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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This is the point at which I need to be fair to Bill Nye. I lit into him for his first Netflix episode on climate change and justly so. But I’ve been watching some of the rest of the episodes and they deal with other subjects rather better than he did with climate change. He remains a showman and the level of science he gets into is aimed at the general population, people mostly not exactly science literate and he does a much better job of explaining or exploring the science behind various topics.
He remains an unashamed showman doing parlor tricks for the most part but to be fair he gets the science right as far as I can tell.
I still can’t believe they called this series, Bill Nye Saves the World. But except for his treatment of climate change and his claims of saving the world he’s doing a much better job. I have trouble believing that what he’s doing is going to be worth much but maybe I could be wrong about that. But getting the foremost problem everyone is pushing down our throats so wrong kinda negates any good he does on lesser subjects.
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He did an excellent job of explaining both the need for double blind studies and how they’re done. So anyone watching that episode will have learned something useful.
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I agree Roy that most successful showmen/actors can convey any subject that is presented to them in a way that’s dictated by the script, however where private life is concerned away from the act itself if these performers decide to share personal beliefs whatever it may be they will come under the scrutiny of others exactly the same as any of us would if we chose to use a large public platform to declare our beliefs.
Its true nobody’s perfect and certain ideologies can be up for debate but when something is empirically wrong its just that, wrong.
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Professor Julius Sumner-Miller was the whole package – showman, scientist, communicator and educator.
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A large number of his videos are available on YouTube.
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Gosh, I got a Red Thumb for that?
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I’m probably gonna get a red thumb for this observation – I believe that Heath Ledger based his ‘Joker’ character on Julius.
I reckon Heath nailed him right down to his distinctive accent and inflection.
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I attended a lecture by Prof Julius Sumner Miller ( Key speaker)at Sydney University School of Physics Jan 4-14 1966 as a year 4 high school student. I still have the book given to all students who attended “Atoms to Andromeda” It dealt with high energy nuclear and cosmic ray research.(edited by ST Butler and Harry Messel who was the Head of School of Physics. Its interesting that cosmic rays are now being recognised as possibly one of the key issues in any Climate change with their relevance to cloud formation and changes in the earths albedo. With the current low solar cycle and increase in cosmic gamma rays reaching earth, it will interesting to see if we have now entered into a global cooling phase as many “real scientists” are now predicting.
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Mal,
That was back in the days when Sumner Miller, Butler and Messel were great “fair dinkum” scientists AND Sydney Uni was a revered institution
Haven’t times changed?
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Isn’t that so….
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Right here.
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I recall a report that there used to be a problem with high rise cranes rocking.
A Sydney businessman saw Julius Sumner Miller demonstrating a phenomenon with ball bearings. He realised that this principle could be applied to solve the problem of the rocking cranes. So all the world adopted the solution.
I don’t know any of the details.
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True educational science passed away with the passing of Professor Julius Sumner Miller. There was a true educator in science that led me to be very much interested in science and technology in later life.
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And a bemused nod to the Late Don Herbert: “Mr. Wizard”. In Black and White, no special effects, 23 minutes at a crack.
Pioneers should get their due from time to time.
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There was also little else on television, except Leave it to Beaver and then the Nelsons. The sitcom had not been born and variety was reinvented as television. Colour television made Collingwood and North Melbourne identical. Athletes were not paid. Sumner Miller was good with basic physics. He was not trying to save the world. Only a self appointed climatologist can do that. We made one Australian of the year. One earned a Nobel Peace prize. They are socialist heroes.
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Yes, there were four TV stations and not much to watch and now we have virtually unlimited TV stations and still not much to watch. 🙂
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Leave my Magpies alone. Similar in appearance only but identical!! never.
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The select group grows even smaller.
We lost Lou Richards during the week, and that only leaves three of them remaining now as Collingwood premiership captains.
Lou captained that ’53 side. Murray Weideman was acting captain in ’58, when Frank Tuck was injured and couldn’t play in the GF. Tony Shaw in 1990, and Nick Maxwell in 2010.
Tony.
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It is entirely appropriate to mention Lou Richards and Julius Sumner Miller in the same thread. They were both pioneers of reality T.V but back then it was compelling viewing. Those were the days.
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Speaking of Netflix and Bill Nye The ‘Science’ Guy, have you seen his recent ‘science’ info clip?
And I think they call his show: Bill Nye Saves The World because he intends to save it by incarcerating heretics, nothing awfully scientific or creative in that idea, it’s the same mass control method adopted in past inquisitions. (Can’t have them spewing the TRUTH to the masses)…
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Be careful here. The relevant issue overall is the snake oil he is selling on AGW. Flashes of competence on other topics are there to bolster his overall credibility; to further aid in the sale of the relevant snake oil.
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Bill Nye promoted a simple experiment on the Greenhouse effect here;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3v-w8Cyfoq8
I have tried to reproduce the experiment and it does not work.
Anthony Watts also reviewed the experimetn and conclude that it is worse than a Fail, it is concocted. In my view Bill Nye fudged the experiment. It is false. Hence nothing he says on the subject can be taken as true. He is a total ******.
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I was as gentle as I thought I dared be in #1. But yes, he’s got all the earmarks of a total ****** when it comes to zealotry, for instance. He’s far too confident in himself. Maybe that’s part of the showmanship so I don’t know how to take it for sure.
I tend to disagree with Dave in the States a bit, however. If you didn’t watch his first episode you wouldn’t be misled by anything else I saw. He even covered GMO, especially crops and it was a balanced discussion among 3 stake holders in GMO, CEO of Monsanto, a farmer who actually raises and has experience with GMO crops and an almost but not quite total skeptic. But I haven’s been through the whole series yet.
He did mention climate change in passing during the presentation on GMO.
I definitely would not take science instruction from him but I think many people will.
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I still can’t escape the Bill Nye/PeeWee Herman resonances whenever I see Nye. And it’s not just the bow-tie. Since we never see PeeWee any more, perhaps he’s just a meme lodged in my mind, seeking connection back into the real world.
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Be fair to life itself/yourself first. https://balance1010.wordpress.com/2017/05/13/the-masses-of-the-world-then-would-soon-degenerate-into-a-chaotic-protoplasmic-mass-of-purposeless-substance/
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Fear and the survival instinct, together with improved access to information from the scientific revolution, have blocked humanity’s recognition and appreciation of our good fortune to exist on a water-covered planet, continuously bathed with an abundant source of energy from the Sun:
We do not see this beautiful, bountiful, benevolent REALITY
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Thank you, JoNova, for your patience as we try to identify and correct this most unexpected consequence of the technological revolution:
Isolation of humanity from reality/truth/God!
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After Aston discovered and reported “powers beyond the dreams of scientific fiction” in atoms on 12 Dec 1922, competing forces of human selfishness tried to:
1. Hide that power by giving Chadwick a Nobel Prize for phalse physics in 1935:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10640850/Nuclear_Energy_Error7.pdf
2. Secretly use that power to take totalitarian control of humanity in Aug 1945:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10640850/HIGHER-POWERZ.pdf
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The Powerline Week in pictures, sorry mods if this triggers the filter again but its a legit site honestly! 🙂
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“Fear, Complexity, & Environmental Management in the 21st Century”
Interesting link at
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2017/05/fear-complexity.html#comments
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Rex Murphy
For those of you who don’t know Rex Murphy.
On Climategate…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooIkYvZOhi8
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Do I know Rex Murphy ? You bet.. Maybe we can upgrade him to cult.
https://notonmywatch.com/?p=1025
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Touché
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In a brief exchange with an ABC listener Friday night, and some expletives about “Trump”, I asked what evidence this woman had to support her derision for the man. Here response was “He claims that he was the first to use the term “prime the pump”.
When I explained that the term is generally applied in the nonsensical Keynesian sense, I was sure that The Donald had used the term in the Saysian context of Say’
s Law. Furthermore, I started to list some of the accomplishments of the first 100 days.
She just turned around and walked away. Such is the behaviour of ABC bigots.
Here is a PARTIAL list of those accomplishments to date.
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After all, this is the 21st century …
Scientists Achieve Direct Counterfactual Quantum Communication For The First Time
If you want to delve a little deeper, the video below gives a great explanation:
http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-achieved-direct-counterfactual-quantum-communication-for-the-first-time#.WRNM6p-Tnac.facebook
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I think most voters are worried about the federal budget, continuing to rise budget deficit cumulative total and rising federal debt.
We are being conned, ignoring for a moment the latest budget for financial year 2017/18 just announced.
In September 2013 the Abbott led Coalition formed government and inherited Labor’s budget for financial year 2013/14 announced by them in May 2013. During the later federal election campaign the Coalition said that they based policies on Labor’s published figures and that until the Coalition could form government and access Treasury and Finance department officers and records they had no choice but to base policy on the published information. Obviously they did not trust Labor and for good reason it turned out after the independent auditors the Coalition commissioned completed their audit report.
The report showed that the Labor budget deficit was much higher than estimated. This was because Labor made no provision to pay for various of their budget items, the Gonski education grants for example. And Labor had not raised the debt ceiling ($300 billion) or borrowing limit they had established over a year earlier. But they continued to borrow and create more debt. The budget position was far worse than Labor had admitted when they announced their last budget.
Note that in 2010 Labor lost the federal election and were forced into a minority alliance government. They then realised that they would most probably lose the 2013 election. Accordingly, they decided to leave government and to hand over to the Coalition a minefield of budget and debt problems. Debt well over $400 billion once the budget unfunded items were covered, provision made to pay for them.
But in opposition Labor have been able to use the hostile Senate to block many or most government budget repair measures and proposed cuts in spending. They mocked Treasurer Joe Hockey and the Coalition first Budget for 2014/15 as a bad budget. But it contained the many budget repair measures recommended by the independent auditors in their report on the last Labor budget. Including a several year plan to return the budget to balance or surplus.
Labor said that the Coalition had shown that they were not good managers, that they had increased the deficit they claimed they would reduce or eliminate and had borrowed more money, more debt creation. Hockey did raise the debt ceiling to $500 billion to account for what Labor borrowed above their debt ceiling, to fund Labor’s unfunded 2013/14 budget items and to make provision for some extra borrowing as needed to manage government business with due consideration for a sluggish economy and low tax revenue receipts.
Today the economy is picking up and forecast to return to long term average GDP growth in the near future. If the new budget is on track the deficit will disappear in a few more years time. Debt continues to be too high and the related annual interest liability is a drain on revenue.
But remember that Labor is still responsible for at least four fifths of the federal public debt (plus hidden off budget NBNCo debt – a government owned private company that does not publish accounts) and most of the cumulative budget deficit. Labor continues to use the Senate to block government bills. Treasurer Morrison commented in his budget speech that $ billions of budget cuts have continually been blocked by Labor and other opposition in the Senate during the past three and half years leaving the government with no choice but to increase taxes.
We voters and the national prosperity seem to mean nothing to Labor as long as they can damage the government.
Former Labor PM Keating is criticising Shorten Labor’s budget stand and recently former Labor federal leader Latham said that a Shorten led Labor government with many Rudd and Gillard Labor government people still there would be worse than the government led by Rudd.
So right now, unless the conservative side of the Liberal Party and National Party Coalition takes control of the situation we voters are left high and dry with nowhere to go but minor parties and independents (if the independent is not a Labor sleeper recruit).
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There could be a simplicity here that is eluding the echo chamber. Suppose Trump is enraging the left on purpose.
At our weekly airport gaggle, where most of us were workers, many union, and traditionally split Dem and Republican,
the Republicans have various degrees of uncertainty about Trump, but the Democrats are disgusted by the Democrats
coming forward — Bernie, Maxine, Chuck, Nancy don’t speak to folks who voted for Lyndon Johnson and John Kennedy.
Maybe the left is exciting their base…where off year margins come from. But Maybe Trump is continuing the erosion from
the Democrats of some of their of their traditional voters.
The establishment is clearly in exploding head mode over Government as a reality show. Exploding heads may not do well in the next campaign.
He is actually governing, and trying to keep campaign promises, under the noise.
And he sure is dictating the topic du jour.
Maybe the mass media can still tell the voters what to think, as they believe. Maybe not.
I believe the primary topic here is a good example. 100% of the establishment, MOL, worships at the alter of global warming.
Less than half the folks have bought in.
Quite possibly true of many other less well defined and surveyed topics, perhaps.
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Richard Ilfeld:
This might be of interest.
https://thepointman.wordpress.com/2017/05/11/find-them-fix-them-and-then-destroy-them/
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Thanks Graeme,
I don’t know what made me click and read that essay by Pointman but I did.
What has Trump done in his first 100 days? Well picking a trade dispute with Canada about dumping of timber exports is one thing (as described by Pointman). If that was the only thing he had done (and there are a lot more things) he would still be a huge winner with his supporters. As it is he will likely capture the whole blue collar electorate from the Democrats.
My anxiety is about how our Prime Minister deals with Trump. I fear that Malcolm might be like Trudeau.
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Trudeau-Like or Trudeau-Lite?
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NOAA is confident that El Nino won’t happen this year, so its all down hill from here.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_April_2017_v6.jpg
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Judah Cohen at AER, near record low AO and NAO.
‘Currently positive pressure/geopotential height anomalies are mostly focused on the North Atlantic side of the Arctic with mostly negative pressure/geopotential height anomalies across the mid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere (NH). This is resulting in a near record low Arctic Oscillation (AO) and North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) for May.
‘As expected during a negative NAO, temperatures are below normal across western Eurasia including much of Europe as a strong block/high pressure has developed in the eastern North Atlantic including Greenland with a cold, northerly flow downstream of the block across Europe.’
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The NAO has bounced back a little but still running in negative territory.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/pna/nao_index.html
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‘Today marks the 33rd day in 2017 that the sun has been blank–no sunspots. This exceeds the total number of spotless days in all of 2016 (32). The accelerating pace of spotlessness is a sign that Solar Minimum is approaching. Forecasters expect the sunspot cycle, which swings like a pendulum between high and low sunspot number every ~11 years, to reach its nadir in 2019-2020. Stay tuned for more blank suns. ‘
Spaceweather.com
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Our star has a connection to the NAO.
http://strangesounds.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/blank-sun.gif
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Burning magnesium metal is an interesting, fun and hazardous experiment. I burned an anode from a hot water heater. I made a video: https://youtu.be/qSoVpKU2RjM
The basic reaction is:
2Mg(s)+O2(g)→2MgO(s)+energy
You cannot use water to extinguish the flame as hydrogen gas is liberated which causes more burning:
Mg(s)+2H2O→Mg(OH)2(s)+H2(g)
You cannot use CO2 to extinguish the flame either. Magnesium reacts with carbon dioxide to form magnesium oxide and carbon:
Mg(s)+CO2→2MgO(s)+C(s)
If you starve the fire of oxygen it will continue to burn in nitrogen:
Mg (s) + N2 (g) -> Mg3N2 (s)
You need to either let it burn (fun) or extinguish the fire with sand or a Class D fire extinguisher.
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Sodium too. Plus, amazingly, aluminium. It is a rapid oxidant but forms an impermeable layer of oxide. We used to file it, mix it with an oxygen source like KMnO3, potassium permanganate and you have a throw down explosive. Alumin(i)um is used as the explosive in major weapons from handgrenades to huge bombs. In the US, the second ‘i’ is missing.
That is why the idea of using Aluminum as a fuel is so exciting, as it is almost pure electricity like a battery but safe to store and like oil or gas, does not lose power in transportation. While Australia is busy shutting down coal power and aluminium smelting from the baseload at night, we are losing the ability to store electricity. Thanks Malcolm.
Turnbull’s giant battery idea shows he has no idea. The real energy storage is in aluminium. Aluminium is the totally recyclable miracle metal of the 20th century which gave us aviation, light weight cars which are replacing steel cars. Still Turnbull is a rich banker not a scientist. You cannot expect him to know more about science than kangaroo specialist Tim Flannery, both as Sir Les Patterson would say, legends in their own lunchtimes.
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I agree that ground up aluminum beer cans can make explosives as it oxidizes rapidly. The energy required to reduce alumina, (Al2O3), bauxite, sapphire; back to the metal (Al) can never be recovered by re-oxidizing Al. Like the production of (H2), it is a badly loosing game. God, that owns the casino just loves stupid earthlings! Reducing atmospheric CO2 to (C) needs only insolation and trees to freely produce the very very safest method of power storage, ‘coal’! If you squeeze (C) for a very long time such is called diamond and upon oxidization still produces more heat energy going 2(C) + 2(O2) => 2(CO2), than 2(Al) + 3(O2) => 2(Al2O3). 🙂
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The second time you have only oxide. No bauxite, impurities. Also the density is higher. $ per kilo it is close enough to oil to pass oil with volume. Aluminium is fully recyclable. Hydrocarbons are not.
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“Aluminum is fully recyclable. Hydrocarbons are not.”
As matter yes! As a source of power NO! Hydrocarbons need only insolation (Sun-light); to be recyclable in both matter, phase, and power storage. Such a wonderful planet 🙂
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No, hydrocarbons are not recyclable except in the most esoteric sense that all atoms are reused. Hydrocarbons form gases which go out the exhaust. In stark contrast burned Aluminium is solid alumina and can be collected and recycled. This is a practical solution suitable for automation, not nature.
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TdeF May 14, 2017 at 8:08 pm
“No, hydrocarbons are not recyclable except in the most esoteric sense that all atoms are reused. Hydrocarbons form gases which go out the exhaust. In stark contrast burned Aluminium is solid alumina and can be collected and recycled. This is a practical solution suitable for automation, not nature.”
Only PV and wind waste wonderful insolation. (out the exhaust.) No wonder the Clowns are taking over!
2(Al)+3(O2)=>2(Al2O3)+ energy.
2(Al2O3)+3C+(more-energy)=>2Al+3(CO2)!
Were ever are you getting your graphite and even more energy?
Only the trees recycle all that:
CO2+2H2O+(even more insolation) => CH4 + 2O2 => fuel!!!
Fuel => CO2+2H2O+energy!.. One of the many carbon cycles that the Clowns refuse to acknowledge, in their asinine budget. Sunlight and CO2 power everything!!
All the best!-will-
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BTW GaAs rather than Si is the semiconductor material of the future! Always has been, appears, always will be! 🙂
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Sorry; 4(Al) + 3(O2) => 2(Al2O3). 🙂
As wonderful kitten ‘Shadow’ proclaims: “Everyone is entitled to my opinion”.
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Aluminium can burn, not just in air, but in CO2 as well. What is even more amazing is that it can burn in water. By mixing aluminium nano particles in water and freezing it, engineers have produced a very energetic solid rocket propellant:
ALICE
Once the reaction is initiated, the temperature of the burn is high enough to cause H2O to disassociate into hydrogen and oxygen, allowing the aluminium to oxidise.
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Thanks guy,
Do they ever get more ‘action’ Joule-seconds out, than is put into producing that handy metal from bauxite? Not like trees falling down and decomposing into wonderful CH4 fuel! 🙂
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No, but they did achieve a specific thrust of 600 seconds from the 3” test. To compare, the specific thrust for a space shuttle main engine burning hydrogen and oxygen is only 366 seconds (at sea level).
ALICE offers the possibility of even greater thrust during flight within the atmosphere. Because much of the exhaust is hydrogen at high temperature, this can be re-combusted in an air breathing afterburner. This is known as RBCC or rocket based combined cycle, where a rocket with fuel rich exhaust powers a ramjet.
Here’s one I prepared earlier:
https://youtu.be/s-AmVDB3g-Y
A “D” sized model rocket motor is discharging into a ceramic ramjet tube, inducing air into the tube and re-combusting the CO rich exhaust.
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Interesting,
Why did the nose-cone fall off?
Have you tried igniting Aluminum Nitride?
Let the techs do that! Be elsewhere\when!! 🙂
-will-
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Actually the nose cone and recovery parachute were removed for that ground test.
What you see is the recovery charge firing, and some flame retardant wadding being ejected.
Model rocket motors have a fuel grain arranged into three stages: boost, delay and ejection. The boost only lasts a second or two taking the model to maximum velocity, the delay burns slowly producing negligible thrust, allowing the model to coast and slow to apogee, then the ejection charge fires out the top of the motor casing, ejecting the recovery parachute.
In the case of the model shown, it can still produce thrust from re-combustion of the exhaust of the delay charge in the rear ramjet section.
I haven’t tried the more exotic composite fuel motors with this set-up, as they burn too clean. The old black-powder motors produce an exhaust full of CO which can be re-burnt.
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Konrad May 14, 2017 at 4:23 pm
“Actually the nose cone and recovery parachute were removed for that ground test.
What you see is the recovery charge firing, and some flame retardant wadding being ejected.”
Do you have any evidence that oxidizing Al in any way can compete with oxidizing recyclable (C) to the tune of 10^9 Watts, continuously 24/7/53.?
The Nuke stuff could easily do that, with no CO2 emissions! Never,ever politically acceptable!
All the best!-will-
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The USSR once ground tested a Nuclear thermal drive, the RD-0410. Of course this was done at a site previously used for above ground nuclear testing. Some reports indicate exhaust velocities above 10 km/s. The Space shuttle main engine only managed 4 km/s.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvZjmj1bopw
O2 + C motors have been tried. These take the form of “hybrid” rockets, where LO2 is pumped into the core of a solid carbon fuel grain. The advantage over solid rockets is they can be throttled by regulating the LO2 flow, but they can’t match the power of liquid hydrogen/oxygen engines or afterburning ALICE.
The most powerful rocket engine ever designed remains “on the drawing board”, but designs are being continually updated. At the time the Russians were experimenting with RD-0410, the US was working on NERVA, a similar nuclear propulsion system. While NERVA was cancelled, design work has continued. This includes designs where the liquid hydrogen working fluid is put through an atmospheric afterburner for assisting ground launch. This design work continues as a hedge against a day where Earth has a massive emergency and needs a massive amount of payload launched into space in a massive hurry and we don’t care about the massive mess down here. (Bikini atoll will just have to “take another one for the team”).
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“O2 + C motors have been tried. These take the form of “hybrid” rockets, where LO2 is pumped into the core of a solid carbon fuel grain. The advantage over solid rockets is they can be throttled by regulating the LO2 flow, but they can’t match the power of liquid hydrogen/oxygen engines or afterburning ALICE.”
Why cannot your O2+C hybrid, when in the atmosphere, throttle that LO2 to produce only CO as fuel for your ramjet? I like the name AlICE; water is much more easily kept as a solid than H2 and O2 are kept as a liquid.
All the best!-will-
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Charcoal sticks soaked with liquid oxygen were used as explosives. Set off by electric spark.
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Graeme No.3 May 15, 2017 at 4:30 pm
“Charcoal sticks soaked with liquid oxygen were used as explosives. Set off by electric spark.”
Indeed! Much is to be learned from those that do, especially those that lost limbs doing! Nothing at all is learned from those that can only profess! 🙂
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Nuclear Rocket.
That sounds interesting. Half a kg of Uranium as fuel and the propellant could be water. The end product (steam) is the same as the hydrogen and oxygen rocket.
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Good one David,
Magnesium anode in a hot water heater? What does it do? And why does it not ignite itself during normal operation?
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These days hot water tanks tend to be made of cheap mild steel rather than copper or stainless steel. The way to stop these mild steel tanks corroding is to use a sacrificial anode which corrodes in preference to the steel tank. If these are not checked and replaced the tank will corrode and require replacement. Most people don’t bother checking or replacing the anodes and that is the main reason why tanks fail.
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The magnesium anode does not ignite in normal operation as it has to be heated to a very high temperature before it will ignite.
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Ahh. It is not like a battery anode. I thought it had something to do with heating the water! I will go and check my hot water tank now.
I did notice how much heat you had to put into the magnesium before it would ignite.
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Years ago I attempted to repair an old cast magnesium wheel from a Ducati for a mate, I treated it like cast iron and too much heat from the oxy torch caused it to ignite like a giant sparkler, a few shovels of sand later the fireworks stopped with a destroyed wheel along with overalls and half my beard.
I did him a favour though as the other good wheel he sold to a classic racing enthusiast completely failed at a Phillip Island track day.
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Just want to thank Jo for putting up with all of us. learned some things, laughed at some, and the idiots, well they know who they are. The world is a complex place. Individual viewpoints are wonderful.
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As in the last post, I remain amazed at how Climate Change owns ‘events’. So the millenial drought in Australia, in hindsight shorter and less severe than the vanished Federation drought, it was caused by Global Warming. Indisputably. Even the CSIRO said it would never end. Then it ended. So it became an ‘event’ and everybody knows, without evidence, events are caused by Climate Change.
The Coral Bleaching will never end. Apparently. It is Climate Change. Barack Obama said so. When it is over and forgotten, it will be another ‘event’, caused by Climate Change because everybody knows, without evidence, events are caused by Climate Change.
Climate Change is caused by Global Warming which is caused by Greenhouse Gases which are dramatically higher with a steady 50% increase in CO2 over 100+ years. Graphs tell us this and everybody knows, so it must be true. CO2 causes warming, except CO2 is going up and the temperature is not going up. Another event.
It is my belief Climate Change was invented by the IPCC, the UN Climate Change political group. It is a hungry beast. In Australia it has caused the Renewable Energy Tax which is devastating Australia. However the socialists are saying nothing, pretending it does not exist and even promising an ’emissions intensity’ tax. Why? Climate Change. As Margaret Thatcher said, socialism is fine until it runs out of other people’s money.
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I understood that the man-made global warming climate change political agenda was created by now deceased Canadian billionaire Maurice Strong, friend of George Soros, Al Gore and others?
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Maurice Strong -Climate Crook!
https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/doomed-planet/2015/12/discovering-maurice-strong/
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Much in the same way that the vast majority of people believe that the destruction of life on earth from excessive radiation was prevented by abolishing CRCs to ‘stop the ozone hole from getting bigger’, it may well be that history will record that global warming was arrested by the action of the IPCC and other altruistic organizations and individuals. The truth is not always a requirement when telling a story.
Regarding Climate Change being a self-serving invention by IPCC et al, my ‘conspiracy theory’, upon hearing about ‘global warming’, was that is was a concoction by the EU to render those countries with cheap energy less competitive.
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I was learning about Climate Change when I was studying for my Science degree back in the 1960’s. Back then it was believed to be caused by a whole number of factors but definitely not by by human carbon dioxide emissions. Only geeks like myself were interested in Climate Change back in those days and definitely not of interest to the young maidens I was trying to impress.
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I like old rainfall figures because there is little that can be challenged or fiddled. Just for the heck of it, I checked out the driest years for Nobbys Newcastle, one of the very old stations. Here are the driest years (5th percentile) in order: 1980, 1905, 1957, 1941, 1888 (in Sydney, 1888 is still driest in that very long record), 1882, 1965, 1944.
As for my own region further up the coast, 1902 was driest, and the latter years (1900-1-2) of the Federation Drought were the worst series for drought. As with the rest of Eastern Oz, freaky 1950 was our biggest drenching, though we had a couple of days here in 1963 that would have floated Noah’s boat.
None of this means much at all. The trouble is that, if any of these extremes were to be repeated, we now have a pseudo-scientific commentariat who would claim that such “events” mean a great deal in relation a future they are never slow to project.
Okay, you can explain away the fact that the Nobbys station recorded ALL of its highest yearly temps between 1862 and 1885 (eight years, 5th percentile). But you can’t dismiss rainfall figures because a signal station or old post office might not have had a well maintained Stevenson screen.
Climate change is real. The point that is being missed: climate change WAS real.
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Its cooled off a bit since the late 19th century.
http://jennifermarohasy.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Newcastle2.png
Looking at those driest years, they seem to all fall into periods when the world was getting cooler.
The 1878-79 climate flip was significant.
20
Peak Oil …
OPEC Sees the Writing on the Wall
Now, OPEC is revising upwards its estimates of how quickly supplies will grow outside of its membership this year by a whopping 64 percent.
https://www.the-american-interest.com/2017/05/12/opec-sees-the-writing-on-the-wall/
40
More like trough oil, not peak oil – in terms of price.
Unconventional producers are still going strong;
http://www.rigzone.com/news/oil_gas/a/150055/Shale_Drillers_Are_Outspending_the_World_With_84_Billion_Spree
As are conventional producers, with records very close to being broken in the gulf of Mexico:
http://www.rigzone.com/news/oil_gas/a/149843/Unsung_Gulf_of_Mexico_Tracks_New_Crude_Oil_Production_Record
30
The production topping from unconventionals will continue for many years to come keeping oil prices low and contributing to heavy unemployment in the industry. More importantly OPEC becomes increasingly irrelevant as unconventionals break-evens continue to fall. This already has a huge effect on the Middle East fat cats by inviting western companies to invest in their aging production.
One thing is certain: the doom and gloom of expensive energy is over for a long time to come. This is why it is so sad that Oz, awashed in cheap energy, forces Australians to pay high prices. We, the petroleum industry, are get blamed for this. Nothing to do with politician and their green idealogy.
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I heard a wonderful story about the huge Hurricane field found recently in the North Sea area.
One of the guys who helped fund the discovery was really struggling to get funds ( they were to use an unusual approach to drilling –not fracking). One day he got in a taxi to go to the airport on his way to the USA from the UK, to pitch to possible investors. The taxi driver got talking to him and when he told the driver where was going the driver said “oh, I’ve got a mate looking for investments”. The guy goes to the US and comes back empty handed. Goes to get a taxi home and ends up with the same driver. On hearing of his lack of success the taxi driver arranges a meeting with his friend. The deal was done and as they say “the rest is history” –one of the biggest finds in the UK, in recent decades.
40
Sorry , forgot the link. This is the field I’m talking about
http://www.thegwpf.com/biggest-oil-discovery-in-uk-waters-this-century/
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Climate Change The Facts
A new volume, titled Climate Change The Facts 2017, edited by Jennifer Marohasy, is due to be released soon. Before it comes out I thought I would re read my copy of Climate Change The Facts 2014, edited by Alan Moran.
The book consists of 21 chapters. Each chapter is an essay (different authors), each taking a different angle on the topic so that while the essays overlap at times they do not cover the same ground 21 times. Each essay can be read on its own without needing to refer to other chapters. The essays are collected into three broad groups;
The Science of Climate Change,
The Economics and Politics of Climate Change, and
The Climate Change Movement.
When I received my volume 3 years ago I dived in and read the essays by James Delingpole, Andrew Bolt and JoNova first. Consequently I am not sure if I read the whole book, so this time I am reading it more systematically.
I have just come again to the Chapter entitled the “Trillion Dollar Guess and the Zombie Theory” by JoNova. This essay is truly a magnificent piece of satire, equal to anything we have read on this blog.
The zombie theory is the theory of carbon disaster (aka Catastrophic anthropogenic global warming), which Jo claims died about 10 years ago. But it it never got properly buried so it keeps being dressed up and paraded around by the green movement and activist ‘climate scientists’.
Jo says “These doctors of dead science were surely given wings by a religious faith in their own insight. Only the true believers could believe thousands of instruments are biased against them (and in the same direction) and know that their 95% certainty hides in the deep abyss. The science ‘may be settled’ indeed but it settled somewhere in the Mariana Trench.”
One might wonder how anyone could read this chapter alone and still want to spend our taxes on saving the world from climate change. Every politician in federal parliament was sent a free copy of the book, courtesy of the IPA. Sadly I suppose that the most likely explanation is that very few of them actually read it.
Climate Change The Facts 2014 can be obtained here;
http://thefacts2014.ipa.org.au/
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Climate Change is a fact free zone. Like most religions. It is all about money and political power.
51
Well the book is called; Climate Change The Facts 2014. Maybe it should have been Climate Change The Evidence.
The Evidence, such as it was in 2014 did not support AGW. I expect that the evidence obtained since 2014 will be similarly damning of AGW.
42
For some reason I have been getting Robocalls with quizzes (technically I suppose these are surveys) this week and I usually respond to them, unless they are from the CFMEU in which case I hang up immediately.
What I found of interest was the one for the SA Liberal Party which early on asked if I wanted cheap reliable electricity or was I in favour of the more expensive but environmentally favourable type. A moment of amusement that they seem to think the latter exists but then I wondered “are they thinking of changing their policy?” A promise of cheaper electricity with no blackouts could be a vote winner, esp. after the coming summer.
The next ‘survey’ was obviously for the Federal Liberal Party and rather boring. I was asked who I thought would make the best Prime Minister.
1. Malcolm Turnbull
2. Bill Shorten
3. Tanya Plibisek
4. Nick Xenophon
5. A name I have forgotten. I think it may be one of the current Fed. Cabinet ministers but I couldn’t place the name. Has anyone else had the call and can tell me who the obvious choice was?
The next question asked “who would make the better PM
Press 1. Malcolm Turnbull
Press 2. Bill Shorten?”
I waited a while for some other choice but none was forthcoming. I have found that pressing number 3 merely gets the question repeated, and if you repeat with 3 then the survey terminates. By this time I was bored and not really paying it any thought so I pressed 1. Now I wonder how many others didn’t think and next week we will be told that M.T.’s popularity has risen after the Budget. I hope not as that will merely cause those isolated in Canberra to think that they should continue doing the same.
And why don’t they make the survey more reasonable by including Blind Freddy as one of the choices?
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And why don’t they make the survey more reasonable by including Blind Freddy as one of the choices?
Because, just like political enquiries, they do not ask questions if they think they might not like the answers.
40
This week petroleum industry has the annual APPEA conference in Perth. I will be attending not for the talks but for business links and to see how many of us are still there during the continuing industry contraction.
Talks are mainly about CO2 sequestration and how to manage public perception of the industry. Just 2 years ago when I wanted to talk about climate change at one of industry gatherings I was told that this topic was irrelevant. Now all major companies, except Exxon, fall over themselves to prove to the world that they “care” and in the process attack coal as the dirty alternative.
This conference, like most of reputable scientific gatherings, has gone down hill as it has been sacrificed to the god of being seen to be caring. I don,t want to publish my papers in the field of geoscience under the APPEA banner anymore as I don,t want to be associated with this PC crowd.
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It’s really odd, coal and oil people apologizing for CO2 and worrying about their image when wind supplies 0%? If coal and oil vanished from our grid, the hydro would run out in days, not weeks. Then we would have maybe 4% of the power we need. Sometimes.
However we would be 100% renewable. Some would be thrilled, people with the rational capacity of Ken the Boxer. 2:36 in. Watch Ken solve a problem.
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That pie chart Joanne provided at the top of her earlier Post is a wonderful one to show those green supporters because they have absolutely no idea of the differentiation between ENERGY and electrical power generation.
81% of the World’s energy consumption comes from Oil, Natural gas and Coal, and if the absolute truth is told, that will change so little in the future.
All three of those emit CO2.
Look again at that ENERGY chart.
The total world electrical power generation is only 6% of that total energy consumption.
Now, imagine the insignificance of going to 50% or even 100% renewable power generation from wind and solar.
Tony.
PostScript – The Maths – Wind and Solar make up 5% of the World’s total power generation, so scaling up from that energy pie chart, if 5% equals 0.3%, then 100% equals 6%.
41
Yeah, yeah, poorly worded, I know.
I just used the simple ratio ….. 0.3% = 5%
Forgot the Hydro and the Nukes, but even then, they only add up to 7.2% and if the plan is to replace all those Nukes with wind and solar, then it’s still only close to that 6% anyway.
Either way, closing all coal fired power (yeah, as if that will EVER happen) will still amount to insignificance.
Tony.
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You have really confused me now!
10
It’s under the thimble next to the one in the middle.
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Attila, the red thumbed Hun, has marked you down for this Tony.
10
woke up to this bit of madness from BBC (originally on Radio 4). listen from 25 mins in –
Gwyther: ongoing challenges for McDonalds…when you are “top dog”.
the big picture on the horizon when it comes to cows is their meat could be going out of fashion and ALL THE CURRENT TALK is about how to get rid of them and their global warming emissions.
AUDIO: 26mins29secs: 13 May: BBC World Service: Global Business: Keeping Up with the Burgers
McDonalds has long dominated the burger market and continues to do so in the UK. But the US owned, giant fast food chain is in the midst of a make-over. Posher burger chains are springing up everywhere and McDonalds is now offering table service and new-look restaurants. Matthew Gwyther, Editor of Management Today, asks how and why McDonalds feels the need to present a new image to its customers and whether it will work in today’s health conscious society.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldserviceradio/programmes/schedules
Disclosure: had an egg mcmuffin 23 years ago because I was with a family member who went to maccas to get their breakfast.
never been there before or since and never been to hungry jacks, burger king or the rest, so not shilling for McDonalds.
but I do like a homemade burger…or steak…and I love cows and don’t want to get rid of them…especially the Swiss variety.
hope a billion-plus Indians didn’t hear this part of the program. lol.
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Obama wants people to eat less meat – because – global warming – then his chef admits he cooked thousands of steaks in the White House.
As I have said before, the UN wants the sheeple to move to insect based diets, but presumably not for the elites.
http://usherald.com/obama-admonishes-americans-eating-meat-due-global-warming-white-house-chef-humiliates-divulging-crowd-obama-eats-time?utm_source=cd&utm_medium=513&utm_campaign=fbext
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Well the weather kinda messed up my evening plans. It’s just too cold to do anything outdoors. I guess I could break out the long johns again. Since mid March there have only been a few days at or above average temperature. I know weather is not climate, but this has been anything but the hottest spring ever. It has been well below average actually, at least around here.
40
Pretty much the same in the UK – but not one announcement of coldest start to May since xxxx, or coldest April days since yyyy etc.
30
Over the next couple of weeks the contiguous US will experience temperatures below average.
‘The Greenland block is also contributing to negative pressure/geopotential height anomalies across Eastern Canada and the Eastern United States (US) and below normal temperatures.
‘The blocking high in the eastern North Atlantic is predicted to drift westward first across Eastern Canada and then Western Canada contributing to a troughing/negative bias in geopotential height anomalies across the Eastern US over the next two weeks. Therefore, the pattern of cool temperatures across the Eastern US looks to continue into the second half of May.
‘The models are predicting that negative pressure/geopotential height anomalies associated with the Aleutian low will crash into Western US during the second and into the third week of May lowering temperatures across the region.
‘The models predict that troughing/ negative geopotential height anomalies in the Western US will quickly slide further east into the Eastern US favoring a return to below normal temperatures to the Eastern US the second half of May.’
Judah Cohen (AER)
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At warmists’ place of work, the warmists win,
As those who disagree are not let in.
Solar panel power does not come cheap,
When gangs are paid for poor outputs they reap.
In Queensland as the prices more than double,
Per megawatt, means economic trouble.
The funding flows to warmists like a tide,
For projects, which the skeptics can’t abide.
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while Murdoch’s WSJ is saying get out of the Paris Agreement –
10 May: GWPF: The Wall Street Journal Makes The Case For Pulling Out Of Obama’s Paris Deal…
WSJ Editorial: We Shouldn’t Always Have Paris
Mr. Trump’s best bet is to exit the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which could be done in a year and would result in a simultaneous withdrawal from Paris. That would quickly end the litigation risk…
The best U.S. insurance against the risks of climate change is to revive economic growth that will drive energy innovation and create the wealth to cope with any future damage—if that day arrives…READ ALL
LINKS TO WSJ (ARTICLE BEHIND PAYWALL)
https://www.thegwpf.com/the-wall-street-journal-makes-the-case-for-pulling-out-of-obamas-paris-deal/
also behind paywall:
26 Apr: Springtime Out of Paris
Staying in Obama’s climate accord risks Trump’s energy plans
If he doesn’t want to topple his own economic agenda, Mr. Trump’s wisest course is to walk away from a pact that President Obama never put before the U.S. Senate…
Murdoch’s UK Times has a different view (behind paywall) – text found at Free Republic Forum:
13 May: UK Times: Baked Alaska: Trump will be blindsided by Putin if he ignores the Arctic meltdown
Meeting in Alaska this week, the countries most concerned with the melting of the Arctic called for global action to reduce greenhouse gases. The most surprising feature of this declaration was that it was signed by Rex Tillerson, the US secretary of State…
President Trump promised in his election campaign to withdraw from the 2015 Paris accord, which commits almost 200 nations to reducing emissions that lead to climate change. This was more than electioneering bluster. His administration has already set about reversing some of Barack Obama’s policies, including the phasing out of coal-fired power plants and tighter restrictions on vehicle emissions.
While the week’s Fairbanks Declaration does not actually contain an American pledge to support the Paris accord or an explicit acceptance of man-made climate change, it does suggest the Trump administration is beginning to moderate its position. Not before time…
By 2030, according to US navy calculations, the ice-melt along the northern sea route will open the way for a fast connection between east Asian markets and European cities. That will revolutionise global trade and make it easier for Russia in particular to exploit oil and gas.
Some 30 per cent of the world’s natural gas reserves are believed to be in the Arctic. Not surprisingly, President Putin of Russia considers the opening of the Arctic region to be a prize that could transform his country’s fortunes. And, it seems he is willing to fight for it.
The Russian navy has 41 icebreakers; the US coast guard has one. The US and indeed other western states need to be better prepared for the way newly open sea routes will change geopolitics. The first step is for Trump administration to examine more carefully the scientific evidence of change in the far north and understand the impact of that change on relations with other big powers. The permafrost is thawing but there is no sign that Mr Putin intends to warm up with it.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/comment/baked-alaska-dzjgqmhbb
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***who elected this delusional GUY?
12 May: Vice: Stephen Leahy: Leader of a Sinking Island Admonishes Trump on Climate Change
The Tuvalu prime minister roasted the US president for his obsession with coal.
The Prime Minister of Tuvalu, an island nation in the Pacific, is calling out President Donald Trump for his myopic views on coal and climate change.
Prime Minister Enele Sopoaga told Motherboard no country is seriously interested in fossil fuel expansion anymore. No one in the US financial community wants to invest in fossil fuels, gas and oil projects are shutting down in the middle East.
“The US is going to be left behind. The ***GUY in the White House doesn’t understand that,” Sopoaga said at the UN energy forum in Vienna this week…
Another thing the GUY in the White House likely doesn’t know is that it will take the US five years to withdraw from the the agreement, according to its terms. And even then, other countries will have to agree to it.
“I’m glad we negotiated so hard to get that.”
https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/leader-of-a-sinking-island-admonishes-trump-on-climate-change
the writer, Stephen Leahy, has form – at Vice:
2014: Oil and Coal Must Be Phased Out Entirely by 2050 to Stop Catastrophic Warming
2014: We Have Five Years to Stop Building Coal Plants and Gas-Powered Cars
MSM loves him, of course:
About Stephen Leahy
CO-WINNER OF THE UNITED NATIONS GLOBAL PRIZE FOR CLIMATE CHANGE REPORTING…
My writing has been published in dozens of publications around the world including National Geographic, New Scientist, The London Sunday Times, The Guardian, Al Jazeera, Maclean’s Magazine, Earth Island Journal, The Toronto Star, Wired News, Audubon, BBC Wildlife, and Canadian Geographic…
My IPS articles are published in over 500 newspapers and magazines all over the world reaching an estimated 200 million readers in up to 20 languages…
https://stephenleahy.net/about/
10
‘Prime Minister Enele Sopoaga told Motherboard’. Sounds like a rock band ‘leader’! 🙂
30
3 pages, lots of charts, figs…read all, check the writer’s bio:
3 pages: 12 May: Forbes: David Levine: Why Tesla’s Solar Roof Is A Bad Buy
Everyone needs electricity. Everyone needs a roof. Everyone does not need the Tesla Solar Roof.
In fact, the Tesla Solar Roof is the gold Apple Watch Edition of the energy industry.
When Tesla started taking $1,000 deposits on its Solar Roof, in California only, there was a rush of reports praising the manufacturer for beating expectations on price. Bloomberg declared the roof was “cheap enough to catch fire.” CNBC noted the estimated $21.85 per square foot was less $2.65 per square foot than Consumer Reports had predicted. Greentech Media highlighted the durability of the tiles and “Infinity Warranty.”
At the time of the gold Apple Watch Edition launch, breathless pundits claimed that at $17,000, the watch “might be too cheap,” and that a $10,000 Apple Watch “wouldn’t be crazy.”
Of course eighteen months later, the gold Apple Watch Edition was declared dead.
In much the same way, Tesla is misleading the public by comparing their Solar Roof to tile and slate roofs, rather than to solar energy in its many forms. As you will see, a real comparison is not flattering to Tesla…READ ALL
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidlevine/2017/05/12/why-you-should-buy-the-apple-watch-edition-before-the-tesla-solar-roof/#1dd7ed3a19df
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more MSM solar PR this week involved:
13 May: Bloomberg: Anindya Upadhyay: SoftBank and Foxconn Bring India Some of World’s Cheapest Solar
Companies led by SoftBank Group Corp. of Japan and Taiwan’s Foxconn Technology Co. Ltd. are bringing India some of the cheapest solar power in the world, helping Prime Minister Narendra Modi reach his ambitious clean-energy goals…
In a contest to win contracts for 500 megawatts of solar capacity through a competitive tender, India’s Acme Group quoted 2.44 rupees (3.8 cents) a unit to win 200 megawatts. SBG Cleantech Ltd. — the clean-energy joint venture between Japan’s SoftBank Group Corp., India’s Bharti Enterprises Pvt. and Taiwan’s Foxconn Technology Group — quoted 2.45 rupees to scoop up the remaining capacity, said Sanjay Sharma, general manager at the Solar Energy Corp. of India, the government agency for renewable targets in India…
10 May: Guardian: Michael Safi: Indian solar power prices hit record low, undercutting fossil fuels
India is the world’s third-largest carbon polluter, ***with emissions forecast to at least double as it seeks to develop its economy and lift hundreds of millions of citizens out of poverty…
Tim Buckley, a director at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, said the most important factor driving a rush of international investment in Indian renewables was the “transparency, longevity and certainty” of the country’s energy policy…
***at least doubling emissions sounds like a lot of CO2 Guardian.
besides, solar is not all that certain, Tim, plus foreign banks are kind of driving the solar thing:
12 May: DNA India: Solar power cheaper, but will the companies survive?
Not surprisingly, banks are unwilling to bankroll thermal power projects and coal mining…
Already, state discoms are wary of executing power purchase agreements for past auctions when tariffs were higher. The central and state governments must allay these fears of solar companies and ensure timely payments.
Fin Express India believes in CAGW and solar, but reports some facts:
12 May: FinancialExpressIndia: Solar Power will not ‘kill’ thermal; here’s why
Thermal power will continue to be the base load for reasons of availability and grid stability; it’s fallacious to think solar will ‘kill’ thermal
With solar power being available only during day time, the present share of solar in electricity mix is only about 1%. Our present energy consumption is about 1,150 BU and should reach 1,570 BU by 2022. Even with our ambitious goal of 175 GW renewable power, out of additional requirement of 420 billion units (BU), solar will add only around 140 BU and wind around 60 BU. Thus, 220 BU will be required from conventional power projects. Thus, it is fallacious to propound that this solar capacity would ‘kill’ thermal power…
Thermal power will continue to be the base load for reasons of availability and grid stability. But we still have long way to go. Our per capita electricity consumption is only one-fifth of the world average!
As India grows to improve the living standards of its citizens, our electricity needs will increase…
Thermal power will continue to be the base load for reasons of availability and grid stability. But we still have long way to go. Our per capita electricity consumption is only one-fifth of the world average!
As India grows to improve the living standards of its citizens, our electricity needs will increase…
The ongoing initiative for modernising thermal plants of 60 GW capacity which need refurbishment as also for reforming coal linkage processes will promote efficient thermal plants and increase business competitiveness.
For these very reasons, while our solar installed base has grown rapidly, ***thermal installed base has also grown at 26%. Thus, there is no need for scaremongering against the solar power…
http://www.financialexpress.com/opinion/solar-power-will-not-kill-thermal-heres-why/664751/
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11 May: Bloomberg: Jesper Starn: Record Cold Nights Cause Spring Pinch for Nordic Power
Nordic power prices soared as record cold weather in parts of the region delayed the seasonal melting of snow into water needed to generate electricity.
The coldest night on record dating back to 1859 this week helped electricity prices on Wednesday jump 34 percent so far in May from a year earlier and they are headed for the highest average level for the month since 2013 on the Nord Pool AS exchange in Oslo. The unseasonably cold weather is also driving up demand for the commodity…
While temperatures were colder in the north in absolute terms, they fell as low as minus 7.8 Celsius (18 Fahrenheit) during the night to Thursday at Visby airport on the Island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea. It was the coldest May in the area on record. Uppsala, a town just north of Stockholm, had its coldest May night since 1947 on Wednesday…
On Thursday Norway’s grid manager Statnett issued a warning for a tight power situation in the Ofoten area in the north of the country. Due to cold weather, reduced water levels and low inflows into reservoirs it would have to take measures to secure supply of power, it said…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-11/coldest-night-in-70-years-causes-spring-pinch-for-nordic-power
Victory Day 2017 in Moscow the coldest since 1945
Russia Beyond the Headlines-10 May 2017
This year’s Victory Day in the Russian capital was the chilliest since the end of WWII, with temperatures struggling to hit five degrees Celsius, peaking at 4.6…
According to forecasters, this week in the city also will be cool, so it looks like summer is taking a little longer to wake up than usual.
Coldest May 8 in 70 years
Cincinnati.com – May 8, 2017
This is the coldest May 8 in 70 years. A temperature of 30 degrees was recorded at 6:45 a.m. at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport
Weird weather Sunday was one for the record books
The San Diego Union-Tribune-8 May 2017
It was the city’s coldest May day in 64 years.
Where has May gone? Very chilly start to May!
WSYR Syracuse-9 May 2017
The first week of May 2017 will be one not to remember, as it is the second coldest on record thus far! The average temperature for May through the first week is 50.0° which is almost 4° below average.
May of 1917 was the coldest May on record in Syracuse when the average temperature for the entire month was 48.1°!
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I just watched an interesting documentary on Netflix, “Patterns of Evidence: Exodus”.
It’s argument is that the Exodus did occur but the conventionally accepted times are wrong and that the timeline exists in Egyptian history but offset by 200 years before the conventional timeline so it happened in 1450BC instead of 1250BC.
It was very interesting and seemed quite plausible.
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I thought immediately of the eruption of Thera on Santorini which was supposedly about that time, but that was revised recently to at least 100 years before the revised date for Exodus.
Not that the dates are sacred as the preceding 1-200 years appear to have been “fun times” in ancient Egypt with changes in Dynasties, foreign invasions (Hyksos) drought, floods and famine. One could understand people wanting to leave Egypt then, but why later? Perhaps an archaeologist will find an obscure papyrus indicating that the population became fed up when they were ordered to build windmills as a sure way of avoiding climate change.
50
David,
It was 1250 BC.
I was there.
10
This is how stupid things have become. People are whining about their WiFi speeds and the NBN. Meanwhile we face the real prospect of our economy collapsing due to several factors, the main two being higher taxes and higher electricity costs, both of which will kill of what’s left of our business enterprises – thanks to both major parties. When our economy does eventually collapse I wonder how many will still be whining about their WiFi and NBN speeds? Not many I bet.
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The NBN is coming to my street in September and they say the speed will be phenomenal. Hmmmm ……
‘When our economy does eventually collapse … ‘
It won’t collapse, the government intends pushing ahead with infrastructure to save the Nats.
20
NBN was Labor’s baby, and NBNCo is a government owned private company with debt accounted for off federal budget.
Former Minister for Communications reported that the NBN is a financial disaster and even after cutting back on expenses, when completed NBN could not be sold for what it cost the government to build it.
20
Historically, situations where infrastructure, “could not be sold for what it costs … to build”, has always been the purview of government. Roads and the rail network, come to mind, as does the runways, and movement areas in airports.
10
https://infrastructure.gov.au/rail/trains/high_speed/
10
I mentioned it earlier, Bill Shorten wants to join the Belt and Road but Turnbull says no way.
Pity.
‘President Xi Jinping called for joint efforts to build the Belt and Road into a road for peace, prosperity, openness, innovation and civilization on Sunday.
‘Xi made the remarks when delivering a keynote speech at the opening ceremony of the two-day Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation. More than 1,500 representatives across the world are attending the forum.
‘The Belt and Road Initiative is “a project of the century” that will benefit people across the world, Xi said.’
China Daily
10
Former Federal Labor Leader Mark Latham says that a Shorten led Labor government would be worse than the Rudd led Labor government.
Former Labor PM Paul Keating says Shorten Labor are wrong about the Medicare Levy increase. Paul appears to be unimpressed with Bill.
Recent news indicated that Anthony Albanese is still seeking the leadership of Labor.
20
Given our recent track record the voters appear willing to vote for ALP with much delight. I think the critical thinking capabilities of most of the voters has been dropping like a stone over the past decade or so. If it continues we have can look forward to much worse years ahead than under Turnbull. I sincerely hope enough of them wake up soon and refuse to vote for either major party. Personally I think we are way past the point of no return and we are doomed no matter who is in government. It would take someone with even more strength that Trump to have some hope of turning things around. Clearly we have no such candidate that comes close. Even if we did we still have the problem of the Senate. It would need to be shut down if someone of Trump+ caliber to make any inroads of significance.
20
I am hoping that some of the older former MPs are concerned enough to use whatever influence they have, from both sides of politics, to force change within parliamentary parties. As journalist Max Walsh wrote in the no longer published The Bulletin magazine in 2006 when the unions were promoting Kevin 07 for PM and a Labor government, and using deceptive advertising to rubbish the Howard Government’s Work Choices industrial relations legislation (now replaced by Labor’s union power returning Fair Work Australia), the union movement has effectively launched a corporate style takeover of the Labor Party, rank and file members no longer listened to and used only as servants for election campaigning purposes, union trained executives parachuted into safe Labor electorates to become MPs.
On the Liberal Party side, notably in New South Wales, the State Executive has power brokers who have guided the party to the left so that Liberal and Labor on most issues are one and the same. Malcolm Turnbull, former Goldman Sachs employee, now very influential and a major donor to the party. On the Union Labor side there are indicators of external influence too, one example is GetUp, a media management and spin doctor centre that according to reports is funded with union donations and foreign donations including George Soros.
We have been told that former Labor PMs Rudd and Gillard are very much involved in UN politics, former Labor AG is now working with the UN IMF, I noted that he was one of their executives attending when the government of Greece was seeking funding to overcome the financial crisis in that country.
Too much to cover in a post here but I was very interested in the articles on crony capitalism and Goldman Sachs because I believe that both major political parties in Australia, our only alternatives for government, are now captive to foreigners. Remember the Christopher Monckton video in which he warned Australians to watch our PM’s back, Tony Abbott.
Public comments since budget day from various former MPs and PMs have given me some new hope of change on the way.
John Howard criticising the RET and energy crisis developing, and the new budget which former Treasurer Peter Costello has also criticised. But former Labor leader Mark Latham said recently that a Bill Shorten (former senior union man) led Labor Government would be worse than the Kevin Rudd government. And others have made comments from time to time that indicate that they too are not happy with the way the nation is heading.
Agenda 21, now Agenda 30 has been applied since the 1990s in many different areas of government, federal, state and local governments. But extending to 2030 indicates that progress is running well behind schedule. And now deceased Maurice Strong no longer influences the agenda new world order.
Happily, neither do the leaders of the US, Britain and Russia and others including China and India appear to be playing politics by not really cooperating.
Frustrating isn’t it.
12
Former Labor Attorney General Gareth Evans.
10
Dennis I think Julia has given up her job at the UN and is now working for Beyond Blue.
20
Character is revealed in moments of truth.
The winning ticket GILLARD drew from a silver ice bucket for a $5650 three-month lease on a Mercedes-Benz C-Class Cabriolet C200 was her own.
Looking around the room as if she were wondering whether she should accept the prize……
…….the former PM got a “get-out-of-jail card” from Women of Melbourne emcee Jen Hansen.
The former PM was told she deserved it.
“You’ve done so much for this country,” Hansen gushed.
“I’ve spent a lot of my life drawing ALP raffles where generally there wasn’t a prize and if you did happen to win the meat tray you had to give it back or you would have been torn limb from limb,” said the former Labor leader. “So, thank you very much.”
The former Prime Minister takes over as Beyond Blue chair on July 1.
[Taken from Michael Smith News website]
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el gordo,
Julia has never done an honest day’s work in her miserable life.
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Gentlemen I’m well aware of her history, but surely its time to move on and wait for her memoirs.
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I’m afraid the career politicians we have will not be of any help in solving the issues we currently have and preventing the coming financial and social crisis. If we had someone like Trump who is not a career politician and we dispensed with the Senate at least temporarily then and only then we might have half a chance.
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It’s not here as bad as it can get yet.
With the Leftists in control of the Canadian Federal scene, there are outright communists in place in Ontario, and Alberta. British Columbia is anyone’s guess at the moment, with many seats in limbo after the election on the weekend.
BC voters had the same choice that voters in the old Soviet Union had. Light red, dark red, or watermelon green on the outside crimson in the centre.
For years BC whipsawed between Social Credit, that provided leadership and real growth, and the Marxist NDP that would throw the brakes on the economy. Every time the NDP won and election, there was an exodus of pot heads and other welfare seekers fro Ontario into BC. Then BC would go Socred, and Ontario would change from Conservative to NDP and the hitchhikers and hummy old Volkswagen vans would again head East. Looks like welfare is a lifestyle choice wherever they go now.
Following this election, whether Liberal Christy Clark forms a hamstrung government or not, the stinking Greens will be pulling the levers.
A sure recipe for a Pacific Venezuela.
Up until now the Greens have had little sway in Canada, with one member in Ottawa; the loathsome Elizabeth May. Gullible, stupid, and ignorant, and a worshiper of Bob Brown, she has been kept in the background. Now they have three seats in the BC legislature, and will undoubtedly have leverage.
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‘….preventing the coming financial and social crisis.’
Fake news, do you have a link?
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Yes there are dozens of “links”. Study history.
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‘Study history.’
I have, history doesn’t repeat itself because there are different variables in play.
One thing is certain, they will blame Donald if there is a collapse.
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When Julia fell on her sword Albo was the people’s choice to replace her, but the union hacks didn’t see it that way. Labor is a cesspit of cronyism .
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el gordo May 15, 2017 at 8:57 am
“When Julia fell on her sword Albo was the people’s choice to replace her, but the union hacks didn’t see it that way. Labor is a cesspit of cronyism .”
Ok! I do not understand your upside down southern hemisphere, with opposing chirality. From the South pole the Earth rotates “clockwise”, from the North pole rotates “anti-clockwise”! Even Gallio did understand that ‘externally’ the Earth’s spin angular momentum remains at exactly zero no mater what the rotation rate! That is why all the other solar system bodies affect the Earth’s rotation rate! Scientific angular momentum, and the conservation of such, always depends on your own POV, not scientific!!
If labor is a cesspit of cronyism, modern “PC socialism” is the cesspit of human stupidity!
All the best!-will-
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Thanks for that insight on angular momentum.
Its been suggested that the world spins faster during a little ice age because of the increased ice at the poles. The large icebergs in the southern ocean during the 19th century are testament to the Length of Day (LOD) theory, the earth’s spin began to slow.
Am I on the right track with this?
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Despite the various critics, Latham is still the best leader that the ALP has had this century – and he was really bad.
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‘When our economy does eventually collapse …’ The yuan is sitting in a sweet spot, fear not, its a gradual takeover.
BEIJING, May 12 — ‘The central parity rate of the Chinese currency renminbi, or the yuan, strengthened 103 basis points to 6.8948 against the U.S. dollar Friday, according to the China Foreign Exchange Trade System.
‘In China’s spot foreign exchange market, the yuan is allowed to rise or fall by 2 percent from the central parity rate each trading day.
‘The central parity rate of the yuan against the U.S. dollar is based on a weighted average of prices offered by market makers before the opening of the interbank market each business day. (Xinhua)
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As long as the US$ is the world’s reserve currency they have no fear. They can “print” as much money as they like. Their major headaches will start when they lose their reserve currency status. Then their bonds will explode, their long term interest rates will skyrocket and hence their economy will collapse big time as the US government has no choice but to default on their loans. That’s one scenario. There are others that are just as terminal.
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Quantitative easing is par for the course around the world and Beijing is no different to Washington. There is a vague rumour coming out of the Fed that they intend to bring a halt to this behaviour by year’s end.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2017/04/06/the-feds-big-reveal-how-it-will-reverse-quantitative-easing/#52877acd1871
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The US Federal Reserve has already said they will not extend the loans from the government. Beginning next year there are hundreds of billions of dollars up for repayment. This is going to be an interesting event to watch. Perhaps the Fed will chicken out once again. Perhaps the government will print their own money like they used to a very long time ago (US Government Notes instead of US Federal Notes). JFK started doing this but was assassinated part way through the process of replacing the Fed notes with US notes in circulation, and it was cancelled. In any case the pied piper has to be paid one day and when he is the chaos that will be unleashed will lead to the utter destruction of the US and drag down all other Western nations, assuming there are any left standing.
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The US economy can manage this debt problem if they play their cards right., think outside the square.
‘The U.S. debt to China is $1.051 trillion, as of January 2017. That’s 27.8 percent of the $3.8 trillion in Treasury bills, notes, and bonds held by foreign countries. The rest of the $19.9 trillion national debt is owned by either the American people or by the U.S. government itself.’
wiki
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First thing; shoot that damn pied piper! Was that not the individual that got ‘all’, including rats to jump off the cliff! 🙂
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‘….chaos that will be unleashed ….’
Nothing in my crystal ball on that, but I can say for a fact that the Belt and Road initiative ‘will never be neocolonialism by stealth.’
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el gordo May 15, 2017 at 6:16 pm
‘….chaos that will be unleashed ….’
“Nothing in my crystal ball on that, but I can say for a fact that the Belt and Road initiative ‘will never be neocolonialism by stealth.’ ”
Indeed! Many forget that USA ‘rubes’ remain armed and dangerous! They likely possess more fine and accurate rifles than China can produce! 🙂
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Here is a good read on the state of play.
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Columns/2016/05/06/Why-Trumps-US-Debt-Default-Isn-t-Idiotic-It-Sounds
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Its important to see things in a historical perspective.
‘America and many other developed economies have a long history with credit defaults. It’s only in the modern post-war era that America’s sovereign debt has become sanctified, along with the elevation of the dollar to the status of global reserve currency of choice (replacing the British pound).’
The Fiscal Times
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Crony capitalism joins socialism-communism via China?
The Maurice Strong and cronies plan.
Managed and controlled workforces in the new world order of four regions with one world government or parliament. Redistribution of wealth – collapsing the existing capitalist system and replacing it with a new much larger consumer market of equal citizens, goods produced with almost slave labour paid a pittance but no wealth divide between countries or member states with no sovereignty and borders. One new world currency, the Yuen. No cars for the masses, but billions of motor cycles and bicycles as in the third world and developing world now. An enormous real global market place.
All citizens will be equal but some (many associates) will be more equal than others?
Consider the Australian position now and for many years past: Kevin Rudd & China Associates, Rudd & Minister Turnbull sighted by a journalist with The Australian dining together with family members in a Beijing China restaurant a few years ago, a couple of Australian Chinese relatives there too. Look up Tang + Rudd.
I could go on and on but I hope this is enough to provoke thought.
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‘I could go on and on but I hope this is enough to provoke thought.’
Australia’s workforce is controlled and managed in what the economists call a mixed economy.
The four regions concept is not fashionable, too unwieldy and expensive, nation states lving in harmony is the best model. Beijing will allow democracy to continue in these nation states.
All the countries in Africa will be given the opportunity to develop a greater middle class and encouraged to buy Chinese goods. Capitalism must always seek new markets or it will perish, I think it was in Karl’s manifesto.
No slaves in the new world order, no money in that, we have real automated robots to do boring human tasks.
‘All citizens will be equal but some (many associates) will be more equal than others?’
Its the way of the world, these glorified apes believe in hierarchy.
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BoM April rain forecast a dud.
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=5117
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It is difficult to produce a meaningful forecast when the staff members are fully occupied on homogenisation.
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Please Note: Channel 7 News tonight, Sunday;
Secret surveillance at the NSW Hunter Valley Bayswater Power Station (coal fired), ariel images of water vapour, has discovered that emissions are unacceptably high. The information has been sent to the NSW Government.
….. another blatant attack on our energy resources.
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I wonder if anyone can help … we’ve lost contact with my cousin, David Luffman, who was an editor / producer of wildlife documentaries on ABC and still, as far as we know, living in Australia. I’m pretty certain he’s retired now as there are no recent programme credits shown and asking ABC to get a message to him and following up with emails to them and their HR department has been a complete failure. Can’t find anything on facebook or other social media either.
We’re all getting a bit ‘long in the tooth’ now and and my sister Helen has a very strong feeling that she must (needs to) get in contact with David; we were all very close as children.
David has a lot of credits on past ABC progs – if anyone knows him or his contact details I would be very grateful if you could ask him to get in touch with his cousin Helen Carter (my sister) or myself, Roger in the UK – both our addresses and contact details are the same as when he was in the UK a few years ago.
Many Thanks for reading this and if you are able to help at all it would be really great. Jo, my apologies if this seems a misuse of Weekend Unthreaded, and I hope you will excuse this.
(ps If anyone does know him or manage to contact him and he has lost our contact details he can look up phone numbers for either of us against UK postcode SL4 4QQ – it covers both of our addresses)
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Have you tried contacting Evolve Films? They list your cousin in one of the films they made.
http://www.evolvefilms.com.au/contact.html
Mark Lamble is the Director of Photography at Evolve films. He is on facebook. Try facebook messaging him, if his email address does not work.
Does you cousin have a middle initial? Sometimes you get a good result searching for a name, with first name, middle initial, then last name all in quotes in a search engine.
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Is anyone out there enough of an expert to do a review of this for correctness.
It showed up on Facebook this morning. I’m doubtful of the advice about lithium ion batteries because what is described is all th problems with nickel metal hydride that I’ve fought with for years because I use them in my cordless mouse and keyboard.
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That’s pretty fair advice Roy.
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Bad advice. It is true that lithium batteries are stored for long periods best at less than 100 percent charge but in a phone they will not stay at 100 percent for very long. Charging with the phone turned off is also ridiculous. The phone does not get “confused” as is claimed. Both the battery and the phone have sophisticated battery management software and dedicated chips. I agree that for best battery life don’t go to very high levels of discharge on a regular basis. Best to keep the phone on charge whenever possible, eg when in your car or at home. I bet the author of that article believes in global warming as well.
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Gee! One says good advice and the other says bad.
I can fall back on some experience of my own which says first of all, the phone is never really off just because you turned it off. If the battery’s in it there’s always enough logic running so it can respond to the action that turns it on again. That may be a pretty small drain but it will run a battery dry in probably less time than you might think. The other thing I’m sure of is that no phone goes unused for long. So factors like shelf life of a charge don’t matter much if at all and you’ve no choice but to try to keep it charged at every good chance.
I know that the phone I bought in 2008 with a 1 A/Hr battery in it didn’t need a battery replacement until late 2015. It was charged all night every night regardless of the battery indication and on all day everyday whether in use or not. So the Li ion battery lives up to its billing as a reliable battery not very sensitive at all to how it’s used. Good monitoring of the battery charge current to keep heat controlled and avoid trouble is going to be there so let’s make use of it. The NiMh jobs don’t fare nearly so well. They discharge fast internally even when not in use whereas the li ion doesn’t discharge internally nearly as fast. But both seem to do it.
None of them lasts forever and worse, there’s no telling when it will happen, just a small flaw internally and bang it’s dead. And so it looks a bit futile to try to manage its life at the micro level.
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Lithium batteries are yet to place lead/acid batteries in conventional vehicles.
As Julius SM would say, “Why is it so?”
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Lead/acid batteries have yet to be used in phones. Why is it so? Well it’s got something to do with the scale of the problem.
The li ion battery hasn’t yet been mastered for high power demands. It can’t take the high charging rates demanded for vehicles without overheating and essentially blowing up. And I wouldn’t carry a lead acid battery around in my pocked even if you paid me to do it.
Last I heard Toyota had a Prius with li ion battery but I’ve heard no more about it. I just did a search and here’s a whole list of hits on the subject. So maybe they have finally mastered it. If anyone can I expect Toyota can.
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Even the Tesla model S still contains a standard Lead acid to run the 12V functions, horses for courses.
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I have been watching the presidential handover in France, and now, the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, is giving a speech, wasting about 10-15 minutes waffling about climate change, and how Macron needs to do something about it.
What was even more worrying, was that she readily mixed the very real problem of diesel particulate pollution (I am sure the air should not have a flavour!) with the “moral and social” obligation to cur “greenhouse gasses”.
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And they do it without even noticing the difference between real and imaginary problems. I see that kind of thing repeatedly, now even from Southern California Edison who supplies me with electricity, a commodity I pay for every month when the bill arrives. They are totally in step with California’s position about climate change yet I find it hard to believe they seriously believe the nonsense. How can well educated men and women, engineers, managers, people who should have a real grip on science, go on that way without at least asking some questions and finding out the answers don’t add up?
So it finally comes down to my receiving a letter from Edison a few days ago announcing my welcome to, “My Home Energy Report Program.” I don’t recall being told about such a program, much less signing up for it but I’m now apparently in it.
The letter’s biggest sin is a graph showing the April usage in kWh of the most efficient homes (like mine, based on square footage) in my area; the average usage of such homes and mine which of course is larger than the average. But it leaves out the one figure that could actually turn those numbers from just numbers into information from which I could determine how I stack up against the rest of the community, the kWh usage of the least efficient homes (like mine). And of course, assuming I gave a toot for what they think.
Clearly it’s an attempt to shame me into using less power (its other sin). It’s all justified by: 1) electricity is in short supply and roving blackouts on hot days… …blah, blah, blah; 2) Climate change.
It also flies in the face of the fact that it’s perfectly legal for me to use all the power I can pay for when the bill arrives and therefor also perfectly moral and ethical as well. And I expect they won’t have the nerve to limit my power usage by law, although this is California so who knows for sure. At what stop do they get off this train to economic ruin and leave us alone?
Since the letter conveniently contains a return address I’ve been working on a letter of reply that can let them know how much I’m dissatisfied with the whole affair, in fact insulted, given the legality of how much power I use and at the same time not let my anger dominate the letter.
It’s that last part that stumps me so far. How do you not get angry at being shamed into compliance with a plan that doesn’t even give you an objective standard by which you can judge what you’re doing? It’s all subjective. Once everyone who is “out of line” now has complied (assuming they do), what will stop them from just tightening the screws all over again? And the answer of course, is NOTHING WILL STOP THEM.
The state has a real electricity shortage on high demand days but the whole thing is conflated with the nonexistent problem of climate change. And we could start doing something about our shortage as early as tomorrow morning if we wanted to… …well that really means if Sacramento and their enablers like Tom Steyer really wanted to.
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I wonder if Macron will declare war on terrorism?
Hollande declared war on terrorism every 2nd month.
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Pro doom-mongerer Church unleashed last week:
This is good news. The precautionary principle is the riskiest mantra ever adopted, as it requires you to definitely incur a large cost in the present without any good reason to believe the other hypothetical future cost would have been larger.
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Climate science – comically
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/05/14/the-dilbert-sunday-comic-strip-hilariously-disses-climate-science-certainty/
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Great.
Thanks Ian.
Dave B
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“3,295,492 stinking giant fans won’t save us.”
Link at
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2017/05/we-dont-need-no-623.html#comments
Plus comments there
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Japanese rider wheelies for 500 km:
The enormity of this is all a bit hard to digest, but Japan’s Masaru Abe has just set the new world record for a continuous wheelie on a powered two-wheeler at an amazing 500.5322km. But he was still disappointed he fell short of his 600km target…
The new wheelie king, 33, set the record on a Yamaha four-stroke Jog scooter at the Kawaguchi Auto Race facility in Saitama, Japan, which smashed the previous record of 331.0195 set by trials rider Yasuyuki Kudo in 1991.
Amazing effort but not without sacrifices:
“That was the most pain I’ve ever felt. Both of my arms were numb from the pain and I had lost feeling in them. My vision was blurred… I was only partially conscious. I was completely dehydrated. I’d never experienced that before.”
I’d suggest a case of Mono but that’d be a wheelie bad diagnosis……
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HOW TO ECONOMICALLY COLLAPSE ANY COUNTRY ~ INCLUDING THE USA.
This is one area where we are way in front of the US, at our own demise. Socialism is deadly.
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Another example how socialism can destroy Western civilisation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_UJws5WpKY
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A very interesting article from Andrew Bolt today, and do not miss the Huffington Post link;
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/just-the-guy-to-run-the-turnbull-party/news-story/d0baa0b382ed0c7bd4b658efcaff4e64
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Excellent.
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“THE GOBAL WARMING HOAX IS DOOMED”
http://pickeringpost.com/story/the-gobal-warming-hoax-is-doomed/7138
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Climate change Dilbert comic.
http://dilbert.com/strip/2017-05-14
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Mann that was funny.
31
Latest thing blamed on Climate Change. Gestation diabetes as per a Canadian study, reported 847AM on their ABC radio 621 Melbourne.
22
‘Microsoft’s top lawyer is laying some of the blame for Friday’s massive cyberattack at the feet of the U.S. government.
‘Brad Smith criticized U.S. intelligence agencies, including the CIA and National Security Agency, for “stockpiling” software code that can be used by hackers. Cybersecurity experts say the unknown hackers who launched this weekend’s “ransomware” attacks used a vulnerability that was exposed in NSA documents leaked online.’
ABC News
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further detail on topic mentioned in DNA India piece comment #25:
15 May: LiveMint: Utpal Bhaskar: Renewable energy deals decline on falling solar power tariffs
Declining solar power tariffs are resulting in fewer renewable energy deals on concerns that discoms may not honour electricity offtake commitments for projects awarded at high tariffs
Deal makers and experts say that the proposed transactions for the solar projects with high tariffs are increasingly being put on a back burner in the backdrop of record low tariffs of Rs2.44 per unit recorded last week at Bhadla in Rajasthan. This is due to concerns over whether the electricity distribution companies (discoms) will honour their commitments for projects earlier awarded at high tariffs and not waver on signing power purchase agreements (PPAs).
“Recent spate of sub Rs3/ unit price of solar energy has created significant uncertainty in the transaction space of Indian power industry. Leave aside assets that don’t have PPAs; investors are increasingly getting cagey about buying assets, solar or thermal, with firm offtake agreements specially those struck at higher tariffs. There are concerns on whether discoms will honour the PPA terms or force generators to reconsider the offered tariff. Even if the PPAs are honoured, in the present scenario of stagnant demand and low PLFs (plant load factors), these assets will find themselves placed lower on the dispatch merit order thereby reducing its overall attractiveness,” said Abhishek Poddar, a partner at consulting firm A.T. Kearney Ltd…
It has been some time since a large deal has taken place in the Indian green energy space…READ ALL
http://www.livemint.com/Industry/QCxeeR7kNwB1cTlCh90CdN/Renewable-energy-deals-decline-on-falling-solar-power-tariff.html
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can’t be bothered excerpting either piece:
14 May: AFR: Mark Abernethy: Policy guidance needed for renewables
http://www.afr.com/news/special-reports/energy-future-of-australia/policy-guidance-needed-for-renewables-20170511-gw2vqf
15 May: Australian: Josh Frydenberg: John Howard is right: recklessness and states’ gas bans fed energy crisis
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/john-howard-is-right-recklessness-and-states-gas-bans-fed-energy-crisis/news-story/309922ce34d6dccc099910abe96988c7
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Not much in the news that I have seen about the strike and lockout at Loy Yang A.
On anero.id this morning though they all seem to be flat out. As are TVPS and TVPP.
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In case you don’t check for new posts above …
Character is revealed in moments of truth.
The winning ticket GILLARD drew from a silver ice bucket for a $5650 three-month lease on a Mercedes-Benz C-Class Cabriolet C200 was her own.
Looking around the room as if she were wondering whether she should accept the prize……
…….the former PM got a “get-out-of-jail card” from Women of Melbourne emcee Jen Hansen.
The former PM was told she deserved it.
“You’ve done so much for this country,” Hansen gushed.
“I’ve spent a lot of my life drawing ALP raffles where generally there wasn’t a prize and if you did happen to win the meat tray you had to give it back or you would have been torn limb from limb,” said the former Labor leader. “So, thank you very much.”
The former Prime Minister takes over as Beyond Blue chair on July 1.
[Michael Smith News website]
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14 May: NBC Boston: Michael Page: Swirling Controversy: Celebration, Concern Over Offshore Wind Power
“We, the smallest town in the smallest state in the United States, have the very first offshore wind farm and we should be so proud,” Nancy Dodge of the Block Island Power Company Board said earlier this month
Deepwater Wind is just one of several companies envisioning hundreds of turbines off the Massachusetts coast, as Governor Charlie Baker asks utilities to incorporate offshore wind power into the state’s grid over the next two decades.
“We’re talking about projects that would be located 20 miles from the south coast of Massachusetts and maybe 15-16-17 miles from the closest point of the Vineyard or Nantucket,” Grybowski, the CEO of Deepwater Wind, adds.
At that distance, he says, the turbines will only be visible from land “if someone is looking for them.”
That’s a key point Deepwater Wind reiterated several times, well aware of the fierce opposition Cape Wind has faced for years…
“I can’t even get a mowing permit from Coastal faster than they got the permits to put that wind farm in,” she adds, referring to the Rhode Island Coastal Resources Management Council.
Opponents of the project, who overall still support a move to clean energy sources, point to political connections between Rhode Island and Deepwater Wind’s Chief Executive Officer as one possible reason for what they call a “fast track”…
Jeffrey Grybowski served as Chief of Staff to former Rhode Island Governor Donald Carcieri. He left his post just before the administration, in 2008, named Deepwater Wind Rhode Island’s preferred developer of offshore wind power. By that time Grybowski was practicing corporate law at a firm representing Deepwater Wind. Grybowski later joined Deepwater in 2010…
Initially, Deepwater Wind told residents on Block Island that they’d save 40% on electricity bills with the switch to wind.
Now officials say the savings may be closer to 25%. That would save an average consumer about $30 per month.
Balser isn’t even convinced of that, saying, “I will not save any money, and neither will anyone else.”…
An unexpected price increase of the undersea cables bringing energy from the turbines to land accounts for some of the lost savings…
The other issue is the high price of power generated…
But project officials say comparing the future price of offshore wind to the current average is misleading, since it too will increase with time, especially as coal and nuclear plants are decommissioned…
http://www.nbcboston.com/news/local/Block-Island-RI-Switches-to-Wind-Power-422215963.html
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13 May: Bloomberg: Adam Williams: Even Clean Energy Has Its Little Oil Spills
Wind turbines were planted along a strip of Mexico’s southern coast to make the country’s power industry cleaner. Now they’re spilling oil.
In the town of Juchitan last month, a clean-up was under way around a generator owned by Electricite de France. Workers wearing goggles and masks were scrubbing off a copper-colored lubricant that dripped down from the turbine…
Flor, who owns the land where the turbine is sited and rents it to EDF, said she arrived on the scene after being alerted by a neighbor. “The stench was terrible, like a sort of burned fuel or ammonia,” she said, asking not to be identified by her surname out of concern over reprisals. “The trees were glistening with oil.” Similar problems have been reported all along the Tehuantepec isthmus, one of the western hemisphere’s windiest places.
While the leaks are limited in scope and probably pose no immediate health risk, they look bad — and that’s yet another headache for Mexico’s energy reformers, who are seeking to make more use of renewable sources as state monopolies open up to private capital. The plan has succeeded in attracting global investment, and wind power is getting its share, with more than $6.9 billion already pledged. But it’s also stirring up all kinds of local opposition, which could soon rebound against President Enrique Pena Nieto’s governing party at the ballot-box…
‘Vicious’ winds
Gas-price hikes in January sparked nationwide protests and looting…
Spain’s Acciona SA, which encountered similar problems at its installations nearby, said the leaks are a consequence of the same extreme weather that attracted the industry to the isthmus.
Winds “can be vicious” for as much as half the year, said Miguel Angel Alonso Rubio, head of Acciona’s Mexican unit. The turbines use lubricating oil that can leak if upkeep is insufficient or gears malfunction. “During those six months of intense winds, we are unable to clean the leaks,” Alonso said. “We prefer to have the machine dirty than an employee in an accident.”
Gamesa Corp Tecnologica SA, which made the EDF turbines used at the Juchitan wind park, said oil leaks occur with “relative frequency” and operators are equipped with “spill kits” to deal with them…
“You might not think it’s that big a deal for a little bit of oil to end up in the land,” said Bettina Cruz, an activist, at her home in Juchitan. “But there are nearly 2,000 turbines here now and hundreds more are planned in the next few years. The leaks will add up. Right into the land we use for water and food.”…
Much of the power produced by the wind turbines is sent to Mexico’s biggest companies, like Cemex SAB and Wal-Mart’s Mexico branch, known as Walmex, which get tax incentives in return for using renewable energy…
“Support is waning,” (Marcelino Nolasco, coordinator of the Tepeyac Human Rights Center in Oaxaca) said. “And with every new turbine, it generates more tension.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-12/wind-power-pollution-turbine-oil-seeps-into-the-land-in-mexico
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“climate change” leader China! lol.
Rosen’s piece is CAGW propaganda, apart from the following:
10 May: National Geographic: As the World Cuts Back on Coal, a Growing Appetite in Africa
New coal plants in Africa are largely being paid for by China and developed countries that are turning away from the technology at home. Here’s why.
By Jonathan W. Rosen
According to data compiled by CoalSwarm, an industry watchdog, more than 100 coal-generating units with a combined capacity of 42.5 gigawatts are in various stages of planning or development in 11 African countries outside of South Africa—more than eight times the region’s existing coal capacity. Nearly all are fueled by foreign investment, and roughly half are being financed by the world’s largest coal emitter: China…
POWERING DEVELOPMENT
Africa’s embrace of coal is in part the result of its acute shortage of power. Although the continent’s economy has doubled in size since 2000, more than two thirds of residents south of the Sahara still live without electricity and most states lack the grid capacity to drive the expansion of job-creating industries.
The International Energy Agency projects the region’s electricity demand to triple by 2040, ***with roughly half of new capacity coming from renewables. Yet coal-fired plants, which generate 41 percent of the world’s electricity today, remain attractive because coal is relatively cheap and their operation isn’t subject to the whims of nature—unlike solar, wind, or hydro…
http://www.nationalgeographic.com.au/nature/as-the-world-cuts-back-on-coal-a-growing-appetite-in-africa.aspx
***roughly half of new capacity coming from renewables! doubt it.
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China’s efforts are just a bit smarter for Africans than Oh Bummer’s grand plan to give each villager a solar panel so they could charge their mobile ‘phones.
That man was an “A” grade dill.
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15 May: Australian: Joe Kelly: NSW Minerals Council pushes for more funding for clean coal technologies
The mining sector is pushing for more funding for the development of clean coal technologies as Westpac is challenged over whether its climate change policy would force major coal-fired power stations and mines into banking overseas.
The NSW Minerals Council will reveal today that it is seeking a 12-month ban on all new red-tape costs, a boost for exploration investment and the streamlining of all existing fees and levies.
It is also arguing for the state government to examine how a High Efficiency Low Emissions (HELE) coal-fired plant could help secure a reliable electricity network…
The push for a greater focus on coal-fired power generation and mining exploration came as conservative think-tank, the Institute of Public Affairs, attacked Westpac over its new climate change policy in a research brief…
Brett Hogan, Director of Resarch at the IPA, warned that, if the Westpac climate policy was adopted by all financial institutions and applied to current projects, “most of Australia’s current coal-fired power generators and energy coal export mines would need to bank overseas.”
“This is economic lunacy,” he said. “If Australia’s four major banks choose to not fund new coal-fired power, there are a number of other institutions in Asia, Europe and the Americas that would snap up the opportunity. Activists are bullying our banks into economic self-harm.”
The IPA brief notes that 1015 supercritical or ultra-supercritical coal generators are already in operation worldwide and a further 1231 are planned while coal will continue to be the world’s leading source of electricity in 2040 — even if countries adhered to their Paris climate targets.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/nsw-minerals-council-pushes-for-more-funding-for-clean-coal-technologies/news-story/1a37d858e03cd20432b3ab45863d2b97
14 May: TelegraphIndia: Bigger private play in coal
(PTI): The government is exploring the possibility of putting under the hammer around seven to eight more coal blocks for commercial mining by private players, taking the total number of mines to be auctioned to up to 12…
India has climbed up to the twenty-sixth position in World Bank’s electricity accessibility ranking in the current year from the 99th spot in 2014, Goyal said. “Our ranking has improved to 26 position from 99,” he said…
https://www.telegraphindia.com/1170515/jsp/business/story_151629.jsp
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15 May: Reuters: China April coal output up 9.9 percent year-on-year at 294.5 million tons: stats bureau
by Hallie Gu and Josephine Mason
It is the second straight month that output has registered a year-on-year increase as mines have scrambled to reverse the government-enforced cuts last year to take advantage of soaring prices…
For the first four months of the year, coal production rose 2.5 percent to 1.11 billion tonnes, data showed…
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-economy-coal-output-idUSKCN18B0C9
more FakeNews from National Geographic:
15 May: National Geographic: Beth Gardner: Three Reasons to Believe in China’s Renewable Energy Boom
It has atrocious air pollution. It fears climate change. And it wants to be a “manufacturing monster” in renewables too.
Official figures can be unreliable, but they show that coal consumption, the main driver of China’s carbon emissions, fell in 2016 for the third straight year. And because China has clearly decided that cutting coal use—the fuel powers much of its heavy industry as well as providing electricity— is in its own interest, it’s a trend that’s likely to continue even as the United States, under President Trump, abandons Obama’s climate agenda.
Because China accounts for half the world’s coal consumption, that’s good news not just for the health of those who must breathe its air, but also for the wider effort to check runaway global warming…
http://www.nationalgeographic.com.au/nature/three-reasons-to-believe-in-chinas-renewable-energy-boom.aspx
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***gone viral in green circles! anyone taking bets?
15 May: AFR: UK Telegraph: Petrol cars will vanish in 8 years, says US report from Stanford economist
by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
No more petrol or diesel cars, buses, or trucks will be sold anywhere in the world within eight years. The entire market for land transport will switch to electrification, leading to a collapse of oil prices and the demise of the petroleum industry as we have known it for a century.
This is the futuristic forecast by Stanford University economist Tony Seba. The professor’s report, with the deceptively bland title Rethinking Transportation 2020-2030, has ***gone viral in green circles and is causing spasms of anxiety in the established industries.
Mr Seba’s premise is that people will stop driving altogether…
Only nostalgics will cling to the old habit of car ownership. The rest will adapt to vehicles on demand…
Cities will ban human drivers once the data confirms how dangerous they can be behind a wheel. This will spread to suburbs, and then beyond…
The shift, according to Mr Seba, is driven by technology, not climate policies…
“Global oil demand will peak at 100 million barrels per day by 2020, dropping to 70 million by 2030.”…
These are all large claims, though familiar those on the cutting edge of energy technology. While the professor’s timing may be off by a few years, there is little doubt about the general direction…
http://www.afr.com/business/energy/oil/petrol-cars-will-vanish-in-8-years-says-us-report-from-stanford-economist-20170514-gw4r0u
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Thank you Pat for one good laugh today 🙂
I just wonder at what stage we need to invest in a horse and cart as we live well out of town and need to visit occasionally for shopping, haircuts, medical appointments? I expect we’ll be told these facilities are no longer available to country bumpkins like us!
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It’s a bright future for you Annie as a regional resident, as well as the fresh air and tranquility you’ll have a choice in transport, a semi autonomous electric vehicle that can be self driven around the back country roads and switched to full autopilot when visiting built up areas or you can stick with your old gas guzzler that will get you from home to the city limits and no further, of course as well as the high fuel and maintenance cost of owning an internal combustion engine, your licence fee will be excessive and your insurance company will take full advantage that it’s not self driving and therefore charge you an arm and a leg to keep it on the road.
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“These are all large claims, though familiar those on the cutting edge of energy technology. While the professor’s timing may be off by a few years, there is little doubt about the general direction…”
South Australia is on the cutting edge of energy technology. I can’t imagine why their economy is in the toilet and why they can’t build a canoe. Or maybe their timing, like the professor’s, may be a little off.
Or maybe they need Elon the Musik Man to lend them his professional cheer squad: you know, all those fresh-faced youths who’ve struggled since acting school but who have really mastered the mass high-five. Why, with enough cheering and high-fiving those canoes will practically make themselves.
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Under the direction of the left’s urban voters.. .. ..
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should have excerpted Ambrose Evans-Pritchard’s finale:
“Whole countries will spin into crisis. The world’s geopolitical order will be reshaped almost overnight. But humanity as a whole should enjoy an enormous ***welfare gain.”
***is he hinting at a Universal Basic Income, which is being pushed in all kinds of odd places, including on local ABC radio last nite?
15 Apr: Australian: Richard King: Utopia for Realists: And How We Can Get There: 21st century capitalism
In Utopia for Realists, Dutch author Rutger Bregman takes a pragmatic attitude. In fact, his utopia is barely one at all if by ‘‘utopia’’ we mean an alternative society along the lines of Thomas More’s island. It is far more in the spirit of Charles Fourier and Marquis de Condorcet, ‘‘utopian’’ writers who sought to harness reason and science in the cause of an improved and improving polity. It asks us to think practically about the problems we face and how our society might be redesigned to ameliorate them.
Bregman’s is not a utopia based on work. Like Paul Mason in Postcapitalism, he understands that increasing automation is unlikely to create a new stratum of labour thick enough to absorb the unemployed and underemployed displaced by robots.
Indeed the coming jobocalypse underwrites two of his main recommendations: a universal basic income and a radically shortened working week. Neither is a new idea: the notion of a basic income goes back to Thomas More himself. But for Bregman, as for others, both are newly relevant.
On universal basic income, a scheme whereby all citizens would receive an unconditional flat-rate sum from the state, he takes his lead from Guy Standing (The Precariat) in demonstrating that ‘‘free money’’ is not a gateway to fecklessness, as economic ‘‘rationalists’’ are apt to argue, but a sure way to alleviate poverty and encourage ‘‘enterprise’’ (where enterprise is defined in broader terms than simply the ability to make money)…
In any case, Bregman makes a number of recommendations, including a legal reduction to the working week and a tax regime pushing people towards more socially important work — away from banking, say, and ***into research…
And yet Bregman seems unwilling to concede that stagnating growth, inequality and debt add up to a crisis of capitalism, not merely a crisis within it.
He quotes Marx and Engels to the effect that capitalism has produced wonders to compare with the pyramids. But theirs was an essentially tragic register that recognised capitalism, in liberating us from ‘‘rural idiocy’’, also brought unique problems of its own, as well as insuperable contradictions that would do for it in the long term.
Bregman seems to think capitalism merely has to get back on track: ‘‘What makes all this especially shocking is that it’s happening in a capitalist system, a system founded on capitalist values like efficiency and productivity.’’
But capitalism isn’t founded on those things; it’s founded on private property and profit — the very things driving the crisis. Any prescription that doesn’t acknowledge this upfront is bound to devolve into a program of piecemeal reform.
Perhaps, then, Utopia for Realists is insufficiently realistic, or insufficiently utopian, or both. It is nonetheless a step in the right direction, and full of interesting material.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/arts/review/utopia-for-realists-and-how-we-can-get-there-21st-century-capitalism/news-story/99ca7c3ffc5bc6aab81404d4ec021eee
9 May: Rolling Stone: Matt Taibbi Free Lunch for Everyone
Can Americans handle the new book ‘Utopia for Realists’?
The first thing you notice about Utopia for Realists, the new book that argues that money should be free and a 15-hour work week sounds about right, is its tone. Writer Rutger Bregman is cheerful, optimistic, imaginative, welcoming, funny and economical – the opposite of most of our political books, which tend to be fulminating, accusatory, combative and narrow-minded, and all of these things across far too many pages…
Bregman’s basic ideas are pretty simple. He thinks (and many scientists agree with him) that if you give people a basic income with no strings attached, they will make better decisions, work more, cost the state less in the areas of things like health care and incarceration, and be happier and feel less humiliated, scared, and insecure…
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/taibbi-free-lunch-for-everyone-w481396
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He is a bit optimistic about human nature. There are plenty who look on their ‘free money’ (i.e. benefits handouts) as their absolute right and to be frittered on beer, ciggies, gambling, at the expense of the people who do work and pay taxes. Some of these people have no intention of ever working…see some of the examples from the UK, like the mother with about 13 offspring fathered by an assortment of different men.
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Free money is like free energy – doesn’t work. It’s amazing to see how many people think they can build over unity devices.
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When collectivism comes back in a new disguise it takes a while before one can pick up that old 1930s stink behind the stirring perfumes of promise and novelty.
We already have a welfare system, one that I believe in. If it is necessary to adapt it to new social circumstances, that adaptation can happen flexibly when the circumstances come about. The danger of intellectuals and “living national treasures” is that they alway claim to know the new circumstances well in advance.
And intellectuals and “living national treasures” have this terrifying tendency to get things wrong in direct proportion to their certainty. They starve the present with debt and waste while they litter the future with white elephants.
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An ongoing slog-fest on Scott Adams site about his Dilbert comic strip yesterday. It’s worth a visit if only for the high quality of some of the comments.
http://dilbert.com/strip/2017-05-14
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Around that area
“The Epistemology of Tyranny
Science and scientism are superficially similar but epistemic opposites.”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/05/15/monday-mirthiness-dilbert-gets-mann-handled/comment-page-1/#comment-2503288
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Peta Credlin is saying that the craven Liberals want to dump Turnbull now, to save their seats. That is their only motivation.
The ones who were elected in Abbott’s landslide were the very ones who voted him out and lost their seats. Now their friends are desperate. While Turnbull pretends to be a conservative and suppporters argue he is just moving to the left, he is the ultimate Labor Prime Minister, without the Unions. He is more Green than the Greens.
However if Abbott does get back in, the thing he could do with popular support is repeal the RET. Electricity prices would plummet overnight. It would not affect taxes or government receipts, but this is bigger at $6Bn a year in public taxation than the $6Billion over 4 years to the banks. It would make life cheaper for everyone, especially the poor who need the same amount of energy but cannot afford it and get no assistance. It would dramatically improve the prospects of saving major industries and jobs, from Whyalla to Portland to Port Pirie to Newcastle. It would make windmill operators buy their own windmills and people buying solar panels to pay for their own ‘free’ electricity.
If Abbott does not do it, the greatest carbon tax in the world will kill our country. 18c kw/hr for the right to buy electricity from our own established power plants and this paid to overseas parties who cannot understand the windfall. Repeal the RET because it does n’t even make sense. More spent in six months than the Pink Batts disaster. Bigger than Gonski. Bigger than the bank smash and grab raid by Malcolm and Morrison.
You can tell me I’m dreaming, but if Abbott gets back in, he has a short list of things he can do to make a difference. The Liberals brought in the RET. They can remove it.
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Plus all the other things Abbott could do without permission
– get out of the Paris COP21 deal
– stop the gifts overseas for climate crooks when we cannot pay our own bills and we are borrowing $50 million a month
– undo the state lockup on gas exploration where possible. Federal laws override state laws even if mining is a State area
– merge the SBS/ABC and save hundreds of millions
– cut the CSIRO budget for Climate Change and Ocean Acidification. Hundreds of people doing the job of the BOM and the oceans are not acid.
– cut the Green tape stopping the Adani mine. Get Australia moving.
– fix our relations with the US after Turnbull’s shirtfront of the new President
– get out of the useless people swap with Nauru and let Trump out of a bad deal
But nothing will restore household finances faster than removing the RET!
Even the Clean Energy Regulator reckons the RET is 6% of every houshold budget, but that is just at wholesale. At the retail prices people pay, the RET is 12% of the household budget, no exemptions for anyone, rich or poor. We also should not have to pay people who have too much electricity at lunch time or pay for windmill power we do not want.
Then the states can stop paying more billions in secret support for overseas operators to keep our factories going, extortion money to stop the collapse of major cities. They can spend the money on education without Gonski and find a way to get more than 6% of school students studying science and not learning to say sorry to everyone.
Still dreaming.
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He is the Chairman for Goldman Sachs – i.e. crony capitalism. But he does appear to be a Labor PM.
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Former Liberal PM John Howard said a few days ago that he is worried about the energy crisis and that the RET should never have been raised from 2 per cent.
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Also on the unbelievable list, Womens’ activist Gloria Steinem is now saying the Global Warming is caused by lack of abortions. In her words ‘forced childbirth’. Is there nothing slightly more CO2 cannot do and that itself is now caused by forced childbirth?
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Maybe she meant if only certain fr**dsters had not been born?
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NEW BARCALDINE SOLAR PLANT
There’s been much fanfare about the new SOLAR plant in Barcaldine, Queensland.
However, what’s becoming very clear is that our taxes are buying very expensive lemons.
It’s no wonder that Renewable Energy gets big ticks from Bankers and Investment Fund Managers as these projects are just big money-go-rounds at the Australian Taxpayers’ expense.
There’s been much fanfare about the new SOLAR plant in Barcaldine, Queensland.
This 20MW (be still my beating heart! Remember we’ve just shut down 1,400MW of COAL fired power in Victoria) SOLAR plant was much heralded as “feeding power into the grid” in mid-December 2016 and was “expected to be fully operational by end-March 2017.
Barcaldine has been added to the Aneroid Energy site .
March was a bit of a slow ramp up to 80% of installed capacity – averaging about 50%IC.
April saw some days to 100% IC but mostly around 90%.
May (to mid-Month) has been 60-90% IC – averaging about 75% Installed Capacity. There was even 1 day over 18MW.
THE COST
Barcaldine was chosen as it’s “an ideal site for solar because of its abundant sunshine”. In addition the proximity to the existing distribution network lessens the overall cost.
The hyperbole continues: “The project demonstrated the continued falling costs in developing and operating large scale solar projects in Australia” (Mills Oatley – who recently organised the sale of the project).
But the 20MW comes at a cost of AUD70 Million – that AUD3.5 Million per installed MW.
Your Taxes at work: AUD22.8 Million from ARENA (Aust Renewable Energy Authority) and AUD20 Million in project funding from CEFC (Clean Energy Finance Corporation).
NOTE: The AUD3.5 Million per MW is the same cost as building a HELE (High Efficiency Low Emission) COAL fired power plant. EXCEPT the HELE Plant would provide nameplate power 24/7/365 – not just when the sun shines.
THE SOLAR PLANT
The plant covers 90 ha and has 78,000 solar modules. Although its capacity is often quoted as 25 MW (DC) – in Australian terms that’s 20 MW (AC). It’s reportedly going to produce 53,500 MWhr of energy pa. This is reportedly enough power for 10,000 homes. It has single-axis tracking technology which will give more hours of power generation. It reportedly MAY have battery storage in the future. There is obviously some storage as it often produces 1-2MW during the night.
SINCE COMMISSIONING
In March 2017, before Barcaldine reached nameplate capacity, it was announced at the official opening that the SOLAR plant was to be expanded to 40MW.
In April 2017, Elecnor SA, announced that it had on-sold the plant to an Australian Investment Company owned by the British firm Foresight for AUD33.4 Million.
Elecnor SA, a Spanish Engineering & Construction company had done its job of promotion, development, construction and start-up. It also had the benefit of the ARENA grant while the CEFC finance could be passed to others.
Equity finance for Foresight was provided by KDB Infrastructure Investment Asset Management (Sth Korea) and Hanwha Energy (China).
SOLAR PLANTS IN 2017
Barcaldine is just 1 of 12 plants to be built with ARENA/CEFC funds in 2017. 6 in Queensland, 5 in NSW and 1 in WA.
God save us from such waste of tax-payers money.
SUMMARY
During May 2017 we’ve seen the plant show the normal characteristics of SOLAR plants – UNRELIABLE and INTERMITTENT power. Power sustained for some period of time at around 16 MW (80% IC) but only peaking above that level.
REMEMBER – the plant was expected to be “fully operational” by end March 2017.
That’s what you get for your AUD70 Million.
Say goodbye to the AUD22.8 Million Fed Govt grant – Spanish Coy Elecnor SA has already pocketed that.
There is still the AUD20 Million Fed Govt loan $$s to be repaid but UK Investors and the Sth Korean and Chinese financiers won’t miss out as the “consumers will always pay”!
Malcolm Turnbull well understands the benefits of this type of project to his friends at finance houses such as Goldman Sachs.
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Shortly after the Keating Labor government lost office in 1996 a former Finance Department senior executive, Dr.Des Moore, wrote a book about his experiences, I now forget the title of that book. However one part described what he referred to as “money laundering” of taxpayer’s monies via government grants to unions that over 13-years of Labor government was almost $100 million in total. He wrote that the unions donated monies to their Labor Party directly and by supporting Labor election campaigns with union advertising.
Subsidies directed to renewable energy target projects also looks like money laundering of taxpayer’s monies with electricity consumer fleecing too via far higher electricity bills than should be necessary.
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Does anyone know if Steve Mcintyre is still alive??
He has posted nothing that I can find since November last year.
Mick
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New Intriguing Questions About Wikileaks and Democratic Committee:
http://www.wnd.com/2017/05/dead-dnc-staffer-had-contact-with-wikileaks/
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Its so easy to dismiss people with a relative point of view , call me an old drunk if it makes you feel better , but do you not understand , that when Constantine came to the throne , he had to pacify an empire and get them to create a feudal system that lasted a thousand years , what is the difference between the councils of Nicea and the councils of Paris , when they can ask Christians to be stewards of the earth
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