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He's also a registered lobbyist, founded and runs Environmental Progress - essentially a pro nuclear lobby group, and is rabidly anti-renewables - inventing "fa

He's also a registered lobbyist, founded and runs Environmental Progress - essentially a pro nuclear lobby group, and is rabidly anti-renewables - inventing "facts" to make them look bad. He does far more damage than good, and you basically can't trust a word he says or cites.

malvosenior 7y ago
Pro nuclear is a good thing though no? It seems like the solution to climate change and energy production. I know I'm very skeptical of people who claim to be pro-environment then rally against nuclear power.
- NeedMoreTea 7y ago
  Sure if done by actual facts and economic or climate advantages. Using it as a basis to spin against hydro or wind - i.e. to prove they are unviable just makes a complete mockery of his claims. TL;DR He lies about it and makes shit up, repeatedly, in all his pieces. What's he afraid of? Nuclear should stand on the reality of the proposition, and indeed should have a place in any low carbon solution if done properly.
- mantap 7y ago
  Nuclear is a solution in countries such as India and China where it can be constructed for cheaper, but in the west it is dying due to the high cost. If nuclear only compared unfavorablely to fossil fuels the externalities could be addressed by a carbon tax. But because it compares unfavorably to renewables it is really dying.
  - AstralStorm 7y ago
    Except renewables cannot deliver a whole network on their own ever, so there is no competition. The cost is a fake issue, because nuclear competes against coal and gas power plants and not renewables. You need a base load capability for smoothing in an electrical grid. Most renewables are the exactly opposite. The exception is biogas or other gasification plants a these cannot handle the required load at all. Not even hydropower. Look at what happens in Australia if you push too much solar energy (same with wind) on the network.
    - bryanlarsen 7y ago
      > Except renewables cannot deliver a whole network, so it does not. Solar and wind need to be paired peaker plants. Conventional nuclear doesn't provide peaking ability. Battery powered peakers are quite expensive, but the need for them can be reduced drastically through over-provisioning and interconnection.
      - AstralStorm 7y ago
        If we could overprovision solar and wind, we wouldn't have the problem now? I find that hard to believe. What happens when you need extra load at night or during a country wide lull in wind speed? Nuclear reduces the need for peakers exactly because it can overprovision reliably. You could also make nuclear peakers if you wanted reasonably easily too. Nuclear plants have tunable output to a point, they're just slow and hard to fully stop, so you would make a design optimized for very tunable output and high peak power. (0) Solar and wind cannot suddenly overprovision. The sources either exist or not, you can at most ground them instead of collecting power. 0) IAEA - Non-baseload operation of nuclear power plants: https://www.iaea.org/publications/11104/non-baseload-operation-in-nuclear-power-plants-load-following-and-frequency-control-modes-of-flexible-operation https://www.iaea.org/publications/11104/non-baseload-operati...
    - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
      IIRC It's only 2 or 3 years ago (Not certain, but astonishingly recent) Australia was getting over 70% of power from coal, including a good proportion of lignite. Right down there with the worst, such as Poland. They've under-funded the grid for years, and belatedly rushed into solar at extreme speed. Not surprising it brought consequences, they seem intent on approaching it really chaotically. :)
      - AstralStorm 7y ago
        Who is approaching it less chaotically? Everyone is already behind the schedule with making the energy grid zero emission.
  - Grue3 7y ago
    >dying due to the high cost But if you want to fight climate change, surely any cost is worth it? Otherwise you're not serious about it. Subsidize it, do whatever it takes to save the planet. Renewables are a false solution, they're quicker to build but cannot produce energy reliably, need to be replaced often, take too much space etc. If they could replace coal, surely Germany would've done so already.
    - mantap 7y ago
      Nobody needs to use coal. Gas turbines are better in every way. Germany's addiction to coal is political not technological. Renewables are part of the solutions but what makes up the rest will depend on where you live. The solution for Sweden won't be the same as the solution for Hawaii. It's hard to talk generally on the internet about this because it only makes sense to discuss power generation in a particular place.
    - bryanlarsen 7y ago
      So we're not allowed to criticize nuclear due to it's cost, but you're allowed to dismiss renewables because of their cost?
      - Grue3 7y ago
        Where did I dismiss renewables due to cost? I'm dismissing them due to inconvenience. For example consider how many solar panels need to be installed to replace a nuclear station, how much area will they cover, how many of them will need to be replaced every day, how a few non-sunny days in a row would render it useless, etc.
        bryanlarsen 7y ago
        Nothing is "inconvenient" for a corporation. All "inconvenient" means is that they have to pay people to do it or put up with it. IOW, a cost.
thu2111 7y ago
You basically can't trust a word he says or cites. He mostly cites the IPCC and climate scientists. Or are you saying those sources aren't trustworthy? I read the article. Every word of it is true. It can be summed up as: Lots of people, especially teenagers, are starting to suffer mental health problems because they think the world is about to end. The world isn't about to end, this is a lie. The people claiming it is are mostly making it up, or misquoting other people, or in one case a journalist misheard "eight billion" as "a billion" and other comedies of errors. It's important that people understand what climate science really says before a teenager does something they can't come back from.
- xyz0 7y ago
  > Lots of people, especially teenagers, are starting to suffer mental health problems because they think the world is about to end Can you source this? > It's important that people understand what climate science really says before a teenager does something they can't come back from. Are you saying that climate change is so widely accepted and feared that it's causing the rate of suicides to increase? Wouldn't a better indicator of the acknowledgement of (supposedly-overblown) effects of climate change be, you know, individuals and governments taking action to curtail those effects instead of walking out of global accords [1], or actively contributing to the acceleration of those effects [2]? [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40127326 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40127326 [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/18/world/americas/brazil-amazon-deforestation.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/18/world/americas/brazil-ama...
  - thu2111 7y ago
    Can you source this? The first paragraphs of the article give both direct quotes from people saying they had that experience, and then cites a report from British psychologists saying they'd observed this effect at scale. Did you read the article? Are you saying that climate change is so widely accepted and feared that it's causing the rate of suicides to increase. It risks doing exactly that: "Studies from around the world document growing anxiety and depression, particularly among children, about climate change." People aren't scared of climate change as actually observed, they're scared of what they're being fed by people like Greta Thunberg, who is lying about the expected scale of the impact. The fact that journalists, politicians and even a few scientists are saying this despite it being false is what the article is about.

malvosenior 7y ago

Pro nuclear is a good thing though no? It seems like the solution to climate change and energy production. I know I'm very skeptical of people who claim to be pro-environment then rally against nuclear power.

NeedMoreTea 7y ago
Sure if done by actual facts and economic or climate advantages. Using it as a basis to spin against hydro or wind - i.e. to prove they are unviable just makes a complete mockery of his claims. TL;DR He lies about it and makes shit up, repeatedly, in all his pieces. What's he afraid of? Nuclear should stand on the reality of the proposition, and indeed should have a place in any low carbon solution if done properly.
mantap 7y ago
Nuclear is a solution in countries such as India and China where it can be constructed for cheaper, but in the west it is dying due to the high cost. If nuclear only compared unfavorablely to fossil fuels the externalities could be addressed by a carbon tax. But because it compares unfavorably to renewables it is really dying.
- AstralStorm 7y ago
  Except renewables cannot deliver a whole network on their own ever, so there is no competition. The cost is a fake issue, because nuclear competes against coal and gas power plants and not renewables. You need a base load capability for smoothing in an electrical grid. Most renewables are the exactly opposite. The exception is biogas or other gasification plants a these cannot handle the required load at all. Not even hydropower. Look at what happens in Australia if you push too much solar energy (same with wind) on the network.
  - bryanlarsen 7y ago
    > Except renewables cannot deliver a whole network, so it does not. Solar and wind need to be paired peaker plants. Conventional nuclear doesn't provide peaking ability. Battery powered peakers are quite expensive, but the need for them can be reduced drastically through over-provisioning and interconnection.
    - AstralStorm 7y ago
      If we could overprovision solar and wind, we wouldn't have the problem now? I find that hard to believe. What happens when you need extra load at night or during a country wide lull in wind speed? Nuclear reduces the need for peakers exactly because it can overprovision reliably. You could also make nuclear peakers if you wanted reasonably easily too. Nuclear plants have tunable output to a point, they're just slow and hard to fully stop, so you would make a design optimized for very tunable output and high peak power. (0) Solar and wind cannot suddenly overprovision. The sources either exist or not, you can at most ground them instead of collecting power. 0) IAEA - Non-baseload operation of nuclear power plants: https://www.iaea.org/publications/11104/non-baseload-operation-in-nuclear-power-plants-load-following-and-frequency-control-modes-of-flexible-operation https://www.iaea.org/publications/11104/non-baseload-operati...
  - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
    IIRC It's only 2 or 3 years ago (Not certain, but astonishingly recent) Australia was getting over 70% of power from coal, including a good proportion of lignite. Right down there with the worst, such as Poland. They've under-funded the grid for years, and belatedly rushed into solar at extreme speed. Not surprising it brought consequences, they seem intent on approaching it really chaotically. :)
    - AstralStorm 7y ago
      Who is approaching it less chaotically? Everyone is already behind the schedule with making the energy grid zero emission.
- Grue3 7y ago
  >dying due to the high cost But if you want to fight climate change, surely any cost is worth it? Otherwise you're not serious about it. Subsidize it, do whatever it takes to save the planet. Renewables are a false solution, they're quicker to build but cannot produce energy reliably, need to be replaced often, take too much space etc. If they could replace coal, surely Germany would've done so already.
  - mantap 7y ago
    Nobody needs to use coal. Gas turbines are better in every way. Germany's addiction to coal is political not technological. Renewables are part of the solutions but what makes up the rest will depend on where you live. The solution for Sweden won't be the same as the solution for Hawaii. It's hard to talk generally on the internet about this because it only makes sense to discuss power generation in a particular place.
  - bryanlarsen 7y ago
    So we're not allowed to criticize nuclear due to it's cost, but you're allowed to dismiss renewables because of their cost?
    - Grue3 7y ago
      Where did I dismiss renewables due to cost? I'm dismissing them due to inconvenience. For example consider how many solar panels need to be installed to replace a nuclear station, how much area will they cover, how many of them will need to be replaced every day, how a few non-sunny days in a row would render it useless, etc.
      - bryanlarsen 7y ago
        Nothing is "inconvenient" for a corporation. All "inconvenient" means is that they have to pay people to do it or put up with it. IOW, a cost.

thu2111 7y ago

You basically can't trust a word he says or cites. He mostly cites the IPCC and climate scientists. Or are you saying those sources aren't trustworthy? I read the article. Every word of it is true. It can be summed up as: Lots of people, especially teenagers, are starting to suffer mental health problems because they think the world is about to end. The world isn't about to end, this is a lie. The people claiming it is are mostly making it up, or misquoting other people, or in one case a journalist misheard "eight billion" as "a billion" and other comedies of errors. It's important that people understand what climate science really says before a teenager does something they can't come back from.

xyz0 7y ago
> Lots of people, especially teenagers, are starting to suffer mental health problems because they think the world is about to end Can you source this? > It's important that people understand what climate science really says before a teenager does something they can't come back from. Are you saying that climate change is so widely accepted and feared that it's causing the rate of suicides to increase? Wouldn't a better indicator of the acknowledgement of (supposedly-overblown) effects of climate change be, you know, individuals and governments taking action to curtail those effects instead of walking out of global accords [1], or actively contributing to the acceleration of those effects [2]? [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40127326 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40127326 [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/18/world/americas/brazil-amazon-deforestation.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/18/world/americas/brazil-ama...
- thu2111 7y ago
  Can you source this? The first paragraphs of the article give both direct quotes from people saying they had that experience, and then cites a report from British psychologists saying they'd observed this effect at scale. Did you read the article? Are you saying that climate change is so widely accepted and feared that it's causing the rate of suicides to increase. It risks doing exactly that: "Studies from around the world document growing anxiety and depression, particularly among children, about climate change." People aren't scared of climate change as actually observed, they're scared of what they're being fed by people like Greta Thunberg, who is lying about the expected scale of the impact. The fact that journalists, politicians and even a few scientists are saying this despite it being false is what the article is about.