Comment by baybal2 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by baybal2 | Hacker News Reader

> Author: Michael Shellenberger

That is already telling. A registered lobbyist...

The two claims he makes:

1. PV modules are made of Cadmium

Cadmium cells make less than 1% of the market, and they are a failed, dying technology. CdTe cells were made in hopes of making cells cheaper by not using a "microchip grade" silicon, but the people behind the startup making them were completely wrong about economics of the process — the truth is completely the opposite. It is silicon cells' process commonality with the rest of semiconductor industry that makes them so cheap.

Hey, but thanks to those joke dudes called "venture capitalists" for spinning them up.

2. PV modules are made of Arsenic

No, only first generation of cells made in electronic fabs were made with Arsenic as N dopant.

No commercial process ever used it. PV cells are N doped with Phosphorus exactly for the reason that it is non-toxic, and because Phosphorus is simply better as a bulk dopant. It is much faster diffusing, and requires lower temperatures for dopant activation.

Guy is a pro-nuclear activist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Shellenberger#Position...

Doesn’t mean he is a sellout, but certainly not neutral.

And neither a lobbyist unless that definition has lost all meaning.

Well, he has started several lobbying companies and been a lobbyist for a number of paying clients, so I think that the meaning of the word 'lobbyist' is still safe.

Can you name some of his current clients that have interest in making solar sound bad?

I only just found out about him. Was only looking him up because you said that anyone who did could see he wasn't a lobbyist. Found out he was a lobbyist. Can you tell me his current client list, since you know so much about him? Then I will go and check it. Twice.

I didn't say he wasn't a lobbyist I said he wasn't a lobbyist the way it was being used originally in this thread.

You are being disingenuous now. You can simply google Michael shellenberger and you won't get lobbyist as the first thing.

Here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-7DIv3AU1o

If you are actually interested which I am sure you aren't actually.

Both nuclear and solar are good energy sources with almost opposite characteristics.

Solar is good for small scale and it is highly variable. Nuclear works better on a large scale and is very stable. Is there a way to make them coexist in a way that doesn't need fossil fuel and where both technology are used to their advantage?

They actually don't coexist very well. That's because they are both inflexible, although in different ways, and the grid has a limited "inflexibility budget".

Nuclear depends on being able to sell power most of the time in order to make enough money to amortize its large capital and fixed operating costs. But solar chews this up, destroying the market a good chunk of the time (longer if some short term storage is added). Even if solar (or solar+wind) are not covering demand all the time, they will be able to crash the price often enough to destroy nuclear's business case.

So basically, unless you have enough spots for hydro, you need fossil fuel to cover renewables.

That's German policy. Lots of renewables backed by coal. No more investment into nuclear.

I know there are some countries that burn trash and plants quite successfully but I'm not sure it can be done world scale. There are some outliers like geothermal, tidal forces, battery storage but these are even smaller scale examples.

I see Shellenberger is still claiming there that PV uses rare earth elements. What a baldfaced lie.

I'm actually a little repulsed that it took me so long to find your informed and concise rebuttal here.

So this piece is a hit piece filled with blatant misinformation, on an investment news website.

Why is this comment so far down the page? Is it factually wrong some way?

He is running for governor and a democrat btw. He used to be against nuclear until he actually did the effort of understanding the facts and came out for it. This made him persona-non-grata by the environmentalists.

So if you want to talk about lobbyism...

But thanks for proving the point. Claiming he is a lobbyist anymore than you are is exactly the kind of shaming tactics that are being used instead of arguments to silence people the majority don't wan't to hear..

I'm not a registered lobbyist.

registered or not is hardly the point.

Using it as an argument against him is absurd.

Using that argument is not absurd. You do not have to register as a lobbyist to lobby on behalf of yourself, but you do if you do so on behalf of somebody else, moreover do so for money (in USA, and many other countries.)

It is especially absurd in the case of Schellenberger. So yes it's absurd. Look him up.

Please point to the point where it makes the argument absurd.

I already did.

You try to use lobbyist to mean that he can't be trusted. That's absurd if you know who he is and how he works and what he works for.

He isn't a lobbyist in any meaningful way any more than you are in this thread or the environmental organizations or the IPCC or the oil companies etc.

If you think your argument can stand on its own you wouldn't need to put that in yet you did and that's absurd and provides no further context and doesn't add to the discussion.

He would not need to register as a registered lobbyist if he was not legally obliged to do so.

What so absurd in this point???

I already explained to you why it's absurd. If you don't understand that there isn't much to do about it, however I would urge you to look up Environmental Progress his group and to learn a little about him.

Again he is no more lobbyist than you or the environmental organisations that's why it's absurd to use it as part of an argument.

I looked him up. He used to be a paid lobbyist for Venezuela.

in 2004 when he was against nuclear. There are so much more about him that you haven't included.

You can start here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-7DIv3AU1o

It's pretty obvious that him being a registered lobbyist means absolutely nothing in this context. But again that's how this whole thing work. Shaming and fingers in ear.

You told me to look him up and that he wasn't a lobbyist. So I put his name and lobbyist into google and almost immediately found that he used to get paid by Venezuela as a lobbyist. I have no real idea who this guy is until you said to look him up. And somehow this is my fault?

I said that it was absurd to use that as an argument against him when you actually know what he DO not what he did in 2004 which isn't really interesting for what he is doing and writing about today.

So again. Show a concrete problem with him being a registered lobbyist otherwise it's just a cheap shot which is why you would have to go back to 2004 when he was against nuclear to find anything related.

You can simply google Michael Shellenberger and you will learn who he is today. You can check out this interview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-7DIv3AU1o as that gives you a pretty good idea of his stance.

No, it’s quite reasonable given the long history of companies covertly funding FUD campaigns about competitors. Those don’t need to be complete fabrications like Steven Milloy’s “junk science”, either — it’s easy to give a negative impression by quoting the scariest cases rather than average or ignoring work which is already being done to address concerns. You can say “I’m just quoting experts” and still pick the most extreme voices in the field to highlight.

The way to avoid this is disclosure: say “I make money from a competitor” prominently so people can read the article with that bias in mind. This guy doesn’t acknowledge it at all in the article or his bio, which is not what you do if your goal is to have an honest discussion.

I would urge you to look him up. It is absurd regardless of the long history.

And if you want to claim that you also have to claim that on the other side, i.e. the environmentalists.

But with Shellenberger it's an especially absurd argument which you would know if you actually knew who he is and what he is fighting for and how.

If his history is so good it’d be better to briefly touch on it early on so it would be a positive rather than leaving the opportunity for people to wonder why it wasn’t disclosed. There’s no downside to being scrupulous about this and it can make a story more compelling when someone explains how their position evolved.

Because it's not important any more than knowing whether you or anyone else is member give that to the extent you can call him a lobbyist he is a lobbyist for his own mission.

He isn't working on the behalf of some industry he is working for a case.

He cowrote a paper with Brand from the long now foundation about nuclear.

Being a lobbyist isn't just one thing even though it always get's used like that and it doesn't mean you are working for some industry.

It’s always important to know about conflicts of interest. If his intentions are good, he should be especially keen on avoiding any risk of being seen as deceptive because that would hurt his stated goal and there’s no downside.

What about you start by being concrete and put forward any evidence of issues with his so called lobbyism. This attempt at weakening his argument by claiming he is somehow in bed with the wrong people instead of actually proving he somehow have husky alterier motives is absurd. I dont see people complain about all the scaremongering by environmental organizations.

Lobbyists are paid to present a preferred opinion, pretty much by definition. If someone is a registered lobbyist then their opinion should be held with great suspicion when it is anything to do with the subject that they lobby on.

Registered to present their own opinion. Your understanding of what lobbyism is is primitive to say the least.

> Registered to present their own opinion.

You don't have to register as a registered lobbyist in USA to present your own opinion. You have to register as a registered lobbyist to represent somebody's else opinion.

The vast majority of registered lobbyists in the USA are paid professionals, usually from the legal field. Several major law companies run large lobbyist for hire departments.

Now Michael Shellenberger may be one of the pro-bono lobbyists (admittedly I haven't yet found out either way), but this would put him in the minority of registered lobbyists in the USA.

I will note that he was at one point a paid lobbyist for Hugo Chavez. Was he presenting his own opinion then?

And, in any case

> None of the above. Rather, the quotes come from a senior Chinese solar official, a 40-year veteran of the U.S. solar industry, and research scientists with the German Stuttgart Institute for Photovoltaics.

> and a democrat btw

I like how Americans put politicians in one of two camps and make it an us vs. them thing instead of having coalitions of parties to come to a good conclusion for everyone.

I am a Dane living in the US. Denmark have 9 parties it's the same thing at the end of the day. The conclusions are no better just because 4 parties got them through.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com