“Despite media horror stories, many species have benefitted from recent climate change. Those species that are struggling have invariably been affected by issues other than climate change and require very different remedies. Controlling our carbon footprints will never address the most pressing issues of habitat loss and watershed degradation.”
– Book Description, Amazon
Book Review: Landscape and Cycles: An Environmentalist’s Journey to Climate Skepticism by Jim Steele, 2013.
In 1615 astronomer Galileo Gallei wrote a famous letter called the Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina in the Duchy of Tuscany, Italy, giving his heliocentric position that the sun – not the earth — was the center of the earth’s solar system. By 1632, Galileo had expanded his letter into his scientific manifesto titled Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems, for which he ended up being brought to trial by a faction of Dominican priests before Catholic Pope Urban as a religious heretic.…
California’s Green Energy Swan Turning Into Ugly Duckling
In the upside down world of California energy, no longer are the hot summer months or the occasional winter cold snap the only peak period of hourly risk to the state’s electric grid. The new daily peak hours of each day from 4 pm to 7 pm during the “shoulder months” of March, April and May and September, October, and November are the new peak month/hour times. What is causing this shift in peak time power is California’s transition to solar energy as the major source of base load power during day.…
[The following is a weekly digest of California energy news excerpted from Calwatchdog.com. This inaugural report will be followed by updates from the world’s 8th largest economy every one-to-two weeks, depending on developments. MasterResource welcomes Mr. Lusvardi to our team (bio below).]
California Dems pass pro-fracking bill; CPUC Blacks-Out Green Power Prices from Consumers; Rooftop Solar to Cost Other Customers $1.1 Billion per Year
A Pro-Fracking Bill Disguised as an Anti-Fracking Bill
Can you imagine California’s Democratic-controlled legislature and Governor Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown passing a pro-fracking bill? Neither could the mainstream media in California that reported state officials had passed an anti-fracking bill on Sept. 20 sponsored by State Senator Fran Pavley (D, Los Angeles County), the leader of the green voting block in both houses of the legislature.
State Senate Bill 4 (SB 4) was reported by green reporter Chris Clarke on his Re-Wire blog at the KCET public television website as requiring: (1) a scientific assessment of fracking, (2) frackers to apply for permits, (3) fracking to continue while state crafts further regulations, (4) fracking permits to be provided to nearby property owners within 30 days; and (5) regulation of injecting acid into the ground, not fracking per se. …