Displaying posts published in

March 2022

ENVIRONMENT AND JUNK SCIENCE Comments turned off

The People Promising Us “Net Zero” Have No Clue About The Energy Storage Problem Francis Menton

By on March 29th, 2022

https://us7.campaign-archive.com/?e=a9fdc67db9&u=9d011a88d8fe324cae8c084c5&id=e79d572f7c

If you are even a semi-regular reader of this blog, you know about the energy storage problem that is inherent in the effort to eliminate dispatchable fossil fuels from the electricity generation system and replace them with wind and solar. As discussed here many times, other than with nuclear power, the storage problem is the critical issue that must be addressed if there is ever going to be “net zero” electricity generation, let alone a “net zero” economy based on all energy usage having been electrified. For a sample of my prior posts on this subject just in the last few months, go here, here and here.

The problems of trying to provide enough storage to back up a fully wind and solar system without fossil fuels are so huge and so costly that you would think that everyone pushing the “net zero” agenda would be completely focused on these issues. And given that the issues are quite obvious, you would think that such people would be well down the curve with feasibility studies, cost studies, and demonstration projects to make their case on how their plans could be accomplished. Remarkably, that is not the case at all. Instead, if you read about the plans and proposals in various quarters for “net zero” in some short period of years, you quickly realize that the people pushing this agenda have no clue. No clue whatsoever.

Today, I am going to look at discussions of the storage situation coming out of three jurisdictions with ambitious “net zero” plans: California, Australia and New York. First a very brief summary of the problem. It is (or certainly should be) obvious that wind and solar generators have substantial periods when they generate nothing (e.g., calm nights), and other times when they generate far less than users demand. Get out a spreadsheet to do some calculations based on actual historical patterns of usage and generation from wind and solar sources, and you will find that to have a fully wind/solar generation system and make it through a year without a catastrophic failure, you will need approximately a three-times overbuild (based on rated capacity) of the wind/solar system, plus storage for something in the range of 24 – 30 days of average usage. For these purposes “usage” at any given moment is measured in gigawatts, but usage for some period of time is measured in gigawatt hours, not gigawatts. California’s average electricity usage for 2020 was about 31 GW; Australia’s was about 26 GW ; and New York’s was about 18 GW.

Continue reading →
CHARLOTTE'S NEWS WEB, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

KBJ Hearings Typify Our Debased Political Discourse David Catron

By on March 29th, 2022

https://spectator.org/kbj-hearings-typify-our-debased-political-discourse/

Since Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson was chosen by President Biden to replace Justice Stephen Breyer on the Supreme Court, we’ve been encouraged by the White House, congressional Democrats, and the corporate media to celebrate her as the “first Black woman” nominated to serve on the Court. Yet, when asked during her confirmation hearing to define the term “woman,” she responded, “I can’t … I’m not a biologist.”

The problem with this answer isn’t just that it was unworthy of a serious SCOTUS nominee. It is symptomatic of a debilitating disease that has infected our political discourse, rendering substantive policy debate all but impossible and endangering the republic.

It is a virulent new strain of an old malady that George Orwell famously wrote about in his 1946 essay, “Politics and the English Language,” a rebuke of politicians, journalists, and academics who use deceptive language to conceal their ideological objectives: “The great enemy of clear language is insincerity.

When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink.” This is how the hopelessly disorganized Jan. 6 Capitol riot became an “insurrection.” It is how differing outcomes between identity groups became “systemic racism.” Orwell also discusses political words that have been rendered meaningless by dishonest usage:

The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies ‘something not desirable’. The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice, have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another.… Words of this kind are often used in a consciously dishonest way. That is, the person who uses them has his own private definition, but allows his hearer to think he means something quite different.… Other words used in variable meanings, in most cases more or less dishonestly, are: class, totalitarian, science, progressive, reactionary, bourgeois, equality.

Continue reading →
FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

 Biden’s reckless words, Ukraine missteps raise risks for US-Liz Peek

By on March 29th, 2022

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/bidens-reckless-words-ukraine-missteps-risks-us-liz-peek

Joe Biden is a danger to the United States.

As I write this, Vladimir Putin’s propagandists are spinning out videos of President Biden calling for regime change in Russia. They don’t even need to doctor the films.

When Biden said in Poland, “For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power,” he handed Putin an excuse to escalate the war in Ukraine. His words sound like a threat, and that is exactly how Russians will hear it.

What difference does it make? Putin has lied to his countrymen, telling them his “special military operation” is aimed at the “demilitarization and denazification” of his western neighbor, and that he is protecting the motherland from the West.

Joe Biden just made his case.

There are two potential ramifications of Biden’s comment. The first is that Biden dealt a serious blow to Putin’s opponents in Russia. It is hard to argue that your leader is lying about the West’s aggressive intentions when the president of the United States backs him up.

The second and more dangerous outcome is this: if Putin uses Biden’s words to justify the use of even more deadly force in Ukraine, like chemical or – God forbid — nuclear weapons, that will be on Russia’s strongman, certainly, but also on Biden. If Putin does take such a step, Americans will insist the U.S. respond, potentially bringing us into direct conflict with Russia.

Continue reading →
FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

Biden’s ‘New World Order’ by Pete Hoekstra

By on March 28th, 2022

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18361/biden-new-world-order

Clearly, America is not leading the “green” new world order, and Biden seems to have no meaningful plan for how to get us there other than radical disruptions to our lifestyle and a heightened reliance on China.

When it comes to oil and gas, it seems Biden’s new world order would continue his policy of decreasing American energy independence and increasing U.S. reliance on bad-faith state actors — thereby ironically funding their efforts to undermine America in the global order.

What does Biden’s record in the Middle East suggest that the new world order will resemble there? Well, the president is pushing to sign an agreement brokered by Russia, and backed by China, reportedly to remove sanctions on Iran, delist Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as the terrorist organization it is, and allow Russia to purchase Iran’s “excess” enriched uranium — perhaps to use against its next “Ukraine”?

Finally, what is Biden’s vision for this new world order with China? The message could not be more mixed. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) continues its genocide against the Uyghurs in Xinjiang, suppressing freedoms in Hong Kong, militarizing at least three of the artificial islands it built in the South China Sea, perfecting hypersonic missiles and “satellite crushers”, threatening Taiwan, and signing new friendship agreements with Russia. Meanwhile the Biden administration was sharing intelligence about Russia with China. Apparently, the administration had some quixotic hope that China would join the U.S. in discouraging Russia from attacking. At the same time, it turns out, China was sharing its intelligence information from the U.S. with Russia. One can only wonder who came up with the crazy idea that the CCP would join with the U.S. in maintaining order and stability in Europe.

Apparently, the administration had some quixotic hope that China would join the U.S. in discouraging Russia from attacking. One can only wonder who came up with the crazy idea that the CCP would join with the U.S. in maintaining order and stability in Europe.

Indeed, Biden’s vision of a new world order led by America looks more and more like a new world of disorder.

So, while it is not clear what Biden meant when he referenced America leading a new world order, his record over the last 15 months suggests it consists of a weakened U.S. economy hamstrung by inflation, war in Europe, unraveling alliances in the Middle East and growing uncertainty in Asia.

If this is the unintended consequence of Biden’s new world order, it is time for him to go back to the drawing board. The world has suffered enough. The time has come for him to recalibrate the global nightmare that his policies have created.

U.S. President Joe Biden recently closed his remarks to the Business Roundtable with a confusing reference to a “new world order.” He stated, according to the White House transcript of his speech:

“It occurs every three or four generations. … [A] time when things are shifting. We’re going to — there’s going to be a new world order out there, and we’ve got to lead it. And we’ve got to unite the rest of the free world in doing it.”

Continue reading →
MY SAY: Comments turned off

MY SAY- HOW TO ADDRESS WOMEN OF A CERTAIN AGE

By on March 28th, 2022

Hospital based doctors now require patients to fill out a questionnaire regarding  their preferred gender and how they wish to be addressed and referred to. Apparently, if you are  satisfied with your biological identity the answer is “binary”.

As for how I wish to be addressed, I will renounce Ms. or Mrs. and have chosen “Seniorita.”

Continue reading →
ELECTIONS Comments turned off

How the ‘Trump Won’ Movement Will Be Vindicated The coming election cycles are shaping up to vindicate the die-hards who refused to be gaslighted under the most daunting of circumstances. By Gavin Wax

By on March 28th, 2022

https://amgreatness.com/2022/03/25/how-the-trump-won-movement-will-be-vindicated/

Imagine if, following the disputed 2016 presidential election, the recently sworn-in President Donald Trump had sicced his Justice Department, hand-in-hand with allies in Congress and state governments throughout the country, after his Democratic political opponents who maintained that his election was the work of Russian interference. 

Although the claim that Trump was a Russian asset was laughably false, and the subsequent investigation into those spurious claims damaged the federal government’s credibility in immense and perhaps irreparable ways domestically and internationally, applying criminal penalties to the promulgation of that theory would have been wrong, anti-American, and contrary to the First Amendment. In keeping with his stalwart defense of American values, President Trump made no directive to the Justice Department to pursue criminal charges against these Democrats. 

Similarly, his Republican predecessor allowed Democrats to freely “challenge an election”: Democrats had previously contested the 2000 election by claiming that George W. Bush was “selected, not elected” as a result of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Bush v. Gore. A smaller minority contested Bush’s reelection in 2004, alleging irregularities in Ohio and elsewhere. 

Reasonable concerns deserve a good-faith examination, not prosecution and persecution. But that is not what the sitting regime has offered when examining the 2020 election and its aftermath. Joe Biden’s goal (and that of his underlings) is to harass and silence politicians, journalists, dissidents, and political donors. Unfortunately, these tactics are working.

Continue reading →
NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The Sheer Madness of Today’s Left When ideologues demand power but cannot achieve it politically because they are cruel ideologues, expect more of their insanity to follow. By Victor Davis Hanson

By on March 28th, 2022

https://amgreatness.com/2022/03/27/the-sheer-madness-of-todays-left/

“Madness! Madness . . . madness!”
— The Bridge on the River Kwai

With that exclamation, director David Lean ended his epic film about a dutiful but vainglorious British officer who sought to display to his Japanese captors superior British discipline and morale in a prisoner of war camp. As proof of British engineering superiority, he pursues his agendas by ordering his POWs to build for their Japanese captors a strategic bridge that otherwise they could not have built—only to try to destroy the efforts of fellow Allied soldiers sent to blow-up his masterpiece. For the delusional ideologue, reality must never intrude.

So it is now. When the rock of green and woke ideology hits the hard place of reality, sheer madness always results.

The world prices of oil and natural gas are skyrocketing. At the time of a major war in Ukraine, the Western democracies have framed the conflict as existential, with a Russia/Mordor on the attack against a declining West/Gondor. 

A subtext of the struggle is that the world’s illiberal regimes—fossil-fuel exporting Russia, Venezuela, Iran, and the various Middle Eastern autocracies—are getting richer by the day while destroying Mother Earth, as noble gas and oil importing green Western nations can scarcely afford to drive or heat their homes. 

Normally, the mad Left would not object terribly to the ensuing fuel price hikes. Remember, Joe Biden bragged on the campaign trail that he would end fossil fuels during his tenure. 

Obama’s soon-to-be Energy Secretary Steven Chu said during the 2008 campaign he wished to see American gas prices match those in Europe (i.e. $9-10 a gallon). And then President Obama himself did not disagree. He meekly added that such increases should be “gradual.” He had also warned that his cap-and-trade initiatives would necessarily “skyrocket” electricity prices—without suggesting that his off-guard brag was even a gaffe of unexpectedly telling the truth. 

So green orthodoxy dictates that the highest possible fossil fuel prices are good. Unaffordability will hasten the end of gas and oil, ensuring currently subsidized but uneconomical green energy as the only remaining alternative. 

But like most leftist top-down agendas, the details and consequences are usually hidden. After all, green wokeism usually exempts the lifestyles of its elite advocates. The Obamas currently are building a most un-green luxury Hawaiian beach mansion (their third such estate). And Al “Earth in the Balance” Gore got rich selling his failed cable outlet to a carbon-fueled Al Jazeera. 

Continue reading →
MOVIES AND TELEVISION Comments turned off

The False Gospel of the Enemies Within the Church By Janet Levy

By on March 28th, 2022

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/03/the_false_gospel_of_the_enemies_within_the_church.html

An unholy crusade to infiltrate the bastions of Christianity and co-opt churches in the revolution began more than a hundred years ago

Christianity has been intricately intertwined with the history and development of America and greatly contributed to its strength.  Judeo-Christian morality, in fact, has been the compass and one of the most powerful influences on Western society.  So, the Marxists see Christianity as the main obstacle to overthrowing Westphalian principles of sovereignty. To them, the church is the most crucial institution to conquer to usher in the New World Order.  They know that if the churches fail – especially in America, which represents the phenomenal success of capitalism and individualism – the entire culture, including politics, will move to the Left. 

Most Americans will be surprised to learn that an unholy crusade to infiltrate the bastions of Christianity and co-opt churches in the revolution began more than a hundred years ago. It is now threatening to gain critical mass.

This danger is the subject of a new film, Enemies Within the Church, produced by Cary Gordon, Trevor Loudon, and Judd Saul.  It chronicles the destructive infiltration of the churches and the injection of “wokeism” — Marxism, social justice, Critical Race Theory, gender fluidity – into church doctrine.  The choir of radical Left ideology, having targeted and gradually co-opted the media, Hollywood, Big Tech, the unions, and the political parties, set its sights on penetrating and controlling the churches, a difficult, long-term endeavor.  And, as the film explains, the communists eventually succeeded in penetrating the Bible colleges, seminaries, and pulpits of many denominations to push Christianity in the direction they want.

Continue reading →
ENVIRONMENT AND JUNK SCIENCE Comments turned off

Renewable Failure The poor pay the biggest price. John Stossel

By on March 28th, 2022

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/03/renewable-failure-john-stossel/

The “Greens” promise renewables, solar and wind power, will replace fossil fuels. After all, the wind and sun are free, and they don’t pollute!

Oops.

Now countries that embraced renewables are so desperate for power that they eagerly import coal, the worst polluter of all!

Do they apologize? No. Greens never apologize.

Germany was a leader in renewable energy, so confident in solar and wind power that they closed half their nuclear plants.

Oops.

That leaves Germans so short of power that Germans are now desperate to buy fossil fuels from Russia. Even worse, pollution-wise, high pollution coal now tops wind as Germany’s biggest electricity source. That’s really disgusting.

Then, even after putting all that soot in the air, Germans pay more than triple what Americans pay for electricity.

Continue reading →
FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

In Poland, Biden Wants To Be Reagan, But He’s Still Carter Daniel Greenfield

By on March 28th, 2022

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/2022/03/poland-biden-wants-be-reagan-hes-still-carter-daniel-greenfield/

When Biden showed up in Poland, the speechwriters dug through Reagan’s old speeches in the hopes of making him sound Reaganesque.

Too bad generations of speechwriters have already been farming that territory for too long. There were a few resonant unoriginal lines in what was otherwise a rambling and repetitive address that more closely resembled the rhythm of a Brezhnev speech.

What made Reagan speeches compelling wasn’t just words, it was the authoritative delivery and the moral authority behind the words. Reagan had built his political career around speaking things that the political elites didn’t want to be uttered: especially when it came to the Cold War. There was bold moral clarity in Reagan labeling the Soviet Union as evil because for so long the liberal elites had resisted stating the obvious. There’s no great moral triumph in pointing out that Putin is bad and that his invasion of Ukraine is wrong. Even few of Russia’s allies are especially enthralled with defending the move.

Continue reading →