A Commodity of Errors.

 2 weeks ago Kansas state Senate (R) passed a resolution that committee’s debating energy policy could not use “climate” or controversial  words… yesterday Ted Cruz (R) got the US Senate to censor the term “Change in Climate” in the resolution supporting International Women’s Day. 

WTF?  1984?

Donald Trump got a nasty tickle under his kilt this week.  The offshore wind farm he spent millions fighting will be built right in front of his fucking zillion dollar Scottish golf course and hotel.  Scotland said piss off.  That thing on his head vowed to keep fighting in court.  What is that thing?

Obama announced new lower sulfur rules for gasoline.  Refiners and oil men are pissed.  Shale oil, and tar sands oil is packed with sulfur, tons of it, second only to hydrocarbons, to get it out increases efforts at the refiner and takes a little of the profit out of these dirtiest oils.  Car manufacturers are partially behind this rule,  they (you) don’t want that sulfur in your engine anyhow, we sure as hell don’t want it in our air.  Ever smell rotten egg?

Ever wonder what MPG the semi-trailer blowing oily mist on you gets?  5.5 to 8 MPG.  Cummins and Kenworth have a joint prototype project for a super mileage truck, improving aerodynamics, low rolling resistance tires, engine and drive train upgrades got it over 10 MPG.  That is hugh, hundreds of millions of gallons, dollars and pollution saved.  Mercedes in Gemany did the same thing last year with even better results.  Some of these features will show up on new trucks soon.  I still hate trucks.

The anti-renewable energy lobby has a great new claim.  We cannot build more wind mills because they block the wind from one another.  Disaster approaching they cry.    Your bullshit alarm should be screeching like a guest showering at the Bates Motel.  Don’t you think the guys investing hundreds of millions to build them know how close they can put them, you know, like by studying wind patterns and using science stuff.   Arithmetic too.

Better than that, the climate deniers discovered science.  In the last few days I ran into a number of posts with a bizzaro world approach.  Climate deniers claiming solid and majority of science is on their side and those wanting clean energy hate science, want to ruin it in schools and take science out of the discussion.

See first paragraph, repeat as necessary.

A must read, at Green Eagle

For $59 you busted your hump.
http://largegreenbird.blogspot.com/2013/03/the-only-story-that-counts.html

Hey Joe, where you goin with that gun in your hand?

Who are these Joe's?  The largest group in each sector of the population is: White. Male. Over 50. Some college didn't graduate.  Midwest or Southern state. Republican or wingnut.

In the last 15 years the number of hunters has fallen, and so the gun industry to make up sales has turned to weapons for killing people rather than rabbit.  The number of buyers of all guns is way down.  The sales of guns is way up.  The most likely buyer already owns 12 guns.
I have two friends who own 20 or 30 and are shopping for more.  One guy told me he has thousands of rounds of ammo, and is plugged into the rumor mill that ammo shortages are rampant and Obama is doing it.
Wyoming is the easiest state to get a gun, Mass. the toughest.  Suicide by gun is higher in Wyoming by 7 times.  You can grade states by suicide and see which are the easiest to buy a gun.
The myth is blacks are doing most the killing and dying.  Truth is the largest group dying by guns are white men over 50, and the killer is either friend or family or their own hand, the gun is almost always from their own household.   You can't tell that from the news, suicides never make it, and white on white murders don't have enough fear and staying power, one or two days in the paper and that's usually it.  So, it seems like all the brown black red and yellow people are killers, in fact few of them own guns.

Pass that guy a Braniff barf bag!

Every few months the news puts out a breathless story of another solar panel maker closing.  Tree huggers wheez with anxiety the future is fading, while the climate deniers and fossil fuel dicks howl with delight at proof clean energy will die, and the fucking hippies with it.

Get a little reality dude!

In the early 1900's there were about 150 motor vehicle builders in the US.  When I was a kid there was still several, today there's 3 and no one can make a case that currently their market share isn't robust.  Most new technologies have a hugh swell of brands in the early years.  Innovation and competition winnows it down over time.   There use to be dozens of tractor makers, now it's John Deere and a couple others.   This is the normal progression of most market sectors.  Rather than being seen as an industry in failure and collapse, these events signal a maturing of the industry.   A strange way to see it but that historically is what it means.  I don't like it, but I understand it, and when next we hear of another solar or wind company closing don't hyperventilate, or blow chunks.

Keep screwing with it, and the earth will destroy us.

“How can we be so arrogant? The planet is, was, and always will be stronger than us. We can't destroy it; if we overstep the mark, the planet will simply erase us from its surface and carry on existing. Why don't they start talking about not letting the planet destroy us?” 
― Paulo Coelho, The Winner Stands Alone

That's really it.  When we have pushed the atmosphere and the oceans out of the narrow band of chemical and temperature tolerances known to them for millions of years, the earth will be unfit for most of the current plants and animals.  The 3rd great extinction.  The anthropocene will peter out in an empty concrete lined urban riverbed.

Picture above: dust storm, Arizona, 2012, once rare, the last couple of years have seen a number of them.  Can you say harbinger? 

thar she blows

Wind at 09:00 eastern.  Wind energy opponents love to talk about the wind going calm without warning.  Forecasting how much snow will fall, or the chance of rain is very difficult.  Forecasting wind is not, if you've ever seen an isobar chart you know where the wind is going to blow hard for the next few hours.  Likewise in the display of current wind it's safe bet to say from the rockies to the Atlantic the wind looks reliable for the next several hours.  Wind farms are in fact rarely caught in the myth promoted.
Starting in the next few weeks, transmission line operators will be selling use of their piece of the grid in 15 minute blocks.  Currently it's hourly.  Following a calm wind period this will let wind (and solar) suppliers get on the grid sooner when the air moves, letting utilities "back down" their coal plants sooner.

Salmonella in Chicken & Turkey: Deadly But Not Illegal | NutritionFacts.org

Salmonella in Chicken & Turkey: Deadly But Not Illegal | NutritionFacts.org