Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
theguardian.com
Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
1–10 of 48 posts
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#2Title seems to be "How to spot the difference between a real climate policy and greenwashing guff"
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#3I enjoyed hearing electric cars called "external combustion engines" given that in most countries (at least mine) the electricity used to charge the car still mostly comes from fossil fuel. In such cases all we're doing is adding an extra lossy conversion between chemical and kinetic energy, potentially making it worse. Yet people buy such cars and feel great about themselves. I am reminded of the South Park episode where a cloud of smog across the town is replaced by a cloud of smug.
Why are we incentivising electric cars at purchase rather than incentivising the use of green energy to charge them?
(Edited to add "potentially" before "making it worse" given a comment below)
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#4A guy from the village I grew up in became a millionaire with a business processing old EUR-pallets into wood chips.
Now he's getting into "sustainable" energy based on burning those woodchips. Note that this isn't about electricity, it's about delivering heat or steam from a "sustainable" source. From what I gather (through village gossip, admittedly) is that the whole process is, and I know this will piss off some people here when I say this but hear me out, heavily underregulated: nobody checks for whether the wood being burned might have been chemically treated, no need for air filters on the small furnaces being built shockingly close to villages, no problem if the hot steam from the furnace crosses half a km of open field without insulating the pipes, and so on.
And he gets millions in government subsidies of course, because "green" energy.
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#5I enjoyed hearing electric cars called "external combustion engines" given that in most countries (at least mine) the electricity used to charge the car still mostly comes from fossil fuel. In such cases all we're doing is adding an extra lossy conversion between chemical and kinetic energy, potentially making it worse. Yet people buy such cars and feel great about themselves. I am reminded of the South Park episode…
Don't power plants have higher efficiency than ICEs anyway, even if combined with the efficiency of electric engines? Correct me if I am wrong.
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#6Title seems to be "How to spot the difference between a real climate policy and greenwashing guff"
Yeah, the title seems to be against HN editorial policy.
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#7I enjoyed hearing electric cars called "external combustion engines" given that in most countries (at least mine) the electricity used to charge the car still mostly comes from fossil fuel. In such cases all we're doing is adding an extra lossy conversion between chemical and kinetic energy, potentially making it worse. Yet people buy such cars and feel great about themselves. I am reminded of the South Park episode…
Don't power plants have higher efficiency than ICEs anyway, even if combined with the efficiency of electric engines? Correct me if I am wrong.
Depending on transmission losses, yes. Theoretically, power plants could also have better exhaust scrubbing and carbon capture, but most currently don't.
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#8I enjoyed hearing electric cars called "external combustion engines" given that in most countries (at least mine) the electricity used to charge the car still mostly comes from fossil fuel. In such cases all we're doing is adding an extra lossy conversion between chemical and kinetic energy, potentially making it worse. Yet people buy such cars and feel great about themselves. I am reminded of the South Park episode…
I’m not sure what country you live in, so this may not apply to you, but most countries, including mine (USA) do heavily incentivize the use of green energy. Globally, renewable energy growth is accelerating, now that costs have come down so far. It’s both/and, not either/or.
One other thing is that EVs have huge potential for energy storage. Smart energy policy will effectively use EVs as both a source and sink. In the daytime, when solar is dominant, EVs can charge at work. At night, they can discharge and power your home (V2G). There aren’t many EVs that do this currently (there aren’t many EVs at all currently), but many, like the F150 Electric, will.
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#9The bullshit is double dipped as well. You can push bullshit policy and then you can push FUD againts good policy by claiming its just greenwashing. It happens in every corner of politics but its pretty frustrating none the less.
Re: Goodbye climate deniers, hello climate bullshitters
#10I enjoyed hearing electric cars called "external combustion engines" given that in most countries (at least mine) the electricity used to charge the car still mostly comes from fossil fuel. In such cases all we're doing is adding an extra lossy conversion between chemical and kinetic energy, potentially making it worse. Yet people buy such cars and feel great about themselves. I am reminded of the South Park episode…
Don't power plants have higher efficiency than ICEs anyway, even if combined with the efficiency of electric engines? Correct me if I am wrong.
That's a good question, I don't know the answer to that. One thing to include though is transmission loss to get the electricity to the place it's needed. And at the same time of course include the energy used to get petrol to a gas guzzling car. In other words, the comparison needs to be fair, and that doesn't sound like an easy analysis. I'd be interested to hear from anyone that knows more about this.