Our 700th Energy Blog Article
It’s time to celebrate our 700th blog article. I call it our, because my writing is largely a reflection of my community and information sources. I like to look beyond the news publications, which avoid numbers, and dig into and present the relevant numbers. I don’t do anything beyond elementary math in my presentations. I have to thank my wife Joan for giving me the time to write and for taking the time to find my grosser editorial mistakes.
My environment includes talking to my colleagues about environmental, science funding, and university issues. I am involved in a Laguna Beach climate action group that has inspired me to study many local impacts and opportunities to slow and deal with climate change.
The Osher Lifelong Learning Institute has brought me in contact with an impressive group of accomplished experts from all areas of academia, industry and government. Our science courses cover climate science with exceptional cooperation from UC Irvine’s Earth System Science Department. We have also studied water issues and local facilities. We have had a lot of excellent geology courses. There are also courses on modern sciences of big data and now artificial intelligence. My colleagues in Physics and Astronomy at UC Irvine have provided many excellent talks to inform OLLI on physics and astronomy.
UC Irvine and the Western National Academy at the Beckman Center have supplied innumerable environmental and energy talks that have informed me in many fields. This includes the Earth System Science Department seminars, the UCI Water institute, and the environmental talks in the schools of education and law.
I, of course, have to thank coverage in the free press, notices from the many environmental groups, the Nature and Science journals, and blogs on energy, including now Utility Dive. My economics curiosity and defiant incentives are fulfilled by Paul Krugman’s columns and tweets. Finally, Wikipedia makes up for the lack of a team of assistant researchers.
Unfortunately, in the Trump Era, we will need many more studies and talks on limiting the attacks on science and science funding. We also have to fight the many assaults on our environment. Then there are the assaults on our free press, our constitution, our checks and balances, our voting system, our law enforcement agencies, and our state’s rights. Instead of just celebrating the triumphs of science and the progress of environmental sustainability, we are going to spend time trying to shine light on and avoid tearing down current progress. This is a preview of our next 100 posts.
