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Overhype on global warming


Bobby

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Posted
  • Location: Chevening Kent
  • Location: Chevening Kent
My mum told me (before she died) " the only person you can guarantee sleeping with for the rest of your life is yourself, if you can't sleep easy with yourself then what?"........what we do for the planet involves what we feel we can do for ourselves in it all, some more some less but to do nowt when we suspect we should do something will lead to nothing but anguish.

I understand peoples personal commitment and admire it, but individual action on a tiny scale will not deliver us any sort of solution it will only make a few feel a little better when the planet goes up the shoots. Your comment about many not seeing is not really true, I think that AGW in some form or other has the support of @70%+ of the people its only the arguments over the extent of human involvement, media hype and government involvement in message and action delivery which dwindles support.

I would argue that AGW is just a part of the whole issue of humans living in a clean and tidy environmentally friendly way.

Edited by HighPressure
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Posted
  • Location: Cheddar Valley, 20mtrs asl
  • Weather Preferences: Snow and lots of it or warm and sunny, no mediocre dross
  • Location: Cheddar Valley, 20mtrs asl
I understand peoples personal commitment and admire it, but individual action on a tiny scale will not deliver us any sort of solution it will only make a few feel a little better when the planet goes up the shoots. Your comment about many not seeing is not really true, I think that AGW in some form or other has the support of @70%+ of the people its only the arguments over the extent of human involvement, media hype and government involvement in message and action delivery which dwindles support.

I would argue that AGW is just a part of the whole issue of humans living in a clean and tidy environmentally friendly way.

That's the most sensible post I've read in a long time, succinctly and accurately sums up my sentiments too.

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Posted
  • Location: Near Newton Abbot or east Dartmoor, Devon
  • Location: Near Newton Abbot or east Dartmoor, Devon
We as individuals can choose to live in a cleaner less polluting way, we can change our light bulbs, sort our rubbish recycle as much as possible even walk and cycle when possible. I do not suggest in anyway that this is wrong, but I think where it goes wrong is with the idea that if we as individuals take these actions we are somehow going to have a meaningful impact on CO2 emissions and thus start putting everything right. This is the front end of our governments delivery of AGW policy, its misleading, its inaccurate and smacks of a government wanting to be seen to be doing something rather then actually getting to grips with the nitty gritty. This as other posters have suggested would mean real measures that would inevitable make them very unpopular and would almost definitely lead to them being booted from office unless cross party and more importantly international agreement on action was reached. Simply the basics of a tough environmental policy would not change merely by voting for another party or by a company simply upping sticks and moving to somewhere more favourable to them.

Sorry, but this is a council of despair. In the past the same view would have left women without the vote, or working practices unreformed - '...real measures that would inevitable make them very unpopular and would almost definitely lead to them being booted from office' would apply to votes for women 100 years ago... Change IS hellish difficult to achieve, but it's most certainly not better not to try.

The problem is that all governments are different all have their own political agendas and no 2 races are or react the same to imposed measures. You only have to take the French and English to see that and we are next door to each other. You have got to take into account that the manufacturing base continues to move eastwards across the globe like a tidal wave which started in the UK 200+ years ago. We as many western nationals have prospered from our manufacturing roots so much so that we can afford to get someone else to make our goods for us. That manufacturing base is currently in China and Asia and of course they are going to resist change, they watched us get wealthy from mass production. Why should they be the ones to miss out or have restrictions imposed when we in the west have polluted the earth for 300 years without so much as a second thought? What about 3rd world countries where most of the population merely exists to feed themselves on a day by day basis are these too expected to shun manufacturing opportunities if it to bring them wealth. We in the nice cosy west may have the luxury of worrying about our children's children or even their children but these are people that cannot fee today's children tomorrow.

Again, this is about giving up, about hand washing, about despair. Sure, the problem is difficult. I realised it was decades ago - that's why a few people said back then 'if we tackle this now it will be easier' - because it would be. Were we listened to? Of course not - the very same attitudes prevailed as in your post...But (and it's the huge but) does the problem go away? No, it will have (that's WILL HAVE) to be addressed, solved, at some point.

Now it may well be that humans would rather eradicate a fishery that fish it sustainably (indeed, that is the case) but it's surely right to keep saying the latter is right rahter than simply resign ourselves to the former? Aren't we better than that?

Yes I have highlighted yet more problems but this is the true extent of the issue, its massive it requires honesty from all governments not only our own before we can even contemplate how we can tackle our polluting ways.

When you get govt honestly you get posts like a lot here are - cynical, obfuscative and resistant to change.

I was asked what should we do about it then? Well I do not believe that our current global social or political setup allows us to reverse back down the route which we have travelled. In being honest we have to accept that we will continue to be a consuming society and that is only going to grow, we will travel more not less, we will use more light not less. We first need to accept this, then we need to look at how we can best accommodate it. We are going to lose some low lying areas of the world to the sea we need to move these populations and build sea defences where practical. We need to educate all out Children in Earth sciences the world over and above all we need to look at new better cleaner technology as money rules and if cheaper better ways can be found then they will be self introducing.

This is the 'we're going to continue to fish unsustainably' argument. It's no solution!

I have rambled on a bit but I felt it necessary to answer DEV's points properly, as a spices we need to be able to adapt to climate change as it does sometimes happen without any human involvement and even if we are causing this one we have no idea if we can put it right?

All a very long way from £10 on a flight or £30 on road tax I am afraid but the reality as I see it.

Well, if that is reality we've had it - in a all we've got to look for is continued and increasing degradation of this planet.

Edited by Devonian
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Posted
  • Location: Brighouse, West Yorkshire
  • Location: Brighouse, West Yorkshire

It's nice that we have people like Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth presenting what the ideal solutions to global warming should be but in reality what will happen is something in between the ideal and what is possible within the constraints of the global political and economic system.

The global 'society' is just not equiped to deal with this kind of threat. It's like a big oil tanker heading towards some rocks, except this oil tanker has 673 captains and they can't agree which which course to take to avoid the rocks. In fact half of the captains don't even think there are any rocks and some of the captains think the ship can cope with collision anyway. In short we are pretty much screwed when it comes to getting anything done quickly.

I am fairly confident something will get done about gloabal warming but only when the really bad effects start to show. It's going to be more about adaptation than mitigation.

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Posted
  • Location: Near Newton Abbot or east Dartmoor, Devon
  • Location: Near Newton Abbot or east Dartmoor, Devon
It's nice that we have people like Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth presenting what the ideal solutions to global warming should be but in reality what will happen is something in between the ideal and what is possible within the constraints of the global political and economic system.

The global 'society' is just not equiped to deal with this kind of threat. It's like a big oil tanker heading towards some rocks, except this oil tanker has 673 captains and they can't agree which which course to take to avoid the rocks. In fact half of the captains don't even think there are any rocks and some of the captains think the ship can cope with collision anyway. In short we are pretty much screwed when it comes to getting anything done quickly.

I am fairly confident something will get done about gloabal warming but only when the really bad effects start to show. It's going to be more about adaptation than mitigation.

If truth be told I think it's about how near to really bad effects we get.

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Posted
  • Location: Dorset
  • Location: Dorset
It's nice that we have people like Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth presenting what the ideal solutions to global warming should be but in reality what will happen is something in between the ideal and what is possible within the constraints of the global political and economic system.

The global 'society' is just not equiped to deal with this kind of threat. It's like a big oil tanker heading towards some rocks, except this oil tanker has 673 captains and they can't agree which which course to take to avoid the rocks. In fact half of the captains don't even think there are any rocks and some of the captains think the ship can cope with collision anyway. In short we are pretty much screwed when it comes to getting anything done quickly.

I am fairly confident something will get done about gloabal warming but only when the really bad effects start to show. It's going to be more about adaptation than mitigation.

I agree re Global Society not equiped IMO it was all down to Blair/Bush.

The framework for some kind of Global Environmental Legal body was paved by Rio, Kyoto etc and then all was dumped in favour of the consensus approach of the IPCC which Governments where then able to ignore. Both Blair and Bush degraded the UN Approach so much because they didn't want to concede any power, any concerted political action on a Global Scale is now doomed, You certainly wouldn't get the CFC ban through.

Small minded protectionism coupled with agressive alienative global policies from the west has shattered world conformety for at least the next 15-20 years.

This is why indervidual responsbility is so important because this is the only way we will be able (though the Purchasing power of our wallets) to influence the GW mitigation.

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Posted
  • Location: Sunny Southsea
  • Location: Sunny Southsea

Hello all. I'd like to point out that anything we do now will have no benefit to us for some years, in terms of GW. We can reduce pollution relatively rapidly, and various other things, but we can't stop GW from happening, as things stand. What we are (supposedly) trying to do is prevent future warming from reaching levels which will make life rather uncomfortable or even impossible for many millions of people.

So: the recent warming trend is with us to stay for another thirty or forty years, at least, and more likely for another hundred or two. The global average surface temperature is almost certainly going to rise at least 2 degress, more likely three or more. We don't know, for certain, what all of the knock-on effects of this are going to be, but very few of them are positive.

What we do know is that the temperature will be warmer, and the effects greater, if we don't slow down pumping s*1t inot the atmosphere. What we are not told often enough is that, as end users, we are only responsible for about 25% at most of all co2 emissions. Most of the Co2 is produced by energy production, and we are not even the largest end-users of that - industry is.

Government and Manufacturers talk a lot about 'green' policies and credentials, but most of all, they talk about it being our fault. It isn't. The problem lies most of all in the system. Capital economy as it stands demands continuing growth to sustain value, prevent inflation and hold off financial collapse. Growth means more production. More production means more energy production and consumption (e.g. China). Which means more CO2, hence more warming. AFAIK, the only way out of this cycle is to totally rethink and restructure the way in which the global economy functions; this is, in a small part, about what we do, but mainly it is about how value is attributed and sustained, and how the markets work.

If anyone is wondering whether it is worth doing their bit to make a better world, the answer must always be yes; one less bit of s*1t is good news. But the scale of change needed for our - the consumer/public - contribution to make any difference requires a long-term, large-scale alteration in the ways in which we live our lives, both collectively and individually. While we continue to place more value on property and wealth than on nature and health, the problem will persist.

I, too, dislike the endless exaggerations and hyperbole of the media and 'green' organisations, but by now it should be relatively clear that this conundrum, how to be 'comfortably well-off' without messing up our planet, is the defining problem of this, and probably the next two or three generations, in the same way that Fascism, Communism, social justice and global warfare were (some of) the defining problems of the twentieth century.

That'll do for now.

:)P

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Posted
  • Location: Cheddar Valley, 20mtrs asl
  • Weather Preferences: Snow and lots of it or warm and sunny, no mediocre dross
  • Location: Cheddar Valley, 20mtrs asl

Welcome back P3, I've missed ya, hope you'll stick around.

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Posted
  • Location: Brighouse, West Yorkshire
  • Location: Brighouse, West Yorkshire
AFAIK, the only way out of this cycle is to totally rethink and restructure the way in which the global economy functions; this is, in a small part, about what we do, but mainly it is about how value is attributed and sustained, and how the markets work.

No disrespect P3 but I really think that this is pure fantasy (with respect to it being part of the solution to AGW anyway). How do you propose that this is achieved? Exactly how long would it take to change to whole economic structure of the world and get everybody to agree? I would suggest more time than we actually have to do something about C02 levels.

I would like to bet we will all be using totally green energy a LONG time before you could implement what you described.

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Posted
  • Location: Dorset
  • Location: Dorset

You won't change the Capitalist, or pseudo capitalist economy's of the world. A Star Trek society would be great but would take until 2100 at least.

Good to hear from you P3 ! Had a good summer I hope.

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Posted
  • Location: Sunny Southsea
  • Location: Sunny Southsea
No disrespect P3 but I really think that this is pure fantasy (with respect to it being part of the solution to AGW anyway). How do you propose that this is achieved? Exactly how long would it take to change to whole economic structure of the world and get everybody to agree? I would suggest more time than we actually have to do something about C02 levels.

I would like to bet we will all be using totally green energy a LONG time before you could implement what you described.

Hi Eddie. I don't think it is likely until it is too late - if even then - I just think that it's the only way to actually solve the underlying problem. From this, you may well guess that I don't think the problem is going to be solved, properly. What will happen is that some things will change at the cost of others, and lots of of people will suffer unnecessarily, and preventably, and the rich will continue to get richer...

As for changing the economic structures which function in the world - in particular, in the stock markets - these are purely man-made constructs based on historical precedent in the large part and working on the assumption that a healthy market is one in which the shareholders get maximum profit. This can be changed relatively simply, by taxing the profit on dividends, or capping the profit levels. This is unlikely to happen not because it cannot be done, but because it isn't in the interests of those in power to do so, as they have the most to lose from it. Whilst we inhabit a plutocracy, our interests, GW or anything else, are always going to take second place to the interests of the most powerful individuals and corporations.

The point about being worse consumers - ie, consuming less, is that in doing so we effect the way businesses are run. By making ethically sound buying decisions, we influence what the market produces and how it makes it. The best way to change the poor record of corporations is to not buy their end product. Oh, and thanks for the kind words. Is summer over, then?

:)P

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Posted
  • Location: Cheddar Valley, 20mtrs asl
  • Weather Preferences: Snow and lots of it or warm and sunny, no mediocre dross
  • Location: Cheddar Valley, 20mtrs asl
Thanks, jethro; I'll be around now and then; been a bit busy lately. Any comments on the above?

:)P

I hope you'll be around more often than of late, although I know exactly what you mean about being busy, I could do with another 2 or 3 days in a week at the moment.

I agree with a lot of what you said, I also agree with many of HP's thoughts. With the best will in the world, even if every household in this country became carbon neutral overnight, the impact it would achieve, would be minimal. Every step taken is an important one and I'm not denegrating anyone's efforts but it's a drop in the ocean. Serious change has to start at the top. I am a great beliver in consumer led demand but with so much hype spinning around I think we're in great danger of switching off people's interest altogether; you only have to read the threads on here to realise folk are fed up with every weather event be it dry/wet, hot/cold being blamed on Climate Change; the instinct is to think yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. Change from the top will however be tediously slow, industry works on outlay&return, not philantrophy; change will have to be forced via carrot and stick, rewards for developing greener methods, taxation for maintaining the status quo; getting the balance of those right however may prove difficult in the global economic market.

You rightly say, any measures we take now will have no immediate impact, this has to be a long term plan and quite honestly, I don't believe there is a government in the world which looks much further than their term of office. Getting all those governments to work together for the greater good and create a better world in a future so far away that many will be dead and buried will I believe, prove to be nigh on impossible. When you add into that equation nations which have watched the West develope and prosper whilst they slumbered on the sidelines, who only now are beginning to have a chance of a bite at the cherry, does anyone really believe they will slow down, put saving the planet above their own desires? Should we expect them to? If I were Chinese I'd think sod you, it's my turn now.

One of my greatest concerns with all the hype and drive to fix things quick, is the almost exclusive focus on Co2. I'd lay a fair amount of money on stopping a hundred people on the street and asking how should we combat climate change and getting a hundred answers of reduce carbon emissions. I doubt one of them would mention the Rain Forest. There's a huge drive to develope bio fuels and in that drive, vast tracts of Rain Forest are being felled to grow palm oil; I mean how mad is that? Lets drive cleaner, kinder to the environment cars, we lose the Planets' lungs but we're being greener, more responsible.

Personally, I think adaptation is far more important. Getting agreement on the level of change needed to curtail global emissions will take a very long time, protecting those most in need won't wait. I expect the bickering over who pays for that to continue for some time.

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Posted
  • Location: Chevening Kent
  • Location: Chevening Kent

For me today has seen some of the most sensible realistic posts on the subject I have seen on this forum and its good to see P3 back in the debate. I also thank 'Dev' for his response to my initial post and to whom I say the most honest thing that we can do at present for our children and their children is to at least acknowledge the world as it is and how it works on the ground. Like any recovering alcoholic or drug addict we first have to face up to our problems and understand how we got here. At the moment we have a room full of addicts all arguing about the extent of their problems and how long they think each will live they completely overlook the real issue which is they are there because they have a common problem. I think this is a major issue within the Climate change debate, why is it so important to ascertain the exact extent of one type of pollutant before we can agree on action?

Surely as top of the planets food chain and so called most intelligent life form we are overlooking the obvious in that as a race we have an obligation towards the planet in the way we live fullstop. We have to be aiming to be as neutral in all respects as possible not just carbon which is only one pollutant. Just like any addict you do not return to your drug supplier to supply you with a programme to get you drug free, and I feel this is exactly what our governments are. Governments of the world as has been said have their own short term priorities and that whether AGW supporters like it or not includes the continuation of drugs supply. They may well subscribe to a programme of reduced production but not of supply, simple by agreeing to cut this by buying in what others produce (carbon credits) and charging the punter more is not to me anything other than a cop out. I also don't think the populous will swallow that either, yes I know they are uneducated and stupid but most can read and add 2 and 2 together (just).

Taking 'eddies' ship analogy which I thought interesting especially as if the Titanic had of taken no action at all the outcome would have been better and many more would have survived, certainly food for thought!

To conclude I don't know all the answers, but don't trust our governments to deliver or the credibility of the IPCC and what's more important is I don't think most of the general public do either. Whether that is unpalatable for many on here to accept it is the truth even if you think that all these people are mad you will in the end be forced to take their views onboard if like me you want meaningful action. And to those such as 'DEV' we are not a million miles apart on views its just that I do not believe you have found the fix and that unfortunately we will hit the rocks and have to deal with its consequences and that is a totally different message to one our government and media are putting forward.

Just to add:

If you want totally green energy that means neuclear at present and all the problems that involves?

Edited by HighPressure
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Posted
  • Location: Co Dublin, Ireland
  • Location: Co Dublin, Ireland
Just to add:

If you want totally green energy that means nuclear at present and all the problems that involves?

The hypocrisy about Nuclear power from the environmental lobby is one of the things that damages credibility most. Nuclear is for the forseeable future the cleanest source of enough energy available. This idea that the world can survive on wave and wind power and other such fanciful notions should be enough to have these people committed to a nut house. Mind you it is the consequences of such ideology on the 3rd world that is the most grotesque implication of their mindset. They have either not considered properly or managed to comprehend that impoverished countries need to develope far faster then at any time in history. This will mean massive extra pollution. Its too easy to prophesise about global warming from the trappings of the first world. IMO some of these people need a shock - maybe of the economic type as a reminder that things are not black and white and that the majority of the worlds population does not have the luxury afforded to them of having so much time to come up with 'solutions' to global warming (after the derisory laughter has calmed down). I find their agenda far from funny.

Edited by Darkman
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Posted
  • Location: 4 miles north of Durham City
  • Location: 4 miles north of Durham City
The hypocrisy about Nuclear power from the environmental lobby is one of the things that damages credibility most. Nuclear is for the forseeable future the cleanest source of enough energy available. This idea that the world can survive on wave and wind power and other such fanciful notions should be enough to have these people committed to a nut house. Mind you it is the consequences of such ideology on the 3rd world that is the most grotesque implication of their mindset. They have either not considered properly or managed to comprehend that impoverished countries need to develope far faster then at any time in history. This will mean massive extra pollution. Its too easy to prophesise about global warming from the trappings of the first world. IMO some of these people need a shock - maybe of the economic type as a reminder that things are not black and white and that the majority of the worlds population does not have the luxury afforded to them of having so much time to come up with 'solutions' to global warming (after the derisory laughter has calmed down). I find their agenda far from funny.

I think they should turn most of the deserts of the world into one huge solar power-station and that should solve the energy needs of China and India.

Well.....if we can separate 'needs' from 'wants'.

:lol:

Edited by PersianPaladin
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Posted
  • Location: Mytholmroyd, West Yorks.......
  • Weather Preferences: Hot & Sunny, Cold & Snowy
  • Location: Mytholmroyd, West Yorks.......
Well.....if we can separate 'needs' from 'wants'.

:lol:

This may be one of the most telling comments I've read regarding AGW and it's existence/remedy.

Old Giffer's (like me) can just about recall pre-plastic bag Britain and how folk lived in those times, of course it wasn't a 'choice' and folk strived to have more than the 'Jones'' just as today.

How can you sell the notion of living like Granny to folk who have only experienced the way we live today?

We have now equipped much of the developing world with mass media equipment (even if it's only a TV in the village elders hut) so they too now have 'wants' that will cost us to satisfy.

The only way we will revert to satisfying our 'needs' is by being in a situation where this is all we can hope for. If we do little to change our ways and reduce the impact of AGW then this situation will surely arise and we will be faced with a generation or two living in conditions that make the 'Austerity Years' look like a picnic (if they manage to survive at all).

I do not forsee any 'fall' in our technological society and ,sadly, I'm with Gee Dubya in believing that our technology will ease the impacts of runaway climate change.

As with any chaotic situation the initial 'swings of the pendulum' will be the greatest and thereafter things will begin to settle. Are we like Moses in that we will see the 'promised land' but never enter into it?

Edited by Gray-Wolf
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Posted
  • Location: Near Newton Abbot or east Dartmoor, Devon
  • Location: Near Newton Abbot or east Dartmoor, Devon
The hypocrisy about Nuclear power from the environmental lobby is one of the things that damages credibility most. Nuclear is for the forseeable future the cleanest source of enough energy available. This idea that the world can survive on wave and wind power and other such fanciful notions should be enough to have these people committed to a nut house. Mind you it is the consequences of such ideology on the 3rd world that is the most grotesque implication of their mindset. They have either not considered properly or managed to comprehend that impoverished countries need to develope far faster then at any time in history. This will mean massive extra pollution. Its too easy to prophesise about global warming from the trappings of the first world. IMO some of these people need a shock - maybe of the economic type as a reminder that things are not black and white and that the majority of the worlds population does not have the luxury afforded to them of having so much time to come up with 'solutions' to global warming (after the derisory laughter has calmed down). I find their agenda far from funny.

Good, then leave us be and get yourself out to the third world and help them - that's what my wife's family did!

After all you do really care don't you?

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Posted
  • Location: Brighouse, West Yorkshire
  • Location: Brighouse, West Yorkshire
The hypocrisy about Nuclear power from the environmental lobby is one of the things that damages credibility most. Nuclear is for the forseeable future the cleanest source of enough energy available. This idea that the world can survive on wave and wind power and other such fanciful notions should be enough to have these people committed to a nut house. Mind you it is the consequences of such ideology on the 3rd world that is the most grotesque implication of their mindset. They have either not considered properly or managed to comprehend that impoverished countries need to develope far faster then at any time in history. This will mean massive extra pollution. Its too easy to prophesise about global warming from the trappings of the first world. IMO some of these people need a shock - maybe of the economic type as a reminder that things are not black and white and that the majority of the worlds population does not have the luxury afforded to them of having so much time to come up with 'solutions' to global warming (after the derisory laughter has calmed down). I find their agenda far from funny.

Nuclear power is far from ideal but unfortunately I think we are at a point in time where it's going to be a necessary evil, at least in the short term.

I am just hoping that these guys deliver the goods soon.

/edit: The next stage of nuclear fusion technology is ITER which is a new experimental fusion reactor that will come on line in 2015. This will be the first reactor that will actually produce more energy than it takes to sustain the fusion reaction.

Edited by eddie
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Posted
  • Location: Steeton, W Yorks, 270m ASL
  • Location: Steeton, W Yorks, 270m ASL
Is the world really going to be a worst place if it were, say, 1.5C warmer? (Me playing devil's advocate, here)

It depends, and there were many early arguments (and some still ongoing and widely held in the US) to say SOME warming might be beneficial. Alas, to the extent that we're "playing" with the climate we don't (yet) have the capability to fine tune outcomes as if we were dialling a thermostat. 1.5C in temperate margins like our is hardly a big difference; it reduces the cold in winter and exacerbates it in summer, much as the pattern in recent years has been (indeed, c.f. the late 60s, we're close to 1.5C above where we were).

...

Surely as top of the planets food chain and so called most intelligent life form we are overlooking the obvious in that as a race we have an obligation towards the planet in the way we live fullstop. We have to be aiming to be as neutral in all respects as possible not just carbon which is only one pollutant. Just like any addict you do not return to your drug supplier to supply you with a programme to get you drug free, and I feel this is exactly what our governments are. Governments of the world as has been said have their own short term priorities and that whether AGW supporters like it or not includes the continuation of drugs supply. They may well subscribe to a programme of reduced production but not of supply, simple by agreeing to cut this by buying in what others produce (carbon credits) and charging the punter more is not to me anything other than a cop out. I also don't think the populous will swallow that either, yes I know they are uneducated and stupid but most can read and add 2 and 2 together (just).

...

Broadly agree there HP. For all the beeling about Government intervention, the simple fact is that most individuals see the world as far bigger than they are and so consume relentlessly. Left to our own devices we almost certainly would NOT stop consuming until supplies ran out. You only needed to see the pictures from Gloucester of the water distribution a couple of weeks ago to see the problem; a sizeable minority of individuals behaving in a manner which then compromised supplies for all. There is nothing novel in this argument by the way, ecologists have been observing it for a long time now. It will almost certainly take Government control, on a global scale, to continue to manage the balance between population and a finite supply of resources.

I understand peoples personal commitment and admire it, but individual action on a tiny scale will not deliver us any sort of solution ...

But if the problem is global consumption, and the "golbe" does not exist as a manageable entity, then all we are left with individuals, and their social collections. The issue isn't whether individual action changes anything, so much as whetehr enough individuals comply. In times of drought there are always some who argue the right to continue watering the lawn (as if a green lawn really matters in the great scheme of things), just like people in the queue for the plane will argue THEIR right to carry two bags not one onto the 'plane, and some people choose to queue in the wrong lane for a roundabout in order to jump a long line of traffic. Behaviour change requires reinforcement.

...I agree with a lot of what you said,

...

Personally, I think adaptation is far more important. Getting agreement on the level of change needed to curtail global emissions will take a very long time, protecting those most in need won't wait. I expect the bickering over who pays for that to continue for some time.

Very sensible post Jethro, can't disagree with any of that, though I suspect the short-termism in Government may be replaced in the coming decade with longer term views, if the populations of the developed world wake up to growing challenges (and IF those challenges do persist).

I feel like a rant.

...

I long for the days when people who said they cared about the environment really did care, instead of using it as a way to enchance their status. The media is also joining the frenzy by writing loads of articles to appeal to the "green" bunch, to sell more papers.

End of rant.

I agree, but then poor publicity is probably better than none.

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Posted
  • Location: Co Dublin, Ireland
  • Location: Co Dublin, Ireland
After all you do really care don't you?

Your failure to intinsically weave your motivation for cleaner energy with that of the needs of the 3rd world speaks volumes about how much you care. You dont care. You are fanatical about one thing and you dont understand the consequences of actions you want taken to protect the environment beyond the shores of Britain. Now back you go to being an armchair environmentalist. **** everyone else as long as the environment is clean. :doh:

fusion reaction.

The answer to all the worlds problems yet containing such extremes of temperature is going to be difficult.

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Posted
  • Location: Near Newton Abbot or east Dartmoor, Devon
  • Location: Near Newton Abbot or east Dartmoor, Devon
Your failure to intinsically weave your motivation for cleaner energy with that of the needs of the 3rd world speaks volumes about how much you care.

Well, perhaps you want dirtier energy? Do you want that? Still, given you prattled on about how much you care about the third world further up (yet do nothing it seems) I accept you're a brazen hypocrite. Trouble is I spoke the truth, my family have and continue to do their bit. You?

You dont care.

If you say so...

You are fanatical about one thing and you dont understand the consequences of actions you want taken to protect the environment beyond the shores of Britain.

Well, someone here doesn't understand the consequences of our actions...

Now back you go to being an armchair environmentalist. **** everyone else as long as the environment is clean. :lol:

Absolute billhooks. I care as much as anyone about how my fellow human lives, I tear my hair out at oppression, the needless killing this world sees, the millions who die needlessly of preventable diseases. Trouble is that , one way or another, all these problem are linked to the environment. You can't feed people fish that aren't there, you can't grow crops where the rains fail, you can't improve the quality of the air people breath without, well, improving it's quality - and that means less filth going into the atmosphere, you can't slash and burn rainforest if you've cleared it all already (or it's been logged up into cheap kitchens for us). But, until you see that the problems humanity has are linked to the problems we cause to the environment you're lost and you'll continue to spout the kind of codswallop you do about people like me that you do.

Edited by Devonian
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Posted
  • Location: Chevening Kent
  • Location: Chevening Kent

Its really disappointing and frustrating when people on the same side of the argument cannot put aside their differences, it makes me wonder what hope we have?

I cannot really see any other realistic path apart from nuclear energy, yes its a difficult one but on balance I would use it. Solar and Wind energy at their present stages of development will not make any significant impact on CO2 emissions.

I think that Carbon credits are a good idea for industry but am opposed to them for international governmental trading.

On an individual basis there are quite a few measures that the government could take to help us:

I would like to see standard lightbulbs phased out with a subsidy on energy efficient ones, it costs a quid or less for 4 x standard 100w bulbs but about £4 each for the energy saving type. This would save millionms of watts a day in the UK.

I see no reason why we need any cars on our roads bigger than 3ltr even 4x4s don't need more than that. I would like to see huge carbon taxes on the manufacture of vehicles with 4 and 5 ltr engines and also a return of the LPG conversion subsidy.

With air travel if we are going to have more flights then we need to be looking at the type of planes we allow to land here along with engine technology improvements.

Simple I think if these manufactors hard they will come up with answers in the form of new technology. Airports should only be allowed to take more flights if the CO2 does not increase if they have to offset it then so be it. Pretty soon we would see aircraft with reduced emissions and Roll Royce would be producing luxury cars with 2.5ltr engines. I really don't subscribe to charging the end user as this simply allows the well off to buy their way out of their responsibilities.

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