A lot of barriers coming down for local Weather reporters to discuss climate change, or at least it seems so to me.
Exceptional spot above from WTVJ, NBC 6 in South Florida, includes a storm discussion by legendary John Morales, and, below, a particularly striking statement by the Emmy Winner Steve MacLaughlin.
A lot of julys pass with no Atlantic Hurricanes.
But August, that’s another story.
Some informative Hurricane Wonkery below.
Below, the view from Fox Weather:
Continue reading “August is Here – Heart of Hurricane Season”As temperatures hovered over 110F (43C) for a fourth consecutive week in Phoenix, heat-related illness calls for emergency services spiked to more than double the level seen at this time last year.
The numbers illustrate just how fragile humans are in extreme heat. And this single indicator showing the limit of human endurance shot up at a time when power systems functioned well and no blackouts occurred.
Continue reading “In Phoenix They’re Used to Heat. This is Different.”Last year, Europe experienced over 60,000 heat-related deaths due to uncharacteristically hot weather, according to a recent analysis. The problem was, in part, a lack of cooling infrastructure. But it suggests the fatalities that might occur in the US after a prolonged grid failure.
In other words, things could be much worse.
Blackouts and heat are a deadly combination. Half the population of Phoenix would land in the emergency room if a multi-day blackout struck during a heat wave, and nearly 13,000 people would die, according to a study published in May in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.
Most people in the US tend not to worry about blackouts because they still tend to be fairly uncommon and brief. Even in Phoenix, with its record-breaking stretch of daily highs at or above 110F, the grid is holding.
The day has finally arrived.
Continue reading “Georgia Nuclear Unit Online – First of Two, Long Overdue”A new reactor at a nuclear power plant in Georgia has entered commercial operation, becoming the first new American reactor built from scratch in decades.
Georgia Power Co. announced Monday that Unit 3 at Plant Vogtle, southeast of Augusta, has completed testing and is now sending power to the grid reliably.
At its full output of 1,100 megawatts of electricity, Unit 3 can power 500,000 homes and businesses. Utilities in Georgia, Florida and Alabama are receiving the electricity.
Nuclear power now makes up about 25% of the generation of Georgia Power, the largest unit of Atlanta-based Southern Co.
A fourth reactor is also nearing completion at the site, where two earlier reactors have been generating electricity for decades. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Friday said radioactive fuel could be loaded into Unit 4, a step expected to take place before the end of September. Unit 4 is scheduled to enter commercial operation by March.
The third and fourth reactors were originally supposed to cost $14 billion, but are now on track to cost their owners $31 billion. That doesn’t include $3.7 billion that original contractor Westinghouse paid to the owners to walk away from the project. That brings total spending to almost $35 billion.
The third reactor was supposed to start generating power in 2016 when construction began in 2009.
Above, heat in Arizona bad enough to choke out cactus plants.
Meanwhile, as the country continues to reel from extreme heat and storms, leave it to the Wall Street Journal Opinion writers to put their finger on the real problem – “alarmist stories”.
So, it’s all in your head, you weak minded snowflakes. Pay no attention to that dying cactus, get back to work.
Allysia Finley in the Wall Street Journal:
Continue reading “As Cacti Choke on Heat, Deniers Blame “Alarmism” for Climate Anxiety”The media wants you to know it’s hot outside. “ ‘Heat health emergency’: Nearly half the US at risk,” CNN proclaimed last week as temperatures climbed above 90 degrees in much of the country.
If heat waves were as deadly as the press proclaims, Homo sapiens couldn’t have survived thousands of years without air conditioning. Yet here we are. Humans have shown remarkable resilience and adaptation—at least until modern times, when half of society lost its cool over climate change.
“Extreme Temperatures Are Hurting Our Mental Health,” a recent Bloomberg headline warns. Apparently every social problem under the sun is now attributable to climate change. But it’s alarmist stories about bad weather that are fueling mental derangements worthy of the DSM-5—not the warm summer air itself.
The Bloomberg article cites a July meta-analysis in the medical journal Lancet, which found a tenuous link between higher temperatures and suicides and mental illness. But the study deems the collective evidence of “low certainty” owing to inconsistent study findings, methodologies, measured variables and definitions. The authors also note that “climate change might not necessarily increase mental health issues because people might adapt over time, meaning that higher temperatures could become normal and not be experienced as anomalous or extreme.”
Well, yes. Before the media began reporting on putative temperature records—the scientific evidence for which is also weak—heat waves were treated as a normal part of summer. Uncomfortable, but figuratively nothing to sweat about.
Yet according to a World Health Organization report last year, the very “awareness of climate change and extreme weather events and their impacts” may lead to a host of ills, including strained social relationships, anxiety, depression, intimate-partner violence, helplessness, suicidal behavior and alcohol and substance abuse.
Climate anxiety.
Scientists have been dealing with this for decades. This summer it’s seeping into the wider population.
“A very high level of distress among children and youth.”
Below, my interviews with scientists, including Jeffrey Kiehl, a paleoclimatologist who eventually pursued a Masters in Clinical Psychology so as to better deal with his own, and others, emotions around climate change. Sarah Myhre also makes an appearance.
Great new piece from the incredibly useful “Just Have a Think” series, summarizing current potential for pumped hydro energy storage.
Pumped hydro is the oldest and most reliable energy storage technology, using the potential energy of water in a high reservoir, as it falls to a lower reservoir. Pump the water up when you have excess power, let it fall when you have a deficit.
The concern has been that appropriate sites for this kind of storage are running out, because many of the remaining potential sites are in environmentally sensitive areas.
I’ve been interviewing engineers who are looking at a new wrinkle in the space, that actually remediates current environmental problems, while invigorating left-behind rural communities. That’s because they use abandoned mine shafts, or which there are tens of thousands across North America and the world.
Basic ides is, upper level chambers in mines become the energy storage portion where water is pumped up during off-peak hours, and then allowed to fall thru a turbine to lower chambers when power use peaks.
Most recently, spoke to Roman Sedortsov at Michigan Tech University, who is looking at metallic mines, (copper, and iron) across the upper midwest especially. Also, a year or so ago, spoke to Peter Schubert at University of Indiana/Purdue, who is looking at the same thing for abandoned coal shafts.
The beauty is that these sites are already permitted, have good road and electrical transmission access – thus taking care of some of the most onerous bureaucratic barriers. In addition, many of these are currently environmental nuisances, leaking acidic water and toxins.
This kind of development will remediate the problem, remain completely invisible below ground, and have ready access to grids not far from major load centers.
Global warming will be good for business, right?
Weirdly, Phoenix and Las Vegas remain some of the country’s fastest growing cities, despite increasing incidence of deadly, suffocating heat.
Go figure.
But the sprawled development is itself a driver of the declining quality of life.
Reader John O’Neil helpfully brought up the shibboleth “Solar panels only last 15 years”, which reminded me of a portion of my conversation with Heather Mirletz, a researcher who has done some of the most comprehensive recent research on solar panel longevity and reliability.
Turns out the “15 year” meme comes from some date that’s, well, outdated.
Below, more details.
Continue reading “NREL Researcher: How Long do Solar Panels Last?”