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Rob Honeycutt at 05:50 AM on 3 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Note that the force exerted on an airframe squares with speed. Large commercial passenger aircraft have a max takeoff weight of upward of half to a million pounds and cruise at speeds of 500 knots. That's a massive amount of force when you enter unexpected turbulence.
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Phil at 05:41 AM on 3 January 20162016 SkS Weekly News Roundup #1
Whilst looking for something else entirely, I found this polling analysis of UK public perceptions which I found interesting enough to share. Bottom line:
Future willingness of the British public to bear the costs of climate change mitigation might well depend on public debate about the economic consequences.
which I suppose is fairly obvious. I do wonder where this debate might possibly take place though, (Certainly not in the comment stream below, which is, however, good for a laugh)
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One Planet Only Forever at 05:32 AM on 3 January 2016Why we need the next-to-impossible 1.5°C temperature target
I support setting the 1.5 C target. Setting a 'stretch target' is a common business practice (also applicable to sport performance and just about any other pursuit worth pursuing).
Such 'targets' may appear to be, be able to be claimed to be, or actually be unachievable. However, the focus on aspiring to achieve them will result in a better outcome than setting 'lower standards' that can continually be lowered as you aspire to 'succeed?'.
Many people have attempted to delay any action that would lead to the advancement of humanity to a better future for all of humanity. Many people 'like' the promotion of perceptions of 'opportunities' for some of humanity (them personally) to enjoy a better life from understood to be damaging and unsustainable developed and developing activity for as long as they can get away with.
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Rob Honeycutt at 05:19 AM on 3 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Keith... How do you make the determination that the stresses are less? I would expect a typical commercial aircraft is designed to take far more stress and cycles than a wind turbine. Passenger aircraft are designed to take in excess of 6 G's fully loaded. They're designed for high negative G-loads, and are clearly designed for cyclical stress loads for turbulent air and for repeated takeoff and landings. The cyclical stresses on a wind turbine blade can't be nearly as high, and is likely more limited to the differences between the force placed on the high and low blades due to laminar flow.
As I originally mentioned, according to Seimen's LCAs, the 20-25 lifespan is based on a tear down, refurbishment and transport to a new location, while the original location would be replaced with updated equipment.
[Edit]
Recycling turbine materials
When wind turbines are dismantled, it is typically not because they have reached end-of-life but because they are replaced with larger turbines. Consequently, most dismantled turbines are refurbished and sold for installation elsewhere.
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dazed and confused at 05:07 AM on 3 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
@KR
The issue discussed re: ERSSTv4 is not addressing colinearity of trends, but rather correcting for the biases of different measurements of the same values, the SSTs. Once the buoys and ship readings are comparable as apples/apples, only then can you look at the overall trends of the regional and global data.
Couldn't agree with this statement more. It's what I've been saying all along.
That's my beef with ERSST3. It knowingly published data where this wasn't true, leading more or less directly to the hiatus issue. If they needed to publish a data set before they could make this adjustment, they should have choosen either the apple or the orange. Since the buoys don't go back very far, they should have used only ship data until this was corrected.
It's also my beef with NOAA for not correcting this ASAP.
Do you agree? I don't see how you couldn't, given your statement above. If you don't, please explain.
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Colinearity is not the goal per se, as you say; the apple to apple thing is the goal. However, the only way to accomplish the apple to apple thing is to make the trends co-linear.
As you say, you need to convert apples & oranges to apples & apples. You do whatever adjustments you think are necessary to turn the oranges into apples. How do you know if you've done a good job? The ideal would be that when you processed your data, the apples and the neo-apples would end up producing the same exact results. Of course, that's never going to happen.
It would be useful to know how close to this ideal goal you are. For one thing, if the apples and neo-apples don't trend together, you don't really have apples to apples. That's why Karl checked this very issue and found them to be parallel to a tolerance of .002 C/decade. Is that good enough? Karl thinks so, but as you know, there is a statistical test (a Welsh t-test would probably be the preferred choice) to tell you whether this difference could be most likely do to noise (good) or not (bad). I do not know if Karl did this type of test, but I haven't seen it. Given how noisy the data is, I'd guess it would pass, but I don't like to guess.
So the trends must at least be parallel. If they are parallel but not colinear, it means that the neo-apples are giving you different temperature readings than apples at every time in the series. So even with parallel trend lines, you're not looking at apples to apples. When Karl adds in the buoy adjustment, he made them nearly parallel, but not exactly (I won't explain why I think this again unless you want me to). I'm saying, why not make a slightly different adjustment that makes them exactly parallel?
Co-linearity of the trends still doesn't mean you've achieved apple to appleness. You'd also want to make sure that the covariance is high (they zig and zag together). Especially you'd want to make sure that the covariance improved after your adjustments, or it would be hard to justify them. After all, if your adjustments made the zig-zag thing worse, they probably don't reflect reality very well, since both should strongly correlate with the actual AWT and so with each other.
I'm not saying that this isn't the case with the NOAA adjustments, I'm saying I don't know, and apparently, no one else does either, other than by eyeballing a graph. This is why I was dissappointed about the OP, based on the title. If you're confirming adjustments, this is the kind of analysis I'd expect.
Moderator Response:[DB] As KR notes, you are simply resorting to sloganeering now and are wasting people's time here.
Please note that posting comments here at SkS is a privilege, not a right. This privilege can and will be rescinded if the posting individual continues to treat adherence to the Comments Policy as optional, rather than the mandatory condition of participating in this online forum.
Moderating this site is a tiresome chore, particularly when commentators repeatedly submit offensive, off-topic or repetitive posts oft debunked. We really appreciate people's cooperation in abiding by the Comments Policy, which is largely responsible for the quality of this site.
Finally, please understand that moderation policies are not open for discussion. If you find yourself incapable of abiding by these common set of rules that everyone else observes, then a change of venues is in the offing.Please take the time to again review the policy and ensure future comments are in full compliance with it. Thanks for your understanding and compliance in this matter.
Repetitive and sloganeering stricken.
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keithpickering at 02:10 AM on 3 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Rob #41, 42
Stress on an airframe is very much smaller than stress on wind turbine components, and much less cyclical. Reducing torque on a turbine is possible, but that loses energy output, which is the whole point of the machine. (Power = torque x RPM).
#43
Doubtful. Total energy consumption is much more closely tied to GDP than to population. Of course, we could reduce (and have reduced) total energy consumption in periods of economic contraction, but that's hardly an acceptable solution. And in fact it's not a solution at all, since any climate plans that require economic contraction would be unable to garner enough political support for their implementation. This again points up the need to keep cost as a touchone when considering alternatives to fossil fuel.
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Rob Honeycutt at 01:42 AM on 3 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
keith... RE: per capita and total energy. If California's population had stayed flat through that period then total energy use would have fallen.
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Rob Honeycutt at 01:38 AM on 3 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
keith... I'd also suggest the torque factor is controlable through blade pitch. Torque loads are going to be a function of the resistence presented by the turbine the blades are pushing relative to how hard you make the blades push it. Right?
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Rob Honeycutt at 01:33 AM on 3 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
keith @40... You're describing exactly what aircraft already do. Typical lifespan for a commercial airliner airframe is 120,000 hours. Composite airframes can apparently go even longer, I believe, but complete composite airframes haven't been used in commercial aircraft yet. And, no, the loads shouldn't be that much different than commercial aircraft. In fact, aircraft likely have greater load factors to deal with than wind turbines, and are designed to take on extreme loads due to the fact they carry passengers.
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MA Rodger at 22:17 PM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
dazed and xonfused @52/53.
I note you are getting replies down this thread which may require better explanation. That is because these replies are too polite to make plain what they are having to contend with from you.
You say of Rob Painting @51 "You quoted my question, but you didn't answer it. I don't know what to make of that." Indeed so! Throughout this thread, your questioning is that poorly framed. I'm not sure anybody would "know what to make of that." That is the essense of it.
You engage here with the oddest of style that does little but suit your chosen eponymy. Thus @52 you tell us:
"What I am "amazed" about is that they didn't include the stats I have come to expect when trying to make this kind of claim. Obviously others aren't as amazed."
Yet there you leave it, full stop, end of subject, like someone dazed & confused. If I had "come to expect" the inclusion of "stats" within papers of this form and found them here absent withn Karl et al (2015) to the point of being amazed while all others seem oblivious, how should I react? Would I not strengthen my position by further demonstrating why all should be amazed? Would I not point to exemplars that do include these "stats" and set the challenge which would demonstrate how exceptional this omission truly is? Surely I would justify my amazement saying "Laurel & Hardy (2013), Jekyll & Hyde (2014), Skywalker et al (2015). All such papers have the "stats". Only in Karl et al (2015) are they absent!!!" So when you stop in full flow without such an addition and continue on a different point, you leave the whole world dazed & confused. Especially as that other point then presents the same thing but now says:
"What calculation would I do to prove that? The OPs have made a claim. Where are their calculations that prove that? They are not there."
What calculations? Surely the ones in Laurel & Hardy (2013), Jekyll & Hyde (2014), Skywalker et al (2015). Oh but they are the fictional exemplars of my contrivance.
Now, @41 you tell us you are about this issue because a denialist friend:
"...brought it up. I love science, and have since before I could read. When I started digging, I couldn't believe what I saw. I mean, this is NOAA. Surely I must be wrong. What am I missing? I've been on this site (SkS) before, and thought it would be a great place to challenge my conclusions. ... My concerns are simply with methodology."
So what are these amazing conclusions you on about?
Helpfully, @41 you list "the claims I made." Great! Except we are back to missing "stats" (1 & 2), a methodological claim (3) for which your parting comment is " If you're in doubt, I suppose I could hunt down a source.", and finally (un-numbered) a garbled account of a discission-in-progress involving apparently "attempts to do what is claimed to be impossible." It is all as clear as mud.
Here is a question for you. If the (1) (2) & (3) presented by you back @2 were exchanged for the (1), (2) & (3) presented by you @41, would it make the slightest difference to #2 or #41? If not, does that bring into question what if anything has been accomplished by the 10,000 words of comment you present between #2 & #41?
Despite your strong trollish accent, the commenters here have addressed you comments with respect. But nothing is being gained. Whether this is because you are unwilling to develop you position or unable, I couldn't possibly know, but this is why you are being urged @51 & @54 to put up or shut up, and I concur wholeheartedly with that urging.
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Andy Skuce at 16:59 PM on 2 January 2016Alberta's new carbon tax
meurig: thanks for those comments
Larry E: that Drake landing project is impressive and thank you for supplying the very interesting links.
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keithpickering at 16:02 PM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Rob Honeycutt #33
Total energy use and per-capita use are different metrics.
Rob Honeycutt #34
Wind turbine components are subject to enormous physical loads, and those loads are cyclical. This is just hell on any material. Refurbishment frequently is not an option when facing metal fatigue, you've got to replace. High-speed, low-torque generators are subject to much less wear and tear. Low-speed, high-torque is the worst. Combine that with cyclical loading and it's the worst of the worst. This is a case where smaller is better, because smaller generators have higher RPM and lower torque.
michael sweet #36
No, actually you're misreading. The numbers reported on page 47 are annual capital costs, which are just one component of the total system costs reported on Figure 12.
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A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
dazed - Several points:
The issue discussed re: ERSSTv4 is not addressing colinearity of trends, but rather correcting for the biases of different measurements of the same values, the SSTs. Once the buoys and ship readings are comparable as apples/apples, only then can you look at the overall trends of the regional and global data. Again, correcting for instrument biases and how they differ.
There is no reason whatsoever to expect exact colinearity from different sampling techniques - random noise, differing sample points/times, and SST heterogeneity will cause trends to differ slightly, albeit in what may be a statistically insignificant amount.
Finally, you appear to not understand some very fundamental points, the differential weighting of buoys and ships, as well as the handling of anomalies where there is insufficient sampling: Your comments seem to assume that these are driven solely by temporal filtering, when both issues are in regards to both temporal and spatial extrapolation - how to treat uneven sampling with different noise levels when forming a global SST estimate. Buoys are given more weight when interpolated over space as well as time due to their lower noise, and where spatial-temporal sampling in the record is insufficient (particularly given high noise levels in the early data) anomalies are damped towards zero so that sparse and noisy data doesn't induce false trends. This is a very basic, and quite conservative approach.
---
As you noted above, you haven't dug into how the very issues you are raising are approached in the literature prior to complaining about them - and that's clear when you demonstrate you fundamentally don't understand how the data was formulated and merged in the first place. Until you actually understand the methodologies employed in ERSST and Karl et al, I cannot consider any of your concerns in that regard meaningful.
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Rob Honeycutt at 14:03 PM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Digby @35... I would suggest that people sometimes forget that there are already significant social costs attached to our use of fossil fuels. Some estimates range as high at $200/ton. By that measure, carbon-free energy solutions are far cheaper than fossil fuel sources. We just current lack the methods of attaching those costs to their sources.
By implementing a carbon tax and ramping it up over time, we are potentially making economies more efficient. If those estimates are anywhere near accurate, then we needn't be concerned so much about the cost. The biggest challenge is the upfront costs of transition.
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stevecarsonr at 12:32 PM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
For Michael and others, on nuclear:
There's a very good summary of nuclear in an open acccess paper, Joskow, Paul L., and John E. Parsons. “The economic future of nuclear power.” Daedalus 138.4 (2009): 45-59. http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/daed.2009.138.4.45
And also a good summary in a very recent paper (not journal paper) published by JP Morgan for investors in renewable energy:
Our annual energy paper: the deep de-carbonization of electricity grids
This paper does a great job of capturing many of the renewable electricity issues and is well worth reading. They comment on nuclear:
However, EIA and Carnegie Mellon cost estimates may not reflect reality. The rising trend in OECD nuclear capital and operating costs is a topic we addressed last year. In the US, real costs per MWh for nuclear have risen by 19% annually since the 1970’s. Even in France, the country with the greatest reliance on nuclear power as a share of generation and whose centralized decision-making and regulatory structure are geared toward nuclear power, costs have been rising and priorities are shifting to renewable energy. Globally, nuclear power peaked as a share of electricity generation in 1995 at 18% and is now at 11%, primarily a reflection of slower development in the OECD.
In contrast to stagnation in the US and Europe, nuclear power is alive and well in Asia where 50 GW are under construction and where plant costs are lower. The World Nuclear Association cites nuclear construction costs in China and Korea that are 20%-30% below US and EU levels. KEPCO (S Kor.) is building 5.6 GW of nuclear in the UAE, scheduled for delivery in 2017 at $3,600 per kW, which is 35% below EIA cost assumptions for the US. Asian cost differentials vs. the US and Europe are apparently related to shorter lead times, shorter construction times and lower labor costs. The differences do not appear to reflect different nuclear technology, since almost all plants under construction worldwide are either boiling water reactors or pressurized water reactors.
And then some more detail in their Appendix V, with the final comment:
It may be decades before we know just how much new nuclear power designs really cost.
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bozzza at 11:03 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
The idea that we don't live in a rational world is not always correct. Money has to flow to create jobs and profits- for those creating those jobs. If employers aren't incentivised with the fruits of enterprise then they just stash their old money away never to see the light of day.
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michael sweet at 10:57 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Keith Pickering at 29:
I do not see the description of the numbers in the Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project that you claim. It seems to me that you have misread figure 12 on Incremental Energy Costs.
On page 47 the estimated yearly costs for the high nuclear scenario is $20 billion for nuclear and $30 billion for renewables. For the renewable scenario the estimate is $70 billion for renewables alone. The cost of renewables is about 40% higher, not 400%. I will note that they estimate the cost to build about 300 nuclear plants in 30 years, 10 plants per year, at a cost of $20 billion per year. That is $2 billion per plant. The Vogtle Plants, current state of the art, are estimated to cost $3.5-4.0 billion each. I will leave it up to other readers to decide if the estimated cost of nuclear plants is reliable and if the nuclear industry can build 40-60 plants at the same time when they currently struggle to build 4 plants. I cannot evaluate their claims for cost of renewables.
The best news from this analysis is their conclusion that all of the scenarios that they evaluated could potentially lead to the desired cuts in carbon emissions by the year 2050. This means that if we get serious and begin to build out a carbon free system there are several ways that can succeed. If we start out to build renewables and it is too expensive we can switch to nuclear. If nuclear is too expensive we can build more renewables. If carbon capture is economic it can work. It will certainly be more clear in five years what is the best path. Now we should build whatever we can as fast as we can.
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bozzza at 10:52 AM on 2 January 2016Why we need the next-to-impossible 1.5°C temperature target
I would also say 1.5 C is impossible without negative emissions technology as Dr David Mills was on youtube years ago saying 440ppm was locked in.
In that video he said it was unsure whether it was possible to go over 440ppm and then come back under it but the fact that 440ppm would be passed was deemed inevitable... and that was years ago!
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dazed and confused at 10:47 AM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
@Rob Painting
The last post should have said #50. The comments broke across pages, and I got confused.
Now, #51
But be aware that interminable rambling without actually performing some form of statiscal analysis won't get you anywhere.
You've said this before. I listed claims I've made, and asked you what statistical analysis I could have done, since it didn't seem approriate to me. I also asked you if there was any other claim I've made that should be backed up by statistical analysis.
You haven't given me any. I can't fix a problem I don't see.
In fairness, could you not say this again without giving me some example?
I think you should do much more reading on the peer-reviewed scientific literature.
I can only read so fast. Do you have any recommendations on what I should read next? Is there a place on this site (or any other) where peer reviewed literature is discussed?
You quoted my question, but you didn't answer it. I don't know what to make of that.
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dazed and confused at 10:33 AM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
@ Rob Painting
#51
You expect continued correlation when the circumstances dictate correlation between the ship and buoy data will grow worse in time. Not sure what you're amazed about.
You've hit on the heart of this matter!
I do expect continued correlation. The ship data was adjusted by Karl so that the adjusted ship data tracks in time with the buoy data (see the supplemental materials), which was the whole point of the adjustments.
I was responding to KR. He wasn't saying that the two shouldn't correlate, but he was arguing that the graph showed correlation. Perhaps it does. Graphs are useful, but it doesn't take the place of a statistical test of fit. On this topic, all I've ever said is that these statistics should be included, and without them, you can't claim correlation.
What I am "amazed" about is that they didn't include the stats I have come to expect when trying to make this kind of claim. Obviously others aren't as amazed.
You haven't done any work. Where are your calculations?
Excellant question. I haven't made any claims about whether the data correlates or not. What calculation would I do to prove that? The OPs have made a claim. Where are their calculations that prove that? They are not there.
If they want to show that the ERSST4 trend was significantly similar to the buoy trend, I think they have made that case, with the calculation to prove it.
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Larry E at 09:40 AM on 2 January 2016Alberta's new carbon tax
With the potential for rooftop solar in Alberta mentioned, it is also worth mentioning the Drake Landing Solar Community in Okotoks, Alberta, a government-sponsored project. 97% of the year-round heating comes from solar-thermal panels on the garage roofs of the 52 homes. The key to using solar heat year-round is a cluster of boreholes in a circular pattern in the ground. The ground itself is the storage medium for storing surplus heat. See: http://dlsc.ca/. See also: Bill Wong's PPT (2011).
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TonyW at 09:16 AM on 2 January 2016Why we need the next-to-impossible 1.5°C temperature target
I would say 1.5C is not next to impossible but actually impossible. According to Michael Mann, 1.7C is already built in, so 1.5C would take some kind of negative emissions technology, and very quickly. Indeed, that linked article also suggests 405 ppm CO2 is the limit for 2C, so that must also be regarded as impossible (though Mann, bizarrely, thinks it's still achievable).
So these targets have been included out of respect for small low island nations? Surely that is not respectful if there is no chance of achieving the targets. What would be respectful is to actually take actions, starting now (not waiting until 2020), to reduce and, soon, eliminate GHG emissions.
So what matters is action, not words about unachievable targets.
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Rob Painting at 09:13 AM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
dazed - "Before I do a lot of investigation, can someone fill me in on this? Am I misreading it? Is there some good reason it was done this way? Has ERSST4 made this question irrelevant?"
I think you should do much more reading on the peer-reviewed scientific literature. If you come up with some way of improving the sea surface temperature record then look at getting it published. But be aware that interminable rambling without actually performing some form of statiscal analysis won't get you anywhere.
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Digby Scorgie at 09:07 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Steve, Keith
Upon further reflection I return to my original position — with a modification. In a rational world it really is irrelevant comparing the cost of non-fossil energy with fossil fuel. In such a rational world we would phase-in non-fossil energy and phase out fossil fuel, regardless of cost, because it is the rational thing to do, because logic dictates that doing so would avoid enormous costs in the future.
The analogy that comes to mind is that of slavery. I don't know if it's a valid analogy, but here goes:
We could use slave labour to power the economy because it is cheap, but we do not because that is the moral thing to do.
Similarly, we could continue to use fossil fuel to power the economy because it is cheap, but we should not because that is the rational thing to do.
Unfortunately we do not live in a rational world. We are trapped in a culture ruled by the dollar. So that's why we have to resort to monetary trickery to persuade ourselves to do the right thing. Somehow I don't think it'll work.
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Rob Painting at 09:03 AM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
dazed - "I'm so used to scientific papers including stats as a matter of course that I just expect it. When I mentioned the lack of such stats (yes, there's one for the trend, but none for correlation), I was amazed that I got any pushback at all on this."
You expect continued correlation when the circumstances dictate correlation between the ship and buoy data will grow worse in time. Not sure what you're amazed about."I shouldn't have to do any work to help the author prove their point. Should I write the program and gather the data also?"
You haven't done any work. Where are your calculations? The peer-reviewed literature you criticize has done the work, done the calculations, tested various approaches, but you haven't. Readers may legitimately wonder why that is.
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dazed and confused at 08:46 AM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
as in the referenced Smith et al 2008 paper (which you state you have read?). [my emph]
- KR
I confess, I haven't read it all. Since a good section of the paper is devoted to satellite biasing, which was subsequently removed in a major product recall (ERSST3B), I decided to skip that for the time being, although it might be interesting to see what NOAA did wrong. I may look into that later.
The ship-buoy adjustment is mentioned in the section on satellite bias for some reason, so I missed it on my initial read. Thanks to davidsanger for pointing this out. It's made my case for the eight year procrastination clearer.
I also have to admit I only skimmed over the low and high frequency tuning, since that should be a matter of statictics and signal processing, both well established fields. Since the filtering has been replaced in ERSST4, I'm not as sure about that as I was. Is that worth looking into? I did notice this that gave me pause:
Anomalies were damped toward a zero anomaly when sampling was insufficient to analyze the climate-scale signal. Here the 1971–2000 climate base period is used to form anomalies, and thus both the LF and HF analyses are damped toward this base when sampling is not adequate.
p 2284. of above mention doc.
I don't know, does this imply that the signal after 2000 (and before 1971) was filled in based on analysis of data before 2000 (and after 1971)? In the context of climate change investigation, it seems to me that wouldn't be a very good idea. I haven't looked how this is handled in ERSST4. Before I do a lot of investigation, can someone fill me in on this? Am I misreading it? Is there some good reason it was done this way? Has ERSST4 made this question irrelevant? I'm sure this issue must have come up before.
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stevecarsonr at 08:21 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
michael sweet (#25)
1. Why Czisch & Ernst (2001)
I tried hard to find papers which looked at huge grids.
The reason for this is even with country-wide grids in Europe there would be multiple days where electricity production would be low, even if the whole grid was tied together with enough transmission capacity to allow one region of the country to power the entire demand of the whole country.
To find other papers with better results I looked at many that cited Czisch & Ernst (2001). This was mainly because Czisch & Ernst didn't quite answer the real question I wanted answered, although they gave indications of the problem.
Relating to your claim/question about wind turbine heights, here is what they say in their paper: "For this study the two of these levels close to 33m and 144m above ground were used to calculate the world-wide wind conditions at 80m hub height. The wind data were converted to power using the characteristics of a wind turbine (WT) with variable speed, 80m hub height 1.5 MW capacity and 66m rotor diameter."
So this indicates they are not quite looking at 90-100m, but they are not considering 50m. In any case, the question is not about the total power possible from a grid, it is about how to get something more like baseload power. How much does the height moving from 80m to 95m affect multiple low wind days? I have not seen anyone address this question.
2. Kempton et al 2010
I was very pleased to have a commenter bring up this paper in the discussion and so cited from it extensively in the comments on the Czich paper. You say "..In Kepton (2010) they rely on wind from a number of locations in Florida.."
Perhaps you are looking at a different paper. The paper I cited in the comments of my article and showed a map is called "Electric power from offshore wind via synoptic-scale interconnection" by Willett Kempton, Felipe M. Pimenta, Dana E. Veron, and Brian A. Colle and published by PNAS.
This paper considers a grid from Maine down to the Florida Keys. Basically the entire offshore east coast of the USA. Maybe you want to revise your comment.
3. Budichak (2013)
You ask "..On the other hand, Budichak (2013), a more up to date paper, whch you cite above (why isn't Budichak mentioned at Science of Doom?)"
I did a whole article on Budichak (2013): Renewables XIV – Minimized Cost of 99.9% Renewable Study
Why isn't Budichak mentioned at Science of Doom? Maybe you want to revise this question as well.
Then you say:
"..They also do not connect to other nearby grids which would also make it easier and much cheaper to build out the overall grid. They wanted to demonstrate that renewables could be used, not to find the cheapest possible grid.."
The first part of that statement is an untested claim (and the second part is not really correct). As you can see in the article I wrote on Budichak's paper, I question this. They do not attempt to prove it in the paper.
I did speak to Cory Budichak after writing the paper as I had emailed him and asked for his comment on a number of points including that one. He suggested that larger grids didn't have low wind days due to low correlation and pointed to Kempton et al 2010. But Kempton really demonstrates the opposite.
Actually their problem was a little different, as you can see if you read the paper in detail. The computing resources constrained the optimization. Therefore, the cost of transmission could not be included in the calculation. They already had something like 2 billion scenarios to calculate.
It would be wonderful to see someone redo the calculations for Budichak's scenario including a transmission cost for a larger grid. Does more transmission cost and better wind production reduce overall cost or not?
I have yet to find such a paper, perhaps one has not been done. It isn't trivial. Transmission lines are very expensive and given the data calculated by Kempton et al 2010 it looks like even a much larger grid than the PJM network will still have many consecutive days of very low wind production. And cost a lot more.
If the solution is simple - just build a larger grid and that solves the problem - then this should be easy to demonstrate.
Budichak's paper is worth studying in detail. I recommend it.
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dazed and confused at 07:30 AM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
@KR
"I claimed that it would be better to compare buoy vs. ship data if you're trying to validate the NOAA adjustments" - That is, in fact, the basis of Karl et al, comparing those data sets to see how to merge them properly.
Yes, and a good goal.
If this refers to the autocorrelation thing, then I was wrong in the last post when I said you didn't mention it.
When I said that the OP should have compared buoy to ship data instead of buoy to ship+buoy data if the goal was to confirm the NOAA adjustements, no one agreed.
When I discovered that Karl himself did just what I had been asking for, even then no one agreed with me, or at least conceded I had a good point.
From the quote above, it seems you are agreeing with me, that this is the way to confirm adjustements.
Since you don't seem to think any of my arguments have merit, I must be misunderstanding. Could you ellaborate?
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dazed and confused at 07:00 AM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
@KR - again thanks.
Regarding correlations, note that ERSSTv4 correlates much better with the buoys than ERSSTv3b, both in trend and in details of the anomalies, as shown in the OP:
The trends correlate better, I'll give you that, and there is obvious stats to back up that claim.
I'm glad we agree that correlation of the "details of the anomalies" (I'd call that the data) is important. Perhaps they do correlate, I never claimed otherwise.
Are you expecting me to rely on eyeballing a graph to determine this? Is that science?
If you want to run your own stats on the correlations, go ahead
I'm so used to scientific papers including stats as a matter of course that I just expect it. When I mentioned the lack of such stats (yes, there's one for the trend, but none for correlation), I was amazed that I got any pushback at all on this.
I shouldn't have to do any work to help the author prove their point. Should I write the program and gather the data also?
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This is only one issue I have. The other is the autocorrelation thing. You didn't mention that.
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Rob Honeycutt at 06:59 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
keithpickering @31...
That brings up a question I'm trying to answer right now. Currently the stated lifespan of a wind turbine is 20-25 years. But there has to be more to it than that. What are the factors that determine that lifespan? If what you say is correct, and turbines have reached their "sweet spot" then what's to stop them from just refurbishing in place? Surely the tower itself can be constructed to last in excess of 100 years. The composite blades I would expect have a useful lifespan in excess of 25 years (or 100,000 hours). The gear box and generator could easily be overhauled (or upgraded) and run for another 25 years.
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dazed and confused at 06:46 AM on 2 January 2016A Buoy-Only Sea Surface Temperature Record Supports NOAA’s Adjustments
@KR
Thank you for addressing the science. Hopefully you can give me some feedback on this and other items.
This comment pertains to my so called "Karl buoy adjustment"
As per the Karl et al article and supplemental materials, the buoys were given a higher weighting when computing the SST due to their lower noise level, as in the referenced Smith et al 2008 paper (which you state you have read?).
Yes, buoys have a lower noise level. This has been stated many times, and I will definitely concede that point. Is the weighting factor justified? If the purpose of the weighting was to reduce noise (implied, but I'm not sure this was ever stated), I guess it would be justified, and I'm willing to concede that point (but it is an interesting question). However, noise reduction should not affect the trend, since you would expect a normal distribution of noise around the mean (the trend line, in this case), so that more or less noise (a smaller or larger bell curve) should have no large affect on the trend, yet Karl states that it did (it was the third leading cause of trend change in ERSST4). I don't think reducing noise is enough justification to skew the data. While it seems wrong to me, I am not sure how to go about evaluating such a question, which is why I haven't brought it up before. Perhaps you can clarify this for me.
I wasn't so much arguing about the purpose of the buoy adjustement as the mathematical affects of the proposed adjustment on them. But you make a good point. Let me retract anything I said implying motivation and purpose for the adjustement. Let me say it this way: with my proposed adjustment, it would vastly improve any weighting that might be justified, since adjusting the weighting would then have no affect on the trend, only the noise.
What was the weight Huang used (either constant or formula), and how was that weight determined? I could find nothing about that; do you have any idea, or can you point me to somewhere? I'm not saying it's not there, just that I haven't found it yet.
Note that removing a constant bias due to sampling method doesn't in any way force the various trends to be colinear; that would require an offset and (unjustified) scalar changing over time.
In general, you are absolutely correct. Do we agree that getting the trends to be as colinear as possible is the goal of the exercise?
The situation is even more complicated than you desribe. Applying an (unjustified) scalar change over time only works if the two trends are both linear.
In the event actual trends are non-linear, you would need a non-linear function to do it. This, in fact, is true of the case in question, at least because the mix of bucket to ERI measurements is non-linear with respect to time.
But here's what I see as the beauty of what I suggested: the required non-linear function we need is the NMAT ship adjustments calculated by Karl. How do we know? Because, according to Karl, when applied to the raw ship data, it produces a trend that is parallel to the buoy data. It creates 2 parallel lines.
The diff between the 2 parallel lines is obviously a constant (your offset). What does that constant represent? Since one line represents adjusted ship measurments, and the other buoy measumrents, the difference bewteen these two lines must be ship minus buoy, aka the ship-buoy adjustment. So why not use that instead of the .12C?
If, in fact, this wasn't the case, so that the two trend lines weren't parallel, it would mean that even after the NMAT adjustment, the ship and buoy readings were drifting closer or farther apart over time. The use of a contant ship-buoy bias (NOAA used the constant of .12C) would not be justified. However, the lines are parallel, according to Karl.
Let me know what you think.
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Rob Honeycutt at 06:43 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Keithpickering... California has most certainly used efficiency to reduce per capita electricity consumption. LINK
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keithpickering at 06:30 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Rob Honeycutt (#27)
You should be aware that a larger wind turbine does not necessarily mean cheaper. Power available to a wind turbine scales with the square of the rotor diameter, but cost of the turbine scales with mass, which in turn scales with the cube of the rotor diameter. There is some improvement by getting big enough to get the turbine out of the surface boundary layer, but that improvement drops off rapidly with height.
The upshot is that there is a "sweet spot" for turbine size that gets you the lowest price per kWh generated. The sweet spot varies by capacity factor. For most locations, that sweet spot is in the 1.5 to 3 MW range. Offshore turbines can be bigger, but that's also reflected in the higher cost of offshore wind power.
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Rob Honeycutt at 06:18 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
bozzza... Can you reference which comment you're responding to?
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Tom Curtis at 05:40 AM on 2 January 20162015 SkS Weekly Digest #52
GeoffThomas @3, glad I could help.
The problem with radical ideas in science is, particularly from non-experts, is that they typically are based on the presumption that hundreds of scientists have neglected something very basic and obvious. Nearly always that idea can only be sustained either by getting something basic and obvious wrong, or by completely misunderstanding the standard theory. That is because scientists tend to be quite bright, and are very critical of each others theories so that if something really basic is wrong with a theory, it will be picked up very quickly (often before publication).
I am not sure I agree with the dictum that "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" that KR has paraphrased. What counts as an extraordinary claim very much depends on your basic world view, and what theories you currently accept. The dictum is consequently unuseful between people with radically different world views, and too conservative in any event. But certainly radical claims in science need to explain at least as much of the evidence as the standard theory they attempt to replace. Therefore any presentation of radical theories to the public should first detail the standard theory and why it does so well, before going on to show that this new theory has a hope of doing better. If the presenter cannot do that, then almost certainly they do not understand the full range of evidence, and/or the standard theory and can be dismissed. Indeed, even the act of going to the (being generous) relatively misinformed public rather than seeking evaluation be experts by peer reviewed publication is itself suspect. I view it as a vote of noconfidence in their own ideas by the pseudoexperts that take that route.
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meurig at 04:49 AM on 2 January 2016Alberta's new carbon tax
Janet Keeping of the Green Party of Alberta offers a useful analysis of the Alberta plan at http://greenpartyofalberta.ca/back-to-the-drawing-board-greens-respond-to-alberta-governments-carbon-plan/
Moderator Response:[AS] I made the link live
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meurig at 04:39 AM on 2 January 2016Alberta's new carbon tax
Re Saskatchewan - the figures for 2013 are slightly different from the 2012 figures on the Environment Canada site which you showed, but not a lot different. From the 2013 NIR, the big categories are:
- electricity 21.5% - historically mostly coal, but the current rapid expansion of capacity is mostly gas. Heavy industry accounted for about half of this in 2013, and is projected to continue to rapidly increase its demand.
- transport 19.5% - it's difficult to determin from the NIR how much of this is industry-related and how much personal, but the split on the Environment Canada piechart looks about right
- agriculture 19.2% - mostly N2O and CH4
- fugitive emissions from the oil and gas industry (venting, flaring, leaks) 17.4%. My view is that, owing to the recent massive growth of high-pressure fracking, this figure (which is basically derived from industry estimates) is a considerable underestimate. Saskatchewan only started implementing regulations on venting and flaring last year, and they are less rigorous than in neighbours such as Alberta or North Dakota (let alone Norway).
- process heat in oil/gas extraction and mining 14.7%.
Everything else is a relatively minor proportion - though the lack of a building energy code together with one of the coldest winter climates in the inhabited world means that we are using several times as much energy to heat our buildings as would be the case in say Sweden or Denmark.
The basic problem here is an economy which is heavily dependent on energy-intensive extractive industry - potash, oil, gas, minerals, coal (and much of our strongly input-dependent agriculture could be put in that category too) - and has weak manufacturing and services sectors. Combined, of course, with very weak commitments to conservation, efficiency and renewables.
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keithpickering at 03:03 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
StBarnabas (#19)
System lifetimes for solar are notoriously hard to pin down, and may vary considerably by both manufacturer and by the skill of the installers. One old but useful reference is Czandernda & Jorgensen (1997), who point out that UV degradation of the cell is only one of several possible failure modes. For real-world data from a utility-scale installation, try Mallineni 2013. YMMV.
Digby (#20)
Point taken, as long as we substitute "non-fossil" for "renewable". I'm not leaving out nuclear, and I hope nobody else does either.
Michael Sweet (#25)
The problem with Mark Z. Jacobson is that he won't tell us how much his all-renewables plan costs in numbers, prefering only adjectives instead. The adjective is invariably "low", a characterization he arrives at by applying the external cost of fossil fuel. That's not necessarily wrong, but it certainly is inadequate. Budischak is more open, telling us that all-renewable will roughly triple the price of electricity. Based on the recent experience in Germany and Denmark, I can certainly believe it.
Meanwhile, the Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (which is interested in decarbonization, and not just all-renewable-at-any-price) finds that the median high-renewable pathway is about four times more expensive than the median high-nuclear pathway. Not surprising, when you consider that high-renewables must depend on either storage (very expensive) or transmission (very expensive) to cover the windless nights. Their high nuclear pathway also sees a large increase in renewables from present levels, but keeps it below the curtailment point, and therefore keeps systems costs at a minimum.
So the lowest cost alternative appears to be (1) hydro and geothermal where available; (2) wind & solar up to the curtailment point; and (3) nuclear for the rest. Also bear in mind that as we decarbonize the grid, we will decarbonize currently non-electric fossil use by switching to grid electricity (e.g., cars and space heat). Thus we should expect electricity demand to increase significantly as we decarbonize.
Regarding efficiency, it has never reduced overall energy demand in human history, and recent works by Garrett suggest it never will. Thermodynamics can be a dismal science.
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bozzza at 02:23 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
You mean, in a good way?
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Rob Honeycutt at 00:34 AM on 2 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
I was noticing in the Seimen's LCA docs I was reading through that, end-of-life for wind turbines is based on timing of newer technology. Older turbines are taken down, refurbished and sent to new locations, and the existing site will have a newer, larger turbine installed.
That seems to build a whole other factor into the cost of scaling wind power.
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Paul D at 23:48 PM on 1 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
When considering the economics of the size of a wind turbine I suggest considering the basic equation that determines the energy capture of a blade size:
Power = 0.5 x Swept Area x Air Density x Velocity3
Swept area is the most important factor when it comes to cost.
The bigger the turbine the better, because if you double the blade length the swept area is the square of that length (Pi x r2).With wind turbines economies of scale are also supported by maths/physics.
A game changer though is the field of superconductors. A superconducting wind turbine of say 3MW would probably be half the weight/size of todays turbines. It's a shame American Superconductor ran into problems a few years ago (with dodgy Chinese license agreements), otherwise we may already have a working superconducting wind turbine.
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michael sweet at 22:52 PM on 1 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Steve Carson,
I looked over your post at Science of Doom and noticed that your primary references are out of date. Czisch & Ernst (2001) was the one you showed the most data from. Did they use hub heights of 90-100 meters, like current wind turbines use, or did they use 50 meters as was the case in 2001? Is this data really applicable to the current state of the art? I doubt it.
In Kepton (2010) they rely on wind from a number of locations in Florida. Nowhere in Florida has good enough wind to be commercial so that data appears to expand their areal coverage without adding any sites where someone who wants to generate electricity would build a wind farm.
On the other hand, Budichak (2013), a more up to date paper, whch you cite above (why isn't Budichak mentioned at Science of Doom?), uses data to show that over a 4 year period they are able to use wind and solar for up to 99% of electricity. While Budichak is more expensive to build out all necessary power, they explicitly state that they do not use hydropower from Canada as a backup because it would be too easy to use renewables for 100% of power in that case. They also do not connect to other nearby grids which would also make it easier and much cheaper to build out the overall grid. They wanted to demonstrate that renewables could be used, not to find the cheapest possible grid. Obviously it is more economic to build the cheapest grid.
Since you neglect to mention Jacobson et al (2014) which is more the state of the art I am not sure what you find objectionable with that analysis. Jacobson and his group have evaluated the entire USA using hourly data, as you have said is necessary, and found that it is cheaper to use 100% renewable power. They use a great deal of Hydrogen in their plan, which I think is risky, but many other opitons are available. For example, excess electricity could be used to make diesel fuel instead of hydrogen.
It seeems to me that a realistic evaluation of renewables should include current research and not rely primarily on references from 2001 and a source that relies on Florida wind for a significant part of its power. 2001 cannot be state of the art and Florida is not economic for wind.
I am disappointed that Science of Doom chose to use outdated references for their analysis. A brief check of the papers that cite Budichak would give many references that are much more up to date.
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stevecarsonr at 20:23 PM on 1 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Digby (#23),
How to reduce fossil fuel usage - now there is an economic argument.
Putting a price on carbon is endorsed by many economists as simpler and more efficient than other approaches (like cap and trade). But I can't claim to any real understanding of economics despite a lot of effort in that direction on my part - uncertainties seem to overwhelm calculations and falsifiable theories.
My only point is that realistic costs surely help in any assessment, rather than just adding an infinite tax.
How quickly should the world reduce CO2 emissions to zero? No idea. Add that uncertainty to the huge uncertainty that is economics and I think (but can't prove) that you can get any answer you want.
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Digby Scorgie at 19:21 PM on 1 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Steve
Okay, it looks like I should refine my viewpoint. I admit I was looking at the end goal in the future. Some people say we've got 20 years to reduce fossil-fuel use to near zero; others extend the period, but it's still relatively short. Whatever the period, the taxing of fossil fuel needs to increase steadily so as to effect this result. I don't mean that it should happen overnight. Is that correct?
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stevecarsonr at 16:50 PM on 1 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
villabolo (#13):
It's true that wind is "more consistently windy" near the coast as a very very general rule (except Oklahoma has the best onshore wind stats), which is why offshore wind would be wonderful if it wasn't for the high cost of offshore installations.
But - important point in understanding wind energy - if you look at a time series over a decade you usually find one period of many days of very low wind.
This is true even if you consider a very large area where the correlation between sites is apparently very low.
In Renewables XII – Windpower as Baseload and SuperGrids I had a look at a paper which investigated a supergrid around Europe/N. Africa. Then in the comments someone highlighted Kempton et al 2010 - a better paper for that subject - and I posted some data from that paper. It looks at the stats from a (hypothetical) offshore wind farm running from Maine to the Florida Keys and even with this "supergrid" the wind power production runs into a bad week over a 4 year period.
This isn't a tragedy for wind. It just indicates that you need to review time-series data rather than just rely on hand-waving, or even aggregated correlation data. The upshot for a working grid - where electricity demand is met rather than blackouts - is that either you need very expensive storage or fossil fuel backup (the latter is currently more realistic).
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stevecarsonr at 16:37 PM on 1 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Digby (#17),
The article that was written was "The Strong Economics of Wind Power" not "The Necessity of Installing Wind Power and Other Renewables Regardless of the Cost". I think this is what people, including me, have been addressing.
And, as Keith points out, knowing the cost is important anyway. Being ignorant about the cost will lead to more expensive decarbonization.
In #20 you say "But ignore the economics of fossil fuel. In any case the latter should be taxed out of contention."
Do you want to make it infinitely expensive? This will also lead to very bad outcomes. In Budischak et al (2013) you can see the (very high cost) problem of moving to 99.9% renewables. And to move to 100% from 99.9% perhaps the cost will be yet more amazing (in a bad way).
I believe being realistic about cost and technical problems is important. I seem to be in a small minority. This observation is based on anecdotal evidence only, no scientific study, but I observe:
a) article written about how cost of renewable electricity generation is actually less than conventional electricity
b) some people, occasionally me, point out that the cost calculation is problematic
c) other people arrive and say, but - item b) people - that's irrelevant: without making this change it will be the end of days
All unsurprising, but my key point is that prior to item b) the item c) folk don't arrive and say "that's irrelevant - i.e., your article about wind/solar/etc energy being lower cost - without making this change it will be the end of days". Perhaps a research project for some psychology PhDs.
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Digby Scorgie at 14:59 PM on 1 January 2016The strong economics of wind energy
Keith
What I meant is that instead of comparing renewables with fossil fuel, just introduce the renewable system that is best or cheapest or both for the relevant circumstances. Which system is best will vary from region to region. But ignore the economics of fossil fuel. In any case the latter should be taxed out of contention. Is that better?
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2015 SkS Weekly Digest #52
GeoffThomas - The more radical the notion, the larger the burden of proof required, it's asymmetric. Because that radical notion has to have sufficient proof to overturn _all_ the evidence proceeding it.
Radical notions require extra evaluation and care before acceptance.
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Wol at 12:16 PM on 1 January 2016Why we need the next-to-impossible 1.5°C temperature target
We should be careful attributing any weather incident or pattern to climate warming, it just plays into the hands of the denial industry.
I accept the evidence on warming, which seems to have legitimate science on its side. But it appears that the effect on weather is not as well understood and forecasts can come back to bite.
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GeoffThomas at 10:32 AM on 1 January 20162015 SkS Weekly Digest #52
Hi Tom, thankyou for your reply, it did not occur to me that Robitaille would have not checked what is a central pillar in his presentation.
Yes his presentation is not very crisp and succinct, on the other hand it is a pretty radical thing had he been correct.
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