Sorry if “douchebag” is an offensive term to anyone.   This level of idiocy and blatant disregard for law and order and the rights and lives of others is simply too disgusting to not use such a word.

Via MSNBC:

Greenpeace Closes Down BP Petrol Stations in Central London Energy Protest

LONDON – As BP CEO Tony Hayward resigned under a cloud Tuesday, thousands of British motorists got an unexpected reminder of the oil spill that’s wreaked havoc in the Gulf of Mexico.

Protesters with the environmental group Greenpeace said they shut off fuel supplies at 46 BP gas stations across London just in time for the morning rush-hour. Small teams of activists used a standard shut-off switch to stop the flow of fuel oil at the targeted stations. The switches were then removed to prevent most BP outlets in the capital from opening.

And to ensure there was no chance of drivers buying gas, demonstrators in fluorescent vests and helmets locked green metal fences around some sites.

“What BP needs to do is not just change CEOs it needs to actually come up with a new strategy,” Greenpeace U.K.’s chief executive John Sauven said at one of the shuttered stations in Camden, north London.

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For a good while it looked like funding of homeopathy through NHS, the national government-sponsored health-care system in the UK was going to finally end.   An MP report on the subject was predictably very strongly against continued funding, nearly every member of the medical establishment who commented on the issue was firmly against homeopathy and various British skeptic and pro-science groups seized the moment to show how worthless homeopathy is.  The British Medical Association firmly backed the removal of funding for homeopathy by government programs.

The big blow to homeopathy came earlier this year when a select committee of the British Parliament published their findings, concluding that homeopathy is no more useful than placebo and does not deserve continued funding.  (Well, yeah, thanks Captain Obvious.)

Yes, it looked like the tax payers of the UK would finally be able to avoid paying for expensive water in perfume bottles.  Or so it seemed…

Via OnMedica:

DH commits to continue NHS funding of homeopathy
NHS funding for homeopathic treatments will continue, despite a highly critical report published by MPs earlier this year.

MPs on the parliamentary science and technology select committee published a report on homeopathy in February, which urged the government to withdraw NHS funding for such treatments and for the medicines regulator to stop licensing homeopathic products.

Both proposals were rejected this week by the Department of Health as it published its official response to the report.

Homeopathy has been funded on the NHS since the service began in 1948 and there are four homeopathic hospitals in the UK, in London, Bristol, Liverpool and Glasgow.

It is estimated that the NHS spends around £4 million a year on homeopathy.

The select committee’s report said there was no conclusive evidence that homeopathic drugs were any more effective than a placebo and given that existing scientific literature showed no good evidence of efficacy, further clinical trials of homeopathy could not be justified.

The committee said it believed homeopathy was a placebo treatment.

To prescribe these treatments was damaging the integrity of the doctor-patient relationship and because the effect of homeopathy was unreliable and unpredictable, it should not form the sole basis of any treatment on the NHS.

The MPs also wanted the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) to stop licensing homeopathic products because they were allowing these products to make medical claims without evidence of efficacy.

The BMA at its annual conference in June voted overwhelmingly for a motion that said homeopathic remedies should be banned on the NHS and taken off pharmacy shelves where they are sold as medicines.

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Molten salt is great for nuclear reactors, but it can’t do much for solar…

Via Business Green:

What is claimed to be the world’s first solar thermal concentration plant to use molten salt as the heat transfer fluid has been opened by Italian energy company Enel in Sicily.

The 5MW Archimede plant – named after the rows of huge parabolic mirrors used to capture the sun’s rays – is also claimed to be the first to integrate a combined-cycle gas facility and a solar thermal power plant for electricity generation.

The solar thermal power plant comprises a field of about 30,000m2 of mirrors that concentrate sunlight on to 5.4km of pipe carrying the molten salt fluid. The thermal energy harvested by the system produces high-pressure steam that is channelled into the turbines of the power plant to produce electricity, reducing the consumption of fossil fuels and, as a result, enhancing the environmental performance of the combined-cycle plant.

The solar collectors (the parabolic mirrors and pipes or receivers), together with a steam generator and two heat storage tanks – one cold and one hot – make up the solar portion of the system.

When the sun shines, the thermal fluid drawn from the cold tank is circulated through the network of parabolic collectors, where it is heated to a temperature of 550°C and injected into the hot tank, where the thermal energy is stored. The fluid is then drawn from the hot reservoir to produce steam at high pressure and temperature, which is sent to Enel’s nearby combined-cycle plant, where it contributes to electricity generation.

The molten salts used in the system are a mixture of sodium nitrates and potassium, which can retain heat for prolonged periods. This enables the plant to generate electricity at any time of the day and in all weather conditions until the stored energy is depleted.

To be precise, this is not the first time molten salts have been used in a solar power application. The supposed claim to fame here is that molten salts are being used for heat collection, heat transfer and storage, where as in the past they were usually limited to heat storage. Also, this is supposed to be a real “power plant,” as opposed to a research facility, as this has been done before in various prototype and pilot plant locations.

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In 1979 Three Mile Island experienced a partial meltdown of one of its reactor cores due to a coolant system failure and operator error.   The actual reactor vessel, though internally damaged, held, and the additional layers of protection offered by the containment structure also held, but were not even needed.   Nobody died, nobody was injured, no property outside the plant was damaged.   To this day, many hold it up as an example of the horrors of nuclear energy.

Meanwhile, a form of “renewable” energy around the country has been destroying homes and snuffing out lives from the very beginning with little fanfare.

The Lake Delhi dam was built in the 1920’s as a hydroelectric generating facility.   In the late 1960’s, the facility began to show its age and the operator didn’t have the capital to replace or refurbish the turbines, leading to most of the electrical generating capacity going offline in 1973.   Had the Delhi dam been a nuclear facility, the owners would have been required to have a fund set aside for its decommissioning, thus assuring that it would not be left a derelict hulk that endangers the community.

But it wasn’t nuclear, so there it sat, turbines rusting and no power being produced.   Instead, operations of the dam were turned over to the “Lake Delhi Recreational Association,” who apparently had no interest in generating electricity  and was not at all equipped to maintain or repair the dam.  The former hydroelectric dam, which held back a ten mile long lake seems to have sat under the control of the equivalent of a neighborhood association, and received little if any maintenance or inspection.

Although hydropower is a good economic and renewable source of energy, no government subsidies jumped in to repair the dam and thus several private attempts to repair the dam and put it back into service generating power went bust over the years.

Finally in 2008, it seemed that the plant would be brought back online.   It had the potential to generate electricity, but since it was not wind or solar, it took a while to get regulatory approval to even begin the refurbishment for power generation.   Yes, that’s right, the process to just get approval to begin refurbishment takes years!

By 2010, it looked like the plant was about ready to come back online.   Unfortunately, as it was being refurbished it was discovered that the years of neglect had not been kind to the Delhi dam and was in worse shape than anyone could have imagined.   Sediment had built up against the dam, at least one gate was severely damaged by a past flood and the integrity of the dam was called into question.  In 2009, the Federal Government allocated 2.5 million for critical repairs on the dam, in part because of the safety issue it presented.   The state of Iowa came up with another one hundred thousand dollars to begin a dredging and improvement plan last April.

But apparently, it wasn’t enough, because this morning, this happened:

Right now, how much damage this dam failure has caused remains unknown.   Details are sketchy, but officials are already calling it “catastrophic.”    At least a few homes are already reported destroyed and upwards of 700 could be in danger.    At least fifty homes have already reported some level of damage and the flood has also been blamed for extensive power outages.  Due to evacuations, it is hoped that deaths will be avoided.

The dam was not a nuclear facility, however, so don’t expect to read about this on the front page of the newspaper.  In fact, don’t expect to read about it on the second page either.   It may not even make the first section of your newspaper and if you don’t live in the US, it likely won’t make it to your newspaper at all.    After all, it’s just a dam and those fail all the time.   Small consolation to those whose lives have been washed away.

At least it was only water and not coal ash.

For those who don’t know, I just got home from a week in Las Vegas where I attended The Amazing Meeting with The Amazing James Randi, Adam Savage, the Great Johnny Thompson, Dr. Michael Shermer, Phil Plait “The Bad Astronomer,” Richard Dawkins and numerous other world-renowned skeptics, critical thinkers and science promoters.

Of course, it was a hoot.   It also involved quite a bit of intellectual stimulation, partying, drinking, running around, socializing and precious little sleep or down time.   Now back home, I figured it was time to crash for the evening before a storm of posting on the meeting, all those who helped pull it off and what my thoughts are on the future of skepticism, which I will say, is quite bright.

Then this shit hit the presses…
Infants Ingest Nearly 80 Times Safe Level of Dioxin

Yes, it is the “Environmental Working Group,” who have managed to gain credibility and also get a lot of media attention by going after a variety of unproven and over-played environmental issues. They’re the same group that made a big stink about cell phone radiation levels without providing much reason why anyone should worry about them.

While dioxin is indeed worth concern, at least in some circumstances, the press release from the EWG is riddled with unsubstantiated claims.

But, I’m simply too tired. Anyone want to take a closer look at the data?

The Active Denial System is a non-lethal crowd control device that has recently gotten a great deal of press.  It is produced by Raytheon, primarily for the US military but with versions under development for law enforcement.

It has also become the subject of a huge number of conspiracy theories. Here are just a few:

Uncovering the Truth #4: Active Denial System
The Pentagon’s People Zapper
Man made earth quakes – Active Denial System Weapon
The Pentagon’s Pain Compliance and Mind Control Weapons
Depleted Uranium, HAARP and ADS – The Ultimate Weapon
US torture weapons used against civilians
Stop Canadian Complicity in Torture – The Active Denial Torture Ray
Michael Jackson Assassinated By CIA Using ADS Microwaves
Bio-electromagnetic weapons can kill, torture, enslave and escape detection
American Mass Murder Weapon?
DEW EMF ILLEGALLY TARGETED SLEEP DEPRIVATION
Air Force Plan: Hack Your Nervous System

The rational for the Active Denial System:

The US military, like many militarizes around the world has found itself engaged in more and more complex peacekeeping and policing actions.   In areas like Bosnia, Afghanistan and Iraq, military activity is not limited to traditional battlefields, but rather involves security and policing of urban areas with large civilian populations.   Some of the greatest dangers and most difficult situations arise when crowds of civilians are involved.

A suicide bomber could easily hide in a mob of otherwise unarmed persons and even an unarmed crowd can potentially block movement of vehicles or endanger soldiers and civilians.  A heated protest can easily erupt into a riot.  Maintaining order in these type of situations has always been an extreme challenge.  The use of deadly force would undoubtedly work, but would be considered unacceptable in all but the most extreme situations.   Even well armed soldiers can find themselves cornered by a large group of angry civilians, and in such situations, they are faced with the limited options of doing nothing or using deadly force.

This problem has existed for both the military and police forces for decades and to this end, a number of non-lethal methods of dispersing crowds or suppressing entry to areas have been developed.   Some of the most common ones include the following:

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Lets face it, the world of conspiracy theories is pretty male dominated.   Perhaps it’s time that some hip young ladies get out there and show they can be every bit as crazy as men.

Well that’s what truthergirls is all about!   You might think from the look of this young lady that she’s a smart, well connected, cultured and educated woman.   After all, she lives in the hip and happening city of Montreal, she speaks at least two languages fluently, drinks boutique-quality coffee, posts on youtube and she’s fairly attractive.   These would all seem to indicate a hip young woman of the world.

However, looks can be deceiving and stereotypes are often wrong.   It turns out, she’s a complete nutball and has about as much going on upstairs as any overweight 40 year old guy who lives in his mother’s basement and wears an aluminum foil hat.

I really wish I could encounter someone like this on the street.  My god, it’s just so lame! Sure, I’ve seen my share of “end is near” guys and religious fanatics handing out signs in Times Square, but never someone quite like this…

This is the Playpump:

The basic idea is that children in Africa play on a manually driven merry-go-round, not unlike those found in many playgrounds and enjoy themselves, not even thinking of it as work, but in the process they pump water out from a well into a tank so that it can be used by their communities.   Of course, there’s no doubt water wells provide a much healthier alternative to carrying water miles or using surface streams and ponds for water, and the makers of the Playpump claim it is superior to the traditional hand-operated pumps that have generally been used to provide water because it’s powered by children playing as they would anyway.

Seems like a good idea, right?
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Via the New York Times:

MIT Researchers See Natural Gas as the Choice for Lower Carbon Emissions
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are encouraging U.S. policymakers to consider the nation’s growing supply of natural gas as a short-term substitute for aging coal-fired power plants.

In the results of a two-year study, released today, the researchers said electric utilities and other sectors of the American economy will use more gas through 2050. Under a scenario that envisions a federal policy aimed at cutting greenhouse gas emissions to 50 percent below 2005 levels by 2050, researchers found a substantial role for natural gas.

“Because national energy use is substantially reduced, the share represented by gas is projected to rise from about 20 percent of the current national total to around 40 percent in 2040,” said the MIT researchers. When used to fire a power plant, gas emits about half of the carbon dioxide emissions as conventional coal plants.

The report asserts the impact of national policies that place an economic cost on greenhouse gas emissions would, first and foremost, be a reduction in energy use across the United States. It would flatten demand in the electricity sector.

….

Gas is an option for cutting power plant emissions and addressing global warming in the short term. But the researchers warned that the gas cushion shouldn’t distract policymakers from addressing the need for nuclear power and carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technology for coal-fired generation.

“Though gas frequently is touted as a ‘bridge’ to the future, continuing effort is needed to prepare for that future, lest the gift of greater domestic gas resources turn out to be a bridge with no landing point on the far bank,” the report says. “Barriers to the expansion of nuclear power or coal and/or gas generation with CCS must be resolved over the next few decades so they are capable of expanding to replace natural gas in generation.”

…
Economics favor vehicles run on natural gas

Automakers that take the plunge into compressed natural gas vehicles would see a significant jump in demand under a national climate policy that makes carbon dioxide emissions costly. Biofuels are expected to advance, but it’s unclear how quickly and at what cost to important food crops. But even with biofuels in the picture, MIT projects natural gas vehicles will be 15 percent of the private vehicle fleet by 2050.

New shale gas fields could reconfigure the national map of gas producers and consumers. Gas production in the Marcellus Shale and other burgeoning gas fields in the Northeast, stretching from New England through the Great Lake states, is set to rise 78 percent by 2030. Under a carbon price regime, the researchers said gas production matches increasing gas consumption.

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Recently Greenpeace issued “seven steps to a future fueled by renewable energy.” At least one writer at ZDNet seems to have eaten the whole thing up saying:

I know how some of you feel about Greenpeace, but let me assure you that this is not mere rhetoric. The report was research and written in conjunction with scientists from the Institute of Technical Thermodynamics at the German Aerospace Centre, and its focus is on how to phase out fuels and cut carbon dioxide emissions without compromising “energy security.” It offers several prospective scenarios for what COULD happen — sort of like the ghost of our energy future.

Having read the report, I can tell you that it could happen, and monkeys could also fly out of my butt, as Wayne of Wayne’s World would say. It’s based on a number of extreme assumptions, including the assumption that unlimited amounts of money can be spent by governments to “create jobs” with zero negative economic impacts. It also makes unrealistically optimistic projections for renewable energy efficiency and capacity factor.

All in all, the proposal is more of the same pie in the sky rhetoric about things that those of us with rational mindsets and some level of technical knowledge know are just never going to happen. Many of the steps proposed are just plain naive and others are likely to be counter-productive.

Since many out there still actually trust groups like this, here is why these just can’t stand:

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