Will anyone really care about cop28?

[Capt Lightning]

It's all very well cop28 coming up with a commitment to 'transition away' from fossil fuels, but will anyone actually do anything? In the past, cars replaced the horse and carriage, but it seems like a greater challenge to develop long range electric aircraft or large ships. (Perhaps ships will use nuclear power)

 

[dilettante]

What commitment? It isn't possible, let alone practical. We need to keep working to make it so, but we just can't do it today or tomorrow.

People have tried to move small trucking businesses to electric vehicles and during he early planning phases found out that their local utility could not supply the necessary power. They needed half the electricity budget of the entire city.

Now ask all such businesses to do that? This would take decades of commitment just to build out the power transmission required, and even then what would the power source be?

I think these pipedreams only make sense to the urban Eloi who have no understanding of engineering or how things work.

This should be taken even more seriously in an overpopulated energy desert like Europe. After cutting off its nose in the Russian conflict scarcity is growing and growing. Like it or not, that's just reality.

 

[fuzzybuddy]

There are two good reasons to get off of fossil fuels. The first is we are using them at an unheard of rate. We're talking of millions of tons of coal a day, and billions of barrels of oil. And we ain't making any new dinosaurs, or growing any 50,000,000 year old forests. We have finite resources. Sooner or later, they will become so expensive, few of us could afford them. And since we plan to live on earth for a while, our descendants won't thank us for wasting them. Then, there's the air pollution, which has a bearing on our weather/climate. I don't have the easy way to switch to new source of power in my back pocket. Nobody does. It's going to take try and lots of error.
Way back in the 1950s, we knew this, but there was always "tomorrow ". That was 70 years of "tomorrows". We just want to sit back, and let the kids worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow is today.

 

[dilettante]

Yet at the same time power waste is ramping up unabated.

Wireless charging? Horribly inefficient. "Gaming" PCs? Some use as much as a washing machine, and get run hard for hours. Electric cars? Don't get me started on the losses from burning the coal remotely to turning the tires on the road. 70 inch TV sets? Really? Electric major appliances? Egad!

 

[againstthegrain]

I'm pretty sure there a few dinosaurs still roaming the earth today, we just need to find a way to make a big enough pile of them so they become more than a soil additive.

 

[Paco Dennis]

Some scientists think we have reached the tipping point, and there is no way to stop a 2-3C rise in temperature in the next 10 -30 years. This is a problem that the masses know about as a possibility not as a probability. I feel like it is impossible to stop fossil fuel use, but maybe we can keep working to slow the pollution down. Our generation will mainly be spared the climate disasters that are probable. We didn't take this science seriously enough, and we could pay an enormous price. Maybe AI will figure something out for us, because we have failed big time. IMO

 

[jimintoronto]

Yet at the same time power waste is ramping up unabated.

Wireless charging? Horribly inefficient. "Gaming" PCs? Some use as much as a washing machine, and get run hard for hours. Electric cars? Don't get me started on the losses from burning the coal remotely to turning the tires on the road. 70 inch TV sets? Really? Electric major appliances? Egad!

You forgot to say.......The sky is falling. How about this for an idea, YOU be the first one here to stop using anything electrically powered, like your computer. JimB.

 

[dilettante]

You can't have both. If you are serious about slowing the warming of the planet you have to make sacrifices. The most effective ones are those which have the greatest impact. Conservation is more practical than dreams of rainbow unicorns.

My PC uses 18 watts.

 

[VaughanJB]

Hm, let me think......

A good amount of wealth, power and influence in the world is based on fossil fuels. Oil has been used as a weapon many times over the years. Those people are not going to give any of that up any time soon. They know, as we all do, that there's news in the announcement, and then everyone forgets about it and doesn't worry if everyone has seen it through.

Then we have the like of Electric Vehicles. All major car companies have made their money out of fossil fuel models. They have to retool, and remake themselves while all the time maintaining profitability. The public will buy what makes sense to them. EV's aren't cheap, so wy not just get the type of car you know and trust?

Also, EV vehicles rely on recharging, which can take 45 minute to 90 minutes to do. And just when we're considering going electric, electricity prices spike, closing the gap. Again, I watched a guy on a video, and his EV had a maximum range of 140 miles. That might suit me now, but it certainly wouldn't have when I was in my 30's.

Then we have fires due to Lithium batteries. I saw a video today where a guy had to get a new battery for his vehicle (two years old, but the old one had failed) and the cost to him was $50,000. He had the car crushed instead. The fact is, recharging units are nowhere near as prevalent and available as gas stations. Anyone doing long journeys have to factor all that in.

In my opinion, you won't convince people based on the environment. Instead, the whole deal with EV's has to make sense. Electricity prices need to be more stable. Rechargers need to be everywhere, and sharable between all vehicle types. Battery safety must be improved. People will go for whatever is the most convenient and cost effective to them. That is the battleground, not environmentalists.

 

[officerripley]

A good amount of wealth, power and influence in the world is based on fossil fuels. Oil has been used as a weapon many times over the years. Those people are not going to give any of that up any time soon

I agree. And I don't think any of the very wealthy are even interested in helping in any way to do anything about since a lot have--or are in the process of having made--"bolt holes" in places like New Zealand, the Alps, etc. where they can ride out the apocalypse in comfort. (I think the Koch billionaire family has an underground lair in Kansas maybe.)

 

[dilettante]

Considering the interests present at these conferences I'd say the rich are just setting up a new round in their games.

 

[Murrmurr]

It's all very well cop28 coming up with a commitment to 'transition away' from fossil fuels, but will anyone actually do anything? In the past, cars replaced the horse and carriage, but it seems like a greater challenge to develop long range electric aircraft or large ships. (Perhaps ships will use nuclear power)

Aircraft (well, commercial and freight aircraft, as far as I know) already depends heavily on satellite power, right? It's all operational and com power, but I wonder if they could replace fuel with satellite power, at least partially. Like within certain airspace, it's a hybrid. I wonder if that's possible.

 

[dilettante]

Communications and navigation, but that's about it aside from maybe in-flight passenger entertainment. The satellites barely have enough power to operate and a plane can't carry enough rectenna to accept significant power if it were available.

 

[oldman]

I don’t know very much about satellite usage for communications. Everywhere I flew, I was able to connect with traffic controllers with little problems. There are a few dead areas in the western part of the U.S., but we can use relays if necessary.

I remember reading about the two planes that collided over the Grand Canyon way back in 1956. That was caused by the planes not being able to connect with ATC. I think it was a United and a TWA plane that collided. The U.S. is pretty much covered today with towers.

 

[Timewise 60+]

Until a new technology is available that can provide a low-cost option to replace fossil fuels, nothing will change!

If any of our government official's tries to force Americans to stop driving cars, those officials will quickly become non-officials.... with no power! The same goes for American's being able to heat and cool their homes...

They all love to talk about it, how they are going to change how we live, but they all know better....

...without a new technology, that is affordable and actually workable...nothing material will change...

 

[Don M.]

Until a new technology is available that can provide a low-cost option to replace fossil fuels, nothing will change!

For Sure! Todays efforts to reduce fossil fuel use and to slow Climate Change are largely little more than 'Wishful Thinking'....IMO. It would take decades for any of todays proposals to have any meaningful impact.. In the interim, the release of Methane, which is far more dangerous than CO2, will continue unabated, as the climate warms. A transition to EV's will take decades, and require trillions of dollars to be invested in wind/solar power, and the grid, in order to support such a transition.

I see Nothing, on the horizon, that will provide an orderly transition from fossil fuels, without creating a major impact on society, I am very pessimistic about the world our Grandkids, and beyond, will inherit. Between Climate Change, and Overpopulation, etc., I think we are currently living in the "peak" of humanity,

 

[dilettante]

This is a long talk, but he gets to the demographic collapse upon us in the first 15 minutes.