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Nuclear vs wind
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Merrick
Merrick
2148 posts

Re: Nuclear vs wind
Nov 02, 2005, 16:55
"That's a bit much."

It's not a bit much. Passenger aviation is a bit much. Or, to be more precise, a lot much.

The current vast amount of global trade is a very new occurence. It cannot last as there simply is no energy source to make it do so. The decline of oil production means that the age of ordinary people like you taking several long-haul flights a year will be over well within the lifetimes of most of us.

So, if we're to have such a crunch, surely it's best we see it coming and wean ourselves off it rather than wait till there's a fan/shit interface.

In the meantime, the ever faster consumption of oil is exacerbating climate change. This is a problem that dwarfs all others. There is a serious risk that climate change will make the planet uninhabitable by humans and most other species within a couple of millennia.

Climate change is not coming. It is here, and it is intensifying. Extreme weather events are getting more frequent and intense. As they do so, a serious proportion of farmland will be suceptible to catastrophic change. Topsoil washed away in floods, places having their rainfall dry up, temperatures not dropping enough in winter to make seeds germinate in spring, etc. As this gets worse, what will that do to the food supply of the people you presently trade with?

Again, much of this is already here. I already have to chill my Lincolnshire spinach seeds in the fridge over winter.

This is all the result of fossil fuel consumption. For most people - and certainly those who travel long haul anywhere - by far their biggest consumption of fossil fuels is aviation.

I respect your distrust of middlemen and your will to ensure the people you get stuff from are fairly paid.

But the effect on climate change far outwieghs the benefit of all but the tiniest amount of aviation. I have no idea what trade it is you're involved in, but I feel it's not likely in that tiny amount.

So, put frankly, yes I do think you should find work closer to home. And I think that about your trading partners over there too.

Rolling Ronnie's point about dependence on trade doesn't hold much water; the dependece on international trade is a by-product of the cheap fuel to transport goods with.

Around the world, people have been quite capable of feeding themselves and living happily for millennia. It's the imposition of European ideas of property ownership, of cash-crops, of western farming methods and the post-colonial problems of government in third world countries that lie behind the overwhelming majority of famines.

And certainly, the poor nations will suffer the most as climate change kicks in. Just as we imposed cash-crops, then once the farming had all gone that we we drop the price we pay for the commodity, so soon we will drop it again or withdraw completely as transport becomes too expensive.

One exception will be the high price of oil making vehicle biofuels financially viable. We will use Third World countries as plantations for the fuel crops. So, just as today we fly in cut flowers and green beans from Tanzania while people starve 200 miles away, so in future we will be shipping over the palm oil.

We have to re-localise our lives, stop flying in onions and apples from New Zealand when we can grow them here. We have to scale back our oil consumption, and that will - be force of circumstance fairly soon even if we don't have the clarity of vision and conscience to choose it now - mean the end of the popular private car and passenger aviation.
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Re: Nuclear vs wind (hongnam)		 Replies:
Re: Nuclear vs wind (Rolling Ronnie)
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