You haven't identified a group, a motive, a psychological mechanism, described the method, or explained the intention in any depth.
In other words, this is a cynical lament about how other people suck that's not descriptive enough to be useful or falsifiable. I believe in acknowledging harsh realities for the sake of dealing with them, but there's just no substance here to even acknowledge.
For fossil-fuel companies, it's about control and extending the world's dependency on their products as far into the future as possible. The others are on their dole to one degree or another, when you consider that many of the edges in the graph in the article represent not only relationships, but also flows of money.
Why don’t they invest in other sectors though vs doubling down? Tobacco companies, famously unscrupulous, did just this, saw the writing on the wall and now make their money off zyn and vapes vs trying to swim upstream selling traditional tobacco products. Seems to me an oil company has enough resources where they can out invest most any green vc outright and dominate the marketshare if they were so inclined.
This is playing out like the hubris film companies had towards digital sensors. Seems they don’t teach history in MBA programs I guess.
One of the core problems of contemporary news media is that you only ever get exposed to the straw man arguments of the other side. It's just so lucrative to perpetually paint the other side as obviously idiotic, so people can jerk off their ago about how smart they are. Then after years of this they have built a solid immutable mental model of their opponent that is mostly incorrect, but the thing they hold dearest. All so they can keep you tuning in to watch fucking advertisements...
Effective propaganda is generally based around slivers of truth. The real problem is the people who believe these viewpoints for valid honest reasons, yet end up getting taken in by the people promoting them for self serving reasons. They feel so happy to simply "be heard" that they end up supporting movements not actually aimed at reforming, but rather furthering corruption. This happens to both political teams - in fact I'd say this is the professional parties' primary purpose.
Please summarise these reasons. Frankly, I'm sceptical. I suspect it's a different philosophy not counterfactual outcomes. Some people dislike socialised tax and regulation.
The uncomfortable truth is that they most likely have the same loves, passions, interests and motivations as us. They are not some alien other, they are us.
But that is uncomfortable. We like certainty more. We prefer an easily identified enemy.
The difference (in many things) is not the motivation but the beliefs about what to do about it. Political opponents are more similar than different. By understanding the other you can reach them and effectively change them.
If you are puzzled by a group of people the issue is not that group - it is the puzzlement!
However one effective political tactic is to outgroup and other an opponent. It strengthens your sense of belonging to the right group. The danger is that it is inward facing and lowers inclusiveness. Empathy generally weakens ones own political passions but brings more peace. Restricting empathy increases enthusiasm and energy and action.
Moreover, there are academic studies and popular schools of thought that say empathy is dangerous, that people should be entitled to their rage and emotions and that people shouldn't be forced to understand. That empathy itself is a tool of power.
There are plenty of "legacy" environmental organizations that view any form of construction, including construction of renewable energy, as worthy of being opposed. They aren't all interested in the bigger picture of advancing renewable energy to slow climate change.
Maybe, but this study is about specific, named organisations with documented personnel or financial ties to fossil fuel companies. Not sure how your comment is relevant to them
Even if you don't care about climate change, spending money to stop all development of wind energy technology and its deployment into the national energy mix is very very dumb. There are a lot of people who just hate certain things and make it their life mission to inflict damage onto it no matter what. It's not a rational thought process.
I did hear an argument on Mastodon that made some kind of sense: currently the US dollar is the reserve currency of the world, not least because oil is bought with USD. Reduce the world's dependency on oil, and you reduce the world's dependency on USD. If the USA loses the benefit of the rest of the world needing USD to buy oil, that changes the US economy in bad ways. Hence the USA opposing renewable energy as much as it can.
I'm not saying it's true - I have no idea. But it's at least a rational reason for opposing renewables, which otherwise seems to be very irrational.
As I understand it, at least some of these groups are nominally pro-nuclear. They are aware that nuclear plants have a very long lead time, while wind (and solar) can be installed quickly. So they can advocate for nuclear as a way of fending off other non-fossil-fuel energy sources, without actually replacing any fossil fuels with nuclear.
What I don’t get about all these evil scrooge types that run out world, is why wouldn’t they want to make money off things like wind and actual climate salves? Seems to me the coming climate crises is going to cost a ton of money and lead to destruction of entire national economies. Meanwhile they could have been raising all boats and made even more money and had even more things to invest in.
Is oil really that profitable to ignore the havoc it wreaks and will wreak on virtually every other industry, including itself when there is less money moving around to spend on oil and oil products?
I just don’t get it how being so objectively shortsighted is actually the corrupt greedy money position instead of ensuring the world as we know it doesn’t collapse and that the money printing machine doesn’t fall apart. But what do I know I guess.
Its because they're in a death cult purity spiral.[0] They suffer from cognitive dissonance so a part of them understands this stuff but another part of them identifies so strongly with their peer group and profession that this second part wins out.
It's really unfortunate that such glaring cognitive defects appear to have doomed the human race smothering itself to death on this planet instead of reaching out to the stars.
If you haven’t heard the term you should look up accelerationists.
There’s several competing flavors of it like the ones who think “the good” communist revolution will happen after society collapses vs the ones who want democracy to fall apart because they think monarchical societies are morally superior, but they all have the same line of thinking that “the collapse” is coming any day now and they want to accelerate when they say occurs
Organised communism is almost completely defunct and afaik the 4th international likewise. At this point accelerationist left views would be as fringe as sovereign citizens and certainly not allied to the coal oil and nuclear industries.
The former RCP members who joined the tory party in the UK, people like Dominic Cummings are interesting of course. And Steve Bannon is fond of posturing as a Maoist in style if not in substance. His oilskin coat is a performance Mao jacket.
I don't understand, I try to constantly mark the threads that use software stacks I don't use or care about ("how to do X in framework Y better with respect to metric Z"). I am constantly interested in scientific discussions. Sometimes HN feels like a slow news day, and the thread with less points and less comments is what I get to see, and this underlying thread does feel suppressed...
I notice a lot of threads critical of e.g., YC vompanies, silicon valley, Israel, corporate greed, capitalism, tend to get to the front page and then disappear soon after.
I'm not sure exactly how the mechanism for the front page works, so I'm not saying it's intentional, but the effect is that the front page trends towards safe topics that don't question the status quo, not even the tech status quo, unless it's about specifically technical issues or the software labour market.
Three wind projects got scrapped in NY and I always wondered if there was some alternate hidden reason. It does seem though that it was just costs and technological shifts that made NY cancel them...
> production of wind energy is crucial for meeting science-based climate goals
What exactly is a science-based climate goal? And why would wind energy be essential for it?
I hear people talk about their solar installations all the time, and it seems like the anti-nuclear sentiment is finally wearing off too. I don't think I've ever heard anything positive about one of these windmills. It seems to be a fairly straightforward wealth transfer from tax payers and utility consumers to the windmill people. Property values go down and electricity prices go up. Windmill people move on to collect the next subsidy.
They pay for themselves in a couple of years (even without subsidies) and tend to produce peak power during periods when solar is offline (e.g. at night or cloudy days). Farmers like them because they don't take up much space and they provide revenue independent of how well their crops do, which varies wildly year to year. It's cheaper than burning fossil fuels (though not quite as cheap as solar)
Adding wind to the network does not make electricity prices go up (unless you do something stupid like shut down all your nuclear plants at the same time). That's nonsense. It's maybe not quite as cheap if you factor in the storage requirements to build up the grid "properly", but still cheaper than coal at the very least.
They're ~the cheapest power options available and provide decades and decades of zero-marginal-cost energy. Building a wind turbine today has about the same all-in "LCOE" as running existing nuclear plants. Building new nukes results in electricity that's about 4x as expensive as building turbines instead.
Not to say we shouldn't build more nuke plants, but they're extraordinarily expensive to build and have construction timelines measured in decades so it's nearly impossible to make them pencil out on a per-kwh basis when compared to wind or solar + batteries that can be deployed and commissioned in 6 months.
>They're ~the cheapest power options available and provide decades and decades of zero-marginal-cost energy.
It's not zero-marginal-cost energy because they do need maintenance. But I'm more interested in knowing where your lifespan idea comes from. I have seen multiple sources agree that wind turbines are expected to last 20ish years, after which they must at least be taken down and refurbished, if not cut into pieces and buried (as they are not recyclable).
>Building new nukes results in electricity that's about 4x as expensive as building turbines instead.
This sounds impossible, especially if you count land value, maintenance, grid stability measures that are required to deal with flaky power sources, etc.
It’s one based on science instead of whatever someone finds convenient. So sub 2 C.
Why would wind not be essential for it? Wind is free just like solar. Some places have amazing wind. Wind costs have declined dramatically so it’s a viable piece of the mix.
There are some who think windmills unsightly, which I don’t understand at all. The old style associated with Dutch stereotypes is cute and picturesque, and the modern type futuristic. If I see windmills within eyeshot, my first thought is, “oh cool, the people here really have it figured out.” Of all the things that I might see on the horizon, windmills are among those that would bother me the least.
For what it's worth: one of the reasons Google has a datacenter in Iowa (of all places) is that there's a windfarm out there making up something like 60% of the local power generation. That makes the power super cheap (and with all the land they have, that windfarm can continue to scale).
If Google's putting their money into it, I suspect there's more to the wind story than "wealth transfer from tax payers and consumers to the windmill people."
Same in the Netherlands; companies like Google, Microsoft etc invest in offshore power alongside the government and energy companies. Unfortunately this also means they "claim" a percentage of its capacity for newly built datacenters, meaning that it's not so much replacing non-renewable energy sources as adding to total production.
Electricity prices go up? Are you blaming the windmills? It should you blame the new AI data centers
And windmills are profitable by themselves. And reduces foreign imports with increasing taxes on this goods. If we removed all subsidies coal would be the real affected.
I am not sure about property value but burning gas next to homes creating health problems to power Elon musk data centers surely doesn't help. The dark fumes from coal, gas or oil are going to affect it.
It's more precise, avoiding that strange construction, "science-based". If I understand correctly, linguists call these productive analogies (?), where we start producing more of them by analogy to some root, so:
Wind power also has the benefit that it keeps the carbon in the ground and isn't contributing to the massive climate crisis that humanity and the earth's ecosystems are facing. And there's no direct waste from energy production.
> What exactly is a science-based climate goal? And why would wind energy be essential for it?
Land-based wind power is OK-ish. It's susceptible to renewable droughts, but it's fine as long as it's just a part of the mix.
But the offshore wind power is pretty much the _only_ reliable renewable, outside of classic hydro and exotics like tidal power or geothermal. Offshore wind generators are pretty much guaranteed to always produce at least _some_ power due to diurnal wind patterns.
Readit News
In other words, this is a cynical lament about how other people suck that's not descriptive enough to be useful or falsifiable. I believe in acknowledging harsh realities for the sake of dealing with them, but there's just no substance here to even acknowledge.
Nobody benefits from this sort of thinking.
For fossil-fuel companies, it's about control and extending the world's dependency on their products as far into the future as possible. The others are on their dole to one degree or another, when you consider that many of the edges in the graph in the article represent not only relationships, but also flows of money.
This is playing out like the hubris film companies had towards digital sensors. Seems they don’t teach history in MBA programs I guess.
for example:
1) more expensive energy of any kind is extremely harmful to society
EDIT: more expensive energy reduces prosperity for everyone. Renewable energy can and should be competitive and cost effective.
2) automatic filing of taxes is more harmful long-term than individuals filing taxes manually
EDIT: automatic filing will lead to silent frictionless automatic tax increases, forever.
3) government funding of internet/broadband/etc is harmful
EDIT: picking winners is more harmful that makeing good public policies.
it's just hard to reason though the details, though it is worth the effort.
My point is that there could be valid viewpoints that are not self-serving/greed-based.
But that is uncomfortable. We like certainty more. We prefer an easily identified enemy.
The difference (in many things) is not the motivation but the beliefs about what to do about it. Political opponents are more similar than different. By understanding the other you can reach them and effectively change them.
If you are puzzled by a group of people the issue is not that group - it is the puzzlement!
However one effective political tactic is to outgroup and other an opponent. It strengthens your sense of belonging to the right group. The danger is that it is inward facing and lowers inclusiveness. Empathy generally weakens ones own political passions but brings more peace. Restricting empathy increases enthusiasm and energy and action.
Moreover, there are academic studies and popular schools of thought that say empathy is dangerous, that people should be entitled to their rage and emotions and that people shouldn't be forced to understand. That empathy itself is a tool of power.
I'm not saying it's true - I have no idea. But it's at least a rational reason for opposing renewables, which otherwise seems to be very irrational.
Is oil really that profitable to ignore the havoc it wreaks and will wreak on virtually every other industry, including itself when there is less money moving around to spend on oil and oil products?
I just don’t get it how being so objectively shortsighted is actually the corrupt greedy money position instead of ensuring the world as we know it doesn’t collapse and that the money printing machine doesn’t fall apart. But what do I know I guess.
It's really unfortunate that such glaring cognitive defects appear to have doomed the human race smothering itself to death on this planet instead of reaching out to the stars.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purity_spiral
There’s several competing flavors of it like the ones who think “the good” communist revolution will happen after society collapses vs the ones who want democracy to fall apart because they think monarchical societies are morally superior, but they all have the same line of thinking that “the collapse” is coming any day now and they want to accelerate when they say occurs
The former RCP members who joined the tory party in the UK, people like Dominic Cummings are interesting of course. And Steve Bannon is fond of posturing as a Maoist in style if not in substance. His oilskin coat is a performance Mao jacket.
Dead Comment
Dead Comment
University student?
I'm not sure exactly how the mechanism for the front page works, so I'm not saying it's intentional, but the effect is that the front page trends towards safe topics that don't question the status quo, not even the tech status quo, unless it's about specifically technical issues or the software labour market.
https://governorswindenergycoalition.org/3-offshore-wind-pro...
What exactly is a science-based climate goal? And why would wind energy be essential for it?
I hear people talk about their solar installations all the time, and it seems like the anti-nuclear sentiment is finally wearing off too. I don't think I've ever heard anything positive about one of these windmills. It seems to be a fairly straightforward wealth transfer from tax payers and utility consumers to the windmill people. Property values go down and electricity prices go up. Windmill people move on to collect the next subsidy.
Adding wind to the network does not make electricity prices go up (unless you do something stupid like shut down all your nuclear plants at the same time). That's nonsense. It's maybe not quite as cheap if you factor in the storage requirements to build up the grid "properly", but still cheaper than coal at the very least.
Do you have a source on this?
Not to say we shouldn't build more nuke plants, but they're extraordinarily expensive to build and have construction timelines measured in decades so it's nearly impossible to make them pencil out on a per-kwh basis when compared to wind or solar + batteries that can be deployed and commissioned in 6 months.
It's not zero-marginal-cost energy because they do need maintenance. But I'm more interested in knowing where your lifespan idea comes from. I have seen multiple sources agree that wind turbines are expected to last 20ish years, after which they must at least be taken down and refurbished, if not cut into pieces and buried (as they are not recyclable).
>Building new nukes results in electricity that's about 4x as expensive as building turbines instead.
This sounds impossible, especially if you count land value, maintenance, grid stability measures that are required to deal with flaky power sources, etc.
Why would wind not be essential for it? Wind is free just like solar. Some places have amazing wind. Wind costs have declined dramatically so it’s a viable piece of the mix.
If Google's putting their money into it, I suspect there's more to the wind story than "wealth transfer from tax payers and consumers to the windmill people."
And windmills are profitable by themselves. And reduces foreign imports with increasing taxes on this goods. If we removed all subsidies coal would be the real affected.
I am not sure about property value but burning gas next to homes creating health problems to power Elon musk data centers surely doesn't help. The dark fumes from coal, gas or oil are going to affect it.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nrMSJOxI6Iqw6HRKtnvWjOkj3tp...
It's more precise, avoiding that strange construction, "science-based". If I understand correctly, linguists call these productive analogies (?), where we start producing more of them by analogy to some root, so:
Faith-based -> Community-based -> Evidence-based -> Plant-based -> Science-based
Or some other hypothetical inheritance chain.
Deleted Comment
Wind power also has the benefit that it keeps the carbon in the ground and isn't contributing to the massive climate crisis that humanity and the earth's ecosystems are facing. And there's no direct waste from energy production.
Land-based wind power is OK-ish. It's susceptible to renewable droughts, but it's fine as long as it's just a part of the mix.
But the offshore wind power is pretty much the _only_ reliable renewable, outside of classic hydro and exotics like tidal power or geothermal. Offshore wind generators are pretty much guaranteed to always produce at least _some_ power due to diurnal wind patterns.