[Editor Note: Last October, Joe Romm at ThinkProgress published a post, September sets alarming global temperature record and negates a favorite denier talking point. In his words: “September 2017 smashed multiple climate records, alarming scientists and further negating a favorite talking point of climate science deniers.” In this post, Romm updates readers on recent monthly temperatures in light of the ‘global lukewarming’ position.]…
Continue Reading“A [September 1, 2015] article in the Los Angeles Times, ‘Unintended Consequences of Conserving Water: Leaky Pipes, Less Revenue, Bad Odors,’ discusses the infrastructure problems faced by sanitation districts. Reduced use reduces wastewater flows, which means there is less water in the sewer system to move solids, which are then collecting causing corrosion, back-ups and odor problems – especially in areas like Sacramento where the system is flat, precluding any gravity-driven movement through the system.”
– Marta Weissman, California’s Water Conservation Regulations and the Law of Unintended Consequences, Part 1: Management Impacts, Nov. 2, 2015.
Could plans to ration urban and agricultural water in California result in a big stink of sewer plant odors that will do little to solve long-term drought cycles? What Marta Weissman identified above lies in waiting for what California water planners have in mind for rural areas.…
Continue Reading“Since 2010, the approximate introductory date for electric vehicles, US sales have totaled 753,886. Assuming none have been scrapped, this represents a minuscule 0.3 percent of all light vehicles on the road in the United States.”
“… only brute-force mandates will force car buyers out of their vehicles to rely on (more expensive) for-hire transportation or (less convenient) mass transit. But this raises ethical questions of hurting the middle class to achieve statist energy goals.”
The goal of the keep-it-in-the-ground, anti-fossil-fuel lobby is electrification where renewable energy not only captures the electricity market but also the transportation market. The latter is quite challenging: while 15 percent of US power generation comes from renewables (and about 7 percent non-hydro renewables), virtually none of the motor-fuel market does, outside of (environmentally incorrect) ethanol.…
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