The Environmental thread + Conventional (HI-FI) wisdom is almost always invariably wrong

[PYP]

31 minutes ago, Priaptor said:

At least you admit it’s “your opinion” and not facts. 

yes, opinion based upon the experiences/opinions of folks I know and trust.

 

For those who present their opinions as "truth" and "facts," I would suggest attaching or linking to data.  

 

but let's get back to the thread...

[PYP]

1 hour ago, Priaptor said:

So why would the Biden admin institute policies leading to an increased demand for the dirtiest of energy?  

This would appear to be market forces vs. government policy.  As much as we like to think the U.S. president is all powerful, they do not move financial markets much (including stock market and Treasury prices), for example.  

 

The article you previously linked to describes the increase in worldwide coal demand this way:

 

https://www.npr.org/2021/10/22/1048108267/u-s-coal-production-is-up-sharply-after-hitting-a-50-year-low-last-year

 

Consulting company IHS Markit says natural gas prices and energy demand dropped early in the COVID-19 pandemic. Unburned coal piled up into a surplus in 2020.

Now, surging global demand has chipped away at the supply. James Stevenson with IHS-Markit says coal demand is especially high in the Asia-Pacific region.

"There isn't enough coal in China," says Stevenson. "Japan's had more coal demand. So there's a scramble to buy coal from where you can."

Including from producers in the U.S.

 

That would seem to be a classic supply/demand issue similar to the non-energy related ones that have resulted in supply chain issues.   No one would want (or suggest that) the U.S. government to stop the producers from selling their product.

 

There will be many such instances as the world adjusts to a new reality.  We cannot look at the short-term problems created by the pandemic or other supply/demand issues and try extrapolate a future or assign blame.  

 

[PYP]

This is scary.  Just in time for Halloween.   Bolding added. 

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/24/us/politics/montana-misinformation-national-heritage.html

 

Ms. Grulkowski had just heard about a years-in-the-making effort to designate her corner of central Montana a national heritage area, celebrating its role in the story of the American West. A small pot of federal matching money was there for the taking, to help draw more visitors and preserve underfunded local tourist attractions.

Ms. Grulkowski set about blowing up that effort with everything she had.

 

She collected addresses from a list of voters and spent $1,300 sending a packet denouncing the proposed heritage area to 1,498 farmers and ranchers. She told them the designation would forbid landowners to build sheds, drill wells or use fertilizers and pesticides. It would alter water rights, give tourists access to private property, create a new taxation district and prohibit new septic systems and burials on private land, she said.

None of this was true.

 

...  

Outside of a poultry coop, as her chickens and ducks squawked, Ms. Grulkowski ticked through the falsehoods she had read online and accepted as truths in the past year: The Covid vaccine is more dangerous than the coronavirus. Global child-trafficking rings control the political system. Black Lives Matter was responsible for the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. The United Nations is plotting to control world population and seize private land. Mr. Trump was the rightful winner of last year’s election. Even in Cascade County, where Mr. Trump won 59 percent of the vote, Ms. Grulkowski argued that 3,000 illegal votes were cast.

 

“We didn’t believe in any of that stuff until last July,” Ms. Grulkowski said. “Then we stumbled on something on the internet, and we watched it, and it took us two days to get over that. And it had to do with the child trafficking that leads to everything. It just didn’t seem right, and that was just over the top. And then we started seeing things that are lining up with that everywhere.”

 

[semente]

I took my youngest to the local football stadium for vaccination yesterday after lunch.
An anti-vaxxer mob was rallying by the entrance and I was offered this free "newspaper"...

 

[PYP]

37 minutes ago, semente said:

I took my youngest to the local football stadium for vaccination yesterday after lunch.
An anti-vaxxer mob was rallying by the entrance and I was offered this free "newspaper"...

 

 

Halloween has come early this year...   Regarding "Agenda 21" referred to in the "newspaper,"  the Southern Poverty Law Center writes (bolding added):

 

At the conclusion of the June 3-14, 1992, United Nations Conference on Environment & Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, President George H.W. Bush and the leaders of 177 other nations signed a document known as Agenda 21. At the time, it was seen as a perfectly sensible planning paper, a nonbinding statement of intent aimed at dealing with sustainability on an increasingly crowded planet.

 

But in the 22 years since that day, at the hands of groups like the John Birch Society, Agenda 21 has been transformed in much of the American public mind into a secret plot to impose a totalitarian world government, a nefarious effort to crush freedom in the name of environmentalism. And it isn’t only extremists pushing this conspiracy theory — in January 2012, the Republican National Committee bought into the propaganda, denouncing Agenda 21 in a resolution as a “destructive and insidious scheme” that is meant to impose a “socialist/communist redistribution of wealth.”

 

The demonization of Agenda 21 began among extremist groups like the John Birch Society, the same outfit that was effectively ejected from the conservative movement after accusing President Dwight D. Eisenhower of being a communist agent. The Birch Society and an array of other radical-right groups see Agenda 21 and virtually all other global efforts as part of a nefarious plan on the part of global elites to form a socialistic one-world government, or “New World Order.”

[Priaptor]

4 hours ago, PYP said:

This is scary.  Just in time for Halloween.   Bolding added. 

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/24/us/politics/montana-misinformation-national-heritage.html

 

Ms. Grulkowski had just heard about a years-in-the-making effort to designate her corner of central Montana a national heritage area, celebrating its role in the story of the American West. A small pot of federal matching money was there for the taking, to help draw more visitors and preserve underfunded local tourist attractions.

Ms. Grulkowski set about blowing up that effort with everything she had.

 

She collected addresses from a list of voters and spent $1,300 sending a packet denouncing the proposed heritage area to 1,498 farmers and ranchers. She told them the designation would forbid landowners to build sheds, drill wells or use fertilizers and pesticides. It would alter water rights, give tourists access to private property, create a new taxation district and prohibit new septic systems and burials on private land, she said.

None of this was true.

 

...  

Outside of a poultry coop, as her chickens and ducks squawked, Ms. Grulkowski ticked through the falsehoods she had read online and accepted as truths in the past year: The Covid vaccine is more dangerous than the coronavirus. Global child-trafficking rings control the political system. Black Lives Matter was responsible for the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. The United Nations is plotting to control world population and seize private land. Mr. Trump was the rightful winner of last year’s election. Even in Cascade County, where Mr. Trump won 59 percent of the vote, Ms. Grulkowski argued that 3,000 illegal votes were cast.

 

“We didn’t believe in any of that stuff until last July,” Ms. Grulkowski said. “Then we stumbled on something on the internet, and we watched it, and it took us two days to get over that. And it had to do with the child trafficking that leads to everything. It just didn’t seem right, and that was just over the top. And then we started seeing things that are lining up with that everywhere.”

 

Oh of course the NYT, the paper of truth, justice and the American would never make stuff up or create a vignette for some nefarious reason. Lol. 
 

I love the sources you guys quote. It’s the copy and paste mentality unfortunately too prevalent among today’s internet experts.
 

Unfortunately if you believe this to be representative of anything or even true you are not much different than those you mock. 

[Priaptor]

3 hours ago, PYP said:

Halloween has come early this year...   Regarding "Agenda 21" referred to in the "newspaper,"  the Southern Poverty Law Center writes (bolding added):

 

At the conclusion of the June 3-14, 1992, United Nations Conference on Environment & Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, President George H.W. Bush and the leaders of 177 other nations signed a document known as Agenda 21. At the time, it was seen as a perfectly sensible planning paper, a nonbinding statement of intent aimed at dealing with sustainability on an increasingly crowded planet.

 

But in the 22 years since that day, at the hands of groups like the John Birch Society, Agenda 21 has been transformed in much of the American public mind into a secret plot to impose a totalitarian world government, a nefarious effort to crush freedom in the name of environmentalism. And it isn’t only extremists pushing this conspiracy theory — in January 2012, the Republican National Committee bought into the propaganda, denouncing Agenda 21 in a resolution as a “destructive and insidious scheme” that is meant to impose a “socialist/communist redistribution of wealth.”

 

The demonization of Agenda 21 began among extremist groups like the John Birch Society, the same outfit that was effectively ejected from the conservative movement after accusing President Dwight D. Eisenhower of being a communist agent. The Birch Society and an array of other radical-right groups see Agenda 21 and virtually all other global efforts as part of a nefarious plan on the part of global elites to form a socialistic one-world government, or “New World Order.”

So you are willing to “allow” political discussion as long as it fits your left wing radical agenda by spewing, through copy and paste nonsense, some absurd conspiratorial whacko theories. 

[PYP]

39 minutes ago, Priaptor said:

 

 

Unfortunately if you believe this to be representative of anything or even true you are not much different than those you mock. 

I'm not mocking her.  This is a story about how one determined person, mislead by her own unsubstantiated fears, helps a community shoot itself in the financial foot.  The "And then we started seeing things that are lining up with that everywhere" reminds me of quotes from QAnon believers and I do think it is representative of that kind of magical thinking.   

[PYP]

39 minutes ago, Priaptor said:

So you are willing to “allow” political discussion as long as it fits your left wing radical agenda by spewing, through copy and paste nonsense, some absurd conspiratorial whacko theories. 

Why is this political?  It is about an environmental policy that is now the basis of a conspiracy theory.  

 

The John Birch Society's views are well known.    

[semente]

Coca-Cola’s 100 Billion Bottle Problem

Coca-Cola sells more than 100 billion throwaway plastic bottles each year. Panorama investigates their promises to crack down on plastic waste. Globally, more of Coke's plastic packaging is found littered than any other brand. Filming on the ground in Samoa, the Philippines and Uganda, this film asks if Coca-Cola is on track to achieve its pledge to create a world without waste.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0010zxs

[sphinxsix]

42 minutes ago, semente said:

Coca-Cola’s 100 Billion Bottle Problem

Coca-Cola sells more than 100 billion throwaway plastic bottles each year. Panorama investigates their promises to crack down on plastic waste. Globally, more of Coke's plastic packaging is found littered than any other brand. Filming on the ground in Samoa, the Philippines and Uganda, this film asks if Coca-Cola is on track to achieve its pledge to create a world without waste.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0010zxs

Johnson talked today to some school kids about Coca Cola and recycling.

 

"He was also cautious about whether many breakthroughs will come when world leaders gather touch down in Scotland later this week. “I think it can be done,” Johnson said. “It’s going to be very, very tough, this summit, and I’m very worried because it might go wrong. We might not get the agreements that we need. It’s touch and go, it’s very, very difficult … It’s very far from clear that we’ll get the progress that we need.”

 

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/25/boris-johnson-says-chances-of-cop26-success-are-touch-and-go

 

 

[Priaptor]

And in other news greenhouse gas emissions were higher last year despite pandemic slowdown. Tells you all you need to know. While The Band Plays on and people worry about Coke bottles and other minor league issues, the biggest polluters accounting for this new record, China, India, et. al as a result of their increasing dependence of dirty fuels and doing more of the world's manufacturing, no one even mentions. 

 

Mindboggling.

[sphinxsix]

Greenpeace: Leaked documents reveal the fossil fuel and meat producing countries lobbying against climate action. Files show how Brazil, Argentina, Australia, Japan, Saudi Arabia and OPEC have pressed to water down a key UN scientific report.

 

 

[sphinxsix]

5 minutes ago, Priaptor said:

the biggest polluters accounting for this new record, China, India, et.

I thought we already talked about who precisely the biggest polluters are 

[Priaptor]

7 minutes ago, sphinxsix said:

I thought we already talked about who precisely the biggest polluters are 

Unfortunately, you didn't get the message.

[Priaptor]

36 minutes ago, sphinxsix said:

Greenpeace: Leaked documents reveal the fossil fuel and meat producing countries lobbying against climate action. Files show how Brazil, Argentina, Australia, Japan, Saudi Arabia and OPEC have pressed to water down a key UN scientific report.

 

 

And in other news, my grass stopped growing as deep fall sets in.

 

And The Band Played On. LMAO. 

[firedog]

On 10/24/2021 at 8:17 PM, semente said:

• Sen. Joe Manchin earned $500,000 in 2020 from his son's energy firm, which Manchin founded in 1998.

• He's also the chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, which regulates the industry.

• He's received thousands from Exxon lobbyists and Republican oil and gas titans.

 

https://www.businessinsider.com/senator-joe-manchin-half-million-year-coal-stocks-climate-crisis-2021-9?r=US&IR=T

Pretty much everyone in the Senate and House gets money from all types of lobbyists/industries. Many are  weathy and so have all sorts of financial interests. Manchin isn't unique.

Priaptor made a good point: he represents a state dependent on coal and fossil fuel industries. His role is to represent his constituents. 

One could argue he should be helping his state by leading an orderly transition away from fossil fuels. But that is sort of a different argument.

[Priaptor]

16 minutes ago, firedog said:

Pretty much everyone in the Senate and House gets money from all types of lobbyists/industries. Many are  weathy and so have all sorts of financial interests. Manchin isn't unique.

Priaptor made a good point: he represents a state dependent on coal and fossil fuel industries. His role is to represent his constituents. 

One could argue he should be helping his state by leading an orderly transition away from fossil fuels. But that is sort of a different argument.

Totally agree. 

 

Your last point is the most appropriate point. Truth is WV has seen, by virtue of the young migrating out of WV, a so called natural transition away from fossil fuel industry. There is an interesting migration pattern in the USA. Previous states like Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, Idaho and Montana and now WV whose prior and main industries were in mining and fuel are now seeing total demographic shifts with huge influx of people escaping the cities for a more relaxed and beautiful lifestyle. The housing boom in northern Idaho and Montana has been off the charts. 

 

I would add, there are some people posting who just like to believe, the "side" they disagree with is the bad side when it comes to lobbyists. As I have said elsewhere, there are no virtuous and noble lobbyists, regardless of what they claim they represent. 

[Allan F]

1 hour ago, Priaptor said:

...there are no virtuous and noble lobbyists, regardless of what they claim they represent.

 

Sadly, ain't that the truth!

[sphinxsix]

2 hours ago, Priaptor said:

And in other news, my grass stopped growing as deep fall sets in.

 

And The Band Played On. LMAO. 

 

You can't surprise me, that's possibly the best thing about most conservatives.. 

 

[firedog]

7 hours ago, sphinxsix said:

 

You can't surprise me, that's possibly the best thing about most conservatives.. 

 

Not really insightful.

In the US there are true Conservatives and Libertarians, and there are Republicans - who claim to be Conservatives, but today aren't really. They seem to have become just sort of an "anti-liberal" tribe. I can't see any coherent world view there. It seems to have become mostly a party concerned with culture wars.

 

Priaptor seems to be a consistent member of the first group, which has the virtue of having a logical  world view. In some instances people with that POV agree with people on the left, but for different reasons than the left has, and their solutions will be different ones.  You can disagree with that POV, but it can't be simply dismissed as lacking in insight or understanding. 

[semente]

10 hours ago, firedog said:

Pretty much everyone in the Senate and House gets money from all types of lobbyists/industries. Many are  weathy and so have all sorts of financial interests. Manchin isn't unique.

Priaptor made a good point: he represents a state dependent on coal and fossil fuel industries. His role is to represent his constituents. 

One could argue he should be helping his state by leading an orderly transition away from fossil fuels. But that is sort of a different argument.

 

But is he representing the constituents or the industry and his own interests?

 

I understand that Manchin is not unique, Lobbying and corruotion are one of the problems of the US system and perhaps to a lesser extent of European democracies.

[sphinxsix]

5 hours ago, firedog said:

Priaptor seems to be a consistent member of the first group

He definitely is. Even his Nola speakers have to some degree quite conservative, soft sound 

 

5 hours ago, firedog said:

You can disagree with that POV, but it can't be simply dismissed as lacking in insight or understanding. 

I didn't dismiss it it this regard, I just said, I rather couldn't be surprised by most conservatives, actually not only American ones. These are two different things.

What I dismiss is Priaptor's tendency to see things in a incorrect light and then not replying to comments on that:

 

On 10/22/2021 at 1:15 AM, sphinxsix said:

@Priaptor There are IMO so many things that are not correct in your above posts that I'm afraid of replying to them in particular since like I said I can't spend so much time here nowadays.

But I'll try. And I'll try to keep it short.

 

The Netherlands where I've been living for the last 4 years:

-relatively high taxes

-lots of regulations in many fields eg highly regulated housing market

-very developed social system - if you don't make an average 3k euro, you get allowances eg housing allowance (often 50% of the rent and I must add that social housing in big cities often counts for more than 50% of all houses/apartments), health insurance (obligatory in the NL) allowance - up to 80% and in such case you pay for it 20e per month), child allowances etc.

-one of the lowest poverty levels in the world (top 3, I believe)

-one of the highest levels of people's 'happiness' (top 5)

-very high level of medical care (also top 5 in the world)

-in addition pension system no 1 in the world for more than decade (last year Iceland has taken the 1st place in most rankings)

-healthy IMO tendency to legalize things which cannot be actually erased from social life - eg soft drugs, prostitution (no hundreds of thousands 'one joint' prisoners like in some countries, insurance and pension for sex workers as they are called here)

 

Apologies for some mess in this post but I really have to be in a hurry.

 

Are you serious? Do you belive in that? 'Normal and competitive'have been working for decades and what we've got.? Free market and capitalism are based on greed - love of money, not love of nature, c'mon..

 

It was not only America but the whole world and definitely not necessarily after facing tax increases. Even East European companies moved their production to China at some point cause it was simply cheaper.

 

Let's call things by their names - you've just named 3 biggest polluters in the world.

Actually as for greenhouse gases emissions per capita, the US is the biggest one before Russia.

 

(All charts by International Energy Agency, 2021 

https://www.c2es.org/content/international-emissions/)

 

Anyway like I already said here earlier countries like Russia, China, Brazil may be a problem.

Hope the opposition and a couple of stubborn Democrats will allow Biden to do something otherwise also US may be a problem, actually due to its meaning and international position and influence I'd say (sorry for that) - the biggest one..

 

The problem starts when the ones who should pay the highest bills (taxes) pay the smallest ones or none at all.. 

As for being ready for real sacrifice - I agree this may be hard for many but I think this might be exactly what needs to be done. Also in the 1st world 3rd world relation. We are after all rich also in connection with exploiting them, if I may allow myself call things by their name again and here also eg the Netherlands isn't a completely innocent historically country but at least they make lots of things easier now for people from Surinam (I'd still personally prefer Manhattan to be Dutch to Surinam ;-)), Indonesia etc.

 

Some of them simply have to - I posted the information about the case lost by the Dutch government in which the court had obliged in quite concrete way the government to do more as far as environmental matters are regarded (check out earlier posts). Courts in other countries followed the example. You can Google it..

 

Let's stick to the facts. Look at the charts above.

 

Do they in your opinion after all.?

The whole problem is that according to science ALL countries must be pretty SOON CLEAN.

Otherwise we and our kids are screwed..

Not even mentioning fauna..

Even most kids understand that as you probably know. :-)

 

I think you overestimate the weight of this problem.

I really don't think it's the no 1 problem taking into account how much greenhouse gases are emitted in these countries or G20 in general in the process of their own production, transportation, agricultural etc processes.

You repeat this so often that this begins to sound to me like some your very personal problem with the People's Rpublic of China.. ;-)

BTW look - their economy, one of the fastest developing ones in the world in recent decades is a highly regulated and planned one.. ;-)

 

But seriously, I will only repeat once again - IMO we (unfortunately) must do much more than what you suggest and I'm afraid that "dismantling" China's power would not be even close to enough as far as solving the problem WE have is regarded.

 

 

 

 

I would also rather dismiss posts like this one:

 

16 hours ago, Priaptor said:

And in other news, my grass stopped growing as deep fall sets in.

 

And The Band Played On. LMAO. 

 

That's it.

 

 

[sphinxsix]

Meanwhile in Australia...

"The Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, has released the government’s plan to reach net zero emissions by 2050, and announced the country is on track to beat its 2030 target, as he prepares to fly to Glasgow for a United Nations climate summit.

Morrison hailed Tuesday’s plan as a “practical way” to neutralise Australia’s emissions by 2050 but the plan showed almost a third of the abatement task is comprised of cuts via unspecified “technology breakthroughs” and “global trends” while a further 20% will be achieved through offsets."

Australia commits to 2050 net zero emissions plan but with no detail and no modelling

 

Australia commits to 2050 net zero emissions plan but with no detail and no modelling

 

 I

Looks serious, doesn't it.? 

 

[PYP]

43 minutes ago, sphinxsix said:

Meanwhile in Australia...

Australia commits to 2050 net zero emissions plan but with no detail and no modelling

How is water conservation going in Australia?