Arguments
SkS Analogy 1 - Speed Kills: How fast can we slow down?
Posted on 15 February 2022 by Evan
Tag line
How fast can we slow down?
Elevator Statement
You are a city planner leading a land-use transition project to convert a densely-packed neighborhood into a major road. You have three options.
- 100-year plan: buy up houses as they come up for sale and remove them. When only a few houses remain, condemn them, move the families, and build the road.
- 10-year plan: rely less on buying, more on condemnation, forcibly moving families.
- 1-year plan: rely completely on condemning houses, forcibly moving families.
Aligning the land-use transition —as much as possible— with the natural cycle of people periodically moving out of the neighborhood, minimizes the pain. Unfortunately, the longer we wait to act the less likely this option becomes.
Climate Science
Many plans are being proposed for ramping down GHG emissions to reach net zero by 2050. Beyond the technical issues of what to do, it is unclear how long it will take to implement solutions being proposed and how much resistance will be encountered. In recent decades the deployment of renewable energy has risen rapidly around the world, giving hope that we are turning a significant page in the fight against Global Warming and Climate Change (GW/CC). Are these early successes an indication of how rapidly we will reach net zero, or merely reminders of how easy it is to pick low-hanging fruit? Will the realization of net-zero emissions be controlled by technological or sociological limits?
Co-existence is easy and fast: replacement is hard and slow
Wind turbines are sprouting up here and there. Texas is the largest US oil and gas producing state. Yet in 2020, 20% of its electricity generation was from wind (read here). Why is wind power popular in a state known for fossil-fuel production? Because wind turbines make financial sense to the power companies running them and for the land-owners hosting them. It is a financial issue, because states like Texas are not known for actively encouraging renewable energy over fossil fuels. Apparently, however, there is tolerance for their co-existence.
Locating wind turbines where there are business opportunities is one thing. Deploying renewable energy with the goal of displacing existing fossil-fuel plants on a decadal time scale is another. There are simply too many vested interests to untangle for there not to be resistance. The faster we decarbonize the energy sector, the more resistance we can expect. Sociological “speed limits” may dictate how rapidly we decarbonize civilization. Read here about opposition to renewable energy facilities in the United States.
Globally, the rise of renewable energy appears to be co-existing with fossil-fuel power plants rather than displacing them, with incremental replacement and early retirement of some coal plants. This is evidenced by the steady, upward acceleration of the Keeling Curve which up to 2021 reveals no hint of the rapid growth of renewable energy.
Crossing the Chasm
It is difficult to forecast deep penetration of a product or technology into society based on rapid penetration into a population of early adopters. Even though renewable energy has ramped up rapidly in the last couple of decades, supplementing traditional power-generation and transportation with renewables is one thing: supplanting them is quite another. Reaching net zero is not about a quick ramp-up, but instead about deep penetration that requires crossing the chasm between early adopters and the broader population. This not only takes time, it demands a different approach. Early adopters seek out new tech. But many in the broader population will be slow to embrace new tech, preferring that which is known and comfortable. Trusted role models can help others feel comfortable supporting new initiatives and new tech: whether in the voting booth or in the markets.
Other headwinds slowing down rapid, deep penetration
- Preparing new technology for wide deployment takes time.
- Deploying new technology takes time, because of limitations of funds and materials. Batteries and electric motors require materials that exist in limited supplies and often come with political and sociological overtones that further limit their supply. There may be material limitations on how rapidly we can deploy new technologies.
- Those with vested interests in propagating our dependence on fossil fuels will often oppose the transition to renewable energy.
- Supply-chain issues related to the Covid pandemic illustrate how unanticipated bottlenecks can occur, increase costs, and slow things down.
Baseline Emissions
Burning fossil fuels in vehicles, buildings, and power plants is perhaps the most recognized link between human activity and GW/CC. Many people probably think that once we pivot to a renewable-energy based society that the GW/CC problem is mostly solved, and what remains is a “mopping-up” activity. But much of the remaining problem comes from agricultural-based emissions, many of which are not easily eliminated. These Baseline Emissions on their own constitute unacceptable GHG emission rates (read here). To achieve net-zero emissions, we will likely need Negative Emissions Technology (NET) to counter Baseline Emissions.
Whether or not we can deploy sufficient NET systems by 2050 to counter Baseline Emissions is an open question for a couple of reasons. As of 2022, NET is not ready for widespread deployment. Another problem is that NET has no immediate benefit, and therefore presents itself as a new tax. We will pay for NET deployment and operation, but will receive no immediate benefit. There will certainly be push-back from those required to pay for its operating costs year after year after year.
Laissez-faire attitude and competing interests
If you live in an area not yet strongly affected by climate change, you may be less supportive of efforts to reach net-zero than scientists and policy-makers who are well aware of the dangers, or those with first-hand experience of the dangers. News reports are not as compelling to take action as is personal loss. Even those personally affected by GW/CC will not necessarily support action to combat it, especially if it means de-emphasizing other issues about which they are passionate. Dealing with GW/CC is a long-term issue with no immediate benefit. Other issues about which a person is passionate likely have much shorter time horizons and more immediate “payback”.
Lifestyle to which we’ve become accustomed
Many were born into a high-carbon lifestyle and learned later about its threat to life on Earth. Good people transitioning their lifestyles and habits takes time. Accelerating such transitions demands strong impetus and consistent support.
Achieving net-zero emissions is more about revolution than evolution (watch video here). To summon the courage to not only change our lifestyle, but to encourage others to do the same, requires reliable information and trusted role models to motivate us. Courage is needed to endure the scorn and derision faced from skeptics within our social spheres. This is difficult. The message that we can transition to net-zero without some level of sacrifice, pain, and adjustment does not properly prepare us for the task ahead, which requires decades of consistent, hard work to accomplish. If net-zero is achievable, it will take time, effort, and perseverance to pivot from high- to low-carbon lifestyles. You can help by educating yourself about GW/CC and then discussing these issues with your friends.
You must become a trusted role model.
So, what do we do?
By reading this long-winded post and making it this far down the page you're already doing more than most, and you're obviously interested in doing the right thing.
Tackling the climate issue in a matter of decades requires broad public support for the initiates presented by policy makers. You can help by talking about GW/CC with others.
- Explain that it’s an inter-generational issue vital for the well-being of your friends' children and grandchildren.
- Explain that in wealthy, developed countries that we must reduce consumption and not expect renewable energy sources to maintain our current lifestyles.
- Encourage your friends to support the initiatives that will come. There are armies of scientists and engineers working on the technical issues, but they need broad public support for their ideas to become solutions.
- Support politicians in the voting booths who support climate initiatives.
It takes time to educate people and to get everyone on board for a common cause, especially in an age of “Alternative Facts” and proliferation of conspiracy theories. Appealing misinformation spreads like wildfire: truth often diffuses slowly. We need your help to spread the truth.
Thanks for your support by reading this blog. Tell us in the Comments section below your ideas for how we can reduce GHG emissions.
Let’s get this done!
For information. "Review of Seim and Olsen paper: “The influence of IR Absorption and Backscatter Radiation from CO2…”
wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/18/review-of-seim-and-olsen-paper/
Comprehensively debunked on WUWT. If those guys are debunking the paper it must be incredibly bad! Not sure why Santilves couldn't find this review because it only took me a few seconds. I wonder if he will argue with the review, or move on and just go onto dumping more junk science onto this website?
I think hes a hard core denialist like I originally stated. He mostly doesnt address specific points people raise. He uses all the usual denialist arguments one after the other. Perhaps he could tell us in unequivocal language what aspects of the AGW issue he accepts? What would change his mind? But no, we will probably just get another flood of denialism.
Time to disengage with him. He has all the factual information he needs. People here have done their bit. If he wont accept it that is his problem.
Yes, Nigelj @51 , the good Professor Kevin Kilty's review of Santalives's paper (the paper by Seim & Olsen) was quite damning of the thing. Kilty was being polite, but in essence he said that the Seim & Olsen's paper was crap. Rubbish. Junk science.
It is somewhat amusing that Santalives picked such a piece of rubbish, in trying to show that all the world's scientists were wrong about climate. Perhaps Santalives can be forgiven, since he seems (or pretends) to be so clueless about science and the Greenhouse Effect.
But it is sadly beyond amusing, that those academics Seim and Olsen are themselves so clueless about Greenhouse, that they designed an experiment that was completely useless from the very start.
As you say, Nigelj , even the WUWT mob were blowing raspberries at the paper. Well, half of them were. The other half were so desperate to find anything, however much of a crappy Fail, which they could close their eyes about and pretend was somehow part of the "debate".
But there is a minor mystery ~ who is feeding all this rubbish to Santalives? And why does Santalives (@52) think that anybody could do total atmosphere experimentation in a plastic bag full of CO2 ? (Ah, this is a distinctly amusiing thread ! )
Oops, sorry Nigelj , it appears that Santalives's reply (@52) has vanished.
But he wasn't really replying to you ~ just raising more rubbish.
[DB] The missing comment in question was removed because the bulk of it consisted of PRATT (points refuted thousands of times).
We're running that experiment right now. Is it your suggestion that we continue with this global experiment until the atmospheric CO2 concentration recahes 560 ppm so that we can verify what the climate sensitivity is? Of course, if the world leaders listen to your suggestion, we will then be stuck with 560 ppm CO2, because it ain't easy to remove once it's in the atmosphere.
I vote we rely on the well-developed physics and skip your suggested atmospheric experiment.
By the way, filling a container with air and CO2 is not the same as filling the atmosphere with air and CO2. There are a few differences.
Yes, my response was also to a now vanished response.
@nigelj @51. Yes have read the critique and all 130 comments, it's good but for all the faults in the experiment it does not explain how for all 3 gases you get basically the same temperature profile? That's strange. Second why simply not point to an experiment showing the expected results.
@Evan 55... What's with vanishing coments?
[DB] This is a moderated forum. You have made a number of comments here constructed in violation of this site's Comments Policy, which applies equally to all. As a newcomer, latitude was given and allowances were made, but that grace period is over. A comment was removed because the bulk of it was unfounded assertions with no factual backing that amounted to PRATT (points refuted a thousand times), violations falling under the prohibition against sloganeering. A continuance of this behavior will see further enforcement of the commenting guidelines listed in the Comments Policy (a prescription for quality conversations that the vast majority of participants at this venue have do difficulties adhering to).
Santalives, the good Prof. Kilty and some others, have pointed out flaws with the containment and sensor readings situation, plus some heavy hints about why the experiment ~ even if redesigned ~ would be a waste of time.
Speaking of which . . . did you want to try Ball Three ?
Something, anything at all, which disproves the consensus climate science? For years I have been hoping there might be such disproof. Never found any. But perhaps you are the Einstein genius who can discover it? Best of luck with your search !
Santalive@57, one of your comments, originally numbered 52, disappeared. I wrote my response (#54), but by the time I posted it responding to your #52 comment, your's was gone. I don't think you did anything wrong, but somehow one of your comments disappeared.
Santalives , perhaps I can give you some helpful hints :
If you wish to discover some major flaw in the conventional climate science ~ something which will overthrow the consensus ~ then you will really need to sit down and put on your Thinking Cap.
Since no-one yet has managed to discover any major error in today's climate science, then obviously it will need you to achieve a huge stroke of inspired genius. You will need to think outside the box. Some thunderbolt of deep insightful & groundbreaking discovery about physics will be necessary. Just like Einstein had, when riding that tram in Vienna.
Achieve that, Santalives , and fame and fortune will fall into your lap. The Nobel Committee will award you a small fortune of cash, and the world's fossil fuel companies will give you much bigger bucketloads of money. Very nice !
Yes, it is a bit daunting that for the past 125 years or so, no-one at all has achieved what you are looking for. But that is why you need to make a completely novel approach to such a quest.
Needless to say, you would be wasting your time in searching through the old, established scientific papers . . . or searching through WattsUpWithThat and all the other denialist/contrarian blogs & videos. They have never found anything ~ otherwise, they would already have received all those awards I mentioned. No, you need a fresh start, entirely based on your own stroke of genius.
(btw, if you are successful, then please consider a small ex-gratia payment to me.)
I guess the thing that interests me, @Santalives, is the motivation. I've read all of your posts in this thread and I'm simply left with that one question: what motivates you here? Genuinely. Like a drowning man in a flooding river you grasp at bits of driftwood bobbing by, when the best advice all along was to stay away from the water because there was a flood coming.
I've also seen a lot of this type of reasoning with regard to COVID 19. Remarkably so, in fact. Is this the bargaining stage of grief?
@eclectic 60 and John 61. I am not trying to find the piece of evidence that overturns all climate science, but I am interested in the evidence that proves it.
What motivates me is I have seen this before. In 1998 I was a senior exec in a very large IT firm, the Y2K was just gaining traction and the press were ramping up the rethoric. In late 1998, government steps in and tells everyone to have a Y2K plan, undertake remediation. At this point we actually hadn't proven a problem. I was in charge of 100,s of people spending millions $ a week chasing the Y2K bug. Nobody stopped to ask is there a real problem, we were all making serious money no questions asked. I actually did believe in it for a while, that planes would fall out of the sky, power grids and water supply would collapse and we had to save civilisation as we new it. To cut this short after spending tens of millions $, I realised that the Y2K bug was real, but would have zero impact on anything. In short the reason was date fields in particular YY had zero impact on the code running critical systems. I resigned my job in Oct 99 and I realised we were all a bunch a sheep going along with a consensus and to be honest the money was the thing that kept it all going. I never saw so many 20,year old IT guys buying sports cars at any time in my career.
So it brings us back to the basic question is there a problem here? So far climate predictions have not really what you call acurrate and real, world observations contradictory.
[DB] Ideology, sloganeering and made-up assertions snipped.
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Santalives
So your logic is Y2K was over hyped so climate change is over hyped. Experts have been wrong about some things. That doesn't mean they are wrong about everything. The issues between computer chips and climate science are obviously also quite different. You have posted another nonsensical denialist talking point. Are you going to ignore your doctors advice because doctors have not always got things right?
"So it brings us back to the basic question is there a problem here? So far climate predictions have not really what you call acurrate"
Just blatantly false, unsubstantiated statements. Warming predictions have been quite accurate refer here:
www.science.org/content/article/even-50-year-old-climate-models-correctly-predicted-global-warming
www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2022/02/another-dot-on-the-graphs-part-ii/
Go away and waste someone elses time. You could find this information yourself, troll.
@Santalives #62
I was actively involved in fixing issues related to Y2K and know first hand that there was a lot of potential for things to go wrong if they were not fixed ahead of time, simply because a two-digit year of "00" would obviously be earlier than "99" even though "2000" was in fact later than "1999". Nothing much happened on Jan 1, 2000 because a lot of code had been fixed in the years and months earlier. Apparently you lacked that undertanding then as you lack it now regarding human-caused climate change.
I thought this is a very good post from Sks but am very disappointed to see the comment thread get hijacked.
i don't have any good suggestions to make. I feel quite conflicted about various measures which can probably be summed up as the need to end the pursuit of perpetual economic growth and consequences from both success and failure to meet that objective.
Santalives @62 , since you mention me, I'll give my 2 cents, too.
The Y2K threat, as an analogy? Love it. Very droll of you.
But no real parallel, at all. And so poster John Mason @61 will still be waiting to see if you express your actual emotional motivation for you doubting the laws of physics. Will Newton's famous apple fall downward, or upward? Gosh, what a problem to solve.
Let me stand back and look at the overall problem. You, as an intelligent inquirer about climate . . . you have of course learnt about the 100,000-year Milankovitch cycles of warming/cooling of this planet. So you know that things have been gradually cooling ( around 0.7 degreesC over 4000 years, until about 1850 A.D. ) . . . which would naturally lead to a new "Ice Age" setting in around 16,000 - 20,000 years in the future.
Except now ~ for the past 170-ish years ~ the planet's temperature has reversed direction, is now going upward a at a rapid rate of knots (geologically speaking). The ocean is warming; the sea level is rising; and the planetary ice is melting rather than increasing.
In fact, the surface temperature is about 1.1 degreesC hotter than the mid-1800's (and it's slightly hotter than the plateau peak of the Holocene era, 5-10.000 years ago ~ according to the expert scientists who study past temperatures).
And the temperature is still rising rapidly ~ because physics. You know ~ Newton, Maxwell, Einstein . . . them guys. So the climate scientists of the past 100 years have predicted it would get warmer, and it's very clearly been getting warmer . . . and is continuing to do so. (Sorry Santalives ~ there's no contradictory observations there ~ and the ice and oceans don't lie to us.)
Climate predictions accurate enough for practical purposes? Check! World continuing to get warmer? Check! Scientists understand the reasons causing it? Check!
Sorry Santalives, but you've struck out: Three Times. And your batting average is still zero. Next innings better, perhaps? Seems unlikely, going on track record.
If you want a stretched analogy, Santalives (but not as stretched as your Y2K analogy) . . . then think about that old joke of the guy who fell off the top of the Empire State Building. Yeah, he was an optimist, saying:- 32 floors and okay so far . . . 45 floors and okay so far . . . 62 floors and okay so far . . .
For me, Santalives, I'm not such an optimist as you are. You, as a skeptic (aka science-denier) want to wait for the clear-cut splat onto the pavement. Me, I go with the scientific evidence, and vote for pulling the ripcord on the parachute [yeah, I know, that wasn't in the original joke . . . but you know what I am alluding to] .
In tally : climate predictions ~ Scientists 1 , Santalives 0 .
And real world observations ~ Scientists 1 , Santalives 0 .
Next innings please.
And a pleasure to talk with you, Santalives. Entertaining !
Santalives you ask "... is there a problem here?"
Coming out of the last ice-age cycle temperature rose 5C, causing a sea-level rise of 400'. Temperatures have already risen 1.2C and there is enough carbon in the atmosphere, already, to take us to 1.7C. There is over 200' of sea-level rise locked up in the world's ice.
We know that ice melts when it gets warmer and scientists are witnessind destabilization of the big ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland.
More carbon -> higher temperatures -> more ice melting -> higher sea-level rise -> problem
This is just one of many problems.
Mikel@65 Thanks for your thoughts. We are volunteers here at SkS working hard to connect with people like yourself. There are many objectives of this site. Mine is to educate people like yourself about the science and what is happening so that you can make better, informed decisions.
But I learn from the comments that come back. Keep reading this and other climate sites and please continue to share your thoughts in these comment threads. I read them all and often incorporate ideas shared here in future postings.
Santalives claimed he was a sceptic, not a climate denialist. So I asked him what parts of the AGW theory / consensus he accepted. Presumably if hes not a denialist he much accept at least some parts. He didn't answer. I wonder why that would be (sarcasm)
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Eclectic @66. Yes eclectic it can be enjoyable debating with denialists and similar characters, but I get a bit annoyed with them. Like badly behaved children they sometimes need some verbal punishment.
And they do not appear to apply much scepticism to their preferred sources of information, ironically.
Getting back On Topic . . .
Evan , your Lead Article is excellent and perceptive. Yes, there are so many sociological hindrances & constraints ~ far more formidable to overcome, than the technological ones. Yet we progress. But it is like wading through honey. The pious wish of carbon neutrality by 2050 , is only half-achievable (short of a miracle) . . . but is at least a worthy target to be steering towards. In this regard, the world is still due for many cuts and bruises for the remainder of this century.
The forces of stupidity are still strong ~ coming both from the intellectual troglodytes and the elites. ( I had the pleasure of reading a recent public speech by the eminent emeritus Dr William Happer, on climate. Oh me, oh my. As Professor Carlo Cipolla has pointed out, it is the intelligent but irrationally stupid people who do the most damage in this world. )
Speaking of which ~ leads me back to the observation of the trolls who frequently crop up in the threads of SkS. Evan, I hope you will forgive me for engaging with them. The trolls are a fine example of one of the sociological "push backs" you mention.
At the same time, the trolls provide entertainment & amusement in the comments columns. Remarkable, how they seem to enjoy embarrassing themselves in public. IMO it is their unacknowledged anger issues motivating them. And they are like a child who rushes to the top of a tiny hillock, plants his "flag" and proclaims loudly: "I'm the king of the castle and you're the dirty rascals!"
Should a troll be ignored on his hillock? No, of course not. We should patiently point out his errors/stupidities, and point out that his childish "flag" is in reality just a square of dirty toilet paper. And the exercise does serve to re-illuminate some climate information.
Plus, trolls are interesting to observe, in themselves! At first , the reader thinks: could this just be an ill-informed person who is seeking knowledge? But almost immediately, the aroma of troll emerges ~ however skilfully & subtly he tries to conceal it. Interesting to observe the different levels of skill there ~ the troll is like a classic actor wearing a "persona" mask. Interesting, to observe how the mask slips a bit, from time to time. Or the troll churns through goalposts/arguments ~ so interesting, to see how the troll is a chameleon trying to change colors frequently : or wear different colors at the same time !
But eventually the troll gets tired and goes away (sometimes, after several pages). Or disappears when the Moderator hammer comes down (on the most obnoxiously repetitious trolls . . . in their various sockpuppet forms). Yet the trolls do provide amusement.
( Nigelj , my above comments will perhaps interest you more than they interest Evan. )
I think there is something in the Y2K analogy. Experts see a problem and make warning. Coders look at code and go "uh-oh". Large no. of $$ fixing the problem and things went well. Also, doom merchants and the uninformed-but-like-publicity getting lots of media hype. There is some of that with AGW but with both, what the experts said is what is worth noticing. (ie, for AGW, read the IPCC reports).
Was Y2K a real problem, well geez, you just needed a programmer to show you production code and see what would happen to it if not fixed. I was also involved with Y2L, fixing for power stations code and consequences of not fixing there were control systems failing.
Like Y2K, we can minimize AGW by taking action in advance. Unlike Y2K, we didnt start soon enough and we are already coping some major downsides.
As an example of what happens when Y2K-like problems are not taken care of, there is the "scaleup" of the Ariane 4 to the Ariane 5 and the software bug that brought down the first flight in flames. Y2K was likely not all scam.
Eclectic@70. Thanks for your comments. It helps to see what connects and what does not. I respond to trolls in the event that a fence-sitter is watching. It is also good practice to formulate defenses when challenged. But I am amazed that so many people stuck it out. It's nice to be part of an active, engaged community. :-) Gives you hope for the future, even though the challenges are great.
Oh well. I was hoping for a more interesting answer than someone blowing the now thickly-accumulated dust off that very old and now generally long-abandoned denialist talking-point regarding the Y2K coding bug!
Eclectic @72
I do agree with all your views on the denialist trolls and how to respond to them. They are indeed quite interesting and entertaining.
Some people say don't respond or engage with the denialists, because it gives them visibility, but I feel that is a grave mistake. We dont know who is reading comments sections and if the denialists nonsense goes unanswered it may gain traction with middle of the road people reading.I tend to respond to denialists largely with those people in mind.
I tend to often keep my responses short and facts based rather than getting into a long debate, to avoid giving them too many opportunities to spam the website. Especially on general news media websites. However sometimes I will get into a longer discussion if it seems useful or interesting, and its unlikely vast numbers of people are reading the posts and they are not the spamming type of troll. I've noticed that rebuttals can actually create some interesting discussion. The people that say never respond to denialists take themselves a bit too seriously.
Imho denialists seem to mostly embrace a lot of deliberate stupidity, mixed together with political and ideological motives, motivated reasoning, cherrypicking, and a tendency to see conspiracies everywhere. However some just appear naturally quite stupid (eg: JDS over at realclimate.org).
The y2k issue was clearly a problem for certain types of software and industries, however y2k seemed to be over hyped. From National Geographic. "Countries such as Italy, Russia, and South Korea had done little to prepare for Y2K. They had no more technological problems than those countries, like the U.S., that spent millions of dollars to combat the problem."
www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/Y2K-bug/
@nigelj #74 - indeed - and do we not see exactly the same patterns emerging over COVID? I find the parallels remarkably similar, if not identical. Yet away from that hard-core of naysayers most of us get that it is a very serious virus - indeed many of us, me included, have witnessed it taking out friends and relatives. Perhaps that's for another discussion beneath another post, though!
Evan @72 , please keep up your good work.
And I was not meaning to imply that engaging with a climate troll would bring them to their senses. Trolls are, by their very nature, impervious to sensible thinking.
As you say, it is all about the unseen audience. The troll is partly aware of that too. Yet IMO the troll's greater motivation is to "act out", to vent his anger. Trolls are angry people. They don't all go to WUWT blogsite to vent their anger ~ well, not full time anyway.
But WUWT is an interesting blogsite ~ the visible tip of an iceberg of angry people . . . angry about occult personal issues . . . crackpots whose conceptualizations are ignored by the wider world . . . conspiracy theorists who find a sympathetic echochamber reassures them of their sanity . . . political extremists who are angry about their slipping status in a changing world (and who complain of their gullible "Leftist" children). There is a certain amount of dog-whistling too . . . but to their credit, WUWT moderators & algorithms are very quick to eliminate any frankly racist comments.
WUWT is a sour, angry site, with a touch of bitterness also. Some of their funding is from a lot of general advertising ~ and to generate many clicks, the editors make sure they frequently throw red meat into the cage for their target audience to snarl over.
(Let me see . . . have I myself vented enough, about WUWT ? Hmm.... )
@nijelj 69. It is obvious that that the temp has increased, that the sea level rises is ongoing and has been for thousands of years. don't know anybody who does not accept that. Except over at Elecroverse who are pushing move to somehwhere warm and learn how to grow vegetables. God help us if they are right. My skeptism is we seem to have put all our chips down on betting on c02 that produced by man is the source of our problem. Whilst I support the study of that,but we should be constantly asking what if we are wrong? As Eclectic wrote @16 I live in hope that someday, some year, WUWT will uncover some killer evidence that the mainstream climate scientists are wrong. I would have thought that would be hope of this site.
Anyway I seem to getting accused of trolling etc. But I was really hoping to see some proper rebuttal for instance the paper by Prof. Demetris Koutsoyiannis Rethinking Climate, Climate Change, and Their Relationship with Water. There has been no rebuttal of his paper other than no this is settled science. His paper is quite specific in its claims and evidence which clearly goes against the settled science. It's a question of if he is wrong where is his paper wrong.
On the Y2K analogy, I never said it was a scam. The Y2K bug was real and we still have come across it from time to time since. My analogy was trying to express the idea how singly focused we all became on something that was a theoretical problem. This focus was initiated by governments but driven by endless money. Even when we found that it was not of concern for some system at all, companies just pushed on spending money to rip out old systems for new technologies under the excuse of Y2K. We dismantled and tested everything from ATM machines to, microwave trammitters. Dragged out 80 year Cobol programmers (for a 6 figure sum for a few months work),Decommissioned more mainframes than I can remember all to prevent a perceived catastrophe.
How serious was the Y2K bug, I would say close to zero, why because this was western government obsession, many counties simply didn't have the money or expertise to do any Y2K remeadation but they did ask the rich countries to pay for it however. Nothing happened, no power grid failures, no planes crashed, banks didnt collaspe anywhere in the world. I know plenty of coders who still think we were saving the world but for me if I am upfront we all went along for the ride because it was easy to scare the people, the politicians, the CEOs to make a lot of money. Seems to be a lot of similarity to AGW.
Santileves @78, I have followed the global warming issue ever since James Hansens speech that we have hard evidence of a human influence on climate in the early 1990s. I was even a bit sceptical at one point in the early days, but lot of time has gone by and tens of thousands of papers have been published. If we were wrong, it would almost certainly have been found by now.
And if we are wrong, we will have built a lot of new energy infrastructure that we will need eventually anyway because fossil fuels are a very finite resource. So being wrong is not a massive problem and will not bankrupt the world economy, not even slightly. Doing nothing could be a massive problem. The worst case scenarios are very bleak and cannot be completely ruled out.
You have been given some references to proper rebuttal of one of the papers you quoted. Several people have posted comments on the paper by Prof. Demetris Koutsoyiannis. It is not necessary to go through his claims line by line when his basic assumptions are nonsensical.
Regarding y2k I agree there was some degree of hype. But using this to cast doubt on climate science is fairly weak. They are very different issues involving different people. And nobody really knew exactly what would happen after year 2000. When theres even a small chance aircraft could fall out of the sky its better to upgrade the computer chip / change the software.
The basics of climate science go back centuries. Svante Arrhenius did detailed calculations in the 1890s on the effect of industrial CO2 on the climate. He predicted a 5 degree warming in total and 1 degree c of warming in the 20th century. He worked essentially alone. He wasn't paid a fortune for this work. He had long been curious about such issues as what caused climate change. Nobody has been able to scientifically rebut his work, and obviously his prediction for the 20th century has been proven reasonably accurate. Successful predictions are good evidence a theory is on the right track.
Nigelj @79, what would you say is the central argument that sites like wuwt believe? I have spent a bit time reading and a lot of the people on there are clearly not dummies but they simply don't accept the settled science.
On prof Koutsoyiannis, to say his assumptions are nonsensical and dismiss the paper out of hand, certainly does nothing for someone like me trying to learn something and I think plays into the hand of deniers who say the other side won't debate. Evan response was an explanation of the consensus not a rebuttal.
As Evan paper is about what we do and how do we convince people to do it. I have always thought rather than just endless debates 2 steps removed on these websites, why not a TV show where the best climate scientist debate against best deniers on these topics. Especially on the settled science. It would be certainly a lot more interesting the current BBC climate programme that seems to have run out content.
from Santalives: < ... it is obvious that the temp has increased, that the sea level rises ...> (unquote)
"You see, my dear Santalives, but you do not observe." ~ if I may slightly misquote Sherlock Holmes ;-)
That's right, it is so ~ but the question is: Why has that happened at a time when (per Milankovitch) the temp should be falling and the sea level falling too !
# The job of scientists is not to marvel at these events, but to discover why they happen. And that's exactly what the scientists have done over the past 100 years or so. And sorry, simply waving your hand and saying "ain't so" . . . is laughable . . . is exactly the sort of thing science-deniers do ( er, not that you are one of those denialists, of course. We take you at your word on that ! ) And you still haven't shown the slightest evidence that the scientists are wrong.
Santalives, it sounds like you have the bug ~ no, not the Y2K bug or the Covid bug ~ but the ABCD bug. (That's "Anything But Carbon Dioxide" ~ a typical denialist plaint, where they accept any causation whatsoever, so long as it's ABCD .)
Lots of fun, here, eh !
Eclectic @81, yes it is a lot of fun here, but I think the moderator cuts you a lot more slack than me.
I will ask you the same question as nijelj then
. what would you say is the central argument that sites like wuwt believe?
The next question is why? As I said many of these people are clearly not dummies they have Phd, s they are work at university's, doing and publishing research. I doubt many are well funded as being on the other side of the argument would not pay well.
[DB] Moderation complaints snipped.
@Santalives #80
"I have always thought rather than just endless debates 2 steps removed on these websites, why not a TV show where the best climate scientist debate against best deniers on these topics."
This would be a fake debate because both "sides" are not equal when there is a scientific consensus on a topic. It just paints a very wrong and misleading picture for people watching such a fake debate on what is basically settled science. This is explained in The Consensus Handbook on pages 8 and 9 and in this sketch from John Oliver's Last Week Tonight show which is as true today as when it came out in 2014!
Santalives @82
sorry Santalives, my lengthier (slightly humorous) post got cut off at the knees, while I was slowly composing and typing a thoughtful reply to you. So you get a severely shortened version (phew! for you)
I sincerely hope the moderators can prevail upon the site admin to allow a much longer window before time-out occurs. Can we try for a 90 minute slot?
And no, I don't see that I get any extra-special slack from moderators.
The site is actually very civilized.
You should do well, if you follow the posting rules, and avoid excessive repetition, avoid bullshitting, etc. It might be worth you giving that a try.
What is the central argument at WUWT ?
There are several :-
ABCD , also:-
99+% of climate scientist are incompetent . . . or are fabricating data . . . or are just working to milk grant money from the taxpayer's pocket . . . or are in a grand conspiracy to overthrow the American Constitution and create a communist World Government (to be led by Soros; or by International Zionists; or by Xi JinPing; or by those shape-shifting Lizard People; and so on). Also :-
There is no global warming . . . or it is very slight . . . or if it's big, then it's not caused by humans . . . or if it's big and it is caused by humans, then it will be very, very good for us.
I could give you more, Santalives ~ but I think you get the picture.
Gotta rush. Sorry.
Those High-IQ but science-denying elite at WUWT ? Yeah, very interesting . . . analysis will have to wait for a later occasion.
Santalives @80
I already said what I think drives people over at WUWT @74. I've amended it slightly here. Imho denialists seem to mostly engage in a lot of deliberate stupidity, mixed together with political and ideological motives (often libertarianism) , motivated reasoning, cherrypicking, and a tendency to see conspiracies everywhere. However some just appear naturally quite stupid (eg: JDS over at realclimate.org). There are also the scientific cranks with science degrees who just seem to like to be different and become very stubborn and narcissistic. This is my observation. I suspect you wont like this but its how they all frequently come across to me.
Regarding "Rethinking Climate, Climate Change, and Their Relationship with Water by Demetris Koutsoyiannis"
Some of his discussion is interesting and colourful. However a discussion of how to better define climate doesn't much interest me. I said before its pedantry. In no way does such a thing directly relate to or undermine findings that humans are causing a warming effect. And what we are interested in is relativities and rates of change from one period to another. You do not need a precise and perfect definition of climate to measure that. I'm sure you would get what I mean. I haven't the time to study his maths in detail and I'm rusty on some of that but I'm sure its probably correct, but it isn't relevant to the points I've just made. He himself said people will probably regard his paper as useless!
He then goes into a long discussion about water: "This idea is further expanded to establish a linear causality chain of the type: human CO2 emissions → increasing concentration of atmospheric CO2; → increasing temperature → changes in hydrological processes and water balance. This is evident in the popular practice of studying the so-called climate change impacts on hydrological processes. However, this is a naïve idea that does not correspond to physical reality.........Arguably, the fact that the CO2; has been so heavily and repeatedly studied, particularly in paleoclimatology studies (e.g., [49,51,52,53,54,55,56,57]), does not suggest that it is more important a greenhouse gas than water. Here we argue that water is the most crucial element determining climate (e.g., [58,59]), or as put by Poyet [60], “Water is the main player”. We list epigrammatically some of the reasons justifying it: (Abundance, heat storage etc.)"
The fact that water is abundant and a heat store and can be influenced by changes in solar energy and that water vapour is the more abundant a greenhouse gas is not contested or new information, and obviously does not in any way undermine the conventional idea that changes in Co2 is causally linked to increased evaporation which can cause further warming. He has conflated things, and enaged in a logical fallacy by deliberate intent or lack of awareness.
He has to be able to explain how his own theory of water would explain climate warming over the last 100 years. He provides no evidence based causal link to expalin a change in water vapour levels in the atmosphere over the period. But Co2 causing warming and evaporation and further warming explains things perfectly well and is consistent with the evidence.
Don't ask me why, how or when on all the details. I don't have the time for more. I'm giving you the essentials as I see them. To me its all fairly obvious. Think about it. I'm just an interested observer and while I enjoy discussions I dont have all day.
@Santalives #80
"I have always thought rather than just endless debates 2 steps removed on these websites, why not a TV show where the best climate scientist debate against best deniers on these topics."
And in the studio tonight, we have an internationally acclaimed marine biologist and a very cross man who are here to debate, "are there fish?"
(wild audience applause and cheers)
That's how silly an idea it is. The role of energy-emitting atmospheric gases was guessed at in the 1820s but not demonstrated, the specific role of carbon dioxide was experimentally confirmed in the late 1850s-early 1860s by two scientists working independently and in different countries and the effect of doubling its concentration on temperature was calculated at the turn of the 20th Century. That calculation is not far from the currently-accepted value.
Today we additionally have a vast wealth of palaeodata and we far better understand Earth's slow carbon cycle, that acts as the planet's thermostat over geological timescales, and into the gears of which we have dropped a very big wrench.
Santalives @78,
You again express an interest in having Koutsoyiannis (2021) debunked for you. Such a debunk has been offered you in the past (@18 up-thread for instance) but you have failed to take them up. There are many similar papers purporting to overturn the science behind AGW and indeed you brought a second such pack-of-nonsense into this thread in the shape of Seim & Olsen (2020). The large quantity of such sub-standard publication is why a single instance of such a paper does not get coverage ar SkS but if you remain interested in seeing the nonsense within Koutsoyiannis (2021) explained to you, do say so. I am not going to bother debunking it in detail if you are not going to read the result.
MA Rodger @87 ,
no no no thanks !
Enough of the Koutsoyiannis rubbish, already.
Why should Koutsoyiannis's paper get preference over all those Flat-Earther screeds, those Anti-Evolution screeds, those Qanon screeds, or over that confirmation of Jewish Space Lasers (or was it the UFO's ?). Or of that Faked Moon Landing?
Fair's fair, MA Rodger. You should devote a full week's analysis to every bit of rubbish "out there".
Desist, sir !
Or come back in 2035, after total debunk of all Dreck.
Stop Press. Early announcement by Nobel Committee. First Greek to receive Nobel Prize for physics. Name withheld, pending dissolution of IPCC. Riots in Athens. More to come.
Er, one moment there, MA Rodger . . . I might reconsider my request.
Santalives. Please make specific claims from any paper you like, and we will respond. But right now you are just accusing us of being closed minded.
Tell us what point a paper makes that you thinks needs to be clarified. But don't through a paper at us and ask, :"What do you think?"
Be specific.
Santalives. "How serious was the Y2K bug, I would say close to zero, why because this was western government obsession, many counties simply didn't have the money or expertise to do any Y2K remeadation but they did ask the rich countries to pay for it however. "
I agree that there was way too much hype and doom-saying nonsense, but the problem was very real and did affect systems in unexpected ways.
Out of curiousity, how many examples of system-taking down bugs would I need to show you before you admitted that you were wrong?
Scaddenp @90. Just one. But I will say I sat through countless hours of meetings of coders demonstrating there y2k bugs. Yep there was heaps that were a problem at an annoying level, but never did we see one that was a catastrophic system failure where we could not recover. We fixed them all because we basically had unlimited money but there was never a bug that was catastrophic, unless seeing 1900 instead of 2000 on your Calendar triggers you.
In response to Santalives’ questionable insistence on asking questionable questions, especially his demand for a comprehensive response to a cherry-picked questionable paper, Evan@89 has concisely and correctly asked Santalives a valid question.
I await Santalives’ thoughtfully considered comprehensive response.
However, Santalives’ responses to all other efforts to help them learn to be less harmfully misled, and every other commenter has tried to help, has prompted me to share more thoughts.
Santalives has rather conclusively proven that they are powerfully motivated to persist in harmfully misunderstanding matters that matter to the future of humanity, like many of the fans of sites like WUWT.
When I first read this item, when there were no comments, it prompted me to consider the matter and consider how I could thoughtfully respond. When I returned with some thoughts I was thrilled to see that there were already many other comments ... then I read the comments to see if they would modify my thinking. Reading the comments motivated me to make the comment I made @23. Santalives clearly did not pick-up on the hint.
My comment @48 was motivated by what continued to happen. Santalives responded @49 in a questionable way that was rapidly and effectively responded to by Evan (no need for me to respond). Santalives’ lack of a meaningful response to Evan @50 (I did not see the comment that disappeared. But I can infer from the remaining comments that Santalives’ response was more misunderstanding, adding proof of my point about them being a unique individual who shares the “anti-commonsense” “Hard of Learning – Selective Learning” characteristic (a play on “hard of hearing – selective hearing”) of fans of WUWT.
Santalives questionably asked about Newton vs. Einstein. “The Big Picture” by Sean Carroll (highly recommended reading for everyone, not just Santalives) explains that science has developed different ways of talking about similar things. Einstein’s way of talking about physics does not contradict Newton’s way of understanding what would happen to an apple when you let it go. And as a structural engineer I prefer to apply Newton’s way of describing things, even though it does not work for everything that Einstein's way does. And newer ways of describing physics are developed for newer things that Einstein was unaware of. And those newer ways of describing things are very unlikely to ‘overturn’ the fundamental understandings of Einstein. And it is highly unlikely that more in-depth pursuit of awareness and understanding regarding climate science will overturn the consensus understanding that human impacts are rapidly causing climate changes that harm the development of a sustainable improving future for humanity.
Returning to Santalives questionably asking about the motivation of people commenting on WUWT. They would each have their own motivations, beliefs and biases which have to be inferred from the patterns of their behaviour (Many situations require the development of understanding of what is going on to be inferred from observation, with the understanding that any interaction may affect the observed result. This is covered effectively by Sean Carroll in “The Big Picture”, but is more relevant to socioeconomic-political matters). Further details regarding the context for my response can be found in my comments on the three recent versions of “Analogy 1”: this one, the previous one, and the one before that.
The important question is: Is a person interested in, or willing to, learn to be less harmful and more helpful to Others. Everyone undeniably always has the ability to learn. People who can be seen to 'Resist learning to be less harmful and more helpful to Others' are harmfully motivated to harmfully misunderstand things. And competition for perceptions of superiority relative to others can produce very harmful motivations, with related harmful misunderstandings, and harmful resistance to learning to be less harmful and more helpful to Others. And competition for popularity and profit can develop harmful demands for the freedom to believe whatever excuses doing something understandably harmful that a person may hope to benefit from.
The Sustainable Development Goals are a very comprehensive presentation of the constantly improving understanding of how to be less harmful and more helpful to Others. They are the result of the efforts of thousands (perhaps millions) of people who became officially globally coordinated to collaborate by the 1972 Stockholm Conference.
Global warming related climate change (btw, As an engineer I would define “climate” as the regional climate norms - like temperature, wind, rain, snow, freezing rain - and their expected variations) is a significant impediment to Sustainable Development. The diversity of rapid climate change impacts harmfully distracts attention by forcing the pursuit of ‘adaptation attempts’ rather than the pursuit of ‘sustainable improvements’ (like the ways that a war or recovery from a natural disaster can ‘appear to improve economic performance measures like GDP’). And changes of atmospheric CO2 levels due to burning fossil fuel is a significant, but not exclusive, cause of the problems faced by global humanity into the future.
Admittedly from a ‘Sustainable Development to improve the future for humanity’ perspective there are many other harmful unsustainable ‘developed popular and profitable activities’ that are excused by harmful misunderstanding. However, this site is focused on the subset of harmful misunderstanding that relates to climate science (btw, the other human caused ghgs of concern are examples, so indeed it isn’t just CO2).
The following items are offered as further evidence of the harm being done by the popularity and profitability of harmful misunderstandings that sites like WUWT fail (potentially deliberately) to help fight against:
Sea Level Rise related to the previous versions of SkS Analogy 1.
Broader impacts of rapid human caused climate change
Regional specific impact of human caused climate change that has already happened.
Historical note for future readers of this thread :
the good Santalives has simpy transferred his circular and repetitive non-arguments to other threads.
- - - - - - -
Evan , allow me to repeat: your Lead Article is perceptive, and the analogy you draw is apt. The sociological impediments are large indeed, and yet progress is being made.
One example, IMO , is the new model Ford pickup truck, the Ford "F150 Lightning Electric". Not yet "on the streets" in numbers ~ but the advance orders are huge, and the Ford company is struggling to ramp up its production facilities. It is a large and impressive vehicle ( not a trendie greenie pricey Tesla sedan car ) , with impressively brisk acceleration, with extensive AC power outlets for tradesman's tools, and with substantial Vehicle-2-Home capability (which is a strong emotional point in its favor).
This is an electric vehicle which will powerfully impress the friends & neighbours of its new American owners. And will help break down the extensive grass-roots opposition (in the USA) to "all that darn new-fangled stuff". Now who would have thought, 10 years ago , that a humongous Pickup would be a leader for change in social attitude?
Renewable electricity generation still lags disappointingly ~ and faces huge problems in ramping up the supply.
And there is no escaping the point: the world still has not gotten the greatly-needed supply of "renewable" liquid hydrocarbon fuel. A fuel which is usable everywhere, in large quantities ~ as we see every day, as we look around. That technological advance would win hearts-and-minds !
My apologies for using 'his' in reference to Santalives in the opening statement of my comment @92. I should have used 'their'.
This is the UN webpage for the series of Conferences that started with the 1972 Stockholm Conference (50th anniversary this year) that I mention in my comment @92.
Eclectic@93 Thanks for your comments and glad you liked the article.
We are making "progress", and I, like you, am impressed with the Ford Lightning. We bought one of those "trendy" Teslas, not because we could afford it, but because it is hard for me to live with the knowledge I have about the Climate Crisis and not do anything. Five years ago Tesla was the only serious game in town. If it was today, likely I would buy a Ford. Also, in Minnesota about 90% of the gas we burn comes from tar-sands oil. I was having a difficult time living with that knowledge as well. So we bought a Tesla instead of waiting. The cost of the car hurt, but it eased my mind.
However, in my articles I draw people back again and again to the Keeling Curve. The reason is that people get excited about this bit of news or that, but nothing we've done, absolutely nothing has had any effect on the Keeling Curve's upward acceleration. Even though we have enough carbon in the atmosphere to take us to 1.7C, we're told there are plans to hold the warming at 1.5C. IF this miracle is to happen, it must happen so soon and with such effect that we should see the effect in the Keeling Curve within a few years. I have posts coming up on this with my thoughts, so I won't belabor it here.
Your next article will be most welcome, Evan.
The Keeling Curve will be stuck in its upslope for decades to come. We are blowing straight past 1.5 degreesC, and reaching 2.5 C looks a more likely peaking point. On the plus side ~ by that stage, the voters (and shareholders) will be clamoring for stricter measures . . . and most of the hard-core denialists will have died off.
But to cheer you up ~ my local story is different from yours. No tar sands here. Natural gas combined-cycle turbines provide the bedrock foundation of electrical power. We are not up to Denmark's standard yet . . . but domestic rooftop solar panels are sprouting everywhere in the suburbs, and in the country the wind turbines are claiming more and more hilltops.
My computer has a permanent tab open, showing the local electrical power generation. The picture shows gas/renewables at 50/50 at midnight (those windfarms do quite well on average). During the day, it shows 70-90% renewables, depending on wind and cloud. And so I try to limit my domestic heating/airconditioning to the peak-renewables times.
Tesla is a rare bird here ~ envied, but not copied much. Yes, everyone wants SUV's. For myself, I follow the "sunk cost" theory, and drive a 20-year-old diesel, and plan to run it into the ground. Not sure if that is the best policy, but I can make a good case for it (at present).
For Minnesota, a plug-in hybrid, surely !
Green electricity is fine, but at this stage, massive hydrocarbon fuels are needed ~ and we need a green source for those, too.
Eclectic@97 When we bought our Tesla the local power company had a deal where they guaranteed that the power we use to charge our car comes from wind power, basically using credits for that. I have no illusion that my buying a Tesla will save the world, but we drive about 25,000 miles/year. My wife worked at a rollerrink that was a 50 mile roundtrip. We could have taken the philosophy of her quiting her job was better than driving any car that far of a commute, but she was working with children, the leaders of the next age. I figured she was doing good for society working with kids, so it alleviated my guilt to know we were driving a EV powered by wind.
Yes, it will take much much more than EV's. But it;s a start.
We also have a 20-year old truck that we will use for hauling. It gets driven maybe 200 miles/year. Obviously there is no sense trading it in for a "greener" vehicle, because we would never work off the carbon used to make it.
I prefer to bypass plug-in hybrids because you have all the complexity of gas engines plus all the electric components. The Tesla is a great car and I'm confident the Fords will be as well. The only thing I'm frustrated with on the Tesla is no vehicle-to-home capability. It is a bummer to have that big battery that cannot be tapped. Ford definitely did good by providing power outlets and the ability to plug it into the house out of the box.
But the bottom line is that EV's are simply great cars to drive: stable, no transmission, quiet, and the best of all in Minnesota, they start every day, no matter how cold it is outside. :-)
Fair enough, Evan. (+ I'm sorry to be intruding on your thread so often)
My local electricity retailers do offer a guaranteed renewable [unquote] package, but I've never taken them up on it. I figure it was a zero-sum game, and what I used would simply be deducted from someone else.
It's a tricky one. Perhaps in Minnesota, it sends a signal to the power generators that customers are interested in an increase in renewable power (and a signal to politicians that voters are interested, too). But on the other hand, it could all blow back if the power companies & politicians see that only a tiny percentage of customers go that way. The best, perhaps, is if the small number of customers is showing a steady upward trend?
As you say, a car battery with V2H capability is emotionally attractive, for people do worry about power outages . . . and do like to feel they have some sort of control. Even if it doesn't actually amount to much, in real terms (on an hours per year basis). And for myself, I would love to have a car with 1000-1500 watt AC output ~ when I go camping out in the sticks. Can see myself "glamping" it up, with micro-wave oven & a coffee-maker. Decadent.
A further point on plug-in hybrids : although they are in a sense doubly complex, does this make any major difference to their carbon input for manufacture? Note that some of these plug-ins have no mechanical transmission (and that's another saving on carbon input). And with a V2H plug-in hybrid in your garage, you can run it and keep topping up the fuel tank during really prolonged outages of electricity supply.
I see the feedback message as simply informing the power company that they can increase their renewable power generation up one notch. It's no secret that we need to match storage with renewable energy generation. Even thought we may need to rebuild the grid to do this effectively, we still need that market signal from consumers to power providers to get things rolling.
Plug-in hybrids are fine. My preference against them is not because of carbon emissions during manufacturing, but simply because of upkeep and repairs. EV's are conceptually much simpler than hybrids and sshould be cheaper and simpler to repair. But I understand the attraction of plug-in hybrids as the "best" of both worlds.
For us the V2H capability is much more emotionally attractive. We lose power about 4 times/year. I can only imagine that getting worse, not better. Again, it's a perfect match between the size of EV batteries and typical home power requirements. Most US houses use about 30 kWh/day, and EV's typical have batters in the 40-100 kWh range.
But for now we are still firing up a gas burner when the power goes out. :-(