Victorian Electricity Generation Water Usage

Conclusion: Victoria uses more than 5% of its total storage capacity each year on power generation. This is enough water for 3 million homes.

Calculation:
500MW = typical 8.3e9 litres/year, 250000 homes worth of water. (1)

Brown Coal plants:
Hazelwood 1600MW according to (2), uses 37.5ML / day
Loy Yang A 2200MW B 1050 MW
Yallourn 1450MW
Total 6300MW
(wikipedia)

-> 1e11 (100 billion) litres of water each year (6300/500 * 8.3e9). by (1)
-> 5e10 (50 billion) litres of water each year (37.5e6 * 365 * 6300/1600) by (2) (unverified)

Strangely it is ridiculously hard to find more accurate information about how much water each plant uses, where it comes from, whether it is recycled etc.

Victorian storage capacity 1,773,000 ML. (1.7e12 litres). (w:Melbourne Water)

1e11 / 1.7e12 = 5.8% of total storage used each year -> conclusion.
5e10 / 1.7e12 = 2.9% of total storage used each year -> 2 million homes.

Resulting question: why don't the power plants use recycled water? colder water will make the plants more efficient, so maybe the alpine water is important to them.

Sources:

1. http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/coalvswind/c02b.html
2. wiki/Hazelwood_Power_Station,_Victoria#Water

should I get

Independence

Figure 1: Independence.

Australian Internet Censorship

As an Australian and an internet user, I have serious concerns about the new mandatory "clean feed" filter initiative.

Given currently unstable economic climate, I am outraged at the proposal to waste untold millions of our tax dollars on the proposed filters. According to the Government's tests, they are inefficient at blocking ‘inappropriate’ and/or ‘illegal’ content (however loosely you define it), often mistakenly block websites that are neither, and can easily be bypassed by users with even a modicum of internet knowledge. Furthermore, given that your tests also determined that most of the filters slowed internet speeds by 22-87%, I cannot see how this is line with Government plans to update and modernise Australia’s internet capabilities.

I am also amazed at the response to the overwhelmingly negative public reaction to the proposal. Instead of consulting and discussing their plans, those behind it have become publicly silent but continue apace with their implementation. This is not how I think a democracy works.

Given the vast amount of Internet content available, and its extremely dynamic nature, I sincerely doubt the Government will ever be able to classify it all. It is an exercise in futility: a clear waste of taxpayer dollars. Additionally, Australian households are diverse, and many do not have young children, so mandating a one-size-fits-all approach does not serve the public interest. It is not the Government's role to decide what is or is not appropriate for me, for parents, for children - for Australians.

I strongly protest the proposed censorship of the Internet, and demand an end to this plan which will cost all of Australia time, money, liberty and stability.

No Australian Internet Censorship

gah. people say to me, "I'm glad 4chan will be censored".

Oscar Wilde once said, "I don't agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."

I agree... why should other people decide what sort of things are appropriate for me to read? I can decide for myself! All those english teachers were trying to teach me critical thinking for a reason, and now I am thinking critically about censorship.

Don't Do It! I will fight you! And when I fight, it is not only to win now, but permanently. I have just read Ender's Game, and learnt that if you are going to fight, you must win so convincingly that you never have to fight again.

On a side note, the economy will not recover to 2007 levels until at least 2012.

Australian Internet Censorship coming in January

http://nocleanfeed.com/

Let's kill this so hard no-one considers trying it again for the next hundred years.

Problems with management

How do you recognize bad management?

I think the following signs indicate such:

• Managers scheduling meetings and then forgetting to turn up to them
• Everything with hard deadlines done at the absolute last minute, to a low standard
• Much work wasted on irrelevant activity
• Team morale dropping to unplumbed depths
• Attempting to blame supervisors for the team's state

In my opinion, one of the characteristics of a good leader is that they take responsibility for their team.

Wow. I just put 100 candles on a cake. That's not something you do every day.

Here's to Auntie Doll!

It's about time

Haven't written in here for ages. Damn, how many blog posts start like that? I think it's because things have been going so well. And they still are. So why am I writing? Orders came from higher up, of course. Oh, and I wanted to give my new haircut an airing.
Only problem is, because it's so cold, I have to wear a beanie the whole time.

Had my 21st... got off quite lightly, in the end. Looks like that season is beginning.

I won't talk bout my love life here. There's a best-of craigslist entry I found recently that covers most of it (what a single man sees as a bible for the unwillingly single man) here.

This is the sort of thing men complain about ("I wish there was a book on how women think"). The only flaw is that it's written by a guy, so it's probably dead wrong. Although possibly more accurate than a woman could do... anyway. Decide for yourself. And if you happen to BE a woman, please don't hit me next time you see me :)

Many plans for holidays in the future... procrastination is finally proving to be a real hindrance in all these team projects, and I want some fun. There is talk of skiing holidays, hiking and beach time (damn that beach would be cold.. but there would be windsurfers!) In other news, I somehow found my way onto the windsports committee as boardmaster, which basically means I'm in charge of windsurfing at melbourne uni. FUN! Now to get a gang off, all I have to do is send an email! We've even got the champions at SHQ (sandringham). There even seem to be people interested in doing it.

Indoor soccer continues. We won this week, which was as unusual as it was welcome. Lots of people coming to play and watch, although we can always do with more players. The more subs we have, the faster we can run!

That's enough for now.. it's almost gone 1am, which means it's time to start the evening's work.

I can't wait for the holidays! 

Real Programmers

One of the first:
http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/story-of-mel.html

And how to be one:
http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/real.programmers.html

Confusion #2

Well, at least I was right. Procrastination is definitely making things worse...

Cats

It's cat time now.

Confusion

# Warning: ramble ahead. You have better things to do than read this.

So many things in life are confusing. Let's start with the definition:

Confusion:

• Unclarity or puzzlement, e.g. arising from ambiguity.
  
• Literally, to mix or join together. The word itself is a confusion of the prefix "con" ("with" or "together") and the verb "fuse" ("join").
  
• The third season of the Discordian calendar.
  

adapted from wikipedia

Take computers, for example. They're as confusing as anything - and ironically, they're almost impossible to join together. Ever tried to network windows 95 with OS X? Not much fun. Why would you? I don't know.

Still reading? Good.

The thing that really confuses me is people, though. I suppose that's why politics annoys me so much; all they're trying to do is confuse each other (and, unfortunately, sometimes the public too). Confusion taken to an art form.

But anyway. People. Why aren't people honest all the time? (By honest, I mean saying everything relevant at the first opportunity. Keeping silent when you know something is not honest ;). I suppose it's usually because there's something to be gained from keeping quiet, whether it's keeping others feeling happy, keeping yourself happy, or something else. So there are good motives for it - they just don't often turn out to be good reasons. If people know the truth, they can just deal with it and move on.. if they don't, there is confusion. While tension may be better than boredom, it's not much fun for anyone in the long run, and I think it's rare to have anything good come of it. I think, as long as one is perfectly clear and sensitive, the truth is often kinder.

But I've never been much good at taking my own advice.

So, once you get into a confusing situation, what's the easiest way out of it? You may have got into it without realising what was happening, but now you're there, what do you do? Well, if you've got the guts, you can just face the music and talk about it with the affected parties. Failing that, procrastinate: wait for the opportune moment, or until things resolve themselves. This is not a good option, for two reasons: You may make things worse by waiting; and they might not resolve themselves in a way you like.

Girls: how to date a geek?

Well! I have finished the assignement due tomorrow at the respectable time of 2am. No sarcasm intended - that is respectable by my standards.

Just discovered yet another Pratchett. I was a whole book behind! The man seems to churn one out every six months or so. Quite a few people know about them now, I hadn't realised how popular the books were. The quality has definitely improved over time, although my favorite is still Small Gods. Religion was asking for it.

Whereeee iiiiis the riiiight geeeeeeerrlll..... (yes, I know my singing hurts..)

Random activities

Today's discoveries:
1. Random activities can be quite rewarding if undertaken in the right frame of mind.
2. Problems set by teachers always have a solution of some sort, even if the solution is that the teacher wrote the problem down incorrectly.
3. Never cross a cat with orange eyebrows.

Hmmm. The spring cleaning of the room isn't so bad either. I have carpet again :)

Music. The spring cleaning of the mind.

Argh. The Chinese have a curse: "May you live in interesting times". Funny, I can't remember offending anyone who might say a curse like that lately..

I think it's time I tried to stop bagging my friends. The whole culture at school was intensely bagful - there wasn't much else to do in the breaks, and it was fun, and other people did it to you. But it's really not that much fun. Much better to say nicer things, although not too often, of course, and only ever when you really mean them.

People like to be comfortable*, and that requires acceptance (ie. not bagging)

Although I suppose it's a sign of a strong friendship if you can get away with bagging them. But does it really need proving all the time?

*Most of the time.