"Just stop oil"

Maple Leaf said:
But why should anyone in Russia, China, India, et al. take any notice of the opinions of relatively rich westerners which will impede the improvement of their standards of living? It's a hopeless situation really.
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That's part of the point that seemed to be totally missed. These places have people living in real poverty and not only does the average citizen in say India emit far far less but the very poorest are going to be emitting very little at all, those are the people who will be hit the hardest initially, quite possibly within our lifetimes in some Indian cities.

This notion of being gleeful that the offspring of the people causing the issue are going to get some comeuppance is completely flawed and no amount of cope by posters totally missing that point and pointing at country-level stats will change that.

www.wired.com

India Isn’t Ready for a Deadly Combination of Heat and Humidity

The country’s recent heat wave has seen “wet bulb” temperatures rise to potentially fatal levels—but plans to handle the crisis are still in their infancy.
www.wired.com www.wired.com
When heat and humidity combine to push wet-bulb temperatures past 32 degrees Celsius, physical exertion becomes dangerous. Consistent exposure to high wet-bulb temperatures—35 degrees Celsius and above—can be fatal. At this point the sweating mechanism shuts down, leading to death in six hours.[...]

During India’s 2015 heat wave, wet-bulb temperatures in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh rose to 32 degrees Celsius. That year, the heat killed over 2,500 people.

Such events are going to become increasingly common as climate change warms the world. What magnifies the problem is that as temperatures rise, so does the absolute humidity in the atmosphere, says Jane Baldwin, assistant professor in the Department of Earth System Science at the University of California, Irvine.
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It doesn't take much more for some Indian cities to be at risk of becoming unlivable at times during heat waves, or at least for anyone not in an air-conditioned room as there is only so much heat and humidity the human body can survive.
 
-Ad- said:
And the cost of our trains is frankly ridiculous, maybe you get lucky with splitting it into loads of cheap single fares, maybe not.

Even if we converted the whole of the UK to EV overnight for all personal cars, coaches and trucks, we would delay this catastrophic climate emergency threshold target malarky by a few weeks. All whilst the rest of the developing and major developed world countries give less than 2 ****s about it.

Well done Britain, you've a achieved the square root of **** all :D
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I think many people accept that we're either fooked or we're not, based entirely on how things pan out whilst continuing to emit at close to present-day levels.

There just isn't the will (regardless of all the talk) to take action that would make much of a difference at this point.

So we wait to see what will happen to the planet, and we continue to do as we always have done.

I think the expression could be, "We're in the lap of the gods, now."
 
individually we won't / can't do much which is why it takes global governmental help/pressure.
of course poorer nations want their industrial revolution and it's difficult for the west to condemn the. as we had ours.

the tech exists however to somewhat have their cake AND eat it by using the clean the where it exists...... energy wise for now that would be renewable where possible but also nuclear in the medium term. Germany shutting down their nuclear is a terrible decision.

definitely not coal!
if richer countries have to help then so be it. I also think family planning needs to be encouraged in some areas (difficult both politically and possibly morally). some countries are currently too densely populated for what they can realistically support.

we also need to stop pushing our pollution on other countries and pretending we are not making it worse

ultimately I do think we are stuffed. we needed to start 30 years ago ) I am now at the point of just hoping to delay the inevitable so my lad can have a good life (he is 7 so that means delaying the worst for another 80 years)
 
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I don’t really get the narrative that developing countries will just turn to burning enormous amounts of coil and oil (which is typically imported).

Why would developing countries want to build huge fossil fuel power stations which need a huge amount of centralised infrastructure and imported expensive fuel when they can deploy renewables for much less?
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
I don’t really get the narrative that developing countries will just turn to burning enormous amounts of coil and oil (which is typically imported).

Why would developing countries want to build huge fossil fuel power stations which need a huge amount of centralised infrastructure and imported expensive fuel when they can deploy renewables for much less?
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I think it's getting rid of the ones they are currently using. and coal is cheaper than nuclear.
 
Hagar said:
We do have rail journey times less than two and a half hours also serviced by flights though.
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I commute, if that’s the right word, between Liverpool and Aberdeen. Flying from Manchester, it works out about 20% cheaper than the train, while it takes about 3-4 hours less time without having to change in multiple stations. On the few occasions I have tried the train, it’s been an utter nightmare with delays and cancellations.

Plus it’s Loganair, so I also get either a Tunnock’s teacake or a caramel wafer with my cup of tea
 
FoxEye said:
I think many people accept that we're either fooked or we're not, based entirely on how things pan out whilst continuing to emit at close to present-day levels.

There just isn't the will (regardless of all the talk) to take action that would make much of a difference at this point.

So we wait to see what will happen to the planet, and we continue to do as we always have done.

I think the expression could be, "We're in the lap of the gods, now."
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There is little doubt we are heading for oblivion. So far, all the evidence is that the weather scientists have underestimated the speed and scale of the changes.

The people aren't ready to change, but this is one of those scenarios that by the time they are, it's going to be too late. Climate change is like a train, once it has gathered momentum, it's a devil to stop.
I think many people have reached the conclusion that we need to change, but we are still at the stage where they want everyone else to make that change, not themselves.

The fires have already started. The permafrost is melting. The gas hydrates have starting to leak. All of these things are irreversible accelerants for Global Warming. Nope, we have run out of time, we are stuffed. There is no way that people are going to change fast enough.
 
our public transport is awful. I looked at getting the train from where I live. this would involve over an HR bus ride, probably 2 changes (at least 1) then would still need a lift or a taxi at my destination.

it would take 2 hrs longer than driving (forgetting the bus ride), and the reward for this massive inconvenience........ paying a fortune more than driving. and that is single occupancy car. add in wife and child and the price comparison is ludicrous.
 
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bigmike20vt said:
I think it's getting rid of the ones they are currently using. and coal is cheaper than nuclear.
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It’s not though, and who said anything about nuclear? The narrative is that they want their own industrial revolution and to bring their standards up to western levels.

The latter is right and absolutely what should happen but the assumption is that they will get there the same what we did over the last 100 years which is where that line of thinking falls down.

They will not get their that way when the alternatives are cheaper and more efficient and better suited to be deployed in those countries.
 
do you not think they will have the same issue as us with the reliability of renewables? renewables are amazing , and cheap.. but as a backbone they will likely need something else as well just like we do, for when the sun doesn't shine or the wind doesn't blow.

cement is the other elephant in the room. construction is a massive CO2 producer. there are alternatives for smaller construction but not sure how well that scales to high rise buildings.
 
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bigmike20vt said:
our public transport is awful. I looked at getting the train from where I live. this would involve over an HR bus ride, probably 2 changes (at least 1) then would still need a lift or a taxi at my destination.

it would take 2 hrs longer than driving (forgetting the bus ride), and the reward for this massive inconvenience........ paying a fortune more than driving. and that is single occupancy car. add in wife and child and the price comparison is ludicrous.
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It's a catch 22. It's awful because not enough people use them.

I wonder if the future is leaning more towards self-driving taxis? I don't know. If they can get the numbers up, the costs come down, and suddenly owning your own car becomes very unattractive.
 
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Maple Leaf said:
But why should anyone in Russia, China, India, et al. take any notice of the opinions of relatively rich westerners which will impede the improvement of their standards of living? It's a hopeless situation really.
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I hate to tell you, but Russia could benefit from global warming. They have vast areas of currently unusable land in Siberia, that will become useable when things warm up a bit. Sure, eventually we will all die, but in the meantime Russia could end up with one of the few places in the world that is habitable.
 
SpellowHouse said:
I hate to tell you, but Russia could benefit from global warming. They have vast areas of currently unusable land in Siberia, that will become useable when things warm up a bit. Sure, eventually we will all die, but in the meantime Russia could end up with one of the few places in the world that is habitable.
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The permafrost is already going and local flora and fauna are dying off, not sure how that is a genius endgame.
 
SpellowHouse said:
I hate to tell you, but Russia could benefit from global warming. They have vast areas of currently unusable land in Siberia, that will become useable when things warm up a bit. Sure, eventually we will all die, but in the meantime Russia could end up with one of the few places in the world that is habitable.
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It could just become a giant marsh if it warms up though.
 
bigmike20vt said:
do you not think they will have the same issue as us with the reliability of renewables? renewables are amazing , and cheap.. but as a backbone they will likely need something else as well just like we do, for when the sun doesn't shine or the wind doesn't blow.
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Because when you are deploying them in much closer to the equator, they are much more consistent in their output and have a significantly higher output. Their electricity demands are much closer matched to daylight hours (think air conditioning). Their electricity demands are also generally lower because they don’t have a 200 year legacy of inefficiency to deal with either.

Have a look at South Australia if you want an idea about what’s in the sort of the possible when you have a decent amount of sun at your disposal. Don’t forget, they have a huge fossil fuel legacy and a very difficult grid to manage because everyone lives along the coast of a vast country makes it all the more impressive. They have peaked at over 85% and have managed a net 100% over the last year (exporting more renewables than the fossil fuel generation they used to cover the gaps they currently have). They don’t exactly run frugal lives either.

A lot of developing countries have a huge amount of untapped hydro potential, if they are going to invest in centralised power generation, that’s where it will go.
 
SpellowHouse said:
I hate to tell you, but Russia could benefit from global warming. They have vast areas of currently unusable land in Siberia, that will become useable when things warm up a bit. Sure, eventually we will all die, but in the meantime Russia could end up with one of the few places in the world that is habitable.
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of things get that bad there will be a world war over the land which is habitable..... (likely making it uninhabitable)
 
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