Powerful Solar Technology Leaps To Being Cheapest Electricity Provider

Solar Delivers Cheapest Electricity ‘Ever, Anywhere, By Any Technology’

Half the price of coal!

Chile has just contracted for the cheapest unsubsidized power plant in the world, Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) reports.

In last week’s energy auction, Chile accepted a bid from Spanish developerSolarpack Corp. Tecnologica for 120 megawatts of solar at the stunning price of $29.10 per megawatt-hour (2.91 cents per kilowatt-hour or kwh). This beats the 2.99 cents/kwh bid Dubai received recently for 800 megawatts. For context, the average residential price for electricity in the United States is 12 cents per kilowatt-hour.

“Solar power delivers cheapest unsubsidised electricity ever, anywhere, by any technology,” BNEF Chair Michael Liebreich said on Twitter after this contract was announced.

Carlos Finat, head of the Chilean Renewable Energies Association (ACERA) told Bloomberg that the auction is “a strong warning sign that the energy business continues on the transition path to renewable power and that companies should adapt quickly to this transition process.” Indeed, in the same auction, the price of coal power was nearly twice as high!

Grid-connected solar power on Chile has quadrupled since 2013. Total installed capacity exceeded 1,000 megawatts this year — the most by far in South America. Another 2,000 megawatts is under construction, and there are over 11,000 megawatts that are “RCA Approved” (i.e. have environmental permits).

THINK PROGRESS

The Strategies of Global Warfare: Washington’s Military Design in the Asia-Pacific

China, North Korea as well as Russia are potential targets under Obama’s “Pivot to Asia”, involving the combined threat of missile deployments, naval power and pre-emptive nuclear war. Major military and covert intelligence operations are being undertaken simultaneously in the Middle East, Eastern Europe, sub-Saharan Africa, Central Asia and the Asia Pacific region. The planning of military operations is coordinated with non-conventional forms of warfare including regime change, financial warfare and economic sanctions. All the safeguards of the Cold War era, which categorized the nuclear bomb as “a weapon of last resort”, have been scrapped.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-strategies-of-global-warfare-war-with-china-and-russia-washingtons-military-design-in-the-asia-pacific/5541976 

A Thousand Balls of Flame 

The US has squandered a fantastic sum of money fattening up its notoriously corrupt defense establishment with various versions of “Star Wars,” but none of that money has been particularly well spent. 

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article45356.htm 

Inside the CIA's Secret Drone War

From drone operators to strike victims, we examine the impact of remote-controlled killing and the future of warfare.

http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/specialseries/2016/03/drone-cia-secret-drone-war-160330081229214.html 

Jackson Hole – What Have We Learned?

Robert Eisenbeis, Ph.D.

 Chair Yellen’s much-awaited Jackson Hole speech has been touted in the media as suggesting that there will soon be a second rate hike to follow the FOMC’s December 2015 move. However, many have noted that there was actually little, if anything, new in the speech. She did note that there was continued improvement in the economy, especially on the employment front. Some suggest that a possible move in September would hinge upon the release of the next employment number for August, and some of the FOMC participants in attendance noted that all meetings were still live.

However, both Chair Yellen and other FOMC participants were also painfully on message to point out that any policy move would depend upon incoming data, that rates would remain low for some time, and that the subsequent path for further policy moves was more important than the exact starting date. None of this is new, and nothing said should be surprising to most Jackson Hole participants. After all, the purpose of the conference is to discuss policy issues and conceptual policy frameworks and not to serve as a substitute for an actual FOMC meeting. It is out of character for FOMC participants to prejudge actual policy positions and/or to suggest that a policy decision has been made, one way or another, in front of a pending FOMC meeting.

Unlike the press, markets revised only slightly their views on the probability of a rate hike in either September or December. The CME estimate, based upon Fed Funds futures prices, put the probability of a move in September at only 33%, with a 35% chance in November and only a 57% chance for a move in December.  

Why might the market’s assessment be so subdued relative to the rhetoric in the press?  There are several reasons. First, although FOMC participants suggest that the next employment number will be important, it is also the case that the Committee’s employment objects are close to, if not already, consistent with their statutory mandate. Even there, Governor Powell, in particular, sounded a cautionary note in Jackson Hole. He stated that he believed there was considerable slack remaining in the labor market and that the FOMC could afford to be cautious. Mark him down as a dove, along with Chair Yellen and Governor Brainard.

Read More

Climate Causing Thousands Of Yellowstone Fish To Go Belly-Up

This unprecedented kill reveals why we need to keep rivers resilient



The Massive Yellowstone Fish Die-Off: A Glimpse Into Our Climate Future?

It was the kind of clear late-August day that anglers live for. Yet at the Yellowstone River near Livingston, Montana, not a single oar boat or even a fishing line broke the river’s calm surface. All was still, save for an osprey scavenging the corpses of pale, shimmering whitefish along the gravelly shoreline. A light breeze carried the sweetish smell of aquatic decay.

Earlier this month, the Yellowstone River made national headlines with the news of an unprecedented fish die-off in its usually healthy waters. Starting in mid-August, biologists counted 4,000 dead whitefish floating on the Yellowstone or washed ashore, but they estimate that the true number is in the tens of thousands. As if that wasn’t enough, they’ve recently spotted rainbow trout and Yellowstone cutthroat trout—both economically important species—go belly-up as well.

The Smithsonian

 

The War On Cash

The banks, credit card companies and big businesses have declared a war on cash. Sweden is going to go cashless. Death of cash means the rise of something else, which may be detrimental to society.

http://www.countercurrents.org/2016/08/24/the-war-on-cash/ 

Water As A Commons

Every day, 2 million tons of sewage and industrial and agricultural waste are discharged into the world’s water, the equivalent of the weight of the entire human population of more than 7 billion people. The amount of wastewater produced annually is about six times more water than exists in all the rivers of the world.

http://www.countercurrents.org/2016/08/24/water-as-a-commons-only-fundamental-change-can-save-us/ 

Zika Is Just the First Front in the 21st-Century Biowar

The new era of synthetic biology could make the dangers of the atomic age seem quaint. By the turn of the next century, most scientists believe biological technologies will introduce the most wrenching changes in our daily lives. These technologies will include human and animal life extension, crop and livestock genetic manipulation, and human performance enhancement, which together will begin changing the very nature of what it means to be human. 

http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/24/zika-is-just-the-first-front-in-the-21st-century-biowar/?wp_login_redirect=0

Three mini-farms are sowing the seeds of global food security

Tiny, biointensive operations show smallholder farmers from around the world how they can grow far more food than conventional approaches. biointensive farms use up to 75% less land, up to 100% less fertilizer, up to 8% less water and up to 99% less energy to produce a given amount of food than conventional farming. 

http://ensia.com/features/how-three-u-s-mini-farms-are-sowing-the-seeds-of-global-food-security/ 

MERKEL PREPARES FOR A DELIBERATE CRISIS WHILE WHITE HOUSE PLANS FOR A DISASTROUS SUCCESSION

Europe is convulsed by Islamic immigration, Brexit and a brutal economic state-of-affairs that are making it difficult for the average European citizen to live anything like a normal life or plan for the future.

Germany is one place where this sort of fear is being aimed at the population on a daily basis. Angela Merkel’s government has just urged Germans to stockpile enough food and water for ten and five days, respectively “in case of an attack or catastrophe.” Germany is also mulling a return to a military draft.

On the surface, Merkel is simply trying to prepare Germans for every eventuality. She is, you see, a caring leader who wants the best for her people.

In fact, Merkel is simply a handmaiden for a much larger group of elites who are continually plotting “chaos” in order to lay the groundwork for a continued evolution of global governance.

People are supposed to exist on the knife-edge of panic. Merkel has been very good at bringing chaos and fear to German communities. Her immigration policies have welcomed millions of Muslims displaced by wars of aggression by the US and NATO to Germany, and while  this only accounts for one percent of Germany’s population, her government has skewed the demographics for maximum impact.

While the median age of  Europeans is 40,  the median age for Islamic immigrants is 32. And the population Merkel has knowingly injected into Germany is sharply male.

Like other European and other Western leaders, she is very obviously not interested in securing the safety and well-being of German citizens.

No, let me be blunt: She is actually interested in the dissolution of German culture. She is interested in destroying that culture in order to strengthen a larger pan-European society.

Fear is just one tool, but an effective one. Fear is where it always begins. Later on Merkel and other leaders will manufacture more false flags – terrorist attacks or outright war – to make it seem as if their predictions were wise.

Read More

Angry Scientists Demand Climate Action

Leading climate and environmental scientists urge Malcolm Turnbull to take urgent action ‘while there is still time’

Letter signed by 154 Australian experts demands climate policy match the science

More than 150 Australian experts have signed on open letter to the prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, demanding urgent action on climate change that matches the dire warnings coming from climate scientists.

The letter, organised by the Australian National University climatologist Andrew Glikson, calls on the federal government to make “meaningful reductions of Australia’s peak carbon emissions and coal exports, while there is still time”.

The 154 signatories include leading climate and environmental scientists such as the Climate Council’s Tim Flannery, Will Steffen and Lesley Hughes, as well as reef scientists Ove Hoegh-Guldberg and Charlie Veron.

The Guardian

Dangerous Crossroads: US Invades Syria, And Warns Russia

The US government will not allow the Syrian government to expel US forces in Syria. The Syrian government never invited US forces into Syria, but the US now officially dares the Syrian government to assert its sovereignty over the areas where America’s troops are located. This means that the US not only is at war against the legitimate government of Syria, but will also be at war against Russia if Russian forces (which the Syrian government did invite into Syria) defends Syrian forces from attacks in Syria by US forces.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/dangerous-crossroads-u-s-invades-syria-and-warns-russia/5542083 

US Hawks Advance a War Agenda in Syria

The US, having illegally sent American troops into Syria, is now threatening to attack the Syrian military if it endangers those troops, an Orwellian twist that marks a dangerous escalation

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article45331.htm

 Music of memory

A heart-warming movement called Music & Memory is creating personalised music playlists for those with dementia. Eyes light up and bodies start to move with the rhythm as the music awakens memories of their forgotten lives.

http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/allinthemind/2015-11-08/6905656

Doctors Now Prescribing Music Therapy for

Heart Ailments, Brain Dysfunction, Learning Disabilities, Depression, PTSD, Alzheimers, and more.

http://didgeproject.com/therapeutics/doctors-now-prescribing-music-for-heart-ailments-brain-dysfunction-learning-disabilities-depression-ptsd-alzheimers-and-more/ 

Why They Did It: Madoff and Enron’s Fastow Explain the Biggest Frauds in U.S. History

Why do business executives—people who already possess status and wealth—commit financial crimes? 

Eugene Soltes offers some interesting theories in his new book, Why They Do It: Inside the Mind of the White-Collar Criminal, including the notion that many senior business people operate in a moral "gray zone." An associate professor at Harvard Business School, Soltes posits that they step over the line—breaking accounting rules or making illegal insider trades—in part because they rely on intuition. And, it turns out, their instincts stink. 

More compelling than his analytical efforts, the author's unusual research method ought to draw a large audience to his book. With an admirably naive eagerness, Soltes wrote letters to some four dozen convicted criminals, ranging from Ponzi scheme legend Bernard Madoff to Andrew Fastow, late of Enron Corp., to Dennis Kozlowski, once the chief executive of Tyco International Ltd. Lo and behold, many of them wrote back.

Soltes thus had the opportunity to pepper his book with the first-person observations and self-justifications of a colorful Murderers' Row of white-collar crime. Here are some examples:

I’ll pay them all back. Promise.

"It's like a comedy of errors," Madoff told Soltes. "To cover the losses, I decided to take in money from hedge funds. And in order for me to do that, I had to commit to a long-term strategy that I wouldn't send the money back [to investors]. I kept taking in more money, figuring that once the market allows me to do the strategy, I will be able to fix it."  That's the classic explanation of supposedly well-intentioned Ponzi masters: Eventually the scam will miraculously produce profits and everyone will be made whole. Madoff, 78, has plenty of time for correspondence, as he's serving a 150-year federal prison sentence.

Oops, I forgot about right and wrong.

 Bloomberg