>>they just raised tier 4 prices to match tier 5, I guess.
I'm being sarcastic, of course. (This is for people like Khayman80 that read everything I say, praying to find an error somewhere.)
In reality, they dropped Tier 5 pricing, as a pap to the customers they're fucking over with their ludicrously high peak power prices, according to a friend of mine that is married to the regional PG&E director.
>>Wow. That initial comment indicates another one (of many) who thinks mismanagement on a spectacular scale is all the fault of smelly hippies with no influence whatever.
Who said all? I lay equal parts blame on our politicians (as I said), hippies (as I said), and PG&E (as I said elsewhere). But dirty hippies are definitely a big part of our energy problem. When you have environmentalists suing solar companies out of existence, then, yeah, shit ain't going to get built. The fact that we haven't built a new large scale power plant here in California since the 70s isn't because we haven't been trying, but because they've all been sued out of existence by dirty hippies. I guess the Sierra Club prefers all our polluting, CO2-emitting natural gas plants to thermal solar?
>>The huge capital cost of any sort of large project has kept solar thermal back just as huge capital costs have effectively buried nuclear. >>Point 4? Looks like your government can't govern if that's an issue so I suppose whatever gets under the radar is easier than wasting time in court.
As I said, lawsuits. PV Solar has immunity, which makes all the difference in the world. Look at how much PV solar has rolled out in California (PG&E services more solar installations than any other company in America) compared to the theoretically more cost-efficient Thermal Solar. Though when you dump billions into a project only to have it scrapped, it perhaps isn't very cost-efficient at all.
>>Point 5 is interesting becuase I never really thought somebody would have a photovoltaic installation that is neutered in such a way.
It's not neutering, per se... batteries with enough capacity to power a Walmart for hours are expensive.
There's different plans available, but the top tier during peak hours is indeed above 50c/kWh, as I said. The average E6 customer will pay 44c/kWh at 130% of baseline (baseline is basically normal power use without running your AC - if you run your AC, you'll hit top tier easily) and 48c/kWh at top tier (200% and above). There used to be an even higher tier (300%+), but they just raised tier 4 prices to match tier 5, I guess.
>>Insulation is a lot more price effective than solar power. Payback at the rates you are absurdly claiming would be a couple of months.
Eh, I actually priced all that stuff out and ran the math on it.
Replacing all the windows and sliding glass doors in my house, reinsulating, and replacing my AC unit with a more efficient one would have run about the same cost as the solar system.
But at the end of the year, my net power consumption will be close to zero (depending how much longer it stays hot). If I ran my AC less during the summer, it could drop negative.
Being more efficient never takes you to zero or below.
>>Tailings from a coal mine (unless they slip into a school) are considerably safer than anything from a uranium mine./snort
"On Feb. 26, 1972, a slurry dam gave way at the Buffalo Mining Company in Logan County, W.V., releasing a giant wave of thick, murky water, choked with chemicals, coal refuse, rocks and dirt. According to the official accident report, 132 million gallons of slurry suddenly flooded the Buffalo Creek Valley floor, destroying or partially destroying 17 communities. 125 people were killed. 4,000 people were left homeless." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_Creek_Flood
"The nation's largest coal slurry spill at the Martin County Coal Company in Inez, Kt., on Oct. 11, 2000. The EPA called the Inez spill the worst environmental catastrophe in the history of the Eastern United States . Far more extensive in damage than the widely known 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off the coast of Alaska, the Martin County Coal slurry spill dumped an estimated 306 million gallons of toxic sludge down 100 miles of waterways." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_County_sludge_spill
And then with coal fly ash: "The TVA Kingston Fossil Plant coal fly ash slurry spill occurred just before 1 a.m. on Monday December 22, 2008, when an ash dike ruptured at an 84-acre (0.34 km2) solid waste containment area at the Tennessee Valley Authority's Kingston Fossil Plant in Roane County, Tennessee, USA. 1.1 billion US gallons (4,200,000 m3) of coal fly ash slurry was released." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly_ash_slurry_spill
Not to mention the thousands upon thousands that die mining coal.
How long has it been since that was actually dogma outside of intro-level stuff(I ask by way of honest inquiry, in case somebody is familiar with the recent history of the field, not rhetorical attack)?
I am given to understand that it was at one point; but friends-of-friends in the university lab scene tell me that, while still considered to be largely ill-understood, the study of epigenetics and other subtle environment/genome interactions was a very hot area, with lots of exploratory work being done.
Well, here on Slashdot, old science loves to have a field day.
People still talk about Lamarckian inheritance as if it was completely wrong, instead of mostly being wrong. =)
If you starve a mother, it will actually methylate the genes of her kid so that they'll grow up skinnier, for example - which is classic Lamarckian inheritance.
Simply because the California electricity system has been an internationally known joke at least since the early 1990s.
Yep. The recent blackout in San Diego is only the most recent symptom of the underlying problem.
Until we can muster the political capital (which won't happen) and clear enviromentalists out of the way (which won't happen), electricity prices will continue to rise and our power infrastructure will continue to be ignored. Which was one of the major reasons I put solar on my house. It makes sense at today's prices, but I'm also gambling that prices will continue to rise, and not fall.
Photovoltaics, while a horribly expensive way to produce electricity in bulk, are a cheap way to say "look at me I'm green" when a more sensible large scale long term solution such as solar thermal has a huge capital cost before you get anything at all. That's why energy companies have had little showpieces of photovoltaics for decades instead of anythign serious. Photovoltaics make sense for Walmart both from the PR angle and the cost reduction angle since they can't muscle into the existing electricity market and can't build their own power plant. If nothing else think of it as a great big UPS for when there are "brownouts" on the grid.
Some comments on the above.
1) Small scale PV isn't "horribly expensive" when compared against PG&E's top tier rates. So it's not a bad choice for anyone wanting to cut back on their power bills - most people that I know that can do math are building out PV systems here in the state. Hell, the preschool that just opened up nearby threw 30 panels on their roof.
2) Greenwashing might be a secondary factor in Walmart's decision to throw up solar on their stores, but I bet they wouldn't have done it if the numbers didn't run the right way.
3) I wouldn't say PV solar "isn't anything serious" - Walmart is apparently only building out a quarter of their electricity consumption in capacity, but you can cover most of your electricity consumption with solar for essentially free. (Take a loan out, build the solar with it, and pay back the loan in cost savings.) There's a reason why solar is exploding all over the place, and the reason is being able to get out from under extortionate power costs.
4) Solar thermal is absolutely not the answer for a company like Walmart. The nice thing about small scale PV solar is that you can throw it up on your roof. Which, I might add, is protected by law - nobody (not even your local micro-Hitler in the homeowner's association) can stop you from doing it. Thermal solar would run into opposition from whacko groups like the Sierra Club (they've sued several such installations here in California) and NIMBYs suing to block the development. They could end up like the other thermal solar companies in the state driven bankrupt by lawsuits. PV, again, is protected.
Also, PG&E are well known to be dicks when it comes to tying in to new power generation facilities like this. Even though they are obligated by law to tie into any community generation plant built, they drag their heels and otherwise do everything they can to delay long enough to put these plants out of business. They have a long track record of doing this. Their PV process is a bit more streamlined. Even though they dragged their heels and fucked up the net meter installation on my house, it didn't take more than about a month to get my system tied in once it was finished.
5) Grid-tied solar systems don't help in a brownout. The inverter will detect an error in the grid, and shut down the solar system for safety reasons. If you want a non-grid tied, or a grid-tied system with battery backup (which will allow you to run in case of a brownout or blackout), then you get to add 50% to the cost.
>>Stupid question, but would it not also shield the roof from sunlight as well? Would that not cut in electricity costs? I presume the roof is not *that* well isolated?
It's not a stupid question.
PV panels actually do provide a significant amount of thermal insulation (they have an air layer beneath the hot, black absorption layer). The area of my house underneath the PV panels is a lot cooler than the other areas exposed to the same sunlight, and a lot cooler than last year. I don't have any way of estimating the cost savings from it, but since it protects my master bedroom, it helps me avoid having to run the AC when I take an afternoon siesta.
>>Walmart probably already got a quote from this and already knows that if they generate excess power they will get a fair price for the extra electricity. So this may pay for itself and more in the long term.
In general, you target solar to reduce your electricity needs down to the baseline (cheap) tier of power, which is subsidized by the higher tier prices, which run up to 55c/kWh in the state.
PG&E used to not have to pay "net surplus customer-generators" for any extra power they produced, but one of Arnie's last acts as governor was to make PG&E pay the same rate for generation as customers would pay for consumption, with AB 920 (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/asm/ab_0901-0950/ab_920_bill_20091011_chaptered.html).
What this means in practice is that for any realistic small-scale installations, PG&E will pay you to generate power at the baseline rate, which is not especially profitable, and certainly not worth the cost of installation.
Some news that will help get solar taken seriously. I understand its not the end-all of our energy problems (not even close), but its nice to see it get to a price point where the largest of corporations begin to utilize it. I'm not sure if the state granted any subsidies, but I'd have to say if they are going to subsidize something, at least this can't cause radiation evacuations, black lung, acid rain, and the like.
I live in California, and installed solar on my house back in March.
There's federal and state subsidies, but they're much lower now than they were in the past. I just filled out my state rebate form today - it amounts to about 5% of the cost of installation. I can't recall what the federal rate is off the top of my head, but it's certainly a lot lower than the 50% subsidy rate solar used to get.
The reason for solar's success here in California is only minorly due to the subsidies (they are being phased out). The real reason is that California's power generation system is 40 years out of date, and electricity prices have skyrocketed, with top-tier power costing 55c per kilowatt-hour, the last time I checked. It's not too difficult to get into the top pricing tier, either. If you set your thermostat below 78 in the summer, you'll end up paying over a thousand dollars for power in a month. (YMMV, depending on the size of your house, the efficiency level of your AC, and the thermal properties of your walls and windows.)
If you have solar, you apply your generation credits to your most expensive kilowatt-hours first, meaning you're generating at 55c/kWh. Small scale PV Solar systems have a 10-year levelized cost (after subsidies) of around 25c/kWh, which is why the optimal solution is to buy solar capacity up to a level that it will drop you into the cheap tiers of power. That's why I switched to solar (the environmental benefits are a nice bonus), and is certainly why Walmart is switching to solar in the state.
In states that don't have such backwater environmental laws, power is often flat rate and around 5 to 10 cents per kilowatt-hour. Solar doesn't make sense in these states.
>>Your statements are false, and the baseless arguments you're repeating have done harm to the scientific community. I've documented these facts extensively. The third criterion seems redundant; making false statements means that by definition you made them without adequate research into the truthfulness of your statements. I don't think that scientists count as celebrities, but even if they do, 'intent to do harm' seems to be supported by the hyperbolic insults and malicious language you've used to baselessly accuse scientists of outright lying and making ridiculously incompetent mistakes.
All of your statements above are false.
>>Maybe you would be able to successfully defend yourself in a libel trial
Weren't you the person who got upset when someone threatened you with a lawsuit? I know you're not, but glass houses and all.
>>This is no different than car manufactures making cars that only run on gasoline.
It's more akin to car manufacturers blocking aftermarket parts, which, IIRC, they tried once and lost at.
I see the whole thing as just another step to moving the entire world to the walled garden model, in an attempt to eliminate software and music/video piracy.
>>Space Marines, Gears of War, Resistance... they are nothing - N-O-T-H-I-N-G- compared to Halo 3, Reach or Halo Combat Evolved Anniversary Edition (november 2011)
Halo sucks compares with Gears of War. And by that I mean both entire series, which I've beaten. Except for the one that's not out yet... which kind of makes it obvious you're just fanboing.
The plot is like the graphics, bland and muddy. There's a few moments of brilliance in each game, which is why I bother playing and beating them. But they're just not very good.
A college student could come up with a more entertaining shooter.
>>As I just said, you definitely have heard of her, because I mentioned her and you called her a nutcase.
Fair enough.
There's enough nuts on Slashdot that second-hand accounts of nutcasery don't stick in my memory. But there's really no reason to equate the two of us, as I rather think it silly to want to sue someone on Slashdot for something they said. It's about as silly as accusing them incorrectly of committing libel.
>>Notice that I was saying "I think you need to keep trying to understand my 'confusion' with you," not "I think you need to keep trying to not be a dogmatist."
It doesn't scan that way, but ok, great.
>>I just spent over 60 pages explaining that your libelous insults aren't true. Of course you're libelling scientists.
You're not a lawyer, but that's still no excuse for using using terms inaccurately.
>>Hint: it isn't that I'm not trying as hard as you to not be a dogmatist.
Well, you do show a certain rigidity of thought, as this whole GI tract business has shown. It takes a certain freedom of thinking to be able to realize that your GI tract, both historically/evolutionarily speaking, physiologically speaking, and mathematically speaking are not part of "us".
>>However, a professional physicist has no such excuse, which is why Jane's accusations (and your incessant accusations) that the overwhelming majority of the scientific community are lying and/or making ridiculously incompetent mistakes really are accusations that we're dishonest idiots.
Making mistakes is not the same as being a dishonest idiot. Being biased is not the same as being a dishonest idiot. Being a dogmatist is not the same as being a dishonest idiot.
>>If history is any guide, this is the point where you claim that you've never made any of these accusations, and that I'm making up strawman arguments.
How could I accuse you of making strawman arguments, when you're obviously conflating my arguments with that of a person (Jane Q Public) that I've never even heard of?
>>showing that only 10% of the cells in the human body
Flush your GI tract with some Fleet's and a antibiotic chaser. Are you still 90% bacteria? No.
So obviously "we" are not made of bacteria.
>>If I love to call you a dogmatist, then surely you can find at least one quote from me supporting that accusation?
"I try very hard not to be a dogmatist." -ShakaUVM "I think you need to keep trying." -Khayman80
Care to print a retraction?
No?
Of course not.
>>libelous smears you've thrown at us
It's only libelous if they're untrue, not because you get offended by them. It would be more accurate of you to call them insult, which is what they were.
>>Please do that. I plan to eventually collect all your accusations of dishonesty, and then display them next to all your statements that you're not accusing scientists of dishonesty.
Oh, please do. You getting your panties in a bunch by me calling the RC.org people politically biased does not make said statement dishonest, libelous, or untrue. It simply means you got your panties in a bunch.
In case you haven't figured it out, biased doesn't necessarily mean they're lying. This is a fine philosophical point which, as usual, flies right over your head. Although it can incorporate outright lying, in the case of RC.org, their biased means they shade things on "their side" favorably (An Inconvenient Truth is handled with kid gloves, and its numerous errors hand-waved away as not being serious), but statements on "the other side" (say, that recent Spencer paper in Remote Sensing that caused all the hoopla) are raked over with a fine-toothed comb for errors. In addition to the real criticisms, they point out he didn't label one of his axes.
The point *that you will miss* if i don't say this is that I'm not saying the Spencer paper was any good. To the contrary. I've read it, and I don't think it really proves anything at all, and certainly isn't the Tea Party Great White Hope that it was supposed to be. If you've read my posts on such web sites, you'll see me flaming a number of people for their misapprehensions about the Spencer paper, and the web sites themselves for not pointing out that Pielke is not the most unbiased of sources. Here on Slashdot, I pointed out that Spencer at least had real academic credentials in the field.
>>Is this really the legacy you want to leave behind?
It's a serious question.
Hint: It involves evolution. Hint 2: It involves primordial oceans.
I realize that biology is not really your forte, but if you want to argue that stuff living in our GI tract is part of "us" you have to explain this as well.
>>That's just something you latched onto once your original point about dropping from "400 pounds down to 40" was shown to be based on an incorrect assumption.
It's not an incorrect assumption. If our muscle cells were 90% bacteria running around in disguise, then we'd lose a significant portion of our weight when we took antibiotics.
The way the urban legend has mutated, though, to now say "We are 90% bacteria" which, again, isn't even remotely true. Search for that phrase to find the meme floating around wild on the internet.
>>But the point is that biologists treat the large intestine and other body orifices as part of the human body
Funny, it was my college biology professor that made the point that - in a number of significant ways of looking at it - our GI tract and other things are treated by our bodies as being exterior to our body.
Your problem is that while you love to call me a dogmatist, the simple truth of the matter is you can't bend your mind around different ways of looking at things, even if they are true.
Think about why semen is salty some time. I'll let you get back to me on that one.
>>So, once again, you say you've just been making a point about topology this whole time? Let's see if that makes any sense...
I did. Read my other posts in this thread, you'll see I've been very careful to make this point every time.
>>You said this was a "modern urban legend that isn't even vaguely true".
Which I stand by. "We" are not made of bacteria, which is what the GP stated.
>>You just don't consider your large intestine to be part of your body, apparently.
Again, you have trouble wrapping your mind around a concept it's not very familiar with. But, believe it or not, the large intestine is external to your body. Think of the hole in a donut. If there is bacteria in the donut hole, do you say that donuts are made of 90% bacteria? It's a completely misleading statement, which has led to the scientific urban legend status it has now.
>>In fact, it's not just the general public who disagrees with you. Notice that the peer-reviewed literature also treats the large intestine, the mouth and other body orifices as part of the human body. Before you start implying that other people haven't studied biology or evolution, perhaps you should try to get actual biologists to use your definition in their papers.
>>I've never heard about the Nintendo twist - and I kinda doubt it; the USB comes from mid-90s, when the NES cartridge slot was still a fresh memory, and would probably make everybody wary about anything from Nintendo in the topic of connectors;p
It was an off-the-cuff remark made by one of my professors. He said they were inspired by the gameboy's connectors, which had been proven to hold up well in real life.
Taking a look at them, I do see the resemblance. (http://www.yyyescable.com/images/Product/PRODUCTPIC/BIG/GAME/gameboy/GBA-GBC-4P-LINK-CABLE.jpg)
>>Anyone else think its gotten a bit sad that a company building something to last/stand up to use has become a news story?
Well, normal full-sized USB connectors (of the various flavors) have held up very very well in real-world use, with the only real issue being that you sometimes have to try to insert them twice, as they are symmetrical and in a dark environment you can't see the black plastic on the inside very well. I heard that they were designed based on Nintendo game plugs, which might explain their success.
Micro-USB, though, IIRC, has those spring-loaded clips to make a strong connection, but the parts are very small, and hard to ruggedize very well with the very small form factor they have to deal with. My first Droid had it fail within a week of owning it, meaning that if I just tilted the phone on its side while it was plugged in, the charging cable would just fall out. It was pretty irritating, especially since it more than once fell out in the middle of the night, leaving me with a minimal charge on my phone for the next day.
So yeah, cut them a break. This is real news, more or less.
>>Yeah, that's why I leave my large intestine at home if I don't plan on using it while I'm out.
Have you ever studied biology? Or evolution? The reason the GI tract and similar things are the way they are is because they are external to our bodies. You can, in fact, flush everything out of them without any harm, thus proving they are not part of our bodies.
Or if you prefer math, you can describe this topologically with your mouth open. In computer science terms, you can calculate the connected-spaces graph of every point in your body. It doesn't matter... any way you look at it, "we" are not comprised of bacteria.
>>Not that I don't fear the "walled garden" concept, but just to point out that what Microsoft is doing seems to be even worse than what Apple is doing.
Well, yeah. But it's also completely unsurprising to anyone who has been following things over the last couple years. The real trick will be to see what happens when Microsoft tries to get everything behind their walled garden, and eliminates superuser access entirely on the desktop. You know they want it - it's just a matter of how to get there that's tricky. Win8 looks to be the first step in this direction - eliminating the ability for even administrators to sideload apps is *telling*.
Think about it - from their perspective it means the end of piracy, which they like to believe costs them trillions of dollars (or whatever hand-wavey amount) every year, and a stranglehold over distribution for the products of an entire industry.
Android, for all its shortcomings, allows you to sideload apps. The fact that Win8 will be locked down harder than a cell phone or tablet enviroment says everything that needs to be said.
It seems like you're trying to parse too much into it because you're letting yourself get hung up on an idea which is only in your head. By mass, yes, bacteria aren't dominant. By cell count (which I believe is what they're talking about)? Quite believable that there are more bacteria cells inside the volume of the human body than cells containing the human genome. Bacteria are prokaryotes (cells without nuclei or mitochondria), which sharply limits their size. IIRC, they may be up to three or four orders of magnitude smaller than eukaryotic human cells. And at any given time, there are likely to be an awful lot of them in your gut. A significant percentage of what you crap out is bacteria.
Right, as I said, the article only vaguely refers to where all these bacteria are supposed to be, with the skin and gut - which are both outside the body, topologically speaking - being the likely places. We simply don't have that many bacteria running around inside of our muscles or blood. If we did, they'd show up on blood screens or under a microscope. That's what I'm trying to say - "we" are not 90% bacteria.
It's turned into something of a science-based urban legend that we're full of shit. Basically.
Slashdot Mirror
>>lol wut
Edumify yourself:
https://notes.utk.edu/bio/greenberg.nsf/0/b360905554fdb7d985256ec5006a7755?OpenDocument
>>they just raised tier 4 prices to match tier 5, I guess.
I'm being sarcastic, of course. (This is for people like Khayman80 that read everything I say, praying to find an error somewhere.)
In reality, they dropped Tier 5 pricing, as a pap to the customers they're fucking over with their ludicrously high peak power prices, according to a friend of mine that is married to the regional PG&E director.
>>Wow. That initial comment indicates another one (of many) who thinks mismanagement on a spectacular scale is all the fault of smelly hippies with no influence whatever.
Who said all? I lay equal parts blame on our politicians (as I said), hippies (as I said), and PG&E (as I said elsewhere). But dirty hippies are definitely a big part of our energy problem. When you have environmentalists suing solar companies out of existence, then, yeah, shit ain't going to get built. The fact that we haven't built a new large scale power plant here in California since the 70s isn't because we haven't been trying, but because they've all been sued out of existence by dirty hippies. I guess the Sierra Club prefers all our polluting, CO2-emitting natural gas plants to thermal solar?
Environmental Lunacy in California:
http://www.basinandrangewatch.org/Calico-Lawsuit.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/24/business/energy-environment/24solar.html?pagewanted=all
http://www.getsolar.com/blog/conservationists-sue-federal-government-over-california-solar-energy-plant/16136/
http://www.earthtechling.com/2011/01/green-vs-green-in-another-solar-lawsuit/
>>The huge capital cost of any sort of large project has kept solar thermal back just as huge capital costs have effectively buried nuclear.
>>Point 4? Looks like your government can't govern if that's an issue so I suppose whatever gets under the radar is easier than wasting time in court.
As I said, lawsuits. PV Solar has immunity, which makes all the difference in the world. Look at how much PV solar has rolled out in California (PG&E services more solar installations than any other company in America) compared to the theoretically more cost-efficient Thermal Solar. Though when you dump billions into a project only to have it scrapped, it perhaps isn't very cost-efficient at all.
>>Point 5 is interesting becuase I never really thought somebody would have a photovoltaic installation that is neutered in such a way.
It's not neutering, per se... batteries with enough capacity to power a Walmart for hours are expensive.
>>Payback at the rates you are absurdly claiming would be a couple of months.
Oh, you think I'm lying about PG&E's top tier rates?
Read it for yourself:
http://www.pge.com/nots/rates/tariffs/electric.shtml#RESELEC_TOU
There's different plans available, but the top tier during peak hours is indeed above 50c/kWh, as I said. The average E6 customer will pay 44c/kWh at 130% of baseline (baseline is basically normal power use without running your AC - if you run your AC, you'll hit top tier easily) and 48c/kWh at top tier (200% and above). There used to be an even higher tier (300%+), but they just raised tier 4 prices to match tier 5, I guess.
You can get a more human-readable explanation here:
http://solarpowerrocks.com/pge/pge-wants-to-take-advantage-of-customers-who-have-gone-solar-%E2%80%93-don%E2%80%99t-let-them-screw-you/
>>Insulation is a lot more price effective than solar power. Payback at the rates you are absurdly claiming would be a couple of months.
Eh, I actually priced all that stuff out and ran the math on it.
Replacing all the windows and sliding glass doors in my house, reinsulating, and replacing my AC unit with a more efficient one would have run about the same cost as the solar system.
But at the end of the year, my net power consumption will be close to zero (depending how much longer it stays hot). If I ran my AC less during the summer, it could drop negative.
Being more efficient never takes you to zero or below.
>>Tailings from a coal mine (unless they slip into a school) are considerably safer than anything from a uranium mine. /snort
"On Feb. 26, 1972, a slurry dam gave way at the Buffalo Mining Company in Logan County, W.V., releasing a giant wave of thick, murky water, choked with chemicals, coal refuse, rocks and dirt. According to the official accident report, 132 million gallons of slurry suddenly flooded the Buffalo Creek Valley floor, destroying or partially destroying 17 communities. 125 people were killed. 4,000 people were left homeless."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_Creek_Flood
"The nation's largest coal slurry spill at the Martin County Coal Company in Inez, Kt., on Oct. 11, 2000. The EPA called the Inez spill the worst environmental catastrophe in the history of the Eastern United States . Far more extensive in damage than the widely known 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off the coast of Alaska, the Martin County Coal slurry spill dumped an estimated 306 million gallons of toxic sludge down 100 miles of waterways."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_County_sludge_spill
And then with coal fly ash:
"The TVA Kingston Fossil Plant coal fly ash slurry spill occurred just before 1 a.m. on Monday December 22, 2008, when an ash dike ruptured at an 84-acre (0.34 km2) solid waste containment area at the Tennessee Valley Authority's Kingston Fossil Plant in Roane County, Tennessee, USA. 1.1 billion US gallons (4,200,000 m3) of coal fly ash slurry was released."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly_ash_slurry_spill
Not to mention the thousands upon thousands that die mining coal.
Well, here on Slashdot, old science loves to have a field day.
People still talk about Lamarckian inheritance as if it was completely wrong, instead of mostly being wrong. =)
If you starve a mother, it will actually methylate the genes of her kid so that they'll grow up skinnier, for example - which is classic Lamarckian inheritance.
Yep. The recent blackout in San Diego is only the most recent symptom of the underlying problem.
Until we can muster the political capital (which won't happen) and clear enviromentalists out of the way (which won't happen), electricity prices will continue to rise and our power infrastructure will continue to be ignored. Which was one of the major reasons I put solar on my house. It makes sense at today's prices, but I'm also gambling that prices will continue to rise, and not fall.
Some comments on the above.
1) Small scale PV isn't "horribly expensive" when compared against PG&E's top tier rates. So it's not a bad choice for anyone wanting to cut back on their power bills - most people that I know that can do math are building out PV systems here in the state. Hell, the preschool that just opened up nearby threw 30 panels on their roof.
2) Greenwashing might be a secondary factor in Walmart's decision to throw up solar on their stores, but I bet they wouldn't have done it if the numbers didn't run the right way.
3) I wouldn't say PV solar "isn't anything serious" - Walmart is apparently only building out a quarter of their electricity consumption in capacity, but you can cover most of your electricity consumption with solar for essentially free. (Take a loan out, build the solar with it, and pay back the loan in cost savings.) There's a reason why solar is exploding all over the place, and the reason is being able to get out from under extortionate power costs.
4) Solar thermal is absolutely not the answer for a company like Walmart. The nice thing about small scale PV solar is that you can throw it up on your roof. Which, I might add, is protected by law - nobody (not even your local micro-Hitler in the homeowner's association) can stop you from doing it. Thermal solar would run into opposition from whacko groups like the Sierra Club (they've sued several such installations here in California) and NIMBYs suing to block the development. They could end up like the other thermal solar companies in the state driven bankrupt by lawsuits. PV, again, is protected.
Also, PG&E are well known to be dicks when it comes to tying in to new power generation facilities like this. Even though they are obligated by law to tie into any community generation plant built, they drag their heels and otherwise do everything they can to delay long enough to put these plants out of business. They have a long track record of doing this. Their PV process is a bit more streamlined. Even though they dragged their heels and fucked up the net meter installation on my house, it didn't take more than about a month to get my system tied in once it was finished.
5) Grid-tied solar systems don't help in a brownout. The inverter will detect an error in the grid, and shut down the solar system for safety reasons. If you want a non-grid tied, or a grid-tied system with battery backup (which will allow you to run in case of a brownout or blackout), then you get to add 50% to the cost.
>>Stupid question, but would it not also shield the roof from sunlight as well? Would that not cut in electricity costs? I presume the roof is not *that* well isolated?
It's not a stupid question.
PV panels actually do provide a significant amount of thermal insulation (they have an air layer beneath the hot, black absorption layer). The area of my house underneath the PV panels is a lot cooler than the other areas exposed to the same sunlight, and a lot cooler than last year. I don't have any way of estimating the cost savings from it, but since it protects my master bedroom, it helps me avoid having to run the AC when I take an afternoon siesta.
>>Walmart probably already got a quote from this and already knows that if they generate excess power they will get a fair price for the extra electricity. So this may pay for itself and more in the long term.
In general, you target solar to reduce your electricity needs down to the baseline (cheap) tier of power, which is subsidized by the higher tier prices, which run up to 55c/kWh in the state.
PG&E used to not have to pay "net surplus customer-generators" for any extra power they produced, but one of Arnie's last acts as governor was to make PG&E pay the same rate for generation as customers would pay for consumption, with AB 920 (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/asm/ab_0901-0950/ab_920_bill_20091011_chaptered.html).
What this means in practice is that for any realistic small-scale installations, PG&E will pay you to generate power at the baseline rate, which is not especially profitable, and certainly not worth the cost of installation.
I live in California, and installed solar on my house back in March.
There's federal and state subsidies, but they're much lower now than they were in the past. I just filled out my state rebate form today - it amounts to about 5% of the cost of installation. I can't recall what the federal rate is off the top of my head, but it's certainly a lot lower than the 50% subsidy rate solar used to get.
The reason for solar's success here in California is only minorly due to the subsidies (they are being phased out). The real reason is that California's power generation system is 40 years out of date, and electricity prices have skyrocketed, with top-tier power costing 55c per kilowatt-hour, the last time I checked. It's not too difficult to get into the top pricing tier, either. If you set your thermostat below 78 in the summer, you'll end up paying over a thousand dollars for power in a month. (YMMV, depending on the size of your house, the efficiency level of your AC, and the thermal properties of your walls and windows.)
If you have solar, you apply your generation credits to your most expensive kilowatt-hours first, meaning you're generating at 55c/kWh. Small scale PV Solar systems have a 10-year levelized cost (after subsidies) of around 25c/kWh, which is why the optimal solution is to buy solar capacity up to a level that it will drop you into the cheap tiers of power. That's why I switched to solar (the environmental benefits are a nice bonus), and is certainly why Walmart is switching to solar in the state.
In states that don't have such backwater environmental laws, power is often flat rate and around 5 to 10 cents per kilowatt-hour. Solar doesn't make sense in these states.
>>Your statements are false, and the baseless arguments you're repeating have done harm to the scientific community. I've documented these facts extensively. The third criterion seems redundant; making false statements means that by definition you made them without adequate research into the truthfulness of your statements. I don't think that scientists count as celebrities, but even if they do, 'intent to do harm' seems to be supported by the hyperbolic insults and malicious language you've used to baselessly accuse scientists of outright lying and making ridiculously incompetent mistakes.
All of your statements above are false.
>>Maybe you would be able to successfully defend yourself in a libel trial
Weren't you the person who got upset when someone threatened you with a lawsuit? I know you're not, but glass houses and all.
>>This is no different than car manufactures making cars that only run on gasoline.
It's more akin to car manufacturers blocking aftermarket parts, which, IIRC, they tried once and lost at.
I see the whole thing as just another step to moving the entire world to the walled garden model, in an attempt to eliminate software and music/video piracy.
>>Space Marines, Gears of War, Resistance... they are nothing - N-O-T-H-I-N-G- compared to Halo 3, Reach or Halo Combat Evolved Anniversary Edition (november 2011)
Halo sucks compares with Gears of War. And by that I mean both entire series, which I've beaten. Except for the one that's not out yet... which kind of makes it obvious you're just fanboing.
The plot is like the graphics, bland and muddy. There's a few moments of brilliance in each game, which is why I bother playing and beating them. But they're just not very good.
A college student could come up with a more entertaining shooter.
>>As I just said, you definitely have heard of her, because I mentioned her and you called her a nutcase.
Fair enough.
There's enough nuts on Slashdot that second-hand accounts of nutcasery don't stick in my memory. But there's really no reason to equate the two of us, as I rather think it silly to want to sue someone on Slashdot for something they said. It's about as silly as accusing them incorrectly of committing libel.
>>Notice that I was saying "I think you need to keep trying to understand my 'confusion' with you," not "I think you need to keep trying to not be a dogmatist."
It doesn't scan that way, but ok, great.
>>I just spent over 60 pages explaining that your libelous insults aren't true. Of course you're libelling scientists.
You're not a lawyer, but that's still no excuse for using using terms inaccurately.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defamation#How_to_prove_libel
>>Hint: it isn't that I'm not trying as hard as you to not be a dogmatist.
Well, you do show a certain rigidity of thought, as this whole GI tract business has shown. It takes a certain freedom of thinking to be able to realize that your GI tract, both historically/evolutionarily speaking, physiologically speaking, and mathematically speaking are not part of "us".
>>However, a professional physicist has no such excuse, which is why Jane's accusations (and your incessant accusations) that the overwhelming majority of the scientific community are lying and/or making ridiculously incompetent mistakes really are accusations that we're dishonest idiots.
Making mistakes is not the same as being a dishonest idiot.
Being biased is not the same as being a dishonest idiot.
Being a dogmatist is not the same as being a dishonest idiot.
>>If history is any guide, this is the point where you claim that you've never made any of these accusations, and that I'm making up strawman arguments.
How could I accuse you of making strawman arguments, when you're obviously conflating my arguments with that of a person (Jane Q Public) that I've never even heard of?
That would be outrageous.
>>showing that only 10% of the cells in the human body
Flush your GI tract with some Fleet's and a antibiotic chaser. Are you still 90% bacteria? No.
So obviously "we" are not made of bacteria.
>>If I love to call you a dogmatist, then surely you can find at least one quote from me supporting that accusation?
"I try very hard not to be a dogmatist." -ShakaUVM
"I think you need to keep trying." -Khayman80
Care to print a retraction?
No?
Of course not.
>>libelous smears you've thrown at us
It's only libelous if they're untrue, not because you get offended by them. It would be more accurate of you to call them insult, which is what they were.
>>Please do that. I plan to eventually collect all your accusations of dishonesty, and then display them next to all your statements that you're not accusing scientists of dishonesty.
Oh, please do. You getting your panties in a bunch by me calling the RC.org people politically biased does not make said statement dishonest, libelous, or untrue. It simply means you got your panties in a bunch.
In case you haven't figured it out, biased doesn't necessarily mean they're lying. This is a fine philosophical point which, as usual, flies right over your head. Although it can incorporate outright lying, in the case of RC.org, their biased means they shade things on "their side" favorably (An Inconvenient Truth is handled with kid gloves, and its numerous errors hand-waved away as not being serious), but statements on "the other side" (say, that recent Spencer paper in Remote Sensing that caused all the hoopla) are raked over with a fine-toothed comb for errors. In addition to the real criticisms, they point out he didn't label one of his axes.
The point *that you will miss* if i don't say this is that I'm not saying the Spencer paper was any good. To the contrary. I've read it, and I don't think it really proves anything at all, and certainly isn't the Tea Party Great White Hope that it was supposed to be. If you've read my posts on such web sites, you'll see me flaming a number of people for their misapprehensions about the Spencer paper, and the web sites themselves for not pointing out that Pielke is not the most unbiased of sources. Here on Slashdot, I pointed out that Spencer at least had real academic credentials in the field.
>>Is this really the legacy you want to leave behind?
It's a serious question.
Hint: It involves evolution.
Hint 2: It involves primordial oceans.
I realize that biology is not really your forte, but if you want to argue that stuff living in our GI tract is part of "us" you have to explain this as well.
>>That's just something you latched onto once your original point about dropping from "400 pounds down to 40" was shown to be based on an incorrect assumption.
It's not an incorrect assumption. If our muscle cells were 90% bacteria running around in disguise, then we'd lose a significant portion of our weight when we took antibiotics.
The way the urban legend has mutated, though, to now say "We are 90% bacteria" which, again, isn't even remotely true. Search for that phrase to find the meme floating around wild on the internet.
>>But the point is that biologists treat the large intestine and other body orifices as part of the human body
Funny, it was my college biology professor that made the point that - in a number of significant ways of looking at it - our GI tract and other things are treated by our bodies as being exterior to our body.
Your problem is that while you love to call me a dogmatist, the simple truth of the matter is you can't bend your mind around different ways of looking at things, even if they are true.
Think about why semen is salty some time. I'll let you get back to me on that one.
>>So, once again, you say you've just been making a point about topology this whole time? Let's see if that makes any sense...
I did. Read my other posts in this thread, you'll see I've been very careful to make this point every time.
>>You said this was a "modern urban legend that isn't even vaguely true".
Which I stand by. "We" are not made of bacteria, which is what the GP stated.
>>You just don't consider your large intestine to be part of your body, apparently.
Again, you have trouble wrapping your mind around a concept it's not very familiar with. But, believe it or not, the large intestine is external to your body. Think of the hole in a donut. If there is bacteria in the donut hole, do you say that donuts are made of 90% bacteria? It's a completely misleading statement, which has led to the scientific urban legend status it has now.
>>In fact, it's not just the general public who disagrees with you. Notice that the peer-reviewed literature also treats the large intestine, the mouth and other body orifices as part of the human body. Before you start implying that other people haven't studied biology or evolution, perhaps you should try to get actual biologists to use your definition in their papers.
Don't revel in your ignorance.
>>I've never heard about the Nintendo twist - and I kinda doubt it; the USB comes from mid-90s, when the NES cartridge slot was still a fresh memory, and would probably make everybody wary about anything from Nintendo in the topic of connectors ;p
It was an off-the-cuff remark made by one of my professors. He said they were inspired by the gameboy's connectors, which had been proven to hold up well in real life.
Taking a look at them, I do see the resemblance. (http://www.yyyescable.com/images/Product/PRODUCTPIC/BIG/GAME/gameboy/GBA-GBC-4P-LINK-CABLE.jpg)
>>Anyone else think its gotten a bit sad that a company building something to last/stand up to use has become a news story?
Well, normal full-sized USB connectors (of the various flavors) have held up very very well in real-world use, with the only real issue being that you sometimes have to try to insert them twice, as they are symmetrical and in a dark environment you can't see the black plastic on the inside very well. I heard that they were designed based on Nintendo game plugs, which might explain their success.
Micro-USB, though, IIRC, has those spring-loaded clips to make a strong connection, but the parts are very small, and hard to ruggedize very well with the very small form factor they have to deal with. My first Droid had it fail within a week of owning it, meaning that if I just tilted the phone on its side while it was plugged in, the charging cable would just fall out. It was pretty irritating, especially since it more than once fell out in the middle of the night, leaving me with a minimal charge on my phone for the next day.
So yeah, cut them a break. This is real news, more or less.
>>Yeah, that's why I leave my large intestine at home if I don't plan on using it while I'm out.
Have you ever studied biology? Or evolution? The reason the GI tract and similar things are the way they are is because they are external to our bodies. You can, in fact, flush everything out of them without any harm, thus proving they are not part of our bodies.
Or if you prefer math, you can describe this topologically with your mouth open. In computer science terms, you can calculate the connected-spaces graph of every point in your body. It doesn't matter... any way you look at it, "we" are not comprised of bacteria.
The GI system is external to the human body, topologically speaking... they are not part of "us".
>>Not that I don't fear the "walled garden" concept, but just to point out that what Microsoft is doing seems to be even worse than what Apple is doing.
Well, yeah. But it's also completely unsurprising to anyone who has been following things over the last couple years. The real trick will be to see what happens when Microsoft tries to get everything behind their walled garden, and eliminates superuser access entirely on the desktop. You know they want it - it's just a matter of how to get there that's tricky. Win8 looks to be the first step in this direction - eliminating the ability for even administrators to sideload apps is *telling*.
Think about it - from their perspective it means the end of piracy, which they like to believe costs them trillions of dollars (or whatever hand-wavey amount) every year, and a stranglehold over distribution for the products of an entire industry.
Android, for all its shortcomings, allows you to sideload apps. The fact that Win8 will be locked down harder than a cell phone or tablet enviroment says everything that needs to be said.
Right, as I said, the article only vaguely refers to where all these bacteria are supposed to be, with the skin and gut - which are both outside the body, topologically speaking - being the likely places. We simply don't have that many bacteria running around inside of our muscles or blood. If we did, they'd show up on blood screens or under a microscope. That's what I'm trying to say - "we" are not 90% bacteria.
It's turned into something of a science-based urban legend that we're full of shit. Basically.