Australians don’t forget Earth Hour The Power Hour!
At 8.30pm tonight March 28th, celebrate electricity and set that CO2 free. Do your bit to feed starving plants, and regreen deserts. Rejoice that at the flick of a switch we can do something that would seem magical for most of human history, and that which 1.3 billion people today still can’t do.
Do it for the children
It’s just one hour a year when we glory in the achievements of electricity. What child would not benefit from taking part in an expression of gratitude that we do not live in the cold and dark anymore? In the West, almost everyone has cupboards-of-cold to store food that we don’t have to catch and kill, or grow, or grind?
h/t to Turtle. I got the date wrong. Next week… – Jo
97% of Australians will ignore it.
290
I won,t ignore it. As for many years now will switch all my lights on so I can be seen from space.
330
I will, couldn’t give a stuff about their propaganda.
130
Seriously thinking about buying a powerful searchlight and pointing it skywards during the whole joke…..should tick the greenies off no end….
110
I have been pointing two spotlights high into the spotty gums by my house for the earth hour evening for a few years now. Very beautiful, and just so restful. gives us a good view of the fruit bats, too. Flying foxes, not the Christine Milne/greens variety.
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OriginalSteve,
You might want to be a little more creatively mischievous. Get a bunch of people together, all of them with hallogen spotlights, and trace out a large ‘smiley wink’ in the outback where it’s nice and dark. 😉
Shouldn’t be to hard to google the optical resolution of satellites orbiting your area taking pictures at the time.
If those pics ever see the ‘light of day’, they’d make great Holiday Greeting Cards.
It’s like sayin’, ‘Gudday, mate!’
Same idea as that Green-Fleece crew in Peru but w/o the damage. 🙂
Abe
30
Actually, just a plain old smiley might be easier to resolve with less spotlights.
Abe
10
Not really mischief at all.
Graffiti That Can Be Seen From Space
Abe
00
Smart meters reveal all. Somewhere in the Ministry of Truth, there may well be record of miscreants not towing the Gaia line….possibly not so far from reality in the Ukraine it seems.
90
If the technology is there, somebody will find a “creative” way of using it, that is different from the original intent. Here am I using a sophisticated calculating machine, come typewriter, to communicate across thousands of kilometers, at close to the speed of light, for no practical purpose whatsoever.
But hey, it is better than doing the dishes.
120
I’ll be looking forward to the Sydney VIVID Light Festival – 22 May – 8 June.
Only Lefty/Greenie/Bedwetters celebrate the passing of Earth Hour by following up with a 2 week long festival of nightly light shows and music.
Was gonna end with a poignant observation, but it says it all really.
130
Burn the village in order to save it?
10
Not just Australians. In Canada we ignore it as well – as we dig out from under yet another typical winter’s snow. Bring on the myth of global warming, we’ld love it.
40
Isn’t it next week?
120
Oh, yes, it is. OK. We start planning now.
😉 Thanks Turtle….
162
AC/DC High Voltage Rock ‘n’ Roll is a good soundtrack.
80
‘We Salute You’ Turtle. Excellent!
90
Should be a good night. We can also celebrate the privatisation of poles and wires in NSW, if all goes well.
High voltage rock ‘n’ roll,
High voltage, powered by coal.
80
Think of the savings to your household electricity bill.
Average power consumption for an Australian home is 20KWH per day, so one hour’s savings comes in at around 30 cents.
I’m stoked.
That’s if you turn off everything, the fridge included. Then, when you switch the power back on, the compressor in the fridge works to get the temperature back down, cancelling out that saving.
Yeah yeah I know. It’s just symbolic.
We had a Cyclone here recently and I was without power for 110 hours.
Saved me $30.
Well, sort of anyway. Just the ice alone cost me $40, not counting the food we lost.
Umm, isn’t Earth Hour next Saturday night?
Tony.
240
Problem is Tony cyclones aren’t sustainable. 😉
Yep Earth Hour 2015 is on 28th March, might be a test?
120
Yonniestone
Then we need more research in to how to make cyclones sustainable. 🙂
130
Yes I like the way your thinking, sustainable cyclones would be the practical solution for providing a consistent power source for wind power generation, the trick would be calculating just the right amount of CO2 released in the atmospheric location to create the climate disruption that would produce a perpetual cyclone for the wind plants.
Even though this would render the area extremely dangerous due to unstable CO2 concentrations I’ve calculated that 401ppm of CO2 would suffice without pushing the boundaries of known physics according to ‘The Science’, we have also developed a groundbreaking idea of using the oceans missing heat for powering surface generators, this involves the deep penetration of a pipe into oceanic trenches to find the hot spots, this type of probing is guaranteed to get the motors running with the added bonus of releasing unnecessary heat into space and cooling the planet in the process.
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Awesomely good!
Put in for the grant, now.
😆
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Yonniestone
Re power in a cyclone.
All you have to do is find a way of harnessing all that power!
_______________________
NOAA; Hurricane Research Division.
From Chris Landsea, a hurricane researcher and alarmist who has featured previously in the climate wars.
[quoted]
Subject: D7) How much energy does a hurricane release?
Hurricanes can be thought of, to a first approximation, as a heat engine; obtaining its heat input from the warm, humid air over the tropical ocean, and releasing this heat through the condensation of water vapor into water droplets in deep thunderstorms of the eyewall and rainbands, then giving off a cold exhaust in the upper levels of the troposphere (~12 km/8 mi up).
One can look at the energetics of a hurricane in two ways:
the total amount of energy released by the condensation of water droplets or …
the amount of kinetic energy generated to maintain the strong swirling winds of the hurricane (Emanuel 1999).
It turns out that the vast majority of the heat released in the condensation process is used to cause rising motions in the thunderstorms and only a small portion drives the storm’s horizontal winds.
Method 1) – Total energy released through cloud/rain formation:
An average hurricane produces 1.5 cm/day (0.6 inches/day) of rain inside a circle of radius 665 km (360 n.mi) (Gray 1981). (More rain falls in the inner portion of hurricane around the eyewall, less in the outer rainbands.) Converting this to a volume of rain gives 2.1 x 1016 cm3/day.
A cubic cm of rain weighs 1 gm. Using the latent heat of condensation, this amount of rain produced gives;
5.2 x 1019 Joules/day
or 6.0 x 1014 Watts.
This is equivalent to 200 times the world-wide electrical generating capacity – an incredible amount of energy produced!
Method 2) – Total kinetic energy (wind energy) generated:
For a mature hurricane, the amount of kinetic energy generated is equal to that being dissipated due to friction.
The dissipation rate per unit area is air density times the drag coefficient times the windspeed cubed (See Emanuel 1999 for details). One could either integrate a typical wind profile over a range of radii from the hurricane’s center to the outer radius encompassing the storm, or assume an average windspeed for the inner core of the hurricane.
Doing the latter and using 40 m/s (90 mph) winds on a scale of radius 60 km (40 n.mi.), one gets a wind dissipation rate (wind generation rate) of
1.3 x 1017 Joules/day or
1.5 x 1012Watts.
This is equivalent to about half the world-wide electrical generating capacity – also an amazing amount of energy being produced!
Either method is an enormous amount energy being generated by hurricanes. However, one can see that the amount of energy released in a hurricane (by creating clouds/rain) that actually goes to maintaining the hurricane’s spiraling winds is a huge ratio of 400 to 1.
100
You may have to get a few rechargeable batteries as well! Alternatively a pump storage scheme, moving water up a mountain at a rate many times that of the water at Niagara falls, into a lake the size of one of the Great Lakes. Then there is a bit of a wiring problem.
60
Details, details, …
What’s important is when it gets started, it could ‘save the planet!’
/sarcoff
🙂
70
Of course, the destruction of the environment in order to save the environment is a price worth paying, too.
You people have no dreams, do you?
70
All that energy getting thrown around and it doesn’t even get a footnote in Tremberth’s Earth energy balance cartoon page.
50
Before we arrange sustainable cyclones, we would maybe need sustainable wind turbines as a good starting point.
https://www.google.com.au/search?q=wind+turbines+collapse&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=BLQOVenaAsahmQX9-ICICA&ved=0CCQQsAQ&biw=1252&bih=580&dpr=1.09
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Nice pics!
50
Tim, great pics, but who gets to pay for the cleanup costs?
10
Red dot special cyclone on Jupiter I suggest to review
70
Now THATS a Cyclone!
60
Imagine if we could harvest the wind power…..
40
It’s a novel approach, I know, but have you thought of acquiring data from various sources, both direct and proxy, splicing it together (leaving out any annoying bits, of course), homogenising it, and then doing some modelling to see what my power bill will be in 2100?
10
TonyfromOz.
A request but only if you have the interest, the facilities and contacts to do this.
Could you do a check and analysis on how much and if and whether there are any detectable changes from the normal in power consumption during that so called Earth / power Hour.
I’m fairly sure most of Jo’s posters and lurkers and just maybe the odd pollie might be quite interested in your analysis if it can be done without too much trouble.
100
You can watch it here in near real time for UK and France (11 & 10 hrs resp. behind Sydney)
http://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk
It won’t register though. Entirely symbolic.
Fridays Solar Eclipse registered on the French Solar output and a drop in demand can still be seen. on the French page weekly view around 09:30 Friday.
The Eclipse didn’t register in UK , where solar isn’t shown as supply, as rooftop Solar just reduces demand.
The 1999 Eclipse produced a 3GW surge in demand afterwards but this time there was nothing showing. Perhaps because the rooftop PV output largely matched the expected drop in demand and surge afterwards.
40
Remember when Labor were announcing (again) that the North could be a great food basket to Asia, and our Green Betters were explaining how processing, especially of meats, should occur onshore? This, at a time when refrigerant gases were soaring in cost due to the carbon tax, even quadrupling, and your local takeout was forced to waste food rather than fix a fridge. Sometimes I think Being Green is one huge unintended consequence.
As for Earth Hour, the Orgy of Ingratitude…
It is better to extinguish a candle than to curse the house fire.
40
I like Tim Blair’s name for it. He calls it the
“Human Achievement Hour”
Celebrating man’s greatest achievements many made possible through cheap reliable electricity. Even those invented while researching and working under a electric light globe at night.
180
It is next Saturday – 28th
OK Gerard, don’t rub it in. I got the day, and the date wrong. ;- ) Yes, it is next Saturday. A great night for a party? – Jo
100
It’a quite clear, Jo is having a dress rehearsal this week, so we all get it right next week. I heartily approve. The Globe needs all the extra CO2 it can get.
170
I shall just ignore it and I am sure many people will. The switcher-offs are just poseurs.
130
That pretty well sums it up. Will I do anything different for that hour? No. I have lights that burn 24×7 because they light dark stairwells so my dogs can go up and down them without missing a step and getting hurt. It is actually more important during the day after they have been outside and their pupils are constricted from bright sunlight. The server will stay running, so will the refrigerator, based on the temperatures I expect the heaters will as well. Whatever lights are on will be because someone is awake doing something.
I have begun switching over to LED lighting primarily for longevity as the couple lights that are on 24×7 were getting replaced about every 3-4 months. If they end up lowering the power bill great. I refuse to have any of the CFL bulbs in the house, the current technology with LEDs makes CFL bulbs a joke.
This symbolic gesture for one hour is also a joke. When I grew up, long before any of this crap, I would regularly hear the following from my dad:
Why is the television on if you aren’t watching it?
Close the door, are we heating/cooling the neighborhood?
If you’re done in there turn off the lights.
If you’re not using it turn it off.
Etc. etc. etc.
Sound familiar? So for some of us, we grew up learning to conserve energy not because some environmental group decided we needed to show our “solidarity with nature” but because dad didn’t want to pay more than he needed to on the power bill.
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Robert @ #7.1
A definite green thumb up from this 76 year old!
.
Old habits die hard! especially when the habit is started as an 8 year old and Dad on the warpath when your first home electricity generator was a 12 volt Windlite generator on a 40 foot tower and three or four car batteries in a big wooden box that gave the family about 6 hours or so of light from one or two globes if the wind wasn’t blowing.
And then it was back to the old well used standby Tilly pressure lantern for the kitchen and candles in the bedroom when the wind didn’t blow for a couple of days.
Then came the old lighting engines in the late 1940’s and their 32 volt generators right through to 1961 when the 240 volt SWER power line, which we paid for with a many year long levy on our power bills, came through our patch.
That old 32 volt lighting plant was a big, big improvement except when you couldn’t get that $%&@(*%^ engine to fire up and your arm nearly came out of the socket from swinging the handle on the damn thing because you choked it too much and flooded it or not choked it enough or it just got plain cantankerous as all those old single cylinder, crank start, petrol engined generators regularly managed to achieve.
Or maybe the magneto points were stuffed because you hadn’t spent some 3 or 4 hours getting at that damn magneto in the gloom to do the points and then retiming the engine.
And all that invariably when the batteries were pretty flat and the Mistress of the Household let it be known in no uncertain fashion that you should have got that bloody engine going a couple of hours ago as she wanted to do some ironing with that fancy 32 volt electric iron you bought her for christmas.
By then if you had been married for some time, you realised that it wasn’t perhaps wise to suggest that she was quite capable of starting the damn thing herself and that she could and did swing a mean crank handle as most farm women of that generation could.
And then there was the big bank of batteries in the engine house that had to have clean rain water added every week .
Never let the plates get exposed on those batteries as they cost a mint and you replaced the lot when they got tired after about 3 years
And changing the engine oil in the half darkness every 20 or 30 hours of running.
I think ours did closer to a hundred hours between changes as every body went missing when oil changes were pronounced as the next item that must be done.
Electricity, that marvelous and amazing bit of modern technology that in my grandmother’s house on Melbourne’s Doncaster road, right opposite the later built municipal offices, I as a small boy could press any switch any time of the day or night and there would be that instantaneous brilliance of a powerful light, not a rather dim light from a globe that was refusing to get up and glow as it should because the batteries were flat.
Nope!, The big city lights just came on and your didn’t have to do anything at all for your light and your electric kettles , another marvel, and your electric iron and the electric fridge instead of the kerosene fridge.
Although the old kero fridges worked pretty good and my mother made some mean icecream in that fridge. They still work even better today with gas power when there is no reliable electric power available .
Yep!
Some of us, we grew up learning to conserve energy not because some environmental group decided we needed to show our “solidarity with nature” but because both Dad and ourselves didn’t want to work any damn harder to get that electric light than we had too.
We were just a bit too close to that “Nature” in every part of our lives to want to get all up and cuddly with a “Nature” we usually saw as always finding some way of screwing you up big time and always being extremely inventive and finding a complete new way to do it every time.
290
ROM
Been there, done most of that. Don’t have a t_shirt.
Notice even then then batteries were the stumbling block.
Except ours was diesel.
A friend in similar situation referred to their Moffat Virtue engine as the “More fat (oil) and torture”
110
Bloody “Moffat Virtues!” GRRRR!
The replacement Ronaldson Tippet [ built in Ballarat when we still made things ] was a lot better but still when it decided that it was joining the usual 1950’s communist run union industrial action of those days, it just refused to have anything to do with anything that was associated with actual work.
90
Yep, the very worst thing about living on a boat for 12 years, & sailing 53,000 miles around the Pacific, was keeping those damn batteries charged, & the lights working.
Just in passing, is it OK if I grab the V8 paddock basher, & go turn some donuts down the bottom paddock, rather than run the lights?
70
Love that V8 rumble….
As I was saying to my wife the other day – we have everything back to front – there is only so much bloo d you can squeeze froma stone, and car efficiency I think has reached its limit. Even electric vee-hicles have to get powerd by coal….
I think we seriously should get people working on hydrogen based tech. Yes it has tech issues, but like most things, it takes time and effort to advance the tech. And yes it will make it hard to tax ( oh boo hoo ) but its time to break the oil paradigm, rather than keep flogging a dead horse….
10
Except H2 required electricity from another source. Perhaps small scale nuclear is the way ahead. Hyperion Power (new name is Gen$ Energy) in Nevada has some good options there.
http://www.gen4energy.com/
00
correction due to finger problem: Gen4 Energy
00
ROM, an engineering place I worked at for years used the old Ronaldson Tippet factory in Ballarat also known for making Austral engines, the old diesel generators were used in many rural towns for electrical supply before they were connected to the grid, we got a few old timers through that either worked there back in the day or were old engine enthusiasts that told some great stories about these engines.
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I had solar during my years in Ligtning Ridge. Boy, wouldn’t it have been a poo without the trusty old Lister..?
20
ROM, you could as well be describing my own experience! The only difference is we had a diesel donk to run the generator.
30
So very well said. I spent too many years talking “long walks in the woods” with a pack a weapon in the service of my country to find anythign romantic and wonderfull about “living rough”. Perhaps the green freaks need to get introduced to the real mother nature, not their Disneyfied version of it.
20
So very well said. I spent too many years talking “long walks in the woods” with a pack & weapons in the service of my country to find anythign romantic and wonderfull about “living rough”. Perhaps the green freaks need to get introduced to the real mother nature, not their Disneyfied version of it.
00
sorry about the repost, had some problems with a few stubborn electrons on my end. Sorted– the BFH works wonders.
00
Don’t just ignore it. Let’s turn it into something good. If children celebrated our great fortune, and gave thanks for electricity every year, not only does it make their lives a bit richer, but it makes them more immune to the one-sided anti-electricity, anti-coal, and anti-miner propaganda. We need more balance in this public debate.
Plus there is an added bonus that if humanity uses more electricity during “Earth Hour” it sends a pointed message…
And of course, I’ve done this with kids. It is actually fun to “light up” the house.
263
Yes we need to turn Earth Hour into a celebration of what has been achieved and so that all that isn’t just taken all that for granted.
Lighting up the house isn’t wasteful either as anyone with basic numeracy can work out that even conventional (incandescent) light bulbs (100W) use a whole order of magnitude less power than than a space heater (>1KiloWatt).
That’s why the whole lights out thing is meaningless on any practical level and of value only in highlighting the collective ignorance of mass environmental movements today, while we still can & do celebrate Christmas with impunity.
110
What annoys me asbout earth hour is that its encouraging people to be embarrassed about power consumption and embarrassed to be achiving society…on par with the local pold leaving the lights running when they pull people up for maximum humiliation.
I feel sorry for true greenies – they are harmless enough, its the hard core commies that have hijacked their cause and turned it into the society destroying nonsense that it is…..
40
Go down to your local event centre supplier, and construction machines rental outlet, and take out every arc lamp they possess on an overnight hire.
Lend them to like-minded people in the neighborhood, and give the finger to the spacestation. If you can get enough lights and volunteers, you could give two fingers.
Many years from now, and light years away, some alien may even think it was funny.
60
Perhaps the conformists are secretly making the point that it is all just a scam when they all light up their petro-chemical paraffin candles for an hour. Jokes aside tho, I don’t think I agree on the notion of teaching kids they don’t need to be frugal with their electricity usage regardless of its source. Most of the old timers here would have been brought up with a good sense of being frugal with electricity long before the CAGW scam took off. Would you encourage your kids to drive large fuel hungry cars too just to dispel the CAGW scam?
30
Joe,
It in not a matter of encouragement, per se, or even discouragement, for that matter.
It is all about freedom of choice, and doing what you personally think is the right thing to do, without some busybody telling you that you will be treated like a pariah if you don’t do what they tell you, when they tell you.
How do you eat an elephant? One mouthful at a time.
How do you loose your freedom? One new “rule”, at a time.
I stopped buying christmas trees, when people started telling me that I needed one, at Christmas
51
Rereke, it would seem then that those xmas tree botherers did have an affect on your tree buying habits. I probably would have just kept doing what I was doing and ignored them. Perhaps those tree botherers were some friends of the forest using a bit of reverse psychology on you too 🙂
I think the whole concept of freedom of choice is a little less tangible if you are a kid and I think the notion of being frugal is a good thing for kids to learn regardless of their family wealth. Whether that is seen as curbing their ‘freedom of choice’ is up to the individual. Personally I won’t be turning anything on or off that I would not do normally, in fact I probably would not have even been aware of the occasion had I not read-it-here-first, such is my ignorance.
40
I spend all year with a low waste, efficient (within reason) philosophy. One hour of celebration doesn’t undo that, though it does provide a contrast with normal practice.
As a society we “waste” electricity in the name of Santa, New Year, Birthdays, mothers day etc. Shouldn’t we spend one hour celebrating the discovery that changes our lives in so many ways?
81
“Shouldn’t we spend one hour celebrating the discovery that changes our lives in so many ways?” – nah, probably not. Well not in the sense of ‘should’ – perhaps a ‘could’ or a ‘would’ or maybe on an ‘only-if-I-wan’t-to’ basis. Plus Jo, we only have 8766 hours in a year at our disposal and by the time we are done with celebrating fire, penicillin, p-n junctions and wine, there are few hours to spare. Good on you too for your low waste philosophy. Maybe you guys could flash the lights on and off for the hour, that could get some attention and save a W-hr or two as well as pay homage to the humble on-off switch that has been so good for us. 🙂
20
I don’t do much for earth hour. I just start the auto-clean on the oven, replace the furnace with space heaters, make a pot of coffee, and run a load of laundry to exercise the electric water heater.
00
Yes, when my grandkids are riding in the big vehicle.
10
A few strings of Christmas lights to add to the general lighting might be the go. I’m into light and heat rather than loud sound!
30
I’d forgotten about earth hour. Usually by now I would have got the nauseating reminders and exhortations from the local nutters. I have tried to explain why it is so grotesque given the number of people for whom earth hour is 24/7/365. Last time, I sent the link to the image below as “my thoughts on earth hour”. Looks like that might have got through …
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/90071372/fire.jpg
90
On to it.
After all…it is an annual ritual in this household.
Light up!
80
If our genset was working I’d do the lights on self generated electricity fuelled by even more evil carbon.
$ priorities brought on by drought and bloody government hypocracy might over rule though.
90
Ian, perhaps save on the bill by timing your cooking washing and water heating. Turn if off at 6pm, and hit go for everything at 8.30 🙂
(Oh, I see Brad R #14 was ahead of me on this one. Nice touch with the self cleaning oven. Say yes to pyrolytic cleaning. That’s the spirit! 🙂 – Jo )
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Jo,
As per post above we went from primitive as per ROM and don’t regret the day the SWER line came.
I was only trying to think of maximising emissions for the time.
In passing a friend pre SWER racked up 58000 hours on a Lister genset.
70
Yikes!!
70
ROM
That’s about six and a half years at 24/7 running as I calculate it.
Which is what at least some of the stations west of the SWER line do, only bigger. One I know runs a main set of 60 KVA 24/7 with a 40 KVA back-up
00
Gee Another Ian, I never thought of my childhood experiences with our own 32 volt power generation independence as “primitive”. I thought it was pretty cool to have a washing machine (an old Lightburn “cement mixer” type – did a fantastic job!), a radiogramme, lights and an electric iron. Our gennie was a Lister as well, so was the plant for the dairy. Good times…….
30
Bushkid
Slight misinterpretation.
The primitive I had in mind was the kero light part. Mind you, you could see things with Tilley lights when they were going but they did have their quirks.
32 volt was a whole new world. We were a Hoover clan.
00
Congratulation!
Paul Homewood reports that you and he get a big mention in the UK’s ‘The Daily Telegraph’ Christopher Booker web-page about the honesty in reporting of cyclone Pam.
That will get this site more attention from CAGW trolls crawling over here.
70
Bring them on …
31
Might do all of the above AND have a bonfire that night – lots of growth from that extra CO2 to deal with around here. I think my environment has eaten too much CO2 so I need to give it back.
100
Would that be a Bonfire for the CAGW vanities?
.
Oh hum … I’ll get my hat…
50
May well be in bed, so DGAF.
50
What I wish –
😆
😆
Reality: it will be same as last Sunday. 🙁
60
Reschedule –
Should be Saturday that no fizzing Wimshurst or crackling Van de Graaff electrostatic generators will arc with a theatrical buzz as sparks erupt.
Next Saturday will not see those neon tubes get pumped with RF power to pulse and brightly fluoresce their eery web of strands all aglow.
30
This year I expect I’ll be too busy to bother. But last year I time-shifted as many power-consuming tasks to that hour as I could…including running a self-cleaning cycle on the electric oven, plus a load of laundry in the electric dryer and a load in the dishwasher. Our normal consumption is about 2 kW; I managed to boost that to 13 kW for Power Hour 2014.
80
It is a silly Fairfax invention that is as easy to ignore or to be honoured with all lights on.
90
I don’t know why they bother. Just present north Korea with a life-time award and forget it.
190
Don’t the catastrophists celebrate all night, every night when their renewable energy systems stop receiving sunlight?
Of course, they may claim that the wind generators are used for power at night so possibly they only celebrate on calm nights.
No change of power use habits in my household. Burn, Baby, Burn!
92
I spent earth day here in north America thinking about the billions of people in developing countries that do not have access to electricity and must cook with biomass as well the hundreds of millions of people who must struggle daily with rolling blackouts.
http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org/resources/energydevelopment/
http://www.economist.com/news/middle-east-and-africa/21637396-rolling-power-cuts-are-fraying-tempers-unplugged
110
Hi all.
Here is my YouTube clip I did back in 2012 for ( The Hour Of Power ). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_i8RXjKG9i4 ….. Share the love fossil fuel lovers.
72
I’m guessing that wasn’t your beer of the evening. Nice cold beer, at night time with no wind no less!
20
“1st beer of the evening”
20
Seems to me a better celebration of ‘Earth Hour’ would be a solid campaign of mass ordinance directed at the anti human cretins wreaking hate and death upon innocent people in Syria and Iraq. That of course would be too hard wouldn’t it. Better to impose themselves on hard working decent people within our societies where they operate and who offer them protection. I guess what Im trying to say is that if we value this planet and our lives within it then maybe its time we started tackling the real threats to “the planet” rather than those manufactured by the politics of the disenfranchised left.
70
22 March: Sky News: Marches across country against Abbott govt
PHOTO: a “handful” of protesters – one smug guy with a placard (COAL IS THE PITS), the other placard the PM & non-Malcolm Ministers plus Gina & Rupert)
Crowds across the country have rallied against budget cuts and Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s government.Protesters with banners took to the streets in Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Adelaide and Canberra to voice their concerns on a range of issues including indigenous rights, coal seam gas mining, homelessness, live animal exports and metadata.More than ***5000 people gathered in Sydney’s CBD to hear Greens Senator Christine Milne, who was introduced as the ‘leader of the opposition’…
In Perth about 500 people, flanked by crowd marshals wearing Guy Fawkes masks, marched through the city’s shopping malls.Federal Labor MP Melissa Parke told the crowd she thought Mr Abbott was a cross between Russia’s Vladimir Putin and former US President George W Bush and that he was leading ‘the worst government ever’…
The annual March in March event attracted colourful parodies of politicians, mostly targeting the Liberal Party with some expletive-laden messages directed at Mr Abbott.’Is being an incompetent buffoon also a lifestyle choice?’ read one banner at the Sydney rally.’Terrorists are threatening our way of life,’ said another, alongside a picture of the Prime Minister.Others carried signs supporting refugees, women and gay rights…
http://www.skynews.com.au/news/national/2015/03/22/marches-across-country-against-abbott-govt.html
***MURDOCH MEDIA SAYS 5,000 IN SYDNEY…FAIRFAX’S SU-LIN SAYS IT’S 500, WHICH THE PICTURES SUPPORT. OTHERWISE, THERE’D BE AN AERIAL PIC:
22 March: SMH: Su-Lin Tan: Australians speak out against Government at March in March rallies
PHOTO: THE NON-MALCOLM MINISTERS PLUS GINA & RUPERT, OF COURSE – SYDNEY (NO WAY IS IT A MARCH OF 5,000 BY THE LOOK OF THE STRAGGLERS BEHIND THE PLACARD)
Hundreds of people joined rallies around the country on Sunday, protesting issues like coal seam gas, budget cuts and Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s government.
The March in March rallies organised by members of the public, filled Sydney, Perth, Adelaide and Canberra with pure democratic fervour…
More than ***500 people gathered at Sydney’s Town Hall in the CBD to hear Greens Senator Christine Milne, who was introduced as the “leader of the opposition”…
Other speakers at Sydney’s Town Hall included chief executive of 305.org, Blair Palese, director of Edmund Rice Centre and co-founder of AnTaR, Phil Glendenning, assistant director of the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation, Annie Butler and co-founder of Jumbunna Indigenous House of Education, Ken Canning.
Roads around Sydney’s Town Hall were closed until just after 3pm.
http://www.smh.com.au/national/australians-speak-out-against-government-at-march-in-march-rallies-20150322-1m4ym7.html
40
Awesome timing. Commissioning a new switch board to accommodate new cold rooms. Gotta bring those temps down!
60
PerthNow front page, 200 people at Perth rally (against Sky News’s 500 in Perth)
WA rally against Abbott government
ABOUT 200 people have attended a March In March rally in Perth to protest a range of issues including indigenous rights and homelessness. Read more…
http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/breaking-news
click on “read more” and AAP calls it “several” hundred. divide even the lowest Fairfax Sydney figure and the PerthNow front page figure and you probably have more accurate numbers:
22 March: PerthNow: AAP: WA rally against Abbott government
PHOTO: HANDFUL OF PEOPLE
SEVERAL hundred people attended the March In March event on Sunday to voice concerns on a range of issues including indigenous rights, climate change, homelessness, live animal exports and metadata…
http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/breaking-news/wa-rally-against-abbott-government/story-fnhrvfuw-1227273487564
50
Sydney pic of about a hundred+ people. placard: “a vote against Baird is a vote against Abbott”:
Twitter: Global Revolution: FibsFreitag: #MarchinMarch protests held across #Australia against budget cuts, CSG and Tony Abbott http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/mar/22/march-in-march-protests-held-against-budget-cuts-csg-and-tony-abbott#via_@smnaustralia_WE-WILL-NOT-BE-SILENT …!
https://twitter.com/FibsFreitag/status/579581118879539200/photo/1
“CROWDS ACROSS AUSTRALIA” SAYS AAP!!!!! SAME PIC AS ABOVE. “PUT THE LIBERALS LAST” SAYS ANOTHER OF THE PLACARDS. SECOND PIC ABOUT 60 PEOPLE:
22 March: Guardian: AAP: March in March protests held against budget cuts, CSG and Tony Abbott
Crowds across Australia have rallied against coal seam gas, metadata retention, the closure of remote Indigenous communities and the Abbott government
More than 500 people gathered in Sydney’s CBD to hear Greens senator Christine Milne, who was introduced as the “leader of the opposition”…
“Is being an incompetent buffoon (Abbott) also a lifestyle choice?” read one banner at the Sydney rally…
http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/mar/22/march-in-march-protests-held-against-budget-cuts-csg-and-tony-abbott#via_@smnaustralia_WE-WILL-NOT-BE-SILENT
50
ABC doesn’t appear to have anything online about the “protests” so far. maybe, as with BBC & the faux Time to Act Climate march success, they’ve decided to steer clear of this one! time will tell.
goodnite folks.
60
Maybe someone in the ABC got around to reading the latest Gallup Poll from the USA and are starting to think they might have backed the wrong horse, the tired old nag, in the climate race.
__________________________
Gallup Poll: ‘Americans Express The Least Amount Of Concern About Climate Change’
Americans express the least amount of concern about climate change — 25% have a great deal of worry — confirming that despite widespread news coverage of the implications of changing temperatures, Americans are not highly worried about the issue.
Out of 15 domestic issues, Americans’ concerns about terrorism and race relations have risen most sharply over the past year. The percentage of Americans who worry “a great deal” about the possibility of a terrorist attack (51%) climbed 12 percentage points from 2014 to 2015, while concerns about race relations (28%) surged 11 points. Americans’ worries about illegal immigration also climbed over the past year, increasing six points to 39%.
These data are from a March 5-8 Gallup poll, which asked Americans about the degree to which they are worried about each of a list of problems and issues. […]
Overall, Americans worry most about the availability and affordability of healthcare (54%), the economy (53%) and the possibility of a future terrorist attack in the U.S. (51%).
Nearly half of Americans express a great deal of worry about the Social Security system, the size and power of the federal government and the way income and wealth are distributed in the U.S.
On the other hand, Americans express the least amount of concern about climate change — 25% have a great deal of worry — confirming that despite widespread news coverage of the implications of changing temperatures, Americans are not highly worried about the issue. Additionally, less than a third of Americans worry a great deal about race relations and the availability and affordability of energy.
[ more ]
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Whoever chose for a globally coordinated celebration hour to begin at half past anyway ?
They must be seriously out of touch with human behaviour.
Earth Hour, conceived by Twits, for Twits.
Let’s save it from being wasted.
71
I can see that on the psychometric testing for Green Jobs coming soon.
Are you an Earth Hour or a Human Achievement Hour person ?
60
I’d like to see the estimated energy saved during this Earth Hour exercise.
Then, I’d like to see the estimated energy that didn’t arrive at the Earth during the recent Solar Eclipse.
That might be an interesting comparison.
60
I want to see the energy spike when everyone starts turning things back on again. My suspicion is anything that was saved during that one hour is negated by the spike when they return to reality. Tony could probably tell us more about how that will work out.
70
Tony alluded to it in #3 above.
10
It looks like starting 20:30 may be timed to catch the natural daily drop on demand so some credit may be taken for it. As this one from California shows it had no effect whatsoever, unless it was most users that got confused about the start time & switched off early ?
https://www.ohmconnect.com/images/Earth_Hour_1.jpg
70
I just like to watch all the lights go out, it makes me feel all warm and green inside.
60
Well, green anyway! 😉
20
Has someone turned watermelons inside out recently?
30
I’ll do my part by turning off every non essential light in the house for an hour. **
Oh! Wait a minute. They’re already off during the day. Maybe I can contribute by turning off all the non essential lights after we go to bed. But nuts, they’re all off then too.
What to do? Oh, I know what. I’ll just ignore the whole stupid exercise. As tony pointed out, “Yeah yeah I know. It’s just symbolic.” Electricity is here to stay and like the air I breathe, I don’t need to celebrate it.
Anyway, look on the bright side. It’s Earth Hour now and we can get rid of 23 hours if we ignore Earth Day. It’s a small victory to be sure but it’s a start.
** The refrigerator will not be shut down nor will the freezer.
70
For anyone interested, I recently discovered a really worthwhile improvement in lighting technology. They’re LED bulbs that really are an equivalent to their corresponding incandescent bulbs. They’re made by a company called Cree. In the states you can find them at Home Depot and possibly elsewhere.
They’re a bit expensive but they have an expected lifetime of 15 to 20 years, something no CFL or anything else can hope to touch. So they’re very much worth their price. The warrantee says that if one fails within 10 years you return it to the manufacturer along with proof of purchase and you’ll get a new one, no questions asked.
This is the first thing in lighting technology that has impressed me. And I’m hard to impress.
Don’t know about availability other than in the U.S. but definitely they’re worth looking for. 75 Watts worth of light for 13.5 Watts and that life expectancy in something that actually looks like and is the same size as the bulb it replaces is not to be sneezed at.
So far they come in 40, 60, 75 and 100 Watt sizes and there are also some floodlight styles. Two color temperatures are available, cold white like the fluorescents used in commercial lighting and warm white identical to the incandescent bulb. And they’re compatible with probably every dimmer technology in use for incandescent lighting. They come in a version suitable for damp locations like outdoor lighting or a bathroom and another that’s only suitable for dry locations (which is about half the price of the former). Take your pick. What’s not to like?
I hardly ever rave about something but these have met my every expectation so far. And CFL can’t begin to compete. I hope they corner the market completely.
70
Watch out with high powered LED lamps and fitments, these devices generate a significant amounts of heat in a small area, and heat stress is one of the cause of failure.
Saying that all good designs take adequate heatsinking into consideration, however when fitting them ensure that the ventilation is adequate and kept clear over the life of the device.
More information (it’s a Wiki)
60
Whatever the ultimate situation turns out to be, I’ve never seen any electrical device with that 10 year unconditional money back guarantee. So Cree is either very certain of their product or very foolhardy.
We shall see.
30
I have several, one replaced the floodlight that illuminates the flag on the house, was replacing the halogens about every two months and that’s just from running dusk to dawn using an optical sensor to turn it on and off. Two 100 watt bulbs in the garage ceiling, so hopefully no more dragging out the step ladder to change those, two 60’s in the bulb housings on the garage door opener, and a couple 40’s in lamps I use 24X7 to light up the stairwells for my dogs. I was replacing those about every 3-4 months.
I put one of the “daylight” bulbs in the furnace room, it’s just too white for my tastes to use for regular lighting. The rest are the “warm white” and in my opinion you can’t tell the difference between one of them and an incandescent without looking at the bulb itself.
Another thing that’s come about is LED fixtures, where the fixture itself is also the light. Picture the ceiling lights where you remove a glass globe to change the bulb only now you replace the fixture and no more bulbs. The lumen output from those can be intense, one was the equivalent of three 60 watt bulbs per the packaging, tried it in the entryway and had to change it to one that is the equivalent of two 60’s. It was far to much light for a fixture only a few inches above your head. My only concern with them is if they do indeed last as long as advertised because if they fail you are now replacing the entire fixture rather than just the bulb. But if they do, no more ladders to change lights in the hall, bathroom, entryway.
Compared to what is happening with the LED lighting technology the CFL bulbs are like going back to using candles. CFL’s can’t match the turn on time especially if it’s cold and their attempt at a “warm white” doesn’t do it as far as I’m concerned.
70
As it just happens, I have a Panasonic LED 600 lm sitting on my desk. It consumes 8W, at 220-240V, drawing 58mA. It delivers the equivalent of 60 watts incandescent, and is rated at 25000 hours (1000 hrs/year is normal in a domestic application, so that is 25 years). Bequeath them in your will.
30
Thanks Rereke. I’ll notify my attorney forthwith.
Actually, before the circuit design was changed I’ve had standard old fluorescent tubes in my kitchen that have gone on without trouble for nearly 15 years. But you can’t get those tubes anymore so I had to pay an electrician to rewire for the new ballasts. The new tubes are nothing but trouble. Progress… …NOT — except for the electrician who gets job security.
I’ve several of the lower power circular jobs in lamps that did go more than 20 years.
In about 1978 I managed to get my hands on two commercial fixtures using the long tubes with the single connection at each end and hang them up in my garage. I don’t know how long they were used before I got them but they’ve done excellently with intermittent use. I had to replace the ballast in each one eventually and I bought 2 new tubes in addition to 4 spares I got with the fixtures. They’re still going but if they ever quit I’m probably up the creek for replacement tubes or ballasts. When it’s very cold these things are an interesting study in standing waves. You can see them in the tubes as they struggle to start up and they don’t reach full brightness until 20 seconds or more of warm up time and then the standing waves disappear.
I suspect the life you can get from standard fluorescent lighting depends on how how long it takes for heat stress to start a leak around the wires that pass through the glass at each end. The failure of these CFLs seems to be electrical, probably heat too but killing the electronics in the base.
The only longevity problem with low power stuff (<= 20 Watts) is the starters, which fail constantly. But starters are cheap.
If anyone knows more on the subject don't hesitate to comment about it.
I really don't like politically driven "progress". But in the meantime the Cree LEDs are doing as expected and with less power required than even a fluorescent equivalent. I suspect this is the future of lighting. Give a free market an incentive to improve and innovate and that's what happens. 🙂
00
They’re available in most countries now, prices vary. BTW, they were invented by Carmanah Technologies in Canada and the patent made available royalty free to manufacturers. Prices are already coming down as they become more common. You can order cheap ones direct from china for about $4 each.
00
I know they’re manufactured there so buying direct sounds good. How do I get ahold of them to order? They must have a web site. But a search on Carmanah Technologies doesn’t seem to lead me to it.
00
How good is your Mandarin?
10
I eat Mandarin Oranges. Will that do?
They’re very yummy in the tummy.
10
a brief web search finds all these distributors, I am certain that there are many more. I bought mine years ago at $4 each, they are cheaper now. You will of course pay shipping and customs but that is still cheaper than buying at the local hardware or big box stores.
http://www.alibaba.com/products/F0/led_lights_china_price_list/CID100009121.html
10
Thanks for the link. However, none of the lights they show is the type I’m looking for.
The field of LED lighting is quite large. In one single store they’ve had a variety of them for a long time already. I always rejected them because of non uniform light distribution, strange shape or size, even for less than the output I wanted. Finding the Cree was a breath of fresh air. Usually anything with the 60 or 75 Watts equivalent output I want has had a rather large heatsink. Cree manages to make the heatsink small and almost unnoticeable compared with anything else.
10
Like this one?
I also note that Cree are using a advanced heat pipe technology to cool the very high power ones(150W and above).
As noted here Heat Pipes are more thermally conductive than solid metals designs. So Cree’s design improves the heat dissipation while actually reducing the size.
00
Yes. And I’ve figured out the heat dissipation method generally. It’s superb. The 75 Watt jobs are not more than warm anywhere but the heatsink, which as the pictures show, is small compared with what you might expect. And the heatsink is nowhere near as hot as the 75 Watt incandescent bulb would get. If you can get air circulation around it you can dissipate a lot of heat. I have 3 of them in a tight fitting bathroom fixture and the glass “bells” they’re in get only warm to the touch near the top, even after hours of constant running. As I said, these impress me. And I’m hard to impress.
Thanks for the heatpipe article. It fills in what observation couldn’t.
So far I have 9 of these running and no failures, not even in questionable circumstances for a CFL.
00
Their other design has a plastic bulb with openings through which air can circulate, directly cooling the capsule containing the LED elements. My only worry about that is the inevitable accumulation of dust inside the bulb which would reduce the cooling air flow. An ordinary incandescent bulb would never last long enough to accumulate significant dust. But these just might last that long.
I suppose they could be blown out at intervals to prevent any trouble. A vacuum cleaner should do it.
00
Do you have any idea what the operating voltage of these Cree LED elements is?
00
Hello Australian Chums,
I will celebrate here in Holyhead (Old North Wales) by inviting some people over to eat my famous chilli and drink alcoholic beverages with impuninty. At midnight we will launch into a lusty rendition of the lovely song Lower Lights, The song of Holyhead, to rejoice in the fact that our fishermen were guided home in foul weather by the lower lights of the town.
All Welcome, it is always a great evening except for 2011 when that little bastard Geri Williams set fire to the conservatory.
It’s at
15 Yr Ogof
Kingsland
Holyhead
Anglesey
UK
100
Sorry to be a spoilsport Jo but i just cant bring myself to join in this protest when i know that some of the cost of that extra energy that i would burn would go to the green profiteers via the levies imposed upon my bills by lord Deben and Co. Instead i’ll protest in a positive way by sending you a little chocolate, after all its nearly easter so enjoy.
60
Rejoice that the flick of a switch,
Can lessen our toil and enrich,
Our years and our days,
In thousands of ways,
And for all of us; not just the rich.
171
Bard of the People.
71
Very nice Joe.
30
that does not rhyme!
32
It’s in proper limerick form GA.
Another great one Ruairi. 🙂
40
For effsake… my reply was clearly under the comment “Very nice Joe”. I made a joke that at least someone understood.
32
A limerick is a humorous poem consisting of five lines. The first, second, and fifth lines have seven to ten syllables while rhyming and having the same verbal rhythm. The third and fourth lines only have to have five to seven syllables and have to rhyme with each other and have the same rhythm
30
well to repost in the most juvenile ways to you nfw – I now have figureed out what the “w” stands for. Please parse the above comments before making nfi comments.
00
“reposte”
sigh
20
Don’t take it so hard little guy.
Us leaves are still largely misunderstood.
But we’ve come along way since the ‘The Fall’ when leaves used to be piled up and burnt in mounds on front lawns.
30
To get this lymeric to rhyme
Syllables aren’t seven or ten but nine.
But I fear I’m in error
Which is not very clever.
And Ruairi’s are better than mine.
😐
50
was just reading yours with different accents. It works much better with an australian one as”erra” and “clevva” rhyme but “air or” and “clev ur” not so well.
20
At least we’ll get a little quiet from our new friend Tristan…. Michael’s long lost brother…..
91
He got his homework project done, and doesn’t need us any more.
20
We are turning that corner again. A big and fairly rapid change is about to happen. It is no catastrophe, it is the natural seasonal change.
That timely fall, as the warm weather in the Southern Hemisphere starts to cool, and days grow a shorter, the nights a little cooler, a little longer.
When the North thaws out to find a new dawn chorus heralding spring’s fresh beginning, with hardy twigs’ buds of green hues bursting.
While there are seasons enjoy them, and pray that they stay, for as witnessed in 1816 and earlier in about 536, when nature robs us of our seasons human life; all life, is hit very hard.
It will happen again, I have no doubt, but will we be better prepared?
Until then enjoy nature’s bountiful seasons.
30
Heading to Finland tomorrow….. can’t wait to see it all come alive!
30
It was 16 degrees C in my kitchen this morning in WA. Had to find the electric heater. Not bad for March.
20
Do it for the children
We did and it was great fun. The last two years the council ran an Earth Hour Festival in a park on Cooks River, Sydney. At dusk kids light tea candles and float them in paper boats on the river. A few of us from the local kayak club paddle in with lights decorating the kayaks, to re-light the one which blow out while floating, and to later collect them all for the rubbish. I’m sure the power system for the sausage sizzle and concert PA, portable lighting system, and the small amount from the tea lights made up for those who turned off their lights at home.
20
calling on the experts:
BBC ran a news ticker yesterday “China admits huge impact of climate change” or very similar.
heard it on BBC radio. lengthy piece, which quoted what i recall as China’s temperature having risen 0.23% per decade throughout the Twentieth Century, more than in any other country, & giving the impression this was part of Zheng Guogang’s Xinhua story.
however, BBC don’t include any figures in their online document & i have checked all other coverage, which is basically AFP, also stating this story is from Xinhua. of course, it could be on Chinese-language Xinhua, or it may not exist at all:
22 March: BBC: Climate change: China official warns of ‘huge impact’
Climate change could have a “huge impact” on China, reducing crop yields and harming the environment, the country’s top weather scientist has warned, in a rare official admission.
Zheng Guogang told Xinhua news agency that climate change could be a “serious threat” to big infrastructure projects.
He said temperature rises in China were already higher than global averages…
These are rare admissions from a Chinese official, BBC Asia analyst Michael Bristow says…
Mr Zheng warned of more droughts, rainstorms, and higher temperatures, which would threaten river flows and harvests, as well as major infrastructure projects such as the Three Gorges Dam. He urged China to pursue a lower-carbon future…
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-32006972
the only article i found in a search of Xinhua English featuring Zheng Guogang was in February 2008, “China’s trunk north-south expressway fully reopened” , in which he was quoted as saying:
“The snow havoc beginning on Jan. 10 has hit 19 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions, toppled 223,000 homes and damaged another 862,000 and affected 7.8 million people, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs.
Three weeks into the national combat against snow havoc, meteorological chief Zheng Guogang admitted on Monday afternoon that the persistent snow and accompanying freeze were “beyond normal expectations”.
“We didn’t expect another two heavy snowfalls would follow between Jan. 25 and Feb. 2 after severe blizzards hit the central and southern regions from Jan. 10 to Jan. 22,” he said.”
the only result i’ve seen for any 0.23% figure per decade for any study is this one:
2013: Science Direct: Climate Change Facts in Central China during 1961–2010
Abstract
Based on the observations from 239 meteorological stations located in Central China (Henan, Hubei and Hunan provinces), this paper focuses on the climate change facts during 1961–2010. There was a significant increasing trend in annual mean temperature for Central China during 1961–2010. The increasing rate was 0.15°C per decade, which was lower than the national trend. Since the mid-1980s, temperature increasing was obvious. Large increasing rate was observed in the mid-eastern part of Central China. For the four seasons, the increasing rate in winter was the largest (0.27°C per decade)…
Results:
3.1.1. Annual mean temperature significantly increasing, most obvious in the mideastern part and in winter
During 1961–2010, there was a significant increasing trend in annual mean temperature for Central China (Fig. 3). The temperature increasing rate is 0.15°C per decade, which is lower than the national mean increasing rate (0.23°C per decade from 1951 to 2009) [ECSCNARCC, 2011] and slightly higher than the global increasing rate (0.13°C per decade from 1956 to 2005) [IPCC, 2007]. There has been significant increasing since the mid-1980s, especially since 1994. From 1997 to 2010, the abnormally high temperature persisted for 14 consecutive years…
During 1961–2010, the increasing rate in the annual mean maximum temperature was 0.13°C per decade. There was also a significant increasing trend in the annual mean minimum temperature, 0.23°C per decade, which was much larger than that in the annual mean maximum temperature. As a result, the annual mean diurnal range of temperature was significantly decreasing at the rate of –0.10°C per decade…
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1674927813500141
would love if someone could shed any light on this story in general, and the overall China temp rise per decade in particular.
10
interestingly, there are virtually no Zheng Guoguang results online in years, apart from this recent story. he’s an IPCC insider, it would seem. BBC’s piece last nite did mention that perhaps officials would deny what is being reported, as they have in the past, when rogue officials have come out with some alarmist statement:
United Nations: (GSP) Panel Members: Dr. Zheng Guoguang, Administrator of CMA
Dr. Zheng Guoguang is responsible for CMA’s overall management. He graduated from the Nanjing Institute of Meteorology (renamed the Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology in 2004) with a Bachelor’s degree in Atmospheric Observation, and obtained his Master degree in Atmospheric Physics from the same institute later. He got his doctorial degree of science in physics from the University of Toronto in Canada. He is a part-time professor in the Peking University, a part-time professor and a doctoral supervisor in the Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology.
In 1996-1997, he was Deputy Director-General, Institute of Strategic Development & Overall Planning of CMA. In 1997-1998, he served as Deputy Director-General of the Fujian Provincial Meteorological Bureau of CMA. In 1998- 1999, he was Director-General, Department of Observation and Telecommunication of CMA. From 1999 to 2007, he was Deputy Administrator of CMA. Since March 2007, he has been serving as the Administrator of CMA.
Dr. Zheng Guoguang also serves as Chairman of the National Climate Committee of China, Chairman of the Chinese Committee of the Global Climate Observing System (CGOS), Member of the National Leading Group to Address Climate Change and Energy Conservation & Pollutant Discharge Reduction and Deputy Director of the Office of the National Leading Group to Address Climate Change, Vice President of the Chinese Meteorological Society, Permanent Representative of China with the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), Member of the WMO Executive Council, Focal Point of China for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Co-Chair of the Group on Earth Observations (GEO), etc.
http://www.un.org/wcm/content/site/climatechange/pages/gsp/group-members_1/Zheng_Guoguang
10
The last para of the discussion/conclusion of the paper bizarrely entitled, “Climate Change Facts in Central China during 1961–2010 (2013)” about says it all and at the same time nothing, and includes the old chestnut, a requirement for further research….to establish the “facts” already established? Horribly circular and written as a political puff piece.
The irony appears that the paper title screams ‘facts’, while the conclusion portrays quite a different perspective – QED…
The Variation of annual mean temperature anomalies for Central China from 1961 to 2010 graph (Figure 3) show a trend line fitted to show increase across this period. Unsurprisingly, the trend since 1995 appears trendless to the eye, quite consistent with the established absence of statistically significant warming. ‘The Pause’ has been excluded from this political paper, as were the three years and data since 2010 to its publication.
20
“What will I do to celebrate.” I’ll have a conversation with my grandchildren to give a different perspective to their greenie mother and teachers. Won’t do a bit of good I suspect, but at least I will have sounded off a little. Plus I will give thanks for the ability to see, work and enjoy my evenings, not to mention using the automatic washing machine and other gadgets such as this computer. I love electricity. Electricity, good water and sewerage and contraception have lifted our standard of living hugely. All to be celebrated.
70
Only needs a good Cyclone to show how utterly dependent upon electrical power we have all become.
On the fourth day after the big blow, the Monday, my good lady wife and I visited our local shopping Mall which had it’s own power, and the reason was to get out of the heat for a couple of hours.
This huge Mall was back on line the day after the blow, but only for replenishing all the millions of dollars of cold storage stock lost when the power was off for just 24 hours, and they opened for normal operations the following day.
We visited on the Monday, and then again on the Tuesday.
The food court was jam packed SOLID with people with long queues at all outlets, Maccas and KFC with queues the longest.
There were quite literally MANY hundreds of people sitting around at every available power outlet, queuing as well just to wait their time to get to that power outlet. They were all charging their devices, Mobile phones, pads, pods, notebooks and full laptops.
Even some of the stores had handwritten signs on their windows saying that people could come in and use their power outlets to charge devices.
Food and power.
I have never seen so many people in that shopping Mall, even at the height of the Christmas rush. You could barely move, and the car park, every part of it was chockers.
Virtually everybody entering the place had their charging device and power lead with them.
It’s so easy to flick the switch at the ‘hole in the wall’. However, when nothing comes out, it’s a whole other story.
Tony.
80
It seems the citizens of Rockhampton should be excused Earth Hour having so recently spent days without power.
50
Everyone should have a plug in inverter (dc-ac) for their vehicles. My Jeep is factory equipped with one and the portable versions are cheap. Charging devices then takes only a couple of minutes, especially if you use a power bar to plug in multiple devices to charge up.
My kids all have then in their disaster kits and have for a long time.
You can run a fridge on one if you have to, or power the forced air on a home furnace for brief periods in an emergency. There are always options for the prepared and thinking people
10
I will celebrate by tying my kite to some fishing line.
I will then tie that line to some string cord. I will tie the cord to some rope and the rope to a light chain. I will tie the light chain to a medium chain and then tie that to a heavy chain. I will clamp the heavy chain to an old car.
I will then go to the nearest wind farm and fly my kite.
40
Smelt some Aluminium or enrich some Uranium.
Can’t decide which.
Decisions decisions!
Oh hang it, I will just do both.
40
Go for the more useful one that will maximize your profit, so…
.
.
.
.
fire up the Uranium enrichment plant!
10
And here is the rubbish issued issued by the company I work for – HQ Germany so full of these fairy tales- needless to say I will wear anything but black!
Monday, 23 March 2015
Earth Hour 2015: Dress In Black on 27 March
Dear Colleagues,
Earth Hour 2015 will take place on Saturday, 28 March. To add on to the excitement and celebrate this meaningful event, you are encouraged to dress in black to represent ‘Lights Out’ on Friday, 27 March. At the same time, please remember to switch off the lights in your offices for an hour that day to further celebrate this occasion.
Thursday 26th March 2015 is casual day in the office.
We would love to witness your participation, so please update and share all your activities on your social media pages. Do remember to include the hash tag #DHL, #EarthHour and #yourpower in your posts.
Every little effort can make a difference, so do remember to switch off your lights at home for one hour from 8.30pm to 9.30pm (local time) on Saturday, 28 March 2015.
If you have not pledged your support for Earth Hour 2015, you can still do so here. The pledge closes on 27 March 2015, 14:30 (GMT +08:00).
You can also check out the official video for Earth Hour 2015 here.
Use your power, change climate change.
Your GoGreen Team
30
I have a celebratory dinner to go to at a local chinese restaurant with a large group so I’ll be celebrating with my friends by paying someone to stir/deep/boil fry my meal which will definitely be focussed around a beef dish. No salad in sight. Then I’ll drive home in my full size station wagon with internal combustion engine, light a log fire (with real wood), put my feet up and read a book or just cuddle up to my wonderful wife and regret why we didn’t have, say, 5 more kids. I’ll leave the porch light on so I don’t trip in the dark as well as the side garden lights and maybe even the patio lights too. I may need to pop out to my office so I shall leave the electric heater on ( but only on low) cos it is starting to cool down in late March.
It will be a relaxing, enjoyable and guilt free Saturday night. As it damn well should be.
30
Manfred – thanx, tho i’m none the wiser, and the China story is going viral as they say, without any mention of the so-called temperature rise per decade.
NOTE: i mistakenly typed % when i should have type “degree” in the statement:
“heard it on BBC radio. lengthy piece, which quoted what i recall as China’s temperature having risen 0.23% (sic, should be degree) per decade”
have noted this is going on in China at the same time as this BBC/AFP story:
22 March: World Bank: Speech by World Bank Managing Director and Chief Operating Officer Sri Mulyani Indrawati at China Development Forum, Beijing
Global Leadership in the New Normal
(As Prepared for Delivery)
It is a great pleasure to once again address the China Development Forum. I want to thank Vice Minister Liu Shijin for his kind introduction and for his long standing support for the partnership between the DRC and the World Bank. And I would like to thank Chairman Xu Shaoshi for his insightful remarks.
Given our topic today the question to start with is: What is normal today?
With a gradual rebalancing of the economy towards services and shifting demographics, China’s ‘New Normal’ presents a different picture…
Reforms for the New Normal
China can afford lower growth rates while continuing to deliver the necessary jobs. Not only that, the lower growth rates can also open the space to implement the reforms needed to achieve the ‘New Normal.’…
So consumption will have to fill the gap, which means either larger central government consumption, or higher household consumption…
The second item on the ‘New Normal’ agenda is to make growth more sustainable.
In the past two decades, China has made major efforts to reduce emission intensity and control pollution. China is already the largest producer of renewable energy in the world, and the current Five-Year Plan has hard environmental targets to control energy intensity, pollution, and water use.
People not only demand but also deserve a cleaner environment…
China just confirmed that it will commit to enforcing its new environmental law. For the next Five Year Plan, China could achieve a breakthrough by implementing measures currently under consideration. These may include capping energy use, particularly coal and expanding the carbon cap-and-trade-system that is currently piloted in 7 localities across all of China—or alternatively, introducing a tax on carbon…
Internationally, the importance of the joint declaration of China and the USA regarding greenhouse gas emissions cannot be overestimated. China’s submission to the COP-21 meeting could solidify the country’s commitments to global environmental goals and hold or even reverse greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 or before…
http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/speech/2015/03/22/global-leadership-in-new-normal
00
this was repeated again last nite, everything on ABC seems to get 4-6 airings lately:
21 March: ABC The Science Show: Call for politicians to share power for a workable democracy
Saturday 12 noon Repeated: Thursday 9pm
Janette Hartz-Karp calls for a different approach to decision-making tapping the wisdom and interest of local communities
Guest: Janette Hartz-Karp, Professor of Sustainability, Curtin University, Perth WA
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/scienceshow/call-for-politicians-to-share-power-for-a-workable-democracy/6335830
towards the end, Robyn Williams says (paraphrasing): examples…i’m thinking of an experiment in Vic where Simon Holmes a’Court and ***friends got together to run their own wind farm, and they got advice from the various experts, & looked at the hazards, & the worries & the health problems that might exist, & they (Hepburn Wind) built it. and there it is. something real. so, if u had more examples.
***funny. i thought it was mom’n’pop investors, not friends, who put up the money, & i thought it wasn’t working out too well!
16 Sept 2014: The Land: Matthew Cawood: Investment blown away by RET reversal
TWO wind turbines spinning a few kilometres from Daylesford, Victoria, are providing enough electricity to power about 2000 homes, but that’s little comfort to the 2000 ***’mum and dad’ investors who built them.
When Hepburn Wind, Australia’s first community energy project, was built in 2011, a favourable political environment around renewable energy meant the project’s investors could bet on a consistent 5-7 per cent return.
“We went into the investment knowing two things about the Coalition,” said Hepburn Wind’s founding chairman, Simon Holmes a Court. “They supported a carbon price and they supported renewables. They were the first party that had a policy on both.”
Under new Prime Minister Tony Abbott, the Coalition began to take a different line. It campaigned on the promise of abolishing the carbon price and, when in office, initiated a review of the renewable energy target (RET)…
“Losing the carbon price took about $250,000 out of the project,” Mr Holmes a Court said.
“That hit us pretty hard. It put us in the position where we can still pay our bills, but we can’t give members a return on their investment – or it pushes the time when investors get a return into the future.”
The renewables industry has protested that it needs more certainty, and a more ambitious RET, to secure its long-term investments…
***The average investment in the Hepburn Wind project is about $1000-$2000, but a “decent number” of people have invested $20,000-$50,000 of self-managed super fund money into the turbines.
Hepburn Wind has responded to the crisis by cost-cutting, including shifting the work done by its former 2.5 full-time employees to volunteers. Mr Holmes a Court is doing half the project’s bookkeeping…
The Federal government might be soft on renewables, but polls repeatedly show the Australian public is overwhelmingly in favour of the technologies.
At the recent Community Energy Forum in Canberra, Mr Holmes a Court said representatives from 50-60 communities expressed interest in similar community-built projects…
http://www.theland.com.au/news/agriculture/agribusiness/general-news/investment-blown-away-by-ret-reversal/2711553.aspx
10
20 March: NoTricksZone: P. Gosselin: German Wind Power Goes Completely AWOL For The 11th Time This Year…Fossils, Nuclear Again To The Rescue!
As the following diagram depicts, there was almost no wind output from Germany’s 40 or so gigawatts of installed wind capacity over the last 36 hours. The country’s wind turbines called it an early weekend…
Since January 1, Wind power failed to show up some 11 times. On average about 85% of the installed capacity doesn’t show up to begin with…
Today’s partial eclipse of the sun did not strain Germany’s power grid as much as feared. Fog and cloudy weather over northern Germany helped to dampen the feared fluctuation…
As the sun’s energy disappeared, conventional fuels saved the day…
In general, power companies and grid operators had months to prepare for the eclipse. Lapses and wild fluctuations in wind and sun energy are common (see above) and so today’s eclipse was manageable though with considerable effort…
comment: Stephen Richards:
In germany the eclipse was less than 80%. I was surprised at how large the fall in electricity was…
http://notrickszone.com/2015/03/20/german-wind-power-goes-completely-awol-for-the-11th-time-this-year-fossils-nuclear-again-to-the-rescue/#sthash.jzkAWyEB.dpbs
btw “Merchants of Doubt” according to Mojo, if i am reading it correctly:
21 Theaters: Lifetime Gross: $113,300
(clicked on title & got… Domestic Total as of Mar. 22, 2015…Widest Release:
21 theaters)
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/search/?q=merchants%20of%20doubt
00
another ABC program with plenty of repeats, including a couple of nights ago:
AUDIO: ABC Spirit of Things: Dr Rachael Kohn: Betray the age to be spiritually free
On stage he’s like a spiritual Billy Connolly (with the same colourful language), but Alan Clements is an artist-activist who is bent on making the world safe for peace…
Rachael speaks to Alan at the tail end of his Australian tour.
Further Information: Alan Clements World Dharma, Tour dates, projects, books, World Dharma Online Institute
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/spiritofthings/betray-the-age–to-be-spiritually-free/6293380
Clements: about 43 mins in, goes on about the US slavery era, then morphs straight into “how many of us realise that what we’ve been doing over the last 40, 60, 100 years since the industrialised, homicidal economy took root, that
essentially we’re in a potential near-term extinction moment on earth?”…
Kohn: that sounds a bit apocalyptic. are we that close?
Clements: i don’t know, but i would ask people to research the evidence out there, look at the the mind scientists & the environmental scientists…
more Clements: i’m just a small person…i’m vulnerable, i’m mysterious, i can make mistakes… someone came forward, an anonymous donor, & said Alan, i
like your message, i want to offer the money for a retreat u can lead for ten days (at the end of 2015) at no cost to anyone, an open invitation to the people of the world.
Kohn: where will this retreat be?
Clements: somewhere in the north of Australia, up near Byron Bay…
Kohn also spruiks for Alan’s Skype consultations.
for those who couldn’t wait for the “free” retreat for the whole world to come to, there was this recently:
18 Feb: Northern Echo Byron Bay: Spiritually Incorrect – why thinking is the new black
If you like your enlightenment with large doses of spiritual-political satire and activist entertainment, then Alan Clements is for you…
‘I don’t think the playing field is as it was two years ago – catastrophic climate change and near-term extinction are on our doorstep – it’s almost game over as we know it on this plane of existence.”…
Alan Clements presents Spiritually Incorrect at the Byron Community Centre…
Ticketing: $30 advance, $40 cash at the door…
http://www.echo.net.au/2015/02/spiritually-incorrect-thinking-new-black/
from Alan’s World Dharma Online Institute:
World Dharma Online Institute: Guiding Principles and Vision
The World Dharma eCourse is rooted in a central idea: “Favor the question, always question,” Nobel Peace laureate and Holocaust survivor, Elie Wiesel states. “Do not accept answers as definitive. Answers change. Questions don’t. Always question those who are certain of what they are saying. Always favor the person who is tolerant enough to understand that there are no absolute answers, but there are absolute questions.”
(and on a page for his Courses)
3 Skype sessons: $145, 25 participants
should taxpayer-funded ABC be airing such rubbish?
naturally, Alan has been on “New Dimensions”, which no doubt aired on ABC as well, with “The World Dharma of Freedom and Non-Violence with Alan Clements, Program #3433”.
sounds like a Pachauri wannabe.
00
This is what the solar eclipse did to power generation in Germany:
http://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Eclipse_2.gif
Or in animation (go to the bottom of the page and set 20th March as the date):
http://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Eclipse_2.gif
Just as well parts of Germany were clouded over, because it might have been a bit more tricky to provide backup power to keep industry working (actually, some of it was shut down to help) – and then to dump it as the sun emerged. Now if everyone switched off simultaneously, all the power sources would need to do likewise: and then re-start simultaneously at the end of the hour. In other words you’d probably get trips allover the place, and a real mess trying to get everything re-started.
10
Oops the second link should be:
http://www.sma.de/unternehmen/pv-leistung-in-deutschland.html
00
23 March: Daily Caller: Noted Global Warming Skeptic Gets His Twitter Account Suspended
Twitter has suspended the account of Steven Goddard, the pseudonym of a well-known blogger who is critical of man-made global warming.
After receiving messages of complaints against his account from Twitter in late February, Goddard woke up Monday morning to find his account had been suspended for violating Twitter’s rules.
“I tried to make a tweet around 8 am, and it failed to go through,” Goddard told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Then a message appeared at the top of my Twitter account, saying that my account had been suspended for ‘violation of Twitter rules.’”
Twitter has previously told Goddard users complained against him for making “non-violent threats” and for “abusive behavior.” Goddard denied ever making threats or being abusive, saying that he was himself often the target of attacks.
“I have never violated any Twitter rules, and Twitter has failed to respond to my requests to provide any details,” Goddard said…
http://dailycaller.com/2015/03/23/noted-global-warming-skeptic-gets-his-twitter-account-suspended/
Real Science: Moving Off WordPress
Posted on March 23, 2015
Having been censored from Twitter, I expect a similar push from climate Nazis to get me blocked from WordPress. I am starting a transition to my own hosting at.
http://realclimatescience.com/
Look for new posts to start appearing there soon.
https://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2015/03/23/moving-off-wordpress/
00
Youtube: Senator Seselja speaking in the Senate about the Greens’ plans to ban Coal Mining
(from Bolt Blog)
This is a motion that would seek to make ferals of us all. It is the sort of motion that is part of the Greens overall agenda to shut down the coal industry that will send us all back to the caves…
Around the country there are approximately 55,000 direct jobs for Australians in the coal industry. There are around 145,000 related jobs for Australians. That is $6 billion in wages paid to Australian workers through the coal industry. The Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics estimates coal is responsible for export earnings of $40 billion…
It goes further. State treasury papers record that the coal industry was responsible for royalty payments of $20.5 billion between 2006-07 and 2012-13. Deloitte Access Economics estimate the coal industry is responsible for $17.7 billion in company tax in that same period. Think of the impact if that amount of company tax were not paid, if that amount of royalties had not been paid to the states. Who would pay for the hospitals? Who would pay for the schools? Who would pay for the roads?…
Coal is responsible for 34 per cent of Australia’s primary energy and 75 per cent of our grid electricity…
[C]oal is one of our largest export commodities… There are billions of people in the world, who the Greens do not care about, who do not have access to electricity…. We have the opportunity to provide cheap and affordable electricity that will lift people out of poverty. Surely that is something we should be celebrating.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtMffbl67pA
10
think what this would do to the world’s poor!!!!!!!
23 March: CarbonBrief: Sophie Yeo: Cost of carbon should be 200% higher today, say economists
The “optimal” carbon price should be up to 200% more than economists currently estimate, according to a new study published in Nature Climate Change. This is because, says the study, climate change could have sudden and irreversible impacts, which have not, to date, been factored into economic modelling…
There is a lot of uncertainty among scientists about if and when these tipping points will occur. Yet the potential for such serious damage at some point in the future means that polluters should pay a lot more today in order to avoid such an event, the report says.
Carbon Brief looks at the suggestion that an uncertain future should mean imposing a higher price on carbon today…
Tipping points
The paper was written by Thomas S Lontzek from the University of Zurich, Yongyang Cai and Kenneth L Judd from Stanford University, and Timothy M Lenton from the University of Exeter.
Economists use models to calculate the “social cost of carbon” – the amount that it is worth paying now in order to avoid future damage…
Three models are used to calculate the social cost of carbon: DICE, PAGE and FUND. The authors of the study published today adjusted the DICE model to include tipping points. A 2012 paper by Cambridge economist Chris Hope made the same adjustments to his PAGE model…
(ONE COMMENT)
Sage Thinker: We must start it as soon as possible!
http://www.carbonbrief.org/blog/2015/03/cost-of-carbon-should-be-200-higher-today,-say-economists/
10
Malthusian misanthropes all of them.
How would they react if the line was –
“The “optimal” luxury goods price should be up to 200% more than economists currently estimate. Yes from private jets to fees for tying up your yacht, jewelry, artworks, and fast cars, should rise by at lease 200%.
The fund created from this useful tax is to be used to help the poor of the world with getting reliable power, reliable clean water, and reliable waste disposal (including sewerage).
All luxury items to be additionally taxed in UN proscribed under-developed countries at not less that 900%
All Davos members and families to incur an additional speaking and breathing tax of 50¢ per hour for life.”
20
Interesting that the eco-innumerates choose a date in spring/autumn, when the weather is usually mild (yes i know that it’s near an equinox).
I’d like to see them have two earth days at the winter/summer solstices – but proper ones where they turn off all the power in their house for 24 hours. Let’s see how they like going without heating/cooling when it’s really needed.
20
I will celebrate Earth Hour as I usually do, by turning on every light in my house.
00
Am touring oz at the moment on my 2015 special build Harley with all the bells and wihistles, gets about the same mileage as a seven litre v8 doing my best to feed the the plant life with nourishing co2 . Travelling because I can seeing good stuff and marvelling at the changes in the red centre over the last fifty years. It was a desert 50years ago and now it is covered with bushes and green. Co2 and the normal 60 year cycle are special, power hour or it’s bs Gaia hr is a time to celebrate our wonderful empty country.
00
I will “celebrate” it the same way I celebrate New Year’s Day, most minor holidays and my birthday – by completely forgetting they exist and going along with life-as-usual.
00
I’m going to read this paper on why UAH is an outlier and how the Hotspot still is
http://www.skepticalscience.com/uah-lowballing-global-warming.html
00