Originally Posted by MordecaiK

... We need to get past Boomer moralising about climate change and realise that the more solar energy and battery technology has to compete with fossil fuels the more efficient solar energy will become. People will install solar energy not because they believe in global warming but because they hate paying electric bills to power companies. The important thing is to give people the right to "go off the grid" and use solar and battery technology and not allow utilities to astroturf "environmental regulations" that require people to purchase electricity from them and relegate solar energy to large public utility installations, which the heirs to Wal-Mart are investing in. Quite frankly, centralized power grids are not only obsolete, they are dangerous to a nation's security. They are vulnerable to bombing and hacking, not to mention severe storms. Decentralized power is far more resilient--and is what people want, if they will be permitted to have it. Germany's push for solar energy, while community based is rooted in a history of vulnerability to cutoff of energy from abroad. One of Hitler's most important war aims was to secure independent sources of energy in the Mideast and the Caucasus to make Germany energy self-sufficient. Germans hate the idea of depending on either the Mideast or Russia for their energy. Even for nuclear power, Germany depends on imports from other nations. Small wonder that Germany is committed to minimise, and if possible eliminate energy imports, at least for electricity.

Yes, a dispersed system is more resilient and less susceptible to attack, but also less able to load share. Once load-share is off the table, then storage moves right to the top ... and there is no viable storage mechanism at this time. Mechanical means, like pump-back lakes, are large and full of political and maintenance headaches. Passive storage, like batteries, is a future dream at best.

Look at the battery options. Enzyme based batteries, which will be highly dense and scalable, not susceptible to resource limitations and relatively cheap, are far from adequate to the task. Molten batteries are even better at density, but operate a high temperature and will degrade in short order, and the worse option of the two. Other choices are out of the game. Assuming it's enzyme batteries, are we all willing to host a "battery garage" on our property containing ~50 m³ of batteries? Are we willing to maintain it? We could go with less, and suffer brown-outs and black-outs. Maybe third-world power is the new first world option.

So I wish the Germans the best, and hope they succeed. But color me skeptical.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

... Mechanical means, like pump-back lakes, are large and full of political and maintenance headaches.

Some months ago I read about an intriguing mechanical storage method. Forget where I saw it.

One builds a very large, very heavy railroad train apparatus running over only a few miles, whereby the train is pulled up a fairly steep hill by excess power, then generates power by coasting back down the hill. When you think about it, if the apparatus was built to run at fairly low speeds, friction losses could be minimized, it would be very simple, easy to duplicate, and might hold a lot of megawatts. Sound primitive, but it could work and would certainly be something that a decentralized area might use.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Yes, a dispersed system is more resilient and less susceptible to attack, but also less able to load share. Once load-share is off the table, then storage moves right to the top ... and there is no viable storage mechanism at this time. Mechanical means, like pump-back lakes, are large and full of political and maintenance headaches. Passive storage, like batteries, is a future dream at best.

Look at the battery options. Enzyme based batteries, which will be highly dense and scalable, not susceptible to resource limitations and relatively cheap, are far from adequate to the task. Molten batteries are even better at density, but operate a high temperature and will degrade in short order, and the worse option of the two. Other choices are out of the game. Assuming it's enzyme batteries, are we all willing to host a "battery garage" on our property containing ~50 m³ of batteries? Are we willing to maintain it? We could go with less, and suffer brown-outs and black-outs. Maybe third-world power is the new first world option.

So I wish the Germans the best, and hope they succeed. But color me skeptical.

Batteries are being developed around the world:
http://ecowatch.com/2015/09/21/batte...able-energy/2/

Off grid batteries like the Tesla powerpack are too expensive yet for most homeowners. Other home batteries exist, but don't last long enough. Staying on the grid seems the best solution at the moment for most people. But solar panels at home can still produce much of people's household needs, and being connected to the grid assures continuous power.

In the long run though, as batteries improve, then off the grid will be more viable. Staying on the grid will probably require paying a service charge, which is not the case right now in northern CA. Such a charge is counter-productive now when we are trying to ramp up alternative energy. But unless the utility companies want to become solar panel and battery companies, they will likely need to charge for grid service to stay in business. If off-grid becomes the norm, then these utilities may go the way of the do do birds. They won't be the first type of business to go belly up in this high-tech day and age.

We need to reduce carbon emissions now, so we can't wait until off-the-grid works for everyone. Allowing a 4C global temp rise is not acceptable. Meanwhile, salt batteries are being used at some solar power plants, and new kinds of batteries at solar and wind power plants will soon enable utilities to reduce reliance on nuclear and natural gas sources. Coal needs to be phased out as soon as possible.

Molten salt batteries
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium...sulfur_battery

From http://www.ecmag.com/section/green-b...n-salt-storage
Published: February 2011 By Mike Breslin
Finally, there is a practical solution to store huge amounts of solar electricity that is generated by large-scale solar plants—molten salt technology.
In mid-December, SolarReserve, a U.S. developer of solar power projects, received environmental approvals from the Arizona Power Plant and Transmission Line Siting Committee to build its Crossroads Solar Energy Project. The 150-megawatt project will be located in Maricopa County, Ariz., and uses an advanced molten salt technology developed by Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, a division of United Technologies, Hartford, Conn.

List of energy storage projects:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...orage_projects


The 150 MW Andasol solar power station is a commercial parabolic trough solar thermal power plant, located in Spain. The Andasol plant uses tanks of molten salt to store captured solar energy so that it can continue generating electricity when the sun isn't shining.[1]

https://www.facebook.com/stonnington...eactionnetwork

This Slate article is for discussion purposes only. I'm not endorsing it, but I will note that very important issues are raised.

In March 2012, in a large-windowed conference hall on the snowy campus of the University of Calgary, I heard two simple questions. The man asking them was trying to help his audience get the most out of their day by giving them a clear understanding of where they, and others, stood when it came to action on climate change. To that end he asked them:

• Do you believe the risks of climate change merit serious action aimed at lessening them?

• Do you think that reducing an industrial economy’s carbon dioxide emissions to near zero is very hard?

The two questions posed that morning by Robert Socolow, a physicist from Princeton University, seem to me a particularly good way of defining your position on geoengineering. So take a moment to answer them, if you would.

The article continues.

So how do you answer the two questions?

I answer them Yes and Yes. Yes, the risks posed by climate change are serious enough to warrant large-scale action. And Yes, moving from a fossil-fuel economy to one that hardly uses fossil fuels at all will be very hard.


To judge by what they say and what policies they support, most people in favor of action on climate change are in the Yes/No camp: They want to act on the risks; they don’t think that getting off fossil fuels is a terribly hard problem. Their way forward is to argue ever more strongly for emissions reductions; they believe these would be quite easily achieved were it not for a lack of political leadership willing to take on the vested interests of emitters.


Most of those against action on climate are in the No/Yes camp: They don’t think climate is very much of a worry; but they do think that getting off fossil fuels is difficult, even impossible. Their leaders tend to focus on the weaknesses they see in the science and politics underlying the case for action on emissions and on the drawbacks of renewable-energy systems.


Neither of these approaches works for people like me in the Yes/Yes camp. Yes/Yes people need different responses: responses that seek to lessen the risks of climate change without impractically rapid cuts in fossil-fuel use; or responses which seek to change society so deeply that such reductions become feasible. I think that deliberate modification of the climate—climate geoengineering—could offer a response of the first sort. It is to outline the promise and attendant perils of that idea and to appreciate its antecedents and its implications that I have written The Planet Remade: How Geoengineering Could Change the World.

I tend to be in the Yes/Yes camp, along with Marx and Lennon. I know that Eric the Green is in the Yes/No camp, and some other posters are in the No/Yes camp. My concern is that going into climate geoengineering could open up a Pandora's box; who knows that side effects you get...

It's hard to reduce the facts into a simple yes/no answer. The transition away from fossil fuels is a big challenge, but it can be done in about 10 years. How fast it is actually done depends on the politics. Waiting for the market to act may take too long, given how much damage has already been done, and the likelihood that we reach a "tipping point" soon making severe damage irreversible. So waiting for the market is not the best course. Some government action by states and the Obama administration and other countries has already helped, and so will the Paris agreement.

But the Republicans think that the market is the only way, because only the market should determine what solutions happen-- unless of course the fossil fuel dirty energy status quo wants their subsidies. Then government support is just fine for them. So that's why it's a political question-- the prevalence of free-market fundamentalism inhibits government action that would speed up the transition. I don't know why that's so hard for some people to understand, or why some people here can't or won't read my posts that explain what's going on. People here are just pretty stubborn on all topics; that's all I can say. I don't know why some people deny that global warming is happening, and that technology is being developed to fix it. But again, for many of these deniers and delayers, the political ideology of free market fundamentalism is a major factor.

Climate geo-engineering is an entirely different matter. If energy transition is not sufficient to deal with severe problems due to climate change, then that may be an option. But as far as I know, it is risky and undeveloped. However, conspiracy theories exist that it is already being tested, and that we the people are guinea pigs for these tests. They charge that chemtrails and the HARPP system are already the agents of geo-engineering. They further charge that these chemtrails are already themselves the main factor causing global warming, rather than reversing it. As far as I can tell, these theories are nonsense, based only on their impression that chemtrails last longer in the sky than before the 1990s, and that some places have aluminum in the soil (and mostly near Mt. Shasta where aluminum already exists in the volcanic soil). I don't think airplanes are emitting barium and aluminum into the air. But if they are correct, then it is a factor to consider in some way. According to them, chemtrails cause global warming; but if not, then if these tests are going on, maybe a new technology is being developed or can be developed someday to reverse global warming, even though the tests are risky. But I don't think the theory is correct. Most mitigation schemes I know involve planting a lot of trees, or increasing ocean life, to create "carbon sinks."

Originally Posted by The Wonkette

This Slate article is for discussion purposes only. I'm not endorsing it, but I will note that very important issues are raised.

I tend to be in the Yes/Yes camp, along with Marx and Lennon. I know that Eric the Green is in the Yes/No camp, and some other posters are in the No/Yes camp. My concern is that going into climate geoengineering could open up a Pandora's box; who knows that side effects you get...

I suspect that some attempts at geo-engineering are inevitable, but not soon and not enough to make a large impact. I think the reason is just what you noted: no one is comfortable playing God with the only planet and social structure we have.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

... no one is comfortable playing God with the only planet and social structure we have.

And yet that's exactly what we have done, and continue to do. Unfortunately our species has the technical capabilities of the gods and the maturity of a one-year-old.

Recent observations from satellite gravimetry (the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) mission) suggest an acceleration of ice mass loss from the Antarctic Ice Sheet (AIS).
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...4JB011755/full

National Research Council says Arctic is warming, and that scientific consensus has been slow to keep up with changing climate.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/2...council-speaks

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Yes, a dispersed system is more resilient and less susceptible to attack, but also less able to load share. Once load-share is off the table, then storage moves right to the top ... and there is no viable storage mechanism at this time. Mechanical means, like pump-back lakes, are large and full of political and maintenance headaches. Passive storage, like batteries, is a future dream at best.

Look at the battery options. Enzyme based batteries, which will be highly dense and scalable, not susceptible to resource limitations and relatively cheap, are far from adequate to the task. Molten batteries are even better at density, but operate a high temperature and will degrade in short order, and the worse option of the two. Other choices are out of the game. Assuming it's enzyme batteries, are we all willing to host a "battery garage" on our property containing ~50 m³ of batteries? Are we willing to maintain it? We could go with less, and suffer brown-outs and black-outs. Maybe third-world power is the new first world option.

So I wish the Germans the best, and hope they succeed. But color me skeptical.

One way to handle load share, if one does not wish to be a purist, may be a home electrical generator powered by natural gas as a back-up to batteries. Which is what hospitals and server farms have (though most use diesel). Natural gas lines are less vulnerable to being knocked out (except in the unlikely event of an earthquake and that generally is the result of homes knocked off their foundations) than power grids and can power vehicles too, until electric cars become more reliable. All that's really needed for NGVs is enough of an incentive for automakers to build them with longer backs (which could require recalibrating parking spaces in some cases). And a big enough commitment to them to overcome the "chicken-egg" lack of investment in vehicles and infrastructure. Iran, which has been bucking US sanctions for years, has had that incentive and may have half their cars running on natural gas by now. Other countries,, where investment isn't centralised and controlled by a few big banks have also moved in this direction.
(And because of frakking natural gas production is in many parts of the nation, close to population centers in many cases, which can create more self sufficiency).
The whole debate goes back over 100 years to the argument between Thomas Edison (who favoured direct current generated onsite) and George Westinghouse and Nikolai Tesla (who favoured alternating current and centralised power grids). Westinghouse and Tesla ultimately won the argument because generated power at the time generally meant coal fired steam turbines. And central generation meant power companies with monopolies which was a more attractive business model. So AC became the standard and electrical apps were modeled to take that power source, even to the point of putting alternators in cars. But that was before the age of hackers, terrorists and insurgents.
We also have to remember that for the Germans, self-sufficiency in energy is a matter of history. The Germans were basically starved into submission in WWI. In WWII, Germany got lebensraum but also needed (and didn't get) access to the Mideast and Caspian oil regions. And now Germany depends on Russia for most of it's energy. One need not be an apologist for Nazi Germany to realise that Germany has taken it on the chin by not being self-sufficient--and that international orders and interdependence finally fail in Unravelling eras. That's what motivates Germany on solar, not a general desire to be "green".

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

I suspect that some attempts at geo-engineering are inevitable, but not soon and not enough to make a large impact. I think the reason is just what you noted: no one is comfortable playing God with the only planet and social structure we have.

The problem with geo-engineering is that it will be done to benefit whatever entity has global power. Geo-engineering presumes a benign and democratic world government. Which to my mind is an oxymoron.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

It's hard to reduce the facts into a simple yes/no answer. The transition away from fossil fuels is a big challenge, but it can be done in about 10 years. How fast it is actually done depends on the politics. Waiting for the market to act may take too long, given how much damage has already been done, and the likelihood that we reach a "tipping point" soon making severe damage irreversible. So waiting for the market is not the best course. Some government action by states and the Obama administration and other countries has already helped, and so will the Paris agreement.

But the Republicans think that the market is the only way, because only the market should determine what solutions happen-- unless of course the fossil fuel dirty energy status quo wants their subsidies. Then government support is just fine for them. So that's why it's a political question-- the prevalence of free-market fundamentalism inhibits government action that would speed up the transition. I don't know why that's so hard for some people to understand, or why some people here can't or won't read my posts that explain what's going on. People here are just pretty stubborn on all topics; that's all I can say. I don't know why some people deny that global warming is happening, and that technology is being developed to fix it. But again, for many of these deniers and delayers, the political ideology of free market fundamentalism is a major factor.

Climate geo-engineering is an entirely different matter. If energy transition is not sufficient to deal with severe problems due to climate change, then that may be an option. But as far as I know, it is risky and undeveloped. However, conspiracy theories exist that it is already being tested, and that we the people are guinea pigs for these tests. They charge that chemtrails and the HARPP system are already the agents of geo-engineering. They further charge that these chemtrails are already themselves the main factor causing global warming, rather than reversing it. As far as I can tell, these theories are nonsense, based only on their impression that chemtrails last longer in the sky than before the 1990s, and that some places have aluminum in the soil (and mostly near Mt. Shasta where aluminum already exists in the volcanic soil). I don't think airplanes are emitting barium and aluminum into the air. But if they are correct, then it is a factor to consider in some way. According to them, chemtrails cause global warming; but if not, then if these tests are going on, maybe a new technology is being developed or can be developed someday to reverse global warming, even though the tests are risky. But I don't think the theory is correct. Most mitigation schemes I know involve planting a lot of trees, or increasing ocean life, to create "carbon sinks."

Based on the time it took to transition (partially) from coal to oil, I'd say we are looking at more like 30-40 years. The UK was thinking in terms of oil, rather than coal to power railroads and ships in the 1910s. Gas powered cars replaced horses and wagons in the US in the 1920s and 30s (and did not do so in much of Continental Europe until after WWII--Hitler was dependent on horse drawn wagons to supply his troops. And the last coal fired steam locomotives were not retired from service in China and India until the 1990s. And we still generate electricity from coal and still need coking coal to make steel (though pet coke from oil refineries fills some of the bill).
My guess is that coal and later petroleum will transition from a fuel to an industrial material (and even raw material for synthetic food) with nano-engineering sometime around mid century. Which means that it won't stay in the ground but won't become CO2 in large quantities quickly either. It will be demand for carbon for things like graphene and plastics as much as solar and wind power that will speed the transition to solar and wind. Hydrocarbons will simply become too valuable for other uses to burn.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

Batteries are being developed around the world:
http://ecowatch.com/2015/09/21/batte...able-energy/2/

Off grid batteries like the Tesla powerpack are too expensive yet for most homeowners. Other home batteries exist, but don't last long enough. Staying on the grid seems the best solution at the moment for most people. But solar panels at home can still produce much of people's household needs, and being connected to the grid assures continuous power.

In the long run though, as batteries improve, then off the grid will be more viable. Staying on the grid will probably require paying a service charge, which is not the case right now in northern CA. Such a charge is counter-productive now when we are trying to ramp up alternative energy. But unless the utility companies want to become solar panel and battery companies, they will likely need to charge for grid service to stay in business. If off-grid becomes the norm, then these utilities may go the way of the do do birds. They won't be the first type of business to go belly up in this high-tech day and age.

We need to reduce carbon emissions now, so we can't wait until off-the-grid works for everyone. Allowing a 4C global temp rise is not acceptable. Meanwhile, salt batteries are being used at some solar power plants, and new kinds of batteries at solar and wind power plants will soon enable utilities to reduce reliance on nuclear and natural gas sources. Coal needs to be phased out as soon as possible.

Molten salt batteries
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium...sulfur_battery

From http://www.ecmag.com/section/green-b...n-salt-storage
Published: February 2011 By Mike Breslin
Finally, there is a practical solution to store huge amounts of solar electricity that is generated by large-scale solar plants—molten salt technology.
In mid-December, SolarReserve, a U.S. developer of solar power projects, received environmental approvals from the Arizona Power Plant and Transmission Line Siting Committee to build its Crossroads Solar Energy Project. The 150-megawatt project will be located in Maricopa County, Ariz., and uses an advanced molten salt technology developed by Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, a division of United Technologies, Hartford, Conn.

List of energy storage projects:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...orage_projects


The 150 MW Andasol solar power station is a commercial parabolic trough solar thermal power plant, located in Spain. The Andasol plant uses tanks of molten salt to store captured solar energy so that it can continue generating electricity when the sun isn't shining.[1]

On one hand, I think that humanity can and will maintain civilisation with a 4T rise in temperature and prosper. Civilisation won't come to an end if palm trees grow in Chicago.
On the other hand, I think that the cost of battery storage will come down markedly and sooner rather than later. Only it may do so faster in nations besides the US. South Korea and Germany, Israel, maybe even France will be ahead of the US on the curve for onsite solar power just as they manage more competition and cheaper rates in Internet connections. The need to import and the precariousness of their energy future will keep them more honest than the US, which cares too much about it's investment in obselete technologies and has a financial sector too concerned about short term profitability.

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

On one hand, I think that humanity can and will maintain civilisation with a 4T rise in temperature and prosper. Civilisation won't come to an end if palm trees grow in Chicago.

It depends on how fast warming happens, how far it goes, and uncertain "tipping points" that may be irreversible. No more than 2C is needed. Preferably less.

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

The problem with geo-engineering is that it will be done to benefit whatever entity has global power. Geo-engineering presumes a benign and democratic world government. Which to my mind is an oxymoron.

It doesn't have to be a government like the United States. Nations can cooperate.

Oklahoma Ordered To Cut Fracking After Unusual Spike In Earthquakes
http://yournewswire.com/oklahoma-ord...n-earthquakes/

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

Oklahoma Ordered To Cut Fracking After Unusual Spike In Earthquakes
http://yournewswire.com/oklahoma-ord...n-earthquakes/

Bloody idiots. Of course it will create earthquakes. They should have thought of that beforehand and not do it at all. I will bet they only stopped because causing earthquakes will be more costly. Damage to infrastructure and all that. Tough about the earth and possible lives lost....

Originally Posted by Taramarie

Bloody idiots. Of course it will create earthquakes. They should have thought of that beforehand and not do it at all. I will bet they only stopped because causing earthquakes will be more costly. Damage to infrastructure and all that. Tough about the earth and possible lives lost....

I live in Oklahoma and yeah, those injection wells are making us earthquake central in the US. At first, nobody even though injecting wastewater back into the earth would cause problems. Here is a short geology lesson about Oklahoma and oil. There is a failed rift called the Nemaha ridge which runs pretty much close to interstate 35. The failed rift is a weak spot in the crust , which is why we have some faults. Another dead give away for faults is, duh, oil fields. Faults are what trapped the oil to begin with. All oil fields have some sort of trap which creates them. So yeah, it would be a good idea to forgo the $$$ from frakking before something "interesting" happens. That "interesting" could be a bunch of pipeline ruptures in Cushing

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...out-innovation

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

On one hand, I think that humanity can and will maintain civilisation with a 4T rise in temperature and prosper. Civilisation won't come to an end if palm trees grow in Chicago.

I wouldn't be so sure of that. Displacement of that magnitude means almost all of the forests in the north (perhaps the world) are well outside their climate zones. The most likely result will be a mass die-off, which will compound the CO² problem, making matters even worse. At some point, the permafrost melts, and the methane off-gassing may very well do what the CO² wasn't able to do -- flip the climate into a tropical state not seen in millions of years, or, alternately, into an ice age.

Originally Posted by MK ...

On the other hand, I think that the cost of battery storage will come down markedly and sooner rather than later. Only it may do so faster in nations besides the US. South Korea and Germany, Israel, maybe even France will be ahead of the US on the curve for onsite solar power just as they manage more competition and cheaper rates in Internet connections. The need to import and the precariousness of their energy future will keep them more honest than the US, which cares too much about it's investment in obselete technologies and has a financial sector too concerned about short term profitability.

Enzyme batteries, if fully developed, already meet the criteria of cheap and dense. They are even low-risk as waste. That said, they may still be inadequate unless we add a lot of zero-emission baseload to the mix. Even with a massive investment in batteries, relying on intermittent sources means a restructuring of our economy and how we assign power on a priority basis.

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

I live in Oklahoma and yeah, those injection wells are making us earthquake central in the US. At first, nobody even though injecting wastewater back into the earth would cause problems. Here is a short geology lesson about Oklahoma and oil. There is a failed rift called the Nemaha ridge which runs pretty much close to interstate 35. The failed rift is a weak spot in the crust , which is why we have some faults. Another dead give away for faults is, duh, oil fields. Faults are what trapped the oil to begin with. All oil fields have some sort of trap which creates them. So yeah, it would be a good idea to forgo the $$$ from frakking before something "interesting" happens. That "interesting" could be a bunch of pipeline ruptures in Cushing

I suspect the biggest fear is poisoning the Ogallala Aquifer

ZCZC MIATCDAT1 ALL
TTAA00 KNHC DDHHMM

HURRICANE ALEX DISCUSSION NUMBER 4
NWS NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL AL012016
1100 AM AST THU JAN 14 2016

Remarkably, Alex has undergone the transformation into a hurricane.
A distinct eye is present, embedded within a fairly symmetric mass
of deep convection. Water vapor imagery shows that the upper-level
trough is now west of the cyclone, with divergent flow over the
center - indicative of a tropical transition. It is very unusual to
have a hurricane over waters that are near 20 deg C, but the
upper-tropospheric temperatures are estimated to be around -60 deg
C, which is significantly colder than the tropical mean. The
resulting instability is likely the main factor contributing to the
tropical transition and intensification of Alex. With these
changes, the government of the Azores has issued warnings for most
of the Azores islands.

The initial intensity is set to 75 kt in accordance with the
analyzed Dvorak T-number of 4.5. Only slight additional
intensification seems possible since the system will be passing
over even colder waters during the next day or two. In 36 hours,
the global models suggest that the cyclone will become
extratropical as it begins to merge with a large low pressure area
at high latitude. The post-tropical cyclone is then likely to lose
its identity after 48 hours.

The initial motion is north-northeastward or 020/17 kt. Alex is
being steered by a shortwave mid-level trough that is rotating
around a larger trough to the northwest. This should cause the
cyclone to turn northward and north-northwestward and accelerate
over the next couple of days. The official track forecast is very
similar to the previous one and also quite close to the consensus
of the tightly-packed dynamical model forecast tracks.

Alex is the first hurricane to form in the month of January since
1938, and the first hurricane to occur in this month since Alice of
1955.

FORECAST POSITIONS AND MAX WINDS

INIT 14/1500Z 31.5N 28.4W 75 KT 85 MPH
12H 15/0000Z 34.3N 27.7W 80 KT 90 MPH
24H 15/1200Z 38.9N 27.7W 75 KT 85 MPH
36H 16/0000Z 45.3N 28.6W 60 KT 70 MPH...POST-TROP/EXTRATROP
48H 16/1200Z 53.0N 31.5W 60 KT 70 MPH...POST-TROP/EXTRATROP
72H 17/1200Z...DISSIPATED

$$
Forecaster Pasch

NNNN

And all this time, I thought El Nino put the kabash on hurricanes in the Atlantic...

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

ZCZC MIATCDAT1 ALL
TTAA00 KNHC DDHHMM

HURRICANE ALEX DISCUSSION NUMBER 4
NWS NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL AL012016
1100 AM AST THU JAN 14 2016

Remarkably, Alex has undergone the transformation into a hurricane.
A distinct eye is present, embedded within a fairly symmetric mass
of deep convection. Water vapor imagery shows that the upper-level
trough is now west of the cyclone, with divergent flow over the
center - indicative of a tropical transition. It is very unusual to
have a hurricane over waters that are near 20 deg C, but the
upper-tropospheric temperatures are estimated to be around -60 deg
C, which is significantly colder than the tropical mean. The
resulting instability is likely the main factor contributing to the
tropical transition and intensification of Alex. With these
changes, the government of the Azores has issued warnings for most
of the Azores islands.

The initial intensity is set to 75 kt in accordance with the
analyzed Dvorak T-number of 4.5. Only slight additional
intensification seems possible since the system will be passing
over even colder waters during the next day or two. In 36 hours,
the global models suggest that the cyclone will become
extratropical as it begins to merge with a large low pressure area
at high latitude. The post-tropical cyclone is then likely to lose
its identity after 48 hours.

The initial motion is north-northeastward or 020/17 kt. Alex is
being steered by a shortwave mid-level trough that is rotating
around a larger trough to the northwest. This should cause the
cyclone to turn northward and north-northwestward and accelerate
over the next couple of days. The official track forecast is very
similar to the previous one and also quite close to the consensus
of the tightly-packed dynamical model forecast tracks.

Alex is the first hurricane to form in the month of January since
1938, and the first hurricane to occur in this month since Alice of
1955.

FORECAST POSITIONS AND MAX WINDS

INIT 14/1500Z 31.5N 28.4W 75 KT 85 MPH
12H 15/0000Z 34.3N 27.7W 80 KT 90 MPH
24H 15/1200Z 38.9N 27.7W 75 KT 85 MPH
36H 16/0000Z 45.3N 28.6W 60 KT 70 MPH...POST-TROP/EXTRATROP
48H 16/1200Z 53.0N 31.5W 60 KT 70 MPH...POST-TROP/EXTRATROP
72H 17/1200Z...DISSIPATED

$$
Forecaster Pasch

NNNN

And all this time, I thought El Nino put the kabash on hurricanes in the Atlantic...

It had a beautiful, perfect eye for a while, but now the eye wall has broken down and it looks like extratropical transition has begun.

The Azores are still going to get fucked, though.

Originally Posted by Odin

It had a beautiful, perfect eye for a while, but now the eye wall has broken down and it looks like extratropical transition has begun.

The Azores are still going to get fucked, though.

First time I ever heard of a hurricane hitting the Azores. Generally the Azores are the centre of a high pressure zone when it's hurricane season. This hurricane could turn around to the east and hit the British Isles, particularly Ireland.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

I suspect the biggest fear is poisoning the Ogallala Aquifer

I learned about minor earthquakes from lubricated faults growing up in Denver. Seems the Rocky Mountain Arsenal, which stored amongst other things, nerve gas, had a deep disposal well. Back in the 70s, I was at a dog show in Henderson CO when there was an earthquake. And it wasn't the only one and the Arsenal had to stop using that disposal well.
There's no excuse for putting frakking wastewater back into a deep disposal well when there is desalinisation that will take 97% of the water out of the mix, leaving pure water and solid precipitate that can either be disposed of, valuable chemicals extracted from or both.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

It doesn't have to be a government like the United States. Nations can cooperate.

Nations cooperating scare me, Eric. Nations cooperating generally amount to elites and banks with more in common with each other than their respective citizens cooperating by closing ranks against their citizenry. Rather like the Monarchist nations of Europe ganging up on revolutionary France in the 1790s. Trans Pacific Partnership is nations cooperating. The European Union is nations cooperating. National cooperation is a great excuse to make govenrments tell their citizenry, "sorry, our hands are tied" when imposing austerity. Nations cooperating is what was done to Greece this summer.
The United Nations Organisation is basically just a tax free (so far, until the Seabed Authority starts bringing in money from minerals leases) foundation, created as such by FDR and the Rockefeller Brothers because creating corporations is what both knew how to do. And like the Concert of Europe before it, it has reached or passed it's "use-by-date".
Do you trust a corporation to run the world? I sure don't.