It isn't the cost of the hardware that's preventing wider adoption. It is the completely ridiculous cost of installation which can easily double to triple the price. A number of states won't allow you to install your own panels and then hire an electrician to finish connection to the grid. You have to get a "certified" installer.

As an example, a 5KW system costs around $9000. The estimate I got for installing the system was $23,000, an additional $14,000 for installation. This is literally for a single day of work. In comparison, to get my whole roof replaced took 2 days and ran me about $8000 total.

If I were allowed to install my own panels, it would take me and a buddy about a day to do, and then have a certified electrician come in and finish wiring everything up. Total cost would be beer, pizza, and about $1000 tops for the electrician. But I'm not allowed to do that, so I either get fleeced by a lease or get gouged by the installation companies. No thanks.

The profit margins must be pretty damn sweet though. Easy money.

Maturity: That point in your life where you look back and realize exactly how completely fucking stupid you were.

To paraphrase Stephen Colbert: If Harry Potter didn't have enough magic for you, read this book.

Ha! Like I'd listen to you! You still refuse to open your eggs from the little end!

With the republicans in charge, you won't be the only scientific group that doesn't have any funding! You'll have lots of company.

The problem here is that your focusing on atmospheric temperatures, which only tells a small part of the story (this is also only 15 years which still has too much noise to make any reasonable comparisons, 30 years is typically used). Most of the heat is stored in the oceans, and it was recently discovered that the heat the oceans were storing has been underestimated. That's where the heat has been going.

Only the idiots are panicking. The scientists are explaining their results and the potential impacts. Few seem to want to listen. Oh well.

FTFY. The republicans in this country aren't any more "conservative" than the democrats are "liberal". Also, an F-MRI of the current crop of republicans would show zero activity. Or at least that's the impression I get whenever I see a scientists go before a panel of congressmen. The fact that the congressmen on the SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY COMMITEE don't even understand basic concepts that most 4th graders understand tells you all you need to know.

Well, if Fox News gets to call itself a "news" site then that's sets a pretty low bar to clear, don't you think?

Not really. A self-sufficient AI could easily come to the conclusion that humans (and life in general) should be eradicated from a number of different avenues of thought. An AI could be incredibly subtle and patient about doing it as well. Humans aren't really good with subtle or patience, especially if the actions seem to be perfectly good and well reasoned.

The ocean below 1.24 miles hasn't warmed. The ocean above that has, and it turns out it has warmed more than originally thought: Link.

Yes, because a news site without links to the actual published research or subsequent scientific discussion is to be taken at face value. However, it didn't take much Googling to find that the so-called study being referenced in the link was authored by none other than Judith Curry, a well-known climate crank. Her work has been scientifically eviscerated many times over. In other words, she has no credibility.

The latest research, done by several different scientists at several different institutions over the past couple years seem to be averaging around 4C. The AR5 centered around 3C.

Again, you are mixing journalistic sensationalism with actual science. That being said, irregardless of the event, Greenland is experiencing rapid mass loss. There have been multiple papers on the subject.

This had nothing to do with why he left NASA. HE RETIRED. He mentioned his retirement several years before he actually left. He worked there for 46 years. Now he's following his passion as the director of the Program on Climate Science, Awareness and Solutions at Columbia University's Earth Institute.

You may not agree with it, but that is exactly what they are doing.

I don't even....

Not happening, at least not in countries with reasonable sanitary practices. Ebola is difficult to catch, and it has a high mortality rate. These two factors prevent it from becoming the next big pandemic. To wit, the guy who was first diagnosed in the US was in Dallas, a city of 1.5 million people. Out of those 1.5 million people, he infected two, and they were the nurses who were directly caring for him.

Yes Ebola is lethal, but so is EEE and yet I don't see you in a panic about EEE (and that's spread by mosquitos). You're far more likely to get EEE than Ebola (along with a whole host of other diseases). You're more likely to die falling out of your chair while reading this than die from Ebola.

Because it would be ineffective. As has been mentioned numerous times, it's easy enough to lie and/or take a circuitous/non-documented route. Screening for possible Ebola victims would be about as effective as screening for terrorists: UST (Useless Security Theater).

What's really happening is climate destabilization. It really doesn't take a lot to destabilize the climate system; plus or minus 2 degrees is enough to bring on the heat or cause an ice age. But the real kicker is you don't even need to cause the whole delta. You only need to push the climate past a tipping point and the positive or negative feedbacks do the rest.

The climate is just like any other thermodynamic system. You add or remove energy from the system, it's going to destabilize until it reaches a new balanced state.

Incorrect. The practices of the most affected countries is the equivalent of "licking" it (drinking the water used to wash the dead). Combined with a mistrust of health workers/modern medicine/sanitation practices it's a wonder why it hasn't spread farther than it has.

The 1918 influenza outbreak killed an estimated 25 million people in it's first 25 weeks, and killed an estimated 50 million in the course of the year. It infected over 500 million people in total.

The regular yearly flu kills anywhere from about 4,000 to 40,000 people a year in the US and infects many many more.

And yet, you don't seem to be panicking about that.

Heart disease kills a million a year. Cancer kills about half that. Car crashes kill about 40,000 a year.

And yet you don't seem to be losing your mind over it.

In fact, there's a whole list of things that are more likely to kill you on a day to day basis and Ebola is right down there around lightning strike, terrorist attack, and getting hit with a meteor.

Perspective. It helps.

Well, since you seem to be content in wrapping yourself in tin foil you don't have much to worry about, do you?

Try sticking to the facts. If Ebola was anywhere close to how bad you're trying to make it most of western Africa would look like a mass grave. Strangely, it doesn't. Even with their piss poor conditions, poor sanitation, and customs which actively encourage the spread of the disease the numbers of infections has been small and limited almost entirely to the region where the outbreak started.

The current outbreak began in December of 2013 and has infected approximately 8400 people and killed about half of them.

By comparison the 1918 influenza pandemic during a similar period of time infected approximately 500 million people, with 25 million people killed in the first 25 weeks of the outbreak.

I don't see any reason to get whipped up into a frothing panic over Ebola, which is what you and the news cycle seem to want.