Adjusted temperature data...

Adjusted temperature data...  Warren Meyer (aka “Coyote”) has a balanced recap of the adjusted temperature data used by the NOAA that forms the basis of many “hockey stick” like graphs.

Learning about this adjusted data was the first thing I ran into, five years ago or so, that set off all my bullshit detectors regarding anthropogenic global warming (AGW).  Specifically, it was the combination of the fact that the reported global warming was nearly identical to the adjustments made in the temperature data, and that the adjustments were never explained, justified, or even revealed.  That was just way too convenient for the AGW proponents – much like the oh-so-convenient “hard drive failures” that wiped out the emails of seven IRS employees.  Just those seven – and just for the time period the investigators need the emails.  Yeah, right.  I felt (and still feel) the same way about those opaque temperature adjustments.

The second thing that I ran into – which amplified my already turned up bullshit detectors – was my discovery that every single model used by both the NOAA and the IPCC used positive feedback loop assumptions for carbon dioxide's effects on global warming.  As Warren Myer has pointed out many times, positive feedback loops are exceedingly rare in natural systems – so much so that when someone claims to have discovered one, the universal assumption amongst scientists is that there's an error in the observations, and everybody piles on to figure out what it is.  Nearly all feedback loops in nature are strongly negative.  What does that mean?  It means that as carbon dioxide levels go up, it is much more likely that its effect on global temperatures will decrease (that is, the CO2 sensitivity will decrease).  The models all assume that CO2 sensitivity will increase as levels go up. 

Mechanical energy storage...

Mechanical energy storage ... is getting a lot of attention right now.  All of these are less efficient than electrochemical systems (aka “batteries”), but have other advantages (most especially, cost at scale) that outweigh the efficiency differences.  I know of one other mechanical storage technique being actively pursued: inertial storage.  In an inertial storage system, a large and heavy flywheel is spun up to store energy and down to recover it.  To my knowledge, the largest inertial storage system is in Israel, where a small town uses one to store solar energy during the day and recover it at night...

Ten small cats...

Ten small cats...  Like the sand cat at right.  Pictured in the series: a serval (sometimes cervil) which, when crossbred with a common housecat, produces a “Savannah” cat like our Jahar...