Author: Jo

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Alchemic for the people

I was less than a metre above current sea level, rooting about in the holy bookshelves of my Evangelical host, searching for a suitable title.

I pulled out “Who Made God ?” from underneath a pile of books on their sides, letting the column slump downwards, alerting my companions to the fact that I had definitively made my choice for the evening’s reading.

We were treated to gentle Christmassy music for an hour or so as we all gave up talking to read by candlelight and compact fluorescent.

I didn’t read fast, as at first I didn’t have my newly-necessary reading glasses, and when I was encouraged to fetch them, the light was too dim to make reading easy. Those fashionable uplighters.

I read into the second part, and I had already formed in my mind several disagreements with the author, Professor Edgar Andrews, despite him having taken several good lines of reasoning and made some humourous points which I had duly responded to with a slight audible giggle.

I instinctively didn’t like his pitch about the impossibility of organic chemistry and I froze a little : personally I see no need for God’s personal, literal, physical intervention to make the ladders and spirals of genes – the DNA and RNA forming from the appropriate nucleotide bases – A, T, G, C.

And then the book’s author blew away his credibility, for me, at least, by getting bogged down in the absolutes of Physics, and ignoring Chemistry. He quoted the Laws of Thermodynamics, and claimed Entropy as proof that God doesn’t play dice because he’s in the garage playing mechanic. The direction of the universe, the arrow of time, plays towards randomness, the author of the book proclaimed. Order cannot come from inorganic matter – Life is the organising force.

At this, I took several forms of dispute, and immediately found in my mind the perfect counter-example – the formation of crystals from saturated solution – the building of the stalgamite and stalagtite from the sedimentary filtering of rainwater. Another example, I think, is chiral forms of molecular compounds – some chemicals behave in different ways if formed lefthandedly or righthandedly. The different forms behave predictably and consistently and this is an ordered behaviour that I believe – without the necessary university instruction in Chemistry – is an imposed denial of chaos.

In fact, the whole of Chemistry, its world of wonder in alchemy, I think points to a kind of natural negation of the Laws of Physics. There is the Micro World, where Newton, and more introspectively, Einstein, are correct in their theoretical pragmas. But in the Macro World, there is Chemistry, and there are precursor compounds to organic essentials. Life forms itself from dead stone. For a Physicist this is “just not cricket”, it is a whole new universe.

Why can Aluminium be used for containers in microwave ovens, but steel cannot ? And why is Aluminium so light ? Why does water expand when it freezes ? Here the Physicists can help out. But they cannot, when it comes to explaining, or even accurately predicting, all the chemical properties of alloys and compounds.

I have been pondering, in a crude, uneducated way, about industrial chemistry for the last couple of months. How large volume reactions are encouraged, catalysed. How fluids work. How gases breathe. My conclusion is that most chemical engineering is a bit brutish, like the workings of the internal combustion engine. Things are a tad forced. It is probably not possible for chemical engineers to replicate photosynthesis entirely – it’s too dainty for them. But that is the kind of chemistry we need to overcome our climate and energy problems.

We may not be able to match the leaves on the trees, but we can do gas chemistry and electricity and semiconductor physics, and it is gas chemistry and electricity and semiconductor physics that will save the planet. Electricity to replace much fuel. Semiconductor physics to bypass photosynthesis. And Renewable Gas chemistry – engineering the chemical building blocks of the future and providing backup to the other green energies.

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2012 : Greenier and Peace-ier

My dear family.

They think I’m an environmentalist, a bit radical, a bit confrontational.

So for a fun wintertime gift they bought me this lovely cloth tote(m) bag for grocery shopping.

I think I might have failed to communicate myself clearly enough.

Although I try to be frugal and efficient in my way of life, recycling is not my central agenda.

I studied physics, but I don’t have a laboratory. The things that I believe need to be developed are technologies in the field of clean, green energy. I am an engineer without a workshop – although my home is now a power station.

Recycling is important, but reducing the use of resource materials is far more important.

Recycling is important, but energy waste is far more important. Digging things out of the ground and burning them in order to keep civilisation moving is the ultimate misuse of natural resources.

Recycling is important, but so are international relations, especially around the sourcing of commodities such as fossil fuels, rare metals, timber and freshwater.

The world needs to work together – to make friends, not invent enemies – even more so when those so-called opponents sit on vital energy resources.

May you have a year that is greener and has more peace.

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The Storm

On my Christmas journey, on the train from Brussels, Belgium, to the Dutch border, besides the wind turbines, I counted the number of solar electric rooftop installations I could see. My estimate was that roughly 300 kilowatts of solar could be seen from the track.

There has been an explosion of deployment. The renewable energy policies that are behind this tide of photovoltaics in Flanders seem to be working, or have been until recently.

On my journey back from Holland to England, I pondered about the polders and the low-lying landscape around me. I don’t know what river it was we crossed, but the river was only held in place by narrow banks or dikes, as it was higher than the farmland around it – waterlogged fields in some places – where parcels of land were divided by stillwater ditches instead of hedges or fences.

“Oh no, we don’t have “Mary Poppins” on Dutch TV any more at Christmas every year like we used to. We’re going to see the film “The Storm”…” said my host. Curiouser and curiouser. “De Storm” is a film that harks back to an actual historical event, the major North Sea flooding in 1953. “I remember what it was like afterwards,” says an older English relative, “I visited Belgium and Holland with my aunt and uncle just after the flooding – he wanted to visit the family war graves. We stayed in Middelburg. You could see how high the water reached. There were tide marks this high on the side of the houses, and whelks left stuck on the walls.”

The film attempts to nail down the coffin casket lid of bad weather history. By telling the narrative of major, fearful floods of the past, people are distracted from the possibility that it may happen again. History is history, and the story tells the ending, and that’s a finish to it.

However, for some people, those people who know something of the progress of the science of global warming, this film is like a beacon – a flare on a rocky landing strip – lighting the way to the future crash of the climate and the rising of sea levels, which will bring havoc to The Netherlands, Dutch engineers or no Dutch engineers.

We have to be prepared for change, major change. If you or anyone you know has Dutch relatives and friends, think about whether you can invite them to live with you in future if things get really bad. One or two really bad storms combined with excessive tides and a few centimetres of sea level rise could be all it takes to wreck the country’s ability to organise water and destroy a significant amount of agricultural land.

“I’ve been studying Climate Change science”, I told another host. “You believe in Climate Change ?”, he asked, somewhat incredulously. “It’s 200 years of science”, I replied, smiling, “but we probably shouldn’t discuss it. I don’t think it would be very productive.”

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Urbanity, Durbanity #2

The following was written by Aubrey Meyer in November before the United Nations climate change talks, reportedly in response to a proposal by Damian Carrington of The Guardian newspaper, although it was not published there.

UN = United Nations
UNFCCC = United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

What chance a climate deal in Durban ?

Representatives of over a hundred nations meeting in Durban at the end of the month will “seek to advance the implementation of the (UNFCCC) Convention and the Kyoto Protocol” in the words of the organisers of the UN’s seventeenth annual climate change meeting.

Kyoto was adopted in 1997, came into force in 2005 and will expire next year with dangerous emissions growing faster than ever. At this rate of advance we are at grave risk of being overcome by uncontrollable climate change. Many senior climate scientists think it could already be too late.

The International Energy Agency, in its 2011 World Energy Outlook, said that we cannot delay further action to tackle climate change and that the door to 2 degrees Celsius is closing. It says that the world is currently on a trajectory to a temperature increase of 6° Celsius or more.

As long ago as 2007, the UK Government’s Committee on Climate Change said that it is not now possible to ensure with high likelihood that a temperature rise of more than 2°C is avoided. It then assigned a less than even chance of success to its statutory emissions reduction plan in the Climate Act.

Since those calculations were made there have been developments in the science that give even greater cause for concern, with some government scientists saying there is now little to no chance of maintaining the global mean surface temperature increase at or below 2°C.

A fresh approach is now required. We probably have no more than four years to effect a downturn in global emissions. That change in direction must initiate a fullterm global emissions reduction path to a point where a safe and stable temperature level is achieved.

The question is where do we start ? The voluntary national reduction plans emerging from the Cancun negotiations are completely inadequate. The notion that they can be advanced over time to a realistic global target will result in too little too late.

But behind the headlines, negotiating postures have shifted significantly since Kyoto. They have moved beyond the complete stand-off between developed and developing countries. By agreeing to set voluntary national emissions targets, developing countries have recognised that they too must participate in a global action plan from the start if the two degree limit is to be met.

This places the delicate issue of historical responsibility as a second order consideration and opens the door to negotiation within agreed global targets.

Even more encouraging is the wide recognition of the principle of equal per capita entitlements to emit, with the accompanying right to trade those entitlements. This principle is at the core of the climate mitigation policy framework proposed at the UN by the Global Commons Institute based in London and which has many supporters in the UN process.

The Contraction & Convergence (C&C) policy framework was first negotiated at the UNFCCC in Kyoto, Japan in 1997, when Developing Countries led by the Africa Group, India and China, proposed C&C as part of the Kyoto Protocol.

Contraction & Convergence (C&C) is an approach to meeting the objective of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) : to reduce the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to a value that is both safe and stable.

Contraction refers to the global reduction in greenhouse gas emissions that is needed to prevent dangerous climate change. Within this contraction, the world’s nations would converge on an equal per capita sharing of that carbon contraction budget. With contraction we obviously get convergence, the only question arising is how to organise it.

The atmosphere is a global commons and everyone has an equal right to emit greenhouse gases into it. If you don’t stand for that, you have to defend inequality which the majority will clearly reject. Climate change is an issue of survival and equity is the price of that survival.

In July 2009, fully five months before COP15 in Copenhagen, the Chinese Government publicly accepted the C&C principle for UNFCCC negotiations, and stated a willingness to negotiate rates of C&C based on immediate convergence to per capita equality of emissions entitlements worldwide.

They stressed the difference between actual per capita emissions and emissions ‘entitlements’ and pointed out that international emissions trading can absorb the difference between the two.

The C&C principle is embedded in the UK Climate Act of 2008. However, the rate of convergence is prescribed to complete only by 2050, within an overall 100 year contraction of emissions. The UK was part of a group of developed country Governments that prescribed these rates of C&C to the rest of the world in Copenhagen.

Since overall this prescription gave Developed Countries on average twice the per capita entitlements of the Developing Countries while 80% of the budget was consumed by 2050, the entire thing was unsurprisingly rejected by those countries – China memorably amongst them – as prescriptive and unfair to them. The UK publicly and naively denounced China for ‘wrecking the negotiations’.

The US had supported C&C earlier in the UN process, but continues to reject any renewal of the ‘one-sided’ Kyoto Protocol, because it logically refuses a way forward that excludes Developing Countries from emissions control. They, on the other hand, continue to reject prescriptions from Developed Countries that they regard as unfair.

The way to break this deadlock is clear: the UK should stop prescribing and become willing to broker negotiation of an agreement at the UNFCCC based on the C&C principle but at a faster rate of convergence to equal per capita emissions entitlements globally.

This way all nations or regions become part of an agreement that will be rational, consensual and fair. We can get on with achieving UNFCCC-compliance at rates that retain some chance of avoiding dangerous climate change.

On sight of a letter to this effect sent to Ban Ki Moon (another C&C supporter), the Chinese Government again showed interest. Why don’t we ?

Aubrey Meyer, Global Commons Institute

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Urbanity, Durbanity

People working for non-governmental, and governmental, organisations can be rather defensive when I criticise the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change or UNFCCC. What ? I don’t back the international process ? Climate change, after all, is a borderless crime, and will take global policing. Well, I back negotiations for a global treaty in principle, but not in practice.

The annual wearisome jousting and filibustering events just before Christmas do not constitute for me a healthy, realistic programme of engagement, imbued with the full authority and support of global leadership structures and civil society. People can try to spin it and claim success, but that’s just whitewash on an ungildable tomb.

The Climate Change talks that have just taken place in Durban, South Africa, were exemplary of a peculiar kind of collective madness that has resulted from trying to navigate and massage endless special interests, national jostling, brinkmanship, unworkable and inappropriate proposals from economists, communications failures and corporate interference in governance.

The right people with real decisionmaking powers are not at the negotiating table. The organisations with most to contribute are still acting in opposition – that’s the energy industry, to be explicit. And the individual national governments are still not concerned enough about climate change, even though it impacts strongly on the things they do consider to be priorities – economic health, trade and political superiority.

Over 20 years ago, the debate on what to do to tackle global warming and still maintain good international relations was already won, by the commonsense approach of Contraction and Convergence – fair shares for all. Each country should count on their fair share of carbon emissions based on their population – and we would get there by starting from where we are now and agreeing mutual cuts. The big emitters would agree to steeper cuts than the lower emitters – and after some time, everybody in the world would have the same, safe emissions rights.

What has prevented this logical approach from being implemented ? Well, we have had the so-called “flexible mechanisms” pushed on us – such as the Clean Development Mechanism which essentially boils down to the idea that the richer high-emitting countries can offset their carbon by paying for poorer low emissions countries to cut their carbon instead. Some have been attempting to make the CDM carbon credits into a commercial product for the Carbon Trading market. Some may contest it, but the CDM and carbon trading haven’t really been working very well, and anyway, the CDM doesn’t aim for emissions reductions, just offsets.

Other carbon trade has been implemented, such as the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), which doesn’t appear to have caused high emissions industries to diversify out of carbon, or created a viable price for carbon dioxide, so its usefulness is questionable.

Many people have put forward the idea of straight carbon pricing, mostly by taxation. The trouble with this idea should be obvious, but rarely is. Over four-fifths of the world’s energy is fossil fuel based. Taxing carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels would just make everything, everywhere, more expensive. It wouldn’t necessarily create new lower carbon energy resources, as the taxes would probably be put into a giant climate change adaptation fund – a financial institution proposed by several people including Oliver Tickell and Nicholas Stern, although in Stern’s case, he is calling for direct grants from countries to keep the fund topped up.

On the policy front, there has been a continuing, futile attempt to force the historially high-emitting countries to accept very radical carbon cuts, as a sign of accountability. This “grandfathering” of emissions responsibilities is something that no sane person in government in the richer nations could ever agree with, not even when being smothered with ethical guilt. One of the forms of this proposal is “Greenhouse Development Rights“, essentially allowing countries like China to continue growing their emissions in order to grow their economies to guarantee development. The emissions cuts required by countries like the United States of America would be impossible to achieve, not even if their economy completely toppled.

Sadly, a number of charities, aid and development agencies and other non-governmental organisations with concern for the world’s poor, have signed up to Greenhouse Development Rights not realising it is completely untenable.

The only approach that can work, that both high- and low-emitting countries can ever possibly be made to agree on, is a system of population-proportional shares of the global carbon pie. And the way to get there has to be based on relative current emissions, ignoring the emissions of the past – your cuts should be larger if your current emissions are large. And it should be based on the relative size of the population, and their individual emissions rates, rather than taking a country as a whole. Yes, there will be room for a little carbon trade between nations, to enable the transfer of low carbon technologies from wealthy nations to un-resourced nations. Yes, there will be space for enterprise, as corporations have to face regulation to cut emissions, and will need innovation in technology to divest themselves of fossil fuel production and consumption.

This is Contraction and Convergence – and you ignore it at our peril.

A few suggestions for further reading :-

“Contraction and Convergence The Global Solution to Climate Change” by Aubrey Meyer. Schumacher Briefings, Green Books, December 2000. ISBN-13: 978-1870098946

The Greenhouse Effect : Science and Policy” by Professor Stephen H. Schneider, Science, Volume 243, Issue 4892, Pages 771 – 781, DOI: 10.1126/science.243.4892.771, 10 February 1989.
https://www.sciencemag.org/content/243/4892/771.abstract
https://stephenschneider.stanford.edu/Publications/PDF_Papers/
https://stephenschneider.stanford.edu/Publications/Publications.html

“Climate Change : Science and Policy“, edited by Stephen H. Schneider, Armin Rosencranz, Michael D. Mastrandea and Kristin Kuntz-Duriseti. Island Press, 10 February 2010. ISBN-13: 978-1597265669

“The Greenhouse Effect : Negotiating Targets” by Professor Michael Grubb, published by the Royal Institute of International Affairs (RIIA) in London, 1990.

“Equity, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, and Global Common Resources” by Paul Baer, Chapter 15 in “Climate Change Policy : A Survey” by Stephen H. Schneider, Armin Rosencranz and John O. Niles, Island Press, 2002. ISBN-10: 1-55963-881-8 (Paper), ISBN-13: 978-1-55963-881-4 (Paper)

“Kyoto 2 : How to Manage the Global Greenhouse” by Oliver Tickell, ISBN-13: 978-1848130258, Zed Books Ltd, 25 July 2008
https://www.kyoto2.org/
https://www.kyoto2.org/docs/the_land_1.pdf

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Advent Joy : Christmas Rose

Audete, Gaudete !
Christus est natus
Ex Maria Virgine,
Gaudete !

Tempus adest gratiae,
Hoc quod optabamus;
Carmina laetitiae,
Devote reddamus.

Deus homo factus est,
Natura mirante;
Mundus renovatus est
A Christo regnante…

Welcome, little Christmas rose, into a big and troubled world. We are so happy you’ve made your journey safely, we could sing heartily.

The world is no closer to a binding, enactable accord on preventing catastrophic climate change, but at least the Durban United Nations conference is over, and many are therefore sleepily rejoicing.

Continue reading “Advent Joy : Christmas Rose”
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First Arcticane of Wintertide

Image Credit : Copyright 2011 EUMETSAT

Something not completely dissimilar to a hurricane or a typhoon has been gusting at incredibly high speeds through the lowlands of Scotland today – and further afield.

Yet, regardless of whether this heralds the start of a proper snow-and-ice winter, it’s not likely to prevent 2011 being one of the hottest years ever.

July and August, worldwide, were nearly the hottest on record in 2011. Meanwhile, the Blob Chart tells the story in a way that nobody can deny.

Meanwhile, in Durban, South Africa, the world’s governments struggle to make sense. A healthy economy is a carbon-emitting economy – because industrial energy causes high carbon emissions. What needs to happen is that the energy production businesses start to diversify their portfolio – increasing the amount of energy they produce from renewable, sustainable low carbon resources, whilst decreasing the amount of fossil fuel energy they supply.

It can’t be left to individual “big hitters” to kick-start the renewable energy revolution – it requires transnational, international, multi-national and national energy companies to start to displace carbon from their products.

If they don’t, they will face mass disinvestment, as ethical concerns rise up the agenda of investor groups and funds. So, BP, Shell and Exxon Mobil – if you don’t start switching from selling us hydrocarbons to selling us renewable energy, your businesses will under-compete. You have been notified.

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Clicking with Climate

Image Credit : University of California at Berkeley

Human beings have two brains. The first is a self-centred workhorse of pragmatic decision-making, interested in social engagement in order to further individual interests – whether those interests are purely for personal enrichment or for the reward of the social group more widely.

The second human brain is a relativistic engine, constantly comparing, reflecting, analysing. We are concerned about other peoples’ emotional response, wondering what other people think about us, responding to peer group pressure.

Are we more successful, popular than others ? Do people listen to us more than others ? We know we’re right, but do they ? We need to pitch ourselves in the right way. We jostle for pole position, for a place on the platform, hoping not to make too many opponents, whilst making more converts to our point of view.

Personally, I don’t listen to my second brain very often. As a social animal, I hope I’m tolerant, and my priorities in interpersonal engagement are mutual empowerment, transparent collaboration and inclusion. In my public projection, I’m not trying to vaunt myself over others, or massage my image for approval, or put up a fake facade. You get me, you get direct.

But I can’t avoid the second human brain entirely – as it is the reason for a lot of fuzziness in our view of the world around us. It’s too easy to stir doubt, falsehoods and bad ideas into the collective cake mix of society, where it fizzes into a bubbling mess. In matters of climate change science and energy engineering, there are no grey areas for me. But for a number of people I know, these are subjects of much confusion, denial and disinformation.

People hold on to the totem of what other people think. And so you have even very intelligent social commentators reciting from paid-for public relations by companies and business pressure groups. Journalists often do not appear to understand the difference between pseudo-science and real live science. There are too many people selling unrealistic, unworkable technological “solutions”, particularly in energy, so it’s hard to know what to accept and what to dismiss.

Yet it is critical to know what rock, what branch to keep a hold of in the flood of information that could sweep us away. The social construction of climate change is an important edifice, a safe house in an information world at war with itself. What high wind can sweep away the grubby pages of non-science from the Daily Mail ? What rising sea can cleanse the Daily Telegraph of its climate change denial columnists ? What can stop the so-called Global Warming Policy Foundation from infecting the Internet with their contrarian position ? What can make us accept the reality and urgency of global warming ? How can we learn to click with climate change ?

Three significant academic thinkers on the social significance of climate change are launching new works at the British Library in London, on 16th January 2012. The British Sociological Association have invited Mike Hulme, John Urry and Gordon Walker to discuss chapters from their recent books which address the question – where next for society and climate change ?

In the words of Chris Shaw at the University of Sussex, “they pull no punches in their analyses, and their approach is based on years of research into the social dimensions of the climate change debate. This is an essential opportunity for all those interested in bringing climate change into the democratic sphere, to help understand the issues involved in such a transition. It is also a chance to discuss the ideas with the authors and other delegates.”

For more information, see here and here.

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Cantor Mirabilis

The confusion in St Paul’s Churchyard this morning at around 11.45 am was a metaphor for the international Climate Change negotiations.

One stream of people with banners was moving east to west, on their way from Cheapside to Blackfriars Bridge. The other stream of people with banners and a large Police accompaniment was making their way from west to east on a “Walk of Shame” of the City of London.

Earlier, in St Mary-le-Bow church on Cheapside, we had been praying for a unity of purpose for the Durban United Nations talks. For the expression of tolerance, love, openness, conviction, determination, resolve.

I read the Scripture passage, in my normal theatrical style, “…I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God…”

Later, as we made our way into St Paul’s Cathedral for choral evensong and prayers for the planet, I stopped briefly to chat with some Occupy people smoking and jamming a little guitar. “We’re going in to pray for good things for the climate change talks. Do you want to come in too ?”. A young man replied, “It’s too late. There’s so much carbon in the atmosphere already, the Earth is going to fry.”

The singer of the Collects for the day made the very arch of the nave of St Paul’s resonate. Tradition. Lasting.

There were nearly 3,000 people on the Climate Justice March that we had been on. Transient.

The City-wide Christmas Market brought reindeer to Cheapside this morning. There they were, just the two of them, in a pen made of traffic control railings, munching on straw. Here, for one night only. Incongruous. Sometimes I wonder why people do these things.

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Fossilised Minds : That’s Britain !

Also, see another word cloud and another.

I had the most dire misfortune to have sat through a television marvel on Wednesday – BBC One’s “That’s Britain”, which contained, in one short dumb-downed programme, enough propaganda about energy to warrant my total disdain.

I had never seen this televisual abomination before, and I was amused at the opportunities for cynicism in audience participation. It is possible to e-mail the producers of the show with the subject heading of those things that annoy you the most.

They call this activity “talking to the wall”, and they create a “word cloud” from the e-mail traffic several times during the course of the programme and discuss the results.

Standing adroitly in front of the “wall” to not quite conceal the phrases “The Wall” and “That’s Britain”, which indicated that not all viewers are fans of the programme, the presenters batted between them disparaging thoughts on wind turbines – since “wind turbines” were almost as unpopular as “dog poo”.

One wind farm, apparently, had been issued with a Noise Abatement Order !

The solution to noisy wind turbines, they claimed with a snort, whinny and jeer, had been found – turn them off when it’s windy !

They allowed the cognitive dissonance of this statement to ring in peoples’ minds. You, the audience, are intelligent. You know that wind turbines are designed to work when the wind blows. So, turning off wind turbines when the wind is blowing makes them useless.

And then, almost immediately, we were treated to an investigative report scripted at the level of a childrens’ TV broadcast, with Adrian Edmondson, “The Insider”.

To a background of stirring orchestral music, a helicopter surveyed Didcot Power Station. Oh mighty coal ! How grateful are we to thee, our succour and our strength ! Do you know that the UK relies on coal to generate 49% (or somesuch number) of our electricity ?

With unparalleled access, Ade gets to see the guts of the barely legal coal burning power plant, and then play at God in the beating heart of the National Grid, where demand is matched with supply. Those “godless” electricity consumers ! They all turn their kettles on at the same time ! During the hymns of the Royal Wedding ! It caused a spike in demand !

Nobody asks the question “Why are manufacturing companies still allowed to sell 3000 Watt kettles ?”

One e-mail was read out, and the writer made to sound a bit of a killjoy, something along the lines of “It’s all very well complaining about wind turbines, but none of your viewers have suggested any means to produce sustainable energy.”

Nobody questioned the source of the anti-wind power statements. Nobody questioned the truth and accuracy behind the scorn levelled at wind energy. Nobody questioned the deference to the major coal-fired power generation businesses. Nobody questioned whether the Reign of Old King Coal might be coming to an end. Nobody questioned whether supplies of fossil fuels might be challenged within a decade. Nobody questioned why wind power is such a successful, cost-efficient technology. Nobody questioned why the British energy-bill-paying public are going to be forced to pay extra for offshore wind power – turbines at sea – because of a small number of British landowners and false environmentalists that don’t want wind power on their land and their “precious landscapes”, but would rather have nuclear/coal/gas power plants – probably because they’ve got shares in fossil fuels and atomic energy construction companies.

So, the BBC proves once again that it is biased and ill-informed. Worse still, the BBC is perfectly happy to propagandise its viewers.

It’s no use complaining to the BBC itself, because their complaints system doesn’t work. And it’s no good complaining to the Press Complaints Commission because they’re toothless. All I can do is never watch this rubbish telly again. If you want my advice, I’d advise you to avoid it too. And if we all do the same, then, maybe, their lack of ratings might show them they’re treading water.

Categories
Assets not Liabilities Design Matters Economic Implosion Political Nightmare Solar Sunrise

Solar FIT To Bust #10

Part 1 : 29th November 2011
Part 2 : 1st December 2011


On Tuesday, Jeremy Leggett of the company SolarCentury alerted the Twitterati to the recording of the UK Parliament House of Commons joint committee meeting of the Environmental Audit Committee and the Energy and Climate Change Committee, so I snapped on over and took a gander.

I was treated to a marvel of confusion over numbers, figures and viewpoints. The spectacle of Greg Barker MP’s performance in committee was wildly entertaining, probably not the kind of effect he intended. He seemed to treat the discussion as an opportunity to keep insisting on his one precious ultimatum – to cut the solar photovoltaic feed in tariff subsidy in half, several months early, with only a few weeks’ warning, on 12th December 2011.

As I was taking in his presentation, I suddenly became aware that I’d seen something very similar to this before – a Minister seemingly somewhat jokingly pushing for something indefensible. I suddenly realised I was watching what could easily have been scripted as a scene in the film “In the Loop“.

Tom Hollander and Greg Barker – twins, separated at birth ?

On a more serious note, during the second part of the committee meeting, held today, 1st December 2011, Her Majesty’s Treasury admitted that the tax revenue from the solar feed-in tariff scheme equated to the level of funds made available; although there were questions about whether the FiT should be considered public spending or not; questions about whether the FiT would contribute overall to the Economy; and a total absence of concrete figures yet again.

But’s let’s go back and look at what the real problem is. The solar electric industry was given to understand that the full feed-in tariff would run until April 2012. Thousands of individiuals, communities and companies borrowed money and signed contracts on that basis – and companies had order books that were very healthy. Equipment was ordered and partly or fully paid for. Goods were in transit. Scaffolders, roofers, fitters, electricians and designers were all busy as bees in Spring, buzzing all over roofs, countrywide.

Everybody thought they had until April to get their solar installation done. Then, suddenly, they didn’t. They had less than two months. Panic on the streets of London, and everywhere else, too. It would be impossible to get everybody’s solar system up before the deadline.

So, the race to complete solar installations was on. The number of completions started to rise exponentially. And suddenly, the Department of Energy and Climate Change got the justification that they needed to confirm pulling the rug out from under the scheme. The very high levels of solar installations in the weeks preceding the full feed-in tariff cut-off date suddenly made it look very, very expensive.

Meanwhile, a number of people have had to be made redundant, many deposits have been withdrawn, and many people must be facing anxieties about whether they can pay back the money they have borrowed if they miss the FiT deadline.

Despite all the confusion, there is one fact that is clear – there will be vastly fewer solar photovoltaic installations in January 2012 than there were in November 2011.

Because of the long period from survey to completion, cutting the scheme short with six weeks notice effectively cut the heart out of the solar PV industry.

So that’s a bust, then.

Categories
Climate Change Faithful God Protest & Survive

St Paul’s Cathedral Prayers for the Climate

CHRISTIAN ECOLOGY LINK
PRESS RELEASE

PRAYERS FOR THE CLIMATE AT ST PAUL’S CATHEDRAL

Prayers for the success of the United Nations Climate Change
negotiations in Durban will be said during choral evensong at St
Paul’s Cathedral on Saturday 3rd December 2011 starting at 5.00 pm, following the end of the annual Climate Justice March in Central
London.

Canon Michael Hampel, Precentor of St Paul’s Cathedral Chapter confirmed today (1st December 2011) that the prayers would be held at St Paul’s on Saturday at 5.00 pm and said, “Reverence for God’s creation is not only something to sing about in church. It demands proper debate and action if we are to be good stewards of the riches with which God has entrusted us.”

Ruth Jarman of Christian Ecology Link said “I am delighted that St Paul’s has announced today that the prayers will be said. It is vital for our children’s sake that we curb greenhouse gas emissions”, and added, “I can’t think of a better way to end a noisy day of protest that to go to choral evensong at St Paul’s.”

Throughout the day, representatives of the faith communities will be taking part in a range of events in London to mark the global talks. Members of the Green Christian community will end their Climate Justice March day as they started it – in worshipful prayer.

Other events during the day are set to include :-

(*) A Climate Vigil beside the Thames the midnight before (Friday 2nd December 2011)
(*) A Service at 11.30 am Saturday 3rd December 2011 at St Mary le Bow organised by Christian Ecology Link.
(*) The Climate Justice March 1 pm and Rally outside Parliament at 2.30 pm, Saturday 3rd December 2011.

PROGRAMME OF DAY

The night before the march, a Climate Refugee Vigil will be held on the Thames foreshore near the Millennium Bridge between 11.30 pm on Friday 2nd December 2011 and 1.00 am on Saturday 3rd December 2011, to which all faith community members are welcome.

Christian Ecology Link is holding a time of prayer and meditation at 11.30 am on Saturday 3rd December 2011 at St Mary-le-Bow church in Cheapside, London EC2V 6AU to pray for the success of the United Nations climate conference in Durban, South Africa, which is happening during the two weeks either side of that weekend. Revd Steve Paynter, member of the Operation Noah board will lead the service. All are welcome.

At 12.00 midday on Saturday 3rd December 2011, the faith communities will leave the church to join the Climate Justice March and Rally organised by the Campaign against Climate Change. The march will start from the north end of Blackfriars Bridge at around 1.00 pm. People are asked to march in support of the tens of thousands mobilising in South Africa, demanding climate justice at the Durban climate talks.

The London march will culminate at 2.30 pm with a Climate Justice Rally outside Parliament. Attendees will physically form a photo opportunity by splitting into two groups to represent the 7 percent global privileged versus the 50 percent suffering climate injustice, and demand urgent action to achieve a Zero Carbon Britain by 2030.

Christian Ecology Link members and supporters will continue on to St Paul’s Cathedral for the commencement of choral evensong at 5.00 pm.

Bishop David Atkinson, member of the Board of Operation Noah which is supporting the St. Mary-le-Bow service, said, “Care for God’s creation is a crucial dimension of Christian discipleship and a central part of Christian mission. Responding to the threat of climate change by reducing our dependence on fossil fuels is a Christian responsibility and one which we share with all people, especially on behalf of the poorest parts of the world, future generations and the wellbeing of all creatures. Our prayers are for all those involved in the United Nations talks in Durban, that they may be given wisdom and courage to act with justice for the good of all people and all God’s creation.”

In November the World Council of Churches general secretary, Revd Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, called the United Nations UNFCCC COP 17 meeting a “last opportunity for the international community to be responsible in addressing climate change”, and called on the meeting to “act now for climate justice.”

For further details on the role of the faith communities in these events, contact Ruth Jarman, Climate Change campaigner for Christian Ecology Link.

ENDS

NOTES FOR THE EDITOR

1. South Africa is host of the next round of talks under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which will be held in Durban from 28th November – 9th December 2011. The timing is critical, as the only legally binding international agreement to limit emissions that we currently have – the Kyoto Protocol – is due to end in 2012.

2. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in a recent publication has reported that the risk from extreme weather events due to climate change is likely to increase.

3. The International Energy Agency has announced that it will not be possible to stop global temperatures rising 2 degrees C above pre-industrial levels without a rapid decision to reverse the growth of the current fossil fuel infrastructure.

4. Christian Ecology Link believes we are responsible for our impact on God’s creation. The organisation helps members to understand and relate these responsibilities to their faith. Members can then encourage others in their local church to think seriously about these issues. CEL was formed in 1981, and formally constituted in 1982 and supports Christians from all backgrounds and traditions. https://www.christian-ecology.org.uk

5. Operation Noah is a Christian charity providing leadership, focus and inspiration in response to the growing threat of catastrophic climate change. https://www.operationnoah.org

6. Founded in or around 1080 as the London headquarters of the archbishops of Canterbury, the medieval church of St Mary-le-Bow survived three devastating collapses before being completely destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666. Rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren, it was destroyed once more in 1941 but was again rebuilt and re-consecrated in 1964. https://www.stmarylebow.co.uk

7. The Climate Justice March and Rally are being organised by the Campaign against Climate Change https://www.campaigncc.org and supported by Artists Project Earth https://www.apeuk.org/.

8. The focus of this year’s national Climate Justice March is the 7:50 percent injustice divide – where 7 percent of the world’s population produce 50 percent of the world’s emissions and 7 percent of the world’s emissions are produced by 50 percent of the world’s population.

9. Zero Carbon Britain is a plan from the Centre for Alternative Technology https://www.zerocarbonbritain.com

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Sadly, concrete always seems to win

I had no intention of actually dirtying my hands by buying The Times of London to read today, but I scanned its headline on the display. “Search for growth lifts estuary airport hopes”, it proudly announced.

And that’s when I realised, that, sadly, even after the lessons of decades of poorly planned infrastructure development, concrete still always seems to win over common sense.

Some people may be most concerned at the Chancellor or the Exchequer’s diktat on freezing public sector pay, just to “put the boot in” conveniently ahead of a national one day strike over worsening pensions management.

But I’m more concerned about his sudden conversion to Keynesianism. He seems to want to create lots of construction jobs, widening roads and motorways, laying foundations for nuclear power reactors, and perhaps throwing Portland cement over large parts of the Essex coast for a new “hub” airport.

Yes, this would create economic growth of a kind. Productivity would rise, employment would rise, income tax revenue would rise. But it would be the equivalent of sending a team of workpeople to dig a trench for no reason whatsoever, and sending another team to fill it in the next day.

What this country needs is assets, not liabilities. We need to build infrastructure that will enable economic productivity and social wellbeing and not place a long-term drain on society and the public purse. Roads, nuclear power plants and airports are all potential liabilities. Here’s just a few reasons why :-

Continue reading “Sadly, concrete always seems to win”
Categories
Climate Change Political Nightmare Regulatory Ultimatum

Fight Harder, Gregory Barker !

Image Credit : Christian Ecology Link

CHRISTIAN ECOLOGY LINK
PRESS RELEASE
26 NOVEMBER 2011

MINISTER TOLD TO FIGHT HARD FOR THE CLIMATE AT DURBAN

Minister of State for Climate Change, Gregory Barker MP faced questions from a local coalition of charities and environmental campaign groups at an ‘African Climate Connection’ event ahead of the United Nations conference in Durban, South Africa.

The event took place on Saturday 26 November at St Peter’s Church, Bexhill a few days before Mr Barker was due to fly to Durban to participate in the negotiations.

Gregory Barker said ‘I am concerned about the lack of urgency at the climate talks. The COP climate conferences are becoming a way of life for some people. We need to look at the science. In Durban I want to close the gap between countries’ pledges and what scientists say we need.’ He pledged to work for global agreement for a single legally binding treaty to keep temperature rises below 2° Celsius while acknowledging how difficult this will be. He also wants to move forward the work on climate finance, adaptation and protection of forests started at Cancun.

The group called for the government to take a lead at the climate talks by ensuring more finance is made available for developing countries to adapt to the effects of climate change, develop low carbon economies and protect forests. Denis Lucey of CEL and the WDM said, ‘Climate change has largely been caused by rich industrialised countries like the UK. Poor countries like Bangladesh, Nepal and Mozambique desperately need funds to help them deal with climate change, but the World Bank loans being pushed by our government will only drive them deeper into poverty. We are asking Greg Barker to take our concerns to the UN talks and help ensure that solutions to climate change also tackle poverty. Otherwise they won’t work.’

Jack Doherty, local Fairtrade leader, asked the minister to take with him to Durban an apology from the developed world on the damage we have caused to the climate with our emissions.

CEL Secretary Barbara Echlin ended the meeting with a strong plea to the minister to fight hard for the vital global deal that the world needs if we are to avoid climate chaos, storms and droughts.

The event was attended by over 60 people and supported by a mix of local branches of national charities and agencies, and locally based groups: Bexhill Environmental Group, CAFOD, Christian Aid, Christian Ecology Link, Fairtrade Bexhill, Friends of the Earth, Operation Noah, Rother Environmental Group, Tearfund, United Nations Association and World Development Movement.

NOTES

Photo: CEL and WDM members Barbara Echlin (foreground), Denis and Christina Lucey presenting Mr Barker (second from left) with a long paper chain bearing messages demanding climate aid be given as grants, not as loans, and for the money to be channelled through the new green climate fund instead of the World Bank.

CEL Secretary Barbara Echlin chaired the meeting. She attends St Peter’s church and believes care of the environment to be a Christian issue. She has had an array of solar PV panels on her roof for five years and is part of the CEL ecocell group trying to reduce household emissions – https://www.greenchristian.org.uk/ecocell

CONTACT DETAILS : For further information, contact Barbara Echlin : secretary@christian-ecology.org.uk

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Daily Mail : Editorial Schizophrenia

I was in my local cafe diner, screening for neighbourhood gossip and genning up on the Daily Mail’s latest scandal and outrage. Several stories were told from different angles throughout the grubby pages of the well-thumbed copy I was sifting through. “You know”, I mused, “I think they might actually want their readers to become schizophrenic.”

On the front page the headline “RESTORE ELITISM TO OUR SCHOOLS“. The editorial line seemed to be aimed at persuading the readers to find Michael Gove’s speech just as “extraordinary” as the writer did – “extraordinary” as in “bad”. This, after all, is a newspaper that often seems to want to portray itself as succour for the common man.

On page 7, however, the same story took on a nanny-ish tone “We must demand more of our teachers… and our children : And here’s why it matters: for the first time 1m [million] youngsters are not in work or education.” So, presumably, the writer of this piece was having a dig at teachers and their performance. Plus it was also having a swipe at out-of-work out-of-the-classroom “scrounger” teenagers.

Where, I asked myself, was the analysis of why so many young people were without a role in life, without prospects ? Where are the jobs, work placements and apprenticeships for “youngsters” ? The statistics show that there are not enough openings for every NEET.

Continue reading “Daily Mail : Editorial Schizophrenia”
Categories
Global Heating Solar Sunrise

Silent Light

José González : “Crosses”

 Solar radiation falls as silently as snow, causing sub-atomic particles to take a quantum leap in my rooftop doped silicon devices. These are solar cells “made of a thin mono-crystalline silicon wafer surrounded by ultra-thin amorphous silicon layers”, and they are much more efficient than equipment of the past.

After barely a fizz or a rasp from the linking wires and gadgets, through the magic of physics and electronics combined, electric juice quietly flows out from my generation meter to the world at large.

Without making any great noise, I am personally lightening the load, with the help of light. National electricity generation is beset by problems of inefficiency and carbon-intensive fossil fuel combustion. Me, I hope to offset some of that, displace a certain amount of carbon dioxide emissions.

In the first week I have had solar electric panels, running my home has consumed roughly 18 kilowatt hours (kWh) of electric power, and I have generated roughly 9 kWh. Not bad for the time of year and the general weather conditions. If this were scaled up, if more and more people installed solar power, that could mean the country as a whole could spend a whole lot less on energy imports.

Yes, only a few people are getting the Feed in Tariff for electricity generation at home, but raising the contribution of power from solar means energy bills could be slashed, for everyone. I’m doing it for us.

Continue reading “Silent Light”
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Dances With Energy Bills

After the recent notorious Panorama programme on energy prices, and yesterday evening’s debate on renewable energy and the costs of green energy policy, in the House of Commons, a number of people have commented that Members of Parliament and Ministers of the UK Government appear to know very few facts – and those they can remember they seem to quote in the wrong context.

This state of affairs is disgraceful, and allows mendacious narratives to persist in the mainstream media.
RenewableUK contacted me and asked me to embed a YouTube offering some corrective information. I was very pleased to do so. I can assure my readers that I have not and will not be paid for doing so.

The key problem is not the cost to energy bill payers from direct subsidies such as the solar photovoltaic feed in tariff. The contribution from this is minor. The largest effect on energy bills is likely to come from two sources – the Energy Company Obligation and the plans for Carbon Pricing and other measures in the Electricity Market Reform.

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Carbon Pricing Policy Warfare Price Control Solar Sunrise Wind of Fortune

Solar FIT to Bust #9

The feed-in tariff proposals made by the UK Government Department of Energy and Climate Change would only add £6.00 a year to household bills by 2020.

By comparison, the cost of supporting nuclear power through a carbon price floor and other measures could cost each home energy bill payer something of the order of £60.00 a year.


Which, I ask you, offers the better value ? And will the UK Government double the Feed-in Tariff Budget, and slow down the reduction in solar photovoltaic FiT payments ?

Besides wind farm development, solar microgeneration development appears to be the fastest-growing electricity generation resource in the UK. The amounts that are required from the public finances to support it are minuscule compared to the grand schemes of carbon pricing and other contract-based measures to encourage investment in large, centralised low carbon power plants.

It’s a bitter truth, but carbon pricing won’t stop the burning of coal for power generation. Pricing carbon will only benefit already existing nuclear power plants – it won’t stimulate energy companies to build new ones. Only renewable electricity generation can displace the emissions from burning coal.

Any pragmatist would conclude – let’s go with solar and wind ! And let’s keep the incentives that are working !

Ask your democratic representative, a Member of the UK Parliament, to support the current levels of solar electric feed-in tariff : 0207 219 3000. The debate starts at 4pm today :-

https://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/house_of_commons/newsid_9645000/9645195.stm

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Bad Science Bait & Switch Delay and Deny Divide & Rule Fair Balance Hide the Incline Mass Propaganda Media Non-Science Science Rules Scientific Fallacy Sustainable Deferment

Climategate 2011 : It’s like déjà vu, all over again

If I had funding of the order of £494,625.00, I wouldn’t waste most of it on legal costs, I would spend it on a decent communications campaign – something fresh and not smelling of two year old turkey sandwiches.

Climategate 2011 ? It all smells like déjà vu, all over again. It’s so fresh, it’s practically putrid. Who’s going to take this seriously ?

If I were to have a word with the media outreach team of the organisation behind Climategate, I’d recommend they try climbing up the strategy ladder a bit. As Michael E. Mann says, this latest “release” of electronic mail, that is actually several years out of date, is “pathetic“.

Electronic mail is informal – it does not constitute official publication of facts or figures. It is not formal research; it is “free speech” dialogue, protected under numerous laws in many jurisdictions. For the climate change sceptics to base their arguments against climate change science on the basis of climate change scientists’ e-mail is ridiculous. No, it’s worse than ridiculous, it’s laugh-out-loud weak. Anyone who has been drawn into the Climategate narrative is not thinking very carefully, or they would realise how tendentious and flimsy it is.

Look guys, we’ve had the inquiries, the reports, the investigations, the debates. You lost. Get over it. The climate change scientists have done nothing wrong. Start reading the actual science instead of the trumped-up nothing-there scandal.

Global Warming is a fact. It’s caused by excessive human greenhouse gas emissions. Climate Change is real, it’s happening now, and it’s causing damages around the world. It’s going to get worse – much worse – if we don’t have an integrated policy response.

All the recommendations of the economists have failed. All the international negotiations have so far failed. Many of the promises of the technologists have failed.

My dear climate change sceptics and skeptics, we need to pull together to resolve this. All your carping, speculation and stirring the pot isn’t helping. Can you please find some arguments that have a foundation in reality; proposals that can contribute something positive – or just get out of the road – you’re snarling up the traffic of genuine progress.

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Solar Sunrise

Bring Me Sunshine

I went to the House of Commons today, to green card my Member of Parliament. I wanted to ask for his support in the forthcoming debate on how the solar power industry should be grown.

I didn’t get to meet my MP, but I did meet a number of lovely, interesting people working to bring low carbon power to the UK, such as the guys from TG Solar – who appear in the photograph here.

I met Nick Pascoe from Orta Solar, who’s had to lay off a number of people this year, due to a succession of changes in policy on solar photovoltaic power deployment.

I shook the hand of Howard Johns of Southern Solar, who is a bit of a phenomenon amongst the Twitterati.

Continue reading “Bring Me Sunshine”
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Solar Sunrise

Curb Your Solar Enthusiasm

New technologies need public funding. This is the brutal fact that stands between us and a fully renewable future.

The feed-in tariffs around the world have been the most effective in getting deployment.

To cut the solar photovoltaic feed-in tariff in the United Kingdom so quickly and so steeply risks Britain’s economic development.

I’m going to the Parliament to make my voice heard.

I have phoned my democratic representative, the Rt Hon. Iain Duncan Smith MP, and his office say he is not available to speak to me this afternoon, but I have sent this message (see below), and I’m going to join the throng regardless…

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Another Meeting I Will Not Be Attending

What appears to be a serious event is due to take place at the Energy Institute in London on 6th December 2011, “Peak Oil – assessing the economic impact on global oil supply“.

Dr Roger Bentley, author of a seminal 2002 paper on the subject, research that spawned hundreds of related learned articles, will be speaking.

But the event organisers have also invited one Dr Matt Ridley, the self-styled “rational optimist”, and member of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, and this, I’m afraid, prevents me from attending.


Ridley projects a view that many probably find comforting – as his headline in The Times of 1st October 2011 summarises – “Cheer up. The world’s not going to the dogs”.

He has been captured speaking at a TEDx event pouring scorn on “environmental” scare stories of the past, but not bothering to delve or dig into how mankind has actually gone out of its way to act on past crises and prevent catastrophes.

And now he’s thrown in his lot with the shale gas miracle men, writing a report with a foreword by Freeman Dyson, one of the world’s most balanced individuals.

How much uncorroborated optimism can one man contain ?

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Bad Science Bait & Switch Conflict of Interest Cost Effective Dead End Delay and Deny Demoticratica Direction of Travel Disturbing Trends Divide & Rule Fair Balance Freak Science Global Heating Global Singeing Global Warming Human Nurture Libertarian Liberalism Mass Propaganda Media Money Sings Non-Science Nudge & Budge Policy Warfare Political Nightmare Public Relations Pure Hollywood Science Rules Scientific Fallacy Social Capital Social Change Social Chaos Sustainable Deferment The Data The War on Error Unqualified Opinion

Everyone’s Entitled to their Opinion

Yes, indeed they are. Everyone is entitled to hold their own particular opinion. In this democracy of ideas, every longshot, wingnut, bonehead, rogue, charlatan, conspiracy theorist, crank, crony and astroturfer should be permitted access to the microphone on the stage. If we hold a public meeting about immigration, we should, of course, invite a white supremicist, a member of the British National Party, and a Daily Mail journalist to offer us their wise words. If we hold a sociological symposium on the Second World War, we should of course invite a Holocaust-denier. If an engineering conference, a cold fusion-in-a-test-tube enthusiast. Of course we should provide balance, as much balance as possible, and offer wisdom, insight and rant from all ends of all spectra. It’s only reasonable.

It therefore goes without question that somebody from the Global Warming Policy Foundation “think tank”, so copiously and generously sponsored by a person or persons unknown, should be invited to speak on the platform, or in a panel, at a well-funded quasi-establishment meeting on Climate Change. Regardless of a complete lack of training in atmospheric physics, or even knowledge of the span of the last five years in the science of global warming, naturally, a GWPF man must be invited by GovToday to a presitigious conference to be held on 29th November 2011 in the City of London grandly entitled “2011 Carbon Reduction : The Transition to a Low Carbon Economy”.

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Climate Change

Green Strawberries in November

I live in the Northern Hemisphere, a considerable distance north of the Equator, and here, plants and animals have evolved over many centuries to adapt to the circling of the seasons.

After a cold lull, they know to bud, and bloom, raise leaves, court, mate, hatch, sprout, nest, burgeon, flower. And as it warms up, they have learned, through inherited development over the generations, to fruit, feather, fly, grow, trail, forage, sun.

Yet what is happening here ? Green strawberries and loganberries in November; ducklings, bluetit chicks ?

Spring bulbs were putting up leaves in October. Things are unseasonably warm for the time of year.

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Solar Sunrise

Solar FIT to Bust #8

[UPDATE : I didn’t need two MCS Certificates in the end – as all the panels were the same make and model and I only have one generation meter. Administration.] I live in a power station. I am now officially a microgenerator, or rather, my house is – although I’m still waiting for the last piece of paperwork to be able to send in my two feed-in tariff application forms.

Why do I need two FiT forms ? Because I had two separate systems installed today.

One is on the back of the roof with 9 250W panels and a central inverter, and one on the front of the roof with 3 250W panels and microinverters.

Continue reading “Solar FIT to Bust #8”