@BrianK

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In your view the only 'useful' person is someone that touches you directly.

You were speaking of 'value' one could attribute to people, not of people's 'usefulness'. Two different words, two different meanings.

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I hope you don't mind I've conveyed you as a Ayn Rand Libertarian type. I think here this overt selfishism displayed yet again confirms my understanding.

I think you gravely and wrongly mix selfishness with individual achievement through rational thinking and self-interest. And doing that, completely misrepresents Ayn Rand basic ideas:
Quote:

Above all, do not join the wrong ideological groups or movements, in order to “do something.” By “ideological” (in this context), I mean groups or movements proclaiming some vaguely generalized, undefined (and, usually, contradictory) political goals. (E.g., the Conservative Party, which subordinates reason to faith, and substitutes theocracy for capitalism; or the “libertarian” hippies, who subordinate reason to whims, and substitute anarchism for capitalism.) To join such groups means to reverse the philosophical hierarchy and to sell out fundamental principles for the sake of some superficial political action which is bound to fail. It means that you help the defeat of your ideas and the victory of your enemies.

From the book Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal
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For the record, I shall repeat what I have said many times before: I do not join or endorse any political group or movement. More specifically, I disapprove of, disagree with, and have no connection with, the latest aberration of some conservatives, the so-called “hippies of the right [ie libertarians],” who attempt to snare the younger or more careless ones of my readers by claiming simultaneously to be followers of my philosophy and advocates of anarchism. Anyone offering such a combination confesses his inability to understand either. Anarchism is the most irrational, anti-intellectual notion ever spun by the concrete-bound, context-dropping, whim-worshipping fringe of the collectivist movement, where it properly belongs.

From the book The Objectivist

So your characterization of Ayn Rand appears to be at odd (at best) to her very own ideas (objectivism).

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I do this all the time. I trade labor for labor. I also set it's worth for some people I do 3 hours of work while they do 2 and for some people I do 2 hours of work and they have to do 3. I've even paid for things with other things. All are types of currency.

Again a definition problem. What you describe are not currencies, it is called barter, exchange or trade: the creation of a service/product/idea/whatever that can or cannot involve a currency as a mean of compensation for your labour doing it. Of course while you have almost total freedom to create such service/product/idea/whatever, you (and I) have no freedom to create currency (which is why it is usually called fiat money = only created by state or government).

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What you did is reject the organization as too political and instead of finding a more accurate count you counted them as 0, which itself is untrue too.

I think I gave you my view on this, which still stands. Data is the only rational evidence worth discussing.

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I'd argue the misunderstanding comes from the representation of your ideas.Quote: Always possible though it is not forbidden to ask for precision or enlightenment. You reject the bulk mainstream science (when it comes to Global Warming) and only promote those with the least amount of evidence validating their assertions.

I reject the knee-jerk reaction induced by the dead-ended positioning of consensus (the form) and rather discuss the underlying Science (or lack thereof) (the substance).

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You accept this all the time, you simply fail to acknowledge it.

It seems we reach a cultural barrier of some sort here as you state the very opposite of my view. Let me put it that way: I question it all the time because asking question and weighing potential responses against reality is the only way to advance Science (the understanding of the natural world). So no consensus for me, neither explicit nor implicit.

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At the end of the day certain theories will have more evidences and some less... Afterall we have to live while science continues it's never ending journey of skepticism.

These two sentences of you correctly defeat the purpose and annihilate the interest of consensus in Science.

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Tectonic plates make discovery easy and less expensive.

It is one of the prediction of the abiogenic theory.

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And AFAIK no oil has been identified without biological material.

As said, biological markers are no proof of biological origin. For example there are many usually simple molecules both found in oil and in living organisms that are as well found in numerous meteorites.

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Perhaps the combination is 'both' are true. But, again as I indicated this might be but at this point we don't understand this near enough to make any sort of useful predictions (aka we can't find oil in this method in a consistent basis.)

I can agree with that, though the only method to find oil is to search for it. Both theories fail on this point.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@TMTisFree

Quote:

So your characterization of Ayn Rand appears to be at odd (at best) to her very own ideas (objectivism).

From your page Quote:

He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. The pursuit of his own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life.

Overt Selfishism as defined by Ayn Rand. Thank you

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Again a definition problem. What you describe are not currencies

Currency has several definitions. The one I used was a method of payment.

Quote:

you (and I) have no freedom to create currency (which is why it is usually called fiat money = only created by state or government).

If you're looking for coinage or billage we can create whatever we want. Though yes at the taxes must always be paid in the way specified by the government collecting taxes.

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I reject the knee-jerk reaction induced by the dead-ended positioning of consensus (the form) and rather discuss the underlying Science (or lack thereof) (the substance).

I don't think you'll be too surpised to find that in science it is this substance which makes up the consensus... They are one in the same.

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So no consensus for me, neither explicit nor implicit.

And therein lies your problem as you've now discarded the substance.

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These two sentences of you correctly defeat the purpose and annihilate the interest of consensus in Science.

The interest of consensus in science is simply to convey our current understanding at this point in time. Take all that substance ball it up into the best working definition based on our current state of knowledge and you get the consensus view of science.

Last edited by BrianK on 02-Apr-2011 at 09:19 PM.
Last edited by BrianK on 02-Apr-2011 at 09:18 PM.
Last edited by BrianK on 02-Apr-2011 at 09:17 PM.

@BrianK

Quote:

He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. The pursuit of his own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life.

I don't see anything remotely related to selfishness. Instead I see a way (an individual moral) to pursuit one's own life which does not not preclude having interest in others (a collective moral). Perhaps one could define a selfish behaviour as an 'irrational self-interest' or 'sacrificing others to himself', the very opposite of what is stated. If you do not agree with having your own moral or philosophy of life, fine. But do not mischaracterize the one of other people. Note that it is not a statement about my own moral.

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I don't think you'll be too surpised [sic] to find that in science it is this substance which makes up the consensus... They are one in the same.

"Make up", "same". These words should now indicate you what is your error, namely confounding form with substance by using an unfortunate slip in semantics as a disguise, a trick to conflate the meaning. It is a travesty you let group's judgement/opinion takes over your own.

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And therein lies your problem as you've now discarded the substance.

And therein lies your problem as you've now dissembled the substance with form: map is no territory. Quote:

"You don't need to take drugs to hallucinate; improper language can fill your world with phantoms and spooks of many kinds."

- Robert A. Wilson

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The interest of consensus in science is simply to convey our current understanding at this point in time. Take all that substance ball it up into the best working definition based on our current state of knowledge and you get the consensus view of science.

...which is the precise reason one should not be interested by consensus: one should build his own judgement, interpretation, understanding and knowledge framework and don't let other dictates what, why and how to think. What you proselytize is the abandon of individual reason under the guise of communion of beliefs, a cultural equivalent of bandwagon fallacy (or argumentum by authority, you choose).

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@MikeB

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Well as I explained I am not against limiting the effects of modern human society on the planet.

You mean negative effects like pollution I think.

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According to scientists the world on average is now less than 1 degree Celsius warmer than it was 100 years ago.

Global average temperature is a rather meaningless metric (a poor proxy for heat content) and essentially irrelevant for weather/climate problems related to the policy field that concerns society (the regional/local scales not assessed by IPCC), as discussed here [PDF] or here [PDF].

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As we don't have sufficient data from before this we can't compare this with natural fluctuations of the distant past.

A sensible position.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@TMTisFree

Quote:

Quote: @BrianK The interest of consensus in science is simply to convey our current understanding at this point in time. Take all that substance ball it up into the best working definition based on our current state of knowledge and you get the consensus view of science. ...which is the precise reason one should not be interested by consensus: one should build his own judgement, interpretation, understanding and knowledge framework and don't let other dictates what, why and how to think. What you proselytize is the abandon of individual reason under the guise of communion of beliefs, a cultural equivalent of bandwagon fallacy (or argumentum by authority, you choose).

The substance of science is available for people to dwelve into as much or as little as they want. You seem to think if someone wants to know the current state of our understanding (consensus) it somehow stops science at that time. That doesn't happen. Science is a continual self skeptical system of rationality.

And certainly balling up the substance into a unified understanding is important. For example, had that not occurred we wouldn't have made it to the moon nor would you typing this on the internet. Was the understanding of engineering which got us to the moon an abandon of individual reason. Not in any manner.

And your concept that science is somehow an argument by authority is completely incorrect. Science is a methodology of constant skepticism. There is no authority. We see this throughout science. Why did Einstein overturn Newton 300 years later? Why do we have 'paradigm shifts'. Because there is no authority everything is under constant review. And certainly saying X is our current understanding based on the available substance at this time neither promotes authority nor stops sciences constant critque.

Last edited by BrianK on 03-Apr-2011 at 02:36 PM.

@BrianK

Quote:

BrianK wrote: @TMTisFree [quote]People creating their own currency are rarity.

I do this all the time. I trade labor for labor. I also set it's worth for some people I do 3 hours of work while they do 2 and for some people I do 2 hours of work and they have to do 3. I've even paid for things with other things. All are types of currency.



Yep, I swap services for services...and I believe one of the original investors into the bank of england bought into it with a stick of wood from my memory banks...

_________________
In a world of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.

http://ozconspiracyhouse.myfastforum.org

@BrianK

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Science is a continual self skeptical system of rationality.

The very best explanation (more concise than mine, it's telling) of why Science is not a consensus. Thanks you.

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And your concept that science is somehow an argument by authority is completely incorrect.

Of course this is incorrect, because I was referring to your concept of consensus.

Quote:

Why did Einstein overturn Newton 300 years later?

Because there was no consensus.

The fate of your concept of consensus is to be defeated, both by your very own explanation and examples.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@TMTisFree

Continuing with irrational radiation fears:

Quote:

[T]hings as radiation dose limits or permissible levels of iodine-131 are not set rationally, they are set to be as low as they can possibly be. For instance, absolutely no measurable health consequences at all result from radiation doses of 100 millisievert a year: if everyone in the UK were subjected to such doses for ever, nothing – no extra cases of cancer, nothing – would happen. And yet even nuclear workers in small numbers are only permitted to sustain doses of 20 millisievert annually – they can only go to 100 or 250 in emergency situations. Large populations are only allowed to sustain 1 millisievert/yr above normal background (itself already 2 or 3). These mad, fear-driven, irrationally-low safety levels - multiplied in the case of food or water limits by regulations framed in terms of a year's consumption by high-risk individuals etc etc - mean that even quite minor situations like Fukushima produce "radiation levels x thousands of times the maximum permitted". Even the unfeasibly low amounts of plutonium now found at Fukushima – remember that this plutonium is causing the soil there to be about 2 per cent as radioactive as human bodies are – gets reported under headlines beginning with "URGENT". Even the insignificant levels of caesium so far found are such that many nuclear regulators would advise people to abandon their property because of them: the IAEA has said that Japan should extend the Fukushima evacuation zone, in fact, though sanity appears to be prevailing in Japanese government circles for now. These crazy "safety" limits are the reason why nuclear electricity never became too cheap to meter; why we don't heat our homes and industry electrically and perhaps drive electric cars too, emitting no carbon at all (and funnelling no huge fossil-fuel payments to unsavoury tyrannies); why we don't today have nuclear-powered rocket ships able to fly to orbit cheaply without throwing most of themselves away, and nuclear plasma-drive cruisers capable of reaching Mars in weeks. In short, irrational fear of nuclear technology is what has stolen away the brilliant Jetsons-style future that was envisioned for us 50 years ago – and may yet steal it from our children. If humanity can't rid itself of its primitive, hysterical fears – if people can't learn to cope mentally with actual powerful modern technologies more capable than fire and windmills and social networking – then we face a bleak, troublesome, mundane future indeed, one which will probably mean an end to human civilisation down the road rather than its long-term survival.

From The Register author Lewis Page: Fukushima fearmongers are stealing our Jetsons future

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@TMTisFree

Continuing with nuclear safety:

Quote:

To risk assessors, nuclear power fits into the low probability-high consequence category of events that seem especially risky to the public because their negative effects occur only rarely but with devastating results. People are more likely to accept the negative effects of events that occur regularly and build up their impact cumulatively over time. Thus, the public rates air travel as more dangerous than travel by automobile, despite that fact that fatalities are far more likely to occur from car accidents than from airplane accidents.

From reason.com by S. Robert Lichter (professor of communications at George Mason University): Nuclear News Meltdown

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@TMTisFree

Quote:

The very best explanation (more concise than mine, it's telling) of why Science is not a consensus. Thanks you.

Somehow you believe someone told you that consensus is science. It certainly was never in either my definitions of science nor of consensus.

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Of course this is incorrect, because I was referring to your concept of consensus.

I think it's clear I cleaned up any misunderstanding. Thanks for the confirmation.

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Because there was no consensus.

Do you agree that consensus is best defined as the explaination we have for all the current substance of a question balled up together? You earlier answers seemed that you indicated that'd be agreeable. If not then how do you define it?

Last edited by BrianK on 04-Apr-2011 at 02:24 AM.
Last edited by BrianK on 04-Apr-2011 at 01:52 AM.

@TMTisFree

Quote:

Continuing with nuclear safety: Quote: To risk assessors, nuclear power fits into the low probability-high consequence category of events that seem especially risky to the public because their negative effects occur only rarely but with devastating results. People are more likely to accept the negative effects of events that occur regularly and build up their impact cumulatively over time. Thus, the public rates air travel as more dangerous than travel by automobile, despite that fact that fatalities are far more likely to occur from car accidents than from airplane accidents. From reason.com by S. Robert Lichter (professor of communications at George Mason University): Nuclear News Meltdown

Another point of confirmation on this impact is 9/11. The US has spent Billions of dollars to weed out terrorists getting on a plane. And the result? 0 Terrorists have been convicted for attacks within the US.

Clearly nuclear is a high consequence category. The nearly 600K people directly impacted for Chernobyl was and is a high consequence. And likely hundreds of thousands of more indirectly impacted as they absorbed the migration out of the area. I'd be great if we could somehow figure out how to assign the costs of all risks into systems. Seemingly energy prices would increase. Today governments typically bear the cost. (You seem to be against government subsidies.) The governments would stop paying and we could stop the government borrowing money and taking money for these sorts of events. Effectively removing a type of subsidy. And of course the user would see a tax reduction while seeing the energy increase as we move the costs out of one area and into another. This however seems to be problematic. I don't think we know how to fairly account for these sort of events.

@BrianK

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Myself I have lots of land. I'm remote and have to use propane, which is expensive compared to natural gas. If I stay in my home for 7 years it's cost effective to use geothermal. (Assuming Propane won't go up in cost, which it will.) Year 8 I'm saving a boatload. The problem in here is the one must pay for geothermal upfront (mostly) and propane is more of an over time expense. Thus, we're trying our best to save up for geothermal. Had home prices not dropped we likely could have rolled the investment into a home loan and been ahead. But, now we have to do it another way.

Lots of land where?

Could you explain what you mean by geothermal here? The word seems to have
two meanings in the heating context:

1. Hot water or steam from a geothermal field - in NZ widely used in the Rotorua area and anywhere there are hot springs.

2. Insertion of hot water from solar heating into underground storage to be recovered via a heat pump when needed. This seems popular in places that in winter are cold or freeze over. I recall a story of a US farmer who combined this with a greenhouse and underfloor water heating, boasting that he had never had to pay a heating bill in the years since he installed it.

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And this is part of the problem with renewables. Your investment is up front and not over time. Many people don't have tens of thousands saved to make the investment even if net over time it's more cost effective. Even with government programs they might give me some of the money back but I still have to have the money to spend waiting the next year for a return.

This is generally recognized. I have read of a number of programs to provide the necessary finance up front, even in USA. Bringing power to remote places in "undeveloped" countries can make spectacular progress with upfront finance. But the issue is universal. Another angle concerns full accounting of costs - environmental accounting ,which the blinkered corporations and their advocates fight to prevent. Recently I was interested to see an examination of how Australia could generate all its power requirements from renewable resources within 10 years. If anyone is as bad as US citizens or worse in generating greenhouse gasses per capita it is Australians, and I regret to say my own country is not far behind. This study showed the costs of "business as usual" soaring way greater than the costs of change over the ten years. The study focussed on photo voltaics because of the huge potential and ignored wind although aussie is not short of that either.

For my own part I find that current government incentives in NZ do nothing for me. They are supposed to reimburse a part of the costs of installing insulation in residential buildings put up before this became mandatory in new buildings. The incentives are only available if one employs approved businesses. I put in the insulation myself, top, bottom and pipes, to the gov't standards for about a third of the costs of employing approved firms even with government incentives. I thought that at least I would get some help with the heat pump but the gov't scheme had evaporated. Still I have been very pleased with the results. Solar water heating is still to be implemented. The other day I noticed that photovoltaics had just dropped so far in price as to be affordable even to an old age pensioner with almost no life expectancy. I should seriously think about it. Oh! Oh! I see an electric car with a useful range is about to be launched on the local market. If I were still a daily commuter I would, and could, go for it.

When I put a 2 hp outboard on my kayak I really considered electric outboards but price and range were serious limitations. I more than compensated for fuel by replacing the petrol lawn mower with electric and really enjoyed, except for the noise, cruising 80km on the Waikato river and 50 km on the Manukau harbour recently at speeds between 16 and 17 km/hr, working the tides over two days with about 8 hrs on the water using 5.5 litres of petrol.

What gave me great satisfaction, however, was simply repainting our copper coloured roof white, not because it reduced costs, but because between a third and a half of all energy falling on our roof, depending on time of day, is returned to space without being re-radiated as heat or trapped as heat. I made a few measurements. Because of the presence of roof insulation, heat gain and loss improvements within the house, due to the white paint, only amounted to about 0.5 to 1°C on the hottest days but I can go into the roof space during the day without being cooked now. Over the ridge there are a lot of vast factory and warehouse roofs which are more often white where the advantage is far larger because they are mostly not insulated. They would not do it just to increase planetary albedo, not corporations!

Noel

Last edited by NoelFuller on 04-Apr-2011 at 11:44 AM.

@NoelFuller

Quote:

Lots of land where?

USA of course... 19 acres

Quote:

Could you explain what you mean by geothermal here? The word seems to have two meanings in the heating context:

There's a third meaning. Kind of like your (2) but one doesn't heat anything with solar. The earth is fairly constant about 3 meters down. Lay a field of tubes and use the planet as a radiator to heat and cool your home. One can do this without much land. Though it's much more expensive to install. They bore a hole that's about 32 stories straight down. Digging in that sort of way gets very spendy. Sounds like you have an air heat pump, this version of geothermal is a ground heat pump.

As for your long description thanks. Lots of variables exist in making alternative energy more or less acceptable. TMTisFree touted the liberty that a micronuke would give him. Of course renewables today could give him the same liberty but he complained about having to put a hole for piping through is wall. Liberty or a couple of holes that are foamed with insulation?

@BrianK

Quote:

USA of course... 19 acres

OK I suppose I should look to see where Mineapolis is but you did say "remote".
So it's a cold place in winter that freezes over every year despite an oversize lake nearby.
To me Chicago does not seem far away (on the map) where real Climate scientist David Archer hangs out, among others. I have a course of videoed lectures by him in which he comments on the variations in warming from place to place. Chicago he reckons has barely changed if at all.

Noel

@BrianK

Quote:

Somehow you believe someone told you that consensus is science.

A someone here insists that consensus has somehow something to do with Science.

Quote:

I think it's clear I cleaned up any misunderstanding.

I think it's clear I cleaned up your misunderstanding.

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Do you agree that consensus is best defined as the explaination we have for all the current substance of a question balled up together?

Consensus is a socio-political artifice. It has nothing to do with Science.

Quote:

You earlier answers seemed that you indicated that'd be agreeable.

Not even in your dream, please reread.

Quote:

If not then how do you define it?

I can't. See responses above.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@NoelFuller

Quote:

OK I suppose I should look to see where Mineapolis is but you did say "remote".

I hadn't updated my location in my profile. I have moved out of the city of Minneapolis. I'm about a 40 minute drive north of Minneapolis.

Quote:

So it's a cold place in winter that freezes over every year despite an oversize lake nearby...Chicago he reckons has barely changed if at all.

Minneapolis (45.07 N) is north of Chicago (41.90 N ). And actually it's north of a few places in Canada (Niagara Falls, Canada is 43.06N). So yes it freezes over every year. Lakes don't freeze solid but do freeze over. Lake Superior is so huge it rarely freezes over, though the coastline and ports freeze which make it unusable from Dec-March.

There have been many changes in Minnesota. Our average temps have increased by about 1 degree. Rainfall, mostly in the south, has increased by 20%. If this trend continues the current climate in Missouri should be in in about 70 years.

@TMTisFree

Quote:

A someone here insists that consensus has somehow something to do with Science.

My version is it's a reflection of our current understanding of science when we ball up all the substance.

Quote:

I think it's clear I cleaned up your misunderstanding.

Blame whomever you want. In reality, my version hasn't changed so...

Quote:

Quote: If not then how do you define it? I can't.

If you can't define terms it's fairly pointless to discuss them. What will occur is you'll reject the definitions. We can't even validate your rejections as you have no working definition.

@BrianK

Quote:

Another point of confirmation on this impact is 9/11. The US has spent Billions of dollars to weed out terrorists getting on a plane. And the result? 0 Terrorists have been convicted for attacks within the US.

Like [C]AGW in fact: billions spent and basically no more knowledge than 30 years ago, trillions foreseen for expected hundredths of a degree of cooling. What a scam.

Quote:

I don't think we know how to fairly account for these sort of events.

It was my point previously: the energy market is distorted by large subsidies (which does not foster market to improve) and heavy environmental regulations/emission fees (which are in fact indirect taxes on customers) that prevents a normal relationship between the customer and the producer. Using a more modern economical approach such as the one described by R. Coase (Nobel Prize, 1991) that involves transactional costs between parties seems more appropriate and efficient than the money wastage what we have now.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@BrianK

Quote:

If you can't define terms it's fairly pointless to discuss them. What will occur is you'll reject the definitions. We can't even validate your rejections as you have no working definition.

My point exactly.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".

@NoelFuller

Quote:

Recently I was interested to see an examination of how Australia could generate all its power requirements from renewable resources within 10 years.

Quote:

In 2004 Australia produced 0.83 t of carbon dioxide emissions per $1000 (US) (essentially the same as in 2006). For this to be cut in half over the next decade or less – as implied by the 5%, 15% and 25% 2020 targets – would require that nearly all Australian coal consumption be replaced by a zero-carbon alternative such as nuclear or renewable. If an average nuclear plant provides 750 MW of electricity (World Nuclear Association, 2007) and one quad is equivalent to 11,000 MW of electricity (produced over one year, American Physical Society, 2010) then about 15 nuclear power plants would provide one quad. Coal provided 2.4 quads for Australia in 2004, meaning that this could be replaced by about 35 nuclear power plants. Of course, Australia’s energy consumption has increased since 2004 and is expected to increase in the future. If Australia’s demand for energy increases by 1.5% per year to 2020 then an additional 1.4 quads of energy will be needed, implying the equivalent of 21 additional nuclear power plants, or a total of 56.

Quote:

Australia has a long history of opposition to nuclear power plants.

Quote:

The same sort of hypothetical sensitivity analysis can be conducted with technologies based on existing solar power plants. The Cloncurry Solar Thermal Power Plant in Queensland is expected to provide 10 MW of electricity when completed (Renewable Energy Development, 2008). One quad (at 33% efficiency) of energy implies 3333 Cloncurry plants. Providing 3.8 quads implies 12,667 Cloncurry equivalent plants, or about 24 such plants [or 80 Lake Cargelligo plants] coming online every week from 2010 to 2020.

From Roger A. Pielke Jr, 2011 An evaluation of the targets and timetables of proposed Australian emissions reduction policies, Environmental Science & Policy 14, 20 – 27.

The inescapable conclusion: Australia is Wonderland.

Bye,
TMTisFree

_________________
The engineering approach to our non-problems: "build a better washer".
The scientific approach to our non-problems: "find a new energy source".
The environmentalist approach to our non-problems: "stop washing your shirts".