Comments not related to Oil and/or Natural Gas Production in this thread. Thank You.
525 thoughts to “Open Thread Non-Petroleum, July 12, 2019”
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Comments not related to Oil and/or Natural Gas Production in this thread. Thank You.
Comments are closed.
https://www.technologyreview.com/f/613938/clean-energy-investments-are-plummeting-bloomberg-bnef/
I don’t know just why the Chinese would cut back so sharply so suddenly, but maybe they are having trouble selling all the stuff they can produce. I know that they have overbuilt wind and solar capacity and are having problems getting transmission lines caught up to make full use that capacity , according to older articles I have read.
Hopefully the trend toward falling costs of renewable electricity versus sure to rise costs, over time, for fossil fuel electricity, will lead to this trend being reversed in countries such as the USA within the near future.
Let’s hope– I have relatives on the Mainland, and in Hong Kong.
(The niece in Hong Kong is well informed and connected)
Here is one reason- Coal
https://www.caixinglobal.com/2019-04-02/chinas-renewed-embrace-of-coal-power-bucks-global-trend-101400065.html
“While China’s coal consumption rose for a second consecutive year in 2018, according to the National Bureau of Statistics, coal only accounted for 59% of the country’s energy consumption…
The report also pointed out that China finances more than half of the world’s global coal power capacity, including domestic plants and plants outside its borders.”
OFM,
Keep in mind that they are measuring in dollars rather than by output. The cost of wind and especially solar has been falling rapidly so lower levels of dollar investment can still result in growth in renewable output.
The piece says investment dollars declined by 14%, but costs might have fallen by 30% so that total new solar power added might have increased. Or they may be focusing on transmission infrastructure to get wind and solar power from Western China to Eastern and central China where most of the demand for power exists.
We shouldn’t be surprised that some areas will see improved conditions n some years, as climate shifts, and other worse.
Upper midwest/canadian prarie, and russian/ukraine/kazak grain growing may improve.
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-climate-corn-soybeans-upper-midwest.html
Other much worse, like India and sub-saharan Africa.
Overall, global yields are expected to decline. Variability of yields expected to increase, as a result of increasing extremes of temp and rainfall.
Another aspect of this depends on how much warming is in the cards. Crop yields just about everywhere get much worse if warming approaches the higher projections.
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/07/why-wind-and-solar-will-never-work.php
There will always be plenty of people, academics of every stripe included, who will sell their professional souls for a few bucks.
So there are limits on the efficiency of solar cells. What the fuck difference does it make, so long as the incoming solar energy is unlimited, and for all practical purposes, it IS unlimited?
The real question is whether solar cells and the equipment associated with building them and using them are efficient producers of captured energy, capturing several times more than is needed to build them and install them.
There’s a huge net capture of extremely useful net energy when we build a modern solar farm.
Of course propaganda pieces of this sort totally ignore such fundamental facts.
The regulars here can and perhaps will go thru this piece of shit propaganda, as my Mom used to say, like a chicken on a dry cow turd.
This is to say, the chicken reduces the cow pie to shreds.
The difference is that the chicken occasionally finds something useful, a worm or grain of corn or other edible tidbit.
It’s interesting to compare solar efficiency with the efficiency of photosynthesis. Photosynthesis is about 1% efficient, and solar is about twenty times that, and improving. The poor efficiency of photosynthesis has not stopped Americans from planting about 38m acres of land in maize to make ethanol, itself an inefficient process, to burn in vehicles, another highly inefficient process. Solar on a small portion of that land would cover all america’s energy needs.
I suspect the practical efficiency of photosynthesis is much lower than 1% (which would be 5% as good as PV).
38M acres is about 165k square kilometers, which receives about 165 terawatts of sunlight. Reduce that by 20% efficiency and 20% capacity factor and you get 6.6TW average production, which could power about 60x as many cars as the US car fleet of 230M. Ethanol, on the other hand, can only power about 7% of the current car fleet. That makes ethanol only .1% as efficient as PV.
In other words, the same amount of land can power 1 car via ethanol, or 1,000 cars via PV.
AND, PV doesn’t deplete the soil, and can allow a lot of complementary wildlife and plants.
“It’s interesting to compare solar efficiency with the efficiency of photosynthesis. Photosynthesis is about 1% efficient…”
You know, I’ve read that 1% figure a lot, but I have an observation that I’ve made and can’t explain or shake.
My observation requires three things; a small tree, a mirror and a slab of asphalt.
If we stand under a single layer canopy of leaves on a bright sunny day, where ~1,000 watts/M^2 is hitting, we’ll notice that vastly more than 99% of light energy has been filtered out by the leaves.
It’s cool under that shade.
And yet if we stand next to the leaves of the tree, as compared to a mirror, we’ll also notice that the bush is not reflecting that missing 99% of light energy back at us. It’s neither bright nor does it warm us from reflective heat.
Further, if we stand next to an absorptive body, like a black chunk of asphalt, we’d notice that it is quite warm to the touch. It has absorbed the sun and we detect that as radiant body heat. Yet when we touch the tree leaves we find they are no hotter than ambient temps. As further proof if we use FLIR, we don’t see green leaves as radiating anything at all.
So what gives? Where did that 1000 watts/M^2 all go if only 1% of it was converted/utilized by photosynthesis?
It wasn’t reflected, and it isn’t radiated…so where is it? Where’s the missing 99%?
I’ve puzzled over this for quite some time and all I can figure is that the 1% figure is missing something and that somehow, over a few billion years of evolution plants have indeed figured out how to utilize a lot more than 1% of the sun’s energy. Which, when you observe how nature manages to use every scrap of energy makes sense, right?
I mean, they’ve even discovered a freaking black mold in Chernobyl’s reactor area that has figured out how to ‘eat’ gamma radiation. Sure, it took a few years to sort out that immensely complicated solution but nature got it done. Go mold!
Serious question – does anybody have an answer for where all that “missing” energy seemingly disappears to in my observation set above?
The efficiency is closer to 2%. Yes, at least half of the radiation is absorbed by the leaves yet they do not get severely hot.
Look up heat of vaporization and radiative surface transfer.
Leaves have low mass per unit area, so can quickly radiate (as infrared) and conduct excess heat to the air. Transpiration is another source, a leaf can transpire several times it’s weight in water during the growing season. Leaves also hang at different angles than the horizontal.
Your test would be better suited to a green piece of paper compared to a nearby leaf in the same sunlight, rather than asphalt. The paper will be more massive than the leaf per area, since it is thicker.
Then put a fine spray of water on the paper and see what happens.
Here is an article about a study of leaf temperatures from the tundra to the tropics.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2008/06/11/tree-leaves-keep-the-same-temperature-from-tundra-to-tropics/
Leaves are also good at gathering diffuse light.
Evapotranspiration is a very big factor.
Secondly, for example, the reflected energy is not of the same visible wavelength as the incoming (or that reflected by a mirror). So you would not be expected to not perceive it like a mirror reflecting visible wavelengths.
I recall extremely detailed and high level research at the Univ of Calif dating back to the 1970s exploring these energy flows in vast detail. This was the same timeframe that photosynthesis biochemistry was fully described.
The mysteries of this issue, are fully dissected.
I don’t have a good layman source for discussing this issue, offhand.
Of great interest, perhaps, is the new engineering of photosynthesis that Univ’s are engaged in. This will have very big implications, I believe. Here is a article discussing just one such effort-
https://ripe.illinois.edu/press/press-releases/scientists-engineer-shortcut-photosynthetic-glitch-boost-crop-growth-40
I don’t think many people understand what an energy transition today entails:
“At this rate, it’s going to take nearly 400 years to transform the energy system”
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/610457/at-this-rate-its-going-to-take-nearly-400-years-to-transform-the-energy-system/
“To cut emissions fast enough and keep up with growth, the world will need to develop 10 to 30 terawatts of clean-energy capacity by 2050. On the high end that would mean constructing the equivalent of around 30,000 nuclear power plants—or producing and installing 120 billion 250-watt solar panels.”
It ain’t going to happen, obviously. If we were serious about this we would be deploying nuclear power plants as if there was no tomorrow.
It’s not going to happen, but it does not HAVE to happen.
We are simply going to use a hell of a lot less electricity per capita than these predictions indicate, and we are going to use it FAR more efficiently.
The odds are extremely high that there won’t be even a quarter as much growth as projected. We will be lucky if we avoid a very widespread and potentially global crash and burn economic scenario before then.
And incidentally, the same amount of money and manpower put into wind and solar electricity produces way more electricity way quicker, compared to nuclear, and WAY safer to boot.
The article is right in that the pace of energy transition efforts is pitiful.
“To cut emissions fast enough and keep up with growth,”-
It is unlikely we will achieve either of these goals, since we didn’t get started hard in the 1970’s.
Regarding nuc’s, it is a mixed bag.
On the downside, its very expensive compared to putting solar where it is sunny or wind where it is windy. And a country like the USA does not have the decision making ability to figure out what to do with the high level waste. We shouldn’t be having any nuclear operations in the country starting today, until long term disposal solution is up and running, IMHO.
On the plus side, low carbon, and runs year round when not down for scheduled or emergency maintenance.
Since you seem to be a proponent, you may find this of interest-
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/02/smaller-safer-cheaper-one-company-aims-reinvent-nuclear-reactor-and-save-warming-planet
Carlos,
The nuclear energy is far more expensive than wind and solar. Possibly a couple of small modular nuclear reactors would make sense, but we will put them all near your house. OK. 🙂
Along with the spent fuel.
Note that solar electrical output has increased by about 35% on average for the past 10 years and World electric power output has increased at about 2.5% per year. So all electricity output could be replaced by solar power by 2030 if the growth rate continues at 35% per year, and hydro, other renewable and nuclear power remain flat at 2018 levels.
We have made it far more expensive. Lots of nuclear reactors were built in the 60s and 70s even by countries that were not particularly rich. And nearly all have a perfect safety record 50 years later. Spain has 8 nuclear reactors, the first three since 1968 and not a single casualty. I am sure we could build them faster, cheaper, and safer today. Nuclear has been killed in the developed world by over regulation.
And yes, I would be happy to have a small modular nuclear reactor nearby that would ensure my lights stay on when the oil goes bust. And I am not worried about storage either. I have experience working with radioactivity. The dangers are greatly exaggerated.
When we come to our senses we will go the nuclear way as King Hubbert predicted. Nothing else can produce the energy we need.
Radioactivity-“The dangers are greatly exaggerated.”
No, not by scientists and nuclear engineers. Not high level radioactive material.
To claim that the dangers of of this material is exaggerated is, lets be gentle, just silly. Taking care of the waste problem is the only step that should matter to proponents. Without that, its just not a serious solution to consider.
Come back to the table when that issue is solved and fully operational.
One of the realities of nuclear power is that it requires oversight by the government. In other words, a free-market solution for nuclear power is unlikely. For example, if a nuke company went bankrupt, who will clean up?
Because of this, I would imagine that the Tea Party types should become deeply conflicted if we started to ramp up nuclear energy. It would all be government oversight, and that is what the Trumpsters hate.
The half life of plutonium is 24,000 years.
How were things 24,000 years ago?
That too
It is obvious to anybody objective that the dangers are greatly exaggerated. In Spain nuclear energy is 51 years old and in that time there has been not a single casualty and no serious incident. I say what a track record! By comparison wind energy is killing people every year because wind turbine maintenance is a high-risk job, and people installing solar panels on roofs also have casualties every year. Not to speak about the number of people killed by coal, probably the most dangerous of all.
By comparing the number of people killed by amount of energy produced, nuclear energy is the safest by far. Fear is irrational.
Carlos Diaz,
What is to be done with the waste?
Chilyb,
That’s for the experts to determine. Why should I have an answer to that? But it looks to me that deep underground storage in geologically stable areas should be safe enough. The waste has so much activity that it is very likely that as technology progresses we will want to recycle the waste and extract more energy from it. It should be much more profitable that mining for much lower grade ore. That waste is very likely to be a valuable resource in the future.
Come back when permanent long term storage for high level radioactive waste solution has been accomplished.
The failure to work out a solution to this problem is a massive one.
We are extremely lucky that the 911 terrorists did not target one of the temporary storage sites. We could have easily lost a state permanently.
Hoo boy, you sure like riding those unicorns! People have been trying to solve the waste issue for decades with no results.
NAOM
Carlos Diaz,
I only asked because you sounded like you might be an expert for a second. In my non-expert opinion, waste management is a major challenge. Most is stored on-site, and I am unaware of long term solutions.
I used to believe in nuclear power, and the ability of the government in countries such as the USA at least, to make sure nukes are operated safely.
Back then I always understood that a potentially catastrophic accident was possible, but I judged THEN that the risk was small enough that the benefits were worth the trade off, namely energy security, economic growth, lots of high tech jobs, off shoot industries, expanding technical knowledge applicable to many other fields, etc.
In recent years, I have come to believe that governments are not stable enough to provide such rigorous oversight, well into the future. Twenty, thirty, forty years from now, politicians in a bind , and people in a bind, will insist that old and worn out and unsafe nukes will CONTINUE to run….. until there is another Chernobyl scale disaster or Fukushima scale disaster, but this next time in a place where hundreds of thousands or even millions of people will either die or have to be relocated in a hurry. Crooked regulators will in some cases be bought off by nuke owners, and sooner or later…….
Having said this much, I’m STILL very much in favor of continued research and development of small modular reactors that are potentially safe enough, and affordable enough, to be built and used on the grand scale.
We don’t KNOW that safe and economical reactors are possible, but on the other hand, we don’t know that they AREN’T.
In any case, it’s impossible in my estimation to build enough nukes of the kinds we have now to solve our energy problems.
Building enough wind and solar farms might also prove to be impossible, but I don’t think so.
The cost of them is still falling rapidly, and they go up fast and pay off the cost of building them fast. They don’ require all that much in the way of up front capital, or high tech and expensive materials in short supply, or highly trained engineers and trades people, etc, compared to nukes.
One way or another we will either solve the storage problem, or else just learn to live with it.
It’s mostly a fucking bogeyman anyway, in terms of our day to day prosperity and long term security.
There aren’t many industries, or things in the home, that MUST run reliably around the clock around the calendar. Almost everything will work operated intermittently, or can be made to work operated intermittently, and we have plenty of fossil fuel to provide the necessary around the clock base load and emergency power for critical around the clock industries for a century at least, if we use it wisely.
There’s PLENTY of time to solve the intermittency problem.
FOR NOW, we need to keep the pedal to the metal in substituting wind and solar power for fossil fuel power, plus speeding up the transition to electric cars and trucks so as to not only reduce air pollution but also to CONSERVE our finite fossil fuel endowment, which IS after all a one time gift of nature.
I’m prety much on the same page as you OFM.
I do think the country should go full steam ahead on some permanent storage solution, and have it ready for operation by 2026. We smart and ‘woke’ enough for that task?
And development of these small modular reactors like NuScale is working on should proceed.
Once we get into the second half of the next decade we will have a clearer view of the technical and financial feasibility.
2026 CO2 = 439ppm
Gallon gas in USA $5.99, 10 gallons available for purchase once every two weeks/household
Along the lines of what OFM said- “In recent years, I have come to believe that governments are not stable enough to provide such rigorous oversight,”… [for safeguarding the public regarding nuclear power and waste management]
I watched the recent documentary on Chernobyl. It portrayed severe mismanagement of the reactor for political and bureaucratic reasons, and personal power motives.
I look at this current administration in the USA, and see how the president has repeatedly selected poorly qualified ‘yes’ men at very important positions, and puts his personal power/profit/ advantage above all else.
I would not trust him or his appointees with any important decision making when it comes to nuclear energy, or waste storage issues. The only reason we have avoided catastrophe under trump thus far, is that some with dignity and proper respect of country and life, have said No to him on various occasions, or simply disregarded his directives.
Read the Mueller report if you have not seen enough proof of these things. See how many appointees and cabinet members he has fired for being subordinate.
Simply, I don’t trust the American voter to make good decisions on leadership.
Those who voted for trump should have no seat at the decision making table.
Humans are not to be trusted with high level radioactivity.
Carlos,
Talk to the people in Ukraine and those that lived in and near Fukishima about how exaggerated the dangers are.
The small modular reactors are not commercial yet in the West, do you live in Spain? Your nation can have all the reactors the people of your nation would like. I can stay away. 🙂
Nuclear power was already uneconomical by the mid 1970s.
Before all the red tape and security regulations that nuclear fans claim responsible for the demise of nuclear.
In late 1976 chemical giant BASF in Germany scrapped their plans to build their own nuclear power plant, despite
– having received a building permit three years earlier
– strong support from politicians starting with the local mayor up to the head of the federal government
– having suffered the oil crisis of 1973
– laying claim to planning the “safest reactor in the world”
– losing 100 Million Deutsche Mark every year the reactor does not work (which was supposed to cost 12 times that to build at that time), according to the CEO of BASF
What do you consider more realistic?
That a bunch of hard-nosed capitalists running the largest chemical corporation in Europe would be thwarted by handful of anti-nuclear protesters (at that time the anti-nuclear movement was not yet as large as a few years later)?
Or that a bunch of hard-nosed capitalists had their bean counters run the numbers and then decided to spend their money on more economical investments?
For comparison:
In today’s Euros, the BASF plant had an estimate for the building costs at 4 Million per MW capacity.
Hinkley Point C in UK will cost 6.8 Million per MW, probably more.
https://de.nucleopedia.org/wiki/Kernkraftwerk_BASF
That site is in German only, you can try this translator:
https://www.deepl.com/translator
(need to copy/paste the text)
And in the USA-
1- How two cutting edge U.S. nuclear projects bankrupted Westinghouse
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-toshiba-accounting-westinghouse-nucle/how-two-cutting-edge-u-s-nuclear-projects-bankrupted-westinghouse-idUSKBN17Y0CQ
2- Twenty-five years ago this summer, prospects for a nuclear-powered Northwest imploded. In what was then the Nation’s Largest Municipal Bond Default, the Washington Public Power Supply System told creditors it could not make payment on a $2.25 billion debt it incurred to build two large nuclear plants. [5 planned reactors, never built]
Thanks for mentioning the WPPSS fiasco. I had totally forgotten about that.
Regarding the current state of the nuclear power industry, I recommend the World Nuclear Industry Status Report:
https://www.worldnuclearreport.org/
It combines a broad overview of worldwide commercial nuclear power activities with a more detailed focus on select countries.
My favorite read in late summer.
Thanks. I’ll check it out.
Gerry- that website is outstanding for Nuclear info-
“I recommend the World Nuclear Industry Status Report:
https://www.worldnuclearreport.org/ ”
The current age of the USA nuclear power fleet averages 39 yrs., and provides 20% of USA electricity. There have been 42 plant cancellations. 97 are operating currently.
This means that coal and nuclear combined make up 46% of USA electricity in 2019, and PV less than 2%.
We’ve got a massive job to accomplish this decade.
Also, the following excerpt from their front page article tells much about the difficulty with nuclear plant installation,design, and cost-
“On 28 June 2019, China connected the second European Pressurized Water Reactor (EPR) at Taishan to the grid. The first unit, Taishan-1, had generated its first power on 29 June 2018. Despite its name, Europe is still waiting for an EPR to come online. One reactor has been under construction at Olkiluoto in Finland since 2005, and another one since 2007 at the Flamanville site in France. Both projects experienced multiple design problems, management failures and quality issues leading to decadal delays. Grid connection still remains subject to uncertainties due to anongoing schedule review at Olkiluoto-3and the decision by French nuclear safety authorities to impose repairs of welding defects in the main steam line at Flamanville-3. As a consequence, the Flamanville EPR will likely see its grid connection delayed to 2022, if it is not joining the long list of abandoned nuclear construction sites (nearly one hundred around the world)….the current cost estimates of around €11 billion (US$12.4 billion) per unit for the European EPRs.”
https://www.worldnuclearreport.org/Second-European-Pressurized-Water-Reactor-Starts-Up-in-China.html
Got solar?
It is called SAFETY requirements. They did not get expensive for any other reason.
Faster, cheaper, better/safer. The world of projects can only meet two of those three corners of a triangle.
I don’t think many people understand the exponential function. I have made some amount of effort to highlight news stories that show how renewable energy and solar PV in particular is growing and is likely to continue growing. For example I have brought up kerf-less wafer production technologies that will allow wafers to be made with a fraction of the amount of raw silicon that more traditional methods need. More recently (the previous non-petroleum thread) I linked to an article about a coating that holds the promise of increasing cell efficiencies by about 50%, past the limits that were previously thought to be theoretically possible. The point of all that is that the costs of the technologies are likely to continue to decline, against the background of some of the lowest cost tenders for electricity production coming from solar PV projects.
Solar energy has grown from 0.01% of the US electricity supply in 2007 to 1.32% in 2017 and 1.92% in the estimated “behind the meter” production is included. It would take less than seven doublings for the contribution from solar PV to rise to 100%. Since wind and hydro already account for more than 13%, it should be safe to say six doublings would eliminate the need for most FF and nuclear. How long will it take for the contribution from solar to double six times from the 2017 level? The contribution from solar grew by about 20% between 2017 and 2018 and if it were to continue to grow at that rate it would double in less than four years and double six times to over 80% in less than 23 years.
I know that just takes care of electricity production in the US but, we have already done estimates of how much more would be needed to supply an all electric light vehicle fleet in the US, somewhere in the region of 19%. So, one additional year of PV growth to take care of the proportion of transportation now served by light vehicles. Of course, I know that technology adoption curves are S curves so it may well be that the transition will take significantly longer than 24 years. On the other hand, with the cost of producing electricity using solar PV falling below every other technology there is also the possibility that the adoption of PV could accelerate and result in a more rapid transition. The more rapid transition is the one Tony Seba suggests will be the case. Who knows? It sure as hell ain’t gonna take 400 years! Now let me go read the article and see if I can understand why they say that.
Okay, so I read the article and as I suspected, a lack of appreciation for the exponential function. The article refers to adding 55 GW in a year when 20,000GW is what is needed and then they simply divide 20,000 by 50 to come up with 400 years. That is not how solar PV is growing. The last time 55 GW of PV capacity was added over the course of the year was 2015 (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Growth_of_photovoltaics#History_of_deployment). Capacity grew by 76 GW in 2016, 95 GW in 2017, 103 GW in 2018 and is expected to hit 120 GW in 2019. So, I decided to play around with my handy little spreadsheet and if growth were to continue at current rates until 2031, more than 1,000 GW would be installed in that year. Projecting forward to 2043 and almost 10,000 GW would be installed in that year.
The problem with my spreadsheet is that if I plug in lower values for growth the annual capacity additions fall below the current global PV manufacturing capacity, a rather unrealistic scenario. I decided to add a couple of columns to base the growth on the growth in current manufacturing capacity rather than basing the growth on the cumulative installed capacity.
If PV manufacturing capacity were to grow by 20% per year, from 2018 onward, more than 1000 GW would added in 2030 and more than 10,000 GW in 2043 but, the 20,000 GW target would be surpassed in 2038 (19 years). If PV manufacturing capacity were to grow by 10% p.a., more than 1,000 GW would be installed in the year 2041 and more than 10,000 GW in 2065 but, the 20,000 GW target would be surpassed in 2048 (29 years). A ridiculously unrealistic, low, 5% growth would hit the 20,000 GW target in 2064 (35 years). For it to take more than 35 years to install 20,000 GW our civilization will have to run up against some pretty hard limits before then, not outside the realm of possibilities but, 400 years? Only if civilization collapses, in which case, probably never!
islandboy —
When you say, “most people don’t understand the exponential function”, I assume you mean most people don’t understand exponential growth. If you DO you understand exponential growth you know that even though growth may start slowly eventually it increases at massive rates. So, an economic (biological or whatever) trend may APPEAR exponential for awhile but that’s it.
In fact, when compared to other graphs, exponential growth eventually outpaces most other functions’ rate of increase. Try it: say, Y = 9^x for Year 0 to 1 where Y = 8, then for Year 7 to 8, where Y = 38,263,752. NB Y = ending value.
Or, do the grains of rice on a chess board exercise, (not literally) which we tried in about Grade 9 as an example of exponential growth. My question to you is this, do YOU understand the exponential function? BTW the last chess board square would total 18,446,744,073,709,551,615 grains of rice. Or, say, about 1.8 × 10^19 😉
My exact statement was, “I don’t think many people understand the exponential function” and in itself is a bit ambiguous since “many” is not a defined quantity. Rest assured, I do understand the exponential function, having watched Prof. Al Bartlett’s video a couple of times. Not to mention my handy little spreadsheets! The numbers can start out very modestly but, they always go crazy towards the end, when compared to the beginning.
With that understanding I also made up a spreadsheet for an S curve type of growth, where the growth rate declines over time, tending to zero but, that is not what I used for this exercise. What is pretty amazing is how 20,000 GW of PV capacity can be reached with exponential growth in manufacturing capacity of just 10% in only 29 years! At that point, my spreadsheet indicates that the annual manufacturing capacity would be 2093 GW a year. That would translate to covering the area of a square with sides 61 miles long with PV panels with no space between them, using panels with an efficiency of 21%, roughly the best efficiency currently available. If exponential growth were to continue we would eventually run out of space on land and eventually the whole surface of the earth!
So, as you quite rightly implied, long term exponential growth of any physical quantity in a finite space faces serious issues! It is quite likely that we are about to see the end of exponential growth in PV starting this year. If the estimated 120 GW of new capacity turns out to be the case, it will be the lowest annual percentage increase in capacity since 1996.
islandboy —
Fair enough. I probably shouldn’t have commented but object to people throwing the phrase “exponential growth” around, implying increasing growth will continue indefinitely (to promote their ideas). In fact, all exponential growth does is describe a math function made by placing time in the exponent or power of the base. Of course, the exponential e (Euler’s number) is frequently used when modeling continuous growth.
In nature exponential grow happens until it doesn’t. Your assumption that renewable energy is going to grow at exponential rates for enough time to make the energy transition last only a few years is likely not to be true. The first comment in this page shows that investment in clean energy is not growing as expected, so your exponential grow might be failing already.
So I went back to my handy little spreadsheet and made some changes adding a column for a declining growth rate. I started from current cumulative capacity and manufacturing capacity and had two cells where I could plug in the initial growth rate for manufacturing capacity and also a cell for the rate at which that initial growth rate declines. Playing around with the initial growth rate and decline in the growth rate allowed me to produce the graph below.
The graph below gets the US PV Capacity to 20,000 GW in less than 50 years, by 2065. One might ask what sort of wildly unrealistic growth rates would produce this result? Well the initial growth rate for manufacturing capacity (amount of solar added each year) is 24.8% and that rated declines by 13% per year such that after 10 years the growth rate for manufacturing capacity is 7.1% and after twenty years is 1.53%. The manufacturing capacity eventually tops out at about 721.7 GW per year. I also retired the capacity added in 2018 after 30 years so that by the time the graph flattens out the capacity added each year is basically replacing retired capacity.
I don’t find this theoretical construct that impossible. Something like this is entirely possible.
At the rate we are going, 10 to 15 percent of that might provide all the power we need in the future.
A couple of things. The caption on the graph is correct. The statement in the first sentence of the penultimate paragraph is rubbish. It should read “The graph below gets the
USglobal PV Capacity to 20,000 GW in less than 50 years, by 2065. ”I should have added the following caveat to the final sentence, provided things do not get FUBAR over the coming decades!
Maybe the UFO’s will save us. 🙂
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIufLRpJYnI
nuclear is dying because they haven’t come up with a better idea for creating electricity from unstable isotopes than boiling water. The idea of boiling water to generate electricity is on its way out.
Combined cycle gas is the only heat based generator that will survive, and only because it boils a lot less water than coal, nukes, or even traditional thermal gas plants, which are also dying fast.
Why transport needs to stop burning fossil fuels – fast!
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/jul/12/billions-of-air-pollution-particles-found-in-hearts-of-city-dwellers
NAOM
Good article, thanks.
I do wonder what all this pollution is doing to the myriad of species on this planet. All of these anthropocentric articles ring sour to me. We do live in an ecosystem.
Dunno? How bout 3 legged, four eyed transgendered mutant frogs?
Yes, industrial civilization is a horror show. Lots of convenient science run by the three monkeys.
But the article was talking about more detailed studies into internal organs by other contaminents/toxins. The obvious mutations related to pesticides/herbicides at low levels has already been proven and ignored by mainstream science monkeys.
2001 — US: Beloved & Respected Comrade Leader Florida Governor Jeb Bush signs a bill banning execution of mentally retarded.
(Obvious ploy to save the life of his brother George & stave off a precipitous reduction of the Florida electorate.)
While everybody is trying to figure out the modes of power generation, global food production is slipping.
How 2030 is the new 2100: Global Food Yields Already Dropping from Abrupt Climate Change
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SModhHUpcj0&t=298s
In that video Paul mentions this open source paper.
Climate Change has likely already affected global food production
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0217148
The additional material in the appendix contains a list of PDF files and links to a few other papers that are worth looking at, though there is not a lot of good news there!
There is a rapidly growing body of evidence that makes it increasingly unlikely that this planet can continue to support a projected human population of between 9 to 11 billion in the next couple of decades. We are currently on track for an IPCC 8.5 scenario which doesn’t bode well for future agricultural production. This is also in line with early Club of Rome business as usual scenarios.
Humanity’s biggest mistake was inventing agriculture and then further compounding it by discovering fossil fuels and using them to implement the ‘Green Revolution’ and allowing human population to go into overshoot. As for all those claiming that Malthus was wrong and that our ingenuity will save the day, I’m afraid they are going to see some of the die off that is already in the pipeline!
Cheers!
“There is a rapidly growing body of evidence that makes it increasingly unlikely that this planet can continue to support a projected human population of between 9 to 11 billion in the next couple of decades. ”
I think millions of other species would breath a sigh of relief if humans went where they are headed.
HARLEY DAVIDSON UNVEILS “LIVEWIRE” ELECTRIC MOTORCYCLE THAT GOES 0-60 IN 3 SECONDS
There is no clutch and no shifting.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-07-12/harley-davidson-unveils-livewire-electric-motorcycle-goes-0-60-3-seconds
Attention astronomy buffs,
Spektrum-RG, one of the most significant Russian space missions in the post-Soviet era has just launched from Baikonur, Kazakhstan. The telescope is a joint venture with Germany that will map X-rays across the entire sky in unprecedented detail. Of course, it must first travel to an observing position some 1.5 million km from Earth known as Lagrange Point 2.
Nice video explaining the mission
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=z8M-80aMDO0
NAOM
Nice video. The Lagrange points are an interesting aspect.
DougL,
Rats. I was hoping to save L2 for myself.
Lagrangian points 1&2 are pretty crowded, best spend your holidays at L3, L4 or L5 if you like solitude. 😉
I like L3, no pesky Earth to bother you.
NAOM
Good choice but the cost of getting there is a bit hard to swallow and Synapsid might have staked it before you arrive, which would be embarrassing.
E DougL,
I guess I’d favor L4 then. Ahead of the game, as it were. (Pun intended)
“Rats. I was hoping to save L2 for myself.”
Sorry about that, but your application was 15 minutes late. Better luck next time.
Rat
Hats off to University of Glasgow’s School of Physics and Astronomy or, as my Grandson would say, “beyond awesome”.
SCIENTISTS UNVEIL THE FIRST-EVER IMAGE OF QUANTUM ENTANGLEMENT
“For the first time ever, physicists have managed to take a photo of a strong form of quantum entanglement called Bell entanglement—capturing visual evidence of an elusive phenomenon which a baffled Albert Einstein once called ‘spooky action at a distance’.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-scientists-unveil-first-ever-image-quantum.html
In case anyone is interested New Orleans and vicinity being hit by Hurricane Barry which is really turning into a major rain event with serious flooding potential…
https://www.cbsnews.com/live-news/hurricane-barry-new-orleans-louisiana-flooding-storm-path-track-today-2019-07-13-live-updates/
Paul Beckwith’s take”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxVSABGsHTc&t=145s
Grave Flooding Risks in New Orleans, LA: Yet Again
I’m sure no one in the MSM will be talking about the toxic brew that will run off exacerbating the Mississippi dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico which is sure to be a consequence of this event.
I’ve read a few reports estimating damages in the 10 billion dollar range due to flooding alone!
Good luck to any of our readers down there, sounds like you may need it.
NAOM
God Bless Louisiana
https://qz.com/1665011/ford-and-volkswagen-team-up-to-buy-argos-self-driving-tech/
It may cost an arm and a leg to perfect it, but once the the various sensors needed are perfected, and the necessary programming written, it will be dirt cheap, on a per vehicle basis, compared to the cost of paying drivers and paying for accidents.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRgoisHRmUE
Given all the UFO stuff in the newspaper and congressional hearing around the US Navy.
Given this is an energy site and these things (if true) have a propulsion system that doesnt burn hydrocarbons.
Given this was captured by multiple systems (AEGIS, Sky1 and underwater). How do u fake that?
Why does nobody on this site seem to care about this?
Genuine question, I find this credible, am I missing something?
Yes, you are missing something. These UFO sightings are not credible.
Can u explain why?
AEGIS, Sky1 and whatever they use underwater are wrong?
or all navy personnel who are coming out on different ships at different times are liars or psychologically mistaken in the exact same way?
UFO doesn’t mean ALIEN….it just mean unidentified.
Happy to be wrong .But how are u so certain?
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-7194019/U-S-Navy-patents-theoretical-ship-bends-physics-speed-air-water-space.html
“As reported by The Drive, when looking over a patent on the technology, an examiner for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office responded with skepticism that such a craft exists only to receive a personal letter from the Chief Technology Officer of the U.S. Navy, who explained that Chinese researchers are ‘investing significantly’ in the craft. “
Sorry Porky, I don’t have time for this bullshit.
Ok. Just curious.
thanks!
THE ANTHROPOCENE OWES A LOT TO THE PLASTICINE
(sorry for the caps)
https://vvattsupwiththat.blogspot.com/2019/07/where-would-anthropocene-be-without.html
UFO doesn’t mean ALIEN….it just mean unidentified.
Happy to be wrong .But how are u so certain?
Simple. there are two possibilities assuming that someone actually saw something. One, that they were under some kind of mass delusion. Two, that the account is a hoax. The laws of physics are not breakable, not by humans or aliens!
Cheers!
Can u contact the Chief Technology Officer of the US Navy to stop wasting tax payer funds on a patent that is impossible.
I agree the laws of physics are unbreakable. But do we understand all of them?
As Richard Feynman said, “If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don’t understand quantum mechanics.”
What is dark matter or gravity Fred?
What is quantum entanglement? what is wave particle duality?
Please explain…
thanks!
AEGIS, Sky1 and underwater aren’t under MASS DELUSION. Thats a human psychology problem.
And it is recorded. Enough time for the LSD to wear off..lol!
If it is a hoax, then Americans better upgrade their military systems
because the Russians and Chinese are better equipped to get in than a bunch of alien nutters.
Fred, do u believe the US Navy is intelligent enough to put in safe guards to protect against these kind of hoaxes?
I am skeptic at heart. But man….lots of people are coming out with the same story….
The film footage is what the US Navy uses to fire missiles and kill people!
I agree the laws of physics are unbreakable. But do we understand all of them?
We understand more than enough to know what is and what isn’t possible. I don’t think you understood Feynman’s point!
Fred, do u believe the US Navy is intelligent enough to put in safe guards to protect against these kind of hoaxes?
Yes I do! Case in point:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/area-51-raid-facebook_n_5d2a0a11e4b0060b11ed38f7
Feds Warn Alien Seekers Not To Try Their Luck At Area 51
More than half a million Facebook users have signed up to besiege the Nevada site to “see them aliens.”
Cheers!
Must be a software bug in AEGIS, Sky1 and underwater systems.
This is an urgent problem. These systems are used to track and kill people!
Where is the urgency from the US Navy?
To be honest Fred, I don’t think u understand Feynman’s point.
He was saying we don’t understand shit as much as we think.
Obviously, that is why you didn’t try to explain anything.
” Facebook users have signed up to besiege the Nevada site to “see them aliens.”
AGAIN: UFO does not mean alien…it means unidentified.
It could be elon musk flying around there. lol!
“Feds Warn Alien Seekers Not To Try Their Luck At Area 51
More than half a million Facebook users have signed up to besiege the Nevada site to “see them aliens.””
The Feds and Area 51 have nothing to do with the US Navy.
These aren’t SAFEGUARDS on US Navy intelligence. Give me a break FRED.
Maybe all these Navy personnel are lying when they know what they are talking about is RECORDED on different systems with other people in the room.
Why isn’t the NAVY trying to prosecute them? They aren’t supposed to be revealing this…
Especially in front of Congress and the Pentagon…
I am a skeptic. But I don’t just blindly dismiss things..
Everyone who is coming out is saying the SAME THING (tic tac objects)
And there is FILM FOOTAGE on highly secure systems. I can SEE IT WITH ME OWN EYES….so can U!
UNIDENTIFIED
“am I missing something?”
Yep, last round of UFO mania was finally acknowledged by the CIA who, basically, said ‘Yep, that was us’.
NAOM
UFO means unidentified…..NOT ALIEN.
If the CIA admitted it was them….now it is IDENTIFIED.
I guess the Chief Technology Officer of the US Navy is a fool
The US Navy personnel are lying about what they saw on AEGIS, Sky1 and underwater systems.
What they saw is recorded and there are other people in the room.
And they are on different ships in different areas at different times. All are liars who come out with same story?
Lets apply for a patent on something just for fun!! It will never work! I hope they don’t get audited for wasting tax payer funds…
Ok. Case Closed.
Hi Porky,
The UFO phenomenon is a vast topic. The majority of UFO sightings are easily explained. However there is a small percentage of which will always remain a mystery, regardless of how much scientific scrutiny you put it under.
With regards to the Nimitz encounter, there are already propulsion systems which don’t burn hydrocarbons, for instance the ion thruster. There is also more hypothetical propulsion systems such as Alcubierre drive which can potentially have faster than light speeds. What exactly the U.S Navy is pouring money in, not sure. Doubt anything will come out of it.
I believe most people on this site don’t care about such events because possibly, people have been claiming secret government research and alien technology for a relatively long time. If the government had such technology, it would be declassified by now and used in modern warfare or espionage etc. Think about it, you’d have a huge edge over the enemy with such tech.
Secondly, most people on here are quite well read and accept the laws of physics as given. The Nimitz encounter and other UFO sightings have attributes which break the laws of physics. For e.g. instant stop and start with extremely ridiculously high acceleration and deceleration rates. Such maneuver shows a lack of inertia, which would imply no mass.
From the little research I’ve done, i personally think “some” UFOs are real. Which means in my worthless opinion, there is a legitimate phenomenon/or an event(s) which has taken place that is hard to explain by conventional physics. Again with regards to the Nimitz encounter, the UFOs were picked up by multiple radar systems as you said and you have visual sightings by pilots, it is a bit of a head scratcher. Hard to explain.
Thanks for that mike!
Best explanation I have heard
It’s altogether possible that we don’t have a COMPLETE understanding of the laws of physics, especially in terms of their possible applications to new technologies. New discoveries are made year after year making things that appeared to be impossible in the past at least theoretically possible in the future.
I’m not talking about breaking the laws of physics, I’m talking about refining our ability to use them to predict what is possible as we learn more about things previously unknown, and possibly to apply them to construct weapons or other machines that up until now would have appeared to be impossibilities.
We shouldn’t underestimate the ability of a rich and powerful government to conduct cutting edge research and development in secret.
Consider this. MAYBE the artifacts captured by radar systems, or seen by pilots, are real, in the sense they were built and deployed by black hole R and D programs within the Pentagon orbit itself. They could be no more than just DECOYS, tricks that hopefully will enable our guys to recognize such tricks if the other side tries them out on US, or tricks we can use to get inside their defenses if we use them against them.
Suppose you want to create the illusion that you have a plane that can travel at supposedly impossible speeds. If you can fire off TWO decoys, one that appears to the east, and the other that appears to the west, with the first one appearing and disappearing quickly, and the second one appearing a couple of seconds later, miles away, with the same signature…….. well, a radar operator sees what he sees on his screens.
Allowing these staged sightings to be publicized could be a false flag operation, leading enemies to invest lots of money into dead end research projects, or to conclude that we already have such decoys ready to use in the event we go to war with them. Whether this is true is irrelevant, it’s their BELIEFS that matter. If they think we can spoof their best weapons, they are less likely to use them.
Or maybe I have been reading too many sci fi and spy novels, lol.
Thanks for that reply OFM
https://www.livescience.com/65585-ufo-sightings-us-pilots.html
“It seemed like they were aware of our presence, because they would actively move around us,” Lt. Accoin said.
According to the lieutenant, when a strange reading shows up on radar for the first time, it’s possible to interpret it as a false alarm, “but then when you start to get multiple sensors reading the exact same thing, and then you get to see a display, that solidifies it for me.”
This certainly lends credibility to MULTIPLE unidentified flying objects (not alien).
Off the coast of San Diego, Up and down the east coast from florida to Virginia, In the middle east.
This isn’t a Grateful Dead concert with hippies on LSD seeing them.
There apparently are multiple stretches of observation in different locations by different personnel and different best of breed tracking systems.
Sorry, I think there is something to this.
To balance things out:
https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2019/05/17/op-ed-why-the-pentagon-is-interested-in-ufos/
thanks for the feedback!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9434BoGkNQ
“that’s all folks!”
Lithium-ion recycling rates far higher than some statistics suggest
I would have written the headline a little differently, something like “Lithium-ion recycling rates far higher than
some statisticsKoch funded anti-EV, anti-renewable propaganda suggests”.Speaking of “Koch funded anti-EV, anti-renewable propaganda…
Granted these two guys are openly self proclaimed Tesla fan boys but I think they are on the money (pun intended) with regards the recent news about Tesla stocks, demand and production issues etc… etc… The fossil fuel companies and the legacy ICE auto manufacturers are quaking in their boots! Their only option to fight Tesla’s unprecedented global success is to pour billions of dollars into shorting Tesla stocks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fdXynwRpsI
Tesla Short Squeeze! | In Depth
Obligatory Disclaimer: Since I tend to agree with people like Paul Beckwith about catastrophic climate change and its implications for the potential demise of industrial civilization, especially the infinite growth model based on fossil fuels, and I don’t harbor any illusions about EVs and renewables technolgy by itself saving it, so please spare me the comments attempting to educate me about those facts, I already know them. We need a global economic system reset with degrowth and massive population reduction! If you want to discuss how to go about that in a humane way and have original ideas to bring to the table I’ll be more than happy to listen. Otherwise simply bad mouthing advances in the only technologies that might allow some kind of path forward is IMHO a waste of time.
BAU. Capitalism, population and ecological overshoot and continued burning of fossil fuels are mainly responsible for events like these. If we don’t change that then renewables and EVs won’t matter!
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jul/11/great-barrier-reef-hard-coral-cover-close-to-record-lows
Cheers!
Who is really in the way of “renewables” and a “clean” energy future?
Honest Government Ad | Renewable Energy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sitPeRlTdNs
LOL! That would be funny if it weren’t true!
While renewables and EVs are not a solution in themselves they give us a window of opportunity to fix the rest. If we do not take that opportunity then we are truly fucked. Though maybe it is too late anyway 🙁
NAOM
Yeah, people seem to ignore that the Gigafactory has a reprocessing facility and is carpeting its roof with solar panels.
NAOM
Is anybody here getting therapy like these people who have severe climate change thoughts?
‘Climate Despair’ Is Making People Give Up on Life
by Mike Pearl; illustrated by Annie Zhao
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/j5w374/climate-despair-is-making-people-give-up-on-life
In the summer of 2015—the warmest year on record at the time—it was the literal heat that got to Meg Ruttan Walker, a 37-year-old former teacher in Kitchener, Ontario. “Summers have been stressful to me since having my son,” said Ruttan Walker, who is now an environmental activist. “It’s hard to enjoy a season that’s a constant reminder that the world is getting warmer.”
“I think my anxiety just reached a peak,” Ruttan Walker continued. It felt like there was nowhere to go, and although she had spoken to her primary care doctor about anxiety, she hadn’t sought help with her mental health. Suddenly, she was contemplating self-harm. “Though I don’t think I would have hurt myself, I didn’t know how to live with the fear of… the apocalypse, I guess? My son was home with me and I had to call my friend over to watch him because I couldn’t even look at him without breaking down,” Ruttan Walker said. She eventually checked herself into an overnight mental health facility.
Her case is extreme, but many people are suffering from what could be called “climate despair,” a sense that climate change is an unstoppable force that will render humanity extinct and renders life in the meantime futile.
Whatever you call it, this is undeniably a real condition, if not one with a set of formal diagnostic criteria. (It may reach that status—it took decades for “burnout” to be declared an official “occupational phenomenon” by the World Health Organization.) It’s impossible to know how many people like Ruttan Walker have experienced climate despair as a mental health crisis, but despair is all around us: in our own momentary but intense reactions to the latest bit of climate news, in pitch-black memes and jokes about human extinction, even in works of philosophy and literature. There is now a fringe group of scientists and writers who not only take our imminent doom as an article of faith, but seem to welcome it.
This despair could be a consequence of climate change being on more people’s minds than ever before. According to social scientist and psychology scholar Renee Lertzman, author of 2015’s Environmental Melancholia, large numbers of people have recently come to the realization that climate change is real, scary, and not being addressed. “It’s a surreal experience because we’re still in the same system, so walking around, people are driving, and everyone’s eating a lot of meat [and] everyone’s acting like that’s normal,” she said. For some people, that feeling is incompatible with carrying on with the business of everyday life.
Orwell knew the proper cure for people who are unable to deal with reality.
Ignorance is strength.
None of my neighbors are the least bit worried about global warming.
One of my old hippie friend’s favorite saying is that reality is for people who can’t handle drugs.
Somebody who is an excellent listener should hear this woman out, and then take plenty of time, and explain to her that life IS, and ALWAYS HAS BEEN, and ALWAYS WILL BE , an iffy proposition, that there is no such thing as long term safety, there is only the illusion that such safety is possible.
The BIG PICTURE is such that life is more like the situation of somebody at sea in a small boat. You CAN’T defeat the sea, sooner or later it WILL get you. You can only fight it to a draw one day at a time. Soldiers and sailors live and fight a minute at a time, a day at a time, a war or a voyage at a time.
She’s a soldier now, and she has within her the intellectual and moral resources she needs to ” man up” or as the case may be WOMAN up, and fight for her son, who in his time will have to fight for HIS son or daughter.
Unfortunately the odds are a hundred to one that she will get only chickenshit counseling from any psychologist or other medical professional, because the typical psychologist doesn’t know shit from apple butter about the physical world and physical reality.
I have yet to meet a medical professional who is a systems thinker, in terms of thinking about the whole physical world. They live and think within their own professional boxes, just like the economists who believe in eternal growth.
Incidentally, there is nothing wrong with the THEORY of eternal growth. It’s possible, depending on the premises on which you base the prediction thereof. The problem lies with the premises, and economists don’t know enough about physics and biology to understand that their premises are built on quicksand, rather than bedrock. Furthermore, they don’t WANT to know, collectively.
She’s a soldier now, and she has within her the intellectual and moral resources she needs to ” man up” or as the case may be WOMAN up, and fight for her son, who in his time will have to fight for HIS son or daughter.
OFM, any mental health care professional worth his or her salt is going to tell you that the last thing you want to do is to tell someone suffering from depression to man up! It’s about as useful advice as telling someone with a broken leg to get up and walk! Now the only way to make that worse is to tell a woman with a broken leg to pick up her child and then walk!
Hi Fred,
You are dead on that just telling this woman to man up wouldn’t work, and might even push her to suicide.
Sometimes I put my fingers in gear and type while my head is still asleep, lol.
BUT in general terms:
I stand by my assertions. I should have said that manning up, or womaning up, as the case may be, is to come AFTER talking and listening,after providing such care as is possible, without the patient having to face up to reality RIGHT AWAY.
I should not have said she’s a soldier NOW. I should have said she needs to , must, grow into the role of soldier, the role evolution designed her for, the role of a parent protecting her kid.
This time it’s not going to be with a fiery stick keeping a saber tooth away, her weapon will be political activism.
All this is going to take some time, maybe years, and some real effort on her part.
The ONE single thing that she can most likely focus on that will MOTIVATE her, provide her with the WILL, to get a grip, and put her in charge of her life again, is her SACRED DUTY to successfully protect and raise that kid. . The instincts that drive us to care for our children are among the most powerful of all the forces that control our behavior.
She can never be HEALTHY again until she does deal with reality, she can only be doped up, and lead around by her intellectual and spiritual nose, like sheep in church, believing that Jesus will provide and protect.
Can she be STABILIZED? Probably? Millions of people will spend the rest of their lives, stabilized by various drugs and counseling.
Cured? Not without taking responsibility for her own actions or lack thereof.
She can live in a miserable ( or not so miserable, depending on her pusher ) fog for the rest of her life, and maybe feel better, pumped full of various drugs, and having somebody hold her hand, and taking her money, or her insurance money, but that’s only kicking the can down the road. Her life is just like the illusion of safety…. temporary.
Drunks and drug addicts have to face up to the fact that their cures come from within, in the last analysis. So do depressed people.
I know.I’ve been there. I’ve read all the books. I have medical professionals in my family who are not afraid to tell it like it IS, privately, when they are not hanging their professional asses out to get them bitten off.
Ask a typical doctor or nurse whether it’s better for my old Daddy to be in a nursing home, where there’s at least an aide within a minute or two of him 24 /7 or home with me, where I must occasionally leave him unattended for an hour or two. They cover their ass virtually every time, saying the only safe option is the nursing home.
IN REALITY, the odds of him acquiring a fatal infection in a nursing home are probably ten times, maybe fifty times, the odds that he will have die or have a stroke or other such critical event, or that the house will burn around him, during the occasional hour or two I am forced to leave him alone. And even in a hospital, they might not be able to do anything for him, given his age. Beyond that, he’s HAPPY at home. The hypothetical medical professional is seldom willing to seriously consider that aspect of his overall situation.
People who become obsessed with one or another particular issue or problem have lost sight of reality, and need to be lead back to it, gently of course, and as slowly as necessary.
The climate issue isn’t the only existential issue. Yellowstone may erupt, an asteroid might hit us, Trump and his little dough boy buddy may start WWIII, a new disease may well evolve that wipes out most of the human race, or be deliberately created and released by some nut case billionaire who starts a cult with that in mind. She may be murdered or her son murdered by a two bit robber, or the kid may be run over by a school bus.
In the end, she will either adjust to reality, or she will spend the rest of her life figuratively more or less hiding in a corner, semifunctional and maybe miserable, until she is reacquainted with reality and ready to cope with it. This is not to say she might not be able to go to work and get home and sleep, and take her meds, and go out and do it again, for years to come……..
There are millions of people who are limited to finding their best possible personal reality in a bottle of pills or alcohol. She may be one of them. Depression IS a hell of a tough problem, and is not by any means necessarily curable, but most of the time, it can be managed to the extent that the victim can function more or less normally in terms of his day to day life, such as caring for himself and maybe holding a job of some sort.
The weepy whiny tone of the article about the woman and her problems irritates me. For every person who is seriously depressed due to the climate issue, there must be ten thousand who are depressed for lack of a way to earn sufficient money to feed their kids. I don’t have any emotional energy to spare for her, as a symbol of the climate issue, considering that I have dozens of people known to me personally who don’t have the resources that are obviously at her disposal, living within a few minutes of my home, who have to just grit their teeth, if they still have any, and DEAL with equally tough problems, including depression. I have known at least four local guys who have committed suicide over the last decade or so. They didn’t have insurance. They didn’t get any counseling. If they had, it would have been entirely pointless, because they lacked the resources to change their personal economic and health care situations.
To my way of seeing the world, such articles trivialize depression as a health care issue. The vast majority of the ten thousand will never see a physician or psychologist for treatment. If they get any treatment at all, it will be self administered in the form of alcohol or tobacco or other drugs.
On this date:
1789 — France: Storming of the Bastille heralds the French Revolution. Begun by Parisian crowds seeking arms & the liberation of political prisoners. (Signals a new period in history with the taking of power by the nascent capitalist class, the French bourgeoisie.)
angst of the youth
remember the 1960’s and the “we’re gonna die in a nuclear war ”
I do , I am not a psychologist but it seems we will always have some in our mists who will “despair”
Hope and despair: keys to the socio-psychodynamics of youth.
Smith MB.
Abstract
A psychology of hope and despair is offered, integrating findings from recent psychological research in application to the interpretation of unrest among youth in the 1960s, of present socially problematic behavior, and of response to life under threat of nuclear holocaust.
some things change , in other ways they stay the same…
time for some single malt I think.
Forbin
And what makes you think we face less of a threat of nuclear annihilation today than we did back in the sixties?! If anything it has much gotten worse…
“‘Climate Despair’ Is Making People Give Up on Life”
OK, lets say its a true.
That would be good if it was on a mass scale.
Its the easiest way to achieve a mass downsizing of the worlds population/pollution/mass extinction rates, etc.
Its nice to have a voluntary mechanism.
A voluntary mechanism should be honored, rather than vilified.
And a voluntary method should be made easy, and readily available.
[I know this is here-say- Religions over the millennia have preferred war with massive slaughter of non-believers]
In the face of global massive population overshoot, as we are far into now,
the idea of getting off the train early is a rational one. Not evidence of a mental health problem.
The mental health problem is the act of ignoring the evidence.
Sure denial is a protective mechanism,
but it is a mental defect if it is prolonged and prevents one from
taking steps to adjust to the situation.
-Yours truly on Sunday Morn
I can relate to the feeling of being in a sort of Twilight Zone. I sense that there are a couple crises baring down on humanity but, most people are just going about their regular course of business as if everything is fine! The way I see it, the scale of human civilization does not allow us the luxury of letting “the market” to take care of things. Making matters worse is the determination of the beneficiaries of the current energy system to keep things just as they are, spending considerable amounts of money to try and influence public opinion.
My feeling is that the situation requires urgent action to prevent things from getting quite ugly but, I feel very alone in that sentiment. Other people seem to think that something should be done but, no rush, so they might find my sense of urgency rather strange. In general I have to constantly restrain myself from saying what I really think for fear of being called a total nutcase. I’m pretty sure many of my acquaintances already think I’m a bit nutty! I definitely fell like I don’t fit in. I guess that explains why I’m always posting “positive”news. It gives me hope. I worry what my state of mind would be like if I didn’t have these little straws to hold on to!
“I guess that explains why I’m always posting “positive”news. It gives me hope.”
Forgive me for previously disparaging the posting of any good news.
I understand where you are coming from.
Thanks for the good works.
The behavior I find interesting is the one where people say something to the effect of-
“Solar and Wind will never come anywhere close to replacing the energy we get from fossil fuels!”
As if that means deploying these technologies are not worth the effort.
OK. Lets assume for a second that they are correct, at least in part.
No matter if that’s just a little true, or mostly true, it is irrelevant to the task.
The task is get as much replacement of fossil fuel accomplished as soon as possible, so as to develop at least some resiliency. Surely better than just sitting on your hands, or being destructive.
And even if you can only get half way there with fossil fuel energy replacement, that is a whole lot better than getting nowhere.
And the sooner you get to it, the more likely you are to approach the goal before depletion and extremely high prices for petrol comes into play.
Didn’t even mention climate.
Speaking of climate and sea level rise, what happens if sea levels start to rise and threaten low lying cities and coastal infrastructure. Do people think that if CO2 emissions were to be cut to zero in a war time like effort, global warming and sea level rise would stop shortly after? The fact is that if that does turn out to be the case, another 10 years of warming and sea level rise would be “baked into the cake”.
Plant trees, LOTS of trees.
NAOM
Good news to go with your morning coffee. Looks like we’ll only have to accommodate another three billion people on our little blue dot!
THE WORLD POPULATION IS TOPPING OFF
“The world population is expected to grow to roughly 11 billion by 2100, a new report from the United Nations estimates… While many other regions of the world will have slowing or stabilizing population growth, Africa is projected to continue at a steady pace for the rest of the century, with an end of century population of around 491 million. Outside of Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa will drive a large part of the whole world’s population growth.”
https://www.statista.com/chart/18672/world-population-over-the-next-century/
Meanwhile, Arctic wildfires are alive and well.
ARCTIC WILDFIRES EMITTED AS MUCH CO2 IN JUNE AS SWEDEN DOES IN A YEAR
“In June alone [Arctic] wildfires emitted 50 megatonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere. This is more than was released by Arctic fires in the same month between 2010 and 2018 combined.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/12/arctic-wildfires-c02-carbon-emissions-same-sweden
Africa is projected to continue at a steady pace for the rest of the century, with an end of century population of around 491 million.
Really?!
By 2070, the bulk of the world’s population growth is predicted to take place in Africa: of the additional 2.4 billion people projected between 2015 and 2050, 1.3 billion will be added in Africa, 0.9 billion in Asia and only 0.2 billion in the rest of the world.
Projections of population growth – Wikipedia
Anyways this statement alone is completely ridiculous!
The world population is expected to grow to roughly 11 billion by 2100, a new report from the United Nations estimates…
No way, Jose! Ain’t gonna happen! WTF are those people smokin?!
“No way, Jose! Ain’t gonna happen!”
Of course it won’t happen Fred. What projections respecting humans, climate, agricultural production, whatever, beyond about 2030 are creditable? That’s why I hate all those condescending starry eyed exponential green growth projections that keep cropping up. Growth models of physical phenomena only apply within limited time frames and the only place exponential growth models work universally (apart from in limited regions), is in mathematics.
Hear hear.
That’s why I hate all those condescending starry eyed exponential green growth projections that keep cropping up.
Which is why I now find it necessary to add this disclaimer every time I talk about renewables and EVs.
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-july-12-2019/#comment-682320
I know the shit is going to hit the fan but until it does I’m pretty sure there will continue to be growth in all sectors, until there isn’t! 😉
For the record, I expect ALL growth to stop before the end of the next decade. Just my humble opinion!
Cheers!
” I expect ALL growth to stop before the end of the next decade”
I beg to pardon. CO2 will still be growing. Nationalism will be soaring,
Other things which will still be growing- walls, dead zones, melt pools on Greenland, species extinction rates, and volume of business at pawn shops.
Cheers.
LOL! Yes those things will probably be growing exponentially. But human population and the economy will not!
You forgot to mention growth in Arctic methane release, wildfires (everywhere), melting ice in Greenland and Antarctica, plastic pollution, species extinction….
No worries!
https://www.rt.com/news/464051-finnish-study-no-evidence-warming/
Finnish study finds ‘practically no’ evidence for man-made climate change
The Finns (Finnlanders?) are praying hard for a warming climate.
They look forward to a time when they can grow barley instead of just Subalpine Fir.
Barley?!
They’re thinking bananas, mangoes, pineapples and avocados… 😉
That would be barley sufficient. Oat to think broader.
ducks out of room!
Ag fact of the day-
Barley is the grain that is most suited to short growing season, high altitude reliable harvest. Places like Tibet.
Barley Fan
Heh, I have a bag of seed on my desk. Must plant some more, the cats love it.
NAOM
As a sort of principle I do not go to rt – disclaimer: living in Finland gives sort of view to russian state activities during the last few hundreds of years vs a small country… – and as I think I follow rather closely the news about science and studies here I haven’t seen any such study indicated in the above post.
OTOH as Finland is about 1000 km long in north – south direction we have environments from near the arctic seas to a somewhat near European southern parts – and all studies and reports about climate change tell similar story: it’s warming up but variability is increasing etc and so forth.
Russian propaganda news I do not consider reliable and believable source.
As a sort of principle I do not go to rt – disclaimer: living in Finland gives sort of view to russian state activities during the last few hundreds of years vs a small country… – and as I think I follow rather closely the news about science and studies here I haven’t seen any such study indicated in the above post.
The paper mentioned in the article does exist. Though the claim that it proves anything is in and of itself absurd. And most people who have read my posts over the years would recognize my ‘No worries’ intro as dripping with sarcasm. As for going to ‘rt’, Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer. https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sun_Tzu
😉
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1907.00165.pdf
NO EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE FOR THE SIGNIFICANT
ANTHROPOGENIC CLIMATE CHANGE
J. KAUPPINEN AND P. MALMI
Abstract.
In this paper we will prove that GCM-models used in IPCC report AR5 fail to calculate the influences of the low cloud cover changes on the global temperature. That is why those models give a very small natural temperature change leaving a very large change for the contribution of the green house gases in the observed temperature. This is the reason why IPCC has to use a very large sensitivity to compensate a too small natural component. Further they have to leave out the strong negative feedback due to the clouds in order to magnify the sensitivity. In addition, this paper proves that the changes in the low cloud cover fraction practically control the global temperature.
Then they cite this Japanese paper to suport their rather dubious claims of ‘proof‘.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-45466-8
Abstract
The strength of Earth’s magnetic dipole field controls galactic cosmic ray (GCR) flux, and GCR-induced cloud formation can affect climate. Here, we provide the first evidence of the GCR-induced cloud effect on the East-Asian monsoon during the last geomagnetic reversal transition. Bicentennial-resolution monsoon records from the Chinese Loess Plateau revealed that the summer monsoon (SM) was affected by millennial-scale climate events that occurred before and after the reversal, and that the winter monsoon (WM) intensified independently of SM variations; dust accumulation rates increased, coinciding with a cooling event in Osaka Bay. The WM intensification event lasted about 5000 years across an SM peak, during which the Earth’s magnetic dipole field weakened to <25% of its present strength and the GCR flux increased by more than 50%. Thus, the WM intensification likely resulted from the increased land–ocean temperature gradient originating with the strong Siberian High that resulted from the umbrella effect of increased low-cloud cover through an increase in GCR flux.
Last but not least this paragraph alone confirms that this entire article is a denialist propaganda hit piece.
The results sharply cut against claims put forward by many environmentalists, including US lawmakers such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who argue not only that climate change is an immediate threat to the planet, but that it is largely a man-made phenomenon. Ocasio-Cortez, better known as ‘AOC’, has proposed a ‘Green New Deal’ to address the supposedly dire threat.
Gobbledegook
Sounds like Svensmark’s theory of cosmic ray flux. It has been repeatedly debunked.
Fred opined “For the record, I expect ALL growth to stop before the end of the next decade. Just my humble opinion!”
Last night, after playing board games outside with a friend, we sat watching the local scene dwindle in the fading light. The end to a perfect warm summer day amidst a paradise of trees, sky and water, the local inhabitants slowly leaving their aquatic exuberance and retiring to their various abodes.
As the hills beyond the lake rose up to cover the sun, the panoply of changing colors, shifting clouds, fading azure sky, all mirrored in the stillness of the water; the absolute serenity and beauty of the world played out it’s symphony within our minds.
Later as I walked through the deepening darkness toward home, I switched on my headlamp displaying the grasses and weeds in a surreal light. The moon was just beginning to illuminate the landscape in it’s grey blue ways of shadow and light adding a touch of cool unfulfilled anticipation.
Yet there had been no chorus of frogs, no hooting of owls, no cricket or katydid song. No glittering spider eyes reflected my light beam. No slithering in the grasses. No hopping or scurrying away from my feet.
The Silence is here and there now. And yes, most likely, the Great Silence is coming. Our massive Oxidation may halt quickly and then Silence will reign.
Not yet though, not quite yet. The quality of Forever is still here. The Cracking has started, the Shattering comes later.
GF
Cracking has started, the Shattering comes later.
Yep and we keep using the fragile webs of life for target practice…
.
And still there is no sense of urgency to try and reign in the destruction. At least none that I am aware of outside of the lunatic fringe (AOC, Greta Thunberg et al).
Addictive, self-destructive people and systems rarely assume a sense of urgency to reign in self-destruction until some massive event forces a lot of fear into themselves, or death occurs. Even after fear sets in they often revert to previous behavior, if still alive.
Doug said,
“That’s why I hate all those condescending starry eyed exponential green growth projections that keep cropping up. Growth models of physical phenomena only apply within limited time frames and the only place exponential growth models work universally (apart from in limited regions), is in mathematics.”
Oh my. You should know we all realize there are competing limits and time constraints to all growth systems and that growth is both positive and negative. If you are going to get emotional (pulling your own strings) about possible future projections concerning what could be if we focused our industrial might on say renewables or EV’s, then that is just silly and self harmful. No one is trying to be superior here, just showing what might happen if we became more focused and responsive to certain predicaments. We all have our foibles and limits. But we also all have our abilities and unique approaches. Especially if we think independently and do not religiously follow the conclusions of others. Some of this will be correct or at least partially correct.
The logistic functions are superior to pure exponential functions but are still far from reality in many cases. Math and knowledge fall far short of the complexity of reality yet when one stands back far enough and takes enough time, the gross simplistic picture of growth (population, production, land use, pollution) come somewhere near our simplistic mathematical models.
The negative side of growth is the Seneca Cliff type response when limits are reached in the biological world or in the business world (population crash or bankruptcy).
Yes we make feeble attempts to model possibilities, but we all know there are many competing factors, especially lately, that will disrupt the rise or fall of any projection. Nature is highly fractal and reality is a symphony of interactions.
But as with all human constructions, mathematics and science, much of it is perspective and grouping. Study and model what? The growth of one species of plant or animal, of a forest (define forest) or pollutant, or energy. Which box one creates to view, study and possibly project the future is a human design. Reality and nature work totally interactively. The odds that humans will ever be able to grasp all the complexities or interactions is probably near zero. But that is our voyage of discovery, our terribly “condescending” attempts at showing possible futures and attempts to fathom things large and small. All full of errors and occasional partial successes as we muddle along trying to comprehend this incredible place we call the universe. Trying to see into the fog of complexity and possibilities.
I breathe out, the trees breath in. The trees breathe out, I breathe in. Reality is fully integrated, human thought is not. Yet that is what humans are stuck with, for now, in this limited time frame, amidst the wonderful apparent chaos and hyper-complex illogic of the world.
Only if you stay in a very small box——
I don’t know where that erroneous projection about African population came from- its not in the link cited.
The graph from the link, apparently derived from the UN report, in fact shows African population exceeding 4 Billion by 2100. That jives with other population trend info that I have seen elsewhere.
Nigeria is on tap to become the 3rd largest country in the world by 2050.
“The central projection by the UN that the population of Africa will grow to 1.467-billion by 2025, add a further billion by 2050 and climb to 4.185-billion by 2100 is just that, a projection, or as Statistics South Africa’s Diego Iturralde would have it, an “educated guessing game”.”
https://africacheck.org/factsheets/factsheet-africas-population-projections/
Sorry to hear so many more people and other species will be put under such deadly stress in the future. It’s tough to grasp the level of pain and death that misdirected technology and overgrown civilization will bring to the world.
Amen to that. Makes me want to cry thinking about the pain, suffering and death that will befall so may fellow creatures. And, of course I include the wildlife in this sentiment.
Here’s Why I Pick Up Other People’s Litter—And Why You Should, Too
By Shawnte Salabert
https://www.adventure-journal.com/2019/07/why-i-pick-up-other-peoples-litter/
Last year, I conducted a memorable interview with French environmentalist Claire Nouvian. She’d just been awarded the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize for her work with BLOOM Association, a non-profit that uses scientific data and public outreach to effectively dismantle destructive deep-sea industrial fishing practices, first in France, and now worldwide.
Things were going well until I asked what I thought was a fairly softball question: “What gives you hope for the future?” Nouvian replied, “Do you want an answer that sounds nice, or do you want to hear the truth?” I gulped, then asked for the latter. Her response was chilling—we’d already reached the point of no return. The damage wrought upon the world’s oceans was now irreversible; all we could hope to do was simply slow its progression.
It’s overwhelming to consider the scope and scale of environmental degradation experienced even in our lifetime. It’s not just ocean health, but a host of other issues: climate change, species extinction, natural resource depletion, ongoing environmental racism, and so much more. It’s equally overwhelming to figure out my own role in collectively working toward a healthier planet, which means that I’m bumbling through it like the next person who is not, say, an award-winning, policy-changing, movement-fronting environmentalist.
So that means I read. Listen. Talk. Donate. Volunteer. Research. Write. I evolve my thinking, alter my habits, hopefully learn a few things, and maybe even help change a few other minds along the way. But I’ve also found a tiny speck of hope—that stuff that seems so very difficult to come by at times—in a small, quiet action that I can take every single day: picking up other people’s litter. I know, I know—scooping up a spent Starbucks cup isn’t going to save a sea turtle, level our rising seas, or purify the Flint water supply, but hear me out.
And where does all that litter go once collected? Into a plastic bag to end up in the ocean or a landfill. Or some is burned adding to our carbon load. All of it involving more carbon burn to collect, transport, separate and possibly reuse some of it.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/10/every-minute-one-garbage-truck-of-plastic-is-dumped-into-our-oceans/
Then there is this… the worst part of which, is that there are people who continue to hold on to this pervasive notion that any kind of geoengineering has even the remotest chance of success on a planet with 8 plus billion humans!
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2019-07-14/why-ocean-acidification-could-make-some-geoengineering-schemes-irrelevant/
Why ocean acidification could make some geoengineering schemes irrelevant
By Kurt Cobb, originally published by Resource Insights
July 14, 2019
Anyways, I have long been convinced that tipping points in ocean acidification have already been passed. Which means that our collective extinction is all but guaranteed!
Cheers!
“I have long been convinced that tipping points in ocean acidification have already been passed. Which means that our collective extinction is all but guaranteed!”
Yeah, but you’re just an old curmudgeon. Next time you find yourself in a drug store get yourself a pair of pink glasses and everything will seem much better. 😉
I feel charming
Oh, so charming
It’s alarming how charming I feel!
And so pretty
That I hardly can believe I’m real
.
“in a small, quiet action that I can take every single day: picking up other people’s litter”
I salute you for that. Its an act of kindness. Sets the proper tone for living, for yourself and anyone else who notices.
Keep on.
Next to where I park my bike, at the supermarket, there are 3 bins – organic, inorganic and recyclable. I drop off the plastic bits and pieces that unavoidably accumulate (despite trying to avoid them) and then, every time, move recyclable objects from the other 2 bins to the recyclable bin – every time!
NAOM
I suspect Africa won’t grow as fast as the United Nations predicts, due to rapidly falling birth rates.
What will cause the rates to fall? Cell phones, because cell phones are spreading knowledge at an unprecedented rate, and education is the most effective form of birth control.
Only about 10+ billion too many. It is interesting how many problems people say more growth would cure could be solved by population reduction.
NAOM
My most recent visit to Auke Hoekstra’s Twitter page led me to this
Liebreich: We Need To Talk About Nuclear Power
Carlos Diaz who started sub-thread further up in this thread would probably approve of much of what Liebreich writes but, I have detected a similar flaw in Liebreich’s argument to the one in the MIT Technology Review cited by Carlos. The flaw as I see it is in the following paragraph:
I went back to my handy little spreadsheet and looked at what it would take to “add two to four times as much capacity in the next decade as has been added in total in the last two decades” and the results are very revealing. If no new manufacturing capacity were added and new capacity additions remained constant at the amount expected by some analysts for 2019 (120 GW), four times the current global capacity would be achieved by the end of 2013 as shown in the chart below. One wonders what sort of projections for growth of solar PV capacity are in the BNEF’s New Energy Outlook 2019, to lead Mr Liebreich to state, “while we could hit the lower end of that range, it is highly unlikely we will hit the higher end of the range on the current trajectory”?
You shared the quote- “We need to talk about nuclear. And I mean really talk, in a truth-and-reconciliation, moving-forward kind of way, not a let’s-all-shout-slogans-at-each-other, my-tribe-versus-your-tribe kind of way. ”
I certainly agree with this in regard to nuclear, and the whole energy mix for that matter.
And population, and climate and economic (de) growth.
The whole thing.
Sure, including nuclear.
Maybe there is no role for nuclear, after exploring the notion in detail, or maybe there is.
We should all leave our per-conceived notions at the door on all these topics.
Time and again on this site I have brought solid evidence that nuclear is extremely dangerous, non-scalable and expensive. Time and again, this subject is brought up and people seem to think that the growth of nuclear power should be discussed and some think that nuclear power is a panacea to solve our energy problems.
There has been some externally unfunded studies indicating that areas with operating nuclear plants cause increases in certain types of cancers in the local populations. That is with operating plants, not emergency problems or failures.
The researchers sought funding for more comprehensive studies Golly gee whiz, no funding was given. Wonder why that could be. So we go merrily forward with the three monkeys still fairly intact.
What it all comes down to is that nuclear power is an inefficient, defective, dangerous and expensive source of boiling water for power. The potential dangers are mostly ignored, so people talk about bringing thousands more of these things into the world.
Creating a deadly world to “save” a stupid and dystopian civilization is not right in any manner or form.
This is just further insanity and the only thing we should be talking about is how to properly dispose of the waste and shut down the existing plants.
Here is a smidgen of the insanity:
https://www.quora.com/How-many-nuclear-reactors-would-be-required-to-power-the-world
30,000 fast breeder reactors around the world! Every point of earth would be within 22 miles of at least two reactors and at least 6 within a radius of 50 miles, if evenly distributed. I could see dense regions have 20 to 100 reactors in a 50 mile radius.
Consider that with that many reactors, major failures will occur about once a month somewhere in the world. Who knows what else will go wrong and how well other contamination will be contained in the processing.
But of course, as with many human activities, we have built a trap for ourselves and the environment.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/jul/30/fast-breeder-reactors-nuclear-waste-nightmare
Will we wriggle out of this trap or go gung-ho nuclear?
Time and again on this site I have brought solid evidence that nuclear is extremely dangerous, non-scalable and expensive.
Nuclear fusion is available today, it is safest source of energy available, scalable and getting almost too cheap to meter… As long as we harvest it from the source at the center of our solar system which is about 93 million miles away! It even has the added benefit of allowing green plants to produce and store chemical energy through the process of photosynthesis to fuel complete ecosystems. It also drives the cycles that produce the winds and the rains… So why are we not all bowing down and worshiping the sun? 😉
Some people do worship the sun.
Sun God:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4diugMg5kQ
Yeah, yeah. Very funny. Problem is we have a good portion of sociopaths and psychopaths in the system we conveniently forgot to weed out. They like things, complex technical things that might make them and their “friends” some profit and keep this whole wacko system rolling down the septic pipe.
BTW: your little rosy glasses curmudgeon song and picture above was amusing, got me to laugh. Yes, I know where it came from.
ALL one Needs to understand about Nuclear fission is that Gubberments, institutions and corporations FAIL in Stewartship of this type of risk: What about uninhabitable do you not understand?
https://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/30/us/excerpts-from-farewell-testimony-by-rickover-to-congress.html
UK are talking about building another nuke despite the disaster they are building now which will supply electricity at about 150% of the current cost. The company proposing it says that it will be much cheaper than the current one due to ‘experience’. Despite that one coming in at many times the original cost. Despite that one ‘benefiting from the experience of its predecessor in France. Despite long delays and multi cost over-runs of the French one. Despite the French one now facing more huge delays and cost over-runs due to bad welds. Despite that the company hasn’t built a working reactor yet. Oh, and the proposed one will be on the coast, you know, where the waters are rising.
Yeah, we should talk about nuclear. In the past tense and how, going forward, we need to remove it – safely.
NAOM
I’d like to add that nuclear takes a long time to prepare and build, even in countries friendly to nuclear.
The Polish government wants to build 6GW of nuclear plants by 2045!
And that will still be only about 20% of their electricity.
Even the first plant is expected to be online no earlier than 2033!
https://polandin.com/43423896/poland-to-build-six-nuclear-reactors-by-2040
By that time they could power the country with wind and solar AND could put their coal miners to work manufacturing both.
(Coal currently provides 60-70% of electricity in Poland.)
https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false&countryCode=PL
At one time I took Noam Chomsky for an idiot, due to reading some of his stuff taken out of context, back in the days prior to the net.
But regardless of whatever OTHER shortcomings I suffer from, I AM willing to change my mind when the evidence indicates that doing so is in order.
I just found out that Chomsky basically agrees with what I’ve been saying about the reasons why the Republicans have been kicking the Democrats collective ass for the last few decades, taken all around, and NOW I consider him to be one of the best thinkers of our time. Anybody that agrees with ME just HAS to be smarter than the average bear! ( Please understand that the previous sentence is to be interpreted as humor. )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llzoItQgLOQ
What have I been saying here for the last three or four years? That the D’s have either altogether forgotten the working people of this country, or else have contemptuously and condescendingly taken them for granted, putting the emphasis at election time on various voting blocks such as gays, lesbians, minorities, immigrants, the concerns of the educated middle class WHICH IS JUST ABOUT ENTIRELY INSULATED from the problems of the uneducated white working class that idiots like HRC was dumb enough to refer, publicly, as second class citizens, lecturing them about the glories of globalization just like a Republican.
Chomsky gets it.
Did you even listen to your attached link ?
For over a hundred years the Republicans have been the party of the wealthy and corporations. They attack regulations that protect workers and the environment for greed and profits. They demonize labor unions for fighting for a living wage. They defund education, the avenue to success. They control behavior with religious barbaric fear. They promote dangerous human society activities with guns. They divide Americans with race baiting fear. They gerrymander elections and degrade democracy for control.
The Republican sheep “can’t stand the truth” when it hurts their delusionary ego.
Only an uneducated idiot would question who the party of labor is.
“But regardless of whatever OTHER shortcomings I suffer from, I AM willing to change my mind when the evidence indicates that doing so is in order.”
It’s time you deal with your HRC hate and let it go
HB, excellent summary of the GOP…
Great post HB. My sentiments exactly.
You guys are great. Of course, I’m a workingman and always will be, even retired.:-)
I was reading your nuke comments thoughout. I always ask the nuke boosters this, “Would you like one built in your town, including onsite storage ponds”? That usually ends the discussion.
I just want to add, it might take a major North American accident to end the discussion once and for all….maybe California fault line induced? I live on the west coast and our family has always prepped for the big one. I don’t think we’re ready for this, though. Anyway, regards.
I wasn’t aware HB’s post had anything to do with nukes. And what gave you the idea that I was a nuke booster?
Hi HB,
Glad to see you are still around, was getting a little worried that maybe something happened to you.
I AGREE with your assessment of the Republican party.
Now as it happens, I have been in some labor unions, including the Operating Engineers, and the NEA, got the papers to prove it, and my dear old Daddy was a Teamster, for fifty years, at his PART TIME job in town, forty hours a week, so I know more than a little bit about the Democrats and labor. The Democrats have historically been the champions of big labor, and remain so today.
There’s zero doubt in the mind of anybody who is politically literate that the Democrats are the party that generally supports programs that are good for working class people, and that the Republicans are the party that DOES NOT support such policies and programs.
BUT the fact is that the facts don’t matter very much, at election time, it’s the BELIEFS of the voters that matter, and the working class people of this country spend pretty fucking near ZERO time on the net, or reading newspapers, about politics.
Their views and beliefs are as simple as simple can get, when it comes to politics, and they can be summed up in one sentence. I never ever quote George Wallace except for this one line.
Paraphrased, he said that ” There ain’t a dime’s worth of difference between them”, referring to the two parties. And so far as Joe and Suzy SixPack are concerned, he was, and REMAINS, dead right. Plus he’s actually dead, too, and good riddance!
I talk every day of my life to people who don’t believe there’s a dimes worth of difference between the Republicans and the Democrats. That’s why they don’t vote.
I don’t waste any time hating anybody.
I keep on pointing out however that HRC was the WORST POSSIBLE candidate the D’s could have come up with, because she had the WORST approval ratings of any prominent Democrat at that time, and probably still does. She was arrogant, condescending, acted as if she was OWED the office of president, practiced one hundred percent old time machine politics, failed to campaign in the states in play that put Trump in office out of her sense of ENTITLEMENT to the votes of working people, while looking down on them and hobnobbing with banksters. THAT’S why Trump is president.
The people of the country wanted CHANGE, and HRC was an establishment politician. Trump won the R nomination BECAUSE the foot soldier cannon fodder Republican voters were ALSO SICK of establishment politics, IN SPITE of the establishment’s control of the R party machinery.
HRC won the D nomination because she was an old time machine politician who OWNED the D party machinery.
Everybody else in the entire fucking COUNTRY, with the sole exception of Bernie Sanders, was so discouraged by her OWNERSHIP of that machinery that nobody even SERIOUSLY TRIED for the nomination. Sanders got started WAY TOO LATE.
I point these things out again because I HOPE like hell that the Democrats will NEVER AGAIN run an old line machine politician who is hated by half the country even before the primary season starts, with a baggage train a mile long, BECAUSE I want the D’s to win.
If they manage to nominate somebody with such a baggage train, and such low approval ratings AGAIN, Trump may win again.
Democrats who right straight thru supported HRC who ran a bimbo squad to protect her serial sex abuser husband are stupid as shit if they think they are now entitled to the moral high ground because Trump is ALSO a serial abuser of women.
If the D’s want the votes of the working classes of this country, they are going to have to run a candidate who at least has sense enough to ACT AND TALK like he or she respects them and values their votes.
They may win without these votes, but on the other hand…….. they may lose without them. They lost without them in the three states that put Trump over the top last time around.
The BELIEFS of voters determine their votes.
Have you ever wondered WHY Obama came out of nowhere and won the nomination against her, and went on to win the WH?
Do you suppose that maybe this had just a LITTLE BIT to do with tens of millions of life long big D Democrats wanting to vote for ANYBODY BUT HRC, during the nominating process?
Have you ever wondered WHY the younger and better educated people last time around went for Sanders ? You think MAYBE it had just a little bit to do with their having a low opinion of HRC as a person,and a candidate?
Adults look to their own team, when they lose, and fix their mistakes, so as to win again next time. Children blame their losses on the opposition.
If the D’s want to win THIS time, they need to run a candidate that inspires the voters.
“If the D’s want to win THIS time, they need to run a candidate that inspires the voters.”
Who OFM, in your opinion, of the current field of top 10 Dems running would have the highest chance of taking Virginia?
How about you HB, who do you think has best chance of betting Trump (if he is still around)?
Hello Hickory, I suspect Harris will be the best to energize the party and will end up with the nomination. Being a strong female of color. Bernie and Biden seem to old. Bernie is already falling out a favor and I think Biden’s age will catch up with him in the long run and Harris will take away his colored vote over time. Bernie and Warren are to far left and will open the door for a socialist attack. I do like Warren, but to far left for me. Mayor Pete will open up the gay attack and seems to have a problem with the colored community. I suspect the gay community will continue to fund him well until March as an excellent representative for their cause. As ugly as the Republicans are, if he won the nomination. It might be the worst thing that has happened to them since the 1980’s. I don’t see any of the other candidates gaining traction except for maybe Tom Steyer. He has money, an email list and has been promoting himself for the last couple of years. Just to early to tell for him.
And you ?
I concur with your thoughts, closely.
I do hope Harris grows into the role, quickly.
I am surprised that Booker hasn’t achieved greater traction.
I am impressed with both Butta.. , Warren, and Castro.
But best chance of beating Trump (which is all that matters)-
I wish I could say the choice was an obvious one.
My biggest fear about the Demo message is that ‘socialism’ won’t be explained well, and if pushed too far/fast, will alienate people. This will be the big weapon the right wing media will be using.
Maybe if the Dems pointed out that the largest pillar of this so called socialism, publicly funded health care has been practiced by and large, by every other major industrialized country on the planet, it could take off some of the edge. IMO a system which is set up to generate huge profits off the backs of sick and unhealthy people is pure evil and incentivizes corporations to produce and market products and services that run contrary to healthy lifestyles. Make money while making people unhealthy, then make more money treating their poor health!
That’s why I kinda like Bernie’s approach. Put the socialism bogeyman out there early and prominently. Let the opposition focus all their attention on scare tactics, while you patiently explain why this so called socialism is not necessarily a bad thing. Once you’ve got that out of the way, you’ve basically taken all of the wind out of the oppositions sails.
Elizabeth Warren’s campaign, with her Accountable Capitalism mantra, runs the risk of being labelled as socialism in disguise.
The main thrust of the Dem campaign should be that it is pretty much agreed that, “the U.S. spends nearly twice as much on health care as other high-income countries, yet has poorer population health outcomes.”
As far as the much vaunted capitalism goes, a system that is concentrating more and more wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer people is not likley to produce good outcomes for the majority in the long term. Redistribution of wealth can happen through some sort of so called socialism or it will likely end in revolution.
Hello Island, I have spent the last 18 years as a health insurance agent/broker and feel Biden’s direction is the best for the United States and Democrats. Fix the ACA. It already has plenty of socialism with in it. I have little or no skin in the game anymore.
The ACA offers free coverage to individuals though Medicaid who make less than 18K per years if the state accepts 10% of the expense. Most of the red states refused to pay the 10% for pollical reasons(unbelievable). The Fed’s pay the 90%. Medicaid is a lower cost system than Medicare. For those individuals who make between 18K to 48K get financial assistance from the Fed’s for the purchase insurance coverage.
The Democrats have already spent to much energy fighting this healthcare battle with the Republicans. We don’t need a new fight. It’s going to be hard enough fight just to fix it. I would make Medicare available for purchase to compete with insurance companies to help control costs.
Medicare for all will not fix a lot of the problems either. Americans failure to take care of themselves. American abuse of anything that is free. American over expectations of convince to costs. The American diet.
Might be time to join the rest of the First World, have an increased life span, lower infant mortality rate, and do it for half the cost.
It called “government single payer insurance”, everyone gets it, cheaper, and you get to live longer.
(the people who have it currently in the US are over 65– they compare favorably with their comrades in the rest of the world)
Single payer would help eliminate lack of coverage, but it wouldn’t eliminate poverty, obesity, smoking, substance abuse, depression, etc.
And single payer would be harmful if it’s used as a simplistic way to reduce costs. The US needs dramatically more publicly funded medical research.
US drug companies fund most of their R&D internally, as far as I know. The profits from US sales pay for that R&D. The rest of the world gets a free ride. It’s analogous to the free ride that many countries get from the US military umbrella.
Forcing US prices down to the levels charged to the rest of the world seems to be precisely analogous to the fairy tale of killing the golden goose, searching for that golden egg.
That doesn’t mean I approve of the current system. Right now medical research in the US totals around $165B, and about 65% of that comes from private drug companies. US R&D is just under 50% of the total for world R&D, and it’s likely that much of the R&D in the rest of the world is funded by selling in the US at US drug prices.
I’d greatly prefer that the NIH dramatically expand it’s R&D budget (which currently is around $32B), and if (and only if) that happens, I’d be happy to see private drug companies reined in. And, if there were a way to reduce US drug prices and raise drug prices in other countries, that would be great. But blindly reducing US drug prices alone, while making no provision for expanded federal R&D, seems misguided. So far, I haven’t heard *anything* about expanding federal R&D from the people who are proposing US price controls. Until that’s part of the package, it seems like a bad idea.
I’m a little surprised Booker and Castro haven’t done better too. There is still a chance for them but time is running out. I agree a socialism message could be the biggest stumbling block to victory.
What a bunch of crap. If 2016 was about “serial sex abusers”, Trump wouldn’t have gotten one vote. 2016 was about misogyny and racisms. OFM, your not fooling anyone here but yourself. Let it go.
“The people of the country wanted CHANGE” is your excuse for voting for Trump fascism doesn’t carry water with me.
2.9 million more “people of the country” voted for HRC than Trump.
STUDY BOLSTERS CASE — CLIMATE CHANGE IS DRIVING MANY CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES
“Against a backdrop of long-term rises in temperature in recent decades, California has seen ever higher spikes in seasonal wildfires, and, in the last two years, a string of disastrous, record-setting blazes. This has led scientists, politicians and media to ponder: what role might warming climate be playing here? A new study combs through the many factors that can promote wildfire, and concludes that in many, though not all, cases, warming climate is the decisive driver. The study finds that the huge summer forest fires that have raked the North Coast and Sierra Nevada regions recently have a strong connection to arid ground conditions brought on by increasing heat. It suggests that wildfires could grow exponentially in the next 40 years, as temperatures continue to rise.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-bolsters-case-climate-california-wildfires.html
The study finds that the huge summer forest fires that have raked the North Coast and Sierra Nevada regions recently have a strong connection to arid ground conditions brought on by increasing heat.
Raked you say?! That’s the solution, you have rake the leaves in the forest and take them to a landfill!
https://wildfiretoday.com/2019/07/09/president-trump-you-dont-have-to-have-any-forest-fires/
President Trump: “You don’t have to have any forest fires”
“You can’t have dirty floors. You can’t have 20 years of leaves and fallen trees.”
“And you don’t have to have any forest fires.”
“I spoke to certain countries, and they said, “Sir, we’re a forest nation.” I never thought of a country — well-known countries: “We’re a forest nation.” I never heard of the term “forest nation.” They live in forests and they don’t have problems. One was telling me that his trees are much more susceptible to fire than what they have in California, but they don’t have fires because they manage, they clean, they do what you have to do. There’s not so much to burn. And we’re going to start doing that. And it’s called, remember, “management.” It’s called “forest management.” So it’s a very important term.”
Methinks the closest President Trump has been to a forest is a golf course. Then again, maybe he thinks a golf course IS a forest?
And the closest he has come to reading a book- almost got through a whole readers digest when he was 12 yrs old.
[unless of course playboy or comic books count]
Well, he wouldn’t need to actually read Playboy.
I think he prefers being spanked with them after they are rolled up…
With some serious dedication and out of the box methods I really think the frequency and severity of these forest fires in the semi arid southwest could be improved substantially while also significantly improving the biodiversity and ecosystem function as a whole. The goal would be to manage these lands in a way to mimic the natural system that was in play for hundreds of thousands of years during the Pleistocene right up to 12,000 years ago when this part of the planet was maintained as a Savannah by the massive mega mammal browsers and the vast herds of grazers and the pack hunting predators.
First step would be to harvest a significant amount of logs and chip up the leaves and branches for mulch so enough sunlight can reach the ground for grasses and forbs to grow.
Then introduce herds of domestic camels goats sheep cattle etc and manage their grazing to keep the brush and trees in check and to stimulate the grasses and forbs to cover the soil to create and maintain a vibrant savanna which produces so much more food and shelter for all kinds of insects birds reptiles and mammals compared to a mature forest.
Fires will still happen but in this case the amount of dry fuel is far less and so the fire can be so much easier to manage. And once the rains return the grasses are still there and ready to grow whereas the dead trees will take a long time to regrow. This would produce lots of clean and healthy animal food for all us humans at the top of the food chain and who knows, maybe with more humans out on the land managing and learning from nature would do us a lot of good.
One of the problems with forest management has been the suppression of small fires that clean out the spaces between trees while not harming the trees. There seems to be a swing away from that kind of management but will it keep up with the increase of dead trees due to beetle infestation?
NAOM
My pet theory is that termites would do the job just fine. But forest fires kill termites, thus causing more forest fires.
Thanks for the thoughts farmlad.
But I don’t think you’ve been to the semi arid southwest [west Texas to southern Calif].
Or perhaps you simply didn’t notice that just about all land suitable for grazing type activity is already being used for such.The same applies to the similar zones of the Great Basin.
These are the places that ranchers first grabbed from the native Americans and set up shop.
Along with huge tracts of adjacent marginal grazing lands that are primarily held by the BLM and leased to the ranchers.
Drier zones we call desert, and they don’t have all that much fuel to burn, or grass/forbs to eat.
High elevation islands do have dry forests, and many of these are grazed already. Many people say over grazed, since the vegetation has been heavily damaged and soil eroded over the last 150 years. Many of these locations are considered logging lands already.
Cougars eat your sheep.
Grazers don’t eat chaparral too well. Not like alfalfa.
Cattleman and shepherds don’t like “the pack hunting predators ” in your vision.
Your plan is suited to a different climate zone. Places where the woodlands gradually fade to grassland. Like Iowa. Eastern Oklahoma. Central Missouri. Western Kentucky. These areas are wetter. Been there?
Much of the American West is a desert thanks to poor land management. You can tell land management is bad by the frequency of flash floods. They are rampant in the American West, and viewed as acts of some god. In fact they are the consequence of human stupidity.
Las Vegas, for example, is often said to be a desert, and imports huge amounts of water. In fact plenty of rain falls there, more than enough for local needs, but they are too stupid to make use of it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jomMfAD1ErQ
Instead, like all American “desert” cities, they have huge aquaducts designed to carry the entire local water resource to the ocean as quickly as possible.
America’s fundamental problem is that it doesn’t seem to be able to learn from its mistakes. Early 20th century land management ideas were obviously wrong headed, but a change in policy would have fixed them.
Fred —
THIRTY YEARS OF UNIQUE DATA REVEAL WHAT’S REALLY KILLING CORAL REEFS
“A study published in the international journal Marine Biology, reveals what’s really killing coral reefs. With 30 years of unique data from Looe Key Reef in the lower Florida Keys, researchers from Florida Atlantic University’s Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute and collaborators have discovered that the problem of coral bleaching is not just due to a warming planet, but also a planet that is simultaneously being enriched with reactive nitrogen from multiple sources.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-years-unique-reveal-coral-reefs.html
Yes that is the same driver that is increasing algal blooms world wide.
Nitrogen loading to the coast is predicted to increase by 19 percent globally simply as a result of changes in rainfall due to climate change, which suggests the need for urgent management actions to prevent further degradation.
No one is managing any of that and with Trump’s coup d’etat placing his crony Andrew Wheeler to head the EPA you can bet that it won’t happen anytime soon.
This past spring and early summer have been among the rainiest I can remember in South Florida since I moved here a quarter century ago. Can you imagine what is in the water running into the Gulf from the Mississippi after Barry? How about what flowed out of all those flooded hog and chicken farms after Florence last year… add to that what happens on a daily basis around the world from just your run of the mill agricultural runoff!
https://www.govtech.com/em/disaster/Florence-Drowns-5500-Pigs-and-34-Million-Chickens-The-Numbers-are-Expected-to-Rise.html
Florence Drowns 5,500 Pigs and 3.4 Million Chickens. The Numbers Are Expected to Rise
Meanwhile, the number of hog waste lagoons in North Carolina that are damaged or overflowing continues to increase.
For Doug and any of the other regulars who are interested in astronomy and physics:
https://www.pnas.org/content/116/13/5961
Sometime back we had an ongoing discussion of the possible consequences of a truly major solar storm, such as wiping out computers satellites.
The most important part of this discussion, from my point of view, was that we didn’t have any way of knowing how often such events might occur. The instrumental record, actual or defacto, goes back less than two hundred years, because prior to that, there weren’t any telegraph lines or other significant electrical infrastructure that could have been damaged, and the effects of such storms on the biosphere are apparently minor and hard to detect, especially if the storm occurred a long time ago.
Now, according to this research, we know that at least a couple, maybe three or more, solar super storms have hit us within the last few thousand years.
It is my understanding that such super storms WOULD wipe out a big chunk and maybe most of our modern communication infrastructure, and maybe countless computers, such as the ones used in cars and trucks as well.
This is still not enough of a baseline to come up with good predictions about the frequency of such storms, but it’s enough that we now the odds of another one hitting within the next few decades are way to high to be ignored.
From the link:
Significance
This study provides evidence of an enormous solar storm around 2,610 B.P. It is only the third such event reliably documented and is comparable with the strongest event detected at AD 774/775. The event of 2,610 years B.P. stands out because of its particular signature in the radionuclide data [i.e., carbon-14 (14C) data alone does not allow for an unequivocal detection of the event]. It illustrates that present efforts to find such events based solely on 14C data likely lead to an underestimated number of such potentially devastating events for our society. In addition to 14C data, high-resolution records of beryllium-10 and chlorine-36 are crucial for reliable estimates of the occurrence rate and the properties of past solar proton events.
Abstract
Recently, it has been confirmed that extreme solar proton events can lead to significantly increased atmospheric production rates of cosmogenic radionuclides. Evidence of such events is recorded in annually resolved natural archives, such as tree rings [carbon-14 (14C)] and ice cores [beryllium-10 (10Be), chlorine-36 (36Cl)]. Here, we show evidence for an extreme solar event around 2,610 years B.P. (∼660 BC) based on high-resolution 10Be data from two Greenland ice cores. Our conclusions are supported by modeled 14C production rates for the same period. Using existing 36Cl ice core data in conjunction with 10Be, we further show that this solar event was characterized by a very hard energy spectrum. These results indicate that the 2,610-years B.P. event was an order of magnitude stronger than any solar event recorded during the instrumental period and comparable with the solar proton event of AD 774/775, the largest solar event known to date. The results illustrate the importance of multiple ice core radionuclide measurements for the reliable identification of short-term production rate increases and the assessment of their origins.
xxxx
There’s quite a bit more if those who know enough physics to appreciate it want to read it. It’s mostly over my head.
I’m wondering if astronomers might be able to detect such storms on nearby stars similar to our own sun now or perhaps sometime within the near future. If so, it would be possible to develop a good statistical model of their frequency.
OFM,
I recommend you read SOLAR EXTREME EVENTS by Hugh Hudson. Hugh is located at the Space Sciences Laboratory of the University of California (No math to speak of).
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/632/1/012058/pdf
Extreme solar events are a bit like super-volcano’s in that they occur on time scales that make then (seem) irrelevant to the great majority of humans. Hell, look at all the people who live on the side of volcanoes (or along hurricane tracks). I’m guilty as well, living in the bush therefore at risk from wildfires, a far greater threat than giant solar storms.
Finally, let me remind you, I’m not especially well informed about astronomy topics, in general. My bag is neutron stars, and especially in finding solutions to the various equations-of-state associated with these fascinating objects — a challenge I’ve been addicted to since 1967.
Cheers,
Thanks for the link.
Headline- ‘Whole-tree harvesting could boost biomass production’
Brilliant.
More biomass than just taking part of tree.
What does nature need with tree parts anyway?
I won’t share the link.
As many know on this Blog Know – Renewables (excluding wind) are only feasible on a local level. but here is a centralized exception that attracts Capital:
“An exception is NextEra Energy (NEE), the world’s biggest producer of wind and solar energy. They’re the largest component of the SPDR Utilities ETF (XLU). On a list of countries ranked by wind power generation, they would be 8th. Just as the Shale Revolution has created ample opportunities to invest capital for growth, so has the burgeoning renewables business in the U.S., albeit with a wholly different response from investors.”
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4275042-nextera-running-place?app=1
Anybody who believes or says that solar power is only viable as a local option is so WRONG that I’m forced to conclude that he has a near zero knowledge of the current day state of the solar power industry….. or else that he’s a troll of one sort or another.
Of course the word local is subject to various interpretations. Right now, using our existing grid, it’s considered practical and economic to deliver wind and solar solar juice up to maybe four or five hundred miles.
Eventually we will have more HVDC transmission lines, and then it will be practical and economic to deliver solar juice up to a thousand miles, maybe even two or three thousand miles, or even farther.
But it’s true that HVDC is not yet in widespread use, and it’s going to be a while before enough HVDC lines are built to take full advantage of the wind and solar resource in places such as the USA.
Ten or twenty years from now, I expect that East Coast cities will be getting a substantial part of their electricity in the late afternoon from wind and solar farms in the heartland, and that likewise West Coast cities will be getting a hell of a lot of their morning and midday juice from these same heartland wind and solar farms.
It also seems likely to me that anytime rain and snow are scarce, any hydro generation will be curtailed so as to use the reservoirs as defacto batteries to the extent possible, thus maximizing the utilization of wind and solar power and reducing the need for storage capacity. A full reservoir hydro plant can produce power at full capacity for several hours, depending on the size of the reservoir.
This does seriously complicate the downstream water flow situation, resulting in various recreational and fisheries problems and such, but it seems to me it will be one of the better options available, compared to just running fossil fuel plants.
The article makes a big deal out of wind and solar infrastructure depreciating as new technology lowers the cost of ACTUAL NEW PHYSICAL COMPONENTS, but it totally glosses over the fact that as time passes, the cost of acquiring sites, getting tied into the grid, getting all the necessary permits, all the necessary construction work, etc, will inevitably rise…… and that upgrading a wind or solar farm ten years or longer down the road will be a PIECE OF CAKE, compared to building new from scratch.
Bringing in a crew to take down old panels and install new ones might take a week or two, without even taking a solar farm off line. The old panels will still have good residual value in the used market.
Setting up a crane to r and r a wind turbine assembly on an existing tower will cost probably no more than ten or maybe twenty percent of the cost of building that one turbine and installing it FROM SCRATCH.
Personally I believe his arguments make about as much sense as the arguments a truck salesman makes when he’s trying to get you to trade in your five or ten year old truck for a new one that will cost you five times as much as refurbishing your old one to like new performance and reliability.
If you have ONLY ONE truck, maybe it’s a good move…. but if you have dozens, or hundreds, you can just use another one if any particular truck is in the shop.
At the same time, the author has NICE things to say about pipelines, etc, because oil and gas production is rising…….. without mentioning that production always eventually falls off, and may leave the owners of a pipeline holding a stranded asset.
The price of oil and gas might even fall off to the point that producers can’t pay the USUAL shipping charges, and the pipeline owner may be forced to negotiate lower rates. Nobody can say for sure how fast the electrical energy storage industry will grow, but if vehicle to grid ever takes off, the glory days of the oil and gas industry will be history.
It’s so rare to run across any actual honest and BALANCED coverage of ANYTHING these days that I can’t remember it happening except at long intervals.
PV is indeed bad news for the fossil industry due to profit killing zero marginal cost, Since PV is a Truly Distributed Energy Resource “DER” the current one way grid must be depreciated. Utilities are not preparing for Distributed Energy Resources in any real way, so the RE Industry is now considering the Utility just another source. As of 2017 NEC It’s now Code. Microgrids are defined in 705.2 as “a premises wiring system that has generation, energy storage, and load(s), or any combination thereof, that includes the ability to disconnect from and parallel with the primary source.”
In Front of the Meter PV is Great for the Utility, Not so for the Customer. The “Return of Capital Invested” Business Model of IOU’s (Investor Owned Utilities) makes no economic sense in a world of Distributed PV. Any Future “Grid” will need to be pure distribution, not a sunk cost dying complex interdependent fragile mesh. LCOE kWh for our Residential Behind the Meter customers is less than a Nickel/kWh @$2.80 watt Turnkey. Install cost is falling rapidly. Future Utility kWh is unknown but models come out 2-5x over onsite PV. Below 40 degrees Latitude there are too many advantages to PV over a hot roof. There’s also a fast growing 3rd Segment, Direct Power PV Islands not over a Dwelling. ie Car Ports, EV Charging, Barns, Wood Sheds, etc that are not yet subject to many Code Requirements designed to escalate the cost of Grid-Interactive Distributed Resources.
islandboy, some food for thought!
VAST SUBSIDIES KEEPING THE FOSSIL FUEL INDUSTRY AFLOAT SHOULD BE PUT TO BETTER USE
“South Africa, the biggest carbon polluter on the African continent, used to be home to the world’s fastest growing renewable energy sector, but government intervention to protect polluting coal interests set back these advances. Under President Cyril Ramaphosa the government is now taking steps to allow small amounts of new renewable energy into the market. But government actions continue to slow the immense potential South Africa has for a low-cost, renewable energy revolution.
A recent study reported that South Africa subsidizes coal by R56,6 billion per year—propping up a polluting industry with taxpayer money. South Africa continues to subsidize coal despite studies showing that renewable energy was helping to prevent energy blackouts, was saving South Africa billions on energy and that a renewable energy future is the country’s lowest cost energy pathway.
On the other side of the Atlantic, a recent International Monetary Fund (IMF) study showed that the US, the world’s largest historic greenhouse gas emitter, gives ten times more to fossil fuel subsidies than it does to education. Without such subsidies half of future oil production in the US would be unprofitable.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-vast-subsidies-fossil-fuel-industry.html
“On the other side of the Atlantic, a recent International Monetary Fund (IMF) study showed that the US, the world’s largest historic greenhouse gas emitter, gives ten times more to fossil fuel subsidies than it does to education. Without such subsidies half of future oil production in the US would be unprofitable.”
https://grist.org/article/opec-head-climate-activists-are-the-greatest-threat-to-oil-industry/
OPEC head: Climate activists are the ‘greatest threat’ to oil industry
…It’s not just public opinion that’s turning against the fossil fuel industry — insurance companies and investors are increasingly opting to put their money elsewhere. But that’s not the fault of some upstart kids: It’s because science and common sense are showing fossil fuels are a bad investment, especially in the long run. Recent figures estimate that climate change could cost the world economy as much as $69 trillion by 2100.
Well, I dunno Fred, maybe its time to burn that little Greta Thunberg witch at the stake and send all her disruptive followers to Siberia.
Oh, Oh! But wait, it gets worse…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-16/fossil-fuels-are-far-less-efficient-than-previously-thought
Fossil Fuels Are Far Less Efficient Than Previously Thought
As oil, coal and gas get harder to extract, renewables are closing the gap.
Fossil fuels, long regarded for their high-energy return on investment, are not as efficient as once thought. In fact, their final yields are not much better than those of renewable options, according to a new study.
Oil, coal and natural gas have generally returned energy at a ratio of 25:1, meaning that for every barrel of oil used in production, 25 barrels have been made. But that measurement, called energy return on investment (EROI), has traditionally been taken when fossil fuels are removed from the ground, and fails to account for energy used during the refining process.
Well Duh Uh!
Any chance we could burn a few oil company execs at the stake in Greta’s place?! Maybe we could do it with a concentrating solar collector. Much more efficient and cleaner than putting their stake on a pile of burning coal.
The only question I have, are there any fossil fuel company execs in the world who are not sociopaths?!
Just pumping the stuff up 7000 feet, along with a lot of water, takes a large amount of energy. Then there is the transport.
So much about Greta Thunberg just validates my own feelings about millennials. Entitled, argumentative, no work ethics, need for constant praise. At my company we had a seminar discussing how the youth today have to have instant gratification and constant emotional validation to satisfy their emotional neediness. At her age I was already working and knew how to shut up and listen to people older than me.
At her age I was already working and knew how to shut up and listen to people older than me.
Technically Greta is not a millennial. She is only 16 and therefore she is a Post-Millennial. Post-Millennials: Born 1997-Present (0-21 years old)
At age 11, she became depressed and stopped talking. Later on she was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD), and selective mutism.[18] She added that selective mutism meant she was speaking only when she needed to and that “now is one of those moments”;
So it’s not like she was big on running her mouth for gratification, kind of the exact opposite…
Thunberg has received various prizes and awards for her activism. In March 2019, three deputies of the Norwegian parliament nominated Thunberg for the Nobel Peace Prize.[9] In May 2019, at the age of 16, she featured on the cover of Time magazine
So what exactly were some of your accomplishments at 16? Do you feel threatened by a 16 year old girl? As for your feelings about millennials sounds a lot like projections of your own feelings of inadequacy than anything else. Maybe you should go out and talk to some of Greta’s peers, who knows, you might even learn something.
Cheers!
She makes me want to vomit because of how much she reminds me of a young Hillary Clinton.
“It’s quite hilarious when the only thing people can do is mock you, or talk about your appearance or personality, as it means they have no argument or nothing else to say.” — Greta Thunberg
Apparently Bradley doesn’t like smart women.
Very threatening to him.
Small hands.
The following comes to mind when reading Mr Lento’s comment.
“It is better to keep silent and be thought a fool.” says Dr. Arthur Burns, “than to speak and remove all doubts.”
Almost tropical!
MOST NORTHERN TIP OF CANADIAN ARCTIC SHATTERS HEAT RECORD
Through pre-dawn Monday, the Alert weather station didn’t drop below 15°C, which was highly unusual for the region and likely an all-time warm minimum temperature record for the area. What’s more impressive is the station not only recorded one day above 20°C, but also a second one on Monday; consequently, this is the first time this climate station has recorded back-to-back days warmer than 20°C.
https://www.theweathernetwork.com/ca/news/article/most-northern-tip-of-canadian-arctic-alert-nunvaut-reaches-21-degrees
Moreover,
“The latest anomaly in what’s been a long, hot summer across the Arctic. Iqaluit, Nunavut, saw the mercury rise to 23.5 C on July 9 — the highest ever for that day. Alaska had its second-warmest June on record. Records have been falling — not by fractions, but by large margins. That’s what we’re seeing more often. It’s not just half a degree or a 10th of a millimetre. It’s like hitting a ball out of the ballpark. It is so different than what the previous record was. More is to come, models for the rest of the summer are saying. In Alert’s case, the source of the Arctic beach weather is a large current of air that somehow found its way north from the U.S. southeast. It could be related to changes in the jet stream. That current has slowed in recent years and has become more unstable, sometimes looping much farther north or south than normal. Many scientists believe the changes are at least partly the result of melting sea ice.”
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/07/16/news/mercury-tops-out-top-world-alert-nunavut-warmer-victoria?fbclid=IwAR2taKXX6JRDKPCZvY2XObO0Oefd1307R1FJIDbCuJLuoSppZkhDj7ZRmlQ
July on course to be hottest month ever, say climate scientists
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jul/16/july-on-course-to-be-hottest-month-ever-say-climate-scientists
“Heatwaves are one of the deadliest natural hazards facing humanity and the threat they pose will only become more serious and more widespread as the climate crisis continues,” said Francesco Rocca, the president of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
Previous heatwaves have killed tens of thousands of people, including 2,500 in India in 2015 and 70,000 in Europe in 2003, according to the Red Cross.
Yeah, just wait till crop failures start to become widespread world wide…
Those projections of 9 to 11 billion humans by the later part of this century are looking more and more unlikely!
Looks like temperature swings are getting wilder too.
https://www.worldweatheronline.com/lang/en-us/iqaluit-weather-averages/nunavut/ca.aspx
NAOM
PS
Looked at my local data, on that site, and it appears there is little change in the maximums but the minimums are rising – eek!
Another alarming article
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jul/02/alaska-heat-wildfires-climate-change
And on it goes. Ain’t science wonderful?
NEW HUBBLE CONSTANT MEASUREMENT ADDS TO MYSTERY OF UNIVERSE’S EXPANSION RATE
“As more research points to a discrepancy between predictions and observations, scientists are considering whether they may need to come up with a new model for the underlying physics of the universe in order to explain it.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-hubble-constant-mystery-universe-expansion.html
I’ve been arguing this for years. The Lamda-CDM model is very flawed. You have ~70% dark energy, ~27% dark matter and ~3% normal matter.
So in essence you have a model in which 97% is unknown.
In no other field of science would this stand as a model.
If the universe is hydrogen, and big bang then over time most hydrogen is consumed… white dwarfs are the black coal at end of time.. dark matter and rest is last 10% hydrogen in the universe…
So, assume a bell curve for hydrogen consumption over time. A 20B year old universe.. outter edge not longer lite… would permit 90% to remain of which 5% is not currently used in stars? Pure hydrogen white dwarfs are listed at 8B years old…so might work for a timeline.
Another big project with long HVDC transmission in the mix- [Iron Mike] this time from Australia.
“Sun Cable recently unveiled a plan to build a massive solar power plant in the Northern Territories. Costing $20 billion and covering 15,000 hectares, it will supply some power to Darwin and other NT cities but its most unusual feature will be a 3,800 kilometer undersea high voltage transmission cable that will supply power to Singapore.”
https://cleantechnica.com/2019/07/16/high-voltage-undersea-transmission-lines-green-hydrogen-could-make-australia-a-clean-energy-powerhouse/
Montana does thing big- water battery.
At Gordon Butte.
1$ Billion project.
1000 ft of head.
Funded and permitted.
https://gordonbuttepumpedstorage.com/project-overview/
Sometimes I think environmentalists, or at least people who want to THINK of themselves as environmentalists, are their own worst enemies.
In the real world, we simply HAVE to have electricity, lots of it, and we have to have it around the clock and around the calendar. This “have to have it” is a POLITICAL reality, rather than a technical and economic reality, but it’s reality just the same.
The real question is not whether wind and solar farms, or pumped hydro , disrupt the environment to some extent. Any idiot knows that virtually any industrial activity does some environmental harm. The question is what’s the best workable solution, what works technically, economically, and politically, to preserve and protect the environment as best we can.
There’s PLENTY of places all thru the many mountainous areas of the USA where pumped hydro plants could be built, and each and every such installation could serve as a giant defacto battery, enabling us to make far better use of any surplus wind and solar power, and to save a TON of money, over time, on the purchase of fuel for fossil fuel fired generation.
Unfortunately the people who are running the environmentalists show are as likely as not to oppose building pumped storage reservoirs.
I’m thinking that the way to get rural people, and working class people in general, behind pumped storage is to lay off the talk about pollution and climate, and emphasize the jobs and cash aspects of such installations.
We’ve all heard the old saying about the way to a man’s heart is thru his stomach.
The way to a working class voters support of renewable energy, electric cars, etc, is thru his wallet. We need to show him that renewable energy and electric cars are good for his bottom line. He has way to many immediate major problems just getting by from one day to the next, one week to the next, to worry about climate and pollution, which are things he considers as being entirely beyond his control if he even takes them seriously.
A dozen or so of my working class neighbors now have a Prius in their driveway, mostly older ones bought well used. They don’t give a damn about green house gases, or forced climate change, because they have OTHER IMMEDIATE problems on their minds, and or because they think climate change is a liberal hoax.
All they give a damn about is that the PRIUS reliably gets them to work and back home again cheaper than any other car they can buy.
It takes an idiot to think that a barely literate guy who doesn’t have money to get his kids’ teeth fixed is going to pay any attention to a high handed and condescending lecture about the environment, other than to take a second to flip the bird in the direction of the lecturer.
‘
Here you go OFM, a fairly simplistic ballpark type discourse on just how much pumped hydro would actually be needed for your real world ideas. “In the real world, we simply HAVE to have electricity, lots of it, and we have to have it around the clock and around the calendar.”
My own calculations came close to his, at least the ones concerning how many days of emergency power storage we would need to get through weather problems for wind and solar power. I had come up with eight days and the author came up with seven (though with a somewhat different set of requirements).
Have fun reading it and thinking about what it might take for that 24/7 world you want.
https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/11/pump-up-the-storage/
BTW: So what do we do? Redo the whole system every century or less? Assuming of course anyone cares at that point.
“All they give a damn about is that the PRIUS reliably gets them to work and back home again cheaper than any other car they can buy. ”
OFM, so now that you have insulted over 42 percent of the people, those who at least give a shit about something, where is your next target?
Interesting poll on environmentalist ID and how the new politics has torn a huge divide in the American public.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/190916/americans-identification-environmentalists-down.aspx
Hi GF,
I ‘m sorry you interpret my last comment, or any others, as a deliberate insult of the forty two percent you refer to, by which I presume you mean either the D party regulars, or the environmental camp, or some combination thereof.
My comments are intended as hard core sarcastic constructive criticism, in terms of real world politics and the art and science of getting things DONE, politically.
Now I’m not usually so BLUNT in telling people what I actually THINK, but if you think more than a small minority of the people of the USA, other than the very small number of people such as you yourself , will support any sort of political program that involves their giving up reliable and plentiful 24/7 electricity, then I must say that I think you are incredibly naive, politically.
Please note that I fully recognize that in technical terms, you are pretty much dead on in everything you say about the environment, our unsustainable economic system, etc etc, etc.
I disagree with you occasionally about some particular detail, or in our estimates of the relative importance of various particular facts and events, but I AM on your side, and on the side of the D’s and FOR the environment.
One of my dearest friends is my lifelong attorney,who is himself a lifelong Democrat, who has two fine daughters, now in their early middle years, both of them hard core Democrats/ liberals, both of them graduates of snooty private colleges, etc.
They make more money than I ever made on a REGULAR basis, by a mile, and they support all the usual environmental initiatives, and I expect to see one or both of them driving a Tesla3 next time they trade cars. But they will buy a Tesla primarily because it’s a super car for the money, rather than because it runs on electricity.
If the power goes off, and it can be blamed on anything to do with renewable energy, their Daddy tells me in no uncertain terms that they would vote for Trump if it stays off more than a day.
They love poor people……. at a distance. They buy organic food. They contribute to charity. But nothing they do lowers their standard of living noticeably. They are willing to buy green electricity….. but only so long as it doesn’t interfere with their budgets. They aren’t giving up Starbucks, or a new car every three or four years, or skiing in Colorado vacations, or any significant part of their lifestyle, in order to support green energy, or much of anything else.
THIS IS WHY WE MUST HAVE twenty four seven around the clock around the calendar electricity, and plenty of it.
Any politician who even HINTS at anything less is committing political suicide. This is why “our American way of life is non negotiable”, as somebody, Cheney if I remember correctly, put it. Any politician suggesting otherwise better have a new career lined up.
THIS is the reality I’m talking about. POLITICAL REALITY.
It’s POSSIBLE that the D’s can win back the Senate, and hold the House, and win the White House, without the votes of the sort of people who live paycheck to paycheck, if they’re still GETTING a paycheck, people who work but can’t afford a dentist, people who have LOTS of problems that are WAY more important to them than climate, etc. They live in fear that they won’t be able to earn enough to keep a roof over their heads, and take their KIDS to the dentist, and they are afraid to even THINK about retiring. POSSIBLE is not exactly the same thing as LIKELY.
Sure they are more often than not VERY poorly educated, and sure they don’t know where their own best interests lie, politically, when they vote for Trump.
BUT they do know enough to understand that the sort of jobs liberals /Democrats more typically hold, such as in the medical, educational, professional, government fields,major labor unions, etc, are not the sort that are easily exported, compared to the sort that THEY more typically hold, in factories or warehouses or driving trucks, in stores, etc.
They know when they are being mocked and made fun of, as some of the regulars here are prone to do, and they have a way of letting you know what they think of you and your culture, by flipping you the bird by way of voting Republican.
I posted a link a couple of days ago, a talk by Noam Chomsky. He’s pretty much trying to tell you the same thing I’M trying to tell you. The Democratic PARTY has sort of morphed into a Republican Lite party, except on social and cultural issues, and now takes working class people for granted. HRC couldn’t even be bothered to show up and campaign for the votes of these people, which is arguably the reason Trump is president today. Had she put half the effort into winning the working class vote in the the last three states that put Trump over the top that she put into her idiotic secret email system, and secret speeches to Wall Streeters, etc, she would almost dead sure be President today.
A lot of people voted for Trump because they were as contemptuous of HRC as she was of them. The single best one line explanation of WHY she lost I’ve ever heard is that ” I’m with her…. I guess. ”
Now you are absolutely free to read all this as an anti Democrat, anti liberal rant, if you please.
But I hope you will gain a little insight, in my own opinion at least, about some changes the D’s need to make in terms of their priorities, so as to WIN ELECTIONS.
The biggest single change, again in my opinion, is that they need to take the worries and concerns of the Trump hard core SERIOUSLY. They don’t have to kiss these voters asses, the way they do to position themselves as holier than thou in terms of pandering to some other voting blocks, but they DO need to do some things to win their affections and their votes.
Trump is extremely popular among the money crowd, and lots of working people who ARE working recently, because they believe his tax cut got the economy moving again. Whether this is TRUE or not is irrelevant, in terms of their votes.
Suppose the Democrats had proposed a similar change in the tax laws, in terms of the total revenues involved, but that hourly and low end salaried workers got the hogs share, and the rich folks got the crumbs?
THEY FAILED TO DO SO.
They hypocritically supported HRC and her serial abuser of a husband, and NOW they go around pissing and moaning about the opposite political camp doing the same thing for Trump?????? Believe me, the opposition camp believes that Bill C is a serial abuser of women, and anybody who is willing to take the word of a dozen or so scared broke women against the word of a super powerful individual believes it too.
Of course there IS this little thing called cognitive dissonance. We believe what we want to believe, don’t we?
If you can’t see WHY social conservatives, poor working white people, and seriously religious people LOATHE candidates such as HRC, you just can’t see at all, politically.
Let us pray to the Sky Daddy or Sky Mommy of our choice that THIS time the D’s nominate somebody who isn’t the LEAST likely of all their potential nominees to actually win. You don’t start out with a candidate who is held in contempt by close to half the country if you want to WIN.
I seldom have much to say for the R’s as a party, but one thing’s for sure. The R PARTY did all it could to KEEP Trump from getting the nomination, but failed to do so, for a very simple reason, the same reason the Democrats lost to Trump.
The R party got into the habit of taking it’s foot soldier voters for granted, and they rebelled by nominating Trump. Between them, the disillusioned people on the right, and the disillusioned people on the left put Trump in office.
OFM, just gently trying to remind you to practice what you preach.
Not sure what you hope to accomplish with your divisive language, but I guess that works in the political realm.
I am still slightly astounded that educated and literate people are so adamant about supporting a highly destructive and dysfunctional system.
We are IT. The best and worst this planet has produced. If we do not take up our responsibilities and act in the living world’s best interest, no one else will. Only actions and results matter.
“We are lost in the great darkness and there is no one to send out a search party”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSrL0BXsO40
True OFM.
For most its about cost primarily.
Secondarily about reliability.
Tenth about environment.
For example, landowners in Texas could become the biggest proponents of solar in the country, if they could make money on it.
They could, if the transmission of electricity from Texas heading north was enhanced.
Centralized PV Rob’s many of their future welfare, Poles rot and fall down, More energy wasted than used, Interest on unnecessary Investments, Tax your Sun, etc. However there is a case for Transmission of PV Power, High Density Cities, Industrial Processes or expanding the Solar Day/capacity factor via East/West transmission.
Despite many “experts” raving about the great efficiency of high density cities and towns, they are not. Cities and high density areas have a very large footprint well outside their boundaries. Cities supply little of what they need in energy and supplies. They are also extremely maintenance intensive.
From my perspective, high density cities are going to fade away. They are only supportable by an extensive dense agriculture at a distance, and a large network of mining, industry and transport.
Probably best not to invest any more than is absolutely necessary in cities and start the process of abandoning them further.
“From my perspective, high density cities are going to fade away.”
More like float away, based on hypsographic demography studies:
https://www.pnas.org/content/95/24/14009
“Altitude affects geophysical hazards for humans (1–3). The location of 11 of the world’s 15 cities with more than 10 million people (4) (Tokyo, New York, Bombay, Shanghai, Los Angeles, Calcutta, Buenos Aires, Seoul, Lagos, Osaka, and Rio de Janeiro) suggests that much of the population lives at low elevations near coastlines. These people and those in low-lying drainage basins could be directly affected by sea-level rise, storm surges, climatic changes in precipitation, and flooding.”
Here comes that sinking feeling
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nH6pWf2iRU8
Fred, impressive video snip.
Dolphin megapod spotted off California coast swimming alongside boat.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science_and_environment
WOW! For 25 minutes they raced alongside a power boat without burning any fossil fuels themselves…
One thing for people to note is that Dolphins swim underwater for several times the length of those jumps between jumps. There are a LOT more Dolphins than appear as a large portion of the pod is underwater at any one time.
NAOM
PS
Closer link
https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-canada-49023953/dolphin-megapod-spotted-off-california-coast-swimming-alongside-boat?intlink_from_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.com%2Fnews%2Fscience_and_environment&link_location=live-reporting-map
I did Dolphin Charters in Guam, mainly Japanese clients.
Free charter if no dolphin sightings (they knew the boat, and were there soon).
Spinners, and Bottle Nose — Spinners were the best.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spinner_dolphin
WHAT COUNTS FOR OUR CLIMATE:
“Available carbon budget estimates often neglect permafrost thawing and other slow Earth system feedbacks that could lead to further heating of the planet. This means that our wiggle room might be even smaller than we thought….
Choices today will determine whether we will have a decent chance of limiting warming to 1.5°C. If anything, the severity of expected climate impacts in a world heated beyond 1.5°C and our better understanding of the various factors that can affect the size of the remaining carbon budget calls for a precautionary approach with decisive climate action in the next five to ten years to limit the risks and keep options open, no matter which direction estimates of the remaining carbon budget might wobble.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-climate-carbon-untangled.html
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/this-article-won-t-change-your-mind?utm_source=pocket-newtab
The scientific establishment has a way of patting itself on the back sometimes, as if it has discovered something entirely new, something unheard of, something unimaginable.
“The theory of cognitive dissonance—the extreme discomfort of simultaneously holding two thoughts that are in conflict—was developed by the social psychologist Leon Festinger in the 1950s. In a famous study, Festinger and his colleagues embedded themselves with a doomsday prophet named Dorothy Martin and her cult of followers who believed that spacemen called the Guardians were coming to collect them in flying saucers, to save them from a coming flood. Needless to say, no spacemen (and no flood) ever came, but Martin just kept revising her predictions. Sure, the spacemen didn’t show up today, but they were sure to come tomorrow, and so on. The researchers watched with fascination as the believers kept on believing, despite all the evidence that they were wrong. ”
Dozens of classical writers knew all about cognitive dissonance long before and explored the subject thoroughly in their various works.
One of the very best such works is Twain’s PuddnHead Wilson.
Every body ought to read it.
Expert reaction to study looking at trees, carbon storage, and climate change – “It is time to stop suggesting there is a ‘nature-based solution’ to ongoing fossil fuel use. There isn’t. Sorry.”
https://desdemonadespair.net/2019/07/expert-reaction-to-study-looking-at-trees-carbon-storage-and-climate-change-it-is-time-to-stop-suggesting-there-is-a-nature-based-solution-to-ongoing-fossil-fuel.html
“There is a clear message from the analysis of Jean-Francois Bastin and his colleagues: there is the land available, nearly a billion hectares, for a massive global tree-planting initiative that should help avoid climate catastrophe, without encroachment on existing arable land. There is also a warning: this is a time-limited opportunity, since the scope for forest-based carbon removal is reduced in a warmer world. What is not made explicit is that very rapid reductions in greenhouse gas emissions must also occur at the same time. Whilst reforestation can undoubtedly assist in achieving net-zero, and subsequently net-negative emissions, it is potentially misleading for the authors to claim that “ecosystem restoration is the most effective solution at our disposal to mitigate climate change”. The most effective solution remains as before: ending emissions, through the worldwide phase-out of fossil fuels within a few decades. Unless that is also done, the newly-planted forests won’t survive for long enough to have the desired effect.”
That’s all fine and dandy! The only way to achieve the necessary emissions reductions quickly enough is to politely ask about 5 billion humans, all of the residents in the so called first world, and especially the 1% that constitutes the super rich sociopaths, to commit suicide starting today. So who is going to be the first volunteer?!
Since that won’t happen it will be up to these guys:
Side note, Google: Ebola becomes global emergency…
.
Not a problem– its a predicament.
(A problem has a solution)
I recommend you look up the definition of the word predicament.
predicament noun
pre·dic·a·ment | \ pri-ˈdi-kə-mənt , sense 1 is usually ˈpre-di-kə-\
Definition of predicament
1 : the character, status, or classification assigned by a predication
specifically : CATEGORY sense 1
Source Meriam Webster
That is what you meant, right?! 😉
BTW this is a snapshot of the state of our Nation as shown by the current top dictionary searches:
Merriam-Webster
✔
@MerriamWebster
?Tonight’s top searches, in order: racism, socialism, fascism, concentration camp, xenophobia, bigot
19.6K
10:15 PM – Jul 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
9,467 people are talking about this
Those that do not learn from history are often forced to repeat it!
And the lessons are much harder the second time around!
Are you one of dem dang envirunmentlists? 🙂
Retrofit Your Thinking: Nurture Nature’s Technologies
Is that a response to what I previously posted regarding scientists suggesting planting lots of trees to best help ‘fight climate change’?
Well, the reason why I emboldened the word, ‘fight’, is because it is not the same as ‘solve’ or similar and is therefore suggestive of a multipronged/holistic/natural response that should include getting off of fossil fuels lickety-split and powering down in general to levels of energy usage and pollution that the planet can more than handle– not just handle, but more than handle.
I seriously doubt– and have yet to be convinced otherwise– that ~8 billion of us getting on the alternative energy bandwagon will result in what the planet can handle.
I would also add not just native and locale-appropriate trees, but similar plants in general. Call it ‘technology’ if you want, but of a different approach than the ‘manmade kind.
Make the ‘birds and the bees’ (etc.) extra-happy.
https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Berkeley-becomes-first-U-S-city-to-ban-natural-14102242.php
Vancouver is banning NG in new construction also.
Market opportunity for H2O electrolysis hydrogen fireplaces and hobs.
Interesting!
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-10817-6
Simultaneous production of fresh water and electricity via multistage solar photovoltaic membrane distillation
Edit: The bad news is things like this probably allow more humans to survive… Therefore increasing overshoot and making the coming dieoff even worse. This is known as a dilemma!
This is known as a dilemma!
Alas, our story: efficient flint weapons –> small squabbles/over hunting; next, animal domestication –> more people/bigger squabbles/over grazing; next, small scale farming/even more people/regional malnutrition/epidemics become common/much bigger squabbles; next, modern massive farming/medicine/industry/global squabbles with fancy modern weapons –> global pollution/population overshoot –> a (very big) dilemma!
Seems like a trend. Been a great ride for some. Most humans are long dead.
All I can add is that the pulse width period of the carbon plume is longer than the pulse width period needed to activate numerous feedbacks. The global soap opera continues.
Case in point, the insanity continues at all levels!
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-17/feeding-10-billion-people-will-require-genetically-modified-food
Climate Changed
Feeding 10 Billion People Will Require Genetically Modified Food
The climate is changing, the population is growing, and unless food production practices evolve dramatically, it’s a hungry future ahead.
Like it or not, genetic modification is going to be an important tool to feed the planet’s growing population.
If we want to feed 10 billion people by 2050, in a world beset by rising temperatures and scarcer water supplies, we will need to dramatically change the way we produce food. Increased public investment in technologies like genetic engineering is a vital piece of that, according to a report published Wednesday by the World Resources Institute.
Not only must crops be more productive, but the agricultural challenges of climate change—including disease, pests and periods of both drought and flooding—mean they must be more resilient as well.
“We have to increase yields dramatically, at an even higher rate than we’ve done historically,” said Tim Searchinger, lead author of the report. “It’s got to be done by growing smarter.”
The Green Revolution of the 20th century boosted food production using many tools, some of which are no longer available to most of today’s farmers. Fertilizer use has largely been maxed out, Searchinger said, and available water is running dry. Now, researchers need to find new ways to “grow smarter,” including through the use of genetic modification.
I don’t have a problem with GMO technology! What I do have a problem with is the the idiotic notion that we should continue saying things like: We must do this or that to feed 10 billion people by 2050!
We need to get our collective heads out of our asses and stop pretending that we can or that we should even wish to achieve such a goal! I don’t care if it is a politically incorrect notion, we need to get 90% of the human population to stop reproducing right now. Oh, never mind, that falls under the category of dilemma… Cue, The Four Horsemen are galloping towards us in a massive cloud of dust… roll credits! The End!
Cheers!
You distress yourself brother. As sure as the Bible is the Word-of-God, be confident that He WILL provide. Your job is to Go Forth and Multiply.
Time to fire up that old fossil fueled “aircon” folks. Yeah, I know it’s just weather.
AS HEAT BAKES THE NATION, EXPERT OFFERS TIPS TO STAY SAFE
“Across two-thirds of the United States, over 115 million Americans live where some level of heat alert is already in effect, and 290 million will see temperatures soar past 90 degrees at some point in the next week. As a dome of high pressure settles over much of the eastern and mid-Atlantic states, the heat indexes (the real-feel temperatures) in many places will top 100 and approach 110 degrees or higher, according to the U.S. National Weather Service.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-nation-expert-safe.html
Methinks this could be a big deal. Perhaps not? Perhaps it’s just a dilemma!?
IN MAJOR THREAT TO DOLLAR’S RESERVE STATUS, RUSSIA OFFERS TO JOIN EUROPEAN SWIFT-BYPASS
“Three weeks after a meeting between the countries who singed the Iran nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which was ditched by US, French, British and German officials said the trade mechanism which was proposed last summer – designed to circumvent both SWIFT as well as US sanctions banning trade with Iran – called Instex, is now operational…
And while we await for the White House to threaten Europe with even greater tariffs unless it ends this special purpose vehicle – it already did once back in May when it warned that anyone associated with the SPV could be barred from the U.S. financial system if it goes into effect – a response from the US is now assured, because in the biggest attack on the dollar as a reserve currency to date, on Thursday, Russia signaled its willingness to join the controversial payments channel, and has called on Brussels to expand the new mechanism to cover oil exports.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-07-18/major-threat-dollars-reserve-status-russia-offers-join-european-swift-bypass
Authorities should prepare to seize trumps passport now. File the documents. NY state attorney general?
RE: Dollar reserve status – Rob Kirby talks about Dark Money in a debt-based Society –
What will be the result when People realize that the Public Sector/Government has no fiscal accountability?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jp3oOscPrE8
.
Oh, really?
“Committed” CO2 emissions jeopardize international climate goals – Existing, planned fossil fuel-burning infrastructure must be retired early, replaced – “Without such radical changes, we fear the aspirations of the Paris agreement are already at risk”
https://desdemonadespair.net/2019/07/committed-co2-emissions-jeopardize-international-climate-goals-existing-planned-fossil-fuel-burning-infrastructure-must-be-retired-early-replaced-with.html
Solar panel demand expected to reach 125.5 GW in 2019, TrendForce says
This got me thinking about the discussion further up regarding the need for aggressive growth in nuclear generating capacity against the background of the supposed inability of other low/zero emission capacity to scale. I looked back at the growth of solar PV generating capacity from 25 years ago (1994) and calculated the compound annual growth rate for new capacity (manufacturing capacity) from 1999 to 2018, arriving at a figure of 37.64%. The projected capacity growth for 2019 from the article above translates to a 24.5% increase in the cumulative installed capacity and a 19.8% increase in manufacturing capacity (supply of new modules).
I wondered what things would look like if I projected the growth rate in new supply forward ten years or so from the present with rate of increase slowing by 10% each year. The essential assumption is that there are no black swan events during this period, no recessions, no droughts or famines that drastically cut global food supplies, no wars and no natural disasters with a long term global impact. Another assumption is that despite the cost of solar PV falling below that of other sources growth will slow rather that accelerate. Both assumption are a little sketchy IMO.
I plugged the relevant numbers into my handy little spreadsheet and the result is the graph below, where manufacturing capacity gets to 446.9 GW by 2030 and cumulative installed capacity of 3,565 GW by the same date.
This is not by any means a prediction since historically PV manufacturing has grown in fits and starts where periods of rapid expansion are often followed by a year or two of little to no growth. I calculated how much electricity would be generated by 3,565 GW of solar PV using an average capacity factor of 20% (quite high for solar) and tried to figure out how much nuclear would have to be in place by that time to generate the same amount. Using a capacity factor of 95% for nuclear, I cam up with about 750 GW. That’s 751 one gigawatt reactors that would need to be built in the next eleven and a half years.Based on the current state of affairs with nukes, if there’s anybody who thinks there is any chance of that happening, I’d love to try some of whatever it is they are smoking!
Hi Island Boy,
I offer the following info regarding the comparison of output from these generating sources,
since I believe the analysis has a flaw.
For nuclear power you would calculate by taking nameplate capacity [1 GW] x capacity factor [typically 0.9 unless its a lemon] x time [365 x 24 to get hours]. That result will be your energy output for the year.
For solar, you would have two choices, one an actual measurement of solar input/m2 at your site, or use an approximation of a nearby recording site if there is one available. You would take panel capacity [say 3,030 panels x 330W/panel = 1GW] x panel efficiency [say 20% for a good brand that is new and clean surface]. If you put that in space above the atmosphere and earth shadow, you can multiply it by the number of hours in the year and be done.
But down here, you must diminish the theoretical output by the factors such as nighttime, clouds, and much of the daytime where the sun is not optimally oriented. Then you can get your generating output for the year to compare.
Ex- I live in a pretty good solar zone. I have a system of 20 x 330W new panels. Nameplate = 6.6kW
It was estimated that the system would produce 10,000 kWh/yr, based on data from a recording station about 12 miles away. The first year I did better than projected at almost 11,000 kWh. This June was poorer than last June- more foggy days, less by about 12% for that month.
So, it might take 20 GW PV to equal the output of 1GW nuclear, depending primarily on the annual insolation at your site. Nonetheless, PV at a sunny site is a much better price/kWh as things now stand.
You said, ” You would take panel capacity [say 3,030 panels x 330W/panel = 1GW] x panel efficiency [say 20% for a good brand that is new and clean surface].” That approach applies the efficiency twice since the efficiency is already factored into the panels nameplate capacity. The efficiency applies to the area covered by the panel such that if your 330W panel was 2m long by 1m wide (78.75″x39.37″), since the panel rating is given at standard test conditions (STC: 1000 W/m2, 25°C and Air Mass 1.5) the efficiency of your 330W panel would be 100 x 330 / 2000 = 16.5%.
The thing is that 1 GW of solar PV should generate close to nameplate capacity if the panels are at 25°C. There is a characteristic of PV modules called the temperature coefficient which will result in a typical panel losing 3% or more of it’s output per 10°C. Depending on your ambient temperatures the panels can operate at up to 40°C above STC which might reduce the output by 12% or more, meaning 1GW would typically generate 0.88 GW or less.
My approach of using capacity factor eliminates all these complexities since capacity factor is simply a measure of actual output compared to what the theoretical maximum would be based on the nameplate. So your example of your own system would generate 365 x 24×6.6=57,816 kWh if it could generate at nameplate capacity 24 hours a day. If you managed 11,000 kWh that would mean your system has a capacity factor of 100×11,000/57,816=19% , so my average of 20% might not be too far off.
While 1 GW certainly cannot generate electricity around the clock, the idea that much more than 5GW of solar PV would be needed to generate as much electricity as would be generated by the same nameplate capacity in nuclear capacity is very pessimistic! That would only be the case in locations not at all well suited to solar power, where capacity factors of less than 5% could be expected.
With all the high energy inputs to build, fuel, maintain and secure nuclear reactors the ratio is probably closer to 3 to 1 or less (nuclear nameplate to solar ) for equal output.
Considering all the other factors such as waste storage, maintenance and securityon into the future decades to who knows when, the reality could end up 1:1 or less. As serious failures crop up the long term energy from nuclear could go quite negative.
Of course the safety factor of nuclear is about zero over time.
If we want electricity, silicon based PV is the least harmful and safest of the sources. It makes the most sense since it can short circuit much of the extended industrial system, thus removing many severe problems, environmental harms and pollutions.
Well,
you don’t have to dive very deep into this issue to realize that the analysis has considerable complexity.
After looking at quite a few sources, you quickly learn to spot poor assumptions that people use, such a nuclear plant running 100% of the time, or solar output not being affected by panel tilt or clouds.
Here is one analysis that I think is worth sharing (from a solar proponent called EnergySage posted on a site called Earth911)-
“For solar to produce as much electricity as is generated by the 2,430 MW Vogtle nuclear plant it would require about 13,000 MW of utility-scale solar capacity, nearly four times as much as built in the above example. However, the cost to build that capacity would be $12.4 billion, which is still just 50 percent of the cost of the $25 billion Vogtle nuclear plant.”
So, 13 GW /2.43GW = 5.3
You would need 5.3 times as much PV nameplate Solar installed to equal the same nameplate Nuc annual energy production, assuming their solar output assumptions are correct.
More importantly, the 1/2 price electricity from solar vs Vogtle is the big news.
And, oh yeh, there is no meltdown/storage/terrorism issue, etc.
Not to mention, a 5-10 yr minimum installation time advantage to solar….
https://earth911.com/business-policy/solar-vs-nuclear-best-carbon-free-power/
Not to mention not needing a large, highly trained team to support it 24/7 and allow for weekend cover + vacations. Not to mention maintenance is somewhat cheaper. Not to mention no expensive fuel, for refueling, that needs complex and expensive production facilities. etc
NAOM
There are no perfect power systems. However if we stop using moronic economics, we may be able to make some reasonable and intelligent decisions rather than taking anything and everything that comes along.
30+ Billion and counting. Vogtle has made nothing but debt.
In an average year, one would expect to see a fairly equal number of record high and record low temperatures each month within the various countries of the world.
In the first 6 months of this year, the score is 69 to 0. [up through July 17th]
That is 69 record national monthly heat records were broken. For example, Hungary set its all-time record heat temperature for the month of Feb, and India set it s all-time record for heat for the month of June (as did Germany).
No country set all-time monthly cold record yet this year. Nada. Not even one.
69-0.
Getting hotter.
https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/June-2019-Earths-Hottest-June-Record?cm_ven=cat6-widget
No country set all-time monthly cold record yet this year. Nada. Not even one.
69-0.
Perhaps you mean no all-time monthly summer cold record yet for any year?!
Because down in Brazil where it is winter they set an all-time coldest ever recorded temperature this year….
https://electroverse.net/all-time-low-temperature-record-falls-in-brazil/
ALL-TIME LOW TEMPERATURE RECORD FALLS IN BRAZIL
JULY 9, 2019 CAP ALLON
The brutal cold-front infecting South America is beginning to take names. Urupema, a municipality in the state of Santa Catarina in southern Brazil, recorded it’s coldest ever temperature on the morning of July 07.
The mercury plunged to -9.2C (15.4F) at the Epagri-Ciram weather station, making it the lowest temperature ever recorded there, comfortably busting the -8.8C (16.2F) set on June 28, 2011.
It got so cold that one of Santa Catarina’s main tourist attractions, the Morro das Torres cascade, actually froze over:
Is that legit info Fred? The source website looks questionable.
If so, somehow the data didn’t make it to the database being used for the analysis.
Which I would consider to be bizarre.
I sent an email to the meteorologist Jeff Masters to get his verification.
I will report back on.
If the data was missed, we could have a shift in the score from 69-0
to 69-1!
I think it was reported by a number of reputable sites.
https://iowaclimate.org/2019/07/08/record-cold-in-brazil/
https://saojoaquimonline.com.br/climaterra/2019/07/07/com-9-2c-urupema-bate-recorde-de-frio-ja-registrado/
Com -9.2°C Urupema bate recorde de frio já registrado
Fred- if you look at the reference for that IowaClimate site, they say the info it cites comes from
IceAgeNow website! Not exactly a reputable site.
I don’t know about the local Brazilian sources.
I got a reply back from Jeff Masters-
[Meterologist, Co-founder of Weather Underground,
Part of The Weather Company, an IBM business]
“The data is legit, but the period of record (POR) of that station is just a few years, and it is also a semi-private agro station.
All official stations in southern Brazil with long PORs came in very far from any record during that cold snap.”
All official stations in southern Brazil with long PORs came in very far from any record during that cold snap.”
Fair enough! Having lived in Brazil for many years at different times and places, all I can tell you is that -9.2° C for Brazil is pretty darn unusually cold. I have also experienced -40° C in Canada 😉
I also know it is just local weather and doesn’t change the big picture in any appreciable way.
Cheers!
@both
Doesn’t change the 69-0 as that is for 1st 6 months and that cold one is for July. 😉
NAOM
You need to get off the Wunderground and read opinions from meteorologists who aren’t part of a communist militia terrorist group (for sure, read up on the history of Weather Underground). Joe Bastardi is one of the unbiased professional meteorologists I follow the most. He runs a company that makes 3-6 month predictions for paying customers representing local governments, investors, corporations, etc…so they can make strategic investment decisions as well as budget for disasters. He uses classical weather science that accounts for the ocean as the main driver of weather, along with polar forces that cool the planet. He has to be accurate because his income depends on his predictions. He constantly reevaluates his models and looks for overlooked factors if any of his predictions are slightly off.
Bastardi was one of the first to notice that temperatures at the earth’s equator remained the same as CO2 increased. This wasn’t suppose to happen as per the global warming models. The warm climate line just moved further north and south of the equator, but it is met by the cold polar forces that simply push back. Global warming envisioned by its advocates cannot happen as such because when the upper atmosphere, which touches space, starts to warm up space acts as a massive heat sink. Even if CO2 levels keep increasing it reaches a point that it will have little effect on temperatures because space is the heat sink that prevents the earth from overheating. So ultimately, global warming temperatures flatten out no matter how much CO2 is pumped into the atmosphere because terrestrial heat generation is no competitor to space.
Alex. “You need to get off the Wunderground and read opinions from meteorologists who aren’t part of a communist militia terrorist group (for sure, read up on the history of Weather Underground). ”
Thats funny. With that one statement, you discredited yourself for a period of 3 decades.
Come back when you have reformed yourself.
Adios=Ignore
Lol fuckin’ Millennials
Fred- evacuate?
“Right now, there are about 25 days a year that feel like they’re above 100 degrees in Florida, like the heatwave last month… scientists estimate there will be 105 of those 100 degree plus days a year in Florida in a few decades, around 2036 to 2065. By late century, that number could climb to 141 days.
Predictions for Miami-Dade County are worse. Instead of the statewide average of 25 days where it feels like 100 degrees, Miami-Dade already has 41 and by the middle of the century, that could be 134. That’s more than any other county in the state.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-florida-tops-states-climate.html
I would never know. I’ve spent the whole day in 72 degree temps in my house. Not Today Satan!
Refrigerated potatoes only last a couple of months at best
And when the refrigeration fails they only last a couple of hours at best…
Yeah, I know! Then there’s lethal wet bulb temperatures and rising sea levels…
June 2019: Earth’s Hottest June on Record
https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/June-2019-Earths-Hottest-June-Record?cm_ven=cat6-widget
(probably just liberal lies!)
Here’s a question in a survey I got after viewing this thread. I had to come back to post it because of the funny coincidence.
Looks like you didn’t retain much from your PeakOilBarrel visit
.
“We have not lost any drone in the Strait of Hormuz nor anywhere else. I am worried that USS Boxer has shot down their own UAS [Unmanned Aerial System] by mistake!”
-Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Twitter, referring to the recent incident.
Who knows? Both sides have trouble with reality.
Perhaps the Strait of Hormuz is just a mirage in the desert…
Yep-
As Mike Tyson reported:
“When I was in prison, I was wrapped up in all those deep books. That Tolstoy crap. People shouldn’t read that stuff.”
Representatives from Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) and the California Public Utilities Commission got an earful from angry residents on Thursday over a plan to charge customers almost $2 billion over the next three years. $ 2Billion not enough to even spray herbisides for easement maintenance.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-07-19/youre-all-serial-killers-outraged-californians-slam-2-billion-pge-rate-hikes-during
Nothing new to most readers here but article includes an interesting graph!
THE PLANETARY INSANITY OF ETERNAL ECONOMIC GROWTH
“”Earthrise” is one of the most influential photographs ever published. Taken on the Apollo 8 mission in late December 1968 by astronaut Bill Anders, it captures Earth’s uniqueness, isolation and modest scale: a blue and white dot on a vast sea of lifeless darkness. The revelation that strikes me is the insanity of pursuing eternal economic growth, not as an option but as the only possible path: there is literally no alternative to extracting ever greater quantities of the planet’s resources to enable ever greater consumption by the planet’s 7.7 billion humans. Stripped to its essence, this mad drive is about profit and power. The necessity is sold as the only path to prosperity for humanity, but it’s really about securing wealth and power for the few. A recent article in Scientific American magazine highlights how the idealistic impulses of protecting the planet’s diverse life from the machinery of “growth” are inevitably subsumed by the necessity for profit.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-07-20/planetary-insanity-eternal-economic-growth
Meanwhile, the wake-up call being ignored by (too) many!
US BRACING FOR EXTREME HEAT AS WEEKEND TEMPERATURES SOAR
The United States is bracing for a weekend of extremely hot weather, with major cities including New York and Washington expecting temperatures close to or exceeding 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius).
And, it isn’t just the US (beyond Alaska) of course —
ARCTIC SUMMER MELT SHOWS ICE IS DISAPPEARING FASTER THAN NORMAL
“This year’s heatwave in the Arctic Circle has led to record temperatures in areas of Alaska, Canada and Greenland, extending long-term trends of more ice disappearing. Ice flows are melting faster than average rates observed over the last.”
Yeah NSIDC said first half of July (fastest melt month) had 25% increase in melt rate from recent average (1981-2010).
Maybe this is interesting to the finance crowd? Maybe not?
WE’VE ARRIVED AT THE END OF THE ROAD
“Here we stand today with the national debt at over $22 trillion, total US debt outstanding of $70 trillion (shown on chart), and unfunded national liabilities of over $200 trillion. And, we add to this every year with an annual deficit now exceeding $1 trillion. This (gigantic) accretion of debt will never be repaid. And as the pile grows higher, the burden of servicing it — even at today’s historically low interest rates — is placing an increasingly heavy drag on economic growth… bla, bla, bla…”
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-07-20/weve-arrived-end-road
It’s capitalism, it runs on debt. 20 trillion GDP versus 70 billion total debt, not bad. Low on the worry scale. No need for real economic growth, billionaires can parasitize US and world for many years to come.
And as the pile grows higher, the burden of servicing it — even at today’s historically low interest rates — is placing an increasingly heavy drag on economic growth… bla, bla, bla…”
Finance is pure Fairy God Mother type fantasy! Just wave a digital magic wand and poof, money falls out of the sky like pixie dust.
Of course there are the hard realities of physics, chemistry and biology which follow the laws of nature. You can’t just recite some mumbo jumbo and wave those realities away at will!
Like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Y9j-fkv9HM
Nonlinear Tipping of Oceanic Carbon Cycle Driving Mass Extinctions: 1 of 2
As that kicks in no one will have to worry about those trillions of dollars in debt anymore!
Cheers!
Hi Fred, GF, and everybody who GETS IT, environmentally
Read this article and weep, if you have emotional energy enough remaining to do so.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/07/where-have-all-the-children-gone/594133/
There’s a hell of a lot of food for deep thought in it, and it’s well worth taking an hour or two to ponder the economic, cultural and political consequences of people with kids fleeing the cities.
But as scary as these thoughts may be, they’re NOTHING compared to THIS.
“Okay, you might be thinking, but so what? Happy singles are no tragedy. Childlessness is no sin. There is no ethical duty to marry and mate until one’s fertility has exceeded the replacement rate. What’s the matter with a childless city?
Let’s start with equity. It’s incoherent for Americans to talk about equality of opportunity in an economy where high-paying work is concentrated in places, such as San Francisco and Manhattan, where the median home value is at least six times the national average. Widespread economic growth will become ever more difficult in an age of winner-take-all cities.
But the economic consequences of the childless city go deeper. For example, the high cost of urban living may be discouraging some couples from having as many children as they’d prefer. That would mean American cities aren’t just expelling school-age children; they’re actively discouraging them from being born in the first place. In 2018, the U.S. fertility rate fell to its all-time low. Without sustained immigration, the U.S. could shrink for the first time since World World I. Underpopulation would be a profound economic problem—it’s associated with less dynamism and less productivity—and a fiscal catastrophe.
Read this again.
“The erosion of the working population would threaten one great reward of liberal societies, which is a tax-funded welfare and eldercare state to protect individuals from illness, age, and bad luck.”
Considering this is THE ATLANTIC, which is one of the very BEST mass circulation periodicals in the entire country, a publication that is pretty much across the board aligned with liberal policies and liberal politicians……. How in HELL can environmentalists ever hope to get the message across… the message being that we need fewer people, because we are already seriously overpopulated, even here in the USA, in respect to the carrying capacity of the environment?
I find the old folks argument compelling, and I’m personally dependent on my own old age welfare benefits, although I could get by without the SS check.I would be totally up shit creek without a paddle without Medicare, if I were to get seriously sick.
Likewise I would be in a hell of a fix looking after my old Daddy, without HIS SS check and Medicare benefits, etc.
But somehow or another, we are going to have to reorder our priorities, because if the welfare state priority is given substantially more consideration than the environmental priority, well THAT WAY lies a catastrophe that will make the collapse of the modern liberal welfare state look like a rained out picnic.
Somehow or another, we have to get the cost of looking after old farts like me under control, because sure as hell, working people aren’t going to be able to pay enough taxes to support the next couple of generations of retirees, given that every generation has fewer children than the last.
The first step would be to get the cost of health care under control, by adopting a system similar to the ones that prevail in Canada and Western Europe. Second step, get control of self inflicted health care problems, such as lung cancer, obesity, diabetes, and so forth. Sugared soft drinks should be taxed right out of the market place. Ditto cigarettes, which are now taxed high enough to discourage smoking, but not high enough to stop people from taking up the habit.
What else we might do is open to debate.
But whatever we do, we don’t really have anybody much in any positions of leadership, other than tenured professors, who can afford to tell it like it is.
Even the greenest of the new green Congress Critters and governors of states would be committing political suicide if they were to propose expanding environmental protections by way of cutting back on the welfare state, which is now part and parcel of virtually everybody’s overall economic reality, excepting the small minority of us who are actually rich. You have to be rather WELL off to pay your own way in your old age these days, if you live a few years beyond the age at which you ares still able to work and can FIND work.
Personally I expect to work quite a bit so long as I am physically able to do so. I’m not hard up, but I’m sure as hell not well off. At least half of all of my local acquaintances will HAVE to work as long as they can.
No surprise here! I had a computer graphics business in NYC, then my son was born and a year later I moved to a small town in Florida.
As for the Hungarian experiment mentioned, I doubt it will work long term. The human population at present numbers is not sustainable anywhere.
I think it is an unsolvable conundrum.
How do you downsize the population without a corresponding economic contraction?
Other than spot examples where you flood the scenario with expensive inputs and upgrade the economy, for example building a university where they once was none, it is not in the cards.
Your idea about cheaper healthcare would be useful, but would not change the trend.
The biggest single change I can think of, that would allow some downsizing without economic contraction, would be redistribution of wealth on a large scale.
For example, if you dropped the population by 10%, but added a higher amount of wealth (with the money spent wisely) into the system, the remaining 90% could possibly avoid economic contraction.
A large percentage of the wealth held by the richest 5000 is sequestered from the economy, with zero velocity of money. It is serving no useful purpose.
Redistribution of this sequestered wealth could help buck the trend for awhile, if it was achieved smartly.
But it would only be a temporary effect, and the chance of pulling it off is close to zero. OK, zero.
The probability of needing to downsize- 100%.
The only other mechanism to downsize without causing economic contraction is to somehow achieve a situation where elderly live shorter lives. For example, if the average life expectancy was 10 years less, the resources used by the elderly would be available to a younger age cohort.
In effect, this is just another type of wealth redistribution.
Very few volunteers. Even when they know it would directly and profoundly helping their younger family members.
My two cents.
One more point regarding the childless city discussed in that article- all over the country in these prosperous cities, many young people relocate to the surrounding suburbs to have children, if they can.
How do you downsize the population without a corresponding economic contraction?
Give women equal political and economic rights–
It has always worked in the past.
I like the notion.
You can slow the birthrate,
but the equation is unchanged.
Decrease the population = economic contraction.
It would slowly decrease the population.
Unfortunately ,we have neither the time, nor the political and social will to succeed.
If you are really interested:
https://resistanceradioprn.podbean.com/e/resistance-radio-dahr-jamail/
Life in the city.
Inside the great tick that looks so slick but not compared to the forest it replaced. The streams are all buried, the people are all worried, but not for no reason at all. Will the sirens sound the warning? But why? There is no escape.
Welcome to the Machine
So, so you think you can tell
Heaven from Hell
Blue skies from pain
Can you tell a green field
From a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?
Did they get you to trade
Your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange
A walk on part in a war
For a lead role in a cage?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lt-udg9zQSE
Poignant.
Even more so now than then.
It came out the same year I was introduced to Limits to Growth
in 9th grade science class.
And became more fully aware of Slavery, Holocaust, Peabody, Mai Lai, etc.
Decided right then.
No children.
Pink Floyd was formed in 1965.
Very interesting, but they were with a very large and talented group.
It is getting very far far away, and the bland culture of the present is far from interesting. Not that there are not very talented people around, it just one has to do a bit of searching.
Waters is truly a find.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9bx5h0FpCg
NAOM
Nissan is building a cheap electric pickup truck suitable for most of the work people do with compact pickup trucks, in China, starting now, or very soon.
I’m still wondering how long it will take some manufacturer, or another, to start building a BASIC electric car, one without a few thousand dollars worth of bells and whistles and fancy paint and so forth. I guess anybody who can afford a new car these days can afford the extras.
But there are thousands of BUSINESS owners who should be in the market for a basic electric pickup priced to sell.
Maybe Nissan will build some of these in the USA before too much longer.
Any PU Truck must have easily upgradeable or swappable for 50-150%% of the Base Pak,
The Model 3 Pak Form Factor would do nicely. Something like LWH 1500x300x90 mm.
Need to be able to swap or add 100kWh on the Fly. 100kWh = ~12 Liters of Diesel. 3rd Party Paks are also a must or it’s just a Joke. Jeff B or Elon M – R U Listening?
Need to be able to swap or add 100kWh on the Fly. 100kWh = ~12 Liters of Diesel. 3rd Party Paks are also a must or it’s just a Joke.
Why?
I think it is more likely there are going to be lots of megachargers at truck stops instead.
https://insideevs.com/news/341571/tesla-semi-juices-up-from-5-superchargers-at-same-time-video/
Tesla Megachargers are expected to be up to 2 MW power electronic monsters, because it needs to replenish 400 miles (640 km) of range (or 80% of the 500-mile version) in 30 minutes.
Not to worry. Looks like fossil fuels will burn for decades to come. Plenty of time for PU trucks to evolve.
Many pickups are driven less than 100 miles per day (at least here in Toronto). Urban contractors are easily able to work within the constraints of a 150-200 mile battery pack. It would be interesting to know the divide between urban and rural work truck owners… my guess is that there are more urban trucks.
In my locale, it’s not the work week that contractors need a suitably long truck range for, it’s the weekend, when they hitch up their collection of large and expensive toys and head out for some recreation.
Since I rideshare a lot now, I am down to about 40 miles a week on my personal vehicle.
Needs vary. Around here a contractor pickup or van can travel over 30 miles just to do an estimate on a job.
All the rain the past few years has really put a crimp in outside jobs for contractors. Weather has an effect on how much fuel is used and when. Looks we might get a rare three days in a row without rain.
As I have opined here before, Ford has no interest in or intent on keeping their work on an all electric F-150 secret:
All-Electric F-150 Prototype: Tows 1M+ Pounds | F-150 | Ford
I tell ya, they’re getting scared!
Saudi Arabia releases Iranian oil tanker, all crew members
https://en.mehrnews.com/news/147859/Saudi-Arabia-releases-Iranian-oil-tanker-all-crew-members
(something is up– Iran seems to be making a point, possibly)
Trump likely wants some kind of useless sit down with the Ayatollah’s, similar to the previous episode with “Rocket Man”. Iranian leadership has likely figured out Trump doesn’t have the minerals for mindless slaughter, and they’re calling his bluff.
If things get Homeric I suspect the Iranian response will be an asymmetrical strategy which aims to break Israel’s strategic Lines of Control on oil imports – the tanker lines to Ashkelon, from Ceyhan Turkey and from Yanbu/Jeddah in KSA, as well as closing the Strait of Hormuz of course. They’ve have a rather nasty special forces capability.
Yep, asymmetrical is the key.
All available forms of fuel except fusion cost more over time so currency must debased to pay for it
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/solar-energy-provides-another-cautionary-203100773.html
NOWHERE in this article does it say that the solar industry is growing by leaps and bounds, lol. Joe and Suzy will read it, if they read it at all, as more proof that renewable energy is another libtard power grab.
Read the comments and cry. Eighty percent repeat long since disproven anti renewable arguments.
Simple quiz for Joe and Suzy-
Your state has 1 $billion (of future rate payer money) to spend on new electricity generation.
The most energy over 30 years can be obtained by spending it on Nuclear, Coal, or Solar?
[lets assume you live in the southern 2/3rds of the country to make it clear, and fuel and maintenance cost will have to come from that original money]
Hi Hickory,
WELL SAID!
You have expressed my one of my key points using exactly the right words. No politics involved, no religion, excepting maybe the hip pocket / wallet religion, and nothing about environmental problems, real or imagined, which can be twisted to turn Joe and Suzy against renewable energy.
Follow up with the remark that they generally only use the Joe’s four by four F250 f when they NEED it, because it burns a lot of gas, compared to Suzy’s Impala, so they mostly use the Impala when they aren’t hauling the boat or building materials or firewood or whatever.
Yep, the truck is needed SOMETIMES, and their own best solution is to own both the truck and the car.
Fossil fuel backup generating capacity is needed at night and sometimes during the day, but the COMBINATION of solar plus fossil fuel generation is the CHEAPEST way to go, or soon will be , considering that fossil fuels inevitably must eventually come up short, and get to be very expensive, where as the price of solar juice is getting cheaper every year, and once the solar farm is built….. it’s just about the next thing to FREE, because the price of sunshine is ALWAYS going to be free….. unless maybe them there libtard athis’ whale huggin Dimmerrats figger out a way to charge ya for the sunshine. Wouldn’t go so far as to put it
past’em ya know.
And just in case old Joe has one a them 409’s like the Beach Boys used to sing about, with two fourbarrels an a four speed, and all that, in the garage, which he only drives once in a long while on Sunday afternoon, on account of it’s worth up pas’ a ah hunnert thousand now, being it’s ‘rigin’l, he could sell it for enough to buy TWO brand new Tesla Threes that burn no gas at all, never need an oil change, never need antifreeze, never gonna need a transmission job… that will outrun his four oh nine without even burning any rubber, on the drag strip or top end either one.
If Joe and Suzy happen to be a little better informed than the average, you can also point out that every ton of coal or liter of gas saved by using solar juice is one less sold, and that means downward pressure on the price of coal and gas used for all other purposes, due to a more plentiful supply. This in turn means machinery made out of steel is cheaper, and fertilizer is cheaper, and therefore GROCERIES are cheaper.
I work on the ones into fishing by talking about clean water. The ones that have cancer, I talk about no more hospital bills that put them in the poor house. Women, you talk about respect and equal work for equal pay.
You can talk about school lunches with a redneck Jesus freak, if he’s a REAL Christian, Jesus doesn’t want little kids to go hungry.
You just have to take your time and approach these people respectfully and give them time to adjust to new realities. Nobody wants to admit he’s been wrong about anything important. Bring it on slow, but keep it coming, a little at a time.
You can point out that every Tesla, every Leaf, and every Bolt on the road means more gasoline available for the F250 and the Impala. Joe and Suzy generally understand such things so long as you take time to point out that the good trickle down effects take time to come about. The price of the corn Joe grows didn’t come down right away because he switched up from a one hundred to a two hundred horsepower tractor…. but he HAD to switch up, to stay competitive, because the OTHER farmers switched up, and grow it cheaper….. and so it SELLS cheaper. ( Two hundred horses mean a big tractor in the South , where farms are smaller than out west. )
Sensible. Here are a couple of quibbles:
No politics involved, no religion, excepting maybe the hip pocket / wallet religion, and nothing about environmental problems, real or imagined
Perception is important, but it’s important (at least in a forum like this) to stay clear on the reality: environmental problems are not imagined, and are not political except as created by FF propaganda and manipulation of government to defend their profits.
Fossil fuel backup generating capacity is needed at night and sometimes during the day
This is increasingly not the case: solar and battery storage is very quickly becoming the cheapest option for handling daily variation.
>> solar and battery storage is very quickly becoming the cheapest option for handling daily variation. <<
Daily, yes. Seasonal, no.
Absolutely.
There are multiple sensible solutions for seasonal variance, including DSM, overbuilding, long distance transmission, and “wind-gas”.
Of course, all of those are also useful for daily variance. But, batteries aren’t suited to seasonal variance, and wind-gas is much less useful for daily variance.
Hi Nick,
“Perception is important, but it’s important (at least in a forum like this) to stay clear on the reality: environmental problems are not imagined, and are not political except as created by FF propaganda and manipulation of government to defend their profits.”
I agree totally, you’re dead on, when participating in THIS forum, or when communicating with people who know at least the abc’s of high school level science, and are well enough off that they don’t feel THREATENED by a possible increase in the cost of their electricity, etc.
Talking to a typical poorly educated working class person about POTENTIAL problems that he MIGHT have to deal with years down the road is a not only a bad strategy.. It’s a HORRIBLE strategy. He has MAJOR problems that he must deal with on a daily basis, problems of the sort I strongly suspect you know NOTHING about, because you have to LIVE WITH these problems to appreciate them. I have lived them, growing up in an impoverished community, and I have retired back to the same community.
Start talking about climate and you are apt to lose him, or even worse, reinforce his suspicion or belief that you’re a goody good commie socialist gun grabbing tree hugging libtard out to run his life at his expense for reasons of your own.
If you want to win him over, you will keep the talk about his day to day problems, and the way that wind and solar power, in combination with fossil fuel power , and existing nukes of course, is the CHEAPEST way to provide his juice, and that as fossil fuels inevitably get to be more expensive, long term, the price of sun and wind will STAY at zero, assuming them there same commie soc’lish libtards don’t figure out a way to slap a tax on ’em.
Start talking about how we can get along WITHOUT fossil fuel electricity, and you have made a complete fool out of yourself, in his eyes. He KNOWS goddamn well that the wind don’t blow all the time and the sun don’t shine at night, and that there isn’t any way to build batteries big enough, or cheap enough, not now, and not for decades to come if ever…….. and he does not give a flying fuck at a rolling donut about thirty years down the road. He’s worried about his job and his kids and his parents TODAY, and how he’s going to get thru the coming weeks, months and the NEXT few years.
It’s all about NOW when you are dealing with spoiled children, and it’s all about NOW dealing with a working class man or woman…… because working class men and women have NO CHOICE but to stay focused on NOW.
Soldiers in the field don’t have time or energy to polish their boots. They’re too busy getting shot at and shooting back. Working class people are in an analogous situation….. they don’t have time or energy to worry about the future……except the near term future.
This is not to say they don’t WORRY about the long term….
But there are plenty of things with IMMEDIATE high priorities, meaning global warming, etc. will be down at the bottom of a LONG list of worries.From their pov, maybe it won’t happen at all, or maybe it won’t happen until after they are long dead, etc.
A man who is worried about feeding his family next week and next year has ZERO energy and patience for such ( as he sees it) drivel.
To expect otherwise, given that he knows less than nothing about the scientific aspects of the issue, is utterly naive.
Like everybody else, when he has no immediate expertise of his own on which to draw, he accepts the opinions and beliefs of people he knows and trusts, adopting them as his own. The people he looks up to, the people whose beliefs he emulates, are not environmentalists.
And if you insult him by insulting the beliefs of his family and community, he’s going to have nothing but contempt for you, and the straight finger for your ideas.
This is why I say it’s important to just stick to the day to day reality of his paycheck and his living expenses. He understands local jobs, local tax collections, and can comprehend the possibility, the PROBABILITY, that wind and solar power can LOWER his electricity bill,maybe not right away, but within a meaningful time frame…… if you don’t let politics, religion, political parties, etc, get in the way.
That all makes sense. I’ve just one quibble:
It’s not really about the long-term vs the day to day. Wind power and solar power are national and state issues, and won’t happen quickly and are not likely to have a dramatic effect on utility bills one way or the other when they do happen. Unless you’re talking about something that can be bought personally, like PV on the roof or an EV, it’s all abstract and longterm.
So…it’s really about being strategic about what you talk about, and what people are ready to hear. If someone has been convinced that EVs are a plot from the devil to take away their road-trip fun, then that’s not the likely place to start when talking to them. If they’re convinced that climate change is a plot by commies from the UN, then you don’t start there.
I think you’re really saying that you have to listen to your audience, you have to know your audience, and start with what your audience is ready to hear.
Dale Carnegie would agree, I’m sure.
Articles like this are written for investors. Investors need profits. Profits are supported by high prices and low competition.
Consumers, on the other hand, want low prices. Those tend to be supported by high competition and low profits.
Any time consumers are doing well, business will tend to be under pressure and complaining about low profits. And…older companies will be getting out of the business and leaving it to newer, lower priced competitors, just as described in this article.
https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/2018/nordhaus/facts/
At its heart, economics deals with the management of scarce resources. Nature dictates the main constraints on economic growth and our knowledge determines how well we deal with these constraints. William Nordhaus’ findings deal with interactions between society, the economy and climate change. In the mid-1990s, he created a quantitative model that describes the global interplay between the economy and the climate. Nordhaus’ model is used to examine the consequences of climate policy interventions, for example carbon taxes.
To be clear, THERE IS NO NOBEL PRIZE IN ECONOMICS!
There is only this fake Nobel Prize: The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2018
And ECONOMICS DOES NOT RISE TO STANDARDS OF LEGITIMATE SCIENTIFIC ENTERPRISE.
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2019/07/the-cost-of-climate-change.html
Yes, classical economics is only useful in a very narrow and exclusive frames of reference . Once the frame is expanded to include most inputs and outputs as well as the real physical world, classical economics is simply an exercise in error.
But then again, the only way to move toward a demolished ecosystem and completely changed world is to use narrow delusional thinking and applications.
ECONOMICS DOES NOT RISE TO STANDARDS OF LEGITIMATE SCIENTIFIC ENTERPRISE.
It’s not really constructive to say that Economics is impossible to do. It’s what we’re doing on this blog! The problem is that it’s a very difficult task. There’s nothing more complex than a human society.
In the case of Nordhaus: I read the 2nd article you linked. It seemed convincing, and it doesn’t argue that models are impossible or unuseful, it argues that Nordhaus has done a very low quality job of it.
In the case of Nordhaus: I read the 2nd article you linked. It seemed convincing, and it doesn’t argue that models are impossible or unuseful, it argues that Nordhaus has done a very low quality job of it.
Sorry, but he hasn’t just done a very low quality job of it! This claim alone, is prima facia absurd!
Nordhaus’s Damage Function is the first substantive graphic in the DICE manual, and one look at it (see Figure 8) should give anyone—even Climate Change Deniers (CCDs)—cause for concern. Even if Anthropogenic Global Warming were a myth, even if the temperature rise was being caused by the Sun, would it really be true that a 5 degree increase in the average temperature of the globe would only reduce global GDP by 5 percent?
A 5 degree increase in the average temperature of the globe will cause the the collapse of global civilization, will seal the fate of most living beings on the planet and that includes humans. That means extinction. At which point talking about economics and GDP is meaningless. May as well discuss astrological charts! Though I still prefer the peer reviewed science in reputable journals, Nordhaus is simply full of shit!
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/
Most Important Message Ever
A catastrophe of unimaginable proportions is unfolding. Life is disappearing from Earth and runaway heating could destroy all life. At 5°C heating, most life on Earth will have disappeared. When looking only at near-term human extinction, 3°C will likely suffice. Study after study is showing the severity of the threat that too many keep ignoring or denying it, at the peril of the world at large.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-35068-1
Co-extinctions annihilate planetary life during extreme environmental change
Giovanni Strona & Corey J. A. Bradshaw
Scientific Reports volume 8, Article number: 16724 (2018)
Abstract
Climate change and human activity are dooming species at an unprecedented rate via a plethora of direct and indirect, often synergic, mechanisms. Among these, primary extinctions driven by environmental change could be just the tip of an enormous extinction iceberg. As our understanding of the importance of ecological interactions in shaping ecosystem identity advances, it is becoming clearer how the disappearance of consumers following the depletion of their resources — a process known as ‘co-extinction’ — is more likely the major driver of biodiversity loss. Although the general relevance of co-extinctions is supported by a sound and robust theoretical background, the challenges in obtaining empirical information about ongoing (and past) co-extinction events complicate the assessment of their relative contributions to the rapid decline of species diversity even in well-known systems, let alone at the global scale. By subjecting a large set of virtual Earths to different trajectories of extreme environmental change (global heating and cooling), and by tracking species loss up to the complete annihilation of all life either accounting or not for co-extinction processes, we show how ecological dependencies amplify the direct effects of environmental change on the collapse of planetary diversity by up to ten times.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-economist-has-no-clothes/
The Economist Has No Clothes
Unscientific assumptions in economic theory are undermining efforts to solve environmental problems
By Robert Nadeau on April 1, 2008
The 19th-century creators of neoclassical economics—the theory that now serves as the basis for coordinating activities in the global market system—are credited with transforming their field into a scientific discipline. But what is not widely known is that these now legendary economists—William Stanley Jevons, Léon Walras, Maria Edgeworth and Vilfredo Pareto—developed their theories by adapting equations from 19th-century physics that eventually became obsolete. Unfortunately, it is clear that neoclassical economics has also become outdated. The theory is based on unscientific assumptions that are hindering the implementation of viable economic solutions for global warming and other menacing environmental problems.
The gilded age is quite a tar baby.
.
A little snippet of “good” news for your Sunday evening/Monday morning reading pleasure (found over at Auke Hoeksta’s Twitter page):
Delhi to shut down Rajghat thermal power plant, use its land for solar park
A coal powered plant about 15 miles from me was shut down a few years ago. Previous to the shut down it had already allowed about 40 acres to go back to nature. Still it owned another 150 of cleared land that could have been used for a solar PV farm or left to go back to nature. Nothing either way, the plant just sits there. Might be doing some occasional gas and oil peaker work at times.
Has not been knocked down, so some dreams of coming back might still be dancing round management heads.
Daily CO2
July 20, 2019: 412.20 ppm
July 20, 2018: 408.19 ppm
https://www.co2.earth
That’s the largest daily yoy increase I recall seeing lately.
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/gr.html
facts, replace 66% of trees, plant hemp for paper & tons of other products.. your co2 horse crap numbers would stop being a issue in 10 years or less..
Brilliant, remove forests and double industrial agriculture. No downsides to that one.
GF, you have to cut Kokoe3 some slack, her language skills have shown a marked improvement over her grandmother’s…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koko_(gorilla)
As with other great-ape language experiments, the extent to which Koko mastered and demonstrated language through the use of these signs is disputed.[8][9] It is generally accepted that she did not use syntax or grammar, and that her use of language did not exceed that of a young human child.[10][11][12][13][14] However, she scored between 70 and 90 on various IQ scales, and some experts, including Mary Lee Jensvold, claim that “Koko…[used] language the same way people do”.
Maybe someone should teach future Kokos some differential calculus…
I’m sorry, but my patience for putting up with idiots, morons, science deniers, trolls and assorted defective bots, has reached an all time low! /rant!
ROFL, ROFL, ROFL …
But just think of all the toilet paper we could make! 🙂
kokoe- ” your co2 horse crap numbers”
trump univ graduate?
[maybe she is auditioning to be the next next trump media spokesman, or ‘acting’ science advisor?]
The CO2 counts are decreasing off of their highs from May.
Yes, it’s the growing season up north where most of the land mass is. When it is warm out, plants grow. Plants grow by taking in carbon dioxide from the air through the process of photosynthesis. So during the northern warm seasons global CO2 level falls a small amount. During the cold time, when plants can’t grow, it rises a small amount. That is the normal cycle of the planet due to seasonality. You can look up seasons on your computer and why they occur.
Scientists use a technique call a differential. It’s the difference from time to time to see changes. Scientists also use graphs and equations to see trends. Trends can show how things are changing over time despite the small changes due to such things as seasons.
Hope this helps your understanding.
That’s interesting, I didn’t know that. I thought, based on the hysterics, that there was nowhere for the CO2 counts to go but up towards infinity.
There seems to be quite a lot that you don’t know or understand
Like graphs depicting trends!
.
What hysterics? Survivalist just reported the data and that there was an obvious anomaly in the differential. I have never seen anyone hysterical about CO2 in the media or otherwise.
To put it mildly, I’m not the hysterical type lol
based on the hysterics
Interesting that on a subject you claim not to understand, you have already decided that those who accept climate change as reality are “hysterics”.
What can I say? It’s 111 degrees in Paris today, and if you look at crop yields for both Europe and North America, they are currently saying 5 to 11% reductions. That should send you into hysterics.
Yes, it is due to seasonal summertime increase of photosynthesis in the Northern hemisphere. The comparison that counts is the comparison of today’s concentration as compared to the same time last year. That is still showing a clear upward trend. You trolls are pathetic!
ADaily CO2
July 20, 2019: 412.20 ppm
July 20, 2018: 408.19 ppm
LOL! I just saw that GF beat me to it!
Grumpy and slow today Fred? Take a short nap and start over. 🙂
Yeah, I was thinking of taking the day off and designing some embroidered hemp bags for poop removal from the moon.
https://www.space.com/weird-stuff-apollo-astronauts-left-moon.html
Astronaut poop on the moon
And then, of course, there’s that human waste.
Apollo 11 left behind four urine collection assemblies and four emesis bags. “That’s really the opposite end of the spectrum to these carefully chosen and carefully placed objects, it’s literally the bag of poo just flung out of the spacecraft,” Gorman said. “
Birds poop just before takeoff to lighten the load. We learn from the best.
Whatever you call it there is defiantly more CO2 in the atmosphere than most times in the history of the earth we are able the measure. The fact that NOAA found the Antarctic ice sheet the largest in recorded history (6M square miles) a couple of years ago is withheld from discussion.
Yes! Atmospheric CO2 concentration is definitely more defiant now than ever before!
Here’s something that has not been withheld from the discussion…
https://interactive.pri.org/2019/05/antarctica/thwaites-glacier-collapse.html
Fred, don’t bother with these numpties. All they do is enter a discussion with baseless statements, with a clear lack of knowledge on the topic. Not to mention their spelling and grammar.
Zooks first statement is utterly false. And his/her second statement is a partial truth. Either they are trolls, or they have an agenda.
IM- “don’t bother with these numpties….Either they are trolls, or they have an agenda”
And/or, they are typical trump voters.
Their capacity to discern true from false is pitiful. Comes from years of Fox news brainwashing. Grey mush in there.
Actually Defiant CO2 made me laugh. Who was it on this site that had asked for better quality trolls? If you can’t even make an effort to use correct grammar and spelling, how can anyone take anything else you say seriously? Sure, we are all guilty of the occasional typo.
.
Hi Zooks, Ice sheet ‘size’ is best measured in mass or volume, not area. Area neglects to consider the third dimension. Think crepes vs pancakes. Both may have the same area, but they are not equal in volume or mass.
https://nsidc.org/cryosphere/sotc/ice_sheets.html
https://nsidc.org/cryosphere/seaice/characteristics/difference.html
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-07-21/how-fukushima-changed-japans-energy-mix
Regulating your Rights away to Harvest SunPower? In Florida it’s Illegal to Buy and Sell Electricity.
“In 2018, 89 utilities—or nearly half of all major U.S. electric utilities—tried to change electricity rates by filing rate cases with state regulatory commissions; this number was the largest number since 1983”
“Regulated electric utilities can request rate changes to help recover expenses for building, operating, and maintaining their electric generators, transmission and distribution equipment, and other buildings and equipment. In addition, utilities have the right to earn a return on their investments.”
For NWF it’s 14.4%. The Only Private Industry that every employee has a Multi-million $$ Pension Package? https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=40133. Have a Cloudy Day.
Future Choice?
https://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/fl-bz-energy-deregulation-debate-20190719-kgv7w2qf2bbw3pek6yiwocj3s4-story.html
It’s big slushy time!
GF, have you read any sources that speculate on the pace of arctic sea warming after the summer ice-free condition is approached? I wonder if the change in albedo, and surface layer mixing due to wind and current, will accelerate the warming trend of the ocean temps.
I wonder if the change in albedo, and surface layer mixing due to wind and current, will accelerate the warming trend of the ocean temps.
Well that’s a great question! There are those who consider Sam Carana’s blog site to be the epitome of Climate alarmism and doomerism. This is his latest post:
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/
There is quite a bit to digest there but if you actually read the many peer reviewed papers that are linked in that post, most of that so called extreme alarmism has a pretty solid underlying scientific basis. To deny the facts is pretty difficult. Though most of the more dire conclusion could perhaps be tempered with a grain or two of salt. Having said that I suggest that before anyone simply discounts the risks out of hand, they may want to explore the topic of risk assessment first.
https://thebulwark.com/what-changed-my-mind-about-climate-change/
Risk management is not about discerning the optimal response to the most likely outcome. It is about discerning the appropriate response to the most likely distribution of possible outcomes. That means incorporating the possibility that climate change, either by a bad roll of the geophysical dice or a large and unexpected societal vulnerability to warming, turns into a bigger problem than we expect.
Then perhaps read some of the linked papers found there or watch some of the videos such as this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=6&v=D3L0R6LzEUE
Dr. Peter Wadhams: Methane Hydrates & Arctic Research
My personal opinion is that we should sit up and take notice!
“The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays is coming to its close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences.”
― Winston S. Churchill
Cheers!
Hickory asked
“I wonder if the change in albedo, and surface layer mixing due to wind and current, will accelerate the warming trend of the ocean temps.”
Yes, but it’s quite a simple physical calculation. The heat of fusion of ice is about 80 times that needed to raise liquid water a degree C. The Arctic ocean surface will rise in temperature very quickly during ice free periods, parts already have hit 11C. So the combined albedo change and thermal property change as ice goes liquid is a large multiple temperature amplifier.
The big variable is cloud cover. There is a lot of downwelling LW radiation in the Arctic due to cloud cover even in winter, but it blocks incoming SW radiation in the warm season. So how the shifting weather patterns change as the Arctic warms faster effect cloud cover is an unknown.
The collapse of snow cover is also a big factor as the Arctic warms, with the amplifying feedbacks of land albedo, methane and CO2 release to contend with.
Paul Beckwith surveys and explains a lot of papers written on these subjects. He discusses the various factors such as wave mixing.
Also Jennifer Francis of Woods Hole Institute and Rutgers has a number of papers and video discussions.
Here is a presentation to Congress by Jennifer Francis done last February. It has a partial listing of her papers.
https://science.house.gov/imo/media/doc/Francis%20Testimony%20and%20bio.pdf
Of course the most direct and longest experienced field researcher of the Arctic is Peter Wadhams. Any search on him will bring up a lot of videos and papers.
For Arctic methane hydrate search on Natalia Shakhova.
Meanwhile, as the ice melts Earth’s boreal forests are now burning at rate unseen in ‘at least 10,000 years’.
SWATHES OF THE ARCTIC ON FIRE, ‘UNPRECEDENTED SATELLITE IMAGES SHOW
Vast swathes of the Arctic are suffering from “unprecedented” wildfires, new satellite images have revealed. North of the Arctic circle, the high temperatures are facilitating enormous wildfires which are wreaking ecological destruction on a colossal scale. It comes after the world’s hottest June on record which has been followed by a devastating heatwave in the US, with Europe forecast for the same treatment later this week. Satellite images reveal fires across Greenland, Siberia and Alaska, with warm dry conditions following ice melt on the enormous Greenland icesheet commencing a month earlier than average.
https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/arctic-circle-wildfires-climate-change-greenland-alaska-siberia-photographs-a9015851.html
The natural world is under a lot of stress from all directions.
The show is just starting, the main act is not even on stage. Stay tuned to a world near you.
BTW Weather warnings here have moved from Severe Heat to Severe Thunderstorms to Flash Flood watch. Temperature down into low seventies now and lots of rain falling.
Drill baby, drill!
STUDY SHOWS AMERICANS ARE DRILLING DEEPER THAN EVER FOR FRESH WATER
“What we’re finding is that in places where water levels are declining, some people are drilling deeper, maybe to avoid having their primary water supply go dry. Regardless of the reasons, we suggest that deeper well drilling is an unsustainable stopgap to groundwater depletion.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-americans-drilling-deeper-fresh.html
Regardless of the reasons, we suggest that deeper well drilling is an unsustainable stopgap to groundwater depletion.”
Surely they jest! /sarc
Can’t wait for the time when we are going to have 10 billion humans on the planet.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13201-016-0440-1
Water scarcity in the Arabian Peninsula and socio-economic implications
Rapid population growth and water consumption
High population growth in combination with increase in per capita water consumption has contributed to increase in water consumption. Population growth triggers not only direct domestic water consumption but also the consumption of agricultural, industrial and other products, and energy use. In many countries, public water demand rises as a result of population growth and increased standards of living (UN Water 2012). The Arab Peninsula’s population growth is considered one of the highest in the world. In the last four decades, the Arabian Gulf countries have experienced rapid economic growth due to the sudden increase in these countries oil revenues, which have led to a fast increase in their economic base and rapid improvement in the standard of living (Mirkin 2010). From 1998 to 2008, real GDP grew at an average rate of 5.2 % annually for the GCC, with the population increasing at an average rate of 14 % annually for the same time period (EIU 2010). The population in the countries of the region increased almost twofold during the period 1970–1990, from 17.8 to 33.5 million (UN Water 2012).
How long can the average person survive without water?!
Yup,
“Goundwater withdrawals have helped farmers weather drought, and they’re a big reason why California’s farm revenue hit record highs in 2013 and 2014. But they come at a long-term cost. The aquifers beneath the Central Valley are getting drained; farmers have to drill deeper and deeper wells each year; and the ground is actually sinking, which in turn means these aquifers will be able to store less water in the future, even after the rain comes again. That means less protection against future droughts. And, as the Saudi example shows, eventually farmers max out their credit.”
https://www.vox.com/2015/9/14/9323379/saudi-arabia-squandered-its-groundwater-and-agriculture-collapsed
How long can the average person survive without water?!
Keep in mind that drinking water is perhaps 1% of all water “consumption”. Perhaps 80% is commercial/industrial,mostly agricultural. And most of that is wasted, in large part because these I/C special interests have corrupted government and get “their” water for free, so there’s no incentive at all to use it wisely.
Nick, no offense, but I wasn’t looking for a literal answer to that question. I could have Googled it, if that was what I wanted to know! The point is that we are reaching all kinds of limits and skating on ever thinner ice. Yet everywhere you look, it is still pedal to the metal… Our civilization is simply unsustainable.
Cheers!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4mHPeMGTJM
10 hours of absolute silence (the original)
I prefer this one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ih4_1FyVjaY
This one gets my dog howling, she does a better job. Sounds more like the Hound of the Baskervilles.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwN24uzc77Q
Is there any human trick that does not end up stupid? Very clever, but not very smart.
This time last year she was unimaginable. Then, pretty much from nowhere, there she was: small and slight, a girl just turned 16, the way-too-young odd person out on a panel of adults sitting in front of the world’s economic powers at Davos last January. Unshowy and serious, careful, firm, she said it: “Our house is on fire.”
‘THEY SEE US AS A THREAT BECAUSE WE’RE HAVING AN IMPACT’
Earlier this month OPEC declared Thunberg, and with her the other young climate activists, the “greatest threat” to the fossil fuel industry. Thunberg tweeted them her thanks. “Our biggest compliment yet.” Hers is a voice totally unlike the world’s usual power-cacophony: clean, simple, inclusive, the voice of someone refusing to beguile. She talks ethics to politics without flinching. She cuts through the media white noise and political rabble-rousing to get to the essentials. This is a communal voice and Thunberg is its lightning conductor, and no wonder: when you hear her speak or you read her speeches you know you’re in the presence of the opposite of cynicism – of a spirit, in fact, that rebuffs cynicism and knows that the way we act, every single one of us, has transformative impact and consequence. “The real power belongs to the people.”
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2019/jul/21/great-thunberg-you-ask-the-questions-see-us-as-a-threat
IMHO, the question and answer that best sums up our global dilemma in a nutshell!
David Lammy
Labour MP for Tottenham
Can you be politically conservative, ie on the political right, pro-growth, pro-capitalism and pro the for-profit motive, and still support the climate change movement and green issues?
That is not for me to say. I am only communicating the scientific facts. This question is probably not possible to answer without personal opinion and I leave that to others. But I think we can safely say that all ideologies have failed. If some have failed more than others then that is for others to say.
Bottom line: “ALL IDEOLOGIES HAVE FAILED”
http://hosting.astro.cornell.edu/academics/courses/a102/pbd.html
The Earth: a pale blue dot in a sunbeam.
Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
Carl Sagan
So the question remains, can we find a way to live without any ideologies?
Because so far it seems that ideologies have put us on course for total extinction!
Cheers!
Greta can see carbon dioxide in the atmosphere says her nutter mother. Greta is great, amazing psychic powers, probably a super-human, a goddess, just amazing what a clairvoyant can do.
How about a kook? No?
A crackpot? No?
A lunatic in the asylum? No doubt about it.
A liar and an imbecile? You make the call.
Talking about yourself?
Drumphish –
What exactly do you see yourself doing when you finally become 15? Washing cars, stacking lumber? Certainly not addressing a respectful audience at the United Nations, I’d guess?
You digress to an ad hominem. Act your age, not your shoe size.
Talking about yourself again?
You digress to an ad hominem
Really now?! And WTF do you call this tirade?!
Nutter, amazing psychic powers, super-human, a goddess, clairvoyant, kook, crackpot. A lunatic in the asylum? No doubt about it. A liar and an imbecile? You make the call.
Let me guess, you have really tiny feet, like maybe a size 6?
I really want her to get that Peace Prize. Why? To see Trump’s reaction when he realises he isn’t getting it.
NAOM
And the winner is:
Ukraine Election – Voters Defeat Second Color Revolution
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2019/07/ukraine-voters-defeat-second-color-revolution.html
“On March 31 new elections were held. Volodymyr Zelensky, a TV comedian who played a teacher who accidentally became president, won the first round. Zelensky is of Jewish heritage and from the east Ukraine. He speaks Russian, not Ukrainian.
The April run-off vote between Zelensky and Poroshenko was a disaster for the later. Zelensky received 73% of the votes. The only districts where Poroshenko won were in Galicia, where the descendants of the fascist who fought in World War II on the Nazi side still follow their forefathers ideology.”
Methane, with greater than 150 times GWP, is a persistent and growing problem.
Below is a graph of the GWP over time for a single pulse of methane.
However, what we have now is not a pulse that slowly decreases with time but a continuous level that is increasing with time. Due to the low saturation and the protrusion of a methane band into the IR window, the effect of methane is very high. Estimates of 200X are probably valid. Considering that methane has about tripled in atmospheric concentration during the Holocene, it is nothing to sniff at.
Natural sources are increasing output with temperature. The vast amount of methane that can be put into the atmosphere from sources, tropics to the poles, is of strong concern to some.
Feedbacks from the warming Arctic will unleash a global rise in methane and CO2 atmospheric concentration.
We may get some respite if the tropics dry up, but that would not be a great scenario either.
Question on that- its unclear, does that mean 150 x’s the CO2 effect?
Did they also put up a chart like that for CO2?
Yes, Global Warming Potential is based on CO2 being 1 so it is 150 X CO2 effect.
No need to put up a chart for CO2 since GWP has been frozen at one for CO2.
Regarding a CO2 chart- I meant one that showed the effect of a single pulse vs time, like the methane one you posted.
Given the time CO2 remains in the atmosphere the curve would be pretty flat over that time scale. Multiply the time scale by 10 to get an approximate CO2 curve. It is, basically, the half life curve.
NAOM
As far as Global Warming Potential goes, CO2 is one, always one by definition. That is a GWP plot, so I could make one but it would be a straight level line with a value of 1 out past 100 years.
If you mean what is the residence time in the atmosphere. I have heard anywhere from a hundred years to a hundred thousand years or more.
Some simplistic models show CO2 concentration falling over hundreds of years but they don’t account for warming oceans or other factors.
As far as rock goes, the conversion is probably on the order of thousands of years or more.
Paleo evidence shows it takes millions of years to drop from say 1000 to 500, but that is against a natural background of volcanism and is dependent upon mountain building rates.
CO2 does cycle quickly but it just mostly exchanges so residence time is a fuzzy concept. In a warming world it will naturally increase as the exchange with the ocean changes and the natural sources increase their rate of output.
https://skepticalscience.com/co2-residence-time.htm
Here comes the big ones- GE Finishes First Nacelle for 12MW Offshore Wind Turbine
I wonder what the embedded energy/CO₂ of that is; what happens to it/its parts at the end of its lifespan; how long its lifespan is; and what is the (political, economic, strategic, etc.) global accessibility of its materials and finished product.
Guessing Games And Cowardly Retreats To Snowflake-Style Safe Spaces
^^ More cluck-clucks from behind the ignore-button safe space, yes?, rather than face-to-face, so to speak? Sort of like OFM last thread and after, a quick retreat back behind their safe space.
Makes sense.
As if those who practice this particular style lend the most confidence to their takes on things like energy or protecting the planet.
But then, guessing seems to be a preference among some who’d rather not think too hard.
Guess away.
Sure, that one will stop close to 350,000 tons of CO2 from being emitted, eliminate lots of fuel used to mine, transport and grind the coal so the boilers can use it. An amount of particulates, NOx, and SO2 from the coal and diesel/bunker fuel burn for transport and electricity production (for mining)will be eliminated too. No large ships running every day and large trains to supply the coal to the power plant.
Just the wind, driven by the sun.
Yep. Its a monster.
But its the second cleanest monster we’ve got (after solar).
And sparkling clean compared to any other alternative source of energy.
So, until we downside towards extinction, this is what we can work on/with.
About 250 of these to replace one nuclear plant, I figure.
[the real monster is us]
Nuclear in the US has a 90% capacity factor. Offshore wind farms can achieve 50%. That would mean a 1GW nuclear plant could be replaced by 150 turbines.
If one does not count all the other inputs needed to build, maintain, operate, handle waste, etc. In reality nuclear is probably closer to 1:1 for wind power over the relatively short term. Over the long term nuclear is probably a non-energy source.
GF, I was referring simply to the amount of energy you need from these generators, to replace a single nuclear plant (1000MW) that you were currently relying on.
So no, 1000 MW nameplant wind does not equal 1000 MW nameplant nuclear. For those who may not be aware, that is just not how it works.
“For those who may not be aware, that is just not how it works.?
True, the accounting is simplistic and gives false results. One would never want to actually look at the net energies produced by something. Decisions need to be made on very narrow frames of reference, otherwise projects would never start.
I was using real numbers, rather than theoretical wish number, Nick G.
I like to go with real whenever I have good data, and I can feel solid about the assumptions.
You and I usually seem to part paths on this point.
Well, the projected 350 12MW turbines would suggest a capacity factor of only 29%. That’s way too low for offshore.
Perhaps I misled you by using language that suggested that 50% is a maximum: it’s not. Offshore can achieve 65% or more.
“Introducing the Haliade-X 12 MW, the most powerful offshore wind turbine in the world to date, featuring a 12 MW capacity (the world’s first), 220-meter rotor, a 107-meter blade designed by LM Wind Power, and digital capabilities. In addition to being the biggest offshore wind turbine, the Haliade-X will also be the most efficient of wind turbines in the ocean. Best of all, it’s capable of transforming more wind into power than any other offshore wind turbine today.
The Haliade-X 12 MW also features a 63% capacity factor*—five to seven points above industry standard. Each incremental point in capacity factor represents around $7 million in revenue for our customers over the life of a windfarm.”
https://www.ge.com/renewableenergy/wind-energy/offshore-wind/haliade-x-offshore-turbine
“The Danish offshore wind farm Horns Rev 2, the world’s largest at its inauguration in 2009,[4] has a nameplate capacity of 209.3 MW. As of January 2017 it has produced 6416 GWh since its commissioning 7.3 years ago, i.e. an average annual production of 875 GWh/year and a capacity factor of 47.7%.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacity_factor
Projections are difficult, but generally capacity factors are rising, especially with larger turbines like these. I’d say 50% is a reasonably conservative projection.
Also, I used an optimum number of 90% for nuclear, based on the US: the rest of the world tends to achieve substantially lower numbers. France, for instance, is closer to 80% and some countries are lower.
The Danish and UK offshore wind over the last two years has CF right around 40%. Certainly creeping up over the years.
Using that figure, and 90% CF for nucs , I get 188 of these big turbines. Ball park thing- specific number not the issue of importance. Its the idea.
I want a couple dozen.
LOL! Let me guess, was Caelan saying that wind turbine nacelle could only be built and maintained with fossil fuels and has a bigger carbon foot print than an oil refinery or some such nonsense. And based on Islandboy’s comment below I’ll bet he also brought up how renewables were all a part of a big crony-capitalist plutarchy plot of some sort.
Well, he is probably right about the last part, GE is definitely interested in making a profit…
Cheers!
Hey Fred. GE going for a profit.
I’m all for that.
Companies need to make a profit, or else they wouldn’t be in business.
The only reason I was able to have some PV to buy for my roof, or bicycle, was that some company thought they could make a little more back than all their costs by building those things.
They sure wouldn’t come to work , if it was for a loss.
Might as well stay home on porch and play banjo, rather than work for a loss.
Might as well stay home on porch and play banjo, rather than work for a loss.
Either that, or join a Shale operation… 😉
Yes, ‘business as usual’, and ‘we all know’ how well that’s working…
Oh but do wrap yourselves in token gestures of ecological concern.
Dr. Peter Wadhams: Methane Hydrates & Arctic Research
https://youtu.be/D3L0R6LzEUE
Yale in denial?
Academia has been bought. Hard to trust anything these days.
Yep, follow the money first then follow the politics (which often leads back to the money).
Yale in denial?
Yeah, I saw that as I posted that very same link up thread. I don’t think it is just Yale that is in Denial…
Though admittedly it is a bit weird to see scientists, especially climate scientists, outright denying risks.
On the other hand even climate scientists are human and many of them have not yet fully accepted the implications and the risks involved and are still in the early stages of the Kubler Ross process.
I think everything around methane hydrate sublimation centers on the temperature of that layer and of the activation energy of the methane hydrate. This determines the sublimation rate according to Arrhenius rate laws ~ exp(-Ea/kT)
So if that seabed temperature changes by a delta T, one can estimate how much more of the material will sublime. If the activation energy Ea is large then the incremental rate will be large and if the activation energy is small then the rate will be correspondingly smaller.
Odd that you find so little discussion about this, instead all they say is that it’s at some sort of tipping point. Yet, there is no tipping point for sublimation, as it is a smooth function of temperature according to Arrhenius rate laws.
NSIDC has both NH and SH sea ice in some record low territory.
https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/www.moyhu.org/blog/polview.html
Man Killed In San Francisco After Tesla Runs Red Light, Crashes Into Tourists
Tesla Enters ‘Whistleblower Hell’
Tesla’s attacks on whistleblowers and critics aren’t stopping more from coming forward with new allegations.
Here we go again! Caelan railing against what he refers to as the “crony-capitalist plutarchy”, conveniently ignoring the huge amount of ongoing environmental damage that is being caused by industries that are over a century old in some cases. In the last open thread I made a comment that was met with stony silence from Caelan. I have cut and pasted it here since I am still interested in a credible response.
In the context of the comment to which I’m replying, I would add that any comment criticizing the German auto industry for the “Dieselgate” scandal would also suffice, as would any comments critical of the level of fatalities from traffic accidents not involving Tesla’s (a significant number) or comments involving labor disputes at companies involved in the continued mass production of internal combustion engines.
edit: Come to think of it, wasn’t it a whistle blower that exposed Dieselgate?
Tesla. Scottish Wind & Tyre Particulates | Fully Charged
A delightful video containing rants by Fully Charged host, Robert Llewellyn that, sort of gets to the essence of what irritates me about certain comments on this site.
Yep!
Go easy on Caelan. We are lucky your post didn’t drive him away. Many here complain about the quality of recent trolls and their laughably stupid posts. Caelan is a good writer and speller who puts up posts that require a bit of thought to respond to. Far better mental exercise than recent trolls provide.
Caelan posts something useful maybe once a year. The rest of his comments are nothing more, and nothing less, than rants about our current economic system. Virtually everybody else has something useful to say, or a useful question to ask.
It’s rather likely that at least fifty people were killed yesterday by incompetent drivers. Calean cherry picks a link about the ONE accident involving a Tesla, without acknowledging that Tesla’s are the SAFEST cars on the road, according to any and every official test I have yet heard about.
I keep him blocked except when a reply to one of his comments results in my looking to see what he posted.
The fact that Tesla has whistle blower issues is about as relevant to the core subject matter here as saddles are to pigs. Every large business has a greater or lesser whistle blower issue. Expecting Tesla to be different is naive to say the least.
Caelan refuses to acknowledge the value of ANY technology, beyond what’s needed to sharpen a stick to use as a primitive plow.
It’s rather likely that at least fifty people were killed yesterday by incompetent drivers. Calean cherry picks a link about the ONE accident involving a Tesla, without acknowledging that Tesla’s are the SAFEST cars on the road, according to any and every official test I have yet heard about.
Here’s some actual data about Tesla safety compared to ICE cars, the numbers don’t lie:
https://electrek.co/2019/07/17/tesla-autopilot-safety-fire-report/
Today, Tesla has now released its report for the second quarter of 2019 and there was a big improvement.
For this quarter, Tesla also added a new comparison with its vehicles that are not equipped with Autopilot or any active safety feature:
“In the 2nd quarter, we registered one accident for every 3.27 million miles driven in which drivers had Autopilot engaged. For those driving without Autopilot but with our active safety features, we registered one accident for every 2.19 million miles driven. For those driving without Autopilot and without our active safety features, we registered one accident for every 1.41 million miles driven. By comparison, NHTSA’s most recent data shows that in the United States there is an automobile crash every 498,000 miles.*
With the updated report, Tesla also released additional data about fires involving its vehicles.
Tesla says that there was a Tesla vehicle fire for every 170 million miles traveled between 2012 and 2018:
“From 2012 – 2018, there has been approximately one Tesla vehicle fire for every 170 million miles traveled. By comparison, data from the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and U.S. Department of Transportation shows that in the United States there is a vehicle fire for every 19 million miles traveled.
In order to provide an apt comparison to NFPA data, Tesla’s data set includes instances of vehicle fires caused by structure fires, arson, and other things unrelated to the vehicle, which account for about 15% of Tesla vehicle fires over this time period.”
The automaker plans to release the fire data annually.
How can anyone say anything bad about Tesla’s safety record?!
Blockquotes
Cherrypicking the fruits of a greenwashed BAU (while going after those who question it) seems like a far heavier basket of cherries.
But I hardly read OFM’s bloated comments, and in any case don’t post for him nor his notions of usefulness. Why would I? Do you? If so, then maybe you should be on his payroll.
If I did, I might be singing the praises of elements, ad nauseum, of a greenwashed BAU/crony-capitalist plutarchy.
But OFM has a bee in his bonnet with my name on it, so his opinion of my commentary, questionably mediated, too, through his ‘snowflake safe-space block’, should also be interpreted in this light.
By his own words, he also appears to want a nice little ‘disclusionary groupthink’ of his own. So someone with that kind of take would naturally seem to prefer uncritical conformity.
Not much of a block is it when you make my comment the subject of your comment and then have to explain that to the forum.
While various business whistleblowing can see the light as news, why should OFM expect Tesla to be any different? Naivete perhaps?
OFM refuses to acknowledge, appears willfully ignorant or is unaware that Caelan has different ideas about technology– as in part previously expressed in the archives.
Perhaps it is a problem with OFM’s bloated writing that limits what he reads, like the proverbial head up where the sun doesn’t shine.
Further to my comments on what I consider trollish behavior that is worse than mine, I post links and excerpts from articles like the two below for two reasons. One is to inform regular readers and passers by of some of the remarkable developments in the area of renewable energy. The other is to troll the anit-renewable, global warming denier types by highlighting that renewable energy is beginning to make an impact by eroding the profitability of legacy generating assets. In this case , while the new kid on the block is by no means perfect, intermittent and all, it is easier and most times less expensive than building new legacy assets and even less costly than operating existing legacy plants.
This is a serious threat to the owners of the legacy assets and I fully expect them to throw a fit and protest through their troll army, about the “danger” of relying on “new”, renewable energy technology. The same goes for EVs, which have the potential to disrupt huge, long entrenched businesses, hence the “war” against them as well.
Alan, no one owes everyone a response to all their comments, and you haven’t responded to all of mine, either. So what.
Besides, what difference would it make? Would you suddenly write something like, ‘Caelan, you have good points. I’ll get off this mindless greenwashed BAU PV/EV huckstering shit and get down with permaculture. Maybe get back to my land here.’
😀
In any event, I seem to recall previously addressing your ‘Koch fetish’ more than once and may have even called it that.
If you’re so interested in my past comments in that regard, then how about looking them up yourself, since you seem to think we all have that kind of time.
Nevertheless, I made a random cursory lookup, incidentally, and, frankly, your apparent overfocus on these Koch brothers seems a little strange. Maybe more than a little. I mean, do your thoughts of them occupy your every waking minute or what? Do they, in your imagination, fly around in the air on currents of C02?
To make my point, I decided to take just a single comment of yours and delete all the words except ‘Koch’ and immediately associated words. Here’s how it looks:
Kind of scary, yet amusing at the same time.
But, hey, maybe, as they say, repeat something enough times and people will start to believe it.
See also here.
Somewhat along the lines of my previous comment; no one owes everyone comments on all issues. We pick and choose what we want to bring to the table… Do we really need to explain this sort of thing to you?
Nevertheless, I feel that ‘railing against the crony capitalist plutarchy’ covers a lot of ground in one fell swoop– including your Koch fetish and environmental damage caused by industry— you-hoo! Earth to Alan!
And we generally already know more about what’s gone down for ‘over a century’ than what some are fantasizing for the future.
I just want to point out to regular readers and passers by that Caelan has responded to my challenge by blabbering on and calling my criticism of the Koch brothers an “overfocus”. Yet despite his penchant for digging up posts from as far back as theoildrum.com days, he has not apparently been able to find a single post where he is anywhere as critical of the FF industries, transport industries and the incumbent polluters (the real crony capitalist plutarchy) as he is of what he calls “non-renewable renewables”, some imagined future “crony capitalist plutarchy”!
It is as if the incumbent carbon emissions producers get a pass for being here first! Very strange!
As far as my “obsession” with the Koch brothers goes, they are the first offenders that come to mind when one ponders the source of global warming denial, being the best documented case of FF derived wealth being used in a systematic way to counter threats to the FF industries of which I am aware. Apart from Exxon-Mobil, I don’t hear other names being bandied about nearly as much when it comes to funding global warming denial efforts aka Climate Change Skepticism. My favorite US politician of the 2016 election cycle, Bernie Sanders has had a lot to say about the Kochs over the years so that helps as well.
Why does it matter? Unlike coal and hydrocarbons silicon is the second most abundant element in the earths crust, making more difficult for individuals to corral the sources and monopolize production. Silicon forms the basis of the semiconductor industries of which PV manufacturing is a part. Lithium, while not nearly as abundant as silicon presents a challenge for FF industry types since it is not a fuel that must be burned to produced energy but, a component of batteries that allow consumers to store electrical energy, regardless of it’s source and use that stored energy many times over the life of the battery. In addition there is a strong likelihood that lithium recycling rates will approach or exceed lead recycling rates as lithium battery usage increases. So silicon and lithium based industries do not hold the allure that the FF industries do.
At the same time, as pointed out by Hermann Scheer, Tony Seba and I’m sure quite a few others, renewable energy poses the single biggest competitive threat to the carbon emitting, FF industries. As highlighted by my many comments on this blog, renewable energy is beginning to threaten the profitability of the FF industries and EVs seem set to start affecting the oil markets in the not too distant future. It has been documented that certain FF interests (who shall remain nameless ;-)) are funding sophisticated PR efforts to try and stymie the adoption of renewable energy and EVs.
I will conclude by saying that in light of what I have written above, I am intrigued by the focus of some people on criticism of FF and renewables and a complete absence of criticism by those same people, of the incumbent FF and transportation equipment manufacturing interests.
An Unhealthy Symbiosis
Alan, you seem to keep speaking of the fossil fuel industries and the so-called renewable industries in a dichotomous sense and I have already written hereon, with references, that that is not the case.
Koch seems like very small potatoes, but they would still appear to plug into the grand and complex scheme of things. We really need to look at this more systemically and/or holistically to get a better pic of what’s going on.
That writ, I can’t help but consider that your thing with the Kochs may be inspired by a kind of dupe in helping to maintain an illusion for particular agendas that the system’s elements– governments, PV/EV/FF industries, etc., — all in an unhealty symbiosis with the crony-capitalist plutarchy– are all somehow more delineated than they really are.
As for references, whether from The Oil Drum or elsewhere, any, say, college sophomore or researcher, without them in support of their arguments would likely quickly find themselves out of class and work, respectively.
I’ll leave you with yet another from the archives in referencial support and then log off for the day. Enjoy and have a good one…
Caelan MacIntyre On, When Big Oil Is Big Government Is Big pseudoRenewable Is Big Dupe
Sample:
Shell CEO: Solar Energy To Be Backbone Of World’s Energy System
Solar energy will comprise the backbone of the world’s energy system in years to come, according to the CEO of Shell (yes, that Shell), Ben van Beurden.
Big Oil Leads in Innovations and Renewable Energy
The Greenest Oil Companies In The World
Total – Investing In Solar
Statoil – Placing Its Bet On Wind
Myth: U.S. oil companies have refused to invest in alternative energy and other clean technologies.
Calling the second wealthiest family in the US, which includes two members who tie for seventh place on the list of wealthiest American individuals, small potatoes. Don’t make me laugh! Why do you seem to be so intent on downplaying the influence of these multi-billionaires?
So what if oil companies are trying to get into the solar PV business? They are small potatoes. “In 2016, manufacturers in China and Taiwan met the majority of global PV module demand, accounting for 68% of all modules, followed by the rest of Asia at 14%.” (source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_photovoltaics_companies ). So that’s 84% from China and the rest of Asia with the rest of the world (Europe, North America, South America, Africa, the Middle East and Australia making p the remaining 18%. Incidentally, with global oil finds shrinking despite increased exploration budgets, maybe oil companies are just seeing the writing on the wall.
I got curious about something I remembered did a quick search and came up with this gem!
Seeing as how population growth is one of the main drivers of ecosystem degradation, I find the whole notion that anybody should be “running around nude all day eating mangoes and making love under the sun and going for a swim” highly irresponsible. In the absence of condoms or other methods of birth control, manufactured by the existing complex human societies, that sort of behavior would result in an unmitigated disaster, not too different from what we are witnessing right now!
It would be quite amusing to see a Caucasian male or couple try “making love under the sun” at 18 degrees latitude, with ambient temperatures over 30°C in the shade and high humidity. Unless it were over very, very quickly, the physical exertion would leave one or both individuals severely hot, sunburned, dehydrated, and most likely exhausted. Maybe it could even kill! 😮
It is as if the incumbent carbon emissions producers get a pass for being here first! Very strange!
Well, to be fair, they were here first, but that may not always be the case going forward! 😉
cro·ny
/ˈkrōnē/
noun INFORMAL•DEROGATORY
a close friend or companion.
cap·i·tal·ism
/ˈkapədlˌizəm/
noun
an economic and political system in which a country’s trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.
“an era of free-market capitalism”
A plutocracy (Greek: πλοῦτος, ploutos, ‘wealth’ + κράτος, kratos, ‘power’) or plutarchy is a society that is ruled or controlled by people of great wealth or income. The first known use of the term in English dates from 1631.
It is no great secret that the current global economic system benefits only a very small minority of the world’s elite. It is also no secret that the foundation of this system for the past couple hundred years has been the use of fossil fuels. It has given us all the benefits of industrial civilization that many of us take for granted. It has also created a huge chasm of inequality between the haves and the have nots. It has also brought us to the very brink of civilizational collapse and biological extinction. Most of the readers of this site can fill in the details of this general overview of our current status and perdicament.
However, to say that renewables and EVs and all the technology and developing supply chains are part and parcel of the existing system, is simply just stating the obvious. Of course it is, how could it possibly be otherwise?
The question remains whether or not a transition to renewable energy changes things for the better or is it indeed just a continuation and an extender of BAU?!
The argument that it is simply a propagandized Green Washing of BAU is in my opinion flawed. Is it part of the system that some identify as a crony capitalist plutarcy? Of course it is, that is the system that currently prevails every where on this planet. How could it be any other way?
What forces and circumstances were in play that allowed the fish swimming in the primordial oceans to venture onto land and breathe air even though they were embedded in a hydrosphere on which they depended for their very survival?
As a long time student of evolutionary biology I tend to look at much of the world through that lens and the question I ask is, if renewables could possibly be a game changer that could lead to not only leaving fossil fuels behind, but could it lead to radical social, political and economic evolution,therefore laying the foundations of a totally new order and reality.
My gut feeling is that it can and it will. It is the only game in town that might be able to undermine the centralized monopolies of current powers that be!
Attacking renewables for being both a product of the system and still functioning within it, is akin to an ancient Coelacanth criticizing a recently emerged air breathing lung fish with rudimentary jointed fins, for mostly still staying in the water. It took a while for that lung fish to evolve into a bipedal great ape!
Cheers!
Fred — Did you know?
CORPORATE COURTS COULD THWART CLIMATE EFFORTS
“Campaigners are urging reform of an obscure system that allows coal, oil and gas companies to sue governments if climate policies hit their profits. The EU is locking horns with a bloc of countries led by the US and Japan over a mechanism included in more than 3,000 trade deals, ahead of UN talks in Vienna in October. Investor state dispute settlement (ISDS) is a system of private courts that allows foreign investors to bypass domestic courts and sue governments in cases where national policies hurt their profits. It raises the prospect of fossil fuel corporations claiming billions of dollars in compensation for climate legislation enacted under the Paris Agreement, including carbon taxes or initiatives to phase out fossil fuels.”
https://www.climatechangenews.com/2019/07/24/un-warned-corporate-courts-thwart-climate-efforts/
There’s always the option of indicting the CEOs of those companies for crimes against the environment…
See here.
Why German coal power is falling fast in 2019
Solar peaks at more than 20% of demand six days in row in mid-winter
From The Archives
(2017)
Energy Revolution? More like a Crawl
Islandboy’s Energy Matryoshka
Blah, blah, blah but crickets when it comes to criticizing the industries that are largely responsible for global warming , having spewed millions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere over the past couple of centuries in the case of coal.
I see your single (isolated, rare occurrence) burning wind turbine and raise you 1 Navajo Generating Station:
Navajo Generating Station Powers and Paralyzes the Western U.S.
After commencing operations in 1974, the NGS is scheduled to cease operation by the end of this year, it’s viability having been savaged by low cost natural gas and increasingly by renewables. Who would have thought?
I am convinced and getting more convinced that Caelan is a troll and, probably, sent here with a mission. Enlighten the 3rd party to his errors, don’t mud wrestle. As for that turbine, they don’t need to evacuate thousands of square miles when that happens.
NAOM
It might just be possible that he has a mild obsession with permaculture that is clouding his thoughts on everything else. That still would not excuse the difference in intensity of his criticism of renewable technology vis a vis the stuff that is largely responsible for the concentration of atmospheric CO2 reaching 412 ppm. I have been accused of being obsessed with renewables and EVs but, I would counter that it is driven by desperation to see CO2 emissions decline quickly. What else can I do besides advocating for birth control, better efficiency, renewables and EVs?
See here.
And to add, I could suggest that your comment is a troll, notanoilman and speaking, ironically, of mud wrestling.
As for your other comments in this thread that I managed to read, I find them rather vapid and would respectfully recommend that, if you’re going to mention or respond to me, that you make better attempts at quality.
“…‘railing against the crony capitalist plutarchy’ covers a lot of ground in one fell swoop– including your Koch fetish and environmental damage caused by industry…
And we generally already know more about what’s gone down for ‘over a century’ than what some are fantasizing for the future.” ~ Caelan MacIntyre
For those interested in renewable energy, particularly pumped hydro
Switzerland
https://www.ge.com/reports/how-the-swiss-turned-an-alpine-peak-into-a-battery-the-size-of-a-nuclear-plant/
https://www.ge.com/reports/view-kilowatt-fit-bond-villain-swiss-power-plant-hides-beneath-alps/
Uraguay
https://www.ge.com/reports/hot-dam-how-hydro-storage-will-allow-this-south-american-nation-to-join-the-100-renewables-club/
Pumped hydro storage is great!
Depends how the reservoirs are constructed.
NAOM
“Depends how the reservoirs are constructed.”
For certain. For example, the one I mentioned above in Montana is outside the local river flow. So no interaction with local hydrology, other than topping off the water level. Its an area with lots of water.
Site selection is crucial, and not easy in most places.
https://gordonbuttepumpedstorage.com/project-overview/
And always at a energy loss—-
But that doesn’t seem to be the issue.
“And always at a energy loss—-”
Well, sure.
Its an energy storage device.
All types of them operate at a loss.
Potatoes are a huge loss of the plants energy, just to make some buds that can hold over til the next growing season.
Pumped hydro is just a big energy storage device, that operates cleanly for a long time. But, sure, it is not magic.
Sure beats a chemical battery.
I would like to see a disaster movie about a 1000 MW flywheel mounted high up in the Poconos, that decided to go on a cross-country excursion down through the middle Atlantic states to DC.
Pumped hydro is just a big energy storage device, that operates cleanly for a long time. But, sure, it is not magic.
Perhaps not quite as dramatic as your hypothetical movie but you might still enjoy it nonetheless! 😉
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=McByJeX2evM
The Electric Mountain | Fully Charged
Excellent video.
A few things that caught my attention.
-they can produce 10 GWhrs/day (that like 10 nuc plants running for an hour)
-the response time to turn on is just 10 seconds
-for every 4 units of energy used to pump water up to top, they get 3 units back when they open the valves for the water to flow back down
-even though they lose energy on the turnaround, they make money, since they pump up when the grid is cheap, and make electricity at the time of day when the grid price is high
-the same equipment is used to as a generator when water is coming down, and as a pump motor when they need to move the water back up
Agree–
And we have a surplus energy to do the work at proper times.
There are hundreds of places in the USA that are suited for use as pumped hydro storage plants. A lot of them, can serve two or three combined functions such as flood control, recreational boating and fishing, and storage reservoirs for nearby towns and cities.
The cards fell, historically, in such a way that we didn’t need all that pumped hydro capacity……. just burning more coal, oil and gas was cheaper, especially up front.
But now that fossil fuel depletion is a reality that must be dealt with, and pollution associated with ff’s can no longer be ignored, we WILL be building quite a few pumped storage facilities, in my opinion, in years to come.
But the building of them will be long delayed, and the cost of them driven up sharply, by the nimby crowd and by people with their hearts in the right place, but their heads up their ass, when it comes to environmental questions.
EVERYTHING is a trade off, everything has strings attached, everything has political consequences.
The country is WELL SUPPLIED with ignorant but good hearted and well intentioned people who really do believe wind farms are a major killer of birds, where as their cats kill a hundred times as many, and coal results in a hundred times as much environmental damage taken all around. And of course there are more than enough ff trolls out there working their tails off to make sure these people STAY ignorant.
Nevertheless pumped storage facilities will be built, unless something better comes along, or unless the economy collapses to the point we CAN’T build them.
Pumped hydro, in combination with wind and solar juice plus long distance HVDC power lines, etc, may well prove to be one of the biggest and best single parts of the solution to our energy and environmental problems going forward.
The positive feed backs involving wind, solar, pumped storage, long distance transmission lines, electric cars, and household and business demand management are such that there’s nothing to stop us from getting nearly all of our electricity fuel free within the easily foreseeable future , and ALL of it at some point down the road.
Caelan is apparently opposed to Tesla, and fossil fuels,and all other technology except maybe a campfire and a digging stick, but I’m willing to bet my farm he isn’t willing to get out in a cornfield and use my Momma’s goose neck hoe to chop weeds all day, day after day, with another job just as tough to be taken care of when the hoeing is done, ENDLESSLY, in ninety plus weather, or freezing weather….. the way she did, and I did myself on occasion as a youngster old enough to help pay his own way.
Our POLITICAL reality is such that we MUST have reliable and plentiful electricity around the clock and around the calendar….. because the people of this country will express their displeasure, cross that out, their RAGE, by voting in politicians a lot worse than Trump and company if the power ever goes off and stays off for more than a few hours.
Anybody who believes or proposes otherwise is not thinking things thru, in terms of our actual political and economic reality, short to medium term.
If as OFM says, they are ‘chopping weeds all day’, etc., they may essentially be telling us that their work may not be as effective, efficient and/or productive as it could be. The term, ‘Work smart not hard.’, comes to mind here.
Apparently, the current industrial agricultural system produces ~1 calorie for every ~10 calories inputted. If so, that’s a stupid system, and is part of the crony-capitalist plutarchy, another stupid system.
Good luck with getting stupid systems to produce intelligent results, such as in the non-renewable renewable and electric vehicle realm. But that’s what some hereon seem to implicitly expect and/or suggest.
From The Archives
The Philosophy of the Technology of the Gun
Values in Technology and Disclosive Computer Ethics
See also:
‘Ethics and Emerging Technologies’,
edited by Ronald Sandler
‘Nanotechnology & Society: Current and Emerging Ethical Issues’
edited by Fritz Allhoff, Patrick Lin
‘Ethical Impact of Technological Advancements and Applications in Society’
edited by Luppicini, Rocci
‘Evaluating New Technologies: Methodological Problems for the Ethical Assessment of Technology Developments’
edited by Paul Sollie, Marcus Düwell”
Which has Higher Entropy? Deutsche Bank or a National Grid? A sprawling electromagnetic Grid is an Attack on the Environment. Governments will Foolishly attempt to keep these albatrosses above ground. Welcome to the New Normal?
:> “More than half of Venezuela’s 23 states lost power on Monday, according to Reuters witnesses and reports on social media, a blackout the government blamed on an “electromagnetic attack.””
:> “These blackouts are catastrophic,” said 51-year-old janitor Bernardina Guerra, who lives in Caracas. “I live in the eastern part of the city and there the lights go out every day. Each day things are worse.”
http://news.trust.org/item/20190722234355-cf1gl
Redundant 20-30V PV Direct Powered Batteryfree Fridge/Freezer are Essential.
Redundant 24V PV Direct Powered (No Battery) Fridge/Freezer is Essential.
Yeah, I tried setting up a few systems like that in Brazil for a poor fishing community in a remote area a few years back. The stupid government bureaucracy and import tariffs made it impossible!
We live in a world of governments based on ignorance, stupidity and greed, all in the name of protecting the status quo and the power of a few. There are a few good souls here and there fighting the entrenched powers that be, unfortunately the planet no longer has the luxury of time to fight long drawn out battles for change.
Use AC if you have the Space for PV, with a reliable (Perhaps the sweet spot) 500W Meanwell Inverter. Ice Ball Phase Change Storage.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6WRF54yijE&t=253s
https://www.sager.com/_resources/pdfs/product/ISI-500.pdf
https://www.trcelectronics.com/mean-well-dc-ac-inverters
Option II for Battery free Freezer. My Experience they would only be necessary if the Freezer is Empty. https://www.amazon.com/s?k=ThermoSafe+U-tek&ref=bnav_search_go
Interesting, thanks. Also, strong plastic bottles (I use Electrolyte bottles, they are square too) with 150g/l salt freeze around -9C so provide a good buffer, don’t fill the bottles completely and squeeze out the air first.
NAOM
Also, ‘freezerless’ options are to simply learn how to preserve/extend the shelf-life of food and other decay-prone stuff– fermentation, drying, alcohol, root cellars/cold-rooms, smoking, salting, spicing, seasonal/local ice-boxing, and stuff like that.
That way, you not only get to learn new things (that in part give you a keener sense of being an adult), and other things as fringe/spinoff benefits, and be more self-sufficient and resilient, but (snowflake trigger alert begin) your balls are likely placed more outside the groping hands of the crony-capitalist plutarchy status-quo and the metaphoric diapers they put us in and that far too many sheeple are happy to waddle and slosh around in. BTW, I like to say that women have balls, they’re just internal. (/snowflake trigger alert end)
Longtimber, just a quick net-scrape, but what do you think? :
What Voltage For The All-DC House?
It’s just not the AC 2 DC conversion. Its the requirement for Voltage regulation. Luv, Grid Optional Low Waste/Power devices, There is a rule of Thumb, 12V 12 USwire Gauge, 12 watts, not more than 12 meters wire. So 12V is too lossy for almost anything except cell phones and sub 100 lums lighting. We settle on 2 Voltages for Critical Infrastructure. 25 and 50V. (Actually 22-28/48-54)… works for Both types of Lithium. Lithium Batteries are key since they Thrive on partial charge that kills other chemistry. Almost everything in the US is Suicidal Grid Only / Solar incompatible since the crapola requires a regulated input…. Toss it in the dust bin if you want HA – High Availability. .9999+ uptime (less than a hour downtime/year). For low cost of ownership, Energy comes from the battery ONLY in complete darkness. Much Marine Equipment is now 8-30V input. There are Panel Lights for Office/Home that use 48Vdc POE over Ethernet. 277/480V Nuclear Powered Lighting Circuits not needed.
Longtimber- you familiar with this product, or other brands?
https://www.goalzero.com/shop/portable-power/goal-zero-yeti-1400-lithium-power-station-app/
I assume many of us will have a device like this as a energy manager between our home, our big battery (electric car), the grid, and a PV array.
RE: Intermittent use Lunch Box Systems- They are evolving, but are still just above Toy Status. Light Batteries and Cheapo Inverters are not Service Duty: Any company that can make millions selling $50 thermal mugs is doing something right. This RV Nerd tests them all.. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoj6RxIAQq8kmJme-5dnN0Q
Why are those Fridge/Freezers so expensive?
3-4 x’s the cost of a 120v ac equivalent model.
Why are those Fridge/Freezers so expensive? Guess a Niche Product made in the EU.
Consider the Cost of Ownership. A 240Liter version Retail is $1250 or so. They do Last.
1/ Get standard chest freezer (2nd hand)
2/ Get your local refrigeration wiz to switch compressor to DC type and condenser to external fin type.
3/ Add 2″ foam insulation panels, to the outside, and cover them with several layers of roof waterproofing including a layer of reinforcing cloth.
4/ Connect to solar system.
NAOM
Clean the Condensor fins, Install near earth, Shade and power with 2 Enphase IQ8’s with two 320watt PV Panel. We will do this as soon as we get samples. You may be able to get a ~700W DC to AC True PV input Inverter on Alibaba. Inverter may need a supercap on the DC side to crank the AC compressor to remain Battery free. It’s all about Staring the compressor. Single phase cap start motors suck, are what they are.
https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2018/08/20/enphase-going-einstein-with-iq8-solar-power-inverters/
Most common small to medium chest freezers use the shell as condenser which is why I suggested installing a fin condenser. Obviously, if it already has one then no change is needed before adding insulation. Any inverter would need to be able to handle the peak surge current which would be many time the run current.
NAOM
“Any inverter would need to be able to handle the peak surge current which would be many time the run current.” – But where does the Starting Energy come from?, we are Talking Batteryless. PV Generaterated Thermal Phase Change Energy Storage. With DC no Problem, The Meanwell HLG-480-30A 200+Volt to 30V has plenty of Energy in the Caps and HF Magnetics to crank a locked rotor. It may work with an Inverter to AC Motor, but you need run times on Dark Cloudy days requiring even larger PV Array. PV is so cheap if you have the space. Everything we do for Critical systems we strive for a 30 year Life or at Least Decades of service. Hence the Reason to Ditch AC if Possible.
LED supply PSU, interesting. Bit close to the limit for my fridge/freezer which peaks just under 500W, I like more headroom. Do you know of any dc to ac inverters that can run off a string of panels giving about 150V?
NAOM
Longtimber,
You seem very knowledgeable on solar power. A post summarizing pointers on how to design a home solar system would be great, or even something short pointing to good resources either on the web or in print.
peakoilbarrel @gmail.com is my address if you are interested.
MANY ANIMALS CAN’T ADAPT FAST ENOUGH TO CLIMATE CHANGE
“Climate change has thrown our beautifully balanced planet into chaos. As oceans and forests transform and ecosystems go into shock, perhaps a million species teeter on the edge of extinction. But there may still be hope for these organisms. Some will change their behaviors in response to soaring global temperatures; they might, say, reproduce earlier in the year, when it’s cooler. Others may even evolve to cope—perhaps by shrinking, because smaller frames lose heat more quickly…
For the moment, though, scientists have little idea how these adaptations may be playing out. A new paper in Nature Communications, coauthored by more than 60 researchers, aims to bring a measure of clarity. By sifting through 10,000 previous studies, the researchers found that the climatic chaos we’ve sowed may just be too intense. Some species seem to be adapting, yes, but they aren’t doing so fast enough. That spells, in a word, doom.”
https://www.wired.com/story/many-animals-arent-adapting-fast-enough-to-survive-climate-change/?verso=true
By sifting through 10,000 previous studies, the researchers found that the climatic chaos we’ve sowed may just be too intense. Some species seem to be adapting, yes, but they aren’t doing so fast enough. That spells, in a word, doom.”
Anyone who has an understanding about evolution and ecology knows that adaptation to change takes time. We know that in the past changes occurred over many thousands of years. Rapid change has always led to major extinction events. The rate of changes currently occurring are orders of magnitude beyond anything that has previously happened on this planet.
Not good!
I’m an independent politically. I firmly believe the climate has been continually changing, but not as drastic as many of these researchers like to say. Instead, I think the biggest issue is that because human beings are the planet’s dominant species with the most needs, we should be doing more to recycle and reuse our planet’s resources so enough will still be around for our descendants.
will still be around for our descendants.
Such a optimist!
For starters, we should be placing the animals we expect to stay around for a long time into protected areas.
“Listen to the science”. Indeed, why is that so bloody difficult?
TEEN CLIMATE ACTIVIST TO FRENCH CRITICS: LISTEN TO SCIENCE
“Swedish teen climate activist Greta Thunberg has told lawmakers at France’s lower house of parliament that they need to listen to scientists on the issue of climate change and act now to avert a catastrophe. Thunberg spoke Tuesday in a conference room, invited by lawmakers from several parties. She has drawn criticism from some conservative and far-right lawmakers. Thunberg said youth like herself are only communicating what scientists have learned about climate change, citing a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. She said if people don’t reduce CO2 levels, the world will reach a tipping point by 2030 with no way to reverse things.”
Thunberg, who has sparked student climate protests around the world, received the first Freedom Prize of France’s Normandy region on Sunday.
https://phys.org/news/2019-07-teen-climate-activist-french-critics.html
“Listen to the science”. Indeed, why is that so bloody difficult?
Simple! Most people, even those who consider themselves highly educated, are basically mathematically and scientifically illiterate! On top of that people have deeply held ideological beliefs that they cling to. People don’t want to hear that they need to change! Especially if scientists are giving them some rather dire news.
Case in point:
https://www.france24.com/en/20190723-france-mps-greta-thunberg-boycott-iceland-glavier-israel-settlements-laughter-dad-jokes
Environmental cynicism? French MPs to boycott Greta Thunberg visit, calling her vision ‘apocalyptic’
Especially if scientists are giving them some rather dire news.
Yep—
https://resistanceradioprn.podbean.com/e/resistance-radio-dahr-jamail/
A couple of reads on Iran, for those inclined. I’m not wholesale in with their analysis, but the writers do bring an interesting lens to the issues.
https://lobelog.com/for-iranians-the-war-has-already-begun-2/
https://lobelog.com/the-iran-nuclear-controversy-is-a-symptom-of-other-problems/
INDIA TURNS TO ELECTRIC VEHICLES TO BEAT POLLUTION
In 2017, Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari shocked the automobile industry (and the world) when he announced that he intended for India to move to 100% electric cars by 2030: “I am going to do this, whether you like it or not. And I am not going to ask you. I will bulldoze it,” he said at an industry conference.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-48961525
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/plaque-memorializes-first-icelandic-glacier-lost-climate-change-180972710/
It’s enough to make a grown man cry, if he really understands whats going on and what it means to all the little kids in the world.
Solve 3 or 4 problems with 1 simple solution.
https://www.bbc.com/news/av/stories-49072274/stopping-child-marriage-with-solar-lanterns
NAOM
Arctic Sea ice area is now tracking just below the 2012 value for this date, slightly less than 6 million km2.
Stay tuned to see if the area reaches the 2012 low or not. This year ice area was significantly lower than the 2012 levels into the beginning of June. Since then it has stayed with the 2012 levels, meaning more solar energy was absorbed by the Arctic Ocean than in 2012 so far.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/worlds-most-northerly-permanent-settlement-set-record-high-temperature-180972702/
Yep, all we need is a strong El Nino to combine with warm Arctic weather patterns and the Arctic will tip.
Double whammy?
EUROPE HEATWAVE: FRENCH CITY OF BORDEAUX HITS RECORD TEMPERATURE
The French city of Bordeaux has hit its highest temperature since records began, as Western Europe braces for the second heatwave to hit this summer.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-49083283
Meanwhile
CLIMATE CHANGE: 12 YEARS TO SAVE THE PLANET? MAKE THAT 18 MONTHS
Do you remember the good old days when we had “12 years to save the planet”? Now it seems, there’s a growing consensus that the next 18 months will be critical in dealing with the global heating crisis, among other environmental challenges…
The idea that 2020 is a firm deadline was eloquently addressed by one of the world’s top climate scientists, speaking back in 2017. The climate math is brutally clear: While the world can’t be healed within the next few years, it may be fatally wounded by negligence until 2020,” said Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, founder and now director emeritus of the Potsdam Climate Institute…
The sense that the end of next year is the last chance saloon for climate change is becoming clearer all the time. “I am firmly of the view that the next 18 months will decide our ability to keep climate change to survivable levels and to restore nature to the equilibrium we need for our survival,” said Prince Charles, speaking at a reception for Commonwealth foreign ministers recently…
And, one of the understated headlines in last year’s IPCC report was that global emissions of carbon dioxide must peak by 2020 to keep the planet below 1.5C. Current plans are nowhere near strong enough to keep temperatures below the so-called safe limit. Right now, we are heading towards 3C of heating by 2100 not 1.5.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-48964736
Reasons to be cheerful?
Whether it’s the evidence of heatwaves, or the influence of Swedish school striker Greta Thunberg, or the rise of Extinction Rebellion, there has been a marked change in public interest in stories about climate change and a hunger for solutions that people can put in place in their own lives. People are demanding significant action, and politicians in many countries have woken up to these changes. For the sake of the innocents, two legged or four, I hope so.
Yes, and by the time the population comes to grips with the issue enough to make a big impact on CO2 emissions, most of the available carbon will have been oxidized. It seems.
How else to get back to warm world?
If you look hard enough for it, there’s a bit of silver lining in every cloud, so they say.
It occurs to me that since at the fundamental level, people are all basically pretty much alike, and believe what the WANT to believe, that the silver lining associated with the black Republican storm clouds is that many millions of people who ordinarily wouldn’t be paying much if ANY attention to the environment and climate, or even politics in general, ARE paying some attention … because they disbelieve anything coming from the Trump camp and tend to believe anything coming from the preferred liberal /Democrat establishment.It REALLY helps that as far as actual science is concerned, the D’s are RIGHT, lol.
So millions of young women in particular, and younger men as well, who would otherwise be paying little or no attention to the environmental issues are paying attention NOW… because the enemy is accusing them of supporting fake science……
There’s no better way to create an enemy that to accuse a person of being a crook or scam artist, or a fraud of any sort, and the R party, as it exists today, is working hard on destroying itself, so far as the younger generations are concerned.
BUT having said this, I have to say that I also understand WHY so many Republican politicians who SHOULD be speaking out against Trump, and WANT to speak out against him, fail to do so. They know without a shadow of a doubt that if they do, Trump will sic his base on them during the upcoming primary season, and that threat keeps them in line. If Trump wants them gone, his rabid fan base will get rid of them. This leaves them between the proverbial rock and a hard place.
If they are in a competitive or near competitive district or state, they are at high risk of losing to their D opponent in the actual election, due to their failure to break with Trump.
Some Democrats who lost close races in elections gone lost because they failed to speak up against other Democrats who were less than ideal ethical role models, such as Bill and Hillary.
I can’t PROVE this assertion, but a number of people known to me personally either stayed home or voted R because of WhiteWater, Cattle Gate, Email, Bill’s messing around with the female help, donations to the Clinton Foundation from questionable shady characters with business before the State Department, etc etc.
Some people, hopefully a LOT of people, who voted for Trump will either stay home or vote D this time, for similar reasons. Some Republicans, local, state and national level are going to lose because they’re afraid to denounce Trump.
If they do, not only do they risk losing their own primary , they also risk putting a Democrat in their seat, because any challenger coming from the Trump wing of the R party is at high to very high risk of losing in a competitive race. So they’re damned if they do, and sooner, in the primaries, and probably damned as well if they don’t, later, in the actual election. A good many Republicans in competitive districts are no doubt already looking at possible new career opportunities.
“Republican politicians who SHOULD be speaking out against Trump, and WANT to speak out against him, fail to do so. They know without a shadow of a doubt that if they do, Trump will sic his base on them during the upcoming primary season, and that threat keeps them in line. If Trump wants them gone, his rabid fan base will get rid of them. This leaves them between the proverbial rock and a hard place. ”
Simply because Republicans are “me first” kind of people.
Just like the Liar n’ Chief
What about those on 6, 8, 10 or 0 legs? They matter too. 🙁 or should that be 🙁
NAOM
0 legs! Sounds like snakes. I’m not keen on snakes, especially sea snakes. 6, 8, or even 100 is OK, as long as they have legs. 😉
And worms. Worms are useful and essential for healthy soil.
NAOM
Fear of snakes is primordial.
IMHO, snakes are cool, growing up in Brazil I encountered many and never had a problem. Live and let live!
BTW, sea snake neurotoxin is probably one of the most potent neurotoxins known but sea snakes are quite shy and they have relatively small fangs.
Cheers!
Yeah sure, snakes are cool, as in cold blooded. You take the snakes, I’ll take puppies. Besides, a snake was guilty of causing the human transition to a world of pain and mortality, it says so in the Bible — small fangs or not! 😉
Yeah sure, snakes are cool, as in cold blooded.
They’re solar powered 😉
Humans are a little solar powered, too. Without it humans don’t make enough vitamin D, and in winter they get Seasonal Affect Disorder.
Last sea snake I saw had had an encounter with a propeller, spoiled its day. Had several baby rat snakes recently plus one big one, I never knew snakes could hurdle low walls when pursued by cats!
NAOM
Let us say the Democrats win House, Senate and Presidency in 2020, they start in 2021. The first year will be cleaning out the Augean stable and trying to recruit new talent. That means the USA will not get moving until 2022. What was that about needing to start in 2020? Were fucked.
NAOM
https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/17/asia/india-nepal-flooding-climate-refugees-intl-hnk/
There’s an embedded graphic that has temperature predictions for some cities in 2050 from Crowther Lab, probably spelled incorrectly. Does anybody here know this outfit, and if these predictions are in line with other predictions made by reputable organizations?
There is some discussion of water supplies as well.
My opinion at the moment, as a farmer, is that the first really and truly shit in the fan on the GRAND scale refugee problem will be due to the loss of irrigation water, either groundwater or runoff from the snowfields, both in combination in some places.The water seems to be depleting faster than the climate is warming.
There’s no existing technology that will enable poor people and poor countries to grow enough food with significantly less water than they are using now, no alternative crop or crops that will serve on the necessary scale, and a near zero chance that any such alternative technologies or crops can be developed and widely deployed before the crisis hits.
Exponential growth in the EV business? Well, maybe not exponential. 😉
TESLA MODEL S REGISTRATIONS PLUNGE 54% IN CALIFORNIA
“Musk had built his business on the idea being able to deliver a combined annual total of 100,000 Model S and Model X vehicles. So far, in the first half of this year Tesla has delivered just 29,750 of the units, combined, which is down 33% from 44,100 last year.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-07-24/ahead-todays-q2-numbers-tesla-model-s-registrations-plunge-54-california-0
Even Californians have to pay SOME attention to the price of a new car, lol, and from what I read in the automotive press, most people believe the THREE is an even better car, at about half or not much more than half the price.
I don’t know a lot of rich or really well off people, but among the ones I do know, they buy top of the line cars because such cars are the ultimate VISIBLE status symbol. It doesn’t matter if you live in a million dollar house, in terms of status, because the vast majority of the people you are likely to come into contact with will never SEE your house, but a hell of a lot of them WILL see your car.
They may tell you they drive a BMW because it’s a high performance driver’s car, but the fact that they have a driver’s license proves otherwise. Not one high performance car out of a thousand is ever driven on a drag strip or race track, and probably not more than one out of hundred ever gets any closer than the spectator’s parking lot.
Tesla volume and revenue are growing by leaps and bounds. Math and history tell us that an oil supply crisis is inevitable, it’s a question of when, not if. When it hits, reservations for new Tesla’s will go thru the roof. Ditto any other respected electric car that’s actually available for sale, rather than vaporware.
So quiet, so fast, so durable.
A German man has now over 900,000 km on his Tesla S odometer-
https://insideevs.com/news/359939/tesla-model-s-900000-kilometers-odometer/
“Even Californians have to pay SOME attention to the price of a new car, lol,”
And you know this how ? Because you stayed in a Motel 6 one night in South Carolina
“Musk had built his business on the idea being able to deliver a combined annual total of 100,000 Model S and Model X vehicles.
Really?! You do realize that the Tesla of the moment is neither of those two vehicles, It is the Model 3.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/502208/tesla-quarterly-vehicle-deliveries/
Tesla delivered around 95,200 vehicles during the second quarter of 2019. This figure represents a new record following the electric carmaker’s previous peak between October and December 2018, when 90,700 units were delivered.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oabkv2XM_g
Tesla Sales Set ALL-TIME High in Q2 2019 Beating Analysts Expectations
Fair enough Fred. Actually, I confess to knowing almost nothing about US vehicle sales; where I live most people have two vehicles, a SUV and a pickup truck. And, apparently light trucks now take a record 69% of U.S. market. Doesn’t matter, with the exponential growth in EV sales pretty soon the Earth’s surface will be covered with them. 😉
https://www.autonews.com/sales/light-trucks-take-record-69-us-market
Light trucks cover everything in the US except purposely built passenger cars. Crossovers that get 30 mpg are light trucks. Minivans and other passenger vehicles are designated as light trucks.
So everything except a sedan or coupe is a light truck in the US. I have a light truck that gets 35 mpg on the highway. Go figure.
I have a 4,000# SUV with 300hp and capable of towing 3500# that gets 40 mpg Interstate @ 60mph. That’s how I “figure”.
Until this very minute, I was SURE old HB owns at least half a dozen Beemers, a couple of Rolls, and a few Mercedes, and that he has chaffeurs so he can check up on his investments online rather than driving.
Everybody knows Californians are all so rich they can afford ninety thousand thousand dollar cars as easily as a poor old hillbilly such as yours truly can afford a Coca Cola.
Well we all know what happens when you assume.
I own one single American brand vehicle assembled in a southern state of Tennessee. But that won’t happen again if the south continues it’s politics of racism.
Nothing wrong with a Tesla make in California
Climate change feedback?
‘UNPRECEDENTED’ WILDFIRES RAVAGE THE ARCTIC
“More than 100 intense wildfires have ravaged the Arctic since June, with scientists describing the blazes as “unprecedented.” New satellite images show huge clouds of smoke billowing across uninhabited land in Greenland, Siberia and parts of Alaska. The wildfires come after the planet experienced the hottest June on record and is on track to experience the hottest July on record, as heatwaves sweep across Europe and the United States.”
https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/24/world/wildfires-arctic-climate-sci-intl/index.html
Meanwhile,
A RECORD MELT EVENT IN MID-JUNE
“Between June 11 and 20, an extensive area of the Greenland ice sheet surface melted. At its peak on June 12, thawing climbed from the western and eastern coasts to elevations above 3,000 meters (9,800 feet). High air pressure and clockwise circulation around the island brought warm air from the south and sunny conditions. While several recent years have had similar early widespread melt events, the event of June 11 to 20 reached a peak of just over 700,000 square kilometers (270,000 square miles), setting a record for this early in the melt season. Models estimate the amount of melted ice at approximately 80 billion tons for that period.”
http://nsidc.org/greenland-today/2019/07/a-record-melt-event-in-mid-june/
Greenland Ice Cap has less than 500 years left.
Doug, you’re just like the Energizer Bunny, you never quit with all the newest alarmism day after day after day. I’m honestly quite impressed. ??
Is passing along some news (and the odd report) about potential climate feedback events alarmism? If so I’m happy to oblige, and leave grunt work to the kids who care enough about our little blue dot to take on the thankless work of getting their elders of their collective asses and actually do something, before it’s too late — assuming it isn’t already!
Kal90 prefers alarmism he gets on Fox news.
Here come the socialist.
They’re going to take away your meat, your submachine gun, and right to pray in your home.
Brainwash=brain mush.
And you are like this!
.
Yeah, perhaps I should have added: As a retired geologist-geophysicist-engineer, I confess to having done bad stuff. Like running surveys from the Arctic to the South China Sea, setting of countless thousands of seismic charges without the slightest regard to innumerable sea creatures that were no doubt killed or maimed in the process, all so you and your buddies could run around in gas guzzling vehicles. At least I’m willing to admit our generation fucked up, big time – and we continue to do so.
I don’t know about you, but I was born under the threat of nuclear bombs. That never changed. I also grew up in a plume of horrible pollution, that reduced but never fully went away. As a young adult it was still pollution, scarce fuel and global warming. Also the natural world was under heavy attack.
Well, the nuclear weapons stayed, the pollution became less (also less visible) but just mostly moved elsewhere while on the increase, global warming kept growing fast, global environmental problems grew, the natural world is still under heavy attack. The only thing that mostly leveled out was availability of fuels.
See, Doug, you helped one thing. So far, though I hear there is trouble ahead with that.
But to summarize, the world was already screwed when I was born. Not much we could have done to change that since the majority is deaf, dumb and blind to much of what goes on.
We were trained in the religion of science and technology, a necessary thing to keep the lid on the nuclear exchange program and keep the ball of wax rolling. If either side weakened much it could have spelled instant disaster. People forget so soon how close we were to mutual destruction and still are.
Meanwhile the large slower threats have escalated and are now looking almost as bad as nuclear exchange, just slower.
Catch 22 all the way from first breath to last.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvHtWjh-M2M
Greta Thunberg full speech at the National Assembly in Paris
If a 16 year old girl can understand the science and take the trouble to actually read the IPCC report why can’t you?
Great speech Fred. Makes me proud to be called an “alarmist”.
Yep!
H.L Mencken, who died January 29, 1956, was an absolute genius. His foresight will be recognized and adored for many decades to come.
“As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”
― H.L. Mencken, On Politics: A Carnival of Buncombe
H.L Mencken was an absolute genius. His foresight will be recognized and adored for many decades to come.
Unfortunately that will have been genius wasted because due to the very trend he predicted, there will be no one left who might be capable of appreciating it…
Cheers!
“Our constitution protects aliens, drunks and U.S. Senators.”
— Will Rogers
Unfortunately, Mencken is systematically marginalized by the more militant elements of the current day PC/ liberal establishment, the same elements that would like to ban Twain from our schools because he too used words that are no longer acceptable.
We shouldn’t underestimate the power of such people, on either extreme. They are quite capable of silencing more reasonable voices, right or left.
A typical English lit instructor at a typical college or university would just as soon not have to deal with being called lots of dirty names and forced to defend himself before the school administration because he includes Mencken in his syllabus.
I have occasionally posted a comment to the effect that once LEVIATHAN, a large modern nation state focuses it’s energy on a particular goal, near miraculous things can happen, in the course of pointing out that IF we were to put our minds and backs into it, collectively, we might be able to turn things around, or at least rather than crashing and burning, walk away.
When I use the best single example known to large numbers of people, namely nazi era Germany, I’m invariably flamed as a nazi myself, or worse.
They went from utterly ruined at the end of WWI to desperately short of everything except manpower at roughly the start of the Depression, and within the span of a single decade built the most powerful war machine ever. There’s no physical law or technical reason why we can’t solve our economic and environmental problems today. It’s just a question of whether we can muster the will power to do so.
It’s possible that we might find that will power….. if we suffer enough hard licks upside our collective head to get our attention, and hold it.
“There’s no physical law or technical reason why we can’t solve our economic and environmental problems today. It’s just a question of whether we can muster the will power to do so.”
Sure there is. It’s the “have the cake and eat it too” law. Not going to happen for much longer. Being the only animals with a wide range of choice we are not very limited. Having low constraints means we do everything we can for the most part. The world does not work that way. The natural laws of population and food supply still apply. The Red Queen is starting to gasp for breath and getting quite overheated.
Not saying that significant positive change is outside the realm of possibility, but given the abilities and temperament of humans it looks very low on the probability scale.
I think these record heatwaves might start to worry people a little more than usual. Likely to remove some doubt from people who are being fed denialist crap and were doubting the science. Nobody likes being told, “See, I told ya!”
But what about the coming grand solar minimum, new ice age and it’s just the weather?
sarc (sort of)
Response to heat waves. More Air Conditioning.
Nobody likes being told, “See, I told ya!”
Too bad!
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/jul/24/scientific-consensus-on-humans-causing-global-warming-passes-99
The scientific consensus that humans are causing global warming is likely to have passed 99%, according to the lead author of the most authoritative study on the subject, and could rise further after separate research that clears up some of the remaining doubts.
Maybe when it gets to 99.99999%
the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”
It’s an enormous mistake to underestimate Trump – if people hadn’t underestimated him, they might have prevented him. He’s not a moron at all – he’s a genius at manipulating voters. He tells them what they want to hear, he entertains them, he gives them scapegoats and makes them feel good. He’s the definition of a masterful demagogue, and his candidacy was built on the back of an effective and long term planning effort by psychopathic billionaires determined to cripple democracy.
It’s an enormous mistake to underestimate Trump and the machine that put him in power.
Methinks you take things way too literally.
But you are right about the demagogue part, though that may just be his inherent character. That and fits of anger.
I have heard several republicans say they will not vote for him again.
This is worth the time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-yydKjuMAM
This could have really pissed someone off if they had got in the way.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/jul/25/indian-farmers-shocked-as-suspected-meteorite-crashes-into-rice-field
UK energy is moving towards the future.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jul/25/low-carbon-energy-makes-majority-of-uk-electricity-for-first-time
One company that is doing it
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/jul/25/uk-solar-power-pioneer-solarcentury-profit-grows-860-in-a-year
Coincidentally, I have just found a local solar PV supplier that seems to be using UK panels, I may investigate further.
NAOM
Major automakers strike climate deal with California, rebuffing Trump’s mileage freeze
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Major-automakers-strike-climate-deal-with-14128028.php
Calif does take the Fat Boy with a smile—–
New posts up
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-july-25-2019/
http://peakoilbarrel.com/us-tight-oil-legacy-decline-and-us-tight-oil-scenarios/