Friday Linkage 9/4/2020

It’s the first furlough Friday of September.  With all of the post-derecho cleanup accomplished in our neighborhood it seemed like a good time to high tail it out of town.  We are on the way to visit family in Lincoln, Nebraska for the holiday weekend.  The hope is that I get to spend a couple of days on local trails.

The fact that it is September is really odd.  During this time of coronavirus it seems like time both flies and stands still.  Perhaps it is like Heisenberg’s cat that is both dead and alive.  The ‘rona time uncertainty principle?

Stay safe out there.

On to the links…

Welcome to the ‘Pyrocene,’ an Epoch of Runaway Fire—Everything is on fire will be the new mantra for six months or more out of the year for a lot of the planet.

Extreme Heat is Here, and It’s Deadly—It is hot out there and it is only going to get hotter.

Americans are Saving More than Just Money by Not Commuting—The problem in the United States is not car culture, but commuting culture.  People think nothing of driving insane amounts for jobs or houses or whatever.  What is the opportunity cost of all that commuting?   $12.50 an hour seems low.

New Federal Rule Could Create Horrifying ‘Bomb Trains’—In Trump’s America it is totally cool to move trainloads of natural gas through cities.  If a few cities are leveled it is just the price to pay for making fossil fuel companies rich.  Plus, he probably sees destroyed cities as just another development opportunity for the Trump Organization.

Solar and Wind Reach 67% of New Power Capacity Added Globally in 2019, while Fossil Fuels Slide to 25%–How do we get to 0% fossil fuels added in a given year?  Actually, the goal needs to be some negative rate.

The US South Could Save Money by Cleaning Up Its Power Grid—Yet, the southeastern United States will be held back by monopoly power and politicians in the pocket of those monopoly interests.

Trump Admin Weakens Obama-Era Rule to Limit Toxic Waste From Coal Plants—Day One of a Biden-Harris administration needs to begin with a formal process—which the Trump team has ignored to the peril of their rule changes’ lifespan—to reverse every asinine decision made over the previous four years.  The list is long so a lot of people better be ready to do some heavy lifting.

How a Plan to Save the Power System Disappeared—My guess is that if someone other than Bill Barr were to investigate the motives behind these moves there would be a lot of money changing hands in ways that would smell like corruption.  Look, the Trump clan and the associated grifters are motivated by money and what money brings them in terms of status.  It is everything to these people.

Severe Storms are Increasingly Leaving Us Without Power. Microgrids can Help.—After most of the region I live in lost power—some estimates were that in the day following the derecho 99% of Linn County was without grid supplied power—the importance of some base level of power in an emergency became clear.

North Dakota Blues: The Legacy of Fracking—The bust following the fracking boom is here.  The cleanup bill is going to come due and we, the citizens of the United States, are going to be left holding the bill because the companies that caused the damage will be long gone.

The 800-Lb Gorilla Between U.S. Shale Producers And A Big Comeback: Decline Rates—There will be no comeback.  The economics of the business just do not play.

Volkswagen ID.3 Pours Across Germany, Ireland, Norway, & Elsewhere—The ID.3 and its variants are a big deal.  Why?  Volkswagen knows how to make a lot of cars in serial production and work the “kinks” out of the process.  Reasonably priced EVs from a mass market manufacturer is just what the market ordered.  Which vehicle is more important across the globe: a BMW 3 series or a Toyota Corolla?

Norway In August – Over 70% EV Market Share And Heading Higher—Norway is not a big market and it has large incentives, but 70% share is big no matter what the market conditions.  Now Tesla’s Model 3 has a competitor in the VW ID.3—funny how they both use the numeral 3—so the share could go even higher.

Norway’s Largest Private Asset Manager Divests in Chevron, Exxon for Lobbying Against Climate Action—Norway makes my head hurt lately.  On one hand it is a country that is actively divesting from fossil fuels and buying lots of EVs.  On the other hand it is planning to drill in the arctic.

Can Planting Trees Make a City More Equitable?—Well, planting a tree is not going to make a place less livable.  So get out the shovels, drop those seedlings, and lets build out some urban forest cover.

How Jack’s Solar Garden Hopes To Transform Farming—For Good—This is just such a good idea.  Combine diversified agriculture with renewable energy to power the future.

What Coffee-Brewing Method Makes the Best-Tasting Cup?—As a long time Aeropress user I am glad to see this simple machine come out on top.  Trust me, when your coffee making device only requires hot water and a little muscle power you discover how lucky you are when the power goes out for days.  A lot of people were looking longingly at their pod type machines during the week post-derecho.

5/11/2018 Friday Linkage

The world is full of bad news.  However, a beacon of hope was shining this week when it was announced the Wyld Stallyns would be returning for a third installment of most excellent adventures.

San Dimas high school football rules!

On to the links…

What Genuine, No-Bullshit Ambition on Climate Change would Look Like—Here is the deal: We have the tools necessary to make a serious effort to combat the causes of climate change.  We understand the risks of climate change and we can estimate the costs.  We have no excuses.

Winter Athletes Aren’t Going to Let Snow Vanish Without a Fight—I am a member of Protect Our Winters, but if you are a skier or a snowboarder or anyone who just likes winter you should be a supporter.

695,000 Winter Sports Jobs at Risk Due to Climate Change—Those million dollar houses are not going to be worth very much when the ski slopes are abandoned for lack of snow:

EPA Clamping Down on Public Records Requests Related to Scott Pruitt—Take a moment to remember that Donald Trump was the political outsider who was going to “drain the swamp.” Too bad he just found the worst creatures to repopulate his swamp.

Passengers ‘Lashing Out’ At Scott Pruitt Justify First-Class Travel, New EPA Memo Says—People were going to be mean to Scott Pruitt so he had to fly first class.  That is the logic of these people.  It is also just corruption and thievery.

EPA “Head” Scott Pruitt Discounts The Value Of Human Life—This is dynamic scoring for the pollution set.  Your health and well-being does not matter one bit compared to the profits to be gained by soiling the air, ground, and water.  This is the world of Donald Trump and Scott Pruitt.

Rick Perry Suggests Using ‘National Security’ to Override Opposition to Pipelines—If “national security” were really the goal, would it not be a better solution to produce power as locally as possible so it was not reliant on an exposed infrastructure?

Sun And Solar Power Cut Electricity Demand From New England Grid To Lowest Ever—Demand for baseload power dropped to a level lower than when the sun is not shining.  Solar works.

For First Time Ever, Solar Dominates UK Power Supply—This is the United Kingdom, famous for its notoriously gray weather, not Spain, famous for its sun.

US Wind Development Surges As Pipeline Exceeds 30 Gigawatts—The pipeline is critical because these are the projects that will keep the industry humming along until we can vote out the fossil fuel soaked members of Congress and the sitting President.

U.S. Added 2,000 Wind Turbines in 2017—AI Would Add 2,200 More Today—It’s not about adding more wind turbines, but wringing more power out of the wind turbines that we have already installed.  Combined with replacing the oldest and least efficient wind turbines there is a huge opportunity to expand power production.

The Puerto Rican Families Who’ve Gone Off the Grid—Puerto Rico is the unintentional laboratory for renewable energy and resilient microgrids.  What this community has learned the hard way will be good lessons in our rapidly changing climate.

The Miracle of Finland: What a Tiny Northern Minnesota Town can Teach America—In a less industrialized and less carbon intensive world I think that things will begin to look a lot more like Finland, Minnesota.

Cheap Tires Are Costing You Money and Probably Also Killing the Planet—I have a car enthusiast friend who always says, “People will spend five bucks a day on a cup of coffee, but want to save a few dollars on tires which are the only thing between you and the road.”  I have the same feeling about bicycle tires as well.

Friday Linkage 4/13/2018

Paul Ryan is gone.  Okay, he is not actually gone today instead opting to “retire” in January when his term is over.  Nonetheless, who saw this coming?

He gave the standard “spend more time with my family” and “I’ve spent enough time in Washington and want to get back home” answers as to why he was choosing to leave Congress.  Does anyone doubt for a minute that he was tired of working with the chief cantaloupe?

This tweet just about perfectly sums up the end of Paul Ryan’s time in Washington D.C.:

On to the links…

The US is Winning the Climate Fight in Electricity — and Losing it Just About Everywhere Else—This chart says it all:

Transportation is killing us, in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, and one of the biggest culprits is commercial air travel.  Flying is bad for the environment.  End of story.  And you free two day shipping on Amazon is also part of the problem because the cargo operators are flying jets all over the place to deliver our crap.  So, buy less stuff and fly less.

Solar Leads Record Renewables Investment—Solar now accounts for more than half of all the investment put into renewable energy.  China alone invested over $127 billion in renewable energy with more than two-thirds of that investment going to deploy 53 GW of solar.

Clean Energy Investment Down 10% To $61.1 Billion In First Quarter—Sometimes these are quarter over quarter anomalies driven by major investment timing, but if the trend continues into subsequent quarters it will be time to question what is driving the trend.

Google Hits its Incredible 100% Renewable Energy Goal—Google does not actually own the wind turbines and solar panels that make its renewable electricity, but it has bought enough renewable energy on the open market to account for its entire usage.

Illinois Blazes New Trail in Anticipation of Private Microgrids Using Utility Wires—Microgrids may be the future of energy generation and transmission.  The problem is that the utility companies own a lot of infrastructure and do not want anyone to have access to that infrastructure unless they control all of the terms.

Secession Or Not, Big Win For Rooftop Solar In South Carolina—South Carolina is in general a state known for doing some batshit crazy stuff.  Like electing Mark Sanford to public office…more than once…and after he had that whole Appalachian Trail thing happen.  WTF?  Anyway, if solar can score a win in South Carolina you know that things are good for solar.

Biggest Problem for U.S. Offshore Wind? Ports Are Too Small—This will hamper offshore wind development for decades as any port expansion project is a nightmare in terms of approval and execution.

This Coal Power Plant is Being Reopened for Blockchain Mining—Nothing can save coal except for another questionable idea: cryptocurrencies.

Washington State Bans Salmon Farms—Last August a breach in an aquaculture facility allowed Atlantic salmon to escape into the waters off of Puget Sound.  These non-native salmon could wreak havoc with the native species.  In response, the state of Washington has decided that hipsters love of grilled salmon is not enough of a priority to risk the health of an ecosystem.

Reckoning with History: The Parks have Been Fixed Before—The National Park system is one of America’s crown jewels, but the parks are in need of help.  This situation is, sadly, not unique in our history.  Make sure that your elected officials are committed to providing the support that our National Parks deserve and require.

REI Rolls Out First-of-its-Kind Sustainability Requirement that will Affect Every Brand in its Stores—If Congress won’t take action on sustainability than it falls to large companies to take action.  REI is, as usual, killing it.

What will Zinke do with the Extra $2.5 billion in his Budget?—Ryan Zinke wanted to gut the Department of the Interior.  Congress said, “Nope.”  What happens next?  Assuming the next most corrupt member of the chief cantaloupe’s cabinet, after Scott Pruitt, is even leading the agency in a few months.

IG: Zinke’s Reassignment Of Native Americans And Climate Scientists Possibly Illegal—The defense on this issue is the most Trumpian of all time, “We might have done something illegal, but we kept such bad records that no one can prove we did anything illegal.  Our incompetence is our shield.”  This is why Ryan Zinke needs to be the next Trumpkin out the door after Scott Pruitt gets his fossil fuel covered gremlin ass out of Washington D.C.

Why Scott Gottlieb is the One Trump Official Everybody Seems to Like—It just goes to show that even in a storm of gross incompetence and outright malfeasance that actual good governance can happen.  It’s not likely, but it is possible.

Guess What? The Rich Really are Different from Everyone Else — and It Ain’t Pretty—In the United States we have spent the last thirty or so years idolizing the rich as if they were somehow intrinsically better than everyone else with less money.  As our current president shows, money does not guarantee any sort of better human experience.  In fact, if the data is to be believed, it is likely that the rich, on average, are worse as human beings.  Suck it Ayn Rand.

A Sperm Whale that Washed up on a Beach in Spain had 64 pounds of Plastic and Waste in its Stomach—Yeah, that headline is pretty much as bad as it sounds.

 

Friday Linkage 12/22/2017

It is time to decompress and enjoy the holidays.  I know that the holidays are actually stressful for a lot of people—dinner arguments with drunk Uncle Carl who want stop saying “MAGA!” and “You’re all a bunch of snowflakes!” would take it out of any of us—but it is important to just stop for a moment.

Yes, the world seems like an unmitigated clusterfuck right now.  For all intents and purposes the world is an unmitigated clusterfuck.  However, it is important to remember that at almost any point in the history of the world things seemed like an unmitigated clusterfuck.  Except the period from 1997 to 1999.  That period of time was freaking awesome.

I digress.

On to the links…

We’re Witnessing the Wholesale Looting of America—Washington D.C. is run by a bunch of sociopaths who want to take from the many and give to the few.  The whole reverse Robin Hood thing is getting old real quick.

The EPA Spent $120,000 in Taxpayer Funds to Hire a GOP Public Relations Firm—Scott Pruitt may actually be the worst person in Trump’s administration.  He is a paranoid party hack who scans his office for bugs, built a secret phone booth like something out of a 1960s spy movie, and he now is hiring partisan opposition research firms to message his mess of a policy platform.

E.P.A. Employees Spoke Out. Then Came Scrutiny of Their Email.—If you do not think we are living in an increasingly Orwellian state than Scott Pruitt’s EPA is here to make you nervous all over again.  Remember, the president and all of his men like free speech as long as it is promoting their agenda of coal, tax cuts, foul air, dirty water, and MAGA.

Rick Perry’s Fake Grid Crisis just got Undermined by More Grid Experts—Rick Perry is the gift that keeps on giving.  No matter how much he tries—the “smart guy” glasses are a good disguise—he is just a partisan hack from Texas who has no idea what he is doing when it comes to leading the department of Energy.  His marching orders from the head Cheeto is to find out a way to pay back the coal barons who love America so much they want to blanket it in fly ash.

Global Coal Consumption Forecast to Slow—Other than India the world is trying to get off coal.

The World’s Biggest Coal Port is Now Preparing for the End of Coal—What happens when the market for coal dries up?  It does not matter how much people like Donald Trump want to mine coal if there is no one to burn coal and no place to transport coal.

Burning Wood instead of Coal in Power Stations makes Sense if it’s Waste Wood—When the forests are managed for timber products, like in the southern United States, there is a lot of waste wood that does not get turned into lumber or pulp.

Tesla Responsible for Slide in U.S. Home Solar Sales—Have we entered the slow growth phase of residential solar installations?  Or, is the business model used by companies like the former Solar City not up to long term stability?

Iowa Utilities Adding to State’s Wind Power Portfolio—Announcements like these are pretty routine in Iowa right now as Alliant Energy and MidAmerican Energy are putting the finishing touches on some serious wind energy expansion.  Iowa is driving toward more than 50% wind produced electricity in the near term when you look at the aggregate numbers.

Germany Predicted To Set Renewable Energy Record In 2017—Take a moment to check out the chart:

Over 33% is coming from renewables and counting nuclear over 44% is carbon free.  This is progress.

Meet the Microgrid, the Technology Poised to Transform Electricity—As our grid becomes increasingly brittle the solution to future resiliency may be a solution that looks a lot like the early days of electrification when small scale grids dominated.

Solar Power and Battery Storage could Topple 10GW of US Natural Gas Peaker Plants—Peaker plants are the necessary evils of the energy marketplace.  When demand starts to spike in excess of baseload power these plants come on line fast to make up for the deficit.  The downside to this rapid action is a severe lack of efficiency compared to traditional combined cycle generation plants.  Replacing these plants with a renewable solution would be a very green thing kilowatt hour for kilowatt hour.

Unconventional Solar Panel Siting Saves Agricultural Land While Providing Plenty Of Power—Basically, there is a lot of potential space for solar panels that would not in any way imperil our ability to produce food.  Just sock this away for that moment this holiday season when drunk Uncle Carl starts talking about how solar panels are taking away land from the farmers.

Food Waste is 20 Percent of Iowa Trash—Waste is bad.  Twenty percent is crazy because it is just money in the dump.

One-Third of Forests aren’t Growing Back after Wildfires—Well, that sucks.

Wine Glasses are Seven Times as Big as they Used to Be—Given how messed up things seem lately I am surprised that the glasses are just seven times bigger than before.

Friday Linkage 3/3/2017

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Damn, March already?  Where did the winter go?  Oh right, winter is going to be a shorter and shorter season as climate change robs us of snowy days and Donald Trump fiddles while the world burns.

On to the links…

Social Media Are Driving Americans Insane—The greatest thing I have ever done is disengage from Facebook.  I maintain an account because there are some businesses that require a log-in to view their content due to age restrictions, etc. but I do not maintain any sort of up-to-date presence.  Consider disengaging as well for the sake of your soul.

This Video Will Make You Believe in Climate Change—It’s not like someone reading this blog does not already believe in the impacts of climate change.  Take a moment, watch the video, and forward the link on to someone who might be on the fence.  Just avoid that Trump supporter in your office who reacts to everything with a spittle laced tirade.

The Pruitt Emails: E.P.A. Chief Was Arm in Arm With Industry—Scott Pruitt is a tool of the oil and gas lobby.  Plain and simple.  Any decision he makes as the head of the EPA is tainted by his close ties with oil and gas companies.

Exxon just Decided to Keep a Big Chunk of its Tar Sands in the Ground—Did you hear that?  It was the faintest sound that oil companies know that difficult to obtain sources of oil are not going to be economically viable in an economy where renewables and efficiency are the name of the game.

Why Oil Prices will Never Return to $100 a Barrel, in One Chart—I am not going to say never like the title of the article, but the underlying supply and demand curves do not favor high priced oil:

The Blue Collar Job of the Future Is Solar Panel Installer—Coal mining is dead.  Automation, natural gas, and coal executives killed the coal miner’s job.  Installing solar panels and working on wind turbines are the blue collar replacement you have been seeking.

Palo Alto’s Repair Café Aims to Combat Throwaway Culture—The world needs more of this kind of cooperation.  How many of us have something that is in need of a small repair that we are incapable of doing?  How many of those slightly broken items could have a long life ahead of them?

How a Pacific Island Changed From Diesel to 100% Solar Power—Islands are our renewable energy laboratories because the electricity grids tend to be isolated and expensive to operate.  Lessons learned from these projects can be applied to larger grids on the mainland.

Pumped Hydro Storage Could Secure 100% Renewable Electricity For Australia—Think about pumped hydro storage as a huge, fairly efficient battery that can be deployed to regulate the intermittency of renewables.

Vacant Lots Provide More Ecosystem Services than Backyard Trees—In the book The New Wild the author makes the same point that vacant, disturbed land is a valuable ecosystem in an era when all landscapes have been shaped by human hands through climate change.

This Anarchist and ‘Anti-Fascist’ Activist is Using Facts to go After the Far-Right Fringe—You are free to say whatever you want in this country and the government cannot impinge your freedom for doing so, but that does not mean private citizens need to put up with your shit.  Daryle Lamont Jenkins is an American hero for making sure that these reprehensible scumbags cannot hide in their little alt-right spider holes.

Infographic Explains Why Coffee and Tea are so Good for Us—Ahhh, infographics.  Like salve for my soul:

Friday Linkage 5/30/2014

This is going to be a short list of links because I am currently on a plane heading to Denver with my brother to spread my parents ashes near the Continental Divide. The upside to this depressing event is that I get to sample some great beers from Front Range brewers. More to come.

On to the links…

Obama to Unveil Rule to Cut Greenhouse Gas Emissions—With no action possible in Congress, the President will issue a new rule through the EPA under the Clean Air Act to, in essence, cut greenhouse gas emissions from coal fired power plants. Republicans will howl that this is an “imperial President,” but conveniently forget how much they liked the same kind of action under the second Bush. It’s called progress.

There is Still Hope for the Climate: Regional Cures for Planetary Fever—I do not know if I am so positive anymore, but some part of me hopes that we cobble together a patchwork of solutions that will avoid the absolute worst of climate change and leave it to our children to fix the mess. We suck as a species.

Wind Energy In 2013 Was Equivalent To Taking 20 Million Cars Off The Road—It’s amazing how much wind energy has been deployed in the United States. Now imagine if we could have a similar commitment to deploy residential solar at this level. Damn.

Ohio Is Poised To Be The First State To Roll Back Its Renewable Energy Standard—Just when you think you are making real progress, ass clowns like those in Ohio’s legislature, egged on by Republican a-hole Governor John Kasich, decided to gut the state’s RES. Progress be damned in the face of Koch money!

On the Road to Green Energy, Germany Detours on Dirty Coal—Following the nuclear disaster at Fukushima, the German government pledged to get the country out of the business of generating power from nuclear sources. While laudable it does mean that the country is going to have to turn to coal to meet its commitment.

‘A Government Of Thugs’: How Canada Treats Environmental Journalists—Apparently, my view of Canadians being easy going was dead wrong when it comes to the government’s treatment of environmental journalists and activists. It’s an insidious thing for a government that claims to be transparent to act as an agent for private development, but it is the nature of our modern governments that this is the case. If you do not believe this to be true, just review the case of Tim DeChristopher.

Resiliency+: Distributed Generation and Microgrids Can Keep Lights On During the Next Storm—Every time there is a storm or major power disruption on the east coast of the United States this topic comes up because somewhere in the center of the problem was a microgrid powered by renewables that kept the lights on. Maybe it’s a trend now.

Turbines Popping Up on New York Roofs, Along With Questions of Efficiency—I guess that in order to attract trust fund hipsters a developer needs to include some sort of greenwashing for their project.

The Time My Mom Got Me A Tiger—It’s not what you think. This video talks about the problem of captive tigers being used for photo opportunities and the chance he got to “adopt” his tiger.

Strange Brews: The Genes of Craft Beer—I brew a lot of beer and the science of yeast really escapes me. It seems that it does not make a difference in some recipes and, yet, in others the difference is marked. What gives?

Chef Dan Barber on the Farm-to-Table Movement’s Next Steps—I don’t always agree with Dan Barber’s ideas about food as I find them to be difficult to scale in order to “feed the world” but nonetheless he is an important influence in how the system develops.

Solar Roadways: A Modest Proposal?—I love seeing this idea get press outside of the normal “green” outlets. One thing lost in the discussion about these panels is that it does not even have to be used on roads to be really effective. How many square feet of driveway, sidewalk, and parking lot exist in just the united states that could be covered with the material? Just saying.

Ford’s Customers Tested Its New Trucks for Two Years, and They Didn’t Even Know It—I am watching the development of the next generation Ford F-150 with a lot of interest. For one, I own an F-150 for work. Second, it’s the best selling vehicle in America so any technology deployed successfully on this platform will likely find itself adopted across a broad swath of vehicles. Of most interest is the new aluminum body, replacing traditional steel, that is purported to cut over 700 pounds off the weight of the truck in the interest of fuel economy. Interesting.