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Renewable Australia update: Fear of blackouts means diesel generator sales up 400%
Welcome
to a clean green Australia where we gave up coal to move to diesel.
Back to the future. Diesel’s prototype engine circa 1892. Channel Ten
news tonight discusses the sudden surge in demand for diesel generators
Homes and businesses are so afraid of blackouts in Australia that some
retailers are selling four times as many generators as normal.
Mygenerator.com.au reports a 425% increase year
Green vision protects coal deposits, razes forests instead: Europe goes back to wood power
Green Utopia We’re trying to control the weather by limiting a
universal molecule intrinsic to life on Earth. What could possibly go
wrong? Loopholes, for starters. Only this isn’t a loophole — it’s an
obvious outcome of “carbon neutrality”. The only thing that could have
stopped wood from replacing coal is if the tidal-windy-solar idea had
been competitive, reliable and batteries were really che
Welcome to renewables world: Australia plans for blackouts, throws billions of dollars, but ABC says it will get “cheaper”
The
fear is palpable How much fun can you have living in a global
experiment? In Australia, peak summer is about to hit in a
post-Hazelwood-electricity-grid. There’s a suite of committee reports as
summer ramps up. Everyday there’s another Grid story in the press, and a
major effort going on to avoid a meltdown. Minister Josh Frydenberg
announced today that “we’ve done everything possible to preve
Dec 23
Weekend Unthreaded
… Rating: 9.2/10 (11 votes cast) Rating: 9.2/ 10 (11 votes cast)
EPA exodus of staff and scientists
This
is what winning looks like. The NY Times reports on Droves of
Scientists Leaving EPA WASHINGTON — More than 700 people have left the
Environmental Protection Agency since President Trump took office, a
wave of departures that puts the administration nearly a quarter of the
way toward its goal of shrinking the agency to levels last seen during
the Reagan administration. This is 700 of 15,000 e
Dec 21
Help. Science blogger needs support…
NEW POSTS ARE APPEARING BELOW Oops, please. The bank balance is
trending to zero, and I must pay attention. Can you can spare the
equivalent of a beer, a steak, or a month of bandwidth ($100) for 2018?
I, we, will be ever so grateful. We can do this thanks to
philanthropists like you. It’s a testament to the fantastic readers here
that nine years, 2,863 posts and 450,000 comments later, this blog
Dec 19
Please sign this petition to get Australia out of the Paris Climate Accord and back to affordable energy
It only takes a moment and it does help. It’s easy to be cynical. But
in the world of psychology and politics, petitions prove there really
are a lot of people who feel the same way. Sometimes these are the only
numbers a politician will pay attention to (though we may wish it were
otherwise). — Jo ___________________ Sign the Petition Demand Affordable
Energy Now Government renewable mandates an
Midweek Unthreaded
Tips and ideas… Rating: 6.0/10 (22 votes cast) Rating: 6.0/ 10 (22 votes cast)
Seven reasons why BHP — a giant coal miner — wants to stop lobbying FOR coal
BHP
is throwing its weight around to stop the Minerals Council of Australia
(MCA) saying what most miners want on climate change. What coal company
wants lobbyists not to lobby for coal? The gauntlet is down — Which
heavyweight will blink first? In one corner — The MCA — the main lobby
group for miners. It’s very effective, and wants to dump the renewables
target (“yay” say most miners!). In the o
Dec 18
Everyone cutting coal use except for most of the world and most of the banks
The
situation with our most hated energy asset Australia’s big four banks
are fighting over themselves to turn down the chance to profit from coal
loans and tell the world. Months ago, Westpac went on a low-coal diet,
declaring like a kind of vegan-keto-banker that they won’t consider a
loan unless the coal mined has at least 6,300 kilocalories per kilogram.
Presumably they will lose weight, or at
Dec 16
Weekend Unthreaded
…. Rating: 7.1/10 (30 votes cast) Rating: 7.1/ 10 (30 votes cast)
Forget Megawatts, ABC invents new unit of power — “size of Tasmania”
Outback
couple build solar farm to prove fringe-of-grid power generation needs
Building a $14 million solar farm is an expensive way to send a message
about electricity prices, but Doug and Lyn Scouller said they were left
with few options. In Normanton, 500 kilometres north of Mount Isa in
north-west Queensland, the Scoullers built a solar farm big enough to
power an area almost twice the size of
Dec 15
Laser Boron Fusion — What if it works? (Forget “climate change”)
Here’s another “breakthrough” fusion claim. Thing is, one day, one of
these will work. Something like this: Boron Hydrogen, Fusion, click to
read about aneutronic fusion. In the meantime, knowing that the future
is nuclear, and the only question is when, we should burn all the coal
we have while it is still worth something. UPDATE: Everyone knows that
fusion is the perennial baby of Hype-n-Hope.
Dec 14
Global warming will weaken winds in the Northern Hemisphere, but speed them up downunder!
Now
they tell us! Climate warming to weaken wind power in northern
hemisphere, increase in Australia: study After building 341,000 wind
turbines, mostly in the Northern Hemisphere, now climate modelers reveal
that winds will decrease in the Northern Hemisphere! Warming
temperatures caused by climate change are set to weaken wind energy in
the northern hemisphere, a study shows, lessening the amoun
Dec 12
Midweek Unthreaded
Tips and other stuff…. Rating: 7.9/10 (33 votes cast) Rating: 7.9/ 10 (33 votes cast)
Save the world with internal combustion engines
Who
cares about 50% more emissions? China is powered by 65% coal. A new
study in China compares cars with internal combustion engines to
electric cars. Qiao et al estimate that from cradle-to-gate electric
cars use about 50% more energy and produce around 50% more emissions.
(Thanks to Kenneth Richards at NoTricksZone.) All Greens should hereby
recycle their EV and buy a gas guzzler. This is not e
Matt Ridley on Brexit: Brits should give foreign aid to EU (with strings) as parting gift
Matt
Ridley writes the letter Theresa May should send to the EU For 40 years
Britain has propped up the EU with nothing in return but complaints and
insults. The fifth biggest economy in the world can offer foreign aid
to the failing EU but on the same terms as other needy states. BRITAIN
SHOULD GIVE THE EU £20 BILLION EXTRA AS AN ACT OF CHARITY Dear Angela,
Emmanuel and others (cc Donald, Jean-Cl
Dec 10
Transformation glitch? Biggest issue facing South Australia is electricity say 70%
A Sunday Mail survey (paywalled) shows that despite SA having more
“free, cheap and clean” renewable electricity than just about anywhere
in the world, the number one biggest issue for most South Australians is
… “electricity”. And despite all the renewable jobs created, the second
most common concern is “jobs”. Going for the Paradox-Trifecta: most
strangely of all, with elected leaders who are l
Dec 09
Weekend Unthreaded
… Rating: 7.4/10 (35 votes cast) Rating: 7.4/ 10 (35 votes cast)
Dec 06
Giant Fans will cool Great Barrier Reef to stop bleaching
”Air-conditioning” of The Great Barrier Reef begins soon To calm a few
panicking people, the Australian Government will pay for large fans to
circulate water on a minuscule portion of the 2,300 kilometer long Great
Barrier Reef. The reef creatures, which have been coping with higher
temperatures and bleaching for two hundred million years, will hopefully
avoid the moving parts. Marine life adapts
(Let me see.Bleaching is a consequence of reduced sea level. Fans would perhaps make that worse? )
Midweek Unthreaded
I’ve had requests for an extra unthreaded. Sometimes the weekend is too
far away… Rating: 7.9/10 (34 votes cast) Rating: 7.9/ 10 (34 votes
cast)
Another hidden cost of intermittent renewables (It’s time to talk about FCAS and roaring price spikes!)
The shape of normal AC Electricity: 50Hz (230V) and 60Hz (110V) Nobody
says much about FCAS in public — but it’s become a hot topic among
Australia’s energy-nerds and electricity traders. It never used to be a
big deal, because we got it at very low cost from huge turbines — from
coal, hydro, and gas. Suddenly, it is costing a lot more. As I
discovered below, in one month FCAS charges in South Au
Dec 05
Burn more oil and feed the world
Climate
change causes … more crops. Climate change threatens our food supply,
our grain harvests. It causes wars, droughts, sometimes floods, shorter
growing seasons. And we all know Climate change is here. We can see it
out the window. Plus 2017 is one of the three hottest years ever.
Somehow all these bad events happened at once and added up to the
world’s largest cereal crop ever. … It’s doom g
Dec 04
Do 40,000 volcanoes matter?
The world is watching one volcano in Bali, but it’s sobering to think
there may be hundreds of others going off, and almost certainly ones we
don’t even know about. The article Is the Bali volcano making us warmer
or cooler? by William F Jasper, reminded me of Ian Plimers words about
there being squillions of undersea volcanoes so I found the 2007 paper,
by Hillier, that tried to count them. Tryi
Dec 02
Weekend Unthreaded
… Rating: 7.5/10 (37 votes cast) Rating: 7.5/ 10 (37 votes cast)
Nov 30
Green rules, profit, legal bullying drove the Grenfell disaster
Grenfell Tower It takes a lot of effort to set up a situation so
dangerous under the guise of “helping the poor and the polar bears”.
Grenfell — Britain’s fire safety crisis By Gerard Tubb, Sky News
Correspondent and Nick Stylianou, Sky News Producer The UK Dept of
Energy and Climate Change wanted help to get insulation onto buildings
to save the world in 2011, so it asked the people who sell ins
Nov 29
*Surprise* Great Barrier Reef has 112 tough spots that survive and replenish the rest
… After lasting for thousands of years through wild swings of
temperature, scientists could never have guessed that the Great Barrier
Reef has evolved to cope with climate change. The reef spans 2,300km and
has spawning events so large that they can be viewed from space, but
who knew that some parts of the reef appear to be safer and more
resilient, and would repopulate the rest of the reef? (App
Nov 27
Last winter 9,000 more British pensioners died than usual — how many were due to high heating costs?
Higher
electricity costs mean more people turn off their heaters There’s a big
freeze coming to Britain with minus 12C temperatures possible in the
next three weeks. Last year in winter in England there was a remarkable
40% rise in winter deaths David Archibald emails that last year was a
mild winter for Brits, but the death toll rose from the normal 25,000
excess to 34,000 people. Remembering tha
Electrical appliances force children to marry
Thanks to The Guardian for drawing a link we would never have noticed:
Why climate change is creating a new generation of child brides As
global warming exacerbates drought and floods, farmers’ incomes plunge –
and girls as young as 13 are given away to stave off poverty If only
these girls had perfect weather, they wouldn’t have to be married so
young. For a million years of human history, every
Nov 25
Your car causes volcanoes (and volcanoes release CO2)
Oh. My. Lord. Keep the car in the garage. … Climate Change Could
Increase Volcano Eruptions Dr Graeme Swindles, from the School of
Geography at Leeds, said: “Climate change caused by humans is creating
rapid ice melt in volcanically active regions. In Iceland, this has put
us on a path to more frequent volcanic eruptions.” The study examined
Icelandic volcanic ash preserved in peat deposits and l
Weekend Unthreaded
… Rating: 7.1/10 (17 votes cast) Rating: 7.1/ 10 (17 votes cast)
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