The U.K. Just Went 55 Hours Without Using Coal for the First Time in History

Bloomberg:

No coal was used for power generation by stations in the U.K. between 10:25 p.m. in London on Monday until 5:10 a.m. on Thursday, according to grid data compiled by Bloomberg. At the same time wind turbines produced more power.

This is good news. But it also shows further development is needed. The latitude of the UK places it in a zone which is rich in wind, but not necessarily rich in solar potential.

This means that decision makers should invest more resources into wind farms, especially those off shore.

It also means that energy storage facilities must be built. Wind (and solar) are intermittent power sources. The recent wind power increase is due to very high winds and will obviously decrease once the low pressure system disappears. Energy storage infrastructure is essential for the future development of renewable energy, as it can store the excess energy generated during peak production times (windy days for wind turbines, sunny days for solar) for later use during peak consumption times. This infrastructure can include the sort of lithium-ion battery storage that Tesla built in South Australia recently, and can be built on land already used by coal/gas power stations (since the distribution infrastructure is already in place).

Effects of the Kurnell Desalination Plant

Sydney's Kurnell Desalination Plant began operating during the first week of February 2010. At full capacity it produces some 250 megalitres a day of potable water. As I flew from Sydney to Launceston yesterday, I managed to glimpse it through the window as we flew over Kurnell.

It has not been a great time for proponents of desalination plants, at least in Australia. Popular opposition to the plants focuses upon the greenhouse gases produced by the increased energy needed to operate the plant (a problem offset by the co-construction of a wind farm that produces more kW-h over a 12 month period than is consumed by the desalination plant), the added cost it places upon tap water (which is only a problem when water supplies are not low) and the pollution caused by pumping brine back into the sea (a process which causes increased salinity in the affected area but is also a natural part of the water cycle).

Another problem is that the plant has begun operating during a severe La-Nina event which is known to cause high rainfall levels in Australia. The plant was conceived and built during an El-Nino period when Australia was suffering prolonged drought and low rainfall.

Over the past year I have been collating data from the Sydney Catchment Authority which runs a weekly data series on Sydney water storage and supply - specifically the amount of water gained and pumped by Sydney's network of dams. When compared to the previous six years (2004-2009), 2010 stands out as the year the least amount of water was delivered from dams - a direct result of the increased supply of the Kurnell Desalination Plant.

According to the Data I have collated, the average amount of water delivered from the first week of February to the second last week of December is 466,438.91 megalitres. In 2010, the water delivered in this period was 387,674.83 megalitres, which means that the Desalination plant prevented up to 78,764.08 megalitres from being pumped from Sydney's dams.

At the time that this article was published, Sydney Dam levels have risen to 1,863,500 megalitres, mainly as a result of increased rainfall. This represents 72.2% of capacity, the highest since 2002. If we do the math, we prove that, since 78,764.08 megalitres was saved due to the desalination plant, then we can expect the current dam levels to be 3.1% less than what they currently are - 69.1% - if the desalination plant was not operating.

Moreover, simply by crunching the numbers already shown above, we can see that the desalination plant produces around 17% of Sydney's water - at least if we compare 2010's results with the averages of 2004-2009.

The Kurnell plant was built with the understanding that it would be "mothballed" during periods of high dam capacity. It was also decided that the plant would run continuously for two years to iron out any problems before any "mothballing" would occur, so the chances are that the plant will continue to operate throughout 2011 no matter how full the dams get.

The Kurnell plant has been designed to allow for a doubling of capacity if needed - land has been set aside at the site for more buildings and the piping to and from the plant has been designed to allow for a doubling of capacity. If rainfall levels in Australia and Sydney continue to decline (despite the recent wet weather) then increasing the capacity of the plant will be a cost effective solution to any declining dam levels.

Since it would be more efficient to operate the plant for long periods and mothball it for long periods (as opposed to short periods for both), I would suggest some sort of "trigger" mechanism to be put into place:

* 75% Capacity: The plant will be shut down and mothballed once stored water supplies reach 75% capacity.
* 50% Capacity: The plant will begin operating once stored water supplies dip below 50% capacity.
* 25% Capacity: The plant will be doubled in size once stored water supplies dip below 25% capacity, or else another desalination plant built if this has already happened. (This assumes that the plant has been operating continuously since supplies dropped below 50%)

Adelaide has been hot these last 12 months

Catastrophic Fire Warning for South Australia

A heatwave has been hitting South Australia hard since the beginning of November. I'll let the stats tell you:

Australian Bureau of Meteorology. Link.

For American readers who read things in Farenheit, you might like to convert the figures here. Basically the mean low and high temperatures this month have ranged from 17.5°C (63.5°F) to 32.1°C (89.8°F). As you can see, temperatures passed 37°C (98.6°F) six times this month. Whew! And now there's this:

The weather bureau has issued Australia's first "catastrophic" bushfire danger rating for two parts of northern South Australia tomorrow.
The Country Fire Service (CFS) says any fires in the North West Pastoral and Flinders districts will be uncontrollable and there is a very high likelihood that people in their path will die.
The weather bureau says there will be a combination of extremely high temperatures, strong winds and low humidity in the two districts.
It is the first time the rating has been used in Australia since a new national warning system was introduced after Victoria's deadly Black Saturday bushfires in February.
The Country Fire Service's Euan Ferguson says even the most prepared residents should leave their homes by the morning.
"It really will depend on the onset of those very strong wind conditions," he said.
"I would say that at the very latest by 10:00 tomorrow morning they should be in their safer place."
Wendy Shirley of the CFS Volunteers Association estimates that about two-thirds of those in bushfire-prone areas have not heard warnings or do not think it affects them.
"It's those two thirds of people that are not only putting their own, their families' lives and their neighbours' lives at risk, but also the lives of our volunteer firefighters," she said.

The Adelaide Forecast doesn't look good:

• Wednesday. Min 20°C (68°F) Max 39°C (102.2°F)
• Thursday. Min 25°C (77°F) Max 41°C (105.8°F)
  

After that things should cool down for a few days. Adelaide is not, of course, the target of the fire warning but areas to the north. I visited South Australia back in November 1999 and to the Flinders districts mentioned in the warning and, while it can get quite hot and dry, it was certainly not a desert. There'll be plenty of trees and scrub - and properties - that might get consumed if any fire breaks out. Dust storms are also likely.

Need I remind people that it is not summer yet down under?

Mount Remarkable National Park. Will this be gone in a few days?

Windy weekend in Spain delivers record amount of renewable energy to grid

Da Guardian:

Wind energy provided more than half of Spain's total electricity needs for several hours over the weekend as the country set a new national record for wind-generated power.

With high winds gusting across much of the country, Spain's huge network of windfarms jointly poured the equivalent of 11 nuclear power stations' worth of electricity into the national grid.

At one stage on Sunday morning, the country's wind farms were able to cover 53% of total electricity demand – a new record in a country that boasts the world's third largest array of wind turbines, after the United States and Germany.

For more than five hours on Sunday morning output from wind power was providing more than half of the electricity being used. At their peak, wind farms were generating 11.5 gigawatts, or two-thirds of their theoretical maximum capacity of almost 18GW.

The new record, which beat a 44 % level set earlier last week, came as strong winds battered the Iberian peninsula.

The massive output of wind turbines meant the Spanish grid had more electricity than was needed over the weekend. In previous years similar weather has forced windfarms to turn turbines off but now the spare electricity is exported or used by hydroelectric plants to pump water back into their dams — effectively storing the electricity for future use.

That last sentence is important - energy was stored. Although wind and solar energy is dependent upon atmospheric conditions, if enough electricity is generated then excess power can be stored. Pumped-storage hydroelectricity is a mature technology that has been used all over the world for decades but is dependent upon good locations for a hydroelectric dam. Other energy storage solutions include Flywheel energy storage, (in which excess energy is turned into mechanical energy which then drives a generator when energy is needed) Hydrogen storage (in which excess energy is used to turn water into hydrogen and oxygen through electrolysis, which is then turned back into electricity via a fuel cell) and Thermal Energy Storage (in which molten salt is heated directly by the sun and the heat used to drive a steam turbine during both day time and night time). None of these solutions prevents a loss of energy, but neither does the pumped-storage hydroelectricity that we have used for decades.

The more renewable energy a grid takes on, the greater will be the need to develop energy storage for the grid.

Cyclone Hamish

That red dot is where I live. The difference between hurricanes and cyclones is that the latter rotate clockwise. Also remember that in the Southern Hemisphere, North is warm.

The cyclone is not going to hit me. In fact by the time it gets to the NSW/QLD border it will probably turn into a Low.

Heatwave in Australia

Hot hot hot:

The heatwave arrived with a vengeance yesterday with temperatures hitting the sizzling mid-40s in parts of the state, well above the predicted high of 41, while Melburnians sweltered in a 43.2-degree heat.

- 45-degree peak in parts of the state
- Melbourne mercury tops forecasts
- City peak of more than 43 degrees

The highest temperatures were recorded in Nhill and Hopetoun in the north-west of the state where the towns and surrounds baked in a maximum of 45 degrees at 3pm.

According to the BOM, temperatures at Melbourne Airport peaked at 42.6°C (108.7°F) on Wednesday afternoon and dropped to 30.8°C (87.4°F) overnight. To the West, Adelaide peaked at 45.1°C (113.2°F) and dropped to 34.4°C (93.9°F) overnight.

Australia is a hot, dry country so such extreme temperatures are not unusual. What is unusual is that they are likely to continue until the weekend. Hot weather in Southern and South-Eastern Australia is usually due to a low pressure system moving Eastward through the Bight and out through Bass Strait. What is unusual about this situation is that a large High Pressure system between Australia and New Zealand is keeping a series of lows from moving. In layman's terms this means that winds from central Australia - which are hot and dry - are blowing over Melbourne and Adelaide and heating them up over a much longer period of time (4-5 days) than what is normal (2-3 days). This is why the heat is lasting longer and not dropping sooner.

Heatwaves also cause heat-related deaths and, while Australia is no exception, Australians are used to the demands of hot weather. Hopefully this means that the physically weaker people in society (the elderly and very young children) are likely to be looked after (air conditioning, plenty of fluids). The conditions are so unusual, however, that an increase in deaths is likely in the next few days.

As a believer in global warming, do I see such unusual weather conditions as proof of the effects of global warming? While such weather conditions are highly unusual, they have occurred in the past. In this case, the conditions appear to be a once-in-a-century event. Obviously Southern and South-Eastern Australia have experienced these conditions before and so it is reasonable to assume that they will experience them again at some point.

The problem occurs, however, when such weather conditions begin to occur on a more regular basis. If we start having once-in-a-century weather events like this every couple of years, then it means that something has changed in the world's climate patterns and global warming can certainly be seen as a possible cause.

On the other hand, global warming or not, these freak weather conditions may just be what they are - simply freakish and unusual. That is probably the most likely explanation.

Fortunately for me, I am located on the East Coast of Australia. The weather system that is causing such problems in Melbourne and Adelaide is not affecting Sydney and Newcastle in the same way. It'll probably reach 31°C (87.8°F) here today - unpleasant for yours truly but nothing unusual for this time of year.

Too Hot

It's nearly mid-day here in Newcastle, and the temperature is 36.6° Celsius.

That's 97.88° Fahrenheit.

No wonder it is difficult to blog.

Anyone in the Northern Hemisphere want to swap places? I could do with freezing at the moment...

Friday update: It eventually reached 42° (107.6°F) on that day. Fortunately a cool change came through and dumped a bit of rain on us. Friday was much cooler.

Ike and Galveston

It's currently 8.50GMT, which translates to 4.50am in New York and earlier in Texas. I've just looked at a BBC video of the hurricane's effects upon Galveston, and, I gotta tell you, it looks bad.

What I saw on that video was Galveston completely inundated with water. Water had covered the entire city streets. Houses and buildings were jutting up out of the water. But that's not the worst part.

You see, the video showed Galveston from the air during the daytime. In other words, what I saw was not the worst of it. Ike passed over Galveston about 4-5 hours ago, so what I saw on the BBC video was small compared to what it would've become when Ike passed over it. But that's not the worst part.

The worst of it is that 23,000 people stayed in Galveston.

Back in 1900, Galveston was levelled by a massive Hurricane. 6-8000 people were killed. It was the biggest natural disaster in US history. As a result of this disaster, a sea wall was built to protect the city from any future hurricane. Ike, however, produced a storm surge that topped the wall. Moreover, it topped the wall hours before the storm surge reached its highest point.

I think there is a massive tragedy happening now in Galveston. I hate to say it, but people are probably dying as I type. Let's hope and pray that there is a minimal loss of life. I'm not optimistic, however.

Wilkins Ice Shelf about to collapse

Okay, this is a rather serious issue. Climatologists about ten years ago said that one of the indications of global warming would be the collapse of the Wilkins Ice Shelf in Antarctica - and that it would probably go within thirty years. Of course, the fact that it is about to go now after only ten years is an indication that things are speeding up.

An Ice Shelf is a floating block of ice. An ice shelf is the result of ice from glaciers going out onto the ocean's surface. The melting of an ice shelf is not going to have any direct impact on sea level rises.

However, there are causes for concern.

The first thing is that this potential collapse will occur in winter. During any polar winter, the low temperatures are such that there is a seasonal increase in the amount of ice present. Yet this collapse is occurring at the coldest time of the year. This indicates that the water around this part of Antarctica is not cold enough at present to prevent any disintegration from happening. In other words, despite the fact that the conditions are helpful to prevent the ice shelf from collapsing, it is still in the process of collapsing. If the water temperature is still too warm even in the perpetual darkness of a polar winter, then that is not good.

The second thing is that, while the melting of an ice shelf is not going to do anything directly, it will expose Antarctic glaciers directly to liquid water. These glaciers and ice sheets are not floating on water - they are located above sea level on land. The combination of (comparatively) warm water and warm air will begin to melt these massive reserves of ice.

The world's sea levels have been rising for quite a long time. In recent years they have risen at a faster rate. Currently sea levels are rising 2.4 - 3.8mm per year. Most of that rise is, I believe, due to glacial melt from Greenland. While the collapse of the Wilkins Ice Shelf will only result in a slight increase in glacial melt by itself, its collapse is a harbinger of what is possibly to come, namely faster increases in sea level rise.

And the faster it gets, the harder it will be to stop.

El Nino seems to be reappearing

Forecasting weather for me can often be as error-prone as forecasting the market. Nevertheless I wish to show here some rather unsettling graphs.

The first is the El Nino Southern Oscillation Index:

This graph (courtesy of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology) is one tool used to predict and determine El-Nino or La-Nina conditions. Any result above 5 indicates La Nina favourable conditions and any result under 0 indicates favourable El Nino conditions. The number used in the index is the difference in Air Pressure between Tahiti and Darwin. A positive number means that the air pressure in Tahiti is greater, while a negative number means that the air pressure in Darwin is greater. Lower air pressure is associated with more rainfall. The fact that the index has moved into negative territory means that Air pressure in Tahiti is dropping below that of Darwin. This means that there is less likelihood of rain in South-Eastern Australia, which matches an El-Nino event.

But the ENSO graph above is not the only one to look at. Here's another important one:

This graph shows temperature throughout the equatorial region of the Pacific Ocean. You can see Papua New Guinea there in the West. If the graph went East more you would see Peru. What is important is the bottom graph which shows temperature anomalies. As you can see, the temperature of seawater in the Eastern Pacific near South America is heating up above normal. Warm seawater is more likely to produce rain while cool seawater is not.

Let me just put this simply, the conditions that we see here are typical of a developing El Nino weather pattern. This means more dry weather for South Eastern Australia, which will probably turn into the worst drought in Australia's history. Not good.

Cold is good

Here in Newcastle we are shivering. It is currently 11.4°C (52.5°F) at 11.30am. This will probably be the coldest day of the year.

If you live in a place where the temperature gets colder, yes I know that I have no idea what cold is like. I have never lived in a place where it snows regularly (except on a three week holiday in Northern Scotland in January 1991).

People often say that we put on weight in winter. That may be true for some, but the reality is that we are more likely to lose weight in winter.

The reason is that our body temperature remains constant throughout the year. Whether it is in the middle of a frozen winter or a burning summer, our body remains at 36.8°C (98.2°F). This temperature can change, but the difference is only slight (±0.7°C / ±1.3°F). If our body temperature rises or drops below this rate for any extended period of time, our body tends to get a bit sick (hypothermia/heat exhaustion).

Therefore, in order for our body to maintain optimum temperature, our metabolic rate adjusts accordingly. The colder it is, the more our body increases our metabolic rate to remain warm. Conversely, the warmer it is, our metabolic rate decreases.

And, of course, any increase in the metabolic rate means that our fat reserves are more likely to be used.

Here in the western world, however, we have so many warm clothes and heaters and so much good food (carbohydrates can increase our metabolic rate) that winter doesn't affect us as much as it used to. Culturally, therefore, it is quite possible that winter does see us put more weight on simply because we like comfort foods when things are colder.

AAAAAAAAA

A blog post with every single category marked (I'm doing this for scribefire)

Warm enough for me

The weather here in Eastern Australia has been quite pleasant.

After a sunless and wet summer we have finally moved into Autumn. March is the wettest month of the year here in Newcastle, but there hasn't been many storms or weather systems doing anything major in the last two weeks.

The days have been getting up into the late 20s - perhaps even 30°C (86° F) out at Metford where I have been working lately. But with the sun setting earlier our nights have been dropping to around 14°C (57° F), which means that our sleep is pleasant and the stored heat in our houses cools faster. In short, while the middle of the day can be quite warm, the rest of the day is very pleasant.

So for my Northern Hemisphere readers, you might be rather jealous at this point, having to endure your horribly cold winters... but remember Spring has sprung and it will get warmer. Winters here in Oz get nowhere near as cold (Newcastle is 6.4 - 17.0°C in July, which is 43.5 - 62.6°F).

A list of some of my predictions

At the risk of big-noting myself (fierté? moi? non! Allez manger un poisson avec une clé!), here's a list of some predictions that I got right... and a few a got wrong (The majority of my predictions have yet to be fulfilled):

• 20 September 2007: The US Dollar is very likely to continue dropping in value. Correct.
• 19 September 2007: Bernanke's continual interest rates cuts will result in a choice between growing inflation or raising rates during a recession. So far the choice seems to be inflation.
• 13 September 2007: A recession is coming and we may be in one already. A recession is still very likely but the US wasn't it one in September 2007 so I was wrong (though technically I said "may").
• 19 August 2007: My prediction that oil will reach $100. This got picked up over at Angry Bear and lots of discussion ensued. Although the prediction was open-ended, it eventually got fulfilled in the first week of 2008.
• 17 August 2007: Bernanke suddenly cuts rates and I predict that this is exactly the wrong thing to do. I also point out that cuts will precipitate a further devaluation of the dollar, which has happened.
• 25 July 2007: I predict that Share Markets are about to "plateau" out. This has been exactly what has happened. Compare the Wilshire 5000 graph in that posting to the most recent one. No bear market yet, but heading nowhere but down.
• 27 June 2007: I predict that a La Nina event is about to be announced. I was wrong, but La Nina was announced some time afterwards anyway. Besides, I think if the experts back-date it they'll agree that it had started by this time.
• 6 March 2007: Another La Nina prediction - that it will occur within the few months afterwards. Again, this was wrong on the timing but right because it eventually happened.
• 31 March 2006: A prediction that house prices in the US will fall. I have to give kudos to Kash over at Angry Bear for that one though, since his posting (linked in my article) pretty much said it all. And if people in the US had heeded this advice, they would have gotten out with their money intact, unlike now.
  
• 16 March 2006: A prediction that the Democrats would win the congressional elections. I also predicted the final amount of House of Rep seats but got it wrong by only 2 seats. My predictions for the senate seats were waaaaaay out.
• 28 January 2006: A prediction that a US recession was coming. "I actually do hope there will be an economic slowdown, a rise in unemployment and an increase in personal and corporate bankruptcies. Does this make me evil?"
• 25 October 2005. Dick Cheney will either resign or be impeached as a result of the Plame Affair, while George W. Bush may not be far behind. Well that one crashed and burned, mainly because I had too much faith in the US political system to actually DO something about the Bush administration. As it stands, neither Bush nor Cheney will be impeached, which shows just how cynical and debased US politics has become.
• 18 October 2005. My Harriet Miers prediction that came true within a month. This was picked up by Steve Gililard at the New Blog, one of the few lefty bloggers who posted my thoughts. Sadly, Steve died in June 2007.
  

Cool Aussie Summer

Well, at least here in South-Eastern Australia:

As summer comes to an end today, Sydneysiders may wonder whether it was ever here at all.

Searing heat, parched gardens and sunny skies - trademarks of an Australian summer - were replaced by cloudy days and lots of rain, according to the Bureau of Meteorology.

"In terms of rainfall it's been the wettest summer for six years," said Shannon Symons from the bureau's climate centre.

Sydney received 438 millimetres of summer rain, a figure achieved by consistent rainfall throughout summer, rather than a handful of large falls, Ms Symons said.

No single-day rainfall records were broken, she said.

Remarkably, not one day this summer pushed past 31 degrees.

"That's only happened three times in the past (in 149 years of the bureau's weather records), with the last being 1956 - it's quite significant," Ms Symons said.

Average maximum temperatures were 25.2 degrees, making it the coolest summer in Sydney since 1996-97.

There were an average of just 6.7 hours of sunshine each day, the lowest since 1991-92, Ms Symons said.

Sydneysiders can blame La Nina, the weather phenomenon in effect in the Pacific Ocean since November, for the rain and cold weather, Ms Symons said.

Typical of the entire summer, its last week saw heavy rainfall and violent storms lash parts of the state.

Here in Newcastle, about 130km (81 miles) north of Sydney, the weather has been similar. The highest February temperature was 29.7°C (82.2°F) and the average top temperature was 25.5°C (77.9°F).

In fact, throughout this 2007/2008 summer, only 10 days in Newcastle exceeded 30°C (86°F). The average is 23.4 days.

There are two basic theories as to why this has occurred.

One, by the ignoranuses, would be "OH NO THE WORLDS GETING COOLER NOT WARMR THAT MAENS GLOBAL WARRMING IS A CROCK LOL".

The other, mentioned in the SMH article, is that the La Nina weather phenomenon has affected it. More than that, although this sort of weather pattern doesn't occur all the time, it does happen now and then.

For me, the world's greatest warmophobe, this summer will live long in my memory as one of the most tolerable on record.

Of course, Autumn is tomorrow, and March/April weather can still be quite warm. But at least the nights are getting cool. Last night it got down to 15°C (59°F), which was most pleasant. I'm still wearing my tracksuit pants!

Cool Summer

As many of you know I complain about Summer. I get heat rash and sweaty and hate getting suncream on me. I also prefer foods known for their Winter styling.

Well, this Summer has been reasonably cool. I think it may have something to do with La Nina, but the extra rainy days we've had here on the East coast of Oz have kept temperatures down below 30 for most of this month and last month. Usually at this time of year we start having things like bushfires and heat waves and fire restrictions - but not this year. We're now over half-way through Summer and so far, I'm quite happy with the way things have been going.

But I need to remember one thing - January may be the hottest month of the year, but February is the second hottest. So all these things I've written may come back to haunt me at some point.

It's good, though, being able to sleep well at night without tossing and turning in the heat. The worst is when temperatures never get below about 25°C (77°F) at night, and the fan acts like a hair-drier. I remember one day a few summers ago when it reached around 44°C (111°F) and it was still around 35°C (95°F) at 10pm. Whew!

But this month has seen night-time temps dropping to around 14°C (57°F) on occasion, which has been great in cooling down the house from the warm day and allowing us to actually use blankets.

Well, I'd love to keep writing, but I haven't finished the washing up and I'm already covered in sweat from washing up the first half. Washing dishes in Summer is a real bummer.

OSO Weather

Yesterday it reached 33.3°C (92°F) and was stiflingly hot and humid. Then the change came through and it hasn't stopped raining. It's currently 20.0°C (68°F), cloudy and rainy - the perfect antidote for the previous day's heat and suffering.

December Solstice

22 December, 06:08 (UTC). Be there.

Bad night

What could be worse than waking up after a sleepless hot night than to walk around bleary-eyed in a kitchen that is blinded by the sun and heating up as the morning progresses?

Well, maybe the holocaust, but that's in a different category.

Update:
It has gotten worse. Standing in the hot sun, putting out millions of wet clothes on the clothes line, being covered with spider webs (who built their webs on the line the night before) and being eaten alive by mosquitoes.