It’s no secret that the United States’ $13 billion cannabis industry is big business. Less obvious to many is the environmental toll this booming business is taking, in the form of greenhouse gas emissions from commercial, mostly indoor production.
A new study by Colorado State University researchers provides the most detailed accounting to date of the industry’s carbon footprint, a sum around which there is only limited understanding. What is clear, though, is that consumer demand for cannabis is insatiable and shows no signs of stopping as more states sign on to legalization. //
They found that greenhouse gas emissions from cannabis production are largely attributed to electricity production and natural gas consumption from indoor environmental controls, high-intensity grow lights, and supplies of carbon dioxide for accelerated plant growth. //
Their research shows that U.S. indoor cannabis cultivation results in life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions of between 2,283 and 5,184 kilograms of carbon dioxide per kilogram of dried flower. Compare that to emissions from electricity use in outdoor and greenhouse cannabis growth, which is 22.7 and 326.6 kilograms of carbon dioxide, respectively, according to the New Frontier Data 2018 Cannabis Energy Report. Those outdoor and greenhouse numbers only consider electricity, while the CSU researchers’ estimate is more comprehensive, but the comparison still highlights the enormously larger footprint of indoor grow operations.
In short, he’s an expert in tax legislation, not simply a black man there to give the GOP cred as Reid suggested.
Scott himself called Reid out for her ridiculous assertion that he’s nothing more than his skin color for the GOP.
“Woke supremacy is as bad as white supremacy. We need to take that seriously,” said Scott. “When she calls a United States Senator who’s a subject matter expert a prop, a token, or a superficial covering, that’s personal and that’s wrong and she should be held to account.”
The NPR article lists Liz Cheney as an example of the control Trump wishes he could wield. They know that he wants Cheney, as well as Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, successfully primaried, and would use funds from his PAC to accomplish that goal. The RNC, NRSC, and NRCC instead have a goal of filling seats with people who attach an R to their name – whether or not they act like a Republican.
And right there you have the most important reason that Trump supporters will donate to Save America PAC over one of the party entitles. They’re sick of watching those entities promote squishy Republicans instead of cultivating a field of people who will stick to conservative principles once elected, and sick of watching those entities not hold Republicans accountable once they’re elected.
It’ll be an interesting meeting at Mar-a-Lago this weekend.
My story of growing up as a little black girl in an all-white region of Canada is wrought with racial abuse which often manifested as physical abuse. In fact, I fled Canada at 18-years-old because my Canadian life had been defined by racism and racist abuse up until that point. //
People who claim that the United States is the worst place on earth when it comes to racism are too privileged to know better. They have never made the effort to understand cultures outside their own, and in fact pride themselves on their ignorance. They are so immersed in American privilege that they assume everyone else on earth lives like we live and thinks like we think – the “we” being the intellectual Left, naturally.
The truth is, the United States is the most racist country on the planet, except for everyone else. Humans are tribal. No amount of shaming, canceling or legislation can thwart human nature, human sin. If you think America is the most racist place on earth I invite you to move anywhere else and begin telling the people of color who live there what a utopia they live in.
Richard Grenell
@RichardGrenell
You’ve never seen a signature verification process like the one about to be unleashed in California in 2021.
The new Secretary of State was just appointed by Newsom - she interviewed for the job during the Recall signature campaign.
Do you think they discussed it?
Ari Fleischer
@AriFleischer
Why is it routine and acceptable to challenge the validity of signatures on recall petitions, but it’s voter suppression if the same standards are applied to signatures on absentee ballots? https://sacbee.com/news/politics-
Israel's F-15 "Baz" fleet is specially modified and appears to fly with an eclectic mix of air-to-air weaponry while patrolling the homeland. //
The story of Israel's F-15A-D Eagles is a very different one than that of their American counterparts. Early on, the IAF adapted their most capable air superiority fighter into a long-range strike platform. Since then, the service has continued to morph the Baz fleet into something that's all its own. Today, these are truly multi-role aircraft and they are treated as prizes by the IAF even many decades after the type first entered service. You can read all about the Baz fleet's fascinating past in this previous feature of mine. In fact, the IAF continues to get second-hand, well-used examples from the United States and carefully rebuilds them and deeply upgrades them into indispensable national assets, some of which get loaded with the best networking capabilities the force has to offer.
https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/the-amazing-saga-of-how-israel-turned-its-f-15s-into-mu-1701606283
Sandy 〽️
@RightGlockMom
This is awesome - lol
Rush Limbaugh's Death Certificate Says 'Greatest Radio Host of All Time'
Camp Ozone is nestled in the small community of Ozone, TN, on the eastern edge of the Cumberland Plateau. With 320 acres of wooded land, and a 10 acre lake, we are a quiet getaway from the busy cities, yet we are within a 2 hour drive of Knoxville, Nashville, and Chattanooga. Ozone Falls, a 110 Ft. waterfall, is within walking distance of the camp property.
Just days after SN10 completed the first – albeit hard – Starship prototype landing, SN11 is set to rollout to the launch site for its own attempt. Incremental progress is being made with the test flights, with another tweak to the landing sequence set to be implemented, based on data gained from SN10. Meanwhile, the first Super Heavy prototype continues stacking operations while parts for up to Starship SN20 are being staged at the Production Site.
These future vehicles are set to take up residence at a launch site SpaceX plans to expand, per updated documentation.
Scenes from the crash site. Starship SN10 landed, but shortly after experienced a RUD. This is the aftermath of that rapid unscheduled disassembly. Check out the mangled Raptor Engine in the 4th pic!
Starships - three unique side-by-side cool clips from Mary, syncing the moment of Raptors' ignition prior to landing.
@NASASpaceflight
@SpaceX
@BocaChicaGal
https://youtube.com/watch?v=sDTZa-tm3A8
Trump and his new campaign team are also cracking down on the use of the president’s name for fundraising — a huge draw attracting small-dollar donors. Three sources told us that Trump, who made his fortune licensing his name, has felt burned and “abused” by the GOP bandying about his name to haul in money.
His team has conveyed that any Republican or GOP committee seeking to use it needs explicit approval, according to five sources familiar with the situation. One Trump adviser said they’ve been sending out cease-and-desists to faux PACs using Trump’s name to fundraise, among other demands to knock it off.
Manyin Li, a freelance writer and author of the forthcoming book, “Bearing Witness: Coming of Age in Mao’s China,” has translated excerpts of several speeches given by “high-profile Chinese scholar serving the Party” Jin Canrong, who is a professor at the Chinese People’s University in Beijing. Jin is considered an expert on the U.S. and is an adviser to the CCP’s Organization Department and United Front Department, Manyin says. His visa was suspended by the Trump administration’s State Department in January 2020. //
she lays out six “rhapsodies” that make up Jin’s basic belief about how China views the U.S. in both the short and long term. These “rhapsodies” involve everything from “enmeshing” the two countries so that the U.S. is powerless to disconnect itself from China; playing coy and waiting for the U.S. to involve itself in meaningless wars in the Middle East as a distraction while China builds its military; ingratiating itself to other nations to isolate the U.S.; and using the U.S. system of Democracy and its free press against it.
The entire piece is an absolute must-read
https://www.nationalreview.com/2021/03/what-china-really-wants-a-new-world-order/
The investment conditions in the U.S. are more open and with larger volume than that of Japan and Europe. Laws in the U.S. are transparent, predictable, and protective.
Our government hopes that eventually China will have investments in each and every congressional district in the U.S., making it possible for China to control thousands of votes to influence congressional members’ stance toward China. In fact, the U.S. representatives can be controlled. The U.S. has 312 millions of people, who elect 435 representatives. That means 750,000 people in each district on average. The normal turnout rate is 30 percent, about 200,000 voters who determine who gets elected. Generally, the two contenders have about the same number of supporters, separated by only 10,000 votes or fewer. Therefore, if you control a few thousand votes, you would be his/her dad. China, if playing well, will be able to buy out the U.S., making the U.S. Congress the second Standing Committee of our People’s National Representatives. //
The CCP’s model includes a police state, high-tech surveillance, censorship of media and the Internet, speech restrictions, lifelong privileges for ruling-party officials, wealth concentrated in a small group of CCP officials’ clans, stark inequality, oppression of the religious, the Sinicization of all ethnic minorities with coercive measures, etc. (And let’s not forget that this system originated COVID-19 in the first place!) Would any people in the world like to live in such conditions? The answer is absolutely “No.” This kind of regime cannot even go on forever in China. Nevertheless, it could last for a while. Americans must be ready to face the reality with patience and wisdom.
It’s a sobering read for anyone wondering how a Biden Administration might be inclined to deal with an ambitious Chinese Communist Party. But a necessary one.
BY REP. FRENCH HILL (R-ARK.), OPINION CONTRIBUTOR
But hidden in this strategy, such as it is, lies one idea of consequence, and that is the president's goal to finance lower emissions in developing countries through organizations like the World Bank. While the Bank already seeks to do this, its hands have been tied in an area where it could make an enormous difference: nuclear energy. For the president's climate plan to be serious, it should prioritize nuclear support through the Bank and the other multilateral lenders where the U.S. is a top shareholder.
While rich countries' carbon output is largely flat, the developing world's emissions are only projected to grow unchecked. The U.S. and Europe, responsible for nearly all emissions at the turn of the 20th century, now only account for one third. Wealthy nations may be the loudest voices in climate activism, but the future will be decided elsewhere, and it won't be an especially prosperous one if we insist that poorer societies power their way up the income scale with renewables alone. Nuclear will be essential for their energy mix.
Although its reputation in the United States suffers from memories of Three Mile Island, a 1979 accident as haunting as the bell bottoms of that era (but just as harmless to human life), nuclear energy is a mainstream power source providing 30 percent of the world's low-carbon electricity. The main risks connected with nuclear arise when retreating from it, not embracing it. For instance, after a 2011 tsunami hit Japan's Fukushima reactor, leading the country to temporarily take its nuclear power plants offline, fossil fuel usage and electricity prices surged, resulting in more deaths for the country than from the disaster itself. Researchers have shown that Germany overreacted to Fukushima too, shutting down some of its reactors and incurring $12 billion in social costs each year, mostly through increased mortality from higher levels of air pollution. //
Though the World Bank left nuclear finance decades ago, its own anti-poverty mission makes its return a no-brainer. The governments that act as the Bank's shareholders have already compelled it to quit upstream oil and gas projects in the developing world, even as the Bank pursues a goal of universal access to electricity. This makes little sense. If the World Bank has to surrender its expertise in fossil fuel lending, surely it can restore its know-how in nuclear finance.
BY REP. DAN CRENSHAW (R-TEXAS), OPINION CONTRIBUTOR //
Last month's once-in-a-century freeze throughout Texas and much of the Midwest underscored an inescapable reality: we need reliable energy, and more of it. Modern society demands it. Millions around the world are escaping poverty because of increased access to reliable energy, a demand that will increase by an estimated 25 percent over the next 20 years. But this isn't the only demand from the public. People all over the world are also demanding cleaner energy that reduces carbon emissions.
The Biden administration believes we can do this by prioritizing solar and wind energy. They're wrong.
Now, I am not opposed to wind and solar on any philosophical level. I think they should be a part of the energy mix in locations where it makes sense and the environmental damage can be minimized (remember, you need to clear huge areas to build wind and solar. This is not costless to the environment).
But the sun and wind have self-evident limitations that many refuse to acknowledge. If the Texas grid was solely or even mostly reliant on renewables last month, our situation would be far more dire. So how do we achieve both a massive reduction in emissions while also maintaining reliable baseload energy? Nuclear. //
We don't even designate nuclear energy as clean energy, even though it is carbon-free. As a result, solar power gets 250 times more subsidies than nuclear, and wind gets 160 times more. Not only is nuclear fuel vastly underutilized, but it is virtually infinite with the potential to separate uranium from seawater. One uranium fuel pellet creates as much energy as one ton of coal.
So why don't we build more? Nuclear plants are expensive, for starters. This is partly because permitting requirements go far beyond reasonable safety standards, as well as a lack of scale (we aren't committing to building a lot of plants, so we can't "buy in bulk"). And here in Texas, where wind energy is prioritized to the grid, nuclear plants sometimes operate at a loss, despite the fact that they are producing reliable clean energy continuously. The result? No one wants to invest in building a nuclear power plant. //
For all the hysterical talk from the Green New Dealers of a renewable-only future, the simple truth remains: renewables will never be reliable enough to power the modern world. If we want to tackle climate change, reduce emissions, and power the grid, then we need the proper mix of energy. We need to make sure that nuclear not only stays on the grid, but grows on it.
The EAA shares that the definition of service ceiling is the height above sea level at which an aircraft with normal-rated load “is unable to climb faster than 100 feet per minute under standard air conditions.” //
Boeing 747
Lufthansa previously bragged that its 747-400 could reach the highest altitude in its fleet, reaching a max altitude of 44,947 ft (13,610 m). Meanwhile, the modern 747-8, which is well deployed by the carrier, has a service ceiling of 43,100 ft (13,137 m). //
Boeing 767
Including extended ranges, the 767 family has six variants. These planes have a service ceiling that ranges from 43,000 (13,106 m) to 43,199 (13,167 m). //
Altogether, the surface ceiling figures of most of the modern jets are not so far apart. Regardless, the widebodies generally have a higher ceiling than the narrowbodies. However, there was a clear winner earlier this century when Concorde was around. This supersonic jet had a whopping service ceiling of 60,000 ft (18,300 m).
About 20 years ago, through the course of their research, Michael Mann — distinguished professor of atmospheric science at Pennsylvania State University — and his colleagues identified a novel phenomenon. //
About every half-century, wind and waves seemed to conspire to warm up or cool down part of the North Atlantic, with probable large-scale effects on weather.
Drawing on the same Earth simulations on which most climate research was then based, they concluded that the back-and-forth swing must be a feature intrinsic to the natural system itself. Mann dubbed it the “Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation” (AMO). //
Only here’s the thing: The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation turns out not to actually exist. That’s the latest and definitive conclusion from Mann and three colleagues, who wrote recently in the journal Science that the newest climate models can no longer find any evidence of a natural temperature flip in the Atlantic every few decades.
Instead, the data has led them to another smoking gun: smoking volcanoes.
Research into ancient climates suggests that before industrialization took off in the 19th century, volcanoes periodically belched out enough sulfate aerosols to explain the “oscillation” going back a thousand years. These aerosols have a cooling effect, by reflecting about a quarter of sunlight back into space, until they wash out of the atmosphere within months or a few years.
In the 20th century, the steady concoction of man-made warming and cooling pollution likely influenced the temperature swings.
“This article is the final nail in the coffin,” said Mann, who last month chronicled his experiences bringing climate science into the public sphere in a book, The New Climate War.
Bitcoin's still anonymous inventor, who went by the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, figured out a completely new way for a decentralized network to reach a consensus about a shared transaction ledger. This innovation made possible the kind of fully decentralized electronic payment systems that cypherpunks had dreamed about for decades. //
One challenge is how to introduce new coins into the system. Obviously a viable payment network needs some way to create new coins, but if you let anyone create new coins whenever they want, the currency will quickly become worthless. //
The second challenge is known as the double-spending problem. The rules of bitcoin say that each transaction output can only be spent once. If someone tries to spend the same output twice, the bitcoin community needs some way to detect this double-spending attempt and reject the later transaction. //
bitcoin inventor Satoshi Nakamoto wanted to build a network that wasn't controlled up by any single organization.
So Nakamoto invented a shared ledger called the blockchain that is maintained by computers, called nodes, operating on a peer-to-peer network. Thousands of computers around the world keep separate copies of the entire blockchain, storing every transaction that has happened since the network was launched in 2009. The network rewards nodes who help to create the blockchain by allowing them to create new bitcoins—solving the coin-distribution problem while simultaneously creating an incentive to help solve the ledger-updating problem.
Solar and wind power provide carbon-free electricity. But their generation is tied to the vagaries of nature. That is why, to achieve a zero-carbon electric grid, technologies that can store that energy for when it’s needed will have to play a big role.
While lithium-ion batteries have started to meet some of the need for storage, the metals needed to make them are not plentiful enough for large-scale energy hoarding. So entrepreneurs around the world have been looking for alternatives.
At Quartz, we’ve written about companies working on reversible sulfur power-plants, injecting water underground, running “refrigerators on steroids,” and using stacked concrete blocks—all with the purpose of storing excess renewable energy. Add to that list Hydrostor, a Canadian startup that’s storing energy by injecting compressed air into deep underground caverns.