Jump to content

The Climate thread


Laxtonto

Recommended Posts

Hey we're back!  What are "things a Republican administration would NEVER do?" for a billion, Alex.

 

https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/biden-harris-administration-announces-50-million-enhance-key-water-infrastructure

Quote

Biden-Harris Administration Announces $50 Million to Enhance Key Water Infrastructure in the Upper Colorado River Basin Through President’s Investing in America Agenda

Historic investments are helping to protect and sustain the Colorado River System

Spoiler

WASHINGTON — The Department of the Interior today announced $50 million over the next five years to improve key water infrastructure and enhance drought-related data collection across the Upper Colorado River Basin. The Bureau of Reclamation is making an initial $8.7 million investment in fiscal year 2023 to support drought mitigation efforts in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming that will help ensure compliance with interstate water compact obligations, maintain the ability to generate hydropower at Glen Canyon Dam, and minimize adverse effects to resources and infrastructure in the Upper Basin.

President Biden’s Investing in America agenda represent the largest investment in climate resilience in the nation’s history and is providing much-needed resources to enhance Western communities’ resilience to drought and climate change, including protecting the short- and long-term sustainability of the Colorado River System. Through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, Reclamation is investing a total of $8.3 billion over five years for water infrastructure projects, including water purification and reuse, water storage and conveyance, desalination and dam safety. The Inflation Reduction Act is investing an additional $4.6 billion to address the historic drought. Today's announcement is one of the many historic investments the Biden-Harris administration is implementing as part of an all-of-government effort to make the Colorado River Basin and all the communities that rely on it more resilient to climate change, including the ongoing drought in the West.

“The Biden-Harris administration is committed to bringing every tool and every resource to bear to as we work with states, Tribes, and communities throughout the West to find long-term solutions in the face of climate change and the sustained drought it is creating,” said Deputy Secretary Tommy Beaudreau. “As we look toward the next decade of Colorado River guidelines and strategies, we are simultaneously making smart investments now that will make our path forward stronger and more sustainable.”

“Resources from President Biden’s Investing in America agenda are allowing us to meet a number of program needs across the Colorado River System, including expanding the Basin’s existing network of instrumentation to improve water accounting, weather predicting and monitoring,” said Reclamation Commissioner Camille Calimlim Touton. “Today’s funding will enhance critical data and empower us with the best-available science and technology to more accurately measure the Upper Basin’s consumptive water use."

The initial $8.7 million announced today will purchase and place 12 new eddy covariance stations. Reclamation will locate the stations throughout the basin to measure evapotranspiration, a key measurement for determining consumptive water use. There are currently four of these stations in the Upper Basin, one placed in each of the Upper Basin states. Reclamation and the Upper Basin states, along with other partners, studied evapotranspiration in the Upper Basin from 2018 through 2020. The data that was collected and analyzed provided critical insight and demonstrated the need and value of expanding the data gathering ability.

This funding helps further Drought Contingency Planning activities in the Upper Colorado River Basin and is consistent with the obligations of the Secretary under the Colorado River Drought Contingency Plan Authorization Act (P.L. 116-14) and related agreements.

To date, the Interior Department has announced the following investments for Colorado River Basin states, which will yield hundreds of thousands of acre-feet of water savings each year once these projects are complete:

Quote

 

  • Hook 'Em 7
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, fattyflattie said:

I don’t see how you are tying that sentence together, so maybe it’s a grammatical issue.   Personally, we are changing plans. 

I didn't connect the two thoughts, you did:

"I’ve been working my entire life to have a place on the coast, and now that it’s time, it’s all stop and now looking more and more like Colorado.  Pretty fucking disheartening.   But, as long as we are leading the world in restrictions, who cares!!1!1."

What are you getting at?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, gmr548 said:

I didn't connect the two thoughts, you did:

"I’ve been working my entire life to have a place on the coast, and now that it’s time, it’s all stop and now looking more and more like Colorado.  Pretty fucking disheartening.   But, as long as we are leading the world in restrictions, who cares!!1!1."

What are you getting at?

I should have separated my final thought with a single sentence paragraph?   The fuck are you so hung up on?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

30 minutes ago, brakeman said:

image.thumb.png.416c36c852acf83a9063a9c8fcc14b6b.png

Desert folks are about to go through some things.

Totally normal.

 

A couple of years ago I ran across a guy named Brad Lancaster from Tucson on YT. 

He convinced the city to make curb cuts into basins so rainwater could run off into those basins and soak in while watering trees and native plants.  

This way the rainfall is basically used where it falls as opposed to just running off. The trees then help cool the neighborhood.

There's no reason something simple like that couldn't work here.  The sooner we start treating water the way they do in the desert the better off we'll be.

 

 

  • Hook 'Em 2
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Biff Tannen said:

Hey we're back!  What are "things a Republican administration would NEVER do?" for a billion, Alex.

 

https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/biden-harris-administration-announces-50-million-enhance-key-water-infrastructure

  Reveal hidden contents

WASHINGTON — The Department of the Interior today announced $50 million over the next five years to improve key water infrastructure and enhance drought-related data collection across the Upper Colorado River Basin. The Bureau of Reclamation is making an initial $8.7 million investment in fiscal year 2023 to support drought mitigation efforts in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming that will help ensure compliance with interstate water compact obligations, maintain the ability to generate hydropower at Glen Canyon Dam, and minimize adverse effects to resources and infrastructure in the Upper Basin.

President Biden’s Investing in America agenda represent the largest investment in climate resilience in the nation’s history and is providing much-needed resources to enhance Western communities’ resilience to drought and climate change, including protecting the short- and long-term sustainability of the Colorado River System. Through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, Reclamation is investing a total of $8.3 billion over five years for water infrastructure projects, including water purification and reuse, water storage and conveyance, desalination and dam safety. The Inflation Reduction Act is investing an additional $4.6 billion to address the historic drought. Today's announcement is one of the many historic investments the Biden-Harris administration is implementing as part of an all-of-government effort to make the Colorado River Basin and all the communities that rely on it more resilient to climate change, including the ongoing drought in the West.

“The Biden-Harris administration is committed to bringing every tool and every resource to bear to as we work with states, Tribes, and communities throughout the West to find long-term solutions in the face of climate change and the sustained drought it is creating,” said Deputy Secretary Tommy Beaudreau. “As we look toward the next decade of Colorado River guidelines and strategies, we are simultaneously making smart investments now that will make our path forward stronger and more sustainable.”

“Resources from President Biden’s Investing in America agenda are allowing us to meet a number of program needs across the Colorado River System, including expanding the Basin’s existing network of instrumentation to improve water accounting, weather predicting and monitoring,” said Reclamation Commissioner Camille Calimlim Touton. “Today’s funding will enhance critical data and empower us with the best-available science and technology to more accurately measure the Upper Basin’s consumptive water use."

The initial $8.7 million announced today will purchase and place 12 new eddy covariance stations. Reclamation will locate the stations throughout the basin to measure evapotranspiration, a key measurement for determining consumptive water use. There are currently four of these stations in the Upper Basin, one placed in each of the Upper Basin states. Reclamation and the Upper Basin states, along with other partners, studied evapotranspiration in the Upper Basin from 2018 through 2020. The data that was collected and analyzed provided critical insight and demonstrated the need and value of expanding the data gathering ability.

This funding helps further Drought Contingency Planning activities in the Upper Colorado River Basin and is consistent with the obligations of the Secretary under the Colorado River Drought Contingency Plan Authorization Act (P.L. 116-14) and related agreements.

To date, the Interior Department has announced the following investments for Colorado River Basin states, which will yield hundreds of thousands of acre-feet of water savings each year once these projects are complete:

 

I’m pro Biden, but if he cares so much about water, why did the EPA give Texas the ability to discharge produced water east of the 98th Meridian in 2021? This article was fucking shocking about how all that fracking water is being dumped into our water supply and companies don’t even have to disclose what chemicals they use if it’s considered a proprietary mix. WTF

https://www.texastribune.org/2023/08/17/texas-oilfield-wastewater-rivers-tceq-fracking/

IMG_2407.thumb.webp.000ed58b6a1d8f6feb2484fa0007b2a8.webp

 

  • Rage+1 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

image.thumb.png.416c36c852acf83a9063a9c8fcc14b6b.png
Desert folks are about to go through some things.
Totally normal.
 


If that sumbitch could just tilt a little more to the east it could at least put a couple inches of rain into the Lake Mead watershed. As it stands it’ll be flash floods and runoff to the Pacific.

I should have separated my final thought with a single sentence paragraph?   The fuck are you so hung up on?

You complaining that we lead the world in restrictions but not providing a single example of what exactly is restricted or why that is bad.
  • Hook 'Em 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, MrBig said:

I’m pro Biden, but if he cares so much about water, why did the EPA give Texas the ability to discharge produced water east of the 98th Meridian in 2021? This article was fucking shocking about how all that fracking water is being dumped into our water supply and companies don’t even have to disclose what chemicals they use if it’s considered a proprietary mix. WTF

https://www.texastribune.org/2023/08/17/texas-oilfield-wastewater-rivers-tceq-fracking/

IMG_2407.thumb.webp.000ed58b6a1d8f6feb2484fa0007b2a8.webp

 

Oh I agree.  Biden also allowed offshore drilling to continue in Alaska on federal lands, which he promised not to do (see article below, which shows how it's kind of a mix of good and bad).  He did, however, reinstate Bears Ears and designated several new monuments, including over a million acres near the Grand Canyon just recently that will stop uranium mining there forever.  Not to mention the climate legislation in the IRA.

Biden is a mixed bag from an environmental standpoint.  As slowly as political will seems to go, he's made decent strides, imo.  That said, we are going to be forced to make many more drastic changes in the coming years, as climate change really starts to fuck us up.  I just hope there's a Democratic admin in charge.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/interactive/2023/biden-oil-drilling-permits-willow-project/

  • Hook 'Em 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 7/16/2023 at 7:15 PM, elfenix said:

ht47hv3y6or21.thumb.png.a59df0e50b3e68a0c378d696fd62aa02.png

 

This movie was based on this short story:

 

https://tonova.typepad.com/thesuddencurve/2007/07/the-marching-mo.html

 

In it, the guy who wakes up years in the future was a conman, gifter type. The masses of morons are secretly ruled by the very few smart people left, who desperately try to get the masses of morons to stop breeding.

The conman comes up with a solution- market a new life on a newly discovered world that is a paradise. Then load up large rocket ships and eject the morons into space, repeat ad infinitium until the population is reduced/stabilized. Basically mass genocide. The ruling smart elites implement the policy and the human race and planet are saved.

 

 

We need a similar approach, but instead of rocket ships, maybe we could use these:

th?id=OIP.5kp4QDlH8shLiVWZ6X5mKwHaEc%26p

 

 

 

  • Like 3
  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 
This movie was based on this short story:
 
https://tonova.typepad.com/thesuddencurve/2007/07/the-marching-mo.html
 
In it, the guy who wakes up years in the future was a conman, gifter type. The masses of morons are secretly ruled by the very few smart people left, who desperately try to get the masses of morons to stop breeding.
The conman comes up with a solution- market a new life on a newly discovered world that is a paradise. Then load up large rocket ships and eject the morons into space, repeat ad infinitium until the population is reduced/stabilized. Basically mass genocide. The ruling smart elites implement the policy and the human race and planet are saved.
 
 
We need a similar approach, but instead of rocket ships, maybe we could use these:
th?id=OIP.5kp4QDlH8shLiVWZ6X5mKwHaEc%26pid=Api&f=1&ipt=8b082db6bfe7add84727ef219fc069cb96d36450f1d545a77eaf0dd081faa9a5&ipo=images
 
 
 

Not a bad idea, we can arrange a few Trump Cruises MAGA edition, and then have torpedo them.
  • Hook 'Em 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Anyone have any insight on carbon capture? I heard a blurb that there are two carbon capture facilities that will be built -- one in TX, one in LA. 

Is this something? 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Anyone have any insight on carbon capture? I heard a blurb that there are two carbon capture facilities that will be built -- one in TX, one in LA. 
Is this something? 

Something? Yes. Enough? Not even close.
The most cost-effective, easiest carbon capture is trees. Plant a 100 acre forest, that’ll be a great carbon capture project.
  • Hook 'Em 1
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:


Something? Yes. Enough? Not even close.
The most cost-effective, easiest carbon capture is trees. Plant a 100 acre forest, that’ll be a great carbon capture project.

Yes and no. Easy, yes. Long term effective carbon capture? Not really. And certainly not on the scale we'd need. Carbon in trees pretty regularly cycles through the environment (e.g., things like wildfires). We need long term geological scale storage, as that is where all the excess carbon came from. The math on trees is something absurd like planting the equivalent of half the continental US every year. I'll have to go and find the studies on that. Point being, it is good to plant trees, but we need something that can scale better and store carbon longer. Pilot projects to further develop direct air carbon capture technologies are important for reversing the damage after we get to net zero. 

  • Hook 'Em 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Nivek said:


Not a bad idea, we can arrange a few Trump Cruises MAGA edition, and then have torpedo them.

It has occurred to me, that those giant cruise ships look very top heavy and would be very vulnerable to a torpedo hit or other underwater damage. Sending them into a minefield would probably work as well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 8/17/2023 at 11:35 PM, MrBig said:

I’m pro Biden, but if he cares so much about water, why did the EPA give Texas the ability to discharge produced water east of the 98th Meridian in 2021? This article was fucking shocking about how all that fracking water is being dumped into our water supply and companies don’t even have to disclose what chemicals they use if it’s considered a proprietary mix. WTF

https://www.texastribune.org/2023/08/17/texas-oilfield-wastewater-rivers-tceq-fracking/

IMG_2407.thumb.webp.000ed58b6a1d8f6feb2484fa0007b2a8.webp

 

When in 2021? Who lobbied for it and when? Was it in 2021 or was that something going on since before Biden took office? What was the position of the Texas GOP and the O&G industry lobbyists? I’m betting this wasn’t granted over their protests.

This paragraph in that article stood out:

“An exemption known as the “Halliburton loophole,” which was inserted into the national Energy Policy Act in 2005, allows industry to use chemicals in oil and gas fracking that would otherwise be regulated under the federal Safe Drinking Water Act. The exemption was nicknamed for the Houston-based oil field services company Halliburton because of the perception that former Vice President Dick Cheney, who was CEO of Halliburton before he took office, advocated for it.”

Thanks, Dubya. Bush put Cheney in charge of his energy policy task force, introduced on Jan 29, 2001, the very first public policy initiative of his administration. Strictly opposed to taking any measures to combat global warming, the task force met behind closed doors with lobbyists and energy industry executives like the not-yet-indicted Ken Lay of Enron. (His indictment wouldn’t come until mid-2004.)

Fracking and all the negative side effects that go along with it have always been A-OK in Republican energy policy. I’d need to know a whole lot more before I could assign a fair amount of blame on Biden but I’d also know full well that things would definitely be no better under a Republican administration. 

  • Hook 'Em 2
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 8/19/2023 at 9:09 AM, FirstTimeCaller said:

Anyone have any insight on carbon capture? I heard a blurb that there are two carbon capture facilities that will be built -- one in TX, one in LA. 

Is this something? 

It is something, but we are in a "yes, and" moment.

Should we build carbon capture facilities? Yes, and 
Should we build nuke plants? Yes, and
Should we build solar capacity? Yes, and
Should we build more wind? Yes, and
Should we invest in fusion research? Yes, and 
Yes, and 
Yes, and 
Yes, and 
Yes, and 
Yes, and 
Yes, and 
Yes, and 
We need to do everything. 

And the best part of doing everything is that while vast fortunes might be made and we may kick off an economic boom on par with the industrial revolution in the conversion of the energy economy, we might also make a better world for our children's children's children, who at that point will probably be clustered around the Great Lakes and in Canada.
 

Edited by Bozo_Casanova
  • Hook 'Em 5
  • Like 1
  • Fuck Around and Find Out 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
18 minutes ago, hookem2010 said:

A respite from the (warranted) doom and gloom. Turns out when a Trump-wannabe isn't in charge, the most important environment in the world can be better protected! 

Deforestation rates falling dramatically

Oh yeah? We have Biden and our wetlands are still fucked now. 

Edited by SydneyCarton
  • Rage+1 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 minutes ago, hookem2010 said:

A respite from the (warranted) doom and gloom. Turns out when a Trump-wannabe isn't in charge, the most important environment in the world can be better protected! 

Deforestation rates falling dramatically

Obviously a good thing, but I really think the world is going to have to unite and buy protection for the rainforest from Brazil.  It's fucking insane, but I don't see any way around it unless Brazil keeps a progressive (or at least not as destructive and fascistic) government for decades.

  • Hook 'Em 1
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

Hurricanes gonna ravage cities with storm surge that otherwise would have been absorbed by wetlands.  Bang up job America.

Counterpoint, by 2030 when the next 5-10 miles of the gulf coast is permanent wetlands from never receded hurricane waters, things will be just fine. 

  • Hook 'Em 1
  • Haha 1
  • Rage+1 2
  • Fuck Around and Find Out 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

image.png.0076f19734d0a26d518f468518ce3160.png

Rush hour traffic in Austin.

Hey, we're all going in the same direction at the same time. I've go an idea! Let's all buy separate vehicles with engines powerful enough to hurl us down the road at 120 mph! We can look at that big number while we're creeping along at 3 mph! We can listen to the motor's idle rumble as it generates exhaust!

We'll give special yellow dots to those wise enough to be travelling to an office job in a heavy pickup truck or SUV. They put out splendid amounts of exhaust! 

When the guy on the radio tells us there's another referendum for rail service, we'll laugh and scoff because taking a train will be so much more inconvenient than spending an hour in the ol' Silverado traveling 15 miles. Rail is a terrible and expensive idea. That's why nobody uses them in Europe or New York or anywhere.

Nope. We'll just keep on keepin' on. These SUVs will make pretty good shelters from Sun radiation for those people trying to survive the cataclysm we're causing. Too bad for them. LOL!

 

spacer.png

Idiot World Lived Large

  • Hook 'Em 1
  • Rage+1 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites



×
×
  • Create New...