Guest post by Alec Rawls
The graphics were changed in the last two days, but Conn Carroll at the Washington Examiner took a screenshot of Obama’s “All of the Above” energy policy page on Tuesday. “Notice anything missing?” he asks:
The updated graphics actually retain the same omission. They still omit the source of almost half of all U.S. electricity generation (coal), and only add the non-existent eco-unicorn called “clean coal”:
Of course what the CO2 alarmists call “dirty coal” is perfectly clean. The only difference is that it produces CO2—that most healthful gas, the beginning of the food chain for all life on earth—which remains alarmingly close to the minimum levels needed to sustain life.
To rid coal-burning emissions of this eco-villain the going cost is $761 per ton of sequestered carbon: “staggeringly, wildly, mind-blowingly higher than any other conceivable measure designed to cut greenhouse-gas emissions.” So still no coal in Obama’s plan. Our existing energy infrastructure is to be jettisoned, as Obama promised in 2008:
If somebody wants to build a coal plant, they can — it’s just that it will bankrupt them, because they are going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.
Obama’s EPA rules already block all new coal plant construction, so his graphics are just looking forward to his true objectives: all-but-coal for now, with oil and nuclear to disappear next.
That slick “clean coal” logo indicates that the coal omission was not a mistake
The Obamatons had the clean-coal stupidity all ready to go, indicating a conscious decision to leave it out. This is reinforced by the absence of the clean-coal logo, not just from their pick-a-topic selector, but also from their header logo. Another of Obama’s eco-pages still has the original header:
That page now includes a clean coal section but the Google cache from May 3rd shows that it was recently added. The people who put these pages together are so anti-coal that they couldn’t even bring themselves to include the utterly phony “clean coal” in their proclaimed “All of the Above” energy strategy. That shows a extraordinary level of zealotry.
Kinda fits with the longstanding “climate denier” smear (recently on display), where people who don’t buy CO2 alarmism are likened to those who deny the holocaust of the Jews during WWII. The alarmists are all projection all the time. Their supposed scientists at the IPCc are omitting virtually all of the evidence for a solar driver of climate from AR5, and here their political leaders are trying to disappear the primary energy source upon which modern society currently relies, yet it is supposedly the rest of us who are conspiring to cover stuff up.
The conniving mind cannot conceive of another mode of being.
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Tom says:
May 11, 2012 at 8:43 pm
@ur momisugly Smokey – No need to become so emotive.
I simply asked if perhaps you can show me where you, Alec, Gail and Jim have indicated that that more is not better, or for a limit?
________________________________
Tom, Why the heck does the government have to micromanage everything especially when they so totally screw it up. A life time of working in safety engineering and quality engineering has given me lots of first hand experience in how messed up government bureaucracies are. The carbon cycle does a find job of “Limiting Carbon Dioxide” all by its lonesome. Unlike you, Smokey, Alec and I are capable of seeing that it was the carbon cycle that removed most of the carbon dioxide in the primitive atmosphere in the first place.
Plants handle levels up to 2,000 ppm just fine and humans up to 5000 ppm so get back to me when the CO2 level reaches 1000 ppm. Of course we will be back to an ice age by then.
Myrrh says: @ur momisugly May 12, 2012 at 1:24 am
Since plants and animals evolved together it’s likely that humans also evolved to function best at some higher level….. However, at 380 ppm we are not far from the lower end of that 10-fold range. Because so many people benefit from enhanced levels of CO2, it appears that our present atmosphere is already lower than the minimum to which some people can adapt.
______________________
Myrrh, since Tom is so convinced that CO2 is evil incarnate perhaps he should be placed in an isolation room with absolutely no CO2 and with CO2 scrubbers for a week to get the point across. Hansen, Mann Jones… should also get the benefits of a no CO2 environment. /sarc
If you do not understand that Tom I suggest you do research before trying it.
I would suggest that tommy is not interested in actually arriving at the Truth, and should be permanently SNIPPED.
LFTR in 5 Minutes – THORIUM REMIX 2011
If you ever feel you never learned LFTR down to the nitty-gritty, the chemistry involved, the exact decay cascades, everything, this might be for you. Only problem, it’s not five minutes but more like about 2 hours. A great video that filled in all of the missing spots for me.
Otter says:
May 12, 2012 at 5:08 am
I would suggest that tommy is not interested in actually arriving at the Truth, and should be permanently SNIPPED.
________________________________
Tom certainly seems to be looking for “sound bits” he can take out of context to show how “Deniers” agree that CO2 is evil and should be regulated doesn’t he.
Gail Combs says:
May 12, 2012 at 5:25 am
“Tom certainly seems to be looking for “sound bits” he can take out of context to show how “Deniers” agree that CO2 is evil and should be regulated doesn’t he.”
Gail, when I answer a troll like Tom, I always intend two things at the same time.
a) Treat him like the piece of crap he is
b) add some information for other readers; not for the troll, as he is not interested in any information.
Gail, DirkH, agreed~ his ‘unlimited amounts’ of Everything, would appear to me an attempt to link to such ill-conceived thinking as ‘big oil’ wants to destroy the world in order to make profit.
Of course, being unable to understand the closed warmist mind, I could be wrong. One thing is certain, tommy has unlimited amounts of [self-snip] for brains.
Gail Combs says:
May 12, 2012 at 4:56 am
Myrrh, since Tom is so convinced that CO2 is evil incarnate perhaps he should be placed in an isolation room with absolutely no CO2 and with CO2 scrubbers for a week to get the point across. Hansen, Mann Jones… should also get the benefits of a no CO2 environment. /sarc
When I first began looking into this only a few years ago, I didn’t know there were arguments about it before then, I first took the science arguments seriously until the list of why I shouldn’t kept growing until I had no choice but to reject it, but the last straw was when I heard carbon dioxide called a poison and found it was being put on government toxic lists. Around the time there was an ad on UK tv which had daddy reading reading to little girl a bedtime story demonising carbon dioxide, and I realised there was an agenda driving this which didn’t give a damn about the environment or passing on our hard earned and recent knowledge of science through childrens’ education, but was deliberately dumbing them down through fear by destroying the wonder of life around them they should have been exploring. Truly despicable. It didn’t surprise me when I later found the character of the ideology of those manipulating the science.
wayne says:
May 12, 2012 at 5:23 am
“LFTR in 5 Minutes – THORIUM REMIX 2011 ”
Thanks Wayne; marvelous video!
Wow. I did some googling and this Deutsch character turns out to be a serious Deutsch-bag. Apparently he spends a LOT of time spamming every climate story at the Orange County Register with vacuous attacks on virtually every other commentator. An example if anyone actually wants to look:
http://sciencedude.ocregister.com/2012/04/25/timebomb-balloon-spotlights-global-warming/170905/
The story is about a big black eco-balloon, blown up to represent a ton of atmospheric carbon. Somebody puts up the funny comment:
Here is wet-rag Deutsch-bag’s response:
Really? It is wrong to say that Mike used what Phil Jones called “Mike’s Nature trick“? Deutsch is constantly demanding that other commentators back up their statements with peer reviewed literature, but he just asserts that Mann’s obliteration of LIA and MWP is not at odds with other findings. Liar.
Deutsch has a dollop of disinformation for everybody. What a pestilence! Media Matters does pay people to be trolls, all in accordance with the plan laid out by Obama’s “regulatory czar” Cass Sunstein, who argues that:
In particular, he is keen to disrupt anyone who claims, “that the theory of global warming is a deliberate fraud.”
The White House was recently found to be coordinating Media Matters via weekly propaganda planning meetings. Given how much work Deutsch is putting into his disinformation, he’s an obvious person to suspect of being one of Sunstein’s anti-democratic minions. Of course he could just be a volunteer Brown Shirt, entirely self-motivated and self-directed, if that is any better.
Some day, I suspect we may be able to purchase – for a price – electricity from China who is putting one new coal fired power plant on-line every week. This remains an option to supplement our foray into unpredictable, unsustainable alternative energies on which we are squandering our resources.
Obama has done what the Communists predicted: The USA is being destroyed from within by an anti-Capitalist, bowing to every foreigner, never apologetic enough, class warfare, Federal debt buster, embarrassed to be an American.
Obama’s re-election campaign slogan should be: Vote For Obama. Let Him Finish The Job.
If Tom has anything to say in his own defense, he can email me, alec at rawls dot org.
I believe that Roger Revelle is widely credited with making the public aware of the ‘danger’ of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in his ground-breaking article “Carbon Dioxide and World Climate,” which appeared in the August, 1982 edition of The Scientific American. I believe this article gave the impression that this was a linear or accelerating effect with no indication of logarithmic saturation. As far as I can recall, there was no serious criticism of the proposed theory–it was generally accepted as an established fact. It also was attractive to those who like to think that modern man is the root of all evil. It is no wonder, then, that the new cadre of atmospheric scientists since then have eagerly striven to be the first to detect ‘real’ evidence of the obvious truth of this theory.
I do not recall seriously questioning this myself before watching a David Archibald video presentation. The “miniscule effect” of CO2 can be readily seen in this MODTRAN plot of the effect of CO2 doubling on the amount of thermal radiation escaping to the upper atmosphere:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ModtranRadiativeForcingDoubleCO2.png
I have not been able to altogether dismiss the claims of the professional ‘Peak Oil’ presenters, as the data on declining discoveries appears to be like the proverbial “Hand writing on the wall” signaling the coming end of the petroleum age. One speaker (Video: “Unconventional Oil and Gas: Reshaping Energy Markets” at the 59 min mark) said that this decline was due to investors, from about 1984 on, regarding oil exploration to be an unnecessary expense. However, it does appear we are going ever further afield to obtain the remaining petrochemical energy.
As far as I can tell, thorium nuclear is the most likely successor to the use of petrochemical energy. I do not know if a Romney Administration would advance or delay its development. The characterization as “Nuclear Green” by some of its proponents may not sit well with new appointees who might now regard “green energy” to be “propeller-head energy.”
“One of these things is not like the others…” – Big Bird knows.
There seems to be a fair amount of evangelizing for thorium reactors. This discussion from From NPR, May 4, 2012, may offer a more balanced view:
http://www.npr.org/2012/05/04/152026805/is-thorium-a-magic-bullet-for-our-energy-problems
It’s not all peaches & cream.
Steve P says:
May 13, 2012 at 12:19 pm
There seems to be a fair amount of evangelizing for thorium reactors. This discussion from From NPR, May 4, 2012, may offer a more balanced view….
It’s not all peaches & cream.
________________________________
National Public Radio is “liberal” and as the liberals will tell you. “There was a lot of bad stuff about Barack Obama, they never told their trusting Liberal audience.” So I am afraid I would take anything on NPR (or any news media) with a very large grain of salt.
“It’s not all peaches & cream.” Of course it is not all peaches & cream. Life is Lethal We all have to make choices and weigh the pros and cons. Even not making a choice is still making a choice.
Civilization requires energy in some form.
The earliest form was human muscle in the form of slaves or the labor of women and children.
Then we harnessed the muscle power of animals but that has major draw backs The Great Horse-Manure Crisis of 1894
Coal kills miners with mine collapses and black lung. Black Lung Disease Kills 1,000 Coal Miners a Year
Oil kills with well explosions, and transporation leaks: Transocean Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion
Natural gas can explode. San Bruno Explosion & Fire
Of the bunch Hydro is probably the best but there is still danger from dam failure.
From WIKI http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroelectricity#Failure_risks
So thorium nuclear holds promise even though it is not “All Peaches and Cream” and it looks like the most promising way forward at this time.
Gail Combs says:
May 13, 2012 at 1:31 pm
You can’t judge a book by lookin’ at its cover.
–Bo Diddley
Attacking source rather than substance is not a good way to start, and I notice you never did get around to addressing the substance of the discussion, which as I read it, shows there are issues with waste and proliferation.
In my view, it makes a lot more sense to exploit existing resources than to invest very heavily in a technology we don’t need, one with potential problems, and one with unknown costs.
Simple solutions, like simple explanations, are almost always better.
>>
Spector says:
May 12, 2012 at 7:03 pm
. . . who might now regard “green energy” to be “propeller-head energy.”
<<
Beany and Cecil. (Or does that date me?)
Jim
steve p~ we’re talking climate change. The science is more and more solidly on Our side. When it comes to AGW shills like NPR, the source must also be attacked, as there sure as HELL ain’t no substance…
And YES, we DO want nuclear in the mix. We’ll take everything we can get.
The inclusion of “Fuel Efficiency” on the original info graphic makes me think less than longingly of the term “megawatts.”
Did anyone else here see the article on Carbon Sequestration and Storage in The Economist? Here’s the link: http://www.economist.com/node/21554501
Excerpts (direct quotes from the article):
__________
“According to the International Energy Agency, an intergovernmental body that monitors these matters, CCS would be the cheapest way to manage about a fifth of that reduction [i.e., a fifth of halving carbon-dioxide emissions by 2050].
To do this, the agency reckons, requires the building of 100 capture facilities by 2020 and 3,000 by 2050. Which is a problem, because at the moment there are only eight, none of which is attached to a power station.”
__________
“All of which is fine and dandy except that, if rigged to the average coal-fired power station, this process might use a quarter of the energy the plant produces. According to Howard Herzog, a chemical engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who has made a study of the matter, that implies a cost of between $50 and $100 per tonne of carbon stored.”
__________
“There was a rush of interest in CCS in the late 2000s, including $3 billion for it in America’s stimulus package of 2009. But many projects are now being cancelled. Either the developers have lost confidence in government commitments to support them or their costs have turned out higher than expected.”
__________
“The upshot is that there is no free lunch. If people are serious about carbon capture and storage, they will have to pay for it. The best that facilities like Mongstad can do is make the meal as cheap as possible.”
There are also these related yet relatively recent articles, discovered separately, on the high price of CSS technology:
Combating climate change: Net benefits
The idea of pulling carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere is a beguiling one. Could it ever become real? (Mar 17th 2012)
http://www.economist.com/node/21550241
Tackling climate change: Deep storage
Carbon capture remains a good idea, but not much more
Oct 29th 2011
http://www.economist.com/node/21534822
This, perhaps, is more applicable to this topic than I earlier thought. It is a long, dry, technical, (and perhaps politically motivated,) but upbeat report on progress being made by the Administration to alleviate the near-term energy crisis by developing unconventional oil resources.
Moderator: Frank Verrastro — CSIS Senior Vice President and Director, Energy and National Security Program.
Speakers:
Dan Poneman — Deputy Secretary of Energy.
David Lawrence — Executive Vice President for Exploration for Shell Upstream Americas.
Michael Bromwich — Director Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement.
ED Morse — Managing Director, Global Head of Commodity Research at Citi Group.
Unconventional Oil and Gas: Reshaping Energy Markets”
“Published on Apr 12, 2012 by csisdc”
2 likes, 0 dislikes, 70 views; 1 hr, 19:37 min
“Amid volatile energy markets, one notable bright spot has emerged on the energy landscape: the development of vast unconventional oil and gas resources in the United States. The success of these resources has widespread economic, geopolitical, and environmental implications and offers a unique opportunity to rethink conventional energy policy.”
Thanks Eugene.
“There was a rush of interest in CCS in the late 2000s, including $3 billion for it in America’s stimulus package of 2009. But many projects are now being cancelled. Either the developers have lost confidence in government commitments to support them or their costs have turned out higher than expected.”
That is not what scares the crap out of me. Super high pressure CO2 pumped under the ground will, in time, release to devastating ends. An earthquake, a fracture, a malfunction. When this occurs if any population is within proximity they will be killed, asphyxiated, along with all animal life forms for many, many kilometers around. This has occurred naturally in Africa deep lakes as they very occasionally decide to turn over.
CO2 Gas Build Up Causes Lake to Explode
“Over 1700 people were asphyxiated up to 16 miles away along with all their livestock, some 3000 head of cattle.”
http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/2008/01/co2-gas-build-up-causes-lake-to-explode/
Lake Nyos
“On August 21, 1986, possibly triggered by a landslide, Lake Nyos suddenly emitted a large cloud of CO2, which suffocated 1,700 people and 3,500 livestock in nearby towns and villages.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_nyos
The only reason you would ever want to attempt CO2 sequestration is if your wanted to kill possibly many million people and animals all due to a terrorist act, natural occurrence, equipment failure, or, on purpose by the greens who “want to save the planet from the nasty humans”.
We say we are afraid of the nuclear industry but what could ever occur by them is totally dwarfed by what disaster CCS could bring into reality. People, CO2 does not make the Earth warmer. Co2 in the high atmosphere is a coolant and CO2 in the lower atmosphere does nothing, zip.
RE: Steve P: (May 13, 2012 at 12:19 pm)
“There seems to be a fair amount of evangelizing for thorium reactors.”
The basic fact is the energy is there and thorium is so abundant that at near 100% efficient usage it should long out-last uranium 235 and perhaps the Earth itself. Also, it does not produce long-lasting plutonium as a primary end product. I think we had better *prove* that it cannot be made to work — nobody has done that — before dismissing it as a solution to the eventual energy crisis when our petrochemical gas tank runs dry.
I am not confidant of high-tech solar or wind to fill this need because of the massive structures that would be required and the increasing scarcity of the high-tech materials, such as rare-earth magnets that make this possible. With a concentrated source of energy, we might be able to mine the oceans to recover scarce materials, but without energy to burn, these elements will be lost to technology.
If we do not have a real alternative for the petrochemical energy we are now using, the Earth may only be able to support a small fraction of our current population. There may be more energy out there than most ‘Peak Oil’ speakers are predicting, but sooner or later, it will all be gone. It does appear that ‘conventional oil’ is peaking, and from now on, we will be increasingly dependent on unconventional petrochemical resources.
Spector says:
May 13, 2012 at 6:39 pm
Yep, if it don’t work, force it. Or go broke trying…
Asking questions about a technology, or having a discussion about its possible pros and cons is not the same thing as dismissal. I’m sure you must appreciate the distinction. and I’m also sure you must be familiar with the logical fallacy known as a strawman,
.
I haven’t seen anyone here who is proselytizing for thorium reactors make any mention of any possible downside to the technology.
Anyone old enough to recall the early PR campaigns for nuclear power, and who has paid attention since, knows that the credibility of the nuclear power industry is not very high.
There is no telling how much money has been poured into the various nuclear projects, more than a few of them black. We do know that the generals have gotten their small & powerful bombs after hundreds of tests, but we’re all still waiting for that “too cheap to meter” part of the bargain.
I oppose nuclear power because whatever man builds, nature can break. As Paul Simon sang it: “Everything put together sooner or later falls apart.”
We are ignorant of the true potential of the forces of nature on Earth, and even where precedents exist, foolish men ignore them. Huge tsunamis along the Tōhoku coast have happened before, and they will happen again, perhaps even bigger and badder than the monster that swept ashore after the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011.
I don’t get it:
We’ve seen lots of excellent effort here to debunk the CO2 scare, and falsify the CAGW conjecture… so we can build thorium reactors?
It seems to me that one likely reason for the CO2 scare was to demonize coal. All the other energy sources have benefited from coal’s persecution, including some without much merit, like wind and solar.
Meanwhile, now that the CO2 scare has been thoroughly debunked, and the wheels shot off the CAGW bandwagon, what again is the reason for not burning coal?