Envirologue: Too Big to Fail – Why National will Never Act on Climate Change
244 Responses
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Steve Rowe, in reply to
There ARE limits!
I never said there wouldn't be sacrifices!
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This is the problem...right here...
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/regional/270526/switch-to-led-lights-could-save-wellington-$2m
"Wellington City Council could make energy savings of up to $2 million a year by replacing sodium street lights with LED-light emitting diodes."
Yet,
"...Commerce Commission clause, lines companies may seek to recover lost revenue because of the savings by offering fixed contracts."
Lunacy.
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Stamper Stamp, in reply to
Hi Bart
"But what you and your ilk fail to realise (or just blindly ignore) is they do so BY PRESENTING DATA"Well - the problem with data is that it doesn’t always suit your story.
E.g. It is now widely accepted that the world’s surface temperature has remained static for some 18 years to-date, while CO2 has increased from approximately 350 ppm to 400 ppm.
That is data which the alarmists have difficulty rationalizing. -
Sacha, in reply to
don’t assume the so-called consensus on CAGW is correct
Pffft. Run along, you fool.
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Sacha, in reply to
It is now widely accepted
amongst denialist crackpots
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
the world’s surface temperature has remained static for some 18 years to-date
Gosh, a whole 18 years - Epic stuff!
What name shall we give this epoch of stability?Though I do notice an upward curve in your passive aggressiveness, not getting a tad hot under the collar are we?
There are other places you could go where people might respect your views you know, this pointless proselytizing here must be draining you of energy....
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A visual lesson for Stamper
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Stamper: pointing out conflicts of interest of the likes of Judith Curry isn't the same as 'hating on' them.
And you still haven't told us what industry you work in. If you work in the oil industry, no shame in admitting it, it just means we can put your arguments in perspective.
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PS. Stamper: and what about Richard Muller, who once associated with Curry and Lindzen and shared their climate-sceptic views, only to later join the ranks of the ‘alarmists’?
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Joe Wylie, in reply to
Though I do notice an upward curve in your passive aggressiveness, not getting a tad hot under the collar are we?
Heh.
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tussock, in reply to
Which is why I ask: Is there a better hill nearby? Where? What does it look like?
I'm glad you asked, Ben. The future of the planet, wherein it has people still on it, is with solar heated, passively cooled, (at least in the interim) and solar electric power as it's primary source (with various ways to make liquid fuels from electricity already available non-commercially, waiting for the massive fossil subsidies to die off). China is currently transitioning, a few small countries are already there, Northern Europe of all places is well on the way.
The thing with solar electric, is that it's gigantic. Unbelievable amounts of power literally fall on the ground and then evaporate back into space every single day, all around the world, and you can use them at a fair rate at very low cost (already well below the cost of new coal plants, for instance, already competitive with natural gas) to do everything we do now and a thousand times more. A major problem is not being able to use it all. Really. Soon Europe will have to beam the spare stuff into space or something. Though you can spend collossal amounts of energy making rocket fuel, and maybe colonise Mars or something.
And you get it everywhere. It's in China, India, Africa, ... everywhere. The Sun, no one really gets an advantage. Well, not so much in Antarctica, but no one lives there anyway.
Now, obviously the world is currently pillaged and looted by a small group of idiots who gained their control by dominating the supply chains of oil and coal (with no shortage of blood spilt in exchange). They can't control a world run on solar-electric. Their model of control is at least a thousand times weaker than the obvious future that will replace them.
All the limits in the future are raw materials, but they're surprisingly abundant once you have a colossal amount of almost-free power to retrieve them from less pure ores, and power to spare for cleaning and redecorating after the fact.Surely, you'd say, you need power to build the power stations and such, and you totally do, almost 20% of the future power of the world will go into recycling and replacing the power grid, which limits it's rate of growth for some time. And it's a tricky beast to bootstrap if we use up too much oil before getting started, so a lot of countries are being a colossal bunch of idiots by delaying, to protect their great dinosaurs of fossil fuel control.
But China's going to make it, Europe's going to make it, most of South America at least, so at least a good many of the people of the future will have abundant energy supplies in electric and whatever other form they desire at near-zero costs. It cannot be otherwise. No one will control anyone at that point, there's no actual point in fighting wars in a post-scarcity society.
The only thing people will have left to value is personal skill, which will mostly involve creative ways of using all that power without breaking anything important, and then tidying up after yourself, so they don't have to make so much rocket fuel with the excess.
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And of course, when I say a thousand times, I'm only counting minimal efficiency, minimal cost, current tech, 24-hour available, only plated at a sparse rate over major desert regions with maximal transmission and usage losses. You can totally multiply that by another hundred if you really wanted each person in the world to have more power (and thus wealth) than a small city available for their personal whimsy.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
Don't fight it Marsha, it's bigger than both of us!
The thing with solar electric, is that it’s gigantic
Know your neighbour,
and their influence...
I found this article interesting:Many people and even some scientists embrace a simple,
binary view of solar activity: Solar maximum is a time of action,
marked by massive explosions and dangerous space
weather that can affect engineered systems on Earth and in
space, while solar minimum is a time of quiet, when almost
nothing happensall stuff to take into consideration...
after all, all life revolves around the Sun
hopefully we can attenuate Aten if needs be... -
Ian Dalziel, in reply to
no particle place to be...
...an ideological problem with nuclear power
<interrupts>
my problems with it are mostly radiological...
it is still as primitive and raw a method of extracting power
as propelling cars by continuous controlled explosions,
both present seriously adverse byproducts and consequences...Guess I like my plankton to be Plancked on by superfine particles
rather than those unstable rough and ready Transuranics -
Atmosphere, utmost fear...
This was interesting as well...
http://www.nasa.gov/jpl/gps-data-show-how-nepal-quake-disturbed-earth-s-upper-atmosphereThe April 25, 2015, magnitude 7.8 Gorkha earthquake in Nepal created waves of energy that penetrated into Earth's upper atmosphere in the vicinity of Nepal, disturbing the distribution of electrons in the ionosphere. The ionosphere is a region of Earth's upper atmosphere located from about 37 miles (60 kilometers) to 621 miles (1,000 kilometers) above Earth’s surface.
Original source: http://www.spaceweather.com/
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Steve Rowe, in reply to
Tussock, do you have an ideological problem with nuclear power?
I have two, Chernobyl and Fukushima. It is incredible that the wildfires in the Chernobyl exclusion zone have not rated a single mention in our media. Similarly the silence on the ongoing Fukushima disaster is beyond belief. Fukushima is still dumping nuclear waste into the North Pacific over four years after the earthquake.
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Steve Rowe, in reply to
Similarly the silence on the ongoing Fukushima disaster is beyond belief.
I think it's more the engineering that failed us in the first instance, not the science.
No offence but the people dying of cancer really don't care which bit of it failed.
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Steve Rowe, in reply to
Sorry Steve, I was editing when you where posting.
No problem - It does raise the point that nuclear power also needs a robust economy that enables plenty of ongoing infrastucture work - another argument against it I would say.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
And this that talks about the science of reading the atmosphere to help predict large earthquakes
That is interesting!
Imagine if the processing power available to the likes of the N S A was instead diverted to a realtime atmospheric, magnetic and Earth monitoring virtual model, where local fluctuations could be observed and flagged and a stepped risk alert system set in place.*Of course some Haarpist in the Gods would want to monetise or weaponise such a thing - it's the only way they can think, sigh...
*speaking of International Rescue, they got the models right in the reboot, but what's with the meringue-like hair? I thought Weta's big CGI breakthrough was blow around hair and fabric, the original puppets had 'wigs' - that clunks for me when watching.
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andin, in reply to
nuclear power also needs a robust economy that enables plenty of ongoing infrastucture work –
Could be, thats why some like it. And I'm not wearing a meringue on my head.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
may the force glow with you...
It does raise the point that nuclear power also needs a robust economy that enables plenty of ongoing infrastucture work
...and a culture that will survive beyond it's decay life while staying aware of the dangers it presents.
Not much hope of that judging by past efforts - we know next to nothing of civilisations a mere 4 to 8 thousand years ago - whereas the road from Uranium 238 to Lead 206 is many many millennia more...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_decay#Decay_chains_and_multiple_modes -
Ian Dalziel, in reply to
Just desserts...
And I’m not wearing a meringue on my head.
Is that a pavlovian response!
;- ) -
almost :-0
damn wheres my tinfoil hat... sorry baking dish... -
Bart Janssen, in reply to
world’s surface temperature
air temperature
water temperature has continued to rise - but you wouldn't know that because your employer never gave you that data when he/she hired you to spout this drivel
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Bart Janssen, in reply to
I think it’s more the engineering that failed us in the first instance, not the science.
No offence but the people dying of cancer really don’t care which bit of it failed.
Both points are correct and relevant.
The problem with nuclear power IS engineering. Modern reactor designs are safer, but still produce waste.
It's like pointing out that sometimes bridges collapse and kill people. It's a tragedy for the people and families who die. But it is not necessarily a problem with bridges per se, rather a problem with making sure bridges are engineered correctly.
A more relevant argument is that we may not need nuclear power plants hence the engineering risk need not exist.
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