Category Archives: the right to be and act stupid

Codium fragile for Saturday, 21st November 2020

Great Web sites here, all about truly preserving Walpole for the long term, rather than in pursuit of myopic interests: http://walpolepreservationalliance.org http://walpole-preservation-alliance.org http://walpolepreservationalliance.net http://walpolepreservationalliance.com http://walpolepreservationalliance.co http://walpolepreservationalliance.info http://walpolepreservationalliance.earth How Norfolk County preserves forest. Choices. Walpole Preservation Alliance

Posted in #climatestrike, #sunrise, #youthvgov, agrivoltaics, American Solar Energy Society, an ignorant American public, an uncaring American public, anti-science, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bollocks, bridge to nowhere, bridge to somewhere, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide sequestration, Carbon Tax, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, climate activism, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, climate justice, climate mitigation, climate nightmares, climate policy, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Cult of Carbon, decentralized electric power generation, development as anti-ecology, distributed generation, DNS, ecomodernism, ecopragmatism, electricity markets, emissions, evidence, fossil fuel divestment, global warming, Green Tea Coalition, Greta Thunberg, Hermann Scheer, Humans have a lot to answer for, indigenous peoples, Internet, investment in wind and solar energy, Juliana v United States, keep fossil fuels in ground, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local generation, local self reliance, luckwarmers, mitigating climate disruption, On being Carbon Dioxide, Our Children's Trust, Principles of Planetary Climate, public welfare, regulatory capture, risk, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, solar revolution, stranded assets, the green century, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, Tony Seba, tragedy of the horizon, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wishful environmentalism, zero carbon | Tagged | Leave a comment

How Norfolk County Massachusetts preserves forest

(Update, 12th August 2021) Of course, if solar photovoltaic arrays were proposed here instead, residents and abutters would come out to oppose them, including untruthfully claiming that photovoltaics leak Cadmium and other materials into soils. “Cutting down trees is detrimental … Continue reading

Posted in American Solar Energy Society, an ignorant American public, an uncaring American public, being carbon dioxide, bridge to nowhere, Carbon Tax, Carbon Worshipers, climate change, climate denial, climate disruption, climate nightmares, climate policy, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Cult of Carbon, global blinding, global warming, global weirding, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local self reliance, mitigating climate disruption, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, wind power, wishful environmentalism, zero carbon | 1 Comment

Opposing Canadian hydropower, an opposition which supports local renewables?

Ilana Cohen of the Pulitzer prize-winning Inside Climate News reports how some environmental activists in northern New England are concerned about the progress of tapping Canadian hydropower to feed the electrical needs of New England. Opposition is also voiced by … Continue reading

Posted in an ignorant American public, an uncaring American public, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, cliamate mitigation, climate business, climate disruption, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Cult of Carbon, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, development as anti-ecology, distributed generation, ecocapitalism, Ecology Action, ecomodernism, electrical energy storage, electricity, electricity markets, emissions, energy utilities, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, gas pipeline leaks, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hermann Scheer, indigenous peoples, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, liberal climate deniers, local generation, local self reliance, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, mitigating climate disruption, Nathan Phillips, natural gas, regulatory capture, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, science denier, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, solar revolution, sustainability, sustainable landscaping, the green century, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, utility company death spiral, zero carbon | 1 Comment

More reasons why centralized grids and ISOs/RTOs cannot be trusted, with an afterthought

From Inside Climate News and I’m sure it’ll eventually show up at Legal Planet, where they touched the matter over a year ago: The new rules, approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, are designed to counteract state subsidies that … Continue reading

Posted in American Solar Energy Society, an ignorant American public, an uncaring American public, Ørsted, Berkeley Haas Energy, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to somewhere, Carbon Worshipers, children as political casualties, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, Cult of Carbon, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, destructive economic development, distributed generation, ecomodernism, ecopragmatism, electric vehicles, electrical energy storage, electricity, electricity markets, emissions, energy levy, energy storage, fossil fuel infrastructure, green tech, Green Tech Media, greenhouse gases, grid defection, Hermann Scheer, Hyper Anthropocene, IEEE, investment in wind and solar energy, ISO-NE, Karl Ragabo, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local generation, local self reliance, Mark Jacobson, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, Mathematics and Climate Research Network, Michael Bloomberg, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, population dynamics, public utility commissions, PUCs, rate of return regulation, regulatory capture, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, solar revolution, SunPower, the green century, 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, utility company death spiral, Westwood, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon | Leave a comment

Natural Gas Companies are Doing Themselves In

As I wrote before, there will be no Golden Age of Natural Gas. The climate periodical DeSmog Blog now reports on its outright dissolution. But the surprise is that natural gas miners, particularly shale gas miners, are apparently destroying themselves. … Continue reading

Posted in American Chemical Society, American Petroleum Institute, an uncaring American public, Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, children as political casualties, clean disruption, climate disruption, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, Desmog Blog, destructive economic development, ecological disruption, explosive methane, false advertising, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, gas pipeline leaks, global warming, greenhouse gases, greenwashing, Hyper Anthropocene, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, natural gas, panic, public welfare, regulatory capture, solar domination, stranded assets, The Demon Haunted World, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, tragedy of the horizon, utility company death spiral | 2 Comments

Happy Earth Day: Doubt climate change? Just be patient and watch

And know that, because of our collective inaction, even if we were to fix everything immediately, now, because of the built-up momentum in the climate system, things will get steadily worse for two-to-four decades after we stop. Don’t like those … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, an ignorant American public, an uncaring American public, climate change, fossil fuel divestment, global warming, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, science, The Demon Haunted World, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, tragedy of the horizon | 1 Comment

On the Ministry of Silly Walks : Brexit

The John Cleese reference came from this week’s treatment of comic self-deprecation in the UK post-Brexit, in The New Yorker.

Posted in Brexit, bridge to nowhere, Britain, populism, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, UK, unreason | Leave a comment

Welcome to snowy New England … Bad place for solar PV, right?

And this is ISO-NE, who, as little as three years back were highly sceptical anything other than additional natural gas generation could supply the ever increasing electrical power needs of the region, particularly with the withdrawal of generation from oil, … Continue reading

Posted in American Solar Energy Society, Amory Lovins, Arnold Schwarzennegger, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to somewhere, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, climate economics, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, corporations, decentralized energy, destructive economic development, distributed generation, ecological disruption, economic trade, economics, ecopragmatism, ecopragmatist, engineering, entrpreneurs, green tech, Green Tech Media, grid defection, investment in wind and solar energy, ISO-NE, Joseph Schumpeter, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, rate of return regulation, reworking infrastructure, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, Sankey diagram, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, SolarPV.tv, Sonnen community, Spaceship Earth, technology, the energy of the people, the green century, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, UNFCCC, Unitarian Universalism, unreason, utility company death spiral, Wally Broecker, wishful environmentalism, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, zero carbon | Leave a comment

“Renewables are set to penetrate the global energy system more quickly than any fuel in history” (BP, 2019 Energy Outlook)

Selections from BP Energy Outlook: 2019 edition: In the ET scenario, the costs of wind and solar power continue to decline significantly, broadly in line with their past learning curves. To give a sense of the importance of technology gains … Continue reading

Posted in Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, BP, bridge to somewhere, Carbon Tax, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, climate change, climate disruption, corporate citizenship, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, ecomodernism, economic trade, ecopragmatist, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, investing, investment in wind and solar energy, investments, local generation, local self reliance, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, the energy of the people, the green century, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the value of financial assets, Tony Seba, tragedy of the horizon, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon | 1 Comment

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 | Leave a comment

Remember …

Updated, 2018-12-51, 14:10 ET Remember who it was that told you it would okay, just fine to continue to emit CO2 as we have been, despite over 50 years of science, scientists, from physicists, to chemists, to engineers, and biologists … Continue reading

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Chemical Society, Anthropocene, climate change, ecological disruption, global warming, stranded assets, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization | Leave a comment

Today, now, and what of the future?

From Aldo Leopold in his A Sand County Almanac: One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds. Much of the damage inflicted on land is quite invisible to laymen. An … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, agroecology, Aldo Leopold, American Association for the Advancement of Science, argoecology, being carbon dioxide, biology, Boston Ethical Society, Botany, Buckminster Fuller, Charles Darwin, climate, climate change, David Suzuki, Earle Wilson, Ecological Society of America, Ecology Action, ethics, George Sughihara, Glen Peters, global warming, Grant Foster, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, population biology, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, Spaceship Earth, sustainability, The Demon Haunted World, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, tragedy of the horizon, unreason, UU Humanists | 2 Comments

What will happen to fossil fuel-fired electric bills everywhere, eventually, including those fired by natural gas

See Cost of Coal: Electric Bills Skyrocket in Appalachia as Region’s Economy Collapses, by James Bruggers at Inside Climate News. Excerpt: The common denominator is American Electric Power, one of the nation’s largest utilities. It owns Kentucky Power, along with … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, American Solar Energy Society, Amory Lovins, an uncaring American public, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to nowhere, bridge to somewhere, Carbon Worshipers, clean disruption, corporate responsibility, Cult of Carbon, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, destructive economic development, electricity, electricity markets, energy utilities, engineering, exponential growth, fossil fuels, grid defection, Hermann Scheer, ILSR, investment in wind and solar energy, ISO-NE, John Farrell, Joseph Schumpeter, local generation, local self reliance, marginal energy sources, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, natural gas, pipelines, public utility commissions, PUCs, rate of return regulation, rationality, reason, reasonableness, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Sonnen community, Spaceship Earth, stranded assets, sustainability, the energy of the people, the green century, 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, unreason, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon | Leave a comment

Censorship of Science by the administration of President Donald Trump

See work by the Columbia Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. … President Trump has directed EPA and DOI to reconsider regulations adopted to control greenhouse gas emissions, despite the wealth of data showing that those emissions are the key … Continue reading

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, an ignorant American public, an uncaring American public, anti-intellectualism, anti-science, Azimuth Backup Project, citizen data, Climate Science Legal Defense Fund, Donald Trump, dump Trump, Ecological Society of America, environmental law, epidemiology, global blinding, Neill deGrasse Tyson, open data, rationality, reason, reasonableness, science, secularism, The Demon Haunted World, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, tragedy of the horizon, unreason | Leave a comment

Leaders (say they) Don’t Know About Lags

Maybe they don’t. Most people don’t. On the other hand, there’s little more to them than understanding skeet, realizing aiming where the clay pigeon is now is a useless tactic for hitting it. Aim where the pigeon will be is … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, AMETSOC, anti-intellectualism, anti-science, atmosphere, attribution, Boston Ethical Society, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, climate education, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Cult of Carbon, dynamical systems, environment, ethics, evidence, forecasting, geophysics, global warming, Massachusetts Interfaith Coalition for Climate Action, moral leadership, Our Children's Trust, Principles of Planetary Climate, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, tragedy of the horizon, unreason, UU, UU Humanists | Leave a comment

`On Records`

This is a reblog from Eli Rabett, one of the post “On Records”, with additional comments and material from the author-moderator of this blog, 667-per-cm.net: A distinguishing mark of a new record in a time series is that it exceeds … Continue reading

Posted in Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, civilization, climate change, climate disruption, Cult of Carbon, ecology, Eli Rabett, ethics, global warming, greenhouse gases, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, liberal climate deniers, Massachusetts Interfaith Coalition for Climate Action, meteorology, Our Children's Trust, planning, pollution, quantitative ecology, radiative forcing, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, Spaceship Earth, temporal myopia, 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, Victor Brovkin, wishful environmentalism | Leave a comment

National Academies Statement on Harmful Consequences of Separating Families at the U.S. Border

(Updated.) “We urge the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to immediately stop separating migrant children from their families, based on the body of scientific evidence that underscores the potential for lifelong, harmful consequences for these children and based on human … Continue reading

Posted in an ignorant American public, an uncaring American public, anti-intellectualism, anti-science, children as political casualties, compassion, Donald Trump, humanism, Humans have a lot to answer for, immigration, military inferiority, moral leadership, sadism, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, torture, Unitarian Universalism, United States Government | Leave a comment

This flooding can’t be stopped. What about the rest?

Tamino is writing about this subject, too. That entirely makes complete sense as it is the biggest geophysical and environmental story out there right now. I’ve included an update at this post’s end discussing the possible economic impacts. It’s been … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, Antarctica, Anthropocene, bridge to nowhere, Carbon Worshipers, citizenship, civilization, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, climate justice, coastal communities, coastal investment risks, coasts, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, corporate responsibility, Cult of Carbon, environment, Eric Rignot, flooding, floods, glaciers, glaciology, global warming, greenhouse gases, hydrology, Hyper Anthropocene, ice sheet dynamics, icesheets, investing, investments, John Englander, living shorelines, Massachusetts, New England, real estate values, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, Robert M DeConto, Scituate, sea level rise, seawalls, shorelines, Stefan Rahmstorf, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, wishful environmentalism, ``The tide is risin'/And so are we'' | Leave a comment

LLNL Sankey diagram of U.S. national energy flows in 2017: What’s possible, what’s not, and who’s responsible

(Updated, 2018-05-02. See below.) I love Sankey diagrams, and have written about them with respect to influence of Big Oil on U.S. climate policy, and in connection with what it takes to power a light bulb, providing a Sankey-based explanation … Continue reading

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Solar Energy Society, AMETSOC, AMOC, Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to somewhere, clean disruption, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, coastal communities, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Cult of Carbon, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, denial, ecological services, energy utilities, environmental law, exponential growth, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, global warming, Hermann Scheer, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, Joseph Schumpeter, Kevin Anderson, local generation, local self reliance, rationality, reasonableness, regulatory capture, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Sonnen community, the green century, 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, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power, wishful environmentalism, zero carbon | 2 Comments

Sea-level report cards, contingency upon model character, and ensemble methods

Done by the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, new sea-level report cards offer a look at current sea-level rise rates, and projections. What’s interesting to me is making the projections conditional upon the character of the model used to project. … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, anomaly detection, Bayesian model averaging, changepoint detection, climate disruption, climate economics, climate education, coastal communities, coasts, dynamical systems, ensemble methods, ensemble models, flooding, geophysics, global warming, Grant Foster, Hyper Anthropocene, ice sheet dynamics, icesheets, living shorelines, meteorological models, nonlinear systems, prediction, sea level rise, shorelines, Skeptical Science, spaghetti plots, temporal myopia, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon | Leave a comment

“Carbon emissions and climate: Where do we stand, and what can be done if it all goes wrong?”

On Sunday, 11th February 2018, I presented an Abstract of a 3 hour talk on the subject, “Carbon emissions and climate: Where do we stand, and what can be done if it all goes wrong?” at the Needham Lyceum, hosted … Continue reading

Posted in Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide capture, carbon dioxide sequestration, Carbon Tax, civilization, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, climate disruption, COP21, Cult of Carbon, differential equations, dynamical systems, ecology, emissions, environment, exponential growth, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, geoengineering, geophysics, Glen Peters, Global Carbon Project, global warming, greenhouse gases, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, investments, James Hansen, Kerry Emanuel, liberal climate deniers, Mark Carney, Michael Bloomberg, Minsky moment, mitigation, nonlinear, nonlinear systems, oceanography, phytoplankton, population biology, population dynamics, precipitation, Principles of Planetary Climate, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, radiative forcing, rationality, Ray Pierrehumbert, risk, sea level rise, sociology, stranded assets, supply chains, sustainability, T'kun Olam, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, thermohaline circulation, tragedy of the horizon, unreason, UU, UU Needham, Wally Broecker, zero carbon | Leave a comment

[reblog] David Suzuki: Consumer society no longer serves our needs

From David Suzuki, who I’ve cited here more and more often, from his blog post, Consumer society no longer serves our needs, of 11th January 2018. An excerpt: But where is the indication of our real status — Earthlings — … Continue reading

Posted in Adam Smith, adaptation, affordable mass goods, Anthropocene, climate economics, climate justice, consumption, David Suzuki, ecological services, ecology, Ecology Action, economics, ethics, evidence, science, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon | 1 Comment

perceptions of likelihood

That’s from this Github repository, maintained by Zoni Nation, having this description. The original data are from a study by Sherman Kent at the U.S. CIA, and is quoted in at least once outside source discussing the problem. In addition … Continue reading

Posted in anti-intellectualism, Bayes, Bayesian, economics, fear uncertainty and doubt, games of chance, reason, risk, secularism, statistics, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, unreason | Tagged | Leave a comment

tripleplus ungood: Long run hot climate models are also the most accurate reproducing today and recent past

Patrick Brown and Ken Caldeira dropped a bombshell into the recent (7 Dec 2017) issue of Nature, and the repercussions are echoing around the scientific world. (See, for example, the related article in MIT’s Technology Review.) To be crisp, current … Continue reading

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, Anthropocene, bifurcations, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, climate models, critical slowing down, Cult of Carbon, destructive economic development, Global Carbon Project, global warming, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, Kevin Anderson, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, radiative forcing, Spaceship Earth, 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, Timothy Lenton, tragedy of the horizon | Leave a comment

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 | 1 Comment

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 | Leave a comment

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 | Leave a comment

On the responsibilities of scientists

On 4 September 2017, I added a blog post here titled “On the responsibilities of engineers”. Scientists have responsibilities, too. And I am delighted to say that the National Academies have just demonstrated a proud example of how such responsibilities … Continue reading

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Statistical Association, anti-science, attribution, Boston Ethical Society, chemistry, citizenship, compassion, Donald Trump, dump Trump, ecology, Ecology Action, economics, environment, environmental law, Environmental Protection Agency, ethics, evidence, fossil fuels, justice, land use to fight, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, pollution, rationality, reason, reasonableness, risk, science, science denier, secularism, sustainability, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the stack of lies, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon | Leave a comment

“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 | Leave a comment

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 | 1 Comment