Yeah it was clear last year that Manchin was aiming for nothing whatsoever. I imagine nothing passes this time too. And there goes the next 10+ more years of inaction. Combined with the 30-40 years of courts acting against any action whatsoever.

Leaves little option but to unionize workplaces and start striking, and shift to the state and local level.

I kind of love your optimism even during the election cycle when I saw no reason to be optimistic about Biden.

I bought this in the meantime:



And looking into building this in France:

And there goes the next 10+ more years of inaction. Combined with the 30-40 years of courts acting against any action whatsoever. — Xtrix

And China along with Europe will most definitely overtake the US in the green tech revolution since the US is incapable of getting it's act together on just about anything.

Leaves little option but to unionize workplaces and start striking, and shift to the state and local level. — Xtrix

Well, might as well leave this here, since I don't want to end this on a down note:

That’s pretty cool.

So you see all of this as inevitable? Better to just get away from it?

I hope you’re wrong, if that’s the case.



Pomerantz has the right idea.

And China along with Europe will most definitely overtake the US in the green tech revolution since the US is incapable of getting it's act together on just about anything. — Mr Bee

I wouldn't underestimate the ability of the USA to become a frontrunner because a lot of people do see the problem. Just because politics is filled with dinosaurs, doesn't mean the citizenry is.

That’s pretty cool.

So you see all of this as inevitable? Better to just get away from it?

I hope you’re wrong, if that’s the case. — Xtrix

Unfortunately yes. I see no awareness with most people in power. Still fucking around with more immediate crises, which will always pop up. While Sunak wants to tackle inflation again and Biden is writing a cheque for 50 billion the world is burning.

And over 800 thousand years:
graph-co2-temp-nasa.gif?ssl=1 — Xtrix

Absolutely, But according to that graphic, CO2 level and temperature are cyclical covariates steady over the past 800,000 years

Sure but there is only so much that can be done the local level. In spite of being the world's biggest emitter the Chinese have invested more in renewables than any other country by far, and that will likely continue as they wish to dominate the world economy. As an authoritarian government they can pretty much allocate as many resources as they want towards this end.

Meanwhile the US is barely capable of operating either because of corruption or tribalism. Simply put, they're incapable of meeting the moment.

WASHINGTON — President Biden bowed to political reality on Friday, conceding that he had been unable to persuade a holdout coal-state Democrat, or any Republicans in the Senate, to back legislation that had been his greatest hope to confront the climate crisis.

Ending more than a year of fruitless negotiations over a proposal to push the nation’s electricity and transportation sectors away from fossil fuels, Mr. Biden said Friday he was instead prepared to “take strong executive action to meet this moment.”

Even for a president who has prided himself on compromise and the art of the possible, it was a marked retreat, one driven by the economic and political challenges of rampant inflation.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/15/climate/biden-inflation-climate-manchin.html

In hindsight, about ten years from now, this will be recognised as one of those watershed moments when the battle was lost.

t, about ten years from now, this will be recognised as one of those watershed moments when the battle was lost. — Wayfarer

It’s not lost by a long shot.

I hope you’re right but there’s a lot going against it. Even if everyone was in agreement it would still be very hard.

In hindsight, about ten years from now, this will be recognised as one of those watershed moments when the battle was lost. — Wayfarer

It sucks but it really wasn't that much money last I checked. $300 billion over 10 years is like 15% the cost of Afghanistan. The US spends twice that much a year annually on the military.

If only if it was a war, then this would've been solved two decades ago with unlimited budget.

The US just overwhelmingly endorsed $40 billion in spending for Ukraine (I suppose inflation didn't matter there) and the budget for that war in the end of it all will probably dwarf the costs of this bill, so you're not wrong on that one.

Well on the bright side Europe is probably gonna be forced to taking the transition more seriously this time now that they are effectively at war with Russia.

Well on the bright side Europe is probably gonna be forced to taking the transition more seriously this time now that they are effectively at war with Russia. — Mr Bee

Put aside the hypocrisy of European leaders all of a sudden wanting actual clean energy to "save Ukraine" and "show Putin" ... yet somehow the entire world and most things that dwell upon the world wasn't good enough all these years?!

Cutting ties with Russia simply forces a return to coal and dirtier fuels.

For large electricity grid based economies, until (1) renewable energy storage is economic and (2) there's enough over-capacity of renewable energy to fill up said storage, then natural gas is required to develop the renewable energy system to accomplish both 1 and 2.

It just so happens that coal and nuclear cannot adjust their output rapidly to compensate fluctuations in renewable energy output. The larger the renewable energy capacity the larger the fluctuations can be, and therefore the larger the online capacity of a auxiliary power source is needed.

Just so happens that basically only natural gas and hydro have this characteristic (that output can be scaled up or down rapidly).

The gas deals and gas infrastructure with Russia was part of a coherent plan to develop renewable energy in Germany and friends. For, if you actually want to go towards 100% renewable, then you need very large natural gas capacity (both power plants and storage of natural gas) to cover a large majority of the grid for when both solar and wind output is minimal (which does happen; the truism that it is either sunny or windy is a "usually" kind of thing, but it can be both cloudy and not-windy).

But far more important than that, European elites have essentially thrown away all their political capital and economic clout in which to influence world policies.

The Ukraine crisis and cold-war "the reboot" effectively removes Europe as a player on the world stage.

We will need now to be relying now on the US, China and India, Russia Brazil et. al. to lead the way in environmental policies.

In short, Europe only had influence as a major economy within the globalised system; destroy that system by doing nothing to use said economic influence to avoid a disastrous European war, and Europe becomes completely irrelevant to global affairs.

US has "asserted its dominance" over its subordinates--what it wanted--but a gang leader that stays at the top by undermining the psychology, material wellbeing and dispossessing his underlings ... well, let's just say it's a double edged shiv.

(As a little footnote, burning biological material for electricity is just stupid and totally meaningless at the scales of concern.)

This is the kind of nonsense narrative being spewed to millions of Americans:

Temperatures in Texas climbed into the triple digits this week but this isn’t unusual. The problem is that wind power faltered, as it often does during hot spells.

From the WSJ.

Unprecedented heatwaves and wildfires: not unusual. Definitely not climate change related.

The problem? Renewable energy. So let’s dig for even MORE oil and gas and coal, and guarantee these scenarios continue and the world burns to the ground.

What's even the proposed connection between "faltering" wind power and a heat wave?

Or do they have problems with their "freedom" grid again?

For those interested, the reason the problem of renewables and backup capacity isn't talked about much is, to make a long story short, the media is dumb.

When renewable energy was in development stage, the media would report cost-per-watt figures of each project, leaving the reader with the strong impression that once solar and/or wind achieved cost-parity with fossils ... we win! Hurrah! Climate change solved.

The problem with this vapid analysis is two fold.

First, cost parity is a stupid metric in the context of fossil fuels being both directly subsidised, indirectly subsidised (such as a giant war machine required to protect shipping lanes and oil-despots--the "friendly" one's ... and also attack the "mean" oil despots), while not internalising the real costs. Using this as a metric is essentially buying into the fossil lobbies "frame" (aka. being their bitch without any capacity for independent thought) as conservative red pillers would say.

However, worse, even if we accept this framework, and just not question fossil fuels getting all these subsidies (let's say for the sake of argument we're morons), then, even so, cost parity with fossil's isn't a good metric.

The grid as designed pre-renewables, already required some level of rapid response in the event a power station went offline all-of-a-sudden the rest of the grid should rapidly compensate. However, this rapid response level, pre-renewables, is generally about 10 to 15% of the whole grid capacity.

So, the first renewable projects can be easily hooked up to the grid no problem as there's already a system to deal with small levels of variability.

However, let's say the grid stays the same and more renewable capacity is added, as this 10-15% level is approached already now there's the risk that the renewable power generation collapses and some other power plant goes offline unexpectedly at the same time ... so already this isn't good.

Push above this buffer zone and collapse of renewable power can collapse the whole grid, or then rolling blackouts are needed to reduce consumption.

Circling back to "grid parity" these added costs need to be included in the cost of solar / wind which, when done honestly, demonstrate the immense scale of our predicament. Energy storage on a large scale is a very large infrastructure project that requires decades to build even if the technologies required were cost-competitive with subsidised fossil. Add in some disruption to the global system as resource competition heats up, a few material bottle necks ... and ... its gone.

OP on how Joe Manchin has single-handedly torpedoed Biden's attempts to tackle climate change.

Over the past year, Mr. Manchin has taken more money from the oil and gas industry than any other member of Congress — including every Republican — according to federal filings. A Times investigation found that he also personally profited from coal, making roughly $5 million between 2010 and 2020 — about three times his Senate salary. Coal has made Mr. Manchin a millionaire, even as it has poisoned the air his own constituents in West Virginia breathe.

As Upton Sinclair put it: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it."

NY Times

Circling back to "grid parity" these added costs need to be included in the cost of solar / wind which, when done honestly, demonstrate the immense scale of our predicament. Energy storage on a large scale is a very large infrastructure project that requires decades to build even if the technologies required were cost-competitive with subsidised fossil. Add in some disruption to the global system as resource competition heats up, a few material bottle necks ... and ... its gone — boethius

:up: Says it in a nutshell. Things Greta Thunberg didn't think of when she became aware of the problem at the age of eight.

We will need now to be relying now on the US, China and India, Russia Brazil et. al. to lead the way in environmental policies. — boethius

Well Russia isn't exactly keen on stopping climate change (in large part due to it's reliance on it's gas), Brazil is currently run by a man who seems fine with letting the Amazon burn (at least hopefully until October), China is the world's biggest emitter currently, India isn't really that far off from China, and the US... well enough has already been said about that.

Pretty dark times indeed. Do you see any possible solution to this mess or has humanity royally screwed itself over for the foreseeable future?

Wow, I was just about to make a joke about how the right was gonna blame wind energy again for failing in the heat instead of the cold. Now I just feel unoriginal.

What's even the proposed connection between "faltering" wind power and a heat wave? — boethius

The claim is that renewables are bringing down the grid because they’re failing and putting pressure on the rest, which also fail.

They blamed the freeze last winter on renewables too, when it was actually refineries.

Just more fossil fuel propaganda, as usual.

None of these changes has nearly the impact that federal action would. But smaller changes can still add up — and even foster broader changes. Consider the vehicle market: By mandating electric vehicles, California and other states will lead automakers to build many more of them, likely spurring innovations and economies of scale that will reduce costs for everybody and thereby increase their use around the country.

It’s a reminder that climate change is one of those issues on which activists may be able to make more progress by focusing on grass-roots organizing than top-down change from Washington, especially in the current era of polarization. Locally, the politics of climate change can sometimes be less partisan than they are nationally, as Maggie Astor, a climate reporter at The Times, has written.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/18/briefing/extreme-heat-climate-fight-us-government.html

This is what I’ve been saying for several months now: local and state action.

The republicans — representing not only a small minority generally but a minority of voters — have managed to block every federal avenue for change on this issue, a particularly deadly one.

They have the judiciary and the congress. Whatever executive actions the president may take, it’s fairly short term and can be overridden.

They also have, since 2010, most state legislatures and have gerrymandered their way to keeping them for another 10 years at least (another huge story of the 2020 election that barely got coverage, but the results of which are now being felt— so much for focusing solely on national politics). They have the Majority of governorships.

So given this scenario, what else CAN be done other than work locally, within your state? New York and California are major players. Illinois, Colorado, Washington, Oregon, New Mexico— all blue states, all can be pushed farther. Ditto the East cost, where I live: New England can do more. Massachusetts, yes — but also and particularly New Hampshire, the only “swing” state in the region.

There’s town councils, city councils, and a range of commissions that can be appealed to or taken over. There are plenty of groups to join, protests to be made, direct actions to take— hopefully with help from the local media. Disruption and crisis needs to be created for them before they start listening.

Lastly, the labor movement needs to continue making gains and forming unions that are strike-ready. I would love to see more strikes for climate — not for wages or conditions, which are important too, but for climate action.

A lot of this, once narrowed down from the overwhelming and vague level of national drama, can be done.

Bone-chilling headline from the Wall Street Journal's editorial board.

The West’s Climate Policy Debacle
Utopian energy dreams are doing great economic and security damage.

"These are some of the unfolding results in the last year caused by the West’s utopian dream to punish fossil fuels and sprint to a world driven solely by renewable energy. It’s time for political leaders to recognize this manifest debacle and admit that, short of a technological breakthrough, the world will need an ample supply of carbon fuel for decades to remain prosperous and free."

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-wests-climate-policy-debacle-global-warming-energy-putin-russia-fossil-fuel-power-summer-heat-11658084481?mod=hp_opin_pos_1

One has no words.

Talk about religious fanaticism...

Paywall. Could you summarize?

Essentially, because of the energy crisis, the West should basically keep drilling and forget about green technology.

Only doing more digging and drilling will make the economy better.

, the usual "disconnect" is seen... :/ Of course economies, politics, etc, matter as well, yet nature doesn't care about our talking — without action, our environment will just go on its course — and that part ought to be part of the economical talk as well.

I see. Withdrawing from drugs can be fatal, so an addict probably should take drugs to avoid death. Same thing:

If we try to abruptly withdraw from fossil fuels use, people will die from that, so we should withdraw more slowly.

We will need a transition, of course we cannot one month to another, or a year, stop all consumption of fossil fuels. Agreed.

But to say we need *more* fossil fuels, not less, is a recipe for certain destruction.