Not As Environmentally Friendly As Promised

[Anonymous-50446]

Pretty much everyone round here has coal or wood fires. We're off the grid for mains gas and electric is too expensive by itself.

I was rather suggesting that setting me on fire was not so good for me...

 

[AlchoPwn]

I was rather suggesting that setting me on fire was not so good for me...

It is true. The New Age medical practice of purifying people with flames, as was done in the "Wicker Man" ritual of the Druids, and the Auto-da-fe of the Spanish Catholics, has been shown to be less than efficacious. Not only does it remove skin, organs, hair and even bone, beyond all recommended medical limits, it has been known to cause hauntings. Deepak Chopra, the singular authority on the matter in his book "Runic Celto-Daoist Tarot in the Ritual of Suttee" has gone so far as to suggest that while it is acceptable to burn women alive if their husbands die, it should probably be avoided as a more general spiritual medicament. You're safe for the moment Coal, or do you need a second opinion?

 

[Anonymous-50446]

You're safe for the moment Coal, or do you need a second opinion?

Unless I get a husband who almost immediately dies...

 

[INT21]

AlchoPwn said: ↑
You're safe for the moment Coal, or do you need a second opinion?

Coal response.

..Unless I get a husband who almost immediately dies...

Coal.
Polymath
Renaissance man.


All very confusing.

INT21

 

[Anonymous-50446]

AlchoPwn said: ↑
You're safe for the moment Coal, or do you need a second opinion?

Coal response.

..Unless I get a husband who almost immediately dies...

Coal.
Polymath
Renaissance man.


All very confusing.

INT21

Never say never

 

[Schwadevivre]

Wasn't there a controversy about that?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockey_stick_controversy

No, there was criticism because that's what science does. In practice, Mann's early construction of 1999 was vindicated but shown to be a little less extreme than his early work implied.

McIntyre's 2004 criticism was shown to be wrong by Wahl's work of 2007

What evidence is there for the hockey stick? via Skeptical Science

See also

 

[Schwadevivre]

Seeing a need for oil, coal and nuclear plants might take a hit when you find that battery grid-scale storage is one of the fastest growing pars of US utilities.
Utilities are starting to invest in big batteries instead of building new power plants

 

[MorningAngel]

My friend was told the other day double glazing is only meant to last five years! All that plastic making and dumping. I tried to look up how bad the making of double glazing was for the environment. But I just kept getting how wonderfully environmentally friendly double glazing was, really?

 

[EnolaGaia]

Likely climate change suspects within the industrial sector are being underestimated as problem sources - even by the regulators charged with monitoring them.

Fertilizer plants emit 100 times more methane than reported

Emissions of methane from the industrial sector have been vastly underestimated, researchers from Cornell University and Environmental Defense Fund have found.

Using a Google Street View car equipped with a high-precision methane sensor, the researchers discovered that methane emissions from ammonia fertilizer plants were 100 times higher than the fertilizer industry's self-reported estimate. They also were substantially higher than the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimate for all industrial processes in the United States.

"We took one small industry that most people have never heard of and found that its methane emissions were three times higher than the EPA assumed was emitted by all industrial production in the United States," said John Albertson, co-author and professor of civil and environmental engineering. "It shows us that there's a huge gap between a priori estimates and real-world measurements."

The researchers' findings are reported in "Estimation of Methane Emissions From the U.S. Ammonia Fertilizer Industry Using a Mobile Sensing Approach," published in Elementa. ...

(Emphasis Added)

FULL STORY: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/06/190606183254.htm

 

[Xanatic*]

I could see the fertilizer plants in court using the defense of "He who smelled it, dealt it".

 

[EnolaGaia]

Moving a large-scale economic activity into the virtual realm (i.e., cyberspace) doesn't automatically mean it's no longer affecting the physical environment.

Bitcoin causing carbon dioxide emissions comparable to Las Vegas or Hamburg

The use of Bitcoin causes around 22 megatons in CO2 emissions annually -- comparable to the total emissions of cities such as Hamburg or Las Vegas. That is the conclusion of the most detailed analysis to date of the cryptocurrency's carbon footprint. For their study, an interdisciplinary team of researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) analyzed such data as the IPO filings of hardware manufacturers and the IP addresses of Bitcoin "miners."

Although Bitcoin is a virtual currency, the energy consumption associated with its use is very real. For a Bitcoin transfer to be executed and validated, a mathematical puzzle must be solved by an arbitrary computer in the global Bitcoin network. The network, which anyone can join, rewards the puzzle solvers in Bitcoin. The computing capacity used in this process -- known as Bitcoin mining -- has increased rapidly in recent years. Statistics show that it quadrupled in 2018 alone.

Consequently, the Bitcoin boom raises the question of whether the cryptocurrency is imposing an additional burden on the climate. Several studies have attempted to quantify the CO2 emissions caused by Bitcoin mining. "These studies are based on a number of approximations, however," says Christian Stoll, who conducts research at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). ...

Therefore, a team of management sciences and informatics researchers at TUM has carried out the most detailed calculation of the carbon footprint of the Bitcoin system to date. Working like detectives, they proceeded step by step to gather conclusive data. ...

The conclusion of the study: The Bitcoin system has a carbon footprint of between 22 and 22.9 megatons per year. That is comparable to the footprint of such cities as Hamburg, Vienna or Las Vegas. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/06/190613104533.htm

 

[Mythopoeika]

My friend was told the other day double glazing is only meant to last five years! All that plastic making and dumping. I tried to look up how bad the making of double glazing was for the environment. But I just kept getting how wonderfully environmentally friendly double glazing was, really?

I heard it was 25 years. Which is more realistic.

 

[MorningAngel]

I heard it was 25 years. Which is more realistic.

She was told the seals go in five years.

Our windows are almost 100 a little TCL and some new paint occasionally is all they’ve needed.

 

[GNC]

My double glazing is fine after about 15 years, and I live on a hill in Scotland.

 

[MorningAngel]

My double glazing is fine after about 15 years, and I live on a hill in Scotland.

I think a lot of people get convinced to change it when it’s not necessary or they just fancy new ones. I would be in the leased surprised if they are built to break though. That’s like most things these days.

 

[GNC]

There's certainly that old cliché (since the 80s) of the pushy to the point of harassment double glazing salesman, which is probably more rooted in fact than that industry would care to admit. But in my case it was very necessary, and they did a really good job.

 

[MorningAngel]

 

[MorningAngel]

Green electricity still isn’t totally environmentally friendly then.

‘Cheap and non-flammable, SF6 is a colourless, odourless, synthetic gas. It makes a hugely effective insulating material for medium and high-voltage electrical installations.

It is widely used across the industry, from large power stations to wind turbines to electrical sub-stations in towns and cities. It prevents electrical accidents and fires.’

Climate change: Electrical industry's 'dirty secret' boosts warming https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-49567197

 

[RaM]

Very few so called environmentally friendly technologies and the people that are making a very good
living moaning about the rest of us wile jetting all over the world are actually so.
It's also a jolly fine way of frightening extra tax out of people.

 

[MorningAngel]

The water-saving device wasting billions of litres every week https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-54326178

 

[bugmum]

Our house was built in 1997 with double glazing, and the majority of the windows are original. We have had some trouble recently with inside fogging - one window was starting to develop its own ecosystem - but there's a local firm who drop round, take the glass away, sort out the problem and put it back. Much cheaper than replacing the entire window, and saves being hassled by Anglian on a fortnightly basis until they get the message that we don't want a conservatory!

The in-house Medic's current bugbear is people offering to fill up our cavity wall with insulation. Our neighbour had it done, and it was made from paper. The I-hM conjectures that the whole thing has probably settled, and any water getting in will have reduced it to a pile of soggy mush, arguably hastening a damp problem. Air is a relatively reliable insulator compared to brick, according to my Physics O-level...

 

[MorningAngel]

Our house was built in 1997 with double glazing, and the majority of the windows are original. We have had some trouble recently with inside fogging - one window was starting to develop its own ecosystem - but there's a local firm who drop round, take the glass away, sort out the problem and put it back. Much cheaper than replacing the entire window, and saves being hassled by Anglian on a fortnightly basis until they get the message that we don't want a conservatory!

The in-house Medic's current bugbear is people offering to fill up our cavity wall with insulation. Our neighbour had it done, and it was made from paper. The I-hM conjectures that the whole thing has probably settled, and any water getting in will have reduced it to a pile of soggy mush, arguably hastening a damp problem. Air is a relatively reliable insulator compared to brick, according to my Physics O-level...

Around my way they keep sticking weird polystyrene to houses. But any time I’ve seen a thermal image of a house losing heat it’s been through the windows or roof not the walls.

I wonder if it’s some scheme to make someone money. I have noticed that the stuff they are putting up has changed from grey to an ugly green. I do wonder if they found something out about the grey stuff. I would think after Grenfell it would be unwise to stick unnecessary stuff to the outside of homes.

 

[Trevp666]

I wonder how long it will be until a report is released to show that the miles and miles of expanded size cycle lanes in major UK towns (which are not being used, and reduced the amount of available road space for the vehicles that contribute towards the upkeep of same) have contributed to an increase in CO2 levels and particulates as the existing traffic has been slowed considerably.

 

[bugmum]

Around my way they keep sticking weird polystyrene to houses. But any time I’ve seen a thermal image of a house losing heat it’s been through the windows or roof not the walls.

I wonder if it’s some scheme to make someone money. I have noticed that the stuff they are putting up has changed from grey to an ugly green. I do wonder if they found something out about the grey stuff. I would think after Grenfell it would be unwise to stick unnecessary stuff to the outside of homes.

Is that the cladding that's currently so fashionable (despite being butt ugly IMO)? It's not actually polystyrene, it's cement fibre. We looked at a house that was perfectly lovely built in brick, but when we arrived at the actual plot for sale, they had added on flat-roofed bits and covered it in the same green cladding.

 

[MorningAngel]

Is that the cladding that's currently so fashionable (despite being butt ugly IMO)? It's not actually polystyrene, it's cement fibre. We looked at a house that was perfectly lovely built in brick, but when we arrived at the actual plot for sale, they had added on flat-roofed bits and covered it in the same green cladding.

I’ve only seen the bits they’ve left behind. I’m not sure there’s much point in it. They do paint over it.

 

[Analogue Boy]

I wonder how long it will be until a report is released to show that the miles and miles of expanded size cycle lanes in major UK towns (which are not being used, and reduced the amount of available road space for the vehicles that contribute towards the upkeep of same) have contributed to an increase in CO2 levels and particulates as the existing traffic has been slowed considerably.

How are these lanes going to be marked out when it snows? Are we just supposed to know where all the new cycle lanes are throughout the country?

 

[Naughty_Felid]

I wonder how long it will be until a report is released to show that the miles and miles of expanded size cycle lanes in major UK towns (which are not being used, and reduced the amount of available road space for the vehicles that contribute towards the upkeep of same) have contributed to an increase in CO2 levels and particulates as the existing traffic has been slowed considerably.

There hasn't been road tax since 1937. The cyclists who are doing far less damage to the roads pay the same amount as you do in taxes that go to support the transport infrastructure.

The whole point of cycle lanes is to get people to use them due to the impending obesity crisis that's will hit in the next couple of decades.

Also, I cycle and own a car - I choose to use my bikes more than my car so you should be paying more tax than me. Try and get off your arses and take a walk or a bike ride for a change.

 

[Trevp666]

Yes I both cycle and drive.
And I didn't mention road-tax. I refer to all the associated costs of owning a private vehicle.
The cycling is free of any kind of charge and I use a ATB cycle so mainly use off-road lanes. The only money I pay for cycling was the initial purchase cost of equipment.
Were it not for the government building the roads and cycle lanes in the first place they would not be there for me to use, and the money had to come from somewhere.
My point was not to 'knock' cycling and cyclists, being one myself, but to point out the irony of the increase in pollution (and greater cost) etc for me to use the roads as a car driver too, roads that are being decreased in size leading to traffic jams etc as per the title of this thread.

My sub-question in reaction to your comment though is this.......once all the private motorists have been forced off the roads, and other forms of transport are electrified, where is the revenue going to be generated from to maintain the roads and cycle paths?
It will no longer come from Vehicle Excise Duty, or Fuel Duty, or MOT payments, or vehicle sale tax, or the VAT on all the other purchases (insurance, servicing, repairs, tyres, cleaning, etc etc) that a private motorist has to make.
The assertion that us cyclists pay the same amount as drivers do in taxes to support the transport infrastructure is totally incorrect once those additional costs are factored in.
I would hate to see how maintaining the transport infrastructure could be funded to the same level if private vehicle ownership was replaced by cycling alone.

 

[Trevp666]

How are these lanes going to be marked out when it snows? Are we just supposed to know where all the new cycle lanes are throughout the country?

Well in the cities and towns they appear to be demarking the cycle lane areas with these 5' tall plastic bollards every few feet.
Dunno how it'll work on the roads where the demarcation is simply a line painted on the tarmac.

But then again, I wouldn't be out cycling on the roads anyway if there was conditions such as falling snow, or settling snow such that the lines would be obscured. On days like that I'd much rather be in my nice warm car.

 

[stu neville]

My sub-question in reaction to your comment though is this.......once all the private motorists have been forced off the roads, and other forms of transport are electrified, where is the revenue going to be generated from to maintain the roads and cycle paths?
It will no longer come from Vehicle Excise Duty, or Fuel Duty, or MOT payments, or vehicle sale tax, or the VAT on all the other purchases (insurance, servicing, repairs, tyres, cleaning, etc etc) that a private motorist has to make.

Everything bar the fuel duty. The roads aren't suddenly going to resemble those ones you see in remote parts of the world, with weeds poking through. Electric vehicles still need servicing, MOT, still have brake pads, tyres, etc etc, so that income stream isn't going to change much. This argument has much in common with the "Pedestrianise!?! But the whole area will go out of business if people can't park right outside!!" line which also doesn't actually play out in most cases either. What's needed is a societal shift away from motoring dependence as it stands: most local authorities post-war took the opportunity to build roads at the expense of all other transport forms (see Beeching, dual-carriageway flyovers 25 feet from people's bedroom windows, etc) never expecting the shelf life of the petrol engine to be so short.