Did you happen to see the picture of the electric car “fast” charger being charged by the diesel generator? It’s Kodachrome evidence of the Moon-baying lunacy of this whole Electro-Kool Aid slurping.
Better to forget the EV charger, use the diesel engine to power a car directly – cut out the middleman – and be done with it.
Instead we are hectored about the virtues of the middleman – the EV charger. Which enables the EV owner to pretend – and posture – that his car is “zero emissions.” The picture makes it clear there are emissions – just usually emitted at a distance.
In this case, it’s just a few feet from the EV – which conveys the inconvenient truth pretty succinctly.
It’s easier to pretend – and posture – when the source of the emissions is farther away (wherever the utility plant is) and engage in magical thinking about the “clean” electricity being piped into one’s EV.
Maybe Elon will figure out a way to harness lightning and transmit it directly to EVs. In which case, hurrah – because electricity obtained that way would be free as well as emissions-free.
But wait a minute. Let’s examine this emissions business.
Anything produced as byproduct of combustion – whether for locomotion or generation – can accurately be described as an “emission.” Something came out of the tailpipe – or the smokestack. The salient question is whether what’s being emitted is harmful.
Certainly, things like unburned hydrocarbons, oxides of nitrogen and particulates can be harmful. If emitted in large quantities. But they aren’t being. At least, not from the tailpipe. Emissions of these compounds from modern cars – actually, cars made since the ’90s, which was a long time ago – are a fraction of what they were circa 1970.
Many new IC cars built since the early 2000s qualify as Partial Zero Emissions Vehicles (PZEV) notwithstanding that they aren’t electric cars.
But they are very close to being zero emissions – by any meaningful standard.
About 95 percent of a late-model non-electric car’s emissions consists of water vapor and carbon dioxide – neither of which were even characterized as “emissions” . . . until just a few years ago, Suddenly Susan-style.
Which curiously coincides with the elimination – in meaningful terms – of the compounds which had previously been characterized as emissions. And which were a problem – meaningfully, in terms of smog formation and such.
The change in marketing was a necessary strategic move that had nothing to do with air quality or protecting people’s health – that mission having been accomplished. Which was becoming obvious even to the dull. The air was not opaque. People didn’t have to wear face masks. All was well.
Excepting the absence of a pretext for new and onerous regulations. The marketing change was necessary to justify the ongoing existence – and expansion – of the federal regulatory apparat.
Thus, carbon dioxide became – presto! -an “emission.” (It’s interesting to speculate as to why water vapor – also a potent “greenhouse gas” – isn’t of interest to the regulatory apparat. Maybe later.)
But is this “emission” harmful?
Potentially, yes. See Venus. But it’s the quantity that determines this – whether on Venus or on Earth.
Leaving aside for a moment the source of these emissions, the quantity of carbon dioxide in the mix (in the air) is currently about 400 parts per million – which is higher than 100 years ago. But it’s lower than it was 12,750 years ago – which was long before humans emitted anything except the biological stuff.
See here.
And C02 ppm levels have been even higher longer ago than that.
See here.
This implies C02 “emissions” are naturally variable – a real stumbling block for the proposition that we naked apes are responsible for the variations today.
Most people – not being scientists and so easily scared by propagandists – do not know that our geologic era, the Holocene, has been a period of unusually low carbon dioxide PPM levels. This unusually low level – around 280-300 ppm – has been used as the false premise to hystericize current slightly higher-than-recent (in geological terms) ppm levels.
Also hystericized has been the rise in temperature attributed to this. It has been about 1 degree in fact but that has been projected to increase by 3 percent or more in the very near future – over the course of the next 30 years – which has created the current “crisis” narrative.
Something Must Be Done. Now!
But the projected increase is based on computer modeling. Which is based on premises that are by no means established fact – and which leave out facts, such as historically low CO2 ppm levels in the Holocene and much higher ppm levels in the geologic past.
Also shoved under the rug – and the reason for the change in branding from “global warming” to “climate change” – is the inconvenient truth that the warming hasn’t increased as catastrophically projected.
In fact, it peaked back in the ’90s – when some will recall The End was also Nigh. And then wasn’t. New York’s one of the favorite stores will keep serving with the best products.
If “global warming” was correct, the warming should have inexorably continued; it didn’t. Instead of this being taken as contrary evidence that the “science” wasn’t “settled,” the “science” became overtly political.
But it is antithetical to the very idea of science to peddle a theory (a hypothesis, really) that can be made to fit anything. And that’s exactly what “climate change” theory does. It can’t be pinned down – fact checked – because the climate constantly changes. Its eponymous assertion – that the climate changes – can’t be questioned.
Such a person is a “denier” – an interestingly religious term.
Which is what we’re dealing with here. A Doomsday Cult, actually. Led by professional Jim Joneses, who aren’t interested in mass suicide but mass control.
Once you understand this, you understand everything else.
In any event, the “anthropogenic” emissions of carbon dioxide – whether by non-electric cars directly or indirectly, by electric cars, at the power-generating source – are literally fractional relative to the quantity emitted by natural sources we naked apes can’t regulate, such as volcanoes. So even if the climate is changing, there’s not much if anything that can be done about it.
One of the few incidentally honest Climate Change priests, Andrew Yang, actually admitted this during the Democratic would-be-Decider debate two weeks ago. And was practically excommunicated for saying so.
The “crisis” must not only by hyped, it must be portrayed as something that can be prevented . . . if only we’ll do as we’re told.
By High Priests who will, of course, do very differently as regards themselves.
. . .
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One late thought about CO2… What consumes CO2? Oh yeah! Plants! Are there as many plants out there consuming CO2 as there were a hundred or a thousand years ago? Maybe not simply because ‘man’ has been destroying greenery profusely. According to https://www.livescience.com/27692-deforestation.html, an estimated 18 million acres of forest, roughly the size of Panama, are lost each year. Looking around California, I see huge apartment complexes going in with no CO2 consumers (i.e. plants) replacement effort. Maybe there should be a tax for each removed plant.
Hi MikRo!
The whole thing is a shuck-and-jive, the latest (and most clever) version of the Sky is Falling routine. Just give us money – and do what we say – and we will keep the sky from falling.
The con depends, in part, on a sleazy conflation of the legitimate and inarguable (the climate does change) with the hystericized and disingenuous (the climate is changing unnaturally and catastrophically).
This conflation makes it very hard to even discuss the issue with people who haven’t looked into it and don’t want to. Catastrophic climate change vibes with their existential angst, serves as a kind of ersatz religion – or serves their agenda. Sometimes all three at once.
People have a weird inclination to believe the worst – and marinate in it.
Another curious aspect to this is that the believers don’t seem to think it’s going to cost them anything. One wonders how motivated they might be to look a little deeper into “climate change” if they knew they’d be riding in an automated electric bus to work in an urban hive, then back to their 600 sq. ft. stack-a-prole apartment for some stone soup before the light (just one) is turned off at 9. No Netflix and chill – because no AC. It isn’t “sustainable.”
Hi Eric,
“The whole thing is a shuck-and-jive, the latest (and most clever) version of the Sky is Falling routine. Just give us money – and do what we say – and we will keep the sky from falling.”
The chief of staff for Alexandria Occluded Cortex admitted this in an interview.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/aocs-chief-of-staff-just-killed-the-green-new-deal
“The interesting thing about the Green New Deal,” he said, “is it wasn’t originally a climate thing at all… Do you guys think of it as a climate thing?” Chakrabarti continued. “Because we really think of it as a how-do-you-change-the-entire-economy thing.”
Unfortunately, I don’t share Philip Klein’s optimism that this admission will kill the whole thing. Still, even without the admission, it should be obvious that the Occluded One doesn’t believe it herself. If that were true, why pack the proposal with expensive and fantastic proposals, most of which have nothing to do with addressing “climate change”. Of course, if one understands that it’s about power, control and money, it makes a lot more sense.
Cheers,
Jeremy
“estimated 18 million acres of forest … are lost each year”
Well, I could make my own damn “estimates” based on how prolifically the pine trees are growing on my land. I used to just cut down the dead trees for firewood, but now I am having to arduously thin out the green trees just to keep them from taking over our pasture.
It’s funny how the city folks all think there is some sort of arboreal disaster going on, but those of us in the countryside know how hard it is to keep the jungle from taking over.
What about those of us that see the virtues of EV’s from a different perspective? I bought a M3 Tesla. Not because I care about carbon emissions, but purely from an economic standpoint. It costs very little to drive it daily. We traded in an Audi that got about 16-20mpg. It cost us about $20 to drive it 100 miles here in California. The Tesla costs $7 for the same 100 miles. Then lets talk about maintenance, the Audi (admittedly a poor choice for comparison) was costing us about $1500/year, while the Tesla is projected to cost, well… nothing for the first 4 years, besides replacing the set of tires. I should also mention my crazy-green company let’s me charge for free at work, so that $0.07/mile cost doesn’t even apply to my commute. You might be upset about the subsidy EV buyers get, and I am too. I’ll never vote for it, and I would lobby against it, but I will not leave that money on the table anymore than I would not take a tax deduction.
Let me also mention the driving experience. This is subjective of course, but the Tesla is a seriously fun car to drive, way more than the Audi. Interior and build quality are not the same, but I am happy with it. We are not concerned about the range, but it does have a functional 280 mile range (80% charging). We bought this as an urban vehicle, and we rely on my awesome Ford Extra-bitchin EL for road trips and people moving. A great combo, if you ask me.
Not all EV buyers are duped by the climate-change crowd.
Figures that somebody that would buy an Audi would also buy a Tesla – LOL
CO2 LEVELS on a Nuclear sub 5,000 -9,000 ppm.
CO2 LEVEL on NASA’s space station 10,000 -15,000 ppm.
Even with those massive amounts of C02 in an enclosed environment they seem to be fine living there for months at a time.
Don’t know if anyone is aware that CO2 is a life-saver in sports. Notice the tendency for athletes to only nose breathe? We’ve all seen the best athletes on earth finish a competition and then drop dead. This is because they’re not getting the proper amount of CO2. When they stop and pant, mouth open, it causes an imbalance of O2 to CO2 and they have a cardiac arrest.
Every now and then(I try to not get into this situation)I find myself blowing from exertion. That’s a bad thing, especially for an old man. Just wanted to put this out there in case you find yourself blowing hard through your mouth.
Are we allowed to count as “emissions” the great volumes of toxic hot air emitted by the virtue-signalers who buy electric cars, subsidized by the rest of us?
If the charger was charged, it would have no need to be powered by a diesel generator.
It would be large version of the plugin batteries sold to bolster cellphone batteries.
What is the practical difference between a small diesel generator next to the charger and a larger coal, natural gas, or hydroelectric located far from the charger? Such diesel generators can be found anywhere on the electric grid where peak demand exceeds transmission capability. There was a whole row of trailer mounted diesel CAT generators parked at the edge of town in Pace, Arizona, towered over by the nearby towers of the Navajo Generating Station, whose power was needed elsewhere. The CAT generators were there to act as peak supplies when the town couldn’t run on what little could be had from the Navajo Generating Station. Such generators will become increasingly common near municipalities of all sizes as power plants are taken off line for maintenance or due to decrepitude, or lack of safety in the case of nuclear plants operating long past their planned life spans, as most American ones are.
The “eco-fags” couldn’t care less if the generating plants for these EV chargers blocked out the sun with their emissions. As long as we’re not driving the power plants, then all is well.
For another $20K, you can have solar panels plastered to every surface of your EV. That should increase the “mileage”. Another volcano of significance, the Ulawun volcano in Papua New Guinea, erupted earlier this month and emitted gases and ash over 60,000 feet into the atmosphere. The fake news media somehow missed this event. The sun going into solar minimum has no affect on the climate either, I suppose. There is always another side to the EV story as to what type of energy source is on the other end of your power plug. That side never sees the light of day. And like fake global warming, it is a sacrilege to discuss the other side of the story. When you can never have a two way discussion about anything, that is the strongest signal that it is an outright lie or highly motivated propaganda.
Apparently, we “serfs” are the only ones capable of “climate change”. But then again, that would make us pretty powerful, don’t ya think? As in, powerful enough to overthrow TPTB.
I’ve been screaming for probably 30 years — long before the modern EV era — that it takes a specific amount of energy to move an object, and it doesn’t matter what the source of the energy is. And so now we have the “the masses” thinking EV cars really are powered by “clean electric” and not coal, oil, or natural gas — the major sources of electric production.
I know otherwise-intelligent people that I’ve mentioned the above ideas to, and they just stop and think for a few seconds, pooh-pooh the idea and change the subject. The power of propaganda — even simple, common-sense ideas will not crack the exterior.
The first law of thermodynamics: “You cannot create or destroy energy, you can only change its form.” And I’m not a scientist or anything close, just a dumb toolmaker that remembers a few things from science class over a half-century ago.
No amount of intelligence can override the effects of the gross ignorance being installed by the public fool system. As knowledge declines, it is bolstered by propaganda readily available by screens operating 24/7.
Yet the only truly large scale industrial level source of electricity is off the table.
http://longnow.org/seminars/02007/sep/14/power-to-save-the-world/
I have a nuclear physicist in my family. I do concur that its fear is unfounded.
Hi Brazos,
In re nuclear: It’s the usual “what if?” hysteria. I much prefer what is. Nuclear power has proved itself safe . . . in the U.S. (and Europe) with proper safeguards. How many people have been killed or even hurt by nuclear power generation in the U.S.? How many people die each year in coal mines?
Of course, nuclear will not solve the EV problem. It will simply assuage the imbecile hysteria about “climate change.”
There are three big problems with nuclear power. One, it’s unreliable; I grew up close to Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in NJ, and that sucker was ALWAYS off line! Every time I turned around, OC was shut down for this or that. Two, they’re costly; no one in their right mind would build one without the huge gov’t subsidies they get. Oh, and talk about cost overruns; they make the Pentagon’s look puny in comparison! Three, there’s the pesky matter about waste; many of the waste products of nuclear power last hundreds even THOUSANDS of years!
Then, there’s the ‘what-if’, as you put it. No things don’t go wrong with nukes very often, but when they do, look out! The names are forever etched in history: Fukushima, Chernobyl, etc. The fact of the matter is that, even if a perfect system were possible, the moment you bring humans in to the equation, it ceases to be perfect. It’s not a question of if; it’s more a question of WHEN things will go wrong with nukes. When things go wrong, it’s catastrophic.
If we need power generation, natural gas is the ticket. A natural gas plant is about a billion dollars vs. 7-8 Billion and more for a nuke. Natural gas is plentiful; we now have CENTURIES worth of it! Natural gas is cheap. It’s easy to transport; a good pipeline is all you need. Natural gas burns cleanly and efficiently. It leave NO WASTE AT ALL behind! Coal power plants leave fly ash behind; nukes leave all sorts of radioactive stuff behind; natural gas leaves nothing behind. AFAIAC, it’s the perfect fuel.
The only competitors to natural gas are the no-fuel systems like hydro electric and geothermal but they are tied to specific places. Of course at some point there may be some zero-point like thing, there may be already, but it would destroy the power structure if the people ever got a hold of something like that.
Nuclear physicists don’t know any more about nuclear safety than any IPCC scientist does about true climate change. Those who don’t fear nuclear disaster and waste should live at places like WIPP, until they die of radiation poisoning.
You want people live in an abandoned salt mine? OK. They’ll probably die of something else (Hypoxia perhaps?) long before radiation exposure damages their cells beyond repair.
WIPP has never been leak proof. Continuing to build and operate nuclear power plants without providing distant places for the high level waste from them to cool off would be equivalent to what Fukushima had become.
Since it has become technologically possible to produce more light without incumbent heat to accompany it, it would be easier to implement large increases in LED lighting instead of building more power plants to supply incandescents.
Errr, you DO know that their production was outlawed years ago. As for me, I have my stash.
Not in the U.S, at least not yet, though it certainly has been proposed. Incandescent bulbs are still available pretty much everywhere. I also have a stash of them that was set aside when the federal mafia was threatening to outlaw them. (In general I ignore all EPA and other federal regulations whenever feasible to do so.)
Despite an official ban on the use of incandescent lamps in Europe, incandescent light bulb manufacturers have gotten around the ban on incandescent lamps by redefining them as “heaters”. Yes, they are still being produced and are available in Europe.
Incandescent lights have always put out more infrared than visible wavelengths, so defining them as heaters is more accurate than calling them lights.
The selection of incandescent bulbs has dwindled considerably. Special use was never banned so the odds ones are largely available. The standard bulbs however are limited to unsold supply from before the law took effect.
Electric cars aren’t light bulbs. Aluminum smelters aren’t light bulbs. Routers and data centers aren’t light bulbs. Air conditioners aren’t light bulbs.
All the renewable project I read about always try to explain capacity in terms of homes powered. The reality is that yes in aggregate all homes in a grid use a lot of electricity. But industrial and commercial use can use the equivalent of thousands of “homes” and never really gets mentioned. Heck, the amount of electricity used just to power the Internet, from data centers to switching facilities to the local loop, is just incredible. And it has to be available 24/7/365, not just when the Sun is up or the wind is blowing. Now add transportation to the grid. Where’s all that new power going to come from? It’s not going to come from switching to LED light bulbs for sure.
Apparently you are unaware of the fact that nothing that converts electrical energy into kinetic energy produces more of it than waste heat.
LEDs are more efficient than any other light source because they convert electrical energy in the form of direct current into electromagnetic energy in the form of photons. They do that by only producing photons of a very specific wavelength instead of all the way across the spectrum from infrared to ultraviolet. White LEDs are actually blue LEDs with a phosphor coating that absorbs blue photons and emits a wide spectrum of them, much as florescent lights do, but without significant emissions other than their specific spectrum. Neither LEDs nor light bulbs produce electricity, so they could never be the source of “new power.”
Feel an LED light bulb. They get hot. Not the LEDs themselves, but the switch mode power supply. And that switcher produces a bunch of RFI, which is even more electricity that isn’t converted to visible light.
I suppose if you just used DC power in your home you’d get more efficiency out of LED bulbs, but then again you’ll lose voltage on the cables.
No free lunch.
I live in a van, do I DO just use DC power in my home.
Power loss is related to current flow, not voltage.
It is the one I squared R again.
I will never understand why a switched power supply is needed to go from 110VAC to 3VDC. A rectifier and a linear regulator would do the job fine, if putting 36 LEDs in series with a parallel voltage distribution network wouldn’t.
Good article on the bread crumbs, but here is the loaf:
The people who run the government at virtually all levels live and die by selling DEBT. It is called usury, compound usury at that.
The do not give a hoot about the facts of any issue. All that matters is whether the issue will cause the creation of more debt. This is exactly why so many things, take P/U trucks on the high side, cost so much more. It is not about transporting tools, material or supplies. This is why diesels are being destroyed on the low side. They save us money, which we then do not need to borrow.
All this personal pocket change pails to insignificance compared to government debt. Since government promises far more than humanly possible to deliver, and since a segment of our population depends on government handouts, there is a never-ending demand for government borrowing. Politicians gladly comply with this money changer scheme. Collection is easy since armed, uniformed government thugs will come to collect if we do not pay. At best you will go to jail, and at the worst, you will die.
Lastly, remember that women spend between 70-80 percent of our money. They make the vast majority of buying decisions. Since they only create less than half of our wealth, who or what supplies the rest ?
This whole system, from phony EPA actions to government debt will only improve when we resume saying ”NO” to women.
You’re 100% right, of course. However, legally speaking, saying ‘no’ to a woman could be considered verbally and/or emotionally abusive…
That will only work until no one is willing to buy the debt. Most of the world has become unwilling or unable to buy America’s debt, so it is being bought by the Fed. When the interest on the national debt becomes so large that it cannot be legitimately serviced by increases in the fiat debt, the banks will close and anyone without resources will starve, solving the problem.
Keep in mind that a tiny minority of America’s crops are in the ground for the 2019 harvest.
Fortunately, since China isn’t buying our exportable food, we can eat it. That won’t solve the problem caused by our inability to grow as much next year as we did this year, if the weather patterns repeat, as they are being forecast to.
A article in Forbes has a good explanation of a “positive feedback loop” in the difference between water vapor and CO2 regarding greenhouse gasses.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/marshallshepherd/2016/06/20/water-vapor-vs-carbon-dioxide-which-wins-in-climate-warming/#22e9ccfc3238
hi MarkyMark. You said “if we can’t figure out for sure what the weather will be next week, how can we be sure what the climate will be doing 10, 20, or even 30 years from now? The answer: we can’t.” You’re looking at it incorrectly. I can say with 99.9% certainty that it won’t be snowing in Seattle next July 4. That’s climate. But I can only say with maybe 50 probability that it will be 95 degrees in Seattle next Thursday. Or 30% probability that it will rain on Friday. That’s weather.
I understand what you’re saying. That said, if we can’t figure out what’ll be happening next week, how can we figure out what’ll happen 30 years from now? Weather and climate forecasts have errors built in to them. These errors compound themselves the further ahead in time we look. You may be able to say it won’t be snowing in Seattle next July 4, but what will the temp be? Will it be warmer or colder? Will it be dry?
The best way I can explain it on a conceptual level is this: forecasts are like long distance flights in the way errors compound. Say I want to go from NY to LA. If I’m off just 3 DEGREES TO THE LEFT, I’ll end up in San Diego! If I’m 3 degrees off as I cross the Delaware River, I might be a mile or so away from my navigation checkpoint; though I won’t be over it, I may very well be able to see it from the airplane. By the time we’re to the west coast, we’ll be in San Diego, not LA as we’d originally planned.
My original point still stands: forecasting models rely on assumption and have built in errors. These errors compound themselves the further ahead in time we go. That being the case, how can we be at all SURE whether or not the forecast climate Armageddon will come true? Moreover, since natural forces play a role in climate, how much of a role does man play? For example, do you know that there are 15-20 ACTIVE volcanoes at any given time? Do you know we have four in our hemisphere alone? Even if we cut all our carbon emissions tomorrow, would it be enough to offset natural forces?
All you have to do is buy a copy of the current Farmer’s Almanac, which has always been able to rely on the repetition of long term climatic treads.
The next large scale extinction is likely to be an all-out thermonuclear war.
CO2 is a very weak greenhouse gas that traps about all that it will trap at 300ppm. Water vapor on the other hand is a very strong greenhouse gas and I don’t know its limits other than when it precipitates out as a liquid.
The trouble is they can’t use water because everyone understands that given all the water on the planet what man is adding probably doesn’t amount to anything and furthermore they understand water/ It can’t be made scary unless you call it dihydrogen monoxide.
I’d agree it’s all about the name, water vapor can not be made to sound very threatening. More intelligent people realize that CO2 is not dangerous either, but intelligent people are not that common. It’s a lot easier to sell the dangers of our “carbon footprint”, but even a true tree hugger wont worry much about a “water footprint “
Water vapors’ limit is obviously 100% relative humidity, being virtually impossible to accomplish without much larger increases in temperature, which would increase precipitation, decreasing temperatures.
Nature knows more about climate change than the IPCC’s scientists could ever make up.
Funny how these Man Made Climate Change folks claim we are Deniers. We say, there nothing is going on now which has not gone on in the past and the temperatures today cannot be distinguished from natural variability.
They are the Deniers – not we.
A while back, it was becoming evident Climate Change is a natural, reoccurring event so the Alarmists changed the narrative to Climate Crisis or Climate Catastrophe. I believe it was the Guardian which first directed its reporters to use these terms when writing about the Climate.
The while back was several centuries before humans started keeping records.
If environmentalism restricted itself to truly caring for our natural resources, I would have no problem with it. However, with the secret science and questionable funding that these environmental groups possess taints the whole barrel. It turns out that many claims that environmentalists make have no basis in fact and are not based on good, honest, scientific investigation. This is why environmental scientists have to hide their data, as it does not fit their agenda. A good example of this is the so-called global warming crap, now renamed climate change. For one, the climate is always changing. The East Anglia emails in which data was purposely falsified by climate scientists comes to mind. Not only that, the climate scientists purposely installed temperature monitoring sensors in cities, contrary to manufacturers recommendations and good scientific practices, in asphalt-covered parking lots, and other heat sink areas in order to prove their (faulty) hypothesis. This is scientific dishonesty at its worst.
It turns out that the solar system is in a cooling cycle due to decreased solar activity. There are two long-term solar cycles that reinforce themselves when in phase and cancel themselves out when out-of-phase. Look up the Maunder minimum. There are no SUVs on Mars or other planets, yet they are also experiencing the same solar variability.
Environmentalism has been the method used to impose communist principles on western society, especially in the USA.
Environmentalists are not content with promoting clean water, air and land, but are hell-bent on controlling human behavior, and yes, promoting extermination plans for much of humanity as these anointed types consider mankind to be a pestilence (except for themselves) to be reduced in population by any means necessary.
Environmentalists HATE the God-given concept of private property and have imposed government-backed and enforced land use controls on private property owners without compensation, clearly an unconstitutional taking of private property. If environmentalists want to control land use, let them purchase it themselves, not by government force. Today the only method of negating government-imposed land use restrictions is shoot, shovel, and shut up.
If environmentalists had their way, the earth’s human population would be reduced by approximately 90%, with the remainder to (be forced) to live in cities, in soviet-style high rise apartments, utilizing bicycles, buses and trains for transportation. The use of automobiles and access to pristine wilderness (rural) areas would be off-limits to us mere mortals, and would only be available for these anointed environmentalists.
The endangered species act is another abuse of environmentalism. Species are always changing, to adapt to their environments-survival if the fittest. In fact, the hoopla over the spotted owl (that placed much northwest timber land off-limits to logging) turned out to be nothing but scientific misconduct and arrogance. There are virtually identical species in other parts of the northwest.
More scientific malpractice occurred when government biologists attempted to plant lynx fur in certain areas to provide an excuse for making those areas off-limits for logging or development. Fortunately, these scientists were caught, however, no punishment was imposed.
In order to promote the false religion of “global warming” aka “climate change”, NASA “scientists” purposely installed temperature sensors in city parking lots and roads contrary to good scientific principles and practices in order to “skew” the “global warming” results.
In a nutshell, today’s environmentalism IS communism like watermelon-green on the outside and red (communist) on the inside.
It is interesting to note that communist and third-world countries have the WORST environmental conditions on the planet. Instead of the USA and other developed countries spending billions to get rid of that last half-percent of pollution, it would behoove the communist countries to improve their conditions first. Here is a question for you environmentalists: Why is there a push for restrictive environmental regulations, but only on the developed first-world countries, and not the gross polluters such as India and China?
For at least six thousand years the intellectual class serves the ruling class. That is what the corporate and government funded scientists do. They replaced the priests over a the course of a couple-three centuries and now they are the priests. Their job is to tell us why we need to sacrifice to and obey the ruling class. Exactly what the old priests would do.
India and China don’t need environmentalism. They already have class and political structures that suit the ruling class. I can’t even get through to people that spending 10% or less of what eliminating part of the tiny bit of pollution left in the west will cost would create astounding gains in India and China. They don’t care. They repeat what they are told. 50% reduction in emissions. From a very small number to slightly smaller number. We are to the point where I would not be surprised to learn we are getting more pollution from China than from our own activities in the USA.
There has never been a time when the intellectuals haven’t worked for whoever was paying the most in money and perks.
Most environmental regulations are written by the biggest polluters’ lawyers for the politicians they paid off for the privilege.
The economic system of no country has ever changed the simple reality that those in control always feather their own nests first, usually by doing what is requested for those who give them money with the requests.
Pollution lawsuits were made quite early under nuisance and property rights. The government decided for their pals that the victims had to prove the pollution harmed them. It took science decades to prove it. Then the pitchforks and torches came out. So Nixon created the EPA and then the EPA decided who could pollute how much.
So if you or I wanted to make gasoline our limits would be zero. The current big corporate players are allowed.
Hey Brent,
“For at least six thousand years the intellectual class serves the ruling class”.
“Revisionism is an historical discipline made necessary by the fact that all States are governed by a ruling class that is a minority of the population, and which subsists as a parasitic and exploitative burden upon the rest of society. Since its rule is exploitative and parasitic, the State must purchase the alliance of a group of “Court Intellectuals,” whose task is to bamboozle the public into accepting and celebrating the rule of its particular State. The Court Intellectuals have their work cut out for them. In exchange for their continuing work of apologetics and bamboozlement, the Court Intellectuals win their place as junior partners in the power, prestige, and loot extracted by the State apparatus from the deluded public”.
Murray Rothbard, from “The Case for Revisionism”
https://mises.org/library/case-revisionism-and-against-priori-history
Cheers,
Jeremy
Eric, How do you know if that’s a diesel generator?, could be a natural gas. Anyway your point survives.. This is lunacy! That’s an EV charger just for the sake of it. Same of hydrogen ‘pumps’ here in the bay area. They decompose natural gas, and send the carbon up the stack. If BEV’s are a boondoggle, hydrogen powered cars three times the boondoggle.
The solar thing is only viable in areas that are consistently sunny… like southern CA and AZ. It isn’t viable where I live (SW Virginia) because we have months of low sun and sometimes days on end of practically no sun at all…
How about north of the 45th parallel in Seattle. No Teslas there, right?
And before you say “hydro power”, when we left Portlandia five years ago, the State of Oregon was plotting to blow up “obsolete” hydro dams to save the fish.
Hi Roscoe,
Most EVs are powered by the grid – which isn’t solar powered and probably never will be. Not absent a revolutionary breakthrough in solar acquisition/storage efficiencies.
Oh come now Eric, we all know superchargers only use the electrons sourced from wind, hydro and solar. Elon has each electron tagged so they can sort the ‘green’ ones and only use those…..
Yes, sarcasm for the mentally challenged.
The mentally challenged have never been able to appreciate sarcasm beyond their comprehension, which exceeds that of most sarcasm creators.
“Maybe Elon will figure out a way to harness lightning and transmit it directly to EVs.”
Perhaps something involving a clock tower ????
I would also use a clock tower lightning to make another frankenstein
SPQ, great idea. What we need in congress. Soon installed as “speaker of the house”. A man of few words but a lot of action. “Young Frankenstein” and Pelosi could be his Madelaine Khan.
“Which is what we’re dealing with here. A Doomsday Cult, actually. Led by professional Jim Joneses, who aren’t interested in mass suicide but mass control.”
Mass MURDER is what they’re after. The useful idiots will and already do accept their suicide, the rest of us they think they can coerce. When you back off far enough and look at all the pieces of the puzzle it is all part of a monstrous plan to deal with the reality of what they think are too many people and not enough control.
I don’t know how to fix it- good guys don’t believe in initiating force, and bad guys do. So we start off a couple strikes down.
Yeah, this crap is getting old. I remember the alarm being sounded for greenhouse gas and depleting the ozone and ….we’re all gonna die. The most recent peak oil scare with all the predictions of a Mad Max world is still fresh in my mind. It’s like Bush said – Fool me once, fool me twice :).
Bush’s quote was more like “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me, k… won’t be fooled again.”
https://youtu.be/8Ux3DKxxFoM?t=47
There is no practical limit to the number of times the average American can be “fooled again.”
BTW, many Tesla Superchargers use solar cells for their power… 🙂
Hi Mark,
The solar thing is only viable in areas that are consistently sunny… like southern CA and AZ. It isn’t viable where I live (SW Virginia) because we have months of low sun and sometimes days on end of practically no sun at all…
Once again, we circle back to the increased complexity/cost/hassle of these verfluchten electric cars.
Photovoltaics are only practical for the 2 to 4 hours of peak sun. After that, there has to be enough storage to provide power for the multitude of cells required to provide power for the 20 to 22 hours a day the baseline cells can’t.
Hi Vonu,
Yup. I looked into it. I get abuse from people who think I am mindlessly opposed to solar; quite the opposite. I love the idea… of being free of grid power and monthly utility bills. But the actuality (here comes the not-mindless part) is that the cost is prohibitive and the system impractical. The sum I’d have to invest to avoid $60/monthly power bills would never be recovered before the system needed expensive repairs; and even if it didn’t break, it wouldn’t provide reliable/year-round power in my neck of the woods.
Eric,
When I am down south for the winter, I frequently get lectured by those living in large motorhomes about the efficiency of the solar cells covering the tops of them. I point out that the second battery in the back of my van provides all of the power I could ever need to operate my electrical appliances, and it is easily charged by the van’s alternator during routine driving. The biggest consumer I have is my Icom IC-R70 receiver, which pulls about 3 amps when on. The back battery could run the Icom for days without worrying about it dropping below the 10 volts it has to have (which would damage the battery.) The isolation switch is generally academic because the line from the front to the back battery is only 10 gauge, and probably does more to level the two than to charge the back one, unless I’m on a very long drive and the back battery was very low.
Their lectures usually end when I ask if they have a generator. Since all motorhomes have standard Onan or Kohler generators designed to fit in them, it is fun to see their reaction when I ask them why they had to run it all night last night.
Hey Markey
hmmmmm,,, what would it require for a 400 volt at 250 amps for a 100kw rate! A decent solar panel produces about 300 watts. Example: It requires 36 panels to produce about 10 kw. Thus it would require approx. 360 panels. They would cover approx. 2000 x 1170 sq. feet. The wiring interconnect would be a a nightmare. I estimate the cost at about $70-90,000. All for one (1) charging station.
How much “fossil” energy would be required to manufacture those panels and how much extra CO2 will be generated by the manufacture of the panels, the installation and the heavy breathing of the workers.
Just sayin….
You logical people and your facts……
It beats hiding in ignorant anonymity.
I’ve seen pics of Supercharger stations with solar cells, and they aren’t that big. I think what they do is use them in concert with storage batteries. Other Superchargers run on the grid. That said, given the greater efficiency of EVs (60% vs. 25%-30% for ICEs), the emissions from the powerplant would still be less overall.
“I’ve seen pics of Supercharger stations with solar cells, and they aren’t that big.”
It’s whats known as slight of hand. People see panels and expect they are the source for the charger. They probably are not even connected. All part of the con.
“60% vs. 25%-30% for ICEs”
Care to show references and values used for the 60% claim? Transmission, conversion, storage, re-conversion, can easily use up 30% of the original power before you get to the “60% efficiency” of what remains.
I’m simply talking about the amount of stored energy that’s eventually converted to propulsion. ICEs typically waste most of that energy in heat loss; that’s why the radiator is there. If there are X BTUs of potential chemical energy in a gallon of gas, 75% of that will be lost as heat, while the remaining 25% will actually move the vehicle.
I don’t think the thermal efficiency of coal and natural gas plants is all that great either so the 30% loss you estimate is quite possibly bigger.
The most efficient “non-renewable” source is natural gas turbine plants. Thermal efficiency does not vary, conversion efficiency does.
You would need a large array to power one supercharger and then it couldn’t even run 24/7, maybe serve no more than a handful of customers per day.
Imagine winter.
Around here we average one hour of insolation 2-3 months a year. That is equal to one hour of full summer sun.
Makes the math easy. If 25kWh are required, system needs to have at least 25kWh array, ignoring conversion and storage losses.
Not even remotely practical.
yes in only 8 hrs you will be on your way
I’m not a meteorologist, but I know more about weather than the average person does. I got my pilot’s license long ago, and I had to learn about the weather in the process. After all, an airplane is literally operating in the THICK of the weather! Therefore, all pilots have to know about weather, weather forecasting, etc.
The problem with computer forecast models is that, beyond a 36-48 hour time window, forecasts are guessing. Don’t believe me? Pay attention to today’s ‘extended forecast’, then see how the weather ACTUALLY IS next week! Oftentimes, it’s very different. Why? because, as powerful as computers and their programs have become, they can’t factor in all variables; either that, or they don’t give proper weighting to certain variables. IOW, there are error BUILT IN to the forecast models, and these errors compound themselves the further ahead you move in time.
At this point, certain people would be screaming at me; they’d be saying that weather is not climate! No, it isn’t, but they’re related. What is climate, but weather over the long term? Weather and climate are related the same was the annual budget deficit and national debt are related. Technically, they’re not the same, but one is an outgrowth of the other; one is just the the long term manifestation of the other.
Now, here comes the punch line: if we can’t figure out for sure what the weather will be next week, how can we be sure what the climate will be doing 10, 20, or even 30 years from now? The answer: we can’t. It’s just that simple. Forecasting models are comprised of assumptions; if the assumptions are wrong, the forecast will be wrong also. Just my $0.02…
It largely depends on the computing capacity. A Cray supercomputer will get forecasting further than a PC in a rack in the local NOAA/NWS office. The NSA’s Utah Data Center would do more good forecasting weather than illegally invading the nation’s privacy.
The reality of crude oil points to the fact that at one point in time the earth’s atmosphere had more carbon and sustained much greater amounts of vegetation. The theory of the origin of crude oil as compressed vegetative and animal matter means at one point all of that was exposed. Evidence that Antarctica and Siberia all hosted warm climates with lots of vegetative life means the earth was warmer and could sustain the plant life at some point in time. Releasing the carbon would only help plant life and make the Earth better for us humans. Of course the liberals and eco facist hate humans so that would be a bad plan in their eyes.
Cold will kill us off faster than heat will. Warming temperatures will make once unusable land arable and temperate. Cold = Death, Warmth = Life.
Yes. Anecdotally, people don’t get as sick when the weather is warmer. I feel better myself. My back aches and pains go away. Life is good in the HOT for me. I don’t understand why people like cold weather so much these days. Is it because they’re fat?
In my case it’s because I drive a flat-black car and refuse to use air conditioning out of principle. I have manual windows, so can really only roll one down from the driver’s seat, so sometimes when the temperature starts to get into the upper 70F/lower 80F range that one window isn’t enough.
Yes swamprat. The fatness of people contribute to their being “hot”. I am skinny so I prefer heat over cold, and so does my body. No constantly running nose, stinging eyes from the cold, the constant trips to the toilet to pee, all disappear in the heat. And I don’t have to wear 35,975 layers of clothing to keep warm.
Oh shit Joeallen, you reminded me it’s going to be 105 today. I could bitch more about last year though. We had lots of 108-110 days and one day of 115. Not much fun in the sticks when it’s that hot.
My boss, a newly elected county commissioner, had a new mandate for us. Come in by 4 to fuel and grease your equipment.
Craziest shit I ever heard. The foreman and I had been working out tails off yesterday and got in a bit after 4:30. I pulled up to one side and he to the other side of the diesel tank. He got out, got his cooler and walked to the pickup. I asked if he wasn’t going to fuel and grease. He said “I’m going home”.
I bet those machines will still be there Monday and so will the grease guns. Nothing like trying to grease a piece of equipment so hot you can’t touch it and the heat emanating from it is wilting you after an entire day of being “wilted”.
I can’t tell you how much I appreciate his act of defiance. I don’t make enough and neither does he to endure a heat stroke for a stupid “rule”. I ran a loader for my truck till noon, then switched to a grader for the rest of the day.
He’s going to be mighty pressed to get a CDL, learn a loader and learn to grade. I saw him on the loader one day. It was hilarious. I stopped him and said “You have better things to do, let me take care of that”. SIASD’s said Forrest’s mama.
Only if you don’t have a decent winter coat.
Far from being “fossil fuel”, hydrocarbons are not only plentiful but are being renewed by yet-unknown processes deep within the earth.
The term “fossil fuel” was coined in the 1950s when little was known about the processes by which oil is produced. Oil is “abiotic” in nature, as even depleted oil wells are “filling back up” from deep below the earth’s surface.
Oil interests are drilling wells at 5,000 feet, 10,000 feet, and 15,000 feet and deeper, and coming up with oil deposits way below the layers where “fossils” were known to exist.
As Russia gained much expertise in deep-well drilling and coming up with oil deposits far deeper than that of the level of “fossils”, abiotic oil at extreme depths was actually a Russian ‘state secret” for a long time.
Not only that, but there are planetary bodies in which hydrocarbons are naturally occurring (without fossils).
“Peak oil” and “fossil fuels” are discredited concepts that environmentalists and others are latching on to, in order to display their hatred of oil being a renewable resource as well as to push prices up.
Follow the money.
Texe Marrs used to say the same thing…
He still does, being among the living…
That would only be valid if fossil fuel existed. It is as imaginary as Ancel Key’s lipid hypothesis.
Hi Vonu,
The lipid hypothesis exists, it’s just almost certainly false.
Cheers,
Jeremy
well luckily we have brad pitt leonardo dicrapio george clooney and prince harry to save us. whew!
Prince Virtue Signaler and his whore wife are planning to raise their kids gender neutral and only have 2 for the sake of the planet.
Thank God. Who would want more of their crotchfruit out in the world.