Perhaps it is just me, but sometimes it seems as though God has a sense of humor, particularly when it comes to climate change alarmists. If they hold a rally to protest about a drought, they seem to always get rained out. If they complain about the heat, the weather turns wet and stormy. Now they are trying to convince everyone to abandon fossil fuels, which may not even be fossil fuels in some cases, with alternative sources of energy that have not and probably never will work. In addition, these alternatives bring enormous environmental problems often potentially worse than the problem they are pretending to solve. What could possibly go wrong?
Well, one may recall that recently I posted an article showing that the snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere is the highest it has been since around 1976. Some of the usual suspects immediately said that snow cover does not necessarily mean colder temperatures and that global warming can actually increase snow fall. God must have been listening, because he just sent a massive cold front from Siberia into the United States.
Cold air from Siberia will send U.S. into deep freeze ahead of Christmas – UPI.com
“The cold could challenge records that have stood since the 1980s, as subzero temperatures are expected to grip states from the northern Rockies to the East. AccuWeather long-range forecasters expect the mercury to be up to 40 degrees Fahrenheit below late-December averages in parts of the country.
To anyone who has ever lived in a “four seasons” part of the country, 40 degrees colder than average is, well, really, really, really cold. When we lived in Steven Point, it was so cold that the radio stations issued “walk warnings.” This is because when it is extremely cold, you can literally freeze your lungs. There were times when I walked to work backwards.
Those of us who wisely moved to warmer climates have zero appreciation of wind chill. Granted, when it 40 degrees, a strong wind can make it feel really cold, to Californians, like say 25 degrees if there is a 60-mph wind. But to those who live in areas where it gets really cold, windchill is a far more serious problem. Here is the windchill chart from the NWS.
Now if it is 0 degrees and there is a 20-mph wind, it “feels” like -22. But if it is already -10, then a 20-mph wind makes it feel like -35. A lot of people have never experienced this kind of cold. But it actually can get really cold. On February 3, 1996, Couderay, Wisconsin recorded a low temperature of -55.
Now the fun part. Electrical power supplies tend to underperform during really cold weather. Things that rely on wind and solar may stop functioning completely. Imagine the joy of sitting in your home, literally freezing to death, with no heat at all. This type of situation would even drive someone like Ted Cruz to consider a last-minute vacation to Cozumel. That is until we switch to electric airplanes.
Now imagine this. You are very cold. You go to buy a warm coat and it costs a fortune. If you want to go anywhere, you need to let your car warm up for about 10 minutes before you can drive it without shivering. If you have a nice new Tesla, you will learn something else. It takes a lot of electricity to warm up an electric vehicle. The distance you can travel is far less than normal. Tesla knows this, which is why the owner’s manual includes the following wording:
In the owner’s manual of the Tesla Model S, you’ll find a stark warning: “In cold weather, some of the stored energy in the Battery may not be available on your drive because the battery is too cold.” When you’re driving, this is usually indicated by a snowflake symbol on the dash display.
Now imagine sitting in your electric vehicle, stranded on some highway. It is bitter cold inside the vehicle. The heater no longer works. You are waiting for a tow truck, but your phone doesn’t work very well either in extreme cold. There is a shortage of tow trucks anyway because many of them have been converted to electric power, so they aren’t working either.
You finally make it home, after some kind person driving a gasoline powered car offers you a lift. When you get home, you don’t have any heat in your electric home, and you can’t even watch TV. When the TV does come back on, there is Joe Biden, grinning like a deranged hyena, says that in five years we will no longer use any fossil fuels to power anything. You would throw something at the TV, but that would be expensive, and you don’t have the energy. But the thought that you are saving the planet from global warming gives you a nice warm glo inside, not.
TDM