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Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

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Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#51

Post by snoshy »

whimsicalism wrote: post #44
mrfredward wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

St Louis Federal Reserve: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PSAVERT Keep in mind this is savings economy wide divided by personal income economy wide, so people with big numbers (high earners) disproportionately affect it.

This has to do with the stimulus checks.

But also because households have lower expenses due to not being able to engage with the service industry, travel, shopping, and leisure expenditures. People are simply spending less because they're stuck at home.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#52

Post by dd_roger »

kristopolous wrote: post #14
cblconfederate wrote: post #6

Yeah but people already miss being stuck in traffic and their daily commute so it's not going to last

I've heard people actually say this. The horror, the horror.

Granted my commute is a 20 minutes walk so I don't get the The True American Commute Experience (TM) but working from home is a miserable experience as far as I'm concerned. Having the possibility to do it once in a while is nice though to make time for appointments or being done earlier to go out after work.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#53

Post by jackdeansmith »

snoshy wrote: post #48
jackdeansmith wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why de-centralized power generation? I was under the impression that the electrical distribution system is very efficient in the US and economies of scale make large scale renewables much cheaper.

Electrical distribution in the US is actually aging quite badly and is in deep need of replacement of large parts of it. Inefficiency isn't entirely the problem, although many (including me) would argue that it isn't as efficient as it could be. DC power transmission at high voltages is now feasible due to new technologies, and it is more efficient as well as easier to step up/down. At large scale, even such seemingl…

100% agree about grid modernization and resilience being high priorities, but as I pointed out in another comment, the economies of scale for renewables are really really massive (utility scale solar is about half the unit cost of residential and commercial rooftop solar). Transmitting power long distance also partially solves intermittence problems with renewables by allowing overcapacity in one region to power extra demand in another. A bunch of good points for sure, but if I had to bet, I would guess that the future of our energy system involves far more long distance transmission and large installations.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#54

Post by jackdeansmith »

throwawaysea wrote: post #47
jackdeansmith wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why de-centralized power generation? I was under the impression that the electrical distribution system is very efficient in the US and economies of scale make large scale renewables much cheaper.

For me, I just like the idea of self-reliance and being able to function in the event of an issue with the grid. I've unfortunately experienced weather events that have led to 2 week outages of power, for example. Fossil fuels provide that security and benefit to some degree, and also have the added bonus of transportability. Yes it is not self-reliance in the sense that you still depend on a supply chain to produce…

I dig the idea of self reliance and preparedness, but like you pointed out, fossil fuels and small generators solve the problem really well. In most places in the US, the grid is pretty reliable so optimizing the system for those handful of days/year doesn't seem prudent. Granted, some places (looking at you California) have a lot of work to do on reliability.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#55

Post by cableshaft »

citilife wrote: post #25
savanaly wrote: post #10

Is it possible that Sars-cov-2 epidemic will eventually save more lives than it cost, through the long term and short term effects of decreased pollution and climate change? If that's true, we have to entertain the theory that the virus was purposefully initiated by a time-traveler charged with averting climate catastrophe through the only means possible.

> Is it possible that Sars-cov-2 epidemic will eventually save more lives than it cost, through the long term and short term effects of decreased pollution and climate change? Climate change wont directly lead to death, we'll have to adapt, but there are models showing more food produced from climate change. Simply put, we don't know what potentially will happen. We highly suspect there are 150 thousand increase in d…

If it's 250 million people that have Covid-19, we'd nearly at herd immunity levels already, at least for the population that can be exposed to the virus.

The numbers should be going way, way down already, as there are a good number of people who aren't exposing themselves to the virus hardly at all (My wife and I are two of them, but it has to be in the millions of people that are limiting their exposure).

Plus the US has vaccinated >17.5 million people, so subtract that from the population and that 250 million estimate, and there would only be 60 million more people who could catch it (assuming no reinfections).

The newest data I can find on this is from the CDC and they've estimated that through December 2020 that 83 million Americans have been infected[1] (and I saw something dated November 27 where they estimated that 53 million[2] had it, so 30 million new infections in December). To get to that 250 million estimate we would have had to have 167 million new infections in less than a month, or more than tripled all the infections we had up until now. That seems very unlikely.

Also their estimate is that 1 in 4.6 of Covid infections are being reported, not 1 in 10 like that Business Insider article (which is dated July 2020, looks like they revised the ratio since).

[1] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burd...

[2] https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/covid-2020-11-27/card/vNksh...

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#56

Post by tryptophan »

gecko wrote: post #34
r00fus wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, everything except the hydrogen part sounds like a good move.

Hydrogen as part is totally reasonable. It gives us hydrocarbon density without us needing to add to the CO2 in the atmosphere. The important thing to remember when discussing it is that it's an energy storage medium, not an energy generation medium. Most of the time I get irritated is when people treat hydrogen as the latter. But if our culture is just too damn wedded to cars for now, and battery tech just isn't the…

IMO ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen.

It doesn't cause metals to become brittle. Its relatively stable. It doesn't require as low temperature or as high pressure to liquidize. It also stores ~50% more hydrogen per volume, as each ammonia has 3 hydrogen, unlike elemental hydrogen with just 2.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#57

Post by citilife »

xur17 wrote: post #35
citilife wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is it possible that Sars-cov-2 epidemic will eventually save more lives than it cost, through the long term and short term effects of decreased pollution and climate change? Climate change wont directly lead to death, we'll have to adapt, but there are models showing more food produced from climate change. Simply put, we don't know what potentially will happen. We highly suspect there are 150 thousand increase in d…

> Given 25 million have tested positive, by the prior estimates, that means a likely 250 million Americans have already gotten covid [4] Considering there are 328 million Americans, that would mean 76% of Americans have had the disease, which I believe would be sufficient for herd immunity. Given what case counts look like, I find that extremely unlikely.

They've been counting any flu related illness as COVID, hospitals also get additional funds for COVID-19 hospitalizations. Only a handful of influenza tests have even been ran: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/

In all likelihood, yes we are nearing heard immunity and we're done with the illness.

Further, there's an issue with the PCR testing. Though there have been reports since August - October 2020, published in November 2020:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/346483715_External_...

Basically, they started over amplifying the DNA and weren't controlling the PCR tests very well. Here's the original WHO warning in December 2020

https://web.archive.org/web/20210102051357/https://www.who.i...

(Since... the page has been deleted, but followed later)

With the official statement January 19, 2020:

https://www.who.int/news/item/19-01-2021-who-information-not...

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#58

Post by ip26 »

r00fus wrote: post #31
youeseh wrote: post #4

Sounds like de-centralized power generation, maximizing remote work, and delivery vehicles powered by electricity and hydrogen is the way forward.

Yeah, everything except the hydrogen part sounds like a good move.

Maybe not for delivery vehicles, but a combo of batteries plus green hydrogen fuel cell might enable long haul airplanes. Hybrids, if you will.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#59

Post by snoshy »

jackdeansmith wrote: post #53
snoshy wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electrical distribution in the US is actually aging quite badly and is in deep need of replacement of large parts of it. Inefficiency isn't entirely the problem, although many (including me) would argue that it isn't as efficient as it could be. DC power transmission at high voltages is now feasible due to new technologies, and it is more efficient as well as easier to step up/down. At large scale, even such seemingl…

100% agree about grid modernization and resilience being high priorities, but as I pointed out in another comment, the economies of scale for renewables are really really massive (utility scale solar is about half the unit cost of residential and commercial rooftop solar). Transmitting power long distance also partially solves intermittence problems with renewables by allowing overcapacity in one region to power extr…

Fair point about the unit costs being drastically lower due to economies of scale. As with any large scale infrastructure, it will certainly be a mix of both local generation and utility scale transmitted power. The real question is where the balance of the two will end up. Either way, distributed generation at scale will be a unique phenomenon that hasn't been seen before, and will certainly result in quite a bit of disruption throughout the industry.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#60

Post by cobookman »

snoshy wrote: post #48
jackdeansmith wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why de-centralized power generation? I was under the impression that the electrical distribution system is very efficient in the US and economies of scale make large scale renewables much cheaper.

Electrical distribution in the US is actually aging quite badly and is in deep need of replacement of large parts of it. Inefficiency isn't entirely the problem, although many (including me) would argue that it isn't as efficient as it could be. DC power transmission at high voltages is now feasible due to new technologies, and it is more efficient as well as easier to step up/down. At large scale, even such seemingl…

Decentralization is also in the National Security interest. Makes it much harder for an adversary to take down large swaths of the US Grid.
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