GOP challengers see opportunity in California water crisis | Fox News

This. I’ve been saying for years that we don’t have a water shortage problem – we have a water storage problem. So out here on the West Coast, where we have a DRY climate and we occasionally experience DRY winters, we should plan ahead and build some handy water reservoirs!

The drought emergency Brown declared last month has added to the pressure on the Democratic governor to address longstanding problems with the state’s water storage and delivery systems. Brown has proposed a $25 billion plan to build two massive tunnels to ship water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River delta to farms and communities.

The two Republican candidates, Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, R-Twin Peaks, and Neel Kashkari, a former U.S. Treasury official, both say the most pressing need is for more water storage, although it would do little to help ease the current shortfall.

“Let’s get going with the piece of this that everybody agrees on — the storage. I think we can get support for that,” Kashkari said.

Although Democrats and environmentalists have often resisted building reservoirs and expanding the state’s storage capacity, instead favoring water conservation, Kashkari said “the politics have changed,” amid the crisis. He said he believes there is now consensus.

via GOP challengers see opportunity in California water crisis | Fox News.

San Francisco – Just Deal With It!

Barrage of Game-Promotion Ballons and Fliers Pollute San Francisco [UPDATES] – SFist

This is what people in San Francisco get freaked about… balloons in the bay. These are video game promotional balloons that ended up in the bay instead of in the air.

As you can see, the balloons have now settled in the Bay where they run the risk of threatening wildlife.

Seriously – nothing substantial is at risk, except maybe the fragile “house of cards” image that environmentalists have of the environment.

Oscar Night Temperatures

AccuWeather.com – Weather News | Unusual Cold Expected for Oscars Red Carpet

Sorry – I just have to take a shot at Hollywood liberals who drank the global warming kool-aid. Expected high temps will be in the 50s…

Such a high temperature is more than 10 degrees below normal, making this one of the coldest red carpet ceremonies in Oscar history. In fact, the forecast high of 56 is just two degrees above the record for lowest high temperature for the date.

Without sounding too bitter, I hope you freeze your silicon butts off in those designer fashions on the red carpet.

Stimulus Weatherization Buys Shoddy Work

Report: In Obama’s Chicago, stimulus weatherization money buys shoddy work, widespread fraud | Washington Examiner

Every time I heard the president try to sell weatherization I thought of the same ridiculous claim that inflating tires was going to help with gas prices.

Wasn’t this guy supposed to be smart? Hell, Bush could come up with these ideas with one arm tied behind his brain.

Hoarding Lightbulbs

Althouse: “A small, sad exit for a product and company that can trace their roots to Thomas Alva Edisons innovations in the 1870s.”

The word is out… start stockpiling incandescent bulbs.

It is doubly sad. The workers are losing their jobs, and we, who love traditional light bulbs are being deprived of a product we want. And those vile CFL bulbs? They’re made in China.

Thanks a lot, Congress.

And they’re wondering why there’s a Tea Party…

Reason #4879 Why Climate Change is a Hoax

Instapundit » Blog Archive » REMEMBER, THESE ARE THE SAME INTERNATIONAL ELITES WHO LECTURE YOU ABOUT YOUR “CARBON FOOTPRINT.” Pr….

Gulf Oil Spill – Perspective

Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Ixtoc 1

UPDATE: More oil spills here… and it DOESN’T mention the Deepwater rig or Valdez.

This is a very good overview, with BALANCE (in others words NOT bleeding with environmental tears) of the Gulf oil spill. Surprisingly when I checked to see who wrote it I was a little amazed that it’s a guy running for Congress in Massachusetts.

Good quote:

Ixtoc 1 is the second largest oil spill in history, eclipsed only by the intentional oil spill by Saddam Hussein’s army as it retreated from Kuwait in 1991. Estimate of Ixtoc 1 volume is 150M gallons of oil. Iraqi deliberate oil spill: 400M gallons. Current, and obviously rough, estimates of Deepwater Horizon oil spill: 20M gallons of oil. Exxon Valdez: 10M gallons.

It would be very interesting to look into the public perception of how big the Exxon Valdez spill was compared to the Gulf. Environmental issues are SO blown out of proportion by the media that I’m guess more people think the Valdez was the mother of all oil spills.

Florida Tar Balls Not From Gulf – MSM Disappointed

FOXNews.com – Florida Tar Balls Not Linked to Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill

Yes, the Gulf spill is big. Yes, it will cripple tourism and fishing industries along with other coastal interests.

But it is NOT the end of the world and a real question remains unanswered: WHERE’S THE OIL?

Myths About the ‘Smart’ Grid

Pajamas Media » Myths Associated with the ‘Smart’ Electrical Grid

Great article that explains in detail where our nations electricty comes from and who’s responsible for it.

Myths exposed:

• There exists a monolithic “national electric grid.”
• The “national grid” is vulnerable to a system-wide failure.
• The federal government needs to rebuild the grid.
• Hackers in Russia and China can shut your house off by hacking the smart meter.
• The “smart grid” will “vastly improve efficiency.”
• (Partial Myth) The smart grid will allow more demand to be added to the grid without building more power plants.

I particularly like this quote:

In summary, people should avoid the mistake of applying analogies between the internet and the electrical power grid. They’re two very different things, and there’s precious little magic intelligent pixy dust to be sprinkled over the system to make things dramatically better.

Alternative Energy – What’s It Gonna Take?

Roger L. Simon » Has Al Gore given up on global warming? (UPDATED)

This was a good article about one of my favorite hypocrites… but there’s a gem in the comments section that cannot be overlooked:

Here’s a number you need to keep in mind: 3 Terawatts. That’s about how much power we’re using in the country right now. If that were used for 100W incandescent bulbs you’d need 30 billion bulbs. There’s no way renewable energy is going to come close to that. That would require over 2 billion square meters of 100% efficient solar panels, that’s about the same area as all the land in Rhode Island (real solar panels are about 25% efficient so you’d need to pave Delaware’s land as well). And of course solar panels don’t do too well at night, so you’d need to at least double that area, that brings us to the land area of Hawaii, plus you’d need a way to store around 40 TWh’s which simply doesn’t exist. And all that ignores factors such as clouds, dirt, animals, etc.

So what about wind? The most powerful wind turbine today is ~7 MW, so we’d need around 500,000 of them. They have a rotor diameter of 126m, so they’d have to be at least 65m apart. That means they’d take up 6 billion square meters, about the same as all of Delaware. I can’t imagine it would be good for anything flying. Now this is the peak power, so we’d have to factor in all the time that the wind isn’t blowing hard enough, or when it’s blowing too hard. Again we need a storage system for mind-boggling amounts of energy. Also, has anyone looked at the climatological effects of taking 3TW of convective energy out of the atmosphere?

Both solar and wind suffer from a fatal flaw: They can’t be controlled. Grid operators can’t dial supply up (we can somewhat do down) to meet demand, and when you’re talking about the electric grid either you balance it or it balances itself…usually in some exciting manner.

Hydro’s pretty much tapped out in the country, not to mention ecomentalists flip their shit whenever someone mentions building dams. Same thing with geothermal, unless we want to start drilling in Yellowstone.

Nuclear could do it, but whenever you mention it the ecomentalists set a record in going from zero to stupid.

That leaves fossil fuels. There’s nothing else. Especially when it comes to moving stuff. We have nothing that comes close to the power density of hydrocarbons when it comes to mobile applications, and hydrocarbons are the only energy source that’s suitable for mobile applications. Everything else (e.g. hydrogen and ethanol) are just ways to make electricity mobile.

You want an alternative to fossil fuels. I want to motorboat Scarlett Johansson. It’s good to want things, keeps us hungry.

So clearly stated.

Gulf Oil Spill – Answers, Please…

In ironic twist, BP finalist for pollution prevention award – This Just In – CNN.com Blogs

BP, now under federal scrutiny because of its role in the deadly Gulf of Mexico explosion and oil spill, is one of three finalists for a federal award honoring offshore oil companies for “outstanding safety and pollution prevention.”

Seriously… heads need to roll in this disaster. Just when Americans were ready to come off the ledge regarding offshore drilling we have an unmitigated disaster with repercussions that will last for decades.

Questions:

1. What happened to cause an explosion that kills 11 workers and destroys a drilling rig?
2. What safety procedures were in place and which procedures were circumvented?
3. What new regulations are going to arise which hopefully will prevent this from happening again – but will also no doubt add to the cost and complexity of developing off-shore resources?
4. Who’s responsible? The easy target is BP but I’d bet more than a few oil-free shrimp they were also dealing with a mountain of regulatory agencies pushing conflicting demands.

James Lovelock: Humans are too stupid to prevent climate change | Environment | The Guardian

James Lovelock: Humans are too stupid to prevent climate change | Environment | The Guardian.

Yes, I’d have to agree with this:

Humans are too stupid to prevent climate change from radically impacting on our lives over the coming decades. This is the stark conclusion of James Lovelock, the globally respected environmental thinker and independent scientist who developed the Gaia theory.

Not because I’ve such a low opinion of people so much as their inherent foolishness (myself included). Come on – just examine our history of failure after failure and it’s not hard to conclude we’re pretty much at the mercy of Divine assistance.

But this quote really got me:

One of the main obstructions to meaningful action is “modern democracy”, he added. “Even the best democracies agree that when a major war approaches, democracy must be put on hold for the time being. I have a feeling that climate change may be an issue as severe as a war. It may be necessary to put democracy on hold for a while.”

Whoa… “put democracy on hold for a while” throws up a lot of caution flags in my opinion. Democracies are suspended when there’s a state of emergency; unfortunately there are still way too many people of the opinion that global warming is NOT an emergency.

One more issue I’m seeing is the lack of God in our democracy means all solutions must be rendered by the hand of the great unwashed. And if “smart” people like James Lovelock conclude we’re too stupid to solve difficult problems then it naturally follows democracies are obstacles to be removed.

MEGAN MCARDLE: “Green jobs… ginseng of progressive politics”

Instapundit » Blog Archive » MEGAN MCARDLE: “Green jobs have become the ginseng of progressive politics: a sort of broad-spectru

Yeah… this pretty much sums up my views of the whole Green movement. Again so well put by Megan McArdle.

Redemption: Climate Change Was A Lie – haystack’s blog – RedState

Redemption: Climate Change Was A Lie – haystack’s blog – RedState

“What he said.”

Climategate and Hockey Sticks and the Truth

Huge Climate Story…. Honesty. | SONICFROG DOT NET

I like this from the comment section:

You can’t cheat data, it’s not a thinking thing. You CAN cheat the public, which is what Jones and Mann have done.

Global Warming Collapse | The Globe and Mail

The great global warming collapse – The Globe and Mail

It was only a matter time – some things just never passed the smell test…

Ann Althouse

Althouse: “When these capitalist gods of carbon burp and belch…”

“When these capitalist gods of carbon burp and belch their dangerous emissions, it’s we, the lesser mortals of the developing sphere who gasp and sink and eventually die.”

It’s Robert Mugabe, lecturing the leaders at the Copenhagen.

And now President Barack Obama is there. He’s saying, “The time for talk is over.” Ironically, he’s talking.

Too funny…

My Global Warming Rant

I’m not a scientist nor have I even read any of the material leaked from the CRU. And I’ll even agree that there is much at stake here; either environmental damage if AGW is true or trillions of dollars wasted if it is false.

But what I do know is that many “experts” have been hiding climate data for years… the CRU and NASA have both been the recipient of FOIA requests and both refused.

What a load of crap.

If the data is so unquestionable why does it remain unexamined? Wouldn’t an innocent man want the court to see evidence that proves beyond a doubt his innocence? Wouldn’t the subject of criticism rejoice at proving his accusers not just false, but UNQUESTIONABLY false?

Instead we are asked to trust those who have a vested interest in propping up AGW theories. Careers, funding, and egos are at stake – these are not the sources any rational person would turn to for an objective analysis.

Show the data.

Just show the data and if it stands up to critical scrutiny I will be quiet.

Energy-efficient traffic lights can’t melt snow – Yahoo! News

Energy-efficient traffic lights can’t melt snow – Yahoo! News

Oh the irony of it all…

Cities around the country that have installed energy-efficient traffic lights are discovering a hazardous downside: The bulbs don’t burn hot enough to melt snow and can become crusted over in a storm — a problem blamed for dozens of accidents and at least one death.

“I’ve never had to put up with this in the past,” said Duane Kassens, a driver from West Bend who got into a fender-bender recently because he couldn’t see the lights. “The police officer told me the new lights weren’t melting the snow. How is that safe?”

And in case there was any question, yes I do think energy efficiency is good. But there comes a point where you wonder why government policy sacrificed finding MORE energy (drilling or nuclear) at the expense of restricting usage (can only buy crappy energy saving lightbulbs).

Plastic Breaks Down in Ocean | Nat’l Geographic

Plastic Breaks Down in Ocean, After All — And Fast

Though ocean-borne plastic trash has a reputation as an indestructible, immortal environmental villain, scientists announced yesterday that some plastics actually decompose rapidly in the ocean.

I always thought that that if man-made materials were so destructive to the environment because they didn’t rapidly decompose, then why not put that lasting property to good use making things you DIDN’T want to breakdown.

In other words, if our landfills are clogging up due to materials that don’t breakdown easily, wouldn’t it make sense to use those materials to develop containers to hold things that were not supposed to leach into the environment? Like, say nuclear waste?

I know this is much more complex than appears on the surface, but part of my argument is to expose the weak logic of people who think the environment is a fragile house of cards waiting for the next man-made item to cause it’s collapse. Either the environment is much more durable than we’ve been lead to presume, or our ability to create long lasting disasters is pretty much overrated.