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The Climate thread


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1 hour ago, hookem2010 said:

I will bet against the coast. Speaking of the coast, which city population drops below 250k first: Miami or New Orleans?

Miami.  I think NOLA has more infrastructure in place to mitigate flooding, since it's been below sea level forever.  And the history is much more ingrained.

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18 hours ago, Satchel said:

Where’s a good snowball when you need one? And Joe Manchin is evil:

The United Kingdom Royal Air Force (RAF) on Monday had to cancel flights at certain bases in light of the country's extreme heatwave.

The RAF was forced to suspend flights into and out of the Brize Norton base near Oxfordshire on Monday, with Sky News first reporting that the situation was due to the extreme U.K. heat melting the runways, according to Reuters. The report was later confirmed by officials, with the RAF explaining that flights were being rerouted through bases that are safe to operate in and that standard military business had not been impacted.

"During this period of extreme temperature flight safety remains the RAF's top priority, so aircraft are using alternative airfields in line with a long-established plan. This means there is no impact on RAF operations," the U.K. Ministry of Defense wrote in a tweet about the situation

Given that it's 45 degrees across much of Britain today, this seems fitting.

 

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On 7/19/2022 at 8:43 AM, Biff Tannen said:

Miami.  I think NOLA has more infrastructure in place to mitigate flooding, since it's been below sea level forever.  And the history is much more ingrained.

Between Teedy’s “We are a city that floods” shrug off of the pipe system and no trash pickup for a month after Ida, I fear NOLA may be first with rate of coastal erosion. Current run to reclaim murder capital for the first time since Cash Money brought in the ‘99-2000s ain’t helping either. 

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Looking at a month in elevation in Colorado chasing fish next July. Looks like voluntary fishing closures on the rivers in mid summer are common because the water temps are too high and it can kill the fish. Drought and rising air temps to blame. Less run off and higher temps to blame. Ugh. And it’s only going to get worse. 

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Seems like Texpatriates thread fell off the front page, but this goes here too.  We just got back from New Orleans where temps were in the low 90s and it rained half the time.  It was like a different planet.  When we got back, it was like getting hit in the face with a hairdryer.

Wife seriously gets reverse seasonal affective disorder and basically told me this morning that she is done.  Her job will keep her here probably until next year at some point, but after that, we are probably out.  Add the nonsense texas politics and it's a done deal.  I'm a 5th generation texan and she's 3rd.  Both lived here our entire lives, but it's looking like that's over.  Sad really.

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When our lease is up in a year and are looking to buy, I may be pushing my wife to look out of state as well. Living here is a beating politically and weather wise. In related human-destroying-planet news, we managed to kill off the world's largest freshwater fish. Something that 140 million years of natural disasters failed to do.

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2 hours ago, hookem2010 said:

When our lease is up in a year and are looking to buy, I may be pushing my wife to look out of state as well. Living here is a beating politically and weather wise. In related human-destroying-planet news, we managed to kill off the world's largest freshwater fish. Something that 140 million years of natural disasters failed to do.

yeah, well they were ugly fish anyway #republicanclimatedeniers #redundant

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23 hours ago, troph said:

So no mention of the historic Biden bill? I came to say what do we think, but the permafrost is melting so we are fucked. Any chance left, even a sliver? 

No, but it's good to mitigate.  Adaptation is the key now.  Doing what we can to make that adaptation less drastic is of course good, but I'm afraid the snowball effect (how ironic) is going to make us realize real soon how woefully prepared we are.

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Perhaps it's a step on the way to making things catastrophic instead of apocalyptic. Obviously we're not going to avoid consequences, but limiting them is still important. Would have been nice if we started taking this shit seriously, oh, 30+ years ago. 

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On 8/20/2022 at 6:02 AM, Willfully Horn said:

Spain is battling fire. Portugal is on alert. 
 

https://apnews.com/article/wildfires-fires-valencia-a219c8a7ff5542b0b3732afd7fc19890

 

Our kids don’t deserve the hellish future we are leaving them. Plant vegetation and a fist in the face of climate deniers.

So much for my southern Mediterranean escape plan. Holy wowzers. 

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This maybe deserves its own thread since the ramifications are so YUGE.

California to Ban the Sale of New Gasoline Cars
The decision, to take effect by 2035, will very likely speed a wider transition to electric vehicles because many other states follow California’s standards.

WASHINGTON — California is expected to put into effect on Thursday its sweeping plan to prohibit the sale of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035, a groundbreaking move that could have major effects on the effort to fight climate change and accelerate a global transition toward electric vehicles.

“This is huge,” said Margo Oge, an electric vehicles expert who headed the Environmental Protection Agency’s transportation emissions program under Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama. “California will now be the only government in the world that mandates zero-emission vehicles. It is unique.”

The rule, issued by the California Air Resources Board, will require that 100 percent of all new cars sold in the state by 2035 be free of the fossil fuel emissions chiefly responsible for warming the planet, up from 12 percent today. It sets interim targets requiring that 35 percent of new passenger vehicles sold in the state by 2026 produce zero emissions. That would climb to 68 percent by 2030.

The restrictions are important because not only is California the largest auto market in the United States, but more than a dozen other states typically follow California’s lead when setting their own auto emissions standards.

Spoiler

“The climate crisis is solvable if we focus on the big, bold steps necessary to stem the tide of carbon pollution,” Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, said in a statement.

California’s action comes on top of an expansive new climate law that President Biden signed last week. The law will invest $370 billion in spending and tax credits on clean energy programs, the largest action ever taken by the federal government to combat climate change. Enactment of that law is projected to help the United States cut its emissions 40 percent below 2005 levels by the end of this decade. Still, it will not be enough to eliminate U.S. emissions by 2050, the target that climate scientists say all major economies must reach if the world is to avert the most catastrophic and deadly impacts of climate change.

To help close the gap, White House officials have vowed to couple the bill with new regulations, including on automobile tailpipe emissions. They have also said that reducing emissions enough to stay in line with the science also will require aggressive state policies.

Experts said the new California rule, in both its stringency and reach, could stand alongside the Washington law as one of the world’s most important climate change policies, and could help take another significant bite out of the nation’s emissions of carbon dioxide. The new rule is also expected to influence new policies in Washington and around the world to promote electric vehicles and cut auto pollution.

At least 12 other states could potentially adopt the new California zero-emissions vehicle mandate relatively soon; another five states, which follow California’s broader vehicle pollution reduction program, are expected to adopt the rule in a year or so. If those states follow through, the restrictions on gasoline-vehicle sales would apply to about one-third of the United States’ auto market.

That would have a major effect on addressing climate change, since emissions from gasoline-powered vehicles are the nation’s top source of planet-warming greenhouse-gas pollution.

John Bozzella, president of the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, which represents large U.S. and foreign automakers, said California’s new electric vehicle sale mandates would be “extremely challenging” to meet. “Whether or not these requirements are realistic or achievable is directly linked to external factors like inflation, charging and fuel infrastructure, supply chains, labor, critical mineral availability and pricing, and the ongoing semiconductor shortage,” Mr. Bozzella said by email.

He said automakers wanted to see more electric vehicles on the roads, but called on the state and the federal government to do more to address issues such as the ability to mine critical minerals like lithium and cobalt in the United States, the affordability of electric vehicles and equitable access to fast charging.

The governments of Canada, Britain and at least nine other European countries — including France, Spain and Denmark — have set goals of phasing out the sale of new gasoline-powered vehicles between 2030 and 2040. But none have concrete mandates or regulations like the California rule.

“This regulation will set the global high-water mark for the accelerated transition to electric vehicles,” said Drew Kodjak, executive director of the International Council on Clean Transportation, a research organization.

In Washington, President Biden last year signed an executive order calling for the government to try to ensure that half of all vehicles sold in the United States be electric by 2030, up from 6 percent today, although the order has no binding legal force.

Mr. Biden has also sought to enact federal policies that would further scale up the nation’s use of electric vehicles. The new climate spending bill includes $14 billion in tax incentives for buyers of new and used electric cars. Last year, the Environmental Protection Agency restored and slightly strengthened an Obama-era fuel economy rule that had been set aside by the Trump administration. It requires passenger vehicles to get 55 miles per gallon by 2026, from just under 40 miles per gallon today.

That national regulation is much less ambitious than California’s rule coming into effect this week, but it was the Biden administration that allowed California to press forward with its ambitious policy: It restored a Clean Air Act waiver giving California legal authority to set auto pollution and mileage rules that are tighter than federal standards, a potent climate policy that had been halted by former President Donald J. Trump.

It is that authority that allows California to enact the new rule. Once in place, the California rule is expected to influence a new federal standard that the E.P.A. expects to introduce next year, further encouraging automakers to build and sell more electric vehicles.

But there is already fierce legal pushback against those plans.

The attorneys general of 17 Republican-led states have sued to revoke the California waiver, which would undo the new policy.  The lawsuit, which will be heard before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, considered the nation’s second most powerful bench after the Supreme Court. Oral arguments have not yet been scheduled.

 

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5 minutes ago, bolverk said:

The attorneys general of 17 Republican-led states have sued to revoke the California waiver, which would undo the new policy.  The lawsuit, which will be heard before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, considered the nation’s second most powerful bench after the Supreme Court. Oral arguments have not yet been scheduled.

sTaTeS rIgHtS!

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5 minutes ago, Foosters said:

Remember 15-20 years ago when the right mocked every Climate Change prediction as pseudo-science? Said it wasn't happening.

Anyone notice how they've just quietly shifted to "yeah, ok its happening, but what you're proposing seems radical." No acknowledgement that they lied and obstructed for decades. 

There are posters on this board who typed thousands of words on TOS and HF arguing that the climate was not changing and attempts to convince the world of the contrary was liberal alarmism. Not a scintilla of contrition for their idiocy.

I recall a guy called "The Cardinal Drake" who parroted Big Oil talking points at every opportunity (maybe at TOS, I don't remember).  I posted the before/after glacier photos and he had stupid answers for all that.  

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30 minutes ago, Foosters said:

Remember 15-20 years ago when the right mocked every Climate Change prediction as pseudo-science? Said it wasn't happening.

Anyone notice how they've just quietly shifted to "yeah, ok its happening, but what you're proposing seems radical." No acknowledgement that they lied and obstructed for decades. 

There are posters on this board who typed thousands of words on TOS and HF arguing that the climate was not changing and attempts to convince the world of the contrary was liberal alarmism. Not a scintilla of contrition for their idiocy.

They are still here. They just post their hot takes in the Daily Texan and 6th Street Journal now. 

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The inability to acknowledge facts that do not support one’s point on a given subject, or, worse, admit when you are wrong when new facts come to light, shows the rhetoric of an insecure mind. We see this everyday on Surly. Perhaps it is my bias, but I notice that behavior chiefly among conservative posters.

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7 hours ago, Foosters said:

Not a scintilla of contrition for their idiocy.

And there never will be, so get used to it.  We will drag these people into the future, kicking and screaming and denying the entire way, even though they should be left behind.  Because that what civilized societies do.  I don't know how long society will hold up, but those assholes (or their offspring) will be there at the end, still kicking and screaming, as they are enveloped by whatever end we come to. 

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On 8/20/2022 at 7:02 AM, Willfully Horn said:

Spain is battling fire. Portugal is on alert. 
 

https://apnews.com/article/wildfires-fires-valencia-a219c8a7ff5542b0b3732afd7fc19890

 

Our kids don’t deserve the hellish future we are leaving them. Plant vegetation and a fist in the face of climate deniers.


This viral photo of the dry Loire riverbed is missing some context

https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2022/08/24/this-viral-photo-of-the-dry-loire-riverbed-is-missing-some-context
 

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2 hours ago, EuroHorn said:

I'm glad that you were here to point this out.  Before I saw this picture originally, I was really worried that the river had completely dried up.  I am completely new to the world of the internet and I take everything I see immediately at face value and assume it is all true.  

In all honestly, fuck your own face.  Cool, I'm glad you found a technicality on a story about climate change.  You are a completely horrible human being if you think what you posted is helpful.  You are going to melt into the dustbin of history and never be anything but a troll.  Good work.  Your family should be ashamed and I hope you are better in another life.

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6 hours ago, EuroHorn said:

Ah, a climate change equivocator. Fuck you to your death in a fire brought on by climate change. 
 

LOIREAUXENCE, France, Aug 17 (Reuters) - France's river Loire, famous for the hundreds of castles gracing its shores, is a shallow river at the best of times, but this year even its flat-bottom tourist barges can barely navigate waters greatly reduced by a record drought.

 

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/frances-river-loire-sets-new-lows-drought-dries-up-its-tributaries-2022-08-17/

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I appreciate accurate reporting especially on these issues. I have a lot of visceral pain, not figuratively I’m saying actual physical sensations of pain around climate change. So for an article to dramatize it more than the truth is like gratuitous violence. That said my motivation is not to deny the truth through technical gotchas but to establish the truth and to act on the truth. 
 

 

Trying to do my part, we have a commercial project in planning phases and will be working toward higher than required building efficiency, roof sourced solar powered electrical supply, less impervious cover, and dozens of trees planted to offset the impervious cover and mitigate the construction carbon outlay. I’m trying to find a way to actually calculate it but it’s not easy when you’re dealing with a minimum of a dozen third parties. 
 

 

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21 hours ago, bolverk said:

This maybe deserves its own thread since the ramifications are so YUGE.

California to Ban the Sale of New Gasoline Cars
The decision, to take effect by 2035, will very likely speed a wider transition to electric vehicles because many other states follow California’s standards.

WASHINGTON — California is expected to put into effect on Thursday its sweeping plan to prohibit the sale of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035, a groundbreaking move that could have major effects on the effort to fight climate change and accelerate a global transition toward electric vehicles.

“This is huge,” said Margo Oge, an electric vehicles expert who headed the Environmental Protection Agency’s transportation emissions program under Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama. “California will now be the only government in the world that mandates zero-emission vehicles. It is unique.”

The rule, issued by the California Air Resources Board, will require that 100 percent of all new cars sold in the state by 2035 be free of the fossil fuel emissions chiefly responsible for warming the planet, up from 12 percent today. It sets interim targets requiring that 35 percent of new passenger vehicles sold in the state by 2026 produce zero emissions. That would climb to 68 percent by 2030.

The restrictions are important because not only is California the largest auto market in the United States, but more than a dozen other states typically follow California’s lead when setting their own auto emissions standards.

  Reveal hidden contents

“The climate crisis is solvable if we focus on the big, bold steps necessary to stem the tide of carbon pollution,” Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, said in a statement.

California’s action comes on top of an expansive new climate law that President Biden signed last week. The law will invest $370 billion in spending and tax credits on clean energy programs, the largest action ever taken by the federal government to combat climate change. Enactment of that law is projected to help the United States cut its emissions 40 percent below 2005 levels by the end of this decade. Still, it will not be enough to eliminate U.S. emissions by 2050, the target that climate scientists say all major economies must reach if the world is to avert the most catastrophic and deadly impacts of climate change.

To help close the gap, White House officials have vowed to couple the bill with new regulations, including on automobile tailpipe emissions. They have also said that reducing emissions enough to stay in line with the science also will require aggressive state policies.

Experts said the new California rule, in both its stringency and reach, could stand alongside the Washington law as one of the world’s most important climate change policies, and could help take another significant bite out of the nation’s emissions of carbon dioxide. The new rule is also expected to influence new policies in Washington and around the world to promote electric vehicles and cut auto pollution.

At least 12 other states could potentially adopt the new California zero-emissions vehicle mandate relatively soon; another five states, which follow California’s broader vehicle pollution reduction program, are expected to adopt the rule in a year or so. If those states follow through, the restrictions on gasoline-vehicle sales would apply to about one-third of the United States’ auto market.

That would have a major effect on addressing climate change, since emissions from gasoline-powered vehicles are the nation’s top source of planet-warming greenhouse-gas pollution.

John Bozzella, president of the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, which represents large U.S. and foreign automakers, said California’s new electric vehicle sale mandates would be “extremely challenging” to meet. “Whether or not these requirements are realistic or achievable is directly linked to external factors like inflation, charging and fuel infrastructure, supply chains, labor, critical mineral availability and pricing, and the ongoing semiconductor shortage,” Mr. Bozzella said by email.

He said automakers wanted to see more electric vehicles on the roads, but called on the state and the federal government to do more to address issues such as the ability to mine critical minerals like lithium and cobalt in the United States, the affordability of electric vehicles and equitable access to fast charging.

The governments of Canada, Britain and at least nine other European countries — including France, Spain and Denmark — have set goals of phasing out the sale of new gasoline-powered vehicles between 2030 and 2040. But none have concrete mandates or regulations like the California rule.

“This regulation will set the global high-water mark for the accelerated transition to electric vehicles,” said Drew Kodjak, executive director of the International Council on Clean Transportation, a research organization.

In Washington, President Biden last year signed an executive order calling for the government to try to ensure that half of all vehicles sold in the United States be electric by 2030, up from 6 percent today, although the order has no binding legal force.

Mr. Biden has also sought to enact federal policies that would further scale up the nation’s use of electric vehicles. The new climate spending bill includes $14 billion in tax incentives for buyers of new and used electric cars. Last year, the Environmental Protection Agency restored and slightly strengthened an Obama-era fuel economy rule that had been set aside by the Trump administration. It requires passenger vehicles to get 55 miles per gallon by 2026, from just under 40 miles per gallon today.

That national regulation is much less ambitious than California’s rule coming into effect this week, but it was the Biden administration that allowed California to press forward with its ambitious policy: It restored a Clean Air Act waiver giving California legal authority to set auto pollution and mileage rules that are tighter than federal standards, a potent climate policy that had been halted by former President Donald J. Trump.

It is that authority that allows California to enact the new rule. Once in place, the California rule is expected to influence a new federal standard that the E.P.A. expects to introduce next year, further encouraging automakers to build and sell more electric vehicles.

But there is already fierce legal pushback against those plans.

The attorneys general of 17 Republican-led states have sued to revoke the California waiver, which would undo the new policy.  The lawsuit, which will be heard before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, considered the nation’s second most powerful bench after the Supreme Court. Oral arguments have not yet been scheduled.

 

To counteract this rule, Texas will ban the sale of EVs and allow neighbors to snitch on you to the government if they see an EV in your driveway.

(probably)

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To counteract this rule, Texas will ban the sale of EVs and allow neighbors to snitch on you to the government if they see an EV in your driveway.
(probably)

This, but with an exception for Tesla, because I’m sure Elon has plenty of money invested in Texas politics by now.
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On 8/25/2022 at 8:04 AM, troph said:

I appreciate accurate reporting especially on these issues. I have a lot of visceral pain, not figuratively I’m saying actual physical sensations of pain around climate change. So for an article to dramatize it more than the truth is like gratuitous violence. That said my motivation is not to deny the truth through technical gotchas but to establish the truth and to act on the truth. 
 

 

Trying to do my part, we have a commercial project in planning phases and will be working toward higher than required building efficiency, roof sourced solar powered electrical supply, less impervious cover, and dozens of trees planted to offset the impervious cover and mitigate the construction carbon outlay. I’m trying to find a way to actually calculate it but it’s not easy when you’re dealing with a minimum of a dozen third parties. 
 

 

Maybe they all thought this was clever as shit from actor Ronald Reagan:

image.png.836296cb97a2749dcea0b38ea678f7e0.png

Government is another tool the average guy has to protect himself and the common good. But it's bad like the press, unions, lawyers, and Congress. Trust the wisdom of the market and your oligarchy. 

The government doesn't work became a self-fufilling prophecy. In this case, government's job was to see the threat not deny it. Once the threat was discovered, it should not have been used by one cynical party to divide the idiots and paralyze any meaningful response.

Now Idiot World will be cooked alive. Well, the descendants of this Idiot World will be. We'll all be buried in a way that we don't return to the life cycle in a grave making useful land useless. Fitting.

They will hate us so badly. So righteously. We're the ones who lived for ourselves buying everything advertizers told us we "deserve."

Why didn't they do something?

Well, son, they were too busy patting themselves on the back and boasting of how great everything was. Kinda funny, huh?

 

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3 hours ago, troph said:

I agree with you, though I think your response was a non sequitor. 

I refer to the part about numerous contractors being hard to bring along on your worthwhile effort. Sometimes I skip a step in linking things together. An uncrippled government would likely be able to ease your path with policies that recognize the problem you try to impact on your own. 

 

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1 hour ago, RomaVicta said:

I refer to the part about numerous contractors being hard to bring along on your worthwhile effort. Sometimes I skip a step in linking things together. An uncrippled government would likely be able to ease your path with policies that recognize the problem you try to impact on your own. 

 

Oh I forgot I typed that. Yes I agree we need the government for climate and environment in a BAD way. I would enthusiastically support a significant single use plastic ban / regulation / restriction, severe penalties related to ocean pollution, and significant environmental requirements on any new build project that it be carbon neutral. I’d prefer every roof top to have solar and every drive and driveway to be offset with significant tree requirements. This might be onerous but we’ve got to get a handle on all of this. 

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1 hour ago, troph said:

Oh I forgot I typed that. Yes I agree we need the government for climate and environment in a BAD way. I would enthusiastically support a significant single use plastic ban / regulation / restriction, severe penalties related to ocean pollution, and significant environmental requirements on any new build project that it be carbon neutral. I’d prefer every roof top to have solar and every drive and driveway to be offset with significant tree requirements. This might be onerous but we’ve got to get a handle on all of this. 

We don't have the political or social will at the levels that will be required.  

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2 hours ago, Post Oak said:

https://cleantechnica.com/2022/09/16/ford-drops-a-bomb-on-dealers-youre-either-in-or-youre-out/

 

Ford Drops A Bomb On Dealers — You’re Either In Or You’re OUT!

Ford has told its dealers it’s time to choose whether or not they want to be part of the coming EV revolution

I've been saying for a couple of years now that Ford is going to come out on top when this is all said and done.  They were the first major manufacturer to fully embrace the EV revolution and they dove in head first.  I'm very interested to see what happens when the electric F150 comes out.

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