New Global Warming Newsletter-Must READ!!

[NeilBlanchard]

A lot more birds and everything else gets killed by smokestacks, I'm fairly sure. We can have large scale wind in 3 states; South Dakota down to west Texas -- and they would provide more than enough power for the entire lower 48. Wave and tidal power are very doable all along the coasts, and these would add a lot more power.

Renewable power will be here for the next billion (or so) years, and they don't have accidents or run out of fuel. We're all set until the sun explodes. No military defense of supply lines, or worries about the stability of a dictatorship, or the supply driven cost of fuel, no pollution -- if we build the next generation of system using renewable power, no explosions, no spills, no poisoned water.

Wind fits onto working farm land and takes up about 1% of the space, and it generates a *lot* of income. A single large turbine can generate $300,000 worth of electricity in one year. And you can still farm or run cattle underneath it. With turbines spread out over a large area, the wind is always blowing somewhere, and the total output is quite consistent and predictable. Wind power scales up very well.

Solar power scales down very nicely, and since it generates power at the peak demand, it makes a great contribution. You can now get solar panels installed for virtually no money down, and pay about half of what you are now for your electricity over time.

[Xringer]

The only problem is, we are too far in red to afford green power.
There are too many power users, and half of them don't have to pay their bills.
Us taxpayers (and China) are picking up the tab..

Our 'government' has locked us into a death spiral with all their crazy spending.
Someday soon, all our taxes will be going to pay the interest on what we owe.

I'm not going out on a limb very much by predicting that before I die,
I'll be paying 50 to 75 cents per kWh.(in today's dollars).

People making their own power with PV etc will be 'taxed', so they pay "their fair share"...
Like billionaires and people earning more than 35k..

[NeilBlanchard]

We have no choice but to spend money to generate electricity.

Pilgrim nuclear power plant is nearing the end of it's useful life (remember what was said about nuclear power -- that it would be too cheap to meter?) and we still don't know how to deal with the radioactive waste. Vermont Yankee is leaking radioactive water and it has gone about 20 years beyond it's useful life.

Coal plants are polluting horribly -- virtually all the mercury poisoning our world comes from burning coal. What are the true costs of that? So-called mountaintop removal is the quickest way to completely ruin a big piece of our environment -- what are the true costs of that?

We are probably passed peak coal in this country. We are certainly passed peak discovery of new coal in this country.

The estimates of natural gas in this country are between 11 and 100 years. And to get at that gas, we are already ruining people's lives, and poisoning the ground water and causing little earthquakes. What is the true cost of this?

There are 3 companies already up and running who make wave power systems. This float on the surface of the ocean about 10 miles out from shore and they generate a lot of power. 10MW from array of 60 buoys. The other type generate 0.75MW from a 500' long hinged steel tube, as it moves up and down on the waves.

Tidal power *especially* from the Bay of Fundy is a no brainer.

I've already mentioned solar PV that we can get put onto our roofs for virtually no money down, and only pay about half of what we pay now for electricity.

Iowa now gets about 20% of their power from wind turbines, and as I said before it would only take big wind farms in 3 states to generate more than enough electricity for the *entire* country.

Solar heat systems are very efficient -- the newest generation of vacuum tube systems are about 70-80% efficient. You can get all your domestic hot water from 12-20 of these 3" x 5' tubes. And probably we can make these work for heat without too much effort.

So, if we stop building incredibly expensive nuclear plants and subsidizing oil and coal and gas companies -- and instead spend that money on renewables, we will come out way ahead in the long run. The lack of pollution, decreasing costs over time, no worries about fuel supplies, distributed resources -- we can have electricity until the earth gets absorbed by the sun in about a billion years!

Renewable energy is an incredibly hopeful thing -- we know our current energy sources are finite. We know that renewables are virtually infinite.

Why are we waiting around, again?

[Xringer]

I heard of a guy who lives down in the cape area,
after his work closed/lay-off, he needed a job, so he went to work at the Pilgrim nuclear power plant.
I think it was a simple clean up job. Just packing stuff away for shipment.

One of the things they drill into you, is you have to report ANY safety problem
to the Feds, no matter how slight. And there are a million little regulations
that have to be followed. No short cuts allowed..
And, if you see anything that looks wrong, you MUST report it to the feds right then..
If you don't, you can go to prison!! He said it was so nerve-racking to work
there, (with prison hanging over your head), with a constant stream of minor
violations going on, he had to quit the job, after only a few months..
And most of that time was spent in training and indoctrination.
It was driving him nuts..

Anyways, you might want to have a plan in place, for evacuating the area, while going up-wind from Pilgrim nuclear power..


~~~
I think we have to face facts, we are not going to have any new power plants built in the coming decades.
There isn't any kind of power plant, solar farm, wind farm & etc,
that's going to be accepted by the anti-everything people.
The anti-everything people think that over-population is the problem..
If the population is a lot smaller, all will be right with Gia etc..

America is on road to becoming a 3rd world hellhole. There is no way
our 'government' employees can get the job done.
They just aren't interested in our problems. They only know how to
borrow money, collect taxes and waste money..

Since they think their job is to stop private companies from getting the
job done, it's never going to happen..

They will shut down every pollutant source they can find, so we will have cleaner air..
That's going to happen pretty fast too.

But, when we can't build anything (not allowed) to replace the lost kWatts,
It's going to get pretty hard to live in the northern part of America..
Only the rich folks and those 50% who live off the workers will stay here.
Regular working folks will be forced to move south..

RE the IRS:
I would not be at all surprised to learn, they waste $80 (on tax-collection related expenses)
for every $100 they collect from me.

[Xringer]

Big Oilmen are up to their old tricks again!!

Sixteen Concerned Scientists: No Need to Panic About Global Warming - WSJ.com

"No Need to Panic About Global Warming
There's no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to 'decarbonize' the world's economy."

[NeilBlanchard]

Yes, this article is full of the same old canards...

[Xringer]

We see an old Canard that flies into Bedford almost every day.. What a racket!! It comes right over my house!

And it seems to be a gas hog too!!

[Xringer]

Dang, another way climate change is going to kill us...

El Nino Climate Pattern May Influence Disease Outbreaks Globally: Scientific American

[Xringer]

It looks like the sun spots might be coming back now..


Which could be important, because:



Per the CLOUD experiments:

CLOUD Home






But, who really knows? I'm just going to go with the consensuses..

[AlanE]

Originally Posted by Xringer

It looks like the sun spots might be coming back now..

It's always something!