solar

Michael Shellenberger, Environmental Progress: An all-star group of energy and climate scholars published a scientific article in a prestigious journal pointing out that a Stanford professor’s proposal for powering the United States entirely on renewable energy sources rests upon a gigantic lie. Over the last several years, Al Gore, Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo and many politicians have pointed to Stanford scientist Mark Jacobson’s modeling as proof that we can quickly and cheaply transition to 100 percent renewables. What is the lie?100 percent renewable energy rested on a lie That we can increase the amount of power from U.S. hydroelectric dams ten-fold. According to the U.S. Department of Energy and all major studies, the real potential increase is just one percent of that.

As of February 2017, Mark Jacobson is listed as being in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Stanford University. He talks about the problems of man-made global warming from fossil fuels and how wind and solar energy can provide 100 % of electrical energy needs in the United States. Many people recognize that wind and solar are extremely low energy density compare to nuclear, highly unpredictable in energy output and have times when they don't provide energy at all. What if the United States adopted his plan? What would that do for the man-made climate change he talks about? What would the rest of the world do, go wind and solar, stick with fossil fuels, go nuclear? What has James Lovelock said recently about man-made global warming, wind energy and nuclear? See his position in other articles on this website.

The World Economic Forum — also known as “Davos” — is an exclusive talking shop for the rich and powerful. As a symbol of the neoliberal order it’s long been a target for the anti-capitalist Left. More recently, it’s also become a bugbear of the populist Right. That’s not just because the WEF champions globalisation, but also because of what some see as an elitist plot to radically change our lifestyles. Peter Franklin, The Post, February 11, 2022

Apparently, a shadowy cabal is dead set on getting us to eat bugs instead of real meat and to live in pods instead of proper flats and houses. Needless to say, the conspiracy theories are overblown; but, as I explain here, insect protein and tiny homes are definitely on the Davos agenda.

David Wojick, Heartland Institute, Ph.D. Philosophy of Science and Mathematical Logic, B.Sc. Civil Engineering: The brutal cold wave that just struck America provides a stark example of why 100% renewables cannot possibly work. Once the massive high pressure system was in place there was almost no wind, so no significant wind power. And the coldest temperatures by far were at night or early morning, when there was no solar power either. The first drawing shows Germany aiming for 100% wind and solar and they are using coal as backup, essentially no reduction in fossil fuel capacity. Colorado and California are mandating 100% wind and solar (with fossil fuel backup?). It is the worse possible energy plan for modern economies. Thank the politicians who planned this.

Edgar Ocampo Tellez: El propósito de este trabajo es el de realizar un acercamiento a las condiciones que serán necesarias construir durante las próximas décadas para que México logre alcanzar un modelo energético sostenible hacia el horizonte 2050. - The objective of this paper is to examine all energy sources for Mexico to have sustainable energy supplies by 2050. This primarily includes wind, solar, fossil fuels. There are no plans to replace their nuclear plants, in part because there are no companies in the USA or Europe to build them. So far, Mexico has not turned to Russia, China or South Korea to provide new nuclear plants.

The main article in this issue is the World Report Card on Climate, Fossil Fuels, Nuclear, and Related Government Policies.

Science pointing to Myths and False Propaganda surrounding the production of electricity is suppressed! Does that Producing, Distributing and Storing electricity hurt anyone? Why is there such a reluctance to publish the Scientific Facts explaining the High Environmental Damage caused from Producing, Transmitting and Storing electricity for driving Electric Cars?

Renewables . . .One wind turbine contains 800 lbs. of Neo-Dymium Boron. More radiation is released making these rare-earth magnets in Mongolia each Year than all the nuclear reactors in the USA, combined. As one environmentalist told the Daily Mail, “There is not one step of the rare earth mining process that is not disastrous for the environment.”

Wind and solar are very small contributors to generation for electricity. It is only because they are very small parts that they can be tolerated on the modern electric grid at all. Wind and solar are a negligible contribution to reducing coal, oil, and natural gas and thus supposedly stopping man-made global warming.

America’s electric grid is being mismanaged and consumers will pay a heavy price for that mismanagement.

More evidence of that came with the recent closure of the Palisades Power Plant in Michigan. The 811-megawatt nuclear plant was shut down on the same day that the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) issued a report saying the U.S. electric grid doesn’t have enough generation capacity and that blackouts are almost certain to occur across the country this summer.

In short, the closure of the Palisades Power Plant will increase emissions, reduce energy affordability, and hurt the resilience and reliability of America’s electric grid. That’s a lousy quadfecta.

The day of reckoning over the Western world’s self-destructive indulgence of the excesses of the environmental movement must now be almost at hand.

Imagine a large room with perfectly insulating walls. The room contains chairs, tables, books, sheets of paper, pitchers and glasses of water, some flowering plants, and so forth. Now comes the question:

“If we add some heat (say 1 MJ) to the room, how much does the temperature rise?”

“If we add a certain heat flux (say 1 W/m2) all over the surface of the earth, how much would the temperature rise? So many assumptions are involved that the calculated temperature rise can be pretty much anything. Start programming your supercomputer!

Now turn that unanswerable question around and ask an answerable question: “If the temperature of the surface rises by (say) 1ºC, how much more IR does it emit?”

Viv Forbes, Executive Director of the Saltbush Club which opposes the war on carbon energy, opposes real pollution, and promotes the rational and sustainable use of carbon energy and carbon food. Greens dream of a zero-emissions world without coal, oil and natural gas. They need to think what they wish for.