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
I haven’t been first for a long time!
120
On behalf of all those gathered here today, may we offer our heartfelt congratulations to you on this fine achievement.
And I say this from the heart of my bottom.
120
Mate, you really tickled my funny bone with,
I’m going to remember that line for the next time I need something really clever with which to amaze and amuse someone…or tell him he said something I didn’t need to know or just about any old useful 😉 remark.
Thanks for the clever line and I hope you haven’t copyrighted it.
30
It’s already been copywrited by Nick Faldo when he thanked the press after winning a British Open Championship many years ago.
20
CLIMATE QUESTION:
Which of the following days was warmest? (It’s a trick question).
A. You wake up to a cold grey day, the sun is obscured by clouds. The temperature is 10℃ but with the wind chill from a moderate
breeze it seems colder. The temperature struggles up to 11℃ at noon. Around 3 p.m. the clouds disappear and the max.
temperature rises briefly to 13℃ and then falls back to 10 ℃ by 9 p.m.
B. You wake to a very cold dawn at 2℃ but the sun soon warms the day so by 9a.m.
By noon it is 15℃ and it gets warmer until the maximum of 22℃ at 4p.m. before
cooling down slowly to 9 ℃ by 9 p.m.
C. The minimum overnight temperature is 8℃ at dawn, and by 9 a.m. it is a pleasant
20℃. The clouds then roll over keeping the day’s maximum to 23℃, and keeping the
evening warm and above 19℃ at 9p.m.
Average temperatures 12.5℃, 12℃ and 15.5℃ but C is subsequently “homogenised” to a minimum of 4℃ minimum and 20℃ maximum to give a new average temperature of 12℃ so the ‘correct’ answer is A.
111
A tricky question indeed.
Maybe you could devise a “plant test” and assess the likely growth of a plant having to deal permanently with each of the three separate environments.
But then again, maybe the plants can teach us a lesson because there are plants which are adapted to specific environments and I’m sure you could find one to suit each profile.
Your example raises the question: what is the day’s temperature?
A tricky scientific question.
KK
51
KK
“GIStemp- Dumber than a Tomato!”
More at
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/gistemp/
51
Interesting.
I noticed during the recent dry spell that while the grass was mostly brown and not growing there was an anomaly: weeds.
The weeds grew like crazy, paspalum type stuff.
It may have been getting a bit of water from early morning condensation.
We’ve heard of England being this: Green and pleasant land, so it seems that temperature isn’t the main control.
It must be availability of water and UV and of course, the main ingredient in the air:
CO2.
40
KK,
Don’t you know that weeds are better survivalists than the stuff we humans insist on growing — like decorative grass, flowers and food crops.
The weeds were here long before us and I’ll bet they’ll still be here after we’re all gone again. If we were smart we would put all our great scientific investigative skill to work figuring out how we can eat weeds. It would surely prove to be more useful than investigating climate change.
Life would be easier for the farmers. Everyone’s yard would be a source of food. Just think about the possibilities.
Weeds and cockroaches will probably survive the destruction of the world. What greater guarantee of always having food could you wish for?
Any attempt at humor is strictly nonexistent, not to mention coincidental and probably terrible too.
30
Lucerne is similar to a weed in that it has a tap root and can go deeper for water. But it doesn’t like sheep which graze too close to the ground and destroy the crown. But your lawn should be doing better, the higher CO2 concentration means it grows a better root system. Of course the weeds can too. 🙂
And there is little protein in a cockroach hence the theory [untested by me] that they can survive in a micro wave.
21
I have it on good authority—from one of the juniors no less—that cockroaches do not survive a microwave. He said “it’s like they let the smoke out.”
So the experiment has been done. When I wanted to know more, he decided to clam up, really tight. I think he, correctly, discerned the imminence of trouble …
10
You’ve just made a very interesting suggestion there Roy.
I know almost nothing about plants but can recognize the possibility of making millions from your idea of crossing a weed with a small fruit or vegetable.
After seeing my weeds grow to one and a half foot high while the grass withered I can imagine the possibility of strawberries or beans being there to eat two weeks after planting.
Why do our “scientists” waste their time and our tax dollars on globul warming propaganda?
KK
20
Researching global warming is like watching “Home and Away” and expecting some sort of ( any ) academic advancement …. not going to happen…at best its a time filler…at worst its distracts you from any useful activity……and consumes elctricity….
30
And the main point in the link was that plants could adapt to temperature.
10
Does your answer mean that you know the secrets of the BOM homogenisation algorithm, or the BOM gnome that fiddles the data is a good friend of yours?
31
Graeme,
What is the meaning of an average daily temperature in the first place?
If you can answer that question by nailing down the meaning of the average daily temperature then I could easily answer your question. But there is no meaning to the average daily temperature. And I suspect that’s the intended point of your question.
Average daily temperature means nothing.
Over the course of a year the maximum and minimum daily temperatures show us something useful, allowing assigning seasons to four parts of a year that indicate general temperature trends during those seasons. But in the end, what else does knowing temperature do for us except allow us to decide how to dress for the day. If it’s cold wear a coat but if it’s hot wear only a shirt.
41
Roy:
Taking the average of the maximum and minimum temperature is pointless as a way of finding the amount of heat in the system. It is just that the historical figures were all the IPCC had available when they started so they used them to support their hypothesis. Since they now adjust (homogenise) the figures to make their claim look true then there is little point in even continuing the practice. They may just as well make up figures as they are doing. You only have to look at the GISS figures showing an almost exact correlation from 1965 to the present between the Earth’s temperature and CO2 emissions. In a system with maybe 62 variables for only one to be so obvious signals that something underhand is going on. Then there is the fact that temperatures before 1965 don’t correlate with CO2 emissions at all, so why did they suddenly start showing such overwhelming effect?
21
Good points Roy.
I could say that “temperature” may just be a very rough proxy for total Ultraviolet radiation reaching a location on Earth’s surface, i.e. the energy available to be used.
11
FOOD FOR THOUGHT , DONALD TRUMP IS PORTRAYED AS A HOBGOBLIN BY THE NEW WORLD ORDER GLOBALISTS , WHY DID I USE THAT
PARTICULAR WORD ” Hobgoblin ” to describe their impression of Trump ?
40
Hobgoblins seem to be small, hairy little men who, like their close relatives the brownies, are often found within human dwellings – In the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game, hobgoblins are a larger, stronger, smarter and more menacing form of goblins.
In folklore, a brownie resembles the hob, similar to a hobgoblin. Thomas Keightley describes the brownie as “a personage of small stature, wrinkled visage, covered with short curly brown hair, and wearing a brown mantle and hood”. Brownies are said to inhabit houses and aid in tasks around the house, like getting rid of spiders.
These should not be confused with greenies which are not small and do not wear brown mantles. Nor do they provide any aid to humans but instead are quarrelsome and demanding. They are a stronger and more menacing form of goblins but are far from being smarter.
130
Hobgoblin: from Hob + Goblin.
A sprite or elf which haunts fireplaces and coal/wood stoves (hobs)
If Trump is called a Hobgoblin then he must cooking. He should take it as praise.
20
I think Trump is not worried about praise or criticism. When I stopped to think about it I realized that he’s one of the mos self confident men I’ve ever heard of. He built an empire second to none, all while raising children who sing his praise as a father and mentor, even through divorce and scandal. You and I should have such kids as that.
He keeps his eye squarely fixed on the goal and is thinking about only one thing, how to obtain that goal.
I think he sleeps quite well at night, secur in the knowledge that he’s outfoxed one of the most vicious political machines in America.
30
Looking at he available evidence not even Ronald Reagan did as well as Trump has.
30
I believe RR was quite unpopular at this stage of his Presidency.
I love the way way Trump makes all kinds of threats and then sidles up to those he has threatened with a “But if you do such and such I won’t actually do it”. He gets a concession without giving one in return. Those who call him an idiot have no idea.
20
Perhaps they consider President Trump a mischievous person who likes to play tricks on them (like Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream)?
60
“There is very definitely an element of what my grandmother called old devilment about him, which is an engaging failing, – – -”
“Moving purposefully towards the head of the fish.”
https://thepointman.wordpress.com/2018/03/09/moving-purposefully-towards-the-head-of-the-fish/
20
What you do when the science is settled?
“Aussie Bureau of Meteorology Staff Accused of Using Work Supercomputers to Mine Cryptocurrencies”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/03/10/aussie-bureau-of-meteorology-staff-accused-of-using-work-supercomputers-to-mine-cryptocurrencies/
111
If true, one would imagine that IT Security and Controls at the BOM are somewhat loosey goosey.
In the actual working world that would be instant dismissal, no discussion, do pass go, do not collect severance pay.
211
I thought that kind of thing only happened in corrupt former Soviet republics.
https://www.freedomsphoenix.com/News/223478-2017-08-15-arrests-of-bitcoin-miners-in-ukraine-spark-questions-about-legality.htm
10
yeah but, no but, yeah but … there were no heat waves … there were no doom catastropic graphics coming out of the models! … to give to the ABC … what’s the harm? … this annoyingly cool summer has really free up the CPU cycles … and they’re just getting wasted … your supercomputer, does she go? … eh? … does she go?
Public Enterprise.
21
At an approx cost of almost $10k per Bitcoin to mine them in Aust., they are on a winner.
20
It is important that we reclaim the language.
Whenever someone talks about “climate change” it needs to be corrected to “man made climate change” or even “CO2 climate change”. That moves the discussion on to the real allegation that mankind has increased CO2 and that this increase is warming the planet.
We also need to challenge an outrageous claim which is never discussed here or elsewhere, extreme events.
If any one has an explanation for why a tiny warming should produce more ‘extreme’ weather events, I would love to know. This is the other wild prediction without any attempt at explanation let alone proof but it is widely accepted without comment. More and more severe hurricanes, droughts.
The best explanation I have ever read is that ‘the models predict’ which is odd since nothing the models predicted has been right, but all major weather events are apparently caused by an increase in average world temperature of less than one degree in a century. Amazingly these weather events include bush fires.
The difficulty is that it is hard to defeat an allegation of extreme events when no explanation is even attempted let alone examined.
230
Someone remarked about models here, that they tend to model the modellers world view and biases, rather than reality.
Years ago I worked for a large unnamed oil company (based in the UK and Netherlands). One of our team produced a model of the financial benefits of deploying a new technology. It was so good that our boss quipped that perhaps the company should stop finding oil, and refining and selling petroleum products. It would be far more luctaive just to keep deploying technology.
140
TdeF,
I would like “gay” and “rainbow” to be returned to their rightful places.
160
To celebrate Australia day and the momentous change of no consequence, I bought a six pack of Golden Gaytimes for the bbq. Odd that the name hasn’t changed. However they may have found a new market.
80
For just desserts.
50
Thank you Eric Bogle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOdHNGG9yWU
20
The same chap wrote the most poignant song I know, Willie McBride. The Fureys do it well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1hiq0MSI24
30
So would I. I still cherish a Little Black Dress (LBD) bought aeons ago in the olden days when I was young; no reason to keep it except that I like it and it rejoices in the label ‘Gay Lady’!
60
This is happening constantly in THe Oz comments, where sceptics are always pointing out that the climate is always changing. Perhaps that’s why “Climate Disruption” is the new meme.
30
‘The difficulty is that it is hard to defeat an allegation of extreme events when no explanation is even attempted let alone examined.’
Under AGW weather should become less robust and more predictable, only global cooling produces extremes because of the wayward jet stream and blocking highs in both hemispheres.
Cherry pick the anomalous signs, a summer snow trend in New Zealand or winter rains return to southern Australia, proof positive that the Pacific Decadal Oscillation overwhelms global warming.
10
“The Apprentices”
“Name That Show in the comments, and I’ll send out a free book from the free book library to the one I like best (closes Sunday night at midnight). ”
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2018/03/the-apprentices.html#comments
30
I like “From Ayers to Eternity”.
11
Looking at three local sources of temperature this morning, all within 20kms of each other.
BOM = 18C
Local weather station (because BOM is in a stupid unrepresntative spot in relation the the community centre) = 10C
Poking noise out back door to look at thermometer on the deck = 8C
171
The construction of a temperature for a whole country, for a planet is made up of thousands of localized measurements like this. This is bad enough logically but the world is spending trillions to control the planet at the scale of 0.1C in a planetary average across the land, the mountains, the valleys, the tropics, antarctica and the vast oceans. This ‘world temperature’ is as inaccurate as the local BOM temperatures from which it is constructed. Contrary to the faux science of Flannery, things do not become more accurate the more wrong numbers you add.
212
If thousands of drones were equipped with real time temperature monitoring equipment and flown at the same height over earths surface would the data sent back be much different to that of a satellite?
60
It doesn’t matter. Instrumental measurements can only give you an average temperature of the sites recorded. A very few instruments recording the weather for a few square meters around them. Most sites through their history will be subject to errors of more than the apparent observed warming.
Satellites are better but cannot take simultaneous readings over more than a small portion of the planet at a time. Obtaining a true average is impossible.
The best any method that we have can do is show a trend if the error from one set of measurements to another is not too great.
What we seem to have is at most a 0.8 C increase per century. If using the instrumental record, it must be noted that all this trend starts from a period around 1880 which was a during a cold period. It depends entirely on this short time period. The satellite record is much shorter at less than 40 years. Can records of 40 to 150 years actually show a climate trend on a planet with a history of 4.5 billion years?
Look at it another way. The temperature of the earth may have gone from about 286.5 to about 288 degrees Kelvin since significant record keeping began. Only about half of that was while mankind was using significant amounts of fossil fuel.
If that seems like a totally insignificant warming, that is because it is totally insignificant.
Alarmists have made wild unsupportable predictions of rapidly acceleration warming in the future, with even less supportable predictions of negative consequences. The only crystal ball used has been climate models that have so far been totally wrong beyond any but very short time periods.
Do the conclusions of catastrophic climate change seem ridiculous to you? They certainly do to me.
162
The reason I asked is the possible variance in data of satellite surface measurement vs static above ground measurement or as satellites measure radiances in various wavelength bands the results would be comparable at any distance chosen?
31
Also interesting is the idea that you can measure anything but ground temperature. The temperature and winds are often very different just 30 metres in the air and most humans live in the first two metres. If they live above that height, their climate is very different. To think a year could be the hottest ever by 0.001 across a planet, across night and day, across seasons and countries and oceans is just beyond reason.
91
Not sure I understand but we do have radiosonde (balloon) measurements that, I believe, correlate fairly well with satellite data.
40
Yonniestone
That brings to mind the Dorothy Parker quip
“If all the young ladies in America were laid end to end I wouldn’t be suprised”
20
Well explained TdeF; ‘the average world temperature’ is a poorly & badly misconceived concept. And as such is a useless piece of information. What really matters is the temperature and weather patterns of particular areas of the globe.
GeoffW
51
You could add, and it only matters to those particular areas. The effect on the rest of the globe is likely undetectable.
40
Now 10C here out over the home area grass with the sun rapidly rising at 0820.
30
I’ve seen the same thing at the airport where the ATIS temp change is continually being broadcast, and its max is up to 4 degrees C less than that claimed by BOM as the ‘max temp’ for that day, and the BOM thermometer is situated right beside the ATIS’s temp sensor. Figure that one out. I know which one the pilots live and fly by, and it isn’t BOM’s fanciful version of ‘reality’. Everyone’s dubios of BOM’s nonsense max temp pseudo ‘data’ claims.
51
The CERES data for February produces a globally averaged net heat input of 16W/sq.m. The warming is consistent with the sun still predominantly over ocean.
In February 2017 the net heat input was 18.9W/sq.m.
60
More cooling?
Given the eccentricity of the Earth’s orbit, solar heating is up to 90W/m^2 greater in Jan than July. Yet the UAH global temperatures do not show an annual cyclical pattern. The extra heat is temporarily stored in the oceans of the Southern hemispher I suppose.
10
South Ozzie power system doing OK this morning (@ 0530 WST). With everybody still in bed and industry also asleep they are producing more power than they are using. Probably trying to export it to other states that don’t need it.
70
Ted, without an extension cord to the east and being able to blame someone else, how do your electricity tariffs compare?
20
Highest in the world despite having reliance on Victoria to sink excess and source shortfalls AS WELL AS getting direct income support from consumers in other States paying for the excess LGCs created in SA.
https://www.canstarblue.com.au/energy/electricity/electricity-costs-kwh/
If SA was stand alone the power would be at least 30% more expensive.
At current price rooftop solar/battery gives a reasonable payback. It is impossible for grid scale wind and solar to absorb the cost of transmission and do better than what local rooftop solar/battery can achieve.
90
RickWill:
That ability to export may be tested. From my comment 9.2
As of 1 July 2017, 1,515 MW of solar generation and 3,178 MW of new wind generation projects are either committed or proposed in South Australia.
Imagine what will happen when the wind blows, there will be more coming onto the grid than the maximum peak demand. Combined the “renewables” would be more than the maximum Peak plus interconnectors can handle so blackouts will be guaranteed.
80
The wind generators will all have overvoltage protection so should just trip out individually until there is an input-output balance. Grid stability becomes increasingly difficult to manage of course.
At some point it gets too complicated for the current market mechanism. There is already so much outside of AEMO’s control that the stability is difficult to manage.
Eventually all the wind and solar generation has to have some form of linear frequency and voltage capability so they can respond progressively to conditions at its connection node.
There are already rooftop systems that are shutting down regularly on over voltage in some areas. As that becomes a more frequent occurrence it will push more to consider batteries and going off-grid.
http://adelaidesolarrepairs.com.au/ac-over-voltage-gradual-power-reduction/
A more subtle impact is appliance damage from poor voltage regulation and harmionics.
The grid in SA is already dead. It just has not fallen over and stayed down yet; albeit a few stumbles over the last two years. The Labor pollies keep propping it up – brings Weekend at Bernie’s to mind. The grid can no longer operate from its own revenue stream but relies on payments from general revenue. It is only getting worse. There is no way of spending more that can reduce electricity costs unless the money is from sources separated from the electricity revenue stream.
Anyone planning to stay resident in SA should be developing their plan to get off-grid.
70
Will be fun to manage wind gusts and times when the wind just drops off .
10
Well, they could always just turn off some of the wind generators if necessary !
20
I think you kissed my point Hanrahan, or I’m missing yours.
50
delete “kissed” insert “missed”
40
Yea. When you quoted WST I assumed you were in WA.
It takes autocorrect to change a simple typo into something meaningless and then hide it. 🙂
40
Kinky 🙂
42
Think we’ve had enough of your crap troll you’re lucky it’s not in my power to ban you ,if you have something to add to the conversation be our guest .
21
Grow up and chill robert. Its just the intertubes.
And, you are on a satirical humour blog after all. 🙂
You just have to accept that not everyone here has my wondrous sense of daH funnies. 🙂
XXX
32
why not join the club geek.There’s a NEW WORLD OUT HERE. Freedom awaits and the infinite stream of the universe. Divest yourself of the meaningless brainwashing and think free.
20
Poor phlop only humour is when he looks in the mirror.
giggling at his own reflection.
22
Robert we don’t want to encourage groupthink, Phil is okay.
30
mORE kINKY. 🙂
11
BLANK
https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/latest_512_hmiic.jpg
30
I have been checking some claims about SA’s electricity supply and find a few things I didn’t realise.
http://www.aemo.com.au/-/media/Files/Electricity/NEM/Planning_and_Forecasting/SA_Advisory/2017/South-Australian-Electricity-Report-2017.pdf
Firstly, SA does very little exporting to Vic.(0.007%) but imports nearly 21% of its usage from (brown coal fired) Victoria. This makes a big reduction in the 48.4% renewables claim. The actual share is 38.8% of which roof top PV solar = 7.4%.
Nor are the wind turbines quite as efficient as claimed with a Capacity Factor of 27.7%. With a 76% increase in the wholesale cost.
120
The capacity factor is showing the early signs of being system constrained. You will see this being blamed on the AEMO new rules on running reserve but it is an inevitable consequence as the market share of wind is pushed higher. Figure 8 in this linked paper shows how it unfolds:
http://www.hanswernersinn.de/dcs/2017%20Buffering%20Volatility%20EER%2099%202017.pdf
I have grave doubts no politicians comprehend this chart and have a feeling that very few in the power supply industry appreciate it either.
Economists wrongly use the term “efficiency” when they should be stating “capacity factor”. Efficiency has a precise meaning when referring to electrical and mechanical energy systems.
One element of the SA situation that AEMO are very aware of is the base demand destruction that is occurring in SA due to rooftop solar. They are forecasting zero midday demand in 2024; I think as early as 2021. That is going to be very difficult to manage. It will mean great reliance on the Vic interconnection simply to have some reliable generation producing in their network. It also means that there will be limited load for grid scale wind and solar to supply during those periods; further reducing CF.
120
I was looking at NEM dispatch yesterday morning and it looked like business as usual, 1GW coming from QLD to NSW, NSW sending about half that amount to VIC, and then some out to SA as at that time there was little wind anywhere.
What really stood out was the price. QLD and NSW were roughly half the cost of SA and VIC. I guess that “downward pressure on prices” hasnt quite kicked in yet. I wonder where the magic tipping point is? that point when all the promised benefits will be delivered?
It seems incredible that reality is presented , continually in real time, on a publicly available platform (many really) yet politicians and renewable fanboys continue spouting completely fabricated BS.
120
Sunday reading
https://thepointman.wordpress.com/2018/03/09/moving-purposefully-towards-the-head-of-the-fish/
40
A long read but worth the time. This single paragraph sums up a lot about Trump and the dreadful modern “news” media:
There is a disease that has infected “news” media; priggish judgementalism states it perfectly. In Australia we see the worst of it on ABC but the commercial channels have many examples of the same disease; neither my wife or I can stand a second of The Project!
In Trump’s case the devilment is surely there to confuse those he is dealing with; nothing like a failing. Look how he now has Turnbull scurrying after his favour. The proposed North Korea talks has media gobsmacked.
110
Rick they (media) want the talks to fail .
80
Absolutely Robert.
The media and many diplomats are incredibly worried (to put it very politely) that Trump will actually achieve something. They don’t seem to realise that having a chat with someone is not going to endanger anyone.
They say Trump has given Kim what he wants –a talk with the President of the USA. So what, all other attempts at talks by lower ranked people from the early 1990s onward, achieved zero. As the old saying about stupidity ” repeating the same thing and expecting a different result”.
I think the media are over looking something Kim has to deal with —modern media technology cannot be controlled like the information flow used to be.
Have Winter Olympians going to SK would not have been thought of 15-20 years ago. You could not have NKs seeing what the world outside is like.
60
I’m amused at the gratuitous advice Trump is getting re his talk with Kim from people who may not know how to tie their shoe laces. They sound like parents who have reluctantly allowed their 16 yr old daughter to go on a date. Trump has been around the block a few times and doesn’t need it.
My take is that sanctions are biting and he can no longer feed his army and a starving army would be a dangerous beast.
80
Kim cannot afford to lose the mandate of heaven, so there is a real possibility that he will embrace socialism with Chinese characteristics. He had a four hour meeting with the South Korean emissary, discussing a very bright future.
No doubt he admires Donald’s bovver boy style, they should get on alright.
40
The US media were shocked and initially caught off guard that Trump and Kim were going to meet and some actually said some complementary stuff for the first hour to two until the orders came down from on high giving them their talking point. That talking point was that Trump is an idiot and idiot that is rushing in without proper preparation and that the fat little inbred Kim is a well prepared genius that will take advantage of Trump. They’re so predictable.
Trump at the gridiron dinner before any of this came up made a self deprecating joke.
“I won’t rule out direct talks with Kim Jong Un, I just won’t. As far as the risk of dealing with a madman is concerned, that’s his problem, not mine.”
Be sure that IF something comes from these talks and Trump is able to get something from that little pudge that no other POTUS has gotten from him or his equally sick father, it will be presented as Kim having been the one that caused it to happen. Just as the press idolized old “spot” Mikhail Gorbachev as the real savior when Reagan had put the pressure on to first bring perestroika about and then the fall of the wall in Berlin he had called for years before and been mocked by some in the press for doing so.
100
The EU is squealing about Trumps new tariff on steel but does anyone know what the EU import tariff on steel is ?
100
The EU has tariffs on US cars.
80
Free Trade Zone is Newspeak to designate a cartel or club where favour must be freely shown to club producers while debt and other enticements must be freely extended to club customers to ensure the continuing favour to club producers. Once freely locked into membership, free participants can be freely guided in decisions other than just commercial ones. They are free at any time to say no and face crushing penalties. But they are especially free to say yes. To ensure freedoms, members of free trade zones regularly send democratically elected representatives to tanning salons and long lunches with lobbyists.
I’d hate to see what an Unfree Trade Zone is like.
100
I do not know the level Robert but the EU along with the UK increased their tariffs on Chinese steel in 2017.
EU tariff on US cars is 10%. USA tariff on EU cars is 2.5%
110
And that’s the crux of what I’m getting at ,while others whinge and whine Trump is looking after the USA and has an us first mentality which is rare for a modern era politician from any country but then again he is no politician he is a businessman with an agenda who doesn’t have time for the media .
80
…”while others whinge and whine “…..
While others, Trump, Turnbull etc, were whinging and whineing…. central banks globally worked hard, and instead did something productive with the printing presses….(“LBO” = leveraged buy-out)
From: https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-03-10/21-trillion-and-rising-how-central-banks-are-lboing-world-one-stunning-chart
“$21 Trillion And Rising: How Central Banks Are LBOing The World In One Stunning Chart”
“Fast forward to today when in its latest update of central bank holdings, Citi shows that as of this moment not only has the total increased by another $3 trillion to a grand total of $21 trillion and rising, but that the big six central banks now own over 40% of global GDP, more than double the 17% they held before the financial crisis less than a decade ago.
20
Very poor terminology in all that. The assets the central banks hold are only as good as the interest they can return. Zero times any large number remains zero. Also the majority of those assets are government liabilities in their respective currencies so can all be just written off with no consequence to the real world.
Hedge funds have been betting on Japan collapsing for almost three decades now. The BoJ can keep writing debt to the Japanese government forever without any adverse consequence. All it does is transfer money into the bank accounts of the population. That has no consequence unless there is propensity to spend and drive inflation. That is not going to happen in Japan given the high average age of the population and declining population.
Decades ago old people used to count on a government pension to get through their latter years. These days an increasing number save for retirement. That reduces the government direct liability to the aged population. The nub is that that requires the money to come from somewhere; still government liabilities but reflected in current borrowings from central banks rather than an obligation to fund future pensions. In recent times we see the obligation of society to look after their aged becoming under greater control of the aged themselves. Savings empower aged people.
60
What part is “poor terminology’?
It merely shows that in general, banks own 40% of all that exists. For example, the debt to equity ratio of most large corporations exceeds their equity.
Perhaps you can show me a corporation or hedge fund that is not in debt? and close to drowning in it?
As we all now know….ok…some still don’t get it…..when a country goes bust, savings are confiscated. From their respective bank directly. That kind of ruins your ancient theory about “savers”. The world has changed, especially since the advent of quantitative easing….used to bail out banks.
It is a complicated web of debt and although i am not qualified to make assertions, i can still see, in my own way, where it goes when the power to print money out of thin air is given to a lender of last resort, being in this case, privately owned central banks.
20
Bank assets are loans. All of the loans through QE went directly into government debt. So the governments owe the central banks. The interest payment is next to nothing or actually costing the bank where interest is negative.
This chart sums up the position of debt in US non-financial corporations:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/NCBCMDPMVCE
As you can see the debt to market value has never been lower in the past 60 years.
The Fed assets stands at around $5tr. The US government debt is $20tr. The fed only holds a fraction of the debt. The US government will never have a problem paying of any debt denominated in US dollars. It just borrows them from the Fed. They can choose to erase the balance at any time. They are just magnetic traces on a disc.
The BoJ has assets of Y520tr. The national debt is Y1020tr. The debt earns nothing so there are plans to cancel it:
The only reason to keep track is to balance the accounts. If the Box holds all the debt then that is how much private savings exist give or take the net financial position.
Most countries in the EU have problems with debt because they have given away the control over their money supply. Possibly worse for Germany because the aged there are unlikely to get money back from Greece. Greece is kept in perpetual decline. That has yet to be sorted out but Brexit gives an inkling of how it may unfold. The recent elections in Italy will likely have some bearing over the future of the EU:
https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/italy-election-wake-call-eu-180308104414631.html
The value of funds in Australia super is now AUD2.5tr. The Australian sovereign debt is about AUD500bn. So only a fraction of the private savings. The problem for Australia is that the private savings are being funded by offshore debt, not always denominated in AUD. So Australia is worse off fiscally than Japan or USA despite high private savings.
40
From: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Quantitative_easing&oldid=405010428
“Credit easing
“In introducing the Federal Reserve’s response to the 2008-9 financial crisis, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke was keen to distance the new programme, which he termed “credit easing” from Japanese-style quantitative easing. In his speech, he announced:
“ Our approach—which could be described as “credit easing”—resembles quantitative easing in one respect: It involves an expansion of the central bank’s balance sheet. However, in a pure QE regime, the focus of policy is the quantity of bank reserves, which are liabilities of the central bank; the composition of loans and securities on the asset side of the central bank’s balance sheet is incidental. Indeed, although the Bank of Japan’s policy approach during the QE period was quite multifaceted, the overall stance of its policy was gauged primarily in terms of its target for bank reserves. In contrast, the Federal Reserve’s credit easing approach focuses on the mix of loans and securities that it holds and on how this composition of assets affects credit conditions for households and businesses.[39] ”
This means that the central bank is still creating money to make the purchases but are not using it to buy back government debt, instead they are using it to buy private sector assets including residential mortgage-backed securities. [40][41]
This means that the central bank is still creating money to make the purchases but are not using it to buy back government debt, instead they are using it to buy private sector assets including residential mortgage-backed securities. [40][41]“
10
Savings held in banks is not an effective strategy, but savings can be held a few other ways, such as property or other income-producing assets. Retiring with your home fully paid for is a good strategy and it can be defended if necessary if not always effectively. If you can raise much of your own food or independently fill other needs, you have a source of income that is difficult to tax.
30
“government liabilities in their respective currencies so can all be just written off with no consequence to the real world. ”
government liabilities in their respective currencies so can all be just written off with no consequence to the central banks.
10
In many ways, the idea that savers fund their own retirement is a bit of a fairytale and does not reflect the real world.
The greek savers were given a haircut…
From Wikipedia:
“A bailout differs from the term bail-in (coined in the 2010s) under which the bondholders and/or depositors of global systemically important financial institutions (G-SIFIs) are forced to participate in the process, but taxpayers supposedly are not.”
Anyway…..the point is that if someone is given the special power to print money, they will eventually own all that exists…it is really quite simple in my understanding.
10
The concept of a “bail-in” is defensible. When you deposit your hard earned in a bank, you expect to have interest paid. That expectation is an explicit acceptance that the bank will lend that money out with your authority so if it goes pear shaped then it is reasonable to suffer a hair cut.
While this is unlikely to happen with our banks, partly because Keating, in his wisdom, knocked back their request to be able to compete on the world stage and mostly because they are totally protected, one should always keep this in mind as a possibility.
20
The reason QE was introduced was because there was not enough people willing to take out loans directly from banks even with zero interest rate. The money was loaned to government and government wracked up the debt. Ultimately the money ends up in deposit accounts of the population.
All banks have the ability to print money. Every new loan adds to the money supply and the amount of money reduces as the debt is paid down. The banks work hard to increase the amount of debt; their assets. However the Japanese population have very low propensity to take on more debt but high propensity to save. The only ways new money can get into the system to fund the private savings is through government spending and offshore savings. This situation has existed for more than two decades in Japan. Japanese private savings is Y1600tr:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-17/savings-and-stocks-make-japanese-households-richer-than-ever
As you can see it is way above the government debt and the extra is holding offshore government debt, private debt and equity.
The USA experienced the same conditions of poor bank lending following the GFC with a high propensity for the population to reduce debt while increasing savings – it is termed deleveraging. The money for the savings had to come from government spending otherwise the economy spirals into sustained recession.
So the banks are limited in their ability to force people to take on debt. It has been described as pushing on a piece of string. The BoJ, Fed and ECB have all needed to do some heavy lifting at times to keep up the money supply as net savings have kicked in.
One way this could change is through solar and wind energy as they are a game changer for the banks. It has the potential for the power supply industry to dominate society. It makes sense for banks to get heavily involved with power suppliers. Solar and wind require a truly massive amount of expenditure to get any meaningful market penetration. Governments have guaranteed that investment will get a return through increasing electricity bills. The beauty for the banks is that grid electricity is hard to do without for the majority of the population. An increasing proportion of the population’s income will go to the supply industry and the banks will rake in their margins on all that investment. Australia will need to invest about half of the current super pool to get 100% solar, wind and hydro.
I made the choice at the point of retiring to generate my own electricity. It has worked out to be one of my best investments. With governments forcing wind and solar onto the grid, the only sensible alternative is to make your own electricity. Rooftop systems eliminate the transmission assets and is logically lower cost than using the same dispersed generation connected on a grid.
10
“he is a businessman with an agenda who doesn’t have time for the media .”
And just for consistency you should probably also mention that he is a self declared grabber of women’s bits that he describes by feline metaphor and is the kind of reactionary lowlife that want more guns in schools. 🙂 Luverly bloke wot??
Question? Would you let him look after your teenage daughter..unsupervised??
43
Do you think he is worse than Bill Clinton?
50
Absolutely. He seems out and proud of something he should be deeply ashamed of.
33
How about Bill Clinton? Or the Kennedies?
30
And really, when he is this bad, what the F is the relevance of whether or not he’s “worse” than anyone??
22
mmmmm deflect,duck,weave…..at this point what does it matter!? style
31
Donald is a vulgar bully boy who regards women as sex objects, but putting all that aside he is still a charismatic leader.
20
“Would you let him look after your teenage daughter.. unsupervised??”
Certainly wouldn’t let you near son, daughter or dog.
31
What you don’t get Phillthegeek is that we DON’T CARE anymore! The left continually has tried to hold Republicans to a much higher moral/ ethical standard than they do the democrats and many times it worked. Using our own social religious mores against us. But now the basic liberties of the Republic are in danger. The whole character of the country, the fundamentals that made it great, are threatened by the left and we knew it. Thus we aren’t listening to the crap anymore because Donald Trump is the only thing that stands between us and the socialist amoral unethical agenda of the left. So they and people like you can go on and on about this kind of stuff and it isn’t going to work. And anyone with a bit of understanding would have gotten that by now because Trump was elected despite of it. The bottom line is that there has been a sea change and the same old Alinsky tactics aren’t going to work anymore on us and the left is going to have to make a new playbook but I don’t think they have what it takes to do so because they are more fragmented between their hard left and more moderate elements than the right is between conservatives and their moderates.
Concerning the most recent move the tariffs, the POTUS has just made a strong stake for re-election and his agenda in PA, OH, VA, and WI. The coal and coke for steel making comes from PA, OH, WV, and VA. The taconite iron ore comes from WI, UP of MI, and MN.
This conservative wasn’t sure what he was getting but I voted for Trump in the primary because I KNEW what milk toast I would be getting with the rest of the Republican field and of course in the general KNEW what kind of corrupt socialist I would be getting with Hillary. It was a gamble but one that had to be taken and Trump has succeeded beyond all my expectations. So much so that for only the second time in my life I have contributed to Presidential campaign.
So go ahead and pull the same old stuff because it doesn’t bother this conservative one little bit and in fact just reinforces the idea that you got nothing.
90
I read recently that the EU tariff on steel was 75%!!! Hypocrites.
40
Good catch Boy, which is why Donald is unafraid of a trade war.
New markets are opening up in the under developed world and Beijing has cornered the market, so the US will need all its ingenuity to remain relevant, both commercially and strategically.
10
Does it matter what the world average temperature is? What is more relevant as far as I am concerned is what the temperature is where I am.
The old joke about one foot in the freezer and the other in the oven, result on average you are comfortable. Maybe one could substitute Antarctica and the Sahara as temperature points.
132
Unfortunately we are stuck with this nonsense of ‘world average’ temperature, but it’ll be to our advantage over the next couple of years as temperatures slide into the abyss.
122
Elgordo if temps do drop worldwide they will just find another yardstick or say see we told you Co2 causes global cooling .
70
We need to counter the argument with an explanation of what is really happening, people are sensitive to weather and will listen.
Step 1: Get the ABC to do a Four Corners on the real world situation, embarrass the organisation until they comply. It may require a successful outcome of the Ridd/JCU saga to get what we want, equal time.
In preparation we need to organise a Red Team of six individuals, all local people, who can argue the case for global cooling.
50
Step 2: Organise a group of satirists and stand up comics to swiftly follow, they are out there somewhere.
The aim is to simplify the message with humour, ongoing ridicule topples governments.
60
That’s the one that will grab the voters.
20
November 28, 2012
Fourteen Is the New Fifteen!
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2012/11/fourteen_is_the_new_fifteen.html
the average surface temperature of Earth is 14 degrees Celsius (57.2 degrees Fahrenheit), but this is a new value which has quietly replaced the original average of 15 degrees Celsius (59 degrees Fahrenheit).
91
Read more: https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2012/11/fourteen_is_the_new_fifteen.html#ixzz59Q4oMs9x
Looks like definite evidence for Global Cooling to me. Before 1997 the average world temperature was 15C. After 1998 it wa 14C.
40
The average annual temperature of New Zealand has been 12.5°C since the 19th Century (somewhere around 1875 …)
(Chris de Freitas et al 2015 applying Salinger’s Protocol rigorously).
Ah yes: Salinger: “Drought is the new normal; get used to it.” (during the 2012 North Island drought.) There hasn’t been a drought since except for Marlborough but that’s normal weather for Marlborough which is why all the grape growers set up there decades ago.
There is going to be buckets of rain tomorrow. A drought of sunshine! The third Tropical Storm (decayed Tropical Cyclone) this year and the second to affect Auckland.
So where is all this global warming everyone, including NIWA, rabbits on about? MIA?
30
We should all be dead already according to alarmists. This week I experienced a temperature change of 37 deg F in 10 hours. Other times I have experienced a change of over 70 deg. F. in a couple hours. I’m pretty sure most of us have dealt with such temperature changes over short periods during our time According to alarmists we can’t survive a temperature change of even 10 deg F.
60
“Canadian Climate Minister Urges Attention to the ‘Gendered Impacts’ of Climate Change”
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/03/10/canadian-climate-minister-urges-attention-gendered-impacts-climate-change/
Will the insanity never end?
90
Classic!
“World ends tomorrow. Women and children affected most.”
60
Climate Barbie has repeatedly shown that she is not exactly bright — right at home among the rest of the Liberals.
80
This is the first time in my 75 years that I am embarrassed by Canada. I would move but every place else seems to be as bad or worse. They just don’t have Justin and “Barbie”
60
RicDre,
You just go easy on Mick Jagger’s son.
10
what? when? why? how? who? where?? http://balance10.blogspot.com/2018/03/left-brain-right-brain.html
01
Humanity is descended from gracile apes, we are little more than moral primates.
10
Wot’s this moral bit then?
The bonobo is better at it than we are.
20
The bonobo would have been a better template, make love not war, but apparently someone at head office thought otherwise.
00
G: having fun in Animal Farm?
20
Socialism with Australian characteristics won’t be so bad.
This is getting a lot of airplay, what is your opinion?
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-13/ufos-former-insider-says-pentagon-doesnt-care/9542484
00
Peak stupid begins in 6 days for south Australians approx 12 months before the rest of the nation.
In preparation for this grand event politicians are whipping the locals into a frenzy with all sorts of promises in an attempt to be voted most liked on the day.
One of the front runners has recently stumbled by promising to deny the locals the opportunity to give their money away placing it into a metal slot, this was a big mistake by the rookie in the field.
The incumbent has has been riding high on in the popularity stakes due to the completion of a new hospital one run even more poorly than the old one, however what can only be described as a master stroke the challenger promised to convert the old hospital into an indigenous cultural centre.
Most notable promises so far are the building of a bike path from Adelaide to the vic border. Burn dead grass instead of gas to generate power.
Run the state entirely from wind/solar
Apply gender quotas to eliminate white male bigotry
I expect the promises to to get even more extreme as the week progresses
120
Isn’t SA defeating TAS now for biggest basket case economy?
80
Right at this moment they seem to be on very different trajectories
00
My goodness—-Do you have some Justin and Barbie clones
40
It must have something to do with the long term effects of drinking Adelaide water, as the opposition is not that far behind Weatherdill and the X-man in the stupidity stakes.
70
Before the 2013 federal election the Coalition had a policy relating to building new dams around Australia and in the top end extending the WA Ord River Irrigation Area across the NT and into QLD building new dams on the “wild rivers” system for irrigation and towns water supply. When the Abbott led government was in office they cooperated with the Newman LNP Queensland government and overturned “wild rivers legislation” Labor QLD had enacted that blocked dam construction and using those rivers for irrigation purposes.
Here is an interesting story about how parts of WA are being turned into productive farmland using underground fresh water supplies, another example of the potential of Australia, just provide water.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-11/meet-the-singaporean-businessman-transforming-the-pilbara/9526810
71
That’s very interesting. Thankyou for the link Dennis.
20
You’re welcome Annie, I was heartened by the information, Singapore are allies and friends, so good for that man.
21
There was a segment on this on Landline today. Repeats one o’clock tomorrow (Monday).
10
Joe Bastardi does a great job of explaining that weather is what it is. Go to https://www.weatherbell.com/
And scroll down to Saturday summary. He could have called it “Weather for Dummies”. However Joe is too polite to do that.
60
This financial and operations report from Infrigen Wind Resources should be of interest, a lot of information about wind turbine operations and returns on investment, profitability and more …
https://www.infigenenergy.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/FY18InterimResultsPresentation-web-2.pdf
11
Readers will note that Goldman Sachs are involved with Infrigen, what is not shown is the major shareholder Keshik Capital Pte registered office in Singapore and a Mr Turnbull who was earlier with Goldman Sachs who is now with Keshik.
41
Thanks, Dennis. I looked for the amount of revenue (I.e. Subsidy) due to RET certificates but couldn’t find it. But total revenue was $118 m, total generation was about 900 GWh, so it would be easy to calculate the amount of the hidden RET subsidy if we knew the “market price” of certificates in the period. I am pretty sure that their net profit would be zero or a loss without the subsidy. Who pays the subsidy? All electricity consumers (except energy intensive trade exposed industries through increased electricity bills.
10
Qld has a nice little export earner. They are exporting 1.2 GW to the four southern states, all importing. They not only make a profit on the electricity but they get royalties from the coal. Plukkachook knows it is coal that keeps the state out of bankruptcy but she must toe the labor line. Beats me.
50
Don’t get too keen, soon we’ll be importing Indonesian coal to do it, if Palachook and powerBill get their way.
30
What scientists found trapped in a diamond: a type of ice not known on Earth
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/space/go-for-launch/la-sci-sn-water-in-diamonds-20180308-story.html
40
A cubical full if ice or ice full of cubicles.
40
9 Mar: DefenseNews: US Navy canceling program to turn gas-guzzling destroyers into hybrids
By David B. Larter
The Navy is canceling a program to install fuel-efficient hybrid electric drives in 34 destroyers, leaving only one destroyer with the technology, the Navy confirmed in a statement…
“Based on the Department’s priorities, President’s Budget 2019 removes funding from Hybrid Electric Drive program in FY 2019,” said Lt. Lauren Chatmas in a statement. “There are no further procurements or installations planned beyond DDG-103 in the Future Years Defense Program.”…
As the program began to materialize and development progressed, a number of problems began to materialize, according to a former Navy official who spoke on background. Foremost among them was the intense electrical load that running the drive system on the ship’s two running generators was putting on the ship.
Destroyers have three generators, two of which run while a third remains in standby, which rotates through while generators are down for maintenance or in case of an emergency. Running the electrical motor that turned the shaft while also running the ship’s power-hungry radars and related systems maxed out the capacity of those generators.
“At that point you are a light switch flipping on away from winking out the whole ship,” the official said…
Furthermore running the generators at that load wasn’t exactly as fuel efficient as they had hoped it would be…
https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2018/03/08/the-us-navy-is-cancelling-a-program-to-turn-gas-guzzling-destroyers-into-hybrids/
80
don’t know what the point of this is, but maybe it will interest some!
8 Mar: AtmosphericChemistry&Physics: Implications of potential future grand solar minimum for ozone layer and climate
Authors: Pavle Arsenovic, Eugene Rozanov, Julien Anet, Andrea Stenke, Werner Schmutz, and Thomas Peter
Abstract. Continued anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are expected to cause further global warming throughout the 21st century. Understanding the role of natural forcings and their influence on global warming is thus of great interest. Here we investigate the impact of a recently proposed 21st century grand solar minimum on atmospheric chemistry and climate using the SOCOL3-MPIOM chemistry–climate model with an interactive ocean element.
We examine five model simulations for the period 2000–2199, following the greenhouse gas concentration scenario RCP4.5 and a range of different solar forcings. The reference simulation is forced by perpetual repetition of solar cycle 23 until the year 2199. This reference is compared with grand solar minimum simulations, assuming a strong decline in solar activity of 3.5 and 6.5 W m−2, respectively, that last either until 2199 or recover in the 22nd century. Decreased solar activity by 6.5 W m−2 is found to yield up to a doubling of the GHG-induced stratospheric and mesospheric cooling. Under the grand solar minimum scenario, tropospheric temperatures are also projected to decrease compared to the reference.
On the global scale a reduced solar forcing compensates for at most 15 % of the expected greenhouse warming at the end of the 21st and around 25 % at the end of the 22nd century…READ ON
https://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/18/3469/2018/
10
specs, stats, videos, wild claims…read it all:
8 Mar: Vox: These huge new wind turbines are a marvel. They’re also the future.
The latest model has blades longer than football fields.
By David Roberts
The declining price of solar power gets more press, but there are big things happening in wind technology too. And I mean big.
The math on wind turbines is pretty simple: Bigger is better…READ ON
https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2018/3/8/17084158/wind-turbine-power-energy-blades
the plan (link provided) proves, once more, that CAGW and the SDGs are now one and the same scam:
8 Mar updated 9 Mar: Politico: Europe’s plan to turn banks green
The Commission rolls out a road map to enlist banks and other financial institutions to tackle climate change.
By Fiona Maxwell
Is green the new black in finance — as in black ink?
That’s what the European Commission clearly hopes in unveiling its “Action plan for a greener and cleaner economy” on Thursday. But whether the initiative will actually aid the EU’s battle against climate change or whether this will turn out to be just a politically correct do-good exercise won’t be known for some time…
In the plan (***LINK), which is part of the EU’s capital markets union project, the Commission sets out a road map to enlist banks and other financial institutions to tackle climate change.
“We want to change the culture in the financial industry,” said Valdis Dombrovskis, the Commission vice president for financial services, after presenting it in Brussels. “We believe green is the new black.”…
Jyrki Katainen, the Commission vice president for jobs, growth, investment and competitiveness, said: “We have to be cautious from several points of view. Green doesn’t necessarily mean risk-free. All investments must be set according to risks, we don’t want to do anything to undermine financial stability.”
In any case, it’ll be a while before the financial sector feels any impact from the Commission’s action plan…
Meanwhile, Ingrid Holmes, director at climate change think tank E3G and member of the high-level expert group on sustainable finance — a group that published a report to advise the Commission — said the action plan will “help to reshape the financial system as a tool for good.” She added: “The European Commission has now set the benchmark for sustainable finance reforms globally.”
And Sven Giegold, a German Green MEP, was almost euphoric. “Our demand to systematically promote green financial markets is finally bearing fruit,” he said.
https://www.politico.eu/article/jyrki-katainen-valdis-dombrovskis-sustainable-finance-europe-plan-to-turn-banks-green/
***see p19: Annex IV – Visualisation of the actions
10
lol. subscripton reqd, but cached version is available in full if anyone wants to read more (not recommended):
9 Mar: Michael Holder: BusinessGreen: What is to be done? MPs debate highlights glaring need for energy efficiency action
MPs yesterday had their first chance, five months after it was published, to debate the government’s Clean Growth Strategy. It may be one of the most important documents produced by this government and it may represent a roadmap for a fundamental transformation of the British economy, but you would be forgiven for doubting its significance given the sparse attendance in the Commons room hosting the debate.
Fewer than 10 MPs took part – including minister for energy and clean growth Claire Perry. However, those who did turn up were quick to blame the disappointing turnout on the “terrible weather condition across the country” for impacting the plans of colleagues who had to travel back to their constituencies for the disappointing turnout…
https://www.businessgreen.com/bg/analysis/3028166/what-is-to-be-done-mp-debate-shows-glaring-need-for-energy-efficiency-action
10
9 Mar: The Hill: John Kelly killed Pruitt’s climate science debate
By Timothy Cama
White House chief of staff John Kelly killed Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt’s plan for a public debate on climate change science, according to a New York Times report Friday.
Pruitt for months has been talking publicly about organizing a government “red team, blue team” exercise among climate change experts and skeptics, possibly on television, and President Trump was receptive.
But at a December meeting that included representatives from the White House and the EPA, Rick Dearborn, Kelly’s deputy, relayed that the concept is “dead” and Kelly would not allow the idea to take flight, the Times reported, citing three people familiar with the meeting.
Administration officials were worried that the exercise would be too politically risky and draw negative attention to Trump’s aggressive mission to undo the Obama administration’s climate policies.
White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah told the Times that the administration “will ensure that any climate science review will be conducted through a robust, interagency process, consistent with federal law,” while the EPA did not respond to a request for comment…
E&E News reported after the December meeting that officials had put the debate idea on hold.
But when lawmakers asked Pruitt about that report later, he said it was “untrue,” and that he was still planning the exercise
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/377658-john-kelly-killed-pruitts-climate-science-debate
10 Mar: Breitbart: James Delingpole: White House Chief of Staff Kelly Just Killed Trump’s Best Hope of Draining the Green Swamp
It’s a betrayal of both the president’s instincts and his authority.
It’s a mighty victory for the sclerotic, DC Deep State establishment and for the corrupt, anti-American and eye-wateringly expensive Climate Industrial Complex…READ ON
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/03/10/delingpole-white-house-chief-of-staff-kelly-just-killed-trumps-best-hope-of-draining-the-green-swamp/
20
Another example of how Groupthink is perpetuated by killing the messenger!
The idea of a red team/blue team public debate was a good one. Blue team won’t engage however unless forced to. It is far easier just to fire insults to the deniers. Scott Pruitt wanted to force them to the table.
However the challenge is there. The glove has been thrown down. If blue team refuses to pick it up they need to be reminded constantly.
40
snow = CAGW:
8 Mar: Inlander: North Idaho schools cut through the climate debate by teaching kids to think like scientists
By Wilson Criscione
Somewhere in the process of digging down through 7 feet of snow near the top of a mountain, measuring the snowpack and jotting down numbers, Cheyenne Kiecker discovered something that, for her, felt impossible: Maybe she does like science after all.
In February, Kiecker and her classmates studied the snow at Lookout Pass in North Idaho. She learned how the snow impacts the runoff into streams and rivers and lakes, how it affects the fish and the spring foliage, how it changes the wildfire season. And she’s learned that in recent decades, the snowpack in the very spot she and her classmates dug into has trended downward…
The field trip that brought nearly 150 Timberlake High School students up to Lookout Pass is part of a yearlong project that teaches science education in eight different North Idaho schools. It’s called “The Confluence Project,” an education model developed by University of Idaho graduate students several years ago…
“The intent of this program was to show students science,” says Jim Ekins, an educator for University of Idaho Extension who helps coordinate the project. “As they become more science literate, it’s a whole lot easier to understand the data that supports anthropogenic climate change.”…
There’s been debate in the Idaho Legislature in recent years on how to teach climate change to students. Some lawmakers tried to scrub the teaching of human-caused climate change from state science standards, arguing that students should instead come to their own conclusions about global warming instead of it being dictated. Last month, however, the Legislature ended up approving science standards that included curricula on human-caused climate change. Still, according to one Yale study, fewer than half of Idaho adults think global warming is caused by human activities, despite a scientific consensus.
Some lawmakers feel both sides of what they call “the debate” around global warming should be taught. But for those involved in The Confluence Project, it’s more important to teach kids how to be scientists. That way, says Ekins students understand it in a more “profound way.”…
The Confluence Project was started in 2012 with a grant from the National Science Foundation…
“The program is investigative in nature,” Ekins says. “We teach students to ask questions, and tell them how to find good, reliable information and data.”
In other words, teaching them to be more like scientists.
https://www.inlander.com/spokane/north-idaho-schools-cut-through-the-climate-debate-by-teaching-kids-to-think-like-scientists/Content?oid=8530142
1 Mar: Inlander: Idaho sides with science
By Wilson Criscione
When it comes to whether or not Idaho teachers should teach students about human-caused climate change, Sen. Carl Crabtree, R-Grangeville, wants everyone to consider a sick cow.
You have a problem like a sick cow or, in this case, certain lawmakers wanting weaker language on climate change in SCHOOL SCIENCE STANDARDS. What do you do? Well, Crabtree says, you call a specialist, of course.
“We called some specialists: science teachers,” Crabtree said at a Senate Education Committee meeting last week. “We asked them what they thought.”…
The original print version of this article was headlined “Cows and Crime”
https://www.inlander.com/spokane/idaho-sides-with-science-plus-washington-leaves-car-thieves-unsupervised/Content?oid=8409985
22 Feb: Spokesman-Review: Idaho lawmakers approve school science standards in full – with no deletions on climate change
By Betsy Z. Russell
Idaho had been the only state in which legislators had successfully removed references to climate change from school science standards. Friday’s vote ends that distinction for the state…
Last year, the same House panel voted to remove five sections dealing with climate change; those were rewritten and resubmitted…
20
more snow, less snow = CAGW:
10 Mar: ***Liberation: Idaho’s droughts, climate change and socialism
***Newspaper of the Party for socialism and liberation
Recently, Idaho’s legislature voted to adopt science education standards that include man-made climate change. Previously, there was no requirement to teach climate change in schools…
Before these standards were adopted, Idaho was the only state that had removed all mention of man-made climate change from science education guidelines.
This vote comes at a time when only about 1 in 3 Idahoans believe that climate change will affect them personally, although the numbers are not much better around the country (LINK) (35 percent in Idaho and 38 percent nationally)…
However, climate change is already harming the people of the world, including those in Idaho. Over the past 20 years, Idaho has been covered by statewide drought several times.. The occurrences of severe droughts in parts of the state have also increased. For instance, the number of emergency drought declarations issued by Idaho counties increased over 400 percent (LINK) between 2010 and 2016, as compared with the amount issued from 1994-2000.
Other impacts of climate include the fact that all species of salmon that spawn in Idaho are either endangered or threatened. This is in part due to effects of climate change, as well as the affects of capitalist development.
Idaho also has a long history of flooding, with many areas having regular annual floods. Increases in the number and severity of both droughts and floods are expected worldwide with the progression of climate change. A 2016 EPA report confirmed that Idaho should not expect to escape the consequences of climate change: increased floods and droughts; endangerment and potential extinction of various species; and increased wildfires being just some of them…
One of the most important water resources in the state come from snowpacks in mountainous areas. Currently, the snow water equivalent of mountain snowpacks in the southern part of the state is anywhere from 39 to 80 percent of their 1981-2010 median. ***This is in contrast to the snowpacks in the northern part of the state, where they are between 110 and 125 percent of their median. The implication here is that the southern part of the state will experience droughts, while the northern portion will be subject to floods…
For an example to the world on how to go about building an ecologically sustainable society, one need look no further than socialist Cuba. Recently, Cuba was found by the World Wildlife Foundation to have the best environmental footprint index rate in the world…
What is necessary for both the people of Idaho and Earth is the prioritization of people and the environment over profits, not the opposite. We need socialism!
https://www.liberationnews.org/idahos-droughts-climate-change-socialism/
00
10 Mar: SocialistAlliance.org: Susan Price: Government’s ‘gag bill’ threatens us all
(Susan Price is a national co-convener of the Socialist Alliance)
Progressive, activist campaign groups such as GetUp!, 350.org and Friends of the Earth have been in the federal Coalition government’s sights for some time.
However, a new bill introduced into parliament threatens to also frustrate the work of human rights, environmental, women’s, international aid and social justice NGOs and charities.
The federal government’s Electoral Legislation Amendment (Electoral Funding and Disclosure Reform) Bill 2017, was introduced under the pretext of protecting Australian politics from foreign influence, following the case of former Senator Sam Dastyari.
But an examination of the bill reveals it to be a fundamental attack on the freedom to campaign and criticise government policy and to challenge the power of corporate interests…
The Climate Council’s Tim Flannery calls it “a direct attack on democracy”.
“Under this proposed legislation, we could take journalists to the reef to document bleaching, BUT we couldn’t talk about the reason behind the bleaching — climate change. That’s because climate change could be considered an ‘election issue’, and charities would be bound by this vague, cover-all rule restricting our speech.”
The bill also contains a provision that any not-for-profit campaign organisation that receives a donation equivalent to $4.80 a week would have to require the donor to provide a signed Statutory Declaration affirming that they are an Australian citizen or commonwealth voter. Failure to comply could mean 10 years imprisonment, with civil penalties of up to $210,000.
The bill has even got the Institute of Public Affairs up in arms. IPA Director, Janet Albrechtson, writing in The Australian, labelled the bill as “Liberals drifting once again to the wrong side of the freedom fault line”…
Albrechtson makes the point that “increasing state power over political communications means restricting our freedom to take part in important debates”. However, she then goes on to argue in favour of the government restricting the activity of “political outfits”, such as GetUp!, as long as they leave “policy think tanks” such as the IPA alone.
GetUp! Did not mince words in its submission to the Joint Committee of Inquiry set up to look into the legislation…READ ON
https://socialist-alliance.org/news/government%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%98gag-bill%E2%80%99-threatens-us-all
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GetUp was established in Australia via the AWU by Bill Shorten who was a senior AWU executive at the time, not long before he entered Parliament. Members monies were used.
The organisation is political activist and associated with billionaire US citizen George Soros and others pushing the man-made global warming agenda. Soros donates to Get Up Australia.
I understand that the Australian Government is concerned about foreign interference in Australia.
71
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-10-14/abetz_unmasks_get_up21/40088
21
7 Mar: FrontPageMag: Daniel Greenfield: It’s Time for Socialism: Let’s Nationalize the Washington Post
The Washington Post, a vanity paper owned by Jeff Bezos, one of the richest men in the world whose Amazon juggernaut dominates the capitalist landscape, has a deep thought.
Elizabeth Bruenig / Washington Post: It’s time to give socialism a try
You know what, I’m convinced. I’m not even going to bother reading the article. That would just be sustaining the capitalist system by putting more money in the pockets of Jeff Bezos, Marty Baron and Elizabeth Bruenig.
I’m sold. (Sorry, was that too capitalistic a phrase?) We need to implement socialism right now. Let’s nationalize the Washington Post…
https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/269529/its-time-socialism-lets-nationalize-washington-daniel-greenfield
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Bezos is worth $121 billion. No one else gets into 12 figures, yet his packers need food stamps and drivers need nappies and to pee in bottles. I will never EVER buy from Amazon.
30
Plenty of truck drivers, including this one, pee in bottles. I bring plastic 1/2 gallon milk bottles that have been washed out with me in the truck specifically for the purpose. I have baby wipes and hand sterilizer in the truck. Your there to make the miles and when your parked in the truck stop taking a 10 hour break the bathroom can be 100 or more yards away and your dressed for bed. We even have a porta potty with a dumpster beside it to get rid of our pee bottles when we return to the terminal. I never recycle them. Just use them, dump them in the porta potty and throw them away.
Besides that it’s better than urinating on the ground. It really is just the nature of the beast. As an over the road driver you have 11 hours of driving time that must be completed in a 14 hour duty period before your required to take a 10 hour break. The drivers that excel at time management, route selection, and keep the doors closed and the wheels rolling make the most miles and thus the most money and/or maximize their home time. And believe it or not there are plenty of consignor and consignee facilities that don’t offer facilities for drivers.
This truck drivers complaint is with those drivers that don’t properly dispose of their bottles. There are some nasty suckers our there for sure.
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How are electronic logs working for you? One company that I do business with just put up their rates as their drivers will not be driving so much.
00
Five years ago I put in for and got this salary driving job in response to be told that our company would be going onto E-logs within the next year. Despite being salary I stayed on paper logs until being forced onto E-logs. So maybe I’m not the best to ask about it because it doesn’t effect my pay check one little bit. For me E-logs are great most of the time. I spend less time fiddling with logging than I did with paper. And even on E-logs I have figured out how to cheat a little bit here and there in little undetectable ways to maximize my drive time and advance the load. E-log management is a part of time management and time management is crucial for making the most of your duty hours.
No matter how one cuts it E-logs increases the cost of freight because it cuts down on the potential utilization of both the driver and the equipment. In the long run E-logs will especially make freight costs climb for shippers and receivers that do not streamline their operations so that they get the trucks in and out quicker. Freight rates will go up for those that hold drivers too long. Drivers and companies will not take their loads because of lost time unless they pay substantial detention for doing so. Time that once could be made up by cheating on paper but can’t be on E-logs makes it so that everyone, from the driver, to the trucking/logistics Company, to the shippers and receivers must become more efficient to keep freight costs from getting out of hand.
One response to E-logs here has been an increase in line haul relays. Runs that were once done by a single driver and truck with a sleeper are now being done by two or more drivers and two or more trucks, usually day cabs. That is just fine for drivers that value home time more than pay and these days there are more of those types than there used be.
20
You need a “motorman’s pal”.
San Francisco streetcar conductor’s key to avoiding embarrasment.
00
Believe it not I was given a device last Christmas specifically designed for use on the road. A plastic reservoir with a flexible hose that has a nice little cup on the users end. I tried it and went back to my old tried and true milk and juice bottles. They’re just easier to use and less labor intensive because they’re disposable and don’t require being washed out. I kept the device though because it has another cup for it designed specifically for a woman and I thought it might come in handy some time if my wife goes with me on a run, which she has never done.
20
Fortunately most small planes have a fuel endurance time that is about the same as most peoples bladder endurance.
You can buy these for a small plane. It would feel pretty weird having to use them!
http://www.sportys.com/pilotshop/catalogsearch/result/?q=Urinal
I think a half gallon jug would be better….at least for a bloke!
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Just finished reading https://www.amazon.com/Viper-Pilot-Memoir-Air-Combat/dp/006213034X
Great read. One of those that’s hard to put down once it gets rolling. If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to be a fighter pilot these days and what they deal with when going to war, this is a book for you. Love the attitude of the author. My kind of guy. And I have an understanding of what it feels like, how it forms a person, to live the life of being a part of an elite unit where you know your brothers have your back and where you have your own language that is unintelligible to those that aren’t part of it. So it all rings true to me.
In it you will find that fighter pilots use “piddle packs”. With air to air refueling their flying day in combat can last 10 hours or more.
As for small planes and bladder capacity you know that many an older male (somewhere over 60% from what I read) experiences increased frequency and urgency due to prostate problems, including me. Lots of private pilots are 50-60 year old guys.
20
BTW the ‘Go Pilot’ is exactly the one I was given and included the “female adaptor” shown on the second row.
00
The following link website carries the notation that the article can be reproduced as long as the link to the website is provided …
http://australian-news.net/article/getup-exposed-george-soros-tentacles-reach-into-australia
41
The above link is to Australian News Commentary website, not The Australian newspaper.
01
RenewEconomy (ho bl00dy hum!) made big news out of the failure of two coal fired Units in Victoria on Thursday Morning. (at 4.30AM)
The failure was not Loy Yang B1 and Loy Yang A2, but the Transmission equipment at LYB1 which caused a spike which dropped LYA2 off line as well, a loss of 1060MW instantaneously.
RenewEconomy made a number of inflammatory self serving points about the failure, telling of the ‘unreliability’ of old coal, considering LYB1 is 25 years old and LYA2 is 33 years old, considerably older than ANY renewable of choice, wind and solar will ever reach.
I (mercilessly) shred each of their statements in this week’s Base Load Series Post, now at week 36, explaining how, not only was this handled effectively and with great skill, but how it was so well handled in such a short time, so much so, that I’ll wager 99.9% of the Victorian population had not even the tiniest inkling that anything was wrong in the first place.
Link to this week’s Post – Australian Base Load Electrical Power – Week Ending 10th March 2018
Tony.
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many thanks for the great response to the RenewEconomy/Parkinson story.
you should be writing a weekly column in a major MSM outlet, but why isn’t anything on offer for you or for Jo?
disgraceful what the CAGW mob get away with saying.
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Global Warming causes Queensland drought and flooding …
12 March 2017: Nearly 90 per cent of Queensland in drought after latest declarations
“The bad news keeps coming, with a report from the Climate Council in February saying the time Australia spends in drought was expected to increase, thanks to climate change.”
https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/nearly-90-per-cent-of-queensland-in-drought-after-latest-declarations-20170312-guwai4.html
February 9, 2018: Professor says global warming could change Townsville from driest city in Queensland to wettest
https://www.townsvillebulletin.com.au/news/professor-says-global-warming-could-change-townsville-from-driest-city-in-queensland-to-wettest/news-story/69d8b95cc43c59dc0e45622aa1d6d0f2
March 9, 2018: Floods could cut off Ingham for three or four days
https://www.townsvillebulletin.com.au/news/townsville/floods-could-cut-off-ingham-for-three-or-four-days/news-story/586d64a5e21a716cbd18f28f82ef9495
> > Eight teachers and 72 Year 6 students from The Willows State School are trapped at the Echo Creek adventure park after roads between Cairns and Townsville were swamped by 200-250mm of rain over the past 24 hours.
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/weather/north-queensland-floods-students-trapped-on-camp/news-story/187bc44e30c8bf7bd6812a70ff45034d
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10 Mar: Lifezette: Another Husband-Wife Team Linked to Fusion GPS Found in Russia Collusion Probe
Former Wall Street Journal staffers, one a veteran Obama and Biden aide, suddenly uncovered by House panel investigators
by Mark Tapscott
Investigators on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence appear to have uncovered a second husband-wife team who provided a conduit for opposition research by Fusion GPS into the highest levels of former President Barack Obama’s White House.
Shailagh Murray (shown above), a former Obama policy adviser who previously served as deputy chief of staff and communications director for then-Vice President Joe Biden, is married to Neil King Jr. — who works for the shadowy Washington, D.C.-based opposition research firm that hired former British spy Christopher Steele, according to Fox News…
Murray and King both worked for The Wall Street Journal, while Murray also was at The Washington Post during her career. Fusion GPS was founded by Glenn Simpson, another former Wall Street Journal reporter…
Steele’s compensation for providing the Trump dossier to Fusion GPS was paid by 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee, which she controlled as the party’s standard-bearer against Republican Trump.
House intelligence panel chairman Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) is asking Murray a series of questions regarding her knowledge of the Steele dossier, its funding, and how it came to be used by federal officials spying on the Trump campaign.
She and a second former Biden aide, Colin Kahl, have been sent questionnaires, according to Fox News. Should either of them decline to respond to those queries, the intelligence committee will seek to compel their answers…
Committee investigators see parallels between the Murray-King duo and that of Fusion GPS employee Nellie Ohr, whose husband Bruce was deputy associate attorney general during the 2016 campaign. Bruce Ohr was demoted after it came out that he failed to disclose on federal conflict of interest reports the required details of his wife’s employment.
The Last Refuge blog, written by a team of former Department of Justice (DOJ) attorneys, contends Fusion GPS was one of a number of National Security Agency contractors that lost access to the government’s intelligence databases in the wake of the Edward Snowden scandal.
The Ohrs provided “a workaround” to regain that access through the DOJ, according to the blog.
https://www.lifezette.com/polizette/another-husband-wife-team-linked-to-fusion-gps-found-in-russia-collusion-probe/
the Obama admin was basically the MSM Admin. no wonder the FakeNewsMSM acts like it was they who lost the 2016 presidential election:
Mar 2015: Politico: Obama picks Shailagh Murray to replace Pfeiffer
Shailagh Murray is currently Vice President Joe Biden’s deputy chief of staff and communications director; Jason Goldman will take over and expand the White House’s digital outreach.
By EDWARD-ISAAC DOVERE
President Barack Obama will name Shailagh Murray, a former Washington Post and Wall Street Journal reporter, to serve as his new senior adviser, and has tapped Jason Goldman, a Silicon Valley veteran, to become the White House’s first-ever chief digital officer.
Murray replaces Dan Pfeiffer as a member of the president’s core team of advisers…
Goldman’s résumé includes Google, Medium, and Twitter, where he worked directly with co-founders Ev Williams and Biz Stone, serving as the first “head of product,” supervising managers, designers, an experts in user research and corporate marketing to develop effective outreach strategies…
https://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/barack-obama-names-two-new-top-aides-116349
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8 Mar: Tablet Mag: Lee Smith: Who Believes in Russiagate?
Knowledgeable reporters on the left and right are frightened by the spread of an elite conspiracy theory among American media
At the same time, there is a growing consensus among reporters and thinkers on the left and right — especially those who know anything about Russia, the surveillance apparatus, and intelligence bureaucracy — that the Russiagate-collusion theory that was supposed to end Trump’s presidency within six months has sprung more than a few holes. Worse, it has proved to be a cover for U.S. intelligence and law-enforcement bureaucracies to break the law, with what’s left of the press gleefully going along for the ride. Where Watergate was a story about a crime that came to define an entire generation’s oppositional attitude toward politicians and the country’s elite, Russiagate, they argue, has proved itself to be the reverse: It is a device that the American elite is using to define itself against its enemies — the rest of the country.
Yet for its advocates, the questionable veracity of the Russiagate story seems much less important than what has become its real purpose —elite virtue-signaling. Buy into a storyline that turns FBI and CIA bureaucrats and their hand-puppets in the press into heroes while legitimizing the use of a vast surveillance apparatus for partisan purposes, and you’re in. Dissent, and you’re out, or worse — you’re defending Trump…
One person at The New Yorker who won’t get on board with the story is Masha Gessen. Born in Moscow, Gessen knows first-hand how bad Putin is and dislikes Trump only a little less than she dislikes the Russian strongman. Yet in a recent New Yorker piece, Gessen mocked Mueller’s indictments: “Trump’s tweet about Moscow laughing its ass off was unusually (perhaps accidentally) accurate,” she wrote. “Loyal Putinites and dissident intellectuals alike are remarkably united in finding the American obsession with Russian meddling to be ridiculous.”…
The specter of an intelligence bureaucracy working in tandem with the press to preserve the prerogatives of a ruling clique is the kind of thing that someone who knows Russia from the inside and actually fears the specter of authoritarian government would naturally find worrying. And not surprisingly, concerns over the role of the intelligence community and its increasingly intrusive methods motivate other Russiagate critics on the left, like Glenn Greenwald at the Intercept, historian Jackson Lears writing at the London Review of Books, and Stephen Cohen at The Nation.
“One of the most bizarre aspects of Russiagate,” writes Lears, “is the magical transformation of intelligence agency heads into paragons of truth-telling—a trick performed not by reactionary apologists for domestic spying, as one would expect, but by people who consider themselves liberals.”
Cohen, a distinguished if often overly sympathetic historian of the Soviet Union, was even more alarmed. “Was Russiagate produced by the primary leaders of the US intelligence community?” asks Cohen, referring to former CIA director John Brennan as well as ex-FBI chief James Comey. “If so, it is the most perilous political scandal in modern American history and the most detrimental to American democracy.”…
What unites Gessen, Greenwald, Lears, and McCarthy obviously isn’t politics — rather, it’s the recognition that the Russiagate campaign represents an attack on American political and social institutions, an attack on our liberties, an attack on us.
Russiagate is a conspiracy theory, weaponized by political operatives, much of the press, as well as high-level intelligence and law enforcement bureaucrats to delegitimize an American election and protect their own interests, which coincide with those of the country’s larger professional and bureaucratic elite…ETC
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/256899/left-right-russiagate
10
The greens want us to eat more greens and give up on livestock farming (Dairy in particular) to improve the planet. Just how much more land is going to be needed to give the world the greens needed? I recall seeing a bumper sticker that made me smile, “Greens belong in a salad not in parliament”
https://www.dairyreporter.com/Article/2018/03/08/Greenpeace-calls-for-decrease-in-dairy-production-and-consumption-for-a-healthier-planet?utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=08-Mar-2018&c=LAEswaWogz6fNUJvjcLUM4W0r5HJKNtw&p2=
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I don’t know about Australia but I suspect that it’s the same as in the US. Our greens are almost all watermelons. They are green on the outside but behind that green façade they’re red to the core.
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And they are under your bed right now!!! 🙂
27
Nope don’t keep watermelons under my bed. R. Lee Ermey and I have a lot in common and watermelons are deathly afraid of people like us. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VRrc2n0NXg
30
DENIAL suits you, phlop.
Its all you have, isn’t it.
30
‘And they are under your bed right now!!!’
You don’t know the half of it, the pseudo Marxists have taken over the ABC newsroom.
00
comment in moderation re: 8 Mar: Tablet Mag: Lee Smith: Who Believes in Russiagate?
how undemocratic is this woman…and her “followers”?
10 Mar: India Today: Hillary Clinton: America didn’t deserve Donald Trump as president, he won a TV reality show
Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton today tore into US President Donald Trumps election campaign strategy saying that he won the first TV reality election in the US. She said that on the basis of what he said in the election campaign in 2016, America did not deserve to have Donald Trump as the US president.
She said that while she ran an election campaign that was done on conventional lines talking serious issues but the other side behaved as if they were participating in a TV reality show. Clinton said that while she ran the presidential campaign like a mother who was telling the kids to eat spinach because it was good for health while the other guy was saying go eat fast food and have ice-cream.
Speaking at the final session of India Today Conclave 2018 in Mumbai, Hillary Clinton repeatedly said that there was Russian interference in the US presidential election of 2016. Terming the alleged Russian interference in the US presidential election as more than alarming, Hillary Clinton said Russian agents used platforms like Facebook to attack my campaign and spread misinformation.
She said Russian interference was not only intended to damage me and the electors but the Russian agents were trying to flare up tension in American society. They even held demonstrations, she claimed, to influence public opinion during the US presidential election.
The Russians, she claimed, are still playing with the American society and trying to turn Americans against each other. She further said that the Russian interfered with the Egyptian election. The Mexican election could be their next target, Clinton said…
She said that some may try to use social media to turn Indians against one another.
https://www.indiatoday.in/india-today-conclave-2018/story/hillary-clinton-at-india-today-conclave-america-did-not-deserve-donald-trump-as-president-he-won-a-tv-reality-show-1186450-2018-03-10
10 Mar: India Today: Hillary Clinton praises Modi for Paris deal, calls Donald Trump’s decision shameful
Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton today said that President Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of climate change deal signed by world leaders in Paris summit in 2015 was shameful. In a discussion at India Today Conclave 2018 in Mumbai, she praised the role played by India in taking the leadership role at Paris climate summit…
Clinton said that the Indian government took every other country on board to create awareness about the perils of climate change…
She said the world is counting on India’s leadership on climate change.
https://www.indiatoday.in/india-today-conclave-south-2018/story/hillary-clinton-praises-modi-for-paris-deal-calls-donald-trump-s-decision-shameful-1186461-2018-03-10
remember, she’s coming here in May – no doubt with more of the same lies about why she lost, despite paying for the fake anti-Trump dossier, and conspiring with the swamp from Obama admin/DOJ/DNI/CIA/FBI/MSM etc to try to stop Trump from winning.
going away quietly is not an option for her, because that would further diminish the donations to the various Clinton “causes”.
30
Evidence too FBI from Australia;
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2018/01/formal-complaints-to-the-fbi-regarding-suspect-australian-taxpayer-donations-to-the-clinton-foundati.html
51
Deep
Swamp,
Deep
State,
Coup
D’Etat
by Coterie
Clinton/Soros
Collusions-
Incorporated.
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2018/01/formal-complaints-to-the-fbi-regarding-suspect-australian-taxpayer-donations-to-the-clinton-foundati.html
Maybe a thread ?
40
I hope no one is waiting for an Aussie politician to go to jail over this , both parties will just close ranks and legislate some last minute deal for indemnity and push it through disguised as something else .
The Alexander Downer claims are pause for thought no doubt little Johnny was aware of these donations .
40
I just sent Michael Smith a donation to keep up his work on exposing the illegal donations of tax payer money to the Clinton Foundation.
50
Look for Charles Oriel’s work on the Clinton Foundation. He is a forensic accountant who has been on this case for years.
If anyone needs confirmation that the US is corrupt to the core a few hours reading his work would do it. The CF has never been in compliance and big donors who claimed tax exemption for donations could be in for a big shock The Oz government is not a US tax payer of course which makes me ask :What was in it for us [the taxpayer] or the individuals who organised the payments. Rudd and Gillard are still strutting the world stage but Downer’s job is not courtesy of the Clintons.
50
I had a win in the Climate Wars yesterday.
I watched the ABC 4 corners program last week on Climate change. My better half said at the conclusion of the program that she was partly persuaded by the evidence presented. That put me into a state of depression.
However she did agree, at my request, to sit down for 75 minutes and watch the whole Martin Durkin documentary, “The Great Global Warming Swindle”. That was a big concession on her part.
I had the CD video but you can watch it for Free on You Tube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52Mx0_8YEtg
At the end she said she can now understand why I have been so disturbed by the whole Climate Change Non Debate for so long.
100
Yarpos, if you see this…
That group have organised a meeting about the solar microgrid for the area on Tuesday evening and we intend to be there, despite the very short notice (like Friday afternoon at the beginning of the holiday weekend). The people pushing this are the regress group and the local shire ‘climate council’. I don’t know how you feel about it but we are not at all favourably impressed…I feel we are being bullied.
51
Annie these schemes come with financial risks and are nothing but a rip off with the installers getting top dollar plus some .
Had a similar scheme here they needed about 20 houses I think but only got two so it folded .
40
That’s encouraging. Let’s hope there is a similar reaction here.
30
there have been a number of articles of late by journos on the left expressing bewilderment at the Democrats/progressive left’s unquestioning embrace/defense of the Intel community re Trump/Russia. (haven’t got time to provide links just now).
however, this series of articles is interesting:
7 Mar: WorldSocialistWebSite: The CIA Democrats
Introduction
By Patrick Martin
Parts 1, 2, 3 (LINKS)
This is the first part of a three-part article.
An extraordinary number of former intelligence and military operatives from the CIA, Pentagon, National Security Council and State Department are seeking nomination as Democratic candidates for Congress in the 2018 midterm elections. The potential influx of military-intelligence personnel into the legislature has no precedent in US political history.
http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/03/07/dems-m07.html
8 Mar: WorldSocialistWebSite: The CIA Democrats: Part two
Agents and war commanders
By Patrick Martin
There are 57 candidates for the Democratic nomination in 44 congressional districts who boast as their major credential their years of service in intelligence, in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, at the State Department, or some combination of all three. They make up the largest single occupational group running in the Democratic primaries that began March 6 in Texas and extend through mid-September, selecting the candidates who will appear on the general election ballot on November 6…
9 Mar: WorldSocialistWebSite: The CIA Democrats: Part three
By Patrick Martin
From the State Department to Capitol Hill
The final category of military-intelligence candidates consists of veterans of the US State Department during the Obama years, most of them former aides to Hillary Clinton. These are among the best financed and most publicized of the likely Democratic nominees…
20
Where are the green mourners?
166 West Indian Manatee have died this year, the vast majority due to unusually cold weather in Florida.
That’s a big number after a number of years of population increases.
We spend a lot on tracking, tagging, and otherwise trying to care for the West Indian Manatee — a marine mammal
so ugly it’s cute. They seek warmth in winter, in natural fresh water springs, and in the outflow of power plants.
The largest concentration is often in the outflow of the coal fired Big Bend plant about 10 miles south of Tampa.
Demands that it be closed routinely also contain demands that the company maintain a heated water outflow to help save the Manatee!?
Not to go gaga over species preservation, but we’ve been doing a good job with these guys and they could use a little
real warming, as opposed to the fake record heat that seems to have led to a die-off from cold.
Most years, the biggest preservation activity is keeping drunk and idiot boaters from running at high speed through shallow water;
I can get behind that as a kayaker who likes to preserve everything littoral, including myself, without praying to any green or climate change gods.
Not this year.
(signed)
Floridians for global warming.
60
The US inflation adjusted tornado count is running right at the 25 percentile line right now. http://www.spc.noaa.gov/wcm/adj.html
Don’t expect we’ll be fortunate enough for the low count to hold much longer.
The waters in the Gulf are very warm and the sun riding higher.
30
“Removal of this upward trend is desirable because the increase in tornado reports over the last 54 years is almost entirely due to secular trends such as population increase, increased tornado awareness, and more robust and advanced reporting networks.” It’s nice to see someone at NOAA is making sense, rather than pushing the man made Climate Change barrow.
51
It was also interesting in a previous debate on this blog that hurricanes are simply tropical storms which make technical landfall. Perhaps it is possible for the State of Florida to argue that they did not suffer up to 15 hurricanes a year which would stop the steady inflow of capital and retirees. A simple bit of semantics and the state seems much safer. Has any subject been more politicized in the late 20th century than the weather?
51
“Energy consumers will be forced to pay more than $1 billion for rooftop solar installation subsidies this year, increasing power costs by up to $100 per household, according to an industry analysis.
Operators warn of a spike in the number of unscrupulous operators unless the green-power subsidy is wound back.
The Clean Energy Regulator has released figures showing that more than 1057 megawatts of capacity was installed last year, equating to 3.5 million solar panels being fixed to rooftops.”
Subsidies? No. No government money is used. This is middle class theft from other electricity users buried in their bills by order of the RET act brought in by a Liberal government. Utterly unscrupulous government ordered theft while the poor have to pay, with no exemptions.
The impact on CO2 levels in tiny Australia. Zero. 98% of our CO2 comes from overseas untaxed, but we are being made to suffer and pay the world’s highest carbon dioxide tax, up to 15 years in advance.
91
One thing I wonder about is the break up of costs that show environmental at 7% and poles and wires at twenty odd percent but the RET is 23% ,more expensive electricity for the poor no matter which way you cut it
50
I have always wondered about what is involved in enabling rooftop solar to be able to be fed back into the grid, the cost of whatever has to be installed to enable this to happen, and who pays for it.
Hopefully Tony from OZ is watching and can enlighten me.
40
wal1957:
Firstly rooftop solar isn’t fed into the whole grid, only the local suburb. How the grid authorities stop it going further I don’t know but they have certainly installed something that stops it. The main benefit of rooftop solar is that it reduces demand in the middle of the day, but unfortunately not during the early morning or evening peaks.
As for who pays – look in a mirror.
41
Thanks Graeme. I knew that we would be paying for it somehow.
Another ‘subsidy’ that us mugs pay for.
30
Graeme No.3 mentions this:
What I have noticed this year is that in Summer, the Peak Power time has moved. In earlier years that Peak was around 2 to 3PM, and now it has moved to 4.30PM, showing a steady rise during the day. This is noticed at the AEMO site, but if you do go there to check it out, select the larger States, NSW especially, and to a lesser degree Queensland and Victoria. Don’t try to judge anything from the SouthAus Load Curve, as that is all over the place, and even so, barely accounts for 6% of Australian power consumption, and similar for Tasmania at only 4 to 5% of the Oz total.
Previously, it would rise from the 4AM minimum and continue rising to around 11AM, when the rate of rise would decrease a little to that 2/3PM peak and then gradually ease off a little and after around 6PM, when it would begin to fall away at a greater rate. So, it was a gentle more rounded look to the middle of the daily Load Curve for consumption.
Now, it rises as it always did from 4AM, only that peak, now a little more pronounced as a Peak, is at 4.30PM.
Power consumption at that 4.30PM time is the same now as it always was.
The difference is that around 2200MW to 2500MW is taken off that earlier time Peak, and that is due solely to rooftop solar power. ALL of that power is used in the Residential sector, as Graeme also mentions. It is only consumed by the home with the panels, and if anything at all is excess, fed back to the grid, is still only consumed by residences also in that same local area, keeping in mind that the home with the panels is consuming anything from 100% to 75% of the power being generated by the panels themselves, depending on the size of the rooftop installation per home. (small installation uses 100%, larger installation, then some fed back)
The fact that the Peak has moved from around 2/3PM back to 4.30PM is due solely to the Insolation of the PV panels themselves, and that looks like a bell curve, so rising from zero at Sunrise to maximum around 1PM and then falling back to zero at Sunset.
Keep in mind that (AUSTRALIA WIDE) there are reports that rooftop solar is now at 6000MW, and even in Mid Summer, it can only generate that 2200 to 2500MW in total, and even that is at the top of the bell curve shape of the generation curve.
In the cooler and then the Winter Months that power generation total would be so small as to be almost impossible to detect in the overall generation data, and again, because of the nature of power consumption rooftop solar, (also as Graeme mentioned) has zero impact on the morning and the evening Peaks.
Tony.
30
I have observed that uptake of solar is higher in new housing developments on the city fringes. The home owners would be best described as young working class rather than middle class. You can use Google Maps to investigate this. In some places up to half the houses have panels.
It may be that the solar installers are simply more active in the developing areas. It does create a problem for the distributors because they are needing to base their design on the peak generating capacity rather than the peak load.
There are places in WA that can no longer allow grid connected solar because they are destabilising the local grid.
The inevitable result of the RETis to destroy the NEM. The SA grid is already dead economically but is still getting life support. The grid connected wind and solar are having to limit output for stability reasons, thereby reducing their income. Rooftop solar inverters are cutting out on over-voltage so have reduced income. That will encourage owners to invest in batteries to get value from the cost already sunk into panels.
SA is providing a great example of how it all unfolds. Grid scale generators will have falling returns and the cost signals to consumers will increasingly encourage them to make their own electricity and eventually go off grid.
There is little indication yet of the poor voltage regulation damaging appliances but I expect that is not far off.
40
Some things get packaged up in the house price
10
We have an elevated ring road that skirts a new development and it appears that the developers installed the cells as part of the estate – every house has one and they are all identical. Working on the assumption that such estates are most likely to have both parents working and school aged kids, they must have an excess capacity problem.
10
Pretty sure that you need X green points when building nowadays and it wouldn’t surprise me to find some councils have it as compulsory for solar on roofs .
10
“How bad will climate change be? Not very -‘consequences for human well-being will be small’ ”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/03/11/how-bad-will-climate-change-be-not-very-consequences-for-human-well-being-will-be-small/
20
And the link here
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/03/11/how-bad-will-climate-change-be-not-very-consequences-for-human-well-being-will-be-small/#comment-2762882
“The Conquest of Climate”
http://progressandperil.com/2018/02/23/the-conquest-of-climate/
20
http://dailycaller.com/2018/03/10/california-green-energy/
Have a look at the comments. I posted a link to images of abandoned wind farms. I received a reply that they are old 100kw turbines from the 80’s. The replier then asked what is there from the 80’s that is still operational.
I replied that I regularly fly in a 72 piper Cherokee. I have a 1983 Subaru Ute in my garage that I regularly drive. I then pointed out that the average age of coal powered plants in the US is 39 years. Average age of nuclear plants worldwide is 29 years. Then I suggested that he go down and visit his local short line railroad. He will find a bunch of locomotives from the 60’s hauling the freight cars!
50
Some of those commentating are scary with their lack of understanding “Just switch off the nukes and boilers”. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing but wilful ignorance is something else.
30
Politicians should not be allowed to unilaterally make engineering decisions. The disastrous results speak for themselves. E.g.
– Desal plants
– Submarines
– Snowy Hydro 2
– NBN
– All “renewable” energy projects
– Household insulation “pink bats”
– Shutting down Hazelwood power station
61
Add to that in Victoriastan:
North South pipeline $800 million and filled with water once just test for leaks and never used again.
East West freeway, contract cancelled which cost $1200 million to pay out the contract.
61
Also in NSW spending $2 billion on trains that are too wide to fit through the tunnels.
61
DM
What do you mean “That’s a problem”?
Look at it as more job opportunities when they make the tunnels bigger.
What’s that you mention about extra costs?
(/s in case)
30
– Snowy Hydro 2
Technically it is viable and should help solve the problems we should not have. Can we afford it? I can’t answer, it is beyond my pay grade but if we continue installing wind and solar that will be moot – it will be necessary regardless of cost.
10
I just love the way that Snowy 2.0 is advertised as supplying 16 thousand million billion homes.
So when the water is flowing downhill and through the turbines it will supply.
Then, to get the water back to the top of the hill, they have to take that power away from those homes which would have been supplied by that power now being used to reverse the process.
You should occasionally check just how often Tumut Three is used, and it’s not very often and not at full capacity, mainly just 240MW at some Peak periods.
Tony.
40
Tony, I’m merely an observer with some technical knowledge and some common sense. I was using a paper linked to from here y’day where the European situation was discussed and it was clear that without pumped storage, particularly in Norway it would already be chaotic there. To expand renewables even more pumped storage would be necessary. Australia being dry and flat we don’t have many options if we insist in travelling that route.
The Kooloomba Dam/Kareeya Hydro is a great project but can only provide 95 MW when they have water. Heavy rain last week filled it to 92% with more coming but it ain’t much in the grand scheme of things.
00
Hi H..
Yes i recall that paper also analysing the European RE power future with specific modeling on Germany.
The one fact i remember was they concluded that for Germany to have a reliable RE only power system it would require three times the amount of RE currently installed..
..AND 6500 times the amount (TWh) of Pumped Hydro storage that they currently have.
(I have also read another report that stated Germany had exploited most of the economically viable pumped storage locations already ! )
Their only option iwas concluded as “parallelgeneration”…..IE, to maintain sufficient thermal generation capacity to support the RE.
00
This is the paper that was linked by RickWill..yesterday..
Very informative and useful
http://www.hanswernersinn.de/dcs/2017%20Buffering%20Volatility%20EER%2099%202017.pdf
00
Hanrahan:
Yes, more renewables means more storage, and pumped hydro is about 1/50 the cost of batteries. But trying to store winter power for use in summer is ridiculously expensive.
Excess electricity from Germany (i.e. when the winds blew) used to be dispatched from Germany to its neighbours, leaving it up to them to handle. Poland and the Czech Republic have installed phase transfer transformers at their borders to stop this disruption of their grids. France and the Netherlands are reported as following suit.
That means that most of the adjustment is thrown onto Norway and Sweden where they have big hydro schemes. They don’t use pumped storage as their schemes are ‘run of river’ type and they just shut down their hydro generators. (think Niagara where they shut down the Falls at night and divert the flow to the generators). There is one pumped storage unit in Sweden but I was told it no longer is in use. The Nordic countries like this as they buy cheaply (‘negative price’ sometimes i.e. they are paid to take the electricity) and sell at a higher price.
Germany has several pumped storage sites but these have shut down as the subsidised solar schemes forced daytime (higher) prices down ruining the economics.
I blieve that the Swiss have been taking advantage of the subsidised glut from Germany (through France) to use pumped storage, then selling onto the Italian and Balkan countries thus maintaining the price differential that pays for pumped storage.
00
Hanrahan:
I meant to post this yesterday, it may be of interest.
http://euanmearns.com/pumped-hydro-energy-storage-in-australia-snowy-2-0-vs-sea-water/
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10 March 2018 – ABC The Science Show with Robyn Williams:
Climate changing ten times faster than historic natural variation
As a key part of the Fourth National Climate Assessment, the U.S. Global Change Research Program oversaw the production of a stand-alone report on the state of science relating to climate change and its physical impacts. The Climate Science Special Report is designed to be an authoritative assessment of the science of climate change, with a focus on the United States, to serve as the foundation for efforts to assess climate-related risks and inform decision-making about responses. Four lead authors spoke at this year’s Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Austin Texas in February. They highlighted the rate of climate change, being ten times faster than natural variations in climate that have occurred throughout Earth’s history. As ice melts at the poles, sea levels are now rising faster, leading to coastal flooding in many major US cities. Little is known about the stability of the Antarctic ice sheet. It has the potential for a major impact on sea level. The report says there is only one solution, being a rapid decrease in carbon dioxide emissions now, and in future, actively removing it from the atmosphere.
Guests:
Katharine Hayhoe, Director Climate Science Center, Texas Tech University
Robert Kopp, Director Institute of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, Rutgers University
Ben Sanderson, Project Scientist National Center for Atmospheric Research Boulder CO
Donald Wuebbles, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences University of Illinois Urbana
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/scienceshow/
above is The Science Show homepage which has all the segments for 10 March, including:
AUDIO: 6min03secs: Award for fighting civilisation’s greatest challenge
In the US, Michael Mann is at the front line with the climate message. For his trouble he has been attacked and threatened. He has also been acknowledged with the Award for Public Engagement with Science from the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Michael Mann says climate change is not just the concern of scientists. So great is the threat that business and the financial world are now getting serious. Despite a US president who denies climate science, transition is underway to a decarbonised world. And there is no time to lose.
Guest: Michael Mann, Professor of Atmospheric Science, Director Penn State Earth System Science Center
—
Mann is interviewed by a Pauline Newman, with no other identification. over more than a decade, a Pauline Newman has been on The Science Show, sometimes described as:
Pauline Newman, Professor of Practice
Hugh Downs School of Human Communication
Arizona State University
Tempe Arizona USA
from the interview with Mann:
PAULINE NEWMAN: what does it mean to get this award from your fellow scientists and the media?
MICHAEL MANN: award means a lot because “in my career, i’ve been battling the forces of anti-science and climate change denial”… “nice to know that the scientific community has my back” … “that there’s support for those of us who are willing to take on the forces of denialistm because we need to push back against anti-science wherever we find it”
PAULINE NEWMAN: do you think anti-science is more of a problem than it used to be?
MICHAEL MANN: “well, no doubt, i mean, because it is now legitimised by our chief executive, our president, who believes in various anti-science conspiracy theories, including the rejection of the science of climate change” etc. clean energy is the economic revolution of our time etc.
—
Trump working in a science vacuum – John Holdren
John Holdren served as science advisor to President Obama for 8 years. Science advisor is one of many key positions relating to science which have not been filled in the present Trump administration. John Holdren says the administration is working in a science vacuum with no scientific input into decision making. He says many agencies such as NOAA, The Environmental Protection Agency and Clean Energy Research have suffered draconian cuts in their funding.
Guest:
John Holdren, Science Advisor for President Trump (SIC) for 8 years
Professor of Environmental Science and Policy
Kennedy School of Government and Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard University
Cambridge MA USA
Trump excludes science from the political process
New analysis shows that the Trump administration’s sidelining of scientific advice is more widespread than previously recognized. The administration’s one-year record reveals stalled and disbanded scientific advisory committees, cancelled meetings, and dismissed experts. For example, in 2017, the Department of Commerce quietly disbanded a committee designed to advise the federal government on how to make research from the National Climate Assessment more useful for businesses, state and local governments, and the public, reducing the need for federal assistance for people directly affected by climate change. Through its advocacy and training programs, The Union of Concerned Scientists hopes to turn this around.
Guests:
Katherine Catalano, Outreach Coordinator Clean Vehicles Program, Union of Concerned Scientists
Matt Hides, Senior Strategist Communications Union of Concerned Scientists
The Science Show – 3 March 2018:
Why South Australia has become a leader in renewable energy
Coal. There was very little in South Australia.
(PIC: TESLA BATTERY)
In 2015 it was announced that the small town of Leigh Creek in South Australia would see its major employer, a coal mine close, with the loss of 250 jobs. Jane Lomax-Smith, who served in the South Australian parliament between 2002 and 2010 was appointed to oversee future business ventures in the town. She describes the energy history of South Australia, and why the state has taken the lead amongst Australian states in forging ahead with its development of renewable energy.
Guest: Jane Lomax-Smith, Board Chair, South Australian Museum
(from transcript)
Jane Lomax-Smith: I think that we are becoming more aware of the work of the national grid. I think people are beginning to look at their supply and they are beginning to understand that we have baseload and we have peak-load. And understanding that begins to allow people to understand that at certain times of the day the load is greater and that’s when you particularly have to be careful. And I think that increasingly (and I know it’s harsh) a few power cuts make people focus on what can change. And I am optimistic that people will change. I know when our family put solar on the roof, we found our children outside looking at the wheel going backwards and then running around the house switching the lights off.
Robyn Williams: Dr Jane Lomax-Smith is a pathologist and then Lord Mayor of Adelaide, twice. She also chairs the South Australian Museum Trust.
The Science Show – 24 Feb:
24 Feb show: President Trump blocks out science
Over a year since his inauguration and President Trump remains without a science advisor.
(PIC TV SCREEN CNN: THE DONALD TRUMP INTERVIEW: “I’M NOT A BIG BELIEVER IN GLOBAL WARMING”)
Guest: Steven Weinberg, Professor in Physics and Astronomy, University of Texas, Austin Texas
(from transcript)
Robyn Williams: So how does he feel about science in America in 2018?
Steven Weinberg: It’s a sad story. You see it on several frontiers. Of course the thing that has come up most is climate change. You have the president of the United States saying that global warming is a hoax, it’s a hoax he said, repeating himself, and appointing secretaries of the environment and energy and so on who share that view. Probably in order to avoid being told things he doesn’t want to hear, he has not appointed a science advisor, more than a year after his inauguration. That’s unprecedented. Ever since Dwight Eisenhower, presidents of the United States have found it useful to have at their elbow someone who could inform them as to developments in science and judge what is scientifically sound and what is not. President Trump doesn’t seem to want to hear that. But it goes beyond that. I mean, after all, questions of environment raise issues of energy policy which are not just ideological but economical. There were economic issues like the future of the coal industry at stake…
Robyn Williams: Steven Weinberg, Professor of Physics at the University of Texas and fan of Eeyore, one of my role models. Professor Weinberg returns next week to celebrate 50 years of his famous paper.
20
“in my career, i’ve been battling the forces of anti-science and climate change denial”… from Michael Mann. So anyone who disagrees with his opinions is anti-science? Perhaps that will change when the Canadian court decides on the Tim Ball case.
30
poor Michael Mann – having to battle with “climate denialists” and “anti-science” folk, while being afford 500 media interviews & appearances in a single year!
watch the short video – nothing politically partisan about the CAGW mob!
14 Feb: AAAS: Michael E. Mann Receives AAAS Public Engagement with Science Award
VIDEO: 1min51secs
In the past year, Mann has had ***500 media interviews and appearances and directly reached public audiences via social media. His op-eds and commentaries have been published in dozens of outlets, including The Washington Post, The Guardian, Le Monde, CNN and The New York Times. He has also advised actor Leonardo DiCaprio, who spoke about climate change during a 2014 speech delivered to the United Nations.
Mann was nominated by Susan Hassol, director of Climate Communication, a nonprofit science and outreach project.
In her nomination letter, Hassol wrote that in one year, “Mann has done more to engage with the public on science than most active scientist-communicators do in an entire career.”
“There is no scientist reaching greater numbers of people with such depth of communication as Michael Mann,” Hassol wrote…
https://www.aaas.org/news/michael-e-mann-receives-aaas-public-engagement-science-award
lol.
24 Feb: DeSmogBlog: Deniers Rage at Climate Scientist Michael Mann’s AAAS Award for Public Engagement
By Guest
Roger Pielke Jr. wrote that by awarding Mann this prize, AAAS sends a message that it’s okay to speak out about people like Pielke and his fellow “denier lites” like Bret Stephens, Rebekah Mercer, Megan McArdle and Judith Curry. Which is exactly what AAAS should be saying.
Scientists should feel not just comfortable, but obligated to correct those who use their platforms to continually make incorrect assertions about science, again and again. Scientists should correct the systematic distribution of misinformation and help inform the public of where, why and how that misinformation is being spread in the public discourse and relied on by politicians to enact anti-climate policies. Most importantly–and especially given the denial machine that attacks those who speak out on climate–academics should be supported in these education efforts by institutions like AAAS.
That, of course, is not how serial misinformers see things. Pielke’s post got tweeted by Bjorn Lomborg, excerpted by Delingpole at Breitbart and expanded on by The Federalist which was in turn reposted by Climate Depot, putting Pielke squarely in the center of the denial world’s feigned outrage machine.
To be fair, Pielke recognizes that human activity causes climate change, and even thinks a carbon tax would be the right policy to address it. But as former New York Times reporter turned New York Times columnist Justin Gillis tweeted, that’s just part of Pielke’s ploy for readership, which is why Gillis stopped quoting Pielke. “The schtick: Pretend to be part of the mainstream consensus about global warming, then draw attention to yourself by kneecapping other people,” Gillis explains. “It’s an odious way to build personal brand. @BjornLomborg does it too.”…
No surprise to see Lomborg and Pielke as two peas in a pod. And their response to Mann’s award continues to show that once you move beyond their token acceptance of mainstream climate science, their jealousy of Mann’s success will likely be as green as they ever go.
https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/02/24/deniers-rage-climate-scientist-michael-mann-aaas-award
one thing from Mann at the start of the following; another at the end:
27 Feb: Guardian: Arctic warming: scientists alarmed by ‘crazy’ temperature rises
Record warmth in the Arctic this month could yet prove to be a freak occurrence, but experts warn the warming event is unprecedented
by Jonathan Watts Global environment editor
“This is an anomaly among anomalies. It is far enough outside the historical range that it is worrying – it is a suggestion that there are further surprises in store as we continue to poke the angry beast that is our climate,” said Michael Mann, director of the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University. “The Arctic has always been regarded as a bellwether because of the vicious circle that amplify human-caused warming in that particular region. And it is sending out a clear warning.”…
Others caution that it is premature to see this as a major shift away from forecasts. “The current excursions of 20C or more above average experienced in the Arctic are almost certainly mostly due to natural variability,” said Zeke Hausfather of Berkeley Earth. “While they have been boosted by the underlying warming trend, we don’t have any strong evidence that the factors driving short-term Arctic variability will increase in a warming world. If anything, climate models suggest the opposite is true, that high-latitude winters will be slightly less variable as the world warms.”…
“This is too short-term an excursion to say whether or not it changes the overall projections for Arctic warming,” says Mann. “But it suggests that we may be underestimating the tendency for short-term extreme warming events in the Arctic. And those initial warming events can trigger even greater warming because of the ‘feedback loops’ associated with the melting of ice and the potential release of methane (a very strong greenhouse gas).”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/feb/27/arctic-warming-scientists-alarmed-by-crazy-temperature-rises
20
meant to type “afforded” –
while being AFFORDED 500 media interviews
20
The explanation is probably that it is pitched to new residents and when you are signing up for a lifetime’s stuggle to pay a mortgage, it is easy to ‘sell’ extras on the never ever. Consider for example the current scandal where all the banks have tricked tens of thousands of students for pay for credit card insurance, when they cannot claim on it as they are unemployed. It only applies when you lose your job. The amount is around $50Million from students. For nothing. Like the RET and the mislabeled ‘subsidies’ which are just ripping off everyone else for nothing at all.
40
This was in response to #42 with regard to ‘subsidies’ and the proliferation of solar panels in new estates.
30
Yep, I understood the reference. This twenty-first century has been fabulous for financiers. France and Australia have captured the zeitgeist by having leaders incubated by Rothschild and Goldman Sachs. Other parallels obtain between Macron and The Windbag, the most salient being their absolute blindness to the concerns of castes beneath their own.
00
Jo
Concerning long post. I fully understand why it was held in moderation and will not feel offended in any way if it’s not used. It is, after all, pretty much off topic for this forum. I should have just linked to it.
00
If you happen to see a fireball during the first few days of April this is probably what it is:
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2018/03/chinese-satellite-filled-with-corrosive-fuel-will-probably-hit-the-ocean/
If it does start to reenter over you at night it will make an impressive fireball that can’t be missed by those who happen to be outside if the skies are decently clear. So if you happen to be outside the first few days in April and see a huge fireball chances are you’ll know that your seeing Chinese made space junk reentering the atmosphere. BTW the window for the estimated reentry time will be refined and become smaller as the actual event approaches but will never been exact. I have a decent telescope and have spent some time out looking at the night sky and have personally only seen only two fireballs during my life time and will never forget them.
30
Dunno if youse all have seen this, but I just seen it ->Should We Chill Out About Global Warming? in Scientific American.
The fact that Scientific American has given significant exposure to someone telling the Chicken Littles to take a chill pill, could very well be a bellwether for the ‘walking back’ of some of the more egregious misrepresentations made by the Cult of Thermaggeddon.
Of particular interest are the two pieces linked to from within the SciAm piece: both reinforce things that I have banged on about for over a decade – chief among them, that the effect on climate change on agricultural output will be more than offset by underlying technological change (i.e., productivity growth specific to agriculture), with the net result that per capita ag output will be 30% higher in 2050 than it is now.
And let’s be clear: you can’t get a large-scale impact on humanity without a massive reduction in per-capita agricultural output. Not unless someone wants to claim that some existential-threat pathogen is more likely to develop if the global swirl of daily temperatures result in a slightly-warmer global mean (when? where? what season and time of the day?).
The trial balloon, methinks, has been launched; the walk-back may not be long in coming. The Climageddon Cult is starting to lose control over the narrative in ‘major’ media outlets.
I read similar articles in mid-late 1999 about Y2K; I have clippings of them in a box somewhere, because they marked the end of that charlatans’ gravy train. (Yes, I was a Y2K ‘denier’ as well – although nobody used such a term back then: people had the good grace to be able to have principled disagreements without trying to draw comparisons between their interlocutor and naughty Uncle ‘Dolfie).
00
I was posed a question, ‘What is the ratio between human energy production and solar energy input. I attempted the calculation shown on the spreadsheet linked to the dropbox below. Can someone tell me if the spreadsheet is actually accessible there?
If so, are there any glaring errors in the calculation?
https://www.dropbox.com/s/lddu7ry9ocr0hd9/human%20versus%20solar%20energy.xlsx?dl=0
00