Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Seattle Committing Slow Suicide
Today’s news from MyNorthwest.com:
New approach to Curb use of Natural Gas in Seattle. The Mayor wants to ban natural gas heating in the city. Because Climate Change Disaster.
South Park Biz Owner: When the sun goes down, the zombies come out. Increases in burglary and robbery after dark.
Seattle leaders unveil plan to strengthen Police Accountability Groups. Don’t strengthen the police to deal with the zombies.
Seattle re-tools plan for “safe injection sites” (opinion). Otherwise known as government-sanctioned drug dens.
Seattle Homeless Response gets new interim head.
It seems that Seattle is having some trouble finding a new head of the Human Services department. The previous one wasn’t coddling the city’s homeless well enough. No thought for the city’s taxpayers who cope with all the homeless camps.
It looks to me like Seattle is in a slow downward spiral. Amazon is slowing its expansion in Seattle and opening new offices across Lake Washington in Bellevue. Real estate prices are still high, but rents are decreasing, due to people leaving.
Published in Domestic Policy
Police Accountabilty Groups? That’ll stop the zombies.
What about natural gas electric power plants? I suppose electric heating will replace natural gas heating in homes. However, shifting the burning of natural gas to heat homes from directly in the home to being supplied by power plants loses efficiency, so more natural gas will be burned. Regardless, natural gas usage has helped clean the air and reduced so-called greenhouse emissions.
Dumb*ss politicians . . .
I’m not so sure. It seems like a fast downward spiral to me. /:
I hope you get to move soon.
If it were me in charge, I’d find some way of preventing Amazon from escaping what they’ve helped to produce.
If natural gas is burned in a high-quality home furnace, the system efficiency is quite high. If it is burned in a power plant–and the resulting electricity is then used to heat the home–then first, there are thermodynamic losses in the power plant. Even the relatively new combined-cycle turbines are only about 60% efficient. And second, there are additional losses in the transmission of the electricity, maybe in the 5-10% level.
Seattle’s power is primarily hydroelectric. Dams on the Skagit River are owned by Seattle City Light. The State has mandated that a certain percentage of power be generated by wind and solar, both of which are much more expensive. And in our state, hydroelectric power is not considered “renewable”.
When are those dams being removed? You know the greens want to do that.
I’m assuming that Seattle officials assume that the wind turbines, solar farms and probably the giant battery farms needed to store that energy when the wind’s not blowing and the sun’s not shining will be built in the Red county part of their Blue state. Certainly not in their own areas, where the pristine views can’t be spoiled by power-generating technology, even renewable ones.
Hydropower really is solar power, with an integral storage capability.
The phrase “dam busters” originally applied to RAF flyers who attacked German hydroelectric dams during WWII. Now, the term is being applied to individuals who advocate the destruction of American dams, for what they claim are environmental reasons.
We have come a long way from the days when the liberals and leftists viewed the TVA as a major national accomplishment and celebrated the Columbia River dams with Woody Guthrie’s song:
Roll on, Columbia, roll on
Roll on, Columbia, roll on
Your power is turning our darkness to dawn
So roll on, Columbia, roll on
The Soviets, too, were very proud of their hydro projects.
While 1930s liberalism/leftism was a child of the Enlightenment…often a bastard child…today’s “progressivism” has a distinct reactionary, counter-Enlightenment flavor.
I’m reminded, as I often am, of a post by a now-defunct Italian blogger who called herself Joy of Knitting:
Cupio dissolvi…These words have been going through my mind for quite a long time now. It’s Latin. They mean “I (deeply) wish to be annihilated/to annihilate myself”, the passive form signifying that the action can be carried out both by an external agent or by the subject himself…Cupio dissolvi… Through all the screaming and the shouting and the wailing and the waving of the rainbow cloth by those who invoke peace but want appeasement, I hear these terrible words ringing in my ears. These people have had this precious gift, this civilization, and they have got bored with it. They take all the advantages it offers them for granted, and despise the ideals that have powered it. They wish for annihilation, the next new thing, as if it was a wonderful party. Won’t it be great, dancing on the ruins?
The entire ethos of the urban lib is like that of a spoiled rich kid: Doesn’t matter how costly or stupid it is— Daddy can write a check. Replace common sense and a moral code with empty, trendy issue symbolism. If the whole city goes into the crapper they can always move to Boulder, Portland or maybe Vermont.
Pierce County towns are also run by idiots. Fortunately, I live in an unincorporated area, so most of their mandates have no effect on me. I am, however, appalled at what has happened to Seattle. When I came out here in 1969 it was the best place on earth to live. My wife and I found a beachfront apartment on Alki Point our first day here. We paid $150/month rent for five year that we lived there, and then bought a lovely little brick house in Madison Park for $28K which is where my son was raised. Looking back, the real decline started in the early 1980s. Seattle started downhill and never turned back. I would say that the major cause of the decline was the vast influx of Californicators who brought the funny money they got from selling their overpriced homes, and drove up the prices of Seattle real estate. There really is some truth to the old communist adage that the capitalist will sell you the rope you hang them with. A lot of people were really happy to see all that new money come into the area. They were more than willing to break up their large lots into postage stamps and sell each of those for more money than the original property sold for. What they didn’t understand was that they were selling paradise and there would be nowhere left to spend their money that was worth living in. That is happening to some extent out here, but for now, at least, there is still acreage which will remain acreage.
Was it Orianna Fallaci? That quote sounds like something she would have said.
Not unless Orianna was blogging under an assumed name for some reason.
Natural gas creates less CO2 than coal or oil so allowing natural gas would help with climate. Because science.
Washington State has one coal-fired power plant, in Chehalis. It is in the process of being shut down. No way could our Leftist government allow coal in our state. Our leftist activists have also prevented a coal-export terminal from being built in Longview, by the simple expedient of blocking the railroad tracks with their bodies, whenever there is even a hint of it being reconsidered. I believe they have a semi-permanent encampment down there, so demonstrators can keep an eye on what those greedy capitalists are doing.
Seattle, which gets less sunshine than most places, has many rooftop solar installations, mostly in wealthier areas. Seattleites voluntarily pay more than they need to, so show their environmental chops. Our Snohomish County PUD also has an alternative where we can voluntarily pay MORE for our power, virtue-signaling all the way.
I like trees. I like a clean environment and clean water and clean air. But this virtue-signalling is useless to everyone. Unless solar panels become insanely cheap, it isn’t worth it to have them in Washington. It probably takes more electricity to make them than it saves for the Washington state.
To use a leftist slogan, we should follow the science.
Brilliant. Simply brilliant. If Washington still needs to suppliment its power needs from other states, maybe those other states should open the transmission breakers at the border . . .
I eould love to have a Power Wall installed in my home. However, I’ve read that some locales require that solar-panel generated electricty be bought by the utility, then sold back to the consumer. I’d rather have an independent supply and only buy what I need . . .
When I was station at Ft Lewis back in the mid 80’s, my branch super would remark that Seattle would look like San Francisco in 50 years. The old man was right, it just happen sooner then he thought.