Schools paying top students to stay? “It is widely known within the school community of a leading Sydney North Shore private girls school that when four high-achieving year five students announced they would be leaving at the end of year six they were offered full scholarships for years seven through 12 just so the school could maintain their impressive NAPLAN results,” says one Crikey writer. The cost? A conservative $750,000, they reckon. “Spending $750,000 to rig NAPLAN results? So how come these private schools are crying poor?” Good question.
Not easy being green on the road. Being green has a price for car drivers, at least in the NSW market. From the oil and petrol industry, we’re told consumption of the supposedly environmentally friendly ethanol enhanced (up to 10%, or E-10) unleaded petrol is proving to be a big disappointment as motorists switch to the more powerful and expensive unleaded 95 petrol. The reason? Drivers get more kilometres per litre from the more expensive and powerful 95 unleaded than they do from the E-10 petrol.
In fact, the switch is now reaching embarrassing levels because (in Sydney at least) Caltex and Shell are finding it very difficult to keep up with demand for 95 unleaded. The result is that the cheaper E-10 (which is supported by the 4 cents per litre off shopper dockets of Coles and Woolies), is proving to be a bit of a flop and a harder sell. Stocks of unleaded 95 are increasingly short in the Sydney and NSW markets, according to an oil industry marketing source. Motorists are waking up to the fact that they can drive a lot further in unleaded 95 and that the only beneficiaries of the E-10 petrol are the ethanol producers, such as Manildra, says our tipster.
Hun hacks sweat over cost cutting. An Southbank insider tells us there were some nervous nellies at the office of the Herald & Weekly Times yesterday after new News Limited CEO Kim Williams made his first trip down south. Herald Sun editors are reportedly under serious scrutiny after overseeing disastrous weekday circulation slides below the magic half-a-million figure. The word is also circulating that “anyone over 40” at the paper is under threat as the division moves to implement its portion of a News 20% company-wide cost cutting policy. As Crikey revealed last week, the shoulder taps have already begun.
Twitter defo case over before it began. It’s over, Twitter watchers. #twitdef, that is. You’ll remember the saga: journalism academic Julie Posetti tweeted from a conference the thoughts of former Oz reporter Asa Wahlquist on her time at the paper and the influence of editor Chris Mitchell; Mitchell claimed he’d been misrepresented and threatened to sue Posetti in what would have been a landmark defamation case. But the 12 months Mitchell had to serve a writ passed yesterday, Posetti has announced with relief. On Twitter, of course.
Jetstar flight in a flap. This tip just landed: an A320 in Cairns a few weeks ago conducted a missed approach when the first officer (cadet) selected flaps up instead of landing flap. The result? A low-speed warning. Apparently Jetstar has swept the incident under the carpet and several captains have been demoted after incidents with low-time first officers.
Home loan documents lost in the mail. From this morning’s 3AW Rumour File: “A leading bank has allegedly lost 400 customers’ home loan documents for homes that were supposed to settle yesterday and today.” Anyone know which bank?
E10 petrol is an environmental joke (if black humour is your cup of tea). The 10% ethanol has a lower calorific value than petrol, and consequently produces less power per unit volume (i.e. per litre). What is not clearly understood is that in order to make the ethanol in the first place, more energy is consumed in the production of ethanol that is actually release when it is burned. Put another way, about 30% more energyis required to produce a litre of ethanol than the energy that actually is in the later of ethanol produced. Without the massive subsidies paid to companies like Manildra, ethanol fuel would be prohibitively expensive. The four cents a litre price differential is actually poor compensation for the lower calorific value.
In reality, there is a 30% carbon emissions penalty for using ethanol as a fuel, but of course that doesn’t worry the “green” idiots and rent seekers pushing this fuel as an option.
Pay $750k for high achieving students? Nah – it actually doesn’t cost em. Question whether private schools have mandated maximum class sizes, question whether the secret posh school is actually full.
And of course they cry poor, poor darlings. It must be so difficult never having to deal with anyone whose parents are on an income of less than a squintillion a year. No awkward students with disabilities to have to cater for. Homogenously well-performing shiny monocultural students are what posh schools like.
The only idiot in this conversation thus far is you ‘Whistleblower’, as evidenced by your conflating a 30% (fantasy value) energy production cost with 30% greater carbon production. This would obviously only be the case if the carbon contents of the fuels were the same (hint: they’re not). Anyway, whilst you be able to dredge up some papers suggesting that net energy balance of ethanol is less than one I think you’ll hard pressed to find one that hasn’t been produced by a superannuated petroleum geologist or other such people, or organisations, that are unlikely to be neutral (I.E competitors). Most studies place it between 1.3 to 2.5 depending on the source and the country (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethanol_fuel_energy_balance). So your premise is faulty and therefore so is your conclusion.
It doesn’t follow that using ethanol is necessarily produces less carbon however since this will be dependant on how much on the mileage reduction is offset by the lower carbon content of the fuel. To take an example, if you accept a figure of 20% less for ethanol carbon content (http://www.autoevolution.com/news/emissions-gasoline-vs-diesel-vs-bioethanol-3657.html) then a back on an envelope calculation suggests that the it would produce more carbon for a given distance only if the mileage is slightly more than 20% less.
The whole tip in bunk anyway, why would people switch to 95 from E10 when 95 doesn’t get you anyone more mileage then 91 (http://www.autoevolution.com/news/emissions-gasoline-vs-diesel-vs-bioethanol-3657.html)
[Hun hacks sweat over cost cutting.]
Please Crikey, let it be true… Surely Andrew Bolt is over 40.
Re. E10. I’ve used both E10 and normal fuel on my VL Commodore. The difference in fuel consumption is is c. 3%, which is what you’d expect given ethanol has c. 30% less calorific value than petrol and is used in a 10% mixture.
BTW, here in Canberra E10 (at least the Shell I’ve used) is 95 Octane and the standard unleaded is 91-92 octane.