Bernie Gunther
Fundamentalist Druid
She(?) seems to be channelling propaganda from the pro-nuclear lobby from what I can see, so my guess is that's the preferred solution.clv101 said:
Giant wind farm plan thrown out
- Thread starter citydreams
- Start date
greenbrain said:
Thankyou greenbrain -- I was vaguely aware of this (bit in bold) and the souce countryguardian that goneforlunch gave, did ring alarm bells.
What are your views on nuclear power goneforlunch?
State them honestly now ...
goneforlunch
Member
William of Walworth said:
Honestly ... I'd prefer getting as much out of solar power as possible. But we need the back up from a conventional source, and the only viable one I can see is nuclear. 'Renewables' receive heavy government subsidation too.
You might like to consider the Sunday Telegraph journalist, and anti wind farm campaigner, Christopher Booker's thoughts in this link ...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/10/17/nbook17.xml#1
Perhaps you will think he's being bribed by the nuclear industry.
edit: I'd already said earlier in the thread that I'd prefer the nuclear option. It wasn't a secret.
Donna Ferentes
jubliado
Loads of wind farms here in Aragón, but then again down on the plain (which is semi-desert, or close to it) there ain't a lot else.
Udo Erasmus
Well-Known Member
Hi, Bernie could you explain a bit more . . .Bernie Gunther said:
I may have given the impression inadvertently that tree plantation could play a major role in solving the problem of C02 emissions - naturally the major role has to be through a shift to renewables and energy efficiency measures + a change in lifestyles.
I should note it was a bit cavalier to preface my comments with as a Respect supporter, as the policy of tree plantation was my own idea.
On the latter point, it reminds me that George Monbiot recently wrote a very good article criticising environmentalists who convert their cars to biofuel.
While it is better to drive a car run by biofuel than petrol, research has shown that the amount of land needed to supply biofuel to cater for all the drivers in the UK would cut into land needed to grow fuel - basically there is not enough land to grow biofuel, and so it is not really a viable mass alternative and distracts from the need to take measures to seriously cut down car use
sustainability
Wind will continue to blow but sources of uranium will become increasingly scarce and difficult to mine, particularly if there is a massive global shift towards nuclear. One unsustainable finite source of energy, fossil fuels, replaced by another, to maintain the current system of energy economics. Not to mention that after Australia, most of the uranium will have to come from Kazakstan, Uzbekistan and a few other less than stable suppliers.
So the choice is to maintain an expensive, centralist system that will produce a load more waste that we have to manage for ten of thousands of years, versus a longer term switch to efficiency and decentralisation with no waste.
The Sustainable Development Commission has just weighed in with its own rejection of the nuclear route. BBC News
Wind will continue to blow but sources of uranium will become increasingly scarce and difficult to mine, particularly if there is a massive global shift towards nuclear. One unsustainable finite source of energy, fossil fuels, replaced by another, to maintain the current system of energy economics. Not to mention that after Australia, most of the uranium will have to come from Kazakstan, Uzbekistan and a few other less than stable suppliers.
So the choice is to maintain an expensive, centralist system that will produce a load more waste that we have to manage for ten of thousands of years, versus a longer term switch to efficiency and decentralisation with no waste.
The Sustainable Development Commission has just weighed in with its own rejection of the nuclear route. BBC News
See Flemings 'Lean Guide To Nuclear Power' here: http://www.theleaneconomyconnection.net/Lean Guide to Nuclear Power.htm
Udo Erasmus
Well-Known Member
Now the government's own advisers have rejected nuclear power. From the front page of the Independent:
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article349711.ece
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article349711.ece
Udo Erasmus said:
They've rejected it on the grounds of CO2, it doesn't achieve the claims of the nuclear looby when you factor in construction and de-commissioning into the energy-balance. They haven't rejected it it terms of mid-term energy security, which is the main factor (IMO) for another generation of reactors. They could be sited on the existing sites, therefore a lot of the infra-structure is already present.
I agree that we do need to improve renewables, though I would prefer to see different schemes to those already proposed. Tidal lagoon system, rather than barrages, because of the environmental impact of those. Deep water tidal turbines (there was a rather good thread in the Science forum recently). Localised generation schemes, such as the wind turbines at Swaffham in Norfolk, small turbines in peoples gardens, heat pumps, solar water heating, etc. CHP schemes for all new estates. Massive incentives for insulation for houses and workplaces. Funding for new techniques (Light Harvesting Materials and organic film technologies for solar panels).
The problems with oil and uranium production have less to do with total volumes of the resources, but their location. It will be easier for other nations to hold us to ransom as they find that they have such a stanglehold on supply. We have already seen the russians doing this to their neighbours. Eventually we will need to husband those resources and we need to be acting now. Pessimistically though, all of our efforts are going to be undermined when you consider that the Chinese are commissioning a coal fired power station every three weeks on average!
UnderOpenSky
baseline neural therapy
It's The Lake District, one of the most beautifull parts of the country and already a very fragile ecosystem. Can't they find anywhere else for the things?
Think we need to be looking at why it is so hard to get planning permission to put up solar panles on your roor - we should be providing grants for this instead and reducing how much power we use.
Think we need to be looking at why it is so hard to get planning permission to put up solar panles on your roor - we should be providing grants for this instead and reducing how much power we use.
Bernie Gunther
Fundamentalist Druid
What I meant was that tree plantations, while they might provide sequestration benefits are generally poor in terms of biodiversity.Udo Erasmus said:
If you leave a piece of land alone almost anywhere in the UK, it'll end up covered with trees anyway (because that's the natural vegetation for these islands) the precise mix depending on where you are exactly, but you'll also get biodiversity appropriate to the local ecology.
Giles,
With the greatest respect - and not wishing to get into semantics - I don't think that that is true. Desire is surely a different order of priority from need? Need would suggest (to me) a certain basic foundation of neccessity. Desire doesn't have to have that - it's just what you want.
i.e. I NEED food and shelter. I DESIRE an Ipod.
Of course, you also desire food and shelter - but I don't think that you can say that you need an ipod...?
With the greatest respect - and not wishing to get into semantics - I don't think that that is true. Desire is surely a different order of priority from need? Need would suggest (to me) a certain basic foundation of neccessity. Desire doesn't have to have that - it's just what you want.
i.e. I NEED food and shelter. I DESIRE an Ipod.
Of course, you also desire food and shelter - but I don't think that you can say that you need an ipod...?
Udo Erasmus
Well-Known Member
Matt S said:
What's your opinion on Carbon rationing, personally I support it as a way of forcing the general public to get real about C02 emissions and their effect on the planet.
But I know some think that it is a bit draconian and totalitarian
chilango
Ha! Ha! Armageddon
Wow!
I´m actually mostly in agreement with Udo for once.
How about using all the useless farmland that´s full of crap subsidy crops that are no use and leaving at as bernie say to regrow naturally diverse woodland?
...and reducing energy consumption should be the main thrust surely? not the least damaging way of powering waste?
I´m actually mostly in agreement with Udo for once.
How about using all the useless farmland that´s full of crap subsidy crops that are no use and leaving at as bernie say to regrow naturally diverse woodland?
...and reducing energy consumption should be the main thrust surely? not the least damaging way of powering waste?
Bernie Gunther
Fundamentalist Druid
I'd say it makes more sense to use most of that land to grow food, but use as much as possible of that food locally. What you're not using for crops, around the farm margins and especially where the drainage ditches are, turn into hedgerows which will significantly benefit the food crops along with useful wood-pasture or coppice.chilango said:Wow!
I´m actually mostly in agreement with Udo for once.
How about using all the useless farmland that´s full of crap subsidy crops that are no use and leaving at as bernie say to regrow naturally diverse woodland?
...and reducing energy consumption should be the main thrust surely? not the least damaging way of powering waste?
The more of our basic needs we can meet locally from low energy systems, like organic farming and managed woodland, the less oil energy we need.
Udo,
I remain to be convinced about carbon rationing. I was one of the few people to vote against it at last Party Conference (its now Green policy) as I still have serious concerns over state power and the logistics/practicalities of any scheme.
However, having said that, I can be convinced - it's certainly difficult to see any other way of adequately dealing with the problem....
Matt
P.S. On tree plantations, there's nothing wrong with them in principle, but once they start getting to a size to really affect climate change, they are problems. Industrial size plantations in the developing world, planted by multinational corporations to 'offset their carbon' have a habit of driving indigenous people from their land, dispossessing the poor, etc etc.
I remain to be convinced about carbon rationing. I was one of the few people to vote against it at last Party Conference (its now Green policy) as I still have serious concerns over state power and the logistics/practicalities of any scheme.
However, having said that, I can be convinced - it's certainly difficult to see any other way of adequately dealing with the problem....
Matt
P.S. On tree plantations, there's nothing wrong with them in principle, but once they start getting to a size to really affect climate change, they are problems. Industrial size plantations in the developing world, planted by multinational corporations to 'offset their carbon' have a habit of driving indigenous people from their land, dispossessing the poor, etc etc.
UnderOpenSky
baseline neural therapy
Udo Erasmus said:
I'm not at all optimisitic that the report will stop the Government from trying harder to push nuclear though, and I don't suppose others on this thread are either
Bernie Gunther
Fundamentalist Druid
Over time, as their utilities bills get higher and higher, they may figure out where their real interests lie. Meanwhile people who can do maths can help to mitgate that situation by figuring out workable alternatives in advance and piloting them to work the bugs out.Giles said:
Bernie Gunther
Fundamentalist Druid
I'm sorry, I should have said *privatised* utility bills to be strictly accurate.
Bernie Gunther
Fundamentalist Druid
We need to protect our communities from capitalist exploitation. Especially capitalist exploitation regarding the basic necessities like heat and water.
http://www.feasta.org/documents/shortcircuit/index.html?sc4/c4.html
http://www.feasta.org/documents/shortcircuit/index.html?sc4/c4.html
Bernie Gunther said:
It don't matter who owns the utilities. As the resource becomes scarcer, prices will rise.
In a way, higher energy prices are a good thing, because above a certain price, various greener technlogies suddenly become viable alternatives. When energy prices are cheap, the only way for renewables to get a look-in is by massive subsidy, which puts investors off, because they never can rely on the subsidy continuing.
As fossil fuels get expensive, then there will be new, big-scale investment in all sorts of good stuff, like CHP, micro-generation, solar water-heating and PV cells, etc, leading to rapid improvements in these technologies.
Giles..
Bernie Gunther
Fundamentalist Druid
Yes but the priorities of capitalist investment are not the same thing as ecological efficiency. The most efficient pattern is local infrastructure for energy, food and recycling. That's not a good pattern for capitalist investment and hence is unlikely to find favour with corporations or their pet governments. They'd prefer expensive centralised infrastructure like big wind-farms or nuclear plants, even though those are not the optimal sustainable solution. Electricity and gas companies have no interest in reducing consumption.
Bernie Gunther said:
If electricity prices, in particular, get high enough, then it would really be viable for everyone to start having little wind turbines and solar thingies on their roofs, and maybe CHP boilers, selling any excess back to the grid. Big companies would also benefit, because they would most likely be the ones making the machinery for all this.
See:
BBC News article about micro-generation
Giles..
Edited to add BBC link
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