uw.edu/sea_ice_cdr/
The World Bank
“The world needs to produce at least 50% more food to feed 9 billion people by 2050. But climate change could cut crop yields by more than 25%.”
http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/foodsecurity/overview#1
Not exactly a bunch of lefties looking to trash capitalism.
If we start building large space station habitats to orbit the earth and moving people up there, we only have to move 83 million people a year into space to stabilize the population on earth. It will provide a large amount of jobs for machines and robots as well as make money for the one percent.
Also all those large orbiting cities will shade earth somewhat and slow global warming.
Climate change is increasing food production, not curtailing it. Check the data. The warmest year with the most atmospheric CO2 saw a world record wheat crop.
No substance to the claim that climate change could cut crop yields by more than 25%.
Climate change is increasing food production, not curtailing it. Check the data. The warmest year with the most atmospheric CO2 saw a world record wheat crop.
No, you check the data! You’re a despicable baldfaced liar!
In the past, I’ve posted plenty of links to peer reviewed scientific papers ranging from topics such as the specifics of wheat plant physiology which show significant decreases in the nutritional levels due to increase of CO2.
to the negative effects of increases of actual temperature in global bread and other major grain baskets. Not to mention the impacts of increases in the unpredictability of droughts and flooding!
We are all well aware that facts do not matter to you. Your are an ideologue and a professional obfuscator of the worst kind!
For those that are interested in critical thinking:
Effects of Climate Change on Crop Yields and Implications for Food Security
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeogLpEvJLQ
Of course our knowledge has increased greatly since this talk was given.
There are some serious and disturbing trends in agriculture. Since 1960 the hectares/capita (global) have fallen from 0.45 to about 0.2. That is a combination of both irrigated and rainfed cropland.
The amount of cropland stopped increasing about 1990 and has held fairly steady since then. We appear to have hit a plateau in cropland area at near 1.5 billion hectares.
Rainfed cropland has stayed about the same (-0.2%) 1961 to 2009. The increase was all in irrigated cultivated land at 117% in that time period.
Water quality is falling and a number of aquifers are being utilized beyond their capacity to fill (levels dropping). Eight countries have exceeded their irrigation potential and twenty countries including China are at least at 75% of their irrigation potential.
Hidden within the statistics is the slash and burn poor quality farmland. The farmland is often abandoned after a few years due to poor soil quality, yet the number of acres does not fall since more forest and jungle is slashed and burned to create new cropland. If the old abandoned acreage is not capable of being brought back into production, then the agricultural process in those areas is just a way to destroy forest and jungle area, a wrecking machine.
Information above from FAO United Nations.
As an example of irrigation withdrawal effects on an aquifer here is the water level changes and storage in the high plains aquifer
https://ne.water.usgs.gov/ogw/hpwlms/files/HPAq_WLC_pd_2013_SIR_2014_5218_pubs_brief.pdf
Irrigated cropland has much higher yields than rainfed cropland, so part of the increase in crop production has been due to increases in irrigation.
As we are reaching limits to food production it makes the world food supply vulnerable to changes in rainfall and rainfall patterns as well as temperature changes and weather variability. To think we can keep producing food at a higher rate through technology may be an incorrect assumption. There is also the problem of increasing pollution and contamination with which we must deal.
The decrease in cropland is due in great measure to the huge increase in crop production per acre. We produce a lot more food from less farmland.
But any excuse is good for you to run around Chicken Little.
Childish name calling does fit your image.
Javier , drop the last sentence and your comment would have more weight.
I won’t call you a liar because you actually believe that bullshit. You are a great consumer of it. We have gone from 270 ppm to 400 ppm in CO2 and no discernible decrease in nutrition levels has been seen. In fact quite the opposite, our nutrition is much better than it has never been. You are simply a fool for believing that for going from 400 to 450 or 500 ppm plants are going to suddenly become less nutritious.
Again you are promising ugly outcomes in the future yet unable to prove any damage to crops from the increase from 270 to 400 ppm CO2 and 170 years global warming. You are a merchant of fear.
You claim increase in wheat yields when the opposite is true.
What can you tell us about plant physiology that supports your position?
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168192311002784
The stimulatory effect of e[CO2] on plant growth is dependent on adequate nutrient supply. For example, N concentrations in plant tissues generally decrease under e[CO2], which in leaves is commonly related to a decrease in Rubisco concentration and activity, and therefore linked to photosynthetic downward acclimation. This effect is also of direct concern for food production where decreased N and protein content can have negative effects on product quality (e.g. grain protein). Plant nutrient metabolism appears to adjust to a new physiological equilibrium under e[CO2] which limits the extent to which nutrient application can ameliorate the situation. What the control points are for an adjustment of plant N metabolism is unclear. Rubisco metabolism in leaves, N assimilation, N translocation or N uptake are all potential key steps that may be inhibited or downregulated under e[CO2]. To achieve the best possible growth response whilst maintaining product quality, it is important to understand plant nutrient metabolism under e[CO2].
Do you deny that this is an issue?
Yeah, there is research underway to genetically select and modify wheat, rice, soy and maize strains to produce higher nutrient quality under heat and increased CO2 stress. Do you seriously believe that will solve the coming food crisis for a planet with supposedly 9 billion plus inhabitants?
Would you care to have a serious discussion about plant phisiology and how increase in CO2 impacts it ?
How about how the fact that even small increases in temperature negatively impact crop yields in geographic areas that are already close to the edge of the optimum crop growing temperature ranges. Especially in the tropics in Asia, Africa and South America?
Care to discuss how increases in the frequency of floods and droughts brought about by climate change affect the long term planning for agriculture production in those very same areas?
And the list of things which you deliberately choose to ignore would fill quite a few books!
I don’t need to. It is the one proposing it who has to demonstrate that it is an issue. Decades and centuries of crop production under increasing CO2 levels indicates it is not.
There is no such thing. Plants get CO2 starvation at around 150 ppm. Otherwise the more the CO2 the better for them all the way to at least 1000 ppm
Global warming affects less the tropics. Crops originated in tropical areas are little affected. Crops in higher latitudes benefit a lot from global warming. Some of the highest grain production regions in the world are in regions that are very sensitive to cold, like Russia.
Figure 9.6 from IPCC AR4. Global warming by latitude.
Otherwise the more the CO2 the better for them all the way to at least 1000 ppm
Absolutely NOT true!
Where do you get your information?
Plant quality impaired by increased carbon dioxide levels
The study examines various types of ecosystems, including crops, grasslands and forests, and involves large-scale field experiments conducted in eight countries on four continents.
“The findings of the study are unequivocal. The nitrogen content in the crops is reduced in atmospheres with raised carbon dioxide levels in all three ecosystem types. Furthermore, we can see that this negative effect exists regardless of whether or not the plants’ growth increases, and even if fertiliser is added.
This is unexpected and new,” says Johan Uddling, senior lecturer at the Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences at the University of Gothenburg.
Significance of food quality, biodiversity and productivity
When carbon dioxide levels in the air increase, crops in future will have a reduced nitrogen content, and therefore reduced protein levels. The study found this for both wheat and rice, the two most important crops globally. The study also reveals that the strength of the effect varies in different species of grassland, which may impact on the species composition of these ecosystems.
“For all types of ecosystem the results show that high carbon dioxide levels can impede plants’ ability to absorb nitrogen, and that this negative effect is partly why raised carbon dioxide has a marginal or non-existent effect on growth in many ecosystems,” says Johan Uddling.
Accepted “truths” do not hold
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2015-06-carbon-dioxide-air-restrict-ability.html#jCp
This is your big problem that it is endangering humankind. Come on.
Coskun, D., Britto, D. T., & Kronzucker, H. J. (2016). Nutrient constraints on terrestrial carbon fixation: The role of nitrogen. Journal of Plant Physiology, 203, 95-109.
http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~britto/publications/N-C.pdf
Again you are promising ugly outcomes in the future yet unable to prove any damage to crops from the increase from 270 to 400 ppm CO2 and 170 years global warming. You are a merchant of fear.
And you are a merchant of doubt who cherry picks data to obfuscate the truth!
Plant quality impaired by increased carbon dioxide levels
The study examines various types of ecosystems, including crops, grasslands and forests, and involves large-scale field experiments conducted in eight countries on four continents.
“The findings of the study are unequivocal. The nitrogen content in the crops is reduced in atmospheres with raised carbon dioxide levels in all three ecosystem types. Furthermore, we can see that this negative effect exists regardless of whether or not the plants’ growth increases, and even if fertiliser is added. This is unexpected and new,” says Johan Uddling, senior lecturer at the Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences at the University of Gothenburg.
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2015-06-carbon-dioxide-air-restrict-ability.html#jCp
Of course most everyone is neglecting the finding that increased CO2 reduces plant transpiration, causing further global warming irrespective of CO2 being a GHG. That is a global occurrence.
And how does a reduction in plant transpiration cause global warming?
Reduction in the atmospheric vertical energy transport mechanism.
That’s probably taken care by the increase in humidity from global warming.
No. You are the one spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt.
One only has to go to a good review to read an overview of the status in the field.
“In this review, we have discussed the effects of eCO2 and N limitation on photosynthesis, respiration, N transport and assimilation, C and N accumulation, and growth and yield in a variety of plant systems and ecosystems.
it is clear that eCO2 increases the NPP (net primary production) of most C3 plants particularly strongly when N supply is adequate,
In agricultural and silvicultural systems, where N is routinely supplemented, there may be potential for greenhouse-gas mitigation, as the growth and yield of crop species tend to respond well to eCO2, especially so in the case of legumes. Clearly, the intelligent management of soil resources will be required, such as the coordinated application of N at specific stages of plant development, and increases in the N-use efficiency of cropping systems”
Coskun, D., Britto, D. T., & Kronzucker, H. J. (2016). Nutrient constraints on terrestrial carbon fixation: The role of nitrogen. Journal of Plant Physiology, 203, 95-109.
http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~britto/publications/N-C.pdf
See. No problem.
But Fred doesn’t lower nitrogen in plants cause lower chlorophyll production, small leaves and lower food production? Doesn’t it also cause lower reproductive rates and cause insect reduction, thus shifting and hampering the food chain?
Once bird populations fall, insect population will rise, causing greater use of pesticides which stresses bird populations even further.
Lower nitrogen levels in plants slow bacterial breakdown of dead plants and animals, thus slowing the availability of compounds for plant growth.
Except that 170 years of global warming and rising CO2 levels have not even hinted that it is a real problem.
Alarmists have a great collection of future problems, that surprise, surprise, never materialize.
You don’t even know what is going on now. So how can you claim knowledge over 170 years?
Hi Javier,
The warming at the global level is occurring at unprecedented rates (DO events were local North Atlantic events, not Global in nature), most of the warming from the 1850-1900 mean (when global temperatures were quite low) simply returned Global temperatures to the 11,000 BP to 1750 CE mean temperature (about o.2 C above the 1951-1980 Global mean temperature). From the 1850-1900 global mean temperature to the centered 20 year moving average in 1970, global land ocean temperatures only rose by about 0.55 C, or about 0.58 C per century over the 1875-1970 period.
In the following 36 years (1971-2006) the 20 year centered moving global average temperature increased by 0.87 C or at a rate of 2.4 C per century. The concern is that crops may not be able to withstand continued warming at this rate, you claim that we do not know that warming will continue at this rate because the models are far from perfect. That is correct, the models may either underestimate or overestimate future warming, we do not know.
The difference is that you assume without proof that everything will be ok. This strikes many as overly optimistic, and implies you know the future rate of warming better than most climate experts.
Your estimate of very low climate sensitivity (1.65 C per doubling of atmospheric CO2) does not match empirical data and median CMIP3 models suggest ECS of 2.5 to 2.7 C, while data suggests a TCR of 1.8 to 2 C.
It is correct that the median CMIP3 ECS and carbon emissions limited to 1000 Pg of C (all sources of CO2 from 1750-2500 CE) might keep us under 2 C above 1951-1980 mean temperatures, but again many believe keeping emissions below 1300 Pg C will be difficult or perhaps impossible. I think it will be difficult, but not impossible.
A more realistic view in my opinion is that we should be careful because the future rate of warming is uncertain and the effects of that future warming (whatever its extent)are also uncertain.
Dennis,
“Your estimate of very low climate sensitivity (1.65 C per doubling of atmospheric CO2) does not match empirical data”
My estimate of very low climate sensitivity is not my estimate of climate sensitivity, but that of:
Aldrin M, Holden M, Guttorp P, Skeie RB, Myhre G, Berntsen TK (2012) Bayesian estimation of climate sensitivity based on a simple climate model fitted to observations of hemispheric temperatures and global ocean heat content. Environmetrics 23:253-271
Annan, J.D., Hargreaves, J.C., 2006. Using multiple observationally-based constraints to estimate climate sensitivity. Geophys. Res. Lett. 33, L06704.
Annan, J.D., Hargreaves, J.C., 2013. A new global reconstruction of temperature changes at the Last Glacial maximum. Clim. Past 9 (1), 367-376.
Annan, J and Hargreaves, J., 2015. A perspective on model-data surface temperature comparison at the Last Glacial Maximum. Quaternary Science Reviews 107 1-10
Lewis N (2013) An objective Bayesian improved approach for applying optimal fingerprint techniques to estimate climate sensitivity. J. Climate, 26, 7414-7429.
Lewis N (2016) Implications of recent multimodel attribution studies for climate sensitivity. Climate Dynamics, 46(5), 1387-1396
Lewis N, Curry JA (2015) The implications for climate sensitivity of AR5 forcing and heat uptake estimates. Clim. Dyn. 45, 3, 1009-1023
Masters T (2014) Observational estimate of climate sensitivity from changes in the rate of ocean heat uptake and comparison to CMIP5 models. Clim Dyn 42:2173-2181 DOI 101007/s00382-013-1770-4
Otto A, Otto FEL, Boucher O, Church J, Hegerl G, Forster PM, Gillett NP, Gregory J, Johnson GC, Knutti R, Lewis N, Lohmann U, Marotzke J, Myhre G, Shindell D, Stevens B, Allen MR (2013) Energy budget constraints on climate response. Nature Geosci 6:415–416
Ring MJ, Lindner D, Cross EF, Schlesinger ME (2012) Causes of the global warming observed since the 19th century. Atmos Clim Sci 2:401–415
Skeie RB, Berntsen T, Aldrin M, Holden M, Myhre G (2014) A lower and more constrained estimate of climate sensitivity using updated observations and detailed radiative forcing time series. Earth Syst Dynam 5:139–175
They all defend a lower than 2.5 ECS, and as low as 1.5, so it does match empirical data.
Crops do not have to withstand continued warming at this rate, since warming rate has fallen significantly for the 2001-2014 period, and may continue to be subdued if we discount the effect of El Niño.
And you have to consider that most of the warming has taken place in the winter, making winters milder, which has a positive effect on most crops. And prolonging the growing season at high latitudes, which is a very positive development.
Climate change is clearly not harming our food production, while weather might have a very negative effect on local or regional crops, like it always has had.
As it is usually said for climate:
Top ten years for global grain production are the last 10 years. Hard to demonstrate any damage to our crops from climate change.
Will it continue in the future? It will certainly stop increasing some year in the future, but so will global warming. The idea that global warming will stop our food increase is just an idea.
Hi Javier,
Not many of those papers defend 1.65 C, there are many papers which defend higher ECS and the experts at the IPCC which review all the peer reviewed literature from an expert perspective suggest a range of 1.5 to 4.5 C for ECS with a TCR of 1.8 to 2.2 C.
Using empirical data and simple linear models it is easy to show that the data supports a TCR of 1.9 C (1.7-2.0 C for 95% confidence interval). Using the land temperature data which might reflect ECS better, a linear model suggest an ECS of 2.9C with a 95% confidence interval of 2.6 to 3.2C.
These models use TSI, AMO, ENSO, Aerosols, and the natural log of atmospheric CO2 as independent variables and BEST Land Ocean or Land only data as the dependent variable in multiple linear regressions.
This independent analysis supports the mean estimates of the IPCC for TCR and ECS.
The median CMIP3 model has an ECS of 2.5 C and models with ECS lower than this do not match the empirical temperature data as well as models with ECS in the range of 2.7 to 2.9 C over the 1870-2015 period.
The lowest mean estimate was 1.7, using very simple models.
A good review at link below.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/wcc.397/full
From that paper:
Another issue is the nonlinearity of the climate system. The principal equation that utilizes the climate feedback parameter (generally the inverse of ECS, depending on usage) is a linear relationship, with higher order terms neglected on the basis that the temperature response from feedback interactions is small.[74] This can still give rise to an asymmetric probability distribution due to uncertainties in observed climate forcing and the feedback responses.[75, 76] This linear assumption may underestimate the risk of high warming.[77] When the top-of-atmosphere energy imbalance is relatively small, such as in the first half of the 20th century, a linear relationship between radiative forcing and temperature change is an acceptable approximation. As the radiative forcing increases, this linear relationship may no longer hold and second or higher order terms become necessary. The asymmetry seen in most estimates for ECS probability distributions (the long right-hand tails) may be partially explained by this nonlinearity.[77] The use of uniform priors also gives rise to the skewed distributions seen in the pdfs for ECS, more so than with normal or noninformative priors.
Dennis said
“Using empirical data and simple linear models it is easy to show that the data supports a TCR of 1.9 C (1.7-2.0 C for 95% confidence interval). Using the land temperature data which might reflect ECS better, a linear model suggest an ECS of 2.9C with a 95% confidence interval of 2.6 to 3.2C.”
I agree that this is right on track, down to 2.9C being a better estimate than 3C for ECS. This last year may push it a bit closer to 3C, but I will have to double check on that.
The records do in fact show that the estimate for effective ECS has been 3C ever since the Charney report from 1979, which was considered the first committee report
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_sensitivity#Consensus_estimates
That’s over 37 years of a consistent track record.
Denialists claim the numbers are being fudged to maintain this agreement. Yet, looking at the data, there is a significant amount of “noise” due to the ENSO signal, which somehow remains there with all this “fudging”. It is impossible to fudge the data while keeping this variation in place. The fingerprints of fudging data would be apparent as the ENSO signal disappears
Hi Dennis,
“Not many of those papers defend 1.65 C”
Average of 1.79 not including Lewis & Curry 2014.
Hi Javier,
If we select all the papers with the lowest estimates, then it is not surprising that the mean is relatively low.
A problem with the Aldrin et al 2012 and Skeie et al 2014 is that they estimate a climate sensitivity parameter which ignores the future warming of the ocean due to increased greenhouse gases. Their “climate sensitivity” is really a transient climate response, so it is nor surprising they have a low estimate, similar to my estimate of the transient climate response based on a simple multivariate linear regression.
So you can call it an equilibrium climate sensitivity that has been estimated, but you would be wrong. A name like “short term climate sensitivity” might be appropriate, bit the equilibrium climate sensitivity is the amount of warming of land and oceans in response to a doubling of atmospheric CO2 after the ocean has approached an equilibrium temperature in response to the increased radiative forcing du to higher levels of greenhouse gases.
The physics suggests it will take roughly 250 to 500 years for the ocean to approach this equilibrium level of warming.
The Aldrin and Skeie papers ignore this part of the ECS which accounts for their low estimates. Typically this ocean warming adds another 1 C to the ECS on top of the TCR, so your 1.8 C “ECS” (which is really TCR) should be about 2.8 C for actual ECS, which is not an unreasonable estimate.
Hi Javier,
Gavin Schmidt covered estimates of climate sensitivity at the link below:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/01/on-sensitivity-part-i/
Regarding Aldrin 2012 he said:
And then there are the recent papers examining the transient constraint. The most thorough is Aldrin et al (2012). The transient constraint has been looked at before of course, but efforts have been severely hampered by the uncertainty associated with historical forcings – particularly aerosols, though other terms are also important (see here for an older discussion of this). Aldrin et al produce a number of (explicitly Bayesian) estimates, their ‘main’ one with a range of 1.2ºC to 3.5ºC (mean 2.0ºC) which assumes exactly zero indirect aerosol effects, and possibly a more realistic sensitivity test including a small Aerosol Indirect Effect of 1.2-4.8ºC (mean 2.5ºC). They also demonstrate that there are important dependencies on the ocean heat uptake estimates as well as to the aerosol forcings. One nice thing that added was an application of their methodology to three CMIP3 GCM results, showing that their estimates 3.1, 3.6 and 3.3ºC were reasonably close to the true model sensitivities of 2.7, 3.4 and 4.1ºC.
On other papers he said:
There are two recent papers on paleo constraints: the already mentioned PALAEOSENS (2012) paper which gives a good survey of existing estimates from paleo-climate and the hierarchy of different definitions of sensitivity. Their survey gives a range for the fast-feedback CS of 2.2-4.8ºC. Another new paper, taking a more explicitly Bayesian approach, from Hargreaves et al. suggests a mean 2.3°C and a 90% range of 0.5–4.0°C (with minor variations dependent on methodology). This can be compared to an earlier estimate from Köhler et al. (2010) who gave a range of 1.4-5.2ºC, with a mean value near 2.4ºC.
Note that the “fast feed back” sensitivity is different from the ECS (also called the Charney Sensitivity) which waits for the upper 700 meters of ocean to approach an equilibrium temperature (possibly 100 years after greenhouse gases stabilize).
The “Charney sensitivity” will be larger (by about 0.5 to 0.7 C) than the fast feedback sensitivity, which is larger than the transient climate response.
So rather than just apples and oranges, we would need to add bananas for the various flavors of climate sensitivity.
Hi Javier,
A good paper to consider is Marvel et al 2015, discussed at Real Climate at link below:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2016/01/marvel-et-al-2015-part-1-reconciling-estimates-of-climate-sensitivity/
Link to paper below
http://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate2888.epdf?referrer_access_token=VGqE1JJ5sDG0YyyP3-q2CdRgN0jAjWel9jnR3ZoTv0MO1zBc6VqRZM1xVU1Fv4jK3g79w9PI3Z1fYM1nxrJDkcREISvpP1bO9et7SH9plneUMA3gox9bltyT5sH8KTCtkFPxH0d6z-hd5MvS6vLjU4x52CmvR2JYyQVUfy4MDeaY0Em__ys4yX9GVmysoP0-fTTXC7wwGEtwts2hEnSuUuQZk6x0tLpPyL_hXEEKHrIcIEv18mkufiYoLP5RBpk51qRRH7NwD0gbgVKa6wvbRRlCiQRJ-A_LcNOUEiaRR_EPvf5hb0w2eOxcD6PXqIYb&tracking_referrer=www.realclimate.org
The paper used the GISS Model E2-R model (CMIP5) with a TCR of 1.4 C and an ECS of 2.3 C.
Based on empirical data, the paper estimates TCR is 1.6 C (using ERF) and ECS is 3 C (again using ERF). So just another recent paper with a different result for ECS, with a possible explanation for the lower estimates.
But Fred doesn’t lower nitrogen in plants cause lower chlorophyll production, small leaves and lower food production? Doesn’t it also cause lower reproductive rates and cause insect reduction, thus shifting and hampering the food chain?
There is most certainly a direct correlation between lower nitrogen levels and a reduction in chlorophyll production. Though I’m not sure it automatically follows that this will also reduce insect populations, at least in the near term. For one thing, a warming climate tends to favor the survival many insects that are considered agricultural pests.
As to how that will affect bird populations?! Yikes!
Oh, man, I think you are now starting to really increase the dimensions of the state space of the system. You are asking for apriori knowledge about the future behavior of a multi-dimensional computational state space system.
That’s Javier’s domain, I honestly haven’t anything more to offer than a hunch or two.
Maybe you can ask Javier to make you a graph of rising bird populations…
We can at least start with the N2 and photosynthesis part… um, yes, light levels do play a role in this discussion as do CO2 levels 😉
Here’s a paper that addresses a part of how Nitrogen can improve the rapid response of photosynthesis to changing irradiance in rice (Oryza sativa L.) plants
Jiali Sun, Miao Ye, Shaobing Peng & Yong Li
http://www.nature.com/articles/srep31305
Abstract
To identify the effect of nitrogen (N) nutrition on the dynamic photosynthesis of rice plants, a pot experiment was conducted under two N conditions. The leaf N and chlorophyll levels, as well as steady–state photosynthesis, were significantly increased under high N. After the transition from saturating to low light levels, decreases in the induction state (IS%) of leaf photosynthesis (A) and stomatal conductance (gs) were more severe under low than under high N supply. After the transition from low to flecked irradiance, the times to 90% of maximum A (T90%A) were significantly longer under low than under high N supply. Under flecked irradiance, the maximum A under saturating light (Amax–fleck) and the steady–state A under low light (Amin–fleck) were both lower than those under uniform irradiance (Asat and Ainitial). Under high N supply, Amax–fleck was 14.12% lower than Asat, while it was 22.80% lower under low N supply. The higher IS%, shorter T90%A, and the lower depression of Amax–fleck from Asat under high N supply led to a less carbon loss compared with under a low N supply. Therefore, we concluded that N can improve the rapid response of photosynthesis to changing irradiance.
Maybe if there were fewer damn birds there would be fewer conservatives complaining about how windmills are killing more birds than all the glass skyscrapers and pussy cats put together… I’m pretty sure the White House put out an alternate fact based bulletin on that!
Cheers!
From your link:
The land, biodiversity, oceans, forests, and other forms of natural capital are being depleted at unprecedented rates. Unless we change how we grow our food and manage our natural capital, food security—especially for the world’s poorest—will be at risk.
Already, volatile food prices—and the price spikes that can result—are the new normal. When faced with high food prices, many poor families cope by pulling their children out of school and eating cheaper, less nutritious food. This can have severe life-long effects on the social, physical, and mental well-being of millions of young people. Malnutrition contributes to infant, child, and maternal illness; decreased learning capacity; lower productivity, and higher mortality. One-third of all child deaths globally are attributed to under-nutrition.
Of course malnutrition is one reason fertility rates are falling in the undeveloped world. And things will get worse. Also: (Bold Mine)
New study indicates dramatic fall-off in global crop yields by the year 2050
A new study has examined the potentially disastrous implications that a combination of global warming and air pollution could have on crop yields by the year 2050. The research is one of the first projects to take into account a combination of the two dangers, and highlights the humanitarian crisis that could arise should the threat not be tackled head-on.
The study, carried out by researchers from MIT, the University of Hong Kong and Colorado State University, focuses on four major crops that represent over half the calories consumed by the global population – rice, wheat, corn, and soy. It estimates that global crop yields will drop by around 10 percent by the year 2050 due to global warming, however the damaging effects of air pollution may be harder to quantify due to the difficulty in differentiating it from other damaging phenomenon.
For example, an estimated 46 percent of damage to soy crops previously believed to have been caused by global warming was reportedly actually due to air pollution. However, whilst the two phenomenon damage the crops in their own right, they are also inextricably linked. The rising temperatures caused by global warming is itself the catalyst that leads to an increase in the creation of plant-damaging ozone.
But Dennis and Nick, not to worry, all this malnutrition is already causing a dramatic drop in the fertility rate, especially in the undeveloped world.
To me the biggest concern regarding food security is the enormous dependence of food production, transformation, and distribution, of oil. That is really our Achilles heel. Should we experience a reduction in oil supplies usually accompanied by a spike in food prices, we are going to be immediately in a very bad situation.
A spike in oil prices usually means a spike in food prices, with very nasty consequences.
To me the biggest concern regarding food security is the enormous dependence of food production, transformation, and distribution, of oil. That is really our Achilles heel.
I could not agree more. An increase in oil prices accompanied by a decrease in oil production is going to play havoc with food production. And of course all that will be accompanied by an increase in fertilizer prices.
When oil production starts to fall, it is going to get bad, really bad. And all those so called renewables will be of very little help.
I too couldn’t agree more with you two on this (Javier and Ron). I hope all who plan to live beyond 2030 are ready to spend a lot personal labor time in the field. Good land (class I/II farmland) is the precious thing, and water of course.
Might be a good time to get good with goat recipes.
Hi Ron,
I believe fertilizer price depends more on the price of natural gas than oil, see
http://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2016/06/anhydrous-ammonia-corn-and-natural-gas-prices.html
Eventually natural gas prices will rise, but probably 5 to 10 years after the rise in oil prices (which will start in earnest in 2018.
Probably the use of oil for personal transportation will decrease as oil prices rise and the cost of batteries falls, leaving plenty of oil for the farm.
Lower fertility is mostly occurring because of decreased poverty rather than the reverse. The poorest nations on the planet tend to have the highest total fertility ratios, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa.
Greater access to modern birth control and education are the solutions to the population problem.
Hi Dennis. The nitrates in fertilizer are made from natural gas feed stock. But the phosphorous and potassium parts of fertilizer both must be mined and processed, so liquid fuel undoubtedly makes up a significant portion of their direct and indirect costs. So as oil prices increase, so will fertilizer prices. However…
Scarcity of phosphorus threat to global food production
Phosphorus is just as important to agriculture as water. But a lack of availability and accessibility of phosphorus is an emerging problem that threatens our capacity to feed the global population. Like nitrogen and potassium, it is a nutrient that plants take up from the soil and it is crucial to soil fertility and crop growth.
“Unless something is done, the scarcity of phosphorus will cause problems of a global dimension. As early as 2035 it is calculated that the demand for phosphorus map outpace the supply,” says Dana Cordell, who presented her thesis at the Department of Thematic Studies — Water and Environmental Studies, Linköping University, Sweden on the implications of phosphorus scarcity on global food security.
Phosphorus is extracted from phosphate rock, a non-renewable resource that is used almost exclusively in agriculture. Two thirds of the world’s resources are in China, Morocco, and Western Sahara.
As phosphorus becomes more scarce its price will skyrocket. So look for fertilizer prices to even outpace rising oil prices.
Hi Ron,
Any references on oil prices and fertilizer prices?
Most of what I have found suggests natural gas prices are a key, in many cases natural gas price moves with oil price so there may be a tie there.
Paper below finds that high oil prices do lead to high fertilizer prices as you have said.
http://eprints.ucm.es/18070/1/1306.pdf
Thanks for the link Dennis. However this link tells the story.
Peak phosphorus: the crunch time for humanity?
Like oil, the world’s economy is totally dependent on phosphate rock. But our dependence on the latter differs: while oil can theoretically be replaced with solar, wind or biomass energy, there is no substitute for phosphorus in crop growth and hence food production. A scarcity of phosphate rock is therefore likely to threaten the world’s ability to produce food in the future if concerted efforts are not soon taken by policy makers, scientists, industry and the global community. While the critical point in time for phosphorus scarcity is highly uncertain and contested, all agree that demand for phosphorus is growing, and remaining phosphate rock is becoming increasingly scarce and expensive.
The Haber Process let us get around Nitrogen.
http://people.idsia.ch/~juergen/haberbosch.html
No such luck for Phosphorus.
I don’ have the link handy but some years ago, the king(?) of Morroco, or whoever was running the country at that time, raised the price of phosphate ore four hundred percent, and nobody said a word.
They just paid the new asking price.
But it’s possible to recapture a good bit of the phosphorus we flush down toilets, and the nitrogen too, by recycling sewage onto farm land.
The art and science of crop management will advance so that we can use a great deal less, to get fairly close to the same yields, most likely. The necessary techniques are known , but implementation won’t come about until the price of phosphate fertilizer rises sharply, because the techniques are expensive.
Doing this on the grand scale is going to be expensive as hell, but it won’t be as big a problem as the alternative, doing without.
Hi Old Farmer Mac,
I imagine in the future there could be sewage recycling plants that converts human and farm animal waste into fertilizer, but I agree this will only happen when critical elements (N-P-K) become scarce.
How Donald Trump Kingmaker-Billionaires Robert and Rebekah Mercer Have Poured Millions Into Climate Science Denial
By Graham Readfearn • Thursday, January 12, 2017 – 10:34
https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/01/12/trump-kingmaker-billionaires-robert-rebekah-mercer-pouring-millions-climate-science-denial
Good morning Ron,
This reply is in reply to your own above comment, but you already know all this stuff, so it’s for anybody else who cares to read it.
The papers you refer to are professionally produced, and must be taken seriously.
But as everybody knows who knows anything at all, the numbers are estimates, and they could be far wide of mark either way, at any given time.
The odds of them being off on the low side, meaning a lot less than twenty five percent loss of production , are not important in the context of my remarks in this comment. That would be great, but I want to talk about how we might collectively deal with declining food production.
I walk and talk professionally in this one field in particular.
The loss of production could easily be a lot worse that twenty five percent, or it could be somewhat less, because we don’t know precisely how fast the climate will warm, and worse, we don’t have more than a general idea how much growing conditions will change in any given geographical area.
The ” worse” potential scares the crap out of me when I allow myself to think about it. People who are well informed often remind those who are less knowledgeable that averages aren’t all that relevant to understanding the EFFECTS of warming on agriculture.
Some places, including some of the best agricultural land of the world , are going to be hotter and drier by a substantial margin ON AVERAGE, compared to the rest of the world. A few places with great potential given more rain might get that rain, etc, but there aren’t many such places.
It’s true as some people point out that growing conditions will actually improve in some parts of the world, on average, particularly in places rather far to the north. But that’s not where the people are, and the people that are going to be in one hell of a fix for food live in countries that don’t own land in the northern climes anyway. Farming in such places in any case will be a crapshoot of the first order, which is something I will address in another comment later on.
It will be horrible when food production in places where people just barely have enough to eat NOW declines gradually, on the human suffering level, but there is some hope that the rest of the world will be able to help out enough to prevent outright famines, and maybe keep the lid on the pressure cooker at least to the extent that no hot wars are fought over access to food, at least for some period of time.
But I wouldn’t bet my farm on the rest of the world being willing to foot the bill, and there’s a very real possibility that the rest of the world WON’T HAVE food enough on hand to giterdone anyway.
There’s some hope gradual declines can be managed locally and regionally,for some years, on a country by country basis, by diverting resources from other endeavors to providing more food production.
It really is possible to grow a great deal of food at a very small scale , meaning the individual family scale, if it is NECESSARY to do so. A country in dire need that goes on a wartime kind of economic footing to produce food the same way munitions and soldiers are produced during wartime will be able to cope to some extent. Resources that are wasted now CAN be put to good use.
Add a little poop and pee, and a few thousand square feet of ground, even if the soil is pathetically depleted, can be extraordinarily productive, using just a LITTLE water, and just a few dollars worth of drip line tubing, etc.
But this sort of coping depends on the availability off food declining gradually, because it will ( very likely ) only be implemented with production declining gradually, as the people in dire need start doing anything they can to eat.
It takes a long time to establish family minifarms or little local community farms of this nature. People have to become convinced of the need, laws and regulations and customs have to change, diets have to change, and there is a STEEP learning curve to be mastered. The people involved, meaning most people, will have to devote a substantial amount of time to the job, time that is now devoted to other work or leisure, and they will have to get by with less other stuff, but they would be able to produce enough this way to substantially reduce the odds of outright famines.
It’s hard to estimate how long it would take to really exploit the potential for alternative production of this sort, but my guess is that it would take at least five to ten years from the time a really serious effort is made to get started.
Now HERE is the REALLY scary part. Consider that people who habitually drive drunk get away with it , ninety five per cent plus of the time, but they do have the occasional fender bender, maybe once or twice in four or five years. Sooner or later they have a SERIOUS accident, maybe this week, maybe five or ten years down the road, if they haven’t been jailed to keep them off the road.
Food production, and the problems associated with it, tend to vary in a fashion comparable to the accidents suffered by drunk drivers. There will be local and regional shortfalls, which will cause more or less pain and stress, locally and regionally, but they will be survivable, just as fender benders are survivable. And just as drunk drivers don’t take their fender benders seriously enough to give up either the keys or the alcohol, the people in such places probably aren’t going to change their ways, because the next two or three years , most likely, production will be up again, and they will continue to do as they usually do, ignoring the problem.
Sooner or later, a weather disaster will hit, and the odds of such a disaster happening grow a little higher every year as the climate heats up. A really wet spring season can delay planting for a few weeks , and this in and of itself can and does result in yields falling off ten percent or more.
If a drought hits after a wet late spring delays planting, production could easily fall off fifty percent or more, regionally. Regionally could mean an area as large as the Yankee bread basket, or half of India.
There are other substantial risks involved as well. A long spell of unusually damp weather can and does sometimes result in major outbreaks of pests and diseases, and while the drought problem vastly outweighs the flood problem, floods will be a problem too.
It’s a foregone conclusion that in places where it is possible to grow more food by putting more land to the plow, it will be done, and the ecosystem services provided by wild or semiwild lands will be lost in proportion to the amount lost, in some cases. In other cases, ecosystem support to agriculture will be lost altogether. Bats eat awesome numbers of insects where they are found, ditto many species of birds. If too much habitat critical to any given species of insect eating bird is lost, the population of that bird will crash, maybe all the way to ZERO over large areas. The species might even go extinct. Some will, there’s hardly any question about that. Predatory insects and wild pollinator insect species ( mostly various bees but there are others ) WILL crash due to habitat loss.
The depletion of fossil fuels, everything else held equal, will result in the price of synthetic fertilizers going thru the roof, sooner or later, and there is essentially no chance at all that production can be maintained on the grand scale, or over large regions, without these fertilizers, at least not for the next thirty or forty years. After that……. maybe. Miracles on the technology front are possible, and to be hoped for, but not to be counted on.
What all these factors combined boil down to, in a nutshell, is that it’s a foregone conclusion that plain old bad luck guarantees that various large regions will experience potentially catastrophic losses of production, without warning , in a fashion that can only be predicted in a general way.
I can say these sudden regional crashes ARE BAKED IN, but not how frequent they will be, nor where they will occur, nor how often. All I can say is that they will be more frequent than they have been in the past, for a lot more reasons than I have mentioned here today.
It’s rather unlikely that food production will crash dramatically in any one year on a global basis, so it’s unlikely that there will be massive unrest, riots, forced mass migrations of hungry people, etc in more than a few places any given year, at least in the earlier years of really troublesome warming.
Bottom line, regional crisis level food shortages, shortages at the famine level, are going to hit without warning. People are going to starve, slowly, or not so slowly, by the tens of millions, and once that happens, the other Horsemen, War, Pestilience, Death, will run wild.
How it will all play out is an open question, but one good thing about being an old fart is that I will most likely be gone before the shit is well and truly in the fan.
The consequences could range all the way up to flat out nuclear war, although I think the odds of nuclear war between the really big and powerful countries such as China, the USA, and Russia are very low. The odds of a nuclear war between say India and Pakistan……….. who can say?
In the past, biological warfare has mostly been a rather impractical and iffy undertaking, and not often successfully DELIBERATELY implemented. But it’s an indisputable fact that when we Euro types landed on the east coast of North America and established colonies, we mostly didn’t HAVE to bother ( sarcasm intended using this word bother) with genocidal warfare in order to play that old Darwinian game so beloved of Mother Nature.The contagious diseases we brought with us killed most of the local people here ahead of us. We rolled over the rest like a tsunami.
Sky Daddy alone knows what may be possible in the near future in terms of biological warfare. I have talked about these possibilities, not for attribution, with a few microbiologists and other specialists who know a lot about the various technologies involved, and my conclusion is that most of the people in the field, or related fields, believe there is a very real possibility, that within another decade or two, even relatively poor and backward countries will be able to invent and manufacture biological weapons that could wipe out just about everybody in places where they are deliberately released. Whether such hypothetical diseases could be contained by quarantine is questionable to say the least.
And if a new killer disease comparable to the flu ( but possibly far deadlier and far more contagious) that swept the world during WWI is created, who is to say the creators won’t already have a vaccine ready prior to releasing it? A vaccine reserved for the use of their own people?
It’s a damned good thing most of the real individual troublemakers in this old world are underachievers lacking in imagination, because they could cause a hundred times more trouble than they are causing so far, except for the areas where actual fighting is going on.
I won’t say anymore than that anybody who knows his shit when it comes to agriculture could potentially cause more problems, all by himself, than an an entire division of soldiers set loose to plunder a helpless country. I wouldn’t say this much, except that some of the trouble makers DO have brains and initiative, and know about the possibilities already. The ones who know enough to act also know enough to know that they might harm their own cause more than the enemies, and thus they so far have refrained from acting in this respect. They might not hold back,in the event they come to believe their cause is lost, and decide to take as many of their enemies with them as they can.
We live in interesting times, and although they are flat instead of round, all of us here have crystal balls, and if we live long enough, we can watch it all come to pass.
Hi Old Farmer Mac,
How much warming (in degrees Celsius) is “really troublesome” for a farmer?
Since 1960 temperature has risen at the rate of 2.62 C/century in Virginia or 1.44 C from 1960 to 2015 (data from Berkeley Earth), is that a “troublesome” amount of warming so far? Does the oft cited 2 C of warming seem a catastrophic level of warming? The Northern hemisphere land temperature has risen on average about 1.5C from the 1850-1900 mean and about 1 C from the 1951-1980 mean (10 year centered average in June 2008). Has farming in Virginia become more difficult (lower yields etc) due to the 1.4 C temperature increase since 1960?
I know very little about farming. Grow some stuff in my backyard garden, which is the extent of what I know about growing food.
http://news.ubc.ca/2016/01/06/drought-heat-take-toll-on-global-crops/
Hi Dennis,
I no longer have access to professional journals, which is a great disadvantage to me, in answering you more specifically. Hopefully within the next year or so, I will have my personal ducks in a straighter row, and get up to Blacksburg, and enroll in a course or two as a special grad student, which will give me access again, and an opportunity to talk extensively with specialists, etc.
That’s part of the plan, anyway, and necessary to doing a good job on my book- which I will hopefully finish someday.
As you know, since you are quite obviously skilled in statistics, separating the signals from the noise can be hard, unless you have a large long term data set. I don’t. I don’t know if it is possible to say with certainty that farmers in this state have yet suffered much in the way of ill effects from climate change over the last couple of generations.
But I can say anecdotally that we have clearly suffered in the orchard business, which is the specialty I know best, from EITHER a long run of bad luck, which has gotten worse, as the years have passed, or ELSE we have suffered , and are suffering , from climate change.
The average temperature in the sense of it being a couple of degrees warmer on any particular day of the year, doesn’t make much difference at all , on an ANNUAL basis. Corn grows about as well at eighty as it does at eighty two.
(Sorry I have never gotten into metrics, except in lab work, where everything is metric. I can do the calculations, and it’s easier in metric of course. But I just don’t THINK in metric. I can do fractions in my head, as needed in my day to day life.I use the decimal inch for precision measure in the shop, and all the people I normally talk to on a day to day basis use the old system. I don’t LIKE metrics on a day to day basis. It’s a damned sight easier to read halves quarters eighths sixteenths, etc, on a tape, and you CANNOT read a subdivided millimeter without a powerful magnifying glass, etc.It’s likewise true that I can’t see a onehunredtwentyeighth inch division on a rule for sure, not anymore, lol, and I can’t see a one thousandth division at all. But I have micrometers and vernier calipers marked in inches, and they cost a lot a long time ago. I use a pad or calculator and convert the readings to metric if NECESSARY. Every single stick of lumber, sheet of plywood, board, brick, block, angle iron, channel iron, I beam, etc, that I own or run into on the job has been standardized and manufactured on the old system. A typical American trades guy will necessarily have to be competent in Imperial measure a lot longer than I will live. But the younger guys might as well get used to metrics, because sooner or later, all NEW manufactured standardized materials dimensions, etc, will be metric. )
Now old anti metric fogey ranting aside, I hate to sound like Javier, but a little warming is not NECESSARILY a problem for farmers. A glass of wine is not necessarily a problem, it can be good for you right? But a bottle of wine, or too much warming IS a problem.
The problem that kicks your butt up into your abdominal cavity as the average temperature rises is that the higher temperatures are never just a degree, or two, warmer , every day, day after day. The length of the growing season changes, and you gain a few days ,on average, which can be and mostly is GOOD.
But as usual, the devil is in the details.
One thing has actually happened HERE is that we have been getting more days that are a LOT warmer than just a degree or two, during the winter months, and especially during the later part of the winter season. Farmers don’t think in terms of officially designated seasons,lol. Spring to us is when things turn green, rather than a subdivision on a calender. So the trees wake up, too soon, and bloom, and then you get a killing frost at about the same calendar date as usual. You can replant corn, but you can’t make an apple tree bloom twice. We are suffering a lot more frost damage than we used to. Warming or luck? I can’t say for sure, but if the trend continues, it’s climate warming up.
And we have been getting hit with hail noticeably more often as the years have passed. Bad weather luck, or climate change, who can say?
When I was a kid, there was ONE place in the entire neighborhood you could get a fig. My maternal grandfather built his house in a very well sheltered spot, with hills on either side to block the wind, and he planted figs tight against the south facing masonry wall. Behind that wall there is a full basement, where in the temperature has never fallen to freezing. His figs prospered. Nobody else had such a good spot, and so nobody else had figs, locally. Figs right off the tree are one of nature’s most sublime gifts, and they are easily propagated from cuttings, and the roots send up shoots all over the place, which can be transplanted. So a number of people tried raising them, no luck.
Fig trees are perfectly common place around here NOW. We still need to select a sheltered spot, but it doesn’t have to be all that good a spot anymore.Any a south facing wall that is sheltered from the worst winter winds is satisfactory.
There’s an important Christmas tree industry in this area, but it’s pretty much the accepted wisdom that you don’t try it at less than about two twenty two to twenty four hundred feet elevation, or they won’t grow. People used to plant some at somewhat lower elevations, and they seemed to do ok.
We aren’t getting as many really cold ( meaning zero to ten F ) days and nights as we used too, and this means that many species of insects over winter in greater numbers than formerly , and insect populations explode in exponential fashion, as a rule, every year. This is perfectly NORMAL. Insect populations always crash in the winter and explode thru the spring and summer.
That swift kick in the butt comes in again when there are enough surviving insects to get the insect ball rolling earlier than usual. The peak number of bugs chewing on your crops can be ten times or even more than ten times as high as usual, if they get a good early start.Sometimes the bugs get in a whole extra GENERATION, and there can be a thousand times as many as usual. This can mean you have to put on a couple more applications of insecticides, which is a VERY expensive job, and unfortunately the insecticides may kill some beneficial insects as well. Plus there are larger implications for the environment, but that’s off topic for the moment.
My end of the state is a long way from the coast, and we have never had much in the way of problems with hurricane winds. We have had fewer problems state wide with such winds in recent years, compared to decades back.
But locally we have traditionally expected that autumn hurricanes would bring us some good heavy rains, over a period of days, which helped keep up the water table, stream flows,and soil moisture.
We haven’t been getting these autumn rains as often as we used to.
So- Taken all around, I think it’s probable that bad weather luck is a less likely explanation that that our climate has changed for the worse, in terms of farming.
Now to be clear, the weather is STILL well suited to farming, but we adjusted our operations to the average weather we used to have, when we were having it, and now we seem to be paying a price, because it’s not easy to adjust your operations to changing conditions, especially when you don’t know what changes you need to make, because you don’t know what conditions will prevail a decade down the road.
The country has gone nuts for wine, and a lot of people have put in grapes just to the south, in North Carolina. They haven’t done as well as expected. The weather has turned out to be a little too hot and humid, on average, although the varieties were generally selected based on the recommendations of professional researchers.
Farmers here in the USA will be able to adapt successfully to changing climate, in terms of gradual changes in average temperatures. The most southerly located apple orchards will fail, but the flip side is that citrus growers will be able to move north some distance if they want to, rather that being forced to.
Guys and girls who grow field crops can switch varieties, or even switch to new crops, as the climate warms up, as far as the average temperature is concerned.
But if the average amount of rain that falls in any given part of the country changes significantly, especially if the changes occur at the most disadvantageous times,farmers in that part of the country may find themselves up the proverbial creek without the proverbial paddle.
From what I read, most modelers expect we will have a LOT more problems with droughts than with floods, but a flood can still wipe out farmers by the thousands, and a long spell of extremely wet weather in the spring, or during the harvest season , can result in yields falling off by fifty percent or more , sometimes, over distances well into the hundreds of miles.
You can grow a decent crop of corn with forty inches of rain, if it falls mostly when you need it. If you can’t irrigate, which is an EXPENSIVE undertaking, and your average rain drops to thirty five inches……….. you may have to give up corn, and try hay and cows, or wheat, because while you could still grow corn, you wouldn’t be be able to compete with a guy who gets the additional five inches, everything else equal.
It’s been raining and snowing in the western mountains that are the source of the water that enables California to WORK, economically. If the rains continue to fall, copiously, we will continue to have domestically sourced fresh winter veggies.
But
The drought there is by no means OVER, it’s just off the front pages for the moment. If the recent trend towards less rain there continues a few more years, we won’t be eating much California produce.
It’s the possibility of more frequent wide scale long term droughts that scares me more than any other single factor.
I don’t know enough about farming in other parts of the world where the people are very heavily dependent on a single crop say rice for instance, to say that a couple more degrees warming will help or hinder production, in any given locality. But it’s well known that every major crop grows well only within some fairly hard and sharp temperature limits, at both the high and low extremes.
If people are growing rice, for example , in places that are already at or near the upper limit for rice to do well, another degree or two of warming could mean their yields will fall off enough to mean they go hungry.
In places where a given crop might continue to do well, in and of itself, due to warmer temperatures, blights or fungus infections or insect problems that were formerly manageable and tolerable could get so bad that crops would fail on a far more frequent basis that formerly.
I need to get back into the academic environment in order to learn the specifics when it comes to given crops and given areas, on a national or world wide basis.
Old Farmer, with the large changes in crop genetics and methods of production over the last few decades, wouldn’t the extra production per acre mask the signal of crop reduction by warming except in severe cases?
Sure. We don’t see the crop reduction by warming, but it is still there masked, and some time in the future it will rise to become a very serious problem for humankind.
You don’t realize how similar and repetitive these stories sound and they have an incredibly long record of failure. But doomsters are never put off by failure. They just move forward the date.
HI Javier
I have posted before, in your defense, that there IS a non zero chance that you are right about enough warming happening to be a major problem.
But that chance is probably one in million, lol.
Now as far as KNOWING what will happen if the climate warms up to a given extent in any given area, we KNOW from experience that there will be proportionally MORE extremely hot days is that area.
And we KNOW VERY WELL what the effects of such hot days are on crops in the field. Depending on what the calender date may be, they are neutral to disastrous nearly all the time, statistically.
You make a greater fool of yourself day after day.
Oldfarmermac
Perhaps you are the one making a fool of yourself by talking without checking the facts.
Our agriculture is not being affected by climate change perhaps because the number of very hot days is not increasing. Contrary to expectations and contrary to your beliefs.
Not in the US
And not in Australia.
So no damage to our agriculture from global warming. Sorry, that’s the evidence.
You might believe otherwise if you want.
Backatcha Javier,
I have said that it is unlikely that the case can be proven EITHER way, that warming ( meaning in the last few decades, I should have said, but failed to specify ) has EITHER helped or hindered in the production of food, on a world wide basis.
Most agricultural scientists ( and working farmers who have read up on longer term climate trends, going back a few hundred years,) will agree that we are in a better position now, in terms of climate, than during the Little Ice Age. I personally don’t know of any who would disagree with this statement.
I SAID was that you are making a fool out of yourself if ( or when ) you insist that continued warming will not result in an excessive number of days that are too hot for crops to thrive.
And additionally I also said you are making a fool out of yourself when you say agricultural scientists and practicing farmers don’t know what the effects are of extremely hot days that fall during the growing season on crops in the field. We DO know.
Even guys who work as laborers on farms know. They’ve seen it.
If the AVERAGE temperature continues to increase, the number of excessively hot days will increase too, in the professional opinion of virtually everybody in the fields of agriculture, statistics, climate, etc.
And it’s a given among professionals in my field we should take the precautionary principle seriously.
As a matter of fact, it’s pretty much SOP to take the precautionary principle as seriously as personal heart attack in ANY field of science involving the environment, public health, or other such broad issues.
You might have heard about that old bit of homely wisdom than says a stitch in time saves nine.
And you might have some knowledge in respect to taking proactive measures in respect to reducing or eliminating future problems.
Most people understand that fixing a leaky roof now is a lot cheaper than replacing an entire rotted out house a decade or two down the road. Most people understand the importance of proactive precautionary measures, especially if the potential problem is even a hundredth as serious as continued forced warming.
You leave me with no other choice, considering your reckless attitude in this respect except to conclude that you are a dangerous quack.
Many kinds of problems can be minimized if proper precautionary measures are proactively taken. Without proactive measures, they can and often do get ENTIRELY out of hand over a period of years, so that possible corrective measures are either prohibitively costly, or non existent.
I have resisted actually saying so until the last few days. But I should have said so sooner. You’re a dangerous quack.
You’re the ONE kid marching in step to the factual music, in your opinion.
Virtually everybody else believes you’re the kid out of step.
I will look into the statistical evidence pretty soon concerning the number of hot days that fall during the critical parts of the growing seasons.
IF there’s any way to cherry pick it, I’m fairly sure you have found it.
Hi GF,
I was just fixing to come back and add something to what I posted in response to Dennis’s question.
These things get to be sort of involved, and separating the various causes and effects can be tricky.
OK- First off, it IS true that as a GENERAL PROPOSITION, more CO2 means greater productivity in most species of plants.
And it is true that SOME warming will improve the productivity of some cultivated plants in some parts of the geographic range over which they are cultivated.
Now without doing some fairly sophisticated, extensive, time consuming and expensive gathering of data , and crunching it, it would be hard to say for sure, either way, that there has been, or has NOT been, a very slight increase in the average yields of food crops.
Your speculative question is DEAD ON.
We KNOW , without ANY question at all, that the farmers of the world ARE using more pesticides, more fertilizer, more herbicides, more of every thing, more irrigation,and of course substantially more productive cultivars ( cultivated varieties) every year, as the years pass.
It’s also rather likely that the total acreage of the major crops has been creeping up over the last few years, although I’m not sure of this point.
So – everything else held equal, we should EXPECT record production year after year. Of course everything is never equal, with the weather being the biggest variable from one year to the next. A major drought or late wet spring, etc, can put a huge dent in production across the entire American mid western bread basket, by way of example . That would be most enough to prevent a record being set world wide for corn or wheat.
Javier doesn’t really have a leg to stand on in terms of asserting that warming is responsible for record crop production. On the other hand……. can I prove some minor portion of the better yields is not the result of warming?
No, I cannot.
But I know that if my neighbors who are growing corn or soybeans go back to the tech they were using just eight or years ago, their yields would fall off five to ten percent!
It’s just not possible to make a good case for warming increasing food production, globally. There’s a correlation, but correlations do not prove causation, and we all know that.
Now another thing that agricultural scientists and working farmers alike know without a SHADOW of a doubt, is that it takes only a few unusually hot days to really cut into crop yields.
What happens is that higher temperatures lead to increased transpiration, so long as soil water is plentiful, but as soon as the plant starts getting to be a little water stressed, it shuts off some pores, which saves water, but it also slows down CO2 intake. CO2 is of course the carbon input source. Hydrogen is ultimately sourced from water, and nitrogen from the air, indirectly, via microbes that can source it from the air.
When the weather gets too hot, our little green food factories slow down to a crawl. As I pointed out in my above comment , there are HARD and fairly SHARPLY defined limits to the temperature range at which any given crop does well. Any colder, or any hotter, and yields start to decline dramatically.
Just about any working farmer will tell you a five or ten extremely hot days, relative to normal highs at his location, mean he’s going to be in the hole, running in the red for the year, if they fall during the wrong part of the season for the crops he grows.
If you can irrigate, you can usually compensate for the heat, up to a certain limit, but irrigation is an expensive proposition, and most farmers don’t have the equipment needed. And even the ones who do have the equipment are apt to run short of water.
A lot of farmers in California have the equipment, but they have never the less stood by and watched helplessly as their almond orchards died for lack of water over the last couple of years.
It’s common knowledge in the industry and among people who are well informed concerning environmental issues that we are looking at a fossil water crisis that might be WORSE than the fossil fuel depletion crisis that must sooner or later arrive, unless we manage the transition to renewable energy, because we will run out of fossil water QUICKER.
Either way, whichever comes first, we’re collectively in for some extremely rough involuntary sex.
I cannot prove that the climate has heated up enough, SO FAR, that total crop yields have suffered due to warming. Javier cannot prove yields have increased due to warming.
What I KNOW, as a farmer, professionally trained, is that if the climate continues to warm , yields WILL decline, and we know how about hot it must get , in order for this to happen, at any given location.
And if the climate modelers are even in the ballpark , it ‘s going to get a LOT hotter than working farmers would like. A LOT hotter. Hot enough to fuck things up ROYALLY.
Here’s a link to some recent work in the field.
https://phys.org/news/2017-01-harvests-climate.html#nRlv
And an excerpt
“The simulations reproduced a strong reduction in past crop yields induced by high temperatures, thereby confirming that they capture one main mechanism for future projections. Importantly, the scientists find that increased irrigation can reduce the negative effects of global warming on crops—but this is possible only in regions where sufficient water is available. Eventually, limiting global warming is needed to keep crop losses in check.”
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-01-harvests-climate.html#jCp
Thanks Old Farmer, very informative response. The kind I would like to see more of on this site.
I wouldn’t concern myself with Javier too much, his hole is dug and he doesn’t know enough to stop digging.
Backatcha GF,
You’re welcome,and thanks for reading my comments.
I likewise would like to see more comments posted by specialists in various fields.
It would be great if we had more people like Fernando, who’s hands on oil engineer. We don’t have any regulars who are health care professionals, or professional military guys, or materials scientists of the sort who work on cutting edge new materials , or a serious historian, or ……..
Now if a correlation is STRONG ENOUGH, then causation is probable, or certain, and there is a VERY strong correlation between high temperatures and water stress in geographically and climatically temperate farming .
If it gets a good bit hotter than usual, then you can safely bet crops in the field are going to be water stressed , and between the heat and the water stress, the result is that yields drop off DRAMATICALLY.
https://www.usda.gov/oce/forum/presentations/Westcott_Jewison.pdf
The data in such documents as this one is all the proof anybody other than a Javier will ever need to understand that if the climate continues to warm up, we are going to be in one hell of a fix.
This is HARD DATA. It’s not modeling.It’s not theoretical.
Hard data.
OFM,
“Javier doesn’t really have a leg to stand on in terms of asserting that warming is responsible for record crop production.”
Warming surely did not harm crop production, did it? If you think so let’s see your leg.
“If you think so let’s see your leg.”
Cheeky.
How about the 2010 Russian heatwave that saw grain yields decline and exports banned.
What about it?
Any evidence that global warming was implicated? Since the world is warming, there should be by now a global effect.
One of the worst heat waves in Europe took place in 1540. Was it global warming?
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/7/2/1311260/-The-Great-European-Heat-Wave-and-Drought-of-1540
For those interested in a little more information than the ramblings of a binary opposition disorder meme.
RUSSIAN HEAT WAVE HAD BOTH MANMADE AND NATURAL CAUSES
https://news.agu.org/press-release/russian-heat-wave-had-both-manmade-and-natural-causes/
Right, because we can see in the West Russian record how heat waves have been getting more frequent.
Wait a second, actually the evidence disproves it.
Climate disruptions to agriculture have increased. Many regions will experience declines in crop and livestock production from increased stress due to weeds, diseases, insect pests, and other climate change induced stresses.
http://nca2014.globalchange.gov/report/sectors/agriculture
More doom predictions, while the evidence says otherwise.
Cold can easily be a lot more devastating to crops than heat. A late frost is one of the greatest dangers in agriculture.
“Cold can easily be a lot more devastating to crops than heat”.
I’ve lost a year’s production three or four times to frost, raising apples and peaches, and suffered lesser losses a couple of dozen times.
In every case, the trees broke dormancy way too early, because we had unseasonably warm late winter weather.
Not once did I ever lose a crop due to having typical late winter weather followed by a normal spring season with a killer frost arriving after our usual last hard frost date.
Farmers who grow field crops can replant. It’s expensive, and it results in significant lost production, but that’s something we can do something about.
Unless a farmer is one of the lucky minority with irrigation equipment, and an ample supply of water, there’s virtually NOTHING we can do about killer heat.
And unusually hot weather usually arrives in combination with dry weather, especially in the temperate zone where we grow most of the grain that’s the foundation of our food supply.
Any experienced temperate zone grain or fruit or vegetable farmer will tell you he has lost more production to hot weather than he has lost to cold weather, probably by a factor of at least three or four to one.
Javier might conceivably have heard that correlation is not evidence of causation but if so, he has forgotten all about hearing it.
Nearly 80% of the nitrogen found in human tissues originated from the Haber-Bosch process in which artificial ammonia is produced.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process
Malthus died in 1834.
Haber-Bosch process successfully developed for industrial scale in 1910.
Due to its dramatic impact on the human ability to grow food, the Haber process served as the “detonator of the population explosion”, enabling the global population to increase from 1.6 billion in 1900 to today’s 7 billion. Nearly 80% of the nitrogen found in human tissues originated from the Haber-Bosch process
The green revolution in the late 1960s
After the Second World War, increased deployment of technologies including pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers as well as new breeds of high yield crops greatly increased global food production.
Chances now are that global energy production will slow and is soon likely to start to decline.
Isn’t nature wonderful? It makes creatures who can evolve technology to produce needed nutrients much faster than the rest of the natural order.
There is a huge supply of nitrogen all around us. There are also many phosphorus containing rocks, just need a new process to access it.
Huge amounts of energy are all around us, just have to be willing to implement the new technologies and not get stuck in the bad old days.
Looks like the new regime is going to gut the clean energy program. In return workers get an extra 10 cents an hour raise within seven years! Whooopeee!!!
Well, not really because there will be more workers to spread it around, so it might only be 7 cents an hour.
.
Someone over at Real Climate posted a link to this talk:
Prof. Philip Mirowski keynote for ‘Life and Debt’ conference
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7ewn29w-9I
I think it thickens the plot a bit. Especially near the end of the talk when he gets to geoengineering.
If humans manage to continue on this path it is the end of the ‘Natural’ world as we have known it. E.O. Wilson’s vision of ‘Half-Earth. Our Planet’s Fight for Life’ is doomed! The conservative right wing religious meme of ‘Man’ dominating the earth will have come to pass! Viva La Anthropocene! Good bye Whales, and Orangutans it was nice knowing ya… Hey, we need to cut down every last stretch of Borneo rain forest so we can grow Palm Oil for the junk food industry. It is God’s will!
The new Government Website makes much more sense once you watch that talk! So does Javier’s “See, No Problem!” Attitude.
Humans living in shopping malls, driving ICE Pickups with bibles on their dashboards, rifles in their gun racks terraforming our entire planet like the cyanobacteria did 3.8 billion years ago.
Cheers and Good Luck!
The neo-liberal attempt to geo-engineer the climate system is just another technological and economic trap similar to the problems they are supposedly trying to solve.
First, just to reduce and eventually eliminate the production of GHG’s means a highly energetic and initially expensive campaign to re-engineer the technology of civilization.
Geo-engineering just adds one more level of gigantic complexity and energy to achieve an unknowable result. Unknowable because it does not solve the problem, merely covers it up and tries to put the problem back in a box, actually a worldwide set of boxes yet undefined. All this with incomplete knowledge or recognition of the natural processes it is playing with.
Also geo-engineering can have the rubber band effect. After reducing or eliminating carbon output, then covering up the problem with reflective clouds, what happens when something interrupts the cover-up? A sudden doubling of heat gain occurs causing weather chaos. Let alone the totally unknown effect on the monsoon system while the process is running.
The fantastic size and complexity of carbon capture and storage planet wide is almost beyond belief. The cost would be tremendous, if it ever did become fully implemented and the security of the storage is unknown over time.
Yes, the whole idea of the “market” knowing better and making the best decisions is a huge fantasy.
Hi Gonefishing,
When most economists suggest a market economy with minimal government interference results in the most efficient allocation of scarce resources (which is true only in the case of a perfectly competitive market with no negative or positive externalities, a case which does not exist in reality), they implicitly assume that monopolies are regulated and that government regulation of negative externalities (pollution) and support for positive externalities (public transportation or road infrastructure) will occur.
You are absolutely correct that our incomplete understanding of the natural world makes the task of regulating positive and negative externalities appropriately almost impossible.
We do the best we can with current scientific understanding while continuing to increase our level of knowledge.
fyi
10 Investigative Reporting Outlets to Follow
Here are some new organizations, as well as a few established ones, that are working to uncover the truth.
JANUARY 13, 2017
http://billmoyers.com/story/10-investigative-reporting-outlets-to-follow/?utm_content=buffer9db28&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
http://insideevs.com/tesla-launches-model-s-100d-range-of-335-miles-starts-at-95800/
I’m guessing, but I think that if you loaded the battery from one into the back of an old Model A pickup truck with a four banger and replaced the engine with an electric motor with the same amount of horsepower, it would go at least five or six hundred miles, and maybe as far as eight hundred miles, but of course it wouldn’t go over about forty or so. But about forty is as fast as anybody with good sense wanted to go, considering the brakes, suspension, tires , etc, back then.
It would be interesting to see how far a chevy bolt would go at 40 mph max.
Heat off, AC off, headights off, steady highway cruising, my guess is three hundred twenty five to three hundred fifty miles by actual road test before she falls back to limp off the road mode.
It’s amazing how much slowing down increases fuel efficiency. Aero drag is MURDER, and it increases exponentially.
GLOBAL ENERGY NEWS | Tue Jan 17, 2017 | 4:13pm IST
In latest move, China halts over 100 coal power projects
http://in.reuters.com/article/china-coal-idINKBN1511A2
China’s energy regulator has ordered 11 provinces to stop more than 100 coal-fired power projects, with a combined installed capacity of more than 100 gigawatts, its latest dramatic step to curb the use of fossil fuels in the world’s top energy market.
In a document issued on Jan. 14, financial media group Caixin reported, the National Energy Administration (NEA) suspended the coal projects, some of which were already under construction.
The projects worth some 430 billion yuan ($62 billion) were to have been spread across provinces and autonomous regions including Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Gansu, Ningxia, Qinghai, Shaanxi and other northwestern areas
Putting the power projects on hold is a major step towards the government’s effort to produce power from renewable sources such as solar and wind, and wean the country off coal, which accounts for the majority of the nation’s power supply…
…To put it in perspective, some 130 GW of additional solar and wind power will be installed by 2020, equal to France’s total renewable power generation capacity, said Frank Yu, principal consultant at Wood Mackenzie.
“This shows the government is keeping its promise in curbing supplies of coal power,” Yu said.
While Trump wants YUUUGE coal mining and generation increases to make America Great Again, China just says,’that’s pretty stupid!’, Let’s just keep investing in Clean energy instead.
Read and heed.
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/preserve-protect-and-defend?mbid=nl_January%2016th%202017%20(6)&CNDID=48654290&spMailingID=10269760&spUserID=MTc4OTMyODYzNjk0S0&spJobID=1081670148&spReportId=MTA4MTY3MDE0OAS2
I couldn’t agree more with just about every line of this article.
Next time around, remember that while you can’t control who the opposition is, you have some control of what they run on, depending on WHO your candidate is.
There’s no NEED to hand the opposition a suitcase of grenades to lob back at you.
And while individuals cannot exert much control over which candidate gets the actual nomination, they can collectively work on making sure the one who gets it is the most likely one to win.
The only line I disagree with is the one about the” coastal elites” getting it. I sure as hell didn’t notice the coastal elites saying very much in favor of the rest of the country.
The VAST majority of what was said was condescending, sniffy nose in the air, to say the least. Most of it was outright insults, the sort virtually guaranteed to provoke the targeted audience into either staying home or voting for TRUMP.
Most of what was said HERE was the same sort of stuff.
But it didn’t matter much HERE, because the audience is small, and hardly anybody here, other than yours truly, is a horny handed son of the soil, so to speak.
I am now DONE talking about HRC’s shortcomings, except for a passing reference, unless somebody REMINDS me again to point out WHY Trump is now our president.
White House climate change webpage disappears after Trump’s inauguration
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/315284-white-house-climate-change-webpage-disappears-after-trumps
“The only line I disagree with is the one about the” coastal elites” getting it. I sure as hell didn’t notice the coastal elites saying very much in favor of the rest of the country.”
MacBackwoods, you have got it ass backwards about who gets it. You have been conned.
Repeat a lie often enough, and it will be believed by people who don’t hear the other side of the story. I will reply every time you tell it.
You’re a cynical, sniveling, bald faced liar of a little partisan porch dog, and everybody knows it. It’s understandable that hardly anybody will post a comment acknowledging my argument. People don’t usually like to admit they were wrong.
I spent the last few months making the case that Clinton was a very high risk candidate, due to her record and baggage train. I started well before she had the nomination locked up, supporting Sanders because he did not HAVE the baggage train, or the negatives, and because he better represents the traditional Democratic Party.
Clinton lost.
I was as right as the day is long.
My point all along, once Sanders conceded, has been to wake up D voters about running the WRONG candidate, so that hopefully they will run a BETTER candidate next time, one who has more brains, better polling numbers, less baggage, etc.
Thanks for helping me keep the attention of the audience focused on my arguments.
Your wanna be empress lost, CHUMP. She lost because she was arrogant, stupid, overbearing, and condescending, and because she talked only a little working class talk, at long intervals, and in the wrong places. She lost because she had a baggage train a mile long, and because half the country had near zero use for her even before the real campaign even got started.
She essentially extended her middle finger to the people of the three big Rust Belt states that put Trump in the WH, not even paying them the courtesy of a visit.
That’s the single COLOSSAL mistake that put Trump in the White House, her being so arrogant as to assume traditional D voting working people would vote for here even as she walked the one percenters walk with the bankers who paid her millions without even blushing, without even trying to conceal the millions.
Well, those working class voters extended that middle finger right back.
Trump’s the result.
And every body in this forum knows it’s true, even you.
Of course nobody is willing to come out and actually say so NOW, since they have failed to acknowledge my point previously, when it could have made a difference, back when Sanders was still in the race for the nomination.
Hardly anybody likes to admit he has been wrong on such an important point, so I don’t expect comments acknowledging I was RIGHT.
And I ‘m sure at least SOME of the D’s in this forum have mostly already made up their minds that they will not support another candidate with Clinton’s shortcomings in future elections, during the primary season. They’ll vote for candidates more likely to win the actual election in the primaries.
Likewise, at least some of the middle of the roaders who vote in primaries in states with open primaries will be thinking about how their choice will fare in the actual election.
I have made my point.
I will repeat it, any time you remind me.
“My point all along, once Sanders conceded, has been to wake up D voters about running the WRONG candidate, so that hopefully they will run a BETTER candidate next time, one who has more brains, better polling numbers, less baggage, etc.”
So there it is, you admit for the almost 5 months prior to the election you trashed HRC and at the same time claiming to want the Democrats to win(only in Republicanland does this make sense). Also claiming that your an Independent who was supporting a life long Independent Sanders.
I stand by my case your a backwoods Republican who enjoyed damaging the Democrat party. Who has swallowed the Republican hate Clinton smear tactics for the last 25 years.
Just admit it, your a Republican Trump supporter because sooner or later you will slip up again and admit it.
Hi Huntingtonbeach,
There was this new color discovered recently, a mixture of black and white, it is called gray. I have heard there are many shades besides black or white. You should check it out. 🙂
HB, you’re such a stupid little lap doggie that you obviously don’t even understand that it’s sop to trash the candidate you DON’T want in order to improve the odds of your own candidate winning.
This is sop, D party and R party both, during the primaries.
Clinton set her dogs on the Sanders camp. Her dogs scared every body else out of even RUNNING.
The Sanders camp played nice, too nice. If he had really gone after Clinton, he would have forced the D voters to face up to her dead fish stink, the stink that trailed her all the way back to Arkansas. He could have won the election, if he had gotten the nomination.
I was not an OFFICIAL part of the Sanders camp , and thus free to say what I pleased, and what in my judgement would help Sanders win the nomination.
And I most certainly did keep on badmouthing Clinton even afterward, warning that her liabilities might cost the D’s the election, and I was RIGHT.
Since then big D Democrats by the thousands, and by the millions, are coming around to admitting, quietly, to themselves that I was right about the risks of running a candidate with Clinton’s flaws.
There’s an excellent chance that the Sanders camp will be running the D party by 2020.
Hopefully the D party as a whole will have better sense next time around. I did everything I could to make sure D voters would be thinking about these things.
Hey, I’m just one little guy blogging, without even having my own site, just like you say you are only one little guy making out like a bandit in the oil biz, and that it doesn’t matter, because you’re just one little guy.
” Just admit it, your a Republican Trump supporter because sooner or later you will slip up again and admit it.”
Any body who is mathematically literate is welcome to debate Clinton’s personal ethical record with me, any old time.
We can start with Cattle Gate, which lies all the way back to the good old days in Arkansas.
From there we can go on to a detailed discussion of her close business associates who spent substantial amounts of time in jail.
The odds of doing as well as Clinton did, even for the best of the best of professional commodities traders, were astronomically high to one against.
Her broker would have been jailed in just about any other state, but given that Clinton’s husband happened to be the guv, and one of her best buddies the head of the biggest company in the state, and supposedly by her own statements giving her advice about her trading ……..
I am not surprised that while I have posted this challenge numerous times, in a number of forums where in most of the audience is mathematically literate, nobody has ever come forward to debate her side.
I propose as the ground rules be that we use the archives of the New York Times and the Washington Post as our sources of admissible data.
To the best of my knowledge, nobody ever referred to either of these two papers as republican mouthpieces back in those days.
“MacBackwoods, you have got it ass backwards about who gets it. You have been conned.”
Yep. I fell of the turnip wagon and landed in this forum in about the same fashion as Alice wound up down the rabbit hole. I imagined the WHOLE THING. Musta got hold of some uncommonly good dope or something.
I sure am glad I have HB to keep me straight. What would I ever do without him?
Climate Change Information Has Been Deleted From the White House Website
The incoming administration has removed any references to climate change, replacing it with a promise to “take advantage” of fossil fuels “on federal lands.”
The official White House website used to feature a lengthy information page related to climate change and energy policy. But as of noon today, that page, and all references to climate change or global warming, have been scrubbed from the White House website, Motherboard reports. In its place is a short statement on the incoming President’s “America First Energy Plan.”
Obama’s Climate Action Plan was a centerpiece of the President’s climate change policy. Through actions like requiring auto manufacturers to increase fuel efficiency, mandating cleaner power plants, and investing in renewable energy initiatives, the plan sought to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and reduce the effects of climate change.
The White House website contained a lengthy page explaining the details and effects of the plan. Since the website has been handed over to the Trump Administration, that page has been completely removed, and is only accessible via the Internet Archives.
In its place is a short description of the Trump Administration’s “America First Energy Plan,” which has the goal of “eliminating harmful and unnecessary policies such as the Climate Action Plan.” The page claims that the new energy plan would “[increase] wages by more than $30 billion over the next 7 years.”
The plan also states the goal of “[taking] advantage of the estimated $50 trillion in untapped shale, oil, and natural gas reserves, especially those on federal lands that the American people own.” This seems to suggest the incoming administration would turn over public lands, including national parks, to private companies for drilling.
Trump has previously promised to cut funding for NASA to study climate change, and many researchers are worried that critical government data may disappear. If they’re right, Obama’s Climate Action Plan page may be the first in a long line of climate information to disappear from government websites.
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/environment/a24849/trump-deletes-climate-change-info/?src=socialflowFB
In its place is a short description of the Trump Administration’s “America First Energy Plan,” which has the goal of “eliminating harmful and unnecessary policies such as the Climate Action Plan.” The page claims that the new energy plan would “[increase] wages by more than $30 billion over the next 7 years.”
The plan also states the goal of “[taking] advantage of the estimated $50 trillion in untapped shale, oil, and natural gas reserves, especially those on federal lands that the American people own.”
Really?! And I have this great deal on a bridge in Brooklyn in case anyone is interested! I’ll even sign the deed over to you at no extra charge…
But, GRRRREAT! We’re now officially ruled by a narcissistic tweeting twit who is owned lock stock and barrel by the global cabal of fossil fuel interests!
I tawt I taw a putty tat!
.
.
A Corporate Coup d’état
Finally they eliminated the middle man.
Really?! And I have this great deal on a bridge in Brooklyn in case anyone is interested! I’ll even sign the deed over to you at no extra charge…
It just occurred to me that the anti-climate public might be just the folks to pitch fossil fuel stocks and beach front property to.
If you have reason to believe climate change will affect the future and you have stocks and property you want to unload as a result, it might be useful to tell potential buyers that they have nothing to fear and then sell to them and get your money out while you can.
NASA Data Shows the Rate of Global Warming is Accelerating — 2016 is Third Consecutive Hottest Year on Record
https://robertscribbler.com/2017/01/20/nasa-data-shows-the-rate-of-global-warming-is-accelerating-2016-is-third-consecutive-hottest-year-on-record/#comment-105936
Up about 0.4*C in 3 years. Unsettling.
All based on an El Niño.
Solid science no doubt. It will be disproved next year, but who cares.
Your repetitive predictions have failed in the past Javier. Why should we care what a purveyor of failed predictions has to say?
“Apparently the rate of fall for RSS is the fastest for a 3 month period since measurements begun. If a strong la Niña develops during the summer, it will be difficult that 2016 is a temperature record year. All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time. ” ~ Javier
https://archive.is/F9a1N#selection-1995.0-2021.289
Fail!
Javier thought that the 2015 record would not be broken for some time. He also mixes up his datasets. 2015 wasn’t the hottest year in the RSS TLT v3 dataset although it was in the TTTv4 dataset. I guess if Javier keeps predicting “next year won’t be so bad” then perhaps one day he will be right.
Hey Survivalist, Have you read my 01/21/2017 at 8:37 am post? I am often more interested in a persons motivations for saying or doing something than what it is that they actually say or do. I get more interested in their motivations as they become more and more persistent, the question changes from what? to why? Why would someone with so much less skin in the game, be so firmly on the side of those with so much (billions) to loose?
Yes I read that post. I like it.
It seems to me that some sock puppets are for convincing those that don’t know better that global warming is not occurring. Other sock puppets are for convincing those that are smart enough to know global warming is occurring that it is not a problem. The sock puppet army has multiple fronts. One front is deny and another front is miiimize the concern. Anybody with a concern is labeled by Javier as an alarmist. Javier’s communication techniques are not those of a scientist. They are the communication techniques of a PR firm that wished to define all questions and concerns as overreactions. Javier has an agenda. His dialogue makes that clear. And it is not the agenda of truth through scientific evidence.
“If a strong la Niña develops during the summer, it will be difficult that 2016 is a temperature record year.”
No prediction there. It says If. La Niña didn’t develop so the condition didn’t happen.
“All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time. ” ~ Javier
https://archive.is/F9a1N#selection-1995.0-2021.289
Failed prediction by Javier.
If w get a record next year, on a La Nina, we know we are totally screwed (even if we get our mild El Nino in the Fall).
But agree, lets hope we don’t get one more record smasher–
Even if we are in the top 5, things are accelerating.
Every heat pulse sent up to the Arctic melts more ice. Each square meter of open ocean absorbs up to 300 watts of solar energy greater than ice. The steady reduction in ice concentration leads to an amplification of heating.
Hmm no when temperatures are below freezing. There is no melting in the Arctic during the winter.
What an ignorance of such basic things.
Despite all the Arctic warming this winter, Arctic sea ice is keeping up quite well. All that heat is going out to space. Together with the El Niño, the planet has been losing an unusual amount of heat in 2015-17. If the Arctic warming ends by the spring we might see a lot of sea ice this summer.
You have very little concept of reality or science. Even if something is below freezing and it’s temperature is raised, it will be that much easier to melt in the warm season. Did you pass the fourth grade?
Here, I will make it simple for you.
Temperature of ice is at 23.5F. Another equal mass of ice is at 27.5F. Which mass will reach 28F first given equal heating later?
Now do you understand? Comprende? What happens in the winter counts too. Si? Heat content changes.
Arctic ice concentration and volume has been falling rapidly for many years. Stop with the lying.
Gone Fishing said about Javier:
“You have very little concept of reality or science. Even if something is below freezing and it’s temperature is raised, it will be that much easier to melt in the warm season. Did you pass the fourth grade?”
Javier has made so many of these baffling statements as to make his credibility essentially zero.
He only has a talent for recycling talking points that on the surface sound reasonable, but that’s only because he says them with such conviction.
“Even if something is below freezing and it’s temperature is raised, it will be that much easier to melt in the warm season.”
Don’t be silly. For that you need temperatures to remain elevated above average all the way to the melting season. If in the meantime they go back to average, as it is quite likely, everything cools down there.
This place is populated by climatic fourth graders that believe they know something about it.
Look, the situation is like last year. Elevated temperatures above average during the cold season, but average or even slightly below average during the melting season, resulting in more ice, not less.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
That Arctic heat is going out to space because it has no other place to go. Lost to the planetary system. A cooler planet than otherwise. Negative feedback. That heat should actually be in mid latitudes where we are getting polar air that is causing cold waves instead. A cold winter like alarmists would like to see every year that is causing increased demand for fossil fuels and high energy prices in many places.
“For that you need temperatures to remain elevated above average all the way to the melting season. If in the meantime they go back to average, as it is quite likely, everything cools down there.”
That is one big IF when heat inputs and are higher than average and longwave radiation is blocked.
Building imaginary scenarios. You are good for a laugh though.
Look Javier, your shtick is getting awful tiresome here.
As usual, when Javier makes a very confident statement that gives the appearance of being objectively based on measurable facts…
” All that heat is going out to space. Together with the El Niño, the planet has been losing an unusual amount of heat in 2015-17”
… it is actually complete and utter bullshyt. Made up. Not based on reality as measured by science. Wrong. Contrary to the published data.
OHC at the end of 2014/beginning of 2015 = 21.12 * 10^22J
OHC at the end of 2015/beginning of 2016 = 22.27 * 10^22J
That is an INCREASE of 1.15 * 10^22J for 2015. Not a decrease.
OHC lost energy during the 2016 El Nino. The change in OHC was -0.71 *10^22J.
So the net change over the two El Nino years of 2015 and 2016 was an INCREASE of 0.43 * 10^22J.
Most of the decrease was concentrated in one quarter at the height of the El Nino – AprMayJun of 2016 – losing 3.03 * 10^22J while temps zoomed up to 1.35C. Most of that loss was regained in the 4th quarter with a gain of 2.41 *10^22J.
This recent gain occurred when global surface temperatures were at all time highs for non-El-Nino months. So even though temps are very high, we are still gaining energy while at 0.8 to 0.9C GISS temps. This means we cannot count on a return to the “Pause”. We are gaining heat at an extraordinary rate, and only temperatures higher than about 1.1C above the 1951-1981 baseline will be sufficient to balance the energy retained by GHGs today.
The Arctic is one place where GHG have increased much faster than average. Water vapor is the strongest GHG, and the Arctic used to be a desert with essentially zero water vapor for most of the year. This allowed heat to escape efficiently, and allowed the heat of ice formation to escape.
Now we have more open water – even in the fall and winter – adding more water vapor, in addition to the increased transport from the south due to the wavier jetstream (see Francis)…
http://airs.jpl.nasa.gov/resources/publications/159
“The Arctic is becoming warmer and wetter as revealed by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder
…In response to sea ice loss, evaporation rates (i.e., moisture flux) increased between August and October by 1.5 × 10−3 g m−2 s−1 (3.8 W m−2 latent heat flux energy), increasing the water vapor feedback and cloud cover…”
Today we have essentially the entire Arctic Ocean covered with ice, but it is very thin, mostly first year ice, and it did not thicken at the usual rate due to the abnormally high temperatures. This coming melting season will be a record. The final autumn low in extent may or may not be a record, but during the important part of the melting season – May to July, when the albedo feedback is strongest – the Arctic waters will gain even more heat than last year, leading to an even weaker re-freeze… even more water vapor… even higher winter temps… you get the idea.
The Non-Science based wishful thinking of Javier will continue to be proven wrong.
Wehappyfew, you are actually one of those people that think that he knows something when in reality your knowledge is negative. You have a hole that you don’t even know is there. You measure the planetary energy budget balance at the top of the atmosphere, not in the oceans.
El Niño and La Niña are not only intervals when heat within the system is distributed around the planet, but also periods which see a net loss of heat by the Earth (El Niño) and a net gain of heat (La Niña). Over the long-term these intervals balance out to zero.
“Tropical variations in emitted outgoing longwave (LW) radiation are found to closely track changes in the El Niño- Southern Oscillation (ENSO). During positive ENSO phase (El Niño), outgoing LW radiation increases, and decreases during the negative ENSO phase (La Niña).”
Loeb, Norman G., et al. “Advances in understanding top-of-atmosphere radiation variability from satellite observations.” Surveys in geophysics 33.3-4 (2012): 359-385.
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10712-012-9175-1
As measured by CERES satellites the planet loses a lot of energy during Los Niños, as I have said. The planet has been losing an unusual amount of heat in 2015-17. And you are the one that is posting bullshyt, while attacking me for posting the reality as measured by science and in agreement with published data.
Now try to demonstrate that the planet doesn’t lose energy during El Niño… if you can.
As usual, after Javier gets caught in yet another blatant lie, he tries to find some graph in his denier playbook to “support” his wildly non-science pontifications.
Also standard operating procedure for Javier, he uses obsolete incomplete AND irrelevant data to “support” his claim.
What’s the claim?
El Nino conditions in 2015 and 2016 caused the planet to lose energy.
The data to “support” this claim… ends in 2010!
Plus the chart Javier posted is of net Long Wave flux (LW), not total flux (which includes both Short Wave and Long Wave fluxes measured by CERES). The paper Javier linked to, but apparently didn’t read very carefully, DOES show a chart of the net TOTAL flux, but that chart still doesn’t tell us anything about 2015 and 2016 data, since it also ends in 2010!
….
What do the actual up-to-date data say about Javier’s claim?
The data say his claim is WRONG (for 2015). See chart below.
The data say his claim is CORRECT for 2016. See OHC data in my previous post… the Earth lost a lot of heat in the first half of 2016… due to the super-El-Nino. Due to the high correlation between OHC and CERES TOA Net flux as shown in the chart, we can be very confident that the CERES data for 2016 will confirm the ARGO data and show that the TOA Net flux was negative for 2016.
For the 2 year period from the beginning of 2015 to the beginning of 2017? Javier’s claim is WRONG. The net change in heat energy for the Earth is POSITIVE for the two years, as shown by the ARGO OHC data.
After failing so profoundly to find even a shred of up-to-date data to support his claims, Javier goes on to challenge me to “show that the planet doesn’t lose energy during El Niño… if you can.”
OK, done.
The Earth gained energy during the 2015 mild El Nino conditions, as shown by both CERES and ARGO data (see chart below)…
…AND it lost energy during the 2016 super El Nino.
The total net change for the two years was a GAIN of 0.43 * 10^22 Joules.
The lesson to be gained from the net energy imbalance data?
It takes very high temps… 1.35C GISS… for the Earth to lose energy at the current level of radiative forcing. At lower temps… 0.87C for 2015, and 0.88C for the last quarter of 2016… the Earth still gains heat. Both the CERES satellite data and the ARGO data confirm this heat gain.
A second lesson?
Never take a Javier-Claim at face value. If it is presented without data, you can be certain that it is made up, false, unsupported – a lie.
If Javier present data to “support” his claim, you can be sure the data is incomplete, not up-to-date, or irrelevant to the claim, as amply demonstrated here.
Chart source:
“Improving estimates of Earth’s energy imbalance”
http://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate3043.epdf?author_access_token=WH-oGmmTVhgyBTn1tn0hBNRgN0jAjWel9jnR3ZoTv0NbDl8PNdWl2LsN_U9az9DjotVsZOc1X_mKsJQUTyXVQA5En__zwz4SJ7kbvt6bZUctn-nmEVjpv5mzVfTBVgV1
Excerpts:
“…With over 90% of Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI) being stored in the ocean, the most accurate way to determine it is to measure increases in ocean temperatures (along with increases in land temperatures, decreases in ice mass, and increases in atmospheric temperature and moisture)…”
…owing to improved sampling by the Argo array over time (Fig.1), the correlation between year-to-year rates of 0–1,800m ocean heat uptake and the latest release of CERES EEI is a much-improved 0.78. This striking agreement between two completely independent measures of EEI variability bolsters confidence in both of these complementary climate observation systems…”
The Non-Science based wishful thinking of Javier will continue to be proven wrong.
Xavier doesn’t give a rodent’s rear end about scientific fact or whether or not he will be proven wrong. His only goal is to sell doubt and obfuscate the truth.
Besides being a science denier he has now come out openly in favor of coal over solar and wind and he keeps talking about the economic dangers of changing as quickly as possible to a clean energy economy!
While he often claims that he doesn’t care about US politics because he doesn’t live here, he fits right in with the new Fossil Fuel Fascists who are actually a global cabal of ultra right wing authoritarians who are fighting alternative energy and human rights all over the world.
https://www.thelocal.de/20170119/europes-right-wing-populists-to-flex-muscles-in-germany-meeting
Emboldened by the Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s US election win, these right-wing populists are hoping to capitalize on rising resentment against the establishment and alarm over immigration to shake up the political landscape on the continent.
French presidential hopeful Marine Le Pen will lead a European gathering of right-wing populist parties in Germany on Saturday in a show of strength ahead of crucial elections across the region this year.
The congress in the western city of Koblenz will also feature Geert Wilders of the Dutch far-right Freedom Party, Frauke Petry of the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) and Matteo Salvini of Italy’s xenophobic Northern League.
Billed as a “European counter-summit”, the event is being held just a day after the inauguration of Trump, who himself rode to power on a wave of discontent with the status quo.
In announcing the meeting on Twitter, Wilders used the hashtag “WeWillMakeOurCountriesGreatAgain”, a play on Trump’s election-winning slogan “Make America Great Again”.
“The aim is to talk about freedom for Europe and for Europeans. Let us break free from the EU’s straitjacket and from globalization,” Ludovic de Danne, an advisor to Le Pen, told AFP.
It is with these people that Xavier is ideologically aligned.
As usual this reply is for any body else who may read it. For HB personally , five or ten seconds to extend the middle finger would be it.
Hi HB,
Thanks for the reminder. Later this evening I will post some articles about Clinton’s good buddies having to resign positions, etc, due to playing dirty tricks during the nomination process.
The sort of comment you make in virtually every case is exactly the kind of comment that provokes middle of the road voters to either stay home, or vote for the opposition,in this case , the R opposition.
I don’t see much in the way of comments from others supporting what I have said, all along, but except for YOU, it’s almost everybody else seems to be thinking about what I have been saying, and staying quiet.
There aren’t any shy people in the habit of posting here. If the run of them were thinking I’m the idiot, the dupe, the sucker, they would be saying so, loud and clear. Lots of them.
They’re thinking, and if they could think of anything substantial with which to refute my observations, they would post their thoughts.
The near silence tells me that their mental mills are grinding slow and fine.
And given that ALMOST every body here is capable of some basic rational thinking, they
one,
realize that you cannot control the opposition, but
two, you DO have control, collectively, about what YOUR team does or does not do, and
three, that if the D team had done things differently, there would have been a Democrat sworn in today.
Blaming your side’s losses on other people is just about as childish as it gets.
ADULTS take responsibility for their own actions and mistakes, although they are naturally reluctant to admit them publicly, or to say thank you to the people who point them out.
HB is obviously too stupid to ever accept that as a person ( as opposed to a person wearing the hat of a writer sitting a long way from the trees, so as to have a good view of the forest ) I want a D in the White House.
There are millions of committed Democrats in this country who have long had and still have LITTLE use for Clinton, which has a GREAT DEAL to do with why Obama came out of nowhere and won the nomination eight years ago, and a GREAT DEAL to do with why so many millions of committed Democrats went for Sanders, this past year, and SOMETHING to do with why Trump is our president NOW.
There is always a possibility that anybody may be a fake or a fraud, a Worm Tongue working for the enemy.
There are only two logically viable conclusions concerning my motives. I’m either a Worm Tongue, a secret Republican, or I’m who I say I am, an individual trying to point out to D voters what went WRONG, WHY Clinton lost, in terms of things WITHIN THE CONTROL of the Democratic Party, so that they hopefully won’t make the same mistakes next time around. Or the one after that.
Try to remember, my Little Lap Doggie,
You are in control of YOUR OWN decisions and actions.
You cannot control the opposition.
Blaming the opposition for whipping your ass, my little lap doggie, is tantamount to admitting incompetence on your own part.
HB has long been reduced to personal insults. When he says I’m deluded, he sounds just like an old time backwoods preacher warning his congregation not to listen to a scientist trying to explain that the world is NOT flat, and that we WEREN’T created as toys by an all powerful entity amusing himself.
The gospel according to HB basically boils down to something along these lines.
Steer clear of OFM, don’t listen to anything he has to say, because he’s a demon ( Republican) sent by the DEVIL ( the right wing collectively, Trump in particular) to steal your soul. Listen to him, and you will be CAST OUT, you will no longer be a member in good standing of the Democratic Party ( meaning the Clinton camp IS the D party, nobody else matters ) .
You will be hated and reviled, and unwelcome in clean households by all truly righteous and right thinking people- meaning the Clinton camp of course.
It’s LONG been said that the bearers of bad news are apt to get shot for their troubles.
It’s not all that different for the bearers of facts and data that are useful in UNDERSTANDING WHY THE NEWS IS BAD- when such facts and data point to mistakes on the part of the recipients.
I’m not here trying to win a Mr Congeniality award. It’s unlikely I will never meet another member of this forum face to face.
Sticks and stones break bones, but I have a leathery old hide, and words run right off of it.
I like HB and OFM. I wish they could be best friends.
“I listened as they called my President a Muslim.
I listened as they called him and his family a pack of monkeys.
I listened as they said he wasn’t born here.
I watched as they blocked every single path to progress that they could.
I saw the pictures of him as Hitler.
I watched them shut down the government and hurt the entire nation twice.
I watched them turn their backs on every opportunity to open worthwhile
dialog.
I watched them say that they would not even listen to any choice for Supreme
Court no matter who the nominee was.
I listened as they openly said that they will oppose him at every turn.
I watched as they did just that.
I listened.
I watched.
I paid attention.
Now, I’m being called on to be tolerant.
To move forward.
To denounce protesters.
To “Get over it.”
To accept this…
I will not.
I will do my part to make sure this great American mistake becomes the
embarrassing footnote of our history that it deserves to be.
I will do this as quickly as possible every chance I get.
I will do my part to limit the damage that this man can do to my country.
I will watch his every move and point out every single mistake and misdeed
in a loud and proud voice.
I will let you know in a loud voice every time this man backs away from a
promise he made to them.
Them. The people who voted for him.
The ones who sold their souls and prayed for him to win.
I will do this so that they never forget.
And they will hear me.
They will see it in my eyes when I look at them.
They will hear it in my voice when I talk to them.
They will know that I know who they are.
They will know that I know what they are.
Do not call for my tolerance. I’ve tolerated all I can.
Now it’s their turn to tolerate ridicule.
Be aware, make no mistake about it, every single thing that goes wrong in
our country from this day forward is now Trump’s fault just as much as they
thought it was Obama’s.
I find it unreasonable for them to expect from me what they were entirely
unwilling to give.”
Author unknown.
Thanks for the warning!
It is doubtful that the unknown author believes his own lyin’ words, though.
You can’t tolerate ridicule, which makes you an ‘intolerant’. Hardly a liberal by any means. You want to dish it out but you won’t take it anymore. Your name must be Howard Beale!
Has Jon Stewart left America and gone to Canada yet?
Where is he now? Still in America? Amy Schumer in Spain yet? Barbara Streisand, where did she go? Whoopi Goldberg still here? Miley Cyrus said so too. How about it, have they flown the coop or not?
Are they going to stay here in the new and improved fascist state of the US of A?
Worthless words from members of the phony baloney left who just can’t stop crying.
Empty promises from left wing nuts once more.
Has Jon Stewart left America and gone to Canada yet?
God you are such a right wing nut case. Jon Stewart never said he was moving to Canada. But you insinuated that he did. That makes you a liar. Also, none of those other folks said anything about leaving the US if Trump got elected. More lies.
The former “Daily Show” host told People magazine last year that if Donald Trump won the presidency, he’d be “getting in a rocket and going to another planet, because clearly this planet’s gone bonkers.
http://www.newsday.com/entertainment/celebrities/celebrities-who-said-they-ll-leave-america-if-donald-trump-becomes-president-1.12588837
Other reports had the word ‘consider’.
If Jon Stewart can make stuff up, I will too.
My advice to Jon is to go to Canada, for his own good. Another planet might be better, I can agree, but Canada is much closer and the Canadians are more open minded than most murkans these days.
Forget America, Canada is a better place to be.
Count me in, Americans have gone bonkers.
The former “Daily Show” host told People magazine last year that if Donald Trump won the presidency, he’d be “getting in a rocket and going to another planet, because clearly this planet’s gone bonkers.
Oh goddammit Walter, Bill Maher said Trump’s daddy was an orangutan. Trump sued him and produced his birth certificate showing that his daddy was not an orangutan. To which Bill Maher replied: “Does that idiot not know a joke when he sees one”? Or something to that effect.
To which I reply to your assertion that Jon Stuart said he would go to another planet… (not Canada)… if Trump were elected.
To which I reply: Are you such a fucking idiot that you do not realize a joke when you see one? Any goddamn fool would have known Bill Maher was not serious when he said Trump’s daddy was an orangutan. Likewise any goddamn fool would have known Jon Stuart was joking when he said he would go to another planet if Trump was elected.
Donald Trump Sues Bill Maher over Orangutan Joke
Well said HB,
There is a substantial core of truth in your post. I wonder who actually wrote it. It’s well enough done that it has some tell tale hallmarks indicating it’s the work of a real professional.
Rants from foot soldiers usually contain some self contradictory ideas, examples, facts, etc. This one is entirely internally consistent.
From here on out , the more you post about the faults and crimes of the R party in general, and Trump in particular, the higher my opinion of you will rise, and the more I will post on other subjects.
But you can rest assured I will be posting any juicy Trump links I run across FIRST, before somebody else posts them.
Trump is our COMMON enemy, even though you may not yet have come to this realization.
As Churchill famously said, he would at least favorably mention the Devil himself in Parliament, if he were to come out against Hitler.;-)
I can work WITH you from here on out. I was working FOR you , in respect to the LONG TERM, all along.
Hi Survivalist,
I am not free to name him, but I have an old friend from the TOD days who an one time maintained two or three different personnas at that site, so as to play them like puppets in order to make his points.
If I didn’t have HB to spar with, I would need to INVENT HB.
I didn’t and don’t want to call the run of the forum members idiots to their face, especially a few of the more important regular contributors. I can best get the hard core Clinton partisans among them to THINKING about my arguments by avoiding a direct confrontation with them, you see?
Hard core Clintonistas have an intellectual blind spot when it comes to Clinton. They allowed their loyalty to blind them to the possibility that she was the WRONG candidate, and that she was at high risk of losing.
Running somebody distrusted and disliked and even reviled by close to half, or maybe even more than half of the electorate is a mistake from the word GO.
When your team is out on the athletic field, playing for the ultimate prize, the White House, the Super Bowl of politics, you don’t necessarily want the coach to put YOUR favorite quarterback out there, if he’s not what he used to be, if he’s apt to get sacked and intercepted too easily. You want to be thinking about whether it’s best to be playing the backup who is maybe in FAR BETTER shape, who hasn’t recently had his ass kicked in eight or ten tough games.
Clinton has suffered a thorough ass kicking that she brought mostly on herself, the speeches, the flip flops, the emails, the shady business deals, the former partners in jail, etc.That ass kicking goes ALL THE WAY back to Arkansas , like it or not.
Somebody accused me of being the dupe, the sucker, the victim of the R wing propaganda a couple of days ago, and I offered to discuss Cattle Gate with him, here in this forum, where most of the audience is mathematically literate. He won’t, nor will anybody else.
Neither he nor any other D partisan has EVER come forward in this forum to discuss this scandal with me, because it is utterly and absolutely obvious what the result MUST be, if the audience knows some basic math. This audience knows basic math.
Clinton herself was one of the most potent tools in Trump’s toolbox, in terms of winning the election. She was arguably the D party’s biggest liability, in terms of losing.
Think about it.
All the things I am in favor of, the traditional D party is in favor of, and the D party as it exists today is ok with me on things issues such as civil rights, etc, although I will quibble about some of the details in that area.
What I am NOT in favor of is the BUSINESS AS USUAL REPUBLICAN form and style of government. I am OPPOSED to most of what the R party STANDS for, although I believe in some of the things it PRETENDS to stand for.
In recent times, the D party has morphed into a REPUBLICAN LITE party that goes along with most of what the R party stands for economically, although it pays some lip service to the interests of the working class and poor people.
Yes, it passed the ACA act, but it was written in such a way that it could not have been DELIBERATELY better designed to poke a sharp partisan stick up the backside of the people who pay for it, and the large majority of them appear to be R type voters.
The primary goal was and is admirable, but the EFFECT on the elections held since then makes it look a hell of a lot like a Pyrrhic victory to me. YMMV. Other folks mileage may vary.
Personally I believe that if the bill for the ACA had been sent to the Treasury, which is the proper place for government bills, the ACA would not have played much of a role in motivating the R voters. It might even have been a net plus for the D’s that way.
Anybody who does not agree that the current day D party is best described as Republican Lite, on economic policy, EITHER lacks a deep enough understanding of our political landscape to actually KNOW, or ELSE cynically maintains otherwise due to reasons of partisan and tribal loyalty.
To me, it’s perfectly obvious from the walk she walks, in recent years, and a SUBSTANTIAL portion of the talk she talks, that HRC’s real loyalties lie more with the one percenters, when you get right down to brass tacks. Yes, she USED to do a hell of a lot for ordinary people, but in recent times, she has pretty much taken them for granted.
YES_ I DO NOT LIKE HER !
That should be obvious enough for a six year old.
But MOSTLY I have been trying to get it across is that it’s STUPID to run a candidate that is at high risk of losing because she ( or he ) comes into the race pulling a mile long baggage train,.
What MATTERED, in terms of WINNING, is what the electorate BELIEVED. It’s as obvious as the noon day sun that a hell of a lot of people BELIEVE she is ethically and morally unfit to be president..I ‘m one of them.
I hammer away at these points for various reasons.
I want to piss off and irritate Clinton partisans, because doing so provokes them into posting comments that I can use to prove my points.
And I ENJOY poking sharp sticks up the backside of people who have called me the dupe, the idiot, or Worm Tongue, etc.
I was RIGHT about the RISK. ( I believed she would win, and said so, except on days I got worried Trump would pull off the upset. ) Clinton managed to snatch a defeat from the jaws of what should have been a cakewalk victory, considering that the R party, AGAINST the wishes of the R PARTY ESTABLISHMENT, ran the worst and most reviled candidate in THAT party’s history.
She was such a piss poor candidate, and such a piss poor campaigner, that she actually managed to lose to a candidate the opposition party establishment wanted about as much as you want a dose of the clap. ( a colloquial term for gonorrhea )
Any D voters who read my comments will hopefully think MORE about who they support in the primaries, and support the candidate they believe will be best positioned to win the actual ELECTION, NEXT time around.
I would have shortened this rant up, except I promised HB to post something, and this is it.
It’s time to move on now, and I will, except when somebody accuses me of being the fool, lol.
Hey, has anybody considered the possibility that HB WANTS me to post this stuff?
Oh what twisted webs we weave, sometimes. 😉
This guy is fun!
“How pathetic of Anthony Watts to resort the the perennial climate denier game “hide the incline” with the predictable climate denier tactic “show such a short time span there’s no context.”
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2017/01/20/u-s-temperature-anthony-watts-plays-hide-the-incline/
Watt is my head doing up my a**?
Time for some reflection, some armchair analysis, some more musings, and to poke some fun at politicians, they deserve it, they are always asking for it, all of them, they have it coming to them in spades. Politicians really know how to squawk, I tell ya.
After listening to our glorious leader speak the Inaugural Address yesterday at high noon, it sent goose steps up my spine.
Although, it was very, very good, magnificent, tremendous. You have to have a very good feeling about the new president duly sworn into the Office of the Presidency.
You have to accentuate the positive, even if there isn’t any, and attenuate the negative. The nattering nabobs of negativism will accentuate the negative for sure, though, have that one covered.
I mean, come on, have a heart, make sure you say a prayer for the new Preznit. He needs all the help he can get and God’s won’t be enough, yours is needed so much more than God’s it is imperative that you do. Goldman Sachs will help Donald do God’s Work, they’ve been doing it for so long, they don’t need God’s help at all!
Did you hear the reverent words spoken by those representing God at the inauguration?
Those words that are ignored the most, especially by the newly, duly elected el presidente, the words that compel the human spirit to believe that there is more than mere mortals to the existence of the whole enchilada.
America is very fortunate to have a president who abides by reverent words.
Aren’t there a set of rules handed down by God to Moses when he was up there on Mount Sinai? Or was it from Mt. Si in the Cascades? A much better place to be handing down some rules to abide by.
15 commandments, five were removed when Moses dropped the third tablet of commandments and they broke apart, according to Mel Brooks, so there are only ten, five were destroyed before anybody could read them, didn’t need them at all, I suppose. Unknown knowns, but there is one commandment in the remaining ten that says you shouldn’t commit adultery. Says it pretty darn plain and clear. Thou shalt not commit adultery. What part isn’t understood?
The members of the clergy conveniently forgot about those 15 commandments, five of which are a mystery to them, but the other ten should be rote. Oh well.
Let’s examine some more of those commandments, can’t remember what they are, but some come to mind.
Like these:
Don’t steal. check
Don’t kill. check
Don’t lie. check
Don’t covet. check. Translates to don’t cheat too. That means coveting your neighbor’s wife, which is very hard to do if you are Donald Trump. Bill got a deferred action on that one, the fury of hell awaits Bill, nothing like the scorn of a woman, though. Hillary will tell you all about it.
Who in the hell wants to abide by things like the Ten Commandments and other such nonsense? Nobody here on earth, that’s for damn sure.
I’ll see them all in hell. har
RW- you proved it- the jester is a fool, a grand one. I want my goat back.
“Don’t covet. check. Translates to don’t cheat too. That means coveting your neighbor’s wife”
Rightwing Walter, you can have her back. Come and pick her up. Like an unleashed dog she keeps returning for a treat and her bottom rubbed. She keeps saying something about business not getting done at home.
Har
HB is so insufferably stupid he wouldn’t know a pole cat from a pussy cat.
Or alternatively,maybe he’s just such a little pussy he gets his jollies making such remarks from his mommy’s safe porch on the internet.
Which is it HB? Stupidity, or malice?
I think maybe it’s a combination of both.
You’ll be ok as long as you stay on your porch, but it would be best that you not venture out into the world where you might forget and make such a remark in the physical presence of a man.
Oh get a sense of humor
When you talk about other people, depending on who they are, I could care less. When you insult me, or RW, I reserve the right to take offense as I please, although RW is a big boy and can look after himself. He might not be back for a day or two, so I took it on myself to return the insult on his behalf, before this thread goes dead.
Call me stupid, that’s ok, deluded, that’s ok too, but there’s a line we should not cross in getting personal.
You don’t apparently don’t realize that.
Slate has a news feed /blog on the first hundred days of Trumpster land.
It’s a handy place , they will be gathering up the worst dirt all in one spot.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/01/20/the_peaceful_transition_of_power_it_s_happening_we_get_it.html
http://theslot.jezebel.com/donald-trump-plagiarized-bane-in-his-inaugural-speech-1791429625
The World Bank in association with the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) has made some renewable energy resource maps available under it’s Renewable Energy Resource Mapping Initiative
World Bank unveils Global Solar Atlas
This is interesting and should be of particular interest to underdeveloped or developing countries that have limited ground based data. It is the first global solar resource map I have been able to access with resolution down to 1 km. One just has to zoom in on a particular location and click on it to get their estimates of solar resources for that location. Nice!
So what is going on in eastern China, a huge drop in solar insolation? Is it the pollution?
I can only guess but, based on their description of how the data was collected it is quite possible that pollution could cause those readings. In February 2015 there was a big fire at the landfill in Kingston, Jamaica. I remember looking at Google maps satellite images for the areas around the fire for months after the fire and they were quite hazy to say the least. It was obvious that the images were captured while the fire was burning.
You can read up on their methodology at http://solargis.com/support/knowledge-base/methodology/solar-radiation-modeling/ and from my reading it would appear that they cover all the bases so, the horrendous pollution in China would be a factor. If the stories one hears about poor visibility are anything to go by, it has to be a factor.
Probably a combination of pollution and the long rainy season.
Direct normal solar radiation China
http://www.nrel.gov/gis/pdfs/swera/china/china40kmdir.pdf
You need to remember that Google satellite images often don’t update for weeks/months/years.
NAOM
That’s the weird part. The images don’t update for months but, they just happened to have updated the region around the fire during the three weeks or so that the fire was burning. We had dark hazy images of the area around the fire for about six months! I know this because I have a little Wikipedia project that involved me using the satellite images to try and spot large rooftop PV installations.
The picture below shows the landfill in relation to a large warehouse in the lower of the two images. The line in the image is exactly 1 mile. Can you spot the PV on the rooftops in the upper image? Hint: there are two installations.
Fair enough, but did the dark, hazy image update during that 6 months?
One of the installations stands out but the second!!!! Nope!
NAOM
I’m not really being fair since even using the clear satellite image it is very difficult to detect the faint grid of the PV modules on the southeasterly facing sections of the roof of the large warehouse. In late June of 2015, when I started the Wikipedia page Solar power in Jamaica, I was made aware of the largest PV installation in Kingston through this page on the web site of that installation’s inverter manufacturer, found by looking at their publicly available sites for the island.
The first data for that project showed production starting some time in May so as a result, I would have been looking for that big installation to appear on the roof of one or more of the company’s buildings and I remember being frustrated by the dark hazy images at the time.
I was also looking for the installation in the upper left of the picture below since it was mentioned on that company’s web site as a project they had started. I did detect the installation in the lower right corner of the picture below, since it ‘s very high contrast allowed it to be visible despite the haziness. A friend of mine had also told me about the one you were able to spot since he had actually done some work on that roof.
So, I was looking for these installations and not been able to find them because the hazy images probably predated them. I kept checking to see when they would replace the hazy images in the hope that updated images would reveal what I was looking for. IIRC it took longer than six months.
One last remark on the Google maps updating process is that it seems very inconsistent. In one case back in August, while I was on my way to an annual agriculture show, I detoured for half an hour or so to visit the site of the newly built 20 MW Content Solar Farm, less than five miles from the show ground. A friend of mine was working at the site and giving me directions but, I had Google Maps on my phone showing me exactly where I was on the map so Google should have been aware of my trip to a location in the middle of nowhere. When I got home I labeled the location on Google maps and lo and behold, within a few days the image had changed from an open field to a solar farm!
On the other hand, the image below clearly shows a new highway under construction, connecting the north of the island to the south. That section of the island consists or limestone with a layer of soil (mostly bauxite) so, the limestone underlay of the road is in stark contrast to the surrounding greenery. I first drove the entire length of the highway back in May of 2015 so the road has been complete since May but, the images date from long before construction was complete.
My most recent trip along the highway was back in December so I tried the trick, this time using Google Maps Navigation, ignoring the guidance and following the highway, just to let the system know that there’s a road there (a phone traveling at speeds of up to 65 mph has got to be on some sort of road) . It’s been a month now and Google Maps satellite images are still not showing the parts of the highway that go through undeveloped areas as complete or in some cases not at all.
Cant figure out what their basis for updating images is.
And here is a similar product for the USA-
https://maps.nrel.gov/nsrdb-viewer/#/?aL=8VWYIh%255Bv%255D%3Dt&bL=ujuxuD&cE=0&lR=0&mC=34.27083595165%2C-102.26074218749999&zL=4
Annual yields of maize, soybean and wheat could decline by 49%, 40% and 22%, respectively, compared to yields under today’s temperatures.
https://www.carbonbrief.org/high-temperatures-hit-staple-crops-us-century-study-says?utm_content=buffer19666&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
That article states impacts to those crops in accordance with global average temps of plus 5. It seems to me that much of those crops are grown in the northern hemisphere and that the northern hemisphere is warming faster than the global average.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/crutem4vnh/mean:12/plot/hadcrut4gl/mean:12/plot/crutem4vnh/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/trend
I would very much like the opinion of OLD FARMER MAC on this video and I particular the Seneca cliff image shown at 46 minutes and 30 seconds into the video.
So sorry Survivalist,
It won’t play for me. I’m using an old computer right now that got the automatic TEN new programming, and I can’t figure out how to fix it. I want to watch it too.
But I’m a computer klutz, so that’s to be expected.
Next time I can get a kid to come by, hopefully he will show me what I’m doing wrong.
Alternatively they could decline by -20% and actually increase like they have been doing for 170 years of global warming. they are just guessing because they have no clue.
Yes Javier, that’s it. They’re just guessing. Just throwing darts in the dark. Not a clue what they are up to. Are you delusional?
Speaking of having no clue, how’s your track record for predictions going?
“All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time.” ~ Javier
https://archive.is/F9a1N#selection-1995.0-2021.289
Not very well I see. You were just guessing because you had no clue. Amazing how you think you know what is going to happen in the future, except that you never get it right.
This is Javier’s latest prediction:
“For 2017 and 2018 the annual global average temperature will not be significantly (≥ 0.1°C) above the average for 2001-2016. For September 2017 and September 2018, Arctic sea ice extent as defined and measured by the Danish Meteorological Institute and OSISAF, will not be lower than for September 2007.”
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-january-1-2017/#comment-591246
Javier appears to have switched tactics from predicting no more warming to predicting no significant warming, or as others might call it, just a little bit of warming.
Cite correctly. I said if there was a strong La Niña in the summer of 2016. There wasn’t one. La Niña cannot be predicted.
If ifs and buts were candy and nuts.
“All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time.” ~ Javier
https://archive.is/F9a1N#selection-1995.0-2021.289
Fail
ENSO (El Nino + La Nina) can in fact be predicted. It’s a standing wave oscillator that has a somewhat erratic cycle related to the periodic cycling of the earth’s angular rotation rate.
http://contextearth.com/2016/11/21/presentation-at-agu-2016-on-december-12/
If you can predict it, I am sure you can publish it. Actually you could make millions if you are the only person that can predict ENSO.
” Actually you could make millions if you are the only person that can predict ENSO.”
How can I make millions if I already placed the physical model for ENSO into the public domain?
I’ve finally figured it out.
Javier is Baghdad Bob.
Hi Javier
They sure as fuck are NOT guessing about the effect of the average temperature in growing areas rising by four or five degrees, because when this happens, the inevitable exceptionally hot days will be hot enough to result in production crashes up to a HUNDRED percent.
I KNOW. I have a degree in the field and a lifetime of practical experience to back it up, and I have seen crops wither and die with my own eyes, several times, due to a string of extremely hot days, in relation to local norms and calender dates.
Now of course there is some reason to hope that we can adapt, by using varieties of wheat for instance that are suited to hotter climates ( currently grown at the southern boundaries of the wheat growing regions) in more northerly areas, and at higher elevations, and that we can develop new varieties that are more tolerant of hot spells, etc.
But as a practical matter, we can’t count on great success in making these adaptations, and there isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that we can just up and move food production from Western Europe to Siberia, or from the American bread basket up into Canada.
The Russians and the Canadians would have a few choice things to say about such ideas, and while I have never yet researched Siberian soils, most of the land in Canada that is well suited to farming is already being farmed. The part that’s good but not being farmed already is pretty much in the hands of various peoples and governments up that way that take a VERY dim view of any except the most minor of changes.
I suppose you might have heard of the Canadian Shield.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Shield
This is an interesting slide deck.
http://www.earth-policy.org/images/uploads/book_items/WOTE_FoodSlidesEarthPolicyInstitute.ppt
It recalls the 2010 Russian heat wave that saw Russian grain production drop by 40% and resulted in Russia banning grain exports.
BUT BUT! Increased CO2 and heat are supposed to increase wheat yeild. Maybe the Ruskies are still trying Lysenkoism and expect that exposing wheat plants to increases in CO2 and heat will produce hardier plants…
This is an interesting study on the 2010 Russian grain export ban secondary to the heat wave that reduced harvest.
https://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/rr-impact-russias-grain-export-ban-280611-en.pdf
And how do we link weather events to climate change?
The prediction is that we should see an increase in heat waves frequency and intensity as global warming takes place.
The statistics show we don’t see such increase.
January 13, 2017 — All charges have been dropped against Vanessa Gray, Stone Stewart and Sarah Scanlon who shut down Enbridge’s Line 9 pipeline on December 21, 2015 on Anishnaabe territory just outside of Aamjiwnaang and Sarnia.
They were charged with mischief endangering lives and mischief over $5000. as their lawyers explained, these exaggerated charges were a scare tactic used to intimidate them and future water defenders from engaging in direct action. however, the court could present no evidence to convict them on these charges.
“The only way Enbridge can prove these cases is by admitting that their pipelines are subject to rupture.”
https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/north-to-alaska-part-4
Pipeline security is gonna be big business.
A guy up in Alberta named Wiebo Ludwig. He would seal off wells with poured concrete mixed with shotgun shells to dissuade the use of jackhammers to remove the concrete. There are some very creative saboteurs in this world. They laid spike belts, blew up propane tanks, cut power lines, fired shots at well operators and truck drivers, and once even plowed up a big snow berm to block a road and posted signage saying the berm was rigged with explosives. Just a few folks cost the industry millions. RCMP had a task force but they were useless to stop it. Rural areas were hard to police back then. UAV’s could today get video evidence but back then it was the county mounty. Good at handing out speeding tickets. Not exactly cut out for counterinsurgency with vandals.
As well some natives up in Canada who were dissatisfied with land claims issues once had a campaign called ‘if justice fails stop the rails’. The activists stated that a simple piece of copper wire, for example 8 feet of uninsulated stranded 3AWG ground wire (wiring for main service panels in a house, or science experiments) can stop thousands of tonnes of train traffic. The wire, laid across the tracks will mimic a blockage and trigger the electronic sensors telling the trains to stop. Covering the wire between the tracks will make it more difficult to detect. They would wrap the wire around one rail then bury it across to the other rail and wrap that rail too. It was difficult to detect and required inspectors to clear lines.
It’s amazing what a smal group of creative and motivated people can do.
“A review of the Fifth Assessment of the IPCC suggests that while positive and negative projections of impacts on crop yields counterbalance each other at global level until about 2030, the balance after that becomes increasingly negative”
http://www.fao.org/3/a-i6030e.pdf
Amazing how they know what is going to happen in the future, except that they never get it right.
It is easy to make predictions. It is hard to get them right.
Somehow I have a hunch that after 2030 we are going to have other worries than climate change.
Who’s they who never get it right in this particular case Javier? Everyone except you? Oh wait, I forgot. Your not very good at predictions either.
“All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time.” ~ Javier
https://archive.is/F9a1N#selection-1995.0-2021.289
Fail! It was broken in 2016.
Amazing how they know what is going to happen in the futurE.
In science if the predictions from your hypothesis fail so spectacularly, it means that you are wrong. This failure to recognize this problem and your insistence that you are still right clearly shows that your professional work is bad.
No prediction. A possibility conditional to a strong La Niña in the summer of 2016, that never materialized.
https://youtu.be/D9NTBp1TNNo
Are we sure this is our friend?
Apparently there is still a lot of disagreement about the Little Ice Age, concerning it’s extent.
This link throws some light on the debate.
I’m hoping somebody who is is more knowledgeable than I am will say a thing or two about it.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141119204521.htm
This study says the onset of the “Little Ice Age” was initiated by multiple volcanic eruptions over a 50 year period then perpetuated by a sea ice-ocean feedback. Makes the most sense so far. One would expect some global effects from a regional change that large and long.
The models showed sustained cooling from volcanoes would have sent some of the expanding Arctic sea ice down along the eastern coast of Greenland until it eventually melted in the North Atlantic. Since sea ice contains almost no salt, when it melted the surface water became less dense, preventing it from mixing with deeper North Atlantic water. This weakened heat transport back to the Arctic and creating a self-sustaining feedback system on the sea ice long after the effects of the volcanic aerosols subsided, he said.
http://www.colorado.edu/today/2012/01/30/new-cu-led-study-may-answer-long-standing-questions-about-enigmatic-little-ice-age
It doesn’t make any sense at all, because volcanic eruptions only have an effect for a few years. We know that both from proxy records and from the Pinatubo and El Chichón eruptions during instrumental era. They are claiming an effect for which there is no experience and no evidence. Of course they base it on a model.
Oh, sorry Javier, too complex for you, has more than one variable.
Javier, I can no more disprove that crop yields on a world wide basis have IMPROVED as the result of warming than you can prove the contrary.
But it’s utterly obvious that you either don’t know doo doo from apple butter about the effects of unusually hot weather on crop production, or else you pretend otherwise, in saying we don’t know what will happen if average temperatures continue to increase.
And even the greenest apprentice mechanic knows that if you hit something once or twice with a hammer, the effects of the blows might be minor and of short duration.
But get with it with the hammer, and pound on it for a while, and it is apt to have a hell of an effect.
From wikipedia
In a 2012 paper, Miller et al. link the Little Ice Age to an “unusual 50-year-long episode with four large sulfur-rich explosive eruptions, each with global sulfate loading >60 Tg” and notes that “large changes in solar irradiance are not required.”[6]
Throughout the Little Ice Age, the world experienced heightened volcanic activity.[74] When a volcano erupts, its ash reaches high into the atmosphere and can spread to cover the whole earth. The ash cloud blocks out some of the incoming solar radiation, leading to worldwide cooling that can last up to two years after an eruption. Also emitted by eruptions is sulfur, in the form of sulfur dioxide gas. When it reaches the stratosphere, it turns into sulfuric acid particles, which reflect the sun’s rays, further reducing the amount of radiation reaching Earth’s surface.
A recent study found that an especially massive tropical volcanic eruption in 1257, possibly of the now-extinct Mount Samalas near Mount Rinjani, both in Lombok, Indonesia, followed by three smaller eruptions in 1268, 1275, and 1284 did not allow the climate to recover. This may have caused the initial cooling, and the 1452–53 eruption of Kuwae in Vanuatu triggered a second pulse of cooling.[6][14] The cold summers can be maintained by sea-ice/ocean feedbacks long after volcanic aerosols are removed.
Other volcanoes that erupted during the era and may have contributed to the cooling include Billy Mitchell (ca. 1580), Huaynaputina (1600), Mount Parker (1641), Long Island (Papua New Guinea) (ca. 1660), and Laki (1783).[20] The 1815 eruption of Tambora, also in Indonesia, blanketed the atmosphere with ash; the following year, 1816, came to be known as the Year Without a Summer, when frost and snow were reported in June and July in both New England and Northern Europe.
Ocean circulation[edit]
Thermohaline circulation or Oceanic conveyor belt illustrated
Another possibility is that there was a slowing of thermohaline circulation.[39][68][75][76] The circulation could have been interrupted by the introduction of a large amount of fresh water into the North Atlantic, possibly caused by a period of warming before the Little Ice Age known as the Medieval Warm Period.[30][77][78] There is some concern that a shutdown of thermohaline circulation could happen again as a result of the present warming period.[79][80]
Decreased human populations[edit]
Welcome to the climate wars, OFM.
We know the hypothesis that the LIA was due mainly to enhanced volcanic activity to be false because two very well established facts that contradict it.
1. We know the effect of volcanic eruptions on temperatures to be short lived. Temperature proxies reflect very well a few years of cooling after the eruption (blue bars), followed by a rebound in temperatures (orange bars). They don’t affect the general trend. This short-lived effect agrees well with modern instrument measurements after El Chichón and Pinatubo eruptions. So the “did not allow the climate to recover” part is not sustained by evidence.
Sources in the figure. You can see some of the eruptions you talk about there. Second argument in next post.
And,
2. We know thanks to sulphate in ice cores that the deglaciation and Holocene Climate Optimum (HCO), up to 7500 years ago had a lot more volcanic activity than the Little Ice Age (LIA). So it turns out that the warmest period in the Holocene, the HCO, had a lot more volcanic activity than the coldest, the LIA. Clearly the hypothesis that volcanic activity drove the LIA is bogus.
No problem. Most hypothesis are wrong.
There is often disagreement in science about how to interpret evidence. If you look at glaciers or peat bogs it is very evident that the Little Ice Age was a global event. It is also well demonstrated that the LIA was also colder at the tropical Indo-Pacific Warm Pool. Those that defend that the LIA affected only the Northern Hemisphere are clearly wrong.
I think the problem comes because almost 95% of the paleoclimatological evidence about the climate of the past comes from the Northen Hemisphere. This is a sampling problem as for centuries geologists and climatologists have been from the Northern Hemisphere, and it is always cheaper to get records without having to travel much.
In the late 90’s and early 00’s there was an attempt by a group of prominent climatologists to erase the Medieval Warm Period and to make the LIA a regional event so the only global climate change in thousands of years was current warming. But apparently it has failed and both MWP and LIA are now quite established, and confirmed by numerous articles, like the one you link.
8 minutes after 4 in the morning in Spain. You’re up early. The last time I was awake at 4am I was on my way to bed.
this is a full time gig.
Let’s look at some 30 year trends in temperature and Ocean Heat Content…
The graph below shows the same temperature data and regression fit of CO2 to temperature as the previous graphs I have posted. Similar to Dennis’ model, the regression is a fit of temperature to the logarithm of CO2 lagged by ten years to account for the heat capacity of the mixed layer of the ocean (roughly 100 meters). Except Dennis does not fit to lagged CO2.
Then 30 year trends are calculated for each year from 1975 up to 2016, so the left-most blue square is the 30 year trend for temperature from 1946 to 1975. The last blue square on the right is the trend from 1987 to 2016.
The red diamonds are the same 30 year trends calculated for the CO2 regression model. It is the “predicted” temperature based on CO2 levels lagged by ten years. It essentially represents something similar to a simplified hybrid ECS/TCS of 2.8C per doubling of CO2.
Finally, the 30 year trends in Ocean Heat Content (OHC) are in green. There aren’t enough OHC data at the beginning, so the green circles don’t start until 1979. The units for the trend in OHC are 10^22 Joules/ quarter, so multiply the number by four to get the rate of annual incremental heat added to the oceans.
What I found interesting and thought provoking is the fairly good ANTI-correlation in the temperature (dark blue squares) and OHC trends (green circles). When temperature trends are going up quickly from the 70’s up to 1991, the OHC trends are flat to declining. When the acceleration in the temperature trend slows down, rising much more slowly from 1991 to 2003, the OHC starts rising slowly (with some waviness). Then the last part has temperature trends declining slightly from 2003 to the present, while OHC trends accelerate vigorously.
It’s like the heat either goes into the ocean, or it goes into driving up surface temps.
From this we could derive a prediction:
If temperature trends start accelerating significantly, then the current rapid acceleration in the OHC trend should slow down, level off or even decline.
OR, conversely, if the temperature trends stay level (low or zero acceleration), the OHC will continue their acceleration.
Either way I predict the blue squares will stay pretty close to the red diamonds, as they always have up to now. Javier predicts the blue squares will decline back to zero (temps stay near 0.6C for for several decades, producing a sharp decline in the 30 year trend rate).
……
Please note that the current plateau in temperature trends – near zero increase since 1991 – means temperatures are rising steadily, but not going up faster and faster like the OHC is right now.
The 30 year trend is analogous to a smoothed derivative of temperature or OHC – it represents the RATE of change, not the absolute difference in temperature from the beginning to the end of the period.
…..
You should look at actual rate of warming to see that anthropogenic global warming has failed to produce a higher rate of global warming as it should.
Doesn’t seem to be much of a hiatus since the 70’s.
How about some regressions on that?
NAOM
More than one variable again, beyond Javier’s comprehension. Half of the warming has been blocked by aerosols. Yet still the global surface temperature rise rate has increased. The rate of temperature increase has doubled in the last fifty years.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/GlobalWarming/page2.php
The problem is that natural global warming and man-made global warming don’t look very different. Shouldn’t they?
Interesting they all meet around 2015. I wonder what bearing ENSO has on this given that it can throw out huge amounts of heat.
NAOM
ENSO is an oscillator. A long-term trend, like 30 years, washes out the short term variation of ENSO cycles (which average about 3 to 4 years in length).
The read and blue lines have to stay close to each other, that’s how the regression math works. The green line is scaled to fit, so it coincides near 2015 purely by coincidence 😉
Another way to look at the data is 30 year averages. The trend calculation in the previous chart is like a derivative – it tends to accentuate the noise. The averages chart below is the opposite, the 30 year average filters out the short term noise, so it show how the long term change in temperature follows CO2.
There are long term variations still remaining. Natural variability does exist. Solar output has changed – the early 1900’s were low compared to the 1940’s to 1960’s. Volcanic aerosols were higher for several decades from 1880 to 1920, and much lower from 1930 to 1960.
When the annual increases in CO2 were small, natural variability could easily overpower the CO2 warming rate. Since 1970, not so much, especially when looking at 30 year averages that filter out the short term noise.
This is interesting, though not really new:
Facts, beliefs, and identity: The seeds of science skepticism
‘”We find that people will take a flight from facts to protect all kinds of belief including their religious belief, their political beliefs, and even simple personal beliefs such as whether they are good at choosing a web browser,” says Troy Campbell (University of Oregon).’
‘Dan Kahan (Yale University) agrees, finding in their research that “the deposition is to construe evidence in identity-congruent rather than truth-congruent ways, a state of disorientation that is pretty symmetric across the political spectrum.’
‘Merely talking about “evidence” or “data” does not typically change a skeptic’s mind about a particular topic, whether it is climate change, genetically modified organisms, or vaccines. People use science and fact to support their particular opinion and will downplay what they don’t agree with.’
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-01/sfpa-fba011317.php
Hi George,
Ya suppose philosophers, playwrights, novelists, and poets, and even old farmers might have known this for as far back as maybe forty thousand years or so ago? 😉
I have said a hundred times that people believe what they want to believe, and what they want to believe is based on their cultural and tribal loyalties as much or more than any other factor. 😉
It was unnecessary for me to figure it out for myself. I read all about it well before I got out of high school.
I bet you did too.
It looks as if Fox News thinks Trump in church is more important than a million women going way out of their way to protest his very existence. This is to be expected, of course. Fox is for all practical purposes a wholly owned subsidiary of the R party, when it comes to political news.
http://www.newshounds.us/fox_news_gives_short_shrift_women_s_march_on_washington_012117
But Fox does run some fairly good coverage from time to time concerning renewable energy, or environmental issues, in the business section.
I wonder if that coverage will be gradually removed, to be replaced by cheerleading for the fossil fuel BAU establishment. It seem’s likeliest to me it will be cut back but not eliminated, because a lot of people would go elsewhere looking for it, and once they’ve gone looking, Fox is at risk of losing them.
It looks like Trump has forbidden the National Park Service to post pictures of HIS crowd, compared to Obama’s crowd. This is both laughable and as serious as chest pains if you have heart trouble, as a warning of things to come.
It looks like Trump has forbidden the National Park Service to post pictures of HIS crowd, compared to Obama’s crowd. This is both laughable and as serious as chest pains if you have heart trouble, as a warning of things to come.
Yeah, next he will command the tides not to rise at his Miami resort.
Given that just about everyone nowadays has a smartphone with video capabilities, internet access and a twitter account, fortunately we don’t need to depend on the National Park Service to post pictures for us… Trump may be POTUS but for starters there are millions of women all over the world protesting him today. Trump does not control the internet and he has the women of the world pissed at him, no pun intended…
And any body with brains enough to wipe his backside knows that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.
If I ever find my self in the cross hairs of more than maybe two women simultaneously, I’m headed up the holler into the deep woods, and crawling under a big rock, and I’m not about to come out again until I’m about forty pounds lighter, I can find a rock abutting a spring branch. 😉
You mean Jon Stewart was only joking? damn!
What is written is merely for the purpose of raising tolerance and awareness.
A world foreign to those who feign to be liberal. They are far from it, not even close.
Bigots are of any stripe. There is intolerance everywhere you go these days. Especially those so-called modern day liberals, they’re totally unaware of how intolerant they’ve all become..
I have thousands of goats, goat roping is a skill few know. Will Rogers was the greatest goat roper who ever lived. He was a goat roping fool himself. He got lots of goats.
But, hey, I understand, everybody knows we’re here on a ship of fools.
Have a good Sunday in Pleasant Valley.
When a ‘jester’ is determined to not be at all funny, people ignore them. Consider it done.
http://www.techtimes.com/articles/193852/20170122/carrington-like-solar-storm-that-could-hit-earth-within-next-decade-may-cost-us-more-than-40-billion-daily.htm
We have talked about this possibility before. I still haven’t found out if we can detect space weather events on near by stars, so as to have a better idea how often these big solar storms might actually occur.
And I haven’t yet run across any good info as to how likely it would be that such a storm would fry the electronics in a modern automobile, etc, nor what the minimum specs would be for a Faraday cage adequate to prevent it.
From the article
”Experts have varied views on the potential severity of blackouts associated with CMEs. Some think that the outages would last only hours or up to a few days. Other think that blackouts would last weeks or even months because transmission networks could be knocked out and would require replacements. – See more at: http://www.techtimes.com/articles/193852/20170122/carrington-like-solar-storm-that-could-hit-earth-within-next-decade-may-cost-us-more-than-40-billion-daily.htm#sthash.ZnLKEid8.dpuf ”
I’m certain that unless things change damned fast from here on out that a major event could knock out the grid for a VERY long time. The knock on consequences could be so bad we could never get the grid up again, and here’s WHY.
I have not heard that the utilities are stocking up on transformers and other extremely scarce long lead time spare parts or that they are doing much in the way of preparing to shut down the grid,and disconnect it into as many discreet parts as possible, on very short notice, so as to keep induced current surges from running wild thru irreplaceable switches, breakers, computers, etc.
Getting into a safe shutdown mode will have to be an automated process, because it would take thousands of times more hands on skilled workers to giterdone in a day or less than are available. That means that making a fast move to safe mode possible requires spending megabucks starting yesterday. THAT means a safe shutdown is probably not in the cards.
If I am technically way off base in any part of my analysis, somebody PLEASE point out where I’m wrong, and I will sleep a little better, and thankya truly. 😉
Being called a chicken little doesn’t bother me at all. I ‘m called a LOT worse just about every day of my life.
The large transformers than are used by the thousands, and scattered all over the place, are built to last more or less indefinitely, and are kept in service more or less indefinitely, maybe for forty years or more.
Since they are so well built, it’s rather unusual for one of them to fail, meaning that the electric utility industry needs to keep only a VERY few spares on hand.
Now although these things are used by the thousands, but the market for new ones is VERY limited, because they so seldom fail, and thus the only real need for new ones is for EXPANSION of the grid.
THAT means that there are very few companies that build new ones, and that they are built mostly on a one at a time basis. You can’t mass produce these things, they’re built to specs, CUSTOM ORDERED.
The lead time to get a big new one is from at least a YEAR on up.
With the grid down, and hell on earth bloody reality even within the confines of gated subdivisions in rich communities, it might not be POSSIBLE to build new ones at all.
And waiting for years for delivery ………….
A really big solar storm could literally wipe us out. It wouldn’t be just the end of life as we know it, but the literal end of the lives of ninety five percent of the people who read this comment.
I could live for a few years without electricity,or gasoline or diesel fuel, or just about anything else not already on the place, but the odds are high I would be murdered within a matter of weeks by starving people willing to do anything whatsoever to put some food in their belly.
But if the cards were to fall in my favor, I might be able to fort up,with mutual help from a few old friends who might manage to get here, and we might manage to hold out until the roving mobs either starve or die of exposure or kill each other. That could take anywhere from a few months to a few years.
We would have to eat mostly horse chow and cow chow concentrates , but it’s actually pretty decent food, if you can choke it down, and it keeps indefinitely if you keep it dry. You can haul home enough in a pickup truck in one trip to last an individual a year.
Anybody in the USA who is ever in a position such that he is worried about access to food for the next year, and has a few bucks and access to a truck could put his hands on a ton in a matter of hours, if he lives where there are farms or pleasure horses. But he would have to act VERY quickly indeed. In store stocks would sell out in an hour once the public is aware the shit is in the fan. Store owners would just close their gates to anybody except personal friends and maybe a couple of long term customers, knowing their next delivery might be delayed……… days? weeks? months?
Anybody who buys a truck load of feed concentrate can sell his load a few weeks later to a horse owner or farmer for just a little less than he paid for it, in the event it’s not needed.
I really don’t have more than a foggy idea how likely it is that a killer solar storm will hit any given year, except that the odds are high enough that it’s prudent to have a plan in mind, in the event one does hit. My plan is about as bare bones as it can get, just stock up on non perishable food as fast as humanly possible, and hope to ride it out with a few old friends.
I have always practiced keeping non perishable stuff on hand in substantial quantities, because it’s cheaper to buy in quantity anyway, and more convenient. A drum of diesel or ton of fertilizer is apt to cost more next year , and a thousand bucks in the bank won’t draw enough interest to pay for the gas to make two or three trips to town to buy in smaller quantities over the coming year.
It helps that my potential fellow doomsteaders are all LITERATE rednecks who believe we have a GOD GIVEN (mild sarcasm intended ) right to own weapons, etc, and that we are proficient in their use, and that a couple of us (not I) are old soldiers who survived serving in Vietnam and Iraq where bullets were actually flying, rather than in rear echelons.
Any links to sites where real astronomers and scientists hang out and there is an on going discussion of this topic will be greatly appreciated.
If the annual odds of such a catastrophe are one in ten thousand or less, the issue is entirely negligible as far as I’m concerned personally. If they’re one in a thousand, that’s ample justification for the thought I have given this matter.
And if they’re one in hundred, or worse, I ought to be proactively doing a few things to prepare.
Having a couple of tons of salt on hand would make it possible to salt down a lot of beef on the hoof that would otherwise be impossible to care for, and to guard from other folks ready to kill for a full belly. Salt’s dirt cheap, and it will keep forever, if kept dry.
The silver lining in this storm cloud is that any of us who survive, if the storm hits, can quit worrying about cutting back on fossil fuels. That problem will take care of itself for a couple of generations at the very least.
First of all , a Carrington-like event would not have the energy density to wreck small electronics that was not connected to the power grid. It could harm the power grid. We do have some warning due to a satellite placed between us and the sun, however I doubt if the operators will take the chance of shutting down the grid or will react fast enough. Can breakers act fast enough?
This is a real advertisement for distributed power systems.
The new map singled out the northern edge of the Midwest—especially Minnesota and Wisconsin—as vulnerable to geoelectric storms for two reasons. First, the shape of Earth’s magnetic field causes space weather to have bigger impacts at higher latitudes. When clouds of ejected material and energy from the sun hit Earth’s donut-shaped magnetic field, some of it is deflected, but the rest is shunted toward the ground near the magnetic poles. This material interacts with Earth’s magnetic field, creating auroras and the electrical surges that flow through the planet’s surface. The closer to the poles a power grid is, the more likely it is to experience problems during geoelectric storms. Using historical data from a network of geomagnetic observation stations, the researchers were able to calculate the statistical likelihood of how strong storms could get in a given region.
But that’s not the only factor at play: Some areas of Earth’s crust are more conductive than others. Over the last few years, the National Science Foundation has sponsored a “magnetotelluric” survey of large swaths of the United States…
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/09/space-storms-could-crash-upper-midwest-s-power-grid
The thing about saying a Carrington like event will not destroy free standing electronic equipment is that it’s true, but we don’t actually KNOW, so far as I know, if CME’s ten times bigger, or even a thousand times bigger, are possible.
Nor do we have any real idea how often such an event might happen.
So far as I can tell, from just casual reading, we would know about such a big one if it had happened maybe as far back as we have tree ring data, etc. It would be detectable in any preserved wood still around, but maybe not in petrified wood.
Am I right about this speculation?
OFM,
Science has taken a look at this as at anything else we can think of.
Usoskin, I. G., & Kovaltsov, G. A. (2012). Occurrence of extreme solar particle events: assessment from historical proxy data. The Astrophysical Journal, 757(1), 92.
“The probability of occurrence of extreme solar particle events (SPEs) with proton fluence (>30MeV) F30 ≥ 1010 cm−2 is evaluated based on data on the cosmogenic isotopes 14C and 10Be in terrestrial archives covering centennial–millennial timescales. Four potential candidates with F30 = (1–1.5) × 1010 cm−2 and no events with F30 > 2 × 1010 cm−2 are identified since 1400 AD in the annually resolved 10Be data. A strong SPE related to the Carrington flare of 1859 AD is not supported by the data. For the last 11,400 years, 19 SPE candidates with F30 = (1–3) × 1010 cm−2 are found and clearly no event with F30 > 5 × 1010 cm−2 (50 times the SPE of 1956 February 23) has occurred. These values serve as observational upper limits on the strength of SPEs on the timescale of tens of millennia. Two events, ca. 780 and 1460 AD, appear in different data series making them strong candidates for extreme SPEs. We build a distribution of the occurrence probability of extreme SPEs, providing a new strict observational constraint. Practical limits can be set as F30 ≈ 1, 2–3, and 5×1010 cm−2 for occurrence probabilities ≈10−2, 10−3, and 10−4 yr−1, respectively. Because of the uncertainties, our results should be interpreted as a conservative upper limit on the SPE occurrence near Earth. The mean solar energetic particle (SEP) flux is evaluated as ≈40 (cm2 s)−1, in agreement with estimates from lunar rocks. On average, extreme SPEs contribute about 10% to the total SEP fluence.”
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1207.5932.pdf
In practical terms it means that we get (as a planet) a strong particle event about every 200-500 years on average. There are no known 50x Carrington events. However the study does not detect the Carrington event in the proxies, so it appears it was a weak one.
Although there’s no way to know if tomorrow is the day, with some luck our technological civilization will be over by the time the next one hits.
“There are no known 50x Carrington events. ”
My point is that so far as I have yet found out, we really haven’t got a clue as to whether 50x Carrington events are possible, or how often they might be expected to occur.
The most we can say for sure is that we don’t think there has been one within the past x years, or else we would have found indications of it.
I’m not at all sure about how many years are represented by X, but about a thousand to two thousand years may be in the ballpark.
I seek enlightenment.
Remember the tsunami that made us a present of the biggest and baddest nuclear accident so far ?
If we had known more for sure about the odds of such a tsunami occurring , maybe that plant would have been at a higher elevation, or never built at all.
Cost of induced electricity blackouts.
http://news.agu.org/press-release/extreme-space-weather-induced-electricity-blackouts-could-cost-u-s-more-than-40-billion-daily/
How about this for a lazy Sunday morning mind stretching exercise?
https://eos.org/research-spotlights/buzzing-ice-shelf-makes-waves-in-the-air-above?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_content=buzzing-ice-shelf-makes-waves-in-the-air-above
Since this thread is about dead and Dennis will probably be posting a new one…… here are some quotes worth a smile or a thought.
The totally convinced and the totally stupid have too much in common for the resemblance to be accidental. Robert Anton Wilson
I tried to edit my 12:42 and didn’t get back in time. Here’s the rest.
I’m hoping some of the brighter bulbs here will have something to say about sure ways of separating the totally convinced from the totally stupid.
Another
We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid. Benjamin Franklin
I agree with old Ben, within the ( omitted ) context of the quote, but it’s just not true as a generality.
Countless people are born into and trapped in lives where they really don’t have much if ANYTHING AT ALL in the way of opportunity to learn very much. I know many such people myself.
(Fortunately none of them are youngsters these days, they’re all older people. The kids nowadays know there’s a big world out there, and that r they have a good to excellent shot at doing as well or BETTER someplace else.)
Their minds are as good as anybody’s, but they’re like computers without adequate and accurate data. You can’t crunch it if you don’t have it, and if you haven’t got it, you are very likely to come to the ACCURATE conclusion that it’s beyond your reach.
They mostly make the best decisions they can be expected to make, given their circumstances, and the data they have to work with. It’s easy to believe you can do better, if you have role models who HAVE done better. If you don’t…..
Making fun of them is a BIG mistake, politically. It reinforces their already strong tendency to stick with what they know. Sticking with what you know, when you have NOTHING to fall back on but your position in the community in which you live is a very wise decision, if you want to be reasonably sure you will continue to live, and that you will be around to support the people who supported YOU when you needed it, as a child, or an adult in a bind.
People in this situation are most often either young and rebellious, or desperate, in order to make the leap and pack up and leave.
In recent times, the ones that have packed up and left in countries like the USA have generally survived, and a lot have thrived.
But in other places they may be at greater risk of perishing than surviving, never mind thriving. . and it seems to me that they usually understand that this is so…..if they even come to realize that packing up and leaving is even POSSIBLE.
Blaming such people for the circumstances they were born to, and the decisions they make within the context of their lives, is as utterly stupid as blaming a black man for being born black.
It’s really sad that so many people who are well enough informed to understand this perfectly obvious fact continue to look down on such people, and make fun of them, for various reasons….. none of them reasons to be proud of.
And it’s not only stupid, it’s sort of hypocritical in terms of the tolerance the liberal establishment preaches on a daily basis.
Even worse, it’s a major major political risk, because it leads to political backlash.
Can any of you nose in the air sniffy talking types spell T R U M P?
Hmmm, resonance can cause structural failures in materials.
Here’s another. Voltaire is a writer of stature comparable to that of Franklin as a poltician and scientist, but quotes taken context sure can make you look silly.
To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. Voltaire
I guess if even if Trump has never accomplished any thing else worth mentioning, he has proved that Voltair. is sort of dated, in this one respect, lol.
This one is one to keep in mind, when making decisions about one’s personal life, and one’s political allies and enemies.
The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.
Thomas Szasz
This one ought to be hanging on the wall in every office, every business, home, and bar.
It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong. Thomas Sowell
Incidentally all these are copied from BrainyQuotes.
Let me tell you something about full moons: kids don’t care about full moons. They’ll play in a full moon, no worries at all. They only get scared of magic or werewolves from stupid adults and their stupid adult stories. Neil deGrasse Tyson
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/stupid_2.html
Solid gold, and a perfectly VIABLE explanation for our status quo predicament.
The wise are instructed by reason, average minds by experience, the stupid by necessity and the brute by instinct. Marcus Tullius Cicero
Memo to White House: Calling voters stupid is not a winning strategy. Karl Rove
Both parties fail to heed this memo at grave risk, both short and medium term.
It can mean losing short term, and it can mean losing two or four years down the road.
The stupid things you do, you regret… if you have any sense, and if you don’t regret them, maybe you’re stupid. Katharine Hepburn
It’s time to get out of this easy chair, and outside, and get a little exercise.
Prosperity Gospel and Trump
http://www.cracked.com/blog/trumps-bizarre-religion-weirder-than-scientology/
PVMA estimates global PV installations at 75 GW in 2016, expects stable market in 2017
300 GW of solar PV installed worldwide must be preventing a fair amount of carbon emissions! Add to that almost 500 GW of wind power (see graph below plus an estimated 60GW for 2016) and it would seem that global renewable energy production is growing quite nicely!
Solar provides 4.3% of Japan’s electricity during 2016
This is after having an installed base of 3,618 MW of PV at the beginning of 2011, the year of the Fukishima incident and ending up with 33,300 MW at the beginning of 2016. According to the story I linked to in the post above this one, Japan added 8,600 MW in 2016 for a total 41,900 MW. If their installations continue as planned, Japan should end up second in terms of installed capacity globally. Only China will have more. Somebody should tell President Trump, the US is currently fourth in this race and if he wants the US to start winning again he’d better get out of the way of the people who want the US to stay firmly in this race!
Somebody should tell President Trump, the US is currently fourth in this race and if he wants the US to start winning again he’d better get out of the way of the people who want the US to stay firmly in this race!
Trump is owned by fossil fuel interests! Hopefully he will be impeached the sooner the better! He also wants to get out of the TPP! China must laughing all the way to the bank!
http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/In-Gear/2017/0119/New-Wyoming-bill-forbids-utilities-from-using-renewables
New Wyoming bill forbids utilities from using renewables
Republican legislators recently introduced a bill that would essentially ban large-scale renewable energy in the state by 2019.
Brilliant move by the coal lobby of Wyoming! Though I think it is tantamount to a declaration of war and it is a war they will lose. Republicans are much stupider than I ever thought possible and I already thought they were pretty darn stupid!
Yeah I saw that but, I didn’t want to steal the anti-renewables crowd’s thunder. Now you’ve gone and spoiled it for them by posting it before they spotted it! 😉
On the other hand,
Feds approve 1st phase of largest US wind project in Wyoming
Grab your popcorn folks! This one promises to be a doozy!
Isn’t most of the coal from Wyoming burned outside of the state? Wouldn’t that limit any effect Wyoming itself has on the coal industry? Sort of like bringing a pea-shooter to a gun battle.
Currently, yes, but the state government along with the University of Wyoming has an exciting Carbon Engineering Initiative that aims to use Wyoming’s incredible coal reserves to produce value-added products within the state. Beyond that many stakeholders are working hard to increase international exports of Wyoming coal along with investigating the feasibility of constructing a coal refinery.
http://www.nationalcoalcouncil.org/studies/2016/NCC-Spring-2016-Kipp-Coddington-Carbon-Mgt-Institute.pdf
http://www.uwyo.edu/ser/research/carbon-engineering/
I agree that our upcoming high tech materials will need carbon, so why are they in such a hurry to burn it up and reduce their long term resource income?
The rest are energetic pipe dreams. Government must increase coal subsidies and ignore all it’s external costs to keep the market stable or growing.
Some of our greatest welfare recipients.
But, along with timber and cattle and mining, the government feeding trough is a part of Wyoming life (one of my favorite states).
(although it is only 16th Nationally)
Red States generally live off Federal Aid:
1 Mississippi 62.08 11 1
2 New Mexico 55.45 2 8
3 Alabama 53.00 5 9
4 Louisiana 51.29 39 2
5 Tennessee 50.07 20 3
6 Montana 49.51 12 6
7 South Dakota 49.34 19 4
8 Kentucky 47.37 10 12
9 West Virginia 46.64 7 16
10 Missouri 45.07 30 5
They better enjoy the high life for the short term they will get it.
Currently, yes, but the state government along with the University of Wyoming has an exciting Carbon Engineering Initiative that aims to use Wyoming’s incredible coal reserves to produce value-added products within the state.
Right!
Your Republican Governor is a dishonest moron of the highest order! he wants the people of Wyoming to go back to the stone age and live in caves. Coal is uneconomic and it is downright stupid!
https://goo.gl/pakDkf
At nearly every turn Mead has raised a fist of defiance in the face of reality, be it with the economy, the environment, the federal government or his apparent conviction that the “Wyoming way” means rejecting science that doesn’t conform to a 19th-century world view.
Just a few weeks ago the governor vowed to again “double down” on Wyoming’s commitment to coal even as three of the biggest coal companies in the state sit in bankruptcy or teeter on the brink of it. Even as some of those companies appear poised to walk away from their liberally granted “self-bonding” requirements, which were supposed to pay for clean-up of the public lands they’ve soiled.
The inability of those companies to fulfill their promises means federal taxpayers are likely to get stuck covering a tab that could reach hundreds of millions of dollars or more.
As Tea Party Wyomingites still curse the Obama administration for completing the Bush-Cheney bailout of Wall Street banks and the auto industry, caused by a Great Recession that began on Bush’s watch, perhaps they might explain how the bonding fiasco does not equate to a taxpayer-subsidized bailout of big coal?
I don’t live in Wyoming, Fred. Although I’ve been there many times and could drive to Gillette, the coal capital of Wyoming, within a few hours if I wanted to.
I’m guessing you’ve never been to this region? Your attitude comes across as a stereotypical coastal liberal who will do anything to avoid “flyover country,” yet somehow feels justified in belittling the people who live there.
yet somehow feels justified in belittling the people who live there.
I didn’t belittle the people, it is the government of Wyoming that is the problem and that is who I’m speaking out against!
I just have a profound dislike of fascism which people who are pushing coal and other fossil fuels seem to love.
I also don’t like Orwellian double speak and alternative facts.
BTW, I’m a citizen of planet earth and have no idea who or what a coastal liberal is. As someone who has lived in countries other than the US, I have seen first hand the results of populist nationalism. It sucks big time!
Thanks to the current administration the US has officially been demoted from being a full democracy!
http://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/25/us-is-no-longer-a-full-democracy-eiu-warns.html
The U.S. has been demoted from a full democracy to a flawed democracy for the first time, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).
Every year, the firm’s Democracy Index provides a snapshot of global democracy by scoring countries on five categories: electoral process and pluralism; civil liberties; the functioning of government; political participation; and political culture. Nations are then classified under four types of governments: full democracy, flawed democracy, hybrid regime and authoritarian regime.
We are losing time with backwards thinking by pushing a 19th century industrial coal based economy while the rest of the world is embarking on a 21st century clean energy revolution.
The US is well on its way to becoming a third world country in all metrics.
On the Weather Depends the Harvest, and on the Harvest Depends Everything
European grain yield stagnation related to climate change, says Stanford scholar
http://news.stanford.edu/2015/02/20/wheat-yield-climate-022015/
The fingerprint of climate trends on European crop yields
http://www.pnas.org/content/112/9/2670
“in 2010 and 2012, high nighttime temperatures affected corn yields across the U.S. Corn Belt, and premature budding due to a warm winter caused $220 million in losses of Michigan cherries in 2012.”
https://www.epa.gov/climate-impacts/climate-impacts-agriculture-and-food-supply
CLIMATE CHANGE THREATENS AMERICAN AGRICULTURE
http://www.popsci.com/climate-change-threatens-american-agriculture
About climate
https://www.wired.com/2017/01/wet-year-wont-beat-californias-never-ending-drought/
It’s critical that people actually understand reality, as it is laid out in this article.
But the Steinbeck qoute at the end perhaps says more about us, and about the future, than the entire article except that last paragraph.
Half a century ago, John Steinbeck wrote in East of Eden: “And it never failed that during the dry years the people forgot about the rich years, and during the wet years they lost all memory of the dry years. It was always that way.” We now have an opportunity to prove him wrong, to remember even in wet years that the lessons learned in dry years can stay with us.
People that live close to the land have long memories.
I fear that those who get their livings doing things that would be mostly incomprehensible to their great grandparents, and their groceries in supermarkets, and live in houses where everything but the food is magically taken care of, have short memories.
Short memories imply relative ignorance, in respect to many aspects of the physical world, and therefore a tendency to take unnecessary chances.
A great read for those who are into biology and nature:
https://www.wired.com/2017/01/life-begin-dividing-droplets-hold-answer/
Even without El Niño, 2016 is the hottest year on record by a long way.
https://www.carbonbrief.org/interactive-much-el-nino-affect-global-temperature?utm_content=bufferbbae7&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
A 19-station index along the Arctic Ocean observed only 5 below normal days in 2016.
http://ak-wx.blogspot.ca/2017/01/arctic-update.html?m=1
We already had the discussion in the last thread about how these numbers represent weather, not climate. In other words, using them to push a personal climate change fanaticism is disingenuous.
The other thing to keep in mind about the Arctic is all the “in-filling” the meteorologists have to perform to the weather data there. Because there are few human settlements up in the far north, there are few observation stations there. Even among the stations that do exist, getting the data out to the wider world can be problematic due to the lack of telecommunications infrastructure or other logistical challenges. Consequently, scientists have to do a lot of “massaging” of actual data in order to get any semblance of understanding of the parts of the Arctic where they have no concrete data. Therefore, any “index” that claims to represent the current state of the entire Arctic should be looked at with, at the bare minimum, a critical set of eyes.
Trigger Warning
And yet a 19-station index along the Arctic Ocean observed only 5 below normal days in 2016. No infilling. Just measurements of temperature. That’s a lot of warm weather. 360 out of 365 days worth.
“We already had the discussion in the last thread about how these numbers represent weather, not climate. In other words, using them to push a personal climate change fanaticism is disingenuous.” ~ Steven Haner
FYI
Premise: (noun) previous statement or proposition from which another is inferred or follows as a conclusion.
Conclusion: (noun) a proposition that is reached from given premises.
https://youtu.be/OpNoCmNtP5c
“Even among the stations that do exist, getting the data out to the wider world can be problematic due to the lack of telecommunications infrastructure or other logistical challenges. Consequently, scientists have to do a lot of “massaging” of actual data in order to get any semblance of understanding of the parts of the Arctic where they have no concrete data.” ~ Steven Haner
Thanks for the heads up Steve. Where would we be without you and your inside scoop on the details of Arctic telecommunication logistics? Pure comedy gold.
For all interested parties, I suggest you peruse the following page for the facts before it too, is removed:
NASA, NOAA data show 2016 warmest year on record globally
After all we cannot expect the web pages of state agencies to contradict the head of state now, can we?
The page linked to above provides a link to another page:
https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/
No need to speculate about the measurements, how they are made, collected and adjusted. The facts are all there.
You can always go to the European Environment Agency. In Europe even the right wing fascists do not dispute the science behind anthropogenic climate change.
http://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/figures#c5=&c15=all&c0=15&b_start=0
Another fun, “fact filled” post, brought to you with the kind sponsorship of the Happy Billionaires!
“The Party told you to reject all evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
~George Orwell, 1984
Tamino is a foolish blogger that believes he can remove the effect of El Niño on global average temperatures. Already the fall in global average temperatures since March 2016 has proven him wrong.
Thanks Bob.
“You guys are such losers, coming after me with ad hominem attacks. It is the recourse of those left without arguments.
You don’t realize those attacks tell a lot more about you than about me. You come out as losers.” ~ Javier
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-jan-18-2017/#comment-593010
What So Many People Don’t Get About the U.S. Working Class
https://hbr.org/2016/11/what-so-many-people-dont-get-about-the-u-s-working-class
This is for NickG,
We ran out of reply slots up above.
I don’t intend to be personally disrespectful to you, either.
So as a PERSONAL matter, I apologize. We’re all big boys and girls here, and we all know it’s hot in the kitchen, so it’s perfectly acceptable to sling a little mud concerning the validity of anybody’s beliefs and opinions.
In terms of debating the specific question, I will continue to believe you are shooting off your own toes, another one every time you try to refute my point.
I don’t CARE what you believe, personally, or if I convince other forum members I am right, and you are wrong, in terms of winning or losing this particular round.
MY INTENTION , MY OVERALL goal, is ONE to provoke any reader of my comments to think about the issues from an ADDITIONAL, DIFFERENT perspective, thereby widening the range of conclusions he MIGHT reach in deciding his future courses of action. Reading my stuff might also help him prove his own arguments, even if they are contrary to my mine.
TWO, to provoke replies that enable me to spot blind spots in my own thinking, and get rid of them, or correct my reasoning, as necessary. The more replies to the contrary I get, the better.
I don’t mind admitting it when I’m wrong. But later on, when I publish for real, I want to be as sure as possible that I am RIGHT. So……. Thank you , Nick, for helping me get my ducks in a row, factually.
And while a less intelligent person might not appreciate this fact, I am sure YOU do. We are basically in the same book, and mostly in the same chapter, and often enough on the same page.
So it pays to remember what Ronnie Raygun had to say about such a scenario.
If somebody agrees with you eighty percent of the time, he’s your friend.
Domestic squabbles aside, I salute you as a friend and ally, in terms of the BIG PICTURE.
Now back to a little domestic cat fight’n, as far as the SPECIFIC argument above, concerning how we present the case for renewables is concerned, I simply cannot conclude anything except that you are utterly incapable of understanding what I am talking about, or ………….
I have often remarked that you are remarkably consistent, so consistent in sticking to your messages, in fact, that I strongly suspect you are a professionally trained PR guy. Such people NEVER admit they are wrong, and they NEVER admit the opposition has a VALID point.
So ……. I conclude you DO get my point. I conclude that you ARE highly intelligent. And I conclude you simply do not wish to acknowledge I have a valid point.
Anybody that has been paying any attention at all for the last forty or fifty years HAS to understand that the people of this country are mostly lead around by the nose via sound bite coverage of the issues, rather than by reading and listening to accurate and in depth reporting of the issues, and making up their own minds after serious thought.
Given this reality, I am convinced I have made my case, in respect to the way we COLLECTIVELY PRESENT the case for renewable energy, and that you have stuck your foot in your mouth, and are trying to avoid acknowledging you lost this point.
I conclude you simply do not wish to acknowledge I have a valid point.
Mac, I’ve agreed that perception and messaging are important. Let me say it again:
I agree that getting the right sound bites are important. Heck, I believe that’s why Trump won the election: Fox News et al have succeeded in spreading vast amount of misinformation and toxic, unrealistic anger/fear over the years. I’ve been saying that for years on TOD and POB: the technical issues about energy and climate are all solvable: it’s the politics and messaging that need fixing.
I was trying to say that we need to come to agreement on the technical issues before we move to messaging…
Now….on the technical issue – I’m just as baffled as you. Javier’s point was dead wrong. The fact is that *seasonal* energy storage just isn’t needed yet, and that the tech and engineering to solve that problem, when it’s needed, are all there. It’s just not a big scary predicament, as his argument would suggest.
So, I’m baffled as to why I’m not able to communicate that to you. Perhaps you can figure out the correct way to say it…
Sure , Nick, just DON’T SAY IT if it isn’t TRUE, and then go back and weasel by adding the qualifier or caveat ” not needed yet” .
It is as obvious as the noonday sun that WE MUST HAVE FOSSIL FUEL BACKUP POWER NOW, TODAY, NOW ,TONIGHT , in order to make use of wind and solar power within the context of an electrical grid.
Saying we don’t need it is sticking our collective chin out for a knock out round house blow, in the public arena, because these days we win or lose such debates in the public arena using sound bites.
It’s FINE, it’s GREAT to talk about new solar farms, or new wind farms, generating electricity cheaper than new or even old gas or coal fired plants, so long as you tell it like it is, and like it is involves acknowledging that we MUST KEEP MOST , maybe even nearly all, of our existing fossil fuel fired plants ready to run, for quite some time yet.
If you (rhetorical ) cannot understand why a man on the street thinks you are talking bullshit, when you ignore this sun at high noon obvious fact, and the anti renewable faction points it out, making you ( rhetorical) look just as phony and slimy as the coal junkies look to US ( renewable’s advocates ) when WE point out they fail to acknowledge the externalized costs of burning coal when arguing that coal is cheap……….
It’s just not intellectually honest to go around saying an electric car costs only x dollars, when the actual fucking price of the car is X plus Y dollars, Y being however much the purchaser can get in the form of a tax rebate.
Pardon my french sir, but the goddamned cost of the car is equal to whatever the MANUFACTURER GETS FOR IT.
And anybody who happens to be even REMOTELY even handed in his judgement of this argument will agree with me. The fact that one guy can get a new electric car for say five thousand less than another guy who for some reason cannot get the five grand tax break simply means in non partisan terms that one guy is the beneficiary of successful special interest lobbying, in THIS case the lobbyist’s being those working for the electric car industry, environmental organizations, etc.
The car does NOT cost less , although the actual purchaser pays less. The difference is paid by guys like me, and maybe guys like you, if you haven’t bought one yourself, and collected the subsidy.
You are prone to saying things that make you look utterly foolish when the opposition is at bat in the court of public opinion.
This forum is not the court of public opinion. The audience is too small, and we are a self selected group with a substantial body of knowledge at our disposal, and HERE , in this forum, we know what you mean, even if what you actually SAY is demonstrably misleading when and if it is overheard by a typical man or woman on the street, because the typical man spends about as much time in a YEAR thinking about such topics as the regulars here spend on them in a single DAY.
None of what I have said should be interpreted as an indication I am opposed to subsidizing the electric car industry. I AM in favor of these subsidies, although I believe they should be arranged in a more equitable fashion so that lower income people can benefit from them as well.
I just try to tell it like it IS.
Tens of millions of people are opposed to these subsidies, and if THEY read your remarks in respect to the cost of buying subsidized electric car……………… well THEIR opinion of YOUR motives and honesty parallels your opinion of the motives and honesty of the Koch brothers defending their coal mines, when they avoid mentioning the externalized costs of using coal.
Am I making it OBVIOUS enough YET?
No, you’re not remembering things right.
1st, Javier claimed that a 100% renewable grid wasn’t possible. Ever. I refuted that. I never said that fossil fuels were not needed on the grid right now. It wasn’t part of the discussion.
I have never argued about the net cost of EVs, after tax credits. I have always talked about the manufacturer’s cost *without* tax credits. I HAVE stressed that operating costs are important, and that EVs like the Leaf have a Total Cost of Operation that is about as low as cars get (again, excluding the tax credit). I also have at times pointed out that at least 90% of new car buyers can take advantage of the tax credit by leasing, and that EVs like the Leaf have a crazy low TCO with the tax credit, but those were never main points. I’ve always taken pains to exclude the tax credit for cost discussions.
You have noticed that I’m careful what I say, and try to be somewhat consistent. For some reason that sometimes strikes you as a possible negative. I don’t know why – it’s because I think what we’re doing here is meaningful, so I try to get things right.
Since there is no slot to reply upthread, I will just copy HB here.
He has oh so GRACIOUSLY offered ME an opportunity to SAVE FACE? HAR HAR HAR
So what are you saying ? The “special lube” is for you big guy ? I tried to give you an opportunity to save face. But I guess that went right over your head too. I think you would be better off not sharing your personal life on an energy blog. Maybe a little more time on a dating websites might help. Good luck.
I didn’t bring up your need for lube, you did(twice). I suggest you google shop “special lube” and see what “pops up”. Don’t blame your problems on me.
Now let’s hear your Trump alternative facts
xxxx
You haven’t even a stub of a leg to stand on, but it’s obvious you are too stupid to ever understand that you are so stupid you can’t comprehend your own stupidity.
Yep, the lube I mentioned is for me. I have machinery that requires that sort of thing.Tradesmen and jobbers refer to them as specialty products, specialty lubricants, specialty paints, specialty fasteners, specialty this that and the other, because the market for them is limited, and you generally have to order them, as they are not sold in sufficient quantity to stock them in local stores.
I know what the other kind is, and who uses it. I have never had any need for that kind. I stick to women, and they are always nicely lubricated after I use my well educated hands and tongue on them for an hour or so. Old farmers generally do it in a leisurely fashion.
One piece of my machinery would probably fit up your backside, using the other kind of lubricant, but it would cause you quite a bit of pain. I wouldn’t abuse it that way, however, for fear I would catch a social disease, and I don’t owe you any favors, and thus wouldn’t want to give you any pleasures.
I can get as dirty as you like, and if you want a personal face to face confrontation, we can sign up for the tough guy fights.
They have them as preliminaries to the regular fights in lots of places. Perfectly legal, no problems with the law. I’m a Scots Irish southern mountain guy. We’re FAMOUS for being touchy, and for fighting just for the fun of it, the way guys in other places play a little basketball. It’s old hat to me.
We’re all big boys and girls on the net, and slinging a little mud is ok as long as it’s aimed at political and economic opinions, etc.
But if you want to play the entirely personal game, I can play it better than you , and will. Call me stupid, that’s no problem. Imply that I am a pervert or whatever, and I will reply in kind until one or both of us are banned.
Ron and Dennis are patient guys, but they will eventually get rid of us.
I forgot to thank H B for helping me keep attention focused on my arguments.
Oldfarmermac says:
01/21/2017 AT 10:29 AM
Hi Survivalist,
I am not free to name him, but I have an old friend from the TOD days who an one time maintained two or three different personnas at that site, so as to play them like puppets in order to make his points.
If I didn’t have HB to spar with, I would need to INVENT HB.
XXXXX
Your post above makes it pretty clear that your only using myself as an excuse to continue your hate rants toward HRC. Which you regularly posted prior to the election and makes no sense it you truly didn’t want Trump to win. No one believes your current story that you were just trying to help the Democrats prior to the election. Mac, you were part of the conduit of the hate Hillary campaign. There is no if’s, and’s or but’s about it. It’s time for you to own up to your actions.
I think Hillary is a horrible human being. She’s a blood thirsty warmonger who campaigned on a promise of an act of war with Russia (Syria no-fly zone). She’s a damned fool.
Alternative view:
“Actually, in retrospect, I’ve started to think I’m pleased about Trump and I’m pleased about Brexit because it gives us a kick up the arse and we needed it because we weren’t going to change anything. Just imagine if Hillary Clinton had won and we’d been business as usual, the whole structure she’d inherited, the whole Clinton family myth. I don’t know that’s a future I would particularly want. It just seems that was grinding slowly to a halt, whereas now, with Trump, there’s a chance of a proper crash, and a chance to really rethink.”
Oldfarmermac says:
01/23/2017 AT 10:32 AM
Hi HB,
You are constantly proving that you are the biggest fool in this forum, with the possible exception of Javier.
Anybody who knows shit from apple butter knows the R party did everything it could prevent the passage of the ACA .
XXXX
Is the ACA the GOP health care plan from 1993?
If there’s one thing conservatives might hate more than Obamacare, it’s hearing that Obamacare springs from Republican ideas. The Heritage Foundation, the granddaddy of the right-wing think tanks, fumed when President Barack Obama said it was the source of the concept of the health insurance marketplaces where people could shop for the best deal. (We rated Obama’s claim Mostly True.)
Squaring off with Sean Hannity on his Fox News Channel show, Democratic public relations consultant Ellen Qualls could barely get these words out:
Time out!
Is the Affordable Care Act really the same as “the Republican plan in the early ’90s?”
Short answer — sort of. There was a Republican bill in the Senate that looked a whole lot like Obamacare, but it wasn’t the only GOP bill on Capitol Hill, it never came to a vote and from what we can tell, plenty of conservative Republicans didn’t like it.
Republican Sen. John Chafee of Rhode Island was the point man. The bill he introduced, Health Equity and Access Reform Today, (yes, that spells HEART) had a list of 20 co-sponsors that was a who’s who of Republican leadership. There was Minority Leader Bob Dole, R- Kan., Sens. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and many others. There also were two Democratic co-sponsors.
Among other features, the Chafee bill included:
An individual mandate;
Creation of purchasing pools;
Standardized benefits;
Vouchers for the poor to buy insurance;
A ban on denying coverage based on a pre-existing condition.
http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2013/nov/15/ellen-qualls/aca-gop-health-care-plan-1993/
You’ve still got your head so far up your backside it would take a winch to extract it.
Sure there have been proposals made by Republicans in the past, such as the ones you mention, that include features similar to the ACA.
I suppose you are too poorly informed to know that Chafee is usually referred to by the R establishment as a RINO, or used to be, anyway. Look it up.
THAT BILL WAS NEVER PASSED.
The ACA was passed, and the R’s did everything they could to PREVENT it from being passed, and only an idiot who has NO CONCEPTION of how stupid he looks by claiming other wise would make such a claim.
You’re at least proving one thing. You are good enough at telling bald faced lies that even a six year old can see thru that Trump might offer you a job in his propaganda department.
Now here’s a little excerpt from a piece written by UGO BARDI, who is a well known scientist, environmentalist, and writer with a deep understanding of modern day culture. Anybody that wishes can read the whole piece at Resilience.ORG.
“Defeats are supposed to teach people how to do better; in theory. In practice, it often happens that defeats teach people how to become masters in blame-shifting. With some exceptions, this seems to have been the main result of the recent defeat of the Democrats in the 2016 presidential election, where we saw a truly spasmodic search for culprits: Putin, the Russian hackers, the Fake News, the Rednecks, the FBI, Exxon, the aliens from Betelgeuse, and more. Everything except admitting one’s mistakes.”
People who can think accept their mistakes, and change their ways, so as not to make the same mistakes a second time.
Every body knows why the D’s lost the election. Clinton came into the race with a baggage train a mile long. She was condescending and arrogant, and only her hard core trusted her, and even her hard core was suspicious of her.
She displayed an appalling lack of judgement in creating her secret home brew email system,and when it was found out, all the little Clinton lap doggies insisted hacking was no issue. She displayed an appalling lack of sense in openly taking millions of dollars in speaking fees from banksters, considering she was running for president, right along.
When she lost, all her lap doggies reversed course on the hacking question, and started baying about the Russians costing their princess the election. It’s nice having it both ways, but believing it both ways requires a certain minimum level of stupidity.
She displayed an even MORE ridiculuous lack of sensitivity to the mood of the public, and to the needs and fears of the REAL core of the D party, by rubbing the noses of working class people in the dirt, using words such as deplorable, and not even bothering to show up for a campaign event in the states that put Trump over the top.
She was even too full of herself to understand that black and brown people, and gays and lesbians and sex changers and everybody else, except her elitist supporters in English suits and Italian shoes and Prada live, in the words of a very famous bald headed D pit bull, “live in the economy” meaning they have to go to work every day, rather than live on investments or inheritances.
She was a dangerously high risk candidate from the word go, and the biggest reason she got the nomination is that she played the old time machine politician game, using her position as Bill’s First Lady, etc, to gain an octopus like grip on the D party machinery.
You can continue to deny it, but other than prominent D leaders who are as a matter of necessity forced to blame her loss on the R’s, the fake news, the FBI, the Russians, etc, you are alone, except for other little Clinton lap doggies.
There are now enough big D Democrats who have either known it all along, or else who have realized the truth of what I have been saying that they are mounting an assault on the D party establishment that may well result in their kicking the hard core Clinton partisans OUT, to a sufficient degree that they ( they are usually referred to as BERNIECRATS or something along that line ) become the party bosses.
I have posted several links already pointing out this rebellion inside the party on the part of D’s who never wanted Clinton as their candidate in the first place. I will post more, here and there , all along, every time you tell another lie about me.
The bald headed D pit bull is James Carville. He’s one of the meanest and most effective D guys ever, when it comes to ripping R’s to shreds with his tongue. When he says something critical of a Democrat, you can bet your virgin daughters honor that it NEEDS SAYING. He’s about as inside an insider as exists, the sort of guy who could get Bill Clinton on the phone just about anytime at all, a go to man that Bill called when there was a problem calling for his talents.
He was an IMPORTANT MAN in the Clinton administration.
I will say it again. The only people, other than Clinton lap doggie true believers, blaming Clinton’s loss on OTHER people are public D figures compelled to pretend they believe it, because they are part of the Clinton machine, and although Clinton is history, the machine still exists, and they still want to maintain their positions as movers and shakers inside the D party AS IT EXISTS AT THIS TIME. Clinton lost, but her machine still exists, and still controls the D party, but maybe not for much longer.
The Berniecrats are mounting an assault that might succeed. THEY may be in control of most of the key D party positions and offices before too much longer.
HB might eventually get it, one of these days, maybe a couple of years down the road, but if he does, he will NEVER admit it in this forum.
This is for Javier.
“All eight papers dealing with extreme heat events in this year’s Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society’s attribution report show a clear climate change signal that made them more likely, more hot or both. In fact, of the 22 studies scientists have submitted to the annual review over the past four years, only one didn’t find that climate change increased the odds or severity of extreme heat.”
I copied this from the Climate Central site. Took about two minutes to find it.
Sometimes some of the consequences of changing averages lag the average. The number of extremely hot days may actually be increasing at a slower rate than global average temperatures are increasing. I haven’t yet looked very far into this possibility.
If so, the number of extremely hot days occuring any given year will sooner or later accelerate and catch up.
Back to the predictions that are not taking place. Why if global warming is more than a century old we have to wait for the predictions to take place in the future instead of taking place right now?
Do you think the EPA is lying when they show their heat wave index?
That figure shows the annual values of the U.S. Heat Wave Index from 1895 to 2015. These data cover the contiguous 48 states. Interpretation: An index value of 0.2 (for example) could mean that 20 percent of the country experienced one heat wave, 10 percent of the country experienced two heat waves, or some other combination of frequency and area resulted in this value.
https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-high-and-low-temperatures
Here is a very informative graph with the hot daily highs and hot daily lows versus US percent land area during June, July and August.
That graph shows the percentage of the land area of the contiguous 48 states with unusually hot daily high and low temperatures during the months of June, July, and August. The thin lines represent individual years, while the thick lines show a nine-year weighted average. Red lines represent daily highs, while orange lines represent daily lows. The term “unusual” in this case is based on the long-term average conditions at each location.
https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-high-and-low-temperatures
For Javier
https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-high-and-low-temperatures
FIGURE 2
Hi OFM, thanks for posting those links. I’m interested in them too. It seems to me that if climate change is a problem it is for various reasons. It’s impact on agriculture is my biggest concern. Note- having a concern makes one an alarmist to some. It’s a feeble attempt to cast an intelligent discussion as a debate between extremists vs a moderate. A moderate who doesn’t believe in the precautionary principle. Any-who, I feel that modern civilization is based on the assumption of a lot of continued rice, corn, soyabean and wheat production. I appreciate your Ag background and experience and your input to the food security climate change discussion. Thanks again for those links. Prof David Battisti has some good lectures on YouTube if you care to view them.
Precisely OFM,
EPA figure shows that it is the hot lows that are increasing, not the hot highs. Hot highs are similar to the 1930’s, when CO2 was much lower.
So how can anybody predict a disaster for agriculture when heat waves and hot highs are not increasing? Based on what? No wonder agriculture is doing so well. What we have seen is a reduction in crop frost losses as the growing season has lengthened and temperatures have raised.
Javier is not only unacquainted with the precautionary principle, he’s also badly vision impaired, as far as I can tell.
He can’t even see the heavy red line from the sixties on up, lol.
He sounds exactly like either a Republican or Democratic party mouth piece denying obvious facts and saying something might be ( and is, in this particular case ) or might not be true to divert the audience’s attention from the issue.
Sure the “hot lows” are increasing. So are the highs for the day, and according to what I hear inside my profession, they tend to be increasing at the times of the year they cause the most problems for farmers.
I am not yet doing detailed research on this this particular aspect of climate and farming, but I suppose I can find a chart or graph to support my case every time Javier can find one to support his. Later on is plenty soon in this respect, because I can use newer data when I ‘m ready for it.
Incidentally temperatures don’t need to go to the century mark to cause some real problems. The problems can and do start at much lower highs for the day, depending on the calender date, the crop, and the geographical area under consideration.
Any thing in a chart that contradicts Javier’s arguments is always an outlier data so far as he is concerned. But if it works better for him, an outlier is evidence .
I’m sure he can repost the graph with his own trend line perfectly flat by going back thru the thirties at the peak. Outliers don’t exist for him, unless they support his case.
As RW would say, HAR HAR.
One of the characteristics of the temperature rise is the increasing warm nights. That is indicative of a shift in the lower end of the temperature distribution and shape of the distribution.
Droughts go hand in hand with temperature rise and high temperature peaks. Desert regions are predicted to expand as the earth warms. Droughts will become more intense with warming.
According to Javier-Logic, we are just now getting back to the ideal growing conditions of the 1930’s Dust Bowl. Yields should skyrocket! 😉
Nope, the growing conditions in the 1930’s were clearly much worse. Non-CO2 global warming then produced a much greater increase of hot days in the US and lots of forest fires, unlike present global warming.
The precautionary principle clearly states that your actions should not cause more harm that the bad you are trying to prevent.
Was putting all Americans of Japanese origin in concentration camps during second world war a good example of the precautionary principle?
If the dangers of global warming are imaginary, how far should we go to de-carbonize the economy for a negligible effect on temperatures? The estimated cost of the Paris accords is one trillion dollars that according to IPCC models will prevent 0.017°C of warming or the equivalent delay of 4 years in global warming by 2100.
5 minute video on the climatic effect of the Paris accords.
https://www.prageru.com/courses/environmental-science/paris-climate-agreement-wont-change-climate
I don’t think you can invoke the precautionary principle under these conditions.
Hi Javier,
Do you expect that fossil fuels will deplete?
If the answer is yes, won’t we need some substitute for the energy provided by fossil fuels?
It would seem a combination of better energy efficiency and a ramp up of non-fossil fuel energy will be needed in the future whether climate change is a problem or not.
Does it not seem prudent to prepare for a future where fossil fuels may become scarce?
I would note that in most cases you have suggested that my projections for future fossil fuel availability are far too optimistic (you believe there will be less available than my “medium” fossil fuel scenario, and that perhaps my low scenario is also too high).
In fact, your belief that climate change is unlikely to be a problem may in part be explained by a lack of economically recoverable fossil fuels along with a low estimate (less than 2 C) for climate sensitivity.
I think it is possible that climate change might not be a problem if my low scenario proves correct, non-fossil fuel energy is ramped up quickly, and ECS is around 2.5 to 3 C.
I am far less certain that any of these assumptions will prove correct than you seem to be. There is much that is unknown and just as an engineer would build a bridge 2 or 3 times stronger than his best estimate of needed strength just to be safe, it would be better to err on the side of caution in the face of uncertain levels of future global warming.
Dennis,
I believe Peak Oil is already taking place and 2015 could very well be the year of highest oil production.
But while I think we are pretty much doomed to collapse starting in just a couple of decades, I believe we are going to enjoy a very nice climate while we collapse. And I define collapse as entering a downward trend in population, economy, and complexity, interrupted by periods of stabilization (pauses or hiatuses in collapse if you like).
In a very few years we all are going to stop worrying about the climate and start worrying about more pressing issues. Perhaps we will have time before to see that the CO2 hypothesis is incorrect and its future dangers have been greatly exaggerated.
Not all Japanese Americans were placed in camps. Many Japanese Americans served in the US Army.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/442nd_Infantry_Regiment_(United_States)
No, putting most Americans of Japanese origin in concentration camps during second world war is not a good example of the precautionary principle. It’s a good example of risk assessment (and risk management). Perhaps you didn’t know there’s a difference.
Precautionary principle is for the avoidance of risks that are impossible to assess. Risk assessment is the process that is used to quantitatively or qualitatively estimate and characterize risk.
“The precautionary principle demands precautionary measures whenever unknown risks prove impossible to assess”
https://cei.org/outreach-regulatory-comments-and-testimony/are-risk-assessment-and-precautionary-principle-equivale-0
I’m rather sure you don’t know what the precautionary principle is. I’m also rather sure that not knowing what it is won’t stop you from thinking that you do and talking about it nonstop like you’re a leading world expert on it.
“The precautionary principle clearly states that your actions should not cause more harm that the bad you are trying to prevent.”
In this case, as in every case, we have to estimate the odds of the potential harm coming to pass , the costs of the harm if it does come to pass, and the costs of the potential precautionary measures, and do the usual cost benefit analysis.
This has been done many many times, and unless you assume that the odds of major climate problems happening are low to negligible, the result is that it’s a no brainer to implement proactive preventative measures NOW.
The Trumpsters and the Koch brothers and their ilk assume the risks of climate trouble are low to negligible, as you do.
The very large majority of professionals in the fields of public health, climate, physics, agriculture, etc, estimate that the odds of climate troubles resulting from the continuing bau use of fossil fuels are high to extremely high.
And they estimate that the MAGNITUDE of these problems will be CATASTROPHIC, if we continue on our current path.
You’re entitled to your own opinion, and free to express it, but I for one will not let you get away with misleading any newcomers or lurkers who visit this forum.
The example of the internment of the Japanese people is relevant , after some fashion, but not very relevant. It might be used to prove that sometimes precautions are taken that later proved to be unnecessary.
I lock up my shop. I have found out thousands of times that nobody attempted to steal my tools the previous night. Does that prove I ought to leave my shop unlocked??
As for your link, I long ago concluded that Lomborg ( spelling? ) went the route of paid mouthpiece for the business as usual establishment, and I rate his credibility as about equal to your own- meaning close to zero. So does just about every body else, except fossil fuel industry mouthpieces, meaning Lomborg. I presume that hardly anybody has ever even heard of YOU, by comparison to Lomborg.
It’s very easy to cherry pick and exaggerate the worst case estimates of the cost of preventative measures, in respect to future climate problems, while totally ignoring the secondary benefits of taking such measures NOW, while we are still able.
Whatever measures we take will on the average improve public health outcomes, and reduce the risk of war between countries, both economic and literal. Any measures we take now will have the happy effect of speeding up progress in various fields ranging from A to Z all the way along the economic alphabet.
And such efforts will have the very happy effect of EXTENDING the life of our one time gift of nature finite depleting endowment of fossil fuels.
It’s easy to deliberately overlook the undeniable fact that natural gas depletes just like oil, and that we will be wishing ten years down the road we had used that one time gift of cheap gas more wisely, because it’s not always going to be cheap.
Virtually every body in this forum knows that conventional natural gas production is in terminal decline. I don’t pretend to know how long the CHEAP part of the tight gas endowment will last, but I am dead sure it won’t last FOREVER, and I’m of the opinion it won’t last much longer than a decade , if it lasts even that long.
Outfits like the one you quoted pull numbers out of the air, as it suits them. Outfits like the CDC and Greenpeace cite their sources.
Folks interested in knowing what sort of outfit prageru is can google the term, and they can see for themselves. I guarantee they will NOT be impressed.
You’re running neck and neck with my little lap doggie HB when it comes to winning the forum’s dunce hat award.
Keep it up. I’m accumulating useful working notes engaging in this little pissing match. It’s wet and muddy and not very pleasant outside. I’m inside enjoying a nice warm fire and an Irish coffee. This sort of thing is both work and recreation to me. I’ve got all night, and if I fall asleep, there’s tomorrow. 😉
As my dear departed blunt spoken country woman Mom used to say, I can tear up anything you are likely to post ” like a chicken on a dry cow turd”.
Are you having any fun yet?
Bring it on, I’m used to working in manure up to a foot deep, and keep knee high rubber boots handy in case of need. If it gets even deeper, I have taller ones that reach up to my armpits, that I can use if necessary, although they were designed for fishing rather than working cows.
I find the Japanese internment issue fascinating. Ethics are a big part of responding to risk assessments, and operationalizing the precautionary principle when risk assessments can’t be made. Perhaps you might like this article that examines the military necessity of Japanese internment from the perspective of the Canadian experience.
http://members.tripod.com/intern_canada/Internment/Internmilitary.htm
“The precautionary principle clearly states that your actions should not cause more harm that the bad you are trying to prevent.” ~ Javier
I thought that was utilitarianism?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precautionary_principle
Forget it OFM, the US government is now controlled by Javier’s ‘FFF’ Friends.
That would be ‘Fossil Fuel Fascists’, in case you are wondering! The only thing they are interested in, is ‘Alternative Facts’!
I’ll see if I can find the link to a talk on how global warming affects the optimum range of temperature for most of the world’s crops. As you are well aware there may be a slight improvement for crops currently being grown in cooler climes.
However since it is highly likely that the temperature range for most of South Asia, Africa and South America will be skewed towards a few days of too hot weather during the already at the high end limit of temperature range, only a fucking imbecile would argue that the world has nothing to worry about.
I have nothing to do with US politics. That’s your problem, not mine.
I already showed you that global warming has taken place mainly in the Northern Hemisphere. Antarctica has been cooling, and the Southern Hemisphere and Tropics have experimented reduced global warming. It is curious that there is so much mythology between alarmists when the knowledge is there. Perhaps because it does not support alarmism.
There is always something to worry, Fred. There were people that went to live into self-made nuclear refuges during the nuclear war scare. Where you one of them? It is not insane to worry, but it is to make your life turn around your worries, because more often than not they turn out to be unjustified.
Figure from IPCC AR4 figure 9.6.1
Hi Fred,
I’m afraid you’re right about the triple F faction being in control of our government, but as you and a few million other scientifically literate guys and gals have said before, and sooner than I, you can’t fool Mother Nature, and facts are stubborn things.
I wish I had thought of the FFF moniker first!
The rest of the world will continue to gather the relevant data, and publish it.
The rest of the world will continue to invest in going renewable as fast as possible, and not only for reasons doing with climate.
One of my primary goals is to convince as many renewable advocates as possible to place a LOT more emphasis on the many benefits associated with going renewable, and relatively less emphasis on the climate problem, especially here in the land o’ the free ( more or less ) and home o’ the brave.
My reasoning is based on a thorough ( though non professional ) study of human nature, and in particular the way we make up our minds about issues such as renewables and global climate change.
Here’s the way I see it.
Those of us who are technically literate DON’T need to be sold over and over, the way the sellers of automobiles, beer, and soft drinks continually sell and resell their products. We understand.
And those who don’t really understand, in purely technical terms, but do understand that scientists in general are morally upright people, and that science as a whole has provided us with our current day pleasant, easy, relatively disease free, long lives are smart enough that they only need be reminded of the climate problem from time to time. So long as the D or liberalish leaning political wing is on board, they will be on board no matter what, because they will vote their tribal loyalties, in precisely the same fashion as the Trumpster types will vote THEIR tribal loyalties.
So far as I am concerned, this interpretation of the political landscape is as obvious as the sun at noon on a clear day.
So- as I see it, what we are doing as environmental advocates in general, and renewable advocates in particular, when we focus so heavily on climate, IS GOOD, but it’s NOT optimal.
We need to get the message across to the middle of the road people, and to the people on the other side who are willing to listen to it. Quite a few of them are on board already, although they still vote the other way. They can be won over, gradually.
And changing the emphasis will not hurt at all, in respect to the people who are ALREADY on board and voting the environmental ticket.
I hang around an hour or so at our little local ” country club happy hour” and have a beer at least a couple of afternoons a week with from four to eight good old country boys, the sort who love their guns, and their women, and their country, and their oversized trucks too, although they have almost entirely given up the oversized trucks for smaller ones, being retired now. Six out of the eight are hard core R types. About three of them believe in Trump. They’re the dumbest , as you can easily guess. Two are hard core D’s, believe it or not. They are not at all scarce even in this backwoods. I’m number nine, and the only real outlier, speaking for both sides, and pissing off both sides.
(We meet in the sunshine right across the creek from my place,at my neighbor’s shop and barn, on nice days, under the equipment shed on hot days, and in the shop on cold days. We get our beer in bulk of course. These guys are as regular as the ones on any tv show where in the characters hang out in a bar. Even MORE regular! )
Four or five years ago, or a little longer, they were all laughing at “lecterk” automobiles, but now they’re talking every day about that there ‘Mer’kun gen’yis Musk ‘n how he’s showed them fancy pants Huns ‘n ‘talyins his taillights racing their cars that cost three ‘n four times as much. And how Guv’mint Motors is gonna be the first big ol time car kumpne to put ah lecterk car that kin really giterdone in driveways and fuck them A rabs, and their camels too.
They even get it about oil coming out of holes in the ground, and that since it doesn’t RAIN oil……………..
We can win these people over, and there are literally tens of millions of them out there.
Enough to make the difference at election time.
And their favorable opinions of wind and solar power and electric cars will be gradually diffusing , eating away, like water on soft stone at the prejudices of the hard core Trumpster types who haven’t got a clue when it comes to physical realities such as resource depletion.
We need to be talking A LOT MORE about local control, local jobs, needing fewer troops overseas, about OWNING our own electrical generation systems, the way we own our own homes, and our own cars.
Any and every good salesman, any and every good general, and and every good advertising man, will tell you to find out where the soft spots are in the quarry’s armor, and what his hot spots are.
If you are smart, you hammer away at the soft spots in the armor, and play the hot spots like a violin, and you make your sale, you win your war, you win your bonus for coming up with an ad campaign that WORKS.
You win elections.
The Trumpsters and their allies the FFF don’t HAVE any GOOD counterarguments against the strategies I advocate.
They have their Javier’s . They have their equivalent of the HB type that accuses anybody who disagrees with the prevailing orthodoxy a Worm Tongue, a lying member of the opposition, but that’s about it.
We aren’t going to win in a month, or six months, but we WILL win, in the long term, so long as we stay after it.
Any comments pro or con are extremely welcome, as always. I’m always ready to change my mind if shown enough relevant facts…….. enough to outweigh the ones I know already and have judged to represent the “preponderance of the evidence”.
And I’m always eager to hear any new argument either pro or con concerning any environmental issue.
You must know your enemy if you wish to overcome him.
Badmouthing his allies won’t win them over.
Putting the facts on our side out there in such a fashion that the enemy foot soldier can consider them and think about them without losing face WORKS.
Don’t rant and rave about industries polluting the environment. Get right down to the nitty gritty part of the mind where you can hit a home run, without your quarry even REALIZING you have just flipped him from Trumpster to environmentalist.
Don’t even mention politics. Get him on your side by pointing out that he has to pay an extra ten or twenty a month for his water because somebody upstream is dumping piss and shit in it, and sawdust, and dirt, and paint thinner and motor oil and stuff coming out of pipes with the other end in factories, and THAT AIN’T RIGHT.
Plant the seed right, and environmentally friendly memes will grow in his head like crabgrass in hot wet weather.
And so far as crops and temperature ranges are concerned, we are already growing a lot of crops in a lot of places where we are bumping up against the high end of the desirable temperature ranges in the USA, for sure.
My neighbors just fifteen or twenty miles to the south, with comparable soils, don’t even TRY to grow cabbage, at only five to eight hundred feet lower elevations. It just won’t grow worth a damn.
I don’t grow it myself, some of my neighbors do, and it works for them, because they get started at the earliest possible date, and cabbage transplants stand up well to frost.
Folks no more than three or four miles to the north, but at somewhat higher elevations, grow cabbage under optimum conditions, and they can grow it and sell it for as little as anybody else anywhere in the USA, and still make a profit.
Sure we can shift the acreage devoted to cabbage farther north, and to higher elevations, as a theoretical matter, because cabbage is a minor crop, in relation to the big picture.
There are REASONS why you don’t hear much about corn in Alabama, or wheat, lol.
At the southern end, and at the lower elevations at which they are grown, corn and wheat production is ALREADY limited to the point of growers just BARELY being competitive with growers farther north and or at somewhat higher elevations. Another degree or so, even less, of warming, and they will either be out of corn and wheat, or they will have to get a higher price to stay in.
Now while it’s theoretically possible to for grain growers to just pack up and move a maybe a hundred miles north every generation, or maybe oftener, there are some PRACTICAL problems to be considered………
I know what I’m talking about, I’ve been on working farms at least three months out of the year just about every year of my life.
I have a degree in the field, and close to enough credits in biology or closely related fields to get a degree in biology, although they are not distributed properly, and most of them are dated.
Javier hasn’t proved his case, and he never will, because for one reason or another, he has made up his mind that he knows more than just about every body else in the forum combined, not to mention the rest of the world’s technically literate people.
Every once in a while, you will run across such a person, for example a doctor who is convinced aids is not caused by the aids virus. He might be a competent doc when it comes to prescribing for the flu, or the treatment of diabetes. Such a doctor is not generally shilling for somebody selling quack aids cures, except maybe to get more patients into his own office.
There is at least a possibility that Javier is not a shill working for the TripleF crowd. I will give him that, it IS possible that he is serious.
But it’s a SLIM possibility. A slim one indeed.
Oldfarmermac,
By your own statements you are an old man. Old enough to have lived to see the end of many scares that turned out to be nothing. I wish that you live long enough to see the passing of the global warming scare. There is a good chance that the turning negative of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, and the centennial solar minimum we have just started make the trick and give us 10-20 more years of pause. The scare would not survive to that, so you just stay put for a couple more decades and you will see how bad you are at calculating odds.
Yes, I have seen some scares flare up and die away. I have also lived long enough to know that some scares are based on reality, and that they WILL manifest themselves as disasters, sooner or later.
The best analogy is that of the sailor , who will tell you that you can never win the battle with the sea. You can only fight the sea to a draw, one time at a time, every time you set sail.
You’re DONE, you’re gone, the first time you lose.
Some scares turn out to be real , and we have lived thru the results of them already, such as the threat of WWII. Lots and lots of people pooh poohed that threat thru the mid thirties, or even a little later.
Lots of people have pooh poohed the threat to our environment concerning the importation of invasive plants and insects for reasons having to do with their making some money, or with ignorance, or unreasoned hostility to environmental regulations because their political enemies are in favor of such regulations.
We are living with the consequences NOW here in the USA, and lots of other people in other countries are suffering likewise. I suppose you know what happened to our chestnut trees, and about fire ants, and various invasive snakes taking over the Everglades, even if you do live in Spain.
A favorite personal story, one I have repeated often, concerns an older relative who bought a brand new car after he retired. Ten going on twenty years later it was still the proverbial grandmother’s car, never been anywhere except church and the supermarket, hardly ever even been wet except to wash it.
He got in the habit of parking in under a big old tree next to his car shed, and sitting in it, and washing it there, and leaving it there. Every body tried to tell him the tree was rotten, and would fall on the car someday, but like a lot of old people, he was set in his ways, and kept leaving the car under the tree, and sure enough the wind got up a little, and a big rotten limb fell on it, and ruined it.
You can disregard the precautionary principle, that’s your privilege, at the personal level.
I refuse to do so, as either a person, or as a technically literate citizen.
There’s this little PROBLEM with your arguments, which can be largely summed up as the hysteresis problem. Results or consequences always lag behind causes.
Sometimes the lag is measured in milliseconds, sometimes in minutes or hours, sometimes in weeks and months, sometimes decades. The lag might even best be measured in centuries.
Sometimes the causes have to reach or attain a certain level , measured in mass, or energy, or accumulate in some fashion to a certain level, such as the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, to RESULT in significant consequences.
I was still a YOUNG man when I realized the truth of these observations, and I have never found any reason to change my mind concerning them. I didn’t have to figure it out for myself, these things were routinely discussed in class.
They’re basically entirely consistent with the orthodoxy prevailing TODAY in the historical field, and likewise prevailing in the general field of biology, meaning all the branches of the life sciences as a whole.
They were orthodox when I was an undergrad ag student, they’re still orthodox TODAY.
Some people like to get sort of sniffy and condescending when talking to farmers, but the reality of agriculture is that it’s basically the application of biological knowledge and principles to the job of producing food and fiber.
I took all my the lower level ag science courses, and some right thru graduation, in the biology department, in the same classroom at the same hour as the biology majors. Same text books, same lab exercises. My transcript only varies from a biology majors in that a given biology course is indicated as for example Intro to Botany as Intro to Agricultural Botany.
The lag in respect to climate changes brought about by rising greenhouse gas concentrations is best measured in decades, and there is EVERY reason to expect the consequences to grow in magnitude over time.
I’m not a climatologist, nor a physicist , nor a physician. Good sense dictates that I rely on the consensus professional judgement of people in these fields, rather than allowing my ego to convince me I know more than they do.
I know my field, and I will do what I can to make sure people who are NOT professionally knowledgeable concerning agriculture understand at least the abc’s of the field correctly.
Doing something about the consequences of warming later will probably prove to be impossible even from a technical viewpoint, because any technology that might work will almost for dead sure cost WAY more than we will be able or willing to pay.
The prudent thing to do is to take proactive preventative measures NOW, while we can afford to do so.
Besides, it’s happily true that these measures , taken as a whole, will actually improve our lives short term, on average.
I’m neither a hick nor a hayseed. I didn’t fall off the turnip wagon and land in this forum by accident, despite what my good little lap doggie HB says about me.
I know a hell of a lot more about this sort of thing than you do, doctorate or not, unless for some reason of your own you are telling it the way you do, deliberately telling lies.
I can think of only two reasons you might do that. One, you’re simply wrong, but serious. That’s rare, but not unheard of among professional people. TWO , you have an agenda having to do with promoting the status quo.
That seems to be about a thousand times more likely, in my estimation.
Nothing I have said however , should be taken to indicate that I disagree with everything you say.
I do for instance agree that you that you have a very powerful argument, in saying that some of the attention and resources currently devoted to the warming issue could be better spent on preservation efforts on the ground, for instance by setting aside more land for nature refuges.
You are most likely right about the Little Ice Age being a real world wide event. I have heard it strenuously argued by some people, some reputed scientists among them, that it didn’t even happen , that it wasn’t real.
Not old enough to remember this.
However we do have the evidence.
Hi Javier,
The AMO has not turned negative yet, but perhaps there will eventually be a hiatus, a more likely scenario is that the rate of warming may slow a bit for a 30 to 36 year period and then accelerate. As natural variability is expected, this would prove nothing should it occur.
Using data from NOAA, link below
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/timeseries/AMO/
It is clear that though you claim the AMO has turned negative, the data says otherwise.
The AMO shows a peak in 5 and 10 year smoothing. But whether it has already peaked or not, it is very clear that the AMO has stopped growing.
It did the same in the 1940’s when the previous hiatus started.
And we know the North Atlantic 0-700 m waters are cooling.
Everything suggests a period of decreasing AMO detrended index is very likely in the next 1-2 decades. Based on past evidence, it is going to be very hard that the world warms with a negative AMO.
Paraphrasing the blog,
The Reported Death of the Pause Has Been Greatly Exaggerated
Come now–
He is Baghdad Bob!
Fred, you really know what you are talking about.
“Fascists believe that liberal democracy is obsolete, and they regard the complete mobilization of society under a totalitarian one-party state as necessary to prepare a nation for armed conflict and to respond effectively to economic difficulties.”
That describes Republicans in the US completely. I think that they do not riot in the streets, do not kill those that disagree with them, do not burn down the cities, do not send death threats to those that disagree with them, but do go to Church and work, etc., is for the sole purpose of fooling everyone. But, we all know that they are just waiting to show that they are fascists at the right time when no one suspects it.
Hi Fred,
I ENJOY poking holes in everything Javier has to say.
Unfortunately you’re right about the government, but as an old friend of mine, a very hard core Democrat, remarked back when Reagan won , we’ll probably live over it. The Trumpsters turn in charge will only SEEM like a century.
You use far too many words to say little. No fun at all.
Javier reminds me of that Etp fanatic Futilitist.
I just ran across this outfit for the first time, and don’t know how creditable they are, but this link seems to be factual and well balanced at first glance.
http://www.conservativeenergynetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Clean-Energy-Survey4.pdf
Scroll down to the charts on voters opinions on renewable energy and you may be in for a surprise.
The most relevant ones start at page ten or eleven.
The nutshell takeaway is that according to this survey, the VAST majority of ALL of the people of the country want more emphasis on renewable energy rather than less, and that surprise ( ? ) this appears to be true of the majority of Trump voters as well, although the percentage of D voters in favor is higher.
Folks into slicing their political data up according to age groups, etc, will find some interesting charts in this link.
Food for thought.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/democratic-party-future_us_58850450e4b096b4a2327af8?2o5uqxemlwyiudi&
Some excerpts
“But the overwhelming analysis emanating from Brockapalooza was essentially a haute couture Berniecrat gripe: The Democratic Party has been writing off way too much of the electorate by assuming it doesn’t need ― or can’t win ― the votes of working-class people.”
““How many bankers went to jail?” Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), the sole senator to endorse Sanders in the Democratic primary, asked the crowd on Saturday morning in reference to the 2008 financial crisis. “None,” he concluded. ”
“There were real disagreements about the right course of action. But speaker after speaker said the party’s reliance on demographic trends had made it complacent on matters of economic justice. This had cost Democrats not just the presidency, but governorships and hundreds of state legislature seats across the country.”
“The Democratic coalition lives in the economy, all right?” former Bill Clinton campaign manager James Carville told reporters. “The idea that somehow it’s only white working-class people that live in an economy … blacks, Hispanics, unmarried women, gay people ― they’re like everybody else.”
Any of you so-called liberals out there in freaking outer space with Joh Stewart on some other planet catch a glimpse of video recorded and broadcast of leftists dressed in black smashing windows and busting heads during the protests in Washington, DC?
Those liberals are some peaceful folks, compassionate, tolerant, always do the right thing, always lend a helping hand, always looking for ways to improve. Anybody can sympathize with that.
Interesting perspective– the Right (unconsciously) has embraced no growth before “liberals”
The standard liberal answer would be to follow our Silicon Valley leaders and new Wall Street friends and double-down on innovation and growth, open the last corners of the world to ever-more trade, and invest in the so-called knowledge economy—messages that fit easily with the other liberal message of inclusion and increased freedoms for the previously dispossessed and marginalized others. Regular readers of Resilience of course realize that this economic program has a strong mythical element. Yes, I would remind us all, but without any joy, economic growth has been the strangely elastic glue (the subject of this series) that has held the body politic together—or sufficiently apart. But economic growth was never simply about innovation or freedom; it was about using energy to turn more and more natural resources into more and more usable products under very specific historical conditions; it was not to be sustained without breaching ecological limits. The price of continued economic growth will be an overheated planet, ecosystems spinning out of control, more war, famine, waves of forced migration initiated by political instability, a further narrowing of our trust horizons leading to tribalism and nationalism, the election of populist right-wing demagogues. . .
Like others, I have elsewhere suggested that Trump is a symptom of the end of growth. I have long assumed that the end of growth would create exactly the sort of dangerous neo-populism and probably violent economic nationalism that Trump represents. But what is left of the hopeful liberal in me had also held out the possibility that, at the same time, the end of growth would have also spawned a vigorous and vibrant post-growth communitarianism–that educated, structurally and system-minded liberals, at the least, would join a post-growth movement founded on values of earth care, people care, and fair share. But as of yet, such values remain secluded in a small and powerless subculture. Liberal America is as lost as Trump with its unarticulated hopes for the rise of a cosmopolitan global middle-class, eight billion strong–a view that belies all reason and all math. Because growth had become magnanimous, or so we could reasonably believe, liberals have narrowed their horizons to growth and only growth as the foundational value. It had not occurred to me that the hard, boorish, and belligerent right would be the first to plant its flag in the end of growth. But it has–whether it is aware of it or not.
To put this another way, yet to emerge is a widespread post-growth political movement grounded in universalism (rather than nationalism), in cosmopolitanism (rather than tribalism), in empathy (rather than pugilism), in sharing what is left (rather than competing over it). Perhaps I was hoping for too much—for the impossible transplanting of a kind of altruism and generosity that, ultimately, may be the result only of growth and expansion, into conditions of contraction. But the possibility that a whole-planet populism is not simply a contradiction in terms—however slight it may be—will keep me going for another round.
I give those DC guys a C-
European Black Bloc are way more brave
Hand to hand with the pigs and lighting then on fire A+
https://youtu.be/CoyF09kJHNQ
Having been CS Gassed on Three Continents, I agree.
The folks who have managed to over throw any existing orthodoxy are always utterly intolerant of any opposition to their new found status as the rulers of the roost, politically, economically, or culturally.
And if part of that new ruling orthodoxy consists of preaching tolerance, it is always understood to mean tolerance of friends and allies, but none for the OLD rulers of the roost.
And when they LOSE, the current rulers always throw the rule book they have always sworn by (publicly, at least ) out the window, and resort to as much violence as they can get away with.
So it’s to be expected that there has been and will be some more violence involved in protesting the Trumpsters taking over.
They won’t be in power forever, hopefully not for more than the next four years.
When it’s their turn to be kicked off the highest perch in the chicken house, they will turn violent too.
But the R’s have reason to be complacent, in respect to the mid term elections. The D’s have a LOT more seats at risk in the Senate, and a lot more seats are currently presumed to be safe for the R party.
It would be good if Sky Daddy , or some nice snake , would send us a wake up brick upside our collective head in the form of a natural disaster unprecedented in recent centuries, one that would clearly indicate that forced climate change is a GRAVE ( pun intended ) issue sure enough.
And while He OR IT is at it, it would also be VERY helpful if somebody would take an obsolete fighter up, loaded with anti armor rockets, and sink a couple of super tankers at exactly the right spot to create the maximum disruption in international energy markets. ( Supertankers might not sink as the result of such an attack, but they sure as hell would burn down to the water line. )
Yes, I fully understand that such events would result in a lot of people getting killed, and a lot more hurt, and some real economic grief. They might even lead all the way up to WWIII.
But on the other hand, WWIII would be an extremely unlikely consequence, and if we DON’T wake up, collectively, and get our shit together, we are going to be up shit creek in more ways than one.
We’re going to experience a substantial taste of Hell on Earth as the result of runaway climate , and as the result of fossil fuel depletion as well.
Sometimes, you literally DO have to smack a kid to get his attention. The ones that refuse to listen are quick to learn that when Mommy and Daddy won’t do anything but talk, they can continue to do as they please, except maybe for losing tv privileges or something of equally trivial importance to them.
And while it sounds harsh indeed to actually say it, sometimes adults likewise have to be slapped, HARD , figuratively speaking, to bring them to their senses, and get them to act.
I’ve been to the funeral of a young woman who died as the result of her husband, who loved her dearly, crashing their car while driving drunk. She paid with her life, and a couple of other people who were badly hurt paid dearly indeed.
He walked away from the accident, but he hasn’t had a drop to drink since. He learned the hard way.
Unfortunately naked apes mostly refuse to learn any way except the hard way.
“When it’s their turn to be kicked off the highest perch in the chicken house, they will turn violent too.”
Not one chance in a billion.
Hi Clueless,
I suppose what you are saying is that there’s not one chance in a million that the R/ Trumpster/ FFF WILL EVER be kicked out ? FFF=fossil fuel fascists
I’m afraid I must agree that they’re perfectly safe , in the very short term, but I’m enough of an optimist to believe they WILL get their butts kicked out of the WH and halls of congress sooner or later, maybe even as soon as the next four to six years.
It does look bad for the very short term, with the R’s holding most of the safe seats in the upcoming mid term elections, and the D’s having a lot at risk.
The repugs will put this train wreck into the ditch– the only question is when.
The Dims would of also.
Whoever “won” this election is going to be the Bag Holder.
Weather is not going to do it. Katrina and Superstorm Sandy didn’t.
Old Farmer, I think we have plenty to act on now with the foxes being in the henhouse. They will set up so many distractions that nothing will get done if the focus is on the foxes.
ENOUGH Katrina’s and Sandy’s will do it.
The historical record includes storms as bad or worse, within the last century or so, and most people are aware of these earlier storms. The money damages were trivial back then, compared to today, because now the coasts are heavily developed.
I personally believe the odds of such storms are higher now than ever before, but it’s just not possible to make A GOOD TIGHT CASE that these last two are the result of global warming. BUT if we get some more soon that are equally destructive, physically, over as large an area, the case will be made, and eventually the man on the street WILL get it.
“and eventually the man on the street WILL get it.”
So what then? What will change when more people conclude that global warming is real and a threat?
Coal as the new way to meet CO2 targets in a cost-effective way.
The Australian: Turnbull backs cleaner coal for hitting renewable target
Pay-walled. Free version from
http://www.wattelectricalnews.com/NEWS/Turnbull-backs-cleaner-coal-for-hitting-renewable-target/
Australia should be a world leader in demonstrating that carbon emissions can be lowered by replacing ageing electricity generators with new and emerging technologies to produce cleaner coal, Malcolm Turnbull has declared.
The Prime Minister also hit back at Tony Abbott days after he called on Mr Turnbull to dump the renewable energy target, saying renewables had a “role” to play in reaching the government’s carbon reduction target of up to 28 per cent by 2030.
As revealed in The Australian yesterday, research commissioned by the Turnbull government has estimated the country’s emissions would be cut by up to 27 per cent if coal-based power generation ran on “ultra-super-critical-technology” used in other parts of the world.
Carried out by the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science, the research showed emissions would be reduced even further — by up to 34 per cent — if the technology now in development was adopted across Australia.
Mr Turnbull acknowledged coal would be part of the world’s energy mix “for a very, very long time” as he attacked the Labor state of South Australia, which generates 40 per cent of its energy through wind, for having the “most expensive and the least reliable electricity” in the country.
“We are the biggest coal exporter in the world. If anybody, if any country has a vested interest in demonstrating that clean coal and cleaner coal with new technologies can make a big contribution to our energy mix and at the same time reduce our emissions in net terms — it’s us,” Mr Turnbull said.
“Our approach, and my approach, to energy is absolutely pragmatic and practical … Renewables have a role. Fossil fuels have a role. Every type of energy — storage, all of it — has an important role to play.”
Mr Turnbull said it was “wrong” to be ideological about the nation’s energy mix after Mr Abbott wrote in The Weekend Australian that the government should urgently scrap the mandatory RET, insisting the focus should be on what is most affordable.
The Minerals Council of Australia said the Department of Industry’s projections showing new coal generation technologies could reduce emissions “sharply” were consistent with emissions savings being achieved around the world.
“With high efficiency low emissions (HELE) coal technologies as clean as gas plants, countries accounting for nearly half of global CO2 emissions are deploying these technologies to meet their emissions targets under the 2015 Paris Agreement,” the council’s chief executive Brendan Pearson said.
“These HELE plants deliver secure, affordable energy while lowering CO2 emissions by as much as 50 per cent compared with existing plants. As the adoption of carbon capture and storage technologies increases, these emissions savings will increase to 90 per cent.”
Resources Minister Matt Canavan said Asian countries were not only reducing carbon emissions by installing supercritical coal-fired power but they were doing so “at a cost cheaper than many other emissions reducing options”.
“When reducing the carbon emissions of our power stations we should seek to do so at the lowest cost,” he told The Australian.
Replacing sub-critical technology with super-critical technology saves CO2 at a cost of between US$15 to US$25 a tonne in Southeast Asia, according to the World Coal Association.
This solution was already proposed by skeptics like Joanne Nova over 5 years ago.
http://joannenova.com.au/2011/08/lower-co2-emissions-by-wait-for-it-building-new-coal-plants/
The Greens are not happy about it, but it appears to be the fastest, most cost-effective way of reducing CO2 emissions while keeping the lights on. Existing coal plants can be upgraded at a much lower cost than being substituted by intermittent renewable generation.
Hi Javier,
The price of “clean coal” is not cheaper than wind and solar.
An analysis from 2011 would be very out of date in 2017 as the price of wind and solar has plummeted since 2011. Find a more recent analysis that shows that new coal fired power plants will be cheaper than wind and solar.
The investment in new coal power plants will become a stranded investment in short order. Natural Gas or nuclear would be a better form of backup for wind and solar than coal.
Coal will peak and decline and electricity from coal fired power plants will be very expensive in the future, a very bad investment relative to the investment in wind, solar, or nuclear power.
The only clean coal pilot plant I know of got shut down. The sequestered power production plant down south is hugely expensive.
The Prime Minister of Australia seems to think it is for them. Australia has a lot of cheap coal which might be a factor. One has to consider that they provide base-load capacity, so they do not directly compete with renewables.
The world efficiency record for a coal plant is held by Denmark, and both Germany and Japan are building HELE (high-efficiency low-emissions) coal plants. It is clear that they compete with nuclear generation and in that they are simply a question of choice between gas and clean coal depending on conditions. Many Asian countries are also going that way.
Coal provided 37% of he world electricity in 1980 and provided 39% in 2014, so it is growing as fast or faster than our energy needs. It is not being substituted except in some countries, but countered by a faster expansion in others.
For electricity generation, the expansion of coal, gas, and renewables is compensating the relative reduction of oil, nuclear and hydroelectric. That is the reality.
http://www.tsp-data-portal.org/Breakdown-of-Electricity-Generation-by-Energy-Source
The Greens are not happy about it, but it appears to be the fastest, most cost-effective way of reducing CO2 emissions while keeping the lights on. Existing coal plants can be upgraded at a much lower cost than being substituted by intermittent renewable generation.
LOL!! You are so full of shit and you know it too! But with that statement you have eliminated any and all doubt about your agenda and ideology. You have finally shown your true colors! You and your little Fossil Fuel Fascists friends are forgetting that you do not get a free pass on externalities, they have costs. You also do not get free use of the commons as a waste sink you will have to pay your fair share. You do not get to make up your own alternative facts! Coal is dirty and it is uneconomic without subsidies and tax breaks!
You are ideologically blinded.
This is the reality. And it is only electricity, which is only a part of our total energy.
Fossil fuels 1990: 59% 6,108 TWh
Fossil fuels 2014: 66% 14,806 TWh
From 6,108 TWh to 14,806 TWh, we have more than doubled our dependency from fossil fuels in the past 25 years only in electricity generation.
We have doubled the dose of fossil fuels in just electricity. Peak oil today would have much worse consequences than in 1990. You are completely blind due to ideology to the fact that the energy transition is simply not taking place. We are just covering part of our growth with a little bit of renewables on the side. Renewables are not going to save us from Peak oil. Due to its irreplaceable role in transportation Peak oil will be also peak energy, with all the consequences.
To be able to withstand Peak oil we should have to be able to boost our cheap energy capacity many fold in just a couple of decades, to be able to manufacture liquid fuels at a loss of energy without wrecking the economy. The only path available to us was nuclear, but we didn’t take it. Now it is not doable.
To keep entertained until Peak oil arrives, while increasing renewables, we distract ourselves with an issue completely blown out of proportion. The climate apocalyse. You have bought into that narrative due to your ideological blindness. Evidence shows we have a very moderate climate compared to just a hundred years ago. A lesson in how to make a good thing look scary without any solid evidence for it.
Team Koch surely must be getting increasingly agitated by stuff I am posting below:
Solar Power to Grow Sixfold as Sun Becoming Cheapest Resource
Does anybody here really think that after growing one hundredfold over the past ten years, PV is only going to grow sixfold over the next thirteen?
“It’s usually the ‘experts’ and ‘insiders’ who dismiss Disruptive Opportunities” – Tony Seba.
You sir, are a classic “insider” and one with an agenda that is becoming more clear everyday to boot!
Perhaps you are correct or perhaps not.
Energy consumption projections by six agencies and organizations:
The BP Energy Outlook 2016
The Exxon 2017 Outlook for Energy
The EIA International Energy Outlook 2016
The IEA 2016 World Energy Outlook
The MIT 2015 Energy and Climate Outlook
The IEEJ Asia/World Energy Outlook 2015
All agree quite well in projecting an average of 16% (15-18) of total energy coming from new renewables by 2040.
http://euanmearns.com/the-gulf-between-the-paris-climate-agreement-and-energy-projections/
It is a nice increase from now that it is like 5%, but can hardly be sold as an energy transition. Specially since all six reports predict an average increase of 27% (19-33) in fossil fuel consumption, and 77% (74-79) of our energy still coming from fossil fuels in 2040.
So I would say the experts don’t see things the way you see them. But still you could be right. I just doubt it.
“It’s usually the ‘experts’ and ‘insiders’ who dismiss Disruptive Opportunities” – Tony Seba.
Either you have never watched any of Seba’s video presentation or read his book “Clean Disruption” or you simply don’t think any of his projections are remotely possible. In March of 2015, I put together a little spreadsheet that started from current shares of generation, with current growth rates for solar and wind and reduced the growth rate by a fixed percentage every year to yield a logistic (S shaped) growth curve.
Below is an earlier EIA projection followed by a run of my spreadsheet that has wind and solar approaching 70% of global electricity production in 25 years. This would allow other sources like hydro, geothermal, biomass, tidal, nuclear and FF to have a share of 30% between them. For all I know, solar PV growth could accelerate rather than decline sometime in the next 25 years, making my projection look conservative.
Of the six agencies and organizations: you listed, two are FF business that are very unlikely to put out forecasts foretelling their demise any time soon. The EIA and IEA have been notoriously conservative (read wrong) with their wind and solar projections and I have never seen anything citing or even mentioning the other two. All six forecasts you list, have been done by people who are probably totally incapable of imagining a scenario in which the energy landscape is disrupted, changing significantly from what persists now.
At any rate, I’m not at all surprised to see you parroting a line that would find favor with Team Koch.
“a run of my spreadsheet that has wind and solar approaching 70% of global electricity production in 25 years”
Quite a prediction. EIA has the entire renewable electricity production, including hydro, at 30% in 2040.
With such a discrepancy we should see who is wrong in just 3-5 years. Since your model starts in 2015 you will probably know with the data for 2017.
I am not really predicting anything in the sense that I am saying that any particular course of events is going to happen. What I have done is examine recent trends and project them into the future with the growth declining at a certain percentage each year rather than accelerating or remaining steady. What actually happens depends on how the rate of growth changes. Since I cannot predict what will happen to the growth rate, it would be presumptuous of me to say I am predicting anything.
What I am saying is that, on the basis of current trends, the projections of the EIA are questionable in the extreme, unless they can point out why the rate of growth is going to fall so precipitously. Is it increases in cost? – No. Is it resource limitations? – Unlikely. Is it politics? – Maybe. I would like to understand why they think renewable growth rates will be so low?
There was no pause
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2017/01/there-was-no-pause/#more-19932
It is important to realize that science is about universal truths, which means that you should get a consistent picture in a comprehensive analysis. The idea of a hiatus was indeed inconsistent with other indicators, such as the global sea level which continued to rise unabated (Watson et al, 2015). And there was no reason to think that changes in the cryosphere and precipitation had ceased either.
More than 70% of earth’s area is oceans, and sea surface temperatures (SSTs) carry a large weight in the global mean surface temperature estimates. Karl et al. (2015) reported a cold bias in recent SSTs due to changing observing network. This bias gave the false appearance of a slow-down in the warming of the oceans, and by taking into account artifacts from a change in the observing network, Karl et al found a more pronounced warming in the recent decade. Hausfather et al. (2017) studied these more closely, and their findings confirmed the NOAA analysis.
“It is important to realize that science is about universal truths…”
I don’t understand what he means by this. Can someone name a “universal truth” that the natural sciences concern themselves with?
which means that you should get a consistent picture in a comprehensive analysis.
So, if data is coming in consistently in one direction, and a anomaly shows up on another data point, one should examine that thoroughly.
(that is what this post was about)
Things are contingent on causal events.
Hi Synapsid,
Laws of nature such as conservation of mass and energy and other physical laws, I imagine.
Synapsid,
“Can someone name a “universal truth” that the natural sciences concern themselves with?”
OK, but first you define what you mean by ‘universal’ and ‘truth’. BTW Biblical Truth doesn’t count and by universal I presume you include the set of all possible universes?
DougL,
“universal truth”–not my words; they’re in the quote. They’re what I don’t understand.
Duncan Idaho, DC,
Thanks, but I still don’t understand what Rasmus meant.
To say that things are contingent on causal events, for instance, just doesn’t line up in my head. I could re-phrase it as “If something can happen, it will.”
What stops me is “truths”, I guess. That makes no more sense to me than “scientific proof”. There is no such thing. We can’t even prove that the Sun will come up tomorrow, though we can make such a strong case for it that it would be perverse not to accept it.
I guess that I’d say that “universal truths” in a statement about what the natural sciences are concerned with is what is called a category mistake. It doesn’t belong in the discussion.
Scientific opinions differ.
Notice how Fyfe et al., 2016, include NOAA-Karl (Karl et al., 2015) corrections to SST and yet they defend the hiatus is real.
Sorry Bob—
There was no slowdown.
The data and science is in.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2017/01/there-was-no-pause/
This is going to be so funny when the evidence shows the pause is still here after the strong El Niño.
The villagers never leave a reference to the source of their graphs and claims.
You got the title of the paper and the authors and the year. What else do you need?
Oh, sorry. I forgot you don’t know how to use Google Scholar despite I tried to teach you some time ago,
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-3/#comment-576271
You are a slow learner.
Slow down is synonymous with pause.
Ok Einstein lol
Get a dictionary doc. You’re embarrassing yourself again.
The villagers are angry and hurling insults.
Slowdown discussion
Guest post by Fyfe et al.
https://www.climate-lab-book.ac.uk/2016/slowdown-discussion/
“Here is a figure that was originally in the Fyfe et al. paper but was removed during the review process. It shows various linear trends (and error bars, 10-90% ranges) for the HadCRUT4.4 and Karl et al. datasets:
http://www.met.reading.ac.uk/~ed/fyfe_extra.png
For example, the trend ranges for 1972-2001 and 2001-2014 are significantly different from eachother, especially for HadCRUT4.4. This is the basis for the statistically significant statement in the text. The error ranges account for the serial correlation, following Santer et al (2000). If you want more details then ask John Fyfe who did the calculations.” ~ Ed Hawkins
https://www.climate-lab-book.ac.uk/2016/slowdown-discussion/#comment-2589
“Firstly, climate scientists agree that global warming has not ‘stopped’ – global surface temperatures and ocean heat content have continued to increase, sea levels are still rising, and the planet is retaining ~0.5 days of the sun’s incoming energy per year.” ~ Ed Hawkins
https://www.climate-lab-book.ac.uk/2016/making-sense/
Which has little to do with the scientific debate on the so-called hiatus between 2003-2014 that most temperature databases show to be real.
The funny thing is that the debate is moot. El Niño has caused a blip in temperature records 2015-2016. The blip is now over and we are likely to see a continuation of the hiatus, slowdown, pause or whatever you call it or whether you believe it existed or not.
The planet has lost a huge amount of heat to space due to El Niño and winter Arctic warming. As there is no La Niña, the AMO has peaked, and we have entered a centennial solar minimum, that heat is not going to be easy to replace. Energetics and climate cycles favor a continuation of the hiatus for 1-2 decades more.
I suppose it is going to be a huge embarrassment for those defending in 2017 that the hiatus, pause or slowdown never existed. Talk about denying the evidence.
This is a measurement of the energy flux at the top of the atmosphere (TOA) by CERES satellites showing the amount of energy lost by the planet during the period studied, compared with El Niño Southern Oscillation index (MEI). Look what happened during the normal Los Niños of the period. Now imagine the amount of heat lost during the monster El Niño of 2015-16. That amount of heat dwarfs the effect of greenhouse gases, but on the long term it averages out.
Don’t count on much warming for the next years, and without a La Niña there is no recharging of the lost heat. The reported death of the Pause has been greatly exaggerated.
Australian population, about 24 million
About 50 000 people employed in the coal industry – This is a very tiny fraction of the population indeed, although there might be two or three times that many whose jobs depend indirectly on the coal industry. Thats still peanuts, in terms of the Australian economy.
Renewable energy is generating 11 time as many jobs in Australia as coal for every petajoule of energy
According to the Minerals Council of Australia, between
2014 and 2018 the coal industry expects to pay more than
$10bn in tax to the federal government.25 If that figure is
correct, and the coal industry contributes around $2.5bn
in federal taxes annually, it accounts for a mere 0.63% of
the government’s annual revenues of $398bn.26
Against the modest revenue being collected from the coal
industry, close to $1bn is being paid out to the industry
in the form of fuel tax credits. Since 2008-9, the amount
being claimed by the coal industry has risen by a massive
46%.27 Today, coal mining claims more in fuel tax credits
than any other industry – more than agriculture, forestry
and fishing combined; more than road and rail freight put
together.28 An industry worth 2% of GDP is receiving 15%
of the fuel tax credits.
Meanwhile, both the carbon tax and minerals resource
rent tax (MRRT) have been abolished after fierce lobbying
by mining companies. Now the coal industry is pushing
to have the company tax cut by a third to 20% in order to
improve their international competitiveness.30 Under the
circumstances, the net contribution to federal government
revenue from the coal industry shows little sign of
increasing any time soon.
At the state level, governments are also relying less on the coal industry to fund
government services. Most Australian states get no significant revenue from coal. With
the abolition of the carbon tax and the MRRT, there is even less prospect that non-coal
producing states will share in any significant benefit. The state governments that do
benefit from coal are Queensland and New South Wales, and to a much lesser extent
Victoria (which has no black coal or coal export industry). Yet, even in Queensland and
New South Wales coal’s contribution has crashed in spite of rising production volumes.
In 2009 the Queensland government received 8.2% of its
income from coal royalties.31 Six years later that figure has
been cut by more than half to just 3.4%.32 33 Coal royalties
once provided the state with over $3bn in annual revenue
out of a total of $37bn. Today, they generate around
$1.68bn out of a much larger revenue base of $50bn.
Because higher royalties apply in Queensland when coal
is over $100 per tonne the collapse in coal prices has
magnified the decline in revenues.34
In New South Wales coal royalties are now nearly 37%
less significant a funding source for the state government
than they were in 2009, having fallen from 2.6% of revenue
to 1.65%.35
Just as federal taxes paid by the coal industry are
substantially offset by fuel tax credit claims, the coal
royalties paid to state governments are eroded by billions
of dollars in taxpayer funding in recent years for coal
industry infrastructure. It might be billed as “multi-user
infrastructure” but in practice, most of the port, rail and
road funding is almost exclusively for use by the coal
industry.3
Coal exports are now a
minor contributor to the nation’s
economy, providing 2% of GDP, less
than 1.5% of tax revenue, and less
than 1% of jobs.37 Other industries now
account for over 88% of exports too.38
These excerpts are from this Green Peace publication.
http://www.greenpeace.org/australia/PageFiles/728009/Reality%20check%20on%20coal%20report.pdf
The figures are all documented with references.
Most of us here are adults , and know about how much credence we should give to the huffing and puffing of politicians who as often as not , regardless of their party, tucked into a vest pocket of an industry such as the coal industry,peeking out like one of Paris Hiltons little doggies peeking out of her purse.
From this link http://www.climatecouncil.org.au/uploads/d2b6cbbfff522e700c99f3c4e3c0aee0.pdf
A global study of health indicators spanning
40 years and 41 countries found that there are
large, hidden health costs associated with coal
consumption (Gohlke et al 2011). In Australia,
it is estimated that the adverse impacts from
pollutants produced from coal-fired electricity
generation costs A$2.6 billion annually
(ATSE 2009). In Europe, the health cost of
air pollution from coal-fired power stations is
43 billion Euros (A$61 billion) a year. There are
18,200 premature deaths, about 8,500 new
cases of chronic bronchitis, and over four
million lost working days each year due
mainly to respiratory and cardiac disease in
Europe (HEAL 2013). US economists have
estimated the health impacts of coal-fired
power stations in the US to be between one
and six times its value added (Parkinson 2014).
The hidden costs of coal
In Australia, it is estimated that the adverse impacts
from pollutants produced from coal-fired electricity
generation costs A$2.6 billion annually.
I think maybe I have posted enough, considering it is reply to Javier’s posting what amounts to a paid advertisement for the coal industry.
But here’s one more , just for good measure.
http://www.chgeharvard.org/resource/explore-true-costs-coal
I’m not religious about doing away with coal. I acknowledge that we will need to burn quite a bit of coal for some time to come, because it’s going to take quite some time to build up enough renewables capacity, and some sort of storage capacity, whether battery, pumped storage, hydrogen gas storage, etc, and up the efficiency with which we use electricity IN ORDER to quit burning coal to generate electricity . And even after that, we will probably need to keep on using SOME coal for some additional period of time to manufacture steel, etc.
I also acknowledge and publicize the fact that the faster we build up our renewables industries, and the faster we increase the our energy efficiency, the faster we will be ABLE to cut back on coal, and the better off we will be , collectively.
And for what it’s worth, my personal opinion is that we owe it to the people who make their living in the industry to do whatever it takes to ensure that they can continue to live decently, by way of direct subsidy, or paying them to move out of coal towns, or whatever it takes.
We can’t do this for ALL the people who work in industry, because we don’t have the capacity to do it, but to the extent we regulate coal out of the economic picture, we owe it to the workers in the industry to REALLY help them. Coal is about the only major industry that has really and truly been in the dead center of the crosshairs of regulators writing and enforcing regulations that make it less and less profitable to be in the coal biz. We can afford to help the relatively small number of people who are coal workers.
And yes, I know and understand that cheap natural gas has been the primary reason for the price of coal for domestic use crashing, with wind and solar power playing a lesser role, and the economic doldrums playing a role as well.
( And yes, it’s obvious that Trump is not planning on downsizing the coal industry ! )
It’s obvious that coal mining is a profit making enterprise and has an oversized negative impact on Australia plus the world in general. About $38 billion dollars export a year and about 6 billion internally. For Australia though, it is a loser, even including pay to workers and personal income taxes. The 2.5 billion in medical costs let alone the pain, suffering, job loss and death make coal a negative for Australia.
Then add in the climate change problem, a loser for the world. Maybe we should add in all those Asians getting sick from using that coal also.
The faster renewables, efficiency and life style changes can eliminate coal, the better.
As an added bonus, a lot of fuel will not be needed and a lot of trucks, trains and machinery will not be worn out or need replacement.
BTW, it looks like the number of employees in the coal industry took a downturn lately to 40,000. Australian Bureau of Statistics give it at 37,800 in 2014.
even after that, we will probably need to keep on using SOME coal for some additional period of time to manufacture steel, etc.
Coal is convenient and cheap for reducing iron ore (and providing a little carbon), but once renewables (or nuclear) are large enough to produce large surpluses of very cheap power 80% of the time, then hydrogen will become very cheap. Hydrogen works very nicely to reduce any kind of oxide, including iron ore. So, coal won’t be needed for much once grid alternatives are in place.
It will be a LONG time before we have enough wind and solar power to manufacture free hydrogen on the grand scale.
But I believe there is an excellent possibility that day will come.
It’s an interesting question.
Even now there are significant amounts of time when whole sale power prices go to zero, due to low night time demand combined with high generation from wind and nuclear. Those periods will only expand, and increase the % of time that very cheap power is available.
So, the question is: what capacity factor would be needed for electrolysis capex to make producing H2 profitable in this way? I believe about 4% of industrial H2 production is from electrolysis right now, but I don’t have the operational details.
Here’s a little something more from the CDC.
https://ephtracking.cdc.gov/showAirHIA.action
More “Pause” Liberal Lies!
“I think Greenpeace is going to come out toasted from the climate change debacle once the climate starts cooling in the near future.” ~ Javier 2015
http://peakoilbarrel.com/eia-says-shale-continues-to-decline/#comment-550135
“All in all it looks like 2015 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time.” ~ Javier 2016
https://archive.is/F9a1N#selection-1995.0-2021.289
No strong La Niña in the summer of 2016 as was expected. Got delayed by one year. Make that 2016.
So, if we get a mild Niño in 2017 the analysis is off?
I agree, 2017 should not be as warm as 2016, and if it is, we are totally screwed.
Noted: Javier now predicts that- 2016 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time.
However this does somewhat clash with his previous prediction of insignificant warming.
“For 2017 and 2018 the annual global average temperature will not be significantly (≥ 0.1°C) above the average for 2001-2016.”
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-january-1-2017/#comment-591246
Your predictions vary from ‘2016 will be the year of Peak Warmth for quite some time’ to ‘annual global average temperature will not be significantly (≥ 0.1°C) above the average for 2001-2016’. You’re all over the road. Pick a lane.
“but temperatures are dropping very fast. We might have a below average late summer and autumn, and that would make it very difficult to have a record year.” ~ Javier June 21, 2016
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/06/21/global-temperatures-are-heading-downward-and-fast/#comment-2241987
Anyone interested in a good laugh can read Javier’s guest post over at WUWT
“It is very likely that Arctic sea ice might not significantly melt or even grow during the next few decades” ~ Javier (comment- “very likely that….. might not significantly…. or even” lol you need an editor dude. Are you sure you’re published? In a science journal right?)
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/10/07/evidence-that-multidecadal-arctic-sea-ice-has-turned-the-corner/
Survivalist,
You are the one alarmed by climate change and talking about models, accelerations and predictions.
Do you think September of 2017 will have less Arctic sea ice than September of 2007? Or do you think we will have a 10th year of no melting in the Arctic? Despite all those record warm years.
Javier is, as usual, lying again. Yes, there has been Arctic melting since 2007, and he’s just lying.
Arctic sea ice is on the increase since 2007.
That chart is laughable.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2016/10/18/extreme-cherry-ice/
Half past one in the morning in Spain and Javier is still at it.
https://youtu.be/9NP0L1PG9ag
For a good laugh at Javier.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2016/10/18/extreme-cherry-ice/
I wonder what other strange ideas are rattling around in his head. Stay tuned for more senseless blabbering.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-24/here-list-donald-trumps-priority-infrastructure-projects
#49 – is Electro-Chem Energy Storage. Will be Interesting to see who the Battery Supplier will be. Tesla / Panasonic NCA cells are not really suitable ( or the best Solution ) for Fix Storage.
It’s interesting to speculate about the possibility that some old battery tech considered obsolete today might make a comeback in the future. Nickel iron batteries for instance are very large and bulky and heavy, but they last just about forever.
And there are PLENTY of places some pretty big ones could be installed with the expectation they will be there indefinitely, such as in attached carports where ventilation could be easily managed.
Iron will stay dirt cheap, and nickel is not all that expensive, considering that such a battery will likely outlast original owner, and maybe his kids too.
And if wind and solar power get to be cheap enough, round trip efficiency won’t matter much, no matter what battery tech is used.
Appliances in the future will be routinely built with computer chips to turn them on and off when the home owner can use intermittent electricity most efficiently, thereby reducing the load on his batteries. Homeowners WILL have batteries a generation down the road, just as they got hooked up to the grid , and the phone company, and most recently to the internet.
The only really BIG electrical load that must be taken care of at night and during bad weather days is the hvac load, and it’s easy as pie to prune the crap out that load with added insulation and by adding thermal mass.
So the batteries won’t really have to carry a large load except maybe when making breakfast and dinner.
Let’s be realistic.
We’re going to have AMPLE fossil fuel or nuke or hydro sourced juice to back up wind and solar power for a LONG time to come, probably at least a couple of decades, here in the USA. The people will insist on having it, and they will gladly pay for it, after experiencing just one or two blackouts due to a lack of it. And the blackouts WILL come, because it’s damned unlikely that we will build out wind and solar power fast enough to prevent them, WITHOUT that fossil fuel backup ready to roll.
The temptation to use any existing renewable electricity infrastructure to the max virtually guarantees the blackouts will come, barring adequate fossil fuel backup. A few blackout are to be expected, because the savings on fuel purchases will be too tempting to pass them up, and the savings from scrapping some legacy fossil fuel capacity , a LITTLE TOO MUCH legacy capacity, will likewise be so tempting that going a little too far down this road is almost a dead certainty.
Hey Longtimber, what do you think about this?
Battery storage startup secures $6M for lead-acid development
We have gone nowhere in battery technology after the Japanese commercialized Lithium-ion in the early 1990’s.
It has been a while.
fyi
AMERICAN EXPERIENCE
Rachel Carson
01/24/17
Rachel Carson is an intimate portrait of the woman whose groundbreaking books revolutionized our relationship to the natural world. When Silent Spring was published in September 1962 it became an instant bestseller and would go on to spark dramatic changes in the way the government regulated pesticides.
http://www.pbs.org/video/2365935530/
I read it shortly after it was published. Back then, I realized just how dangerous pesticides could be , POTENTIALLY, but I wasn’t at all that worried about the picture painted by Carson. It seemed grotesquely over done.
I changed my mind about how dangerous pesticides could be, not because of the inherent properties of any given pesticide, but rather because I realized that the farmers of the world could not be expected to use them wisely, without being FORCED to do so, and that the various governments of the world, including our own, could not be counted on to force the manufacturers, sellers, and users to exercise the necessary precautionary measures, right up to banning the worst ones as necessary.
I have always changed my mind when the facts warrant doing so, and will continue to do so.
We NEED pesticides. We can no more get along without them, given the cards in our hands TODAY, than we could get along without tractors and trucks to grow and haul food. Nature doesn’t do redeals, we HAVE to play the cards in our hand.
Rachel Carson deserves a statue, or at least a bust, on the campus of every agricultural college, but I’m not holding my breath waiting for them to be put there.
And we need to keep on getting rid of the most dangerous and harmful pesticides we use, replacing them with newer ones that are safer and less harmful, and working on technologies and techniques that enable us to use less and less , per unit of food produced.
When I retired, I was using less than half as many kilos per unit of production as my Dad did when I was a kid. The really nasty ones I routinely used back then have all long been banned here in the USA.
There’s a theoretical possibility that some day we can invent or discover pesticides that cause little harm to the environment, and maybe even farm on the industrial scale without any pesticides, but that day is one hell of a long way off.
A little kid alive today might live to see it, but none of the regulars here will live that long.
Apparently using natural predators works well, allowing reduction of pesticide use and increase in production.
http://theconversation.com/cut-pesticide-use-to-boost-yields-its-worked-for-millions-of-farmers-in-asia-and-africa-38951
Yup I can still remember Rachel Carson. I remember the banning of DDT after all the hearings that could find no evidence of any harm it caused yet our wonderful federal gov’t banned it anyway and destroyed many jobs. I know that millions of humans have contracted malaria and died of it in the years following. Yet there’s still way more birds to go around, as seen with all the droppings on my windshields despite all the pesticides and chemicals still in use. Yup looking back the DDT ban wound up being one of the key events that allowed fringe leftist movements to dictate federal gov’t policy for all these years.
Navypop, you are so wrong it isn’t funny.
DDT prevented birds from forming eggshells and the osprey was about to go extinct. This is not controversial; it is established fact. The osprey has since recovered.
DDT is a *persistent organic toxin* which means that it bioaccumulates. (Good pesticides *break down* into harmless chemicals *quickly*. DDT lasts for decades.) Top predators end up with a large dose of it. It prevents birds from forming proper eggshells.
Yes, the hearings demonstrated evidence of this harm. You clearly don’t remember them properly.
Rachel Carson was very specific in describing this harm; it was amply demonstrated; and the elimination of DDT has allowed birds to recover.
I hope you were simply extremely ignorant. I hate liars.
“The idea is that for those who lack a cognitive ability to grasp complexities of our world, strict-right wing ideologies may be more appealing”
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/millennial-media/201304/do-racism-conservatism-and-low-iq-go-hand-in-hand
You sir, are the one who’s so wrong it isn’t even funny. All of these supposed “truths” about DDT you’ve thrown out have been completely and utterly debunked and proved as myth. A simple google search will turn up hundreds of references revealing the actual truths. Here, let me get you started with the research.
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/viewSubCategory.asp?id=1259
In congressional testimony, Charles Wurster, a biologist for the Environmental Defense Fund (and someone whose sympathies, therefore, were clearly with the anti-DDT coalition), likewise noted the general abundance of birds during the DDT years—referring specifically to “increasing numbers of pheasants, quail, doves, turkeys and other game species.” Similarly, the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary Association of Pennsylvania noted dramatic increases in most kinds of hawks; national forest studies from Wisconsin and Michigan reported a nearly sevenfold increase in nesting osprey productivity from 1965 to 1970; and the herring gull population reportedly grew from 2,000 pairs in 1941 to 35,000 pairs in 1971. Some birds, such as blackbirds and redwings, multiplied so rapidly that they became “pests.”
Experiments on caged birds repeatedly found that exposure to DDT—at levels that were hundreds of times greater than those which birds in the wild might encounter—did not lead to significant thinning of their egg shells. A slight degree of eggshell thinning was observed among some birds that had been exposed to mega-doses of DDT, but that thinning was much less pronounced than what had been found in many natural habitats around the world where DDT had not been used. Nor was there any solid evidence that the eggshell thinning among the DDT control group was in fact due to the pesticide. Eggshell thinning can result from such variables as high levels of oil, lead, or mercury in a bird’s environment; or from phosphorus deficiency, calcium deficiency, dehydration, temperature extremes, decreased light, and stress.
Other studies have shown no correlation whatsoever between DDT exposure and eggshell thickness in pelican populations. Moreover, it was found that red-tailed hawks and golden eagles during the DDT era produced eggs whose shells were thicker than those of the eggs that these bird species had produced before the creation and use of DDT.
Just as empirical evidence discredits the notion that DDT led to a decline in bird populations, so do the facts contradict claims that the pesticide is harmful to humans and other animals.
http://dailycaller.com/2016/02/26/discredited-silent-spring-is-still-being-taught-on-college-campauses/
Today, it is widely acknowledged that Carson overstated the dangers of DDT, according to a diverse array of groups including the conservative think tanks such as American Enterprise Institute and civil rights groups like the Congress of Racial Equality. It is widely acknowledged that a reduction in DDT use has led to a dramatic rise in malaria cases — over 214 million new cases of malaria occurred in 2015, according to the World Health Organization.
“DDT can be used safely and in limited quantities in and around homes to repel mosquitoes and save lives, but many governments ban or severely limit its use because of Carson-generated alarmism,” Logomasini continued. “Meanwhile, people continue to get sick from diseases like Malaria, Dengue, and now the Zika virus. An estimated half a million people—mostly children–die every year from malaria alone.”
The Environmental Protection Agency even admitted “DDT is not a carcinogenic hazard to man … The use of DDT under the regulations involved here does not have a deleterious effect on freshwater fish, estuarine organisms, wild birds or other wildlife.”
Even Carson’s claims that DDT use harms birds, the original justification for banning DDT, have been thoroughly debunked.
See linked page “The Truth About DDT and Silent Spring” – http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-truth-about-ddt-and-silent-spring
http://www.breadandbutterscience.com/DDT.htm
Almost a half billion people contract malaria each year. Over a million of them die. DDT is the most effective weapon against malaria. But it was banned. Was that decision based on faulty research?
http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2016/02/05/zika-outbreak-revives-pesticide-controversies/
To this day, news organizations cite their DDT hoax as if it was true. But it wasn’t — the pesticide caused none of the problems laid at its feet, including the infamous thinning of bird shells alleged by the 1962 book Silent Spring. This was known at the time, as reputable scientific research knocked down the anti-DDT allegations … only to be overridden by political considerations.
Dr. Robert Zubrin, author of a recent book on junk science, succinctly summed up the DDT saga in a National Review article, calling for the return of the much-maligned, highly effective pesticide
See linked page “Will the EPA Cause a Zika Pandemic? – http://www.nationalreview.com/article/430504/zika-virus-epa-ddt“
Banning DDT marked the start of the left bringing it’s population control eugenics agenda to our country. They disguised it as environmentalism, just like they still do today with climate change.
“The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.” ~ Winston Churchill
https://youtu.be/Xw_V2kMOUgw
Well folks, now that the foxes are busy with taking charge of the hen house, Team
FoxKoch is busy spreading their ideas!I would not be surprised if it were discovered that the Koch brothers are interested in DDT. Did their father have anything to do with DDT?
You are full of shit!
Out wingnut friends really have a hard on for Carson.
They are trying to rewrite history, with their fairyland delusions.
Sounds to me like they do not understand basic biology and ecosystems. Also that they did not read or understand the book.
It’s a complex subject and the changes affected powerful pesticide manufacturing. Both factors lead to dilution of the knowledge chain with time.
George, you need some serious meds, bro! You are a real sicko!
May I suggest something to help soothe your twisted pathetic little mind…
PSYCHEDELICS
Oh, give me a button of wild peyote
To munch in my den at night,
That I may set my id afloat
In the country of queer delight.
So ho! it’s off to the land of dreams
With never a stop or stay,
Where psychiatrists meet with fairy queens
To sing a roundelay.
Give me a flagon of mescaline
To wash o’er my mundane mind,
That I may feel like a schizophrene
Of the catatonic kind.
So hey! let in the visions of light
To banish banality,
Then will I surely catch a sight
Of the Real Reality.
Give me a chalice of lysergic
To quaff when day is done,
That I may get a perceptual kick
From my diencephalon.
So ho! let all resistance down
For a transcendental glance
Past the superego’s frosty frown
At the cosmic underpants.
Give me a pinch of psilocybin
To sprinkle in my beer,
That my psychopathic next-of-kin
May not seem quite so queer.
So hey! it’s off for the visions bizarre,
Past the ego boundary,
For a snort at the psychedelic bar
Of the new Psychiatry.
F. W. HANLEY, M.D.
Hey, if non of the above suits your fancy, then, since it is so harmless anyway, why don’t you go ahead and quaff a chalice of DDT instead. Let us know how that works out for ya!
Cheers!
the anti science left gets grubered again! i mean really how much more proof do you guys need to see DDT is very helpful but banned bcuz politics.
DDT ban linked to population control
read the comments….”I read years ago an account by the daughter of a DDT salesman in rural Ohio back in the 1950s. At each farm visited, the salesman would drink a tablespoon of DDT to show farmers the pesticide was not dangerous to humans.”
Just about every old fart in the USA USED to know half a dozen guys who habitually smoked a pack or two a day, guys who departed this old vale of tears a decade or two earlier on average that guys who never smoked.
DDT is a deadly poison, depending on the species exposed to it. And it sticks around just about forever in the environment, messing things up that are better left undisturbed.
I know it’s not going to make any friends for me when I say this, but the folks who drew a line in the sand in respect to transporting Canadian heavy oil, tar sands oil, thru the USA by pipeline made a major mistake, politically, in that their opposition in my opinion pushed the hot buttons of a lot more people to voter R than it did hot buttons among people who tend to vote D.
The mistake was compounded by the fact that it was perceived by the Canadians as a slap in the face. That sort of mistake can fester and poison relations for years or even decades depending on who might hold some particular political office in Canada.
I understand that the people who so vigorously opposed the pipeline did so mostly for what they thought was an EXCELLENT reason, namely that it would at least temporarily reduce the production of tar sands oil, with high hopes that it would cripple production of that nasty stuff permanently.
And it’s altogether possible that the opponents of the pipeline roused up enough D voters to win a few elections here and there for the D party. I don’t know.So maybe they achieved that goal.
The biggest tactical mistake they made was to continuously emphasize the possibility of a pipeline failure resulting in a major oil spill. Nobody can deny that such spill could happen, or that there have been plenty of spills before proving their case. So focusing on that possibility worked, at least it worked to motivate D ‘s afraid of virtually everything that moves, sarcasm intended.
It backfired badly however when R inclined voters heard it over and over, because the pipeline advocates had the relevant facts on their side.
One the country is literally crisscrossed with old pipelines, built to yesteryear’s far less rigorous standards, and spills aren’t all that common in spite of there being many thousands of miles of old lines.
Two, the new line would be built to the latest and most rigorous standards, and equipped with pumping stations so designed that they would shut down pretty quick in the event of a major leak. Bottom line, anybody listening to the pipeline advocates with an open mind most likely concluded that the new line would be quite safe enough , in terms of the big picture.
Then the opponents made another mistake, emphasizing that most of the profits would accrue to oil companies, with little of the money going to American workers. That sort of argument doesn’t sit too well with most Americans, not even ultra reliable D voters such as union members and teachers, who are apt to have some of their pension money in oil stocks.
What I’m trying to get at is that the D’s need to think more about the needs, desires, and fears of the common people of this country, in terms of formulating policy, if they want to win elections.
Preventing the construction of the Keystone didn’t do result in our country, or the world, cutting back on oil enough to matter, if there was any reduction in the use of oil AT ALL due to preventing it being built.
The pipeline advocates had this high card in their hand too, they knew the public in general would understand that oil is fungible , and it will find it’s way to the customer who wants it.Blocking drilling in one particular spot, or blocking one particular pipeline, won’t stop people from burning as much oil as they please, they just get it from a different producer via a different delivery path, if necessary.
It’s said that nobody has ever went broke overestimating the gullibility of the public, but it is certainly possible to lose close elections by overestimating the ignorance of ordinary working people, and their ability to understand such clear cut arguments as the ones pro and con in respect to the Keystone.
If the D’s want to win, they MUST HAVE leaders with the common touch, leaders who can understand how to win the votes of the people who put Trump in the White House.
Anyone who has their pension money in oil stocks needs to get it out. NOW. It’ll be worthless in 10 years. Tillerson already cashed out, making sure he sold his Exxon Stock even though he wasn’t supposed to be able to sell it for 10 years.”
It’s quite possible to lose elections by underestimating the ignorance of ordinary working people. Which is what happened, actually. Having the “common touch” is largely about being able to communicate and sympathize with the deeply ignorant.
The pipeline was a weird and not entirely useful place for environmentalists to take a stand, but there was a very sound reason for Dakota Access Pipeline to be stopped. It was going to run north of Bismarck. Bismarck complained because of the threat to their municipal water supply. So it was rerouted to run right under the water supply of the local Native Americans, who absolutely rejected it but were overruled.
Does that sound legal to you? Because it isn’t. It’s a treaty violation. Running it north of Bismarck *was* legal.
Trump and his oligarch buddies are running a pump and dump scam on the American economy. I’m gonna ride the scam and cash out at the top. Dow Jones to 23,000. Oil to 140/barrel. Then get liquid before the next big crash. The next crash is the last crash. Ain’t no recovery after that. The next economy after that is agrarian, with a bit of post industrial scavenger economy on the side.
http://www.the-american-interest.com/2016/12/19/the-curious-world-of-donald-trumps-private-russian-connections/?utm_content=buffer55e4b&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
Hi Nathanael,
I will take your word for the local opposition, it was well founded.
My larger point in making my 12:58 comment, which I intended to come back and add a few minutes later, is that the D’s miscalculated in picking this particular battle.
There are battles you can win, and battles you might win, at very high costs to your own side, and battles best avoided, so as to use your troops and war materials in OTHER battles that are easier to win at lower costs.
My opinion is that simply opposing the Keystone pipeline was ok, but drawing a line in the sand and making such a HUGE issue out of it was a serious mistake.
The D’s dawdling and avoiding making a decision on the pipeline was one of the hottest of hot button issues for a lot of R leaning and R voters. They were totally convinced of course that it would eventually be a denial, and just saw it all as a farce to help Clinton or who ever got the D nomination among the “tree huggers and whale lover” set.
Construction guys who work in big unions know the D’s are the ones who put the money up for the really big jobs, and help them keep on making maybe double or triple ( I KNOW, I have been in heavy construction both union an non union ) what they would make in an open shop environment.
So as a rule, they’re reliable D voters. But the Keystone issue, and the regulatory pressure on the coal industry , etc, well……….
That sort of thing can leave construction and trades guys wondering if a D politician is REALLY their friend . Throw in support for globalization, and you have found yourself a formula for losing the votes of the working class people who are the REAL core of the D party.
Such people don’t have to actually work in heavy construction or industries that might be or have been offshored.
There are a lot of people in the little city nearest me who USED to be hard core Democrats, a minority of the voters, to be sure, but still a lot of them. A bunch of them lost their jobs, or went broke running businesses of their own , when the textile and furniture industries were mostly offshored.
A few years ago , they were more prone to blame this FIRST HAND personal loss on the R’s, but last year……….. They were far more prone to blame it on the D’s, because they saw Clinton as the champion of the offshoring movement.
A good many of them voted for Trump for this reason alone. Some others simply stayed home. If the D’s had run a candidate not burdened with that globalist baggage, or with the secret speech at a quarter of a million a pop to the banksters, etc, they would have voted D.
This is the sort of thing I’m talking about when I say the D’s need to run somebody with the common touch.
Bill had it. So did Reagan. Obama had it too, but maybe not quite to the same extent.But he still WON. Any D nominee with a little charisma, a decent reputation with the overall electorate, and a message that rallied the working class would in my estimation have whipped Trump’s ass by at least ten points and won the WH as easily as falling off a log.
I forgot to post this link up thread for my little buddy HB.
Carville is one of the big D Democrats who has said that Clinton and the D’s lost because they made too many mistakes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Carville
Big D Democrats don’t come a whole lot bigger than Carville, except for Presidents and Congressional committee chairmen and maybe senators with a lot of seniority, etc.
“An updated NOAA sea-level rise report just released recommends a revised worst-case sea-level rise rise scenario of 2.5 metres by 2100, 5.5 metres by 2150 and 9.7 metres by 2200. It says sea level science has “advanced significantly over the last few years, especially (for) land-based ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica under global warming”, and hence the “correspondingly larger range of possible 21st century rise in sea level than previously thought”. It points to “continued and growing evidence that both Antarctica and Greenland are losing mass at an accelerated rate”, which “strengthens an argument for considering worst-case scenarios in coastal risk management.”
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/publications/techrpt83_Global_and_Regional_SLR_Scenarios_for_the_US_final.pdf
Judith Curry Is In With The Koch Brothers
Posted by Greg Laden on January 25, 2017
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2017/01/25/judith-curry-is-in-with-the-koch-brothers/
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Cause_of_Action
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/files/2017/01/2017.01.25-Mot.-for-Leave-to-File-Nos.-14-cv-101-14-cv-126-D.C..pdf
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/files/2017/01/2017.01.25-Br.-of-Amicus-Dr.-Judith-A.-Curry-Nos.-14-cv-101-14-cv-126-D.C..pdf
Georgia Tech couldn’t stand the smell—
Judith is a intellectual embarrassment.
She’s cashed out and started blatantly accepting checks from the people who were sponsoring her dishonesty all along.
Good for her.
“Additionally, in its recent transition from the Dyas/Frye test to the Daubert test for the admissibility of scientific evidence, this Court has embraced the view that generally accepted scientific viewpoints are not always more reliable than the minority opinion. In order for minority views to flourish and develop into arguments that will aid finders of fact, they must be protected from efforts that seek to silence and force them out of the marketplace of ideas.”
Couldn’t be more correct.
“With 168 published peer-reviewed articles and two major textbooks she has nothing more to demonstrate in Academic science. Her climate studies private company is doing good and she has requested emeritus status at Georgia Tech. She will continue to do great whatever she pursues. Her contributions to climate science will only grow with time.” ~ Javier, on Judith Curry.
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-january-1-2017/#comment-591033
“She’s saying there’s a lot of uncertainty and we don’t really know how much we are contributing to climate change.” ~ Javier, on Judith Curry
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-january-1-2017/#comment-591442
Merchants of Doubt (Sockpuppets for Uncertainty)- using scientists as merchants of doubt.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2017/01/19/merchants-of-doubt-2/
Our Friend:
A question for anyone knowledgable: the Antarctic sea ice extent is about to hit a minimum which is going to be below 2 million square kilometres (probably close to a record but I don’y know for sure). When they give the numbers does the sea ice include ice shelves or just free floating ice, and in either case how would they account for the big chunk of Larsen C that is about to break away?
Sea ice is frozen ocean water that forms and melts in the ocean. Sea ice is typically just a few metres thick. Ice shelves float in the ocean but originate on land as glaciers. When Larsen C goes they will subtract (about) 50,000 km^2 off the total ice shelf area.
From what I understand sea ice is ice with the sea under it. Glaciers are grounded on land, even if the land is below sea level. Sea ice is not glaciers.
No, ice shelves and any ice that comes from glaciers is not considered sea ice.
http://nsidc.org/cryosphere/sotc/sea_ice.html
Changing climate has stalled Australian wheat yields: study
Statistically, the chance of observing the decline in yield potential over 50 weather stations and 26 years through random variability is less than one in 100 billion.
https://theconversation.com/changing-climate-has-stalled-australian-wheat-yields-study-71411
And I thought the future of food would be in the oceans. Maybe it still is our future food source.
http://grist.org/food/this-ocean-farmer-could-make-you-hopeful-about-the-future-of-the-sea/
Yep, I’ve been following him for a while. This is his company website:
http://greenwave.org/3d-ocean-farming/
But just like climate change affects agriculture on land it does the same to ocean based agriculture and whether or not the anti science types would like to deny it, ocean acidification is also a problem that we know will continue to get worse if we continue on our current fossil fuel burning path.
But hey jelly fish are edible, though not quite as tasty as tuna…
I am going to try those kelp crunch energy bars from the Maine coast. Rather eat weeds than jellyfish (yuck).
Hi Dennis, I replied your message above. But somehow it’s now showing up:
Hi Dennis, a late Happy New Year!
I still don’t quite understand those power purchase agreements that offer 2-3 cents/kwh for wind/solar
Using relatively reliable EIA data and making assumptions about reasonable rate of return, I still don’t see wind/solar being cheaper than gas in the US. In China, solar is still more expensive than coal. These are the two largest economies in the world, one high income, one middle income.
The EIA data is for national average. But their state by state cost estimates do not show that much difference from the national average.
One possibility is that for some reason, those solar investors do not need to demand normal rate of return. Say, if they only need to have depreciation covered, that would of course the price a lot. Subsidy is another matter. But basically one really needs to know (1) detailed terms of power purchase agreement; (2) actual investment cost of wind/solar (some time ago, I also read reports about very cheap solar power in UAE but the actual investment cost turned out to be high); (3) on the ground capacity utilization rates (not theoretical, hypothetical projections) to have real sense about how exactly those agreements work
About 100% renewable energy, before we can talk about that, we need to have 100% renewable electric power first. I think last month Euan Mearns’s website had several posts about difficulties in having 100% renewable electricity in some Pacific islands
EIA projections are known to be absolute utter garbage for solar and wind. EIA *data* is accurate but is typically two years old.
Yes, utility-scale solar and onshore wind are cheaper than NG for electricity production in most of the US, as of now (not 2 years ago). Please note that most of the world has substantially more expensive NG than the US does.
Yes, utility-scale solar is cheaper than new coal in China, too.
Second point, which might be where you went wrong: estimates on rate of return for solar depend quite heavily on lifetime of the panels. The warranties are now about 25 years. The actual lifetimes appear to be in excess of 40 years. Investors with a long time horizon will use the 40 year lifetime.
I am not talking about projections, I am talking about actual cost estimates of US generating capacity. I do not think anyone can seriously claim EIA’s is not among the most authoritative regarding actual current cost estimates.
About China’s construction cost, it’s safe to say I know better
About China’s construction cost, it’s safe to say I know better
Hey Political Economist,
Have you ever seen this?
The breakthrough in renewable energy (vpro backlight documentary)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmyrbKBZ6SU
Love to hear your thoughts on how accurate the part about China is.
Fred, thanks.
In China, coal power costs about 4000 Chinese Yuan/kw to build and solar PV still costs about 7000-8000 Chinese Yuan/kw to build. Of course, coal power plants consume coal but PV has much lower capacity utilization rates.
Regarding Gonefishing’s points about wind power’s rising capacity utilization, I don’t see it in the data (BP or EIA). Some individual sites may be, but that may not be representative. In China, effective capacity utilization rates for wind is less than 20% and for solar is about 10%
I do know that if there had not been central government intervention, the local authorities would have rushed to build coal power plants. China used to build near 100 GW of coal plants every year and is still building dozens of them every year now. So, instead of building 2GW of coal plants per week, now the pace is down to about 1GW per week. Progress, a sort of.
China used to build near 100 GW of coal plants every year and is still building dozens of them every year now. So, instead of building 2GW of coal plants per week, now the pace is down to about 1GW per week. Progress, a sort of.
Thanks Political Economist, appreciate the response and your perspective. So we are at least moving forward, sort of 😉
Cheers!
Hi Nathanael,
I’m personally all for building things to last for generations, for centuries even, and have invested extra money in some of my own projects to extend their lifespan to “indefinite” or permanent status, even though I won’t be around to benefit.
But not many people will invest money in anything other than real estate based on the life expectancy of it.
It’s all about returning the principal amount to the lender within a workable time frame.
Thirty years is about the longest time frame that can realistically be considered for loaning money. Even at thirty years, the first five years payments are almost entirely interest.
This is why you seldom hear of a forty year mortgage. They exist, but I have no personal knowledge of an example.
Any debt scheduled to run past thirty years is basically partially a gift to the borrower in that the expectation of the lender getting his money back is slim to none.Inflation typically means the last few years payments are worth only a rather minor fraction of their worth at the time the loan was made.
Now if a solar installation is built as a PERMANENT part of a house , or permanent installation on the grounds, in such a way that nobody is ever likely to remove it, it’s easy to make a case for including it in a purchase money loan. Furnaces or heat pumps are included , although there is no real expectation that either a furnace nor a heat pump will last thirty years.
Replacing some individual panels, or the lot of them, with new ones somewhere along the way is not that big a deal.
Bottom line, my opinion is that the industry should put a lot of emphasis on selling customers to integrate new installations as part of the new house construction process. Then there need be nothing that looks out of place, or that is harder to work on than the rest of the house.
Apparently the increasing utilization factor of wind turbines while holding cost of the turbine the same has dropped the power cost dramatically in less than a decade. Solar has a similar story of increasing efficiency with quickly reducing costs allowing a solar farm to now produce electricity in the 2 cents/ kilowatt range over 40 years (including O&M).
http://www.awea.org/falling-wind-energy-costs
Some areas have very good wind and or solar potential, leading to very low prices in those areas, along with the technological advances.
China installed 17.4 gigawatts of wind power in 2016. The represented a fall by 16.8 gigawatts from the wind power installation in 2015.
However, China’s solar power installation surged from 15.3 gigawatts in 2015 to 34.8 gigawatts in 2016
Some people think the Chinese have gotten way too far ahead building wind farms and way to far behind in building long distance transmission lines, and are thus more or less compelled to back off on the wind somewhat until they can catch up on the transmission lines.
This sounds entirely reasonable to me.
That’s true
Extreme Permafrost Warming on Svalbard
https://youtu.be/eo9-6PNFsgM
Ed Hawkins has some great tweets
https://mobile.twitter.com/ed_hawkins
“Harvests in the U.S. to suffer under global warming”
http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2017/01/harvests-in-us-to-suffer-under-global.html
http://reneweconomy.com.au/2017-will-be-a-big-year-for-australias-energy-system-heres-what-to-look-out-for-80289/
Our own Fred Maygar could have written this piece.
It’s right down his favorite alley, er, I mean no speed limit FREEWAY.
It’s about the turmoil in the Australian domestic electricity market, and change happening and the old boss dogs no more able to stop it that a man in a swamp can keep the mosquitoes from biting. For every one he can squish, a dozen home in on the smell of blood ( figurative blood) .
“The problem for the minister is that the nature of the energy sector has changed from a centralized, top-down, slowly changing system dominated by big businesses, governments and large investments to a chaotic, decentralized, diverse and rapidly changing jungle.
Even if state governments could be brought into line, local governments, the private sector, households and community groups will pursue their agendas. Competitive democracy is at work.”
Things are not always as political partisans paint them.
Georgia is a red state, and we all know that R type people not only don’t like renewable energy, they DETEST it. We’ve heard it from some of our D true believers, and they’re NEVER wrong about anything, right HB?
This is why the wind energy industry in Texas consists only of a few old timey windmills pumping water for the cows , because Texans are mostly Republicans. 😉
Them there Texans have obviously got plenty of open space, and plenty of wind, and some nice big cities that could use the juice, but being as they’re REPUBLICANS, they would just rather do without. Stupid stupid stupid!
http://www.pv-tech.org/news/georgia-power-expects-to-add-up-to-1.6gw-of-renewable-energy-by-2021
North Carolina is another red state where the solar power industry is growing fast.
OFM-
I had a few gigs (movie industry) in Atlanta this summer and Fall, and really liked it.
(and I’m from SF and the Bay).
We need to be more open to experience.
Daily CO2
January 24, 2017: 407.69 ppm
January 24, 2016: 403.45 ppm
What, still increasing at over 3 ppm per year and El Nino long over? How can that be? Only two decades to a doubling now, maybe less. Arctic will be mostly free of summer ice by then. Natural feedbacks cranking up, should be interesting.
We better really get those EV’s on the road and install a lot more renewable energy by then. Need to anyway, oil will be depleting.
The temperature effects of the late El Nino receded months ago, but the hydrological effects (drought) take longer to rebound. It’s the accelerated oxidation and reduced CO2 uptake due to drought in the tropics that bumps up the CO2 during and after El Nino. The drought conditions are apparently continuing.
After the 97-98 El Nino, we saw a rapid reversal to strong La Nina, but CO2 kept going up until it plateaued from April 99 (368.45ppm) until May 2000 (368.71ppm).
This time, we are heading back to neutral or weak El Nino for 2017 after a very weak La Nina that has already fizzled out. There may not be any drought relief in sight until the next real La Nina.
There is a chance of a more robust El Niño in the Fall, is starting to become part of the discussion among the forecasters.
Which will be realty interesting.
However, we are still behind the “Spring Barrier”, which makes forecasting much more challenging.
Accelerated oxidation and drought in the tropics has been going on for a long time, initiating well before the latest El Nino. There has been increased growth in higher latitudes due to warming to help balance that effect. I think one needs to look to the ocean for changes in CO2, as it warms it absorbs less CO2 and has a much vaster area than the jungles and forests of the tropics.
If the drought in the tropics could cause a 30 percent rate increase in atmospheric CO2 increase then they are actually outputting much more since the ocean sink and land sinks would take up at least half. That is a lot of CO2 and a lot of forest oxidation.
seems like this is actually 6 months old.
http://www.sciencealert.com/nasa-just-made-all-the-scientific-research-it-funds-available-for-free
NASA just announced that any published research funded by the space agency will now be available at no cost, launching a new public web portal that anybody can access.
The free online archive comes in response to a new NASA policy, which requires that any NASA-funded research articles in peer-reviewed journals be publicly accessible within one year of publication.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/funder/nasa/
http://modernfarmer.com/2017/01/gag-order-not-heres-trump-cracking-government-science-scary/
Due to the narrowing width of replies, my comment above is hard to read and the chart almost illegible, so I am reposting it here:
As usual, after Javier gets caught in yet another blatant lie, he tries to find some graph in his denier playbook to “support” his wildly non-science pontifications.
Also standard operating procedure for Javier, he uses obsolete incomplete AND irrelevant data to “support” his claim.
What’s the claim?
El Nino conditions in 2015 and 2016 caused the planet to lose energy.
The data to “support” this claim… ends in 2010!
Plus the chart Javier posted is of net Long Wave flux (LW), not total flux (which includes both Short Wave and Long Wave fluxes measured by CERES). The paper Javier linked to, but apparently didn’t read very carefully, DOES show a chart of the net TOTAL flux, but that chart still doesn’t tell us anything about 2015 and 2016 data, since it also ends in 2010!
….
What do the actual up-to-date data say about Javier’s claim?
The data say his claim is WRONG (for 2015). See chart below.
The data say his claim is CORRECT for 2016. See OHC data in my previous post… the Earth lost a lot of heat in the first half of 2016… due to the super-El-Nino. Due to the high correlation between OHC and CERES TOA Net flux as shown in the chart, we can be very confident that the CERES data for 2016 will confirm the ARGO data and show that the TOA Net flux was negative for 2016.
For the 2 year period from the beginning of 2015 to the beginning of 2017? Javier’s claim is WRONG. The net change in heat energy for the Earth is POSITIVE for the two years, as shown by the ARGO OHC data.
After failing so profoundly to find even a shred of up-to-date data to support his claims, Javier goes on to challenge me to “show that the planet doesn’t lose energy during El Niño… if you can.”
OK, done.
The Earth gained energy during the 2015 mild El Nino conditions, as shown by both CERES and ARGO data (see chart below)…
…AND it lost energy during the 2016 super El Nino.
The total net change for the two years was a GAIN of 0.43 * 10^22 Joules.
The lesson to be gained from the net energy imbalance data?
It takes very high temps… 1.35C GISS… for the Earth to lose energy at the current level of radiative forcing. At lower temps… 0.87C for 2015, and 0.88C for the last quarter of 2016… the Earth still gains heat. Both the CERES satellite data and the ARGO data confirm this heat gain.
A second lesson?
Never take a Javier-Claim at face value. If it is presented without data, you can be certain that it is made up, false, unsupported – a lie.
If Javier present data to “support” his claim, you can be sure the data is incomplete, not up-to-date, or irrelevant to the claim, as amply demonstrated here.
Chart source:
“Improving estimates of Earth’s energy imbalance”
http://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate3043.epdf?author_access_token=WH-oGmmTVhgyBTn1tn0hBNRgN0jAjWel9jnR3ZoTv0NbDl8PNdWl2LsN_U9az9DjotVsZOc1X_mKsJQUTyXVQA5En__zwz4SJ7kbvt6bZUctn-nmEVjpv5mzVfTBVgV1
Excerpts:
“…With over 90% of Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI) being stored in the ocean, the most accurate way to determine it is to measure increases in ocean temperatures (along with increases in land temperatures, decreases in ice mass, and increases in atmospheric temperature and moisture)…”
…owing to improved sampling by the Argo array over time (Fig.1), the correlation between year-to-year rates of 0–1,800m ocean heat uptake and the latest release of CERES EEI is a much-improved 0.78. This striking agreement between two completely independent measures of EEI variability bolsters confidence in both of these complementary climate observation systems…”
wehappyfew,
Thanks for taking the trouble of responding to Javier’s ongoing lies, misrepresentations and (deliberate) distortions. It’s pretty obvious most of us find his subterfuge anything other than disconcerting noise but there are, I suppose, bound to be a few lurkers who mistake him for an honest broker in the assessment of scientific data. So, simply ignoring him may not be an ideal solution.
I came to the conclusion that Javier is like static noise on a radio station, irrelevant and meaningless. Merely clouds the communication if you pay attention to it. I stopped taking him seriously, he has nothing of value to add to anything, waste of time trying to chase down all his claims. He no longer provides references since then it is too easy to refute.
So turn on the squelch and let’s talk to each other in the clear.
Your data range is well below the ocean thermocline so is missing much of the imbalance. The actual mixed layer only goes down to 450 meters and the main thermocline exists between 90 and 125 meters depth. So to go to 1800 meters averages in a lot of little changing temperatures of water not involved in the radiational heating and cooling process.
“So to go to 1800 meters averages in a lot of little changing temperatures of water not involved in the radiational heating and cooling process.”
Good point. If memory serves, ocean waters warmer than 10°C which dominates the surface rarely extend much below 500 meters.
However, I must say, static noise is not irrelevant and meaningless because it can, and often does, mask meaningful signals (useful information). In my field, seismic, digital signal processing offered a major resolution and image clarity improvement of over previous analog methods making it possible to strip off and separate the unwanted noise. So, maybe we should digitize and strip off Javier. 🙂
Sure, adding in mass that is not involved in the process can allow any result to be generated. Might as well add in the temperature of the first 1800 meters of earth to the land surface temperature results.
Five by five on the noise problem. Reducing bandwidth will increase Q.
No, Wehappyfew,
You are the one trying to confound the issues to accuse me of lying when what I have said is supported by the best data available.
You try to change the discussion to the energy imbalance when it is something that cannot be measured with any precision and therefore it is estimated by different procedures that give different results.
The issue is much simpler. During El Niño situations the amount of heat that radiates to space from the planet increases, while during La Niña situations is the opposite. And the way you measure that is by measuring Outgoing Longwave Radiation OLR from satellites. And it is measured with AIRS and CERES instruments.
It is really funny that you would accuse the graph as denier data, because Norman Loeb is CERES Principal Investigator at NASA Langley Research Center.
“Tropical variations in emitted outgoing longwave (LW) radiation are found to closely track changes in the El Niño- Southern Oscillation (ENSO). During positive ENSO phase (El Niño), outgoing LW radiation increases, and decreases during the negative ENSO phase (La Niña). The coldest year during the last decade occurred in 2008, during which strong La Niña conditions persisted throughout most of the year. Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) observations show that the lower temperatures extended throughout much of the troposphere for several months, resulting in a reduction in outgoing LW radiation and an increase in net incoming radiation.”
Loeb, Norman G., et al. “Advances in understanding top-of-atmosphere radiation variability from satellite observations.” Surveys in geophysics 33.3-4 (2012): 359-385.
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10712-012-9175-1
Is that clear enough for you? El Niño means an increase in OLR i.e. heat lost to space.
Both AIRS and CERES show very close agreement in their measures:
“The extremely close agreement of OLR anomaly time series derived from observations by two different instruments implies high stability of both sets of results. Anomalies of global mean, and especially tropical mean, OLR are shown to be strongly correlated with an El Niño Index. These correlations explain that the recent global and tropical mean decreases in OLR over the time period studied are primarily the result of a transition from an El Niño condition at the beginning of the data record to La Niña conditions toward the end of the data period.”
Susskind, Joel, et al. “Interannual variability of outgoing longwave radiation as observed by AIRS and CERES.” Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 117.D23 (2012).
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2012JD017997/full
This are the best measurements on the issue that science can provide, and they agree that El Niño conditions produce an increase of radiation to space and therefore and increase of heat lost to space as I have said
You have been caught not knowing this and are trying to confound the issue, while attacking me. That the CERES data for the 2015-16 El Niño has not been published yet does not change anything. The conclusion is solid and supported by several articles and the best group in the world in measuring OLR.
Ignore what Javier is saying.
Much more interesting is to follow my geophysical modeling of ENSO
http://contextearth.com/2016/11/21/presentation-at-agu-2016-on-december-12/
This behavior has probably been going on for thousands of years and it really is a zero-sum contribution to global temperature.
I posted the chart showing CERES data for 2015. You ignored it because it disproved your lie.
Then you post more charts that DON’T SHOW 2015 or 2016 data. Again proving you cannot ever post up-to-date or relevant data.
I agree the CERES data will show a net energy loss for 2016. Super Los Ninos do that. Since the resumption of neutral ENSO conditions in late 2016, OHC has resumed its relentless increase. And CERES data will confirm that.
D party inside politics
http://thehill.com/opinion/opinion/316174-budowsky-the-truth-sanders-proves
This guy gets it.
“Soon there will be demonstrations that dwarf in size the humongous outpouring the world witnessed last Saturday. Hundreds of thousands of citizens became millions. Millions will become tens of millions. The big lie of Trump’s phony investigation of voter fraud will give way to the big truths that set us free. Many who did not vote before will vote next time. Most who supported Sanders in primaries and Trump in November will not support Trump again. Many who believed Trump’s false promise of reform reject the dirty swamp of crony capitalism and conflicts of interest that corrupt Washington under Trump today.”
But this one sentence is apparently intended to be read as meaning a lot of Sanders supporters voted for Trump.
I’m sure at least a handful of people who hate HRC’s insides and supported Sanders for that reason only went on to vote for Trump. I’ve read an account or two posted by such people on the net.
But I talked with a LOT of Sanders fans, and I have never yet met one personally or engaged one on the net at a site devoted to Sanders fans, who would vote for Trump even if the D party were to run OLD SCRATCH himself, or Atilla the Hun , at the top of the D ticket.
I think maybe this guy is trying to deflect some of the blame for Clinton losing onto Trump supporters.
There’s a good chance that later on he will be all kissy kissy with Sanders fans, because there’s a very good possibility they will control the party, or at least a whole lot of key positions in the party, within the near future.
Barring really good luck, I don’t see the R party and the Trumpsters losing the congressional mid terms, because the R’s hold most of the safe seats by a mile. Local elections and state elections don’t correlate very will with national elections in the off years, and voters aren’t too apt to blame their county and city governments for Trumpster issues.
But in 2020, it’s my opinion that the D’s have a FINE, an EXCELLENT shot at regaining the White House and picking up a lot of seats in both the House and the Senate, maybe even enough to capture control.
Trump and his homies are setting all time records fast, when it comes to pissing off just about everybody except his fellow one percenters and the unfortunately less well informed ( AKA know as ignorant ) part of the working class that has little or no appreciation of the BIG PICTURE.
Too bad we don’t have a democracy.
When I look at the state of the world right now, I see an arc bending towards something that dwarfs any parochial concerns about particular presidential elections or political arrangements between human nations, and which should put those events into deep perspective. I see a grand planetary shift that has not been seen for millions of years. I see that half the world’s wildlife has gone, and half the world’s forests, and half the world’s topsoil. I see that we have perhaps two generations of food left before we wear out the rest of that topsoil. I see 10 billion people needing to be fed. I see the highest concentration of carbon in the atmosphere since humans evolved. I see coming waves of political and cultural turmoil resulting from all of this, which makes me fear for my children, and sometimes for myself.
Hi Duncan,
Whoever wrote it has a way with words.
I don’t have any children, at least not any who know who Daddy really is, and I don’t fear for myself, because I am old already.
The author gets it, in spades.
But he or she is probably wrong about having two more generations of food left.
The optimists will of course point out the the pessimists have been wrong in the past, but in the past there were fewer people and more remaining resources. The rate of consumption of resources grows faster year after year, even as the remaining endowment shrinks like a stone.
Agriculture is my profession, and my personal estimate is that it’s rather unlikely we will make it another two generations without some parts of the world suffering a very hard crash, in terms of food production.
Whether the more fortunate citizens in other places and other countries will be willing and able , if willing, to give up a substantial part of their own food supply to prevent forced migrations, famine , war, death from exposure and disease and local violence on the grand scale is a tough question.
We Yankees can feed a billion MORE people than we do already, IF we are willing to give up red meat and eat bread,beans, and a little chicken, maybe.
I’m not placing any bets on our being willing to do so.
The only real hope for avoiding a very hard crash is to pray to our favorite snake or sky daddy or sky mommy or waterfall or mountain that the birth rate continues to drop like a stone in water, to the point that the population peaks and starts declining a hell of a lot sooner than anybody expects it to.
The one somewhat comforting thought considering this scenario is that people living in larger,more powerful , well developed and well educated countries with a substantial remaining endowment of natural resources have a very good shot at pulling thru without suffering a catastrophic crash, so long as they don’t get entangled in too many hot fights.
DON’T get caught in Egypt!
Egypt has nothing to export except desperate people, and not even a quarter of the decent land that is needed to sustainably support the CURRENT population, never mind twice as many.
There are many other countries in as bad or worse circumstances already.
Technological miracles on the ag front might help, if they come about, but not they won’t solve the problem. We know about what the theoretical limits are, when it comes to producing food, and about what inputs are necessary.
The inputs won’t be available in even remotely adequately sufficient quantities.
I’ve been living on 20 acres, horses, llamas, donkey, two mules, chickens, a mature orchard of various trees, and I grew (I’m now living in Mexico) a significant portion of my food.
But even with the fertilizer inputs from the animals (which need exterior inputs), I didn’t come close to self sufficiency, and I had year around growing conditions (Sonoma Valley).
Veggies are easy, eggs not a problem, but calories and oils and fats, more challenging.
I had olives, and a community olive press, and one could get dairy (I didn’t go there).
Potatoes seem the easiest available calories, without getting into grain production, which opens another door entirely.
Anyway, it is much more challenging than the uninitiated ever realize.
What part of Mexico, if I may ask?
NAOM
“I don’t have any children, at least not any who know who Daddy really is”
Deadbeat Dad
Unfortunately for you not much good said about you, disrespectful is your middle name, laziness is your game
Babies don’t need fathers, but mothers do. Someone who is taking care of a baby needs to be taken care of.
I totally disagree about babies not needing fathers. They DO. Kids grow up healthier and better adjusted in two parent homes.
And while it IS possible I might be a father without knowing it, the odds are very high that I am not.
I had three or four long term girl friend/ lovers, and a couple of wives, over about a forty year period, but I know for sure I never fathered any children with any of them.
I had a few casual encounters, as did most young men and women back in those days, and these days as well, but they were few and far between, and I took the usual precautions. So did the women. I never was the sort of guy that lots of women found attractive, but those who did tended to stick around, and I was always faithful to them, for lack of opportunity if for no better reason. Amazingly enough, they were all physically attractive themselves.
Any one of those relationships might have lasted a lifetime if a kid happened. At times there was a mutual decision made that we would like to have one or more, but it never happened.
Who’s fat?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2mU6USTBRE
Just eat it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcJjMnHoIBI
Tim Minchin – Fat Children (with Lyrics)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_ElXYzFX_w
With some luck and good management, we could probably collectively ( world wide ) grow enough food, even considering the resource depletion problem, and maybe even the climate problem as well, IF we were willing to make the necessary sacrifices.
But I just don’t think the odds are at all good that most of the countries at the greatest risk of a catastrophic economic, ecological and agricultural crash are going to make the necessary sacrifices over the next decade or two in order to ensure their survival more or less whole thirty or forty years down the road.
The last thing starving subsistence farmers eat is next years seed.
A lot of countries and a lot of people are going to be doing what they MUST to survive the near term, without giving the long term any thought at all.
It’s unfortunate, but naked apes aren’t very good at long term thinking and ACTING , on either the individual or collective basis.
The next time you are at a hospital, look around at the doctors and nurses. Most of the ones middle aged or older are seriously overweight, despite the fact that they are health care professionals.
To put it mildly, I’m not an optimist.
Tilting at Windmills, Spain’s disastrous attempt to replace fossil fuels with Solar PV, Part 2
http://energyskeptic.com/2017/tilting-at-windmills-spains-disastrous-attempt-to-replace-fossil-fuels-with-solar-pv-part-2/
We are still paying that disaster in our energy bills. The backlash has been so harsh that there is now a big tax on solar energy for self consumption if you also use grid energy. It is almost not worth it to install PVs in Spain. Clearly they are being actively discouraged. A lot of people that invested in Solar due to huge subsidies lost money when subsidies were slashed and have a demand against the Spanish government at the EU.
This is one of the reasons I am quite skeptical of renewables saving the day. They haven’t worked very well in Spain. Still we get about 1/3 of our electricity from renewables on good months.
In retrospect, with the benefit of hindsight, it’s now obvious that some countries went overboard on subsidizing solar power and wind power, and promised too much to early investors.
Mistakes WILL be made, in any sort of business or government program.
But the subsidies have in the end basically resulted in doing what they were intended to do, which was to speed up the growth of the renewable energy industries, so that the cost of renewable energy would come down as the result of better technology and the economies of scale.
In the long run,Spain will be much better off for having spent the money on getting the wind and solar industries up and running strong.
Suppose the people of the country had spent the money on cable television, or wine? The money would be gone, just the same, and they would have nothing to show for it except memories.
The solar panels and wind farms are still there, and because they are there, new ones that produce twice or three times as much electricity per euro invested are available for new installations.
As best as I can remember , Spain has next to nothing in the way of domestically sourced fossil fuel. This means every ton of coal, and every barrel of oil, and every cubic meter of gas used means more money leaves the country, and the long term price trend of all three will be up, rather than down.
Personally I believe that both solar power and wind power generate a high enough return measured as EROEI to make a strong case for believing that we really can transition away from fossil fuels and still enjoy the fruits of industrial civilization.
It won’t be easy, and even if we get with it and stay with it, we might not succeed anyway. Lots of things will have to go right, and there are countless things that can go wrong. If too many go wrong……..
At different times I have read quite a lot of articles arguing that wind and solar power simply aren’t efficient enough to ever shoulder the load currently borne by fossil fuels, and at one time I found them convincing.
But in recent years I have changed my mind.
It’s not just that the costs of building and deploying renewable energy infrastructure has fallen dramatically, especially over the last ten to fifteen years.
It’s also that we are improving the efficiency with which we use energy at a steady if slow pace, and we have barely scratched the surface when it comes to how much bigger bang we can get out of a dollar’s worth of electricity.
There’s every reason to believe that we can get by just fine with a quarter or even less of the energy we use per capita in countries such as the USA, using only well proven existing technology, if we are willing to make the necessary changes in our life styles.
Anybody who makes an honest and unbiased effort to investigate the possibility of using so little energy and still living well is just about sure to come to the same conclusion.
The anti renewables faction has a way of overlooking some of the most dramatic benefits of going renewable and adopting truly healthy lifestyles . These benefits in and of themselves are more than adequate to justify the ENTIRE cost of adopting a very low energy lifestyle.
It’s so mindblowing that most people can’t get their heads around the well demonstrated fact that if they would only eat right and get enough exercise and give up tobacco that they can cut their risk of suffering from cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity, etc by two thirds or more.
The savings in health care costs alone, if we do the right thing, will be more than enough to convert our homes to zero net energy status and to pay for our per capita share of the cost of building out wind and solar farms on the grand scale.
We’re sort of STUCK right now with our existing sunk infrastructure investment in suburbia and all the trappings associated with suburbia, but that can change over the next generation or two, and it WILL change.
A twenty five mile round trip to town back when my maternal grandfather was a boy was a can’t see to can’t see proposition. Now if you REALLY think about it, WHY should anybody, excepting a few specialists, NEED to travel farther than that on a regular basis?
Work, shopping, medical care, and all the other day to day things we do day after day can gradually be reorganized so that we can work and shop and go to the doctor and out to have a good time within a few minutes of home, maybe not for everybody, but for just about everybody, for sure.
Such changes will be very hard indeed on people who make their living in businesses and industries involving a lot of travel. The coming of the automobile and the tractor played hell with the livelihood of the people who raised horses and mules. The birth of the coal industry put woodcutters out of work. Big box stores have put most of the smaller independent stores that sell items such as hardware, paint, and groceries out of business.
When and if energy gets to be too expensive to travel very much, we will just quit doing very much travelling. When the time comes when we can’t afford our food precooked in boxes and pouches, we can go back to cooking, and save by far the larger part of the money we spend on groceries. One truck load of potatoes in bags is enough to make at least ten truckloads of potato chips, which come wrapped in at least fifty times as much throw away packaging. And when potatoes go to the store in bags, the bags can go back to the farm, and be reused indefinitely, until they are worn out.
When I was a kid, we were still making our own wooden boxes, felling the trees and milling the lumber right on the farm. Other than nails, gasoline, and spare parts, we bought only nails to make boxes, since we already had every thing else needed on hand. Some of the boxes we made in the fifties are still in use. They were typically used from four or five times up to ten or even more times in a given year, because they were used in turn for peaches, potatoes,apples, sweet corn, tomatoes, and anything else grown and sold on the home farm. We delivered to local stores, and picked up the empties next time around, a few days or weeks later, and loaned the boxes to customers who came from farther away for full truckloads.
I feel that solar is of great use to me personally. I just don’t think it’s sufficient to keep the economy going. Soccer moms driving around in mini vans looking at show homes, so to speak, accounts for a lot of economic activity. When that activity ceases a lot of jobs go with it. I use solar to recharge my 12V batteries when the power is down. Usual due to a tree falling on the line somewhere. As it stands right now when the power goes out you soon hear a helicopter fly by within the hour, if it’s after a big wind storm, to assess the damage. Then the repairmen in trucks get dispatched. It’s usually back on in 3 hours or so. In the future that 3 hours could be 3 days, then 3 weeks. Yeah, I got a use for solar panels. But they ain’t gonna run the world. And they ain’t gonna feed 7 billion people.
Solar and wind power sure as hell are not going to support today’s energy hog economy, and for now all they can really accomplish, in terms of the big picture, on a real time basis, is to help us cut back substantially on the use of fossil fuels used to generate electricity.
We’re getting five percent plus of our electricity in the USA from wind and solar power, and the two industries together have just within the last four or five years grown big enough to REALLY start growing, in terms of capacity added on an annual basis.
Trump or no, my opinion, which I base on reading the industry news at left right and middle of the road web sites, is that within about five years we will be getting TEN percent plus of our electricity from wind and solar.
I can remember hearing a lot of people saying such and so a new technology would never take off and replace an older technology.
My grand parents could remember seeing their first automobile, and their first tractor. Mom and Dad, who is still with me, can remember when electricity made it into this FORMER backwoods community. I have witnessed the coming of cheap air travel, organ transplants, the internet, the wide scale adoption of computers and the rise of highly automated manufacturing processes personally.
When we shut down the orchards, I was getting things done in a couple of hours that took couple of days when I was a kid.
Unless the economy collapses sooner, there will come a time when we can generate enough electricity with wind and solar farms to run AN industrial civilization, although it’s not likely we will have the amount of energy available per capita that we have now.
But we don’t really need more than about a quarter to a third as much as we use today to still live quite well, by gradually changing the way we live.
And we have only two basic choices. ONE is to start cutting back before too much longer, and keep on cutting back until there is nothing left that could honestly be described as an industrial civilization, because fossil fuels DO deplete.
The other is to go proactive and generate as much renewable energy as we possibly can, and make the best possible use of it.
Dozens of trades and industries have come and gone since we made the transition from wood as fuel and animals as the source of motive power.
I can’t say how many new ones will arrive over the next couple of generations, but I can say with confidence that some that are dependent on using a lot of energy providing non essential goods and services will GO.
In my opinion, air travel on the grand scale will be one of them.
People who can’t get their heads outside the box of the present day economy seem to think that there’s something intrinsically NECESSARY about millions of people travelling long distances on a daily basis , day in and day out, but IT JUST AIN’T SO.
The people who work in air travel, and in jobs related to tourism dependent on air travel, will have to find new work. It may not pay as well, but they will find something, and barring the economy actually collapsing, they won’t starve or die of exposure.
Ditto the people who work in a large number of other trades and industries that are dependent on cheap energy and the customer having disposable income.
It’ll be rough as the proverbial cob ( Cobs were reputedly used in earlier times as toilet paper in rural outhouses, but I have my doubts. Grass and leaves are preferable by a mile, and free. About the only thing a damned old corn cob is good for is kindling.) but the experience will be survivable.
Just how well we will be able to live on renewable energy is an open question, but there are MANY MANY scientists, engineers, and economists who believe it is possible to live well without fossil fuels.
>> within about five years we will be getting TEN percent plus of our electricity from wind and solar. <<
At current growth rates, wind will be 14% and solar will be 7% in five years time. We will be getting TWENTY percent plus of our electricity from wind and solar.
http://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.cfm?t=epmt_1_01_a