Dan Weiss reports at Climate Progress that the attempt to kill energy conservation standards failed tonight. It required a two-thirds vote from the House to suspend the rules to consider it (the bill did not go through normal legislative channels) — the bill failed.
You may want to read Steve Lacey’s earlier explanation of the bill there, too.
Tip of the old scrub brush to Tony Sidaway and his tweets.
19 Comments | 
Conservation, Cost of Green, Green Politics, Politics, Rampant stupidity | Tagged: Conservation, Energy, Green Politics, Politics, Rampant stupidity | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
Part of “Green Revolution,” a series on science and environmental awareness from the National Science Foundation (NSF). This is a quick introduction to wind power, with some good video:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
1 Comment | Conservation, Electricity, Energy, Science | Tagged: Conservation, Electrical Generation, Energy, National Science Foundation, NSF, Renewable Resources, Science, Wind Power | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Life is just a constant bitch for tea partiers.
Rand Paul revealed why he’s full of . . . that certain fecality, shall we say. He did that in a hearing about light bulbs, and appliances. Energy conservation gives Rand Paul formication (look it up).
Burning money: Republicans prefer more heat than light, less energy conservation, and the libertarian, self-help yourself to others' money philosophy popularized in recent movies.
But what about efforts to undo the energy conservation bill that practically forces long-lived, low-energy light bulbs on us? The Tea Party doesn’t like that idea, either. Michael Patrick Leahy, writing at the blog for Rupert Murdoch’s Broadside Books, explains why he thinks the Tea Party should oppose Fred Upton’s bill to repeal the energy standards Rand Paul castigated.
Basically, none of these guys knows beans about energy, nor much about the technology or science of electricity and lighting — they just like to whine.
Leahy wrote:
Section 3 [of the “Better Use of Light Bulbs Act,” HR 2417] states that “No Federal, State, or local requirement or standard regarding energy efficient lighting shall be effective to the extent that the requirement or standard can be satisfied only by installing or using lamps containing mercury.” This reads to me that Congress is attacking the mercury laden CFL bulbs. The point of the individual economic choice guaranteed in the Constitution, however, is that Congress ought not to favor CFLs over incandescents, just as it ought not to favor incandescents over CFLs. I’m no fan of CFL bulbs personally, but look for CFL manufacturers like GE to make this argument against the bill at every opportunity.
Section 4 of the Act is designed to repeal the light bulb efficiency standards in effect in the State of California since January 1 of this year. The standards are essentially the federal standards that will go into effect January 1, 2012, but moved up a year. While I personally question the legal status of these very specific rules promulgated by the California Energy Commission based on a vague and non-specific 2007 California statute, it seems to me that there are serious Constitutional questions surrounding a Federal law prohibiting a State to establish its own product efficiency standards. While a good argument can be made that the Commerce Clause grants Congress the right to repeal California state regulations, a reasonable argument could be made by opponents of the bill that Congress can’t do this because the state of California is merely establishing local standards, which is its right.
Given these concerns about Sections 3 and 4, what purpose does it serve to include them in the bill? Both raise potential objections to the passage of the bill on the floor of the House if it comes to a vote this week.
Now, granted this is the House of Representatives, and not the Senate where Sen. Paul keeps a chair warmed, occasionally. Still, is it too much to ask the Tea Party to support the bills it asks for? Leahy said:
A full and open discussion of these issues in public hearings held by the House Energy and Commerce Committee would have been the right way to begin a legislative process that would have identified and addressed these potential objections. That’s the course that a Committee Chairman seriously committed to repealing the light bulb ban would have taken. Instead, Chairman Upton has followed this secretive, behind closed doors, last minute rushed vote approach.
There was a hearing in the Senate — good enough for most people — and of course, there were hearings on the issue in the House. The Tea Party was unconscious at the time. The bill they’re trying to repeal was a model of moderation as touted by the president when it passed, President George W. Bush — and it’s still a good idea to conserve energy and set standards that require energy conservation (the law does not ban incandescent bulbs).
Also, while they’re complaining about the mercury in Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs (CFLs), remember, Dear Reader, they oppose letting our Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) protect you from mercury in your drinking water or the air that you breathe. Pollution is only worrisome to them if they can use worry as a tool to whine about people making life work without pollution. A rational person would point out that the mercury released by coal-fired power plants to produce the energy required by repeal of the conservation law would more than equal the mercury from all the CFLs, even were all that mercury to be released as pollution (which it isn’t, if properly disposed of):
8 hours: The amount of time a person must be exposed to the mercury in a CFL bulb to acquire the same mercury level as eating a six-ounce can of tuna, according to Climate Progress’s Stephen Lacey.
Is it too much to ask for reason, circumspection, and a touch of wisdom from these guys? You’re supposed to drink the tea, Tea Party, not smoke it.
A wet shake of the old scrub brush in the general direction of Instapundit, who never met a form of pollution he didn’t prefer over clean water or clean air.
_____________
Update: Mike the Mad Biologist talks sense about the light bulb vote planned by the dim bulbs:
Because it’s not like more efficient light bulbs would be helpful at all:
The American Council on an Energy Efficient Economy says that the standards would eliminate the need to develop 30 new power plants – or about the electrical demand of Pennsylvania and Tennessee combined.
Only Republicans can make the current crop of Democrats look good…
Mike provides more points that make the Upton bill look simultaneously silly and craven: The current law does not ban incandescent bulbs at all, for example, one manufacturer has introduced two new incandescent bulbs in the past year. Tea Party Republicans: No fact left unignored, no sensible solution left undistorted and unattacked.
Also see:
35 Comments | Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Conservation, Energy, Environment, Environmental protection, pollution, Regulation | Tagged: CFLs, Clean Air, Conservation, Department of Energy, Energy, environment, Environmental protection, EPA, Light Bulbs, pollution, Rampant stupidity, Regulation | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
While a few (crabs?) argue that solar power will never make a significant contribution to our daily energy budgets in the U.S., others quietly slip the bonds of the grid and go solar. If solar works, it will work one house at a time.
If you wish to go solar, where do you start? The Orange County (California) Register provided a great graphic to illustrate some of the considerations a homeowner needs to make, and how much it might cost.
From the Orange County Register, accessed June 2011 - click for larger image
Orange County, California, is the hotbed of conservative politics, and warming denialism such as it exists in California. In Orange County, solar power is a question of practicality, and one’s desire to save money on electricity. It’s in the Home and Garden section of the newspaper, not politics, not business.
Another gift from mainstream media that bloggers don’t equal, yet.
Is a Smart-Meter required for solar, today?
1 Comment | Electricity, Energy, Environmental protection, Newspapers, Science, Technology | Tagged: Electricity, Energy, Environmental protection, Newspapers, Orange County Register, Science, SmartMeter, Solar Cells, Solar Power, Technology | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
David Roberts at the online Grist site has a toilet that will solve Rand Paul’s problem, as Paul let slip at a Senate hearing earlier this week. A couple of interesting videos accompanied Roberts’ article:
And this one, which makes me happy we didn’t have this toilet when our kids were toddlers, and at war with each other, or just happy to study hydraulics with frequent flushes, frequently with stuff that shouldn’t be flushed:
Bill Scher, also at Grist, did the shopping earlier that Rand Paul appears unable to do — there are several toilets available to solve Paul’s problem, many of them made in America.
Almost three years ago we replaced the three toilets in our home with two Toto models and one Kohler, all low-flow, water miser editions. They work fine. (We also shopped our local area, and found prices considerably below those listed, at several different outlets.) Kohler, in fact, enlists the help of a fetching plumber named Jo. She steps into a well-appointed bathroom and invites you to test Kohler’s toilets — you pick something in the bathroom, and she flushes it. Bye bye, rubber duckie. So long, handtowel. Four bottles of shampoo at once.
Click image to test Kohler toilets [Update, August 2012: Alas, Kohler seems to have deactivated the interactive site.] [BUT, see update below.]
Kohler, clearly, had someone with Sen. Paul’s, er, um, problem, in mind!
So, Rand Paul no longer has a reason to be full of s—. It’s time he vote to endorse saving energy, as appliance and lightbulb manufacturers have done. Why is Paul so opposed to American business anyway?
Update: The Trophy Wife™ suggested somebody stage a showdown, or flush off between Jo the Plumber and Sen. Rand Paul. Jo the Plumber could see how well the Republican budget whacks flush away . . . “H.R. 1: Flushes cleanly! 382 pages gone! Appropriately disposed of! What do you want to flush next?”
Perhaps someone adept at editing flash videos could make that happen . . .
Update, May 2020: Fortunately, Kohler did a video of their interactive ad, and that still exists. I admit I enjoyed pointing to odd objects in the game, which Jo the Plumber then dutifully flushed. Video gives you an idea of what the toilet can handle, enough to handle Rand Paul and Donald Trump together, probably.
12 Comments | Conservation, Energy, Environmental protection, Government, Humor, Rampant stupidity, U.S. Senate, War on Smart | Tagged: Conservation, Energy, Environmental protection, Government, Humor, Light Bulbs, Politics, Rampant stupidity, Rand Paul, Regulation, Tea Party, Toilets, U.S. Senate, War on Smart | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
In the march to brand all non-fossil fuel use as politically incorrect (at least for those who deny global warming should get our policy making attention), the poobahs and commenters at Watts Up have outdone themselves in seeing conspiracies under the ice, mountains where there are molehills, and molehills where there are mountains.
If you wonder whether global warming deniers are biased, Watts’s blog just confessed.
We’re quite frozen in here in Texas, you know. The unseasonable warm air (high pressure) over the Arctic that warms the sea and melts the ice also pushed the Arctic air south over the U.S. Where that frigid air met wet air coming from the Gulf of Mexico, weather ensued (yeah, warming may have increased the amount of moisture, too — but that just makes the anti-warmists go blind, so we won’t say it).
Texas got hit with rolling power blackouts last week, when the cold weather increased demand for electricity and crimped the ability of several utilities to bring on power plants build to generate to meet such extra demands. Some coal-fired plants were off-line, a couple froze up, and natural gas supplies were not in the right place at the right time, so some natural gas plants couldn’t fire up.
But Anthony Watts, seeing spooks behind every clump of Texas Bluestem (Big or Little), promptly got a post up blaming wind power turbines. His post’s headline gives you the whole story as Watts spun it: “We Spent Billions on Wind Power… and All I Got Was a Rolling Blackout.”
If you’re wondering just what in the world he was thinking, you’d be demonstrating more common sense than the average global warming denier.
Freezing rain had been predicted, but not so much as Texas got. The follow-up snow also surpassed predictions and expectations — for example, the “skiff to 1″ accumulation” predicted for Dallas turned into 5″ to 7″ through much of the area — stopping any hope that the ice might clear so schools could reopen. Texas got slammed by the same enormous storm that slammed much of the Midwest and Northeast, with similar results. For Super Bowl host cities Fort Worth, Arlington and Dallas, that created big problems. Texas is not equipped to deal with much winter weather, let alone so much in so little time.
In cold weather, power plants fail. Sometimes power lines fail when the plants stay up. Sometimes it’s just a question of wheeling power from one part of a local, regional or national grids. Sometimes the wheeling fails because a switch fails or . . . a failure of capacity can have myriad causes. In the past, we covered for these problems with additional generating capacity, in excess of what might be needed at any point — mandated by state and local utility commissions to insure power at all times.
Texas deregulated electrical power more than a decade ago, too — which means that market forces govern what gets built and whether there is any emergency generating capacity.
Free enterprise cannot take any blame in the kingdom of those who deny climate and economics. So when the rolling blackouts plagued Texas, the search for a scapegoat became frenetic. The question was, who could take the blame that could cast what was perceived to be the most aspersional light on Al Gore, the case for global warming, and anything approaching “green energy?”
Ah, there’s the target! Wind power.
Watts Up quickly claimed that Texas windmill-generated electricity had failed, if not in fact, then in economic hypothesis. If the windmills didn’t fail themselves, it must be that the money invested in them could have been better invested in coal-fired power plants, or oil-fired plants, and the blame can be squarely laid at the feet of Michael Mann, or the UN’s IPCC, or Al Gore, or Rachel Carson, or John Muir, or Aeolus — or anyone other than the real trouble, the freakish weather. Avoiding blame on the weather is important to denialists, because such “perfect storm” combinations come astonishingly close to the predictions of some global warming hypotheses.
So blame must be established, far from the house of warming denialists if possible. Watts’ blog attacked windpower all through 2010; ignoring any rebuttals, all Watts had to do was point to his earlier published articles.
The operators of Texas’ electricity grid blamed myriad problems at power plants across Texas for last week’s rolling blackouts. But interviews and a review of documents by The Dallas Morning News reveal that the breakdown of a cluster of coal-fired power plants in Central Texas was at the heart of the problem.
These facts were known days ago. In fact the second comment at Watts’ blog corrected the record:
Walt Stone says:
I believe it was two power plants, one coal and one gas fired.
Could Watts ever concede a possible error? Not yet, not on his blog, nor anywhere else. Texas electric grid officials said early they had coal-fired power plants down; they’ve stuck to that story. Reporting by the state’s major newspapers and other news organizations has borne out that story.
Continuing their leading reporting on energy and environment issues, the Texas Tribune, an on-line publication by a non-profit group, specifically asked about wind power shortages as alleged by Watts:
TT: Were there problems with wind-power plants needing to be shut down for high winds or icing blades, and also did nuclear plants have any problems?
[Trip] Doggett [CEO of the Electricity Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)]: I’m not aware of any nuclear plant problems, and I’m not aware of any specific issues with wind turbines having to shut down due to icing. I would highlight that we put out a special word of thanks to the wind community because they did contribute significantly through this time frame. Wind was blowing, and we had often 3,500 megawatts of wind generation during that morning peak, which certainly helped us in this situation.
Is there any room for the wind nay-sayers to squirm on this?
One publication which should be keyed into the facts poked fun at Watts’ hypothesis, although in a subtle, implicit fashion. Energy Tribune’s story by Philip E. Lewis, comparing Texas to King Canute, noted that Texas has bragged about its energy reliability and separateness from the rest of the state. What to do in the next energy crisis?
But no worries, I have the perfect solution: Next time power plants are “tripping,” ERCOT (irony alert: Electric Reliability Council of Texas) should issue an order for the wind to blow harder in West Texas. If the wind is reluctant to comply, ERCOT should brook no nonsense and immediately escalate. Surely an order from the governor’s office will do the trick.
Based on little more than antipathy towards wind power, bloggers beginning with Anthony Watts started a hoax rumor that wind power is to blame for Texas’s electricity shortage problems. Very little basis could be found for such a claim, and in the days since the events, that little basis is evaporating. It’s time to put that claim to bed.
Sorta post script: I am aware of the claims at Meteorological Musings that wind generation is, somehow, to blame — if for no other reason than that it could not play Superman and bring a few thousand megawatts online with no notice to save the rest of the grid. As best I can cipher it, the claim is that because not every wind generator was on line, wind generators should have been able to take up the slack. Of course, no other energy source could step in to take up the slack, either, including those who were scheduled to do it. I don’t put a lot of stock in the claim that we need to be particularly stern with wind generating companies when other generating companies fall down on the job. For that matter, there is a Reuters article listed at Watts Up that said a wind shortage added to the problems, but it didn’t suggest in any way that a wind shortage caused the problems — and it’s from 2008, not 2011. I don’t believe problems in 2008 contributed to blackouts in 2011. I’m also aware that Energy Tribune is hostile to wind generated power. Testimony contrary to interest . . .
More:
Tip of the old scrub brush to a commenter named Bryan Brown.
Leave a Comment » | Climate change, climate_change, Coal, denialism, Electricity, Energy, Government, Hoaxes, Politics, Texas | Tagged: Climate change, coal, denialism, Electrical Grid, Electricty, Energy, ERCOT, Global warming, Government, Hoaxes, Nuclear Power Plants, Politics, Texas, Watts Up With That, Wind Power | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
First time in years I’ve gotten solid information from a politician that didn’t come wrapped in a plea for money. I got a message from President Obama today (I’m sure a few million of his closest friends got the same one):
Ed —
Yesterday, I visited Caminada Bay in Grand Isle, Louisiana — one of the first places to feel the devastation wrought by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. While I was here, at Camerdelle’s Live Bait shop, I met with a group of local residents and small business owners.
Folks like Floyd Lasseigne, a fourth-generation oyster fisherman. This is the time of year when he ordinarily earns a lot of his income. But his oyster bed has likely been destroyed by the spill.
Terry Vegas had a similar story. He quit the 8th grade to become a shrimper with his grandfather. Ever since, he’s earned his living during shrimping season — working long, grueling days so that he could earn enough money to support himself year-round. But today, the waters where he has worked are closed. And every day, as the spill worsens, he loses hope that he will be able to return to the life he built.
Here, this spill has not just damaged livelihoods. It has upended whole communities. And the fury people feel is not just about the money they have lost. It is about the wrenching recognition that this time their lives may never be the same.
These people work hard. They meet their responsibilities. But now because of a manmade catastrophe — one that is not their fault and beyond their control — their lives have been thrown into turmoil. It is brutally unfair. And what I told these men and women is that I will stand with the people of the Gulf Coast until they are again made whole.
That is why, from the beginning, we have worked to deploy every tool at our disposal to respond to this crisis. Today, there are more than 20,000 people working around the clock to contain and clean up this spill. I have authorized 17,500 National Guard troops to participate in the response. More than 1,900 vessels are aiding in the containment and cleanup effort. We have convened hundreds of top scientists and engineers from around the world. This is the largest response to an environmental disaster of this kind in the history of our country.
We have also ordered BP to pay economic injury claims, and this week, the federal government sent BP a preliminary bill for $69 million to pay back American taxpayers for some of the costs of the response so far. In addition, after an emergency safety review, we are putting in place aggressive new operating standards for offshore drilling. And I have appointed a bipartisan commission to look into the causes of this spill. If laws are inadequate, they will be changed. If oversight was lacking, it will be strengthened. And if laws were broken, those responsible will be brought to justice.
These are hard times in Louisiana and across the Gulf Coast, an area that has already seen more than its fair share of troubles. The people of this region have met this terrible catastrophe with seemingly boundless strength and character in defense of their way of life. What we owe them is a commitment by our nation to match the resilience they have shown. That is our mission. And it is one we will fulfill.
Thank you,
President Barack Obama
Good news is that BP now reports some success in stopping the flow of oil. Information flows increase, oil flows decrease — good trends.
Caption from the White House: President Barack Obama talks with U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Thad Allen, who is serving as the National Incident Commander, and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, aboard Marine One as they fly along the coastline from Venice to New Orleans, La., May 2, 2010. John Brennan, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, is in the background. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza). (This official White House photograph is being made available only for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photograph. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way and may not be used in commercial or political materials, advertisements, emails, products, promotions that in any way suggests approval or endorsement of the President, the First Family, or the White House.)
More information:
1 Comment | Barack Obama, Citizenship, Energy, Environmental justice, Environmental protection, Government, Natural history, Natural resources, Politics, pollution, President Obama | Tagged: Energy, Environmental protection, Government, Gulf of Mexico, Gulf Oil Spill, Natural resources, Politics, pollution, President Obama | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
A dozen scholars from a half dozen universities presented papers at SMU Saturday, at a symposium titled “Indians and Energy: Exploitation and Opportunity in the American Southwest.” Papers detailed the history, economics, cultural and social effects of the development of energy resources on Indian lands, concentrating on development of the massive Navajo Reservation that straddles four western states.
The seminar was cosponsored by the William P. Clements Center for Southwest Studies at SMU, and the distinguished School for Advanced Research of the Human Experience, at Santa Fe.
Energy development does not paint a pretty picture. Since 1800, development of Indian resources generally means value is extracted from Indian lands, but the Indians themselves make no profit, and often bear the burdens of development, especially in health damage, pollution, and hammering of social structures.
One presenter, Colleen O’Neill of Utah State, had a photograph that hit me hard. It showed two Navajos aboard an ore car from a uranium mine on the Reservation, in 1952. Neither man had any breathing protection of any kind. I worked for a decade to get compensation for victims of atomic fallout and mine radiation, on the U.S. Senate staff. And I know that the death rate from lung cancer for the uranium miners was nearly 95% when I worked the issue, 30 years ago. Those smiling men had been given a death sentence, and no one told them.
Especially after the final presentation, specifically aimed at a new proposal for another massive coal-fired electrical generating plant in an area that hosts two already, concern about the effects of energy development was clear from the symposium participants and audience.
Stakes got a lot higher Sunday morning. The Arizona Republic published a story on Desert Rock about as glowing as the proponents could hope for, pitting high unemployment rates and a lack of electricity on the Navajo Reservation against environmentalists who oppose the plant.
This post is a marker. I hope I’ll get time to write more about the seminar and the extensive findings (the School for Advanced Research will publish the papers, but that will be several months in the future). But until then, let me urge you to read the newspaper’s story, “For Navajos, Coal means survival.”
When you read the story, remember this: The employment numbers cited in the story are considerably more optimistic than any touted before; past construction on the Reservation has been difficult for Navajos to break into the work force, and imported workers generally do much of the work; it’s taken more than 50 years for Navajos to get the number of jobs they now hold at the Four Corners Plant, a fight that continues; and the sad story of the woman who died during a cold snap will tug at your heart and conscience, but you need to remember that there is no way her cold hogan will get electricity from Desert Rock; her children will still be cold if the plant is built.
More, later, I hope.
Sherry Smith and Brian Frehner did a whale of a job organizing the thing, by the way. You shoulda been there.
Resources:
3 Comments | History, Politics | Tagged: Energy, Environmental protection, Navajos, Politics, Poverty, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Ed Darrell on Texas's Colorado River
Come on in, the water's fine. Come often: Cleanliness is next to godliness.
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 