Day: July 30, 2024

Why Nuclear is Cheaper than Wind and Solar

Wind and solar supporters have a nasty habit of pretending that their preferred energy sources are the “cheapest forms of energy.” The problem, of course, is that they use unrealistic Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) estimates—see Cooking the Books for wind and solar—and they conveniently forget to mention the large system costs needed to reliably serve electricity demand using these unreliable energy sources.

From ClimateRealism

Guest Post by Isaac Orr and Mitch Rolling

Editors’ Note: This guest post explains how nuclear is actually cheaper than wind and solar, contrary to what most renewables advocated claim. Climate Realism has explained previously how wind and solar are actually far more costly than activists claim, here and here, and that they are not as “green” as advertised, here.

Wind and solar supporters have a nasty habit of pretending that their preferred energy sources are the “cheapest forms of energy.” The problem, of course, is that they use unrealistic Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) estimates—see Cooking the Books for wind and solar—and they conveniently forget to mention the large system costs needed to reliably serve electricity demand using these unreliable energy sources.

That’s why, despite its high up-front capital costs, powering an electric grid with nuclear power is cheaper than using wind, solar, and battery storage.

Before we jump into the benefits of nuclear power, it’s important for our readers to understand that building a fleet of nuclear power plants will be very expensive, which will increase costs for ratepayers. A forced energy transition of any kind is going to increase costs inherently, and nuclear is no different.

If your main priority is reliable, low-cost power, keeping the existing coal and natural gas plants online and building new natural gas plants as needed will be the more affordable option. If decarbonizing the electric grid is your main priority, building new nuclear power plants will deliver a superior value to electricity customers, with reliable service at a lower cost than a grid powered largely by wind, solar, and battery storage.

The Benefits of Nuclear Power

American energy policy has been focused on “transitioning” to so-called cleaner energy sources for a number of years. However, even nuclear plants have fallen victim to this transition, even though they are the most reliable source of emission-less generation.

Nuclear power plants are a proven baseload and emission-free technology with the potential to offer low-cost electricity for decades longer than wind, solar, and battery storage facilities. As such, nuclear power plants are a much better replacement for coal or natural gas plants than wind, solar, and battery storage because they are reliable, inexpensive, and last a long time.

Below, we highlight a couple of the most important benefits of nuclear power and why it is, in fact, lower cost than wind and solar. This will show why energy policy in the states should be more focused on nuclear energy than wind and solar if policymakers are serious about reducing emissions reliably and affordably.

Dispatchability is King

Our definition of a reliable generator is dispatchability, meaning the unit can be turned on or off as needed.

Because nuclear plants are dispatchable, they don’t require backup generators or batteries like wind and solar facilities, and there is no need to overbuild and curtail the plants to ensure there is enough electricity available when the wind isn’t blowing very hard, or the sun isn’t shining.

In our 2022 report on the cost of Minnesota’s 100 percent carbon-free electricity mandate by 2040, we found meeting Minnesota’s electricity demand would require 100,455 megawatts (MW) of installed capacity under the renewable scenario. In contrast, this same job could be done by just 16,379 MW of new and existing nuclear plants, some battery storage, and retrofitting a North Dakota coal plant with carbon capture and storage technology.

The Renewable Scenario uses Minnesota’s existing nuclear plants and adds tens of thousands of MW of wind, solar, and four-hour battery storage.

Building excess wind, solar, and battery storage capacity in the Renewable Scenario was necessary to keep the lights on during periods of low wind and solar output, but it was also very expensive.

As part of our modeling, we analyzed the “all-in” system cost of each energy source, which is a much better representation of the cost of serving load than traditional Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) values, which leave out the cost of keeping the lights on with intermittent sources.

Our modeling found the additional costs of battery storage, referred to as “load balancing” in our report, and overbuilding and curtailment resulted in wind costing $272 per megawatt-hour (MWh) and solar costing $471 per MWh.

Load balancing is the cost of battery storage. Overbuilding and curtailment costs are so high because it was cheaper to overbuild wind and solar and curtail them than building more battery storage.

Meeting electricity demand with new nuclear power plants was much cheaper.

We modeled the cost of the APR-1400, a South Korean reactor, and found the cost of serving load was $69 per MWh. Small modular reactors (SMRs), based on EIA cost estimates, were modeled to generate electricity for $213 per MWh if used as peaking resources and $120 per MWh if used in a baseload capacity.1

The APR-1400 was modeled because it has a successful track record for completion, with four units being built in the United Arab Emirates in a 12-year span. SMR capital cost data were obtained from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Additionally, it’s important to note that the costs for new nuclear plants above are only for the duration of the model, which was through 2040. As will be shown below, these costs would decrease over time, unlike wind and solar facilities.

Nuclear is Very Cheap…In the Long Run

The other main benefit of nuclear power plants is their longevity, making them a long-term value play.

Nuclear plants are initially licensed for 40 years and can apply for 20-year extensions thereafter. For example, in its Integrated Resource Plan, Arizona Public Service assumes a 40-year book life for nuclear power plants. However, nuclear plants can last twice as long as this estimate, and a growing number of nuclear plants have applied to operate for 80 years, allowing them to generate very cheap electricity for decades.

The main cost for a nuclear plant is paying down the upfront capital cost of the plant. In a way, building a nuclear plant is a lot like taking out a big mortgage on a house. As you pay it off, it becomes cheaper to live there. When the mortgage is fully paid, the house is a very low-cost place to live. It’s the same with a power plant.

The graph below shows the annual cost of electricity from a nuclear power plant. The costs in the initial years are high, but once the capital costs are paid off, the only costs are fuel and operating expenses.

Nuclear is Lower Cost than Wind and Solar

The benefits of nuclear power – mainly, its dispatchability and longevity – result in far lower system costs than wind and solar.

We see this all the time in the real world. FERC Form 1 data consistently show existing nuclear plants generating electricity for $20.15 per MWh in Virginia, $21.71 per MWh in North Carolina, $37 per MWh in Minnesota, and $26.19 per MWh nationwide. Even without accounting for the system cost of incorporating wind and solar onto the system, the existing nuclear fleet in America is less expensive than existing wind and solar facilities, which cost $52 per MWh and $73 per MWh, respectively, according to FERC Form 1 data.

Conclusion

Nuclear power plants provide a superior value to consumers relative to wind and solar because of their dispatchable characteristics. This means less installed capacity can serve more load, more predictably. This eliminates the need for backup generators and overbuilding and curtailment.

Not accounting for system costs when considering which energy sources to build on the grid is one of the most egregious oversights in the energy industry, one that has led to incredible inefficiency and rising energy costs for many Americans.

When one does consider system costs and long-term value, nuclear plants are by far the most affordable carbon-free energy source that gives energy consumers the most bang for their buck. If the ongoing “energy transition” were serious, it would allow for more realistic timelines that stretch many decades into the future and the replacement of retiring coal plants more naturally with nuclear plants – instead of the premature retirements before suitable replacement capacity can even come online, as we have seen thus far.

This piece originally appeared at EnergyBadBoys.substack.com and has been republished here with the authors’ permission.

Virginia’s risk of offshore wind turbine blade failure is serious

On July 26, CFACT’s President Craig Rucker sent Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin a letter warning him about the serious risk of blade failure in the giant offshore wind facility being built off Virginia. The warning builds on the recent blade failure off of Nantucket, which has littered the beaches with fiberglass fragments. Virginia is also at risk.

From CFACT

By David Wojick

On July 26, CFACT’s President Craig Rucker sent Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin a letter warning him about the serious risk of blade failure in the giant offshore wind facility being built off Virginia. The warning builds on the recent blade failure off of Nantucket, which has littered the beaches with fiberglass fragments. Virginia is also at risk.

In this article, I present some technical background on that risk. The facility will be one of the world’s biggest, with 176 enormous turbines. It is just getting started with pile driving, so no turbine blades have been installed to date. This is an opportune time to undertake caution.

The Nantucket turbines are made by GE, and they are the world’s largest in operation today at 13 MW, each driven by three huge 107-meter-long blades. That is 351 feet for those of us who do not speak metric. The Virginia turbines will be even bigger at 14 MW with 108 meters (154+ feet) long. They are made by Siemens Gamesa, or SG for short.

The GE turbines and blades have been in production for going on two years, so have some operational experience. The SG turbines and blades just came into production so there is no experience with them. One could say they are being beta tested off Virginia.

This newness in itself is a great concern. At three blades each, there are an incredible 528 blades with a combined length of over 57,000 meters (187,000 feet or 35 miles) of blades. To take first production blades to these huge lengths is surely very risky.

Multiple or even systemic failures are certainly possible. A sound engineering approach would be to build a few and see how they did over time. Note, too, that the prototypes were in Europe, so these blades have never been tested in a hurricane, which offshore Virginia is prone to get.

Now let’s look at the blade stress physics just a bit, as it is amazing. SG has a quick look on their website, saying this:

“The rotational forces found in offshore wind turbines in operation put IMMENSE STRAIN ON THE BLADES and the rest of the wind turbine structure. (Emphasis added) At a tip speed of approximately 90 meters per second – equivalent to 324 kilometers per hour! (201 mph!) – and a projected lifetime of more than 25 years, high-quality and innovative design is imperative. For a 108-meter-long blade, the rotational forces are around a staggering 80 million newton meters, and the strain on the blades and the structure is intense! To put this into perspective, the force pulling on a human shoulder while spinning a 1 kg object around in an outstretched arm is only about 10 newton meters!”

(80 million newton meters is about 59 million pound-feet of torque).

Given these immense, intense strains, the novelty of the SG blades becomes even more of an issue.

To begin with, they are constructed in an unusual way. GE and other major manufacturers build half a lengthwise blade at a time, then glue the two halves together. Building half a tube is relatively simple, just lining a trough-like mold with fiberglass. Gravity is your friend, and inspection is easy.

In contrast, SG builds the entire tubular blade at once. I have no idea how, but it cannot be simple. Gravity wants to distort the tube, and inspection must be difficult. In addition, while SG has built a lot of smaller blades this full tube way, their giant blades are of a different composition. Because of the extreme stresses, they have added carbon fibers.

In summary, we have a newly huge blade, subject to immense stresses, made for the first time in an unusual way with a new composition and never tested in a hurricane. The high novelty risk to Virginia is obvious.

But there is another big risk issue as well, a business issue if you like. SG no longer exists as a corporation. It was absorbed by its majority stockholder to keep it from going under. The reason, as Reuters puts it, is “quality issues and ramp-up problems caused a 4.6 billion euro (5 billion dollar) annual net loss.”

In Virginia, we are looking at the biggest wind turbine ramp-up in history, where high quality is imperative. One has to wonder if SG is capable of this prodigious task at this time, and that wonder signals a big risk. Not only does SG have a deep history of problems, they are undergoing restructuring.

Given these novelty-laden circumstances, it surely is unwise to try to throw up 35 miles of untested blades without further consideration. Hence Craig Rucker’s letter to Governor Youngkin.

Image Idaho National Laboratory Creative Commons

Early 1900s Maps Reveal Sea Levels Have Fallen Dramatically Near Estonia

A new study reports Estonia’s climate was 2-3°C warmer and sea levels were 10-20 m higher ~7,300 years ago.

From NoTricksZone

By Kenneth Richard

A new study reports Estonia’s climate was 2-3°C warmer and sea levels were 10-20 m higher ~7,300 years ago.

Comparing detailed maps from 1915 and 1904 to 2004 and 2021 aerial images reveals the sea waters have receded from the coasts of Estonia so acutely that lagoons are fast disappearing, islands are being transformed into peninsulas, and bays have reduced in size by 30-45%.

In the last seven millennia the coastal areas above sea level have expanded by 10s of kilometers due to falling water levels in this region, which is still ongoing thanks primarily to post-glacial uplift.

Sea level rise linked to climate change has not managed to offset natural geological processes.

Image Source: Suursaar et al, 2024
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When Green Dreams Go Up in Smoke: The Great Lithium Truck Fiasco of I-15

In the end, after 44 hours of chaos and confusion, the northbound lanes of I-15 were finally reopened. The charred remains of the lithium-ion batteries were a stark reminder that, while the road to a greener future is paved with good intentions, it’s also littered with the smoldering remnants of our best-laid plans.

From Watts Up With That?

By Charles Rotter

Once upon a time in the magical land of California, a truck carrying the very essence of green dreams – lithium-ion batteries – decided to take a nap on the side of I-15. This wasn’t just any ordinary nap, mind you; it was a fiery, apocalyptic slumber that would go down in the annals of transportation history.

Now, let’s not forget that lithium-ion batteries are the darlings of the green movement. They’re supposed to be the answer to all our energy woes, powering everything from our electric cars to our smartphones. But, as the saying goes, “with great power comes great responsibility,” and in this case, the responsibility to not spontaneously combust on a major highway.

Lithium battery fire between Barstow and Baker, I-15 NB. All traffic has been stopped for at least six hours. Fire still burning.

 pic.twitter.com/ZtUmhQHNvB— Linda Weber (@LAGreyhound) July 27, 2024

As the truck’s cargo decided to go full-on barbecue, the brave firefighters of San Bernardino County rushed to the scene, only to find themselves scratching their heads. You see, lithium-ion fires are a bit like that one friend who refuses to leave the party; they just keep going and going and going. Water is out of the question, as it only makes things worse. So, the firefighters had to stand back and watch the spectacle unfold, hoping that the batteries would eventually burn themselves out.

Meanwhile, the poor souls who found themselves stuck on I-15 were left to ponder the irony of it all. Here they were, trying to do their part for the environment by not driving gas-guzzling SUVs, only to be trapped in a traffic apocalypse from hell, courtesy of the very technology that was supposed to save us from ourselves.

Lithium Battery Fire Sparks Traffic Mayhem Across California Desert https://t.co/2cfiYdAEnl— zerohedge (@zerohedge) July 28, 2024

The situation was so dire that some motorists were forced to spend the night in their cars, dreaming of the days when a simple gas-powered engine could get them from point A to point B without the risk of spontaneous combustion. It’s almost as if Mother Nature herself was sending a message: “You want green? I’ll give you green… the color of a fire truck.”

UPDATE: Motorists are stranded on I-15 tonight after a truck carrying lithium ion batteries overturned and caught fire this morning near Baker, Calif. I-15 northbound to Las Vegas is still closed. #RJNowhttps://t.co/tDTefKPyjZ pic.twitter.com/elgi8RVH07— Las Vegas Review-Journal (@reviewjournal) July 27, 2024

In the end, after 44 hours of chaos and confusion, the northbound lanes of I-15 were finally reopened. The charred remains of the lithium-ion batteries were a stark reminder that, while the road to a greener future is paved with good intentions, it’s also littered with the smoldering remnants of our best-laid plans.

So, the next time you’re stuck in traffic, dreaming of a world powered by clean, renewable energy, just remember: it’s not easy being green. And maybe, just maybe, we should take a step back and reevaluate our priorities before we put all our eggs in one lithium-ion basket.

British Green Energy Biomass Plant Hands £300 Million to Shareholders, then Demands More Subsidies

£6 billion in subsidies is a lot of money – around £90 for every man, woman and child in Britain. I wonder how many Britons would prefer £90 in their pockets rather than in the pockets of Drax’s shareholders.

From Watts Up With That?

Essay by Eric Worrall

h/t Steve Richards; … ‘A large part of profits come from public subsidies Drax is given by claiming that burning forests is good for the planet.’ …

Drax seeks new handout despite £300m buyback

Drax wants ministers to provide support through to the end of the decade

By JOHN ABIONA 

UPDATED: 19:37 AEST, 27 July 2024

The UK’s biggest wood burner is in talks with the Government over further handouts to cover funding its controversial biomass plant.

Despite whopping profits and a £300million share buyback, Drax wants ministers to provide financial support through to the end of the decade.

It has been handed more than £6billion of subsidies for the power station in Selby, North Yorkshire that generates more than 4 per cent of the UK’s electricity. 

…

Matt Williams, of Cut Carbon Not Forests and advocate for US environmental advocacy group Natural Resources Defense Council, said: ‘It is unacceptable this company is burning the world’s forests and making money hand over fist from environmental harm.

‘A large part of profits come from public subsidies Drax is given by claiming that burning forests is good for the planet.’
…Read more: 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/markets/article-13677211/Drax-seeks-new-handout-despite-300m-buyback.html

£6 billion in subsidies is a lot of money – around £90 for every man, woman and child in Britain. I wonder how many Britons would prefer £90 in their pockets rather than in the pockets of Drax’s shareholders.

According to DeSmog Blog, in 2023 Tory politicians received £48,000 in donations from companies connected to Drax. DeSmog claims Labour also accepted a lesser donation of £12,000 from Drax. Obviously I’m not suggesting such donations in any way influence whether politicians support Drax’s request for more subsidies.

Fantasies of Clever Climate Policies

We think we are so clever. The conceit of contemporary humankind is often unbearable. Yet this modern self-regard has generated a collective idiocy, an inane confusion between feelings and facts, and an inability to distinguish between noble aims and hard reality.

From Science Matters

By Ron Clutz

Chris Kenny writes at The Australian Facts at a premium in blustery climate debate. Excerpts in italics from text provided by John Ray at his blog, Greenie Watch.  My bolds and added images.

Collective Idiocy From Intellectual Vanity

We think we are so clever. The conceit of contemporary humankind is often unbearable.  Yet this modern self-regard has generated a collective idiocy, an inane confusion between feelings and facts, and an inability to distinguish between noble aims and hard reality.

This preference for virtue signalling over practical action can be explained only by intellectual vanity, a smugness that over-estimates humankind’s ability to shape the world it inhabits.

As a result we have a tendency to believe we are masters of the universe, that we can control the climate and regulate natural disasters. Too lazy or spoiled to weigh facts and think things through, we are more susceptible than ever to mass delusion.

We have seen this tendency play out in deeply worrying ways, such as the irrational belief in the communal benefits of Covid vaccination despite the distinct lack of scientific evidence. Too many people just wanted to believe the vaccine had this thing beaten.

Still, there is no area of public debate where rational thought is more readily cast aside than in the climate and energy debate. This is where alarmists demand that people “follow the science” while they deploy rhetoric, scare campaigns and policies that turn reality and science on their heads.

This nonsense is so widespread and amplified by so many authoritative figures that we have become inured to it. Teachers and children break from school to draw attention to what the UN calls a “climate emergency” as the world lives through its most populous and prosperous period in history, when people are shielded from the ill-effects of weather events better than they ever have been previously.

Politicians tell us in the same breath that producing clean energy is the most urgent and important task for the planet and reject nuclear energy, the only reliable form of emissions-free energy. The activists argue that reducing emissions is so imperative it is worth lowering living standards, alienating farmland, scarring forests and destroying industries, but it is not worth the challenge of boiling water to create energy-generating steam by using the tried and tested technology of nuclear fission.

Our acceptance of idiocy, unchecked and unchallenged, struck me in one interview this week given by teal MP Zali Steggall. In many ways it was an unexceptional interview; there are politicians and activists saying this sort of thing every day somewhere, usually unchallenged.

Steggall was preoccupied with Australia’s emissions reduction targets. “If we are going to be aligned to a science-based target and keep temperatures as close to 1.5 degrees as we can, we must have a minimum reduction of 75 per cent by 2035 as an interim target,” she said.

Steggall then patronised her audience by comparing meeting emissions targets to paying down a mortgage. The claim about controlling global temperatures is hard to take seriously, but to be fair it is merely aping the lines of the UN, which argues the increase in global average temperatures can be held to 1.5 degrees with emissions reductions of that size – globally.

We could talk all day about the imprecise nature of these calculations, the contested scientific debate about the role of other natural variabilities in climate, and the presumption that humankind, through policy imposed by a supranational authority, can control global climate as if with a thermostat. The simplistic relaying of this agenda as central to Australian policy decisions was not the worst aspect of Steggall’s presentation.

“The Coalition has no policy, so let’s be really clear, they are taking Australia out of the Paris Agreement if they fail to nominate an improvement with a 2035 target,” Steggall lectured, disingenuously.

This was Steggall promulgating the central lie of the national climate debate – that Australia’s emissions reduction policies can alter the climate. It is a fallacy embraced and advocated by Labor, the Greens and the teals, and which the Coalition is loath to challenge for fear of being tagged into a “climate denialism” argument.

It is arrant nonsense to suggest our policies can have any discernible effect on the climate or “climate risk”. Any politician suggesting so, directly or by implication, is part of a contemporary, fake-news-driven dumbing down of the public square, and injecting an urgency into our policy considerations that is hurting citizens already with high electricity prices, diminished reliability and a damaged economy.

Steggall went on to claim we were feeling the consequences of global warming already. “And for people wondering ‘How does that affect me?’, just look at your insurance premiums, our insurance premiums around Australia are going through the roof,” she extrapolated, claiming insurance costs were keeping people out of home ownership. “This is not a problem for the future,” Steggall stressed, “it is problem for now.”

It is a problem all right – it is unmitigated garbage masquerading as a policy debate. Taking it to its logical conclusion, Steggall claims if Australia reduced its emissions further we would lower the risk of natural disasters, leading to lower insurance premiums and improved housing affordability – it is surprising that world peace did not get a mention.

Mind you, these activists do like to talk about global warming as a security issue. They will say anything that heightens fears, escalates the problem and supports their push for more radical deindustrialisation.

Our national contribution to global emissions
is now just over 1 per cent and shrinking.

Australia’s annual emissions total less than 400 megatonnes while China’s are rising by more than that total each year and are now at 10,700Mt or about 30 times Australia’s. While our emissions reduce, global emissions are increasing. We could shut down our country, eliminating our emissions completely, and China’s increase would replace ours in less than a year.

So, whatever we are doing, it is not changing and cannot change the global climate. Our national chief scientist, Alan Finkel, clearly admitted this point in 2018, even though he was embarrassed by its implications in the political debate. Yet the pretence continues.

And before critics suggest I am arguing for inaction, I am not. But clearly, the logical and sensible baseline for our policy consideration should be a recognition that our national actions cannot change the weather. Therefore we should carefully consider adaptation to measured and verified climate change, while we involve ourselves as a responsible nation in global negotiations and action.

Obviously, we should not be leading that action but acting cautiously to protect our own interests and prosperity.

It is madness for us to undermine our cheap energy advantage to embark on a renewables-plus-storage experiment that no other country has dared to even try, when we know it cannot shift the global climate one iota. It is all pain for no gain.

Yet that is what this nation has done. So my question today is what has happened to our media, academia, political class and wider population so that it allows this debate and policy response to occur in a manner that is so divorced from reality?

Are we so complacent and overindulged that we accept post-rational debate to address our post-material concerns? Even when it is delivering material hardship to so many Australians and jeopardising our long-term economic security?

Should public debate accept absurd baseline propositions such as the idea that our energy transition sacrifice will improve the weather and reduce natural disasters, simply because they are being argued by major political groupings or the UN? Or should we not try to impose a dose of reality and stick to the facts?

This feebleness of our public debate has telling ramifications – there is no way this country could have embarked on the risky, expensive and doomed renewables-plus-storage experiment if policies and prognostications had been subject to proper scrutiny and debate.

Our media is now so polarised that the climate activists of Labor, the Greens and the teals are able to ensure their nonsensical advocacy is never challenged, and the green-left media, led by the publicly funded ABC, leads the charge in spreading misinformation.

Clearly, we are not as clever as we think. Our children need us to wise up.

Met Office State of the UK Climate Report

It’s the same tired old theme every year – more extreme weather, the climate is changing, and it’s all due (of course) to fossil fuels!

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

The Met Office are back with their “extreme weather” fraud:

Climate change is causing a dramatic increase in the frequency of temperature extremes and number of temperature records the UK experiences.

New analysis of observations shows that extremes of temperature in the UK are most affected by human induced climate change. This means the UK is seeing, on average, more frequent periods of hot weather, bringing challenges for infrastructure, health and wellbeing. The observations also suggest an increase in rainfall extremes.

The new analysis features in this year’s annual publication of the ‘State of the UK Climate’ report. Published in the Royal Meteorological Society’s ‘International Journal of Climatology’, the report is a comprehensive review of the UK climate and significant weather events through 2023. This report is based on observations from the UK’s network of weather stations, using data extending back to the 19th Century to provide long term context.

Using an example of 28°C, the frequency of days reaching this threshold has increased nearly everywhere across the UK. Where in the 1961-1990 averaging period only London and Hampshire recorded six or more days over 28°C, by the latest decade (2014-2023) this has spread across much of England and Wales, with frequencies in the south east increasing to over 12 days each year in many counties.

Although rainfall has a much higher natural variability than temperature, it is still possible to identify an increasing frequency of the wettest days over time too. By taking the top 5% of wettest days during the 1961-1990 averaging period it is possible to see how frequent these very wet days have been in the most recent decade (2014-2023).

The most recent decade has had around 20% more days of exceptional rainfall compared to the 1961-1990 averaging period. While there is no significant signal for this change being more pronounced in a specific area of the UK, overall, this analysis clearly shows an increase in the number of very wet days in the UK’s climate in recent years compared to what was observed just a few decades ago.

Lead author and Met Office climate scientist, Mike Kendon, said: “Our new analysis of these observations really shines a light on the fastest changing aspects of our weather as a consequence of climate change. Long term averages can be difficult for people to relate to, but what we are showing here is the notable change in frequencies of extreme weather that can have a real impact on people’s lives.

“2023 was another year of interesting and at times significant weather. . But underlying this natural variability is a continuing and increasing influence of climate change which is influencing the weather we experience.”

Professor Liz Bentley, Chief Executive of the Royal Meteorological Society, said: “This report is the authoritative annual summary of the UK climate published as a special supplement in our International Journal of Climatology. It not only helps to highlight the latest knowledge on our changing climate but also enables us to understand the trends, risks and impacts to help inform how we will need to adapt, now and in the future.

“The new analysis of days that are classified as ‘hot’ or having ‘exceptional rainfall’ highlights the increased frequency in high impact extremes we are already experiencing in the UK, and the attribution studies help to understand how human activities, such as burning fossil fuels, are making these extreme events much more likely to happen as our climate continues to change.”

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/news-and-media/media-centre/weather-and-climate-news/2024/temperature-extremes-and-records-most-affected-by-uks-changing-climate

It’s the same tired old theme every year – more extreme weather, the climate is changing, and it’s all due (of course) to fossil fuels!

Apparently pleasantly warm weather is now more common than in the 1960s, but equally extremely cold days are less frequent. So how can they say we are having a  dramatic increase in the frequency of temperature extremes? As I have repeatedly argued, London is warmer than Manchester, but does that mean that London’s weather is more extreme?

And if you asked most people if they would like a slightly warmer climate, they would jump at the chance! Hence the Met Office’s need to bang the “extreme weather” drum, so as to scare the public into believing that every bit of bad weather is due to global warming.

The report itself is 121 pages long, and full of largely irrelevant waffle. Clearly the intention is to obfuscate and stop the public from finding out the real story.

But today I want to focus on rainfall, including this Met Office claim:

Although rainfall has a much higher natural variability than temperature, it is still possible to identify an increasing frequency of the wettest days over time too. By taking the top 5% of wettest days during the 1961-1990 averaging period it is possible to see how frequent these very wet days have been in the most recent decade (2014-2023).

The most recent decade has had around 20% more days of exceptional rainfall compared to the 1961-1990 averaging period. While there is no significant signal for this change being more pronounced in a specific area of the UK, overall, this analysis clearly shows an increase in the number of very wet days in the UK’s climate in recent years compared to what was observed just a few decades ago.

Comparing one ten-year period with a 30-year one is a strict no-no, as any statistician would tell you. And the Met Office is stacked with statisticians, so why did they choose to do so? And why choose the 1961-90 for that matter, rather than the 1991-2020 period which is the only one relevant now?

The answer to the second question is that 1961-90 was a much drier interlude, particularly the 1970s. Since then average annual rainfall has risen, but only back to levels seen in periods such as the 1870s and 1920s. It has nothing to do with “changing climate”; indeed the UK still has just the same climate as it has always done. But this does not mean that weather cannot vary tremendously from year to year, so inevitably some years will be wetter then normal, and others drier. Nowhere has the Met Office provided evidence that rainfall trends in the last two centuries are anything other than natural variation.

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadukp/data/download.html

Leading flood experts are fully aware of these historical variations. Professor Stuart Lane of Durham University, for instance, describes the 1960s to 80s as being a “flood-poor” period.

And the Met Office’s own graphs give their game away. For both 95th and 99th Percentiles, they show an increase up to the 1990s, but since then the trend is flat.

So much for the “climate is changing” meme!

But why do these graphs only begin in 1960? What are they trying to hide?

The Met Office says that this increasing rainfall intensity is nationwide, and their maps clearly show this is the case for Oxfordshire. So what does the data for Radcliffe Observatory tell us?

The ECA&D charts below only go to 2020, but both confirm that the 1961-90 period was drier than much of the preceding period.

Up to date data confirms that the 2014-2023 average, as used by the Met Office, is at a similar levels to much of the pre-1960 years, where 95th Percentile is concerned.

As for 99th Percentile, it is at record lows. In neither dataset is there any evident long term trend.

https://climexp.knmi.nl/start.cgi

In short, the Met Office has been caught out attempting to con the public into thinking that rainfall is becoming more extreme, when it is not.

Can American conservation survive ‘Green’ energy?

It’s summer, the ACs are cranking, SUVs are loaded, and families are hitting the road for beaches, forests, mountains, and National Parks. Thanks to our unique history of conservation and a culture of preservation, Americans have, for many decades, taken for granted their access to natural beauty. Reverence, even love of that natural beauty, is epitomized by our country’s 400 National Parks, hundreds of miles of protected coasts, and 800 million acres of forest, only 40% of which falls under government management.

From CFACT

By Portia Roberts

It’s summer, the ACs are cranking, SUVs are loaded, and families are hitting the road for beaches, forests, mountains, and National Parks. Thanks to our unique history of conservation and a culture of preservation, Americans have, for many decades, taken for granted their access to natural beauty. Reverence, even love of that natural beauty, is epitomized by our country’s 400 National Parks, hundreds of miles of protected coasts, and 800 million acres of forest, only 40% of which falls under government management.

Organizations like Save the Bay and thousands more founded by concerned citizens serve to champion habitat restoration and protection. Indeed, such was the very foundation of the modern environmental movement spawning nonprofits that advocate for policy, educate, install oyster beds, guard sea turtles, clean woodlands, “save the whales,” remind drone operators about the negative impacts of unmanned vehicles on wildlife, and, of course, constrain or prevent drilling and mining projects to preserve species and habitats.

But now, the environmental movement is at odds with itself. The movement’s full-throated embrace of so-called “green energy,” successfully amplified by unprecedented government mandates and subsidies, is leading to habitat-invading and beauty-destroying energy projects at scales that not only rankle onlookers but also those environmentalists still committed to stewardship and conservation—and would shock the founders of the preservation movement.

In California, a 2,300-acre solar project requires destroying thousands of 150–200-year-old Joshua Trees, also the habitat of endangered desert tortoises. Locals object. Officials approve. The power generated in the eastern part of the state will reportedly benefit communities hundreds of miles west.

Disputes in Maine about where to put massive wind turbine projects pit environmental groups against conservationists intent on protecting wilderness and wildlife. Paradoxically, the state has the nation’s strictest mining laws, precluding any possibility of directly sourcing even a portion of the raw materials necessary to construct the turbines and solar panels slated for deployment to Maine’s electrical grid. Meantime, in Vermont, a solar panel project that would cover 227 football fields of pristine landscape is being vigorously opposed.

These so-called “green” technologies, useful in generating intermittent power in discrete conditions and geographies, not only impact the visual environment but also have, as yet, unknown impacts on our environment when deployed at scale. However, we are starting to get some indications.

Scientists are still studying impacts of massive off-shore wind installations on sea temperatures and marine life. Only now are some communities and environmental groups coming to terms with the monumental scale of non-recyclable plastic blade trash on the horizon as those turbines age out. Just this month at Vineyard Wind, a partial blade from a single Eiffel Tower-sized wind turbine failed, dropped into the ocean, and necessitated several beach closures. Add to this other newly discovered consequences such as, for example, studies showing that massive solar installations often proposed for the Sahara Desert would contribute to higher global temperatures. We also know large-scale solar installations cause loss of habitat, confuse birds, drive runoff, pollute waterways, degrade soil health, and disrupt animal migration.

Despite ample evidence that we should proceed with caution regarding industrial-scale  deployment of land-invading green energy, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) promises trillions to subsidize such projects. So-called green energy, with the notable exception of nuclear, is—from mine to deployment—extraordinarily land and resource intensive. Some environmental groups are beginning to raise alarms about both deep sea mining and expanding conventional mining for the vast quantities of critical materials needed for aggressive electrification and large-scale solar and wind projects.

In total acres used per megawatt, coal, natural gas, and nuclear power have tiny footprints compared to wind and solar. A solar power plant typically requires 5 to 10 acres per megawatt, while a natural gas plant uses less than a half an acre per megawatt. These estimates don’t even account for the increases in land mined for the necessary metals and mining.

In the 100 years since modern environmental conservation began, we have become increasingly more efficient in the resources and land we use to supply energy. But now, ‘green’ energy policies come at the expense of far greater land and water use. ‘Green’ policies also ignore increased foreign resource dependence and environmental impacts overseas. The production of useful energy, which drives economic productivity, is always about tradeoffs. Americans are unlikely to tolerate increasingly obvious ‘green’ tradeoffs.

A future with denser, cleaner urban footprints that preserve natural habitats requires that we continue to decrease the natural resources and land we consume, particularly with our population predicted to peak anywhere from 20 to 60 years from now. In addition to affordable cars, air conditioners, and smartphones, virtually all Americans want clean air and abundant, biodiverse seas and wide-open spaces our 19th-century forebearers helped to realize.  You can bet future generations will, too. It’s in our nature. And our energy policies and choices should reflect that.

Portia Roberts is the Policy Director for the National Center for Energy Analytics and holds an MA from Johns Hopkins SAIS.

This article originally appeared at Real Clear Energy

Democratizing and navigating 2024-era markets

David Goone was ready to retire after guiding Intercontinental Exchange Inc. (ICE) through over twenty years of industry-defining growth, including the acquisition of (among others) the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).

From CFACT

By Duggan Flanakin

David Goone was ready to retire after guiding Intercontinental Exchange Inc. (ICE) through over twenty years of industry-defining growth, including the acquisition of (among others) the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).

Then, he got an intriguing offer — to become the new chief executive officer at tZERO, pioneering the adoption of blockchain technology for capital markets and a solutions provider for the efficient trading of private assets.

The prospect before his eyes was the opportunity to build a blockchain-friendly, regulated automated trading system (ATS) providing continuous liquidity.

tZERO’s current EVP and Chief Legal and Corporate Affairs Officer (and the former interim CEO who helped to recruit Goone) Alan Konevsky calls the company “…the infrastructure layer; the connective tissue between supply and demand, between legacy and digital, and between digital and digital.”

Many forward-thinking investors today seek to incorporate real or philosophical elements of the crypto thesis into the securities issuance and trading environment – such as the instantaneous settlement of trades, relative independence of middlemen, lower transaction costs, transparency, automation, and portability of asset ownership, including the ability to hold assets in a personal wallet and have interactivity/utility of instruments – to ultimately be independent of institutions.

Setting aside that, with increasing AML and other regulations, much of this is not really available in the crypto markets today, anyway; the securities ecosystem requires a particular focus on marrying legacy concepts and processes with the promise of technology.

For example, says Goone, who was a member of the board of directors of the DTCC, the settlement cycle has been getting shorter with conventional securities.

While it is still longer than instantaneous, it is now closer to “tZERO” than the ‘t+5’ (meaning five days to close a trade) scenario of the relatively recent past.

It took years for Wall Street, including NYSE and other exchanges, to go from t + 2 to recently launched t + 1.

There are ultimately two main reasons why people want to tokenize their securities in 2024 – One is that the blockchain creates a single public and immutable database for assets – rather than one for you, one for your transfer agent, one for your broker-dealer, one for your custodian, and so on.

The second reason is ‘smart contract automation’, which is one of the more exciting aspects of blockchain technology and part and parcel of a wider push into increasing automation across all industries, including through the use of AI.

The marriage of digitally native single public database architecture with smart contract automation is probably the first time anyone endeavored to create public, accessible, and open infrastructure for the exchange of value since the advent of paper money and coinage.

The ability to create each security, each item of value, as a piece of software that is forever programmed to act in certain ways and not to act in other ways, a relatively new market phenomenon, says Konevsky, allows automating compliance, transfer restrictions, and other functions while eliminating or reducing reliance on intermediaries otherwise needed to check documents and papers to ensure protocols have been followed.

This is particularly true for private assets – such as private equity and securitized real-world assets (RWA) – and the broken secondary liquidity options for them.

Says Goone, “We realized there were a lot of types of assets we could tokenize and put on the blockchain, including turning assets in the sports, arts, and entertainment arenas into non-traditional securities.”

This enables people to buy shares of an athlete’s revenue, or sports team or, a piece of art, or even a motion picture.

Or, as it turns out, a hotel.

About six years ago, the St. Regis Aspen Resort, led by Stephane De Baets, became a leading hotel to offer blockchain-enhanced securities. These shares have been actively and successfully traded on the alternative trading system operated by tZERO’s broker-dealer subsidiary. Many investors bought and held their shares, while others traded them more actively. One reason for this is that their shares entitle them to special dining or skiing experiences and provide other benefits.

It’s like joining a private club but with residual financial rewards, perhaps dependent on the size of one’s sharehold.

With traditional currencies and investments not tied to real-world assets (RWA) falling under heavy scrutiny of late and often overly reliant on good or bad ‘PR’, toppling governments, and the ebbs and flows of an antiquated marketplace, it’s intriguing to look at alternatives that are ‘next-gen’ in 2024, however also offer traditional safety and investment security for any who enter the arena, like gold and real estate.

This article originally appeared at Real Clear Markets

How Will New York’s Energy Madness End? The “Don’t Do It!” Report

I frequently write about how the mandates for energy transition that New York has adopted are impossible and irreconcilable in the real world; and therefore it is inevitable that they will have to be abandoned at some point when implementation of the project runs up against physical reality.

UNITED STATES – AUGUST 15: Manhattan skyline is dark as the sun comes up on the morning after a massive power failure caused the largest power outage in the nation’s history, affecting 50 million people in parts of seven states and Canada. (Photo by Mike Albans/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images)

From The MANHATTAN CONTRARIAN

 By Francis Menton

I frequently write about how the mandates for energy transition that New York has adopted are impossible and irreconcilable in the real world; and therefore it is inevitable that they will have to be abandoned at some point when implementation of the project runs up against physical reality.

Probably the most frequent question that I get asked is, OK, how and when will that occur?

The question is important because for as long as the impossible mandates remain in place they are causing massive ongoing damage to our electricity system and to consumers. As examples, on the electricity generation side, natural gas power plants that currently supply about half of our electricity are slated for forced closure at the rate of several a year until all of them are closed by 2040. The longer the net zero fantasy goes on, the more difficult and costly it will be to re-open these plants (if they are even still standing), or build new ones. Wind and solar facilities are getting built at the cost of billions, with huge subsidies, producing essentially no useful power. Every time another one gets built, the taxpayers and ratepayers are on the hook to pay its costs for its entire life. On the consumer side, residents of large buildings are under a mandate to discard their current natural gas or oil heat systems in favor of inferior electric heat pumps, at costs estimated at $100,000 per housing unit or more for older buildings. When the net zero project gets abandoned, these massive investments will be a deadweight loss. And there are many other examples of the ongoing damage being caused by the mandates.

So what will be the event that causes the project to crater? If nothing else comes first, at some point we will get hit with a string of catastrophic blackouts. That would surely wake people up and almost certainly force a re-think of the project. But just waiting for this catastrophe to turn things around is not really a great idea, for two reasons: first, to their credit, the people who run the grid are good at keeping it going in difficult circumstances, meaning that we could get “lucky,” and the catastrophe could be postponed for years during which enormous ongoing damage from mal-investment occurs; and the second problem is that when the blackouts come they could cause real human harm and tragedy, such as deaths of people with electric heat who freeze in their apartments. In other words, people who care about New York owe it to their fellow citizens to try to straighten this out before the catastrophe hits.

And thus it comes about that three public-spirited guys, who have been observing the ongoing slow-motion train wreck with horror, have written a Report to urge New Yorkers to defy the statutory mandates to electrify building heat. The title of the Report is “Don’t Do It! Report to New York Co-op and Condo Boards and Trade Associations On LL97 Conversion To Electric Heat.”

The three public-spirited guys are myself and co-authors Roger Caiazza and Richard Ellenbogen. Caiazza is a retired air pollution meteorologist who has a blog called the Pragmatic Environmentalist of New York, where he writes prolifically about New York’s impending energy disaster. Ellenbogen is a Cornell-trained electrical engineer who does not have a big internet presence, but is a very knowledgeable frequent commenter on New York’s various regulator dockets relating to the energy transition, where he pulls no punches. The three of us wrote this Report for no compensation so that nobody could accuse us of being shills for the fossil fuel industry or the real estate industry or any other special interest.

The reason that the Report is directed to condominium and co-op Boards and Trade Associations is that the condo/co-op community represents a group of hundreds of thousands of voters who find themselves in the cross-hairs of New York’s impossible energy mandates. Among other New York residents, small building residents and single-family homeowners have been exempted from the heat conversion mandates (at least for now), while rental tenants are insulated by rent regulations. So the boards and shareholders of the large condos and co-ops are the largest group of residents directly affected by the mandates. Many boards of these buildings are only now starting to look into how to comply with the 2030 mandate to convert to electric heat, and getting feedback from consultants about the enormous costs. Few of them realize that the State at the same time has no credible plan to generate enough electricity to make the heat conversion mandate work.

The distribution of the Report to the relevant communities has recently begun. Daughter Jane — known to readers here as a frequent contributor — has set up a group called New Yorkers for Affordable Reliable Energy (“New Yorkers ARE”) to organize grass-roots opposition to complying with the heat conversion mandate. Co-author Roger Caiazza wrote a post for Watts Up With That two weeks ago announcing the issuance of the Report.

I recommend the Report to readers who are at all interested in the depths of ignorance and incompetence of the New York legislators and regulators who are pushing the impossible “energy transition.” It’s only about 15 pages long, with a good Introduction and Executive Summary at the beginning that capture the gist. Here is a summary quote from the Executive Summary:

The Net Zero transition is by far the largest, most expensive and ambitious government-directed project ever undertaken in New York. However, the statutory mandates of the CLCPA and LL 97 have been enacted without:

• Any detailed Feasibility Study of whether this transition is possible under basic physics and existing technology;

• Any Demonstration Project anywhere in the world showing how an electrical grid can function relying on mostly on wind and solar and without emissions-creating resources for back-up of intermittency;

• Any detailed analysis or projection of the costs to New Yorkers of this transition, whether in their capacities as taxpayers or ratepayers or both.

This Report assesses issues of the feasibility and cost of New York’s electricity transition project. The purpose is to advise New York residents, particularly co-op and condo owners and their Boards who are subject to LL 97, on how they should respond to the statutory mandates. The Report reviews facts and data showing that there are strong reasons to believe that the goals that have been set, and mandated by law, are impossible of achievement, let alone at any remotely affordable cost. The State and City have totally failed in their responsibilities to their citizens to assure that the mandates they have enacted are feasible and affordable.

So to get back to the initial question of how New York’s energy madness will end: An alternative to just waiting for the blackouts to come will be for a critical mass of New Yorkers in the cross-hairs of the mandates to refuse to comply and to demand that the mandates be rescinded. We are attempting to start that process into motion. Let’s hope that we have some success.