Life is back to normal in New England after last weekend’s snowstorm dumped about 24 inches or more on parts of the region. Ted and Rob are getting ready to go to Washington for this weekend’s Keystone XL protest, but there is other news, so settle in and let’s talk about what’s happening in Massachusetts and beyond relative to climate change this week.
As always, click on the “MCAN Climate Minute” picture to the right to start the recording in a new window.
Here are some links to go along with our talk this morning.
The President laid down the law at the State of the Union this week; if congress doesn’t act to pass a market-based carbon reduction program, he will use the power of his administration to act.
Derrick Jackson of the Boston Globe opines that the President’s threat of increased regulation will drive legislators to embrace cap-and-trade programs, like the successful RGGI program. You can read his editorial here, grab it before it goes behind the paywall.
The President’s speech ignited another round of supposition about a possible Carbon Tax-for-Keystone trade, in US as well as in Canada. Would the President try and appease both the fossil fuel lobby and the environmental lobby by offering a deal on both issues? Or would that just create two unhappy camps?
In the midst of this discussion, Senators Barbara Boxer and Bernard Sanders have filed a “cap and dividend” bill to impose a carbon tax, and disperse (much) of the proceeds to taxpayers.
The coming abdication of Pope Benedict presents a possibility for a new vigor about climate change from the Catholic Church. A non-European pope, particularly a southern-hemisphere pope, may redirect Rome’s attention on the planetary suffering that will ensue from Climate Change. While the primary experience of climate conscious Catholics has been one of deafening silence, there are groups within the church paying attention to Climate Change.
In other meteorlogical news (har har, couldn’t resist) later today asteroid 2012DA14 will come as close to Earth as we’re likely comfortable with. 2012DA14 will actually pass closer to the planet than the orbit of several satellites, and yesterday a meteor streaked across the sky in Russia, causing injuries to hundreds and causing quite a commotion.
We mention this, not because unlike certain newsreaders on CNN we’re trying to tie these events to climate change, but to point out that this is the “bright shiny object” syndrome that drives news coverage and media attention, while the inexorable march of climate change caused by human emissions of greenhouse gasses, goes if not mocked than underreported — and has consequences orders of magnitude larger than 2012DA14 or that meteor over Russia!
Fortunately there are some weather people paying attention. Kudos to Boston’s own Channel 5 meteorologist Harvey Leonard who explained very clearly and calmly that while you can’t go and pin the development of a winter storm on climate change, the trend toward larger and larger storms is very clearly due to climate change and associated warming. Good on ‘ya Harvey — we loved you when you were announcing school was out when we were kids, and we love you now.
Thanks for listening, and here’s a little gift. Here’s NPR’s Bands that Should Be Bigger podcast with some links to great artists you should be listening to, particulary Adam Arcugai and Seryn.
Remember – our annual conference is coming up March 10th at Northeastern University. Register today to get the early bird rate!
Well we’ll see you in Washington, and as always — remember, for these reasons we have discussed, the United States must place a price on carbon.
Wind is not just a wholly useless idea, it is a dysfunctional one. Yes, the plain states offer the best wind conditions. And yes, if taxpayers foot the cost of billions of dollars of transmission lines to bring their volatile energy to market (as is the case in Texas), the wind machines will produce more of it than is the case generally in the eastern US. But more wind output places even greater inefficiencies on any grid, in the process largely subverting any “benefit” that accrues from this ancient technology. Overwhelmingly, more wind means more problems–and more use of fossil fuels.
Indeed, with now over 6GW of installed wind in the US, produced by nearly 45,000 wind turbines, there is not a shred of evidence that any of it has caused reductions in the output of fossil fired machines. Or any conventional generator.
What all should understand, better than they do, is that wind is the dumbest idea for modern power imaginable, not least because it can’t produce modern power. Think about the reciprocal relationship among energy, power, and productivity , where energy is the ability to do work, power is the rate work gets done, and productivity, at least modern ideas about it, is a function of being able to do work in less time, leaving more time to do something else.
Yes, huge swaths of land would have to be employed to harness the diffuse energy of wind. But this isn’t really the point. Even if the Great Plains was swallowed up with wind machines, you still wouldn’t get modern power. Perhaps you should consider your household appliances. How many wind “powered” vacuum cleaners would be required to “equal” one gas powered vacuum cleaner, which would do work when you wished it to on your schedule. You could project an easy mathematical equivalency–and say, five. But this wouldn’t be a functional equivalent. Since you can never know what wind will do one second to the next but know that it works best at 3 in the morning, the real answer is that an infinity of wind powered vacuums could never functionally replace your coal powered one. Now think about your refrigerator, iron, stove, toaster, mixer, chain saw, automobile, etc. What would your schedule be like if they were all wind powered?