Hello y’all again. I was recently reading an article which had a whole lot of definitions of commonly used mountain climbing terms. For example: solo climber – one person, falling alone; roped party – a group of climbers, falling together; belay bunny – a person content to hold a rope while the leader falls off.

So I have put together a number of electrical and energy definitions for you. Ready?

Energy poodle – a person who has the electrical knowledge of a lap dog but considers himself or herself an expert in electrical power generation and distribution; experienced artisan – a 60-year-old white male who remembers what an AVO meter was used for; green bunny – an energy poodle who believes cheap electrical power can be generated by wind turbines at no cost, without noise, constantly and with no effect on wildlife, forever; green smiley bunny – A financier who could not care less how energy is produced as long as it pretends to be ecofriendly and makes a fortune; green BEE energy partner – one who puts nothing into any energy scheme, who could not care less how energy is produced as long as it pretends to be eco- friendly and makes a fortune, of which he or she gets a share; global warming parakeet – a person who repeats what he or she reads about any subject relating to air temperature and turns it into a conference which requires that thousands fly thousands of miles to attend, thus releasing enough heat to justify any preposition; denialist – academically qualified person who wants the global warming parrots to shut up, shut up and die or just die but pretends to be too polite to admit this; South African Minister of Energy Affairs – a person, preferably female, who has a law degree, a BA degree, a teacher’s diploma, was part of the struggle and has no idea how electrical energy is produced or distributed.

Here are more definitions: a nuclear blomp – a person who is against nuclear power because “everybody is”. He or she has heard of Chernobyl and has never heard of Windscale, Three Mile Island, SL-1, Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Nuclear plomp – a man who knows the half life of plutonium but does not know if the figure he has applies to Pu-238, Pu-239 or Pu-240. He does not know what ‘half life’ means. He does not care. Green stud muffin – an obese man who tries to attract women by showing apparent commitment to the green energy cause.

These are some of the short definitions. There are some longer definitions, including the following:

• Carbon clown, a person who, when told that South Africa has 40-million tons of coal reserves, which, at the current rate of consumption, will run out in 200 years, says, darkly: “They would say that, wouldn’t they?” He or she knows that trees give off oxygen and consume carbon dioxide but thinks ‘unnatural trees’ like gums and pines should be cut down in South Africa, being nonindigenous.

• Cream soda polisher – a radio announcer who knows absolutely nothing about energy but supports any energy that is green and warm and fuzzy.

• Helmet polisher – a political figure who knows abso- lutely nothing about energy but makes amazing state- ments, such as: “Energy efficiency opportunities are frequently overlooked due to the simple fact that industry and other consumers are unaware that they exist.” (This statement was made by Pumzile Mlamo-Ngcuka when she was Minister of Minerals and Energy.)

• European wind turbine manufacturer – a company losing €900-million a year.

• Indian wind turbine manufacturer – a company losing $900-million per year.

• South African wind farm operator – a company about to lose R50-million a year.

• Bubble puff operator – an organisation owned by wind turbine manufacturers who convince people to invest in wind farms so as to pay back operators and turbine suppliers.

• Applied wind ornithology – the belief that wind turbines usefully clear the air of migrating birds and blue cranes.

• Applied wind acoustics – the belief that a 156-m-diameter three-blade fan rotating at 10 rpm with a blade tip speed of 25% of the speed of sound makes no noise that we can hear other than when it chops through a blue crane.

That is it, folks. Do send me any electrical energy definitions of your own. I may well be persuaded to publish them. Letters of outrage are also welcome.