JoNova
A science presenter, writer, speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic's Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).
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Some of my better comments have been posted at believer sites, and have never seen the light of day.
In my judgement, they’ve been fair, courteous, accurate and relevant. Nevertheless, not being ‘on-message’, nobody’s seen them.
(Of course there was that embarrassingly wrong one also suppressed.)
Anyway, I think it’s time we exposed just how many reasonable comments are being censored. Is anybody interested in me creating a site for posts censored at believer sites?
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You’re proposing a rather monumental project I think.
When I was met with nasty, uncivil behavior a few times for trying to make a good counter argument I gave up looking at such sites. In the long run they’re not worth the effort. When someone’s mind is made up before you even get started there’s little chance of changing it. And we mostly know any comments they disagree with will simply fall into the trashcan.
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At least on some sites, it’s hard to prove that a comment was made unless it is published, not every site has a visible ‘your comment is awaiting moderation’ limbo zone, or similar system.
Playing devils advocate for a minute, one could argue that not making an effort is tantamount to letting them ‘win’.
Having said that, I also find it very tough to put up with the abuse, false assertions, misrepresentations, and downright ignorance prevalent on such sites – that is, if they allow any dissent to be published at all. Thus, I do not venture forth into those realms as often as I probably could.
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I should add that I think the proposal by Leo Morgan is a good one, in retrospect my comment may not have seemed as positive as it could have.
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Roy
FYI
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2015/08/is-it-possible-to-change-political-bias-can-evidence-challenge-an-entrenched-position.html
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Michael Smith has posted a very good
article today about “Scotomas”.
I have just seen that someone else has linked to it.
A good read and something that I imagine that
most people “suffer” from at some stage in
their life.
10
James makes a good point about publication.
But what if you had an independent site that allowed you to automatically record the fact that a) you had made a comment at site “X”, and b) recorded the addressees, and first two or three paragraphs, or an arbitrary number of words?
You would need to “cc” (or better, “bcc”) this site, and it would check that the comment had a bona fide “to” addressee, before making the record.
If nothing else, we might be able to establish, and publish, the acceptance rate for those sites that currently see the delete button, as being a valid debating tactic.
Just a thought …
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Good idea.
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Leo,
Have a good look at the believer sites. I’ll pick one – SkepticalScience.
Now count the number of comments to each post – one to two mostly.
Believers don’t even post on believer sites, they can’t get recognition because no body reads them.
That’s why believers ‘troll’ sceptic sites, because they are rewarded with an audience and the attention they crave.
Most sceptic sites will at least entertain their ‘trolling’ as fair game.
Having written that if you really want to meet and joust with some dead set, die hard, wind-turbine huggers, then visit a face book page The Goulburn Dialogue.
You may eventually be deleted and banned, but not before a rollicking good stoush and plenty of accusations of ‘trolling’ and ‘denier’ thrown in – but some will entertain with graphic representations of GISS and NASA and stuff, good sport all round.
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Oh and for Tony from Oz,
The zany cast down at The Goulburn Dialogue love, love, love wind-turbines.
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@Leo.
It’s a good idea for precisely the reasons you mentioned. Many good arguments are made and then lost.
Remember to also keep the comment that the reply is intended for, perhaps even a section of the thread to provide a context.
Some people will enjoy such a website like the enjoy walking by a car accident. So don’t shy away from bringing in the most unhinged comments from all sides and how they contrast with a reply that offers a coherent take on the topic.
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Commenting on websites is just that, a typed message that the web-host or appointed moderators can allow or delete, I believe that when the general public are eventually personally motivated to look into the reason the ‘climate hysteria’ is negatively impacting their lives they will see open forums and debates (like Jo’s) as being genuine in seeking the truth rather than orchestrated self interested ones that raised their suspicions initially.
Some of my best comments will never see the light of day and is probably a good thing too!
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Its probably against the rules of common decency, but I wonder if we could form a ‘flash mob’ and spontaneously turn up at warmist sites like Deltoid and briefly make merry.
I’m sure the blogmaster won’t mind.
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Deltoid has to be the deepest echo chamber available. There hasn’t been an active post since Feb 2013, yet the true believers pat each other on the back to the tune of 500 comments a month.
Real green-ink-in-the-back-bedroom stuff.
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‘Real green-ink-in-the-back-bedroom stuff.’
They don’t mind debating sceptics, sometimes they come here for sport.
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Don’t feel lonely.
My Bob Ellis’ score is 0 out of 100+.
My success on The Drum is <30%. On climate issues it is ,10%.
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I’d say that to be on-the-level skeps we should go on accepting as much opposition and contradiction as comes along, and we should avoid any kind of tribal or en-masse behaviour with regard to “believer” sites. Similarly, if a skep (like me) isn’t particularly enthusiastic about defending Mark Steyn’s every word or doesn’t feel comfortable with the pilfering of the Climategate emails, don’t regard the person as a traitor or backslider. It’s just skeps being skeptical, okay? Tell me I’m wrong, but don’t tell me I’m letting down a “side”. I don’t have a side or want one. I just like coming here for a regular dose of skepticism and to feel some love for my favourite mineral (black Aussie coal, duh).
In short, leave stunts and tribalism to the Herd of Independent Minds. It’s what they do, what we don’t do.
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The Warmists have been posting propaganda on facebook but without any comment buttons available.
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It’s not just the blogs that delete uncomfortable comments. TheLocal is supposedly a “collator” of news for expats in various non-English countries. It is however strongly partisan; like the Grauniad.
Recently TheLocal.de had another absurd article Climate change to raise price of German beer to which I commented:
The comment was up long enough to be up-voted by another reader whose subsequent comments have also been put into “moderation”.
A subsequent comment, now also sunk into moderation, addressed the use of “Merchants of Doubt” by one respondent to support their argument:
Disqus is a comments/discussion engine that retains the original comment, even if the host site deletes it from their pages. Unfortunately, it’s up to the web site provider to select Disqus as their comment engine, not the person who comments.
You can “DIY” by getting a free blog on WordPress or BlogSpot and then attaching a copy of your comments at “hostile sites” to your own blog articles. Or post of copy of your blog comments (with link) to the hostile site which makes it pretty clear that they can’t “disappear” your comment.
BTW: Luboš Motl, who doesn’t entertain political correctness, concludes his “movie review” with:
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Leo, I do ask people to copy their comments and post them here. We need links and follow up to see what is censored. But yes, I’m interested in the comments that the ABC/BBC/CBC/Fairfax/MSNBC etc reject.
But it takes a certain diligence to follow up and see if comments do get published or snipped. Cut and pasting a comment here is fair, and if people wanted to do it I could post a cut-n-paste comments thread here as needed. What is the demand? Others here would be interested too in reading and discussing whats-going-on around the traps. It may encourage more people to get involved…
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Do you really want to add to their “click count?”
There are several sites I just refuse to visit (anymore). SS is one.
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I have very rarely tried to post on believer sights. One example this year was on a British site …and Then There’s Physics, where the author did a particularly narrow article on temperature homogenizations in Paraguay. In particular he made it seem as though there was only one station under dispute, and this was due to a station move. Rice also alleged that the source was from columnist Christopher Booker. I politely filled in readers in a comment on all three errors. I got deleted.
Other aspects were the use of biased language (conspiracy theorists v expert scientists) and directing readers off in other directions. I did a diagram to illustrate these methods on this and a follow-up article.
Deleting comments is just a way of discouraging people from thinking for themselves. If you have a much better argument then you will not be afraid of a light touch approach to comments to allow debate to happen. You will also be prepared to encourage readers to read alternative views for themselves, by properly referencing articles. ATTP’s follow-up article on temperature homogenisation is here.
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A new player in the climate information war: climatefeedback.org
Their goal is to peer-review the web.
Relatively new web site with Domain name Creation Date: 2014-09-09, first article also dated Sep 2014, but only just popped up on my radar today. Their description:
That sounds like a noble goal. Many is the time we and our generous host have lamented shoddy journalism about global warming. Improving scientific accuracy across the `net should see an end to all those “Pause-busting”, “Hottest Month Ever”, “Proof in 99.99% Consensus” type articles, right? 🙂
A reconnaisance of ClimateFeedback’s cast of climate-conscious characters shows absolutely no known skeptics and several people well-known to be on the global warming Team. Andy Pitman, Ed Hawkins, Kerry Emanuel, Mike Lockwood, Feely, Brian Soden, and the infamous John Abraham. You might wonder if the goal is simply “improving scientific accuracy in climate coverage” then why is the selection of the crew seemingly all biased to one side? I guess the climate skeptics just didn’t get invited?
I won’t copy and paste their whole description of their “guidelines” “to provide an assessment regarding the overall scientific credibility of the article”, you can read it under the About section on the web site.
Firstly I have to give them credit for pointing out unduly alarmist articles in the media. Yes, really. They’ve done this at least once.
http://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/rolling-stone-eric-holthaus-point-of-no-return-climate-change-nightmares/
Attributing specific weather events to AGW is very Gore-ish and by now the majority of warmists would like to kick Gore out of the nest as being a liability. So despite all appearances, some promotion of accuracy in climate science journalism may actually occur here. My praise has to be somewhat tempered by the begrudging endorsement of one scientist that “I appreciate the need to raise public awareness of the potentially worst-case climate-change scenarios”. That sounds like a protracted definition of “alarmism” and you don’t have to dig far to find the doomer defense exerting itself.
As another example they nitpick a Telegraph article from 11 July about a solar activity reduction forecast which was later modified to remove any suggestion that cooling might happen. ClimateFeedback’s feedback was the decisive force in obtaining the Telegraph’s rewrite and was soon celebrated as a victory on the CFB web site’s news section.
http://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/the-telegraph-dan-hyde-earth-heading-for-mini-ice-age-within-15-years/
True enough, Zharkova didn’t actually say that this Maunder minimum condition would create cooling but…
Obviously that last line is meant to say TSI heats the Earth. But this contrarian detail didn’t make it into ClimateFeedback’s careful assessment of the scientific accuracy of the article. A rather odd omission since it’s a comment made by Zharkova on 16 July and Earth’s defenders didn’t write their article analysis until two weeks later. Revealing cracks in the consensus is not part of ClimateFeedback’s agenda.
Note also how David Battisti refers to his own in-press unpublished paper (dated 13 June 2015, a month after the article) to disprove any causal connection between solar activity and the Little Ice Age. He’s a completely unbiased observer, obviously. At least he has the grace to provide a free copy of the paper.
He first argues the CMIP5 models show solar activity did not cause warming/cooling around the MWP/LIA, despite the words “solar activity” and “magnetic” appearing absolutely nowhere in his paper, and seemingly nowhere in the CMIP5 models. Seriously, how does one argue the CMIP5 models eliminate solar activity as a factor when TSI is the only solar aspect they modelled? Whether it’s volcanic aerosols one minute or CO2 the next minute, it’s the same old argument from ignorance; changes in atmospheric composition cause all climate changes because we couldn’t imagine anything else.
His paper then argues that the CMIP5 models did a great job of simulating temperatures according to tree-ring proxies of temperature, except in the places where they didn’t which is easily explained because tree rings aren’t accurate thermometers. Wait what? So the models are accurate because tree rings work and don’t work. Well you can’t argue with logic like that can you?
How highly would Mr Battisti’s paper score on ClimateFeedback’s own criteria of Logic and Accuracy? I doubt you’ll hear the answer from ClimateFeedback.
Given how few articles ClimateFeedback has published so far, we may not hear many answers out of them at all. This might be a blessing for several reasons. With such low output their choice of targets will reveal their priorities.
Probably a site to keep an eye on, at least once a month.
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If one has two faces, one cannot avoid speaking with a forked tongue.
50
I suggest that for anyone who’s prepared to look at the records and data, there’s no need for any more peer-reviewed papers on the subject of the supposed dangerous man-made global warming.
How the planet regulates its temperature is of course a complex subject, and the subject of specialist study.
But the simple question I ask as a taxpayer is – are we seeing any warming whatsoever which can be considered to be a threat, and which is unprecedented?
Can the billions (name your currency) being spent on this supposed threat be in any way justified? Have we seen any effect as a result of the money already wasted?
No.
It’s crystal clear that the whole issue is dead in the water – the figures and historical observations are all available for anyone who’s prepared to look for them. Yet the pantomine carries on.
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Okay, here’s my open comment:
I sea-kayaked for a week in the Strait of San Juan de Fuca in 2005. Whoo-haa, it was a total Blast. It was warm. Then I flew down to San Diego (early August), it was overcast and cold. In the 70’s -80’s when I lived there August was early-morning fog, sun by 11 AM. In 2005, it was fog all afternoon.
Even the LA Times called it “June Gloom in August”. No problem for me bodyboarding, full wetsuit, even though I remembered a shorty vest at that month.
2011, vitisted relatives in the Salnas Valley, and SF. Exactly as I remembered the 60s and 70s.
2015, some sun in the SF highlands, that was nice, but then cold fog (visibility less than 100 feet), yuch I remember that.)
In 2014 , I drove through the Sacramento Valley: contrails,chemstrials, whatever, the overcast was not what I grew up in, in the 1960s. It used to be clear skies.
Anyway, Cali definitely has had warmer winter-spring temps than normal. Humbolt and giant squid are proliferating. At the same time, Midwestern and Northeastern winter-spring temps have been cold the last two years. Great Lakes froze over, Hudson Bay had major ice cover into late July.
Most people who actually measure temps in their backyards have not been recording frightening temperature rises. Evenin Death Valley, there has been no high temperature threatening to best the 134 record of 90 years ago. Not even close.
So, despite what the warmunista is claiming, about “global warming”, actual real people living in places are realizing,”this is within my normal experience” so they are not panic moving to the poles.
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Canada’s version of ABC and BBC the CBC. Once or twice a week they post some caterwauling view of doom and gloom and of course never any opposing view.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/climate-change-municipalities-unprepared-for-weather-whiplash-warns-meteorologist-1.3200332?cmp=rss
00
Forgot to add, the article is posted with no corresponding facts or proof. Also notice how he deftly avoids mentioning so called mans involvement but the implication is there.
20
People in the area in which I live have been saying this has been the coldest winter for a few decades. Will the usual suspects issue a ‘coldest winter in …’ press release? Of course not. It is an ABSOLUTE DISGRACE that a so-called conservative government allows government employees to carry out a political agenda and, worse, use taxpayers money fraudulently. But it’s too late now. The Abbott government has used up its political capital by putting the boot into pensioners and working people – for no tangible gain in any respect – while at the same time doing too little to undo the Left’s social policy agenda. For example, it is likely that most of the money the Left are using in their anti-fossil-fuel campaign has come from, firstly, taxpayer funding provided to NGOs, and, secondly, giving charitable status for taxation purposes to organisation that are working against the interests of our society. The Abbott government has failed us, just as the Howard government failed us. The Left have won. This country is done for.
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It becomes shriller ever day (Paris anyone?): http://www.theage.com.au/comment/with-middle-eastern-weather-extremes-politics-takes-a-back-seat-to-the-environment-20150821-gj4hi8.html
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Are Middle Eastern Plants Climate Change Deniers? (natureworldnews.com)
It seems that humans aren’t the only ones capable of ignoring climate change.
Middle Eastern plants, too, are denying its existence, as new research shows the region’s vegetation is defiant and able to withstand more than seven years without water.
Surprisingly, the studied ecosystems barely noticed the change in rainfall.
Despite the fact that they were subjected to over nine years of either extreme dryness or massive amounts of rain, there was little effect on the diversity or composition of species, their concentration, or biomass.
“This means we need to revisit the popular theory that arid regions are particularly sensitive to climate change,” lead researcher Katja Tielbörger said in a statement.
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You mean to say that in areas prone to droughts plants are resistant to droughts? Wow that is novel. 🙂
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This finding should encourage copious government grants for further research.
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“A 2011 study from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration … found strong evidence that winter precipitation decline in the Mediterranean littoral and the Middle East from 1971 to 2010 was likely due to climate change, with the region experiencing nearly all of its driest winters since 1902 in the past 20 years.”
That is a regional cooling signal.
20
The rubbish in the lead-up to Paris continues: Experts are warning that more intense El Nino and La Nina events are coming
I found this interesting, since we know models can’t manage ENSO events. So I went looking for the paper, abstract here:
Just…wow. They start with an assumption (weakened Walker circulation from the models), follow it through to their desired conclusion (more catastrophic events), then decide to check reality. Oh, reality doesn’t agree…..too bad, we’ve written the paper, we’ll just include a footnote.
This passes review? This wouldn’t pass highschool science. If the evidence doesn’t meet your predictions at the very first step, you need to revise your predictions. Unmitigated (self-snip).
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“Unmitigated (self-snip).”
Balderdash?
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Agreed
A Nature Climate Change publication. I regard this paper as an example of the coarsening of public discourse, since (self-snips) are the only rational response
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The video claims with respect to Australia the strongest El Nino effect were in 1982-3 and 2002-3. Globally the strongest El Nino was in 1998, as is evidenced by the spike in global average temperatures. When trying to forecast ahead for changes in trends it helps to see local variation within the wider picture.
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From previous thread, the hottest July in 4000 years? no but it’s possibly the stupidest utterance made in 4000 years.
I’ll bet during the Roman Warm Period dodgy Soothsayers with the Senates ear claimed the dams will never fill again or that future children will never see snow, in hindsight disregard my first sentence as reality has struck me that stupid always is and always was.
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Not so, Yonnie.
The ancient Romans had a way of discouraging bad soothsayers. They examined their entrails.
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So you had to show a bit of guts to be a Soothsayer back then?………
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The best (surviving) ones always delivered their predictions orally with a bit of mumbling e.g. what the soothsayer actually said to Caesar on the way to the Forum was “Caesar, beware the ideas of March hares”. Afterwards nobody could recall his exact words and didn’t contradict his assertion that he had warned Caesar.
The mistake, well the second mistake, of the IPCC was to put it in writing. The difference between what they said and what has happened 15 to 20 years later, is so vast that you wonder about the IQ of those trolls who still believe. Well, what I wonder is does their IQ exceed their shoe size?
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A bit of blood and GORE, eh what?!
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I would like to publicly acknowledge this comment from ianl8888, which I received in reply to a comment of mine on an earlier Thread. I would have replied a lot sooner, but not long after I entered my Comment I left for the day. We did some shopping, and visited with our daughter. I’m teaching our granddaughter to drive and there was another hour and a half session at that, and they are good times.
When we did arrive back home and I came back to the site, I saw that comment from Ian and resolved to reply after having some dinner. Not long after dinner, the power went out for just on four hours, and I didn’t get back on the site until Saturday morning, and any reply I made might have been lost by then, as a new Thread had been posted and not many would have gone back to look at that earlier Thread.
(most of) The text of Ian’s comment is this:
This is what I like so much about Joanne’s site. There is such a wonderful variety of people who comment here who actually do know what they are talking about. I would like to think I know something about the topics I do comment on, but even I have areas associated with my perceived knowledge base which are lacking, and I can search for ages and not find information I need, no matter how many parameters I use for the search engine.
So, here, with Ian’s comment, I finally find information I have been looking for some time to try and find, and I would like to thank him for providing that information. There was also some gentle criticism, another thing I like about this site. Note how polite it was, instead of the outright attacks there would have been at other sites. Something like this criticism I actually like, because it makes me focus even further, and adds to that perceived knowledge base I think I may have.
I knew that there was a formula for calculating CO2 output from coal input, but I was always puzzled as to how they could calculate it with any form of accuracy, as coals varied so much, and here I received the reply that goes towards solving that for me.
So Ian, thank you for your comment. It’s another I have saved to a burgeoning list of saved comments from this site.
Incidentally, when I started all this in March of 2008, I could go to any coal fired power plant I wanted to. They all had their own home sites. Not any more. They have virtually all of them vanished without trace, in the U.S. and now even here in Australia. Information is scarce, and some sites, like the dreaded ‘W’ site is totally and utterly useless for information, as it is so biased and in the main incorrect.
So then, now I have an idea how the coal is blended, I would like you all to consider this. A large scale coal fired plant burns a lot of coal. Let’s look at Bayswater, which has four units. Each unit whilst in full operation is processing coal and burning it at the rate of one tonne every 14.5 seconds, so with all four units in operation, one ton of coal is being burned every 3.6 seconds. Roughly one ton of coal is this much:
Stand up and spread your arms out and make a 90 degree angle with your outstretched arms. Your fingertips are the extent of two sides of the square. Fill that square with coal to your height and I’m around 180Cm tall. That is around one tonne of coal. (perhaps Ian could indicate it a little more accurately than that for us)
Burned every 3.6 seconds.
One last question Ian, if I may.
I know that the coal is crushed in the Pulveriser to almost fine talcum powder consistency before injection into the furnace. What consistency is the coal when being blended in the holding area prior to pulverisation, and do the operators try and source the same coal as much as is possible?
Tony.
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Most of Ian’s post regarding blending of boiler feed coals is correct. However, one physical characteristic which can not be blended is “slagging index”.
This is THE key criteria in boiler tube design and if you get this wrong, you get a boiler that does not boil – and removing the slag is a “show stopper”.
Fortunately, the problem of slagging index with Australian thermal coals is rare.
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My experience with slagging is that it is, by boiler design, related to the sodium (Na) content within the coal ash – the Na generally arising from clays within the mineral component of the as-mined coal
This characteristic certainly has a very tight tolerance. Cleaning the boilers after inadvertent contamination is a big struggle, especially when you need to keep Melbourne alive
For those who may be curious as to how such tight tolerances are monitored (and the monitoring is not perfect), rigid sampling procedures including an online (ie. on the conveyor belt) scanner with constant back-checks by on-site laboratories are commonly used
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Thanks Ian.
I sort of calculated it by volume as well, going on the information I had available after a number of searches.
I make it a metre from outstretched fingertip of one arm to the shoulder point of the opposite arm, so that makes the actual arm from its own shoulder less than a metre, and my height of 180 centimetres (1.8 metres) to give an approximate volume similar to one tonne of coal.
Even approximating it like this, the point I wanted to make is that that amount of coal is being crushed to talcum powder consistency and then burned every 14 seconds or so just for one unit.
People look at me with an incredulous look on their faces when I mention that to them, as they find it all but impossible to believe. I’m certain some of them still don’t believe it.
People have no concept whatsoever about the scale of large scale coal fired power generation.
I can explain that. I can explain wind power generation. I can explain all forms of solar power generation. And yet, having done just that, virtually no one believes a word of it, because it’s so at odds with what is being reported at EVERY other source.
It’s just so frustrating.
Tony.
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Okay think about this for a minute.
Take EVERY currently existing wind plant and solar power plant in Australia. Most have them have been constructed in the last ten to fifteen years.
Bayswater came on line in 1985/86.
Bayswater power plant will still be operational after all those currently existing wind and solar plants have closed, having reached their life expectancy.
In the life of all those wind and solar plants, Bayswater will have delivered more than double the power, and that’s on top of what it had delivered prior to all those wind and solar plants opened, and it will still be delivering.
Tony.
100
EVERY currently existing solar panel on every roof will need to be replaced before Bayswater closes.
Every currently existing rooftop solar system. Total Nameplate – 3,300MW – Actual power generated per year – 3600GWH
Bayswater – Nameplate – 2640MW (only 80% of rooftop solar Nameplate) Actual power delivered by Bayswater per year – 17,500GWH (Rooftop solar multiplied by 5.3)
See why they use Nameplate.
Tony.
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Thanks Tony, I am going to make notes of all this information. It is just so useful when talking to warmists (like my astrophysicist Prof daughter who arrives home from the U.S. next month – got a copy of Mark Steyn’s book on Michael Mann, too, to leave on the coffee table for her to see!
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Peter,
there’s something in all of this that the clueless believers in renewables just fail to grasp.
As shown at this link, AGL (which now owns Bayswater and the huge Loy Yang in Victoria) has promised to close them by 2050.
2050
That’s 35 years from now.
The anti coal lobby and green believers look upon that as a victory.
You can only laugh that they have been so taken in by all this hype, that they fail to understand even the most basic common sense.
All the currently existing wind plants, all the currently existing solar plants and all those rooftop panels have a life span of barely 25 years at best. 25 years from now will be 2035, and AGL says that Bayswater and Loy Yang will still have 15 years ahead of them.
So, in reality, even those new wind and solar plants which are still in planning and (they hope) will be coming on line within the next TEN YEARS will also be time expired by the time Bayswater and Loy Yang are slated for closure.
So, not only have these wind and solar plants failed so utterly to replace coal fired power, they end up having to replace themselves before the coal fired plant, umm, runs out of steam! (literally)
What an absolutely enormous waste of money this mad rush to useless renewables really is.
That’s a little fact which actually is useful.
Tony.
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”
People have no concept whatsoever about the scale of large scale coal fired power generation.”
Indeed. I have an old photo of the cooling water intake pumps at Eraring (4 x 660MW) – 6 x 7MW pumps, inlet pipe for each one large enough to drive a car through!
20
And yes, there is an active index for measuring the “grindability” of coals – because the harder coals wear out the crushing mills more quickly, an obvious power station cost
30
Ian, I’m confused. If the relative density is greater than 1, is not the volume per ton less than a cubic metre?
Black coal density is 1345 kg/m3 so 1 ton has a volume of about 3/4 cubic metre.
Graham
20
Bulk density and relative density are two very different animals.
00
And therein lies the issue of accurate measurement of density
I’d chosen not to explore this more technical issue as most would think it too arcane for this website
I can suggest using Google Scholar to explore the issue at greater depth. There are many papers in, eg, the International Journal for Coal
Apart from the arithmetic involved in calculating CO2 volumes, the more fundamental aspect from a daily, practical viewpoint is the tonnage contained in a live stockpile – ship loading, royalty calculations (various State Treasuries have a keen interest in the relative densities of live stockpiles), stockpile pad size for adequate volume … the list is not quite endless
00
Sorry
International Journal for Coal Geology
00
Thanks Ian, I do understand the difference between density, relative density, specific gravity and bulk density. I was an Engineering Surveyor (in road design & construction) in a past life.
I stand by my confusion. You said “RD (relative to water) about 1.35-1.40, so a tonne of that coal has a volume of around 1.35 – 1.40 cubic metres.”
However, no matter how you look at the amount of coal fed into the boilers it is quite amazing.
Finally, my eldest (BA Eng) does a lot of contract work for the power industry in the Latrobe Valley and I have seen the dredgers in action close up when he took me on a site visit.
cheers, Graham
30
Hi Tooright
Your comment is true but GrahamP was making another point and it looks like Ian just worked off your comment.
As Graham points out the volume should be the inverse of the relative density, which is dimensionless, times 1 cubic metre.(ref 11.2)
The result is less than a cubic metre.
KK
00
That slipped past me.
It’s Sunday, that’s my excuse.
KK
00
I read it and understood it.
Takes me back to the sixties. We had a great guy called Neil Molloy who taught us how to calculate and quantify almost anything besides the off gases from a blast furnace using MSTM (or was it MSTS) a fantastic American metallurgical “who dunit”.
KK.
00
A nice reply Tony. This discussion is fascinating to me.
10
If I understand IPCC, UNFCCC, they are saying, “Whatever happens to weather, we need a small coterie of people to run the world for the masses’ benefit.”
Let’s see, Maurice Strong, Bachelors, PhD in what? science field? ( Well he did finish high school.) Al Gore, science degree in what? Christiana Figureres, science degree in what? James Hansen B.S. and Ph.D. IOWA, (no Nobel Laureates in any science field), third-rate in science, Michael Mann, (A.B. from Berkeley, but was down tracked to Yale for PhD, no physics Nobels. only 4 NAS Physics members (now down to 2), postdoc at UMass, faculty at Penn State (third-rate in sciences), Phil Jones, UAE, not Oxford, Cambridge or even U London. Third-rate in science. Third-rate science gets to dictate “new science” where falsification/invalidation is not allowed. Science is “settled” by non-scientists and faculty from third-rate science unis.
200
Mark,
In most fields the level of qualification, and where it was obtained are strong indicators of competency in the field. For instance in your own field of medicine I believe this is particularly the case. To achieve your current level of expertise you had to spend many years studying established knowledge and demonstrate that knowledge in many examinations. You also had to develop the more practical skills under supervision. Another element is a strong ethical code in medicine.
Apply this climatology. Where are the established set of competencies exhibited by climatologists? Like the ability to discern what proportion of the recent warming is human caused. At least to be able to get a bit closer than between 20% and 200%. Or the track record of predictive successes?
In medicine as well there are the highest standards of prescribing drugs, and testing prior to launching. Where in climatology is policy even thought through for ability to perform or for possible side effects? Where are the proven competencies in policy-making or policy implementation?
40
Something that REALLY irks me is the automatic rejection and criticism of comments by “non-climate scientists” while climatologists feel fully qualified to comment on the ecological, biological, sociological, and psychological impacts of climate change.
40
Jo
FYI
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/08/22/bad-news-for-climate-alarmists-deadly-methane-isnt-going-to-kill-us-all/
Note the reference to what happened to the WW2 ships oil – IIRC the English Channel also got its more than fair share.
After many years of no such thing we’re having a lot of microbial problems in-farm diesel and now have to treat as a precaution.
70
Without giving away any secrets, just what seems like a secret; you can bulk-circulate the fuel through liquid cooled diesel engines using the coolant circuit (slightly modified to cope with fuel chemistry) and thereby heating the fuel to be used to at least 80°C for half an hour, killing most of the bugs. Bleed some of the hot coolant diesel back to the fuel tank and draw off some make-up volume from the colder parts of the tank. You won’t need the “radiator” until the tank is toasty-warm.
Diesel fuel can be safely heated to (well) over 100°C offsetting its lower specific heat capacity somewhat, and it remains stable. Another advantage is that you won’t need corrosion inhibitors or anti-freeze in the coolant and diesel “wets” the surfaces better as well as conducting heat well; especially compared to water.
Moreover, if it gets really, really cold and the coolant does freeze, the diesel contracts in volume and won’t thereby endanger the integrity of the engine or the cooling circuit. Water would expand, blowing “freeze plugs” (“best case”) that have to be refitted before the engine can be operated again.
30
Bernard
Yes but!
A bit exotic for, say, a 1959 grader that is idle for most of the year. Spent a lot of its life like in similar service. Has only threatened bulk filter changes in the last few years until I was pointed at the additives.
Similar with our 1981 diesel truck and 1976 dozer.
They do eventually warm the tank a bit with return flow diesel if they don’t plug up first and stop.
00
Bernard
And I forgot the 1940 Southern Cross YC – which has survived our modern fuel so far
00
Nothing “exotic”. Technology-wise, it was used by the Wehrmacht on the Russian front in WW2 when many of their liquid-cooled vehicles had their coolant changed over to diesel (even the petrol-engined ones) due to as the glycol-cocktail shortage. They didn’t bleed hot stuff back to the fuel tank and make up with cooler diesel but that’s only an incremental step in the “invention”.
It may not help if you don’t run the engine for 6 months or more at a time. The bugs can take over, especially if there is any water in the fuel at all.
00
Bernard
Yes but they didn’t used to – and it hasn’t got any wetter around here.
00
I’ve always thought the way to handle spills is to clean up what you can by mechanical means and then let nature do the rest – faster and more efficiently.
20
Climate Gate Emails:
It wasn’t an outsider hack, it was an insider whistleblower. The MSM never reported that and CAGWers falsely labelled the release as a hack from the outside.
No matter, the emails showed an instruction to delete all incriminating evidence that was subject to FOIA requests.
That was real science–NOT.
Launching attacks to remove “”not on or side” journal editors, redefining peer review to be “friends of us” publication-approval.
And some of you are wondering “What happened to science publication?”
And then Virginia Atty General tried to get Michael Mann’s emails and publication raw data and methods. The VA Supreme Court ruled,”Publicly-funded research basic info ration does not belong to the people who paid for it. This may have been paid for by taxpayers, but tapayers cannot see the information. The rule of law is that taxpayers have to accept the pronouncements of taxpayer-funded scientists, even if the promulgations are based on unscientific processes, and are not genuinely within the realm of natural science. IF it’s bogus information, you people who paid for this phony ‘research’ do not have a right to know. Pay your tax dollars and accept phony ‘science’. This is a political snow job, and you have to pay foe it and not inquire, which would only prove you are right.”
As Phil Jones said, “I am not going to give you information that will allow my critics that my work doesn’t meet scientific standards. I’m a UAE, not Cambridge. Our definition of scence is: we claim it, we don’t let critics examine our work, either believe what we say, or don’t and we’ll launch ad hominems.
70
‘It wasn’t an outsider hack, it was an insider whistleblower. The MSM never reported that and CAGWers falsely labelled the release as a hack from the outside.’
Yep, eventually it will all come out in the wash and what a terrific movie it would make.
20
All of the people who were sent the password to CG3 were also sent nastygrams from CRU lawyers instructing them to not release the password or the decrypted emails and to not reveal the content of the restraining nastygram.
This is why, to date, no CG emails have been released that were uniquely part of CG3 and no prior release, AND no explanation has been given by Mosher, Jo, or Anthony, as to why no emails have been released. Tallbloke and Jeff Condon leaked the existence of the nastygrams but I’ve seen no others do so.
At the time Lucia (rankexploits) was saying that everyone would know more in 6 months after redactions and selective releases. It’s been 2 years and nothing has come out. It’s safe to say nothing more will ever come out of CG3, not even for a movie, because that would require one of the 12 password recipients to violate the lawyers’ nastygram.
Forget about CG3, it will never happen that way.
It certainly may all come out in the wash, but only through insiders defecting.
Of course you first have to make the dubious assumption that there are “insiders” of some clandestine ring in the first place, whereas personal confirmation bias and ego defense are more reliable explanations for the Team shenanigans seen to date. Of that hypothesis we don’t need much further proof.
20
This is excellent news: http://www.skynews.com.au/news/politics/national/2015/08/22/canberra–fully-powered-by-renewables-.html. I suggested this in another post (suggesting SA), but there could not be a better place for this to be put to the test. I wonder how far they’ll get before the wind goes out if their sails?
70
Where is Canberra?
What country is it in?
10
Sounds like Obamacare: Everyone will be covered and everyone will save $2500 a year on insurance. If it works out the same way, Canberra will be sitting in the dark half the time with huge electric bills.
20
Of course they will not be sitting in the dark, the ACT Government heard about the new battery packs promoted by ABC Radio National that have made wind turbines reliable and efficient.
40
“Sitting in the dark half the time with huge electricity bills” is the present day case for Canberra – what about the future?
20
Dennis: They will be sitting in the dark. 😉
toorightmate: My sympathies. Your future is looking like virtually no electricity and even larger electric bills for the electricity you aren’t getting. (Remember, wind plants are paid for the electricity whether they make any or not.)
20
My suggestion to our government would be to mandate that the grid connect to Canberra be cut on the first day of 2025 and see how well they fare.
00
It would be interesting to see RET subsidy costs accounted for and compared to coal fired power station costs. I noted a couple of weeks ago that various electricity providers are offering discounts of up to 20 per cent for consumers who pay their electricity account on time. Today I read that a group of providers, AGL and Origin were two of them, now offer 22 per cent discount to consumers who sign up with them.
Obviously the Renewable Energy Surcharge adds about 10 per cent plus 10 per cent GST to electricity bills. However the pay on time discounts are unusually high and were not offered in the past, no discount was offered. The operating profit margin must therefore be substantial. And no doubt the retail price of electricity reflects the operating costs and profit margin of the highest cost electricity supply sources, subsidised wind turbines and solar systems. And as they supply a very small amount of electricity to the grid the profit margin on the bulk of electricity supply must be very high.
If the RET increase supporters get their way and the level is increased to 50 per cent as Bill Shorten announced at the Union Labor National Conference recently no doubt the overall operating profit margin will fall however the retail price of electricity is most likely to increase. The present pay on time discounts are temporary, just marketing games.
60
I wonder why Mark Latham was on stage at a Writers’ Festival?
It’s akin to me giving the keynote address at a heart surgeons’ conference.
40
The same could be said for David Hicks when he appeared at a couple of writers festivals promoting the book he didn’t write. I used to have some respect for people who cared enough about certain topics to spend their whole career in academia, but their poster-boys are exceptionally poorly chosen – a wannabe war hero, or soldier of fortune who abandons his family, fights with the enemy, and still expects sympathy when he gets caught out, and a potentially psychopathic ex-politician who manages to make Kevin Rudd look respectable by comparison.
00
As political events and extreme acts unfold around the World with distressing regularity, one cannot help but feel not only a clashing irrelevance with the needs of our time, but frank discordance between the Parisian climate extravaganza surrounded as it will be by unbridled, bawdy pre-Christmas commercialism. The UN marketing department it seems has spent too much time isolated in their comfortable turrets. Look for a moment at the mindlessly tragic murder of Khaled Asad in Palmyra. Everything and I mean EVERYTHING of true importance eclipses the ideologically driven UN climate vapors.
I am growing to think and hope that the Parisian climate fest runs the gravest risk of succumbing to a growing perception that it has become an irrelevant distraction from the daily and excruciating realities that are genuinely and urgently demanding of our intellectual and physical resources.
Increasingly, elite eco-fiddling while Rome burns must be seen for what it is. The last thing the jet-setting climate glitterati want is the laser of hypocrisy pointed at them. I think Paris in December may finally make this an inevitability. It is an absolute god-send for the rest of us.
10
Given that the man made Global Warming hypothesis is based solely on a casual short term increase in temperature in the 1980s/1990s, there is no established connection between man and increased CO2 levels nor between increased CO2 levels and warming. In fact it has been obviously disproven. You cannot argue natural variation as the major effect as that defeats the original argument. There is simply nothing to deny, except ocean acidification which is a lie as all the oceans are alkali.
As for politicians, they want to be elected. With a Green vote of 14%, the money is pouring into the coffers of lawyers and the communist Greens and the shrinking Labor people do what they are told. Greens do not even pretend to be Green anymore. Refugees. Anti Israel. Blatantly anti democracy and very anti liberal.
So what’s a scientist to do? It has been a long time since man made Global Warming has been about science. It is about politics and money and the UN in particular has long passed the point where they even pretend. Pachauri is gone, Figueres is openly communist and our Climate Council is a joke. Most Australian politicians still pay lip service to Climate Change, except perhaps for Australia’s Tony Abbot who is famous for saying “the argument behind Climate Change is absolute crap”. He is right of course, but even he is spending billions on nothing.
Maybe the review of the BBC in the UK will bring the winds of change into our extreme left public service organizations, the last bastions of mass marxist unionism at 40% instead of the industry average of 12%. Then we can start to see an end to this climate change nonsense.
51
Interesting news story recently about the CFMEU donations accepted by the Greens. A union lawyer speaking at the Trade Union Royal Commission on Friday said that the Union Movement and Labor are “organically connected” (as many Australians suspected), obviously the Greens are connected too.
And the CFMEU has been funding various Senators too.
21
Every organization has a constitution and the ALP one is freely available.
This puts the power to appoint ALP representatives to parliament squarely in the hands of Union officials, regardless of what actual members of the Labor Party want. Two years ago, 66% of ALP members selected a candidate but were overruled by the Unions. This is common. It is now the party of ex Union officials who are given lifetime jobs and some like Stephen Conroy, without anyone much voting for him. That’s how the Senate works and that’s why billions more went on an NBN.
Yes, the ALP Constitution has changed to lower the percentage now down to 50%, but when you add the caucus and parliamentary parties, the ALP is still the legal child of the Unions. Imagine if BHP had absolute control over preselection?
So the ALP members, almost always Union officials, do what they are told by the Unions. Some have never had a real job. Worse, only 7 of the current Federal ALP members were elected on first preference, so they are dependent on two masters, the Greens and the Unions. It is no surprise that their policies are all extreme Green. “There will be no carbon tax in a government I lead”, was not just a lie, it was a solemn promise to ALP voters. The ALP used to be a good, reasonable party. It is now the plaything of minority extremists.
So it is no surprise the CFMEU is also supporting the Greens, as they are partners in this farce where 14% Greens and 14% Unions control the Senate and prevent a democratically elected government from enacting legislation. We must be grateful though that the Carbon tax is gone. Lambie and Muir would not remove it today and Abbott is determined to frustrate Labor.
The tragedy is that all the insane RET legislation is still in place and supported by a Gillard creation, the expensive Climate Change Authority, headed by perennial economist Bernie Frazer and with such famous warmists as Clive Hamilton and David Karoly.
This non science is costing billions. It is tragic for Australia. Fishing, mining, forestry, coal, dams, live meat exports, car manufacture, heavy industry, aluminium smelting, punitive taxation, Union power, massive uncontrolled migration, the Greens and Labor are shutting down Australia. The essential battle ground is still a Carbon Tax and Global Warming.
20
Gay whales demand marriage equality!
33
I think I have sighted a few walking around in Oxford Street Sydney CBD.
20
[Snip. Sorry beyond the bounds of what we can moderate –Jo]
43
Yeah. Everyone should be in a majority and if not, cop it like they should
01
Hmm,
Political correctness strikes at Jo Nova? Neither scaper nor I identified any individuals, and just drew logical extensions from the equality argument. While it’s up to you Jo and the mods what gets published – I’d urge you to consider whether the points we made were valid, rather than whether someone might find them confronting for their non conformance with the consensus view?…
Slippery slope …
00
Wow.
The BoM issues it’s failed Annual 97% Consensus Doomsday Global Warming Warning;
ABC, 1 Jun 2015: Bureau of Meteorology bearers of bad El Niño tidings to farmers
“We don’t get any pleasure out of telling people what is not good news, but we think the better informed people are, and the earlier they know, then the better position they’ll be in to make their own critical decisions.”
~ ~ ~
Outside the BoM’s 97% consensus bubble, the real world:
Bloomberg: El Nino Defying Rain Seen Boosting Australia Wheat Yield Outlook
> El Niño was expected to bring dusty danger to India this year by stopping the country’s annual monsoons, which many of India’s 1.3 billion people rely on for their food to grow. Happily, the climate predictions were wrong.
. . .
With enough links to permanently put this comment in moderation to prove this point, pity Australia doesn’t have a responsible government that would just ask questions why the Australian Bureau of Meteorology is wrong. Again?
the conversation: Weather forecasting is about to get even better
The BoM’s weather forecasts couldn’t be any worse, as shown above.
Maybe the BoM could use the CSIRO’s new “climate change tool:
ABC: The CSIRO has launched a tool that will help predict climate changes in particular geographical locations into the future
And, for the ‘red thumber’, weather is now climate.
60
Handjive
My 2 cents worth
“No doubt you’ve all heard of the promised “Super el Nino”? The UN climate bunfight in Paris (being referred to as the Paris-ites) in December desperately needs one to help relieve you of a bit more cash – like $100 bil per year.
BUT
Have a look at
http://weather.gc.ca/saisons/animation_e.html?id=year&bc=sea
Wait till it loads the control panel at the bottom and click the >>/ button to get the latest image. Notice that most of the warm water is north of the Equator and that the water to the south is cold.
Which is not a normal el Nino situation where it is hot on both sides.
Which leads me to suspect that all this super-gasp-you-beaut-measuring-gear hasn’t seen a year like this and there is some unskilful blind flying going on
Then have a “Deeper Look At The Top 10 El Ninos Since 1870” at
http://sabolscience.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/a-deeper-look-at-top-10-el-ninos-since.html
it looks to me like 1957-58 has a very similar pattern of Pacific temperatures.
And these years aren’t mentioned in the list of drought years for our area.
I don’t have rainfall records for those years for our place but a neighbour found those for his place
1957
Jan Feb Mar Apr May June July Aug Sept Oct Nov Dec
132. 330, 131, 157, 121, 310, 000 40, 000. 13, 46. 478
1958
400, 306, 85. 96. 28, 234. 24, 66, 90, 57. 233, 340
So maybe we have some hope.
And remember the results of the model predictions of big el Ninos for the last two years v/s what happened.
30
Clarification for you last sentence:
“Weather” is for cold stuff.
“Global Warming” is for hot stuff.
00
This sounds serious scaper, Humpback, Sperm and harpoon one-liners notwithstanding……….
30
Met Office said it is disappointed:
23 Aug: UK Daily Mail: Met Office fury as BBC ‘gives contract worth millions to foreigners’: Broadcaster announces plant to scrap its 93-year relationship with the weather forecaster
Met Office ‘unsuccessful’ in tender process to provide BBC TV forecasts
Dutch and New Zealand firms still believed to be competing for contract
Ex-Culture Secretary and BBC reporter Ben Bradshaw: move ‘outrageous’
Nick Craven And Sanchez Manning For The Mail On Sunday
The Labour MP (Ben Bradshaw) pointed to the importance of the relationship between the two bodies in terms of shipping, defence and extreme weather crises, adding: ‘Madness if true. Government must intervene.’…
Tory MP Andrew Bridgen said: ‘Everybody understands the BBC has to cut costs. But the public will need to be convinced the new forecaster can accurately predict the fickleness of the British weather, especially if it’s a foreign provider.’
The Met Office has often been criticised for its lack of accuracy…
The BBC refused to say who the remaining bidders were, insisting the tender process was ‘ongoing’, but they are thought to be Metra, an offshoot of the New Zealand national forecasting service and Meteo, a collaboration between the Press Association, based in the UK, and the Dutch national weather service…
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3207392/Met-Office-fury-BBC-gives-contract-worth-millions-foreigners.html
Meteo sounds like it would be as CAGW-infested as the Met Office. don’t know anything about Metra.
20
My idée fixe of the week….
Austerity and economic downturns kill CO2 emissions.
Second CO2 fact of the week.
Oil rig count in the US alone is down 57% in one year from approx 1600 down to 800 also killing CO2 emissions.
Both sides of the polarised question of CO2 and the climate seem to be completely blind to these aforementioned stunning observations and all that they imply.
30
Like a good old white, male, luddite, climate denier I follow the weather records pretty closely. So for what its worth, here is beautiful Beauty Point for August.
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/tas/central-north/beauty-point Max Avg down by 1.2c and Min by 1.4c for the month (23rd)
July was similar but I cant find the link and have been talking about spread-sheeting this data for about 5 years and never done it (a true credit to science I am).
Just an interesting little local snippet on a background of July being the “hottest EVA”.
Not suggesting Weatherzone is reliable or that the data is not somehow “smoothed”, just interesting to see when you follow it closely, that winter in our area may have been colder than average by a good margin.
50
I would not be surprised if this winter on the mid north coast of New South Wales has not been well below average temperature. Right now 15C in my home office at 12.51 pm.
10
Anything below average is now discounted – BY ORDER OF THE BOM.
40
ABC’s idea of a science show!
21 Aug: ABC The Science Show: Andrew Denton: Comedy joins the climate change debate
PHOTO CAPTION: Andrew Denton believes that comedy can bridge the gap between climate change advocates and denialists.
Andrew Denton believes that comedy—with its power to reach our common humanity—might be able to move the debate forward…
It’s hard to see scientists and the scientific method being so thoroughly rubbished and disrespected. And it’s hard not to respond to that with some degree of anger or at least some degree of sarcastic humour.
Part of me tends to think that those who believe that the scientific method is ridiculous should have their electricity, planes and cars taken away…
Comedy, when it’s done well, shows people ways of thinking, organising their arguments and critically analysing the world. It’s why people like Bill Hicks, ***George Carlin and Lenny Bruce are still remembered, quoted and read today. They didn’t just tell jokes. They put together an argument and used comedy to make it stick…BLAH BLAH
This is an edited extract of Andrew Denton speaking at the WOMADelaide 2015 Planet Talks for The Science Show
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/scienceshow/comedy-can-help-change-attitudes-about-climate-change/6708862
Denton – don’t even pretend to admire Carlin – u obviously know as little about the climate as you know of the great comedian:
ClimateChangeDispatch – Because the debate is NOT over: George Carlin – Saving the Planet
Full transcript
You got people like this around you? Country is full of them now! People walking around all day long, every minute of the day — worried about EVERYTHING! Worried about the air, worried about the water, worried about the soil. Worried about insecticides, pesticides, food additives, carcinogens; worried about radon gas; worried about asbestos. Worried about saving endangered species…
We’re so self-important. So self-important! Everybody’s going to save something now. “Save the trees; save the bees; save the whales; save those snails.” And the greatest arrogance of all, “Save the planet.” WHAT? Are these f***ing people kidding me? Save the planet? We don’t even know how to take care of ourselves yet. We haven’t learned how to care for one another, we’re gonna save the f***ing planet?
I’m getting tired of that s**t. Tired of that s**t. Tired! I’m tired of f***ing Earth Day! I’m tired of these self-righteous environmentalists; these white, bourgeois liberals who think the only thing wrong with this country is there aren’t enough bicycle paths. People trying to make the world safe for their Volvos. Besides, environmentalists don’t give a s**t about the planet. They don’t care about the planet. Not in the abstract they don’t. Not in the abstract they don’t. You know what they’re interested in? A clean place to live. Their own habitat. They’re worried that some day in the future, they might be personally inconvenienced. Narrow, unenlightened self-interest doesn’t impress me.
Besides, there is nothing wrong with the planet. Nothing wrong with the planet. The planet is fine…etc
http://www.climatechangedispatch.com/george-carlin-saving-the-planet.html
as for Bill Hicks & Lenny Bruce, if they were around for the CAGW scam, they’d have much more in common with Carlin than with with Denton…of that i am certain.
70
17 Aug: HuffPo: AP: Julia Horowitz: California Ballot Measure Fails To Create Many Green Energy Jobs
Only 1,700 jobs have been created in three years.
Three years after California voters passed a ballot measure to raise taxes on corporations and generate clean energy jobs by funding energy-efficiency projects in schools, barely one-tenth of the promised jobs have been created, and the state has no comprehensive list to show how much work has been done or how much energy has been saved.
Money is trickling in at a slower-than-anticipated rate, and more than half of the $297 million given to schools so far has gone to consultants and energy auditors. The board created to oversee the project and submit annual progress reports to the Legislature has never met, according to a review by The Associated Press…
The State Energy Commission, which oversees Proposition 39 spending, could not provide any data about completed projects or calculate energy savings because schools are not required to report the results for up to 15 months after completion, spokeswoman Amber Beck said.
Still, she said she believes the program is on track.
***Not enough data has been collected for the nine-member oversight board of professors, engineers and climate experts to meet, she said….
***Proponents such as de Leon and billionaire investor and philanthropist Tom Steyer, who funded the ballot measure with a personal $30 million, told voters in 2012 that it would send up to $550 million annually to the Clean Jobs Energy Fund. But it brought in just $381 million in 2013, $279 million in 2014 and $313 million in 2015…
***Steyer’s office declined to make him available for an interview or to comment on the lower revenue figures…
“We’ve got a long track record in California of over-promising green jobs and under-delivering,” said Clark, who also expressed concern that most of the jobs created so far appear to be consulting positions…
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/california-green-energy-jobs_55d19c8ee4b07addcb434f86?kvcommref=mostpopular§ion=australia&adsSiteOverride=au
30
Good news for libertarians desirous of small government!
It’s only the ACT but of course we look forward to seeing the effect the trial has on the size of government when the reliable coal power is supplanted by spasmodic and unpredictable renewables. One may even speculate the goal is not 100% renewable because even the ACT knows it needs refrigerators.
I suggest that as the electrical power shrinks so does the political power, with a lag of one election cycle. 😉
30
This’ll be a boon for those selling standby and primary load generators.
Will APH be retiring its standby generators? The ATO? Defence? The hospital? Canberra Airport? How indeed will aircraft be flying into and out of Canberra on renewables?
What about schools, libraries? Shopping centres? The commercial complexes at Fyshwick?
Who will be paying for the electrification of public transport? The trolley buses from Dunlop to Fyschwick; from Throsby to Conder?
What about the parliamentary road vehicle fleet? And the embassies of foreign nations?
How will they run Tidbinbilla Deep Space Communication Complex on renewables?
40
It is entertaining,isn’t it ? 🙂 🙂
I’m reminded of a line from some film (can’t remember at all which) where Sam Neill is playing a politician. After some inane dialogue, the Neill character is asked: “Did anyone ever tell you you’re stupid ?” Neill’s answer: “I’m a politician. That seems to be all I ever hear”
They’re simply not credible, but with compulsory voting, that doesn’t matter
10
It’s just political spin. I have 3KW of solar – nameplate. Assuming 24 hours of sunlight it has nameplate capacity of 3 x 24 or 72 KWh per day which is about 200% of my usage. So I do better than the ACT. In actual fact it generates only 15kWh per day which is only 40% of my usage. So I can claim to have 200% renewables but still have 50% of my power come from coal.
Frankly I hope the Fed government does play the nameplate game with the 26% renewable target because it means that we only need to meet about 5% actual renewable generation, a much cheaper ask.
20
Ah, just noticed bemused linked to similar story earlier. Since I wrote the comment the previous night and didn’t get around to posting it until this afternoon, I should have checked first for speedier couriers.
00
AGL will soon offer solar with storage. http://aglsolar.com.au/batteries-included/ They say Adelaide City Council will be offering up to $5,000 subsidy for solar storage. Unbelievable. I hope people realise that battery packs won’t last as long as they think (like wind generators) nor are they likely to achieve nameplate capacity if full capacity is used as per my post in a recent thread.
30
The Adelaide City Council has numerous magnanimous benefactors, which is why the people and businesses in Adelaide do not have to pay rates.
00
What is the stable state of the atmosphere?
Last weekend I put up a proposed experiment to determine if gravity creates the thermal gradient in the atmosphere.
Rick Will made an interesting contribution, including this insight:
To test that idea I thought I would have another look at the Aerological plots from balloon flights which are conducted by the Bureau of Meteorology from a lot of sites in Australia and three sites in Antarctica. The info is posted on the BOM site about an hour after the flight.
Melbourne showed an atmosphere which cools at the saturated adiabatic lapse rate(SLAR) from the surface to 32,000 ft and is isothermal from 32,000ft to 55,000ft (top of trace). I am taking it that the SLAR represents the isentropic state
http://www.bom.gov.au/aviation/observations/aerological-diagrams/
What about Antartica, where the surface heating is much less? Casey station had an atmosphere which cooled at a much lower rate than the SALR to 32,000ft and then was isothermal from there upward.
http://www.bom.gov.au/aviation/observations/aerological-diagrams/
Unfortunately I have missed mid winter in Antarctica (when surface heating should be at a minimum and convection in the lower atmosphere also at a minimum) and I don’t know how to access old records, however I think these traces are quite good evidence of what Rick Will said.
00
Reducing carbon emissions only leads to slight warming, not any cooling at all. None of you will correctly understand what is really happening with energy transfers in planetary tropospheres until you understand the cutting-edge 21st century thermodynamics involving maximum entropy production that has been explained this month in a comprehensive 43 minute video recording here now viewed by about 500 in its first two weeks. It will blow your mind and you will learn what you don’t yet understand and will not learn from any other source. It is correct physics based on the laws of thermodynamics.
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are you saying that this particular theory is time constrained? What will be the physical laws in 85 years? We need to know so we can plan for the future.
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How did you come up with that interpretation?
Thumbs up tickers please explain!
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read the sentence I quoted. It is an insight into an “interesting” mind, not at all an insight into physics. Talking about physics with respect to Doug’s comments would be a novelty for all
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This feels like a cooling signal.
‘East coast lows are relatively unusual for this time of year with June the peak month for such events. It is also “not a classic set-up”.
‘A more typical system involves a cold air mass about five kilometres above the land surface and about 200 kilometres inland meeting moist offshore air, Mr Taggart said.
‘Instead, the inland air is warmer and more moist than usual, he said.’
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/weather/sydney-weather-city-to-sit-on-edge-of-unusual-east-coast-low-20150824-gj69sd.html#ixzz3ji7RJXSy
Follow us: @smh on Twitter | sydneymorningherald on Facebook
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Germany’s network agency (BNA), responsible for the provision of an electricity and wired comminucations network, has applications on its desk to shut down 57 conventional (gas, coal, hydro) power stations due to commercial unviability in the Energiewende (energy transition to renewables). That’s 9 more applications than at the start of the year.
The Energiewende is costing Germans 28 billion Euros (AUD$44,000 million) a year via electricity surcharges.
Keep in mind that two of Germany’s large electricity generating companies have “spun off” their conventional power generating capacity into separate companies, keeping the subsidised renewables in their main operation. The unprofitable companies cannot continue to operate indefinitely; even if they have no permission to shut down. Even administrators cannot continue to run up debts while trying to fill the network agency requirements for reliable power on demand.
A third operator, Sweden’s Vattenfall, is trying to sell off its coal-based assets in Germany but has found no buyers.
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Currency conversion does not compute!
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Well maybe it does!
44,000 million equals AUD 44 billion.
Bernd confused me by changing units. I thought I read AUD 44 million.
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Apologies for the mixed units.
A good way to keep people on their toes but unintended … I try to write the figures as thousands of millions to provide some sense of proportion and to avoid the billion ambiguity.
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Germany’s quandry:
Earlier this year had about 10 GW in still-to-be-constructed, approved, coal-fired power stations that they need as spinning reserve. These pending withdrawals add to the need for despatchable capacity.
But the market signals that nobody’s going to be buying into new coal-fired power stations on a commercial basis.
Every year, around 600,000 German electricity households are getting their power cut off because they can’t afford to pay their bills.
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The people are going to be very upset when they discover CAGW was only a theory.
This coming European winter should see a return to the Dark Ages and mass migration. I am not alarmed.
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“Households consuming 3,500 kilowatt hours of electricity now pay an additional €270, or $307, a year as a result of the energy transition, according to the Cologne Institute for Economic Research”
“In no other European country have the fees and contributions risen as steeply as they have in Germany,” Esther Chrischilles from the economic research institute told Handelsblatt. “It jeopardizes the competitiveness of many companies.”
https://global.handelsblatt.com/edition/247/ressort/politics/article/coming-clean-with-green
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‘There is a very well defined empirical relationship between the growth in Earth’s human population and the growth in atmospheric CO2, at least for the last 40 years’.
Atmospheric CO2 as a proxy for population — graph
Lewis BTR, Ocean-499 class of 1997, University of Washington,
School of Oceanography.
One wonders then What Is Obama’s Top Population-Control Freak Hiding?
How long then before the eco-glitterati suggest taxation by population or has that already taken place?
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These are the same people who want to disarm whole populations so they can brutlize them with this nonsense.
These people are egencists in effect.
We see eugenics surfacing in Nazi & white supremacist mindsets to remove “unter munchen” from society. Problem is, when lunatics are in control “unter munchen” is a rubbery label.
And going out onm a limb here – we see eugenics also surfacing in funding of abortion facilities too. Look at the firestorm in the USA over Planned Parenthood recently.
Aborting babies would be viewed by eugenecists as “beneficial”.
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theguardian.com, 15 April 2012 09
Tens of millions of pounds of UK aid money have been spent on a programme that has forcibly sterilised Indian women and men, the Observer has learned.
Many have died as a result of botched operations, while others have been left bleeding and in agony.
A number of pregnant women selected for sterilisation suffered miscarriages and lost their babies.
With officials and doctors paid a bonus for every operation, poor and little-educated men and women in rural areas are routinely rounded up and sterilised without having a chance to object.
Across the country, there have been numerous reports of deaths and of pregnant women suffering miscarriages after being selected for sterilisation without being warned that they would lose their unborn babies.
Yet a working paper published by the UK’s Department for International Development in 2010 cited the need to fight climate change as one of the key reasons for pressing ahead with such programmes.
The document argued that reducing population numbers would cut greenhouse gases …
. . .
The environmental nazis have begun their evil pogrom.
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