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Greta Thunberg - brave campaigner or deeply disturbed? Part II.

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Lplus said:
How many years on average?

How much outlay on average?

How quickly will you get your money back on double glazing on average?

Quoting vague best case scenarios is little better than selling snake oil.
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Solar panels are snake oil? Better not tell our government where over half our electrical generation is renewable.

Solar panels take 3-6 years for pay back.

https://solarbright.com.au/calculate-your-solar-panel-payback-period-with-these-simple-steps/

Double glazing is more expensive but payback can still be 10 plus there is the immediate noise reduction.

https://www.deakin.edu.au/?a=724822

What is your problem with cheap, effective and economical measures like these?
 
lionking said:
Solar panels are snake oil? Better not tell our government where over half our electrical generation is renewable.

Solar panels take 3-6 years for pay back.

https://solarbright.com.au/calculate-your-solar-panel-payback-period-with-these-simple-steps/

Double glazing is more expensive but payback can still be 10 plus there is the immediate noise reduction.

https://www.deakin.edu.au/?a=724822

What is your problem with cheap, effective and economical measures like these?
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Solar panels take 12 - 18 years to payback in the UK
https://renewableenergyhub.co.uk/ma...olar-panels-roi-for-pv-solar-panels-pay-back/

Most houses in the UK already have double glazing, including mine - because it's cold here in the UK

And I have all led light bulbs.
 
What works for someone not me, not where I am may not work for me at all.

I don't have a car, heat or cool our home at all. We don't need that stuff.
I really could make better use of solar than we can afford but that's future stuff.

We have made many changes to be less wasteful and we recycle a lot.
If everyone did what they could just because it made more spending money it would be a huge difference.
That's just on the home front level.

Now if we take on a community to state level and accept a few sacrifices for everyone that's even more.

But it has to make sense for where one lives. Many solutions for many realities. No activist can know enough about everywhere to make sense to everyone.

Food, transport, housing needs and everything else will differ with some in place for decades and some measures impossible to implement. Solar water heaters in Alaska and zero petroleum use tomorrow, anywhere isn't going to be possible.
We need to apply intelligence before we make huge sweeping changes. Still, we can make many changes now on another level.
 
lionking said:
Solar panels are snake oil? Better not tell our government where over half our electrical generation is renewable.

Solar panels take 3-6 years for pay back.
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To be fair, solar absolutely has to be able to work in Australia if it is going to work anywhere. Huge country, mostly desert with loads of sun and comparatively small population. It's a no-brainer there. Similarly, geothermal has to work in Iceland, and wind turbines have to work off Windy Hill Island.

It makes sense to tailor the energy production to where it is most useful, and also provide government incentives/subsidies to where energy can be produced (solar panels) or saved (insulation/double glazing).

That said, I don't understand the knee-jerk complaining from others that it's too late and too expensive, (and many of those saying the same about nuclear), when the alternative is to NOT spend on it NOW and have to pay MORE in the future.

If anyone is saying "we should have done X two decades ago and it's too late now", what is the alternative but to wait another two decades only to lament that it is even later now and will be even more expensive and should have done it FOUR decades ago, etc...?
 
I've heard the economic argument most of my life here in the Netherlands.
'Working on alternative measures is a left wing pipe dream'
'It will cost the economy and the man in the street too much'
'The doom scenarios are just fantasy, the science done by oil companies shows nothing will go wrong if we keep relying on fossil fuel'
'Using tax money to invest is against capitalism'

We're paying for it now and it's hitting the man in the street the hardest now. And yet somehow this is still not the fault of the party that has set the policies for the past 40 years.

Of course there can be no question of taxing the fossil fuel companies that had to deal with the blow of suddenly rising oil prices by making record profits.
 
angrysoba said:
That said, I don't understand the knee-jerk complaining from others that it's too late and too expensive, (and many of those saying the same about nuclear), when the alternative is to NOT spend on it NOW and have to pay MORE in the future.

If anyone is saying "we should have done X two decades ago and it's too late now", what is the alternative but to wait another two decades only to lament that it is even later now and will be even more expensive and should have done it FOUR decades ago, etc...?
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It's only too late to avert 1.5C warming unless we jump on the Greta Thunberg plan and implement a system wide change today. Not tomorrow, not next week, today. A system wide transformation that nobody, and I mean nobody, has the faintest clue of what that transformation would look like.

Like I said in a post last year those pandemic related emissions cuts in the first half of 2020 would not only have to remain permanent but they's have to be followed by equal cuts every following year for up until 2028. Anybody in the 10% of the global population who caused this problem in the first place want that?

All this talk of electric cars and solar panels etc. reflects the reality of what's happening on the ground today, actual reality, not the drop everything because there's a drought happening in Africa drastic lifestyle change that Thunberg demands.

Those posts I put up yesterday, that wasn't ChatGPT, that was something much older. Plain ole' copy-pasta, something I've done countless times before.

https://time.com/6254639/greta-thunberg-book-how-to-save-climate/
 
theprestige said:
Is Greta Thunberg deeply disturbed? It's hard to imagine a more precision engineered scenario for answering yes.
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Only if you want to repeat the baseless accusation of, I remind readers yet again, a racist misogynist right wing conspiracy theorist shock jock.

Remember where this thread started, all those years ago? Andrew Bolt hasn't changed, and he is still on the air spewing bile.
 
Skeptical Greg said:
From your link:




Anyone confused about what ' halt ' means?
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I'll bite. It's that thing talk about when it comes to emissions but dagnabbit nobody is interested in doing in any meaningful way. Earlier in this thread I extended an offer to Thungergophiles, I can help you remove yourself from the destructive 10% by instructing you how to liquidate your assets and relocate to a country with a very low CO2/pp emission rate and live like a local. I only want a, yep you guessed it, 10% of your total net worth with enough cash being held back to buy citizenship in a developing nation so you can shred that developed world passport and start being a victim of the problem rather than the cause.

After all, what did Greta and I say upthread? Oh yea, There is, in reality, absolutely no reason to believe that the necessary changes will make us less happy or less satisfied. If we manage to do this right, then our lives will be given more meaning than selfish, shallow over-consumption can ever give us. Instead, we can make time and space for community, solidarity, and love—the true tenets of a good life.

Sell everything, book a low carbon passage to the nation of your choice and begin your new life this year. Don't forget to tithe to Stout, and...bon voyage.

6 years 158 days, $ 32 trillion owed in climate reparations.

Your daily sermon can be found here.

Fun fact: About $16 billion was spent gambling on the Super Bowl, that's enough to rebuild Pakistan.
 
Stout said:
It's only too late to avert 1.5C warming unless we jump on the Greta Thunberg plan and implement a system wide change today. Not tomorrow, not next week, today. A system wide transformation that nobody, and I mean nobody, has the faintest clue of what that transformation would look like.

Like I said in a post last year those pandemic related emissions cuts in the first half of 2020 would not only have to remain permanent but they's have to be followed by equal cuts every following year for up until 2028. Anybody in the 10% of the global population who caused this problem in the first place want that?

All this talk of electric cars and solar panels etc. reflects the reality of what's happening on the ground today, actual reality, not the drop everything because there's a drought happening in Africa drastic lifestyle change that Thunberg demands.

Those posts I put up yesterday, that wasn't ChatGPT, that was something much older. Plain ole' copy-pasta, something I've done countless times before.

https://time.com/6254639/greta-thunberg-book-how-to-save-climate/
Click to expand...

Yeah, I get that Greta Thunberg's vision is a pipe-dream and her demands are smiled upon indulgently by people who have no desire to implement them. I get that.

What I don't get is why this fact is then used to essentially pooh-pooh any suggestions at all.

"How about insulation?"
*indignantly*: "Insulation!?!?!? Who has money for that?!"
"Solar panels?"
*scoffs* "Solar!?!? What are we?!! Primitive tribes worshipping the Sun like weird .... erm.... druids or something?!"
"Nuclear?"
"Oh yeah, maybe you forgot about a little thing called Chernobyl?!?"
"Carbon capture?"
"And deprive the trees you so love to hug?"
"Wind turbines?"
"Think of the whales you so called environmentalist!"
"Geothermal?"
"And ruin my hot spring experience?!"

It's too late, too expensive and wouldn't work anyway and the world has always changed climate so it's no biggie and China don't care blah blah blah. flak, flak, flak....
 
angrysoba said:
Yeah, I get that Greta Thunberg's vision is a pipe-dream and her demands are smiled upon indulgently by people who have no desire to implement them. I get that.

What I don't get is why this fact is then used to essentially pooh-pooh any suggestions at all.

"How about insulation?"
*indignantly*: "Insulation!?!?!? Who has money for that?!"
"Solar panels?"
*scoffs* "Solar!?!? What are we?!! Primitive tribes worshipping the Sun like weird .... erm.... druids or something?!"
"Nuclear?"
"Oh yeah, maybe you forgot about a little thing called Chernobyl?!?"
"Carbon capture?"
"And deprive the trees you so love to hug?"
"Wind turbines?"
"Think of the whales you so called environmentalist!"
"Geothermal?"
"And ruin my hot spring experience?!"

It's too late, too expensive and wouldn't work anyway and the world has always changed climate so it's no biggie and China don't care blah blah blah. flak, flak, flak....
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Dude,
Who is poo-pooing those suggestions in this discussion.
They are all great suggestions, but the masses are poo-pooing them with their pocket books.

The thread is about Greta after all.
 
Skeptical Greg said:
Dude,
Who is poo-pooing those suggestions in this discussion.
They are all great suggestions, but the masses are poo-pooing them with their pocket books.
The thread is about Greta after all.
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If "the masses" cannot afford insulation and solar, then surely government subsidies would make sense.

Now here is something that is going to bring a wistful tear to my eye....

Britain must build "at least" eight new nuclear power stations during the next 15 years to replace its ageing plants and contribute to a "post-oil economy" that is cleaner and much more efficient than in the era of "cheap energy and careless pollution", Gordon Brown signalled last night. The first new reactors could feed electricity into the national grid by 2017.

Ministers want the private sector to make the running, but fear that the parallel contraction of the UK's coal and oil-fired generating capacity, on environmental grounds, will trigger a serious energy gap unless the government moves decisively.
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This was back in 2008.

But I think many of those plans have now been scrapped, partly through obstructionism and fears following Fukushima. :(
 
Government subsidies make sense for any good cause that one cannot otherwise afford.

You speak of ' Government subsidies ' as if it is free money.

The same masses who will not open their pocket books for this or that, are not any more likely to agree to have their taxes spent on this or that.
 
Skeptical Greg said:
The thread is about Greta after all.
Click to expand...

Exactly. All those energy saving ideas would be better off in a thread about climate change rather than this Thunberg specific one but nobody's complaining and we might as well keep on with them.

I only mentioned the whale people as an obscure reason why somebody is objecting to wind. It was a recent news article and if the article hadn't happened then I would have gone with NIMBYs whining about their view.

All these suggestions are good and well but if you can't afford the $10-15K for a solar installation even after government subsidies, then you can't afford it. Borrow against the equity maybe?

We don't have a ton of poorly insulated houses around here anymore, Most of the old ones, the ones that were sometimes insulated with newspaper, have been renovated with at least some insulation upgrades.

It's too bad so many people are freaked out by nuclear but it is what it is.

Carbon capture doesn't exist at any appreciable scale. Even Thunberg covers this and she's riding the pooh-pooh train as to that being a solution to averting 1.5C.

Thunberg mentions China in LA Times article, so it looks like she's trying to come around on that issue. Unless, of course the Chinese press fat shames her again then she may go back to radio silence.
 
Lplus said:
Solar panels take 12 - 18 years to payback in the UK
https://renewableenergyhub.co.uk/ma...olar-panels-roi-for-pv-solar-panels-pay-back/

Most houses in the UK already have double glazing, including mine - because it's cold here in the UK

And I have all led light bulbs.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure how accurate the information in that article now is. For example:

The initial cost of an installation will obviously vary depending on the size and quality of panels installed. A small 1 kW system will more than likely set you back between £2-3,000 whilst a bigger, more efficient 4 kW panel array will be in the region of £6-7,500.
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Our 4kw array, installed in December 2022 cost £3,897.35 all in.

The electricity bill saving would total £202 (energy used in home – 1350kWh x 15p – this is the electricity that does not need to be bought from a utility company)
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The cost of a kWh has shot up over the last 12 months and the (subsidised by the UK government) cost is now 35p and industry experts are warning us not to expect any significant reductions in the medium term

The combination of the costs being significantly lower and the savings being considerably higher means that the payback period would be much, much shorter - probably closer to 5-10 years depending on how you well you can exploit the energy you generate.



Currently (no pun intended :o) we're saving approximately £1 a day (3 KWh a day - we're been using on average 8kWh as compared to over 11 kWh) based solely on our energy usage this year compared to last year. This is likely to increase significantly as daylight hours get longer. Also bear in mind this now includes charging Mrs Don's EV (which we didn't have last year) which consumes around 100 kWh a month, so the like for like savings are close to double that. Conservatively that's around £600 a year when EV charging is included which gives a payback of under 7 years for our investment.

We haven't opted to install a battery for cost reasons. My expectation is that at some point in the next 5-10 years, house batteries will become much larger and cheaper as spent vehicle battery packs come onto the market. What we can do instead is to time our electricity usage better to take advantage of our PV. It's sunny this afternoon so I'll consider running the washing machine and/or dishwasher or perhaps run the breadmaker. This could drive our savings higher.

We don't sell our surplus back to the grid on the grounds that the (tiny) income we would receive would be more than offset by the (considerable) costs of registering our system.

edited to add....

I've just noted that we've been switched to Octopus Energy and can get 15p/kWh for selling back to the grid - will have to investigate this because that could easily be another few hundred pounds a year.
 
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The truth about how the poorest live in Mexico?

Rent or squat in a piece of land building a tarpaper and tin house.
Cook (or heat in cold regions) with scavenging wood and combustible materials.
A car and phone are luxuries one must have. It's how one finds and get to jobs.
That phone won't be a low end model . The car will be more than a decade old, faked plates and couldn't pass vehicle emissions test with a new EV in its place.

It's no eco paradise. It's survival on the cheapest where possible to make the luxury possible in a few things. These people have kids in schools, feed and clothe them too.
It's actually doing many things the worst way possible from a Greta pov so they can buy a phone and big tv made and shipped in from China to watch soccer on.
These are my neighbors. I walk past the homes every day. I talk with them.

Greta obviously doesn't from her first world view. She doesn't address why they are poor (many for failing in school or alcohol) and try to fix that.
Which would be equally futile as some of her actual demands. They like how they live.

It takes money and real efforts to reduce the carbon footprint, it takes sacrifices. Maybe like not having a car to be able to put solar on the roof.
Free or near free hot water daily is a sweet luxury. Bike or walking to work is a passable sacrifice.

There are no one size fits all solutions. We must do what works, where it works, to achieve goals, even if it makes someone uncomfortable.
 
8enotto said:
The truth about how the poorest live in Mexico?

<snip>
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The poorest in Mexico (indeed the poorest in most of the world) aren't the big problem here, it's people in developed countries and in particular people with first world lifestyles.

It's the people who heat their houses to 24C in the winter and cool them to 20C in the summer.

Clearly the sheer number of people is a factor but the real problems come when you have both population size AND greenhouse gas emissions.
 
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