Climate change

[Skids]

This is a pretty interesting map, gives a bit of perspective on Australias minimal emissions.... https://www.carbonbrief.org/mapped-worl ... wer-plants

This bad boy blew me away when on the way to Vegas.... blinding!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivanpah_S ... r_Facility

Blows a few birds away too!!

https://www.latimes.com/local/californi ... story.html

[stui magpie]

It is an interesting map when you see all the new coal plants in China and India.

And that Solar station, they've basically created a solar death ray to boil water.

[David]

[stui magpie]

OK.

I've got no problem moving faster toward renewables, but we have to have reliable base load power and solar and wind don't provide that unless you have serious batteries. The power grids need to be redesigned and upgraded significantly as well to increase the amount of solar and wind going in.

I'm not a fan of carbon taxes or emissions trading schemes, there's not enough oversight and too many shonky ways to avoid penalty.

Interesting that China and the USA are 3rd and 4th in the world respectively for using renewable energy but China is also the largest producer of CO2 and building more coal fired plants.

The problem is, the developed world needs Electricity and coal is the cheapest way of producing reliable baseload energy so we'll be burning coal for the forseeable future.

Mind you, for all the grief about how bad Australia is and isn't doing enough to reduce CO2, the rest of the world must be shit because we're the runaway world leader in building new renewable energy.

In Australia, renewable energy is growing at a per capita rate ten times faster than the world average. Between 2018 and 2020, Australia will install more than 16 gigawatts of wind and solar, an average rate of 220 watts per person per year.

This is nearly three times faster than the next fastest country, Germany. Australia is demonstrating to the world how rapidly an industrialised country with a fossil-fuel-dominated electricity system can transition towards low-carbon, renewable power generation.

https://theconversation.com/australia-i ... rgy-123694

[Wokko]

The only answer is nuclear. We have the land, water and uranium, it produces minimal emissions, cheap power and we can take the waste into the desert and stick it in a big hole.

[stui magpie]

I wouldn't be opposed to nuclear, done with several small reactors to replace the coal stations, providing the consistent base load power, topped up with renewable.

[Skids]

The only answer is nuclear. We have the land, water and uranium, it produces minimal emissions, cheap power and we can take the waste into the desert and stick it in a big hole.

And there's plenty of those where we've dug out iron ore! This site I'm at is mind boggling! Google earth pic is 5 years old so you don't get a good view of how it is now.
I'll send some pics through to TP and she may be kind enough to post them for me

The thing with renewables, mainly solar and wind, is they themselves, are far from 'clean'.

The chemicals used and waste generated in the production is massive. Some of the gases produced in solar panel production are over 20,000 times more potent than co2... the steel used in the production of wind turbines is also massive.

Lithium batteries don't grow on trees either, you have to mine; lithium, nickel, cobalt, graphite, copper, aluminum and manganese.... not to mention the chemicals needed in the mining process, and there's plenty!

https://theconversation.com/theres-a-lo ... oom-117421

https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/what-material ... e_products

[pietillidie]

OK, I'm not clear what you mean. Are you talking financial cost ? Can you explain please?

To reiterate a past point, think like an actuary. Both climate change and unpredictability have massive costs attached to them. Take your pick of negative outcomes or unpredictable outcomes. Both insurance and leadership are about minimising that risk, meaning controlling what can be controlled and hedging against what can't be controlled.

The urgency to minimise and hedge where climate change is concerned is based on the best information decision makers have available. It doesn't matter what shrill advocates or opponents go on about; their opinion lacks professional and legal credibility, and weighting it would be considered negligent. You can have reservations, but you can't criticise people in positions of responsibility for behaving with due diligence.

My gripe with popular advocacy is twofold: (a) you also have to cost economic loss up front and be open about it (e.g., Australia not exporting coal costs whatever), and (b) you have to create no-loss action plans when you can (and we can, especially when you factor in, for example, fossil fuel pollution per se; the funding of war and tyranny by the fossil fuel industry and the cost of defence against such regimes; the risks to real estate, agriculture, health (disease), tourism, regional stability (people movement), and more; and the returns to the energy transition we all seem to agree with).

The lack of urgency shows me the emotion hasn't been taken out of it. People who manage risk don't have the luxury of subliminally falling back on the fact that they'll be old soon anyway; risk management is a future-oriented present responsibility. Moreover, it always trades in imperfect knowledge, again by definition, and that knowledge has to be best-in-class, not lifted off a forum somewhere.

[Skids]

OK, I'm not clear what you mean. Are you talking financial cost ? Can you explain please?

To reiterate a past point, think like an actuary. Both climate change and unpredictability have massive costs attached to them. Take your pick of negative outcomes or unpredictable outcomes. Both insurance and leadership are about minimising that risk, meaning controlling what can be controlled and hedging against what can't be controlled.

The urgency to minimise and hedge where climate change is concerned is based on the best information decision makers have available. It doesn't matter what shrill advocates or opponents go on about; their opinion lacks professional and legal credibility, and weighting it would be considered negligent. You can have reservations, but you can't criticise people in positions of responsibility for behaving with due diligence.

My gripe with popular advocacy is twofold: (a) you also have to cost economic loss up front and be open about it (e.g., Australia not exporting coal costs whatever), and (b) you have to create no-loss action plans when you can (and we can, especially when you factor in, for example, fossil fuel pollution per se; the funding of war and tyranny by the fossil fuel industry and the cost of defence against such regimes; the risks to real estate, agriculture, health (disease), tourism, regional stability (people movement), and more; and the returns to the energy transition we all seem to agree with).

The lack of urgency shows me the emotion hasn't been taken out of it. People who manage risk don't have the luxury of subliminally falling back on the fact that they'll be old soon anyway; risk management is a future-oriented present responsibility. Moreover, it always trades in imperfect knowledge, again by definition, and that knowledge has to be best-in-class, not lifted off a forum somewhere.

Just like you can't get rid of horse racing, you can't stop exporting coal and other mineral fuels. These account for 35% of what we export! Over US$90 billion per annum. Then there's the ores and gems that we mine, making up another 30% US$76 billion per annum.

Meat (4%) is our next biggest export product.

Stop our major exports.... great idea

[Pies4shaw]

Merry Crisis, everyone.

[Skids]

Merry Crisis, everyone.

[David]

Just like you can't get rid of horse racing, you can't stop exporting coal and other mineral fuels. These account for 35% of what we export! Over US$90 billion per annum. Then there's the ores and gems that we mine, making up another 30% US$76 billion per annum.

Meat (4%) is our next biggest export product.

Stop our major exports.... great idea

If our biggest national export was military arms and the countries we were exporting to were planning to use them to bomb us, you’d at least consider weaning our economy off that, wouldn’t you? Even if it hurt the economy in the short-term?

Replace bombs with bushfires, floods and large numbers of refugees from neighbouring countries, and that’s not dissimilar to the situation we’re in. Of course it requires hard choices and may cause short-term pain. Nobody said this was going to be easy.

[pietillidie]

Just like you can't get rid of horse racing, you can't stop exporting coal and other mineral fuels. These account for 35% of what we export! Over US$90 billion per annum. Then there's the ores and gems that we mine, making up another 30% US$76 billion per annum.

Meat (4%) is our next biggest export product.

Stop our major exports.... great idea

Where in what I have said does the word 'stop' appear? Do I not say my biggest gripe is the lack of costing for countries such as Australia? Do I not talk about 'no loss' action plans?

Read. Consider. Pause. Type. You can't call teen advocates hysterical when as an adult you shoot a far worse score.

[pietillidie]

Just like you can't get rid of horse racing, you can't stop exporting coal and other mineral fuels. These account for 35% of what we export! Over US$90 billion per annum. Then there's the ores and gems that we mine, making up another 30% US$76 billion per annum.

Meat (4%) is our next biggest export product.

Stop our major exports.... great idea

If our biggest national export was military arms and the countries we were exporting to were planning to use them to bomb us, you’d at least consider weaning our economy off that, wouldn’t you? Even if it hurt the economy in the short-term?

Replace bombs with bushfires, floods and large numbers of refugees from neighbouring countries, and that’s not dissimilar to the situation we’re in. Of course it requires hard choices and may cause short-term pain. Nobody said this was going to be easy.

It's a pitiful sight to see such a toxic sector colonise the economy and polity. A sector notorious for massive externalities, synonymous with corruption, war, pollution and ill health, lacking in consumer discipline and answering to no one, whose modus operandi is dark deals with corrupt officials and governments.

It's even worse watching people trapped in the tentacles of this giant squid, from direct employees to money managers, pension fund holders, and of course shock jocks and politicians. You simply can't have a rational conversation with that level of vested interest, and it will build layers of vehement denial even as structural distortion corrodes the country. It's hard to be upbeat, frankly. Not the nicest thought for Xmas morning!

[David]

Wish someone had gotten me a furphy for Christmas!

https://youtu.be/dRFEHKfRchM