It's all over but for the sweating?

[Arragonis]

I'm sure this will appear at some point, so I'll park it here first.



A Reconstruction of Regional and Global Temperature for the Past 11,300 Years

Surface temperature reconstructions of the past 1500 years suggest that recent warming is unprecedented in that time. Here we provide a broader perspective by reconstructing regional and global temperature anomalies for the past 11,300 years from 73 globally distributed records. Early Holocene (10,000 to 5000 years ago) warmth is followed by ~0.7°C cooling through the middle to late Holocene (<5000 years ago), culminating in the coolest temperatures of the Holocene during the Little Ice Age, about 200 years ago. This cooling is largely associated with ~2°C change in the North Atlantic. Current global temperatures of the past decade have not yet exceeded peak interglacial values but are warmer than during ~75% of the Holocene temperature history. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change model projections for 2100 exceed the full distribution of Holocene temperature under all plausible greenhouse gas emission scenarios.

It has lots of proxies, like the original Hockey Stick - and some results at odds with lots of other results, and what is known about ice cover.

But there you go.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by Arragonis

So even if windmills don't make any energy they still get paid - from energy bills. And when they need backup, which is idling and uses energy to do so - those will also be subsidised from energy bills.

Sure, just as the people who build peaker plants & backup equipment get paid, even though their equipment may not be used very often. That's just a consequence of the mechanism of electric grids as they're currently implemented: there is not much storage out there.

It would seem that the sensible solution, long term, would be to quit whining about the nasty politicians forcing you to (gasp!) actually have clean air and such, and get off your butts and add some storage to the system.

If we do see some blackouts or maybe some brownouts and people begin to realise that we have just closed our coal plants due to the CCA...

So how is that different from getting brownouts/blackouts because you can no longer afford to buy & import coal? Or because your coal-miners union has just gone on strike again?

To reduce electricity consumption, and thus conserve coal stocks, a series of measures were announced on 13 December 1973 by Heath, including the "Three-Day Work Order", more commonly known as the Three-Day Week, which was to come into force at midnight on 31 December. Commercial consumption of electricity would be limited to three consecutive days each week.

- Three-Day Week - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Arragonis]

Originally Posted by jamesqf

Sure, just as the people who build peaker plants & backup equipment get paid, even though their equipment may not be used very often. That's just a consequence of the mechanism of electric grids as they're currently implemented: there is not much storage out there.

It would seem that the sensible solution, long term, would be to quit whining about the nasty politicians forcing you to (gasp!) actually have clean air and such, and get off your butts and add some storage to the system.

OK so peaker plant owners paid for nothing (as insurance) = good - agreed.

Renewables paid for nothing = er, what exactly ?

And that money could have paid for a nice, clean nuclear plant which would occupy about 9 square miles (3x3) somewhere remote next to the sea, and it would be reliable.

Our air has been nice and clean since the clean air act of the 1950s - no more London Pea-Souper fogs. It also extends to power plants so our air has been pretty good.

Ironically Biomass plants are excluded from the act as they cannot meet it, but they make less CO2 and therefore walk on water.

Oh hang on, why are greenies taking uk.gov to court over air quality then ?

Originally Posted by jamesqf

So how is that different from getting brownouts/blackouts because you can no longer afford to buy & import coal? Or because your coal-miners union has just gone on strike again?

- Three-Day Week - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Oh dear, you are about 30 years late on that one James old bean. More research needed.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by Arragonis

And that money could have paid for a nice, clean nuclear plant which would occupy about 9 square miles (3x3) somewhere remote next to the sea, and it would be reliable.

Sure, if you can figure out how to shut up the anti-nuclear hysterics long enough to get it built - and not have them shut it down in response to tsunami damage to a plant half a world away.

Our air has been nice and clean since the clean air act of the 1950s - no more London Pea-Souper fogs. It also extends to power plants so our air has been pretty good.

I beg to differ. Better than in the 1950s, sure, but it's still not all that great, per random nose tests between 1990-2003.

Oh dear, you are about 30 years late on that one James old bean. More research needed.

Oh, and you think they won't be back, when/if you give them the chance?

[Arragonis]

Originally Posted by jamesqf

Sure, if you can figure out how to shut up the anti-nuclear hysterics long enough to get it built - and not have them shut it down in response to tsunami damage to a plant half a world away.

I would like a system whereby consumers could choose, so if they choose renewables only and they are not producing then those households are cut off and not charged, those of us happy with Nuclear could continue to have power and heat. Maybe when West London dwelling Gaurdian readers suffer some consequences of what they preach they might like a move to the real world.

Originally Posted by jamesqf

I beg to differ. Better than in the 1950s, sure, but it's still not all that great, per random nose tests between 1990-2003.

You would need to have a nose here in the 1950s to conclude that. At that time all power was coal, trains ran on coal and houses were heated by coal fires in a fireplace, not the case these days in 80-90% of homes - biomass excluded of course.

Originally Posted by jamesqf

Oh, and you think they won't be back, when/if you give them the chance?

No. And even if they did it wouldn't matter as much as it did in the early 1970s.

[freebeard]

Why the Great Smog of London Was Anything but Great

Wow, that was worse than NYC on 20010911.

[Arragonis]

Originally Posted by freebeard

Why the Great Smog of London Was Anything but Great

Wow, that was worse than NYC on 20010911.

It wasn't just a London smog, the same thing hit most industrial cities in the UK around that time - Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Hull, Newcastle, Glasgow etc. The Clean Air Act sorted most of that out.

In related history, Edinburgh (where I am) was also known as "Auld Reekie" because of the smell of the town. This was mainly due to the fact that the waste from the town would flow into a lake / pond at the foot of the castle where the railway station is now.

Worth knowing if you come to visit and arrive by train

EDIT - but if you do, PM me !

[NeilBlanchard]

From Hockey Stick to Ski Jump | Climate Denial Crock of the Week

In an enormous leap forward, new analyses of temperature records for the last 11000 years have now been published.

Don’t look for the climate denial blogosphere to learn anything from new science. Expect instead a newly focused attack on the facts, – trolls will have to bone up – and a new buzzword.

The older temperature graphs took in only the past 1000 or 2000 years, and were recognizable for the pronounced upward swing at the end. The new, longer graphs include a hump that peaked 9500 years ago, when the planet’s axial tilt was most extreme toward the sun, and have declined [slowly] until the past century, where we see a dramatic spike.

Less like a Hockey stick, said one scientist. More like a Ski Jump. With a brick wall at the end.

[Arragonis]

Originally Posted by NeilBlanchard

...

*cough

Note how I post from both sides ? Just saying...

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by Arragonis

I would like a system whereby consumers could choose, so if they choose renewables only and they are not producing then those households are cut off and not charged, those of us happy with Nuclear could continue to have power and heat.

Unfortunately the electric grid doesn't work that way. You may, as in some places in the US, be able to notionally buy "green" electricity from wind plants &c (and could do the same with nuclear or whatever), but you aren't actually getting the same electrons that the wind plants shoved out on the grid.

You would need to have a nose here in the 1950s to conclude that.

Why? I'm not saying that British air quality is not lots better than it was in the 1950s, just that it's not yet up to my standards of good. So I would just need to move my nose from here to there, and compare.



At that time all power was coal, trains ran on coal and houses were heated by coal fires in a fireplace, not the case these days in 80-90% of homes - biomass excluded of course.



No. And even if they did it wouldn't matter as much as it did in the early 1970s.[/QUOTE]