California’s economy is 5th or 6th largest on planet earth; the state is the most populous in the US; so one of the very first indicators for whether I will read, much less subscribe to ANY Substacker is whether or not their writing is predisposed to misguided & misinformed attacks on California. This Substack is not worthy of my time. CYA!
Apparently the majority of Californians value the lives of their children and grandchildren more than their bank accounts. How un-American can you get, eh? Let's get ALL our power from COAL, right? It's CHEAP!
Anyone who believes Cacklin Kamalarkey is going to win the Presidency has just sucked down too much koolaid to quantify. For example, on July 20, Crazy, Creepy, and Crooked Senile Old "Child Lover" Joe and his deeply, deeply, deeply sidekick Cacklin Kamalarkey were six to ten points down in EVERY swing State, and then miraculously (and consider the irony of associating miracles with democrats), on July 22, Cacklin Kamalarkey hasd 'surged ahead' in all those polls. Yeah, right.
Robert, the most important bill for the environment, ever, passed, and it was signed in to Law by President Biden. It was as bipartisan as you could imagine. 88:2 in the Senate, and one of the two anti-environmentalists isn't even in a party!
For the first time in 2 decades I feel like we are at least trying to restore our climate before it collapses.
I can't believe I still hear people advocating for "net zero". That might have worked in 1980, but by the time the UN caught wind of it in 1992, it was too late for that.
I see NRDC and Sierra Club officially less concerned about the climate than almost all of the GOP and DEM senators, congressmen, and the President of the USA. THe NRDC Clean ENergy webpage doesn't even mention nuclear energy. That's not a sign of a working mind. That's the sign of a censored wimp. You want to stop war and pollution and save nature- you can't be in the closet about nuclear. You gotta sing loud!
When people realize that with manufactured nuclear energy modules, we can make abundant water, close the recycling loop, end energy poverty, safe air-conditioners for everyone who needs them, while preventing 1/6th of all human deaths now caused by air-pollution-- while saving money we might have wasted on fossil fuels.
Most importantly, a huge amount of land will be returned to be biodiverse habitat, once our energy supply is assured. First all the biofuel land, like ethe Corn and Surgar Cane and Tropical Palm Oil Plantations go away. Then organic indoor farming takes a huge dent out of pesticide use and fertilizer use.
Desalinization of ag water allows far less water to be applied to farms. Desalination of seawater for urban use allows removal of dams and return of water to wetlands and fish. The Colorado will flow again, only Backwards, like the Jordan River in Israel, supplying the ecosystems along the way to serving the landlocked people upstream.
This is easy to do. But we can't just keep pretending the nuclear power of 1975 is the best we could ever do. The NRC has beena vandalizing regulatory regime designed to never approve anything significant in it's entire history. It's not normal for a tech to get more expensive over time! How is that possible? Is Marijuana so much more powerful today that engineers are less productive? :-) Or is there a conspiracy of out-of-date boomers against the boomers, and the fossil fuel industry to make the NRC knuckle drags us to climate collapse, while murdering 1/6th of us with fossil fuel pollution.
Fact 4: As a result of Cultists surrendering all rationality and thinking ability to the Cultic Priests of the Church of Anthropocentric Global Warming, Cultists refuse to investigate the history of atmospheric CO2 content, glaciers or glacial research or planet Earth's ice content, or world wide sea levels or sea level measurements, or continental uplift or subsidence, or, even the simplest of all, thermometers and thermal measurements.
Fact 5: The Cultists and Cultic Priests of the Church of Anthropocentric Global Warming are no different than the cultists or cultic priests at the Aum Shinrikyo, Branch Davidian, Heaven's Gate, Peoples Temple, Solar Temple, or, or, or ... they all "drank the koolaid".
There are five (5) fundamental "facts" that one needs to know to understand 'climate change':
Fact 1: If one believes in "climate change", aka the anti-human movement that was forced to change its name from "anthropocentric global warming", then that person is a "Cultist" and is in a "Cult".
Fact 2: Every one of the hysterical assertions and predictions from the Cultic Priests of the Church of Anthropocentric Global Warming have been proven to be false or irrelevant or deliberate lies ... not just a few, but every one. And, to no one but Cultists' surprise, every Cultic Priest has made hundreds of thousands to tens of millions of dollars peddling their false ideology.
Fact 3: Anthropocentric Global Warming Cultists have surrendered all rationality and thinking ability, choosing instead to unquestioningly suck down the rancid pap the Cultic Priests are dishing out.
Bad wording on my part. If you vote for write in candidate, you are casting a vote for Harris. Is it either her or Trump. Trump’s policies are so far superior to Harris that despite his imperfections how could anyone not support him when Harris is the alternative.
With only 1 offshore wind farm that has been operating more than 8 years, it has been anything but what it claimed. It will deliver, reliable and affordable energy. In its first year, the undersea cables came up off the seabed and electricity gone and fishing halted for months. This is the Block Island wind farm with 5 wind turbines generating 30MW so what did anyone learn? A promise to do more! So, 2 more turbines were constructed off the coast of VA adding 12MW in 2020, and 12 turbines off Mantauk Point NY that started operation this year to deliver 132MW, so most would consider this pretty much non-commercial.
So, moving right along, a nice big wind farm is constructed by Vineyard Wind offshore MA with 62 turbines to generate 806MW and so it began operations 4 months ago. Now they were getting somewhere until one of the 351' W blades snapped in half a couple of weeks ago, and blew a swath of fiberglass and styrofoam all across the beaches of Nantucket and shortly after the collapse, a surfer found debris in Compton, RI. But, Bloomberg writes "it's just a hiccup", and GE (the manufacturer) says the materials are non-toxic. However, a physician on the Island was a bit ticked that the company insisted there was no threat to the public or marine ecosystem. He's told the local news "I consider things that are non-toxic to be things you can put on a sandwich".
But, no matter, the Harris Administration will shrug it off since they just gave millions to Atlantic Shores in July along with renewable energy basket case, Gov. Murphy, to begin dragging the lines for the sonar survey to map out an area to lay cables for its 200 wind turbines offshore NJ in the 1st quarter of 2025. The residents are now up in arms again, and in the meeting with Atlantic Shores, the citizens who will see the 1,045' offshore wind turbines 8 miles from shore ask multiple questions of Atlantic Shores. And, the CEO's response was "we're on a learning curve". So, if Vineyard Wind is an example, Atlantic Shores thinks like Bloomberg, it was just a hiccup and should be just fine.
And so it goes and Harris will be fast tracking the renewables across the country and from coast to coast and the enviros will be thrilled since she's found a way to steal $200 million out of the IRA to hand out to these groups, who in turn have started a PAC to donate back to her campaign. So, just a glimpse into the future of Harris-Walz running our country and her "no fracking", to her current "I don't oppose fracking", we know the latter is an outright lie.
And as the cheerleading writers of the religious sect of renewable energy "Utility Drive", so succinctly said today: "It's time to stop fretting about load growth and get serious about demand-side solutions"! Solution: "rates and tariffs to compel customers to respond to grid conditions"! In other words, smart temperature controls to stop consumers from controlling their home heating and cooling, along with kill switches on the mandated EVs. So, force renewable energy on the grid and ignore the physics, just punish the people. It will be just great but you can bet your ass they'll have electricity, gas stoves, gas powered cars, etc. since like John Kerry, the climate czar said: "I must have a private jet for my important business dealings and negotiations on climate change". It's all a load of bull and Harris is chomping at the bit to tear the country apart and the environment with it.
If you review the US Energy Information Administration's data and look at installed capacity vs actual production, three, yes, three, as in one-two-three, windmills must be installed just to get the equivalent of full production from one.
Except for solar, where NINETY-NINE panels must be installed just to get the equivalent of full production from one, there is no other form of energy production as inefficient or financially devastating as those two.
Black Island wind farm is a 30 MW wind farm will generate approximately 210,000 Mwh per year. This is worth about $60/Mwh, or $12.5 million per year.
The wind farm cost $290 million to build. So, the simple payback will take 23 years. With interest? Add on another 25 years. With O&M?
The Block Island Wind Farm has experienced multiple issues, causing it to fail. Problems include turbine stress fatigue on four of the five turbines and erosion exposing the underwater cables that took the power to the mainland. The combination of the issues resulted in extensive shutdowns in the summer of 2021 for repairs and safety inspections. Four of the five wind turbines at the farm were offline for at least two months. So, your payback will be...let's see....
You can do this simple calculation with any offshore wind farm, and no matter how you slice it, payback is always never. It will never ever be worth the money spent.
As a politician once said, the time for debate is over. We said, 15 years ago, overreliance on wind and solar would lead to exactly this disastrous result. We were told to shut up, that we were in the pockets of "big oil", that we were sowing fear, uncertainty and doubt.
Now the results are here, and they are exactly what we predicted. Energy shortages, skyrocketing prices, importing dirty energy, and surprisingly little to show for it in reducing emissions. Despite us being right, and them being 100% wrong, they refuse to change course.
It's like hiking with a friend in the woods and trying to find our car. Our friend points in the wrong direction, and insists the car is over there. We argue for a bit, then we go along with them. No car. He then says, well it's just over the next hill, and the next, and the next.... never accepting he's going in the wrong direction.
I have a lot of admiration for Mr. Bryce. But it is ridiculous to not accept the reality that a binary choice faces every American. For anyone that appreciates the need for rational energy and climate policy not voting for Trump is insane.
Here's a newsflash: "Name calling" requires an element of falseness, without which it's a "statement of fact". For example, characterizing someone with a perfectly nice mother as an SOB is "name calling".
However, if that mother meets the requirements of being a "B", then it's a "statement of fact", maybe not socially acceptable or personally embarrassing, but it's still a "statement of fact".
However, there has to be a good-faith interpretation of hyperbole. I read Dennis's comment as hyperbolic expression of his strong agreement with Mr Bryce.
Pretending that every comment must be interpreted literally is part of the cancel/woke/'you've offended' me culture. What's more you misquote Dennis. He did not say that all non-Trump voters are insane, he says that those who, 'appreciate the need for a rational energy policy' and THEN vote against Trump, are insane - because they are behaving in an internally inconsistent way (a popular definition of insanity).
Got it. My apologies to Dennis. I, too, appreciate the need for a rational energy policy, having studied and written about nuclear power for years. And call me crazy, but I wouldn't trust Trump to run a casino.
Trump is no threat to democracy. Just foolishness. The election of Harris is a a major step towards the permanent decline of the U.S. as global power. The energy policies alone will insure economic catastrophe. Trump is undisciplined & vain, but he is the only viable alternative in this election. Trump for all his faults doesn’t hate the country & he doesn’t belong to the DEI & climate change cults that are tearing at the fabric of our nation. Trumps policies may be in error, but they will not divide Americans into intersectional tribes that will be at war with one another while the federal government & their media Allie’s cheer it on and consolidate their power over the people they have impoverished with their insane energy & economic policies. I love what Robert does, but I think it is an error not to vote for the best alternative to stop the radical leftist policies. I can’t believe I said all of that and didn’t even the disastrous immigration, crime, and foreign policies that will come with a Harris administration. It’s just mind boggling how destructive such an administration could be.
"Household electricity in San Diego costs 2.4x more than the U.S. Average." In the 1980's, San Diego Gas and Electric wanted to build a nuclear power station in the desert, not a solar panel farm, called Sun Power. Governor Jerry "Moonbeam" Brown insisted that coal could do the job, along with electricity imported from Mexico. The Brown family has extensive coal, oil, and gas interests, including in Mexico. Do you remember the massive methane leak in Aliso Canyon? Governor Brown refused to force Southern California Gas Company to empty the cavern and stop using it. Why? It's under a ranch his sister owns. He also used state resources to survey his properties for oil and gas. Mike Shellenberger explained this in "Apocalypse Never."
California’s economy is 5th or 6th largest on planet earth; the state is the most populous in the US; so one of the very first indicators for whether I will read, much less subscribe to ANY Substacker is whether or not their writing is predisposed to misguided & misinformed attacks on California. This Substack is not worthy of my time. CYA!
Apparently the majority of Californians value the lives of their children and grandchildren more than their bank accounts. How un-American can you get, eh? Let's get ALL our power from COAL, right? It's CHEAP!
Anyone who believes Cacklin Kamalarkey is going to win the Presidency has just sucked down too much koolaid to quantify. For example, on July 20, Crazy, Creepy, and Crooked Senile Old "Child Lover" Joe and his deeply, deeply, deeply sidekick Cacklin Kamalarkey were six to ten points down in EVERY swing State, and then miraculously (and consider the irony of associating miracles with democrats), on July 22, Cacklin Kamalarkey hasd 'surged ahead' in all those polls. Yeah, right.
People should ask the question, why are so many people moving from California? Is California a good system to replicate across the country?
No
Robert, the most important bill for the environment, ever, passed, and it was signed in to Law by President Biden. It was as bipartisan as you could imagine. 88:2 in the Senate, and one of the two anti-environmentalists isn't even in a party!
For the first time in 2 decades I feel like we are at least trying to restore our climate before it collapses.
I can't believe I still hear people advocating for "net zero". That might have worked in 1980, but by the time the UN caught wind of it in 1992, it was too late for that.
I see NRDC and Sierra Club officially less concerned about the climate than almost all of the GOP and DEM senators, congressmen, and the President of the USA. THe NRDC Clean ENergy webpage doesn't even mention nuclear energy. That's not a sign of a working mind. That's the sign of a censored wimp. You want to stop war and pollution and save nature- you can't be in the closet about nuclear. You gotta sing loud!
When people realize that with manufactured nuclear energy modules, we can make abundant water, close the recycling loop, end energy poverty, safe air-conditioners for everyone who needs them, while preventing 1/6th of all human deaths now caused by air-pollution-- while saving money we might have wasted on fossil fuels.
Most importantly, a huge amount of land will be returned to be biodiverse habitat, once our energy supply is assured. First all the biofuel land, like ethe Corn and Surgar Cane and Tropical Palm Oil Plantations go away. Then organic indoor farming takes a huge dent out of pesticide use and fertilizer use.
Desalinization of ag water allows far less water to be applied to farms. Desalination of seawater for urban use allows removal of dams and return of water to wetlands and fish. The Colorado will flow again, only Backwards, like the Jordan River in Israel, supplying the ecosystems along the way to serving the landlocked people upstream.
This is easy to do. But we can't just keep pretending the nuclear power of 1975 is the best we could ever do. The NRC has beena vandalizing regulatory regime designed to never approve anything significant in it's entire history. It's not normal for a tech to get more expensive over time! How is that possible? Is Marijuana so much more powerful today that engineers are less productive? :-) Or is there a conspiracy of out-of-date boomers against the boomers, and the fossil fuel industry to make the NRC knuckle drags us to climate collapse, while murdering 1/6th of us with fossil fuel pollution.
Fact 4: As a result of Cultists surrendering all rationality and thinking ability to the Cultic Priests of the Church of Anthropocentric Global Warming, Cultists refuse to investigate the history of atmospheric CO2 content, glaciers or glacial research or planet Earth's ice content, or world wide sea levels or sea level measurements, or continental uplift or subsidence, or, even the simplest of all, thermometers and thermal measurements.
Fact 5: The Cultists and Cultic Priests of the Church of Anthropocentric Global Warming are no different than the cultists or cultic priests at the Aum Shinrikyo, Branch Davidian, Heaven's Gate, Peoples Temple, Solar Temple, or, or, or ... they all "drank the koolaid".
There are five (5) fundamental "facts" that one needs to know to understand 'climate change':
Fact 1: If one believes in "climate change", aka the anti-human movement that was forced to change its name from "anthropocentric global warming", then that person is a "Cultist" and is in a "Cult".
Fact 2: Every one of the hysterical assertions and predictions from the Cultic Priests of the Church of Anthropocentric Global Warming have been proven to be false or irrelevant or deliberate lies ... not just a few, but every one. And, to no one but Cultists' surprise, every Cultic Priest has made hundreds of thousands to tens of millions of dollars peddling their false ideology.
Fact 3: Anthropocentric Global Warming Cultists have surrendered all rationality and thinking ability, choosing instead to unquestioningly suck down the rancid pap the Cultic Priests are dishing out.
Climate clown. The globe has been warming for 10000 years. The greatest threat to civilization is economic, not ecological
Bad wording on my part. If you vote for write in candidate, you are casting a vote for Harris. Is it either her or Trump. Trump’s policies are so far superior to Harris that despite his imperfections how could anyone not support him when Harris is the alternative.
Yes, and I'm especially impressed with his heath care plan.
Hi. I have removed some comments and banned one person due to the posting of disrespectful remarks on my piece about California's energy policies.
We can disagree without being disagreeable.
Incivility won't be tolerated on my Substack.
Well done. Thank you. 🫵🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸👊
With only 1 offshore wind farm that has been operating more than 8 years, it has been anything but what it claimed. It will deliver, reliable and affordable energy. In its first year, the undersea cables came up off the seabed and electricity gone and fishing halted for months. This is the Block Island wind farm with 5 wind turbines generating 30MW so what did anyone learn? A promise to do more! So, 2 more turbines were constructed off the coast of VA adding 12MW in 2020, and 12 turbines off Mantauk Point NY that started operation this year to deliver 132MW, so most would consider this pretty much non-commercial.
So, moving right along, a nice big wind farm is constructed by Vineyard Wind offshore MA with 62 turbines to generate 806MW and so it began operations 4 months ago. Now they were getting somewhere until one of the 351' W blades snapped in half a couple of weeks ago, and blew a swath of fiberglass and styrofoam all across the beaches of Nantucket and shortly after the collapse, a surfer found debris in Compton, RI. But, Bloomberg writes "it's just a hiccup", and GE (the manufacturer) says the materials are non-toxic. However, a physician on the Island was a bit ticked that the company insisted there was no threat to the public or marine ecosystem. He's told the local news "I consider things that are non-toxic to be things you can put on a sandwich".
But, no matter, the Harris Administration will shrug it off since they just gave millions to Atlantic Shores in July along with renewable energy basket case, Gov. Murphy, to begin dragging the lines for the sonar survey to map out an area to lay cables for its 200 wind turbines offshore NJ in the 1st quarter of 2025. The residents are now up in arms again, and in the meeting with Atlantic Shores, the citizens who will see the 1,045' offshore wind turbines 8 miles from shore ask multiple questions of Atlantic Shores. And, the CEO's response was "we're on a learning curve". So, if Vineyard Wind is an example, Atlantic Shores thinks like Bloomberg, it was just a hiccup and should be just fine.
And so it goes and Harris will be fast tracking the renewables across the country and from coast to coast and the enviros will be thrilled since she's found a way to steal $200 million out of the IRA to hand out to these groups, who in turn have started a PAC to donate back to her campaign. So, just a glimpse into the future of Harris-Walz running our country and her "no fracking", to her current "I don't oppose fracking", we know the latter is an outright lie.
And as the cheerleading writers of the religious sect of renewable energy "Utility Drive", so succinctly said today: "It's time to stop fretting about load growth and get serious about demand-side solutions"! Solution: "rates and tariffs to compel customers to respond to grid conditions"! In other words, smart temperature controls to stop consumers from controlling their home heating and cooling, along with kill switches on the mandated EVs. So, force renewable energy on the grid and ignore the physics, just punish the people. It will be just great but you can bet your ass they'll have electricity, gas stoves, gas powered cars, etc. since like John Kerry, the climate czar said: "I must have a private jet for my important business dealings and negotiations on climate change". It's all a load of bull and Harris is chomping at the bit to tear the country apart and the environment with it.
If you review the US Energy Information Administration's data and look at installed capacity vs actual production, three, yes, three, as in one-two-three, windmills must be installed just to get the equivalent of full production from one.
Except for solar, where NINETY-NINE panels must be installed just to get the equivalent of full production from one, there is no other form of energy production as inefficient or financially devastating as those two.
Where did the 200 mill go and where did it come from (not the IRA, which agency and program)?
Black Island wind farm is a 30 MW wind farm will generate approximately 210,000 Mwh per year. This is worth about $60/Mwh, or $12.5 million per year.
The wind farm cost $290 million to build. So, the simple payback will take 23 years. With interest? Add on another 25 years. With O&M?
The Block Island Wind Farm has experienced multiple issues, causing it to fail. Problems include turbine stress fatigue on four of the five turbines and erosion exposing the underwater cables that took the power to the mainland. The combination of the issues resulted in extensive shutdowns in the summer of 2021 for repairs and safety inspections. Four of the five wind turbines at the farm were offline for at least two months. So, your payback will be...let's see....
Never.
You can do this simple calculation with any offshore wind farm, and no matter how you slice it, payback is always never. It will never ever be worth the money spent.
Except to the investors that thought up these scams.
As a politician once said, the time for debate is over. We said, 15 years ago, overreliance on wind and solar would lead to exactly this disastrous result. We were told to shut up, that we were in the pockets of "big oil", that we were sowing fear, uncertainty and doubt.
Now the results are here, and they are exactly what we predicted. Energy shortages, skyrocketing prices, importing dirty energy, and surprisingly little to show for it in reducing emissions. Despite us being right, and them being 100% wrong, they refuse to change course.
It's like hiking with a friend in the woods and trying to find our car. Our friend points in the wrong direction, and insists the car is over there. We argue for a bit, then we go along with them. No car. He then says, well it's just over the next hill, and the next, and the next.... never accepting he's going in the wrong direction.
But wait, I thought wind and solar were cheaper than any other energy source, hence shouldn't energy costs in California be declining...? ;)
I have a lot of admiration for Mr. Bryce. But it is ridiculous to not accept the reality that a binary choice faces every American. For anyone that appreciates the need for rational energy and climate policy not voting for Trump is insane.
Please reconsider.
I expect you know this in any case.
Calling anyone insane who doesn't vote for Trump is precisely the kind of disagreeable incivility that Robert just warned about in his latest post.
Here's a newsflash: "Name calling" requires an element of falseness, without which it's a "statement of fact". For example, characterizing someone with a perfectly nice mother as an SOB is "name calling".
However, if that mother meets the requirements of being a "B", then it's a "statement of fact", maybe not socially acceptable or personally embarrassing, but it's still a "statement of fact".
Wow. Profound lol. And btw since when does the FBI tell the truth?
Well Johnnie-boy, care to point out a fallacy in my statement?
However, there has to be a good-faith interpretation of hyperbole. I read Dennis's comment as hyperbolic expression of his strong agreement with Mr Bryce.
Pretending that every comment must be interpreted literally is part of the cancel/woke/'you've offended' me culture. What's more you misquote Dennis. He did not say that all non-Trump voters are insane, he says that those who, 'appreciate the need for a rational energy policy' and THEN vote against Trump, are insane - because they are behaving in an internally inconsistent way (a popular definition of insanity).
Got it. My apologies to Dennis. I, too, appreciate the need for a rational energy policy, having studied and written about nuclear power for years. And call me crazy, but I wouldn't trust Trump to run a casino.
I feel your pain. I wouldn’t trust Kamala to run anything. What to do? I’d throw away my vote on Kennedy (but I’m not a US citizen anyway).
JF Krackpot, Jr? Really? Perhaps it's just as well that you're not a US citizen.
Trump is no threat to democracy. Just foolishness. The election of Harris is a a major step towards the permanent decline of the U.S. as global power. The energy policies alone will insure economic catastrophe. Trump is undisciplined & vain, but he is the only viable alternative in this election. Trump for all his faults doesn’t hate the country & he doesn’t belong to the DEI & climate change cults that are tearing at the fabric of our nation. Trumps policies may be in error, but they will not divide Americans into intersectional tribes that will be at war with one another while the federal government & their media Allie’s cheer it on and consolidate their power over the people they have impoverished with their insane energy & economic policies. I love what Robert does, but I think it is an error not to vote for the best alternative to stop the radical leftist policies. I can’t believe I said all of that and didn’t even the disastrous immigration, crime, and foreign policies that will come with a Harris administration. It’s just mind boggling how destructive such an administration could be.
The good news is our rulers are incompetent the bad news is our rulers are incompetent
What’s interesting is they are puppets
So raising even more questions
That’s the good news part
It’s a dying power system
Doomberg or Bust!
"Household electricity in San Diego costs 2.4x more than the U.S. Average." In the 1980's, San Diego Gas and Electric wanted to build a nuclear power station in the desert, not a solar panel farm, called Sun Power. Governor Jerry "Moonbeam" Brown insisted that coal could do the job, along with electricity imported from Mexico. The Brown family has extensive coal, oil, and gas interests, including in Mexico. Do you remember the massive methane leak in Aliso Canyon? Governor Brown refused to force Southern California Gas Company to empty the cavern and stop using it. Why? It's under a ranch his sister owns. He also used state resources to survey his properties for oil and gas. Mike Shellenberger explained this in "Apocalypse Never."