by P. Gosselin, July 5, 2018 in NoTricksZone
A new German paper assesses wind energy in Europe . The results are devastating. It concludes that wind energy requires almost 100% backup and that the more capacity that gets installed, the greater the volatility.
The paper appearing at the VGB, authored by Thomas Linnemann and Guido Vallana, finds that “the total wind fleet output of 18 European countries extending over several thousand kilometers in north-south and east-west direction is highly volatile and exhibits a strong intermittent character.”
In other words the power supply across the European grid fluctuates wildly and thus cannot work well. The paper’s abstract continues: …
by University of Birmingham, July 10, 2018 in WUWT
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According to the report, if we are to take cooling demand seriously, the key stages to move towards a solution for cooling demand are:
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Reducing the energy required for cooling: getting industry to adopt high efficiency cooling technologies and using maintenance to deliver optimum performance.
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Reducing the need for cooling through better building design
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Systems level thinking across built environment and transport
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Harnessing waste resources: ‘wrong time’ renewables; waste cold; and waste heat.
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Considering the strategies and skills required for installing appliances and maintaining them in order to maximise efficiency and reduce energy demand
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Creating a model for delivery of affordable cooling to those in rural and urban communities based on the energy needs of local requirements, rather than imposing a ‘one size fits all’ approach
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by Polar Bear Science, July 10, 2018
According to the Guardian (9 July 2018), there is a “global heat wave” going on right now.
In Siberia, the heat is supposedly “completely unprecedented” and will surely (we are told) impact Arctic sea ice — the habitat of the iconic polar bear. Yet a comparison of previous years shows little to no impact on sea ice: there is more ice present than there was in 2007.
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by University of Alberta, July 11, 2018 in ScienceDaily
Discovery provides evidence of iron-rich seawater much later than previously thought.
The banded iron formation, located in western China, has been conclusively dated as Cambrian in age. Approximately 527 million years old, this formation is young by comparison to the majority of discoveries to date. The deposition of banded iron formations, which began approximately 3.8 billion years ago, had long been thought to terminate before the beginning of the Cambrian Period at 540 million years ago.
The Early Cambrian is known for the rise of animals, so the level of oxygen in seawater should have been closer to near modern levels. “This is important as the availability of oxygen has long been thought to be a handbrake on the evolution of complex life, and one that should have been alleviated by the Early Cambrian,” says Leslie Robbins, a PhD candidate in Konhauser’s lab and a co-author on the paper.
La géologie, une science plus que passionnante … et diverse
