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HOUR OF POWER
Did Earth Hour cause an increase in Sydney’s electricity use?
UPDATE. Readers are not convinced. Meanwhile, the Sydney Morning Herald’s homepage promises a piece “busting the 10 biggest environmental myths”. Which turns out to be slightly overselling things, unless your idea of a big environmental myth is something to do with food labelling or sheep.
The article states 10.2% reduction in electricity usage in Sydney’s CBD. Being the weekend, the CBD isn’t that busy gernally.
I have two questions:
Where did that figure come from and why didn’t the article publicise the figure for the whole of Sydney?
Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 04 02 at 08:37 PM • permalinkMebbe it’s true, but beware of Terry Lane syndrome…
Posted by Margos Maid on 2007 04 02 at 08:37 PM • permalink#5 I’m refering to the SMH article, of ourse.
Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 04 02 at 08:41 PM • permalinkThe truth is that demand fluctuates from week to week far more than any Earth hour effect. The graph is misleading in that it selects certain figures from 2006 rather than 2007 for comparison. In 2007, demand was 10-20% higher on the 24th than on the 31st, but this was true for the whole day. Could be due to weather. If you make the graph using figures from 2007 it doesn’t look nearly as neat.
However, averaging all 2006-2007 figures, demand from 7:30-8:30pm on a March Saturday is typically 6% lower than the afternoon demand. Last Saturday it was only 2% lower.
Conclusion: no discernible Earth hour effect. In fact a lower demand would have been expected if it followed a normal pattern for a Saturday.
In a sense, the graph is “fake but true”, but by cherry-picking data it is open to attack. Earth hour supporters have already pointed out that 7:30-8:30 demand was lower on the 31st than on the 24th, but this is also misleading. Better to look for broader patterns.
#4 aaron_
Yes, Landeryou has made a couple of fundamental errors in his post. First this:
For comparative purposes I have graphed three days of similar electrical usage 18/03/06, 25/03/06 and 31/03/06. Can you see any lessening of demand caused by the “Earth Hour”?
Then the actual graph had lines representing 18/03/06, 25/03/06 and 31/03/07.
Pity he was so sloppy because the ‘expose’ sounded like fun.
I’m suspicious too. That spike seems awfully big to be explained away as people getting their “electricity stuff” done before Earth Hour. Is the graph actually based on reliable data?
Although I suppose it could be that individuals and businesses keen to demonstrate their eco-virtue went around before Earth Hour turning all their lights on, so that they’d have something to turn off at 7.30pm.
Posted by blandwagon on 2007 04 02 at 09:27 PM • permalinkMaybe it was caused when the Age turned everything up to 11 for the “before” pictures.
Posted by Margos Maid on 2007 04 02 at 09:40 PM • permalinkThere is a large degree of smoke and mirrors in the Earth Hour stunt. The date, March 31, was picked because of the moderate temperatures expected at that time of the year. Air conditioning would not be struggling to cool or heat high-rise.
The day, Saturday, meant that most city high rise buildings would be empty. The lights might be on normally, but the other power consumers were not on - computers, lifts.
The time, 7.30pm, was before the night chill set the air conditioners working harder but long enough after sunset to allow the buildings to lose heat from the sun.
So between 7.30pm and 8.30pm, the organisers could count on lighting as a abnormally high percentage of the total CBD power consumption. So if you could cajole businesses into turning off the lights - and remember most of the buildings were empty anyway - you would get a power consumption drop that was measureable. They say triumphantly says 10%. But anything under 25% was pretty piss-poor under the circumstances.
They didn’t even cover the carbon cost of organising the event.
I’m hoping Earth Hour was a massive here’s mud in your eye to the programmers at SBS who moved Top Gear to Saturday night from Monday night. Total arseholes.
It’s pretty bloody simple you Euro wannabe, vegemite drillers, Saturday night is for carousing, Monday night is for relaxing.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 04 02 at 09:56 PM • permalinkOT
In a world where stupidity and plain dumbness is commonplace, it is rare to find an ornament to fuckwittery quite so comprehensive as the sydney magazine which -whether you want it or not - slides out of today’s Sydney Morning Herald.
Sandwiched between ads for SUVs, high heeled shoes, and luxury heavy-duty lube, today’s magazine features a hagiography on Peter Garrett, and a range of articles about the environment and high fashion.
As an ornament for this age, it is hard to top, and I commend it to you as an item that should take pride of place in any self-respecting fuckwits, fuckwittorium.
Posted by Margos Maid on 2007 04 02 at 10:52 PM • permalink“Recycling is a waste of time” - Penn and Teller covered this one and presented a whole list, I think about 8 reasons, supporting this proposition. SMH failed to address any of those and instead stuck to one point about contents of recycling bins being dumped with other rubbish behind our backs, which they claimed wasn’t true. Recycling is good if it actually occurs they proclaim, no further debate required.
Slightly O/T, reports are just out that despite all the grandstanding by Nick Stern and Tony Blair, Britain’s greenhouse gas emissions increased in 2006.
The increase was apparently due to power stations switching from gas to coal as a result of gas becoming more expensive.
It’s unlikely their figures would take account of all the greenhouse gases generated by Nick Stern coming over here to admonish us and be fawned upon by Rudd & Co.
Re the update, I’ve found a better article that busts environmental myths:
That world population is increasing exponentially - myth
That the capacity of our planet to feed ever larger numbers of people is at its limit - myth
That levels of human welfare are declining or about to decline - myth
That the world is running out of energy and other natural resources - myth
That pollution and other environmental degradations are increasing - myth
That technological progress (eg, pesticides and chemicals) is damaging human welfare - myth
That technological progress is damaging the rest of the natural world (eg, 40,000 species a year become extinct because of human activity) - myth
That economic growth is damaging the capacity of our planet to support all life (eg, global warming) - myth
link (pdf file) (google ‘lomborg’ and ‘myths’ for more)
Posted by Art Vandelay on 2007 04 02 at 11:01 PM • permalinkThe SMH declares it is a myth that our economy was built on the sheep’s back - and doesn’t mention the economy at all in its explanatory piece.
Posted by Margos Maid on 2007 04 02 at 11:08 PM • permalinkMaybe we can distract them
(Borderline work safe)
Posted by Margos Maid on 2007 04 03 at 12:08 AM • permalink#27 - Thanks for the heads up Sparrow. Okay everyone, lets move over to the super secret forum so we can continue discussing the poison banana plot.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 04 03 at 12:50 AM • permalinkTurn on the AC for me Sydney, LOL.
Also Massachusetts supreme court outlaws beer, whales and photosynthesis all to help the environment.
How hard can it be to get rid of one of the most common molecules [CO2] anyway?http://marginalizedactiondinosaur.net/?p=52
Posted by hollingshead on 2007 04 03 at 12:55 AM • permalinkMM: further to a recent post of yours, I believe Fatima made a visit to Surfers Paradise and found the lights way too bright.
Whoever James is (over at the SMH, and author of that article about the 10 myths), he is not the greatest at prose construction.
This sentence, while it gets the message across, reads awkwardly, and sounds like language my kid would use.
In fact, new solar technology is very robust and can run even big power tools.
#27
We’ll invoke the Trad defence. We were misquoted, quoted out of context, misunderstood because we were talking in Classical Australian, the translation was inaccurate and we were joking because in reality we are loyal Muslims who just want to be part of this great Caliphate called Australia.The Trad defence has worked for AlHilali for years and Muslim Village People accept it without question. By the way, there is a regular poster at Muslim Village who goes by the tag “Aqidah_police”, so we know which of Muslim Village People he is.
#39 Fleety. Well I don’t quite know what your take on the statement that “new solar technology is very robust and can run even big power tools” happens to be, but it is nonsense.
The robustness or otherwise of photovoltaic panels has nothing whatsoever to do with the amount of useful power that they deliver. Funnily enough, the sun actually determines how much power is delivered, a fact so often ignored by the greenies, and for Sydney the maximum solar radiation (insolation) is about 1 kW per square metre. With a maximum conversion efficiency of say 28%, all that can be collected at the best of times is about 280 watts per square metre, and that is only when the sun shines brightly.
It’s all very well for Woodford to talk about grid feeding (by the way don’t lose the grid or the system will fail) but his comment that you require neither batteries nor an inverter to convert solar power to 240 volts is another lie. No PV cell produces 240 volts ac.
And as for his other comment that “the panels, if you are serious about it, generate so much power they earn enough credits from your power company that you don’t receive a bill.” This also is a lie unless you don’t want any electricity outside sunlight hours. And remember the great green Olympic Village (Sydney 2000 - the green games)? The return on investment on the PV panels fitted to the athletes houses was (is) 89 years at last count. Current costs are about $9,000 per kW installed (and power only when the sun shines).
So much for Woodford’s Eco advice. It’s all crap. Clearing the air is he? More like polluting it with his gerbil verbal garbage.
One of the busted myths in the SMH article is the myth that rainwater is dangerous to drink.
NSW Health’s position is that rainwater is drinkable: “Providing the rainwater is clear, has little taste or smell and is from a well-maintained water catchment system it is probably safe and unlikely to cause illness for most users.
Well, of course this is true.
If you ignore a short-lived giardia outbreak, Sydney’s water system has fitted that description for decades.
It’s only recently that there has been talk of drinking non-rainwater stuff like filtered sewage and osmotic sea water.#27 Don’t worry - they’ve been stalking us for ages.
Everyone wants to be one of Blair’s Attack Dogs.
If they hang around long enough, registrations will open and then a few of them can sign up and let us know how we’re doing.
Oh, and Hilaly should be allowed to say anything he likes to whomever he likes. Particularly when it’s the meeja. He is, after all, a revered quranic scholar, so knows exactly what he’s on about.
Does my context look good in this?
Posted by Nilknarf Arbed on 2007 04 03 at 07:39 AM • permalink#41, you’re right. Taken completely out of context.
Just sent the following email to the smh -
“Calling a product organic means it is organic. Right?”
I am sorry, but although I see organic mentioned in the context of enviro. friendly concerns time and again, from what I know of the matter, which isn’t trivial, I see nothing environmentally friendly about organic when compared to conventional farming. In fact, I would certainly ague that it is more destructive than conventional farming. Can you explain why organic is being lumped into the Eco section?
Another myth perhaps?
Posted by Chris Harper on 2007 04 03 at 10:20 AM • permalink#51, the whole thing amused me. I think they chose some of the single most amusing posters here and decided they were racist. I almost wet myself when I read that one from Infidel Tiger. I bet that’s exactly why the horses are so fast!
#52, the Muslims don’t get it either. But they feel like they’ve been discriminated against anyway. Somewhere on that site (too lazy to look it up again) was someone saying that all Muslims act and look the same. I know one Muslim, who is Cambodian and therefore looks distinctively Asian, and another, who is Turkish, and therefore looks Turkish. If anyone can tell me how they look the same, I’d really appreciate it.
Those links seem the same. Anyway, I guess what I’m saying is, if they are being discriminated against, they could at least describe that discrimination accurately. Is “religionist” a word, anyway? I guess they could just call it “religious discrimination”.
Personally, I don’t see what’s wrong with religious discrimination. Frankly all religions seem a little silly to me (especially Gaia worship!) and I think it’s valid to be able to criticise people who do silly things that have a negative impact on others. Hell, if someone calls me an “infidel”, that’s them discriminating against me on the basis of my religion, right? What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
What’s going to happen when criticising anything is illegal because it might hurt someone’s feelings? I shudder to think what such a country would be like. Probably a dictatorship, because you wouldn’t be allowed to criticise the government…
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This readily available information shows that Saturday’s “Earth Hour” is Sydney is a total scam. A scam that has been aided and abetted by lazy and scientifically illiterate journalists.
I like that. Its time for a people’s court to try enviro-fraudsters.