Every stat I could find on Scotland tourism says it's remained steady, even through the 2008 crash, and that it's slated to rise in the future.

No Bullshit. Your response, on the other hand - complete doctrinaire bullshit. How does it feel to be a sock puppet?

Tell ya what - as soon as Canada and the US stop subsidizing oil and gas production and consumption ($600B/year) I will ask for the same for alternative energy ($6B/year)

I do like the reservoir idea. it's on the table.

Approximately 100 households were bought out because they complained. Not because they proved evidence hardship or physical effect. The most-often reported complaint was a drop in property value.

Some valid points re the comparison... but FFS would people please stop hypothesizing and produce the science that says that there is an actual detectable subacoustic signal at the mandated 550 meter minimum distance mandated in Ontario, and that this measurable signal has human effect? More than the sound of waves crashing on the shore?

You fanned away my other points like a bad smell.

All these anti-wind generator points are weak, mostly hypothetical and you miss the main point of my comment and the OP, which is that the anti-windfarm organizations are working overtime to generate FUD for broader political reasons than that they simply don't like wind generators.

Finally, these are first and second-generation machines; they're going to get better as we get further into this. The noise will magically go away when the alternative is freezing in the dark.

In Ontario, the right-wing establishment have successfully united the usual anti-government, anti-progress suspects with some pissed-off farmers, rural retirees, and rich NIMBYs to create a particularly nasty strain of anti-windmill sentiment. They've become the Typhoid Mary of wind farm sickness.

It's true that the Ont. government was a bit overzealous in a few of its land acquisition, and there were a small number of households which were closer than what is considered a comfortable distance from some installations, but as far as i know, every such household has either been paid off or relocated.

The claimed negative health effects are spurious. I wonder what any of the hundreds of thousands of households located close to rail lines, expressways or airports must think when they hear people whinging about effects from wind generators...

Yes windmills kill some birds and bats. In North America the reported bird-kill from windfarms is a fraction of the kill from oil and gas operations.... and several orders of magnitude lower than the number of birds killed annually by.... house-cats. Like birds? Don't let your stupid cat out.

Finally, the technology is still pretty young. There's every reason to expect that wind generators will become more reliable, efficient, quieter, and that their energy can be stored and used more effectively. How many centuries has coal-burning taken to get efficient and clean up a bit?

It's kind of a tough call. On the one hand, if you sign off on something government-y that's technically false, that can boomerang on you later on. On the other hand, since the US and Canadian dollar are within a percent or two of parity, the discrepancy is trivial, so any future correction would be trivial. Me, I'd have probably STFU and signed.

But I could only afford a used boat.So maybe I don't understand...

The flaw in the system seems to be the inordinate amount of power in one agent's hands. If the agent had to call a superior to do the seizure, and explain the stupid reason... I bet the matter would have evaporated at that point.

-sigh- a bit older than 52... I'm still finding decent work in some niches, but the young'uns, both local and visa, are making it harder. (Also, flavour-of-the-month technology choices. Rails...eccch)

Never fear. I'm cross-training as a boat mechanic/electrician. At least I'll get a tan.

That article does more harm than good.

First, it's extrapolating from one article's hypothetical projection about solar capacity to the incorrect conclusion that all the proponents of renewable energy have forgotten about energy conservation and Malthusian population limits.

Then, she's doing exactly what she accuses the renewables backers of: playing up only one possible improvement and ignoring the rest.

"Renewable energy advocates typically support conservation efforts, but they don't make reducing consumption their primary goal. Panicked by the urgency of the climate crisis, and rightfully so, their knee-jerk response is a "just do it" approach to technology. "Why don't we just build more solar panels and wind turbines?" they ask.

To which I say: Why don't we just not do it? Let's not build any new power plants except to replace old, inefficient ones. Let's not dig up all the oil. Let's not drive to work alone. Let's not eat meat every day. Let's not turn the thermostat up so high. Let's not buy so many things we don't really need. And above all, let's not accept continued energy growth as a necessary or even desirable way of life".

Her solution, in isolation, is as unworkable as any other single approach.

As long as the various evangelists for alternative energy strategies continue to undercut each other like this, instead of standing together to craft strategy that's actually workable, the pro-oil, pro-growth powers can just point and laugh at the lefty loonies, and little will change.

Good point.

Ok... the best electronics hardware platform is one of those 300-in-1 kits you see in science stores, RatShack, etc etc. Many have you wire the circuits using wires tucked under springs connected to mounted components, but the best kits give you a breadboard that you plug loose parts into. The circuits in the kit's manual are not stellar but you learn tons by just making them and making the circuits work I learned my trade on a 50-in1 kit back in the 70s... and about 5 years ago I picked up a 300-in-1 set for half-price. It makes a great quickie platform for experimenting.

I've been quite happy with using SourceBoost as a PIC environment C compiler. You can do alot with the free version, and licencing for Pro use isn't that expensive. The simulator plugins at $20 are pretty good. Alas... Windoze only

Back to the original question... I respect the Arduino project, it seems to be a great microcontroller infrastructure, with lots of hardware and community support. But I already have PIC tools and dev boards, and I've attended a few MicroChip courses.

I've got some RPi's now... for $35 wow. I'm learning their capabilities, and I'm going to try talking serial or I2C to a PIC board. Could be my new go-to ethernet-enabled platform.

I'm sort of a JS hater, but that IS impressive.

If I was to be really cynical, I'd say that this proves that any ole programming language, if it survives long enough to be worked-on and added-to for a couple of decades, and given fast enough processing, can evolve. Maybe.

(Also it's a great breakdown/tutorial of the game programming steps)