Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[THE_WIZARD_]

...and hack is still looking for Mr. Right...

[hack]

Well I've ruled out you, so that's progress.

[Wild Hoss]

hack listens to Cher.

[froot loops]

All music is guilty pleasure, find the hook get to the chorus.

[hack]

YOU like Bono. Automatic disqualification.

[hack]

hack listens to Cher.

I have in the past posted her cover of Groupie (Superstar), which is shockingly good. She's an idiot, and far better vocalists have done a beautiful job with that song, but holy fuck she nails it. That's her one.

[iam416]

I found it very instructive and interesting that wood is considered a renewable. I found it very interesting that wood is, by far and away, the most used renewable in Europe. When I hear about Europe's renewable revolution, I think wind and solar. I found it very interesting that a country at the forefront of "renewable" energy will wildly miss its goals even after clipping the tremendously easy low-hanging fruit. And I found it very interesting that the country at the forefront of the "renewable" energy charge pays 3x what the US does for electricity.

I'm all for VC. Really in anything. They are drivers. And the US gets more of it than the rest of the world combined. The US will continue to crank out improved real renewable solutions as there are plenty of markets where government policy has made them profitable. Good of for us.

However, if you believe some prominent environmentalists, we're well past the "tipping point" -- so it's all too late. In fact, I believe the "100 Months" Hilarity expired at the end of 2016, so it's all over.

[froot loops]

YOU like Bono. Automatic disqualification.

My point still stands.

[iam416]

A fascinating 2013 article on the "Wood Boom" in Europe from The Economist: https://www.economist.com/news/busin...pe-fuel-future

The EU wants to get 20% of its energy from renewable sources by 2020; it would miss this target by a country mile if it relied on solar and wind alone.

They still may miss that target.

With incentives like these, European firms are scouring the Earth for wood. Europe consumed 13m tonnes of wood pellets in 2012, according to International Wood Markets Group, a Canadian company. On current trends, European demand will rise to 25m-30m a year by 2020.

Europe does not produce enough timber to meet that extra demand. So a hefty chunk of it will come from imports. Imports of wood pellets into the EU rose by 50% in 2010 alone and global trade in them (influenced by Chinese as well as EU demand) could rise five- or sixfold from 10m-12m tonnes a year to 60m tonnes by 2020, reckons the European Pellet Council. Much of that will come from a new wood-exporting business that is booming in western Canada and the American south. Gordon Murray, executive director of the Wood Pellet Association of Canada, calls it “an industry invented from nothing”.

Indeed -- an industry and market demanded created from nothing except an massive policy directive. As if the actual marketplace would ever go this cuckoo!

But if subsidising biomass energy were an efficient way to cut carbon emissions, perhaps this collateral damage might be written off as an unfortunate consequence of a policy that was beneficial overall. So is it efficient? No.

Wood produces carbon twice over: once in the power station, once in the supply chain. The process of making pellets out of wood involves grinding it up, turning it into a dough and putting it under pressure. That, plus the shipping, requires energy and produces carbon: 200kg of CO2 for the amount of wood needed to provide 1MWh of electricity.

This decreases the amount of carbon saved by switching to wood, thus increasing the price of the savings. Given the subsidy of ?45 per MWh, says Mr Vetter, it costs ?225 to save one tonne of CO2 by switching from gas to wood. And that assumes the rest of the process (in the power station) is carbon neutral. It probably isn’t.

No way.

A fuel and your money
Over the past few years, scientists have concluded that the original idea—carbon in managed forests offsets carbon in power stations—was an oversimplification. In reality, carbon neutrality depends on the type of forest used, how fast the trees grow, whether you use woodchips or whole trees and so on. As another bit of the EU, the European Environment Agency, said in 2011, the assumption “that biomass combustion would be inherently carbon neutral…is not correct…as it ignores the fact that using land to produce plants for energy typically means that this land is not producing plants for other purposes, including carbon otherwise sequestered.”

Tim Searchinger of Princeton University calculates that if whole trees are used to produce energy, as they sometimes are, they increase carbon emissions compared with coal (the dirtiest fuel) by 79% over 20 years and 49% over 40 years; there is no carbon reduction until 100 years have passed, when the replacement trees have grown up. But as Tom Brookes of the European Climate Foundation points out, “we’re trying to cut carbon now; not in 100 years’ time.”

In short, the EU has created a subsidy which costs a packet, probably does not reduce carbon emissions, does not encourage new energy technologies—and is set to grow like a leylandii hedge.

Heh. Just heh.

[iam416]

More recently, Wood is not Carbon neutral: https://www.forbes.com/sites/bjornlo.../#50fe62ca3a81

That article is from Forbes -- perhaps a dubious source -- I dunno. However, the basis of the article is a Chatham House report (https://www.chathamhouse.org/publica...global-climate)

The Forbes article concludes with this:

The problem comes from a governmental desire to transition to renewables before they are ready. We use biomass to cover for inefficient solar and wind, which need backup power when it isn’t windy or sunny. We will only solve global warming when solar and wind can compete with fossil fuels on their own merits. To achieve that, huge investment in green energy R&D, including batteries, is needed.

But in the meantime, biomass is a terrible short-term answer to global warming. In incentivising its use, policy-makers are having a dubious effect on climate change, likely destroying biodiversity, and killing tens of thousands from air pollution.

Forbes, Chatham House and The Economist certainly seem to say that the EU is "juking the stats" with a shitass policy to include wood-burning as a "renewable" so that they can meet some crazy goal they have no fucking chance of meeting with wind and solar.

[hack]

Renewables people categorize wood as ``traditional'' or ''modern'' use. Traditional is an open fire, and this is not considered sustainable or renewable. Modern use means a more expensive way to produce heat for power or industry. I don't know what Europe's thinking there, or whether those figures are true given how much of that piece is bad spin, but when the people with the best sense of the problem don't have much resource, given how Northern Europe doesn't have a sun belt to crank out cheap on-the-grid solar, you're going to get some goofy policy ideas. As goofy as anything Washington can do to get new coal investment? Good question.

China leads the IP race in renewables, but there's no question that the US is a leader too. In part there's no country more entrepreneurial, absolutely. This is one of several reasons why the US leads the world in carbon-emissions reductions in the past decade, which is another thing the author of that NRO piece probably knows but does not mention. It's hard to make an argument about Trump's "energy-policy realism" when the market is ignoring that policy and in fact moving in a different direction.

[Da Geezer]

Anyhow, that article does not mention that saplings absorb more carbon than matured trees, so if there's a cycle in which every felled tree is replaced, or in which carbon is captured as trees are burned, that would be relevant in an unspun analysis. I don't know how Europe does power. I do developing countries.

I've never heard that before, that saplings absorb more carbon than matured trees. I'd appreciate a link to that information because I doubt it very much. And even if it were true, your next statement that "if" the cut trees were replaced speaks for itself. "If" a frog had wings, he wouldn't have a flat ass. So what. It makes me wonder why we don't just cut down the rainforests and replace it with saplings of a like variety. Then we could REALLY cut down on CO2. IMO, what you are saying is BS of the highest order.

You said, " reduced reliance on hydro is a priority there and elsewhere in Africa because rainfall is no longer reliable." Why is doing away with hydro beneficial? It seems to me that dams are used to control water precisely because rainfall is unreliable. Do you mean hydro from waterfalls? Why is unreliable green energy from falling water something to be removed and replaced with unreliable green energy from windmills or solar panels?

I'm with Talent. It is news to me that Europe uses wood as their major renewable. I also find it interesting that they had a plan for when Hillary was elected.

[AlabamAlum]

Music is one of "The Six Essentials" that makes life worth living. The others, of course, are good food, art, literature, sport, and companionship.

Someone of low consequence mentioned Night Ranger earlier (I forget who - Wiz or one of his multis, probably). They were a poor man's Journey. For those of you who read music, note the chord progressions of Night Ranger vs Journey. Very similar. I am not a huge fan, though - of either group. But to each their own.

With music, I try not to disparage anyone's choices (unless it's Rush or Zepp), because all music touches people and evokes memories in different ways. For example, I will never forget driving across Iowa on a clear July night. I was about 30 miles outside of Sioux City. Nothing on the road except the faded white center stripe and the cracks in the road caused by the harsh winters. Off in the distance, I could see fireworks while I blared Maria Callas' "Casta Diva". The fireworks and music's tempo started slowly and increased. As Ms Callas reached the crescendo of the piece, the fireworks followed suit. It was perfect. I shall never forget it. Now that piece by Callas is tied in my mind to the 4th of July, and - unfortunately - Iowa (not everything is a positive).

[iam416]

I'm with Talent. It is news to me that Europe uses wood as their major renewable.

The non-NRO articles/reports I posted from The Economist, Forbes and Chatham House seem to make it fairly clear that wood as a renewable is a hot garbage answer. But, because wind and solar are so far behind they need something to juke the stats, so they go with wood -- and it turns out wood may be even less eco-friendly (in the near term) than coal!

[hack]

Do you mistake me for supporting the policy? Just in case, again, I don't. My point is that the market is telling us what's going to happen, and that won't stop governments from coming up with stupid policies anyways. They'll continue to do that. You can start with reality and come up with a stupid policy, as Europe does in plenty of areas, and this wood thing may count. Or you can start with a desire to line the pockets of yourself and your donors, which how current US policy was formulated, and still come up with plenty of stupid ideas the market will ignore. IMO best to just acknowledge that making the diagnosis is easier than finding the cure, and aim for policy that aims for a level playing field rather than picking winners, and takes cues from clear and consistent market signals.

For the record, I like Forbes especially on anti-competitive behavior, but publishing Bjorn Lomborg on climate change? The loudest skeptic now admits climate change is real and argues it's not a top priority. Beyond me why he still has a voice, but that knocks Forbes down a peg in my book. Beyond me why you would continue to heed spun/discredited sources, but that's our world.