iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 12/10/2026

I think it's one of our best small National Parks, a true overlooked gem. The geology is awesome and you have condors to look at.

110

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 11/10/2026

The Fish Story is from the Paiute of the Mono Lake Area and tells how Trout searches through the lakes of the Eastern Sierra looking for a place to settle.

youtu.be

The Fish Story

YouTube video by California DWR

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 11/10/2026

The Making of the World story is from the North Fork Mono Tribe.

youtu.be

The Making of the World

YouTube video by California DWR

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 11/10/2026

The California Department of Water Resources has released three beautifully animated videos on their telling water related indigenous stories. This is a part of the Sustainable Ground Water Management Act, supporting Underrepresented Communities, California Native American Tribes and Small Farmers.

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 01/10/2026

I blame Wexford myself. They talk funny over there.

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 01/10/2026

I'm in no way an expert on the technology, large scale solar energy was my field. But personally, I think heat pumps are absolutely the way to go, especially in a mild climate like California. But, living in an older home, I plan to invest in a home insulation upgrade before replacing my furnace.

000

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 30/09/2026

It is a hard problem to solve. But if we really have to electrify everything, then grid planning and expansion are the most pressing problems. But politically it's much easier to go just after 'regulations'.

120

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 30/09/2026

It's more complicated than that. To over simply, the grid upgrade process, of which the interconnect queue is a part, is a lot slower and inconsistent than it should be. And whatever the cause, it doesn't change the fact that it's the barrier. So speeding permits won't accelerate renewables much.

130

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 30/09/2026

While permitting and environmental review are certainly time consuming, it is grid interconnection queues that are the most significant delay/barrier to building renewable energy.

130

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 22/09/2026

"I mean, sure it could be pancreatic cancer, but I suspect it's a plutonic intrusion in your lower bowel"

1151

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 17/09/2026

San Francisco 'Housing Group' seems a very generous description of NIMBYs.

000

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 15/09/2026

When you step back and try to picture a zero carbon economy, you realize 'renewable' molecules are essential to replace many uses of fossil fuels. In that world, where renewable H2 is ubiquitous its use in transportation is a given.

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 15/09/2026

Obviously I disagree, it's not clear at all what a carbon neutral world looks like. EV trucks of any flavor are a vanishing small % of what's on the road today. Predicting an outcome based on the earliest and EASIEST adoption of a technology is unlikely to be accurate.

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 15/09/2026

It's not an either or situation. There doesn't have to be a 'winning' technology, neither are a perfect replacement for diesel, but both complement each other. BEV and FCEV are both electric, you can think of FCEV as just a BEV with a smaller battery and a H2 range extender.

fuelcellsworks.com

Europe Hydrogen Mobility Expansion and Scale-Up Progress - Fuelcellsworks

Industry leaders including Volvo, Daimler Truck, and Toyota accelerate hydrogen-powered vehicle rollout across Europe with infrastructure and policy support.

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 13/09/2026

I have found Rob Miles' YouTube channel on AI safety to be very informative and a great place to start to understand where current AI safety research stands. He also had a recent interview on the Computerphile YT channel talking about some of the recent OpenAI irresponsibility.

youtube.com

Robert Miles AI Safety

Videos about Artificial Intelligence Safety Research, for everyone. AI is leaping forward right now, it's only a matter of time before we develop true Artificial General Intelligence, and there are a...

We haven't over built our electric grid, today it provides about 20% of our end energy use. Doubling or tripling that will take a lot of new wires. 80% of our energy still comes in the form of molecules, we have to repurpose those distribution networks to carry renewable energy.

010

We have a distribution network for energy carrying molecules already. Pipelines, liquefaction plants and tankers. Energy is the biggest business there is, if there's money to be made the infrastructure gets built. It's often easier infrastructure to build than transmission lines because it's buried.

100

Hydrogen has a whole range of uses in a fully decarbonized world. Heavy trucks are just one of them. It really isn't a competition between technologies, Lithium and hydrogen are complementary. Two tools to couple solar and wind to all sectors of the economy.

000

I drive an EV, in the small/medium class they rock! But BEV heavy trucks are still a rounding error (as are FCEV) in the USA and the Chinese data is heavily weighted to smaller trucks. It's a hard problem to solve within the weight limitations. Every extra kg of batteries is one kg less of freight.

200

I have yet to see one actually on the road and I live less than 30 miles from the factory.

000

There are no long range heavy duty battery electric trucks, they are all still burning diesel. It is this high duty cycle application that hydrogen solves as it couples renewable energy to these types of application.

100

With all the noise about Navier Stokes this similar story seems to have gotten lost. The min gap in the work on the twin primes conjecture had stood at 246 since 2014. In late August a human lowered it to 240. Just 3 days later an AI company used her ideas to supersede her result.

000

Ryan J Hollister @phaneritic.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

The petunias were heard to say "Not again!"

000

Reposted by Brenor

Phenomenal office ours today from @weatherwest.bsky.social. The marine temperature data is truly eye-popping.

0101

Reposted by Brenor

Stan Oklobdzija @stano.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

If you live in California, the most important vote you'll cast in November is for Insurance Commissioner. Don't vote for Jane Kim.

39921

Reposted by Brenor

c0nc0rdance @c0nc0rdance.bsky.social · 01/01/2025

The weird but true story of how California got its name: Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo wrote the definitive Spanish language fantasy novel, a swashbuckling adventure called 'Las Sergas de Esplandián' ("The Adventures of Esplandián") around 1510. This was a sequel to his popular...

Frontispiece to “Las Sergas de Esplandián” by Garci Rodriguez de Montalvo, published 1510, but with the number 1526 at the bottom.

513649

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 11/07/2026

I am shocked to read this, I had thought that the beautiful California Toyon was our state shrub and have often told people so. Now I know this to be an urban myth, though frequently repeated in native plant circles. I'm surprised that we were bereft of an official state shrub until so recently.

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 06/07/2026

You meant to say "machine learning"

010

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 25/06/2026

"... NOAA’s Colorado River Basin Forecast Center had predicted 13% of average runoff flows, just 800,000 acre-feet, compared to the more average 6 million. “It’s below even 2002, which was the lowest year on record, just about a million,” said Udall. ..."

010

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 14/06/2026

This was back when planes didn't have wheels and you could only use them once.

000

I don't disagree, and that's what CEQA should ensure. My basic point is that single-issue environmentalists, that often oppose energy development because of impacts to their pet concern, are ultimately doing more damage to that concern by delaying climate change mitigation. I wish they wouldn't.

000

All the arguments you quote from Anza are to my mind FUD (Fear Uncertainty Doubt). Unspecific, general opposition that is basically NIMBY. I'm not even sure that transmission is damaging environmentally. It is more about aesthetics. Whereas climate change is an existential threat to AB.

110

Transmission is agnostic to the electricity it carries. The correct strategy here is to voraciously fight the addition of any new fossil generation. The good news is renewable energy is cheaper and so is advantaged. But expansion is limited by available transmission capacity.

100

This is the smoke plume from the huge medical supply warehouse fire in Tracy, #California. It's drifting over the southern Santa Clara Valley in the Bay Area this Thursday afternoon.

120

Is It Really Impossible To Cool A Datacenter In Space?

There's lots of reasons why space data centers are likely stupid. Cost and maintenance are the main ones in my mind. Cooling however probably isn't that much of an issue as this video from Scott Manley attests.

youtu.be

YouTube video by Scott Manley

000

SDG&E says its proposed transmission line would meet growing power demand but opposition is growing

Individual transmission lines are rarely associated with a specific project. Rather they allow additional system capacity to come online and get to consumers. This one is due to a CAISO study “... to help California meet its energy policy goals and facilitate the clean energy transition,”

kpbs.org

The 145-mile transmission line would bisect Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, widely recognized as California's largest and most biodiverse state park.

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 11/06/2026

I thought you had King Arthur in reserve, isn't he supposed to ride out to England's aid in times of dire need?

000

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 11/06/2026

Anza-Borrego also needs protection from climate change. Our best tool for that is electrification with renewables. New transmission lines are badly needed. As environmentalists we need to look at the tradeoffs and make the best decisions we can, a focus on narrow issues can hurt more than it helps.

110

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 10/06/2026

They probably don't have anything better to do

000

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 09/06/2026

What was the referendum?

100

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 08/06/2026

Well given that Dutch property tax is 0.1-0.3% rather than the typical 1.5% in California they were probably shocked that an owner of a basic 3br home here has to write a $15,000 check every year.

291

Brenor @brenorbrophy.com · 08/06/2026

Myron Cook, WY based but excellent. Dr. Anton's Rock-o-Rama, also WY, but lots of western sedimentology & paleontology content. Solomon's Outdoor Adventures, a younger guy with CA focus.