Posts by Mark Pawelek

Bill Gates has no qualifications, and apparently no education, in climate science. The second sentence in Gates' book: "Greenhouse gases trap heat, causing the average surface temperature of the earth to go up.", is a lie. Heat is not trapped by radiative active gases such as carbon dioxide, CO2. As demonstrated by actual research: ( PDF: https://www.scirp.org/pdf/acs_2020041718295959.pdf )

The idea that heat is trapped by the atmosphere is entirely based on modelling. Models which have never been validated. No attempts to falsify them have ever been tried either. If Gates wanted to add to the sum of human knowledge he should fund empirical work in climate science. He should stop taking doomsday climate modelers seriously.

Greenhouse gas, GHG, models are falsified by real data. Models assume more CO2 makes the atmosphere more opaque to infrared, and that, net, there's less out-going radiation to space. Reality shows: a) the atmosphere has not become more opaque to infrared at higher CO2 levels; and b) when the climate warmed prior to 2016, more OLR was emitted, not less! Greenhouse gas models predict more water vapor in the atmosphere will accelerate warming. c) yet over 4 decades, when the Ganges plain was irrigated (1979 - 2018), its atmospheric relative humidity rose 2%; but average surface temperatures fell by 0.8C. The opposite of what GHG models predict. GHG climate models assume the world works in the opposite sense to reality.

I blame everyone : grid operator and wind farm operators.

Not a good description of the real problems. It's well known wind turbines do not work well in stormy weather. They should've had more gas turbines fired up, ready to switch in as the inevitable wind turbine shutdowns happened. As the storm approached, South Australian electricity sources were (approximately): 18% gas turbines, 47% wind turbines, 35% imports from Victoria. They did not have nearly enough gas connected to the grid and were just not prepared in any way. As if they just expected to sail through this. A second mistake they made was running the Victoria interconnector nearly flat out. With inevitable wind turbine failures, the Victoria interconnector was the only source they had that could be quickly switched in to cover for lost generation. South Australia has no hydroelectricity to speak of, which is a source that might normally be expected to fulfill that role. If the interconnector was already nearly maxed out, as it was, no reserve capacity could be quickly switched in. So: zero grid resilience.

Of course the loony hippies don't want resilience. They'd like you all to be off-grid.

Incompetence then. By everyone. The grid operator, wind farm operators. Yes, those who supplied the wind farm software should've made it clear their software was made to protect windfarms from catastrophic grid failure. But then, the wind farm operators should've known that. They must go back to school to study Energy 101 before being allowed out to play again.

So called toxic radioactive waste not as toxic as anti-nuke fear-mongers would like it to be

This article contains a number of wrong statements by a guy who hasn't much of a clue what he's talking about. He's just an anti-nuclear power campaigner. For example:

"no operator wants to use plutonium-based fuel" -- there are plenty of people who'd love to use plutonium-based fuel. Maybe not current operators. Then again, there is only one current nuclear plant operator in Britain: EdF.

"So nuclear waste remains the Achilles heel of the nuclear industry" -- the amount of spent fuel produced by the nuclear industry is a tiny amount. Worldwide: less than 400,000 tonnes since nuclear power began. A single coal plant makes more solid waste than that in one year (ignoring its global warming gases). Your i-pads, smart phones and other electronic gear make lakes of actually toxic waste going for miles upon miles in China. Used nuclear fuel is not toxic in practice because no one is ever harmed by it. It's secure, guarded and safe. It's not particularly dangerous. Low level radiation does not cause cancer, despite the lies green fearmongers tell you. Cancer is dues to a weak, or suppressed immune system : http://pbadupws.nrc.gov/docs/ML1532/ML15329A092.pdf

Strange definition of "open access"

"Because of the great importance this paper will be open access" except "your current credentials do not allow retrieval"

Tim's hopes for solar and wind are doomed

Solar and wind will always be too expensive, although solar has the potential to beat wind on price - even in the UK. The main problem with solar and wind is that

* the sun does not shine at night

* short, cloudy winter days can result in very little solar, when we need energy most

* UK can go for weeks on end with a tiny amount of wind energy delivered to its electricity grid (just like the first 3 weeks of Sept 2014).

* energy use is only 1/3 electricity anyhow. What about industrial energy, transport fuels, etc?

This necessitates backup using

1. Dispatchable gas or coal fired electricity AND/OR

2. Energy storage, charged up during times of plenty

If (1), we find that solar and wind are no longer carbon free, and that we need twice as much plant to deliver our electricity. All those coal and gas fired stations must be built and manned 'just in case'; adding greatly to expense.

What about (2) energy storage? When energy storage is factored in to support renewables we find that renewables can't even generate the energy needed to sustain its own production/reproduction. Energy returned on energy investment (EROEI / EROI) studies show that renewables + energy storage won't work. Nor will route 2 stop blackouts.

Countrywide renewables such as wind and solar won't work for the UK. Nor can tidal, wave, geothermal, hydro, ... That's why the Tories plan to build lots of new nuclear power plants and invest in fracking.

Is alternative energy worth it?: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=16729

Catch-22 of Energy Storage: http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/

Steve Jobs orchestrated Silicon Valley wide conspiracy to keep tech workers wages low

1) How Silicon Valley’s most celebrated CEOs conspired to drive down 100,000 tech engineers’ wages:

http://pando.com/2014/01/23/the-techtopus-how-silicon-valleys-most-celebrated-ceos-conspired-to-drive-down-100000-tech-engineers-wages/

2) Why George Lucas, Eric Schmidt, (and yes, Steve Jobs) Should Go to Jail: Conspiring to Reduce Wages of 100,000 Tech Pros

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2014/01/george-lucas-eric-schmidt-steve-jobs-go-jail.html

Not all the fault of Siemens / Deloitte

The contract was given to Siemens, with consulting by Deloitte, in February 2008 but taken back in-house in summer 2009 after the BBC decided that Siemens were not delivering. Up to then losses were only £11m. The BBC's real blunder was to blindly continue with Siemens solution rather than first evaluate it before continuing in-house.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_controversies#2008.E2.80.932013:_Digital_Media_Initiative

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/review_report_research/vfm/digital_media_initiative.pdf

It isn't called theft it's called copyright infringement. Andrew knows this full well. Nor does copyright infringement have any relationship to piracy.

RIP dear Mr Vance

The Eyes of the Overworld will always be my Vance favorite.

Lets all ditch Flash

I uninstalled Flash yesterday - all 6 versions (6,7,8,910,11) I found on the PC. The motivation to do this were the regular red blobs in the PCs event log. On finding these errors I googled for a solution. Found nothing, so decided to unistall it. Interesting that the Flash auto-update had already been disabled my me. The only reason I unistalled it were the regular issues I've seen from Adobe updates. I wish I could do the same for Acrobat.

As for the security issues - it's mostly the users fault; if they won't stop visiting dodgy sites and clicking on obvious evil links they're going to find their PCs attacked. The only antivirus I have on my PCs are the ones they force me to use at work. They even put AV on the database servers sitting behind corporate firewalls! What's that? - architecture done with paint-by-numbers?

Naturally all the money belongs to bankers anyhow...

According to Tim Worstall, CDS don't exist. The US government never bailed out AIG to payoff the hedge funds and others holding these CDS which the London office of AIG never sold to anyone. Tim Worstall offers an alternative version of history where finaciers do no wrong. They don't fabricate CDO mortgages to fail (those hedgies just happened to guess that there would be a massive blowout. They guessed that the US treasury would pay them off because, off course, the US treasury belongs to them - as does all money. They've earned it - they work 16 hour days to make all that money.

Follow the Money

The problem isn't limited to government.

As Josh Lerner wrote recently [see footnotes], more and more venture capital funding is being channeled into IT (social networks, etc) because they can get their capital back within 8-10 years. 4-5 years funding followed by another 4-5 years selling off the business.

Many other business areas [especially hard tech for export] don't all such precise and time limited investments. Venture capital funding for cleantech has bought no rewards (losses if anything). IT/Internet has been the consistent payer for them.

This government takes it's lead from business. It may not seem like it to you (working in IT) that there's a boom going on but, relatively speaking, there is. When it stops there will be little investment in the West in anything. I don't see it getting better.

Josh Lerner, The Narrowing Ambitions of Venture Capital, MIT Technology Review <http://www.technologyreview.com/news/429024/the-narrowing-ambitions-of-venture-capital/>

Josh Lerner, The Architecture of Innovation, Harvard Business Review Press

Obsolete by well over 10 years

It still doesn't support epub. The amazon book format is based on mobi pocket book format which is itself based on html 3.2. Html 3.2 has no proper css support. The maker can not easily style these books. It's obsolete by well over 10 years. If Amazon must use a proprietary format they should, at least, keep it up-to-date.

PS: epub is also slightly obsolete but much less so than mobi format.

Women out there - please tell us what you want!

[q]I take on at least 2 graduates per annum as trainee (permanent) web developers. ... about £140 per diem.[/q]

£140 per diem is far more than women can expect to earn in a nail bar or behind a retail counter, etc.

He taking on recent grads with no actual experience. Why is he unable to recruit any women?

Women out there - please tell us what you want!

Less waffle, more evidence please

[quote]an insight into how policy-making within the IPO was driven[/quote]

In the USA, such policy-making has been driven by Disney and Hollywood, their lawyers, lobbyists, and paid cronies in Congress. They've extended copyright law over 11 times since the mid-1970s. Has that generated any 'economic growth' at all? Does IP law, in any way, promote productivity gains? Just show me the evidence. otherwise I must assume Andrew Orlowski is applying similar 'magical thinking' as those he discredits. The theory behind patent law says that the general productivity of the populace is enhanced by publication of inventions (but only if the inventions are thereby applied). Better for us that Google, Oracle (and everyone coding) use best practice. Show me a single patented software invention that has led to any productivity increases in computer programming. Show me evidence - I don't need to read more waffle by Andrew Orlowski. I'll show you loads of open source products that have enhanced my productivity; loads of books and talks promoting ideas held in common (principles, patterns, DRY, SOLID, simple design, TDD, etc) - I can't find a single patent that made me a better (more productive) coder.

Water vapour is a greenhouse gas

[quote]And of course the water cycle is the planets thermostat. Hotter=more vapour=more cloud carrying heat up to radiate to space = more cold rain falling to cool planet surface and sea and more cloud shielding the earth from the sun.

Completely obliterating the effects of and CO2 change by and large.[/quote]

LOL. Such extreme ignorance. Water vapour is a greenhouse gas - more so than carbon dioxide.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jan/29/water-vapour-climate-change

Small UK companies sell-out ASAP

Anonymous Coward said: "even Switherland has industry and manufacturing nowdays"

- as a proportion of the economy, Switherland's manufacturing is up there with Germany's.

- why is no one addressing the major problem raised here? - that small UK companies sell-out ASAP. Should any ex-employer be reading this, I'm not talking about my experience - I'm talking about all the people I meet at tech events (e.g. the people who sold out their excellent small company to a bunch of idiots without doing any providence check before accpting the dosh, etc.)

Where's the money going?

- What size pay rise will Gerhard Ritter get now that he's chairing a much larger department? Call yourself journalists? - you need to remember the basic question - where's the money going?