Solar ... In the news

Leeds_Solar

Sorry to dredge this up, but I felt like responding to this post.

zeupater wrote: »

Hi

If you actually took time to look at the recent debate and what it was about you would discover that it's about 'fact' vs 'consensus', not global warming. [

I was responding to a specific statement you made which is demonstrably false.

In the 1970's, consensus, based on the research-based evidence available at the time, was that the earth was cooling and we were on the cusp of entering into another 'ice age'.

In the 70's there may not yet have been full consensus about the likelihood of warming resulting from increased greenhouse gas levels, however it's plain wrong to state as you do that there was ever a scientific consensus around the prospect of imminent global cooling when the evidence of the scientific literature at the time clearly demonstrates 6:1 published papers supporting the Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) hypothesis vs cooling.

zeupater wrote: »

There is one undisputable 'fact' here. In the 1970s I personally was taught (in England) that (i) there was a decades-long cooling trend which was contrary to the long term inter-glacial trend & (ii) that, based on glacial-cycle research, the northern hemisphere was both close to the max temperature before a new cooling period and close to the average interval between such events ... note, this is 'fact', however the science behind what was being taught was based on 'consensus'.

The curriculum being taught, along with the approved textbooks, were selected by whichever one of the major examining boards the particular education authority selected to use (Oxford, Cambridge & JMB in this area), therefore, they were either teaching based on what was then current consensus, outdated consensus, or no consensus ...

Note also that the curriculum at the time was based on the science at the time and how the individual examination boards selected the scientific consensus. Here stands a quandary for consideration ....

Presenting your memory of what was being taught to you in high school in the 70s as evidence of what the scientific consensus was at the time, in contradiction of published research assessing all peer reviewed published scientific papers at the time demonstrates a particularly low burden of proof you're working on to refute well researched and referenced data.

(i) there was a decades-long cooling trend which was contrary to the long term inter-glacial trend & (ii) that, based on glacial-cycle research, the northern hemisphere was both close to the max temperature before a new cooling period and close to the average interval between such events ...

tbh though, none of that is even vaguely controversial or inconsistent with current thinking.

i) [simplified version] There was a slight temporary cooling trend occurring particularly in the northern hemisphere, caused largely by a process known as global dimming, related to the vast amounts of particulate pollutants that were being spewed out into the atmosphere across the northern hemisphere from the rapid growth in industrial, power generation and vehicle emissions.

This temporarily masked the underlying warming trend that would otherwise have been caused by rising greenhouse gas levels. The warming trend then came to the fore again in the 80s when the impact of clean air legislation across the capitalist industrialised world led to significant reductions in this particulate pollution along with continued rises on greenhouse gas concentrations.

Now, where there were problems was with a few scientists (and mostly journalists) who attempted to extrapolate from this slight cooling trend as if air pollution levels would continue to worsen in perpetuity, who failed to take into account either the short lived nature of these pollutants in the air, or the underlying warming trend associated with rising greenhouse gas levels.

There was also a slight reduction in solar output on one of the cycles in this period that would likely have exacerbated the issue.

So your teachers weren't really wrong unless they were falsely extrapolating from the short term trend and expecting it to continue, which is the sort of error I could well see a fairly poorly trained teacher making, but doesn't in itself have any real reflection on the actual understanding of the subject amongst the majority of scientists active in the field at the time.

Note the difference now being that CO2 is a very long lived greenhouse gas, and there are multiple feedback mechanisms already confirming their capacity to reinforce and enhance the initial warming trend caused by rising CO2 levels...

ii) Again there's nothing controversial about this position, unless you forget that this statement is talking in geological time, so we're probably due another ice age at some point in the next few thousand years based on those cycles, but there's no evidence that it's any more imminent than that.

It's also worth noting that the actual direct climate forcing attributed to these solar cycles is actually significantly lower than the forcing level we've already caused through increased greenhouse gas levels.

zeupater wrote: »

The IPCC was set-up in 1988 specifically to review existing research and formulate a centralised, fully transparent, climatic consensus because there wasn't a single one available at the time - the remit has since been modified, but that's what it was in 1988.

Actually, the IPCC was established as a political tool to delay the action that the scientific consensus at the time was already clear needed to be taken, in order to give the USA in particular chance to come to terms with the implications politically.

In reality, all this has actually achieved is to give time for the big fossil fuel corporations to regroup and launch a massive sustained decades long PR campaign to ensure that the US in particular defers any actions that might hinder their business models for as long as possible. The IPCC essentially is the US government's get out clause to continually kick the can down the road.

Not that the IPCC isn't a good idea and I'd fully support continued research under its banner, just not for it to be used as a delaying tactic by US politicians waiting for some form of mythical level of absolute scientific proof.


It is also noteworthy that the journal referenced was not published until 2008 ... if either were available in the 1970's then they could be considered to be relevant research in the 1970's, however, as it is they both merely support the position that consensus can change with time.

It needs to be fully understood that there are questions which can be answered by 'fact' and others which can only be addressed through logical conjecture, usually supported by consensus .... however, consensus is open to change.

indeed, but yet it hasn't changed in 25 years of probably the most intensive continuous collective global scientific study into a subject that has ever taken place.

At the start of the 20th century, when this possibility was first raised in the scientific literature, the consensus at the time was that this wasn't likely to be an issue effectively because many scientists underestimated our capacity to extract and burn fossil fuels at a rate sufficient to impact seriously on global greenhouse gas concentrations.

Through the 20th century the level of evidence both of the fact that greenhouse gas concentrations were rising rapidly, and of the historic volatility of the global climate in reaction to relatively small changes in the balance of the various climate forcings, resulted in a hardening of the consensus scientific position supporting the AGW hypothesis... ie the consensus position changed in reaction to the evidence that was available at that time.

After 25 years of solid study under the IPCC, and another half century or more before that by independent scientists or scientific bodies, all this has done it to amass ever greater volumes of evidence to support the core AGW hypothesis, and virtually nothing to refute it (despite the best efforts of all concerned in the anti-AGW camp).

The consensus position in science doesn't continually change, it changes in light of evidence presented to refute previous hypothesis / consensus positions, but once no such evidence can be presented, it then becomes established scientific fact in the same way that gravity, or the earth not being flat are no longer disputed and haven't been for some time.

As previously raised .... 'There are vested interest groups which would have everyone believe that consensus is fact .... but 'in fact', it's not.'

HTH
Z

There are also vested interest groups with a combined turnover of approximately 15% of the entire global GDP who stand to lose the majority of their market capitalisation if we move away from fossil fuels, and the reserves they hold become worthless as a result.

These vested interest groups have demonstrably mounted a very well funded campaign of disinformation sustained for more than 3 decades in an attempt to confuse the public into believing there is sufficient scientific doubt to justify delaying action to reduce our carbon emissions.

Which side do you consider to be more likely to be basically telling the truth? The fossil fuel lobby protecting their multi trillion dollar assets, or the 97% or so of published scientists working in the climate change field who might possibly feel the desire to protect their research budgets or something?

Please consider that most of these scientists are in tenured positions in their universities, so would continue to get paid regardless of their support for the IPCC position - they'd just get paid for teaching the revised version of climate science if one of them made a breakthrough and managed to refute the core AGW hypothesis. Or even if they were just contrarian, as evidenced by the few practicing contrarian scientists such as Richard Lindzen, who continue to get paid by their universities despite their position on AGW.

So multi-trillion dollar industry protecting their interests vs scientists who'd mostly get paid regardless of their position on AGW, I'll leave you to consider which is really the more likely vested interest group to be twisting the public presentation of the science to suit their own agenda.

Leeds_Solar

Cardew wrote: »

Thanks for a reasoned argument, albeit not one with which I would agree.

The less well-off pensioner in an all electric council flat have little option to fit wood burners, etc etc and whilst you might consider the present system:



I suggest many have simply no option but to 'pollute'.

So overall I think the funding the 'green levy' from taxation and not fuel bills is a good idea.

tbf, there is some merit to the point you're making, but it is also worth pointing out that successive government's have also taken vast sums of money from energy bills and targeted this funding directly at the fuel poor to provide funding for them to insulate their homes, upgrade their heating systems, lights etc etc to reduce their fuel consumption and therefore their bills.

As a result, most council houses and social housing providers will have undertaken at least 1 round of no cost energy efficiency measures for the vast majority of their properties by now, all subsidised from energy bills we all pay.

So it's not as if this is a one way street here.

Also, one of the current measures that would be eligible for funding under ECO in this situation would be... solar PV, which combined with energy diversion units could work quite well with storage heatings and immersion heaters to reduce electrical bills. Not that it's actually being done much / at all yet, as the ECO funding system is a nightmare.

The other point to make would be to compare the effectiveness of previous schemes that were tax payer funded grant schemes, with the current feed in tariff scheme. Installation rates rocketed almost 1000 fold following the introduction of the feed in tariff scheme, and costs have more than halved, and FIT levels have reduced by 2/3 in the 3 years since it was launched.

In the previous 3 years of the LCBP funding, the installation rate stagnated as the funding was rationed to the extent that it basically ran out each year within a couple of days of the new funding year starting, and prices hadn't changed at all during it's years of operation. So effectively this funding was entirely wasted as it had no positive impact on the development of the industry at all (there's a report kicking around the net somewhere that basically says this).

One final point to make, is that it's important to recognise the long term goal of this scheme, which is to develop the scale of the solar PV market to the point where economies of scale through the supply chain result in solar PV becoming economic without further subsidy (when combined with rising electricity prices generally). At this point, solar PV will become a force to actually restrain the impact of the inevitable price rises from fossil fuel generated electricity. This point probably isn't actually that far off tbh.

So effectively the concept is that we should invest now in order to restrain energy prices in the medium and long term. Alternatively we can fail to invest now, and end up paying through the nose in the medium to long term future as we become almost entirely reliant on expensive imported gas to generate both our heat and power.

Martyn1981

Nothing special article, except for the paragraph I've copied, regarding the 20by20 target. I wonder if this is still possible, momentum will need to grow?

Greg Barker to launch solar energy roadmap at Solar Energy UK

http://www.solarpowerportal.co.uk/news/greg_barker_to_launch_solar_energy_roadmap_at_solar_energy_uk

Solar Power Portal understands that the roadmap is expected to restate the often repeated 20GW by 2020 solar ambition. The solar strategy will aim to set out in detail how the government and the private sector can work together to capitalise on the sector’s growth.

Mart.

Cardew

Leeds_Solar wrote: »

tbf, there is some merit to the point you're making, but it is also worth pointing out that successive government's have also taken vast sums of money from energy bills and targeted this funding directly at the fuel poor to provide funding for them to insulate their homes, upgrade their heating systems, lights etc etc to reduce their fuel consumption and therefore their bills.

Indeed the point about the social levies on bills was raised in my post #348

Energy giants SSE and E.On have called for ministers to go further and remove environmental and social levies from energy bills altogether, paying for them through general taxation instead.

Going further the pay-as-you-go meter tariffs receive a cross- subsidy from other tariffs.

The remainder of your post seems to me to re-state the position of the solar industry, and some posters here, on the reasons for the subsidies, present successes, and future predictions.

Those issues have been discussed at length of the past 3 years and we must agree to differ on many aspects.

However I fail to see why funding the 'Green Levy' from general taxation would not have achieved the same results.

To my mind one of the greatest injustices of the FIT scheme is that poor people in all electric households pay a large levy to house owners and venture capitalists funding Rent-A-Roof companies.

George Bonbiot summed up the injustice of the FIT system here:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/mar/01/solar-panel-feed-in-tariff

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2012/jan/13/green-deal

The opening paragraph contains this statement:

The government is about to shift £8.6bn from the poor to the middle classes.

Leeds_Solar

Cardew wrote: »

The remainder of your post seems to me to re-state the position of the solar industry, and some posters here, on the reasons for the subsidies, present successes, and future predictions.

Those issues have been discussed at length of the past 3 years and we must agree to differ on many aspects.

I'm sure it has, the proof is in the pudding though, and the pudding is starting to taste pretty good;)

Cardew wrote: »

However I fail to see why funding the 'Green Levy' from general taxation would not have achieved the same results.

It's possible that a scheme paid for from general taxation could have been a success, however we have had successive governments who've done everything possible to transfer government spending off the books via PFI financing, and these sort of arrangements, so frankly it was probably this or nothing.

In an ideal world we'd have invested most of our incomes from north sea oil and gas into a sovereign wealth fund that could then have been used to pay for this sort of thing... but the idiots we have in power decided to squander it instead, so now we're left with a range of not exactly ideal options to choose from instead.

We didn't make system, we often don't agree with much of it, but I would confidently say that it's better than nothing, and significantly better than the previous scheme.

Cardew wrote: »

To my mind one of the greatest injustices of the FIT scheme is that poor people in all electric households pay a large levy to house owners and venture capitalists funding Rent-A-Roof companies.

To a degree, however they would also be disproportionately affected if we did nothing / opted for Osbourne and co's ludicrous dash for gas plan, which ignores the fact that wholesale gas prices have pretty much doubled in the last 3 years. By far the biggest driver in electricity price increases over the last few years has been the rapid rises in the wholesale gas price since north sea output began declining a decade ago.

At least with solar PV we're effectively setting a ceiling point beyond which electricity prices should begin to stabilise, or at least slow the rate of increase.

We're really not that far off from that point in the right circumstances - there are already suggestions that new build's may end up with solar installed without FIT payments as they're not really needed (more hassle to administer than it's really worth).

George Bonbiot summed up the injustice of the FIT system here:


The opening paragraph contains this statement:

let's just say that his interpretation of the german situation was a little off, with solar PV accounting for 4.7% of total electricity generation in 2012 vs 0.4% in his article written just 3 years ago.

If we compare the german economic performance over that period vs the UK, I think it's safe to say that Germany hasn't exactly been crippled by this policy.

spgsc531

Cardew wrote: »

Indeed the point about the social levies on bills was raised in my post #348



Going further the pay-as-you-go meter tariffs receive a cross- subsidy from other tariffs.

The remainder of your post seems to me to re-state the position of the solar industry, and some posters here, on the reasons for the subsidies, present successes, and future predictions.

Those issues have been discussed at length of the past 3 years and we must agree to differ on many aspects.

However I fail to see why funding the 'Green Levy' from general taxation would not have achieved the same results.

To my mind one of the greatest injustices of the FIT scheme is that poor people in all electric households pay a large levy to house owners and venture capitalists funding Rent-A-Roof companies.

George Bonbiot summed up the injustice of the FIT system here:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/mar/01/solar-panel-feed-in-tariff

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2012/jan/13/green-deal

The opening paragraph contains this statement:

This AGAIN????


Numbers?


Forgot them, AGAIN????

Martyn1981

Leeds_Solar wrote: »

The other point to make would be to compare the effectiveness of previous schemes that were tax payer funded grant schemes, with the current feed in tariff scheme. Installation rates rocketed almost 1000 fold following the introduction of the feed in tariff scheme, and costs have more than halved, and FIT levels have reduced by 2/3 in the 3 years since it was launched.

Hiya LS, and apologies for being overly pedantic, but if you take changes to the length of term into account also, then the FiT rate has actually fallen 74.5% (the largest bulk of which had happened by Aug 2012). Or, if we include the export rate too (not really a subsidy, but part of the mix) then the drop is 71.5%.

Mart.

Martyn1981

Cardew wrote: »

George Bonbiot [sic] summed up the injustice of the FIT system here:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/mar/01/solar-panel-feed-in-tariff


The opening paragraph contains this statement:

The government is about to shift £8.6bn from the poor to the middle classes.

Perhaps this was meant to see if I'll bite, or perhaps it was meant to deceive new readers who might not know your history regarding this matter. Either way I'll point out for the benefit of others:

George Monbiot's statement is untrue. I'm even tempted to call it a lie. The PV FiT budget at the time was quoted as being £8.6bn, and this would OF COURSE be paid by all leccy customers, not just domestic, and not just poor domestic.

3 months later GM admitted that this wasn't true, however, despite being aware of this Cardew has continued to promote this 'false fact' at every opportunity. His actions ultimately resulted in this thread being created to help explain the error to him:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4439699

Continuing to promote that particular article, and specifically quoting that paragraph appears to me to be an act of trolling.

I expect Cardew to say 'that he was only pointing out what the opening paragraph says' (leaving himself an escape route), but the history regarding this article is well documented on this forum, so posting that statement performs no other purpose than that of deliberate trolling - perhaps in the hope of causing more pointless arguments.

Mart.

Leeds_Solar

there is one other point worth making on that point, in that the Feed-In Tariff actually doesn't come directly from people's bills in the form of a direct levy, it comes out of general expenditure budgets for the energy companies, and it then levelised between them to ensure the costs are evenly distributed.

How the companies decide to cover these costs is a commercial decision for them at the moment, this is different from other schemes which do directly place an additional charge per unit on bills.

When the scheme was set up, there were social tariffs that households in fuel poverty were eligible for with reduced unit costs that would really have meant that these households weren't actually contributing to the FIT scheme costs in any significant way.

Unfortunately, this government decided to scrap these social tariffs, and they've been phased out since 2011, removing the protection they would have afforded to these households both from profiteering energy companies, and the costs of the Feed-In Tariff.

I trust cardew that you have also been ardently ripping into the government for their decision to scrap these protected tariffs if you really are concerned about those living in fuel poverty.

The_Green_Hornet

Leeds_Solar wrote: »

Unfortunately, this government decided to scrap these social tariffs, and they've been phased out since 2011, removing the protection they would have afforded to these households both from profiteering energy companies, and the costs of the Feed-In Tariff.

Social tariffs are being replaced by the Warm Home Discount Scheme.

Warm Home Discount Scheme