'Solar freakin roadways' on Saturday the Five Live tech show Joy Of Tech opened by enthusing about them as if they are actually proven technology instead of the usual Green thing of confusing fantasy with reality (whether its eco-nightmares or a dream solutions) mp3 audio
.. They don't bother to find a sceptical commentator .. "That would be false balance" woudn't it ?

any feedback from the BBC's head of weather ?
Coincidentally I just noticed I missed listing The Grantham Gravity Fields Festival 24-28th September
eg. Reporting the Weather
Liz Howell and Nina Ridge @St Wulfram's Church
BBC Head of Weather Liz Howell and colleague BBC TV weather presenter Nina Ridge discuss how reporting the weather on TV has become an ever more challenging business. Free Event.
Duration: 45 mins Wed 24 Sep 5:15pm

As I said the output of BBC bias on Climate Change is so prolific it's just not possible to list them all here ..many items make it into the Bishop's main blog If you click the Navigation on the menu bar at the top of the page and Search on the word Harrabin, Shukman or McGrath you should find most.

- Credit has to be given to the minority of BBC staff who do apply to Climate/green stories the rule that applies to all other types of story ie challenging stories on behalf of the consumer. (The public is thanking you although the GreenHedgeFund barons are angry)

@lapogus Nov 16, 2014
Phillip - as Paul Homewood has pointed out, Harrabin & McGrath have no shame when it comes to using BBC output for environmental campaigning, and routinely break the BBC's own editorial guidelines :
- Harrabin Ignores BBC Guidelines On Cooling Tower Images
- More Deceptive Images From The BBC
- Shukman is no better, his videos from the Catlin Arctic fiasco** were blatant alarmist propaganda; in one video broadcast on the Six News (but quickly deleted from the BBC website) *(wow evidence of that would be good)... he even suggested that open leads in the ice were the result of global warming. And of course there have been no BBC reports that the Arctic sea-ice is now at its highest extent for 10 years, or that Antarctic sea-ice extent has never been greater since satellite records began.
**(WUWT page has info inc long reply from Shukman )

@Phillip Bratby Nov 16, 2014 highlighted that a BBCAustralia story appeared to create a narrative as if it was written by Greenpeace
- "Who said the BBC has an unbiased agenda when it comes to climate change?
-According to the BBC, the G20 summit is :
"more likely to go down in history as the meeting that avoided discussing arguably the world's biggest economic conundrum - climate change".
-----------------------------------------------

I add - yes when I checked it appeared to me that BBCAustralia article was written by freelances whose have form for outputting Climate propaganda
Philip that article by "Wendy Frew, Australia editor BBC Online and Marie McInerney" is the kind of thing that would come out of the Greenpeace press office ..'this will be the narrative we set' etc.

- Wendy Frew has form for CC super-bias : Bolt wrote "Not reporting, but smearing March 2007"
- She then repeated the same smears in July 2007 Dissected here eg ""One of the so-called experts on the ABC’s panel that will debate climate change is retired James Cook University professor Bob Carter.
- Professor Carter, whose background is in marine geology, appears to have little, if any, standing in the Australian climate science community"

- @mariemcinerney Twitter feed often features alarmism " Nov 5'The Population Bomb' author Paul Ehrlich pulls no punches re Australia " etc. etc.
…
She writes the Crikey Health Blog but frequently skews in climate eg latest post is
"Climate change hits the headlines, despite the intense control efforts at G20 ..
The Australian Government’s efforts to distract the world from its inaction on climate change have been blown out of the water .."

Useful complete list of Paul Homewood's tracking of BBC Bias

Hey that is a good list from Paul Homewood.
Obviously the daily onslaught of GlobalWarming /GreenDream stories from the BBC is so much I stopped adding stuff to these page.
However I will rewaken this thread to put some notes about last night's Look North from Hull.

Summary : the BBC gave 2 long segments to 2 professional Greenblob PR people
..and gave an opposer 27 words
That’s not a figleaf of balance , that’s a clover leaf of balance.

And the award for creative advertising work on Windfarm Promotion, goes to BBC’s Pa.ul Murphy for putting together 2 packages on BBC Look North tonight
probably in cooperation with with Greenblob PR guys ECIU
Balance ?..yeh
– 6:30pm segment was with Richard B.lack of ECIU (former BBC) ,
– 10:35pm seg was with head of PR of the Wind industry lobby group
with a token 27 words from an anti-turbine campaigner …. whose concerns were quickly dismissed by Murphy

I made notes Here’s 2 quick examples (misspellings are deliberate, cos of PR agency web-tracking)

Of course the 2 PR professionals pushed a lot of dodgy claims
Star of the 6:30pm show was Richard Bl.ack who got about 5 mins video (expires after 7 days) from 50s to 7m22s
“Surveys show that only 2-3% oppose windfarms”
..then 20 mins later (27m26s) the show ended with the presenter
reading messages 1 FOR, & 5 opposed to windfarms
………
Later at 10:35pm “”Emma P. inchbeck is from Renewables UK PR” video 50s to 6m0s

3m40s EP ” I think many people would be interested in better wind turbines
That are going to produce CHEAP power for consumers”
(No wind turbine produces cheap electricity that is why on average they are SUBSIDISED to 2.5-3 times cost of gas made power
and even more when all factors are counted eg extra network costs & inefficiencies)

More detail
The 2 segments are identical mostly except for the PR interview at about 3m40s to 6 mins

6:30pm
Thestar of the show was Richard Bl ack who got about 5 mins
"Surveys show that only 2-3% oppose windfarms" (he misses STRONGLY OPPOSE, govs figs which seem low say 8% oppose to 74% support , Wave23, wave 24 no data link
..then 20 mins later the show ended with the presenter (who does know how local people)
reading out 7-10 messages all opposed to windfarms

Blacks other claims :
#2 'Our grid is more stable than ever, we haven't had a proper power cut for more than 10 years'
..Uttter tosh they didn't used to have to beg factories to shut down
#3 "We have pumped storage and batteries to balance the grid"
..Tosh the first is pretty limted and batteries account for absolute negligible balancing

#4 There is no scientific basis for people experiencing health effects of windfarms , what it is is people have been told to expect to effects , so that triggers them"
..AFAIK occasional people have won damages in courts
One trick is to settle out of court in return for Non-Disclosure agreement
eg June 2017 the Ireland case :Cork village families settle action against wind turbine operators
- Yorkshire Jan 2018 Fined £51,000 ... for having a loud wind turbine
- Australia Feb 2018 Australian court: wind turbine noise a “plausible pathway” to disease

That line "no scientific basis for people experiencing health effects of windfarms" is just a PR line
I have walked very close and through windfarms many times and I'm still alive, and most of the time the noise was not a problem ..maybe depends wind direction.
However they are an industrial process and so like any other they CAN have health effects
say just like if a normal generators broke and it made excessive noise,
And there is research that talks about subconscious noise etc
But generally I think it's a PR trick to put up a minor fault and easily bat it down , rather than deal with more difficult issues.

I tweeted the presenter cos he failed to ask about birdstrike
and didn't mention subsidies

22:32 Second item on windfarms
"Good evening there are calls for bigger wind turbines to be built in our region ".
.. Calls from who ? ECIU you mean ?

"to help meet the countries energy demands and also to reduce our reliance on traditional fossil fuels"

"A new report from an INFLUENTIAL ENERGY GROUP* says that upgrading existing turbines would CUT BILLS and also be better for the environment"
* (why describe ECIU that way ?)
"One campaigner against wind energy, says that it would be foolish and potentially harmful to human health to build them"
"Here's our Environment Correspondent Paul Murphy"
PM (advertising voice) "Windfarms have been a feature of our local landscape for nearly 20 years
and may of them are nearly reaching the end of their lives" (Really ? they are supposed to have 25 year lifespan)
"Supporters of onshore wind energy says this could be an opportunity to replace them with bigger, more powerful, more efficient machines"
..cut to talking head Richard Bl.ack (screen doesn't give his name)
"because new turbines are bigger, more powerful, more efficient ..you could produce the eqt of about 2 gas power stations of new generating CAPACITY, if all of these aging winfarms were to be repowered"
(dingaling the CAPACITY vs output fallacy.. cos a 1GW windfarm only averages 30% output 2GW of CAPACITY only outputs 0.6GW ..which is 60% of a 1GW gas plant)

cuts to Paul Murphy with his graphic explain bit of the advert
"....but producing 8 times more power" (that's eight times zero when the wind is not blowing)

Next the tiny bit of balance bit
"but the Lincolnshire based campaigner Melvin Grosvenor, who believes that noise and energy is harmful to human health says it would be folly to build them any bigger"
* MG speaks for less than 1 minute ..27 words
"We are now entering into new territory bigger turbines, increased sound power energy,
it's the energy that's behind the noise, which we see as causing the real problems" quick cut

PM "Claims that turbine noise adversely affects human health, have been rejected by the industry as scientifically UNPROVEN, (PR trick: quickly dismiss rather than debunk opposition concerns, cos otherwise you are dwelling on them)

but the visual impact of such machines has been a constant source of controversy
.. video of large anti-turbine protest ..with this commentary "There have been marches and protest, but communities have also benefited"
"as a condition of its planning perm England's largest windfarm near to Scunthorpe will handout nearly £8 million"
(dingaling the TIMESPAN fallacy, by not stating the 25 year timespan the grant looks big
... actually it's £0.33m per year ..and all paid for via Guaranteed subsidies we fund anyway)
seg on the disabled angling club

Studio " Emma Pinchbeck is from Renewables UK they represent the industry"

EP " I think many people would be interested in better wind turbines
That are going to produce CHEAP power for consumers
............local concerns ..to be clear we are talking about existing sites"
Pres "...David Bellamy ..blott on landscape ..don't work"
EP "...extremely efficient now"
Pres "they only work third of time.., you've always got to have backup power"
(Good on this presenter he's done some prep)
EP "We are talking about the development of a smarter more efficient energy system across the piece
So you won't find a single analyst now that would put their money on traditional forms of generation, rather than renwables (whopper ..since most new power plants in the world are conventional by a massive margin"
Pres "Roughly what percentage welcome more onshore turbines ?"
EP "over 80% support for renwables, 75% for onshore wind, record breaking levels"

..however it is about a mix , there will always of tech"
..."planning process allows to come together with local communities
Pres
EP "There is no evidence that links wind turbines to impacts on human health"
----------------

Context info
Pinchbeck is Exec Director & Board @RenewableUK | Ex-Head of #ClimateChange @WWF_UK |

video links 6:30pm Seg 1
10:32pm Seg 2

LNorth had set up a Facebook post 12 hours before the items Discussion
They try to make it about the visual
but Andrew Heath makes the point about SUBSIDIES and gets 5 likes

They are what 62% efficient tops the subsides make up the rest.
The ones out at sea are troublesome and costly.
But it's green and it looks good.
Just pray you don't ever have to pay the cost of the electricity they produce without SUBSIDIES

Utterly utterly pointless monstrosities which haven't helped my bills one jot.
Massive con and good income for the person whose land it's on.

"These things will never be good enough to power the nation
they are a red herring put up to appease the greener earth crowd ,
they are not sustainable without coal or nuclear.

Harnessing nature to produce power. I don't know what the problem is!
Haven't seen any studies that they cause cancer or pollute.
I'm no eco warrior (bet she is)
but we have to embrace change with sustainable energy alternatives such as wind power
and as mentioned tidal power.
A lot of Scandinavian homes have micro turbines on their properties (they are rubbish)
and I've seen companies in Lincolnshire using them too to harvest energy.
Stop the nimbyism, they're here, they're clean. Move on.

Mar 30, 2018 at 2:54 PM typo
"however it is about a mix , there will always BE A MIX of tech"

So Mel was edited down to a mere 27 words without even the official title of his org
The Independent Noise Working Group (INWG) they have reported on Wind Turbine Amplitude Modulation a known effect, and the government report about it

His main point was that the larger turbines are like your neighbour who owns a mini, switching to a Ferrari or your village festival becoming the Glastonbury.
However due to BBC editing his point was dismissed.

Mel had a proper live interview the day before on Radio Scotland..direct link

Far from science dismissing noise complaints; there are real people saying they are victims and have won out of court settlements with (non-disclosure orders).
There has been an official govt report into existing effect
"There is enough evidence of increased annoyance from amplitude modulation noise* (AM) from wind turbines to recommend its control through planning conditions according to a BEIS review."
That contradicts Black's assertion about "no scientific evidence"

Mel G & Dr John Yelland who is an expert in wind turbine noise gave a presentation in Glagow last September 2017 in conjuction with Professor Mariana Alves Pereria and Patrick Dugast on wind turbine noise-infrasound immissions and links to health impacts which are being vehemently denied by the wind industry collective.. see.. here About a real event when SSE built test high turbines off shore and onshore residents reported health effects.

On the radio Scotland seg Mel said
"We already have severe noise impacts at the Hunterston SSE offshore site at Fairlie"
news story

I checked Black's statement
"Surveys show that only 2-3% oppose windfarms"

Link to spread sheets
(he misses some wording 2% STRONGLY OPPOSE, whilst 6% oppose )
support is 49%, + strongly 25% = 74%
So overall 8% oppose to 74% support (Wave23 Nov 2017, wave 24 didn't ask)
"Q13) Generally speaking, do you support or oppose the use of the following renewable energy developments:"

Those opposition figures seem quite low .
Around here people tend to know that the rich landowners are being fed a subsidy so it's easy to find people who oppose them eg my mother & father
So what's what's going on ?, are London people all prowind and pro-subsidy ?
Apparently FOI reveals the poll locations and questions are cherrypicked

March 2016 Look North piece video
with Tom from Gayton Le Marsh
"amplitude modulation report"
Mentions Deepings St Nicholas settled out of court

2011 Deeping St Nicholas, Lincolnshire, settled out of court BBC
(That couple moved out in Dec 2006 and settled in court Nov 2011
That was a 5 year slog)

Another German report does seem to dismiss most complaints as psychological and then adds a note on amplitude modulation
\\the weather impacts the noise from the turbines — and not by making them go faster.
When it is more humid or when there is frost, the noise from the wind turbines is more perceptible.
“The wind and the movement of the rotor blades can cause amplitude modulation, in other words an irregular pulsating of the volume,” //

MP Chris Heaton on his website describes the govt AM report thus :
" Wind Turbine Noise Adversely Affects Sleep and Health."
More detail and links

A Notalot commenter makes a good point
Larger blades are not necessarily noisier, cos mostly they run slower.

Post by Mark Hodgson Apr 3, 2018 at 9:52 AM
More uncritical advertising of wind turbines by the BBC:

Reaping the wind with the biggest turbines ever made
By Chris Baraniuk. Technology of Business reporter

Lots of spin (pardon the pun), no critical thought or difficult questions, while the article comes close to ending with this:

"Wind supplied more than 11% of Europe's electricity in the first half of 2017, Wind Europe says.

And Mr Meggelaars expects that percentage to grow, as more windfarms are installed.

"In 2019, we expect to see another record of offshore wind being installed, around 4GW - again, most of that is in the UK and Germany.""

Wind Europe is casually referred to in the piece as "...industry association Wind Europe...".
, that does admit some self-interest, but is hardly the whole story. This is how Wind Europe candidly describes itself on its website:

"WindEurope is the voice of the wind industry, actively promoting wind power in Europe and worldwide. We have over 450 members, active in over 40 countries.
In addition to wind turbine manufacturers with a leading share of the world wind power market, our membership encompasses component suppliers, research institutes, national wind and renewables associations, developers, contractors, electricity providers, finance and insurance companies, and consultants

WindEurope actively coordinates international policy, communications, research and analysis. We also provide various services to support members’ requirements and needs in order to further their development, offering the best networking and learning opportunities in the sector.

WindEurope analyses, formulates and establishes policy positions for the wind industry on key strategic sectoral issues, cooperating with industry and research institutions on a number of market development and technology research projects. Additionally, the lobbying activities undertaken by WindEurope help create a suitable legal framework within which members can successfully develop their businesses.

WindEurope produces a large variety of information tools and manages campaigns aimed at raising awareness about the benefits of wind and enhancing social acceptance, dispelling myths about wind energy and providing easy access to credible information.

WindEurope regularly organises numerous events, ranging from conferences, exhibitions, and launches to seminars and workshops. These encourage the exchange of international experience on policy, finance and technical developments, and provide the ideal forum in which to showcase the latest technology..

I think that in the interests of balance the BBC should have made some of that clear, and/or offered up an alternative voice and some critique of the hype. Fat chance!
(Yeh the BBC claims having 2 opponents on is "false balance", so serves "NO BALANCE" instead )

Mel discounts the claim about bigger turbines being slower or less noisy

@Mark adds
"I'm biased too. I candidly admit I dislike wind turbines intensely, and I've watched the antics of wind turbine companies setting local communities at each other's throats,
while some local residents chase the bribes and others want to preserve their landscape.
IMO wind turbine companies don't care two hoots about the environment or local communities,
and it's all about the money for them.

@golf charlie, adds
"Additionally, the lobbying activities undertaken by WindEurope
help create a suitable legal framework within which members can successfully develop their businesses."
Apr 3, 2018 at 10:12 AM | Mark Hodgson

That is a disturbing admission. Where do all the subsidies go?