Distributed Solar: The Democratizaton of Energy
Category Archives: Hyper Anthropocene
Ørsted: love means nothing without action
Love your home. The H-field is measured in amperes per metre (A/m) in SI units, and in oersteds (Oe) in cgs units. From Wikipedia. Ørsted.
Posted in Anthropocene, climate change, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Svante Arrhenius, the energy of the people, the green century, the right to know, the value of financial assets, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon
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Will the Climate `play nice`
An explanation by Dr Jørgen Peder Steffensen, a down-to-earth one, about climate bifurcations. He’s hardly the only scientist that has warned about this. Dr Wally Broecker famously said: The climate system is an angry beast and we are poking it … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, atmosphere, being carbon dioxide, bifurcations, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide capture, carbon dioxide sequestration, Carbon Worshipers, climate change, climate disruption, dynamical systems, fossil fuels, geophysics, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, ice sheet dynamics, Our Children's Trust, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, tragedy of the horizon, Wally Broecker
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“Azimuth Backup Project (Part 5)”, upcoming presentation by Prof John Carlos Baez
The post. The Project. The Place. The Conference. The Funders. Thanks to everyone, especially to The Team, to Professor Baez, to the Funders, and to University of California, Riverside. I don’t identify the Team because some don’t want to receive … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, Anthropocene, Azimuth Backup Project, California, citizen data, citizenship, climate data, denial, Donald Trump, Ecology Action, friends and colleagues, global blinding, Hyper Anthropocene, rationality, science denier, scientific publishing, tragedy of the horizon, University of California
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What does it really mean for an electrical grid to be resilient?
(Slightly updated 2nd October 2017 to add a link to the Brattle Group’s report on the myth of baseload generation.) Secretary of Energy Rick Perry has recently called for `baseload` coal and nuclear plants which are no longer competitive in … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bollocks, bridge to nowhere, Carbon Worshipers, corruption, Cult of Carbon, decentralized electric power generation, demand-side solutions, denial, disingenuity, disruption, distributed generation, Donald Trump, electricity, energy utilities, engineering, ethics, false advertising, fear uncertainty and doubt, FERC, grid defection, Hyper Anthropocene, local generation, local self reliance, making money, meteorological models, meteorology, microgrids, public utility commissions, rate of return regulation, rationality, reason, regulatory capture, resiliency, science denier, superstition, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the stack of lies, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon, transparency, utility company death spiral
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‘Near classified information’ and the militarization of environmental degradation
EPA Anti-Leak Campaign EPA employees are currently receiving instruction in “unauthorized disclosure training,” teaching them not to leak classified or near-classified information. This training is part of a government-wide eradication effort following National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster’s memo to agency … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, anti-science, Azimuth Backup Project, Bill Nye, Boston Ethical Society, bridge to somewhere, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, citizen data, citizen science, citizenship, climate justice, Climate Science Legal Defense Fund, criminal justice, Cult of Carbon, denial, destructive economic development, Donald Trump, ecological services, ecology, Ecology Action, environment, environmental law, Environmental Protection Agency, Equiterre, fear uncertainty and doubt, Hyper Anthropocene, James Hansen, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, science, science denier, science education, United States, ``The tide is risin'/And so are we''
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Forward thinking. How about that?
See, too, Minster, Ohio: http://www.minsteroh.com/town-crier-blog/solar-and-energy-storage-project-awarded-renewable-energy-world%E2%80%99s-renewable-energy-p http://www.minsteroh.com/town-crier-blog/solar-energy-storage-facility http://www.minsteroh.com/town-crier-blog/energy-storage-grand-opening http://www.utilitydive.com/news/inside-the-first-municipal-solar-plus-storage-project-in-the-us/421470/ Hat tip to Paul Lauenstein. Wonder why other towns aren’t that smart?
Posted in American Solar Energy Society, Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to somewhere, clean disruption, Cult of Carbon, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, distributed generation, electrical energy storage, electricity, electricity markets, energy storage, green tech, Green Tech Media, grid defection, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, local self reliance, Paul Lauenstein, public utility commissions, rate of return regulation, solar domination, stranded assets, the energy of the people, utility company death spiral
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Andy Skuce
Source: Andy Skuce Exit, Pursued by a Crab, from Critical Angle.
Results of short literature search on impacts of climate change upon ecosystems and bird or animal migration patterns, from the journals of the Ecological Society of America
I decided to do a quick literature search on the impacts of climate change upon ecosystems and migration patterns. I could have kept the list private, but why not make it public? Not all these articles are purely about the … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, American Statistical Association, Anthropocene, biology, climate change, climate education, climate models, complex systems, differential equations, dynamic generalized linear models, dynamical systems, ecological services, Ecological Society of America, ecology, Ecology Action, environment, evidence, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, marine biology, mass extinctions, nonlinear systems, population biology, population dynamics, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, tragedy of the horizon
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`Insurance companies should collect a carbon levy`
From Anthony J Webster and Richard H Clarke in Nature, “Insurance companies should collect a carbon levy”: Governments juggle too many interests to drive global action on climate change. But the insurance industry is ideally placed. With annual premiums amounting … Continue reading
Posted in American Statistical Association, Anthropocene, attribution, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to somewhere, business, capitalism, Carbon Tax, climate business, climate economics, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, corporations, Cult of Carbon, economics, energy levy, finance, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, insurance, investments, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, moral leadership, statistics, stranded assets, sustainability, the right to know, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon, transparency, zero carbon
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A lesson for Boston
And, from the Harvard Business Review: There was a time a decade or two ago when society could have made a choice to write off our massive investment in a fossil fuel-based economy and begin a policy driven shift towards … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, bollocks, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, coastal communities, coasts, Cult of Carbon, Daniel Kahneman, environment, flooding, floods, Florida, global blinding, global warming, greenhouse gases, hydrology, Hyper Anthropocene, John Englander, living shorelines, Mark Carney, nor'easters, oceanic eddies, oceanography, Our Children's Trust, rate of return regulation, rationality, reasonableness, sea level rise, seawalls, selfishness, shorelines, solar energy, the right to be and act stupid, water
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‘Nuf said: Ensembles as descriptions of Bayesian space-time posterior densities
(UPDATED, 2017-09-09, 12:38 EDT) Click here to see just the latest update. An exercise in the appreciation of ensemble models. By the way, many of these charts were obtained courtesy of my subscription at Weather Underground. They are, as far … Continue reading
Dr James Hansen is great
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, AMETSOC, Anthropocene, atmosphere, Carbon Tax, climate change, climate disruption, emissions, environment, floods, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, hurricanes, hydrology, Hyper Anthropocene, James Hansen, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, nonlinear systems, reasonableness, solar democracy, the tragedy of our present civilization, Unitarian Universalism
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Houston, forward
For the purposes of this post, let’s pretend climate disruption does not exist (!). Let’s pretend Hurricane Harvey had no climate component, and that Hurricane Harvey was just another, big storm afflicting the fortunes of the U.S. Gulf coast. The … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, Anthropocene, bridge to somewhere, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, coastal communities, Daniel Kahneman, destructive economic development, ecology, economics, environment, FEMA, flooding, floods, fossil fuel infrastructure, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, Joseph Schumpeter, living shorelines, reworking infrastructure, Robert Young, shorelines
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`The California way: sunny, with a chance of apocalypse’ (recommended read)
This article at the San Francisco Chronicle is by Jon Christensen. Dystopian scenarios encourage us to act in such a way that the dystopia does not come to be. Professor Christensen has written more recently about this as well. This … Continue reading
`The Republican Party is enabling an increasingly dangerous demagogue`: Fallows, at The Atlantic
I don’t often do straight politics or even national concerns here. Some people (you know who you are) think everything I do is political. For example, I had an exchange on Google+ which included as the last post from my … Continue reading
Saving the World: Jacobson, Chu, with DiCaprio, at Stanford
(The above video is intended to start at time second 2051 or at 34 minutes. WordPress is sometimes funny about that. Apologies if not.)
Posted in Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, Arnold Schwarzennegger, Bill Nye, BNEF, Buckminster Fuller, clean disruption, climate disruption, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, distributed generation, Hyper Anthropocene, Mark Jacobson, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Stanford University, Stephen Chu, Tony Seba, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon, ``The tide is risin'/And so are we''
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On Hoarding Electrons
I was once scolded by an energy wonk and political progressive at a semi-public forum for suggesting people “hoard electrons”. That is, instead of being grid connected, there seemed to me to be situations where becoming as independent of the … Continue reading
Posted in American Solar Energy Society, Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to somewhere, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, conservation, Debbie Dooley, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, distributed generation, economics, electrical energy storage, electricity, electricity markets, energy efficiency, energy storage, energy utilities, engineering, Green Tea Coalition, green tech, grid defection, Hermann Scheer, Hyper Anthropocene, ILSR, investment in wind and solar energy, Joseph Schumpeter, Michael Osborne, microgrids, public utility commissions, rate of return regulation, RevoluSun, Sankey diagram, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Stanford University, SunPower, the energy of the people, the green century, the value of financial assets, Tony Seba, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon
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The South Shore Recycling Cooperative can save you money!
Abington, Cohasset, Duxbury, Hanover, Hanson, Hingham, Hull, Kingston, Middleboro, Norwell, Plymouth, Rockland, Scituate, Weymouth, Whitman Join ’em. Ask your town governors on the South Shore to check ’em out. It’s your tax dollars wasted if you don’t. What your town … Continue reading
Posted in Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, argoecology, coastal communities, composting, destructive economic development, ecological services, ecology, economics, environment, environmental law, Equiterre, Hyper Anthropocene, John Farrell, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local self reliance, oceanography, Our Children's Trust, pollution, recycling, Sankey diagram, sociology, South Shore Recycling Cooperative, stranded assets, sustainability, the green century, UU Needham
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“Energy is at the core of all these things”
Energy and water. Update, 2017-07-19: The Solver Elon Musk at the National Governors Association conference last week: It is possible to supply every electron needed to keep America humming by covering just 100 square miles with solar panels. “The batteries … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, biofuels, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to nowhere, climate disruption, climate economics, decentralized energy, destructive economic development, distributed generation, ecological services, Ecology Action, environment, environmental law, fossil fuel infrastructure, global warming, green tech, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local self reliance, methane, natural gas, Spaceship Earth, Stanford University, the problem of evil, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, Tony Seba, tragedy of the horizon, water as a resource
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Schroders asset management forecasts global warming of more than +4℃
(Updated Thursday, 27 July 2017) Schroders is a global asset management firm. They very recently issued a warning that current global trends put the planet on track for more than +4℃ warming. The full news brief, from them, is available … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, Anthropocene, Buckminster Fuller, climate business, climate disruption, climate economics, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, corporate supply chains, disingenuity, dynamical systems, economics, environmental law, forecasting, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, global blinding, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, investing, investments, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, Schroders, sea level rise, Spaceship Earth, sustainability, temporal myopia, the right to be and act stupid, the show, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon, zero carbon
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The Myth of Baseload Power (Amory Lovins)
Posted in Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, Buckminster Fuller, capitalism, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, design science, distributed generation, economics, energy efficiency, energy reduction, environment, Hermann Scheer, Hyper Anthropocene, ILSR, integrative design, John Farrell, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local generation, local self reliance, microgrids, petroleum, reasonableness, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Spaceship Earth, sustainability, the energy of the people, the green century, the right to know, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon
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“Explosive methane will create two million jobs!”
The American Petroleum Institute has trotted out a commissioned study claiming an increase of two million jobs in 2040 off a base of four million (in 2015). First, these are not people working with development or distribution of natural gas. … Continue reading
Posted in American Petroleum Institute, Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, disingenuity, economics, EIA, emissions, explosive methane, false advertising, fossil fuels, gas pipeline leaks, Hyper Anthropocene, methane, natural gas, petroleum, pipelines, the right to be and act stupid, the show, the tragedy of our present civilization, tragedy of the horizon
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Solar Costs at `Jaw-Dropping Lows`; `No Evidence That Changing Power Mix Endangers Electric System Reliability`
From GTM: `Solar Moves in a Curious Direction Since Trump Quit Paris Deal: Up‘ There is “[n]o evidence that the changing power mix endangers electric system reliability”. Two reports: Advancing past baseload to a flexible grid Electricity Markets, Reliability and … Continue reading
Posted in American Solar Energy Society, Anthropocene, Bloomberg, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to somewhere, Buckminster Fuller, clean disruption, climate business, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, destructive economic development, distributed generation, Donald Trump, economics, electricity markets, engineering, force multiplier, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, Green Tech Media, grid defection, Hyper Anthropocene, ILSR, investment in wind and solar energy, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local generation, local self reliance, microgrids, public utility commissions, reasonableness, Sankey diagram, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Spaceship Earth, stranded assets, sustainability, the energy of the people, the green century, the right to be and act stupid, the value of financial assets, Tony Seba, tragedy of the horizon, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon
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Defying technology, trends … nay, defying Mathematics!
The creatures from Trumpland are planning an Energy Week in the upcoming, probably to lead up to the Fourth of July celebrations. Our Orange Leader … will tout surging U.S. exports of oil and natural gas during a week of … Continue reading
Posted in American Petroleum Institute, American Solar Energy Society, Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to nowhere, bridge to somewhere, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, clean disruption, climate business, climate economics, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, corporations, destructive economic development, Donald Trump, economics, electricity markets, energy, energy utilities, evidence, explosive methane, exponential growth, extended supply chains, false advertising, FERC, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, fracking, global blinding, greenhouse gases, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, investing, investment in wind and solar energy, investments, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, military inferiority, Minsky moment, pipelines, politics, pollution, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, risk, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, the energy of the people, the green century, the problem of evil, the right to be and act stupid, the stack of lies, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon, United States, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power
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Prayer Vigil for the Earth, Needham Common, Massachusetts, 4 June 2017
“Avoiding [in excess of] 2 degrees [Celsius] warming `is now totally unrealistic.”’ Led by our own UU Needham Reverand Catie Scudera, with Reverand Daryn Bunce Stylianopoulos of the First Baptist Church of Needham, and Reverend Jim Mitulski of the Congregational … Continue reading
Disney’s Robert Iger resigns from Trump advisory panel over the Trumpistas’ decision to quit COP
“Protecting our planet and driving economic growth are critical to our future, and they aren’t mutually exclusive,” he said in a statement. “I deeply disagree with the decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement and, as a matter of principle, … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, Buckminster Fuller, carbon dioxide, citizenship, climate business, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, COP21, destructive economic development, Disney, Donald Trump, environment, Florida, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, Robert Iger, Walt Disney Company
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`Exxon Shareholders Approve Climate Resolution: 62% Vote for Disclosure’
Flash from InsideClimate News: ExxonMobil shareholders voted Wednesday to require the world’s largest oil and gas company to report on the impacts of climate change to its business—defying management, and marking a milestone in a 28-year effort by activist investors. … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, Bloomberg, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to nowhere, business, capitalism, Carbon Worshipers, clean disruption, climate, climate business, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, corporations, destructive economic development, environmental law, extended supply chains, Exxon, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, Global Carbon Project, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, investing, investments, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, making money, Our Children's Trust, petroleum, pollution, rationality, reason, reasonableness, statistics, stranded assets, sustainability, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon, zero carbon
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Dikran Marsupial’s excellent bit on hypothesis testing applied to climate, or how it should be applied, if at all
Frankly, I wish some geophysicists and climate scientists wrote more as if they thoroughly understood this, let alone deniers to try to discredit climate disruption. See “What does statistically significant actually mean?”. Of course, while statistical power of a test … Continue reading
Massachusetts Senate, Climate and Clean Energy Tour (Senator Marc Pacheco, and others), testimony
I testified at the Weymouth, Massachusetts hearing for the MA Senate Climate and Clean Energy Tour. Here’s Senator Marc R Pacheco introducing the Tour: The Weymouth hearing was recorded and is available on YouTube in three parts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3EHAp9Hjf8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OP5buad0nFQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dy5TNyx5Vdw … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Solar Energy Society, Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to somewhere, citizenship, clean disruption, climate disruption, climate economics, climate justice, Constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, decentralized electric power generation, destructive economic development, Ecology Action, global blinding, Global Carbon Project, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hermann Scheer, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, investments, John Farrell, Joseph Schumpeter, Mark Carney, Mark Jacobson, Massachusetts, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, Massachusetts Interfaith Coalition for Climate Action, science, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Spaceship Earth, the energy of the people, the green century, the value of financial assets, Tony Seba, tragedy of the horizon, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon
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