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- Book review of “Livewired. The inside story of the ever-changing brain”
- The conveyor belt may be slowing down — Yikes!
- Battery Energy storage batteries (BESS) too complex to ever be commercial
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- Book review of “Siege: Trump Under fire”
- Why do people vote for Trump?
- Book review of “Pandemic Politics: The Deadly Toll of Partisanship in the Age of COVID”
- The evolution of the Republican party from 1960 to 2024: from moderate democracy to extreme authoritarianism
- Why some people are conservative and others liberal
- Book review: Bring the War Home: The white power movement & paramilitary America
- Book review: How Democracies Die
- Book Review “Conservatives without Conscience” by John Dean
- Book review of “The Power Worshippers. Inside the dangerous rise of religious nationalism”
- Fox news estranges millions of families and instills hate and fear in its cult members
Category Archives: Energy
Are biofuels a sustainable and viable energy strategy?
Preface. In 2000, Melanie Kenderine at the U.S. Department of energy stated that: “This nation has abundant biomass resources (grasses, trees, agricultural wastes) that have the potential to provide power, fuels, chemicals and other bio-based products” (136). That’s a good … Continue reading
Posted in Biofuels, EROEI Energy Returned on Energy Invested
Tagged biofuel, EROEI, EROI, net energy, subsidies
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Department of Energy algal biofuels roadmap: A summary
Preface. If you really want to get into the weeds about the details of why algal fuels have failed to produce biofuels, read this 140 page paper. Alice Friedemann www.energyskeptic.com Women in ecology author of 2021 Life After Fossil Fuels: … Continue reading
Effects of biodiesel on diesel engines: John Deere
[ Since petroleum is finite, the most important focus of U.S. energy research ought to be keeping trucks operating, since civilization ends when trucks stop running. Ideally this would be done with a “drop-in” fuel that can be burned in … Continue reading
Posted in Biodiesel, Trucks
Tagged biodiesel, diesel engine, John Deere
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A U.S. Senate hearing on T. Boone Pickens plans for natural gas and wind to reduce oil dependence
[ This session is unusual in that the words “peak oil” are spoken several times, and M. King Hubbert, James Howard Kunstler, and Matt Simmons are lauded. Gal Luft points out that “10 years ago, Osama bin Laden predicted that … Continue reading
Posted in Natural Gas Vehicles, U.S. Congress Energy Dependence
Tagged natural gas, peak oil, pickens, wind
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Natural gas is a stupid transportation fuel
[ My comment: The only reason natural gas has come up as a transportation fuel at all is the false belief that there is 100 years of natural gas (even this article does, but natural gas may last far less … Continue reading
Posted in Automobiles, Natural Gas Vehicles, Transportation
Tagged cars, natural gas, transportation
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California could hit the solar wall
[ According to a Stanford University article below this introduction (followed by excerpts from two California Energy Commission reports), if California uses mainly solar power to meet a 50% Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS), on sunny days, for most of the … Continue reading
Posted in Photovoltaic Solar, Renewable Integration
Tagged alternative energy, renewable integration, solar, solar wall
4 Comments
Taxpayers are paying for a concentrated solar project — Ivanpah– that doesn’t work
Ivanpah in the news: Dvorsky, G. May 21, 2016. The World’s Largest Solar Plant Just Torched Itself. Gizmodo (Australia). Misaligned mirrors are being blamed for a fire that broke out yesterday at the world’s largest solar power plant, leaving the … Continue reading
Posted in Concentrated Solar Power, Corporate Welfare
Tagged concentrated solar power, CSP, ivanpah, solar thermal
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Over and under-cooked oil — tar sands, “fracked” tight oil & gas, oil shale
[ This article discusses why it’s so hard and expensive to extract difficult oils like tar sands, oil shale, and tight “fracked” oil, for reasons such as: These are at the bottom of the resource pyramid, so there may be … Continue reading
Posted in Oil & Gas Fracked, Oil Shale, Tar Sands (Oil Sands)
Tagged Canada, fracking, oil sands, oil shale, tar sands, tight oil, Venezuela
2 Comments
Net metering and the death of US rooftop solar
April 22, 2016 by Roger Andrews at euanmearns.com “Net metering” allows anyone with a solar installation to sell surplus solar power to the grid when the sun is shining and to purchase power back from the grid when it isn’t. … Continue reading
Promoting soil health in agriculture at U.S. House hearing 2014
Preface. At last, many years after I first published “Peak soil: Why biofuels destroy ecosystems and civilizations” in 2007, Congress had a hearing to educate House members on why preserving topsoil is so essential for food production for future generations. … Continue reading
Posted in Biomass, Peak Topsoil, Pesticides, Soil, U.S. Congress Infrastructure, Water Pollution
Tagged agriculture, cover crop, erosion, no-till, peak soil, soil health, U.S. House of representatives
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