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Environmentalism

Weirdly, a lot of sympathy here

“Wales has enough low-carbon energy already. The power from this wind farm will all be going to England, the money will go to the company and we will get nothing. And then the English wonder why we Welsh get stroppy.”

The arguments are not just about landscapes. Wind farm construction means drilling massive holes in the ground to install concrete foundations. It also means laying cables and building sub-stations. Usually a brand new road is needed too – so the construction phase often has huge impacts.

Once built, wind turbines can cause further disruption through “flicker” – caused by sunlight reflected off moving blades – and low level vibrations transmitted in the air or ground. Such prospects mean Welsh planning meetings have become heated or even aggressive.

An Englishman being sympathetic to the Welsh, yes, I know, see that aerial porcine?

However, over the years I’ve lived around the corner from an oil well and just over the slope from some windmills. And the windmills were definitively the more intrusive. Get up close to them and the noise is simply inescapable.

Here’s the real complaint

A plan backed by the Duke of Beaufort to build a 2,000-acre solar farm near the King’s Highgrove estate has sparked a row with residents including his environmentalist ex-wife.

Protesters claim that the Lime Down Solar Park scheme, which is designed to generate 500 megawatts of clean energy will blight swaths of the countryside near the Fosse Way, a Roman road.

Part of the farm will be housed on the Duke’s 52,000-acre Badminton estate in Gloucestershire – as well as on land in a triangle between the market towns of Malmesbury, Tetbury and Chippenham.

Not quite God’s own country as it’s not in Somerset but it’s nearby. So., shouty, screamy, Noooo!

Protesters also fear that the development, comprising three and a half square miles of 14ft-high solar panels surrounded by security fencing and floodlights, will be turned into housing once the solar farm has served its purpose.

That’s the real complaint of course. That worry that at some point Britons might gain housing.

Only a little thought

Modern household appliances hit the scrapheap sooner than older models
White goods such as microwaves and dishwashers have a shorter lifespan than they did in 2011 as tech becomes more complex, figures show

Well, OK.

He believes the advent of “complicated parts, high-tech appliances and sophisticated manufacturing” is the prime reason for the trend.

“Modern appliances often rely on complex circuit boards and software, which can be more prone to failure over time than simpler mechanical components,” he said.

Right, OK.

And the thought:

From 1 July a wide range of electrical and electronic products put on the European Union market may no longer contain certain hazardous substances that can endanger human health and the environment. Four heavy metals and two groups of brominated flame retardants are being banned as they can pose a direct risk to workers’ health when waste electrical and electronic equipment is recycled and can be released into the environment when such waste is incinerated or disposed of in landfill dumps. ‘E-waste’ is the fastest growing type of waste in Europe. Producers have had over three years to prepare for the ban’s entry into force since it was decided in January 2003. This EU initiative has been closely followed by public authorities in some third countries, with China, a leading producer of electrical and electronic equipment, intending to introduce similar legislation next year.

Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas said: “This ban has a double benefit for human health and the environment. Ending the use of these hazardous substances in many e-products not only removes the intrinsic hazard they pose but will also enable us to considerably increase the amount of waste equipment that is recycled by making this activity safer and also less costly. I welcome China’s plans to follow Europe’s example and would encourage other countries to do likewise.”

The six hazardous substances being banned are the heavy metals lead, cadmium, mercury and hexavalent chromium, as well as two groups of brominated flame retardants, polybrominated biphenyls (PBB) and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE).

Lead is now banned in solder, therefore we get tin whiskers. Which means circuit boards blow up sooner.

Hmm…..

Hmm, OK

Hotel room shampoo bottles to be banned in Northern Ireland but not in the rest of the UK
New EU net-zero laws on packaging waste will also see plastic shrink wrap and sauces in plastic sachets prohibited under Windsor Framework

Great, so we’ve a natural experiment here.

Hands up anyone who thinks it will be honestly studied?

So, that’s that problem solved

Women are required to have 2.1 children each on average to maintain population growth, known as the “total fertility rate”, and as of 2021 it stood at 2.23 worldwide.

But experts say it is on a persistently downward trend, having fallen from 4.84 in 1950, and researchers predict it will decrease to 1.83 in 2050 and 1.59 by 2100.

No, it wasn’t solved by contraception – it is desired fertility that hsa fallen, not just actual. It also wasn;t solved by government action or insistence. It happened simply because humanity got gloriously rich. So rich that we solved the problem of 50% of kids dying by puberty. Thus the number of kids necessary to have a sporting chance of grandchildren – that win in the evolutionary race – fell. Plus that idea that as there are other things to do in life now therefore less of any one thing is done.

And that’s it. Capitalism and free markets for the win then. For that is what has caused this.

Erm?

Only seven countries are meeting an international air quality standard, with deadly air pollution worsening in places due to a rebound in economic activity and the toxic impact of wildfire smoke, a new report has found.

Of 134 countries and regions surveyed in the report, only seven – Australia, Estonia, Finland, Grenada, Iceland, Mauritius and New Zealand – are meeting a World Health Organization (WHO) guideline limit for tiny airborne particles expelled by cars, trucks and industrial processes.

Maybe the standard is too high? You know, given all the trade offs that have to be made about anything at all?

Blimey

Something with high capital costs, high running costs, is not very popular with the punters:

Public enthusiasm for heat pumps has been overestimated by ministers, putting the Government’s net zero goals at risk, the spending watchdog has warned.

Strike me down with a feather, eh?

I rather like this idea

Sure, I’ve no idea whther it’s technically possible – I guess it’s getting close to be but that’s all – and I’d have my worries about the costings but:

Britain homes could one day be powered by electricity generated in America under plans to install up to six power cables across the Atlantic.

The cables would stretch roughly 3,500 miles across the ocean, reaching depths of up to 11,000 feet, and carrying power roughly equivalent to several nuclear power stations.

A group of London investors and energy consultants are behind the ambitious scheme, as they claim technological advances in subsea cables could allow the creation of a global “intercontinental grid”.

Simon Ludlam, one of the businessmen backing the project, says such a cable would enable electricity to be traded across the Atlantic, taking advantage of the differences in peak demand as the power line crosses time zones.

The cost of such an ambitious project is uncertain, although current estimates suggest it will be above £20bn but potentially cheaper than the £46bn being spent on Hinkley Point C – Britain’s new nuclear power station.

The thing is – with all those ccaveats about price and doability – that if it is possible to do it at some reasonable price then it is a good and sensible thing to be doing. Which does mark it out, distinguish it, from the usual Green plans.

I’d also point out that cheaper than Hinkley isn’t quite true. If we build Kinkley then operating costs are near zero. If we build the cables we’ve still got to buy the power in the US. But even so, intercontinental connectors, if they can be done, are a perfectly sensible idea.

So, err, umm?

The Labour party leader slashed the clean energy policy to just £4.7bn per year, but kept plans to invest £7.3bn in a National Wealth Fund to help create jobs in a zero-carbon economy.

This includes investment in carbon capture and storage, floating offshore wind farms and green steel across Britain, creating thousands of jobs for plumbers, electricians, engineers and technicians.

Anyone think that carbon capture, floating offshore wind, will actually be profitable? Without the externalities being included that is, profitable on a straight financial basis? Then this isn’t investing through a wealth fund, this is buying public goods with public money.

Buying public goods with public money is fair enough as an idea – depends what’s being bought for how much – but it’s not a wealth fund.

Green steel is, of course laughable. Because we’ve already done that, they’re paying a £billion to the two blast furnace sites to install EAFs. There, that’s already done.

Cynical, yes, hypocritical, no

“It’s obviously hypocritical to call for technological neutrality when you are the dominant technology,” he said.

It’s also sensible societally.

Lobbyists on both sides of the Atlantic argued that government subsidies for clean technologies distorted free markets.

They do. And?

This is just Jevons again

Jevons’ Paradox:

There’s a widespread belief that these problems can be solved simply by enhancing the efficiency of irrigation: huge amounts of water are wasted in agriculture. So let me introduce you to the irrigation efficiency paradox. As better techniques ensure that less water is required to grow a given volume of crops, irrigation becomes cheaper. As a result, it attracts more investment, encourages farmers to grow thirstier, more profitable plants, and expands across a wider area. This is what happened, for instance, in the Guadiana river basin in Spain, where a €600m investment to reduce water use by improving the efficiency of irrigation has instead increased it.

You can overcome the paradox through regulation: laws to limit both total and individual water consumption. But governments prefer to rely on technology alone. Without political and economic measures, it doesn’t work.

Jevons is a maybe, it depends, not an is.

The depends is the elasticity of demand with respect to price. Now if George were even capable of understanding that we’d all be happier. But given that we, we initiates, know what it is we can now see how to square that circle. You charge farmers more for their irrigation water. Thereby changing that price movement to which they are reacting.

Job done.

George just never does get economics, does he?

This is going to be a problem, yes

A warehouse in France storing lithium batteries caught fire on Saturday, amid growing fears over their safety.

The fire on Saturday afternoon occurred at a storehouse in the southern town of Viviez, in Aveyron, where 900 tons of lithium batteries were waiting to be recycled.

Authorities ordered residents to stay indoors and keep their windows closed as thick smoke billowed over the town. No injuries or deaths were reported and the cause of the fire has yet to be established.

Lithium batteries, found in electric scooters and vacuum cleaners, are known to spontaneously combust if they overheat or become damaged. Their dangers have raised concerns in countries where e-bikes have been promoted as a climate-friendly mode of transportation.

Not really much to be done about it either – other than to note that it’s going to be a problem.

This is rewilding

One factor contributing to the apex predators’ presence is the fact that much agricultural land on the outskirts of Siena is no longer farmed.

It has reverted to scrubland, which provides a habitat for roe deer and wild boar and attracts the wolves, the mayor said.

The effect?

There has been an increasing number of sightings on the outskirts of Siena, some 135 miles (220 kilometres) north of Rome, as the creatures nonchalantly pad along suburban streets.

The most recent sighting was in late January when a pair was spotted at Porta Camollia, on the northern edge of the Tuscan city.

They were seen by a motorist who did not manage to photograph them with his mobile phone. But he notified the authorities and officials found wolf excrement at the scene.

G. Monbiot will be along in a moment to tell us that the solution is to bring the bears back to attack the wolves.

Global Witness are, yes, twats

Profits at the energy company BP halved last year to nearly $14bn (£11bn), but were better than expected after weaker oil and gas market prices caused revenues to slump across the industry.

BP said it would return more cash to investors with $3.5bn of share buybacks over the first half of this year, and at least $14bn over the next two years. The move prompted criticism from campaigners who said the money would be better spent on investing in the green transition.

“Shareholders should want to protect their long-term positions. That means demanding a rapid clean energy transition for companies like BP. These reckless shareholder payouts do the opposite,” said Jonathan Noronha-Gant, a senior campaigner at Global Witness.

It is shareholders who want to protect their long term positions.

Drilling for oil and gas may well last longer than many think and some hope. But it’s also clearly, over the next century, a dying business.

So, how do shareholders maintain their position? They take money out of an oil and gas business and go put it into some other line of work.

Paying out today’s profits to be redeployed into something elose is protecting the shareholder position.

Global Witness are ignroant, ignorant, twats.

Gosh, really?

A shift towards a more sustainable global food system could create up to $10tn (£7.9tn) of benefits a year, improve human health and ease the climate crisis, according to the most comprehensive economic study of its type.

It found that existing food systems destroyed more value than they created due to hidden environmental and medical costs, in effect, borrowing from the future to take profits today.

That is interesting, do say more!

A change of diet is another key element

Ah, the same old bollocks, the turnip diet.

Fuck off.

George’s latest explanation

Many explanations are proposed for the continued rise of Donald Trump, and the steadfastness of his support, even as the outrages and criminal charges pile up. Some of these explanations are powerful. But there is one I have seen mentioned nowhere, which could, I believe, be the most important: Trump is king of the extrinsics.

Some psychologists believe our values tend to cluster around certain poles, described as “intrinsic” and “extrinsic”. People with a strong set of intrinsic values are inclined towards empathy, intimacy and self-acceptance. They tend to be open to challenge and change, interested in universal rights and equality, and protective of other people and the living world.

People at the extrinsic end of the spectrum are more attracted to prestige, status, image, fame, power and wealth. They are strongly motivated by the prospect of individual reward and praise. They are more likely to objectify and exploit other people, to behave rudely and aggressively and to dismiss social and environmental impacts. They have little interest in cooperation or community. People with a strong set of extrinsic values are more likely to suffer from frustration, dissatisfaction, stress, anxiety, anger and compulsive behaviour.

It’s boys and girls, all things nice and puppy dog tails. And it’s not more than that.

It’s a setup with all the things that are – claimed to be – admirable in the one group and yep, I’m one of them! Everyone who disagrees with me is puppy dog tailes. And that’s it. There is no more here.

It’s a nursery rhyme to run the world by.

Second order effects

Really quite important:

The report also urged policymakers to ban plastic bags of any kind — not just thin ones. In some jurisdictions, it identified a “loophole” that has allowed grocery stores and other retailers to replace thin single-use plastic bags with thicker ones that are nominally reusable — even though research suggests that consumers don’t reuse the thicker bags in practice. In California, this loophole led to a net increase in the weight of plastic bags used per person between 2004 and 2021.

Triffids, eh?

One of the first councils in Britain to ban weedkiller has dropped the strategy after streets and footpaths became choked with weeds.

Brighton and Hove was branded a “city of triffids” after the council imposed a ban on the use of glyphosate – the active ingredient in most weedkillers – in 2019.

Weeds standing up to five feet tall blocked pathways, trailed across streets and snaked up lamp posts.

Now, after five years of complaints, the council has admitted the situation had become untenable and has voted to reintroduce glyphosate.

5 years might make them a little slow but they have actually learnt and thus changed couree. Congratulations on that at least. Rare political behaviour after all….. even if this does still leave rather a lot of green policies in conflict with reality.

Not grasping the business model

Last week US rental giant Hertz announced it would replace 20,000 EVs with petrol cars, taking a $245m (£193m) hit as it sold the plug-in vehicles because of a rapid depreciation in their value.

Three years ago, Hertz announced plans to buy 100,000 Teslas to electrify its fleet.

But the company said renting out electric cars had proved to be less popular and profitable than traditional vehicles and the cars had also come with higher repair costs.

Europe’s biggest car rental company, Sixt, announced in December that it would be phasing out Teslas altogether, however a spokesman said this was part of its “regular de-fleeting process”.

It is understood Teslas made up a small proportion of Sixt’s fleet to begin with, but the company had concerns over how quickly they lost their value.

OK. And:

Part of the Government’s strategy for decarbonising motoring was to flood the used car market with EVs via fleet operators and company car schemes.

Traditionally, the rental companies have made a profit on their used cars. As mass buyers – really, mass, mass – they get a huge discount from the manufacturer. After x k miles, or y months being rented out, they are sold. The original discount was larger than the depreciation. Used car values are, traditionally, a profit centre for rental companies.

So, govt tries to flood the used EV market, that means depreciation is going to be high – possibly higher than the original discount. The govts plan “works” by destroying the economics of car hire.

What a great plan, eh?