New Solar Power Record in California 2 Sept 2016

Yet another record for grid-scale solar power production yesterday in California. 

photo courtesy of NREL
(click to enlarge)

Per records from CAISO, grid-scale solar power produced 8,442 MW at 13:00 hours, and 8,447 MW at 14:00 hours.

The breakdown for 13:00 hours was as follows:

PV .......... 7,742 MW 
Thermal ....  702

And at 14:00 hours

PV .......... 7,740 MW 

Thermal ....  707

see link to CAISO data for 2 September, 2016.


Roger E. Sowell, Esq.
Marina del Rey, California

copyright (c) 2016 by Roger Sowell - all rights reserved 

Free Speech and Opus 400 - A Look Back at SLB

Subtitle: Reflections on 400 Articles and Free Speech

Sowell exercising Free Speech right
at Tulane Law School in New Orleans, Louisiana, in 2011
I lectured on US Energy Policy and Peak Oil.

This article is number 400.  That is not much in the internet world, where some blogs publish for quantity and strive for readership and high volume of comments.   Four hundred in 8 years is just an average of 50 articles per year, approximately one per week.  

Still, I have fun writing SLB and reading the comments.  Readership has grown over the years and now averages approximately 3,000 views per month.   The pace of articles has also increased, with a recent average of 2 per week. 

The topics on SLB continue with global warming (the science is so bad there is zero cause for alarm), nuclear power generation (costs are far too high and safety is horrible), legal aspects of science and technology, space exploration (Mars colony is a death trap), fresh water (we have plenty, sometimes too much, in the wrong places), California policy stupidity (far too many to list), electric power issues and grid changes, renewable power sources (wind and solar are already cheaper than conventional), new technologies that enable grid improvements (grid-scale battery storage), and some others.  

A topic of considerable interest to me is the legality of suppressing speech from climate skeptics such as myself.  A popular topic is #ExxonKnew, which is shorthand for ExxonMobil failed to warn their millions of customers that their oil-based products could or would create dangerous global warming, even though they had research that showed the possible danger.  An extension of this is an effort to criminalize speech that criticizes the global warming belief, and to put in jail those who dare to speak out against the science behind global warming. 

This will be the topic of an in-depth article here on SLB, in which I argue that the US Constitution's First Amendment protects such dissenting speech under the Free Speech clause.  There are ample cases to support the free expression of dissenting views on matters of public concern, many from the US Supreme Court.   Recognizing that some forms of speech have been made illegal, such as defamation, clear and present danger, and false advertising, climate skeptics who speak out without violating those forms of speech are making a protected form of speech.  

A private citizen who writes or speaks verbally, or makes an act that is considered a form of speech (carrying a sign with a slogan), all to express his or her views on the subject of global warming science and policies, is protected under the Free Speech clause.  

Wishing all a happy holiday weekend, for here in the USA it is Labor Day weekend. 

Roger E. Sowell, Esq.
Marina del Rey, California
copyright (c) 2016 by Roger Sowell - all rights reserved 

Idiotic Claims About Carbon Capture Plant - CCS

Subtitle:  Arrogant Know-It-All Claims An Actual Operating Plant Cannot Work

A truly astonishing series of exchanges occurred over the past few days on Dr. Judith Curry’s blog, Climate Etc. that prompts me to chronicle these comments here. see link   Also, I include some more in-depth discussion.   The sheer ignorance (I hesitate to use that word, but in this case it certainly fits) of the commenters about such an important issue is well, staggering.  One commenter in particular, Rud Istvan, a Harvard-trained economist, was particularly snide and obnoxious when I pointed out the errors in his claims that carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) cannot work without nuclear power as the electricity source. 

The general topic is CCS, one of the chief aims of the man-made global warming camp.   CCS is a technology that captures carbon dioxide (CO2) either from a man-made source before it enters the atmosphere, or directly from the atmosphere.   The sequestration can take many forms, including injecting CO2 as a gas or liquid into subterranean rock formations, and chemical conversion of CO2 into other, solid substances such as sodium bicarbonate.   The warmist-alarmists' basic (and mistaken) belief is that CO2 build-up in the atmosphere is causing, and will cause in the future, catastrophic consequences around the world including polar ice melting, glaciers melting, sealevel rise and shore inundation, heat waves, droughts, floods, and a host of other disasters.   It’s pretty scary stuff, except that none of it is true.

Regarding CCS, I should note here that chemical engineers have been capturing CO2 and removing it from gas streams for many decades.  The problem is not new, in fact, an amine-based process has been perfected and optimized over many years.  An example is natural gas plants, which remove impurities from raw natural gas received from wells, and have CO2 removal as but one of many steps in the purification process.   The CCS proponents don’t like the amine-based CO2 removal process that is used in natural gas plants because of its relatively high energy consumption.  CCS technologies with lower energy consumption is one of their goals.   With that as background, on to the ignorance and snide-ness. 

Dr. Curry’s blog article for August 30, 2016 leads with: “The economic models that are used to inform climate policy currently contain an unhealthy dose of wishful thinking. Technologies that remove carbon dioxide from the air are assumed in the models that avoid dangerous climate change – but such technologies do not yet exist and it is unclear whether they could be deployed at a meaningful scale.  – Tim Kruger”   (Mr. Kruger is Programme Manager, Oxford Geoengineering Programme, University of Oxford)  (emphasis added) 

And, a bit farther down in the article,  Mr. Kruger again:  “Technically, there are serious doubts about the ability to sequester the vast quantities of carbon dioxide that are implied in the models.”  (emphasis added)

Knowing those statements to be false, I took keyboard under fingers and joined the conversation.  My first comment was as follows:

“Seems somebody missed a memo re CCS.  Not only is carbon capture possible on commercial scale, it has been operating for more than one year in San Antonio, Texas. It is not (pure) CCS, but carbon capture and mineralization.”  I added a weblink to a recent article from a San Antonio newspaper on the success of the Skyonic company’s SkyMine® plant that captures CO2 from the flue gas created in a cement plant.  (note, the word “pure” was added here for clarity) 

Then, Rud Istvan responded with a dismissive story about a high school chemistry experiment in which one places Drano in a bottle of soda water to absorb the CO2.  He then wrote as follows:

“NaOH is made by electrolysis of salt water. NaOH and Chlorine are two of the highest volume basic chemicals made industrially. Guess what. The electricity needed to make the precursor NaOH when produced by fossil fuels almost exactly produces what Sky Mines (company is Skyonics) sequesters. Actually, a bit more due to thermodynamic losses. So only way this works is if the NaOH electrolysis electricity comes from nuclear. But then just build nuclear and be done with it. . . . all the stoichiometry and chemical energy equations, with footnotes for those that did not pass high school chemistry but still willing to learn.

Your lovely picture is a consequence of $26 million of utterly ignorant DoE grantsmanship. Total waste of ‘climate’dollars. Skyonics claimed it was economic because they would use cheap off peak electricity to make NaOH. Yes, but that does not solve the basic chemistry problem their foolish scheme cannot surmount.”   – RIstvan.   (emphasis added)

“RS, (meaning me) you have yet to post any chemical engineering that might refute my post. You cannot, because it is irrefutable. You appeal to authority, I appeal to the fundamental laws of physical chemistry. I agree you can make the chemistry work; said so above. I disagree that it can net sequester CO2 absent nuclear electricity. Also said so above.”  -- Ristvan

I then posted a few comments that describe the SkyMine® plant in general terms, and that the President and CEO, Joe Jones was issued a US patent for the process, but RIstvan apparently doesn’t read these comments or doesn’t understand them.  ( He also ranted a bit about disproving patents himself, and (presumably) that makes Skyonic's patent invalid.  That's plain nuts, as the Skyonic patent covers basic chemistry and chemical engineering; I should know, having read it and verified it myself.) 

RIstvan still hasn’t learned anything, so he posts the next howler: “Skyonics issued patent does not repeal the physical CO2 chemistry you have yet to refute. I provided the high school chem experiment proving the chemistry works. The simple chemE problem is CO2 net sequestration in the absence of nuclear electricity producing Drano. . . .  You really need to learn more physics and physical chemistry before opining here against my research. You only display both your ignorance and your biases. ”  (note, Ristvan wrote the name wrongly, Skyonics is incorrect, Skyonic is correct.   I left his wording as is). 

Then, a bit later in the comments, I posted a link to a Skyonic-produced document for the Department of Energy that has great details about the plant’s design and energy consumption.  I added a brief summary for those who would not or could not follow the chemistry and engineering language.  see link to Skyonic report to DoE. 

DISCUSSION

Where to begin?  There is so much wrong with Ristvan’s comments it is simply staggering.  First, let’s start with Drano.   Ristvan apparently does not know that Drano is not pure NaOH, sodium hydroxide.  A material safety data sheet from S.C. Johnson, its manufacturer, shows the chemical components are NaOH, sodium nitrate, sodium chloride, and aluminum.  But, he is an economist, not a chemical engineer. 

Next, Ristvan claims three very wrong things: 

1) CCS cannot work absent nuclear-based electricity to produce the “Drano,”  

2) (CCS has) a “basic chemistry problem their (Skyonic’s)  foolish scheme cannot surmount,”  and 

3) “You really need to learn more physics and physical chemistry before opining here against my research. You only display both your ignorance and your biases.”  There was a similar dig, saying “RS (meaning me), you are apparently not very versed in high school level physical chemistry.”

Each point is addressed in turn below. 

CCS Cannot Work Absent Nuclear-Based Electricity

One must understand that traditional CCS uses quite a bit of electricity, not only in the production of NaOH, but also in the pumps and blowers in the carbon capturing process, then to compress the CO2 into pipelines, and finally more compression to inject the CO2 deep into underground rock formations.   The compressors are driven by electric motors.  
One must next understand that it is indeed a losing proposition if one uses CCS to capture CO2 from a high-efficiency power plant that burns natural gas, while creating the electricity to run the CCS in a low-efficiency coal-burning power plant.   Perhaps this is what Ristvan had in mind.   However, the CCS plant would likely take power from the local grid and be powered with whatever mix of power generation the grid happens to have. 
  
However, it is a winning proposition to collect CO2 in a CCS process from a low-efficiency coal-powered plant, and use electricity from a high-efficiency gas-fired power plant.   Coal-burning produces two to three times the CO2 of a natural gas powered plant.   There is no need to use nuclear power at all.    It is even better to use power from a grid that has renewable power on it, such as wind power and solar power. 

So, it can be seen that Ristvan’s first assertion is completely false.

A Basic Chemistry Problem 

It’s not entirely clear what Ristvan is referring to as a “basic chemistry problem” with the Skyonic-patented CO2 mineralization process.   There is no dispute over the basic chemistry, as it is well-known that NaOH will react with CO2, ultimately to form NaHCO3, however, there is an intermediate reaction to Na2CO3 and water.   Whether Ristvan knows this, is very much in doubt.  

There is no basic chemistry problem.  There is, though, a matter of properly labeling the chemistry.  Ristvan insists that this is physical chemistry, when the correct term is inorganic chemistry.   But as an economist (he also claims a JD and MBA, and is quick to state that all degrees are from Harvard), perhaps he can be forgiven for his ignorance of chemistry. 
What do exist are a few very beneficial modifications by the SkyMine® inventor, Joe Jones (who by the way is also a chemical engineer, and happens to be a graduate of my alma mater, The University of Texas at Austin).   

The modifications Joe discovered include (but are not limited to): 1) operating the electrolysis process at optimal conditions for NaOH production, 2) using cement plant waste heat to provide heat to the electrolyser so it performs at the required temperature, and 3) no external energy required to evaporate the aqueous NaOH to market grade, which is at minimum 50 percent by weight NaOH. 

These give the SkyMine® process an energy advantage over conventional chlor-alkali plants that otherwise produce the NaOH that could be purchased and used.  Skyonic chose to build the electrolysis plant onsite, and take advantage of the several benefits listed just above, while conceding some capital costs due to lack of economy of scale. 

It can be seen, then, that there is no basic chemistry problem. However, there are several ingenious (and patentable) improvements over the conventional chlor-alkali process. 

Sowell’s Need to Learn More Physics and Physical Chemistry

I repeat here Ristvan’s comment: “You (Sowell) really need to learn more physics and physical chemistry before opining here against my (Ristvan) research. You only display both your ignorance and your biases.”  There was a similar dig, saying “RS (meaning me), you are apparently not very versed in high school level physical chemistry.”

This one is truly a gem.  

Having known about and followed the Skyonic company, their patented process, and the San Antonio plant design, construction, startup, and operation for several years, I know the plant is based on sound engineering.   I was somewhat surprised that Ristvan took such a tone as shown above.  Clearly, there is no chemistry problem, and no economics problem either.   The CO2 balance is negative when running a SkyMine® plant, on the order of 30 percent less CO2 on a net basis.  In other words, for every 100 tonnes of CO2 removed from the atmosphere, the SkyMine® process cradle-to-grave analysis adds back only 70 tonnes.  A net reduction of 30 tonnes occurs. 
  
The one with ignorance on display is not Sowell, but Rud Istvan.   (As my readers and friends know quite well, I hold a BS in chemical engineering and have more than 40 years of experience as an engineer in many countries world-wide; I also have university class education in nuclear chemistry and plant design and economics).   I also started my career in chlor-alkali plants in 1975.   We ran a CO2 absorbtion process using dilute NaOH to create our own sodium bicarbonate for in-house use in the plant.   Chlor-alkali plants have done the same for decades, around the world.   It is more than a bit amusing to read the rantings of Ristvan, an economist, on these issues.  

What is also not obvious to Ristvan, apparently, is that producing the sodium bicarbonate in a SkyMine® plant, then selling the bicarbonate in the commodities market, ultimately keeps some other plants’ raw material in the ground.   The sales from SkyMine® plants also reduces production from the liquid Solvay process that consumes NaOH.   Both of these market adjustments result in less energy consumed and less CO2 produced.  The mining process typically burns coal in the bicarbonate production, so the energy reduction there is much greater.  

Conclusion

All in all, it was a very entertaining few days in commenting on Dr. Curry’s blog post.   It is a bit dismaying to see articles published that continue with the false statement that CCS does not yet exist.   The SkyMine® plant in San Antonio removes 75,000 tonnes per year of CO2 from the cement plant flue gas.  This is admittedly described as a pilot-plant scale, and could be scaled up by a factor of at least 5.  However, a net reduction of 33 percent would be 25,000 tonnes per year removed.  Scaled up by 5, that would be 125,000 tonnes per year.   

Built out at tens of thousands of plants world-wide, there would be 1.25 billion tonnes CO2 removed annually for every 10,000 such plants.   IPCC claims a need for “hundreds if not thousands of gigatonnes” CO2 removed, but that is cumulative, not annually.    Therefore, having 20,000 SkyMine® plants at 5 times the San Antonio size operating for 100 years meets the IPCC requirement, removing cumulatively 250 gigatonnes over the next century.   It could also be done with 10,000 such plants at 10 times the San Antonio size. 

Another point about Ristvan’s misplaced outrage, that of nuclear power being the end-all-and-shut-up solution to all the CO2 issues.   As I have written before on SLB, nuclear power is not magic. see link  One fellow (not Ristvan) argued that nuclear power would completely replace oil, gas, and coal world-wide.  No, it won’t, not now and not ever.   The world has a critical need for products that simply cannot be made using electricity, and their production releases CO2 into the atmosphere.   Among these are cement, asphalts, lubricating oils and greases, petroleum-based waxes, petrochemicals including plastics and thousands of others, and transportation fuels (especially jet fuel for airplanes) and diesel for long-haul trains.   In fact, one could not even begin to build a nuclear power plant without the CO2 intensive products (cement for concrete, diesel for trucks to haul the component parts, diesel for construction equipment, plastics for the hundreds of miles of insulation, more plastics for electrical equipment such as the generators, etc.) 

So, I get a good laugh from Rud Istvan, who comments as "Ristvan" on various blogs.   He bristles each time he tries to correct me, and I show him time and again that he is actually wrong.   

A word to the wise: pick your battles carefully when you want to battle a highly experienced chemical engineer over the chemistry and economics of a chemical process.   We seldom lose such a battle.   Especially when the adversary is not a chemical engineer but merely an economist. 

Roger E. Sowell, Esq.
Marina del Rey, California

copyright (c) 2016 by Roger Sowell - all rights reserved 

A Nuclear Nut Claims 90 Percent Cost Reduction

Subtitle:  Investing Only Ten Percent Won't Even Buy the Turbine-Generator

This one falls in the "Sometimes, ya just gotta laugh" category.   The sheer desperation of the nuclear cheerleaders, advocates, and true nut-jobs is getting pretty funny.  This time it is the claim by a self-styled nuclear expert that government regulations have wrongly increased nuclear power plant costs by a factor of TEN.   He claims, apparently with a straight face, that if only the government would get out of it, nuclear power plants would be built for only ten percent of the present, hyper-inflated costs.  He shall remain nameless here, unless circumstances change.  He writes prolifically, and amusingly enough on several venues. 

Knowing this claim to be absolute rubbish, I spent a bit of time exploring the bits of the internet that might have some actual, published data on the costs of component bits that make up a nuclear power plant.   It seems that the nuclear cheerleaders just won't accept my word, even though that word is based on substantial education and decades of long, hard and pertinent experience in process plants and power plants world-wide.  So, a bit of hopefully objective data is presented below, with the source. 

Source document:  "REDUCTION OF CAPITAL COSTS OF NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS," NUCLEAR ENERGY AGENCY, ORGANISATION FOR ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT (2000) see link (500 kB, 110 pages pdf format)

The data:  in the OECD paper cited above, their Table 5 lists nuclear plant component costs

Figure 1

as a percent of total installed cost for six different plants in different countries: Czech Republic, Germany, France, USA, UK, and Mexico.   Average plant size is 1,260 MWe.  

The average of the six nuclear plants is 13.8 percent for just the turbine and generator.  See Figure 1 at right for nuclear power plant cost breakdown, using average of costs for the six plants in the OECD paper above. 

It would be difficult, then, to see how removing or relaxing regulations would allow one to build an entire nuclear plant at 10 percent of present cost, when buying just the steam turbine and generator will cost more than that.    One would rapidly run out of money for the other major systems: nuclear reactor and associated equipment to generate steam, electrical plant for transforming and distribution, heat rejection equipment (cooling tower, heat exchangers, pumps and their motors), and miscellaneous equipment. 

The OECD paper is fairly interesting reading.  It goes on and on about how nuclear plant costs can be reduced, if only.... and then there is a long, long list of what-ought-to-be's.   What is truly interesting is, if the plant constructors know all this already, why haven't they already implemented these steps?    I note with great amusement that "no more lawsuits" is not on their list.   See below for the entire list:

• Increased plant size.
• Improved construction methods.
• Reduced construction schedule.
• Design improvement.
• Improved procurement, organisation and contractual aspects.
• Standardisation and construction in series.
• Multiple unit construction.
• Regulatory and policy reform. 
-- (source: OECD document cited above, "Conclusion" section) 

Ah, well.   The nuclear power cheerleaders' desperation increases.  This one is pretty funny, though.  Building a modern, pressurized-water reactor of 1,200 MWe or greater for one-tenth the present cost.    

UPDATE: 10-1-2016:  The Hinkley Point C twin-reactor plant in UK is an excellent case on point; with GE contracted for $1.9 billion (US) to supply the steam turbine/generators; note the plant's published cost estimate is $20 billion.   see link to "GE’s Steam Power Systems to deliver $1.9 Billion Contract for Hinkley Point C Nuclear Power Station in the United Kingdom"  (a press release from GE Newsroom of 9/15/2016.)  --  end update


Roger E. Sowell, Esq.
Marina del Rey, California
copyright (c) 2016 by Roger Sowell - all rights reserved 

Another Convert to the New Electrical Grid Paradigm

Subtitle:  Grid Will Remain Robust - But Times Are Certainly Changing

A former nuclear engineer, Michael Liebreich, says what SLB articles have said for quite some time: the electricity grid in the US will rapidly change from coal, nuclear, and natural gas to one that is powered by solar, wind, natural gas, and some hydroelectric with grid-scale batteries for balancing.   He goes on to describe some of the impacts that millions of

Smart Grid Schematic - NREL 2012

electric cars, EVs, will have as loads to absorb excess power when needed, and resources when the grid needs a boost.    

An article from AIChE, "Michael Liebreich Says Electric Vehicles Are a Global Revolution Sitting in Your Garage" see link  has the story.  
The graphic at right, from NREL, shows PHEVs (plug-in hybrid electric vehicles) being charged and discharged.  EVs can and will also be charged and discharged as needed. 

Liebreich is correct that there will be many winners, and losers too in all this.  Winners will be the battery companies and EV manufacturers.  Losers will be conventional auto mechanics and mechanical garages.   Solar panel producers and wind turbine-generator producers will have a brisk business. 

What Liebreich did not mention, though, is the booming business of the nuclear power plant decommissioning companies.  There will likely be 50 or more nuclear plants shut down in the next 10 years, certainly more in 20 years. 

There are also major implications for railroads in the US, since moving coal is one of their primary business segments.  Freight rates will likely decline, and other items will find rail transport more attractive.  As written several times on SLB, and documented quite well at the EIA, coal consumption in the US is dying rapidly.  Indeed, there are less than 20 years of coal remaining in the US, absent massive government subsidies to prop up the industry.  Subsidies are not likely, though, with the government's fixation on reducing carbon dioxide emissions and penalizing those who produce CO2.  

Roger E. Sowell, Esq.
Marina del Rey, California

copyright (c) 2016 by Roger Sowell - all rights reserved 

US Still Has the Can-Do Attitude from the Apollo Program

Subtitle:  Renewable Energy and Grid Integration have Plenty of Can-Do

A commenter asked me an excellent question the other day on another forum.  My reply follows the question.   This is about providing safe, reliable, affordable, and environmentally responsible power to the US grid, in the near future as nuclear plants shut down in great numbers and coal is more scarce.  

He asked: 

“The U.S.A. used to be a “Can-do” country. Now people go around wringing their hands and saying, “But what if…?”. Meanwhile, China is building nuclear power plants, while we give Iran’s mullahs hundreds of $billions to build nuclear bombs. Are our priorities screwed up, or what?”

My reply:  

We are still very much a can-do country, at least the fellows are that I hang around with. We look at coal, nuclear, natural gas, wind, solar, ocean current, and the various storage technologies. The best answer we have is that nuclear has zero chance of improvement, because we’ve given it our best shot for decades and that was one helluva shot. Nuclear can never compete. I’ve written on this in depth on my blog.

Coal is a losing proposition, not because of technology but because of limited resources. It is a solid fact that current prices limit recoverable coal to less than 20 years in the US, and 50 years world-wide. see link  Perhaps government will subsidize coal by $1 or $2 per ton produced, which would be only $9 to $18 billion (in US dollars) annually worldwide. That would increase coal’s economic life by a few years at most. Then what?

The can-do attitude is in finding much more natural gas than anyone ever expected via precision directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing in shale deposits. Lucky for mankind, shale deposits occur world-wide.

The can-do attitude is also alive in designing and installing economic wind turbines and solar PV systems. Sandia Labs has a fabulous new design for a flexible-blade wind turbine that continues to provide power in high winds. see link  and this link  That will cause capacity factors to skyrocket. New tower materials will allow 300 meter hub heights, with 50 MW turbine-generators. The combination of more output and greater size will make wind power even more attractive.

The best, and perhaps most important can-do attitude is in power plants that harvest electricity from the oceans’ currents. Those are renewable, inexhaustible, environmentally benign, and hold far more energy than mankind will ever need. The plants are not yet economic, but they will be. It’s just a matter of time. see link 

The can-do attitude is very much alive with battery innovators and inventions, such as the BioSolar halogenated polyactylene super battery. That is not science fiction, it is a reality. As I wrote on my blog, and others posted elsewhere, the HPA battery is a game-changer. Tesla has already made electric cars, while not perfect and not yet economic, his new car the Tesla 3 will be close to economic.

Finally, he stated “If today’s media was around in the 1960’s, we never would have gone to the moon.”

We had mass media in the 1960s. The media was on-board because we also had a fear that the Russians would occupy the high ground of outer space and drop rocks on our cities. Big ones. The rocks, that is. I remember those times, with the can-do attitude coupled with careful research and data acquisition by sober, somber and talented people. We didn’t fudge the numbers just to get the desired result. Rockets exploded or fell out of the sky without that, as it was. Space is a very unforgiving place. Physics had to be right, and the engineering had to be solid. I grew up in Houston in the 1960s and my family knew some of the important players in the Space Race. I met and got to know Astronaut Gus Grissom’s younger son.

Today’s climate scientists with all their data manipulation, making up data, using false statistics, should never be allowed anywhere near a space program.

My personal view is that the climate or global warming scare today is taking the place of the Soviets-in-space scare of the 1960s. The global warming scare is spurring innovation in certain industries that will be very beneficial long-term as the Earth runs out of economic coal and nuclear plants close by the hundreds, yet the people still need electricity.

see link  to SLB article of 2014:  "Forecasting the Future - Hubris or Honesty: Coal Exhaustion Looms - Renewable Energy to the Rescue"

Roger E. Sowell, Esq.
Marina del Rey, California

copyright (c) 2016 by Roger Sowell - all rights reserved 

Skeptics Wrangle While Cooling Is Coming

Subtitle:  Imminent Cooling On Display in North Atlantic  

Sometimes I am more than amazed, and this time rather amused, by the commenters such as on today's post at WUWT, by David Archibald (see link).   Commenters arguing over the proper cause of imminent cooling is rather like a family at the kitchen table, arguing over what caused the house to be on fire while the house is burning down around them: an electrical wiring fault, no, it was arson, no no, it was hot embers from the wildfire outside.

Perhaps it makes a difference in the long term, if the evident Atlantic ocean cooling is due to cold water upwelling, or more clouds blocking the sun, or more Arctic ice melting into the Atlantic (but you’re going to need an awful lot of ice for that one).

Perhaps it makes no difference. No one can stop the oceans from upwelling. No one can stop the clouds from forming. And no one can stop Arctic ice from melting now that ton after ton of black soot, ashes, and jet engine exhaust have settled onto the ice and accelerate the melting.

It would be prudent to examine the recent trends in global cooling, then try to determine exactly what can be done to stop the trends or reverse them, or at the very least reduce the rate of cooling.

I stand by my 2012 speech and article, "Warmists Are Wrong – Cooling Is Coming". see link

Roger E. Sowell, Esq.
Marina del Rey, California
copyright (c) 2016 by Roger Sowell - all rights reserved