Global catastrophe / SHTF "survivable locations"

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by crankysailor

I dunno man.. vigilante justice, no services, no water, no food, no police or police abuses and brutality, looting and rapings..if that ain't a breakdown of society and you guys consider that the normal state of affairs in a US city, I think the SHTF long ago and you just didn't notice!!

On the other hand I think Mike does have a point about catastrophe also bringing out the best and not only the worst in people. There are enough examples in history. For example Germany after WWII is a case where there are plenty of accounts of the surviving civilian population just pulling together and helping each other and rebuilding etc. But there are also plenty of other cases of war ravaged zones where the people just never seem to have recovered. I think unfortunately one must conclude that not all societies are equal and it makes a difference if the SHTF scenario happens in Norway or Newfoundland, or if it happens in New Orleans or some other place with deep seated socioeconomic, racial or religious problems as it were.

So choose your community of like minded people and yeah invest time and energy now in knitting and strengthening those bonds. And in the end who cares if the SHTF or if it never does, it seems like a very nice way to have a very nice life today :-)

here is a statistic graphics to consider unfortunately its true.

[Singularity]

Originally Posted by newhaul

here is a statistic graphics to consider unfortunately its true.

Lies, damned lies, statistics, and ultimately Russian-sponsored memes.

The cities cited in the meme accounted for 1,568 of 17,250, or 9.1 percent, of all homicides reported to the FBI in 2016, Tom Kovandzic, a criminologist at the University of Texas, Dallas, calculated for us. And without those cities, the homicide rate (per capita) would only decline by 7.73 percent, or from 5.34 to 4.93.
When we applied those reductions to the UN data, the United States barely budged in its international standing. It moved down four spots in per capita murders and stayed the same in total murders. That’s inconsequential compared with the 186-spot jump the meme concocted.
https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-m...utlier-cities/

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by Singularity

Lies, damned lies, statistics, and ultimately Russian-sponsored memes.

The cities cited in the meme accounted for 1,568 of 17,250, or 9.1 percent, of all homicides reported to the FBI in 2016, Tom Kovandzic, a criminologist at the University of Texas, Dallas, calculated for us. And without those cities, the homicide rate (per capita) would only decline by 7.73 percent, or from 5.34 to 4.93.
When we applied those reductions to the UN data, the United States barely budged in its international standing. It moved down four spots in per capita murders and stayed the same in total murders. That’s inconsequential compared with the 186-spot jump the meme concocted.
https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-m...utlier-cities/

depends on where you get your statistics . You can get as many different numbers as there are sources. The official city of Detroit statistics are for 261 murders in 2018 for the city
There were 230 for my entire state.

Of those 17,250 murders only 11,004 were involving a gun of some type.
The rest were by other means . Aside from the part about it being a meme ( satirical in nature .) it does speak volumes

[AmberSands]

We’re from UK and we have a growing belief that a global event is on the horizon. We are in essence over populated.

My family have a disaster plan. Where to meet etc. My thoughts are to head for the boat.and get out of Dodge. Others prefer to go to their mobile homes.

Whichever the preference they are geared for 12v off-grid living. Obviously won’t stop a marauding gang. But living day to day will be normal. We’ve all taken gardening and survival courses.

My plan is to head north to Iceland/Greenland or to the tip of Scotland if staying with the family as that is where they are heading.

[newhaul]

Murders
Detroit 267
Chicago 542
Washington dc 159
St Louis 186.
New Orleans 146
For a total of
For a total of 1300 for the 5 cities
Which means that 12% of all gun murders in the entire country is from those 5 cities by them selves.
Add in new York's 289 and it really looks bad ( add another 3% to the total )
and Damn 259 in los Angeles. I think they named the wrong cities.

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by crankysailor

I dunno man.. vigilante justice, no services, no water, no food, no police or police abuses and brutality, looting and rapings..if that ain't a breakdown of society and you guys consider that the normal state of affairs in a US city, I think the SHTF long ago and you just didn't notice!!

On the other hand I think Mike does have a point about catastrophe also bringing out the best and not only the worst in people. There are enough examples in history. For example Germany after WWII is a case where there are plenty of accounts of the surviving civilian population just pulling together and helping each other and rebuilding etc. But there are also plenty of other cases of war ravaged zones where the people just never seem to have recovered. I think unfortunately one must conclude that not all societies are equal and it makes a difference if the SHTF scenario happens in Norway or Newfoundland, or if it happens in New Orleans or some other place with deep seated socioeconomic, racial or religious problems as it were.

So choose your community of like minded people and yeah invest time and energy now in knitting and strengthening those bonds. And in the end who cares if the SHTF or if it never does, it seems like a very nice way to have a very nice life today :-)

Racist

[Sojourner]

Don't have any places I'd run off the bat, but short term it would be with the boat for sure. 100 percent self sufficient, enough food for a year already onboard, fishing gear, solar and wind gens, watermaker and spares for everything...it would be fine for the short term.

The problem is where to go. You need some isolation that is defensible, but the issue is there will likely already be an indigenous population already there, who as was pointed out, may welcome you for a while, and then may not, with mixed results (prob not good for you). Or others would have the same ideas for the same logical reasons as you and beat you there. Or come later.

Wherever to go, I CAN say that even sailing around living onboard for 2 years, I would go there with my fellow cruisers. We already have traditions and laws, rules and conventions we all abide by, more or less. I (and all of us) have had total strangers on boats help us in ways unimaginable sometimes to people who don't live on the water. I've opened my boat and have stayed on the boats of strangers. Helped, towed, been towed, watched out for, given spares to and had spares given to me.... If the SHTF, I'd band up with the other 4 boats here at our winter marina and go from there. Could do a lot worse.

Safety in numbers, lots in common, sharing a code to help each other, everyone with bug-out vehicles filled with supplies and the skills to use them...dont know about you, but that makes for a pretty good start to the apocalypse

[Auspicious]

Originally Posted by hpeer

In theory the USA and Canada should be relatively secure, both food exporters. If that is not handled well the outcome could be very different.

Cities, including American cities, will be bad. In my town we've had food problems when it snows with scattered power outage. SHTF and there will be major food problems in lots of places.

Originally Posted by newhaul

Quote
Now, four decades later, a larger group of scientists is sounding another, much more urgent alarm. More than 11,000 experts from around the world are calling for a critical addition to the main strategy of dumping fossil fuels for renewable energy: there needs to be far fewer humans on the planet.

The only life form of which we have a surfeit on this planet is human beings. It isn't eugenics to make a substantiated observation. It isn't eugenics to note that the least productive people are reproducing most aggressively. Eugenics is breeding for specific characteristics. It isn't clear to me that "productive" is a qualifying characteristic for eugenics. Watch the movie Idiocracy and get back to us.

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

This has nothing to do with eugenics NH. Suggesting otherwise is disengenuous. And there’s nothing new or “scary” about citing over-population as one of the drivers of rapid climate change.

...and other bad things - hunger, inefficiency, a loss of innovation due to resource limits.

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

Energy: The world must quickly implement massive energy efficiency and conservation practices and must replace fossil fuels with low-carbon renewables. … Wealthier countries need to support poorer nations in transitioning away from fossil fuels.

Unfortunately people leap to the conclusion that PV solar is green and renewable when it is neither. Look at the mining that must take place to get the rare earth minerals (and where ownership resides) and the environmental load of manufacturing, recycling, and disposal. PV solar is neither green nor renewable.

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by Auspicious

... Unfortunately people leap to the conclusion that PV solar is green and renewable when it is neither. Look at the mining that must take place to get the rare earth minerals (and where ownership resides) and the environmental load of manufacturing, recycling, and disposal. PV solar is neither green nor [and] renewable.

WRONG!
Life-Cycle Analysis (LCA) is a tool for investigating the environmental profile of a product, or technology, from cradle to grave.
A life cycle assessment of Photo-Voltaics vs Coal reveals that PV produces about 25 times SMALLER lifetime carbon footprint than coal.
For instance, the NREL Life Cycle Assessment Harmonization Project found when comparing PV technology studies (crystalline silicon and thin film) to coal technology studies (e.g., sub- and supercritical, integrated gasification combined cycle, and fluidized bed) that approximately 40 grams of carbon dioxide equivalents per kilowatt hour (g CO2e/kWh) are released through the many stages of PV as compared to coal, which produces approximately 1,000 g CO2e/kWh.
➥ https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy13osti/56487.pdf

Total lifecycle emissions associated with photovoltaic energy production are higher than those of nuclear power, but lower than those of any fossil fuel energy production. In 2005, lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions of several energy generation technologies:
Silicon PV: 45 g/kWh
Coal: 900 g/kWh
Natural gas: 400-439 g/kWh
Nuclear: 20-40 g/kWh
Per ➥ http://www.clca.columbia.edu/papers/...back_Times.pdf

[Auspicious]

Originally Posted by GordMay

WRONG!

Your coal numbers don't include CSS.

My point is that PV solar is neither green nor renewable.

For baseload nuclear and hydroelectric are much better solutions. Pump back hydroelectric and offshore wind are good for surge. Wind has the downside of transmission capacity that doesn't exist and isn't accounted for in economic analyses I have seen.

You can't beat PV solar as part of a cruising energy system. For long-term planetary good it isn't a great solution.

[Mike OReilly]

As is so often the case, Gord beat me to it. I was just about to say I haven’t looked at the full life-cycle analysis for PV panels, so can’t say if they are a better “green” option. I do know that many so-called “green” initiatives aren’t nearly as positive as their PR suggests; recycling and the shift from plastic to cloth bags comes to mind.

So thanks Gord. Good to know .

But since this is a thread about how best to survive and thrive in a post SHTF scenario, I really don’t think any of us will care how environmentally sensitive we’re being .

Originally Posted by Auspicious

...For baseload nuclear and hydroelectric are much better solutions.

Absolutely. From a “green” standpoint the best solution for most first world countries is nuclear. Outside of hydro, which is also not nearly as “green” as some like to think, nuclear is the best environmental option.

Originally Posted by Auspicious

You can't beat PV solar as part of a cruising energy system.

And also for various SHTF scenarios. No one will care how “green” they are when the apocalypse comes.

[GordMay]

Carbon Capture and Sequestration/Storage (CCS) does have the ability to dramatically reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from coal-fired power production.
Most studies find the potential for 70 to 80 percent reductions in CO2 emissions on a life-cycle basis, depending on the technology, which would still give them about 5 to 7.5 times higher lifetime carbon footprint than PV (not to mention the other pollutants unique to coal).

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by Auspicious

The only life form of which we have a surfeit on this planet is human beings. It isn't eugenics to make a substantiated observation. It isn't eugenics to note that the least productive people are reproducing most aggressively. Eugenics is breeding for specific characteristics. It isn't clear to me that "productive" is a qualifying characteristic for eugenics.

The problem isn't simply the number of people. I've seen a few analyses that show that the planet could in theory carry a few billion more than we currently have. For example, it's still the case that approximately 50% of all human-grade food in North America ends up in the garbage (and we still have an obesity epidemic). No, the problem comes if you assume that all those billions of people want the same lifestyle as the average CFer.

"It isn't eugenics to note that the least productive people are reproducing most aggressively."

No but it's kind of ignorant and misleading though. It's based on a very narrow measure of "productive" - where a wealthy person sitting in the shade (or on their boat) while their investments grind out interest is deemed more "productive" than a teacher, or a grandmother providing free childcare for the kids of her working children, or a guy with a street food cart, or the family with a small rice plot, or the migrants and temporary labourers we bring in legally or illegally so that we can have fresh broccoli in our stores.

It's well known that as personal precarity goes down, so does birthrate. This points to one solution for managing global birthrate, if we choose to see it.

[GordMay]

Coincidentally, just came across this related article, in my weekly review of “Nature”.
“The technological and economic prospects for CO2 utilization and removal” ~ Cameron Hepburn, et al
“The capture and use of carbon dioxide to create valuable products might lower the net costs of reducing emissions or removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Here we review ten pathways for the utilization of carbon dioxide...”
➥ https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1681-6

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by Auspicious

My point is that PV solar is neither green nor renewable.

To start with, it's a pretty narrow point. Whether it's true or not, it's still the case that PV is much greener and more renewable than burning massive quantities of a finite resource that's also harming us. And with development and scaling up comes improvements - eg more efficient PV designs, and economically viable reprocessing of end-of-life PV to recover and reuse the rare component elements.

But the main point is that PV is just ONE way of directly harvesting the constant energy of the sun. No-one's saying that PV is the only answer. (Ditto for wind). There are many other ways of capturing solar energy. Just one example, passively-heated housing with net zero or positive energy output is already possible, even in Canada. One of my friends is an architect who has completed a few of these for clients.

For baseload nuclear and hydroelectric are much better solutions. Pump back hydroelectric and offshore wind are good for surge. Wind has the downside of transmission capacity that doesn't exist and isn't accounted for in economic analyses I have seen.

No argument that nuclear and hydroelectric are good baseload generators. I've also toured one hydro plant that services daily surge demands. But nuclear is currently hard to build and still has waste issues, and hydro is limited by geography and other considerations.

Distributed power generation, including PV and wind but also small modular nuclear reactors, actually makes for more efficient grid use. Large-scale generating plants require long transmission distances to its users, with attendant losses, and sized for peak loads, whereas distributed generation together with localized storage means less energy travelliing long distances on one path. Cost-effective localized storage is of course what we most lack right now, but it's coming along. Distributed generation and storage, together with the continued push for conservation and efficiency, actually reduces pressure on the existing grid, makes for a more flexible and resilient system, and could mean that we can get by with the existing grid infrastructure for longer.