Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
As usual, please read DMI’s explanatory note, to the effect that SMB does not include calving losses:
The Greenland Ice Sheet evolves throughout the year as weather conditions change. Precipitation increases the mass of the ice sheet, whilst greater warmth leads to melting, which causes it to lose mass. The term surface mass balance is used to describe the isolated gain and loss of mass of the surface of the ice sheet – excluding the mass that is lost when glaciers calve off icebergs and melt as they come into contact with warm seawater.
I hope to shortly update the full data, including calving, once DMI publish it.
But it is SMB which is the real driver of what is happening on the icesheet. A warmer climate would normally be expected to reduce SMB, but this is clearly not happening.
In July, the U.S. Department of Interior greenlighted large offshore wind farms in New Jersey and Maryland. Once the financial agreements are in place, New Jersey’s Atlantic Shores and Maryland’s MarWin and Momentum will join the two large wind farms in New York approved in June. These projects will receive huge, multibillion-dollar subsidies from the federal government and electricity ratepayers. What benefits will New Jersey and Maryland enjoy from this flood of money?
In July, the U.S. Department of Interior greenlighted large offshore wind farms in New Jersey and Maryland. Once the financial agreements are in place, New Jersey’s Atlantic Shores and Maryland’s MarWin and Momentum will join the two large wind farms in New York approved in June. These projects will receive huge, multibillion-dollar subsidies from the federal government and electricity ratepayers. What benefits will New Jersey and Maryland enjoy from this flood of money?
To answer this question, it is best to recall the classic warning of the Trojan Horse legend, “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts”—in other words, the hidden dangers of accepting something that seems too good to be true. New York State ignored that warning when it agreed to pay very high prices for the electricity to be supplied from its new offshore wind farms—Empire Wind 1 and Sunrise Wind—located off the coast of Long Island.
In announcing the final agreements, New York Governor Kathy Hochul triumphantly claimed that the new projects would create more than 800 jobs during the construction phase and deliver more than $6 billion in economic benefits for the state over 25 years.
Rather less emphasis was given to the fact that New York will pay an average price of over $150 per MWh (megawatt hour) for the electricity generated by Empire Wind 1 and Sunrise Wind.That’s more than fourtimes the average wholesale price of electricity in New York during 2023–24, $36 per MWh. The total annual premium over the wholesale market price for the power from these wind farms will be about $520 million per year at 2024 prices. Over 25 years, New York ratepayers will be paying about $13 billion for alleged benefits of $6 billion.
That is not all. Thanks to tax credits, U.S. taxpayers will cover at least 40% of the costs of constructing the wind farms. At a minimum cost of $5.5 million per MW (million watts) of capacity, the total federal subsidy for New York’s two wind farms will be at least $3.8 billion.
What about jobs and other economic benefits? A study prepared for Equinor, the owner of Empire Wind 1, and submitted to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) claimed that it would directly generate 180 annual jobs in New York during the six-year construction phase. The study estimated another 60 annual jobs due to the indirect employment effect, i.e., extra employment in the supply chain for the project.
A more reasonable estimate for the two projects together would be 515 annual jobs, not 800. The total contribution to New York State’s gross value added (the equivalent of GDP at the state level) during the construction of both projects would be less than $450 million, based on the report submitted to BOEM. Similar calculations for annual operating and maintenance (O&M) costs suggest an annual contribution of about $24 million to gross value-added or about $600 million over 25 years.
Rather than the benefits of $6 billion over 25 years touted by Governor Hochul, a realistic assessment would be closer to $1.1 billion at 2024 prices. In any event, residents will be paying a cumulative premium of $13 billion for the electricity these projects will generate.
Moreover, the additional jobs claimed for the project are concentrated heavily in the final year of construction—and the largest share (47%) consists of professional services. Overwhelmingly, these are jobs for people who would otherwise be working on other assignments.
The economic benefits of the two offshore wind farms are much lower than claimed by the governor and the jobs are, in large part, temporary assignments for professional services staff. Promoting business for consulting firms may be considered a desirable outcome by Ms. Hochul. Still, the very high financial burden will be borne by almost the entire population of the state.
Stepping back from the New York projects, the Biden administration’s overall goal is to reach a target of 30 GW (billion watts) of offshore electricity generation capacity by 2030 or shortly thereafter. That is equivalent to 17 times the capacity of the combined Empire Wind 1 and Sunrise Wind projects. Detailed costs and financial arrangements vary, but the figures above suggest that the recurring premium paid by electricity ratepayers in states with offshore wind farms will be about $9 billion per year. The benefits of new job creation and incomes from capital and O&M expenditures are likely to be less than $800 million per year.
In addition to the very large subsidies paid for from ultra-high electricity bills, federal taxpayers will contribute about $65 billion via tax credits if the Biden administration’s offshore wind target is met. While the subsidies for individual projects may not seem outrageous, the commitment of money to subsidize offshore generation is about $870 for every member of the country’s population. This may be spread over 25 years, but it is a huge liability for one very small element of U.S. programs to support renewable energy.
Once upon a time, those charged with delivering affordable power, as and when we needed it, were responsible, stoic and serious. These days, the energy domain has been overrun by a group of delusional zealots, who act as the spearhead for a band of cynical, billionaire rent-seekers.
Politicos love them, and are always keen to shower them with other people’s money.
Once upon a time, those charged with delivering affordable power, as and when we needed it, were responsible, stoic and serious. These days, the energy domain has been overrun by a group of delusional zealots, who act as the spearhead for a band of cynical, billionaire rent-seekers.
Politicos love them, and are always keen to shower them with other people’s money.
In Australia, billions of taxpayers’ money is being squandered on the falsehood that, in the not-too-distant future, every single watt of power will be generated by nothing other than sunshine and breezes.
There is no better example of the level of idiocy that has overtaken energy policy, than the ‘plan’ (childish pipe dream?) by a billionaire software developer, Mike Cannon-Brookes to carpet the Australian outback with millions of solar panels and then send the power generated (for about 6-7 hours a day – cloud and cyclones permitting) 4,200 km along an undersea cable to Singapore, of all places.
As Nick Cater outlines below, Australia is neck-and-neck in the race to peak energy stupidity.
The sun is setting on our renewables ‘superpower’ fantasy The Australian Nick Cater 26 August 2024
Renewable energy superpower status is supposedly in Australia’s grasp now the government has given Mike Cannon-Brookes the green light to export solar power to Singapore.
Tanya Plibersek announced environmental approval for the tech billionaire’s eccentric proposal last week, taking a swipe at Peter Dutton’s “expensive nuclear fantasy that may never happen”.
By contrast, the Environment Minister would have us believe Cannon-Brookes’s plan to siliconise the NT Outback is a done deal. All that’s left to do is raise $35bn in capital, install 120 square kilometres of solar panels, build a modest 788km transmission line to Darwin, and lay a 4200km high-voltage cable on the seabed, and we’re good to go.
The Sun Cable AAPowerLink project feels like it was stolen from a Heath Robinson cartoon: a convoluted, unnecessarily elaborate, and impractical contraption designed to accomplish a mundane task. It may mark the beginning of the end of the renewable romance, the point at which the transition to wind, solar and hydropower collapses under the weight of its own absurdity.
There is increasing evidence the US has reached the point of peak renewables, as the pool of private investors shrinks and winning community approval becomes harder. Research by the Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory showed roughly one-third of utility-scale wind and solar applications submitted over the past five years were cancelled, while about half of wind and solar projects experienced significant delays.
The US Department of Energy says the national electricity network needs to grow by 57 per cent by 2035, the equivalent of approximately 21,000 km a year. Last year’s total was around 200 km, down from just over 1000 in 2022.
Meanwhile, the challenges of grid synchronisation and storage remain unresolved, and the technical problems for offshore wind turbines, in particular, are mounting. Last week, turbine manufacturer GE Vernova announced an investigation into a blade failure in the 3.6GW Dogger Bank project in the North Sea off the coast of the UK. It is the third blade failure this year.
In July, a newly installed blade crumbled at the Vineyard Wind offshore plant, creating debris that washed up on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts. At 107 metres long and weighing 55 tonnes, they are the most enormous blades deployed commercially. The failure of three in quick succession suggests the quest to increase output by installing ever-larger blades has reached its natural limits.
Yet the imperative of expanding generating capacity is hardening. The principal driving force is not electric vehicles but the rapid growth of artificial intelligence. AI requires at least 10 times the power of conventional computing programs.
In the US, data centres account for about 2.5 per cent of power and demand could rise to 7.5 per cent by 2030, according to Boston Consulting Group. In Ireland, data processing and storage use 12 per cent of electricity produced, forcing the authorities to limit the number of connections to the grid.
Silicon Valley has long abandoned the notion it can be powered by silicon photovoltaic panels while burying stray emissions in the Amazon forests.
In April, the tech giant Amazon paid the best part of $1bn ($US650m) for a sizeable block of land next to Pennsylvania’s Susquehanna nuclear power station. It will be the site for a data centre powered by up to 480MW of carbon-free electricity delivered reliably around the clocky.
Shares in US nuclear power companies such as Consolidated Energy, Talem and Vistra have soared by between 80 per cent and 180 per cent in the past year. So-called green energy stocks, on the other hand, are static or falling, while coal is making an unexpected comeback.
In May, the Financial Times reported that the retirement dates for coal-fired power stations are being pushed back as operators become concerned about grid security. Allianz Energy has delayed the conversion of its Wisconsin plant from coal to gas for three years to 2028. Ohio-based FirstEnergy announced in February that it was scrapping its 2030 target to phase out coal, citing “resource adequacy concerns”.
The effect of AI on electricity demand was largely unanticipated at the beginning of the decade. AI chips will undoubtedly become more efficient, but there is no telling how much further the demand for AI will grow since the technology is in its infancy. Nor can we begin to guess what other power-hungry forms of technology might be developed by 2050.
What we do know, however, is that if Australia’s demand for electricity exceeds 313 TWH a year in a 2050, we’re in trouble. That’s the target the Australian Energy Market Operator has set in its updated blueprint for the great electricity transition.
As Chris Bowen points out, that’s going to take a lot solar panels and wind turbines. The Energy Minister says we need 22,000 new solar panels a day and a new 7MW wind turbine every 18 hour s just to meet our 2030 target of a mere 202 TWH. For the record, the speed of the rollout in the first two years of Labor government is less than a tenth of that.
One of the hallmarks of the anointed is an unwavering conviction in the integrity of their analysis and the effectiveness of their proposed solutions. They feel no need to hedge their bets by factoring in contingency arrangements should their predictions turn out to be wrong. Nothing in AEMO’s Integrated System Plan indicates its experts have given any thought to scaling up electricity production in line with actual demand, which may well be considerably higher than they’ve anticipated.
If they had, they would have to acknowledge that there are limits to the renewable energy frontier determined by energy density, the demand for land and the requirement for firming. The silicification of northern Australia cannot continue forever, nor can we expect to rely on China for most of the hardware and pretend there are no geopolitical consequences.
As for our nuclear-phobic Prime Minister’s dream of turning Australia into the Saudi Arabia of green hydrogen, while simultaneously sitting at the cutting edge of quantum computing, forget it. In 2006, as the shadow minister for the environment, Anthony Albanese gave a speech at the Swansea RSL on avoiding dangerous climate change.
“Why on Earth would we want to take the big health and economic risk of nuclear energy when we have a ready-made power source hovering peacefully in the sky every day?” he asked.
If Albanese doesn’t know the answer to that question 18 years later, he probably never will. The Australian
I am continuing to keep an eye on the Vineyard Farms offshore blade failure near Nantucket. A few weeks ago the facility was closed because of the failure of Vineyard Wind’s newly installed wind turbines, and the city was poised to sue.
I am continuing to keep an eye on the Vineyard Farms offshore blade failure near Nantucket. A few weeks ago the facility was closed because of the failure of Vineyard Wind’s newly installed wind turbines, and the city was poised to sue.
After one blade failed and ended up in the water, the beaches were cluttered with sharp fiberglass shards, which is a sub-optimum condition at the height of the summer tourist season. Continuing investigation into the cause of this environmental contamination incident determined that a manufacturing flaw in the blade was responsible for the failure.
Now this weekend, a “flotilla” of about two dozen commercial and recreational fishing vessels steamed to the wind farm on Sunday to protest offshore wind development.
The vessels, hoisting anti-offshore wind flags and blasting air horns, departed early Sunday morning from ports in New Bedford, Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, Rhode Island and along the Cape, converging at about noon on the site of the crippled Vineyard Wind turbine.
“The blade collapse was an eye-opener to a lot of people who before didn’t know that offshore wind is a disaster for the ocean,” said Shawn Machie, 54, who is captain of the New Bedford scalloper F/V Capt. John.
…The “flotilla” protest was organized by the New England Fisherman’s Stewardship Association (NEFSA). Plans kicked into gear when Dan Pronk, captain of lobster boat F/V Black Earl, was collecting turbine debris that had washed up on the shores of Nantucket. He called Machie and other New England fishermen who said they felt they had to “do something before it’s too late,” Machie said.
“We feel like our jobs are just accepted as collateral damage,” Machie said. “We are regulated for sustainability. And that makes sense. We need regulation. But offshore wind is allowed to kill fish and wreck nurseries without any manageable stopping point.”
The protesters indicate the impact on their industry will be more significant than many appreciate…because they can’t trawl on former fishing grounds.
Otto Osmers, a commercial fisherman from Martha’s Vineyard, made the journey from Menemsha at 7 am on Sunday, arriving at the Vineyard Wind site around 10:30 am. Osmers conceded that offshore wind projects like Vineyard Wind can block trawling and crab trap routes, but had other concerns about the project. “The ocean is one of the last undeveloped places on earth,” he remarked about the sight of so many large turbines peppering the horizon. “We put cables down there but it’s largely undeveloped. It’s sad to see that go away.”
Others were more passionate in their displeasure. Sue Zarba, who along with her husband John who fish recreationally, said seeing the scale of the turbines was emotional. “That was the first time I was up close to the turbines, and I was sobbing,” she said in an interview after the protest. “After you’ve seen this offshore wind farm, you cannot unsee it. Soon over one thousand acres just off the coast will be filled with turbines. We will never be able to undo this man-made environmental disaster.”
“This cannot continue because that’s where we fish,” said Zarba. “They’re developing on a tuna fishing ground. You can’t fish around turbines, you can’t trawl.” She added that her son, who attended the protest, was initially skeptical of her protesting but changed his mind once he saw the turbines.
However, their protests are being met with a deaf ear. The National Marine Fisheries Service issued a new biological opinion for flagship offshore wind project Vineyard that finds no adverse effects to endangered whales and other marine wildlife stemming from driving the array’s last 15 monopiles.
“It will have no effect on any designated critical habitat,” National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries said in a statement. “NOAA Fisheries does not anticipate serious injuries to or mortalities of any ESA-listed whale including the North Atlantic right whale.” The agency said that with mitigation measures, “all effects to North Atlantic right whales will be limited to temporary behavioral disturbance.”
Available statistics on sharks: the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority can’t tell me whether numbers are increasing or decreasing.
We used to hunt whales, but now we revere them, and numbers are on the increase.
We don’t eat turtle anymore, though we used to, and numbers are on the increase. But what about sharks?
Sharks. Well, we still hunt them and eat them. It is just not discussed that much. We are conflicted. Perhaps.
At my local beach, the same beach from which I can watch whales breach, Lammermoor Beach, has 7 drumlines; these are unmanned aquatic traps used to lure and capture large sharks using baited hooks.
My mother at Heron Island in 1951, with a dead tiger shark. Now the government catches and kills sharks out of sight on drumlines.
Drumlines are supposedly deployed near popular swimming beaches with the intention of reducing the number of sharks in the vicinity and therefore the probability of shark attack. But Lammermoor beach is not a popular swimming beach and this has more to do with the crocodiles than sharks. We go across the bay to swim, at Great Keppel Island where the water is clearer and the chance of a crocodile encounter much less.
Yet in the time I have owned a house just up the hill from Lammermoor beach, which is more than a dozen years now, the number of drumlines has increased from five to seven. There is ever more government money for drumlines, to catch and kill sharks. And this stretch of beach is within the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park.
I understand about 600 sharks are caught and killed each year, including in Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority waters, as part of the Queensland Department of Primary Industries’ shark control program. Meanwhile the authority responsible for the Great Barrier Reef, GBRMPA, has no idea whether shark numbers are increasing or decreasing – even if the average size of sharks is increasing or decreasing at the Great Barrier Reef.
Some fisherman will tell you sharks numbers are on the increase, and that they are getting bigger. Some scuba divers will tell you that shark numbers are in decline, and they are getting smaller.
How is that we don’t have any of these most basic of statistics on one of the most important megafaunas at the Great Barrier Reef?
And of course, we still eat shark.
Who will shoot, with their camera, the largest shark on the inaugural Great Barrier Reef Megafauna Expedition?
The pictures are top to bottom: the GBRMPA promoting shark week at Facebook, my mother with a tiger shark at Heron Island in 1951 when it was fashionable to kill sharks, a white tipped reef shark at Saxon Reef resting at 18 metres, and shark meat for sale at the fish mongers at Noosa Heads just recently.
When tornadoes do occur, growing population and infrastructure put more property and lives at risk, but growth-normalized tornado damage has decreased since 1950.
As regulars will be well aware, I have been reporting the decline in severe tornadoes for a long time now.
This new paper from Roy Spencer and Joe D’Aleo confirms the trend:
Key Takeaways
There has been a 50 percent reduction in strong tornadoes in the U.S. since the 1950s; weak tornado counts increased until 1990 due to better reporting.
When tornadoes do occur, growing population and infrastructure put more property and lives at risk, but growth-normalized tornado damage has decreased since 1950.
These facts do not support claims that increasing greenhouse gas emissions are causing storms to intensify. Modest warming has reduced tornado activity.
Despite a modest warming trend, the claim that climate change is causing more and stronger tornadoes in the U.S. is unsupported by the relevant trend data. Most notably, tornado frequency has elicited a decline of at least 50 percent in all but the weakest tornadoes since the inception of these statistics in 1950. Although the number of weak tornadoes increased from 1950 to 1990, this increase may be in part explained due to an expanding, weather-conscious population increasingly armed with cameras—and that increase stopped more than 30 years ago. Fluctuations in these trends do indeed occur, as can be seen in Charts 3 and 4; however, the fluctuations are largely manifestations of natural climactic cycles, such as El Niño and La Niña.
Tornadoes that once roared through mostly open fields now more frequently devastate areas that have since experienced significant population growth and urbanization. As a result, tornadoes that have struck such areas have indeed resulted in increased damages. But when these damages are normalized with respect to the growing and maturing economy, these increases disappear.
Taken together, these results refute the implication of the Fifth National Climate Assessment that severe storms are becoming more frequent and stronger and causing more damage across the United States. Indeed, the frequency and intensity of tornadoes varies over time, but not due to CO2 emissions. If anything, modest warming in the U.S. has been accompanied by a decrease in strong to violent tornado activity.
Despite all the earlier rosy promises of a flourishing green economy by the Socialist-Green government led by Olaf Scholz and Robert Habeck – and those made by the earlier Merkel CDU-led government, sentiment among German companies continues to erode badly.
Despite all the earlier rosy promises of a flourishing green economy by the Socialist-Green government led by Olaf Scholz and Robert Habeck – and those made by the earlier Merkel CDU-led government, sentiment among German companies continues to erode badly.
Germany’s online FAZ here reports that Ifo Business Climate Index fell to 85.7 points in August 2024, down from 87.4 points in the previous month. Pessimism is spreading and deepening.
That’s the lowest level sentiment in 3 years
“The current economic slump is particularly evident in the renewed decline in the Ifo business climate index, which has left many economic experts downright perplexed. One thing is certain: the economy is in a serious crisis,” reports Blackout News. And: “no one can say exactly how far the German economy will fall.”
High energy prices, hostile business environment
The current socialist-green government has botched things so much, and now has no idea how to proceed further.
“The challenges are complex and a rapid improvement is not in sight,” comments Blackout News further. “In summary, it is clear that the German economy is currently in a serious crisis.”
Many factors are contributing to the pessimistic business sentiment. Foremost are the high energy costs, which are among the highest energy costs in the world – thanks to Germany’s botched attempt to move to green energies.
War and terrorism weighing down
Also the country’s massive regulation is hostile to free enterprise. Add to this the escalating Ukraine war, which is weighing down further on sentiment.
Another depressing factor: Germany’s uncontrolled flood of refugees from countries plagued by terrorism and war, all of which has led to rapidly rising violent crimes like the one recently witnessed in Solingen. Citizens fear for their safety, and have lost trust in the government’s ability and willingness to protect them.
Not only business sentiment is plummeting, but so is confidence in the government. Unfortunately, real change will remain elusive for the foreseeable future.
Germany is mired in pessimism and fear, with little hope in sight.
“Barrier islands are a coastal landform, a type of dune system and sand island, where an area of sand has been formed by wave and tidal action parallel to the mainland coast. They usually occur in chains, consisting of anything from a few islands to more than a dozen. They are subject to change during storms and other action, but absorb energy and protect the coastlines and create areas of protected waters where wetlands may flourish. A barrier chain may extend for hundreds of kilometers, with islands periodically separated by tidal inlets.”
On the U.S. Atlantic Coast and the Gulf Coast, we find Barrier Islands:
“Barrier islands are a coastal landform, a type of dune system and sand island, where an area of sand has been formed by wave and tidal action parallel to the mainland coast. They usually occur in chains, consisting of anything from a few islands to more than a dozen. They are subject to change during storms and other action, but absorb energy and protect the coastlines and create areas of protected waters where wetlands may flourish. A barrier chain may extend for hundreds of kilometers, with islands periodically separated by tidal inlets.”
There are several important things to know about barrier islands:
1) There are made of sand. Often on the ocean side they have sandy beaches and sand dunes, behind which are flatter areas of sand leading to the semi-enclosed lagoon.
3) They are subject to change – by the very same forces that created them: waves, currents, and storms.
Barrier islands, when left to their own devices, make wonderful places to visit – by car if there are roads and by boat when there are no roads.
They seem so nice, in fact, that beach loving humans have even building entire cities on them for more than a century.
Now, a reasonable person might think that building a city on a low-lying spit of sand at the ocean’s edge is a rather foolish thing to do. After all, barrier islands are by definition “subject to change”. That is, the sand both washes onto the barrier island and washes away from the barrier island. The wind and waves remove parts of barrier islands and move them elsewhere. Whole islands can move along the shore in what is known as longshore drift.
The USGS’s Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center has a very well-done illustrative series of satellite images showing the changes of the barrier islands off of Chatham, Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Check the link and click through the images in time order. Then imagine, instead of bare sandy beaches, the island had been covered, like so many others are, with homes and businesses.
The island, as its name implies, is a barrier between two bodies of water – the ocean/sea and an enclosed (semi-enclosed) body of water. The backshore (facing the continent) semi-enclosed bodies of water have many different names such as “bay”, “river” (incorrectly), “sound” and “lagoon”. Not all barrier islands are strictly islands, are not entirely surrounded by water, some have minor connections to the main body of land and a larger number have been connect to the main shore with causeways and bridges.
Sea level, slowly and steadily rising in most parts of the world at the present time, is not a major concern for barrier islands. This is true despite the clamor of alarm from the climate crisis crowd. The tiny annual rise of the sea’s surface, measured in single digit millimeters, goes entirely unnoticed by the dynamical system that creates and destroys barrier islands.
Remember: “They [barrier islands] are subject to change during storms and other action, but absorb energy and protect the coastlines and create areas of protected waters where wetlands may flourish.” [ source ]
Barrier islands do not protect the coastlines on purpose – nor do they create wetlands. The protection is a byproduct of the dynamics of the energy of ocean waves, tides, and storms (increased energy) that builds the barrier island. Wetlands develop on the backshore of the islands and on the shoreline behind barrier islands as the sediment from the land builds up along the shore and is no longer washed out to sea by waves and strong tides – both prevented by the existence of the barrier island.
But the same forces that build barrier islands also alter and destroy them – one piece at a time.
The greatest U.S. disaster involving a barrier island was the Galveston Hurricane of 1900. “Galveston [Texas] is built on a low, flat island, little more than a large sandbar along the Gulf Coast. …. development activities on the island actively increased its vulnerability to storms. Sand dunes along the shore were cut down to fill low areas in the city, removing what little barrier there was to the Gulf of Mexico.” [ source ] Over eight thousand lives were lost (6,000-12,000) and the city was nearly totally destroyed. Galveston, Texas did not learn its lesson, as evidence by the Google maps satellite view here. Before that, the Texas city of Indianola was destroyed by a hurricane in 1875, rebuilt, and then destroyed again by a hurricane in 1886. It is a ghost town today.
Ocean City, Maryland is said to have benefited from a massive storm in 1933:
“However, the most historically significant change in the storm-ravaged resort was the existence of a new 50-foot wide, eight-foot deep Inlet at the south end of town. The huge waves that pounded the east side of the resort combined with the massive amount of water that built up in the back bays conspired to cut the Inlet and separate the southern end of the town from what is now Assateague Island.” [ source ]
A number of homes and business were swept out to sea an the new inlet caused the loss of continuous access to the southern portion of the island creating what is today called Assateague Island. The good news was that the new inlet allowed the fishing community, on which the area depended for income, to get their fishing boats from the bay to the ocean and return. Before the storm, fishermen were forced to drag their boats with teams of horses from the oceanfront beach across the island to the bay.
The cutoff southern portion of the island is now the famous Assateague Island National Seashore, with fabulous beaches and roaming herds of wild horses.
Now, consider the consequences of such a natural event if it was to occur today at a slightly different portion of what is Ocean City:
“Barrier islands like Fire Island are known as early successional habitats [pdf], which means they require regular disturbance events to keep their ecosystems in check. Under normal circumstances, Fire Island would experience disturbance events on an annual basis. However, engineers have gone to great lengths to stabilize the island, and now only powerful storms like Sandy are able to have a significant impact on the island’s ecosystem.”
“Barrier islands are very dynamic systems, they don’t stay the same from one year to the next. The species that inhabit them there are adapted to these changes, so if we try to keep these systems static, we are going to lose these species,” said Dr. Cohen [assistant professor at SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry ].“
The major threat to all of these cities built on low-lying barrier islands is storms with high winds and strong waves. These forces wash away sand dunes, lowering the overall height of the island, and drive water through low elevation areas, often all the way across an island forming a cut. Sometimes the water comes from the bay side of a barrier island, as a storm blows more and more water into the bay, the lagoon, on the shoreside of the island. The excess water then seeks out a path back to the sea. When it finds a downhill path to the sea, it runs through it, cutting away the sand, the land, faster and faster as the water flows through. This is what happened at Ocean City, MD in 1933, which is clearly visible in the photo of the new inlet (far above). The same occurred at Fire Island, NY.
Not all long thin islands off the Eastern Seaboard are, strictly speaking, sand-based barrier islands. Some, such as Miami Beach, are remnant limestone/coral reef systems subsequently covered with sand. These types of islands will suffer from waves and wind and surface erosion, but are unlikely to have new inlets created.
Almost all mass media outlets focus primarily on sea level rise when covering threats to barrier islands, with storms (hurricanes) secondary. This is, of course, a misleading picture. Sea level rise is a slow minor issue.
Storms, with their energetic wind and waves, push almost unbelievable amounts of water at high energy against the shore – whatever is there has to deal with all that mass moving at speed hitting those stationary objects.
That water moves sand, soil, building, trees—whatever is there. That water builds up in bays and lagoons and seeks release to a lower elevation – and it is this that cuts barrier islands, forming new inlets. And it is then, when water is rushing into or out of a bay, that major geomorphic changes occur. One island becomes two, a long island is shortened, a short island is made longer, an entire island moves hundreds of yards up or down the coast or its end becomes a hook. The human developments on those islands are of little consequence, unable to mitigate or resist the tremendous forces being applied.
Building permanent structures or infrastructure on impermanent, or ephemeral, barrier islands is a serious societal error. These islands should all be allowed to revert to their more natural states, used as beaches and National Seashores. Rebuilding after storms should be forbidden.
# # # # #
Author’s Comment:
This has all been said before. The lessons of Galveston, Ocean City and Indianola (Texas) have been ignored and cities built on the “here today, gone tomorrow” barrier islands of the U.S.’s Atlantic and Gulf Coasts.
Historically, we are almost at the height of the Atlantic Hurricane Season, which statistically is the second week of September.
As I showed in a recent essay on Atlantic hurricanes, it is only a matter of time before a hurricane barrels ashore on one of our barrier islands covered with condominiums, homes, highways and businesses. Hurricane strength and path, direction and speed of winds and state of the tide at landfall will determine the extent of the disaster.
Perhaps Greta Thunberg could be put in charge of the Bank of England. Caroline Lucas could be appointed to oversee the Treasury. A couple of activists from Just Stop Oil could be let out of jail to run the Department of Business and Trade, while some from Extinction Rebellion could take over at the Office for Budget Responsibility. The Telegraph has the story.
No one voted for anti-growth, anti-capitalist green groups to use lawfare to control our economic fate
Perhaps Greta Thunberg could be put in charge of the Bank of England. Caroline Lucas could be appointed to oversee the Treasury. A couple of activists from Just Stop Oil could be let out of jail to run the Department of Business and Trade, while some from Extinction Rebellion could take over at the Office for Budget Responsibility. The Telegraph has the story.
It may sound like a parody. And yet, Ed Miliband, the Energy Security and Net Zero Secretary, has just effectively given Greenpeace control over elements of our energy policy. And we are well on the way to handing anti-growth, far-Left eco-activists far too much influence over our economic fate.
The trouble is, no one voted for that. And even worse, it will end up impoverishing us all.
The North Sea had already become a hostile legal and regulatory environment for anyone still brave enough to try and make a living from exploring for oil and gas and delivering it to British homes and businesses, to keep the lights switched on and the heating running through the winter.
They already face bans on expanding their business, and punitive windfall taxes in the event that they ever manage to make a profit. Many of them have quite sensibly already decided enough is enough and pulled out, preferring to put their money to work somewhere else or simply to do nothing instead.
And yet, they face full-scale lawfare as well.
Miliband decided that his department would not fight a climate lawsuit challenging licences granted to the Rosebank and Jackdaw oil and gas fields, two of the largest potential developments left in the region. He argues that it would save the taxpayer money.
It will no longer contest the challenges brought against them by Greenpeace, and its fellow climate campaign group, Uplift. And while it will be up to the courts to make the final decision, the licences look as good as finished. The slow death of the North Sea has now taken another decisive step forwards.
This is crazy. There are three big flaws with this decision.
To start with, when did Miliband’s department last display any interest in saving taxpayer money? GB Energy, the new, £8.3bn, state-owned company has been on a hiring spree. But no one yet seems to have a clear idea what it will actually do.
If Miliband is suddenly so worried about how taxpayer money is being spent, then perhaps he should start there – instead of pinching a few pennies on the legal fees for contesting this legal action.
After all, at least Rosebank and Jackdaw would, if allowed to go ahead, definitely generate some actual energy. This is more than can be said for the Government’s odd investment vehicle.
Next, the door has been opened for green activists to use lawfare to control our economic fate. With this decision, any green pressure group may be tempted to launch a judicial review. And if the Government won’t oppose it, then they have a veto.
In July, the U.S. Department of Interior greenlighted large offshore wind farms in New Jersey and Maryland. Once the financial agreements are in place, New Jersey’s Atlantic Shores and Maryland’s MarWin and Momentum will join the two large wind farms in New York approved in June. These projects will receive huge, multibillion-dollar subsidies from the federal government and electricity ratepayers. What benefits will New Jersey and Maryland enjoy from this flood of money?
In July, the U.S. Department of Interior greenlighted large offshore wind farms in New Jersey and Maryland. Once the financial agreements are in place, New Jersey’s Atlantic Shores and Maryland’s MarWin and Momentum will join the two large wind farms in New York approved in June. These projects will receive huge, multibillion-dollar subsidies from the federal government and electricity ratepayers. What benefits will New Jersey and Maryland enjoy from this flood of money?
To answer this question, it is best to recall the classic warning of the Trojan Horse legend, “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts”—in other words, the hidden dangers of accepting something that seems too good to be true. New York State ignored that warning when it agreed to pay very high prices for the electricity to be supplied from its new offshore wind farms—Empire Wind 1 and Sunrise Wind—located off the coast of Long Island.
In announcing the final agreements, New York Governor Kathy Hochul triumphantly claimed that the new projects would create more than 800 jobs during the construction phase and deliver more than $6 billion in economic benefits for the state over 25 years.
Rather less emphasis was given to the fact that New York will pay an average price of over $150 per MWh (megawatt hour) for the electricity generated by Empire Wind 1 and Sunrise Wind.That’s more than fourtimes the average wholesale price of electricity in New York during 2023–24, $36 per MWh. The total annual premium over the wholesale market price for the power from these wind farms will be about $520 million per year at 2024 prices. Over 25 years, New York ratepayers will be paying about $13 billion for alleged benefits of $6 billion.
That is not all. Thanks to tax credits, U.S. taxpayers will cover at least 40% of the costs of constructing the wind farms. At a minimum cost of $5.5 million per MW (million watts) of capacity, the total federal subsidy for New York’s two wind farms will be at least $3.8 billion.
What about jobs and other economic benefits? A study prepared for Equinor, the owner of Empire Wind 1, and submitted to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) claimed that it would directly generate 180 annual jobs in New York during the six-year construction phase. The study estimated another 60 annual jobs due to the indirect employment effect, i.e., extra employment in the supply chain for the project.
A more reasonable estimate for the two projects together would be 515 annual jobs, not 800. The total contribution to New York State’s gross value added (the equivalent of GDP at the state level) during the construction of both projects would be less than $450 million, based on the report submitted to BOEM. Similar calculations for annual operating and maintenance (O&M) costs suggest an annual contribution of about $24 million to gross value-added or about $600 million over 25 years.
Rather than the benefits of $6 billion over 25 years touted by Governor Hochul, a realistic assessment would be closer to $1.1 billion at 2024 prices. In any event, residents will be paying a cumulative premium of $13 billion for the electricity these projects will generate.
Moreover, the additional jobs claimed for the project are concentrated heavily in the final year of construction—and the largest share (47%) consists of professional services. Overwhelmingly, these are jobs for people who would otherwise be working on other assignments.
The economic benefits of the two offshore wind farms are much lower than claimed by the governor and the jobs are, in large part, temporary assignments for professional services staff. Promoting business for consulting firms may be considered a desirable outcome by Ms. Hochul. Still, the very high financial burden will be borne by almost the entire population of the state.
Stepping back from the New York projects, the Biden administration’s overall goal is to reach a target of 30 GW (billion watts) of offshore electricity generation capacity by 2030 or shortly thereafter. That is equivalent to 17 times the capacity of the combined Empire Wind 1 and Sunrise Wind projects. Detailed costs and financial arrangements vary, but the figures above suggest that the recurring premium paid by electricity ratepayers in states with offshore wind farms will be about $9 billion per year. The benefits of new job creation and incomes from capital and O&M expenditures are likely to be less than $800 million per year.
In addition to the very large subsidies paid for from ultra-high electricity bills, federal taxpayers will contribute about $65 billion via tax credits if the Biden administration’s offshore wind target is met. While the subsidies for individual projects may not seem outrageous, the commitment of money to subsidize offshore generation is about $870 for every member of the country’s population. This may be spread over 25 years, but it is a huge liability for one very small element of U.S. programs to support renewable energy.
You must be logged in to post a comment.