From a Eurekalert press release, it seems the polar bears just aren’t doing the job anymore: “Communicators need to move away from the traditional images of polar bears or fear-laden imagery to find new, inspirational motifs to engage people with climate change.”
Beyond polar bears? Experts look for a new vision of climate change to combat skepticism
Climate change is about more than just polar bears. That is the message from Dr Kate Manzo whose research into climate change communication has been published in Meteorological Applications. The research, which reviews the efforts of journalists, campaigners and politicians to engage the British public with climate change, explores how new ‘visual strategies’ can communicate climate change messages against a backdrop of increased climate scepticism.
“There have been various efforts to put a face on the climate change issue,” said Dr Manzo, from Newcastle University. “Communicators need to move away from the traditional images of polar bears or fear-laden imagery to find new, inspirational motifs to engage people with climate change. My research has uncovered a variety of possibilities – such as windmills as icons of renewable energy – as well as alternatives to documentary photography as the dominant form of climate change communication. Artists and cartoonists are among the producers of inspirational alternatives.”
“A recent study of American public perception showed that fewer people are convinced of the reality of climate change, and of those that are only 36% attribute it to human activity. This shows the variance of levels of climate change knowledge and understanding, which effects how people behave in response. It also highlights the need for strategies to boost the cognitive and behavioural elements of climate change engagement without resorting to methods such as fear appeals that are, at best, a double edged sword.”
In her study Manzo analysed the traditional standard bearing symbols of climate change, especially polar bears, which (like the images of the global poor that sometimes appear in relation to climate change) are traditionally cast as being ‘helpless’ and ‘stranded’ victims as their habitat changes around them.
The most famous example of a polar bear gaining iconic status is Knut, the cub from Berlin Zoo whose image was used so successfully for political and commercial campaigns that he became the biggest cash grossing animal of all time.
“Polar bears score highly in the so called identifiable victim stakes. Findings suggest that the image of a lone polar bear, like Knut, wins hands down in the affective stakes provoking feelings of pity and concern as well as charitable giving.”
But is it time for those communicating climate change messages to find a new motif? To answer this question Manzo studied recent charity campaigns, climate change photography and the framing of climate change articles in the press.
Dr Manzo suggests that icons of extreme weather and renewable energy are the standard alternatives to faces of climate change, with images such as windmills providing an inspirational approach to a climate change message which is inherently difficult to visualise.
“Visually pleasing images have indirect value when they allow organisations that use them to raise money for climate action and science. Icons of renewable energy, such as windmills, change the frame of reference from either business as usual or visions of apocalypse to possible strategies of mitigation.”
“All of these alternatives represent efforts to move beyond polar bears as the iconic representation of climate change and the visual sign of the so called ‘age of the melt,'” concludes Manzo. “The challenge is to use visuals creatively in ways that can address all three aspects of climate change communication, i.e. cognition, affect and behaviour, without enhancing a sense of fatalism and disengagement.”
Of course, it’s not a marketing exercise, at all … oh wait…
I still reckon we should bring on the sky-diving poley bear fail. That was a laugh, at least!
Can I suggest some honesty may be a good start?
It pains me to think that this woman is based just 22 miles North of me.
I do marvel at her ability to produce a paper whilst her head is stuck so firmly up her behind and with one of her feet wedged in her mouth.
So it doesn’t matter if it is true, as long at the public believes in it.
Science at it’s best. (not) {avoiding a well deserved snip}
How about an image of a destitute scientist wearing a sandwich board saying “Will research for a luxury hybrid”
I don’t think the residents of areas having windmills forced upon their landscape find these wind-electric generating industrial facilities (don’t call them wind farms) “inspirational” in the least. What’s next, reeducation camps?
The Argument is getting positively Medieval-the Warmist position is like that of an
Monk who tries to set the number of Angels on the head of a pin. An intangible that cannot be quantified in any was but just is-take it as your truth-or else. doubt and
skepticism- is simply heresy. In the meantime -cover those hills with wind turbines!
Hide your roof in Solar cells! Sinner! Infidel! Believe! or face Destruction! Gaia is
watching your every move!. Hold your:”Icons of renewable energy” close!!!
Sarcasm is now off…
Split Atoms, Not Birds..
Windmills are destroying the UK countryside. Calling them inspirational is bizarre. Even the Kennedy family won’t allow them in their neighbourhood.
Grrr. ‘This shows the variance of levels of climate change knowledge and understanding, which effects how people behave in response.” Never dawns on her that the more one becomes educated as to the details of GW, the more likely one is to be skeptical.
Can someone please create an iconic image showing an eagle being beheaded by a windmill, please?
If they use pictures of windmills they need to include the dead birds at the base of those windmills. They can show a before and after picture of an environment inhabited by solar panels!
The future lack of water is being now their most recurrent promoted threat, at least in blessed “third world countries”, through ads paid by an international bank (owned by a well known NY bailed out Investment Bank=YOU pay those ads), and also by well known NGO´s.
Our president was asked about it, a few months ago, by a journalist, and he answered:
In a world of 71% water? (laughing).
All this propaganda are directed to “innocent” people (like bedwetter Al Baby: He does believe it).
istockphoto, search “global warming”: (sorry, no hits for climate change, they didn’t get the memo it seems)
http://www.istockphoto.com/file_search.php?action=file&oldtext=cllimate change&abstractType=1023&text=global warming
and you get a nice assortment of dry reservoir beds, smokestacks, guys with gas masks… I’d go with the dry reservoir bed, that’s the Betty Page of Climate Change.
Reality dis—\= \—connect.
wait, here’s a shorter link with the same effect:
http://www.istockphoto.com/file_search.php?action=file&abstractType=1023&text=global warming
Our brain washing techniques are not working,
we need a new one.
“The most famous example of a polar bear gaining iconic status is Knut, the cub from Berlin Zoo whose image was used so successfully for political and commercial campaigns that he became the biggest cash grossing animal of all time.”
And because of the media’s cuddly image of the dangerous beast, in 2009 a German woman visiting the zoo decided it would be fun to enter the polar bear sanctuary and was viciously mauled. Had she not been rescued she would have been dinner. Idiot media.
I am waiting for the day the warmists throw themselves under the bus.
It would save us an awful lot of money and probably save our economies.
http://web.me.com/sinfonia1/Clamour_Of_The_Times/Clamour_Of_The_Times/Entries/2010/5/28_Through_the_Looking_Glass_with_Connie.html
How about an icon of a whirling windmill with a dead bird wrapped about one blade?
Show videos of bird choppers at work,doing what they do best.
These are tough times-people won’t buy BS if it costs them.
stevengoddard says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:10 am
Windmills are destroying the UK countryside. Calling them inspirational is bizarre. Even the Kennedy family won’t allow them in their neighbourhood.
The real issue is they get out there on there boats and get plastered, The chances of running into one of the towers is at the orange danger level this weekend. I have also been on the Intercoastal in florida by their party compound and wonder how they make it down the intercoastal to open water.
The Kennedy deal is offshore turbines.
At precisely this point in time ( 1510 GMT Saturday 29 May 2010 ) it was recorded that owing to global warming ( climate change ) their were no more “polar bears” at the South Pole, green pieces and the world wide fund for idiots issued a ‘joint’ ( as in drugs ) statement’
That it was due to extensive use of delusional material buying, by members, was the problem, the communique said that it was making available AGAIN free of all charges the book ‘Grow your own mind blower’
sarc off.
stevengoddard says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:10 am
Windmills are destroying the UK countryside
NO!, my dear Steven, they are purportedly destroying the UK, along other developed countries to achieve a more fair world. Their crazy ideology is, in this aspect, tanatophilic, unconsciously finding joy in suicidal acts.
The kinder, gentler approach will not set well with Joe Romm and his acolytes. They so love to paint images of coal companies’ CEOs in handcuffs as their ‘death trains’ finally come to a halt.
And the image of oil production as stealing Gaia’s very blood is just too good to pass up. If they should succeed in stopping oil production, at least the weekly checks from ExxonMobil to skeptics would also stop. You do get yours, don’t you? (/snark)
Is this like subliminal messaging ? The slow conditioning of the masses, altering their thinking without them knowing it ?
1984 anyone ?
Wow, just bloody wow.
There is a protest near Ottawa Ontario in a village called North Gore were a “wind farm” has been approved (I didn’t find a link but it was on CFRA radio station about a week ago). I think the good doctor may have given us imagery that would be ammunition for anti AGW use. How about windmills and chopped up seabirds images. Also, I believe a peer-reviewed paper can be written now revealing the failure of the windmill as a substitute for conventional E generation except for small individual projects.
Ah. Paint political faith-based “stupid” in the colors of Shangrila. We all know how that movie turned out.
Steven – let’s play their game. Don’t call them “windmills”, call them “bird blenders”.
On-topic, I note the mention of Knut, who is no longer beloved of the left as he’s decided he’s not a vegetarian and that he likes to play with his food (to the eco-nuts horror). Nothing stays static in nature, including the climate around it.
This is one of many such articles of recent weeks. I was sent one by a friend – from The Environmentalist (Member’s publication of IEMA – Institution of Environmental Management and Assessment) –
This had the headline “How environmental managers can be persuasive in the face of increasing scepticism”. It cites the economic downturn, political failure at Copenhagen and “highly publicised errors and unfortuate mis-statements by a small number of climate scientists” that have been used to cast doubt on the entire subject of global warming an climate change mitigation as a challenge for those in the [AGW] field [to counter].
It proceeds to give advice on how to stay on message and overcome counterarguements:
“Don’t get bogged down in the science. The overall trends are clear.” But, it says, the uncertainty is in the magnitudes of the impacts and that action to reduce GHG emissions is akin to purchasing an insurance policy.
Yeah – a damned expensive one that we don’t need.
Kate Manzo seems to be another Polly Higgins: Hyperactive in various areas, probably not earning real money in any of them. Has her own website:
http://www.katemanzo.com/
Has written a novel, she brags.
Teaches Pilates, kickboxing and everything else for the modern city dweller:
http://www.positivelifestyletraining.co.uk/aboutus/
She’s also an academic, she brags. Political science.
2 books, her CV says. Having nothing to do with pilates but more with supression, human rights and so on.
It looks a lot like a data base mistake has merged several people into one, but it doesn’t seem to be the case. A kind of female Willis Eschenbach, only evil. (Evil because she wants to be a communication manipulator; i don’t like communication manipulators very much. YMMV if you’ve majored in political science).
Really reminds me a lot of those eco door mats Polly Higgins wanted to sell.
“Experts look for a new vision of climate change to combat skepticism”
Call me slow! Call me stupid! But when did we (or anyone else) elect these self-procalimed ‘experts’ to say squat about anything? I must have been asleep. Anyone who claims to be, or know, an “expert” needs to fess up and preface any remarks with a little justification for the use of the word ‘expert’. This is not unreasonable! Anyone can claim to be an ‘expert’. Anyone can introduce anyone as an ‘expert’. But there simply must be some foundation for the claim, Right? Left? Whatever?
We have really bastardized the language. Anything means anything anymore! Nothing means nothing anymore! What planet is this? What country is this? Did someone put LSD in the national water supply? This is wierd! This is insane!
We’re skeptics if we don’t believe an ‘EXPERT’?
Is this 1984?
One can only hope that the planned Government cut backs will result in the closing of such University departments, unfortunately it is likely real science will suffer whilst “add nothing” departments will continue to massage the message and their own job options.
As for cartoons, I have seen snippets of a Simpsons episode where Homer is sold a turbine with subsequent images of electric fans being used to turn the turbine.
P-lease, if anyone has a link to where this episode can be vieweded in it entirety. 🙂
Mick.
No, no conspiracy at all. They’re actually doing studies on how to market the AGW hoax! Nice. It doesn’t matter. The cat’s already out of the bag. They can use windmills, but I don’t think it evoke a positive emotion. Maybe if they go back to the poor seals, but that’s been done already.
“the so called ‘age of the melt’” I love this one!
to move beyond polar bears as the iconic representation of climate change
I think a chocolate ice cream cone would work. Can someone suggest this to her?
A proper definition of “climate change” might be a good starting point. I’m aware of diurnal changes in weather, as well as seasonal changes, but I’ll be darned if I can identify this thing called “climate change”. I recall skiing in 1955 and I went skiing yesterday in some excellent late season powder in the Sierra backcountry. In between I saw decades when the snows increased and decreased but overall nothing much has changed. Weather is still weather.
Notice how there’s no mention of the need to improve actual climate science. It’s all a matter of “better” propaganda and more devious marketing psychology to subject the masses to.
Disgusting…..
stevengoddard says: May 29, 2010 at 7:10 am “Windmills are destroying the UK countryside. Calling them inspirational is bizarre. Even the Kennedy family won’t allow them in their neighbourhood.”
Two slight corrections. Apparently the Kennedy family (and other wealthy families) have lost a battle, and the wind developer has won permission to proceed. Also, windmills are a welcomed site in many American farm communities. They represent a diversity to income and also a means by which government regulations transfer money from cities to rural communities.
The liberal elites, like this babe, need to get a life, after they obtain a real education. Imagine, having the time and resources to sit around and come up with this nonsense! To put the country back on the right track I would propose a new coin be minted:
Top side inscribed: Join Us and Prosper
Bottom side: Fight Us and Die
Make it out of gold to discourage our present fiat money. Perhaps an image of a machinegun toting Marine on one side and a mushroom cloud on the other. Now, this would be the proper imagery to portray. The Marine could be stomping on a spotted owl with industrial smokestacks in the background.
How’s that for a change of pace from the pinko, commie, bedwetter messages be sent by our present loser leaders? And I came up with all this creativity in my spare time, as a private enterprise (owned by me) supported individual with no federal funds or grants!
The problem with our side is that we are too politically correct and the lefties, on the other hand, are down and dirty street fighters who care nothing of science, truth or morality. Guess who wins in that kind of contest.
http://www.bmreports.com/bsp/bsp_home.htm
Perhaps Dr. Manzo would like to do some real research and examine the graphs in the above site.
There she will find that at this moment her 3,000 iconic windmills (sic) are producing 0.2% of consumption and that we are importing 6.o% of our current consumption through the French Interconnector.
That will be reliable nuclear generation coming to our rescue, not the wind generation advocated for our salvation by green idiots in ex polytechnics.
Fortunately it seems that David Cameron has rescinded the grants to individuals wishing to site renewable generators on their properties because we are broke and can no longer afford such idiocies, thank God.
The latest example of crassness is planning applications to site residential sized hydro units in the nursery streams of Scottish Salmon rivers. I promise you!!!
There is nothing safe from the evangalistic fervour of the greens who seem hell bent on destroying species in thoughtless and ignorant pursuit of their collective mirage.
“The challenge is to use visuals creatively in ways that can address all three aspects of climate change communication, i.e. cognition, affect and behaviour, without enhancing a sense of fatalism and disengagement.”
So… having failed to pursuade with facts, figures and logic (less people accept warming and of the ones that do, only 34% accept AGW, her numbers not mine), the study of climate has now turned to the study of psychological manipulation through the use of imagery and subliminal messages designed to change cognition and behaviour. May I summarize?
“We’ve lied to their faces and they didn’t believe us. We will now lie to their subconcious and see if that works.”
An Inquirer says:
May 29, 2010 at 8:01 am
“………..windmills are a welcomed site in many American farm communities. They represent a diversity to income and also a means by which government regulations transfer money from cities to rural communities.”
Being a member of a rural American community, I know of no single person other than the direct recipient of the lease money for the windmills that “welcome” the windmills across our landscape. Further, most of the land used for the wind farms is owned by large corporate farming outfits. As far as the transfer of wealth, in any of the many rural communities I’ve ever been a part of, we are decidedly capitalists. There are, of course, exceptions. But for the most part, we’d just appreciate if the government kept their regulations and wealth transfer schemes to themselves and leave us out of their socialistic ventures.
An Inquirer,
Transfer monies to rural communities? What with farm subsidies on the chopping block its a good thing the local politico will be spared cutting costs by green tech which is so expensive to operate over any length of time local energy costs will have to soar off the bat as they indisputably DID in those oh so green EU member countries? Try reading less of the GE propaganda (be that published by themselves or the current incarnation of POTUS) and a bit more on what countries like Germany have already seen and documented regarding wind power. They haven’t stopped the expansion of such because they suddenly ran out of air movement within Germany’s borders. They haven’t built a brand spanking new massive nuclear storage facility out of a played out mine in Salzgitter because it’ll bring in the tourists or recycling old mines is eco-rrific! This is well documented in Germany but in America, as with most painful admissions, “You can lead some people to the truth but you can’t make them believe it!”
What was paid to this nitwit for this study?
I need to send away to a diploma mill for my PHD in Environmental Hysteria. Then I’ll ask for a 10M grant to interview Knut and get his reaction to all this.
So the public is developing emotional ploy fatigue and the marketers have to be more creative. Yawn.
The Earth Day episode I mentioned above looks to have the title “Family Goes Off The Grid”, available in the US on Hulu but not in the UK 🙁
“inspirational motifs”
Credit where credit is due…. no one comes up with better euphemisms than the environmental left.
The Audabon society will be the hurdle for the wind turbines. Bears are growing in numbers and are still being hunted with permits. The Prairie chicken population is down 80% and going extinct. It is not about the condor cuisinart action. The sounds, fighting and mating activities just do not happen around the turbines. Maybe a new Pickens Chickens will evolve and conduct a wind turbine compatible mating dance.
I’d laugh but these mongrels shill shame and pain.
Anyway to Ms Agony pants and her ad campaign, we can supply photos of dieing babies, unfortunately they wont be drowning, just starving coz their food is now bio fuel for her and all her caring mates. A dead kid in every tank.
60 to 70 % of people need re education after 15 years of pre education about evil.
Scientists need re education about evil.
Me I say BS to BS artists.
Surely the point about wind farms is that they require huge grants [tax payers money] to attract any interest in building them. They then have to be subsidised [tax payers money] for years so forcing up the basic price of electricity. They don’t work at peak efficiency very often. They require fossil fuel backup or they fail. They require expensive maintenance and don’t match coal/oil/gas fired outputs [cheaper by miles] in any way.
May they rust in peace. A Green disaster of huge magnitude. Ask the Spanish!
Farmers should produce food not watts.
Hi there. If any of you have a Reddit account then could you please upvote this comment of mine to prevent it from being buried? Apparently readers of the Reddit “Environment” section don’t like knowing what the CERES satellite says about their environment. 🙂
http://www.reddit.com/r/environment/comments/c957j/rightwing_group_seeks_to_strip_climate_change/c0qzqzt?context=3
The only thing they could do in response was to try to dig up some dirt about Roy Spencer. Attack the man, repeat the mantra, same old warmist tactics.
While all this talk of PR and propaganda and replacing scientists with cartoonists is all very funny, we do need to keep putting the facts out there, citing the sources, and refraining from the mudslinging at all times. If we are wrong, we’ll learn the truth from the data instead of from a ranting lefty. If we are right, then the straight talking approach should succeed in the end. Let the data tell the story.
I came in on DDT.
These clowns are still killing kiddies.
You plug one kiddie murder hole and they open another, because they care.
As people become desensitized to Milgram-esque manipulation and over-the-top propaganda, several psychologists are clamoring to be the next Joseph Goebbels. Nice! When they make AGW Propaganda Minister an official office, maybe they’ll campaign against each other. That could be fun!
Shewchuk said there is no clear evidence to support assigning that status to the polar bear despite recommendations to the contrary by Environment Canada and a federal scientific panel.
“We live in polar bear country,” Shewchuk told reporters in Iqaluit on Friday afternoon. “We understand the polar bears, and we do actually think our polar bear population is very very healthy, with the exception of a couple of populations that we are taking action on.”
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/north/story/2010/05/28/nunavut-polar-bear-status.html?ref=rss#ixzz0pKpisBhc
The natives seem to have a handle on the Poley Bears. It seems most of the issues are raised where we have an excessive overpopulation of politicians and pretend eco doo gooders.
They are talking about the effectiveness of various propaganda tools. The best propaganda is probably where they are telling the truth selectively in order to create a false impression.
The danger, when it is repeated continuously, is that little by little folks start to realize that they being misled. After that, each repetition of the same propaganda tool only serves to further reduce the credibility of the source of the propaganda. I suspect that the polls reflect that people are catching on.
…..against a backdrop of increased climate scepticism.
They need to get used to it. Next winter should be a cold one if La Nina does indeed start this year. That would be a 4th harsh winter in a row. And no barbecue summer this year either.
Funny I just stumbled upon Philip Stott’s site where he parodies Lewis Carrol’s Through the Looking Glass Chttp://web.me.com/sinfonia1/Clamour_Of_The_Times/Clamour_Of_The_Times/Entries/2010/5/28_Through_the_Looking_Glass_with_Connie.html.
I think these people have been swotting up their lessons learnt at the School under the Sea. such as reeling, & writhing (which they have especially been doing a lot of recently), – “and then the different branches of Arithmetic– Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision”.
Windmills as an icon can be shoved back in Warmists’ faces by revealing the government subsidies required to erect just ONE! Realityists should use the pictures with a dollar figure superimposed over each one, to the tune of a cool million, a figure I heard. At the overpriced cost of these things, there is no way even one would be erected without massive subsidies.
oh yes, a pic of a lovely windmill
If only wind mills were understood, remove the investment incentive, figure energy required to manufacture, locate, install, maintain, connect,/ maintain PRIMARY source of energy so wind energy can be frittered away when it is inconveniently generating.
Only one thought comes to mind, boondoggle.
lastly anyone ask why the windmills installed twenty years ago have stood useless for the last eighteen?
These clowns forget society has been desensitised to ad campaigns.
This is an information age, 20 years ago it was a phone book and a Library. Now they all phone a friend. They can check it out.
Still doing Phillby and his Cambridge mates. Dumb.
Al Gore’s Holy Hologram says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:21 am
…And because of the media’s cuddly image of the dangerous beast, in 2009 a German woman visiting the zoo decided it would be fun to enter the polar bear sanctuary and was viciously mauled. Had she not been rescued she would have been dinner. Idiot media
Think of it as Evolution in action.
Jim G: Where can I get one of those coins?
“A recent study of American public perception showed that fewer people are convinced of the reality of climate change, and of those that are only 36% attribute it to human activity.”
And so the reaction is to create another advertising campaign.
How did so many people become so disconnected from reality?
The general public is just getting more skeptical about everything, and why not?
They have witnessed every authority – government, environmental, banking, businesses, you name it – get caught in lies, exaggerations, fabrications……….
It’s only that 20%, that shows up in almost every poll, that consistently falls for it.
I’m in the advertising business and know what Dr Manzo doesn’t: A brand’s “personality” is determined by its customers, and its “promise” is what it stands for in their eyes. If consumers are no longer attracted to the brand and no longer believe its promise no amount of repositioning will help. Think Firestone and new Coke et al, brands that were damaged beyond repair.
Well, she’s just doing what she says she’s done on her website!
“The move from academic writing to fiction came after I joined a creative writing group for ‘tired and busy academics’ “
The lunatics have taken over the asylum. The only doom coming our way is that perpetrated by the warmists, who are hell bent on our destruction under the guise of “saving the planet”. Our only salvation from eating lentils will be to lurk beneath the millions of windmills, and gather the bird carcases for meat, which we can cook over our candles in our caves.
Kate Manzo:
My research has uncovered a variety of possibilities – such as windmills as icons of renewable energy
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
What she hasn’t recognized is that many “environmental” groups are seeing windmills as the antithesis of environmentally friendly. If the US were to put in enough windmills to achieve currently stated goals, it is possible that windmills could kill as many migratory birds as hunters … assuming any are left for hunters.
As for bats, we already have Montana and Alberta wiping out thousands of migrating Alberta bats every year …. expect lots more mosquitoes and West Nile …
And we won’t even talk about the Altamont wind farm in California.
http://www.savewesternny.org/wildlife.html
The trouble with those darn Polar bears as an icon is that they are adaptable and with still breed opportunistically with Grizzly bears so their genes are likely to stay around for a few thousand years yet, even if the ice was continuing to melt rather than recover.
Did I mention I am looking out the window at a blizzard as I write this? Typical Alberta spring, May 29. Calgary set another snowfall record for May 26. Forecast for snow all over the place this weekend. And don’t worry about the Polar Bears, they are fine. Probably good to change the focus, then we can talk about how to fix wind and solar.
But I am going to have to go out and drive to town in a blizzard.
http://www.ama.ab.ca/road_report/camera/camera_images/2-26b_3.jpg
Well off to put put out hay. Have a good day Y’all
Wayne, Central Alberta, Canada
Notice the number of times the words “iconic”, “icon”, “believe” and “inspirational” are used. These are religous terms. The new religion has been established. They are called the Climate Catholics (apologies to Rome). The new Pope is Al Gore. The Cardinals are Jones, Mann, etc. The Priests are all the so-called Climate Scientists that follow the dogma. They haven’t decided who their devil is. I’m sure they have nominated several demons. You know who you are. Their IPCC Bible is rewritten every few years. The Warmist papers are the religious Tracts and Prophesies. The Cathedrals are East Anglia, U of P, etc.
The problem is, you can’t fight a religion. You can only establish a competing one. Our only hope is that enough of the Prophesies are proved false that the whole structure collapses. That will take years. Meanwhile, their religion is causing cr@p that will take centuries to undo.
Obviously it just happened in the UK, Global Warming under the bus?
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7139407.ece
Gary Pearse says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:36 am
http://windconcernsontario.wordpress.com/2010/05/01/wind-turbine-protest-blows-into-queen’s-park/
There are a number of groups fighting wind installations in Ontario
to move beyond polar bears as the iconic representation of climate change
Fish and Wildlife Research Institute
http://research.myfwc.com/manatees/
http://research.myfwc.com/features/default.asp?id=1001
FWC News – Record cold leads to record number of manatee deaths
http://myfwc.com/NEWSROOM/10/statewide/News_10_X_ManateeRecordDeaths.htm
As of March 19, biologists with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s (FWC) Fish and Wildlife Research Institute (FWRI) have documented 431 manatee carcasses in state waters so far in 2010. This preliminary data indicates that in just three months, the number of manatee deaths has exceeded the highest number on record for an entire calendar year, which was 429 in 2009. The cause of death for the majority of these animals is cold stress.
If they’re looking for new art, what about Avian Cuisinart?
Alan Simpson says: May 29, 2010 at 7:05 am
. . . I do marvel at her ability to produce a paper whilst her head is stuck so firmly up her behind and with one of her feet wedged in her mouth.
I find such language offensive, sir. It displays a complete lack of parallelism and respect for the syntactical sensitivities of others.
I suggest either
“. . . whilst her head is stuck so firmly up her behind and
withWHILST one of her feet IS wedged in her mouth,”or (preferably)
“. . .
whilstWITH her headisstuck so firmly up her behind and with one of her feet wedged in her mouth.”I recommend a subscription to the College Board’s free
Question of the Day for practice. The question for Saturday, May 29 is even on our theme.
Al Gore’s Holy Hologram says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:21 am :
“And because of the media’s cuddly image of the dangerous beast, in 2009 a German woman visiting the zoo decided it would be fun to enter the polar bear sanctuary and was viciously mauled. Had she not been rescued she would have been dinner. Idiot media.”
Here’s a pic of the bear’s new best friend.
R. de Haan says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:22 am
Stirs up images of Bhuddist Monks lighting themselves on fire to protest.
Never quite got what they were thinking. So much for the after-protest interviews.
The ‘Communicators’ are not the people really interested in the welfare of Planet Earth.
Nothing new in message content or delivery is going to change the perception that the folks with the
loudspeaker are clueless paid mouthpieces. Dinner is ruined, the keynote speaker has flopped and the guests are leaving.
Here are some images of windmills which allow me to visualize, and thus inspire me to have my positions on, the
global warmingclimate changemassagemessage.This one I remember well, it is indeed iconic. Had to search for it, found it with this article.
The search lead to this image (article) and this one (article) as well.
Truly inspirational imagery, indeed.
All of this sounds like the PR crap being produced by the churches in the 60’s and 70’s as the believers were just not coming in the doors as they did before. They never have recovered, these Alarmists probably won’t either, since “Mother Nature” has this obstinate attitude about her, the one that simply ignores the faithful.
For years, the acronymic interpretation was Piled Higher and Deeper.
Now perhaps its Pure Hypocrisy and Delusion, or
Publishes Hyperbole and Dementia, or
Persistent Hubris and Dilettantism, or…
Combine as required for desired effect.
Good Lord! Has anyone remembered to provide deicers on windmill blades? And something to catch the flung-off ice before it damages adjacent ‘mills? Quick, print more money!
Climatechange Truth: 14000 Wind Turbines Abandoned! – [ Traducir esta página ]
Check this out, there should be plenty of scope for taking photographs from this lot in california.
“Experts look for a new vision of climate change to combat skepticism”
Why don’t we proles believe these intellectuals? They can’t understand it? Neither can the Marxist intellectuals understand why we proles don’t rise up and start the revolution; they have to do it themselves.
The answer is simple, but unpalatable: the proles aren’t as stupid as the intellectuals.
Warmist; We need a new compaign, something visually impacting the way people think about global warming. What are the strongest images you could use to associate our message with?
Marketing Firm; Well, the images that evoke the strongest reaction in human beings are sexual.
W; Fine. Let’s go with that. Let’s look at some examples.
MF; Ok, we could do an ad with a bikini clad supermodel on the beach and a caption that global warming could force her to take even more of her clothes off…
W; …uhm…. no…. not quite the message we want. How about something more arctic related, that’s where almost all the warming has been and that’s the most fragile ecosystem there is.
MF; I thought it was fragile because it was cold?
W; Never mind that, have you got an image idea or not? Something sexy.
MF; Well… we could go with an attractive Eskimo woman in clad in traditional furs…
W; Yes! Yes! now we’re getting somewhere!
MF; With a caption that says global warming could make her switch to a bikini.
W; ….uhm…. no. Something sexy that men won’t see as a good thing. Can you do something with windmills? Something sexy?
MF; Hmmm…. could be a tough one. Windmills have this shape…
W; Towering above the landscape, majestic….
MF; …vaguely phalic. The size and shape intimidates men at the subconscious level.
W; Oh. But women would be attracted to them then, right? Great big phalic symbols….
MF; Studies indicate women say size doesn’t matter. I’ve confirmed with my wife.
W; But they’re still phalic…
MF; The spinny parts make them dizzy. And the whiney sounds remind them of children.
W; Skip sexy. How about cute and cuddly? But no polar bears.
MF; How about penguins?
W; Sure,penguins are cute.
MF; We could do something on those ones who are having a declining population…
W; Yes… cute… declining population…. I like it so far…
MF; Because the global warming has caused the ice sheet to grow forcing them to walk further from their breeding ground to get to their food source.
W; …uhm
MF; Hey, how does warming make the ice sheet grow anyway?
W; Never mind. We’ll stick witht polar bears.
“Alan F says:
[…]
off the bat as they indisputably DID in those oh so green EU member countries? Try reading less of the GE propaganda (be that published by themselves or the current incarnation of POTUS) and a bit more on what countries like Germany have already seen and documented regarding wind power. They haven’t stopped the expansion of such because they suddenly ran out of air movement within Germany’s borders.”
Sorry, some corrections: Wind turbines are still erected in Germany, just a few weeks ago i overtook a heavy goods convoy transporting the parts for a new one. Policy here is to control the growth of wind and solar power by reducing the feed in tariff for new installations. Prices for the technology come down, so the feed in tariff can be reduced (old installations still get the tariff that was in place at the moment they were built, guaranteed for 20 years).
The number of installations is still growing steadily (but not exponentially):
http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Datei:Installed_Wind_energy_(World,_EU,_Germany)_2000-2008.svg&filetimestamp=20090511090029
A lot of german economists have pointed out the costs and the obvious drawbacks. The political answer is to force other european nations like the UK into renewables as well and install a european supergrid of high voltage DC lines to compensate for the intermittance of wind and solar. Siemens and some other german companies are interested in building this infrastructure; they have a lot of political influence here. Smart grids and localized battery storage are also parts of this vision. Desertec, the Club Of Rome Germany initiative for thermal solar power in North Africa could be part of it.
This is the biggest european pork business after our usual agricultural subsidies. It’s really big. It won’t stop anytime soon, too many careers are built on it.
They could build the re-education camps by the Bird Blender Farms. “Free” access to power and protein.
Looks like they’ve managed to throw the bus (of global warmists) under the polar bears. Yum!
I just reclined for my monthly read of Wired Magazine, only to find a short article with the same theme of ceating more effective PR to promote the cause. I’ve seen such articles before, but it’s interesting to find them in such close juxtaposition in time. I wonder if this a short term trend, or a long term strategy? In other words, is it a weather change or a climate change?
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/05/st_essay_sciencepr/
Kate Manzo is a scary lady. I just did a quick google. She’s a “Big Time” Marxist propagandist who promotes the use of attacks from multiple disciplines focusing on indirect issues to destroy nationalism and property rights. She hates Western Civilization. She also knows nothing about climate science, but sees its trans-national nature as a wedge to destroy boarders. She is a “One World Government” true believer.
Wow, second non-scientist Marxist propagandist in two days.
Ah, the PoMo info wars. Spinmeisters search for the next meme-caine to numb the masses. Bright, shiny, roly-poly. “Two legs good, four legs better.” The People Are Stupid model of social interaction.
Well, two can play at that game.
WARMER IS BETTER — FIGHT THE ICE
I like polar bears – in the zoo. Looking cute.
In the wilderness I like ’em even more, but love increases with distance,
a pretty thousand miles – between them and me – sounds great.
In my neighborhood, I’ m a little bit picky.
Perhaps she’s not so daft.
There is a difference between a windmill and a wind turbine (the green side of my family become a little agitated when I refer to their beloved turbines as windmills).
Every single commenter assumed she was talking about wind turbines when she actually, twice, mentioned windmills (the first time coupled with “as icons of renewable energy”) Look, she has a degree (or two) in something, so she certainly knows the difference.
Windmills as such have been around doing useful work for thousands of years, without a doubt they are icons.
Could there be more to this than meets the eye?
An Inquirer says: “…windmills are a welcomed site in many American farm communities. They represent a diversity to income and also a means by which government regulations transfer money from cities to rural communities.”
funded by subsidies up the wazoo. Your tax dollars at work.
At the last count there were 230 campaign groups in the UK fighting to preserve the countryside from ruination by wind turbines. Clearly these academics have no idea of what goes on in the real world.
Mike McMillan says: ”
Alan Simpson says: May 29, 2010 at 7:05 am
. . . I do marvel at her ability to produce a paper whilst her head is stuck so firmly up her behind and with one of her feet wedged in her mouth.
I suggest…
“. . . whilst WITH her head is stuck so firmly up her behind and with one of her feet wedged in her mouth.”
I prefer the more concise: “…whilst suffering from both hoof-in-mouth disease and proctocraniosis.”
They will try a new tactic….the Deepwater Horizon incident will generate endless footage of oil-sodden pelicans, grebes, marshes etc.
The AGW crowd has been stung so hard & so often by their idiotic claims, I expect them to shift PR focus away from natural calamities and towards the environmental risks of fossil fuels. Watch for this in a big way.
I don’t know if it has sunk into this group that they have largely lost the belief and support of the international mainstream public, and they are so intellectual incestuous (just read posts on RealClimate!) that they may never realize this. What a miserable lot….
Henry chance says:
May 29, 2010 at 8:48 am
“The Prairie chicken population is down 80% and going extinct… The sounds, fighting and mating activities just do not happen around the turbines. Maybe a new Pickens Chickens will evolve and conduct a wind turbine compatible mating dance.”
Pickens Chickens – good one! But a much more widespread and insidious threat to these and many other bird species is that other great ‘green’ idea, biofuels. Not just ethanol which puts more pressure on marginal farmlands once left for habitat but also other fuels like ‘switch grass.’ They claim they can reduce this problem by not harvesting these fuels in nesting season but conveniently forget about the rest of the year when these areas provide habitat for both resident and migratory bird species.
I see the whole biofuel thing, everywhere, like the proverbial ‘plague of locusts’ stripping the land. Very, very stupid and desctructive idea.
But green is ungreen in this Orwellian project.
Al Gore’s Holy Hologram says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:21 am :
“And because of the media’s cuddly image of the dangerous beast, in 2009 a German woman visiting the zoo decided it would be fun to enter the polar bear sanctuary and was viciously mauled. Had she not been rescued she would have been dinner. Idiot media.”
Another revealing tangent on this story is that when Knut grew out of his cute stage, attendance at that zoo to see him dropped off like a stone. Last I heard they were trying to find a new home for the homely teenager because of the costs of feeding him but that was a problem because all the zoos have more than enough polar bears already… because they are so rare, apparently.
If anyone has an update on Knut’s whereabouts that would be interesting.
Windmills are not just expensive non generators , except on rare occasions, but I recall somewhere on WUWT reading an analysis based on German figures, that because of the inefficiences of ramping up & down the conventional plant so as to utilise the varying wind output, no CO2 is saved anyway – not that that worries me but even on warmistas own terms is stupid.
And that’s before the CO2 emmitted in construction, including transmission lines, and the negative environmental impacts – noise, bird slicing, visual impact (for those who don’t like to see them). Wind turbines for other than off grid supply to isolated buildings, with battery storage, are a complete disaster. And will remain so until we have cheap and effective electricity storage?
I explain this to those who will listen, and others do too I expect, so iconic windmill pictures may not help the CAGW religion I hope!
inspirational approach to a climate change message which is inherently difficult to visualize.
Might I suggest a satellite photo of the now-melted polar ice-cap? Oh, but that was just predicted, it didn’t happen. OK, how about one of the islands of Tuvalu half-drowned by the rising sea? Oh, that’s been long predicted and has never happened… that’s right. I can see what Dr. Manzo means, global warming is very hard to visualize. It’s hard to see it at all.
I think we need to worry about Kate only when she drops the Pilates teaching; just like Polly Higgins dropped the eco doormat business when she achieved eco stardom with Moonbat and the Club Of Rome. She’s a small fry for now. You don’t even find her monologuing on youtube yet.
In the interests of helping, fairness, etc., I have come up with what I feel is the perfect icon for them, along with a caption:
“Now, what can we do to get you into this Alarmobile today”? She’s a beaut, aint she?
(hope I got the html right).
ummm, of course the warmists haven’t tried the truth yet …
As time goes on, the real truth is now getting harder to ignore, it was all a scam.
“Al Gored says:
[…]
If anyone has an update on Knut’s whereabouts that would be interesting.”
He’s still in the Berlin Zoo and likes to rip up t-shirts (no, no visitor inside):
http://www.morgenpost.de/printarchiv/berlin/article1306019/Neuer-Knut-Look.html
Windmills as an icon can be shoved back in Warmists’ faces by revealing the government subsidies required to erect just ONE!
There is a wind farm in New Zealand erected and operated without subsidies. The locals have adopted it and the rugby team for the area is now the Turbos.
I can understand not liking an uneconomic windmill. I oppose all uneconomic activity. But I don’t get the knee-jerk dislike of them in principle. Dutch windmill = cute. Modern windmill = ugly. How is that?
We need power. We have to build power stations. Do you honestly think that wind generators are uglier than coal or nuclear equivalents? Would you want a nuclear power station in your back yard?
The Kennedy example is not relevant. They would have opposed any and all power stations in the area. Coal, nuclear, hydro or wind. They were rich people protecting their playground. Their not-in-my-back-yard attitude is a disgrace, frankly, unless you are an eco-luddite. I expect more from this site.
“Ge0ld0re says:
May 29, 2010 at 9:11 am
Windmills as an icon can be shoved back in Warmists’ faces by revealing the government subsidies required to erect just ONE! Realityists should use the pictures with a dollar figure superimposed over each one, to the tune of a cool million, a figure I heard. At the overpriced cost of these things, there is no way even one would be erected without massive subsidies.”
Good point. I was thinking the same thing, only maybe a few more graphics would enchance the image you’d like to present. Show the amount of money going into construction and subsidization of windmills and ALSO into backup power systems. And show the limited open market value of what comes out (and account for what price per kilowatt-hour is legislatively/regulatorily dictated as a minimum or supplemental charge).
Also, show the amount of energy going into fabricating/installing the windmill and the amount of energy it produces on average. But also show how much electricity must be generated by backup systems to compensate for when the windmills are down. Think of the image for just the power generation graphic – a horizontal segmented line split horizontally that shows total kilowatt-hour generation, with the wind contribution shown as a “green” segment, but with the balance of that line shown in “red” for power critically needed from the “evil” fossil fuel backup systems to keep our lights on and the air conditioners working.
And let’s not forget the whole CO2 issue. Like biofuels, wind is, I believe, a net CO2 generator if you look at the life cycle contributions of all involved fuel sources.
And speaking of life cycles, what’s the REAL life cycle of a wind turbine and how does that compare to current wind cost projections? 25 years ago, my family visited and area east of SF in CA. Many hundreds of wind turbines of a huge variety of physical configurations (helicals, 2-, 3- and 4-blade models). How many are functioning today?
And what’s the proven reliability history of the new wind turbines going in today? Does anyone have the vaguest notion of system output at they approach the end of the economic life of these wind turbines? I think we have a good track record of natural gas, oil, nuclear and hydropower systems. Wind? Not so much.
Ooh, Ooh, I read about something called “quality fade” with respect to China. Which means that one of our biggest sources of alternative energy systems can’t help themselves in sticking it to their clients on products when it comes to quality of their products. It’s a game and/or a joke to the Chinese. Produce high quality products for demos, then after the production contracts are signed, let the production standards slide with time so that the buyers don’t realize they’ve been shorted on quality. I wonder when Chinese tradition translates into shattered wind turbines and blades?
And as one poster said earlier, wind turbines can also be nicknamed “avian cuisinarts”.
Can you imagine the work that will be needed in the future when this global warming hysteria and environmental nuttiness is finally disabled. All of those inefficient, ugly, mechanically faulty, bird killing machinations of idiocy will have to be torn down. What a waste of resources, mental and physical, to assuage inflated fears fed by a corrupted science establisment, enviro-wackos, and a complacent news media. Imagine if governments focused on solving real problems with realist and cost effective solutions. I can dream at least…
If your message hasn’t got the “reach” it used to, you have to change the
way the product is “pitched” to your target audience.
The folks in marketing almost never suggest the product be improved,
just repackaged.
“Mooloo says:
[…]
There is a wind farm in New Zealand erected and operated without subsidies. The locals have adopted it and the rugby team for the area is now the Turbos.[…]”
NZ can combine an intermittent source like wind power with their hydropower very well. Here’s a good page about wind power cost in NZ, probably from the local wind power association.
http://windenergy.org.nz/wind-energy/costs
Mooloo says:-
“We need power. We have to build power stations. Do you honestly think that wind generators are uglier than coal or nuclear equivalents? Would you want a nuclear power station in your back yard?”
I am surrounded by wind turbines both on and off shore and visible in every quadrant. I also can see amongst these excrescences the decommissioned remains of an early nuclear station to the north east.
The plethora of turbines which have rarely turned in anger for the past six months intrude on every aspect of my views here on the Scottish Solway.
The decommissioned nuclear station occupies a handful of acres which will be off limits for a hundred years, but, you know what, there are a huge number of handfuls of unrestricted acres in this vicinity that I have never visited and never will. If Our Scottish Government weren’t such twats we would already have replaced the old facility with a new nuclear station producing on an annualised basis more than all the stop start turbines in Scotland put together
Follow the money – who will be on the boards of the power companies when they leave office?
As far as windmills go, read the ERCOT (Electrical Resource Council of Texas) press release for last year. They are the grid manager with the largest installed wind generating capacity in the country. “For summer peak capacity, ERCOT counts 8.7 percent of wind nameplate capacity as dependable capacity at peak in accordance with ERCOT’s stakeholder-adopted methodology.” I believe that’s call wasted resources. Or a someone else said, “windpower is a faith based initiative.”
They aren’t “wind farms”. We should refer to them as “tax farms”. My back yard is too small for a nuke but I have no objection to one being built in the locality.
Are you sure there is no subsidy on the NZ wind farm, Mooloo? No government mandated renewable energy target? With a target you don’t subsidize directly, just let the power companies charge the real cost(expensive) of adding the wind farm to their network so the subsidy provider is the consumer.
PaulH says: What’s next, reeducation camps?
No need for RE-education camps, just target kids in UK schools, and they will hassle their parents instead. You’ve all heard of Minnesotans For Global Warming, well we’ve got Mothers Against Climate Change!
I despair……
http://www.cooltheworld.com/
Dr Kate Munzo had better keep up her pilates. I was reassured by a clever economist this evening that the only part of the globe still talking seriously about climate change legislation are the Europeans, and, he said laughing merrily, they are about to go broke!
Ed Murphy says:
May 29, 2010 at 9:57 am
Don’t forget the coral!
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/02/01/record-cold-in-florida-kills-reef-coral/
“Mike Borgelt says:
[…]No government mandated renewable energy target?
”
Very good, look here – NZ: 90% by 2025. (Hydro counts as renewable)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandatory_renewable_energy_targets#Selected_Other_Countries
Power station cooling towers, complete with “smoke” billowing from them, have become more iconic than polar bears … iconic for stupidity that is.
…And because of the media’s cuddly image of the dangerous beast, in 2009 a German woman visiting the zoo decided it would be fun to enter the polar bear sanctuary and was viciously mauled. Had she not been rescued she would have been dinner. Idiot media…
Think of it as Evolution in action.
Incorrect assumption,evolution is bounded by necessity and chance,adaption and cooperation.
Say for example it is to cold and food is scarce,a hungry family to feed adaption and cooperation are a better evolutionary strategy ,and the golden rule in nature is do not bite the hand that feeds you.
http://englishrussia.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/_.jpg
http://englishrussia.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/7-1.jpg
It is a jungle out there.
Branding strategies and the drive for dominance in the green jungle have long been primary for the successful giants. See this 2004 WWF presentation: http://www.unep.fr/scp/compact/dialogue/2004/pdf/WWF.pdf
Now there are suggestions for funding be directed away from physical research to opinion changing social science research: http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/the_last_experiment/
For Michael Mann and Gavin Schmidt’s thought on the subject:
http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/is_there_a_better_word_for_doom/
” maksimovich says:
May 29, 2010 at 4:19 pm
…And because of the media’s cuddly image of the dangerous beast, in 2009 a German woman visiting the zoo decided it would be fun to enter the polar bear sanctuary and was viciously mauled. Had she not been rescued she would have been dinner. Idiot media…
Think of it as Evolution in action.
Incorrect assumption,evolution is bounded by necessity and chance,adaption and cooperation.”
No, not really. Serendipity plays as big a role. It’s all about the gene pool. If the Darwin Award candidate has bred prior to falling in the bear pit, no Award. but if not…
“Communicators need to move away from the traditional images of polar bears or fear-laden imagery to find new, inspirational motifs to engage people with climate change.”
I get what they are saying, need to change the words to be more accurate… not so scary…
“Communicators need to move away from the traditional images of polar bears or fear-laden imagery to find new, inspirational lies and deceptions to engage people with climate change.”
There, that’s better. I hate fancy words!
anyone looking for Knut may possibly find him here:
http://johny.info/uploads/knut-burger.jpg
OH, and PETA want to Knut Knut’s Knuts off:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article7048233.ece
In other words, since the data isn’t cooperating, let’s try marketing!
Chris B says: May 29, 2010 at 7:07 am
How about an image of a destitute scientist wearing a sandwich board saying “Will research for a luxury hybrid”
The sandwich board should read “Scientific results made to order”.
Schadow says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:29 am
“…..And the image of oil production as stealing Gaia’s very blood is just too good to pass up. If they should succeed in stopping oil production, at least the weekly checks from ExxonMobil to skeptics would also stop. You do get yours, don’t you? (/snark)”
___________________________________________________________________________
BUT, BUT, but, but,… what about the weekly standard oil checks (Rockefeller Foundations) to Greenpeace and WWF????
Gary Pearse says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:36 am
There is a protest near Ottawa Ontario in a village called North Gore were a “wind farm” has been approved (I didn’t find a link but it was on CFRA radio station about a week ago). I think the good doctor may have given us imagery that would be ammunition for anti AGW use….
_________________________________________________________________________
You may want to check out this book, WIND POWER FRAUD: WHY WIND WON’T WORK by Charles S. Opalek, PE for more information to use as ammunition. (I have not read it)
Also there was this comment made recently:
bubbagyro says:
“I live in New Hampshire on the coast, 50 miles or so where they projected the Cape Cod wind farms. They were shot down by Ted Kennedy and John Kerry, of course, because of the NIMBY effect.
They had some good arguments, however, based on studies. The liberals can pay for good science when it is in their interest. Here are some of the “Vineyarders” arguments, (some are plain silly, like ruining the artists’ vistas) besides the main issue that they are net energy negative :
1) Lifetime – they are touted to last 15-20 years without maintenance. Truth be told, in practice it averages out to 4-5 years.
a) Bearings – they are of high tolerance steel, but they wear out, and go out-of-round. This causes vibrations that increase as the bearings wear, more or less from the get-go. This produces efficiency loss, of course, but moreover the vibrations begin to stress the foundations. Think of billions of little earthquakes. Think of the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
b) Even when set up in concrete pads directly on top of granite strata, the vibrations enable the 1000 ton behemoth to start drilling into the strata, starting with the edges and the weak points in the subsurface. In the sea, sand is a good abrasive. The turbines go out of vertical with a time frame related to the fitness of the material it is perched upon.
2) Migrating birds – someone here said this does not happen. Untrue. Birds follow the prevailing winds when they can, just like ancient mariners used to navigate east or west, utilizing different winds at different latitudes. Where the wind farms are most feasible are thus in the migrating bird routes. Raptors, like eagles and osprey, and bats are swatted by these behemoths especially in high winds that blow them into the rotors. See the eagles cut in half near Danish rotors.
3) Noise pollution – they are noisy, especially when the bearings are in between lubrication cycles (yes, each rotor requires tons of petroleum lubricant each period) or they are worn. This could impact whales and dolphins adversely (I did not make this up – it seems like the lamest argument – but the Greenpeaceniks have tried to stop submarines from communication using this argument, also).”
Henry chance says:
“….1 tower is 850 tons. It takes 4 tons of coal in the process to make one ton of steel.
These towers are a boom for the coal business. Another un intended consequence.”
Hope that helps. (And thanks to the other three contributors I am shamelessly cribbing from)
“JER0ME says:
May 29, 2010 at 6:04 pm
OH, and PETA want to Knut Knut’s Knuts off:”
At least they don’t want to take him into their own loving hands like those dogs…
Pascvaks says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:45 am Is this 1984?
Yes
and please remember that applies to almost every subject, in every media
so stay skeptical
universally so!
Mick J says:
May 29, 2010 at 7:46 am
I have seen snippets of a Simpsons episode where Homer is sold a turbine with subsequent images of electric fans being used to turn the turbine.
Mick.
It is my understanding that turbines have to be kept turning so the shaft doesn’t take a “set” from being stationary for a prolonged period with the weight of the blade assembly bending it. So, if you see a turbine turning very slowly it may not be wind moving it but electricity being fed into the turbine “works”.
IanM
DirkH
May 29, 2010 at 6:43 pm
Neutering is just PETA’s fallback position. The started out trying to convince the zoo to slaughter him.
DirkH said on May 29, 2010 at 6:43 pm:
http://www.petakillsanimals.com/
Yup, I got that URL memorized. PETA, saving animals from ever being abused by the only absolutely certain way…
Here’s an alternative “inspirational motif” for bio-fuel campaigning. That’s just an amateurish example though, I’m not that good with graphic programs.
http://www.wikio.es/video/fatal-accident-with-vulture-on-windmill-1885500
I am nominating the above youtube for consideration as the iconic image of climate change response.
What other fields of science needed a good PR campaign? Did Newton need one to advance his ideas of physics and calculus? Did Einstein need it for the theory of Relativity? What about the founding of Quantum Mechanics?
“DesertYote says:
[…]
Neutering is just PETA’s fallback position. The started out trying to convince the zoo to slaughter him.”
Yes, you are right. I knew about the activist who wanted Knut to be killed when he was a baby (and rejected by his mother) but i wasn’t sure whether it was a PETA activist.
But here’s an article that shows that the suggestion to kill Knut and the suggestion to have him castrated both come from Frank Albrecht, the german zoo animal expert of PETA.
http://www.thelocal.de/society/20100303-25621.html
These people are as reliably evil as GreenPeace.
Sorry, the link i gave only mentions Frank Albrecht of PETA in connection with the suggested castration, here’s another one where Frank Albrecht suggests the killing.
http://www.faz.net/s/Rub475F682E3FC24868A8A5276D4FB916D7/Doc~E8B8FD4D0944D4EB68BA4874C4F423464~ATpl~Ecommon~Sspezial.html
Just for completeness. We can’t make grave accusations without sufficient evidence.
A small and pedantic point, but if the sentence “This shows the variance of levels of climate change knowledge and understanding, which effects how people behave in response.” is as it was actually written by the good doctor, then we should ask for her Ph. D. back.
It’s “affect”.
Various thoughts.
The future could be in small nuclear sub sized nuclear power generation. The problem is with control of the fuel. Spreading it out in bits and chunks instead of maintaining control of larger chunks means that the chain of possession becomes weak and vulnerable to terrorist activity.
The decision related to huge wind turbine farms is based on corporate interest in controlling and benefiting from power generation of any kind. The guvmnt said that it will generate jobs. Hasn’t happened. The number of new jobs created with these large wind farms hasn’t made a dent in unemployment.
Why? It is small business that employs people and has the greatest potential of impacting unemployment. Therefore the idea of Dutch inspired windmills is not a bad idea to consider. This would generate a local industry geared towards making windmills for single household/apartment use and would generate another industry that would make appliances that are energy efficient enough to run off these local windmills (IE with internal storage capacity). Windmills are an off again on again item. So every appliance that runs off these power generating things would have to have energy storing capacity. The problem with this is that corporations will no longer be profiting from household energy use.
Everybody wants a large piece of the pie, and in some cases, desire to horde the entire thing.
By the way, my pic of large windmill farms would go like this:
A field of blenders stuff with birds waiting for someone to push “frappe”.
Well, if propoganda is the new science debate practice and windmills the new CAGW logo focus, what logo might we on the other side of the debate adopt? How about windmills danger to wildlife.(Perhaps the disquietening image of a couple polar bears that have been hit for six, flying through the air.)
Mike McMillan says:
May 29, 2010 at 10:04 am
My apologies for mangling the language up to the point that I offended your eye.
Back to the topic, this study/paper/opinion piece illustrates how bankrupt the “Green Movement” has become. This in effect is an open admission that the main thrust of the various “eco” organisations is more about raising funds than promoting their primary cause.
It reminds one of the tacky adverts on pay TV, you know the them, pay us cash or the kitten/child/seal cub/( feel free to add your own ) gets it. There was a time when the “eco” groups were all about, “Fighting the Man”, now their organisations are so large they are, “The Man”, consequently they spend all their time on self perpetuation and almost none on their Raison d’être.
The great shame is that the “eco” groups can’t grasp this basic concept.
My apologies in advance to Mike McMillan for my, doubtless, egregious abuse of the written word.
Mike M. May 29, 2010 at 7:13 am
“…Can someone please create an iconic image showing an eagle being beheaded by a windmill, please?”
How about a vulture getting wacked?
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RcTjdY1aN4&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xd0d0d0&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&fs=1]
Betapug (May 29, 5.21pm)
Thanks for the links. Mann is utterly without shame, irony or self-knowledge:
“Those in the scientific community who seek both to inform the public and to maintain their integrity, must, by contrast, play by the rules. Rather than engaging in the artifice of misrepresentation and cherry picking, we must find clever, simple ways to convey the facts. To do otherwise would constitute unilateral disarmament in this war.”
I didn’t realise until I read his article that the denialist machine runs focus groups to hone its disinformation. Anthony, where do they meet? Can I come along some time?
I have proposed via Tim Blair’s blog that we should form a Polar Bear rights Society and put them out of their misery of clinging to slushy bits of ice by shooting them dead.
At least she didn’t suggest pictures of cooling towers, with all that evil water vapour (aka steam) going into the sky. That’s the one the media loves to show / interspersed with polar bears.
Why don’t they show pictures of sunny beaches? AFter all, it’s going to get warm, might as well show everyone relaxing in the warm. Sure beats imagery of shovelling snow.
Someone should send Kate Manzo the URL for that video of a Griffon Vulture on Crete, which had its wing broken by a wind turbine. Is that sufficiently iconic for her?
Alexander says:
May 29, 2010 at 11:23 pm
Here’s an alternative “inspirational motif” for bio-fuel campaigning. That’s just an amateurish example though, I’m not that good with graphic programs.
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Superb. The last phrase makes a great bumper sticker too, especially with the picture as a lead in on the left.
David S says:
May 30, 2010 at 2:53 pm
“Those in the scientific community who seek both to inform the public and to maintain their integrity, must, by contrast, play by the rules. Rather than engaging in the artifice of misrepresentation and cherry picking, we must find clever, simple ways to convey the facts. To do otherwise would constitute unilateral disarmament in this war.”
I didn’t realise until I read his article that the denialist machine runs focus groups to hone its disinformation. Anthony, where do they meet? Can I come along some time?
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All the conmen and crooks I have caught were very quick to blame another, usually their victim, for the behavior they were practicing. The guy who is very quick to say “John Doe stole it” is usually the one who did the actual stealing.
CAGW bares all the earmarks of a con, including the “blame the other guy first for my actions”