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Daffy = then we are back to pie in the sky. No commercial scale electricity generating breeder reactor is yet possible. France tried really hard and failed
Totally agree - hence my post earlier on wind/battery/hydrogen. People
Retrofitting Air source heat pumps will cause huge issues. My partner works for a small housing association and they are installing asps on a small estate.
The roads have been dug up for months as the electrical supply has been improved and extra sub stations built.
There appears to be some doubt about how good asps are when retro fitted to existing houses.
It’s easy to sit at your keyboard and tell it like it is, but things have to work for real people in real life.
And the gas main would need the same doing to it. But you're going to have to do the electric grid anyway to support EVs, so why do both? IF electricity can be provided by renewables at a cheaper rate, then the cost of running an ASHP for longer will still be cheaper and more sustainable. Moving electricty around is MUCH easier than moving hydrogen, trust me.
Molgrips – nuclear provides IIRC 4% of the worlds energy needs. Its not zero carbon but lowish carbon. to create a significant effect on reducing greenhouse gas then this needs to be expanded massively. There is not the fuel to provide for this massive expansion.
Yes. As I said, we need many tools to solve this problem. Including nuclear doesn't have to mean replacing everything with nuclear.
Molgrips
Steve this isn’t either/or. The choice isn’t either large scale nuclear or billions dead. We need to build a better world, and there will be many many pieces involved.
There’s no one solution, and I don’t think even pro-nuclear people believe that.
Totally agree with both those statements. Hence why nuclear, gas and other tech is NOT off the list of better than present choices.
Where I take issue is how we define a "better world" .. and "better for whom". and very specifically where forced depopulation fits into that
As I've said previously, lots of the developing world needs affordable gas... it's not ideal but its WAY WAY better than burning wood and dung. The LPG taxi's in India are in crisis (or were last time I checked Indian press something I probably do way more often than most STW readers) meanwhile rural cooking and boiling drinking water is done using wood and dung and the Indian government is trying to get then to switch to gas due to the decreased carbon footprint whilst the wealthier obviously want air conditioning at home.
As Daffy points out India are fast tracking breeder reactors... we are dicking about
MEANWHILE: Europe is currently importing gas that goes right past many developing nations (like India) on its way to us. I can't believe we are talking about reopening coal mines... and complaining about the minor inconveniences of fracking.
We go on about heatpumps that only work efficiently with proper design, and very good insulation whilst being philosophically opposed to petroleum based insulation.
very specifically where forced depopulation fits into that
Do you mean limiting family size?
Harness the amount of hot air being expelled on this thread?
This thread has been fun.
Anybody got Thanos' phone number?
I hear he has an effective solution.
Molgrips
Do you mean limiting family size?
Not necessarily, rich families could have more kids... so long as we limit the poor.
Sorry... that's a bit blase.
You seem to find the numbers ChevyChase gives as a bit unpalatable... but I don't think they are too far out of line with this idyllic eco world where man lives in balance with nature.
This is the difference I am trying to get across between climate change and "eco"/"green" philosophy rewilding the UK, getting rid of commercial food production and living like ChevyChase / pre-industrial groups. (Sami, North American First nations etc.++)
We are too late to limit now without going past the next point of no return climate wise where best case scenario is even bleaker so we would need to accelerate depopulation** initially, perhaps as a one off but that would need to happen in the future if the "better world" is that utopia of the Green movement described by ChevyChase.
From China 1 Child to Logans Run, forced sterilisation to euthanising criminals, disabled or poor to letting natural disasters run their course.
**Yes... that's a euphemism it means what you know it means. This living sustainably with the environment just isn't even close to possible with 1/4 of the worlds current population even with modern medicine
Steve this isn’t either/or. The choice isn’t either large scale nuclear or billions dead. We need to build a better world, and there will be many many pieces involved.
In the same way yes it's not either/or.... I'm not against less pollution at all, I'm against selling less pollution (e.g. Nox) as better for climate change and widespread greenwashing because I see the "Clear and Present Danger" above all else is climate change.
ChevyChase talks more shite than you, i wouldnt base your perception of environmentalism on him.
Stevextc - what age do we start culling people? 80, 75, or as low as 60.
I'm finding all this very uncomfortable.
Bunnyhop
Stevextc – what age do we start culling people? 80, 75, or as low as 60.
I should imagine its more based on wealth, ethnicity and disabilities than age in practice.
Last time the UK did this due to lack of food it was Indians and the time before** that Irish
**unless I missed some inbetween?
I’m finding all this very uncomfortable.
Me too. But without rapid and huge depopulation we can't keep doing this "eco" or "green" stuff that accelerates climate change without mass depopulation or further accelerating climate change.
This whole idea of living "sustainably" using "renewables only" whilst removing all commercial farming and covering the UK in trees again in some wonderful utopia means returning to a pre-industrial revolution population very quickly or instead we die from climate change.
Even returning to 1900 population is 30M from the current 68M...
You seem to find the numbers ChevyChase gives as a bit unpalatable
I've absolutely no problem with people having one kid. It's not 'unpalatable' as you put it. But it would cause significant economic issues down the line, which was my point.
I don't accept his actual numbers because whilst maybe if we all piss resources up the wall those numbers are okay, but the more efficiently we can live the more people the Earth can support.
You aren’t being objective because you care if something is renewable to your definition when objectively all that matters is we have enough.
No, I'm simply pointing out that factually, your assertion that nuclear is renewable is utter horseshit.
You completely missed the point … if we will have some failures and some people die .. SO WHAT
Okay now I know you're trolling. Either that or you really need to go speak to a professional, and I don't mean an engineer. The nuclear industry cannot and absolutely will not tolerate such a lax attitude to safety.
Time, effort and money spent on nuclear means that there is less time money and effort on other solutions
You do realise its not an either/or scenario right?
Oh and India is doing stuff with breeder reactors and we aren't because we abandoned Gen IV development decades ago. SMR tech is mostly based on Gen IV (breeder, pebble bed etc.) rather than the glorified sub reactors we are dicking about with.
I’m against selling less pollution (e.g. Nox) as better for climate change
I've never seen that claimed and I see a lot of eco stuff. It's claimed it's better for local air quality, which it is.
You do realise its not an either/or scenario right?
to some extent it is. We have limited amounts of engineers, money and effort. So every person/ hour spent on nuclear is a person hour unavailable for other things
Daffy, I said nothing about hydrogen I just said there are infastructure problems with asps and some doubts about how well they work with existing housing stock. The problems are not trivial and we need long term planning and a touch of realism to do any good. The fundamental problem is the mass of the population dont want change and dont like the solutions.
So every person/ hour spent on nuclear is a person hour unavailable for other things
Spoke like a true project manager.
If a woman can have a baby in 9 months 9 women can have a baby in one month.
🙂
I just said there are infastructure problems with asps and some doubts about how well they work with existing housing stock
This is true. I have learned that my boiler is rubbish, and I looked around at reasonable replacements. Looks like I can get a decent gas boiler for £1,300. I looked at heat pumps, some estimates went up to FIFTEEN GRAND.
That needs to change.
Uncle Bill (Gates) is coming to save us all with traveling wave reactors. 🙂
As I’ve said previously, lots of the developing world needs affordable gas… it’s not ideal but its WAY WAY better than burning wood and dung.
Really? Wood and dung are renewable.
Wood, assuming new trees are planted to replace those burnt, is completely renewable. Dung just happens anyway, rather than let it decompose and give off greenhouse gases why not burn it and release those same gases but replace the ones which the gas would have given off? It's us which should be copying them, moving from gas to wood and dung! (yes, yes, call it biomass boilers because that sounds fancy, but that's what it is)
The problem with wood and dung for those in the developing world is the I'll heath for the users.
@andrewh I suggest you read up about Drax, burning wood as biomass is absolute greenwash it's still burning stuff and releasing co2 - let alone all the other issues with burning either pellets or wood chip. Unless burning locally sourced wood waste & regenerating locally then it's a non starter.
One of the problems with growing trees, (ultimately new forests and woods), is the over population of deer. Deer munch on saplings and lower branches of trees, thus preventing proper growth. Also there is the over population of grey squirrels, who are also destroying many trees (they take off the bark). These trees never make it to full maturity and therefore we can't rely on wood as a source of fuel for most of the population.
Drax had contracts signed for local coppiced willow when they first converted. Local landowners had actually started growing it but then Drax got an offer to undercut this from logging of virgin forest in north america. So the local folk got shafted and instead virgin forest gets cut down and shipped in. ( from memory - think this was drax)
@tjagain yup that's right.
Also, dung can be burnt much cleaner by extracting the methane via an anaerobic digester. Burn the gas through an engine and you have a source of electricity. Burning directly in a fire hasn't been good practice for years now. See also any other bio waste.
The leftover product is fertiliser.
I looked at heat pumps, some estimates went up to FIFTEEN GRAND.
Only 15?
The ground source i have cost over 25k to fit. Over half to drill the hole in the ground.
On the plus side, when i moved over it cost me about the same to heat this place in scandi weather (large villa in the countryside) as it did my shitty 2 bed terrace in the midlands.
Molgrips
I’ve absolutely no problem with people having one kid. It’s not ‘unpalatable’ as you put it. But it would cause significant economic issues down the line, which was my point.
How are "we" going to enforce this and what happens when someone or some whole country breaks it?
Rank
Country
2022 Population
2021 Population
Growth Rate
Area
Density (km²)
1 China 1,425,887,337 1,425,893,465 -0.00% 9,706,961 147/km²
2 India 1,417,173,173 1,407,563,842 0.68% 3,287,590 431/km²
3 United States 338,289,857 336,997,624 0.38% 9,372,610 36/km²
4 Indonesia 275,501,339 273,753,191 0.64% 1,904,569 145/km²
5 ****stan 235,824,862 231,402,117 1.91% 881,912 267/km²
6 Nigeria 218,541,212 213,401,323 2.41% 923,768 237/km²
7 Brazil 215,313,498 214,326,223 0.46% 8,515,767 25/km²
8 Bangladesh 171,186,372 169,356,251 1.08% 147,570 1,160/km²
9 Russia 144,713,314 145,102,755 -0.27% 17,098,242 8/km²
10 Mexico 127,504,125 126,705,138 0.63% 1,964,375 65/km²
Lets ignore Russia for now and remove those we might work with ... leaving India, Indonesia, ****stan, Nigeria, Bangladesh
India has already embarked on drastically lowering its CO2 ... but Europe is selfishly doing all they can to prevent that by buying the LPG they need to reduce their CO2 so what do we do threaten India they must abandon their initiatives (already well ahead of ours) and instead adopt a 1 child policy and we don't care how they enforce that?
How should we deal with Indonesia and Bangladesh? Threaten to reduce aid ??
You see perhaps why the ban more than one child policy quickly becomes very distasteful.
source: https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries
I don’t accept his actual numbers because whilst maybe if we all piss resources up the wall those numbers are okay, but the more efficiently we can live the more people the Earth can support.
UK Pop today about 68M -- 1900 30M -- 1700 5M we can feed ourselves somewhere between 1700 and 1900 levels.. but
the more efficiently we can live the more people the Earth can support
That isn't what the green movement are generally pushing... there is a contingent that want to stop all commercial farming and live "sustainably" that you can compare to the ERG in the Tory party ... fundamentalists that view mankind as a blight and like the ERG they keep getting their policies through... EVEN when this means making climate change worse they do not compromise because their philosophy is mankind being reduced to live sustainably.
If we were starting from scratch... it sounds idyllic to me. My objection is how we depopulate.
Example of this in action:
Really? Wood and dung are renewable.
Wood, assuming new trees are planted to replace those burnt, is completely renewable.
Again what does renewable matter if they are releasing CO2? It's a religious dogma then you get the apologists who also succumbed to the dogma.
Also, dung can be burnt much cleaner by extracting the methane via an anaerobic digester. Burn the gas through an engine and you have a source of electricity. Burning directly in a fire hasn’t been good practice for years now. See also any other bio waste.
Except that isn't what the developing world are doing for their cooking/boiling water....
andrewh
It’s us which should be copying them, moving from gas to wood and dung! (yes, yes, call it biomass boilers because that sounds fancy, but that’s what it is)
Which particular rural communities in developing countries do you spend your time in?
Do you quickly make them a biomass boiler and they are amazed?? Please let us know about your extensive experience and why you know so much better than the people who actually live and work in these communities.
That isn’t what the green movement are generally pushing… there is a contingent that want to stop all commercial farming and live “sustainably” that you can compare to the ERG in the Tory party … fundamentalists that view mankind as a blight and like the ERG they keep getting their policies through… EVEN when this means making climate change worse they do not compromise because their philosophy is mankind being reduced to live sustainably.
As someone who is a dark green politically IE a fundamentalist I have never seen this, never heard of it and would like to see something to back this up
Certainly no fundamentalist green policies are in action in the UK right now
Remind me again on GreenPease supporting getting rid of diesel cars and supporting ULEZ zones?
Thats not a green fundamentalist position. Thats mainstream. Green fundies like me would get rid of all private cars
Looks like the world population will be declining in less than 80 years.
https://edition.cnn.com/2022/08/30/health/elon-musk-population-collapse-wellness/index.html#:~:text=Population%20projections%20by%20the%20numbers&text=The%20UN%20predicts%20the%20global,billion%20in%20just%208%20years.&text=By%202080%2C%20the%20worl d's%20population,begin%20to%20decrease%20by%202100.
So.... we need to plan how best to feed, clothe and supply enough energy for about 9 billion people....
Of course the growing UK population is not because we are having too many kids but immigration. So largely irrelevant when discussing planet impact because it is just people moving from one place to another.
Though granted if a person movves from a poor country their carbon footprint will be higher here.
How are “we” going to enforce this
We're not, that's been my point this whole thread.
Green fundies like me would get rid of all private cars
And ignore the practicalities... This kind of "thinking" gives the green movement a bad name and is actually harming progress.
Molgrips - Im just pointing out that what steve thinks is fundamentalist is not
Of course it needs both time and interim arrangements to reach that aim. But without dramatic action immediately we are looking at deaths in the billions in your childrens lifetimes
Its not"ignoring the practicalities" to understand this point. Its dramatic action now or the planet becomes uninhabitable for humans
tinkering around the edges will not work. Pretending its not a mass extinction for humans coming rapidly is not understanding the situation.
Molgrips
And ignore the practicalities… This kind of “thinking” gives the green movement a bad name and is actually harming progress.
Exactly my point...
EITHER climate change is way and above and by far the over-riding challenge or it isn't.
Green fundies like me would get rid of all private cars
and refuse to use buses and .... lets abolish commercial farming??
All of which leads back to how do YOU plan to depopulate to the extent your fundy principals can be put into practice for everyone across the entire planet?
But if the solution to prevent a mass extinction event for humans involves removing all industrialization, then that will cause a mass extinction event.
Squirrelking
Okay now I know you’re trolling. Either that or you really need to go speak to a professional, and I don’t mean an engineer. The nuclear industry cannot and absolutely will not tolerate such a lax attitude to safety.
Skewed reality here ... a near certainty of hundreds of millions and potentially billions dying from climate change vs a couple of limited nuclear accidents (perhaps)?
But if the solution to prevent a mass extinction event for humans involves removing all industrialization, then that will cause a mass extinction event.
It's just "accelerated depopulation" so the survivors can all live "sustainably".
It's not only deindustrialization though it's removing commercial farming and replacing fields with the natural forests and biodiversity.
I'll admit, other than the killing everyone it sounds quite idyllic.
I go back to how many people the world/UK supported before ... there is a reason the US and Canadian first nations had tiny populations and it's not because they had a 1 child policy, it is what the land could support sustainably.
Chuck in some modern medicine and tech and perhaps we multiply that by 5x or 10x ???
We still need to cull billions somewhere...
Its not”ignoring the practicalities” to understand this point. Its dramatic action now or the planet becomes uninhabitable for humans
I do understand the point that we need radical solutions. I fully agree. But simply calling for radical solutions is the easy part. Implementing them is really hard, and that's the bit I'm trying to get you to think about.
How do we ban private cars without catastrophic economic fallout?
I go back to how many people the world/UK supported before … there is a reason the US and Canadian first nations had tiny populations and it’s not because they had a 1 child policy, it is what the land could support sustainably.
They weren't as tiny as you think. Most of them were wiped out by diseases which travelled faster than the European colonisers, so the Europeans never got to meet them. Yes, small tribes were small in the early days of humanity (earlier than North American first nations) but that's because they didn't have the technology to support more people. It would have been possible if they did.
The land can support more people if those people live sustainably. The more sustainably they live, the more can be supported. The problem isn't too many people, it's too many people living unsustainably.
Chuck in some modern medicine and tech and perhaps we multiply that by 5x or 10x ???
We still need to cull billions somewhere…
I think you are just guessing here.
Skewed reality here … a near certainty of hundreds of millions and potentially billions dying from climate change vs a couple of limited nuclear accidents (perhaps)?
Nuclear accidents, by their very nature, are not limited. If you have a release it won't respect any site, local or national boundaries.
What you propose is completely unacceptable to everyone inside and outside the nuclear industry, pro and anti alike.
This is the last I'm saying on the matter, you obviously haven't got the slightest clue about what you're talking about.
In fact, that goes for everything you've been spouting off about. Go and read a book about carbon cycles and carbon neutrality and stop making utter horseshit up to suit your ridiculous arguments.
Molgrips
I think you are just guessing here.
Absolutely .. hence the perhaps.
They weren’t as tiny as you think.
We don't have census data of course but we do for the Sami.
We do have census data for Roman Britain, Norman Britain and more recently.
The romans of course were organised, industrialized and had commercial farming... but lets take their 3.6M and round it up to 4M...
The land can support more people if those people live sustainably. The more sustainably they live, the more can be supported. The problem isn’t too many people, it’s too many people living unsustainably.
I'm not the one promoting this idyllic lifestyle ... I'd like to see their peer reviewed figures and something beyond a religious belief and a roadmap with as-is - to-be and a gap analysis.
I'd like to see as an example how we plan to replace Kingspan type insulation etc. on a global scale without any oil... that isn't straw and dung...
Because frankly... wouldn't it be nice if ... isn't a plan but a dream.
It's an absolute certainty we can't support the current world population ... just as certain as climate change is going to kill millions->billions depending how we focus. That number depends on for example how do we plan to insulate ..
My whole point is we shouldn't be doing ANYTHING we call "green" or "eco" if it actually makes climate change worse in the next 25 years... even if its a lovely dream.
It really amuses me the cognitive dissonance shown on here.
People are going to die in the billions because so few of us will accept that we are part of the problem and so few of us are prepared to accept the reality of the situation and that our lifestyles have to change radically.
Stop pretending fiddling around the edges will do.
so few of us are prepared to accept the reality of the situation and that our lifestyles have to change radically.
I see most of us have agreed with you multiple times.
Nope - not one of you is prepared to accept the lifestyle changes required. Not one. You yourself keep making excuses as to why any solution is impossible. Multiple times on this thread.
You yourself keep making excuses as to why any solution is impossible.
Sigh.
They aren't excuses. An excuse is a reason you don't have to do something. I'm trying to understand HOW we do something.
Molgrips - you will not accept anything that compromises your lifestyle. I cannot be bothered to go back thru this thread but there are multiple examples of this. Any solution radical enough to actually make a significant differnce is dismissed as "not possible" with a load of excuses. Up to you but that attitude is why after 30+ years there is no significant change
There is no solution without radical change to western lifestyles. thats the basic point you will not accept.
Any solution radical enough to actually make a significant differnce is dismissed as “not possible”
That's REALLY not what I've said. It really isn't. You should go back through and read this.
What I'm doing is pointing out that whilst you are correctly calling out the problems, you are not then talking about how to get solutions.
YES WE NEED RADICAL CHANGE. The question is how do we implement it?
You want to ban private cars - ok good, I like that idea. What would you then do to keep the economy working? That's not rhetoric, it's an actual question, I want you to try and answer it.
Im done with it Molgrips. I have explained this many times how to end the reliance on private cars. Ramp up fuel costs dramatically over time, use the money raised to invest in alternatives. You continually misrepresent what I say then make excuses why it will not work
What you do is make excuses why society in general and you in particular cannot take action.
"What would you then do to keep the economy working? " Thats the excuse for not taking action
Without taking action then the economy collapses and billions die. You are looking at this from the wrong direction and refusing to accept the radical change needed
I'm not getting at you personally. most folk think like you on this
Molgrips
You want to ban private cars – ok good, I like that idea. What would you then do to keep the economy working? That’s not rhetoric, it’s an actual question, I want you to try and answer it.
Again these are tactical point solutions ... population of the UK 68M .. number of motor vehicles in India 295M
https://www.statista.com/statistics/664729/total-number-of-vehicles-india/
In a country with the third largest road network in the world, the total number of vehicles in fiscal year 2019 stood at 295.8 million. Road travel seemed to be the preferred choice in India with over 60 percent of the population who used personal or shared vehicles for commute. Not only public commute, the industrial movement of goods through roads had also been on the rise with well over two billion metric tons of freight transported through roads in financial year 2017.
TJagain
Nope – not one of you is prepared to accept the lifestyle changes required. Not one. You yourself keep making excuses as to why any solution is impossible. Multiple times on this thread.
Pot, kettle, black ???
Steve - I have done what I can over my adult life. I consume far less than most in the west. I understand that solutions need to be worldwide and that the solutions need to be radical
I have never commuted by car. I owned a car for a few weeks when I was 17.
I have never bought any: New furniture, crockery, cutlery, TVs, soft furnishing etc etc. 2 new computers in my life. Almost all my consumer electronics ( of which I have far less than most westerners) are second hand. I have owned 2 new bikes in my life
I have spent well over £10 000 on insulating my flat. Similar on my rental flat - I will never get that money back. I fly very rarely.
But yes - even if everyone on the planet had my lifestyle its still unsustainable and my lifestyle has far less impact than most in the west
Im done with it Molgrips. I have explained this many times how to end the reliance on private cars. Ramp up fuel costs dramatically over time, use the money raised to invest in alternatives. You continually misrepresent what I say then make excuses why it will not work
What do you want me to say? "Oh ok then you know best" and then stop?
Or do you want to explore the issues?
Your post is all about YOU. I'm not talking about you I'm talking about everyone.
That post was in answer to Steve. the post answering you was:
I have explained this many times how to end the reliance on private cars. Ramp up fuel costs dramatically over time, use the money raised to invest in alternatives. You continually misrepresent what I say then make excuses why it will not work
What you do is make excuses why society in general and you in particular cannot take action.
“What would you then do to keep the economy working? ” Thats the excuse for not taking action
Without taking action then the economy collapses and billions die. You are looking at this from the wrong direction and refusing to accept the radical change needed
I’m not getting at you personally. most folk think like you on this
What you do is make excuses why society in general and you in particular cannot take action.
No, I'm pointing out a reason WHY society has not taken action. Don't talk to me in particular, the argument is not about me, which is why I'm refraining from getting involved in that.
“What would you then do to keep the economy working? ” Thats the excuse for not taking action
No, it's literally a question, not an excuse. I want you to try and answer it.
When fuel duty goes up, what do you think will happen to the poor people in rural areas who need petrol to get around? Are you going to give them allowances? Rich people will be far less affected by this than the poor, so it's a regressive policy and I don't like those. Environmental solutions should not penalise the poor. This is what I want to discuss. Headline policies are no good without implementation details. Again - this isn't rhetoric, these are actual real questions I want to see answers to.
I already suggested a better solution earlier in the thread. I think I may write to my representatives about this actually.
1. TJ isn't saying ban cars - he's saying that we use ratchet economics to drive them from the road using the tax from those economics to implement change.
2. It's not radical, despite that he says there's a need for radical change.
3. TJ, it wasn't an excuse - it was a failure on molgrips part to read. Mol - he did answer "how?"
4. The real problem here (and an earlier poster identified it) is that people focus on their own good habits and others perceived bad habits and pick the thing which annoys them most as the most practicable target.
5. Steve - arguing about the emission cost of people buying and using sustainable technologies is just dumb. It's a well proven fact that they more than pay for themselves in the lifetime of the product. Equally, you saying that we're essentially making more emissions elsewhere is equally dumb. Technology adoption reduces costs and increases uptake. Those in the west which can afford it in the early adoption phase should pay for it to encourage this.
6. TJ - using the circular argument that the economy won't exist in 30 years, so crushing it now makes more sense, doesn't make sense. If there's no money to do anything, people will default to whatever is cheapest. Just like in the energy crisis with people buying tonnes more wood to burn rather than paying the extra to have a cleaner solution.
Radical thinking - Borrow £300-800bn, build another 10-15 offshore wind installations like Hornsea and Dogger. Massively subsidise the installation of insulation, solar and batteries on every roof/carpark (not fields) and and invest in hydrogen storage (this isn't rocket science - well, it sort of is, but well known rocket science) and turbines to replace existing gas turbines in power plants. Build a UK company to make both the batteries the panels the turbines so it's all made here, etc. Increase taxes to pay the interest on the debt only and then payback the debt with profits from power/battery and panel manufacture including eventual export or selloff of the state owned companies. The UK would be energy secure and carbon neutral (from an energy perspective ) in 10 years. Offer new businesses coming to work in the UK access to free energy for the first 5 years of their operation. Invest the tax from those new companies into new infrastructure.
I’m not getting at you personally. most folk think like you on this
They're right to. Nothing they can do as an individual will make any difference. Even removing all consumption and emissions created by the UK would make no difference. Globally we'll keep using more resources and causing further damage until either large parts of the world become uninhabitable or we find a technological solution.
TJAgain
Steve – I have done what I can over my adult life. I consume far less than most in the west. I understand that solutions need to be worldwide and that the solutions need to be radical
I have never commuted by car. I owned a car for a few weeks when I was 17.
I have never bought any: New furniture, crockery, cutlery, TVs, soft furnishing etc etc. 2 new computers in my life. Almost all my consumer electronics ( of which I have far less than most westerners) are second hand. I have owned 2 new bikes in my life
I have spent well over £10 000 on insulating my flat. Similar on my rental flat – I will never get that money back. I fly very rarely.
But yes – even if everyone on the planet had my lifestyle its still unsustainable and my lifestyle has far less impact than most in the west
TJ, the point is not everyone in the UK let alone globally can.
I have never commuted by car. I owned a car for a few weeks when I was 17.
Your solution to this doesn't scale ... you cycled to work and refused to take a bus and that simply can't work for everyone.
Take something I hope close to your heart like lifesaving pharmaceutical drugs. Skilled people need to physically make the things (and test etc.) and they have to get into work. They may also wish to work elsewhere or retire etc.
Those people also need their equipment and machinery to make and test the drugs and that has to be made somewhere by someone who also has to get into work.
Not everyone is going to break up with someone because they get a job elsewhere and need to drive a car, especially if they have kids.
If my replies have been a bit sporadic, I've been on the roof using some recycled tiles to repair it. I used some $EVIL$ petroleum based sealants .. should I have gone and collected reeds instead.
Under the tiles is some $EVIL$ petroleum based insulation ... if I had 4' of thatch I suppose I'd not need that...
The only issue here is there aren't sufficient reeds in the UK for EVERYONE to do that. Scale that to the food you eat, the insulation you used ..
What we need are solutions that can work for everyone that produce the lowest greenhouse gas footprint GLOBALLY.
Some of these you might not like for other environmental reasons than their greenhouse potential.
India** is converting burning wood to burning gas in rural areas. They have a higher percentage of LPG taxi's and cars that produce less greenhouse gas than petrol and they are investing in nuclear.
(** Why do I bang on about India - partly because I spent a lot of time there, have lots of friends there and still read some of the newspapers I used to read when working there but I've lived and worked in lots of places)
Lets take another, Libya was regreening the Sahara... it's not by itself "sustainable" as they are using a reserve of 1000-4000yrs worth of paleolake that isn't renewed. On the other hand the more they green the more rainfall and the more CO2 captured. Not everything needs to be sustainable!!! If it gets us past the population maxima with minimal deaths we can clean some stuff up more incrementally after.
Still at it?
@tjagain
Of course it needs both time and interim arrangements to reach that aim. But without dramatic action immediately we are looking at deaths in the billions in your childrens lifetimes
Its not”ignoring the practicalities” to understand this point. Its dramatic action now or the planet becomes uninhabitable for humans
Yep. 100%
Implementing them is really hard, and that’s the bit I’m trying to get you to think about.
That's your comfort blanket isn't it - ask everyone else to think about it. But you already know what's required.
Get out there and start forcing government to take real, drastic action, or your grandchildren die.
The suffragettes and Mandela knew what it took to force action. That's what this will take. No less.
>which is why we won't make it<
How do we ban private cars without catastrophic economic fallout?
Who gives a ****. Our economy as it stands needs trashing. We're going to either trash it - and all of humanity - in the future, or we're going to trash it, and some humans - today.
Unfortunately - because all we ever really do is "debate"- we've left it too late to act effectively without incredibly serious consequences. These are the "tough decisions" that governments say they'll make but never do. So we're buggered.
Trashing it all, economic and social fallout and, yes, deaths are inevitable. All we need to argue about now is the type of death - extinction-level or not.
Pick one.
What. We can't say ****?
F. Eck?
I like this @Daffy:
Radical thinking – Borrow £300-800bn, build another 10-15 offshore wind installations like Hornsea and Dogger. Massively subsidise the installation of insulation, solar and batteries on every roof/carpark (not fields) and and invest in hydrogen storage (this isn’t rocket science – well, it sort of is, but well known rocket science) and turbines to replace existing gas turbines in power plants. Build a UK company to make both the batteries the panels the turbines so it’s all made here, etc. Increase taxes to pay the interest on the debt only and then payback the debt with profits from power/battery and panel manufacture including eventual export or selloff of the state owned companies. The UK would be energy secure and carbon neutral (from an energy perspective ) in 10 years. Offer new businesses coming to work in the UK access to free energy for the first 5 years of their operation. Invest the tax from those new companies into new infrastructure.
Costs would be in the lower end of your estimate and this should be bog-standard thinking - we could have done this ages ago.
Renewables aren't subsidised right now. They're so cheap that companies compete to make them. We still subsidise fossil fuels.
But even if we fix 100% of our energy problems - we're not fixing consumption or construction. So this is maybe 20% of the solution we need.
Renewables not subsidised? Yes they are.
https://www.ref.org.uk/ref-blog/370-offshore-wind-subsidies-per-mwh-generated-continue-to-rise
That’s your comfort blanket isn’t it – ask everyone else to think about it. But you already know what’s required.
No, not really, it's not comforting at all it's horrific. And yes, I know what's required, but I don't know how to get everyone to do what's required. Do you?
Who gives a ****. Our economy as it stands needs trashing.
Well the economy is what buys us food and shelter. So you're saying we need to simply destroy everything so that we don't.. destroy everything..? I think in your scenario everything gets destroyed either way. A global economy 30% of its current size isn't going to be able to solve anything.
Get out there and start forcing government to take real, drastic action
Oh lol this again. You make it sound so easy! Got any ideas how? And no, gluing myself to a road probably isn't enough.
@irc:
You really should check your sources:
Renewables not subsidised? Yes they are.
https://www.ref.org.uk/ref-blog/370-offshore-wind-subsidies-per-mwh-generated-continue-to-rise/blockquote >
The "Renewable Energy Foundation" is a campaign group started by Noel Edmonds and CALOR GAS. - the "organisation" exists to spread lies. And you've been suckered in.In reality - wind providers bid for contracts for difference - the amount they'll get paid to generate power. Despite no subsidy they still produce the cheapest energy we can produce (offshore wind).
MOlgrips - and still your only answer is " its impossible" to any solution offered. You really have not grasped this at all
Either we change things in a controlled manner now or in a few decades the dying planet does it for us in an uncontrolled manner and billions die
No significant change to global warming can be done without radical changes in our western lifestyles
You are far from the only one tho
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/commentisfree/2022/nov/02/despite-years-of-exposure-to-the-climate-science-i-dont-believe-we-are-headed-for-total-societal-collapse
Daffy - a decent stab but we do not have a technological solution to energy storage on the scale needed for that to work. the rest is fiddling around the edges
Again the only solution is massive lifestyle changes and using a tiny fraction of the energy we use now
Daffy - I'll expand a little more. Currently we have hours worth of energy storage in the UK in pump storage. We need many weeks worth if we go for wind and solar as our energy sources to cover a winter high pressure event. Its not possible to do this with batteries - simply not enough of the materials available for this to be a worldwide solution and anyway battery production is dirty and energy intensive. Hydrogen - again its a scale issue ( Unst project has been runny this for many years small scale). The amount of hydrogen storage we would need to power the world or even the UK is enormous. To store hydrogen large scale it needs to be liquified - a hugely energy intensive process Its also massively dangerous and technically fairly tricky
Unfortunately the tech for energy storage on the scale needed is just not available - hence the only solution is to reduce energy consumption massively
Squirrelking probably has some numbers on this but relying on tech developments will not do - it needs to be scalable using tech we have now
We don’t have infrastructure for energy storage, but we do have the technology. Hydrogen can be liquefied and stored, we do it for spacecraft all the time. The difficulty for spacecraft is that it needs to be lightweight, but for commercial earth based storage, cast iron is actually much better than carbon fibre and vacuum separation. Really, we don’t even need LH2, we can store hydrogen as a gas, but the volume is massive. The question is one of space. If we’re willing to give up some space to store it, then the easiest option is H2 gas storage, if not, it needs to be the more expensive, LH2 storage which will need to be near to the power plants, or will need to be de-liquefied for pumping to them. None of this is new technology, we’ve been storing, moving burning and generating hydrogen (via electrolysis) for decades. It just needs scaled up and it can be. That’s the beauty of it.
Can it be scaled up tho so we can store weeks worth of even UK energy usage? its in millions of tonnes of storage needed. which is tens of millions of cubic meters of liquified gas or billions of cubic metres if stored as a gas thats storage facilities kilometers across for liquified gas and thousands of facilities a kilometer across if stored as gas or have I lost something in my arithmetic?
Squirrelking? any numbers?
Of course it can. Germany and France store vast amounts of gas as did we once upon a time.
The real beauty of hydrogen via electrolysis is that if you get the balance right, you may not need as much storage if you can generate it quick enough. As such you’d need water storage too. But really, you want storage. It’s the best balancer for renewable power generation.
I still believe it’s a mistake to put hydrogen boilers in peoples homes. I think transitioning to electric heating gives better future options with less infrastructure challenges.
We keep hydrogen for power generation and eventually aerospace.
If you are running the entire UK on wind and solar you need weeks worth of energy stored to cover a winter high pressure event where demand is high and generation next to zero. Natural gas is much easier to store than hydrogen.
Do some numbers daffy please?
Workplaces offering coffee should have a cafetiere rather than a machine. And sugar from a bowl not packets.
And its a taxable benefit.
Not always.
<h4 id="tea-and-coffee">Tea and coffee</h4>
An employer may provide its employees with access in the workplace to tea, coffee or water from a cooling dispenser. If this refreshment is available generally to all employees, the benefit is exempt from charge (EIM21670). If the exemption does not apply, you should accept that these refreshments represent a trivial benefit.
Ah - OK
Anyway hydrogen storage
I like the theory and as I said Unst runs on a hydrogen setup but from my understanding there are huge practical issues with scaling it from a population of 60 to a population of 70 million.
the conversion cycle wind / electricity/ hydrogen / electricity has inefficiencies at every step so you only get out 30% ish of the energy at the end that you put in at the beginning
Hydrogen is not very energy dense so the amount of storage needed is huge
Hydrogen to electricity conversion via a fuel cell needs rare earth / materials so again difficult to scale up. do it via burning and you get NOX production
The main issue tho is the storage. to liquify it needs cooling to minus 200c. Store as a gas then the volume of storage needed is simply impractical
I think with our current tech then enough storage to cover daily fluctuations is possible but to store the weeks worth of energy needed if the generation is all wind and solar is simply not possible because of the scale required.Storage tanks kilometers across even if liquified
And its a taxable benefit.
It is possible to accept an idea as being a reasonable attempt at responding, without trying to shoot it down with erroneous minutae.
I genuinely thought it was. I clearly was wrong and stand corrected. sorry
Anyone who knows more than me do some sums on Hydrogen storage?
Anyone who knows more than me
😆
MOlgrips – and still your only answer is ” its impossible” to any solution offered. You really have not grasped this at all
No. I'm just criticising YOUR solutions, because I don't think they will have good outcomes. I've not once said anything is impossible. I've come up with ideas to address the shortfalls in your ideas, but you're not even interested in debating those, you just keep bashing away at the same sentence. It's like arguing with a brick. Your idea is half baked, and you are refusing to accept any attempts to further the discussion to bake it further. You would make an excellent cabinet member in the current government.
Re hydrogen - compressing it takes lots of energy on its own, and liquifying it even more so.
Hydrogen can be liquefied and stored, we do it for spacecraft all the time.
That's done on a very small scale, and there is a huge amount of money available to do it.
We don't need hydrogen storage @tjagain - we need huge energy networks that can link us to where it's sunny/windy.
The european supergrid never really got going at the pace needed but we can absolutely do it.
The head of the UN environment comittee in 2010 said he was depressed by our response to the banking crash. We spent a lot of money ensuring ric people didn't lose out - and we picked up the tab.
For the same money he insisted he could have solved the world's energy problems - but the urgency isn't there. - solar in the worlds biggest deserts, big cables to connect them all. Job jobbed - always-on energy for the whole planet - the rest being generated by wind and local solar where it's sunny. Added benefit of us increasing the albedo effect of the planet to compensate for arctic melting.
We can do this - easily - right now. It's a simple engineering challenge. But we're not doing it.
Molgrips - sorry dude but you do. You will not accept any solution that requires significant changes in lifestyle. the problem is the only solutions that work require massive changes in lifestyle in the west.
Go on. Outline a solution that will work on the scale required without changing lifestyles massively.
Remember that developing nations want to reach our level of affluence so they need to be scalable worldwide