7 hours ago, FBW737 said:

Carbon is not a problem. That's the biggest lie told in the history of the world.

They're literally saying that carbon, on which all life on Earth is based, and CO2, which plants and trees need to survive and humans release when they exhale, are bad.  Kind of like cow farts are bad so people have to stop eating meat.  It's ludicrous and hard to believe, but it's true.

What they really mean is: you humans are the problem!

CO2 is 0.04% of the atmosphere, and a minuscule increase from 300ppm to 400ppm has not had, and will not have, the drastic effects some claim.  We're talking about a mere increase of 1C in the global average temperature over decades, and this measurement is based on satellite data over the past 50 years or so.  Before that there were no reliable global measurements, and ground-based instrument measurements are not reliable even today due to their questionable placement.  No disappearing ice caps, no sea level increase of dozens of feet, no mass crop failure and starvation, and on and on.  It's all a scam, and the people promoting it are flying around the world on private jets and own multiple 10,000sqft palaces.

Hey, you know, water vapor is by far a more potent and significant greenhouse gas.  Are we going to ban hot water now?

Dave

2 hours ago, dave2013 said:

The renewable power industry is not honest about the cost, and they do not include the massive govt. subsidies they get in order to build and operate, which is an additional cost that is not factored in.

 

The cost of electricity in Europe is high at the moment because we import natural gas to generate around 36 - 38% of our needs. We also no longer buy much of that lovely cheap Russian gas so we're exposed to the cost of a volatile global wholesale market.  However, the amount of gas we burn is declining on a weekly basis as more alternatives become available.  Nevertheless, the price of gas plays an important part in the price of our electricity....and of course we like to tax it.... 

Dave, if you're receiving 'massive' subsidies from the government it's generally very hard to hide this sort of thing. Not sure about the US these days but in Europe we have a very vociferous and intrusive press - or 'legacy media' if you like and a whole bunch of opposition politicians who have a part in the checks and balances of our political systems. It's simply very hard to hide stuff or shout people down.  All of this information is available and transparent.                                                                                                     The cost of everything gets scrutinised in minute detail. In the UK we have a Contacts for Difference system in our renewables market to encourage development. These contracts set a strike price.  If the wholesale cost of electricity goes below this price then a payment to renewable providers is made.....and it works the other way; if that cost runs consistently above the strike price then the renewable suppliers have to pay money back.  The idea is to iron out price and therefore profit margins to a predictable level to encourage investment in an emerging industry. These strike prices are now getting lower and lower as natural gas imports are being removed from the electricity supply equation.

In the UK we certainly have provided a lot of financial incentives to get the renewables industry up and running.  As these sort of spending decisions are made by our not very reliable politicians they've often managed to get it wrong.  It's generally agreed that the UK was a too early adopter of technology that was still being refined. 

Luckily we can thank those evil chinese people for going hell for leather with renewables and bringing the cost and availability of this stuff down. China leads the way with renewable technology. It has to. It realised several years ago that burning coal was choking their cities to death. 

Of course the grants and subsidies we've given to renewables pale into absolute insignificance when you consider the amounts of money we've poured into nuclear energy. Hinkley C - which you might remember we've discussed before - has taken forty years from conception to come within...six years of opening and the original cost of construction forecast has risen from £18 billion to over £44 billion and it's still rising.

And finally, here's something to really think about:  The original decomissioning schedule for our ageing reactor estate in the UK assumed nothing would be done to dismantle these sites for 85 years after they were shut down. In 2022 our government itself estimated that cleaning up all these locations would cost a breathtaking £141 billion.  It has now been discovered that these sites are deteriorating at a faster rate than had been anticipated. Costs estimated by some industry experts could now potentially approach a stunning £240 billion.

Oh yeah, you might want to google 'Sellafield'. That's our current and in fact only nuclear dustbin going right back to the early nineteen fifties.  Due to the secrecy and lack of record keeping they don't actually know what's lurking in some of the older storage facilities there.  That's an estimated £40 billion clean up in it's own right......

4 hours ago, dave2013 said:

The renewable power industry is not honest about the cost, and they do not include the massive govt. subsidies they get in order to build and operate, which is an additional cost that is not factored in.

 

Just for a laugh, here's the late Queen Elizabeth the Second opening the world's first civil nuclear power station at Calder Hall in 1956. 

Despite the grand speeches, the actual reason for Calder Hall's construction was to accelerate the production of Plutonium for our bomb program.  Hooking it up to the national grid and a local steelworks was a handy byproduct.   

 

Edited April 2, 20251 yr by DD_Arthur

43 minutes ago, dave2013 said:

Hey, you know, water vapor is by far a more potent and significant greenhouse gas.  Are we going to ban hot water now?

!00% agree with your post. Of course clouds are by far the largest factor in the green house effect. The number one driver of climate and climate change on this planet and all the other ones in the solar system is the Sun. I can't remember exactly but I believe the threshold for all plant life to die on the planet is 150ppm and optimal for plants to thrive is well over 400ppm., Climate change hysteria along with much other horrific and bizarre echo-chamber of cognitive dissonance stuff is all part of some terminal stage weird death cult that's going on in the western world much to the amusement and advantage of our rivals in the east.

11 hours ago, dave2013 said:

Here's a couple links

Dave

 

 

https://www.ciphernews.com/articles/this-one-chart-shows-europes-struggle-with-high-energy-prices/#:~:text=In 2023%2C industrial prices in,following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

 

"

 Bruegel found, a result of the 2022 energy crisis following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

The EU, a major energy importer, had to scramble to substitute cheap piped Russian gas for more expensive liquefied natural gas from around the world. Higher electricity prices followed the higher gas prices. Higher network costs and energy taxes also contributed. 

Edited April 2, 20251 yr by martin-w

6 hours ago, FBW737 said:

 

6 hours ago, FBW737 said:

7 hours ago, dave2013 said:

Hey, you know, water vapor is by far a more potent and significant greenhouse gas.  Are we going to ban hot water now?

!00% agree with your post. Of course clouds are by far the largest factor in the green house effect.

Gentlemen.... weve spoken about this many times. Its called the water vapour positive feedback loop.

Very true that water vapour is the most potent greenhouse gas. But the catalyst for that increase in evaporation and increased atmospheric water vapour is... wait for it... CO2. 😁

Our CO2 from burning fossil fuel has a smaller impact on atmospheric tempreture, but that small increase in tempreture causes greater evaporation and more water vapour in the atmosphere, and thus, the temp rises even more. And thus, greater evaporation and the feedback loop continues.

Not to mention the greater temp also releasing more CO2 from locked up sources, and worse still, methane from places like permafrost.

Climatologists aren't dumb.

And we know it's our CO2 in the atmosphere from burning fossil fuel causing the issue due to its isotopic signature. 🙂

 

As for the mention of subsidies paid to the renewable sector. How much is the fossil fuel industry given in subsidies.... I recall approximately one trillion dollars.

This stuff isn't new. We can go back to the 1800's when Svante Arrhenius (Nobel Prize winner) carried out research and predicted what we see now as a result of burning fossil fuel.

Edited April 2, 20251 yr by martin-w

8 hours ago, dave2013 said:

16 hours ago, FBW737 said:

Carbon is not a problem. That's the biggest lie told in the history of the world.

They're literally saying that carbon, on which all life on Earth is based, and CO2, which plants and trees need to survive and humans release when they exhale, are bad.  

 

No Dave. They aren't at all. Just that the atmospheric balance is changing. CO2 isn't bad. Too much, changing the atmospheric balance, is.

CO2 has been higher than today, they know this from archaeology studies from bore samples. the rain forest did not grow on rain fall alone higher CO2 makes them grow faster. three things support life on the planet H2O,O2.CO2. take anyone away and life dies but not the planet. If we all die the planet survives probably better. but industries like to force people to buy the next technology and if you can`t see CO2 you are not allowed to question it.   

PS. Did you know archaeologist found evidence of Vikings farming in Greenland before ice and snow sheet was laid down. Temperature records don`t go back that far less than 200 years. And we are talking 2,000 years they were sea fairing people back then.

Edited April 2, 20251 yr by G-RFRY

Just for fun, google "global greening" and read the AI overview.

Hook

2 hours ago, G-RFRY said:

CO2 has been higher than today,

 

It has indeed, as has global atmospheric temperature, And we know the causal factors responsible for past CO2 increase and temp rise, none of those factors are present now, except our CO2 emissions. The rapidity of warming is the point, too. 

1 hour ago, LHookins said:

Just for fun, google "global greening"

 

Global greening is indeed a real phenomenon but it might sound good in the short term, but in the long term its terrible. Increased plant grwoth has both a positive and negative impact. 

14 hours ago, DD_Arthur said:

The cost of electricity in Europe is high at the moment because we import natural gas to generate around 36 - 38% of our needs. We also no longer buy much of that lovely cheap Russian gas so we're exposed to the cost of a volatile global wholesale market.  However, the amount of gas we burn is declining on a weekly basis as more alternatives become available.  Nevertheless, the price of gas plays an important part in the price of our electricity....and of course we like to tax it.... 

Denmark's power, for example, is 88% renewable, so they're not importing huge amounts of expensive natural gas, yet their electricity price is very high.  Germany gets over 50% from renewables, so again doesn't have to import huge amounts, and they are also bringing coal-fired plants back online, as I guess coal is cheaper.  Your argument that the reason for the high electricity prices is the result of not being able to import cheap Russian gas just doesn't quite cut it.  I'm sure it plays a role, but I guarantee that even if you go 100% wind and solar, your electricity prices will exceed that of countries that use more fossil fuel and nuclear sourced electricity. 

If your governments are still heavily taxing your electricity despite the current situation with expensive natural gas imports, then that's just plain sad.  I have read that some countries in Europe are actually providing direct financial aid to help some people pay their electric bills.  I know that Italy does this.

If you believe that China is leading the way in renewable energy production then I've got some oceanfront property in Kansas to sell you.  China is building more coal-fired power plants than ever, as they know it is a cheaper form of electricity production which gives them a huge advantage in manufacturing and powering their predatory economy.  They are producing lots of renewable energy parts and equipment to profit from and take advantage of all the naive countries who are "going green" and thereby destroying their industrial base, all in the name of saving the planet or whatever.  China has no intention of honoring its climate agreements, or any other agreements for that matter.

Solar and wind are not cheaper.  The wind turbines are especially expensive to maintain and must be replaced after 20 years.  It also takes huge numbers of these turbines as well as massive battery storage to make them a viable and reliable power source.  Moreover, I doubt that most people want these behemoths sprouting up in their back yards and ruining the local countryside.  The same goes for solar panels which require very large amounts of land in order to produce enough power to make them viable, and like wind turbines, require massive battery storage.  This equipment is very expensive and must be maintained and replaced every 20-25 years.  The renewable equipment producers love this stuff as it means more money for them.  This is why Al Gore invested millions in this industry and then went around promoting it and trying to scare everybody.

Look, I don't like seeing coal plants spewing fumes into the air, and certainly don't want to go back to the days of smokestacks.  I'm also not thrilled about having to build more expensive nuclear plants which do pose some level of risk to the environment and people, although newer designs are much safer and cleaner.  I'd love to see nuclear fusion reactors come to fruition and then we could close down all the coal and natural gas plants and oil and gas wells.  The reality is that we just ain't there yet and won't be for several decades at least.  It is just not smart to set unrealistic climate and net zero goals and then go full bore in order to achieve them no matter the cost to the nation in terms of the economy and industry, and to the people in terms of the cost of energy.  This should be done thoughtfully and gradually, but sadly it is full steam ahead and consequences be damned.

Dave

1 hour ago, martin-w said:

 

It has indeed, as has global atmospheric temperature, And we know the causal factors responsible for past CO2 increase and temp rise, none of those factors are present now, except our CO2 emissions. The rapidity of warming is the point, too. 

According to real climate scientist the earth is coming out of a cooling period and will turn again. In 1800 people skated on the Thames in London well documented, I remember playing on a frozen large pond at the back of the school with some 50 children on it in 1953, it was about 5inch thick ice.

1 hour ago, G-RFRY said:

According to real climate scientist the earth is coming out of a cooling period

 

Not relevant. Doesn't explain the rapidity of warming.

Re the so called little ice age, it wasn't an ice age, it was very short term and just parts of the northern hemisphere, believed to be caused by the Maunder Minimum.

Edited April 2, 20251 yr by martin-w

Climate psudo scientists have been predicting catastrophes for decades and decades now. Either there is going to be a new Ice age or the planet is going to burn up. They are consistent in that hindsight always proves them wrong. They have every un or ill credentialed social justice warrior monkey and his uncle running around like chicken little screaming, "the sky is falling down, the sky is failing down." On thing is for sure for every credentialed climate scientist that says there is catastrophic man made climate change there is another equally credentialed who says there isn't. It all comes down to their credibility. Insight into that comes from who paying them and who is persecuting or these days even prosecuting them. Politics lurks beneath that and big business beneath that. When the last time you got a big mac that looked like the one in the ad? QED.