As for thorium reactors not producing commercial power yet, that is because there was an incentive to use uranium and that path was chosen. There don’t appear to be any fundamental reasons why thorium reactors won’t produce commercial power.
I would also argue that renewables (other than hydro) have yet to produce any commercial (unsubsidised) power to the grid and are not likely to in the foreseeable future.
The only “commercial” power they produce is if you are off grid and need to rely on them and you’ll find the price per Kw-hr is very high and your personal economic circumstances are poorer as a result..

It’s a “broken window” , Bill.

if the “renewable energy source” is less efficient and more costly than fossil fuels over it’s expected lifetime, then it IS breaking a window.

If you have to put a gun to my head in order to get money from me for a green project, I can almost assuredly guarantee that such is NOT efficient, and thus represents a wast of resources that decreases economic growth.

I.e. it’s a “broken window”, Dude.

This is just a variation on the Broken Windows Fallacy
( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_fallacy )

In this fallacy, a child breaks a window – this provides work and pay for the glazier – who then buys bread off the baker and shoes off the cobbler, who each buy …..

Maybe if we all decided to walk round in lead divers’ boots: it would provide jobs for the boot makers, jobs for floor repairs, jobs for physiotherapists, ….

I’ve never seen this fallacy so simply and so utterly destroyed. I was watching the Green Channel (sorry) and saw some of the new green workers. I think they were in Chicago. They even had cheerleaders and signs and everything! It was explained that these green workers were cleaning up around the lakefront. Also, they were spreading potted plants on the roof of a three story building! Of course, the plants were first raised in lifts of hundreds of plants to the roof by a crane. Wow they made a green roof!!! What tremendous strides we have made, and soon these gangs, uh I mean groups of our highly educated high school grads will be cleaning lakefronts and spreading out plants all over this great country of ours!!

I have a lump in my throat…

Thanks, Smokey,
Mike

“Someone has to design turbines for example. Other have to construct the design, and still more have to erect them. The grid will need upgrading = more jobs.”

That is a well known economic fallacy. It goes something like this:

A vandal throws a rock through a store window. This creates jobs! Because the glazier will get extra work replacing the window, and he will then have extra money to pay for a new pair of shoes, so the shoemaker will have more income… and so on.

But here’s what really happens:

Because the store owner must pay for the damage, he cannot buy the new shoes his kid needs, so the shoemaker loses business, and can’t paint his shop, so the painter loses income… etc.

When the government forces taxpayers to pay for unnecessary job creation, the same thing happens. The country becomes poorer.

Every new “green” job is the equivalent of throwing a rock through a store window. Businesses and taxpayers are made poorer as a result of not allowing them to direct their money into the most productive uses. Every green job created is created by money confiscated from taxpayers. There is no free lunch.

Every dollar spent on wind/solar that produces less energy than the same dollar spent on fossil/nuclear/hydro is some fraction of a dollar that cannot be spent on other goods and services in society.
You end up with the same amount of energy to use but miss out on the other goods and services including the ability to pay for research that will increase energy availability from ever cleaner and more efficient sources.

I’m still hoping that the Bussard/Nebel Polywell fusion reactor will work and produce nett power. It is looking good so far. If it does, all talk of energy shortages will be over. If it doesn’t fission or fission/fusion hybrid with fuel recycling and thorium will do for a couple of thousand years although I doubt the human race will be using it for that long before something better comes along.
With enough cheap and abundant energy you can MAKE “fossil fuels” from CO2 and water.

Here’s a link to the Bussard device

http://nextbigfuture.com/2009/04/inertial-electrostatic-bussard-fusion.html

And this one will make you think about the nuclear “waste” problem.

http://blog.the-thinking-man.com/nuclear-waste-does-not-exist

From the wesite you identified:

“We recognize the importance of international collaborations in building a Sustainable Arctic Observing Network. Towards this end, we will also continue our established collaboration with the European Union scientists involved with Developing Arctic Modelling and Observing Capabilities for Long-term Environmental Studies (DAMOCLES) project.”

Doesn’t “DAMOCLES” pretty much say all that needs to be said?
Thanks,
Mike

George E. Smith (09:46:07) : no point me answering as it will be snipped
Jack Hughes (04:23:47) : I did answer but it was snipped!

Pamela Gray (17:10:06) :
Try this on for size: Question everything, even your own beliefs. Youth used to be really good at this. Not so much anymore

I am sceptical of all sides – the anti AGW and the AGW . I have weighed up all the information. I have looked at the consequences of doing nothing and the consequeces of “going green”.

I am not convinced the AGW is valid. BUT I know I would not be able to say to my children “I did nothing to stop GW” if AGW is true

I am convinced, absolutely, that oil and gas will be in short supply in a couple of decades. I am convinced that nuclear is not the way – dangerous, and if the world goes nuclear then supply will run short in a couple, or so, of decades, (please do not mention sea water as extracting and processing uranium from it will take most of the energy it will provide) AND I do not want to pass the need to attend a festering heap of higly radioactive waste onto the next 5 generations of my family.

I therefore KNOW that renewables are the only option for any future for my children. So consequently following the path of preventing AGW will be hard but at least I will feel at ease with the future I pass on.

AND if the AGW is not happening then at least the world will have a future.

Going the other way my children become fuel impoverished anyway and the world could overheat.

Which way is the right choice? “”"

So Bill; given what you believe; or is it don’t believe, what is your excuse for having children; given that all the ones we have now are helping use up the limited resources left on this planet.
About 100 years ago, the head of the US patent office declared that everything that could be invented, had already been invented. Obviously he thought the future would be pretty grim too.

But I can’t fathom people who see everything wrong with what has been accomplished by those who came before them; not having the self control to stop having children.

There’s 14,000 children available for adoption in just the city of Oakland California. Why would environmentally concerned people want to make more.

George

Any day now, some disinterested wind/mapping/ directional scientist will feel compeled to explain the use of lacy black panties for a wind sock.

Perhaps the environmental reporter posted early. April the first was probably the intended date. What do you expect from the useless twerps that call themselves environmental journalists these days?

In which case the current deployment is hopelessly inadequate for the task.
Of course they say that what they’re doing is research with different goals than you suggest, but they would wouldn’t they.

http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/ourplan.htm

It’s off topic but ~snip~