P30 Pick Points

Half-a-dozen or so stories of interest:

Moving to undo some of the last actions of the Bush Administration Interior Secretary Salazar has cancelled the lease agreements that had earlier been approved (but then delayed when the government did not cash the checks) in Utah for oil and natural gas. At the same time, in Wyoming some sales are proceeding, while other leases have been withdrawn at the Governor’s request.

Adding additional numbers to the costs for drilling wells in the gas shales, Encore Acquisition have stated that their goal this year, in the Bakken, is to reduce costs from $5 million per well to $4 million. They are also planning refracs of some of the wells. These are done some 9 – 18 months after initial completion, and at a cost of $500,000 each can increase reserves by up to 80,000 boe. Over in the Woodford, Newfield Exploration have lowered (on a lateral foot basis) the cost of drilling wells by some 38% and are hoping to continue this trend by drilling longer wells (out to 5,000 ft from 4,436 ft last year and 2,700 ft in 2007.) Lease rates in the Marcellus were reported to be up to $4,000 an acre and 17.5% royalty, prior to the slackening of demand.

Public relations in the Barnett still appear to be becoming more difficult, as an application for a compressor station has just been withdrawn. Without the dramatic reductions in well costs, and without an increase in gas prices unlikely in the present glut of gas, the current economics of many operations are being further questioned by Arthur Berman.

Royal Dutch Shell said that the cost of producing oil from the oil sands of Alberta rose to $38 a barrel last year. Their production dropped last year to 80,000 bd falling 7,000 bd from 2007, while costs rose by $9 a barrel. More than $60 billion worth of projects have now been delayed, including the expansion of the Shell output to 250,000 bd, which was scheduled for next year. Meanwhile Marathon has written down the $1.4 billion cost of its oil sand operation. Canadian Oil Sands trust, the largest shareholder in Syncrude Canada cut its dividend 80% because of the drop in oil prices. Meanwhile BP and Husky have not yet gone forward with their investment on the Sunrise assets in Alberta. Yet the prospects are such that a firm that specializes in the construction side of the development has just been taken over by Aecon. They, however, do not have to deal with the stronger environmental rules that are now being applied to the tailings ponds.

Merrill Lynch says non-OPEC oil production has peaked, expecting that such production will be in the 49-50 mbd range by next year, while the IEA were predicting last summer that the peak would be next year at around 51 mbd. The Merrill Lynch projection is based on an increase in field decline rates which they set at 4.5% against the IEA figure of 4.2%. The IEA recognizes that the decline rate will rise to 4.7% in the next seven years, but this will slow, not stop increases in production. In contrast ML argue that some of the decline will come from the loss in capital availability and this will carry decline above 5% (and perhaps as high as 6%). Should this happen then within a year oil prices will be back where they were earlier last year. A year ago CERA were saying that a 4.5% rate was typical but they were saying this as rumors and reports of figures already above 5% were starting to circulate.

It looks as though Croatia is going to be the next meal for Gazprom as plans for the Pan European Pipeline start to collapse, and their experts head off to Moscow. With Nabucco also still not having enough gas commitment to be viable and Gazprom is making promises to Turkey about providing natural gas their dominance becomes more evident. With the upcoming North and South Stream deliveries giving Russia the chance to provide for 50% of Western European gas needs (up from the current 25%), the only question becomes where does Gazprom get all the money to fund these developments? It must find $10 billion in debt payments by the end of July, and just lost up to $2 billion in the dispute with Ukraine. As a result they are sweetening their stock offers, even as their production of natural gas falls 14% y-o-y . On the other hand, as deliveries through the Baku-Tblitsi-Ceyhan rise, those through the Baku-Novorossisk pipeline are falling.

Over at the European Tribune Luis has just finished his 3-part review of the plan to Secure the Energy Future of the EU, with earlier posts on the Action Plan and an Introduction. Given the outreaching hand of Gazprom, it is worth getting to know this background, before it gets more serious.

More stories can be found at The Energy Bulletin and Drumbeat at The Oil Drum

The Weekly Petroleum Report

Every week the EIA puts out updated production charts for the past year. On Wednesdays those for petroleum, including crude oil and gasoline, are posted, and then on Thursday one can get information on the natural gas situation. These are useful charts, as much for showing the current situation in contrast to earlier years, and also to bring in the seasonal effects that are not always recognized if one just looks at the numbers for a month. Looking at these every week isn’t necessarily needed, but regular visits to both sites are well worth taking the time. For example let’s begin with what has happened to gasoline demand over the last year.
US Gasoline Demand

One can see, looking at the comparison of the patterns of the last two years how dramatic the slump was as the recession took hold in the US as we went into the Fall. But one can also see how, over the past three months, the demand has come closer to previous use at this time, and now appears almost coincident with that of a year ago.

The next interesting thing to do, having seen what demand is doing, is to see how it is being met. Gas can either be refined domestically, or it can be imported after refining. And one can see that the domestic refining of gas recovered more quickly than the demand:
US Production of Gasoline

It has been in the import of gasoline that the drop-off in demand has been handled.
Gasoline imports

Yet even here the product is coming in at close to the same level as it was a year ago, indicating that this particular part of the economy has no longer been hurt as much, in volume, as one might have thought. Now it is true that is does not all have to be used, but if one looks at the volumes that are held in stock, the quantity is less than last year, and so, although there has been a build in stocks, it is well within the average values for the past five years.

Gasoline stocks

I should note that by May of last year the country had seen a steady decline in the number of miles driven, relative to 2007, because of the increase in the price of gasoline, so that needs to be remembered in this analysis.

Taking a step further back into the process, gasoline coming out of the refinery is only a part of the product, and so we look at what is going into the refineries. In relative terms we again see that dip in volume that came in at the end of September, and which we have been assigning to the recession.
US Refinery inputs

But now it is important to look at the regions of the country to see how the refineries in each region has been coping. And in looking there we see another cause for the drop in refinery operations.
Regional Refinery inputs

Notice that they all remained stable, apart from the Gulf Coast. And if you remember there were two significant Hurricanes that affected production in the Gulf this past summer. I have used a plot from the Natural gas page (which I will chat about tomorrow) to show when they occurred.
Showing the arrival of two hurricanes.

So one steps back to consider where the crude oil that went to the refineries came from.

Domestic supplies are again back to normal, and stabilized fairly rapidly after September.

Domestic crude oil production

While imports are also back to historic levels. Note they also fell since there were issues with getting oil into Gulf refineries.
Crude Oil imports

And since they recovered somewhat quicker than demand, stocks of crude have risen above the five-year average.

Crude stocks of oil

Which has allowed the Administration to begin pumping oil into the Strategic Reserve again.

And the thing is, looking at these figures, it does suggest that if demand is returning to earlier levels, then supplies may tighten again, and prices will then start back up. So that is why we will keep dropping by these EIA pages and noting what they tell us in the months ahead.

Regal Edicts or a Canute Moment?

Glancing throught the WP this morning I came upon the following quote

Environmental groups yesterday were working on a letter to senators, arguing that the risk of default on the loans for nuclear and coal projects -- and thus the potential cost to taxpayers -- was much higher than that.

"The credit risk to the taxpayer is very significant," said Josh Dorner, a spokesman for the Sierra Club.

At the moment coal-fired power plants provide about half the nation's electricity, nuclear about 20%, natural gas about 21% and hydro-electric about 6%. It would seem that the environmental groups are suggesting that, with the change in Administration these ratios will change and that there will be a major change in supply sources.

Now I know that Dr. James Hansen is wandering around decrying coal extraction and use, both with his letter today demanding that the mine at Coal River Mountain not be allowed to proceed, and making a successful input to the KingsNorth protest trial , but there is a point where reality has to be brought into the debate.

As an illustration, back in the days when the Kings of England had real power (as in “off with his head” type power) Edward I (Longshanks – the one that had (Mel Gibson -er no) , (Braveheart er no), William Wallace (yes) cut in bits while alive), decided that he didn’t like the smell of coal burning and banned its use from London.

Early on, no one had the scientific tools to correlate smog with adverse health effects, but complaints about the smoky air as an annoyance date back to at least 1272, when King Edward I, on the urging of important noblemen and clerics, banned the burning of sea-coal. Anyone caught burning or selling the stuff was to be tortured or executed. The first offender caught was summarily put to death. This deterred nobody. Of necessity, citizens continued to burn sea-coal in violation of the law, which required the burning of wood few could afford.

So it is today. Even if the information that Dr Hansen was providing about global warming was correct (see my Saturday posts among many others that point to evidence that he is not) one must first find and provide a satisfactory alternative. Solar panels do not do one any good if they are under a foot of snow and wind turbines don’t work well if festooned in ice. Thus one is left to look at natural gas as being the potential alternative to coal and nuclear power.

The EIA projection for sources of power for projected new stations shows that of the roughly 93,000 Megawatts (MW) of new power anticipated to come on line between 2008 and 2012, roughly half (48,460 MW) is anticipated to be powered by natural gas, and 15,000 MW roughly by wind , while coal has 23,347 MW and nuclear only appears in 2012 wih 1,270 MW . (Solar is at 2,395 MW). Now the further out years are probably a little low for solar and wind, since these cost somewhat less to install in terms of time and money, although permitting of wind is becoming an issue in California. Yet I suspect that they may be a little high, by that time for natural gas.

When one looks at the current projection for natural gas supply in the country then one gets a quite significantly mixed message. On the one hand there are growing reports of new wells being sunk into the various gas shales around the country and the success that they are having. The Oil and Gas Journal, for example, wrote last week of developments in the Marcellus shale, speaking of Range Resources Crop.

The Marcellus, a hindrance to overall capital efficiency the past few years, will be "highly accretive to our capital efficiency in 2009," the company said.

Seven of the 10 wells had initial rates of 3.5 MMcfd or gas equivalent or more, and three flowed 9 MMcfd of gas equivalent or more. The best well made 24.5 MMcfd of gas equivalent.

The company is producing 35 MMcfd of gas equivalent from the Marcellus and is constrained by processing capacity. Eight of the wells have been on line for more than 30 days, and their 30-day average rate is 4.3 MMcfd of gas equivalent. The highest volume well averaged 9.6 MMcfd of gas equivalent. . . . . Range, which has cut more than 20 days and $800,000 from its drilling costs in recent wells, believes horizontal well costs will average $3-4 million in 2009.

I had earlier mentioned that the long slick-water fracked horizontal wells were being estimated as costing about $5 million apiece, and those numbers suggest the ballpark that drillers are now playing in. There are similar tales of success for the Barnett, Fayetteville, Woodford and other gas shales around the country.

Haynesville production is also looking promising.

The company's budget is $690 million for Haynesville drilling in 2009, when it expects to average 12 rigs and complete 75-80 gross wells.

Petrohawk is targeting laterals of 4,300-4,600 ft with as many as 15 frac stages spaced 325 ft apart to improve drainage and minimize the number of wells.

While laterals at its first four completions averaged 3,339 ft with 10 frac stages, the last 12 completions averaged 3,958 ft and 12 stages except one well that had mechanical problems and only six frac stages.

In an article in the OGJ authors from Booz & Co quote an EIA projection that unconventional natural gas will represent almost 50% of total US production by 2012.

It is this increasing reliance on the unconventional gas reserve that leads me to first be a bit cautious about seeing the assurance of future supply, and then in being comfortable with the ability to continue to supply the growing power station demand for gas, let alone increases in other demands.

It should be remembered that gas wells in shale have a relatively short life, and with some 60% of production lost after their first year of operation long-term stability of supply (a vital necessity for power station viability) can only be assured by a continuous program of well drilling. And since one tends to drill the more promising leads first, this also implies that to meet demand the number of operational rigs will have to increase, rather than the current opposite. For that to occur the price of natural gas will have to rise back up again.

And here we come to catch 22 (and back to old King Edward) – at this point natural gas supply and demand will reach a balance point (that likely reduces each year) as the increase in price limits the demand for a switch in comparison to coal. That has already happened at our local power station that has blanked off the gas feed lines, and does not anticipate unsealing them again. As companies seek to find the cheapest alternative that will allow them to continue to operate (these not being the best of financial times) then the market for coal, and probably nuclear, will grow, rather than decline and the investors in those power plants will probably have a better financially assured future than those investing in other alternatives.

By the way, speaking as one groundhog in defense of another, why are they picking on Punxsutawney Phil?

P29 Pick Points

Half-a-dozen or so stories of interest:

In 2006 ethanol was still the biofuel of the future, and while cellulosic ethanol was still a bit of a dream, corn-based ethanol was already seen as riding to the rescue both of farmers and fuel users. Two years later the emphasis seems to be moving towards cellulosic ethanol, with a more negative view of corn-based. US capacity has dropped 5% to about 10 billion gallons a year, while in contrast POET has just opened the first cellulosic ethanol pilot plant. The University of Minnesota has just issued a study that shows cellulosic is better for human health, and will help slow climate change. It is an idea whose time appears to have come, and the Chinese are also moving forward, using corn stover as a feedstock.

Oil output from Russia has declined by 0.9% y-o-y to average 9.7 mbd in January this year. This may be in sympathy with OPEC fuel cuts, or it may be an indication of another peaking in their production. It is always a little hard to tell, however, since though supply dropped 60,000 bd in January, some of this may be weather related, with field production falling in the worst of the weather. However the difficulty in restarting wells under Arctic conditions after they have stopped flowing are considerable. Dave Cohen looked at the data last April suspecting that Russia had peaked, and their performance since has not been reassuring. Thus Prime Minister Putin may be sufficiently concerned to reopen Russian markets to foreign companies. If this is one signal that investment is not ongoing, then at least in some eyes, shortages may come within the next three years.

Turkmenistan continues to try and build its global visibility based on its gas reserves, and that both Russia and the West would like that gas in their pipelines, it now hints it can supply Nabucco. Iran is also going to be helping develop the gas reserve and with work continuing on the pipeline to China,their gas business is booming. They may even seek help from Belgium.

First there was the Barnett, then the Fayetteville, then Haynesville and the Marcellus, and the Bakken, now there is the Moosebar, a new gas shale that is being explored in Northeast British Columbia. In the meanwhile producers are still expecting that the Barnett and Fayetteville will remain productive. Back in October Southwestern Energy were planning to use 19 rigs to get production in the Fayetteville up to a 100 million cu ft/day. A TV program – Shale TV that was supposed to premier late last year on the Barnett was shelved, because of the economy as part of the problems that Chesapeake, the sponsor, was having at the time. And there has been some growing resistance to the development of the Barnett, while a new pipeline is going into the Haynesville. Meanwhile Statoilhydro has purchased a large part of Chesapeake’s holdings in the Marcellus shale, now if only the price would go back up . . .

On a climate related note there has been a volcanic eruption at Mount Asama 90 m from Tokyo while Mount Redoubt, a volcano in Alaska, also prepares to blow its stack.

And even as southern Australia bakes in a drought, in Northern Queensland there is massive flooding.

Rural Electric Systems

The world is in recession. And with the drop in demand for different fuels, it becomes a little harder to see when we will return to the teetering balance between available supply and demand. Certainly the price increases that happened last year have not totally dropped back and eased the discomfort in places such as India. The current price of gas remains high out of Russia, and the agreements that Eastern European countries will now pay prevailing prices for their gas, will be an increasing burden on their economies.

There is, however, an underlying desire by governments in the less well-developed countries to increase the availability of electricity to their rural regions. Whether it be in Africa or Asia, the arrival of power in a village can make a drastic difference in the quality of life. It has been suggested that the initial impact, however, relates more to female than male employment. And yet levels of penetration are not yet that great. For example, Botswana has about 12% connectivity, while Zambia is estimated to have only 2.2% connectivity. Many of these countries, with the aid of foreign governments, intend to radically improve these percentages.


The original target for Zambia was to have 50% access by 2010 and the country is concluding an agreement with Japan for $550 million with a grant from Sweden for $30 million also in the works. And yet current power outages make even the existing network insufficient to meet the need, with health centers being reduced to working by candle light. However, in contrast to Zimbabwe and Botswana, Zambia generates most of its power from hydro-electric sources, and the failure of one of the turbines has exacerbated the current problem.

The shortage highlights, however, the problems in creating a new set of power sources to meet the needs for the rural program. It is not sufficient to provide the connections to the grid, if the grid is not itself sufficient to meet the needs it will face. For Zambia the immediate solution is the construction of the Itezhi-Tezhi 120 MW power station. and increasing the capacity of existing hydro-electric schemes. In these efforts the partnerships are being formed with Indian and Chinese contractors.

Boosting hydro-electric production is also seen as helping in Bhutan, where the Asian Development Bank is funding the Green Power Development Project which will not only provide power to rural Bhutan, but will also provide export power to India, reducing their need for fossil fuels.

In Mali Jatropha has been used to produce power in a pilot plant at Garalo . At present the plantation has been formed, but it will take a couple of years to generate the seeds (one gets around 2 kg/tree/year) in sufficient volume for the plant. A ton of seeds produces 250 kg of oil, and 750 kg of filtercake, which can be used as a fertilizer. The oil has to be pre-heated and filtered before it can be fed into the generators, of which the village has 3 at 100 kV.

Jatropha is not, however, as productive as was once thought, with collection being more labor intensive and yields being relatively low at around 2 tons per hectare. Thus originally optimistic projections for its use are now being qualified. Yet just today a relatively large (180 million gallon/year) refinery has been announced. A market for the fuel has been helped by the passage of the Biofuels act in the Philippines that requires that 1% biodiesel shall be blended into fuel in 3 months, rising to 2% in 2 years. The only alternative to jatropha in country at the moment is a plant that produces coconut oil, and that is meeting 55% of the current demand for biodiesel.

While biodiesel has, therefore some advocates moving forward, as a fuel supplement, and can be used for power generation, quite often the funding initiatives have been oriented towards solar electricity. Schedules are provided, for example, that show that 5 sq m of solar cells will supply a school with 16 lights, power for a projector, and a socket for a small electrical device. Solar also has the benefit of being installable in areas that are remote from the grid, and where running power lines would be expensive.

The Green Power Development project in Bhutan is one such, and supplies for 100 communities are planned in that endeavor. As I mentioned recently, the initial trials of the technology have gone over well with the nomadic yak herders, reducing their need for firewood and kerosene.

Herders from Nubri and Soie Yaksa said alternative energy technologies like solar lighting and the one- and two-holed metallic solar cooker were very useful and convenient. “The small portable solar light is the best. We can take it along with us whereever we go,” said Tobgay from Nubri.

Nado from Soie Yaksa said that use of solar had reduced the danger of burns, cooking time, and saved firewood. Norza Gem from Soie Yaksa said that she could cook faster, churn milk and round up cattle at night.

A report from CORRB states that the use of kerosene has been reduced by 90% in these areas.

. One of the recognized problems is that of maintenance and repair. This can be partially overcome by having the lamps etc rented, and recharging them at a central facility. Such an operation in Laos has grown into a small business. In Bhutan, however, they recruited local women to learn how to deal with the problems. The Barefoot Solar Engineers had to walk 5 hours to a local road and then on to India’s Barefoot College in order to learn how to do the repair, and one of the engineers now maintains systems in 30 villages – not bad for someone whose formal education stopped at grade 5.

There are many such encouraging stories of such a nature at the local level, and from them one can anticipate that electricity demand will grow steadily. But the next question will come as demand rises above that needed at this scale. But then that is a topic for another day.

P28 Pick Points

Half-a-dozen or so stories of interest:

As up to seven new LNG ports and a number of carriers are completed this year it is expected that supplies will increase to the United States. The projects have been planned for so long, and cost so much that gas must flow and be sold. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has had to develop policies on LNG , but even they defer to the market. Given this potential for over-supply the Freeport LNG terminal is looking into the potential for re-export, and local storage, since peak demand and supply may not be in phase. On the other hand recognizing that the time might be ripe to gain access to a cheaper source of power, Japan’s Tokyo Gas is looking at installing a new LNG terminal. To ensure supplies they have agreed to extend buying contracts for LNG supplies from Alaska. The Japanese, who are the largest users of LNG, need to do this to replace supplies that have been lost due to export reductions from Indonesia. The Alaskan gas sells for roughly 4/7ths of what the Japanese would have to pay for gas from Qatar.

In the lower 48, gas producers from shale are moving to stabilize supplies to the network. A new “Tiger Pipeline” is planned to collect and deliver for Haynesville shale gas into the interstate network. A new well is going into the Haynesville, that will run 17,000 ft horizontally. The Marcellus shale is also seeing some investor interest. XTO expects that gas (natural) prices will head back up before the year is out.

Hopes for energy price increases are hitting the wind industry, just as it comes out of a year where the USA added 8.5 GW of wind power. Of the major states adding wind power, California has seen the smallest recent growth, and in part that is because all the “easy” sites have now been taken, and the costs of permitting are now beginning to bite in the sites that are now in development. As a result Iowa is now second in wind power in the nation and has six manufacturers. But it turns out that the claim that the wind industry had more employees than coal mining relied on skewed counting (they counted everyone in wind, but only the miners in coal mining. But older wind farms are refurbishing with larger turbines and this also helps economically.

There will be a new 500 MW farm in Iowa, if they can get enough land, but construction will start in 3-5 years. In Rhode Island they plan on starting an offshore plant in 2010, they have enough wind for utility size operations which is level 3 on land (out of 7 with 1 being poorest), but have higher levels offshore, which is where the farm will go. In inland Northwest Missouri they now have a town (albeit only 1300 people) that receives all their power from the 4 nearby wind turbines.

The disruption caused by Total giving a contract to an outside, rather than domestic company in the UK may spread to other refineries and include nuclear power plants.

High temperatures in Australia, and particularly Melbourne played some considerable havoc with the Australian Open . Even as that ended, rolling blackouts are anticipated today because of the closure of the power link from Tasmania (due to overheating) . About 20,000 homes in the state (Victoria) are without power and the rise in the demand for energy has reached the limits of what can be provided. Bush fires are also threatening power lines, and a local coal company operation , while the drought is draining local water supplies . Locals are also concerned because of the secrecy of the order of priorities for load shedding.

It is not only in California and Australia that water supply is a problem. In the Central Asian republics Russia is stepping in to sort out possible conflicts since the countries from which the main water supply comes (Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan( want to develop hydropower, while those downstream (Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan) want the water for agriculture. The Tajiks are willing to offer the Uzbeks water for energy. Turkmenistan is also involved since they send out electric power that must pass through other countries to the end user.

Uzbekistan is demanding 10 per cent of the $0.03 per kilowatt paid by Tajikistan to Turkmenistan.
This year the Uzbeks are also charging Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan US$ 240 per 1000 m3, up from 145 dollars last year.

And the Tajiks are not taking kindly to the Russian intervention.

For more stories go to The Energy Bulletin or Drumbeat at The Oil Drum

Saturday Pick Points

Running a little late again, blame the ice on the grass!

Taking the weekly stroll around some of the climate sites, we start this week with the story that wasn’t. Perhaps nothing illustrates the control that the environmental lobby now have over the news better than the quiet disappearance of the story about James Hansen’s boss. Dr. Theon does no agree with Dr. Hansen’s work, in a nutshell. It was picked up by Anthony Watt and there was a brief comment in a response at Real Climate, and a post at Grist but perhaps given the time since he retired, there really wasn’t as much to the story as first appeared.

Climate Audit has been a little embroiled this week with getting the raw data for a study by Dr Santer, who had previously been loathe to provide the information. It has now been posted, though some minor debate about the process remains. The two more interesting posts are however, (for the sadists among us) the chase, by a polar bear, around a van and the contrast going on between various models of Antarctic temperatures, based on Steig’s paper discussed last week. It will be interesting to follow that thread.

Real Climate makes mention of an article in the Daily Mirror, that goes back to a Danish paper, and I am going to break tradition by putting their plot up, since it agrees with Dr Akosafu that the rise in sea level began about 200 years ago.

Their conclusions, based on a continued acceleration of the line in the short term really depend on the cause of the change, and if it is a return to a warming period, when the curve bends back over. Real Climate has other issues with the paper and considers it unrealistic and caused by a misunderstanding of the data, and explain why they see the return to an equilibrium state as taking a much longer time that the Danes. Both however project a sea level rise of over a meter, this century. Interesting that the Danes report

Over the last 2,000 years minimum sea level (-19 to -26 cm) occurred around 1730 AD, maximum sea level (12–21 cm) around 1150 AD.

which tie in with the MWP and the LIA, and which lead them to project a cycle time of 1200 years.

Real Climate goes into some discussion of the Antarctic warming story that I mentioned last week, and has some rebuttal and discussion relative to the points that Climate Audit were raising, as well as a couple of snide digs at Ross Hays, whose letter at WUWT, was part of last week’s story. They end the week with a discussion, relating to the inter-relationship between air and ocean carbon inter alia, on the paper that got a headline this week that carbon dioxide emission effects will last a thousand years.

Gristmill has some fun (and if they think about it shows the irrelevancy of the argument) by showing how folk are within six degrees of funding by Exxon Mobil. (If their criterion is that a University got some money from that source, then it gets tenuous fast). They note for example that the new USDA chief can be tied to coal money. They note that the wind industry in the United States now employs more than the coal industry and Jerome’s column that the wind industry will contract this year, due to the financial climate.

They don’t like beef tallow biodiesel; the NPR debate on the value of carbon reduction; UL certification of “greenworthiness”; or the Illinois Clean Coal Portfolio.

But it does like giving funds to the natural world; a pro-rail coalition; a kid’s book on climate change; and noted that the lawyer who argued for Massachusetts against EPA in the case over global warming is now joining EPA, while it is following the freezing of the Arctic ice this year. If you go there, you’ll find it since went back up. (For which there is no headline)

And to return to WUWT who hosts an interesting paper on how CO2 and temperature levels can be related, there is an interesting discussion on what is really needed to make a good forecast -climate projection has a few problems there, and the site continues to grow, after having won the Weblog award for science.

On a not-unrelated topic, in discussing the current financial package, Taleb, a former trader who wrote the book "The Black Swan," argued that Wall Street's models -- supposed to prevent bankers from taking excessive risks -- were actually a big part of the problem, since they created a false sense of confidence about the future. Rather than seeking reassurance in models, he advised anxious traders to go have a drink or take up religion. I wonder if that relates also to the global warming models - somehow I can't see those guys giving up all the funds they are getting to go find a bar.