Scientific Sense

There is a kind of madness that has overtaken the media - we have had a real disaster - the earthquake and the tsunami - and yet if you look at the headlines you would think this was nothing in comparison with events at Fukushima nuclear power stations. On the BBC news last night, a mention of the Fukushima disaster was followed immediately by a statement about the fact that thousands had died. How many nervous people watching this and other news items will have presumed - because of the hype - that somehow these deaths were caused by Fukushima, rather than the earthquake and the tsunami?


More from Watts Up With That - a heartfelt plea for a return to scientific sense regarding nuclear power - by a physicist Dr Peter Heller:

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/03/20/a-plea-for-a-return-to-science-on-the-nuclear-power-issue/


James Delingpole also quotes Dr.Heller:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100080636/japan-whatever-happened-to-the-nuclear-meltdown/

Jamess Delingpole also says, interestingly, that the lesson to learn is that "if your country is hit by a monster earthquake and tsunami, one of the safest places to be is at the local nuclear powerplant." Apparently, other Japanese nuclear power plants - which have survived the quake - are sheltering the homeless in their buildings, which are not only still standing, but have heating and lighting.

And here is another article bringing the number of deaths caused by the nuclear industry into comparison with that by the wind power industry. More people are killed by wind power than by nuclear power:
http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Fukushima-is-not-Chernobyl,-wind-power-causes-more-deaths-21064.html

And what about coal? Where are the screaming apocalyptic headlines about this disaster? Pakistan - 52 feared dead in Mine.
It just doesn't make sense, especially when you remember that no one was killed at Three Mile Island. Is it because fatal accidents are so rare in the nuclear industry that they make such headlines?

How many wind turbines don't even spin?

It is time for someone to make a website/webpage/ with links to all the videos that show wind turbines that don't spin. Or perhaps they have already? If anyone knows of such a site, let us know! We all see them, but unless you can video them, photographs don't show the reality.

This is a good link, on the Watts Up With That site


http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/03/19/the-reality-of-wind-turbines-in-california-video/

A once beautiful field

Not so long ago, you could do a beautiful walk, from the valley down below the little hamlet of Fullabrook, up a sweet path through trees, that opens onto a hill. All you would see in the way of movement would be sheep and ponies grazing. I remember a particular walk, on a spring evening. It was so peaceful. It is not quite the same now. The hills look like the site for a gigantic motorway, great heavy vehicles trundle by for twelve hours a day, six days a week.

Imagine what is it like if you love solitude, and you have chosen to live somewhere quiet, somewhere peaceful, because you love the countryside. You love the solitude: you haven't asked for much, just to be left in peace to live your life the way you want to. You do not miss the bustle of the modern world, the conveniences of city life, you do not miss having shops nearby, you do not care if you are cut off during snowfall. You love your home, your hills. You may even have said that when you die you want your ashes scattered here, on the hill that you love so much. Where can you go to now? The Isle of Lewis? The Shetlands? The Australian Barrier Ranges? The Kansas Prairie? Nowhere is safe from the Wind Power Industry.

Here is a photographic record of another walk, started at Burland Cross, where the above photograph was taken.

Bananas

While the problems the Japanese are having with their nuclear reactors are serious, it is important to keep some perspective on the issue, especially when the media get carried away with doom-mongering.

Did you know that bananas are radioactive enough to cause false alarms on radiation sensors? Read more here:
http://dailycaller.com/2011/03/18/going-bananas-over-radiation/

Anthony Watts has also produced a live real-time monitoring map of radiation counts in the USA. The levels it shows are reassuring. Perhaps if more members of the general public had their own geiger counters, we would all have a better understanding of the risks/benefits of nuclear energy.

More about whales and wind farms

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/windpower/8382476/Wind-farms-blamed-for-stranding-of-whales.html


Note;, April 2nd:
This link does not work. The article was removed from The Telegraph because it was in error, Professor Boyd did not talk to anyone in the Press about wind farms, and the paper that is mentioned does not mention wind farms either.

The link below gives more details:

http://www.windturbinesyndrome.com/news/2011/do-marine-wind-turbines-drive-whales-to-beach-themselves-nobody-knows-for-certain-uk/

Anne Campbell

Moorland on the Isle of Lewis


Go to this website to see new work by Isle of Lewis artist, Anne Campbell, who was one of the first featured artists on the Artists Against Wind Farms website.

Remember the Whales

A good article here by Larry Bell titled Wind energy's overblown prospects.

Larry Bell is a Professor at the University of Houston. My sister Jane and I were students there, many years ago, and still have fond memories of days spent in the Cougar Den. So, as someone who was led a Save The Whales protest back in 1970, before it was fashionable, I was especially pleased when I noticed that he mentioned the risk off-shore turbines might cause to whales. On reflection, I am not sure if he was taking this so seriously, but the article makes many good points.

For anyone who is concerned about whales, we have already highlighted several articles about whales and underwater noise on this blog, and he gives a link to a lawsuit filed by environmental groups that accuse the Obama administration of violating the Endangered Species Act with its approval of the Cape Wind Project in Nantucket Sound.

Christine Lovelock

http://blogs.forbes.com/larrybell/2011/03/08/wind-energys-overblown-prospects/