Arctic Sea Ice Not Melting in 2015

Subtitle:  Where Is All The Heat That Melts The Ice?

Arctic sea-ice extent, 4/22/2015, Red line is 2015
source: NORSEX SSM/I

One of the interesting aspects of being a global warming skeptic is observing the data that cannot be easily falsified, fabricated, adjusted, or plain made-up.   As readers of SLB will know, my view of the entire Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) issue is that there is zero cause for alarm from warming.  There is, however, genuine reason for concern over global cooling.   

The graph at the right shows a close-up of sea-ice extent data from NORSEX for the past few years, with the red line indicating extent for 2015  (see link).  What caught my attention is the relative flat-ness of the red line, compared to most of the earlier years.  The graph shows ice extent in millions of square kilometers on the vertical axis.  The horizontal axis shows time in approximately 10 day increments (three increments for each month), with January 1 at the far left. 

Is this normal, or unprecedented?   Careful inspection of the graph shows that the light green line, representing the data for 2011, also had a similar flat trend over the same period.  Therefore, the flat trend for this year has a precedent.  

One can also speculate on the reasons for the ice not melting at the "normal" rate, where "normal" is provided by the blue dotted line.  The blue dots represent the monthly average of the period 1979 - 2006.   The slope of the blue dotted line from the maximum (roughly March 10th) to April 22 is (very roughly estimated) 15 million to 14 million, or a decrease of 1 million square kilometers.  Yet this year, only (roughly) one-third that amount of ice melted.    Could the reason be that CO2 in the atmosphere is not getting the job done?   Are there clouds over the Arctic this year, preventing solar heat from hitting the ice?   Are the ocean currents that enter the Arctic colder than usual this year?   Is the black carbon soot that normally falls on the ice absent this year?    Perhaps the Arctic winds are not blowing the ice floes to the south, where they meet warmer waters and melt.  

I don't know the answer or answers.  What I do know is that the ice is not melting this year, at least not at the historic rate.  

Roger E. Sowell, Esq. 
Marina del Rey, California
Copyright (c) 2015 by Roger Sowell

Nuclear Plant May Have Unsafe Steel

Subtitle:  France May Have Installed Unsafe Steel In Flamanville Reactor

Several recent articles, including this one from BBC (see link), and this from RT (see link) state that the new nuclear power plant under construction in France's Flamanville complex has reactor vessel components with high carbon content; making the steel weaker than it should be.  

EPR Reactor Vessel for Flamanville, France

From the BBC article:

"In a joint statement, Areva and EDF said new tests were under way on the "reactor vessel head and bottom".

"It said this followed initial tests which had shown "greater than average carbon content" - something French regulators said caused "lower than expected mechanical toughness" in the steel."

This nuclear plant is the new, 1600 MWe EPR design, or European Pressurized Reactor.  Another EPR is under construction at Olkiluoto, Finland.   The planned new reactor at UK's Hinkley Point is to also have the same EPR design.   

Not having access to the laboratory test reports for the reactor components at Flamanville, it is not possible to assess the problem.  However, a few comments are in order. 

First, what quality control measures are in place that would allow such steel to be fabricated and installed?   It would appear that French regulators are remiss in their duty to ensure only acceptable materials of construction are used. 

Next, what impacts will occur if (and when) the reactor is rejected as unsafe?  How long will a new reactor require for fabrication and installation?    What will be the cost impacts?  Will the plant be finished, or abandoned as hopelessly costly?   Alternatively, can the reactor be modified at this time and made safe?  What will be the cost and schedule impacts of such modifications?

Next, what impact will there be on future plants?  Is the reactor at Olkiluoto made of the same steel?  The Hinkley Point EPR reactors are also stated as made from the same steel.  

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

copyright (c) 2015 by Roger Sowell 

Brutal Winter of 2015 - Not Over Yet

Subtitle: When will Congressional hearings occur to hold mis-leading scientists accountable?

The winter of 2015 is not yet over, not by a long shot.  The US east coast is having a record year for total snowfall, with one blast of cold air following another. Blizzards have brought major cities to a standstill, with public transportation not operating.  Roofs are collapsing on buildings.   Record cold temperature is reported in many areas (record lows, and in some cases, daily high temperatures that are lower then ever recorded).  (citations: too many to include, future visitors are encouraged to search the internet for Winter 2015)  However, here is one link to a NOAA pdf file that describes conditions on the east coast on February 14-15, 2015 see link.  

The conditions mentioned above are entirely consistent with what I wrote, and discussed in a speech in May of 2015, posted on SLB here, see link.  (note, this article is the second most-viewed post on SLB).   The speech title is "Warmists are Wrong, Cooling Is Coming."   A brief portion of the speech is below, from "Part III: Implications" --

Transportation and industrial output:  this will be huge.  We do not move barges over frozen rivers.  We know this.  When a river is frozen for many months out of the year, how can you get your materials moved?  What about trains or heavy ground transportation; will they work? Probably not. The train is going to cross the Rockies’ grades in the snow and ice?   Likely not.

Industrial output: how does one move materials around?  How do we get raw materials into the factories and the products out?  If we have seen big trucks trying to go up even a small incline during an ice storm, well, they don't.  We can not get trucks to go up or down the Grapevine incline here just north of Los Angeles when snow falls.  Multiply this 1000 times across the northern tier of the United States.


Communications and infrastructure: we know what happens when ice storms or big snowstorms occur.   The system fails.  Why does it fail?  It is due to ice on the lines or tree limbs falling on the lines.  Can you imagine this on the scale something like the Little Ice Age?  We’re going to need serious reconsideration of infrastructure.   

We have seen employers being unable to open their doors because their employees cannot get to work.  Mandatory curfews - stay indoors orders - have been issued.  Light rail transportation systems are stopped; the various parts will not function reliably in the deep snow and cold.  One example cited in Boston is rail switches that cannot be operated reliably.   

Power grids are failing due to high winds, with hurricane-level winds, ice on the lines, and limbs or entire trees smashing into the lines.    City budgets for ice and snow removal are already exhausted.   Simply finding a place to put the snow is a major problem. 

In an unprecedented move (to my knowledge), Boston officials allowed snow to be dumped directly into the Boston harbor - an area previously off-limits due to environmental regulations.  

The nuclear power plant at Plymouth, in Massachusetts, has shut down as a precaution in this storm (Feb. 14, 2015) - but was also shut down in an earlier storm a few days ago when the grid failed.   Plant operators assured everyone that they had plenty of fuel for the emergency generators and the plant was safe.   Well, one would expect them to have sufficient fuel for the diesel generators.

The storms are not finished, either.  Weather predictors show yet another blizzard with very cold air next weekend.  

At some point, currently unknown, the US Congress or Senate will hold hearings to inquire why the prominent climate scientists were so very, very wrong.   It won't be while Obama is president, because he has maintained (many times) that global warming is real and a serious threat.  That is entirely false.  Global warming stopped more than a decade ago and the global cooling has begun. 

Roger E. Sowell, Esq. 
Marina del Rey, California USA
copyright (c) 2015 by Roger Sowell 

Nuclear Plant Delayed Yet Again - Costs Soar

Subtitle:  Vogtle Plant Expansion approaching $17 billion and 3 years late

The twin-reactor nuclear power plant under construction at the Vogtle site in Georgia (US) has once again had delays and cost over-runs. see link.   From the article:  

“The abysmal failure to execute this project, with the long delays, repeated construction screw-ups and escalating costs, means that even if Vogtle (expansion) is completed, it will not be the starting gun of the race for new (nuclear) reactor construction in the U.S.,” said Mark Cooper, a fellow with the Institute for Energy and the Environment. “It will be the mausoleum in which nuclear power is laid to rest.”  

Vogtle nuclear power plant and expansion project --
Wiki Commons by Charles C. Watson Jr.

This is not a surprise (see link) as nuclear power plants are almost always reported (and sold) at a figure far below the final cost, and their startup dates are optimistically stated as many years before they finally start. It will likely be at least 10 years total, maybe more, to get the plant running.   The project was announced with a 4 year construction period for the first reactor, and clearly that will not happen as 3 years are already added to the schedule. 

The consequences to the utility, and ultimately the rate-payers, are grim.  This is for at least three reasons: 1), the builder must pay interest on the construction loans, 2)  inflation keeps increasing the prices of labor and materials, and 3) the utility must keep purchasing power to send into the grid, power that the nuclear plant is not producing. This may be from keeping older plants running past their shutdown date, or buying power from others. None of this is news, as the South Texas Nuclear Plant (STNP) showed clearly back about 30 years ago. Austin, San Antonio, and Houston all were scrambling to find power for their cities when the STNP ran years and years over schedule. The power they had to purchase was very, very expensive.   

One can speculate what problems are causing the cost over-runs and the delays.   Typical delays on large projects include, but are not limited to, tearing out and re-working faulty construction, equipment suppliers providing late or defective items, serious adverse weather, unforeseen site conditions, and redesign for new regulatory (NRC) requirements.  Also, delays can be caused by worker slowdowns, lawsuits for allowable causes, owner-contractor disputes, contractor-subcontractor disputes, faulty design that requires corrections, acts of God or the enemy (force majeur), improper scheduling by the contractor, inadequate workforce staffing or untrained workforce (learning on the job), poor supervision, and others. 

Even with the unprecedented move of charging rate-payers more on their monthly bills while the plant is constructed, this Vogtle plant will be very costly, perhaps as much as $20 billion at completion.  It may very well require more than 10 years to complete.  At that, it should indeed be the "mausoleum in which nuclear power is laid to rest".   

Sadly, nuclear proponents have only rose-colored glasses and will say something like "it is wrong to condemn an entire industry because one new-technology plant was a bit over-budget."     In the same vein as the nuclear safety mantra, with its steady progression from “no one has ever been injured”, to “no member of the public has ever been injured”, to “no member of the public has died”, to “nuclear power is safer than coal or natural gas,”  nuclear proponents dig ever-deeper in finding creative ways to vainly justify the enormous costs and years-long schedule overruns for nuclear power plants. 

Roger E. Sowell, Esq.

Marina del Rey, California   
copyright (c) 2015 by Roger Sowell

Most Important Event of 2014

Subtitle: Weak Sunspot Cycle - Most Important Event was Not On The Radar

Cycle 24 - weakest, at bottom.  Source: solen.info

As the year 2015 has arrived and 2014 is gone, many writers have already discussed what they view as the most important event or events of 2014.  This is a very common thing, reviewing the old year as the new year arrives.  

This article addresses briefly a half-dozen events (more or less) that made the news in 2014, in no particular order, then discusses the most important event of the year: Sunspot Cycle 24 (the current cycle) peaked right on schedule, but far below most previous cycles.   The world-wide climate implications are grim. (see chart showing the relative activity of the four most recent solar cycles, 21, 22, 23, and 24)

1.  US midterm elections - resulting in conservative majorities in House and Senate for the remaining 2 years of Liberal Obama presidency.   Many of Obama's presidential accomplishments will be criticized, and a few will be reversed.   The defection of some Democrat legislators to vote with conservatives will be required.  However, the defection will likely save their electoral lives as they can show increasing distance from a wildly unpopular president.  

2.  Ebola outbreak, treatments improved, vaccines tested.   The deadly virus spread to many countries with this most recent outbreak, including the US and some in Europe.  Treatment systems and protocols work, at least for those who seek early treatment and are correctly diagnosed.  

3.  Space - first landing on a comet, successful test blastoff and return to Earth of Orion system.   The comet-lander bounced a bit and landed in a shadow, which is unfortunate because the batteries are solar-powered.  The solar panels are essentially useless in the shade.  We may never receive data from the lander again.  

Meanwhile, the Orion spacecraft was a huge success.    The Orion may be the technology that carries men to other moons and planets in the solar system, and perhaps asteroids.  SLB soon will carry an original article on the idiocy of a Mars manned colony.  As a preview, the hard reality is that Mars has strong radiation, very little protection from meteors, an unbreathable atmosphere, and is very cold, to mention only a few deadly issues.   

4.  China passed the US as the world's largest economy.  The diplomatic implications are staggering, as China can, and probably will, either threaten or impose economic sanctions on the US to achieve their goals.   

5.  OPEC caused the world price of oil to decline more than 50 percent by maintaining cartel output.  Gasoline prices have dropped to under US $2 per gallon, although California in its infinite wisdom increased state gasoline sales tax as part of the futile effort to combat global warming under state law AB 32, "The Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006."   Worldwide, the lower oil price has many important implications.  Russia, a major oil exporter, will have greatly reduced revenues.  OPEC members will also see reduced revenues.  As SLB predicted years ago, this will very likely see OPEC fractured and member nations withdraw so they can pump all the oil they want.  Natural gas prices in many countries will also decrease, which will make electricity prices also decrease.  Consumers will have more disposable income, which will boost economic activity. 

6.  Nuclear power - Another US plant shutdown, Vermont Yankee; Sowell published 30 articles on SLB on Truth About Nuclear Power showing the futility of building and operating nuclear power plants, as not economic, not safe, and not sustainable long-term; as predicted, plants under construction are hopelessly delayed and have escalating construction costs; French plants are aging and are not reliable.   Providers of small, modular nuclear plants failed to attract investment or orders, completely as predicted - the small plants cannot possibly hope to be economic.   

7.  CO2 capture plant started operating in San Antonio, Texas - a commercial scale and economically viable plant designed and operated by Skyonic, Inc. of Austin, Texas.   This falsifies the statements made by many (ill-informed?  Deliberately misleading?) who maintain that there is no viable technology to reduce atmospheric CO2, therefore draconian reductions in fossil fuel use are required.    

8.  World coal consumption passed 9 billion tons annually, further decreasing the remaining years of economically viable coal.   An economically viable, and long-lasting (sustainable) source of 40 percent of the world's electricity production must be found and proven, long before the coal runs out.  This should be a strong priority for planners and policy makers around the world.  Economically produced coal is expected to run out in approximately 50 years.  

9.  Sunspot Cycle 24 had a weak peak and is now declining.   This is the single most important fact of the year 2014.   The sun's magnetic poles reversed, indicating the maximum has occurred.  The long, slow decline in sunspot number is now underway.   The Cycle 24 peak was approximately 80, compared to 120 (cycle 23), and 160 (both cycles 22 and 21)  (see graph at top of post).  

Some prominent solar physicists are on record calling for awareness that the weak solar activity is strongly associated with cold, sometimes bitterly cold, temperatures on Earth.   They also predict a return of the cold based on the very weak Cycle 24.   The winter of 2014-2015 has already started, with unusually cold events across the northern hemisphere.  As just one indication, winter ice appeared on the US Great Lakes far earlier than normal.   As another, Heating Degree Days for November in the US, per EIA, were 13 percent above average, however some regions experienced 30 and 36 percent greater than normal HDD.   Data for HDD for December will be published by EIA soon.   And yet another, the NOAA-predicted El Niño did not occur.   Finally, a new media term emerged: Polar Vortex, to describe vast areas of bitterly cold air plunging southward from Arctic regions and causing ice storms, heavy snow, and cold temperatures.  

As stated in other posts on SLB, there is no man-made global warming from burning fossil fuels.   Tiny increases in CO2 concentration in the atmosphere have no measurable effect on Earth's temperatures, as stated (paraphrased) by the imminent climate scientist Dr. Richard Lindzen (professor emeritus at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT).  

The area of grave concern, however, is the sudden and dramatic decrease in solar activity and the associated cold weather.   More detail on the implications are at an earlier post, Warmists are Wrong - Cooling is Coming (see part II), see link. 

There is no doubt about it:  the sun is weaker than it has been in the past 60 years.  Winter weather is earlier and colder.   The implications of prolonged and bitter cold are grim.   The most important event of 2014 was the weak peak of Sunspot Cycle 24.  

Roger E. Sowell, Esq. 
Marina del Rey, California
Copyright (c) 2015 by Roger Sowell

OPEC Maintains Output - Prices Decline

In an earlier post, see link, the disarray in the world energy markets was discussed in view of OPEC's upcoming meeting in November, 2014.  

That meeting is now over, and OPEC chose to maintain oil output.  The effect will be for world crude oil prices to continue their fall.  Today's stock prices fell for major energy companies.   

Much has already been written about the likely effects of the lower oil prices.   Transportation costs for many will decrease as the crude oil prices work their way through the refining and marketing systems.  Consumers will have more disposable income, and will likely spend that rather than save. Some, though, will pay down debt.  

Oil-based chemicals and derivatives will also see price reductions, which will also benefit consumers.  

The long-term impact on nuclear power plants, both new and existing, will be to make them more and more un-economic.  Natural gas price, in many countries, is tied at least loosely to the price of oil.  Falling oil prices mean falling natural gas price, and a nuclear plant will have ever more difficulty competing with the power price from the natural gas-fired plants.  This is especially true of the combined-cycle gas turbine plants with the highest efficiencies.  see link  

Roger E. Sowell, Esq.
Marina del Rey, California
copyright (c) 2014 Roger Sowell

Thoughts At 75000 Pageviews

Today the pageview counter at SLB turned over 75,000 pageviews, another milestone of sorts.   These views are from a bit more than 39,000 unique visitors from 143 countries. As always, it is amazing to see such numbers.  

Lately, the pace of pageviews has sharply increased.  That is most likely due to the 30-part series on Truth About Nuclear Power, TANP beginning in March and concluding in August.  Cumulatively, the TANP articles have almost 9,000 views to date, with the Summary article (part 30) and US Nuclear Plants are Heavily Subsidized (part 13) sharing the most views with just over 1,200 views each.   Nuclear plants typically are lauded by the industry and supporters as being cheap, safe, long-lasting, and reliable.  TANP articles shows the truth, that none of those claims are accurate.   New technologies under development are also touted by supporters (small reactors, fusion, thorium, and high temperature gas reactors), and these are shown in TANP to be hopelessly uneconomic or unsafe, or both.  see link to Article One of TANP. Links to all 30 articles are provided there. 

As my readers know very well, my views on man-made climate change are that the science does not support an alarmist view.  see link  That is based on a critical examination of the available data.  What is disappointing is that so many skeptics of climate alarmism are also nuclear power supporters.  How nice it would be if they applied the same scrutiny of climate data to the nuclear plant data.  It appears to me that the nuclear power supporters are being led by smooth-talking dis-informers.  An article on this appeared here:  see link. 

Also, another series is underway, this one on wind energy.  see link  There is much mis-information spread by the anti-wind group.  Truth About Wind Energy will dispel those myths and show why and how wind energy presently is providing valuable energy, and will in a few years be supplying reliable, low-cost, low environmental impact energy via grid-scale storage.  See link for additional SLB articles on wind energy. 

A few articles discussed coal as an energy source, (see link) concluding that coal is being used up much faster than in the past.  The grim consequence of this is that an economic and reliable replacement for forty percent of the world's electricity production must be found, tested, and proven long before the coal runs out.   The best candidates for coal replacement are renewable energy with grid-scale storage.  Candidates in this area include solar thermal, and offshore wind with submersible pumped storage.  Ocean current energy needs no storage, nor does energy from river mouth osmosis.  

A trio of legal-oriented articles from SLB were republished on other blogs, those being Are Climate Skeptics Legally Liable for Criminal Negligence (see link), Climate Science, Free Speech and Legal Liability (see link), and Prosecuting Those Who Force a Scientist to Resign (see link).  

It was also very interesting to rebut the false claims of the US President in his recent commencement speech to UC-Irvine (2014).  The President spoke on the urgency to combat dangerous man-made climate change.  see link   There is no man-made climate change, and therefore there is no urgency to combat it. 

Finally, it is is gratifying that several groups continue to request me to speak to them on various topics.   In the past three years, I have made formal speeches to Southern California Section of AIChE, to the student chapter of AIChE at University of California at Irvine, and the student chapter of AIChE at UCLA (University of California at Los Angeles).    I am very pleased that UCLA students have asked me to present a four-part series of lectures on approaches to the national student design competition.   See link for a list of recent speeches. 

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