Discussion: Blue States Form Climate Alliance After Trump Withdraws From Paris Pact

My condolences for the associations you cultivate.

You sell the jobs. You sell the future. You make it a patriotic duty.

I spent last weekend in Western Kansas and Eastern Colorado. That is Red State Central, but they have wind farms and those wind farms provide really important money and jobs to the people who live there. They get the importance of wind power.

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Solar Employs More People In U.S. Electricity Generation Than Oil, Coal And Gas Combined

The issue isn’t that there are no jobs out there in renewable energy but that some portion of Americans don’t believe it. Or they think it’s just incidental and will never replace REAL energy jobs in coal and oil.

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Trump - the Greatest Negotiator in the World - will get us a “better deal.” Hahahahahahahaha!

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Well…it depends.

If there are civil servants left over from the Obama Administration still working there…it might be better than a trump appointee. After all they would be pro-hurricanes and pro-disasters.

So you’re point is it’s hopeless, correct? And in the near term, like tomorrow or next year, you’re right. People’s minds aren’t going to change. But that’s pretty short sighted thinking.

If men were meant to fly, God would have given them wings.

Perhaps this will help.

The enhanced burning embers diagram, providing a global perspective on climate-related risks. Levels of risk associated with 5 different reasons for concern are illustrated for increasing global mean temperature and are the same as those presented in the IPCC Working Group II report. Icons indicate selected risks that played an important role in locating transitions between levels of risks. Coloured dots indicate overarching key risk categories that were considered in the assessment for each RFC (see Table 1). Confidence in the judgments of risk transitions is indicated as medium (M) or high (H) as provided in ref. 93 and supplemented here, and the range over which transitions take place is indicated with brackets. For example, RFC1 is underpinned by overarching key risks (i), (vii), and (viii) from Table 1; there is high confidence in the location of the transition from Undetectable to Moderate risk, which is informed by impacts to coral reef, Arctic and mountain systems; and there is high confidence in the location of the transition from High to Very High risk, which is informed by impacts to coral reef and Arctic systems as well as to species associated with unique and threatened systems.

The issue is not that things are hopeless.

The issue is to recalibrate what can be considered hopeful and leave the rest behind that is proving to be hopeless. And if that includes some section of the population, we have to work with that.

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The conservative response to that is to stop being liberal. Citizens United We Stand!

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I think the pushback should be explicitly against the GOP and Trump. Most Americans are worried about climate change. Over time, they’re not going to get any happier about Big Oil owning the GOP and jeopardizing the planet and screwing the booming renewables sector, particularly if the matter is put in those simple (and accurate) terms. The “Republican leader, Donald Trump” should in any case be a meme at this point. Really start branding the GOP with him.

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I never said “things” are hopeless. I’m addressing your oft repeated point that the nothing can change people’s minds and that a large segment of the country is just completely hopeless.

I say they are right now, but I don’t believe it’s impossible to coax at least some (and more likely many) flat earthers into the modern world. If that were the case, and human beings were all that incapable of opening their eyes, we wouldn’t have a modern world.

And to add a note of extreme pessimism, there is a distinct, non-zero probability of the earth’s succumbing irretieveably into a runaway greenhouse effect. At which point human argument becomes irrelevant.

It is a vision of a future so apocalyptic that it is hard to even imagine.
But, if leading scientists writing in one of the most respected academic journals are right, planet Earth could be on course for global warming of more than seven degrees Celsius within a lifetime.
And that, according to one of the world’s most renowned climatologists, could be “game over” – particularly given the imminent presence of climate change denier Donald Trump in the White House.

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You can leave out the “will” on this given that, generally speaking, this is already the case.

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Not necessarily a product endorsement, but the Tesla solar roof is changing the paradigm about the true value of our homes. How much energy does your house produce? The ability of any individual building to produce its own energy is becoming a much bigger economic factor that people never even considered before. The more energy a home can produce separate from the grid, the more valuable it is to its owner, and to the utility. That is $$$.

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I would argue that the “modern world” was formed by a somewhat small group of people that dragged the remainder kicking and screaming into the future.

You’re characterizing my statement as examples of extreme pessimism and, to a certain extent, I would agree. But, I’d also argue that the pessimism reflects the realistic point where we’re at now (as you said) and doesn’t show signs of abating in the future for all of us. I believe that some simply can’t be reached and the issue of time is now very troubling. Exactly how long do we get to wait to change what seems to be ingrained?

But if you have a way to do it, by all means.

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Who knows, maybe Drumpfie has a direct line to God (or at least His cell phone nr.)

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I’m reminded of the saying/quote “You can’t reason someone out of a position they didn’t achieve by reason.” It is like your tiger analogy, there is a large chunk of this country that are simply deadenders and we need to stop wasting time and energy trying to figure out ways to win them over and start looking for ways to get things done despite them. Anyone that can be won over should be won over by results and the rest are beyond convincing.

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Various states will put a stop to this nonsense:

Oklahoma residents who produce their own energy through solar panels or small wind turbines on their property will now be charged an additional fee, the result of a new bill passed by the state legislature and expected to be signed into law by Gov. Mary Fallin ÂŽ.
On Monday, S.B. 1456 passed the state House 83–5 after no debate. The measure creates a new class of customers: those who install distributed power generation systems like solar panels or small wind turbines on their property and sell the excess energy back to the grid. While those with systems already installed won’t be affected, the new class of customers will now be charged a monthly fee — a shift that happened quickly and caught many in the state off guard.

https://thinkprogress.org/oklahoma-will-charge-customers-who-install-their-own-solar-panels-4bbf8850a3d0

Indiana legislators have introduced a bill that many fear could kill the state’s solar industry by ending net metering and also essentially preventing people from using the energy from their own solar panels.

Senate bill 309 would ban net metering by 2027, and it would limit the options that the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission could replace it with for compensating customers with solar installations.

Rather than the retail rate paid for solar energy sent back to the grid under net metering, customers could only get the much lower “avoided cost,” or wholesale rates.

Perhaps most disturbing to solar advocates, the bill would institute a mandatory “buy-all, sell-all” provision to replace net metering that would essentially prohibit customers from using their own solar energy, forcing them to sell all of their energy back to the grid at low rates, only to buy it back at higher rates.

http://midwestenergynews.com/2017/01/24/indiana-energy-bill-would-eliminate-net-metering-move-to-buy-all-sell-all-solar-model/

LANSING, MI – Solar industry experts say that Senate legislation overhauling Michigan’s energy policy would eliminate the ability of small-scale solar users to use their own renewable energy to offset their utility costs.

Currently small solar and renewable projects at Michigan homes, businesses and nonprofits are able to connect to the grid of their regulated utilities through a net metering program, which allows customers to offset their electricity costs with their own renewable energy and then potentially sell excess energy back into the grid.

A small but growing number of Michiganders have chosen to do just that. According to a report released by the Michigan Public Service Commission on Tuesday there are now 1,840 customers who use net metering.

But Senate Bill 438, which changes parts of state energy law as part of a legislative overhaul, would change how the system works. According to Amy Heart, spokesperson for The Alliance for Solar Choice, it would essentially eliminate net metering in Michigan.

A bill proposed by six state lawmakers would charge utilities a penalty if they use wind or solar energy to provide Wyoming consumers with electricity.

If Senate File 71 were law, there would be six permissible resources for generating electricity for Wyomingites, including natural gas and coal. Wind and solar are not on the list, except for individual use.

Utilities would have a year to reach the first compliance milestone of the bill, in which each company would have to get 95 percent of its Wyoming-sold energy from the approved resources.

The following year, 2019, companies must reach 100 percent compliance.

Under the bill, if electricity were generated by wind or solar in Wyoming to serve customers in the state it would come with a $10-per-megawatt-hour penalty. That penalty would be double the suggested tax hike on wind also under consideration this legislative session.

http://trib.com/business/energy/bill-would-penalize-utilities-for-wind-generated-electricity-for-wyoming/article_fa25328e-aa4b-561f-9955-0995b9118e23.html
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I live in a world that is full of people with a variety of ideas. My condolences to anyone who lives in a bubble, even it is a shiny blue bubble. The full texture of life is far more interesting.

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There’s only one reason the Trumps do anything: $$$$. Does anyone remember the property “deal” they had with the rich Russian? $50 million they, the Trumps, bought it for and sold it to him for $100 million? Just wait and see.

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