Global Warming...New Report...and it ain't happy news

@Ionus,

Ionus wrote:

..............

Quote:
I think the greenhouse gas theories are flawed
Only flawed ? I would say they are based on manufactured data.

Quote:
their computer modeling projections
I think HS covered rather well the faults with those....
....................

The anthropogenic-global-warming crowd has now taken to spoofing itself on the internet - not hard to do, though few are taken in so far:

Quote:

....Earlier this year Greenpeace issued a report detailing Koch’s aid to such groups, calling it “a financial kingpin of climate-science denial”. The New Yorker followed up with a profile of the company and its owners, the brothers David and Charles Koch, detailing their generous, if discreet, support for these and other right-wing courses. If all this adverse publicity had indeed induced a bout of “climate conscience” in the brothers, it would be quite some story.

But it was a spoof. A well-executed one, mind. The release appeared on Friday on www.koch-inc.com, which one might easily have assumed to be the American conglomerate’s official website. Someone had gone to the trouble of registering and creating this site in the hope that it would convince journalists “checking” the story that it was authentic. By Monday it seemed to have been taken down or blocked, and Google was redirecting searchers to the company’s real homepage.

As far as we know, no news organisation fell for the hoax: the New York Times’s environment blog and a few other websites ran stories noting it as a spoof. But the pranksters could all too easily have scored a hit, as BBC Radio demonstrated last week.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/newsbook/2010/12/anti-business_protests

0 Replies

@georgeob1,

Quote:

However, history shows that you Europeans have been more susceptible to fashionable, emerging theories about the perfection of mankind and the world we live in, than have we.

Such assertions George may well be of comfort to you but they take us nowhere. It may not even be true.

And it is possibly of no significance to the argument what wind generated power costs. We may need it whatever it costs given the expansion of the middle-classes and its soul's need to conspicuously consume.

Why didn't the president go fishing instead of to Hawaii? His entourage was probably more expensive than when Poppea Sabina went to Baie with 400 asses to supply the milk for her bath.

What about "sumptuary laws" coming back?

0 Replies

@georgeob1,

Quote:

True enough, however the GW cult is nearly unanimous in asserting that a solution can and must promptly be found by diminishing only the man-made constituent. This alone flies in the face of reason, given its relatively small share of the total.

A small share of what total?

I hate to niggle george but you claim that it is a small share of the increase is flat out not supported by any evidence.

0 Replies

@georgeob1,

Quote:

It has more to do with the economic effects of replacing proven, economical sources of electrical power with wind turbines that deliver a product that costs three times as much - both in terms of the initial capital outlay and continued operating costs.

And coal can never be replaced as a way to heat homes.
And wood can never be replaced as a way to heat homes
And whale oil can never be replaced as a way to light homes.

I would hate to see what real propaganda is george as you spout your unsubstantiated cost estimates.

1 Reply

@parados,

The fact is that whale oil, wood, and coal all, in turn, were eclipsed by alternative sources of heating homes that were both cheaper and more efficient - and not as a result of any other factor.

If you doubt my assertion about the relative costs of wind and standard methods of producing electrical power, you have only to consult the Department of Energy web site. It will provide you with relatively current average cost for power production from nuclear, coal and gas plants. Interestingly nuclear is the cheapest of the three. The last time I looked they didn't have wind power data in that section, because its share is so low (and because advocates aren't likely to want it published). However another section provides data on the capital cost per KW-Hr capacity installed of all these sources of power, wind included. In this section wind power comes out as having about the same capital cost as nuclear - per unit of installed capacity. The difference is that nuclear plant actually produce about 90% of their capacity 24/7/365, while wind plants average well under 30%. Thus wind power involves a capital cost per unit of power actually delivered about three times that of nuclear.

2 Replies

@georgeob1,

georgeob1 wrote:

.... Thus wind power involves a capital cost per unit of power actually delivered about three times that of nuclear.

Capital and operating projections are functions of cost of capital. Absent subsidies, at interest rate zero, wind is 10x more expensive than nuclear. Feeder plutonium reactors are cheaper still. But once interest rate (price of credit, not price of money) is introduced wind is only 3 to 5x as expensive.

0 Replies

@georgeob1,

I posted my doubts about your statement. You failed to provide anything to support your statement. In fact, you seem to have ignored completely how you were unable to provide support.

1 Reply

@parados,

I assume you are able to read data clearly posted on the DOE web site.

I haven't seen any data from you supporting your apparent contention that the real cost of wind power is less than I asserted. Have you ever wondered why utilities aren't rushing to build wind turbines, or why environmental zealots are so eager to establish legal mandates for producers to deliver a specificed share of their power from wind sources?

Your defensive tactics are rather thin.

3 Replies

@georgeob1,

If the costs are so high then why are there thousands of wind turbines?

0 Replies

@georgeob1,

I realize this is anecdotal, but we recently drove past a large windfarm in Colorado, and even though the wind seemed to be moving pretty good as evidenced by trees and bushes, none of the turbines were turning. Incidentally, what has happened with Boone Pickens big plans? I thought Pelosi had invested into his dreams, and so I wonder if she is still on board with trying to get the government to help fund his project?

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

Quote:

I haven't seen any data from you supporting your apparent contention that the real cost of wind power is less than I asserted.

Since I never made that argument why should I support it?

Arguments were made at various times that coal was cheaper than natural gas for heating but technological advances changed that. It is possible and more than likely probable that renewable energy will be come cheaper than fossil fuels over time. Short sightedness will leave the US looking like buggy whip manufacturers.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

I am still waiting for your evidence to support this claim george.

Quote:

True enough, however the GW cult is nearly unanimous in asserting that a solution can and must promptly be found by diminishing only the man-made constituent. This alone flies in the face of reason, given its relatively small share of the total.

What percentage of the total warming is man made? Why do you think that is a small percentage? What science do you have to back this up?

1 Reply

@parados,

Evidently you don't read very well. The excerpted remark above referred to the atmospheric CO2 content. I was responding to a poster who noted the relative values of the "natural" and man-made sources of it in the atmosphere, as well as the IR reflectivity of other gases in the atmosphere.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

Evidently YOU don't write well and probably don't read well

The excerpted remark was in response to a statement I made about warming. It had nothing to do with CO2. The statement I responded to had nothing to do with CO2. It was about "climate change".

Quote:

georgeob1 wrote:

parados wrote:

No one has claimed it is all man made. That is a strawman argument that is easy for you to debunk but it isn't science on your part and isn't debunking science.

True enough, however the GW cult is nearly unanimous in asserting that a solution can and must promptly be found by diminishing only the man-made constituent. This alone flies in the face of reason, given its relatively small share of the total. It also implies a number of usually unstated or unacknowledged assumptions on the part of the cultists ... i.e. that such a change is possible without inflicting far more harm on the earth's six + billion people; and that no greater natural phenomina are at work that might swamp whatever we might do at great cost.

So in other words, you were just talking without knowing what you were talking about? OK. I can accept that.

1 Reply

@parados,

parados wrote:

Arguments were made at various times that coal was cheaper than natural gas for heating but technological advances changed that. It is possible and more than likely probable that renewable energy will be come cheaper than fossil fuels over time. Short sightedness will leave the US looking like buggy whip manufacturers.

Natural gas beat coal for heating once the local price for gas came close to that for coal. After that the much smaller size of gas heaters and the absence of any requirement to store dust laden and dirty coal did the rest.

Similarly coal generation of electricity was much cheaper than natural gas used in turbines until the manufacturers started using heat recovery boilers to extract energy from the hot turbine exhaust gases. These "compound cycle" engines have thermodynamic efficiencies approaching those of steam boilers with reheat. With current gas turbines the cost difference is mostly a reflection of the relative prices of gas and coal. Right now coal is still cheaper. Nuclear is much cheaper than both.

On what factual basis do you declare that "It is possible and more than likely probable that renewable energy will be come cheaper than fossil fuels over time.." ? Propeller and airfoil technology has been around for over a century : a very mature field of engineering and fluid mechanics for which no significant technological breakthroughs are even considered possible. Solar power has seen even less progress in cost effectiveness over the past decade than wind. Both are limited by an imbalance between production and consumption in that the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine all the time. Even efficient means of storing peak energy generation are subject to large losses that so far appear very hard to reduce.

One renewable source is already cheaper than even nuclear - hydroelectric. However we have already dammed most of our potential sources and environmenatlists are out to force us to take down many of the dams we have.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

Quote:

On what factual basis do you declare that "It is possible and more than likely probable that renewable energy will be come cheaper than fossil fuels over time.."

Is there in infinite supply of fossil fuels? I don't think so but perhaps you have different information.

1 Reply

@parados,

parados wrote:

So in other words, you were just talking without knowing what you were talking about? OK. I can accept that.

Here is the post from Deckland that started that portion of the dialogue;

Deckland wrote:

FUN FACTS about CARBON DIOXIDE

Of the 186 billion tons of carbon from CO2 that enter earth's atmosphere each year from all sources, only 6 billion tons are from human activity. Approximately 90 billion tons come from biologic activity in earth's oceans and another 90 billion tons from such sources as volcanoes and decaying land plants.

At 380 parts per million CO2 is a minor constituent of earth's atmosphere-- less than 4/100ths of 1% of all gases present. Compared to former geologic times, earth's current atmosphere is CO2- impoverished.

CO2 is odorless, colorless, and tasteless. Plants absorb CO2 and emit oxygen as a waste product. Humans and animals breathe oxygen and emit CO2 as a waste product. Carbon dioxide is a nutrient, not a pollutant, and all life-- plants and animals alike-- benefit from more of it. All life on earth is carbon-based and CO2 is an essential ingredient. When plant-growers want to stimulate plant growth, they introduce more carbon dioxide.

CO2 that goes into the atmosphere does not stay there but is continually recycled by terrestrial plant life and earth's oceans-- the great retirement home for most terrestrial carbon dioxide.

It is very clear that the issue under discussion had to do with the fraction of atmospheric GHG that involves CO2 and the sub fraction of that that is man-made -- and not the fraction of observed warming that you are implying.

Please try to be truthful and accurate.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

No george. This was the post. I am not the one being untruthful or inaccurate. Nor am I the one with a reading problem it seems.

Deckland wrote:

In days gone by, scientist gathered information and tried to
come to a conclusion based on that information or least it appeared
to be that way. The media reported it and everyone believed it.
Today it seems, some scientists come to a conclusion and then try
to get the evidence to fit. The media report it as fact but
thank goodness, lots people are questioning the conclusions.
It's good to see people not being railroaded by academics, many who have
a vested interest in pushing a particular wheelbarrow.
The phrase "Climate Change" is skilful bit of trickery, as climate is always
changing and always will,but the bit that irks me is that when "climate change"
is mentioned, it is automatically assumed to be man made.
Keep repeating this in the media time and time again, and eventually people will believe it.
Put fear into the population and they will happily pay more for fuel and electricity.
Trading of carbon credits then becomes a new source trade and money making.
We know who will make the money, and we know who will PAY.

http://able2know.org/topic/44061-822#post-4460505

Deckland's statement is not in response to any previous statements nor does it reference CO2. My statement was in direct response to this...

1 Reply

@parados,

parados wrote:

Quote:
On what factual basis do you declare that "It is possible and more than likely probable that renewable energy will be come cheaper than fossil fuels over time.."

Is there in infinite supply of fossil fuels? I don't think so but perhaps you have different information.

Oh ! I see. You are now declaring that renewable sources will become cheaper than fossil fuels when we run out of coal, petroleum and natural gas. What a brilliant insight ! However that event is centuries away, so what's your hurry?

Besides, nuclear power is cheaper than coal or natural gas, and we have abundant natural fuel for it, as well as the ability to make even more of it in breeder reactors that also produce electrical power while they're at it.

1 Reply

@parados,

parados wrote:

No george. This was the post. I am not the one being untruthful or inaccurate. Nor am I the one with a reading problem it seems.

Whatever. I was very clear in what I was referring to, and it wasn't the fraction of observed warming as you now assert. Read my words.

You really are unusual in the tiny details you use to evade accountability for the erroneous accusations you throw out so liberally.

2 Replies

Global Warming...New Report...and it ain't happy news

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know