JoNova
A science presenter, writer, speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic's Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).
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Statistics
Rino Mitt:
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/aug/19/mitt-romney-climate-change-happening-humans-contri/
He once said Obama was clueless about things. Mitt shows he is as clueless, perhaps more clueless.
100
I apologize to the people of the world for voting for Romney. Unfortunately, all I had to go on was what he said at the time. That made him look vastly superior to his opponent. Had I only known.
Go forward to the present and I know differently. Had he won, he would have been worse than the abominable person who did win. He would have caved at every turn and would have worked hard to be more Democrat than any Democrat alive. As I see him, he is a paid for life member of the Spelunking Party. The party that can only cave to the opposition no matter how mild.
You have to have principals founded in reality with a character to match to hold to them when the going gets tough. As near as I can tell, it is zero on both counts for Romney, for far too many Republicans, and for almost all other creatures calling themselves politicians – in or out of office.
150
I agree. What would he have done differently from Obama? Hardly anything. In fact it would have been even more difficult to oppose the regressive leftist agenda, because of Mitt being a Rino instead of an out of the closet Democrat. It was bad enough with the spineless congressional Rinos.
If Mitt had won election in 2012, we likely would still have him and not had got Trump in there-not a minute too soon. Al Gore would have had three terms by proxies in a row, instead of just two.
80
““Discussions on global warming often refer to ‘global temperature.’ Yet the concept is thermodynamically as well as mathematically an impossibility,” says Science Daily, paraphrasing Bjarne Andresen, a professor at the University of Copenhagen’s Niels Bohr Institute, one of three authors of a paper questioning the “validity of a ‘global temperature.’” ”
Link at
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/index.php/2019/08/24/the-sound-of-settled-science-54/
130
Astronomers who measure temperatures of whole stars might argue the thermodynamic point, and the statement definitely goes too far saying that global temperature is a mathematical impossibility.
A mean is a purée of the details. What is mathematically impossible is to go from some trend in mean values to dire warnings that extremes are going to become more extreme. You’ve blurred a complicated picture down to a single pixel. If you could go from that back to the details you could have saved the Hubble telescope people a fortune fitting it with glasses.
60
Yes, this is right. Homogenising the whole planet down to 15.3C misses the point that it matters when and where any warming/cooling might occur, for example increasing winter minimums or ocean, or polar temperatures are largely irrelevant to life on earth. Indeed increased minimums are good for life in that frost gets minimised over a greater area of the surface.
40
About time someone of note brought this up. The term ‘global temperature’ is physically absurd as suggested. Even more so averaging it. One also would hope that anybody from the Niels Bohr Institute (named after one of the really great early 20th physicists) would not be a party to the notion of any anthropogenic weather theory theory.
50
It is a measure of all temperatures. At best indicative. It is likely not a variable in any equation. So not predictable in any sense. As a single measure of temperature, going up does not mean all things go up and going down does not mean all things go down. In heating, some areas of the planet will heat more than others, as with the water moderated tropics. Some will cool more than others with the same change in solar input. The system is also very turbulent and when you consider that mobile water has 340x the mass of mobile air and a much greater heat capacity the measure is not calculating the heat in the system but the vagaries of currents in a 3D system.
You could also take the view that this one measure is simply meaningless, an attempt to condense many disparate and unconnected turbulent and mobile and interconnected and unconnected systems into a single number when that is nonsensical except in the most general terms of up and down, it is completely unpredictable in change and distribution, not only geographically but from night to day, from summer to winter.
Until there is a predictability of heat exchange and ocean currents, any climate model which only addresses surface temperature is nothing more than observation presented as comprehension when it is not science, just data. As for achieving ‘world records’ by 0.004C, it is more simple to say nothing has changed. So where is this rapid and global warming anyway?
And who made the amazing prediction that the probability and severity ‘extreme events’ were critically dependent on average temperatures? I can only think someone just made it up.
Conversely if a storm or drought occurs, how can you tell that it is caused by Climate change and not just a storm? Or that the collapsed sea walls in New Orleans were not caused by Cyclone Katrina but by the one metre drop in land level in the area that same year, the highest in the world?
As for the amazing dictum that Climate Change causes bushfires, how? And the severity has more to do with the prohibition of grazing and back burning and maintenance of fire breaks.
I would blame many the increased severity bushfires entirely on the Greens, as did Donald Trump. That’s because it’s obviously true, unlike a fantasy Global Temperature.
60
Great.
Second last paragraph is especially relevant but so old fashioned: that’s 1950s technology.
If you don’t sweep the kitchen floor you’ll have more mice, rats and roaches as guests.
If you leave the bush to “infill” unchecked you are going to have unnaturally severe bushfires.
That’s life.
KK
20
My Trump hating son insists Australia’s steel and aluminium exports to the US attract the 25% tariff. I know Turnbull negotiated an exemption which I assume still stands. Besides AFAIK we only export a little specialty steel to them, 0.9% of total exports which would be a low figure anyway. Don’t know about aluminium.
Anyone know for sure?
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We only have aluminium exports at all because the government subsidises them because they are not viable due to high electricity costs. Turnbull gave a subsidy to the Portland aluminium smelter in Victoriastan to the tune of about $80,000 per worker per year (2000 workers).
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As from 1/6/18 Australian steel and aluminium were “indefinitely exempt” from new tariffs of 25% on steel and 10% on aluminium, and prior to that we had a temporary exemption from the tariffs. The Australia-US FTA pretty much guaranteed that we would be left unaffected in any case.
Quotas are however in place. Whether they make any real difference is debatable. The US accounted for only about 0.8% of Australia’s steel exports and about 1.5% of aluminium exports prior to the tariffs and quotas in March 2018 so we may never reach the quota trigger volume (and I don’t know what it is).
Australian steel exports to the US were only worth roughly $US210m a year while aluminium exports were about $US213m a year. Steel and aluminium come in at number 12 and 13 on our list of exports to the US. They’re small potatoes compared to almost $2.5 billion in meat exports to the US for instance.
BlueScope exports 300,000 tonnes of hot rolled coil out of Port Kembla to the US per year to supply its own manufacturing operations there. It employs more than 3,000 Americans and has nearly $3 billion in local assets in the US, that’s not counting the recent announcement of its $1 billion additions.
100
WOW. Thanks beowulf.
40
Exciting news on a new process that had it’s origins around the time of WW11.
Surprisingly it has been brought life as a result of our former prime minister’s decision to incorporate Snowy Hydro Two into the electricity grid. Very promising.
30
Tell us more…
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KK may be referring to developments in the field of Nuclear power generation.
There is quite a lot going on behind the scenes at present. Pressure is building because of the looming electrical power crisis in S E Australia.
http://www.nuclearaustralia.org.au
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Loosely related Peter, but the new focus is still essentially a renewable.
10
The Australian Nuclear Association is hung up on all the old technology — the ultra-expensive pressurized-water-cooled fuel-rod-powered ancient design reactors. All the old expensive and dangerous stuff.
Someone should point them towards modern modular and safer no-nuclear-waste designs: Liquid Fuel Thorium Reactors.
eg https://www.terrestrialenergy.com
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That’s why I reckon we should stick with coal for now [improved of course] and allow modular and/or thorium to prove themselves.
I remember being excited about the “pebble bed modular reactor” but it fell at the last hurdle so we just have to wait and see.
50
Yes, have to agree there, coal is the obvious front runner for the next twenty years and the next step is to heavily research nuclear options.
KK
20
I’d say the next two hundred years or until the coal runs out.
20
Yes Serp, there I am bending to the influence of CO2 PC.
Nuclear is still expensive.
20
Research Thorium reactors ?
The Chinese are already commissioning 2 Thorium Salt Reactor powered generator stations in the Gobi regeon.
But we will probably never get past the discussion level ….if that far !
The Government are not decisive enough..
The CSIRO are not smart enough..
The population are not awake enough.!!
60
Chad:
Virtually every nuclear reactor can be adjusted to use some thorium. Some more successfully than others.
The work in the 1960’s was using different thorium salts. Latest designs AFAIK use fluorides and I doubt that the corrosion potential has been looked at from a long term angle.
The Russians are building an old process – homogeneous reactor – which was tested for possible use as a bomb (and failed). They are building a 170MW one, bigger than the original 5MW.
The Canadian CANDU types have years of operational experience in several countries. Can be recharged while operating. Useless for making nuclear bomb materials.
Modular reactors? In use for 50+ years, multiple sites. Never an explosion.
20
Anything built by Westinghouse (nuclear) is a disaster. As said ..too old.
20
They used to make a pretty good fridge
11
GE used to make pretty good electrical/turbine motors. Finance and insurance? Not so much.
10
Whacky Will Steffen updates the 97% global warming apocalypse in 2018: 2 years to go …
This presentation by Professor Will Steffen was made at an event called ‘THE BIG U TURN AHEAD; Calling Australia to Action on [Global Warming]’, held in Byron Bay, NSW on 27 June 2018. (Published on Feb 11, 2019)
Some one on twitter has devotedly created a thread of shorts from the hour long apocalypse presentation for your viewing pleasure: https://twitter.com/Jumpsteady/status/1163718889139818496
Here is the youtube, full length (51 mins): https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=OzQsjuzr3_M
So much low hanging doomsday fruit to grab.
I choose the first short on the twitter feed, where Whacky Will quotes his close IPCC friend, Prof. John Schellnhuber regarding 2°C warming.
Whacky Will fails to note that “2°C warming” target is unscientific nonsense that was made up by his friend:
” … a group of German scientists, yielding to political pressure, invented an easily digestible message in the mid-1990s: the two-degree target.
But this is scientific nonsense.
“Two degrees is not a magical limit — it’s clearly a political goal,” says Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK).
“The world will not come to an end right away in the event of stronger warming, nor are we definitely saved if warming is not as significant.
The reality, of course, is much more complicated.”
Schellnhuber ought to know. He is the father of the two-degree target.”
https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/climate-catastrophe-a-superstorm-for-global-warming-research-a-686697-8.html
Unscientific, political made up nonsense.
130
The coming decade should be cool and wet.
‘Several independent studies find evidence for just two full PDO cycles in the past century: “cool” PDO regimes prevailed from 1890-1924 and again from 1947-1976, while “warm” PDO regimes dominated from 1925-1946 and from 1977 through (at least) the mid-1990’s. Shoshiro Minobe has shown that 20th century PDO fluctuations were most energetic in two general periodicities, one from 15-to-25 years, and the other from 50-to-70 years.’
JISAO
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I’ll put this up again as it appears relevant.
‘During the past 400 years, climate shifts associated with changes in the PDO are shown to have occurred with a similar frequency to those documented in the 20th Century.
‘Importantly, phase changes in the PDO have a propensity to coincide with changes in the relative frequency of ENSO events, where the positive phase of the PDO is associated with an enhanced frequency of El Niño events, while the negative phase is shown to be more favourable for the development of La Niña events.’
Verdon and Franks 2006
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What is the null hypothesis?
22
https://www.google.com/search?q=null+hypothesis&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
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We know from earlier discussions that CO2 doesn’t cause global warming, so I propose that the next two decades will resemble the 1950s and 1960s. La Nina will be more common and a dip in temperatures should be observed.
http://research.jisao.washington.edu/pdo/pdo_tsplot_jan2017.png
It will be a scientific paradigm shift.
120
that would be greatly desired.
22
Indeed, the end of the renewable industry and floods in south east Australia. La Nina doesn’t become more intense, but back to back Nina should replenish the Artesian Basin and fill the dams.
100
Yes, and that would fit into the written experiences of the those who pushed up the Darling, some of whom are my ancestors.
42
They knew about Australian droughts being worse in the past too, do they. !
60
“that would be greatly desired.”
Yep, the end of the AGW scam would be greatly desired.
90
Poor PF, again PROVES that he has basically ZERO understanding of science.
Do you have any empirical evidence of warming by atmospheric CO2, PF ?
Until you do, the FACT that climate varies NATURALLY, as it always has done, holds true.
There has, in fact, been very little change in the world climate in over 40 years of satellite data.
(And basically NONE if you go back to 1940.)
A fraction of a degree of solar warming, after a slight dip through the 1960,70s
Since the late 1970s, Arctic recovered from an anomalous high amount of sea ice.
Extreme weather, hurricanes, droughts, floods, fires etc still happen at around the same rate, or lower, than 50-60 years ago.
Nothing out of the ordinary is happening with the global climate,
and according to PF, its all humankind’s fault.
112
What are you saying, that there is no effect of CO2 on temp at any time ever?
110
I’m saying there is no empirical evidence of atmospheric CO2 affecting the global temperature.
You can fantasise and troll all you want, but you remain totally empty of that evidence.
There is NO evidence, some vague correlations and inverse correlations and non-correlation.
Hypothetical garbage science hypotheses that leave out so many parts of the actions of CO2 that it is farcical.
Come on little man, in what way has the global climate changed in the last 40 years that can be scientifically shown be related to human release of sequestered CO2?
130
and I repeat..
Nothing out of the ordinary is happening with the global climate
We live in remarkable benign times after a period of slight but highly beneficial NATURAL warming from strong solar cycles out of the coldest period in 10,000 years.
Be very glad of that warming !
There is no evidence of any warming affect by the highly beneficial increase in atmospheric CO2
Feel free to post it if you think you have any empirical scientific evidence.. that last lot was so totally laughable.
120
PF please provide the REAL data (not fake) that shows CO2 correlated (and caused) with world climate changes going back to the paleozoic, or at least over the last 300 million years. Come on where is it?
80
hey RU, here’s one
https://i.postimg.cc/rw8jLc1R/EPICA_v_GRIP.png
and another
https://i.postimg.cc/j2J2nH29/CO2_v_UAH_2001-15.png
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‘ … there is no effect of CO2 on temp at any time ever?’
That does appear to be the case. In laboratory testing they seemed to have a case but in a normal convective atmosphere it didn’t work because the biggest greenhouse gas (H2O) was poorly modelled and nullifies the theory of global warming.
With all the information at our disposal we need to plan for global cooling, because as soon as the truth is known it may have a devastating impact on the human mind.
Apart from the politicians, what in hell is the pope going to say?
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Finally I get it Peter Fitzroy, you’re just here for the mechanics of the chat, the semantics is irrelevant to you, and you’re having a lot of fun doing it to judge by your persistence.
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I think he is just a very lonely little man.
This is just his rather pathetic form of attention-seeking
31
Still waiting PF.
10
The small change in sat data, while suggestive, is a bit sort as a time series. We have to acknowledge that it really isn’t dispositive, since we know that the temperature has been generally rising since the end of the little ice age 200 plus years ago and the ice age twelves thousand years ago.
The null hypothesis is that carbon dioxide is driving an extreme change over the last few years … entry point cherry picked for convenience.
A long term proxy I like, that is real data, and reconstructable world wide, is frost free agricultural days (in temperate climates only, of course.
A wide variety of local sources report this publically and the few researched ho have called for farm diaries have been richly rewarded. I saw an image of one 250 year record on the inside covers of a family bible. This “proxy” has the great advantage of being easily continued to the present day, unlike ice core bubbles or tee rings.
I have looked casually at several state record with the idea of doing research, and the slow progressive increase of about 20 frost free days over two and a half centuries is common to all. The Hypohthesis would suggest a rising rate over the last 70 year — not there in the data (although I’m sure a stat fraudster could find it if challenged).
There is probably other ag data, recorded though the present, that speaks to climate….growing degree days suggest itself. Time to maturity I rejected because farmers do a lot of genetic evolution of their plants so the plants change more than the climate.
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“The null hypothesis is that carbon dioxide is driving an extreme change over the last few years “
NO.
The null hypothesis is that any change is totally natural, having occurred many times in the past.
As you say, there isn’t any evidence against this null hypothesis.
The hypothesis of CO2 driving change is the fantasy hypothesis, and there is absolutely no real evidence for this fantasy hypothesis. It has failed utterly, according to real science.
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Richard I hypothesise that a quiet sun should freeze the Thames.
‘The frost fair of 1814 began on 1 February, and lasted four days, between Blackfriars Bridge and London Bridge. An elephant was led across the river below Blackfriars.
‘Temperatures had been below freezing every night from 27 December 1813 to 7 February 1814 and numerous Londoners made their way onto the frozen Thames.’ wiki
Let us be clear on this, sorting the wheat from the chaff, the Tambora explosion happened in 1815.
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… and for all those keen students the hydrology has changed, but on this occasion the coal fired power stations have been decommissioned, so there is a good chance with all the oscillations locking into place …..
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But on this occasion the coal fired power stations have been decommissioned”
Mainly old ones, replaced with more efficient new ones.
Still lots of new coal fired being built around the world
Except in Australia, they are not replaced or being built..
.. a problem that will undoubtedly cause problems in the not too distant future.
.
50
‘Mainly old ones, replaced with more efficient new ones.’
Not on the Thames River.
‘In January 1963, the sea froze for a mile from shore at Herne Bay, Kent. The sea froze inshore in many places, removing many British inland waterbirds’ usual last resort of finding food in estuaries and shallow sea.
‘The sea froze 4 miles out to sea from Dunkirk. The upper reaches of the River Thames froze over, although it did not freeze in Central London, partly due to the hot effluent from two thermal power stations, Battersea and Bankside.
‘The removal of the multi-arched London Bridge, which had obstructed the river’s free flow, and the addition of the river embankments kept the river from freezing in London as it had in earlier times.’ wiki
40
I see your point. With those two big power stations no longer providing hot water , there could be the prospect of Thames ice if we get some significant cooling.
40
The oscillations would need to be on the same plate: La Nina conditions, negative NAO and blocking high pressure to bring home the beast from the east.
A rough timeline could see this outcome by the winter of 2021-22, a curve fitting exercise gives me a 60 year cycle.
40
If you require further proof.
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/324/5923/78
10
ANY temperature so called ‘target’ is totally un-scientific made up garbage and totally impossible.
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When I get upset and discouraged by the current hysteria about Climate Change etc. I often go back and reread The South Sea Bubble by John Carswell. (There are other books on the subject but they add little).
The frenzy, the excitement, the gullibility reported as the prices rose to their climax reads as fresh today as ever. Few kept their heads; Sarah Duchess of Marlborough (“2 + 2 never add up to more than that”) made money as did Thomas Guy (who founded the hospital named after him in 1721, with a fortune made from the Bubble. Appropriately the hospital’s address is Great Maze Pond, London, one of which he navigated ignoring all the hype).
The scheme was improbable, almost unbelievable yet the vast majority were sucked into believing it possible. Even as the precursor on the Continent collapsed in disaster people rushed to gamble their savings, and borrowings, in a frenzy. Sir Isaac Newton made a large loss and was reported as unable to bear even hearing the name ever after. Nor were the politicians any guide, even many who accepted bribes** to pass the necessary laws would lose money. Walpole emerged from the disaster as the richest man and the most astute politician in England, yet he wanted to buy into the Third Subscription at £1,000 but fortunately for him his private banker decided not to follow instructions, and instead sold out.
The scheme collapsed suddenly and almost without warning. A legislative change designed to help the South Sea Company backfired, and belief collapsed. The public were furious at being “tricked” although even then it was pointed out that they should blame themselves.
The bankers and stockbrokers mostly made money, but some were engulfed by retribution. In an extraordinary response the House of Commons set itself up as a Court of Inquiry and punishment. Hampered by documents “going missing” and Office Holders going abroad (for 20 years in voluntary exile) they eventually fined several Ministers and ALL the Directors. Very heavily in some cases (up to 98% of their net assets), but it took years before the country recovered.
** a side note; The Chancellor of the Exchequer, a very guilty man, was sent to the Tower of London where another prisoner complained officially about “the low company he had to associate with”.
He had also been in charge of the King’s (secret) gambles and had made money, although not as much as the King had hoped for. So after paying a heavy fine he was released to retire to his country “cottage”.
https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/fountains-abbey-and-studley-royal-water-garden/features/studley-royal-water-garden-at-fountains-abbey
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It would be too much to expect that The North Sea Climate Bubble could be brought down with the same level of justice dispensed.
30
KK:
Unlikely. As I suggested there was a coverup. The Company Secretary departed suddenly for the Continent. Not before helping himself to a substantial amount of the Companies cash and the Green Book which contained details of which politician had been bribed and by how much. He was arrested in (what is now Belgium but was then Austrian territory) and held for months until he “escaped” accompanied by his son & the captain of the guard, but without the Green Book which disappeared (possibly to Walpole). His time in jail (with servants and food brought in) was a farce as the Government in England passed furious motions condemning the refusal of the Austrian Governor to send him back to face justice, while privately negotiating through their diplomats that he wasn’t to come back at all.
The Opposition in England was discredited as they had founded the South Sea Company, and some of their MPs had also collected bribes. The method of bribery was that a politician was ‘assigned’ shares at a suitable price which were then “sold” at a higher price and the difference creditted to the MP. On paper (if missing) it looked legitimate and indeed one of the top politicians was able to convince the House of Lords (parallel) inquiry that he had paid for the issue therefore it wasn’t a bribe. That worked because the evidence, and the Company Secretary, weren’t available.
Nevertheless 3 leading politicians died (one definite suicide) and several had huge sums confiscated. (As you will see from the link above they weren’t reduced to penury).The same with the Directors of the Company. The bankers got off. One continued to sit in the House of Commons until his death 12 years later (and was reported as a “devoted follower” of Walpole). No-one knows where the Green Book ended up.
20
When this scam collapses can you see Labor or the Greens having any creditibility with the public? Walpole had a deal because he had spoken against the scheme (while on the back bench) and made his money in Insurance companies (which managed to survive) and copper miners (which didn’t).
There was only the members of the Government, who were not at all anxious for a lot of dealings to be made public, and some of them suffered fines, and other Ministers were relegated to the back bench for ever.
As for the coming collapse, I expect it will be coming fairly soon. Merkel’s recent decision to spend $500-1,000 of each citizen’s money PER MONTH will face opposition. I think her Coalition will collapse and she will be retired.
A side note: Captain Cook’s interest in the south seas is reported to have been piqued by receiving a worn silver shilling issued by the South Seas Company bank years before.
30
“When this scam collapses …..” It’s not going to collapse. There is no longer a sane majority, but if it existed they are cowed.
10
My latest research:
How to measure the liberal bias in Google News
https://www.cfact.org/2019/08/23/how-to-measure-the-liberal-bias-in-google-news/
I am looking at first page search results on Google News. Initial sampling finds 93% of first page links are to liberal sources, with just 7% to conservative news sources.
The bias is glaring and can be measured. President Trump recently held a summit meeting on this bias. Left wing critics of the President say there is no hard evidence, but I found a big smoking gun.
Details are in the article. Pass it on.
David
https://www.gofundme.com/climate-change-debate-education
130
Fortunately David the “we the people” are not buying into or listening to any Democrat or MSM claims about Trump and from where I’m sitting he seems more popular than when first elected .
100
Yes, as I say in another article, we read MSM for laughs.
Trump is indeed looking good, especially compared to the Democrat candidates.
70
The AOC + 3 meme will sink thd rabid members of the Dumbocrats…..
50
Trump was brilliant by forcing Pelosi to defend them, thus OWNING them.
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David, that’s about all the MSM is worth these days.
It’s risible.
Watching the shuffle of the Wannabes — it’s not a Dance, nor can it be called one — for the upcoming US Presidential Election, the `Stupid on Display’ is amazing. Sometimes I wonder, but only sometimes, if they can possibly be serious but they are, sadly, they are.
30
If you don’t look for evidence, you can’t find it. If you look in all the wrong places, you won’t find it either. It is technically correct that you didn’t find any evidence but that doesn’t make it honest.
This is why, in a court of law, the oath is tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Telling only part of the truth is as much a crime against justice as telling something that is not true. It should similarly be a crime for someone calling themselves scientists not to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
120
Half a be is no be at all. The whole truth and nothing but.
40
G O O G L E = Censor in chief, ALL news that ‘they’ dont want you to know. (left and right, what ever that means)
10
Seems Basslink went down yesterday around 11am and is still down
https://aemo.com.au/Market-Notices?searchString=69378
110
V,
I can see the headline in the Hobart Mercury already:
FAULT IN BASSLINK, AUSTRALIA CUT OFF.
50
FAULT IN BASSLINK,
AUSTRALIANORTH ISLAND CUT OFF.Fixed it for ya, 🙂
40
No Hanrahan: “North Island ©” is NZ’s 😛 claim, long standing and historical. It goes with its sister “South Island ©” also long standing and historical. Youse guys have “Tasmania ©” and The Rest.
Now, from our perspective, The Rest is West Island, relatively speaking. So it’s been cut free? Well, all those West Islanders had better
mantake up their paddles and start working. When last measured, West Island was heading North so the longer you wait the more of a Krisis it will be.40
Purely as a matter of interest, is Tasmania moving northward at the same rate as the mainland?
If not, that Bass-link Cable is gunna get stretched. !
20
I’m not a geologist so I don’t really know. The material I read ages ago said Bass Strait was formed when Australia and Antarctica separated during the breakup of Gondwana Land (the southern half of Pangea) which implies Tasmania was a left-over fragment from somewhere else.
The Rest (West Island from my perspective) is moving or drifts 70mm to the northeast towards the equator annually (from this article: https://theconversation.com/australia-moving-on-up-from-down-under-7658
If you tust the Conversation.com … (revealed by a quick hunt …).
If it’s not dragging Tasmana along behind it, then yes, that cable will be stretched. That may be why the Bass Strait cable breaks regularly 🙂
20
This Wiki entry says Tasmania is a fragment of Antarctica, so it won’t necessarily be moving with the same velocity as The Rest.
20
sophocles:
Bass strait is fairly shallow. During the last Ice age it was possible to walk to Tasmania, which the aborigines did.
This implies that Tasmania is firmly connected to the mainland of Australia. I don’t know if the same could be said about the inhabitants.
30
tasmania is within the Australian plate (wiki again https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Plate) and moves with Australian mainland. Sophocles, I think is referring to the boundary it shared with Antarctica before the plates broke apart.
20
As sophocles explains above, yeah we’ve already got the North© and South© island names claimed – all the Rest is West, simple as! Meanwhile, their ABC finally uploaded an article worth reading (apart from the D-minus grammar) which, inadvertently, kind of trashes all their previous shouty nonscience about ‘no more snow because…’
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-08-26/back-country-skiing-the-hard-way-in-tasmania/11446382
Updated August 26, 2019: “August is often the best time for snowfall in Tasmania and skiers have not been disappointed this year… snow-laden Cradle Mountain[‘s] eastern side provides some skiing couloirs – or long narrow corridors – for thrill-seekers prepared to haul gear up and over the northern face”. Couloir, a steep narrow gully down a mountainside, Fr., gully, to flow — my kind of snowboarding terrain… 🙂
“Luckily it was really firm frozen snow with a soft layer on top which really made for pleasant and relatively safe skiing. We still hit a bit of ice on the way down which was slightly never-wracking [sic] when there’s a huge drop below you, but we got through it. It was fantastic. It was one of [the] best days of skiing I’ve had in Tassie”.
Pictures #3 and #7 provide a glimpse of the terrain these two Australians and one New Zealander dropped into, where the “gradient was 40 degrees on average but approached 50 degrees in some parts”. Steep! Scary! Lovely! Way cool rock formations up on the summit (is that Antarctic granite?). Shame about the ABC journalist’s complete lack of writing skills and/or command of the English language, but hey, it is 2019 after all.
10
Tas is the closest resemblance to NZ geographically than the Mainland (West Island) 😉
As for skiing on Cradle Mountain..looks great to me, dam i miss my touring skiis!
10
That was how the delightful hostess at Woolnorth described us.
10
I wonder if the Taswegians are noticing how cheap their power is now they arent entwined with the mainland mayhem.
10
How much water have they got? I searched but Hydro Tas is not telling.
10
Will be fun if it goes down in summer on a calm hot day.
Have your generators ready. !
Tassie has theirs ready 😉
30
Oh nooooo, how will we survive without the “battery of the nation”
I noticed it was zero’d out the last couple of days but couldnt find out what was happening. Thought it might have been maintenance. Hope its not another big one.
30
Doomsday Global Warming.
It’s here, now … it’s in the future … it’s here, now … it’s back to the future …
Doc Brown comes back from the future in 1990 to celebrate the Earth Day 20th anniversary special and warn us …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=51&v=bMFtKlHbKLY (5.20 long)
Here is the full 90 minute special from Time/Warner, 1990 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uz0HzS1O-ug&feature=youtu.be
Check the list of people at the start in the special.
No, I haven’t watched the full 90 minutes.
40
I see from various sources in the UK saying that Australia is not doing enough to cut our emissions. Morrison should hence forth not only keep honouring his current belief and commitment to cutting our emissions but also boost it by the one and only means of doing so as are the UK, France and others are already doing. GO NUCLEAR! Stop pretending PM Morrison. Be sincere about your belief in cutting our emission. Start building nuclear power stations as proof of that commitment. That we we stop this mad rush to renewables, which as most of us already know is a total waste of time and money as it provides zero benefit to the climate and plenty of negative influences on our economy. As for HELE coal fired power stations, yes we can build them too but by building nuclear ones as well we will come to the same level playing field on the world stage in providing a reliable, cost effective and sustainable power source to meet the requirements of any large nation that wants to grow rather than the current self-destructive path we are running on at break neck speed. So PM Morrison pull your finger out and do something. Or are you just another politician like Turnbull and Rudd who lets power go to their head and do as little as possible?
130
Reducing emissions is a wrong-headed goal and it’s high time for a determined push back against this claptrap.
160
I’m just offering a solution that ought to satisfy everyone, and those who still will not accept it can go jump. That’s the approach I believe Trump would use in our position in his approach to making a deal and PM Morrison should follow. Unfortunately it appears Morrison has no backbone. The alternative is for Morrison to call the emissions reduction campaign a hoax but it appears he’s not considering that approach at this stage. He has to make up his mind or else we will crash and burn. We desperately need true leadership to get us out of this rut.
50
Peter S- bad news for you, the enviros do not want a solution.
50
I already knew that. They want to destroy the West as we know it. That’s why we need a strong leader to stand up to them and tell them to go jump. Sadly it appears Morrison is not that person.
50
‘GO NUCLEAR!’
Cory lacks the vision to bring it about, but if the crow eaters desire nuclear power they should be given the opportunity.
60
His vision was not the problem as he was and presumably still is in favour of us “going nuclear”. His policies were clear on that aspect. He’s just not popular for other reasons. One of them is he comes across as a boring conservative, something that helped Howard his last election in favour of a more charismatic personality such as Rudd. Too many people simply can’t be bothered to turn on their brain to think before they vote. That’s one reason why we end up so often with crap PMs, current one perhaps not included but only time will tell.
50
Australia has the world’s largest uranium reserve, so the option is always there. Even if the ban was lifted, the cost of the build maybe prohibitive.
Morrison has been given a small chair at the G7 to keep Donald company.
30
The cost may be prohibitive but the cost of implementing the NBN and building those useless subs didn’t stop them going ahead. I consider spending the big bucks on nuclear and HELE coal fired power stations one of the best decisions any government can make in the long term. Sadly we have both major parties who disagree.
40
Don’t use France as a shining beacon of nuclear energy. They are trying to get out of nuclear, and is installing bird-mincers everywhere. I flew back to Paris from Eastern Europe yesterday, and it was either the hangover, or the lack of sleep, but I couldn’t help feeling very disheartened when seeing how much of the landscape is already dotted with these follies.
The fact that almost all French electricity already came from sources which don’t generate C02 is either totally lost on Macron and his predecessor, or it is indeed by economic design.
40
Macron will just play the Chernobyl/Fukishima card rather than the CO2 card. This is because France obviously incompetently operates aged Soviet reactors in geologically unstable locations subject to tsunamis. The people of France should be grateful he is there to save them.
30
The Palaszczuk Government has a strong commitment to 50% renewables by 2030.
So much of a commitment that they shelled out $90 Million for a recent (and still ongoing) Upgrade to, umm, the Kogan Creek coal fired power plant.
The single Unit plant shut down on 12th July at Midnight, and will restart on 27th September after the 77 day work program is finished.
This plant is one of the youngest in the Country at only 12 years old, and it has the largest single Unit in the Country at 750MW. It utilises SuperCritical Steam technology, so it is in fact a HELE plant, although one step lower than USC. It is one of just six of these Supercritical Units in the Country, all of them in Queensland.
Incidentally, Kogan Creek Station is owned by CS Energy, a subsidiary Company of the Queensland Government. That Company also owns the nearby coal mine which supplies coal to the plant. Own the mine, own the coal, own the plant, own the electricity. Win win all round, eh!
Kogan Creek operates at a Capacity Factor of 83%.
In 2011, CS Energy kicked in $70 Million of Queensland taxpayer dollars and the Feds kicked in a further $34 Million, not loans, just outright contributions, for a Solar Boost program, where solar power would be used to generate high temp/high pressure steam to boost part of the second stage turbine operation, (instead of burning coal to produce that steam.) It was estimated to possibly contribute 44MW to the 750MW output total, not an addition to power output, just part of that total.
The, umm, project was discontinued in 2016, because they could not make it work. $100 million down the gurgler. Still it was other people’s money eh!
This plant has a proposed operational life span out until 2057, so, umm, does not count towards the 50% renewables target.
A real deep commitment to renewables, eh.
Tony.
310
Thanks Tony
That’s the kind o detailed, accurate information
Which tells the truth
And spoils the scam.
So what exactly are they doing
To the Kogan Creek plant this time ?
Another money waster
Virtue signalling project ?
90
No, Bill, this Upgrade is to the ….. coal fired power technology, to extend the life of the plant.
Tony.
130
Tony,
Following on from the previous thread re QLD power generation etc..
..no one could explain why NSW ramps down coal generation by 1 Gw + after the am peak …whilst importing a similar amount from QLD ?
Doesnt this simply export NSW consumer dollars to the QLD government ?
50
Queensland Labor supports resources industry
Courier Mail – 14 hours ago
Queensland Labor declares its support for the resources industry as it battles to hold on to votes in the regions ahead of next years state election…
“Queensland Labor supports the coal industry,” party president John Battams declared as he delivered a sobering speech to the party faithful yesterday…
40
Chad,
The, umm, problem (if it can be called that) with Queensland, is it is so vastly decentralised. You have a largely populated State like Victoria (6.5 Million) and Queensland (5 Million) and yet Queensland is the second largest power consumer in the Country after NSW, consuming a lot more power than Victoria. In Victoria, it is more densely populated because it has only 13.1% of the area when compared to Queensland. Hence Queensland has to generate more power to cover that vast area, North South, and Coast to the NT border. Some of those Queensland cities in the North are further from power plants than the largest distance across Victoria, and Victoria also has more reliance on gas as well to supplement electrical power consumption.
So, while Queensland consumes more power North of say the Sunshine Coast, that power generated in the SE corner, where there are the largest concentration of power plants, then that excess power generated in that area would be useless supplying the North of the State, so it will always be exported across the border into NSW, no matter what happens in NSW.
The furthest north coal fired plant in Queensland is Stanwell at Rockhampton, and Rocky to Cairns is 1100KM, and then a further 1100KM to the Cape, with Mt Isa 900km west of Townsville, while in Victoria, Melbourne is barely 150Km from those plants near Morwell.
The losses involved with using ALL Queensland power (generated in the South East) in Queensland only, would see most of that power lost in greater losses if they tried to use it to supply the North of the State, so selling it all into NSW is a viable (financial) option.
It’s a difficult thing to explain, because there are people who will still believe that power generated in Queensland is what is keeping the lights on in South Australia, when that excess power generated in Queensland, is probably all consumed by say Coffs Harbour.
Tony.
110
Tony, the draglines on the coal fields are BIG users of power. When a bucket takes a bite it sucks so much power from the grid the freq. drops. The freq. chart in the Townsville control room [in the 70s when I was there] was quite broad.
60
Tony,
Whilst i do get the overall picture of the geographic logic of Qld supplying northern NSW, the simple fact remains that ..
A) QLD is more than able to supply ALL is own demand ALL af the time ..peaks ans distances included.
B) NSW has shown likewise it can supply ALL its own demand even at peak times, by maximising its coal otput at 8+ GW when needed
BUT, why does NSW daily ramp its coal generation back down to 5-6 GW during the day ….whilst NET IMPORTING coal power from Qld ?
Why doesnt NSW simply keep supplying its own demand, as it obviously has the capacity to avoid any NET imports other than at crisis peak times ?
It must be detrimental to NSW coal plant efficiency, and financially a boost to QLD finances
70
Chad:
check the price of Qld. coal-fired vs NSW coal-fired.
Higher efficiency means lower costs.
30
Graeme,
But who would that benefit ?…would NSW consumers pay less ?
And.. correct me if i am wrong but dont all generators get the same price during any single bidding period ?
Im happy to be corrected, but i do want to understand why QLD generation is used WITHIN NSW in preference to our own capacity.
20
The high solar output in Queensland is causing negative prices in Queensland. There has been rapid increase in both grid scale and rooftop solar while air-conditioning demand has not started to really crank up yet. Queensland is actually paying NSW to take the power. The grid scale solar is curtailed to hotd the wholes price above minus $45/MWh, which is the current price of LGCs. It does occasionally go more negative but that results in the grid scale solar reducing output.
The linked chart captures the detail well:
https://1drv.ms/u/s!Aq1iAj8Yo7jNgzu5YvqXCxNwLUSk
Note the reduction in the grid scale solar through the middle of the day while the rooftop is following close to normal sine wave. The wholesale price in Queensland tracked around the minus $45/MWh value from 1130 to 1330. There were days last week when the grid solar was curtailed for 5 hours.
South Australian wind is regularly curtailed and the SA gas plants are being paid a bundle to provide their stability service.
Both QLD and SA now have their minimum demand through the middle of the day due to the load reduction as rooftops light up.
The coal generators are offering enough energy at negative prices near to the minus $1000/MWh to ensure they are dispatched at minimum output, forcing wind and solar to curtail. The coal generators force up prices when there is no sun and little wind. The daily swing in price is covering a wide range.
30
Rick,
The same surplus of capacity over demand also prevails in NSW currently. . More so, when the imported QLD power is added. !!
The minimum demand is also during the day recently.
So why doesnt the same pricing issue apply to NSW ? And who exactly does benefit if QLD pays NSW to take their power surplus …consumers ?, Retailers ? , AEMO ?
20
Both QLD and NSW consumers benefit. The most pain would be felt by the grid scale solar as they only have 6 hours of solid production on a good day to make money and that opportunity is eroded by the rooftops in QLD.
At this stage the coal plants have the opportunity during the morning and evening peaks to make money.
With more policy certainty, meaning ambient energy subsidies, there is not much point adding more grid scale solar in QLD.
Dispatching QLD coal generators in preference to NSW coal generators would be the result of lower bid price. That will be a function of the minimum demand each generator needs to remain stable, their short run marginal cost including transmission and the cost of taking a generator off line then reconnecting. There is significant NSW load close to QLD generators so the transmission losses would favour QLD. On that basis NSW customers are the main beneficiaries.
In a month or so, air-conditioners will ramp up and the excess generation capacity will be reduced.
30
I have asked about that before and commented on it being a nice little earner for Qld.
Tony says Kogan Ck was built 12 years ago. If that was completion date it means it was commissioned by Beattie, Premier from 1998 to 2007. Thanks for that at least Peter. 🙂
40
Hanrahan,
Commissioning date 2007.
Construction started in 2004.
Planning from proposal date is usually eight to ten years, so this plant would have been first proposed in around 1994 to 1998, long before coal became a dirty word.
The other five SuperCritical Units are at Callide C, 2001 (2 x 405MW) Millmerran, 2002, (2 x 425MW) and Tarong North, 2003. (1 x 443MW)
So, taking into account from proposal dates, they could all date back to former National Party Governments.
Tony.
90
The Solar Boost outcome is interesting though not unexpected given renewables track record of delivering real benefits. These projects are hyped at the front end, go quiet, then area sort of nudged under the carpet with a few mumbled excuses. If mentioned at all , media coverage is a tenth of the orginal hype. Tidal power, hot rocks, solar concentrators come to mind.
60
WUWT …. Tim Ball wins suit against little Mikey … 😉 😉
100
For those interested in yachting and Greta’s voyage across the Atlantic, here is a yacht tracker.
https://www.windy.com/track-team-malizia-and-greta-on-their-journey-across-the-atlantic
The crew have done a very good job so far, negotiating around storms and strong winds to give her a relatively comfortable time, comfort being a relative term when used in reference to a high-tech carbon fibre racing yacht.
Of course, the fact that they have achieved that is entirely due to the use of satellite navigation and weather tracking information and as far as I know windmill and solar panels don’t quite have the power to launch rockets carrying satellites into space or make the exotic materials they are constructed from.
However, I do hope Greta’s long voyage across a vast ocean has opened her mind to a world far removed from the inner-city life that many of the climate worriers experience.
80
And I hope the colour of Greta’s face matches the colour of her politics for most of the trip. That’ll learn her for not flyin’ 1st class.
Wonder how all of her XR minders are getting to the States for the upcoming climate events? Swimming?
60
Has somebody explained to her that the crew will be flying back to Germany and a replacement crew will be flying to crew the yacht home again?
40
Anyone relying on power from windmills in the Americas, north or south, will be freezing/sweating in the dark, according to that wind map.
Having another look none of the continents are getting much wind, Australia a little more than the others. The UK, with all their bird-choppers is only getting 1.3 GW. https://winderful.diascreative.net
https://www.windy.com/track-team-malizia-and-greta-on-their-journey-across-the-atlantic?29.477,-96.904,3
30
Probably suffering from
Sea sickness
As well
poor poor Blessed Greta !
Sarc/
20
All that poopin’ in the plastic bucket … all for nothin’ …
As Brics environment ministers meet in Brazil, experts see little appetite for meeting António Guterres’ benchmark of climate ambition –
“With little more than a month to go before the summit, environment ministers from the “Brics” countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – are meeting in Brazil.
“Basic” – the same group minus Russia – is anticipated to have its own meeting focusing on climate issues. But for both occasions, expectations are low.”
https://www.climatechangenews.com/2019/08/14/un-chiefs-climate-asks-fall-flat-emerging-economies/
20
O/T in breaking news the Pope has Sanctified the Swedish Zombie.
Queried as to why he bypassed all previous protocols, the (Green) Pope explained that the Climate Emergency was so dire and coming so quickly, that there wasn’t time.
Saint Greta will be the patron saint of the confused and the gullible. No ruling yet on the lighting of candles.
70
Excellent Graham P
Great has favourable winds at her back and the yacht is making over 300nm/day with 860nm to go.
30
I think it is unfair to wish this poor girl a miserable voyage. However I have nothing but contempt for the adults that are using her for their own ends.
https://www.thegwpf.com/greta-thunberg-and-the-plot-to-forge-a-climate-warrior/
60
“For those interested in yachting…” here’s a great example of a high performance yacht tacking downwind, something never done a couple of decades ago.
10
Oops. The link:
https://www.windy.com/track-team-malizia-and-greta-on-their-journey-across-the-atlantic?42.513,-63.677,7
10
a plea for lots more money at the end:
AUDIO: 5min37sec: 23 Aug: The Wire Radio: Plant extinctions hundreds of times higher than historical average
Produced by Steven Riggall
Featured: Dr Jaco Le Roux – Macquarie University
An international group of researchers led by Macquarie University in Sydney, looked at documented plant extinctions in different areas around the world.
They found the rate of extinctions climbed dramatically in most areas up until the 1970s, before slowing down somewhat after that, but caution the situation is very serious.
http://thewire.org.au/story/plant-extinctions-hundreds-of-times-higher-than-historical-average/
***Macquarie have “extinction” form:
AUDIO: 3min21sec: 7 May: ABC AM: The world is “sleepwalking into an extinction crisis”
The (IPBES UN-backed) report, three years in the making, was based on systematic reviews of 15,000 scientific and government sources.
Guests include:
***Dr Kirsten Davies, senior lecturer, Macquarie University Law School, expert adviser and co-ordinating lead author, Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/am/the-world-is-sleepwalking-into-an-extinction-crisis/11086110
24 Aug: Quartz: Plants are going extinct up to 350 times faster than the historical norm
Jaco Le Roux, Associate Professor, Macquarie University; Florencia Yanelli, Researcher, Stellenbosch University; Heidi Hirsch, Postdoctoral research fellow, Stellenbosch University; José María Iriondo Alegría, Catedrático de universidad en el área de Botánica, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos; Marcel Rejmánek, Emeritus professor, University of California, Davis, and Maria Loreto Castillo, PhD Candidate, Stellenbosch University
Earth is seeing an unprecedented loss of species, which some ecologists are calling a sixth mass extinction. In May, a United Nations report warned that 1 million species are threatened by extinction. More recently, 571 plant species were declared extinct.
But extinctions have occurred for as long as life has existed on Earth. The important question is, has the rate of extinction increased? Our research, published today in Current Biology, found some plants have been going extinct up to 350 times faster than the historical average—with devastating consequences for unique species…
We also show that recent extinction rates, at their peak, were 350 times higher than historical background extinction rates. Scientists have previously speculated that modern plant extinctions will surpass background rates by several thousand times over the next 80 years…
This article is republished from The Conversation (LINK)
Disclosure statement
Jaco Le Roux receives funding from the South African National Research Foundation.
Florencia Yanelli receives funding from the Working for Water Programme (SA) and the Centre for Invasion Biology, Stellenbosch University (SA).
Heidi Hirsch receives funding from the Centre for Invasion Biology, Stellenbosch University.
Maria Loreto Castillo receives funding from the Centre for Invasion Biology, Stellenbosch University.
https://qz.com/africa/1694276/plants-are-going-extinct-350-times-faster-than-normal/
22 Aug: Current Biology: Recent Anthropogenic Plant Extinctions Differ in Biodiversity Hotspots and Coldspots
Johannes J. Le Roux ETC
DOWNLOAD
Summary
During the Anthropocene, humans are changing the Earth system in ways that will be detectable for millennia to come…
Overall, plant extinctions over the last three centuries appear to be low, with a recent (post-1990) and steady extinction rate of 1.26 extinctions/year…
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0960982219309431
21
24 Aug: HeraldScotland: The green energy scheme that is tearing island community apart
By Rohese Devereux Taylor
When plans for a giant wind farm to be built on pristine peatland on Shetland were proposed in 2005, it was presented to the islanders as a community-owned enterprise with the potential to earn them £37 million a year.
But after 14 years and growing concerns over Shetland’s fragile biodiversity being shattered by the 155ft turbines being built on pristine peatland and the infrastructure required to construct them, hundreds of islanders are now calling for the project to be scrapped…
The risk of peatslides is just one of the concerns held by local meteorologist and geologist Allen Fraser. He said: “Most of the access roads are floating roads on peat more than five metres deep, which will disrupt the natural drainage into the valleys, resulting in erosion and peatslides.
“Carbon release and pollution risk was not properly investigated. It is clear from the works already begun that planning and environmental constraints placed on the developers are being circumvented or ignored.”…
Mr Fraser said: “The wind farm and others granted or in the planning process will stretch in a practically unbroken line through the length of the islands for more than 70 kilometres, all on peat, on an island chain of low hills that is 110 km long and only 10 km wide at the widest point.
“Access roads and power lines, along with at least 12 super quarries, will
criss-cross and permanently scar the hills for 150 km.”…
Richard Lindsay, head of Environmental and Conservation Research at the University of East London, who has visited the site, said: “The simple fact is that just 30cm of peat over one hectare contains the same amount of carbon as one hectare of tropical rainforest – around 280 tonnes…
Campaigners have argued that Shetland cannot support the £700m interconnector cable that would transmit energy from the islands to the Scottish mainland. Mr Fraser said: “Not one amp of power generated by these giant windfarms is for use in Shetland, it is all for export down the cable. There is no guarantee of any community benefit after the shareholders and owners of the windfarms have taken their cut.”…
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/17858289.shetland-windfarm-plans-sparked-furious-response-locals/
60
in the Republic of Ireland:
23 Aug: UK Times: RTÉ dedicates a week to climate change
by Brian Mahon
Young people will get a chance to play politicians and debate climate change in the Dáil in a week-long series of programmes on the issue to be broadcast on RTÉ.
Tara Peterman, executive producer of RTÉ on Climate, said the issue had been chosen because Irish people care about the environment. “When I looked at the staff for ideas, this was something of major importance,” she said. “When you see young people standing outside the Dáil, when you see kids globally demonstrating on climate change issues, you know it’s an important issue.”
RTÉ announced its autumn schedule yesterday. In the second week in November it will focus in on climate change with at least eight specific shows on the issue, including a documentary presented by Philip Boucher-Hayes on the policy decisions that need to be taken in Ireland…
22 Aug: Buzz Ireland: RTÉ announce new autumn schedule
by James Cox
RTÉ ON CLIMATE One of the greatest challenges to Ireland’s rising generation is climate change. RTÉ will devote an entire week of investigations, events and debate to this urgent issue facing us all…
This special week will roll out across RTÉ television and radio, RTÉ Player, RTé.ie and social media. It will also include an unprecedented Youth Assembly as part of RTÉ on Climate – a first time event for young people in Dail Éireann, jointly hosted between RTÉ and the Houses of the Oireachtas…
RTE’s youth music radio station, 2FM aims to provide a soundtrack to accompany the Climate Youth Parliament blending interviews and music both on FM and digital with the creation of a special week-long digital radio stream called Generation 2. And while young people have been asked to have their say in Dail Eireann on November 1t5th, expect to hear lots of young people flexing their voices on 2FM in the build-up to the big day…
In Will Ireland Survive 2050? Gerald Fleming uses immersive 3D graphics to examine the disastrous effects of extreme global weather patterns on our country.
News2day Ireland’s only daily live TV news programme for primary school children will feature one school each week. They will also cover the Youth Assembly…
There will be five 20-minute podcasts from the RTÉjr Green Team, and 16-year-old environmental activist James Dunne is the guide as they tackle topics ranging from marine pollution to renewable energy to how schools can become green.
Tara Stewart will present a sustainable fashion podcast in a brand-new podcast series broadcast in front of a live studio audience during RTÉ Climate Week. My Story: The Beach Cleaner documents Flossie Donnelly, a 12-year-old Dublin child obsessed with picking up rubbish and plastic from her local beaches in Dun Laoghaire.
https://www.buzz.ie/movies-tv/rte-announce-new-autumn-schedule-335637
11
Wikipedia: Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ)
RTÉ is a semi-state company and the national public service media of Ireland…RTÉ is financed by television licence fee and through advertising…
Even though commercial quotas have been removed, commercial revenue and the license fee each contribute roughly half of the organization’s income.
The licence fee does not fund RTÉ 2fm, RTÉ Aertel, RTÉ Guide or the website RTÉ.ie, however each of these brands are indirectly funded by the licence fee through the use of content that is funded by the licence fee, such as News and Current Affairs…
RTÉ personality salaries
Fine Gael said the high salaries were “rubbing salt in the wounds” for people who had lost their jobs or taken significant pay cuts…
Many of the highest-paid stars are not technically members of staff but are paid through separate companies, enabling them and the station to avoid paying tax on their salaries.
In December 2018, RTE published the list of salaries paid to its top 10 personalities in 2016…READ ON
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raidi%C3%B3_Teilif%C3%ADs_%C3%89ireann
01
My bet is the debate will be between drastic action proposals, not whether the problem exists or no. That is, no skeptics.
10
scores of Community Radio stations in Australia are airing two children programs weekly – Primary Perspectives & Funky Kids Radio – with plenty of CAGW propaganda.
3MDR: Primary Perspectives
Now in its 9th year and hosted entirely by young people aged between 9-16 years old, Primary Perspectives is award winning radio produced by SBN (School Broadcasting Network Inc) for national distribution via CRN and is broadcast on numerous stations around Australia each week. Primary Perspectives has been created specifically to provide an opportunity for children, tweens and teens to share meaningful dialogue about local/global community issues they care about, as well as to mentor young people about initiatives and benchmarks for creating equitable, healthy and sustainable communities – via the medium of high caliber ‘for young people, by young people edutainment’.
Primary Perspectives attracts ‘A list’ guests from diverse fields such as…Founder of 350.org world renowned journalist Bill McKibben; Director NASA’s Carl Sagan Centre & SETI Institute USA Dr David Morrison…and SBN’s International Patron Dame Jane Goodall…
The show provides the regular weekly segments…Let’s Talk Tech (science, technology and renewable energy), Going Green (sustainability topics), From Little Things Big Things Grow (with Jane Goodall Institute)…Eco Heroes, Global Perspectives (speaking with children and leaders in their field around the world), Walk on the Wild Side (endangered species)…
http://programs.3mdr.com/primary-perspectives/2019-06-25
About: THE SCHOOL BROADCASTING NETWORK INC & FUNKY KIDS RADIO
The School Broadcasting Network Inc is a registered youth charity based in Melbourne, Australia and our network is extremely honoured to have Dame Jane Goodall as SBN’s International Patron and world renowned futurist and best selling author ***Dr Peter Ellyard as National Patron…
SBN’s award winning team has mentored over 200 young people to date within a culture of positive, responsible and solution based production and reporting – with the vision that students and interns who choose a future career in the industry will become catalysts for the new paradigm of positive, proactive and socially responsible media…
Rachel and Michael Cooper launched Funky Kids Radio in 2010 to offer a content appropriate radio station especially for ‘tiny tots to tweens’ and at that time Funky Kids Radio was the very FIRST 24/7 online streaming children’s radio station licensed in Australia…
http://www.musicmatters.org.au/about-sbn-fkr/
***Wikipedia: Peter Ellyard
Peter Wake Ellyard (born 13 April 1937 in New South Wales, Australia) is a futurist, strategist, speaker and author living in Melbourne, Australia…
Ellyard is currently Chairman of the Preferred Futures institute and the Preferred Futures Group, which he founded in 1991. He also chairs the Sustainable Prosperity Foundation and two start up environmental companies…
He held CEO positions in a number of public sector organizations over 15 years including two associated with Environment and Planning, and one with Industry and Technology, and was also Chief of Staff of an Environment Minister in Canberra for 3 years. He is Adjunct Professor of Intergenerational Strategies at the University of Queensland (formerly at Curtin University), and is an Elected Fellow of the Australian College of Educators, the Environment Institute of Australia and New Zealand, and the Australian Institute of Management. He is an elected Member of the Union of International Associations, based in Brussels.
Besides being a senior consultant to Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development for 20 years, Ellyard has been a Senior Adviser to the United Nations for more than 30 years, including to the 1992 Earth Summit where he was a senior advisor (the only Australian) on both the climate change and the biodiversity conventions. He also advised a number of International conferences including the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (1971), The UN Conference on Human Settlements (1976). At other times he has been a senior consultant to the UNEP, UNDP and UNESCO…READ ON
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Ellyard
21
Yeah and we used to mock Pravda and Izvestia for their journalistic accuracy; at that time the ABC was not itself invested with today’s outrageous bias –when’s Ita starting on fixing it?
10
Off topic, even for unthreaded but this is priceless.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-_G8yATYP8
50
Initially it looked like it could be a good landing. There must have been a big bump at the edge of the concrete runway!
40
Obviously not a Navy pilot. Those guys can’t land short.
20
Take a look at this.
Fury and Firefy landings HMAS Sydney 1951
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6RTCWhZwyN0
From the comments: “That film was shot at the very early days of the Royal Australian FleetAir Arm – When HMAS Sydney first arrived off Nowra in 1949 , she had a complement of 6 Sea Furies and 6 Fireflies plus 1 Sea Otter – In early trials they crashed all of them except the Sea Otter. I remember it well – I was one of the crew”
20
Scary stuff.
10
The Sea Fury was a fast airplane and looks to have a faster landing speed than the Firefly. Had an AIRFIX model of the Firefly.
10
That technique of coming from the left and turning onto the centreline with the wing dipped was developed by the Poms which enabled the USN to put the Corsair back onto the carriers. They had far too many prangs with a straight in approach.
10
Whoopsie!
20
Just finished reading the interim ESO report on the recent UK power blackout. Very interesting. The full report should be published on 6 September.
30
Link ?
00
Unfortunately, I deleted the link after downloading the PDF. Think it came from a WUWT blog on this topic. But it looks like you have found it.
10
Key points…..
So…
…..lightning takes down solar and the wind farm whith the smaller (244 MW) gas station following .
20
Not sure the initial loss of 500 MW was fully explained in this interim report. However, it did halve their safety margin, which was exceeded shortly afterwards. The point was made that they did expect lots of lightning and it hasn’t caused any major problems in the past. The system recovered frequency-wise from the initial 500 MW loss, but it couldn’t recover from the following over-1 GW loss.
Apparently the following Little Barford units were shut down manually because there was too much steam pressure.
20
I agree about the lack of explanation over the initial events….
The report says. “ the lightning strike and initial frequency loss caused the 500MW drop…”
But what is the actual cause ( mechanism) that makes that initial frequency fall ?.?
20
An interesting statistic from a recent Roy Morgan survey, I’ guessing figures extrapolated from a small population sample I’m not sure how many get surveyed, 1,000? But according to the survey more motorists want to buy electric or hybrid vehicles as their next vehicle.
“New data from Roy Morgan shows that 1,174,000 Australians (aged 14+) are looking to buy a hybrid vehicle, and 438,000 Australians are intending on buying an electric vehicle, as their next car purchase – either new or used. Both figures represent an increase in the intentions of car buyers from a year ago. The number of Australians looking to buy a hybrid car as their next vehicle increased 553,000 since June 2018. The number of consumers intending to buy an electric vehicle has increased 200,000 since a year ago. The rise in popularity of environmentally friendly vehicles has almost doubled the number of consumers looking to buy hybrid and electric vehicles as their next purchase.”
Is this people just giving the pollsters the results they think they need to hear but not want they really feel? I can’t see 1.5 million people buying hybrids or 440,000 buy fully electric as their next vehicle. When they do the sums and see the costs, what do ?most people do, go for the cheaper option. How many hybrids and electric cars are being sold right now, any uptick in sales
IS this data form the same pollsters who told us that a Labour win was certain?
60
liberator –
it’s called manufacturing opinion.
24 Aug: Guardian: Greening your life is all very well – but only a global climate strategy will fix this
The blaze in the Amazon shows the need for a green Marshall plan to allow poorer parts of the world to benefit from low-carbon tech
by Larry Elliott
Judging by the latest opinion polls, **the public is ripe for some green austerity***. Ipsos Mori says that 85% of Britons (LINK) are concerned about climate change, with 52% admitting they are very concerned. These are the highest figures since the pollster started tracking opinion in 2005. Given the spate of extreme weather-related events, and the pictures of the torching of the Amazon rainforest, such concern is both logical and predictable. In this country, the climate deniers have been put to flight.
What the polls don’t show is whether the public is willing to translate this concern into action…
China and India currently have much lower rates of car ownership than countries in the west, but as they grow richer their new middle classes will inevitably seek to emulate western consumers. The number of cars per thousand people are as follows: the US, 811; the UK, 471; China, 179; India, 22. There are 2.8 billion people in China and India. Do the maths. Africa accounted for one in five of the world’s live births in the 1990s, but by the end of the next decade it will be one in three. Demand for energy will soar as the population rises.
All of which makes the case for a global green Marshall plan to finance the transfer of low-carbon technology to poorer parts of the world look pretty compelling…
Donald Trump is no Harry Truman and US participation in a green Marshall plan will have to await a change of personnel in the White House…
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/aug/23/greening-your-life-global-approach
Guardian doesn’t mention the poll was done for pro-CAGW Evening Standard, which has a pic at top of happy Brits enjoying a day at the beach!
21 Aug: EveningStandardUK: EXCLUSIVE: Climate change fears gripping Britain: Poll reveals 85% are worried about warming – the highest figure on record
It comes after the hottest July ever around the globe
Nearly three-quarters of Britons believe the country is already feeling the effects of climate change
by Nicholas Cecil
The Ipsos MORI survey showed 85 per cent of adults are now concerned about global warming, the highest figure since the pollster started asking the question in 2005.
It comes at a time when concern for the natural world is being propelled by freakish weather and after the hottest July ever around the globe…
In Britain, a record temperature of 38.7C was set on July 25 at Cambridge Botanic Gardens . In contrast, the downpours that followed are set to make August the wettest ever , according to the Met Office…
One year ago Swedish activist Greta Thunberg started the School Strike for Climate movement…
Last week the 16-year-old set off on a zero-carbon yacht…
In London, there have been a series of demonstrations by environmental group Extinction Rebellion, amid rising public demand for action…
Ipsos MORI interviewed 1,007 adults by phone between July 26 and 30. Data are weighted.
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/climate-change-fears-gripping-britain-poll-reveals-85-are-worried-about-warming-the-highest-figure-a4218251.html
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one question:
Q. Thinking about the recent hot weather in parts of the UK. Would you say that it is…?
only 26% say they believe it is mainly caused by climate change as a result of human activity.
TWEET: Joe Murphy, Pollitical editor, Evening Standard
Climate change fears finally grip Britain with 85% worried about global warming
Lankmark poll by @ipsosMORI for @eveningstandard
21 Aug 2019
reply Ben Page, Ipsos MORI (***LINK TO DATA BELOW)
https://twitter.com/JoeMurphyLondon/status/1164183426083147776
links to:
***July 2019: Ipsos-MORI: Most important issue facing Britain today?
Pollution/environmnt 19% down 1%
behind Brexit 60%; NHS 39% Crime 25% Education 21%
11
Published on Aug 22, 2019
Australian Industry Group Chief Executive Innes Willox warns the national energy market “could be in crisis” within the year.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3&v=up9LM9gbMWE
60
Travis,
thanks for this link.
What Innes says is pretty much right on the money.
I’m also heartened that the phrase ‘Base Load’ is being said out loud by someone who gives the impression he knows what it ….. really is.
Tony.
50
fire ploy was a dud:
25 Aug: Reuters: Britain joins Germany in criticizing Macron’s Mercosur threat
by William James, Michel Rose; Additional reporting by Andreas Rinke, Marine Pennetier and Simon Carraud
“There are all sorts of people who will take any excuse at all to interfere with trade and to frustrate trade deals and I don’t want to see that,” Johnson told reporters.
Late on Friday, a spokesman for Merkel said not concluding the trade deal with the Mercosur countries of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay was “not the appropriate answer to what is happening in Brazil now.”…
On Thursday, Macron and U.N. Secretary General António Guterres expressed concerns about wildfires raging through the Amazon, but Bolsonaro responded angrily to what he regarded as meddling…
France has long expressed reservations about the Mercosur deal, with Macron warning in June he would not sign it if Bolsonaro pulled out of the Paris climate accord.
France has been worried about the impact on its vast agriculture industry of South American imports that would not have to respect strict EU environmental regulations.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-g7-summit-mercosur/britain-joins-germany-in-criticizing-macrons-mercosur-threat-idUSKCN1VE0ON
24 Aug: Reuters: Squabbles erupt as G7 leaders open summit in French resort
by Jeff Mason, William James
However, in a bleak assessment of relations between once-close allies, European Council President Donald Tusk said it was getting “increasingly” hard to find common ground.
“This is another G7 summit which will be a difficult test of unity and solidarity of the free world and its leaders,” he told reporters ahead of the meeting. “This may be the last moment to restore our political community.”…
U.S. President Donald Trump had brought last year’s G7 summit to an acrimonious end, walking out early from the gathering in Canada and rejecting the final communique…
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-g7-summit/global-disputes-likely-to-thwart-unity-at-g7-summit-in-france-idUSKCN1VD2MM
01
24 Aug: WaPo: Donald Trump may have killed the G-7 communique. Will anyone miss it?
by Adam Taylor
After every one of the meetings, these world leaders have released a communique signed by those present…
But this year, as G-7 leaders gather in Biarritz, France, on Saturday, it looks like this storied tradition may come to an end. Officials have suggested that unless there is an unexpected level of agreement among the guests, there will be no official communique released after the meeting.
Host Emmanuel Macron downplayed the suggestion at a news conference this week. “No one reads the communiques, let’s be honest,” the French president quipped. “And in recent times you read the communiques only to detect disagreements.”…
In 2017, the new U.S. leader pushed back on trade and climate change at the G-7 event in Italy, resulting in the addition of a passage in the statement that said “the United States of America is in the process of reviewing its policies on climate change and on the Paris agreement and thus is not in a position to join the consensus on these topics.”
Only days later, the United States unilaterally pulled out of the Paris agreement on climate change.
Things were even worse the next year in Canada, with entirely separate sections on climate change for the United States, and for the rest of the G-7…
That does not mean the G-7 could not help move the needle in smaller ways. From its early years, the communiques have mentioned serious environmental issues — as early as 1985, G-7 leaders were talking about “climatic change,” more than three decades before the Paris agreement on climate change was actually signed…
Climate change remains a problem, as seen in the raging fires in the Amazon…
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/08/24/donald-trump-may-have-killed-g-communique-will-anyone-miss-it/
01
24 Aug: Bloomberg: At the G7, Trump Is One of the Popular Ones
When it comes to approval ratings, only Japan’s Shinzo Abe has him beat.
By Justin Fox
Then there is French President Emmanuel Macron, the one other more or less directly elected head of state (as opposed to leader of a parliamentary government) coming to Biarritz. In so many ways, he’s the diametric opposite of Trump: young, cosmopolitan, well-spoken, technocratic. He’s the least popular of the lot, with a 28% approval rating in the most recent poll listed by the diligent editors of the “Opinion polling on the Emmanuel Macron presidency” Wikipedia page and 22% percent in the one before that…
Trump’s approval rating has of course been remarkably stable, stuck since early 2018 in a narrow band between 40% and 45%. This may be the result of extreme partisan polarization — Trump remains very popular, if not quite as popular as he says he is, among Republicans — or of the personalization of the presidency. Or maybe it’s just that a reasonably healthy economy and a chaotic presidential performance have so far mostly canceled each other out…
While in Biarritz he might want to consider chilling out and enjoying the fact that, relative to that crowd, he still counts as quite beloved.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-08-23/at-the-g7-trump-s-approval-rating-is-second-to-one
24 Aug: Bloomberg: Macron Rips Up Agenda for His G-7 in a Fit of Climate Fury
By Arne Delfs and Helene Fouquet
Within two hours, his call to arms was met with a furious response from Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who accused Macron of colonial posturing. Affairs relating to Brazil should not be discussed without Brazil at the table, Bolsonaro said.
Macron’s critics on social media pointed out that he’d used an outdated picture of an older blaze…
Maybe he (Macron) took offense at the colonialist jibe, maybe it was headlines from Brazilian officials bringing up forest fires in Portugal and Siberia. Whatever it was, Macron had another shocker up his sleeve.
In a terse statement from the Elysee palace, he branded Bolsonaro a liar and vowed to block the EU’s trade deal with South America’s biggest economies unless Brazil takes its environmental obligations seriously…
The EU’s trade accord with Mercosur has been 20 years in the making, will ease tariffs on some $90 billion of annual commerce, and was Europe’s biggest riposte to Trump’s assault on the multilateral trading order. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, invited to the summit as Macron’s special guest, is set to be one of the biggest winners from the deal and invested time and political capital to get it over the line just eight weeks ago. Sanchez had no warning the announcement was coming, according to an official…READ ON
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-23/merkel-opposes-macron-threat-to-block-mercosur-deal-over-amazon
01
didn’t bother posting Real Clear Politics aggregate poll re Trump, because so many of their polls are from FakeNewsMSM. prefer to post Zogby – it’s more interesting:
15 Aug: Washington Examiner: Zogby: ‘Poor performances’ of Democrats boost Trump’s approval to 51%, up with blacks and Hispanics
by Paul Bedard
President Trump’s approval rating has edged up, driven by long-term confidence in his economy and boosted by the lackluster performances of the two dozen Democrats trying to beat him in the 2020 election, according to the latest Zogby Analytics poll (LINK)…
Namely, it found that recent issues portrayed as trouble for Trump haven’t hurt him and that he is growing in support among Africans Americans, Hispanics, independents, and younger voters…
“Race also played a factor in Trump’s job approval rating. Hispanics, this time around, were much more likely to approve of his job performance (49% approve/51% disapprove), while the president also saw his numbers jump with African Americans. This was his second straight poll with over a quarter support from African Americans (28% approve/70% disapprove). If Trump wins half of Hispanics and a quarter of African Americans in 2020, Democrats will be in trouble!”
Zogby said that older millennial voters approve of Trump, and a growing number of younger voters too…
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/washington-secrets/zogby-poor-performances-of-democrats-boost-trumps-approval-to-51-up-with-blacks-hispanics
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24 Aug: LacombeGlobe: Report slams Trudeau on climate change
by Lorrie Goldstein
A report by the Climate Action Network, France last week — part of a global coalition of 1,300 environmental groups — released ahead of the G-7 meeting in France which is now underway, had (a) sting for Trudeau and Environment Minister Catherine McKenna.
While they keep boasting about their leadership on climate change, the Climate Action Network describes it as dismal.
It concludes that among the world’s leading developed nations that comprise the G-7 — Canada, the U.S., United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy and Japan, plus the European Union — Trudeau’s climate change plan is almost as bad as that of the U.S., which, under President Donald Trump, doesn’t have one.
It puts Canada’s efforts on a par with Japan’s, behind every other G-7 nation, except the U.S…
The report calls Canada’s climate targets (which used to be Harper’s) “very inadequate,” its commitment to them “inadequate,” and its plan to make Canada carbon neutral by 2050 “very inadequate” because it doesn’t have one, even though it’s committed to that goal…
The report says no G-7 country is doing enough and every national plan would lead to a catastrophic global temperature increase of more than 3 % C…
No Canadian political party, except perhaps for the Greens, has a climate plan that would satisfy the Climate Action Network.
The point, however, is that Trudeau asked in 2015 to be judged by the international community on his climate record.
Four years later the verdict is in, and it’s brutal.
https://www.lacombeglobe.com/opinion/columnists/goldstein-report-slams-trudeau-on-climate-change/wcm/f818f43b-6e44-48ba-b675-953cdffd9b10
01
what’s up with the Moscow freedom movement? Navalny got out of jail and
https://balance10.blogspot.com/2019/08/lies-and-fraud-are-not-enough-for-them.html
https://balance10.blogspot.com/2019/08/meet-former-military-commissar-of-moscow.html
10
Well I can understsand that Navalny and others are tools of the EU and NATO and his supporters are largely younger Muscovites and other urban GEN-Y millennial types.Putin commands great support out of these areas of Russian WOKENESS. These new so-called progressive forces will compromise Russian security.
10
25 Aug: Fox News: DNC rebuffs push for unofficial climate change-focused presidential ‘debates’
By Melissa Leon
The Democratic National Committee voted down a resolution at its summer meeting in San Francisco Saturday that would have freed the party’s presidential candidates to participate in unofficial “multi-candidate” forums focused solely on climate change.
The national party committee voted 222-137 against a resolution that would have encouraged candidates to essentially disregard a rule set by DNC Chairman Tom Perez that barred them from appearing on the same stage at the same time during so-called “non-party events.”
The vote drew a rebuke from left-wing environmental activists, such as the Sunrise Movement, who say the party leadership is ignoring young voters’ priorities…
PROTESTS ERUPT AFTER DNC PUTS KIBOSH ON CLIMATE CHANGE-FOCUSED DEBATE
Similar protests broke out Thursday when the DNC’s resolutions committee voted 17-8 against holding single-issue debates…
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/dnc-presidential-candidates-climate-change-debate
Extinction Rebellion threat to shut down Brisbane for weeks
Courier Mail-22 hours ago
CLIMATE change protesters have revealed their plans to shut down the Brisbane CBD in another act of “rebellion” they warn will last days or even weeks.
24 Aug: Daily Mail: Menacing climate change group Extinction Rebellion announces plans to shut down Brisbane with its biggest ever protest bringing misery to thousands on a public holiday
•Extinction Rebellion have announced more protests in Brisbane on October 7th
•Commuters will be inconvenienced by climate activists civil disobedience
•Protests are scheduled in many cities around the world on the same date
•The groups last protest in Brisbane ended with 72 people being arrested
By Jackson Barron
The protest is not just scheduled in Brisbane, with the International Extinction Rebellion community holding events in various cities around the world on the same date.
The group are expecting thousands of activists to attend the rally, with the organisation running workshops educating protesters on how to conduct their demonstrations, as well as how to deal with police and media…
‘With certainty, we now know that failure to force swift and radical action on the climate crisis will result in the deaths of billions of humans and untold numbers of other species on this planet,’ the event post reads…
The scheduled protest comes after an Extinction Rebellion member abseiled off William Jolly Bridge in Brisbane CBD on Monday, stopping peak hour traffic for more than one hour…
Police will again have a strong presence for the demonstration.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7389981/Climate-change-group-Extinction-Rebellion-plan-shut-Brisbane-Queens-Birthday.html
01
Why bother stopping traffic for an abseiler.?
Having a strong police presence is pointless if they don’t act immediately to remove these clowns.
Lock them up for a few months this time.
30
24 Aug: Washington Examiner: The great failure of the climate models
by Patrick Michaels and Caleb Stewart Rossiter
Computer models of the climate are at the heart of calls to ban the cheap, reliable energy that powers our thriving economy and promotes healthier, longer lives. For decades, these models have projected dramatic warming from small, fossil-fueled increases in atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, with catastrophic consequences.
Yet, the real-world data aren’t cooperating. They show only slight warming, mostly at night and in winter…
Should we trust these computer models of doom? Let’s find out by comparing the actual temperatures since 1979 with what the 32 families of climate models used in the latest U.N. report on climate science predicted they would be…READ ALL
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/the-great-failure-of-the-climate-models
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ABC and Laura Tingle climate change reporter ….
“Climate change no longer a hypothetical
The Government might have moved publicly beyond the argument of whether climate change is happening. But it is hard to escape the impression it thinks it is happening to someone else and that, therefore, the politics of the issue — apparently reinforced by the swing in coal seats at the election — is clear cut.
But it isn’t of course. In the Torres Strait Islands, sea walls are being breached in big tides and monsoons. Houses, infrastructure, graves and other sacred sites are being lost.
An island’s race against time
The Carteret Islands were the first place in the world to require population relocations due to climate change, with predictions they would be submerged by 2015.
Elders from the same part of Australia that brought on the Mabo case have lodged a case against Australia in the United Nations Human Rights Committee, arguing that not doing anything about climate change is a breach of the islanders’ human rights.
And if the cynics in the Government view this as not an issue because it involves a far-flung community, an Indigenous one at that, and (yawn) the United Nations, they might like to consider how the structures of their own government are now also being influenced by climate change.
When the agriculture portfolio was carved up after the election, David Littleproud became the Minister for Water Resources, Drought, Rural Finance, Natural Disaster and Emergency Management: a range of jobs which bears a striking resemblance to the need to deal with the varying impacts of climate change.”
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What’s very odd about Mabo, is that the win was by a Torres Strait islander. These more modern people had agriculture, farmed and truly could be said to be occupiers and settlers of the land. So the case was won for the Torres Strait Islander peoples including the Torres Strait people.
However as all black people are the same apparently, the doctrine of Terra Nullius was overturned in the Australian continent too despite not having any evidence that *borigines farmed or settled.
It’s really odd that Mabo for Australia is based on real racism and ignorance was never about the view that the land of continental Australia was settled by anyone. If fact the greatest Climate Change was by the people who set fire to the place 50,000 years ago and halved the rainfall, destroyed the vegetation and wiped out endless species including all the mega marsupials. Farmers now who are feeding a whopping 26 million from the same land are accused of every crime, as well as destroying the land and the Climate, somehow. It is impossible to follow any of these arguments against meat, farming, cows, wheat, grazing, dams, saving water generally. Our political masters are all bowing to the swinging Green voters and accepting blame and guilt for improving Australia in just 200 years and the lives of what are now a million *borigines, as much as they can.
We even have the BOM with a section on ‘Indigenous Weather Knowledge’. You have to wonder how they kept their records and how they knew where they were or that Australia was even an island continent. It’s all nutty stuff and the welcome to the Country was invented by Ernie Dingo and a friend because the New Zealanders had a Hakka. No wonder people believe in Climate Change. Everything’s made up.
120
The anti meat agenda being pushed through ” guidelines”?
Give it time and the whole cholesterol myth will disappear as well….
Note the bolded bit, which is the key.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/health/2019-08-25/meat-and-dairy-guidelines-updated-heart-foundation/11439540?pfmredir=ms
“Full-fat dairy can safely return to your shopping list but you might want to think about cutting back on red meat.
“That’s according to the Heart Foundation, which earlier this week updated its guidelines of what to eat to reduce your risk of heart disease and stroke.
“For the first time, the health body put a specific limit on the amount of red meat Australians should consume: no more than three lean meals (totalling 350 grams) of unprocessed beef, pork, lamb or veal a week.
“It’s also important to limit our intake of processed or deli meats, according to Heart Foundation chief medical advisor Garry Jennings.
““People should get most of their heart-healthy protein from plant sources such as beans, lentils and tofu, as well as fish and seafood, with a smaller amount from eggs and lean poultry,” he said.
“The limit on eggs, however, has been lifted: they contain good quality protein and are a source of healthy fats. But if you have cardiovascular disease or diabetes, no more than seven a week is recommended.
“Similarly, full-fat (but unflavoured) dairy is no longer off the cards — unless you suffer high cholesterol or heart disease.
60
Always behind the times. I knew this ages ago. [I am now taking the next step into keto but taking it slowly.] I remember when anyone promoting this was called a quack.
BTW KETO has been demonstrated to help childhood epilepsy and type II diabetes.
10
The excellent book, Cape York – The Savage Frontier, is a good read and explains about the migration from Papua New Guinea to the now mainland Australia.
20
Fact Check for Laura Tingle and the ABC:
From Wikipaedia: “In 2007, CNN reported that the Carteret islanders will be the first island community in the world to undergo an organized relocation, in response to rising sea levels. The people of the Carteret are being called the world’s first environmental refugees.[18]
In 2017, despite the relocation efforts, the Finnish Embassy in Canberra which is involved in an aid project, reported that there are more people than ever living at the atoll, and the atoll has practically doubled its population.[19]”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carteret_Islands
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‘The Cartaret Islands were the first place in the world to require population relocation due to Climate Change (2015)’
In case they didnt notice its now 2019! Oh my G ..o d they are still above water!
So who got egg on their face? no-one over this I bet. As there is literally absolutely NO as in ZERO sea level rise ANYWHERE due to melting ice, ONLY due to geological processes.
The Finnish Embassy should have Nils Axis-Morners phone number…?
20
I ❤ google earth so I just looked it up. The atoll looks to be in perfect health with the fringing reefs just below the water.
10
Three new large scale solar farms approved for construction in the GV region. Tatura East, Tallygaroopna and Lemnos. So 800 jobs,(is that just for construction, I cant see why you would need 800 people running solar farms unless that’s to go out and clean off the bird shit and dust?) powering 80,000 homes, 650,000 solar panels and 175 MW generation if we’re lucky for 4-5 hours a day and some more instability added to our already fragile power supply.
How many quality hectares of irrigated farming land are being covered by these panels to produce a lousy 175 MW – and that’s not its true output capacity? What are they going to do with 650,000 solar panels n 10-20 years time when they stop working or have significantly reduced output? So many things wrong with this. Lusts just run the state on wind and solar during the day – turn off the dirty coal burning generators during the day and fire them up in the evening. That will work.
80
A drone washer could keep the dust off the panels….
01
I suggest it will not last five years; try and find one that has lasted that long.
10
It’s now 9 days since Lord Monkton gave Nature Communications 7 days to respond to his letter. Does anyone know what has happened?
And is there any more detail on the final ruling from the court in the Mann v Ball case?
Cheers
Dave B
50
Nine years later case dismissed because Mann refused to table his figures.
60
Does that mean that Mann can be, or will be charged with contempt of court?
40
I believe costs were awarded to Ball. I don’t think that’s a given in the US, often you bear your own. That’s what was remarkable about the finding for Trump V Stormy. Trump was awarded costs there too. How’s Avanatti going, anyone heard?
30
Avanatti was going to jail, last I heard.
30
The US election is getting as crazy as Bill Shorten’s approach to the Australian election. Just nuts.
Bernie Sanders wants to spend $1.7Trillion on Climate Change, the greatest threat to America, greater than ISIS or certainly China.
Biden said they needed coal but now he is against it. Close all the coal mines.
AOC, crazy as ever, wants her Green New Deal which means you cannot get to Hawaii except by boat. It seems they will need to build hundreds of sailing boats.
After 16 years of Democrat rule, 8 under the Clintons and 8 under Obama, they want reparations for Black people from 200 years ago and to stop guns, something neither of
them even tried to do.
And everything is Trump’s fault.
They also are openly hoping for a recession.
And Hollywood is very glad that one of the Koch brothers has died at 79, as if he was an enemy of the State and behind Climate Change, even though he was in favor of open borders.
The list of nutty things goes on and Bette Midler pens a nasty poem and OAC wants to get rid of the Electoral College as the mega states have farmers too, so there.
Plus Elizabeth Warren is not only not Cherokee, as she has claimed all her life to her great profit, but her ancestors were the herders on the Trail of Tears and the
squatters who stole Cherokee land against US laws. It’s ok though, she has said sorry for the misunderstandings. Clearly the Cherokee should vote for her as well.
It’s almost as if Trump was scripting the insanity. No jobs, no coal mines, a recession and endless abuse from Hollywood and the Democrats demanding Trump solve the problems they
did not even try to solve in 16 years. And conservative leader of Brazil is single handedly responsible for Climate Change. Like Trump. And the Koch brothers, no matter how crazy that is.
You elect a conservative and not only are they instantly Nazis, they are responsible for all the sins of the previous government which were never mentioned. And Italy’s Salvini represents the most Right Wing government since Mussolini, except Mussolini was extreme left wing Socialist like Hitler.
But above all Climate Change is the biggest threat to the world, as AOC says, bigger than WWII. Too bad no one can identify a single problem in the last 31 years of extreme Climate Change.
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Bernie’s Bus Breaks Down but Trump Comes to the Rescue
30
The dems know they are outgunned in a fair fight so none of this matters. They have pinned their hopes on vote rigging and facebook/twitter/google hiding any conservative message and promoting everything of the left. I think it was Cruz questioning an expert on social media who said google could deliver over 20 mill votes to the dems. In ’16 they didn’t think it mattered. in ’18 it worked. Trump still has a lot of work to do.
40
Hanrahan –
btw FakeNewsMSM has come out as one in defense of Clinton and Google.
VIDEO: 4min35sec: 22 Aug: Robert Epstein says Hillary Clinton told lies about him
Research psychologist and author Robert Epstein says Hillary Clinton saying his work has been ‘debunked’ is a blatant lie.
https://video.foxnews.com/v/6075953852001/?playlist_id=5198073478001#sp=show-clips
following includes pic of Robert Epstein with Hillary Clinton:
21 Aug: MRC TV: Dr. Robert Epstein Counters Hillary’s ‘Debunked’ Claim of His Study Following Her Response to Trump
by Nick Kangadis
https://www.mrctv.org/blog/dr-robert-epstein-counters-hillarys-debunked-claim-his-study-following-her-response-trump
VIDEO: 52min03sec: Updated 25 Aug: Epoch Times: Google’s Power to Shift Elections—Zachary Vorhies, Greg Coppola and Dr. Robert Epstein
By Jan Jekielek
In this special episode, we sit down with Google whistleblower Zachary Vorhies, a former senior Google engineer, who recently leaked nearly 1000 pages of documents that he says suggest Google has been secretly acting as a publisher, selectively boosting or demoting content, while publicly claiming to be a neutral platform…
We also spoke to another Google whistleblower Greg Coppola, who has also called out big tech bias, and Dr. Robert Epstein, a leading expert on Google search engine bias, to get their take on the leaked documents and Vorhies’ allegations against Google.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/googles-power-to-shift-elections-zachary-vorhies-greg-coppola-and-dr-robert-epstein_3053500.html
50
The Biden budget is actually $17 trillion, not $1.7. But AOC’s GND is pegged at $90 trillion, so Biden is peanuts. I only hope the election turns on these nonsensical numbers.
40
But most Americans are now scientifically illiterate, economics illiterate, and math innumerate.
30
And proud of it probably; certainly beats being labelled a “swot”.
10
From the: Warming Causes Freezing & ‘Beast From The East’ Nonsense Department –
https://www.niwa.co.nz/news/rare-weather-phenomenon-possible
22 August 2019, Sudden Stratospheric Warming (SSW)
“After the SSW in 2002 New Zealand experienced its coldest October in 20 years… [In 2010] records were broken with well below normal sunshine and very cold temperatures in parts of the South Island”. Damn you global warming!
“Mr Noll says next week the weather will feature cool conditions for the time of year and the potential for an active spell of weather late in the week bringing rain, snow, and wind [or what we call ‘winter’]. The SSW is likely to peak between Thursday 29 August and Monday 2 September”. Eh? Just a weekend affair? Not the final apocalypse?
Funny, all the maps are calling for high pressure over us while Sydney/NSW gets battered by a tiny Tassie tantrum: Baby Beastie from the Eastie? Yet MSM headlines here are already shouting calamity and doom due to an East Beast dropping out of the sky (making it colder) because we made it warmer. Or something.
90
NIWA is just another (useless) gov dept believing their own BS.
20
East Coast Low is forming and should provide good coastal rains, Sydney can turn off the desalination plant.
20
I thought this might be of interest here. Viv seems to hold similar opinions to those here.
Viv Forbes
Sat 24/08/2019 10:45 PM
The Saltbush Club
PLEASE SPREAD THIS AROUND
1. Climate Petition – call for support
A petition being prepared by hundreds of independent climate scientists and professionals from numerous countries for submission to heads of the European Council, Commission and Parliament declares: “There is No Climate Emergency.”
They welcome more signatures from all over the world.
Here is the petition: https://saltbushclub.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/european-petition.pdf
And some media comment:
https://www.thegwpf.com/dutch-climate-intelligence-foundation-challenges-belgian-climate-alarmists/
Petitioning Against Climate Alarmism Goes Global | Newsmax.com
We invite individuals with suitable qualifications or experience to advise the organisers who will add their names. Please circulate the declaration to appropriate colleagues.
Supporters are requested to send their name and brief qualifications/experience to
Prof Guus Berkhout at the Climate Intelligence Foundation (Clintel) —
2. The Murray Darling Basin Mess:
Have a listen to this informative interview:
https://omny.fm/shows/the-alan-jones-breakfast-show/ron-pike-on-the-murray-darling-basin-plan?fbclid=IwAR1krvgkt7BdbNlL67JFBi6fWKN_egfiWxvG7Nxen6o39m8qnmKOqKlHfEw
Ron Pike has spent a lifetime in the Murray Darling Basin. He is water spokesman for the Saltbush Club.
A Basin Plan that works for all:
https://saltbushclub.com/2019/05/27/basin-plan/
https://saltbushclub.com/2019/01/25/darling-river-fish-kills/#more-264
3. Infamous Alarmist loses Case against Dr Tim Ball
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/08/michael_mann_creator_of_the_infamous_global_warming_hockey_stick_loses_lawsuit_against_climate_skeptic_ordered_to_pay_defendants_costs.html
4. Other Saltbush Activities:
Pls visit the Saltbush web site. New stuff appears there all the time.
Have a look at our posts, spread them around, invite comments or make comments yourself:
https://saltbushclub.com/w4pl/post-list-summary/
Viv Forbes
25 August 2019
Washpool Qld 4306 Australia
forbes@saltbushclub.com
Viv Forbes is not a member of any political party, and has no vested interests in mining, academia, green energy or black energy, except as a consumer. He has qualifications and experience in science, financial analysis, government and industry.
Contributions: We have no formal membership fees and no special tax status but have a bank account where people may donate to Saltbush or Carbon Sense at:
Account: Carbon Sense Pty Ltd
Bank St George Bank Queen St Brisbane
BSB 334 113
Account 553 077 331
To Unsubscribe just hit reply and type “Unsubscribe” in the Subject Line
60
Viv is great.
20
He has been an active sceptic for many years, and has written many published articles on the hoax that is UN IPCC climate change/global warming.
10
The American media have been breathlessly rooting for a hurricane for about 6 weeks now. Every wave off Africa or Caribbean disturbance portends Armageddon.
I have cleaned the steel shutters, but aside food & water, filled the generator fuel tank and tested same, etc. etc. I am hopeful that nature is quiet again this year.
Riding one out or running are both bad choices, and we’re not getting younger.
Buy we fondly remember that day when weather was reported without a rooting interest. One has to go to the web now for useful data as the time previously given to technicians at the national hurricane center now goes to infobabes flogging fear of climate change.
As I write this we are on “D”, almost a record slow year. One can hope.
Every year we in hurricane alley are reminded that the weather is serious business, and its capture by the political mythmakers can do a lot of harm. The lost details are critical, like the predictions as to the tides at landfall, critical to a go-stay decision.
Turning weather reporting, and understanding into climate pornography can cause real harm. Where I live, having false fears about carbon pollution and amazon fires, instead of real knowledge of tropical systems, and the forces that move them, can be a clear and present danger to public safety. So can over-reaction to minor storms leading to complacency in the face of big ones. I have averaged 1.5 days of shutters over 37 years, but not one single year has been ‘average’. SO this time of year, I don’t want air time wasted on the amazon.
90
Well said. Average weather is a rare event, so above or below average is not news. Even worse, the National Weather Servive calls average weather “normal” which is truly wrong.
60
Richard,
There is a lot of dust coming west into the Atlantic off the Sahara today (25 August 2019).
This dust originates from a storm in Southern Algeria three days ago on the afternoon of the 22 August 18:00:00 UTC.
It is still only August and we have a long way to go yet, but the Ventusky short range forecast for West Africa shows the potential for more dust storms in the Sahara over the next week.
30
despite searching for updates on Tesla/fires, it is only by accidentally coming across mentions on Engadget –
24 Aug: Engadget: Tesla’s solar panels reportedly caught fire at an Amazon warehouse
The e-commerce giant reportedly experienced the same thing Walmart did.
by Mariella Moon
According to Bloomberg, Tesla’s solar panels caught fire on the roof of one of Amazon’s warehouses in Redlands, California…
—
that I found the following:
Updated 25 Aug: Bloomberg: Amazon Joins Walmart in Saying Tesla Solar Panel Caught Fire
By Dana Hull and Matt Day; With assistance by Brian Eckhouse
On Friday, Amazon.com Inc. said a June 2018 blaze on the roof of one of its warehouses in Redlands, California, involved a solar panel system that Tesla’s SolarCity division had installed. The Seattle-based retail giant said by email that it has since taken steps to protect its facilities and has no plans to install more Tesla systems…
Tesla also said in a statement it worked with Amazon following the “isolated event” last year that occurred in an inverter at one of the sites.
“Tesla worked collaboratively with Amazon to root cause the event and remediate,” it said…
News of the Amazon fire comes just three days after Walmart dropped a bombshell lawsuit against Tesla, accusing it of shoddy panel installations that led to fires at more than a half-dozen stores…
Walmart and Tesla issued a joint statement late Thursday, saying they were in discussions to resolve their issues. “Both companies want each and every system to operate reliably, efficiently, and safely,” they said…
Also this week, Business Insider reported that Tesla launched an effort to replace a faulty part used in some of its solar panel systems last year. It was unclear whether issues with the component known as a “connector” affected Walmart or Amazon installations.
Tesla said in response to the Business Insider story that some connectors manufactured by Amphenol Corp. “experienced failures and disconnections at a higher rate than our standards allow.” Over the past year, the company said, less than 1% of sites with these connectors exhibited abnormal behavior.
Amphenol did not respond to a request for comment.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-23/amazon-joins-walmart-in-saying-tesla-solar-panels-caught-fire?srnd=markets-vp
Bloomberg doesn’t link to Business Insider. here it is:
23 Aug: BusinessInsider: Last year, Tesla initiated ‘Project Titan’ — a stealth nationwide program to replace solar-panel parts that could cause fires
by Linette Lopez
•Last summer, Tesla initiated “Project Titan,” an attempt to quietly replace defective solar-panel parts across the US, according to documents viewed by Business Insider.
•Specifically, Tesla was replacing connectors and optimizers, parts that are meant to regulate the amount of energy flowing to a solar panel. Too much energy can cause a fire.
•Walmart said in its complaint that Tesla never provided sufficient “root cause” analysis of why these fires happened. Project Titan’s existence answers some of those questions.
•In a statement to Business Insider, Tesla confirmed it was replacing certain parts of its solar panels, calling it “a remediation effort to limit any impact” its connectors may have had.
•To be clear, this issue affected Tesla’s solar panels, not its Solar Roof shingle product
In the summer of 2018, Tesla initiated a massive undertaking – a stealth replacement of solar-panel parts across the US. It was called Project Titan, Business Insider has learned.
The faulty parts in question were connectors – Amphenol H4 connectors – and SolarEdge optimizers. These parts are supposed to regulate the flow of energy and heat to a solar panel, ensuring that as much power goes through the part as possible without overheating. Overheating can lead to a fire.
“A portion of SolarCity-installed modules and optimizers from various manufacturers were made with H4 connectors from Amphenol, a part that was ***commonly used across the industry at the time,” a Tesla representative told Business Insider…
Business Insider learned that these parts were “quarantined” as part of Project Titan and were either reworked and put back on roofs or scrapped. One document viewed by Business Insider put the number of parts that needed to be quarantined sitting in warehouses and distribution centres at over 120,000 as of last September. A Tesla representative said this number was not accurate…
One former Tesla employee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal, said that life at Tesla was chaotic and especially so during Project Titan.
“That’s how all this goes – we fix stuff as it comes out,” the former employee, who left earlier this year, said. “There is no planning ahead – there are too many fires to put out. Pun intended.”
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/tesla-project-titan-replace-bad-solar-panel-parts-2019-8?r=US&IR=T
60
The Canadian federal election is next month and climate is hot. Here is a good quote from July 9:
“The federal election is still three months away but both parties seem happy to have this fight. The Liberals are betting that Canadian voters want potent policies to cut greenhouse-gas emissions. The Conservatives are betting that those same voters don’t want to pay too much for them.”
https://www.timescolonist.com/tories-libs-fight-over-costs-of-climate-action-in-election-campaign-preview-1.23879617?utm_campaign=magnet&utm_source=article_page&utm_medium=related_articles
Here’s to an Oz-like finish.
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Correction the election is in October. I feel like I am in September.
60
I really find it odd that Canadians would be worried about an hypothetical, modelled increased in temperature of a degree C or so.
I would have thought that rejoicing would be a more appropriate response. !
70
“The Road To Serfdom”
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/index.php/2019/08/25/the-road-to-serfdom/#comments
20
news from the techno/Red Dragon world rulers:
https://balance10.blogspot.com/2019/08/the-guidelines-for-hk.html
https://balance10.blogspot.com/2019/08/if-people-really-knew-what-we-had-on.html
https://balance10.blogspot.com/2019/08/facebooks-new-initiative-powerful-new.html
https://balance10.blogspot.com/2019/08/missiles-either-overtly-or-covertly-on.html
10
Quick breakfasts in NSW, Vic, SA
26/08/2019 07:30
Power about $300
Qld $49, Tas $102
https://www.aemo.com.au/Electricity/National-Electricity-Market-NEM/Data-dashboard#nem-dispatch-overview
30
Courtesy of windy electrons Ian ?
20
I noticed on the BoM’s homepage that FIVE DEGREES was a ‘popular’ temperature this morning:
5˚C for Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Canberra, Hobart (just after 7 am Aus east coast time) with only Sydney, Brisbane and Darwin in double figures.
From Thredbo’s -6˚C minimum to Darwin’s forecast max of 33˚C, that’s THIRTY-NINE DEGREES of
differenceclimate change! How do you all cope! I’m surprised the whole continent isn’t on fire!! Saint Greta Algoricle save us from our sins!!!18th day in-a-row with no sunspots and G1-class geomagnetic storms in the offing (next few days) when the solar wind arrives:
http://www.spaceweather.com/
30
No wonder it was so
hotcold in southern Oz this morning:26 August 0700 east coast Australia-time satellite image –
http://www.fvalk.com/images/Day_image/HIM-2100.jpg
Bill in Oz, here’s the link you asked about a week or so ago, global satellite images updated every 3 hours:
http://www.fvalk.com/day_image.htm
10
Thanks Greg, I’ve bookmarked the home page
!
20
Also https://himawari8.nict.go.jp/
10
Tony’s daily data shows that Sat Aug 24 was the lowest minimum coal day for the year at 11.4 GW, previous low 12.2 GW, average minimum 14 GW. And it happened at 1.50pm. That’s due to the increasing amount of rooftop solar. With large and rooftop solar now peaking at over 6 GW when total demand is about 23 GW, makes you wonder what happens to the grid when total solar reaches 8 or 10 GW and wind delivers a further peak of 4-6 GW.
In SA peak solar delivers up to about 50% of total demand, and in Qld 30%, and both export surplus generation.
When does the grid or parts thereof become unstable?
Could the solar boom bust the grid?
Solar threatens to bring down Perth’s power grid.
40
South Australia has demonstrated that the grid becomes unstable when intermittent generation is supplying around 50% of the demand. The UK grid also demonstrates that.
SA is able to get much higher proportion than 50% but that is by relying on its 600MW link to VIC to ensure additional stability along with the SA’s gas generators sitting around 300MW.
Electranet in SA has approval to spend $166M on its grid strengthening project. That involves installing synchronous condensers. Once they are installed, AEMO will no longer need to order the gas plants to stay connected. SA may need more batteries to be able to provide energy quickly in the event of sudden loss of supply from regional intermittent once gas plants are not connected. The $166m spend should reduce costs as it reduces gas consumption. If more batteries are needed then that will likely add to costs.
This year will be a test of the viability of intermittent generation because LGCs are reducing in costs and the intermittent generators often face negative prices forcing reduction in output. The coal generators are offering energy at negative prices to ensure they remain in dispatch in preference to the intermittents. Intermittents can no longer afford staying bids. They are very active in the bidding process and rely on accurate load and generation forecasts during pre-dispatch bidding.
The technology pieces are all there to replace coal but it comes at a huge cost to consumers. Victorians are facing an $18bn bill to upgrade the network and I expect that does not take into account the distribution level to get reverse power flows from residential rooftops.
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RickWill:
SA will probably still need some gas fired plants going as the synchronous condensers won’t have that much reserve. They are rotating masses of steel, much like in coal-fired plants but without any capacity to generate.
The new power station in SA is gas-fired engines; (dual fuel) diesels started on (diesel) fuel and once hot switching to gas. Isn’t it ironic that isolated places like the Falkland and Assuncion Islands should introduce wind turbines to reduce the cost (and unreliability) of imported diesel fuel, whereas South Australia is introducing diesels to reduce the cost (and unreliability) of electricity from wind turbines.
60
The big battery has proven to have faster response for energy supply than gas or coal. With the huge swing in wholesale price on a daily basis, reflecting supply feast to famine, I suspect the wind generators will be angling for more batteries. That is already happening. In addition to the HPR, there is already a 30MW battery in operation in SA and bigger ones in the pipeline:
https://reneweconomy.com.au/huge-solar-and-battery-storage-projects-proposed-for-south-australia-28245/
So with the synchronous condensers providing the fault level as well as voltage control, the batteries can take care of the energy ups and down. There is also the 600MW link to VIC but it is not as useful as it was when Hazelwood was running.
With intermittent subsidies declining, higher transmission losses being recognised and VIC having less ability to source or sink SA generation, the economic viability of wind and solar in SA should be clearer within a year or two. A lot of capital has been sunk and it is all looking for a return. Curtailment will be an increasing concern for the grid scale intermittents.
30
I have no objections to “renewables” operators having more batteries IF THEY PAY FOR THEM.
The latest policy is the State Govt. spending $100 million (+another $100 million from the Federals) subsidising home batteries.
I assume the aim is to store home PV solar during the day, rather than feeding it in at 8 or 16¢ per kWh, and using it during the peak time after sunset (replacing grid electricity at 40-45¢ per kWh) and smoothing out the demand curve. If this makes sense then why aren’t the wind farms all installing Big Batteries to soak up the electricity they sell for zero (before subsidy)?
20
How big a battery would they need? Take Hornsdale, 316 MW nameplate, so average generation 95 MW, but variations from 0-190 MW. They built a 129 MWhr battery at a cost of $90 million, so could store peak generation for just over an hour, and deliver 100 MW when the wind doesn’t blow for just over an hour. In fact they seem to use just 30 MW for frequency control. To store 100 MW for one day would require storage of 2,400 MWhr or 18 of the “world’s biggest battery” at a cost of $1.7 billion. Reported construction cost for Hornsdale was $800 million.
20
At this stage, the objective with batteries is to provide energy over long enough period to start gas plant and get them up to capacity; probably a couple of hours. The batteries also help with stability as they are fast response despite limited fault level. Given that the gas plants operate at a minimum around 300MW, I assume that 300MW of battery with 600MWh of storage would be sufficient. There is already an additional 600MW available from VIC in certain circumstances; reduced availability since Hazelwood closed.
The cost of providing enough generation and storage in SA to avoid gas completely would be horrendously expensive. Once there is enough battery and synchronous condensers to provide the required fault level there will be times when SA runs gas free but there will be long periods when gas plants are still required to run. 2100MW of the 2142MW wind capacity in SA was MIA today. Probably just enough power being produced to energise the lines and run auxiliaries.
It will be interesting to see how Q3 wholesale price works out. Demand is relatively low while intermittent supply appears to be more significant than last year. I expect intermittent generators to have low income for Q3.
There may be a generator problem in NSW at the moment; lack of reserve in NSW declared last night. Gas in QLD has been used to supply NSW despite QLD prices being around zero.
30
‘When it comes to harnessing renewable wind energy, the European Union is not even close to reaching its full potential, according to a new study.
If a wind turbine was placed on every suitable spot of land, research shows it could provide more than 100 times the wind energy currently produced on shore. Calculated at more than 11 million additional turbines, that would be enough to power the entire world between now and 2050’.
“Obviously, we are not saying that we should install turbines in all the identified sites,” says Benjamin Sovacool, an expert in energy policy at the University of Sussex.
“But the study does show the huge wind power potential right across Europe which needs to be harnessed if we’re to avert a climate catastrophe.”
🙂
https://nexusnewsfeed.com/article/science-futures/europe-could-power-the-entire-world-with-onshore-wind-farms-alone
01
“Calculated at more than 11 million additional turbines, that would be enough to power the entire world between now and 2050”
My thoughts while reading this were:
1) Does this assume that the wind would always be blowing on all of the 11 million additional turbines at an optimal speed?
2) Does this assume there would be no losses in shipping that power all over the world?
3) If you actually did build all of the additional 11 million turbines, what would be the effect on the world’s climate from extracting that much wind energy from it?
30
3) answer – guesstimate. I dont think 11millon uselessbines would do anything to the climactic energy. Would amount to nothing compared to the solar input to the atmosphere. And assuming they were at peak output all at same time , totally impossible.
1) NO it wouldnt be blowing as indicated.
2) Yes BIG losses.
10
And..https://stopthesethings.com/2017/08/10/wind-industrys-dirty-little-secret-turbines-to-generate-40-million-tonnes-of-toxic-waste/
‘according to a new study’ that alone is a red flag…whos study? where? what?
20
ATM all of Western Europe, with the exception of a small windy patch in Spain, is virtually becalmed. Been like that for days. “Houston, we have a problem”.
https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/orthographic=-328.68,50.77,795/loc=40.435,49.950
40
biggest story of the day:
Super giant to impose 100pc carbon reduction targets
In-Depth – The Australian – 9 hours ago
26 Aug: SMH: Super funds set carbon targets for $10bn worth of infrastructure assets
By Patrick Hatch
A slew of Australia’s largest infrastructure assets, including airports, docks and a train station, have set carbon emissions reduction targets for the first time as part of a co-ordinated push led by industry superannuation fund manager IFM Investors.
The targets set by Melbourne Airport, Brisbane Airport, Ausgrid, NSW Ports, Port of Brisbane, NT Airports and Melbourne’s Southern Cross Station aim to eliminate 200,000 tonnes of carbon emissions annually by 2030…
The reductions will be achieved through a combination of solar generation, building, lighting and transport efficiency, and other energy efficiency projects…
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/super-funds-set-carbon-targets-for-10bn-worth-of-infrastructure-assets-20190823-p52k6v.html
reminders:
APRA warns against superannuation fund activism
Australian Financial Review – 18 Mar 2019
Treasurer’s super war on activists
The Australian – 3 Mar 2019
The Treasurer Josh Frydenberg: “Superannuation is not a plaything for union bosses…
5 Mar: AFR: Why industry super funds should avoid activism
by Karen Maley
It’s certainly valid for industry funds to express their opinions to management on a wide range of issues, provided that they’re acting in the interests of shareholders as shareholders. But they should be extremely wary of being co-opted to push some political or social agenda under the cloak of acting to promote long-term shareholder value…
20 Mar: TheConversation: Super power: why the future of Australian capitalism is now in Greg Combet’s hands
by Danny Davis, Executive Director, Australian Institute of Performance Sciences, and researcher at, La Trobe University
(Disclosure statement: Danny Davis is Executive Director of the Australian Institute of Performance Sciences)
Right now Greg Combet is arguably the most powerful man in Australia.
Earlier this month the former trade unionist and federal politician declared his intention to transform Australian business. His radical idea: to promote the concept of “long-term value”.
Combet is chairman of Industry Super Australia, which represents 16 of Australia’s biggest industry funds and thus the vast bulk of the A$630 billion saved by more than 11 million Australians.
These super funds would use their massive clout as investors to transform corporate culture, Combet told the Australian Financial Review. He wants business to focus on long-term sustainability, not be “hostage to the short-term share price or six-monthly profit announcements”.
“The energy sector is an example of where long-term thinking is needed,” he said. “We have to start making a significant transition from old coal-fired power plants to renewable energy generation and distribution.”…
This week the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority, responding to Treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s “urgent” request for guidance on “aggressive union behaviour”, warned super funds to keep away from financial activism…
Heather Ridout, a former head of the Australian Industry Group who now chairs the AustralianSuper fund, has told Frydenberg to stop politicising super.
Combet says his agenda has nothing to do with “activism”.
He’s right…
Investors who help companies focus on the long term thus help themselves. It is a virtuous circle…
We will now see which of Australia’s economic elite join his mission and collaborate in building global momentum. Those who want to resist, or who cannot organise themselves to participate, should know the clock is now ticking.
http://theconversation.com/super-power-why-the-future-of-australian-capitalism-is-now-in-greg-combets-hands-113648
01
the softest ABC interview evah? you decide.
Peter Ryan ABC: so, rather than activism in these companies that you own or co-own, this is good business sense to get these companies working towards emission targets?
AUDIO: 3min51sec: 26 Aug: ABC AM: Industry super forces 2030 emissions target on key infrastructure assets
By Peter Ryan on AM
Some of Australia’s top infrastructure companies have agreed to cut their carbon emissions by up to 100 per cent by 2030, as industry superannuation weighs in on climate change risks.
IFM investors, which manages more than $140 billion for industry super funds, has convinced companies it owns or co-owns to increase their use of electric cars, LED lighting and rooftop solar systems.
Companies cutting back on their emissions include giant energy network Ausgrid, Melbourne Airport, Brisbane Airport and NSW Ports.
IFM’s director of responsible investments Chris Newton speaks with ABC’s Peter Ryan.
Featured:
Chris Newton, IFM Investors
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/adelaide/programs/am/industry-super-forces-2030-emissions-target/11447100
01
26 Aug: Guardian: Ausgrid and Melbourne Airport commit to emissions reduction targets
NSW Ports and Southern Cross Station also pledge to reduce emissions in line with Australia’s Paris targets after push by infrastructure fund
by Call Wahlquist
IFM Investors announced on Monday that Melbourne, Brisbane, and NT airports, as well as NSW Ports, the Port of Brisbane, Southern Cross Station, and electricity network Ausgrid, would commit to a carbon abatement plan in an effort to align the fund’s critical infrastructure assets with Australia’s Paris targets.
***It follows a $150m investment, 12 months ago, from the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) to encourage emissions reduction projects in Australia’s biggest infrastructure projects…
The aim was to have IFM use its position on the board of critical infrastructure companies to introduce firm emissions reduction targets and reporting requirements within the year…
IFM head of Australian infrastructure, Michael Hanna: “This exciting initiative represents a genuine commitment, and start, to aligning our assets to the Paris Agreement, and it makes perfect business sense by reducing costs, mitigating future business risks and contributing to outcomes that our customers value.”…
Ausgrid has said it will reduce emissions by 8% by 2024 and 17% by 2030 through investment in renewable energy, primarily solar, as well as building efficiency upgrades and transitioning to a low energy vehicle fleet…
IMF(sic) is owned by 27 of Australia’s industry super funds and invests on behalf of 6 million Australians and roughly 15 million pension fund members globally…
CEFC chief executive Ian Learmonth: “This comprehensive program of activity sets an important example for other major infrastructure owners and managers in Australia.” he said. “Cutting carbon emissions can deliver a long-term dividend to the environment and ***in most cases an improved financial performance.”
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/aug/26/infrastructure-fund-pushes-companies-to-commit-to-emissions-reduction-targets
01
This is very bad for productivity. In essence the super funds are aiming to manipulate businesses. Rather than investing in businesses pursuing a particular strategy, the super funds are aiming to define the strategy. When labor is in power it becomes collusion. The government establishes the racket to extract money and invest in businesses designed to extract said money. The way the RET works is a perfect example although individuals do have some control by making their own electricity if they own a roof.
11
Combet is Australia’s Xi Jinping manque and should never have been allowed to impose his footprint on Australia’s sovereign risk as it will be years in the unwinding of his folly.
10
26 Aug: AFR: Ports, airports owned by big super funds to cut their emissions
by Joanna Mather
Some of the nation’s busiest airports and ports will be forced to cut their carbon emissions to meet targets set by industry superannuation funds and their members.
IFM Investors, which owns key infrastructure assets on behalf of seven million super fund members, will require annual emissions reductions equivalent to 200,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2030…
Northern Territory Airports will have to cut emissions by 100 per cent by 2030, while the airports of Brisbane and Melbourne have reduction targets of 16 per cent and 25 per cent respectively…
NSW electricity distributor Ausgrid, which is by far the biggest polluter in the group, will be required to reduce emissions by 8 per cent by fiscal 2024 and 17 per cent by fiscal 2030. IFM Investors and AustralianSuper acquired a 50.4 per cent stake in a 99-year lease of Ausgrid in 2016…
Achieving the targets is heavily contingent on the use of rooftop and large-scale solar power, as well as upgrades to terminals and other buildings so they are more energy efficient. The use of electric and low-emissions vehicles and LED lighting will also contribute…
The targets do not apply to, in the case of airports for example, the airlines themselves, or to the carbon emissions associated with generating the power that is distributed by Ausgrid…
The Clean Energy Finance Corporation invests IMF’s Australian infrastructure fund and last year spent $150 million to help drive emissions reporting.
The emissions reduction targets, to be formally announced on Monday, form part of that work…
https://www.afr.com/companies/infrastructure/ports-airports-owned-by-big-super-funds-to-cut-their-emissions-20190825-p52kjr
01
clicking on this:
IFM Investors and the CEFC work together to cut carbon emissions
Clean Energy Finance Corp – 12 Apr 2018
gets you this:
“The page you are looking for cannot be found.”
the cached version:
A joint media release from the CEFC and IFM Investors
12 April 2018
Australia’s largest infrastructure fund, the $12 billion IFM Australian Infrastructure Fund, is working with the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) to reduce carbon emissions at some of the nation’s leading infrastructure assets across ports, airports and electricity infrastructure.
In its first equity commitment to Australia’s diversified infrastructure sector, the CEFC is investing $150 million in the IFM Investors’ managed IFM Australian Infrastructure Fund, which will target emissions reduction and energy efficiency initiatives across assets including Ausgrid, Brisbane Airport, Melbourne Airport, Sydney’s Port Botany and the Port of Brisbane. IFM Investors’ agreement with the CEFC builds on its track record of working with asset management teams to deliver sustainable ESG outcomes that benefit both the communities they serve and superannuation member returns.
CEFC CEO Ian Learmonth said: “We recognise IFM Investors as a leader in sustainable investment in infrastructure and congratulate IFM Investors on this significant commitment to lowering emissions, and contributing further to the environmental sustainability of the assets in its Australian Infrastructure Fund.
“Infrastructure assets are central to our economic and social well-being. They are usually large, expensive and built for the long term. It is absolutely critical that the assets of today contribute to the overall emissions reduction task that we are facing.
“With this investment the CEFC will work with IFM Investors in targeting comprehensive and sustained improvements to the carbon footprint of some of our most important infrastructure assets. We will also work with IFM Investors to enhance benchmarks and transparency around infrastructure emissions, so that we can deliver a step change in the emissions profile of our national infrastructure.”
IFM Investors, owned by 27 of Australia’s industry superannuation funds, invests on behalf of six million Australian workers and approximately 15 million pension fund members globally.
Kyle Mangini, IFM Investors Global Head of Infrastructure said: “IFM is a leader in sustainable investment. With the support of the CEFC, we will accelerate our program of measuring, reporting, and decreasing emissions from Australian infrastructure assets.
“The fact that this is the first commitment by the CEFC to an infrastructure fund reflects our alignment in a cleaner future. Today, I invite other investors in infrastructure to follow our lead and make a difference.”
According to Australia’s National Greenhouse Gas Inventory, infrastructure-related emissions account for more than half Australia’s total greenhouse gas emissions, mainly from the electricity sector (35 per cent) and the transport sector (18 per cent).
The CEFC estimates that just a five per cent improvement across the assets in the portfolio would abate almost 69,000 tonnes of CO2-e annually. This is equivalent to removing 14,775 cars from the road each year, or providing electricity to about 7,450 homes a year.
CEFC infrastructure lead Julia Hinwood said: “IFM Investors has a track record of actively working with its assets to identify and introduce value add initiatives. We’re looking forward to drawing on our clean energy finance experience to help IFM drive carbon emissions reductions across its assets through an innovative approach to planning, construction and operations.
“This is about investing in global best practice infrastructure to support its important economic potential while proactively addressing the emissions challenge.”
Ms Hinwood said initiatives may include installing on-site solar PV and battery storage solutions and converting to electric vehicles. They are also likely to involve using smart management systems which monitor asset performance and assist with reducing energy consumption and optimising logistics and supply chains.
***This equity investment builds on the CEFC’s extensive record in infrastructure development, including up to $150 million in debt finance to the Moorebank Logistics Park intermodal terminal in south-western Sydney. The CEFC is also a leading investor in energy-related infrastructure, financing innovative large-scale solar, wind and energy storage developments Australia-wide.
CEFC finance for infrastructure projects is part of its Sustainable Cities Investment Program, which is aiming to invest $1 billion into clean energy initiatives in Australian cities over 10 years…
ABOUT IFM INVESTORS
IFM Investors is a uniquely-structured global fund manager with A$100bn under management at 30 December 2017. Established more than 20 years ago and owned by 27 major superannuation funds, IFM Investors’ interests are deeply aligned with those of its investors. Investment teams in Europe, North America, and Australia manage institutional strategies across infrastructure (equity and debt), debt investments, listed equities and private capital. IFM Investors is committed to the United Nations supported Principles for Responsible Investment and has been a signatory since 2008. IFM Investors has offices in eight locations; Melbourne, Sydney, New York, London, Berlin, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Seoul. For more information please visit http://www.ifminvestors.com.
https://www.cefc.com.au/media/files/ifm-investors-and-the-cefc-work-together-to-cut-carbon-emissions-in-the-infrastructure-assets/
01
open access:
26 Aug: The Australian: Super giant to impose 100pc carbon reduction targets
by Michael Roddan
Emissions reductions targets of up to 100 per cent by 2030 will be slapped on a broad range of infrastructure assets across the nation, including the Ausgrid electricity network, Melbourne and Brisbane airports, and NSW ports.
The move risks stoking a conflict with the Morrison government, which has sought to clamp down on social and environmental activism by industry super funds.
The $140 billion IFM Investors, chaired by former ACTU head Greg Combet and co-owned by 27 of the biggest industry super funds, including AustralianSuper, Hostplus and Cbus, also controls or has large stakes in assets such as the Port of Brisbane, Southern Cross Station in Melbourne and Northern Territory Airports.
IFM Investors will announce today a move to strip 200,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide annually from the assets by 2030 — equal to removing almost 70,000 cars from the road…
Following the collapse of the Coalition’s national energy guarantee last year, IFM Investors will apply an emissions reduction target of between 8 and 25 per cent on infrastructure projects by 2024, and of 38 to 100 per cent by 2030.
Ausgrid, which was half-privatised by the NSW Liberal government for $16bn in 2016, is the largest energy network in the country, supplying more than 1.6 million homes and businesses across Sydney, the NSW central coast and the Hunter region…
Deep divisions between union-backed funds and big business surfaced this year when Josh Frydenberg asked the prudential regulator whether it had the power to ensure union-appointed super trustees did not pursue political objectives at the expense of members’ interests.
The Treasurer’s intervention came after the ACTU backed a Maritime Union of Australia campaign for industry funds to pressure BHP and BlueScope Steel into reversing a decision to forgo the renewal of a legacy contract for two Australian-crewed vessels — the last servicing the iron-ore industry.
AustralianSuper, the nation’s largest fund — where ACTU president Michele O’Neil is an alternate board director — also joined a throng of major institutional investors to pressure global commodity group Glencore to cap its coal production.
Industry funds have an equal-representation board model, meaning they appoint directors from unions and employer groups. Together, they have $677bn of assets under management — more financial power than the bank-run retail fund sector ($623bn), or publicsector funds ($475bn).
Last week, the US Business Roundtable overturned 57 years of corporate orthodoxy holding that the only purpose of a corporation was to generate profit for shareholders by publishing a new “statement on the purpose of a corporation”. The statement sought to elevate the concerns of customers, employees and communities. It was signed by 181 chief executives, including Lachlan Murdoch, the chairman and chief executive of Fox Corporation and co-chairman of News Corp, ultimate publisher of The Australian.
Ausgrid, which owns the NSW energy distribution network, triggers the majority of its emissions through electrical line losses by transmitting power over long distances. While these particular costs would be too “prohibitive” to clamp down on, IFM said it would tackle inefficient street lights, which account for 11 per cent of emissions, and convert more than 250,000 to energy-efficient bulbs.
The company will also install more than 11,500 rooftop solar panels across its work sites…ETC
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/super-giant-to-impose-100pc-carbon-reduction-targets/news-story/2d8bb14b7c9c0e301fd23e0072aff5ef
01
20 Aug: Harvard Business Review: 181 Top CEOs Have Realized Companies Need a Purpose Beyond Profit
by Claudine Gartenberg and George Serafeim
(Claudine Gartenberg is an Assistant Professor of Management at Wharton School of Business at University of Pennsylvania. She has consulted to Fortune 500 companies in energy, retail and banking on change management and technology; George Serafeim is a professor of business administration at Harvard Business School, a cofounder of KKS Advisors, and the chairman of Greece’s National Corporate Governance Council)
On August 19 the Business Roundtable issued an open letter titled “Statement on the Purpose of a Corporation” (LINK). One of the preeminent business lobbies in the United States, the Business Roundtable (BR) includes the CEOs of leading U.S. companies from Apple to Walmart. Sandwiched between the spare title and 181 signatures was a one-page declaration that ended as follows: “Each of our stakeholders is essential. We commit to deliver value to all of them, for the future success of our companies, our communities and our country.”
On its own, this sentence is indistinguishable from the anodyne commentary that fills the annual reports of many Business Roundtable members. For those actively following this topic, however, it represents a very public rebuke of the Milton Friedman worldview that guides business decisions behind closed doors. Friedman, the renowned University of Chicago economics professor, penned a famous 1970 New York Times essay, “The Social Responsibility Of Business Is to Increase Its Profits,” that helped launch a half century of “shareholder capitalism.” In this worldview, the business of business is business, and the sole focus of the CEO is to maximize the profits of that business.
The new statement by the Business Roundtable explicitly counters this view. Corporations are, according to the statement, accountable to five constituencies, of which shareholders are only one (customers, employees, suppliers, and communities are the others). In that sense it is a classic articulation of “stakeholder capitalism,” prevalent in Europe today and in the U.S. during the immediate postwar period. So while the statement itself is not notable, that it has the backing of CEOs representing nearly 30% of total U.S. market capitalization is…
In our data we find (LINK) that companies with high levels of purpose outperform the market by 5%–7% per year, on par with companies with best-in-class governance and innovative capabilities. They also grow faster and have higher profitability. However, the link between purpose and profitability is present only if senior management has been successful in diffusing that sense of purpose further down in the organization, especially in middle management, and in providing strategic clarity throughout the organization on how to achieve that purpose…
In our data we find that companies with high levels of purpose outperform the market by 5%–7% per year, on par with companies with best-in-class governance and innovative capabilities. They also grow faster and have higher profitability. However, the link between purpose and profitability is present only if senior management has been successful in diffusing that sense of purpose further down in the organization, especially in middle management, and in providing strategic clarity throughout the organization on how to achieve that purpose.
https://hbr.org/2019/08/181-top-ceos-have-realized-companies-need-a-purpose-beyond-profit
01
19 Aug: CNBC: Value Is No Longer Everything, Top C.E.O.s Say
by Maggie Fitzgerald
“The American dream is alive, but fraying,” Jamie Dimon, chairman and CEO of J.P. Morgan Chase and chairman of Business Roundtable, said in a press release.
Along with Dimon, the statement received signatures from chiefs including Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Apple’s Tim Cook, Bank of America’s Brian Moynihan, Dennis A. Muilenburg of Boeing and GM’s Mary Barra…
Another one of the signatures is from BlackRock chief Larry Fink, who has previously called on CEOs to reevaluate the purpose of a corporation, specifically the “inextricable link” between purpose and profit.
“Purpose is not the sole pursuit of profits but the animating force for achieving them,” Fink wrote in his 2019 annual letter to shareholders. “As divisions continue to deepen, companies must demonstrate their commitment to the countries, regions, and communities where they operate, particularly on issues central to the world’s future prosperity.”
Fink said that fundamental economic changes and the failure of the U.S. government to provide lasting solutions has forced society to look to companies for guidance on social and economic issues, such as environmental safety and gender and racial equality…
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/19/the-ceos-of-nearly-two-hundred-companies-say-shareholder-value-is-no-longer-their-main-objective.html
20 Aug: Arizona Republic: American big business invites European-style, more intrusive regulation
by Robert Robb
The Business Roundtable demotes the interests of shareholders. There are political consequences from that.
One of the big questions looming over the 2020 presidential election is whether Americans are ready to move toward becoming a European-style social democracy. The Democratic nominee is all but certain to be pledged to so doing.
One somewhat surprising group recently signaled no problem with that: big business, or at least the big businesses that are members of the Business Roundtable.
The 181 corporate chieftains who signed the pretentiously titled statement, “The Purpose of a Corporation,” probably didn’t intend to so signal. But that is the practical effect of the tenets expressed in the statement…
The most striking thing about the statement is its impertinence. The CEO signatories aren’t the owners of their corporations. They are hired hands. Fabulously compensated hired hands, but ultimately worker bees nonetheless.
They work for the actual owners, the shareholders, whose interests they have demoted to being no more worthy of their attention than the supplier of the toilet paper for the executive bathroom…
I’m sure the roundtable CEOs just wanted to put out a statement making themselves look less grubby, more woke. They don’t really want European-style regulation of how they run their businesses and interact with various stakeholders. But they are now left without a principled argument against it.
Fortunately, American small businesses are made of sterner stuff.
https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/2019/08/25/big-business-invites-european-style-regulation-column/2097113001/
01
26 Aug: Guardian: US companies tell Apple and Amazon to put planet before profits
Patagonia, Ben & Jerry’s, Danone and others take out full-page ad in New York Times addressed to business leaders
by Zoe Wood
The bosses of some of the world’s biggest companies, including Apple and Amazon, have been told to put the planet before profits – not by environmental campaigners but by other multinationals, including Danone’s US arm, and a unit of Unilever.
A group of more than 30 American business leaders, including the heads of outdoor clothing brand Patagonia, The Body Shop owner Natura, Ben & Jerry’s (part of Unilever) and Danone’s US business, have taken the extraordinary step of taking out a full-page ad in Sunday’s edition of the New York Times to champion a more ethical way of doing business. The advert is aimed at members of the influential Business Roundtable (BRT) lobby group, which represents 181 of the US’s biggest companies.
The letter – addressed to the powerful group that includes Jeff Bezos, the founder and chief executive of Amazon, and Tim Cook, the boss of Apple – is designed to capitalise on the BRT’s recent landmark decision to change its definition of the “purpose of a corporation” from making money for shareholders to include broader goals such as caring for staff and the environment.
“We are part of a community of certified B Corporations who are walking the walk of stakeholder capitalism,” said the open letter…
The B Corp movement is gaining momentum as the climate crisis coupled with rising inequality has made business leaders question what success looks like in the 21st century. So far more than 3,000 companies globally have become B Corps after completing a certification process, with chef Jamie Oliver recently revealing the ambition to turn his business empire into a B Corp (LINK).
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/aug/25/us-companies-tell-apple-and-amazon-to-put-planet-before-profits
links to:
23 Aug: Guardian: Jamie Oliver to create ethical ‘B Corp’ from remnants of his empire
Jamie Oliver is to turn the remains of his business empire into an ethical “B Corporation” that officially gives equal weight to people, the planet and profit…
The collapse of Jamie’s Italian which resulted in more than 1,000 job losses was an emotional and financial blow for Oliver, who had pumped £26m of his own cash into the venture…
The outspoken chef shocked fans last year when he signed deals with Tesco and the Shell oil company, but in the report Oliver argues that these partnerships fit with his ambition to make healthy food affordable and accessible. In defence of the multi-million-pound Shell deal, Oliver says drivers can now pick up healthier snacks with high-sugar energy drinks removed from the meal deal in its service stations…
https://www.theguardian.com/food/2019/aug/23/jamie-oliver-to-create-ethical-b-corp-from-remnants-of-his-empire
01
Refashioning corporations in a bonfire of the vanities by Janet Albrechtsen
The Australian – 23 Aug 2019
Led by JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon, who chairs the Business Roundtable…
one thing Zingales has right – it’s a “power grab”:
20 Aug: WaPo Op-Ed: Don’t trust CEOs who say they don’t care about shareholder value anymore
by Luigi Zingales
(Luigi Zingales is a professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business)
If workers’ unions were to get together and unilaterally decide what the employment contract meant and how it should be interpreted, the Business Roundtable would scream “socialism.” Why shouldn’t we do the same when business leaders get together and redefine the purpose of the corporations that hired them and for which they work?
Yet that is exactly what the chief executives of major U.S. corporations at the Business Roundtable did this week in redefining corporate purpose to introduce a responsibility to all stakeholders, not just shareholders. This effort is at best misleading marketing, at worst a dangerous power grab…
At best, the new statement seems an attempt to present a kinder and gentler image to cover the reputational blow that daily scandals are imposing on corporate America: a marketing ploy with no real bite.
At worst, it is a dangerous power grab…
Nor do shareholders have any say on how much carbon dioxide companies choose to emit…
Because shareholders pay the cost of the social purposes pursued by corporations, what executives advocate is taxation without representation…
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/08/20/dont-trust-ceos-who-say-they-dont-care-about-shareholder-value-anymore/
01
May have missed this if mentioned previously, but incase not…
Basslink interconnector is busted again !
Cause unknown.
20
I searched for news on this y’day but to no avail. I also couldn’t find anything on the current water levels for Hydro Tas.
20
No point in telling Lily D’Ambrosio as she’d not be aware of the implications.
10
Basslink media page says the fault is on land in VIC. Initial estimate is that it will be down till mid October.
00
Vic electricity supplies hanging on a couple of threads.
00
behind paywall:
25 Aug: UK Times (Ireland edition): Green hypocrites are preaching hot air
by David Quinn
We rail against the church’s double standards but today’s eco-warriors lecture Brazil on emissions then fly off on foreign jaunts…
As you read this, Greta (Thunberg) is travelling by boat to New York where she … The boat on which she is travelling is a racing yacht owned by a member of the Monaco royal family…
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/ireland/david-quinn-green-hypocrites-are-preaching-hot-air-6vvrnhpzl
in Monaco, they are clearly not concerned about sea level rise!
PICS: 30 Jul: DredgeWire: Monaco Land Extension Project Reaches Milestone, Caissons Belt Completed
The tax haven has a luxury housing crisis – it doesn’t have enough land for the 2,700 multimillionaires forecast to settle there over the next decade
When an area has developed every square foot of land, the next step is usually to start building upward, à la New York City. But rather than squeeze in new skyscrapers, Monaco has always taken a different approach… So to increase the available land space, the principality is once again expanding into the Mediterranean.
The new district, called Portier Cove, will add an additional 15 acres and is set to be completed in 2025…
This is not the first time that Monaco has reclaimed land from the sea. The principality first began expanding in 1880, and Prince Rainier, known as the “builder prince,” increased the size of Monaco by 20 percent during the 1960s and ’70s. The new $2.3 billion undertaking will create nearly 650,000 square feet of residential and commercial space to accommodate up to 1,000 residents. The district will also boast a landscaped park, a marina with 30 berths, and a central public square. The Grimaldi Forum, a conference and cultural center, will be expanded into the new land, allowing for a 50 percent increase in capacity…
PIC: An aerial rendering provides a view into the new developments planned for Monaco’s $2.3 billion expansion into the Mediterranean Sea.
To build the extension, Bouygues Travaux began by dredging the area so that 18 caissons (a watertight structure that’s typically used to work on the foundations of water-based structures) could be added. The band of 10,000-ton caissons will be connected to form a seawall surrounding the reclaimed land. Over 21 million cubic feet of sea sand dredged from north of Sicily will be used to fill in the reclaimed land…
This new piece of Monegasque territory will host a luxury ***eco-district comprising 150 upscale apartments, an underground car park, a coastal promenade, a green park, public facilities, an extension of the Grimaldi Forum and an animation port…
http://dredgewire.com/article/11706/monaco-land-extension-project-reaches-milestone-caissons-belt-completed
6 Aug: DredgingToday: VIDEO: 59sec: Forming New Coastline in Monaco
https://www.dredgingtoday.com/2019/08/06/video-forming-new-coastline-in-monaco/
Wkipedia: Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation
The Foundation was initially created in 2006 by Prince Albert II of Monaco and it concentrates on environmental protection, sustainable development, climate change and the promotion of renewable energies as well as biodiversity…
The Mediterranean Basin is a natural priority area due to the geographical location of the Principality. The Foundation is keen to take action with the players concerned, in order to preserve the wealth of the marine and land ecosystems…
The Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation Awards INCLUDES
Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, Bill McKibben, Laurance Tubiana ETC
01
this is rich, coming from one of the most CAGW-infested newspapers in the world – The Financial Times. not a hint about sea level rise:
28 Jun 2018: Financial Times: Monaco’s building boom spreads on to land reclaimed from the sea
Last year saw the largest number of new homes ever built in the tiny city-state
by Hugo Cox
Average prime sale prices in the last year were roughly €41,300 per square metre, according to Savills — nearly three times the average price for New York…
A group of private developers, overseen by the municipal government, is working on a €2.1bn project to reclaim 15 acres of land from the Mediterranean in the easternmost ward of Larvotto, a minute’s walk from Monte Carlo…
Monaco’s director of public records estimated in January that the homes — which will house 1,000 residents — would net the developers more than €3.5bn, suggesting that few of the homes will be reserved for local workers. Environmentalists say the work will disrupt the bay’s fragile biodiversity…
Perhaps the most vocal protests are coming from the minted residents of Avenue Princesse Grace. Much of the seafront boulevard — claimed by local agents to be the world’s priciest street — is overlooking the new construction site. As well as the noise and an unsightly dredger ship preparing the seabed, there is the small question of what will happen to those splendid Mediterranean views for which many existing owners have paid tens of millions of euros…
Noise nuisance and the risk of obscured views are not all that Monaco’s most wealthy are grappling with. By the end of the year, a new register disclosing the true beneficiaries of companies that own Monaco property will remove confidentiality, according to Remi Delforge, a lawyer from the firm DL Corporate & Regulatory in Monaco…
For some long-term residents the challenges of Monaco life have become too much. A combination of the construction nuisance, the perception of increased crime and a growth in the number of day-trippers from France is dulling the allure, says Heslin. “It’s a funny time. In the last six to eight months I’ve spoken to a number of residents who are leaving, saying the place is losing the glamour, exclusivity and community that they came here for.”…
https://www.ft.com/content/e23c1308-749e-11e8-bab2-43bd4ae655dd
24 Aug: Irish Examiner: Greta, don’t sink the green message
Sweden’s teenage climate change campaigner, Greta Thunberg, is now well on her way to New York, aboard the carbon-neutral racing yacht generously provided by a member of Monaco’s royal family…
The non-carbon yacht will be sailed back to Europe by crew who will fly to New York to get it. Could she have journeyed to the US on a cargo ship, which are said to be less polluting than cruise ships and planes? Was her journey really necessary, since there is Skype?…
Greta and those around her ought to think seriously about the extent to which their headline-grabbing publicity exploits can dilute the message they send to people who are unable to borrow yachts from Monaco’s royals and who can’t see why they shouldn’t fly to the Med for a week or two in the sun.
https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/views/ourview/greta-dont-sink-the-green-message-945864.html
11
I actually paid CAD6 to look at the ruling in the Mann v Ball defamation case:
I checked the court documents. The following is the result of the 22Aug2019 hearing Mann v Ball.
The last sentence can be translated as the winner takes all; meaning Tim Ball may recover a significant portion of what he actually spent defending the case. I expect it will be a tidy sum given it has gone on for 7 years. It was a great tactic to get the court to order Mann to show his workings, which he failed to do!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=100&v=WMqc7PCJ-nc
70
Worth watching the video below yet again. What amazes me it took so long to catch him out officially. Sort of shows how gullible so many people were and still are.
Hide the decline – satire on global warming alarmists
40
There is a $20 billion solar project planned for Tennant Creek NT. Power to be exported to Singapore via underground cable. Tell me this is only a bad dream….
20
To say it is planned probably overstates its progress; more like feasibility. There was discussion on the proposed project on WUWT.
10
Where do they find enough water in Tennant Ck to wash the ever-present dust off the cells/mirrors?
It is over 2,000 Ks as the crow flies, crossing Indonesia. Are you kiddin me? They can’t keep Basslink operational.
60
And the cable will have to cross an active tectonic plates junction. What was it you said about Basslink being unreliable?
30
They might have problems before that.
The first fibre optics cables across the mitchell grass plains ran into problems.
The ground cracks when it dries. This allowed the native rat population access to the cable and they chewed hell out of it.
Not sure what the solution was.
40
It sounds like astrology but I’m keeping an open mind.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/major-heat-cold-waves-driven-key-heliocentric-alignments-ulric-lyons/
20
No demonstration of the process which has the supposed effects EG
There is just a bit of correlation.
Demonstrated causation ?
Zip !
00
el gordo,
Have a look at this work for more evidence of 60 year climate cycles.
Cyclic Climate Changes and Fish Productivity
August 2007
Publisher: VNIRO Publishing, MoscowEditor: Dr. Gary D. SharpISBN: 978-5-85382-339-6
Klyashtorin L.B.A. Lyubushin A.
Don’t dismiss the strangeness of the heliocentric study, the true test of an idea, even weird ones, is this – Is it predictive?
Science is not about belief, and certainly not the even stranger concept of “belief in”.
20
News from UK
I heard an interesting example of “Westminster bubble thinking” on BBC radio this morning. Robert Halfon MP is campaigning for a cut (or at least a freeze) on fuel duty. He is a supporter of the FairFuelUK Campaign.
The interviewer asked him “aren’t you worried that voters will desert you for not being green enough?”
Clearly, the interviewer assumed that most voters would think the way she does. I suspect that most voters would rather have the tax cut.
20
More from sunny UK
“It is the hottest late August Bank Holiday Monday ever, as temperatures continue to soar across the UK. Temperatures had reached 32.9C (91.2F) at Heathrow by 16:00 BST, BBC Weather said, beating the previous record of 28.2C set two years ago. BBC forecasters said temperatures could still climb above 33C later on Monday. On Sunday, the record for the hottest late August Bank Holiday weekend was broken, with a high of 33.3C.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-49471053
These tenths of a degree terrify me! I’d better emigrate to Siberia.
51
They cannot seriously keep using Heathrow as a temperature monitoring center ?
That must be one of the largest exposed hard surface areas in the south of England, with continuously increasing amounts of jet exhaust blasted around continuously.
There are practically no trees or hills to promote shade or air currents…
… its just a giant concrete “hot plate “
30
“They cannot seriously keep using Heathrow as a temperature monitoring center?”
Why not? It tells them what they want to hear.
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Scotland is heading for disaster faster than England.
“Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, has agreed 2045 will be Scotland’s new net-zero target for CO2 emissions”.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/aug/26/ban-petrol-and-diesel-cars-from-scottish-cities-says-coalition
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There is a battle looming between local landowners trying to prevent a coal mine going ahead and the Environment Minister is being sued for neglecting heritage values.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-08-27/steve-talbot-pictured-on-the-shenhua-mining-lease-1/11447658
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ABC still banging on about renewables and this report finds no need for baseload power .
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-08-27/energy-audit-finds-nuclear-power-is-not-the-answer-for-australia/11450850
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