Using Tax Policy To Fight Peak Oil

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I’m not sure how effective this will be, but the government of Indonesia seems hell-bent on making sure more of the carbon trapped beneath the Earth gets out in a timely fashion:

Indonesia has been offering incentives, particularly for oil and gas,
seeing them as strategic businesses that could impact the country’s revenue.
Finance Minister Sri Mulyani said in December that the government hoped the
incentives would help meet the country’s target of 1.034 million b/d in 2008.
Indonesia has been struggling to maintain its oil output as mature fields
yield less oil. In 2007, the oil sector contributed Rupiah 165.39 trillion
($17.6 billion) to the country’s revenues.

Storm Death

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Here’s a lazyweb question, the product of an afternoon at the office with entirely too much time on our hands. (Hey, it was this or writing about White Christmas. Again.)

The “storm death toll” is a newsroom staple:

At least 19 deaths were linked to the weekend-long blast of ice and windblown snow, which led to multi-car pileups that closed sections of several major highways on the Plains.

I’d like suggestions regarding how to deconstruct this number.

Let us assume that 19 people did, in fact, die in traffic accidents related to the storm. During non-storm conditions, what would be the normal traffic death toll in the area in question? How does that compare with the death toll during the storm? (My hypothesis: that lots of people stay home during a bad-ass storm, and that despite the storm-related traffic death toll, the net effect is to reduce the total traffic death toll. Just call me “Lomborg.”)

Welcome to One of the ‘Net’s Top 10 Water Blogs

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Years ago, when I had two working knees, I used to enjoy running in local 5k and 10k races.

I would often linger at the finish area, hoping against hope that I might win one of those coveted top three age group finish medals. It rarely happened, but if the field was small enough, I always had hope. That was the scene after a race down at Isleta Pueblo, south of Albuquerque, in the early 1990s. As they came to my age group, they skipped right over the third and second place finishers in my age group and called my name to come up and collect my winner’s medallion.

It took a moment for the reality to sink in. I had been the only person in my age group entered.

It is with that humility that I proudly point out that my this blog has been named one of the top 10 water blogs.  Thanks, Jared. I was surprised you could find ten. Good work.

A Christmas Miracle

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k-mart holiday decorAnd the angels came from on high, and bade Lissa go forth into that December morn and purchase luminaria bags, for the old bags were worn, or missing entirely.

And lo, the angels suggested K-Mart, saying the Lord doth view Wal-Mart as the more evil of the two shopping options in our neighborhood.

“But K-Mart never has what we go there looking for,” wailed Lissa, and she spoke truth, for the shelves at our K-Mart are bare. But the Lord spoke of trust in His wisdom, and Lissa went forth in search of luminaria bags, which are small and brown and made of paper and meant to light the way for Christmas revelers celebrating whatever it is they might celebrate in its vision of light.

And lo, the Lord did truly bless Lissa, for there, at the K-Mart, she did find the luminaria bags.

It was a Christmas miracle.

On a Post-Simian Future

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Home evolvesA Thinking Ape’s Critique of Trans-Simianism:

Technologies such as the bow and arrow already desimianize the act of hunting.  While our ancestors were able to experience the pure ape feeling of clubbing an animal to death with a rock, we are left with the cold, sterilized bow that kills cleanly and quickly from a safe distance.  This separation from basic daily activities is a slippery slope.  What would happen if we no longer had to gather fruits and nuts, and they simply grew wherever we wanted them, or had drinking water flow right to our feet instead of wandering in search of streams for days?  These seeming conveniences would rob us of what it means to be an ape.

HT Nora

Ethanol, Soy and Deforestation

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deforestation in the AmazonA letter in Science last week from William Laurance of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute lays out a piece of the argument I’d not heard regarding the extent to which ethanol as fuel reduces, or doesn’t reduce, carbon emissions. The ethanol push in this country is causing U.S. farmers to shift from soy to corn. That’s triggered a rise in global soy prices, Laurance argues, which is leading to greater deforestation in the Amazon to grow more soy:

In a globalized world, the impacts of local decisions about crop preferences can have far-reaching implications. As illustrated by an apparent “corn connection” to Amazonian deforestation, the environmental benefits of corn-based biofuel might be considerably reduced when its full and indirect costs are considered.

Don’t Count La Nina Out Just Yet

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snowpack mapSnowpack may be looking just dandy here in the Southwest for a La Nina winter, but Klaus Wolter’s latest experimental forecast suggests it would be unwise for us to get all cocky about our decisions to buy those full-season ski passes:

My experimental forecast guidance for the late winter season (January-March 2008) continues to show a pervasive tendency for dry conditions over the full domain. Half of Colorado, and most of Arizona and New Mexico appear most likely to experience a dry season, raising the specter of renewed drought in currently drought-free regions. For northern Colorado, this pessimistic outlook is actually more severe than the more neutral or even wet La Niña impacts that are more typical for such winters. A first glimpse at the moisture prospects for spring is surprisingly optimistic for New Mexico and southwest Colorado, but should not be taken at face value, due to lack of verifiable skill this far out, and due to typically lingering La Niña dryness.