COP26 - the Glasgow Climate Summit

[LakeSuperior]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

That's somewhat misleading; coal use in the US has dropped by more than half since 2007. So a 4% rise from 2020 levels isn't much, especially when considering how much fossil-fuel consumption dipped because of the pandemic. The resurging economies have resulted in all sorts of distortions and problems in the supply chain, including energy. Notice the surge in natural gas prices?


(And it's not all Biden & Kerry. Just saying)

See bottom of my post. US consumption is forecast to be up 10% from 2020 in 2021.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by Bycrick

Thanks. The report that you sent the link to proves my point.

It proved that your rant about advocacy groups was wrong.

[and you're not a fan of governments. I get that. Moving on.]

Is there likely to be a single contrary voice at this conference? Will there be a single speaker talking about how to provide more energy, more water and an improved living standard for an increasing world population? And doing all of that without raising taxes and living costs and with no deleterious impact on the environment? No, just keep your eyes on the 1.5 or 2.2 or 3.0 degrees number while we change everything else. We’re here to help.

Heh. Well, the libertarian & small-government-lover's convention on climate change has not been announced yet.

It’s largely based on the unproved speculation that somehow we can "stop" climate change, or that we can implement all their social plans without cost and without adversely impacting everybody.

No, it's based on the fact that there's much evidence that we have a big problem and that we haven't yet done much about it.

For example, i t’s easy and politically beneficial to propose all electric cars in 10 pr 15 or 20 years. Where are the discussions about millions of acres of solar panels (and their effects), or the massive changes in the electricity grid that will be required? Who’s going to pay for that? Or how mining the minerals that EVs need will impact the environment? Or the fact that being able to recycle electric cars and their batteries and other components is a problem that’s being left to the future?

All that and more has, and will be, discussed there and elsewhere. Including comparisons of the environmental impact of the proposed solutions, vs the present and future impact of fossil-fuel use. Ever seen an open-pit coal mine? Abandoned oil wells? Water-table pollution from fracking? 1.1 million barrels of oil just about to leak off the coast of Yemen? Compare apples with apples.

Can I tell the world how to solve the problem? Of course not. But that doesn’t mean that I have to put blind faith into a group of people who’s prime purpose is to get elected to office so that they can improve their own economic position. If you think that’s cynical, how many politicians can you name that came out of a career in "public service" with less money than they started with.

That's just silly. More gummint-hate. No-one enters any career with the intention of losing money at it.

There's a bunch of environmental problems that need to be addressed. It's that simple.

[Bycrick]

Politicians and activists always want the other guy to give up something. That’s why people vote for hotel taxes on visitors. It’s rare for a politician to declare that he’s taxing or penalizing the people who voted for him. The last case I can remember was Churchill and his "I have nothing to offer you except blood, tears and sweat" speech. That worked only in the face of a world war, and after he helped win it, he was promptly thrown out of office.

[Bycrick]

Governments are a necessary evil. Just ask the people who wrote the Constitution in a way that the various branches and levels of government were set into a continuous fight to try to insure that none of them could amass too much power. That wasn’t an accident.

Conventions and committees are great ways to insure that nothing except talking gets done. There will be a Libertarian Climate Change Convention as soon as they can agree on the agenda.

How about mining at the Salton Sea for lithium? Or child labor producing more cobalt in Africa. Or strip mining the sea floor for manganese and rare earths? The EV crowd acts as if there’s no possible downsides to electric cars. To them, it’s all a free lunch.

"Nobody enters any career with the intention of losing money." I submit that there’s a huge difference, not only in quantity but in quality, between the guy who works all his life as a carpenter or coal miner, and the politician who has never held an honest job leaving office and buying an 8-figure mansion in the Hamptons, or has been a “ public servant" all his life and puts $10 million plus of book revenues into a foundation while in office. Read the lyrics to "A little tin box" from the play "Fiorello." Nothing has changed.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Bycrick

Governments are a necessary evil. Just ask the people who wrote the Constitution in a way that the various branches and levels of government were set into a continuous fight to try to insure that none of them could amass too much power. That wasn’t an accident.

Conventions and committees are great ways to insure that nothing except talking gets done. There will be a Libertarian Climate Change Convention as soon as they can agree on the agenda.

How about mining at the Salton Sea for lithium? Or child labor producing more cobalt in Africa. Or strip mining the sea floor for manganese and rare earths? The EV crowd acts as if there’s no possible downsides to electric cars. To them, it’s all a free lunch.

"Nobody enters any career with the intention of losing money." I submit that there’s a huge difference, not only in quantity but in quality, between the guy who works all his life as a carpenter or coal miner, and the politician who has never held an honest job leaving office and buying an 8-figure mansion in the Hamptons, or has been a “ public servant" all his life and puts $10 million plus of book revenues into a foundation while in office. Read the lyrics to "A little tin box" from the play "Fiorello." Nothing has changed.

Perhaps you might then look at other countries

I’ve a close relative who was a senior politician , 3x cabinet minister and a party leader , he owned the same extremely modest 4 bed. semi detached to the day he died , he had a conventional family saloon car and took a small cottage in the rural countryside for his two week vacation with his family.

Both my local members of parliament are very ordinary. Ones a secondary school teacher the other was a bus driver, I’ve sat in their houses. They work extremely hard as the job has virtually no down time.

My daughters an EU civil servant, the jobs pays well , but hours are long and demanding. There no free lunch , literally.

My father was a senior civil servant working for the then housing minister. Very long days often working well into the evenings and weekends. The Pay rates of a good carpenter were better.

The American constitution may be a fine document but the government system it spawned is not.

Governments are not evil , they are a proper part of normal functioning society. The consist largely of ordinary people trying to do good as best they can within a system with often conflicting demands.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by Bycrick

The EV crowd acts as if there’s no possible downsides to electric cars.

Heh. Wait til you meet the self-driving car zealots.

There is no silver bullet that will painlessly turn our current headlong rush towards crises into an endlessly sustainable Eden. Not EVs, not autonomous vehicles, not solar panels.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

Heh. Wait til you meet the self-driving car zealots.

There is no silver bullet that will painlessly turn our current headlong rush towards crises into an endlessly sustainable Eden. Not EVs, not autonomous vehicles, not solar panels.

Who says there is. But EVs help as well as many other initiatives.

The fact that there no silver bullet isn’t a reason to do nothing. Every little bit helps.

[Bycrick]

Goboatingnow properly makes the case that not all government employees and politicians are lazy, incompetent, greedy, conniving, corrupt thieves. He is absolutely correct. But there’s a difference between civil servants who work to run the system and the career politicians who set the tone and direction.

At the bottom, any corruption is likely to be small scale. The DMV worker who will take a tip to grease a squeaky wheel. Or a building inspector who can find a way to overlook something. Every society has that, more or less.

But politicians are in the business of selling influence and buying votes. It might not be as obvious as a written quid-pro-quo contract, but the underlying reasoning is still there. And people with a lack of integrity will exploit it when they feel they can. To me, that’s reason enough to be skeptical of government rather than trusting. And there’s enough examples world-wide to support the position.

The comment about an unfortunate lack of silver bullets is also on point. Which reminds me of the famous quote that for every difficult and complex problem, there’s a solution which is obvious, simple, easy, free and wrong. So I tend to argue with the people who present simple, just-do-this solutions.

But one of the few belly laughs I've had in this thread is the comment on the autonomous car zealots. That’s going to be a permanent specialty for lawyers: if you’re hurt or killed by an autonomous car, who’s responsible? If you get in while you’re drunk, is that DUI? If you modify the system under the much-bruited right-to-repair laws, who’s responsible. If the autonomous car manufacturers ever really have to tell you what the "magic algorithms" are going to do, who’s really going to buy a car that has pages of disclosures in the sales contract saying something like "when the car decides that it’s better to run you into a telephone pole than to hit somebody in the street, it will decide that you’re expendable?

[seandepagnier]

Originally Posted by PippaB

How far will these 20,000 participants travel to participate? Let's say 1000 miles/1600 kilometers each way, 2000/3200 roundtrip (that get's you into central Europe from Glasgow - some will travel a lot less, but many will travel significantly further if they come from anywhere other than Europe, and air is the only practical way to get there from anywhere other than the UK). The

I disagree. There are several practical ways to reach the UK that don't involve air travel.

But why do they need to go at all?

What are the emissions required to enable video conference?

[seandepagnier]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

Who says there is. But EVs help as well as many other initiatives.

Imagine a world where personal nuclear reactors were promoted. This alternate reality we have 1000's of times the radiation and diesel engines are being promoted as an "alternative". A lot of people are upset because of the tiny energy density of diesel fuel compared to uranium/plutonium they are used to.

So really, the question is, do we need either? EV are not really needed. Never were before combustion engines. Maybe they can work for ambulances or something, but why even bother? It is not reasonable to have millions of vehicles that weigh many times more than what they transport especially when cars with 14,000 miles per gallon are already possible: https://pratt.duke.edu/about/news/du...uel-efficiency

So with typical EV such as tesla, the total emissions is only half gasoline. This type of EV should be banned alongside gasoline engines. This is no where near good enough to reach the climate goal.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

Who says there is. But EVs help as well as many other initiatives.

The fact that there no silver bullet isn’t a reason to do nothing. Every little bit helps.

Oh, you're preaching to the choir there. I am a proponent of better urban design that's people-centric instead of car-centric. With emphasis on public transit and cycling. Many European cities are very livable, with better health and half (or less) the per-capita carbon footprint of Americans or Canadians.

[boatman61]

All I can say is... if our mighty all knowing leaders were halfway serious about this impending 'Catastrophe' maybe they should reconsider all the resources being wasted on armaments, chemical and biological warfare, Moon and Mars shots and rein in Bezos et Al then redirect all that wealth and alleged knowledge into regenerating our world.
But.. that's unlikely, to many palms being greased and to many personal fortunes to be made.
Maybe it's time folks like Gord and Lake Effect etc started redirecting some of their ire at the truly selfish, Screw You I'm Fire Proof crowd that Govern the world, supposedly for our benifit..
But till then I'll just keep laughing at their outrage..

[GordMay]

The wealthiest ever [non-royal] heads of state and government chiefs:

Official salaries, for world leaders range from the modest, to the outstandingly generous. Yet numerous premiers, past and present, boasted outrageous wealth, before they bagged the top job, while others got very rich, at their nation's expense, during their time in office.
The dubious accolade of richest world leader of all time goes to two heads of state.

Vladimir Putin:
One of them is Vladimir Putin. In 2018, the Russian president's official salary totalled 8.6 million rubles, which is the equivalent of $116,000 (£83.7k), but he was reportedly worth up to $200 billion (£162bn) in 2017 according to former Hermitage Capital Management CEO Bill Browder, who revealed his estimate under oath to the US Senate Judiciary Committee. The recent Pandora Papers raised questions as to where his wealth is stashed, although any impropriety was denied. Already Russia's longest-serving leader since Josef Stalin, new legislation passed last July could allow the billionaire to rule until 2036, giving him plenty of time to amass even more wealth.

Muammar Gaddafi:
Richest world leader number two is Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. In 2011, officials estimated that the assassinated chairman, who was in power from 1977 to 2011, stashed away $200 billion (£144bn) in secret bank accounts, shady investments and suspect real estate deals, courtesy of the country's massive oil revenues. Gaddafi's wealth was intended to go into a trust to help stabilise war-torn Libya, but the colonel continues to be controversial even in death, with his frozen funds generating cash for unknown beneficiaries and much of his money's whereabouts still a mystery.

Other, notably rich leaders include:
Hosni Mubarak: $70 billion
Ali Abdullah Saleh: up to $64 billion
Suharto: up to $55 billion [in 2004, was named the most corrupt world leader of the previous 20 years, by Transparency International]
Ferdinand Marcos: $53.1 billion
Mahathir Mohamad: $45 billion
Ibrahim Babangida: $22.7 billion
José Eduardo dos Santos: $20 billion
Mobutu Sese Seko: $12 billion
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali: $10 billion
Silvio Berlusconi: $9 billion
Adolf Hitler: $6.5 billion
Sani Abacha: $6.3 billion
Kim Jong-un: $5 billion
Donald Trump: $4.5 billion [since declined to $2.5 billion]
Kim Jong-il: $4 billion
Francisco Franco: up to $3.8 billion
Ilham Aliyev: $3 billion
Daniel Arap Moi: $3 billion
Sebastian Piñera: $2.8 billion
Saddam Hussein: $2.8 billion
Wen Jiabao: $2.7 billion
Ali Bongo Ondimba: $2 billion
Bashar Al-Assad: $1.5 billion
Robert Mugabe: $1.45 billion
Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani: $1.4 billion
Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby: $1.3 billion
Fidel Castro: $1.15 billion
Islam Karimov: $1 billion
Nursultan Nazarbayev: $1 billion
Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo: $764 million
George Washington: $553 million
Uhuru Kenyatta: $500 million
Napoléon Bonaparte: $400 million

Q: How many of these, could you match to the countries they ruled?
A: I could only match about half of them.


Q: Do you see a shadow, of an outline, of a pattern, in the list?
A: I do.

I didn’t fact check the list, with multiple sources, so don’t take it as ‘gospel’.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by seandepagnier

Imagine a world where personal nuclear reactors were promoted. This alternate reality we have 1000's of times the radiation and diesel engines are being promoted as an "alternative". A lot of people are upset because of the tiny energy density of diesel fuel compared to uranium/plutonium they are used to.

So really, the question is, do we need either? EV are not really needed. Never were before combustion engines. Maybe they can work for ambulances or something, but why even bother? It is not reasonable to have millions of vehicles that weigh many times more than what they transport especially when cars with 14,000 miles per gallon are already possible: https://pratt.duke.edu/about/news/du...uel-efficiency

So with typical EV such as tesla, the total emissions is only half gasoline. This type of EV should be banned alongside gasoline engines. This is no where near good enough to reach the climate goal.

This is double think

If you take the end to end costs including the environmental cost to extract and refine hydro carbons. ICE cars are a disaster.

Furthermore the enmisions from ice are concentrated at the point of emission. This causes massive local pollution in cities

EV point pollution is negligible and electrical energy pollution is both distributed and avoidable.

Not to mention the inherent inefficiencies in the 19th century bag of bolts that is an ICE

note electric motors are around as long or longer then car engines.

[LakeSuperior]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

This is double think

If you take the end to end costs including the environmental cost to extract and refine hydro carbons. ICE cars are a disaster.

Furthermore the enmisions from ice are concentrated at the point of emission. This causes massive local pollution in cities

EV point pollution is negligible and electrical energy pollution is both distributed and avoidable.

Not to mention the inherent inefficiencies in the 19th century bag of bolts that is an ICE

note electric motors are around as long or longer then car engines.

Efficiency of a new car is 30 to 35%. This means that of the total energy in a gallon of gasoline only 30 to 35% is converted to mechanical energy. Diesel car efficiencies are in the 40% range.

Modern power plants burning coal, natural gas, etc. convert roughly 45% of the energy into electricity. Of this 45% 6% is lost in transmission yielding about 42% that is available to charge an EV in your garage.

Not considering the back end, getting the fuel to the power plants or gas stations, EVs are just about as inefficient as a ICEs. Especially, they are a wash environmentally when the natural gas for the power plants is a by product of drilling for oil.

In the end, your point doesn't hold up very well.