@TMTisFree

Science improving itself is not an oxymoron. It's a fact.

Quote:

scientists who deliberately mislead

Not an excuse but a fact. Science is an endeavor of men. Its therefore always subject to politics. There are clearly scientists on both sides who do this. However, the majority don't. In fact the majority don't get on MSM because they aren't sensationalizing the issue. As such the MSM fears that it's unsellable and will hit their bottom line. This is why in the USA we see the minority view getting more than a representative share of the news.

Quote:

It rings alarms when someone is trying to sell such non sense at large scale: how a 2100 prediction could be anything than useless when at the same time model near and mid term predictions are regarded as unreliable by modellers themselves.

It seems you are mixing weather and it's more exact resolution with climate. Because the near and mid-term Climate predictions have been pretty darn accurate.

Quote:

It defies common sense and can not be accepted without heavy scientific arguments

Meh! So are various sciences. Take for example the various consensuses of Germ Theory, Einstein's Gravational Theories, and Theory of evolution.

Quote:

IPCC is just bare assumption and is not related to statistical calculations in any way

I agree the certainty this claim is funny but ridiculous is nearing absoluteness

@umisef

Quote:

Or could there be some significance to the sudden use of "one"? Just a guess, here...

Well, one "one" has now done this. Taken the data set as presented by TMT, but not following the "look at this, where the temperature of melting ice never changes" advice. Instead, one "one" wrote a little program to pick out all the red pixels, exclude the legend pixels, average the Y position of red pixels for each column (if there is more than one), interpolate columns which have no red pixels at all (due to multiple graphs overlapping in the animated gif), calculate the average Y position over all columns for each frame, and then plot the trend.

Result:



Now, call me a blind AGW follower, but to me that certainly looks as if things have gotten warmer between 1990 and 2008. The unit on the Y axis is "pixels in the animated GIF"; 7 pixels are roughly one degree Kelvin, so it has been trending up roughly 0.1 degrees/year over the last 20-ish years. All of this according to the data TMT provided... So was that data cherry-picked, too?

@NoelFuller

Quote:

For a gut wrenching experience should you dare:

I have all the scientific information (and more) available at hand (together with the analysis of current climate 'politics' by respected scientists -- whose opinions I do not necessary share entirely): what is the point reading anything else (scientific I mean ; of course POV of other people are always interesting, even wrong)?

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@Dandy

Quote:

They have been built here in the past

The following table lists nuclear power plants across the world:


Quote:

It was just last weekend that the German public stood up against nuclear power once more:

Germany has been early intoxicated by green propaganda. Anyway a protest is a protest: until a direct asking to people to know (called referendum here) if they dis/agree to nuclear power is set up, no one will know what Germans think.

Edit: typos and wrong link

Bye,
TMTisFree

Last edited by TMTisFree on 07-Sep-2009 at 06:38 PM.

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@umisef

Quote:

The fact that you think this is in any way remarkable still says more about you than about temperature...

Point to where I said anything is remarkable.

Quote:

BTW, I am glad you learned something, judging by the non-italicized use of "et al." in your latest document dump :)

I am happily learning everyday but not here (no surprise). As for my 'dump', it is common usage in quoting to quote entirely without correcting the errors by the author, which I have respected here. This is common knowledge.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@BrianK

Quote:

First paragraph is the standard ad hominem and misrepesentation of the pro-GW science.

He has set up the context quite nicely.

Quote:

Paragraph 2 tells us how he's making predictions.

Quite the contrary: he is talking about models' inconsistencies when checked against measurements, and how alarmists always 'adjust' data to fit models' warming.

Quote:

The next few paragraphs talk about CO2's Greenhouse gases impact. Which you've told us that CO2 is not a GHG. In fact you've told us that Greenhouse Effects don't exist.

As I explained earlier, setting up an hypothesis is a requirement to falsify it: the very conclusion of Pr Lindzen -- that AGW theory is wrong -- shows it clearly.

Quote:

Not sure what you meant this paper to do. It clearly fails to support what you've explained your understanding of the science is.

No -- as seen above --, the article is perfectly in line with what I wrote.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@BrianK

Quote:

It seems you are mixing weather and it's more exact resolution with climate. Because the near and mid-term Climate predictions have been pretty darn accurate.

The quotes from the various alarmist modellers I provided do not agree with your claim: see here. Finally, what are those heavy arguments supporting the belief that long term predictions are more accurate than shorter ones (near and mid terms)?

Quote:

TMTisFree's claim: IPCC is just bare assumption and is not related to statistical calculations in any way"Quote: BrianK cut&pasted's response: "I agree the certainty this claim is funny but ridiculous is nearing absoluteness"

Let see what the IPCC has to say about that question. The IPCC WG2 defines the uncertainty as follows (as does the WG1)): Quote:

In applying the quantitative approach, authors of the report assign a confidence level that represents the degree of belief among the authors in the validity of a conclusion, based on their collective expert judgment of observational evidence, modeling results, and theory that they have examined (bold by me).

As IPCC's goal is to review the current state of climate science, and not to perform any scientific work, it can simply not build statistics. Thus the IPCC's definitions of confidence (WG2) or likelihood (WG1) are not based on any statistical calculations -- as recognized by IPCC itself -- and are then "just bare assumption[s]" (you may prefer informed guesses or speculation). QED.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@umisef

Quote:

one "one" wrote a little program to pick out all the red pixels

An uncommon way to get data and build plot.

Quote:

things have gotten warmer between 1990 and 2008

Fine, that was not apparent at first sight. As it seems the highest spikes are not in the 150-250 days range, it could be interesting to track down when they really appear in the year: could you modify your script to add the curves for, roughly, the 150 first days, the 100 next, and the rest of the year?

Quote:

it has been trending up roughly 0.1 degrees/year over the last 20-ish years.

Just for information, what is the actual temperature value of your 0 anomaly?

Quote:

So was that data cherry-picked, too?

Certainly any calculated trend is data cherry-picking if one is unable to demonstrate the physical basis of the model (e.g. the straight line you draw between year y and year y+n). That said, I have no problem to recognize that -- providing your plot has any relevance with the real data and the temperature reversal is statistically significant --, the authors were correct on this particular point (that they "found that the cooling trend reversed in the mid-1990s"). Until demonstrated otherwise.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@umisef

Quote:

Well, one "one" has now done this. Taken the data set as presented by TMT, but not following the "look at this, where the temperature of melting ice never changes" advice. Instead, one "one" wrote a little program to pick out all the red pixels, exclude the legend pixels, average the Y position of red pixels for each column (if there is more than one), interpolate columns which have no red pixels at all (due to multiple graphs overlapping in the animated gif), calculate the average Y position over all columns for each frame, and then plot the trend.

How nice to have an applicator of goblin-bane in-house. This is delicious!

Noel

@TMTisFree

Quote:

TMTisFree wrote: @Dandy ... Germany has been early intoxicated by green propaganda.

Nope.
You see it the wrong way.
Germany just was among the first that were clever enough to realize the environmental issues, to develope technologies to handle them and to capitalise on them...

What do you think could be the likely reason France missed that opportunity?

Quote:

TMTisFree wrote: Anyway a protest is a protest: until a direct asking to people to know (called referendum here) if they dis/agree to nuclear power is set up, no one will know what Germans think.

Maybe this article from the Info-series on nuclear energie, part 8 is suited to draw a picture of "what Germans think":

Quote:

Info-series on nuclear energie wrote: ... The French plutonium plant "La Hague" near the British Channel "disposes" its radioactivity through chimneys and pipelines. According to the 'World Information Service on Energy' (WISE) in Paris "La Hague" releases 40 times more radioactivity to the environment than all the 440 worldwide operating reactors together. The risk to come down with leukaemia in the periphery of this facility is "statistically significantly increased", the 'British Medical Journal' already wrote in 1990. According to a CRIIRAD (independant research laboratory) report high concentrations of iodine-129 had been measured in air, water and soil around "La Hague". The radioactive effluents from "La Hague" are carried through the British Channel into the north sea and the German Bight by the gulf stream. After roughly a year they reach the south-west of Norway. Between 1967 and 1969 the French Atomic Energy Commission "CEA" discharged 46.000 radioactive containers from Marcoule into the Atlantic. Even in the Mediterranean Sea - just 80 km offshore - nuclear waste had been sunk despite the protests of the well-known oceanographer Jacques Cousteau. In 1997 Greenpeace discovered that the operating company of "La Hague" - Cogema - simply discharges its nuclear waste into the ocean. During an record-ebb one of the drain pipes had been disposed. The then French environment minister, Dominique Voynet, checked the Greenpeace information, which had been fiercely denied by the Cogema. The measurements resulted in significantly higher figures that even exceeded Greenpeace's estimations. The alloweed EU figure of 100.000 becquerel per kilogram has been exceeded by far by the measured 155 million becquerel. A independant team of researchers even measured 3.000 x oversteppings. Furthermore the researchers demonstrated that beaches, sea water and fish nearby the facility were highly contaminated. This finally led the French environment minister to close the beaches and decreed a fishing forbiddance. ... The worlds greatest and oldest nuclear force - the US - is facing insolvable problems regarding the "deposition" of their nuclear waste, which developed into a unique fiasco within a few decades. In the US state of Washington at the Pacific coast nine old plutonium reactors and big amounts of nuclear waste reside on the Hanford site. On an area of 1.450 square kilometers - roughly two third of the Saarland territory - 60 % of the plutonium for the american nuclear weapons had been produced. The "Zeit" wrote about that on may 26th 1995: "In that area 1.6 billion hectolitres of radioactive or chemically contaminated fluids have been poured onto the soil. This way the groundwater and the Columbia River got contaminated and the westerly carried cancer and thyroid diseases to the nearby villages. Here 765.000 cubic metres of slightly radiating waste have been hastily buried and 1.400 contaminated locations have been mapped - up to now. ... E.g. the K-Basins, two concrete blocks, are situated not even 400 meters away from the river: What to do with them? 2.300 tons of burnt out nuclear fuel rods are stored in large basins behind those windowless walls. These buildings are deteriorating. Their ventilation system is as antiqued as is the electric installation and the water pipes. The over 100.000 nuclear fuel rods - partly in aluminium- and partly in steel storage cylinders six meters below the water surface - originally were meant to be stored intermediately just for months. ... Then the cold war came to an end and the nearby reprocessing plant got closed. Meanwhile many nuclear fuel rods and storage cylinders show decomposition phenomenons, releasing plutonium and strontium-90 to the water. Every now and then ascending bubbles demonstrate the decaying process. On the basin's bottom a deadly slime has formed. ... Or the "tank farm". It is the other of the two haviest problems in the "Hanford area". Just concrete plates and instruments can be seen behind the fence. 2-3 meters below there are 177 tanks. Just 28 of those 177 tanks are double-walled, but each tank is filled with high-grade contaminated waste fluids up to a height of 10 meters." In Russia and other successor states of the Soviet Union the situation is even worse. On the Cola peninsula right besides Norway and just 2000 kilometers away from Hamburg, over 200 scrapped nuclear reactors (mostly from submarines) are stored. On top of that come several interim storage facilities filled with strongly radiating nuclear fuel elements. The containers have fissures and the area isn't guarded - not even fenced. Radioactivity is leaking uncontrolled. The "Stern" of June 12th, 1997, reported about the city of Murmansk on the "Cola" peninsula that just 2 percent of the children born there are healthy. ...

[translation from German by me]

_________________
Ciao

Dandy
__________________________________________
If someone enjoys marching to military music, then I already despise him.
He got his brain accidently - the bone marrow in his back would have been sufficient for him!
(Albert Einstein)

@TMTisFree
@Dandy

Excellent graph.....it shows if you are for, or against nuclear? The nuclear Jeanie Can’t be put back in the bottle !

Quote:

Germany has been early intoxicated by green propaganda. Anyway a protest is a protest: until a direct asking to people to know (called referendum here) if they dis/agree to nuclear power is set up, no one will know what Germans think.

Before the last US elections, the new "safe" nuke design talked about in the USA, was based on the German design advanced a few steps further.

Have you heard of this?

Last edited by Interesting on 09-Sep-2009 at 01:58 AM.

_________________
"The system no longer works " -- Young Anakin Skywalker

@Dandy

Quote:

Nope. You see it the wrong way. Germany just was among the first that were clever enough to realize the environmental issues, to develope technologies to handle them and to capitalise on them...

But what are the alternatives?? Windmills or solar energy will just not be enough and the alternatives are then to import more dirty power from coal or gas. Solar energy is not an option in a country like germany either since it is located far too north.

Nuclear is currently the least polluting way to generate electricity.

@BrianK

A new paper: Validity of climate change forecasting for public policy decision making, dealing with *real* statistics to see how well/bad perform IPCC models' projections.

Quote:

Policymakers need to know whether prediction is possible and, if so, whether any proposed forecasting method will provide forecasts that are substantially more accurate than those from the relevant benchmark method. An inspection of global temperature data suggests that temperature is subject to irregular variations on all relevant time scales, and that variations during the late 1900s were not unusual. In such a situation, a “no change” extrapolation is an appropriate benchmark forecasting method. We used the UK Met Office Hadley Centre’s annual average thermometer data from 1850 through 2007 to examine the performance of the benchmark method. The accuracy of forecasts from the benchmark is such that even perfect forecasts would be unlikely to help policymakers. For example, mean absolute errors for the 20- and 50-year horizons were 0.18 °C and 0.24 °C respectively. We nevertheless demonstrate the use of benchmarking with the example of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 1992 linear projection of long-term warming at a rate of 0.03 °C per year. The small sample of errors from ex ante projections at 0.03 °C per year for 1992 through 2008 was practically indistinguishable from the benchmark errors. Validation for long-term forecasting, however, requires a much longer horizon. Again using the IPCC warming rate for our demonstration, we projected the rate successively over a period analogous to that envisaged in their scenario of exponential CO² growth—the years 1851 to 1975. The errors from the projections were more than seven times greater than the errors from the benchmark method. Relative errors were larger for longer forecast horizons. Our validation exercise illustrates the importance of determining whether it is possible to obtain forecasts that are more useful than those from a simple benchmark before making expensive policy decisions.

Green, K. C., et al. Validity of climate change forecasting for public policy decision making. International Journal of Forecasting (2009). Free here (PDF) (emphasis mine).

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@Tomas

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Germany
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_Germany
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy_in_Germany

While some people say "impossible", other people implement. The target was 12% renewable by 2010, 14% was reached in 2007.

At the same time, they're requiring people to use less electricity. obviously something has to be done about that if cars suddenly start running on electricity, but for non-transport needs, it's a very good idea to require next generation consumer electronics to be less hungry than last generation.

_________________
This weeks pet peeve:
Using "voltage" instead of "potential", which leads to inventing new words like "amperage" instead of "current" (I, measured in A) or possible "charge" (amperehours, Ah or Coulomb, C). Sometimes I don't even know what people mean.

@Dandy

Quote:

You see it the wrong way.

According to the data from the table, Germany appears to be the world fifth country in nuclear power capacity despite "clever enough to realize the environmental issues". Surely even green activists forget where the power comes from when they switch on the lights at home: who will really abandon his hard earned and deserved comfort after a tiring day of protest... Finally your claim about Germany choosing 'green way' ("develope technologies to handle them and to capitalise on them") is funny: more than 60% of German energy come from the "dirty" coal, oil and gas:

Add nuclear production to the figure and you get a 87%: now tell me, without nuclear and fossil, what would be the Germany development with only ~13% of its current production? Are you really sure you want to give up your current welfare to return to caves/trees homing and fire cooking? No need to reply, I know the response.

Quote:

What do you think could be the likely reason France missed that opportunity?

Conversely, if environment was so unsafe, I wonder why so many tourists (PDF) risk their lives every year coming here. For fun, a picture of the environmentally-degraded place (people there call it 'little Bahamas') I was on vacations this summer:


Quote:

Maybe this article from the Info-series on nuclear energie, part 8 is suited to draw a picture of "what Germans think":

An email? Well, you can do better than that, can't you?

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@TMTisFree

Quote:

Germany has been early intoxicated by green propaganda.

And profits. Germany is one of the leading green manufactures in the world. They are seeing employment and profits in the green energy. In 2009 they are on track to better $10Billion Euros income.

Quote:

He has set up the context quite nicely.

So, you're now embracing politicalization?

Quote:

Quite the contrary: he is talking about models' inconsistencies when checked against measurements, and how alarmists always 'adjust' data to fit models' warming

Ahh but he retains CO2 being an impact in the Greenhouse. He attempts to claim a negative impact. Yet you told us we can't determine this and there is no Greenhouse. While he 'shows' the anti-GW to be false. He does so by retaining that Greenhouse exists and that CO2 might have the opposite effect. Both in his model are deterministic. Your model they are not. This article fails to show your model correct. If we accept it then we can predict some aspects of climate and your model is wrong.

Quote:

the article is perfectly in line with what I wrote

The ends, yes. The means, NO.

Quote:

The quotes from the various alarmist modellers I provided do not agree with your claim: see here. Finally, what are those heavy arguments supporting the belief that long term predictions are more accurate than shorter ones (near and mid terms)?

The quotes you provided indicate there are things we don't know. Which is of course true, but in degrees. The science, GASP, continues to learn. As for your last request. It's your strawman no one said that. Even so the predictions have been fairly accurate in the near and mid term.

You stated the IPCC is not related to statistical calculations. However, you quoted the page which defines the relationship to the experiment, which does include the statistical calculations. Strange? Sure not direct as in science. But, as you said this is a work summarizing the science not an experiment itself. The relationship is there.

As for post #466 and Quote:

"A look at the real temperature data from satellite show no trend (look at the top of the curve, above the melting line in blue):

Why would we want to cherry pick a couple of months in the year? We have the whole year's data. And, GASP, it reflects temperature changes. This clearly shows why less winter ice exists and things continue to shrink. Again you showing the change and reading no change. Typical, put down the kool-aid.

EDIT: And for your comment of the massive amount of the earth's surface needed for solar. 496K square km would be required. LINK The earth is ~510 M square km. So less than .1% by 2030.

Last edited by BrianK on 09-Sep-2009 at 01:11 AM.

@TMTisFree

Quote:

TMTisFree wrote: @Dandy Quote: You see it the wrong way. According to the data from the table, Germany appears to be the world fifth country in nuclear power capacity despite "clever enough to realize the environmental issues".

According to your table Germany had 17 reactors in operation as of 24-jul-2008.
Germany decided for nuclear power phase-out in 2000:

Thursday, 15 June, 2000, 12:47 GMT 13:47 UK - Germany renounces nuclear power:

"The German Government has reached an historic agreement with energy companies for the gradual closing down of the country's 19 nuclear power stations.
..."

So a table showing the development of the number of reactors in operation from y2k onwards up to the year 2020 would be more informative.

Quote:

TMTisFree wrote: Surely even green activists forget where the power comes from...

Even the current (conservative) chancelor - Angela Merkel (physicist) - supports nuclear power phase-out:

05.01.2006 - Germany Committed to Phasing Out Nuclear Power :

"Chancellor Angela Merkel remains committed to phasing out the remaining nuclear power plants in Germany, her spokesperson Thomas Steg said on Wednesday.
..."

Quote:

TMTisFree wrote: Finally your claim about Germany choosing 'green way' ("develope technologies to handle them and to capitalise on them") is funny: more than 60% of German energy come from the "dirty" coal, oil and gas:

Obviously we're on a good way to change precisely that - you should watch these figures change from year to year.
I do not fully understand what you think is so funny with that?

Quote:

TMTisFree wrote: ...now tell me, without nuclear and fossil, what would be the Germany development with only ~13% of its current production? Are you really sure you want to give up your current welfare to return to caves/trees homing and fire cooking? No need to reply, I know the response.

Ever heard of the word "transition phase"?

We're not that stupid to switch off all the "dirty" power plants first and then try to develop something clean with just a fraction of the former energy available.

The more "clean" energy is available, the more "dirty" power plants are going to be switched off.

Why do we do that? Just read:

Nuclear power phase-out pros and cons:

"...
Reasons against a nuclear power phase-out
We do not see any reason for stopping or delaying the phase-out of nuclear energy. Despite opposite declarations of lobbyists from the atomic industry: Nuclear power is an expensive, dangerous and non-sustainable technology. There is still no solution in sight for the treatment of the hazardous waste produced. It is therefore high time to replace nuclear power and to clear the way for sustainable technologies.


Reasons for a nuclear power phase-out
Transformation of the energy system for a sustainable society
Survival of human being on the Earth will in the long and medium term only be possible if we switch to a sustainable life style . This is only achievable with renewable energies. The nuclear power phase-out opens a whole window of opportunities for renewable technologies.

In contrast to nuclear energy, alternative technologies have almost no lobbying organizations. The development of alternative technologies has therefore mainly been financed by private investors. They have received only very little subsidies, if any at all. However, industry will only invest in such technologies if there is a strong demand and large market for them. Nuclear phase-out will create exactly this market.

We cannot on one hand decide to continue nuclear power to generate electricity and on the other hand expect alternatives to be developed. It will not work because in this case there would be no interesting market for alternative technologies. As a consequence alternatives - like sustainable technologies - would not be developed.
..."

Quote:

TMTisFree wrote: Quote: What do you think could be the likely reason France missed that opportunity? Conversely, if environment was so unsafe, I wonder why so many tourists (PDF) risk their lives every year coming here. For fun, a picture of the environmentally-degraded place (people there call it 'little Bahamas') I was on vacations this summer:

I didn't claim that ALL of France was contaminated (the figures in the pdf you linked refer to the entire country - not the polluted areas I mentioned). Would be interesting to see related figures of the "la Hague" area.

Quote:

TMTisFree wrote: Quote: Maybe this article from the Info-series on nuclear energie, part 8 is suited to draw a picture of "what Germans think": An email? Well, you can do better than that, can't you?

Of course - if that wasn't sufficient for you - here is a part of the Lauri Myllyvirta speech in Berlin last Saturday:

Lauri Myllyvirta (Greenpeace) speech in Berlin on 05-sep-2009:

"...
I work for Greenpeace and live in Finland, the country that chose to be the testing ground of the German-French nuclear industry, of the companies Siemens and Areva. The new nuclear reactor was supposed to be 100% safe, cheap and to allow us to shut down coal-fired power plants. This was what the media was reporting over and over again just four years ago.

In four years, we have seen the nuclear decision turn from a national pride to a national shame. None of the promises have been fulfilled.

The nuclear project is already three years late and construction costs have doubled. Because of that, French and German companies and, ultimately, taxpayers will lose at least 2 billion euros. The project costs Nordic electricity users up to 3 billion euros in higher energy prices. Trying to reduce the costs, Areva, the French company building the reactor, has chosen to ignore quality and safety. The number of detected quality problems exceeded 2000 last year. The company still does not know how to implement the control systems of the reactor in a way that would fulfil basic safety standards.

Because of all this, a clear majority of people in Finland are opposed to the nuclear industry’s plans to build new reactors.

You have probably heard politicians talking about a “global nuclear boom” or renaissance. I have good news: there is no such thing. Last year, not a single new reactor was started anywhere in the world. About 10 large nuclear reactor projects have been recently cancelled because of exploding costs. The few remaining concrete projects struggle with quality problems and delays. Nuclear power has entered a permanent decline.

On the other hand, last year, a wind turbine was installed every 33 minutes, somewhere in the world, with US and China leading the effort. The total energy output derived from renewables worldwide is seven times as large as that from nuclear power, and the gap is growing.

The only place where nuclear power is above renewables is in the minds of politicians of conservative parties like Finland’s National Coalition Party or your CDU or FDP.

Our responsibility is to phase out power plants that endanger the health and livelihoods of future generations. Each year nuclear power plants are kept running means more nuclear waste, more uranium mining, higher risk of accidents. There is no excuse: Climate change can be best tackled without nuclear plants.

The nuclear phase-out in Germany is one of the reasons for the success of wind and solar energy all over the world. A relapse into nuclear power in Germany would send a very bad signal to other countries.
..."

EDIT:
"Little Bahamas"-picture removed

Last edited by Dandy on 09-Sep-2009 at 09:53 AM.
Last edited by Dandy on 09-Sep-2009 at 09:50 AM.

_________________
Ciao

Dandy
__________________________________________
If someone enjoys marching to military music, then I already despise him.
He got his brain accidently - the bone marrow in his back would have been sufficient for him!
(Albert Einstein)

@Tomas

Quote:

But what are the alternatives?? Windmills or solar energy will just not be enough and the alternatives are then to import more dirty power from coal or gas. Solar energy is not an option in a country like germany either since it is located far too north.

Most people thinking on this question favour a spread of renewable energy options, coupled with efficiency measures, and make plausible can-do arguments. Some, however, think that they can get all the power they want from solar options.

For Europe it is the Sahara project. It is apparently feasible using solar concentrators to gather all the power Europe needs from a patch of the Sahara and conduct it via a direct current grid to Europe that would also tie in renewable energy systems in Europe. The projected cost is 450 billion euros and the problems are as big but it seems to be better than a pie-in-the-sky project.
http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/sciencetech/03-of-saharan-sun-enough-to-power-europe/1421

IN USA there is something that is certainly imaginative, using roads as solar collectors. Were all the roads converted they would supply 3 times current US needs:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/solarpower/6155110/Solar-panel-roads-could-solve-energy-crisis.html

I've been imagining roads used for generation and storage of power for some years, even to the idea of electric vehicles recharging from them while in motion, exactly how has been purely speculative, and rather fuzzy. This project does not go so far, but I am pleased to see the basic idea is being actively developed.

Meanwhile China is getting to work on a 12 gigawatt renewable energy park featuring wind, solar PV, solar thermal, biomass and hydro storage projects. Like you, I can't help thinking Mongolia is too far north for cost effective solar power too but they're going for it anyway. http://ecogeek.org/

Assuming they go ahead these projects will take a long time to realise but the cheapest way to realise them is to start right away.

Noel

Last edited by NoelFuller on 09-Sep-2009 at 11:32 AM.

@Dandy

Quote:

05.01.2006 - Germany Committed to Phasing Out Nuclear Power :

Kinda old quote. I've heard this policy has changed, or the phase out is in the process of review, true?

====================================
From Slashdot yesterday

US Nuclear Power Industry Poised For a Comeback on Tuesday September 08,

"For the first time in decades, popular opinion is on the industry's side. A majority of Americans thinks nuclear power, which emits virtually no carbon dioxide, is a safe and effective way to battle climate change, according to recent polls. At the same time, legislators are showing renewed interest in nuclear as they hunt for ways to slash greenhouse-gas emissions. The industry is seizing this chance to move out of the shadow of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl and show that it has solved the three big problems that have long dogged it: cost, safety and waste."

What are your thoughts on this?

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"The system no longer works " -- Young Anakin Skywalker

@NoelFuller

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IN USA there is something that is certainly imaginative, using roads as solar collectors. Were all the roads converted they would supply 3 times current US needs:

Something I've seen is claims that solar would consume massive amounts of land. Certainly this is an uncreative look at the problem. We have much more land covered by buildings. Why would one not put the solar collectors on top of the buildings whenever possible? This would 'dual purpose' the land, working & energy production.

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've been imagining roads used for generation and storage of power for some years, even to the idea of electric vehicles recharging from them while in motion, exactly how has been purely speculative, and rather fuzzy.

Electric cars are a good idea because the power can be generated in a myriad of ways. One of the large issues with electric cars are the batteries. Getting rid of the battery would be ideal. Of course how to do this is still years out. I could see cities going to a type of grid system such as for trolley cars. (Perhaps bumper cars is a good representation.) The long areas in the US between cities probably can't do this in a cost effective manner. Having the roads power the cars in some manner would allow us to remove the battery. Realistically we'd probably have a small battery on the car such in the case of power grid failure there is a bit of backup power in reserve.