
Distributed Solar: The Democratizaton of Energy

Blogroll
- In Monte Carlo We Trust The statistics blog of Matt Asher, actually called the “Probability and Statistics Blog”, but his subtitle is much more appealing. Asher has a Manifesto at http://www.statisticsblog.com/manifesto/.
- Subsidies for wind and solar versus subsidies for fossil fuels
- Gabriel's staircase
- Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard on how businesses can help our collective environmental mess Patagonia’s Yvon Chouinard set the standard for how a business can mitigate the ravages of capitalism on earth’s environment. At 81 years old, he’s just getting started.
- "Perpetual Ocean" from NASA GSFC
- Healthy Home Healthy Planet
- Simon Wood's must-read paper on dynamic modeling of complex systems I highlighted Professor Wood’s paper in https://hypergeometric.wordpress.com/2014/12/26/struggling-with-problems-already-attacked/
- Rasmus Bååth's Research Blog Bayesian statistics and data analysis
- Thaddeus Stevens quotes As I get older, I admire this guy more and more
- Earth Family Beta MIchael Osborne’s blog on Science and the like
- Flettner Rotor Bruce Yeany introduces the Flettner Rotor and related science
- Quotes by Nikola Tesla Quotes by Nikola Tesla, including some of others he greatly liked.
- The Keeling Curve: its history History of the Keeling Curve and Charles David Keeling
- Why "naive Bayes" is not Bayesian Explains why the so-called “naive Bayes” classifier is not Bayesian. The setup is okay, but estimating probabilities by doing relative frequencies instead of using Dirichlet conjugate priors or integration strays from The Path.
- All about models
- NCAR AtmosNews
- Earle Wilson
- Comprehensive Guide to Bayes Rule
- Nadler Strategy, LLC, on sustainability Thinking about business, efficient and effective management, and business value
- Beautiful Weeds of New York City
- OOI Data Nuggets OOI Ocean Data Lab: The Data Nuggets
- American Statistical Association
- Brendon Brewer on Overfitting Important and insightful presentation by Brendon Brewer on overfitting
- Carl Safina's blog One of the wisest on Earth
- The Plastic Pick-Up: Discovering new sources of marine plastic pollution
- Number Cruncher Politics
- What If
- London Review of Books
- Tony Seba Solar energy, electric vehicle, energy storage, and business disruption professor and visionary
- Mike Bloomberg, 2020 He can get progress on climate done, has the means and experts to counter the Trump and Republican digital disinformation machine, and has the experience, knowledge, and depth of experience to achieve and unify.
- Slice Sampling
- The Mermaid's Tale A conversation about biological complexity and evolution, and the societal aspects of science
- Karl Broman
- Pat's blog While it is described as “The mathematical (and other) thoughts of a (now retired) math teacher”, this is false humility, as it chronicles the present and past life and times of mathematicians in their context. Recommended.
- Earth Family Alpha Michael Osborne’s blog (former Executive at Austin Energy, now Chairman of the Electric Utility Commission for Austin, Texas)
- Giant vertical monopolies for energy have stopped making sense
- Dollars per BBL: Energy in Transition
- Ives and Dakos techniques for regime changes in series
- Leadership lessons from Lao Tzu
- AP Statistics: Sampling, by Michael Porinchak Twin City Schools
- Los Alamos Center for Bayesian Methods
- Busting Myths About Heat Pumps Heat pumps are perhaps the most efficient heating and cooling systems available. Recent literature distributed by utilities hawking natural gas and other sources use performance figures from heat pumps as they were available 15 years ago. See today’s.
- BioPython A collection of Python tools for quantitative Biology
- John Kruschke's "Dong Bayesian data analysis" blog Expanding and enhancing John’s book of same title (now in second edition!)
- John Cook's reasons to use Bayesian inference
- Brian McGill's Dynamic Ecology blog Quantitative biology with pithy insights regarding applications of statistical methods
- "Consider a Flat Pond" Invited talk introducing systems thinking, by Jan Galkowski, at First Parish in Needham, UU, via Zoom
- SASB Sustainability Accounting Standards Board
- South Shore Recycling Cooperative Materials management, technical assistance and networking, town advocacy, public outreach
- Hermann Scheer Hermann Scheer was a visionary, a major guy, who thought deep thoughts about energy, and its implications for humanity’s relationship with physical reality
climate change
- The HUMAN-caused greenhouse effect, in under 5 minutes, by Bill Nye
- Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature
- Sir David King David King’s perspective on climate, and the next thousands of years for humanity
- Simple box models and climate forcing IMO one of Tamino’s best posts illustrating climate forcing using simple box models
- Nick Bower's "Scared Scientists"
- Warming slowdown discussion
- “The discovery of global warming'' (American Institute of Physics)
- The great Michael Osborne's latest opinions Michael Osborne is a genius operative and champion of solar energy. I have learned never to disregard ANYTHING he says. He is mentor of Karl Ragabo, and the genius instigator of the Texas renewable energy miracle.
- The Scientific Case for Modern Human-caused Global Warming
- The beach boondoggle Prof Rob Young on how owners of beach property are socializing their risks at costs to all of us, not the least being it seems coastal damage is less than it actually is
- Earth System Models
- "Warming Slowdown?" (part 1 of 2) The idea of a global warming slowdown or hiatus is critically examined, emphasizing the literature, the datasets, and means and methods for telling such. In two parts.
- Ellenbogen: There is no Such Thing as Wind Turbine Syndrome
- Climate model projections versus observations
- Climate Change: A health emergency … New England Journal of Medicine Caren G. Solomon, M.D., M.P.H., and Regina C. LaRocque, M.D., M.P.H., January 17, 2019 N Engl J Med 2019; 380:209-211 DOI: 10.1056/NEJMp1817067
- Agendaists Eli Rabett’s coining of a phrase
- Climate change: Evidence and causes A project of the UK Royal Society: (1) Answers to key questions, (2) evidence and causes, and (3) a short guide to climate science
- Tamino's Open Mind Open Mind: A statistical look at climate, its science, and at science denial
- "When Did Global Warming Stop" Doc Snow’s treatment of the denier claim that there’s been no warming for the most recent N years. (See http://hubpages.com/@doc-snow for more on him.)
- SOLAR PRODUCTION at Westwood Statistical Studios Generation charts for our home in Westwood, MA
- Eli on the spectroscopic basis of atmospheric radiation physical chemistry
- Équiterre Equiterre helps build a social movement by encouraging individuals, organizations and governments to make ecological and equitable choices, in a spirit of solidarity.
- And Then There's Physics
- Skeptical Science
- The Sunlight Economy
- Rabett Run Incisive analysis of climate science versus deliberate distraction
- Paul Beckwith Professor Beckwith is, in my book, one of the most insightful and analytical observers on climate I know. I highly recommend his blog, and his other informational products.
- The Green Plate Effect Eli Rabett’s “The Green Plate Effect”
- “The Irrelevance of Saturation: Why Carbon Dioxide Matters'' (Bart Levenson)
- ATTP summarizes all that stuff about Committed Warming from AND THEN THERE’S PHYSICS
- "Climate science is setttled enough"
- World Weather Attribution
- Professor Robert Strom's compendium of resources on climate change Truly excellent
- Wally Broecker on climate realism
- Bloomberg interactive graph on “What's warming the world''
- Simple models of climate change
- Interview with Wally Broecker Interview with Wally Broecker
- Tuft's Professor Kenneth Lang on the physical chemistry of the Greenhouse Effect
- Jacobson WWS literature index
- Updating the Climate Science: What path is the real world following? From Professors Makiko Sato & James Hansen of Columbia University
- HotWhopper: It's excellent. Global warming and climate change. Eavesdropping on the deniosphere, its weird pseudo-science and crazy conspiracy whoppers.
- Climate Communication Hassol, Somerville, Melillo, and Hussin site communicating climate to the public
- Grid parity map for Solar PV in United States
- Climate Change Reports By John and Mel Harte
- Thriving on Low Carbon
- "Getting to the Energy Future We Want," Dr Steven Chu
- Transitioning to fully renewable energy Professor Saul Griffiths talks to transitioning the customer journey, from a dependency upon fossil fuels to an electrified future
- Anti—Anti-#ClimateEmergency Whether to declare a climate emergency is debatable. But some critics have gone way overboard.
- Steve Easterbrook's excellent climate blog: See his "The Internet: Saving Civilization or Trashing the Planet?" for example Heavy on data and computation, Easterbrook is a CS prof at UToronto, but is clearly familiar with climate science. I like his “The Internet: Saving Civilization or Trashing the Planet” very much.
- Ice and Snow
Archives
Jan Galkowski
Category Archives: plastics
“Microplastics in the Ocean: Emergency or Exaggeration?” (Morss Colloquium, WHOI)
Update, 2019-10-28 00:34 ET I have compiled notes from the talks above, and from the audience Q&A and documented these in a Google Jam here.
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, bag bans, Claire Galkowski, coastal communities, coasts, diffusion processes, microbiomes, microplastics, NOAA, oceanic eddies, oceanography, oceans, perceptions, phytoplankton, plastics, pollution, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, science, science education, statistical ecology, WHOI, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
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Marine microbes are eating plastics
The news item was reported in Science. I wrote about the possibility earlier, but, there, WHOI scientists had not confirmed that microbes were actually consuming plastics. This has been suspected since 2011, due to the work of WHOI scientist Dr … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Anthropocene, basic research, ecological services, ecomodernism, ecopragmatism, environment, marine biology, marine debris, materials science, microbiomes, microplastics, oceans, plastics, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, WHOI, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
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plastic-hating environmentalists as pawns and collaborative distractors of the Trump administration
Andrew Wheeler, 45‘s head of the Environmental Protection Administration and former coal industry attorney and legal advisor to Senator Imhofe, famed climate denier of the U.S. Senate, has stated it quite simply: Clean drinking water is a higher priority for … Continue reading
On bag bans and sampling plans
Plastic bag bans are all the rage. It’s not the purpose of this post to take a position on the matter. Before you do, however, I’d recommend checking out this: and especially this: (Note: My lovely wife, Claire, presents this … Continue reading
Posted in bag bans, citizen data, citizen science, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Ecology Action, evidence, Google, Google Earth, Google Maps, goverance, lifestyle changes, microplastics, municipal solid waste, oceans, open data, planning, plastics, politics, pollution, public health, quantitative ecology, R, R statistical programming language, reasonableness, recycling, rhetorical statistics, sampling, sampling networks, statistics, surveys, sustainability
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“What’s new with recycling”
South Shore Recycling Cooperative Director Claire Galkowski, spoke in Norwell, at the South Shore Natural Science Center, a couple of weeks ago:
Posted in Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, biofuels, Carbon Cycle, Claire Galkowski, coastal communities, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, EBC-NE, ecomodernism, ecopragmatist, education, extended producer responsibility, extended supply chains, green tech, greenhouse gases, local self reliance, Massachusetts, microplastics, paper, plastics, public health, quantitative ecology, recycling, science, solid waste, South Shore Recycling Cooperative, sustainability
Tagged plastic bag bans
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50,000+ golf balls, along a coast
KQED carried a story about free diver and 16 y.o. Alex Weber who discovered not only a new source of plastic pollution, but another testament to the casual, careless sloppiness of people. And Ms Weber has converted it into a … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, an uncaring American public, coastal communities, coasts, consumption, ecological disruption, Ecological Society of America, ethics, field research, Florida, Humans have a lot to answer for, marine debris, oceans, plastics, pollution, science, sustainability, sustainable landscaping
Tagged updated
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On plastic bag bans, and the failure to realize economic growth cannot be green
(Updated 2019-01-12.) Despite the surge of interest in plastic bag bans, the environmental sustainability numbers haven’t been run. For example, it makes no sense to trade using paper bags instead of plastic ones, even if the paper is recycled, because … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, an ignorant American public, an uncaring American public, Anthropocene, development as anti-ecology, E. O. Wilson, environment, evidence, evolution, exponential growth, fragmentation of ecosystems, global warming, greenwashing, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, local self reliance, plastics, population biology, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, supply chains, sustainability, sustainable landscaping, The Demon Haunted World, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon
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Plastics in the oceans!
From Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution: (Click on image to see a larger figure, and use browser Back Button to return to blog.) “Tracking a snow globe of microplastics“ “WHOI Marine Microplastics Initiative“ “Sweat the small stuff“ “A hitchhiker’s guide to … Continue reading

