The obvious headline:
“Worst drought in history was 100 years ago, nothing to do with CO2”
The Carbophobic headline:
Drought of 1891 to 1903 reconstructed shows today’s conditions likely to have more devastating effects
Indoctrinated ABC copy-writers can’t see anything other than future doom and a chance to advertise the government religion. Figure that the Australian GDP per capita is 13 times larger now than in 1900. We have phones, planes, antibiotics, air-conditioning, satellites, and super computers, yet somehow we wouldn’t cope as well if the drought hit now?
It’s great, for a change, to see the ABC reporting on historic Australian extremes, and the BOM researching our amazing documentary history, shame they miss the bleeding obvious.
By Nikolai Beilharz, ABC Enviro-propaganda Unit.
A reconstruction of the Federation drought has found that if it were to occur again today, its effects would likely be even more devastating in some areas of the country.
The ‘once in a century drought’, which went from 1891 to 1903, caused an ecosystem collapse affecting more than a third of the country. The drought was one of the world’s worst recorded ‘megadroughts’, which at its peak saw much of the country get less than 40 per cent of its annual rainfall, with 1902 the driest year on record.
Isn’t “global warming” meant to increase rainfall?
Panic, Australian rainfall has increased since 1900.
Source: Bureau of Meteorology
An increase in rain across the year and the nation doesn’t prove droughts will be lower, but it’s surely relevant. Figure how it makes the risk of a long widespread drought worse?
If the ABC represented the taxpayers, they would train staff to ask reasonable questions. Beilharz would have pressed the BOM to mention long term rainfall and drought trends, he would have pointed out that we are vastly better equipped to deal with any climate extreme, and he also would have asked about studies of previous megadroughts. Instead he’s a paid parrot.
Megadroughts have always occurred in Australia and we are lucky the weather this century has been so kind.
[The Vance et al 2014] study of Law Dome Ice cores tells us that droughts are common in Australia, and that there appears to be eight mega-droughts over the last thousand years, including one that lasted a whopping 39 years from 1174- 1212AD. By their reckoning the 12th Century in Australia was a shocker with 80% of it spent in drought conditions. Things weren’t so bad from 1260 – 1860, at least, as far as they can tell. The researchers are convinced theirs is the first millennial-length Australian drought record.
The ABC even reported on the 39 year megadrought at the time. Of course, it didn’t show our climate was worse without “CO2” — it only mattered for water management policies.
One day maybe the ABC and BOM will serve the nation instead of themselves. But not while Big-Government funds them both, and the voters get no accountability. A “tick a box” option on our tax returns would change that — these agencies would need to impress the people instead of the politicians.
Give us a real free market please. Who would buy this propaganda if they had a choice?
REFERENCE
Vance et al, Interdecadal Pacifi c variability and eastern Australian mega-droughts over the last millennium (2014) American Geophysical Union, doi: 10.1002/2014GL062447
ABC just churns it out. they must earn bonuses for CAGW output or something. green groups, who lost the federal election by miles, continue to get all the attention:
17 Jul: ABC: Green groups accuse Chevron of ‘deliberate mismanagement’ of its own carbon storage project
ABC Science By environment reporter Nick Kilvert
Chevron has “deliberately mismanaged” its carbon sequestration project at the Gorgon gas facility in Western Australia in order to avoid its environmental commitments, a WA conservation group has alleged.
The carbon sequestration facility was taxpayer funded to the tune of $60 million under the Low Emissions Technology Development fund, and supposed to begin operation just after the plant began processing gas in 2016.
However a series of technical issues has prevented that from happening…
This delayed licence application is proof the company never intended to begin sequestering carbon in 2016, said Conservation Council of Western Australia (CCWA) spokesperson Piers Verstegen…
But the CCWA aren’t the only ones sceptical of Gorgon’s timeline for sequestration.
Richie Merzian from the Australia Institute said the emissions baselines that Chevron has negotiated for the Gorgon project don’t take into account successful CO2 sequestration…
An EPA report from 2006 recommended the facility not go ahead…
Around this period, Chevron brought a representative out from the US who made promises that the company have since broken, ***Professor (Peter Newman of Curtin University) said.
“They brought out their big, high-flying pinch-hitter. His name was Chuck, that’s all I remember, Chuck from Houston, and boy did he chuck his weight around,” he said.
“He was very, very strong, and at the end of that he walked home having achieved a very good result for Chevron and they got what they wanted.”…
https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2019-07-17/chevron-gorgon-gas-sequestration-mismanagement/11309076
***Professor Peter Newman:
AUDIO: 6min 21sec: 8 Oct 2018: ABC PM: Australia’s coal devotion will maroon us fiscally: Peter Newman
By Linda Mottram
Scientists from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) say there is a monumental job to be done to limit global warming to well under two degrees Celsius.
The panel’s latest report says rapid and far-reaching infrastructure changes will be needed in energy, land use, urban design, transportation and engineering.
***Peter Newman, professor of sustainability at Curtin University and lead author for transport in the IPCC report, says that coal is no longer cost-effective.
He says householders and small industry worldwide are leading changes in energy supply through renewables, but that large industry and the massive international freight industry – the regulatory oversight of which is secretive and ambiguous – is doing nothing of real significance.
TRANSCRIPT:
PETER NEWMAN, PROFESSOR OF SUSTAINABILITY, CURTIN UNIVERSITY: Globally, there is an extraordinary disruption occurring to the electricity system because of solar and wind and batteries, which are growing so fast.
It’s very hard for anyone to keep up with it.
So, we’re now in a position where you can see very quickly that coal will phase out from power, because it’s just not appropriate or cost effective…
For example, in Perth, we’re doing community batteries that will enable people with PVs on their rooftop, to share into a system that enables a local resilient kind of system to emerge.
The other good news is that the EVs – electric vehicles are taking off, so in the transport urban kind of area, there’s quite a few zero carbon developments occurring…
LINDA MOTTRAM: The IPCC report is essentially saying it’s life and death time – sure there are achievements but as well as the lagging sectors, there are lagging governments, and actively hostile governments. The United States for example, particularly hostile.
Some say it’s too late. Is it too late?
PETER NEWMAN: The modelling is showing we really do have to get to a much more significant reduction in our greenhouse gases, or else there will be impacts that are going to disturb the economy, they’re going to disturb communities – and certainly civilisation is under threat unless we get going seriously…
LINDA MOTTRAM: And just finally, the Australian government, the deputy Prime Minister as “Some sort of report,” as he argued again that coal will last Australia many, many decades, indeed.
PETER NEWMAN: Oh, look, it’s playing politics, it’s not making any sense in terms of greenhouse gases, but it’s also not making any sense in terms of the economy. That is clearly not going to happen, and if we don’t face up to the fact that coal is phasing out, then we’re just going to be blind, and we are going to suffer economically because investments will be made that will be stranded.
It is not a sensible approach. Nowhere in the world is coal going to happen in any kind of way like it has in the past. We now have a new set of technologies, a new approach to making energy and making economies work based around renewables.
And it’s working! We need to get into it seriously…
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/pm/australias-coal-devotion-wil-maroon-us-fiscally-peter-newman/10352284
191
Bring on the Climate Nuremberg trials……the gaols will be overflowing…..
150
What a load of nonsense! Professor Peter Newman?
At 73 a lifetime dedicated to environmental matters and he still does not make sense. Is Australia a bolt hole for this sort of activist?
“The modelling is showing we really do have to get to a much more significant reduction in our greenhouse gases”.
What modelling? Mankind has no control over either Greenhouse gas (CO2 or CH4) regardless of whether they are even significant, apart from water. There is almost no fossil fuel CO2 or CH4 in the air, but that’s real science, not make believe.
261
I make an exception for Dr. Murry Selby, who was fired when Tim Flannery and friends realised he was a real scientist.
Otherwise this is all bumpf, from a bumpf generator (Bumpf: The word bumf or bumpf refers to obvious or blatant propaganda, usually issued by a government, an organization or a large company, especially when you disagree with the content.
190
I have to ask Tdef that within the profession of Scientists is there an actual standard one has to meet to become eligible for employment?
As a qualified tradesman I have to meet a certain level of skill and knowledge to 1.- obtain employment at an official Australian Standard. 2.- Receive or negotiate a level of pay or contract relevant to that level.
If I was to advise, supervise or construct something that failed in a structure and it was proven to be of my own doing I would personally be held accountable for any cost, time lost, injury or my employment with that company.
For those that don’t believe or haven’t experienced this I’ve seen,
– Penalties applied to a contractors pay for not meeting a deadline.
– Loss of employment for reading a drawing wrong costing time, money and materials.
– An appearance at the Coroners court due to a failed join and wrong safety procedure.
– Getting fired for falsely claiming proficiency in a type of welding.
If like the many sciences (not theoretical) a tradesman has to have good knowledge of the basics in their area of expertise then how is a scientist allowed to teach others while failing in knowing or understanding the basics or even the fundamentals of the scientific method?
211
But Yonnie
Isn’t it tradesmen who build those
Inflammable high rises
With all that insulation cladding.
Or those buildings in Sydney which have developed cracks ?
And have been evacuated ?
63
Bill you’d know the saying ‘s&$t flows downhill” on a large development the decisions on sourcing materials would come from higher up and the labour used would do their job, you might be surprised how many contractors turned the work down with concerns over products used.
My analogy was specifically welding/structural and while there are good and bad tradesmen the majority are proficient in their work, there’s also the Trade Union factor in this country when workers will do what they’re told by their Union bosses.
140
Agree Yonnie !
🙂
50
Agreed. Builders work with the materials given. They are not engineers who have done the calculations or purchasing officers who are reponsible for quality control in purchasing. If someone substitutes dangerous material for the original material, it is impossible to tell and this is becoming a serious problem the world steel trade as China produces half the world’s steel and is often of consistently lower quality and much lower price.
As for academics, the explosion of universities in Australia has been a boon for poorly qualified people. What used to be trade schools like Perth Technical College where people learned essential trade skills college became insititutes and then universities. It happened in Manchester in England where the people wanted a trade school. It became a polytechnic. Then a university. And then the manfacturers want to know about a trade school. Worse, universities head into Philosophy and away from anything practical. They talk about the philsophy behind society and manufacturing and politics and even science. And then they shut out the real scientists like Murry Selby.
Personally I would get rid of half the universities and half the degrees and half the staff as fake. These are now just giant businesses where the number of ‘administrators’ is twice that of teaching staff and where our Vice Chancellors have million dollar salaries, the highest in the world. Anyone who threatens their massive business model of ripping off the government has to be silenced, as with Prof Ridd.
And where does anyone learn how to weld or cook or fix cars or build houses or nursing? All philosophy degree courses now and the trade schools are giant empty palaces devoid of expert staff and teachers and even students and the manufacturing boom of the 1950s nearly dead as our children learn how to make a good coffee to serve to tourists.
Our education system is becoming a complete farce. Then they comment on science and economics and politics and carbon dioxide, which is odd as they know nothing about these things.
140
Bill
Get yourself a copy of “It is a crock of sh1t and it stinketh”
Follows the report as it progresses from the work face where the action happens.
In its upward translation by the time it gets to the minister it becomes
“Powerful fertiliser which will do much good”
61
The difference between the “safe” and the “splody” kind of material would be indistinguishable to the “tradie”.
The liability is with the inspectors that have “signed off” and/or the material providers that have certified that the material is one thing, when it is in fact another.
130
🙂
40
Thats usually decided by the architects and engineers.
81
Thanks Bill, I don’t know why you got so many red thumbs (wasn’t me) as the point of questioning or engaging in discourse is to look for answers or give input.
50
I was being sarcastic.
But perhaps I was not obvious enough in my sarcasm
My dad was a tradesman – a skilled one !
And had the ‘joy’ of saving higher ups
From their own stuff ups
On Many occasions
For no extra pay ever !
40
PETER NEWMAN, ‘PROFESSOR OF SUSTAINABILITY’, Wonder when that post was invented, what ever it means..Sound so environmentally PC , looks like a great gravy train winner.
120
🙂 🙂
30
‘PROFESSOR OF SUSTAINABILITY’
A lifelong sinecure?
50
PETER NEWMAN, ‘P.O.S.’ ~ why am I getting a picture of Alfred E. Neuman in my head… M.A.D.
40
No doubt very ‘sustaining’
For this professor !
20
Gladys going along with this? why not. since the federal election, it’s been a Labor/Greens agenda all the way:
17 Jul: SMH: Lower house inquiry to set ‘responsible road map’ out of coal for NSW
By Peter Hannam
Plotting NSW’s transition away from coal will be the subject of a parliamentary inquiry, including how the state can make the most of renewable energy supplies.
Submissions for the lower house’s committee of environment and planning inquiry are open from Wednesday until September 15, with an aim to sidestep the “ideological debate” over the fossil fuels and climate change, said Alex Greenwich, independent MP and committee chair…
“It allows us to plot a responsible road map for renewables in NSW,” Mr Greenwich told the Herald. The inquiry will seek to avoid “pitting coal communities against climate change activists”…
Danielle Coleman, coordinator for ***Hunter Renewal, said the inquiry was a chance for people in regional coal communities “to speak for ourselves about how we want to prepare for our future”.
“We need a plan for a future that is less dependent on coal mining and that sets us up with new jobs and industries for the long-term,” she said.
***Sophie Nichols, a Singleton student, said there was “considerable worry” in her town aout the future of coal exports.
“It’s clear they cannot be relied on and we need to prepare for change, and this inquiry is a chance to put the Hunter region on the road to renewal,” she said…
Prior to the March election, Mr Greenwich – along with fellow independent MPs Greg Piper and Joe McGirr – called on Premier Gladys Berejiklian to develop a 10-year plan for coal-mining communities if the government was “serious about saving the world from catastrophic climate change”.
Mr Greenwich said post her election win, the premier “indicated she was open” to the inquiry after the three MPs offered to provide support for the government in Parliament if required…
The five-person committee counts three Liberal MPs, including Felicity Wilson, a supporter of climate action, and Nathaniel Smith, the member for Wollondilly, a coal-mining region. Backing for the inquiry was unanimous with Anoulack Chanthivong, a Labor MP, the fifth member, also voting in support…
Adam Searle, Labor’s energy spokesman, questioned the need for another inquiry after an upper house probe last year “thoroughly” dealt with the key energy issues in the state.
“We all know renewable energy is the cheapest new-build supply,” he said. “The time has passed for another inquiry – the time for action is now.”…
https://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/lower-house-inquiry-to-set-responsible-road-map-out-of-coal-for-nsw-20190716-p527mo.html
Hannam’s Danielle & Sophie:
Lock The Gate: Regional coordinators
Hunter Renewal Project Coordinator – ***Danielle Coleman
8 March: ABC: Hunter Valley calls for tougher renewable energy policies, ponders transition to a post-coal future
ABC Newcastle By Anthony Scully and Kia Handley
The ***Hunter Renewal Forum, organised by environmental activist group Lock The Gate on February 20, was attended by 100 people from government, business and the general community…
—
Singleton Argus, owned by Australian Community Medis, owned by Nine Entertainment Co, chaired by Peter Costello:
6 April: Singleton Argus: Glencore’s Global Head of Coal engages with protesters outside of Hunter Coal Festival Mining Leaders Lunch
by Shannon Dann
From ex-mine workers and local residents to members of Lock the Gate and the Knitting Nannas, a small but diverse group of protesters gathered outside of Club Singleton ahead of the Hunter Coal Festival Mining Leaders Lunch…
***PIC: DISCUSSION: Mr Freyberg has offered to continue his conversation with ***Sophie Nichols in relation to her concerns about Climate Change and the industry.
As the who’s who of the industry arrived at the venue, the defiant group voiced their concerns about what they perceive to be the government’s reluctance to initiate the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy in Australia…
Calling for “no new coal” and “clean air, soil and water for the children” as they waited for the Federal Resources Minister, Matt Canavan, to arrive…
https://www.singletonargus.com.au/story/5327891/coal-boss-has-a-chat/
41
Anyone know how to get a copy buckshee?
30
OK – you can download a pdf.
That doesn’t look like what got mentioned on ABC radio around lunch today – not sure if it was the end of the Country Hour or on The World Today. It mentioned using Trove for old records etc for drought effects – which methodology sounds like it needs inspection
50
As long as Australia is surrounded by oceans I predict we will always have some rain…:).
Sun+ocean+evaporation+wind = clouds+rain!
120
There are no ‘oceans’ left though Zane, they have all been turned to acid doncha know? Apparently we Deniersaurus did it. Yet I haven’t heard of any parents of the 10,000s of schoolies who regularly jump in the ocean complain that the kids are ‘surfing on acid’. That was the 70s wasn’t it?
240
23 green thumbs? Woohoo! My best so far – thank you one and all. Either there’s a bunch of fellow seaweeds here, a bunch of trippers from yesteryear, or my twisted Deniersaurus humour is finally developing, maturing, ageing like a good Cabernet Sauvignon should. Anyway, talking of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds [25], your Michael Peterson (MP) was the Dude when I was a grommie in the 1970s (even bought a pair of red baggies like his) although Mr Pipeline, Gerry Lopez, was and is THE Dude.
Though the world didn’t end in 2012, it did for MP who, after a lifetime of ups and downs and highs and lows, finally shuffled off his mortal coil and floated away to The Endless Summer of Perfect Barrels somewhere beyond the Morning of the Earth… RIP MP.
Searching for Michael Peterson – 2012 OFFICIAL TRAILER [2′ 14″]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTQBWJHwd2s
20
Turn off the coal fired power stations now for one day. Let see the future now.
350
Geoff,
I’ve been saying that for yonks.
We can, right now, OPEN and LOCK the interconnectors between
the states. With a sign saying,
“NOT to be operated under ANY circumstances”.
110
Also stop all coal and Uranium mining for a year or so. Watch our stock market collapse and everyone’s super vapourise. Then again that’s exactly what the Greens want. So why is the ALP and the ABC still allied to them? Answer: not enough voters are awake to stop voting for the ALP. The ALP ought to be close to extinction. It’s a sad indictment of how aloof many Australians are today.
150
‘ …. including one that lasted a whopping 39 years from 1174-1212AD.’
It was an aridity pulse in the Southern Hemisphere.
70
It was very dry in north Queensland around 1200 AD.
https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2016/01/clip_image0061.png
30
PDO negative during MWP.
‘A prolonged period of strongly negative PDO values between AD 993 and 1300 is contemporaneous with a severe medieval megadrought that is apparent in many proxy hydrologic records for the western United States and Canada.’
MacDonald et al 2015
50
On further investigation the late 1600s, mid 1700s and late 1800s all had high runoff from the Burdekin. The low runoff came in the late 1700s to 1870.
It has all the qualities of a PDO cycle, but what was ENSO doing?
20
Climate protesters say politicians inciting violence among them
Courier Mail-5 hours ago
“We know we have the majority of people on our side … most people support action on climate change.” She said politicians were using the “threat of convictions…
New Daily, founded by AustralianSuper, Cbus and Industry Super Holdings but in 2016 became wholly owned by the latter – Wikipedia:
16 Jul: TheNewDaily: Young climate activists ‘most at risk’ of being spied on by AFP
by Cait Kelly
Children and young adults who go to protests are the most likely Australians to have their phones tracked and monitored by police, a prominent security analyst has warned in a submission to an inquiry cybersecurity laws.
Dr Stanley Shanapinda of La Trobe University said that politically minded youth are “the most at risk” of having their digital footprint watched by the AFP.
“They’re the most at risk because of their social media habits, they’re a lot more vocal. As a community they’re the most likely to be targeted,” he told The New Daily…
Dr Shanapinda argues that ***both Liberal and National politicians have highlighted young climate change activists, Adani protestors and The Greens as threats…
https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/2019/07/16/metadata-activists-climate/
Shanapinda knows a thing or two about our politics for someone who hasn’t been in the country very long, it would appear:
The Conversation: Stanley Shanapinda, Research Fellow, La Trobe University
https://theconversation.com/profiles/stanley-shanapinda-610761
71
Targeted really?
Shanapinda should stop double projecting and crying victimhood when they know anyone protesting climate inaction is given extraordinary leeway by authorities during such protests to the point of ignoring basic laws for public safety and obstruction.
If he want’s to see authoritarian bias against PEACEFUL protesters then he should walk the streets holding the national flag and see how fast the authorities pull you up citing “creating a public disturbance” or “a designated area” or “inciting violence” and then be subjected to a search or threat of detainment or a charge.
Oh and don’t forget the many times your image is taken by public cameras, drones, police vehicles, body cams and then kept on a state and national data base to be used for facial recognition or future crimes when the laws are changed to facilitate such further bastardisations of powers that further erode your liberties.
The only reason a government approved protester would have their details gathered is to either,
– Be advised of when the next protest is organised.
– Given a state Skippy badge for services rendered.
– To locate you for collection and disposal when operation “Useful Idiot” is implemented.
60
Whenever anyone complains that climate change is causing increasing drought and/or flooding rains in Australia I refer them to this poster link: https://data.longpaddock.qld.gov.au/static/products/pdf/WetDryDroughtPoster.pdf . It usually causes them to change the subject or shuts them up completely.
210
Dorothea 1 IPCC 0
120
Yes BIll I also do that, had a large print on my office wall which really had people take notice
120
Not accurate Bill. 2004- 2010 were bloody dry in South Australia
It was reasonable from 2011 -2016 but 2015 was bloody dry in SA
And since 2017 it’s been dry as dust till this May.
So a question for you Bill : Where do this data come from ?
Feels very very suss to me.
50
Thanks Bill in SA. Alan at #8.4 should have put you on the right track. The poster he refers to has more specific rainfall info than the one I chose to illustrate my point – that there are obvious cycles of drought and flooding rains in this country (generally averaging around 5-7 years in length), extending back for more than 125 years and probably millennia before that i.e. these cycles just did not eventuate only after we started burning fossil fuels. Few areas seem to escape this pattern and of course, as the poems of Dorothea McKellar and “John O’Brien” so tellingly inform us, you did not need a rain gauge to observe the bleeding obvious.
As for the errors you claim for the Mt Barker area you need to give the poster creators a little slack. Mapping drought and heavy rainfall cycles for the whole of Australia, and over lumped 5-7+ year time frames, is aimed at giving the reader the overview needed to identify trends. No doubt many individual properties and towns could claim that they were exceptions at certain times and places. But the main message for the younger generation is that recent weather history is not unique. And with a little patience what you wish for is what you will get!
80
Bill,
“here are obvious cycles of drought and flooding rains in this country (generally averaging around 5-7 years in length), extending back for more than 125 years and probably millennia before that”
I agree completely.
Years ago I got hold of BOM ‘s rainfall statistics for Mt Barker going back to 1863. And the cycle pattern as obvious from just high lighting the dry years in yellow and the wet years in blue.
But the rainfall pattern here in SA is different to the Eastern states. We are effected far more by the Indian Ocean Dipole cycle, than the El Nino/La Nana s of the Pacific ocean
11
Bill,
I’d put this down to the overlapping years with the LP map starting at 2001 (wet) and 2003 (wet) and then dry to 2007. You can still see some very dry areas in this map but there must have been reasonable rain at some stage in some parts of SA during that period.
2010 and 2011 were very wet which distorts the 2007-2012 map.
Here is a better representation.
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/timeseries.cgi?graph=rranom&area=sa&season=0112&ave_yr=0
2004-2009 appears to be a very dry period for SA, as you say, but nothing as bad as the drought in the 1920s and 1930s for SA as borne out by the LP maps and the BoM data..
50
Actually this was the poster I used https://data.longpaddock.qld.gov.au/static/products/pdf/australiasvariablerainfall2019.pdf
Bill in Oz the data source is on the poster, looks like 2007-08 and 2012-13 were dry and 2017-19 but 2015? So were is your data from?
Believe this Longpaddock poster should be shown to a wider audience, especially pollies and the media
70
I’m an organic farmer. I’ve been observing the weather & taking rainfall records here in Mt Barker since 2004
50
Or you can all check up the BOM’s rainfall records for Mt. Barker here : http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_nccObsCode=139&p_display_type=dataFile&p_startYear=&p_c=&p_stn_num=023733
But I add the proviso that the actual site of the BOM’s rain gauge ( about 150 meters away from my house ) is in a sheltered location. Sheltered by 2 houses and by trees. So the BOM records almost certainly UNDERSTATE the real rainfall here in Mt Barker SA.
90
Bill not a problem that 2015 was dry but still above the 10th percentile and viewing the annual graph is fairly informative.
Why do you believe that the sheltered location would “UNDERSTATE” the total. Is it not possible that a sheltered location ie less wind may overstate the total – just asking
20
Alan, years ago a staffer at the BOM told me that
Any rain gauge to be accurate must be at least fifty meters from any major obstacles like buildings or trees etc.
Here in Mt Barker we get most of our rain from the North West.
The BOM rainfall gauge is located in the front garden of a neighbour’s house.
There is a house wall running North West/South East
About 3 meters from the gauge
Plus trees & shrubs within 5 meters
Plus yard fence 4 meters away
Plus another house immediately over the fence.
It is incompetently located.
And the recordings are thus not accurate for the area.
30
Oh that is bad
20
And overstates the temperature.
10
The BOM Stevenson screen housing the temperature gauge
For Mt Barker is located about 2 meters fromm the rain gauge
In the same front garden
So yes Chris,
I strongly suspect that daily minimum temperatures
Are higher than what should be the case.
But I am unsure what the impact on
The thermometer’s daily maximum temperature.
What do others here think ?
10
Don’t forget the barrier reef coral cores.
They show that in the mid 1700s there was a period of 28 years when no silt was deposited on the reef. Even rivers like the Fitzroy & the Burdekin did not have a single fresh.
Queensland must have been as dry as a witches boob.
140
And yet there must have been times with a lot more water than Europeans have seen here.
Our local example:-
2012 is reckoned to have been about its biggest flood seen by Europeans. But our house is built on a cypress pine sandhill right beside the creek, so a fair bet where the sand came from. And there would need to be around a metre more water to get that 2012 flood to under the house.
We have a dam in the first hollow on the east side of the creek and its bank was maybe half a metre clear of the 2012 water level. With a full metre it would be underwater and flood waters would be well east of the creek – where Europeans have never seen them.
Geoff Pickup (CSIRO Alice Springs) used to talk of paleo floods and the evidence for same. One example
https://www.psi.edu/sites/default/files/imported/about/staff/mbourke/bourkepubs/pub/Pickup.et.al.pdf
80
A lot of the early settlers in the Hunter Valley had an English mind-set where they expected streams to be gentle, constant sources of water as they are in Britain. In Paterson, right on the edge of the riverbank, they built tobacco-drying warehouses and large brick flour mills, obviously in the expectation of using water wheels as motive power. The Paterson River (a major tributary of the Hunter) ranges from a gentle tidal stream to a raging torrent, and most of those early buildings have long since been carried away by the floods for which the river is known. It floods most years. In 1967 after the 65-66 drought broke we had 13 floods in the space of a year. There is nothing constant about Australian streams and Australian weather. Upstream is the property where a teenaged Dorothea McKellar wrote My Country, a poem unknown to young people reared on global warming fairy tales.
A major tributary of the Hunter is the Wollombi Brook. A fluvial geomorphological study of the Brook undertaken some years back revealed a depositional history that scared the pants off the people doing the study. What they found was that in the several hundred years prior to white settlement there were floods on a scale unimagined, floods that would make the 1955 monster seem a trivial event. If something on their scale happened now it would wipe clean the face of the lower Hunter Valley except for the higher points. Cities like Maitland, Singleton and Raymond Terrace would disappear, along with much of Newcastle. There would be nothing left to clean up. Infrastructure would be a shambles for months/years. The hit to the NSW economy would be lethal.
120
I often sit on the back deck of the Wollombi Tavern and ponder past floods that would be at my feet.
Apparently the name refers to the “meeting place” of the waters and when they do meet the rise can be impressive.
According to locals, the major flooding can only occur after the local area has been thoroughly saturated beforehand. When it goes off, look out.
80
H
Maybe Cook missed those rivers because there were no silt plumes?
50
James Cook said the Queensland coast was ‘barren’ and a glimpse of the corals tell the story.
‘There is also a striking period of below-average rainfall from the mid-1760s to the mid-1780s and four out of five years prior to Cook’s visit were dry. It is hardly surprising that the Burdekin River mouth was not marked on The Endeavour’s charts.’
Erica Hendy 2003
80
Yes I dont think we have seen what the worst of floods can bring ref to paleo times. Check videos from ‘Nick on the Rocks’ the geologist describing the post glacial melt floods in Nth America, NOTHING could compare to those, literally mega floods on proportions that mind boggle when the ice dams broke from the mega glaciers 14000 years ago! Also the English Channel was carved out from a mega flood.
80
It would have been a sight to behold.
Closer to home and down on the Murray there was an 18 metre flood at Overland Corner around 1750, which was two metres above the 1956 flood.
‘However, the relationship is more complex in the 19th century. Notably, a high flow period beginning in 1820 corresponds to positive IPO conditions spanning the 1824–1854 period. According to the established 20th Century relationships presented by Power et al. [1999], low streamflow conditions are expected during positive IPO conditions. Assuming both the streamflow and IPO reconstructions are valid, this potentially implies that the relationship between the IPO and River Murray streamflow is non-stationary.’
Gallant and Gergis 2011
20
“Gergis”
Isn’t that a name we’ve heard before?
40
The Southern Hemisphere Hockey Stick is a large blemish.
10
On the question of the Burdekin, looking at figure 2 there was a jump in flow from 1870 onwards.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/10878714_Coral_record_of_increased_sediment_flux_to_the_inner_Great_Barrier_Reef_of_Australia_since_European_Settlement
This has been put down to human habitation, it happened around the same time, but I would argue Queensland was droughty and the increased stream flow after 1870 was unrelated to European settlement.
40
An effect that quickly?
Does that mean that Europeans are far more effective climate changers than the greenery have made out so far? (/s)
50
Exactly, they are clutching at straws. The negative PDO started in 1870 and came to an end in 1900.
Correlation doesn’t prove causation, in the same way the klimatariat try to convince us that a benign trace gas caused the atmospheric warming late last century, when in fact its just a warm PDO.
30
The green ‘science’ tells us coal mining causes precipitation …
“Australian Greens leader Bob Brown says revenue from the Federal Government’s proposed mining tax should go to the flood appeal because the industry is a major contributor to global warming.”
Whoa! Wait. What?
“The (LaboUr) Queensland Government says it is not good science to link the Queensland floods to the coal mining industry.”
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-01-17/coal-industry-not-responsible-for-floods-robertson/1907788?site=southqld
If only they had coal mines back when …
110
There’s only one thing worser than a Carbo-Phobic “public servant”, and that’s a Carbo-holic Carbo-Phobic organisation that is funded from our taxes.
We demand a return to Carbo-Neutral government, science, taxation and especially hidden carbo-dynamic fees at every point of our daily lives.
Exit, Brexit, Trumpit, Macronit, AusUNexit, EuroEUexit and especially WarmExit.
Enough.
KK
80
If the whole country decided for 12 months to withhold all money to the ATO, the govt would fall.
Who says voting is the only way to change things…..
50
🙂
Revolting.
50
“doesn’t prove droughts will be lower” Or did you mean “will be over” Jo.
10
I turn on ABC NEWS24 every morning to get the headlines and weather without the ad’s and nonsense. Everyday the ABC runs a hyped up global warming disaster story, sometimes they are just grasping at straws to make a connection and the result is so ludicrous you have to laugh at the TV. But someone at the ABC must trust in the old adage “if you tell a lie enough times it becomes the truth”
180
Which is worse; the ads and all that nonsense or the ABC hyped up Climate Disaster Story?
For my self I would rather put up with the ads, because I just get so angry when I see my taxpayers dollars being misused by the ABC!
180
I too dislike working for other people.
It used to be called slavery but that was abolished in the 1800s, wasn’t it?
70
I know you’ve already paid for it (involuntarily) but why would you freely
?
And let’s not kid ourselves. The ABC does indeed run “ads” relentlessly, they just fail to collect revenue from advertisers.
It is News they lack, which brings me back to the original question:
…why would you freely?
And where is the ACCC? Surely it should be Propaganda24.
60
Legally the ABC is not required to respect their Charter, so as the propaganda wing of the klimatariat they have free rein to spread false rumour.
30
At first glance I read Nikolai’s surname (he from the ABC Enviro-propaganda Unit) as Bilharzia – not Beilharz.
A buddy had gone swimming in an African river and, wondering why locals were yelling at him to “look out for Bill Harzia!”, came out with a dose of schistosomiasis burrowing into a very private part of his anatomy. By the time he got back to NZ he was in a bad way and needed some serious medical help… ouch. Researching who this young, fresh-faced, ABC Beilharz chap is, hmmm, the word parasite does come to mind.
150
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
Good one.
60
For some reason, Bilhazia evoked a memory of bladder worms.
I looked it up. The bladder can indeed by infected by these worms,
But so can many other organs. Do not swim in in fresh water ie rivers in Africa and probably also Asia, India and SE Asia.
The sea is mostly ok but there are a few other dangers.
Chlorinated swimming pools should be ok.
70
Correct, Peter – the schistosome blood fluke / parasitic flatworm (with suckers and hooks for attachment to its host) was aiming in the general direction of said buddy’s bladder but got stuck – nay, attached! – halfway there. From the UK’s NHS website:
“You can become infected if you come into contact with contaminated water – for example, when paddling, swimming or washing – and the tiny worms burrow into your skin…. After a few weeks, the worms start to lay eggs”. Egads – it’s like a 1950s Wholly-weird alien horror movie!
Myself, while in Varanasi by the river Ganga, was told if I swam in its ‘holy waters’ all my earthly sins would be washed away. Being familiar with similar baptism stories, eg. the river Jordan, I reasoned a double-insurance plan couldn’t hurt and would only bring blessings and life eternal! So I did. That was thirty-three years ago and I’m still blessedly standing to this day (worm-free I may add) though I do have a preference for salt water (NaCl + H₂O) despite the rumours of plastic bags and acidification and 8 mm sea level surges.
60
Sounds a lot like what on of my Ex’s labelled me, A parasitic worm with a compromised slug……..
20
Hmmm….the ABC fleeces the consumer like the UK tv licence does…..
Actually, come to think of it, we lived in the UK for 4 years and I never actually recall paying a tv licence….we really never watched tv ( too busy doing pub walks ) so we were no doubt in front….
90
It’s the cold cycles that kill. Anyone with an eye to the facts understands we’re either in or heading into another cooler cycle that will last for some decades or (hopefully not) the next glaciation. Cooler, wetter AND dryer rotating through the agricultural zones.
Just read the news. Millions of agricultural acres won’t be planted this year. Even Walmart posting notices (in North Carolina) of shortages of locally grown veggies. And it’s a global event, millions of acres in the USA’s midwest grain belt, same in China, same in Russia, etc.
80
16 Jul: Environmental Research Letters: Enhanced flood risk with 1.5 °C global warming in the Ganges–Brahmaputra–Meghna basin
The simulations of 1.5 °C and 2 °C warming indicate an increase in extreme precipitation and corresponding flood hazard over the GBM basin compared to the current climate. So, for example, even with global warming limited to 1.5 °C, for extreme precipitation events such as the south Asian crisis in 2017 there is a detectable increase in the likelihood in flooding…
1. Introduction
In many regions around the globe, climate change is increasing the severity of damaging flooding events…READ ON
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ab10ee
21
16 Jul: New Scientist: Journal criticised for study claiming sun is causing global warming
By Adam Vaughan
A high profile scientific journal is investigating how it came to publish a study suggesting that global warming is down to natural solar cycles. The paper was criticised by scientists for containing “very basic errors” about how Earth moves around the sun.
The study (LINK) was published online on 24 June by Scientific Reports, an open access journal run by Nature Research, which also lists the prestigious Nature journal among its titles. A spokesperson told New Scientist that it is aware of concerns raised over the paper, which was authored by four academics based at Northumbria University, the University of Bradford and the University of Hull, all in the UK, plus the Nasir al-Din al-Tusi Shamakhi Astrophysical Observatory in Azerbaijan.
The authors suggest that Earth’s 1°C temperature rise over the past two centuries could largely be explained by the distance between Earth and the sun changing over time as the sun orbits around our solar system’s barycentre, its centre of mass…
Michael Brown of Monash University in Australia lamented uncritical media coverage of the paper in Australia (LINK).
Following criticism of the paper, lead author Valentina Zharkova, of Northumbria University, described Rice as a “climate alarmist” in an online discussion.,,
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2209895-journal-criticised-for-study-claiming-sun-is-causing-global-warming/
16 Jul: IFL Science: This Paper Has Climate Change Deniers Very Excited. There’s Just One Tiny Problem
by James Felton
Climate change deniers have been getting excited about a recent paper published online titled No Experimental Evidence For The Significant Anthropogenic Climate Change, which goes against the widely accepted scientific consensus on climate change based on many years of climate data.
The paper, yet to be accepted for peer-review but published online on pre-print site arXiv, claims to “prove that the changes in the low cloud cover fraction practically control the global temperature” and the recent United Nations IPCC report (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) failed to include this…
Several news outlets sympathetic to climate change denial picked up the story after it was published by Russia Today, whilst several more mainstream news organizations – most noticeably in countries where climate skepticism is strongest, like the US, Russia, and Australia – covered it with little to no criticism.
The story soon showed up on Fox News, Sky News Australia, Infowars (of course), and Sputnik. It also, thankfully, caught the attention of Climate Feedback, a worldwide organization of scientists that actively debunks unscientific claims about the climate crisis…
“Some news outlets are publishing articles stating that this claim is based on a new ‘study’,” Climate Feedback stated in a detailed debunking. “If they had contacted independent scientists for insight, instead of accepting this short document as revolutionary science, they would have found that it does not have any scientific credibility.”…READ ON
https://www.iflscience.com/environment/this-paper-has-climate-change-deniers-very-excited-theres-just-one-tiny-problem/
61
Absolutely fabulous.
50
Well, they would say that wouldn’t they?
30
Michael Brown of Monash thinks he’s an everyman intellectual.Dismal in my opinion,like most ideologues is bound to his staff office chair and ponders internal e-mails with confusion.
30
Another member of “The Empixellated” by that description
30
Yeah.. empixellated.That’s right. If you read about his specialty in astronomy for sure.
10
Zharkhova responds in todays Australian and drop kicks him into the next postcode.
10
The guy should stick to measuring distance galaxies…
Rather than supplying evidence that is where is mind is… far from Earth.
30
“Climate change deniers have been getting excited about a recent paper published online titled No Experimental Evidence For The Significant Anthropogenic Climate Change, which goes against the widely accepted scientific consensus on climate change based on many years of climate data.”
James Felton is a lier!
1. There is and was NO consensus, in fact the reverse is true.
2. which goes against the widely
accepteddebunked scientific consensus on climate change based on many years of REAL climate data.Felton go and check your real facts!
50
11 Jul: IEA: Commentary: Global patent applications for climate change mitigation technologies – a key measure of innovation – are trending down
By Miguel Cárdenas Rodríguez, Statistician, OECD/ENV; Ivan Haščič, Senior Economist, OECD/ENV; and Nick Johnstone, IEA Chief Statistician.
One of the key measures of innovation in climate change mitigation is showing worrying trends, according to new evidence from the IEA and the OECD.
Drawing upon new extractions from the Worldwide Patent Statistical Database (PATSTAT), researchers at the IEA and OECD have found that while patenting of innovations in climate change mitigation technologies (CCMT) related to power generation, transport, buildings, manufacturing, and carbon capture and storage (CCS) had generally been increasing much faster than other technologies in the period up to 2011-2012, there has been a notable drop-off in the number of these patents since then…
https://www.iea.org/newsroom/news/2019/july/global-patent-applications-for-climate-change-mitigation-technologies–a-key-mea.html
30
16 Jul: AFP: Some reef islands resilient to climate change: study
Wellington – The Pacific’s low-lying reef islands are likely to change shape in response to climate change, rather than simply sinking beneath rising seas and becoming uninhabitable as previously assumed, new research has found…
But a study published this week found that such islands “morphodynamically respond” to the environment because they are composed of the skeletal remains of tiny reef-dwelling organisms, rather than solid rock.
The researchers said evidence that such islands slowly change like shifting sands had profound implications for climate change planning in affected nations…
Co-author Murray Ford of Auckland University said low-lying reef islands appeared more resilient than previously thought…
The study, conducted by researchers from New Zealand, Britain and Canada, was published by the Geological Society of America this week…
The concept of climate change forcing Pacific islanders from their homes is a sensitive issue in atoll nations.
New Zealand’s progressive government entered office in 2017 with a policy of creating a world-first visa that recognised climate change refugees fleeing their swamped homelands.
But it quietly shelved the idea last year after receiving feedback from islanders, who wanted relief efforts to concentrate on saving their homes rather than easing access to new ones elsewhere.
The 18-member Pacific Islands Forum will hold its annual summit in Tuvalu next month, with climate change expected to again top the agenda.
https://www.afp.com/en/news/826/some-reef-islands-resilient-climate-change-study-doc-1it4ut1
16 Jul: Reuters: EUROPE POWER-Spot prices up on wind downturn, curve off with fuels
by Vera Eckert
Prompt power prices in the European wholesale market rose on Tuesday due to a wind lull and rising temperatures while forwards eased from the multi-month highs of the previous session.
*Electricity production from German wind turbines will likely fall to roughly 2 to 6 GW on Wednesday from 10 GW expected for Tuesday, according to forecasts published by Refinitiv Eikon…
*Wind power supply is forecast to range between 2.9 and 9.7 GW over the next fortnight, representing less than 20% of capacity utilisation.
https://af.reuters.com/article/commoditiesNews/idAFL8N24G4TZ
60
16 Jul: NewStatesmanAmerica: Could the UK’s financial sector become an unlikely ally for climate action?
New guidelines could impel the sector to start greening finance and financing green infrastructure.
by Will Martindale
(Will Martindale is Director of Policy and Research at the UN Principles for Responsible Investment)
For environmentalists, global politics can feel like a lonely place. Recent headlines include Bolsonaro’s “huge rise in Amazon destruction”, the re-election of Australia’s “coal-clutching premier” and Trump’s disdain for climate action; “we have the cleanest air we’ve ever had”.
But last week, environmentalists found an unlikely ally: the UK financial sector, which published its first Green Finance Strategy on 2 July.
To help implement the strategy, the UK launched a Green Finance Institute, the City of London hosted a Green Finance Summit and UK financial regulators launched a joint statement on climate change. This is the first real example of the UK’s financial regulators seriously addressing climate change…
If that’s not enough, the London Stock Exchange recategorised oil and gas firms as “non-renewables”…
The UK’s Green Finance Strategy can be understood in two ways: greening finance and financing green…
On “financing green”, the UK government needs to go further still. A major gap is financing green infrastructure. The UK could also follow the French in issuing a sovereign green bond. Paris and Frankfurt present real competition in winning green capital…
https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/staggers/2019/07/could-uk-s-financial-sector-become-unlikely-ally-climate-action
04
Right: that debunks the Drought and Floods!
Here’s Nils Axel Morner: UN IPCC Scientist Debunks UN IPCC Lies
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1PS9-oOfRw
Cheer him on, everyone! — posted (dated) Feb this year, so watch it before youtube disappears it.
81
Hes great, and so calm, since he was on the IPCC panel as a sea level expert. He said the ‘science’ from the IPCC ‘experts’ is of undergraduate level if that.
50
I watched it a few months ago but it certainly was well worth watching again.
40
If there was a vote amongst all Australians, the ABC would close tomorrow and people would save their 8 or 11 cents or whatever it is now. There is nothing of interest on the ABC radio or television these days that the Internet can supply far better
140
About $1.5Billion a year with about 10million families so $150 a year per family, $3 a week. No exceptions. To be told what a pack of irrelevant people think and presented as news. Another $3 a week for the CSIRO and $1 a week for the BOM. The Green jobs are in the public service.
120
Nicholas a lot of people have been brainwashed and this is clearly illustrated in a dodgy poll done by the Australian Institute last year. Spokeswoman Ebony Bennet explains.
“Seven in 10 Australians think a strong, independent ABC is critical to a healthy democracy. Cutting funding to the ABC is the opposite of what we should be doing in an age of ‘fake news’ and when the business model for journalism has been seriously disrupted.”
In fact the propaganda coming from Auntie has been a disaster, so we’ll need to see them admit they got climate change wrong and then we can dismantle the organisation.
80
In any other industry, this kind of behaviour would be deemed fraud.
Conducting and promoting bogus surveys to continue receiving huge amounts of the public’s money – is there any other word that suffices.
What would happen to a private venture that included knowingly false information in a prospectus?
20
Bring back TV licences
14
But make them all voluntary
Not compulsory !
The we would really see how many Australians
Really want the Australian Brainwashing Corporation
40
About the same proportion of Australians that demand action on “Climate Change™” (according to their same bogus polls) and also volunteer an extra payment to airlines to offset their Carbon (Dioxide) emissions, I would expect.
30
Why?
20
Great! ABC/SBS only licences. If you don’t pay you cannot watch the ABC/SBS. They would both close overnight. Most of the people who watch the ABC are people who pay for nothing.
30
I mean those who don’t watch the ABC/SBS would be thrilled not to pay $3 a week for nothing.
Those who actually watch it would would refuse to pay.
40
I’d rather get the money back in a tax refund, and then spend it on something worthwhile, like chocolates…
30
“Carbo-phobic” is truly cool. As for the drought hype, this is the standard move: however bad it was, it will be worse unless we end our wickedly consumptive ways.
90
These carbophobes are suffering from a bout of carbonic plague – H₂ CO₃ NUTS – which can only be cured by fresh air, sunshine, regular immersion in the ocean (the colder the better) and a few hours every week checking in to joannenova (dot) com for some cold, hard, observed, recorded, scientific
facttruthmedicinereality. A sense of humour will also aid recovery.Meanwhile, our unelected Green MP bureaucrat (Minnesota-born with a BA in Philosophy from Berkeley, CA no less), “Associate Transport Minister Julie Anne Genter [who] said the strategy will follow Sweden’s Vision Zero strategy which seeks to eliminate road deaths”, should be required to spend at least 2 weeks on the end of a shovel fixing the innumerous potholes and sunken manhole covers dangerously littering our highways and byways before embarking upon her Road To Zero guided by Vision Zero –
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/394542/road-to-zero-everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-government-s-new-safety-strategy
“More police and more cameras doesn’t mean more money generated in fines, however… ‘It’s not about making money. In an ideal world, we wouldn’t generate a cent from fines'” chirped the young, idealistic, green, bike-riding American who has no problem taking a government limousine to Parliament on wet/windy days (this is Wellington, the capital, after all) after flying down from Auckland in an evil, steenky, carbon-spewing, Earth-killing, polluting aeroplane. Is there a chemical formula for HypOcrisY²?
40
Not Oz but another “worst ” beat-up
“Extreme Fraud By The Union Of Concerned Scientists”
https://realclimatescience.com/2019/07/extreme-fraud-by-the-union-of-concerned-scientists/
(I have to risk “the word”)
60
Stability comes from coal baee load power, not *hoping* people will sell excess back…
https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2019-07-18/aemc-urges-change-to-allow-energy-users-to-sell-back-to-grid/11319494
“The proposal from the Australian Energy Market Commission (AEMC) comes as businesses, consumers and regulators make contingency plans for the proposed closure of the Liddell coal-fired power station in the NSW Hunter Valley by 2022.
“Under the rule change, high energy consumers could decide to reduce their consumption and sell the “demand reduction” back into the grid via a third party, such as an aggregator, at the market price at the time.
“AEMC chairman John Pierce wants the rule changes put in place quickly to take pressure off the grid so energy demand can be guaranteed in the increasingly uncertain environment.
50
““AEMC chairman John Pierce wants the rule changes put in place quickly to take pressure off the grid so energy demand can be guaranteed in the increasingly uncertain environment.”
And what is making the environment increasingly uncertain? (hint: it isn’t coal fired power plants)
60
So, just stop making and selling stuff.
What a bright economic future our betters have planned for us…
30
Gotta love the hubris of these people in NSW: if the government was “serious about saving the world from catastrophic climate change”.
So NSW can save the world by shutting down coal mining and miraculously create new jobs.
And despite BoM reporting that Australia has warmed by 1.0 degree C since pre-industrial times, we are told to believe that a further 0.5C rise will lead to Armageddon. Why do the media keep reporting “we must keep warming below 1.5C” rather than we must keep warming below 0.5C? Not as scary?
Add the hubris of the City of Melbourne Council jumping on the bandwagon by declaring a “Climate Emergency“. Quick, switch to green power, travel sustainably, love your leftovers, become a citizen forester, stop heating/cooling your home. And next: no cars in the city, ban tourists, ban nighttime sporting and other entertainment events. It’s definitely getting too hot in Melbourne, all greenies please move to Tassie, and send ice to those pour souls in Brisbane.
70
At least a state government has constitutional credibility.
Other than some functions it has ceded to the Commonwealth (Foreign Affairs, Defence, etc) they have a stage for this sort of thing.
A pity we voters have far less control of their actions than we ought to. Voting once every four years on general issues (never specific) does not quite seem good enough.
Melbourne Council, on the other hand. What’s that about. You should be providing a few parks and libraries (maybe less so these days), keeping the streets clean and collecting the garbage – THAT’S IT.
You have no more business offering your view on “Climate Change™” than any of the building strata committees in your council area.
It just isn’t part of your remit. So STOP already and stop misusing the monies of ratepayers indulging your faux self-importance.
You want an official view on something else? Run for the relevant office.
20
Melbourne City Council has adopted Agenda 21 -389 page master plan for control of what we may consume, where we may live and how we are to be allowed to develop. Top down UN new world economic order. The socialists, in green guise, love it.
60
Re “Drought of 1891 to 1903 reconstructed shows today’s conditions likely to have more devastating effects
”
Well I didn’t read that ABC article.
Just too bored with it’s continual alarmism.
But I have just realised one important thing
Different to 1900.
We now have big de-sal plants
Supplying fresh water to all our metropolitan cities.
So folks there will be OK I suspect.
30
And those . de-sal plants are all powered
By those reliable, old fashioned, cheap, fossil fuels
Coal & gas !
And our idiot Greenists want the de-sal plants
To all shut down.
They think it’s better to die of thirst
Than have plant food CO2 in the air !
80
But Bill, the Sydney Kurnell Desalination Plant energy usage has been offset (if it is operated) by provision of the Capital Hill Wind Farm at Bungendore NSW, near Goulburn, the Federal Minister and State Minister for Water reported at the time, wind farm owned and operated by Infigen Energy.
Reports indicate that one shareholder was “Born Lucky”.
60
Come on Dennis, You know that is complete B/S
When that plant needs to process sea water to freash
It will need power
From where ever it can get it when it needs it.
Bungendore only supplies windy electrons
When the wind blows
Unreliable
Expensive
Far away from Kurnel ( 200 odd ks. )
With power loss in the transmission as well
60
Bill
Slight correction IIRC
“Semi-windy electrons”
as they shut down in bigger winds
50
Yes, very true !
They shut down in high winds !
10
We are indeed fortunate that droughts do not occur on windless days!
70
“the Sydney Kurnell Desalination Plant energy usage has been offset (if it is operated) by provision of the Capital Hill Wind Farm at Bungendore NSW
“
Capitol hill near Bungendore also supplies Canberra with 100% “renewables”
All at the same time, even when there is no wind blowing. 😉
120
It’s not just plant food. It’s the ONLY plant food, the only source of power for all living things. CO2 hydrated by solar energy into carbohydrates. And the Greens want it banned.
50
TdeF, I suggest that is being a little extreme.
Plants do need other things to grow
Nitrogen
Phoshorus
Potassium
Etc
But carbon is as you say, an essential nutrient for plants
No CO2 and they ALL die.
30
Look at the chemical composition by weight alone.
98% is just CO2/H2O, 50% carbon, 42% oxygen, 6% hydrogen.
plus 1% nitrogen and we are 99% carbon dioxide and water or carbon and gases.
Then a total of only 1% of metals calcium, potassium, sodium, magnesium, iron, and manganese.
Wood also contains tiny amounts of metals sulfur, chlorine, silicon, phosphorus.
People aren’t much different except Calcium for bones. There are only 4 grams of iron for blood in humans.
We are carbon life forms, built entirely directly and indirectly from plants. Without photosynthesis, the hydrogenation of CO2, carbohydrates, we do not exist.
Metals are essential for biochemistry but the amounts are tiny.
A tree is solid CO2 and water. Like wood, dried we burn. CO2 is not just food, it is the only food for life on earth. (There are some sulfur powered lifeforms in the deep ocean trenches where the sun doesn’t shine)
20
Also consider the “50% carbon, 42% oxygen, 6% hydrogen” by weight.
In number of atoms you have C12, O16, H1 so the ratio of atoms would mean
50/12, 42/16, 6 or 4, 3.3, 6. This is 99% CH2O. 33% Carbon and 66% water by numbers of atoms.
As we know trees and humans are so much water, we are hydro carbon made from evil CO2. All from the air.
20
Born in 1580, one of the great heroes of chemistry was Van Helmont.
‘In what is perhaps his best-known experiment, van Helmont placed a 5-pound (about 2.2-kg) willow in an earthen pot containing 200 pounds (about 90 kg) of dried soil, and over a five-year period he added nothing to the pot but rainwater or distilled water. After five years, he found that the tree weighed 169 pounds (about 77 kg), while the soil had lost only 2 ounces (57 grams). He concluded that “164 pounds of wood, barks, and roots arose out of water only,” and he had not even included the weight of the leaves that fell off every autumn.’
He obviously had no idea of CO2 and how much of the tree was now carbon by weight. He knew nothing of CO2, that tiny component of nearly weightless air.
He pioneered the transition from alchemy to chemistry by weight and was arrested by the Inquisition for his experiments. He showed for example that acid did not make metals vanish, merely dissolved them as the total weight did not change.
20
Just imagine what a modern version of that might look like.
Enclosed greenhouse, atmospheric water content kept to replicate outside, hourly 24_7 gas analysis etc. Three such units side by side with increasing amounts of vegetation enclosed.
Not gonna happen, No pixie dust involved.
10
It’s extremely easy for an entity so far to the left as the ABC to miss the obvious. Why is it a surprise? There are many things they miss. They also miss how racist they are. They miss how anti-Semitic they are. They miss how anti-West they are. They miss how they support groups that are extremely violent against those who dare disagree in a peaceful way with their ideology. They miss how they are in coalition with a political party called the Greens who are a threat to the very existence of the Australia we and our previous generations have built and deafened in two world wars. I shudder to think what they would be doing if we ever had another major war against an evil foe like the ones in the past. To be consistent they would have to support that foe who would have the same features as those I mentioned here.
120
Your their ABC is from the same petri dish as our their RNZ (which suffers from continual name changes, from National Radio to Radio New Zealand to simply ‘rnz’ these days for the young-at-heart and ill-equipped for spelling) yet hidden amongst their never-ending post-new gospel of sinful man = burning planet = rising seas = drought and/or flood = more rules and taxes = Utopia™, the rare gem of blinding light shines through:
https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/394641/tuvalu-seeks-to-attract-climate-change-tourists
“World War II relics on Tuvalu’s atolls draw other intrepid tourists like retiree Steve McKinlay who had been to visit the atoll of Nukufetau. His father, a Seabee during the war, had helped build a three kilometre long runway using coral mined from the lagoon. ‘I went to follow up and see what was left of the air base’. The take-off spot for B-29 bombers, ‘a magnificent airstrip’ was now overgrown with breadfruit and coconut trees and only one man was left on the island, Mr McKinlay discovered.
“‘I consider climate change a bunch of bunk. It’s hype by a bunch of scientists trying to raise research dollars,’ Mr McKinlay said when asked whether climate change curiosity was a way to attract tourists”.
Bunch of bunk… Bingo Bob!
60
Greg, Tuvalu has a problem with tourism
Most Greenists think it has already disappeared !
Washed away by the waves of rising seas.!
Or about to be washed away
And thus to be avoided for fear of being washed away also.
Also, how very curious that an island
With a 3 kilometer long airstrip
Is completely abandoned by the Tuvalu people.
Perhaps it does not fit in with the myth of
Tuvalu people being endangered by the
Horrendous rising waves..
30
Bill, you’ve summed it up well, it’s all about Hit And Myth!
The UN’s Gutteres (plus his vast entourage), NZ’s Jacinda (plus her lesser entourage), plus a cast of thousands of other B-grade actors & scammentists appear to have no ‘problem with tourism‘ when it comes to flying en masse to those
sinkinggrowing tropical isles for gatherings and photo ops and yet another declaration of $#!T for the peasants back home… paying for all the extravagance and kudos.Lest we remember, the internet domain of .tv brings in vast revenues for Tuvalu (well, a select few with Swiss bank accounts maybe), unlike their neighbours in the Cook Islands – how come THEY aren’t drowning? – who entered the Digital Age by choosing .ck to follow on after .co
20
All true, but most importantly we have DAMS! and used to have cheap energy.
We have more control over our local environments than ever before.
The major risk to prosperity and wellbeing at this time are activisits, lobbyists, bureaucrats and the elected representatives that prefer pandering to them rather than honouring the duty they were elected to perform by voters.
There should be real prison time for officials that abuse their office in these ways. Australians are far too tolerant of nefarious forces that dwell amongst us.
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a new BIG IDEA at theirABC! Paul Barclay begins with long-haul plane travel bad for the environment and, when you reach your destination, there’s all these plastic containers (mentioning plastic is de rigueur at ABC these days).
how did Sheldon get to Australia?
AUDIO: 54min06sec: 17 Jul: ABC Big Ideas: Sustainable tourism
We all have the travel bug and cheap airfares promote mass tourism…
Can the planet sustain this level of tourism or does the tourist industry need a new business model?…
Recorded 24 June, 2019 Victoria University
Speaker
Pauline Sheldon, Professor Emerita University of Hawaii
https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/bigideas/sustainable-tourism/11302804
for those who don’t want to listen:
13 Jul: Medium: Shifting sands, the next economy & tourism
by Dianne Dredge
(Dianne Dredge is Founder and Director of The Tourism CoLab, and passionate about cataylsing the next economy in tourism and the visitor economy. By unlocking purpose beyond profit, by really valuing people, place and planet and the diverse contributions they make beyond growth ETC)
So when TTRA’s 50th International Conference in Melbourne was themed “Navigating the shifting sands: Research in changing times”, I grabbed my bucket and spade and headed to Melbourne!…
Most tourism conferences usually start with the unquestioned premise that growth is good…
This year the TTRA 2019 conference organisers took a courageous step by inviting two keynote speakers who were always going to challenge that assumption:
***Prof Tim Flannery, mammalogist, palaeontologist, environmentalist, conservationist, explorer, public scientist and Australian of the Year (2007)…To his long list of expertise above, I would also add storyteller and sage! His message was clear: tourism and travel can unleash complex relationships and cultural sensitivities. Tourism needs to be culturally appropriate, respectful, and the level of change acceptable to those communities should be set by the community itself, not outsiders…
***Prof Pauline Sheldon, University of Hawaii Professor Emerita, United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) Ulysses prize winner for contributions to knowledge in sustainable tourism, and TTRA Lifetime Achievement Award Winner, was the second keynote. The remainder of this article focuses on unpacking her contributions…
Drawing on diverse works including the Stockholm Resilience Centre and Johan Rockström’s call to recognise planetary boundaries, Kate Raworth’s work on Doughnut Economics, and Naomi Klein’s treatise on the failures of our current economic system, Professor Sheldon called for a rethink of the current ‘growth is good’ discourse…
The climate crisis, biodiversity loss, water and food security, labour and employment issues associated with Industry 4.0, and the challenges of inclusive development, are just some of the challenges that are changing our relationship with the Earth and with capitalism…
In short, Professor Sheldon suggested we need to move from the ‘Me’ to the ‘We-economy’…
https://medium.com/@dredgedianne/shifting-sands-the-next-economy-tourism-5683fbfa8017
as she began, Sheldon quoted Otto Scharmer, MIT:
Otto Scharmer
Axial Shift: The Decline of Trump, the Rise of the Greens, and the New Coordinates of Societal Change – November 7, 2018
Axial Shift: The Decline of Trump, the Rise of the Greens, and the New Coordinates of Societal Change – November 7, 2018
About Otto Scharmer
Otto Scharmer, author of Theory U, Second Edition and co-author of the newly released Leading from the Emerging Future: From Ego-system to Eco-system Economies, is an action researcher who co-creates innovations in learning and leadership that he delivers through classes and programs at MIT, MITx U.Lab, the Presencing Institute, and through innovation projects with organizations in business, government and civil society around the world.
http://www.ottoscharmer.com/
13
Pat, how do you turn up all this stuff? 😉
My first reaction to this conference in Melbourne was ‘pass the sick bucket’! What planet do these people live on? How can they travel long haul and not realise the huge size of our planet? Do they ever bother watching out of the window on such flights? Those people are just not real, or realistic.
70
Annie –
I just go to RN’s full schedule and check the topics of their overnigh programs. it doesn’t catch all the CAGW rubbish, because it’s also in programs they broadcast from CBC or BBC, for example, and they only link to the home pages of those programs, so it’s difficult to know which program was actually aired on ABC.
20
Annie and Pat, our very own carbon-conscious celebrity (CCC) La Presidénté is in Melbourne today “taking the opportunity to talk about the progress
ourherr Coalition Government is making [sic]” or sumpthink (to paraphrase RNZ today).“Ms Ardern is being hosted by the Australia New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG), but will also sit down with her Australian counterpart Scott Morrison for the first time since his re-election. A technical hitch almost forced a change in plans this week when the Air Force Boeing 757 broke down, but repair efforts were able to get the aircraft fit in time for take off [thanks to RNZAF mechanics and the whiff of their oily rags].
“Ms Ardern will also meet Victoria Governor Linda Dessau and Premier Daniel Andrews during her Melbourne trip, as well as speaking at several New Zealand Trade and Enterprise investor events”. My apologies – I never voted for her. In fact I voted for nobody in 2017 (for the first time ever) because nobody was the only one telling the truth.
100
Pat I think you run the risk of signifcant mental contamination with that work load on your back !
🙂
10
Good old Terry McCrann has a great piece in the Herald Sun today on the nonsense of wind power, and of the hypocrisy of the rent-seeking Shell CEO who is visiting Oz and pushing for a carbon tax – all so that Shell can sell more gas at high prices. Unfortunately our dumb pollies will likely listen to this clown.
Shell of course has invested $20 billion in LNG in Qatar. The Emir of Qatar is a seriously rich dude, he bought a £200 million palace in Regent’s Park a while back, to add to the Qatari royal family’s other massive property holdings there.
Shell, naturally, is a big believer in climate change… Vested interest, much?
Poor old coal. It’s on the ropes, and getting punched in the kidneys…
90
To be fair, the referee has hand-cuffed “Poor old coal” to the corner, and yet “Poor old coal” is somehow STILL ahead on points, despite the rigged match.
70
more on the AEMC “demand response” draft plan. unbelievable – short, so worth a listen:
AUDIO: 3mins 19secs: 18 Jul: ABC AM: National plan designed to cut use and cost of power released
By Felicity Ogilvie
The Australian National Energy Market Commission has today released a wholesale demand response draft rule that would allow businesses to sell power into the grid.
It is designed to reduce power use and cost.
Featured:
Tennant Reed, Australian Industry Group
Craig Memery, Public Interest Advocacy Centre
Dan Cass, Australia Institute
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/adelaide/programs/am/national-plan-designed-to-cut-use-and-cost-of-power-released/11320054
AUDIO: 6min 30sec: ‘The globe’s at risk of climate apartheid’, UN rapporteur warns
By Sabra Lane
The UN special rapporteur for extreme poverty and human rights Philip Alston is visiting Australia and he’s being awarded an honorary doctorate by the ANU tomorrow – a university where he used to lecture in law.
He recently delivered a scathing warning about the world’s inaction in climate change saying the globe’s at risk of “climate apartheid’.
Featured:
Philip Alston, UN rapporteur
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/adelaide/programs/am/the-globes-at-risk-of-climate-apartheid-un-rapporteur-warns/11320144
11
WONDERFUL!
Who wants some “fresh” chicken from those cold storage facilities that have “turned off/turned down” their refrigeration?
Question: If a business COULD turn down their refrigeration without impact to the stock in storage (would like some evidence of this), then why would they not already be doing this to reduce power consumption, given the already extortionate cost of energy?
Seems AEMC have discovered a fantastic new plan for deck-chair configuration on the Titanic. A far better response would be to throw AEMC overboard, so that they are not tempted to occupy lifeboats that would be better used for those that did not cause this mess.
Australia: desperately pursuing Third-World status while our parasite-class relentlessly pursue a luxury-lifestyle at our expense.
60
As a bonis your turned down hot water system with added listeria
40
17 Jul: SanFranciscoChronicle: Berkeley becomes first U.S. city to ban natural gas in new homes
By Sarah Ravani
City Council on Tuesday night unanimously voted to ban gas from new low-rise residential buildings, starting Jan. 1, 2020…
The natural gas ordinance, introduced by Councilwoman Kate Harrison, requires all new single-family homes, town homes and small apartment buildings to have electric infrastructure…
Mayor Jesse Arreguín called the ordinance innovative and groundbreaking.
“I’m really proud to be on this City Council to adopt this groundbreaking ordinance … We know that the climate crisis is deepening and is having cataclysmic impacts,” he said at the meeting. “Warmer temperatures and the year-round fire season… the melting of the polar ice caps, growing sea level rise, all these conditions prove that we are in real trouble and that we have to take bold action now.”
California Energy Commission Chairman David Hochschild, a Berkeley resident, also spoke at the meeting and said that 50 cities across the state, including San Francisco, are considering similar action and Berkeley would pave the way for future legislation…
Electric-only buildings prevent the installation of natural gas pipes and instead install heat pumps and induction cooking, Gould said…
Kristin Davis, the co-owner of KC’s BBQ in Berkeley, said she prefers using a gas stove over an electric cooktop.
“I just prefer an open-flame,” Davis said. “I don’t think there is a huge difference in the taste, but I do think the taste is a little more enhanced over an open flame.”…
Davis said she is concerned that installing electric equipment in new restaurants could be a financial burden for small businesses.
Harrison acknowledged that electric appliances might be more expensive, but she said the use of electric equipment is cost-effective in the long term.
“Electricity on an ongoing basis will be less expensive,” she said…
A public interest exemption may also be allowed if the council or the Zoning Adjustments Board determines that the use of natural gas is necessary.
https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Berkeley-becomes-first-U-S-city-to-ban-natural-14102242.php?t=ea39d0f200&f?
2018 Total System Electric Generation in Gigawatt Hours
California: Natural gas: Percent of California In-State Generation: 46.54%
California’s natural gas-fired electric generation was similar to that of 2017, accounting for almost 47 percent of in-state generation or 90,691 GWh. Imported gas-fired generation contributed an additional 8,953 GWh. As a result, natural gas totaled 99,644 GWh or about 35% of the California Power Mix…
While total renewable generation as shown in the California Power Mix now stands at 31 percent, this figure should not be used to track the state’s progress for the Renewables Portfolio Standard (RPS) program. The reason is twofold. First, RPS is based on retail sales that do not take into account energy used for water conveyance and pumping, transmission and distribution losses, and city self-supply such as street lighting. The total system electric generation summary includes these losses and uses of energy as it is measured at the plant gate. Second, the RPS program requires verification of the eligibility of renewable energy procured by LSEs and allows for the use of Renewable Energy Credits (RECs). As LSEs are allowed to retire RECs to meet RPS procurement requirements up to 36 months from when the electricity is generated, procurement claims may include RECs that were generated in previous years.
https://ww2.energy.ca.gov/almanac/electricity_data/total_system_power.html
11
” Climate apartheid “. That’s a good one. Even the climate – sun, wind, & rain – must be politically correct nowadays. When will we get a transgender typhoon?
20
Well, US southern states did receive a wet, soggy visit from ‘Barry‘ the other day and like its namesake, showed promise to begin with then fluffed out, a non-event, not even making Cat 1 Hurricane status although some experts in alarmism claimed one wind gust reached the catastrophic speed of ‘ruffling feathers’ – merely a mea culpa storm in a D-cup:
ACE Real-Time North Atlantic Ocean Statistics by Storm for 2019 – Tropical Storm Barry
http://tropical.atmos.colostate.edu/Realtime/index.php?loc=northatlantic
20
this guy is worried about global WARMING!!!
17 Jul: Scotsman: How UK’s disgraceful inaction threatens Scotland’s climate change goals
The UK Government appears intent on being an obstacle to Scotland’s ambitious plans to tackle climate change, writes Alan Brown MP.
by Alan Brown, SNP energy spokesperson
As we face another record-breaking hot summer, it’s important to remember that the climate crisis we face may also lead to ***harsher winters…
It is absolutely unacceptable for people to be forced to choose between having the ***heating on or cooking their dinner. It is shameful that in 2019 people are going hungry or dying ***from not being able to afford their heating bills…
Scotland is among only a handful of countries to define fuel poverty, let alone set targets relating to its eradication…
By the end of 2021, the Scottish Government will have allocated over £1 billion since 2009 through energy efficiency programmes ***to make homes warmer and cheaper to heat…
A report published yesterday revealed that Westminster support for onshore wind could save each UK household £50 a year…
https://www.scotsman.com/news/opinion/columnists/how-uk-s-disgraceful-inaction-threatens-scotland-s-climate-change-goals-alan-brown-1-4966008
12 Jul: National Grid: Pathways to 2050 – National Grid ESO publishes 2019 Future Energy Scenarios
Reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050 is achievable but requires immediate action across the energy system
National Grid Electrciity System Operator’s Future Energy Scenarios (LINK) report maps out credible pathways and scenarios for the future of energy for the next 30 years and beyond. Based on input from over 600 experts, it looks at the energy needed in Britain, across electricity and gas – examining where it could come from, how it needs to change and what this means for consumers, society and the energy system itself…
The analysis shows the positive role electric vehicles can play in decarbonization, with a predicted 35 million electric vehicles by 2050 providing greater flexibility and supporting increased energy from renewable sources. During periods of oversupply EVs could be used to store excess electricity with the potential to store roughly one fifth of GB’s solar generation for when this energy is needed.
It also outlines large scale changes in how power is generated, including growth in wind and solar generation as coal plants close. There are domestic actions too – homes in 2050 will need to use at least one third less energy for heating than today, with over 7 million hybrid heat pumps installed by 2050 to provide continued flexibility…
https://www.nationalgrideso.com/news/pathways-2050-national-grid-eso-publishes-2019-future-energy-scenarios
11
17 Jul: WRI: Beyond Renewables: How to Reduce Energy-Related Emissions by Measuring What Matters
by John Woolard, Senior Fellow, Energy Program
Despite the uptick in renewable energy usage, global emissions have steadily increased. Senior Fellow John Woolard argues that commitments to 100% renewables, while critical for sending market signals to increase investment, will not alone achieve the system change needed to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. It’s time for companies and countries to commit to 100% zero-carbon energy…
How Can This Pattern Be Changed?
Solar and wind power represent important renewable sources of energy, produced at near-zero marginal cost. Their adoption should continue to be aggressively promoted. But policy makers also need to understand the limitations of renewable energy, including the challenges associated with the variability of their output…
Because renewable sources of energy are not consistently and reliably available, even companies and consumers that purchase all of their energy from renewable sources often rely on fossil fuel to meet their needs for consistent, reliable power…
2. Harness the Power of Markets to Drive Down Emissions
Coal generation is the largest single source of carbon emissions in the United States. It needs to be eliminated quickly…
5. Keep Operating Existing Nuclear Plants—And Keep the Door Open to New Ones…
Conclusion
Addressing climate change will require trillions of dollars in expenditure, coordination across all countries and the deployment of multiple technologies at scale…
https://www.wri.org/news/beyond-renewables-how-reduce-energy-related-emissions-measuring-what-matters
11 Jul: FinancialPost: Reuters: America wants to extend the lifespans of its nearly 100 nuclear reactors to 80 years
Most U.S. reactors already have seen their licences extended to 60 years from 40 years
by Geert De Clercq
U.S. Deputy Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette told an International Energy Agency conference on nuclear and hydrogen in Paris that both technologies were crucial for reducing carbon emissions and boosting energy security…
“We believe strongly that a strong domestic nuclear energy (industry), enabled by our existing fleet and enhanced by game-changing advanced nuclear technologies is critical to our nation’s energy security, our national security, our environmental sustainability…,” Brouillete said.
The U.S. department of energy (DOE) agrees with the IEA that extending the life of existing reactors is perhaps the most competitive way to produce low-carbon electricity, he said. The DOE was working to help extend the licences for the existing fleet out to eighty years, he added.
The United States has nearly 100 nuclear reactors in operation, which produced about 20 per cent of total electrical output in 2018, World Nuclear Association data show…
***In France, where state-controlled utility EDF is the world’s largest nuclear operator with a fleet of 58 reactors, nuclear regulator ASN is looking into allowing reactor lifespan extensions but has not made a decision yet.
Brouillete said the U.S. industry was working on several new nuclear technologies and his department strongly supported the development of new technologies, in particular small modular reactors and micro-reactors.
“Looking forward to the next generation of nuclear power, there are nearly 50 innovative US companies that are actively working on new advanced reactor designs and we are excited about the potential that they bring to produce more energy with less waste,” he said…
https://business.financialpost.com/commodities/energy/u-s-to-extend-nuclear-reactor-lifespans-in-bid-to-revive-industry
10
17 Jul: Guardian: Offshore wind auction could raise millions for Queen
Crown Estate holds rights to seabeds around British Isles for wind and wave power
by Juliette Garside and Jillian Ambrose
The Queen’s property managers will this week set out terms for the world’s biggest offshore wind auction in a decade.
Industry experts expect the complex bidding process to raise record sums, which could increase energy bills and hand a windfall to the crown – potentially generating hundreds of millions for the Queen.
The Crown Estate, which manages the monarch’s property portfolio, holds exclusive rights to lease the seabed around the British Isles for wind and wave power. Its profits go to the Treasury, which then sends 25% back to the royal household in the form of the sovereign grant.
Criticised as a cash grab by some energy companies, the auction has already prompted calls for a review of whether the Queen should have the right to claim any revenues from offshore wind…
The sovereign grant was increased two years ago, from its previous level of 15%, in order to pay for extensive renovations at Buckingham Palace. It is to stay at 25% for a 10-year period, meaning the royal household should benefit directly from the money raised from the new leases…
The Queen’s seabeds generate 8% of the country’s electricity generation, but that could increase to a third by 2030 under government targets.
A more ambitious target of almost 80% from offshore wind by 2050 has been proposed by the Committee on Climate Change…READ ON
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jul/17/offshore-wind-auction-could-raise-millions-for-queen
20
Powering a First World country with windmills is just plain stupidity. But that is where we are going… Even science fiction writers did not predict this kind of self-induced lunacy.
60
Warming in Scotland, yeah, right. They should be so lucky…
30
19 Jul: ABC: Oil and gas giant Eni starts work on Northern Territory’s largest solar farm in race to 50pc renewables by 2030
NT Country Hour By Carmen Brown
A major oil and gas company has set to work building the Northern Territory’s largest solar farm, with the $40 million project expected to be completed later this year.
Italian-owned Eni Australia purchased the development from Epuron in February, and has been busy developing its 70-hectare site near Katherine.
Once completed, the facility will house 100,000 solar panels with a 25 megawatt capacity…
Power generated from the site will feed into the main grid between Katherine and Darwin under a power purchase agreement with retailer Jacana Energy…
A proposal to build a 15,000-hectare solar farm (LINK) has been recently announced in the Barkly region which, if completed, will become the largest solar project in the world.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2019-07-18/oil-and-gas-giant-eni-start-building-biggest-solar-farm-in-nt/11317072
links to same story as below. “The Wire” is now broadcast on hundreds of community radio stations around Australia, it seems, including one on AM radio in Brisbane – 4RPH – which is a member of the Radio Print Handicapped Network which recently stopped broadcasting BBC World Sce from midnight to 6am, replacing it with even more extreme left stuff from US and locally:
AUDIO: 3min42sec: 16 Jul: The Wire: Australian Desert Power to Light up Singapore
By Roderick Chambers
Can these electrons make it across the desert and under 3 seas to Singapore?
Featured in story: Pat Conroy, ALP Shadow Minister for Defence, Climate Change, International Development & The Pacific
A $20 billion project from Sun Cable is intended to take solar power from the desert near Tennant Creek across the Timor, Banda and Java seas to Singapore.
At present it appears that Directors David Griffin and Mac Thompson are bunkered down in Singapore, as an email stated that they were not doing media, and there is no phone listed. Their Australian office according to their website is domiciled at accountants PwC in Sydney, and when contacted PwC media were vague just saying they would not comment on their clients.
Shadow Minister for Defence, Climate Change, International Development & The Pacific, Pat Conroy was certainly more enthusiastic and knowledgeable about the project, and vowed to hold the Government to account on renewables when Parliament returned.
The Wire is produced in partnership by 2SER Sydney, Radio 101.5 Adelaide, 4EB-FM Brisbane ETC…PLUS Supporters and Program Distribution
http://thewire.org.au/story/australian-desert-power-to-light-up-singapore/
About The Wire: The Community Radio Network satellite and the CAAMA Radio satellite deliver the live program to more than 200 stations each weekday…
Produced with the assistance of the Department of Communications and the Arts via the Community Broadcasting Foundation.
http://thewire.org.au/about/
11
another example from The Wire.
Adani segment begins at 15min16sec to 19min40sec: by Rob Osborne with Lock The Gates Ellie Smith:
AUDIO: 25min50sec: 16 Jul: TheWire: Adani employs intimidation to influence scientific reports
Adani uses aggressive tactics to influence government decisions Freedom of Information material shows Adani requesting names of scientists CSIRO and GeoScience Australia personnel have their reputations impugned
Featured in story Ellie Smith – Lock The Gate Alliance
http://thewire.org.au/story/adani-employs-intimidation-to-influence-scientific-reports/
4RPH also now airs Alternative Radio program:
About Alternative Radio
Alternative Radio is a weekly, unembedded, award winning one-hour public affairs program that is offered free to all public and community radio stations in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, the UK and on short wave through Radio for Peace International…
AR, in the words of its founder, David Barsamian, has its headquarters “situated to correspond with the Left’s position in the mainstream media: down an alley, behind a house, on top of a garage in Boulder, Colorado.”
Since 1986 David and his team have sought to capture the spoken word of some of the worlds most radical thinkers. Spanning the full range of political, social and environmental issues, AR seeks to promote informed, intellectually stimulating and entertaining debate on the issues that affect residents of the global village.
AR is currently broadcast on over 125 stations on four continents, reaching an audience of millions…
Since 1997 AR has been broadcast in Australia by various community radio stations affiliated with the CBAA.
AR (Aust) PO Box 687 Cowes VIC 3922
(SHANE’S PAGE)
Shane Elson – Australian AR Producer
Shane is an award winning media commentator and producer who has covered many events of significance. He is the Executive Producer of AR in Australia and for 12 years was the Executive Producer and Anchor of the ground breaking Public First Program on Gippsland Community Radio. Shane teaches radio and online journalism at Monash University and radio production and criticism at Swinburne University.
He lives on Phillip Island, just off Victoria’s Gippsland coast, with his wife, Wendy.
http://www.araustralia.org/about.htm
what this stuff is doing on 4RPH, which is for the visually-impaired, is beyond me.
01
17 Jul: OneStepOffTheGrid: Solar industry warns of “bloodbath” if Victoria rebate not changed
By Sophie Vorrath
The solar industry has intensified calls for the Victorian government to review the design of its “absolute monster” of a rooftop solar rebate, amid reports of failing businesses and frustrated consumers.
Industry peak body the Smart Energy Council says a “massive gap” exists between the Labor Andrews government’s perception of the success of its Solar Homes scheme, and what has been happening on the ground.
“The phones have stopped ringing, the debts are mounting… That’s what the whole industry is facing,” said SEC CEO John Grimes in a webinar on Wednesday…
He says many previously busy installers have had no work since the first pause in applications for the rooftop rebate in April, and more than a few are facing the prospect of shutting their businesses down…READ ON
https://onestepoffthegrid.com.au/solar-industry-warns-of-bloodbath-if-victoria-rebate-not-changed/
18 Jul: OneStepOffTheGrid: Rooftop solar prices spike in Victoria, up 13% in July
By Jeff Sykes
The Solar Price Index for July 2019 as published monthly by Solar Choice noted a 13% rise in residential solar prices in Victoria following the re-opened rebate scheme being snapped up in the first 3 days (LINK)…
We have seen a number of installers suffering from the lack of clear communication from the Victorian government as the pauses without notice to the scheme have made Solar PV a difficult product to sell to Victorians…
We have also seen some installers exit the Victorian residential solar market as a result.
https://onestepoffthegrid.com.au/rooftop-solar-prices-spike-in-victoria-up-13-in-july/
30
Bloodbath is right. Why are rooftop solar owners being paid a feed in tariff of 11 cents/kWhr, when lunchtime prices are often around 5 cents? More solar subsidies will soon drive that lunchtime price closer to zero. Yet there must be reliable generators on standby to deliver the evening peak demand when prices often rise to 15-20 cents.
50
Die rent-seekers!
20
17 Jul: 9News: AAP: Industry ‘unprepared’ for NSW solar plan
The NSW government’s solar battery program risks injury or death because of a lack of training in the industry, according to internal budget documents.
The Empowering Homes program, which was touted as an election promise in February by the Berejiklian government, provides interest-free loans for up to 300,000 households for the installation of solar-battery systems.
Budget documents obtained by the Greens show the 10-year scheme could lead to injury and death because of high installation rates and an “unprepared workforce”.
“High installation rate with an unprepared workforce, poor training, poor auditing scheme leads to injury/death/reputational damage,” the document, seen by AAP, said.
There is also a significant risk of medium- to low-income families being “enticed” into loans they may not be able to pay back, the document said…
The Department of Planning, Industry and Environment insists the document is a preliminary draft of potential program risks…READ ALL
https://www.9news.com.au/national/industry-unprepared-for-nsw-solar-plan/46acee24-66ee-4ea2-b83c-73e1a300f24e
10
thought subsidies weren’t needed, Reuters:
18 Jul: Yahoo: Reuters: U.S. solar sector launches lobbying push to preserve key subsidy
by Nichola Groom in Los Angeles
In a letter sent to congressional lawmakers and signed by more than 900 solar companies, the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) argued that the 30% tax credit for solar energy systems should be preserved because it has helped generate $140 billion in investment. The subsidy has also created more than 200,000 jobs even though solar energy accounts for only a little more than 2% of U.S. electricity generation, the letter said…
The credit’s phase-out is a major change for an industry that has relied on it to underpin growth for well over a decade…
The extension would need Republican support to pass the Senate.
If allowed to sunset, the subsidy will drop to 26% next year and will continue to step down annually until 2022, when it will settle at a permanent 10% for utility and commercial projects and disappear for residential projects…
The letter to lawmakers highlighted the sector’s growth in the Midwest and Southeast, regions with many Republican-controlled states, and focused on its economic and job-creating benefits.
In a separate press release, however, SEIA linked the policy to a drive to combat climate change…READ ALL
https://news.yahoo.com/u-solar-sector-launches-lobbying-195637389.html
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This statement should be a red flag for everyone. If it takes 200,000 jobs to get to 2% then extrapolating gives 10,000,000 jobs to get to 100% of the generation. Then there will be at least that effort in building, operating and maintaining storage to get above 30% market share for intermittent generation. That puts 12% of the US labour force just making and supplying electricity. If the car fleet is converted to electric power then that doubles the electricity requirement; providing jobs for 25% of the labour force – just making electricity.
This is why intermittent are unrenewable.
This is why labour productivity is in the toilet in Australia.
https://edge.alluremedia.com.au/uploads/businessinsider/2018/06/Australia-non-farm-productivity-v-average-hourly-wages.jpg
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17 Jul: PV Mag: Connection issues continue to hamper large scale solar PV projects
The 60 MW Kennedy Energy Parkhas been deprioritised by its developer Windlab due to “uncertainty around connection solution.” The move comes despite the fact the hybrid solar, wind and storage facility known as “Big Kennedy” was completed last December
by Blake Matich
Windlab has blamed the move on the “lack of progress on the Queensland Government’s proposed Clean Energy Hub (which included the part funding of a multi-user transmission line to be used by Big Kennedy).”…READ ALL
https://www.pv-magazine-australia.com/2019/07/17/connection-issues-continue-to-hamper-large-scale-solar-pv-projects/
17 Jul: Energy Matters: The challenge of going solar in Alice Springs comes down to the wire(s)
As it attempts to go more solar, Alice Springs is the site of a storm brewing between a community solar group and the Northern Territory Government-owned power company…READ ALL
https://www.energymatters.com.au/renewable-news/solar-alice-springs-wires/
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another of those stories that never made it into the English-language media:
17 Jul: PV Mag: Sunowe’s trial for solar panel smuggling in Germany: customs must bring evidence
From pv magazine Germany (LINK IN GERMAN)
By Heinz Wraneschitz and Sandra Enkhardt
In October 2017, German customs authorities “discovered a fraud cartel with solar modules,” according to their own statements. Among others, a local county politician from the district of Erlangen-Höchstadt was also arrested. Management and employees of the photovoltaic group Sunowe of Nuremberg are suspected of having evaded a good €20 million in anti-dumping and anti-subsidy tariffs, while also circumventing the minimum import price (MIP) for crystalline solar modules from China since December 2013.
Although the trial against the six defendants, including the county council member, began in March and trial dates were set for July 11, the Nuremberg Law Office announced on July 2 that the trial was unexpectedly suspended.
The office said that it was suspended due to the fact that the customs investigation office had failed to submit evidence of the alleged crimes within the requested deadline…
The consequence is that now “the procedure must start over completely again.” According to Nuremberg’s justice spokesman Friedrich Weitner, the process should start again at the earliest in winter…
The trial is investigating two women and four men who worked for the German subsidiary of the Chinese photovoltaic manufacturer. According to the prosecutor, the politician is denying the allegations, while three of the defendants have confessed…READ ON
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2019/07/17/sunowes-trial-for-solar-panel-smuggling-in-germany-custom-duties-must-bring-evidence/
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Free radicals under the spotlight.
‘A former Head of the Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command (SO15) has warned that Extinction Rebellion are an extreme anarchist group and should be treated as such.
‘Richard Walton, Senior Fellow at Policy Exchange, says the movement of climate protestors seeks a “subversive agenda” rooted in political extremism, eco-socialism and radical anti-capitalism.’
Tallbloke’s Talkshop
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If the kiddies want to throw a tantrum like that, LEAVE THEM THERE – glued to the road, out in the weather, day and night – that’ll learn ’em what carbon zero means when a large bus or a heavy truck or even a 4WD diesel their way cometh…
[figuratively speaking, not literally]
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PIC: 17 Jul: WarrnamboolStandard: Wind turbine blade in collision with power pole at Glenthompson
by Jessica Howard
More than 160 people are without power after a truck carrying a wind turbine blade collided with a power pole at Glenthompson.
A police spokeswoman said the collision occurred on the Maroona-Glenthompson Road just after 2pm on Wednesday…
A similar incident occurred in Hamilton earlier this year…READ ON
https://www.standard.net.au/story/6279702/power-outage-after-truck-carrying-wind-turbine-blade-collides-with-pole/
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4 letters on Bob Brown; first one below is the best:
18 Jul: Australian: Letters: Last Post
I must have missed the ABC’s coverage of Bob Brown’s late realisation that the wind farm proposed for Robbins Island will affect Tasmania’s natural beauty and could kill bird life. I expected broad coverage from our no-bias ABC after such an important change of heart by the Greens founder.
Lesley Cowie, Blackburn, Vic
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/letters/last-post-july-18/news-story/84ffe7f998f2ffbc790bb4e9dd1e362d
16 Jul: Wind-Watch: GreenNewsIreland: Hen Harrier killed after wind turbine collision
A Hen Harrier, one of Ireland’s most threatened birds of prey, was killed on a wind farm in Co Kerry in April, according to the Irish Raptor Study Group (IRSG).
The rare female Hen Harrier was killed after colliding with a wind turbine near Knockrour East, according to the conservation group…READ ON
https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2019/07/17/hen-harrier-killed-after-wind-turbine-collision/
16 Jul: Irish Examiner: Kerry council to review renewable energy policy after protest by locals
by Anne Lucey
Kerry County Council is to undertake a revision of its renewable energy policy with regard to the siting of wind turbines, which will include additional landscape protection designations.
A second protest in recent months against wind farming and the development of new technologies like battery storage unit compounds took place outside the monthly meeting of Kerry County Council recently…
The area is being torn apart by the placement of wind turbines, representatives from Save Sliabh Luachra and the East Kerry Wind Turbine Awareness groups said…
“We don’t want any more wind turbines. We want to change the county development plan,” said teacher Clare Bell, who lives in Gneeveguilla…
Cllr Farrelly said people adjacent to wind turbines were now in “a terrible, terrible situation”….
https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/kerry-council-to-review-renewable-energy-policy-after-protest-by-locals-937153.html
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lots of detail:
16 Jul: Wind-Watch: TheCenterSquare: Texas’ sixth largest wind production in world costs taxpayers and consumers billions
By Bethany Blankley
Since 2000, installed wind capacity in the ERCOT region has increased from roughly 100 MW to more than 22,000 MW as of December 2018.
In 1999, the Texas Legislature passed Texas’ first major subsidy for renewable energy, the Renewable Energy Credit (REC) program, which mandated that Texans must use – and pay for – a certain amount of electricity produced by renewable sources…READ ALL
https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2019/07/17/texas-sixth-largest-wind-production-in-world-costs-taxpayers-and-consumers-billions/
17 Jul: BaltimoreSun: Maryland’s highest court rules state can trump counties in deciding where solar, wind projects can go
By Scott Dance
Solar farm proposals have raised concern in northern Baltimore County, among other areas of the state. County Councilman Wade Kach, who represents that area, pushed in 2016 for a four-month moratorium on solar development in the county. He said he worries the court ruling will pave the way for the expansion of solar farms on valuable farmland, instead of rooftops, parking lots or brownfield sites.
“It just seems like in my district these solar facilities are being proposed mostly on prime and productive [farm] land,” the Cockeysville Republican said. “It doesn’t make much sense when there’s other locations which are not as sensitive where they can be located.”…
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/environment/bs-md-court-ruling-power-projects-20190717-ndq6q6todfhwjcnri7www7lft4-story.html
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Firstly, I wonder if the BOM evalution of the Federation Drought used the actual measured temperatures of the day, rather than the adjusted temperatures currently in the ACORN-Sat II database? The adjusted temperatures are up to 1 degC lower than what was measured at the time.
Secondly, any reading of contemporary newspapers show there was an horrific human death toll from the Federation Drought, at a time when the outback population was a fraction of what it is today. What would happen now?
And lastly, The BOM deliberately leave the Federation Drought temperatures out of the historical temperature graphs – so they can claim annual temperatures have warmed since ca. 1910. If they extended the graphs back to say 1899 and used the actual temperatures of the day – guess what?
It was hotter then than today, and the anthropogenic global warming scare collapses.!
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Dave the stock and wildlife died, but humans survived.
Off hand, I think it may have been cooler during the Federation drought.
31
Temperatures at Nobby’s Head in Newcastle during the Federation Drought were the same as now, unadjusted.
https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/doomed-planet/2018/03/climate-sooks-can-stop-whimpering/
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TWEET: Sen Ted Cruz, R-Texas
This witness, a respected academic, publicly SUPPORTED Hillary Clinton in 2016. Nevertheless, he’s deeply dismayed w/ his research showing that Google was deceptively manipulating millions to vote for her. If they do it again in 2020, he predicts it could flip 15 million votes.
LINK Tweet: Breitbart News
If you only watch one thing today, make it this:
VIDEO
17 Jul 2019
https://twitter.com/tedcruz/status/1151707070762246151
17 Jul: Breitbart: Robert Epstein: Big Tech Will ‘Go All Out’ with Election Meddling in 2020
by Alana Mastrangelo
https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2019/07/17/robert-epstein-big-tech-will-go-all-out-with-election-meddling-in-2020/
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17 Jul: Newsbusters: Google Expert to Senator Cruz: 15 Million 2020 Votes At Risk
By Corinne Weaver
At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, “Google and Censorship through Search Engines,” Dr. Robert Epstein, who researches the impact of Google, informed the hearing that “upwards of 15 million votes” were in jeopardy in the 2020 election. During his testimony, Epstein told Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) that in 2016, Google gave at least 2.6 million votes to Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, “through bias and search results.” He stressed that was the lowest number.
When questioned further by Cruz, Epstein gave a more concise answer: “The range is between 2.6 and 10.4 million votes depending on how aggressive they were in using the techniques that I’ve been studying, such as the search engine manipulation effect, the search suggestion effect, the answer bot effect, and a number of others. They control these and no one can counteract them. These are not competitive. These are tools that they have at their disposal exclusively.”
***Cruz was shocked by this, responding, “If any headline comes out of this hearing, that should be it.”…
Cruz reminded those at the hearing that Google’s parent company, Alphabet, was Clinton’s biggest corporate supporter in 2016. The company donated $1.6 million to the former Secretary of State, according to OpenSecrets.org…READ ON
https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/techwatch/corinne-weaver/2019/07/17/google-expert-senator-cruz-15-million-2020-votes-risk
***15 hours after Breitbart posted this story, 13 hours since Newsbusters posted theirs, nothing from the FakeNewsMSM is showing up in my searches.
also, clicking on “view all” for the small group of stories in google “news”, incl the two mentioned, I get completely unrelated stories, with only the Breitbart one I posted, and that is at the very bottom of the page of unrelated stories!
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Yale Poll, 16% of Americans think global warming is not happening.
https://climatecommunication.yale.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Climate_Change_American_Mind_April_2019_2.1b-1024×723.png
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Global warming has been hapeneing over the longer term ever since the last ice-age. It’s just not man-made.
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There has been no warming in two decades, CO2 cannot do the job.
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Hi Peter, on a longer scale over the last seven thousand years, sea levels have fallen about 6 metres.
On a gross level this tells us that sea water is being “sequestered” somewhere. If we acknowledge the only answer it means that more ice is collecting somewhere on the Planet.
The Poles.
And this indicates that the Earth is cooling overall.
We’re safe!
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On a Canadian finance blog I follow a poster referred to an SUV as ” driving a climate changer “, lol. Well Canadians do love their F-150 Raptors! It was new terminology to me, but I don’t get out much… :). The next door neighbours here have a 5 litre Mustang AND a Ford Ranger… Guess they don’t care about the climate, or maybe they prefer warmer weather!
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I do love watching the Holmes series of home renovation shows. Holmes and Holmes Jnr are often seen driving “light” trucks you would need a ladder to get in and out of.
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Our ABC had some great stuff tonight on the ongoing drought , talking about how there had been little raid for beef producers on the edge of the Tanami Desert!? the clue is in the name I think.
The interview was there saying its the worst he has seen , cue a nice shot of him climbing up on a massive new corro tank to “check levels” I guess. If you know what you are looking at the tank has a float indicator with a rod and ball sticking out the top , indicating its full. Bore water I assume.
Breaking news on the ABC, the Tanami Desert is a dry region! Who knew?
Then just to follow up there was an item on a African guy appearing at the mental health commission. The guy himself was fine and had been through a lot, but our ABC offers the following gem, that he suffered from his experiences and his community being demnonised by “sections of the media” Demonised? really? demonised (if that is the word) because??? perhaps if fitting in and not running rampant along Swanston St or car jacking people or aggravated burging people then you dont get “demonised” This things dont fall from space , you are “demonised” because………., you are over represented in jail because……….., you are over represented in unemployment because……… Actions have consequences.
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Australian Brainwashing Corporation
Hard at work in the desert
Wasting our money
On how dry it’s been !
BAH !!!
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Must be a concensus!!
While German media and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research with Stefan Rahmmstorf and Scientists for Future continue to push the apocalyptic undertone in their report on climate change, in Italy 90 scientists, mainly geologists and physicists, have petitioned leading political leaders. In it, they explain alarmist theses on climate change for insubstantial. Because the past teaches us, so far none of the apocalyptic catastrophes of the doomsday preachers has occurred.
http://www.science-skeptical.de/klimawandel/90-wissenschaftler-aus-italien-erklaeren-die-alarmistischen-thesen-zur-klimaentwicklung-von-rahmstorf-pik-und-co-fuer-substanzlos/0018383/
In German, use translate..
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followup to comment #51 and reply:
15 Jul Updated 17 Jul: Bloomberg: To Break Google’s Monopoly on Search, Make Its Index Public
The tech giant doesn’t have to be dismantled. Sharing its crown jewel might reshape the internet.
By Robert Epstein, former editor-in-chief of Psychology Today, senior research psychologist at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology.
I’m focused here on Google, which I’ve been studying for more than six years through both experimental research and monitoring projects. (Google is well aware of my work and not entirely happy with me. The company did not respond to requests for comment.) Google is especially worrisome because it has maintained an unopposed monopoly on search worldwide for nearly a decade. It controls 92 percent of search, with the next largest competitor, Microsoft’s Bing, drawing only 2.5%…
If Google retains its monopoly on search, or even if a government steps in and makes Google a public utility, the obscene power to decide what information humanity can see and how that information should be ordered will remain in the hands of a single authority. Democracy will be an illusion, human autonomy will be compromised, and competition in search—with all the innovation that implies—might never emerge…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-15/to-break-google-s-monopoly-on-search-make-its-index-public
22 Apr 2016: The Intercept: The Android Administration
Google’s Remarkably Close Relationship With the Obama White House, in Two Charts
by David Dayen
As the interactive charts accompanying this article show, Google representatives attended White House meetings more than once a week, on average, from the beginning of Obama’s presidency through October 2015. Nearly 250 people have shuttled from government service to Google employment or vice versa over the course of his administration…
https://theintercept.com/2016/04/22/googles-remarkably-close-relationship-with-the-obama-white-house-in-two-charts/
Youtube: 14min05sec: 17 Jul 2019: Top Scientist Reveals How Google and Facebook Are Going To Steal The 2020 Election
During the 7-16-19 Senate hearing on Google and censorship was underway during and former editor of Psychology Today Dr Robert Epstein.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cx4_NsXMb1o
01
full testimony from American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology (AIBRT) website:
PDF: 28 pages: AIBRT: Why Google Poses a Serious Threat to Democracy, and How to End That Threat
Testimony by Robert Epstein, Ph.D. (re@aibrt.org) Senior Research Psychologist, American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology
Before the United States Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution Tuesday, June 16, 2019, 2:30 p.m.
I have been a research psychologist for nearly 40 years and have also served in various editorial positions at Psychology Today magazine and Scientific American MIND. I received my Ph.D. at Harvard University in 1981 and have since published 15 books and more than 300 scientific and mainstream articles on artificial intelligence and other topics…
Data I’ve collected since 2016 show that Google displays content to the American public that is biased in favor on one political party (Epstein & Williams, 2019) – a party I happen to like, but that’s irrelevant. No private company should have either the right or the power to manipulate large populations without their knowledge…READ ALL
https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/download/epstein-testimony
when it comes to CAGW – a matter Google is heavily invested in – the manipulation is evident daily. a good amount of what I post is not found via a simple google search, but by using very specific search terms that will draw out regional newspaper articles, for instance, or by knowing websites which have somehow found the links through whatever means they might have available to them.
10
16 Jul: Bloomberg: Oil and Gas Companies Targeted in Germany’s New Carbon Levy Plan
By Brian Parkin and William Wilkes
Experts want to widen carbon trading to tranport and heating
National program would cover 110 million tons of CO2
Chancellor Angela Merkel this month started talks on how to force the transport and building industries to pay for their pollution, widening the number of sectors required to participate in the European Emissions Trading System, or ETS. Merkel hasn’t decided yet whether to push for extending the ETS to those industries or to impose a new tax on carbon. A panel advising Merkel and her ministers favors using the cap-and-trade market…
Germany should copy Europe’s ETS and apply it nationally to heating and road emissions, Klaus Schmidt, the group’s co-chairman told reporters on Monday. Setting up separate platforms for trading permits in those sectors would enable the market to squeeze out polluting technologies like road and heating fuels. That’s provided floor and ceiling prices are set, he said…
The proposals “were very well received” by the government, Friedrich Breyer, the group’s co-head, told Bloomberg…
The question remains on the readiness of consumers to stomach higher prices for road and heating fuel including gas…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-15/oil-and-gas-companies-targeted-in-germany-s-new-carbon-levy-plan
01
Tank is overflowing at home I’m told but here where I am the weather and fishing are just peachy .
http://fms.ws/19sxaH/16.41995S/123.03288E
50
So that’s where you are. )
30
Rob, Are you enjoying meeting your crocodilian neighbours ?
20
Found a rock that has an imprint of our ancestors maybe a million years before we crawled out of the swamp .
40
a trilobite?
20
Now that’s remote.
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18 Jul: EnergyLiveNews: What impact does your holiday have on the environment? The Environmental Audit Committee has launched a new investigation into sustainable tourism
by Priyanka Shrestha
The Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) is inviting written evidence on what the government can do to support a sustainable inbound tourism industry in the UK and how the sector should balance the need to encourage tourism while protecting fragile environments…
The tourism industry accounts for an estimated 8% of global greenhouse emissions.
https://www.energylivenews.com/2019/07/18/what-impact-does-your-holiday-have-on-the-environment/
18 Jul: Guardian: Environmental damage of tourism comes under MPs’ spotlight
Inquiry to address problems including aviation emissions and traffic in UK and abroad
by Jonathan Watts
The inquiry into the environmental cost of tourism and transport will consider whether the UK government should play a greater role in offsetting the waste and damage caused by the tens of millions of Britons who go on holiday overseas each year.
It will also look at ways to reduce the negative consequences of the growing domestic tourism industry, including the hefty carbon footprint of aviation and cruise companies.
According to the Commons environmental audit committee, which launched the inquiry on Wednesday, global tourism is responsible for 5% of greenhouse gas emissions…
Thanks to ever cheaper flights and zero tax on aviation fuel, the holiday business is one of the world’s fastest-growing industries and accounts for more than 10% of global GDP…
The committee will study the industry and report next year on ways to reduce the impacts by using incentives, taxation, offsets and greater scrutiny of corporate claims to provide sustainable or eco-friendly packages…
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jul/18/environmental-damage-of-tourism-comes-under-mps-spotlight
01
Gee I hope Jacki Ardern read up on this. After globetrotting around Europe she recently jetted off with the first bloke and mini Ardern for a nice break in Raratonga. Breeding, flying , doesnt she know there is an emergency??
30
Progress… moving forward… well-being… conversation… interweb *free* speech… gUNs… emergency… fast-track laws…
Internationalism on steroids – or its final fatal fling? Has been a Long March on the Road To Zero yet Comrade Cinders can see her prize almost within grasp… a miracle in itself considering all that carbon pollution gas she emits which the child prodigy, Saint Greta of Thermals, claims she can ‘see’ during her moments of
delusioninsanityseizuretrance-like celebrity.10
17 Jul: ScientificAmerican: Climate Solution: Use Carbon Dioxide to Generate Electricity
Sending atmospheric CO2 into underground methane hydrates could clean the air and create revenue
by Mark Fischetti
The world is quickly realizing it may need to actively pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere to stave off the ill effects of climate change. Scientists and engineers have proposed various techniques, but most would be extremely expensive—without generating any revenue. No one wants to foot the bill.
One method explored in the past decade might now be a step closer to becoming practical, as a result of a new computer simulation study. The process would involve pumping airborne CO2 down into methane hydrates—large deposits of icy water and methane right under the seafloor, beneath water 500 to 1,000 feet deep—where the gas would be permanently stored, or sequestered. The incoming CO2 would push out the methane, which would be piped to the surface and burned to generate electricity, to power the sequestration operation or to bring in revenue to pay for it…READ ON
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-solution-use-carbon-dioxide-to-generate-electricity/
02
who cares what these CAGW zealots think. clearly not a good move as far as the public is concerned, despite AFP’s cherry-picking a union quote:
17 Jul: AFP: Industry and campaigners spar over S.Africa’s carbon tax
South Africa’s new carbon tax has provoked a storm of criticism from environmental campaigners who say it is too weak — and from industry that predicts it will cause mass job losses…
Set at 120 rand ($8.30) per tonne of carbon dioxide, the tax will be largely offset by allowances to lower it to an effective rate of between six and 48 rand per tonne in the first three years.
That is far below the $40 to $80 cost per tonne the ***Carbon Market Watch non-profit group says is necessary to reach the objectives of the Paris Agreement…
Nevertheless, industry is indignant that the tax has been introduced by a government that says its priority to foster growth and create jobs by promoting investment.
South Africa’s key mining sector, which is in long-term decline, fears the tax will further hasten its demise as one of the country’s main employers.
The Minerals Council South Africa, which represents mining companies employing 450,00 people, said the tax could wipe out 6,800 jobs in the next two years and then about 6,000 jobs annually after that.
It described the tax as “the wrong method at the wrong time — a time of already deep financial stress”, adding it would “erode profitability through increasing costs resulting in a shrinking sector”…
Matthew Parks, of the umbrella union Cosatu, said it was “worried about the impact of pollution and global warming on poor working class communities”.
But he added there were also major fears of the impact on jobs.
South Africa’s unemployment rate is at near record highs of more than 27 percent, with youth joblessness above 50 percent…
Noelle Garcin, project manager at African ***Climate Reality Project, said the squabbling over the tax bore no relation to the threat of climate change.
“The costs will be very low for industries and the big emitters in the next three years,” she said.
“When we look at the timeframe that we have, I feel like it is three years lost, which we can’t really afford,” said Garcin. “The burden will be much more on the next generation. I don’t even know if we can talk about the next generation anymore.”
https://www.afp.com/en/news/826/industry-and-campaigners-spar-over-safricas-carbon-tax-doc-1ip31c1
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You can almost hear the chains rattling as we march in time with our fellow South Africans, slaves together.
The chronic eco warmunist bleating of our governments and the supporting cast of thousands riding on our backs will surely crush the Australia we once knew.
Once again, with this post, Jo has highlighted the plight we are in.
We do not have the government which we are entitled to.
KK
10
A carbon tax in South Africa, good grief. Just imagine the potential for corrupt scamming and skimming. Another step in hastening the demise of a great country.
20
https://snowreport.co.za/snow-forecast-23-25-july-2019-south-africa-1/
O ye of little faith! These
crookscampaigners haven’t even enacted theirdraconianempowering tax plan yet and even so – ye, even thusly! – the temperature doth plummet andfrogsflakes shall fall from the sky! Forsooth it was scribed:“possible widespread snow falling in South Africa and Lesotho starting on Tuesday the 23rd of July, with up to 20cm possible in places indicated by purple on the map”. And we know the colour purple comes from the humble mollusc and molluscs don’t lie… then again purple was the chosen colour of the UN-Holy Roman Empire which
Babylonthe Vatican still utilises to this very day.Who will think of the wildebeest and elephants and springbok, bru’!
10
If that is what the weather gods are throwing at South Africa
I suspect in a week
It will be here in South Australia
In other words
More cold wet windy weather coming our way.
Where oh where is the Blessed Gore Bull Greta
In our hour of need ?
00
Word of warning – the Vance et al 2014 paper has one major problem. They have not verified that their ice-dome proxy matches the actual rain record over Australia. If their proxy correctly predicts the levels of rainfall over Australia then there should have been a systematic decrease in total rainfall since the 1850s. No such systematic decrease has been observed. This disqualifies heir claim that they have a viable rainfall proxy from their Antarctic ice-cores. It is absolutely amazing that no one seems to have pointed this basic error out to others.
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