Energy & Environmental News-5/17/11

May 20, 2011 by Walter Schneider.

Some recent energy articles of interest

By John Droz, Jr.

In a shockingly honest assessment, the head of the NYS agency promoting offshore wind, now publicly admits that it’s a bad idea:

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20110503/NEWS01/105030346/Michael-Townsend-doubts-viability-offshore-wind-farms

A fine list that dispels the myths about the “anti-wind” campaign http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/print-friendly/33662

An extremely pertinent report is this worldwide study comparing energy use to several other important matters (e.g. infant mortality rate, GDP, literacy rate, etc.) http://www.aeaiinc.com/reports/Energy_and_Country_Instability.pdf

A Spanish community voted to pass a “visual impact” tax on wind turbines (1.6% of their generated income) http://www.windpowermonthly.com/News/MostRead/1061498/Spanish-region-imposes-visual-impact-tax-turbines/

Wind Power’s Promises Gone Awry, written by a NY physicist http://www.empirepage.com/2011/4/26/promises-and-predictions-gone-awry

A new book “The False Promise of Green Energy” http://www.cato.org/store/books/false-promise-green-energy

Obama on Energy: Inconsistent, Incoherent http://www.energytribune.com/articles.cfm/7290/Obama-on-Energy-Inconsistent-Incoherent

Very promising news: government financial support of Cape Wind project now in doubt
http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110513/NEWS11/110519876

The official UK’s government’s climate advisory panel (made up mostly of environmental activists) recently concluded that building nuclear was the way to go: http://tinyurl.com/3s6ydep

A reasonable discussion of nuclear radiation, written by an environmentalist
http://www.marklynas.org/2011/03/the-dangers-of-nuclear-power-in-light-of-fukushima/

A good article, with graphics, about Small Modular Reactors http://www.climatecentral.org/blogs/small-modular-reactors-smaller-and-cheaper/.

Other worthwhile discussions of the same topic

• http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/03/the-new-debate-fukushima-and-small-modular-nuclear-reactors/73084/
• http://alfin2300.blogspot.com/2011/04/can-small-modular-nuclear-reactors-save.html
• http://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/The-Future-of-Nuclear-Energy-Small-Modular-Nuclear-Reactors.html

“Lots of Dirty Things Have To  Happen to Make Clean Energy” touches on some of the environmental downsides of wind energy
http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/05/ron-arnold-lots-dirty-things-have-happen-make-clean-energy

Some recent global warming articles of interest

George Manbiot is one of the leading environmentalists on the planet. Recently he wrote two introspective columns about the environmental movement, and how it has gone wrong. For an environmentalist, he makes some amazingly candid observations:

part 1 http://www.monbiot.com/2011/05/02/the-lost-world/

part 2 http://www.monbiot.com/2011/05/05/our-crushing-dilemmas/

In my view, the main failing of his commentaries is that he doesn’t see the solution. It’s this:

Any and all environmental solutions must be truly SCIENCE-based. To date they have instead been POLITICAL agendas.  If the environmental movement adopted real science (not things like consensus science) then environmental progress would happen.

A fine article about AGW and the Scientific Method http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2011/04/scientific-method

All you need to know about AGW http://www.theblogofrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/global-warming-cartoon-the-rent-seekers-dream-come-true1.jpg

“The Ten Major Failures of Consensus Science” http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/originals/10_major_consensus_failures.pdf

A new good website about the fallacy of AGW  http://www.galileomovement.com.au

Thank you for your support.

john droz jr.,

physicist & environmental advocate

Posted in Energy Newsletter, Propaganda debunked, Energy Issues, Alternative Energy Sources, Climate Change | Print | No Comments »