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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My not-especially-groundbreaking takeaway from this exercise in honing my energy intuitions is that we built our energy infrastructure primarily around hydrocarbons, a technology with a particular set of capabilities and constraints. Hydrocarbons are very energy-dense, easy to move around, and easy to store, which to some extent makes up for the fact that it’s hard to convert them into other types of energy without incurring large losses.
The technology we’ll replace it with will likely not share those particular capabilities: electricity can be converted to different forms of energy with fewer losses, but it’s not as easy to store and move around as hydrocarbons are. Decarbonizing doesn’t just mean building lots of solar power and wind — it probably means completely rethinking how our energy infrastructure works.
https://www.construction-physics.com/p/energy-cheat-sheet?utm_campaign=email-half-post&r=tks73&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
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In short hydrocarbon energy storage is 10x more dense than batteries. And the basis of life on earth all driven by solar power from perfectly natural carbon compounds, specifically carbohydrates, another name for hydrated carbon dioxide.
But now we have to ‘decarbonize’? No. It’s a fantasy from the Greens who would be appalled to realise the green they worship is a long chain hydrocarbon. (Or very rarely an oxide of copper as Malachite or VerdiGreen, the dull Grey green of copper domes.)
I see Greens as people scared of technology, any technology. And so of the industrial revolution which they demand is now reversed. Which would take us back to slavery, destitution and the Dark Ages, literally.
Meanwhile China chases our dreams based on carbon power and nuclear and automation but driven by utterly dictatorial communism in a world scale military dictatorship. The War on the West is well underway. Supported by easily manipulated Greens who demand we ‘decarbonize’ but stay rich. Except that’s not possible.
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I see the Greens as unintellegent, poorly informed, people who blindly follw their leaders.
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Correction in country level energy is being done per comments
The country-level energy consumption vs per capita numbers look off? China almost certainly does not have more per capita energy usage than the US.
And as for the impact of growing renewables on grid (and off grid) uses, I wrote something almost three years ago now but I think is still very relevant
https://www.tsungxu.com/p/clean-energy-transition-guide
Yep, this is an error, I’m away from my computer atm but will correct it as soon as I’m able.
Thanks!
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Clean energy transition? Why is the use of natural solar energy in the form of hydrocarbons now dirty? You are breathing out CO2 at the moment.
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Calling traditional energy sources like coal, gas and nuclear “dirty” is just more propaganda, which the Left are superbly good at.
But they think burning wood or other biomass is OK?
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Johannes Leak in Today’s The Australian Cartoon sums up The Labor Party approach on Nuclear Power
“Nuclear Power – Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid” with Impotence Albo, Brain Damage Chalmers & Hideous Deformities Blackout Bowen – Warning Could Shock You!!
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Nuclear will rise on the rubble of flawed policy … but not before damage is done
Energy ministers, and the uncountable legions of advisers, agencies and advocates responsible for the grid under construction, are inflicting the greatest act of self-harm in our nation’s history.
CHRIS UHLMANN
It’s odds-on the Albanese government will deliver billions more in electricity subsidies some time after the Reserve Bank board meets next February.
Because, if not for the Ponzi scheme of state and federal governments laundering taxpayer dollars back through power bills, electricity prices would be 66 per cent higher.
In the parallel universe of politics the arsonists expect praise when they return with a fire extinguisher. In this world Labor and a long parade of Luddites also furiously attack a remote nuclear future in the hope people won’t focus on the disastrous energy present.
The here and now is where the focus should be sharp because the system under construction will be ruinously expensive and unreliable. The case for nuclear inevitably will rise on the rubble of bad policy, but not before enormous damage is done.
Economist Chris Richardson has calculated the difference between the subsidised and real cost of power from figures hiding in plain sight in the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics consumer price index.
Richardson wrote on X that the politics of surging electricity prices were dire, so the federal government would almost certainly return to the taxpayer till to mask the bill shock.
“But that’s another $3.5bn into the economy for the RBA to juggle,” he wrote. “So they may well keep the RBA guessing … because that’s what makes sense in a game of chicken.”
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Another great article by Chris Uhlmann. A stunning summary with indisputable facts, and an excellent comparison of countries such as China and the U.S. who have good energy policies, and countries such as Germany who are suffering because of their very flawed energy policy. I urge folks in Australia to buy a copy of The Australian this morning and read this article.
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Graeme4,
there are so many good articles in The Australian, that I finally succumbed and have become a The Australian Subscriber – Worth Every Cent & includes WSJ as well
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Then We Have the Brain Dead Idiot TEAL in Mackellar – Zali Sreggall
Nick Cater: ‘Antiquated’ concept of base load power is more relevant to Australia’s energy future than Zali Steggall would have us believe
Australians just need to look at what is powering our grid right now to know why Zali Steggall’s obsession with batteries and lithium is nothing but hot air,
writes Nick Cater – SkyNews.com.au Contributor and Political Commentator
The invention of smartphones allows fewer excuses for ignorance than at any time in human history. Fact-checking political pronouncements has never been so simple, even on technically complicated subjects like climate change and energy.
The AEMO Energy Live app, for example, tells us the source of the electricity we’re using in real-time, as opposed to the type of generators Zali Steggall prefers.
Steggall told Sky News this week that base load power is “an antiquated idea”.
“Our grid is evolving and changing,” she said. “We are now, with smart technology and appliances, able to meet the needs of the grid by turning on and off as required, on demand.
“The old-fashioned concept of base load power is proving to be more and more a thing of the past.”
Steggall may or may not be surprised to learn that at 5.15 am on Friday, 92 per cent of NSW’s electricity was provided by antiquated base load generators. What’s more, they were burning what she calls fossil fuel and the rest of us call coal.
Of the rest, two per cent was generated by gas and hydro. Wind was generating five per cent and solar one percent. Batteries were contributing a big fat zero.
This is certainly not a picture of a grid evolving and changing at a pace visible to the naked eye.
This is the real world, which MPs like Steggall are prepared to ignore.
Base load power cannot be imagined away, and if Steggall wants us to stop burning coal and gas, nuclear energy is the only energy source capable of holding up the grid.
In the interests of full disclosure, Steggall would, I’m sure, want us to put on the record that her 2022 election campaign received funding from Climate 200, led by Simon Holmes à Court.
Steggall’s base load denialism must be judged on its own merits by whether it is in harmony with the data. Unfortunately for her, it is not.
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We don’t and can’t control the CO2 levels. 98% of all CO2 we put into the atmosphere gets rapidly absorbed by the sinks, mostly by the ocean. Anthropogenic CO2 is removed from the atmosphere with a half-life of about 10 years:
https://chipstero7.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/9d896-donkeyland.png
90,000 measurements of CO2 levels compiled by Georg Beck show a very different history of CO2 levels. So does Stomata data. The ice-core shows CO2 levels below 280ppmv but has been shown to consistently underestimate paleo levels:
https://chipstero7.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/5fb43-main-qimg-0b5b17574244ade3b5fe9b1aa71d78d52b252812529.png
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C14 levels look sort of OK but the lower graph of atmospheric CO2 is bizarre.
Who is this George Beck?
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https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/09/23/obituary-ernst-george-beck/
https://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/beck_data.html
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Quite right Richard.
A minor point.
The half life of CO2 is less than 10 years. The IPCC use the word “lifetime” to refer to two different things. Turnover time and adjustment time. This creates a lot of confusion.
The IPCC say, on page 8 of the First Assessment Report, the “turnover time” is “about 4 years”. The turnover time is not the half life. It is the inverse of the proportion of the gas that cycles through the atmosphere each year. The turnover time used by the IPCC can be calculated by dividing the amount of the gas in the atmosphere, at the time the report was published, by the total emissions at that time. In the 6 assessment reports the turnover time they use ranges from 3.5 to 3.9 years.
If the turnover time is 3.9 years, then about 26% of the atmospheric CO2 is cycled out each year.
This would be a half life of a little over 2 years.
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The half life of all CO2 is about 5 years as measured by C14. But all CO2 is not ’emissions’. Emissions are much lower and closer to the water and cycle much faster. The amount of fossil fuel CO2 in the air more than half way through the 20th century in 1958 was only 2.03%+/-0.15%. Today it is still 2.0%. Both are direct measurements. There is only a small amount of fossil fuel CO2 in the air. The increase in CO2 is from the ocean with slight warming, nothing more.
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“There is only a small amount of fossil fuel CO2 in the air.”
I agree completely.
I should have said above that the estimate of the half life being about 2 years is predicated upon the assumption that the IPCC value for the turnover time is correct.
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George has closed the argument with direct CO2 measurement, not ‘world’ proxies like ice cores in Antarctica.
For example the temperatures of Europe, measured by real thermometers not proxies in six cities over the last 250 years were summarized, smoothed and fitted by Prof Carl Otto Weiss and his team of retired mathematicians. It is the best fit I have ever seen with just two regular cycles.
But the real temperatures match George’s CO2 in Europe! Firstly this confirms that CO2 is a direct consequence of warmer oceans.
It also demonstrates that the temperature in Europe is NOT the same as the ‘world temperature’ most of which is from extrapolation from proxies, especially the bottom 30% of the planet where no one lived or the 3/4 of the planet which is water and ice. Indirectly it debunks this idea of a ‘world temperature’ which for all practical purposes of prediction does not exist. No surprise there. On humans scales the climates in Australia and Europe are not connected, subject to the ocean currents which are so different and contain 99.9% of surface heat and all the water.
As for ‘ice’ cores, this is compressed snow. All the man made CO2 story comes from the top half metre of a 2km block of ice!
CO2 escapes as the snow piles up over the years and turns very slowly with the seasons from snow to compressed snow (firn) to hard blue ice over hundreds of years, reducing in size x2. The time resolution of CO2 from the very spectra is clearly about 2,000 years. An experienced scientist can tell the resolution from the width of the peaks which do exist. The most recent 250 years 50% excess is going to be a substantial overestimate. It may be nothing at all.
A real concern though is that George’s data does explain why CO2 levels over China are not higher than those over Antarctica given 40% of all CO2 is generated in China.
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A bit more on the Fractionation Process, smoothing is the key word.
‘This rate indicates smoothing of the CO2 record by diffusion is one to two orders of magnitude smaller than the smoothing by diffusion in the firn at the depth of 287m (gas age 1⁄4 2.74kyrBP) in the Siple Dome ice, and so does not degrade the record. However, applying the permeation coefficient to greater depth (equivalent to tens of thousands of years) in the Siple Dome ice core suggests an impact on smoothing of the CO2 records on a decadal scale.’ (Ahn et al 2008)
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More TRUMP Revolution news:
1) George Floyd drug overdose case which sent an innocent police officer(s) to jail to be reopened.
Comments by Liberal Hivemind.
https://youtu.be/8fxNc8Rmsjw
2) Liz Cheney to come under criminal investigation.
Steve Turley comments.
https://youtu.be/yj6PXekURtI
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Great news for justice. The pile on over George Floyd was appalling. There is no way justice was done. Floyd had Wuhan Flu at the time. A similar pile on for Daniel Penny nearly saw him in jail too simply because Penny was white.
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Video:
Tragic use of North Korean soldiers by Russia as cannon fodder.
https://youtu.be/9OnfGDky1Ts
No matter which side you support, the use of these poorly trained, conscripted, essentially mindless robotic soldiers as cannon fodder is a horrible tragedy that belongs in warfare tactics of 1000 years ago.
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This war is not about tactics. It’s slaughter. Like all wars. The last man standing wins. This war must stop. Most are killed by cannons, explosions, shrapnel, not ‘honorable combat’ as in WWII. It is a proxy war created and funded from outside Ukraine. Both sides speak the same language and now you have Koreans? Like the Italians and Romanians in WWII. Or the Italians in Napoleon’s armies. Cannon fodder.
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Video:
Dr John Campbell interviews Dr David Grimes about Vitamin D.
It’s such an essential vitamin (actually a hormone) which many people are deficient in, even in sunny countries like Australia, and most of the medical profession is ignorant about.
We know for a fact that even a simple measure like correcting vitamin D deficiency in people would have dramatically reduced the covid death toll. And probably most people who died in nursing homes were vitamin D deficient.
Vitamin D deficiency is related to many other diseases as well.
But why use an inexpensive drug when you can use an expensive and poorly effective drug from Big Pharma and their marketing partners of the Left (which we saw during covid and Australian Government misinformation said vitamin D was of no use for covid)?
[BTW, normal vitamin D takes a while to build up but the calcifediol form can raise serum levels more quickly.]
https://youtu.be/a-uzGkCjiKQ
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Incidentally, during the plandemic the Left blamed “racism” for the fact that many more darker skinned people in Western countries supposedly died of WuFlu than lighter skinned people.
This wasn’t racism but likely due to the fact that unless they take vitamin D supplements, darker skinned people in non-tropical countries are likely to be vitamin D deficient, even more so than lighter skinned people
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FWIW
“We’re about to fly a spacecraft into the Sun for the first time
“Quite simply, we want to find the birthplace of the solar wind.””
https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/12/were-about-to-fly-a-spacecraft-into-the-sun-for-the-first-time/
Via https://instapundit.com/691538/#disqus_thread
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Well, you’d better do it at night, else the craft will be destroyed by the heat.
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One of the most significant moments in the war against energy was when the US Supreme Court in 2007 decided CO2 is a “pollutant” and therefore that the US EPA has a right to regulate it (1). Bush waa president at the time.
One aspect of this ruling was put into effect by Obama in 2015 when he implemented the so-called “Clean Power Plan” (2) to “limit carbon (sic) pollution” from power plants.
1) https://dieselnet.com/news/2007/04epa.php
2) https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2015/08/03/fact-sheet-president-obama-announce-historic-carbon-pollution-standards
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FWIW
“The Keynesian Playbook – Eat your Cake and Have it too!! Are we at the End of the Road?”
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2024-12-15/keynesian-playbook-eat-your-cake-and-have-it-too-are-we-end-road
But as Chiefio points out
“@Another Ian:
I must once again protest that what almost everyone says is Keynesian Economics is not.
Keynes took pains to say that: yes, government can deficit spend to help prevent a depression and deflation; BUT he also then said “for no more than 3 years and then governments must run a surplus to pay off the deficit” or you will get inflation.
What is commonly practiced today is “deficit spend all you want forever” and that is NOT Keynesian and is something Keynes took pains to specifically forbid.”
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2024/11/29/w-o-o-d-29-november-2024-post-thanksgiving-hope-rises/#comment-174355
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FWIW
“Denmark Passes The World’s First ‘Burp Tax’… But This Is No Laughing Matter”
“Denmark, according to The New York Times (NYT), is going ahead with its livestock “Burp Tax.” Though hotly contested, the Danish government has nevertheless finally settled on levying farmers 300 kroners (~$43) per ton for carbon dioxide emissions, ramping to $106 per ton by 2035. As is the case with many of these farm-targeted green interventions, the action is ludicrously ineffectual at addressing the trumped-up problem, while remarkably effective at further cementing state controls over economic production.”
More at
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/denmark-passes-worlds-first-burp-tax-no-laughing-matter
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Thought for the day.
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That was from Ziad K. Abdelnour, Economic Warfare: Secrets of Wealth Creation in the Age of Welfare Politics.
Many more of his quotes at:
https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/18183912-economic-warfare-secrets-of-wealth-creation-in-the-age-of-welfare-polit
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FWIW – more covid scene
“BOMBSHELL: AUSTRALIAN DRUG REGULATOR KNOWS DNA FRAGMENTS IN MRNA VACCINES CAN ENTER NUCLEUS AND INTEGRATE INTO GENOME, INTERNAL EMAILS SHOW”
https://richardsonpost.com/rebekah-barnett/38221/bombshell-australian-drug-regulator-knows-dna-fragments-in-mrna-vaccines-can-enter-nucleus-and-integrate-into-genome-internal-emails-show/
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Unfortunately no one at Their TGA, Uniparty politicians or their Lamestream Media media partners understand or care.
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And lighting up the covid flashing red lights panel – today’s Coffee and Covid newsletter
“Alex Berenson, an author, former New York Times reporter, and the first major journalist to question the covid narrative during the pandemic, published a new Substack this week making a remarkable claim. It was headlined, “URGENT: Yale researchers have found Covid spike protein in the blood of people never infected with Covid – years after they got mRNA jabs.” ”
“In other words, they identified what I believe is the biggest problem with the jabs, which is that the mRNA has no off switch. I am convinced they are perfectly aware of this problem and are trying to figure out how to turn it off, and how to make new types of mRNA shots without that defect or that, at least, make harmless fragments of virus and not the most dangerous and harmful part like the spike protein.”
More at
https://open.substack.com/pub/coffeeandcovid/p/odors-of-mendacity-friday-december?
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Physics lesson for today.
Brachistochrone curve.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brachistochrone_curve?wprov=sfla1
The problem was first posed by Bernoulli in 1696.
Bernoulli wrote the problem statement as:
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Many killed at German Christmas market as Saudi Arabian drives car into crowd
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14215355/magdeburg-germany-suspect-saudi-arabia-arrested-christmas-market-explosive-device-bmw.html
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And we’ll see the usual BS from “authorities”:
“Baffled as to the motive.”
“Lone wolf.”
“Killer had mental health issues.”
“***** is a religion of peace.”
“Motor vehicle accident. Suspect mechanical defect in car.”
Blah. Blah. Blah.
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German authorities were alert to the possibility of a terrorist attack at Christmas markets so racially profiled “little old ladies” and did bag checks on them.
I suppose it would gave been considered some form of “******phobia” to check or monitor the behaviour of fighting age immigrant males of a certain demographic.
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