Bi-monthly thread on climate solutions and responses.
Reader Interactions
363 Responses to "Forced responses: Aug 2019"
Al Bundysays
Zebra,
I Wonder if we could develop a plague that only infects denialists? You know, a plague for a plague.
Kevin,
I don’t have any plans for my. Atlanta house experiment. If you want something a bunch, as opposed to somewhat, let me know.
zebrasays
#300,301 Al Bundy,
“lockouts”
Yes, of course, almost everything involved in my approach is already being done in bits and pieces in various combinations in various places. It’s off-the-shelf or easily becomes ots, with more demand, which you would get from the uniform market setting I propose.
Make the equipment “smart”, people will write apps, and the consumer can minimize costs/maximize benefit, which reduces energy consumption whatever the generating modality. Doesn’t work if you have monopolies in supply.
“plagues”
It’s just us monkeys, Al. Well studied; the genes are pretty much the same for everyone, but childhood environment and early experience can put you in one camp or the other. That’s why I’m a “Malthusian”; get to where there is an abundance of resources relative to population, and the balance shifts away from Authoritarian psychology to valuing the individual’s value.
Would it be too much to do a quick ‘n dirty sketch and email me? We will be building, if we ever find a contractor we can work with/afford.
patrick027says
re 295 David B. Benson – ” I quit reading once it was clear that Mark Jacobson assumed that the Pacific Northwest could generate ten times as much hydropower as it does.” – average power? or capacity? With larger reservoirs, power could fluctuate greatly with time, with larger excursions for longer time periods, in a dispatchable manner. I don’t know offhand the details of that region’s reservoirs, but Grand Coulee is a big one, I’ve heard.
patrick027says
re 297 zebra – I think I pretty much agree – tax/regulate the externalities and have other sensible policies (safety, etc.) and otherwise let the market do it’s problem-solving thing.
Although the market allows agents to make contracts where they agree on fixed prices… etc… People like security. It reminds me of something I learned from watching “[The?] Men Who Built America” (original 4 part History Channel show focusing on Rockeffeller, Carnegie, JP Morgan, Vanderbuilt) … and recently I started watching “The Food that Built America” – some (or at least one) of those deals were anticompetitive and therefore inefficient… what was my point? Too many tangents…
Well, I’ll just say that I’ve come to see fixed prices as a sort of service provided to the customer (financial reliability), in exchange for a higher average price. For people who feel like there is a risk in paying real-time market prices (risks that would tend to be ameliorated by averaging for larger entities) – e.g. what if I turn the [?] on one time and it costs me a $100 – that’s probably hyperbolic but anyway, there might be middle ground compromises. (Obviously that wouldn’t happen with appliances that are programmed to delay operation to avoid price spikes … or operate in advance of forcast spikes.) I confess I don’t know all about PPAs and that sort of thing. I
Otherwise, my interest in finding those load and supply curves was about large-scale demand-supply matching (with the understanding that some features can change, but you can still get a sense of the potentials from the eia graphs). Interestingly … to be cont.
patrick027says
re my re David B. Benson –
Oops! I forgot about downstream effects – flash flooding from hydroelectric power spikes… if only they had built the reservoirs in upper and lower pairs… oh well (well they could put deep basins beneath dams with inflatable air bags; to deliver more power let the air out and fill the basin with water). Still, clearly hydro can be dispatchably cycled diurnally within limits. Not sure about 10x, though. Where can I find this original Jacobson paper, anyway?
for the last 7 days, it seems solar generally peaks around 20 GW; the highest I’ve found so far is under 23 GW. It would be interesting to see how this compares to Jun and Jul, but supposing it was not much higher … e.g. if solar U.S. power rarely got above 25 GW, then from a national-level variability point of view, the effective capacity factor would be ~ 33/25 times the actual (assuming this is for utility scale and Aug-Sept ’19 capacity is not much different from June ’19).
I came across the idea of having fixed-tilt solar panels mounted to face somewhat W of due S to sacrifice some of the average power generation for more power in the afternoon-evening. Notably, a panel with latitude-tilt facing south can never get more than ~12 hours of direct sunlight; if placed in the defining meridian of a time zone, setting aside the analemma figure-8 shape (not all solar days are mean solar days) and atmospheric refraction (tiny effect), and without daylight savings time, the sun would set on the panel at 6 p.m. from spring to fall equinoxes; so a westward shift in orientation would continue to provide power later than otherwise. Of course, it would be cool if the surfaces of surrounding buildings of similar or greater height were reflective so as to redirect sunlight (direct and/or diffuse) onto panels… etc.
patrick027says
Of course, having solar power spread-out E-W with good transmission would also help. As of now there is still a concentration on the west coast of the U.S.
“As of now there is still a concentration on the west coast of the U.S.” … this is for utility-scale solar.
alan2102says
Worth the listen, IMO. If a new forced responses thread is posted, I will duplicate there.
Would you believe: a POTUS candidate who wants a Constitutional amendment on environmental protection?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9BCvJk8a8M
Andrew Yang CNN Climate Crisis Town Hall | Full Video
The Zach and Matt Show, Sep 4, 2019
1:30: inadequacy of GDP as measure; must include environment
4:15: abolish ALL oil/fossil subsidies
4:40: plan for electoral reform, opposing big money
6:15: constitutional amendment to protect environment
7:45: reforestation, ocean seeding, rebuild ecosystems
8:30: supports carbon tax; internalize externalities
9:10: incentivize good behavior
11:00: Freedom Dividend will help restore public trust in system,
and will help with public support for climate action
13:10: reducing emissions is primary, not geoengineering
16:55: farming reform
18:10: meat consumption, switch toward vegetarianism
19:00: Green New Deal
20:40: U.S. must lead on climate change
23:00: UBI, Freedom Dividend, transition to green economy
24:40: clean water is a fundamental human right
26:15: ban all offshore oil drilling
28:20: convert military spending to infrastructure spending
29:40: personal responsibility/action vs. collective action
David B. Bensonsays
patrick027 @304 & 306 — Lake Roosevelt, the impoundment of Grand Coulee dam, fills up to the border with Canada in 7 weeks each spring. It is possible to study, via the internet, the hydropower of the Columbia River system. Nothing more can be added.
As I stated, the Mark Jacobson paper is in PNAS, open access. So is the rebuttal. Neither are worth further effort.
zebrasays
#305 patrick027,
Yes, there’s nothing wrong with people wanting the security of fixed prices for whatever term they choose. That’s where nuclear has a niche… whether for large-scale industrial users or individual households. As a premium product, very reliable, no need for demand management, the price would be higher, of course.
#309 You mention transmission E-W; the market setup I suggest does that naturally. A house in “the next time zone” could be producing an excess because the residents haven’t gotten home yet, and that could be sold “back East” where demand is increasing.
Again, it’s all about making as many options as possible available.
alan2102says
#307 David B. Benson 4 Sep 2019
“Why Renewables Can’t Save the Climate
Michael Shellenberger 2019 Sep 04 Forbes”
Poor little Mikey Shellenberger — shill for Big Nuke. My heart goes out to him. To think he has to stoop to publishing in Forbes! Hopefully they are paying him handsomely. For that sort of intellectual prostitution, he should at least be getting some nice checks.
Shellenberger, recall, is director of the Breakthrough Institute, a pro-nuke anti-renewables thinktank that is cozy with various other right-wing think tanks (Hoover, Manhattan, etc.). Joe Romm describes them as “a pro-nuclear,
anti-clean-energy-deployment think tank that has partnered with the American Enterprise Institute to push right-wing energy myths and that routinely attacks energy efficiency programs, except when they reverse themselves.”
“Previous research suggested that solar energy could reach grid parity—that is, become as or less expensive than coal and more conventional sources of electricity—in most developed countries between 2013 and 2020. In contrast, prior work suggested it might take China decades before solar energy achieved grid parity.”
Killian,
Just to let you know, my opinion of you has consistently risen over the last couple of months. You’ve taught me a bunch.
Keep it up.
nigeljsays
“Why Renewables Can’t Save the Climate, Michael Shellenberger”
Read this. Seemed like a huge exercise in cherry picking and deceptive rhetoric, so it’s not worth much, and is not an attempt to objectively get at the truth. Its the equivalent of quoting Chernobyl as a reason to dismiss nuclear power.
nigeljsays
patrick @308
“Of course, it would be cool if the surfaces of surrounding buildings of similar or greater height were reflective so as to redirect sunlight (direct and/or diffuse) onto panels… etc.”
Solar panels are great, but you have to be careful with that. The glare can become a real problem for pedestrians and the heat can become damaging as well. Some extreme examples below where curved reflective glass and panels caused a few unanticipated and dramatic problems…
The McKinsey report warns of more serious consequences for Germans when the remaining nuclear reactors are turned off.
alan2102says
Regarding Andrew Yang’s climate/environment proposals, about which I posted earlier, here is a critique. The author finds good and bad; overall score: grade “B”.
“Renewables Threaten German Economy & Energy Supply, McKinsey Warns”
Phew!! Good thing we got that clarified in time to avoid renewables!
And thank our lucky stars we have fossil fuels, so as to burn stuff that will last forever, and doesn’t threaten the economy and the energy supply.
alan2102says
Published in that notorious journal of far-left Marxist ideology, Nature Climate Change:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-019-0402-3.epdf
NATURE CLIMATE CHANGE | VOL 9 | FEBRUARY 2019 | 8287
Shift the focus from the super-poor to the super-rich
Carbon mitigation efforts often focus on the world’s poorest
people, dealing with topics such as food and energy security,
and increased emissions potential from projected population,
income and consumption growth. However, more policies are
needed that target people at the opposite end of the social
ladder — the super-rich.
“Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) has struggled to deal with the buildup of groundwater, which becomes contaminated when it mixes with water used to prevent the three damaged reactor cores from melting.
Tepco has attempted to remove most radionuclides from the excess water, but the technology does not exist to rid the water of tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen. Coastal nuclear plants commonly dump water that contains tritium into the ocean. It occurs in minute amounts in nature.”
what could go wrong?
David B. Bensonsays
mike @324 — Take the water out to the North Pacific Gyre. Then nothing can go wrong as even the fishermen shouldn’t mind.
Nemesissays
Everytime I say funny capitalism is done, as good as finished, I hear things like “ah, com on, fuckin communist, there is no alternative to wonderful capitalism, you lazy dreamer, go and walk along the herd, along the rat race and work hard to grab that money”. Hahaha, Bullshit. There is a future beyond money and it’s already happening for roughly 50 years now- Auroville, the first off-grid sustainable city without funny money:
What a beauty, what a vision. All discussions and all piling up of data and endless numbers are futile without massive and instantaneous acting (hear, hear: Bye, bye, funny capitalism^^)– that sounds mundane, but comes with infinite impact for good or bad. These guys in Auroville truely act towards an inspired and sustainable future beyond funny money.
Leave materialism, capitalism and egotism behind or die.
Al Bundysays
Kevin McKinney (UV): I’m wondering how complete Abaco’s recovery will be
AB: It will be for naught, but naught might come later if retreat is combined with grading. Devastation can be used to build berms that harvest CH4. Kind of a downgrade in value for a house.
Land seaward of the berm can be turned into a current or future lagoon. The dirt and rock harvested can be used to build the barrier ring.
Al Bundysays
mike: Coastal nuclear plants commonly dump water that contains tritium into the ocean. It occurs in minute amounts in nature.”
what could go wrong?
AB: Not much. One of the fastest currents in the world sweeps by there. Plus, tritium’s biological half life is measured in days while its nuclear half life is measured in years, so you’ll excrete it before it zaps you.
nigeljsays
Nemesis, while there is much to admire about Auroville and its ideals, and some aspects of its operation, there are significant problems as well as follows:
Trouble in Utopia. India’s Auroville was envisioned as an international community free of government, money, religion, and strife. It hasn’t exactly worked out quite as planned.
Perhaps these problems can be overcome, I don’t know. I was just curious and googled Auroville to try to see how it was working and if there were problems. I have spent about ten minutes on it and this post, and claim no expertise on it, but many articles like the above popped up, and this material looks very credible and well documented.
These alternative communities have nice ideals, but it seems that human beings often fail to live up to the ideals. Inward looking communities can become like cults and havens for sex abuse. Remember the people that wreck the capitalist system with their greediness and desire for power, often end up in alternative communities as well.
Al Bundysays
nigelj: Some extreme examples below where curved reflective glass and panels caused a few unanticipated and dramatic problems…
AB: That applies to greenhouses, too. The greenhouse on my Atlanta project threw a glare onto the house across the street that really degraded their experience. Nothing like heading into the kitchen and sitting by the window so as to enjoy a cup of coffee while being “lasered”.
The article includes a video shot by a crew embedded in a caravan. If you can watch it without crying then, well, you probably voted for Trump.
Nemesissays
@nigelj, #329
” These alternative communities have nice ideals, but it seems that human beings often fail to live up to the ideals. Inward looking communities can become like cults and havens for sex abuse. Remember the people that wreck the capitalist system with their greediness and desire for power, often end up in alternative communities as well.”
There are real people living in Auroville, no saints, just like real people, who are living some usual life within capitalism, are no saints. I don’t know about any sex abuse in Auroville so far, but there’s a lot of sex abuse outside Auroville all around the world. But that’s not my point, my point is, they are TRYING to live a life outside of funny material competition resp funny money hoarding. Sex, religious brainwash, drugs, crimes and rock’n roll? Might all be happening in Auroville, but that’s happening outside Auroville as well. But you will hardly find any city elsewhere that is TRYING to live without funny material competition resp funny money hoarding, trying a way outside of capitalism.
Personally I don’t need any project beyond capitallism, I freed myself beyond funny material shit hoarding anyway, one can do that anywhere, within any system. I don’t need Auroville or any other project, I can be free, strong and healthy almost anywhere, it’s not hard to get healthy and free within or without capitalism. But if you think, capitalism might survive, just lay back and wait and see things unfold a little bit further down the road ;) I’m just some transit passenger, I got no kids, so personally I can be pretty relaxed about the future. Auroville is concerned about mankind as a whole, I am not, I prefer my personal journey, I don’t need any ideology, no capitalist nor communist nor any ideology, I walk my own road, my own vision, no one elses road, no one elses vision and I’m pretty happy with that :))
Mr. Know It Allsays
326 – Nemesis
They make their own money in Auroville as shown in the video. Sounds like a similar system to the failed Soviet Socialist system. They have 2500 people – only 8,000,000,000 to go. If Auroville is self-sustaining, I’m wondering where they got all the material goods they have – brick and glass buildings, digital cameras, plastic, steel tools, gold jewelry, heaps of trash and empty wine bottles, etc.
331 – Al Bundy
Watched it. Not one person in the video was moving because of climate change. The reasons given were better life and escape violence. What I saw: lush green landscape, new clothes, new cars, gangsta handshakes, well fed people, modern freeways, respiratory disease coming to the US, nice BB gym, unprotected US border, lot of people walking which is what greens say we should be doing. It looked like a Bernie Sanders utopia, and they want to come here and make our country into the same thing. Did not shed a tear – except at the idiocy of our country allowing them within 1/2 mile of our border. ;) They will turn the USA into Argentina:
It would be awesome if we could help the 3 billion or so who would like to come here. Unfortunately we have our own problems that we will likely not be able to solve.
And let’s not forget that this Friday marks the start of a week of climate action around the world. Here in the US, you can find an action near you here:
Please come out. We need to ‘force a response!’ It won’t be from the maladministration, to be sure, but the overall political system can and (if the push is hard enough) will respond.
Killiansays
Re #334 Kevin McKinney said
And let’s not forget that this Friday marks the start of a week of climate action around the world. Here in the US, you can find an action near you here:
Please come out. We need to ‘force a response!’ It won’t be from the maladministration, to be sure, but the overall political system can and (if the push is hard enough) will respond.
The fact is, demonstrations have little effect compared to actual protest, which is disruptive, on-going, non-violent, has specific asks, and is massive.
Demonstrations can raise awareness, but rarely cause real change. I remind you:
Re #123 Raven Onthill says:
16 Sep 2019 at 1:00 AM
This, in passing, are some notes on renewables, how they could work, and their limitations. I am not sure it is appropriate here, but it is at least a technically-based policy paper. Discouragingly, I do not see any appropriate forum for it, yet if we are to mitigate AGW we must begin to address these issues.
If you are moved to comment over there, be aware that comments on older posts on my blog are moderated. I will be checking in every so often, but it may be a while before your remarks appear.
Nemesissays
@nigelj, 333
So, we will not see any new system, shrug, but we will see the fall of capitalism, I guarantee that, hehe.
Nemesissays
Correction of my recent comment:
I confused Mr Know It All with nigelj, damned, leave me alone, Mr.
Killiansays
Note: Raven’s link is to their own pro-nuclear screed, which is, actually, off-topic – and foolish.
Well, we already knew you voted for Trump. Way to validate Al’s assertion!
except at the idiocy of our country allowing them within 1/2 mile of our border.
Gee, and here I thought that sovereignty began *at* the border. Learn something every day…
They will turn the USA into Argentina
Apparently, you think Guatemala or Honduras = Argentina?
Not one person in the video was moving because of climate change.
Would it have been too much trouble to read the story, too? Because here are paragraphs 1, 5 & 6:
Gilberto Ysaias started thinking about leaving Honduras when he couldn’t produce enough crops to provide for his family. As an Indigenous farmer, the hotter summers were wreaking havoc on his yearly harvest…
Because climate change is not yet seen as a valid legal reason for asylum in any country, it is not included as a claim for their case. Yet the climate crisis played a central role in their decision to leave.
“Last summer, in my region, there was tremendous heat for a month, and half of all the plants dried,” Ysaias said in a case declaration. “Because of the heat, farmers are planting fewer crops and planting more grass for cattle. Because landowners are planting more grass, there are fewer jobs maintaining crops.”
Al Bundysays
KIA,
So far, climate change has been a precursor. Syrian refugees don’t talk about fleeing because of climate change, for example. However, it is extremely likely that the number of refugees generated in Syria would be lower without climate change, perhaps by an order of magnitude or two. Note that your observation is legally mandated. If a refugee mentions climate change as a motivation then said refugee has zero legal rights to claim refugee status. This is going to cause a problem as climate change gets more and more front and center.
And thank you for confirming my estimate of the breadth of your empathy sphere. The issue is tribalism. Does one give a s**t about those within one’s city who have different skin, habits, choices, whatever? With climate change one must enlarge the scope of one’s tribe to include all biomes everywhere, or at least all humans.In that film I saw folks who reminded me that Central Americans are humans, too. No grass huts. No subhuman strangeness. Just folks whose nations were deliberately destroyed by USAians (Banana republics were imposed on these folks by US oligarchs) and whose climate is being deliberately destroyed by USAians via, “We don’t care what happens to them [as long as they die in place]. America First, Last, and Only!”
What you don’t understand is that YOU are included in “Others”. Some oligarchs’ plan to let YOU and YOURS die off as soon as robots exceed your capability to serve. Personally, I think their plan has a good chance of success.
Al Bundysays
patrick027: if only they had built the reservoirs in upper and lower pairs
AB: great idea and it sounds easy to retrofit. I bet many dams have suitable downstream terrain for a much smaller and shallower “pumping pond”. If used to solve the duck curve problem they’d have a set high and low “tide”, which would make them grand for human utilization.
Kevin,
It sounds like you’re not in a super hurry. I’ll send something brief within a week or so and then follow up with more detail.
nigeljsays
Al Bundy @341 says “Syrian refugees don’t talk about fleeing because of climate change, for example. However, it is extremely likely that the number of refugees generated in Syria would be lower without climate change, perhaps by an order of magnitude or two.”
I agree. Syria’s refugee crisis has been positively linked to drought, which in turn is linked to climate change. I remembered this:
So, what form does your resistance take? Don’t just be the “I know better buzz-kill” guy; be specific as to what you think is effective. And all the better if you are actually speaking from experience.
Me? I’ll be on the street Friday–or, actually, the Statehouse steps, since I filed the appropriate paperwork. If all it does is “raise awareness,” I’ll still be glad. Kind of hard to have “massive” resistance without awareness, after all.
“I’ll send something brief within a week or so and then follow up with more detail.”
Correct; it appears that dealing with the monetary aspects is going to take a while, and there’s lots of organization to do as well. I’m deeply appreciative of any trouble you choose to take! So, thanks.
(Since that will all sound rather cryptic to most, let me clarify that Al had done some work on a simple residential geo-cooling system that I’m hoping we could use here in South Carolina. So, practical mitigation…)
A Harvard study identified the precise reason protests are an effective way to cause political change.
Since US President Donald Trump’s inauguration, protests have become ubiquitous in America. The day after Trump was sworn in, millions gathered gathered in cities around the country for a women’s march. Trump’s temporary ban on US entrants from seven Muslim-majority countries likewise led thousands of people to flock to airports to demonstrate.
…But do these these protests matter?
A clever analysis (pdf) by economists from Harvard University and Stockholm University finds that protests do in fact have a major influence on politics, just not in the way you might think. Their research shows that protest does not work because big crowds send a signal to policy-makers—rather, it’s because protests get people politically activated.
Evaluating the efficacy of protest is no easy task. It’s challenging to untangle whether a big protest actually caused a change, or whether that change would have happened regardless, because a policy was unpopular and the protest is a symptom of that unpopularity. The researchers got around this problem by using a natural experiment from the origins of the Tea Party…..
Interesting question. Imho we will be doing well if planting trees can even keep up with deforestation, and there are also limits on how much land is available to plant more trees.
However artificial trees are expensive ( I recall talk of similar carbon capture schemes requiring a price on carbon of around $100 / ton (US), so doable but still quite expensive, see article below) and the numbers required are pretty mind boggling, and they will require a high level of international coordination at a time when the world is devolving into an absurd form of Nationalism. And the technology at scale would use a lot of materials when there are many competing demands for the pool of planetary resources.
The other solution is sequestering atmospheric carbon in the soils, using special regenerative farming and cattle grazing techniques and field trials have shown at least some positive results.I don’t think we should over hype the potential of this, but it has one huge thing in its favour: the land is there, so its simply a question of changing how that land is managed. But such schemes require the education and winning over of of literally millions of farmers, and a warming climate will eventually cause soils to become a carbon emitter, according to research, so the plan will come up against limits.
Not saying either approach is right or wrong, and obviously they could exist in combination.
Al Bundysays
Killian: The fact is, demonstrations have little effect compared to actual protest, which is disruptive, on-going, non-violent, has specific asks, and is massive.
AB: True. Note that Occupy Wall St wasn’t sufficient. Until executives suffer there probably won’t be sufficient action. Perhaps 21% of executives are psychopaths. I’m sure that many or most of the rest have psychopathic tendencies.
There’s a [potential] test for psychopathy using an fMRI. When making decisions about morality-based issues (such as the trolley car problem*) normal people make a snap emotionally-driven judgment in one part of the brain then send the data to a calculating part. Psychopaths skip the first step.
A bit of executive advice: When a demonstrator screams at you you can either scream back or you can head up to your office, have your assistant bring you a coffee, and peer down at the circus in the street as you enjoy your brew. You might even see an idiot fighting with a demonstrator. Remember, that idiot could have been you.
Note that Iran just demonstrated a better model of “terrorism”: don’t kill anybody on purpose. This new “field” is greatly augmented with drones and cell phones. I think some “freedom fighters” are going to start taking out infrastructure. Others will fly butric acid stench-bombs into executive suites. I wonder if a few nutcases will set a bazillion simultaneous forest fires at exactly the worst moment via the touch of a button.
Or, more optimistically, many executives must be taking flak at home. Grandchildren have influence. Note that executives’ rationale for playing the intoxicating game of Capitalism (where actual humans are the pieces) is to give their children and grandchildren a better life, so cognitive dissonance is induced by grandchildren who constantly berate an executive for destroying their future.
Zebra,
I Wonder if we could develop a plague that only infects denialists? You know, a plague for a plague.
Kevin,
I don’t have any plans for my. Atlanta house experiment. If you want something a bunch, as opposed to somewhat, let me know.
#300,301 Al Bundy,
“lockouts”
Yes, of course, almost everything involved in my approach is already being done in bits and pieces in various combinations in various places. It’s off-the-shelf or easily becomes ots, with more demand, which you would get from the uniform market setting I propose.
Make the equipment “smart”, people will write apps, and the consumer can minimize costs/maximize benefit, which reduces energy consumption whatever the generating modality. Doesn’t work if you have monopolies in supply.
“plagues”
It’s just us monkeys, Al. Well studied; the genes are pretty much the same for everyone, but childhood environment and early experience can put you in one camp or the other. That’s why I’m a “Malthusian”; get to where there is an abundance of resources relative to population, and the balance shifts away from Authoritarian psychology to valuing the individual’s value.
Al, #301–
Would it be too much to do a quick ‘n dirty sketch and email me? We will be building, if we ever find a contractor we can work with/afford.
re 295 David B. Benson – ” I quit reading once it was clear that Mark Jacobson assumed that the Pacific Northwest could generate ten times as much hydropower as it does.” – average power? or capacity? With larger reservoirs, power could fluctuate greatly with time, with larger excursions for longer time periods, in a dispatchable manner. I don’t know offhand the details of that region’s reservoirs, but Grand Coulee is a big one, I’ve heard.
re 297 zebra – I think I pretty much agree – tax/regulate the externalities and have other sensible policies (safety, etc.) and otherwise let the market do it’s problem-solving thing.
Although the market allows agents to make contracts where they agree on fixed prices… etc… People like security. It reminds me of something I learned from watching “[The?] Men Who Built America” (original 4 part History Channel show focusing on Rockeffeller, Carnegie, JP Morgan, Vanderbuilt) … and recently I started watching “The Food that Built America” – some (or at least one) of those deals were anticompetitive and therefore inefficient… what was my point? Too many tangents…
Well, I’ll just say that I’ve come to see fixed prices as a sort of service provided to the customer (financial reliability), in exchange for a higher average price. For people who feel like there is a risk in paying real-time market prices (risks that would tend to be ameliorated by averaging for larger entities) – e.g. what if I turn the [?] on one time and it costs me a $100 – that’s probably hyperbolic but anyway, there might be middle ground compromises. (Obviously that wouldn’t happen with appliances that are programmed to delay operation to avoid price spikes … or operate in advance of forcast spikes.) I confess I don’t know all about PPAs and that sort of thing. I
Otherwise, my interest in finding those load and supply curves was about large-scale demand-supply matching (with the understanding that some features can change, but you can still get a sense of the potentials from the eia graphs). Interestingly … to be cont.
re my re David B. Benson –
Oops! I forgot about downstream effects – flash flooding from hydroelectric power spikes… if only they had built the reservoirs in upper and lower pairs… oh well (well they could put deep basins beneath dams with inflatable air bags; to deliver more power let the air out and fill the basin with water). Still, clearly hydro can be dispatchably cycled diurnally within limits. Not sure about 10x, though. Where can I find this original Jacobson paper, anyway?
Why Renewables Can’t Save the Climate
Michael Shellenberger
2019 Sep 04
Forbes
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/09/04/why-renewables-cant-save-the-climate/#5c0360633526
Insufficient energy density.
https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.php?t=epmt_6_02_b
Net Summer Capacities
June 2019 capacity, GW
31.5899 utility-scale PV
1.7579 utility-scale solar thermal, therefore 33.3478 GW utility-scale solar
21.2857 small-scale PV
52.8756 total PV
54.6335 total solar
98.1118 wind
79.8805 conventional hydro
comparing to https://www.eia.gov/beta/electricity/gridmonitor/dashboard/electric_overview/US48/US48
for the last 7 days, it seems solar generally peaks around 20 GW; the highest I’ve found so far is under 23 GW. It would be interesting to see how this compares to Jun and Jul, but supposing it was not much higher … e.g. if solar U.S. power rarely got above 25 GW, then from a national-level variability point of view, the effective capacity factor would be ~ 33/25 times the actual (assuming this is for utility scale and Aug-Sept ’19 capacity is not much different from June ’19).
I came across the idea of having fixed-tilt solar panels mounted to face somewhat W of due S to sacrifice some of the average power generation for more power in the afternoon-evening. Notably, a panel with latitude-tilt facing south can never get more than ~12 hours of direct sunlight; if placed in the defining meridian of a time zone, setting aside the analemma figure-8 shape (not all solar days are mean solar days) and atmospheric refraction (tiny effect), and without daylight savings time, the sun would set on the panel at 6 p.m. from spring to fall equinoxes; so a westward shift in orientation would continue to provide power later than otherwise. Of course, it would be cool if the surfaces of surrounding buildings of similar or greater height were reflective so as to redirect sunlight (direct and/or diffuse) onto panels… etc.
Of course, having solar power spread-out E-W with good transmission would also help. As of now there is still a concentration on the west coast of the U.S.
https://www.eia.gov/beta/electricity/data/browser/#/topic/0?agg=1,0,2&fuel=004&geo=qnifi05c03j78&sec=o3g&linechart=ELEC.GEN.SUN-US-99.M~ELEC.GEN.SUN-NV-99.M~ELEC.GEN.SUN-CA-99.M&columnchart=ELEC.GEN.SUN-US-99.M~ELEC.GEN.SUN-NV-99.M~ELEC.GEN.SUN-CA-99.M&map=ELEC.GEN.SUN-US-99.M&freq=M&start=200101&end=201710&ctype=linechart<ype=pin&tab=overview&pin=&rse=0&maptype=0&datecode=null
“As of now there is still a concentration on the west coast of the U.S.” … this is for utility-scale solar.
Worth the listen, IMO. If a new forced responses thread is posted, I will duplicate there.
Would you believe: a POTUS candidate who wants a Constitutional amendment on environmental protection?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9BCvJk8a8M
Andrew Yang CNN Climate Crisis Town Hall | Full Video
The Zach and Matt Show, Sep 4, 2019
1:30: inadequacy of GDP as measure; must include environment
4:15: abolish ALL oil/fossil subsidies
4:40: plan for electoral reform, opposing big money
6:15: constitutional amendment to protect environment
7:45: reforestation, ocean seeding, rebuild ecosystems
8:30: supports carbon tax; internalize externalities
9:10: incentivize good behavior
11:00: Freedom Dividend will help restore public trust in system,
and will help with public support for climate action
13:10: reducing emissions is primary, not geoengineering
16:55: farming reform
18:10: meat consumption, switch toward vegetarianism
19:00: Green New Deal
20:40: U.S. must lead on climate change
23:00: UBI, Freedom Dividend, transition to green economy
24:40: clean water is a fundamental human right
26:15: ban all offshore oil drilling
28:20: convert military spending to infrastructure spending
29:40: personal responsibility/action vs. collective action
patrick027 @304 & 306 — Lake Roosevelt, the impoundment of Grand Coulee dam, fills up to the border with Canada in 7 weeks each spring. It is possible to study, via the internet, the hydropower of the Columbia River system. Nothing more can be added.
As I stated, the Mark Jacobson paper is in PNAS, open access. So is the rebuttal. Neither are worth further effort.
#305 patrick027,
Yes, there’s nothing wrong with people wanting the security of fixed prices for whatever term they choose. That’s where nuclear has a niche… whether for large-scale industrial users or individual households. As a premium product, very reliable, no need for demand management, the price would be higher, of course.
#309 You mention transmission E-W; the market setup I suggest does that naturally. A house in “the next time zone” could be producing an excess because the residents haven’t gotten home yet, and that could be sold “back East” where demand is increasing.
Again, it’s all about making as many options as possible available.
#307 David B. Benson 4 Sep 2019
“Why Renewables Can’t Save the Climate
Michael Shellenberger 2019 Sep 04 Forbes”
Poor little Mikey Shellenberger — shill for Big Nuke. My heart goes out to him. To think he has to stoop to publishing in Forbes! Hopefully they are paying him handsomely. For that sort of intellectual prostitution, he should at least be getting some nice checks.
Shellenberger, recall, is director of the Breakthrough Institute, a pro-nuke anti-renewables thinktank that is cozy with various other right-wing think tanks (Hoover, Manhattan, etc.). Joe Romm describes them as “a pro-nuclear,
anti-clean-energy-deployment think tank that has partnered with the American Enterprise Institute to push right-wing energy myths and that routinely attacks energy efficiency programs, except when they reverse themselves.”
Good news!
https://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/energy/renewables/china-gridparity
20 Aug 2019 | 12:30 GMT
Solar Power Is Now as Inexpensive as Grid Electricity in China
Researchers found that PV systems could produce electricity at a lower price than the grid in 344 cities
By Charles Q. Choi
snip
“Previous research suggested that solar energy could reach grid parity—that is, become as or less expensive than coal and more conventional sources of electricity—in most developed countries between 2013 and 2020. In contrast, prior work suggested it might take China decades before solar energy achieved grid parity.”
Poof! “Decades” suddenly disappeared.
More on Shellenberger and Breakthrough. Do this:
http://www.culturechange.org/cms/content/view/176/65/
Neo-liberals in green clothing: Nordhaus, Shellenberger and Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors
by Lorna Salzman
6 June 2008
Killian,
Just to let you know, my opinion of you has consistently risen over the last couple of months. You’ve taught me a bunch.
Keep it up.
“Why Renewables Can’t Save the Climate, Michael Shellenberger”
Read this. Seemed like a huge exercise in cherry picking and deceptive rhetoric, so it’s not worth much, and is not an attempt to objectively get at the truth. Its the equivalent of quoting Chernobyl as a reason to dismiss nuclear power.
patrick @308
“Of course, it would be cool if the surfaces of surrounding buildings of similar or greater height were reflective so as to redirect sunlight (direct and/or diffuse) onto panels… etc.”
Solar panels are great, but you have to be careful with that. The glare can become a real problem for pedestrians and the heat can become damaging as well. Some extreme examples below where curved reflective glass and panels caused a few unanticipated and dramatic problems…
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/shortcuts/2013/sep/03/walkie-talkie-death-ray-buildings-heat
Renewables Threaten German Economy & Energy Supply, McKinsey Warns in New Report
Michael Shellenberger
2019 Sep 05
Forbes
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/09/05/renewables-threaten-german-economy-energy-supply-mckinsey-warns-in-new-report/#2a0bbe208e48
The McKinsey report warns of more serious consequences for Germans when the remaining nuclear reactors are turned off.
Regarding Andrew Yang’s climate/environment proposals, about which I posted earlier, here is a critique. The author finds good and bad; overall score: grade “B”.
https://cleantechnica.com/2019/09/06/yang-would-spend-us3-trillion-on-residential-solar-but-the-same-money-could-decarbonize-the-grid-entirely/
Yang Would Spend $3 Trillion On Residential Solar, But The Same Money Could Decarbonize The Grid Entirely
September 6th, 2019 by Michael Barnard
“Renewables Threaten German Economy & Energy Supply, McKinsey Warns”
Phew!! Good thing we got that clarified in time to avoid renewables!
And thank our lucky stars we have fossil fuels, so as to burn stuff that will last forever, and doesn’t threaten the economy and the energy supply.
Published in that notorious journal of far-left Marxist ideology, Nature Climate Change:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-019-0402-3.epdf
NATURE CLIMATE CHANGE | VOL 9 | FEBRUARY 2019 | 8287
Shift the focus from the super-poor to the super-rich
Carbon mitigation efforts often focus on the world’s poorest
people, dealing with topics such as food and energy security,
and increased emissions potential from projected population,
income and consumption growth. However, more policies are
needed that target people at the opposite end of the social
ladder — the super-rich.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/10/fukushima-japan-will-have-to-dump-radioactive-water-into-pacific-minister-says?utm_term=RWRpdG9yaWFsX0d1YXJkaWFuVG9kYXlVUy0xOTA5MTA%3D&utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GuardianTodayUS&CMP=GTUS_email
“Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) has struggled to deal with the buildup of groundwater, which becomes contaminated when it mixes with water used to prevent the three damaged reactor cores from melting.
Tepco has attempted to remove most radionuclides from the excess water, but the technology does not exist to rid the water of tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen. Coastal nuclear plants commonly dump water that contains tritium into the ocean. It occurs in minute amounts in nature.”
what could go wrong?
mike @324 — Take the water out to the North Pacific Gyre. Then nothing can go wrong as even the fishermen shouldn’t mind.
Everytime I say funny capitalism is done, as good as finished, I hear things like “ah, com on, fuckin communist, there is no alternative to wonderful capitalism, you lazy dreamer, go and walk along the herd, along the rat race and work hard to grab that money”. Hahaha, Bullshit. There is a future beyond money and it’s already happening for roughly 50 years now- Auroville, the first off-grid sustainable city without funny money:
https://youtu.be/y2kFDDfLGqA
What a beauty, what a vision. All discussions and all piling up of data and endless numbers are futile without massive and instantaneous acting (hear, hear: Bye, bye, funny capitalism^^)– that sounds mundane, but comes with infinite impact for good or bad. These guys in Auroville truely act towards an inspired and sustainable future beyond funny money.
Leave materialism, capitalism and egotism behind or die.
Kevin McKinney (UV): I’m wondering how complete Abaco’s recovery will be
AB: It will be for naught, but naught might come later if retreat is combined with grading. Devastation can be used to build berms that harvest CH4. Kind of a downgrade in value for a house.
Land seaward of the berm can be turned into a current or future lagoon. The dirt and rock harvested can be used to build the barrier ring.
mike: Coastal nuclear plants commonly dump water that contains tritium into the ocean. It occurs in minute amounts in nature.”
what could go wrong?
AB: Not much. One of the fastest currents in the world sweeps by there. Plus, tritium’s biological half life is measured in days while its nuclear half life is measured in years, so you’ll excrete it before it zaps you.
Nemesis, while there is much to admire about Auroville and its ideals, and some aspects of its operation, there are significant problems as well as follows:
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/roads/2015/07/auroville_india_s_famed_utopian_community_struggles_with_crime_and_corruption.html
Trouble in Utopia. India’s Auroville was envisioned as an international community free of government, money, religion, and strife. It hasn’t exactly worked out quite as planned.
https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/what-s-a-girl-like-you-doing-in-a-place-like-this-1.1131645
https://www.theweek.co.uk/26909/my-bizarre-childhood-auroville
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auroville
Perhaps these problems can be overcome, I don’t know. I was just curious and googled Auroville to try to see how it was working and if there were problems. I have spent about ten minutes on it and this post, and claim no expertise on it, but many articles like the above popped up, and this material looks very credible and well documented.
These alternative communities have nice ideals, but it seems that human beings often fail to live up to the ideals. Inward looking communities can become like cults and havens for sex abuse. Remember the people that wreck the capitalist system with their greediness and desire for power, often end up in alternative communities as well.
nigelj: Some extreme examples below where curved reflective glass and panels caused a few unanticipated and dramatic problems…
AB: That applies to greenhouses, too. The greenhouse on my Atlanta project threw a glare onto the house across the street that really degraded their experience. Nothing like heading into the kitchen and sitting by the window so as to enjoy a cup of coffee while being “lasered”.
https://www.vice.com/amp/en_uk/article/59n9qa/climate-change-will-create-15-billion-migrants-by-2050-and-we-have-no-idea-where-theyll-go
The article includes a video shot by a crew embedded in a caravan. If you can watch it without crying then, well, you probably voted for Trump.
@nigelj, #329
” These alternative communities have nice ideals, but it seems that human beings often fail to live up to the ideals. Inward looking communities can become like cults and havens for sex abuse. Remember the people that wreck the capitalist system with their greediness and desire for power, often end up in alternative communities as well.”
There are real people living in Auroville, no saints, just like real people, who are living some usual life within capitalism, are no saints. I don’t know about any sex abuse in Auroville so far, but there’s a lot of sex abuse outside Auroville all around the world. But that’s not my point, my point is, they are TRYING to live a life outside of funny material competition resp funny money hoarding. Sex, religious brainwash, drugs, crimes and rock’n roll? Might all be happening in Auroville, but that’s happening outside Auroville as well. But you will hardly find any city elsewhere that is TRYING to live without funny material competition resp funny money hoarding, trying a way outside of capitalism.
Personally I don’t need any project beyond capitallism, I freed myself beyond funny material shit hoarding anyway, one can do that anywhere, within any system. I don’t need Auroville or any other project, I can be free, strong and healthy almost anywhere, it’s not hard to get healthy and free within or without capitalism. But if you think, capitalism might survive, just lay back and wait and see things unfold a little bit further down the road ;) I’m just some transit passenger, I got no kids, so personally I can be pretty relaxed about the future. Auroville is concerned about mankind as a whole, I am not, I prefer my personal journey, I don’t need any ideology, no capitalist nor communist nor any ideology, I walk my own road, my own vision, no one elses road, no one elses vision and I’m pretty happy with that :))
326 – Nemesis
They make their own money in Auroville as shown in the video. Sounds like a similar system to the failed Soviet Socialist system. They have 2500 people – only 8,000,000,000 to go. If Auroville is self-sustaining, I’m wondering where they got all the material goods they have – brick and glass buildings, digital cameras, plastic, steel tools, gold jewelry, heaps of trash and empty wine bottles, etc.
331 – Al Bundy
Watched it. Not one person in the video was moving because of climate change. The reasons given were better life and escape violence. What I saw: lush green landscape, new clothes, new cars, gangsta handshakes, well fed people, modern freeways, respiratory disease coming to the US, nice BB gym, unprotected US border, lot of people walking which is what greens say we should be doing. It looked like a Bernie Sanders utopia, and they want to come here and make our country into the same thing. Did not shed a tear – except at the idiocy of our country allowing them within 1/2 mile of our border. ;) They will turn the USA into Argentina:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33i_BAhuiE0&list=RD33i_BAhuiE0&index=1
It would be awesome if we could help the 3 billion or so who would like to come here. Unfortunately we have our own problems that we will likely not be able to solve.
And let’s not forget that this Friday marks the start of a week of climate action around the world. Here in the US, you can find an action near you here:
https://strikewithus.org/
Please come out. We need to ‘force a response!’ It won’t be from the maladministration, to be sure, but the overall political system can and (if the push is hard enough) will respond.
Re #334 Kevin McKinney said
And let’s not forget that this Friday marks the start of a week of climate action around the world. Here in the US, you can find an action near you here:
https://strikewithus.org/
Please come out. We need to ‘force a response!’ It won’t be from the maladministration, to be sure, but the overall political system can and (if the push is hard enough) will respond.
The fact is, demonstrations have little effect compared to actual protest, which is disruptive, on-going, non-violent, has specific asks, and is massive.
Demonstrations can raise awareness, but rarely cause real change. I remind you:
https://popularresistance.org/naomi-wolf-when-protest-is-effective-and-when-it-is-not/
Share widely with “leaders” of change.
From the “other” forum:
@nigelj, 333
So, we will not see any new system, shrug, but we will see the fall of capitalism, I guarantee that, hehe.
Correction of my recent comment:
I confused Mr Know It All with nigelj, damned, leave me alone, Mr.
Note: Raven’s link is to their own pro-nuclear screed, which is, actually, off-topic – and foolish.
KIA, #331–
Well, we already knew you voted for Trump. Way to validate Al’s assertion!
Gee, and here I thought that sovereignty began *at* the border. Learn something every day…
Apparently, you think Guatemala or Honduras = Argentina?
Would it have been too much trouble to read the story, too? Because here are paragraphs 1, 5 & 6:
KIA,
So far, climate change has been a precursor. Syrian refugees don’t talk about fleeing because of climate change, for example. However, it is extremely likely that the number of refugees generated in Syria would be lower without climate change, perhaps by an order of magnitude or two. Note that your observation is legally mandated. If a refugee mentions climate change as a motivation then said refugee has zero legal rights to claim refugee status. This is going to cause a problem as climate change gets more and more front and center.
And thank you for confirming my estimate of the breadth of your empathy sphere. The issue is tribalism. Does one give a s**t about those within one’s city who have different skin, habits, choices, whatever? With climate change one must enlarge the scope of one’s tribe to include all biomes everywhere, or at least all humans.In that film I saw folks who reminded me that Central Americans are humans, too. No grass huts. No subhuman strangeness. Just folks whose nations were deliberately destroyed by USAians (Banana republics were imposed on these folks by US oligarchs) and whose climate is being deliberately destroyed by USAians via, “We don’t care what happens to them [as long as they die in place]. America First, Last, and Only!”
What you don’t understand is that YOU are included in “Others”. Some oligarchs’ plan to let YOU and YOURS die off as soon as robots exceed your capability to serve. Personally, I think their plan has a good chance of success.
patrick027: if only they had built the reservoirs in upper and lower pairs
AB: great idea and it sounds easy to retrofit. I bet many dams have suitable downstream terrain for a much smaller and shallower “pumping pond”. If used to solve the duck curve problem they’d have a set high and low “tide”, which would make them grand for human utilization.
Kevin,
It sounds like you’re not in a super hurry. I’ll send something brief within a week or so and then follow up with more detail.
Al Bundy @341 says “Syrian refugees don’t talk about fleeing because of climate change, for example. However, it is extremely likely that the number of refugees generated in Syria would be lower without climate change, perhaps by an order of magnitude or two.”
I agree. Syria’s refugee crisis has been positively linked to drought, which in turn is linked to climate change. I remembered this:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-change-hastened-the-syrian-war/
Klaus Lackner’s artificial trees:
https://asunow.asu.edu/20190429-solutions-lackner-carbon-capture-technology-moves-commercialization
Better than natural ones?
#335, Killian–
So, what form does your resistance take? Don’t just be the “I know better buzz-kill” guy; be specific as to what you think is effective. And all the better if you are actually speaking from experience.
Me? I’ll be on the street Friday–or, actually, the Statehouse steps, since I filed the appropriate paperwork. If all it does is “raise awareness,” I’ll still be glad. Kind of hard to have “massive” resistance without awareness, after all.
strikewithus.org
#342, AB–
“I’ll send something brief within a week or so and then follow up with more detail.”
Correct; it appears that dealing with the monetary aspects is going to take a while, and there’s lots of organization to do as well. I’m deeply appreciative of any trouble you choose to take! So, thanks.
(Since that will all sound rather cryptic to most, let me clarify that Al had done some work on a simple residential geo-cooling system that I’m hoping we could use here in South Carolina. So, practical mitigation…)
Oops! Cut-and-paste error!
My “correct” was supposed to be in response to Al’s:
“It sounds like you’re not in a super hurry.”
But do carry on regardless…
https://qz.com/901411/political-protests-are-effective-but-not-for-the-reason-you-think/
A Harvard study identified the precise reason protests are an effective way to cause political change.
Since US President Donald Trump’s inauguration, protests have become ubiquitous in America. The day after Trump was sworn in, millions gathered gathered in cities around the country for a women’s march. Trump’s temporary ban on US entrants from seven Muslim-majority countries likewise led thousands of people to flock to airports to demonstrate.
…But do these these protests matter?
A clever analysis (pdf) by economists from Harvard University and Stockholm University finds that protests do in fact have a major influence on politics, just not in the way you might think. Their research shows that protest does not work because big crowds send a signal to policy-makers—rather, it’s because protests get people politically activated.
Evaluating the efficacy of protest is no easy task. It’s challenging to untangle whether a big protest actually caused a change, or whether that change would have happened regardless, because a policy was unpopular and the protest is a symptom of that unpopularity. The researchers got around this problem by using a natural experiment from the origins of the Tea Party…..
“Klaus Lackner’s artificial trees:”
https://asunow.asu.edu/20190429-solutions-lackner-carbon-capture-technology-moves-commercialization
“Better than natural ones?”
Interesting question. Imho we will be doing well if planting trees can even keep up with deforestation, and there are also limits on how much land is available to plant more trees.
However artificial trees are expensive ( I recall talk of similar carbon capture schemes requiring a price on carbon of around $100 / ton (US), so doable but still quite expensive, see article below) and the numbers required are pretty mind boggling, and they will require a high level of international coordination at a time when the world is devolving into an absurd form of Nationalism. And the technology at scale would use a lot of materials when there are many competing demands for the pool of planetary resources.
https://www.power-technology.com/features/carbon-capture-cost/
The other solution is sequestering atmospheric carbon in the soils, using special regenerative farming and cattle grazing techniques and field trials have shown at least some positive results.I don’t think we should over hype the potential of this, but it has one huge thing in its favour: the land is there, so its simply a question of changing how that land is managed. But such schemes require the education and winning over of of literally millions of farmers, and a warming climate will eventually cause soils to become a carbon emitter, according to research, so the plan will come up against limits.
Not saying either approach is right or wrong, and obviously they could exist in combination.
Killian: The fact is, demonstrations have little effect compared to actual protest, which is disruptive, on-going, non-violent, has specific asks, and is massive.
AB: True. Note that Occupy Wall St wasn’t sufficient. Until executives suffer there probably won’t be sufficient action. Perhaps 21% of executives are psychopaths. I’m sure that many or most of the rest have psychopathic tendencies.
There’s a [potential] test for psychopathy using an fMRI. When making decisions about morality-based issues (such as the trolley car problem*) normal people make a snap emotionally-driven judgment in one part of the brain then send the data to a calculating part. Psychopaths skip the first step.
A bit of executive advice: When a demonstrator screams at you you can either scream back or you can head up to your office, have your assistant bring you a coffee, and peer down at the circus in the street as you enjoy your brew. You might even see an idiot fighting with a demonstrator. Remember, that idiot could have been you.
Note that Iran just demonstrated a better model of “terrorism”: don’t kill anybody on purpose. This new “field” is greatly augmented with drones and cell phones. I think some “freedom fighters” are going to start taking out infrastructure. Others will fly butric acid stench-bombs into executive suites. I wonder if a few nutcases will set a bazillion simultaneous forest fires at exactly the worst moment via the touch of a button.
Or, more optimistically, many executives must be taking flak at home. Grandchildren have influence. Note that executives’ rationale for playing the intoxicating game of Capitalism (where actual humans are the pieces) is to give their children and grandchildren a better life, so cognitive dissonance is induced by grandchildren who constantly berate an executive for destroying their future.
* https://www.iflscience.com/brain/the-trolley-problem-has-been-tested-in-real-life-and-the-results-are-surprising/