Day: October 3, 2023

Horrendous Number of Eagle Deaths From Wind Farms

From The Daily Sceptic

BY CHRIS MORRISON

Further devastating evidence of the toll that onshore wind turbines take on local eagle populations has emerged in Tasmania. The local Wedge-tailed eagle is thought to be down to just 1,000 individuals, but over the last 12 years at least 270 birds have been killed or injured in the vicinity of wind farms. According to a recent paper in Australian Field Ornithology, a further 49 vulnerable White-bellied sea eagles have also been killed in this period.

The scale of depredation is shocking but it could be much worse than reported. According to author Gregory Pullen, information about eagle deaths is not readily available, “nor readily made available”. His calculations arise from a number of primary sources including annual reports. He suggests that unrecorded casualties are higher since most are recorded anecdotally and are not the result of systematic survey. The Tasmanian sub-species of the Wedge-tailed eagle is listed as endangered under both federal and state threatened species legislation.

Large birds of prey such as eagles are at particular risk from giant wind turbine blades revolving at speed since they rely on air currents for sustained flight. The Daily Sceptic has covered this developing story, noting that few activists, bird conservation groups and writers seem able to rouse themselves to complain when the natural flight path of raptors stands in the way of green progress. The Australian climate journalist Jo Nova has stood out from the unquestioning crowd, noting that in Tasmania the greens are destroying nature – again. “It’s not about the environment is it,” she said. She went on to add that there are plans to build up to 10 wind turbine parks across Tasmania – “and if one tower misses, the next will get them”.

It’s not really about the environment over in California either, where America’s national bird, the bald eagle, and many other raptors face mass slaughter in the local wind farm avian graveyards. This follows the state Democrat-controlled legislature’s recent decision to relax controls on wildlife protections to allow permits to kill previously fully protected species for renewable energy and infrastructure projects. However, evidence continues to emerge that the slaughter has been going on for years. Last year, NextEra, one of America’s largest utility companies, was fined $8 million after 150 eagles were killed at its wind farms across eight states. According to the Golden Gate Audubon Society, a wind farm complex in Altamont has been killing 75-100 golden eagles every year since the 1980s.

The animal slaughter does not stop at large birds of course. A number of scientific studies have point to the destruction of millions of bats and smaller birds every year by turbine blades capable of travelling at the tip at speeds approaching 150mph.

Alas, it is not as if the deaths of these wildlife green martyrs are helping to produce much worthwhile economic activity. In the U.K., the small number of jobs being produced by green technologies is starting to be noticed. Gary Smith, the leader of Britain’s largest trade union, recently said that communities along the North Sea can see wind farms, “but they can’t point to the jobs”. Possibly exaggerating to make his point, he added that much of the green work seems to be either London-based lobbying or clearing away the animal casualties of wind farm blades. “It’s usually a man in a rowing boat, sweeping up the dead birds,” he observed.

Green activists are increasingly being caught between a rock and a hard place on these impact issues. It is becoming obvious that many of the green technology solutions proposed to replace fossil fuels come with heavy environmental costs. Whether it be open cobalt mining with child labour, or digging up vast quantities of the Earth’s crust to help construct second-rate solutions such as windmills, the terrible impact is all too obvious. At the moment the typical stance seems to be that voiced by Audubon California Policy Director Mark Lynas, who said we need renewable energy resources, and he did not want to see the eagle deaths “being used to push against clean energy”.

Another area where ecology fights are breaking out is on the east coast of America, where whales are beaching on the shores of New Jersey and New York in alarming numbers. In the first half of this year over 40 whales have died in this way. Large areas of the local ocean are being turned into industrial wind parks, with particular concern arising over 24-hour sonar soundings. The veteran environment campaigner Michael Shellenberger has said the massive offshore works are wreaking environmental damage in previously pristine waters. “It’s the biggest environmental scandal in the world,” he charges.

The waters off the U.S. east coast are important feeding and breeding grounds for large mammals such as whales and dolphins, including the rare North Atlantic right whale. Shellenberger has recently produced a documentary called Thrown to the Wind which presents evidence of whales hit by ships, and high decibel sonar that is said to separate mothers from their calves, sending them into harm’s way. The film shows environmentalists checking the sonar which is said to measure 150 dBs at sea – equivalent to about 90 dBs on land. The noise is a relentless drum beat that is said to pound across the ocean throughout the day and night. On land, the sonar noise would be equivalent to a hairdryer. For humans, prolonged noise much above 70 dBs may start to damage hearing.

The film makes the point that serious pile-driving to secure the giant turbines to the sea floor has yet to start in earnest. Once built there is a danger that the huge back wash created by the giant blades will disturb and kill off plankton, destroying the food supply for the whales.

It must be noted that many interested parties dispute the claims currently being made about wildlife in the new oceanic industrial parks springing up with generous subsidies from the Biden Administration. Both sides can marshal their arguments and evidence. But at the moment, the deck is rigged in favour of the green lobby. Fracking for oil and gas was banned in the U.K. with Friends of the Earth presenting evidence of local earthquakes similar in force to someone falling off a chair. It is more than likely that multiple eagle deaths would be enough to stop the operation of any oil and gas installation. Seemingly, it will take more than a mere rowing boat full of protected but very dead birds to stop the new Green Barons.

Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.

The Irony of “Green” Charging Stations: The Harris Ranch Tesla Supercharger Station

Aerial photo of supercharger Tesla station at the Harris Ranch in California. (Shutterstock)

From Watts Up With That?

By Charles Rotter

https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/30/largest-ev-charging-station-in-the-world-uses-diesel-powered-generators/

Touted as the world’s largest charging station with a whopping 98 charging bays, one would expect this facility to be the epitome of green energy. After all, back in 2017, Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk proudly declared that all Superchargers in the automaker’s network were transitioning to solar.

“Over time, almost all will disconnect from the electricity grid,” he confidently posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/30/largest-ev-charging-station-in-the-world-uses-diesel-powered-generators/

But as it turns out, the reality is quite different.

“Superchargers charge vehicles up to the 80% sweet spot in as little as 20 minutes, but to provide that kind of power for nearly 100 bays takes something solar can’t provide — diesel generators.”https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/30/largest-ev-charging-station-in-the-world-uses-diesel-powered-generators/

That’s right. Diesel generators. The very antithesis of the clean, green energy that Tesla and other electric vehicle (EV) proponents have been preaching about. Investigative journalist Edward Niedermeyer made the startling discovery that these diesel generators were conveniently tucked away behind a Shell station. And when reporters from SF Gate tried to ascertain just how much of the station’s electricity came from these generators, Tesla remained conspicuously silent.

“The station isn’t connected to any dedicated solar farms, which means that absent the diesel generators, the station is powered by California’s grid.”https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/30/largest-ev-charging-station-in-the-world-uses-diesel-powered-generators/

Now, let’s take a moment to ponder the implications of this. According to the U.S. Energy and Information Administration, as of June 2023, natural gas supplied nearly 5,000 megawatt hours of electricity in California, while non-hydroelectric renewables provided about 7,250 megawatt hours. So, even if we give Tesla the benefit of the doubt and assume that the Supercharger station occasionally draws power from the grid, it’s still not entirely “green.”

But wait, there’s more. Energy analyst David Blackmon, author of “Energy Transition Absurdities,” points out that the Harris Ranch station isn’t an isolated case. He recalls a Whole Foods in Houston that had installed a charging station, which, to his amusement, took up prime parking real estate and even displaced several handicap spaces.

“He said there were diesel generators behind the store and whenever someone was using the chargers, the generators would kick on.”https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/30/largest-ev-charging-station-in-the-world-uses-diesel-powered-generators/

It’s almost comical, isn’t it? The very establishments that tout their commitment to sustainability and a cleaner future are, in reality, relying on the same “dirty” energy sources they publicly condemn.

Blackmon further highlights the lack of foresight in the current energy transition, especially as the demand for EVs grows. The retirement of a coal-fired power plant in Kansas had to be postponed to cater to the energy needs of an under-construction EV battery factory. As Blackmon aptly puts it:

“These stories illustrate well the lack of thought going into the demands that will be placed on the grid with increasing amounts of electric vehicle adoption.”https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/30/largest-ev-charging-station-in-the-world-uses-diesel-powered-generators/

State Sen. Cheri Steinmetz, R-Lingle, echoes this sentiment, emphasizing the unreliability of wind and solar energy to meet the growing energy demands.

“Adding the load required for electric vehicles and the transportation network to support them would exacerbate the looming shortages we already face in the near future if energy policies are not reformed,” Steinmetz warns.https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/30/largest-ev-charging-station-in-the-world-uses-diesel-powered-generators/

Blackmon also sheds light on the impracticality of Musk’s vision to power charging stations solely with solar energy.

“If that’s what he wants, then he only wants the chargers to work six to eight hours a day. If they’re purely powered by solar, there’s just no way out of that,” Blackmon states.https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/09/30/largest-ev-charging-station-in-the-world-uses-diesel-powered-generators/

Musk’s ambitious claims have often been met with skepticism. From promises of powering the world with a small patch of the Sahara Desert to the assertion that Superchargers would disconnect from the grid, many of these pledges remain unfulfilled. Energy expert Alex Epstein even debunked Musk’s Sahara claim, estimating that the cost of creating a reliable grid using batteries would be a staggering $590 trillion, excluding transmission infrastructure costs. And let’s not forget that these batteries have a lifespan of a mere decade.

In conclusion, the Harris Ranch Tesla Supercharger station serves as a stark reminder of the challenges and contradictions inherent in the current energy transition narrative. The current execution of the so-called energy transition leaves much to be desired. We need to approach the energy policy with realism, acknowledging the limitations of current technologies and the indispensable role of traditional energy sources.

“Actions speak louder than words.” And in this case, the diesel generators behind the world’s largest charging station are speaking volumes.

HT/Ralph G

‘ALL CARS ARE BAD’: Pete Buttigieg’s Equity Advisers Want You To Stop Driving – ‘Vehicles have wreaked havoc on the environment & communities’

From ClimateDepot

Free Beacon:Buttigieg, in August 2023, appointed 24 new members to his Advisory Committee on Transportation Equity, an Obama-era body that Buttigieg is reviving after the Trump administration scrapped it. Included on the committee is Andrea Marpillero-Colomina, a “spatial policy scholar” who says “ALL CARS ARE BAD” given that they cause “a myriad of environmental issues and conditions.” Another Buttigieg appointee, self-described “transportation nerd” Veronica Davis, argued in an August essay that cars perpetuate “systemic racism” and are therefore “the problem” in America’s transportation system.

Marpillero-Colomina told the Washington Free Beacon that she is not “advocating for a complete erasure” of cars but intends to push Buttigieg to move America away from its reliance on private motor vehicles.

“My interest in being on the [equity committee] is to raise the question and push the Department of Transportation to really think about: What are some equitable, environmentally sustainable, economically beneficial, and feasible alternatives to policy that is car-centric?” she said in an interview. “How can we reimagine streets to prioritize people instead of cars? How can we create streets that are inclusive of modes other than cars?”

“If we just replace all the gas-powered cars with EVs, we’re going to have many of the same problems that we have with gas-powered cars,” equity committee member Marpillero-Colomina, told the Free Beacon.

By Marc Morano

‘ALL CARS ARE BAD’: Pete Buttigieg’s Equity Advisers Want You To Stop Driving

Transportation secretary’s equity committee aims to bring ‘diversity’ and ‘inclusion’ to America’s infrastructure

By Charles Hilu

September 1, 2023

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg is appointing a group of “leading experts” to advise him on “transportation equity,” including several who argue that cars cause climate change and promote racism and therefore should be phased out.

Buttigieg earlier this month appointed 24 new members to his Advisory Committee on Transportation Equity, an Obama-era body that Buttigieg is reviving after the Trump administration scrapped it. Included on the committee is Andrea Marpillero-Colomina, a “spatial policy scholar” who says “ALL CARS ARE BAD” given that they cause “a myriad of environmental issues and conditions.” Another Buttigieg appointee, self-described “transportation nerd” Veronica Davis, argued in an August essay that cars perpetuate “systemic racism” and are therefore “the problem” in America’s transportation system.

Buttigieg’s appointments—and his decision to revive the equity advisory committee—reflect the Biden administration’s whole-of-government emphasis on diversity, equity, and inclusion. President Joe Biden shortly after taking office in 2021 issued an executive order that called on federal agencies to “pursue a comprehensive approach to advancing equity for all.” Under the order, agency heads must conduct an “equity assessment” to identify policies that create “systemic barriers” in minority communities.

The committee will advise Buttigieg on “promising practices to institutionalize equity into agency programs, policies, regulations, and activities” and plans to meet for the first time this fall, according to Buttigieg’s August announcement. Marpillero-Colomina told the Washington Free Beacon that she is not “advocating for a complete erasure” of cars but intends to push Buttigieg to move America away from its reliance on private motor vehicles.

“My interest in being on the [equity committee] is to raise the question and push the Department of Transportation to really think about: What are some equitable, environmentally sustainable, economically beneficial, and feasible alternatives to policy that is car-centric?” she said in an interview. “How can we reimagine streets to prioritize people instead of cars? How can we create streets that are inclusive of modes other than cars?”

Davis, who did not return a request for comment, is likely to pursue similar goals on the committee. Davis in July released a book titled, Inclusive Transportation: A Manifesto for Repairing Divided Communities, which advocates for “a different way of thinking” to “address healing the damage done by cars.”

“Not to oversimplify the problems of transportation, but all roads lead back to cars,” Davis wrote in an August essay adapted from her book. “This isn’t anti-car propaganda but vehicles have wreaked havoc on the environment and communities. … Racism shaped the urban and suburban areas, where even today we see the residual effects.”

In addition to Marpillero-Colomina and Davis, Buttigieg tapped to serve on the committee Oliver Sellers-Garcia, who serves as Boston mayor Michelle Wu’s Green New Deal director. The city’s Green New Deal program, which Sellers-Garcia manages, calls for Boston to transition away from cars and embrace a “multimodal” plan of transportation.

“We need to make it not only possible but also preferable for residents to leave traffic- and pollution-inducing fossil fuel-powered vehicles behind,” the city’s plan states.

Sellers-Garcia did not return a request for comment. The Department of Transportation told the Free Beacon the equity committee “will provide advice and recommendations” to ensure Biden’s climate spending brings “jobs and opportunities … to every community across the country.”

This is far from the first time Buttigieg has shown an open hostility toward car transportation. Buttigieg’s agency in January released a climate plan aimed at lowering the transportation sector’s carbon emissions. Included in the plan is a call to reduce “commuting miles” through an “increase in remote work and virtual engagements.”

“The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted major opportunities for telework, with some studies showing the possibility of 10 percent long-term reduction in annual vehicle miles traveled,” the plan says.

Biden has similarly moved to phase out gas-powered cars in favor of electric ones—the Democrat’s Environmental Protection Agency and National Highway Safety Administration in recent months unveiled regulations that would require automakers to ensure that two-thirds of the vehicles they sell are electric by 2032. For equity committee member Marpillero-Colomina, however, electric vehicles “are not the silver bullet.”

“If we just replace all the gas-powered cars with EVs, we’re going to have many of the same problems that we have with gas-powered cars,” she told the Free Beacon.

Update 3:20 p.m.: This piece has been updated to reflect a comment from the Department of Transportation.

#

Free Beacon: Buttigieg, in August 2023, appointed 24 new members to his Advisory Committee on Transportation Equity, an Obama-era body that Buttigieg is reviving after the Trump administration scrapped it. Included on the committee is Andrea Marpillero-Colomina, a “spatial policy scholar” who says “ALL CARS ARE BAD” given that they cause “a myriad of environmental issues and conditions.” Another Buttigieg appointee, self-described “transportation nerd” Veronica Davis, argued in an August essay that cars perpetuate “systemic racism” and are therefore “the problem” in America’s transportation system.

Marpillero-Colomina told the Washington Free Beacon that she is not “advocating for a complete erasure” of cars but intends to push Buttigieg to move America away from its reliance on private motor vehicles.

“My interest in being on the [equity committee] is to raise the question and push the Department of Transportation to really think about: What are some equitable, environmentally sustainable, economically beneficial, and feasible alternatives to policy that is car-centric?” she said in an interview. “How can we reimagine streets to prioritize people instead of cars? How can we create streets that are inclusive of modes other than cars?”

“If we just replace all the gas-powered cars with EVs, we’re going to have many of the same problems that we have with gas-powered cars,” equity committee member Marpillero-Colomina, told the Free Beacon.

…CO2 Derangement..

From Power For USA

Mankind is on the brink of extinction, but it’s not from too much CO2: It’s from too little CO2.

Today, atmospheric CO2 levels are approximately 420 ppm, 270 ppm above where mankind would become extinct.

Yet, there are plans to spend millions, if not billions, of dollars building huge complexes to capture CO2 from the atmosphere and get rid of it by storing it underground.

Occidental Petroleum Corp., through its 1PointFive subsidiary, has offered to buy Carbon Engineering Ltd. for $1.1 billion. 

Carbon Engineering Ltd. is building a Direct Air Capture (DAC) facility, Stratos, in Ector County, in Texas’ Permian basin. 

Stratos is expected to begin operations in 2025 and capture 500,000 tons/year of CO2.

Occidental’s president and CEO, Vicki Hollub said the acquisition will enable OXY Low Carbon Ventures to increase the deployment of DAC.

Another company funded by Microsoft, Heirloom Carbon, absorbs CO2 from the air using calcium hydroxide which then becomes limestone.

This is suicidal. We are only 270 ppm above where mankind becomes extinct.

Over millions of years, the Earth has been gradually, but consistently, sequestering CO2 in the earth as calcium deposits, where marine plant life, sheathed in calcium shells, have died and fallen to the ocean floor.

This chart predicts, absent intervention, that CO2 levels will eventually be driven below 150 ppm.

The burning of fossil fuels is restoring CO2 to the atmosphere, thereby interrupting the predicted fall below 150 ppm.

For us to deliberately remove CO2 from the atmosphere, in the face of the known downward trend in atmospheric CO2 levels through natural sequestration, is not in mankind’s interest.

We have nothing to fear from CO2 emissions, except fear itself. Fear perpetuated by climate fear mongers.

Electric bus breakdowns cripple Wyoming transit

From  CFACT

By Bonner Cohen, Ph. D.

By replacing its fleet of diesel-powered buses with sleek (and taxpayer-subsidized) electric buses, the transit system run by Jackson and Teton County, Wyoming, was set to transition to a green, “climate-friendly” future.

Instead, all eight electric buses purchased by Southern Teton Area Rapid Transit (START) have broken down, and when any of the vehicles will be up and running again is anyone’s guess. Help is not going to be on its way anytime soon because California-based Proterra, the company that manufactured the defective buses, has declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Once a darling of the Biden administration’s vaunted “energy transition,” the company cannot say when – if ever – spare parts will come to the rescue.

“We’re evaluating our options to see how we can work through that and make sure they can be on the road,” START Director Bruce Abel told Cowboy State Daily (Sept. 26). Local officials are bracing for a long wait, with Jackson Councilman Jimbo Rooks saying the company’s bankruptcy was “a real punch in the gut.”

START still has 23 diesel buses in its fleet, which are working fine. But the electric buses were plagued with problems as soon as they went into service. Winters in Wyoming can be cold, and EV batteries do not perform to standard in freezing temperatures, a fact perspective EV buyers should consider before they shell out real money for these vehicles. Specifically, EV batteries’ efficiency declines markedly in cold weather, curtailing EVs’ already limited range. What’s more, the batteries needed to power electric buses and trucks are so heavy that they tear up roads and bridges at an alarming rate, adding to the infrastructure problems associated with EVs.

Biden and Granholm: Fans of Proterra

Proterra CEO Gareth Joyce could provide little more than a boilerplate when trying to explain his company’s misfortunes, saying in a press release that the company faced “various market and macroeconomic headwinds that have impacted our ability to efficiently scale all our opportunities simultaneously.” He didn’t say why the buses he supplied to his customer in Wyoming broke down.

This wasn’t the way things were supposed to work out. The company got its mitts on some of the $5.5 billion in federal handouts for low- and no-emission bus manufacturers contained in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act, along with the cash it got from investors eager to plow money into green projects. As noted by the Cowboy State Daily, President Joe Biden participated in a virtual tour of the company in 2021.

“The fact is, you’re making me look good,” Biden said before touting his plan to provide 50,000 charging stations nationwide.

Biden isn’t the only member of his administration to be a fan of Proterra. Jennifer Granholm invested in the company and sold her stake AFTER she became Biden’s energy secretary for a net capital gain of $1.6 million. She got out before the roof fell in.

On the Road with the Energy Secretary

Granholm’s eagerness to plug EVs led her on an ill-fated, four-day road trip from Charlotte to Memphis in June that included a testy exchange with local law enforcement officers in North Carolina. An Energy Department staffer, prudently driving a gasoline-power car, blocked a family in an EV from recharging to allow Granholm to recharge her vehicle first.

On September 25, the House Oversight Committee launched an investigation into Granholm’s EV excursion.

“This taxpayer-funded publicity stunt illustrates yet again how out of touch the Biden administration is with the consequences of policies it has unleashed on everyday Americans,” Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-KY, and fellow committee member Pat Fallon, R-TX, wrote in a letter to Granholm.

The committee demanded information by Oct. 10 about the purpose, costs, and planning of the trip, which covered 770 miles. Comer and Fallon also requested a staff-level briefing by Oct. 3, The Washington Times reported (Sept. 27).

Don’t look for a prompt response from Granholm and her minions.

Author


Bonner Cohen, Ph. D.

Bonner R. Cohen, Ph. D., is a senior policy analyst with CFACT, where he focuses on natural resources, energy, property rights, and geopolitical developments.

Articles by Dr. Cohen have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Investor’s Busines Daily, The New York Post, The Washington Examiner, The Washington Times, The Hill, The Epoch Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Miami Herald, and dozens of other newspapers around the country.

He has been interviewed on Fox News, Fox Business Network, CNN, NBC News, NPR, BBC, BBC Worldwide Television, N24 (German-language news network), and scores of radio stations in the U.S. and Canada.

He has testified before the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, and the U.S. House Natural Resources Committee.

Dr. Cohen has addressed conferences in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and Bangladesh.

He has a B.A. from the University of Georgia and a Ph. D. – summa cum laude – from the University of Munich.

Horwitz vs. Kiesling on Climate (social science matters too)

Psycho Wallpapers

From  Master Resource

By Robert Bradley Jr

” … we have to acknowledge that property rights in climate *cannot* be defined fully and we thus have to find some shared institution for governing the climate commons and managing emissions.” (Kiesling)

“One can think humans are causing the planet to warm but logically and humanely conclude that we should do nothing about it.” (Horwitz)

Lynne Kiesling is an electricity specialist who describes herself as working in the classical liberal tradition. Problem is, she refuses to define what classical liberalism or a free market is in regard to electricity. She instead endorses central government planning for the wholesale grid, among other Statist proposals. [1] In so doing, she ignores how the traditions she espouses argue against her positions (Hayek on central planning, Coase on transaction costs, Public Choice on politicization, etc.).

How can an alleged classical liberal believe there cannot be effective private property rights to the grid? [2] How does she square her views about “market failure” to her “synthetic theory of regulation“? If only she could elaborate rather than obfuscate and then disengage….

Channeling Horwitz

Kiesling recently wrote on Substack: “To set this stage I’m channeling the wisdom and insight of my dear, departed friend and excellent economist Steve Horwitz. Steve’s been gone for two years and I miss him every day.” This is part of her charm offensive to the wider free market community. [3]

But does she take Horwitz to heart? Not when it comes to climate change and public policy.

Kiesling as Climate Activist

One problem with Kiesling as a “classical liberal” is her uncritical acceptance of climate alarmism and lack of criticism toward government-forced energy transformation (“low-carbon solutions,” in her politically correct language). It undergirds her activism in electricity away from the reliables to the unreliables (the virtual power plant) where batteries and her “real time pricing” (read: governmental rationing) come in. She is a “woman of system,” a technocrat, when it comes to one of America’s most essential industries.

So what does she think of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions? In hushed tones, she assumes that CO2 is a pollutant, a negative externality, creating a global commons problem. Her views came out in response to a post by Tyler Cowen, Green energy vs. green jobs, summarizing his Bloomberg column, We Need Green Energy. We Don’t Need Green Jobs. (April 14, 2021).

Here is our exchange:

Kiesling: Tyler [Cowen] is right. The focus should be on innovation that makes green energy cheap. If green energy creates value, then the jobs will follow. But the value creation has to come first.

Bradley Energy density and intermittency pretty much doom so-called green energy. The world, for most of history, was 100% ‘green’ energy. Then came mineral energies and progress. https://www.aier.org/article/w-s-jevons-1865-on-the-limits-to-renewables/

Kiesling: First, we have to acknowledge that property rights in climate *cannot* be defined fully and we thus have to find some shared institution for governing the climate commons and managing emissions (read Ostrom). All forms of internalizing that external cost will be imperfect and involve rent-seeking, so we have to be creative and design mechanisms that manage the physical, economic, & political tradeoffs. By failing to do so, we’ve ended up with RPS & other policies that create even more deadweight loss than a simple emissions tax would.

Second, the production costs decline & increased energy efficiency for renewables in the past decade has been astounding, and that’s what’s driven investment. You should look at the LCOE analysis I shared with Anna below, and there’s more recent research on wind: look at the experience curves they estimate. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/wene.398 Your focus on the PTC can’t explain that change; it’s small and it started in 1992, so can’t be causal for recent changes. RPS might play a role by increasing demand.

Like you, I’m opposed to subsidies & command-&-control regulation; unlike you, I put weight on the value of the varied attributes of different energy resources.

Bradley: Thanks for this explanation. We disagree on many points here, beginning with the premise that CO2 is a clear pollutant necessitating global government mitigation. And perhaps ending with Public Choice on the futility of nearly 200 sovereign governments addressing the alleged problem. Market adaptation to weather/climate change is the simple, best, and really only ‘climate policy.’ There is much more–I will address it in a future post at MasterResource.

I see no avenue for classical liberals to take other than to challenge the forced transformation from dense, reliable mineral energies to economically inferior/eco-negative dilute, intermittent resources. Classical liberals should also challenge climate doom/exaggeration that totally rejects the global lukewarming, truth-is-in-the-middle view.

She did not respond further (her typical style–assert vaguely and disengage).

Any classical liberal or intellectually inclined person should not assume the climate emergency but debate it. Judith Curry, not only Elinor Ostrom, should be Lynne’s role model and mentor in this area. [4] This debate should not be ducked to be politically correct or relevant. Check the statistics about extreme events provided by Lomborg, Pielke Jr., and others. Do consider the benefits of carbon dioxide emissions and increasing atmospheric concentrations.

So why is global climate a “commons problem”? And how in the world can nearly 200 sovereign governments be expected to approach anything like the examples of an Ostrom “commons problem.” [4]

Steve Horwitz to the Rescue

If Lynne Kiesling is serious about the economics and politics of climate change, she should directly confront the check list of the late “excellent economist” (her words), Steve Horwitz. Starting with Point 4 on his list:

4. What are the costs of global warming?

5. What are the benefits of global warming?

6. Do the benefits outweigh the costs or do the costs outweigh the benefits?

7. If the costs outweigh the benefits, what sorts of policies are appropriate?

8. What are the costs of the policies designed to reduce the costs of global warming?

He warned about climate policy:

So if in our attempt to reduce the effects of global warming we slow economic growth so far as to impoverish more people, or we give powers to governments that are likely to be used in ways having little to do with global warming, we have to consider those results in the total costs and benefits of using policy to combat global warming. This is a question of social science that is no less important than the scientific questions I began with.

to conclude:

“[I]t is perfectly possible to accept the science of global warming but reject the policies most often put forward to combat it,” Horwitz concluded. “One can think humans are causing the planet to warm but logically and humanely conclude that we should do nothing about it.”

Lynne has bragged about her “synthetic theory” of electricity regulation. If she has put serious thought into a “synthetic” view of global government and CO2 emissions, she should tell us all about it. And not walk back to the dugout at two strikes.

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[1] Kiesling’s implicit endorsement of the wind/solar takeover of the grid has led to the problems that she now wishes to cure with the “virtual power plant:” open-ended wind, solar, and batteries on the supply side are complemented by smart meters in the home to ration demand via price or another metric. Obviously, a free market would bypass such statism-on-stilts with, most likely, two-part pricing to handle ‘peakiness’ in an obligation-to-serve capacity.

[2] Kiesling argues rather astoundingly: “… the grid is a common pool resource in which it is literally—literally—impossible to define and enforce property rights.”

[3] Lynne has complained that my criticisms of her policy positions and evasion is “grotesque” and “has lurched from your more typical passive aggressiveness to outright aggressiveness.” Such psycho-analytics is ad hominem to a greater degree than my criticisms. So I go on the record by noting that her “charm offensive” has camouflaged her Statism from a lot of classical liberals who would otherwise know better or ask her serious questions. I will leave the psycho-analysis of her in this regard to others.

[4] A future post will contrast Ostrom’s criteria for a “commons problem” with anthropogenic climate change.

It’s Time To Build The Intermittent Renewable Plus Hydrogen Storage Demonstration Project!

From The MANHATTAN CONTRARIAN

Francis Menton

My last post discussed a new Report out from the UK’s Royal Society in early September, with the title “Large-scale electricity storage.” The Report describes and models how the UK might build out a “net zero” electricity system for Great Britain. The proposed system would consist of generation entirely from wind and solar sources, with the intermittency backed up only from energy storage and without any use of fossil fuels.

To its credit, the Report dabbles in reality on the subject of how to store sufficient amounts of energy and for a long enough period of time. It considers the various sorts of battery storage that might be used, and concludes that none of them could remotely handle the task at affordable cost. After also considering ammonia as a potential energy storage medium (too costly and dangerous), the Report concludes that the only viable alternative for the storage piece is hydrogen.

Here, from the Executive Summary, is the headline conclusion from the Report:

In 2050 Great Britain’s demand for electricity could be met by wind and solar energy supported by large-scale storage. . . . Meeting the need for long-duration storage will require very low cost per unit energy stored. In GB, the leading candidate is storage of hydrogen in solution-mined salt caverns. . . .

The Report then proceeds to a treatment of the prospective costs of this system. Unfortunately, that treatment of costs is perfunctory and thoroughly inadequate. Ultimate electricity prices to the consumer are not even mentioned. There is brief discussion of how much this system, based on projected costs, would charge as a wholesale price to the grid. However, there are obvious gaps in that analysis (discussed in my prior post), and one commenter suggests that the Report’s guesstimated costs could be off by as much as a factor of ten.

Unlike the authors of this Report, I would not claim to know what the costs of this proposed system might be. But I can see that the proposed system would be very large, very complex, that it has never been tried before, that it has many elements that are novel and will need to be designed from scratch. In the real world, things with these characteristics have a way of costing a multiple of what their proponents claim they will cost.

In promoting that Great Britain should move toward a fully wind/solar/storage electricity system by 2050, the Royal Society is essentially advocating that every one of GB’s 65 million or so inhabitants shall be made guinea pigs for a system that may or may not work and whose unanticipated costs could be enormous. No responsible government would ever go down such a road.

There is an obvious alternative approach: Build a demonstration project to establish feasibility and cost.

Once hydrogen made by electrolysis from water has been selected as the storage medium, it is not difficult to envision what the demonstration project will consist of. Pick a town or region of about 65,000 people, or about 0.1% of the population of GB. For the backup, build a modest-sized thermal power plant for burning the hydrogen (when needed) of about 60 MW nameplate capacity. Then dedicate to the project wind turbines sufficient to generate the entire electricity usage of the 65,000 people over the course of a year, plus all the losses in hydrogen production and storage. This will probably require something like 300 MW of wind turbines (nameplate capacity). The output of the wind turbines will either go to direct supply, or when in excess will feed electrolyzers to make the hydrogen. You will need to procure the electrolyzers, and also create a big enough salt cavern to store hydrogen to cover these people for at least a couple of months in the event of wind drought. Don’t forget the water purification system to make the sea water pure enough to be electrolyzed. And of course add in pipelines to take the hydrogen to the salt cavern and from there to the thermal power plant when needed.

Now you have all the elements to be the equivalent of a dispatchable fossil fuel-burning thermal plant. If it turns out that you have underestimated the amount of hydrogen you need to keep this going all the time, and you need to build facilities to make more hydrogen, well now you know.

I suspect that this system for the size specified could be built for a few tens of billions of pounds. That will be very expensive. But it will be the best tens of billions of pounds you have ever spent, because when it shows that this system costs five or ten times what the existing system costs to produce the same electricity, it will be abandoned. And the people will have been spared decades of impoverishment. And, if it turns out that the system can be built at some modest premium to the current system (unlikely), then at least a rational debate can be had as to whether this premium is worth spending for the slight “climate” benefits.

Meanwhile, there continues to be no demonstration project anywhere in the world of a wind/solar/storage electricity system that can keep the lights on through the year without fossil fuel backup. The Gorona del Viento project (wind turbines and a pumped storage reservoir) on El Hierro Island off Spain fails worse and worse every year. From its website, here is its stated objective:

Gorona del Viento, El Hierro, S.A.´s Wind-Pumped Hydro Power Station is designed to supply the Meridian Island with electrical energy derived from clean, renewable energy sources such as water and wind. The Wind Farm has capacity to fully meet El Hierro´s demand for electricity.

But at the data section of the website, we find this chart:

There are 8760 hours in a year (8784 in a leap year like 2020). So in 2019 they got all of their electricity from the wind/hydro system about 26% of the time. Then that dropped to under 22% of the time in 2020, and less than 15% of the time in 2021. Some time in 2022 they stopped reporting the data. Now they blare out baloney about “tons of carbon emissions saved” while running the backup diesel generator fully 85% of the time.

If anybody thought that the demonstration project I proposed could be built at reasonable cost to make a profit, then multiple entrepreneurs would already be building these things. Meanwhile the costs are buried so no one can figure them out. We have a desperate need for a real demonstration project. UK, you are the one to do it!

More Real-World Evidence Indicates ‘Trace Gases Such As CO2 Don’t Have Any Influence…On Climate’

High CO2 Is Greening of the Planet 

From NoTricksZone

By Kenneth Richard on 2. October 2023

Increased CO2 levels are greening the Earth

Non-greenhouse gases like O2 and N2 (air) absorb radiation “almost to the same degree” as CO2 does in outdoor experiments, which is “proof that the greenhouse theory cannot be true.”  – Allmendinger, 2023

A principal reason why CO2 is regarded as a special gas, the “control knob” of the globe’s surface temperature, is that it is thought to be a potent greenhouse gas that absorbs thermal radiation.

But a real-world outdoor experiment (Allmendinger, 2023) involving containers heated by sunlight reveals there is no equilibrium temperature or heating rate difference when filling a container with 100% CO2 vs. 100% argon (Ar), a non-greenhouse gas. That’s because noble gases (like Ar) absorb radiation too.

Furthermore, there is only a modest (<5%) temperature differential when the container is filled with only air (21% O2, 78% N2, 0.042% CO2) vs. a 100% (1,000,000 ppm) CO2-filled container. Like Ar, O2 and N2 are regarded as non-greenhouse gases, but they nonetheless absorb thermal radiation too.

Image Source: Allmendinger, 2023

The molecular weight of the gases, and the consequent variation in convective heat transfer, is what primarily determines the slight (<5%) temperature differential (Wagoner et al., 2010). Argon and CO2 have similar (heavier) molecular densities, allowing them to more effectively reduce heat loss, whereas as O2 and N2 are lighter gases. The radiative heat transfer properties of non-greenhouse gases vs. greenhouse gases are thus not temperature-determinative in real-world experiments.

Dr. Allmendinger conducted another outdoor experiment demonstrating the temperature gradient at different altitudes above the Earth’s surface is not determined by the radiative properties of greenhouse gases vs. non-greenhouse gases either. While the atmosphere does thermally radiate back to the Earth’s surface, “this radiation has nothing to do with trace gases such as CO2,” but instead it “depends on the atmospheric pressure which diminishes at higher altitudes.”

Image Source: Allmendinger, 2023

Thus, it can be empirically demonstrated that “trace gases such as CO2 don’t have any influence on the behavior of the atmosphere, and thus on climate.”

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Doomsday Climate Talk, Deja Vu

From Science Matters

By Ron Clutz

At Quora, Dan Gracia responds to this question: (in italics with my bolds)

Q: Why did people start using the term “climate change”
instead of the previous term “global warming”?

I’m 73 now and I remember on April 22, 1970 carrying the totally green American Flag (stars and stripes but in green) at college in a parade celebrating that first Earth Day. Problem then was that we were causing the earth to slip into an ice age due to the use of fluorocarbons as a propellant in spray cans of all types but the most significant factor was their use in hair spray cans. So it was an “Pending Ice Age Alarm”. Well, of course, that didn’t happen as actual temperatures didn’t sink and actually raised very, very slightly (less than a fraction of a degree over the next 10, or was it 20 years?) .

Then it turned into a “Global Warming Alarm” because there was some evidence of an increase in temperatures, regardless of how minuscule it was. So “Global Warming” is the earliest term most people remember now. Then the warming not only did not fit any of the climate models they were/are basing their alarmist claims on, it stopped warming entirely for about 20-years despite Al Gore’s claims the ice-cap would melt and our coasts would be underwater within 10-years.. And then temperatures sank slightly again.

Figure 1: The measured (symbols on left) and modeled (lines) temperature trends vs. altitude. The Russian model comes closest to the data, and the worst fit is GFDL-CM3, Manabe’s model for which he was awarded a Nobel prize. (Fig. 3 from John R. Christy and Richard T. McNider, DOI:10.1007/s13143-017-0070-z, annotated.)

None of these changes fit any of the computer models that were generating the Alarmist predictions. At that point, instead of trying to find out what variable(s) they were missing, the alarmists finally decided to just call it “climate change”. And now they could blame anything even slightly out of the ordinary as due to climate change. It’s a great catch-all term that you can claim regardless of what the temperatures actually show and also because the global climate is in a almost constant state of change. You’d be a fool to deny climate change because the climate is constantly changing and has been for over 4-billion years now. The trick is proving that human interaction is contributing to it in a meaningful and detrimental way. There are so many more powerful forces at play.

Add to that the fact that the earth was in its most prolific state millions of years ago when the Co2 ratio was much higher. Remember those elementary school science lessons that taught you that plants consume (ingest) Co2 (carbon dioxide) and exhaust O2 (oxygen)? Or perhaps that’s not common knowledge anymore? Plants and trees proliferated because growing conditions were better suited for them.

But regardless of weather getting warmer or colder,
climate alarmists are able to blame it all on climate change.

So it’s a catch-all phrase and anyone can chant it for any reason and claim there is a consensus among scientists that this it is a real threat. Unfortunately included in that “consensus” are medical doctors, dentists, Mechanical Engineers, Electrical Engineers, Biologists, Chemists, etc. – basically anyone who has a Bachelor of Science degree or higher. The thing that is missing is a consensus from climatologists. Many of these Bachelor of Science degrees may deal with some fringe parts of the problem but Climatology is an incredibly detailed with ever-changing data field and none of the others have the depth of knowledge to make an accurate claim of cause and effect with enough data and knowledge to make valid predictions.

Would you want a microbiologist to perform open heart surgery on you? Undeniably a scientific background but certainly not enough knowledge and practice to perform a long and complex surgery. Would you look to a Electrical Engineer for that? Definitely a scientist because he/she has at least a bachelor of science degree, ore perhaps a masters or even a doctorate degree. But would you trust that “Doctor” of engineering to perform open-heart surgery on you. Of course not. They don’t have the specialized education, ability to analyze relevant data, or even determine what data was relevant, let alone the fine motor skills needed to successfully complete open heart surgery.

To further muddy the waters, there’s huge amounts of money being spent on climate change research, and if they reach the conclusion that it is not a main ingredient in climate change, that research money dries up and goes away. So actually reaching a provable conclusion whose computer models can be born out with actual evidence instead of speculation, is working towards the elimination of their jobs. Plus, there’s real money to be made outside of climate research projects and grants. There’s the “Carbon TAX”.

Al Gore was one of if not the earliest proponent for “Carbon Credits”. If an industry or installation was generating too much Carbon Dioxide, they would have to purchase the carbon credits to offset their pollution. Ideally this money would then be spent to further other methods of Co2 control. And of course, you would purchase them from Al Gore’s carbon credits company. So then, if the installation had the credits, they could go ahead and continue polluting. As if Al Gore didn’t get enough money from his climate alarmism over the many years he’s been involved this is a Bonanza for him. And how much of that money is actually spent to improve methods and machinery to reduce the carbon levels? How much goes to the top executives of those companies and the people working for them…?

And of course, government has to get in on this cash cow too. A recent carbon tax was imposed on businesses in Washington state. The carbon tax basically requires companies to buy “greenhouse gas allowances,” sold at auction by Washington state, if they emit more than 25,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year. The law took effect on Jan. 1, 2023. The first of 4 “auctions” of “greenhouse gas allowances” raised over $300 million dollars. The remaining 3 auctions for the year are expected to raise at least as much resulting in over $1.2 billion dollars for 2023.

Washington State Senator Ericksen said it best, “This legislation will raise billions of dollars from the people of Washington state. Now, who’s going to pay those billions of dollars? It’s not going to be the oil refineries, it’s not going to be the manufacturers, it’s going to be the people of Washington state who will pay through increased costs for their energy.” Anyone who’s had any experience in business from employee to CEO knows that if a company is to stay in business when their costs increase, they either have to raise their prices or decrease their costs. The first place they go to decrease cost is to chop hours and to let people go. Since it’s an industry-wide expense, they all raise their prices because they all have to do so to stay in business – competition doesn’t have a lot to do with this. If they delay raising their prices, then people lose their jobs instead.

As a result of this carbon tax, energy prices have skyrocketed. Promises were made that it certainly wouldn’t raise the price of gas by more than perhaps 5¢ per gallon because it was a tax on businesses, not a raise in the gas tax. In the first 3-weeks of 2023 it went up 25¢ per gallon and now has exceeded a 50¢ per gallon increase. Pricing of Diesel is even worse. Politicians who have never worked a “real job” for a “real business” don’t have much common sense when it comes to raising taxes.

Energy prices have also risen and continue to rise and since virtually everything moves by truck, that drives up the cost of all goods driving inflation even higher. And of course, now that the government has it, they will never let go of that tax regardless of how it hurts their residents.

So this is a self-perpetuating process originated by well meaning folks
who just didn’t have the knowledge or data to back it up.

Absolutely on that first Earth-day in 1970 everyone was concerned for the earth and wanted to find ways to help make it better. Since then it’s become a self-perpetuating scheme with prediction models that have consistently failed over the last 50-years raising alarms which still can’t be proven.

And people seem to forget that Science is not an absolute. What we believe is true today may be disproven tomorrow. THAT is the scientific method regardless of how many people believe in something. At one time virtually all the people in the world believed the earth is flat and the son revolves around the earth. Folks who disagreed were called heretics and persecuted.

The scientific method requires an proposal of what they believes is a reasonable hypothesis that can be proven or disproven. Then through a series of “repeatable” experiments the hypothesis is proven out and published for peer review. If the technique of proving the hypothesis does not generate the same result, then the hypothesis is not proven. Peer review invites dissent, opposing views, and proof of the ability or inability to reach the same result.

NOTE that peer review means scientists who are the peers of those offering the hypothesis with the ability to repeat the experiments used to prove it. You do not solicit or consider the opinion of a medical doctor to a hypothesis put forward by a climatologist, just as you don’t consider the opinion of a climatologist regarding a surgical procedure for a surgeon. Neither are actual peers in the other field of study. They can have opinions, but they are not “peer review”.

As a result I am far more interested in the opinions and research of Dr. Judith Curry and her true peers, than I am of a screaming media darling.

I’m not particularly fond of people
who fly in private jets to a meeting
where they discuss how to take away
my car and feed me bugs . . . but that’s just me.