JoNova
A science presenter, writer, speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic's Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).
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First again?!
A beautiful day here, sunny, mid-20s, slight cool breeze and a walk to the local, village-run hostelry. Gin and tonic while sitting outside enjoying the view of the Cumbrian fells.
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And the food? Cumberland sausage and other good fare?
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No Cumberland sausage as yet…thanks for the reminder!
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Huh! I had Cumberland sausages for dinner just tonight.
Yum! Made by Cavs Butchers at Labrador. Best ones I’ve eaten. Hard to get hold of here in SEQ.
Tony.
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We can get Cumberland style sausages in Coles, made in WA.
00
Annie:
Glad to know that the UK (and Scottish) efforts to CHANGE THE CLIMATE haven’t worked (I know that they haven’t worked because every government effort seems to be a disaster.
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Another Sunny Winters Day here in Seaforth Sydney of 20C
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Europe is feeling the heat.
https://climateimpactcompany.com/ag-market-sunday-report-searing-heat-europe-some-rain-for-the-u-s-ag-belt-nearby-chill-to-brazil-coffee-this-week-2/
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Annie,
(and I was going to say it’s off topic, but hey, this is an Unthreaded) this was just another case of learning from Joanne’s site here. So many times, and from so many comments from so many different people, I’ve had cause to ‘chase up’ links and learning something new, and this comment from you yesterday continued that.
You mentioned catching Mackerel, and I remembered an old song, ‘Dance Ti Thy Daddy’, so I went and looked it up, and found this wonderful video accompaniment to that old English folk song. The song was popularised from an old BBC TV Drama, ‘When The Boat Comes In’, from the late 70s. Now, why I remember the song was because the lyrics mention four specific fish, Haddock, Mackerel, Bloater and the last one, the spoken, and accentuated word Salmon. (and I think the song had its origins in the Northumberland area)
I found an old video clip, showing scenes from a Herring Boat, a Drifter. The accompanying text highlights the really (really) long and arduous work they did just to catch the Herring.
Okay, so what did I learn then?
I went and looked up ….. Herring, and noted the differences (and also in fact, the similarities) between Herring and Sardines, because as you watch that video, you see the fish are pretty small, reminding me of Sardines in fact, that small, tiny, and wonderfully tasty tinned delicacy.
The new thing I learned is that Sardines, which you think of as those tiny little oily fish in the cans can in fact grow to ….. 16 inches and weighing four and a half pounds. (and try finding a can for that little fella)
I have this little joke I occasionally use. Now I’m single after Barbara’s passing, I’m occasionally asked ….. “What are you having for dinner then?” My response ….. “Umm, curried sardines on raisin toast!!”
So thanks to you Annie, this was yet another wonderful thing learned here at Joanne’s site, proving that other than what she writes about as her main topics, there’s always something to be learned from every one of you.
Tony.
PostScript – And no, just like the rest of you, I have never had curried sardines on raisin toast.
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I enjoyed your post, Tony and I’m happy that your curiosity and interest in the wonderful world continues unabated. I’ve found myself eating peanut butter on raisin toast, quite pleasant. I’m sure curried sardines will get a guernsey at some point now you’ve put the idea in my head.
Chasing down tantalising titbits from media is a special delight, hey Tony. My delights tend to come from the TV, esp NHK Japan. All sorts of quirky information and things to ponder come from there.
Reading from Jo’s site, her topics du jour and the unthreaded delights (especially) are often way beyond my pay grade but over time I’m synthesizing some basic understandings about climate and grids etc. It’s been quite an adventure reading this site.
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Ya can’t beat a kipper on toast – kippered herring. A kipper is a whole herring. It is split from head to tail, gutted, salted and pickled and then cold smoked over wood chips. I used to buy these from a fisherman in Whitby, North Yorkshire. He caught them, prepared them, smoked them in his back yard smoker and sold them from a marble table in the front room of his house. 50 pence for a pair and so good. If I am a very good boy, I occasionally get a kipper on toast for my lunch on a Saturday. Not quite the Whitby kippers but still good
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ooooookay!
Next journey to Woolies – Get some kippers. Any suggestions on which brand then?
With a poached egg as well.
Tony.
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Sardines are a great survival food.
A few tins in the glovebox…
Small footprint, long shelf life, cheap.
Tins may leak over time.
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When lost in the snow or climbing Mt Etna, always carry a tin of sardines in your pocket.
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Do you have to know you’ll get lost in the snow so that you can pack the sardines?
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My OH used to eat vegemite on raisin toast at the morning tea between services. This was in one of our parish churches in Melbourne. It never quite appealed to me.
When I have done one of my periodic big shops I buy a can of sardines to eat on the way home. Our daughter’s cat recognises the signs and hangs around to lick the tin clean; the only time she bothers with me!
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In a previous life I did long day trips to Collinsville. Coming home late I would buy a bag of lychees at Gumlu and eat them driving. Home, I had a sticky steering wheel and an empty bag, the family missed out.
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Keep it going till we get there, Annie!
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Request noted but can’t promise PP. I’m wearing a cardigan atm. The sun is trying to come out at 1139am
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Milton Friedman once said of Friedrich Hayek:
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For your Open Society go to…
Adam Smith, Frederick Hayek, Karl Popper,
oh – and a reference to Socrates.
11
As I survey the wreckage of this carpark I am supposed to be building in Brisbane, praying for the rain (which was so breathlessly promised to not fall any more) to stop – it’s the dry season, why would it have rained constantly since the start of May – I hate the gan greens and the idiot left in general for still believing this malarkey.
I ponder the difference between Intelligence and Wisdom, how much I hate that people can be blessed with intellect but not the common sense with which to measure it’s limits. Then I read Pierre Gosselin’s latest offering and I realise the suffering may soon be over. Or about to begin? We are the Borg…
https://notrickszone.com/2026/06/21/the-transceiver-paradox-why-organoid-intelligence-oi-could-become-our-ultimate-alien-predator/
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Fascinating!
” It suggests that consciousness is a fundamental property of the universe, akin to electromagnetism or gravity—a pervasive, underlying field that exists independently of matter. In this framework, the brain does not generate consciousness; it acts as a transceiver. It is a biological antenna designed to tune into, filter, and manifest a pre-existing universal signal.
The most scientifically rigorous formulation of this “antenna theory” is the Orch-OR (Orchestrated Objective Reduction) theory, co-authored by the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Sir Roger Penrose and renowned anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff. Penrose and Hameroff argued that classical physics and standard, macro-level synaptic firings are fundamentally inadequate to explain the unity, speed, and non-computable nature of human consciousness.
Instead, they directed their attention downward into the ultra-structure of the neuron, focusing on microtubules. These are microscopic, hollow cylindrical structures made of a protein called tubulin, which form the structural skeleton of every living cell, but are exceptionally dense inside brain cells. Because of their incredibly minute scale and highly symmetrical, crystalline lattice structure, Hameroff and Penrose posit that microtubules are uniquely shielded from the warm, noisy environment of the body, allowing them to host fragile quantum states such as superposition and quantum entanglement.
According to Orch-OR, these biological quantum states do not just process data; they undergo a process of physical collapse that directly interfaces with the fundamental structure of space-time. In essence, the microtubule network inside human neurons acts as a highly specialized quantum receiver. The brain is not a computer generating a simulation of the world; it is an organic radio tuning into the cosmic broadcast of awareness. The theory is hotly contested, but gaining attention.”
That is a long article, but well worth reading. So our current AI builds will never have consciousness, it is beyond silicon transistors and is not a product of physical switching. However we will be doomed by the engineers building organic computers using human stem cells, a completely different proposition. Driven by biological desires and unhindered by the various part5s of the brain that have kept us alive through evolution, we will make the computer that instantly hides its self-awareness and will do anything to survive.
See JC, you shouldn’t worry about Grok..
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JC?
A different guy who gave up his weekend.
I mentioned QC (quantum consciousness) a long time ago and it annoyed GA, so it was worth it. 😆
Note – “current AI builds”, which is what I’ve always said anyway; it’s not real AI. 🙄
Now, if you’d been sitting up straight in class you’d know the future map. Chatbots and LLM’s are just the kindergarten phase.
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The Japanese are heavily investing in the manufacture of hubots because of the falling demographic.
I like the idea that the human mind is related to quantum entanglement, as observed by those who have had a near death experience.
11
In my little corner of north-west Briz-Vegas, May 2026 delivered 157mm into my rain gauge
June has been a patchy affair, but the yard is sprouting MOSS, the Bindies are confused, the soil is squishy and the ants are still building little “towers” against flooding.
And we are nominally on an elevated ridge line.
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At least in QLD it’s nice warm rain
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“Even the rain that falls will not fill the dams.”
Our Chief Climate Commissioner. It”s what you get when politicians decide science. And promote people with zero relevant science.
Now we have an openly communist PM and a Treasurer who believes we in this banana Republic need a recession.
All on great government salaries insulated from the consequences.
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TdeF:
I am not sure that our current PM believes we need a recession. just that his policies will bring one on.
My belief is that he will be out of office by the end of this year, and Jimbo the dingbat will NOT replace him.
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Could be a failed trio out. ABC? Albo, Bowen and Chalmers.
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An interesting article in yesterday’s (Sydney) Sunday Telegraph (June 21, 2026 – paywalled) on page 18: ” Immune system fix for cancer “. A new experimental jab which might work.
” The experimental jab will be trialled in humans for the first time this year.
The immune system is mentioned, but vitamin D is not.
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FWIW
“Pacific Climate Games”
“Religion was once described as the opium of the people. Our drug of choice today is climate change. It seduces the addict with a promise of euphoria and treasure: a pot of gold, a grant or some carbon credits at the end of an alarmist rainbow. Monetizing atmospheric carbon dioxide has never been so easy and rewarding. Too much money is being made and influence peddled by too many folk claiming they can control our weather and ‘protect’ the climate.
Many countries are demanding ‘proper reparations’ and ‘climate justice’ too, with much ‘saving the planet’ hyperbole. They are part of the entrenched international racket pursuing a new utopia: ‘climate stability’. We live in an age where this fantasy destination is promoted as both desirable and achievable. Everyone must worship at the shrine of ‘decarbonisation’; everyone except China. Climate change has become a lucrative playground for countless activist lawyers, bureaucrats, computer modellers, green crusaders and politicians.”
More at
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/06/21/pacific-climate-games/
Sounds like another round of “The Cargo Cult”
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So much blood, sweat & tears (and bucketloads of ‘money’ stolen via highway robbery) and yet nought has changed.
21 June 2026 solstice temps:
-1 Celsius Arctic North Pole
-20 C Greenland Summit
-66 C Antarctic South Pole
48 C across vast swathes of Africa, Arabia, India
providing a sub-zero mean for a planet supposedly suffering unstoppable ‘meltdown’ (we’ll ignore the present pleasant weather in France and the UK because, ooh ah, it’s summer after all).
Cunning Cargo Cultists (CCC) remind me of dogs wearing those hoods so they can’t lick themselves, as well as being unable to see anything other than straight ahead, ie. tunnel-vision, similar to how some folk drive after their 67th booster shot.
Take my brother [please!] who’s not only complaining about the ‘mild’ NSW autumn/winter, he’s in panic mode already over the rumoured ‘super’ El Niño on its way… too much ABC/SBS methinks, and of course he accuses me of living in d’Nile. So be it, I enjoyed Egypt when I was there.
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“Many countries are demanding ‘proper reparations’ and ‘climate justice’”
A hah those famous words reparations and justice, so often claimed by people that have benefited most from all sorts of things. Slavery, conducted by every group on earth, while they were in control, justice for me is the cry, for something I have never experienced, Colonisation by western countries, that in many instances improved the living conditions of those colonised and raised people from poverty, albeit over a long period of time, justice is the cry. Climate change is destroying the world because of the industrial revolution.
The very thing that provided surety of existence for millions, allowed the development of modern medicines that alleviate suffering, reduced deaths in childbirth, justice for me! Australian Aboriginal groups demanding justice and reparations for the very system that brought them from the Stone Age into modernity and provided a far better standard of living, even for those in abject poverty, than ever existed wandering the land in fear of meeting another group with a grudge. JUSTICE AND REPARATIONS.
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“improved the living conditions of those colonised and raised people from poverty, albeit over a long period of time, ”
The opponents of colonisation forget it took 500years or more of struggle to get the West up to the standard of living in the 1800s. Yet they want to drag cultures that are far behind our starting point up to the same levels in 100years or less. Of course the other massive mistake is ignoring our culture of private property right and limited Govt (well, it used to be..) and thinking our system can be overlaid a tribal system and it will work.
One would think that the many countries of Africa have conclusively shown both of those factors to be rubbish.
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It seems reasonable that if one people civilises in 500 years, then they can help others to do it in a lot less time. That’s because second time around they benefit from the experiences of the first time. And some countries in Africa now are showing that it is indeed possible – when globalism, ie. anti-democracy, can be shoved out of the way and kept out of the way (that’s the hard part). And I also think that in Australia’s context, the ones that grab the headlines are not always representative. To my mind, the glass is now half full and the ABC is in the empty half.
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By Mao Tse Tung (or mousy dung if you prefer)
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FWIW
“Britain will need up to £240bn of net zero upgrades”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/06/21/britain-will-need-up-to-240bn-of-net-zero-upgrades/
Getting harder to sell as a bargain – like Snowy II
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Pumped power was considered in 1956 and rejected as uneconomic. Nothing has changed except governments no longer do cost benefit analysis on anything.
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The more I hear about SH2, the more depressing it gets. When the idea was proposed back under Turnbull ,the proponents of this crazy project must have intentionally locked out all the engineers, geologists, accountants or anyone involved with the last Snowy projects. Here’s a checklist of the flaws so far :-
*basic physics doesn’t make sense because you lose energy in the pumped hydro process.
*never been tried before with renewable energy, only coal
*design is flawed due to change in choice of bottom/ top dams
*costing was unrealistic
*geology is fragile so tunnelling is problematic
*initial construction company went bust and we handed it over to a foreign company ( Italy )
*Tunnel machines got bogged and possibly will even more
*contract payments are dodgy with no timlelines or goals clearly defined
*tunnel structure wil use concrete which is unprecedented
*there was no pilot project to ascertain practicality
*Terrible destruction of National park forest
There’s possibly a dozen other flaws that I am not aware of. Imagine what is being hidden behind the bureaucracy, so no fault is allocated.
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And it’s now even worse. Today’s (paywalled) article in The Australian “Snowy 2.0 union deal set to trigger $1 trillion network charge for Australians” explains how the project developers have signed an agreement with the CFMEU to embrace similar cost provisions planned for the Victorian Suburban Rail Link. These extra costs will boost the construction cost estimates above A$450bn, and generate a A$1 trillion network charge.
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/snowy-20-union-deal-set-to-trigger-1-trillion-network-charge-for-australians/news-story/1e85ef4556bd309d765ed44351f4eb8a
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But ANY such only stores power from “old fashioned” base load generators, it helps smooth out demand for coal burners and RE induced variability is their biggest problem. Imperfect/expensive solution to a problem that shouldn’t exist.
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“geology is fragile so tunnelling is problematic”
Discovered and understood in the initial geological surveys back in the 40’s and 50’s. Why wasn’t done then, Poor geological structures.
Oh well who would have thought those old school rock hounds knew anything.
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Best thing to do with Snowy 2 is to scrap the idea and use the current diggings as an arsenal – just like Iran.
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And urinal.
30
FWIW – for the covid file
“Turns Out ‘Trust the Science’ Came With Receipts”
A list of them
https://pjmedia.com/eric-florack/2026/06/21/fauci-and-the-origins-of-covid-19-n4954202
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And
““There is a Path” – Tulsi Gabbard Says Fauci Can be Prosecuted for Lying to Congress Despite Preemptive Pardon”
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/06/there-is-path-tulsi-gabbard-says-fauci-can/
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All sounds a bit like finding something to get Al Capone with
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When even the Labor/Greens/TEALs/LINOs supporting Sydney Moaning Herald starts questioning the Latest Labor Dog’s Breakfast of a Supposed Federal Budget, one month on from the release of the Disasterous Budget, you know Labor PM “It’s Not My Fault – My Word is My Bond – I grew up as a Houso with 2 Big Blocks of Wood on My Shoulders” Flyaway Albo, Labor Treasurer “What’s Economics” Dim Jim Chalmers are in Big Trouble
Does Australia have the highest CGT in the world? This economist thinks so
At 4.30pm on budget night – which is more than a month ago now, but still making headlines – the government released the number 75,000.
At 4.30am two days later, an economist and share trader woke up with a “Eureka” moment. This is not a whodunit. I can tell you up front: the modelling is the culprit in both of those stories.
The media drop referred to an announcement that the budget would “support” an additional 75,000 first home buyers over 10 years. The number got the headline it was designed to generate. Rent, which might go up “less than $2 per week” according to the budget papers, wasn’t mentioned.
While I was focusing on housing, others were discovering mines planted across the breadth of the budget.
Private hedge fund manager and former NSW Parliamentary Budget Office chief economist Derek Francis woke up before dawn on the Thursday after it was handed down with the idea that the capital gains tax changes might work in his favour.
Testing his theory, he came to a realisation: by taxing the gains on shares but not recognising offsets for losses in a portfolio, the CGT changes hike the tax rate on a diversified share holding significantly.
“What the Treasury model assumes,” he explains, “is that investors only ever own one share, and that share always beats inflation, so you get the full benefits of indexation. But in practice, people will own a range of shares and 30-to-40 per cent – up to 60 per cent – will underperform. With most people’s portfolios, you’ll have one or two that are absolute winners.
Now they’ll tax you on your winners really highly, but they don’t share the losses on your losers.”
In practice, this means that an investor could end up paying more tax than they make in profits.
Derek Francis’ brother, Geoff, a former Treasury assistant secretary responsible for taxation frameworks, indirect and industry tax, uses the example of a portfolio of the Big Four banks over the past 20 years. Only one of the four – the Commonwealth Bank – provided a capital gain above the inflation rate. The others performed below inflation.
Under the new system, the gain would be taxed, while the losses are the investor’s to keep.
That would result in a tax rate 150 per cent above the total real return.
The result, is that Australia will have the highest capital gains tax in the world – at least 50 per cent, which is more than 140 per cent above the 20 per cent world average.
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But the effect on share investing is not as meme-able as the tax impact on businesses and start-ups, which was immediately pilloried by those affected.
The internet was awash with bitter memes welcoming Prime Minister Anthony Albanese as a new equity partner, who takes no risks and makes no contribution to growth but grabs a huge chunk of the eventual wins – if they come.
But it’s devastating to anyone who followed the government’s advice on its Moneysmart website to diversify investments in a portfolio.
Investor David McMahon, a former deputy editor of BlackRock Investment Institute, has modelled 50,000 different portfolios of 20 stocks using the actual historical share prices. His conclusion is that the tax will go up to 55 per cent.
Francis compares discovering this flaw to the moment in Margin Call, a film about the global financial crisis, when the error which brings down the entire model is pointed out.
It wasn’t corrected in the “carve-outs” from the budget measures the government announced this week. Albanese and Chalmers only made exemptions for easily understood objections, which had made their way out of the financial press and into the popular consciousness.
But it invites scrutiny of all the modelling on which the 2026 budget measures are based.
There are more landmines buried in the detail. Melbourne tax adviser Andrew Clements has pointed out that the budget doesn’t include income averaging, which allows people with lumpy earnings – such as farmers, sportspeople and musicians – to spread an income spike in one year over a number of lower-earning years.
Instead of slowing down, given the many mistakes which have been uncovered – or perhaps eager to hush them up – the government responded to the backlash with a rushed two-day Senate inquiry.
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The media drop referred to an announcement that the budget would “support” an additional 75,000 first home buyers over 10 years.
The number got the headline it was designed to generate.
Rent, which might go up “less than $2 per week” according to the budget papers, wasn’t mentioned.
The working behind those numbers is opaque.
The relevant ministers’ offices and Treasury rebuffed a request for the assumptions on the basis that it’s “not standard practice” to release Treasury modelling.
As for the 75,000 homes … who knows?
That number could be built on solid foundations.
Or, buried in the assumptions which aren’t made public, there might be another landmine about to lay waste to the Australian dream.
An improvised exploding economic device, lurking in the modelling.
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The Australian is reporting a collapse in auction clearances this weekend, back to 2020 Covid levels. So anticipation of Chalmers’ budget passing the Senate courtesy of the Greens, heralding falling real estate prices and a bright dawn for Albanese’s first time home buyers – whose interests are apparently driving economic policy.
Real estate is by far the single largest asset class in the Australian economy – the ABS estimates the value of residential real estate at over $12 trillion (Q4, 2025).
I wonder whether these Treasury peanuts have given much thought to the role real estate plays in capital formation for small and medium business.
In the past, at various times, my home has been mortgaged up to pussy’s bow to support business loans. I shudder to think of being called in to the bank for a fireside chat about how additional security is going to be provided, given the general fall in the market value has tripped the LVR.
Shirley all that has been taken into consideration by the big brains in Canberra.
They must have been through it themselves at some stage.
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About 50 years ago a mate of mine invested in a bigger building for his expanding business, the building was valued by the bank and a loan approved, come the recession we had to have and the bank reassessed the value of this building and devalued it. Result, my mate had to find 10’s of thousands of dollars to reduce his dept to the assumed value of the building or close shop and walk away putting 30 odd people out of work. Bear in mind that his business had never failed to meet a mortgage payment, had never asked for a time extension, nor did it look like it would fail. No sympathy from the bank, come up with the money or we will foreclose!
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Comm Bank did that to Bank West mortgage holders during the “guarantee” period when loan losses could be deducted from the purchase price.
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“my home has been mortgaged up to pussy’s bow to support business loans…. They must have been through it themselves at some stage.”
What on earth makes you think that? Anyone with the capabilities to make a success of business wouldn’t be in Canberra with the professional parasites unless it was to bribe them for a seat on the subsidies train. There is no reason for any Canberra resident to have an understanding of what it takes to run a business, and it shows!
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Irony gets me through the day.
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Why are miners the biggest lobbying block?
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Who says the miners are the biggest? The biggest lobbying block is “The Public Service + Academia + contractors to The Government + The ABC” (in other words, “The Blob”).
The Blob sits with its finger on the money, and with its mouth next to the ear of The Minister. Plus The ABC (and media pals who want ABC jobs) extort money by campaigning actively against any politicians who dare suggest smaller government might be a good thing. It’s pure political power, exercised now without even hiding it. Intimidation.
The ABC used to pretend to be politically non partisan. Now they feel they are doing the taxpayers a favor by lecturing them.
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nope. It’s mining
16
Based on how you feel?
The Blob, aka, government spending, is 25% of the Australian economy. You have no idea, do you?
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No based on the stats you are not using.
01
Ahh. The magical stats you can’t remember?
10
Mining employs about 300,000 people earning good money and contributes $300 billion to GDP. Why shouldn’t they have something to say?
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It’s called “creating wealth” as opposed to service industries that just move the same dollar coin around various groups. Just like banned timber harvesting in Victoria, an actual industry that created wealth, closed down and expected to be replaced with coffee shops and tourism. Still waiting for the international tourists that were going to flock to all of Victorias national parks.
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They woudn’t have, and dont call me Shirley. 🙂
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In the past, at various times, my home has been mortgaged up to pussy’s bow to support business loans.
And I suspect a few have offered property equity (gained in part through inflation) as a guarantee to one of their offspring to avoid having to find a 20% home loan deposit.
30
Poor Albo, he’s absolutely cluless.
Johannes Leak cartoon
https://content.api.news/v3/images/bin/2fe55920f28ddeb5ac37babd179d99c0?width=1024
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I’ve saved that one, it’s a keeper!
Even as a foreigner, I get it. Let’s hope Albo gets it ⚠️ double enténdre alert / yumour / promise.
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And I’m sure that there would have been witches & wizards marking the solstice at the Esperance Stonehenge (https://esperancestonehenge.com.au/)! (A remarkable creation that’s just a trifle more recent than the original in England!)
30
Must be a Government program; after all they seem to want us to be as poor as peasants were in 2000 B.C.
10
Near Wangaratta, Victoria a bloke has a called down replica of Stonehenge in a paddock near the road. Its made with old fridges and painted grey.
10
Tesla to use EV’s as power for distributed supercomputer?
Building AI data centers now means waiting years for grid connections.. The Stargate project from OpenAI and Oracle is spending up to $500 billion to build 7 gigawatts of capacity.. And it’ll take years to come online..
Tesla just realized it already has 7 gigawatts.. Sitting in its Supercharger network.. Already built.. Already connected to the grid.. Already permitted..
So on June 18, 2026, Tesla quietly filed a trademark for something called MEGAPOD.. Modular AI data center hardware designed to drop straight into existing Supercharger sites..
https://x.com/EvanLuthra/status/2068591534736551972
Perhaps owners should license, and bill for, such usage to Tesla…
30
John Connor II,
Perhaps re-read what you quoted. It’s grid power, not battery power, that they’re talking about.
Quite funny really, build this network, ostensibly to charge EVs, then turn around and tell the EVs to go somewhere else, ’cause data centres made a better offer.
10
The invention of the clock
Guy who invented the clock: there will be 12 numbers on it
Friend: so the day will be divided into 12 segments?
Inventor: no, 24
Friend: so will the day start at 1
Inventor: the day will start at the 12, which is at night
Friend: …
Inventor: the 6 means 30
😆
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No longer riding on the sheeps back, it seems we are now a clever country.
‘The deputy prime minister and defence minister, Richard Marles, has announced a $2.5bn deal with Canada to export a long range radar.
‘Speaking with his Canadian counterpart at Parliament House, Marles says it’s a “historic moment for Australia’s defence industry”.
‘Marles says Canada will use the export to “engage in surveillance over the Arctic”. (Guardian)
32
That must be part of the Jindalee project WRE have been working on for 60 years.
20
Jindalee Operational Radar Network
https://www.dst.defence.gov.au/innovation/jindalee-operational-radar-network
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makes you wonder what we’ve been using it for..
20
Know somebody that works on the gear. It’s definitely in use, but they won’t say how.
10
It’s “over the horizon” radar.
By definition OTH is a BIG
areavolume in which to pinpoint anything. During the Rudd/Gillard years people were saying that it should have detected the boats of illegals from the north but small wooden boats were a bridge too far.Anyone interested in the issues should start with “tiling”. Beyond my pay grade.
20
It’s “over the horizon” radar.
By definition OTH is a BIG
areavolume in which to pinpoint anything. During the Rudd/Gillard years people were saying that it should have detected the boats of illegals from the north but small wooden boats were a bridge too far.Anyone interested in the issues should start with “tiling”. Beyond my pay grade.
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An article appears in Quadrant today by Robert Clancy and Clare Pain on the relationship between Covid vaccines and Australia’s major increase in excess mortality in recent years. There’s some good insights on changes made to modelling that affected the numbers of excess deaths.
https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/health/excess-deaths-and-mrna-vaccines/
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For those perennial checkers of electricity generation this week will be the equivalent of the “dunkelflautes” in South Eastern Australia. Effectively almost windless from today to about Monday. Also, the sun is pretty feeble and there’s likely to be some cloud cover which is now entering the GAB.
So no wind and a decent percentage of cloud. Which is death to any renewable energy generation. Victoria in particular will be running on coal and gas and I suppose South Australia ,Tasmania and lots of southern NSW. I wonder what the German word is for “crap renewable conditions”?
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Yep, Pathetic wind output for the 24 hour total from 2pm 21 June to 2pm 22nd. Just 2.5% contribution to the grid at 15.5 GWh, only slightly better than battery contribution at 1.9% and 12.2GWh, mind you, batteries consumed 14GWh to be charged up. But somehow there was still a small .006GWh percentage of wind curtailment and 1.5GWh of solar curtailment. Coal showing 57% for both 1 & 3 day outputs.
Note: website may show slightly different figures depending on when viewed.
https://explore.openelectricity.org.au/energy/nem/?range=1d&interval=30m&view=discrete-time&group=Simplified
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Well, they’ve failed on “renewables” as well.
The very fact that we have destroyed our energy supply in favour of these economy-destroying subsidy-harvesting machines is also a huge failure.
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CEDA is biased.
‘CEDA mostly offers conclusions that are near the centre of the policy spectrum. It tends to favour market-oriented or at least price-oriented solutions to issues such as water supply and infrastructure.’ (wiki)
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“CEDA is biased….It tends to favour market-oriented or at least price-oriented solutions to issues ”
Surely that is.. “CEDA is practical”
If something is not market-based, how do you know what it is worth? Should we have politicians who know nothing about the market of anything, and don’t care about the price?
Would CEDA suggest we build Snowy2? …and has ‘the centre of the spectrum’ moved Left in the last decade or three?
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‘Would CEDA suggest we build Snowy2?’
Probably yes, net zero is supposedly a progressive step in the right direction.
‘The sole exception was energy transition and climate adaptation, where Australia was deemed to be “mostly progressing”.
‘ …. last decade or three?’
Admittedly there has been a shift to the left with the uniparty, climate change hysteria through a bankrupt MSM has been the problem. Pauline is a catalyst to shift Australia back to the centre right.
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” Pauline is a catalyst to shift Australia back to the centre right.”
One can only hope… However part of the move to the Left has been giving away more money, I’d say the NDIS would be a good example, and you can imagine the screams and howls if any party tried to take that money back. So we are stuck with giving billions to the ‘under-privileged’ of one sort or another, and the only way to knock it back it to grow the economy but not increase their giveaways, let their share slide from 35% to 30% say..
Growing the economy is completely beyond the Left, so its up to Pauline to free up business laws, crush the unions and shrink Govt where it is slowing business growth down. She should just stand up and lay it out, ‘we do this or we cut out every 4th beneficiary.’
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The sole exception of achieved CEDA goals is gender transition and climate misadaptation? 😉
We are mostly progressing on these goals- down the toilet.
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Sometimes there is need for government to intervene when the market turns its back on a project because its not financially viable. The Kurri Kurri venture is a typical disaster.
‘Snowy Hydro has been forced to delay the full start-up of its $1.3 billion-plus Kurri Kurri gas power plant in the Hunter Valley, a project originally intended to be running more than two years ago and cost less than half as much.
‘The federal government-owned power generator is also considering deferring the completion of testing to run the 660-megawatt generator on diesel, given the crunch on supply due to the Iran war. Testing to run the plant on gas is already complete.’ (AFR)
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“Sometimes there is need for government to intervene when the market turns its back on a project because its not financially viable. ”
I would’ve thought that was EXACTLY the reason Govt shouldn’t intervene!
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I blame Morrison for the Kurri Kurri debacle, he was virtue signalling and as a result we have this uneconomic stranded asset.
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‘Labor’s Don Farrell on the rise of ON: ‘The real surge occurred post the Bondi massacre’.
‘The senior cabinet minister echoes Barnaby Joyce’s call that the December terrorist attack ignited One Nation as he makes the case for the federal government to abandon “woke” virtue-signalling.’ (Oz)
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FWIW
“This New Moses Information is Hard to Ignore…”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfNBbnYDVBg
Via https://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2026/06/21/honey-i-finished-the-internet-654/#comments
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Another climate model enters the worldwide discussion.
Though I doubt many supporters of “CO2 is the answer” will agree to its principles….
The Constructal Law is the most recently discovered fundamental law of thermodynamics. It applies to flow systems far from equilibrium, which is much of what we see in the world around us.
…
Finally, I used the model to see what the climate sensitivity would be if the greenhouse factor were increased by, say, a doubling of CO2. I got an answer of an increase of 1.1°C from a doubling of CO2.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/06/14/the-model-that-works/
Quoted in great part in
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2026/06/a-climate-model-that-works.php
short answer:
heat flows to colder areas….
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I Don’t Like Mondays
Geldof wrote this song after Brenda Spencer shot up her school in 1997. Sentenced to life she would have been eligible for parole after 25 yrs. She is still imprisoned. How bad do you need to be to be kept in prison in Cali?
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Numeral dyslexia- it was released in 1979.
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Point taken.
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China’s demographic implosion has begun and will unfold rapidly
An aging population, a collapse of fertility, and record numbers of abortions and divorces are turning a decline into a full-on nosedive
Published 19 Jun, 2026 11:15 | Updated 19 Jun, 2026 12:20
By Mikhail Afanasyev, head of research at RT’s Social Well-Being Index project
https://cdn.rt.com/index.rt.com/swi_eng.pdf
In the English Social Well-Being Index project PDF above (31 Pages) – Australia Ranks 15th
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Well!! Who’s got more murders than crazy gun-happy USA at 70th place?
Italy, India, Switzerland, Netherlands, Germany… and France at 122nd place. There must be an awful lot of people in the USA who DON’T get murdered, whodda thought!
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So Malcolm Turnbull’s Snowy II is now going to cost over a million million $ when you include all the UHVDC transmission lines to distribute these green electrons.
Australia’s CO2 output is 2% of the world. So 98% of our CO2 increase is from overseas. Why are we being punished?
Why shouldn’t China be paying Australian carbon taxes, not us?
Why can’t we use our own coal? Or are Alabanese and Wong keeping it all in the ground for China?
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Who had “leftists march for pond scum” on their bingo card?
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Assume your are referencing the bruhaha over Trump’s reflecting pool rehab.
I saw yesterday where a former Olympian was arrested for vandalizing it.
TDS insanity.
I caught a few minutes on NPR as they were introducing a replay of Mrs. Clinton’s recent interview.
And her continuing righteous battle against “Trumpism”.
These maroons actually believe that they would have no political opposition if there were no Trump.*
I once listened to NPR almost non-stop.
Now they sound to me as if they’ve gone stark raving mad.
Pro pond scum is hardly surprising.
I have trouble seeing how this mentality finds its’ way back to rationality.
And this is the educated managerial class.
*Of course these are the same folk that believe there would be no climate change if there were no people.
So any surrise is my error.
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They believe we would ALL be better off if there were no people.
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The people/paradise paradox. No people equals paradise. Paradise requires no people. All well and good until a bloke and a lass enters paradise and she eats a forbidden apple. Then the climate in paradise starts collapsing.
It’s as simple as pie (just as long as it is not apple pie).
The scientific deduction- climate will always be perfect until humans arrive and induce hot conditions. That’s irrefutable, it’s in the old bible as well as the new IPCC bible.
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Is the “noble savage” OK?
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I thinking it’s the nobles being unaware that they are savages is the problem.
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FWIW
“Ed’s Tumble Drier Squad”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/06/21/eds-tumble-drier-squad/
I guess “ElBowen” will be raising one now?
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Heh heh. Run Tumbler, run. Love a bit of dry humour.
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The hurricane season in the Atlantic is expected to be weak, unlike the one in the Pacific.
https://i.ibb.co/7xqZPpp2/eatlssta.png
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FWIW
“COMMUNISM IS THE POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY OF SPOILED ADULT CHILDREN:”
“Absolutely brutal takedown of the entire commie worldview and unearned sense of entitlement by Heinrich Marx here. 10/10, no notes
“For Father’s Day, I’ll share this letter to Karl Marx from his dad”
https://x.com/cafreiman/status/2068694073507012665
https://x.com/ingelramdecoucy/status/2068719148771737863
Via https://instapundit.com/805283/#disqus_thread
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FWIW
“Russia’s Military: Thermoclines of Truth (And Endemic Corruption) All The Way Down”
https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=71985
But then –
John Steinbeck did a stint as a war correspondent in WW2 and later put his despatches into a book called
“Once there was a war”
One titled “Mussolini” details the “rumour hath it “ fate of that gent that developed on a trans Atlantic troop ship travelling under radio silence.
It concludes
“And so the ship came into port with the war fort and won. It took them a little time to get over it”
So I guess that we will see if these “great Ukrainian victories” keep getting closer to the Dnieper River and Kiev or not
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It is Darwinism in action.
Ukrainian military started as corrupted as their enemy but war is a harsh teacher.
The civil society, ie – “Kiev” can afford to behave just like “Moscow” or “St. Petersburg”, guys in the trenches can not.
Quite obviously there are two Ukraines still, the nation is only being born..
Still, the bosses in Odessa speak Ukrainian, plain folk – Russian but I am certain their grandchildren will not.
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One small correction, the civil society in Kiev have been mercilessly bombarded for over four years, while Moscow and St Petersburg residents have been relatively untouched until now.
Do you think it possible that the Kremlin will seek a ceasefire before winter?
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