Reposted from the NoTricksZone
By P Gosselin on 6. February 2021
Green energy and COVID-19 lockdowns are playing energy Russian roulette with people’s lives. Perfect winter storm brewing.
A winter blizzard is set to strike Central Europe, bringing with it the potential to wreak power outage havoc. Temperatures will plummet to as low as -15°C accompanied by bone-chilling high winds. Closed shops due to COVID-19 are leaving citizens unprepared. A protracted power outage would be devastating.
In the coming hours, a high pressure system situated over Scandinavia and storm Tristan to the south will collide over central Europe and develop into dangerous weather conditions over one of Europe’s most populated regions, North Rhine Westphalia Germany.
Watch the Kachelmann forecast (in German) here.
There are some major problems with this storm that will test the German power grid stability and even possibly the citizens’ ability to fend for themselves.
Power grid at risk: hours of freezing rain
First will be the band of freezing rain that is forecast across the Ruhr region of North Rhine Westphalia. According to Kachelmannwetter.de, the freezing rain period could last hours and thus lead to heavy weight loads on power transmission structures as ice builds up. Lines could collapse.
High winds – even heavier loads
To make matters worse, high winds will further exacerbate the loads on the already ice-coated power transmission infrastructure – thus increasing the probability of power line structural failure and an ensuing power blackout, which in turn could cascade and threaten the European power grid.
Winter blackout not unprecedented
Such a blackout would not be unprecedented. In 2006, a major European blackout was caused by a disconnection of a powerline crossing in northwest Germany. The power outage quickly cascaded across Europe, extending from Poland in the north-east, to the Benelux countries and France in the west, through to Portugal, Spain and Morocco in the south-west, and across to Greece and the Balkans in the south-east.
Also just last month a major European blackout was narrowly averted. The cause: wintry weather, which was mild compared to what is forecast to hit soon.
November snow storm 2005
Wintry weather causing a blackout also occurred on November 25, 2005, in northwest Germany when the region was hit by a snow storm. Power transmission lines, which had been poorly maintained over the previous years, collapsed under the weight of ice and caused a large blackout. According to power company RWE, around 250,000 people in 25 municipalities lost power.
Grid more destabilized than ever – unsteady green energies
Another problem with this weekend’s coming storm – in addition to high winds and ice – is the fact that Germany’s power grid is more unstable than ever – thanks to the wildly fluctuating supply from wind and solar energy. Also a number of baseload-providing nuclear and coal power plants have been taken out of service, thus further destabilizing the country’s and continent’s power grid.
Power grid winter Russian roulette with people’s lives
The forecast weather conditions mean almost zero solar energy, and the expected high winds may necessitate the shutdown of wind turbines or cause wild feed-in fluctuations. One thing is certain, the grid will be challenged over the coming hours and days.
Most likely the grid will hold up and keep everyone out of the cold and darkness. But the bad news is that in the wintertime the country’s power grid has turned into a game of energy roulette and citizens have to rely on “a little luck” every time the weather turns stormy and frigid cold – thanks in large part to disastrous energy policies by the German government.
The worst time for any blackout is during a period of blizzard and bitter cold. People can freeze to death quickly. In such times they rely more than ever on a stable power supply.
What if there’s a longer term blackout?
For my wife and I here in northwest Germany, we would be toast.
With this weekend’s forecast high winds and temperatures dropping to near -15°C, we’d not only lose both power but also heat. Our natural gas furnace is controlled electrically, so it would cease to function too. Within hours the house would turn very cold and uninhabitable. We don’t have a woodstove or a fireplace. We’d have to move in with friends or relatives who have wood heat.
It would not be possible to go out and buy a generator to power the furnace because the stores are closed – due to Corona! I’ve got a gas bottle for the barbecue grill, but it’s almost empty. And I can’t fill it because the shops are closed – due to Corona. What a time for a lockdown – just when people need to be preparing the most.
Without heat at home, we could just stay at a hotel, right? Wrong. They’re closed too – because of COVID. So are bars and restaurants.
All the ingredients for a perfect disaster
Across the country, many people face the same scenario. Most would somehow get by, I’m sure. But if a blackout should occur, many will risk freezing to death in large part because of the self-inflicted green energies grid instability and the Corona lockdowns making it impossible for them to prepare properly.
We can almost see the perfect disaster brewing.
Unfortunately, this is what the government has left its citizens with: hope for the best! A game of energy Russian Roulette. The winter bullet is in the chamber. We can only hope to miss it.
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If the blackout is bad, I suspect the government would be forced to respond by reactivating its mothballed nuclear plants.
Doesn’t it depend on how long it tales to remove those mothballs?
And how do they get those poor moths to get into the carrier?
Moth treats?
I think he means public opinion will force the reactivation over some years, but no doubt they will blame Brexit and global warming first
And to replace the critical staff they let go when the reactor was shut down.
No way. The greens made them inoperable to prevent this.
Can’t they let everyone be miserable and just blame “climate change”?
That is a very difficult thing to do and would take weeks if not months . You just don’t have to flick a switch .
Posted in 2013:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/11/01/water-is-replacing-climate-as-the-next-un-environmental-resource-scare/#comment-1131731
[excerpt]
My primary concern at this time is that Earth is about to enter a period of global cooling that could be severe, and could result in significant loss of life, especially among the elderly of Britain and Europe, since the fearless leaders of those countries have created “the perfect storm” by damaging their energy systems with costly and ineffective grid-connected wind and solar power schemes – “solutions” to a false global warming crisis in a cooling world.
We warned of this debacle in 2002, but to no effect. It has all, regrettably, unfolded as it should not have.
We wrote in 2002:
[PEGG, reprinted at their request by several other professional journals , the Globe and Mail and la Presse in translation, by Baliunas, Patterson and MacRae]
Formerly at: http://www.apega.ca/members/publications/peggs/WEB11_02/kyoto_pt.htm
Now at: http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/KyotoAPEGA2002REV1.pdf
On global warming:
“Climate science does not support the theory of catastrophic human-made global warming – the alleged warming crisis does not exist.”
On green energy:
“The ultimate agenda of pro-Kyoto advocates is to eliminate fossil fuels, but this would result in a catastrophic shortfall in global energy supply – the wasteful, inefficient energy solutions proposed by Kyoto advocates simply cannot replace fossil fuels.”
In Germany it’s election year. I’m even hoping that such an event happens, before they shut even more energy infrastructure down due to the rising number of green voters… Hopefully these people will then think twice when they fill out their ballot…
Green and thinking are two words rarely used together in a sentence.
Schadenfreude will get us nowhere, Eric. If there is a disaster this time, it will be explained as damage to the power lines from the ice storm. “Don’t be absurd, nothing to do with renewable energy”. (Whether true or not).
Even if there would be a prolonged cold period with still winds, resulting in a grid collapse, and no icestorm-damaged infrastructure to blame, they will think of some excuse for griff to propagate. The natural gas plants failed obviously. A 1000-year event… Maybe denier saboteurs–must root out the traitors in our midst.
I hope that nobody dies.
It’s not schadenfreud, there needs to be an example the world can’t ignore, sooner or later someone will have to pay.
Europe is much further along the green insanity curve so they are likely it, california not going to see -20 any time soon
-20C in Europe is equivalent to -7C in California, Bay Area. I personally experienced -3C there. With poor house insulation and PG&E Tier pricing it would be same problem as -20C in Europe.
In this particular scenario, if there is a big outage with downed power lines, it will be reasonable to blame the problem on the ice storm. That would be something that would have caused the outage even if the grid were 100% coal-powered. Maybe the ice storm itself is due to Climate Change ™. If we try to say it was due to unreliable sources of power, that will discredit us. Just ask griff if I’m right on this. He’s probably already using the excuse proactively.
However, it would be good if there were a long series of frequent failures undeniably due to insufficient wind and solar, long enough to get people struggling to stay warm, and fearing for their lives, but not long enough for anybody to actually die. Maybe when ordinary people see their electric bill double, but they no longer have anything approaching reliable power, then they will figure it out on their own.
I have read that the cost of industrial energy in Germany has close to tripled in the last 5-7 years. Isn’t that enough of a wake up call?
I imagine the wind turbines and solar panels will produce next to nothing due to icing of turbine blades and snow and ice cover on panels – and they want to cram electric vehicles down people’s throats, so they won’t be able to get to the snow and ice choked power generation infrastructure and clean things off when there’s no power, will they?!
“Green” energy (NOT) is stupidity cubed.
“If there is a disaster this time, it will be explained as damage to the power lines from the ice storm. “Don’t be absurd, nothing to do with renewable energy”. (Whether true or not).”
Exactly.
One thing they won’t be able to hide is that windmills and solar panels barely operate, if at all, in this kind of weather.
Hopefully those ballots will be counted correctly…… Unlike here in the good old US of A.
With a bit of luck the iceload on the wind turbine blades could do the job . Wouldn’t it be fantastic if most of these monsters would not survive the storm.
They will simply blame the -15 degrees on CO2.
–26.7 C measured in Muhlhausen (216 m elevation) this morning : https://twitter.com/DWD_presse/status/1359407965011398656
Sorry, already broken: -30.2 in Olbersleben a new >century cold record for that location: https://www.bild.de/news/inland/news-inland/alle-schnee-news-im-live-ticker-wetter-in-deutschland-75245828.bild.html
Friends are already sending me pictures of the snow fall in their gardens. It began pre-dawn in The Netherlands. I am very concerned for the welfare of all my friends living under this storm. May everyone stay safe and warm!
As long as some canals freeze over, all will be well.
A dear Canadian friend who moved to Rotterdam a few years ago, tells me the country is shut down. Naturally, she threw on her Hudson’s Bay coat, went for a walk, and took pictures. It’s beautiful, but not a lot of people out and about to get in the way of the scenery.
It is minus five degrees Celsius and very windy: 5 – 7 Bft. After many warm winters, people are not used to low temperatures. But everybody I heard enjoys the real winter. When the canals are frozen you will see the Dutch outside: skating. Today I have seen many beautiful pictures, people enjoyed. A short impression from parts of the Netherlands:
https://nos.nl/video/2367721-vlieg-mee-over-wit-alkmaar-den-bosch-en-brabantse-natuur.html
Looks pretty but cold.
Remind me again why colder is better…
No kidding, for me, It’s -19F currently.
It could be worse.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7623488/edmonton-weather-extreme-cold-arctic-air/
-39 in Ft mac
C or F? LOL
Yes.
This must be why the City of Edmonton Council declared two years ago that we have a climate emergency in Edmonton.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7623488/edmonton-weather-extreme-cold-arctic-air/
{excerpt}
“Cold on the Prairies is very common. In fact, we were looking back in recent history to see the last time that Edmonton saw -40 C. That’s not a wind chill index, that’s an absolute degrees Celsius temperature and the Edmonton airport has at least reached it in the last two years consecutively,” Hoffman said.
“We’re not stranger to this cold, especially in the outlying areas of Edmonton.”
However, she noted the weather station at Edmonton city centre hasn’t dipped to -40 C since 1972.
“It’s quite rare to reach that -40 C in the city centre, although not as rare for outlying areas and low-lying areas.”
_____________
The low forecast for Calgary this week is -32C.
The same network posted the following headline:
“‘Incredibly destructive’: Canada’s Prairies to see devastating impact of climate change”
You have to be a total idiot to believe that a little warming will be bad for the Canadian prairies – we are freezing here. Warming is not a threat, but cooling truly is. Even minor cooling will mean the end of farming in the Peace River District – it will revert to ranching like it was decades ago.
9am in Calgary and it has “warmed up” to minus25C, deemed minus34C with the wind chill.
The brass monkeys have been brought indoors. The birds, bunnies and squirrels are not so fortunate.
I am so grateful for our meagre amount of “global warming” and am mystified by those who rant and screech against it.
I suspect that those anti-warming “screechers” have never experienced real cold – I suggest they try working outdoors at minus 50, as I have – call it an exercise in re-calibration.
I hate it when the temperature gets much above 25 C … but maybe that’s just me. 🙂
It’s all happened before
“Grindelwald Fluctuation’ (1560-1630) – Little Ice Age – What We Can Learn From The Past Is Prepare. – YouTube
Nice!
“We don’t have a woodstove or a fireplace.”
The climate alarmists don’t want anyone to burn wood.
Wrong, it’s “wanted” Green Energy”.
No- the greens hate burning wood becaues it releases CO2. They do NOT consider it “green energy”. There is a movement in America and Europe to stop cutting any tree for any purpose- the idea is that even if we stop all carbon emissions- that won’t save the Earth- so we should also begin reducing CO2 in the air- and to do that, we must lock up the forests. I’ve been a forester for 48 years and I currently battle against those idiots who hate all tree cutting- so I know what I’m talking about.
The German “Umwelthilfe” (Enviroement Help) promoted for years woodstoves and pellet stoves as sustainenbal energy source, not many people like it, but the number increased to millions in Gemrany
And I agree that wood is a good thing- for all sorts of products and for energy- both to burn in your home and for electric power. It requires excellent forest management. Good forestry is an old art in Germany going back a thousand years. Good thing they have wood to burn in Germany when their power grid fails with only wind and solar.
A wood stove is not of much use when you cannot get wood – just like a diesel vehicle (which were also promoted and are now demonized) is not of much use when you cannot get diesel.
Now, I will admit that there are quite a few more people who have a wood lot outside their back door than those that have an oil refinery out that door – but still a minuscule number.
During the 1970s “energy crisis” in the United States, one of the news networks ran a story about a guy in Colorado who had solved his fuel problem. He installed a wood burning stove, and a wood burning furnace in his house in the mountains. Then he got on every junk mail list he could find. The (literally) tons of paper delivered to him by the US Postal Service kept him warm and able to cook, both at zero cost to him.
Red ink smells and tastes best…’specially around the Holidays.
🙂
What I forgot to mention is the fact, that CO2 from wood burning, private and in powerplants, has not to be added to the German CO2 budget, because of the sustainability of wood = biomass
One example of many
wood heating plants, for the climate 😀
It’s a big debate now- is wood burning “carbon neutral” or not. It’s a very complicated subject. It’s not if you look at the smoke going up the chimney- but it is if you look at the well managed forests where the wood comes from- because if well managed, those forests are adding carbon all the time. I won’t go further with this because it’s probably not of much interest here- but if the subject comes up, I can say more as I battle forestry haters every day here in Massachusetts- a very, very politically correct state.
The problem, Joseph, is that it takes 80 years to grow the tree in your back yard that you have to cut down to heat your house for one winter. If wood is used for home heating, the trees within 100 miles of LA are consumed in a a couple of years. Applying forest regrowth stats to the size of the problem doesn’t work overall, even if the numbers work out that you can grow enough wood every year for a plant like Drax to burn….calculate how much back yard is needed for someone to grow enough grass to heat their house all winter with dried straw ? The real estate cost alone is prohibitive.
Right. In the old days in Quebec and Ontario, every farm had 5-10 acres of woodlot. Thats what it takes to heat with wood in Canada.
Yes.
And when done carefully- they didn’t use up the forest- they’d burn the trees unlikely to grow into high value timber. At least this is true in New England. Maybe farther north with only 5 acres or so- you might need all of the wood growing on that acreage for home heating. Well, 10 would do better. Much more than 10 and much of the extra growth could go into high value sawlog growth.
Irrelevant how long it takes another tree to replace it –because the rest of the forest NOT cut that year is doing the job. I keep saying this but simpletons can’t get it. And, of COURSE everyone in LA won’t heat with wood. Who said they would? Nobody says wood energy will serve all energy needs of mankind- it’s just one of many sources of energy which should not end because some tree huggers don’t like it. Your comments about straw are also irrelevant.
How much heat is needed in LA?
Trees grow a lot faster than you think.
Anyplace with rain and that is not bitterly cold most of the year can grow a tree in a couple of decades.
“Hailed as the leading commercial timber tree in the southeast United States, the native Loblolly pine grows rapidly with a straight trunk clear of branches. It reaches 50 feet in just 20 years, and when mature can top 100 feet with a trunk diameter between 2-3 feet. The bark on young trees is usually dark, blackish-brown and scaly.”
LOBLOLLY PINE | fast growing pole wood (treeplantation.com)
Just sayin’.
Mr. M.-glad to see you posting. Great telephone poles, but pine will ruin residential chimney, coating clay liner with creosote that will catch fire at some point and crack the liner. Not so bad with steel flu liner.
As for LA, they don’t need the heat, they need the ambience.
What do you think of the WHO “investigation” finding C-19 certainly did not come from a lab in Wuhan?
True, and there is not much energy density in softwoods to begin with.
But hardwoods grow a lot faster than 80 years from planting to usable firewood as well in most places on the planet.
If you want large planks of clear grade lumber for fine furniture that is a different story.
I was under the impression though, that those pellets they have been shipping over the sea are mostly southern yellow pine.
For ambience, hard to beat gas coming up through a bed of glass pebbles, but that is a matter of taste I guess.
As for COVID…the whole issue has become, IMO, farcically political and subject to too much bias and opinionating.
It makes meaningful discussion of the facts problematic…again, IMO.
At this point I would not bet much money on my ability to separate out fact from fiction in order to arrive at anything conclusive.
Having said that…I would not trust a political organization like WHO to report on anything with candor. Certainly not this issue.
The “biofuel” plants of the green energy movement burn mostly wood pellets.
Yes, wood pellets- but you’re mistaken if you think the greenies like pellets. They hate them. I’m in the middle of the battle over wood energy so I know it well. It’s NOT part of the green energy movement- yet, ironically, it is a green energy. Instead of destroying forests for solar and wind farms- we MANAGE the forests to produce wood products that EVERYBODY loves AND energy.
It sounds like you are fighting the good fight, Joseph. 🙂
Unless it’s in pellet form and shipped from across the sea. 😕
Nothing wrong with shipping it- like everything else. On really big ships which keeps the cost and “carbon footprint” small.
1 really big ship requires hundreds of tractor-trailers hauling the wood pellets from hundreds or thousands of miles to fill it up for the trip … woods pellets are far from carbon neutral … they are just a virtue signaling heat source that moves the actual carbon and pollution footprint away from the user and spreads it out over other countries/states so it is not noticed by the local carbon police …
And there’s the irony; how much: diesel fuel or gasoline for “chipping” the wood products to be “pelletized,” diesel fuel or gasoline (or coal fired electricity) for turning it into “pellets,” diesel fuel for trucks and trains to haul the pellets to the coast, “Bunker C” fuel for the ships crossing the Atlantic, and how much diesel for lorries or trains to get the pellets in quantity to Drax to burn them has been expended before the pellet burning generates its first bit of energy?!
All while refusing to use the mountains of coal you’re (still) standing on.
The stupid, it burns.
I really want to see the UK get hit by a series of blackouts..
.. maybe then Boris’s “johnson” will be able to think more clearly about the people’s needs..
rather than its own needs.
Me too. I have a standby generator, a wood stove, oil-fired central heating and two camping stoves with several gas bottles. “Be prepared” we used to say in the scouts, and with this government and its insane policies, people sure need to be prepared to look after themselves.
I have just had a dual fuel stove installed and I have a camping stove. 2021 and we have to worry about things that were sorted decades ago madness.
I live in the UK and although it would be very unpleasant especially in winter I agree with you. Perhaps he’d think more clearly if he didn’t have an ecoloon looking after the contents of his pants, or is that what you were getting at?
Yes, gas fired central heating needs electricity for the boiler control and circulation pump. A stand alone gas fire would work but I think these days they are more likely to have electric controls to mimic central heating so won’t work. I have a fireplace, a stack of wood and a small gas heater with spare cylinder. Luckily the UK will escape the worst of the cold.
There really will have to be a big failure and loss of life to bring about a change. It will require an alternative at the ballot box – unless you are in the US where you can just dial up votes an win regardless – as in the UK there is not currently.
Again in the UK, we have been lucky not to experience extensive blackouts for years. Heating at this time of year is critical, and my parents retained the gas fire in the living room because of the regular powercuts of the seventies due to miners strikes and power workers industrial action. New houses are generally too airtight to permit solid fuel appliances, and the planned restrictions on gas heating will only increase dependence on grid electricity. I keep batteries stocked for lighting and radio, and have a multifuel stove (briquettes) for some heat, and a gas hob for hot food and drinks. I have even considered installing a small off grid solar system just to provide minimal electricity for some lights and central heating operation. If it gets too windy for the whirlygigs to generate, we could face problems.
Is there a German equivalent of gridwatch?
TIA
https://www.agora-energiewende.de/service/agorameter/chart/power_generation/04.02.2021/07.02.2021/
I used to have a German link but it went dead some time ago ! (energy data is constantly being restricted )
I’ve got this general German one
https://www.tennet.eu/electricity-market/data-dashboard/generation/
This is The Nordic region
https://www.statnett.no/en/for-stakeholders-in-the-power-industry/data-from-the-power-system/#nordic-power-flow
Spain (click on pie chart for details)
https://demanda.ree.es/visiona/peninsula/demanda/total
Belgium
https://www.elia.be/en/grid-data
Ireland
https://smartgriddashboard.eirgrid.com/
Northern Ireland
http://www.soni.ltd.uk/how-the-grid-works/system-information/
reply part 2: part 1 is still ‘Awaiting for approval’
Here are two stand alone islands (no inter-connectors)
Both have lots of wind & solar availability
Hawaii
https://www.islandpulse.org/
King Island Tasmania
https://www.hydro.com.au/clean-energy/hybrid-energy-solutions/success-stories/king-island
[ a really well thought out system for a remote small agricultural community …. But don’t ask the price !! ]
“part 1 is still ‘Awaiting for approval’”
3 links maximum or the auto-mod get’s ya. !!
Thanks for that, fred. I wasn’t sure how many links would set off the moderation. I’ll keep it below that level in the future and that way the moderators won’t have to get involved, which I imagine they would appreciate.
You can ask all you like but Hydro Tasmania will not provide the costings for any of their deployments (King Island, Coober Pedy, Flinders Island).
And they still need the full capacity of the diesel generators that were already installed when KIREIP began – none of it has been replaced so the whole exercise is best viewed as a fuel reduction scheme.
Thanks guys, I was hoping for something as easy as gridwatch so the next time Griff claims wind power is so amazing and cheap they’re exporting to France cheaper than nuclear, I can say “er…no.”
I wonder why it’s so difficult to get data in Germany and so easy elsewhere
There will be deluded people who will advise Mr Gosselin that all he needs to survive an electricity blackout are candles & ceramic flower pots. Here is a video that puts paid to that idea.
3415 BTUs = 1 kW.
the usual flowerpot heaters use more than one and the heat flow is directed up and around a series of them as well as steel rod nuts n washers that would also emanate heat. as a uncovered candles heat rises directly a covered one at floor level would enable some warmth closer to the person at least even if it wasnt a huge warmth its better then having nothing id guess
A reasonable first estimate of the thermal energy in a fuel is its weight. Most reasonably available fuels contain roughly the same amount of heat, for the same amount of weight (not including the container). A few ounces of candle does little in comparison with the many pounds of fuel that go into your furnace on a cold day. You likely burn as many calories from food just picking them up and carrying them home (if you walked) as you would get from the calories of heat from burning them.
Even if this idiot idea worked… Except for some artisanal candles, all of that wax is made from fossil fuels.
Thus we see the problem with ‘science’ and how Climate Change has become such a mess.
So, the guy is doing science and he’s using primarily the 1st Law.
Exactly as Downwelling Radiation Forcing does
Entirely ignoring the science of Jozef Stefan.
If you light a candle, it will burn and produce some quite hot gas = energy = what you want/need to keep warm
But with the candle flame, 2 problems arise (haha)
1 The hot gas will race up to the ceiling of your home or room you’re in and it will stay there
2 The hot gas is comprises CO2 and heated nitrogen & oxygen.
All these gases have vanishingly low emissivities, they hardly radiate and by the time they’re attached to the underside of your ceiling, Totally Zero Use at keeping you, down near the floor, warm
Thus enter the flower pot.
It intercepts and slows the very hot gas and via conduction is itself heated.
This has 2 very major advantages.
1) The flower pot will have much higher emissivity than the hot gas does so it will radiate. You will feel the heat coming off it
2) It is closer to the floor, exactly where you are and expecting to be kept warm
And also, by cooling the hot gases, they will not be so bouyant and with a modicum of luck, hang around in a mini cloud of warm (not hot) air, near the floor & near you.
Doncha just love it when muppets pop up claiming they know all about ‘science’ and then proceed to perfectly demonstrate quite the contrary.
Yes Gavin, James, Al, Michael, Katherine, Joe et al, I’m looking at yoohoooooo 😀
Everyone, do try to remember that next time when a Climate Eco Warrior makes claims about Settled Science
Their settled science is as the settled sludge in the bottom of a septic tank – and even less wholesome & inviting
Exactly
the flower pot is the appliance of science, replacing useless convective heat energy at the ceiling with useful radiant heat energy where you want it.
The BTUs /Watts/ergs/joules added to the space is identical with or without the pot.
The only way to dramatically increase the temperature of a room with a candle …
is to use it to set the curtains on fire !
How about a ceiling fan?
If you the electricity for the fan why do you need a candle heater?
In addition to PETA’s remarks, the following.
1. The configuration is important. Convection patterns in a room are quite different than within the box.
2. Also, the radiation adds to warmth at person level.
3. The candle oxygen supply depends on ventilation. It could be improved by leaving the hole in the pot top open, thus creating a stable chimney type of flow, adding to the stability of the flow for the flame.
4. The flame intensity will have been different among the experiments. By measuring the candle weight, he could have estimated its contribution in the difference in temporal heating.
Anyway.
Good to have a candle in your car before going out.
Candle power is somewhere between 20W and 100W, depends on size of candle. 100W heating room is not enough, increase temperature maybe 0.5 – 1C. But 100W heating human body makes big difference. Basic metabolism is around 200W, with full power you can add another maybe 200W as untrained. I heard that Peter Sagan, famous Slovak cyclist can make 700W.
So if 200W makes you comfortable at 24C, that is 13C lower than your body temperature, with additional 100W it will be 19,5C difference between ambient and body temperature, thus 17,5C. Of course you will never get full 100W from candle to your body.
Thermofor works best for this, under blanket you are getting close to 100% of energy from hot water. Plastic bottle works nice as thermofor.
If you increase the CO2 in the room, the candle generates a positive feedback loop that gives you runaway warming – now you too can survive the coming ice age!
Be careful though if you don’t keep an eye on it the temperature feedback loop might just kill you.
It’ll still be the warmest February evuh, though.
Is that snow?
The computer says no.
It’s snowing this morning in Antwerp, temperatures forecast to fall to -13 C by Wednesday night. No above-freezing temperature forecast for more than a week.
People of Germany, have no fear, Griff will be here!
Now click the heels of your snow shoes together and repeat :
“Warmer is better, warmer is better, warmer is better”
There are scientist with a sense for realism:
A prequel to the Dantean Anomaly: the precipitation seesaw and droughts of 1302 to 1307 in Europe
“Abstract
The cold/wet anomaly of the 1310s (“Dantean Anomaly”) has attracted a lot of attention from scholars, as it is commonly interpreted as a signal of the transition between the Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA) and the Little Ice Age (LIA). The huge variability that can be observed during this decade, like the high interannual variability observed in the 1340s, has been highlighted as a side effect of this rapid climatic transition. In this paper, we demonstrate that a multi-seasonal drought of almost 2 years occurred in the Mediterranean between 1302 and 1304, followed by a series of hot, dry summers north of the Alps from 1304 to 1306. We suggest that this outstanding dry anomaly, unique in the 13th and 14th centuries, together with cold anomalies of the 1310s and the 1340s, is part of the climatic shift from the MCA to the LIA. Our reconstruction of the predominant weather patterns of the first decade of the 14th century – based on both documentary and proxy data – identifies multiple European precipitation seesaw events between 1302 and 1307, with similarities to the seesaw conditions which prevailed over continental Europe in 2018. It can be debated to what extent the 1302–1307 period can be compared to what is currently discussed regarding the influence of the phenomenon of Arctic amplification on the increasing frequency of persistent stable weather patterns that have occurred since the late 1980s. Additionally, this paper deals with socioeconomic and cultural responses to drought risks in the Middle Ages as outlined in contemporary sources and provides evidence that there is a significant correlation between pronounced dry seasons and fires that devastated cities.”
Let’s see, what will happen the next years.
For those like me who lived through the 1998 winter ice storm that cut off power in Quebec and eastern Ontario this article rings very true.
Don’t you have natural gas stove? It usually does not need electricity to run. Combined power of 3kW can heat up home quite efficiently.
Almost all newer gas stoves and ranges have electronic ignition. I suppose you can light the range burners (and put a pot of water on it), but you cannot light the oven without disassembling part of the oven (NOT RECOMMENDED).
For that matter, boiling a pot of water wouldn’t be recommended either, as the condensation away from the heat source would make things quite uncomfortable.
Correct. The top burners can receive gas even in a power failure while the oven has a safety valve in the circut so no gas flow unless the glow plug is energized. There are off grid versions with a built in battery but I have no personal knowledge of them beyond their existance.
Mine has electric ignition, but no other electricity. So you can start with matches. I used it this way when my central heating was out for two weeks due to control unit failure. Using no pots, just flame. Be carefull to not catch fire on furniture above stove. CO is probably not an issue, my wife is sometimes cooking for hours.. Just vent room regularly to replenish Oxygen.
Most can still be lit with a lighter
We’ve had a blackout or two in the middle of winter where I live. The nastier and most recent was November 25 to 27, 2018, when a sputtering power outage turned into a complete blackout. ComEd’s response to my message was “364,000 outages, 188,000 in your area”. My neighbors were out in their cars, trying to keep warm. I just dressed for cold weather, made some soup and tea, and waited it out. It would have been nice to have a fireplace to add a little heat. Bad weather – rain, turning to sleet, caused the blackout – but no one ever seems prepared for it. We just take it for granted that the power won’t go out.
I think we’re too dependent on the “modern” conveniences and take for granted that they’ll be there, period, which is completely not true. We had power outages every winter when I was in grade school, but we also had a fireplace in one room, which kept us warm. Camping out on the floor was fun. And the stove had a pilot light, which meant we could cook on the stovetop or in the fireplace. Losing the art of cooking at the fireplace is very bad. It’s worse when dependence on a poorly-engineered grid means people with suffer from loss of power. And yet, we seem to be heading back to the 18th century and prior with these constant failures of engineering.
I do sympathize with people on the receiving end of this. I don’t know what the outcome will be, but it’s as though this whole “grid” idea was designed for failure with consequences.
ComEd, huh? I also live in the Chicago area, but have been spared most of the power outages (Thank God!) that have occurred, and no major interruptions in the winter.
Here’s hoping my luck continues to hold- especially as the temp this AM is -6F, and the next ten days won’t be much warmer.
All I can say is, “Pray for Global Warming!”
Ditto, Kpar, and ironically, about 25 minutes after I posted that comment, the power shut off in my area. I texted the ComEd and the truck arrived, and the power is back on 1.5 hours later, but this emphasizes exactly what the author of the article is talking about: we’re dependent on “other” for what we need.
Unfortunately, this is exactly the direction that those loons like Aoc and Bernie want to take.
I do not take anything for granted these days.
Even if you did have gas for your grill, DO NOT BRING A OUTDOOR GRILL INSIDE TO HEAT YOUR HOUSE! They produce toxic amounts of carbon monoxide. (Sorry for shouting, but it’s important.)
In my country (Canada), too many people die in winter blackouts doing this very thing. (PSA ends)
Agreed. The most dangerous type being those disposable barbecues. Chimneys are crucial safety devices with stoves (or open fires), and even then, a CO alarm should be installed. Unfortunately, desperate people who are losing reason through hypothermia make bad decisions. Cold kills far more than heat does.
Record cold and snow across North America. Record cold and snow across Europe. That global warming is sure kicking in.
I’m sure in a month we’ll see a headline about the hottest February ever.
For the entire 10 day forecast we are going to be 25-35 degrees F below normal. The Atlas and southern end of the Zargos (below 30 degrees north) are going to be below freezing, all of mainland Japan to the southern tip, and even the high elevations of Taiwan are all forecast to be below freezing. I think when the cult claims that we have 12 years to save Earth (8 now), what they really mean is they have that many years to finish their free market killing agenda before even the deepest brainwashed sheople start to realize it’s a scam.
Hey but the that polar vortex split which is pushing down the Arctic air was caused by the Global Warming
/s
The Chinese were also freezing their *sses off; luckily they have zillions of coal, gas & nuclear power plants to provide electricity and heat.
India is less effected by either climate change or corona. Also we are used to short power cuts and always prepared for calamities – not sussed to sleep in a fake consumer “wonder” world.
Most of all spirit over matter is balancing out slowly in a healthier future, as India was on the other extreme end of that scale once.
And so it begins: UK Government mulls emergency measures that would enable networks to switch off your electricity without warning or compensation – The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF) (thegwpf.com)
Combine that with government control of healthcare, and we’ll be looking at “1984” as a better alternative…
Oligarchs and dictators are boiling us like frogs. How unpleasant does it need to be before people start to reject overweening bureaucracy and self appointed royalty?
I love this: These include giving networks the right to decide when they consider the grid to be in a state of ’emergency’ and the power to switch off high usage electrical devices such as electric vehicle chargers and central heating systems in British homes.
What have we ALL been talking about??????
If it gets really cold I think I would just go to bed .
Summer outages are bad enough. But a winter outage will really focus your attention on emergency back-up and redundancy.
PS – Get a small gasoline generator, 5 gal. can, and learn how to hotwire your gas furnace or boiler. If you have electric heat, you must be wealthy enough to afford a whole house generator running on natural gas?
Please remember to disconnect your panel from the mains if you are wiring in a generator.
Get an electrician to put in a panel that does all that switching for you. But if you MUST backfeed the electricity from a generator into your home, TURN OFF THE MAIN FIRST. It’s the big switch at the top of the breaker box.
Otherwise, you could fry the line worker trying to fix your problem.
I have family whose power goes out due to ice storms, municipal sewer backing up due to crazy rain, no heat, unable to flush the toilet, and they still haven’t prepared for the next time this will happen. I guess this individual in the article likes the excitement and hardship like my family. Being prepared is just too boring.
I live out in the country, and our power used to go out like we were on the far end of a long extension cord that kept getting kicked out of the outlet.
Then a Costco warehouse depot was built about a mile and a half away.
New power poles down our road, power lines twice the diameter. Never goes out now unless a transformer blows, or some drunk takes out a pole. Still gets routed right back up, though.
Funny thing, though — we all get a regular newsletter in the mail from the power company, and they attempt to power-shame me by comparing my usage to my neighbors’ best, and average, use.
I can’t figure that out. Isn’t it their business to sell me electricity? This is like getting a letter from Giant or Safeway complaining I buy too many groceries.
Look on it as a challenge to use more electricity than your neighbors with 3 kids 😉
We get that with water bills as well down here in Australia
Anybody know if kerosene heaters are legal in Germany or the UK, the kind that is portable.
What we will see is a lot of carbon monoxide deaths from people forced to do what is necessary to keep warm
I have two CO detectors just to play it safe. I use my cylindrical style kerosene heater all winter and they’ve never gone off but it does need to be maintained and many wouldn’t bother.
This happened to Quebec in 1998 from freezing rain.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRKOpXIO73M19jbsn0bGHRsaLj1OWvL3NcKjg&s
We will have nice days in front of us in Germany
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