Victorian (Australia) Electricity supply meltdown.

[beanflying]

Have a browse of her site she is a self proclaimed High Priestess of climate change denial and Bolt likes to think of himself as a preacher of the same religion.

[cdev]

Corporatism, more specifically Disaster Capitalism sees a silver lining behind every emergency or disaster. They try to take maximum advantage of every disaster by policy ratchets, huge power, IP, and land grabs, and they are not even above creating avoidable disasters.

Energy is their playground and the taxpayers their preferred victims, as shown by the Enron Tapes, and ISDS (arbitral) suits that have been brought under the Energy Charter Treaty for example.

These are the people who are running the world right now, pretty much, BTW.

[doobedoobedo]

What you guys need is solar freakin' roadways.

[wilfred]

The alarm bells should be sounding when "Andrew Bolt described her writing as “outstanding”. That is as bad (or worse) as Trump calling someone a special friend to those who don't know Mr Bolt

If someone peddles controversy along with advertising then you need look no further for the reason. Money. It's not complicated. Once I realised that I stopped thinking of them as idiots. They found a niche and they profit from it.  Clever actually. They don't need to believe it themselves.

The people who uncritically lap it up, that's religion.

[cdev]

Millionaires who make huge profits from keeping things the way they are fund climate change denialism on a large scale.

[apis]

Over the years I've seen enough examples of such things just being plain old lobbying. I.e. people are paid to lie and spread misinformation. For many years someone have been feeding a relatively small group of paid writers talking points (often bloggers but sometimes it's someone who writes a book or manage an email lists). Those blogs get a following of astro turfers and fools who then spreads those neatly packed snippets of misinformation wherever there is a forum or a comment section. It's completely legal to do so and probably a lot more common than people are aware of.

A few years ago there was a woman with a blog here in Sweden who also wrote a book, and she didn't even try to hide the fact that she was a copywriter and knew no science (she kept making silly mistakes like calling molecules atoms and the like) yet she was somehow an authority on climate science and got a fairly large following. If you write a book you automatically become an expert in the eyes of the media and get invited to promote your book in tv-sofas and on radio (I assume you need to have the right contacts, which these people apparently do). And of course, they demand equal exposure for their fringe views in public service media, so whenever a climate scientist is interviewed they have to be paired with a lobbyist who are a climate sceptic, a lot of people can't tell the difference and get the impression there is no consensus among the experts. It's scary how effective they appears to have been.
(The bloggers wikipedia page.)

Problem is that money=power and those who own the coal/oil/gas industry have a lot of it. They don't want their golden goose to disappear so they spend billions on lobbying. Even if they don't manage to suppress the truth completely, they can at least delay the inevitable shift away from fossil fuels.

[wasyoungonce]

Long read.  Sorry.....

Australia  has a lot of coal for power I mean hundreds of years worth if not more.  It’s cheap easy to dig up.  Problem is the brown coal is a bituminous type which pollutes a lot.  We also have vast other types of coal and shale.

There is no working large scale carbon capture nor carbon cleaning technology that is cost effective for coal power production. Despite the industry “infomercial ads” on Australian TV. 

Our coal power plants like this are now getting quite old. They need replacement they break down often.  It is environmentally destroying to keep using such power production.   Consider not just the carbon but the heavy metals and radio nuclides it releases.

Coal producers are large political doners their influence is great.  The Liberal National coalition party  (LNP) (our version of the US Republicans) are the same party that promoted selling off these coal power generation assets to private enterprise (in the 90s), from profitable state owned assets. Electricity prices have soared since.

These old plants need replacing and the whole field needs major injections of  investments but no bank wants to lend for “coal”. Electrical generation companies will not invest they are target fixated. They need leadership.

The incumbent federal LNP is frothing mad prompting coal however some Labour state governments (the other major political party akin the Democrats) have been investing in major renewables projects and or giving incentives for household renewables.

This is a good start but doesn’t address base load investment. Ok we can raise our renewable use and I applaud this (my house has a 6.6Kw solar system) but it’s not base nor storage. 

What to do....indeed I believe we can raise or use of renewables to much higher levels, invest in new tech but we need base investment.  Dare I say nuclear?  I can hear the howls now! 

That said we cannot even agree where to store low level waste from Lucas Heights (Australian medical nuclide and research reactor). I believe Lucas Heights was the site of the worlds 2 nuclear reactor (in1950s) sadly it all stopped due to the bad publicity.  It now has a newer OPAL reactor.   Australia is a vast place we have places that are so geological stable it beggars belief.   In the same breath no one mentions how many related deaths coal power production causes.

Not saying nuclear is cheap but are saying it is reliable.  Australia is probably the safest place to have such generation.
Oh a little known fact is that coal fired plants throttled back
Idling produce more waste than when generating.   You cannot just use a coal power plant and they take time to bring on line.

What do we do?  Well the LNP should be voted out within a few months (a federal election is due) Labour Party is not tied to coal industry funds.  Labour is big on promoting more renewables but short on real large scale facts.  Our state government (as other labour states have) provided incentives for solar and batteries.  This as said is a good step.  It breaks the producers monopolies assists the grid.

All that said we will still need base load or major potential storage.  The LNP has bold faced lied about renewables causing major power outages.  The fact is it was ageing infrastructure. 

All I can say is watch this space. Times they are a changin!   I wish Australia had some investment in ITER or such like.  We are an innovate lot hopefully we shall come out with some decent alternate direction and investments.   It’ll take 5-10 years to build big new tech base load plants.

Edit: currently we get around 1000 watts p/m squared incident solar energy.  We have panels producing 340watts they are over a metre so yeah 300 watts p/m is about right.  That said technology has got better, from around 230 watt panels to 340 watt panels in ~ 15 years. Let’s hope this efficiency can be increased.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[TerraHertz]

Have a browse of her site she is a self proclaimed High Priestess of climate change denial and Bolt likes to think of himself as a preacher of the same religion.

 I love it when people unintentionally out themselves.

"High Priestess of climate change denial"
Here's an article addressing that phrase.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/01/27/sowell-the-catchwords-climate-change-deniers-reveals-political-crusade/
Thomas Sowell: the catchwords “climate change deniers” reveals nothing but a political crusade

He's entirely right, but I'd go further than he does. Imo the use of the term "climate-change-denier" to describe AGW-skeptics, is so irrational and contrary to reality, and so far into ad hominem insult territory, that it reveals the speaker to be either:
1. Apparently incapable of independent analytical reasoning, and merely parroting what they've heard on MSM channels. With no thought whatsoever, and in ignorance of Earth's highly variable climate and geological history. Plus unaware that AGW skeptics ARE universally aware of that wildly varying climate history - which is one reason WHY they are AGW skeptics.
or
2. Reading their lines from a talking point list they've been provided as part of their paid shillery. With not the slightest care for whether it makes sense or not. This definitely happens, as the term 'climate change denier' is being used far too widely and in the same remarkably stupid sense, for it to be random people coming up with it themselves. It's clearly a fallback tactic originating from the core tacticians of the Warmist scam. (Who are Globalists btw.)


Here's some questions for everyone here who still accepts the AGW theory: that an increasing atmospheric CO2 level is causing global warming, and is therefore a bad thing.

1. Are you aware of the actual levels and rate of increase? You don't dispute that atmosperic CO2 is presently around 410ppm, up from about 300ppm at 1900?

2. Do you have any idea what the average level of atmospheric CO2 was, over the history of life on Earth? And how that compares to present levels?
There are many sources on this, go hunting for yourself. But here's a quick summary.
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/Carboniferous_climate.html
Climate and the Carboniferous Period
Particularly this graph:



At this point you have exactly two options. You can either dispute the fact that CO2 levels were almost always in the range of 1000 to 5000 ppm through the entire history of life on Earth, and that this didn't cause any climate problems at all. Or you can give up on AGW as a credible theory. Because the two things are logically mutually exclusive. It's very, very simple; they can't both be true. You have to choose one. If you continue to pretend both are true, then what you have is cognitive dissonance. Maintaining an irrational, comflicted state of mind, because you can't bear to face the consequence of accepting some uncomfortable facts you've been presented with.

It's true that if till now you accepted the AGW theory, then you do have a lot of dependent questions to work through for yourself. Like:
* You've been lied to, in a coordinated way, by an extraordinary number of people and sources, for over 20 years. How and why did that happen?
   (You might start with the CRU emails leaks. http://everist.org/archives/links/__AGW_CRU_1st_emails_leak.txt http://everist.org/archives/links/__AGW_quotes.txt   http://everist.org/archives/links/__Global_Cull_links.txt )

* Do you feel bad about having been sucked in by what is effectively a political propaganda campaign? Don't be, it was really quite sophisticated, and got most people for long time. Me included, and I am by nature very doubting. Better to get angry with those who did this to you.

* So what does control climate, if not CO2? This is a fun one. There are now some very good and accurately predictive theories. Their evolution (and the lengths the Warmist camp went to in attempts to block and suppress that research) is fascinating.

* When you go hunting for the underlying motives for the AGW scam, you're going to encounter some very very nasty things. Be brave. Yes, there is evil in the world. Don't be one of those who go into denial and/or do nothing about it.

* Perhaps the most tragic aspect of the AGW scam, is the damage it's done to the function and reputation of science. It's had a seriously corrupting effect. Collateral damage being a severe diminishment of our species' ability to forecast and react to _actual_ (as opposed to fantasy) risks to Earth, and the harm the Warmist scam and all its related hype has done to the standing of Nature Conservation in general.

For example, we're in the early stages of a no-joke Ice Age. The Warmist scammers being still widely in control of public policy, means there is zero chance of any sensible preparations being made for the massive disruptions of a mini Ice Age.


Bonus questions: What are the relationships between CO2 level in the air, plant growth, and plant requirements for water? And why. What level of atmospheric CO2 did plants evolve to work with optimally? What's the air CO2 level below which plants cannot survive?  Might the present CO2 low have anything to do with the prevalence of deserts? Might the rising CO2 level have anything to do with the recent notable worldwide greening of arid areas?

Edit: typos.

[beanflying]

Out and proud and what part of that statement I made was 'unintentional' I would think calling Bolt Trump like very intentional .

I am still pragmatic enough to say one more go for coal in this state even though it does harm so I am not renewable or bust by any means and my posts here would back that up.

This is an Engineering forum not a forum for voodoo priests of pseudo science. Climate change denial is NON Science as it fails to meet the basic criteria of peer revue far to often because the papers never get that far in most cases. Just because you have links and 'your' evidence doesn't make it proof of anything until it is tested, repeated and found to be true or false.

[beanflying]

Researched NON Climate SCEINCE

Monte Hieb
Mining Engineer

Monte Hieb is the author of several popular web pages skeptical of Anthropogenic Global Warming, serving as a evangelist for the viewpoint (he does not state his qualification in climatology or a related science). He is an employee at the West Virginia Office of Miner’s Health, Safety, and Training.

Owner and creator of geocraft.com

Speaking of 'Research' you might like to look at the source material here, journals quoted and references given not to mention some actual data https://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/

[ziggyfish]

Have a browse of her site she is a self proclaimed High Priestess of climate change denial and Bolt likes to think of himself as a preacher of the same religion.

Can you define religion for me?

It's just that this thread has a lot of references to religion, yet no supernatural being is existent within the context.

[beanflying]

Calling a lot of what they spout 'Science' is a misnomer so what should it be called? Quackery, Snake Oil, Religion, Pseudo Science would all be appropriate I guess I just chose religion? Religion doesn't have to rely on a supernatural being or entity at it's core either it can be devotion or commitment to a cause or even an idea.

BTW Al Gore and his ilk are not much better preaching to the Science for 'reasons'.

Back on topic from a couple of days ago before we got to talking about a path forward. Planned Shutdowns and failure of aging infrastructure of the Coal Fired Generators was the actual reasons https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/victoria-s-frail-energy-grid-exposed-on-day-of-record-heat-and-demand-20190125-p50tqr.html

[ziggyfish]

Calling a lot of what they spout 'Science' is a misnomer so what should it be called? Quackery, Snake Oil, Religion, Pseudo Science would all be appropriate I guess I just chose religion?

But there is no "Science" that proves global warming either, only climate models that have been proved wrong. Moreover, there is no verifiable (base on historical data) formula that says if we produce X amount of CO2 then we will get X degrees in temp rise.

Your an engineer, you should be well aware that in order to solve a problem, you first need to know what the problem is. At the moment, all we have a symptom of the problem (small rise in temps), we haven't been able to diagnose what causes is.

Religion doesn't have to rely on a supernatural being or entity at it's core either it can be devotion or commitment to a cause or even an idea.

So socialism is a religion? The reason I am badgering this point is that we need to be clear as to what we are talking about. We could be arguing the same idea, just using different words.

[beanflying]

There is no consensus among scholars new and old about what Religeon is definitively. That discussion on what is or isn't a religion is no where near on topic and other than my view is broader than yours I will be leaving it here. So I will from now on refer to it as Climate Change Denial as Quackery in this thread to avoid offending your definition

Science

the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment.

Observations - Refer to the NASA link and look at the EVIDENCE not the models. We are getting hotter and CO2 is rising rapidly these are FACTS. These things are a PROBLEM in particular if this trend continues that is self evident to deny this is complete The GLOBE IS WARMING!

So now we are at the 'model' and the 'Experiments'. You cannot build a physical model of the world so you must extrapolate what you can from reduced scale experiments and use the observations to guide that process. When you have that model or hypothesis it should be scrutinized, tested, repeated and verified by peer reveiw. That is how it works if it doesn't then the model is flawed and you look again. This gets you a 'model' that changes and becomes more accurate over time and version.

The Quakery merchants do not do this at all they yell their rhetoric at the media to try and make it magically become fact using the Meincampf/Trump method of the Big Lie and Non Science is their factual information base.

Solution we need to stop abusing the rock we live on and treat it more kindly where we can before it throws a hissy fit.

As this has nothing to do with Grid Failure this is the last I will be saying on it here.

[connectTek]

Have a browse of her site she is a self proclaimed High Priestess of climate change denial and Bolt likes to think of himself as a preacher of the same religion.

 I love it when people unintentionally out themselves.

"High Priestess of climate change denial"
Here's an article addressing that phrase.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/01/27/sowell-the-catchwords-climate-change-deniers-reveals-political-crusade/
Thomas Sowell: the catchwords “climate change deniers” reveals nothing but a political crusade

He's entirely right, but I'd go further than he does. Imo the use of the term "climate-change-denier" to describe AGW-skeptics, is so irrational and contrary to reality, and so far into ad hominem insult territory, that it reveals the speaker to be either:
1. Apparently incapable of independent analytical reasoning, and merely parroting what they've heard on MSM channels. With no thought whatsoever, and in ignorance of Earth's highly variable climate and geological history. Plus unaware that AGW skeptics ARE universally aware of that wildly varying climate history - which is one reason WHY they are AGW skeptics.
or
2. Reading their lines from a talking point list they've been provided as part of their paid shillery. With not the slightest care for whether it makes sense or not. This definitely happens, as the term 'climate change denier' is being used far too widely and in the same remarkably stupid sense, for it to be random people coming up with it themselves. It's clearly a fallback tactic originating from the core tacticians of the Warmist scam. (Who are Globalists btw.)


Here's some questions for everyone here who still accepts the AGW theory: that an increasing atmospheric CO2 level is causing global warming, and is therefore a bad thing.

1. Are you aware of the actual levels and rate of increase? You don't dispute that atmosperic CO2 is presently around 410ppm, up from about 300ppm at 1900?

2. Do you have any idea what the average level of atmospheric CO2 was, over the history of life on Earth? And how that compares to present levels?
There are many sources on this, go hunting for yourself. But here's a quick summary.
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/Carboniferous_climate.html
Climate and the Carboniferous Period
Particularly this graph:



At this point you have exactly two options. You can either dispute the fact that CO2 levels were almost always in the range of 1000 to 5000 ppm through the entire history of life on Earth, and that this didn't cause any climate problems at all. Or you can give up on AGW as a credible theory. Because the two things are logically mutually exclusive. It's very, very simple; they can't both be true. You have to choose one. If you continue to pretend both are true, then what you have is cognitive dissonance. Maintaining an irrational, comflicted state of mind, because you can't bear to face the consequence of accepting some uncomfortable facts you've been presented with.

It's true that if till now you accepted the AGW theory, then you do have a lot of dependent questions to work through for yourself. Like:
* You've been lied to, in a coordinated way, by an extraordinary number of people and sources, for over 20 years. How and why did that happen?
   (You might start with the CRU emails leaks. http://everist.org/archives/links/__AGW_CRU_1st_emails_leak.txt http://everist.org/archives/links/__AGW_quotes.txt   http://everist.org/archives/links/__Global_Cull_links.txt )

* Do you feel bad about having been sucked in by what is effectively a political propaganda campaign? Don't be, it was really quite sophisticated, and got most people for long time. Me included, and I am by nature very doubting. Better to get angry with those who did this to you.

* So what does control climate, if not CO2? This is a fun one. There are now some very good and accurately predictive theories. Their evolution (and the lengths the Warmist camp went to in attempts to block and suppress that research) is fascinating.

* When you go hunting for the underlying motives for the AGW scam, you're going to encounter some very very nasty things. Be brave. Yes, there is evil in the world. Don't be one of those who go into denial and/or do nothing about it.

* Perhaps the most tragic aspect of the AGW scam, is the damage it's done to the function and reputation of science. It's had a seriously corrupting effect. Collateral damage being a severe diminishment of our species' ability to forecast and react to _actual_ (as opposed to fantasy) risks to Earth, and the harm the Warmist scam and all it's related hype has done to the standing of Nature Conservation in general.

For example, we're in the early stages of a no-joke Ice Age. The Warmist scammers being still widely in control of public policy, means there is zero chance of any sensible preparations being made for the massive disruptions of a mini Ice Age.


Bonus questions: What's are the relation between CO2 level in the air, plant growth, and plant requirements for water? And why. What level of atmospheric CO2 did plants evolve to work with optimally? What's the air CO2 level below which plants cannot survive?  Might the present CO2 low have anything to do with the prevalence of deserts? Might the rising CO2 level have anything to do with the recent notable worldwide greening of arid areas?

Spot on.

Sent from my TA-1012 using Tapatalk

[beanflying]

Back on topic from a couple of days ago before we got to talking about a path forward. Planned Shutdowns and failure of aging infrastructure of the Coal Fired Generators was the actual reasons https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/victoria-s-frail-energy-grid-exposed-on-day-of-record-heat-and-demand-20190125-p50tqr.html

And Yes you should see the politics here. This is a Federal Election year with Morrison in trouble in the polls making promises to a State where he stands to get thumped. Federal generally doesn't get involved in matters of State power generation 

[ziggyfish]

There is no consensus among scholars new and old about what Religeon is definitively. That discussion on what is or isn't a religion is no where near on topic and other than my view is broader than yours I will be leaving it here. So I will from now on refer to it as Climate Change Denial as Quackery in this thread to avoid offending your definition

If we want to talk about science we need to take a scientific approach. Definitions are the core of any scientific debate. I would ask you to define Quackery, and Climate Change Denial, however, I believe that will lead to another nonsensical response from you so I will leave at that.

Science

the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment.

Observations - Refer to the NASA link and look at the EVIDENCE not the models. We are getting hotter and CO2 is rising rapidly these are FACTS. These things are a PROBLEM in particular if this trend continues that is self evident to deny this is complete The GLOBE IS WARMING!

Yay, we get to talk about Science now.

Not sure which link you're referring too? Would love to see the evidence that explains the current pause in global warming.

So now we are at the 'model' and the 'Experiments'. You cannot build a physical model of the world so you must extrapolate what you can from reduced scale experiments and use the observations to guide that process. When you have that model or hypothesis it should be scrutinized, tested, repeated and verified by peer reveiw. That is how it works if it doesn't then the model is flawed and you look again. This gets you a 'model' that changes and becomes more accurate over time and version.

The Quakery merchants do not do this at all they yell their rhetoric at the media to try and make it magically become fact using the Meincampf/Trump method of the Big Lie and Non Science is their factual information base.

All I am after is the reproducible model which shows that with X amount of CO2, we get X rise in temperature, which is the Global Warming Advocates claim. This can easily be done in a test tube, or a lab experiment.

To prove your claim, all that needs to be done is add oxygen, and a layer of CO2 to a test tube, shine a heat source on it and measure the difference in temperatures with and without CO2. So no need to model the universe.

Solution we need to stop abusing the rock we live on and treat it more kindly where we can before it throws a hissy fit.

Correct, the question is how are we abusing the rock (which is the question, that proponents of Global Warming, haven't been able to answer)? I myself believe that the climate is changing.

Let's say the problem is CO2 is the cause of the warming. What is the solution? Well, the current solution is to tax the CO2 in the hope we scare the CO2 molecules into complying with our man-made laws.

I believe in a different approach, and that is planting more trees. Now for some actual science.

The equation for, Photosynthesis (this is apart of the earth carbon fixation defence mechanism).

CO2 (carbon dioxide) + 2H2O (water) + (photons light energy) →  [CH2O] (carbohydrate) +  O2 (oxygen)  + H2O (water)

This means that the more trees we plant, the more CO2 is converted to larger plants, which means more photosynthesis (and less CO2).

The oxygen molecules that are produced in the reaction also lowers the air pressure  (thus attracting more rain), which is why large forests often produce their own rainfall.

Or if you prefer a picture:



So logically the solution is to plant trees if the problem is CO2, however at present, we simply don't know the cause of global warming, we have only speculated that it is CO2. We simply can't get this wrong though, we may spend all our resources (time and physical resources), trying to reduce CO2 emissions, however, the problem could be something completely different.

As this has nothing to do with Grid Failure this is the last I will be saying on it here.

Define Grid Failure? I define Grid Failure as a shortage of power supply on the grid, which is exactly what happened in Victoria.

[apis]

If someone is interested in what actual scientists are saying about climate change it can be found here:
https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg1/

Who are the IPCC one might justifiably wonder:
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

And for those who don't feel like digging into the science themselves, for whatever reason, here are some authoritative statements by actual scientific organisations:
Scientific opinion on climate change: Statements by scientific organizations of national or international standing

Of course, none of that is going to convince the conspiracy theorists since it is all part of the big conspiracy.

[Marco]

Old growth forests only sink a tiny amount, to sink CO2 with trees you have to keep mulching them and grow the forest on an ever larger mound of carbohydrates ... bit of a fire hazard.

[cdev]

Considering the way many people use energy, saving lots of it wouldn't be hard!

[GeorgeOfTheJungle]

[...] We have panels producing 340watts they are over a metre so yeah 300 watts p/m is about right. [...]

Do you have a url where I can see those 300 W/m² PVs? Please? Thanks!

[station240]

[...] We have panels producing 340watts they are over a metre so yeah 300 watts p/m is about right. [...]

Do you have a url where I can see those 300 W/m² PVs? Please? Thanks!

'over a meter' yeah that's the problem.

Lets take LG's 360W 20.8% efficient panel (best on their site).
https://www.lg.com/us/business/solar-panel/all-products/lg-LG360Q1C-A5
1700 x 1016 x 40 mm
1.7m x ~1m = 1.7m²
360W/1.7m = 211W per m²

[wasyoungonce]

[...] We have panels producing 340watts they are over a metre so yeah 300 watts p/m is about right. [...]

Do you have a url where I can see those 300 W/m² PVs? Please? Thanks!

https://www.lgenergy.com.au/downloads/category/5/product-datasheets

THe LG Neon panels.   I thought they were 1.2m x 1m but they are 1.7m x 1m.....so they would be under 300Wm/2 but close'ish.  Our panels are 305W rated, 1.6m x .99m.

https://www.solargain.com.au/sites/default/files/EN%20Eagle%20PERC%2060M%20295-315W_0.pdf

We were to have the Q cell 325W panels but they ran out some installed 305W x 22.
https://www.solargain.com.au/solar-panels

Considering panels output was on avg 220W 10 years ago they have improved somewhat.   Panels to suit for various installations, aka low angle, low light, mono, poly etc.  Depends upon the panel design and what optimal wavelength they work at.  A lot of good info here.
https://mcelectrical.com.au/tag/solar-panels/

[wasyoungonce]

........A few years ago there was a woman with a blog here in Sweden who also wrote a book, and she didn't even try to hide the fact that she was a copywriter and knew no science (she kept making silly mistakes like calling molecules atoms and the like) yet she was somehow an authority on climate science and got a fairly large following. If you write a book you automatically become an expert in the eyes of the media and get invited to promote your book in tv-sofas and on radio (I assume you need to have the right contacts, which these people apparently do). And of course, they demand equal exposure for their fringe views in public service media, so whenever a climate scientist is interviewed they have to be paired with a lobbyist who are a climate sceptic, a lot of people can't tell the difference and get the impression there is no consensus among the experts. It's scary how effective they appears to have been...................

http://www.galileomovement.com.au/who_we_are.php

Absolutely there is a site (link above) run in Australia called "the Galileo movement"......you'd think ah a science site!....well errr no!  A climate change denialist site that is full of rubbish written by morons who have big business and airwaves prowess.  They even write articles then refer to their own articles as fact....my god!  They started this way back to stop carbon pricing and reduction of coal under the Labour Party (Australian version of the Democrats).

Not withstanding their links to the Australian LNP (our version of very right Republicans or Tories in UK) and obviously coal industry are massive.

Now here's a proper science site about Galileo which will calm everyone's anger....How dare they sully his name, absolute lying tossers.
http://galileo.rice.edu/

[amyk]

No doubt some of us visiting this thread wanted to see late-19th-century electricity disasters...