US Politics Mega-thread - Page 9856

On February 06 2018 10:31 Nyxisto wrote:


Crypto coins don't serve any purpose apart from buying illegal stuff. The transfer costs are high, the energy usage is high, removing the middle man is not a feature but a bug as it erodes trust, they're unstable as hell because there's no central bank and so forth.

Also the privacy proposition is inversed in a weird way. The entire ledger is public which means once you are identified everything you did is public, while a single transaction is anonymous. Pretty much everybody who cares about privacy in finance wants the exact opposite. I want to know who I'm buying from but I don't want my entire history public

On February 06 2018 10:22 Plansix wrote:


If anyone wants a preview of what congress is going to look like when crisis hits, watch PA. This is the current GOP brand: fuck the rule of law, win by any means necessary.

On February 06 2018 11:00 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
Don't worry Schumer will cave.

On February 06 2018 11:22 GreenHorizons wrote:
Wasn't the acceptance of caving the first time predicated on the idea that it would force the GOP to cave this time?

On February 06 2018 11:22 GreenHorizons wrote:
Wasn't the acceptance of caving the first time predicated on the idea that it would force the GOP to cave this time?

On February 06 2018 11:26 Plansix wrote:

No. They got CHIP by default because the GOP used it as a bargaining tool and then went on full illegal immigrant attack against the dreamers. I think everyone underestimated the will to deport them within the conservatives. Including myself. I don’t think they will every back down.

On February 06 2018 10:54 Sermokala wrote:

Well not entirely. There are new coins were the transfer costs are almost nill and the energy useage is only in the mineing. I agree the market is probably only a thing right now to allow people to get around financial sanctions and to commit crimes but its not the only thing they're used for.

Plus people love air bnb and uber. Millennials are okay with selling out as long as they can buy in.

On February 04 2018 09:45 GreenHorizons wrote:


Would it make you feel better if it was his friend's?

On February 06 2018 13:58 Doodsmack wrote:
So can we all agree that Trump, having voluntarily taken full ownership of the stock market's performance, owns today's record setting drop?

On February 06 2018 14:01 Doodsmack wrote:


I assume that Trump is the first one to do this sort of thing while he is the President. And I would actually say it would make a difference if it was his friend's. Trump, being a billionaire businessman, is uniquely greedy and corrupt.

On February 06 2018 14:01 Doodsmack wrote:


I assume that Trump is the first one to do this sort of thing while he is the President. And I would actually say it would make a difference if it was his friend's. Trump, being a billionaire businessman, is uniquely greedy and corrupt.

While Texas is most often associated with fossil fuels and conservative politics, it’s also earning a reputation as a leader in renewable energy integration.

For years, Texas has led the United States in installed wind capacity, thanks to a $7 billion investment in transmission lines linking windy West Texas to load centers the state approved back in 2007. Since then, the state has seen sustained growth in wind energy with few integration issues to speak of. The Texas grid, operated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), has seen sustained levels of wind energy penetration above 40 percent for hours at a time without significant issues.

But of course, the wind isn’t always blowing hard enough to cover 40 percent of Texas’ electricity needs. What really matters is the amount of energy renewables provide over the entire year. That’s what’s so remarkable about the numbers that have been coming out of Texas in recent years.

Last year, Texas generated 18 percent of its energy from wind and solar — with wind providing the vast majority of total renewable generation. The 18 percent number matters because for years critics of renewable energy have argued that grid costs and reliability will spiral out of control before we hit 20 percent wind and solar. But in Texas, retail electricity prices have actually decreased, coming in well below the U.S. average.

Part of the reason Texas’ renewable integration achievements are such a big deal is that the Texas grid is essentially completely isolated from the other U.S. grids. The United States has three synchronous power grids: the Eastern Interconnection, the Western Interconnection, and the Texas Interconnection. The only electrical connection between the Texas grid and the other U.S. grids is direct current lines that carry relatively little power. There’s no tricks here — every bit of renewable energy produced in Texas has to be transmitted and balanced within the state. (Other big wind energy producers, like Denmark, have the advantage of being able to exchange power with neighboring grids, making integration easier).

You might be thinking that Texas’ hosting capacity for wind and solar might be nearly saturated. Sure, the state has integrated a lot of wind so far without any major problems, but are people building new wind and solar plants? The answer is a definitive yes.

As of December 31, 2017, Texas had 8,720 megawatts of new wind capacity and 1,952 megawatts of new solar capacity in the interconnection queue, the list of new generation projects seeking approval to interconnect to the transmission grid. Wind energy is still getting built at a much faster rate than solar, because it still has a lower levelized cost of energy (as little as 3 cents per kilowatt-hour) than utility-scale solar (about 4-5 cents per kilowatt-hour). However, solar is on the rise with nearly twice the current amount of installed solar capacity planned to be operational by 2020.

Texas is poised to achieve the storied 20 percent renewable energy barrier without the out-of-control costs and stability critics still fret about. That doesn't mean that going beyond 20 percent will be easy — but the Texas experience gives reason be skeptical of experts that claim to know the true barriers to renewable integration.

Over the coming years, battery storage costs will decline, electric demand will become more flexible, renewables will become more "dispatchable," and grid operators will get better and better at integrating renewable energy. Given these convergent trends, I wouldn't be surprised to be surprised at just how much renewable energy Texas and others will be able to integrate effectively over the coming decades.

Yup. Sean Hannity Found A Way To Blame Obama For The Stock Market Drop

President Barack Obama left office more than a year ago, but that didn’t stop Fox News host Sean Hannity from blaming him for the stock market slide.

On his Fox News radio show on Monday, Hannity said the market drop ― which at its worst saw the Dow industrials plunge by nearly 1,600 points and closing down 1,175 points for the day ― wasn’t the fault of President Donald Trump.

It’s his predecessor that’s to blame.

“Because the Obama economy was so weak all of these years, we had just artificially cheap money,” Hannity said, referring to a Fox News analysis he had seen on the cable network.

He explained that “cheap money” is from borrowing at “ridiculously low rates,” which he added must now end.