Climate Change is here and man made

[Scottyboi]

Don't know how serious this figure is, but a piece on garden lawns on the London Review of Books blog by someone called Arianne Shahvisi claims that forty million acres of land in the U.S. are devoted to people's lawns, and that 60% of water consumed in urban areas is devoted to watering them.
If that is true, it is nuts. We simply cannot go on living this way. I'm not saying that we've got anything to congratulate ourselves about in Europe, but anyone who has visited the U.S. will surely have been struck by the way wastefulness has virtually been integrated into their whole way of living.
By the way, there is a fascinating in-depth article in the LRB by the excellent James Meek about wind turbines and the construction of Hornsea 2, which will be the world's biggest offshore wind farm. What's good about the article is that it points up all the (inevitable?) contradictions in the drive to green energy. The towers for the turbines (which for obvious reasons are much, much bigger than land-based turbines – they are real behemoths) were partly constructed in Campbeltown in Scotland. That factory was closed, and they are now constructed at a much bigger factory at Phu My in Vietnam. Why? Essentially, because Scottish workers won't work the extremely long hours that the Vietnamese workers accept, for the much lower salary, in often dangerous conditions (there have been deaths at the Vietnam factory, and bad injuries at the Scottish one).
This means that every tower constructed for Hornsea 2 is hauled by container ships from the other side of the globe. I'd be curious to know what the carbon footprint is. Beautiful, eh?

Incidentally, as a coda: Johnson said that wind power was a stupid idea: "it wouldn't pull the skin off a rice pudding”. Seven years later, he said that he wanted the U.K. to “become the Saudi Arabia of wind” (quotes from Meek, who is generally a serious and trustworthy journalist. I suppose they can be tracked down.) I have no beef with Johnson either way, by the way. I haven't voted in British elections for many years.

Would putting us all on water meters have a positive effect? Pay like 40 quid a month for unlimited water abit crazy tbh.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

Don't know how serious this figure is, but a piece on garden lawns on the London Review of Books blog by someone called Arianne Shahvisi claims that forty million acres of land in the U.S. are devoted to people's lawns, and that 60% of water consumed in urban areas is devoted to watering them.
If that is true, it is nuts. We simply cannot go on living this way. I'm not saying that we've got anything to congratulate ourselves about in Europe, but anyone who has visited the U.S. will surely have been struck by the way wastefulness has virtually been integrated into their whole way of living.
By the way, there is a fascinating in-depth article in the LRB by the excellent James Meek about wind turbines and the construction of Hornsea 2, which will be the world's biggest offshore wind farm. What's good about the article is that it points up all the (inevitable?) contradictions in the drive to green energy. The towers for the turbines (which for obvious reasons are much, much bigger than land-based turbines – they are real behemoths) were partly constructed in Campbeltown in Scotland. That factory was closed, and they are now constructed at a much bigger factory at Phu My in Vietnam. Why? Essentially, because Scottish workers won't work the extremely long hours that the Vietnamese workers accept, for the much lower salary, in often dangerous conditions (there have been deaths at the Vietnam factory, and bad injuries at the Scottish one).
This means that every tower constructed for Hornsea 2 is hauled by container ships from the other side of the globe. I'd be curious to know what the carbon footprint is. Beautiful, eh?

Incidentally, as a coda: Johnson said that wind power was a stupid idea: "it wouldn't pull the skin off a rice pudding”. Seven years later, he said that he wanted the U.K. to “become the Saudi Arabia of wind” (quotes from Meek, who is generally a serious and trustworthy journalist. I suppose they can be tracked down.) I have no beef with Johnson either way, by the way. I haven't voted in British elections for many years.

A lot of places in the USA are now promoting xeriscaping. Last time I was out in Nevada a lot of the new build houses were certainly xeriscaped as opposed to that thick, lush green grass you see everywhere that gets watered three times a day.

 

[west didsblue]

White Heart or Lincoln Hotel?

I often ride up the hill at the side of steep hill (Michael Gate) on the way home which pops out pretty much half way up Steep Hill. The cobbles are a bit emotional if it's wet.

Stayed in quite a few in Lincoln during the years I used to visit. The White Hart was definitely one of them. Also used to stay in a modern one on the waterfront but can't remember its name. The worst one was actually situated on a roundabout but I think that's been demolished. Not stayed there for at least 10 years, probably nearer 15.

Is that shop still there on Steep Hill that buys and sells old aircraft parts?

 

[Lovebitesandeveryfing]

A lot of places in the USA are now promoting xeriscaping. Last time I was out in Nevada a lot of the new build houses were certainly xeriscaped as opposed to that thick, lush green grass you see everywhere that gets watered three times a day.

Good to hear it. When I travelled in California about fifteen years back, I was staggered to see quite big supermarkets air-conditioned down to an uncomfortably cold temperature (for a European, anyway), and all the doors fixed wide open! (Musn't discourage the customer, you know). That was in Central Valley. Quite shortly after that, I started seeing the same thing in Europe. All too often, where America goes, Europe follows.
The blog piece is actually mainly about artificial turf lawns (like Astroturf), which are a booming business, but which aren't really the answer, ecologically speaking, either. They're dead zones, which don't allow for any of the kind of teeming life that goes on in grass and soil. The piece is critical of both kinds of lawn. It should itself be read critically. Blog pieces on the LRB are shortish opinion pieces, and they sometimes annoy me with a very obvious agenda. This one's worth reading though, I'd say.

 

[inbetween]

Fair enough to have your view but to dismiss others that they know nothing about the issue infers you know it all when anyone with a half a brain knows that the response is partly political , economic , social etc.

All we here from the alarmists is the pollies don't know what they are doing and are the first to incur there ire.

Business and corporations in some cases leading the way and ignoring politicians or working with them as they should.

it futile to think the response doesn't lie in part in the public arena as people like to crow about all the time.

To infer those who don't get on board that climate change is the greatest threat to mankind and if nothing is done to reduce global warming or its not being done in the pace it should be we are doomed its only a matter of when dislike their children etc is sheer lunacy and again why the kids in school are being scared out of their wits thinking their future is bleak.

these people are the main character in the nursery rhyme saying to all the sky is falling in save me from the sky.

of course that is not the case but go on perhaps you have all the answers and know how to implement them and who must implement them and how.

Lat time I heard no scientist can implement the so called measures we must do to address the issue , it needs government , industry , citizens etc to do the work.

they can suggest options pure and simple , they don't have the will or the means to make to " changes " required.

No bureaucrat I know will pay for my living and my kids and grandkids mental health and education when a health bureaucrat tells them to lock us down time and again.

No-one has the will because we are unable and unwilling to adapt to the change required. We don't see animals progressing from trotting around fields to driving Ferraris in the space of 200 years, this kind of change and consumption of resources has never happened before.

We've gone too far and too fast for the planet to sustain us and that's probably why certain people are inventing rockets and means to get us off the planet. The rich aren't stupid, they know they need to enjoy and accumulate their money now because at some point the war for resources will begin. We can already see this happening in the housing market where the rich have virtually monopolised the supply of housing.

To deny this would be ignorant or even moronic because are less houses being built than 10 years ago? Do we see less cranes, do we see less development? The reality is it's the complete opposite and it's accelerating. That acceleration will keep pressing every resource until it runs out, it's just a mathematical certainty.

This isn't an argument against capitalism or socialism, both are irrelevant because both economic models support unrestricted consumption. Capitalism prioritises companies and progress, socialism prioritises the progress of people and the state, neither of these are compatible with reducing the impact of humans.

The only hope we have is technological but that doesn't mean it'll be pleasant. In all likeliness, all it means is you'll be driven in an electric car (with filters so you don't breathe the polluted air) to your flood defended house where you'll sit down to eat that same lab grown shite.

Watch the movie Elysium, that probably gives a good picture of what things will be like.

 

[mancity1]

Don't know how serious this figure is, but a piece on garden lawns on the London Review of Books blog by someone called Arianne Shahvisi claims that forty million acres of land in the U.S. are devoted to people's lawns, and that 60% of water consumed in urban areas is devoted to watering them.
If that is true, it is nuts. We simply cannot go on living this way. I'm not saying that we've got anything to congratulate ourselves about in Europe, but anyone who has visited the U.S. will surely have been struck by the way wastefulness has virtually been integrated into their whole way of living.
By the way, there is a fascinating in-depth article in the LRB by the excellent James Meek about wind turbines and the construction of Hornsea 2, which will be the world's biggest offshore wind farm. What's good about the article is that it points up all the (inevitable?) contradictions in the drive to green energy. The towers for the turbines (which for obvious reasons are much, much bigger than land-based turbines – they are real behemoths) were partly constructed in Campbeltown in Scotland. That factory was closed, and they are now constructed at a much bigger factory at Phu My in Vietnam. Why? Essentially, because Scottish workers won't work the extremely long hours that the Vietnamese workers accept, for the much lower salary, in often dangerous conditions (there have been deaths at the Vietnam factory, and bad injuries at the Scottish one).
This means that every tower constructed for Hornsea 2 is hauled by container ships from the other side of the globe. I'd be curious to know what the carbon footprint is. Beautiful, eh?

Incidentally, as a coda: Johnson said that wind power was a stupid idea: "it wouldn't pull the skin off a rice pudding”. Seven years later, he said that he wanted the U.K. to “become the Saudi Arabia of wind” (quotes from Meek, who is generally a serious and trustworthy journalist. I suppose they can be tracked down.) I have no beef with Johnson either way, by the way. I haven't voted in British elections for many years.

if you think that is bad we dig up much of the material to ship over to China to make the large scale panels and turbines and in fact the solar panels with respect to China of shit quality ( already three of mine have blown up fortunately not starting a house fire yet ) placed on roofs because we don't make a single panel in Australia built by effectively slave labour. with little ILO code approval The transmission lines to get the farms to the grid are being built over prime agricultural and horticultural land and farmers who have little say where they erect the poles only get compensated for the pole.

the environmental impact given the remit size taken up defies believe its communism at its finest.

You can build a nuclear fired power station on a land mass a hundred and then some of the size of infrastructure that dispatches ten times the electricity of these farms to many more homes that still operate without having to rely on gas or coal when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine.

Madness is doing the same over and over again and expecting a different outcome.

 

[ballbag]

"It'll all be ok" is exactly why it won't.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

Stayed in quite a few in Lincoln during the years I used to visit. The White Hart was definitely one of them. Also used to stay in a modern one on the waterfront but can't remember its name. The worst one was actually situated on a roundabout but I think that's been demolished. Not stayed there for at least 10 years, probably nearer 15.

Is that shop still there on Steep Hill that buys and sells old aircraft parts?

The hotel on the waterfront would have probably been the Holiday inn. There is a newer hotel (Double Tree, Hilton), but I'm not sure how long that's been there.

J. Birkett is till going strong - J. Birkett - Shop Lincoln

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

Good to hear it. When I travelled in California about fifteen years back, I was staggered to see quite big supermarkets air-conditioned down to an uncomfortably cold temperature (for a European, anyway), and all the doors fixed wide open! (Musn't discourage the customer, you know). That was in Central Valley. Quite shortly after that, I started seeing the same thing in Europe. All too often, where America goes, Europe follows.
The blog piece is actually mainly about artificial turf lawns (like Astroturf), which are a booming business, but which aren't really the answer, ecologically speaking, either. They're dead zones, which don't allow for any of the kind of teeming life that goes on in grass and soil. The piece is critical of both kinds of lawn. It should itself be read critically. Blog pieces on the LRB are shortish opinion pieces, and they sometimes annoy me with a very obvious agenda. This one's worth reading though, I'd say.

I've stayed in and around the Antelope Valley area a few times, and as you say, shopping mall's, restaurants and supermarkets can be unbearably cold at times, even in the height of summer. Astroturf was a big thing out there in places like hotel car parks and shopping malls. Nasty stuff.

 

[Deleted member 77198]

I think most people have a go at her parents and teachers for frightening the shit out of an autistic girl for no good reason.

Climate change is a problem but it isn't an existential problem and it's not even the biggest problem currently facing mankind.

Human ingenuity and innovation will provide the solutions; we'll be fine.

Close the thread and relax. I'm genuinely more worried about making a slow start in the Premier League.

Human ingenuity and innovation are providing solutions but they aren’t moving fast enough to keep up with the acceleration of climate change, they will take too long before they do catch up at the current rate and size they are going.

For example, there are CO2 capturing plants around the world that capture emissions from the air and lock them deep underground in rocks. There are currently 19 plants, there are plans in the future to have more of them, but in the next 25 years there aren’t plans in place to have enough for what we needed 25 years ago.

When you read around, all of the initiatives we have come up with are facing the same problems - there aren’t enough of them, they aren’t moving fast enough to catch up, there isn’t enough widespread coverage, it isn’t being taken seriously enough, and there isn’t enough investment.

We are moving forward with the innovations and initiatives, but while still doing so, we are moving ever further away from the goal because it’s just moving far to quickly to catch up to. A lot of them are saying they will be where they need to be now, in 50 years, but the climate isn’t going to pause to allow us to catch up… my analogy the other day was that it’s like we are deciding to start ‘Couch to 5K’ on Monday and thinking we’re going to win an Ironman race on the weekend.

This is where more everyone needs to act, individuals, groups, governments. Because we will not be fine!

The level of indifference towards this is frightening.

 

[Gremlin]

I think most people have a go at her parents and teachers for frightening the shit out of an autistic girl for no good reason.

Climate change is a problem but it isn't an existential problem and it's not even the biggest problem currently facing mankind.

Human ingenuity and innovation will provide the solutions; we'll be fine.

Close the thread and relax. I'm genuinely more worried about making a slow start in the Premier League.

It may not be an existential problem for humanity as a whole in that we're not going extinct any time soon but it's going to be very much an existential problem if you are a poor farmer in a third world country whose family is about to die of hunger due to extreme weather events. Or if you live in a low lying coastal area which gets inundated in the next few years. Just because we'll be largely OK in the UK doesn't mean we should have an 'I'm alright Jack' attitude.

It will also very much become our problem when said poor farmers see that we're doing OK here, decide they're not going to sit about waiting to die, and start turning up in numbers that make the current migrant levels seem like a minor annoyance.

 

[Deleted member 77198]

Early humans in general left evidence of their existence but never did anything to damage our ecosystem that couldn't be reversed by the natural processes that drive the planet. Even to an extent relatively modern civilisations didn't really cause any major environmental impacts that couldn't have been eventually reversed if human instantaneously ceased to exist.

Then along came the industrial age and EVERYTHING changed

When humans spread around and out of Africa 125,000 years ago or so, there isn’t an area that they populated where they didn’t make all megafauna of the time extinct.

Redirect Notice

They also caused a lot of deforestation

Ancient deforestation in the green heart of Africa

The forested expanses of Central Africa host the second largest block of tropical rainforest on Earth (after Amazonia), stretching over around 2 × 106 km2. They are the great green heart of Africa, and changes in vegetation cover are likely to have important but poorly understood influences on...

www.pnas.org

The Amazon Rainforest Was Profoundly Changed by Ancient Humans

The region’s ecology is a product of 8,000 years of indigenous agriculture.

www.theatlantic.com

Look at Great Britain; once covered in forest, is now just 13% forest. This isn’t a modern change (although there was a big first full by the Normans), it started thousands of years ago.

The Industrial Age saw the population explosion which saw the industrial emissions explosion; you could also say that it was when we started agriculture and raising livestock 12,000 years ago that is seeing our biggest problems now.

“agriculture and land-use generates more greenhouse gas emissions than power generation”

Redirect Notice

Humans have always been devastating to the planet, it’s a revolution we need as a species to change that. It’s the next big revolution for our species. We had the cognitive revolution 35,000 years ago; the Neolithic revolution 12,00 years ago; and the scientific revolution 600 years ago (which includes the industrial and digital revolutions).

 

[TonyM]

Rather than setting goals for emissions should we be setting goals for births? For example by 2050 we want the total population to be X billion. Parenthood and kids are awesome but should we set a limit of 1 per couple in the interest of those kids' futures?

I know China had this policy and it had problems but could it be amended to be fair for all?

Apologies if this was discussed earlier.

 

[Deleted member 77198]

It may not be an existential problem for humanity as a whole in that we're not going extinct any time soon but it's going to be very much an existential problem if you are a poor farmer in a third world country whose family is about to die of hunger due to extreme weather events. Or if you live in a low lying coastal area which gets inundated in the next few years. Just because we'll be largely OK in the UK doesn't mean we should have an 'I'm alright Jack' attitude.

It will also very much become our problem when said poor farmers see that we're doing OK here, decide they're not going to sit about waiting to die, and start turning up in numbers that make the current migrant levels seem like a minor annoyance.

It’s not even the third world… there are already climate refugees in the USA, Australia and Britain.

Citizens of California and New South Wales are homeless and needing to migrate to other parts of their country due to recent forest fires; citizens of Florida are homeless and needing to migrate to other parts of their country because sea levels have risen and eroded the coastline where their homes were.

These include previously well-off citizens of these areas who’ve lost everything.

 

[Chippy_boy]

"It'll all be ok" is exactly why it won't.

I think you have limited imagination.





Like you ;-) ... I cannot imagine what technology we could develop over the next 100 or 200 years as needed to prevent the most catastrophic effects alarmists like to bandy around.

 

[Chippy_boy]

No-one has the will because we are unable and unwilling to adapt to the change required. We don't see animals progressing from trotting around fields to driving Ferraris in the space of 200 years, this kind of change and consumption of resources has never happened before.

We've gone too far and too fast for the planet to sustain us and that's probably why certain people are inventing rockets and means to get us off the planet. The rich aren't stupid, they know they need to enjoy and accumulate their money now because at some point the war for resources will begin. We can already see this happening in the housing market where the rich have virtually monopolised the supply of housing.

To deny this would be ignorant or even moronic because are less houses being built than 10 years ago? Do we see less cranes, do we see less development? The reality is it's the complete opposite and it's accelerating. That acceleration will keep pressing every resource until it runs out, it's just a mathematical certainty.

This isn't an argument against capitalism or socialism, both are irrelevant because both economic models support unrestricted consumption. Capitalism prioritises companies and progress, socialism prioritises the progress of people and the state, neither of these are compatible with reducing the impact of humans.

The only hope we have is technological but that doesn't mean it'll be pleasant. In all likeliness, all it means is you'll be driven in an electric car (with filters so you don't breathe the polluted air) to your flood defended house where you'll sit down to eat that same lab grown shite.

Watch the movie Elysium, that probably gives a good picture of what things will be like.

I'd top myself now if I were you mate. Save all the grief etc.

 

[Deleted member 77198]

Rather than setting goals for emissions should we be setting goals for births? For example by 2050 we want the total population to be X billion. Parenthood and kids are awesome but should we set a limit of 1 per couple in the interest of those kids' futures?

I know China had this policy and it had problems but could it be amended to be fair for all?

Apologies if this was discussed earlier.

Should be both and more.

Billions needs to be invested in contraception in the developing world. But at the moment it’s not necessarily the developing world who are creating the most emissions.

It’s the usage and wastage from the developed world that is the worst problem. Both in terms of emissions and global farming that is consumed by the developed world.

Although, as the developing world develops and starts to catch up with the developed world in terms of usage and emissions, we will have an even bigger problem than we have now.

 

[Scottyboi]

I'd top myself now if I were you mate. Save all the grief etc.

Abit much considering we have lost members on here to suicide.

 

[Chippy_boy]

Abit much considering we have lost members on here to suicide.

Hardly surprising, reading this thread.

That said, apologies for any offence caused.

 

[Scottyboi]

Rather than setting goals for emissions should we be setting goals for births? For example by 2050 we want the total population to be X billion. Parenthood and kids are awesome but should we set a limit of 1 per couple in the interest of those kids' futures?

I know China had this policy and it had problems but could it be amended to be fair for all?

Apologies if this was discussed earlier.

Abit authoritarian that. In Britain we need our younger population to rise alot to help fund the pensions of the elderly we have.

Hardly surprising, reading this thread.

That said, apologies for any offence caused.

Is a depressing thread I agree but probably contains alot of uncomfortable truths.