Pro-nuclear, pro-money crazy (and less a pro-life one)

"Before we all become pro-nuclear greens, however, you've got to ask three questions: Is #nuclear power safe and clean? Is it economical? And are there better alternatives?
No, no and yes. So let's not swap the pending environmental disaster of climate change for another that may be equally risky."

From: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/08/23/the-new-nuclear-craze/?smid=tw-bittman&seid=auto&_r=0

 

Keywords: safety, uranium mines (still not cleaned up), disposal of spent fuel (no real plan after decades of their existance), HUGE governmental subsidies, taxpayers, ratepayers, externalities (usually) excluded (from calculating C/B), ... and ultimately, better energy alternatives.

 

Utilities are afraid that solar power will be to the electrical grid what PCs were to mainframes, or e-mail to the Postal Service: a technology that will simply kill its predecessors. Coal and nuclear power are both doomed, and the profit-making power grid with it. That's all to our benefit.

IPCC projections accurate, Alaskan fish dying, and Deathly taxation in Spain

Contrary to Contrarian Claims, IPCC Temperature Projections Have Been Exceptionally Accurate
In this post we will evaluate this contrarian claim by comparing the global surface temperature projections from each of the first four IPCC reports to the subsequent observed temperature changes.
(http://www.skepticalscience.com/contary-to-contrarians-ipcc-temp-projections-accurate.html)

Want money? Tax death. There'll be plenty of death (that) where it came from.
'Even in death, people in Spain cannot escape the economic crisis. /.../ 
"I paid over 7,000 euros (9,300 dollars) for my husband's funeral, and it was a simple service, with one of the simple coffins, which cost 2,600 euros (3,450 dollars), without mementos or music, and only a few flowers. Besides, instead of a burial, we had him cremated, which is even less expensive," Ana María Robles, a 66-year-old pensioner, told IPS. /.../
In 2004, a complete funeral service cost around 4,000 euros (5,300 dollars), and today a normal average funeral costs between 6,000 and 7,000 euros (8,000 to 9,300 dollars)," the source added.'

/.../ the crisis in this country has led to a 30 percent increase in social inequality between the richest and the poorest since 2006.'
(Source: http://www.ipsnews.net/2013/08/even-death-feels-weight-of-crisis-in-spain/)

"Unusually hot, dry weather in Alaska is wreaking havoc on fisheries, as thousands of fish perish in overheated waters. Last month, 1,100 king salmon died on their way up to the Crystal Lake hatchery due to water temperatures around 80 degrees Fahrenheit and lack of oxygen. That's the bulk of the 1,800 adult salmon that were expected to return to the hatchery this season.
 
Earlier in the summer, another hatchery lost hundreds of grayling and rainbow trout in a Fairbanks lake where water temperatures reached 76 degrees. Alaska's heat wave broke records last week, with 14 days straight above 70 degrees in Anchorage and 31 days of 80 degrees in Fairbanks."
From: http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/08/05/2410921/extreme-heat-is-killing-off-thousands-of-fish-in-alaska/
(Salmon is, apparently, 'the state's largest export product after oil and natural gas' (ironical, isn't it?).)

Oh, also from the same source:
'While Alaska's heat wave is expected to subside soon, the state has warmed up twice as fast as the rest of the nation in the past 50 years, and climate change is worsening extreme weather. Wildfires raged through subarctic forests as late as Friday, consuming more than a million acres and prompting emergency evacuations across the state. Thawing permafrost is also sinking villages, threatening fish stocks and water supplies that the communities rely on to survive.'

A new climate change action agreement? Hopefully in 2015. With the IPCC's AR5 coming up in Dec, 2014, it will be a Crunchy Christmas.
"Peru is a country absolutely committed to the negotiations and its progress in dealing with climate change. We are committed to the Durban Platform agreement and we know that in Warsaw 2013, Lima 2014 and Paris 2015 we will come to a binding climate agreement, for the planet, for the people and for our citizens. Those of us who serve the public are aware that our fundamental priority is our people, especially the most vulnerable-those who suffer the consequences of climate change," says Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, Minister of Environment"
From: http://www.ecosystemmarketplace.com/pages/dynamic/article.page.php?page_id=9807&section=news_articles&eod=1

'Conservative IPCC Errs on the Side of Least Drama

 
'Although the IPCC climate models have performed remarkably well in projecting average global surface temperature warming thus far, Rahmstorf et al. (2012) found that the IPCC underestimated global average sea level rise since 1993 by 60%.  Brysse et al. (2012) also found that the IPCC has tended to underestimate or failed to account for CO2 emissions, increased rainfall in already rainy areas, continental ice sheet melting, Arctic sea ice decline, and permafrost melting.  Brysse et al. concludes that the on the whole the IPCC has been too conservative in its projections, "erring on the side of least drama" — in effect preferring to be wrong on the conservative side in order to avoid criticism.'
From: http://www.skepticalscience.com/contary-to-contrarians-ipcc-temp-projections-accurate.html