Don’t despair when climate change takes back seat in next administration; stay positive, be critical, active, kind
Nature Rambles: Here we go again with a ‘new’ president …
by Mike Miller • • 0 Comments
Tag Archive for climate change
Heat Waves in Red & Black: Earth’s fate precariously placed at glacial pace
by Community Word Staff • • 0 Comments
For many Floridians, melting polar glaciers means too much water, rising sea levels, and eventual relocation. For many Peruvians, melting Andes glaciers means torrential spring floods, summer water shortages, and rivers — major sources of drinking water — possibly running…
Heat Waves — In Red and Black | State of our electricity shortage
by William Rau • • 0 Comments
Illinois once exported 40% of its electricity generation. Now, we must import electricity. Between 2007 and 2020, 44 Illinois coal plants closed (EIA) thus eliminating a sizeable fraction of our generation capacity. Another 12 coal plants may close by 2023.…
Heat Waves — In Red and Black | Forecast for rolling blackouts?
by William Rau • • 0 Comments
The ultimate just-in-time commodity, supply and demand for electricity must be immediately and precisely balanced. If a supply deficit can’t be closed rapidly, grid operators order round-robin shutoffs across all customers, i.e. “rolling blackouts” lasting hours to days depending on…
Heat Waves — In Red and Black | Emergency Management hiding behind wall of voodoo statistics
by William Rau • • 0 Comments
My last column finds the Illinois Emergency Management Agency whitewashing heatwave risk by aggregating a misleading measure into just one score for a county. Thus, Cook County’s 136 diverse municipalities, and strikingly diverse 1,332 census tracts, are all labeled as…
Heat Waves — In Red and Black | Illinois unprepared for killer heat
by William Rau • • 2 Comments
Deadly heat gets no respect. Natural hazards that count — tornadoes, floods, etc. — are property-destroying traumas. Homeowners, public infrastructure, and insurance companies all take big hits. The Great Flood of 1993, for example, destroyed 24,000 Illinois homes and 884,000…
Heat Waves — In Red and Black | The Grid-AC Conundrum
by William Rau • • 0 Comments
A climate crisis conundrum involves heatwaves, air conditioners, and blackouts. Air conditioning saves lives during heatwaves, but soaring AC demand can crash the grid and claim lives. Today, the top 20% of peak electricity demand involves the hottest 200 hours…
Heat Waves — In Red and Black | Demand Flexibility vs. Murphy’s Climate Law
by William Rau • • 0 Comments
Murphy’s Law, “If anything can go wrong, it will,” merits climate crisis amplification: If two things can go wrong simultaneously, they will. And they have via electricity blackouts due to extreme weather. Examples: California in August 2020, and Texas in…
Heat Waves — In Red and Black | Can Illinois teach the Duck to fly?
by William Rau • • 1 Comment
Yes, and fast — but a reprise first. California’s “duck curve” in January’s column exposes the misfit between nukes and renewables. The duck curve shows how increasing solar output would replace midday fossil generation until solar output bumped into (in…
Heat Waves — In Red and Black | A half-nuke, half-renewable energy house: Can it stand?
by William Rau • • 0 Comments
No. Just as it was impossible to stitch together an economy with half-slave, half-free labor, a half-nuke and half-renewable energy house is equally impossible. Nuclear and renewable power are irreconcilably incompatible. Yet, the General Assembly and Governor’s 2021 Clean Energy…