Are the heat waves really getting more extreme? This question popped up after the summer of 2003 in Europe, and yet again after this hot Russian summer. The European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), which normally doesn’t make much noise about climate issues, has since made a statement about July global mean temperature being record warm:
Consistent with widespread media reports of extreme heat and adverse impacts in various places, the latest results from ERA-Interim indicate that the average temperature over land areas of the extratropical northern hemisphere reached a new high in July 2010. May and June 2010 were also unusually warm.
Here, the ERA-Interim, also referred to as ‘ERAINT’, is the ECMWF’s state-of-the-art reanalysis. But the ERAINT describes the atmospheric state only since 1989, and in isolation, it is not the ideal data set for making inferences about long-term climate change because it doesn’t go all that far back in time. However, the statement also draws on the longer reanalysis known as the ERA40 re-analysis, spanning the time interval 1957-2002. Thus, taken into context of ERA40, the ECMWF has some legitimacy behind their statement.
The ERAINT reanalysis is a product of all suitable measurements fed into a model of the atmosphere, describing all the known relevant physical laws and processes. Basically, reanalyses represent the most complete and accurate picture that we can give for the day-to-day atmosphere, incorporating all useful information we have (satellites, ground observations, ships, buoys, aircrafts, radiosondes, rawinsondes). They can also be used to reconstruct things at finer spatial and temporal scales than is possible using met station data, based on physical rules provided by weather models.
The reanalyses are closely tied to the measurements at most locations where observations – such as 2-meter temperature, T(2m), or surface pressure – are provided and used in the data assimilation. Data assimilation is a way of making the model follow the observations as closely as possible at the locations where they are provided, hence constraining the atmospheric model. The constraining of the atmospheric model affect the predictions where there are no observations because most of the weather elements – except for precipitation – do not change abruptly over short distance (mathematically, we say that they are described by ‘spatially smooth and slowly changing functions’).
There are also locations – notably the in the Polar regions and over Africa – where ground-based measurements are sparse, and where much is left for the weather models to predict without observational constraints. In such regions, the description may be biased by model shortcomings, and different reanalysis may provide a different regional picture of the surface conditions. Surface variables such as T(2m) are strongly affected by their environment, which may be represented differently in different weather models (e.g. different spatial resolution implies different altitudes) and therefore is a reason for differences between reanalyses.
Furthermore, soil moisture may affect T(2m), linking temperature to precipitation. The energy flow (heat fluxes) between the ground/lakes/sea and the atmosphere may also affect surface temperatures. However, both precipitation and heat fluxes are computed by the reanalysis atmosphere model without direct constraints, and are therefore only loosely tied to the observations fed into the models. Furthermore, both heat fluxes and precipitation can vary substantially over short distances, and are often not smooth spatial functions.
While the evidence suggesting more extremely high temperatures are mounting over time, the number of resources offering data is also growing. Some of these involve satellite borne remote sensing instruments, but many data sets do not incorporate such data.
In the book “A Vast Machine“, Paul N. Edwards discusses various types of data and how all data involve some type of modelling, even barometers and thermometers. It also provides an account on the observational network, models, and the knowledge we have derived from these. Myles Allen has written a review of this book in Nature, and I have reviewed it for Physics World (subscription required for the latter).
All data need to be screened though a quality control, to eliminate misreadings, instrument failure, or other types of errors. A typical screening criterion is to check whether e.g. the temperature estimated by satellite remote sensing is unrealistically high, but sometimes such screening may also throw out valid data, such as was the case of the Antarctic ozone hole. Such post-processing is done differently in analyses, satellite measurements, and reanalyses.
The global mean temperature estimated from the ERAINT, however, is not very different from other analyses or reanalyses (see figure below) for the time they overlap. We also see a good agreement between the ERA40 reanalysis, the NCEP/NCAR reanalysis, and the traditional datasets – analyses – of gridded temperature (GISTEMP, HadCRUT3v, NCDC).
Do the ERAINT and ERA40 provide a sufficient basis for making meaningful
inferences about extreme temperatures and unprecedented heat waves? An important point with reanalyses, is that the model used doesn’t change over the time spanned by the analysis, but reanalyses are generally used with caution for climate change studies because the number and type of observations being fed into the computer model changes over time. Changes in the number of observations and instruments is also an issue affecting the more traditional analyses.
Since the ERAINT only goes as far back as 1989, it involves many modern satellite-borne remote sensing measurements, and it is believed that there are less problems with observational network discontinuity after this date than in the earlier days. It may be more problematic studying trends in the ERA40 data, due to huge improvements in the observational platforms between 1958 and now. Hence, it is important also to look at individual long-term series of high quality. These series have to be ‘homogeneous’, meaning that they need to reflect the local climate variable consistently through its span, not being affected by changes in the local environment, instrumentation, and measurement practices.
An analysis I published in 2004, looking at how often record-high monthly temperatures recur, indicated that record-breaking monthly mean temperature have been more frequent that they would have been if the climate were not getting hotter. This analysis supports the ECMWF statement, and was based on a few high-quality temperature series scattered across our planet, chosen to be sufficiently far from each other to minimize mutual dependencies that can bias the analysis.
The ECMWF provides data for some climate indices, such as the global mean temperature, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has a web site for extreme temperatures and precipitation around the world with an interactive map, showing the warmest and coldest sites on the continents. Another useful tool is the KNMI ClimateExplorer, where people can both access data and carry out different analyses on line. It is also possible to get climate data on your iPhone/iPod Touch through Apps like Climate Mobile.
Update: I just learned that NOAA recently has launched a Climate Services Portal on www.climate.gov.
Update: http://rimfrost.no/ is another site that provides station-based climate data. The site shows linear trends estimated for the last 50 years.
#290 Phil Scadden,
It might help to clarify if I asked how you intend to measure the energy that went into establishing the potential energy that hydro depends on? The answer is of course that most of us have no idea how to do that, and Dr. MacKay does not pretend to either. Lacking a number, he simply makes up a number when he decides to use a one to one conversion.
Whether or not we know the efficiency of the heat engine that makes water settle at a point above sea level, does not change the fact that there is such a heat engine operating in nature. If anyone knows how to make this calculation it should be someone at realclimate, but barring that, they certainly know about that heat engine of nature.
I felt I should add that we would have to replace those panels in the desert often and figure out how to dispose of all those wastes and the emissions given off producing those panels. Organic panels only last a day or two. The poorer you are too the less carbon neutral you are as well.
Right now raising taxes is not good for our economy either so tech needs more private investments, however, there are efforts being made by both corporations and government in investing in such green tech.
FurryCatHerder (@335), it is certainly possible for a +2 or +3 sigma range event (or a +3 or +4 sigma range event, which is what we are realy talking about) to occur with an opposite sign to the change of the mean over a given period. This just shows that “…is evidence for …” is an inductive relationship, not a deductive relationship; which we already knew. We should never confuse the “… is evidence for…” relationship for the “… is proof that …” relationship, although it is evident that many people do so. Even the proof relationship (as in, proof on balance of probability, and proof beyond reasonable doubt) can be an inductive relationship, and hence we can be in the unfortunate situation of having proof beyond reasonable doubt of a proposition which is in fact false. In any such case, however, there will be other evidence available (though not necessarilly available to us) that will defeat our “proof”.
#305 Didactylos, and re mine of #283. Benson’s of #286, Alex’s of #288, Phil Scadden’s of #290, and mine of #349,#350, #351, and #352
Also see mine of #285 where the real point might become clear.
OK?
Wellington just called and said I should pay attention to you (Didactylos) since to not do so would be a tactical mistake. He consoled me that having made myself to look like an idiot is not the same as being an idiot.
And since I had already confessed to the character flaw of being a lazy lout (#283) I should use that as a defense.
But Wellington then got to his real point of advice which was that a major campaign could not be won without seizing tactical opportunities when they came up, and of course, “That Didactylos fellow was really telling you a further aspect of corruption in MacKay’s position.” He went on, “Now old Jim, don’t just focus on the heart of the matter, like that stuffy old Kelvin would do, but parry and thrust at all the logical nonsense hanging about.”
So the business about converting electricity to fuel shows further absurdity of MacKay’s system of energy conversion. While rather irrelevant to the business of heat engines, yes indeed, it is possible to convert electricity into hydrogen and oxygen, say by electrolysis for example. MacKay asserts that this would be also a way to waste heat energy, and the efficiency of conversion would also be abysmal. But here is the ultimate nonsense: The fact that there is great inefficiency in this process is somehow a justification for ignoring the heat loss of any conversion. So this justifies somehow that a one to one conversion is appropriate and even ‘time honored.’
So now to the point that MacKay is a physicist. I contend that a physicist is as a physicist does. Case closed?
Do you hear Lord Kelvin rumbling with rage? I think he is saying something about canceling diplomas of those who read this and don’t get it.
Septic Matthew (@316) writes, Can you do the same for the Mongolian, Andean, and New Zealand cold waves? As a Bayesian problem, it is a very high dimensional Bayesian problem, with the covariances among the many measures provided how? By the diverse GCMs would be one possibility.”
The Andean cold wave recorded temperatures not seen “for thirty years”, or since 1991. That would appear to make it around a 2 to 2.5 sigma event. (The same is also true of the cold wave in Europe at the start of the year.) The Mongolian cold wave was more intense, with at least one site recording a record low temperature. But, by comparison, Ulan Bator (the capital of Mongolia, located in the center of one of the most effected provinces) had colder Januaries in 2008, 1957, and 1958 (and possibly others, I did not search all the records). That suggest it was not more than a 2 sigma event. Unfortunately, I have been unable to find comparative data to even guess at the status of the New Zealand cold wave of 2009. May was the coldest May on record, and October the coldest since 1945, but August was the hottest on record. Presumably the May cold wave was at least a 2 sigma event, and probably a 2.5 sigma event – but I have no information that suggests it was a 3 sigma event, let alone a 3.5 sigma event. For comparison, in 2010, in addition to the Russion heatwave, there was a heatwave setting national records across much of North Africa and the Middle East, and another setting national records in south Asia (Pakistan and Burma). There is no more reason to think that these were 2.5+ sigma events than there was for New Zealand.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_wave
http://bimchat.wordpress.com/2010/07/24/south-america-cold-wave-brings-rare-snow-freezing-deaths/
http://www.tutiempo.net/en/Climate/Ulan_Bator/01-2010/442920.htm
This is not, of course, a Bayesian problem. Rather, using Bayes theorm we can determine certain rules of thumb so that we can determe whether a particular event will increase our confidence in an hypothesis, or decrease it should we actualy (be able to) perform a full Bayesian analysis. Although these rules of thumb can determine the sign of the change in confidence from particular events, and even the relative size of the change, it certainly cannot tell us the absolute value of the change in confidence. Such rules of thumb are, despite their deficiencies, very usefull where the circumstances are too complex for us to do a proper Bayesian analysis.
#353 ‘The poorer you are too the less carbon neutral you are as well.’
How does this work? The poorer you are the more likely you are to use carbon cycle fuels rather than carbon sink fuels. There are all sorts of nasty consequences from using dung or charcoal or even wood in primitive stoves. Mainly if an area is under population stress it will be denuded of trees if people use wood for building and for fuel there will be a local climate effect quickly and a larger climate effect from the land clearing.
Solve the problem with better stoves with better fuel economy and you reduce lung cancer, deforestation, particulates and black soot. I don’t see the link (apart from land clearing) on the global climate.
HOW CLIMATE IS CHANGING ?
Massive Arctic ice island drifting toward shipping lanes The biggest Arctic “ice island” to form in
nearly 50 years — a 250-square-kilometer behemoth described as four times the size of Manhattan —
has been discovered after a Canadian scientist scanning satellite images of northwest Greenland spotted
a giant break in the famed Petermann Glacier.Canada.com – Aug 07 10:16am
In another research, using Autosub, an autonomous underwater vehicle, researchers led by the British Antarctic
Survey have captured ocean and sea-floor measurements, which revealed a 300 meter high
ridge on the sea floor. Pine Island Glacier was once sitting atop this underwater ridge,
which slowed its flow into the sea. The warm water, trapped under the ice, is causing the
bottom of the ice shelf to thaw, resulting in continuousthinning and acceleration of glacial
melt. Lead author Adrian Jenkins said, The discovery of the ridge has raised new questions
about whether the current loss of ice from Pine Island Glacier is caused by recent climate
change or is a continution of a longer-term process that began when the glacier disconnect
from the ridge. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100620200810.htm
Not only warm water, but also concentrated Magnesium Chloride =7,100 p.p.m & Sodium
Chloride= 31,000 p.p.m. (de-icing agents) trapped under the ice, is causing the bottom of the
ice shelf to thaw, resulting in continuous thinning and acceleration of glacial melt
(under water glacier cutting).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-KU_s9tjE4&sns=fb
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fGHlEBvKYw&sns=fb
Last Winter, Australian Glaciologist, Neal Young, declared that more than 300 icebergs are
floating in the East Antarctica.
DISINTEGRATED ICE SHELVES DISINTEGRATION DATES
Worde Ice shelf March 1986
Larsen A Ice shelf January 1995
Larsen B Ice shelf February 2002
Jones Ice Shelf 2008
Wilkins Ice shelf March 2008
If the Ice shelves are disintegrating during WINTER, it is not SUN or CO2.
U.N. Secretary General, BAN KI-MOON recently declared that Let me be clear, the thread of
Climate Change is real .
The Climate is changing said JAY LAWRIMORE, Chief of Climate Analysing at the National
Climate Data Center in Asheville, N.C. Extreme events are occuring with greater frequency and
in many cases with greater intensity.
The current Climate Change is due to the following:-
1. Mushrooming of Sea water desalination systems in the Middle East: Discharging of desalination
& Cleaning chemicals & Concentrated brine into Oceans & Seas.
2. Artificial Island developments in the Arabian Gulf since 1985: dredging, drilling, dynamiting &
excavation of sea floor shifted Magnesium Chloride, Sulfur & Sodium Chloride.
The geographic position of the Arabian Gulf, Ocean circulations bringing it to Arctic & Antarctic Oceans
during Monsoon seasons along with hot water of the Middle East.
Those who are having the Oceans water Analysis since 1980 will WIN the Climate WAR. Concentrated
7,100 p.p.m. of Magnesium Chloride & 31,000 p.p.m. of Sodium Chloride are detected in the Arabian Gulf.
These are De-icing agents which are helping to disintegrates the Arctic & Antarctic Ice shelves. Now
International Desalination Association (IDA) formed a committee to investigate about it.
If we enforce strict Environmental regulations, recover MgCl3 and NaCl3 at Straight of Hormosa and
Straight of Gibraltar and recover those at closed eddies of Baffin Bay & Green Land Sea. Sea ice & Ice
shelfs in Arctic & Antarctic are Natural Air Conditioners of the Planet EARTH. When more ice in both
Poles, the third Pole, as Scientists described, Himalayas will have abundance of ice and Snow & Bolivi
will have more Glaciers & water.
Book releasing soon in USA Environmental Rapes & H. R. abuses Lead to Climate Change Control.
(Full color 450 pages) by Raveendran Narayanan also visit:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/group.php?gid=358564892147&ref=ts SARVA KALA VALLABHAN
GROUP in Face book.
Raveendran Narayanan, U.S.A.
Tel-1-347-847-0407
E- mail : bestfriend97usa@yahoo.com
narayananraveen@gmail.com
narayananraveen@yahoo.com
356 RAV said, \7,100 p.p.m. of Magnesium Chloride & 31,000 p.p.m. of Sodium Chloride are detected in the Arabian Gulf.
These are De-icing agents which are helping to disintegrates the Arctic & Antarctic Ice shelves. \
Average sea water has 35,000 and I’d expect the Arabian Gulf to be higher so I’m not convinced that it is a catastrophe for one area to be at 38,000.
Raveendran Narayanan (@356) writes, DISINTEGRATED ICE SHELVES DISINTEGRATION DATES
Worde Ice shelf March 1986
Larsen A Ice shelf January 1995
Larsen B Ice shelf February 2002
Jones Ice Shelf 2008
Wilkins Ice shelf March 2008
If the Ice shelves are disintegrating during WINTER, it is not SUN or CO2.”
Some simple fact checking can avoid egregious errors. In this case, the simple fact that needed checking is that the southern hemisphere and hence antarctic summer coincides with the northern hemisphere winter. The ice shelves, therefore, disintegrated in summer, and early autumn. The lag in the disintegrations is because of thermal buffering by the ocean, with maximum sea temperatures in the Southern Hemisphere found occuring in February (maximum air temperatures occur in January).
http://www.aviso.oceanobs.com/en/newsstand/newsletter/newsletter05/sea-surface-data/index.html
“Dubai: Every time desalination plants dump tons of brine carrying chemicals into the Arabian Gulf, sea temperatures rise by 10 degrees Celsius, according to researchers.”
Hmmmmm …..
http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/uae/environment/waste-dump-threatens-arabian-gulf-1.72058
Ten degrees C. for each, um, poorly defined value of “every time”
356, Tom Curtis, good response.
Okay, I couldn’t stay away. I’m addicted to RealClimate.
JM: It is theoretically possible to cover the UK with enough wind turbines and solar cells to power the country. However, it is not practical (something which BPL refuses to accept).
BPL: Let’s try it for the globe. We now use about 16 terawatts of all kinds of energy.
The solar flux at the surface averages 161.2 watts per square meter (Trenberth et al. 2009). The Earth’s surface area is 5.1007 x 10^14 square meters. Therefore the available raw solar energy is 8.222 x 10^16 watts.
Earth’s land surface is 29.2% of the area. Let’s say solar energy conversion averages 10% efficiency. The available solar power is then .0292 * 8.222 x 10^16 watts or 2.4 x 10^15 watts. Assume only up to 50% of land surface can ever be used. The available solar energy is then 75 times human energy usage.
Or, to put it another way, we could provide all our energy needs from 0.67% of Earth’s land surface.
JM: Collection, storage and transmission problems.
BPL: Solar thermal plants store excess daytime energy in molten salts, then use that heat to run the turbines at night and in cloudy weather. Some plants already beat coal-fired plants for on-line time.
JM: Electricity generated by solar power stations is intermittent which cannot be handled by out [sic] current power grid.
BPL: Right, so we need to build new power grids, right away. Smart grids with HVDC lines, I’d say.
JM: Solar cells are far too expensive. The average citizen cannot afford them and to build such a large scale project in the desert would be immensely costly in terms of engineering, materials and labor. Who is going to pay for that largescale of a project.
BPL: Try solar thermal, which is already competitive. And if solar cells go into mass production it will bring down the price, just as happened when the Pentagon bought semiconductors en masse in the ’60s.
JM: 1 KW-h of energy generated from solar cells costs about 35 cents where the same energy produced through combustion of fossil fuels costs about 4-5 cents.
BPL: Solar thermal. Wind. Geothermal. Biomass. Ocean thermal. Tidal, wave. Are we learning yet? And the price of fossil fuel energy does not factor in the environmental damage, which is a real cost to the community, is it not?
JM: Theory and application have not [sic] and are not the same thing in terms of producing energy and energy conduits.
BPL: The theory that humanity can never run 100% off renewables and will forever need fossil fuels strikes me as particularly unsupportable.
JM: no one can even answer one of my questions
BPL: In the perhaps 100,000 internet posts I have read over the years, I have ONLY seen this line from trolls who ignore answers, then claim no one can answer them.
Raveendran-ji,
Hoshiyar rehiyay. There are people here who are professional scientists and can poke holes in your assertions with little effort. This isn’t really the place for crackpot theories, other than to have them destroyed.
RE: 361, Hank, the statement probably means the local water temperature at the discharge site, else I have the same response as you. I wonder if that article was translated to English. Still, the effluent is damaging to the local marine enviro, and surely there’s a better way to handle the mineral discharge. At 7 bucks a kilo, the copper alone should be worth addressing.
#357… okay but you need to lower the prices of such better stoves so they can afford them.
# 364: I read your previous post and you still have not really answered the questions. No solar or wind mill based application can store enough power in those salts you mentioned to power the world or even an entire large country. You know I have been posting here for a few years and we rarely disagree but here you have no evidence to support your statement. Where are the links and textbook/peer review journals that have been validated regarding your statements in the previous line to line post you wrote? Try again.
Sum: The greate thing is we do not need to power the world on clean renewables alone anyways. If we can power 50-65% of the globe on renewable and use carbon capture and other cleaner methods with what we have then we can do very well with the anthropogenic global warming issue.
There is of course research that shows we may be heading into a far more polluting future so we ought to be cautious and get close to the 65% number if we can but we are not going to power aircraft on solar, wind or beet juice in any kind of mainstream manner. How do I know? I talk to aircraft engineers pilots and so forth on PPRUNE and I keep up with the tech and engineering journals as well.
We are not at peak oil yet but if we do not use more renewables we could be there within the next few decades so clean renewables are and will be very useful tech speaking and economically speaking but they will not replace all fossil fuels and not should they…
BPL wrote: “And if solar cells go into mass production it will bring down the price, just as happened when the Pentagon bought semiconductors en masse in the ’60s.”
And in fact, this process is already occurring.
According to WorldWatch Institute, in 2009, “Nearly 11 GW of solar PV was produced, a 50-percent increase over 2008. First Solar (USA) became the first firm ever to produce over 1 GW in a single year. Major crystalline module price declines took place, by 50–60 percent by some estimates, from highs of $3.50 per watt in 2008 to lows approaching $2 per watt.”
Oh, I’m itching to jump into the renewables debate, perhaps by pointing out that the US DOD is testing (expensive) non-fossil jet fuel already–but David B. Benson’s impassioned plea is still in my mind, so I’ll refrain from tootling off to find a link to that particular story.
Before getting back on topic, let me mention this retrospective of the melt season this year. Hopefully, it will move a few skeptical hearts to take another look a climatological reality–and maybe even get Ed Greisch to consider whether the literary essay might not have some redeeming value after all. ;-)
http://hubpages.com/hub/Through-A-Glass-Darkly-Equinox-Reflections-2010
On second thought, maybe this IS on topic for “Warmer and Warmer.”
They are always testing expensive non-fossil jet fuel… it has gone nowhere.
http://www.worldwatch.org/node/6421
Great website worldwatch but as you can see natural gas is still a part of some of their proposed solutions for lower C02 emissions, not zero or near zero C02 emissions prior to 2020 and 2050.
Let us not forget about the Pickens debacle as well.
JM: No solar or wind mill based application can store enough power in those salts you mentioned to power the world or even an entire large country.
BPL: Who says? You? Show your work.
In any case, they don’t have to. Use wide-area smart HVDC grids, and lots of different types of power source–solar thermal plus wind plus geothermal plus biomass.
Kevin McKinney @369 — Thank you for the forbearance.
I find it is all relevant since it getting warmer and warmer needs some solutions no?
http://www.syntroleum.com/profiles/investor/fullpage.asp?f=1&BzID=2029&to=cp&Nav=0&LangID=1&s=0&ID=11912
BPL 372: Now you are being theoretical. Show this can be done now or in the immediate future.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=wind-power-turbine-storage-electricity-appliances
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=storage+intermittent+power+wind+solar
> renewables
Compared to sun and wind, most other renewables are more stable and bigger sources:
http://www.caiso.com/green/renewrpt/HourlyBreakdown.jpg
From here: http://www.caiso.com/outlook/SystemStatus.html
Hank,
your first link only lends an abstract that makes claims without data but I will find the full article on my University account.
The second link again supports the need for conservation which is always good to stress. We do not us an AC in our home, we do not own a car anymore by choice and we are lookins at solar panels for our home in the near future. All of that is good stuff but making claims we can power the world with wind needs to be verified and validated. I do see, however, they do discuss those high power lines I have been promoting here at RC almsot since I arrived here under my less than mysterious pseudonym.
I still like the idea of solar boilers the best. Windmills are still in need of back up generation powered by fossil fuels, but again thanks for the links.
Okay Hank I fully read and went over the calculations from:
Operation and sizing of energy storage for wind power plants in a market system
Magnus Korpaas, , a, Arne T. Holena and Ragne Hildrumb
a Department of Electrical Power Engineering, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, 7491, Trondheim, Norway
b Statkraft SF, P.O. Box 200 Lilleaker, 0216, Oslo, Norway
Available online 22 April 2003.
Abstract
This paper presents a method for the scheduling and operation of energy storage for wind power plants in electricity markets. A dynamic programming algorithm is employed to determine the optimal energy exchange with the market for a specified scheduling period, taking into account transmission constraints. During operation, the energy storage is used to smooth variations in wind power production in order to follow the scheduling plan. The method is suitable for any type of energy storage and is also useful for other intermittent energy resources than wind. An application of the method to a case study is also presented, where the impact of energy storage sizing and wind forecasting accuracy on system operation and economics are emphasized. Simulation results show that energy storage makes it possible for owners of wind power plants to take advantage of variations in the spot price, by thus increasing the value of wind power in electricity markets. With present price estimates, energy storage devices such as reversible fuel cells are likely to be a more expensive alternative than grid expansions for the siting of wind farms in weak networks. However, for areas where grid expansions lead to unwanted interference with the local environment, energy storage should be considered as a reasonable way to increase the penetration of wind power.
I read the whole article in my science direct account through my University.
The models are far too simplistic in this case and P1 in the real world as well as: Pw, Pdev, and potentially S exist. For those who cannot see the full PDF P1= load demand in terms of MW. Pw = output of of wind power plant (MW) and Pdev is the deviation between actual and scheduled power.The article mentions other aspects as well like: Pe which is output of wind power plant, Ps which is power output of energy storage and so forth.
While the symbols and math are of some use and the theory is not totally debunked, this method and methods like it remain non-viable even after billions upon billions of dollars invested into this type of infrastructure. Here lies the second class of problems besides technical engineering: the costs associated with getting it off the ground and working well. This article is far too theoretical, and in fact when engineers and construction professionals get together to work out problems associated with the aforementioned issues with windmills, improve storage, transport and efficiency, these types of claims quickly fly away like a kite. If any of you also have full text access we can work out the calculations in some considerable detail via email if you wish.
The assumptions arise from what they keep referring to as a “simple algorithm.” While I like parsimony this is not an elegant answer that works. GCM’s do better than this and they are not simple with all of that data and math:)
Oh and in my previous post I meant to say the second link.
This first link:http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=wind-power-turbine-storage-electricity-appliances
is again encouraging but nothing stated, currently developed or in the works even puts a dent into the energy needs of the US alone whether it is 200 MW or 54,000 + 6600 MW which = 60,600 MW. The US on the other hand needs far more than that. Of course then there is the fact that at whatever MW a windmill is rated at is in consideration at peak times so the rest of the time it can slightly to far lower.
Consider this:
“The world’s largest wind turbine is now the Enercon E-126. This turbine has a rotor diameter of 126 meters (413 feet). The E-126 is a more sophisticated version of the E-112, formerly the world’s largest wind turbine and rated at 6 megawatts. This new turbine is officially rated at 6 megawatts too, but will most likely produce 7+ megawatts (or 20 million kilowatt hours per year). That’s enough to power about 5,000 households of four in Europe. A quick US calculation would be 938 kwh per home per month, 12 months, that’s 11,256 kwh per year per house. That’s 1776 American homes on one wind turbine.”
http://www.metaefficient.com/news/new-record-worlds-largest-wind-turbine-7-megawatts.html
Consider this:
Nothing to be proud of though it seems some people on that blog are plenty proud.
Okay back to the warmer and warmer topic specifically:
http://www.cbs8.com/Global/story.asp?S=13224239
Jacob Mack,
You referenced a seven year old paper from Norway and proceed to talk about how this or that is mere theory would be impractical. Please look up how much fossil fuel Norway uses for generation. How is it impractical to stop using fossil fuels again?
Norway has long had the means to store massive amounts of energy: hydro. We’re not talking about theory as you would have us believe but about what’s been powering Norway for years!
This post is brought to you by pumped storage by the way. My utility says there’s 0% fossil in my mix (and we have way less hydro than Norway).
JM 375: Now you are being theoretical. Show this can be done now or in the immediate future.
BPL: Obviously I can’t prove it until such a system is, in fact, built. So you’re asking for something which you know I can’t provide. One more form of trolling.
We know the engineering works. There’s no reason to think something unexpected will prevent it from working on a large scale. Prove your thesis that something will. Or demonstrate it theoretically. I have lower standards than you; I’ll take a sound argument as sufficient.
When picking cherries, pick fresher ones:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=a-path-to-sustainable-energy-by-2030
Here’s a nice fresh cherry:
“Choosing shorts or long underwear on a particular day is about weather; the ratio of shorts to long underwear in the drawer is about climate.”
— Charles Wohlforth, “The Whale and the Supercomputer”
hat tip to Reddit
Have we finished with the 11 year? “solar minimum” (during which there was slight warming, or non-significant warming, but certainly no global average cooling)? And are we now into a “solar maximum”?
If we are, of course the denialists will say it’s all due to the sun.
AC: the Norway paper that was 7 years old was Hank’s reference.
BPL: you cannot prove the enigineering exists because it does not exist at all.
Hank Roberts: I have often benefitted from your references but none of these has shown currently working engineering.
RC: I agree we need to continue to use wind mills and solar cells along with: hydroelectric, natural gas and combinations derived thereof, and biofuels where applicable.
My fellow posters in general: when one cannot provide sufficient evidence to support their claims or states they “know” something without any analytical and credible discussion or evidence, they often resort to name calling. I have read all of the start here links and worked with many of the models and I have read the RC archives and I keep up with current and recent threads:) Clearly I am not a troll. I even linked older RC links regarding the renewable energy debate.
I clearly think AGW is serious and is currently affecting the global climate system and the attribution to current crazy weaher patterns also has me 99% convinced AGW is messing up weather NOW.
I support clean energy, just not too much more nuclear power. I support bringning alternative energy costs in a more competitive range across the board.
What I do not support are: lies, exaggerations, twistings of the truth, and bad physics/engineering from anyone.
Fact: Wind mills are still very inefficient and will be in the forsseable future.
Fact: Solar panel costs are still very high, the maintenance is very expensive and the organic developed here in CA only last 1 or 2 days.
We can,we must and we will do better with clean tech.No argument there but we will not be powering the world on solar, wind and biofules alone. Nuclear widespread is very bad: Chernobyl et. al. Many people across from Russia like Scotland got sick, gave birth to sick children linked to ionizing radiation.
Norway has a population of 4.6 million or so. What does Norway have to do with the US with a population of over 305 million? How about China or India, etc…
Norway has a lot of natural resources due to its location and oil supply. They are the 6th largest exporter of oil in the world. Thay drive 99% of their electricity from hydroelectric and not wind mills. The paper is very theoretical that Hank gave me as a reference.
Norway has a higher per capita than the US and universal healthcare. The suicide rate is higher in Norway than the US. Depression is common in Norway.
The state of Massachusetts not a partucularly populated state has more people than Norway let alone CA and NY. Try again.
Hank references:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=a-path-to-sustainable-energy-by-2030.
Copenhagen was almost a complete failure. That proposed plan was rejected, so there is the political resistance.
As I write this I am stopping to look at the supplemntal material with the full paper by Jacobson and Delucchi. I will not comment on it until tomorrow the earliest and after I have read it 4 times and asked some questions of my engineer friends. I will go over every calculation as well prior to my commenting tomorrow… I hope I am shown to be wrong and not right.
Lynn Vincentnathan @386 — The solar cycle produces a most modest 11 year, approximately, variation in solar irradiance. See Tnug & Cabin (2008?) for an interesting attempt to determine its contribution; not large.
There is now a 130 year long, good to excellent instrumental record. The whole record needs explaining, not just the last little bit. Here is a simple exposition:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2010/03/unforced-variations-3/comment-page-12/#comment-168530
383 Hank Roberts,
What is fresh about that?
Other qualities notwithstanding, I give you fresh.
See the feedbacks post discussion following this.
270 Rod B
I just picked up on your comment about the EPA and ‘stationary sources.”
Having been recently involved in a search for small engines, I ran into the curious situation that in California, the ‘CARB’ regulations for NOx from stationary sources is significantly easier than it is for mobile sources. Thus, there were no real diesel options in the low horsepower range for use in cars, but there were such engines available for use in ‘stationary’ installations such as for auxilliary generators in Recreational Vehicles. Thus, Cummins makes an auxilliary power generator with a Kubota diesel engine in it, but the Kubota diesel could not meet the requirement for use in a car. Silly as this is, if the EPA makes the same rule generally applicable, watch out when manufacturers figure this out.
Yup, we are not on a path to economic recovery.
JM 387: BPL: you cannot prove the enigineering exists because it does not exist at all.
BPL: There are no working windmills, solar power plants, geothermal power plants, biomass producers, or smart grids?
What planet did you say you were from?
JM: What I do not support are: lies, exaggerations, twistings of the truth, and bad physics/engineering from anyone.
BPL: Whom, precisely, are you accusing of lying, sir? Care to name names?
http://www.wral.com/weather/story/8363062/
It is getting awefully hot here in CA and not just in southern but in NorCal where I reside.
East Coast:
——————————————————————————–
AccuWeather.com – Weather News | Oppressive and Dangerous Heat Wave in the East
Not a fan of Wikipedia but here:
2010 Northern Hemisphere summer heat wave – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I prefer PBS:
Scorching Heat Wave Waylays East Coast States | PBS NewsHour | July 7, 2010 | PBS
Latest heat wave could set records
Perhaps you prefer FOX:
FOXNews.com – Sizzling Heat Wave Tightens Grip on Northeast
Or USA Today with commentary from the weather channel:
18 states dealt heat advisories – USATODAY.com
Or the Week:
The 2010 heat wave: 7 excruciating climate records – The Week
Quote:
1. A record high in Los Angeles
For the first time ever, downtown L.A. registered at 113 degrees on Monday, besting the previous mark of 112 set in 1990.
2. Houston’s hottest month ever
While Houston’s residents are used to hot days, they’ve never seen heat like this, with an average temperature of 87.8 degrees in August, a new record for the hottest month in the city’s history.
3. A new all-time high in Asia
Temperatures in Pakistan’s ancient city of Mohenjo-daro reached a scorching 129 degrees on June 1, marking the hottest weather ever recorded in Asia, and the fourth highest temperature in history.
4. An unprecedented heat wave in Russia
With smoke from burning peat-bogs clogging the muggy air, the heat in Moscow on August 6 broke the “psychological barrier” of 40 degrees Celsius, or 104 degrees Fahrenheit.
5. Record heat in Sudan
While searing weather is common in Sudan, the 121-degree temperature recorded on June 25 in the city of Dongola was the hottest the country has ever seen. The previous record was set in 1987.
6. New all-time highs in the Middle East
U.S. troops in Iraq endured some of the most intense heat of the summer. The mercury hit a blistering 125.6 degrees Fahrenheit in July, the highest temperature ever recorded in the country.
7. The hottest month in world history — four times in a row
June 2010 was the warmest month ever recorded on planet Earth. The previous mark had been set in May. The mark before that had been set in April. The one before that in March. Sense a trend?
Not indisputable proof but all of these things occurring now and over the past 3 decades or more and espcecially the past 10-15 years were well predicted prior to their occurrence.
Next the attribution studies will need to be discussed in greater detail; see right back on track with the thread topic:)
(I also posted this elsewhere where people deny AGW too)
BPL just saw your new post. I of ocurse acknowledge that there are all you mention: “working windmills, solar power plants, geothermal power plants, biomass producers, or smart grids?”
To state that there is none would be far worse than being wrong and would be either insane or 100% dishonest sir:)
BPL you are either not getting the engineering or you are deliberately exaggerating in hopes we can pull this clean energy off 100%. Even the references left for me to read discusses the need of some natural gas, some back up generation even when nuclear and coal are rules out, which thus far is only Hank’s more recent homage to Copenhagen. The primary article at lower right does mention (except jets) which is what I have been saying all along too by the way. I support the smart grid and so forth as well. But do you realize how much energy the US and the rest of the world really need? I know you have a degree in physics, perhaps a master’s? The physics alone is not enough and postulating formulas to represent how it is all going to be done is not an exact translation in the real world of construction technology to say the least. Many of these papers get too hypothetical and theoretical which may pave the way to improvements but not global clean energy at 100% or > 90%.
I despise offshore drilling. It can be done safely but it will not be due to corporate greed and we do need to rely less on oil and all fossil fuels.
Do you realize that 2% of the global energy is not even a drop in the bucket? Neither is 10%. We are nowhere near 10%.
Look, I want to discuss this further too but the best way to go over calculations and long discussion in a fruitful manner is to just email me:
jcbmack@yahoo.com
I did not break my promise Hank. I am still going over the paper before I make any direct comments.
I have said something like this before, so I’ll be as brief as I can, but given the discussion here it is worth repeating:
Yes, we are starting to get wind and solar on a fairly large scale, though still small compared to FF’s. Yes, there is a gargantuan amount of incoming solar radiation (some of which turns into wind, waves, etc). But this is only a small part of the engineering/economic story, since the fact of life is that this energy is very dilute compared to FF’s, and hard (=expensive) to concentrate usefully, and to store.
The other fact of life, fundamental but seldom discussed in these pages, is that the windmills and whatnot we want to scale up are, today, utterly impossible to make without FF’s. The feasibility of gradually scaling down FF use while gradually transforming our infrastructure (virtually ALL of it) to renewables, cannot be assessed merely by extrapolating percentages, costs, market penetration, and so forth into the future. The feedbacks in the relevant economic and human systems are so daunting as to make estimating climate sensitivity look easy. What is the cost of building a big factory for steel, or cars, or computer chips, without moving anything around using an internal combustion engine? (Not to mention all the other deeply embedded FF uses.) Too far from today’s state to say. (The same goes for producing liquid fuel for that IC engine without resort to FF’s.)
Even if all that can be done (most of us hope yes), merely falling behind the 8-ball in scaling up renewables would result in a self-reinforcing downward spiral in industrial civilization.
383, Hank Roberts: When picking cherries, pick fresher ones:
Hank and others, for another overview of the problem of scale, check out the California Independent Systems Operator (they run the grid for most of California):
http://www.caiso.com
They have reasonable detail about California generation and use of electricity. The other day when the temp (hence A/C use) around here peaked at nearly 110F, renewables contributed about 6% of total. As solar installation continues, that will eventually be 8%, 12% etc. But Californians continue to block, by court action, wind and solar installations in the desert, thus thwarting California’s goal of getting 20% renewables by 2010.
Just a few details of interest, the Sturm und Drang, so to speak, of implementing the renewable economy.
One brief comment about renewable energy tech:
“Windmills” grind grain.
“Wind Turbines” generate electricity.
Septic Matthew wrote: “But Californians continue to block, by court action, wind and solar installations in the desert, thus thwarting California’s goal of getting 20% renewables by 2010.”
That is not an accurate description of what is actually happening with wind and solar energy in California.
Ric Merrit # 397 well said. These are enourmous issues not solved or near solving as of yet. At this rate then we will be seeing more than a doubling of C02.