Category Archives: Energy Development

Obama Agrees To Give China A 16-Year Advantage On Energy Costs.

Posted on November 14, 2014 | Leave a comment

onionpicofobamaandJinping700President Obama announced a “historic” (probably should have said “hysterical”) agreement with China regarding greenhouse gases.  The President says we will reduce CO2 emissions by an economy-wide targets by 26%-28% below its 2005 level in 2025.    This will require an equivalent reduction of the use of fossil fuels (oil, natural gas and coal).   China will continue to increase its CO2 emissions to sometime around 2030 and to make best efforts to peak early and intends to increase the share of non-fossil fuels in primary energy consumption to around 20% by 2030.   So, the US will incur sharp increases in the cost of energy over this period of time.  China gets the green light to use the cheapest form of energy production until at least 2030.

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Posted in AGW, China, CO2, Coal, Domestic Energy, Energy Development, Environment, fossil fuels, US Manufacturing Companies

Skeptical Scientists Effectively Challenge IPCC Climate Change Report

Posted on October 2, 2013 | Leave a comment

The IPCC has issued the 2013 report on global Climate change.  The skeptic community has effectively challenged the IPCC primary positions.   This post will provide a broad selection of those challenges for the reader to examine.   Each of the 18  entries will give you the title, a brief synopsis, and the link to that document.

The IPCC failed on two major issues.  Their failed to explain why global temperatures have not increased in the past 16 years despite a continued growth of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2).   The second issue is that of climate sensitivity.  They did say that in the past, they had overestimated climate sensitivity but did not tell us what they now believe it to be. This posting will also cover climate model performance and should the IPCC be discontinued.

GLOBAL TEMPERATURES

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Posted in AGW, Climate Alarmism, Climate Models, ClimateGate, CO2, CO2 positive feedback, Domestic Energy, Energy Development, Environment, EPA, Global Temperatures, Government Regulations, IPCC, Sea Ice, Sea Level, solar cells

August Electric Vehicle Sales

Posted on September 25, 2013 | Leave a comment

This might be the right time to begin separating monthly sales of plug-in hybrids vehicles from battery vehicles.  So here goes.

Plug-in hybrids (PHV) August Sales.

The August PHV sales were up by 83% over July’s sales.  Volt led this category with 3,351 vehicle sales and a 52% share of this market. Volt year-to-date sales were 14, 994. The Prius PHV sales were 1,791 and with year-to-date sales of 6,822.   Others making a showing were Ford C-Max with sales of 621 and Ford Fusion Energi with 600.

pluginsalesaugust136a00d8341c4fbe53ef019aff36fe6e970d-800wi

(Click on chart for clarity)

The chart does show some reasonably good upward movement for PHEV sales. But not to get too excited just yet, Green Car Congress posts that: “With overall light-duty vehicles sales of 1,503,151 units in August (up 17% year-on-year), according to AutoData, plug-in hybrids had a 0.4% share of the August new vehicle market.”

Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV) August Sales

The Nissan LEAF August sales were 2,420 with year-to-date sales at 14,123.

Tesla is the elephant in the room.  The next report on sales will be at the end of the third quarter so it is a guess where they rank in the scheme of things.  Green Car Congress reports sales of Leafs plus a number of other models with sales in the 200 or below would add to August BEV sales of 3,206.  They estimate that upward of 1700 Teslas were probably sold in August increasing the total BEV August sales to about 4,900 units. BEV sales would be about 0.3% of the August new vehicle sales.

Still far from impressive.

cbdakota

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Posted in AGW, Batteries, Electric Vehicles, Energy Development, fossil fuels, Personal Automobiles, US Auto Manufacturers

Department Of Energy Forecasts 2040 World and US Energy Use/Source

Posted on July 26, 2013 | 1 comment

The Department of Energy (DOE) projects that global energy consumption will increase 56% between 2010 and 2040 from 524 quadrillion Btus to 820 quadrillion Btus.

worldenergyconsump

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Posted in AGW, Alternative Energy, Climate Alarmism, Domestic Energy, Electricity, Energy Development, Environment, fossil fuels, Fracking/Shale Gas, Renewable Energy, solar cells, Windpower

Solar Panel Defects Surfacing

Posted on July 7, 2013 | 2 comments

The NY Times is reporting that solar panels failures are becoming a major concern for the industry.

The photovoltaic cells, incorportated into the panel,  generate electricity when exposed to the sun.  A thin film protects the cell from moisture and it is encapsulated between layers of glass. The life expectation of the cells is 25 years and the economics of their use is predicated upon that length of service.  But inspection of some these panels finds that cheaper materials are being used to bring down the manufacturing costs.

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Posted in AGW, Alternative Energy, China, Electricity, Energy Development, solar cells

Will The OPEC Cartel Break Up?

Posted on June 7, 2013 | 1 comment

Because the OPEC cartel provides about 40% of the world’s crude oil, it has been able to control the crude oil price.  Its members meet and set the amount of crude they will produce for sale opposite the forecast world demand.  They can reduce or increase production to raise or lower prices. Other major crude producers outside of OPEC have been able to sell all their crude oil but acting independently are unable to displace OPEC’s role as the selling price arbiter.   As you would expect, OPEC wants the price to be high but recognizes that if they set it too high, demand will drop and competitors will be encouraged to prospect for more crude.   Within OPEC, the members have their own issues that make setting the production levels and thus the price, not easy.  However, Saudi Arabia, currently the world’s largest producer of  crude oil,  is said to be the primary voice in this process.  When the OPEC members meet, as they did on May 31st, to set the production level/price, one big factor was how much of their government’s budget is derived from the oil revenues.  And what is the price of crude oil that makes that budget whole? The graph below, from the American Interest’s posting “OPEC Sweats: How Low Can Oil Prices Go?” illustrates the price needed to balance their government’s budget:

2013_fiscal_breakeven_point-e1370293236725

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Posted in Energy Development, Environment, EPA, fossil fuels, Fracking/Shale Gas, Middle East Resources, Off Shore Resources, Oil and Gas Exploration, OPEC, Peak Oil

The Obama Administration Targets Congressional Skeptics

Posted on May 28, 2013 | Leave a comment

President Obama is not content with just targeting the news reporters, whistle blowers  and conservative groups such as the Tea Parties, he is now singling out Congressional skeptic by name in hopes he can get them voted out of office.

He is practicing Chicago Politics at the national level.  Chicago politics operates on the basis of denigrating your opponent.  This style of politics lacks logic, good ideas, etc.  so they result to insult and innuendo.

The President’s website lists those Senators and Representatives that do not agree with his plans to artificially reduce availability of fossil fuels and to force taxes on those people and businesses that use them.

If you click here, you will be sent to the President’s website and see a list of Congressional people he wants removed.  Each of the named individuals is credited with a quote they have made which is to give reason to why they should be removed.  I think it likely will have the opposite effect if the usual uninformed liberal voters actually read the quotes. The low information voters may never before have seen the logic expressed in these quotes.

The liberals often revel in their retelling of President Nixon’s “enemies list.”  I believe that the current president’s “enemies list”  makes Nixon’s pale by comparison.

cbdakota

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Posted in AGW, cap and trade, carbon tax, Climate Alarmism, ClimateGate, CO2, Domestic Energy, Energy Development, Environment, fossil fuels, Global Temperatures, Government Regulations, IPCC

CONGRATULATIONS!! Some Rich Californian Thanks You For Helping Pay For His New Tesla

Posted on May 27, 2013 | 2 comments

Now the Tesla is a sweet looking car with some impressive stats.  Perhaps not as good as advertised, see this posting, but still right up there with the best.
teslamodelcimages
 And while you may not be able to afford one—early models went for over $109,000 and the new S model goes for about $70,000—some people, wealthy ones anyway, are buying them.  Tesla sold an estimated 9,650 S models by the end of April this year. Things are going so well that Tesla made a profit in the first quarter.

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Posted in AGW, Batteries, carbon tax, CO2, Electric Vehicles, Energy Development, fossil fuels, Government Regulations, Government Revenues, Personal Automobiles, Renewable Energy, US Auto Manufacturers, US Manufacturing Companies

International Nuclear Fusion Project Underway

Posted on April 27, 2013 | Leave a comment

The UK Independent reports that the Iter fusion project gained final approval “ for the design of the most technically challenging component – the fusion reactor’s “blanket” that will handle the super-heated nuclear fuel.”
The Iter project is designed to produce  at a rate of  500 megawatts of energy using an input of 50 megawatts  during a 1000 seconds run. The Iter fusion project is forecast to cost £ 13billion (US $20 billion) .  The project team is an international combine of 46 nations that are contributing  science and money.  The facility is based in Cadarache, France.
Below is a cut-away of the Iter reactor design and brief description of the elements of the reactor from Howstuffworks.com
fusion-reactor-5

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Posted in AGW, Alternative Energy, Energy Development, fossil fuels, Nuclear Energy, Renewable Energy, Sun

“The Magic Washing Machine”—–Limiting Energy Access To The World’s Poor Is Wrong

Posted on April 2, 2013 | 1 comment

You have to give credit to the Green NGOs in that they are much more upfront about their goals than most of the Global Governments. Greenies want to stop development of all fossil fuel sources and they would like to see the nuclear industry dismantled and no new nukes built.  The Obama Administration is not quite that ambitious, at least for now, although there is not much difference in their objectives. Examples of goals the Administration have announced are: kill coal,  minimize (and in some cases prevent any) use of Federal lands for accessing the mineral resources and raise the price of gasoline and electricity.
Who is it that will feel the most pain, if this cabal is successful?  It will be the poorest among us, of course.  They justify their actions by saying that the Earth will really, really, really go to hell if we don’t stop burning fossil fuels.  And besides they add, we will have wind and solar farms takeover the job of supplying power.  Wind and solar farms are not ready for prime time and who knows if they will ever be. The experience around the world demonstrates that when and if these renewables do replace fossil fuels, the power supplied will be more costly than that supplied by fossil fuels.  No help for the poor here.

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Posted in AGW, Alternative Energy, Climate Alarmism, Electricity from Coal, Energy Development, Environment, Famine, fossil fuels, Government Regulations, Nuclear Energy, Renewable Energy, solar cells, Windpower