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The EU is Banning Almost All Coal Mining on Jan 1 (futurism.com)
Every unprofitable coal mine in the European Union must cease production by the first day of 2019, the date on which all public funds for the mines will come to an end. From a report: In Spain, that means that 26 coal mines are about to close up shop, according to Reuters. This move away from coal is a refreshing bit of bluntness -- letting the failed remnants of a fossil fuel industry fade away -- compared to how the federal government in the U.S. is grasping at anything to keep coal alive. But it remains to be seen how much of an impact the coal closures will have in the ongoing effort to curb climate change. The deadline was set back in 2010 as the EU sought to move away from fossil fuel dependence, according to Telesur. The EU wanted to end public aid to coal mines sooner, but groups from Germany -- which shuttered its last coal mine earlier this month -- and Spain are responsible for extending the deadline all the way to the end of 2018.
Well, those instances of the human race that do not prioritize species survival, will not survive. But apparently that is too hard to grasp because it is quite a while in the future. Bust thanks for illustrating the fundamental nearsightedness of most people. Also, Science is not Religion. One is for people with working minds, the other is for the rest.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
I totally agree that thousands and thousands of scientists across many disciplines,, most who have never talked, seen, or even heard of each other, have somehow conspired to take as much money as possible by lying to the public. It's amazing how they do it!
I mean I even heard someone say the temperature has increased by 1C over the last hundred years. We've only had satellites since 1979.
Iron Maiden are an English heavy metal band formed in Leyton, East London, in 1975 by bassist and primary songwriter Steve Harris. Can you spell non-sequitur?
You are fatally wrong. I do know how scientific funding works. Strongly advising hard real-world changes is one of the ways to not get funding for your research. Why do you think climate scientists have been so tame when the models did reliably predict the catastrophe to come about 30 years ago? Simple: They did not want their funding to dry up and did hope the human race would realize how bad things are without them pushing. They have now realized that the human race is far too stupid for that and have started pushing _despite_ the negative effects on their funding, because of pure desperation.
As to the past measurements, why on earth do you think measuring temperatures requires satellites of all things? What these older records use is thermometers and records on paper. What then needs to be adjusted (and the adjustments are entirely legitimate) is the extrapolations of the localized measurements.
How anybody at this time can still think this whole thing is not real and not very dire is beyond me. People like you will probably deny there is a problem while in the process of dying from its effects.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
The problem with climate change is some people like to believe it isn't true, because it means they are in some way special and "in the know".
But they are idiots. The science is a provable done deal at this point. Twenty years ago, having some skepticism was sensible (and it always makes sense to be skeptical of motivations -- Al Gore, I'm looking at you), but man-made climate change is just impossible to refute without resorting to a conspiracy that includes basically every climate scientist and body in the world working in coordination, including fake temperature measurements from a huge array of sources. It just isn't plausible. Plus, we are experiencing the exact instability that the models predict, so we would need to be faking pretty much all the global news on storms, etc.
But you know what, even if there was doubt (there isn't), would it not be a good idea to err on the side of caution and not pump huge amounts of shit into the atmosphere?
So you think what will get human civilization ended is the inability of most people to distinguish Science from Religion? Would not surprise me in the least.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
The ending of government subsidies to coal mines will have an equalising effect on the cost of coal (up to the new cost of production) making it easier for renewables to compete on an even playing field.
We know climates change. The effects are less well known however. We know a little bit from geology but even there the results of mass extinctions were at least partially if not wholly caused by the event itself and not directly a result of the climate on its own.
The other problem we don't know is the economics. How will it affect progress? How will you pay for the solution? Where do we spend the energy to sustain the energy? Nuclear and beyond (fusion) seems to be the most promising but there is lots of misinformation about the effects of even the worst disasters that could happen while windmills happily chop up whatever golden eagles we have remaining.
Will having unfettered access, innovation and progress to alternative resources get us a solution or will mass murder, government intervention while regressing to the Stone Age prior to extinction be necessary. That's where left and right politics differ.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
Most things are taken on faith. Never been to Australia, yet I have faith it exists based on what evidence I have. Never been to the Moon but I have faith that it is mostly as described rather then a balloon launched by the evil Liberals to spy on god fearing Americans. Never seen an atom or even an atom bomb, but have faith they exist based on various things that collaborate there existence. I even have faith that things fall towards the center of the Earth in Australia even though it's below me.
This is life, we have to have faith as we can't check everything out, whether it is geography or science. When there is consensus that Australia exists or the Sun burns by nuclear reactions or electricity works by electrons or that CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere are increasing and CO2 is a greenhouse gas, most everyone has to take things on faith.
Both geography and science generally get more accurate with time and it would be stupid to deny everything we can't personally check out. Shit, even flying to Australia wouldn't prove it exists as perhaps the plane made a subtle turn and landed somewhere else where everyone pretends it is Australia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
This will hopefully drive the cost of business for US coal miners way up, since there is now a smaller market of buyers. The real question is why are we providing welfare for the mediocre?
Um, what? The EU closing a bunch of mines will not make the market smaller, it will make it larger. The coal fired power plants in the EU will still need coal, and if they're not getting it locally they will have to import it from somewhere which will drive the price up. That's a good thing for the coal miners, but not for the environment, as it will mean more strip mining in the U.S.
--- Keep the choice with the user..
Neither. Scenario 3 is a whole bunch of people (overwhelmingly most of those who have studied the phenomenon) predict that extreme events will permanently increase in rate over time, including high powered storms, and this agrees strongly with observations. They predict a sustained global average temperature rise (note: local average temperature decreases are *not* contraindications), which has been observed although to be fair, this needs a long measurement time (we're looking at permanent >2 degree Celsius change from man-made contributions over 100 years). They also predict eventual sea level rising substantially once a certain threshold is reached, which has not yet been reached. Frost-free season lengthening -- that's held for almost 40 years now. Droughts and heat waves have increased in frequency 10-fold. Arctic is projected to get ice-free summers in about 30-40 years.
Most predictions have come to pass, and a distressingly large number of them are passing in the "worst-case-scenario" version. Not literally every one that has ever been made.
Note, no religion ever snagged 97% of people who looked into it to be followers.
It's also interesting to see why so many on the left are suddenly against these supposed lefty policies, including pulling out of the middle east.
Cars contribute immeasurably more to CO2 emission. What to really do something? Force govt agencies to buy electric cars only. Yes, it is more costly, it requires an infrastructure, but it will work, and it is beneficial in the long run because it creates jobs and is basically the same as spending on infrastructure projects which all governments love (employment, kickbacks, hype).
Closing the mines is a big step forward. Firstly it sent a very clear signal to everyone that coal is going away, and as such industries that rely on it have been switching to alternatives. They delay to 2019 was to allow that it happen.
Even the remaining coal fired power plants are changing. Many are relatively new, replacing older more polluting ones with designs that allow them to better integrate into a grid high a high level of renewable energy. There are far fewer of them too. For example Spain is back to 1980s level of coal powered electricity generation and headed down.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Speaking of misinformation, are you really trotting out the old "send us back to the stone age" bullshit?
When adults talk about this they recognize that no-one wants that, they just have different proposals for how to make life better. They also understand that the effects are fairly well understood at this point, as are the solutions and more important the politics of the solutions.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
It was no more reasonable for the average person to be skeptical twenty years ago, not even slightly. There was consensus along climate scientists then, and people aren't generally any better educated on science now than they were then. Most of them knew jack then, and they still know jack now. Either way the reasonable thing is to trust the people who know more than you do. For the plumber to expect to be trusted in matters of shit and then refuse to trust scientists in matters of science is a truly pathetic disconnect.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Trumps economics are pretty far left. Protectionism, propping up failing industries, making promises to support labour are all left policies.
Except for probably the biggest economic choice of the left which is a social safety net of some sort. Hopefully he'll grab hold of that too, with the effects you describe.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
The effects are less well known however.
And I call strawman right there.
We know that life as we know it depends on a very narrow margin of conditions. Miniscule changes can have dramatic impact. The eco-system is a chaotic system, speaking strictly mathematically. It is stable within small margins, and can easily go into various runaway positive feedback loops. We have already seen in multiple cases how the introduction of one foreign species can impact a local ecology.
We do not need to know the exact effects to understand that there is a considerable risk involved that has a very real probability of causing damage in amounts that we haven't yet heard about in connection with currency values. Trillions will be the pocket change when we're talking about large parts of coastlines affected.
The other problem we don't know is the economics. How will it affect progress? How will you pay for the solution?
Unlike climate, economics is not a natural system, but an artifical one. Despite all the bullshit rhetorics that makes it seem like economics is some kind of higher power, we humans decide how it works and where it goes. Anyone who tells you the opposite stands to profit from that falsehood.
If you have one system that is based on the laws of physics, and one system that is entirely man-made, it should be clear to anyone with three working brain-cells which system needs to adapt, because there is only one that can be adapted.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
I see the problem.
You're arguing as if they were skeptics and therefore open to new evidence, whereas you are in fact arguing with cynics who don't give a damn about the evidence.
What's more, you're arguing with puritanical cynics, who in the words of a Victorian author, are insensibly drawn to choosing the facts to fit their theories.
There's no point. In terms of effort, it would be easier to find ways to build a functioning Biosphere II on Mars and move there.
Actual climate skeptics, they're worth talking to, because a skeptic is convinced by data and reason. A cynic isn't and never will be. There aren't many skeptics, they looked at the data and were convinced.
And, yes, some were paid a great deal by rich cynics to find faults. What they found was that there was no fault. The science was sound. The cynics these days try to pretend that never happened. Ruins the narrative.
You can't pretend people are paid to get a given result when you pay them to get the opposite and they still get the same result.
Mind you, I doubt that anyone was paying the scientists back in 1896 to talk about AGW.
But, then, thus is about facts and the cynics don't want those.
I'm not sure what they do want, as they mostly oppose their supposed beliefs of Libertarianism in their opposition to AGW. So I reject utterly the thesis that this is for such political beliefs or, indeed, for anything. It is purely cynical reactionary conduct.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Most of them aren't idiots: they're old people. It's a perfectly rational decision for them to pretend climate change doesn't exist, because fixing it will cost them money while bringing them none of the benefits. Who cares if it bankrupts their children or grandchildren? It's the same approach they've taken to national budgeting: cut taxes today, let the next generation pay for the debt after we're dead.
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Which part of ""mining proletariat" left" don't you get?
There is not even an automotive proletariat anymore. All industries are done by machines.
"You'll be surprised how backwards and sad it is compared to your sofa and your computer games." :D I mostly live in Europe, idiot. There is nothing backward here. The other part of the year Iive in Asia, mostly Thailand, there is absolutely nothing backward here either. No idea in what shit hole you live, though.
Haha
Hint: the mining and steel industry used to have _millions_ yes, in a country of 60 million people at that time (80million now), we had _millions_ of workers in coal mines and the steel industry. Now, 2019, it is perhaps not even 10,000. If you want to call that a 'proletariat', up to you. There are probably more software engineers working at Thyssen-Krupp-Stahl than engineers/workers in actual smelters or other steel manufacturing facilities.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.