Climate Change - The Scientific Debate
Discussion
El Guapo said:
A couple of gems from the above-referenced Mail story:
World's top climate scientists admit computers got the effects of greenhouse gases wrong
Scientists accept their computers 'may have exaggerated'
Those darn computers!
What the idiots seem to forget is that a computer only works with the facts/infoWorld's top climate scientists admit computers got the effects of greenhouse gases wrong
Scientists accept their computers 'may have exaggerated'
Those darn computers!
that is put into it. Unlike a human being it can not come up with an assumption.
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
When you see vehicles that are quite capable of 20 years of service from a structural engineering POV (and that will have significant costs, both types, associated with it) being written off economically after about a third of that time, or less, because the cost of repair makes them uneconomic you should start to wonder.
Why is this?
Well there are some fairly advanced electronics involved in achieving (or appearing to achieve) the 'targets' that will likely fail well before the the larger part of the mechanical structure suffers. The electronics tech is relatively short lived. Therefore there are fewer options for economy of scale over extended periods yet greater potential for failure due to complexity and the need for the vehicles to have whole product centralised control often with rather bespoke software.
The manufacturers are not really too bothered with doing more than selling boxes and somehow, they don't care how, hitting randomly set bureaucratic targets for 'something' whether they make sense or not. Moreover they now have government body/bodies inspired and legally mandated reasons for enjoying the principles of 'planned obsolescence'. That nicely offsets the problems that they inherited from the safety lobby as cars become generally stronger and heavier and bigger and so had the potential to last longer. Add in reduced accident rates and the market for new car sales was somewhat diminished compared to what might be expected from growth in world markets and population increases.
Still, at least there are mandated systems to recycle (at some further additional cost of energy consumption) all the metals that are nowhere near the end of their potential life span and even the plastics, though of course to some extent they are an intermediary part of the problem, just after the electronics failures.
More than that most of the figures one reads about for 'greater efficiency' for cars are not as true and honest in real life use as we would like to think and the moves to diesel because the number look good in the brochures are rarely going to do much for the average punter - other than increase their service bills per mile. But hey, let's not dwell on the reality nor concerns about particulates. They are 'cheaper' and carry less tax, right?
Well, I doubt it over all - you simply get taxed elsewhere in ways that you would not have been taxed before and just as before with likely no connection to the direct and indirect costs of mobility at all. We have already seen moves to counter the reported lack of VED revenues by changing the qualifying bands after people have made their choices. Moreover the cost burden falls mainly on the people down the chain who are, in effect, extracting the full energy value from the original construction costs - except they can't do that when subsequent 'legal and tax' changes make it uneconomic or in some cases impossible.
So, you may think you can enjoy your new pointlessly high powered vehicle (that the "true" greens would have you give up for something with a fraction of the power and therefore even greater supposed fuel economy) and you very well might but the argument that this has mostly come about because of a focus on AGW/CC/whatevertheywanttocallittoday is largely specious for many reasons. There is no reason to suppose that something very similar, possibly even better, would not have occurred anyway over 20 years of development and with less impact on the total cost of ownership and, just maybe, the initial buying price.
On the other hand if you are using your own money and buying new at or near list price - all power to you. Thanks for taking the depreciation. It would likely be a lot less expensive for you if a vehicle's service life expectancy was greater that it seems to be today. By comparison the cost of fuel (and emissions from the fuel) is really rather small even if you cover much higher than average distances.
Enjoy.
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
The word 'better' being the key word, in that it implies better economy irrespective of enforced religious CO2 beliefs.
I would put the case forward that the average citizen these days has not really benefited from the development of 'new' energy sources (as a result of the CO2 religion) as you mention. Because fuel bills have risen dramatically, so called 'green' energy supplies are heavily subsided by the taxpayer and the fear of the CO2 religion has resulted in a nation that is lacking energy supply (extrapolating to future year's demand). ie. lack of urgency to move to Nuclear and current lack of urgency to mobilise fracking operations.
I would hazard a guess that the average citizen is well out of pocket with little 'benefit' in return as a result of the CO2 religion.
109er said:
El Guapo said:
A couple of gems from the above-referenced Mail story:
World's top climate scientists admit computers got the effects of greenhouse gases wrong
Scientists accept their computers 'may have exaggerated'
Those darn computers!
What the idiots seem to forget is that a computer only works with the facts/infoWorld's top climate scientists admit computers got the effects of greenhouse gases wrong
Scientists accept their computers 'may have exaggerated'
Those darn computers!
that is put into it. Unlike a human being it can not come up with an assumption.
grumbledoak said:
This?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-2403...
Seems the end of the last Ice Age was bad news for the big, woolly creatures.
Forgot to make an observation I had about this when it was still news.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-2403...
Seems the end of the last Ice Age was bad news for the big, woolly creatures.
It seems that the beast's primary source of food was grass. So I suppose some sort of prairie, maybe something like the Patagonia area of Argentina?
Now on the one hand the Mammoth was adapted for cold weather and so, presumably, had few options for cooling itself other than finding somewhere cooler; yet is fed on grass which, in our world, tends to like warm and wet environments for optimal growth. Cold areas tend to be drier areas (in the the wet freezes much of the time) suggesting that the latitude at which the specifically adapted Mammoths lived much have been a very narrow band between the tundra and wherever it was that the grass was plentiful but the temperature too hot.
Presumably too they were able to adapt their routines to extremes of light hours during the day,
In the other hand if they adapted at the southern boundaries of an ice age - so the latitude of southern UK for example, and then followed cooler temperatures north as the ice age receded one might imagine that at some point the balance of available grass growing land and the light and moisture required to grow reasonably consistently in enough volume to feed the beasts throughout the year would be compromised. The potential for finding themselves trapped in an inhospitable and inescapable area of land (compared to the relatively large plains available further south) would be much greater too.
I just had this vision of early humans fretting about biodiversity loss and discussing how to ensure that the declining ice age was reversed in order to save the Woolly Mammoth for its contribution to world ecology. And of course its tusks and food source potential - so much more than just a Polar bear pelt can offer.
PRTVR said:
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
Are they costing you money? I seem to be paying no more money nowadays on electricity than I did in the old days if you take out inflation and me using more electrical appliances. The only time power prices have gone for me was when gas was restricted from the Ukraine / Russia episode and when middle east woes hit us again. And again. That's events happening outside the UK we have no control over.
You could argue of course this is because wind power is not that widespread yet, and I agree. The government might give out subsidies to it but that is small fry compared to how much they handed out for the banking scandal. We are still paying 20% VAT over that of course and no end in sight....
Given that wind farms do not effect me economically but the rush for car firms to produce efficient engines do, I stand by my point.
Gandahar said:
PRTVR said:
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
Are they costing you money? I seem to be paying no more money nowadays on electricity than I did in the old days if you take out inflation and me using more electrical appliances. The only time power prices have gone for me was when gas was restricted from the Ukraine / Russia episode and when middle east woes hit us again. And again. That's events happening outside the UK we have no control over.
You could argue of course this is because wind power is not that widespread yet, and I agree. The government might give out subsidies to it but that is small fry compared to how much they handed out for the banking scandal. We are still paying 20% VAT over that of course and no end in sight....
Given that wind farms do not effect me economically but the rush for car firms to produce efficient engines do, I stand by my point.
Fantastically inefficient and the subsidies are HUGE. I don't know where you get your figures but not to put too fine a point on it, they're rubbish.
AJI said:
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
The word 'better' being the key word, in that it implies better economy irrespective of enforced religious CO2 beliefs.
I would put the case forward that the average citizen these days has not really benefited from the development of 'new' energy sources (as a result of the CO2 religion) as you mention. Because fuel bills have risen dramatically, so called 'green' energy supplies are heavily subsided by the taxpayer and the fear of the CO2 religion has resulted in a nation that is lacking energy supply (extrapolating to future year's demand). ie. lack of urgency to move to Nuclear and current lack of urgency to mobilise fracking operations.
I would hazard a guess that the average citizen is well out of pocket with little 'benefit' in return as a result of the CO2 religion.
At the same time there was an incentive for car manufacturers to supply more efficient engines. So they did. They even spend a lot of time getting the figures better than actually can be obtained by normal driving, but at least that means they are concentrating on it and not ignoring it.
I don't actually agree with cars being judged by C02 figures, I think they should be by weight, but the system has meant that I benefit now from a car, if I choose wisely, that will give me far better fuel economy than 10 years back.
I can assure you amount paid by me in taxes for green energy is far less than I save now on a car that can do 60mpg. My main tax increase is VAT which has gone up to 20% and that was due to the banking scandal, not wind turbines.
I'm sure we will never agree though, nice conversing with you.
WinstonWolf said:
Gandahar said:
PRTVR said:
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
Are they costing you money? I seem to be paying no more money nowadays on electricity than I did in the old days if you take out inflation and me using more electrical appliances. The only time power prices have gone for me was when gas was restricted from the Ukraine / Russia episode and when middle east woes hit us again. And again. That's events happening outside the UK we have no control over.
You could argue of course this is because wind power is not that widespread yet, and I agree. The government might give out subsidies to it but that is small fry compared to how much they handed out for the banking scandal. We are still paying 20% VAT over that of course and no end in sight....
Given that wind farms do not effect me economically but the rush for car firms to produce efficient engines do, I stand by my point.
Fantastically inefficient and the subsidies are HUGE. I don't know where you get your figures but not to put too fine a point on it, they're rubbish.
What's your actual figure for "HUGE" per person per year in the UK tax wise additional cost?
Gandahar said:
WinstonWolf said:
Gandahar said:
PRTVR said:
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
Are they costing you money? I seem to be paying no more money nowadays on electricity than I did in the old days if you take out inflation and me using more electrical appliances. The only time power prices have gone for me was when gas was restricted from the Ukraine / Russia episode and when middle east woes hit us again. And again. That's events happening outside the UK we have no control over.
You could argue of course this is because wind power is not that widespread yet, and I agree. The government might give out subsidies to it but that is small fry compared to how much they handed out for the banking scandal. We are still paying 20% VAT over that of course and no end in sight....
Given that wind farms do not effect me economically but the rush for car firms to produce efficient engines do, I stand by my point.
Fantastically inefficient and the subsidies are HUGE. I don't know where you get your figures but not to put too fine a point on it, they're rubbish.
What's your actual figure for HUGE per person per year in the UK tax wise additional cost?
WinstonWolf said:
Gandahar said:
WinstonWolf said:
Gandahar said:
PRTVR said:
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
Are they costing you money? I seem to be paying no more money nowadays on electricity than I did in the old days if you take out inflation and me using more electrical appliances. The only time power prices have gone for me was when gas was restricted from the Ukraine / Russia episode and when middle east woes hit us again. And again. That's events happening outside the UK we have no control over.
You could argue of course this is because wind power is not that widespread yet, and I agree. The government might give out subsidies to it but that is small fry compared to how much they handed out for the banking scandal. We are still paying 20% VAT over that of course and no end in sight....
Given that wind farms do not effect me economically but the rush for car firms to produce efficient engines do, I stand by my point.
Fantastically inefficient and the subsidies are HUGE. I don't know where you get your figures but not to put too fine a point on it, they're rubbish.
What's your actual figure for HUGE per person per year in the UK tax wise additional cost?
If it is £5000 per year and assuming about 30 million in the UK currently pay tax then that is a total of £150 billion per year in subsidies.
That's more than we spend on health and defence combined.
You were right, it was a fantastical figure. Stop it now!
Gandahar said:
WinstonWolf said:
Gandahar said:
WinstonWolf said:
Gandahar said:
PRTVR said:
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
Are they costing you money? I seem to be paying no more money nowadays on electricity than I did in the old days if you take out inflation and me using more electrical appliances. The only time power prices have gone for me was when gas was restricted from the Ukraine / Russia episode and when middle east woes hit us again. And again. That's events happening outside the UK we have no control over.
You could argue of course this is because wind power is not that widespread yet, and I agree. The government might give out subsidies to it but that is small fry compared to how much they handed out for the banking scandal. We are still paying 20% VAT over that of course and no end in sight....
Given that wind farms do not effect me economically but the rush for car firms to produce efficient engines do, I stand by my point.
Fantastically inefficient and the subsidies are HUGE. I don't know where you get your figures but not to put too fine a point on it, they're rubbish.
What's your actual figure for HUGE per person per year in the UK tax wise additional cost?
If it is £5000 per year and assuming about 30 million in the UK currently pay tax then that is a total of £150 billion per year in subsidies.
That's more than we spend on health and defence combined.
You were right, it was a fantastical figure. Stop it now!
Energy prices haven't gone up?
Yeah right...
Gandahar said:
PRTVR said:
Gandahar said:
Mansell90 said:
Worst case scenario, global warming doesn't exist at all, it was all a hoax, we spent a bit of money on developing new energy sources and making our energy use more efficient... is that so bad?
Pretty good point. Due to how the government levy road duties based on C02 people are moving to more efficient cars, so much so that the government is now out of pocket on the tax on fuelling those cars.You can now get a car which has 300bhp that does 45mpg rather than a 1996 car that had 300bhp and did 25mpg.
So this claim by the sceptics that pandering to AGW is costing you and me money is not the case. It's giving us a benefit whether true or false scientifically.
Are they costing you money? I seem to be paying no more money nowadays on electricity than I did in the old days if you take out inflation and me using more electrical appliances. The only time power prices have gone for me was when gas was restricted from the Ukraine / Russia episode and when middle east woes hit us again. And again. That's events happening outside the UK we have no control over.
You could argue of course this is because wind power is not that widespread yet, and I agree. The government might give out subsidies to it but that is small fry compared to how much they handed out for the banking scandal. We are still paying 20% VAT over that of course and no end in sight....
Given that wind farms do not effect me economically but the rush for car firms to produce efficient engines do, I stand by my point.
I am struggling to get my head round how you think the banks have anything to do with this? that's over, the scam that is windmills goes on and gets bigger.
Energy prices have been going up;
Renewables only make up a couple of percent of the generation mix. Hence their somewhat overpriced contribution makes next to bugger all difference to our electricity bills. Higher prices are driven primarily by increases in the wholesale price of gas, increased margins for the suppliers and to a lesser extent higher prices of other fossil fuels.
Renewables only make up a couple of percent of the generation mix. Hence their somewhat overpriced contribution makes next to bugger all difference to our electricity bills. Higher prices are driven primarily by increases in the wholesale price of gas, increased margins for the suppliers and to a lesser extent higher prices of other fossil fuels.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/en...
The greening of the energy sector is not going to be cheap, regardless of the charts you post.
Apologies that this is not science,but I think most will agree the science died a long time ago, its just kept going on hot air and bulls
t.
The greening of the energy sector is not going to be cheap, regardless of the charts you post.
Apologies that this is not science,but I think most will agree the science died a long time ago, its just kept going on hot air and bulls
t. PRTVR said:
The greening of the energy sector is not going to be cheap, regardless of the charts you post.
I didn't say it was - quite the opposite. My point was that the direct cost of 'green' generation isn't responsible for the price increases to date to any great extent. It may well be responsible for hikes in the future. Future electricity generation in the UK is fked. The time has passed for a sensible plan to be put in place. Gandahar said:
Interesting it is a very round number. I always find stats tend to be not like that.
If it is £5000 per year and assuming about 30 million in the UK currently pay tax then that is a total of £150 billion per year in subsidies.
That's more than we spend on health and defence combined.
You were right, it was a fantastical figure. Stop it now!
This article suggests the subsidies are costing us about one billion per year. Not exactly chump change.If it is £5000 per year and assuming about 30 million in the UK currently pay tax then that is a total of £150 billion per year in subsidies.
That's more than we spend on health and defence combined.
You were right, it was a fantastical figure. Stop it now!
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