Cont: Global warming discussion V

[dann]

I can recommend this episode of An Optimist's Guide to the Planet, which I recently watched on Danish TV:

Move: Clever Inventions Behind Cleaner Transport (Bloomberg Originals on YouTube, Mar 8, 2024 - 48:05 min.)
Transportation is one of the biggest contributors to global warming, but electric vehicles remain largely impractical or unattainable in many parts of the world. And the power used to charge EV batteries is often derived from fossil fuel while other types of transportation, like air travel, remain resistant to sustainable change. In this episode of An Optimist's Guide to the Planet, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau meets people in Kenya, Switzerland and the US who are working to remove these three big hurdles between us and a true transportation revolution.

In Kenya, Coster-Waldau (the incestuous Jaime Lannister in Game of Thrones) visits a factory that manufactures electric motorcycles, in the USA he visits the production site of electric airplanes, and in Switzerland he tours a site for storing energy by means of gravity. (Yes, there are several ways of storing energy! It doesn't always depend on batteries and rare-earth minerals.)
I was astonished to learn how much cheaper the electricity was for the airplane than it would be to power a similar plane running on fossil fuels.

I am sure that Stout will enjoy ignoring it.

 

[Stout]

What they are both in denial of is that consumption (creature comforts, a pleasant life) is not the cause of CO₂ emissions. The cause of global warming is the way that the energy used to produce those creature comforts, i.e. by means of burning fossil fuels, is generated: by burning CO₂.

This is Myriad and Stout both refuse to acknowledge that in many parts of the world the energy used to produce those creature comforts is now increasingly being generated in ways that don't add CO₂ to the atmosphere.
This is why they ignore the facts I have presented again and again, most recently in post 2,010.

No ◊◊◊◊, Sherlock

Explain then, with all of that increasing renewable energy, why CO2 emissions are still increasing. Oh and Denmark finally gave up burning coal. Figured they would have done that in the last century.

 

[Stout]

I can recommend this episode of An Optimist's Guide to the Planet, which I recently watched on Danish TV:


In Kenya, Coster-Waldau (the incestuous Jaime Lannister in Game of Thrones) visits a factory that manufactures electric motorcycles, in the USA he visits the production site of electric airplanes, and in Switzerland he tours a site for storing energy by means of gravity. (Yes, there are several ways of storing energy! It doesn't always depend on batteries and rare-earth minerals.)
I was astonished to learn how much cheaper the electricity was for the airplane than it would be to power a similar plane running on fossil fuels.

I am sure that Stout will enjoy ignoring it.

Video unavailable in your country.

Tell me this was about 5 passenger planes and when, exactly, they'll make a dent in global aviation emissions.

 

[Aridas]

I wasn't talking about whatever Harris and Trump represent outside of the theme of this thread, i.e. global warming.
When you write that "the Democratic Party, very much including Harris, actively promotes renewable energy and seeks to speed the larger transition," you can't have been talking about what the Democratic Party actually did during the presidency of Biden and Kamala Harris' campaign.
What they said they intended to do was nothing but empty promises.
Did you even read what was hidden by the spoiler?

Biden is approving more oil and gas drilling permit on public lands than Trump, analysis finds (WaPo, Dec 6, 2021)
Joe Biden Is Producing More Oil Than Donald Trump Did (Newsweek, Jan 9, 2024)
Big Oil is doing way better under Biden than under Trump (yahoo!finance, May 10, 2024)
Harris touts record oil boom as she embraces fossil fuels (Financial Post, Sep 11, 2024)
Harris twice invoked the surge in U.S. crude and natural gas production during Tuesday's debate

Or is that what you would call 'actively promoting renewable energy and seeking to speed the larger transition'?!
If that is the case, could you please explain it to me because I don't see it.

So you've got nothing to actually address what was said, just a repeat of proving the obvious? Democrats don't seek the immediate complete stop of oil production, duh. As for empty promises? Man, the IRA was such a big pile of empty promises, eh? Hundreds of thousands of green energy jobs, significant incentives to reduce pollution in various ways, and plenty more. Yup, bothsiderism wins the day with you, because making active efforts to decrease the drivers of pollution and climate change, albeit imperfectly, is somehow indistinguishable from or worse than actively working to make things worse.

 

[Myriad]

Explain then, with all of that increasing renewable energy, why CO2 emissions are still increasing.

Easy! The world builds more renewable energy, while the world also maintains all the comforts and conveniences of the global wealthy, while the world also improves the standard of living of the global poor. All three of those things require energy but they're all the top priority, so there's no choice.

That's the status quo, and has been for decades. For some reason it continues to result in increasing rather than decreasing CO2 emissions. That's apparently the fault of capitalist scum who don't get that extracting and using less fossil fuels wouldn't require any reductions in any of those three important uses.

 

[dann]

So you've got nothing to actually address what was said, just a repeat of proving the obvious? Democrats don't seek the immediate complete stop of oil production, duh.

I'm sorry that I have to present you with this for the third time

Biden is approving more oil and gas drilling permit on public lands than Trump, analysis finds (WaPo, Dec 6, 2021)
Joe Biden Is Producing More Oil Than Donald Trump Did (Newsweek, Jan 9, 2024)
Big Oil is doing way better under Biden than under Trump (yahoo!finance, May 10, 2024)
Harris touts record oil boom as she embraces fossil fuels (Financial Post, Sep 11, 2024)
Harris twice invoked the surge in U.S. crude and natural gas production during Tuesday's debate

'Not seeking the complete stop of oil production' is an utterly insane euphemism for what is actually happening in the real world!

As for empty promises? Man, the IRA was such a big pile of empty promises, eh? Hundreds of thousands of green energy jobs, significant incentives to reduce pollution in various ways, and plenty more. Yup, bothsiderism wins the day with you, because making active efforts to decrease the drivers of pollution and climate change, albeit imperfectly, is somehow indistinguishable from or worse than actively working to make things worse.

Yes, bothsiderism does win the day with me as long as allegedly "making active efforts to decrease the drivers of pollution and climate change, albeit imperfectly," looks like this:

President Biden Archived on X, Aug 1, 2024
On my watch, we’ve responsibly increased our oil production to meet our immediate needs – without delaying or deferring our transition to clean energy.We’re America. We can do both.

What Biden was doing and what Kamala Harris appeared to want to continue to do was the kind of bothsiderism where you give your Big Oil campaign donors what they desire most while pretending that you are doing what you know that many of the people in your electorate desire.
It's the bothsiderism of promises given, promises kept to the oil industry and empty promises to the people that you try to persuade to vote for you.
Which also answers Stout's question:

Explain then, with all of that increasing renewable energy, why CO2 emissions are still increasing.

THIS IS HOW!

Oh and Denmark finally gave up burning coal. Figured they would have done that in the last century.

No, Denmark did not entirely stop burning coal, unfortunately. Denmark is in the process of giving up burning coal instead of rebaptizing coal and calling it clean.
This year, however, it goes in the six months of summer. By 2030, the last (and at this point only) Danish power plant based on coal will close down. At that point, I assume that the USA has already come up with five new euphemisms for burning fossil fuels and a couple more for fracking.

 

[dann]

Tell me this was about 5 passenger planes and when, exactly, they'll make a dent in global aviation emissions.

It is fairly obvious that it will only "make a dent in global aviation emissions" if electric planes replace the old planes using conventional fuel, i.e. fossil fuels. I have more faith in the Chinese solution:

China’s New Train Is Faster Than a Plane (620 mph) (BeyondTheBuild on YouTube, June 14, 2025 - 11:42 min.)
China just revealed a magnetic levitation train that can reach speeds of over 620 mph (1,000 km/h) — faster than most commercial airplanes.
This is not a concept. It’s real.And it could revolutionize transportation as we know it.
In this video, you’ll discover:
How Maglev tech works — and why it’s so fast
Why some claim this technology was originally developed in Germany and stolen by China
The long-term plan behind China’s high-speed dominanceWhat this means for the future of global mobility and economic competition
Forget everything you know about trains. This is engineering at the edge of reality.

Unfortunately, this is bound to disappoint Myriad immensely:

Easy! The world builds more renewable energy, while the world also maintains all the comforts and conveniences of the global wealthy, while the world also improves the standard of living of the global poor. All three of those things require energy but they're all the top priority, so there's no choice.
That's the status quo, and has been for decades. For some reason it continues to result in increasing rather than decreasing CO2 emissions. That's apparently the fault of capitalist scum who don't get that extracting and using less fossil fuels wouldn't require any reductions in any of those three important uses.

I'm sorry, but it seems as if the maglev trains won't fulfill his dream of a future where the standards of living of the global poor remain where they are because improving them would lead to more CO₂ emissions in his dystopian fantasy. He also wants people in Western countries to give up all comforts and conveniences for the same reason. He imagines that it's the only way to lower CO₂ emissions and save the planet.
You can't please everybody, and Myriad won't be pleased by solutions that don't force austerity on people, especially common people.
So China's new trains look much too comfortable and convenient for Myriad's taste.
Why can't the Chinese continue to use coolie-powered rickshaws?

China's NEW Maglev Trains are RIDICULOUS (The China Adventure on YouTube, July 16, 2025 - 2:14 min.)

I hope Coster-Waldau will go there next.

 

[dann]

Where do fossil-fuel advocates pick up their arguments?

How Oil Propaganda Sneaks Into TV Shows (Climate Town on YouTube, Feb 11, 2025 - 31:30 min.)
0:52--> I saw a viral Tick Tock clip from the new show The Landman featuring a crotchy Billy Bob Thorton spewing a bunch of weird lies about wind turbines you know it really bummed me out:
"You want to guess how much oil it takes to lubricate that ◊◊◊◊◊◊◊ thing? In its 20-year lifespan, it won't offset the carbon footprint of making it. And don't get me started on solar panels and the lithium in your Tesla battery!"
And I'm not saying that TV needs to fact police their characters, but I am worried that the millions of people who saw the out-of-context clip might assume that the incorrect statements of a fictional television character are actually very smart and need to be spread far and wide.

And that actually was actually the case with "many right-leaning users (including fossil fuel advocates, oil executives and a US senator)":

The Landman (TV series): Criticism (Wikipedia)
Dialogues that included a narrative about renewable energy have been criticized. Norris makes a rant about wind turbine, claiming that the amount of steel, oil and concrete needed to construct a wind turbine produces such a high carbon footprint, that it will not offset the costs in its 20-year lifespan. This led many right-leaning users (including fossil fuel advocates, oil executives and a US senator) on social media to repost the clip. However, the scientific veracity of such claims has been challenged.

How dare they challenge our favourite TV series! There's woke cancel culture for ya!

Dave O'Brien on X, Nov 26, 2024
If you’re not watching Landman you need to start. Billy Bob Thornton is freaking hilarious and his one liners to his ex-wife played by Ali Larter is gold.

Bonchie on X, Nov 25, 2025
Every left-winger should have their eyes held open and be forced to watch this on repeat until it sinks in.

It didn't take long for 'Bonchie' to stop responding to comments - like the comment posting a link to this:

Wind farms can offset their emissions within two years (Science Daily, May 6, 2024)
Summary:
After spinning for under two years, a wind farm can offset the carbon emissions generated across its entire 30-year lifespan, when compared to thermal power plants.

 

[dann]

PS to my reply to Aridas in post 2,026:
Obama: "Suddenly America's, like, the biggest oil producer and the biggest G. Uh, that was me, people. I just want you to FF..."
From the Climate Town video in my previous post, at 7:38-->.

 

[Aridas]

I'm sorry that I have to present you with this for the third time

Because you simply can't address the points actually made and are stuck repeating yourself with things that were accounted for before you even tried them the first time? There was no argument being offered that Democrats were somehow great on the oil front, but rather, agreement that they're not. The argument being offered is, in short, that there's more to the story than just that and that you are consistently refusing to so much as acknowledge that, creating a very distorted picture. Everything that you've been posting is confirming the correctness of that argument.

 

[Stout]

THIS IS HOW!

That's just the USA and since American CO2/capita emissions have been steadily falling for the last couple of decades, they can't be responsible for any global increase now can they.

It is fairly obvious that it will only "make a dent in global aviation emissions" if electric planes replace the old planes using conventional fuel, i.e. fossil fuels. I have more faith in the Chinese solution:

So far in the future then. I mean these things may help when David Suzuki takes a 45 minute commuter flight to visit his daughter, rather than taking the bus like us plebes but when it comes to any meaningful reduction in aviation emissions they're really more propaganda than anything practical.

I hope Coster-Waldau will go there next

COOL! Now how many plane trips have these maglev trains actually replaced?

I know, I know, sometime in the distant future...

How dare they challenge our favourite TV series! There's woke cancel culture for ya!

I'm the shampoo bottles in our showers have heard a million rebuttals to claims made in that show and there's a special kind of stupid attributing fact to works of fiction.

 

[Myriad]

Unfortunately, this is bound to disappoint Myriad immensely:

Yes, I'm very disappointed to learn that in the future we'll all be riding comfortable high-speed CGIs. If we're giving up on reality for virtual pipe dreams, let's at least have teleportation gates. Even Azeroth has those, ffs.

 

[dann]

Because you simply can't address the points actually made and are stuck repeating yourself with things that were accounted for before you even tried them the first time? There was no argument being offered that Democrats were somehow great on the oil front, but rather, agreement that they're not. The argument being offered is, in short, that there's more to the story than just that and that you are consistently refusing to so much as acknowledge that, creating a very distorted picture. Everything that you've been posting is confirming the correctness of that argument.

Everything I've been posting has shown that the Democrats, two presidents and one candidate, bragged about increasing the extraction and thus use of fossil fuels. And yet Democrats still want to portray Democrats as the environmentally friendly not-as-bad-as-the-alternative party.

 

[dann]

That's just the USA and since American CO2/capita emissions have been steadily falling for the last couple of decades, they can't be responsible for any global increase now can they.

Yes, they can. You don't understand the principle of global warming. If the bucket is already overflowing, it won't stop overflowing just because you lower the amount of water you keep pouring into it.

So far in the future then. I mean these things may help when David Suzuki takes a 45 minute commuter flight to visit his daughter, rather than taking the bus like us plebes but when it comes to any meaningful reduction in aviation emissions they're really more propaganda than anything practical.

They are actually a very meaningful reduction in aviation emissions.
The argument used to be that there was no alternatives to all the fussed-fuel driven ways to create power, be it for transport, heating or generating electricity. Your arguments now make it obvious that that first argument was never meant seriously. Now that the alternatives are there, you come up with other dumb excuses for not making (or even working on) making the shift. Like this :

COOL! Now how many plane trips have these maglev trains actually replaced?
I know, I know, sometime in the distant future...

You have done nothing but argue against the shift away from fossil fuels, and now your problem suddenly is that it doesn't come fast enough for you? The pinnacle of hypocrisy!

I'm the shampoo bottles in our showers have heard a million rebuttals to claims made in that show and there's a special kind of stupid attributing fact to works of fiction.

You were presented with examples of people who presented arguments of that particular work of fiction as if they were facts. I know that you want to let them get away with that, but your argument for that isn't convincing.

 

[dann]

Yes, I'm very disappointed to learn that in the future we'll all be riding comfortable high-speed CGIs. If we're giving up on reality for virtual pipe dreams, let's at least have teleportation gates. Even Azeroth has those, ffs.

Like I already pointed out: I knew Myriad wouldn't like any solution to global warming that wasn¨t based on the poorest of the poor staying poor and on people in industrialized contries having to give up the few pleasures and conveniences they have and to live up to his austerity ideal.

It's how Myriad and Stout complement each other so well:
Myriad can point to Stout and say: 'See! People are to blame for being selfish and unwilling to sacrifice comfort and convenience the way I do!'
And Stout can point to Myriad and say: 'See! Those crazy environmentalists want to take away your cars and your gas stoves!'
It's the reason why they are both in denial of the practical changes that are not only possible but actually already exist and are being implemented in reality.

 

[Myriad]

Like I already pointed out: I knew Myriad wouldn't like any solution to global warming that wasn¨t...

I don't like the 620mph maglev train whipping around a curve pulling about sixteen lateral G's in the first three seconds of the first video, and I don't think the passengers would like it very much either. Nice of the video to make it clear from the very start that they've put no thought whatsoever into the engineering issues of the "fast as airline travel" pipe dream they're touting.

 

[dann]

Are you commenting on an AI-generated cartoon?
The rest of your post is just as childish. It is fairly obvious that they have put a lot of thought "into the engineering issues of the "fast as airline travel"" and that you have no serious objection to it because it clashes with your pipedream of making everybody succumb to your austerity gospel.
China appears to be building a future based on wind and solar and emission-free transportation.
It's obvious why you don't appreciate it.
So coolie-powered rickshaw it is.

 

[Stout]

Yes, they can. You don't understand the principle of global warming. If the bucket is already overflowing, it won't stop overflowing just because you lower the amount of water you keep pouring into it.

But America is pouring in LESS than they used to, that's equal to the reductions afforded my a couple of maglev trains and a small fleet of electric short range planes. Celebrate America!

The argument used to be that there was no alternatives to all the fussed-fuel driven ways to create power, be it for transport, heating or generating electricity. Your arguments now make it obvious that that first argument was never meant seriously. Now that the alternatives are there, you come up with other dumb excuses for not making (or even working on) making the shift.

You must have me confused with someone else, I wasn't posting here in the 1960s

You have done nothing but argue against the shift away from fossil fuels, and now your problem suddenly is that it doesn't come fast enough for you?

Climate Emergency! We are at the beginning of a mass extinction! End fossil fuels now! Climate anxiety! Climate clock, 1.5C!

Nope, not getting an eco-stiffy over a train and a handful of little planes.

You were presented with examples of people who presented arguments of that particular work of fiction as if they were facts. I know that you want to let them get away with that, but your argument for that isn't convincing.

So? Some retards took some fiction seriously. Happens all the time. That particular bit didn't change anyone's mind about wind power and it might have even prompted a few people to go look it up.

 

[Myriad]

Are you commenting on an AI-generated cartoon?
The rest of your post is just as childish. It is fairly obvious that they have put a lot of thought "into the engineering issues of the "fast as airline travel"" and that you have no serious objection to it because it clashes with your pipedream of making everybody succumb to your austerity gospel.
China appears to be building a future based on wind and solar and emission-free transportation.
It's obvious why you don't appreciate it.
So coolie-powered rickshaw it is.

I'm commenting on the AI-generated cartoon you posted to support your claim that China has a "solution" to long-distance high-speed travel without fossil fuel emissions using "620 mph trains."

I don't doubt that such trains are technically possible (the best kind of possible!) and perhaps even economically viable in a few places in the world. But there are good reasons they're not going to duplicate the capabilities of airline travel.

The track for a 620 mph train not only can't turn with radii less than about seven miles, it can't follow ground contours either. So the whole thing has to be elevated (or entrenched or tunneled, which is even more expensive) except occasionally on salt flats. If it crosses a navigable river at an elevated height (say, sufficient for cargo ships to go under), it requires at least a two mile long bridge regardless of how wide the river is, and that will still feel like what roller coaster fans call an airtime hill to passengers. (Will the passengers be held down by shoulder harnesses like on a thrill ride? Will children have to be this tall to ride?) Or maybe just build the whole thing 200 feet in the air instead. The passengers would hardly even know it wasn't a plane!

To replace airliner travel without major sacrifice of speed or convenience, you need tens of thousands of miles of this trackway all around the globe. (Let's just forget oceans exist.) Closer to the ground, China can probably do this at about $100 million per mile because power flows from the barrel of a gun and all, but most other places, $200 million. More if any rivers, bays, lakes, mountains, hills, cities, towns, or rich people are in the way, but no doubt there are plenty of available routes to avoid all those while making only the most gradual turns and elevation changes.

There's nothing wrong with improved trains that don't get you there as fast as an airline flight, except that by your principle of no-sacrifices-ever, they shouldn't and won't be built at all, because doing so acknowledges a lowering of standards and if you do that you might as well ride a rickshaw. "Sorry, we don't want climate change, but going to Disneyland Paris by train would be slower, and that would be a sacrifice, so fire up the jets! A day may come when the hearts of Men fail, and they make voluntary compromises for the sake of sustainability, but it is NOT THIS DAY!!"

 

[dann]

No, I didn't post an "AI-generated cartoon ... to support [my] claim that China has a "solution" to long-distance high-speed travel without fossil fuel emissions using "620 mph trains."" I posted an 11:42 min-long. video containing a 1-sec-long clip from an "AI-generated cartoon", which Myriad himself pointed out: "in the first three seconds of the first video."
As for the rest of his post: Yes, in many places a maglev train won't be able to go at its maximum speed. Big deal! It's not as if the current version of trains don't slow down or never "make voluntary compromises" to maximum speed due to "rivers, bays, lakes, mountains, hills, cities, towns, or rich people," is it?! It tends to go very wrong if they don't:

2015 Philadelphia train derailment (Wikipedia)
Investigators are focusing on why the train entered the curve too fast (Wikipedia)

There are even stretches of ordinary roads with speed limits for similar reasons.
But in Myriad's view of the world, there is no other ""solution" to long-distance high-speed travel without fossil fuel emissions," because the only way to limit fossil-fuel emissions has to be austerity, poor people remaining. poor and other people (except for the very oligarchs) having to sacrifice all creature comforts and standards of living. As if that solution to CO₂ emissions isn't exactly the kind of solution that requires the "power [that] flows from the barrel of a gun."