Great stuff, Craig.

I know you’ve swung behind the Lib Dems.

Tell me: should I vote Green or Lib Dem?

My constituency is not a target seat for either party. My inclination is to back the Greens. Whaddyareckon? And why?

Keep on bloggin’.

Ed

Thanks Craig,

Your Comments and analysis compulsive reading. You honest reporting cuts out the chaff and deceit of the MSM and are I know people in Malaysia and Saudi Arabia who are regular readers.

Ed,

look at the opinion polls for your constituency and vote tactically – it’s the only plan that makes sense under our stupid voting system. Vote for whoever stands the best chance of displacing a warmonger.

I’d probably vote Green if we had a proportional representation system.

Clark,

Our local incumbent “warmonger” is Labour. The only realistic challenger in this constituency is Conservative.

So there is no-one to vote for “tactically” in terms of determining the winner of this parliamentary seat.

The only “tactical voting” I can engage in here is to add one vote to the national share of the vote of one the parties who will not win this seat.

Ed,

I’m lucky in having an easy choice; the LibDem candidate is the only viable opposition to the Tory incumbent.

In your position I’d look at my Labour MP’s voting record – some of them do oppose the wars – and consider if s/he’s a good MP.

If it’s a marginal seat, I’d still consider voting Labour (possibly with much disgust – see above!), just to try to keep any possible Tory majority as slim as possible – a hung parliament will give the smaller parties more power, and it would be bad if your constituency went Tory.

If the seat is safe Labour, I’d probably vote LibDem, because an increased LibDem vote would increase LibDem chances if a hung parliament led to an early second election.

I loathe our voting system, with all the second-guessing it requires of me. I wish my vote could just follow my feelings.

Ed

If there is no tactical significance, then it is a question of your own priorities. My own view is that the Lib Dem policies like road pricing, VAT on new houses, no nuclear energy are sufficiently green and they have a better developed wider agenda. But it is your vote!

But Craig,

it’s not “our” vote! If we vote how we honestly feel, the system sweeps it under the rug and discounts it utterly! Aaagh!

Craig, What’s the problem with nuclear?

I know we had Chernobyl but France is 80% nuclear power.

I did the maths on wind turbine cost/benefit earlier – it is simply not commercially viable not now nor in the forseeable. Currently it is unbelievably heavily subsidised by us.

Anyone noticed, how their energy bills have escalalted recently and wondered why?

Of course it’s my vote, dear Craig Murray

But I’m starving – I’d kill for a curry.

So send me a pint and a sag aloo

And I’ll vote the way that you tell me to.

scousebilly

nuclear is the most expensive of all, if you include waste processing and storage and plant decommissioning costs. It has only ever been made to look viable by excluding these costs or transferring them to the taxpayer.

My previous comment helps me understand someone like Eddie better. Rather than feel as frustrated as I do, he supports Labour, and then bludgeons his feelings to fit. Hence his distortion of the Iraqi death toll etc. – he HAS to believe!

The energy problem has not been solved – by any party. Our consumerist society wastes more than it uses, and two thirds of the world is yet to reach for our consumption levels.

Usage reduction, deep geothermal and desert solar is my bet; the Earth itself is a huge, stable and well sheilded nuclear reactor. But it’s a global problem, I suspect it can’t be solved at a national level – roll on the New World Order!

As to pricing, Craig warned us about Gazprom ages ago.

Other Ed,

Before the election was called my plan was to vote Green if there was a Green candidate (in a safe Tory constituency), Lib Dem if not. It looks like there’s no Green candidate so the answer’s easy but if there was it now would be a more difficult decision than it was before the recent Lib Dem upsurge.

I’d suggest that if the Lib Dems have a realistic chance of knocking the second of the war-parties into third place then that’s got to be worth something. Otherwise, pick depending on your policy preferences.

EdD

Welcome to honesty

Dave Davies MP (not the rock musician)

WHY THE TORIES CAN’T BE TRUSTED ON CIVIL LIBERTIES

I have a lot of respect for Dave Davies after his campaign against ID cards, the 42 day detention bill and the Labour governments outsourcing of torture.

Davies, we learn’t from WebCameron never got the full support of his Conservative colleagues on these issues and I personally believe he resigned because of that lack of support. In fact many supporters wrote on WebCameron saying, ‘this resignation is quite extraordinary and without precedent that I can think of in British politics.’

It has come to something when it takes the lone bravery of one man and the house of Lords to protect civil liberties in this country.

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg said: “The Conservatives are a long way from being defenders of liberty.”

David Davis lonely stand only highlights the big questions that still remain over whether the Conservatives really are committed to protecting our freedom.

Dave Davies resignation was I believe – a direct result of CFI pressure – AND DAVID CAMERON CAVED IN TO THEIR DEMANDS!!

BE CAREFUL VOTERS – BE VERY CAREFUL.

Craig,

Thank you for your reply regarding nuclear energy costs.

I don’t know where you got your information. I go by the Royal Academy of Engineering’s very detailed and “neutral” research:

http://www.raeng.org.uk/news/publications/list/reports/Cost_Generation_Commentary.pdf

The first graph completely contradicts your “received wisdom” (?).

Even, for non-phycisists who actually “believe” CO2 is dangerous, nuclear is “clean”. Offshore wind is btw far and away the most expensive, and least reliable.

Why have Simon Hughes and Ed Millipede not come clean on this?

P.S. further to you excellent posts on the volcanic ash debacle, here is a rather good expose of computer modelling.

http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/62827,news-comment,news-politics,computer-modelling-fraud-at-the-heart-of-science-climate-change-eyjafjallajokull

The first comment regarding the role of Jerome “PNS” (say it quicly) Ravetz is a germane as it is revealing.

“Craig, What’s the problem with nuclear?”

“I know we had Chernobyl but France is 80% nuclear power.”

http://tinyurl.com/2v33eoj

Keep up the good work.

Thanks, George but irrelevant,

Let’s see what people who know their technology have to say:

“‘Nuclear’ has had the Cold War (and other) imperatives of plutonium producton for weaponisation, severely influencing reactor design.

These are ‘Defence’ costs, not ‘Energy’ costs.

Due to this design imperative, requirements for very expensive pressure containment vessels and extensive plant size, have added fantastic levels of construction costs.

Due to this design imperative, the associated waste from plutonium production has been extremely high and can also be considered ‘Defence’ costs.

The French reprocessing facilities for example, are highly complex, and extremely expensive as a result.

We will have a massive ongoing cost penalty, from building French nuclear power stations. We should say ‘Non, merci!’

Just because this is how things ‘are’ doesn’t mean this how things ‘have to be’.

Nuclear can be very cheap, very small, very clean, very low half-life waste, very safe, very unattractive to terrorists, and very portable. It can also with designs such as the LFTR Thorium fuelled reactor, reprocess existing long term waste, into useful and valuable products with a short half life, the longest of which, would be 300 years, as opposed to up to thousands of years.

At current pricing, a Thorium power plant should produce electricity for a real cost of less than 2p per unit. With most of the reprocessing carried out in the reactor itself, with chemical separation, and anything that needs further reprocessing, can just stay in the liquid fluoride until it has been processed.

Some of the nastiest byproducts even having a half life as low as 6 hours and 9 hours before making themselves ‘useful’.

With such a reactor already having been run reliably and safely for years, so safe, it was possible to just ‘turn it off’ on a Friday and ‘turn it back on’ on Monday morning, getting such a reactor through present day pre-production development, would be quite fast and relatively inexpensive.

A small plant can easily fit on the back of a lorry. Power the lorry with electric drive motors, and the plant can even power itself to where it needs to go.

Such a reactor would make an ideal ship propulsion unit power source. If it sank, no problem.

The realistic and practical solutions are there, but some people simply don’t want solutions, because it’s problems that serve their agenda, not solutions.

(N.b. George Dutton).

Let’s get a pre-production LFTR Thorium Reactor built, shall we?

The initial design work would cost far less than the Government spent on its BS pre-Christmas, pre-Copenhagen, propaganda campaign.

£56 million of Public Money that cost, didn’t it? What price were the backhanders from the advertising and media Agencies?

And if you think LFTR is fantasy:

India’s thorium reactor…

http://nextbigfuture.com/2008/08/indias-thorium-nuclear-reactor-and.html

This is real technology at work, you know.

What do you think, Craig?

The realistic and practical solutions are there, but some people simply don’t want solutions, because it’s problems that serve their agenda, not solutions.

(N.b. ScouseBilly).

http://tinyurl.com/lv4tof

ScouseBilly

A persopnal question, if you don’t mind: do you seriously believe what those “nuclear industry” publications print?

Works both ways.

http://tinyurl.com/28fcb79

ScouseBilly,

this is only the second time I have heard of the Thorium Pebble Bed reactors. You know your stuff, do you? I thought they sounded too good to be true, but I’ll read up on them now. Got any good links please? And what objections / problems are there?

Clark. I know a little having read a long article a few months ago. I felt the same way: this is remarkable, can it be true?

A mate of mine gave me the latest info. hence I put his views in quotes and the Indian program link came from someone else.

That’s the beauty of the internet/blogosphere. There’s a lot of resource at the end of a few keystrokes but there’s a lot of disinfo too.

I do my best to be selective and read as much as possible. I could have quoted nuclear industry sources on costs but anticipated perfectly reasonable questions of bias.

I didn’t bookmark the paper I read but will try and find it for you.

George Dutton,

the thorium reactors that ScouseBilly mentioned are very different from the big power stations that we’re familiar with; I think they should be assessed in their own right, though as I said above, I don’t know much about them yet.

ScouseBilly,

old nuclear has given us terrible problems; you can’t blame George Dutton for being suspicious. Post us a selection of links.

Oops, posts crossed… I’ll look forward to that paper.

ScouseBilly

As you said “Chernobyl”.

Says it all.

Clark, lol, I will do my best. I do have top go out and see a mate but will do some serious searching later tonight.

I will post any papers that I think are credible and informative.

Till then, YNWA

Oh, George, come on, give new tech a chance. I used to feel the same about nuclear but have been persuaded differently by those who are at the coal-face if you’ll forgive the metaphor

ScouseBilly,

as far as anthropogenic climate change is concerned, I think we should apply the precautionary principle for now. If CO2 is a problem it is best to limit emissions before it is too late, especially considering ocean acidification.

Clark, I really must go but we can have a conversation on AGW at a later date.

Clark

We don’t need “nuclear” never have. We in the UK have more then enough renewables, we could export it to europe and make money…Fact.

However, one final thing to consider.

Increasing temp -> increased CO2 (with an average latency of 800 years) and NOT vive versa.

Why would we need to apply a precautionary principle to a fiction.

Are we applying this priciple to the risk of a meteorite impacting our planet, or to an alien invasion?

Clark

http://tinyurl.com/234q4g9

George Dutton,

if what I read about thorium reactors is true, they can’t do what Chernobyl did. There will undoubtedly be other dangers. But a quick solution is needed (if CO2 really is a problem, as I believe); I favour deep geothermal, but development should have started decades ago, and we need something now.

“but development should have started decades ago”

Indeed. We are being played like puppets on a string by evil. Has it not always been so.

ScouseBilly,

maybe AGW is a fiction, maybe not. Plenty of scientists seem to think AGW is true. Big Oil tried to cover it up for decades, the head of NASA was silenced by Bush.

Also, look up ocean acidification. CO2 disolves into the ocean and decreases alkalinity – sorry, no links to hand, I saw it in New Scientist.

I’m not prepared to write it off as a fiction at present. And as to meteor strikes, well, there is a project to detect and catalogue Earth-orbit crossing asteroids.

Aleins we needn’t worry about. If they have the technology to get here, (a) they won’t need anything we’ve got and (b) we couldn’t fight them, anyway. We probably couldn’t even detect them.

Clark, good reply though I view New Scientist and Nature with extreme caution.

Yes, I’ve visited Rendlesham Forest a few times and still not met any aliens

As I understand it, there is no risk of ocean acidification – again I’ll have to look up sources.

Good discussion I am sorry I have to leave it now.

George Dutton,

I’m not a great believer in evil – usually it seems to come down to short termism and greed. But yes, those lead to manipulation of opinion.

I like the wilderness of Scotland, I’d hate to see it festooned with turbines and tidal power installations. Building with concrete releases loads of CO2; has that been accounted for?

ScousBilly,

bye for now.

This is perhaps one of the best examples and illuminating of that clown Humphrys interrupt agenda.

When you listen to this you quite quickly realise that his interruptions have no merit whatsoever.

He quite simply isn’t interested in what his interviewee has to say.

He’s there purely to push a BBC agenda come what may.

Interestingly it’s in this fairly uncontroversial interview that that becomes most clear, but it shows just how damaging the likes of him can be to public discourse when more controversial matters are being discussed.

It begin 4.25 mins in:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8655000/8655738.stm

“I like the wilderness of Scotland, I’d hate to see it festooned with turbines and tidal power installations.”

It doesn’t have to be like that.

“come on, give new tech a chance”

Perhaps, a little bit of discrimination, in among it ? Some tech good, other tech bad ?

I mean, I share the dislike of “nuclear”, meaning as we have it, but have heard mutterings about the thorium pebble-bed things, and do wonder if maybe they do bypass my objections ?

which are, among others -

military. France is 80% nuclear, yes, and also likes having its own bombs. Our programs were, I think, mostly started for the same reason, and I’m not sure how far they can be disentangled from it – and I’d like to see us give up on our nuclear weapons (along with the whole “puching above our weight” self-flatttering macho shite). I remember New Scientist did a piece at the time of the Reagan/Thatcher buildup, on calculating the market value of plutonium as if it had no military use. I forget the details, but the conclusion was that any sane person would run miles to avoid being given money to ge anywhere near it …

“chernobyl” etc, with a nod to “Neddy Seagoon, the brains behind the Windscale disaster” – because the Goons see as sane a commentary as any other. The sheer timescale of the mess it leaves behind seems quite mindbogglingly disproportionate to the needs it addresses.

centralisation – I’d rather see a much more distributed system, that didn’t need such “security” around it all (which refers back to the military aspects, of course).

Craig (I think) referred to the ‘cost of decommissioning’. Have any ever been completely decommissioned & the site cleaned up ? It’s a while since I’ve looked, maybe someone has by now ?

So, a failsafe system producing only energy plus byproducts with a really short halflife, might just be very different. How common is thorium ? Do we fight wars to ‘secure our supply’ a few decades down the line ? I could check, yes, but I have to get ready to go out & play a ceilidh.

Oh, but I wouldn’t want to throw away quite all of it. We need the medical stuff, and “research” is fun.

Later …

Re George Dutton:

“Increasing temp -> increased CO2 (with an average latency of 800 years) and NOT vive versa.”

This is wrong. It works both ways round. Increased temperature causes increased co2, and increased co2 caused increased temperature.

Sorry that last comment should be aimed at ScouseBilly not George Dutton

http://tinyurl.com/27v6846

Thought some of you might be interest to see what ‘ScouseBilly’ has been posting on James Delingpole’s blog at the Telegraph; it’ll give you an idea of the sort of ill-informed twerp you’re trying to deal with…

scousebilly on May 1st, 2010 at 5:02 pm

“For anyone who fancies a troll bash:

There’s a leftwing arse called George Dutton who I’ve been batting with here:

http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2010/05/cries_not_unhea.html

We kicked off around 2.05pm

YNWA

I really have to go out and wondered if anyone fancied giving him a kicking?”

scousebilly on May 1st, 2010 at 1:27 pm

“Would appreciate some help.

Got this from Craig Murray and would like good technical info to rebuff:

“scousebilly

nuclear is the most expensive of all, if you include waste processing and storage and plant decommissioning costs. It has only ever been made to look viable by excluding these costs or transferring them to the taxpayer.”

This is not my area but I know some you are seriously expert.”

You see, he doesn’t have a clue about nuclear power, he just has an ideology and finds facts to suit it.

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100037371/inventor-of-mann-made-global-warming-feels-the-heat/#comments

Again since Craig’s exposure the tabloid press is doing all it can to skew the election result by bullying and scaring voters. [1] The political editor of The Sun has been given clear instructions from Rupert Murdoch:

“It is my job to see that Cameron f****g well gets into Downing Street” [2].

Murdoch and his tabloid press friends think they’ve got the right to decide who governs us.

Please check the links as this deception will reach boiling point in the next few days before voting. I propose one more big push to expose this media scaremongering. What can we do? I would appreciate any ideas. Thanks

newstatesman.com/media/2010/05/murdoch-clegg-cameron-paper

thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/election2010/2942670/Election-2010-The-no-win-nightmare.html?OTC-RSS

charter2010.co.uk/news/who-says-hung-parliaments-cant-be-effective

Thanks again folks.

I am disappointed senegal at the back-stabbing especially as I have great respect for George.

It was an interesting argument and one I forwarded to Lizabeth, wind turbine sceptic from the former WebCameron blog.

Here is one of her posts saved from the blog:

Sir

May I thank Ewan Boyd and Ian Consterdine for the way the have responded to my letter which gave correct facts relating to wind turbine subsidy. They have had the decency to write to our local paper, The Teesdale Mercury.

For many years my letters or appearances at meetings throughout the country, have brought numerous responses from anonymous and spineless creatures in the form of threatening, nuisance and pornographic e- mails. This particular form of hassle or intimidation does in no way suggest any official connection with BWEA (British Wind Energy Association) The gutless beings who hide behind anonymity make reference to wind energy.

I support all forms of renewable energy except where they impact on the landscape This is not oxymoronic but commonsense, once gone the landscape is gone forever. Landscape is not just about views but the right to enjoyment and use of it. I cannot put seven years of research into one letter but it is recorded in my book, Force10 available at the library.

Recent Issues need to be made public before elected members are conned into ruining the county and in fact the country. With no 3rd party right of appeal it is heads they win and tails we lose. This is not democratic.

Land of the Prince Bishops is in danger of becoming Land of the King Turbines as about 80 x350foot turbines are currently planned for the county. The Stang, Barningham and Hamsterley are marked on the Regional Spatial Strategy indicative diagram for wind farms in Teesdale.(North East Renewable Energy Strategy document , North East Assembly and TNEI services,.. Oct 2003 )

I offer some comments to help give a balance to councillors and planners before they decide, on future applications for wind turbines. something obviously lacking when permission was given for the GSK (GlaxoSmithKline) secondhand turbines (Agent ,TNEI, managers of the TREC programme)

The Journal 16/6/04

TNEI. Doing a roaring trade in used wind turbines

Farmers Weekly 15/07/04

Damage from Wind Turbines in Germany have resulted in preliminary payments over £161m

Country Life Magazine 5/8/04

Landowners advised to speak to a commercial property lawyer before entering into contracts to host wind turbines.

Ian Fells 25/07/04/ Sunday Times

One of the world’s leading experts on renewable energy. He states that behind the building of windfarms is a goldrush, created Prof Fells says by a government struggling to meet its own renewable energy targets. It has led to developers racing to build turbines with little care for the environment.

Tom Burke, former director of Friends of The Earth 25/07/04/ Sunday Times

“..there is a lot of money to be made” A single 2MW 2million turbine will

generate £385000 a year for 20 years, not bad for a machine that costs £1.2million to build.

Further information on ROC’s, this complicated but ingenious subsidy hiding under a levy can be found on official websites.

DTI appoints Porter Novelli to power up renewables debate 6/2/04 http://www.coi.gov.uk

Porter Novelli has been appointed by Department for Trade and Industry to increase awareness of renewable energy sources amongst investors and planners.

This I understand at a cost of £2M and with two pilot areas in Co Durham

All I ask for on behalf of the community is a balance not bias.

For interest.£13000 needed for The High Court Hearing to protect Barningham High Moor did not come from Teesdale Council but from local residents and supported in the main by CPRE branches

Nimby’s will protect the areas they love as no one else can understand the need., least of all it seems our politicians.

Elizabeth Mann

Barningham High Moor Conservation Group

Webcameron never blocked any of my posts but when they ‘closed’ the site the truth and full facts were being exposed! Thank you web rejects for allowing me to finish the story of this travesty of justice.

senegal

Thanks for telling me that. I think I should inform the police that someone going under the name of “scousebilly” is inciting people to come and physically harm me. I am sure the Telegraph have their IP number.

Thanks again.

“I am disappointed senegal at the back-stabbing especially as I have great respect for George.”

The feeling is entirely mutual Mark and then some.

Senegal,

thanks for your research.

ScouseBilly,

things certainly seem to be changing faster now than ever before in human history. Beware some of the writers on that Telegraph blog; they seem so attached to their lifestyles that they blind themselves to the possible consequences. Our way of life *may* be unsustainable; do we really want to find out the hard, irreversible way?

I’ll still look up thorium reactors sometime.

For your info scousebilly’s comments have now mysteriously disappeared from Delingpole’s blog.

@ Fergie

are you sure of that link? JH seemed to be a pussy cat in that piece compared with some interviews…

This is deliberately provocative – but the refusal of the UK political system to face up to (and the media to report) the energy shortfall we are facing infuriates me.

This is how I see the situation:

The problem re. future electricity generation is thet everyone wants the lights to go on at the flick of a switch but opposes the only generation systems that can guarantee it: coal and nuclear.

Forget windpower, it’s political not a serious contribution to UK energy consumption. I have more chance of flying to the moon on a cosmic ray than wind power has of providing even 10% of UK electicity demand by 2020. And NONE of that is baseload.

Offshore wave energy has potential but is really at the demonstration stage in terms of large-scale plant. maybe in 5 years or so.

We should have started building new baseload power stations 5 years ago, but none is now likely to commence for 3-5 years. More gas power stations are feasible and could be built more quickly as their environmental impact is lower, but can we source the gas? We’d be dependent on pipelines from Russia and north Africa, and tanker loads of liquid gas from the Gulf.

Existing coal fired stations are old and will have to close from 2016 onwards unless their safety certificates are extended. And chances of planning permission for a new coal fired power station in the current political climate = zero. Kingsnorth, anyone?

Opposition to nuclear station replacement, let alone new sites, and refusal of government to have a policy let alone a strategy means we can’t build them in time either.

Unless we start cutting UK electricity demand fast (and that’ll probably have to be by price – 20% VAT on electricity, gas and heating oil anyone?) I foresee serious winter “brownouts” in about 2017 or 2018.

And on a connected issue, most of the UK’s energy is now controlled by companies based in other countries.

I’m very pessimistic about all of this. There has been no mention of energy security by any of the main parties in the election campaign. I’m glad I’m getting to the age where I won’t have to live with the long term consequences of the wasted decade 2000-2010. Maybe global warming will reduce my winter heating needs…

Very interesting. So this is how it works… hmn. Thanks, senegal.

ScouseBilly,

did you delete your own comments? Or what happened?

Senegal,

thanks again.

George Dutton,

my apology. I was too trusting of ScouseBilly.

John D Monkey writes:

“Forget windpower, it’s political not a serious contribution to UK energy consumption. I have more chance of flying to the moon on a cosmic ray than wind power has of providing even 10% of UK electicity demand by 2020.”

10% of something can be a serious part of it!

According to this great publication on sustainable energy technology -

http://www.withouthotair.com/Contents.html

The maximum practical contribution from onshore wind turbines in the UK is

20 kilowatt hours per day per person.

Maximum offshore wind is 48 kwh/d/p

European average gross energy consumption (electrical and everything else) is about 120 kwh/d/p

I am enthusiatic about windpower having studied it and designed and built a portable camping windmill. I really love wild places -not so much deforested wildernesses- and im happy with the presence of windmills. Businesses may be profiteering with them, but they can produce useful amounts of clean, safe and quite affordable energy.

If we could get a decent incentive for microgeneration, as they have in Germany, we’d see millions of small turbines springing up every year. One decent nuclear station produces about a gigawatt – which equates to about a million small wind turbines.

Add to this solar power. Germany, again, has a huge generation from solar, even though they have more cloudy days than us in the UK, hard as that might be to believe.

They get a tax break on the price, get a government mandated very low interest loan on the generator from the banks, a mortgage on it effectively, which returns from the generator will cover over the period. Once paid for, it makes money. And you get to sell excess power back to the grid at 7 times the purchase price of power from the grid.

So it costs you nothing down to install, the repayments are paid for by the generator, after which you make money. The banks get a small return. The government/ power companies do not have to pay the huge costs of building reactors. And 40,000 jobs have been created installing the generators.

Everyone wins.

But wait… big contractors haven’t won. Oh rats, well, out with that idea – it’ll have to be nuclear for the UK, and get the major contractors in to bid for commissioning nuclear sites. Cost overruns will not be a problem, the taxpayer has unlimited funds. Trebles all round!

What a bloging shame.

Now why didn’t Craig’s blog get on to this Times list? Would it be because he tells the truth about the Murdochracy and its servants?

http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article7108518.ece

Note the disproportionate space given to Guido Fawkes, which consists of mostly nasty right wing trash comments and with its creator Paul Staines dying for a Cameroon victory.

‘Cameron International Corp, which supplied the rig’s blow-out prevention equipment that failed.’

Hope there’s no connection to Dave.

This great ecological disaster is turning into a lawyers’ paradise before they’ve even stopped the leaks and cleaned up the mess if that is possible.

Notice our old friends from Iraq, Halliburton, are in the frame.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/7664862/BP-faces-criminal-inquiry-into-rig-explosion.html

The BP spokesman should have been a politician.

‘[A] BP spokesman said he was not aware of previous safety issues at the Deepwater rigs despite reports of spills, fires and a collision in the nine years it had been at sea.’

glenn

There is an incentive for microgeneration in the UK. You can sell electricity to the grid at 41p a unit while you can buy electricity at 8p a unit.

Trouble is it makes no sense at all. Domestic wind and PV is so inefficient in the UK it needs such a massive subsidy.

We should be getting together with other European countries and North African nations to develop large scale solar projects in the desert areas and high voltage DC transmission systems to transport the energy to Europe.

That is the only form of solar power that makes economic sense and everyone is a winner. We get the energy and the technology jobs, the North African nations get much needed income.

George Monbiot wrote a good piece on why domestic solar makes no sense at

http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2010/03/01/a-great-green-rip-off/

I’m very much with derek on the issue of micro generation and CSP plans for in cooperation with the magreb countries, the wat forward.

rather than making up some pretext to attack Iran for its oil, diplomacy should steer us towards more cooperation and economic mutuality, far better. Such longterm projects would also undermine the reasoning for terrorist outrage.

Well done Craig for running this popular site, long may it last and hopefully, it will be an inspiration to many.

ScouseBilly, asking for scientific help against the left-wing? Wooo. Now, ScouseBilly, that is what I call ‘machine football’. Shame about the game. Shame about the name.

I got my knickers in a twist over wind ‘farms’. I spent a lot of time trying to find out the truth of the matter – I don’t want nuclear, but the more I looked into wind the more it looked like a racket to generate money rather than energy. My own summary of the situation is that at best (i.e. using the most optimistic estimates of the pro-wind lobby) wind can supply only about 25% of our total requirement. This is a result of its unpredictable intermittency, which the national grid cannot absorb beyond that level. There must exist baseline generation capacity to backup wind, almost on a gigawatt for gigawatt basis, so the question remains as to how this baseload will be generated.

I understand that the interest in thorium is principally from India, which is rich in thorium. From memory, the thorium process is related to the fast breeder technology, considered dangerous, currently being dismantled at Dounreay – or at any rate they’re removing what little hasn’t already seeped into the surrounding landscape or blown away across the beaches.

I think JD Monkey’s concerns on energy security are well-founded. Soon all our gas will come from Russia, and remember what happened to Ukraine. It was no accident – an old pal of mine is CEO of a Russian gas company, and over a pint of beer he bragged about the squeezing of the Ukrainians.

“Cries Not Unheard”

http://tinyurl.com/32chhnm

James Lovelock, the lifetime environmental scientist has persuaded me that the energy situation is so dire, that my lifelong aversion to nuclear energy is no longer tenable. I wish it was not so, but things are that bad. Renewables like solar panel and wind farms can help a little, but the major changes needed are down to US to change our unsustainable, over consumptive lifestyles.

“but the major changes needed are down to US to change our unsustainable, over consumptive lifestyles.”

http://tinyurl.com/2vakfp

My personal view is that:

The issues with nuclear energy are more political than practical; so far, every nation (bar Iran?) that’s had nuclear power has made nuclear weapons. So the first equates to the second. I guess making the weapons is technically easier than making controlled power, so it stands to reason.

It seems similar to the issues with Genetically Modified seeds – it’s the copyrighting of their DNA and the tying-in to specific weedkiller products, all controlled by Monsanto or similar, that is the real problem. That is, a political problem rather than a practical one.

I wouldn’t necessarily get too excited by the large number of hits. Some people think think you’re a cunt, like me.

Your nemesis – Speaking the truth makes you a cunt in this society eh ? You must be of the spin-doctored, PR, ad-agency, PC, lies, bullshit and deceitful political classes.

Thinking people don’t mind hearing truth.

Clark, it was the wired article I read:

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/12/ff_new_nukes/

These may also be of interest.

http://www.nytimes.com/1995/05/16/news/16iht-atomen.ttt.html?pagewanted=1

http://cavendishscience.org/bks/nuc/thrupdat.htm

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20090029904_2009029422.pdf

P.S. No, I don’t have any contact with DT mods nor did I claim to be an expert on energy but I was both intrigued and disappointed by Craig’s response. George doesn’t debate but merely links to propoganda and clearly doesn’t comprehend metaphorical language.

Craig

Why did you delete the comment that I made yesterday? Its not as if it could be regarded as off-topic because there isn’t really a topic is there.

MarkU

I am not aware I deleted any comment by you. Have been deleting literally thousands of bits of spam throughout the older posts. This involves tracking it down by key words (as an example, I once deleted everything with “cialis” – a viagra style drug advertised by spam – and quite accidentally deleted all comments with the word “racialist” in. Possibly some similar accident.

ScouseBilly,

thanks for the links.

George Dutton isn’t so bad, ScouseBilly. There is so much right-leaning propaganda that it doesn’t even get recognised as propaganda. I don’t agree with all of George’s links, but they provide a healthy balance, I think.

Anyway, there’s nowt wrong with being socialist.

Craig, I run a small business. I like many others that have this incessant spam problem.

Any “business” minister that proposed a hard line, worldwide “war on spam” would certainly have a lot of support.

If anyone is interested in finding out where the damn things come from, check out spamcop.net.

Clark, I’m sure you are right and I’m sorry for my use of DT vernacular. Truth is there are plenty of good people over there too (engneers etc.) who are concerned that we face a huge energy crisis. In turn, many of us are concerned that many “green” initiatives are making the poorest suffer. Take good agricultural land being used for bio-fuel crops as just one example.

There are some seriously nasty anti-islamist and BNP-leaning posters there too. For what it’s worth I do tackle them for it. I also posted links for people there to Craig’s posts on Straw’s latest “treating”. I think in the end the more people are aware the better. We all can do our little bit.

Glad you liked the links and I grew up a socialist btw Now, I’m hoping for a hung parliament so that Lib-Dems (and others) can finally get PR.

“Craig”

“Why did you delete the comment that I made yesterday? Its not as if it could be regarded as off-topic because there isn’t really a topic is there.”

He does that a lot these days even when they are on topic. He has lost some regular bloggers already…About to lose another one and I don’t mean you.

“George doesn’t debate but merely links to propoganda and clearly doesn’t comprehend metaphorical language.”

ScouseBilly

Unlike you I do comprehend that when I disagree with someone I don’t go around inciting people to come and physically harm them.

Aw come off it, George.

I mean you no physical harm whatsoever, and I sincerely hope you know that, too.

“I once deleted everything with “cialis” – a viagra style drug advertised by spam – and quite accidentally deleted all comments with the word “racialist” in.”

*laughter*. That’s a neat variation on the Scunthorpe Problem.

I wonder how long it’ll be before people start designing product-names with a view to taking advantage of it (if they’re not already) ?

There are many lanes in England named in the old days after various sexual manoeuvres but which were re-named in more self-conscious (?hypocritical) Victorian times. It’s a deeply fascinating subject, the exploration of which renders to the explorer a whiff of Pan and coal-scuttles of Cowper Powys and

D.H. Lawrence.

http://wapedia.mobi/en/Gropecunt_Lane

George Dutton,

please don’t go. I, for one, follow your links. I was rather shocked at what ScouseBilly wrote on the DT blog, but he’s also made some good posts, and I’m convinced that he just used unduly harsh language and does not really mean you harm.

ScouseBilly,

you probably know this trick already, but anyway… Any e-mail address published on a website in plain text will get spammed. Publish it as an image instead; it won’t work as a “mailto” and can’t be copy-and-pasted, but people can type it and it won’t get spammed.

If you want to help fight spamming, you can add a honeypot to your website:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeypot_(computing)

Clark/George,

I didn’t mean any real harm.

The Dellingpole blog is essentially a “sceptical site” with regard to AGW.

Recently a lot of Guardian “trolls” have been winding up the regulars. It can be something of a bear-pit and if you’ll accept my apologies, my intemperate language was for someone to argue the toss with George from a sceptics pov.

I have no doubt George is a good bloke and though we may not agree on everything, I would never wish him any real harm.

Although I consider myself neither left nor right, that DT blog can be one of the most stimulating talking shops I’ve yet to come across. In fact, the real attraction is a character called “captainsherlock” real name David Hawkings, an englishman in the states. His “research” claims massive global insurance fraud. He sees the “fake AGW science” as a distraction from said fraud. Facinating and I have an uneasy feeling he really is onto something. He posts several times daily for anyone interested.

Thanks Clark. Nothing to do with ScouseBilly, you don’t think the likes of ScouseBilly scare me.

I will leave you with my last links brother, all the best to all, even ScouseBilly.

“Spodden Valley, asbestos scandal (part 1)”…

http://tinyurl.com/37mnmtm

“Spodden Valley, Rochdale’s asbestos scandal. (Part 2)”…

tinyurl.com/ydoerup

“Cyril Smith defends killer asbestos”…

tinyurl.com/yaoko2l

@George

Thanks. I wish you well.

CaptainSherlock’s website btw is:

http://abeldanger.blogspot.com/

“Any e-mail address published on a website in plain text will get spammed. Publish it as an image instead; it won’t work as a “mailto”"

You can use a link to an image as (part of) the text for a mailto: link.