Britain has just got the latest climate change taxes passed, this time hitting businesses with phenomenal charges simply for using energy. The reason, to lower the UKs carbon emissions by 80% by 2050.
This makes me wonder how many people affected by this (everyone, it's happening worldwide) know what a low carbon economy means in practice?
1) Low carbon means low industry. That means cutting back on our industrial usage, in this case 80%. That seems self evident to me.
2) Taxing local industries has two immediate results. One is the taxes have to be recouped. Companies must make a profit, so will simply pass on the tax to the end user. Of course every country without such penalties will not include the charge so unless import controls are used (out of fashion currently) people will simply buy from abroad, causing local firms to go out of business. If all companies worldwide could be taxed the same then the costs would be passed on worldwide and first the public would go broke followed by the businesses. You can't get a quart out of a pint pot.
3) The increase in energy charges will have two consequences. If driving becomes too expensive it will eventually become limited to the rich. If home energy becomes more expensive (as it has) people have to spend less on everything else or freeze.
4) If you do reduce CO2 by 80% most power would be generated by nuclear. Like it or hate it, Philip Stott's estimate of 30 year's worth of uranium before that runs out (as it is destroyed in the process) won't get us far beyond 2050. All the coal lying underground will be available but gradually being outlawed.
5) If people prefer to live in pre industrial communities as a few of our local protestors do already, the population is now many times higher than it was a few hundred years ago. Sustaining such numbers by growing their own food and supplying their own fuel from wood and rubbish is hardly going to be viable. And what would they do with all the empty factories and make what they would have made without them?
6) The actual figures for what is termed alternative energy are tens of times the price of conventional at a fraction of the efficiency. The sun rarely shines, the wind rarely blows at just the right speed, and the amount of water required for wave power is restricted to very few sites. There may be alternatives to compare with what we have one day, but not today or for many years.
7) In the short and medium term increased fuel prices will gradually raise transport costs of all types making holidays, private cars and ultimately all transport unviable for all but the richest.
In the Soviet Union there were rich people, the money went to the Communist Party hierarchy. Of course if you remove huge amounts of money at one end it has to go somewhere. The rest of us will be gradually be deprived of more and more home comforts and cash until we will be living at subsistence levels. And even the government's own advisors expect power to be cut off for part of the week as there won't be enough legal fuel to run the power grid. I very much doubt more than a handful of the enthusiasts actually want to live like this, so why are they all pushing governments to make that happen? Do they really not understand the consequences?
Showing posts with label low carbon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label low carbon. Show all posts
Monday, April 05, 2010
Monday, November 23, 2009
A low carbon story
I am learning how to live within what appears to be guidance, as despite it working on many projects there are still huge gaps, and the rule is to look for the guidance in the apparent space. Well today the place with the old sign closed early and may have to go on Wednesday, which is about 30 miles from me. Better than not but a pain nonetheless. Other projects are moving on nicely but weeks or more from completion so can't focus on those seeds still growing slowly so have to find interest in the present. Last weekend I ran out of material and found a sign after a couple of hours online, but can't rely on them for everything.
So the week ahead has been possibly altered somewhat. Tomorrow will be a routine photo trip presumably, and haircut the next day, and Wednesday probably get the sign fitted. There was football on the same night but can't be in both places at once and the football is on again. And I think just after my last entry (certainly when I read the papers) the powers that be have been caught adjusting the figures on global warming. Were it not for the internet this would have been impossible without breaking in but now it's not so easy to hide your tracks. I hope another section of society has been lost from sitting on the fence, as it's so bloody obvious the climate can't rely both on CO2 to drive it, and the piddling (3%) amount we are responsible for. Common sense seems to have been suspended by (41% by our first survey) of the population, and hopefully woken up a few more from their sleep of pure idiotic gullibility. Crooks are crooks and the fact some are in authority is a better reason to expect it than not.
I expect little more but always hope for it, I have collected a lot this year already and raised my level somewhat, and if the book comes out with my photos in it will be more so. But again, not for weeks so can't use it now. Last week I didn't speak to a single person three days flat, and with no grandma may be a regular occurence. I saw today they want to charge for Facebook, that'll remove another social route but may have done all I can on it since the latest batch of new arrivals ignored me in unison. They were all from the 70s, fuck knows what I must have been like to alienate so many women but that hasn't changed 30-40 years later. I only want one or two people I can see locally again, I always have till not long ago but people move and have their own families so all dried up now. But if guided now I've seen other problems solving themselves one by one, so currently seems to be working its way along them all. And writing it all down here always helps organise my mind so even if no one reads it I'd be doing it somehow as I can see all my situation in one place.
I hope tomorrow and beyond brings more global warming revelations as it may finally poke a hole in the balloon that's grown so big the TV and radio can't go an hour without getting it in.
Low carbon economy means basically going to Greece, not knowing the language so you can't read the signs, understand the people and basically either learn a new alphabet and country from scratch or get totally lost. Then you get put in a factory where you can't understand the job or instructions, and someone's preaching to you through a speaker but of course it makes no sense at all. Every so often they slip a little English in, not enough to make sense but to gove the impression of what the job entails. But you never quite get it.
So then you go to sleep and start dreaming with bits of Greek slipped in as it's now all around you. Of course in the dream a little seems to make sense, but when you wake up it's all gone and all you understand the boss shouting at you is 'low carbon economy'. The next step is to ring up one of the clairvoyants who advertise, and see if they can see into the problem. One says they have your spirit guide and you should change your shoes as your footprint is too big. You give her the sack on the spot and try something new.
You then go to the cinema to watch the latest low carbon film, it's on a black screen, some kind of symbolism, but it's in bloody Greek again and because it's in black and white the images keep fading in and out on the black screen. More symbolism of course but only the gods can understand it, well the Greek gods anyway. Alcohol could be the key, so try and get drunk, previously setting the intention for a low carbon hangover. Alka Seltzer is banned there as it produces too much CO2 so another dead end. In the end Al Gore sells you his new bible, which is the bible of world carbon neutrality. In the beginning was the word. Money. Money can be made of paper so if you burn it it releases CO2, so don't burn money, give it to him. Then your industry will be low carbon and they all live happily ever after.
Do you understand it now? No? Me neither.
So the week ahead has been possibly altered somewhat. Tomorrow will be a routine photo trip presumably, and haircut the next day, and Wednesday probably get the sign fitted. There was football on the same night but can't be in both places at once and the football is on again. And I think just after my last entry (certainly when I read the papers) the powers that be have been caught adjusting the figures on global warming. Were it not for the internet this would have been impossible without breaking in but now it's not so easy to hide your tracks. I hope another section of society has been lost from sitting on the fence, as it's so bloody obvious the climate can't rely both on CO2 to drive it, and the piddling (3%) amount we are responsible for. Common sense seems to have been suspended by (41% by our first survey) of the population, and hopefully woken up a few more from their sleep of pure idiotic gullibility. Crooks are crooks and the fact some are in authority is a better reason to expect it than not.
I expect little more but always hope for it, I have collected a lot this year already and raised my level somewhat, and if the book comes out with my photos in it will be more so. But again, not for weeks so can't use it now. Last week I didn't speak to a single person three days flat, and with no grandma may be a regular occurence. I saw today they want to charge for Facebook, that'll remove another social route but may have done all I can on it since the latest batch of new arrivals ignored me in unison. They were all from the 70s, fuck knows what I must have been like to alienate so many women but that hasn't changed 30-40 years later. I only want one or two people I can see locally again, I always have till not long ago but people move and have their own families so all dried up now. But if guided now I've seen other problems solving themselves one by one, so currently seems to be working its way along them all. And writing it all down here always helps organise my mind so even if no one reads it I'd be doing it somehow as I can see all my situation in one place.
I hope tomorrow and beyond brings more global warming revelations as it may finally poke a hole in the balloon that's grown so big the TV and radio can't go an hour without getting it in.
Low carbon economy means basically going to Greece, not knowing the language so you can't read the signs, understand the people and basically either learn a new alphabet and country from scratch or get totally lost. Then you get put in a factory where you can't understand the job or instructions, and someone's preaching to you through a speaker but of course it makes no sense at all. Every so often they slip a little English in, not enough to make sense but to gove the impression of what the job entails. But you never quite get it.
So then you go to sleep and start dreaming with bits of Greek slipped in as it's now all around you. Of course in the dream a little seems to make sense, but when you wake up it's all gone and all you understand the boss shouting at you is 'low carbon economy'. The next step is to ring up one of the clairvoyants who advertise, and see if they can see into the problem. One says they have your spirit guide and you should change your shoes as your footprint is too big. You give her the sack on the spot and try something new.
You then go to the cinema to watch the latest low carbon film, it's on a black screen, some kind of symbolism, but it's in bloody Greek again and because it's in black and white the images keep fading in and out on the black screen. More symbolism of course but only the gods can understand it, well the Greek gods anyway. Alcohol could be the key, so try and get drunk, previously setting the intention for a low carbon hangover. Alka Seltzer is banned there as it produces too much CO2 so another dead end. In the end Al Gore sells you his new bible, which is the bible of world carbon neutrality. In the beginning was the word. Money. Money can be made of paper so if you burn it it releases CO2, so don't burn money, give it to him. Then your industry will be low carbon and they all live happily ever after.
Do you understand it now? No? Me neither.
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