The sinkholes are not just in
Michael McCormick’s garage.
According to groundscan radar by a VSU professor and students,
the sinkholes are also
spreading
under his
front steps and
his house.
The steps are sinking and there’s a crack on the wall inside the house.
Continue readingThe VDT apparently declined to print this LTE submission. I added the links and images. -jsq
Continue readingWhen I opened a recent “Sunday Business” section of the Valdosta Daily Times I was expecting to see a thorough discussion of the pros and cons of smart meters. After all, the headline read: “Smart Meters — Fact or Fiction?” What I found, however, was quite different. In case you missed it, here a summary of the highlights:
According to Georgia Power “concerns about smart meters are
nothing more than myths.” These concerns range from health risks and increased bills to an invasion of your privacy and house fires started by electrical shorts. Myths or not, the best way to counter customers’ concerns would be to provide studies that, for example, show that smart meters are less dangerous than cellular phones or that electricity bills have not increased as a result of smart meters. However, customers only get assurances which, frankly, do nothing to dispel existing concerns.
Georgia Power also claims that it is using smart meters to be more environmentally
Apparently the natural gas industry pays professors to greenwash their polluting product, like back in the hey-day of radio record companies used to pay disk jockies to play their records. Remember: 
natural gas from fracking is the main thing Southern Company and Georgia Power are switching to from coal (not that they’re even abandoning coal, just rebranding it as “21st century coal”). That and their nuke boondoggle at Plant Vogtle. All approved by the Georgia Public Service Commission, all of whose members apparently accept massive direct or indirect contributions from the utilities they regulate. Two GA PSC Commissioners slots are up for election right now.
The professor most recently found to be in the pay of a fracking company when he reported on fracking is unrepentant. Terrence Henry wrote for State Impact Texas yesterday, Texas Professor On the Defensive Over Fracking Money
So the questions remaining are: Why didn’t Groat disclose this in the study? And did he fail to tell anyone at the University about it?
The professor would not agree to an interview, but in an email to StateImpact Texas he says the Public Accountability Initiative report is “a mixture of truths, half truths, and unfounded conclusions based [on] incorrect interpretations of information. I don’t want to discuss it.”
The University of Texas requires that financial conflicts of interest be disclosed by employees when it has “potential for directly and significantly affecting the design, conduct, or reporting of … research or is in an entity whose financial interest appears to be affected by that research.”
Dean Sharon Mosher of the Jackson School of Geosciences says that Groat submitted the financial conflict of interest form to her office in previous years, but that he had not done so this year. “I was not aware that he was still a member of the board,” Mosher tells StateImpact Texas. “Had I known he was still a member of the board and being paid, I would have insisted that he disclosed it.”
What report? Follow the links in here. Terrence Henry wrote for State Impact Texas 23 July, Fracking Company Paid Texas Professor Behind Water Contamination Study,
Earlier this year, a study led by Dr. Charles “Chip” Groat for the Energy Institute at the University of Texas at Austin made headlines for saying there was no link between fracking and groundwater contamination. (When we reported on the study in February, we noted that the study also found some serious issues around the safety and regulation of fracking that weren’t getting much press coverage.)
But according to a new report out today by the Public Accountablitiy Initiative (PAI), a nonprofit watchdog group, the conclusions in Groat’s report aren’t as clear cut as initially reported. And Groat himself did not disclose significant financial ties to the fracking industry.
Groat, a former Director of the U.S. Geological Survey and professor at the Jackson School of Geosciences at the University of Texas at Austin, also sits on the board of Plains Exploration and Production Company, a Houston-based company that conducts drilling and fracking in Texas and other parts of the country. According to the new report (and a review of the company’s financial reports by Bloomberg) Groat received more than $400,000 from the drilling company last year alone, more than double his salary at the University. And one of the shales examined in Groat’s fracking study is currently being drilled by the company, the report says.
Since 2007, Groat has received over $1.5 million in cash and stock awards from the company, and he currently holds over $1.6 million in company stock, according to the PAI report. (Update: we clarified with PAI, and that $1.6 million in stock comes from the stock awards over the years. PAI says Groat’s total compensation from the company is close to $2 million.)
And it gets worse from there: rough drafts published, unsubstantiated peer review claims, etc.
This isn’t an isolated case:
This isn’t the first time that academic studies of drilling have been called into question because of industry ties. In an earlier report on a State University of New York at Buffalo study on fracking’s environmental risks, Public Accountability Initiative found that it “suffered a number of critical shortcomings” and the “report’s authors had strong industry ties.”
And in today’s investigation from Bloomberg, they found other instances of industry influence and financial ties at Pennsylvania State University and University of Wyoming.
Do we want to trade air pollution by coal for groundwater pollution by fracking? When we have a better future already at hand through conservation and efficiency along with solar and wind power?
-jsq
MIT Prof. Donald Sadoway thinks he’s found a way to build electric-grid-scale batteries out of dirt.
Electric utilities complain solar and wind power are not baseload, capacity, energy sources because they are intermittent. You know, if they weren’t busy running up cost overruns that could easily exceed the entire annual budget of the state of Georgia, maybe the utilities could solve this problem. Meanwhile, Prof. Sadoway, instead of looking for the snazziest coolest most efficient new method of energy storage, defined the problem in terms of the market:
the demanding performance requirements of the grid, namely uncommonly high power, long service lifetime, and super low cost. We need to think about the problem differently. We need to think big. We need to think cheap.
Then he set parameters on the solution:
If you want to make something dirt cheap, make it out of dirt. Preferably dirt that’s locally sourced.
He cast about for possible precedents and found aluminum smelting gave him some ideas for using low density liquid metal at the top, high density liquid metal at the bottom, and molten salt in between. Choosing the right metals is the trick, which he thinks he’s found: magnesium at the top, and antimony at the bottom.
Is Sadoway right? Will his battery work at grid scale? I don’t know. But he’s asking the right questions, and it’s worth a try.
As Kyle Sager wrote for Heliocurrent 4 May 2012, Renewable Storage: Leave it to MIT,
Has Dr. Sadoway achieved the holy grail of renewable energy? Judge for yourself. Our attention is compelled by the degree of his certainty and the seeming simplicity of the approach. Watch MIT’s Donald Sadoway explain his vision here (link).
Seems to me there are at least two major approaches:
Continue readingBack in April Southern Company CEO Thomas A. Fanning gave yet another version of his stump speech that we saw at the shareholders’ meeting in May and that he’s video blogging on YouTube now. In April he emphasized a huge assumption with no evidence; an assumption that may just not be true.
National Energy Policy – Part 5 of 7 (30 April 2012)
This much we know: demand for electricity will increase. The Energy Information Administration projects an 18% increase in electricity demand nationally and in the southeast, we’re as expecting as much as a 25% increase over the next 20 years. So we know the need is real, immediate, and critical.
Really? Here’s recent electricity use and nearterm forcast by the U.S. Energy Information Administration:
Sure looks to me like there was a big dip in 2009, and projected use in 2013 is no higher than in 2007. What was that about “immediate”?
Now you may say, of course, that’s a recession. But what about this?
Continue reading 
Since our coverage of the Southern Company (SO) shareholders meeting in May, SO CEO Thomas A. Fanning has started his own YouTube video series, “Why Energy Matters to You”, in which he tries to head off a real energy policy by advocating SO’s nuclear and coal strategy instead.
SO PR 28 June 2012, Southern Company Chairman Launches CEO Social Media Video Series,
Southern Company SO today unveiled the first in a series of CEO Web videos examining issues critical to the electric utility industry. The video series, “Why Energy Matters to You,” is available on YouTube and features Southern Company Chairman, President and CEO Thomas A. Fanning. Fanning announced the Web series during an appearance at the 2012 Aspen Ideas Festival in Aspen, Colo.
Here are his two episodes so far. His theme:
“I believe that every American deserves a supply of clean, safe, reliable, and affordable energy.”
Who could argue with that? It’s just SO’s ideas of how to do it that provoke some argument.
Here’s Part 1 of 2:
Why Energy Matters to You —Thomas A. Fanning Part 1 of 2
His question:
“How can better energy create more economic freedom for the American people?”
His answer is in Part 2 of 2:
Continue readingHere’s a new battery technology that might be good for evening out solar power production: 
the Aqueous Hybrid Ion (AHI) battery. Some such storage method will eventually become good enough to do away with most of the arguments about solar power fluctuating with time of day and weather. Meanwhile, getting on with a smart grid would go ahead and do that.
When we got our new solar panels we did not buy batteries with them, because enough batteries for 12 kilowatts 
of solar would have been quite expensive. Our old panels do have batteries backing up their 3 kilowatts, so when the grid is out we still have that much power, which can keep us up (refrigerator, lights, computers, Internet) for 10 hours even at night, and longer if the sun is shining. We’re waiting for better electricity storage methods. Maybe AHI is it, or maybe something else will be.
Somebody thinks AHI is promising. PR dated 19 June 2012: Horizon Technology Finance Leads $15 Million Venture Loan Facility for Aquion Energy, Continue reading
Tell me who doesn’t want clean jobs for energy independence and profit?
“Environmental sustainability… can lead to more and better jobs, poverty reduction and social inclusion,”
The above quote is Juan Somavia in an article Stephen Leahy wrote for Common Dreams 1 June 2012, For an Ailing Planet, the Cure Already Exists,
Germany’s renewable energy sector now employs more people than its vaunted automobile industry.
No wonder, when German solar power produces more than 20 nuclear plants.
How many jobs? According to Welcome to Germany 13 April 2012, Renewable Energies Already Provide More Than 380,000 Jobs in Germany, which cites a report from the German government,
The boom in renewable energies continues to create new jobs in Germany. According to a recently published study commissioned by the Federal Environment Ministry, the development and production of renewable energy technologies and the supply of electricity, heat and fuel from renewable sources provided around 382,000 jobs in 2011.
This is an increase of around 4 percent compared to the previous year and more than double the 2004 figure.
“Current employment figures show that the transformation of our energy system is creating entirely new opportunities on the job market,” said German Environment Minister Norbert Röttgen.
“It is the major project for the future for German industry. This opens up technological and economic opportunities in terms of Germany’s competitiveness as an exporter and location to do business.”
Wouldn’t we like some of that here in sunny south Georgia, a thousand miles south of Germany?
Back to the Stephen Leahy article:
Globally, the renewable energy sector now employs close to five
million workers, more than doubling the number of jobs from 2006-2010, according to a study released Thursday by the International Labor Organization (ILO).
The transformation to a greener economy could generate 15 to 60 million additional jobs globally over the next two decades and lift tens of millions of workers out of poverty, concluded the study, “Working towards sustainable development”.
Everyone will benefit. Everyone can benefit starting right now.
Continue readingThose cost overruns so far on the new nukes? How much solar and wind could that money buy?
John Hanger wrote on his Facts of the Day today, $913 Million Construction Overrun Hits Georgia New Nukes: How Much Gas, Wind, Solar Capacity Would That Buy?
Comparing the Vogtle initial $913 million cost overrun to the capital costs of gas, wind, and solar plants show just how big these cost overruns can be. The Vogtle $913 million cost overrun by itself could have paid for approximately 1,000 megawatts of natural gas generation; 450 megawatts of wind power; and 330 megawatts of solar power.
Don’t forget that’s just the first cost overruns on those nukes. When the current Plant Vogtle nukes were built, there were supposed to be four at a cost of $660 million; only two were built, at a cost of $8.87 billion. That’s a cost overrun of 1300%. How much solar and wind could $8 billion buy?
Moreover, gas, wind, and solar generation could be up and running in 3-years or less from the first day to the last day of development, as opposed to the 10 years or more needed to build a nuclear plant.
Austin Energy’s new 30 MW solar farm, for example, approved beginning of 2009, opened end of 2011, and cost less than originally projected.
Oh, and solar doesn’t leak radioactive tritium like Plant Hatch and won’t get shut down two days after an NRC clean bill of health like Plant Vogtle.
-jsq
Remember how Georgia Power customers get to pay for cost overruns on the new nukes? Well, the overruns have already started.
JoAnn Merrigan wrote for WSAV 15 May 2012, Environmental Groups: Plant Vogtle Reactors Almost One Billion Over Budget,
A group of nine national environmental groups says that the two new
nuclear reactors being built at Plant Vogtle (near Waynesboro in eastern Georgia) are over budget by up to $1 billion dollars. The opponents say Georgia Power’s share of the cost overruns is currently $400 million and that may cost ratepayers as well as taxpayers who are guranteeing loans in the billions of dollars.
The nine environmental groups, Friends of the Earth, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, Center for a Sustainable Coast, Citizens Allied for Safe Energy, Georgia Women’s Action for New Directions, NC WARN, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, and Nuclear Watch South, are also suing:
Continue reading