I’m absolutely delighted, tickled pink even to read this post on slashdot: The Power Grid Can’t Handle Wind Farms

But I’m even happier to read the New York Times Article it links to!

Okay, I’ll admit that the article paints a far more rosey picture of wind power than things really are. The article does describe the power grid issues it also seems to suggest that some of them could be at least partially solved by improving the electric grid. On this I think it might be a little too optimistic. The fact is that no electric grid, no matter how advanced can ever deliver more power than is being generated unless it has massive storage capacity, and storage of utility scale energy is always extremely lossy and generally extremely expensive.

Really, what we’re dealing with here is far more than a grid that is unsuited to deliver wind energy but rather an energy source that is inherently extremely difficult to manage and utilize. The article states:

“We need an interstate transmission superhighway system,” said Suedeen G. Kelly, a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

No. What we really need is that plus millions and millions of tons of sodium-sulfur batteries, about ten times the pumped hydro storage we have, at least four times as much wind nameplate capacity as we actually plan on drawing, a few thousand enormous flywheels, a grid management system that would make NORAD look like a joke, power lines made out of silver and a little magic too.

I shouldn’t complain though. I’m glad to see that wind energy is finally getting some of the criticism it deserves in the mainstream media. Just like biofuels started getting called on its various empty claims a couple of months ago, the wind is shifting on wind power (pun intended). It had to happen though. Something like wind power can only get away with misleading the public before eventually someone starts to notice that despite the enormous expenditure and the turbines spinning all over the countryside, there is no apparent benefit in terms of electric rates or fossil fuel consumption.

The honeymoon is over. The jig is up. The scam is being exposed and it’s finally getting some attention. Lets hope this trend continues.

Solar thermal: You’re next.

Here’s a scan of an advertisement in Australia which I clipped from Rod Adam’s excellent site “Atomic Insights.” Rod calls it the “smoking gun” of the real motive behind much of the anti-nuclear movement. Well, I think he’s right in a sense, but I’d consider it to be just as much a whiny confession.

Believe it or not this is an actual advertisement being circulated in Australia by the coal industry. The message is pretty straight forward, actually I’m even a bit surprised they’d just come out and say it: Nuclear energy is bad and must be stopped because it will endanger the coal industry. The thing I especially like about this is that it singles out nuclear as a threat to coal. Wind? Solar? Oh those are no threat. Build as many wind turbines as you want. Build solar plants. That has no affect on the job security of coal miners.

Also, it apparently is becoming harder and harder to lie about the facts regarding nuclear power’s economics or safety. So what’s left? Just try to cry for sympathy and be a little more honest, stating that the real reason is that the opposition has a vested interest in a competing and inferior power generation method, I guess.

A little reality check:

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I happened to be flipping through the channels when I saw our friend Dr. Michael Shermer, on a program about vampires. Apparently there are people who claim that they are, indeed, real life vampires.

Peak Oil Crisis - Prepare to Survive!
The Long Emergency
Peak Oil And The Coming Collapse: Five Rules For Survival
Preparing for the End of the Oil Age
You can Survive Peak Oil
Life After the Oil Crash
Peak Oil Anarchy!
In the Wake - Surviving Past the End of Our Civilization
“Shock in the USA: America Becomes Third-World Country Overnight”
Survive the Post-Petro World: List of Survival Suppliers
The Decline Of American Civilization and The Age After Oil

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“an industrialised farming system will continue to fail people and the environment around the world”.

- Mike Childs, Campaign Director for Friends of the Earth, speaking of the use of genetically modified crops and modern farming techniques in Africa.

My god, the nerve of this guy! Sitting in the EU with food of plenty and enjoying the finest at whatever ‘organic’ boutique he shops at! “industrialized farming” failing people? Ahem, sir, take a look around you. Here in the “industrialized” world we farm with “industrial” methods like fertilizers, tractors, irrigation, pest control and centralized farming and let me ask, when was the last time you went hungry? I mean really hungry, not just missed your lunch hungry but so hungry you weren’t sure that you’d even live more than a few more days.

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My first response upon reading this article is “Why the hell do they get them to begin with?” But apparently Greenpeace is funded, at least partially, through the Dutch government, who see no problem with not just tolerating groups like Greenpeace, but actually putting them on the public payroll!

But apparently, the ecoscum over at Greenpeace and FOE are finally pushing things a bit too far and may very well get their direct government funding cut.

Dutch Environment Minister Jacqueline Cramer says she may curb the supply of government subsidies to environmental organizations. She told the press on Saturday that she may even cut them off altogether.

Ms Cramer was responding to continuing harsh criticism of a number of environmentalist groups. One of them, Friends of the Earth Netherlands, has been attacked for its “dogmatic” and “undemocratic” campaign against illegal logging.

The campaign prompted the senior party in the ruling three-way coalition government, the Christian Democrats, to urge Minister Cramer to reconsider government support for environmental organizations.

Dogmatic? Undemocratic? Gee… YA THINK?

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Yep, armed robbery at a psychic shop. Woman shot in the face. I’m not entirely sure if the woman was the self-proclaimed psychic or not, but if she was, well then… much as I respect the rule of law, I still find it hard to pass any negative judgment on the gunman.

I wonder if the response was something like “Ah… So this explains why the Tarot Cards were indicating “A time of change with new challenges.” It’s just amazing how accurate those things are! Oh and my horoscope said “Travel is in your future” that’s amazing! I traveled to the hospital just after reading that horoscope!”

CHARLESTON, SC (WCSC) - One person is shot inside a West Ashley psychic shop, and the gunman is on the loose.

A Charleston County Sheriff’s Office spokesman says 46-year-old Kathy Parrish was shot inside the European Psychic on Sam Rittenberg Boulevard Saturday at about 8:40 p.m.

Right now Parrish is at the hospital. Officers say she was shot in the head more than once, but she is in stable condition. Detectives are waiting to ask her some questions to find out exactly what happened.

Officers say Parrish was the victim of an armed robbery at the West Ashley business. The sheriff’s spokesman says whoever did this stole her car, a 2000, 4-door white and cream colored Audi, with the South Carolina license plate 518-WSU. They are asking people to be on the lookout.

Source…

Video from local news Here

One of the most pervasive arguments of the conspiracy nuttballs who believe that the attacks of 9/11 were all part of the black-helicopter/Free Masonry/Major League Baseball/New World Order conspiracy to take over the world has been the collapse of World Trade Center building 7, which occurred hours after the first two towers fell.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology has released their final report on the collapse which concludes that it was primarily due to fire.   It should be noted that the fire at WTC7 was unique amongst structure fires in that it was basically allowed to burn without any major attempts to extinguish the fire or cool the structure.   After the collapse of WTC 1 and 2, fire was seen on numerous floors of WTC7.  The tower’s sprinkler system had been disabled by damage from the attacks and due to water main failures.  Firefighters were able to briefly enter the tower and search for survivors, but it was concluded that all had escaped successfully.

At the time it was impossible to mount a fire fighting effort because of lack of pressure from water main breaks and due to the fact that the fire department was still trying to locate any potential survivors in the rubble of the first two towers, to attend to the injuries of those who were hit by falling debris and to reorganize after many fire fighters and police officers had been killed in the collapse.   Therefore, the fire burned unchecked.  When the tower began to bulge the area was evacuated.

The report adds some details but otherwise is mostly just a confirmation of what we knew, that it was primarily fire that caused the collapse.   No doubt this will not stop conspiracy theories from continuing, unfortunately.   If this is not enough to dispel the “Show me one other sky scraper that collapsed from a fire” my response would be “Show me a large ocean liner that sank after striking an iceberg.. other than the Titanic.”

Just an interesting comparison of some photographs I’ve collected. These show the steam turbines at nuclear power plants and coal-fired power plants. The turbines at both nuclear and coal fired plants do the same thing - convert steam into mechanical energy to spin a shaft connected to a generator. Nuclear plants often use a higher pressure primary turbine than most coal power plants (although some coal fired units use a similar setup) but otherwise the systems are identical.

That being said, I wonder if anyone notices a general difference between the two, and I will be the first to admit that this is hardly a scientific comparison. Actually this is completely unscientific (sorry), and this alone is not enough to draw any conclusions, but still it provides a visually dramatic example of the difference.

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Congratulations to commenter “Ross” who is the first and only commenter to be completely blocked and defined as spam by IP address and email address.   We’ll see if the little bastard tries to comment some more via a proxy or something and if so I may have to go even further.

It’s not the fact that he was being a complete idiot in general or that he seemed to be unable to deal with the fact that he was asked to search this site for the information which he demanded proof for or even the fact that he quoted Helen Caldicott as a  definitive source of nuclear information.   The little assclown decided he wanted to post a long and completely irrelevant passage about how nuclear energy is the devil because the nuclear energy companies (GASP) would dare lobby or have a PR operation.   When this passage was moderated automatically (which happens for comments over a certain length or containing more than two links) the assclown had a little fit and started posting it on every article on this page he could find, including those which have nothing to do with nuclear energy or wind power.

Oh sure, he could have looked at the FAQ’s or he could have just calmed down a bit.

We value freedom of speech here and thus I’ve never banned anyone before because discourse and debate is encouraged.   This kind of spamming is unacceptable.