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keycocker



Joined: 10 Jul 2005
Posts: 3598

PostPosted: Fri Oct 11, 2013 3:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Poinster,
Your recent links are some of the best stuff posted on these various threads in some time.
We got to hear directly from the Teas about their plan to shut down government and the importance of concealing that fact.
The analysis on GOP rank and file attitudes taken directly from statements made to researchers who were sympathetic was quite enlightening.
The description of a conservative moderate was right on.
The ACS was just talking energy balances instead of politics, like other science topics are treated until the lobbyists get on board and start passing around cash.
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pueno



Joined: 03 Mar 2007
Posts: 2807

PostPosted: Fri Oct 11, 2013 4:07 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

mac wrote:
Poinster--OMG, you posted a site from scientists. Next thing we know you'll be telling us that the earth wasn't created in six days!

Even worse, they have models of global heat processes. Are you a commie?

Great article, but there's a huge problem with it.

<sarcasm>

The article mentions "black body."

This is obviously a racist article. Therefore, it will be accepted by the large majority of righties who won't understand a word of it... particularly that "Planck" stuff. And what about those "emissions"?

Did they make somebody walk the Planck for having a wet dream about a black body?

</sarcasm>
.
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mac



Joined: 07 Mar 1999
Posts: 17742
Location: Berkeley, California

PostPosted: Tue Oct 22, 2013 10:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Something you won't read about in the Drudge report--or any Murdoch paper:


Quote:
We’re actually winning the fight against climate change, but most people don’t know it yet.”

That may seem a strange statement to make in a week when a landmark scientific report declares that humanity must quit fossil fuels within thirty years or risk catastrophic climate change. But Danny Kennedy, a former top Greenpeace activist who helps run the global solar company Sungevity, says that solar and wind power are growing so fast worldwide that they will displace fossil fuels much sooner than usually thought. He has lots of supporting data, much of which comes from the crazy tree-huggers at Bloomberg New Energy Finance, Deutsche Bank and the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Not that the fight is over. When the scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a summary of their Fifth Assessment Report on September 27, they effectively endorsed activist Bill McKibben’s argument that most of the earth’s remaining fossil fuels must stay in the ground. The IPCC calculated that, from this day forward, humanity can burn no more than one-half of 1 trillion metric tons of carbon if we are to have a better than 50-50 chance of limiting global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels. At current rates, this “carbon budget” will be used up by the early 2040s. The upshot: the great bulk of the 3 trillion tons of fossil fuels still underground must remain there.

Encouragingly, the Environmental Protection Agency recently proposed the first limits on how much carbon new power plants may emit. Those limits, to be implemented next year if the EPA stands up to coal industry resistance, will make it almost impossible for new plants to run on coal, the most carbon-intensive conventional fossil fuel. As a practical matter, new coal was already dead in the United States, thanks to the grassroots activism of the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign and a plunge in natural gas prices. The real test comes next year, when the EPA issues rules for existing power plants, the source of one-quarter of US greenhouse gas emissions.

Meanwhile, it’s renewables to the rescue. Kennedy argues that wind and especially solar are growing exponentially as millions around the world leave fossil fuels behind. In Germany, which has pledged to forsake fossil fuels and nuclear, “there are now thirty gigawatts of solar on rooftops—that’s the equivalent of thirty nuclear power plants,” he says. In China, renewables will make up more than half the power capacity added through 2030, when renewables’ capacity will equal coal’s, projects Bloomberg New Energy Finance. The solar growth rates in Kennedy’s homeland, Australia, are even steeper, rising from a mere 900 households in 2006 to 1 million today. “There is nothing else like these rates of adopting a new technology,” he says. “They’re faster than the adoption rates for cellphones.”

Solar is expanding even faster than wind power, thanks to plummeting costs and financing programs that enable people to put solar panels on their roofs with no money down yet lower monthly bills. “Solar is growing so fast it is going to overtake everything,” said Jon Wellinghoff, chair of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, in August. “It is going to be the dominant player. Everybody’s roof is out there.”

Deutsche Bank projects much the same for the global market—and says subsidies will soon be unnecessary. Within eighteen months, says the investment giant, solar will be able to compete in three-quarters of the world’s electricity markets without subsidies. The industry is climbing the learning curve, explains Kennedy, driving down costs the same way computer manufacturers did: “Like Moore’s law predicts, every doubling in [production] volume has led to an 18 percent reduction in price.”

Please support our journalism. Get a digital subscription for just $9.50!

Solar is exploding in energy-impoverished countries as well. “There are literally millions of people in these regions who will get electricity for the first time in 2012 to 2015” thanks to solar, Kennedy says. In Kenya, the village Bar Nne waited decades for the national grid to reach it. Powerhive, a company Sungevity helped incubate, lit up the village in weeks, “replacing kerosene with solar, reducing indoor air pollution—and all at lower prices,” says Kennedy.

No political naïf, Kennedy knows that the Koch brothers and other fossil fuel titans must still be resisted. But he believes climate activists need to shift emphasis. “We’ve convinced the public that climate change is a problem and that the powers that be don’t have an answer,” Kennedy says. “The final step is to show we do have an answer. It’s divest, but also reinvest. Let’s talk about how we drive wind and solar forward in the US so they’re in not just half a million households but 40 million, which is entirely possible

Mark Hertsgaard

October 2, 2013
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nw30



Joined: 21 Dec 2008
Posts: 6485
Location: The eye of the universe, Cen. Cal. coast

PostPosted: Tue Oct 22, 2013 11:32 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well damn, it must be working since there hasn't been any global warming for at least 15 years, the alarmists should be having a party,,,,,,,,,, a green party of course, if there is any money left.
They've harnessed the sun!!!!!!!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
World Is Spending $1 Billion Per Day To Tackle Global Warming
Date: 22/10/13

EurActiv

The world invested almost a billion dollars a day in limiting global warming last year, but the total figure – $359 billion – was slightly down on last year, and barely half the $700 billion per year that the World Economic Forum has said is needed to tackle climate change.


These are the findings spelled out in the latest Climate Policy Initiative (CPI) report. For the first time, it estimated global North-South cash flows at between $39 and $62 billion.

But the total funding pot fell $5 billion from 2012, and remains just a tiny fraction of the $5 trillion that the International Energy Agency estimates is required by 2020 for clean energy projects alone, if rising temperatures are to be pegged at 2 degrees Celsius.

“Investment to combat and adapt to climate change is happening around the world, but it’s short of where it needs to be and efforts to grow it have not been successful enough,” said Thomas Heller, the executive director of Climate Policy Initiative, the group which compiled the report.

“Leveling the playing field can help unlock significant additional finance,” he added.

The report, Landscape 2013, says that amounts invested in clean energy were dwarfed by the $523 billion a year that the world shells out in fossil fuels subsidies, according to the OECD.

The EU’s energy commissioner, Günther Oettinger was last week accused of suppressing data which shows that the bloc’s €30 billion of subsidies to renewable energy sources is outweighed by a de facto €66 billion of handouts to the fossil fuels sector, and €35 billion to nuclear power.

Some 38% of this year’s climate investment – $135 billion – came from the public sector, according to the CPI study. It was used to leverage the other 62% of funds from project developers ($102 billion), manufacturers and corporations ($66 billion) and households ($33 billion).

“Three-quarters of the climate revenues originated in the same country it was spent in, while the other quarter flowed from the global North to South, and was dominated by public sector funds.”

“Of private flows, the vast proportion was invested in developed countries where policies are often underpinned by similar legal and regulatory frameworks,” the report says, adding that perceptions of risk in the developing world need to be challenged by policy-makers.

All the funds for adapting to climate change – some 65% of the total – came from the rich world’s public exchequer, and were mostly invested as international climate finance.

http://www.thegwpf.org/world-spending-1-billion-day-tackle-global-warming/
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techno900



Joined: 28 Mar 2001
Posts: 4161

PostPosted: Wed Oct 23, 2013 8:17 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Mac - Mark Hertsgaard seems to be a wingnut from the far left, painted all green given his writing history for the last 15 years. This is your best for factual information to support your views?

As you would say, "it's just ....wing talking points". What happens when the sun don't shine? I am not opposed to solar, and it will play a key role for power in the future, but not until new technologies and costs become competitive. Yea, I know, the costs will come down as more buy into solar, but it has a ways to go. Where I live, it's not an option because of HOA rules, not that any would choose to go that route. I have a nice nuclear plant about 10 miles away that works just fine. Out of the last 20 days or so, I have seen maybe 32 hrs. of sun. NO wind either, but it is suppose to blow today (over 20), the first time in over 3 months locally.

All hail clean coal, gas and nuclear.
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boggsman1



Joined: 24 Jun 2002
Posts: 9118
Location: at a computer

PostPosted: Wed Oct 23, 2013 9:36 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

techno...you might want to do a little reading, solar in on fire(not literally). We are finally at a place where significant profits are being generated, and consumers are saving money. In fact , just last week, Nexterra energy contracted to build a 250 MW plant in SoCal, a deal First Solar won. Solar City has massive backlog, and the stock is up 400% this year. It is happening right now Mr Technoo, and Solar will be 5% of all electrical generation in the US by the end of the decade. This is happening with nat gas at super cheap prices...can you imagine the growth when nat gas rises?
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mac



Joined: 07 Mar 1999
Posts: 17742
Location: Berkeley, California

PostPosted: Wed Oct 23, 2013 10:11 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

NW's point is just laughable. Hasn't found a credible source yet.

Techno--Hertsgaard is an advocate, not a wing nut. I haven't made any attempt to verify his argument, which I understood as advocacy. I don't buy the Nation's story line, but I read credible sources from the left and the right to get ideas. My main problem with his article is that he has projected rapid increases in market penetration to continue--people who did that in the windsurfing business are no longer in that business. But the increases in feasibility, all due to subsidy and increased demand, are the point. Lost on those who subscribe to Murdoch sources.

These trends are not even mentioned, much less discussed and rebutted if wrong, by the right wing media. That was my point.
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techno900



Joined: 28 Mar 2001
Posts: 4161

PostPosted: Wed Oct 23, 2013 11:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

boggs,

Solar will be a great thing when it can stand alone withOUT government subsidies. If you have to be bribed to do it and to make it cost effective, I am not in the game. It will get there, but there still has be adequate back up to keep EVERYTHING lit when the sun isn't shining.

California has lots of sunshine. You guys willing to ship your power to where the sun isn't always out?
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DanWeiss



Joined: 24 Jun 2008
Posts: 2296
Location: Connecticut, USA

PostPosted: Wed Oct 23, 2013 11:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

techno900, you seem to apply different standards to solar by claiming solar will pass muster only "without government subsidies."

Petroluem companies received about $4 Billion in federal subsidies last year. I'm aware of no other industry that receives such darling tax support. For but one reference: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/04/business/04bptax.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

My point isn't the normative value of subsidies, but only that one should consider applying the same structures to different energy producing methods.

It seems your post would claim petroleum isn't quite ready for market either.

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mac



Joined: 07 Mar 1999
Posts: 17742
Location: Berkeley, California

PostPosted: Wed Oct 23, 2013 12:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Techno--in addition to the direct subsidies that Dan Weiss notes, the producers of petroleum pay nothing for the toxic emissions associated with their products, or the military budget that assures their delivery to US (and world wide customers.) Various studies have estimated those subsidies--they dwarf the subsidy that has been effective in reducing, dramatically, the cost of solar power.

The subsidies for nuclear energy are even greater. I have a general agreement with you that, in the long term, subsidies should be withdrawn from products and they should compete in the market place. But I think we should consider subsidies if they are likely to prove useful in encouraging innovation, or if they generate substantial public benefits that are not monetized. Economic theory is pretty comprehensive in dealing with the issues of externalities; but if you favor true markets you need to also favor monetizing externalities. Our current energy policies, established largely by previous Congresses and previous presidents and vice-presidents, do not.
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