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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Wind Turbine Causes Major Wildfire
https://ktxs.com/news/big-country/wind-turbine-causes-wildfire-in-nolan-county
Fire still going in brush 5 days later
The wildfire continued to run for at least five miles and has burned more than 3,200 acres destroying land in its path.
Robertson and other land owners are concerned about their land, homes, and families if another wind turbine catches on fire.
“The financial reward of wind turbines is not worth the safety of your family and property,” said Robertson.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/ktxs.com/amp/news/local/the-game-ranch-fire-continues-to-burn-five-days-later-in-nolan-co-land-owners-worried
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Current fire statistics
https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/article/6855/52600/
Sorry about double post above. Mod can remove first one. Thanks!
john
10
Note that this is about all of science, not climate science.
Is peer review bad for science?
By David Wojick
After studying the popular practice of peer review of scientific journal articles for several years, I have reluctantly concluded that peer review is bad for science. While the practice has its good side, there are several ways that it greatly impedes progress, and the bad greatly outweighs the good.
To begin with, let’s look at what peer review tries to do. The obvious thing is to block the publication of fake science. However this appears to be a rare event in most sciences. There are several million journal articles published each year, all peer reviewed, typically by two or three reviewers. Clearly these many millions of reviews did not keep any of these myriad articles from being published.
Paradoxically, however, most of these articles were in fact rejected based on peer review; many were rejected many times. Top journals often boast of having high rejection rates, like 80% or so. If this is the general practice then the average article must be submitted to something like five journals before it is accepted and published. If each submission is peer reviewed then that is a lot of reviews per article, perhaps ten to fifteen on average.
Given that all of these multiply rejected articles eventually get published, something other than simple gate keeping must be going on. This something looks to be an extremely laborious sorting process, whereby each article eventually finds the “right” journal. It is hard to see any value being added by these many millions of peer reviews. Given modern search technologies, which journal an article ultimately appears in no longer seems very important.
One negative aspect of peer review is well known. This is where gate keeping keeps great new ideas from being published. Max Planck, who discovered the quantum nature of energy, put it very nicely, saying something like “Your ideas will (only) be accepted when your students become journal editors.” This is the dark side of peer review blocking science, the novel good ideas get blocked as bad ideas.
But there are several other bad things that flow from peer review that I have not seen mentioned. These down sides are features of the incredibly time consuming and laborious nature of the practice.
First there is the huge time delay between the time a paper is written and when it is finally published. Let’s say that peer review takes four months, which is probably pretty fast. If the average paper is reviewed five times then that is almost two years of reviews before it is finally accepted. (Also, there are many other steps between these reviews, so the average might be more like four years from first submission to final publication.)
If two million papers are published each year, with an average delay of say two years each, due to peer review, that is an accumulation of four million years of delay every year. It is reasonable to believe that eliminating this vast tide of delay would dramatically speed up the progress of science.
Then there is the cost. Organizing and managing the peer review process is probably the greatest expense that journal publishers face. Keep in mind that given an 80% rejection rate, something like five articles will be reviewed for every one published. At three reviews each that means fifteen reviews per published article.
The high cost of journals and articles is a major obstacle to access by all but the richest universities and researchers. This too probably greatly impedes the progress of science.
Then there is the huge amount of time that researchers spend reviewing each other’s articles. Reviews are expected to be comprehensive, so they probably take from 10 to 20 hours each, maybe more. If there are fifteen reviews per article published that is 150 to 300 hours of review time.
Multiply that by 2 million articles published and we get an incredible 300 to 600 million hours a year devoted to reviewing, rather that to research. Assuming that a work year is 2000 hours, this is like taking 150 to 300 thousand researchers off the job, just to peer review each other’s papers. Think of what that amount of research might create. Again, this is a huge loss to the progress of science.
Conclusion: Peer review adds an enormous amount of delay, cost and distraction to the process of science. It does not do enough good to justify these huge adverse impacts on the rate of scientific progress. Thus on balance peer review is bad for science.
https://www.cfact.org/2020/07/18/is-peer-review-bad-for-science/
Please share this.
David
351
I agree.
Especially when it encourages the same mindset that anything not researched through these institutions is rejected.
Always correct as no one can published a different view that may show their errors and mistakes.
The “Walkers” group mindset.
110
I might post my sad story of gatekeeping/peer review.
I had a falling out with my supervisor. He had started to get a bad reputation for being a power hungry grub before I started my PhD. We had gotten along well, initially. I don’t know the exact reasons for it and if wrong, it would be slanderous so I’ll skip it.
When I tried to publish my work at a prestigious journal, two reviewers liked the work while the third didn’t. It was obvious whom the third person was. He made some really stupid objections. For example, he claimed that I hadn’t considered something when, in fact, there was a whole section dealing with it that had an obvious title. The editor agreed and she sent it to a fourth who didn’t even try to hide it was him again, referring to his previous comments. This time he just picked at my poor grammar making it illegible, despite two others having no problems reading the paper.
It was pretty obvious that I would not be treated fairly by the journal so it ended up being published by an obscure journal.
I found out, in a round about way, that the mathematics had been bagged. I checked it and I did make a typo. A subscript was an i instead of a j. It does throw you off the stream of logic behind it a bit so I was sort of surprised that nobody who peer reviewed it, the paper and my examined thesis had spotted it. I hadn’t because it’s like proof reading an essay too soon – you read what you meant to write.
Anyway,I found out recently that a second rate mind landed an academic job based on only one good paper which was pretty much what I had done in this bagged paper.
That’s academia for you.
250
I’ve come to the same conclusion about peer review science a long time ago when I published papers in certain scientific journals while doing my PhD. It was a closed group of bigoted people back then and still is. There is little or no room for dissent depending on the science topic. It’s a stranglehold on the progress of scientific knowledge.
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Sciene progresses one funeral at a time…the same can be said for medecine…
120
This is why I start with the science, move to engineering, make something that works and is useful, then take it to market. By depending upon willing participants, the process produces valuable intellectual property that can be protected from bigoted people. Even then there are bigoted people who have invested their whole lives being expert in my field. I simply demonstrate using their samples that my method works and which proved their entire life’s work had been rendered obsolete. They didn’t like it. Their impact upon my work was very short lived.
170
My experiences with peer review as an author, reviewer, and mere spectator have hardly been positive either
Probably the most egregious incident involved watching an associate editor of a journal work his way through a stack of geochemistry conference abstracts on a train, while talked to myself and others. Most were rejected for reasons such as ‘I don’t like this person’, ‘I don’t like this university’, ‘their English is not good enough’, ‘the title is too long’, ‘ too many authors’, ‘I disagree with this theory’, and the ones he accepted were just as unscientific; ‘I had a great time at a conference with this person’, ‘If I accept this, maybe I can visit them because I’ve never been to that country’, ‘My wife knows this person’, ‘that topic is something I’ve worked on’, etc.
I feel sorry people trying to publish oil & gas geochemistry papers, it really is who you know, and not what you know, unless it fits with current theories. I was going to complain to the journal, but I knew absolutely nothing would happen because it’s all one big happy family of editors, associate editors, and reviewers, plus, of course, I had no hard evidence to support my claims. I did raise the matter on another occasion, one-on-one, but as was made clear to me, my degrees are from “irrelevant no-name universities”, and I don’t have a PhD, so I couldn’t possibly understand how smart people make real academic decisions.
160
Good Work David.
Peer review;
1. blocks Good Papers and stultifies the field
2. fails its primary objective if rejecting scientific f…
3. is very expensive
4. causes massive delays in publication.
What was the good thing again?
120
Well put, Peter. They do catch typos.
21
Sometimes?
10
The test is falsifiable. If it cannot be faulted by repeating the experiment with a different result…the conclusion stands. Peer review apears to be a means of circumventing this basic tenet of science
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My first experience with peer review was as a reviewer. I was asked to review two papers produced by Ph.D. grad students under a US regulatory agency research contract. Since the research was in an area where I had broadly recognized expertise I agreed. Long story short the papers were crap and failed from initial experimental design right through data collection and analysis and provided little, if any, value. I said so in my “confidential” written reviews. A few months later a colleague took me aside at a conference and told me my reviews had nearly cost a very popular administrator at the agency his job. As a result, my company seemed to have a very hard time dealing with the agency until there was a retirement of a certain administrator. Anyway, I never accepted another request to do reviews. I was made clear to me that when reviewing government sponsored research papers, negative reviews were just not done.
150
David, though not as old as you and I, Peer Review goes back to when publication was by typewriters, carbon copies and the printing press. Modern technology imposes no such limitations on publication. Even the capital cost is small. Which filters cost of publication out of the system.
Peer Review had its place, and surely still can. But, as we have seen with the AGW scam, Peer Review has become too often Pal Review. As a result the Peer Review that we are accustomed to will surely last only as long as vested interests succeed in maintaining its position.
The situation is made worse by the deliberate dumbing down of our education system that took place in the 1970s.
All of this comes back to the system in use. The number of publishing platforms will increase, and the “peers” reviewing will be much greater in number. The platforms and the authors will have to stand on their own reputations. Lionell Griffith has illustrated a solution that, while not available to everybody, keeps the system on its toes.
70
Interesting cv19 twitter link:
“So pleased to see all this good news about Herd immunity.
Just shows one experiment – Diamond Princess- is better than 1000 models.
Biology is so complex that predictive theories are rare.
Empirical common sense follows data and always works. Report 28 Feb. 20 is aging well.”
https://twitter.com/MLevitt_NP2013/status/1284358079564394496
>> Too much Information in thread to summarise here, with more relevant links in thread.
1 link:
“Indeed a great opportunity to learn from the Princess Diamond cruise “experiment”.
In our analysis we have found that 18.5% were infected and around half asymptomatic.”
What can be the worst-case scenario for COVID-19?
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-can-worst-case-scenario-covid-19-dr-cristian-ilie
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Excellent find Travis and perhaps best raised here without all the heat and emotion seen in the last topic discussion.
Not only does the Diamond Princess experiment give an idea of the worst case, there were several other ships which can be analysed.
Maybe those experiments can also give some indication of methods to reduce infection and protect ourselves.
30
I suggest look into the degree to which published “scientific” results cannot be replicated. One source: https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2020/entries/scientific-reproducibility/ suggests this is a serious problem. If true, peer review fails to screen out the non-scientific “science” from being published.
One cause of this problem has been the almost religious belief in p scores. Yet the more ways you test your data, the more likely it is that you will find a P <0.03 and deem it significant. Even so called good experimental design can fall into this trap. This suggests that "new" science cannot be considered science until it can be replicated many times by many different INDEPENDENT scientists from many different perspectives. Until then, it is only "interesting" at best.
Ultimately, engineering is the final test of science. If a material device can be constructed on the bases of the science and it reliably produces the results the engineering predicted and found useful, then and only then, can the science be considered passing the smell test. All the rest misses the point and reduces itself to "send more money".
The cure? Remove ALL government funding grants from science and require that ALL experiments be self financed or financed only by willing and able participants. Fake science couldn't get past the first experiment let alone being published and used for grant applications.
Bottom line: earn your own keep. You don't have the right to force others to finance your life's work at the point of the government's gun.
120
If you have a lot to contribute, you get shunned and ignored as there are too many that rely on that government money not to rock the boat.
Our get “I am the expert and shouldn’t be questioned on how I came up with this”
I question everything because I like to know if I’m being suckered in or not.
Most times I am.
I have no problem to share my research and data as I want to make sure That I am 100% accurate and correct. Being criticized for no valid reason because the research may hurt your carriers is pretty lame.
120
As a scientist I agree with you. As an engineer, I use the science to create working devices that can be patented and copyrighted as intellectual property. I use engineering something that works to prove my science then work to market it.
I have no problem sharing the science but I do have a problem giving away the intellectual property. It becomes a product that can be rented, leased, or sold to private individuals, institutions, and even Government but not for free. Except for my creative work, it would not exist. I therefore have a right to be paid for my work. THAT is how I have made my living for many decades.
200
In replication, the original methodology must be strictly adhered to. there is too much opportunity to engineer an outcome. I have been involved in projects in which there have been deliberate attempts to engineer an outcome. In both cases it was due to the hostility of a senior member of the staff towards me. It took me ten years to have senior management to accept what I had conclusively demonstrated. It is now on the record.
In the other project the same senior member of the staff altered the methodology, which if it had not been later corrected would have completely altered the outcome…Fortunately the environment in which the project was being conducted was sufficiently resilient to survive the altered methodology. There are two papers published on this project in one of which I am named as a co-author as the purpose of the project was to test my hypothesis. I am pleased to say that outcome of the project supported my hypothesis.
40
I saw an interview from a few days ago with Dr Zev Zelenko of New York on YouTube discussing his C-19 treatment protocol. A few (of many) points he made:
1) There are powerful forces working against the HCQ/Zn/Azi protocol to be given immediately upon suspicion of infection, basically because its adoption would be seen as a win for Trump. They want this treatment to fail Because “orange man bad”.
2) He has now published his work in peer reviewed literature, he has a paper currently in preprint.
3) HCQ is a lot more available in the US for doctors for C-19 treatment than Australia but even he has problems getting it sometimes. He then uses quercetin as a substitute.
4) He discusses his prophylaxis protocol for use in nursing homes, health workers or anyone else that wants to use it. It includes an initial “loading” dose then once per week as HCQ has a very long half life in the body of 50 days.
5) His treatment is for early stage infection before the virus moves to the lungs but HCQ might protect the lungs also. He points out it is difficult to get HCQ into the lungs via the blood, he is therefore looking at a nebulised form of HCQ.
6) He is looking at the use of steroids and other drugs for later stages of the infection.
There is a lot of other interesting discussion in the 52 min interview.
HCQ trials have all been sabotaged because his protocol has not been followed exactly either due to 1) excessively late administration once the cytokine storm has started (Stage 2 of the disease and too late), 2) an excessively high dose of HCQ on already very sick people or 3) no zinc supplementation.
If he is right, it seems there is a treatment for C-19 for early stage infection. If our Government and medical authorities weren’t so against it just because Trump’s people wanted it investigated further (because “orange man bad”) then we would have a decent chance of ridding ourselves of C-19 either through prophylaxis or early stage treatment.
Incidentally, it’s Government doctors both here and in the US who probably haven’t seen a patient in decades that are against it. GP’s and specialist doctors I know are supportive of its use as a treatment or at least open to it.
Our government’s opposition to it’s adoption or GPs using it or clinical trials exactly as per the Zelenko protocol for early stage treatment or prophylaxis is an enormous crime. At the very worst, the treatment is as harmless as any medical treatment can be, contrary to lies told about HCQ.
As for supply, HCQ is relatively simple and very cheap to make. If there is a demand I am confident the marketplace will supply. And what happened with the 32 million doses purchased by Clive Palmer? He purchased them on the basis of Zelenko’s work.
Video at https://youtu.be/uEntfcBiW4k
251
An interesting quote from him was “COVID is not killing people, politics is”.
141
And this is the point I have made abiut Victoriastan and what appears to be irs communist leadership.
In Victoriastan:
– police and military on the streets – like China
– people locked down – like china
– freedom of travel internally tightly controlled – like china
– parliament suspended with no democratic process currently ( rule by effectively unaccoutable politburo ) – like china
– political protests tgat support The Party are allowed but no others – like china
– belt and road initiative supported – cozy up to china
– people slugged with punative fines exercising basic freedoms – lije china
Yep…no politics in the Victoriastan Soviet at all….
140
Well Melbournistan maybe
40
I agree with your observations OriginalSteve. And the Chicomms are very happy with the performance of their CCP delegate Do Pi Dan.
The only good thing about it is if the Chicomms wanted to build a coal or nuclear plant in Victoriastan Do Pi Dan would agree to it because he would never say no to them for anything. However they’ll never propose that because their interests are better served by the economic destruction caused by “renewables” (and cheap asset purchases from bankrupt companies and people down the line) and which they also benefit from by selling the renewables hardware.
And let’s not forget the economic destruction caused by Wu Flu either.
Victoriastan has probably Australia’s most stupid voters. They voted for Do Pi not once, but twice and will likely do so a third time. The Sheeple love him and he also provides lots of “free stuff”.
I Googled Dan Andrews and could find no references whatsoever where he acknowledged that C-19 came from China. Because that would “racist” or “Sinophobic” I suppose.
51
We’ve wondered whether the bosses of himself were behind the wrecking of Hazelwood?
90
Annie, I think all his major decisions are probably run by his CCP masters. He wants things set up nicely for when they assume control via the Belt and Road Initiatives. Like the pathetic sycophant he is, he aims to please.
61
Maybe a big 8′ high fence around Victoriastan and cut off any power interconnectors from NSW ( let them eat renewables “cake” ) , and leave him to it.
Wont be long before he’s tarred and feathered and run into port phillip bay….and told to keep walking.
I know quite a few conservatives who are seething angry and what Comrade Dan has now put Victoriastan under the leftist boot and into submission by forcing people to wear masks. Masks are very much a symbol of submission to leftist lunacy – why? Because if the Italian professor Ive quoted ( along with the Cell paper Ive also quoted ) has shown meidcally that the current mutation in Australia of covid is now fairly lame, then its all about a power trip and little to do with medicine.
Are people in hospital? Yes. Why? Likely underlying pre-existing comorbidities.
See my postings a bit risk factors.
Victoria had 334 people die in 2019 from Flu. How many from Covid 19? 40?
Calling this a power trip, not about medicine.
Youre welcome…..
40
I don’t know enough about Australia to comment on the local levers for the “ism”, but suspect thee may be some.
In the US we are arguing politically about everything. One side often considers itself itself curator of the American experience,
and accuse the other of “ism”, ideologies imported from elsewhere and misapplied.
Here is a simpler test for those abroad keeping a scorecard.
Americans have arrived at a consensus of our key question, race. One side wishes to solve it over time, through equal opportunity.
The other wants to solve it immediately, through equal outcomes, arrived at by force if necessary.
We will either negotiate, segregate, or fight. The country is large enough, with enough jurisdictions, for some of this to happen
simultaneously at different places.
In my opinion, the biggest fear is that we actually achieve a unifying central government with power to command conformance. This will likely destroy the country.
30
This is encouraging – finding the molecular “switch” that makes covid dangerous and treatable by another new drug
https://www.timesofisrael.com/existing-drug-may-downgrade-covid-threat-to-common-cold-level-jerusalem-study/
An existing medicine can “downgrade” the danger-level of coronavirus to that of a common cold, a Jerusalem researcher is claiming, after testing it on infected human tissue.
“Prof. Yaakov Nahmias says that his research shows that the novel coronavirus is so vicious because it causes lipids to be deposited in the lungs, and that there is a solution to undo the damage: a widely-used anti cholesterol drug called fenofibrate.
““If our findings are borne out by clinical studies, this course of treatment could potentially downgrade COVID-19’s severity into nothing worse than a common cold,” Nahmias said.
“Unlike remdesivir, which is being lauded for its effect on coronavirus patients, fenofibrate, sometimes sold under the brand name Tricor, is already accredited by America’s Food and Drug Administration and is in plentiful supply. Remdesivir is in short supply and is also still pending full approval by regulators like the FDA.
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Paper for above post
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3650499
20
Another excellent interview with Dr Zelenko.
40
I’m surprised YouTube hasn’t deleted it yet as they do with others that question the narrative that HCQ is bad etc.. I believe they have censored other videos involving him.
51
A bit of perspective on sea-level rises for the casual observer.
http://www.dinosaurdiary.com.au
60
When someone in a crowded room yells “Fire!” the normal response is for people in the room to rush out even if there is no fire. The alarmists who are yelling the sea rises are significant and will lead to a catastrophe if we don’t reduce our emissions are causing too many people to fall for the false alarm. There two ways to put a stop to all that. One, leaders to grow a spine and call it for what it really is; a scam. Our leaders at state and federal levels are not only silent but promoting the emission reduction nonsense. So, instead of our leaders trying to do the right thing and expose the scam they are doing the exact opposite and in cahoots with the alarmists. So, option 2 is the only thing left, which is voters to grow a brain and stop voting for the fake leaders. Otherwise the brainwashing will continue and the West will collapse. China and Russia will be laughing as they pick up the pieces.
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Thank you PeterS. Your option 2 is precisely what i’m trying to do. That is, to counteract the brainwashing of uncommitted voters with uncomplicated messages. I believe a large number of people form opinions based on clickbait and the like and never even scratch the surface. Hopefully a bit of light reading with a touch of humour might cut through.
50
China and Russia are more likely to be fighting themselves or each other. The biggest threat that we face is that China or Russia might see expansionism as the best way to avert disorder at home.
00
Yes probably after the West has fallen. One of them will be the victor. Like all civilisations when they fall another takes its place.
20
I’m sure you know this one:
https://balance10.blogspot.com/2020/07/is-cia-on-level-accountable.html
01
have you heard?
What JFK didn’t know was that his plans were threatening a covert long-standing conspiracy engineered by Allen Dulles to effect regime change in Indonesia through bloody means. The primary goal of this plan was to gain unimpeded access to the vast load of natural resources that Dulles had kept secret from Kennedy, who thought Indonesia was lacking in natural resources. But Dulles knew that if Kennedy who was very popular in Indonesia visited Sukarno, it would deal a death blow to his plan to oust Sukarno, install a CIA replacement (Suharto), exterminate alleged communists and secure the archipelago for Rockefeller controlled oil and mining interests for whom he had fronted since the 1920s. https://www.educationviews.org/allen-dulless-indonesian-strategy/
……………………….
Beginning in 1939 and lasting for five years the CFR achieved much greater prominence within the government and the State Department, when it established the strictly confidential War and Peace Studies, funded entirely by the Rockefeller Foundation.[3]:23 The secrecy surrounding this group was such that the Council members who were not involved in its deliberations were completely unaware of the study group’s existence.[3]:26 It was divided into four functional topic groups: economic and financial, security and armaments, territorial and political. The security and armaments group was headed by Allen Welsh Dulles who later became a pivotal figure in the CIA’s predecessor, the Office of Strategic Services. The CFR ultimately produced 682 memoranda for the State Department, marked classified and circulated among the appropriate government departments.[3]:23–26 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_on_Foreign_Relations
02
A song for our time
Chuck Mead “I ain’t been nowhere”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIQvaBOuvAs
21
It turns out emitting a minute amount of the trace gas CO2 is a truly lousy way of causing seas to boil, turn acidic, with reefs bleaching and dying with all the inhabitants – and cause species to become rare and/or extinct …
WALKING SHARKS THAT CAN LEAVE THE WATER DISCOVERED IN INDO-AUSTRALIAN ARCHIPELAGO
“The scientists believe the newly found sharks are apex predators within their environment – shallow waters around reefs.
According to Dr Dudgeon, it’s possible that there may be more species of walking sharks living in isolated patches in the region.
We believe there are more walking shark species still waiting to be discovered.”
https://truththeory.com/2020/06/29/walking-sharks-who-can-leave-the-water-discovered-in-indo-australian-archipelago/
50
It’s the running ones which are the scariest.
82
And in Australia, we now have sharks trying to jump into boats to get the people. And perhaps steal the boat. Steering sharks.
92
I’d say the ones in suits are the scariest and do the most damage Tdef.
60
SHARKNADO may not be fictious then ??
30
Land sharks. Usually with sandwich boards.
42
There is a photograph in most papers of storm damage to houses on the NSW coast. In the photograph, the cliff has vanished in front of a house which has no rocks to protect it. This was prevented by the council. Residents wanted a sea wall, which was refused. Now the recriminations begin as it is obvious from the photograph that the likely loss of at least one house is entirely the fault of the council as their Climate WOKE policies. People are working overnight to put rocks where they should have been and save the houses.
We are in a world where elected WOKE officials decide they are working for any mad cause and not for the people who elected them, pay their inflated salaries and perks and depend on them. From BLM to Climate Change to stop and search prohibition in London, governments around the world have lost their way. It is democracy gamed by extremists and communists, as in the case of WHO, a previously world respected organization brought low by a strategic arrangement between African dictators and the Chinese President. Wuhan Flu is not infectious, person to person. According to the President of WHO, a founding member of the ruling military dictatorship in Ethiopia. Liberation fighters, now totalitarians.
And the multi trillion dollar cost of the world’s biggest fraud, man made Global Warming aka Climate Change is starting to fall apart simply because there never was any science behind it, just politics and money.
That is fascism, a form of socialism invented by Mussolini which allows the dictators of the world to work hand in hand with the capitalists, plutocrats and opportunists. It’s not a conspiracy. It’s a free for all.
So we have the Climate Baggers, the windmilll pushers, the desalinator pushers. And solar, hot rocks, wave power, geothermal power. Trillions wasted. After all as wombat specialist Tim Flannery told us so sincerely as a real fair dinkum dead wombat scientist, “the technology is straight forward”. It didn’t work. That was another $100Million of public money down the toilet with all the directors on $400K per year. That was nothing compared to the blowing up of multi billion dollar coal power stations which were working fine. Or our ex PM gifting an unrequested $444million in cash to his wife’s climate charity. No questions asked.
One decision ahead is what to do with councils in cities which have grown so big they are infested with activists who leach the city and think they own it, even though they have built nothing. And Greens like former Australian Green leader Bob Brown who now refuses to have windmills in his backyard, while retired on his huge indexed government pension and whinged that people who actually did something useful in business did better. And Sadiq Khan’s woke London Council is seeing record murder levels, like the Democrat’s New York and Chicago and Baltimore. Clearly Black Lives Don’t Matter.
And Joe Biden, the quintessentially useless and geniatric wind vane of a politician who has done absolutely nothing in his public life except use his position to enrich his family is being promoted as ideal for position of the President of the United States. Words fail. Woke is not an adjective. It is a verb, stolen like gay to make the point that the new dictators of opinion can just make it up.
172
If you build on a floodplain, or in a hurricane zone, or in a deep forest, are those also to be protected by the government, local or otherwise?
Why should my rates go towards subsidising a few elites who expect the community to underwrite their exclusive privilege?
TedF, why are you promoting a form of socialism?
142
Agree with you both although the council will not allow homeowners to carry out their own mitigation work at their own expense .
100
‘Why should my rates go towards subsidising a few elites who expect the community to underwrite their exclusive privilege?’
Its a legal issue, the Council gave them permission to live there without due diligence.
71
Which council el gordo? Those blocks have been there and built in the 1930’s, as depression era shacks, and on sand dunes to boot. By this argument, we would be responsible for compensation to the original inhabitants of that land.
But it’s not just the local council that is adverse to the socialist funding of a few elites, the Insurance Council of Australia, has this to say on its website
“The coastal risks of storm surge, coastal erosion and gradual sea level rise are excluded by many general insurance policies in Australia. Consumers should ensure they are familiar with their policy and are aware of what risks the policy will not respond to.”
Now would you purchase a property built on a sand dune, knowing that storm surge and erosion are not covered?
131
Good point Peter, but a surprising number of people forget that, including the developers. When buying a flat in Sydney I was amazed by the blatant disregard to obvious problems.
The classic class was the Nepean river flats upstream from Windsor where 2 subdivisions were approved for new houses. Only one house was built on stilts and escaped the inevitable floods (yes, 2 in 1984). The owner used to return home by tinnie and sit on the front balcony watching the furniture from up-stream float by.
110
Okay thanks Peter, it might become a test case.
20
Where did I suggest the public was being asked for anything? You read something which I did not write and did not mean. That’s your mindset, not mine.
The council prevented owners from protecting their own homes against the known threat. That is socialism quashing individual rights to health and happiness. The karma of Climate Change councils. Some councils even stripped homeowners of the right to sell, making their properties worthless. But I bet they still charged annual rates on the old value. That’s greed. Who needs councils like this?
These are also very expensive homes and the cost of work, putting a few big rocks at the bottom of the steep cliff where waves crash anyway would probably cost less than the annual council rates. And it obviously works as can be seen in the photograph.
114
Here is an article about the “hot rocks” debacle. According to a comment Flannery didn’t personally lose a cent, “just” the tax payers and investors who lost $$$$$.
Also according to a comment the hot rocks were so deep that the steam would have condensed by the time it got to the surface and would also have released vast amounts of CO2 from the rocks (not that it would be a problem for us, only for warmists).
Where was the science and how did taxpayers and investors get duped into investing and losing so much?
https://catallaxyfiles.com/2014/08/08/hot-rocks-a-dud-ask-tim-flannery/
61
Geodynamics was the company behind “hot rocks”. They changed their name to ReNu Energy https://renuenergy.com.au/ and now seem to be imvolved in bioenergy. Current stock price $0.026 (2.6 cents).
51
“Hot Rocks” deserves its own thread.
I followed the story quite closely at the time. The problems were partly technical (very deep drilling and corrosion of the well pipe) and partly economic;
The well was very far from a major market (nearest was Adelaide) so the transmission lines were going to be very long.
Unless the company promotions lied (which they might have) I think they did produce steam at the surface and made a small demonstration power plant.
30
“Hot Rocks” are a particular form of geothermal. They are usually granitic bodies with trace radioactive minerals – the heat is generated by radioactive decay, with radon gas one of the by-products. Nuclear energy.
60
It would be better to concentrate that nuclear energy into a useful and convenient location as a reactor on the surface.
51
Are you sure about that? We are living on a thin crust on a molten core. Temperature goes up 25C every 1k.
“The oceanic crust is 5 km (3 mi) to 10 km (6 mi) thick and is composed primarily of basalt, diabase, and gabbro.
The continental crust is typically from 30 km (20 mi) to 50 km (30 mi) thick, and it is mostly composed of less dense rocks than is the oceanic crust.
Some of these less dense rocks, such as granite, are common in the continental crust but rare to absent in the oceanic crust.
The temperature of the crust increases with depth, reaching values typically in the range from about 500 °C (900 °F) to 1,000 °C (1,800 °F) at the boundary with the underlying mantle.”
So you do not have to dig too far to boil water and make steam. And maybe there are areas which are naturally hotter at less depth?
There is also the radioactive heating but I did not read the hot rocks company technical literature. Given that it’s South Australia, our uranium source, you are probably right but it might be both.
You do not need super heat to generate electricity, just to boil water. Less than 200C is common. “Temperature of the steam in a locomotive boiler at 190 psi is 383 degrees Fahrenheit (195 degrees Centigrade). This is also the temperature of the water at that steam pressure.”
82
Link here –
and here:
and the image here:
Just don’t mention the fr@cking word either.
20
That Central Coast Council is controlled by “independents” who successfully campaigned as an independent group of candidates (not a political party, of course not) with a logo that was/is very obviously Greens.
90
For something different
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-07-18/largest-tractor-in-the-world-for-its-time-celebrates-a-century/12445794?WT.ac=statenews_vic
60
Thanks Ian,
An amazing piece of Aussie history that should not go un recognised.
Quote of the day..
“ did not need refueling for 3 years “ …
30
Amazing. From a time when it was possible to do useful and productive things in Australia.
41
That is impressive Ian, they didn’t mention the fuel but I’m guessing it was solar.
30
Fuel economy what fuel economy?
10
It ran on crude oil and had a 19,800 litre tank!
https://redcliffshistory.wordpress.com/history/big-lizzie/
21
The value of modelling?
Published in The Australian last weekend: “Locked-down Victoria will be hammered by up to 500 new cases of COVID-19 every day by the end of next week — with infections doubling every five days — unless the disastrous coronavirus outbreak is checked.” The modelling by NSW’s Kirby Institute at UNSW predicts the daily increase in new cases will hit 500 on Thursday and pass 1000 by July 21 if the disease continues to spread at the current rate. Is that modelling, or simply mathematics? The report then said expectation is that case numbers will plateau next week as the reinstated restrictions take effect in Melbourne. Daily numbers since that report was published: 273, 177, 270, 238, 317, 428, 217
50
And yes exponential growth is all they mean by modelling of random individuals at a distance. 2^n.
Well they were wrong. It halved yesterday, which is remarkable and exciting. And I hope today.
My guess is that this event was not a second wave but a specific community (as if that’s not obvious) and isolation does not work as quickly with family groups who will not isolate. With isolated individuals, once the infection is over everyone is safe. However when groups like families or co-residents are infected, they are locked up together and everyone gets it as the Ruby Princess and Diamond Princess demonstrated. Many small clusters. So you can expect this period to increase x2 or x4, which is what has happened. It could go down as suddenly as the virus is defeated by the isolation of groups, not individuals.
72
And I detest the way the papers call everyone an expert. Experts say. We are still getting opinion pieces quoting Swedish experts on how their experiment of balancing lives against economic gain is the way to go. Only 5,600 dead in a country of 10 million. Was that a fair price to pay? Ask an economics expert or business commentator. It’s a sad day when people seriously argue that profit is more important than human lives. Principal not principles.
45
Excess deaths in Sweden over the peak covid period, per capita , were mid range in Europe. Talking absolutes in isolation does help with emotive points though.
40
Per capita is a rationalist argument which can justify anything, make the appalling truth go away. In reality if you save one life, you are a hero and get recognition. We celebrate heroes. If you let 5,000 die, you are an economist.
36
Yes being rational is just horrible, much better to pretend that people dont and shouldnt die. I guess you can have the “if it saves one kiddie” argument all you like , its the never ending precautionary priciple.
50
Rationalist in this context means uncaring, rationalization, justification without concern to consequences. No one is pretending people don’t die. But the whole point of the state is to prevent that if at all possible. It is also the object of all medicine, do no harm, the Hippocratic oath. The death rate in Sweden is horrendous.
And it’s nothing to do with the imaginary ‘precautionary principle’ invented by Sir Paul Nurse. There is no such ‘principle’ in any science. It’s pompous made up stuff meant to sound as if it exists like Newton’s Fourth law.
44
Sure , wrap it up however you like, the fact is (rational even) the country people wish to pick on as some example of the wrong thing to do actually had a mid range experience in Europe. There is an awful lot of hand wringing to do before you get down to Sweden.
30
TdeF:
Over 83% of the passengers on the Diamond Princess did NOT get CoVid19, and nearly half those who did get ‘infected’ did not develop symptoms.
As the figure you give is for the whole country there is no way to check if “this event was not a second wave but a specific community”. Given the Super Woke attitude of the Swedish (and previous) government there are specific areas with predominantly migrant population and high social welfare dependence (Malmö), and it could well be those areas where deaths were high.
71
In Australia, there are only 11,000 cases recorded. That’s one in 2,600 people. 99.94% of Australians are not infected. Or with 20% only showing symptoms, possibly 99.8%.
In Sweden, 77,000 cases recorded. That’s 7.7 in 1000 people. 0.77%. So 97% not infected. So much for herd immunity at 60%.
To get to their aim of 60% infection and herd immunity, they need to lose 20x as many or 100,000 lives. To make the others safe?
And have they thought that through? Who wants Swedes to visit when they are guaranteed to carry the virus?
The business about migrant populations applies equally to Australia. Half of our adult population was born overseas. We are just seeing it in the Iraqi, Pakistani, Indian, Syrian, Lebanese migrant areas of Melbourne.
53
who exactly will you will want to have as visitors? it wont be a risk free world , never has been.
40
Another straw man argument. No one said anything about a risk free world. Letting people die when you could have prevented it is criminal. Done by an individual or the state. Justifying it by saying life has risks is heartless. Our world based on Christian morality is that life is precious. Remove that and everyone’s life is forfeit to the state.
54
Who said anything about letting people die, straw argument or no straw argument? I suppose we could prevent all deaths by banning cars, etc. but of course, we won’t for obvious reasons. Life is precious but not infallible.
30
straw man? what? its a direct response to the question raised that Swedes will be pariahs. Realise you are obsessing re Sweden but try to be serious.
20
A disturbing trend in what passes for science these days is all the modelling, most based on poorly understood science or none at all.
For high profile politically charged subjects like climate catastrophism or COVID-19, modelling is done because 1) it can produce pretty graphics for 30 second news grabs, 2) it produces pretty graphics for clueless politicians and senior public serpents and 3) it produces panic and scares among the Sheeple hence political support for whatever junk science is being promoted.
Proper modelling requires a deep understanding of the underlying science. Very few “modellers” who are in public view have this understanding but the output of the models is never questioned.
72
A criticism of the Neil Ferguson model;
https://lockdownsceptics.org/second-analysis-of-fergusons-model/
21
And whatever happened to the concept of GIGO (garbage in, garbage out)?
32
Also known as
“Garbage in – Gospel out”
Which, in some cases, seems to have progressed to
“Garbage in – God out”
00
The modelling is reasonably accurate. That is why Melbourne went into the second lockdown. The first day of the second Melbourne lockdown was 9 July.
It typically takes 5 days from infection to symptoms if they are going to develop and by day 10 the host is either in recovery or getting seriously ill.
There is also a delay in getting test results. That ranges from 12 hours for a hospital our 5 days for some of the field testing. There are quick tests of 2 to 3 hours in hospitals but there are limited numbers of those kits in Melbourne.
All that adds up to a 10 to 12 day lag between a quarantine action and the response. So the reported numbers in Melbourne should be definitely declining from 19 to 21 July in response to the 9 July lockdown. Yesterday was promising but maybe a bit early for a decline in numbers. By the end of next week it will be clear that the second lockdown has been effective.
Vocal gatherings are the major cause of spread. Choirs in the UK have been found to cause rapid spread among participants. Loud voices from people in close contact. Don’t get into a load argument or attend boisterous family gatherings and social outings.
Nearly all the early hospitalisations in the current surge in Victoria were from a particular group that celebrated E a-F in late May. Interestingly they were mostly new Australians but their country of origin varied.
The other observation that can be made is that communities have a threshold where individuals take it upon themselves to self-quarantine. That is apparent in Sweden now and parts of the USA. When deaths reach around 500 per million of population, there are enough individuals who have had some experience with the virus to move the population to keep separated; fundamentally stop partying (boisterous gatherings). That death rate for CV19 corresponds with about 5% of the population having the virus. I guess that could be considered the required level of infection with a deadly virus in an intelligent but privileged population to achieve herd immunity. Less priviledged and very intelligent populations like Taiwan achieved herd immunity with near zero infections.
Every serious outbreak around the world can be related to large gatherings. The current situation in the USA stems from BLM protests as well as Memorial Day and Independence Day celebrations. All those States that considered it only a thing in New York and neighbouring States are now getting the experience. Using refrigerated trucks to store bodies appears to be the threshold in the USA that sobers enough of the population to avoid hosting the virus. Interestingly New York is now closing borders with all those badly infected States after infecting them.
One of my sons is now in the thick of it in a Melbourne hospital. Anyone who has a chat with him for a few minutes would be doing all they could to avoid the virus. This is a NASTY infection. And if you think you are bullet proof spare a thought for all those young professionals who have spent years in training to provide medical care to those who need it. On the positive side COVID wards present an opportunity for young medical professions because the old ones literally avoid those wards like the plague.
50
Just saw a pointer to this
https://medium.com/@vernunftundrichtigkeit
FWIW
11
Another “could”
“Simple Addition to Crops Could Help Soak Up 2 Billion Tonnes of CO2 Each Year ”
https://www.sciencealert.com/a-sprinkling-of-rock-dust-could-help-crops-soak-up-billions-of-tonnes-of-extra-co2
20
Turning silicates into bicarbonates with dilute concentrations at ambient temperature?
And how stable would those bicarbonates be (if formed)?
This idea (ground up rock dust) has been around for years as a means of supplying trace elements to soil. Fully endorsed as GREEN but there is some truth in it. You can buy packets of Magic Dust** to apply to your plant pots on the patio.
**NOT the actual trade name but the claims….
10
There is a battle raging in Narrabri over coal seam gas.
https://www.echo.net.au/2020/07/are-the-nsw-planning-department-doing-their-job-over-csg/
10
From what I understand, the coal seams supplying the gas are 450 – 900 metres deep. I seriously doubt whether any of the locals are extracting groundwater from those depths.
40
Which is probably why the authorities gave it the nod.
10
However, “gases” are often contained in bore water extracted, why would hydraulic fracturing cause anything different to what takes place naturally?
20
Here is the argument from the other side, are they telling fibs?
https://www.lockthegate.org.au/csg_around_narrabri
21
Triangular signage and other extreme Greens ID.
31
The Lock the Gate Alliance is an incorporated Australian community action group which was formed in 2010 in response to the expansion of the coal mining and coal seam gas industries,[1] which were encroaching on agricultural land, rural communities and environmentally sensitive areas. The organisation has initially focused on responding to developments in the states of Queensland and New South Wales, through peaceful protest and noncooperation. Lock the Gate Alliance’s stated mission is “to protect Australia’s natural, environmental, cultural and agricultural resources from inappropriate mining and to educate and empower all Australians to demand sustainable solutions to food and energy production.” The Alliance claims to have over 40,000 members and 250 local groups constitute the alliance including farmers, traditional custodians, conservationists and urban residents.[2] The organisation was incorporated in 2011 in New South Wales and became a registered company, limited by guarantee on 6 March 2012. The inaugural AGM was held in Murwillumbah[3] on 11 June 2011 at which Drew Hutton was elected president.[4] Another notable member is Dayne Pratzky, whose activism became the subject of the 2015 documentary film, Frackman.
On 21 June 2017, Drew Hutton announced his resignation as the president of the Lock the Gate Alliance via Facebook. In the post Hutton noted that he “made this decision with great sadness but I have serious, chronic health issues that simply won’t allow me to do what is needed in such a position.” Hundreds of tributes to his work and dedication followed this announcement.
Lock the Gate’s supporter base includes notable individuals from across the political spectrum, including former Greens party leader Bob Brown and conservative 2GB radio personality, Alan Jones.[5] Despite the diverse political backgrounds and regional distribution of its member base, the Lock the Gate Alliance’s opponents have labelled them a “green” group and suggested that their membership is urban and anti-development. In 2015 an editorial in Queensland’s Courier Mail said of the group: “The mindless demonisation of industries that offer the chance to ensure the continuing prosperity of Queensland – and therefore Queenslanders – does nobody any favours.”[6] The organisation features in the media regularly and lobbies government for stronger protections for productive agricultural land, groundwater resources and catchment areas.[7]
The organisation claimed several successes in 2014, including the cancellation of 35 million hectares of gas license applications, the extension of a moratorium on drilling in the state of Victoria, the declaration of 280 mining-free communities across Australia and the perpetuation of the water trigger requirement in Federal environmental approvals under the EPBC Act. The alliance supported campaigners in Bentley (NSW), Broome (WA), Gloucester (NSW), Seaspray (VIC), Maules Creek (NSW), Borroloola (NT), Narribri (NSW) and Tara (QLD).[8]
Wikipedia
10
Elgordo when You get to the CO2 emissions bit it gives the ulterior motive away as to what it’s all about .
20
Yeah, its a big mistake mixing memes, they lose credibility on the science.
10
It’s all in the semantics el gordo. One of the key statements is the one below:
I’m sure Santos doesn’t anticipate leakage from the precious surface alluvials hundreds of metres to the coal seams below, but the consultant hydrologists who prepared the reports were probably not willing to guarantee that it would not happen – a business survival decision. There may be a drip-drip leakage through an unknown fracture system located kilometres away that is impossible to deny but would in no way affect the precious surface alluvials. It’s all about how the question is posed – the worst way being “can you guarantee that…”.
Those 4 words and the lawyers that take advantage of them will be the ruination of orderly development.
20
Santos have put out this fact sheet and its very impressive, I have no objection to the project going ahead.
https://narrabrigasproject.com.au/ask-us/
00
Santos won’t be in a hurry to get on with the job.
‘Santos has become the latest Australian oil and gas producer to take heavy write-downs on the value of its assets as coronavirus guts energy demand.’ SMH
00
https://www.sciencealert.com/a-sprinkling-of-rock-dust-could-help-crops-soak-up-billions-of-tonnes-of-extra-co2
Not being from Missouri but “Show me”
Bring on the dust storms – we ought to be able to measure and praise them?
No doubt sand, being somewhat bigger rock dust, will work?
How much CO2 got sunk during the US “Dust Bowl”?
20
ALP Revolt over Climate Goals
Senator Warns Labor may never Win An Election Without a Moderate Position on Climate Goals.
The Weekend Australian – July 18-19,2020
I have warned my local member that Greens Policies are toxic for Labor. Maybe they are starting to listen.
How would it be if the ALP turned about face and dumped all Green Climate policies? That would put the Coalition in a very awkward position.
90
I think that they have already done a “claytons” backdown, designed to appease all but achieve very little apart from election votes.
If we look at the announcement, the definition of net zero emissions is:
The key term is carbon offsetting – they can happily do as the ACT Govt and Sydney City Council have done and pay to support some form of renewables somewhere on the planet and claim to be compliant.
The statement on no taxpayer funding of new coal power does not preclude private investors doing so.
50
This article was in last week’s “The Courier Mail”. Does not say who, how, when, where, etc, the ‘study’ was done. Could easily have been made up by a bored journalist sitting at a desk. Typical of the type of tripe dished out by the media. It’s the sort of the thing that screams out to be torn to shreds but won’t be. Just passes to the keeper, (people), as great information from the “scientists”.
“MELT SPEEDS UP
SIMPLY applying the brakes on your car is contributing to the melting of the polar ice cap, according to a study.
Microplastic particles shed by tyres and brakes are swept by winds to remote areas including the Arctic where they darken the surface and hasten the melting of ice.
About 48,000 tonnes of these particles end up in snow and ice-covered areas each year, scientists calculated.
Previous research estimated that the world’s vehicles shed six million tonnes of particles annually from their tyres and 500,000 tonnes from brakes.”
Wow. Sell your car and save the planet even if it’s an EV.
51
This is always a concern, the melting of ‘the polar ice cap’.
If it’s the North Pole, so what? It’s sea ice and comes back in winter. It would be great if it was missing for half of the year. Trade would boom. Polar bears sit out the summer on dirt anyway and there’s no dirt at the North Pole.
If it’s Antractica, how did these particles from tyres and brakes get to the other side of the planet? Only 2% of all people live in the bottom third of the planet and the ‘ice cap’ is 3.5km thick at -50C.
And snow and ice covered areas in winter means all of 1/3 of the top third planet, from Canada, America, Europe to Siberia, China and Japan. Most of it melts in summer anyway and gets washed into the vast oceans.
500,000 tonnes sounds a lot. Consider it is spread over the 500Million square miles of the planet. That’s a massive 1 kg per square mile>, less then one milligram per square meter. Most of it over water or washed to sea. And this terrible 0.001gm is iron and copper oxides. Hardly pollution, iron and copper? Except for the graphite which is really deadly and becomes aerial pollutant CO2.
You are right. It’s an utterly useless article.
60
Meanwhile, back at the Yangtse, just below 3 Gorges, where America has its production of medications made, they are all getting very very nervous. The ‘Damn’ wall was not anchored to the bedrock, and was previously said to be designed for a 1 in 1000 but has now been downgraded to a 1 in 100 flood. The problem is, it is now facing a 1 in 200 flood, so it is not looking too rosy. The wall is said to have moved and there is one hell of a lot of people downstream – maybe hundreds of millions. Just imagine the chaos that would be unleashed if the wall failed?
Jo might know the answer to this question: does Australia get all their medications from there? If so we might be in the same ‘barbwire canoe’as the States and being flooded with refugees with no medication.
50
Really? I find that surprising. If the wall has moved it should have already given way so I am skeptical about that also.
30
So how did our Variable Renewable Energy (VRE) producers do during June 2020. These are the ones that are reported in the AEMO’s SCADA database. Their performance is summarised by converting dispatchable outputs in MW on 15 minute intervals to MWh for the month.
:
Solar – Nameplate 3,820 MW
Output: 370,044 MWh at 13.5% capacity factor
:
Wind – Nameplate 7,725 MW
Output: 1,494,208 MWh at 26.9% capacity factor
:
And for comparison:
:
Bayswater Power Station – Nameplate 2640 MW
Output: 1,520,939 MWh at 80% capacity factor
81
Another interesting article . . . . .
https://srsroccoreport.com/the-green-electric-car-myth-772-pounds-of-petro-chemical-plastics-in-each-vehicle/
31
Global cooling has commenced in the Northern Hemisphere.
https://notrickszone.com/2020/07/18/ncep-analysis-northern-hemisphere-surface-temperature-falls-1c-since-february/
By year’s end La Nina should be operational and world temperatures fall a little more.
70
EG:
No problem. The IPCC** will just just dust off all those warnings from the 1970’s about the Coming Ice Age.
** International Pedlars of Coming Catastrophe (trademark applied for).
50
I failed to mention that temperatures are falling much faster in the Southern Hemisphere.
What are the mechanisms involved?
00
Its not showing up in the UAH.
https://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_June_2020_v6.jpg
00
I stand corrected, there was a plunge in March.
https://electroverse.net/earths-temperature-plunged-in-march/
00
A negative North Atlantic Oscillation is indicative of a quiet sun.
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/pna/nao_index.html
00
The Hepburn Wind Farm cooperative has their latest annual report online. They seem to be the only intermittent producer that publishes an annual report to the public. Does anyone care to analyse it?
In the year being reported they actually seem to make more money from electricity sales than imaginary “renewable energy credits”. They have earned more from REC’s in the past.
https://www.hepburnwind.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/HW-Annual-Report-2019_Print.pdf
51
“We thank all members for their support and patience during our first seven years of operations during which we were unable to provide a dividend.In particular we thank the 100 members who opted to reinvest their dividend into the wind farm and the 13 members who donated their dividend to the Community Fund.”
Now read A Message From The Board and Performance Highlights.
Note that each wind turbine operated attracts $500K a year taxpayer/government subsidy.
What a poor investment that business appears to be reading the Report.
50
Has anybody looked at the wind farm return compared to older reports?
00
ARENA, Australian Renewable Energy Agency are advocating for a “grey market” for imported, second-hand, Electric Vehicles.
Car dealers are warning that easing restrictions on imports would put consumers at risk, given that importers do not have the same legal requirements as car dealers, noting the recalls like Takata Airbag scandal.
So what is the advantage of EV in Australia? If it’s emissions reduction please explain how when around 80 per cent of electricity here in Australia is generated by coal or gas fuelled power stations? less than, up to, subject to intermittent operation, 10 per cent from wind and solar and the remainder from hydro or diesel/petrol engine generators.
Furthermore, I understand that burning liquid fossil fuel in an internal combustion engine is far more fuel efficient than burning coal or gas to produce steam to drive a steam turbine operated generator in a power station.
60
Funny that most, if not all, the vehicles with the defective airbags were sold through dealers not grey market importers. What was their point again?
21
Yes, sold through dealers and recalled for replacement via dealers.
Grey imports are not supported by a manufacturer dealers network.
Having owned a grey import 4WD I can vouch for the fact that at least one manufacturer’s Australian operation will not assist grey import owners.
20
Ok, so if you import a grey market vehicle you assume the risk of it. I guess that would be an issue between the owner and their insurance company. Consumers should have the option at their risk but with the benefit of a greatly reduced cost.
11
Risks? Like condition of a battery pack from a very cold winter or very hot summer country, no record of rapid charging history and other battery life shortening factors.
Like no dealer/manufacturer support for software and/or hardware computer faults or failure.
No guarantee of distance driven by original owner or owners.
Cheap grey import in my experience is not always cheap in the future driving period.
30
There are already independent shops looking after the battery pack side. Doesnt fix other issues or provide the product tracking the stealerships provide though.
10
And grey market vehicles still have to conform to the same design regulations as other cars on the road.
11
I’m mystified….what’s grey import?
20
Grey Import is …
https://www.carsguide.com.au/car-reviews/buying-a-grey-import-13435
10
A vehicle that is sold by a seller who doesn’t have specific permission from the vehicle manufacturer to sell that vehicle in Australia. Also called “parallel imports”.
The ACCC website has a good article on this: https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/sales-delivery/buying-parallel-imports
10
No brands, no pack drill.
In my experience “parallel importing” is common in machinery for parts. I get excellent service from a couple of such. One of those if you have a part number even the office girl can tell you if they have it or can get it from overseas. If it isn’t too large and you want it from overseas and have ordered by 10 am Monday they’ll have it next Tuesday (with a couple of reservations). And I’ve gotten some pretty obscure parts that way.
Parts for an older Alfa Romeo seemed to come with a choice of “genuine or non-genuine” – I’d reckon out of the same factory in Italy.
Another brand makes their own problem – there are plenty of parts for your new machine but once it is older than 5 years the Australian distributor does not replace stock – has to come from overseas.
30
Can be a new or used car built for other countries but imported into OZ .
20
Sometimes EV provide too many emissions …
https://twitter.com/i/status/1284168363154067459
30
Earlier this morning whilst flicking over a few radio stations I came across an Ian Macnamara (ABC) agreeing with a certain “Alex” (I think he said he was in or near Canberra) agreeing with each other that more Australian infrastructure was needed in wind farms and solar farms. Another sellout?
40
I think Macca was better when there was more music and less McNamara
40
Give him a break! He’d be out of a job if he didn’t toe the “party” line.
I was listening to a local ABC radio station last Friday and a dear lady phoned in to pose the question, “Why are we doing all this lockdown stuff when we never did it before in previous pandemics?”
Quick as a flash the young male presenter countered with, “Yes they did in 1919. And anyway do you obey the rules about social distancing etc.”
The deflection was instantaneous and he never let her counter with a reply about previous non-lockdowns before ending her conversation.
He would have been terminated if he had allowed a debate on that topic. (or for the people of faith, – excommunicated from the Holy Church of Australians Broadcasting Communism)
31
Way back when I was a kangaroo harvester the vehicle radio was stuck on ABC so I heard a lot of Steve Austin. And marveled at how he still had a job with the things he got to touch on.
Eventually worked out that he would raise a subject on the party line and depended on someone to phone with the other side to get the discussion going.
Sign of the times – now none of the radio’s are on “Their ABC”
10
A new species of animal was discovered that burrows into rock and is found only over a tiny stretch of river in the Philippines.
https://youtu.be/4crB-YKYbdo
11
Victoriastanis will now be required to wear face masks from Wednesday.
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/coronavirus/close-contacts-of-confirmed-coronavirus-cases-in-victoria-are-falling-through-the-cracks/news-story/380bd6eda9cf34254bc05428a9b6b55e
21
I found out that a face mask could be worn for a couple of outings before cleaning unless the wearer comes in close contact with virus, as in visiting a hospital or being in crowded places.
To clean place in a washing machine with other laundry and hang outside to dry if possible, or rinse in bleach-water. Another method is to spray with Glenn 20 disinfectant holding spray can 20mm from mask for several seconds to dampen the material and then hang out to dry.
I thought carrying a can of Glenn 20 when outside home would be a good idea?
31
We are headed down that road.
https://www.henrymakow.com/2020/07/when-do-we-stand-our-ground.html
If only we had brought in more Serbians!
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53353854
00
our maybe just Melbournstanis and Mitchellstanis
00
Knee jerk reactions from clueless politicians who seem to think ‘gee that didn’t work,let’s try something else’. Andrews government will not admit they stuffed up and were more concerned about their union mates and allowing a socialist rally.
From what I have read in the published research, cloth face masks are less than useless when handled properly and even worse in spreading disease when not handled correctly. Even the WHO and Dr Fauci said they were next to useless a few months ago and were not necessary.
Maybe Andrews can have compulsory certification of the handing of face masks for the public as his next move.
10
Latest Pointman
https://thepointman.wordpress.com/2020/07/18/regaining-your-life-inch-by-inch/
10
I wanted to point out one of the solar ideas which surfaced in the 1970s in the OPEC oil crisis 1973. Oil was running out. An ice age was starting. Vietnam was still a war zone.
There were many good ideas. Some fantastic. The best of these, in my opinion, was solar using floating ammonia refrigerators which worked on the difference in temperature of the deep ocean to the surface, a huge solar collector covering many square miles. It worked. Prototypes were built. Each one would produce like a windmill , a megawatt or two and their energy source did not suffer rapid fluctuations. They could have been mass produced and anchored along the coast.
In fact the only problem found was that the sea life loved them. Seals would park on them. Molluscs would clog the intakes and outlets, feeding on the krill. The real problem was the attack of the environment on the power station. That could have been solved, perhaps with copper clad intakes as with the hull of the Cutty Sark. It was done for speed but they found the hull never needed cleaning.
And the best idea since then, one that the Chinese have adopted is to build UHVDC towers, a single wire at over a million volts and DC. No current much, so little loss over thousands of kilometers. What has been built is very lossy, making a National grid a joke. I would guess that half the power is lost in transmission anyway. All that money to build a really st*pid idea for Malcolm Turnbull’s many $billion Snowy II when we could have put in a truly national and incredibly robust and simpler grid which would have connected the country. And because it is DC not AC, cannot drop out because one windmill has a problem.
So in the end, Edison won over Tesla. DC distribution is the answer to long range. To be fair, the semiconductor rectifiers are billion dollar investments but they cost nothing to run, unlike Malcolm’s utterly useless waste of our money. I wonder if he will get a statue?
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Those systems that exploited ocean temperature differences with depth were called OTEC. Wikipedia has a good article on them. I doubt they could compete with coal or nuclear but they’d be probably cheaper and less visually polluting than solar or wind and are capable of generating a constant power output therefore they would be preferable to solar and wind but not coal or nuclear.
The climate catastrophists wouldn’t like them though because they would want energy generation to be ugly and “in your face” just to give us a daily reminder of the misery and high cost of unreliable energy generation and the control it gives the Left over our lives.
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My fascination with this is that you can collect huge solar power from a massive catchment area without taking up real estate. Otherwise solar is a very poor source of power. The total solar power falling on Victoria might satisfy our energy needs but only if we cover the state in solar panels. And then where would we live?
As a source and store of vast power, the sea is untapped. Like those systems in Britain where they lay pipes in the earth and collect low grade heat. At 3 metres down, it is always 12C. That’s why in Colorado all the plumbing is far underground and the houses have basements. In the coldest winters and hottest summers you always have the basement, plumbing, electricity. The first thing you do when you build a house is dig a big hole. It creates very big houses with massive storage, not like Calofornia bungalows as in Australia.
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I note they now use the same pipes for dumping heat in summer when cooling.
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Now red thumbing a statement about pipes dumping heat in summer shows the illiterate nature of some of the visitors. It’s nice to know this blog and the police are keeping them off the streets.
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that is rather curious, I wonder sometimes if its automated and it just red thumbs keywords or particular people
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Not necessarily, certain people still seem to get a Green Thumb despite quite ludicrous ideas.
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Red thumbs ..
Many users on iPads or tablets will flick the pages up with a finger on the screen.
Its easy to accidentlally “thumb” Red or Green , without intention or even knowing.
Personally i suggest you ignor all such “rating” indicators.
If anyone has a serious objectio, they will post a comment.
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Re “That’s why in Colorado all the plumbing is far underground ”
Some things I’ve met in that field.
One Colorado university with lots of lawns has the maintenance crew blow the water out of the spray lines with air compressors each autumn.
Friends with a mountain cabin have to add antifreeze to the toilet bowls as part of winter maintenance.
Around Calgary one February conference a long time ago
Usually it gets cold, a layer of ice forms , then it snows and snow is a good insulator. That year it got cold without snow. One ranch had to blow 4 feet of ice to get to 18 inches of running water for their feedlot. And towns around had the entire water/sewerage systems frozen.
There is a poster on one blog who signs in as “North of 60” who has to dig stock water pipelines in to 8 feet. I’d like to know how you find leaks.
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Using the latest HVDC transmission lines as indicators for long-distance losses, and the figures provided by ETSAP for HVDC losses, I believe that the losses for the proposed transmission cable from NT to Singapore would have been around 3%.
30
Notice how the mega rich Elites who tell scary stories about sea level rise all live near the sea?
Australia – Flannery, KRudd and Turnbull.
USA – Obama, Gore, Gates.
I’m sure there are many more. Feel free to add to the list.
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how far above sea level do they live?
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Well below the Sydney Opera House that Tom Foolery claimed would be underwater by Year 2000.
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actually that is factually incorrect.
01
It is not the elevation that matters but the proximity to water and what the house sits on. K Rudd’s place is lower than the places being lost in NSW at the moment.
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Flannery has a house on the beach in an island in the Hawkesbury. One of Al Gore’s many places is on the pier at San Francisco. Obama’s $US14m place has absolute beach frontage at Martha’s Vinyard and a nice walkway to the beach, though possibly slightly uphill.
Gates is a different person. Unlike the others he is not after power or money. He is trying to spend his vast fortune to help people and do things only he can do. He can be wrong like anyone else but he has changed the world for the better. However he is a bit head nerd and easily led astray by alleged experts, like anyone else. And Melissa gave $100Million to WHO. She means well. And he was absolutely right that the next big problem for mankind would be a pandemic. Even lifelong virus ‘experts’ disagree on what to do.
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consider this a moral challenge. None of those houses will be under water in any projections in the lifetime of the current occupants. Imagine the press if they sell these houses knowing that the next occupants will be burdened with rising sea levels. How could they hold the moral high ground? Ergo, they cannot sell.
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I’ve just finished reading an interesting article from The Daily Signal, where two of their researchers in conjunction with other researchers have come up with a very interesting chart, and even I understand that statistics can mean whatever the writer wants them to mean, but just one sentence in the whole article made me take notice.
Okay, there are 3100+ Counties in the U.S. spread across all of the States.
Just 30 of those Counties account for nearly one-third of all the coronavirus cases in the U.S. and 49% of all deaths, much greater than their 16% share of the U.S. population. That is, just 1% of the counties in the U.S., representing 16% of the U.S. population, are responsible for approximately half of the country’s COVID-19 deaths.
It’s a relatively bland collation of numbers, but just one line stood out for me, the following.
Perhaps New York itself is the super spreader.
This is the link to that article – Two-Thirds of COVID-19 Deaths in US Occurred in 10 States
Tony.
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I think that might be dated data. Most of the new cases are in the southern, south western and west:
http://91-divoc.com/pages/covid-visualization/?chart=states&highlight=Arizona&show=10&y=both&scale=linear&data=cases-daily-7&data-source=merged&xaxis=right#states
Top 10 States by number of cases averaged over last week:
Florida
Texas
California
Georgia
Arizona
Louisiana
Tennessee
North Carolina
Alabama
South Carolina
Florida alone is getting more cases each day than Australia has in total. US is just starting to see the death rate rise following the rapid increase in cases. Most of the states listed have ordered refrigerated trucks as morgues fill. Florida already has extra refrigerated storage in anticipation of hurricane causalities.
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Having driven from Washington D.C. to New York, I was amazed at the unrelenting density of the population.
Adding a probable above average age population and boom.
00
8 of those counties are headquarters, broadcasting sites, and residences for 100% of our public media.
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I’m not surprised at all by those numbers, I live 15 from the city and virtually all train lines or major hwy to or from east coast cities have major corridors of high density population along their length. Only in the central and western states do you have large breaks in population centers as you move around. The virus is in all states at some level, They don’t need ny to feed them shedders. You just need to reach a certain threshold to spark the explosive growth in a highly populated area, and your off to the races. NY and NJ are all still wearing masks in public places, stores and malls, and all follow the rule with few exceptions. It’s been over 2 wks since indoor dining at 50% level, and shopping malls have opened. Most people refuse to sit inside when eating, majority are outside. Most coprorate offices are closed, people working from home, with no intention of returning before min Sept 1st.
So far, NY and NJ, who have roughly 2 % of population listed as Corona Virus cases, have not seen any appreciable increase in new cases since relaxing the restrictions, that includes making it through the 4th of July holiday. Still masks required in any public place.
At one point they allowed bars to offer alcoholic drinks if you ordered take-out food…..thus invented the $15.00 dry Martini with the 25 cent bag of potato chips “To Go”….that has ended
I suspect eventually all heavily populated states will see the same fate. Maybe that 2% level takes out enough “spreaders” along with distancing and masks, to make the infection rate livable…if there is such a thing.
00
In line with Chiefio lectures on replacement of expensive items (maybe)
“Here’s the latest one: a new sodium-graphite sandwich, apparently. Promises to be as good as lithium batteries but without the lithium. Catch this sighting before it too disappears:
https://www.rt.com/news/495111-sodium-sandwich-replace-lithium-batteries/”
From https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/17/open-thread-weekend-23/#comment-3036969
WUWT moving shop and the warnings that this thread may not
00
“I have a Interesting thought on the whole vaccine thing. Im not a ant vaxer by the way, just feel proper precautions and testing should be adhered to like anything else.
A lot of these people who are going to trip on themselves trying to be the first to get that vaccine are the same people who tell us farmers that biotech seeds and some of the herbicides and insecticides are unsafe even though they went through multiple years of testing and trials before they released it for sale. More years of trials then what im guaranteeing any vaccine will be. But yet we’re wrong on how we’re using science after long trials, while its ok to ramrod a vaccine through in a short period of time not knowing the long term effects. Makes me shake my head sometimes. At least with what we do if it proves harmful they pull the license and we can no longer use it. Once the injection takes place, you’re stuck with it. Side effects or not. No getting rid of it if found with adverse side effects.”
https://www.redpowermagazine.com/forums/topic/131937-here-i-go-thinking-again-dale/?tab=comments#comment-1450770
I also saw a mention that the “chippers” could do that via the injection Might slow things down as I doubt you’d want your chip to be around a failure – might be a bit hard to retrieve them en masse
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Also another comment points out that canola oil passes muster on green diets even though it is the result of Canadian GM to get rid of the poison.
Another verse for the “Hymn of the Age of Hypocritical”
10
Link to that
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapeseed
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The Peer Review process is nominally a good system.
Unfortunately, like all good systems it is capable of corrosion by parties putting self interest above what should be the guiding principle of all societies: Ethics.
Ethics was once the guide for action and behaviour but has declined in value as people found short cuts, work arounds, and ways to circumvent scrutiny.
Sadly, the peer review system needs replacing, true, but more importantly society needs a Solid Guiding Light that goes back to re-present the Best of Ethical behaviour that every citizen should abide by and demand of the rest of the group.
KK
11
anything can be subverted with a little effort and enough people look the other way
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And the list grows …
At Retraction Watch the list of papers linked to COVID-19 grows, with 25 Retracted papers, 3 ‘Temporarily retracted’ papers, and a paper listed as ‘Expressions of concern’.
See it all at https://retractionwatch.com/retracted-coronavirus-covid-19-papers/
30
It’s disappointing to see Victoria’s new cases up dramatically again at 381 for today. Still lower than two days ago, but the variation is huge.
Saturdays seem to be a quiet day with lower counts.
Having closed down a few specific suburbs and tested everyone, you expect big numbers
from a rapid virus location operation. This also restarts the tracing given that it was completely lost as the returning people were allowed to do
as they pleased in lockup, destroying the whole logic of letting them into the country. Many Ruby Princesses.
Now there are whole family groups and extended family groups but with the end of testing they can
start to pull the numbers down again. And a lot of infected doctors and nurses this time.
Whoever is advising Daniel Andrews medically is right. We need elimination and it is possible.
But the private sweetheart deals he does are the core problem. An Abattoir which should have been closed and actually doubled its workforce.
A donor to the Labor party. The people he had to mind and didn’t because contracts were allocated without tender or supervision.
And Comrade Andrews really doesn’t care, except that it makes him look totally useless.
Andrews promised Victorians that not finishing a critical tunnel road would cost nothing, not the paper it was written on.
It costs us $1.2Billion. Typical. Plus the loss of $2.5Bn of Federal assistance. And we really need that road.
He even had part of the perfectly boring 1970s freeway in the area classified as of historic value so it could not be removed if he lost power.
Which is really absurd. And who doesn’t need a mass march in the city in the middle of a pandemic lockdown for everyone else?
Everything is hushed up.
And he forced Hazelwood to close by tripling the price of coal. Why triple the price of coal if it means they stop buying coal. Or is that
a silly question? It’s always about pleasing the Green voters and buying votes from the migrant communities. So many scandals and abuses.
One minister using government cars to run his dogs around. But he doesn’t care.
Worse, the opposition is so ineffectual you wonder why they bother turning up. We have no government. And the money flows like a river
out of Spring street.
So Victoria is now worse than the whole of Australia was three months ago and we all have to lock down with masks. Thanks Comrade Andrews.
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Rick, the price of coal was not tripled.
The State Royalty was increased, which infact just brought it up to the same level as NSW..
20
Coal is free. Hazelwood mined its own coal. The State Royalty is the only price for minerals.
And this is brown coal, 66% water which makes is 3x the price of black anthracite.
Which entirely misses my point that the owners of Hazelwood were decided whether to close and they had 20 years to go on their lease.
They had spent more than a billion on the plant after paying the Victorian government for it.
So we, the people, lost the coal income and the biggest coal power plant in the state, a power station which was running at 98% when closed.
Why?
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TdF..
Coal may be free, so is Gas and Oil,..but to get it out of the ground and to the power plant costs $$$s…approx $15 – $30 per ton , depending on which pit. !
from the official statement..
So they increased the Royalty by 20c/GJ..
With approx 20 GJ/tonne of coal, that suggests the cost of coal to the power plant INCREASED by $4.0 /Tonne
And with approx’ 8 GJ per MWh of electricity that represents a $1.6 per MWh INCREASE !
Or,.. approx a 2.5% increase on their total power production cost.
So, whilst they may have used the Royalty increase as an EXCUSE to shut Hazelwood, it was not the real reason .
00
Maybe kowtowing to his bosses overseas is the real reason Hazelwood was closed and then destroyed? After all, they have plenty of subsidised solar panels and windmills to sell to us.
20
Victorian’s now compelled to wear masks in public. $200 fine for not complying. As mentioned earlier Vernon Coleman.com has an interesting transcript on the wearing of masks, not to mention many other topics. He Definitely doesn’t hold back his own views. Jo,I’m curious to know, when G.O’S 1984 Ministry of Truth takes effect, how do we find you. This blog is my daily go to site. Be encouraged with your excellent work. I’ll buy a Box of chocolates.
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just wear a mask , stop the infection and quit the faux objections.
To paraphrase a comparison made elsewhere – imagine if during the London blitz a bunch of people said, “stop stepping on my rights, I’m not blocking my window or turning out my lights”.
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Totally agree with you there GeeAye. Just handle the clean mask with clean hands and get on with it while in public! I am fed up with reading all the concocted outrage about masks, pathetic. Just do it! For most, except health professionals, it should mean only short periods one needs to be masked.
30
The attitude of some seems to be that the government is having their way and this is a bad thing, with no further depth of thought than that. Another way of looking at it, and this is hard for some to accept, is that the government is an organisation set up by the people with one role to take actions that achieve a goal for all people (hence the war analogy).
Beating the virus can only be achieved by community lead action and government is part of the community response. If individuals don’t want to be part of the community then the community has the choice of putting up with the effects of individuals doing things to the detriment of all, or stopping them from doing those things. A $200 fine is hardly a disproportionate response by the goevernment and is supported by the community. I’m actually not sure that it is enough of a deterrent.
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The fine is proportionate, littering has a penalty of $250.
00
some littering a lot more but so are some breaches of covid related regs
10
I like your war analogy, we must keep in mind that the virus came out of the Wuhan lab.
Morrison is doing well in the polls, a pair of steady hands in a universal crisis.
00
why should we keep that in mind when we are trying to stop transmission in another country?
TO use the war analogy, you keep your lights off at night to confuse the bomber no mater where they took off from.
20
Its guerrilla warfare, we have to mop up the clusters and eliminate the virus in every nook and cranny, tie up with NZ and become a Covid free zone.
The outcome of the investigation into the origin of the virus may have profound long term implications for international relations.
00
This is a good one.
‘I asked my doctor when this virus will end? He said: ” How should I know, I’m not a politician”‘
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when you mix science and politics together, the final result is politics.
40
Melatonin Inhibits COVID-19-induced Cytokine Storm by Reversing Aerobic Glycolysis in Immune Cells: A Mechanistic Analysis
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7211589/
20
Dave, Brilliant. Thank you!
Gee Aye, Annie, Agree. Agree.
The left is wrong on a lot of things, but they are not a truth-finding beacon. They accidentally get things right sometimes, like stopped clocks and all. We cannot understand the world by watching leftists and picking the opposite.
We decide masks based on observations — not on which side of politics wants them to work.
I was cynical about masks til I read the papers.
http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/masks-can-stop-maybe-75-of-influenza-and-you-can-make-them/
http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/cheap-ways-to-starve-a-virus-masks-reduce-spread-by-70-distance-by-80/
Sigh. Thanks SpringDam, Vernon is another task to explain. I can only fix one thing at a time. Hope I get time.
50
I fail to see why you bring in wing based politics. This is a weird obsession that seems to be promulgating the blog’s proclaimed theme of “A perfectly good civilization is going to waste…”
01
In these days of gloom and doom here is some feel good video, a series that are worth watching, pick and chose your episodes or watch them all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6cSZ_6AGGw
It is Twenty-five years since I lived on my ketch in Hastings Victoria. A life style I miss really badly in these days of lock-down.
00
This may be the answer to a frequently asked question
“Why do Victorians keep voting for Daniel Andrews?”
https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/20/why-do-victorians-keep-voting-for-daniel-andrews/
00
Princess Anne is with us on climate change, she must be only independent thinker amongst that lot.
https://www.thegwpf.com/princess-anne-blasts-prince-charless-views-on-climate-change-and-veganism/
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Never met either of them, but years ago I worked with an Ex-RNZN bloke who’d been involved with Charlie and his sister in Singapore over some weeks. His words “within a week almost the entire crew thought that Anne would make the better (successor to the Queen) and that Charles was a XXXX” **.
**person of limited intelligence but inflated sense of own importance.
40
And “Here’s one for the octogenarians”
https://www.redpowermagazine.com/forums/topic/132025-heres-one-for-the-octogenarians/
00
Its probably just a coincidence, a town close to the origin of those horrid bats has gained international recognition as a place where twins are more commonplace.
https://thediplomat.com/2016/05/a-chinese-town-gets-rich-from-an-unlikely-resource-twins/
00
Premier Gladys is caught between a rock and a hard place.
‘The Premier isn’t focusing on making masks mandatory because the bulk of NSW’s recent transmission has occurred at restaurants and pubs where wearing a mask would be impractical, she told a Sydney radio station.’ SMH
10
Keep up the pace…. Tuesday Unthreaded ?
00
Cool waves are killers, who knew?
https://notrickszone.com/2020/07/20/the-coldest-temperatures-since-the-1960s-responsible-for-a-rapid-rise-in-recent-cold-weather-deaths/
10
Another ECL expected late weekend, nothing unusual for this time of year.
https://www.weatherzone.com.au/news/hints-of-another-low-pressure-system-for-australias-east-coast/532151
00
Japanese push to remove manufacturers from China points to a ‘deep-seated mistrust’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xemp14rVgQM
00
ABC presenters show how ‘limited their world is’ by suggesting shutting meat works
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIlWICpnrCo
00