#Severn Barrage

[collapsedsquid]

Britain's reliance on fossil fuels and nuclear energy was considered to be a risk as power sources could be "rendered at least partly inoperable" if global supply chains collapse.

Researchers said this could be mitigated by the nation's manufacturing capabilities.

Meeting the large population's energy demands through renewables alone would require very extensive infrastructure, they said, but the UK could increase its resilience by harnessing more energy from wind and water bodies like lagoons or barrages in the Severn Estuary.

Feel like you’re going to be missing stuff other than fossil fuels and energy if global supply chains collapse, befuddled that the assumption here isn’t that Britain goes pre-industrial.

[fromtheringapron]

WWF Royal Rumble 1999

Date: January 24, 1999.

Location: The Arrowhead Pond in Anaheim, California.

Attendance: 14,816.

Commentary: Michael Cole & Jerry Lawler. Shane McMahon joined commentary for match 4. 

Results:

1. Big Boss Man defeated Road Dogg. 

2. WWF Intercontinental Championship Match: Ken Shamrock (champion) defeated Billy Gunn. 

3. WWF European Championship Match: X-Pac (champion) defeated Gangrel. 

4. Strap Match for the WWF Women’s Championship: Sable (champion) defeated Luna Vachon (with Shane McMahon).

5. I Quit Match for the WWF Championship: The Rock defeated Mankind (champion) to win the title. 

6. Royal Rumble Match: Vince McMahon won the match by lastly eliminating Steve Austin. Other participants included (in order of appearance): Golga, Droz, Edge, Gillberg, Steve Blackman, Dan Severn, Tiger Ali Singh, The Blue Meanie, Mabel, Road Dogg, Gangrel, Kurrgan, Al Snow, Goldust, The Godfather, Kane, Ken Shamrock, Billy Gunn, Test, Big Boss Man, Triple H, Val Venis, X-Pac, Mark Henry, Jeff Jarrett, D’Lo Brown, Owen Hart, and Chyna. 

Analysis

The 1999 edition of the Royal Rumble may be one of the most memorable in the history of the event. Let me clarify, mind you, that memorable doesn’t necessarily mean great, as this show is far from it. But few capture the spirit of the Attitude Era quite like this one, for better or worse. The WWF is reaching enormous heights in popularity thanks to its brand of crash TV. The fans in the arenas are submerging under a tidal wave of crass, neon signage. The matches are constantly booked with run-ins and outside interference. Storylines move have more twists and turns than a Mario Kart course. When the product isn’t serious and gritty, it’s campy and oversexed. Everything has the vague feeling of a nu-metal concert. Sure, the era’s success carried on into the early 2000s, but you can’t deny the time period in which this show takes place is smack dab in the middle of the Attitude Era vortex.

And you really can’t acknowledge this time period without mentioning Vince Russo, the man responsible for turning the WWF into a barrage of Jerry Springer theatrics and all the bad taste that comes along with it. Under Russo’s watch, every member of the roster is given a storyline It’s wonderful to learn that, say, Steve Blackman and Dan Severn are feuding or that the J.O.B. Squad and The Brood are feuding. It should be noted, however, that this doesn’t mean every member of the roster is given a good storyline because it’s still Russo at the end of day and there’s going to be content that’s varying degrees of problematic. Still, giving everyone something to do is a great idea and certainly one of the hallmarks of the Attitude Era that WWE should implement today.

On the other hand, one thing is they should not implement today is basically try to stuff an entire episode of Raw into the Royal Rumble match, which is what happens here. As I explained in my ranking of the Rumbles, the match isn’t boring. There’s just so much going on that there isn’t really a lull but, amidst all of that, the actual Rumble feels like the least important thing. Sure, there’s all the intrigue of Austin vs. McMahon at its zenith, but it’s a story so big that it can’t help but overshadow considerable portions of the match. Plus, it leaves the winner options pretty limited. Either Austin wins for the third year in a row, a logical choice but wouldn’t fly in an era that would deliver swerves just to avoid the predictability, or McMahon wins, which everyone would know to be a ruse the instant it happens. Literally anyone else winning would seem out-of-the-blue.

The Royal Rumble undercard, no matter how good it may be, always feels like something to pass the time until we get to the main attraction. This show isn’t an exception to the rule, but it does feature one of the most legitimately brutal contests of its era: the I Quit match between The Rock and Mankind. We, 20 years later, know so much more about the dangers of unprotected chair spots but the late ‘90s was a much different time where wrestlers were upping the ante on risky high spots just to pop a crowd or a TV rating, much to the detriment of their own health. It’s weird how there’s a spot where Mankind gets thrown into an electrical circuit board and people kinda forget about that now. The real spot of the match is Mick Foley is shedding years off his career, and possibly life, by taking a series of legit, unplanned chair shots to the head. It’s hard to watch now, but it’s the rare occasion where an undercard Rumble match may be more remembered than the Rumble itself.

As a whole, Royal Rumble 1999 isn’t the most satisfying Attitude Era show, but it does gives you a good taste of an extremely popular time in wrestling history. Just don’t try to consume the whole thing all at once. For every good idea in the era, there’s a bunch that don’t work, and like Mick Foley on that January night, the WWF doesn’t seem to know when to call it quits.

My Random Notes

Of course, this show’s coverage on the documentary Beyond the Mat is a huge reason why it’s so memorable. Does it get any more real than watching Mick Foley take all those chair shots as his children look on in terror?

This show immediately got me thinking about the WWF Attitude game I had for the Game Boy Color, which I rage quit several times because I never knew how to pin an opponent or get up off the mat.

I had the privilege of watching this show live on pay-per-view and I was so pissed that Mr. McMahon won the Rumble that I swore off wrestling, which only lasted like two seconds because it didn’t stop me from watching WrestleMania XV. Whoops!

Ugh. I also wanted Gangrel to win the European championship so badly and he got so close on that botched pinfall. I was such a mark for him. Heck, I’m still a mark for him.

Oh, and looking back now, I wish Luna Vachon was women’s champ at some point. It’s actually next-level sad that storyline never came full-circle.

Kudos to the dudes in the front row bopping along to the Oddities and The Brood entrance theme. I bet they were delightful at, I’m assuming, the several Korn concerts they attended back in the day.

Imagine being so pathetic that you actually find the time to make a sign that merely says “Sable is Old!” and then wave said sign just so it can be seen in front of a live pay-per-view audience. Some fan was that pathetic on this particular January evening. I mean, wow.

I can’t just not mention the amazing Mr. McMahon training montages leading up to this show. I still quote the whole “I HATE AUSTIN!” thing pretty often.  

Terri Runnels accompanies D’Lo Brown to the ring by, um, performing an interpretive dance?!?

You know what? Kane’s character development throughout 1999 is amazing to watch. They did such a good job of making him a more relatable, human character.  Easily one of the best parts of the Rumble is when he wrecks shit and receives a major pop for it. For someone whose character is so prone to jokes and truly execrable storylines, it’s great to remember all the times when he’s been, excuse the pun, fire.

On Chyna entering the Rumble: This seems like a fairly minor step forward now in the time of the all-women’s Royal Rumble but for as much as Chyna is thrown in the discussion of trailblazers in the Women’s Revolution, she’s still pretty much on her own level. Sure, there’s all the talk of her as the first woman to do this and that, and rightly so, but nobody has quite thrown up a middle finger to the whole concept of gender quite like Chyna did. No wonder she’s a queer icon.

[manscaped]

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[dailygreenworld]

Possibility of barrage across Severn estuary for tidal energy

Possibility of barrage across Severn estuary for tidal energy - https://dailygreenworld.com/2021/11/06/possibility-of-barrage-across-severn-estuary-for-tidal-energy/

[earthenvironmental]

WELCOME TO LINDEN RICHARDSON OUR NEW PRINCIPAL GEO-ENVIRONMENTAL CONSULTANT HEAD OFFICE

Linden will be working with the Head Office team based in Stockport, Greater Manchester providing an extensive range of contaminated land, remediation, geology, mining and geo-technical services across the North of England and Wales.

Linden is currently engaged in the assessment of a number of telecommunication sites, a factory complex in North Wales and development works on housing and retail sites.

He has a great deal of experience of working on the investigation, assessment and remediation of brownfield sites, predominantly in the North West and is a welcome addition to the Head Office Team.

Linden obtained his BEng in Civil/Environmental Engineering at Cardiff University and an MSc in renewable Energy & Resource Management at the University of Glamorgan, writing dissertations on Ground Source Heat Pumps and the Severn Barrage.

Background

Linden started his career as an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) consultant working on Wind Farms, Highway Schemes, Environmental Management Plans, Project Management and Ecological Surveys.

Over the course of his career he has managed ground investigations at more than 150 sites around the UK.

Linden’s experience includes:

Phase 1 Desk Studies

Phase 2 Desk Studies

Ground Investigations

Coal Mining Risk Assessment

Ground Gas Risk Assessment

Hazardous Waste Classification

Unexploded Ordnance Clearance

Earthworks Design To Series 600

Flood Risk Assessment

Materials Management Plans

Environmental Impact Assessment

Geotechnical Design To Eurocode 7

Asbestos Surveys

Ecological Surveys

He has worked on a wide variety of sites and ground conditions, and is experienced in logging soils, rocks, chalk and peat and a wide variety of drilling and site investigation techniques. He is also pretty handy with a shovel!!

Linden has worked on several high profile projects such as Chapel Wharf and The Slate Yard in Salford.

He has a pending application for Chartered Environmentalist status and is also a Fellow of the Geological Society and an Associate Member of the IEMA. He also holds CSCS and First Aid Qualifications. Adam and the Head Office team are looking forward to working with Linden on up and coming projects.

See More:- https://www.earthenvironmental.co.uk/new-principal-geoenvironmental-consultant/

[ericfruits]

The government stalls on backing an experiment in tidal power

KICKING off a tour of the United Kingdom’s four increasingly disunited nations ahead of Brexit negotiations, Theresa May arrived in Swansea on March 20th bearing gifts. The prime minister announced that the Welsh and British governments would together invest £241m ($300m) in a regional plan to put Wales at the “forefront of science and innovation”. Boosters claim this could be a “transformative” deal for Wales, which has long suffered from industrial decline.

But among the promises, there was one omission: no mention of the Swansea Bay tidal lagoon, a pilot project for a new method of generating electricity. When pressed, Mrs May said that officials were still looking at the idea. Local politicians and manufacturers expressed their disappointment at more procrastination. The government, though, worries about the price tag.

If it went ahead, the project could be the first of its kind in the world (there is another tentative tidal-power proposal in the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia). A tidal lagoon works by using the rise and fall of the tides to generate electricity. At Swansea, a 10km (6 mile) seawall would capture the water created by the high tide, which would then be released to drive 16 turbines embedded in the wall. The company behind the proposal, Tidal Lagoon Power (TLP), selected Swansea Bay because it has the second-highest tidal reach in the world, after Nova Scotia, and a shallow seabed.

TLP has lined up the required £1.3bn of private finance, a manufacturing supply chain and cross-party support in the Welsh Assembly, which likes the look of the jobs that it could bring. A report on the potential of tidal power commissioned by the previous government and chaired by Charles Hendry, a former energy minister, endorsed the idea last December. But before it can get under way, Mrs May must sign a deal to buy its electricity.

Attempts to make marine power—that is, wave and tidal energy—commercially viable have lagged behind other renewables such as wind. A few tidal barrages, built across rivers or estuaries, have been operating for years at various sites around the world. But they have never been widely deployed because of the disruption they cause to shipping and the damage they do to the environment. Proposals for a giant barrage across the River Severn, in south-west England, were shelved in 2010. Backers of tidal lagoons say that because they stretch out into the open sea, they interfere less with shipping and bird life—though Swansea’s anglers fret that the turbines would turn their salmon into pâté.

Much of the pioneering work on tidal power has been done at the European Marine Energy Centre in the Orkney islands. Neil Kermode, its director, says his team has tested 17 variations of tide and wave technology from nine different countries. With a technological lead, and big tidal ranges all around its coast, Britain is well placed to exploit tidal energy, argues the Hendry report.

If the Swansea Bay project were to work, Mark Shorrock, the boss of TLP, would like to build five much bigger tidal lagoons at Cardiff, Colwyn Bay, Newport, West Cumbria and Bridgwater Bay. The Cardiff lagoon would have up to 110 turbines and cost more like £8bn. Together they could meet about 8% of Britain’s electricity needs, TLP says. For comparison, the government recently gave the go ahead to the Hinkley Point nuclear power station in Somerset, which is expected to provide 7% of Britain’s electricity. Lagoons have a longer operating life (120 years, against 35 or so for nuclear), are safer and do not have expensive decommissioning costs.

The problem is the price of their electricity. Tidal lagoon power is currently much more expensive than either nuclear or offshore wind. The so-called strike price that the government would have to pay for Swansea’s electricity, to get the project off the ground, would be about £123 per megawatt hour, compared with £92.50 for Hinkley and under £100 for offshore wind. The Hendry report argues that the price of tidal power should fall sharply over the medium term if the technology works and more lagoons are built. That has been the story of offshore wind. The strike price for Hinkley, by contrast, is guaranteed for 35 years.

The government’s hesitation over the initial strike price for tidal power is understandable. And tidal energy is intermittent, since the tides come and go only twice a day. But the Swansea pilot would be a chance to make a smallish bet on a new technology that may yet turn out to be a useful part of Britain’s future energy mix. It looks worth a modest gamble.

http://ift.tt/2nh6dKE

[lukepracticescollaboration]

Name of the Rose

I really enjoyed this film, have wanted to watch it for a long time. I remember my parents renting it from our local independent video shop  when I was young (The Entertainer in Upton-Upon-Severn, it was a magical place).  I was interested because it had James Bond in it, but was quickly bored as it contains nothing of interest to a mind of that age.

This film is full of fantastically ugly people, which is great. Ugly people are so much more interesting to look at than the usual symmetrical faced Hollywood himos and bimbos. They just keep coming, a barrage of ugly people to fit this ugly time in history.

Connery’s Brother William Baskerville is a Dark Age’s Sherlock Holmes, as his name suggests. When he unpacks his bag at the monastery, you see astrological measuring instruments which he hides from the Lord Bishop. Brother William then greets the Bishop with this strange triangle hand sign. Does this triangle represent the religious trinity of God, Son, Spirit / Osiris, Isis, Horus.  Perhaps it is a hand sign from some secret society / order. Brother William is clearly illuminated and he does mention that in his past he was a Catholic inquisitor, this suggests that being in the thirteenth century he is probably a Templar. This hand sign can be seen flashed by many politicians past and present,  Angela Merkel, Trump, Hitler, Gaddafi and every British prime minister for at least the last 30 years.

The main theme in the film is hidden knowledge by those in power. The plot revolves around a book containing something that needs to be repressed (Humour), to maintain control and order. The ignorant peasant population outside of the monastery’s walls are shown as almost subhuman and happy in their squalor below the monastery and its hidden library.  Another theme within the film is sexuality and once again, the repression / suppression of it. There is the encounter of the apprentice with the peasant girl, the homosexual priests and a few blatant suggestions of paedophilia.

This film gave some of the best poster artwork. Posters are in order: Polish, Czech, Hungarian, Spanish, American and French. I guess they did not know how to sell this film and adapted the artwork to appeal to individual nations. I love the French poster, its like a cover from Mike Mignola’s Hellboy comics, I’m sure Mignola would have been inspired by this film. There is more sybolism in the font of the American and French posters with the arrow/sword coming from the O making it into a male gender symbol with the arrow pointing into the A with its triangle / pyramid shape.

[walesmarine]

A Severn Barrage: good news for bad surfers, bad news for good surfers

We at Wales Marine have fallen prey to the temptation to use a tabloid headline to describe serious scientific research. The news is, of course, more nuanced than the headline suggests.

The boffins @LCRIMarine have published an article (paywall but see below) with the title "The effects of a Severn Barrage on wave conditions in the Bristol Channel", and they calculate that changes due to a large barrage would be - on average - no more than 5% of the 'natural' case. It's important to note that whilst waves on incoming tides would be slightly smaller, waves on outgoing tides would be slightly bigger, so in principle it would extend the daily surf 'season' (although it would also diminish the number of very large days which would presumably annoy the better surfers out there).

In other words, a barrage is bad news for the good surfers, and good news for the bad ones.

Sorry Swansea

That's not *quite* all there is to it. It turns out that there are winners and losers at particular sites.

The modeling demonstrates that these guys benefit from increased wave height:

North Somerset (+20%)

South Gower Coast

Vale of Glamorgan

The losers include:

Swansea to Porthcawl coastline (biggest decrease)

Llangennith (marginal decrease)

Scarweather Sands (marginal decrease)

Maybe it means that the Welsh coastline will be have to be divided into zones for beginners and advanced. 

Get the detail

There's too much detail in the document for us to do justice here, and before you get too concerned, I suggest that you read the document yourself. You can obtain a copy of the research by getting in touch with the researchers. 

What about flooding?

Natural Resources Wales and residents will be pleased to hear that a barrage and localised increases in wave height don't automatically mean a greater risk of flooding. That's because the increases in wave height are *not* coincident with high water. Good news for barrage advocates!

[renewablesenergy]

published Renewables Energy

Severn Barrage “No Knight in Shining Armour for UK Renewables” - http://renewablesenergy.net/renewable-sources/severn-barrage-no-knight-in-shining-armour-for-uk-renewables/ Plans for a £25 billion (US$38 billion) tidal barrage across the longest river in Britain have been slammed by members of the UK Parliament’s Energy and Climate Change Committee as economically, environmentally and publicly unacceptable. The proposal is to build the 18 km-long barrage across...Armour Renewables, Knight Shining, Severn Barrage

[dailygreenworld]

Commission to explore building a barrage across the Severn estuary for tidal energy

[dailygreenworld]

New commission to explore building a barrage across the Severn Estuary for tidal energy

New commission to explore building a barrage across the Severn Estuary for tidal energy - https://dailygreenworld.com/2021/10/22/new-commission-to-explore-building-a-barrage-across-the-severn-estuary-for-tidal-energy/

[walesmarine]

Hafren power loses top brass

Blimey! It seems that heads have rolled (or rather that people have walked) from Hafren Power, leaving the barrage project without some key individuals. 

Wales Online reports in detail about the losses, which presumably are a further (final?) nail in the coffin of the project this time around (though the idea will presumably resurface in another 5-10 years).

[manscaped]

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