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BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions

03 Apr 20 - 02:44 PM (#4043844)
Subject: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Iains

The resulting drop in greenhouse gas emissions, as well as air and water pollution, is already making news headlines. But with the pandemic yet to peak in most countries, the wider impacts for a world attempting to slow climate change are still far from clear.
Carbon Brief asks scientists, analysts and policy experts from a range of disciplines for their thoughts on how the lifestyle changes brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic could affect global CO2 emissions in the short and long term.
https://www.carbonbrief.org/coronavirus-what-could-lifestyle-changes-mean-for-tackling-climate-change?utm_campaign=RevueCBWeeklyBriefing&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Revue%20newsletter (My link construction did not work)

My take is that picking the economy off the floor will be the first priority, followed by repatriating essential manufacturing industry.
Combating climate change will be well down the list.
What do others think?


03 Apr 20 - 03:00 PM (#4043849)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Jim Carroll

Interesting that Trump the Tump is trying to counteract this by abadoning American exhauxt emissions in order to assist the floundering American car industry and maintain oil profits
HERE
HE'S EVEN PUT THE SHITS UP THE CAR-MAKERS !!
He's one of your heroes, isn't he ?
What HMV says today, his poodles inevitably bark tomorrow
Jim Carroll


03 Apr 20 - 05:21 PM (#4043874)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Mr Red

I did wonder what the effect on CO2 the lock-downs would have.
Air travel, cars etc. But I would posit there would be an increase in electricity consumption for several reasons. Stuck at home, people would use the TV & computer/internet far more, and server farms servicing that need would be more active. Given the novelty of the situation, people would concentrate more on just getting through this, than say being carful.

Mostly fueled by sever farms & bitcoin mining, but computers are drinking a sizeable amount of electricity.

So less of a saving than you would think.


03 Apr 20 - 05:41 PM (#4043878)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Steve Shaw

I think there's bound to be a significant reduction in emissions overall, especially if the crisis is protracted. Depends on what happens if and when we can ever "get back to normal." Interesting that the person who started this thread doesn't believe in anthropogenic climate change.


03 Apr 20 - 06:13 PM (#4043882)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Iains

I believe in climate change. It has always changed, it is a dynamic process. Whether there is an anthropogenic component is disputed. The IPCC is a political organisation so whatever they pronounce on has an agenda driving it. Going green will take second place to being fed and sheltered and having enough to survive.
At What point does the present recession become a full blown depression on steroids. The world cannot shut down for 3 or 6 months or longer and expect to pick up from where it left off. How many of the increased controls on society will lift when the crisis is over? Will cash be banned because it is rife with pathogens? Will freedom of travel be reinstated? Will all those cheap holiday flights ever come back?
Will this pandemic have a second or third phase requiring further shutdowns?
Will food security become a sick joke?
The longer the pandemic grips, the more uncertainty attaches to the future. I suspect tbe better airquality will be about the only positive. I hope I am entirely wrong.


03 Apr 20 - 07:33 PM (#4043892)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Steve Shaw

"Whether there is an anthropogenic component is disputed."

Disputed by a tiny minority of contrarians who wish to be seen as standing out, people of the anti-science Nigel Lawson persuasion. There is consensus among those who are the true scientists in this field, more solid than for almost any issue in history. Of course, there are those who would rather like to be so conspicuously different, for their own reasons. I'll stand with the real science meself, not with oddball nutters who not only don't know what they're talking about but who are also irresponsible enough to suggest that everything's hunkydory. If the cap fits...


03 Apr 20 - 08:32 PM (#4043903)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Jim Carroll

Don't be too hard on him Steve - he's moved on a bit from blanket support of Trumps stance that iyt ia s all a "leftie plot" and a pathological hatred of Greta Thunberg
Jim


04 Apr 20 - 03:57 AM (#4043928)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Mr Red

Not to extend the anthropogenic dimension unduly, but there is plenty of evidence that the precession/wobble/ovality of the Earth's trajectory around itself/the sun, and historical evidence in ice/mud cores with colder/warmer cycles is:

That we should be heading for a dip in global temperatures going forward. And that is clearly not the evidence we are presented with.

When I wus designing electronic gizmos and debugging/proofing prototypes the one thing that would have caught me out if I let it go too long is:

to deny it was a problem. Just like Twitler is changing his COVID tune, ya can't ignore for long, ya just dun gotta act.

Sadly human endeavour is pretty self-centred (en mass) so whatever is done GW/COVID will mean we will do other things without thought to the effect on consumption - unintended consequences will be the cry.
Un-thought-through is mine!


04 Apr 20 - 06:55 AM (#4043941)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Jim Martin

As regards electricity consumption, I noticed Moneypoint coal-fired power station which had been switched off UFN, was back up and running this week, sure sign demand has increased!


04 Apr 20 - 07:31 AM (#4043943)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Jim Carroll

"Sadly human endeavour is pretty self-centred (en mass) "
Too easy to blame human failings when overwhelmingly, most humans have no say in what is done on their/our behalf
For instance, I was an electrician all my life and I know as most of those who shared my job, that it was possible to produce light-bulbs that would last indefinitely yet throughout my half century working I say them gradually being made weaker
A light bulb will seldom last a year now whereas, I was taking light-bulbs out of customers homes that had been there for twenty years and still working - planned obsolescence was the respectable e name this waste was given
Now, the first think asked about a product is not, "is it useful", but "Is it profitable" - if it isn't, it doesn't get made
The system worked for a while, as did all the other systems - the question now is this sytem going to outlive it's purpose or will kiit be allowed to destroy the planet - unfortunately, the answer sll lives with those who appear to care more about their own well-being than they do for the rest of us
Jim Carroll


04 Apr 20 - 08:13 AM (#4043952)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Dave the Gnome

Without a planet to support us we have no means of providing resources or feeding a workforce to manufacture anything. Prioritising economic recovery over planetary survival is putting the cart before the horse. To put it mildly.


04 Apr 20 - 10:36 AM (#4043970)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Iains

Economic recovery puts infrastructure back together and keeps food flowing to the table. It is conceded by some that the world is but 9 meals from anarchy. If you wish to prioritize pie in the sky before a pie on the table don't winge to me that you are hungry.


04 Apr 20 - 10:46 AM (#4043972)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Dave the Gnome

I repeat

Without a planet to support us we have no means of providing resources or feeding a workforce to manufacture anything


No point in going any further.


04 Apr 20 - 11:24 AM (#4043980)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Iains

Is the planet about to be abducted by little green men?


04 Apr 20 - 11:33 AM (#4043981)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Jim Carroll

"No point in going any further."
Told you you weer wasting your time with this braindead lads
I see Trump has decided to help solve one of America's major problems by refusing to take any of the protective measures advised for warding off the virus
Would that all leaders of his ilk were so patriotic !!!
Jim Carroll


04 Apr 20 - 07:03 PM (#4044028)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: keberoxu

There is a report from Yosemite National Park
about how the animals are enjoying having the whole place to themselves.


05 Apr 20 - 09:11 AM (#4044107)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Mr Red

Too easy to blame human failings when overwhelmingly, most humans have no say in what is done on their/our behalf

OK I'll have to call it unintended consequences people do what they do without thinking. Life is actually too complex to get it all on board. But en mass there are trends. As someone pointed out coal fired power switched on, consumption up. Tell them to stay at home and switch off the TV, Computer, and the lights. And the unintended unintended consequences are disbelief and disobedience.

In the UK we have a rule "walking for an hour, permitted" so people drove to pretty and wide open spaces en mass. unintended consequences? or was the addendum "don't drive to walk" too complex to put into words until the pictures of it were plastered over the news? People don't think, because the situation pretty dire and just dealing with the worst is all we can manage.
Call it piecemeal. Pay as you go. We haven't seen this ilk since WW2, and I would posit none of this parish remember that lock-down.


05 Apr 20 - 12:13 PM (#4044139)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Iains

The downside of this situation is that at some future point it has to be decided if the cure is going to kill more people than the disease.
At the moment it is only fresh vegetables in jeopardy. Going forward, what else?


05 Apr 20 - 12:35 PM (#4044146)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Jim Carroll

"Yosemite National Park"
We don't hae to go that far - the same is happening in Britain, from
LONDON to - LLANDUDNO


06 Apr 20 - 01:47 AM (#4044263)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Manitas_at_home

The trouble is there isn't a rule limiting the exercise. The rules vary between Wales, Scotland and England. In England that's the guidance from some ministers but not the rule and even that guidance is not the same as on the government website. It's all too loose and vague.


06 Apr 20 - 04:44 AM (#4044318)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Steve Shaw

"But en mass there are trends."

Yep. En Mass when I were lickle there was a trend to move away from Latin to the vernacular, and congregations accepted this en masse.

We live at one end of a farm, a hundred acres of which, on three out of four sides around our house, the farmer plastered with raw chicken shit a week ago, and it hasn't rained since. Unless the wind is in the south, there's no way you could walk from home or do the gardening without feeling nauseous and gasping for breath (and forget hanging the washing out). I can drive to a deserted spot half a mile away as the crow flies and stroll on cliff tops on the South West Coast Path in the fresh air and take in stunning views. That's allowed. Which would you do?


06 Apr 20 - 12:30 PM (#4044437)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Mr Red

Tell it to Mr Plod. With fingers crossed. Er, make that: + toes.

Or you could spare a thought for the poor, embattled Lunduners without your wide open spaces (& sans their bloated wages). It would occupy you for all of, er, five minutes. Er, make that seconds.


06 Apr 20 - 04:32 PM (#4044504)
Subject: RE: BS: Covid-19 shutdown, reduced emissions
From: Steve Shaw

Not so, Rooge. We know how lucky we are. We have a garden, we have each other, we have scenery close by to die for and we have a police force which keeps a low profile in a very uncrowded area. Can't remember where but I've already posted sympathetically about people with kids in flats and no garden, etc, who desperately need to get out into their local green spaces. Even if they have to drive there. We do our best round here to help people who can't get out, by doing their shopping for them etc., and by keeping in frequent contact with elderly people who live on their own. We spend several hours every day keeping our grandson occupied on FaceTime (we live over 200 miles away from them) so that his mum and dad can work from home. We live in times when doing your bit isn't always exactly easy, but Mrs Steve and I do our best, thanks. I wouldn't be posting in this vein but for the insinuation that we're just lucky bastards who hardly bother to spare a thought for others less lucky. Best to avoid the judgemental stuff. Cheers.