Tea Party congressman Joe Barton (TX): "Wind is a finite resource ...".

[pampango]

?w=640

http://injusticebydesign.wordpress.com/2013/10/06/gone-with-the-wind/

Wind energy controversy

In June 2010, Barton has questioned the wisdom of deficit spending to fund an extensive national wind turbine energy generation grid. He said, "Wind is God’s way of balancing heat. Wind is the way you shift heat from areas where it’s hotter to areas where it’s cooler. That’s what wind is. Wouldn’t it be ironic if in the interest of global warming we mandated massive switches to wind energy, which is a finite resource, which slows the winds down, which causes the temperature to go up? Now, I’m not saying that’s going to happen, Mr. Chairman, but that is definitely something on the massive scale. I mean, it does make some sense. You stop something, you can’t transfer that heat, and the heat goes up. It’s just something to think about."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Barton

Do these guys really believe this stuff? Or are they just throwing BS out there to confuse the gullible and achieve the political goals of the oil industry?

[Cha]

1. Either way.. it's stupid is as stupid blows. I think I hear "God"

telling him to sit down and stfu.

[dorkzilla]

4. Hahahahahahahaha!

Well said, Cha, well said indeed...

[MADem]

2. Keep feeding that asshole beans! Hell, he's fartin' out his mouth as it is!!! nt

[Jackpine Radical]

52. No, No!!

Farts are methane, a terrible greenhouse gas!

[MADem]

56. Light 'em on fire, they'll warm up the room; reduce our reliance on fossil fuels!!!

[Fridays Child]

3. There's definitely a stiff breeze blowing between his ears.

And I suspect that's not his only personal wind source. In fact, if Texas decides to harness Joe Barton, the entire 6th Congressional District could probably go off the grid.

[newfie11]

5. Not sure if they are that stupid

Or playing to a gullible base with low intelligence.

[barbtries]

6. the latter

has to be. right? they cannot be that stupid can they?

[A Physicist]

7. Barton is roughly correct

Oddly enough and for probably all the wrong reasons he is correct.

[brush]

11. Roughly correct how? nt

[tclambert]

15. The atmosphere is finite, and wind turbines can raise temperatures.

The atmosphere and the wind energy in Earth's atmosphere is a finite resource. Finite but really, really huge. The air covers the entire planet miles deep, and windmills can only harvest the wind energy of a minuscule fraction of it.

Turbines converting wind energy into electricity will result in some waste heat. A really, really small amount. Probably unmeasurably small on a global scale.

I'm sure his alternative is to burn more oil. At that point, he doesn't want to talk about finite resources or rising temperatures. He might have to admit global warming existed, and that we will run out of oil not that far in the future.

[berni_mccoy]

21. Sorry, meant to respond to the other poster.

[tclambert]

22. Well, okay then.

I was going to scold you for reading only the (sarcastic) title of my post and not the text, which essentially said the same thing you said. I guess we'll just have to agree to agree.

[berni_mccoy]

29. :-)

Agreed!

[Scuba]

13. Yes, he's correct except for the part about everything he said ...

Wind is cold air moving in to displace warm air that's getting less dense. A physicist should know this.


Barton is a moron and a shill for big oil.

[berni_mccoy]

24. Um, no, not at all

Yes, the matter in the atmosphere is finite. But wind energy is derived from solar, so we won't run out of wind until the sun dies (yes, even the sun is finite, but it's infinite compared to the amount of fossil fuels on the planet). In that sense, wind is referred to as a renewable energy (because the sun will make more for us). And the temperature differential from wind turbines is minuscule compared to temperature change that results from dumping more carbon into the atmosphere.

Please don't add to the ignorance someone like this representative would create.

[Bolo Boffin]

8. Brains are a finite resource in D.C. n/t

[BillyRibs]

9. WTF, Really!?

Are you That Stupid!? or Is your district!?

[brush]

10. How he hell did that . . .

dumb fuck get elected? Jesus Christ, where do the repugs get them?

[nxylas]

12. That's science, that is

Unskewed science.

[A Physicist]

14. The Laws of Thermodynamics and Unintended Consequences working in Unison

“‘Large-scale exploitation of wind energy will inevitably leave an imprint in the atmosphere,’ says Kleidon. ‘Because we use so much free energy, and more every year, we'll deplete the reservoir of energy.’ He says this would probably show up first in wind farms themselves, where the gains expected from massive facilities just won't pan out as the energy of the Earth system is depleted.

Using a model of global circulation, Kleidon found that the amount of energy which we can expect to harness from the wind is reduced by a factor of 100 if you take into account the depletion of free energy by wind farms. It remains theoretically possible to extract up to 70 TW globally, but doing so would have serious consequences.

Although the winds will not die, sucking that much energy out of the atmosphere in Kleidon's model changed precipitation, turbulence and the amount of solar radiation reaching the Earth's surface. The magnitude of the changes was comparable to the changes to the climate caused by doubling atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide.”

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21028063.300-wind-and-wave-farms-could-affect-earths-energy-balance.html?full=true#.UlAE_Z0o5aQ

[tclambert]

19. Whereas we have an endless supply of oil, and when you burn it, it just vanishes, like magic,

producing no environmental consequences at all. And using a lot of foreign oil encourages international trade, thereby guaranteeing a more peaceful world.

[A Physicist]

25. can’t find it in the thread.

Who advocated for continued usage and/or expansion of fossil fuels? I can’t find it in the thread.

[tclambert]

28. I assume that is Rep. Barton's (R-Tex) implied alternative.

Why else would he try to run down wind energy? You think he's pro-solar?

[A Physicist]

31. However

the reply is to me not Barton or his words.

[diane in sf]

23. Not everyone responding to this article finds it convincing:

Eric Kvaalen

"Well, no, not all solar radiation turns into heat. A lot of it is reflected back to space. It's true that a solar panel may reflect less and may heat up its locality more than what was there before. But let's remember that the amount of solar energy arriving to the earth is vastly greater than the amount of energy (of whatever kind) we use. So if we use solar panels that convert a few percent of the sunlight into electricity, then even if they put a few more percent into the environment as heat we can still get enough electricity without significantly heating up the planet.

What I object to is the sentence, "Photosynthesis also generates free energy, but without producing waste heat." Photosynthesis certainly produces waste heat.

Generally I find this a poor article. First of all, almost all the energy coming to us from the sun is "free energy" because it has a "temperature" of more than 5000 K whereas the earth's surface is around 300 K -- that means that 47/50 of it is free energy. I suppose that Kleidon knows that and has a more sophisticated argument, but this article doesn't sufficiently explain what he's really saying. I remain unconvinced that he has a valid point."

[berni_mccoy]

17. WOW Dumber than a box of rocks.

[Ganja Ninja]

18. If only there was a way to make electricity from pure stupidity.

The Texas GOP is the Saudi Arabia of stupid.

[A Physicist]

20. Max-Planck Research School for Earth System Modeling

ESTIMATING MAXIMUM GLOBAL LAND SURFACE WIND POWER EXTRACTABILITY AND ASSOCIATED CLIMATIC CONSEQUENCES

L. M. Miller (1,2), F. Gans (1), and A. Kleidon (1)
1 Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena, Germany
2 International Max-Planck Research School for Earth System Modeling, Hamburg, Germany

“We estimate that between 18–68TW of mechanical wind power can be extracted from the atmospheric boundary layer over all non-glaciated land surfaces. Although wind power extraction from a single turbine has little effect on the global atmosphere, many more will influence atmospheric flow and reduce the large-scale extraction efficiency. Any extraction of momentum must also compete with the natural process of wind power dissipation by boundary layer turbulence.

Our study focuses on the rate of wind power generation in the climate system rather than previous near-surface estimates that focused on measured wind velocities and engineering limitations (e.g. Archer and Jacobson, 2005; Lu et al., 2009; Santa Maria and Jacobson, 2009). This consideration results in our estimate being significantly less than previous studies while also being independent of wind turbine size or layout.

Given that only 0.03TW of wind-derived electricity was produced in 2008 (World Wind Energy Association, 2008), there is still substantial wind power development possible with relatively minor climatic impacts. However, future plans for large-scale wind power development must recognize the finite potential of the Earth system to generate kinetic wind energy. It has also been suggested that with increased carbon dioxide concentrations, the total atmospheric dissipation rate, and therefore its kinetic energy generation rate, will decrease (Lucarini et al., 2010; Hern´andez-Deckers and von Storch, 2010).

Future plans must accept that the human appropriation of wind power must be accompanied by a climatic effect and with large-scale deployment, will be associated with a decrease in the total atmospheric kinetic energy generation rate. Our estimation methods are certainly extreme, but they nevertheless provide critical understanding of the limits of wind power in the climate system and how it can serve human energy requirements.

Faced with the present-day global energy demand of 17TW and a predicted change to 16–120TW by 2100 (EIA, 2009; IPCC, 2007), extreme calculations such as this will provide the maximum power potentials and possible climatic effects of different forms of renewable energy sources planned to fulfill future human energy requirements. This in turn helps to prioritize which renewable energy resources are likely to be successful in meeting the future global human energy demand. More complex modeling studies can help refine our estimates and climatic impacts, but the presence of a maximum in wind power extractability and the associated climatic consequences from this extraction are fundamental.”

http://www.earth-syst-dynam.net/2/1/2011/esd-2-1-2011.pdf

[A Physicist]

33. Estimating maximum global land surface wind power...- Interactive Discussion

L. M. Miller, F. Gans, and A. Kleidon

Here objections to the original paper are raised and corrections are made or countered; it’s physics not politics.

http://www.earth-syst-dynam-discuss.net/1/169/2010/esdd-1-169-2010-discussion.html

[Neoma]

26. If I were to say something stupid about windmills...

Of would be, "windmills are like fans, and they'll cool the earth down." But what he said is on a whole other level of stupid.

[Paulie]

27. He's right! It is finite. Why all the snark?

We only have about 4.5 billion years before the sun turns into a red giant and consumes the earth in the expansion.

[Warren Stupidity]

35. We have less than 1B years before earth won't sustain life.

I worry for my children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children's children

[liberal N proud]

30. As opposed to OIL?

The stupid is really hurting this nation!

[Alkene]

32. If this was breaking news,

would Barton be breaking wind?

(I know that really doesn't make any sense, but I just had to get in a fart reference.)

[Liberalynn]

48. I was going to say he alone probably

breaks enough wind to fuel the whole country for a decade.

[Warren Stupidity]

34. He is regurgitating a talking point about local effects of large wind farms.

Designed by the oil and coal lobby propaganda machine to create the usual fud.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

36. So are brains Barton and you've used up your allotment.

Idiot.

[tanyev]

37. And yet Republican blowhards never run out of ignorant things to say.

[aintitfunny]

38. Not as long as there are Windbags like him around (eom)

[dinger130]

39. This is the same dude

that apologized to BP during the BP OIL SPILL. Remember?

[Javaman]

40. He and bill o'lielly must have a heck of a time together.

Stupidity makes my brain sad.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

41. Only if he stops talking. nt

[jberryhill]

42. And the danger of asphyxiation

If we deplete wind using turbines, then people will suffocate from not enough mixing of fresh air.

[hatrack]

43. "Wind blows in. Wind blows out. You can't explain that."

[winter is coming]

44. Proving, once again, that hot air is limitless....

[Snake Plissken]

45. Wind is God’s way of balancing heat

wind energy, which is a finite resource, which slows the winds down, which causes the temperature to go up

There you have it, the real cause of warming is anything that obstructs the flow of winds, that why clear cutting the Amazon Rain Forest will cold down the planet. Next we need to start knocking down all of the building on the planet which obstruct the wind.

[Orsino]

47. OMG. Barton just said God is finite! n/t

[Old and In the Way]

46. so he believes humans can influence the climate.

Rediverting alittle wind vs. Burning oil...I wonder which has a bigger impact on globalvwarming?

[CanonRay]

49. Please tell me this is the onion...

It is, right?

[lonestarnot]

50. LMAO. I've got some finite wind for him.

[northoftheborder]

51. duct tape needed for all Texas Repub. congressperson's mouths.....OMG why can't they keep their

moronic thoughts to themselves????????

[L0oniX]

53. "Wind is a finite resource ...unless it's coming out of my ass"

[walkerbait41]

54. Just another republican dumb ass

[jsr]

55. Slow molecules increase temperature. Makes sense.

LOL.

[TomCADem]

57. *sigh* - The Chair of the House Energy Committee?

Idiocracy has arrived.

[NuclearDem]

58. Well, it's alright, it's not like he sits on the...

...oh for fuck's sake.

[Hungwa]

59. Working on sending a personal message

Have no care to be here just wanna be able to send a PM.

That's All.