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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Statistics
For those that don’t get the Bolt Report, here he discusses the SA blackout.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ET-g0NLpc9U
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I marvel at how the mere mention of Bolt’s name brings out the red thumbs!
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Speaking of SA. Here is a “big call” from Bill Shorten.
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Shorten should be packaged as a Herbal Mix (99% Dill).
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100% hypocrite
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Green war-mists played Russian roulette with Southern Australians falls on black.
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South Australia joins North Korea, both black from the Space Station LOL, LOL
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Just a comment on just how reliable is the info/data provided by the BOM. I had a look at this BO map for rainfall to the end of September 2016.
http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/awap/rain/index.jsp?colour=colour&time=latest&step=0&map=percent&period=cyear&area=wa
It shows the SW corner of WA 80% to 100% average rainfall. I was sceptical as IO keep an eye on the figures form the SW. Following is a sample from ten randomly selected sites within the SW corner. Here’s what I found.
Mt Barker: up 193mm
Merredin up 92.3mm
Perth down 3.6mm
Windy Harbour up 179.1mm
Albany up 7.8 mm
Collie East up 103.4mm
Bunbury up 80.1mm
Busselton up 63.5mm
Bridgetwon up 145.5mm
Manjimup up 29.1mm (officially but if you add in the 64.1mm that fell during the 22 days that the rain gauge was out of commission. Measured by DPAW just 50m from the BOM station.) up 93.2mm
Seems like a well above average rainfall to me.
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Is the BOM trying to keep the recent decline in rainfall in the SW of West OZ alive, or do they just have a lousy GIS person preparing the maps.
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Ted
At best “good enough for government work”
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The most terrifying words in the English language are: “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” Ronald Reagan
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Over many decades I’ve flown over many parts of Australia, including the Outback, where it looks like an inland sea. Heavy rain is to be expected, it’s recorded in Australia’s history
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BOM Map WA rainfall anomaly for September shows that most of the state got within 10mm either way of normal rain. Some slight 10-25mm deficits in Perth and central coast areas. A few 10 – 25 excesses along far south coast.
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My figures and the map I linked to were for the nine months to the end of September. Just to avoid any confusion between our comments.
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I was surprised to hear the radio reporting a week or so back that our rainfall in WA was only half the average – that seemed untrue to me as we have had lots of rain. I did once hear, though I’m not sure if its accurate, that their average rainfall is calculated against a designated period (not the moving average from the last 20 odd years that I would expect). If this is the case they could cherry pick some years and then their claims for change would be easy – mind you I don’t believe weather people any more when they are talking warmista rubbish.
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… they could cherry pick some years …
The don’t just cherry pick some years at random. Randomness has nothing to do with it. They carefully select the years that will allow even the most minor increases to look frightening to the uninitiated.
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Year to date rainfall anomalies in WA looks pretty normal, except for the little dry patch around Perth (south of perth)?
In terms of percentages most of the southern half of the state is from 80 -120% of normal. There is a small pocket of 60-80% around Perth (or Mandurah?) If that island dot is Rotto, Perth is in the 80%+ cat.
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‘The system used for calculating areal averages of rainfall was changed in September 2009; the main effect was that current and historical values for Tasmania were increased. ‘
This may mean that rainfall (temps) are compared against the ACORN sites and gridded out to cover the area around that site. I know the temp anomaly is compared to the 1961-1990 average (rather than the site’s long-term average) but I’m not sure about rainfall.
As an example, this allows the BoM to show Bourke (NSW) in a -3C to -4C zone when it was 5.1C below its average. Many times if you average a particular state’s mean max temps, it will be below average – yet the official temp for the state will be above average.
This is probably why there seems to be a disconnect between what is observed and what is recorded.
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30 Sep: EurActiv: James Crisp: Surge in electric cars could strain energy grid, warns EU agency
The large scale roll-out of electric cars on EU roads will help fight climate change but more electricity will have to be generated to power the vehicles which, the European Environment Agency (EEA) has warned, could have its own impact on global warming.
The European Environment Agency this week said that larger numbers of electric vehicles will not be enough to make to the transition to a low-carbon economy. The EU’s transport sector still depends on oil for 94% of its energy needs…
Although sales and the use of electric vehicles are increasing, they still only make up 0.15% of Europe’s car fleet and only 1.2% of total passenger car sales in the EU…
http://www.euractiv.com/section/transport/news/surge-in-electric-cars-could-strain-energy-grid-warns-eu-agency/
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I read some time ago that for developed countries to cope with recharging batteries for electric vehicles, even if 25 per cent of the car fleets were electric, would require massive new investment in power generation, grids and charging stations. And that the cost alone would be prohibitive.
Of course there could be local travel using electric vehicles, cities and suburbs maybe, but even then the infrastructure costs would be substantial. But for country people, forget it. Try to imagine Outback Australia being serviced for electric only vehicles.
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The best way to cripple a nation is to rely too much on so called renewable energy sources. One wonders if the Greens have an agenda to achieve such an aim. So far the plan is on track and working very well.
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Not enough Lithium on this planet.
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Déjà vu: http://www.breitbart.com/california/2016/10/01/californias-renewable-energy-grid-on-verge-of-crisis/?
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It appears, Pete, that standby generation may be only one of the problems associated with renewable power. In this lecture by one Andrew Dodson on ‘Issues Regarding Renewables‘ he states, inter alia that,
I’m sure that many of you will find it helpful in explaining how the grid works and how complex the task is keeping it stable.
I never realised, either, the huge amount of generated electricity lost in transmission.
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Oh yes, we are very good at heating up wires.
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A change of heart goes even further: http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/10/01/james-lovelock-godfather-green-climate-change-religion-totally-unscientific/.
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And I forgot about this one: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-01/sundrop-farms-opens-solar-greenhouse-using-no-fresh-water/7892866:
While I admire the concept of what’s being done, Their ABC’s headline is completely misleading.
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Hi all,
Looking for help here.
What I want to be able to do is express a concept in roughly these words:
“Before the Industrial revolution, the world had the same average temperature as Hobart, Tasmania. IF we follow the IPCC’s expected (median) scenario for doubling Carbon Dioxide, it will have the temperature of Melbourne Victoria. Please explain why you think this will make it uninhabitable?”
Except of course, as a good sceptic, I want my claims to be accurate. So can somebody please give me a list of locations that fill these criteria? And document both the numbers used, and the source of their data?
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What you should do is as much personal research as possible and then look to forums such as this to fill the gaps, not to do your research. Jo already provides a wealth of information and links to relevant sites. It may require hard work and it may be a ‘dirty job’, but that’s what so many in this world are doing all the time.
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@ bemused.
Of course you’re right.
And that is what I’ve done. Sadly, I failed to get a satisfactory result.
My first draft of my request was ten times as large as the one I eventually went with, defining terms, discussing sources and ambiguity, and documenting what I’d tried, and what I was unclear about. I decided I was both boring and winging, and whittled it down to essentials.
Any help is much appreciated.
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The problem is just your question. Heating is “supposedly” not even everywhere and it affects mins and maxes unevenly. Indeed whenever there is water about (which on earth is pretty much everywhere except the heart of large continents in the subtropical belt) increasing the temperature results in increased humidity which lowers max temperatures. So near the equator on islands you get 33 by day and 23 at night (average around 28) the year around. In say Melbourne, it varies a lot, you get lows in winter of around -2 to a highest max about 41 in summer an average of 19.5 over the year.
So Melbourne gets hotter than say south Kalimantan despite the fact that it has 10 degree lower annual average.
It’s difficult to then get an “average difference in temperature” because the average means so little. However if you do want to do it then get stations around 1000 km apart which correspond to around 2 degree average. Say Melboune and Sydney, or Sydney and Brisbane.
While I understand what you want to be able to say, quantifying it isn’t easy and there aren’t any predigestible statistics like this that you can use. It would be better to pick another related argument (like the one I presented above); IE that a higher average temp says nothing about what the max (which heatwaves are related to) will do. That in fact we KNOW that higher average temps leads to LOWER summer maxes (higher winter maxes) because that’s what happens on earth now.
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Hobart monthly averages are from 11.5C to 21C like Melbourne you have to pick your average. This is the extraordinarily silly thing about a ‘world temperature’. It is hard enough to make sense of an average temperature for Melbourne. It is near meaningless as the temperature varies much more during a single day. Besides would any one care much if the range was 13 to 22.5? Would the crops fail and the boats stop sailing and would people stop playing tennis? What exactly is the problem, from the -50C at South Pole to +35 at the equator? Seas rising more than they would because the ice age ended? I have never understood the devastating problem and as even the ‘world temperature’ has not changed for 20 years, why is South Australia spending billions of borrowed money on windmills and desalination? Or don’t they know the Federal government is going further into debt at $1,000,000,000 a week? Personally I blame the ABC. Sell it. If we are going to be misinformed, we can choose to pay for bad information.
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Questions:
Place No.1 is humid and 28℃ overnight, and rises to 30℃ maximum before dropping back to 28℃. Average is 29℃.
Place No. 2 is drier and drops to 15℃ minimum. During the day the temperature rises to 40℃ except during a brief 15 second when it jumps to 45℃ then declines rapidly back to 25℃ by tea time. The temperature at a station close by shows no such jump. The average of the 2 extremes is 30℃. (The ‘jump’ is modelled on the recent hottest day figure for Sydney).
Which Place is hotter? Which Place would you rather live in?
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Both places appear to average the same temps during the 24 hour cycle, but I’d prefer the humid existence. Drought is more unlikely and we can’t do without water. I might visit the 2nd arid option for holidays.
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I know, I’ve said this before but it’s worth a re-run. Averages are meaningless without some indication of what they speak to, namely the range and standard deviation of the sample in which they occur. When global mean temperature is reported (NOAA August 2016) as 15.6°C, and juxtaposed to the global temperature range: +54C to -93.2C, it isn’t so usefully informative. So the focus on temperature “anomaly,” namely the deviation away from the mean, becomes the preoccupation and to this end the NOAA state this:
Is this 0.05C something to fret about? In short absolutely not. Should it be a basis of fear, political paroxysm, societal manipulation, eco-religious fanaticism, and denial courts? Again, absolutely not. Should it be called out as a scam of biblical proportion? Absolutely. Why? Because there is nothing in the slightest bit unusual about global temperatures and their creatively named “anomalies” that doesn’t lie within the bounds of natural variation. The theoretical anthro warming due to a trivial addition of CO2 is undetectable, as indeed it should be.
AN ESTIMATE OF THE CENTENNIAL VARIABILITY OF GLOBAL TEMPERATURES. Lloyd, PJ. Energy & Environment · Vol. 26, No. 3, 2015.
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As bemused said, Jo has a library on every aspect of the debate.
As a starting point CO2 does not cause warming in a real world environment, water vapor is poorly modelled.
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‘Please explain why you think this will make it uninhabitable?’
Its going to get cool and wet, property values must fall.
http://appinsys.com/globalwarming/SixtyYearCycle_files/image005.jpg
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As a short question Leo Morgan, I think that was nicely put. Just the thing for people of short attention to hear!
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When the scraggers won a game it was obviously because of global warming.
Now they’ve won a grand final – what can the sceptics say now? There’s just no point denying it- the world has been turned up side down.
Expect more earthquakes, showers of frogs etc – the portents of the end of the world are unmistakable.
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‘Now they’ve won a grand final – what can the sceptics say now?’
Its a 62 year climate cycle.
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Well, it’s happened again since then.
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When it rains bedsteads and tins of tuna I’ll worry.
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Here’s something for South Australians who want to completely embrace the Stone Age consistent with their voting for an expensive and unreliable “green” electricity supply. Here is a video of a guy from Queensland who builds quite a respectable hut who starts out with no tools whatsoever but makes whatever he needs as he goes. I recommend other videos in his channel as well. NO ELECTRICITY NEEDED!
https://youtu.be/nCKkHqlx9dE
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David
In our clan there is the story of a great uncle on his horse and met on the road.
He was carrying a coil of fencing wire, an axe, a brace and bit and a pair of pliers. In response to the obvious question
“I’m off to build my mother in law a new house”.
It is still partly standing.
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And I’ve done a bit of bush carpentry using all those and an adze.
But chainsaws and post hole diggers don’t go astray in that game.
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A couple of good technical videos about grid subsynchronous resonances and other serious problems caused by wind subsidy farms and solar.
https://youtu.be/gJtv7gkuh1s (22 mins)
https://youtu.be/kU6izpryqqw (19 mins)
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Red Thumb Troll: I look forward to your critique of those two talks. Or are you clueless, like most Greentards?
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It’s probably Michael Connelly, ex-Wikipedia moderator/something, AGW advocate and cheat who used his position to edit climate change pages on Wiki to suit his warmist agenda.
Whoever it is, the better your argument, the more red thumbs this cow-ardly troll will unleash upon your comment. Feel proud you’re causing them so much painful angst in their time of need, forcing them into “drastic” measures.. 😉
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That would be William CONnelly, ie the stoat or the weasel…. not Michael
As for red thumbs, if you have annoyed a dumb red thumb, that is a big plus…
so just add all the thumbs together 🙂
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Thanks for the correction Andy. He was so pointless in my life I forgot his name.
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Although there was a guy called Michael around a few years ago..
Surely his life couldn’t be so worthless as to still be the phantom red thumb.
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Well to be fair, it is school holidays…maybe some greenies kid is in their office ( heated with carbon belching hypocritical power ) …I am yet to get more than 4 red thumbs from the random red thumb guy, but I am hopeful…..
Maybe if I sling off at the useless Left and their mates the equally useless money grubbing communist UN might kick off some pass-ag red thinb action….
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He makes a very good point about windmills or solar. If they are serving a local community, there is no need for AC. DC is fine and the windmills can turn on an off as they please. All you have to do is match the voltage. Putting windmills in a large grid has raised a host of problems solved last for mechanical generators and not yet solved for windmills. Beating between source and supply made worse by capacitive storage can destroy generators and the harmonics of a windmills are far worse than the old generators.
So it is better to keep the windmills local and off the grid, but the NIMBY crowd want the windmills out where they drive farmers mad and not in the city where the varying deep humm disrupts their sleep.
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When jackerooing years ago the lighting system was 32 Volts DC.
The problem, as always,was storage.
The battery room was full of corroding lead acid car batteries and the owner decided just to run the generator when needed.
More recently solar power in distant areas benefited from the decommissioning of GPO batteries from Telstra, tall heavy blocks of lead acid, which were to be broken up and used as scrap.
You can’t get them now.They have gone back to car/truck batteries.
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Thanks David Maddison, for the links.
This sort of thing should be shouted from the rooftops.
‘Renewable energy endangers the grid!’, ‘Renewables push up costs!’
The grid system is a transmission line system with many feed-offs — if you know anything about the old telephone line system or RF equipment then what has been said may make sense. If you do understand then you will know that, in a matched system, a short circuit applied at a quarter wave length away from an AC source will look like an open circuit at that same AC source then the following may make sense… If not try looking at this HERE>
Imagine trying to put a vast array of variable output power transmitters on a transmission line in an uncoordinated way. Now link the line to multiple variable loads (variable impedance loads, varying in reactance and resistance) — i.e. the consumers. Compounding this is the fact that the transmission lines characteristic impedance is poorly maintained.
How can this system be regulated? Answer: It can not!
The power companies and the transmission authorities attempt to mitigate against dangerous fluctuations by switch the transmission system, and varying generator outputs; switching and adjusting this way and that to head-off a catastrophe.
As more unreliables are dumped on the lines the less stable the system and the more it will cost!
Adding unreliable power generation significantly adds costs to a grid connected electricity supply system.
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Which strengthens my suspicion that wind power as presently applied is more trouble than the good of it.
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I think, as mentioned in the first talk, that if people want renewables, let them have them and pay for them on their own entirely separate grid. However don’t expect others who want traditional reliable and cheap power pay for them, that’s stealing.
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Freydenberg flatly disagreed. Renewables were not the problem.
He is completely wrong and a reflection of the opinions of his Green lawyer boss.
Really it’s not as if this is the first blackout for SA or the last. Calling windmills renewables to cover up the obvious fact thpat the are unreliables fools no one. Windmills and a National grid are incompatibles. Everyone knows it now except Malcolm.
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“Freydenberg flatly disagreed.”
Fact thus far show his interpretation of events to be in error.
But there again nothing more should be expected from the complacently ignorant Greens.
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The word from South Australia is… the locals have now (belatedly) wised up to the fact that the wind turbines cannot be restarted and reconnected as grid supply until the turbines themselves are receiving electricity!
There are several reasons, such as needing to re-orient the turbines into the wind with motors, internal monitoring electronics, and most importantly that the turbines are expecting to see a 50Hz signal on the grid that they can synch with, they were never designed to be the first and primary generator.
Updating the Ancient Mariner:
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Thanks David. Superb to see to electrical engineers hard at work. Should be mandatory viewing for Greenism bubble-heads in general and their politicians / policy ‘visionaries’ in particular. I enjoyed the reminder around RCI phase interactions and how impossibly complex they become with multiple rotating generators at varying rpm … and how none of this complexity is modeled let alone understood in a network with the additional variable of age-dependent efficiency.
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Wow!
That was enlightening.
Thanks+
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This guy is pro-renewables but he is also pro-reality and gives a good talk about how unrealistic renewables are in terms of the vast amount of land required to support them.
https://youtu.be/E0W1ZZYIV8o 18 min 35 sec
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I’m all for renewables, IF and only IF they can be used safely with the existing grid.
So far running too many of them turns the grid into a concoction closer resembling some medaevil dung-sodden country fair than a modern state….
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Renewables like solar and wind make sense being used, even as DC supplies where they are needed, over short distances. Long distances require AC. The problem for Australia is that 85% of people in Victoria and SA and WA live in three cities. So there is nowhere to put thousands of acres of solar and wind and that means transporting energy and across the existing grid. That in turn means AC and all the major problems of synchronization or collapse of the entire grid. The logical conclusions is that so called ‘renewables’ are totally unsuitable and should be run on their own grid if anything, perhaps supplying country towns only. Even in the traditional power situation, it pays great dividends to have power close to the city, as with the Newport gas power station in Melbourne or the old Playford station in Adelaide. The one the Greens blew up.
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Natural gas is also a renewable and so is oil. Hydrocarbons on that scale are too large for being sourced from ‘squashed fish, or dead leaves’. stir stir..;)
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Sorry. They are not. I am not aware of any natural production to match our current usage of fossil fuels. If the world survives, one day they will wake up to the fact that the future is nuclear.
Mind you, there is still a lot of scope for developing wind and solar power. Home heating and cooling for example. People just need to think realistically.
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I am, there is a whole moon full of hydrocarbons, called Titan, It has Oceans of methane – a Hydrocarbon – I suppose they were made from dead trees right?
Clearly there are ABIOTIC processes that make hydrocarbons.
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Hmmm. Fascinating. I have read a bit around the abiogenic oil issue in particularly and hydrocarbons in general. How about a reference for your comment please?
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Here is a teaser.
You can read the whole paper here, a pdf download.
https://anticorruptionsociety.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/overwhelming-preponderance-of-geological-evidence.pdf
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Talking to the parents today like a good little favourite son, so this is going to be a bit of a ‘friend of a friend’ story but they were talking about someone within their social cycle.
Now this mate of my parents is retired and apparently got his house fully solared up. Problem is he has so much solar that if he takes all cash back he ends up having his pension cut. So to keep his pension intact he basically spends every day with every single piece of electrical equipment running and invites all the extended family over to use his washing machine for the new baby’s nappies.
Okay, like I said this is basically a ‘friend of a friend’ story but this does sort of imply there is something a bit wrong with the entire solar network system.
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I think its good to use it up, its reneable after all , right?
I’d suggest bringing some solar batteries over and charging them up, then leasing them fully charged to people….that way during earth hour…you can see your mates place from space….
He he …I am naughty….
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The South Australia blackout brings a reminder of a problem I’ve run across with the NBN and its impact on phones.
I am happy with my “Fixed Wireless” variant, which apparently only available to those of us who are out of range of even “fibre to the node” or FTTN, particularly as, in contradiction to the paperwork, I have to keep my landline on the old copper. That suits me, as I can still phone out in an emergency, including blackouts. I’ve used that function often.
I’ve discovered that with the FTTN option, a landline dies, and you can’t dial out to report the outage, or call 000, if the situation is really bad. Bad luck if your mobile’s battery needs charging, or its tower has also gone black.
At least one suppler has said that if you want multiple landlines in the house, you have use a cordless. Sounds Ok, unless you consider the warnings about them being more likely to cause brain tumours than mobiles.
Has anyone else encountered these, or similar isses, and maybe found answers?
The suppliers seem to be pushing people into converting, without alerting them to some of these problems.
Cheers,
Dave B
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David
From experience you need one of those old fashioned white phones with just the dial pad. At least then when the power goes off you still have land line. The walk-arounds won’t work.
The HRCS network has an email address for reporting – if that is working.
We’re on land line with computer on wireless – mobile phones too if you have the patch cord to the yagi.
Last big flood we lost the lot – fortunately still have the uhf-cb net
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And I should add – the land line network is one place where battery back-up does seriously work
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We have an old landline ‘phone, kept tucked away for use in an emergency.
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A correction – our “landline” is a HRCS radio network. Each house has its tower with solar charging. If two houses are close enough one may be linked to the tower with underground cable.
The old one wire party lines had dry cells in the individual phones as well as batteries at the exchange – I’m not sure how that worked over the distances involved.
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In my area, service providers are falling over each other trying to get business now that NBN has been announced. The sales people don’t seem to understand the difference between FTTN and FTTP, and no one seems to know how to configure a land line on FTTN. My new supplier has sorted the NBN modem ok, and has supplied a mobile SIM card that works. The land line is still with Telstra. Big silence. I have warned them that they contracted to transfer the land line, so the contract is void if they can’t do that. Just hoping a complaint to ACMA might get some action, otherwise I’ll just stop paying two lots of bills and go full wifi for a while.
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Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman TIO, is the place to go for that not ACMA which regulates radio broadasting.
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I’ve been “naked” here for nearly 10 years – ADSL without the Telstra tax and an IP phone only. It has almost never been a problem and, even on the odd occasion when the power is out, one of the 3 mobiles in the house still works … but I wouldn’t want to be doing this in the renewables paradise of South Australia.
BTW No NBN here yet. 15 years ago, I worked from home as effectively as in the office and that started out as 256k (yes, k) ADSL, which has kept up all the time with increasing data demands. It’s only the NBN suffocating incremental investment in improving copper-wire connectivity that has prevented further bandwidth gains. Fibre connectivity IS the future – it just doesn’t have to be now and everywhere.
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I agree DavidH. I am a fairly tech-savvy person and a heavy internet user but can’t understand the current need for NBN. I am quite happy with ADSL2+ and even regularly stream HD videos on YouTube. What is the actual business case for it? I agree that eventually all comms will be via optic fibre to the household but I just don’t see the urgency especially at the vastly inflated prices for the NBN, something like an absurd price-gouging $5,000 per household, isn’t it?
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You are correct David.With NBN my phone is now connected to the Telstra Gateway that is powered. So during any power outage, no phone as well as no Internet. Telstra advice is to have a mobile phone. But apparently if you require emergency phone connection it is possible to get a system with battery backup, at extra cost of course.
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But I thought that with FTTN, there is no backup power at the node, so a battery operated phone connected to it serves no purpose ?? Just more money for the Telco?
Cheers,
Dave B
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I think the reply to TELSTRA then would be “keep your landline and its rental, and I’ll stick with the mobile!”
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I looked into that, but both what I’m reading, and what I’m being told, is that the old network will be “turned off” 18 months after the NBN is available. Then NBN or nothing…
In my case 2020 has been mentioned.
Cheers,
Dave B
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Off grid solar with landline, sat Internet (NBN) and sat TV for 10 years. No mobile service. Cyclone or heavy monsoon weather we lose the lot. Battery system keeps the power running and we have a good generator with two spare. Close community always does the rounds after an event to check all ok, love it here. 🙂
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Thanks for your replies. For those of you currently able to use old landlines, be careful I’m now thinking there’s a very strong push to cut them off completely, somehow, although the timetable escapes me.
Cheers.
Dave B
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David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz,
A bit of historical information may help you. The telephone system was based on DC voltage being supplied from a local telephone exchange via copper cables – your traditional 4 wire telephone land lines.
The length of those copper cables always had a maximum distance. I can’t find a reference, but I think it is somewhere around 5km. So you may have driven past the local telephone exchange many times and not noticed it – usually a small brick building with one door and no windows.
That exchange also had a bank of batteries to provide back-up DC power if the AC power to the exchange was ever lost. All the local exchanges were connected heirarchically into what was known as the Public Switched Telephone Network. Additionally, telecommunication equipment was also entirely DC powered. This allowed the entire PSTN to continue functioning in the event of a wider power outage.
Technology has changed much of the design of our telecommunications networks. While your home may still have a copper land line, the rest of the network has pretty much shifted to fibre optic cabling, and requires AC power to keep the network alive. Battery backup today is really only about protection against short term black outs, and most of today’s larger Optus and Telstra exchanges have multiple diesel back-up generators which are used to provide AC if the black out goes for more than about 30 seconds.
Those back-up generators only have a limited fuel capacity, so will run out if the black out goes for more than a few hours. So your land line may get you to the local exchange, but if the power is down across the grid, you may have difficulty placing any call – emergency or not.
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Thanks Paully,
Your final sentence expresses my concern very well. And yes, I am at the end of a line, and wasn’t able to consider an ADSL connection, but have only had one failure of my phone service in 24 years. That was when the local exchange got flooded.
Cheers,
Dave B
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We’re the same out here David, far enough out to only get wireless broadband and windfarms.. But its great to keep the copper phone line for when the power is out. Bet that would have helped more than a few south aussies the other day too.
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Thanks pauly, interesting.
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Re alternator overspeeding
I was just re-reading the SA black hole item and there is mention of this problem.
An example from a much smaller scale. We have a Dunlite 7.5 kva alternator set which runs at 3000 rpm for 50 cycle power. The engine would run at 3600 rpm for 60 cycles.
There is a large warning on the alternator to not exceed 3200 rpm. That would be 53.3 cycles power.
So just imagine the problem with those power station monsters.
10
worth a read for all the fine print etc, tho this relates to New York State:
2 Oct: LockportJournal: Virginia Kropf: Solar deals carry risks for farmers
DEVELOPMENT: Tax impacts await land owners who take acreage out of production.
Signing a lease with a solar company may seem like an environmentally friendly act and a way to make some easy money, but landowners should think twice before signing on the dotted line.
That was the message conveyed to about 30 individuals at a meeting last week at the Orleans County Cornell Cooperative Extension, sponsored by the New York State Farm Bureau…
http://www.lockportjournal.com/news/local_news/solar-deals-carry-risks-for-farmers/article_e18094a9-3aed-5d8d-b2eb-eca71dfe5000.html
30
The huge money and resources put into useless windmills and solar is an utter tragedy especially when the money could have been put into useful things. Those responsible must be held to account.
111
more woes for Tesla!
26 Sep: Reuters: SolarCity sued by Cogenra Solar and Khosla Ventures
Elon Musk’s SolarCity has been accused of intellectual property theft by Cogenra Solar Inc, a wholly owned subsidiary of SunPower Corporation, and Khosla Ventures.
In a lawsuit filed in San Francisco on Monday, the parties accused SolarCity of gaining undue advantage of Cogenra’s Shingling technology that helps in manufacturing high-efficiency commercially viable solar panels…
Last week Tesla said its proposed acquisition of SolarCity could be delayed because of shareholder lawsuits alleging board members breached their fiduciary duty…
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-solarcity-lawsuit-idUSKCN11X04X
more problems for solar customers:
1 Oct: SouthCoastToday: Aimee Chiavaroli: Solar panels not always sunny
David Pelletier of Pelletier Realty in New Bedford has also seen problems in selling houses with long-term solar contracts. In the body of the agreement, the solar company reserves the right to approve who the new buyer is by seeing if they are credit-worthy, Pelletier said…
When companies like SolarCity install solar panels on a residence, they record a document at the Register of Deeds to protect their investment, he said. The document, a Uniform Commercial Code Financing Statement commonly called a UCC-1, notifies buyers or refinancing companies that the solar company owns the rooftop equipment and has a financial interest in the property.
The notice may cause snags in a closing, but it can usually be handled by the lawyers and Realtors involved. “It’s another thing those professionals have to address in the pathway to consummation of a property sale,” he said…
“Consumer advocates are becoming increasingly aware that some people are having difficulty obtaining equity loans or reverse mortgages if they have leased solar panels and equipment,” he advised consumers earlier this year.
When solar panels and equipment are being leased in a multi-year contract, “homeowners are finding they cannot sell their home unless the solar company approves the new buyer,” O’Donnell said. And if the solar company does not approve the buyer, the homeowner may have to purchase the solar panels at a cost of up to $20,000, he said…
http://www.southcoasttoday.com/news/20161001/solar-panels-not-always-sunny
50
oops, should have said “more woes for Musk”, not Tesla…
20
Who will provide Elon with the billions now Oh Bummer is departing the scene?
30
Some background on the state the EU is in and how it got there, plus why Britain will be negotiating trade deals with outside countries including Oz.
https://thepointman.wordpress.com/2016/09/30/angelas-ashes/
Pointman
101
Pointman
With a lot more sweat and a bit of luck yet another perfect crime nipped at the last minute – hopefully
60
SA Coopers Brewery does Co-Generation and sell 60% of the Power it generates. Any business that has mission critical components that need to stay in operation might consider moving next to Coopers and making a deal for all their surplus power during any outage on the grid.
At 3.48pm on Wednesday as violent storms and 80,000 lightning strikes triggered an unprecedented power blackout across South Australia, Coopers Brewery managing director Tim Cooper and his staff at Australia’s third largest beer maker merely went into “island” mode at their brewery.
A $7 million co-generation mini electricity plant installed in 2003 at the Coopers facility in the Adelaide industrial suburb at Regency Park powers the brewery, which produces 35,000 cases of beer and 1000 kegs each day for the company which has 5 per cent market share in Australia’s $14 billion beer market. The blackout caused mayhem across the state, bringing chaos on roads as traffic lights stopped working, and 900,000 households were left fumbling for candles.
The giant BHP Billiton Olympic Dam mine 560 kilometres north of Adelaide was brought to a standstill, but the clattering of the Coopers production line continued on. An automatic switch was triggered which meant the power that the Coopers and AGL mini-plant normally pushed out to the state’s electricity grid was fully quarantined to the factory.
Source Financial Review
Designing and making their own power supply is another option. Moving interstate next to a Hydro Power Plant with a 24/7 contract to supply is another.
80
Essential services cannot be disrupted !!
121
Two good things from South Australia
Coopers home brew
The roads out
100
What does this say if you have a business in SA , BYO power .
60
That would be great if said business is allowed to build a coal fired or nuclear power station. Otherwise, why would any serious business that relies on lots of electricity would even set up shop in SA? One would have to have a financial death wish.
50
SA needs stable base load power.
As it is the state upon which depends our most expensive and reputedly highest tech combat system, the nation needs the grid to work.
Now that the SA government is teetering on fissile material storage and nuclear power, they may agree to building a nuclear power station.
If they don’t, the Commonwealth must step in and mandate stable base load power of some sort, using the defense power in the constitution.
Another 50 year weather event could still occur in the next few years.
Such events would prevent any further investment in SA.
When Prof Flannery was telling us that our dams would dry, the NSW government was raising the NSW dams for a 200 year flood event.
Apart from the obvious, more storage when it rains, the idea was that we cannot afford to have major flooding in built up areas.
60
You raise a good point. The federal government should mandate that all states implement a reliable and secure source of power for security reasons. Of course Turnbull would not even dream of submitting such a move for discussion let alone implementing. He wouldn’t have the brain power to do so.
60
Another possibility, Lewis, to add to your:
“Another 50 year weather event could still occur in the next few years”,
A one in a thousand year event could still…
Cheers,
Dave B
30
How much did that contribute to the blackout? Vic tripped the interconnector and SA had power for another 6 minutes. I noticed that there were many sources of fossil fuel power in SA and I was wondering if many of the smaller ones decided to go to island mode in those 6 minutes. One of them could have been the straw to break the camels back.
00
Thanks RB,
So far I’ve been unable to get reliable and precise times for those two events. It seems that 3:51pm SA time was when the state went black, consistent with 4:20-4:25pm AEST interval shown in an earlier post, but I couldn’t tell when the connectors to Vic went out. It sounds like they were turned off, rather than failed. Diid they both go off at the same time? And do you have a reference available, I hope?
Cheers,
Dave B
00
Sorry but I can’t remember the source but the interconnector supposedly tripped at 1618 EST.
00
2 Oct: UK Telegraph: Michael Wilkinson: Live: Theresa May vows to trigger Article 50 by March and be out of the EU by early 2019
Britain looks set to leave the European Union by summer 2019 after triggering the formal process to pull out before the end of March next year, Theresa May has said.
The Prime Minister said Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty will be triggered in the first three months of 2017, marking the start of the two-year process to enact Brexit.
The process can be extended beyond two years if Britain and all other EU countries unanimously agree, but that prospect is seen as unlikely…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/10/02/theresa-may-brexit-boris-johnson-david-davis-liam-fox-live/
remember the MSM’s disdain for BREXITEERS?
same thing, except for Trump this time, as NYT tries to dismiss Ohio:
29 Sep: NYT: Jonathan Martin: Ohio, Long a Bellwether, Is Fading on the Electoral Map
ATHENS, Ohio — After decades as one of America’s most reliable political bellwethers, an inevitable presidential battleground that closely mirrored the mood and makeup of the country, Ohio is suddenly fading in importance this year.
Hillary Clinton has not been to the state since Labor Day, and her aides said Thursday that she would not be back until next week, after a monthlong absence, effectively acknowledging how difficult they think it will be to defeat Donald J. Trump here. Ohio has not fallen into step with the demographic changes transforming the United States, growing older, whiter and less educated than the nation at large…
Ohio has long basked in the presidential spotlight. Every four years, fall would bring frequent candidate visits…
Mr. Obama held five events over three trips to Ohio in September 2012 alone.
And it was all for good reason: No candidate of either party has won the White House without carrying Ohio since John F. Kennedy in 1960…
Some political veterans speak with wonder about private polls showing Mr. Trump leading even in bedrock Democratic communities. “I see, at best, lack of enthusiasm in traditional Democratic areas,” said Dennis E. Eckart, a former Democratic congressman from suburban Cleveland.
Mike Dawson, a Republican strategist who runs a website on Ohio’s political history, said Mr. Trump would be competitive in two counties in Youngstown’s Mahoning Valley that the Democratic presidential candidate has carried in every election for 60 years with the exception of 1972…
Mrs. Clinton remains strongest in the more affluent and educated areas around Ohio’s population centers — Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati — where some voters who backed Mr. Romney four years ago are appalled by Mr. Trump…
http://archive.is/dD7Ef
30
much ado about nothing:
1 Oct: Bloomberg: Anindya Upadhyay: India Agrees to Ratify Paris Climate Agreement; Limit Emissions
The deal will be formally ratified on Sunday, Environment Minister Anil Dave told reporters in New Delhi. Under the accord, India will reduce the INTENSITY of fossil-fuel emissions, a measure of pollution released per unit of economic growth, by 33 percent to 35 percent from 2005 levels by 2030.
India, in its climate pledge — also known as Intended Nationally Determined Contribution — submitted to the United Nations last year on Oct. 2, estimated a cost of $2.5 trillion for its climate-action plan. India will ask developed countries to provide $100 billion per year in climate finance for poorer countries, the minister said. Commitments to the Green Climate Fund are at a little over $10 billion, Dave added…
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-01/india-agrees-to-ratify-paris-climate-agreement-limit-emissions
TimesOfIndia 2 Oct: Money will be a big challenge for India, which says it will require over $2.5 trillion to meet all of its targets. It says it will achieve the targets only if other countries give it money and discounts on new technology.
multiple links, lots of other detail:
1 Oct: Townhall: Paul Driessen: Green pixie dust energy policies
Chinese President Xi Jinping and President Obama unilaterally ratified the Paris climate treaty on September 3. Barely three weeks later, China said it can no longer afford current levels of wind and solar subsidies, and so is sharply reducing renewable power generation. Instead, it plans to increase its thermal coal production by 182 million tons per year. Meanwhile, Chinese banks and construction companies are financing and building hundreds of new coal-fired generating units in Indonesia, Pakistan, Turkey, Africa, Latin America and beyond—including nearly two dozen in the Balkan countries.
India has become “the center of the world’s oil demand growth,” says Citigroup. Its economy will likely expand by 8% per year through 2021, its domestic coal production even faster, and coal demand for factories and electricity generation is rising so rapidly that India is financing a major coal mining operation in Mozambique.
Southeast Asian fossil fuel consumption is expected to double by 2040, to 1,070 million tons of oil equivalent per year. Oil, gas and coal will then represent 78% of the region’s energy mix, up from 74% today…
Japan has joined this Asian bloc. Instead of reopening nuclear power plants or expanding renewable power generation, it is using coal and natural gas for 75% of its power, compared to 54% in 2011.
Meanwhile, Mr. Obama’s “Power Africa” initiative has been a dismal failure. In 2013 he promised that the USA would bring the continent “more than 10,000 megawatts of cleaner, more efficient” renewable electricity. (By comparison, total US generating capacity is 1,069,000 MW.) So far, the project has provided less than 400 MW—4% of what was promised, and 0.04% of US capacity…
It’s time we had some grownup thinking and policies, instead of green pixie dust.
http://townhall.com/columnists/pauldriessen/2016/10/01/green-pixie-dust-energy-policies-n2226185
50
I am sure that they have a detailed list of good things they will do with $2.5 trillion.
For a minute there I thought it might have just been an ambit claim.
20
Just saw a great quote credited to a H.L. Mencken (I had never heard of this person before)
80
Mencken has a lot of good quotes: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/H._L._Mencken
30
Seriously? Well and truly an overrated leftard. This quote highlights it.
That’s leftardism. If you bother to pay attention to the twits, it becomes obvious despite the trigger happiness to scream “racism”
Except Galileo was (barely) persecuted for being a twit rather than for heliocentric ideas (ridiculing the Pope and insisting that scripture said the Sun was the centre of the universe), Mecken was not aware that the flat-earth myth was pure fiction, and that Darwin got more crap from atheists who didn’t like the idea of the cruelness of natural selection than the Catholic or Anglican church (hierarchy of both had positive responses to The Origin of Species).
Considering how small even the percentage of church goers without skeletons in the closet is, some of the great painters were very religious. Some, like Michelangelo might have had homosexual tendencies but were not sexual active and very religious. A lot of the minor artists were boring, even priests or nuns.
Lewis Carroll was very conservative and religious. Bach as well. Then there are less notable writers and composers who were religious or just square. Considering how much imagination is required to create works that last centuries, rather than worth your time, it shouldn’t be a surprise that many were a little more adventurous in their private lives but Mencken’s assertion is bullocks.
10
Nonetheless, I think you can see how the one quote I originally posted can be applied to climate alarmism, and particularly how it is presented in the media.
10
How about ?
There is no nonsense so arrant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate governmental action.
(Bertrand Russell)
Or
Government is too big and too important to be left to the politicians. (Chester Bowles) [ an obvious pinch from Clemenceau ]
00
This is the forbidden information Dr. Dale Evans and Jo Nova have been exposing: http://www.nature.com/polopoly_fs/1.20175!/menu/main/topColumns/topLeftColumn/pdf/534610a.pdf
21
Exciting stuff.
20
I too am excited to see what Dale has to say. Dale is very close to Jon Ova, the famous fertility specialist
10
Interesting article on radio bursts.
That they can’t be placed as to distance leaves all sorts of doors open.
My guess would be that they might be what happens when a sun is sucked into the black hole in the center of a galaxy. They would be more rare in older galaxies (as the core area is cleared) so most would seem to come from farther away (thus younger). As per repetition, a young galaxy with a feeding center would repeat at irregular intervals…
10
Australian doctors in the dark over imminent global cooling.
‘Australian health professionals overwhelmingly say they don’t know of any policies that deal with the health implications of climate change, despite the World Health Organisation saying “climate change is the greatest threat to global health in the 21st century”.
Guardian
50
They should stick to medicine. And it is worrying that as medical doctors they are meant to make decisions based on evidence and here they are believing in anthropogenic “climate change” without considering the evidence, or lack thereof.
51
Part of the problem is that it takes a lot of time to poke around and find evidence that contradicts the avalanche of scary stories that we’re constantly bombarded with. It took me quite a while after I retired to ask myself questions and look into the whole issue – and I have a scientific/technical background.
How many doctors would have the time for this?
Any medics out there who would like to comment?
20
Hi folks , I have been very busy this week so not had a chance to gauge what people made of the first debate between Clinton and Trump , initially I gave it to Clinton , but then realised that Trump is playing the long game , there are three debates , like three rounds in a boxing match and Trump spent the previous week campaigning with the famous boxing promoter Don King, well known for his promotion of famous boxing match ups in the past , including a match between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman that became known as ” rope a dope ” with that in mind I now have a different perspective on that first debate , has Don King been whispering in Trumps ear ? , did mr Trump hide behind his jab and let Hillary throw her best punches , so by the third round ( just before the election ) she will be punched out and Trump can then unleash on her ? if so , its pure genius , what did you think
40
I believe he’s holding back, also factor in the need for not spooking swing voters at these final days, there’s still a lot of proles that believe what ‘B’ broadcasts is truth.
20
Jo
Re gold
“Gail Combs says:
2 October 2016 at 11:25 am
More on Deutsche Bank from ZeroHedge
8/31/2016 Deutsche Bank Refuses Delivery Of Physical Gold Upon Demand
….what is Xetra-Gold?”
More in the tip at
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2016/09/21/tips-september-2016/
20
3 Oct: ABC: Alexandra Beech: SA weather: Government’s energy policy worsened state-wide blackout, Greg Hunt says
In an opinion piece published in Fairfax, Mr Hunt acknowledged the storm caused the toppling of the poles.
But he said the state’s energy policy made things worse.
“If SA policy had not deliberately forced the Northern base load power station offline, supply to Whyalla’s Arrium Steel plant and to BHP’s Olympic Dam smelting operations would almost certainly have been continuous,” Mr Hunt wrote.
“This would not only have saved millions of dollars of lost income, but provided a basis for future investment security.
“The South Australian Government’s conscious policy to drive baseload energy out of the system meant the system collapsed further and faster than it would otherwise have done and recovered far more slowly than it should have.”…
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-03/sa-government-energy-policy-exacerbated-blackout-greg-hunt-says/7897298
29 Sep: OwenSoundSunTimes: Denis Langlois: Two local wind farm projects now on hold
At least two proposed multi-turbine wind farms in Grey-Bruce are now on hold due to the province’s decision this week to suspend signing new contracts for large-scale renewable energy projects.
RES Canada had planned to submit a bid under the now-halted Large Renewable Procurement II process for a development with about 63 turbines near Dundalk.
The company, which is in the midst of holding community engagement sessions on the project, has secured agreements for about 12,000 acres of land in Southgate as well as property in Wellington County for the proposed Grand Highlands Wind Project…
“We’re in dormancy mode right now, unfortunately,” a company spokeswoman said.
Officials with both companies said they are disappointed with the government’s move.
“The entire industry is in shock,” Crump said…
The province’s suspension decision is being applauded by turbine opponents, but many say the government should have stopped signing green energy contracts years ago…READ ALL
http://www.owensoundsuntimes.com/2016/09/29/two-local-wind-farm-projects-now-on-hold
20
One of the problems we have is the successful propaganda output by the Greens and its unquestioned reporting of these stupid claims by the MSM. Leaving aside any bias in the MSM their inclination is to report the nonsense claims as is.
Put yourself in their shoes – on one hand they have someone claiming that “the sky will fall and millions will die” and on the other the comment is “nothing is happening”. Which do you think will be used to get attention to the news outlet? The media will always fall back to “we only reported what was said”.
How do we counter this? The Greens will generate an inexhaustible supply of scare stories and it doesn’t seem to matter that they are false, they just repeat them again. The general public doesn’t monitor this output, although they are starting to be sceptical about the false claims, but they keep being repeated (as Adam Bandt’s claim that “the SA blackout was due to Climate Change”. The only method I think may have some traction is to focuss on the cost of ‘greenery’ and the associated costs. Constantly recalling the failures and how much they cost, and are costing, would provide a stick for the media to beat the government with.
What do readers think?
50
The trouble is that the MSM will not beat the government with the stick even if one is provided. They have had ample sticks at their disposal for years, but refuse to pick them up. As I pointed out in the previous thread, the SA crisis has finally given the media an anti-wind power event that they couldn’t ignore with their customary one-eyed bias. Even Turnbull and Hunt are taking a crack at the Labor premiers over bird-choppers. What were the chances of that happening before this week? ABSOLUTELY NIL.
Until one media outfit decides to break ranks and tell the opposing facts, AGW will continue on its merry way with all the political and social momentum it has built up. Product differentiation could give one outlet a big scoop that others would be forced to follow. NEWSFLASH: global warming is a huge beat-up, you’ve all been conned, blow up the windmills and chuck the Greens out.
With apologies to the SA people, the SA shambles is the best thing that could have happened in the fight not only against wind power, but more generally in the fight for factual reporting on the global warming scam. The only things that will beat headlines promoting global warming are counter headlines spelling out the facts, but to achieve such counter headlines you firstly need a headline-worthy event to make the media sit up and take notice, something they can’t wriggle out of. SA was such an event which exposes the whole sorry mess to the light of day and finally gives an opportunity to put the other side of the story to the public.
Let’s hope that the 3 enquiries under way are not all political white-washes. If the Feds are fighting the states, that’s a good start. We might see some factual reporting that can’t be buried.
40
You are correct re the media, but where to look in the MSM? Even Graham Lloyd, the environment reporter in the Oz, is a global warming believer, even if not a rabid one. Even with the latest SA debacle, he tip-toed around the issue of the level of renewables and made no real effort to punch the blame home.
I don’t think we can expect even our very few right-of-centre papers to print good news stories about the climate issue as they believe that they won’t sell papers. It would be interesting to see what effect it would have if the Australian and papers such as the Daily Telegraph made a point of one front page story each week from respected scientists regarding the good news on climate change.
I think millions of people would say “thank goodness” and would buy the papers.
31
Plans are afoot to build a seasonal ice rink on the Thames, cultural memories reinvented.
http://metro.co.uk/2015/12/08/ice-skating-on-the-thames-could-become-a-reality-once-more-5552252/
30
message from India:
3 Oct: TimesOfIndia: Vishwa Mohan: India joins Paris Climate Change Agreement, submits instrument of ratification at UN headquarters
By putting Gandhi seal on the climate deal, the country will now urge the global community to adopt ‘Gandhian way of life’ (shun extravagant lifestyles) to reduce their carbon footprints and protect the earth from adverse impact of climate change…
“India had led from front to ensure the inclusion of climate justice and sustainable lifestyles in the Paris Agreement. We will put across this view based on Gandhian lifestyle in Morocco”, said environment minister Anil Madhav Dave…
“It is important that apart from emission cuts, we also focus on measures that involve broader participation. People in developed countries live extravagant lifestyles with high carbon footprint.
“Simple everyday changes in lifestyles, when practiced by a large number of people around the globe, collectively will make a huge impact”.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/environment/global-warming/India-joins-Paris-Climate-Change-Agreement-submits-instrument-of-ratification-at-UN-headquarters/articleshow/54643135.cms
have seen no mention of caveats in MSM coverage, which prefers to write glowingly that Obama tweeted his praise.
00
A refreshing piece in The West Australian describing Paul Romer’s criticism of recent macroeconomics:
https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/32788018/have-we-got-economics-all-wrong/#stop
For the whole paper please see:
https://www.law.yale.edu/system/files/area/workshop/leo/leo16_romer.pdf
It is a facepalm about the state of the field of study. I have been saying this for ages … the economists’ reliance on modelling is appalling. The fact that people believe the claims of said modelling is even worse … it leads to poor government decision-making. This is why I keep drawing the parallels with climate science modelling and the associated political schemes. All models do is give “experts” and politicians plausible deniability.
60
Thought I’d add the abstract:
See some familiar themes there?
40
Reserve shortfalls predicted in SA.
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=4729
00
Between 1600 and 1814, it was not uncommon for the River Thames to freeze over for up to two months at time. There were two main reasons for this; the first was that Britain (and the entire of the Northern Hemisphere) was locked in what is now known as the ‘Little Ice Age’. The other catalyst was the medieval London Bridge and its piers, and specifically how closely spaced together they were. During winter, pieces of ice would get lodged between the piers and effectively dam up the river, meaning it was easier for it to freeze.
Although these harsh winters often brought with them famine and death, it was the local Londonders – as enterprising and resilient as ever – who decided to make the most of it and set up the Thames Frost Fairs. In fact, between 1607 and 1814 there were a total of seven major fairs, as well as countless smaller ones.
These Frost Fairs would have been quite a spectacle, full of hastily constructed shops, pubs, ice skating rinks… everything that you would expect in the crowded streets of London but on ice!
The first recorded frost fair was during the winter of 1607 / 08. During December the ice had been firm enough to allow people to walk between Southwark to the City, but it was not until January when the ice became so thick that people started setting up camp on it. There were football pitches, bowling matches, fruit-sellers, shoemakers, barbers… even a pub or two. To keep the shopkeepers warm, there were even fires within their tents!
40
Going further back the Thames froze in 1434, 1407, 1205, 1114, 1076, 1063, 1035, 998, 987, 923 and 908 AD.
40
And during that period Britain and Europe had an encounter with the regions worst ever storm, that of the great storm of November 1703.
http://www.historytoday.com/richard-cavendish/great-storm
After that, there were as you say, many periods of brutal freezing but also there was some very hot summers(hottest eva!) in some localities, and many droughts that affected the so many parts of Europe.
Ireland …
http://www.agrometeorology.org/topics/agromet-market-place/new-drought-atlas-maps-2-000-years-of-climate-in-europe
Poland…
http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/21/14012333-400-year-old-marble-loot-revealed-by-drought-in-poland?lite
How the warmists wish for that settle weather of the preindustrial era. Bouncing decade to decade from subfreezing temperatures, up to fiery summers, and droughts. Add a few plagues and it was amazing that humans survive the era here.
30
See the graph in this Paul Homewood piece https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2016/10/01/annual-variability-in-central-england-temperature/
1740 was very warm in England!
10
… and cold in New England.
http://www.climate4you.com/ClimateAndHistory%201700-1799.htm#1740-1741:%20A%20very%20cold%20winter%20in%20New%20England
10
In 1205 ad the frost began on January 15th and continued until March 22nd, which impacted cultivation and wheat became very dear at ten times its normal price.
Its still the MWP.
20
Warmists tell me the hydrology has changed and the Thames can’t freeze over anymore, this has yet to be tested.
Most importantly it happened at a time when temperatures were the same as now, I’ll look for a graph.
40
1205 ad appears to be cooler than now.
http://kaltesonne.de/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Ljungqvist2010b.jpg
20
It is an interesting coincidence, that the Thames appears not to have frozen at any time during the 14th century – the period of the Tudor dynasty.
Well interesting to me, since I once had to write an essay on the period. Had I been able to highlight something that was not a factor in the politics of the day, it might have been less dry and academic than it was.
20
During Tudor times major changes were started to the lower reaches of the Thames, with the building of forts along the Thames’ coastal estuary areas and the industrialization of the river banks. Some flood alleviation was also started.
Coupled to this was the increase in use of the land around the Thames basin both above and below London. With the increase in use of this land was the draining and removing of much of the marshland surrounding the river and the enforcement of the riverbanks. Tributaries of the river were rerouted and made into canal-ways. Much later most of these tributaries were straightened and encase underground to allow building over the land. Keep in mind that the flow and geography of the river has altered considerably since Tudor times.
However even with those changes records show frost fairs during the winter of 1607-08 and later.
http://www.southwarkbridge.co.uk/history/the-river-thames.htm
and
http://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofEngland/The-Thames-Frost-Fairs/
and many other sources.
10
Also see http://docs.lib.noaa.gov/rescue/rarebooks_1600-1800/GB13985G7F761814.pdf
00
Well, a bit late now (several decades, in fact), but the Tudor period is still interesting to me. Thank you for the references.
00
Would have given it a whole new atmosphere Rereke.
00
A viscous and fetid pool had a change in freezing temperatures
10
The interesting thing is that Londoners took their washing water from it. Nobody ever drank it. That is why they invented ale, and the hovercraft.
20
It was essentially an open sewer prior to 1500, and it was much the same after 1600, by all accounts. And yet it froze before that century, and froze after that century, but not during.
The population was much the same size, and wood and animal dung was still being burnt for cooking and heating, so what caused the 16th Century climate change, I wonder?
00
Is it possible that the scientific recognition is unfolding in China,of the New Ice Age and its potential eruption in 2050?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDFa92aLu0c
00
Bartender UK –
don’t know about that, but this tells a tale:
30 Sep: Reuters: Dominique Patton: China set to export corn, threatening global market: sources
China has given approval to at least two companies to export corn, trading sources said, in a radical move by the world’s No. 2 producer to cut its ballooning surplus and unleash more supply into a saturated global market…
“China’s overproduction of corn has created a growing stockpile of corn that appears to have reached unsustainable levels,” agency spokesman Matt Swenson said. “Chinese exports could negatively impact corn prices just as U.S. farmers are harvesting their crops.”…
Traders and analysts said exports have been increasingly likely as China struggles with a massive grain surplus and prepares to harvest a bumper crop, its first in almost a decade without government price support…
Even if quantities are limited at first, sales abroad would spook major exporters, such as Brazil and the United States, increasing competition at a time when record harvests are predicted in many regions.
Five of the top 10 corn importers are in Asia, which may allow China to compete against the Americans and others with lower freight costs…READ ALL
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-corn-exports-idUSKCN1201GB
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A battle between free traders and protectionists, with a beggar thy neighbour policy there would be a lot of dumping going on.
Has the world ever experienced a glut of oil and corn at the same time?
00
The price of corn can only mean good news for consumerism but will it last?
Plasma astro-flow physics is the flow of invisible energy that powers every single Sun in the Universe. Our Sun is a ‘Plasma Sphere’ externally powered by streams of plasma flowing over it, unlike the internally powered hydrogen Sun that we are all led to believe by science fairy tales.
It would be interesting to know Jo Nova’s thoughts on this.
00
Huh? FUBAR, WTF over! Have you anything but jerking off in the cloakroom?
[Will, Let’s NOT go to this extreme. Children sometimes read Jo Nova.] AZ
04
The greentards keep saying “renewables” are at a disadvantage compared to fossil and nuclear because they say that the cheap and reliable energy sources are subsidised. But surely this is the opposite of the truth? It’s the renewables that are subsidised, but they keep spreading the lies.
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Many of those people cannot even work out that leasing is not a sale, so how would they understand what subsidies are?
30
The greentards keep referring to the Diesel Fuel Rebate as a “subsidy” that miners of all kinds get, as do farmers. The Fuel Tax is designed to be a charge on moterists that is intended to go wholly to the maintenance of roads to make up for the wear and tear of our vehicles.
As the heavy mining and farming equipment never travels on public roads they are exempted, quite fairly. This is not a subsidy.
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Of course the Greens cheat. They count diesel rebates as a subsidy when the rebate for use in tractors on a farm is due to not being used on roads. They count research on geological mapping subsidies, they count tax deduction on exploration subsidies etc. They think that oil and gas sales should be taxed more because of supposed warming of the atmosphere by CO2 -then say there is a subsidy due to the difference between the tax that they think should be charged and the actual (very high) tax. At the same time they ignore the actual subsidies on wind and solar such as feed in tariffs higher that power purchases (ie a government hand out with no expenditure) and the LURC handouts which allows wind farms to sometimes to pay the grid to take power which makes it look like wind delivers cheap power. I note that the price-demand data for SA is presently not accessible after showing rapid price fluctuations from $1000/MWhr to -$1000/MWhr.
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Greentards can’t comprehend the importance of energy density and how it effects their existence in our extremely lucky society, yet the very innovations of fuel, gas, coal, stable electricity are demonised by these people for the appeasement of a failed hypothesis.
Our once justified chortles of such types has come back to bite us on our collective behinds, where ignoring was valid some vigilance was needed.
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Consider the population of South Australia at 1.677 million. Of these 1.251 million live in Adelaide, 63%. So isolate the grids and let the windmills be 100% of country power and Adelaide can have coal power, making sure all the hospitals,elevators and airport work without interruption. Also by creating local grids, the chance of total interruption and the time taken to reconnect power to the grid would be much reduced. That way at least a total power shutdown of the entire state could be avoided.
However the inner city Adelaide Greens want their own local low CO2 environment and would not agree. Why should the country people have all the clean air as CO2 is pollution and it is poisoning their children and pets? What else could they be thinking in becoming totally dependent on Victoria coal based power or Chinese manufacturers? So isolate the grids and have windfarms supplying local communities. New windfarms could even be DC, so they could turn on and off easily.
The current situation and those recent blackouts and those to come show how silly and selfish the Green view of the world can be.
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Good luck with that ‘New windfarms could even be DC, so they could turn on and off easily.’
Either :-
a. supply is hi-voltage low current, or
b. supply is low voltage hi-current, or
c. supply is medium voltage medium current (what ever that might be)
Either way round they have to be correctly engineered and maintained.
Switching high voltages are fraught with arch-over and insulation breakdown problems, a method of converting back to low voltage is required, on the plus side line loss willbe low; hi-currents are less efficient to distribute (more IR losses on the line), switching hi-currents pits and erodes switchgear quickly. Medium voltage/current has lower degrees of all problems, IR losses on the lines, arch-overs, and pitting of switchgear but obviously not to such an extreme.
In all cases expensive maintenance will be required.
Also in all cases transient electromagnetic pulse (EMP) could be generated during supply switching periods, which interferes with most low power equipment, and communication networks.
These DC supplies can be switch electronically but this is expensive and is not a technology normally available for small/medium (10s to 100s kW) size installations.
Regulating the DC supply efficiently (think switch mode power supply [SMPSU] at a few kW) is a difficult problem once an appreciable power level is attained.
I’m not saying it can not be done, it most surely can but you should go in with your eyes open to the probable difficulties and costs.
Plan for the worst but hope for the best. 🙂
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Thanks but ‘easily’ was relative to the clearly massive and patently unsolved synchronization problems with AC in reconnecting to the grid, despite the billions spent. Here you risk damage to whole networks, not just switch gear.
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More politicians in city areas so renewable energy for city areas would end the global warming scam fast.
20
MORE FALL-OUT:
3 Oct: AFR: Simon Evans: SA blackout mayhem hits BHP, OZ Minerals, tuna millionaires
BHP Billiton’s giant Olympic Dam copper and uranium mine and OZ Minerals’ Prominent Hill copper and gold mine in outback South Australia are stuck without full power for a fifth consecutive day in the wake of a collapse of the state’s electricity system last Wednesday.
The full restoration of power to large industrial users in remote regions may take a further 10 days, according to network provider ElectraNet.
Arrium’s Whyalla steelworks is also facing mounting costs from the power outage, which KordaMentha administrator Mark Mentha has calculated at $4 million a day for the steelworks and an associated iron ore mining operation, and is undermining attempts to find a new buyer for Arrium’s Australian operations…
It comes as one of Australia’s wealthiest towns, the tuna millionaire haven of Port Lincoln on the southern tip of South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula, is fuming over the outage which left the town of 15,000 in darkness for almost 54 hours…
Port Lincoln has more millionaires per capita than Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s affluent electorate in Sydney’s eastern suburbs which covers Bellevue Hill and Double Bay, and was the hardest hit of South Australia’s residential areas…READ ALL
http://www.afr.com/business/mining/sa-blackout-mayhem-hits-bhp-oz-minerals-tuna-millionaires-20161002-grtgdm
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Add those costs to the cost of subsidising SA renewable energy, buying in electricity from interstate, etc.
30
This is so ironic. Sabotage or terrorism couldn’t have done a better job. The lunacy of expanding into more renewable energy sources must be halted, at least until a thorough, open and truthful appraisal is made.
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This could be interesting.
Anyone know if sales of back-up generator sets are tracked anywhere?
Might be a lucrative sideline in SA.
40
Interesting snippet. After the April 2015 storm that hit the Hunter and wiped out power for some days in places, a local chainsaw shop that used to sell 1 pallet load of generators per month was selling 3 pallets per day for about a week. They couldn’t ship them in fast enough. Sales of chainsaws also spiked to 2 pallets per day as everyone cleaned up. Nice little earner.
20
I wonder if there is a place that tracks sales of clothing internationally, as this would give a fairly quick and dirty indication of whether people perceive global temperatures as rising or falling.
More wool jumpers, socks, coats and wet weather gear — its not warm.
More shorts, flimsy summer dresses and short sleeved shirts — its warming.
20
Thong-Track?
30
Love the greens take on SA power out , nothing to do with renewables everything to do with ” dangerous climate change ” notice it’s no longer dangerous global warming ?
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They changed from “global warming” to “climate change” for marketing reasons, especially as it was becoming increasingly difficult to show warming, even with fraudulent data.
21
Voting in the US is not compulsory, so a lot of people abstain and unlikely to change their habits on this occasion. The NY Times does a nice presentation of the breakdown.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/08/01/us/elections/nine-percent-of-america-selected-trump-and-clinton.html?_r=0
00
The solution to the renewables issue is simple. Let all those that want them have them. They must pay the full cost for them and they must be on a completely separate grid that is not connected in any way with the traditional grid. Needless to say the cost of this grid would be full paid for by the consumers of renewables. It is simply not morally correct that the consumers of reliable energy should pay higher costs and get less reliabilty to support a fundamentally defective mode of electricity production.
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A quiet sun will allow more cosmic rays to bombard earth, creating low cloud and increased precipitation. Then it gets cold, depending on what the oscillations are doing at any given time.
This upward trend is surely a signal.
http://spaceweather.com/images2016/27jan16/cosmicrays_mar15_jan16.png?PHPSESSID=phhbub5qpsg64h8mibh2uto1r5
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For those that like arguing the toss over the theory CO2 effect in the atmosphere may be interested in this —
Dr. Robert D. Cess admits mathematical errors in the AGW theory of the IPCC
20
because i prefer to post the LA Times poll which has had Trump ahead for weeks even though the paper is anti-Trump, i found the following interesting:
2 Oct: PeoplesPunditDaily: Richard D. Baris: In Defense of the LA Times Poll
After nearly a week of interviews conducted after the first presidential debate, Donald Trump leads Hillary Clinton by roughly 5 points in the LA Times Poll, 46.9% to 42.2%. TV pundits have stuck to conventional political wisdom, despite the fact it has failed them at every turn this election cycle.
As a result, the LA Times Poll has been taking even more heat than it has in the previous several weeks, which is really saying something…
But there’s something pretty damn significant missing from the conventional wisdom-based argument, something I think readers and election-watchers should know. In 2012, the model and methodology they are using, which was designed by the team behind the RAND Continuous Presidential Election Poll, or the “Daybreak Poll,” was was right when most other traditional random sample polls were wrong…
https://www.peoplespunditdaily.com/news/elections/2016/10/02/defense-la-times-poll/
note the number of events in the following. also keep in mind tens of thousands accumulatively have not been able to get into the Trump events, so the figure quoted is conservative. the pic at the bottom is typical when comparing any of their events yet, when Clinton fell on 9/11, i heard MSM saying both candidates have “gruelling” campaign schedules!
PIC: 1 Oct: DC Whispers: Trump Is Already CRUSHING Hillary Clinton…
Two things to see here. One, just how many more people are attending Donald Trump rallies compared to Hillary Clinton. It is likely the most lopsided figure in all of modern-era American politics.
Nearly 340,000 for Trump compared to just 14,000 for Clinton…
The second thing is just how more vigorous Donald Trump’s schedule is. He’s running circles around Team Clinton…
http://dcwhispers.com/trump-is-already-crushing-hillary-clinton/
00
Are there any statistics for the number of politicians attempting to cover a well exposed backside.
20
Examine nature footage of a pack of baboons.
00
There are two things going on.
1) There is no anthropogenic global warming therefore CO2 is not an issue.
2) Because people believe in AGW as per above they install supposedly non carbon emitting power production like windmills. This form of power production is fundamentally defective.
What is the best way to tackle these two related issues? Attack first the lie of AGW or attack the defective power production technology or both at the same time?
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Getting lazy politicians to think and actually look in detail at the issue would be a start. I wrote to my (now former) Member of the European Parliament and my Member of Parliament in the UK, and it was abundantly clear that neither of them had looked at any figures or weather/climate data at all. Neither of them had any figure to hand to contradict the points I’d made. Of course, one of them told me that she believed in sustainable power. Pure laziness, yet these are the people making decisions on so many related matters.
20
As to the politician’s comment that she believes in “sustainable power”, we already have it. It’s called fossil and nuclear power.
10
There was a big Windows 10 upgrade in the last few days.
I just found that I can’t see a heap of directories and Open Office is doing strange things on printing
Seems like a conumental mockup
Anyone else had problems?
00
Yep.
00
Ian, this is why I’m sticking to Windows 7, even though I’d dearly love to update my hardware. The number of people complaining about Windows 10 screwing their file systems is staggering. It may be a better option to go to an open source platform such as Ubantu.
00
You could try PCLinuxOS, in my experience it’s a simple to use solid Linux distribution.
00
The problem with Linux is the lack of drivers for hardware configurations. For example, try finding a reliable Linux driver for more than a handful of relatively common printers.
This issue has been there for 20 years or more. Reliable drivers are absolutely essential for an OS to function but no one likes doing the abysmally boring grind of writing and testing them. Hardware manufacturers tend to allocate these resources to the mass market demographic, not niche groups of users.
00
Maybe but all is not well in that world either
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2016/10/03/any-user-one-line-systemd-crash/
And then a recent quote
“Apple is what scientology would be if it was an IT company”
10
FWIW
Things seem to be back to normal this morning.
I don’t like faults that self fix.
00
Dynamite SA’s ‘prayer wheels’ and recommission real power plants…coal and/or gas fired.
CAGW = BS & Wind power as an alternative major power source = a joke!
What will happen if Victoria under the hunchback Dictator Andrews, scrap the Hazelwood power plant currently supplying 25% of state power?
Where will SA then get its power back up?
The future of SA power,if the status quo remains is ‘PAIN’ with Vic to follow suit.
Both loopy true b’lver ALP state governments need to be ousted, and the sooner the better!
30
Jo
FYI
http://pickeringpost.com/cartoon/6495
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The vast majority of CO2 rise since the dawn of time has been and always will be natural. Human impact on the CO2 rise is negligible. Theory says I’m wrong, observation show theory is in error!
Just look at the official graph of CO2 levels, yes it rises but within the rise are times when the rise rate changes (1991-93, 96-96-98, etc.). Oddly during those times humans did not stop emitting or significantly change there use of fossil fuels!
With CO2 levels nature rules not man.
Also note that the upper atmosphere CO2 (above the topopause) cools the atmosphere AND filters out the sun’s IR at those frequencies that excites CO2!
So how is the lower atmosphere CO2 warmed when the upper atmosphere has filtered the majority of specific frequencies that would warm the CO2? See https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2010/15jul_thermosphere/ for atmospheric COOLING by CO2.
And see https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2012/12/12/tropopause-rules/ for why CO2 below the tropopause is less active.
And For those that like arguing the toss over the theory CO2 effect in the atmosphere may be interested in this —
Dr. Robert D. Cess admits mathematical errors in the AGW theory of the IPCC
31
For 20 years the CO2 level has continued its steady rise through the 20th century. World temperature has not. That alone means the hypothesis is busted. There has not been a single attempt at an explanation and many laughable attempts to show the temperature is actually rising despite the data. Now who are the deniers?
Worse, the usual suspects are grabbing at ocean temperatures and Tim Flannery says the oceans have stolen the heat rise. How that happens is some sort of unexplained religious belief as it was the air which was supposed to heat. Forget the laws of thermodynamics. Still, Tim is getting closer as 98% of all CO2 is in the oceans and even a slight warming would increase CO2.
So regardless of endless calculations, the data says the theory is wrong. In fact before the 1980s, the data says the world was cooling. However there is so much money involved, no one earning money from Global Warming can afford to stop. You would think they would be planning to segue to Global Cooling. Caused by … drum roll.. CO2.
By the way, it does not matter if CO2 caused warming as you can show almost none of the 50% rise in CO2 is man made. As the people of Adelaide recover from the worst blackout in their history, they can reflect on the nonsense which led them to blow up their power stations and build windmills.
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I’ve often wondered which countries show any evidence of their climate having changed.
The UK’s certainly hasn’t, in all my 67 years on Earth.
We are being fed intellectual garbage, despite plenty of data to the contrary. When will it end, and sanity return I wonder?
Since when did fraction of a degree temperature changes define climate?
10
Omg … you are right. CO2 rose when humans were not around. I never realised that this meant that humans therefore can’t be the cause now. It all makes sense now… something caused it in the past therefore that is the cause now. Tomo, you need to publish now and collect your due rewards.
46
Don’t be a dork, Gee Aye.
Tomomason is just restating what is in the literature. Geeze, even I can remember writing that on my slate, as I sat on my bench, in the school room.
Now write out fifty times: “Correlation does not imply causation, and Tomomason never claimed that it did.”.
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he never said it he just accidently plonked three unrelated sentences together which gave that impression thus
22
Around 700 million years ago CO2 began nourishing plants and its been that way ever since. Human induced CO2 is negligible.
31
Can you please tell me how the second sentence follows the first?
00
He did not just “plonk three unrelated sentences together”. That is purely your interpretation, based upon your established bias.
He was actually showing a logical sequence of thought: The phenomina has always been apparent in nature; The phenomina is unchanged in the current environment; Therefore, changes made in creating the current environment have had no impact on the phenomina.
He then goes on to give examples that support his logical sequence.
Please feel free to present a sequence of logical thought that is counter to the above, that will also stand up to logical scrutiny.
21
but R, this sentence is not substantiated by the “logic” as the phrases preceding it do not justify the therefore
This can be justified or rejected using data but not precedent to extrapolate from a humanless world to one filled with billions of active humans.
I wont present a “single sequence etc” since the logic flow I would be bettering is not a logic flow at all.
00
” sequence of logical thought “
From Gee.. probability as close to zero as it is possible to get.
He hasn’t had one single one yet.
13
lol
10
The Guardian often deletes comments. But “Fuck of climate change denialist scum” is OK:
http://rodmclaughlin.com/you-can-t-make-it-up-lxxxviii—another-comment-not-deleted-in-the-guardian
00
Some one on Jo’s blog put up some links to scientific articles, these stated that science had found some force that was not part of the standard model of science.
I have been trying to find the blogger and the links, to no avail. My friend and I have been doing experiments for some time that defy the norm and a new subtile force has been my view for some time.
If anyone remembers the blogger and links I would be much appreciative. Wayne
00
Wayne, maybe, you are referring to this https://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2016/09/25/ned-nikolov-in-science-new-messages-mean-more-than-the-messengers-names/ but you need to read the paper mentioned at Q5 and A5 to more fully understand the discussion. Then you may require to have studied engineering maths to understand about dimensional analysis which engineers have been using since the early 1900’s but it appears very few scientists have even heard about let alone understand. I will let you into a secret -a force as express by Newton is mass * acceleration this has the dimensions MLT^-2. The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is not a force but has mass. Talking about “forcings” is talking nonsense.
11