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

bbc.com

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

#41

Post by minkeymaniac »

polka_haunts_us wrote: post #11
badRNG wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Source? Anecdotally most folks I know have had to burn through their savings after living off of unemployment or going through underemployment this past year.

Anecdotally as someone in a family all of whom are thriving financially during the pandemic, here are possible reasons it could be true. * My student loan payments are frozen, I believe the total balance of student loans that are frozen is something like 85% country wide. * People working remotely = low transit expenses. * No live events = low entertainment expenses. * Raging pandemic = low travel expenses. * Investm…

And don't forget clothing... no need to get new outfits if you are home... no dry cleaning if you wore suits ...

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

#42

Post by dnautics »

remarkEon wrote: post #15
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.

I've had this thought, but it's a thought experiment that I kinda don't want to go engage in. I've also been wondering if the death toll in the US is so high because, well, Americans are just really unhealthy and overweight and that increased morbidity in a way that was unique in the world. Non-compliance with stay-at-home and mask wearing obviously didn't help, but I can't shake the feeling that the structural probl…

> I've also been wondering if the death toll in the US is so high because, well, Americans are just really unhealthy and overweight and that increased morbidity in a way that was unique in the world..

Don't forget that the EU (at the moment) has a higher overall per-capita mortality rate than the US, and it looks like wave 3 is waning in both geographies. Interestingly enough, morbidity figures are much higher in the US, but that could be a self-reporting/self-testing issue, or even false positive rate of the tests, etc.

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

#43

Post by jackdeansmith »

RobRivera wrote: post #39
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.

heat loss in power distribution is nontrivial

In the US at least, transmission loss seems to be on order of 5% of total energy distributed. Source: https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=105&t=3#:~:text=Th....

The economies of scale seem to be much larger. For example, utility scale solar seems to be about half the unit cost compared to residential and commercial solar: https://www.nrel.gov/analysis/solar-installed-system-cost.ht...

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

#44

Post by whimsicalism »

mrfredward wrote: post #38
badRNG wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Source? Anecdotally most folks I know have had to burn through their savings after living off of unemployment or going through underemployment this past year.

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.

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

#45

Post by ozborn »

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…

The problem is that hydrogen is more likely to be made with steam-methane reforming, not electrolysis using clean energy sources.

It is also difficult to store, so I suspect the hydrogen ship has sailed.

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

#46

Post by whimsicalism »

remarkEon wrote: post #15
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.

I've had this thought, but it's a thought experiment that I kinda don't want to go engage in. I've also been wondering if the death toll in the US is so high because, well, Americans are just really unhealthy and overweight and that increased morbidity in a way that was unique in the world. Non-compliance with stay-at-home and mask wearing obviously didn't help, but I can't shake the feeling that the structural probl…

> if the death toll in the US is so high because, well, Americans are just really unhealthy and overweight and that increased morbidity

But the US doesn't have a higher IFR than most European countries. The difference in number of dead has to do with a. the population differences, b. differences in proportion infected.

The gaps between France and the US in per capita deaths, for instance, are not that huge.

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

#47

Post by throwawaysea »

jackdeansmith wrote: post #33
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.

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 those fuels. But it is easy to store a lot of those fuels for an extended period of time. It's not really practical to do so for electricity, however. A Tesla Powerwall is much much more expensive than a tank, and only stores 13.5 kWh.

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

#48

Post by snoshy »

jackdeansmith wrote: post #33
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.

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 seemingly small losses do start to add up and matter.

Decentralization brings an obvious benefit - if power is consumed near generation, you need less infrastructure to distribute it, thereby lowering costs. Once we start adding large numbers of EVs charging at home, our energy consumption will tilt more and more towards the home, making generation and consumption on the spot much more efficient and useful.

Another benefit of decentralization is grid resilience. Removing single points of failure by distributing them means that large scale power outages (while already infrequent) would become less frequent.

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

#49

Post by gecko »

ozborn wrote: post #45
gecko wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

The problem is that hydrogen is more likely to be made with steam-methane reforming, not electrolysis using clean energy sources. It is also difficult to store, so I suspect the hydrogen ship has sailed.

Yep, and that's a very legitimate concern and why I'm certainly not bullish about hydrogen. I just don't want to reflexively throw it out; sufficient energy production from clean sources would make electrolysis quite reasonable, even if it's not ideal, and there are approaches to handling the storage, too, if that ends up being the last bit. I suspect, based on current trends and sciences, that we'll see better batteries instead, but I don't see harm in continuing to look at hydrogen for now.

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

#50

Post by whimsicalism »

fasteddie31003 wrote: post #29
remarkEon wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had this thought, but it's a thought experiment that I kinda don't want to go engage in. I've also been wondering if the death toll in the US is so high because, well, Americans are just really unhealthy and overweight and that increased morbidity in a way that was unique in the world. Non-compliance with stay-at-home and mask wearing obviously didn't help, but I can't shake the feeling that the structural probl…

I actually love uncomfortable thought experiments. My recent one I've been asking my friends is how many years of the current lockdown would you trade with getting the virus and all the issues that go along with that but then being over the lockdown. My number is 1 more year of the current lockdown. My girlfriend's is 3 years.

To be clear, you're saying you would rather have one more year of lockdown than get the virus? And your girlfriend would rather have 3 years?

For me, 0 - the reason I lockdown is out concern for others, I am not personally worried of the impact Covid would have on me.

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