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Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

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Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#311

Post by DoingIsLearning »

tekknik wrote: post #305
DoingIsLearning wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> consumer demand drives industry And industry lobby drives government policy and regulation. Industry apologism will not help us move towards mitigating climate crisis effects. Industry has externalized most of their environmental costs, this needs to change ASAP.

What is your solution for bulk transport, last mile, etc?

You are asking the wrong question. _Total_ Road transport emissions is 11.9% of CO2 emissions. It is still a lot but it will probably be the hardest to get rid of due to the whole car-centric infrastructure.

- Energy use in buildings is 17.5% of CO2 emissions

- Energy use in Industry is 24.4% of CO2 Emissions, The steel industry alone accounts for 7% of global emissions of CO2

The _number_one_priority_ is to force out Coal and Methane Gas from the Energy production sector and heating. That alone would cut global emissions by more than 40%.

This is a gigantic step because it solely depends on government energy policy, Infrastructure investiment, and also requires us to advance against an extremely embedded lobby of both Coal and Oil&Gas.

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#312

Post by Gordonjcp »

ornornor wrote: post #302
Gordonjcp wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't feed livestock soy, it's too expensive. The animal feed that contains soy is made from the stuff that humans can't eat - roughly 80% of the plant mass of soy is simply inedible by humans. If you've got a clever trick for using this without running it through a cow, you'll be rich. Otherwise, what are you going to do with it? Pile it up and let it rot, releasing even more carbon dioxide and methane?

These two pages, the kurzgesagt video linked above, and virtually every source I came across before all say cow feed uses corn, maize, soy. Not the human inedible parts but the actual cereals/beans: https://vetmedicinebd.com/list-of-cattle-feed-ingredients/ and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cattle_feeding . You won’t do me once me that feeding cows food humans could eat is a good thing, or that raising meat isn’t a…

I've never in my life seen people feeding corn, maize, or soy that is human-edible to cattle. I can't imagine why you'd do that, either, because it's not very nutritious for them and there's a limitless amount of grazing.

Is it possible you're concentrating your view of livestock farming to the very artificial "feedlots" that they have in parts of the US where there's basically nothing for anyone to eat and no water?

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#313

Post by ZeroGravitas »

tekknik wrote: post #309
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I'm thinking that such people, if they exist at all, are heavily outnumbered by the people saying * Not actually physically possible * Its just coal powered * It's worse for the environment because batteries die after 3 years * Rare earths!! * Subsidized foolishness * Toys for rich people * Communism And weirdly those people all get paid to write op-eds in right wing tabloids.

What are you even saying here? > And weirdly those people all get paid to write op-eds in right wing tabloids. Oh, spreading hate. Got it.

Yes, let's pretend that there wasn't an organised campaign to discredit EVs, even though basic science made it clear they would be superior, even if you ignored climate change.

And why would you ignore climate change? Possibly because of the organised campaign to discredit the idea even though basic science made it clear it was a problem.

But now, they'll deny that crime against humanity even happened. "No one actually denied climate change they were just worried about government overreach" while demial is still being done by the same people.

It was all published in newspapers, we have it on record. We have academic studies of how many times certain newspapers admitted that climate change was caused by humans in their op-eds.

We have databases that track their lies over decades:

https://www.partnershipforresponsiblegrowth.org/research-1/c...

But no, now the people who let themselves be convinced by those lies bizarrely blame "Greens" or "environmentalists" for complaiming that EVs were too easy. Which despite being obvious lies doesn't seem to be considered "hate", but pointing out the well documented truth is?

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#314

Post by npteljes »

suoduandao2 wrote: post #228
npteljes wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And individual behavior is just the result of the culture and the systems that surround us. We can campaign for individual change all day long, and they'll have less effect than what legislation could bring. In fact I don't think individuals have much choice. They can inconvenience, or hinder themselves, in what effectively amount to a race amongst each other, or they can participate as fully as they can, thereby als…

Politics is downstream from culture though. Mr Money Mustache and those like him are doing a huge amount for politics as well, just by making nonconsumerism sexy on an individual scale. There's always this chicken-and-egg problem where legislation is talked about as though it could make us want different things, when in fact, the electorate wanting what it wants now, such legislation would be a losing horse for any p…

>Making the moral choice seem attractive to one's neighbours is what I'd call true aikido.

I agree especially with this, but with the rest of your comment as well. Culture, politics, economy go hand-in-hand, with no clean initiator among them. I currently think that everyone should try their best, and that those with more influence have more responsibility as well.

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#315

Post by franga2000 »

tekknik wrote: post #304
franga2000 wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that people benefit from something is not enough to assign any blame to them. Even if alternatives exist (they often don't), if they require a significant trade-off, blame is minimal. Even when it comes to buying products it's a tough sell - I know my phone battery is made with slave labor, but it's not like I can choose to buy the one that isn't. So when it comes to industry, we share exactly 0% of the blam…

> I know my phone battery is made with slave labor, but it's not like I can choose to buy the one that isn't. But you can choose to go without the phone that requires the battery. Now I know the canned response is “it’s not practical these days to not have a smart phone”, but going without one will not kill you. If the only phone available killed one person for every phone sold would you still demand to have one?

Ok, so let's say I don't have a phone. But computers contain thousands of components, many of which contain minerals mined by slaves. So no computer either. Without access to the internet, there's almost no way to get a job. Nevertheless, I go to the employment center and say that my only condition is that the job does not require me to interact with any computers or other devices that contain minerals mined by slaves. None exist, so I go home unemployed (to an apartment building built by an oil tycoon in the 80s). Now I'm hungry, so I walk barefoot and naked (clothing is often is made by child labourers and with no regard for environmental impact) to the shop. Good thing I don't live in North America so I can actually go places without driving a (planet-killing) car! At the store, I want to buy some bread and vegetables, but discover that a rainforest was cut down to build the field where the wheat was grown and dangerous pesticides were used on the vegetables, leaking into the soil and poisoning the groundwater for the locals. Back home, I close the main central heating valve - it's powered by a coal plant after all. It's winter. It's now a race to see what kills me first - hypothermia, starvation or the random infection I got last week from a small cut that I refused antibiotics for because they were developed with animal testing.

So who is the criminal here? Me, right now, using my 6 year old phone on the bus? Or is it the capitalists who pushed hypothetical me to the brink of death for trying to live "sin"-free and the politicians who oppose any attempt to keep them accountable?

And more importantly, what's the solution? Because going full Amish isn't nearly as scalable as you might think.

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#316

Post by n4r9 »

Gordonjcp wrote: post #275
hardlianotion wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think Glasgow is t-short weather all year round, you are quite inured to the cold and wet.

Glasgow is drier than Rome, and on average about 5° cooler at any given time of year.

Glasgow average rainfall (https://www.holiday-weather.com/glasgow/averages/):

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec

mm 130 90 120 50 60 70 70 60 80 110 100

Rome average rainfall (https://www.holiday-weather.com/rome/averages/):

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec

mm 25 20 19 18 33 6 7 0 42 38 49 96 120

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you mean by "drier" ?

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#317

Post by teddyh »

belorn wrote: post #195
dakr wrote: post #10

Not to minimize the impact to ocean life and the environment, but lost fishing gear costs money. The upside of which is that there is direct financial incentive to recover lost gear. I know nothing about this space, but a former coworker started a company about ten years ago in part to allow fishers to track and recover their gear: https://www.blueoceangear.com/

It depend a lot on the kind of fishing operation. At small scale the fishing gear is a large part of the investment. This is why repairing nets is a large part of those peoples time. Tracking is a nice technological solution, through at small scale the money is tight and local knowledge usually mean that they know where the net is by memory/intuition and keeping track of where the winds/currents are going. Large scal…

> The law require them to dispose broken nets at landfills but that is a cost center.

You could fix that by moving the cost. Make nets really expensive to purchase, and instead give a deposit back at the landfill. This way, there would be a profit in properly disposing of nets.

Of course, it might not be practical to suddenly have to watch for contraband smuggled nets at the borders.

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#318

Post by JohnJamesRambo »

freeqaz wrote: post #96
JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For people that don’t know the math behind this, it is astounding. >when you double the weight per axle, you increase the road damage by 16 times >For example, while a truck axle carrying 18,000 pounds is only 9 times heavier than a 2,000-pound automobile axle, it does 5,000 times more damage.

Mind throwing a resource that I could review about this? I'd love to share it with my friends, as well.

The gao report is good and here is discussion of the equation.

https://www.insidescience.org/news/how-much-damage-do-heavy-...

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#319

Post by foxyv »

causality0 wrote: post #55
epistasis wrote: post #24

To place this in context, it's 50,000 tons/year of fishing waste, versus 200,000 tons/year of microplastics from car tires: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jul/14/car-tyre... Further, microplastics enter the ecosystem far easier than the bulky big plastic from fishing gear, so the tire microplastics should be far more concerning to people. It's really weird how cars get a pass for so much. Try to live a…

It's really weird how cars get a pass for so much. It's really weird how trucks get a pass from people who don't give cars a pass. If tire wear is proportional to road wear, the majority of tire-originating microplastics is from semi trucks, not commuter sedans.

The answer as always is TRAINS! MORE TRAINS! For the love of the Earth and all that is sacred we need more trains! Trams, commuter rail, low gauge freight, high speed rail, street cars, metros and parks with little trains to ride on! Not rubber or plastic, steel on steel!

Cars should be something that only a few people really need. Unfortunately auto makers and oil companies have had a huge influence on our government and society since World War II. The result is this stupid nonsense where you can't even go to a GROCERY STORE without some form of car. Where our train tracks are rotting and rail lines are slowly disappearing. Where you can't even go out your back door without seeing a monstrously loud big rig turning acres of asphalt into rutted gravel.

Re: Fishing gear accounts for an alarming amount of plastic in oceans (2021)

#320

Post by airstrike »

franga2000 wrote: post #315
tekknik wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know my phone battery is made with slave labor, but it's not like I can choose to buy the one that isn't. But you can choose to go without the phone that requires the battery. Now I know the canned response is “it’s not practical these days to not have a smart phone”, but going without one will not kill you. If the only phone available killed one person for every phone sold would you still demand to have one?

Ok, so let's say I don't have a phone. But computers contain thousands of components, many of which contain minerals mined by slaves. So no computer either. Without access to the internet, there's almost no way to get a job. Nevertheless, I go to the employment center and say that my only condition is that the job does not require me to interact with any computers or other devices that contain minerals mined by slave…

Just wanted to say this was incredibly satisfying to read. Well said.
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