I read it. So what?

"it was Republican President Gerald Ford who began a concerted federal effort to seek "unconventional" natural gas in response to shortages."

Not only that, Gerald Ford was the Funky President.

Really? That was the most flattering explanation as to why you would mod that comment as "brilliant."

Your reading comprehension is still abysmal as post #15 was an explanation of why I don't have sockpuppets.

Well, then, tell me: why did you call that comment "brilliant"?

If it upsets you that much I will not look at another poster again. By the way, you look pretty today.

Nothing here upsets me: it's all various degrees of entertaining since Thalia left.

If we're discussing gas replacing coal, shouldn't we be discussing electrical production rather than all energy?

...wind went up almost as much as gas...

In what other area of energy production is gas replacing coal?

Incorporating wind power into a generating system can make the system less efficient and cause increased emissions.

Could you site some examples of that happening?  The only incidences I'm aware of the system becoming "less efficient" is times when turbines were producing too much energy and had to be taken off the grid.  That doesn't increase emissions.

*Cite, of course.

Ho ho!

For example:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2012/05/30/wind-power-may-not-reduce-carbon-emissions-argonn e/

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/9000760/Wind-power-is-expensive-and-ineffective-at-cuttin g-CO2-say-Civitas.html

http://docs.wind-watch.org/BENTEK-How-Less-Became-More.pdf

Also wind turbines murder birds.

That's bad because birds taste good.

Also wind turbines are a visual blight.

http://i1133.photobucket.com/albums/m589/zyxwvutsr1/somewindfarmsomewhere.jpg

http://farm1.staticflickr.com/46/174166765_a09642e5fb_b.jpg

I like how circular fields look.

"If"  "in danger of"  "could"

In other words: it's a possibility as we progress toward properly managing the grid.

...it's a possibility...

Elastic properties have more of an effect on the speed of sound than the density of the medium.

In what other area of energy production is gas replacing coal?

Could you site some examples of that happening?

The only incidences I'm aware of the system becoming "less efficient" is times when turbines were producing too much energy and had to be taken off the grid.  That doesn't increase emissions

I have no idea, but if there were any

Exactly.

The loss of efficiency is when, unpredictably, the wind stops blowing.

You don't understand what efficiency means in terms of the electrical grid.

Exactly

You don't understand what efficiency means in terms of the electrical grid

Then your comment wasn't relevant.

Whatever.

Incorporating wind power into a generating system can make the system less efficient and cause increased emissions.

That's ridiculous.  

The articles you cited do not support your assertion.

A study in the Netherlands found that turning back-up gas power stations on and off to cover spells when there is little wind actually produces more carbon than a steady supply of energy from an efficient modern gas station.

It's blindingly obvious a technique exists whereby replacing or augmenting power production with windmills will reduce green house gases.  What's ridiculous is you cite this clearly biased anti-environmental nonsense.

Did you even read the articles?

I read the first one.

I just quoted from the second. The third has a lot of detailed data.

wind-watch.org, really.  Do you expect me to take that seriously?

A simple thought experienement:

• wind energy starts getting created.
  
• gas generators are reduced from full-boil to simmer.
  
• wind energy stops getting created.
  
• gas generators are increased from simmer to full-boil.
  

Not gas generators, coal.

Here's the article in question, or a more recent version by the same author.  It's non-peer reviewed, and is blatantly political propaganda.  To quote:

This article is a shortened version of a report in Dutch: 'Brandstofbesparing bij de Nederlandse elektriciteitsvoorziening' sent to the Netherlands Government and Parliament in August 2012. Parts usually well known to insiders have been left out.

What he does is to take the amount of fuel used for electric generation, subtract the actual generation divided by the reported efficiency factor, and to assume for no good reason that the difference is due to inefficiencies caused by wind power.  (All numbers as reported by the government of the Netherlands.)  These numbers should be equal regardless of what wind power actually does to efficiency.  "Because the government of the the Netherlands says 1+1=3," isn't a good reason for anything.

Peer review exists to avoid playing whack-a-mole with utter nonsense like this paper.

The Bentek paper is from a reputable source.  Their business is selling natural gas information, so the bias in their spin will be heavily pro-natural gas, but nevertheless they're a reputable source.

They're talking about emissions of specific coal plants in the Texas electric grid.  (The US has three electric grids, the Western one, the Eastern one, and the Texas one.  I think that says something fundamental bout Texas.)  The Texas has the largest fraction of both coal and wind generation.  They look at actual operations during windy shoulder month days, when demand is lowest, and they actually have to curtail baseload power.

The headline said that "pollution went up", but they find that SO2 emissions of the plants went up slightly, not much, NOx emissions went down slightly, not much, and CO2 emissions dropped quite a lot.  Unsurprisingly, when they didn't run the plants at their designed rating, total efficiency was down slightly, and instantaneous efficiency was down a lot during the times when the plant was putting out little power, and mostly sitting round hot and waiting.

They're talking about emissions of specific coal plants in the Texas electric grid

In 2009, the lower number of events resulted in...111,506 tons of CO2 more than would have been produced had the cycling not occurred.

Did it ever occur to you that if coal production is roughly steady and we aren't eating the coal or living under mountains of coal, well, something else must be happening?

You clearly don't understand how to correctly account for unintended side effects of government action.  If it's a positive outcome, the outcome wasn't intended, so the credit belongs to the free market.  If it's a negative outcome, clearly the government deserves the blame.

We've had widespread switching from coal to natural gas for quite some time now, due to pollution controls designed to reduce SO2 and NOx.  Since the positive outcome of CO2 reduction was not an intended effect of the government regulation, clearly the free market deserves all the credit for the generation switching.

We've had widespread switching from coal to natural gas for quite some time now, due to pollution controls designed to reduce SO2 and NOx

The idea that the Invisible Hand is now correcting for externialities is just smash you head on the desk stupid. It really has that clue-proof Palin-esque quality.

The idea that the Invisible Hand is now correcting for externialities is just smash you head on the desk stupid

To frame this as an example of the free market's success in addressing environmental concerns...

http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp

I've seen a family of four hippies live in a 300 sq ft cabin.  That's about the size of the bathroom in either of these two homes you've linked to.  Which do you think is creating more greenhouse gases?

I've seen a family of four hippies live in a 300 sq ft cabin

The embeded energy consumed to allow taking a shit in those homes is far greater than the entire amount of energy used to build a hippy shack and run it for an entire year.

Yeah it's the capitilists who are causing the problem.  Spending a bunch of money to greenwash their homes doesn't make the problem go away.

2000 sq.ft. is a mansion?

What a 2000 sq ft manison might look like: Here.

I imagined the + sign would have a larger effect..... but yeah, when you compare it to houses from 100 years ago or any remote and impoverished place it does look like a mansion.