EIA’s Electric Power Monthly – October 2017 Edition with data for August

317 thoughts to “EIA’s Electric Power Monthly – October 2017 Edition with data for August”

1. Hi Islandboy,

   Rather than capacity can we look at growth rates of net generation from the various sources (coal, hydro, nuclear, natural gas, wind, and solar) for the past 3 or 5 years? Maybe take 12 month average output from Sept to Aug for each source to account for seasonal effects. I imagine you have this data already loaded into a spreadsheet. I took a quick look at non-hydro renewables using 12 month average output from 2015 to 2017 and the average growth rate was 14% per year for net MWhrs generated (including rooftop PV not owned by utilities). If that growth rate continues until 2035 and total net generation remains flat (it has been decreasing since 2007), then renewables will be able to produce the total average output by 2035, though some nuclear and natural gas might be needed to cover variability. A continued growth until 2040 at 14% per year would almost double output and nuclear and natural gas may no longer be needed (or can cover the 1-2% of load hours that might not be covered by widespread wind, and solar, with limited hydro backup.)

   1. I had to extract the data from the main table to make the chart below and the monthly data only goes back to January 2013 so, it just covers three periods, the twelve months up to the end of August of 2015, 2016 and 2017. Since the spreadsheet doesn’t have data for September to December of 2012, there is not enough data to work out the growth rate between September 2012 to August 2013 and September 2013 to August 2014. We will have to wait until the end of February 2018, when the data for December 2017 will be released, to get another data set.

      Looking at the graph it’s impossible not to notice the high growth rates of solar relative to everything else. Nuclear has been very stable, which is not surprising since nuclear plants are run flat out as much as possible and there has been very little change in nuclear capacity. The decline in production from coal seems to have been arrested so far for 2017 with a decline in production from NG being experienced instead. The other growth story from the chart is wind.

      Solar at 2% market share year to date does not yet pose a major threat to any of the major sources but, if it continues to grow at anything like the rate over the past decade or so, it could have a significant impact on the market within another couple of years. Maybe the build of of NG fired capacity is a response by the utilities to prepare for a much larger contribution from intermittent (low cost) sources than has existed in the past. If a significant portion of the generation does not have fuel cost per kWh associated with it, maybe it is possible to work with the higher cost of NG as a fuel and still have acceptable average electricity prices.

      

      1. Thanks Islandboy.

         The solar plus wind growth rate averaged about 14% per year, but your chart shows solar is the big story, interesting. It will surely help with the summer peak, but we will need a lot in the south and good transmission capacity to handle winter if solar is a big player. Northern sites could potentially use some heat pump water heating with thermal storage along with an over build and a powerwall for night time lighting. Passive solar would also help with space heating with a large slab or other type of storage system for heat. Insulated window covers to be closed at night on the south side would help along with insulation for northern facing windows (in Northern hemisphere). Even west and east facing windows probably are net losers of heat and might be better to insulate in the winter or open and close insulated shades.

         1. we will need a lot in the south and good transmission capacity to handle winter if solar is a big player.

            That would be one option, and often a good one. But, it’s not the only one: keep in mind that solar insolation may not be as bad in the north as you think. For instance, average kWh/m2/day:

            Miami, FL: 5.26
            Fargo, ND: 3.68

            Fargo gets 30% less solar energy. So, the panel portion of a solar installation will cost 43% more, and perhaps the overall installation will cost 30% more. But, you’ll eliminate transmission losses and costs and perhaps most important: NIMBY problems.

            http://solarinsolation.org/

            1. BTW, North and South Dakota are rich in wind, so solar would only be part of the equation. Very little solar in ND and SD. Lots of wind power with capacity factors over 40 percent.

               1. Hi Gonefishing,

                  Yes wind widely dispersed and interconnected by the grid will cover quite a bit, my point was simply that winter output of solar in the far North will be relatively low and demand may be high especially as we move to heat pumps powered by electricity as fossil fuels become expensive.

                  Demand will be relatively low in the South in winter (relative to summer demand) and the excess solar output can be shipped north over HVDC lines, in summer when demand is low in the North the excess solar can be shipped south.

               2. We need to cut demand levels, not feed in more to the grid. Seal leaks, insulate more, add passive and thermal collectors for heating.
                  Work smarter not harder. .

               3. Hi Gone fishing,

                  I agree. Much can be accomplished by sealing leaks and using passive solar with thermal storage. Also ground source heat pumps require relatively little electricity and potentially PV solar with heat pump water heating and storage of heated water in insulated tanks might solve some of the issue.

                  There might still be some need for an import of electricity from other regions during a long cloudy spell during midwinter. Based on my experience living north of 44 N for the past 20 years, and North of 42N for over 50 years, this might be correct.

                  Using efficiency, passive solar, and ground source heat pumps might reduce the space and water heating energy need (relative to natural gas or oil for heating) by 72% or more.

                  Potentially all energy needs might be met by local wind and solar, but it makes sense from my perspective to move excess output in one area to other areas with electricity in short supply by means of the electricity grid.

                  It is likely to be the lowest cost means of providing energy needs.

               4. Local storage in the form of hydro or hydrogen could get the areas past some shortages. Could be that we have to swing with the flow somewhat. We can’t keep doing things the same way anymore.

                  Long range transmission has losses, but is still a very viable idea. Who knows, maybe we will have a high temperature super-conductor someday, then power could move all over with only the cooling loss.
                  http://www.youris.com/energy/energy-grid/new-superconductive-material-for-long-distance-energy-transmission.kl

               5. Hi Gonefishing,

                  Yes excess could be used for pumped hydro or producing hydrogen as a storage mechanism. It might be cheaper to transmit any electricity that is needed over the HV transmission network and store any excess remaining. Over time HVAC will be replaced with HVDC lines which have lower losses. Also at some point the Tres Amigas super station may be completed so the entire US grid can trade power more easily.

                  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tres_Amigas_SuperStation

                  No doubt you know about this, but others may not.

            2. Hi Nick,

               The averages may not be that different, but the days are pretty short in the far North of the US, that won’t change by much over time.

               1. January here at 41N averages about 2.8 kWh/m2 insolation. Solar is usable up to about 50N. North of that it is merely an add-on in the fall/winter but very useful during the spring and summer with very long daylight hours.
                  Thermal has the advantage of being much more efficient than PV and mass storage is so much cheaper and easier than battery storage.
                  The other big advantage of thermal collectors has been taken advantage of in Europe even for large scale buildings. Summer insolation can be stored in large insolated underground tanks and then used to heat the buildings in the winter in addition to any insolation they get daily.

               2. Hi Gone fishing,

                  In my passive solar camp (around 45 N) I use about 35 gallons of propane (heating about 95% efficient) to keep the camp at 44 F or above. I am not there in the winter to open and close shades to reduce losses at night so southern shades stay open to get as much passive solar as is available, camp is mostly used spring through fall. The heating degree days from Dec 15 to April 1 are about 2650 adjusted to 45 F from the usual 65 F. A thick 8 inch concrete slab on top of concrete blocks arranged to allow heat flow from south to north sides of the camp is the only thermal storage no basement but frost wall is insulated to allow some thermal storage in the ground beneath the camp.

                  If I lived there in the winter I would build thermal shutters for the interior to close at sunset to reduce thermal losses. I should probably use insulation in northern and east west windows during winter, but so far have just closed the inexpensive shades (double cell).

                  The Passive Solar House by James Kachadorian was used as the basis for the design of the camp, a small 900 sq foot structure.

               3. Surface area?

               4. Hi Gone fishing,

                  No square feet of living space, about 20 by 30 footprint with 600 sq feet on first floor and 300 sq feet on second floor. Salt box style with largest wall facing south and short wall facing north with smaller windows on the North side.

2. Hi Dennis,

   I’m wondering about the decision making process that will determine how much and how fast wind and solar capacity gets built once the installed capacity is large enough that a substantial portion of that capacity is not needed a great deal of the time. Every new wind and solar farm that is built at some point will be needed LESS on average, around the clock and around the calendar.

   Storage is a wild card, and it’s probably impossible to do more than just speculate about how much storage capacity can and will be built , and how long it can be expected to last in the event of unfavorable weather( lots of clouds and little wind over large areas ) .

   Will the amount of new construction as the market for it approaches saturation be determined by market demand, or energy policies enacted by the federal and state government, or a combination of these factors, or by other factors that haven’t occurred to me??

   I’m guessing that once it gets to the point the output of a new wind or solar farm is needed only occasionally, it’s going to be very hard to new ones approved and financed, unless they are allowed to sell the output of them at VERY high prices on the relatively few days that output will be needed.

   Unless of course the construction of these seldom needed wind and solar farms happens to be mandated policy and the cost of building them is subsidized, perhaps heavily.

   And will the last few coal and gas plants that WILL be needed at times be profitable because the owners will be able to sell their output at very high prices when it’s needed, or will these plants be kept on standby via subsidies??

   Anything you, or any body else may have to say about these questions will be appreciated, especially if there are good reasons to think one or another possibility is the more likely.

   1. Here’s a bit of info. googling “capacity credits” will get more.

      http://www.pjm.com/markets-and-operations/rpm.aspx
      https://www.pjm.com/~/media/documents/manuals/m21.ashx

      These are from PJM – the NE grid. Each grid and System Operator has their own approaches.

      1. Thanks, Nick

         I will be looking very carefully at these links a little later on.

   2. Hi OFM,

      I am no expert on the subject and can only speculate. I imagine there may need to be some planning, I doubt market prices alone would take care of this. Perhaps there will be some subsidies to enhance system reliability, it’s a complex problem. Not sure what the answer is, but I imagine there will be a regulatory agency that decides what makes the most sense.

      1. Hi Dennis,

         Take a look at the links I provided above.
         There is an existing system for integrating wind and solar and ensuring system reliability, managed by the various grid ISOs (Independent System Operators).

3. Beside the asthma, lung disease, heart disease, deaths, mercury in the fish, other toxic metals, acid rain, we now have evidence of low birth weights from coal fired plants.
   https://phys.org/news/2017-04-downwind-coal-fired-power-birth-weight.html

   Time to dump coal, make electricity in other ways that make sense and don’t harm everyone and everything downwind of the burn as well as wreck the regions in and around the mines.

   BTW, the nearby town where the coal ash was being dumped stopped that process. They like their water without additives.

   1. Time to dump coal, make electricity in other ways that make sense and don’t harm everyone and everything downwind of the burn as well as wreck the regions in and around the mines.

      But, but, but! Haven’t you heard?! Without FOSSIL FUELS there is no way those poor little Africuns can avoid being sexually assaulted…

      BTW, I thought I’d add just a tiny twist of irony to this story by linking to XINHUANET’s article about it.

      http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2017-11/03/c_136725300.htm

      American largest environment group calls for Energy Secretary to resign
      Source: Xinhua| 2017-11-03 10:40:14|Editor: ying

      LOS ANGELES, Nov. 2 (Xinhua) — American’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization said Energy Secretary Rick Perry should resign over his Thursday’s remarks that fossil fuels can help prevent sexual assault.
      The California-based group Sierra Club released a statement Thursday afternoon as an official respond to Perry, who said at an event in Washington this morning that expansion of energy can help reduce sexual assaults in Africa and fossil fuels will play an important role.
      “It was already clear that Rick Perry is unfit to lead the Department of Energy, but to suggest that fossil fuel development will decrease sexual assault is not only blatantly untrue, it is an inexcusable attempt to minimize a serious and pervasive issue,” Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club, said in the statement.
      “Women, and particularly women of color, are among some of the most severely impacted by the climate crisis, and it is these same communities that are most at risk of sexual assault. Rick Perry’s attempt to exploit this struggle to justify further dangerous fossil fuel development is unacceptable,” Brune said.

      I have a hunch that Chinese manufactured and financed solar panels will be producing more electricity for those poor African women, than fossil fuels, and it will happen much sooner than later.

      Anyone who still buys the Trumpian vision of a fossil fuel powered future, anywhere on this planet, is completely delusional.

      I don’t think history will be very kind to these people!

      Oh, side note: I bet a lot of those African women will learn to fly these Chinese electric planes…

      http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2017-11/02/c_136721572.htm

      Advanced version of China’s 1st electric plane makes maiden flight

      A ground staff member checks the battery of the RX1E-A, a two-seater aircraft designed by Shenyang Aerospace University, at Caihu airport in Shenyang, capital of northeast China’s Liaoning Province, Nov. 1, 2017. An advanced version of China’s first electric plane made its maiden flight on Wednesday, extending the single flight time to two hours from around 45 minutes. (Xinhua/Pan Yulong)

      1. When you are governed by clowns, you live in a circus.

      2. With DT giving the world tremors by saying the US will totally destroy North Korea I think that people of sober mind need to do something about this. There is no good way out of this once the bombs start flying.
         We need to stop being played by Russia.

   2. Incoming EPA Adviser Thinks Air Is Too Clean

      http://www.newsweek.com/robert-phalen-epa-air-too-clean-700143

      “The relative risks associated with modern [particulate matter] are very small and confounded by many factors,” Phalen wrote. “Neither toxicology studies nor human clinical investigations have identified the components and/or characteristics of [particulate matter] that might be causing the health-effect associations.”

      1. Sounds like the tobacco industry got hold of the EPA.

         1. The biggest single risk of failure of regulatory agencies to do their job is capture of the agency by the industry it is supposed to regulate.

            Then the agency morphs into one working to protect the industry rather than the people.

            1. It’s a government takeover and most of the nation is not represented.
               Next week is time to do what I can, vote. Little as it is, at least it sends a message.

4. This one’s for HB.

   http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/358531-sanders-supporters-see-vindication-in-braziles-dnc-revelations

   I’m wondering if he will call Donna Brazile a trumpster ( trumpstress ?) . 😉

   Former Democratic National Committee (DNC) chairwoman Donna Brazile’s accusations that the party favored Hillary Clinton during the presidential primary have reopened old divisions,

   Brazile levied the charges Thursday in a Politico excerpt of her forthcoming book, “Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns that Put Donald Trump in the White House.

   1. “We learned today from the former Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Donna Brazile that the Clinton campaign in her view did rig the presidential nominating process by entering into an agreement to control day-to-day operations at the DNC,” Tapper said, continuing on to describe specific arms of the DNC the Clinton camp had a say over, including strategy and staffing, noting that the agreement was “entered into in August of 2015,” months before Clinton won the nomination.

      Warren called that “a real problem.”

      “But what we’ve got to do as Democrats now, is we’ve got to hold this party accountable,” Warren said.

      The Massachusetts Democrat is seen as a possible presidential contender in 2020 and beyond.

      Tapper then asked, “Do you agree with the notion that it was rigged?” And Warren responded simply: “Yes.”

      Another groundbreaking finding from the N. S. Sherlock institute of current events?

5. Public health is one of the most pressing issues of our time.

   The subject was brought up in the other thread, which is supposed to be about petroleum only.

   Pets are extremely important to the well being of people who for any reason are isolated from enjoying the company of other people on a regular basis, and by regular I mean all the time.

   Given that I’m a soft hearted old communist election hacker Trumpster , I allow people to have pets in my rental properties. It’s cruel to deny people, especially old people, who can’t get out much, if at all, the companionship of a dog or cat or any other reasonably safe animal.

   This costs me a little more in maintenance, but I’m dead certain it actually generates a net profit for me by way of making it easy to find creditworthy tenants who take good care of the property and STAY PUT.

   An old woman or man who once thinks of a place as home doesn’t EXPECT new carpet every year, or the walls to be repaired and repainted, because the dog dug a hole in a corner or chewed on a window molding, and moving doesn’t even occur to such tenants. . The more the dog messes up, the more she comes to appreciate that if she moves, her next landlord will either make her get rid of her dog or cat, or pay thru the nose for repeated repairs. I take near perfect care of leaks, plumbing, electrical, and similar problems, and keep everything shipshape in general, and don’t worry about floors being less than pristine.

   So long as the place is safe and sound and comfortable, the next tenant will be VERY glad to find rent it with the floor “already pet ready”, lol.

   I don’t allow tom cats because getting out the cat piss smell is a tough and expensive job once the tenant does eventually move out…… to a nursing home or cemetery. And I don’t allow pit bulls or other dogs that have a tendency to bite.

   This sort of thing is very old news to anybody with even the most modest training in the medical field. It’s taught in the first or second semester of a four semester course in professional nursing, which is the minimum needed to sit for the professional license exam in my state. It’s also included in the assigned reading materials used in teacher training courses, although ed professors don’t have time to cover it in classes organized around teaching in elementary and high schools.

   1. Once someone is generally alone, they can choose to enjoy the freedom and peace or angst about it and live a depressed life. Friends come and go in this mobile society and are often at a distance. If one wants company and is able, join community activities and travel with groups.
      But again, despite protestations to the otherwise, a lot of it is mindset. If it’s dead one’s or the past one misses, there is no going back only forward. So why put anchors and chains on oneself like a living Jacob Marley ghost? Learn to wander on in whatever landscape you find yourself in. The sun still rises, the birds still sing, the flowers still grow and who knows what is around the next corner.
      No one ever said getting old would be easy or that being young was a guaranty of success.
      BTW, our culture and society is designed to isolate people. It has it’s plusses and minuses. We have no control over what time or culture we are dropped into at birth. After a while it is up to us.

      1. There is a very solid consensus in the scientific community that living alone, isolated from other people, is very bad for such people that find themselves in this situation.

         We’re social creatures, programmed by evolution to live in intimate contact with our own kind.

         Some solitude is good. I treasure my time alone, but I don’t want to be alone for very long at a stretch. Very few people deliberately isolate themselves unless they are already suffering from some sort of emotional or mental issue, or perhaps because they are engaged in behaviors that are frowned on.

         1. How do you know so much about people Old Farmer.? Have you been blessed with special knowledge? People vary and much like the birds don’t read bird books, people do not fall within the pages of books either. Only an arrogant fool would believe that all knowledge is written down and taught. Any person of understanding knows that a book or whole subject area only contains what some men have learned about a subject and some of that will be wrong. Knowledge only is a representation of a portion of reality, not reality itself, nowhere near.

            “Very few people deliberately isolate themselves unless they are already suffering from some sort of emotional or mental issue, or perhaps because they are engaged in behaviors that are frowned on.”

            Ah, the Bible teaching comes out. The person must be doing bad things or ill if he acts differently. Maybe they are not sick, just sick of arrogant judgmental assholes who live in tiny mental boxes. But people like that cannot take or comprehend being ostracized themselves, so the person leaving the flock or tribe must be sick or twisted. They must be witches in league with the devil.

            At least atheists are honest about it. Most so called Christians are that in name only and live a lie or at most a half-truth. Appearance is the name of the game. Truth is far from it and only a name.
            What it basically comes down to is chest beating and king of the hill stuff. Who is bigger or stronger or smarter, who rules, who has the money. The pursuit of territory and power. The rest is just frills, camouflage, nastiness or delusion. Nothing has really changed since cave-man days.
            I will bet good money if you could hear the thoughts of other people you would probably never want to go near them again. But they are stupid and talk to other people about it, because most people have little control over themselves in the long run. They sooner or later reveal themselves. It’s a rare and smart person that can keep his mouth shut or is honest enough that he doesn’t have to be quiet all the time.

            Nope, people are not allowed to make their own choices without being labeled by some know-it-all who often can barely think. Often the “nice” ones rape their children, beat their wives, act like tyrants and then go off to church looking like they are just fine. I think the child rape rate is about 20 percent (that we know of) and the rate of domestic violence is about 30 percent.
            Those child rapists and wife beaters and children beaters are great church goers and quick to judge other people in a negative way. They just don’t know who knows their secrets. Makes them angry and nervous.
            But as I said, people can’t keep their mouths shut.

            And then there are the con-artists, sociopaths and mental cases.
            So what is so great about hanging around with people?

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0guEKMVYmZ8&list=RDpZ6mCI3wpEk&index=4

            1. If you will spend about five seconds typing in the words “effects of isolation on mental health” you will get more hits than you can read in a year in a very small fraction of a second, lol.

               Here’s one of the first three or four I got. I selected this particular one because it’s government sourced from the UK, where they have a health care system that is more equitable than the one we have here in the USA.

               https://www3.havering.gov.uk/Documents/Public-health/PH/docs/Mental-Health.pdf

               I suggest you read it. It’s comprehensible to laymen.

               I know a few things. Perhaps it’s worthwhile explaining how I came to know them.

               For fifty years plus I have spent at least four hours a day reading, on average, and except for what I read for entertainment, which is not very much, I have always selected books written by people with solid reputations in their particular field. Sometimes I lived in the woods in a camper just emerging to go to the library every couple of days for months at a time, or to visit with friends or family . NEVER bought a new car in my entire life, habitually wear old jeans and flannel shirts, never paid rent more than maybe three years total, and that in short stretches while in the process of selecting the next job of buying and renovating an old house. Worked in nukes a month or two at a stretch on shutdowns making good money, etc, so I could take it easy for months on end afterward. No kids. No expensive habits. All my recreational activities are self supporting, such as fishing, hunting, restoring old cars, flea marketing, etc. I have a car and a truck, currently,the two together worth maybe three thousand bucks on the used car market. I will most likely drive both of them another five years, if I am able to drive that much longer. BEEN driving the truck fifteen years already. I have more free time by a MILE than my attorney, my physician, or anybody else I know who works for big bucks, lol. My two one percenter sisters manage to ENJOY themselves maybe a month out of the year, when they are on vacation. The rest of the time, they’re either at work or on call. Neither of them has sense enough to retire, as I see things.

               Enrolled in grad school for ten years or so as a “special graduate student” meaning Va Tech, UVA, and VCU were glad to have my tuition money, without my ever even having an advisor, lol. Mostly taking one or two courses per semester. Went to the local community college and took almost all the courses offered in automotive technology back in the nineties. ( Campus is where the most attractive physically and intellectually attractive unattached women are to be found, lol, and also the best route to meeting a LOT of people via classes and social activities.)

               Took my degree in agriculture, which is applied biology,meaning I have as many biology courses as biology majors in their junior year. Took extra courses in psychology, etc, to enable me to get a professional license as a teacher in my state. Went almost all the way thru nursing school in my sixties so as to better know how to look after myself and parents and other people who may need me, but dropped out when the home front situation went critical. Lots of women there, although most of them were WAY to young to look at me, lol. I was one of only four guys out of about eighty, lol.

               Spend a couple of hours a day, at least, in forums such as this one, where the subject matter is primarily about critical issues such as energy, climate, etc. Sometimes the entire day, depending on the weather and how my dear old Daddy is doing.

               You are displaying your own ignorance, prejudices, a and arrogance when you shoot off your mouth about “bible teaching”. You may have failed to take notice of the fact that I AM an self described hard core Darwinist, and an athiest , as practical matter, although TECHNICALLY I am an agnostic. I have said so numerous times in this forum.

               If you will take the time to actually THINK about all the people you have ever known, you will realize that hermits are pretty goddamned scarce, lol. Maybe one person out of a hundred remains voluntarily secluded to a great extreme, excepting those who are unable to get out and socialize easily, due to age, infirmity, or lack of economic resources, etc. Most of these people watch television, which provides an ersatz community for them. The more fortunate ones among them also very often have pets, if their situation allows.

               If I have ever had a career, it would have to be described as ” world class rolling stone” laid back non materialistic old time hippie who as he got older got wiser. I get bored VERY quickly, and it takes very little time to master a new trade or skill once you have mastered half a dozen others. This is not to say I’m a PRO carpenter, but I can work alongside pro carpenters. I can work with pro plumbers, pro truckers, pro electricians, although the MORE INTELLIGENT guys who do one thing all the time are better than I am. I can drive better, wire better, plumb better, and weld better, etc, than a LOT of people who do these things day after day to get their living.

               If you are competent in high school algebra, you can learn the fundamentals of electricity in thirty days, an hour a day, to the point that you can do any ordinary wiring such as in houses.You don’t even have to know that much, the wiring code is cut and dried, like the rules of the highway. ( Passing allowed on broken lines, do not pass on solid yellow lines, etc. ) You can learn to drive a big truck in four weeks at school, but I learned that as kid on the farm, lol.

               Quit tv cold turkey back around 1980 or so. Since then I average maybe ten hours a year watching tv. That time at social functions such as friends hold for the Kentucky Derby, Superbowl, etc. I don’t even know the name of the football coach, or a single player, at Tech, so help me Jesus, but I hear they are having a good season.

               Have two computers running different browsers and reset my IP address every couple of days and clear cookies etc, so I can read ENOUGH of what’s published in the major papers that have firewalls, and then follow up in other papers that don’t, or that I don’t read regularly, etc.

               Finally gave up my last university student ID four or five years ago. Miss that, I can’t access the U library remotely anymore.When I had it, I could read a lot of serious stuff online.

               If I want to, I can go thru your comment line by line, and point out the times you have contradicted yourself, which at first glance averages about once every two or three lines. Would you like me to do so?

               It’s raining, and this is not only a hobby, it’s research work and practice writing for me, lol. I’m storing up lots of remarks such as yours for inclusion in future work.

               I think maybe I will anyway, later today, but since this is a nice gentle warm rain, I may go out hiking for a while, since the wet leaves won’t make any noise underfoot, and see if the deer and turkeys are out and about.

               I’m not rich by any stretch by first world standards, or even well to do. If you live in a nice house in a city where the real estate market is hot, your house is probably worth more than everything I own combined.

               But I have never had to work for money more than half the time, and usually a lot less than half, on an annual basis. So I have had TIME ENOUGH to as I pleased, and I did so, knowing , or at least BELIEVING, there is no afterlife.

               ( Can you PROVE there is no afterlife? A lack of evidence is not evidence, lol. )

               1. Sure, go ahead, have fun, Being critical and judgmental is the hobby of most every villager I have known, that and running down people verbally. And I lived in a village, observed the people, saw the results of their continuous gossip and lies and ran tests on it.
                  Decided I didn’t want much to do with all those god fearing people because they were sowing the wrong kind of seeds. Seeds of pain, isolation, ostracism, and bullying.
                  I much prefer the mental cases, they at least cannot help their actions and may be trying to modify them. They are more self aware and caring in many cases. Except for the sociopaths.

                  If you missed my point about knowledge (other than simple invented rules which are changed as they learn more) is that knowledge is an incomplete and often erroneous view of a small portion of the reality of that subject. There is still much more to learn about every subject that exists and some we don’t know about yet. Books are great, but they are always short of reality and as knowledge grows, well behind the curve. Plus they hold the biases of the authors.
                  The times my field studies have elicited the response type “that is not possible!”. I would ask why and the person, usually one of supposed high intelligence, would show me a book or quote a book (before the days of internet). They had a difficult time grasping not only that their knowledge was incomplete or wrong but the major problem I saw with most educated people was they had little concept of how things actually worked, the basic principles. They knew a lot, but it was more encyclopedic knowledge rather than knowledge based on principle. The best part is being called a liar by those self-inflated know it alls. The better part was much later sometimes one would tell me I had been correct.

                  I look on the world as a distribution, one that we only understand pieces of, and so apply what principles I understand as well as expect to find occurrences and vectors beyond typical knowledge.
                  The part I see that wastes a lot of time in science and life is using the wrong tool to find answers or solve problems. We have been given so many tools (abstract and real) that people think that is all the tools they need. Sometimes one has to invent new tools to actually even see what is going on. That advances knowledge and even better, understanding.

               2. I will leave it to anybody who is reading your comments and mine to decide who knows what he’s talking about, lol.

                  When you see me posting comments that are contradictory to what YOU have learned by studying the work of professionals who have devoted centuries to discovering the what’s and how’s and why’s of this old world, constantly refining their knowledge, please point out my errors.

                  I would rather not repeat them, lol. You aren’t very likely to catch ME contradicting physicists, or geologists, or electrical engineers, or biology professors or the medical profession, or the authors of classical psychological literature that has survived and been cherished by thinking people for anywhere from decades to millenia.

                  You are as judgemental as any backwoods preacher I know. Worse than most. It’s obvious you suffer from the faults you accuse Christians of suffering.

                  Now you do display some real insight into the nature of the way we live, and we DO live in VERY LARGE PART by sailing under false colors, by lying, by pretending, by doing whatever works to survive and thrive.

                  What you apparently fail to realize is that playrights and novelists have understood these facts for centuries, for millenia, and that by studying their work, you can develop great insight into these truths. EVERY THING they have learned, COLLECTIVELY, has been WRITTEN IN BOOKS.

                  Evolutionary psychologists and biologists who study social animals in general, and humans in particular, have written LOTS of thick textbooks, and dozens of books intended for laymen, about this general field, about the ways we behave , and the reasons why. I’ve read a representative sample of them.

                  IF you were to read and understand them, you would understand that virtually every body in this old world practices the SAME BEHAVIORS you accuse Christians of practicing, with you considering them FAULTS.

                  Such behaviors are as natural as eating and sleeping. Such behaviors are survival strategies, and they WORK. Calling them faults displays a lack of real knowledge. Anybody who truly understands the basics of biology understands this, it’s taught at the freshman or sophomore level at the latest at any reputable university.

                  People from every walk of life lie, cheat, steal, abuse children, take any advantage they can, etc, and then rationalize their behavior, so as to sleep comfortably at night.

                  Anybody who believes other wise is a fool.We do agree on a few things, even lots of things, lol.

                  Anybody who points the finger at Christians in particular in this respect, implying that Christians are ” worse ” in this respect than other people, is simply making his own prejudices known.

               3. Ok, you have heavily beaten your chest, marked your territory, placed blame on another, refused to see the limits of your knowledge, and claimed your superiority. Bravo. Excellent displays.

                  All for the privilege of labeling people you do not even know. But I guess putting everyone in neat boxes is much easier mentally. A world of boxes is a very small world.

               4. Placed blame for WHAT?

                  You say”Sure, go ahead, have fun, Being critical and judgmental is the hobby of most every villager I have known, that and running down people verbally.”

                  I said

                  “Very few people deliberately isolate themselves unless they are already suffering from some sort of emotional or mental issue, or perhaps because they are engaged in behaviors that are frowned on.”

                  My remarks are entirely consistent with any modern psychology text.

                  And you reply

                  “Ah, the Bible teaching comes out. The person must be doing bad things or ill if he acts differently. Maybe they are not sick, just sick of arrogant judgmental assholes who live in tiny mental boxes. But people like that cannot take or comprehend being ostracized themselves, so the person leaving the flock or tribe must be sick or twisted. They must be witches in league with the devil. ”

                  This little bit of misdirection won’t work.

                  You are trying to win an argument by accusing me of being a dim witted member of a second or third class variety of humanity, implying that religious people are less worthy than other people.

                  If you really believe that virtually all the knowledge we possess as a species isn’t to be found between the covers of books, well then ,you just don’t have any real idea what is to be found in libraries, unless perhaps you believe that there’s a great deal of knowledge that cannot be communicated by way of books, art, music , or other means from one person to another.

                  Yep, I’m a real honest to Sky Daddy hayseed, and all the proof that’s needed, obviously , from your perspective , is that I grew up in a sleepy, religious backwoods community, and chose to retire back to this same community.

               5. You are so far off in your analyses, I am not even going to bother.

6. islandboy,

   Interesting post.

   Below I have made a sunrise/sunset bubble chart for the major sources of electricity. These are yearly averages (2017 ytd) and confirm somewhat the findings of the EIA. Natgas is going down 31% and coal stabilizes around 30%. Coal is definitely in its sunset, yet also wind seems to consolidate (cut of subsidies?). Solar is simply too small, yet growing strongly and over the next years we will see how this will develop.

   However, there are huge seasonal differences. When renewable production is low during the summer, natgas share goes up to 36% and declines accordingly during the winter when mostly wind electricity generation surges. This seems to confirm my view that with the growing share of renewable electricity generation, natgas becomes an ever important swing producer.

   

   1. Nice graph Heinrich. Can you do a global one?

      1. Gone Fishing, if you know where I could find global data, this would be possible.

         1. Hi Heinrich,

            Try

            https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/energy-economics/statistical-review-of-world-energy.html

            The spreadsheet with the data can be downloaded from that web page (on right side of page).

            Wind, Solar, nuclear, and hydro are covered, but there isn’t data for coal and natural gas used for electricity so alas it is a problem. One could subtract hydro, nuclear, wind, solar, and other renewables from total electricity produced to give a “fossil fuel electricity” category.

            Also the annual data does not allow us to see seasonal effects.

            1. Dennis,

               Thanks for your message. I did have the data already, yet they are for total energy consumption and supply. It is quite difficult to get worldwide data about the electricity generation mix.

               However, I have made also a chart about total energy mix, which is quite interesting as well (see below Chart). Oil has lost market share from 47 % in 1977 to just 33% now. But is still growing due to emerging countries. The growth rates below are for ten years – except for renewables, which are yearly growth rates.

               Coal has lost as well market share from 34 % to 27% now. Coal does not grow very fast anymore – even in the emerging countries. Gas has gained from 16 % to 23 %. However, from the chart it can be seen that gas will not significantly grow its share anymore. These kind of charts have also great predictive power for any product or segment.

               Renewables show very strong growth – hundred of percents over ten years (the sky blue bubbles below indicate yearly growth as the 10 year growth rate would not fit into the chart).

               Although the change of energy mix went quite slowly – the data go over 40 years, it seems to change now faster.

               

               1. Thanks Heinrich,

                  I assume where there are three bubbles they are 1977, 1997, 2017 for oil and natural gas and maybe 1987, 2007 and 2017 for non-hydro renewables.

               2. Dennis, I could have put in more bubbles,yet the chart gets then overloaded. One bubble at the beginning, the end and in between is enough to show the trend.

               3. Thanks Heinrich,

                  I was trying to clarify what year the middle bubbles represented, still not clear if my guesses were correct.

   2. Heinrich,

      I remain puzzled by the stated connection between natural gas use and the price. I went back into the EIA’s Electric Power Monthly data to get the net generation and market share data starting from January 2004 (annual data back to 1992) and did a chart showing the Henry Hub spot prices and comparing them to the amount of electricity generated using, both in absolute terms and in terms of the share of the total. IMO there are other factors in addition to fuel price that are driving NG generation growth and these other factors may be more important than the fuel price.

      It is very difficult to discern a reliable relationship between the price and the amount generated but, a 12 month moving average of all the variables shows that, sometime between 2010 and 2011 an inverse relationship between NG price and use developed. I find it a little strange that leading up to and going through the GFC the growth in NG generation and market share was essentially slow and steady, despite the two spikes in the price during that period. It looks to me that generation using NG is competitive once the price stays below a certain point and that, generators take advantage of prices below about $4 per million BTU to increase market share and at prices below $3, they “kick it up a notch”. The 20 year trend for NG generation has been slowly and steadily upward, from 13.21% in 1996 to 33.84% in 2016, despite the price increasing before falling back to essentially the same price it was 20 years ago. One factor could be that at the same nominal price, NG is now significantly less in 1996 dollars.

      If you look at my reply to the top post by Dennis you will see that net generation by solar is on track to increase by 50% this year, having grown by 38% for the previous twelve month period and 33% for the period before that. Wind generated 5.6% of US electricity last year and is at roughly 6.1% year to date for 2017 but, the middle of the year is traditionally the weakest wind generation period. We can expect to see the share of wind pick up in the last quarter of 2017 and based on last years growth in capacity and some growth numbers from the American Wind Energy Association for 2017, I expect 2017 to end up at in excess of 6.7%. The combination of wind and solar should end the year in excess of 8.7% market share, up from 6.9% for 2016. It will not take much for wind and solar to be contributing more than 10% by 2018.

      Note that in Kansas, South Dakota and Iowa the market share of wind is 29.6%, 30,3% and 36.6% respectively (according to U.S. Wind Energy State Facts , Texas has hit wind power levels of 45% (Nov 27, Texas Hits New Wind Generation Record Of 45% Total Electric Demand) and “On the morning of Feb. 12, wind power provided 52.1 percent of the electricity for the 14-state grid known as the Southwest Power Pool (SPP). ” Obviously wind is a major source in some regions and coal would not be a good source to complement wind, NG being a much better choice due to the fast ramp times it offers.

      It would seem that despite the risk of fuel price volatility, power utilities view NG as a better to choice to complement increasingly low cost wind and solar power.

      

      1. Islandboy, one of the biggest advantages of gas generation is the much lower capex – compared to coal. Gas generation is much cheaper when it lays idle. This makes it the ideal swing producer – even at higher gas prices. Therefore I think gas demand will rise when renewables get more market share.

7. A new Great Ape:
   (like us)

   Frizzy-haired, smaller-headed orangutan may be new great ape

   http://www.sfgate.com/news/science/article/Frizzy-haired-smaller-headed-orangutan-may-be-12326478.php

8. Dennis. Sorry for the EV comment on the oil thread.

   The reason I asked about Model 3 delivery is it looks like it will be delayed awhile.

   I notice there are used low mileage Model S for sale and many are in the $45-60K range. Would it make sense to buy a late model used Model S now, rather than wait another year or more for a Model 3?

   1. Hi Shallow sand,

      Not many of the used Model S have the features I am looking for and I would prefer the latest tech, plus my wife is not as nutty as me, so this is a compromise we have reached.

      She would rather wait longer, though she thought the Model S we test drove was nice, not 100k nice, which is the one that has the features we prefer. From her perspective 50k looks better and the plus side is that the technology will likely improve over the next 12 to 15 months.

      Hey it looks like the depletion allowance is intact, don’t worry about the Tesla stuff, that was started when others brought up the tax credit and my response to that.

      It’s kind of oil related (it may effect oil demand in 15 years or perhaps 20.)

9. As I had thought would happen, the assessments are slowly catching up with the science.
   http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/11/02/561608576/massive-government-report-says-climate-is-warming-and-humans-are-the-cause

   I bet by 2030 they will be very very sure of the human causes involved in global warming but highly confused by why the reductions in carbon output (or leveling off) are having no effect on the ever rising temperatures. Then by 2050 the assessments will say that human causes are only half the problem or less and nature is a major player in global warming. “That is why all that renewable energy and EV’s are not solving the problem. It was never really us” will be the new (old) cry of the wacko right wing FF promoters and conservative politicians.
   Of course when one waits long enough to implement actual changes, nature will take over and is taking over right now.

   Being only a few decades behind on the reality of the situation is probably fine when talking planetary changes, right? No harm done.

   Maybe we just didn’t read the rules. Here are two.
   1) Don’t mess with Mother Nature.
   2) Not all ideas are good ideas.

   And one more
   3) The world gives you everything but does not choose for you.

   1. Fish — Forgetting tipping points, feedback, etc., we are looking at approximately 40 years between cause and effect from CO2 emissions. This means that average temperatures of the last decade are a result of what we were putting into the air in the 1960’s. It also means that the true impact of our emissions over the last decade will not be felt until the 2040’s. This thought should send a chill down your spine!

      1. I totally agree Doug, have brought up that point before. Land responds a bit faster and ocean surface slower but 30 to 40 year delay on the biggest carbon input yet is a bit daunting. So ignoring feedbacks we get about a degree rise from the lag and at least another as the atmosphere clears of pollution (assuming energy transistion).
         Now including feedbacks… let’s not go there. That would make for 3 degrees C by 2050 or earlier.
         I doubt I will be around to see that , but might be around for the next 1C rise (3C up north).

         And it’s the gift that keeps on giving.

      2. Hi Doug,

         Where does the 40 years come from? Is that the time it takes to warm up the top few hundred meters of the ocean? On can get a rough idea in real time by looking at land only temperatures. An interesting exercise would be to look at global land-ocean temperature vs global land only, perhaps a 40 year lag would be a pretty good match (Global land minus 40 years against Global land ocean).

         1. Dennis — “Where does the 40 years come from?”

            It comes from averaging estimates of several different climate scientists and yes the lag relates mainly to inertia imposed from the heating of ocean surface layers.

            1. Gotcha.

               I only used a single data set, but several different data sets could be averaged (GISS, Hadley, and Berkeley), but the lag looks like its about 20 years for the BEST temp data between land only and land-ocean.

               Chart below has zero temp for the 1850-1900 average of both data sets and the land ocean data is lagged by 20 years (1850 on the chart is really 1870 data for land ocean data and 1994=2014), the land only data is not lagged (1850=1850). The data plotted is the 5 year centered average for each data set.

               

         2. When using the Berkeley Earth Temperature data there is about a 20 year lag if we rescale land -ocean and land only temperatures so that zero is the 1850-1900 average. Land only 5 year centered average has increased by 1.5 C by 2014 and this suggests Global land ocean temperatures might rise by 0.5 C by 2034 (change in 5 year centered average from 2014 to 2034 may be around 0.5 C).

            It is not clear that aerosol changes will have a 1 C effect over the next 33 years. The models suggest about 2 to 2.5 C by 2100 with an RCP4.5 type scenario (about 1500 Pg of total carbon emissions from all sources from 1750 to 2200).

            Many models do not include the effect of melting permafrost, this is an area of active research, but would tend to increase the climate sensitivity so that 2.5 C is likely to be the better estimate.

            Certainly less carbon emissions would be better, some research suggests we should aim for 1000 Pg C or less (lower being better).

            This will be difficult to achieve without a rapid transition to non-fossil fuel energy. Market forces alone are unlikely to make this happen, better government policy is needed. A carbon tax would be a good start. The revenue could be used for deficit reduction to try to get conservatives on board, when deficits are eliminated, debt can be paid off, then return any excess to citizens or reduce income tax rates.

   2. I thought we would be over having to go thru this again -but apparently we are not- these are some of the facts on climate change I learned in looking at the independent research on the topic.

      1) The planet hasn’t warmed in 2 decades, which even the scientists acknowledge by calling it “The Big Pause”
      2) Oceans haven’t risen to the amount they were predicted to by now
      3) CO2 isn’t a pollutant, but a plant food -just 0.04% of the atmosphere- and a essential nutrient for living things
      4) Climate change models have terrible performance, they can’t even go back in time to “predict” known conditions about the past
      5) Climate scientists need to go read up on the story of Chicken Little, and understand the morals of the story

      1. Raymond, If you ever paid money for any kind of an education, please ask for your money back. Obviously you obtained no usable education from it. But, more than likely you are just another know nothing scripted troll.

      2. Hi Raymond,

         Try http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/05/start-here/

         Get back to us when you have learned something.

      3. First paragraph – you say you will present facts, but actually nothing that follows is a fact, so that is a straight lie, but let’s call it cherry picking or a hasty generalization. You also have an appeal to emotion, a kind of appeal to authority (your own, though how deluded you must be to think that I don’t know) and a “begging the question” – you are kind of saying the argument is settled, and therefore there is no argument
         Item 1 – that is just false, but lets call it cherry picking or hasty generalization again: any hiatus, which was minor, was only in some atmospheric data sets, not the ocean, and ended a couple of years ago with a series of hottest ever years. I’ve never heard anyone call it the big pause and if they did it would not be acknowledging what you claim.
         Item 2 – that is a straw man and cherry picking and another falsehood.
         Item 3 – that is a false dilemma – CO2 can be a plant food and a pollutant, not one or the other (actually maybe two dilemmas as it can be a pollutant or not depending on the it’s concentration).
         Item 4 – that is a red herring and strawman (climate change does not depend on the whether it can be modelled accurately).
         Item 5 – is ad hominem, red herring, appeal to emotion, and a moral equivalency fallacy.

         So all in all a complete load of dishonest bullshit.

         1. Thanks George.

            Agree completely.

      4. Raymond, Thanks for your points. I completely agree. The link between CO2 and global warming is technically impossible as the amount of CO2 is far too small to have any material impact on the warming up of the atmosphere. As a chemical engineer dealing with these issues on a daily basis I can only shake my head in disbelief that self styled experts, who do not understand the technical background at all – make so many incompetent remarks.

         Again: the link between CO2 and global warming is technically impossible.

         1. Your view of the effect of CO2 on the emissions of infra-red radiation were set aside long ago. Back in the 1950’s as more precise instrumentation was available and the effect of CO2 at high altitudes was found to be a controlling factor. Band saturation and water vapor no longer operate at those low pressures and temperatures, making CO2 the dominant absorber of LWIR in that atmospheric layer.
            The lower troposphere is essentially black to LWIR due to water vapor and CO2 blocking most of the spectrum in relatively short distances. Radiation escaping above that level “sees” a much different absorbance, primarily from CO2. So increases in CO2 there are highly significant.
            Also any temperature increase in the atmosphere leads to higher levels of water vapor (another GHG) so the two gases are coupled.

            To put it more simply, the CO2 increase has a small effect near ground level but a much larger effect on the trapping of heat with increased altitude. Like throwing on a second blanket, or layering clothing for winter.

            If you need the equations for path length and concentration they are available also.

            1. The physical radiative response to CO₂ is very well known. What is not known at all is the climatic response. That’s why climate sensitivity to CO₂ is no better known today than 40 years ago, when the Charney report was published.
               http://www.ecd.bnl.gov/steve/charney_report1979.pdf

               Since the climatic effects are less than anticipated 40 years ago, the problem is also less serious than anticipated.

            2. I smell fertilizer.

         2. And that is called argument ad nauseam, or the last man standing fallacy, also PRATT – point refuted a thousand times. Again: PRATT.

         3. Hi Heinrich,

            Try the following book, maybe it’s at the library.

            https://www.amazon.com/Global-Warming-Sir-John-Houghton/dp/1107463793/ref=dp_ob_image_bk

            Or see

            https://history.aip.org/climate/Radmath.htm#L_0756

      5. All fair points raised by Raymond that as a response gets flames, attacks and insults.

10. Here’s another one for HB.

    “CNN asked Senator Elizabeth Warren if Mrs Clinton’s contest against Democratic rival Bernie Sanders was rigged, and she said: “Yes.”

    http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-41850798

    “Ms Brazile herself came under fire last year after the anti-secrecy website Wikileaks released hacked DNC emails that revealed she had notified the Clinton campaign in advance of a question the candidate would be asked by CNN.

    Her predecessor at the DNC, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, resigned during the election after her leaked emails appeared to show a co-ordinated effort to aid Mrs Clinton’s campaign.”

    1. This is a good example as to why I call you a rube. You spend to much time looking for the prefect and missing the opportunity of excepting the good. The Republicans are out there giving big tax breaks to the corporations and rich while giving the poor a couple of hundred dollar bones. Clinton or Sanders wouldn’t have done anything like what the Republicans are presenting to congress in their current tax cut bill. You get to involved with the personal campaign of mud slinging and miss the important policy. It’s also why I think you act like a Republican. Your more interested in dividing the Democrats than uniting them. Sanders and Clinton are dead horses. It’s time to move on. You just can’t get over your hate and your only hurting yourself and friends.

       BTW, of course Clinton was going to use the DNC to her advantage. She has been part of it for the last 40 years. Sander is an Independent. Do you really think Sanders should or would get the same opportunity as she did from the DNC after her husband being President and 40 years of being a Democrat ? It wouldn’t have made a difference anyway. Sanders lost to Clinton by a large margin.

       Shortly after the 2018 election. A few new Democrats will emerge as future leaders. Listen to their policies and get out of their personal life. Your never going to find the prefect. Just pick the best.

       1. Sorry buddy, in the 2016, US election, Sanders was the best but, it is becoming more and more clear that the DNC had anointed HRC and treated the Sanders campaign as a distraction. Truth be told, if they hadn’t rigged the primaries, the US would probably have had a president named Sanders now.

          What evidence do I have that primaries were rigged? Lots of stories about the Sanders campaign reaching out to the DNC, mistakingly thinking that the party could offer them help but instead getting no help or in some case downright sabotage.

          Hindsight is 20/20. In hindsight the Democrats had nothing to loose by running Sanders. He was a much better campaigner. I watched most of his campaign rallies, some of them live and he had an excitement and enthusiasm that was simply unmatched by the Clinton campaign. Looking back, of the three crucial states that contributed to her loss the only one he lost was Pennsylvania. Where he did worse than her were many of states that are considered deep red in the south west. He also beat her in West Virgina with a much more humane message than her “Were going to put coal miners out of business”. Face it buddy, Sanders had a much better chance of winning the general election but, the only way to prove it would be to run him in 2018 and he’ll be four years older by then.

          1. HB will never ever admit he is wrong about HRC, he’s a true believer in her.

             The more evidence I or anybody else produces that she was a lousy candidate, the more he will defend her by any means. Unfortunately for him, the only means he has is to call me names, lol.

             That plays right into my hands. The more he defends her, the greater my opportunity to remind others that they should support candidates based on their acceptance by the public, especially the middle of the road and opposition camp public.

             Virtually any democrat without her baggage train could have beaten Trump as easily as taking candy from a baby. She was the only Democrat in the country so well suited to Trump’s attack dog style.

             Crooked Bernie, or Crooked Elizabeth wouldn’t have worked at all.

             She got a strangle hold on the party machinery, it’s as simple as that. The primary process was rigged to the point there WASN’T any competition for her, excepting Sanders. Her control of the party machinery and party coffers was such that she scared everybody else out of even running seriously.

             1. Desperate liberals have convinced themselves that the risible, Russiagate fool’s mythos will provide a deus ex machina miracle to rid the (sham) republic from the likes of boxy-suit-clad, two-legged toxic waste dump who ascended to the presidency due to the Democratic Party gaming their primary and nomination process for a candidate who performed the seemingly impossible — to wit, preventing the craven Trump from defeating himself.

                The best thing Republicans have going for them is, the Democrats themselves, from their corrupt-to-their-reeking core leadership class down to their willfully and belligerently obtuse rank-and-file. In particular, professional and political-class liberals’ refusal even to acknowledge the grim plight of the besieged U.S. working class, and when they deign to notice their economic lessers, at all, they, as a rule, evince an aura of condescension and scorn.

                1. The best thing Republicans have going for them is, the Democrats themselves,

                   The best thing the Democrats have going for them is Donald Trump and all the stupid republicans who support him. Trump is obviously a narcissistic buffoon who is totally ignorant of the US constitution and constantly tweets stupid things while behaving like a fifth-grade schoolyard bully.

                   November 1st
                   New Jersey Governor – Guadagno vs. Murphy Monmouth Murphy 53, Guadagno 39 Murphy +14
                   President Trump Job Approval CBS News Approve 39, Disapprove 55 Disapprove +16
                   President Trump Job Approval Reuters/Ipsos Approve 36, Disapprove 60 Disapprove +24

          2. “Hindsight is 20/20”

             We don’t get do overs. There is little doubt she wasn’t the best campaigner. But when it came time to getting things done and understand how to do it within the system. She was a force to be reckon with. It’s why the Republicans feared and smeared her so much. Most Democrats realized this. Also most of her loyal followers didn’t need to attend a rally to be convinced of her qualifications.

             If Bernie had been the Democrat nominee, he to would have faced a smear campaign of unbelievable proportions. He had never faced attacks like the one he would have been subject too. For me, Bernie was to far left and most likely would have never been able to implement his pipe dream. Just look at the resistance the Republican have mustered trying to fix healthcare. Which is the biggest problem with the Affordable Care Act.

             Both Hillary and Bernie would have been a million times better than Trump. No question. But on November 8th, when it came down to put your money were your mouth is. Guys like OldFarmerMac loved their guns more than humanity and punted.

11. Southern California Edison Introduces Clean Energy Proposal to Meet State’s Climate, Air Quality Goals

    October 31, 2017

    Southern California Edison today proposed an integrated strategic framework for the state of California to meet its ambitious climate and air quality goals. SCE describes its Clean Power and Electrification Pathway in a white paper released today.

    The approach builds upon existing state programs by identifying cost-effective actions to increase clean energy in the electric system and to leverage that clean electricity in the transportation and building sectors to achieve needed emissions reductions. California environmental goals include reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 40 percent from 1990 levels by 2030 and by 80 percent by 2050, as well as reducing nitrogen oxides (NOx) and other health-harming pollutants in areas of the state with the highest levels of air pollution by 2032.

    The Clean Power and Electrification Pathway calls for three closely linked efforts that support and build upon each other:

    Doubling the use of carbon-free electricity from 40 percent today to 80 percent by 2030, supported by energy storage – The electric sector has already reduced GHG emissions below 1990 levels and now accounts for only 19 percent of California’s GHG emissions.
    The plan calls for increasing the use of large-scale, carbon-free generation such as wind, solar and large hydroelectric power plants to at least 80 percent of electricity delivered to customers, continued use of distributed rooftop solar and doubling energy efficiency by 2030.

    Accelerating the use of electric vehicles, including passenger cars and medium- and heavy-duty vehicles, to more than 7 million by 2030 – The transportation sector is the largest source of GHG emissions and local air quality problems, with 40 percent of the goods entering the nation moving through the region’s ports and highways. “It is critical that we work toward providing measurable reductions in air pollution that causes health problems and disproportionately affects communities that are located near transportation corridors with heavy freight movement,” Pizarro said.
    To encourage consumer acceptance and adoption of electric vehicles, SCE’s proposal urges development of additional charging infrastructure and continued financial incentives that lower the purchase price of electric vehicles during the early stages of adoption, particularly for low- and middle-income communities.

    Increasing electrification of commercial and residential space and water heating – SCE’s plan indicates that the electrification of nearly one-third of residential and commercial space and water heaters, combined with continued improvements in energy efficiency in buildings, could reduce GHG emissions significantly.
    The SCE proposal provides continued support for the state’s market-based, cap-and-trade program as a critical component of efforts to reduce GHG emissions, while ensuring that electricity remains affordably priced for utility customers. The proposal also recognizes the importance of geographically diverse sources of renewable energy and regional markets that support affordable, zero carbon energy supplies.

    https://newsroom.edison.com/releases/southern-california-edison-introduces-clean-energy-proposal-to-meet-states-climate-air-quality-goals

    1. Chinese firms to build 700 coal plants

       These Chinese corporations are building or planning to build more than 700 new coal plants at home and around the world, some in countries that today burn little or no coal, according to tallies compiled by Urgewald, a Berlin-based environmental group. Many of the plants are in China, but by capacity, about a fifth of these new coal power stations are in other countries.
       Overall, 1,600 coal plants are planned or under construction in 62 countries, said Urgewald, which uses data from the Global Coal Plant Tracker portal. The new plants would expand the world’s coal-fired power capacity by 43 per cent.

       http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/chinese-firms-to-build-700-coal-plants

       1. Sad, an excellent example of way politics is important.

          “Last Thursday, Mr Trump said he wanted to lift Obama-era restrictions on US financing for overseas coal projects as part of an energy policy focused on exports. “We have nearly 100 years’ worth of natural gas and more than 250 years’ worth of clean, beautiful coal,” he said. “We will be dominant. We will export American energy all over the world, all around the globe.””

          1. Yep, the caveman attitude. We will be dominant. As coal salesmen? Now there is a vision for the country to follow. Bring America down and make it a dump again. Make the world a dump, oops people are ahead of us on that. We need to catch up.

             sarc

             1. I have come to the conclusion mother earth is thawing out like a steak out of the freezer and there will be no stopping it. The question is will earth be uninhabitable for humans in 150 years from now or 1500 years from now. It’s currently an exponential process. The sooner we address curbing our effect on earth will have a big effect on the longevity of the human race.

                1. I don’t think we have any real control, either over human activity or over natural system feedbacks. We talk a lot about it, do a few things, while the rest are just overwhelming any progress by doing just the opposite on large scale.

                   http://nypost.com/2017/06/01/humans-are-killing-the-planet-and-all-its-inhabitants/

                   https://gizmodo.com/watch-humans-destroy-the-earth-in-30-years-with-google-1789485336

                2. The whole extravaganza is heading toward a constitutional crisis that might clean out the system like a Death Wish coffee enema.

                3. There is even a better way to visualize the destruction of earth. If you go to Google images and put in the name of a large cities and aerial. A lot of times you come up with old black and white pictures taken back as far as the 20’s.

                   Education is the key to living in a civilized society. Without it we are just animals in a dog eat dog world. Actually, that statement isn’t really fair to dogs.

       2. Yet a lot of people are under the impression that China might lead the fight against climate change. A dose of reality, I guess.

    2. and large hydroelectric power plants

       Don’t think so—
       But I commend SCE for their efforts.

       1. I don’t think so either. Most rivers that could be dammed have already been dammed. Anyway, more dams would make the cure worse than the disease.

          Incidentally, in power plant workers lingo, a hydro plant simply means a plant with a boiler. Electricity is generated by a steam turbine. But in this case I am sure they mean dams.

          1. Dams and reservoirs are ecocide, and evaporation tanks.
             Most should be removed.

             1. To be replaced by what?

                1. Nothing

                   Back to the Paleolithic!

                2. Happy radioactivity everywhere.

                3. Ah yes, our fuel rod problem.

                4. Yep, the machines have us by the short ones.
                   Some ideas are bad ideas.

12. https://science2017.globalchange.gov/chapter/executive-summary/

    Trump has not yet managed to silence the professional science community.

    1. Don’t think Cheeto Jesus will even notice.

    2. I’m willing to bet a very considerable sum that our ‘Fearless Leader’, hasn’t even bothered to read the executive summary of this report…

       I have been reading it piecemeal over the last few days and have noted that the overall tone is, um, how shall I put this? Oh, I know, ‘ALARMIST’!!

       Which, IMHO, given all the cumulative evidence, is quite appropriate.

       When the kitchen is in flames, one sounds the fire alarm, one doesn’t waste time with morons who are saying that the smoke detector was giving a false reading because it was too sensitive and was actually detecting the vapors from the melting linoleum floor.

13. Could the Neolithic Revolution offer evidence of best ways to adapt to climate change?

    https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/11/171101092005.htm

    (Things were already going downhill during the Neolithic. The Paleolithic is where it was at!)

    1. I have yet to see one politician advocate the one thing that, far and away would be the most effective way to adapt to man made climate change. It’s population control. It would not only reduce CO2 pollution, but unsustainable demand for everything else, energy, clean water, food, clothing, housing, raw materials. But we know why the politicians don’t do that. Because it would reduce their voting numbers (mostly on the Democratic side), and they also need the additional people to fund various financial schemes.

       1. Politicians have little to no control over birth rates. The voters would slaughter them if they tried. And it would make little difference even if they were successful. The US has only five percent of the world’s population.

          But on top of all that, the world is in denial. Very few believe a problem even exists. The earth is dying a little each day. We are in a death spiral and most people think it is progress.

          1. Deep down inside I feel that we don’t have any real control over anything. It’s like the human race is playing out some script written long ago.
             Probably better to be in denial, once realization occurs in general, panic might set in globally.
             Panic mode would be way too scary and hyper destructive, though inevitable.

          2. “The earth is dying a little each day. We are in a death spiral and most people think it is progress.”

             Wow, in a nutshell.

             NAOM

       2. Ronald Radish, LOL!!!

          Anatoly Nikolaev, is that you?! Shouldn’t you be selling your BS over in the Russian troll section on Facebook ?

          While continued global population growth is a serious problem facing humanity. And it certainly deserves attention at the highest levels in all nations, only a stupid Russian troll would frame it in a way that portrays Democrats as being against mentioning it, because that would be to their political disadvantage.

          So if you really wish to sow discord amongst Americans using this theme, 1), this is definitely the wrong forum, and 2), you really need to go back and study American culture a little more in depth. Especially the Red (pun intended) fundamentalist conservative Republican christian states.

          Hint, talking about controlling global population is a taboo subject for all political factions in the US and around the world for that matter. You won’t get any brownie points (That’s an American idiom) from either side by suggesting that Democrats alone, have anything to gain by being silent about this topic.

          Приятного дня, Тролль!

          1. Perhaps you are correct Fred. But I did not take Ronald Radish to be a Russian troll. I just assumed he was just another ignorant buffoon who thinks he has all the answers to all the world’s problems. You know, a person cut from the same cloth as Donald Trump.

             1. I agree Ron, but given what has been happening to our political process and the fact that Russian Trolls are real and have been implicated in attempting to manipulate the conversation on many forums, I’ve taken the approach of shooting first and asking questions later, and the leaving the onus of a defense on the poster of comments such as the one by Ronald.

                For starters, I’m highly skeptical of posts by anyone who calls himself ‘Ronald Radish’.

                Then what really got me was this:

                But we know why the politicians don’t do that. Because it would reduce their voting numbers (mostly on the Democratic side), and they also need the additional people to fund various financial schemes.

                If we’re discussing the implications of a global planet wide issue, then framing it as somehow being beneficial to Democrats should they try being deliberately silent on this topic strikes me as being quite the stretch.

                To be clear all of this is just a hunch on my part, at least for now…

                1. Ronald Radish
                   John Small Berries
                   John Icicle Boy
                   It’s a joke! Martians! In New Jersey!

                   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCyyU0bSPtk

14. Does anybody here know of any research, or just good commentary, about the effect a major oil crisis would have on the speed at which electric vehicles will displace conventional vehicles?

    I strongly suspect that if gasoline were to shoot up to five dollars or more in the USA in constant money, and we were to find ourselves standing in line to buy it, every other day, that old Volts and Leafs would fetch a pretty penny indeed. And the assembly lines where new EV’s are assembled would probably run twenty four seven, assuming it’s possible to get enough batteries, etc.

    There must be numerous instances in the historical record where in people have switched very quickly from one technology to another due to the older one being subject to supply problems. Any links to such history will be greatly appreciated, and thanks in advance.

    Suppose we were to be forced to ration gasoline more or less permanently. I suspect that a lot of people who drive cars or trucks that get lousy mileage will be stuck with them, and searching for ways to cut back on gasoline so they can at least still drive them most days. They might buy electric or gasoline scooters to stretch their gasoline ration. Everybody always talks about moving, and about carpooling, and combining trips, etc..

    I’m wondering about what else people might do. Giving up a satisfactory credit rating to get rid of a gas hog that will sell for a minor fraction of what is owed on it is not a good option. How will they hold on?

    1. There must be numerous instances in the historical record where in people have switched very quickly from one technology to another due to the older one being subject to supply problems.

       Well, New York probably didn’t suddenly run out of horse shoes but ICE automobiles still took over in a bit more than a decade due to technological disruption as per Tony Seba.
       .

       

       1. Hi Fred,

          I know of numerous examples of old tech being displaced by new tech, but apparently there have been only a few occasions when the switch was REALLY FORCED because of supply problems with the old tech.

          New tech displacing old just because new is cheaper is not exactly the same thing as new replacing old because old cannot be had at a remotely competitive price in terms of the necessary or desired quantity coming to market.

          One was guano, etc. The supply got to be critically short, and this forced the transition to other fertilizers that are partially manufactured, especially the nitrate part. The phosphorus and potassium fractions are naturally derived, but need substantial processing, where as guano merely needed to be kept dry and ground up if lumpy before applying it. No amount of money will ever bring guano to market ever again in meaningful quantities.

          So guano to industrially produced fertilizer is a great example. Manufactured drywall replacing wood paneling, petroleum based flooring replacing wood, etc, plastic replacing metal in cars, etc is not such a good example, because metal is still plentiful and cheap, although it is not as cheap as plastic, especially including manufacturing costs. .

          There will still be a lot of oil on the market when an oil supply crisis hits, which seems to be at least ninety percent likely to me, given that I am not optimistic that electricity WILL displace oil in mobile applications faster than oil depletes…… especially if oil gets to be scarce due to a combination of depletion and politics up to and including hot warfare.

          The more examples I have to work with, the better job I can do speculating about future scenarios in that part of my book to be……. IF I ever finish it, lol.

          So ……. I’m grateful for any links about interesting examples, and thanks anybody and every body in advance.

          1. Well there’s the story of Whale Oil.
             https://io9.gizmodo.com/5930414/1846-the-year-we-hit-peak-sperm-whale-oil
             1846: The Year We Hit Peak Sperm Whale Oil

             1. Thanks again Fred but I had this one already.

                It’s mentioned in probably half of all the longer articles, and just about every book ever written, about the history of the oil industry.

                I need more. Haven’t gotten them yet.

                1. You could look at the phaseout of lead paint and leaded gasoline; and the phaseout of mercury thermometers.

                   These weren’t supply problems, but they were examples of high priority phaseouts.

                2. You could also look at oil for electrical generation, roughly 1975 to 1985 – I think it got phased out pretty quickly due to high oil prices.

                   There was also a panic about natural gas for electrical generation, around the same time (see quotes by Jimmy Carter, Hubbert) – that would be interesting to look at.

    2. There seems to be two schools of thought on that. First, the EV adoption will be fast enough to kill oil production. Second, reductions in oil production will boost EV adoption through scarcity and higher prices.
       Either way, the new shiny object has been presented and will be adopted to whatever degree is necessary and possible. Luckily it solves some problems. Any prices over $3 a gallon for gasoline will strongly promote EV adoption. I don’t think much research has been done since the assumption that we will be carbon free in the future seems implicit in most academic circles. Also the broad economic impacts of fuel shortages might cripple the market for cars.

       https://seekingalpha.com/article/4086862-coming-peak-oil-plateau-higher-oil-prices

       It’s a complex problem though, involving oil sources, economics of oil extraction, economics of electrical supplies, pollution reduction and politics of legacy fuel businesses.

       When Comparing Alternative Fuel-Vehicle Systems, Life Cycle Assessment Studies Should Consider Trends in Oil Production
       http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jiec.12418/full

       Implications for the floor price of oil of aggressive climate policies
       http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421517303300

       What if there had only been half the oil? Rewriting history to envision the consequences of peak oil
       http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214629617301792

       1. That is why there are attempts to kill the electric car subsidy to delay EV sales. Increasing gasoline price may speed the move to EVs but more EV sales will cut demand for gasoline and keep the price down or even reduce it. There will be an ecological balance between EVs and gasoline price,. More EV sales lower gasoline prices, lower gasoline prices less EV sales. A prey/predator system, where will the balance point be?

          NAOM

          1. Hi Not an oilman,

             The price of EVs will continue to fall. Do you see a lot of people riding horses to work? 🙂

             Also peak oil (and 1 to 2 billion ICEVs in the World) means that oil prices are not likely to fall until EVs become ubiquitous. Once that occurs, ICEVs will become as commonly used for transportation as the horse.

    3. “I’m wondering about what else people might do. Giving up a satisfactory credit rating to get rid of a gas hog that will sell for a minor fraction of what is owed on it is not a good option.”

       First check out EV Photo Album for an amazing array of conversions of cars, trucks, motorcycles, bicycles, go-karts, boats, lawn tractors and maybe other motorized contraptions I’ve missed, from all over the world. Most of the creations are in the US but you can look at the section “By Location for the full list of countries ( http://www.evalbum.com/geo ). Looking for info on a common motor brand used in many of the US conversions (HPEVS) in stumbled upon http://www.electriccarpartscompany.com/, the URL is self explanatory. A Google search for “EV conversion companies” yields some interesting results.

       At the moment, most of these custom EV conversions cost more than just buying a brand new Nissan Leaf, Chevy Bolt or a used Tesla but, the real reason for this is that each one is a custom job that takes weeks at least. If things don’t go to hell rather suddenly, I expect that at some point some enterprising outfits will come up with conversion kits that, come complete with wiring looms or adapters for the existing looms, battery modules, instrumentation, drive train (motor/gearbox) replacements, all the mounting brackets and the instructions on how to do the conversion in a day or two. I can imagine that very common ICEs that are fitted to many different models in given brands will be the first to see kits appear, like the motors fitted in Volkswagen’s Golf or Nissans B12 or B13 (Sentra). These kits will not require any cutting welding or body work and might consist of salvage parts from wrecks but, if demand got high enough they would have to be new.

       You might also take a look at some of the work done by Jack Rickard at http://evtv.me/. I particularly like the job they did on the VW Vanagon (Transporter) pick-up conversion using a Tesla drive unit. If memory serves me right the amount of EVs out in the wild globally is approaching two million. Increasingly some of these will be involved in accidents and be written off, despite the drive train and batteries being essentially intact, a treasure trove for conversion enthusiasts at knock down (salvage) prices!

       1. I expect that at some point some enterprising outfits will come up with conversion kits

          It’s already been done – a company started doing this around 2009 for hybrid conversions, especially for Crown Victoria taxis. I’m not sure what happened to them, though – I suspect taxi companies decided to go for new hybrids.

          1. Crown Vic taxis would have been a bad choice in 2009. Oil prices had tumbled from their lofty heights 0f $145.31 in July 2008 and remained under $80 for the whole year after going as low as $32.94 in December 2008 (see chart below from http://www.macrotrends.net/2516/wti-crude-oil-prices-10-year-daily-chart ).

             Batteries were still relatively expensive and there were no factory made EVs available yet. The range was probably low and recharge times would have been long, not good for taxis.

             There were far fewer chargers available in 2009 than there are now.

             Basically, they would have been ahead of their time. Too early.

             

             1. I could have the year wrong. OTOH, they very likely did have bad timing.

                The project was a conversion to hybrids, rather than full EVs, which was probably a good call. It was a fairly easy install, I think: the electric motor was attached to the drive train to allow regen braking as well as supplementary power.

15. FYI… Thomas Friedman, on CNN (Smerconish) this morning, called the proposed GOP tax bill, aboslutely stupid. I don’t always agree with Friedman but I definitely do in this case.

    Another item of interest that I found out by watching Smerconish this morning. People in the Department of Energy and the Department of Agriculture are not allowed to use the term “climate change”, and all those who believe in climate change are being purged from those departments. Why they asked? Because oil companies and other oil interest are such big contributors to the Republican Party, they surmised.

    1. It’s a way to force lobbyists to the table and make a lot of money for the Repug campaign system.

16. CLIMATE CHANGE: US REPORT AT ODDS WITH SOME IN TRUMP TEAM

    “The White House has sought to downplay a major climate change report, which was compiled by 13 US federal agencies.”
    The scientists’ predictions include:
    • A global sea level rise of up to 8ft (2.4 metres) cannot be ruled out by the end of the century
    • Risks of drought and flooding will increase
    • There will be more frequent wildfires and devastating storms

    http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-41868878

    1. Meanwhile,

       CALIFORNIA ASKS US FOR $7.4 BILLION FOR WILDFIRE REBUILDING

       https://www.voanews.com/a/california-asks-for-seven-point-four-billion-dollars-for-wildfire-rebuilding-/4099671.html

       1. The bills are adding up fast. But it’s only the weather. 🙂

    2. Interesting thermometer in that article. Odds of less than 2C this century are fading away fast. It shows the US only has a very small effect if it would not keep it’s climate pledges. Does that indicate that the whole climate accord is just not adequate to the task?

       1. Yup,

          ALBERTA OILSANDS PRODUCTION OUTLOOK BRIGHT DESPITE GLOOMY HEADLINES

          Alberta’s oil sands has the third largest oil reserves in the world, after Venezuela and Saudi Arabia. As of 2016, Alberta’s oil sands proven reserves were 165.4 billion Barrels. “It’s hard to imagine a scenario where oilsands production would go down,” says oilsands analyst Michael Dunn of GMP FirstEnergy.” And in its budget announced Thursday, the Alberta government forecasts oilsands output will rise from 2.5 million bpd in the 2016-17 fiscal year to 3.3 million bpd in 2019-20.

          Dunn says oilsands companies have dramatically cut operating costs per barrel over last two years while oil prices have been low, and although it seems counterintuitive, one of the best ways to do that is by producing more barrels.

          http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-oilsands-production-bright-outlook-1.4031788

          1. And BAU in the oil patch,

             OIL EXPLORATION CONTINUES UNABATED IN EUROPE, DESPITE PARIS GOALS

             “As world leaders prepare to meet for UN climate talks in Bonn, it may come as a surprise that firms are lining up to drill, at great expense, in Europe’s northern waters where output peaked years ago.”

             Norway announced in June that it would open up a record 102 new blocks on its continental shelf to oil exploration, most of them virgin territory inside the Arctic Circle, in the Barents Sea.

             “The interest there is substantial, which is reflected by the fact that 2017 will be a record-year with regard to exploration wells drilled in the Barents Sea,” said Sissel Eriksen, exploration director at the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate (NPD) at the time. Companies have until the end of November to bid for a concession.

             https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy/news/oil-exploration-continues-unabated-in-europe-despite-paris-goals/

             1. Interestingly,

                NORWAY’S OIL FUND HITS $1 TRILLION; MEANWHILE, IN ALBERTA…

                “Alberta and Norway may be two similar-sized oil jurisdictions, but when it comes to their approach to how to run the industry, they couldn’t be more different. Case in point: Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, which collects money from its offshore oil industry and invests it in stocks and bonds, reached US$1 trillion in value on Tuesday. That stands in stark contrast to Alberta’s oil fund, which is valued at C$17.2 billion. Norway’s fund amounts to US$192,000 (C$235,000) for every person in the country. Alberta’s fund works out to C$4,150 per person in the province.” I don’t think the UK (Britain) has a sovereign wealth fund but if they do George might chime in on that?

                http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2017/09/19/norway-s-oil-fund-hits-1-trillion-meanwhile-in-alberta_a_23215451/

       2. I have felt, for quite a time, that 3C would be the lower limit. Many charts, that I see, still show straight line projection. Very, very few show exponentials.

          NAOM

       3. Does that indicate that the whole climate accord is just not adequate to the task?

          I’m pretty sure it doesn’t begin to adequately address the magnitude of the problem. However as inadequate as it might be it is at least a first step on a long and probably arduous journey.

          1. I guess that must be the trickle from the trickle down theory.

       4. Odds of less than 2C this century are fading away fast.

          Why? temperatures have been going down since February 2016. I would say that at worst the odds are not changing right now.

          In any case the 2°C mark is arbitrary and baseless. As in the case of population, it is the rate of change that matters.

          1. Once again Javier is cherry picking his years by using an El Nino year as the starting point. 16 is the new 98.

             NAOM

    3. Betcha the second part of the report, due next year, will heavily cens… er… I mean edited.

       What I find troubling is that this report is far more extreme than previous, various, reports but does not include the most recent results or WIP. Add those into it and , well, it would need a change in underwear let alone policy.

       NAOM

       1. Reports and claims are getting more extreme, while the climate doesn’t.

          1. What’s up, basement boy, you got your pay check from the Kock brothers and managed to pay your mother’s internet bill again?

             NAOM

17. Smart, magenta colored, ‘Green’ House generates electricity and helps plants use less water.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=8&v=lfKYfQbOvlc

    UC Santa Cruz
    Published on Nov 2, 2017

    SANTA CRUZ, CA—The first crop of tomatoes and cucumbers grown inside electricity-generating solar greenhouses was as healthy and robust as those raised in conventional greenhouses, signaling that “smart” greenhouses hold great promise for farming and energy conservation.

    1. PLEASE bring that tech here and grow some decent tomatoes. The ones here are CRAP. They are in terrible condition, picked under-ripe or green to mature on the shelf so are completely flavourless. They then get piled in large crates so get damaged then left so long to get ripe in the crate that they rot. I won’t even let the cat get hold of some of them.

       NAOM

       1. Ask any body who is a diversified farmer in the more temperate northern parts of the world, and he will tell you that vintage tomatoes are a crop that is ordinarily harvested ( in Virginia for instance) from early July thru maybe the end of September. Commercial varieties bred for the mass market can be harvested up to three weeks earlier and maybe four weeks or so later in my neck of the woods.

          It’s not my fault as a farmer that you ( rhetorical ) can’t find good tomatoes. You won’t buy them when we farmers can produce and sell them during that harvest window, preferring to buy whatever industrial tomatoes are available at your super sized super market.

          So Momma quit growing them ( with help from the rest of us) when her old and long established customers got old and /or prosperous enough that they wouldn’t get in their car and come buy a bushel or two or three to can and divide among their family,neighbors, and friends. The manager at your local supermarket may put up a sign that says the market supports local farmers, but that’s ninety nine percent bullshit. The market MAY buy by the truckload a few times a year from ONE or TWO local guys.

          Ninety percent plus of all the organic produce I buy for sampling purposes ( I won’t pay double or triple for no PROVEN significant extra value, not being loaded with cash ) tastes just like the rest of the industrially produced produce on the market. The ten percent that does taste better costs triple, being produced in very small amounts and sold only in boutique food markets.

          ( I hardly bother with gardening anymore, finding it much easier to buy in season from a relative who runs a farm market only a couple of miles away.I can earn five or six times as much doing something else as I can save by gardening. When I was a kid, we ate mostly home grown and home preserved foods including milk , beef, pork and chicken. That stretched our family cash income a LOT back in those days. )

          Organic produce probably IS marginally healthier, but nobody I know of and respect, including any number of major universities and scientifically oriented organizations, says it is noticeably healthier or safer than conventionally produced produce.

          This is not to say insecticides and other pesticides are SAFE, but rather that in places like the USA, it’s hard to impossible to prove that the usual minute traces of them in mass marketed food produce detectable health effects.

          On the OTHER hand, it’s EXTREMELY easy to prove without a shadow of a doubt that any number of ingredients added by the food processing industry are significant to MAJOR health hazards, especially including some preservatives, salt, sugar, synthetic sweeteners, hydrogenated fats, trans fats, etc.

          The REMOVAL of certain fractions of mass marketed foods, for instance rice hulls, is also VERY clearly proven to be detrimental to the health of persons who eat such products as white rice.

          It’s easy of course to find people and organizations that cherry pick the thru ALL the data to make THEIR evidence match THEIR agenda.

          Note that I do not defend the use of these manufactured fertilizers or chemicals AS A WORKING FARMER. Working farmers pass along their costs, so my fellow farmers and I would make about the same money, or more, after a period of time to allow the markets to stabilize, if these products were to be outlawed.

          BUT I defend the use of them as a PERSON involved in discussing the environment and public health and the overall welfare of our society, and the REST of the world as well.

          If farmers were denied the use of these things starting tomorrow, people would start starving in a matter of WEEKS, in some cases, because some people are depending for survival on what will be fertilized and sprayed within thirty days of harvest.

          The production of wheat in the USA would crash like a rock within the next six months. The corn and bean crops are in the silo, so we would have plenty of those to last a few months, but the price of them would quadruple at least, and keep going up, within thirty days of the time farmers realize they aren’t going to be using these chemical inputs NEXT SPRING.

          Chicken would go from a dollar a pound on sale to five dollars a pound within days.UP from there.

          Grass fed beef shortly would be as expensive………. well, there’s no telling how expensive, but you would have to be pretty well off to afford dog food to be fed to an actual DOG.

          I’m not saying industrial agriculture as we practice it today is sustainable. What I’m saying is that short term and medium term, we are utterly and absolutely dependent on it, excepting third world subsistence farmers , etc.

          I could make it without this stuff, and if the shit hits the fan, I have several old friends with diversified skill sets who know the way here. I have enough diesel fuel and other stuff stashed to run a subsistence operation until we could train a saddle horse or cow to pull a plow, lol. I don’t think the odds are more than maybe five percent to ten percent things will get to be so desperate within the next two decades, and I will for sure be gone by then. Stashing this stuff actually saves me some money, which is why I buy it in bulk when it’s temporarily cheaper than usual.

          1. So you add Copper Iron Magnesium Manganese Phosphorus Potassium Selenium and Zinc to your soil?

             1. I add trace elements sometimes, yes, depending on the analysis that comes back from the lab.

                Trace elements aren’t often needed in my area, but when they are, they make a hell of a difference, just as adding iodine to salt makes a hell of a difference in places where people suffer from iodine deficiency.

                Most soils that are farmed on a regular basis need additional phosphorus and potassium and in significant quantities, sooner or later. This need could arise in as little as two or three years, or take as long as a generation, or longer, depending on the soil, the crops raised there, and so forth.

                Most people who understand the basics of ecology somehow FAIL to grasp the critical fact that farms these days are NOT miniature ecosystems, capable of producing food for extended periods of time, as they were in the past, in subsistence societies. When little or nothing LEAVES the farm, little or nothing needs replacing.

                There’s a lot of phosphorus and potassium in many soils, but these elements are not necessarily readily available, and can thus in effect be depleted, due to lack of their being in a readily soluble form accessible to the crop. So yields are limited by the amounts actually available for uptake by the crop.

                Adding these elements is readily soluble form obviously increases the available quantity, and doing so can and does often result in yields going up by a factor of as much as two or three, and in some cases, even more.

                VERY VERY little of the nutrient content of the soil that is shipped off the premises ever finds it’s way back to a typical modern farm. These nutrients mostly wind up in number one and number two and are flushed down the toilet and out to sewage treatment plants……… mostly……… in places such as the USA, and then on out into rivers, in substantial quantities, eventually making it to the sea and creating dead spots quite often.

                Since they don’t get recycled back to the farm, they MUST be replaced to keep yields up.

                I am not arguing that this is sustainable, or environmentally sound business, or that it’s right ethically or morally, or anything along that line.

                I’m simply saying that we are at least as dependent on manufactured pesticides and fertilizers as we are on oil. Without diesel fuel, we start starving within a week, and rioting even sooner. Ditto farm chemicals, except the time lag is longer, months to a year or so.

                We’re damned if we continue this way , long term, and double damned if we don’t, short term.

                Technical answers are possible. Practical answers may NOT be possible, until after things get so bad that whoever is in control FORCES draconian changes, even so draconian as sterilizing people before they have even ONE kid for example.

                We’re pretty far gone into overshoot, and Mother Nature has a long proven method of correcting overshoot, commonly referred to as die off, sometimes referred to as the FOUR HORSEMEN, other times by other names.

                I used to believe along with the founder of this forum, Ron Patterson, that the shit would eventually hit the entire planet, HARD, and just about wipe out industrial civilization as we know it.

                Over the last few years, the incredibly fast progress being made in the renewable energy industries has lead me to become somewhat optimistic that some of us can pull thru without crashing back to life the way it was lived hundreds of years ago.

                Some entire countries have a fairly decent shot at pulling thru, including the USA, if the climate doesn’t go entirely haywire, and their populations don’t get out of hand.

                We Yankees may well wind up living under a very heavy handed authoritarian government as a matter of NECESSITY, due to overshoot, but heavy handed government is better than dying of disease, starvation, exposure and violence.

                Euthanizing two or three hounds will mean that enough more food will be available to keep one more HUMAN alive. It won’t be gourmet food, but it will be food.

                Forcing a dozen gas hog personal trucks used mostly to fetch beer home will free up enough gasoline and diesel fuel to run one or two ESSENTIAL vehicles, such as food delivery trucks and ambulances, etc.

                Force will without any doubt at all in my mind be NECESSARY to force today’s privileged people to live modestly enough that the rest of us can continue to live.

                1. I used to believe along with the founder of this forum, Ron Patterson, that the shit would eventually hit the entire planet, HARD, and just about wipe out industrial civilization as we know it.

                   I still believe, along with Joseph Tainter and many others, that civilization as we know it will collapse. Peak oil will only be a contributing factor, not the cause. Massive overshoot of the human population and the destruction of the planet that overshoot brings will be the cause.

                2. Joseph Tainter and many others, that civilization as we know it will collapse.

                   Do you remember where Tainter said that?

                3. A reading of “The collapse of complex societies,” shows that Joseph Tainter is neither pessimistic, not overly concerned by a future collapse of the industrial society, even if he sees some reasons for concern.

                   The relevant part starts in page 209.
                   http://wtf.tw/ref/tainter.pdf

                   As an example:
                   “Recent history seems to indicate that we have at least reached declining returns for our reliance on fossil fuels, and possibly for some raw materials . A new energy subsidy is necessary if a declining standard of living and a future global collapse are to be averted. A more abundant form of energy might not reverse the declining marginal return on investment in
                   complexity, but it would make it more possible to finance that investment.”

          2. Ketchup is a vegetable!
             Ronald Reagan

             1. He was wrong, it’s a fruit.

                NAOM

             2. Hi Ron,

                I believe that there is a substantial probability that you are right. Fifty percent? Ninety percent?

                We’re deep into overshoot, and it would take a whole series of near miracles to avoid the consequences of it.

                It’s impossible for me to even guess how likely it is that most or even all of the world wide economy will collapse as the result of environmental degradation, overpopulation, and the depletion of one time gifts of nature such as oil, natural gas, topsoil, and so forth.

                But I am now guardedly optimistic that collapse will be piecmeal geographically, and over time, and that some countries , or some people in some parts of some countries at least, have a fair shot at pulling thru ok, barring bad luck.

                1. Texas Attorney General Paxton thinks more parishioners with guns will help prevent mass shootings

                   http://www.sfgate.com/news/houston-texas/texas/article/Texas-Attorney-General-Ken-Paxton-More-people-12333868.php

                   As a species, we live by myth and story, think heuristically, and discount the future.
                   This brought genetic fitness in the past, but is currently a liability.
                   Plus, we are governed by idiots, like our Texas friend.

                2. Maybe the human cognitive component is not stable and some changes lead to an apparent devolution state in certain groups of individuals.

                3. I am just waiting for the chain reaction shooting. Someone shoots (or maybe even a car backfire) so people pull out guns. Someone sees someone with a gun and shoots them, others see them shooting and shoot them etc.

                   NAOM

          3. I did have some growing rouge in the garden, distributed by the cats who had pinched/eaten them (I will leave it to the imagination as to how the seeds got to the ground) but they were F1s so the crop was small but tasty and, alas, no more. My plan is to buy some non-hybrid seeds and set to growing my own but I have to get past a slight hiccup in my plans first. Might try runner beans again, the last time the cats grazed the plants away.

             NAOM

18. EPA Chief Set to Meet Privately with Chemical Industry Execs

    WASHINGTON — The Trump administration’s top environmental regulator is set to speak privately to chemical industry executives next week during a conference at a luxury oceanfront golf resort.

    Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt is listed as the featured speaker at a board meeting of the American Chemistry Council, a group that has lobbied against stricter regulations for chemical manufacturers. The three-day conference is being held at The Sanctuary resort on Kiawah Island, South Carolina. Corporate members of the American Chemistry Council include such industry giants Dow Chemical, DuPont, ExxonMobil, Chevron and Arkema.

    Council spokeswoman Anne Kolton said Pruitt’s speech will not be open to the public or the news media. Admission to the members-only event where Pruitt is speaking ranges between $7,500 and $2,500, depending on sponsorship level. Rooms at the resort are being offered to conference attendees at a discounted rate of $389 a night, not including taxes and fees.

    Travel and lodging expenses for Pruitt, four aides and his security team will be borne by taxpayers.

    California to list herbicide as cancer-causing; Monsanto vows fight

    http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-glyphosate-california/california-to-list-herbicide-as-cancer-causing-monsanto-vows-fight-idUSKBN19H2K1

19. Defies logic,

    ALASKA’S PLAN TO PAY FOR CLIMATE CHANGE: DRILL FOR MORE OIL

    Across the political spectrum, Alaskan officials agree that climate change is real and demands urgent action. But they also believe the best way to shore up the state’s finances is more fossil fuels. In particular, as part of the push to raise $1 billion in revenue for tax reform, they are asking Congress to allow oil and gas drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, reigniting one of the longest-running environmental fights in US history.

    https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/11/3/16602764/alaska-climate-change-oil-anwr

    1. I don’t think they know the cost of such a move.

    2. Alaskan officials agree that climate change is real and demands urgent action. But they also believe the best way to shore up the state’s finances is more fossil fuels.
       .

       

       1. .

          

          1. Well, I escaped for a while today:
             https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Badlands_Wilderness

             But even there, I ran into rapacious apes and their canines.

             But I’m glad its there, as it makes for good late fall and wintertime hiking.

             The BLM designated the Oregon Badlands a wilderness study area in 1980,[20] and proposed federal wilderness designation for the Oregon Badlands in 1989.[21] Although there was popular local support for wilderness status in the years that followed,[22] issues such as grazing rights and off-highway vehicle (OHV) access were subjects of contention.

             Wilderness designation was opposed by the Oregon Cattleman’s Association and a non-profit group devoted to trail access for OHVs

             The “Rape and Scrape” boys and girls were really against making this a wilderness, but those liberals in Portland and all those tree huggers in Bend finally got it done.

       2. We got rid of DDT right? No more Silent Spring right? Wrong again. We can do better than ever now.

          The quantities required to destroy insect life are astonishingly small: by volume these poisons are 10,000 times as powerful as DDT. When honeybees are exposed to just 5 nanogrammes of neonicotinoids, half of them will die. As bees, hoverflies, butterflies, moths, beetles and other pollinators feed from the flowers of treated crops, they are, it seems, able to absorb enough of the pesticide to compromise their survival.
          Neonicotinoids are highly persistent chemicals, lasting (according to the few studies published so far) for up to 19 years in the soil. Because they are persistent, they are likely to accumulate: with every year of application the soil will become more toxic.

          What these pesticides do once they are in the soil, no one knows, as sufficient research has not been conducted. But – deadly to all insects and possibly other species at tiny concentrations – they are likely to wipe out a high proportion of the soil fauna. Does this include earthworms? Or the birds and mammals that eat earthworms? Or for that matter, the birds and mammals that eat insects or treated seeds? We don’t yet know enough to say.
          

          And it only gets worse. Read on.
          https://www.theguardian.com/environment/georgemonbiot/2013/aug/05/neonicotinoids-ddt-pesticides-nature

          1. Where I grew up as a kid, virtually every fence post held a Western Meadowlark; nowadays when one is spotted people come from miles around to catch a glimpse. The grasshoppers, etc. are gone, victims of agricultural sprays. That’s one of the reasons why when assholes like Javier claim everything is hunky dory I get pissed off. DDT may be banned but whatever replaced it doesn’t allow insects to return and without insects most song birds have disappeared as well. I suppose this is the new normal.

             1. I still see Western Meadowlark’s frequently still in Central Oregon (saw one Wednesday while out with Audubon ).
                But birds are in trouble, especially passerines.

             2. The vast majority of humans have not the slightest understanding of how ecosystems work.

                We had a fly by troll here recently who commented that if insects disappeared he would be fine with that.

                Just visit any supermarket or the garden department of your local Home Depot to see all the poisons available to anyone who wants them.

                That of course doesn’t begin to address the pesticides and herbicides used by the agriculture industry!

                Everything is most definitely NOT hunky dory!

                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knSVJ4v4fPs

                GERMANY — Three quarters of insects in protected German nature reserves have disappeared, according to new research.

                http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0185809

                More than 75 percent decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

                Abstract

                Global declines in insects have sparked wide interest among scientists, politicians, and the general public. Loss of insect diversity and abundance is expected to provoke cascading effects on food webs and to jeopardize ecosystem services. Our understanding of the extent and underlying causes of this decline is based on the abundance of single species or taxonomic groups only, rather than changes in insect biomass which is more relevant for ecological functioning. Here, we used a standardized protocol to measure total insect biomass using Malaise traps, deployed over 27 years in 63 nature protection areas in Germany (96 unique location-year combinations) to infer on the status and trend of local entomofauna. Our analysis estimates a seasonal decline of 76%, and mid-summer decline of 82% in flying insect biomass over the 27 years of study. We show that this decline is apparent regardless of habitat type, while changes in weather, land use, and habitat characteristics cannot explain this overall decline. This yet unrecognized loss of insect biomass must be taken into account in evaluating declines in abundance of species depending on insects as a food source, and ecosystem functioning in the European landscape.

                1. Yeah, I miss the sound of frogs and crickets. A lot of the bird species here have left or are few in number, except vultures.
                   I always appreciated nature but little did I know when I was a kid I was witnessing what was soon to be become graveyards.
                   The real reason to eat only organic is to not give any money to Monsanto and Bayer.

                2. Yeah, I miss the sound of frogs and crickets.

                   I was fortunate enough to experience many a night in the Brazilian rainforests being treated to a symphony of frogs, crickets, and a light show of many varieties of fireflies blinking on and off in synchronous bursts. At the time, I too had no idea that I might live to see the end of many of these creatures.

                   But hey, we all have smartphones now…

                3. “I too had no idea that I might live to see the end of many of these creatures.”
                   In one lifetime and not from nuclear war? That is about as astounding as it gets.
                   Next spring I think I will travel into the mountains to some places where I have heard hundreds of frogs in the past. If I hear any I am going to record them on my smartphone.

                4. https://amphibiaweb.org/declines/declines.html

                   Worldwide Amphibian Declines:
                   What is the scope of the problem, what are the causes, and what can be done?

                   February 13, 2013
                   Updated March 3, 2017

                   I. Introduction

                   Amphibians, a unique group of vertebrates containing over 7,000 known species, are threatened worldwide. A 2004 global assessment (Baillie et al (eds) 2004) found that nearly one-third (32%) of the world’s amphibians are threatened, representing 1,856 species. Amphibians have existed on earth for over 300 million years, yet in just the last two decades there have been an alarming number of extinctions, nearly 168 species are believed to have gone extinct and at least 2,469 (43%) more have populations that are declining. This indicates that the number of extinct and threatened species will probably continue to rise (Stuart et al. 2004).

                   Amphibian diversity is highest in the tropics, especially in the Amazon. Brazil has the most described species, over a 1,000 species. By contrast, the United States is nearly the same size as Brazil with about a third of the amphibian species (although it has many more salamanders!).

                5. Jungles are very noisy places.
                   Except for Guam. The silence is scary.
                   The invasive tree snake has eliminated all the sound.

                   https://www.sciencealert.com/guam-s-plague-of-snakes-is-having-a-devastating-impact-on-the-trees

                6. Two years ago I was up in the wilderness area near Tahoe in late summer, close to 7000 ft.
                   It was eerily warm and still. About 90 degrees and not a wisp of breeze. Hot pine smell.
                   And it was quiet. No bird, no frog.
                   Hot, quiet, and still.
                   The lakes were low and the streams just a trickle. The snows have all melted.
                   Melted all the way up to the high granite ledges.
                   I thought maybe this is the beginning of it all up here, as all I could hear was the pulse in my ear.
                   And this year the oven turned on the fires out here, all the way up into north British Columbia. Smoke gets thick even a hundred miles away. Hard to breathe.
                   Thankfully, some winter rains have just commenced, give us all a break, til next year.

                7. I’ve always said that pollution is a far more massive problem than climate change and that is where we should be putting all our emphasis.

                   Recovering most insect populations shouldn’t be too hard if we eliminate contaminants and reintroduce biodiversity. Most are short generation fast breeders.

                   I still remember how my father’s car windshield got during trips when I was a kid. Now I only get a few insect impacts that don’t need cleaning when refueling.

             3. assholes like Javier claim everything is hunky dory

                Misrepresenting my position while insulting me shows how fallacious, bigot, and uneducated you are.

                I am a conservationist, and very worried about the trend in natural wildlife reduction in the world. By focusing on an nonexistent climate crisis, you and those that think like you are doing a very poor service to the planet, by diverting very much needed resources and attention from where they should be, reducing pollution and increasing natural reserves.

                That’s one of the reasons why I get pissed off with the climate change theater and its court of mindless supporters. In a few decades the climate crisis will be discredited, but we will have lost wildlife populations and spaces that we could have saved with a part of the resources wasted on a useless climate fight. Countries should be getting together to see ways of expanding and better preserving natural areas, and reducing pollution, not CO₂.

                CO₂ is our ally in the fight for preserving the biosphere, as it increases ecosystem productivity everywhere. That’s why the planet shows an amazing 14% greening in just a few decades.

                1. Increased carbon dioxide levels in air restrict plants’ ability to absorb nutrients
                   (especially bad for wheat)

                   https://phys.org/news/2015-06-carbon-dioxide-air-restrict-ability.html

                   But Bagdad Bob, I have increased CO2 for some enclosed applications.

                   Significance of food quality, biodiversity and productivity

                   When carbon dioxide levels in the air increase, crops in future will have a reduced nitrogen content, and therefore reduced protein levels. The study found this for both wheat and rice, the two most important crops globally. The study also reveals that the strength of the effect varies in different species of grassland, which may impact on the species composition of these ecosystems.
                   “For all types of ecosystem the results show that high carbon dioxide levels can impede plants’ ability to absorb nitrogen, and that this negative effect is partly why raised carbon dioxide has a marginal or non-existent effect on growth in many ecosystems,”

                   Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2015-06-carbon-dioxide-air-restrict-ability.html#jCp

          2. The radical left-wing environmental lobby has bloodied hands from the deaths of tens of millions from malaria, all due to that ban on DDT. Of course many in that same tent will claim that was a positive thing, or even the point all along. There’s a huge amount of scientific research on this very subject. Best start here with “When Politics Kills: Malaria and the DDT Story”

             http://www.cei.org/PDFs/malaria.pdf

             While there is evidence that the widespread, virtually unregulated agricultural use of DDT in the 1950s and 1960s did harm the environment, no study in the scientific literature has shown DDT to be the cause of any human health problem. Low-dose use of DDT indoors to protect human health is therefore extremely unlikely to cause any harm to the environment.

             Also “Special Report: The Overpopulation Fear Behind the Ban on DDT”

             http://21sci-tech.com/Articles_2010/Spring_2010/Special_Report_DDT.pdf

20. Here is a great calculator for solar thermal systems. It puts out a series of graphs and gives good insight into how the input side of will function.
    Below is an example of one of the graphs.

    http://andyschroder.com/SolarEnergyResearch/SolarCollectorPowerOutput

    

    1. And if you tilt the collectors up a bit:

       

21. Now this article squares away with what OFM has been telling us. Democrats won’t win the rural ares by hating guns and loving immigrants and abortions.

    Democrats still toxic in rural America
    By KEVIN ROBILLARD
    11/03/2017 03:11 PM EDT
    Updated 11/03/2017 02:59 PM EDT

    https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/03/democrats-dream-candidate-struggles-rural-voters-244527

    BLACKSBURG, Va. — Virginia gubernatorial hopeful Ralph Northam looked like the perfect candidate to help Democrats regain traction with rural voters after a disastrous 2016, with his Southern drawl, upbringing in the state’s rural Eastern Shore and military background.

    But despite substantial efforts in the far reaches of the commonwealth increasingly ignored by Democrats, Northam appears to be coming up short of a big improvement, according to his own internal polling.

    Critics point to Northam’s stances on sanctuary cities and natural gas pipelines as possible reasons for the struggles. But the predominant issue may be that no Democrat, no matter their rural credentials, appeals to rural voters who have been turning away from the party for years — a big warning sign for Democrats hoping to compete in dozens of rural-rooted Senate, House and gubernatorial elections around the country next year.

    1. Democrats can win in rural areas, very easily, if they have sense enough to back off on EMPHASIZING the issues of gun control, abortion, and easy immigration, etc.

       You have to pick your fights or battles in order to win a WAR, in the event your enemy is roughly as strong as you are.
       The Democrat/ liberal wing is going to win on these issues without even having to fight for them, if they have sense enough to just wait for my generation, and the following generation, to DIE. We’re already dying off at a tremendous clip, and I hear about a boomer of my acquaintance dying almost every month, due to the habit of listening to what a local radio station calls the “obituary column of the air”.

       In the MEANTIME, backing off somewhat on these issues, giving up EMPHASIZING them, would allow the Democrats to pick up enough voters in small towns and cities and rural areas to win back control of the government. They don’t NEED a hell of a LOT of new voters so much as they need to win back just four or five out of each hundred voters who have abandoned them, and rebuild their local organizations and start running candidates at the local level who aren’t FUCKED before they even file to run because the national party is obsessed with pushing the “right to choose” and so forth.

       Some people argue that what urban liberals say does not determine how rural and and conservative people vote. I say they are as dumb as a fence post, in terms of understanding politics at the level of the VOTING BOOTH.

       Most people, including most liberals, excepting those on either side who are well educated, don’t actually know shit from apple butter about much at all, except their own job and the shows they watch on tv.

       They make up their minds about the way they will vote based on sound bites, pro or con, and on what they perceive to be consistent with their own personal economic and cultural agenda.

       So……. one of my VERY well read but NEVERTHELESS poorly informed friends,recently deceased, had this to say about single payer health care.

       “IF you think health care is expensive NOW, JUST WAIT until it’s FREE.”

       And based on what he actually KNEW about this issue, he was right. He was taxed at a much higher rate , for all practical purposes, than many people he knew who worked less than he did, and got far more in the way of government benefits. So he perceived that he was supporting them, and he was right, to some extent.

       I knew most of these same people myself, and I AGREED with him. I went to the hospital for an MRI before I got my own welfare bennie aka Medicare, and was charged almost two grand, and had to pay for it out of pocket. Any of these people, most of whom drive MUCH nicer cars than I do, and spend a good bit of money on beer and cigarettes, can go to the hospital and see this sort of bill WRITTEN OFF.

       I spend maybe forty bucks a month on beer, and drink only one, as a rule, any given day, and those days are the ones I go to our little informal afternoon country club get together. The rest go to treat the other guys. It’s always best to be known as the guy who pays a little more than his own way.

       I don’t buy tobacco at all, except a pack of cigarettes once in a while for a hard up guy I know who does me an occasional favor by way of keeping me informed of what the local riff raff are up to.

       What’s right and wrong, economically and ethically, as a PRACTICAL matter in THIS CONTEXT, is irrelevant. What actually determines the way a person VOTES is what he BELIEVES at the moment he pulls the lever.

       Why this should be so hard to understand escapes me. To an old hillbilly, it’s as simple as falling off a long.

       1. “I got my own welfare bennie aka Medicare”

          You’re such a Rube(a country bumpkin, an unsophisticated person from a rural area), Medicare is not welfare. Medicare is earned during ones life working prior to retirement by paying taxes and paying a portion of part B during the benefits period.

          “can go to the hospital and see this sort of bill WRITTEN OFF.”

          This is exactly the type of health care Bernie Sanders promoted during his election campaign. Single payer were everyone gets health care if they pay(or work) for it or not.

          ” whom drive MUCH nicer cars”

          OldMacDonald aka KGB Trumpster(OFM), you seem jealous of others who manage their finances better than you.

22. http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/articles/2017/10/tesla-asks-where-s-storage-in-perry-s-nopr.html?cmpid=enl_rew_energy_storage_news_2017-11-02&email_address=oldfarmermac@gmail.com&eid=291109020&bid=1912951

    It sounds OH SO REASONABLE to restrict certain government programs to certain groups of carefully selected people, doesn’t it?

    xxxxAs proposed, the final market rules would allow for the recovery of costs for what is called “fuel-secure” resources that provide “reliable capacity, resilient generation, frequency and voltage support and on-site fuel inventory.” Eligible units would be required to have a 90-day fuel supply on site in the event of supply disruption.
    xxxx

    Coal is the only possible fuel that can be stockpiled in sufficient quantities to meet this requirement.

    So ……. this is pork for coal companies, and electric utilities that want part of this government cash.

23. October 2017 extended the spell of exceptional global warmth that has now lasted since mid-2015. It was:

    -close to 0.6°C warmer than the average October from 1981-2010;
    -the second warmest October on record, though only by a very small margin of 0.01°C over October 2016;
    -about 0.06°C cooler than the warmest October, which occurred in 2015.

    The warmest instances of each month of the year occurred from October 2015 to September 2016. Each of the twelve months from November 2016 to October 2017 has been the second warmest on record for that month of the year.

    https://climate.copernicus.eu/resources/data-analysis/average-surface-air-temperature-analysis/monthly-maps/surface-air-2

24. There seem to me to be so many potentially disablizing events in the world that I wonder if business as usual will fall apart before we see the biggest effects of climate change. Between wars, right wing nationalism, and declining oil supplies, seems like the global economic system could fall apart.

    While we talk about what needs to be done moderate climate change, what will we even have to work with by the end of the Trump administration?

25. FPT Industrial unveils new Cursor 13 natural gas heavy-duty engine

    FPT Industrial has introduced its newest and most powerful natural engine. The Cursor 13 Natural Gas is the most powerful 100% natural gas engine available on the on-road segment market today, and is the first purely NG engine on the market specially developed for long-haul missions.

    The Cursor 13 NG delivers power up to 460 hp @ 1,900 rpm and torque up to 2,000 N·m @ 1,100 rpm—15% more power and 18% more torque than FPT Industrial’s 8.7-liter NG engine. Cursor 13 NG is a mono-fuel 100% Natural Gas and an easy-to-use solution for end-users, since it can run with CNG (Compressed Natural Gas), LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) starting from “methane number” 70 and bio-methane. The bio-methane solution is capable of reducing CO₂ emission levels near zero.

    The use of bio-methane has the added benefit of reducing dependency from fossil fuels, as it can be generated from agricultural and urban waste, sewage, or waste from the food industry. It can be produced locally, significantly reducing the need for transporting energy and the related CO₂ emissions. In addition, its production process creates valuable by-products, such as bio-CO₂ for refrigerated units and bio-fertilizer for agriculture

    http://www.fptindustrial.com/global/en/Lists/PressEventsList/Attachments/461/02_301017_FPTIndustrial_new_Cursor13_NG_TD.pdf

    1. Yair . . .

       This engine concept has been around a while and seems a logical step.

       Its a pity its being developed by a consortium of Case, IH, Iveco and I think a couple of others, what could possibly go wrong . . . remember the Caterpillar fiasco?

       1. Seems more probable and realistic than long haul EV trucks.
          Anyone doing the math on that one is in for a wake up.

       2. It’s as easy as falling off a log to build a truck engine that runs solely on methane, propane, or any other readily available gaseous fuel. I could write the specs for one myself, by copying the needed data out of a service manual, lol. I’ve personally worked on a couple of such engines in trucks that run around strictly in the immediate neighborhood, where refueling is as simple as dismounting the fuel tank by hand and swapping it out for a full one. Takes about two or three minutes, if you are strong enough to lift the full tank, which can be a problem for small women and men with back problems. They call these little special purpose trucks FORK LIFTS, lol.

          Maybe in a few years somebody will be building tanks with spongy fillings inside that absorb or adsorb methane, and so will hold large enough quantities to be useful for commercial trucking purposes. The technology is understood, but getting the cost down to a practical level is a nut that hadn’t yet been cracked,last time I checked.

          Propane can be hauled as a liquid in tanks at practical pressures, so it can work, except that propane is not available in vast quantities, and such propane as IS available has plenty of regular customers already.

          The PROBLEM is that such fuel is NOT readily available out along major highways anywhere in the world at locations where trucks can stop and get fueled up, and there’s as yet no practical way to carry along enough fuel to run long distances between refueling stops.

          It’s not prohibitively expensive to add dual fuel capability to an engine at the factory, if the primary fuel is to be diesel. So as diesel gets to be more expensive by comparison to natural gas, it’s likely that dual fuel trucks will start selling well. Getting just the first fifty or hundred miles per day on gas could save enough money to make this a profitable proposition, especially if that hundred miles worth of gas is taxed at a lower rate than diesel fuel. Thirty years or more ago I helped convert a truck that ran on propane to run on gasoline. We just took off the gas fuel system and bolted on a conventional carburetor, fuel pump and gasoline tank, lol. The reason this truck could be run on gas is that it belonged to a gas company, and never went more than about fifty miles from it’s home base, and there was plenty of room on the back to store a few extra conventional cylinders, in addition to the ones being delivered to retail customers, and propane was plentiful and cheap back then.

          When one cylinder started running out, all the driver had to do was turn a knob by the seat to switch to the next one, when he felt the engine losing power. The owner saved a lot of money in fuel taxes alone, and refueling was a SNAP. All it was used for was the delivery of propane in cylinder style tanks, lol.

          1. Yair. . .

             OFM

             As I understand these engines are a whole new ball game and, while it is simple to get an engine to run on gas running economically for a million miles is a different thing again.

             LPG (Propane?) is a very common fuel in Australia. Versions of the Ford Falcon sedan were once available as straight gas or dual fuel but gas being a dry fuel they could die quickly with burnt valves if driven hard. Various fixes came out but for long distance work it was never worth the bother . . . LPG is available at the pump on most major routes in Australia and is common in major cities where most petrol (gasoline) engine taxis have been converted.

             Conversions are available for diesel engines including most of the 2.5/3.5 litre four and five cylinder common rail diesels available in the standard Aussie ute
             (pickup).

             I understand some of these new generation purpose built gas engines inject diesel to initiate combustion and some use electronic ignition and sparkplugs.
             The European system of compound turbocharging where a second lower-speed turbine is geared to the transmission is being trialed with a (I think) a Caterpillar version of a gas automotive engine.

             This system (which most people are unaware of) is probably most common in the US on certain Case tractors where the manufacturer claims it can put seventy horse power back into the drive train.

          2. I talked to the owner of a local repair shop who fixes a lot of buses and heavy vehicles. I asked about the buses moving to LPG and he told me that LPG vehicles cost a lot more in maintenance.

             NAOM

26. Kinda sounds like a occupation?

    Tillerson: US Troops Will Stay in Iraq Even If Asked to Leave
    http://news.antiwar.com/2017/10/31/tillerson-us-troops-will-stay-in-iraq-even-if-asked-to-leave/
    (a libertarian site, but still—)

    1. Is Iraq a real country anymore? It’s more like Chinese Warlord period or the collapse of Greek City States, so who would actually have authority to ask them to leave?

       1. Theoretically they have a National Government in Bagdad.
          But, from the time the liberated Iraqi people welcomed the US Liberators with open arms and flowers, it has been a neocon fantasy.
          As stated, it has been paying off War Lords that has actually had some influence.

27. When one looks at a power plant (coal or gas fired) it gives the appearance of solidity and reliability, a stalwart block that just keeps projecting power.
    However, that not the case for the important parts, parts that spin, face high temperature, pressures and flow speeds on a daily basis. The new technology is causing economic problems across the board, needing higher maintenance at more expense.

    Over the last 20 years, the power industry has experienced a shift in steam turbine (ST) maintenance strategies driven by two compounding factors. The first factor has become the overwhelming task of managing the maintenance of newer technology – Gas Turbine (GT) related maintenance.

    These machines by design and operating profile require a greater frequency of maintenance than their
    steam turbine predecessors. Frequent GT inspections and repairs/upgrades have driven maintenance budgets to a point at which something has to give. The once well-cared-for work horse of the industry, the steam turbine has become a maintenance afterthought as funds are reallocated to GT issues. Major ST outage- intervals and inspection points are pushed out to support the expense and frequency of Gas Turbine inspections, repairs and upgrades.

    http://www.power-eng.com/articles/print/volume-120/issue-5/features/steam-turbine-maintenance-repair-management.html

    1. A somewhat upbeat talk by Prof. Richard Ally, who is a contributing author in the just released government report: “Fourth National Climate Assessment / Volume 1”

       https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsecTT1SIrg

       Richard Alley, Ph.D. Presentation – 3/22/2017

       Lycoming College
       Published on Apr 3, 2017

       His presentation, titled “The big picture on energy and climate,” discusses the dynamics of how money, jobs, national security, ethics and the environment influence perceptions and decisions about energy.

       1. Thanks Fred, Alley is a great presenter. I have yet to see him not upbeat. He is also good at not getting too political, sticks to the story. We need a million guys like him.

28. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/mueller-has-enough-evidence-bring-charges-flynn-investigation-n817666

    1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/at-least-nine-people-in-trumps-orbit-had-contact-with-russians-during-campaign-and-transition/2017/11/05/07c9993c-bf4c-11e7-959c-fe2b598d8c00_story.html?utm_term=.62cb3a9e8e08

       What all ya dumb as dimrats and republicrats don’t understand is that our REAL goal is to weaken your country to the maximum possible extent, anyway we can, on the cheap. So we don’t give a flying XXXX about either HRC, or DT, as such. What we want is to create distrust and dissension, we want to throw sand and wrenches into your political and economic gearboxes, put you in positions where you don’t know what to do, or else are gridlocked and CAN’T do anything, lol.

       For the price of just one ICBM, we have done your country more harm than we could do with a hundred thousand well trained troops in a hot fight in places where we are bleeding you even more by supplying small arms and ammo and a few guys to train your enemies in guerilla warfare. How many guys is it that you have deployed in the Middle East?

       And for those of you too stupid to figure out why I’m revealing these not so secret the state secrets, well, it’s because I’m hoping for political asylum, because if I go back home, it’s the Gulag for me, unless somebody risks his career by taking pity on me and treats me to a bullet in the base of the skull.

       It’s bad luck old bad HB outed me.

       I could have soon been living in a nice dacha with a car and driver and access to western stores just outside Moscow.

       1. The Russians played OldFarmerMac hate for HRC because of his love for guns masterfully.

          25 more innocent victims lost their life yesterday to gun violence.

          May they rest in peace

          *******

          Murphy: ‘No one is safe’ until Congress acts on gun violence

          “Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), who has emerged as a leading advocate for gun control, made an emotional appeal on Sunday for Congress to address gun violence in the wake of the deadly church shooting in Sutherland Springs, Texas.

          “The terrifying fact is that no one is safe so long as Congress chooses to do absolutely nothing in the face of this epidemic,” Murphy said in a lengthy statement, stressing that time to act “is now.””

          http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/358876-sen-murphy-steps-up-calls-for-gun-control-in-wake-of-texas-church-shooting

          ******

          Trump Says Deadly Texas Shooting Isn’t A Guns Issue, It’s A Mental Health Problem

          “This is a mental health problem at the highest level.”

          “President Donald Trump responded to the deadliest mass shooting in Texas history by saying the attack was a result of “a mental health problem” and not due to lax gun control laws.

          During a news conference Monday in Tokyo, Trump said it was “a little bit soon” to get into a discussion about gun control.

          “This isn’t a guns situation,” Trump said, noting that a person in the crowd with a gun shot at the attacker and caused him to flee. “This is a mental health problem at the highest level. It’s a very, very sad event.”

          The president woke on Monday morning in Japan to the news that a lone gunman had opened fire on churchgoers at a small Baptist church in rural Texas and killed at least 26 people and injured another 20. The dead and wounded range in age from 5 to 72 years old.”

          https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-texas-shooting-mental-health-problem_us_5a0004c8e4b0c96530006f16?ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

          *******

          Does “This is a mental health problem at the highest level” mean those gun lovers who prefer to sleep with their guns, as apposed to their “hot” second wife have issues ?

          Trumpster aka KGB(OFM) says – “It’s bad luck old bad HB outed me”

29. Saudi deputy governor killed in helicopter crash near Yemen

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-crash/saudi-deputy-governor-killed-in-helicopter-crash-near-yemen-idUSKBN1D512O?feedType=RSS&feedName=worldNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Reuters%2FworldNews+%28Reuters+World+News%29

    The reports did not elaborate on the cause of the crash.

    I bet they didn’t!

30. CLIMATE TALKS OPEN AMID ANGER OVER TRUMP’S COAL SUPPORT

    “According to reports, members of the Trump administration will lend their support to an event to promote fossil fuels and nuclear power as solutions to climate change. Speakers from coal giant Peabody Energy, among others, will make a presentation to highlight the role that coal, and other fuels can play in curbing the impacts of rising temperatures.”

    Well, I suppose the good news is acknowledgement that climate change IS a problem.

    http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-41859283

    1. Meanwhile,

       CHINA MAY GRASP CLIMATE LEADERSHIP AT U.N. TALKS

       “China has a chance to assert leadership of a global plan to combat global warming this week at the first U.N. climate talks since U.S. President Donald Trump decided to quit the 195-nation Paris Agreement, delegates say.”

       https://www.theweathernetwork.com/news/articles/china-poised-for-climate-leadership-at-un-talks-as-us-pulls-out/88863/

       1. Oh goody, while they burn more coal, plan and build more coal power than anyone, they will talk out the other side about being green and slowing climate change. Isn’t that like putting the problem in charge of the system? Doesn’t anyone see the error in this?
          Making money selling PV on one side while polluting out the wazoo is not a qualification. They produce more than twice as much CO2 as the US now.
          Norway and Sweden anyone?

          1. Yup, why does BAU reality keep throwing a wrench in the Pollyanna projections?

             COAL PRICES SOAR AS DEMAND HEATS UP

             “Coal prices are on the rise again. With benchmark rates in Australia up over 30 percent since July, approaching the $100/t mark that prevailed in November 2016 after a massive run-up last year. And a number of events the past week show that things could get even more heated in coal over the coming months.”

             https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Coal-Prices-Soar-As-Demand-Heats-Up.html

             1. Because BAU is accelerating.
                Thought of the century:
                Remember, to get the most air, always put down the pedal to the metal as one approaches the cliff.

             2. Hi Doug,

                There’s a silver lining in every (COAL ) black cloud, so they say.

                It’s obvious that the higher the price utilities have to pay for coal, the greater the incentive to add more wind and solar generation at all levels.

                After allowing for transmission losses , it’s likely that even the most efficient coal fired power plants don’t deliver more than about 2,500 kilowatt hours per ton of coal burnt. If coal goes from fifty bucks delivered to a hundred bucks delivered, yankee money, that means wind and solar power have an additional half cent per kilowatt hour NO FUEL COST cost advantage.

                There are other savings as well, such as having more rail capacity available to move other goods, less truck traffic wearing out highways and tying up traffic, and of course the reduced environmental impact.

                I’ m fairly sure technically well educated Chinese bureaucrats pay more attention at least PART of the time to such considerations than Yankees.

                It seems perfectly obvious, at least to me that they also understand the value of accumulating foreign currency reserves, and so are building out wind and solar infrastructure at a furious pace, in large part to avoid paying for imported oil and coal.

                1. If coal goes from fifty bucks delivered to a hundred bucks delivered, yankee money, that means wind and solar power have an additional half cent per kilowatt hour NO FUEL COST cost advantage..

                   5,000 cents divided by 2,500 kWhs = 2 cents per kWh. A distinct advantage.

                2. Time to quit doing arithmetic in my head I guess, lol.
                   Thanks, Nick.

                3. OFM – Irrespective of your argument(s) (wishful thinking?), use of coal is currently INCREASING. Personally, I’d like to see every coal power generating plant shut down yesterday but…..

                   WORLD BUILDING NEW COAL PLANTS FASTER THAN IT SHUTS THEM

                   “Nations around the world are building coal-fired power plants at a faster rate than those being ¬decommissioned. The plants under construction reflect a 10 per cent increase to the total global generation powered by coal. New electricity generated by coal-fired plants will outstrip that which was retired in 2015 and 2016 by a factor of five.”

                   http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/world-building-new-coal-plants-faster-than-it-shuts-them/news-story/6b39ea6a51636ba074c0ad86aa5f05f0

                4. Probably cleaner ones too so aerosols will decrease and warming accelerate.

                5. Well, there’s a cheerful thought!

                6. And millions of people can breathe easier. 🙂

                7. This seems to be behind a paywall, but 2 thoughts:

                   1) Articles about coal plant construction tend to say that coal generation is growing. Even if that’s true, coal consumption is very different from coal generation, as new plants tend to be much more efficient, so even if kWhs from coal plants are rising, coal consumption could still be falling. And,

                   2) some countries, especially China, are building coal plants for which there is little demand, and their coal plant utilization rates are plummeting.

                8. Cancel 100 but still build 700. It’s a magic trick, they have people looking one way while the other hand is doing the opposite.

                   http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/chinese-firms-to-build-700-coal-plants

                   I don’t think these will be stranded assets. They will fun for as long as possible.

                9. “…the country has too much power capacity. Its fossil-fuel power plants can produce more than 1,000 GW of electricity (which is 25% more than what US fossil-fuel power plants can produce), but they run for less than half the time. And the average utilization rate for thermal power plants, according to the Chinese government’s own figures, fell 4.6% compared to last year.
                   At the same time, the world’s biggest emitter is also the world’s biggest investor in renewable energy. That means the utilization rate of fossil-fuel power plants is likely to keep falling, which means China will continue to consume less coal. ”

                   https://qz.com/982437/china-is-suspending-permits-for-new-coal-power-plants-in-29-out-of-32-provinces/

                10. Hi Doug,

                    You’re right, coal is being used in increasing quantities.

                    I’ll put the bottom line up top. You’re right to be pessimistic.

                    Sometimes I think like Nick G, who generally believes in economic arguments of the sort I’m making in this case.

                    Some countries, including China, are already getting a significant percentage of their total electricity supply from wind and solar farms.

                    People such as Tony Seba may be way off base in predicting that electric cars and light trucks will dominate new vehicle sales in only a decade or so, primarily because they think ev’s will be cheaper to build, buy, and operate than conventional vehicles.

                    But they might be right.

                    And likewise if wind, solar or any other essentially fuel free method of generating electricity gets to be substantially cheaper than coal fired electricity, I ‘m of the opinion that the Chinese top down leadership will force feed these industries and put the coal generating industry on short rations, as a practical matter, as soon as they can.

                    The basically autocratic Chinese leadership does seem to be quite competent, in terms of scientific literacy,

                    So maybe the Chinese will continue to build wind and solar infrastructure as fast as they possibly can, so as to save money on coal.

                    Plus there are some considerations involving Chinese status, economic power , and national security, all of which can be improved by relying less on imported coal, and more on generating fuel free electricity domestically and exporting solar panels and wind turbines and so forth.

                    One thing I’m sure of, speaking as an avid observer of the political scenery, is that the Chinese play the long game as well or better than any country in the world.

                    They probably don’t think they have any CHOICE except to burn the hell out of coal, short to mid term, so as to keep their economy growing fast, thus making it possible to remain in control. People who are getting ahead are not apt to revolt. They likely believe they will come out ahead long term by sacrificing their environment and public health short to medium term.

                11. The top energy priority of China’s leadership is ensuring adequate supply.

                    Reducing pollution and reliance on imports are definitely secondary, but China’s leaders can walk AND chew gum (unlike some…): these two things are getting a very, very big push lately.

                12. OFM – As I’ve said on many occasions, I worked in China for seven-ish years, with a main office in Dalian and a branch office in Harbin, so I know a bit about how things work there. My mandate was to identify potential joint venture projects for a Texas oil company, mainly oil but minerals as well. I was expected to assess deposits/reserves and write reports acceptable to US regulatory bodies. Three things that I learned were:
                    1. The country is highly corrupt with bribes flying in all directions;
                    2. Much (most) power lies at the provincial level with only lip service paid to Beijing;
                    3. The people I dealt with were (mostly) highly educated and competent. In fact, one had a PhD from Princeton, another from MIT.

                    You can’t really rely of reports coming from Beijing or the Western media. I’m certainly not an expert but sometimes my view is more realistic than a lot of the armchair experts.

                13. Back atcha, Doug

                    I appreciate where you are coming from, especially in terms of the corruption, and you have the advantage of personal experience.

                    Normally I don’t rely very much on other people’s interpretation of actual demonstrable facts, preferring to do my own thinking.

                    It seems to me that while you are right about powerful people out in the provinces determining what happens locally, the central government is still more or less in control in terms of setting overall national policies, and that these policies really do take the long term into account.

                    They are for instance building up their military, establishing solid trade relationships with many countries up to the point of avoiding using dollars in trading with them, pushing very hard on renewable industries, and generally spending like hell on long term infrastructure.

                    These things seem to indicate that they do substantial long term national level planning, at least to the point of steering local spending in certain directions.

                    As Nick pointed out, their leaders appear to be at least smart enough that they can walk and chew gum at the same time.

                    And you met people in positions of power and influence with doctorates from respected universities.I doubt you would meet any government people with comparable training in the USA doing similar work, other than maybe some lawyers.

                14. Nick, OFM, Doug, GF, any others with China knowledge,

                    I’ve just started reading “The New Chinese Empire” by Ross Terrill, 2003. Are any of you folks familiar with this book or Terrill’s China view? Just wondering if this book will give me some accurate info on China. Most of the books I read are from 5 to 20 years old, because that’s what I find in thrift stores and such, usually 50 cents to a couple bucks each. Sometimes I get pleasantly surprised by what I find mixed among the religious books and novels in Goodwill stores. Stuff by respected scientists and thinking folks.
                    Thanks for any input.
                    Stan

             3. Hi Doug,

                High coal prices may reduce demand which is a good thing in my opinion.

                World coal consumption decreased from 3889 Mtoe in 2014 to 3732 Mtoe in 2016 which is at least in the right direction. China’s coal consumption went from 1969 Mtoe in 2013 to 1888 Mtoe in 2016 also moving lower for the past 3 years.

                1. Dennis – It’s not that simple. According to the IER Institute for Energy Research:

                   CHINA AND INDIA WILL CONTINUE TO INCREASE OIL AND COAL CONSUMPTION, PARIS AGREEMENT NOTWITHSTANDING

                   China’s coal-fired generation capacity may increase by as much as 19 percent over the next five years. While the country has canceled some coal-fired capacity due to lack of demand growth, China still plans to increase its coal-fired power plants to almost 1,100 gigawatts, which is three times the coal-fired capacity of the United States.

                   Further, China is also building coal-fired plants in other countries such as Kenya and Pakistan. In Lamu, Kenya, a $2 billion, 1050 megawatt, coal-fired power plant—the first of its kind in East Africa—will be financed with Chinese, South African, and Kenyan capital, and be built by the state-owned Power Construction Corporation of China. The plant will power an adjacent 32 berth deep-water port that is part of a plan to transform Kenya into an industrializing, middle-income country by 2030.

                   Excluding projects in South Africa, over 100 coal-generating units are in various stages of planning or development in 11 African countries and China is financing about half of them. The combined capacity of the units is 42.5 gigawatts—over eight times the region’s existing coal capacity. While not all are being financed by China, almost all are financed by foreign investment.

                   http://instituteforenergyresearch.org/analysis/china-india-will-continue-increase-oil-coal-consumption-paris-agreement-notwithstanding/

                2. BTW,

                   South Africa has rich coal deposits concentrated in the north-east of the country and as such the majority of South Africa’s coal-fired plants are located in the Mpumalanga province. About 77% of South Africa’s energy needs are derived from coal and 81% of all coal consumed domestically goes towards electricity production. This has given South Africa access to cheap electricity, but it is also one of the leading reasons that the country is in the top 20 list of carbon dioxide emitting countries.

                3. Doug,
                   I would advise you to be extremely wary about posting anything coming from the “Institute of Energy Research”. They are an outfit that was set up with major input from the Charles G. Koch, see:

                   https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Institute_for_Energy_Research

                   I don’t know if you saw or remember an exchange I had with one “Glenn Stehle” that, got started by a post of his on 10/17/2015 at 1:55 pm but, in that case the IER published a chart showing energy industry subsidies, giving the exact opposite impression from one put out by the SEIA (Solar Energy Industries Association). In one instance, a supposedly independent think tank and the other, an industry association. See the two charts below for yourself. Neither organization necessarily telling the truth but, one hiding behind a false veil of impartiality.

                   

                4. islandboy — point taken, will avoid these guys in future.

                5. @Islandboy, I understand your point but those two graphs do not appear show the same thing. If you can get them into the same units then it will cut more ice. Exhibit A is $ per Megawatt Hour while exhibit B only shows a historical average but does not demonstrate a relation to Megawatt Hours.

                   NAOM

                6. As I suspect you know, these graphs are not meant to “cut ice”, they were both crafted to make the other side look bad and “my side” look like the victim, both of them. Not sure if there’s any dishonesty (lying) or omission of inconvenient facts but, it would not surprise me if either party were guilty. The best source of facts should be the government but, the previous administration had a “horse in the race” as does the current one.

                7. Hi Doug,

                   The future is difficult to predict,

                   I am simply reporting what has happened.

                   Fact: coal consumption has decreased from 2014 to 2016.

                   Fact: World CO2 emissions increased by 0.17% per year from 2013 to 2016.

                   

          2. Hi Gone fishing,

             Yes the CO2 emissions in China are high, cumulative emissions from 1965-2016 for China are 179 Gt vs 270 for the US. Much of the emissions in China is to produce goods consumed by the OECD.

             Also Chinese emissions are falling since 2014, but not as fast as US emissions.

             World emissions rose by 0.1% from 2015 to 2016.

             1. My oh my Dennis. Averaging in a time before their massive industrialization to prove what? We could divide all of humanities emissions in total by the 70,000 years since we changed cognitively to modern humans and get a very low figure per year. Meaningless though.

                Yes, much like the US and Europe they make a lot of their money by producing goods for export. Are they a fair trade balanced market?
                And you know how they keep prices down to maintain that market.

                You completely missed the point. They are in no way green and are mostly black environmentally with a current action and future plans to continue that way and spread it to other countries. So what qualifies them to be leaders in climate change? The fact that they burn almost 4 billion tons of coal a year? I guess they are leading climate change now.

                1. Hi Gone fishing,

                   Per capita consumption of coal by China about 1.37 toe/person in 2016. In the US in 2006 it was 1.9 toe/person, in the past 10 years US consumption of coal has fallen to 1.1 toe/person in 2016.

                   Chinese CO2 emissions are 6.6 metric tonnes per person.

                   US CO2 emissions are 16.5 metric tonnes per person.

                   The Chinese are not perfect, but they have started to reduce their carbon emissions since 2014.

                   Also from 2006 to 2016 Chinese non-hydro renewable consumption grew by 35%/year on average, while for the US it was 13%/year.

                   China seems to be moving in the right direction.

                   For both nations growth rates have slowed in the past 5 years to 26%/year for China and 12%/year for the US.

                   Rising coal prices may make the future planned coal power plants obsolete as wind and solar costs continue to fall, a wiser investment would be natural gas wind or solar power for those nations planning to invest in coal power.

                   China was one of the fasting growing nations for non hydro renewables (especially compared to other large OECD nations) from 2005 to 2015 at 44% per year, China also has more non-hydro renewable consumption than any other nation.

                   From that perspective they are a leader.

                   I agree it would be better if they do not build as many coal fired plants around the World, but that is the choice of the nations building those coal plants.

                2. Use of per capita numbers is highly deceptive due to the large number of rural farmers and poor using very little carbon. China is not comparable to developed nations, where machines do most of the work.
                   Using percentages is meaningless if it is not tied to actual numbers.
                   I do agree they are leading in causing climate change.

                   

                3. Hi Gone fishing,

                   Who is “they”.

                   “They” are a nation with 1.3 billion people, 680 million are urban dwellers, let’s assume the rural population emits no CO2 (not likely, but for simplicity). In that case we get 13.46 metric tonnes of CO2 per urban resident of China.

                   The US is still higher at 16.56 metric tonnes CO2 per person in 2016.

                   For the EU in 2015 CO2 emissions per capita were much better at 4.68 metric tonnes per person.

                   So for developed nations the EU seems to be doing best and would be considered the leader.

                   China is not perfect, they have tried to improve the welfare of their population as rapidly as possible.

                   A continued rapid expansion of renewable power and nuclear power can eliminate fossil fuels in electricity generation by 2037. This assumes the growth rate of renewables decreases by 3% per year from the last 5 year rate of 26%/year (0.26 times 0.97) and that electricity use continues to grow at 5%/year and that nuclear grows at 7% per year. Hydro is assumed to remain fixed at 2016 level. Hopefully they will transition to EVs rapidly as well following the lead of many EU nations.

                4. Huhh?
                   I am sure you will jump at the chance to have less than $10,000 a year income because then you will use a lot less carbon. You may also jump at the chance to ride a bicycle or a small motorbike to work.
                   Try that in NYC, you will make less than the average beggar on the street. That is the Chinese urban reality. Living in very austere and shared conditions, many very poor. The extreme overcrowding and pollution is attractive also. We all like to have 110 square feet of living space (total per person). You know the size of a small bedroom for your whole living space.
                   In reality many places have one family per room.

                   Yep quite comparable and things are getting better there, if you don’t breathe the air or expect much.

    2. I just realized it, their brains are in backwards. That explains why they react in the opposite direction to logic, science, and facts.

    3. The Onion is officially retired?

       1. It’s been trumped.

          1. Good one!

31. 10,000 EV rapid charging points to be installed in Europe.

    Recommend the footage starting at 2:00.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SONGVntOgyA

    1. These will offer 150kW, with a modular upgrade option to 350kW, to accommodate the more powerful batteries that are gradually being introduced on EVs. The ultra-fast stations enable charging of a 250-mile range battery in 20-30 minutes, claims the company.

32. Hardly newsworthy but……

    2017 ‘VERY LIKELY’ IN TOP THREE WARMEST YEARS ON RECORD

    “The WMO says it will likely be the hottest year in the absence of the El Niño phenomenon… The scientists argue that the long-term trend of warming driven by human activities continues unabated. While the new study only covers January to September, the WMO says the average global temperature was 1.1C above the pre-industrial figure.”

    http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-41859288

    1. Yes, high temperature, but going down, and still less than predicted.

       

       1. http://peakoilbarrel.com/eias-electric-power-monthly-october-2017-edition-with-data-for-august/#comment-619796

          Prof. Richard Ally vs Javier…

       2. Hoooo boy, does Javier like cherry picking the El Nino years as his starting points. Starting with an exceptionally warm, outlier, year to base your data on is distorting the comparison deliberately.

          NAOM

          1. That all the warming since 2003 has come from El Niño is shameful for climate doomers. No El Niño, no warming.

             1. What a bloody stupid statement.

                NAOM

                1. Well, at least Javier is consistently stupid. It’s not as if he mixes reasonable with inane.

       3. I really don’t get how someone can post a graph like that and somehow not be alarmed.

          We already have some pretty severe issues at just a 1C increase. 2000 year old trees drying in California, the near total loss of coral reefs, 500 year floods every other year, super storms, record wildfires, etc. So we might hit 1.5c by 2030 or if you want to be optimistic it’s a few years later. But even if it takes 2C to do it, it’s curtains for civilization in less than 80 years…

          1. You have been successfully subjected to the climate reality distortion field by the media.

             Precipitation: IPPC AR5 acknowledges that confidence is low for a global-scale observed trend in drought or dryness (lack of rainfall) since the middle of the 20th century. IPCC AR5 WG1 chapter 2

             Coral Reefs: They recover quite quickly from bleaching episodes. The recovery is already underway. New signs that bleached corals are making a recovery emerge

             Extreme weather: After 40 years of global warming no increase in hurricanes has been detected. NOAA U.S. Landfalling Tropical System index shows no increase, and in fact a very unusual 11-year drought in strong hurricane US landfalls took place from 2005-2016.
             NOAA US Extremes in landfalling tropical systems

             IPCC AR5 states “Current datasets indicate no significant observed trends in global tropical cyclone frequency over the past century … No robust trends in annual numbers of tropical storms, hurricanes and major hurricanes counts have been identified over the past 100 years in the North Atlantic basin”
             “In summary, there continues to be a lack of evidence and thus low confidence regarding the sign of trend in the magnitude and/or frequency of floods on a global scale”
             “In summary, there is low confidence in observed trends in small-scale severe weather phenomena such as hail and thunderstorms”
             IPCC AR5. 2013

             Forest fires: The global area of land burned each year declined by 24 percent between 1998 and 2015, according to analysis of satellite data by NASA scientists and their colleagues. Scientists now believe the decrease in forest fires is increasing 7% the amount of CO2 stored by plants.
             Science Daily. June 29, 2017

             There is no reason to be alarmed by the moderate warming the planet has undergone recently. After many decades of study the scientists cannot demonstrate that the warming is causing any serious negative effect, while they can demonstrate clear positive effects of the CO₂ increase, like the greening of the Earth and the increase in forest biomass. This increase is bigger than deforestation, so the global forest biomass trend is positive.
             Nat. Clim. Change. 2015

             Only through the lies you have been told that graph might look menacing. The reality is other.

    2. El Nino is just stored solar energy surfacing. It’s all just global warming. The ocean does not generate it’s own heat. The ocean just stores it and moves it around.

       1. After El Niño, the ocean gets cooler and part of the energy is radiated to space. From the global mean average surface temperature it is just heat passing by as the atmosphere also doesn’t generate its own heat and just moves it around.

          1. The lack of comprehension is staggering. Are you OCD?

             1. No. Are you?

             2. He is a Wing Pawn.
                Deception is a badge of honor.

          2. Javier. You have no credibility with me. I wouldn’t trust you to do simple math, because you already decided the answer before even seeing what the numbers are.

             1. Hickory,

                My credibility in a world taken by the catastrophic climate change narrative is of no significance. The important one is the credibility of those that propose that the world will suffer a climate catastrophe unless we do what they tell us. It is their credibility that you should be worried about, and your credulity of their postulates. It is as easy as seeing how many of their catastrophic predictions for these past 40 years have come true.
                Some Failed Climate Predictions

                1. “My credibility in a world taken by the catastrophic climate change narrative is of no significance.”

                   Nice to see that Javier finally admits that he lacks any scientific credibility.

    3. Hottest non El Nino year by quite a long way. I think the next El Nino might be the one where people actually start to wake up and can’t deny the trends anymore.

       1. Sorry, I can’t help but feeling that that is wishful thinking.

          NAOM

          1. I agree. Having people change is usually when they are screaming in a fetal position as reality emerges through the smoke.
             Humans discount the future, think heuristically, and live by story and myth.
             Simple stories override science and observation.

             1. I have recently been watching Kitchen Nightmares and the denial there reminds me, very strongly, of the climate denialists. For some of the restaurant owners it seems to take Gordon screaming in their faces to get them to acknowledge the problem and I just wonder what it will take, how much screaming, to wake up some of the idiots denying climate change. Perhaps when cities surrender to the sea but then it will be too late, far too late.

                NAOM

33. HOW INDIA’S BATTLE WITH CLIMATE CHANGE COULD DETERMINE ALL OF OUR FATES

    “According to an ambitious pledge by India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, every Indian will have electricity, and the education, health and business benefits that follow, by the end of 2018. But how Modi achieves that, and the development of what will soon become the world’s most populous nation, matters to the entire world…India is embarking on one of the fastest rural-to-urban transitions in human history, with 200 million more city dwellers expected by 2030, all using new buildings, roads and cars.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/nov/06/how-indias-battle-with-climate-change-could-determine-all-of-our-fates

    1. That’s too bad they’ve come so late. The party is about to end.

34. Launch of Pan-European High-Power Charging Network IONITY

    * Joint Venture of automotive manufacturers enables electric mobility on long-distance journeys

    * Joint Venture to build a High-Power-Charging (HPC) Network for electric vehicles starts operation

    * IONITY will implement and operate about 400 fast charging stations across European major thoroughfares until 2020

    * Build-up of 20 stations in multiple European countries starts already in 2017

    * A charging capacity of up to 350 kW enables to reduce charging time significantly when compared to existing systems

    * Multi-brand compatibility with current and future generations of electric vehicles through Combined Charging System (CCS)

    https://www.volkswagenag.com/en/news/2017/11/IONITY.html

    With 350KW it will only take 10 minutes to add 200 miles of range or so….

    1. BTW, It’s a joint venture with several car companies. We should expect super fast charging cars from them all. Nice to see Ford, maybe they will have a good EV soon.

       “BMW Group, Daimler AG, Ford Motor Company and the Volkswagen Group with Audi and Porsche today announced joint venture IONITY that will develop and implement a High-Power Charging (HPC) network for electric vehicles across Europe.”

       The trick to super fast charging is the cable supplies both power and water cooling. You can charge faster as long as you keep the batteries from overheating.

35. Mac,

    Any thoughts about Gillespie?

    1. Hi Nick,

       I presume you mean the Gillespie running for governor in Va.

       He’s behind in the polls,but gaining, and polls in this state, and this part of the country, seem to be a tad biased in favor of D’s for some reason. The R’s do somewhat better and the D’s do somewhat worse than predicted more than half the time. So if were betting, I would say this race is even.

       Northam is not as good a campaigner as Gillespie, and has blown a substantial lead over the last few weeks.

       The election will turn on turnout, and my guess is that R turnout will be better.

       He might win. I don’t care for his substance or style, and will vote D.

       http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/06/politics/northam-governor-virginia/index.html

       Northern Va is a different world, compared to my end of the state and just about all rural areas except those referred to as “horse country”. Lots of people in “NVA” , and lots of people in the rest of the state, would be very happy to see the state divided into two separate states.

       At least a million Virginians imo believe that abortion is murder, and at least a million imo believe that the D’s long term plan is to do away with our right to own guns.

       There’s huge overlap of course, so these people are often one and the same, but not always. Little old ladies like my long deceased Mom don’t vote R based on gun rights, but rather on what they call the right to life. And younger men aren’t all that bothered by the abortion issue, because the churches are losing out, gradually.

       I seldom see the inside of a church except for weddings and funerals, but I talk with many devout people often and know the local political scene as about as well as anybody.

       The Greatest Generation is pretty much gone already, and Boomers are departing in ever increasing numbers on a DAILY basis. A typical poorly educated rural Virginia Boomer is bewildered and dismayed to find out that after busting his ass to send his kids off to college, they come back home, IF they come back, morphed into Democrats more often than not.

       Times here are changing, but D’s here are still handicapped because they get tarred by association with the most “liberal” of “liberals”.

       If Gillespie wins, he will win because R’s can still win in Virginia on the basis of the culture war I talk about so often.

       Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, of people have lost their jobs to globalization here over the last couple of decades, and several times that many are AFRAID they may likewise lose theirs, or that they will suffer because their local community suffers. You don’t have to work IN a furniture factory to lose out big time when one closes to suffer real losses. Rental income has crashed in towns that have lost factories, restaurants have closed, etc.Tax revenues go down even as the need for government spending on law enforcement and welfare grows.

       The typical rural R voter here believes the D’s are primarily responsible for our blue collar jobs being exported, especially since the HRC/ Trump campaign reinforced that belief.

       Facts don’t matter much on election days. Beliefs determine which lever the voter pulls.

       Most people, liberal or conservative, excepting the SMALL minority of truly well educated people, are as ignorant of the big picture as a cow.

36. Here’s a thoroughly detailed long-range climate forecast for the upcoming U.S. winter. Looks like people in the north will start to wonder what happened to all the global warming.

    https://www.americanwx.com/bb/topic/50432-griteaters-winter-outlook-17-18/

    1. It is GLOBAL warming, ie the whole globe. That causes CLIMATE CHANGE which may be hotter/colder wetter/dryer.

       What you are reporting on is called WEATHER which is what you experience, locally, over short periods such as 1 winter.

       Learn your basics before posting this rubbish.

       NAOM

    2. Here’s a thoroughly detailed long-range climate forecast for the upcoming U.S. winter.

       Yep! And you post a link to a website called… Drum Roll Please!!! AMERICAN WEATHER!

       I see notanoilman has already called you out on it. Now go sit in the corner with your dunce cap.

    3. It’s going to be cold in the north an warm in the south this winter. Hot damn! Who would have suspected that?

       2F anomaly against a daily variation of 20F to 30F? Who would notice.
       It’s the Jet Stream dude, basically which way the wind blows. From the south it’s gets warmer, from the north it gets colder, for that few days at a time.

    4. “About 97% of the global population does not have the education to critically understand the science and evaluate its merit…”

       That’s you Frisky!

       1. It’s the fact that they’d rather not know that is really scary.

    5. I have seen several other winter forecasts and they tend to favor a colder more snowy NH winter than previous years. The deciding factor appears to be that we are in a solar minimum and the QBO is in East phase. This is a question of probabilities, not a sure thing.

       Climate is made of weather changes through successive periods. ENSO is weather yet climatologists give it a huge importance, and periods with predominant Los Niños are quite different to periods with predominant Las Niñas.

       A cold winter is also very relevant to energy consumption, fossil fuel use and fossil fuel prices, so if it happens we will be discussing it for many more reasons than climate change.

       1. Javier has no idea the mechanisms behind El Nino and La Nina, which is typical for him.
          http://contextearth.com/2017/11/03/approximating-the-enso-forcing-potential/

    6. So Bob, “people in the north will think its cold in the winter”
       Well, ain’t that something.
       Makes you think, huh?

37. Emergency! Emergency! Don’t breathe!
    Forget climate change. Do you think India and China have enough reason for getting off of coal and petroleum burning? 50 cigarettes a day equivalent particulates.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/07/delhi-india-declares-pollution-emergency-as-smog-chokes-city

    1. At fifteen seconds into the video clip link below, “There’s an old expression that has served me well, Do not shit where you eat.”

       https://youtu.be/geYShsl2BG4?t=15

       Could be changed to “Do not pollute where you breath”.

       1. There is not a stream, a lake, a pond, piece of land or an acre of ocean that we have not polluted. We have marked everything. It seems that we mostly respond to strong visual clues, sometimes strong odor. So a lot escapes us and when our instruments detect levels that we cannot see or smell, it takes a while for us to respond, if ever.
          There is much profit in free roaming pollution, though in any real accounting it is a big loss. Reality rarely seeps through.

38. NATURAL GAS EMISSIONS WILL BLOW EUROPE’S CARBON BUDGET AT CURRENT LEVELS

    “Governments have been underestimating methane emissions from gas and must phase out the fossil fuel, along with coal and oil, by 2035 to keep within Paris climate targets, a major study shows.” Antoine Simon, an FoEE spokesman said: “It is intolerable to see the European commission and its members giving support to an increasing number of gas projects that will lock us in to decades of fossil fuel addiction. As the UN reminded us last week, we are currently paving the way to a 3C temperature rise. Facing the prospect of being ‘toasted, roasted and grilled’, it is unconscionable that the EU is turning its back on the urgent climate action needed to remedy this situation.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/nov/07/natural-gas-emissions-will-blow-europes-carbon-budget-at-current-levels

39. Ageing satellites put crucial sea-ice climate record at risk​

    Scientists scramble to avert disruption to data set that has tracked polar ice since the late 1970s.

    https://www.nature.com/news/ageing-satellites-put-crucial-sea-ice-climate-record-at-risk-1.22907

    1. It’s going away, whether we watch it or not. Sept 2017 ice thickness anomaly.

       

       1. It’s going away, whether we watch it or not.

          Ah, the faith.

          1. I have already proven your incompetence, your OCD and now your ineptitude. But you cannot help yourself.

             1. The only thing you have proven is your own credulity.

                40 years of global warming and still no evidence of any catastrophic effect. IPCC AR5 is a complete alarmist turn off. One would think that if global warming is so dangerous and catastrophic 40 years would suffice to find some evidence.

                1. No one is alarmed but you. We were talking about ice melting and satellite tracking, yet you make all these crazy claims about catastrophes and being turned off, and danger. Crazy talk.
                   You reinterpret everything to fit your anti-science agenda. Anyone reading your sources knows this. You have a problem.
                   Your claims of no global warming do not match even your own previous posts. Sad.
                   Take your problem over to the mental health blogs, you fit in there. Here it is just wasting space and time and embarrassing yourself to the world.

                2. One thing our Wing Pawn friends have as a advantage, is they are incapable of being embarrassed.
                   While a healthy individual would have their insula screaming in disgust, wing pawns can lie without holding their nose.
                   It is quite interesting from a neurological perspective.
                   Their prefrontal cortex (mainly the dlPFC) is able to override the insula and amygdala, the bad boy of the brain.

                3. Yes, global warming is real, but Arctic sea ice hasn’t reduced its September extent in 10 years. And the Japanese are the ones that are doing the ice tracking with the AMSR (Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer) series of instruments on board satellites. With the AMSR2 on board the GCOM-W1 Japanese satellite. GCOM-W2 is scheduled for launch in 2019.

                   We will still see the Arctic ice not melting.

                   Your reading problems will also continue. I’ve never said global warming is not real, just not leading to any catastrophe. 40 years of investigation have shown a more moderate warming than expected, and a moderate increase in sea levels. We still don’t know how much of that is due to CO₂.

                4. This is about thickness not extent. It seems that as ice thickness goes down yours goes up.

                   NAOM

    2. Cryosat is back from the summer break:

       http://www.cpom.ucl.ac.uk/csopr/seaice.html

       There is almost not thick ice showing, and there have been recent studies saying the thin ice is about 20% overestimated for thickness.

40. Really old teeth of one of our ancestors found in Great Britain by undergrad student.

    http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-41889633
    Whales, elephants, wolves, deer, all the mammals came from these little guys. Unless you are a creationist then your ancestors were made from mud in a virtual universe.

    So we need to promote a save the rats program. Or a save the rodents program, They may be the next progenitor of hundreds of species if things go belly up. 🙂

    1. If the rats disappear then there REALLY is trouble in store.

       NAOM

       1. Rats always leave a sinking ship or in this case they might be considered prime food.

          1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeyC52zeSGA

41. I may be the forum idiot, I ‘m sure some people are dead certain of it.
    Nevertheless, even stopped clocks are right once or even twice a day, lol.

    The culture war I talk about so often is real, and it’s the key to understanding today’s politics.

    Understanding politics, and making the right political decisions, is the key to victory in saving the environment, and with it, everything else. If we don’t win the environmental war, all other issues are merely academic questions.

    Maybe I’m not the idiot at all. Maybe I’m ahead of the curve.

    https://ssir.org/book_reviews/entry/climate_science_as_culture_war

    1. Balderdash. You can dress a pig in a silk gown but it is still a pig!
       There is no culture war, there is a heavily funded and propagandized military type business venture war on the government using the people. The fossil fuel owners and others realize that the changes needed to fight climate change and environmental destruction are a direct reduction and elimination of old business. All they have to do is keep renewables and other climate efforts slowed down enough that it stays behind the growth curve long enough. Then it will not be replacing existing BAU but merely adding to it, securing future profits long enough to make profound political ingress and control the whole thing or at least enough and often enough.

       The use of certain cultural elements in the population is merely a means to an end.

       1. The fossil fuel owners and others realize that the changes needed to fight climate change and environmental destruction are a direct reduction and elimination of old business.

          Both Nicaragua and Syria have now signed on to the Paris Climate Accord leaving the US as the ONLY country in the entire world to be a non signatory nation. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!

          Maybe it has something to do with this…

          https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinanderton/2017/11/07/science-related-news-is-not-reaching-most-americans-infographic/#3c679e124b21

          Scientific news is a subject of growing concern in the United States. It seems like every scientific finding or report is met with disbelief, skepticism, and the anger people that just don’t want to believe in facts. What has happened in America that has put science at an all-time low? Are we headed for a society where opinion matters more than fact, or are Americans just not getting the information they need?

          Most Americans, about two-thirds, get science-related news a few times a month or less. Only about one-third of Americans get science-related news a few times a week or more and less than that are actively seeking it out. An even smaller group, about 17%, are actively seeking out science news and reading it a few times a week.

          1. The USA is far more medieval and gangsterish than most people think. Look at the hierarchy of the corporation and then realize that the US is mostly a corptocracy.
             Science and engineering are tools for profit making and are only tolerated in other venues. When science comes up against profit and becomes anti-extractive, it will be on thin ice.

       2. Sure,

          I’m certain that you know more than the people who write for SSIR, rotfl.

          Would you like for me to post more links along the same line? I’m not all that busy, and it’s wet and miserably chilly outside. And all I post here is by way of killing two birds with one stone, because my comments here, and the responses I get, are also working notes for my book to be.

42. OFM asked a question further up:

    “I’m wondering about what else people might do. Giving up a satisfactory credit rating to get rid of a gas hog that will sell for a minor fraction of what is owed on it is not a good option. How will they hold on?”

    Looking for more answers and realizing that I had left out a very popular class of vehicle in my previous answer, I did some digging and here’s what I came up with for pick-up trucks. Designed as up-fits for new, fleet work vehicles to convert them into hybrids, plug in hybrids or extended range EVs:

    http://www.viamotors.com/
    http://www.xlhybrids.com/
    http://www.altellc.com/

    An outfit in Arizona has put together a F-150 conversion to all electric, without any welding or body modifications, the sort of thing that could form the basis of a kit as I described in my earlier post. There’s an interesting video on it at:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upCUWYDVmFY

    So, if things get dicey as suggested by OFM, there will be huge opportunities for outfits such as those listed above. Below is a graphic from the VIA Motors web site, showing the layout of their system. Just from a glance, I wonder why they chose to retain the drive shaft instead of mounting the motor adjacent to the differential or even integrating the motor into the rear axle. With EVS, there are lots of opportunities to do things differently, since the electric motor does not require scheduled maintenance like an ICE does and since it is much smaller, it doesn’t have to be “under the hood”. Tesla is a good example, eye watering acceleration and not a motor in sight!

    

    1. “I wonder why they chose to retain the drive shaft instead of mounting the motor adjacent to the differential or even integrating the motor into the rear axle”

       Probably a combination of strong mounting points on the chassis, where the engine was, and avoiding adding new suspension points for the motor since the rear axle and diff are floating.

       NAOM

       Edit: The XLHybrids page sums it up nicely:-
       “installs in less than one day on both new and existing vehicles with no changes to the OEM powertrain”

    2. Hi Islandboy,

       Thanks for the links.

       While I’m not even an beginner level electric vehicle mechanic, having worked on only a few electric forklifts, etc, I’m nevertheless pretty good on conventional vehicles such as pickup trucks, excepting troubleshooting late model electronics. I’m too old to bother with learning that SPECIALIZED skill now.

       They’re planning on selling or actually selling kits to convert new or used conventional pickup trucks to partial or complete electric propulsion. It’s going to be a HELL of a lot cheaper for them, and their customers, to use a lay out such as the one pictured in your comment. Integrating the motor into the drive axle would mean engineering and building a WHOLE NEW axle assembly. BIG BIG expense. And with the gasoline or diesel engine still up front, you still need the drive shaft.

       The layout pictured is by far the best possible solution in terms of the cost of building such a truck as pictured. It’s not optimal from an ENGINEERING pov, but it’s optimal from an ECONOMIC pov.

       Ya gotta play the cards you’re dealt, and they have to play with the trucks already on the market. Even Tesla can’t bring a new truck to market these days, having just about CHOKED on trying to build entirely new mass market cars from scratch. ( I do think Tesla will succeed pretty soon in ramping up production of the Model THREE. )

       Note Nissan , GM, and Ford all started building electric cars by adapting existing cars that they were already building, saving nearly all the costs of designing and setting up production of parts for their electric models. This little company is doing the same thing, as best it can, piggybacking on existing trucks.

       So here’s the deal, and while I cannot GUARANTEE it, the odds are about ninetyninepoint nine I’m right.

43. Seems the Repugs lost in Virginia and New Jersey.
    A transgender candidate took out a 25 year repug representative in Virginia.

    Seems like the bewildered herd has a different story this time?

44. Graphical representation of rising CO2 and global temperature.

    CO₂ concentration and global mean temperature 1958 – present
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEGwCPmELh8

45. Berkeley Earth representation of global temperature over time showing 1.4 C rise.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2AyhZqXFY0

    1. Yes but let’s put that all in perspective. As any aspiring geologist could tell you, global temperatures during the last 10,500 years–a period we scientists call the Holocene–shows seventeen (17) other rises of temperature just as significant in length and rate of increase as the planet has been exiting an an Ice Age. Even more interesting, many of those temperature increases have been even more pronounced in speed and intensity as the current one.

       1. We haven’t been in an ice age recently we’ve been in an interglacial with unusually stable temperatures and you’re not a scientist so stop misrepresenting yourself.

          1. Scientist?! The moron can barely handle eight grade level English composition! Math and science are way beyond his capabilities.
             .

             

       2. Who is us and where is this current ice age?

       3. Hi Bill,

          Just exactly and precisely what kind of scientist are YOU? I ask because you say ” we scientists”.
          Methinks I have forgotten more science than you know, although I could be wrong about that…….. and yet I dare not refer to myself as more than an an AMATEUR scientist.

46. BTW, in case anyone is interested here is the DIF (Disruptive Innovation Festival) live launch

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=6145&v=u9b0W02hfi4

    Disruptive Innovation Festival
    Streamed live on Nov 6, 2017

    What are the stories that we tell ourselves about the economy?

    That’s the question that Mark Stevenson, Ann Pettifor, and Tim Harford will explore at the DIF Live Launch, live from the Crypt on the Green in London.

    Futurist, author and comedian Mark Stevenson says that “technology is not an answer, it is a fundamental and deep question about the kind of world that we want to live in”, and will share what he’s learnt from the people re-imagining our future.

    The Undercover Economist Tim Harford is known for his many books and chart-topping podcast 50 Things That Made the Modern Economy, but at the DIF we’ll be looking forward, not back. What are the different innovations, mindsets and behaviours that need to co-exist to create an economy that works?

    In 2006, Ann Pettifor saw an economic story unfolding. Her book The Coming First World Debt Crisis predicted the crash and chaos that was around the corner, but since then has anything actually changed? At the Live Launch, Pettifor will tell us not just why we need to redesign our financial systems, but how we can start.

47. I was very pleasantly surprised, and I mean surprised, by the D’s margin of victory in the Virginia governor’s race last night. I was hopeful he would win, but in the past, the polls have mostly been a little on the optimistic side for the D’s, with the R’s doing better than the polls indicate they will, all thru this part of the country.

    This is a turning point in Virginia politics. My guess is that the D progressive base is really fired up, and the Trump base is getting more discouraged and disillusioned by the day, given Trump’s clownish behaviors.

    Four members of our little informal retired self identified CHRISTIAN WHITE GUY guy redneck conservative farm shop country club who voted for him are now cussing him for the idiot he is.

    And considering that we have only about eight to twelve ” regulars” ,depending on what you call a regular, that’s a hell of a sea change.

    I wasn’t expecting this big a change.

    This election may well be an indication Virginia has passed a tipping point and will be considered a blue state a lot sooner than anybody has so far predicted.

48. https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/nov/07/us-republican-donors-offshore-paradise-papers?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GU+Today+USA+-+Collections+2017&utm_term=251441&subid=9848135&CMP=GT_US_collection

    1. For insight into the American political scene

       http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2017/nov/08/explaining-virginia-election-results-white-house-c/

49. https://theconversation.com/how-trump-could-undermine-the-us-solar-boom-82038

    I try to tell it like it is, and Chinese dominance of the solar panel industry is obviously good for the USA, and the world, short term at least, because they’re the guys who got the price of panels down to peanuts, which has a hell of a lot to do with the rocketing growth of the solar power industry.

    BUT ……… In the long term, they’re going to OWN this industry, because they’re going to have not only the engineers and scientists who do the skull work, they’re going to have the hundreds of thousands of people who are past masters of all the countless skills involved in everything from organizing the supply chain to making little incremental improvements in everything from the packing crates to saving a quarter of a gram of copper. They ‘re going to own the factories, and they’re going to own the money spent on panels.

    This sort of thing obviously doesn’t bother a lot of people at all, but it bothers people who wonder what a world that might be dominated by China will be like.

    I’m about the last person who would claim that Uncle Sam is a saint, but compared to other countries that have achieved dominance in the past, the USA isn’t all that bad.

    It’s no secret I live in the USA, and it doesn’t keep me awake at night knowing this country is for now at least, still dominant.

    The security of one’s country is not enhanced by being dependent on potential enemies for critical resources or manufactured goods.

    Those of us who are gung ho renewables advocates frequently point out that the less oil we use, the less blood and treasure we must expend controlling access to oil located in the far flung corners of the world.

    This argument applies in principle to any critical resource or product, if the supplier of it morphs into an enemy.

    Only an idiot could possibly believe that when the chips are down, he who owns the tallies of electrons and pieces of green paper will control what happens. NO.

    He who owns the iron and steel and machine tools and employs the people who know how to turn iron and steel into trucks and tanks and beams for highway bridges, and how to build solar panels and batteries will be holding the winning hand.

    Such thoughts don’t worry me very much, because I’m not going to be here long enough to see the worst, if the cards fall wrong for us Yankees……. and maybe for Western Europeans as well.

50. https://arstechnica.com/cars/2017/11/tesla-buys-automation-company-perbix-to-soup-up-factories/

    Tesla doesn’t have to figure out how people are going to be able to afford a new Tesla……. at least not anytime soon.
    But sooner or later……. somebody is going to have to figure out how EVERYBODY can afford ANYTHING when the world is totally automated.

    Maybe the machines can be programmed to worship us, and turn out stuff for us the way people make offerings to gods these days, lol. If so, lets hope one with a flaw in it’s programming or hardware doesn’t figure out the machines don’t need us. Such a flaw could be analogous to a mutation in an ordinary creature.

51. Lots of opinions from various professional journalists, etc, at this link, and lots of embedded links, for those who care

    https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/11/08/what-the-hell-just-happened-in-virginia-215805

52. I didn’t expect to find this first on Fox.

    There’s two sides to every story.
    I’m all for protecting every species, and consider it the next thing to murder to kill chimps and other apes, and I’m wondering if these smaller whales are extremely intelligent species as well.

    On the other hand, people like me are used to stomping our own snakes and know all about butchered meat in plastic wrappers under supermarket lights and how it gets there, lol.

    http://www.foxnews.com/science/2017/11/08/grisly-pics-show-mass-whale-slaughter-in-faroe-islands-hunts.html

53. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/kathleen-hartnett-white-climate_us_5a03700ee4b0937b510f5ad9?ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

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