Coal: Bigger Than The Elephant In The Room

HenryBG said :

Your polished regurgitation of pseudo-factual strawmen is witnessed a couple of times each decade when the Nuke industry and its right-wing fanclub try it on with their periodic PR-push which inevitably fizzles out for lack of interest.

We won’t be conned.

Henry,

Who is “we” exactly? If you have a problem with the work of the top experts in their field, let them know.

Your pace of keeping up to the science and economics is about the rate of a spastic in a magnet factory, and trying to make sense of your crack-pot conspiracies make me look as frustrated as a Chinese wicket-keeper.

Good day sir.

P.S. As a general rule, never quote a source we have not read and comprehended in it’s entirety.

HenryBG said :

shauno said :

It simply wont work. Not yet anyway.

I refer you to Germany with the greatest amount of wind power in Europe around 27 Gw at peak or equivalent to 14 2Gw coal power stations. Now for the last couple of weeks the amount of power produced by those has only been around 1Gw because of light winds or lack of wind. .

27Gw is the *installed capacity*. It doesn’t describe any “peak” production, not even remotely.

shauno highlights a sobering reality of wind farms, Henry.

So now you’re starting to scratch the surface of energy generation understanding. We call that capacity factor- every form of electrical generation is less than 100%. So next time public discourse ventures into $/W nameplate (installed) capacity, you can ask them “what is the capacity factor”.

Revert back to comment #97 for more tips, any questions- just ask.

Diggety, I see you have changed course a little. You are now talking about commercial Gen3 reactors (AP1000) and not pipe dreams like IFR. Interesting. I’d also suggest you check more carefully on nuclear construction in USA:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prospective_nuclear_units_in_the_United_States

Post Fukushima, I certainly don’t think I’ll be betting the farm on the so called nuclear ‘renaissance’!

Being simplistic but let’s just take Diggety’s (BZE Criticism) most extreme figure of $4trillion. Now, not that anyone would install solar this way, as there are better ways to do solar, but let’s use a home solar PV system as a model and work on a figure of $2k per installed kW. $4trillion would buy 2billion installed kWs of panels. Canberra tracks on about 1464kw per year per domestic PV installed kW. 2billion installed 1kW systems would produce 2trillion kWs per annum or more than 8 times Australia’s entire annual electricity production. I understand that BZE includes all sorts of other goodies such as transmission lines etc. I’m not suggesting a 2billion kW PV system as a solution, my point is that even a quick sanity check on the $4trillion figure Diggety gave can be shown to be bollocks.

First hand I’ve seen domestic solar PV reach the point where without subsidies, it is competitive with commercial power.
http://www.carbonetix.com.au/news/plummeting-solar-pv-prices-a-sustainability-game-changer/

In my employment I’ve seen some amazing steps forward that can be made with smarter energy use eg data centers utilising natural outside air ventilation (with greater airflow) for much of the year rather than 24/7 AC.

Diggety said :

4. I don’t want Governments to waste money on overpriced renewable energy projects like Solar Dawn that only give renewable energy a bad name.

Your conflation of “renewable” and “wasting money” and your assertions about “unreliable electricity supply” are a tired old PR refrain.

I don’t know where “100% renewables by 2020” would come into it (bedtime story, perhaps?), although it sounds very much like the kind of study Sir Humphrey Appleby would be keen to sponsor, were this some sort of a comedy show. (100% in just 8 years? You’re going to have to tell your right-wing freinds to supply you with *much* glossier brochures in future).

At Yale, Dr William Nordhaus’s economic modelling gives us 22 Trillion $ of climatic damages over 50 years.
He shows that spending 2 trillion will save 5 trillion of those damages.

http://nordhaus.econ.yale.edu/Balance_2nd_proofs.pdf

So the question is how we spend Australia’s share of that 2 trillion.
Spending it on a technology that relies on a non-renewable fuel source and carries uninsurable risk and no known safe way of disposing of its waste is not – in my humble opinion – a good way to spend our money.

Your polished regurgitation of pseudo-factual strawmen is witnessed a couple of times each decade when the Nuke industry and its right-wing fanclub try it on with their periodic PR-push which inevitably fizzles out for lack of interest.

We won’t be conned.

shauno said :

It simply wont work. Not yet anyway.

I refer you to Germany with the greatest amount of wind power in Europe around 27 Gw at peak or equivalent to 14 2Gw coal power stations. Now for the last couple of weeks the amount of power produced by those has only been around 1Gw because of light winds or lack of wind. .

Well, as usual, we have fossil-fuelists demonstrating either dishonesty or incompetence.

27Gw is the *installed capacity*. It doesn’t describe any “peak” production, not even remotely.

@ HenryBG and OpenYourMind: So let’s address the third objection in more detail:

3. They are not needed as renewable can do the job, normally preceded by “I reckon…”. Let’s evaluate some proposals:

(i) Case study 1:
Beyond Zero Emissions (BZE) came out with a 100% renewable plan for Australia. In 2010 proposing the following:
– Cost- $370 billion
– 100% renewable energy by 2020
– $8/week for every household
With much fan-fare, some shall we say ‘easily excitable’ politicians and NGO’s received it with open arms. That soon changed when publications of the critiques started flowing; Deisendorf (2010) (a renewable energy researcher and activist at UNSW), Trainer (2010) and Nicholson and Lang (2010) (independent energy policy advisors to various Governments). The latter finding:

– Revised cost was somewhere between $855 billion to $4,191 billion.
– The CST technology used in the plan was not sufficiently scaled or commercialized.
– Electricity would not be reliable enough.
– It would not deliver reliable baseload power
– Unacceptable amounts of embodied energy would be required, and needing replacement in the near future.
– Australian quality of life would be significantly diminished (travel restrictions, loss of agriculture and food supply, serious economic impacts, job losses)

Now, you see why politicians dropped it like a sack of sh*t, and after 18 months of requests, BZE has still not responded.

(ii) Case study 2

One of BZE’s critics, Mark Deisendorf, was involved in a recent 100% renewable simulation study- Elliston, et al (2012) (IMO, much more realistic for a variety of reasons).

No costings were provided to accompany the study, although Lang did do the sums along with an analysis of a technological feasibility study:
– The costs for capital:: $568 billion
– Cost of CO2 abatement:$290/tonne CO2
– Electricity would cost 7 x more than today
– The carbon tax would need to be 13 x the $23/ton we have now. (30x the European carbon price).
– The electricity supply would be unreliable
– 76% of our agricultural land would need to be used for fuel supply.
The latter renewable energy plan is much more realistic as I said. The reason for this is that the authors are experts in the field and are honest, bound by academic integrity.

So, I hope you can start to begin to realise how difficult it is to transition to a renewable energy system. Let me reiterate a few things:
1. I am not advocating 100% nuclear, I am saying we will likely need it for a portion of our energy supply. I just want us to pick the right kind of nuclear- not outdated, unsafe junk.
2. I believe renewable energy will play a significant role in decarbonising our economy. Like I said before, I am in solar energy research myself for good reason (I think it has big potential).
3. I would like Australian’s to have all the correct facts presented to them so we can as a nation select the best outcome for our future.
4. I don’t want Governments to waste money on overpriced renewable energy projects like Solar Dawn that only give renewable energy a bad name.

HenryBG said :

All I’m saying is that wind, solar and wave, whatever, simply will not do the job at this stage.

All options need to be explored.

You’ve acquired those assertions via the energy lobby disinformation PR.

*Why* won’t they do the job? It’s just not true.

They’re scared of renewables in a similar way that print media (and governments) are scared of the internet: democratisation of the electricity supply will lose them a lot of money. Individuals and entire towns can reduce their reliance on their State’s rip-off pseudo-privatised electricity supply monopoly.

It simply wont work. Not yet anyway.

I refer you to Germany with the greatest amount of wind power in Europe around 27 Gw at peak or equivalent to 14 2Gw coal power stations. Now for the last couple of weeks the amount of power produced by those has only been around 1Gw because of light winds or lack of wind. And dont forget all this wind power is subsidised.

Because this is a known factor in power they didn’t just go without power because they still had all the old power stations on back up to cover the times when there is no wind. So you cant just replace these power stations with Wind. Also they can import power from neighbours if need be Australia cant do that.

If for whatever reason yo don’t want to use cheap coal power than a transition to 4th generation Nuclear is the go. Mean while build your 2 sq km solar arrays out in the desert but don’t expect subsidies if its so viable build it and they will come.

@ HenryBG and OpenYourMind:

Ok, so the only objections you have left, that have not been proven wrong are:

1. Right wing, America evil, Iraq War, blah blah blah.

– Excuse me if I suggest this is a little off topic and choose not to respond.

2. Safety is not guaranteed. Fair enough.

– design features of advanced reactors have significantly improved.
– As an example, the US regulatory commission has just given the OK to the AP-1000 reactor, and 14 of them are under construction in the US, and 12 in China.
– It is the safest nuclear reactor to date and the first to be approved in the US since 1979, despite the board having prominent anti-nukists.
– we will just have to wait until advanced reactors are demonstrated with previously built, under construction and proposed.

3. They are not needed as renewable can do the job, normally preceded by “I reckon…”.

All I’m saying is that wind, solar and wave, whatever, simply will not do the job at this stage.

All options need to be explored.

You’ve acquired those assertions via the energy lobby disinformation PR.

*Why* won’t they do the job? It’s just not true.

They’re scared of renewables in a similar way that print media (and governments) are scared of the internet: democratisation of the electricity supply will lose them a lot of money. Individuals and entire towns can reduce their reliance on their State’s rip-off pseudo-privatised electricity supply monopoly.

HenryBG said :

[Meanwhile, 17 French reactors had to shut down or reduce output in 2006 due to water supply problems. The power that *was* supplied was only supplied by allowing the reactors to pump hot water into the rivers, causing environmental damage and fish kills.

We have to cook fish before we eat them anyway – isn’t this MORE environmentally friendly?

Of course, if we phase out coal we all know that solar , wind and wave will be able to cope with the demands.

Of course they will.

Well, nuclear can’t unless it has a 100% guaranteed *cool* water supply, so renewables aren’t any worse.

In fact, they are way better, and I can think of a few reasons just off the top of my head:

1) cost is 99%+ capital investment, virtually no ongoing costs and virtually no decommissioning costs, unlike nukes, which, as the British taxpayer has been finding, cost hundreds of millions to decommission, never mind the cost of running them, even *with* the taxpayer providing a massive subsidy in the form of not requiring the industry to carry insurance.

2) ownership of renewables can be personal, private, communal, corporate, public, in any combination, at any scale, unlike nukes, which can only be owned and run by a secretive and dishonest industry as a private or part public body running a huge plant.

3) no lock-in to a fuel supplier, unlike nukes where you are locked-in to purchasing a dangerous fuel being produced by a secretive, dishonest, uneconomical, dangerous and dirty industry

4) the ability to distribute power generation, unlike nukes which produce a lot of power in just one location. As long as the water doesn’t run out, which case they produce nothing, like they discovered in Spain, Fraqnce, Germany, the USA.

5) the ability to site power generation far more flexibly. Anybody can stick a windmill or a solar panel on their roof or in their paddock. Try siting a nuke anywhere in Australia – there may be a couple of spots where a nuke would work, but you’ll never get it past the local NIMBYs. Bad luck.

If I may interject…

To me nuclear stands as an option. Anyone truly concerned about the impact of CO2 emissions needs to at least keep the option there.

Maybe it will prove to be too expensive or otherwise unfeasible. There are definitely issues regarding cost, safety and ongoing sustainability. However, it still offers the potential for massive base loads of electricity, and for this reason shouldn’t be completely ruled out.

Of course, if we phase out coal we all know that solar , wind and wave will be able to cope with the demands.

Of course they will.

I reckon renewables could do that easily compared to the cost of likely Govt subsidies required to set up a nuclear industry. That little incident in Fukushima has displaced more than 160,000 people and costs are estimated at over $1trillion. You won’t get that kind of public liability insurance from NRMA, that’s for sure. Finland’s new plant has eye watering cost over-runs and that’s with established technologies on an existing plant site. Don’t buy into Diggety’s suggestions of nuclear alternatives that are cleaner/safer…they carry even greater project risk and therefore cost than established nuclear tech.

Diggety said :

HenryBG said :

Face it – the French get blackouts in Summer thanks to the unreliability inherent in nuclear power’s huge reliance on the availability of water – how’s Australia going to re-jig its water supply to add Nukes as a new and massive consumer of water to compound our existing water supply problems?

Which didn’t eventuate.

Australia will not be able to employ such water intensive reactors, as they no longer exist or are required!

Instead, Australia will:
– use forms of nuclear with less water needed/kWh of a solar thermal or coal plant.
– will have huge excesses of energy for water desalination, including energy to pump it far away wherever it is needed.

All these points have been given to you in peer reviewed articles, if you’d bothered to read them. We wouldn’t be heading to Mullyville right now if you’d grasped the concept of science, engineering, economics and technological progress, Henry.

For the last time Henry, give me your list of objections as i asked before and I’ll answer them for you…. Don’t be scared.

More vaporware.

“Australia’s going use a bunch of new you-beaut stuff that doesn’t actually exist.”

And of course, it’s *so* economically viable that the nuke industry is begging the government to subsidise them.

Meanwhile, 17 French reactors had to shut down or reduce output in 2006 due to water supply problems. The power that *was* supplied was only supplied by allowing the reactors to pump hot water into the rivers, causing environmental damage and fish kills.

During the same heatwave, the Spanish reactor which that country relies on for 20% of its electricity generation had to be shut down.

Obviously, nuclear is not a viable, reliable option for baseload electricity requirements, nor is it in any way environmentally safe.

In any case, there is no point having this argument – the right-wing cretins who support this nonsense don’t have the same pull here in Australia as they do in the USA, and nuclear will never get anywhere with the Australian electorate.

HenryBG said :

Diggety said :

I only have time to discuss options presented with established research and examples, OYM. Not teach people the background basics needed to understand it all.

No, you need to convince venture capitalists to invest in your vapor-ware.

They’re not biting.

Wonder why that is….I guess venture capitalists must be a bunch of smelly greenies…..

Not only did you completely miss the content of that discussion, you also are completely wrong about investment in nuclear energy.

Shame, Comrade.

HenryBG said :

Face it – the French get blackouts in Summer thanks to the unreliability inherent in nuclear power’s huge reliance on the availability of water – how’s Australia going to re-jig its water supply to add Nukes as a new and massive consumer of water to compound our existing water supply problems?

Which didn’t eventuate.

Australia will not be able to employ such water intensive reactors, as they no longer exist or are required!

Instead, Australia will:
– use forms of nuclear with less water needed/kWh of a solar thermal or coal plant.
– will have huge excesses of energy for water desalination, including energy to pump it far away wherever it is needed.

All these points have been given to you in peer reviewed articles, if you’d bothered to read them. We wouldn’t be heading to Mullyville right now if you’d grasped the concept of science, engineering, economics and technological progress, Henry.

For the last time Henry, give me your list of objections as i asked before and I’ll answer them for you…. Don’t be scared.

HenryBG said :

Diggety said :

And yet, as we speak the British government are considering a proposal based on the IFR, to convert their dangerous ‘waste’ stockpiles to electrical energy…

Alternatively OYM, you could knock down the door of GEH and the UK Atomic Energy Authority that they’ve got their sums and knowledge all wrong. And yourself and HenryBG will educate them on the ins and outs of a technology that doesn’t exist?

While you’re there OYM, you may as well tell all those suppliers and consumers of fast/breeder gigawatts in the past, that they didn’t generate or consume electrons running around a circuit at high potential.

It was all an illusion was it?

It’s not up-and-running and it’s not making money.

Henry finally made an accurate statement!

However, fast/breeder technology, of which IFR’s are based are up-and-running and have been for decades. With Britain about to adopt the IFR system soon.

The progress in technology from conventional fast/breeders demonstrated by the IFR, of which I advocate are in-house fuel recycling, passive safety systems, inability to produce nuclear weapons and small, modular reactor designs.

The IFR was proven, even it’s harshest critic admitted it passed all it’s objectives. It was shut down by lack of Government funding when CO2 was not an issue.

The only thing the Sellafield GEH technology won’t do is in-house pyroprocessing, i.e. the ‘integral’ component.

Diggety said :

I only have time to discuss options presented with established research and examples, OYM. Not teach people the background basics needed to understand it all.

No, you need to convince venture capitalists to invest in your vapor-ware.

They’re not biting.

Wonder why that is….I guess venture capitalists must be a bunch of smelly greenies…..

Diggety said :

OpenYourMind said :

Referring back to the discussion, you were still banging on about IFRs, a non existent ‘safe’ breeder technology when HenryBG pointed out the disastrous Japanese exercise in Breeder reactors and this was before Fukushima.

And yet, as we speak the British government are considering a proposal based on the IFR, to convert their dangerous ‘waste’ stockpiles to electrical energy…

Alternatively OYM, you could knock down the door of GEH and the UK Atomic Energy Authority that they’ve got their sums and knowledge all wrong. And yourself and HenryBG will educate them on the ins and outs of a technology that doesn’t exist?

While you’re there OYM, you may as well tell all those suppliers and consumers of fast/breeder gigawatts in the past, that they didn’t generate or consume electrons running around a circuit at high potential.

It was all an illusion was it?

It’s not up-and-running and it’s not making money.

In the IT world we call it vaporware: sales-spruikers selling stuff that only exists on paper – just like you magic reactors which can be run economically; and magically turn waste into…nothing, produce no waste, and are so risk-free they don’t even need insurance.

A load of utter bollocks, in other words.

Face it – the French get blackouts in Summer thanks to the unreliability inherent in nuclear power’s huge reliance on the availability of water – how’s Australia going to re-jig its water supply to add Nukes as a new and massive consumer of water to compound our existing water supply problems?

You have to laugh at these nuke-spruikers – flogging a horse that died in 1986.

OpenYourMind said :

Just give up FFS.

Nah. I’d rather drag Australian Luddites kicking and screaming into the 21st century.

OpenYourMind said :

Diggety said :

No, I stopped commenting when I realised you weren’t aware of Capacity Factors, LCOE, Load Following, Intermittency, Energy storage challenges and the discrepancies in domestic, industrial and transport energy consumption.

I only have time to discuss options presented with established research and examples, OYM. Not teach people the background basics needed to understand it all.

Post Fukushima all nuclear discussion for the Western World is moot – it just won’t happen. The opportunity for convincing the voting public died on March 11, 2011. Just give up FFS.

Correction: no countries are pursuing Fukushima technology Neither before or after the accident. Reasons:

1. No one makes it anymore- the technology is redundant.
2. There are far safer, cheaper reactor designs requiring less fuel, resources and capital costs.
3. The technology required indigenous bottom up development, rather than off-the-shelf proven technologies that nations can purchase today.

Most countries using nuclear power today are either planning, constructing or commissioning new reactors right now. That includes western countries, and countries without a civilian nuclear power program.

That is all post-Fukushima.

So, again. You’re wrong.

OpenYourMind said :

Diggety said :

No, I stopped commenting when I realised you weren’t aware of Capacity Factors, LCOE, Load Following, Intermittency, Energy storage challenges and the discrepancies in domestic, industrial and transport energy consumption.

I only have time to discuss options presented with established research and examples, OYM. Not teach people the background basics needed to understand it all.

Referring back to the discussion, you were still banging on about IFRs, a non existent ‘safe’ breeder technology when HenryBG pointed out the disastrous Japanese exercise in Breeder reactors and this was before Fukushima.

And yet, as we speak the British government are considering a proposal based on the IFR, to convert their dangerous ‘waste’ stockpiles to electrical energy…

Alternatively OYM, you could knock down the door of GEH and the UK Atomic Energy Authority that they’ve got their sums and knowledge all wrong. And yourself and HenryBG will educate them on the ins and outs of a technology that doesn’t exist?

While you’re there OYM, you may as well tell all those suppliers and consumers of fast/breeder gigawatts in the past, that they didn’t generate or consume electrons running around a circuit at high potential.

It was all an illusion was it?

Diggety said :

OpenYourMind said :

we did the nuclear thing to death on the Large Scale Solar discussion. Suffice it to say nuclear didn’t fair well.

No, I stopped commenting when I realised you weren’t aware of Capacity Factors, LCOE, Load Following, Intermittency, Energy storage challenges and the discrepancies in domestic, industrial and transport energy consumption.

I only have time to discuss options presented with established research and examples, OYM. Not teach people the background basics needed to understand it all.

Referring back to the discussion, you were still banging on about IFRs, a non existent ‘safe’ breeder technology when HenryBG pointed out the disastrous Japanese exercise in Breeder reactors and this was before Fukushima. Post Fukushima all nuclear discussion for the Western World is moot – it just won’t happen. The opportunity for convincing the voting public died on March 11, 2011. Just give up FFS.

Skyring said :

A little bitty solar cell powers an iPod, a few more keeps the TV alive, just string enough together and the streets light up and the steel mills run along happily.

I wish.

Diggety said :

I only have time to discuss options presented with established research and examples, OYM. Not teach people the background basics needed to understand it all.

What’s to understand? A little bitty solar cell powers an iPod, a few more keeps the TV alive, just string enough together and the streets light up and the steel mills run along happily. Bob’s yer uncle. The man’s a genius and should be PM.

OpenYourMind said :

we did the nuclear thing to death on the Large Scale Solar discussion. Suffice it to say nuclear didn’t fair well.

No, I stopped commenting when I realised you weren’t aware of Capacity Factors, LCOE, Load Following, Intermittency, Energy storage challenges and the discrepancies in domestic, industrial and transport energy consumption.

I only have time to discuss options presented with established research and examples, OYM. Not teach people the background basics needed to understand it all.

p1 said :

Skyring said :

p1 said :

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

The thing about climate change (as opposed to fossil fuel supplies dwindling, which is a separate issue) is that cropland inundated or rendered inarable can be replaced by the same area of land opened up. It gets warmer, we’ll move further from the Equator, as we did following the Ice Ages. The sea levels rise, we’ll move further inland..

It might only take 50 years to make big chunks of Australia’s currently fertile land to become relatively worthless. Even if the western desert becomes much wetter, it might take more then 50 years to turn into a tropical oasis. Perhaps we should did the canal and give the inland sea a head start?

Apparently climate change is happening right now. I’m not seeing any huge changes. We’re dealing with the effects right now.

Look, it’s not something that’s going to blindside us, is it? We’re going to have smug bastards like you running around ringing the bell and crowing that you told us so with every mansion sliding into the water. We’ll cope because it will happen slowly enough for government cycles to respond.

HenryBG said :

Nukes are utterly economic, as demonstrated by the fact that even the yanks aren’t building any.

Well, they are the only serious alternatives to fossil fuel energy. Better learn to love ’em.

Besides, the Chines can’t squeeze much more coal-fired power stations into the grid before they are breathing nothing but soot and spilling it over into the rest of the region. Seriously, have you seen the place?

HenryBG said :

Presenting us with articles which vaguely suggest “extracting uranium from seawater” as a serious option are pretty much an admission on your part that you don’t have a leg to stand on.

It’s ironic that those who profess so much scepticism in the face of the facts of climate change are so quick to swallow nuke-industry bollocks.

Actually, it isn’t – it’s an entirely ideological position. But you’ll need to face both facts fairly soon: climate change presents enormous risks for us to manage and the nuke industry will never get anywhere in this country.
Even in the US where rabid right-wing maniacs have the clout to push the country into a pointless and borderline-illegal invasion of Iraq, they’ve been unable to come up with the cash to build any new nukes for decades. Here, you’ve got buckleys. Nukes are utterly economic, as demonstrated by the fact that even the yanks aren’t building any.

Henry,

1. I made no comment on the validity of anthropogenic climate change, I am convinced it highly likely and very important to act on it. But while we’re at it:
– some of the most prominent climate scientists in Australia, UK, USA, India, China, Korea and EU are advocates of advanced nuclear reactors.
– nuclear power- repeatedly around the world- has been the found to be effective technology to significantly reduce our carbon footprint (including Australia).
– Germany plans to phase their NPP out, resulting in many more gas and coal power stations about to built (from clean energy funds!)

2. Every assertion you’ve made has been shown to be wrong, by peer-reviewed literature in reputable impact factor journals.

3. Instead of disputed those claims, you instead come up with ad hominem against the authors. Authors who are far more qualified to research, scrutinize and conclude in this field than you.

4. Instead of reading the material I gave you to enlighten you of your certifiably false claims, you do not read them at, evidenced by your repeated myths.

5. I want you to list every objection you can think of against Australia considering nuclear reactors as part of future energy mix. Then I’ll answer each and every one for you using facts- not myths.

P.S. US not building reactors? They are about to complete the regulatory framework to allow GenIII+ reactors, the cheapest and safest off-the-shelf reactor ever designed. China of course has already started.

we did the nuclear thing to death on the Large Scale Solar discussion. Suffice it to say nuclear didn’t fair well.

Diggety said :

HenryBG said :

Diggety said :

“we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is” -Henry

Not true. Fuel recycling technolgy places reserves around 50,000 years. Or 5 billion years if extracted from sea water.

Typical nonsense from the nuke-spruikers.

Name one commercial operation extracting Uranium from sea water. Or ever likely to, for that matter. If Uranium were ever expensive enough to make this economically feasable, nuclear power would, by defnition, be UNfeasable due to cost, compared with all the “free” renewable energy available all around us.

The US Nuclear Energy Agency says we have enough Uranium for 200 years.

Your seawater extraction and fast-breeder reactor stuff is all pipe-dreams. If it were economic, it would be happening.
As it is, the nuke industry can’t even afford to insure itself, let alone subsist without massive government subsidy.

And why should the taxpayer subsidise an industry that is shoddy, dishonest, dangerous and incredibly dirty when there are better options?

I thought I told you to do your homework, Henry.

I took my time to provide you with the evidence you asked for (note: none of which is “industry-funded PR bullshit” at your request). If you can’t understand the articles, find someone to explain them to you.

Presenting us with articles which vaguely suggest “extracting uranium from seawater” as a serious option are pretty much an admission on your part that you don’t have a leg to stand on.

It’s ironic that those who profess so much scepticism in the face of the facts of climate change are so quick to swallow nuke-industry bollocks.

Actually, it isn’t – it’s an entirely ideological position. But you’ll need to face both facts fairly soon: climate change presents enormous risks for us to manage and the nuke industry will never get anywhere in this country.
Even in the US where rabid right-wing maniacs have the clout to push the country into a pointless and borderline-illegal invasion of Iraq, they’ve been unable to come up with the cash to build any new nukes for decades. Here, you’ve got buckleys. Nukes are utterly economic, as demonstrated by the fact that even the yanks aren’t building any.

Skyring said :

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

The thing about climate change (as opposed to fossil fuel supplies dwindling, which is a separate issue) is that cropland inundated or rendered inarable can be replaced by the same land opened up. It gets warmer, we’ll move further from the Equator, as we did following the Ice Ages. The sea levels rise, we’ll move further inland..

It might only take 50 years to make big chunks of Australia’s currently fertile land to become relatively worthless. Even if the western desert becomes much wetter, it might take more then 50 years to turn into a tropical oasis. Perhaps we should did the canal and give the inland sea a head start?

Nuclear fusion FTW, but most likely we will transition through some kind of “clean” coal developments such as coldry and carbon capture.

As far as fuel for vehicles goes though, until we have a glut of cheap, clean electricity, bio-diesels will probably be the next stepping stone.

Not that this is what I want to happen, but it is likely that this is what will occur.

HenryBG said :

Diggety said :

“we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is” -Henry

Not true. Fuel recycling technolgy places reserves around 50,000 years. Or 5 billion years if extracted from sea water.

Typical nonsense from the nuke-spruikers.

Name one commercial operation extracting Uranium from sea water. Or ever likely to, for that matter. If Uranium were ever expensive enough to make this economically feasable, nuclear power would, by defnition, be UNfeasable due to cost, compared with all the “free” renewable energy available all around us.

The US Nuclear Energy Agency says we have enough Uranium for 200 years.

Your seawater extraction and fast-breeder reactor stuff is all pipe-dreams. If it were economic, it would be happening.
As it is, the nuke industry can’t even afford to insure itself, let alone subsist without massive government subsidy.

And why should the taxpayer subsidise an industry that is shoddy, dishonest, dangerous and incredibly dirty when there are better options?

I thought I told you to do your homework, Henry.

I took my time to provide you with the evidence you asked for (note: none of which is “industry-funded PR bullshit” at your request). If you can’t understand the articles, find someone to explain them to you.

Skyring said :

Postalgeek said :

Skyring said :

So global warming – or climate change as some call it in this year of no summer – isn’t such a big deal. We can handle the sea level rises and the changes in weather patterns. Humanity has done it before and we’ll do it again.

Beg to differ.

Marginal global warming might not have been a big deal with a couple of billion humans to feed.

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

The thing about climate change (as opposed to fossil fuel supplies dwindling, which is a separate issue) is that cropland inundated or rendered inarable can be replaced by the same land opened up. It gets warmer, we’ll move further from the Equator, as we did following the Ice Ages. The sea levels rise, we’ll move further inland.

These aren’t going to be overnight changes.

You’re talking about a global population that numbered in the hundred thousands, maybe a few million, migrating over hundreds if not thousands of years. I’m talking about a population that is projected to be 8-9 billion migrating over the span of a few decades.

Do you have any idea of what land will be denied, what arable land is left that isn’t suburb or hasn’t be drained of nutrients, what it is capable of yielding, how much fertilizer is required to bring soil up to speed, what unseasonable weather can do to crops? How’s the Murray Darling doing?

Agriculture requires stability. Stability in sunshine, water, and supply of nutrients. And it’s hard to maintain that even with today’s climate.

Nobody knows for sure what is going to happen once we start kicking 2 degrees.

Diggety said :

“we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is” -Henry

Not true. Fuel recycling technolgy places reserves around 50,000 years. Or 5 billion years if extracted from sea water.

Typical nonsense from the nuke-spruikers.

Name one commercial operation extracting Uranium from sea water. Or ever likely to, for that matter. If Uranium were ever expensive enough to make this economically feasable, nuclear power would, by defnition, be UNfeasable due to cost, compared with all the “free” renewable energy available all around us.

The US Nuclear Energy Agency says we have enough Uranium for 200 years.

Your seawater extraction and fast-breeder reactor stuff is all pipe-dreams. If it were economic, it would be happening.
As it is, the nuke industry can’t even afford to insure itself, let alone subsist without massive government subsidy.

And why should the taxpayer subsidise an industry that is shoddy, dishonest, dangerous and incredibly dirty when there are better options?

Skyring said :

The thing about climate change (as opposed to fossil fuel supplies dwindling, which is a separate issue) is that cropland inundated or rendered inarable can be replaced by the same land opened up. It gets warmer, we’ll move further from the Equator, as we did following the Ice Ages. The sea levels rise, we’ll move further inland.

These aren’t going to be overnight changes.

You are right about the way it will change migration patterns. Australia needs to consider the political and economic costs of a couple hundred million south Asians who currently live in low-lying areas needing to find new places to live. Our current ‘issue’ with boat people will pale in comparison to the type of human migrations that are likely to happen over the next couple of hundred years.

Diggety said :

Peer reviewed analysis:

Study on renewable feasibility without nuclear:
Energy Policy. Volume 38, Issue 8, August 2010, Pages 4107–4114

Study on renewable feasibility with nuclear:
Energy Policy. Volume 42, March 2012, Pages 4–8

Another analysis of Australia’s climate policy vs technical feasibility:
Environmental Science & Policy. Volume 14, Issue 1, January 2011, Pages 20–27

Henry, I forgot one.

Post carbon pricing cost evaluation of technologies:
Energy. Volume 36, Issue 1, January 2011, Pages 305–313

And I highly recommend that Ockams Razor episode, I’ll know if you haven’t listened to it… Do your homework naughty boy.

HenryBG said :

Do think about the answer to this before making your next posting, to save embarassment. This advice goes for everybody else who’s been posting ignorant twaddle to the effect that one day’s weather proves something (anything) about climate change.

Well, yes, but aren’t we going to get a summer at all this year?

Postalgeek said :

Skyring said :

So global warming – or climate change as some call it in this year of no summer – isn’t such a big deal. We can handle the sea level rises and the changes in weather patterns. Humanity has done it before and we’ll do it again.

Beg to differ.

Marginal global warming might not have been a big deal with a couple of billion humans to feed.

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

The thing about climate change (as opposed to fossil fuel supplies dwindling, which is a separate issue) is that cropland inundated or rendered inarable can be replaced by the same land opened up. It gets warmer, we’ll move further from the Equator, as we did following the Ice Ages. The sea levels rise, we’ll move further inland.

These aren’t going to be overnight changes.

HenryBG said :

Diggety said :

HenryBG said :

Nuclear is vastly more expensive than renewables. Of course they have to hide this to make it seem attractive. They do that by forcing vast amounts of cost onto the taxpayer. The industry takes virtually no responsibility for insurance, waste, or decommissioning and the taxpayer foots the bill. Factor these costs in and this equally non-renewable energy source is a complete non-starter. (we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is).

All reputable studies disagree with all your points, Henry.

Name them.

And don’t give industry-funded PR bullshit, either.

Peer reviewed analysis:

Study on renewable feasibility without nuclear:
Energy Policy. Volume 38, Issue 8, August 2010, Pages 4107–4114

Study on renewable feasibility with nuclear:
Energy Policy. Volume 42, March 2012, Pages 4–8

Another analysis of Australia’s climate policy vs technical feasibility:
Environmental Science & Policy. Volume 14, Issue 1, January 2011, Pages 20–27

“we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is” -Henry

Not true. Fuel recycling technolgy places reserves around 50,000 years. Or 5 billion years if extracted from sea water.
American Journal of Physics. 51(1), Jan. 1983

Governmental analysis:

Draft Energy White Paper (Ch. 7) projected energy costs 2030, Dept Resources, Energy and Tourism:
http://www.ret.gov.au/energy/facts/white_paper/draft-ewp-2011/Pages/Draft-Energy-White-Paper-2011.aspx

In the meantime, there is a important little Ockhams Razor broadcast you should listen to. If you want any questions, just ask.

dungfungus said :

Science is neither good or bad but scientists using computer models and making predictions isn’t exactly sciene either.

What are you talking about? Do you have the faintest idea of what modelling is and what it’s used for?
Modelling is used to *test* predictions.
And the modelling done (on paper) over 50 years ago correctly predicted the warming, the sea level rise, and the more rapid warming in the Arctic that are all actually occurring today.

dungfungus said :

BTW, have you noticed how cold it is today?

I have an exercise for you:
Consider my next statement:

“SYDNEY is DOWNHILL from CANBERRA”

Now, when you next drive to Sydney, and you come to a hill, (like, just past Eaglehawk) does the uphill bit on your way to Sydney prove my statement wrong?

Do think about the answer to this before making your next posting, to save embarassment. This advice goes for everybody else who’s been posting ignorant twaddle to the effect that one day’s weather proves something (anything) about climate change.

dungfungus said :

HenryBG said :

Postalgeek said :

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

Combine that with an agricultural industry hugely reliant on dwindling oil and phosphorous supplies, and heavy machinery that is not within cooee of an electric revolution (little electric cars are nice but do stuff all for the serious problems) and the potential for some serious SHTF is in the making.

Those who think that the present number of uninvited refugees are a problem are in for a rude shock.

Exactly.

And the proof of the seriousness of the problem lies in the strenuousness of the Denial-machine trying to convince the nutters and dimwits that science is bad.

Science is neither good or bad but scientists using computer models and making predictions isn’t exactly sciene either. BTW, have you noticed how cold it is today?

you do have a brain, dungfungus? i suggest you consider the science – yes ‘science’ – involved in developing these computer models: or do you imagine computers magically come with ‘click here for the latest global warming models’ software already installed? only on an apple, of course, probably a free i-phone app…

anyway, go on, cite some peer-reviewed science climate that supports your position…

HenryBG said :

Postalgeek said :

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

Combine that with an agricultural industry hugely reliant on dwindling oil and phosphorous supplies, and heavy machinery that is not within cooee of an electric revolution (little electric cars are nice but do stuff all for the serious problems) and the potential for some serious SHTF is in the making.

Those who think that the present number of uninvited refugees are a problem are in for a rude shock.

Exactly.

And the proof of the seriousness of the problem lies in the strenuousness of the Denial-machine trying to convince the nutters and dimwits that science is bad.

Science is neither good or bad but scientists using computer models and making predictions isn’t exactly sciene either. BTW, have you noticed how cold it is today?

HenryBG said :

Postalgeek said :

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

Combine that with an agricultural industry hugely reliant on dwindling oil and phosphorous supplies, and heavy machinery that is not within cooee of an electric revolution (little electric cars are nice but do stuff all for the serious problems) and the potential for some serious SHTF is in the making.

Those who think that the present number of uninvited refugees are a problem are in for a rude shock.

Exactly.

And the proof of the seriousness of the problem lies in the strenuousness of the Denial-machine trying to convince the nutters and dimwits that science is bad.

Indeed. People who seriously think about the trajectory of our current way of doing things can see some pretty scary stuff happening in the mid decades of this century. This isn’t simply climate change or peak oil, but a whole confluence of problems with our current resource management and treatment of the environment. They point to serious international conflict over increasingly scarce resources.

Skyring said :

I’m just wondering how you’d explain Ötzi the Iceman. If he was covered by ice 5 300 years ago and remained buried until recently, then surely temperatures then were much the same as now.

So, what you’re saying is that one particular spot in the European Alps is warmer today than at any time in the last 5300 years?

Do you think – just maybe – that the people who study this area are basing their analyses on just a few more data points than just one?

Maybe some of our tin-foil-hatted nuke-spruiking geniuses can point out to us exactly where their “cooling” can be seen in the data:

http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.A2.gif

Postalgeek said :

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

Combine that with an agricultural industry hugely reliant on dwindling oil and phosphorous supplies, and heavy machinery that is not within cooee of an electric revolution (little electric cars are nice but do stuff all for the serious problems) and the potential for some serious SHTF is in the making.

Those who think that the present number of uninvited refugees are a problem are in for a rude shock.

Exactly.

And the proof of the seriousness of the problem lies in the strenuousness of the Denial-machine trying to convince the nutters and dimwits that science is bad.

Diggety said :

HenryBG said :

Nuclear is vastly more expensive than renewables. Of course they have to hide this to make it seem attractive. They do that by forcing vast amounts of cost onto the taxpayer. The industry takes virtually no responsibility for insurance, waste, or decommissioning and the taxpayer foots the bill. Factor these costs in and this equally non-renewable energy source is a complete non-starter. (we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is).

All reputable studies disagree with all your points, Henry.

Name them.

And don’t give industry-funded PR bullshit, either.

HenryBG said :

Nuclear is vastly more expensive than renewables. Of course they have to hide this to make it seem attractive. They do that by forcing vast amounts of cost onto the taxpayer. The industry takes virtually no responsibility for insurance, waste, or decommissioning and the taxpayer foots the bill. Factor these costs in and this equally non-renewable energy source is a complete non-starter. (we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is).

All reputable studies disagree with all your points, Henry.

HenryBG said :

Solidarity said :

HenryBG said :

Skyring said :

One way to keep more of these finite assets in the ground would be to heavily invest in energy generation from renewable sources: wind, solar, and tidal are energy sources that are sitting there waiting us to properly tap into them, and tapping into them would entail wealth creation rather than asset depletion of continuing to use fossil fuels.

You mean nuclear.

Nuclear is vastly more expensive than renewables. Of course they have to hide this to make it seem attractive. They do that by forcing vast amounts of cost onto the taxpayer. The industry takes virtually no responsibility for insurance, waste, or decommissioning and the taxpayer foots the bill. Factor these costs in and this equally non-renewable energy source is a complete non-starter. (we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is).

Might want to check your facts there, buddy.

Skyring said :

So global warming – or climate change as some call it in this year of no summer – isn’t such a big deal. We can handle the sea level rises and the changes in weather patterns. Humanity has done it before and we’ll do it again.

Beg to differ.

Marginal global warming might not have been a big deal with a couple of billion humans to feed.

Serious global warming over the space of a few decades with a 7 billion population already pushing past the safety margins of food production is a very big deal.

Combine that with an agricultural industry hugely reliant on dwindling oil and phosphorous supplies, and heavy machinery that is not within cooee of an electric revolution (little electric cars are nice but do stuff all for the serious problems) and the potential for some serious SHTF is in the making.

Those who think that the present number of uninvited refugees are a problem are in for a rude shock.

Solidarity said :

HenryBG said :

Skyring said :

One way to keep more of these finite assets in the ground would be to heavily invest in energy generation from renewable sources: wind, solar, and tidal are energy sources that are sitting there waiting us to properly tap into them, and tapping into them would entail wealth creation rather than asset depletion of continuing to use fossil fuels.

You mean nuclear.

Nuclear is vastly more expensive than renewables. Of course they have to hide this to make it seem attractive. They do that by forcing vast amounts of cost onto the taxpayer. The industry takes virtually no responsibility for insurance, waste, or decommissioning and the taxpayer foots the bill. Factor these costs in and this equally non-renewable energy source is a complete non-starter. (we’re going to run out of Uranium before we run out of coal as it is).

HenryBG said :

Skyring said :

One way to keep more of these finite assets in the ground would be to heavily invest in energy generation from renewable sources: wind, solar, and tidal are energy sources that are sitting there waiting us to properly tap into them, and tapping into them would entail wealth creation rather than asset depletion of continuing to use fossil fuels.

You mean nuclear.

Skyring said :

. But if we make our coal too difficult to get, the Chinese are likely to come down here and start digging it up for themselves.

I would guess that one should definitely be reasonably high on the list of things the ONA should be thinking very hard about – up there with the very serious implications of climate change, energy security, food security and how those inter-relate.

Skyring said :

.Besides, we stop selling cheap coal and Julia won’t be able to bang on about wise economic management. It’s the only thing keeping her head above water at the moment as she captains the Costa Canberra past the voters lining the shore.

Politically-motivated drivelly bollocks with a whiff of mysoginism thrown in.

It is globally accepted that Australia did a very good job (under Labor. I assume the other idiots would have followed the same advice, were they in charge at the time) at responding to the GEC.

HenryBG said :

This should be the other significant concern with Australia’s energy policies: we are accelerating the rate at which we extract fossil fuels (especially gas) in order to sell it at today’s cheap prices to foreigners. If we slow down the rate at which we sell our energy sources, our national assets increase in value.

Mmmmmaybe. But if we make our coal too difficult to get, the Chinese are likely to come down here and start digging it up for themselves.

Besides, we stop selling cheap coal and Julia won’t be able to bang on about wise economic management. It’s the only thing keeping her head above water at the moment as she captains the Costa Canberra past the voters lining the shore.

johnboy said :

As the saudi’s are fond of saying: “the stone age didn’t end because we ran out of stones”

Well, has the Stone Age ended in Saudi Arabia?

Of course, that’s right, they reached the Dark Ages 900 years ago….and stayed there.

Skyring said :

Precisely correct. Oil and gas reserves are finite. One day we’ll run out, even after we go after the increasingly difficult stuff in cold and deep places.

Likewise coal. There’s only so much of that available.

Can I just point out – the whingers complaining about the Greens “locking up” our coal are completely missing the point: the law of supply and demand dictates that as a finite resource is consumed, there is a good chance that its value will increase.

In other words, a ton of coal that we don’t use *now* should appreciate in value while we keep it, this providing is with an asset that would have otherwise been used at the cheaper price by our foreign friends.

This should be the other significant concern with Australia’s energy policies: we are accelerating the rate at which we extract fossil fuels (especially gas) in order to sell it at today’s cheap prices to foreigners. If we slow down the rate at which we sell our energy sources, our national assets increase in value.

One way to keep more of these finite assets in the ground would be to heavily invest in energy generation from renewable sources: wind, solar, and tidal are energy sources that are sitting there waiting us to properly tap into them, and tapping into them would entail wealth creation rather than asset depletion of continuing to use fossil fuels.

Jethro said :

You mustn’t have learnt too much about the differences between renewable and non-renewable resources Dungfungus. Peak oil is as much as an inevitability as night following day. You cannot have a non-renewable resource being used at an ever increasing rate without eventually reaching a limit of production, after which production levels will go into terminal decline.

Ah, I see you are new to just how foolish these fools are: according to them, oil *is* a renewable resource.

You see, contrary to the widely held belief by – pish-posh – scientists – and all they scientific observations and data, oil is *not* a mineral formed by sedimentary processes: in fact oil is formed *abiotically* deep down below the crust (yes, and – magically – the heat and pressure down there doesn’t instantly denature it) and so oil is a renewable resource.

Look it up. The nutters who believe 9/11 was a conspiracy and global warming is a fraud ALSO believe in magic never-ending oil supplies.

The thing that irks me, is that these ignorant morons (led by IQ-challenged idiots like Alan Jones, disinformers like Ian Plimer and mischievous lunatics like Monckton) are actually successfully diverting government policy away from sensible, constructive, and forward-thinking initiatives.

Jethro said :

Anyone who believes that you can continue to use a non-renewable resources at an ever expanding rate and not hit some type of production wall is a fool.

Precisely correct. Oil and gas reserves are finite. One day we’ll run out, even after we go after the increasingly difficult stuff in cold and deep places.

Likewise coal. There’s only so much of that available. Burning it directly, or converting it to other fuels, or making plastic out of it, one day it will all be gone.

I wouldn’t count on fossil fuels being available elsewhere in the solar system. Maybe we can mine methane from the gas giants, but the expense and technological challenge makes deep water Arctic mining look like farting after Maccas in comparison.

So we’ll have to find other energy sources, and we’ve got to do it reasonably quickly because our civilisation depends on energy to power computers and lifts and lights and recycling plants and just about everything that sets us apart from cavemen. And, more to the point, our food production systems need energy to harvest, to transport and to process the things that keep us alive. If there was a big enough war or natural disaster interrupting our oil supplies, we’d starve in huge numbers.

So global warming – or climate change as some call it in this year of no summer – isn’t such a big deal. We can handle the sea level rises and the changes in weather patterns. Humanity has done it before and we’ll do it again.

But we have to look at alternative energy sources if we are to survive in any form that resembles civilisation.

You want to keep playing around on the web as you munch on Malaysian fish sticks, you’re going to have to look at nuclear or fusion or some other power source.

Maybe our hills will be covered in windmills and our plains lost under solar arrays if the Greens have their way.

dungfungus said :

The “peak oil” theory is another nonsense like man-made “carbon pollution” being the cause of climate change.
There are massive amounts of oil reserves still untapped. They will be developed when the producers deem it is commercially appropriate. In the meantime, the “peak oil” theory is great for building receptivity for the next great scam namely “sustainable reneweable energy”

You mustn’t have learnt too much about the differences between renewable and non-renewable resources Dungfungus. Peak oil is as much as an inevitability as night following day. You cannot have a non-renewable resource being used at an ever increasing rate without eventually reaching a limit of production, after which production levels will go into terminal decline.

The deep-water disaster in the Gulf of Mexico happened because already oil companies are having to go into more and more inhospitable mining environments in order to meet demand. This is why previously uneconomic options such as the Canadian tar sands are being looked at as potential sources of oil, and why there is an increasing level of conflict over arctic sea territory that was previously covered with sea-ice and is now open to miners.

Anyone who believes that you can continue to use a non-renewable resources at an ever expanding rate and not hit some type of production wall is a fool.

SEEChangeIncCanberra said :

Sorry to take so long to answer your query, Diggety: I will be happy to post some pictures and a summary of the presentation after tomorrow night; not sure if our facilities stretch to video. Will do my best.

Thanks SEECIC. Appreciate it.

By the way, Roger Pielke gave (IMO) the climate/energy talk of the decade in Australia at ANU last Thursday night, anyone see it?

Skyring said :

Obviously you’ve never been to Luxembourg.

Ah Luxembourg, famous for being more boring than Belgium. I suppose the upside would be you can walk to another country in under five minutes.

davo101 said :

Let’s try highest per-capita emissions in countries you would actually want to live in.

Obviously you’ve never been to Luxembourg.

Great to see this post sparking so much interest and debate. Sorry to take so long to answer your query, Diggety: I will be happy to post some pictures and a summary of the presentation after tomorrow night; not sure if our facilities stretch to video. Will do my best.

dungfungus said :

The “peak oil” theory is another nonsense like man-made “carbon pollution” being the cause of climate change.
There are massive amounts of oil reserves still untapped. They will be developed when the producers deem it is commercially appropriate. In the meantime, the “peak oil” theory is great for building receptivity for the next great scam namely “sustainable reneweable energy”

DF, why aren’t you sharing your valuable insights with the servant of oil energy, the IEA?

They’ve been forced to concede that, while they were busy denying it would occur soon, peak happened back between 2006 and 2008. You could save all those amateurs a lot of embarrassment with your data.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/nov/12/oil-shortage-uppsala-aleklett

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/nov/09/peak-oil-international-energy-agency

http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2010-11-11/iea-acknowledges-peak-oil

davo101 said :

p1 said :

Ummm, but Australia IS a country with a tiny population and large industrial emissions???

Population of Australia 23 million, population of the ten “countries” that beat us 17 million.

Let’s try highest per-capita emissions in countries you would actually want to live in.

If the Greens (or Greenpeace) have their way, any of those countries would be more desirable to live in.

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

What – warmest days ever? Or since modern record keeping began?

Clearly not ever, but the fact that the earth was a good 6~8 degrees warmer in the Cenozoic era doesn’t really give me any comfort. Our way of life is tuned to the climate of the Holocene and it is likely that by 2000 we had returned to the Holocene maximum.

p1 said :

Ummm, but Australia IS a country with a tiny population and large industrial emissions???

Population of Australia 23 million, population of the ten “countries” that beat us 17 million.

Let’s try highest per-capita emissions in countries you would actually want to live in.

VY, the most commonly cited GISS data series for temperature (available at http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/ ) generally start at 1880 (such as the meteorological stations data set). So pretty much following the instrumental record period.

If you are interested in longer-term temperature data sets, including some of the critiques of these, there is a reasonable summary at http://www.skepticalscience.com/broken-hockey-stick.htm or you can download a pdf of the US National Academy of Science’s assessment of surface temperature reconstructions over the last 2000 years at http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11676

The key message from that review: recent warming in unprecedented over at least the last 1300 years.

Again, are we likely to get some video posted from the talk? Slides will do.

davo101 said :

switch said :

People keep saying this, but we don’t even get in the top ten. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita

OK, how about highest country where the stats are not skewed by tiny populations and large industrial emissions?

Ummm, but Australia IS a country with a tiny population and large industrial emissions???

switch said :

[People keep saying this, but we don’t even get in the top ten. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita

Well spotted! Oooh, but there are some wicked people around pedalling untruths and spin cycles!

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

What – warmest days ever? Or since modern record keeping began?

Well, the world was only created about 7000 years ago, so it doesn’t make much difference does it?

switch said :

People keep saying this, but we don’t even get in the top ten. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita

OK, how about highest country where the stats are not skewed by tiny populations and large industrial emissions?

pajs said :

Nine of the ten warmest years for the globe happened during the 21st century. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/

Warming continues. I profoundly wish it were otherwise.

What – warmest days ever? Or since modern record keeping began?

Nine of the ten warmest years for the globe happened during the 21st century. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/

Warming continues. I profoundly wish it were otherwise.

Skyring said :

Incidentally, when people point the finger and say that we australians are the highest per capita canon dioxide emitters in the developed world, that’s because every comparable nation is using nuclear power – which doesn’t emit carbon dioxide.

People keep saying this, but we don’t even get in the top ten. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita

Skyring said :

milkman said :

Treating this as a rabid religious debate isn’t helping. We need more pragmatism and less sensationalism.

Hear, hear!

We’re not getting much beyond can’t and catchphrases from Julia Gillard. She’s bringing in this complex and controversial carbon tax, talking about a “clean energy future” and then bragging about how strong our economy is from selling coal to China. Yeah. China’s on a different planet.

Solar, wind, tidal and geothermal power aren’t really at a stage – if they ever will be – to compete with fossil fuels and nuclear energy. I think if some new technology comes up, then whoever has the patent will make a fortune, and that will drive research and innovation. Taxing Australia’s biggest companies might make some sort of political sense for the ALP, but it’s not going to do much beyond providing employment to creative accountants and lawyers and give the Greens a nice warm feeling in their pants.

Heard on the ABC News (so it must be fact) this morning that the huge Government REC subsidised commercial solar farms that were planned for NSW and Queensland have failed to get financial backers. Appears RECS are now next to worthless – the subsidies to the coal and gas producers are more realistic.

Jethro said :

Skyring said :

milkman said :

Treating this as a rabid religious debate isn’t helping. We need more pragmatism and less sensationalism.

Hear, hear!

We’re not getting much beyond can’t and catchphrases from Julia Gillard. She’s bringing in this complex and controversial carbon tax, talking about a “clean energy future” and then bragging about how strong our economy is from selling coal to China. Yeah. China’s on a different planet.

Solar, wind, tidal and geothermal power aren’t really at a stage – if they ever will be – to compete with fossil fuels and nuclear energy. I think if some new technology comes up, then whoever has the patent will make a fortune, and that will drive research and innovation. Taxing Australia’s biggest companies might make some sort of political sense for the ALP, but it’s not going to do much beyond providing employment to creative accountants and lawyers and give the Greens a nice warm feeling in their pants.

Ok.. so those are criticisms with policy responses to the science. That is fine. It is when people dispute the science because they don’t like the implications it may have to future economic or social policy.

Personally, I see the main benefit of the carbon tax is that it will provide a market incentive to invest in those alternative energies. At the moment, short-termism dictates investment policies i(e. I can continue to profit from burning coal, so why move away from it?) A price on carbon makes it more difficut for a company to externalise the cost of burning coal (ie. ignore the environmental cost of the action and pass it on to future generations). Once a company is less able to externalise the cost of burning coal it may become more prudent for them to invest in other technologies.

As you said, alternative energies aren’t there yet. A price of carbon emissions may help drive the investment needed in these areas. In this way we will be able to ease from one type of energy technology to another. Otherwise, we may find ourselves in 20 or 30 years time having to make incredibly rapid changes that end up costing more economically.

Don’t forget that peak oil also means that we have a spot not too far in the future where oil prices will become increasingly expensive. Putting in place systems now that help us reduce our reliance on this finite resource makes sense.

The “peak oil” theory is another nonsense like man-made “carbon pollution” being the cause of climate change.
There are massive amounts of oil reserves still untapped. They will be developed when the producers deem it is commercially appropriate. In the meantime, the “peak oil” theory is great for building receptivity for the next great scam namely “sustainable reneweable energy”

Jethro said :

Don’t forget that peak oil also means that we have a spot not too far in the future where oil prices will become increasingly expensive. Putting in place systems now that help us reduce our reliance on this finite resource makes sense.

I think we’ll have to wait for a Coalition government before we make moves towards nuclear energy. Nothing else comes close to matching the efficiency of fossil fuels.

Incidentally, when people point the finger and say that we australians are the highest per capita canon dioxide emitters in the developed world, that’s because every comparable nation is using nuclear power – which doesn’t emit carbon dioxide.

Skyring said :

milkman said :

Treating this as a rabid religious debate isn’t helping. We need more pragmatism and less sensationalism.

Hear, hear!

We’re not getting much beyond can’t and catchphrases from Julia Gillard. She’s bringing in this complex and controversial carbon tax, talking about a “clean energy future” and then bragging about how strong our economy is from selling coal to China. Yeah. China’s on a different planet.

Solar, wind, tidal and geothermal power aren’t really at a stage – if they ever will be – to compete with fossil fuels and nuclear energy. I think if some new technology comes up, then whoever has the patent will make a fortune, and that will drive research and innovation. Taxing Australia’s biggest companies might make some sort of political sense for the ALP, but it’s not going to do much beyond providing employment to creative accountants and lawyers and give the Greens a nice warm feeling in their pants.

Ok.. so those are criticisms with policy responses to the science. That is fine. It is when people dispute the science because they don’t like the implications it may have to future economic or social policy.

Personally, I see the main benefit of the carbon tax is that it will provide a market incentive to invest in those alternative energies. At the moment, short-termism dictates investment policies i(e. I can continue to profit from burning coal, so why move away from it?) A price on carbon makes it more difficut for a company to externalise the cost of burning coal (ie. ignore the environmental cost of the action and pass it on to future generations). Once a company is less able to externalise the cost of burning coal it may become more prudent for them to invest in other technologies.

As you said, alternative energies aren’t there yet. A price of carbon emissions may help drive the investment needed in these areas. In this way we will be able to ease from one type of energy technology to another. Otherwise, we may find ourselves in 20 or 30 years time having to make incredibly rapid changes that end up costing more economically.

Don’t forget that peak oil also means that we have a spot not too far in the future where oil prices will become increasingly expensive. Putting in place systems now that help us reduce our reliance on this finite resource makes sense.

dungfungus @#38 So you trawled back to 1976 to find a definition that you think helps your case. I can’t speculate on what the learned academics of Latrobe were thinking, but their definition is useless in practice, because it leads to a logical inconsistency. Consider (as Julius Sumner Miller might have said)- a town has a ‘hot’ year followed by a cool year- according to the way you want to interpret the definition, the same town would thus have two distinct climates. Most definitions refer to ‘generally prevailing’ or words like that.

In their publication ‘The Science of Climate Change: questions and answers’, the Australian Academy of Science puts it this way-
‘Climate change is a change in the average pattern of weather over a long period of time Climate is a statistical description of weather conditions and their variations, including both averages and extremes. Climate change refers to a change in these conditions that persists for an extended period, typically decades or longer.’ (http://www.science.org.au/policy/climatechange.html)

But of course, they’re only climate change scientists- if you don’t like their conclusions and evidence, you can always put your trust in Christopher Monckton, Ian Plimer and Alan Jones.

The cat did it said :

dungfungus- I’m not a scientist, but if i were, I’d suggest you try to understand the difference between weather and climate- weather is what we experience from day to day; climate is weather averaged over at least a decade, usually over 30 years. This and last year’s mild summer get averaged along with the stinking hot summers we had a few years ago.

Also, there are a number of weather phenomena that are cyclic over periods of several years, notably (for Australia) ENSO (el nino/la nina), but there are similar phenomena in eg the Indian Ocean and the North Atlantic. The prevailing La Nina is responsible for the current cool damp summer. These shorter period events can temporarily mask the longer term increase in global temperatures. Just because temperatures aren’t increasing steadily year-on-year doesn’t mean they’re not increasing just the same.

You can get a good idea of what is happening by looking at the chart of temperature at http://sks.to/escalator. It shows how you can select the short term decline quoted selectively by sceptics, and the increase over the longer term.

You are correct; you are not a scientist because if you were you would know that the definition of climate is “the weather conditions of a place or a region DURING A YEAR” (Source: Heinemann Australian Dictionary written and compiled in association with members of the academic staff of La Trobe University, published 1976)

milkman said :

Treating this as a rabid religious debate isn’t helping. We need more pragmatism and less sensationalism.

Hear, hear!

We’re not getting much beyond can’t and catchphrases from Julia Gillard. She’s bringing in this complex and controversial carbon tax, talking about a “clean energy future” and then bragging about how strong our economy is from selling coal to China. Yeah. China’s on a different planet.

Solar, wind, tidal and geothermal power aren’t really at a stage – if they ever will be – to compete with fossil fuels and nuclear energy. I think if some new technology comes up, then whoever has the patent will make a fortune, and that will drive research and innovation. Taxing Australia’s biggest companies might make some sort of political sense for the ALP, but it’s not going to do much beyond providing employment to creative accountants and lawyers and give the Greens a nice warm feeling in their pants.

welkin31 said :

Jethro – in #26 you said “Natural variation is all well and good, but it simply does not and cannot explain the rate and consistency of global climate change.”

Recall that in the time of Eric the Red in the heyday of the Vikings – farms thrived in Greenland. Why did they call it “Green”land. When that sort of agriculture returns to Greenland, then I will know that Earth’s temperature is roughly on a par with what it was a millenium ago.
So – any temperature rise in the last 200 yrs is simply natural rebound from the Little Ice Age.

Localised periods of warming are not the same as global changes.

Also, Greenland has been covered under an ice-sheet for hundreds of thousands of years. There was in the middle ages, and remains so today, a very small part of Greenland not under ice. The name Greenland was a clever piece of propaganda by Viking settlers who wanted to encourage more people to join their colony. Farms didn’t thrive. All evidence points to a colony that just hung on.

While there was likely a short period of locally warm weather during the early partof the Viking colonisation it was nothing comparable to the long-term global trend of increasing temperatures.

breda said :

Jethro, your ‘vast amounts’ of CO2 being emitted by human activity represent a small part of the 0.04% of the atmosphere that is CO2. Even the most avid warmistas admit that (i) the planet would be devoid of life without carbon dioxide and (ii) human activity contributes a tiny part of the tiny part of the atmosphere that is CO2.

[
Please spare us the ‘whatever the weather does, it proves that one of our many models is correct’ schtick. It got old a long time ago. Remember the prediction that we were set for eternal drought (Tim Flannery) or that snow would be just a memory (some UK dickhead whose name I can’t be bothered looking up). Queenslanders and Poms who are respectively drowning and freezing will draw their own conclusions.

The tide is going out – best jump on one of the ‘sustainability’ or ‘biodiversity’ lifeboats before it is too late. You really don’t want to be stranded on the island of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming, like a latter day Alexander Selkirk. If you have been paying attention, the smarties are already gently backing away and into new boondoggles.

The “it’s only a tiny percentage of the atmosphere argument” belies your lack of understanding of the science. 99% of the atmosphere (oxygen, nitrogen and argon) has absolutely no ability to absorb any light radiation, so in the context of the atmosphere’s impact on warming, these things basically don’t exist. We shouldn’t be counting them as part of the atmosphere that causes warming.

All of the warming properties of the atmosphere that existed before industrialisation came from the other 1% of the atmosphere. It’s how much we add to this 1% that counts, or do we argue that this 1% couldn’t work to keep the Earth warm because it is not a large enough percentage of the total atmosphere to have an impact?

In terms of the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, we have caused it to move from 280ppm to 400ppm – an increase of about 40% from pre-industrial levels. This is the figure you should be looking at, as it is the one that matters. The 99% of the atmosphere that doesn’t operate to trap heat doesn’t figure in calculations regarding the impact of carbon pollution. To focus on it is either dishonest or ignorant.

You are referring to Tim Flannery as prove that climate predictions are inaccurate. Flannery isn’t a climate scientist. How about you look up their predictions? The models used by climate scientists are reasonably sound, in that their predictions continue to be reflected in the changes that are occurring.

I think you will find that any reasonable person and pretty much every expert in the field sees that the evidence regarding AGW is stronger than ever. You might want to reconsider your stance on the topic lest you end up stuck in rural Kentucky looking at a museum diorama explaining that dinosaurs and humans once lived together until a giant flood washed the dinosaurs away.

Jethro – in #26 you said “Natural variation is all well and good, but it simply does not and cannot explain the rate and consistency of global climate change.”

Recall that in the time of Eric the Red in the heyday of the Vikings – farms thrived in Greenland. Why did they call it “Green”land. When that sort of agriculture returns to Greenland, then I will know that Earth’s temperature is roughly on a par with what it was a millenium ago.
So – any temperature rise in the last 200 yrs is simply natural rebound from the Little Ice Age.

dungfungus said :

Jethro said :

Waiting for Godot – because Canberra is the globe and local weather reflects global climate.

As a globe, we are not cooling. Global temperatures continue to increase. The first decade of the 21st century was the hottest on record.

But I guess your ‘looking out the window’ model is more exact than the culminated efforts of thousands of scientists using collated data from around the globe.

I wish a scientist would explain to me why I have only turned the air conditioner on once this summer but I have had the electric blanket put back on my bed and it has been switched on several times.

The trouble is that we don’t have enough data to draw together an accurate prediction. We know that humans are polluting, we know that this this is impacting the environment. But we also know that climate changes anyway, and that there are times in history where it was both hotter and colder.

Treating this as a rabid religious debate isn’t helping. We need more pragmatism and less sensationalism.

Jethro said :

The ability of CO2 to capture heat radiation has been known by science since the 19th century and the impacts of emitting vast amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere were theorised well before they were observed. If we are to argue that adding CO2 to the atmosphere won’t lead to warming, we would need to also argue that the current CO2 in the atmosphere never worked to trap heat in the Earth’s atmosphere in the first place, which is clearly false. The fact you don’t freeze to death every night is proof of this.

This isn’t a religious belief in any sense. It is supported by an incredible amount of research, data and analysis. Religious belief requires faith without evidence. A non-evidence based belief in natural variation is more akin to religious faith than the belief in decades of climate research and centuries of basic scientific knowledge.

I think it’s more than CO2 that traps heat. Ask anyone who owns a double brick home. Thermal mass has very little to do with the atmosphere.

I’m just wondering how you’d explain Ötzi the Iceman. If he was covered by ice 5 300 years ago and remained buried until recently, then surely temperatures then were much the same as now.

Jethro, your ‘vast amounts’ of CO2 being emitted by human activity represent a small part of the 0.04% of the atmosphere that is CO2. Even the most avid warmistas admit that (i) the planet would be devoid of life without carbon dioxide and (ii) human activity contributes a tiny part of the tiny part of the atmosphere that is CO2.

Please spare us the ‘whatever the weather does, it proves that one of our many models is correct’ schtick. It got old a long time ago. Remember the prediction that we were set for eternal drought (Tim Flannery) or that snow would be just a memory (some UK dickhead whose name I can’t be bothered looking up). Queenslanders and Poms who are respectively drowning and freezing will draw their own conclusions.

The tide is going out – best jump on one of the ‘sustainability’ or ‘biodiversity’ lifeboats before it is too late. You really don’t want to be stranded on the island of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming, like a latter day Alexander Selkirk. If you have been paying attention, the smarties are already gently backing away and into new boondoggles.

dungfungus- I’m not a scientist, but if i were, I’d suggest you try to understand the difference between weather and climate- weather is what we experience from day to day; climate is weather averaged over at least a decade, usually over 30 years. This and last year’s mild summer get averaged along with the stinking hot summers we had a few years ago.

Also, there are a number of weather phenomena that are cyclic over periods of several years, notably (for Australia) ENSO (el nino/la nina), but there are similar phenomena in eg the Indian Ocean and the North Atlantic. The prevailing La Nina is responsible for the current cool damp summer. These shorter period events can temporarily mask the longer term increase in global temperatures. Just because temperatures aren’t increasing steadily year-on-year doesn’t mean they’re not increasing just the same.

You can get a good idea of what is happening by looking at the chart of temperature at http://sks.to/escalator. It shows how you can select the short term decline quoted selectively by sceptics, and the increase over the longer term.

breda said :

No rational person disagrees with the notion the the climate changes. Where the pea and thimble trick comes in is with people who have a view based on models (which aren’t working out too well) that CO2 emitted by human activity is driving whatever changes are occurring. It’s a religious belief, in the worst sense, including the need to purchase indulgences in the form of worthless carbon credits and paying higher prices for energy.

Poor people, who pay a high proportion of their income on energy costs, are the sacrificial lambs. Now we find that the AGW crowd are having a bet each way – if the models don’t work out, it’s ‘natural variation’, and if they do, ‘we were right’. But either way, we need to keep throwing virgins into the volcano, just in case.

Even the lead perpetrators of the fraud are backing off. The next big (C02 emitting) confab in Rio, the 20th anniversary of the Virgin Birth, is focusing on ‘sustainability’. Apparently the climate thing is causing more trouble than it is worth. It is the next Trojan Horse, now that the last one is now widely recognised as the scam it is.

Agree – the same people that believe in man made climate change also believe in the tooth fairy.

Jethro said :

Waiting for Godot – because Canberra is the globe and local weather reflects global climate.

As a globe, we are not cooling. Global temperatures continue to increase. The first decade of the 21st century was the hottest on record.

But I guess your ‘looking out the window’ model is more exact than the culminated efforts of thousands of scientists using collated data from around the globe.

I wish a scientist would explain to me why I have only turned the air conditioner on once this summer but I have had the electric blanket put back on my bed and it has been switched on several times.

Some of these posts make Jeff Manny seem completely sane.

breda said :

No rational person disagrees with the notion the the climate changes. Where the pea and thimble trick comes in is with people who have a view based on models (which aren’t working out too well) that CO2 emitted by human activity is driving whatever changes are occurring. It’s a religious belief, in the worst sense, including the need to purchase indulgences in the form of worthless carbon credits and paying higher prices for energy.

Poor people, who pay a high proportion of their income on energy costs, are the sacrificial lambs. Now we find that the AGW crowd are having a bet each way – if the models don’t work out, it’s ‘natural variation’, and if they do, ‘we were right’. But either way, we need to keep throwing virgins into the volcano, just in case.

Even the lead perpetrators of the fraud are backing off. The next big (C02 emitting) confab in Rio, the 20th anniversary of the Virgin Birth, is focusing on ‘sustainability’. Apparently the climate thing is causing more trouble than it is worth. It is the next Trojan Horse, now that the last one is now widely recognised as the scam it is.

Natural variation is all well and good, but it simply does not and cannot explain the rate and consistency of global climate change. Indeed, many of the things that affect natural variations in the Earth’s climate (eg. solar minimums ) would actually have lead to a decrease in global temperatures over the past decade. The continued trend upwards is happening despite these things, not because of them.

The ability of CO2 to capture heat radiation has been known by science since the 19th century and the impacts of emitting vast amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere were theorised well before they were observed. If we are to argue that adding CO2 to the atmosphere won’t lead to warming, we would need to also argue that the current CO2 in the atmosphere never worked to trap heat in the Earth’s atmosphere in the first place, which is clearly false. The fact you don’t freeze to death every night is proof of this.

This isn’t a religious belief in any sense. It is supported by an incredible amount of research, data and analysis. Religious belief requires faith without evidence. A non-evidence based belief in natural variation is more akin to religious faith than the belief in decades of climate research and centuries of basic scientific knowledge.

Climate change denialists point to failures in the models, yet no climate scientists have ever claimed they are infallible. The climate is an incredibly complex system and it would be impossible to accurately predict every singe change that will occur and when it will occur. However, this does not take away from the central premise of climate science, that pumping massive amounts of extra CO2 into the atmosphere will have dramatic changes on the Earth’s climate.

Also, the climate models have actually been better than you claim. Predictions such as the loss of arctic sea ice, sea level rises, ever increasing global average temperatures, even the cold snap you referred to in your first post (climate models that have taken into account the impacts of climate change on the flows of air currents predicted that extra masses of hot air outside of Europe would act to trap cold air systems on the continent and would lead to an increase in the number and severity of severe cold weather events in Europe), are all coming to fruition. In fact, the main problems with the climate models is that they may have actually been too conservative in their predictions.

Climate change denial boils down to people who are either simply ignorant to understand how science works, or simply unwilling to accept the political, economic and social implications of the science. In this sense climate change denial is very similar to the denial of evolution. The evidence is there, but people choose to ignore it or dispute it because they don’t like the implications. in doing so they put forward theories that are much less grounded in evidence and much more grounded in faith.

The argument has moved on from whether or not we are impacting the climate, and on to how we should deal with it. This is where you can make your criticisms of things like carbon credits or the emissions trading scheme. You’re right, in many ways carbon credits are a complete scam. The reliance of the government’s climate change policy on the purchase of overseas carbon credits is a big issue that should be discussed. You could also mount legitimate arguments about the cost effectiveness of carbon pricing versus other models of either limiting climate change or dealing with its impacts.

But to simply deny the science because you don’t like its implications is reckless ignorance.

Waiting For Godot said :

AndrewW said :

Waiting For Godot said :

Gee, Andrew it’s great having people like you reading this board. I’m guaranteed a bite every time! Just keep reading and responding, there’s plenty more to come 🙂

There’s no use pretending you you enjoy a verbal challenge, John. If I’d posted my comment on your blog, you would’ve deleted it, disabled further comments, called the police and then boarded up your doors and windows until they arrived.

See what I mean 😉

These “I-know-you-are-but-what-am-I?” style responses may have worked back when you were a schoolboy, but unfortunately you’re dealing with adults these days. I know you are genuinly terrified at the thought of confrontation.

No rational person disagrees with the notion the the climate changes. Where the pea and thimble trick comes in is with people who have a view based on models (which aren’t working out too well) that CO2 emitted by human activity is driving whatever changes are occurring. It’s a religious belief, in the worst sense, including the need to purchase indulgences in the form of worthless carbon credits and paying higher prices for energy.

Poor people, who pay a high proportion of their income on energy costs, are the sacrificial lambs. Now we find that the AGW crowd are having a bet each way – if the models don’t work out, it’s ‘natural variation’, and if they do, ‘we were right’. But either way, we need to keep throwing virgins into the volcano, just in case.

Even the lead perpetrators of the fraud are backing off. The next big (C02 emitting) confab in Rio, the 20th anniversary of the Virgin Birth, is focusing on ‘sustainability’. Apparently the climate thing is causing more trouble than it is worth. It is the next Trojan Horse, now that the last one is now widely recognised as the scam it is.

AndrewW said :

Waiting For Godot said :

AndrewW said :

Waiting For Godot said :

Mate, you are so far out of your depth in any kind of rational debate and should stick to working your biceps and other less mentally challening activities.

Gee, Andrew it’s great having people like you reading this board. I’m guaranteed a bite every time! Just keep reading and responding, there’s plenty more to come 🙂

There’s no use pretending you you enjoy a verbal challenge, John. If I’d posted my comment on your blog, you would’ve deleted it, disabled further comments, called the police and then boarded up your doors and windows until they arrived.

See what I mean 😉

Waiting For Godot said :

AndrewW said :

Waiting For Godot said :

Mate, you are so far out of your depth in any kind of rational debate and should stick to working your biceps and other less mentally challening activities.

Gee, Andrew it’s great having people like you reading this board. I’m guaranteed a bite every time! Just keep reading and responding, there’s plenty more to come 🙂

There’s no use pretending you you enjoy a verbal challenge, John. If I’d posted my comment on your blog, you would’ve deleted it, disabled further comments, called the police and then boarded up your doors and windows until they arrived.

AndrewW said :

Waiting For Godot said :

When I look out the window and see the rain and put on my winter clothes during an Aussie summer I can’t help thinking how badly many people were conned by the global warming brigade.

Global warming stopped in 1997, it only went for a few years and normal climatic patterns were restored. We are now cooling, in fact many are predicting we are heading towards another ice age.

You can understand why so many people fell for the great climate change con. We were in a huge drought which just went on and on, and in the middle of it all came a former US vice president – Al Gore – and a Hollywood movie which put forward the theory of global warming which was eagerly taken up by environmentalists and others in the broad left.

Now it all just seems to be a sick joke. When you have people writing to The Canberra Times saying that exercising causes climate change and we should stop all physical activity and take up reading, and when you have people calling carbon dioxide a pollutant, when in fact it is a building block of life which plants inhale, then it becomes abundantly obvious that the climate change brigade lacks credibility and intelligence and can’t be taken seriously anymore.

Slowly but surely the climate change bandwagon is falling off the rails as more and more people reject the hype and lies and see it for what it is – a massive con promoted by a compliant media in conjunction with leftists and other naive dreamers and hucksters.

I love it when buffoons like John Moulis waddle into an argument about climate change between intelligent folk and say things like “it’s cold at my house” and “carbon dioxide is just plant food”.

Mate, you are so far out of your depth in any kind of rational debate and should stick to working your biceps and other less mentally challening activities.

Gee, Andrew it’s great having people like you reading this board. I’m guaranteed a bite every time! Just keep reading and responding, there’s plenty more to come 🙂

IrishPete said :

welkin31 said :

And I assume that if we locked our coal up as Greenpeace wants – China would stop burning coal ?

They’d stop burning our coal, which would give me a warm inner glow.

More seriously, probably worldwide coal prices would rise, and everyone currently burning coal would become even more motivated to look for alternatives.

IP

good to see you’re on the side of the good guys, IP, but we can see your handle in the left column, beside your interjections, so no need to sign each of your posts 🙂

and good point about the rise in price from demand in the absence of a major supplier – ie strylya – a point too often overlooked ion such a discussion (i shan’t denigrate the intelligence being opposed to the ignorance here as a ‘debate’)

I beg to differ Irish Pete – if China could not buy our coal – then they would replace that in various ways – they could both increase coal imports from other countries and increase domestic production – they could substitute some gas for coal and bring forward plans for more Nuc power plants. Ramping up their own coal mines would greatly increase deaths from mining acidents – whatever they do – standing by idle and seeing their economy set back will not be on their agenda.

Alternative imports would tend to be from places with less environmental regulation than Australia, countries in SE Asia, Africa and Mongolia.
So all in all – a lose lose situation for the environment and sky-rocketing Chinese emissions would not be affected.
And the Australian economy would be damaged.
Great result all round – but thats typical for Greens policy when you examine it.

Waiting For Godot said :

When I look out the window and see the rain and put on my winter clothes during an Aussie summer I can’t help thinking how badly many people were conned by the global warming brigade.

Global warming stopped in 1997, it only went for a few years and normal climatic patterns were restored. We are now cooling, in fact many are predicting we are heading towards another ice age.

You can understand why so many people fell for the great climate change con. We were in a huge drought which just went on and on, and in the middle of it all came a former US vice president – Al Gore – and a Hollywood movie which put forward the theory of global warming which was eagerly taken up by environmentalists and others in the broad left.

Now it all just seems to be a sick joke. When you have people writing to The Canberra Times saying that exercising causes climate change and we should stop all physical activity and take up reading, and when you have people calling carbon dioxide a pollutant, when in fact it is a building block of life which plants inhale, then it becomes abundantly obvious that the climate change brigade lacks credibility and intelligence and can’t be taken seriously anymore.

Slowly but surely the climate change bandwagon is falling off the rails as more and more people reject the hype and lies and see it for what it is – a massive con promoted by a compliant media in conjunction with leftists and other naive dreamers and hucksters.

I love it when buffoons like John Moulis waddle into an argument about climate change between intelligent folk and say things like “it’s cold at my house” and “carbon dioxide is just plant food”.

Mate, you are so far out of your depth in any kind of rational debate and should stick to working your biceps and other less mentally challening activities.

PA1 said :

I think the elephant in the room is that green movement is trying to have one’s cake and eat it too (Low emissions and no nuclear power). The problem is they are yet to come up with an alternative which is remotely close to the cost of coal generation.

Man-made (anthropegenic) climate change is a problem of pollution – releasing large amounts of C02 which have been locked up for millions of years, over just a few decades.

Nuclear power comes with its own pollution problems (from mining and waste). It’s not a long-term solution to replace one pollution problem with another. Never mind the issues of nuclear weapon proliferation and the risk of catastrophic accidents.

Somewhere around the world, 24 hours a day 365.25 days a year, the wind is blowing and/or the sun is shining and/or tides are moving. Virtually free energy, waiting to be harvested.

IP

Solidarity said :

Sounds really unbiased.

Worthwhile to counter the bias of the mining industry and its lobbying.

IP

welkin31 said :

And I assume that if we locked our coal up as Greenpeace wants – China would stop burning coal ?

They’d stop burning our coal, which would give me a warm inner glow.

More seriously, probably worldwide coal prices would rise, and everyone currently burning coal would become even more motivated to look for alternatives.

IP

Jethro said :

Breda, you’ve convinced me.

Who would accept the findings of the very vast majority of the worlds’ climate scientists, when we have the incredible insights of an armchair conspiracy theorist.

The conspiracy theorists are backed up by the finest minds in talk-back radio. Persuasive stuff.

Jethro said :

Breda, you’ve convinced me.

Who would accept the findings of the very vast majority of the worlds’ climate scientists, when we have the incredible insights of an armchair conspiracy theorist.

especially one that links to a cherry-picking skeptic’s blog, rather than, say, credible science – perhaps breda would like to read, carefully, through http://unfccc.int/2860.php and see if there are some easy soundbites to make it sound like you have your conspiracy backed up… pathetic right wing scoundrel idiots concern me – they get to vote, too.

Waiting for Godot – because Canberra is the globe and local weather reflects global climate.

As a globe, we are not cooling. Global temperatures continue to increase. The first decade of the 21st century was the hottest on record.

But I guess your ‘looking out the window’ model is more exact than the culminated efforts of thousands of scientists using collated data from around the globe.

Breda, you’ve convinced me.

Who would accept the findings of the very vast majority of the worlds’ climate scientists, when we have the incredible insights of an armchair conspiracy theorist.

When I look out the window and see the rain and put on my winter clothes during an Aussie summer I can’t help thinking how badly many people were conned by the global warming brigade.

Global warming stopped in 1997, it only went for a few years and normal climatic patterns were restored. We are now cooling, in fact many are predicting we are heading towards another ice age.

You can understand why so many people fell for the great climate change con. We were in a huge drought which just went on and on, and in the middle of it all came a former US vice president – Al Gore – and a Hollywood movie which put forward the theory of global warming which was eagerly taken up by environmentalists and others in the broad left.

Now it all just seems to be a sick joke. When you have people writing to The Canberra Times saying that exercising causes climate change and we should stop all physical activity and take up reading, and when you have people calling carbon dioxide a pollutant, when in fact it is a building block of life which plants inhale, then it becomes abundantly obvious that the climate change brigade lacks credibility and intelligence and can’t be taken seriously anymore.

Slowly but surely the climate change bandwagon is falling off the rails as more and more people reject the hype and lies and see it for what it is – a massive con promoted by a compliant media in conjunction with leftists and other naive dreamers and hucksters.

I think the elephant in the room is that green movement is trying to have one’s cake and eat it too (Low emissions and no nuclear power). The problem is they are yet to come up with an alternative which is remotely close to the cost of coal generation.

breda said :

How’s that catastrophic global warming thing going for you?

They call it Climate Change these days as you are no doubt aware. The reason that they do is because unscientific people look out their window, see that it’s cold outside, then leap to the conclusion that global climate scientists must be idiots because it’s cold at their house.

Charlatans? Sure, many people have jumped on climate change as a trojan horse for their wider agenda. But to label climate scientists as dishonest or incompetent indicates a lack of knowledge about how science works. Science is not based on the opinion of one scientist or one piece of evidence. Science is based on the accumulation of evidence and consensus opinion about what that evidence means. The consensus is overwhelmingly that climate change is a serious threat to our way of life.

I sincerely hope climate scientists are wrong, but I doubt it.

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Just promise me that, should you start coughing up blood one day, you’ll consult a podiatrist and tell the pulmonologists that they know shit.

How’s that catastrophic global warming thing going for you?

RIP the poor sods in Europe who have frozen to death in the past week, not to mention ice cream vendors all over eastern Australia.

Oh, and the UK Parliament has just released a report saying that they expect ‘natural variation’ to dominate the local climate for the next few decades:

http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2012/2/3/note-it-post.html

But the UK government is not backing off from its lunatic policies. If the models don’t work, we revert to ‘natural variation’. Heads I win, tails you lose.

Sadly, their Climate Change Minister has just had to resign after being charged with perverting the course of justice. His ex wife says he got her to to take the rap for the speeding fine that would have maxed out his points – just another Marcus Einfeld, so preoccupied with saving the world that normal standards of honesty don’t apply. What is it with people who want to impose their ‘virtuous’ ideas on us by force and personal ethics?

Prepare for lots of backpedalling into ‘sustainability’ (definition, requiring a subsidy to be sustained) and ‘biodiversity’ (definition, creating new sub-species following successful grant application) for the usual suspects. Of course, these worthy objectives will have to be enforced by legislative fiat. Meet the new boss, etc.

The elephant in the room is the extent to which these charlatans have conned governments and the public – with one hand firmly in each of our pockets to create ‘green jobs’ for themselves and their mates.

One day, I’ll tell you what I really think. 🙂

And I assume that if we locked our coal up as Greenpeace wants – China would stop burning coal ?

Perhaps you could update with video and Q&A?

Actually, Solidarity, we are hoping to expose a bias. But as we all know: bias is like BO – everybody’s is offensive except your own.

Somehow I think nuclear power will be the mammoth whose name we dare not speak…

Sounds really unbiased.